The Witch & the Cathedral - Wizard of Yurt - 4 (21 page)

Only I stood still, while the creature settled on top of the half-completed tower, the tower that was not yet consecrated, and stared down at me with burning eyes. Though vaguely human in shape, it was covered with scaly hide, and its mouth and fangs were much bigger in proportion to its face than any human's could be. This was no illusion. This was real.

And this was why I was in the cathedral city. I took a deep breath and, without the slightest idea what I would do, launched myself into the air.

The creature watched my approach with interest. It had folded its wings and seemed content to sit where it was. As well as long fangs it had enormous, curved claws. As I flew closer it extended its claws as though in anticipation of sinking them into me.

My immediate need was to get it away from Joachim's cathedral. I hovered thirty feet away and tried a lifting spell. It shifted a little but that was all. Either it was too heavy or its magic too strong against mine. The evil lips pulled back in a grin, and the bat wings rose slightly.

I backed up warily. A hideous stench wafted toward me. I had defeated a dragon once, but I had had the old wizard of Yurt to help me, and I still had come remarkably close to a funeral of my own. I caught a brief glimpse of white faces far below me and wondered if they would mention in the eulogy that I had been trying to destroy the monster when it killed me.

Abruptly and with a loud bang it was gone. But not gone, I told myself grimly, only invisible. I could still smell its stench, and somewhere in the air, horribly near, I heard a hungry slobbering.

There were faint, excited shouts from below, but I ignored them. I retreated rapidly toward the main body of the cathedral and braced myself on the slates of the roof, my feet in a rain gutter, hoping it would not follow me to a consecrated church. But it might still attack the people below, especially now that it was invisible.

Desperately and without success I tried two school spells, and then the powerful spell inscribed inside Theodora's ring, to reveal all that was hidden. I shouted the words of the Hidden Language, my fingers grating on the slates and eyes staring.

It appeared directly in front of me, its mouth wide open and one set of claws only a foot from my chest.

I spun away and fell into space, expecting to feel its touch on my skin any second. But I did not hear the slobbering behind me, and in a quarter mile I looked back. It had resettled itself on the half-finished tower.

It was not alone. Scampering around the tower were several red lizards the size of dogs. They must have been there all along and only been revealed by the spell.

But I had no time for them. I approached cautiously, watching for the monster to leap toward me. For a second I thought I glimpsed in the square below a woman's face with amethyst eyes, framed by nut-brown hair, hut I could not look. I remembered Theodoras spell to create a series of tiny flames and began saying it rapidly, over and over, until the very air around me began to burn, and I hurled balls of tire toward the monster.

It sprang backwards, spreading its wings, one of which was already scorched. It gave a guttural cry as it staggered toward the pile of cut stones set ready for the masons. With clawed hands, it heaved up a piece of rock as big as I was and flung it toward me.

I whirled out of the way, but the stone hurtled downward, toward the crowd below. I flew after it, madly seizing at it with spells until its fall was slowed. People had just enough time to see what was coming and scatter, screaming, before the stone crashed into an empty spot where seconds ago a dozen had stood.

I found my feet and looked up. The monster had another enormous stone ready to hurl.

"Into the church!" I shouted, though I wasn't sure anyone could hear me through the general cries of panic. "Get inside the church!" I flew up, dodging the stone and trying to slow it with magic at the same time. Barely, just barely, I was able to reduce the speed of its descent, even guide it a little sideways. By the time it reached the ground, the construction site was nearly empty.

I could not take time to rest, but if I did not take at least a few seconds my lungs would burst. I leaned against the stone, which had shattered the paving where it landed, and took deep, sobbing breaths.

There was still wild scrambling at the cathedral doors but almost everyone was inside. One figure, however, watched with attentive interest: the foreman of the construction workers.

I flew back up. The monster’s eyes glowed, but it threw no more stones. My balls of fire had lit the scaffolding timbers, which now blazed merrily, and the monster seemed afraid of fire. I eyed it warily as I approached.

The scorched wing was extended at an awkward angle as though it might not be able to fly, but I feared a trick. I wrapped myself in the spell Theodora had taught me against fire and waded into the middle of the blaze, screaming insults and challenges at the monster.

I had suspected it was trying to mislead me with its wing, but I was not suspicious enough. With a single leap it was beside me, careless of the blaze. I ducked barely in time to avoid being disemboweled by raking claws. But the monster's other arm caught me. It sprang into the air with a great flap of its bat wings and began to squeeze.

Desperately I raced through all my spells of attack, but I had never had very many of them, and none of them worked. The monster kept squeezing tighter. The only advantage I had was that I would already be unconscious when it began to eat me.

My last hope was a transformations spell. Zahlfast had taught me something important about transformations spells, I vaguely recalled, something highly important, something I ought to know right now—he had even been talking about it the day I visited his class. I did not have time to remember.

Because I could not wait to see if my spell would work, I coupled it with another spell, a spell I had never used in my life but which I, along with several of my friends at school, had looked up very late one night in the old Master's library. It was the spell to summon a human mind. To summon another human against his will, we had been taught, was the greatest sin a wizard could commit. I found and summoned the monster's mind and stuffed it into the middle of my transformations spell.

The grip around me was released so suddenly that I collapsed, losing parts of my spell against fire. My hair was ablaze and both hands were tightly grasped around something. I readjusted my spell to put out the fire and looked down. I was holding on to a frog.

I realized then I was not really flying but only floating, and not very well at that. Consciousness kept threatening to leave me, and the frog struggled in my hands. I set myself back down on the tower, away from the fire. There I found a piece of rope and, with the last of my concentration, attached the most powerful binding spell I knew to it and tied up the frog.

The red lizards all seemed to have scurried away. Still hanging on to the frog, I stepped out into space, only to recall too late that if my magic was deserting me it might have been better not to try flying.

But my spells stayed with me long enough for me to descend at only a moderate pace. I hit the ground, staggered, and fell, the mass of rope and frog a hard lump under my stomach.

"Get up!"

I could not move.

The toe of a boot kicked me. "Get up! Now!"

The toe turned me over. Prince Lucas stood over me, a naked sword in his hand and his face dark with fury.

III

I felt gentle hands then and heard Paul’s voice. "Lucas! What are you doing? He conquered the monster, but he's been burned badly!"

I closed my eyes. It was quite clear that I would die before being able to get up.

"Conquered the monster!" said Lucas in utter scorn. "Can't you see it was a magical creature he summoned himself? He played with it for a while, then sent it away again. All of us came out of the bishop's funeral in sorrow and awe, yet all he could do was perform a few flashy tricks to show wizardry's utter lack of respect!"

This last was said in a shout, for the benefit not just of Paul but of the others who had begun gathering around At this I did manage to open one eye.

Paul pulled back sharply. I could hardly blame him. The timing had been too good, too carefully planned to show disrespect for the old bishop. And it would be hard to explain that this tied-up frog, still very much alive and struggling in spite of being rolled on, was a monster.

For a second I thought I saw someone black-bearded, someone I did not recognize but who seemed strangely familiar, step forward from the crowd. The sight of Lucas's blade distracted me from a closer look.

"I'll show him now to avenge the church!" bellowed Lucas. I ached so badly that death at the moment seemed rather appealing.

But if he was trying to win Paul's support, he had gone too far. I heard the metallic hiss of another sword being whipped from its scabbard. 'Then you'll have to kill me first,"

calmly replied the royal heir to Yurt.

There was a brief pause. I could see a corner of Lucas's face, and he looked as though he realized his miscalculation. The ugly murmuring against me which had started in the rapidly gathering crowd changed its note.

A firm set of steps advanced across the pavement "In the name of Christ!" came Joachim’s voice. "The bishop has not yet been buried one hour, and the cathedral has just been successfully defended from the powers of evil incarnate, and all you princes can do is start fighting each other!"

I closed my eyes and began to believe, for the first time since Lucas had pointed toward the sky, that I might actually live. Joachim had never properly understood the fundamental difference between wild, natural magic and supernatural evil, but I didn't feel like trying to explain it now.

He knelt beside me. "Can you hear me? Do you think we can move you?"

I discovered I was still capable of speech. "Moving me couldn't possibly make me feel any worse than I already do."

"Good," said Joachim in a tone of authority. "Here, some of you, help me get him onto a board so we can carry him inside. He's saved the church in its greatest need, and we can't let him die a martyr."

I heard two swords being sheathed. People who a moment ago had been murmuring against me now came forward, volunteering to help. "He set the new cathedral tower on fire," said Lucas almost plaintively.

"Only in overcoming the monster," Joachim replied, "and the workmen already have the fire mostly out." I did my best to focus on the tower and could see several workmen scrambling around on it. To my surprise, being shifted onto a board actually did make me feel worse.

Paul saw the frog. "Ugh, what's this?" He reached for it, but I held on tight

"This is the monster. I've transformed it, and now I've got to take it somewhere I can destroy it. I must get to a telephone."

Paul clearly did not believe me, but he decided to humor me. I rather hoped the dean didn't believe me, because he might not want even a transformed monster in his church.

"We'll take the wizard to the cathedral office," said Joachim, lifting the head of the board. Paul had the foot, and several townspeople stood around in helpful attitudes. Lucas followed slowly.

A seminary student was sent for the doctor, but even before he came I insisted on using the telephone. In a minute, I had reached the wizards’ school and was talking to Zahlfast.

"I need the air cart," I said in the husky voice that was the best I could manage.

Without a far-seeing attachment I couldn't see him, but he could see me. He drew in his breath in a sharp gasp. "Where are you? Aren't you home in Yurt? What have you been doing to yourself?"

"I've been fighting a monster in Caelrhon. I don't know what it is, but it must be from the northern land of wild magic."

The foreman of the construction crew had slipped into the office with us. I wondered rather distantly if I should suspect him. "It was a fanged gorges," he said quietly.

"It was a fanged gorges," I repeated for Zahlfast, wondering with mild curiosity if there was also a non-fanged variety; if so I doubted it would be a substantial improvement.

"But it isn't one anymore. That's why I need the air cart; I need to get it back north before it breaks out of the transformations spell."

"Out of the what?”

"I turned it into a frog."

And then Zahlfast said something I had never heard him say before. "Dear God." He paused for several seconds. I wished again I could see his face. "You realize transformations spells don't work against creatures of wild magic."

"Yes, I know. I remembered after I did it. I used a summoning spell at the same time as the transformations spell. Please don't be angry; I know you never wanted us young wizards to know summoning, but I learned the spell years ago."

"Used the summoning spell," said Zahlfast slowly.

"And now I think I've destroyed all my own magic. I couldn't say another spell to save my own life, which may not last long anyway."

"Nonsense," said Zahlfast in something closer to his usual brisk tone. "You're just worn out. I'll send the air cart at once." But he paused then and added, "Have you remembered my warning?"

"Yes," I said wearily. At this point I neither knew nor cared whether priests hated and feared wizardry, but I did know that if Joachim wanted to destroy me I would do nothing to stop him.

Paul sat beside me, offering me drinks of water and brandy and ineffectually straightening the blanket while we waited for the doctor. He felt guilty, I guessed, for having believed, even momentarily, that I might have called the gorgos myself. "You know," he said, "I'm not sure I'd ever seen you really using your magical powers before. I've heard of course about your fight with the dragon, but that was before I was even born."

If I was going to serve Paul when he was king of Yurt, I thought, maybe it was just as well he realized that a Royal Wizard could do more than just after-dinner illusions.

"Thank you for standing up to Lucas," I told him. "Usually a wizard can defend himself, but I certainly couldn't now."

"I'm almost sorry Father Joachim stopped us," he said with a grin and a quick look across the room to make sure we were not overheard, "It would have been my first real fight." But then he became more sober. "Can that frog really be a transformed monster?"