T
hat moment when the
dawn sears away the night was always my least favorite part of the day, but I discovered that the world is a dimmer place when you're in love. The sun and its uncompromising brightness seemed more tolerable this morning.
The memory of my body against his rested somewhere in Wyst's mind. Once, he touched his forehead where I'd kissed him. He smiled, shook his head, and surely dismissed it as a curious dream. Even White Knights must have had those sorts of dreams. Accursed witches certainly did. Sometimes even when I was awake.
We broke camp and continued on our quest. Wyst and I said nothing for the morning. It was our habit to talk little during the day, and almost all of these exchanges were quest-related. His wound was healing nicely, judging by the ease of his movement. My mundane medicine and his enchantment allowed him to recover from injury far quicker than normal. I didn't offer comment on it.
Newt passed the morning by complaining. He had much to complain about, and the demon in him had no trouble letting everyone know how unhappy he was. I found it amusing that a creature without an ounce of compassion should expect sympathy, but it wasn't that strange. Demons do have empathy, even if only for themselves.
I was only too happy to listen to Newt's grievances. I'd found a degree of affection for his flaws as passing time often encourages. I think we'd all missed his grumblings. Even Wyst smiled as Newt vented.
"Where did you send me anyway?"
"It has no name. If it did, it could be found, and if it could be found, then it wouldn't be where lost things go."
"You have no name," Newt said. "And you can be found."
"Perhaps only because I allow it."
He cast one of his customary dubious glances. I must admit, I'd missed them in his absence. "Anyway, wherever it was, it smelled like wet kobold. And it was terribly cluttered with dreadful lighting. And things were always falling from the sky."
Gwurm plucked his ear and moved it to the right side of his head to better hear Newt. "What sort of things?"
"Rings. Grails. A ratty yellow fleece. There was a mountain of keys and coins and a field of boots, none a matching pair."
"No troll ears?" Gwurm asked.
"Not that I noticed, but it was a very cluttered place. Especially for a place that has no name and can't be found."
"Pity If you find yourself there again someday would you mind keeping an eye out for it?" Gwurm chuckled.
Newt bristled at the notion.
"Three trials left," he remarked. "Which one was that anyway? Combat, I imagine."
"It might have been magic," I replied. "Chimera are magical. Or it might have been peril. Chimera are monsters. And it might have been strength, a test of physical might."
Newt sighed. "Don't you know?"
I merely looked onward enigmatically.
"Fine. Three trials left in any case. When is the next one?"
I kept staring into the distance.
"You don't know. Just admit it."
"It doesn't really matter what I know and what I don't. Things will progress in their own way."
"Meaning you don't know."
I wasn't about to admit anything. No one but Newt expected me to, which was precisely why I didn't. I enjoyed tormenting my familiar as much as anyone. Well, perhaps not as much as Gwurm.
Several hours upstream, the River suggested we part company because it no longer knew anything about our quest except that traveling north seemed the right thing to do. Newt couldn't help but point out that we'd been going north before following the River, but quests were traditionally filled with detours. This annoyed him, but so many things did.
"Do you at least have some idea what this sorcerer is up to?" he asked.
I closed my eyes and lowered my head. "I have seen a crush of phantasmal goblings sweeping across the world, cleansing it of all genuine flesh. And in its place, another world has been made. A world of shadows and glass. A perfect but hollow reproduction."
"You make it sound as if it has already come to pass."
"Perhaps it already has." For the first time, I understood what Ghastly Edna had meant by the past that was yet to be. Time was neither now or later, then or after. Time simply was. Tomorrow was found by walking the hours, one minute at a time. None could know for certain what waited farther down the path, not even the magic. The only way to learn was to make the journey.
"But why would anyone want to do that? Destroy the world just to remake it?"
"Sorcery is illusion. It's potent, but never quite real. But in a world of phantoms, illusion is reality."
"Madness," Wyst said.
"Magic and madness often walk together, and sorcerers have always been especially prone. Theirs is an art that blurs reality and illusion, and most eventually stop noticing the difference."
"Can he do it?" Newt said.
"Where great magic is concerned, anything is possible. But in this instance, I wouldn't worry much. The world
is
not so delicate. If we fail in our quest, then most likely, someone somewhere will stop him."
Newt was disappointed. He wanted to be the world's savior. It would only confirm what the demon in him already knew: that the universe existed only for his glory. This wasn't true, but I offered him a nugget of self-importance.
"We are the first though, and if we fall short, there will be much more death and suffering before his plan is ended."
Newt would have grinned from ear to ear if he'd had ears. He was now the center of the world. Rather, he had always been, and I'd merely confirmed it. He was content to indulge in his hero fantasies. Without doubt, he imagined himself a sorcerer slayer. The rest of us were mere accessories to his destiny, which was really my destiny. He was enjoying himself, so I didn't point that out.
Northward, the forest thinned to a sparse wood, then a grassy field, then hilly plains. I hardly noticed. Wyst of the West occupied my perceptions. Newt may have been the center of his own universe, but the White Knight was the center of mine. I understood little of love, but I thought this normal. The obsession of fresh love. Time would soften its edge to something more manageable. I could only hold it in check by forcing myself to think of other things. I closed my eyes, lowered my head, and muttered nonsense under my breath. Ghastly Edna had often said, "Everyone talks to themselves, but if they truly wanted to learn anything, they would listen. A one-sided conversation rarely does anyone any good."
So I talked, and I listened, though not very well with Wyst so near. Even with my eyes closed, I could see his pleasing face, those dark eyes, those lean shoulders, delectable ears. I could smell his warm breath and feel my fingers running across the short hair atop his head. I could still taste his skin on my lips. My lust was stronger than ever. As was my appetite.
"You know what must be," I whispered.
I glanced at Wyst. He was watching me. Perhaps he had been the whole time. Neither of us turned away. We just stared into each other's eyes. And then, at the exact same moment, we smiled. I would have kissed him or bit off his soft, chewy lips if I'd been close enough. My body spoke to me in a hundred wordless ways, and I knew what I would do . . . what I must do.
I lowered my eyes from Wyst and pushed my lust aside. The ravenous beast was content to lick its lips in anticipation of the meal it knew was coming.
Newt's hero fantasies ceased being distracting. "This sorcerer, does he really have enough power to do that shells and darkness in your vision?"
"Glass and shadows," I corrected. "Potentially, yes."
Newt whistled. "He must be one of the greatest sorcerers alive then."
"He is, I believe, an Incarnate."
Newt was so taken aback that he slipped from my lap and fell to the ground. He hopped to his feet. "An Incarnate! You didn't say anything about an Incarnate!"
"You didn't ask."
There are many who study the ways of magic, and a select few have the talent to be great. Of these elite, there are an even smaller group who have the power to shape history, to alter the world (and sometimes even the universe) in ways that are never forgotten. To become legends that will live until the end of time.
And then, there are the Incarnates. They are magic given flesh. Or flesh given magic, depending on how one looks upon such things. There is only ever one upon the world, and in whatever craft of magic they practice, they are unequaled. Strangely, they were a mixed lot. Many never accomplish anything of great note. Such power doesn't always go to those who have a desire to decimate kingdoms or better the world. The magic chooses its Incarnates by its own reasons, and none are privy to those reasons.
Ghastly Edna had mused on occasion that Nasty Larry might have been an Incarnate. If so, I was all his awesome wizardly might in one accursed form, but I was not an Incarnate.
Gwurm picked Newt up and deposited him on my lap. "A sorcerer Incarnate," my familiar said. "Then it can only be one man."
"Soulless Gustav," said Gwurm.
I hadn't heard the name before, but I didn't need to ask. I only had to listen.
Newt's eyes grew wide and fearful. "Not so loud. He'll hear you."
"That's just a fairy story."
"No, it's not. I knew someone who knew someone who said His name and attracted His attention." Newt spoke with hushed reverence. Apparently, even pronouns weren't safe enough distance from Soulless Gustav.
"And what happened to this friend of a friend?" Gwurm asked.
"What do you think happened? The poor bastard died. Miserably, I might add. His tongue swelled up. His skin turned to maggots. His heart jumped from his chest, grew arms, and beat him to death."
"That is horrible," I agreed.
"Superstitious nonsense," Wyst remarked.
"No it's not!" Newt nodded at me. "Tell them. Tell them an Incarnate can do that."
"I suppose it is possible," I said. "Of course, it's also possible his heart was upset with him for reasons all its own."
Both Wyst and Gwurm laughed. Penelope shook with her own silent giggling.
"I wasn't aware you had so many friends," I said.
"I wasn't always a familiar, or just a duck. There's more to my past than you'll ever know."
I'd never thought about it, but I hadn't been born in Ghastly Edna's tutelage. A demon-infested waterfowl must surely have had as colorful a background as an accursed witch.
"Fair enough. And in that past, I take it you've met this Soulless Gustav."
Newt sputtered. "Don't say His name. Weren't you listening?
"Skin to maggots," I said to prove I was.
"Swollen tongue," added Wyst.
"Pummeling heart," said Gwurm.
"Exactly. And that's just saying His name. None who have ever seen Him has lived to tell the tale."
"Sounds like a fairy story to me." Gwurm shrugged. "If everyone who's ever seen him has died, then how do you know he exists?"
"Because none of the unfortunate fools died right away. First, they all went mad. Then they stumbled back to civilization before they perished."
"I thought you said no one lived to tell the tale."
Newt rolled his eyes. "That's just a figure of speech. Of course, they lived to tell the tale."
"What about the swollen tongues?" asked Wyst of the West. "Wouldn't the swollen tongues get in the way of the telling?"
"That was just my friend's friend. Everyone perishes in a different way. Sometimes their eyes burst. Or their brains liquefy. Or their intestines strangle them. I've heard of a man who was compelled to chop himself to pieces with a rusty ax. And another who gasped with such terror that his lungs exploded."
"Sounds dreadful," Wyst said.
"Dreadfully horrible." Newt shook out his wings. "Ghastly and gruesome and appalling and any other terrible word you can think of. Which is exactly why we shouldn't even be talking about Him. Even just thinking about Him is dangerous."
"Stuff and nonsense. We trolls don't believe in such foolishness." Gwurm hunched carefully so not to throw me off his shoulders. "I'll be damned if I'll be afraid of a sorcerer who doesn't have better things to do than send strangling intestines after those who say his name. Even if he does exist." He raised his hands in gnarled fashion. The large size and flexibility of troll fingers makes them quite terrifying when held like that. Like great, twisted claws. "Soulless Gustav can scratch my unmentionables."
"Stop saying His name!"
Gwurm fiddled with his little finger, twisting it all the way around. "Who? Soulless Gustav? Do you want me to stop saying Soulless Gustav? Because if you really want me not to say Soulless Gustav anymore, I'll stop saying Soulless Gustav. You just have to ask."
"Stop saying it!"
"What's that?" Gwurm adjusted his ear. "Stop saying what?"
"Stop saying Soulless Gustav!"
Penelope smacked Newt on the bottom with her bristles. Thinking it the sorcerous wrath of Soulless Gustav himself, the duck jumped in the air with a howl. He flapped his wings madly, fell to earth, and jerked tensely upright. His head twisted back and forth, up and down. My undead ears heard his heart thundering.
Gwurm cracked a crooked grin. Penelope shook. Even Wyst chortled ever so lightly.
"Fine. You got me to say it. Very funny. All I'm saying is that even if He's not real, even if He's just a story, there's no point in taking the risk, however negligible it might be."
Gwurm and Penelope decided they'd tormented Newt enough and agreed. But the sorcerer was still a topic of conversation. Though he refused to sit on Gwurm's shoulders, Newt relented to talk about Soulless Gustav as long as the name went unspoken.
"They say he was born without a soul," Newt said. "That's why he's so mad and evil. And that he must feast upon the souls of virgins to survive, like the Lords of Inferno themselves. And that all the unfortunate soulless virgins are kept as his slaves, an army of beautiful, empty flesh. Neither dead nor alive nor undead but something wholly different and unnatural."