Spellbreaker (2 page)

“You have a proposal?”

“In Abuja there's talk of a new power in Chandralu. The Cult of the Undivided Society, it's called. They don't worship neodemons like the usual cults; they worship the ancient demons. The empire and the league claim to have hunted down all of the demon worshipers after Typhon's defeat, but maybe they missed a few. The Undivided Society is tired of waiting for the Disjunction and aims to hurry it along a step or two. Have you heard of it?”

“Tall tales from sailors drunk on kava, nothing more. The tellers often follow it with an account of the Floating Island.”

“Floating island?”

“Stories of an island of ghosts or neodemons that isn't fixed to the sea floor but floats around the archipelago. Those who make landfall are doomed to damnation or reincarnation as pubic lice or whatever. My point is that sailors are better known for creativity than reliability.”

“And you think this Cult of the Undivided Society is just another sea yarn, just another floating island?”

“There's no proof the cult exists.”

“But the Empress Vivian is offering a heavy purse for such proof. And she is sure to offer more now that her half-brother is in Ixos.”

Leandra stiffened. Twenty days ago Nicodemus Weal, the empress's half-brother, had arrived in Chandralu ostensibly to cast his metaspells, which allowed deities to thrive in the league kingdoms. But in truth, he had come to reinforce the archipelago against possible imperial attack. More distressing, upon arrival, Nicodemus had heard rumors of the Undivided Society and of two neodemons attacking caravans near Chandralu. Therefore, Nicodemus had launched efforts not only to support his daughter, the Lady Warden of Ixos, but also to investigate her competency.

Leandra found this distressing for two reasons. First, she feared the smuggler would flee if he learned that Nicodemus had doubled the ships patrolling the bay. Second, she was, after all, Nicodemus's daughter.

Family isn't a word; it's a sentence.

For three decades Leandra's family had served as the wardens of the league, tasked with converting or destroying neodemons. As the Warden of Ixos, she was responsible for suppressing neodemons in the archipelago. If Nicodemus thought that the two marauding neodemons and the rumors of the Undivided Society signified her incompetence, he might revoke her independence.

Fifteen days ago, Nicodemus and his followers had set out to hunt one of two neodemons. He might return any day. Although Leandra did not dislike her father, there was much she hoped to accomplish before he returned, including closing a deal with this disturbingly well-informed smuggler. She looked at the man. “Should I learn anything about the Undivided Society, you will be the first to know. But I am not inclined to enter into a new agreement until the present one is concluded to my satisfaction.”

“Ah, yes, your prophetic spell,” the smuggler said and raised his cup to his lips. But then he paused and looked out to the bay. “Your pardon, but … I think I might … I sense … some danger…”

Leandra turned and saw nothing but moonlit waves and towering limestone islands. “Look, there is no ship among the islands. No army hiding under the table. No Nicodemus bloody Weal about to fall out of a God-of-god's damned coconut tree. I am here to purchase that prophetic spell, but that text seems to be giving you distressingly little information about the future. What is this danger? Shouldn't your spell foresee what it will be?”

“This spell doesn't work that way. It allows me to feel forward into time.”

She frowned. “That sounds … rather ungentlemanly.”

“I can sense the emotions of all the different men I might become in an hour.”

“And how many of these men are there?”

“A near infinite number. I'm not aware of them all, but when many of them experience anxiety, I grow wary.”

Leandra studied the smuggler's face. “What could be frightening them?”

“You saw no ships amid the standing islands?”

“No dammed ships. And no other threats.”

“Very well…” He looked down at his mandana. “Perhaps it's just apprehension.” He raised the cup to his lips.

Leandra put her head to one side. Even with a prophetic spell around his head, he was going to drink poison? Feeling forward in time, as wondrous as it sounded, seemed as useful as a boiling pot made of Lornish butter.

But then the smuggler froze. He peered into his liqueur and frowned. He lowered the cup, paused, raised it back toward his lips, lowered it again. He looked at her, eyes narrowed, put the cup down.

Leandra allowed herself a small laugh. “Is there a problem?”

“The closer I bring the mandana to my lips, the more of my future selves are writhing in terror. What in the Creator's name did you put in here?”

She shrugged. “The extract of a puffer fish liver, just a few drops. The hydromancers call it tetrodotoxin; it's an old recipe of the Sea People. Just a bit of local flavor.”

“And what flavor would that be?”

“The flavor of nothing,” she said airily. “But half an hour from now your mouth would tingle. Then your face and hands would go numb. All your muscles would slacken and you'd stop breathing. As a windfall, you would be perfectly aware as paralysis caused you to suffocate to death.”

“Antidote?”

“None.”

“You have a very trusting soul.”

“I do,” she admitted. “One day it'll be the death of someone else. Likely several someone elses. But don't be too upset; I now have evidence that your prophetic spell is genuine.”

“You could have tried the text.” He picked up a slim leather folio from the ground beside him.

She shook her head. “What's to stop you from selling me a death sentence? I will purchase the text around your head or nothing at all.”

“Killing you would not be good business. There is more I would like to sell you and information I hope you will sell to me. On the next trip I could have more substantial texts.”

“Then let me increase your profit. I'll double your price if you tell me where you get these spells.”

The man studied her but said nothing.

She pointed to his head. “A text that powerful couldn't be written; it had to be part of a deity. I'm guessing you chopped one of the empire's gods into sellable pieces.”

“You forget that imperial spellwrights have revolutionized composition. With Vivian's metaspells, they are changing the rules.” He nodded toward the folio. “Inscribing brief godspells onto paper for example.” Previously, godspells could be imbued only into a deity's ark stone.

Leandra shook her head. “Perhaps you had an imperial spellwright to set that godspell on paper, but no human mind could have composed it. Tell me where and how you are deconstructing deities. In return, I will investigate your Undivided Society. That or I could pay a large sum of jade.”

He studied her. “I wonder why you should want such information … and how much it is worth to you. Some information isn't for sale to just anyone.”

“Then perhaps when our partnership is stronger?”

“Shall we meet again? Perhaps tomorrow … in the city?”

Leandra considered. “If this exchange proves satisfactory … tomorrow at dusk, my bodyguard will meet you by the Lesser Sacred Pool. You know where that is?”

He nodded.

“Come alone. If there is anyone else with you, you'll never find us again. Understood?”

“Indeed. In the meantime, maybe you could tell me more about yourself?” he asked before seeing her blank expression and quickly adding, “Perhaps not your name or station, but—”

“If you discover my identity, then I will have to dispose of you in several large and bloody pieces deposited almost directly into a shark's belly. I say ‘almost directly' because the shark's teeth would have to act as brief but effective intermediaries. And neither of us would want that.”

“Neither of us would.”

“Good, now for that godspell.” She gestured to her guard.

A moment later Dhrun placed two small chests next to the smuggler and opened them. One was filled with rough-cut jade and balls of opium. In the other chest lay plates of Lornish steel and lacquered Dralish wood, each imbued with black market magical language.

The smuggler sorted through the jade and then held his hands over the steel and wood, seemingly able to sense magical text. Only a spellwright using a synesthetic reaction could do so. That made him a rogue wizard perhaps? Or maybe a pyromancer? “It is good,” the smuggler said before holding out his folio.

“The godspell around your head,” Leandra said coldly.

“They're identical, down to the last rune.”

She shook her head.

“How could I sell you this spell? I can't remove this spell from my head.”

“My bodyguard will assist.”

The smuggler eyed Dhrun's face, which presently was that of youthful Dhrunarman—light brown skin, aquiline nose, densely curled black hair, sparse beard. Dressed in a black lungi and a vest of scale armor, which showed to good advantage all four of his powerfully built arms, Dhrun looked every bit a young Ixonian divinity complex.

The smuggler looked back at Leandra. “Very well, but before I remove my headwrap, I will admit to being in disguise. I am not of the Lotus People.”

“You fill me with shock,” she said in deadpan before leaning forward. “What do most of your future selves feel an hour from now?”

“Some are satisfied … but some are agitated, a few very much so.”

“You still must smuggle your payments back into the city or out of the bay.”

He seemed to consider this and then removed his headwrap. His forehead was encircled by rubicund prose. Though Leandra was not fluent in the red language, her inheritance from her mother allowed her to visualize the divine text.

Then she realized that the smuggler's hair consisted of silvering dreadlocks. “You're Trillinonish,” she said and was struck by a sensation of familiarity. Had she seen this man before? No, it wasn't possible. And yet … she couldn't shake the feeling.

Dhrun put his upper hands to the back of the smuggler's head. The radiant godspell slackened from his brow and then fell away. Holding the sentences as if they were a necklace, Dhrun carried the crimson language to Leandra and stood behind her.

As Leandra removed her headdress, she was aware of Dhrun's lower hands resting on her shoulder and his upper hands moving near her ears. She caught glimpses of the godspell's red glow, but she felt nothing press against her forehead or scalp. “Is the godspell around—” she started to ask, but then she perceived … what was it?

It was like nothing earthly.

Currents of emotion moved all around her but not through her. She felt them only partially, as if she were watching a poignant shadow play or listening to a touching song. But these sympathetic feelings were sparked not from actors or lyrics, but from the multiplicity of her future selves. There were thousands of her possible selves. Hundreds of thousands? No one could say how many.

Most of herselves felt variations on her present anxieties, but a few were filled with strange emotions changing too fast to identify. Concentrating on one of these improbable futures was like trying to barehandcatch an oiled gecko. And yet … Leandra couldn't resist mentally chasing these bright futures.

Dhrun had walked back to the smuggler and was using his upper hands to pull rubicund sentences from the smuggler's folio and tie them around the man's head.

Leandra closed her eyes and concentrated on the alluring futures. Again they flitted away, but not before one gave her a glimpse into an hour hence in which she felt unabashed triumph. Leandra's excitement grew. Perhaps she could learn the smuggler's identity? Discover how he was eviscerating deities?

With even more vigor, Leandra mentally chased after this triumphant future. Within moments she lost it within a sea of banal hours.

Something more was needed.

Leandra peered through slit eyelids. Dhrun was adjusting the godspell tied around the smuggler's head. Neither man was attending to her.

Because of her parentage, Leandra could give herself over to her disease and gain temporary fluency in the magical language she was touching. In this state, she could perfectly understand and misspell any magical text. For a price, she became the universal spellbreaker.

If she used this ability now, she could alter her new godspell; however, this would undoubtedly cause the divine aspects of her body, which she had inherited from her mother, to attack the human aspects she had inherited from her father. The result would be a disease flare, possibly with dire consequences. And yet if she could catch that triumphant future, the rewards might justify the risks.

A change ran through her futures; more and more of them were filled with shock. Some also felt triumph, others raw horror. A different future had become probable, and the more she thought about that future, the more probable it became.

Leandra brought a hand up to her forehead and let her disease consume her. Soon her joints would ache and a rash would unfurl across the bridge of her nose, her forehead, her cheeks. Perhaps this flare would be so bad that Leandra would need to urinate frequently and her hands and face would swell. The God-of-god's willing, the flare would not be so bad as to cause her perception to expand. But now, in this painless moment, she forgot the risks as her mind joined with the godspell.

For an instant, she became the text's progenitor—a minor but ancient Trillinonish goddess of artistry, beauty, dance. The impoverished priests of her temple had sold her ark stone to the smugglers for thirty lengths of gold. The smugglers had bound her in a textual cage and cracked open her skull to pull the living language out of her mind. Her shrieks deafened two men.

In the next instant, Leandra returned to her own skull. Her hands were shaking as she thought of what the smuggler's people had done.