The Spirit Gate (44 page)

There was a second ewer of holy water in a cabinet behind
the altar; there was fire on the myriad wicks that made the altar glorious. The
combination was called a Battle in the books of the Mateu, but in the hands of
Kassia and Zakarij, they did not battle, they struck a harmony, and conjured so
great an elemental spell that it resonated in the stone sanctuary like a
musical tone, drew shafts of radiance from the glass mandorla and filled the sanctuary
with its light. They were bathed in it; Pater Julian was bathed in it, though
he couldn’t see.
And though they were not used to the shape of the magic of this place, it fit
in their hands and vibrated in their bones and rang in their souls just as did
the magic of the cesia.

Not so alien after all
, Zakarij thought.

When they had finished, Zakarij expelled a long pent-up
breath and glanced down at the still unconscious priest. “Will it be enough?”

Kassia’s
eyes were still on the mandorla. “It
will have to be, Zakarij. I don’t
know what else to do. Now we must find Benedict.”

“Now
we must return to Lorant.” She opened her mouth to protest, but Zakarij raised a finger to her
lips. “You
promised your son.”

He watched as weariness overcame her native stubbornness.
She nodded. “Lorant,” she agreed.

They used the mandorla above the altar to create the Squared
spell, and forming the words of the equation together, they traveled home. So
weary was Zakarij that for once he paid no notice to the world that beckoned
from behind the shimmering tunnel wall.

oOo

”Damek!
Hear me!”

His Master’s
voice jarred him out of a sound sleep and frightened him, he was sure, out of a
year of slumber. When his heart had stopped pounding and his skin had ceased to
feel like the belly of a dead fish, he swallowed, cleared his throat and said, “Here, Master. Only do
let me wake myself.”

The apparition looked upon him with affectionate scorn and
waited for him to rouse himself, rise and put on a linen robe against the cool
of the mountain summer night. Then it said, “I’ve
a task for you, Damek. A very important task.”

Deep in Damek’s
soul, a well of satisfaction began to fill. The Master was asking for him, not
for the clever Kassia or the loyal, plodding Zakarij.

“What
can I do for you, Master?”

“I
need you to go to my studio and do some research for me. Possibly, I will also
need to have you assemble some items. Some ingredients for a spell.”

Damek puzzled. “Master,
I’m not an
Apprentice. Shouldn’t
Kassia or Zakarij be doing this for you?”

“They’ve done quite enough
this evening, I think, and deserve a rest. They can only be pushed so far. What
I need from you, Damek, is your unquestioning loyalty. Will you give it?”

“Master,
you have no need even to ask.” He was already heading for the door. Behind him, the bright window
closed as silently as it had opened, leaving his room empty.

Lukasha’s
effigy was awaiting Damek when he reached the studio. There his Master
instructed him to locate a compendium of organic elements. He had trouble finding
it in the neat, but over-f studio, and his Master’s patience was beginning to fade by the time he
finally opened it atop the work table.

“Come
Damek, don’t
dawdle. You must look up information on serpents.”

“Serpents?”

“There
is at least one species of poisonous snake whose venom has been used in ages
past for geomancy. If it has ever been used by the Mateu or the shai, it should
be listed in that book. Find it for me.”

He did find it, after nearly twenty minutes of search. “A wood-creep, it’s called here.”

“Describe
it to me.”

“Green,
with gold and black lengthwise striping. It often lives at the base of
deciduous trees where there are rotting roots or debris.”

Within his window of brilliance, Lukasha nodded. “Very good. You must
capture such a serpent for me.”

Damek’s
heart jolted painfully. “Capture—? Master, you jest. I
wouldn’t know how
to begin.”

“Then
have Shagtai do it for you. I need the snake.”

“What
am I to tell Shagtai about why I am asking him to catch a poisonous snake?”

“Tell
him nothing. He’s
used to such odd requests from the Mateu. Let me tell you what else I will need—the ash of bone that
has been consumed by fire, the feather of a raptor that has been dipped in the
blood of the bird’s
kill. There will be more when I’ve
deciphered this last riddle.”

Damek blanched. He had never, in all his years of service to
Master Lukasha, had from him such a shopping list. “Master,” he said, “where
am I to get burnt bone?”

“There
was a fire in the upper town not so long ago.”

Damek took a deep breath and tried to steady himself. “You are suggesting I
might . . . sift through the debris? Master, I don’t think anyone was
killed.”

Lukasha’s
eyes narrowed. “That’s not what you told
Kassia. I suspected it was a lie. Damek, people cook food and eat it. Burn some
chicken bones, if you have to. It’s
not that difficult.”

“But,
a blood-stained feather? Snake venom? How am I to get these things? What am I
to do with them? Perhaps my energy would be better spent trying to decipher
this riddle of yours. What is it, please?”

“I
also need ‘a
thing possessed by a victim of the all-devouring fish’. Does that
make any sense to you?”

Damek’s
brain was blank. “No,
Master, it does not. Perhaps if I understood what you expected me to do with
these things . . .”

His Master’s
voice was tight with suppressed irritation. “I was going to have you construct some spell balls
for me.”

“Spell
balls? Me?” He shook his head. “Master,
I really must protest—”

Lukasha sighed. “Yes,
of course you must. I’m
a fool. I should be doing this myself, not delegating it. The spell is too
important, its correct performance too critical.”

He was talking to himself now, and Damek closed the
compendium with a snap. “Why
haven’t you
simply come here to complete the spell yourself?”

“Why
indeed?” asked Lukasha, and vanished from sight.

Damek waited a moment to see if the window would open again.
When it did not, he returned to his room, thereby missing the spectacular sight
of his Master stepping into his studio through a doorway of pure light.

oOo

Lukasha had spent long, dark moments preparing for his
journey to Dalibor. Agonizing. He was not even certain he could make the leap
without Kassia.

No, that wasn’t
quite true. He could perform the spell, he could forge the magic, but then the
terror would take him. It had caught him once, unexpectedly, in the midst of a
journey. The horrid, glassy, squirming walls of the corridor had collapsed
about him and he landed in some unknown place. It had taken him the better part
of an hour to complete the journey.

It was not pure fear that assailed Lukasha in the corridor.
It was tempered with fascination. The translucent walls with their flickering
colors and alien shapes beckoned as they repelled. He was at war with himself
as he slid along that tunnel; he was at war with something Other. There was
power in the corridor—watching,
perhaps, through the glazed walls. He feared it would devour him, was terrified
of it; yet, in the briefest of flashes, he almost yearned to be devoured.

He knew he must attempt the spell. Neither Kassia nor
Zakarij were here to help him, nor was he inclined to reveal to either that he
could barely bring himself to perform the spell alone. He prayed; he gathered
his mental, spiritual and physical resources; he spoke the equation in a firm
voice; he flung the catalysts into the mix as if they were weapons of defense;
he closed his eyes and stepped out into darkness.

Moments later, he was in his own studio at Lorant, quaking,
for no matter how good were his intentions to keep his gaze from the pressing
walls of the corridor, they would open against his will and he would see the
unnameable things behind the seemingly feeble barrier.

He brought light to the room with a gesture. The compendium
was right where Damek had left it, and he opened it, verifying what Damek had
told him of the wood-creep. He knew that falcons nested in the lush forest
around Lorant—the
feather should pose no great problem. Nor should the ash. But the last demand
puzzled him—
a
thing possessed by a victim of the all-devouring Fish
. He had heard of
huge fish in the sea who were said to devour fishermen whole, but . . .

After turning the words in his mind for a time to no avail,
he came to the conclusion that he was taking the instruction too literally. The
all-devouring Fish was perhaps not literally a fish. Its name was Maelstrom,
the sea-whirl. Light dawned. Maelstroms were devourers of ships and men. If
that was the intent, then the meaning was clear; he needed something owned by a
drowning victim. He thought of Kassia and smiled. Would she be gratified to
know that the death of her father and husband might not have been in vain?

Weary, he promised himself a few hours of sleep. Then, he
would see to fulfilling the needs of the spell.

oOo

Morning found Kassia strolling the woodland path that ran
past Lorant’s
cesia into the depths of the sacred wood, appreciating the beauty of a day that
sounded like an avian symphony and smelled like incense. The air was warm and
moist and she was unabashedly reveling in it—and in being home. She was also procrastinating,
putting off the moment when she and Zakarij must return to Tabor to report to
Master Lukasha. Zakarij still slept, and she told herself it was his waking she
waited for.

She was beyond surprise to see her Master coming toward her
along the path from the deeper wood. He had a canvas bag in one hand and was
humming to himself. Lukasha waved and smiled when he saw her, and she responded
with delight, running to meet him.

“Master,
you’re home! I
thought you were still in Tabor.”

He laughed as she drew up to him and wagged a cautionary
finger at her. “Now,
Kassia, does this skipping about the wood manifest the decorum necessary for
one entering the Aspirancy?”

Kassia completely forgot anything she might have said to
him. “The
Aspirancy? What do you mean?”

“My
dear child, your performance these past weeks has been above exemplary. You
have bravely and sacrificially defended your king, you have made unheard of
strides in your art. I have no reward I can offer save to recommend that you be
elevated to the rank of Aspirant immediately. I have plans to hold the
installation ceremony at week’s
end. Does this please you?”

“Please
me?” Kassia was dumbfounded. “Master,
I’m speechless.
And honored. And surprised. I never thought that anything I was doing—”

“Was
extraordinary?” His brown eyes crinkled pleasantly at the corners. “No, of course not.
Which makes it all the more extraordinary. Most Apprentices are painfully aware
of their progress toward the distant goal.”

“What
will Zakarij think? He worked for his Aspirancy for years.”

“It
doesn’t matter
what Zakarij thinks. You have eclipsed him. Soon, you will eclipse me.”

“Master,
that’s not
possible.”

“Ah!
No false humility. You are a woman of exceptional talent, Kiska. You are a prodigy
such as comes along once in several generations. I am thankful I was the one to
find you.”

Kassia ducked her head, blushing more with pride than with
humility. “I’m the one who should
be thankful, Master. I had come to a dead trail. I was seriously looking at
having to marry Ursel Trava.”

Lukasha laughed and started to move past her on the path. “Never that!”

She put a hand on his arm, pausing him. “Master, I’ve something important
to tell you. Zakarij and I discovered how Benedict has been manipulating the
Gherai Khan.” Seeing that she had her Master’s
complete attention, she went on. “He
was using Pater Julian as an amplifier. There’s a mandorla in the church—a ‘vesica
piscis’, he called it. Somehow Benedict set up a . . . a resonance
between it and himself and Pater Julian. He passed power to the priest through
the mandorla; Pater Julian merely directed it, using the heart of the mandorla
as a focal point. It was just like . . . a prism, or a suite of
mirrors, amplifying the light source, directing it, focusing it. All Benedict
had to do was give unfocused power.”

Lukasha raised a brow. “You speak of this arrangement in the past tense.”

She smiled, a little too fiercely, perhaps, but she felt a
great deal of satisfaction about last night’s work. “We
put a ward on the church, Zakarij and I. On Pater Julian, too, though I doubt
he’ll remember it
consciously. The Bishop of Tabor will have to find himself a new mirror and
prism if he wants to set that work in motion again. And until he does so, he
will have to choose who he wishes to manipulate.”

Her Master’s
eyes shone, his pride in her accomplishment obvious. He put an arm about her
shoulders, shifting the bag away to the other side. Kassia could swear that
something within it moved.

“You
amaze me, Kiska.”

“It
wasn’t just me,
Master. I couldn’t
have done it without Zakarij.”

He nodded. “So . . . He is also to be granted an ascent in station.”

“He
passed his examinations?”

“Yes,
and though tradition dictates that since he examined late, he must wait for
Equinox for the official ceremony, I think I must consider that it was my
tasking him that made his examinations late in the first place. I’m certain I can
persuade the Circle to grant him a special dispensation.”

“Might
we be married at the same time?”

Lukasha glanced away from her, chuckling. “One ceremony at a
time, Kiska. I had plans for a great wedding celebration during the Reaping
Festival. You haven’t
even made public your intentions yet. Don’t you intend to publish the traditional bans?”