Outlaw magic, p.13
Outlaw Magic, page 13
“I took him to the Alterers,” Eleira explained, as if this were the most ordinary thing to do in Job’s Bet. “He’s down on the lowest level now, having the time of his life. Don’t worry about him, Alec. My sweet Firemane has had more fun since coming to this town than he’s seen in all the Royal Academy, I’d wager!”
“That’s not what I’m worried about,” Alec said, glancing from Eleira to Alison and then to Maimonides. “Who in the world are these Alterers, and why have you trusted the safety of your Familiar to them?”
Alone among Alec’s group of friends, only Trystara looked like she fully agreed with Alec’s concerns. “That’s what I said,” the demoness hissed, her arms crossed beneath her breasts. The demoness had gotten even more stares than usual since coming to the underground city, which was quite the opposite of what Alec had expected. Surely coming to a place with more nonhumans running around would make a creature like Trystara stand out less?
Yet the curious gazes of passersby followed them everywhere they went. What disturbed Alec even more was that these weren’t the lewd, lusty looks the students of the Royal Academy had been so fond of. These people looked at Trystara with genuine surprise, as if they’d never seen a creature like her before. Alec had been making a mental note to ask about it as soon as possible.
“You’re just saying that because you don’t want to evolve,” Eleira said, the words tumbling out before she understood their full import. “If you weren’t afraid of the power, you’d have embraced it and surprised Alec with it when he woke up at the Infirmary.”
It was the wrong thing to say. Trystara stood up straighter, her wings flapping backward with wicked intent. Behind them, the elevator platform descended beneath the spot where they’d gotten on to visit Alfhild at her offices. They were now dropping into the lower levels of the already underground city, where the atmosphere grew darker and smokier with each level.
“Excuse me?” The demoness stepped forward, baring her fangs. “What did you say, Eleira? I must have misunderstood your words, little elf girl. Surely you didn’t mean to imply that I’m some kind of a coward?”
“No one with a brain would doubt your bravery,” Eleira said, rolling her eyes. “But Trystara, you have to realize this reticence you have toward learning new skills is hurting you in the long run. And not just you—but Alec as well.”
The words were like a dagger through Trystara’s heart. The demoness turned away, all of her anger extinguished like a candle that had been dipped into a pool of water. “I see,” she said, clearly trying to hold back tears. “I guess you just know so much better than I do, Eleira. That must be why you’re marrying my mage. I’ll see you back at our apartments.”
Eleira realized she’d gone too far. “Wait, Trystara,” she said, looking honestly upset at herself for hurting the demoness’s feelings. “Don’t—I’m sorry—”
Too late. Alone among all of them, Trystara could fly—and fly she did. One smooth jump carried the familiar over the edge of the elevator, where she dropped like a stone. Alec’s heart leapt in his chest as the demoness disappeared, his mind’s eye filled with images of her splayed across the stones like a broken bird.
Then something dark soared upward like a loosed balloon. Trystara caught an updraft and rode the wind, flying upward and away. Alec couldn’t tell one hundred percent from this distance, but he thought he saw tears streaming down his familiar’s face.
“You hurt her feelings,” Alec said to Eleira.
She still had the good sense to look chastened. But now that Trystara was no longer on the platform, she felt compelled to defend herself. “I’m not wrong, though,” she said, shaking her head. “We’re about to go into the belly of the beast, Alec. We’re going to need every bit of firepower we can get. Trystara’s refusal to be powered up was all well and good while we were at the Royal Academy—there, we had plenty of time to plan the rest of our lives. But what if her strength proves the difference between whether or not we survive this fight?”
Alec hated to admit it, but his own thoughts had been trending in that direction as well.
“Lad,” Maimonides said in a mild tone, clearly trying to play the peacemaker. “Has the demoness given you any reason why she’s so dead set against evolving to a new form?”
Alec shook his head. “I don’t have the faintest idea,” he said, not having to lie. “I know she had issues with being treated like an animal by the handlers at the Royal Academy, but we got through all of that. I consider Trystara part of my family, and things between us have never been better. Save for this.”
The group looked down at the platform as it descended into the bowels of the city. “Perhaps you had best have a long chat with her,” the gnome said with a shrug. “Whatever the issue is, it is between you and her at the base. So you and her will have to work on it.”
Alec made a mental note to find out which ‘apartment’ belonged to himself and his familiar as soon as possible. He needed to have a chat with Trystara.
But that would have to come later. For now, the platform had just reached the lowest level. Here, the hallways were ringed with steam, giving the caverns the impression of a misty lake on a cold morning. The residents of this section were mostly workers, with a more common appearance than the finely dressed citizens up above. A few food stalls hawked wares less savory than those on the higher levels, designed to be carried along one’s walk or brought to a factory.
Here, Eleira took the lead. As much as Alison Raleigh had known the way to go when it came time to visit the mayor, the elf girl clearly knew what she was doing down here on the lowest level of the city. In fact, she looked completely in her element in the cavern, nodding at this or that person on the street as if she were friends with them.
“You’ve been fitting in here well,” Alec said, sidling up beside his beloved.
“This city isn’t like any other in the world,” Eleira said with a smile. “The people, the food—it’s amazing. You’ll see, once you spend a little more time here. It’s no great difficulty to protect these people, Alec. The thought of those worm monsters running through the streets, hurting people…” She shuddered.
On that point, he and Eleira were in perfect agreement.
“I love you,” Alec said, lacing his fingers through Eleira’s. “And Trystara loves you, too. But please don’t ever speak to my familiar like that again.”
The elf girl nearly missed a step. “I what?”
“That was extremely disrespectful,” Alec said, his face never changing from the mild, supportive man he was. It wasn’t his way to raise his voice or get angry. He wouldn’t have done it at all, but in this instance, he felt it was necessary. Best to nip this in the bud now, he thought, gripping Eleira’s hand a little bit harder. “Any issue with Trystara is between me and her. How would you feel if I inserted myself into a problem between you and Firemane?”
He could practically see the thought explode behind her eyes. Eleira’s cheeks burned like the bellows they passed, the coals glowing like a flow of magma beneath the earth.
“I’m sorry,” she said, putting a hand on her forehead as they walked. “You’re right, Alec—that was uncharitably done. I would be so upset if you tried to assert yourself over Firemane. I promise I won’t do that again, and I wish I could apologize to Trystara myself…”
“You can,” Alec assured her. “Later. Once I talk to her.”
Up ahead in the path loomed a tall, narrow building. It reached almost to the top of the plate separating the lowest level of the city from the second-lowest, as if it had grown until it had run out of space. Long workhouses fringed it to either side, as short and flat as the main building was tall and thin. Alec had never seen anything quite like it before.
“Here we are,” Eleira said, shaking off her guilt for the moment. “The home of the Alterers. A kind of magic unique to Job’s Bet and the Haunted Isle, where Familiars become their absolute best selves.”
Alec stared up at the massive front as the party came to a stop before the building. An exotic fresco had been carved over the entrance, showing a handler who looked like Olivia Pawmaw’s twin walking a dragon-like creature through a series of transformations. In the first, the creature was little more than a floating snake—by the final one, it was a beast out of one of the ancient myths. The message couldn’t have been clearer: our magic is about increasing the power of your familiar.
“Why have I never heard of these Alterers before?” Alec asked, a little hesitant to step inside. It felt a bit like betraying Trystara.
“They’re one of my parents’ secrets,” Alison Raleigh said, looking up at the building with a mixture of distaste and appreciation. “The Inscribers use the Alterers’ spells to increase the power of their familiars—Abraxas went through this same process before he was assigned as my partner. How do you think I commanded such a powerful creature at such a young age?”
Alec hadn’t thought about it before, but he supposed it made sense. “They... alter familiars, then?” he asked.
“Come inside,” Eleira said, taking Alec by the hand. “I’ll show you.”
The elf girl’s excitement increased by the moment as they stepped inside. They walked through what looked like nothing so much as a technologically advanced version of Olivia Pawmaw’s beast stable. Had the Royal Academy decided to allocate a third of their full budget to providing the familiar handler with the most advanced building to practice her craft available, it might have looked a bit like the area through which Alec and his group now moved.
The similarity wasn’t lost on Maimonides, either. “A beast stable,” the gnome whispered, whistling through his teeth at all the finery on display. “A very profitable looking beast stable, from the looks of things…”
Alison Raleigh shot the gnome a guilty look over her shoulder. “Mages come from all around the world to have their familiars powered up by the Alterers,” she explained. “It’s the worst kept secret in the kingdoms to certain people.”
“Rich people, in other words,” the gnome said, a smug smile spreading across his face. “A far cry from your lofty claims of spreading magic to the common people, no?”
Alison looked like she’d swallowed something sour. “The Alterers aren’t part of the Inscribers—they just work with us,” she said defensively. “We have nothing to do with the... pecuniary aspects of their business.”
“I’m sure,” Maimonides said, shaking his head. “Where’s Firemane?”
He needn’t have worried. Almost as soon as he asked, a door near the rear of the chamber opened, and the great gold and red dragon emerged. Firemane’s reptilian face filled with joy to see his mage—the creature wrapped itself around Eleira, trails of smoke and flame spitting from its nostrils as it made noises suspiciously like laughter.
“There you are, my baby!” Eleira said, rubbing the creature’s lustrous mane and making kissy faces. “Oh, I’m so happy to see you! Mommy was so worried about you, yes she was, and look! Alec’s alright!”
Firemane looked pleased to see Alec as well. The dragon’s broad head slipped away from Eleira, sniffing at Alec as if Eleira’s familiar hadn’t seen him for a long time. The creature’s nostrils lingered around his Bloodcloak, as if something about the garment confused the dragon.
“He doesn’t look all that much different than I expected,” Alec said, reaching out and rubbing the side of Firemane’s flank. “A little more powerful, perhaps, but you’ve all been making these Alterers sound like they can do some extremely major changes to a familiar…”
“The changes aren’t noticeable when a familiar is in its basic form,” a smooth feminine voice said. “Which is all part of the process, of course—you don’t want your enemies to know what kind of power you’re packing until you jump into battle.”
The voice made Alec look up. Standing in the open doorway with a smirk on her dusky face was the dark elf from earlier—the one Alec and Maimonides had gotten caught staring at. She looked like she’d been expecting them ever since that brief interaction—and like she was on the verge of laughter now that they were here.
“You,” Alec blurted, unable to stop himself. He turned to Eleira. “Why didn’t you tell me this woman was an Alterer?”
“I’m standing right here,” the dark elf said with a smile. “It’s wonderful to meet you, Alec Diamondspear. Eleira has told me so much about you. My name is Viya—an artificer, like your friend the Shadebringer. Only my work isn’t in inventions as much as it is creatures. Maimonides works with crystal and steel—my magic is etched in flesh.”
There was definitely something of flesh about Viya. The beauty that had captivated Maimonides on the elevator ride to the city’s highest level was even more apparent in the furnace lighting of the Alterers’ stable. A thin sheen of sweat stood out on the dark elf’s midnight skin, as if she’d been taking a walk in a thunderstorm just before she came out to greet them. Her clothing was even darker than her skin, a black that seemed to absorb the light around it. To make things even worse, all of it was skintight, which made it hard to tell exactly how much of her was exposed and how much wasn’t.
Alec remembered to glance away quickly, but Maimonides was caught like a fly in a spider’s web. Alec could practically see the gnome’s eyes bugging out of his head, his jaw hitting the floor at the sight of the sleek, tall dark elf before him.
“You know of me,” Maimonides finally managed, blinking rapidly.
With the kind of total lack of self-consciousness only possible in the truly beautiful, Viya took both of Maimonides’s hands in one of hers. “It’s an honor,” the dark elf said, nodding. Long white hair trailed down her back in a thick ponytail, as brilliantly bright as her skin was dark. “I’ve studied all your inventions, Master Shadebringer. There are no inventors in this world with your intellect—or your keen sense for mechanical engineering. I would simply love it if you could take a tour of my facilities and identify places where we could improve our efficiency…”
“You would!? Well!” Maimonides took the woman’s hand, grinning from ear to ear like a total buffoon. “I would be, uh, happy to do such a thing for you!”
“By the Archon,” Eleira said, giggling as she elbowed Alec in the ribs. “I do believe the infamous bachelor is smitten.”
That impression only deepened as Viya led them into the stable proper. Magical creatures of all kinds waited in enclosures within the broad, low-ceilinged facility, and from a casual perusal of the place, they lived in even more luxury than the creatures of the Royal Academy. Viya led them down the main thoroughfare, pointing out this or that legendary creature the way a breeder might indicate a litter of puppies they were particularly proud of.
“Of course, so far we’ve only discovered how to imbue a familiar with one elemental magic,” the dark elf was explaining to an utterly enchanted Maimonides. “If we could put our heads together and find a way to expand that, Master Shadebringer, well—I don’t need to tell you how extreme the effects in the magical world would be!”
“That’s fascinating,” the gnome said, hanging off Viya’s every word. “And please—call me Maimonides.”
“Are you certain?” The dark elf giggled behind her fingers. Only now did Alec realize she looked just as smitten with the gnome as he was with her. “Well, alright! Come this way, Maimonides, and I’ll show you the fruits of the Alterers’ labor.”
Toward the back of the chamber lay a raised platform, studded with strange machines and tall glass cylinders. If Maimonides’s workshop had toppled over a second time and landed in the midst of a metalworker’s smithy, this place might have been the likely result. It looked like the domain of a high-tech blacksmith—and a few moments later, that’s exactly who strode out to meet them.
It was the tallest dwarf Alec had ever met. The man stood the same height as Eleira, his thick, black beard reaching all the way down to his knees and tied in ornate braids. Nearly every inch of the dwarf’s skin was covered in tattoos, all of which were of the ancient runes of the dwarvish alphabet.
“This,” Viya said with obvious familiarity, “is my secret weapon. Maimonides, Eleira, Alison, Alec Diamondspear—I’d like you to meet Ru’un. He’s my second in command down here—the foreman of the Alterer’s forge, an absolute master of the craft. Ru’un, this is Alec Diamondspear.”
The dwarf looked Alec up and down. Now that he was closer, Alec could see traces of gray shot through the dwarf’s long black beard. His face was unlined, however, which gave no indication of how old the artisan actually was.
“I see,” Ru’un said in a noncommittal fashion. He didn’t offer his hand to Alec to shake, or seem to want Alec to offer the man his own. “Where’s his familiar? I’m told you control a demon?”
“Demoness,” Alec corrected mildly. He’d met men like this before at the Archon Temple. Almost supernaturally dedicated to their work, to the point that they focused solely on that while letting the rest of the world fade away. They often had strange behaviors, like a flapping of the arms when excited or an interest in esoteric topics. The Archon Temple had functioned as a kind of safe haven for such people, giving them a place to live in peace and work amongst the monks. Alec had never wondered if such people existed among the dwarves as well, but here was evidence that they did.
“Demon,” Ru’un said, glancing down at the tiles between his feet. “I want to bestow the element of ice upon that one. Should complement the classic Diamondspear infatuation with fire nicely.”
“Classic infatuation?” Alec couldn’t help but be curious. “I’m not particularly aligned with fire over any of the other elements, Master Ru’un.”
“Oh, don’t get him started.” Viya clearly knew how to handle her second in command—a gentle touch on the arm was all she needed to forestall what would probably be a long speech. “Ru’un here knows the elemental heraldries of every noble family, going back all the way to the Archon practically! He’ll tell you about it, too, unless you give him a good piece of metal to shape instead.”
