The Measure of the Magic Read online

  While she floundered like a rat in a maze, sunshine and fresh air waited outside. She would recognize features in the wall of the distant mountain peaks, and then forests and hills and trails she knew well would guide her home. Somehow she would find her way. She kept that thought foremost as she searched for an exit. But the corridors ran on, twisting and turning, the arrows pointing this way and that, and eventually she realized she no longer knew which way she was going.

  She stopped then, took a deep breath, and tried to think clearly. She was lost, but she could still find her way if she kept her head. The sounds of pursuit were still audible, but they didn’t seem to be quite as close as before. Maybe she was wrong about where she was. Maybe she was farther back in the complex than she had thought.

  “Where do you think you are running to?” said a voice in the darkness just ahead of her.

  She started so badly that she dropped the bow and arrows. Snatching them up again, she backed away from the voice, terrified. She had reason to be. The old man was standing there looking at her, tall and lean and bent, ragged clothing hanging off his skeletal frame, narrow head cocked to one side, obsidian eyes fixed on her.

  “Get away from me,” she whispered.

  “Well, I can’t do that until we’ve talked. But I can stand right where I am, if it will make you feel any better. All you have to do is answer my questions.”

  She took a deep breath, steadying herself. “What kind of questions?”

  He gave her a tight smile. “Nothing much. Like what sort of magic you possess, for instance?”

  “None. I don’t have any magic. I’m a Tracker.”

  “Oh, you have magic, all right. I can sense it. I don’t make mistakes about that sort of thing. What can you do that no one else can? Tell me.”

  She swallowed against her fear. One hand snaked into her pocket and her fingers closed about the automatic weapon. “I can sense danger. I can tell when it’s close to me.”

  The old man nodded. “Really? Do you sense it now, from me, when I am close?”

  She shook her head no. “It doesn’t always work.”

  “What an unreliable gift! Sometimes it helps and sometimes it leaves you hung out to dry. Like now.” His smile returned, colder. “You really shouldn’t think about trying to use that weapon on me. It won’t work. Those sorts of things can’t hurt me.”

  She was trying to think what to do, how to get away. She could run, but what was the point if she didn’t know where she was going? “I only have your word for that. I don’t think I should take your word about anything. I don’t think you can be trusted.”

  “Oh, but I can. I will tell you exactly what I am going to do before I do it. Just so long as you don’t attack me. Fair enough?” He glanced around. “Why don’t we go back upstairs and outside? It would be much more comfortable out there. We could talk just as easily. You might feel better about things. Trackers live outside, don’t they? You must feel trapped down here under all these tons of stone. Don’t you?”

  “I’m fine where I am.”

  “I doubt it, but it’s up to you.”

  “Why don’t you just let me go?”

  “Questions, remember? Do you know a man who carries a black staff? Ah, your face gives you away. You do know such a man, don’t you? Tell me where he is. Tell me how to find him. Then you can go on your way.”

  Sider Ament. He was looking for the Gray Man. Prue was furious with herself for giving anything away, but she imagined that where this old man was concerned it didn’t take much to reveal yourself. “He’s dead,” she said quickly. “Killed a month ago.”

  The old man shook his head admonishingly. “You’re lying, young lady. How unbecoming. I can tell when people lie to me. It’s a waste of time to try doing so. The man who carries the black staff is alive and you know where he is. So now you had better tell me or things will quickly become very unpleasant for you.”

  She hesitated only a moment, and then she jerked the automatic weapon from her pocket and fired it at the old man until it clicked on empty. She was running by then, tearing back down the corridors, racing for a freedom she had no idea how to find. She threw away the weapon and began struggling with the bow and arrows—although if the Flange 350 wasn’t enough to stop the old man, she had no reason to think the bow and arrows would work any better.

  Risking all, she glanced back to see if her pursuer was anywhere in sight. Her heart sank. A shadowy form was cleaving the darkness, keeping pace with her, coming much more quickly than should have been possible for someone so bent and old.

  She pounded ahead, running faster, her stamina already waning, her breathing uneven. The old man continued to draw closer. She could not outdistance him.

  She notched an arrow to the bowstring as she ran, swung about abruptly, and fired the steel-tipped missile directly at him. The arrow struck his chest and bounced away. The old man didn’t even slow.

  Then he was right on top of her, so close she could hear his breathing. She heard his voice in her mind, screaming at her. Stop running! Running is pointless! You cannot escape me!

  She refused to give up. She ran on even faster. But she was beginning to labor. Ahead, she could hear the sounds of the Trolls. She was running right toward them. She flashed on a corridor that would take her another way and turned down it without thinking.

  She had run more than a dozen yards before she realized she had chosen a dead end.

  She wheeled back, frantic now. The old man was slowing to a walk, not twenty paces away, blocking her escape. His smile was slow and mocking, as if he had known all along that this was how it would end. She notched another arrow to her bow and held the weapon in front of her, pointing it at the old man. He shook his head, a clear admonishment. But he didn’t say anything this time. He just kept walking toward her.

  She cast aside the bow and arrows, knowing they were useless, and was reaching for her long knife, determined to die fighting rather than let him take her, when the light appeared behind her, sudden and intense. It came out of the darkness, out of nowhere, growing swiftly to fill the whole of the corridor. She risked a quick glance over her shoulder, but the light blinded her to whatever was there. She turned back to the old man, saw the perplexed look on his face, the sudden flicker of concern that changed quickly to rage.

  Then the light closed about her and everything vanished.

  IN THE AFTERMATH of the girl’s disappearance, his equanimity recovered, the ragpicker stood quietly in the darkness, thinking it through. She hadn’t gotten away from him by herself; of that much, he was certain. She had magic, but she didn’t have magic powerful enough for this. If she had that kind of magic, he would have sensed it immediately. No, another magic had been brought to bear; someone had intervened to aid her, to remove her from his grasp.

  He sniffed, able to smell the magic’s residue even now, pungent and raw. He stared off into the darkness. Even without light, he could see perfectly well—but of course there was nothing to be seen. He was alone, back where he had started when he stumbled on the Trolls trying to break into this aged fortress.

  He licked out with his tongue, tasting the stale air. What should he do about the girl? What should he do about finding the one who carried the black staff, the one he had come to find? He shook his head, mulling his choices.

  Grosha had said something about a valley. This was where the girl had come from. Which meant that the bearer of the black staff might come from there, as well. He nodded to himself. He had his starting point.

  Turning around, he began retracing his steps, intent on retrieving the collection of scraps he had dropped outside. It wouldn’t do to leave his memories. The dead needed their due. Yes, he was impatient, but good things come to those who wait.

  As he walked, he hummed and then began to sing.

  Ragpicker, ragpicker, take your time.

  There are plains to walk and mountains to climb.

  Ragpicker, ragpicker, find your way.

  The
black staff’s bearer comes closer each day.

  He smiled eagerly as he disappeared into the darkness, anxious to resume his long search for the one he had come to kill.

  PANTERRA QU KNELT BESIDE SIDER AMENT, ONE hand resting on the dead man’s chest, looking off toward the pass at Declan Reach. Time didn’t have meaning for him. Time had come to a standstill, the world stopped where it was, everything as still and immutable as the mountains and the sun in the sky.

  Take the staff.

  Sider’s words echoed in his mind, the last spoken by the Gray Man before he died, a plea to Pan to accept responsibility for what needed doing. A bearer for the black staff must be found—a protector for the people of the valley, a wielder of magic who could withstand the demands that would be laid upon him. It was easy to forget, in the crush of things that had transpired since the agenahls had broken through Sider’s wards and come into the valley to kill Bayleen and Rausha, that five centuries of knowing their world was safely locked away from the devastation of the Great Wars had come to an end.

  Take the staff.

  A bird cried out from somewhere high up in the mountain peaks, and Pan’s eyes shifted skyward. A sleek winged predator was hunting, sweeping in wide circles across the open skies. Pan watched its flight, suddenly fascinated. A hawk, he thought. Maybe it was an omen. Maybe it was the spirit form of the boy who had saved them all those years ago, looking down on them.

  Looking down on him.

  He shook his head. Nonsense. The old days and all those who had lived them were dead and gone. There was only the present and those alive now. Himself and Prue and the people of Glensk Wood and the Elves of Arborlon and all the others who called the valley home.

  What was he to do?

  He took a deep breath and exhaled, looking down at Sider’s face for the first time since his final words. He had died saving Pan and trying to prevent Arik Siq from reaching the Drouj with information on the passes leading into the valley. But now Sider was gone, and the threat from the Troll army remained. Worse, Arik Siq had escaped back into the valley, where he might cause further trouble.

  Something had to be done; Pan knew this. He knew, as well, that he was the only one who could act, the only one who knew that Arik Siq had not yet managed to get word of what he had learned to the Drouj. All those who had come with the Maturen’s sons lay dead. Arik alone remained. If he were stopped …

  But did that mean that Panterra must do what Sider had asked of him? Did it mean he must become the Gray Man’s successor, the next bearer of the black staff, the next servant of the Word? Could he not simply go after Arik Siq, using the skills he had already mastered as a Tracker? He could, he told himself. He could hunt down the treacherous Drouj and finish the job Sider had started. He could return to Glensk Wood and then Arborlon and tell everyone what had happened. Then others could step forward and act in Sider’s place, men and women older and more experienced than he was. It would be better that way, wouldn’t it?

  He shook his head at the enormity of what Sider had asked of him. He could admit to himself, if to no one else, what he knew was true. He was still only a boy. He was just seventeen.

  He experienced a sudden wave of shame. By thinking like this, he was making excuses he had never made before. He was saying to himself that he was not equal to the task. If Prue were there, she would order him to stop. She would tell him that he could do anything he set his mind to. But of course Prue wasn’t there—nor anyone else who could tell him what to do.

  He took his hands away from Sider’s body and clasped them in his lap, unwilling to let them stray too close to the black staff. He couldn’t leave it, but what would happen if he touched it? Would it hurt him just to pick it up and carry it somewhere safe? Would he be accepting use of it by doing so? Would he be taking on a larger commitment by conveying it elsewhere with no intention of using it himself?

  He didn’t know. The truth was, he didn’t know anything about how the staff would react. He didn’t even know if he could summon its magic, if he was capable of wielding it. He was painfully ignorant of everything that mattered about the staff.

  Except what he knew in his heart and could not deny—that Sider Ament had wanted him to take it for his own.

  He stood up slowly and looked around the vista of the plains west and the mountains east, searching the landscape. He sought signs of movement, looking for Drouj in the direction their army was encamped and for Arik Siq in the dark mouth of the pass. But there was nothing that attracted his attention in either direction. His gaze shifted skyward and he tried to locate the hawk he had seen flying through the peaks earlier, but it was gone.

  He was alone with the dead and his thoughts on what their dying had meant.

  Because that was the final measure of all of his choices. It wasn’t only Sider, but the men of Glensk Wood, too, who had given their lives attempting to hold the pass. What did he owe them for doing this? What obligation did he have? He could argue that he owed them nothing because he hadn’t asked that they give their lives. But when men die in your company, sharing their last moments with you, surely you incur an obligation of some sort.

  It did not stop there, either. Eventually, the Trolls would find their way into the valley, and many more would die. Did he owe something to those people as well? In his heart, he knew the answer. If he could do something to help them, perhaps even to save them, he must act. It was an oath he had sworn long before this day. It was a Tracker’s oath to his people: he must serve and protect them to the best of his ability, using his training and skills and determination. Nothing that had happened here changed the fact of that commitment.

  He shifted his gaze once more, looking down again at the black staff. He might not like it, but that was the way things stood. The people within the valley depended on him. Prue depended on him. He was obligated to them all, bound to them as much as if they were his charges and he their guardian. He could not forsake them because he was afraid for himself. He could not allow doubts and uncertainties to rule his choices or to undermine his determination.

  Without thinking about it further, he reached down and took the black staff from Sider Ament’s dead hands.

  “Do with me what you will,” he whispered, eyes locked on the smooth black surface of the wood, scanning the sweep of intricately carved runes, searching for something that would reveal the magic hidden within.

  But nothing happened.

  Nothing at all.

  He stood in the shadow of the mountains, the skies beginning to cloud with the approach of rain, and wondered what more he needed to do.

  WHEN ENOUGH TIME HAD PASSED and still the staff had not reacted in any noticeable way to his handling of it, he propped it up against a cluster of rocks and set about burying Sider Ament. The ground was hard and rocky, and he lacked any sort of digging tool, so he had to settle for building a cairn. He lifted stones and carried them over to where he had laid out the Gray Man, then piled them about him until the body could no longer be seen. He tried to fit the stones as closely together as possible to prevent animals from digging their way in. He used the heaviest stones he could manage, aware that the larger creatures residing in the outside world—the agenahls, for instance—would not be deterred. But most scavengers would likely let the cairn be. The remains of the Drouj were an easier choice for satisfying their hunger. The Gray Man’s body should be safe enough until he could come back for it.

  When he did that, something he promised himself he would do as soon as it was possible, he would uncover his friend and carry him back inside the valley to be buried in the country where he had been born and which had served for his entire life as his home. A marker would be placed and words would be spoken over his remains. Those who had known and cared for him would come together to remember him.

  But that would have to wait. Panterra would not take the Gray Man back with him now.

  Instead, he would go after Arik Siq.

  He had choices in the matter, and they wer
e all compelling. Going to Glensk Wood to warn the villagers of what had happened in the pass and from there to the Elven city of Arborlon would be necessary at some point. It could be argued that this was a Tracker’s first duty and should be carried out now. Going in search of Prue was equally necessary; he still had no idea if she had been rescued from the Drouj. She was the most significant person in his life, his best friend since childhood, and he was responsible for her. Every fiber of his being screamed at him to forget everything else and save her.

  But more important than both of these was tracking down the Drouj traitor whose continued freedom imperiled them all. If Arik Siq managed to escape the valley, there would be no more concealing the secret location of the passes and nothing to protect any of them. If he escaped, Sider Ament’s death would have been for nothing. Panterra Qu could not allow that to happen. He could not justify any other choice than going after the Drouj.

  In part, he knew, he would be testing himself against a very dangerous adversary. The Troll was skillful and experienced. He would not be easily tracked and even less easily caught or killed. But Panterra had made his choice when he had picked up the staff, and whether or not he could use it, whether or not he could summon and employ its magic did not alter in any way the extent of his obligation to exercise a responsibility that was his and his alone.

  Still, he thought, glancing over at the black staff for the first time since he had laid it down, it was important to discover if the magic that had belonged to Sider Ament now belonged to him.

  He picked up the talisman once more and stood looking at it.

  What would it take to make it respond? What must he do to bring the magic alive? He ran his hands up and down its length, feeling the indentation of the runes beneath his fingertips. Perhaps there was a secret to the way it was held or in how the runes were touched. But wouldn’t Sider have told him so? Even dying, wouldn’t he have said something about how to engage it?