Hemlock And The Wizard Tower (Book 1) Page 3

  What does it mean?

  Vibrations from above, more voices. Getting closer.

  She returned her focus to the magical ward on the door.

  What do the sensations mean? Anticipation… Expectation? What is the key to the magical protection? It’s a service door – it shouldn’t be a complex ward. Feel.

  The footsteps were now directly above her, on the second floor.

  Not a complex ward – likely runic or spoken.

  The geometry she felt pointed to runic.

  Footsteps turning onto the stairs above!

  Soon they would be within sight of her.

  She reacted from a place of desperate instinct now: raising her hand to the middle of the door, she pointed toward it with her fore and middle fingers. Her eyes closed and her head leaned back slightly, as she began to trace a pattern in the air–following the guidance of her mind’s eye as it struggled to traverse the geometry of the rune she was seeing in her mind. Her hand steadily traced out a graceful character consisting of six interwoven lines with three dots above it.

  The door clicked inward softly, and she slipped in just as three figures descended to the first floor, and a moment before a robed figure with a serpentine appearance darted its head her way.

  As she slid the door shut silently behind her, Hemlock hoped no sound had escaped in the short time the door had been open just a crack–which had been enough time to allow her slight form to pass within. She now stood in a damp, dark space which had a musty, metallic smell permeating it.

  A band of dull green light, emanating from deep within the room, shone rhythmically up and down over Hemlock’s body as she surveyed the room for exits. The only exit seemed to be a metallic spiral staircase, which rose up into the ceiling some distance in front of her, behind a machine of infernal appearance.

  The machine consisted of a man–sized glass piston filled with a glowing green liquid, which was being pumped by the actuation of a metallic shaft. Ghostlike, an airy human figure worked a wooden handle attached to a round gear which turned the shaft. The figure was nearly transparent, but the room behind it was oddly distorted.

  There was a large glass vat which was reinforced with iron banding, which was suspended above the piston. Within the vat rested the flanks of a massive green Dragon attached to some sort of mechanical device. The Dragon was suspended by chains, its clawed feet securely restrained with massive iron cuffs. The upper body and head of the Dragon were not visible, but appeared to extend up into the floor above. The glowing green fluid dribbled from a number of gaping wounds on the hindquarters of the Dragon, hissing as it fell into the vat, which then fed the green fluid into the glass piston.

  The piston pumped the green fluid into a copper pipe which ascended into a larger glasslike shaft, within which the glowing fluid could be seen to flow to the upper floors of the Tower in great volume.

  The ghostly figure continued to pump as Hemlock took in her surroundings.

  Sensing no living, corporeal occupants in the room, Hemlock gazed in unmitigated awe at the massive body of the Dragon, finding she was unsure whether it was alive, dead or in some intermediate state. She’d heard legends about dragons, but had never seen one. Seeing its massive form imprisoned there and subjugated by the wizards gave her an increased appreciation for their power.

  Hemlock cautiously strode toward the ghostly figure, casting a lengthening shadow on the wall behind her as she was bathed in the ghastly green light.

  The figure was manlike in form; it appeared to wear full armor, and moved as if encumbered by its weight. As she approached it, there was no indication it sensed her presence.

  She continued to creep toward it, moving silently. A faint sound began to emanate from the figure and within two steps, it had grown to a wail of utter agony.

  Startled, she leapt back into a crouch, and just as quickly the sound was gone. She glanced to either side of the room to make sure she had not been surprised by any other developments, and noticed both walls were lined with shelves holding supplies of a mysterious nature. There were beakers, books, strange robes, brooms, and a host of tools like shovels and pick axes; all in all there was a myriad of what were likely items of day to day use in a wizard tower.

  Feeling somewhat befuddled by the strange apparition, but confident she could circumvent both the machine and the Ghost, she moved toward one of the shelves in a circular motion, maintaining the distance between herself, the ghostly figure and the machine.

  She could see the figure in profile then, and her heart skipped a beat. The features were some cruel combination of human and skeletal, locked in a howling scream of pain and anguish, which seemed to reflect a level of suffering beyond anything in Hemlock’s experience—and she had witnessed her share of suffering.

  She imagined it would roughly equate to those moments of utter destruction of the mortal form, which normally extinguished the flame of consciousness before the true magnitude of the torment could be experienced. This man–ghost–skeleton appeared to be enduring in this state, however, as a gibbering shell put to some foul purpose in this Tower, no doubt, Hemlock felt, as a result of some Wizard spell of an ultimately corrupt nature.

  Averting her gaze from the tragic figure, Hemlock briefly toyed with the idea of trying to free it somehow. But her senses quickly told her she was in no way qualified to meddle in such a powerful dweomer, and she strongly felt her goal was at the top of the Tower, not here.

  She could sense the form of the magic being employed in this room. Woven into the magic were strong emotions of ambition, aggression, and perhaps even megalomania, locked into a complex weave with the considerable mechanics of the machine itself. It was like a tapestry of indecipherable pattern, folded back on itself in four or more dimensions. Her mind simply could not make any sense of the complex lattice of these spells. Simple wards and traps she could often handle, but this was different. Understanding this magic would have been like a journeyman painter trying to touch up a masterwork painting: the probable result would be destructive. She felt it would likely result in her destruction and possibly that of a good portion of the City as well. Such was the power of the magic that she felt here.

  She ruefully moved toward the staircase, experiencing a reluctance to leave this machine in operation, but not knowing how else to proceed. As she approached it, she saw at periodic points along the spiral stair, its railing was adorned with odd hands, which were cast in the form of a clenched fist. Some were large, some were small. The staircase ascended to an opening in the ceiling and led to another floor above, which was cast in shadow. She anticipated there was another level of this maintenance area for this strange machine, accessible via this stairway.

  Sound! she warned herself, as the door opened.

  She heard new metallic sounds, clearly but faintly, amidst the thunderous metallic churning of the strokes of the piston; there were clattering footsteps heard on the flagstone floor near the door.

  She tumbled into a somersault and landed behind a small workbench near the spiral stair. After a few moments, she peeked out beside the bench.

  A small clockwork gnome, who was dressed in a bright red, conical, velvet hat, clattered and sputtered over to the bench and placed a silver tray on it, upon which rested a large glass jar containing a spidery form suspended in a milky fluid. The Gnome’s body was composed of brass and iron parts: bolts, gears, pistons, and welds.

  The gnome soon made its way toward the staircase. It did not seem aware of her presence; as it reached the stair, she heard the metalwork of the steps groan slightly under the weight of the automaton when it began to ascend.

  Suddenly there was a metal scraping sound and the climbing stopped. Hemlock risked a glance toward the stair and she saw the lowest of the metallic hands had opened, and was now gesturing as if motioning the Gnome to stop. A small mouth formed in the palm of the hand, and Hemlock had to contain a gasp.

  "What is the form of the concept when unseen?" cried that small mouth,
with the strangest voice she had ever heard. It sounded like what she imagined a talking mouse or rat would sound like, yet it was melodious just the same.

  "A dream," responded a voice–she realized it must be the Gnome’s voice–somehow quite understandable despite being composed of a fast series of horns, grinds, squeaks, metallic shivers and dull groans.

  The sounds of climbing resumed.

  Hemlock heard another odd scraping sound. Again the climbing stopped.

  "What is the nature of the spotted alligator?" cried the strange little voice, challengingly.

  "To rend and consume," replied the Gnome.

  Hemlock heard the odd pattern of challenge and response continue at the next highest point on the stair.

  "How high flies the Lagma when his wings are mired in magma?"

  "The gift of flight he’s never known."

  The Gnome had almost reached the next floor as another question was asked. But Hemlock could not make out the phrasing of the question. She glided along the floor, reaching the foot of the stair, but she was unable to hear the answer in her concentration on executing the quick motion without making any noise.

  She cursed to herself as she took stock of the fact she had missed both the final riddle and its answer. Since the first three answers had been phrases, she imagined she stood little chance of getting that final answer right on her own.

  She wondered if she could leap off the stairs or even climb up beneath them. She walked toward the underside to investigate. As she moved closer, an invisible force gently pushed her backwards. She surged forward then and was thrown back several feet, landing on her backside. Apparently, she mused, the wizards had thought of that.

  Again she reflected on her options. Since the Gnome seemed to be a machine, there seemed to her to be a good chance that he was automated and might return. But she wondered how long that would take.

  Every moment of delay increased the chances the wizards would notice the damage to the Gargoyles and Portcullis.

  She knew she was relying on the wizard’s arrogance and overconfidence. She wondered whether whatever magical protections they might have had been allowed to weaken over the years of seeming invulnerability. Or, she considered, maybe there were alarms going off somewhere, but no one had noticed them–yet.

  Chapter Two

  Somewhere on the seventh floor of the Wizard Tower, a wizard stood in a small, dark room amidst a din of shrieks. His long robe did not conceal the fact that he was relatively young and of vigorous appearance, having a slight but muscular build with dark hair and sculpted facial features. He carried himself with an energetic bearing, which also communicated an unmistakable hint of power.

  The Wizard stood before a stone shelf, which was the only feature of the small closet-like chamber. On the shelf, a row of small, metallic skulls were arrayed in a line; they had been cast in silver and polished to a shine. Below each skull was a small wooden stand with a placard which bore the name of a location. Two of the skulls were emitting a loud shriek and their eye sockets were glowing red, bathing the room in a crimson light. Their placards bore the words "Front Gate," and "Service, First Floor."

  The Wizard bristled at a lack of discipline that he attributed to his fellow wizards. He had pushed for more rigorous security measures, but the other wizards had been more intent on their research than anything else; they had not wanted to be disturbed by false alarms or guard duty. Additionally, they had argued that the Tower was well–nigh impregnable.

  The Wizard judged that the current policy of relying on automatons to check the safety of the Tower’s defenses was reckless–especially given the fact that he knew that the automatons only checked for alarms in this room once every hour.

  Despite his anger at the fact that someone had apparently infiltrated the Tower, the Wizard’s thoughts were also laced with a raw feeling of excitement.

  "Who has entered the Tower? Is it the one that my visions have suggested will come?" were the questions that raced through his mind over and over again, inspiring an intense feeling of curiosity in him which overshadowed his other feelings of anger, fear and concern.

  The Wizard concentrated for a moment, and then he extended his hand past each of the clamoring skulls. As he did so, their eyes went dark and their shrieking subsided. When all was quiet again, the Wizard paused and his body tensed, as if he was confronted by a sudden doubt or fear. But his body gradually relaxed over the course of several seconds, and then he strode out of the room with a confident gait.

  …

  With a final glance at her surroundings, Hemlock began to methodically climb the circular staircase. She sensed in it a magical force kept in check by a delicate control. The nature of the force was pure aggression surrounded by and contained by a boundary of civility.

  As she reached the first small hand mounted on the stair railing, she heard the strange metallic grating sound, as the fist abruptly began to glow and then opened up into a restrictive gesture, with fingers extended and palm jutting forward.

  This hand was cast with a furry appearance–like that of a hairy ape. The hairs were rendered with some detail in the iron and as she halted and turned her attention to the hand, she saw a small fanged mouth appear in the middle of the palm.

  The little mouth spoke the first riddle, which she answered with the same response that she had heard the Gnome use, using an audible but very hushed voice. She figured that an audible answer was probably a requirement of the process. After she spoke the answer, the hand clenched back into a fist, and she took this as a signal that she could continue to climb.

  The second hand was a human looking hand. The same sequence of events occurred as had with the first hand, and she answered the second riddle correctly.

  Hemlock desperately hoped that no one was in the room above and able to hear her speaking the answers to the riddles. But she couldn’t figure out any alternative to proceeding as she had seen the Gnome do before her.

  As she resumed climbing and approached the third hand, she struggled to catch a glimpse of the upper room in order to try to see if anyone was observing her. Despite her stealth, her footfalls were making a faint metallic clunk on the stairs as she climbed, and this concerned her greatly. Beyond that sound and the pulsating rhythm of the machine, she didn’t hear anything else–including from the upper room. But she did notice another light, orange hued and otherworldly, which seemed to pulsate in time with the rhythm of the machine below, emanating from the room above.

  She reached the third riddle. Again, she cringed as the strange voice from the third metallic hand asked the question and she tried to provide the answer as silently as possible. With that done, she reluctantly started her climb up toward the fourth hand, and her adrenaline surged in anticipation of whether she would be able to think quickly enough to figure out the answer.

  …

  She and Safreon had been relaxing one day in their favorite tavern, when he had unexpectedly started telling her about the wizards.

  "The ale has loosened my tongue… You’ve been wanting to know about the history of the wizards. Now I’ll tell you, but be patient, for it’s not a short tale."

  "Everyone has heard the tale of the Bridge of Ninety-Nine Tears and knows that the wizards are not to be meddled with. In fact, passive obedience is how most folk try to deal with them–if ever an occasion arises where they must be dealt with."

  Safreon had then explained to her that there was a strange plant called Oberon which was said to grow on the highest peaks of the Witch Crags, a mysterious region to the west of the City.

  "The Witch Crags are supposedly the place where despondent souls go to try to die. Apparently, as the lore goes, some people just can’t figure out how to let go of their life in this realm–even after their mortal body has perished. It’s said that spiritual forces begin to pull them into the next life; and these souls find it harder and harder to remain here as shades in the realm of the living. Eventually they are drawn to the Witch Crags. It
is said that something about the rocky crags makes these spirits think they will find relief from the pull of the next life there."

  The crags themselves were steep and stark rock formations. Safreon told her that it was rumored that those crags, and the valleys that separated them, had once been beautiful.

  "No one is sure whether some unique properties of the region first drew the lost souls to the area or whether the souls arrived and brought evil with them. But the area is now called the Witch Crags–partly because it is perennially dark and noisome, and strange lights are often seen around the peaks."

  He related that the spirits of the not-quite-departed were frightening and often very dangerous–especially at night when they roamed the hills and valleys in great numbers, anxious to engage an unfortunate traveler in an icy embrace that would consume their very soul.

  "But it’s the evil hag-like spirits that truly give the Witch Crags their sinister name. These Witches are said to be powerful, malevolent spirits who gather the lost souls into evil covens. It is said that they mask their evil with great beauty, but little else is known about them in the City."

  "Oberon is pure concentrated magical energy in physical form. It can be used to make magical potions and can also be used to magnify the strength of magical spells. It is a vital resource for a Wizard to have in order to allow him to reach the heights of magical power."

  "The Wizard Guild is said to have been formed by an enterprising wizard named Julius who supposedly discovered the Oberon for the first time, in the possession of a dying man. This man had carried himself like a lunatic as he wandered into the City, and raved about surviving a sojourn through a land called the Witch Crags."

  Hemlock knew that their City, which was named San Cyra, but was always referred to simply as "The City," had strange properties compared to the other lands that it travelled through. The City never stayed in the same place for long. If one travelled to the edge of the land around the City, they saw a shimmering and opaque border, which was referred to as "the veil." Beyond the veil, things always changed. If one crossed the veil and lingered for more than a few hours, then they wouldn’t find the City where they left it, and would be stranded.