Cursed Bones: Sovereign of the Seven Isles: Book Five (37 page)

Haltingly, the soldier strapped on his sword from the pile of gear they’d collected and pulled a cloak over his shoulders. He stopped at the mouth of the cave and turned back, shaking his head slightly.

“I don’t understand you.”

“What’s your name?” Abigail asked.

“Haldir.”

“I wouldn’t expect you to understand, Haldir. Now get out of here and don’t come back.”

Chapter 30

Several minutes passed without a word, both of them content to stare into the fire crackling in the growing darkness of late evening.

“I’m not sure if that was mercy or vengeance,” Anatoly said.

“Maybe a little of both. Or maybe I just wanted to give Haldir the chance to exercise his free will informed by all of the facts.”

“He’ll probably lead them right to us,” Anatoly said.

“Maybe, but I doubt it. Zuhl’s soldiers have come to revere and fear the dragons, even if under false pretenses. I doubt Haldir wants to meet Ixabrax ever again.”

“Either way, we should be vigilant tonight,” Anatoly said.

Abigail nodded. “Why should tonight be any different?”

They kept the fire low and built up a screen to diminish the soft glow it cast from the mouth of the cave, but the soldiers didn’t come. The next morning, Abigail watched the sun rise over the sparsely wooded slope of the mountain, expecting to see troops marching toward her, but there was no sign of them.

Magda’s fever broke that morning and the infection in her wound started to diminish with each successive application of Old Man’s Beard. While the infection was no longer a danger, the wound was still serious and debilitating.

“You should go without me,” she said after listening to them recount the events that had transpired since she’d become delirious with fever.

“Not a chance,” Abigail said.

“I won’t be fit to fight for weeks. You can’t afford to wait that long. Zuhl’s already sent soldiers after us. When they fail to produce results, he’ll send something else, or he’ll come himself.”

“We’re not leaving you here alone,” Abigail said flatly.

“She’s right,” Anatoly said. “You’re not strong enough to feed the fire, let alone hunt and we don’t have enough food to last you until you heal. We’re staying.”

“Then we need to figure out how to help me heal faster,” Magda said. “Has Alexander visited lately?”

“A few days ago,” Abigail said.

“Apparently, Isabel is still in a bit of trouble, so I suspect he’s trying to help her,” Anatoly said.

It was several days before Alexander returned. Abigail was starting to get restless, but Magda’s wound was still too serious for her to travel, let alone fight. Abigail was pacing outside the entrance to the cave when Alexander appeared.

She stopped and glared at him. “You really should check in more often.”

“Sorry. Isabel was captured and I couldn’t find her. I’ve been spending every moment trying to get past the magical defenses surrounding the place where she’s being held.”

“Is she all right?” Abigail asked, suddenly worried.

“I’m not sure. I don’t know who has her or why.”

“I’m sorry, Alex. Sometimes I forget how much you’re tying to manage all at once.”

Magda smiled from her bedroll as Alexander and Abigail entered the cave.

“How’re you feeling?”

“Much better, though not well enough,” Magda said. “I fear that Zuhl will find us before I’ve healed sufficiently to travel.”

“What can I do?”

“Consult with Master Alabrand,” Magda said. “Perhaps he’s aware of some medicinal herbs native to this part of the world that would speed my healing.”

“I was just going to pay him a visit. I’ll see what he knows.”

“How’s everything else going?” Anatoly asked.

“Aside from Isabel, mostly the same. Dad’s building up his line in Buckwold. Blackstone’s magic has failed, so the wizards have relocated to Glen Morillian. Mom and Emma have gone with them. All that’s left in the Keep are Rangers and a few Sky Knights. Phane is working day and night to build ships, both in Karth and Andalia, but he seems content to wait out the winter before making his move. Bianca has secured the northern fortress island and is running patrols into Fellenden. Cassandra is busy with her wyvern-breeding program and training new Sky Knights; she’s already increased her ranks by fifty. My leg is stiff and sore but healing, and Jack is going stir-crazy.”

Abigail smiled. “I know how he feels.”

“He misses you, by the way.”

“Me too.”

“I’ll be back with Lucky’s advice in a few minutes.”

He faded into the firmament, reappearing in Lucky’s workshop in a blink. Lucky was sipping a cup of tea, reading and listening to the sputtering and bubbling from several tables filled with glassware.

“Ah, Alexander, there you are. I’ve acquired the ingredients to make a quart of aqua regia. I’ve been eagerly awaiting the next step in the process.”

“Excellent, but I need some more advice for Magda first. The Old Man’s Beard eliminated her infection, but her wound is still pretty serious. Any suggestions?”

“There are a number of healing herbs that grow in colder climates but most are rare.” He got up and went to a bookshelf, searching briefly before selecting a tome and flipping through the pages until he found what he was looking for. He laid the book open on the nearest table.

“This is called snowbell … it’s similar to deathwalker root in its healing properties, but it’s hard to find, growing almost exclusively on rocky outcroppings high in the mountains.”

It looked like a creeper vine that covered the rock it lived on without actually putting down roots. The leaves were small and very dark green, and tiny white, bell-shaped flowers grew in clusters on the end of long stems.

“What part of it do I need?”

“The vine itself,” Lucky said. “The flowers are useless except for decoration, but the vine can be prepared just like deathwalker root to make a healing salve.”

“How quickly does it work?”

“Depending on the severity of the wound, days or weeks, but generally much more quickly than the natural healing process.”

“If I can’t find any, is there anything else that might work?”

“Not this time of year,” Lucky said. “If they can find an apothecary, they may be able to purchase it.”

Alexander nodded thoughtfully. “I have no idea how the people on Zuhl might react to their presence.”

Lucky shrugged with a smile. “Why not go and ask for yourself?”

Alexander chuckled softly. “The simplest solutions are usually the best.”

“Indeed they are. Now, I’m eager to proceed with my project.”

“All right, the sovereigns tell me that one of the ingredients of aqua regia is muriatic acid.”

“Yes, essentially a concentrate of stomach acid.”

“Good, so mix the aqua regia, but keep a quantity of muriatic acid aside for use later. Dissolve an ounce of gold into the aqua regia and boil it down to one-tenth of its initial volume, being cautious of the fumes.”

“Wait, am I to understand that
gold
is the secret of Wizard’s Dust?”

Alexander nodded, smiling. “Essentially, yes, but it’s more than that. Gold
is
Wizard’s Dust, or more to the point, Wizard’s Dust
is
gold, only in a much different state than it’s normally found.”

“Miraculous. I’ve often wondered why men are so obsessed with gold. It isn’t very useful as a metal, except for jewelry, of course, yet it’s been used by every society in history as money. Now I think I understand that better. Gold is the link between consciousness and the firmament, the source of life and magic. No wonder we’re drawn to it, no wonder men crave it, even if we don’t fully understand why.”

Lucky sat down chuckling softly with a mixture of awe and revelation ghosting across his face.

“The sovereigns have outdone themselves with this. Keeping such a thing secret for so long is almost beyond imagining. Consider how many people are carrying gold in their pouch as we speak.”

“I know, and that’s exactly why it must remain secret,” Alexander said. “Tell no one … ever.”

“I understand, of course,” Lucky said, nodding solemnly. “So, I’ve dissolved an ounce of gold in a quart of aqua regia and boiled it down to one-tenth of its original volume.”

“Add an equal quantity of muriatic acid and boil it down again. Repeat this step until no more fumes are produced, then gently boil it down until the solids are just dry. Be careful not to burn it. Take the resulting material and repeat the steps from the beginning until the product is a rich orange-red in color.”

“This is very exciting, Alexander. I’m quite sure that every wizard who’s ever lived since the fall of the Reishi has dreamed of learning the secret of Wizard’s Dust, the secret of magic itself. Thank you for entrusting me with this task.”

“You’re welcome, Lucky, but it’s important for you to understand that you are literally one of only two people in the world capable of producing Wizard’s Dust. It’s more than just gold manipulated by a complicated process … it requires magic to create, powerful magic.”

“In a way that’s reassuring,” Lucky said. “If just anyone could learn the process and make it work, we’d have people attempting the mana fast left and right; most would fail and die horribly, but those who succeeded would lack the guidance and wisdom of other, more experienced wizards. There’s no telling what they might do, even if by accident or mistake.”

“I couldn’t agree more. The power to manipulate the fabric of reality itself must be guarded and protected. To do any less would be to unleash a thousand Phanes or Zuhls on the people of the
Seven Isles
.

“When Balthazar Reishi told me of the crushing burden he felt after he first discovered the process for creating Wizard’s Dust, I didn’t fully understand. It seemed to me that he’d just unlocked the secret of life. I imagined that I would be jubilant in his place, but now I understand the weight he felt.

“Honestly, if we weren’t at war with such dangerous enemies, I’d give serious thought to letting this secret die with me.”

“You can’t mean that, Alexander.”

“Consider the consequences for the world if we fail to control this. If this secret falls into the wrong hands, it’ll be our fault. We will bear some of the blame for the evil they do, the suffering they cause.”

“Magic is power. Like a hammer, it can be used to pound a nail or beat someone’s brains in,” Lucky said, donning the hat of the tutor. “We don’t deprive the world of hammers because they can be misused.”

“No, but a hammer can’t be used to destroy tens of thousands of lives or enslave whole countries … magic can. While I agree that it
is
a tool, it’s far too powerful a tool to be left lying around like a hammer.”

“Fair enough, just don’t forget that magic is also used for good, enriching and improving countless lives, assisting with food production, building construction, and healing, just to name a few of the limitless uses of magic that benefit not just those entrusted with wielding it but society in general.”

Alexander nodded, smiling at his old teacher. “I miss these conversations.”

“Me too, my boy, me too.”

“I should be going. The process will take you a few days to complete, but the end result will be stable. Just keep it someplace dry until I can return with the next steps.”

“Take care,” Lucky said as Alexander faded out of sight.

Chapter 31

After returning to the cave and clairvoyantly searching the surrounding area for any hint of snowbell, Alexander finally decided that seeking out an apothecary was probably the best chance they had for procuring the rare root. He floated high over the cave and found the telltale streamers of smoke rising over a village in the distance. It was several leagues away over rough terrain but it was also fairly large, more of a small town than a mountain village.

It was perched on the high ground of a bluff overlooking a winding stretch of fast-moving mountain stream. A single road led into the town from the south, crossing the stream over a well-made stone bridge that arced gently across the steep ravine. Several smaller roads led from the town into the less tame parts of the island farther north.

Alexander discreetly materialized between two buildings near the market square and strolled out into the flow of people coming and going, taking care to avoid being near enough to anyone for them to brush up against him and wonder about his lack of substance.

The marketplace was busy, filled with stalls and carts offering goods for sale. There was no sign of war except for the absence of men. There were adolescent boys and old men aplenty; women comprised the majority of the people in the square. Men of fighting age were nowhere to be seen.

One woman took notice of him standing in the middle of the throng of people looking this way and that. She strode up to him with her jaw set and her eyes alight with passion. “What’s your excuse?” she demanded, looking him up and down.