Chapter 24 #2
Sir Stephen’s position, which kept him so much in the public eye, tempted Zacharias not at all.
But he kept his own counsel, not wishing to provoke an argument.
The disagreement was bound to arise at some point, but he would do nothing to hasten it.
He was as happy as he had ever been—contented with his work, of real use to his benefactor.
Perhaps it was no wonder that he had no premonition of disaster that evening—that, upon entering Sir Stephen’s study, he had seen nothing amiss but a log.
It was only when he had retrieved the stray faggot that he rose and saw what Leofric was about.
The dragon’s serpentine form was curled around Sir Stephen’s chair, his forelegs propped up on the armrest. His head was bowed over Sir Stephen’s immobile form, and he had already commenced upon his meal.
For a moment Zacharias did not understand what he saw.
He had known Leofric nearly all his life, but they had never been on intimate terms. Leofric was not only magical and ancient, but something of a snob: in common with many familiars, he thought all mortals other than his master beneath his notice.
“Leofric,” said Zacharias, “do you think that wise? You may wake Sir Stephen.”
The dragon’s jewelled eyes met Zacharias’s without alarm.
“Nothing will wake him,” said Leofric. He licked his chops.
Zacharias saw that Sir Stephen no longer had a left hand. That was why Leofric’s jaws were red. It did not trouble Sir Stephen, for he was dead.
The strength went from Zacharias’s limbs, and he grasped at the table to avoid falling over. He was trembling with horror. He already knew what had happened, but his mind would not admit the truth.
“Sir Stephen has been taken unwell,” he heard himself say. He must not leap to conclusions. Something might yet be done. He must unloosen Sir Stephen’s neckcloth, get a glass of brandy down his throat. “You must go for a doctor—inform Lord Burrow—”
“Stephen is dead,” said Leofric. He spoke with a horrible matter-of-fact detachment, though he had seemed fond of Sir Stephen in life. Leofric had accompanied him everywhere; had told him, with apparent sincerity, that Sir Stephen was his favourite of all the Sorcerers Royal he had served.
“What have you done to him?” said Zacharias. That missing hand could not be denied, however his mind strove to reject the image. He looked down and saw that his own hands were shaking.
“I? I did nothing. It was his heart that killed him,” said Leofric, speaking still in that intolerable, unfeeling voice. “I told him he would not last if he did not take care. He killed himself with overwork, as I said he would. He might have had many more years of sorcery.”
He looked down upon Sir Stephen’s still face, and for the first time a trace of regret entered his voice.
“Now look how he has served himself out,” he said. “Dead before sixty, with your position as yet unassured, and so many of his plans unrealised. And I at liberty to exact my reward prematurely.”
“Your reward?” said Zacharias.
“I pledged myself to Stephen’s service, body and soul, for his lifetime,” said Leofric. “In return for which, he agreed he should be mine upon death. Body and soul.”
This was the first Zacharias learnt of the Exchange, for no sorcerer willingly spoke of the grim deal he struck with his familiar—the price demanded by every magical creature before it would submit to bondage.
He had often complained to Sir Stephen of the opaqueness of the field of thaumaturgy. There was so much that was not known, or only half-known, because magicians were so jealous of their secrets. Each generation took some of its discoveries with it to the grave.
“What learning may not we be losing by this foolish attachment to mystery?” Zacharias had argued. “Surely transparency would serve us all better, and none could lose by it.”
Sir Stephen had not been convinced. “After all, the very essence of magic is its inscrutability. No one could become a sorcerer without one great secret.”
And this was the great secret. Zacharias had not conceived that it could be so horrible.
“You need not look so distressed,” said Leofric. “Stephen was prepared for his end. The Exchange really only poses difficulties for those sorcerers who believe in salvation. Stephen was always in two minds about heaven. Forsaking it did not come so hard to him as it would to others.”
“I thought you loved him,” said Zacharias.
He was surprised at how calm he sounded. His voice seemed to have its own separate life, which had nothing to do with the rest of him. The weight of a terrible sorrow pressed against his ribs, but he would not let it crush him yet.
“Who would render such service as I have purely for love?” said Leofric. “It is no more than the bargain every sorcerer strikes. I have performed my end of the contract. Now it is come time for my remuneration.”
“Do not take him,” said Zacharias, the words seeming to flow from him without his volition. Surely the anguish could not continue. It was intolerable. “Pray—pray do not.”
“It was agreed,” said Leofric. He bent his head again.
Zacharias could never explain the impulse that overtook him then. When he reflected upon it later, in the cold light of day, he was not persuaded that he would make the offer again.
But at the time, his shock, the unreality of the scene, and the vivid memory of Sir Stephen—the near-conviction, impossible to contradict, that at any moment he would open those bright blue eyes, with their usual look of pride and affection—all combined to rob Zacharias of his instinct of self-preservation.
“Would not you consider a substitute?” he said.
Curiosity glinted in Leofric’s amber eyes. “What do you propose?”
Zacharias swallowed.
“You may have me,” he said, “in replacement for Sir Stephen.”
Leofric hissed with laughter. “You! Child, for six hundred years I have served the Sorcerer Royal. No lesser magician could satisfy me.”
“It was not my intention to suggest that you should devour me only when I was dead,” said Zacharias.
He was familiar with the cuisine of Fairyland, having read the memoirs and travelogues of adventurous thaumaturges.
In these civilised times the Fairy Court only served at its banquets courses which were no longer alive, but that had not always been the case.
“Could not you satisfy yourself upon me while I was yet alive? Would not that please you better than a corpse?”
He faltered over the last word. It seemed so hideous to be referring to Sir Stephen as such.
“What a very interesting proposition,” said Leofric. His head was arrested in its downward swoop, the scales upon his neck gleaming dully in the candlelight.