Chapter 21 Blood Malady #2
Caelum ignis is still disputed in terms of specific physiological or magical cause, and even whether it ever truly existed the way it had been described in early records.
Most experts agree it likely does exist in some form, but there is some question as to whether those descriptions were exaggerated and in what ways.
There have been frequent accusations of fraud in many of the accounts.
Some of those related to efforts by the Iron Front to instill fear in royal families and the Magical governments that refused to go along with their political goals.
Governed by deeply isolationist ideology, the Iron Front was a cabal of dark sorcerers led by reputed caelum ignis, Konstantin Petrov, more famously known as The Dragon.
My fingers wound tightly around the edges of the book.
The Iron Front operated firstly during the Russian-Polish War.
They made their mark on the battlefields and surrounding townships with large massacres in 1634, with the initial goal to eliminate all hybrid Magicals believed to exist across Magical civilization, particularly within the Russian aristocracy.
One of Petrov’s most strident demands was to outlaw the practice of “seeding,” whereby human blood was injected into royal lineages to strengthen their Magical abilities, a practice he blamed for his own condition.
I blinked at that, thinking of Luc’s research.
Seeding?
There was a practice of altering royal bloodlines with human blood?
I wondered if Luc knew about this, if he’d studied the Russian aristocracy in particular. I pulled a piece of parchment from my satchel and scribbled a quick note to him.
“Vixen?” I spoke the name loudly but tentatively.
A small fiery creature, seemingly coming from nowhere at all, appeared on the end of the couch, and bowed. I handed her the note.
“Do you mind bringing this to my friend, Luc Mocking, at Malcroix Bones Academy?”
The creature bowed solemnly again, its face stern.
Then it darted away, leaving behind only a faint smell of burnt toast.
My eyes dropped back down to the book.
The fanatics in the group, represented most vocally by Petrov himself, advocated closing off portals to the human world entirely, thus making it impossible to traverse between the two halves of Lemuria for the rest of time.
Petrov’s eventual aim was the creation of a wizard-only kingdom, in which he believed the existence of only pure Magical bloodlines would ensure a peaceful and prosperous civilization.
Ironically, perhaps, Petrov claimed to have part-human blood himself, a fact he worked extensively into his speeches and ideological appeals.
Petrov believed “the abundance of animalistic qualities” in the dispositions and hungers of the Magical world came entirely from their being “tainted” by human blood.
Further, he called himself a “monster” ordained by the gods to stamp out “monstrosity,” as only a monster would have the temperament and depravity to do what needed to be done.
Eye of Ra.
Biting my lip, I continued to read.
It is commonly believed that in the early years of the conflict, Petrov, “The Dragon,” killed thousands, utilizing magics unseen in any part of the civilized world at that time.
He is said to have murdered personally on battlefields in Poland, Russia, Lithuania, Germany, and France.
He was only taken down years later, by an international military authority of mages and witches who employed extreme tactics to eventually end him.
Many of those killed were accused hybrids from royal, quasi-royal, and common bloodlines, but Petrov also decimated armies with the wherewithal to fight against him, and even whole towns if he perceived them as standing in the way of his ideological goals.
“But what is it?” I muttered under my breath. “Just a lot of deadly magic?”
The fire crackled in the grate, but I didn’t look up.
Prior to the evolution and rise of the Iron Front, it had been decreed in Magical Law for close to a thousand years that any child born of caelum ignis should not be suffered to live, as the condition was long considered so egregiously dangerous.
My skin prickled again, making me swallow.
In England, as early as the 10th Century, a mage or witch afflicted with the condition could not be allowed to reach full maturity, with “full maturity” falling roughly between the ages of twenty-four and twenty-seven, depending on the individual Magical.
The preference, however, remained to destroy them as soon as the condition was discovered, if only for reasons of mercy and to avoid the parents growing attached before the ailment turned deadly.
The Iron Front and the quasi-mythologized affliction of The Dragon solidified those decrees into the current laws, which are for the most part still on the books and supported by every Magical Court in the civilized world, although instances of enforcement are anecdotal and largely unreliable.
It is known that at least one ascended royal, the King of France, Richelieu III, sired a witch afflicted with caelum ignis who was disposed of legally under the authority of the High Court of Federation Europa in 1484, one year before he was forcibly removed from the throne to be replaced by his brother, Augustus I.
Other stories of enforcement are found in the historical books of most Magical courts. Naturally, it is not something a polity would wish to publicize, the murder of seeming innocents, even for the agreed-upon greater good––
I was forced to stop at that point, mostly because I felt sick.
My skin felt cold as I re-read the entire section.
I’d skimmed through a longer, more detailed description of the Iron Front, the Polish-Russian War, and battles in which “The Dragon” was believed to have been decisive, as well as death tolls, the means by which he was brought down, and several others suspected to fall under the designation of caelum ignis over the centuries.
I slowed my reading down in the section titled, “Enforcement.”
Indications of the caelum ignis strain are varied, but several agreed-upon methods have been passed down over the years for identification, often conducted in combination and verified by experts in several different disciplines.
While some older Magical families have used scrying and theosophy in its various forms as an initial assessment precaution, the legal determinants require very specific tests to the suspected caelum ignis’s magic, and normally require at least one Obeah at a high level of sight to conduct the conclusive verdict.
I stopped reading.
My brother, Arcturus, was an Obeah. He’d been identified as part of the caste only a few months ago, and now lived and studied in the Sanctum Occulus.
Would he be trained to see if someone had the caelum ignis condition?
It was an unnerving thought.
My eyes returned to the book on the pillow in my lap.
These tests would now be performed in Magical Britain by a representative appointed by the Sanctum Occulus of England, and confirmed by the Obeah Regis in the event a positive result had been found.
Additional, supporting evidence would then be required from at least two other experts, usually a master theosophist, a master magi-physician, and/or a master alchemist, before a final verdict could be rendered.
In a case involving one of the royal families, particularly one whose bloodlines extended outside of Great Britain, at least two members from the international community would also be engaged.
I let out a low scoff.
Even in the determination of whether their kids might be legally murdered by the state, the royal families got preferential treatment.
Not like it would help them much, if the verdict came down as positive.
I shoved the thought from my mind with an effort.
Only accredited witches and mages trained to spot the tell-tale markers are permitted to register an opinion included within the official record, but these additional sources are considered mainly supportive of the verdict of the Sanctum, which is always seen as the final judgment.
Evidence deemed relevant at the court hearing other than these expert testimonies would include detailed tests of the suspected’s magical attributes, blood, hair, and the administration of several potions meant to ignite more specific markers.
I’d felt sick again by the time I read through all of it.
I felt even sicker when the implications sank in.
Assuming he’d suspected his son suffered from the condition, had Malefic conducted all of those tests himself, if only to “prove” to himself he’d been correct? Had he employed an Obeah? A master theosophist? A magi-physician? All of the above?
Naming him Caelum, if he truly suspected his son of having the disease, struck me as deeply twisted.
Was that Malefic thumbing his nose at the authorities of Magique?
Was it meant to be a subtle hint to Caelum himself?
Was it a hint (or threat) to Varya, his mother?
Or simply a dark joke from a twisted mind, done purely for his own amusement?
I wasn’t sure I wanted the answer.
I skimmed through more of the legal history, a few other documented cases, and a few more medical and magical details used to identify a caelum ignis. I slowed my reading again when I reached a section titled: “The Condition.”
The nature of a caelum ignis can be summed up as follows: the afflicted’s blood consists of a form of magic that is extremely powerful, intrinsically unstable, tied in every conceivable way to their physical body, and able to be brought to magical effect without any outside means, including any need for specific incantations.
They are, in effect, literally made of magic, and therefore, legally-speaking, could arguably be classified as a separate species.
That sick feeling returned to my chest.
A separate species?
I was taking this personally.
I could feel myself taking this intensely personally.
I wasn’t just sick because I was horrified, or even because I could feel the connections, even more than I could read them in the text. I was so angry I could feel bile seeping into my throat, making me want to scream, or maybe throw the book into the fire.
Instead, I clenched my jaw and read on.
This argument has in fact been made, as recently as 1894, when lead magistrate Malfius Norumbert wrote in his notes to a specific case under investigation by the Russian Court that they should not hesitate to kill the child in question, should it be found to meet the conditions of caelum ignis, as it could therefore not be legally classified as a member of the Magical species, and should be treated and disposed of as any other dangerous magical beast that posed a threat to wizardkind.
I stopped on another paragraph at the top of the next page.
The name, literally “heaven’s fire,” comes from the magic itself. Once a caelum ignis has reached full maturity, they have magical abilities both functionally and intrinsically different from that of ordinary mages and witches, and therefore very difficult to counter by ordinary magical means.
It was said The Dragon could incinerate opponents simply by looking at them, and was feared and revered by his followers almost as a god.
Reputedly, he could also phase, an ability never seen with any other magical condition, or possessed by any other magical creature.
Phasing involves an ability to collapse space and time, which allows a caelum ignis to travel across great distances almost instantaneously, regardless of warding or chimaeric defense, and regardless of the physical material on either side of the wormhole created.
Due to the nature of phasing and how it is accomplished, it has been theorized that a caelum ignis could also potentially travel through time, something that has been strictly illegal in Magical society even longer than the condition of caelum ignis itself.
Because of this ability, there is almost no way to hold a caelum ignis captive, apart from severe drugging, severe blood loss, or other means of cutting them off from their ability to perform magic.
This difficulty in holding them prisoner is another aspect to their condition that makes them exceedingly dangerous, even beyond the fact that the vast majority go insane within a year of manifesting their full power.
I stopped. I re-read those paragraphs twice.
I read them one more time just to make sure I hadn’t misunderstood.
Gods.
I needed to talk to Bones.