Chapter 45
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
The sun was low when I opened my eyes. Though I was on my back, my mouth tasted like dirt and the metallic tang of blood. A figure stood over me. Two figures. I blinked in the low light and groaned when I realized who they were. Vern.
And Max.
“Easy,” Vern said, as I scrambled to sit up.
“Ugh.” I pressed my palms to my eyes. I felt like I’d gotten hit by a truck. “What happened?”
“You passed out just outside your dorm. Max saw you go down and ran to get me.”
I winced, not wanting to meet Max’s gaze, but all I felt radiating off him was guilt. He put a hand tentatively on my shoulder.
He looked down, his face in shadow under his hat. “I’m really sorry about earlier.”
“No, it was my fault. I shouldn’t have said that. I don’t know what came over me.”
“You did it, though.” His mouth curved to a wry smile. “You cracked the case.”
I shook my head. “What are you talking about?”
He handed me the book and laughed. “You even bookmarked the damn page.”
I looked down; it was a page I had only really skimmed the contents of before dog-earing it and shoving the book at Max. I read the page now, and my mouth fell open.
It was barely noticeable, hidden between two spells to keep amulets from shattering. Another entry, a whole bit I’d missed while trying to wade through the nonsensical spells.
There is a belief among the others that Magia would be less treacherous if one were to perform his workings while wearing an amulet or talisman, in hopes that the excess power may be stored inside.
There is certainly no denying that the toll the raw Magia takes on our bodies is not trivial.
None of us speak it, but I know I am not the only one disheartened by the circumstances of Hermippus’s death.
Master said he died of a heart attack, that it was not related to the Magia he cast during the ritual, but he should have had at least fifteen years left of his life.
Perhaps something like this will protect the rest of us, too.
Something to bear the brunt of the Magia, much like a hot pan takes heat and we only wield the handle.
Update—
There is discourse among the others. Some of us believe these talismans of power make our workings less efficient, that it limits what we can do.
Daelius complains that when he went to heal an ailing cousin, his dear cousin was pelted instead with bits of amethyst rock, and all his other spells are tinged purple.
Many of the others report similar problems. They say their charms do not work unless they are holding the talismans, that their Magia is now insufficient for their needs.
They wish to rid themselves of their talismans.
I confess I am conflicted as to one way or the other.
I do not wish to end up like Hermippus, no matter how much it lessens my abilities.
It pains me to say it, but I believe there are other initiates who do not fear this strange Magia as He has bid us to. They reach only for more.
Update—
Alas! In His ever-loving wisdom, He has discovered a way, a resolution to all our problems! I will add the full instructions below.
INSTRUCTIONS FOR UNBINDING FROM A TALISMAN OF POWER
Max frowned. “A talisman of power?”
“I think … an object.* It looks like S and his friends discovered objects, seemingly by accident. And when they didn’t like the effects, they worked out a way to undo the process …”
We looked at each other, shocked.
“I didn’t even know it was possible to become unbound once you’ve started casting with an object,” he said.
“It looks like they found a way.”
My fingers shook as it all swirled around me. It was unraveling, but it all felt so wrong all of a sudden and filled me with more questions than answers.
Our gaze traveled back down to the text.
Not everything has worked out as we had hoped.
Thermoporo completed the Unbinding ritual and started his workings again.
He called forth from the One wondrous, strange power.
But he grew greedy, his thirst for Magia unquenched.
The working went straight through him. The spell lifted him into the air and drained his body dry of power.
He collapsed in front of us, nothing more than a lifeless corpse.
Daelius in his unbound state has become something strange and frightening.
His wife and children report unusual behavior.
They said he ate his food with the dogs and howled.
He tore their pig’s throat out with his teeth.
He left messages in a script I have never seen made of bizarre letters formed with circles.
Our Master says this is more evidence that the One uses Daelius as a vessel, for the One only speaks in the old language.
Daelius came to us, the black toga and cloak of the initiates floating around him as if blown by wind and suspended in water, though no wind flowed and the rivers had long since dried.
His eyes were pits of darkness glimmering as if from inside a long, deep well.
The others feared him, afraid of the fierce power of the One.
It was as if he was possessed by some nocturnal deity, but we had called forth no demon.
Daelius had only called Magia to him, only the One.
When he sacrificed two young boys to the Underworld in order to summon the spirits of the dead, our Master put a stop to it.
“This is against our laws,” He said, “Daelius must be stopped.”
“But why is this happening?” we asked our teacher, for we were afraid and wanted to become bound again for the protection our talismans brought.
“The soul of Daelius is not yet perfected. This can only be done through an understanding of the world and of what is good. The One uses him as a puppet, a vessel, but not an equal. There is danger in what we have done.”
We shut Daelius in a cavern in the mountain for fear that through him, the One would rip a hole through the world and walk through it at will.
He, being the merciful, wise man that he was, worked for many days and nights to find something that could bind us again to protect us from the One.
At last, He told us he had found a way to bind us again.
I have added the instructions below.
INSTRUCTIONS FOR BINDING TO A TALISMAN OF POWER.
“He did it,” Max breathed. “The bastard found it. A way to fix them.”
“If what Dani did was a spell to unbind her from her objects …” I began, thinking aloud, “then that—that thing that is tearing through her body, that made her kill Maya, and nearly throttled us, that’s destroying her from the inside out, it’s—”
“It’s Magic. Or the One, as they call it,” Max said.
“Raw Magic, going straight through her. Just like Daelius. Because she had first bound to an object and then unbound from it, her Magic and body didn’t know how to react.
Without any objects to take the brunt of the Magic, her body is operating as the object instead. She’s taking the full force of it.”*
I paused, looked down at the book, running my fingers over the ink. A thought I didn’t like wormed its way through me.
“But she’s not casting any spells …” I said slowly. “I mean, she was unconscious before. Thermoporo had cast a spell that was too strong for him, but … Dani’s not casting any spell.”
He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “No … it looks like the Magic’s doing it for her.”
I was afraid, suddenly, of the power I’d felt under the soles of my shoes on campus, buzzing with a strange and steady hum. I hadn’t realized before, but it sounded almost … louder now. Hissing and swirling and beating like a living, breathing thing.
“There’s something else.” My eyes scanned the last words on the page.
Three talismans are required for the workings this time, instead of one. The brothers have sold everything for possession of the rare gems. So far, the spell has worked for two of the other initiates. After the ritual, they have scarcely parted with their talismans.
It has not worked for Daelius, who is still alive in the caverns. Sometimes, when we meditate or go for walks, I can hear him scream.
Master has done all he can. Once a person has been Magically unbound for one cycle of the moon, the Binding charm is no longer possible. Magia will take permanent ownership of the vessel.
Tonight, I think of Daelius and mourn, for the last of his water will surely run out soon.
Slowly, the realization dawned on us both.
“Oh, God.”
I did a quick sum in my head. A month! If I’d arrived on the fourth day of Dani being possessed, that only left …
“One day, Max. We have one day until we can’t turn her back. Until … ‘Magic takes permanent ownership of the vessel.’”
FROM THE JOURNAL OF DANICA STEWART
APRIL 2ND [THE DAY AFTER THE MURDER]
Wouldst thou, great Jove, thou Father of Mankind
Reveal the Demon for that Task assign’d,
The wretched Race an End of woes would find.
And yet be bold, O Man, Divine thou art,
And of the Gods Celestial Essence Part.
Nor sacred Nature is from thee conceal’d,
But to thy Race her mystick Rules reveal’d.
These if to know thou happily attain,
Soon shalt thou perfect be in all that I ordain.
Thy wounded Soul to Health thou shalt restore,
And free from ev’ry Pain she felt before.
Abstain, I warn, from Meats unclean and foul,
So keep thy Body pure, so free thy Soul;
So rightly judge; thy Reason, so maintain;
Reason which Heav’n did for thy Guide ordain,
Let that best Reason ever hold the Rein.