"Forgive me, Wyst."
I lowered him onto the bed. His slumber was peaceful, save for a soft frown across his lips.
I descended the stairs. My companions sat ready by the table. I wasted no time on politeness and got dressed. Soulless Gustav had given me my hours. I wouldn't be rude and keep him waiting any longer.
"Gwurm, you'll find Wyst upstairs. Dress him and take him from this place. Penelope, you'll go with them."
"And me?" asked Newt.
"You'll be coming with me."
He squinted with surprise. "I will?"
"You are my familiar, aren't you? Your place is by my side, isn't it?"
"Well, yes..."
"Good then. We'll see about that violent death you were hoping for. Although I make no promises."
"Yes, mistress." He beamed.
"And me?" asked the gray fox.
"You can do whatever you like," I said.
"Then I shall come along too."
Gwurm went to fetch Wyst, and Penelope tried to force herself into my hand.
"None of that. You'll go with Gwurm. I'll most likely be dead very soon, and he'll need a friend. I'm trusting you to take care of him."
She stood straight and bobbed once.
"Good girl." I turned to Newt. "It's time to go."
He couldn't resist smirking at Penelope, even though all he'd really earned was almost certain doom.
The phantom servant materialized by the front door. "Right this way madam. The master is expecting you."
Gwurm descended the stairs with Wyst over his shoulder. "Good luck."
I glanced back at my troll, broom, and slumbering White Knight. "Tell him I'm sorry."
"He'll understand."
I wasn't so sure. Wyst was a proud man. He would've chosen to die by my side, and I was wrong to not allow him that.
"Tell him ..." I found the words very hard to say. I should've told Wyst in the bedroom. Now, I couldn't.
"He already knows," said Gwurm. "Just as you know."
"Are we going or not?"
The servant directed us onto a cobblestone path that led up to a tall hill. Penelope and Gwurm with Wyst and steed in tow headed the other direction. 1 didn't know if they'd make it, but accompanying me was certain death. Now they had a chance.
I put aside the distraction as we marched up the path.
Magic is everywhere in all things and all places, but there is more magic in some things than others. Accursed witches and Incarnate sorcerers draw arcane power like lodestones. As we drew closer, that power crackled in the air. The magic knew a terrible battle was about to begin, and it offered all its potency before us to ensure a colorful struggle.
Witch magic is a subtle art. I may have been out of my element, but Ghastly Edna had prepared me. "Remember, child, that magic follows no rules other than its own. Many of its followers fail to understand this. They fail to adapt when the magic demands it. Mostly because they've grown set in their ways. But a good witch knows her place, and a great witch understands that experience can as often be a burden as a gift."
To defeat Soulless Gustav, I only had to forget everything I'd learned, but unlearning was a witch's greatest talent. Perhaps I wasn't as far out of my element as I thought.
I was expecting everything and nothing on the other side of the hill, but the landscape remained unexceptional phantom fields of grass. The cobblestones came to an end at a gleaming silver cube.
"What is it?" asked Newt.
"The heart of a world that doesn't exist," I replied.
The shape of Soulless Gustav's face pressed through the shimmering surface. "You should be honored. You'll be the first to glimpse the beautiful fate that shall replace this universe." He glanced to my companions. "I expected you alone."
"The duck is my familiar. The fox is merely an observer."
"For posterity, eh? An excellent idea. Enter and witness my glory."
His face melted into the cube, and I stepped into its impalpable surface. It wasn't so much that I entered it as it expanded around my perceptions. First came the illusion of time to distinguish one moment from another. Then came the fantasy of space. Then came the other details of Soulless Gustav's creation. The countless lesser particulars that make up a phantom universe fell into place. I stood on the threshold of a miniature cosmos. Dozens of tiny planets swirled amid an endlessness of stars. Neither Newt nor the fox were with me.
Soulless Gustav stood at the center of his universe. "Beautiful, isn't it?"
I remained properly inscrutable. "I suppose it is. In much the same way a painting of a flower can almost be as beautiful as the flower itself."
He glowered. Then sighed and smiled in a passable imitation of good humor. "Forgive me, witch. I've forgotten that you lack the vision to see what I've shown you."
His solar system wound to a slow halt. A tiny planet ceased its orbit before me that I might glimpse its continents and oceans. If I looked close enough, I could no doubt see mountain ranges, forests, and deserts as well as villages and cities teeming with millions of phantom inhabitants.
"Mine is a flawless re-creation. This is the universe, my universe. A small thing now, but it shall grow like a seed. And one day, mine will overthrow that flawed jumble you call reality."
I slapped the planet and started it spinning again. "How sad that you think this is a dream worth fighting for. You have my pity"
His worlds twirled faster. He walked forward between the speeding spheres. "You have courage, witch. I'll grant you that. This isn't your reality. Nor is it even that impure realm of sorcery outside this cube. This is my power, pure and undiluted. Here, I am a living god, and you are absolutely nothing."
"Perhaps. But I am a good witch, even here. And you are still a very poor sorcerer, even here."
The only sign of Soulless Gustav's rage came in a clenched fist. "Your bravado doesn't fool me, woman. I sense your fear, your awe."
"You've lived too long among glass and shadows. You sense only those illusions you desire."
He raised his hand. An inch-high double of me stood in his palm. He waved his other hand over them, and it writhed and dissolved into moldering paste amid tortured shrieks.
I smiled. "Most impressive. If I were a phantom, I would be most terrified."
"How dare you..."
"I dare. I confess to once having some dread over facing you, but that disappeared the moment you showed me your dream." I reached out and plucked a passing moon. "All that power at your disposal, and this is the best you could do."
"All that I can do!" Soulless Gustav snarled. His voice echoed from one end of eternity to the other as his civility crumbled at the edges. "I have remade a universe!"
I shook my head and balanced the moon on my fingertips. "There is already a perfectly good universe out there. Remaking it is a waste of magic, an exercise in futility"
The orbit of his worlds grew erratic. They zipped about, barely missing one another.
"You dare mock my power."
"Your power, never. It is awesome without question. It is your vision that I find lacking. You have the gift to create whatever your will desires, to make the unreal real. Yet you choose to make something that already is. You lack the one thing every great sorcerer should possess: imagination. Without that, all the magic in this universe and a thousand others counts for naught."
Soulless Gustav's anger was a cataclysm on his creation. Worlds smashed into each other. Stars flashed, only to burn away in moments. The moon on my fingertips cracked in two.
"You don't honestly think you can defeat me?" he said softly through clenched teeth.
"Probably not," I agreed, "but even if I lose, what difference does it make? Even if you succeed in your dream, what does it matter? Either way, this universe continues. Whether genuine or unimaginative illusion, I fail to notice the difference."
Soulless Gustav drew in a deep, calming breath. "Mine shall have one less accursed witch."