"True. Only I."
Karsus walked around the star, inspecting it. Candlemas wondered what would come next.
"I know!" the archwizard cried. "Only a genius such as I could conceive of this. We'll make the entire star into one giant crucible. T'will save time and get on with discombobulating my enemies! A Stoca's feign or Smolyn's seer coupled with a Zahn's location to find the softest parts, and a Proctiv's dig such as the dwarves use to find water. In one fell swoop-"
"No!" bellowed Candlemas.
But Karsus raised both hands and gabbled fractions of spells, until suddenly a green-white bolt was crackling between his fingertips. With a laugh, he flung the bolt at the magic drenched star.
Candlemas dived under the heaviest table. Not that it would do much good. The whole top of the inverted mountain would probably explode, reducing him and Karsus and Aquesita alike to floating dust.
Several things happened at once.
At the last moment, the chief mage had hurled some sort of shield spell at the star. Karsus's green-white bolt spanked off the star in an eye smarting electric crackle. Karsus had his hair and eyebrows crisped as the bolt sizzled overhead.
But like lightning, the contrary and muddled bolt went to ground, between the flagstones, where lay pounds and pounds of discarded heavy magic. That magic combined with the bolt to turn it bigger, but more confused. Candlemas saw green fingers of energy like giant grass blades spike up from between the stones. One spike seared a hole big enough for a man's fist through a three-inch oak table. Another sheared a woman's arm off. A third shattered a chandelier overhead so the heavy iron latticework crashed down on another unfortunate apprentice. Yet another bolt squirreled up a table leg and danced from artifact to artifact along the table, so an iron gauntlet clenched shut, a glass globe gave a glimpse of the future, a magic sword rang like a bell, a ring's sapphire turned from blue to red, and there were many more whimsical magical oddities.
Not so funny was that several flagstones erupted from the floor to batter half a dozen people. Candlemas had the sole of his sandal slapped by a chunk of stone.
Yet nothing compared to the final effect, as one super energized bolt ricocheted and struck the star from behind.
The ring's stone turned to powder. The gauntlet went dead. The palantir burned out. The magic sword lost its luster. One mage clutched his chest, cried in agony, and collapsed. Another shrieked and covered her face. A third went howling mad and ran out the door. And Karsus's robes suddenly sported great ragged holes that showed dirty white flesh.
Yet the mage was exultant. He danced, shouted, waved his hands, sang, and laughed like a lunatic. Ignoring the groans of the wounded, the clattering of dropped things, the crackling and smoking of several small fires, he jumped in place and clapped his hands.
"We've got it! We've got it! Imagine the possibilities! My rivals will be powerless! Completely powerless! They'll be babes for the slaughter! We'll be invincible!"
"What?" Candlemas coughed as he crawled from under the table. He was surprised to find he couldn't stand. That slap on the foot had sprained his ankle, come close to shearing it off. He helped up the chief mage, who'd also dived under the table. "I don't understand. What does he mean? What happened?"
"The magic went dead." The woman rubbed her nose, found it was bleeding. She pitched her voice low. "It's happened before. Karsus, Great Karsus, once before, cast a Volhm's drain on a barrel of heavy magic. He sucked all the power from the mythallars and almost dropped the city out of the sky."
"Sunrest," muttered a man. "The city of Sunrest had a mage competing with Karsus. We guess he tried the same thing, because the whole city of Sunrest dropped and shattered."
"The whole mountain?"
The chief nodded, put her head back, held out a bloodstained hand, and waggled her fingers. "Look at my ring. It was a gift from my mother. Rub it and it sings like a nightingale. But it's dead. Permanently."
"All the artifacts in here are dead," the other mage concurred. "Oh, Kas and Zahn! My experiments! How far did it reach?" He ran from the room and had to leap over a dead man to get out the door.
Candlemas could only stare. Finally, he said, "That man who clutched his chest-"
"— had an erratic heart. A chirurgeon implanted a heavy magic massage spell that squeezed his heart gently, endlessly. It stopped. Nibaw there, I suspect, was using magic to keep her face looking young. And Karsus seems to have stitched his clothes with magic thread."
The chief yelled at someone to fetch water, either for her nose or the fires.
Candlemas watched the mad mage Karsus chortle with glee, tapping his head and listing dire fates for his imaginary foes while his skinny bum stuck out through a rent in his garment.
Candlemas was alone, but muttered aloud, "I've had enough for one day."
Limping, he made for the door.
Later, washed and splinted, fortified with a small brandy and leaning on a borrowed cane, Candlemas limped through the long journey to Lady Aquesita's abode. He told himself he went only to consult about this latest madness of Karsus's, since she was his cousin and, sometimes, keeper.
He hoped she didn't giggle in her knowing woman's way at his bald excuse. Actually, he liked her giggle too.
When he was shown into her study, he found her instructing an artist on how capture the afternoon light while simultaneously dictating a letter to a secretary. Yet when Candlemas was announced, she dropped both tasks and sprang up like a newborn fawn. Her smile faltered at his distressing limp. Nothing would do but he must sit immediately while a servant fetched a cool drink and a pillow for propping his foot. Candlemas objected to all the fuss, but secretly liked it. It was such a pleasure to see Aquesita he felt no pain.
He explained how his injuries involved Karsus's latest mad blunder. As his story drew to a close, Aquesita gnawed her plump lower lip. Her comment was odd. "More bad news…"
Candlemas was instantly alert, and jerked forward so suddenly his foot rang. He asked gently, "What troubles you, Sita?" (How naturally that name came to his lips in a crisis.)
"Portents, dear Candlemas," she said. Her pudgy hand stroked his pate. "I do so admire a man with a smooth scalp. Have I told you that? It's a sign of great intelligence, I think. And very sexy to boot. But alas, there are portents no one likes."
"Who? What?"
"I'm not altogether sure who's divined them."
She sat on a low stone railing, patted his shoulder, and left her hand there.
"It was either the sages of Mystryl or the Keeper of the Eternal Sun-you know, what's his name," she continued. "There have always been prophecies, of course, especially when donations are slack. The story about the fountains of blood that will precede the fall of the empire is one. Skulls will rain like hail is another. But this one… several sages have dreamt of a woman with starry eyes who blots out the sun just before the city falls."
"Which city?" asked Candlemas, already knowing the answer. "Not this one. Not with you in it!"
"No, silly, not us," she tried to sound soothing. "Some other city, I guess. Sunrest fell, you know, everyone in it killed through a magical mishap. And there's more. I correspond with a great number of people, you know, and many have mentioned the storks being disturbed, that they're not laying as many eggs as usual this spring.
"The white storks are the blessing of the empire, you know. 'The Eyes of She Who Shapes All.' That might be nothing, too. But spells have gone amiss, I know. Mid-wives are worried that babies are stillborn or freakish, but of course no one can show one. But someone mentioned the loss of the 'first of the brightest,' which is supposed to mean stars, we think. It's hard to say. The gods work their will, and we mortals bear up."