“Heavens, you are a genius!”
Her face brightened. “I am?”
“You are.”
“Tell me, beloved.”
Vlad smiled. “Just as the first spell we all learn is how to extinguish a fire, so perhaps there needs to be magick developed which can extinguish or diminish other magick. Of course, that would only work if we can determine the medium through which magick travels. If it would require matched items, as we used here, then it would be difficult to employ. If it can travel through air, or some other unseen medium, then it might be more effective.”
Gisella nodded. “Could it be that there is more than a single channel? Sound travels through air, and through water, but at different speeds, yes?”
“Excellent point. It could be that magick might travel faster or slower in some cases. It might be faster through linked items, and slower through air or water. And it might have range limitations based on the strength of the person using it.” Vlad returned to his desk and began jotting notes. “We will have to devise a series of experiments to determine what we can. But, first, there is an even more important bit of work I need to do.”
She smiled. “Yes, darling?”
“I need to create a spell which, to my knowledge, has never been created before. If I can do that, we open a world of possibilities, and will urgently need to explore them all.”
After lunch Vlad returned to his laboratory. From the woodpile outside it, he chose a small stick of oak roughly two inches in diameter. Using a saw he sliced off two disks, each roughly a half inch in width. He sanded them down until smooth, then, using a stencil, he decorated each side with identical images of a bell. He heated a small iron rod in his stove and then used it to burn the image into the wood.
He set the disks aside and pulled a small brass bell from an upper shelf, blowing the dust and cobwebs from it. He hung it from a small wooden stand and used a tiny hammer to ring it. The tone pealed crisply. Closing his eyes, he struck it repeatedly, forcing himself to remember the sound. He listened to it rise, then fade and echo back from the walls. He focused on how he could feel it reverberate in his chest, and then rested a finger lightly on the top so he could feel the vibrations in the bell itself. He weighed the bell in his hand, sniffed it, and even licked it, getting as much sensory information about it as he could. He pressed the cool metal to his neck, memorizing that sensation as well, then hung it on the stand again.
He took one of the disks and crossed to the table his wife had used in the morning. He set the disk down and then placed on top of it a teacup and saucer. From a pitcher he filled the cup to the very brim with water. Careful not to jostle the table and spill anything, he returned to his desk and laid his right hand on the other wooden disk.
As he had been instructed to do when learning how to light a candle, he closed his eyes and focused on how a bell looked and sounded and felt when it rang. He visualized the bell he’d been experimenting with, knowing he could shift to the image of a massive bell in a cathedral steeple if needed. For his experiment, however, he felt that the immediacy of experience with the smaller bell made it perfect for his purposes. In his mind he drew an image of a bright, sunny day, cool and crisp like the sound of the bell. He thought about how the word peal seemed so perfect to describe a bell’s sound.
He concentrated on that word, imbuing it with all the other sensations, and pushed magick into it. And then he shoved that magick through his hand and into the wooden disk.
Eight feet away, the teacup clattered in its saucer, and water spilled.
Vlad forced himself to measure the volume of water he had spilled, less because it was important, than it gave him sanctuary from considering what he had done. When he sat back down, the enormity of it hit him: he’d created a brand new spell where none had existed before. Even more amazing, it had not been that difficult. All he had done was to analyze one spell and how it had been taught to him, then he repeated that process with a parallel phenomenon.
But if it was so easy for me, why haven’t others done it?
He shivered. Likely they had, hundreds if not thousands of times, perhaps tens of thousands of times. But just as with Mugwump using magick of which he had no clear understanding, a spell could drain a man, hurting him badly. In the battle for Fort Cuivre, Makepeace Bone had fired a swivel-gun, assuming it was, in essence, just a big musket. While that was true, the magick necessary to fire it off had bruised his arm to the elbow and left him completely exhausted. Had he been a smaller man and lacked the constitution of a mammoth, it likely would have killed him.
The Prince looked at his right palm. Blood had risen in tiny blisters, barely the size of freckles, in a circle the diameter of the disk. The presence of blood did not surprise him-but he had expected to see more. Why would I get away so easily with a new spell?
Vlad tapped a finger against his chin. It was easy enough to suppose that the Church began imposing limitations on magick as a way to prevent people from killing themselves. This would naturally lead to them refusing to teach spells or branches of magick that they found morally objectionable-necromancy being a case in point. That did not mean, however, that Church officials would not study it, or other things, in order to understand the true nature of the threat they imposed. From there, the creation of a self-perpetuating thaumagarchy would only make sense. It would have to destroy any threats to its monopoly on power and knowledge, and would do so behind the guise of preventing people from unleashing unspeakable evils.
The difficulty there was simple: they had no monopoly on magick, only a monopoly in Auropa and the Near East. The Twilight People had their own magickal traditions. Vlad assumed the same was true of the Far East and of the Dark Continent. The Tharyngians, since their revolution, had created yet another magickal tradition, the destruction of which could explain why Norisle was willing to bankrupt itself waging wars it could never be truly expected to win.
That thought brought him all the way back to Ezekiel Fire. Assuming the man knew at least as much as Vlad did, there seemed no question that Postsylvania could be home to its own, brand new, magickal tradition. Not only would it have the freedom of the Tharyngian system, but it would be paired with an absolute belief that God intended men to know this new way of magick. Power, when coupled with a vibrant theology, often wrought havoc.
Vlad rose and left the laboratory, walking down toward the river. He looked west. “If you find a new magick out there, my friends, I don’t know whether I hope you bring it back, or destroy every trace of it. My fear is that if any of it is even rumored to exist, Norisle will feel forced to extinguish it, and I do not think the Crown will be particularly concerned with how many people die to make that happen.”
Chapter Twenty-one
10 May 1767 Happy Valley Postsylvania, Mystria
The Steward gestured gently toward the ceiling. The rifle’s muzzle rose accordingly, despite Nathaniel’s valiant effort to keep it centered on Branch’s chest. “You will find, gentlemen, that your guns will not fire within the precincts of Happy Valley.”
Owen pointed his rifle at the floor and covered the firestone with his thumb. He invoked magick, but nothing happened. How is that possible? He let that question linger in his mind because du Malphias had moved Owen’s own musket aside the same way Ezekiel had raised Nathaniel’s. With contempt on his face, not the Steward’s kindness, but it was the same nonetheless.
“I don’t need no rifle to kill you, Branch.”
Ezekiel raised a hand. “Please, Brother Nathaniel…”
“I ain’t no member of your flock.”
“But the Good Lord commanded us to consider all men our brothers.” The Steward imposed himself between them and Rufus Branch. “Brother Rufus has been among us for over two years now. I have spent long hours with him, teaching him to read and write. He is a very peaceful man and has been of great help to me. He has borne witness to his sins, but they are in the past. They have been forgiven.”