He was behind the old Arab’s throne, in an excellent position to see the junior sorcerer’s face where the man knelt over his master, sprinkling powders and chanting verses. Matt’s hair tried to stand on end, for he understood the words the man was saying. He was trying to bring the dead back to life, to summon the soul that was already gone.
And it came. Air thickened above the corpse, and the old Arab’s face appeared. The junior sorcerer took one look and flinched away, screaming, hands raised to block the vision from his sight.
Matt wondered what could be so horrible. Then the vision became completely clear, and he saw the flames that wreathed the head.
“Look upon me, Gasim, as you wished to do,” the hollow voice bade the junior sorcerer. “See the torment with which Ahriman rewards his followers!” Suddenly the head tilted back and an unearthly scream ripped from its mouth. “I … I shall not, my master!” the ghost gasped. “I shall speak no truth, I shall … shall …”
“Who … who has brought you to this pass?” Gasim cried. Matt knew what was coming. He pulled out the wand and ran toward the man.
The ghost materialized an arm and hand, spearing out at an impossibly backward angle at Matt. “They did!”
Gasim looked up, face working in fear and anger. He raised his hands and began to chant.
“I shall take the younger!” Balkis stood beside him in human form. She pulled the wand from Matt’s hand and pointed it toward the living man, chanting a quick verse in Allustrian. Matt heard the man shout, but he didn’t stop to look, only turned to the ghostly face, trying to ignore the hollow eyes and the grimace of pain as he shouted,
The face screamed again, leaning back—and back, and back, till it was only a line of darkness, then gone.
Matt whirled around to see Gasim flat on his back, arms wrapped about his chest, legs crossed, lips working but making no sound. Balkis stood over him, brandishing the wand like a club. “What shall we do with him?”
“Get him out of here before those Tartars get curious about the screaming!”
Even as he said it, five stocky shapes darkened the doorway. They saw only a man, a girl, and their own sorcerer lying supine. Scimitars hissed out, and they came on at the run.
Matt grabbed Balkis’ wrist with his free hand. “Quick! Get a hand on that sorcerer!” He swirled the wand to draw an imaginary circle around the three of them, chanting,
The mosque started to grow dim around them. The shouts of the Tartars came closer and louder, but so did the roaring in Matt’s ears. A hand seemed to touch his arm, then instantly let go, and he thought he heard a scream fading into the distance but couldn’t be sure. The whole world appeared to heave and tilt, and so did his stomach, but he managed to choke it down.
Then things steadied, sunlight enveloped him, he heard something chirping nearby, and he staggered, then caught himself.
Balkis didn’t. She overbalanced and fell into the mud beside the brook.
Matt dropped to a knee and helped her up. “Sorry. That’s the roughest ride I’ve had yet. Must have been the aura of sorcery in the place.” Then he broke off, staring, and bit his lip to keep from laughing, for though her veil was clean, Balkis had fallen with her face in the mud.
She wiped it off with both hands. “Faugh! What manner of place is this?”
“Oh, a really pretty place, once we’re here.” Matt’s knees suddenly went weak; he sat down. “The brook makes very pretty music, too. It’s just that it has muddy patches here and there.”
Balkis looked around her and saw the beauty of the mountain wall rising a hundred yards away across a meadow filled with wildflowers. Matt thought of mentioning that she still had mud on her nose and around her mouth to her chin, but just then she breathed out a sigh that turned into a shudder. “Yes. It is pretty, very. And so clean, after the sink of depravity into which the barbarians have made of that city!”
“We have not!”
They turned to look. The barbarian sorcerer was struggling to sit up. “We shall purge, cleanse the earth of unbelievers! We shall conquer all, and thus put an end to these silly wars! We shall put an end to the fairy-tale notions of any god but Ahriman, and extirpate their foolish notions of right and wrong!”
Matt stared at him. “You don’t really believe any of that!”
“Wh-What?” Gasim’s voice faltered as he tried to make the question a demand. “How can you argue with Ahriman?”
“How can you believe him?” Matt retorted. “Don’t you know he’s the Prince of Lies?”
“That is a vile rumor put about by his enemies!”
“You just saw somebody who knows firsthand how badly Ahriman lied to him,” Matt said grimly. “Arjasp told him Ahriman would give him eternal luxury for his service, didn’t he?”
“So he will!”
“Sure, the luxury of central heating,” Matt said with full sarcasm, “only the old priest gets to be in the center of the heat.”
“A vile lie!”
“It was a vile lie indeed, to promise him pleasure and give him pain—and when he tried to tell you the truth about it, he found out that no matter how bad the pain was, it could get worse. It could always get worse.”
“An illusion you conjured up,” Gasim accused, but he wouldn’t meet Matt’s eyes.
“No, you did the conjuring,” Matt reminded him. “Is it my fault that you got what you asked for?”
“It must be your fault!” Gasim cried. “You must have sent a glamour instead of a true summoning! How you did it, I know not—but you must have!”
“I didn’t,” Matt said sternly, “and you know it. Think, Gasim—it’s not too late. Your boss put himself into Ahriman’s power. He declared himself to be the Liar’s man, to do the Destroyer’s work. You don’t have to let that happen. You can turn away from the Prince of Lies, turn to Ahura Mazda. Ahriman has no power over you unless you give it to him.”
Uncertainty shadowed Gasim’s eyes; for a moment his face was gaunt with fear. Then he summoned bluster to drown his doubts. “It is you who speak untruths! Your power that you wish me to accept! Ahriman will blast you, will fry you, will turn you to ashes!” He lifted his hands to start spellcasting. “And I shall begin it! I shall seal you into a prison that shall endure a thousand years!”
Balkis snatched the wand from Matt and leveled it at Gasim. She started to chant in Allustrian.
But Matt didn’t want a charred corpse, he wanted information. “Prison? Don’t make me laugh! Either of us has more than enough magic to break out of any prison you could think up! Don’t we, lass?”
Balkis broke off her chant to stare up at him as though he were mad—but she saw the calculating look in his eye and said, “Aye. Why, we can summon a djinna, and any of the djinn could break from a prison wrought by Ahriman’s magic.”
It was a great thought, and Matt picked up on it instantly. “Yeah! Any of the djinn, even a baby! After all, any prison of Ahriman’s must be just another one of his lies, a mere illusion!”
“It is you who lie, ignorant warlock!” Gasim dropped back out of hysterics into vindictiveness. “Why, even now we hold two djinn children in a prison wrought by Arjasp’s magic!”