Realms of Magic

IV

Orlando drew back on Zephyr's reigns. The animal, well trained and eager to please its master, slowed quickly from its trot to a full stop. The enigmatic black equine that Lelanda rode did the same, although Orlando saw no sign of a command from rider to mount. The horse seemed always to know what the enchantress expected of it.

"Aren't we going a bit out of our way?"

"Only slightly," responded the witch. "I thought we might stop at Jolind's estate and tell her what happened. She won't be interested in joining us, of course, but she was one of the Six. She has a right to know."

Orlando was surprised to hear Lelanda speak like that. In their adventuring days, she'd had little use for the individual members of the Six of Swords^ To her, they were bodyguards, scouts, and healers, who enabled her to explore the mysteries of magic, recover rare spell components, and otherwise practice her arcane art. Perhaps time had softened her heart, or perhaps there was more to this detour than she was telling him.

With the aid of Lelanda's magic, the miles passed as fleeting images in the corner of the eye. Even at that rate, however, it was several hours before the lights of Jolind's tower were visible. When they reached the edge of the clearing in which it stood, both riders brought their mounts to a stop.

"She's done a remarkable job here," said Orlando as his head swept back and forth to indicate the lush forest that rose around them. "I remember when we first found this clearing. The soil was so poisonous that nothing less robust than spitweed would grow here."

"I'll go in first," said Lelanda, ignoring his attempt at conversation. "Jolind always valued her privacy, and I'd hate to have a druid angry at me in the heart of her own forest."

She slipped the hood of her cloak over her head, causing the sunset colors of her hair to vanish into a thick darkness. Even as he watched, Orlando found that he could no longer focus clearly on her. Though he knew exactly where she was standing, he was able to see her only as a fleeting image in the corner of his eye. m be back as quickly as I can, said the darkness. Before he could respond, Orlando realized he and the horses were alone by the side of the road. He wanted to chuckle, but the chills that her macabre voice had left running along his spine wouldn't let him.

While he waited for his companion to return, Orlando opened the saddlebags draped over Zephyr and pulled out an apple. He fished around for a few seconds more and brought out a small knife. With a deft flick of his wrist, he split the fruit cleanly in two. After wiping off the blade and slipping it back into the leather pouch, he offered one of the halves to his horse and considered the other for a moment. With an unconscious shrug, he reached over and held it before Lelanda's mount. The ebon animal eyed his offering, but then snorted and turned away. Orlando shrugged again and ate it himself. The first hints of dawn were lighting the horizon, and he had an unhappy feeling that the animal's snobbery was to set the tone for the day ahead. He was right.

Jolind is dead, came the too-familiar voice of the darkness. And the body is warm. The killer must still be nearby.

The inside of the tower stirred Orlando's memories of the time when the Six of Swords had first explored it.

In those days, these lands had been defiled by the black dragon that made its lair here. The entire area had been poisoned by the creature, with pools of acid, swarms of stinging insects, and tangles of slashweed dominating the tortured remnants of the forest. From the moment they entered that fell region, the druid Jolind had become solemn and morose. Such destruction, she swore, could not go unpunished.

When they reached the tower-a ruined structure built by an unknown hand centuries before any of the Six were born-Jolind had led their attack against the dragon. Turning the very elements of nature against the creature, she had been instrumental in its destruction.

Eighteen months later, when the company disbanded, she announced her intention to return to this place and restore the forest to its past glory. She had done an outstanding job.

Jolind had not, however, restored the tower. At least, she hadn't done so in the way that Orlando would have. The interior floors and walls had been stripped out, a great glass dome placed atop the tower, and a bubbling fountain set into the ground at its center. The combination of the fish-eye skylight and the dancing water of the fountain made the climate inside the tower hot and sticky.

Under normal circumstances, this would have made the place unbearable. With the careful hand of Jolind to shape the place, however, it had been transformed into a tropical paradise. Great tresses of ivy climbed gracefully up walls dotted with brilliantly colored flowers. Shafts of morning light, shunted downward by the facets of the glass dome, illuminated a dozen trees and the colorful butterflies that flitted between them.

The horrors of the past had been completely banished by the careful hand of the druid. Sadly, they had been replaced by the horrors of the present. At the heart of all this splendor was a copper-smelling pool of red. And at the center of that scarlet expanse lay the body of the druid Jolind. Her head had been cleanly cut from her neck.

It took all the courage Orlando could muster to approach the body. Jolind had been a friend, a companion, and more. For a time, the warrior and druid had been lovers, seeking escape in each other's arms. Their relationship had lasted less than a year, but in that time, each had learned much about the other's philosophy and profession. For Orlando, that meant a keen appreciation of the ways of nature, the give-and-take of the environment, and an understanding of his place in it. Jolind had not feared death. In her mind, it was nothing more than the end of life. To Orlando, death had always been an enemy to be held at bay. In the end, he knew, death would triumph. For the present, however, he preferred to keep that most final of foes as far away as possible.

"Horrible way to die," he said softly.

The same way Jaybel and Gwynn were killed, said a voice from nowhere. Although the sound still irritated him, Orlando had already adjusted to the macabre intonations that came from empty air. It was amazing to him how quickly the old ways of thinking returned. Indeed, even as that thought crossed his mind, he realized he had subconsciously drawn Talon from its scabbard. Without the slightest thought, he had made ready to defend himself from Jolind's attacker.

"A pretty fierce struggle," said Orlando, examining the disturbed earth around the pool of blood and beneath the decapitated body. "But something doesn't make sense. All of these footprints were made by Jolind's sandals. Whomever she was fighting didn't make the faintest impression as he moved about."

Perhaps we're dealing with a doppleganger or other form-shifter. If her killer assumed Jolind's shape, you wouldn't be able to tell one set of prints from another.

"I doubt it," responded the warrior. He tilted his head to one side, and then to the other. "No, the positioning is pretty clear. Only one person made these prints. What about the undead? Remember that vampire we tracked down near Dragonspear? He didn't leave footprints, throw a shadow, or make any sound when he moved." As soon as he mentioned that adventure, he wished he hadn't. It was in the ancient crypt where the vampire's coffin had been hidden that Lelanda found the mysterious shroud of shadows.

Possible, responded the enigmatic shadows of the garden, but unlikely. This place is pretty heavily warded against intrusion by the undead and other unnatural creatures. If the killer is something like that, he'd have to be extremely powerful to enter the tower. For our sakes I'd prefer to believe that isn't the answer.

Orlando said no more for several minutes. Instead of allowing dark thoughts to dominate his mind, he forced his attention back to the matter at hand. With measured steps, he walked to and fro around the area, using his experience in combat to piece together this puzzle, whose pieces had been scattered in the darkness of the previous night.

After a time, he noticed something and reached into a beautiful but painfully prickly shrub. Cursing and wriggling, he pulled back his arm and drew out a slender, wooden rod some three feet long. Covered in a gleaming white lacquer, it was painfully cold to the touch. From past experience, however, he knew that it was warmer than it should be.

What have you found? inquired the stillest part of the garden.

On some level, Orlando realized it wasn't the fact that he couldn't see Lelanda that bothered him most. It was the spectral nature of her voice while she wore the shroud. There was too much of death and darkness in this place already.

Orlando could stand no more of this one-sided conversation. "Take off that damned shroud, and I'll show you!" he hissed.

Almost at once, the shadow of a pear tree lightened and the elegant sorceress was standing beside him. She quickly complied with his request, making the hostility in his voice seem suddenly unnecessary.

"I'm sorry," Orlando said softly, "but you have no idea how quickly that thing gets on your nerves." He expected her to argue the point, just as she would have in the past. To his surprise, her response was quite civil.

"No," she answered, "I suppose I don't. You see, it's been a very long time since I've had a traveling companion. I've gotten rather used to wearing the shroud all the time. I'll try not to use it unless it's an emergency."

There was a brief pause, a moment of still contrast to the violence that had unfolded around them. Orlando searched for something to say, but failed.

Lelanda seemed only slightly more at ease, picking up the frayed threads of conversation. "I asked you what you had found," she reminded him.

"Looks like a piece of that staff Jolind used to carry with her; feels like it too, almost as cold as those blizzards it could summon up."

Lelanda tilted her head and looked at the broken staff. Her lips pursed as she considered the broken end and several places along its length where something had cut deeply into it. "There was some pretty powerful magic woven into this thing. It wouldn't be easy to break. The weapon that hacked these notches out of it and finally broke it must have been every bit as powerful. That doesn't bode well for our future."

Silence fell upon the garden again. Orlando went back to fishing through the shrubs, eventually finding the other section of Jolind's staff.

Lelanda examined the head, looking into the druid's eyes as if she might read the woman's dying thoughts. Then she walked a distance toward Orlando and called to him. He met her halfway between the shrubs and the fallen body.

"We've learned a little bit from an examination of the area and the body, but Jolind can tell us more."

"Necromancy?" asked Orlando, the word sounding just as bitter as it tasted in his mouth. She nodded. He growled. "I suppose there's no choice. Get it over with."

"I'll have to…"

"I know," he said.

Two steps brought the witch to the edge of the bloody pool, another to the place where Jolind's severed head had come to land. She looked back at Orlando, flashed him an uncomfortable smile, and raised the hood of the shroud above her head. Instantly, it became difficult for the warrior to focus his eyes on her. Even knowing where she had been standing only a few seconds earlier, he could discern nothing but the faintest impression of the shrouded figure.

The magical energies of death and darkness answered Lelanda's urging. She spoke words of power whose sounds had no meaning to Orlando's untrained ears. He felt the strange tugging of death at his spirit and knew that something stood nearby, hungering for the taste of his soul, contained only by the power of Lelanda's will. If her concentration failed, the consequences could well be disastrous. Then, with a cry of agony from the unseen mage, the spell was completed.

Orlando steeled his nerve as the eyes on Jolind's severed head snapped open. The thin-lipped mouth did likewise, and a hissing, hollow scream filled the garden. Unable to stand the sight, Orlando turned his head away. He felt the need to vomit, but retained control of his traumatized body by remembering that a deadly enemy might lurk nearby.

Jolind, said the spectral necromancer, can you hear me?

"Yesss," responded an empty, lifeless voice. "Who are you? Your voice is familiar… but distant."

Jolind, this is Lelanda. I'm here with Orlando. We've come to help you.

At that, the disembodied head released a humorless, rasping laugh. "You're a little late for that, old friend."

Orlando's nerve buckled, but did not fail him.

I know. We're sorry. But we want to find the person who did this to you. He murdered Jaybel and Gwynn, too. Can you help us? Did you recognize your killer?

"Yes, I know who killed me," whispered Jolind.

Then tell me, Jolind. Be quick; the spell is failing fast, urged Lelanda.

Orlando couldn't decide which was more macabre, the living but unseen spirit of the wizard or the dead, but substantial head of the druid.

"Kesmarex," hissed the head as the eyes slipped quietly shut and the jaw went slack. The spell had ended, and the spirit of the druid had gone to rest with those of her ancestors.

Orlando hoped she would find peace there. In his heart, he said a last farewell to the woman who had meant so much to him so long ago. It seemed a crime to have drifted away from her. He wondered what mysteries had died with her. A single tear slipped down his bronze cheek.

Kesmarex? said the witch, slipping the hood of the shroud from around her locks and emerging beside the fallen druid. "Who is that?"

"It's not a who," said Orlando. "It's a what. That was the name given to Shandt's battle-axe by the dwarves who forged it. It mean's something like 'Vengeance of the King,' but the words don't translate perfectly into our language."

"But Shandt is dead," said the witch, her voice trailing off into a haunting silence.

"I know." Orlando exhaled. "He couldn't have survived." After a moment of reflection, he continued. "Tell me more about the wards around this place. Just how certain are you an undead creature couldn't have gotten in here…?"