LITMIR.BIZ

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happened here happened more than a year ago.’

      Amirantha’s companion, the old warrior Brandos, knelt, complaining, ‘Ah. My knees aren’t what they once were.’ He peered at the stones around the broken remnants of a wooden table. ‘Fair tore this place apart, it did.’

      Looking at the Demon Master, Pug asked, ‘What do you think happened?’

      Amirantha, Warlock of the Satumbria, considered the question. He was garbed in plainer fashion than he had affected when Pug had first met him. He was still vain enough to trim his beard daily and make sure his flowing dark hair was combed, but his florid robes with their golden and silver threading lay in a clothes chest at the old castle on Sorcerer’s Isle that served as the headquarters for the Conclave of Shadows. Unlike the mummery he had employed to flummox local nobles and convince them to pay him gold to chase away the very demons he summoned, his work with the Conclave had involved real danger and travelling under harsh conditions. Now he wore simple tunics and trousers and rugged leather boots.

      After thinking about the question for a moment, Amirantha said, ‘I think the object of our search conducted his last summoning here.’ He pointed to a distant corner and Magnus turned his hand in that direction, throwing light upon it.

      The tall, white-haired magician, Pug’s sole surviving child, moved closer until they could see clearly what Amirantha had noticed. Outlined more darkly than the rock against which it lay was the form of a man, crouching. Brandos ran his hand over the surface of the cave wall. ‘It’s as if he was turned to ash and pounded into the rock itself.’

      The old fighter had been with Amirantha for most of his life, having been a boy when the Warlock had taken him under his care. Now looking older than his mentor, he turned to face Pug and the others. ‘I’ve seen this before, but I can’t remember where.’

      ‘I do,’ said Amirantha. ‘Years ago, when you were a child, it happened at one of the very first summonings you were party to, remember?’ When it became clear that Brandos didn’t, he prompted, ‘The cat?’

      ‘Oh!’ responded Brandos as comprehension dawned. ‘Yes, the cat!’

      Amirantha said, ‘When Brandos was a child and came to live with me, I thought having a boy along would make me look even more credible as I came to rid a town or village of a demon. After all, what sort of mountebank would lovingly care for a child?’

      ‘Your kind,’ said Brandos with a rueful smile.

      ‘The cat?’ prompted Pug.

      ‘Yes, the cat. It’s a long tale, but the part that applies here is that my friend, when he was a boy, managed to interrupt one of my summonings at the worst possible moment. He was annoying a cat we had around the house and it fled into my chamber … well, instead of the tractable creature I expected, one showed up I’d never seen before or since. A massive winged monster that spewed fire of an incredible heat.’

      ‘Nearly burnt the entire house down,’ added Brandos. Pug and Magnus could tell the story had been told enough times that it had become one of those family lore events that was treasured as much for the entertainment value as it had caused outrage and consternation at the time it had happened.

      ‘Unfortunately for the cat, but fortunately for me, the creature’s attention seem drawn to movement. I was motionless, in the midst of my summoning, while the cat was scampering, stopping only long enough to hiss at the demon.

      ‘The demon made short work of it, and I was able to banish it back to the demon realm, but not before, as Brandos said, a rather large fire had broken out in my chambers.

      ‘When we went back the next day to see what might be salvaged, the outline of the cat could clearly be seen against the wall, much as you see here.’

      ‘Another accident?’ asked Pug, his brow furrowing. ‘Or another attempt by those behind the Demon War to destroy anyone who might eventually oppose them?’

      Looking around the cave, Amirantha said, ‘We can only speculate.’

      Pug’s frustration was surfacing. Since the advent of demon incursions into Midkemia, and especially after the events several years earlier at the abandoned Keshian fortress above the Valley of Lost Men, he was balked at every turn as he attempted to understand what was threatening his world. Something unprecedented was occurring in the demon realm, which Pug and his companions referred to as the Fifth Circle, and while evidence of that upheaval and its potential danger to Midkemia was scant and infrequent, Pug knew that even though the Demon King Dahun had been destroyed attempting to enter this realm, they were still far from safe.

      In fact, one topic of conversation revisited on a regular basis with the Warlock was what could cause a powerful demon lord to flee from that realm into this one; not coming at the head of an army as had happened in the past, to conquer and destroy, but sneaking in disguised as a human, seeking to find a safe place to hide.

      To hide from what?

      That was always the question they were left with.

      With a last look around the cave, Pug said, ‘Magnus?’

      Understanding his father’s wishes, the younger magician motioned for the others to stand close to him and a moment later they were all back in the large entrance hall on Sorcerer’s Island.

      It was early spring and the weather was still cold and damp. ‘Have you ever considered rebuilding that lovely villa?’ Brandos asked lightly.

      Pug shot him a sharp glance. The remnants of the sprawling estate that had housed his school of magic had been the scene of his worst defeat at the hands of those seeking to destroy the Conclave, and it had cost him the lives of his wife, son, and daughter-in-law, as well as over two dozen students. The charred timbers and stones still standing were being quickly overgrown with vines and wild grasses. In not too many more years it would be difficult for anyone chancing on the site to recognize it as the once-proud home of a thriving community.

      Without further comment Pug turned and walked away to speak with Jason, the magician who acted as the castle’s reeve, the man who was responsible for the fortification and those living within it while Pug and Magnus were absent.

      Brandos glanced at Magnus who shrugged slightly. If the white-haired magician understood his father’s reason for keeping the villa abandoned, he wasn’t sharing it. At first it had simply been a matter of expediency, in case enemies were spying on them, suggesting that the Conclave had been destroyed and that only a few refugees were left huddling for safety in the old castle on the bluffs overlooking the Bitter Sea. Which, Brandos conceded silently to himself, wasn’t that far from the truth.

      But the Conclave had endured, even thrived, though it was now scattered across the entire span of the world, with pockets of research and teaching located in isolated spots, while many who worked for the organization did so in the hearts of power, in various courts and capitals.

      Amirantha watched Magnus follow his father and turned to his old companion. ‘You still have a knack for it, don’t you?’

      ‘Apparently,’ said Brandos. He let out a long sigh. ‘I’ve seen it before and I know you have. He’s hanging on by sheer will and there’s no joy in him.’

      Amirantha took a moment, then looked around. ‘Could there be any joy here?’

      Both men knew the answer already. They had supped with others from the Conclave here many times, a warm fire in the hearth, chatting about this and that, but on none of those occasions had there been anything close to a sense of celebration. When a child was born, it was somewhere else. When the great holidays of Midwinter Day or Midsummer Day, the Planting Celebration, or the Harvest Festival came along they were largely ignored save perhaps for a minor remark.

      Of all in the Conclave, there was only a handful who resided permanently here in the castle. Among those who stayed were Amirantha, Brandos, and Brandos’s wife Samantha. Jason, the castle’s caretaker, Rose, his wife and a magician in her own right; and a very young apprentice, Maloc. And of course Pug and Magnus. There were always

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