A Bad Spell in Yurt - Wizard of Yurt - 1 (29 page)

position, as long as you live you can do good and you can sin, and your soul wil be judged accordingly."

"Or wil I maybe never die again? Doesn't the Bible say that, after Lazarus was brought back to life, he became immortal?"

This time he laughed. "You're not Lazarus. Besides, that story isn't in the Bible, which only tel s us that Christ raised him. It's the kind of story young priests like to tel , but it's not true. Al of us are going to die, and you're not an exception."

He smiled cheerful y, as though he had just said something very comforting; and in a way he had. He went out as Gwen came in with my second breakfast.

She hurried away without a word, and when I heard a step outside a few minutes later, I assumed Joachim was returning, having forgotten something. "Come in!" I cal ed, when the step seemed to hesitate.

My door swung open, but it was not the chaplain. It was two wizards, one in a tal red hat and the other with piercing blue eyes and an enormous white beard: Zahlfast and the Master of the wizards' school. "May we indeed come in?"

V

"Yes, yes, come in," I said, flabbergasted. I struggled to raise myself from the bed, to make the wizards the ful bow, but fel back without success. "What are you two doing here?"

They entered in a stately manner, closed the door, and found chairs. "The supernatural influence is gone, I note," said Zahlfast. "We saw the remains of the dragon's carcass down by the edge of the forest as we flew in, and then your constable told us you'd overcome a demon! He took us for an escorted tour of the cel ars, including the hole he said the demon made when it returned to hel ."

"The hole?" I had no idea what he was talking about.

"It's at the very end of the cel ars," said Zahlfast soberly, "a black hole about two feet across, and it's stil smoking. When you look down, you can't see anything, only darkness so black it's almost solid, and when you drop something down, you can't hear it hit. We put a triple pentagram around it. As you know, nothing should come back up unless summoned, but it seemed to make your constable feel better, and we wanted to save you the trouble. He plans to cover everything over."

That sounded like an excel ent plan to me.

"Now," said the Master, "could you tel us exactly what's been happening?"

I told them, although when I had left the City for Yurt and imagined some day tel ing the Master of my triumphs, I had not imagined doing so sitting up in bed in yel ow pajamas. Besides, it wasn't a triumph I was describing.

"So I guess it's al right now," I finished, "even though I'l know, if it ever happens again, to get a demonology expert right away. Someone else, more expert, might have been able to negotiate a settlement with the demon without having to offer it his own life. But what are you doing here? Did the chaplain send you a message?"

"No," said Zahlfast, "we got no message, unless that was you cal ing a month ago. The phone rang at the school, yet there was no one on the line. When I heard about it, at first I just thought someone had cal ed us by mistake, or was doing so for a joke, but then I remembered you and your far-seeing but inaudible telephones."

"That was me," I said. "The demon had grown bold and was teasing us by running around the castle in daylight, while the chaplain was away. It was afraid of the chaplain."

Zahlfast and the Master looked at each other, the same slightly skeptical look they had given each other when I told them Joachim had miraculously brought me back from the dead. "I want to show you these telephones, Master," said Zahlfast. He reached one of them down from their shelf and spoke the name attached to the wizards' school instrument.

This time it worked perfectly. The base lit up, as it always had, but when the tiny figure of a young wizard picked up the receiver, he could hear Zahlfast.

They spoke for several minutes. "Yes, that's right," said Zahlfast. "So we'l probably be home tomorrow or maybe the day after. No, there's no problem now."

"Congratulations, young wizard," said the Master, his frost blue eyes sparkling. "You've made an original contribution to wizardry and wil probably have your name in the new edition of
Ancient and Modern Necromancy.
Not bad, for someone not yet thirty."

"It works!" I gasped. "I'd told the constable an anti-telephonic demonic influence was affecting my phones, and I was actual y right!"

"You'l have to teach us that spel ," said Zahlfast.

I thought rueful y that they seemed more impressed by my telephones than my return to life. "But what are you two doing here?" I asked, returning to my original question, wondering if I could possibly reconstruct the sequence of spel s I had tried on the telephones over the past few months. "Were you just so busy it took you a month to get here after my cal ?"

"Wel ," said Zahlfast, looking surprisingly embarrassed, "at first I didn't think anything of it, though I should have realized immediately it was you asking for help. It wasn't until we heard about the dragon going over on Christmas day that I began to think there might be something seriously wrong in Yurt.

"First we got telephone cal s from the wizards in courts with telephones, and then the next day the messages started coming in from the pigeon relay station. When we plotted them on a map, it became clear that the dragon had been heading for Yurt, for no one south of Yurt had seen it."

"And even then," said the Master with a chuckle, "we had an idea that you might be a competent enough wizard to handle a dragon, although we probably should have considered the likelihood of a demon as wel ."

"Didn't you," I said accusingly, "even for a minute, suspect that I was practicing black magic and might have brought the dragon down for my own purposes?"

Zahlfast blushed, which I had never seen him do before.

"Not at al ," said the Master. "At most, one or two people had momentary doubts. Besides, we knew there was another wizard here, the retired wizard of Yurt, who could help you."

"He did help me with the dragon. I never could have kil ed it without him. But what do you know about the old wizard?"

"I've only met him once," said the Master, "this summer. That's when he came to the City to try to find out about you."

"He came to the City?" I cried in amazement. "You didn't tel me this, Zahlfast."

"That's because I only found out about it myself the other day."

The Master laughed. "He said when he arrived that he would talk to the head of the school or to no one, so he had to talk to me."

"But I always thought he didn't want to have anything to do with the wizards' school."

"I don't think he ever does. But he wanted to know about
you.
He said he'd left you sleeping among his herbs for the whole day, while he flew down to the City. Said he'd never been to the school before, hoped he'd never come there again, but he thought this was the fastest way to find out about someone he cal ed a 'young whippersnapper.' Took me a few minutes to realize he meant you."

"So what did you tel him?" I asked, feeling highly inadequate. Once again, everyone else seemed to know my business much better than I did.

"I told him you had flair and promise, if you ever applied yourself. And from the look of the telephones, it's clear that you have. To say nothing of kil ing a dragon and defeating a demon, even if you nearly got yourself kil ed in the process."

"Did get myself kil ed," I corrected, but they pretended not to notice.

Zahlfast stood up. "You look tired. I think we should let you rest."

"Just don't leave Yurt yet," I said. "Most of the guest chambers are stil sound, in spite of the dragon. And you'l want to try our cook's excel ent holiday meals. I hear they had to leave the boar at the duchess's castle, but I'm quite sure she wouldn't have left the Christmas cookies."

"We'l stay tonight at least," said the Master. "Sleep now, and we'l talk more later."

I stil did not feel strong enough to climb the chapel stairs the next morning, but the fol owing morning, leaning on the constable's arm, I ascended by the light of my own magic lamps. The others respectful y stood aside for me and made sure I was comfortably seated in the front pew. Joachim led the thanksgiving service, and while I had good reason to be highly thankful myself, I was rather surprised to see that everyone else in the castle was also delighted to have me alive. Even Dominic smiled at me, and the queen gave me a radiant look that made my heart turn over.

The winter sun burned red through the chapel's stained glass. Listening to Joachim read from the Bible, I decided I was not worthy either of a miracle on my behalf or of the friendship of al these excel ent people. When the congregation sang the final hymn, I did not trust my voice and stood silent.

Once Joachim had pronounced the final benediction, every person there, from King Haimeric down to the stable boys, came up to me. Most said a few words, of how glad and grateful they were to have me again with them, though a few just touched my arm hesitantly and turned away as though overcome with profound awe and wonder. Not daring to speak, I nodded at al of them and tried to smile.

But my foray into sentimentality was cut short by talking to Zahlfast and the Master of the school. They had ended up staying two nights in Yurt, but this morning they were ready to go, waiting only until I returned from the chapel to say goodbye. We stood by the castle gate, talking for a minute, with me wel wrapped up in two coats and a muffler. The two wizards were the only people in the castle who had not been at chapel service.

"We're delighted you're feeling better," said Zahlfast briskly. "Now that your telephones are working, I hope you realize you should cal us if you run into any other problems this serious. I hadn't realized you'd take my warning against cal ing the school for every little problem so literal y!"

I nodded glumly.

"Though I must say I should have credited you with more courage than I did," Zahlfast continued. "Most wizards wouldn't have gone down alone to face a demon, even those who did a lot better on the demonology exam than I happen to know you did. I hope you aren't going to turn into one of those rash young wizards who think of themselves of indestructible."

There didn't seem to be much danger of that. I had never expected to have a second chance at life, and I knew I would never get a third.

"Just remember you're a wizard," said the old Master. "Don't start relying too much on the priests."

"This makes it al very symmetrical," I said. "The bishop is worried about my possible evil influence on the chaplain."

The two glanced at each other. "Coming close to death doesn't seem to have changed you very much," said Zahlfast.

I had noticed the same thing myself. One might have hoped that if I came back from the dead I'd come back better, but I was too happy to be back at al to care.

The old Master looked at me with a twinkle in his eye. "I hope you realize we are very glad to have you stil alive. In a few weeks, after al of you here have had a chance to repair some of the damage to the castle, we'l send up some wizards from the technical division. They'l take down the details of how you put the spel s on your telephones so we can start putting far-seeing attachments on other instruments."

After watching them fly away, I sat on a bench in the courtyard for a few minutes to catch my breath, wondering how soon the new edition of
Ancient and Modern Necromancy
would come out and what it would say about me. I hoped it wouldn't say that I had made a bril iant invention but that no one could ever duplicate it because I hadn't kept good notes. The sunlight was almost warm here in the shelter of the castle wal , even though there was stil a dusting of snow on the ground, left behind by the stable boys' brooms. But in ten minutes, as soon as my strength returned enough to walk again, I went inside in search of Joachim.

He was sitting in his room, finishing breakfast. "Thank you again for interceding with the saints for me," I said, sitting down and breathing hard. "I've just been seeing off the wizards; they're on their way back to the school. But I wanted to find out if you'd spoken to the Lady Maria."

"Yes, I spoke to her yesterday. I told you I would."

When he seemed unwil ing to continue, I said with an exasperated laugh, "What is this, Joachim, the secrets of the human soul that a priest can never reveal? Since I realized she'd sold her soul to the devil long before either you or she did, and then got myself kil ed negotiating for her soul, I should at least be able to find out what she's going to do now that her soul is safe again."

Joachim looked at me gravely a moment, then slowly started to smile. "You're right this time; but I may have difficulty explaining this to the bishop.

"She had worked much of it out for herself already," he continued after a brief pause. "So when I sent her a message to come to my room, she had a good guess what I was going to say. She seemed to have the strangest idea, however, of how to act in such a situation. She came in as though she were a naughty schoolgirl caught in some mischief."

I could have told her this would never work with Joachim. It wouldn't even work with me.

"But it al seemed to be a facade, behind which she was genuinely terrified and repentant at what she had done. Even though she kept referring to the demon as a 'little magic man,' she realized how close she had come to damning her soul for eternity. She agreed at once when I explained to her that a few years of vain youth and beauty in this world could never be worth an eternity in hel . She had also had a chance to realize that asking to 'see a dragon' was not the innocuous request she had original y imagined.

"In fact," continued Joachim, looking somewhat uncomfortable, "once she stopped pretending she thought of it as a naughty joke gone wrong, she broke down and sobbed. I was trying to impress on her the need to beg God's forgiveness, and she kept on asking if I thought you would ever forgive her."

"I hope you told her I would."

"I told her that you were not angry with her personal y, that you had been wil ing to die to save both her and the kingdom because you were fol owing the high purposes of God."