Vicious Magick (25 page)

Like everywhere else, Hell has its own class
system. Low Hell houses your run-of-the mill damned, your petty
thieves, rapists, murderers, tax dodgers, prostitutes, and beggars.
High Hell is reserved for the worst of the worst: dictators,
jurisprudes, philosophers, and people who picked on you when you
were a child.

Zanther and Madra sit at a table at the pub,
stealing the occasional glance at the weapon shop across the street
as they sip their drinks.

“You know,” Madra says, “Novanostrum’s really
falling for that girl. What do you think of her?”

“Something’s a little off about her. For
someone accosted by demons six hours ago, she seems pretty full of
pluck.”

“Maybe she’s just dumb.”

“Living all alone smack dab in the middle of
the Mucklands? There’s something going on there, and I don’t think
I wanna find out what it is.”

“Hey guys!” Risma shouts as she and
Novanostrum walk towards them and sit at their table.

A barwench takes their drink order and
scurries off to fill it.

“They still over there?” Novanostrum
asks.

“Yep. Maybe they’re open all night. You know
how these Darrinians are…” Zanther says.

“Nah, they’ll lock up and head out in a
little while. Just have to be patient.”

“So how are we getting in? Or are we just
gonna smash and grab?”

“Here’s the thing, with this watch, I can
slow down time for about thirty seconds, or completely stop it for
ten. It takes about an hour for the magick to recharge. Either way,
that’s not going to be enough time for a good, solid heist. We need
a plan. Any ideas?”

Risma eyes the sewer grate at the side of the
road. “What if we come up from below? This city has all kinds of
tunnels running under it.”

Madra smiles. “Going through the sewer? You
know, Risma, this really sounds like a job for the men. We should
keep watch from over here.”

Zanther narrows his eyes at them.

A Contemporary Guide to Witching and Wizarding, Part
I

So your parents sent you to the Academy, and
you’re pretty much freaking out because you don’t know any magic.
Relax, we’ll walk you through this. Your first question is
probably, ‘What is magick and how do I do it?’ The complicated
answer is that magick is the effectual demonstration of a wizard’s
hypotemporal volition realized through the production of unusual
natural phenomena, usually chemical and meteorological processes.
Too hard? Well, let’s put it like this: magick happens because you
want it to.

But that’s not to say that just because you
want magick to happen it will. There’s more to it. Let’s use a
lightning bolt as an example. Now, the odds of a bolt of lightning
striking your enemy, especially out of a clear blue sky, are
astronomically small. Out of a million possible near-futures, maybe
one will have this outcome. So the point of magick is to choose
your desired immediate future from the range of all possible
futures. Hmm…let’s see if there’s another way to put this.

Take a gross of children, in twenty-four
years, how many of them will be jurisprudes? Maybe one or two. But,
they won’t
randomly
become jurisprudes, only the ones who go
through law school and pass their Executioner’s Exam will make it.
So, we can see that there is a connection between this point in
time called ‘now’ and the future we desire. We need to take steps
to produce our desired result. Magick works in this way. It’s
highly unlikely that lightning will strike our enemies, but by
focusing our energies on both the potential future where it does
and the past events that will need to have occurred to make this
possible, it can happen.

This textbook will teach you the necessary
steps to successfully completing a spell: Clearing your mind,
Focusing on your desired result, Identifying the necessary past
states required, and Connecting your desired future with the
required past.

Now, before you flip ahead to the sixth
chapter and start zapping your enemies with fireballs and
lightning, there are a few warnings, so pay attention. Never do
magick while drunk. Never do magick while underwater. Never attempt
to do magick in the presence of Moonmight stones. Never attempt to
do magick while riding on a moving vehicle, such as a skyship or
horse-propelled wagon. Lastly, never, never ever, NEVER attempt a
spell whose result you are unsure of, including but not limited to:
the summoning of unknown beings, the creation of portals leading to
unknown places, and spells which will make you more attractive to
the opposite sex (Arcturus Mystifer, Maximagus of the Fourth
Circle, died during a marathon bedroom session forced upon him by a
gang of milkmaids).

The burly man turns his key in the lock and
plods into the night. Novanostrum sees this from a nearby alley,
nods at Zanther, and they drop through the metal hatch and into the
darkness. The sewer is just a tunnel with a four-foot-wide ditch
running through the middle of it. Without a staff, Novanostrum
can’t provide any light, but some lights from the street above
trickle down through various grates. Down unseen paths, they can
hear the sound of tiny, padded footsteps and skittering.

“How do we know this even connects with the
weapon shop?” Zanther asks.

“They have to drain a lot of water forging
those longknives and spears, they must have a fairly large drain
somewhere in the smithery. I’m thinking it’s right around…here,”
Novanostrum says, pointing directly overhead towards a large metal
grate.

“Well, how do we get it open?”

“Give me a boost and I’ll show you.”

Zanther cups his hands together and
Novanostrum puts a foot on them, lifting the grate out of place and
getting a handhold on the floor above. He pulls himself up, and
reaches an arm down for Zanther to follow.

“Guess they’re not too concerned about
security,” Zanther says.

“Not when everyone’s convinced the only
criminals are foreigners.”

Zanther smiles. “There might be a little
truth to that, though.”