Shards of Broken Magic
Written for genrechallenge. The genre was sword and sorcery, but i think it’s more sorcery than sword. It was inspired by a dream I had one night – the whole dream was as vivid as this, even more so probably. The title was a last minute addition and possibly a little over the top.
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I heard the screams from outside but paid no heed to them. Research did not stop because of a few unforeseen consequences; I saw no reason to go out and help put right the confusion I had caused. There would be time enough for that when the guards came banging on the door to my tower.
A quick glance away from my spell books reminded me of the price I had paid to get this far. Only shards of wood and tatters of cloth remained of my beautiful furnishings, the plastered walls had been battered back to rough stone and a chill wind blew through the jagged cracks in the windows.
The view out the window stole my attention for a moment. Dark clouds covered the sky. Slate grey, violet and navy stained the mid-day firmament. Crackles of blue and white lightning laced the clouds, scuttling over them like spiders over a catch. So much power, mine for the taking, if only I knew how to harvest it.
I turned back to the pages of my grimoire and saw the delicately inscribed words, but my mind refused to make sense of them. Letters formed patterns I recognised but some magic, greater than I, kept the knowledge from me. This book was locked and, in the back of my mind, I knew why but I did not want to admit to myself that I had fallen from the virtuous ways. I continued scanning the pages and they continued to elude me.
Thudding boomed through the tower, startling me away from my studies. I jumped back from the lectern, a whirling ball of lightening at the ready to defend me. The noise sounded like someone bashing on the door with a hammer. Striding to the edge of my spell platform, I looked down at the entrance to the tower.
The door burst open, wooden splinters spraying into the atrium. Dust and woodchips exploded out as the door keeled over, ripped clean off its hinges. By every right, I should have stopped whoever had the temerity to do such a thing to my property, but I stayed my hand. I did not want to add to the violence I could hear from outside.
The dust cleared around the doorway to reveal a warrior, cloaked in chain-mail and wielding a sword as tall as its owner. She leapt across the broken door and paced up the curving stairs towards me. Let her come. Her strength and brawn meant nothing here.
“Mage,” she said. “You have to stop.”
One hard glance from me told her everything she needed to know.
“You do not know what you are doing,” the warrior said.
“I have paid too much to stop now,” I said.
The bare walls and broken shards of my tower mocked me. This spell had the power to put everything back the way it should be, to remake my home and everything in it.
“The price will continue to rise,” the warrior said. “Can you not hear the death screams from outside?”
I heard the screams, but I did not want to register what they meant.
“You don’t want these lives on your conscience. You are a good person, mage. I do not want to harm you.”
Formidable as her sword was, it could not stop me. But her words held power enough. Innocent people died because of me. Things should not be this way. I worked for good, people came to me because they needed help.
*
“What am I doing?” I whispered.
I glanced at the pages of the tome before me and suddenly the words made sense. No longer did my selfish desires cloud my magic. My intent was reparation for all the suffering my errant will had caused. I had the command now to break up the energy I had called.
“Stand back, warrior,” I said.
My mind split. It was in the words of the book in front of me and it was in the lightening far above, discharging it and calming it. Fire and ice danced from the pages of the spell book. Orange, red, blue and purple looped and curved in huge arches of magic that shot from the illustrated words. White light stabbed skyward and with one titanic crack the magic vanished. The clouds vaporised, leaving nothing but pure blue sky in their wake.
Silence. Not a breath of wind nor screech of a bird. And then, the sound of weeping.
“It is over,” I said.
I turned to the warrior. She nodded.
But we were both wrong. Stumbling out into the bright light of day showed us how it was just the beginning. People stood over fallen friends, bloody weapons still in their hands, and watched the bodies shudder and shake. Eyelids fluttered and lips twitched, and slowly the bodies started to rise. Pale faces held looks of bewilderment, their fully black eyes staring out at the world. I did not know if they comprehended what they saw, for their expressions did not change, not even when friends approached them with half-sincere smiles. The other half of their smiles was fear.
The pale-skinned once-dead held out their hands in supplication. They were just as afraid and confused as the survivors. I had brought this to be. My spell had put everything back the way it should be, just as I had asked it to, but I had not factored in the power I’d had at my command. The power over death itself.
*
My back hit the rough stones of the tower walls. My eyes looked out at the thaumaturgy I had wrought, but I did not see the physical world, I saw only my failure. These strange creatures with their fey black eyes, all glancing at me with hope and anguish, I could not help them. So I cowered against the walls of my tower and hid my face from the sight in front of me. There would be other days to face this calamity, but for now I needed to hide away and find my inner strength once again.