Shadow Prowler

10. A BLIZZARD BLOWS UP

There was a cold wind sweeping down the street and Valder breathed on his hands in their thin gloves in an attempt to warm his fingers.

Immediately after returning to Avendoom after a long journey to the Lakeside Empire, he hadn’t even been given time to take his boots off before he was summoned to an urgent session of the Council of the Archmagicians of the Order. And so he had set out for the tower with a perfectly clear conscience, still wearing the clothes in which he had returned to the capital, and disregarding official formality.

Valder was the youngest archmagician in the entire history of the Order of Valiostr. He had received his staff with four rings of rank at the age of only thirty, far outstripping even the present master of the Order, Panarik, who had become an archmagician at the age of forty-five. Both his friends and his enemies predicted that Valder would receive the master’s staff in the none-too-distant future. He himself, however, loathed the intrigues that accompanied the struggle for power, preferring work and the special assignments that Panarik gave him. This had earned Valder the nickname of the Sullen Archmagician, since he was absent from most of the Councils of the Order.

The sky was darkening rapidly, and twilight had advanced. It had grown colder. The crust of snow crunched sharply under the soles of his boots. His nose was beginning to tingle unpleasantly.

Winter had come early this year. From the beginning of November, the clouds arriving from the Desolate Lands had brought snow, and the winds arriving from beyond the Needles of Ice had brought cold. But by mid-January Old Man Winter had grown tired of raging and decided to take a break, freeing Avendoom for several days from the heavy icy shackles of unrelenting frost. And now, in comparison with what it had been like at the beginning of December, the weather in the capital could actually be called warm.

The magician turned onto the Street of the Magicians, and then someone called his name.

“Master Valder! Master Valder! Wait!”

He looked round unhurriedly toward the sound and saw a teenaged boy hurrying after him. It was Gani, the archmagician’s pupil, his face bright red from running.

The magician had found the boy in one of the poor villages of Miranueh, when he was on his way back to Valiostr from the Empire. The orphan had proved to have a gift. He had magic sleeping inside him, glittering faintly, like the spark in a drowsy campfire. But if good kindling was thrown onto that spark, it would turn into a conflagration. And Valder was intending to awaken that flame in Gani in the near future.

The archmagician of the Order had not previously had any pupils, but so far the youth had entirely justified all the hopes placed in him. Bright and diligent, he easily remembered the initial spells for working with Air-the most inconstant, complex, and capricious of the elements. Yes indeed-he began with Air-although all the pupils in the order usually started with the stable element of Earth.

“Master, you forgot this!” said the youth, holding out a long, white bundle.

“What is it?” the archmagician asked with a frown of surprise.

“Your staff, of course. You forgot it. I thought you might need it.”

Valder laughed. He had deliberately not taken the symbol of magical power with him, but evidently the gods were against it and had found someone to return it to the hands of the “forgetful” magician.

All right. It would be useful. At least the old fogies wouldn’t whine that he didn’t respect the traditions of the Order. Besides, the staff was merely a concession to tradition and nothing more. It carried no power within itself. When he was traveling, the “sullen” archmagician usually left it at the very bottom of his luggage.

“But why did you wrap it in a cloth?” Valder asked peevishly as he took the bundle.

“So the guards wouldn’t stop me,” said Gani, sniffing with his frozen nose. “They’re blind, of course, but they probably wouldn’t let through a boy with an archmagician’s staff.”

“Thank you, Gani. That’s very helpful.”

“Great. But can I go with you, Master Valder? I’d really like to get a look at the tower.”

“You’ll have plenty of time to look as much as you like. I’m going to the Council, and that’s only for archmagicians. Off you go home. It’s getting dark already. Will you find the way back?”

“Of course!” the lad said, nodding and casting a regretful glance at the Tower of the Order soaring up above the roofs of the houses.

Valder tucked the bundle under his arm and strode off rapidly along the Street of the Magicians toward the tower. Avendoom was slowly sinking into the sleep of a long winter night. The radiance of the Northern Crown lit up the velvet sky. Its brightest star glowed with a cold, ominous light.

The archmagician could watch the stars for hours at a time. He felt that they made Siala seem a lot more beautiful and pure than it really was.

A minute later the street led the magician out onto the square where the old Tower of the Order soared upward in solitary splendor. The wind seemed to have gone wild and now it was running riot, picking snow up off the roadway and setting it swirling around in a frenzied white dance. And in addition, hordes of clouds had crept across the sky, concealing the stars, and snow had started falling heavily. He could no longer see the houses on the other side of the street; the wall of white was absolutely impenetrable. That sort of thing often happened in Avendoom. In the blink of an eye beautiful weather was transformed into a genuine nightmare.

However Valder, securely protected by his magic shield, took no notice of this snowy insanity. Quite soon he found himself outside the bronze door and it opened of its own accord, confirming his right to enter the Order’s holy of holies.

“Valder, my old friend!” said an archmagician descending the staircase. “It’s ages since I last saw you.”

The man was leaning on a staff exactly like Valder’s.

“Hello there, Ilio.”

“What have you got in that bundle?”

“Damnation! I completely forgot!” The magician hastily extracted his staff and tossed the piece of cloth on the floor.

Ilio laughed.

“Well, look at you! Zemmel would have a fit if he saw the way you drag the symbol of the Order around. All right, let’s go. The Council’s waiting.”

“What’s happened? I was summoned the moment I got back,” Valder said, climbing up the staircase after his massive friend.

“Panarik and Zemmel have got an idiotic idea into their heads, and we have to put it into practice tonight.”

“An idiotic idea?”

Until that day he had never thought of the two most powerful magicians in the country as idiots.

“Exactly so,” Ilio replied morosely. “Precisely the right word for it. Zemmel’s been digging through the ogres’ old books again-you know yourself that he’s the only one who understands any of their gobbledegook. Well, he’s found a way to stop the Nameless One forever.”

“How?”

“He’s decided to destroy the Kronk-a-Mor that protects the wizard. In my opinion the whole idea’s a load of nonsense. The magic of the ogres is stronger than steel.”

“But-”

“But,” interrupted Ilio, continuing his progress along the winding stairway, “Zemmel has managed to pull the wool over Panarik’s eyes, and even over Elo’s, and that really takes some doing, doesn’t it? So today we have the night of the fools. Get ready for it.”

Valder bit his lip thoughtfully. Persuading the light elf, who was far from fond of Zemmel, would not have been easy. Almost impossible, in fact. But this time the lover of the ogres’ magic had indeed managed the impossible.

“What exactly do you mean?”

“The Order has taken the Horn out of its dusty trunk and decided to work a miracle.”

“I see,” Valder said, chuckling skeptically. “But what has all this to do with me?”

“Oh, come now!” said Ilio, genuinely surprised. “You and I will act as reservoirs of power. Panarik and Zemmel have to draw their energy from somewhere, don’t they? We are the two fools that the Council needed to complete its blissful happiness.”

“Are we the only ones who have been summoned?”

“No,” said Ilio, stopping beside a door encrusted with bluish ogre bone. “Not the only ones. Elo and O’Kart, too.”

“What about Singalus, Artsis, and Didra? Is the performance going to take place without their participation?” Valder asked in amazement.

That would mean that only six out of nine archmagicians of the Order would be involved in this absurd attempt to restrain the Nameless One.

“Singalus is in Isilia. As for Artsis-well, you know how Zemmel feels about our friend…”

“The way an orc feels about a goblin,” Valder said with a dour nod. “That’s a pity; Artsis would have been useful.”

“Who are you telling? I know that. But he ‘could not be found.’ Didra’s in Zagraba, with the dark elves.”

“So six archmagicians are going to destroy the Nameless One?” Valder whispered. “Doubtful, very doubtful. Didn’t Panarik think about calling in the higher-order magicians? Or even the entire Order?”

“He did, but Zemmel convinced him that the six of us could cope.”

“The cretin!”

“Worse than that. You’ve been away for a year and a half, right?”

“Two years.”

“Well, Zemmel spent all that time poring over the books of the ogres. If you ask me, it would be a better idea to stick your head into a giant’s mouth than to read those ancient tomes. He must have completely lost his reason, if he’s decided to mess about with the prohibited shamanism of the ogres.

“By the way,” Ilio said with a smile, “before we go in, would you care to dispose of your shield? That is what I can see glittering, isn’t it?”

Valder had completely forgotten that he was still maintaining the energy of the spell that had protected him against the bad weather.

“Perhaps you ought to remove it,” Ilio suggested good-naturedly. “You know how twitchy O’Kart gets when there are inexplicable energy surges. He’s so paranoid.”

“He’s too suspicious altogether. It’s bad for the health.” Valder snorted, but he removed his defensive shield. At least, as far as Ilio could see, that was what he did. In actual fact, the magician merely “dimmed” the spell by feeding it with a subtle stream of power that only Panarik would be able to detect, and only if he deliberately searched for it. Some strange, childish caprice prompted him to resist Ilio’s friendly suggestion.

The archmagicians entered a spacious round hall illuminated by ordinary torches, in accordance with the prescriptions of the ancient statutes, reinforced by Panarik’s dislike of magical illumination, which made the master’s eyes sting and water.

The flames were burning steadily, and the pale shadows stood on the walls as still as sentries. Imperturbable. Self-assured.

Valder did not like this place-it was always too cold and unwelcoming. Emphatically official.

The walls were patterned with a large number of small lancet windows, glazed with the greenish purplish glass of the dwarves. They offered a fine view of Avendoom at night, since the tower was the highest point in the whole city, even higher than the royal palace. The immense flat mirror fused into the floor in the center of this space reflected imaginary stars and a double moon, even during the daytime. There were nine armchairs with tall backs standing around the mirror. Five of them were empty, four were occupied by archmagicians waiting with patient dignity for the late arrivals.

Ilio and Valder bowed their heads reverently as a sign of respect for their colleagues. Their colleagues replied with gracious nods. Equals greeting equals.

The magicians walked to their places, and Valder had a few seconds to examine these men he had not seen for so long.

Seated directly opposite him was Elo, a light elf with ash-gray hair cut short in the human style and protruding fangs.

Next came two empty armchairs, and then the solemn O’Kart-a short, permanently gloomy native of Filand.

O’Kart was excessively suspicious, always anticipating conspiracies against himself, and in conversation he was excessively sharp, rancorous, and intolerant. There were many who did not like him. But nonetheless, Valder had to admit that his antagonist was a talented magician.

Seated alongside Valder’s adversary was a gaunt individual with gray eyes, a smiling face, and a snub nose. His rather pleasant appearance was spoiled by the bloodless lips and the slim, dry hands with bony fingers.

Archmagician Zemmel was the oldest member present at the Council. His passion was the ogres’ books on shamanism, especially if they dealt with their forbidden battle magic-the Kronk-a-Mor.

Valder did not approve at all of the idea of using the Rainbow Horn to destroy the Nameless One. Hitherto this artifact had only been capable of containing the wizard within the Desolate Lands. What had changed now? How could the Council have agreed to such a risky undertaking without lengthy preparations?

“Glad to see you, my pupil,” said Panarik.

The Master of the Order of Valiostr was the most important and influential figure after the king. At seventy years of age he barely looked fifty.

“And I am glad to see you, my master.”

“Have you been informed what is happening here?”

“Yes, Ilio has informed me. But I cannot see any point in all this.”

“The point is to destroy the Nameless One forever,” Zemmel said severely, looking up from his book.

“At this very moment? This very night?”

“And what do you find so unsuitable about this night?” Elo asked, his fangs flashing.

“Well, if nothing else, the fact that there are only six of us instead of nine.”

“Don’t worry, you won’t have to strain yourself,” Zemmel said with a smile.

“That’s excellent. But I still don’t understand what all the haste is about. The Council is not full. Three members are absent.”

“Not all of us are required. Six is enough.”

“Perhaps so. But why are you so certain that we shall succeed in doing what other magicians of the Order have been unable to do in several centuries?” Valder asked, trying to speak in a calm and friendly manner, although he was very tired after his journey.

“I have been thinking the same thing,” said O’Kart, unexpectedly supporting Valder.

“The magicians of the past did not know what I know,” Zemmel declared weightily. “They did not make the effort to read several important books. It is all here,” he said, slapping the spine of his book with one hand. “The Kronk-a-Mor that protects the Nameless One so securely can be broken by using the Rainbow Horn.”

“But let us not forget,” Valder objected, “that the Horn, like the Kronk-a-Mor, was created by ogres, and we do not know what to expect from it if we start using the artifact at its full power. We still do not know if it is light or evil!”

“What incredible nonsense!” Zemmel snorted in annoyance. He opened the chest standing beside him and took out the magical relic.

The Horn was encrusted with silver, mother-of-pearl, and bluish ogre bone. The power with which it was filled made it tremble-the same power that so reliably held the Nameless One on the Desolate Lands.

“Do you feel any evil from it, Valder?”

The archmagician shook his head.

No, he couldn’t feel anything except primordial power. This magic was not dark. But then, he couldn’t have called it light, either. It was simply different. Absolutely alien, incomprehensible, and therefore dangerous. The Horn kept the secret of the ogres secure.

“Surely you don’t think the dark elves would have handed over an artifact to men if it contained even an iota of black shamanism?” Zemmel continued.

“If magicians can use the Horn, that doesn’t mean it wasn’t used by the shamans of the ogres,” said Ilio, speaking for the first time and supporting Valder. “I am also opposed to acting hastily. Let us wait for Artsis, Didra, and Singalus.”

“I support that,” O’Kart put in dourly. “To this day we have no idea what the Horn was created for. And we only guessed that it neutralizes the Kronk-a-Mor by pure chance. There’s no point in being hasty. The Nameless One has been sitting up in the north for all these years; nothing’s going to happen if he’s stuck there for one more week.”

“No, we shall do it today!” Zemmel was not smiling any longer. His eyes glinted angrily. “The star charts are favorable for tonight! Today or never. Because there will not be such a night for another forty years.”

“I propose an official vote on this insane idea!” Valder snapped curtly.

“Speak on this matter,” said Panarik, nodding and looking round at the assembled magicians. “Who is in favor of using the Horn to destroy the Nameless One’s defenses?”

“I am opposed,” said Valder.

“I am not certain that it will work, but I have complete confidence in the skill and experience of my respected colleague Zemmel,” said Elo, drawing out his words slowly. He set the Horn on a plinth that had been made ready in the center of the mirror floor. “I am in favor.”

“Naturally, this is exactly what I wish to achieve,” said Zemmel, giving Valder a mocking look.

“I am opposed,” Ilio said with a frown. “If only because the full Council should decide.”

“I am also opposed,” said O’Kart. “We ought not to wake a sleeping giant. Afterward, as we know, it is very difficult to get him to go back to sleep again.”

Three against two.

Now everything depended on what Panarik would say. If the votes were evenly divided, then the side supported by the master would win, for the simple reason that his vote carried more weight than the votes of the others.

“Zemmel’s arguments are entirely convincing,” the head of the Order said after a moment’s thought. “Let us try it. I am in favor.”

Now no one could go against the decision of the Council.

The magicians stood in a circle round the mirror on which the Horn was lying.

Valder saw Ilio’s glum face opposite him. The ogrophile was on Ilio’s right, with his book in his hands, and Panarik was on his left. The indifferent, abstracted Elo was standing stock-still on Valder’s right, and O’Kart was in the position between the Sullen Archmagician and Zemmel.

A feeble circle. Three magicians were missing and the others would have to call on all their skill.

“What is our task?” the elf asked.

“Simply open yourselves up. I need your power. Pass it through the Horn. Stream twelve, profile eight, if you please,” Zemmel replied, opening the old book at the right page. “And now…”

Valder remembered that phrase very well.

It was the phrase used to teach pupils to concentrate instantly and activate their energy. And now the archmagicians’ energy began passing through him and pouring into the Horn in a thin purple stream.

To his right Elo’s azure-greenish power, with the scent of fresh leaves, reached out and entwined with O’Kart’s fiery red stream. Panarik and Ilio also joined in.

A radiance appeared around the Horn, it pulsated and began changing color. The fiery red flame of a dragon was replaced by an orange sun, which was transformed into a yellow autumn which, in turn, changed to the green leaves of the forests of Siala, then became a bright blue spring sky, the bottomless blue Western Ocean, and then once again, as at the very beginning, became the all-consuming dragon fire. It was this very property-of changing its color under the influence of others’ magic-that had earned the Rainbow Horn its name.

The first few minutes passed quietly. The artifact responded well, behaving in a stable fashion and giving no cause for alarm. And Valder did not feel any dizziness from the constant drain of magic.

“Intensify the flow! Ilio, you are working for me now.” Zemmel’s voice sounded intent, focused.

The magician was about to attempt the most difficult part of the task-arousing the magic of the ogres.

“Elo, realign the flow, you have deviated three degrees toward the sixth coordinate.” Panarik’s voice rang out sharply in the total silence.

The master was not only directing his own power, he was still able to pay attention to the work of the other archmagicians. Elo started in alarm and directed his azure-green ray to where Panarik had indicated.

Zemmel began a plaintive chant in the ancient language.

For only the second time in the history of the Order the ancient speech of the ogres was heard in its tower-the speech that had once awoken the magic of Kronk-a-Mor.

“Some kind of difficulty in the second field,” Ilio murmured. “Valder, why is your power dissipating?”

Valder himself was beginning to feel that he had to make a greater effort and concentrate harder to control the flow. He had the feeling that something was drawing off a small amount of magical energy.

And then he suddenly realized.

Because of the quarrel with Zemmel he had completely forgotten about the magical shield, which he had not bothered to remove. And now it was glowing feebly on the boundary of his awareness, interfering annoyingly with the direction of the flow, consuming power like a leech. But it was impossible for him to remove it-if he was distracted for a second, the circle would be broken, and he could only imagine the catastrophic consequences that the liberated flow of energy would produce.

“It’s all right. Nothing that I can’t handle,” Valder hastily assured his friend.

Panarik cast a dark glance at him. Unlike the others, he could see the obstacle. Which meant that when this was all over, Valder would face a very difficult conversation with him.

Hours seemed to go by in the Council Hall. There was a tenacious, pulsating pain growing stronger in Valder’s temples-the price for his magic.

The magic enveloped the group in a warm, glowing cocoon, pulsating gently, spreading out into a multicolored aura and flowing into the Horn in a waterfall of power. The entire hall was filled with energy. It was intoxicating-you wanted to bathe in it, reach out your hands to take possession of it forever. With its help you could create mountains and rivers, heal thousands of sick people, even bring the dead back to life. A single tiny speck of it was enough to destroy all the enemies of Valiostr. It could rid the world of Siala forever of ogres, giants, orcs, and dozens of other creatures hostile to human beings. Valder was overcome by euphoria, a feeling of might that made anything possible.

“Something’s wrong!” said O’Kart, alarmed. “Fluctuations!”

“I don’t feel anything. Where?” asked Elo, turning his head.

“To the right of the third field, directly above the artifact.”

“But where? I can’t see it!”

And then Valder noticed it, a little black dot of decay on the rainbow radiance of the Horn. The dot was pulsating to the rhythm of Zemmel’s voice, quivering like a candle flame in a gusty wind. And it was growing…

“Stop!” Valder barked, his throat suddenly dry. “We have an unplanned surge of energy!”

“We extinguish the circle now,” Panarik commanded. He had also seen the particle of Darkness that had been born.

“Don’t dare!” squealed Zemmel. “It will kill you.”

“Nonsense!” the master said, and began closing down his flow of power.

“Ghaghaban!” Zemmel suddenly shouted, throwing his hand out toward Panarik with the fingers twisted into a freakish sign.

The master went flying back against the wall and slumped onto the floor with his rib cage ripped open. The magician’s death broke the circle and four magicians went flying in different directions. Only Zemmel was left at the Horn.

The rainbow radiance dimmed and became as black as the murderer’s heart. No longer under control, the flows of energy seized on their freedom and four blinding shafts of magic struck upward, vaporizing the ceiling and the roof of the tower. A cold wind burst into the tower, driving an army of snowflakes round in a jolly dance.

The fifth flow, the one that had been controlled by the now-dead Panarik, struck horizontally, passing through Elo as he got up off the floor and reducing him to dust, then made a huge hole in the wall of the hall and disappeared.

As Valder, stunned, tried to get to his feet, the energy fell on his shoulders like a hungry bear. The mirror floor onto which he had been thrown reflected his pale, contorted face with blood seeping from the nose. The bitter taste of magic burned his throat, it passed through his body in shafts, gnawing into his bones and causing him appalling pain. An ocean of power controlled only by Zemmel splashed all around him.

“Murderer!” shouted Ilio, who had got to his feet. Forgetting his magical gift, he went rushing at the traitor with his fists held up.

Zemmel, reveling in the newly awoken Kronk-a-Mor, took no more notice of his opponent than a giant does of a mosquito. A click of the fingers, a an incomprehensible phrase in ogric, and Ilio cried out as he fell into the hole that appeared below his feet as the floor parted. The edges of the mirror came back together with a squelching sound, burying Valder’s friend.

“You!” Valder shouted, jerking himself up onto his knees, but he was suddenly swathed in supple black cables of power.

“Quiet.” Zemmel’s voice was quite imperturbable. “I’m busy.”

“What are you doing, you madman?” Valder shouted, trying to break free. “Don’t you understand what you’ve set free?”

“I understand. The Master explained it to me. He taught me how to wind you all round my little finger and become immortal. In a few minutes I shall be the equal of the Nameless One, or even more powerful! Why, the Nameless One, that incompetent, will bow his head before me!”

“Who is this Master?” asked Valder, trying not to pay any attention to O’Karta, who had begun to stir, and to continue distracting Zemmel.

“You don’t need to know that. Dunces like you are altogether too proud of the might of the Order, you have no idea at all of the might that will soon be mine! Awakening the Kronk-a-Mor proved incredibly easy. All I needed was the Horn and five idiots willing to give me their power. I have studied the language of the ogres, I have pored over their books for decades, mastering the ancient secrets of shamanism. I have achieved my own immortality, and I do not give a damn how many of you are dispatched into the Darkness after Panarik!”

“Go there yourself!” shouted O’Karta, and struck at Zemmel with the hammer of fire.

Boooom! the flame roared, and the snowflakes melted in the unbearable heat.

The black bonds loosened, and Valder added his own power to the redheaded archmagician’s second blow. But Zemmel merely swayed, and the flames flowed down off his clothes like a waterfall.

The traitor struck a terrible blow in reply. The air trembled and thickened and a semitransparent crimson sphere came hurtling toward the two magicians. Valder could see a densely interwoven Air, Earth, and something else incomprehensible. All he had time to do was to activate his extinguished shield and throw all of his energy into it.

An azure wall sprang up between him and Zemmel and the battle spell crashed into it, shattering it into hundreds of thousands of bright blue sparks that scattered across the ruined Council Hall like grains of millet. The sphere lost speed and changed direction, but it still caught Valder a glancing blow.

A shaft of fire penetrated Valder’s chest and exploded, and he collapsed onto the floor. He writhed and twisted, wheezing hoarsely in his pain, and missed the moment when O’Karta struck with fire again, this time not at Zemmel, but at the Horn, from above which the black magic was pouring out into the air.

This blow sent the Rainbow Horn spinning across the mirror floor and, having lost its stable base, the power escaped from Zemmel’s control.

“What the…” was all that the traitor had time to say before all the power of the Kronk-a-Mor that had already been accumulated struck back at its master like a sledgehammer, then dived into the mirror and retreated deep below the Tower of the Order.

The Council Hall was immediately flooded with silence. There was only the cold wind howling through the holes in the walls and snowflakes falling from the night sky.

“Are you alive?” asked O’Karta, walking across to where Valder was lying.

“Yes, but it’s only a matter of time.” The magician tried to smile. Blood seeped out onto his lips.

There was a hungry weasel in his chest, devouring his lungs. It was getting harder to breathe. Valder had no illusions about his own condition.

“Excellent,” the redheaded archmagician said. “You’ll live for another fifteen minutes. Quite long enough.”

“Enough for what?” Valder asked, sitting up and keeping his hand against his chest as he spat blood onto the mirror floor.

“To carry the Horn out of the tower.” The Filander held out the artifact that had somehow appeared in his hands. “Get a move on. You’ll have an eternity for lying down.”

“Take it out? Where?” Valder didn’t really understand, but he took the Horn.

“As far away as possible. See that?”

Valder looked where O’Karta was pointing. A thin, sinuous crack crept across the surface of the mirror floor.

Then another one. And another.

“When it breaks, the tower will be no more than a memory. And what went down through its floor will flood out into Avendoom. Come on! Get up! You were never a spineless milksop!”

Valder got to his feet, struggling hard not to fall over.

“I’ll hold the mirror together for as long as I can!”

“I’m already dead, O’Karta. Let’s do it the other way round. You have a chance to save yourself.”

“We’re all dead already. If you stay, it will be over too soon-you’re very weak. I’ll try to hold out for as long as possible.”

O’Karta turned away from Valder, raised his hands, and began directing streams of energy onto the cracked mirror.

That was the other magician’s last memory of him.

Intent and unbowed.

Valder found the winding staircase very difficult. When he reached the ground floor, there was darkness dancing in his eyes and the pain in his chest had expanded to a huge, pulsating sphere. He kept spitting out the blood that constantly appeared in his mouth.

The Tower of the Order was quivering slightly. Inconceivable forces had locked grips with each other in a struggle for liberty, and the archmagician had no doubt that the Kronk-a-Mor, even though Zemmel had not completed it, would be victorious. Valder tried not to think about what would happen after that.

The tower was no longer shaking; it was groaning in a low voice. Massive cracks ran through the walls. The ancient building could feel that its death was near. But the magical door opened gently to let the archmagician out.

The cold air and icy wind stung his face. His hands, firmly clutching the now-dormant Horn, were instantly frozen. Valder staggered away from the tower. Now without a single light burning, it watched him go with a melancholy stare. Every now and then there were flashes of magic at its very top as O’Karta spent his last strength on delaying the mirror’s collapse.

The Street of the Magicians was surprisingly empty. No one came out of their houses to see what was going on, as if everybody had been crushed under the weight of heavy sleep. The pain in Valder’s chest was growing worse, and he could hardly see anything. He walked blindly, setting his feet down one after the other and moaning softly when the torment became unbearable. Blood filled his mouth, running down over his chin and dripping onto his clothes.

The ground shuddered as it tried to expel the hostile magic of the ogres.

O’Karta held out for much longer than could have been expected. Valder got as far as the Street of the Sleepy Cat.

Even from there he heard the jangling sound of the mirror breaking, and then the triumphant howl of power hurtling up out of the earth. A terrible explosion threw the magician into a snowdrift and his face sank into the gentle coolness. The roaring continued as the magic of the ogres went on a rampage. As he lost consciousness, Valder could sense the threads of people’s lives being crumpled and snapped as the dark curse consumed street after street, house after house, inhabitant after inhabitant… They died in terrible torment. This power that was alien to humankind knew no pity or compassion; it took everyone who happened to be in its way.

In only a few minutes the Evil would reach the spot where Valder was lying, and then the Horn would stay there forever.

This thought forced the archmagician to turn over onto his back. He held his snow-covered face up to the falling snowflakes, catching them greedily with his bloody mouth. The wind died down. The world froze in horror at the advancing disaster, anticipating the most terrible blizzard in the city’s entire history. With a superhuman effort, in danger of losing consciousness at any moment, Valder got up off the road and looked in the direction of the tower.

Now, instead of solid ground there was a rapidly swirling black whirlwind. Ordinary people would never have seen it, but Valder’s magical vision, even though it was weakened by his injury, could clearly distinguish the black vortex reaching up into the night sky.

The magician managed to walk a little farther, and then he collapsed at the foot of the statue of Sagot and could not rise again.

The upper part of the god’s face was covered by a layer of fresh snow and Valder could only see the lips. The mentor of thieves was looking at the archmagician with a frank smile of approval.

“I have to save the Horn. Do you hear? I have to. Help me, and I’ll do anything you want.”

Sagot didn’t answer.

Valder felt as if he was engulfed by the delirious visions of fever. He saw dark shadows circling above Avendoom, he imagined he saw a man in a jacket with a hood, running across ruined roofs and hiding. In his agony he no longer understood where he was or who he was. The archmagician was falling asleep… Life was abandoning his body with every beat of his heart, and his reason was already poised above the abyss from which there is no return.

“Master Valder! Wake up! Wake up, teacher!” Someone was shaking the magician relentlessly.

He wanted to brush off this annoying fly. He was enjoying dozing, and quietly humming the children’s song that his mother used to sing to him. But through the drowsiness of approaching death he could hear someone crying.

“Teacher, it’s me. Come back…”

With a struggle, Valder parted his leaden eyelids and saw Gani’s wet face.

“Wh-what are you doing here?” the archmagician gasped with a great effort.

“I felt worried. And I came running to find you.”

“You felt…” The magician looked up at the statue of Sagot, listened, and nodded. He was suddenly swamped by a new wave of pain and had to grit his teeth to avoid crying out loud. “Here, take this. It’s the Horn. Take it to Artsis. Quickly… He can stop this.”

“I won’t go without you!”

“Take it! This is my last order to you, my pupil. Find Artsis and give him the artifact. Tell him that I ask him to take you as his pupil. T-tell… tell him that everything went wrong. Tell him we awoke something that is beyond our understanding. A blizzard…” The exhausted magician collapsed back onto the snow. “Go on now. Run. Or it will be too late. Save what can still be saved.”

Gani hesitated, then nodded decisively and dashed off, clutching the Horn tightly against himself.

“Run, kid, run,” Valder whispered.

The snow circled gently as it fell on the dead archmagician, covering him in a white blanket of warmth and peace. The snow whispered and sang its song, knowing that soon its most frenzied dance of all would begin.

There was a black blizzard gathering over Avendoom.