Wizards Conclave

Chapter 22
The Bastion

Will this cursed night never end?" demanded Kalrakin, stalking through the largest room in the Tower, the Hall of Mages. The ceiling was lost in the vast black space, obscured by shadows; the sorcerer's words echoed as he threw back his head and shouted skyward. "Those moons taunt me, vex me. If they would but come closer, I would smite them all!"

Wild magic pulsed suddenly, a flash of light emanating from the white stone he perpetually held in his hand. In that blink of time, he teleported, coming to stand again in the banquet hall where he had first encountered the Master of the Tower. He found food on the table, as usual, but the wizard disdained the splendid feast, knocking over a pitcher of milk in contempt, tumbling a bowl of fruit so that apples and melons rolled across the floor.

"Come to the door, my lord. I see the pink of dawn in the east." Luthar called from the anteroom. "This night is ending, at last!"

"It is about time!" snapped Kalrakin. "And Luthar…?"

"Yes, lord?"

"I have been thinking. I want you to call me 'master,' not lord," Kalrakin declared haughtily. "It seems more fitting, somehow, since I am the new master of the Tower of High Sorcery."

"Very well, my lo-Master," answered the other sorcerer, glancing nervously over his shoulder as Kalrakin approached. Luthar stepped back from the open door to let his companion see the fringe of light coming into view above the eastern horizon. "It is welcome, the sun, is it not?" he asked.

"Welcome in that it signals the conclusion of this accursed night!" snapped the sorcerer. "And the departure of those three moons that so vex my thoughts and my dreams!"

"Do they worry you very much, those moons?"

"No! They insult me-that is all. Of course, they signal their wizards who will come here, soon enough. The white-robed wench I chased away will certainly return, with all the assistance she can gather. But when they come, they will die. The moons taunt me, and for this insult I shall exact keen revenge!"

"How, Master?"

"When the wizards come, I will meet them with a surprise."

"What do you have planned?" Luthar asked, looking around nervously.

"Come!" Kalrakin seized the shorter man's shoulder in an iron grip. Wild magic swirled around them then they vanished, appearing in another second far above the ground level, standing side by side on the outer parapet of one of the tower's loftiest balconies. This was one of several perches supported by cantilevered beams, outcrops that jutted to the sides of the spire like a multitude of short, stubby branches. This platform was a small half circle, surrounded by a crenellated rim of carved black marble near the top of the north spire. Behind them a single door made of the same black stone as the tower's surface offered entry back into the spire.

"Please, Master-you frighten me!" Luthar gasped, cringing from the edge, pressing against the stone door that would allow passage back inside.

"I shall kill them slowly when they come-the red and the black will certainly die as painfully as possible. The white wench appeals to me-I think I may keep her alive for a time… after I cut the little bitch's tongue out, of course." He laughed dryly. "I will not have her casting any foolish spells."

"No, er, of course," Luthar said, with a sideways look at his master. The pudgy wizard looked a little pale. "But she seems like such a child-a mere girl! Surely her spells are foolish, as you say-and she is no threat?"

"Don't be beguiled by her appearance," warned the tall mage.

"I'm not beguiled!" Luthar insisted. "It is you that has an eye for her, after all!"

Kalrakin snorted. "I might find a use for her, that is all. Even you have your uses, old companion."

Luthar looked stricken at this remark but bit his lip and remained silent.

"You need more sun!" declared Kalrakin. "Come out here in the open, and savor my work."

"I can see very well from back here, Master."

Turning his back, contemptuously, on the other man, the master of wild magic studied the broad vista. "When these wizards of the three moons come to challenge me for this tower, I intend to greet them properly-in the form of a guardian at our gate. That should put them at their ease. And with a little fortune, all of them will be dead before they even reach our tower."

Stepping forward, Kalrakin placed his hand against the smooth, sun-warmed black marble forming the parapet of this high platform. He closed his eyes and drew upon wild magic, pulled it up from the depths of the world, summoned it through the foundation and walls of the Tower. He called that ancient sorcery to him, imbibing it like a powerful drug-even as its toxicity shook the tower. The ancient structure shuddered and writhed, and this brought a fierce grin to Kalrakin's face. The Irda Stone was like a hot ember, a powerful pulse in his hand. He squeezed and caressed the stone.

The stone barrier began to soften and the wizard pushed slowly, bending the rock to his will, changing its shape, cracking it loose where he wanted it to break. He watched in glee as the entire rim of black marble tumbled away, leaving only a thin fragment of the original balcony. Kalrakin now stood at the very edge of a smooth platform, nothing between himself and a drop of several hundred feet. Luthar gasped and shrank back, but Kalrakin relished the sight of the marble tumbling below. He saw the stone crash into the ground far below, felt the tremor through the soles of his feet.

"That is a start," he announced. "Now, to the next."

He turned and entered the Tower with the still-trembling Luthar close behind. The corridor here was a ring surrounding a plunging well of space, with doors to a pair of similar balconies on the right and left, spaced evenly a third of the way around the outer wall. Shards of stone were scattered across the floor, rubble that marked where Kalrakin had torn a section of railing away in an earlier outburst. Here stretched a perilous drop of several hundred feet, a yawning gap plunging into the central atrium of the north tower.

Ignoring the potential danger, Kalrakin made his way to the closest of the doors on this level, leaving Luthar to edge slowly behind. The stout sorcerer inched along the wall, as far as possible from the broken railing, arriving at another, red parapet, surrounded by a ring of rose-colored marble.

His eyes wide, Luthar watched as Kalrakin strutted back and forth across the parapet.

Again, Kalrakin called on the wild magic, which surged through the sorcerer's flesh, expanding and destroying the stone, until this platform, too, tumbled to the ground. In a few moments he had destroyed the third crenellated wall, tearing the white marble cleanly away from its seamless black foundation.

And still the magic flowed through him; it had become a surging torrent of power quickening his heart, tightening his sinews. His jaw remained clenched, teeth bared in a rictus grin that terrified his comrade-who continued to watch from a cowering safe distance.

Kalrakin now turned his magic to the stone walls of the tower, leaping from a parapet to cling to the smooth outer surface of the spire like a human spider. The wind whipped his beard, his tangled hair, and his filthy robe, as he clawed his way down the wall. The wild magic was strong, and he never lost his foot- or handholds. Halfway down he paused, dangling by one hand as he admired the broken stones scattered on the ground below.

Luthar peered down. In less than a minute Kalrakin had climbed to the ground. Standing below, once again Kalrakin summoned the destructive wild magic, focusing it on the rubble. The stone in his hand glowed especially bright in the daylight as the sorcerer drew the shards of red, black, and white marble together, bending their shapes with his will, assembling them in what first looked like simply a chaotic pile of multicolored stones. Now the master of wild magic began to sculpt with care, precision, even affection. From large wedges of black stone he created a pair of massive, knobby stone boots-boots that each stood five feet high.

Next he shaped other chunks of black stone into a pair of massive, trunklike legs. He worked not with his hands, which remained outstretched and motionless, but with the carving skill of his wild sorcery. The white stone shone like a beacon in his hand, and whatever it touched was shaped.

Moments later Luthar pulled open the tower door, gasping and flushed, having taken ten minutes to run down the tower stairs. The shorter wild mage gaped at the torso of white marble which was taking form above the stone legs and huge black boots. Already the half-built creation loomed high over their heads. In a stir of whimsy, Kalrakin had placed a gash of red marble across his creation's "chest"-just where the heart would be in a mortal giant. Next came the arms, a mixture of some of the red and black marble he had remaining, and finally he was ready for the head.

For this crowning touch, Kalrakin took special care. His golem would be a manlike being, glowering and shelf browed, with a square rock for a jaw and two deep, lightless caves where the eyes should be. But of course the thing had no organs, no sight, no flesh. This was a guardian connected by wild magic to Kalrakin himself. Luthar stared, speechless. When it was all done, Kalrakin stationed it at the door of the tower, facing outward, standing with arms hanging at its sides. It would never sleep, never rest, never tire.

And when the wizards of three robes came calling, it would destroy them.

Later, Kalrakin stood atop the rampart of the south tower. He was alone, but his spoken word thrummed through the stonework, the flesh, of the lofty structure, reaching the ears of his cohort many hundreds of feet below. The answer returned via the same medium, tremulous but quick.

"Yes, Master? What is it?"

"How long has it been since I have slept?"

The wild mage closed his eyes, not in fatigue but in sublime ecstasy, as he awaited Luthar's reply. The power of the world pulsed in Kalrakin's veins, and his sinews felt as taut, and as strong, as steel cables. His ears tuned to the faintest sound. When he looked out he could clearly see the pattern and shape of every leaf on every tree within a mile of the tower.

The Irda Stone had become a part of him. He admired the object in his hand, flexed his fingers, saw the pulsing of his blood and the fiery veins of wild magic intertwined among the delicate pearly surface. That maze of energy flickered as, from somewhere far away, Luthar's voice reached him.

"I do not know precisely, Master. But I believe it has been many, many weeks-since shortly after we arrived in this tower."

"Yes. I know that it has been four months and five days since I became lord here. And in that time, the Tower has done my sleeping for me. It suffers, it weakens, it fades-just as the three gods do themselves-and I claim all of their collective power for myself. Luthar, this structure sustains me-and this stone is the vessel through which I now drink life!"

The mage scrutinized one of the lower platforms on the north tower, a hundred feet away. With a scream of delight, like an eagle surveying his mountaintop domain, Kalrakin sprang into the air. His powerful leap carried him across that space, his tattered robe flapping around him as he landed lightly. Approaching the north wall, where a gaping hole marked a door he had earlier smashed into kindling, the sorcerer placed his hand on the stone frame of the doorway, murmuring an incantation. Immediately the stones parted, creating a narrow gap limned in blue light. Ducking his head, the tall mage stepped into that gap, his gloved hand extended before him. In two steps he emerged-only now he was at the base of the Tower, entering one of the luxurious studies where he knew his companion awaited him.

Luthar, who had been seated before a roaring blaze in the deep fireplace, leaped to his feet in consternation.

"I wish you would stop doing that!" sputtered the shorter wizard. "I can never get used to you just popping in and out of sight like this!"

"Your wishes are insignificant," Kalrakin said, striding to the hearth, extending his hands, absorbing the warmth of the fire for just a second. Magic pulsed from the gauntlet in his hand, sucking the heat and energy of the fire, which was instantly doused into a mound of smoldering logs. When Kalrakin turned away, his body was smoking; wisps of gray vapor swirled from his filthy robe, and rose amid the tangled whiskers of his beard.

"There is something I am just beginning to understand," he added meaningfully.

Luthar knelt nervously at the hearth, putting more logs into the fireplace, casting a quick puff of wind with his own wild magic to draw yellow flames from the coals. "What have you learned, Master?" he finally ventured to ask, turning away from the once more roaring blaze.

"This tower has become the foundation of my being. It is slowly dying, and with each shattered block, each fresh hole in the wall, every blasted stone or swath of ceiling plaster, the power abandons these ancient stones and flows to me. As this structure, raised from the very bones of the world-as the wizards were once so fond of claiming-yields its power to me, it rots away, just as old bones rot. It is dissolving around us even as we grow stronger because of it. When it passes from the world of Krynn, I will take its place… strong, even indestructible, and everlasting."

"Do you mean you are becoming immortal?" In spite of his best efforts, Luthar sounded skeptical, and the shorter mage sneaked a close look at Kalrakin, wondering if he might glimpse a glimmer of derangement.

"More than immortal!" Kalrakin crowed. "I am becoming not just godlike, but mightier than the gods! Those three pathetic moons who created, who watch over this place-they are my puppets, my toys, my bread! I consume them, and they deliver me ultimate power!"

With a gesture of his hand, Kalrakin swatted at the fire and a great explosion pulsed through the room, knocking Luthar to the floor. The great force of the blast rushed outward, smashing right through the outer wall of the tower, leaving a gaping hole in the stones and sending the logs, embers, and coals plunging downward to the courtyard forty feet below.

"I am feeding, Luthar, and I grow stronger with every meal!"

The tall mage strode right into the smoldering ruins of the fireplace, placing his hand on a shattered stone, leaning outward through the hole in the wall to admire his handiwork. The larger logs, sooty and still burning, were scattered like matchsticks; a smoky cloud lingered in the air.

Abruptly Kalrakin turned and stalked from the wrecked room, heading for the main hall. All around him were shattered doors, scorched walls, and rubble. The alcoves between each apartment once were magically illuminated and once had displayed the treasures of history: a scepter from Silvanesti sparkling with gems excavated during the Age of Dreams; a vase of icy crystal, permanently chilled, reputed to have come, a dozen centuries ago, from some land far across the sea; a pair of bracers that had been worn by Huma himself when he flew against the Dark Queen. Now the alcoves were empty, the enchantments drained away, the ground was strewn with shards of broken glass and scattered jewels gleaming weakly in the sunlight that spilled through the various breaches in the outer wall.

This had once been a level of luxuriously appointed apartments, quarters for the mightiest of the wizards who had studied, taught, and convened here. Paintings from the old masters of Krynn had decorated each anteroom, with many of the canvasses predating the first Cataclysm. Now the frames were broken, the images stained and distorted and shredded by wild magic.

Kalrakin paused to admire one of the ruined paintings. Once it had been an intricate moving painting, a ritual display of elegant dancers performing their stylized steps at a grand ball in the grand manor of the Lord of Palanthas. The sorcerer snorted in amusement-the painting still moved-but now the lord in the image was dead, impaled by a decorative halberd, while the dancers moaned and writhed on the floor, their faces pocked by plague, blood running from their mouths and ears.

He placed his hand against the wall, and a blue-lit doorway opened. Two steps took Kalrakin through the outer wall of the Tower, emerging at ground level. He advanced until he stood just within the gates in the outer courtyard. Here his golem stood silent watch, its marbled brows tiered in a constant frown, the boulders of its fists dangling at its sides. Those fists, at the low terminus of two long, powerful arms, hung high above the tall sorcerer's head.

"Keep a careful watch, my stone sentry," Kalrakin said, tracing his hand over the craggy outline of one of its massive boots. "Be ready to smite the lackeys of the three gods-I know they will be here soon."

Of course there came no reply, but the wild mage nodded serenely, utterly reassured by the emanations of readiness he felt within the stone sentry. When it was needed, the golem would be ready.

Then Kalrakin was back in the Tower of Sorcery, this time in the hallway outside that vexing door that still resisted his most determined efforts. He stood on one of the damaged floorboards, staring at the barrier contemptuously. He toyed with the thought of another convulsive blast of magic, but decided the contemptible chamber was not worth his efforts; instead, he turned and stalked away, following the broken boards like a rickety bridge toward the stone stairwell at the end of the hall.

Halfway there he halted, frozen in his tracks. His mind churning with pent-up frustration, he whirled, his long finger extended toward that vexing door. An inarticulate cry exploded from his mouth, and wild magic shimmered in the air. That power lashed out, smashed into the door-and then burst backward against the spellcaster, slamming Kalrakin down onto the remains of the floor, rolling him along until he fell between two support beams, barely catching himself with a desperate grab of one lanky arm.

He pulled himself back and staggered toward the stairs, growing stronger every minute. Lost in thought, he opened another dimension door in the stone wall. His next step brought him back to the anteroom.

"Luthar! Bring me drink!" he called, his voice booming and echoing through the empty chamber and its towering adjacent hallways.

"Yes-of course, Master!" Kalrakin heard footsteps from the direction of the kitchen and, moments later, Luthar hastened into view. He carried a crystal pitcher, the outside of it slick with condensation.

"Chilled water," offered the short mage.

Taking the pitcher with a swipe of his hand, Kalrakin leaned his head back and poured the ice-cold contents into his gaping mouth. He ignored the spillage, though in fact much of the water splashed through his beard, soaked his robe, and fell into a growing puddle on the floor. When the pitcher was empty, the mage sent it flying across the hall; it shattered against the stone hearth, and joined the wreckage on the floor.

"Would you like something to eat?" asked Luthar.

"Hah!" Kalrakin sneered at the very idea. "Wild magic is my breath, and the body of this tower is my bread! I have no need of sleep, and I have no need of food, not while this ancient totem still stands."

"Dare I ask-how long will that be?" said the shorter mage somewhat wearily. "I am ready to go away from here, Master. There is a sense of doom about this place that allows me no peace."

"We do not need peace, my friend-for we have power!"

Magic sparked from Kalrakin's slender fingertips, arcing through the room in repeated, visible streams. The stone over the door began to melt, flowing like mud, seeping right across the wooden panel that had allowed access into and out of the tower. Pieces of black stone tumbled to the floor, sparking and flaming, rolling around the room, trailing plumes of thick smoke. Luthar cried out and fled from the room, though not before one of the rolling chunks of molten rock scorched the hem of his robe.

Kalrakin took scant notice. He flexed his fist and his voice rose in a keening, bestial cry, and still the very substance of the Tower broke apart and flowed down and added to his magic. Deeper and deeper the molten stone piled, sludgy waves of darkness rolling down across already-cooling base elements. By the time he was finished, the door was gone, buried under a sheen of hard black stone.