24. DEVIN, YEAR 496

The old wizard ground his molars. “Not quite the warm welcome I was expecting,” he said between clenched teeth. “You must introduce me to your sword swinging confederate, Devin, so that I may greet him in a similar manner. I see plenty of swords here.”

As if you've ever swung a blade in your life, old man. Devin planted his sword in the ground and waved Festus away as the general leaped to assist his mistaken foe. “A case of mistaken identify, Cornelius. I . . . we . . . thought you were Captain Vice.”

“You thought I was Captain Vice?” Cornelius asked, smacking the dying horse with his fist. “Why?”

“Because you came riding up like a mysterious phantom after I fought the soldiers and you wore one of those watches like a pendant and talked about stopping me like a rabid dog.” Because I willed for the pale rider to be Cornelius. Because for a brief, violent moment, despite all the killing, I still craved horrible, blood curdling vengeance on my nemesis.

“What did you think this stupid brass boondoggle was for?” Cornelius heaved the brass watch at Devin's head.

“I've already got one of those.” May the gods piss on me if I'll stoop to collecting the damn things like trophies. The youth caught the watch and tossed it back to the wizard who sighed and draped it around his neck again. “And where is your beard?” Devin asked. “Old wizard equals beard. If you only had your beard, we would have realized that you weren't Captain Vice.”

Devin and Festus attempted to lever the dead horse with a pair of discarded pikes so the old wizard could drag his leg out from under the prone beast. The youth placed a metal log at the optimal fulcrum point to shift what he assumed a horse weighed. It's just a log. A metal log. And for a wonder, those physical science lessons the guild put me through are finally useful for something.

“Stop! I'm still caught in the stirrup. You're just pressing the abdomen of the beast into my broken leg,” Cornelius screamed.

Devin sighed. “The pikes just aren't tall or strong enough to reach all the way under the horse while maintaining enough leverage to lift its body. Did you bring any long, iron bars?”

“No.” The general shook his head. “If a pike will not do, a sword may suffice. We must bisect the animal along the axis of the wizard and then lever the horse half which traps him with the one that does not.”

The artifice mage and the general eased the beast back onto the ground. “I'll get my sword,” Devin sighed, still reluctant to wield the blade.

The wizard unclasped his cloak and threw it. “By the breath of the five gods, it's stuffy tonight. Thought I was Vice, eh? Because Vice talks about seeing his own body impaled on a pike and Vice cannot possibly grow a beard as easily as I can shave one. Sometimes, I wonder about you, Devin.”

“I thought you were referring to yourself sarcastically in the third person,” Devin whispered, pulling his sword from the sand. “It's something snide that Vice would do.” Why did the general and I never question our assumption of the rider's identity? Did we both want to confront Captain Vice so much we conjured his ghost from a brass pendant and hooded cloak? What would I do if Vice was actually here lying prone and trapped? Would that make me happy?

“Would he? I cannot claim to know. If you must know about my beard,” Cornelius stammered, “I wanted to look young again before I lose my hair entirely. Well?” He waggled his bushy eyebrows with a rakish flair. “Do I look younger or not?”

Festus shook head and his own salt and silver beard swayed. “In the end, age spares no man the cruelest lash, sir.”

Cornelius looks as old as he's ever looked, but maybe less distinguished or mature? Devin's eyes narrowed. “Look younger for whom?”

“For myself. Just for myself. What does that matter now?” Cornelius said, dismissing the matter with a flip of his hand.

“Why are you here, Cornelius?” Devin braced his glowing sword on the taunt skin between the horse's ribs and the stiff, black hairs began to smoke and scorch. The youth sawed back and forth, cutting slowly through the beast's vertebrae. “And why ride straight through a catastrophe of dragons?”

“To answer your second question first,” the wizard said, “anyone who has ever read my Guide to Fantastique Magick Creatures much less authored it knows dragons are no danger after they curl up for the evening, even if they could be bothered to hunt one lone man. You should have remembered that detail. I suspect you were distracted by other tiny, insignificant events.”

“It's a warm night,” Devin said, waving his arms. The arrogance of that man. Tiny, insignificant events, indeed. “It's not inconceivable a large beast with a temperature linked metabolism would bestir itself without the warmth of the sun to fuel . . . I'm just turning a wyrm hole into a wyvern pit, aren't I?”

“A charming command of classic idioms, lad, although you fail to address the glaring allometry conundrum.” Cornelius shook his head. “A year away from your studies and your mind is already dulling. Such a waste. Such a pity that you persist in choosing violence over scholarship to express your magic. But on to more pressing matters. We can reminisce about dragon physiology later.”

“Cornelius dropping a scholarly debate like a hot coal?” Ah, the arguing. The give and take. It's like the last year never happened. I've missed you, old man. Devin asked, pressing his fingers against the wizard's forehead. “You really did injure yourself. Are you you sure you're not feeling feverish, Master Cornelius?”

“Hush, Devin. Don't you 'Master Cornelius' me. This is important. With regards to your first question, there are disturbing rumors and reports from the Royal Army. Another contingent of your countrymen just entered the country through the northern pass and marches towards Ingeld.” Cornelius glared at General Festus. “A company of Black Guards. Moving slowly to avoid the army, thank the five gods. With a fast horse, which that stupid soldier just butchered, we could have made it back in time to repel the invasion.”

“General Festus, sir, at your service.” The man bowed stiffly. “My officers should have several horses on hand with which to replace your steed.”

“Cornelius Gander,” the wizard replied, “and I don't think much of your service. One of your officer's horses appears to be galloping this way, already. With an officer on it. A white mare.”

The general peered across the beach. The rider's white captain's insignia blazed across his dark red chest plate. “Who is that? Captain Arcla? No, I saw him dismembered.” He snorted. “It's not Captain Horace. I'm wearing his cuirass.”

Devin paused in his self appointed task of cutting through the dead horse when he heard the general's curses rise into the air like blistering flames. The youth glanced towards the tall rider on the white horse, a nasty suspicion burrowing into his mind like a worm. No! It couldn't be.

The man had doffed his helmet and pulled an object from the satchel hanging at his side, revealed to be a familiar battered, wide brimmed hat with a broken white plume. Captain Vice cocked the hat at a jaunty angle, touched the brim, and bowed from his saddle. The pearly gleam from his white, crescent smile rivaled the moon.

“How are you here, you stinking pile of horse shit?” Festus roared. “I had four men escort you off my ship at Port Minnow.”

“Apparently, I am here twice,” Captain Vice laughed, waving his hat back towards the dunes. “Show some gratitude, General. I saved the last vestiges of your pitiful army and all you can ask is how I crept back aboard your ship?” Armand Vice clutched the hat as the wind rose up. “So, the Black Guards finally march on Ingeld? Now I have but to take command of the company and destroy that viper's nest of mages forever. And to think I was once happy killing you people one at a time.”

Devin stabbed his sword between the dead, black horse's ribs and Cornelius sighed. “Truce, Captain Vice. I thought I wanted you dead, but I've killed too many people and stained my soul with too much blood to reach this point. I refuse to kill another creature on this day, even one such as you.” This is the kind of decision I'm supposed to regret later, but may the five gods cry for me, I swear I never will. I had vengeance within my grasp and let it slip between my fingers.

“You threaten me with a glowing sword? I've seen the like in the gift shop of that accursed town,” Armand Vice scoffed. “Lies! The lies of a mage bereft of his power. Tell me another.”

“I can tell you that Cornelius does not teach a school for mages,” Devin said, lowering his head and wriggling the sword free. The youth started hacking at the dead horse's torso, pausing for a breath at the end of each swing as he worked through the ribs and backbone. “But you would not believe me. I could not believe it myself. Then I met his students. I lived with them for a time in their town. You once told me you would catch up to me. Seems I must now catch up to you. Leave this place, butcher. Where so many brave men died with steel in their hearts. Before I do something I regret. With the steel in my hands.” The vertebrae broke like two puzzle pieces with a crackling pop as the cartilage separated from the bone. Devin gagged as the raw bile stench of punctured, cooked intestines rose like warm steam.

“Why not fight me here, now?” Vice taunted. “Can't you use that sword for something other than butchering dead horses, mage? Are you anything without your vaunted powers?”

Do you not hear those soldiers behind you preparing to cross the beach with death in their hearts? the youth thought. There's only one person they hate more than me right now and he's sitting on a white horse wasting time with petty, shallow taunts. It's not enough that I can't kill you. Must I save your life, too? Devin gestured over towards the dunes where faint sounds of martial chaos drifted on the wind. “Already the soldiers gather to attack you if General Festus doesn't beat them to it. No more death. Escape, butcher, while you still can. Slink away to Ingeld if you dare and face me there surrounded by your Black Guard cronies. Let them see you for the coward you are on the field of battle.” Devin raised the sword, pointing towards the town he once called home in the distant east. The blade's glow split the night. “And then, Captain Armand Delacourt Vice, I am going to ram this molten sword into your black, shriveled heart.”

“If you can find it,” Cornelius murmured. “Please, Devin. Finish this. My leg is on fire.”

Devin ignored Vice and focused on saving Cornelius as Festus braced a pike perpendicular to the trapped wizard and raising the front end of the horse using the animal's pelvis as a fulcrum. Devin helped Cornelius crawl away. General Festus lowered the beast's torso back onto the ground, raised the pike until the point was chest high on a horse. The general snorted and flicked the strands of gore off the blade. Then he advanced towards the captain.

“I need to cut off your leg. Below the knee. The hot metal . . . ” Devin sobbed. “The hot metal will cauterize the wound.”

“Cut it!” Cornelius smacked his thigh with the stick and winced. “I never liked that foot. We can compare stumps later.”

The youth raised the molten sword and a single bead of sweat trickled down his cheek, reviving another banished memory. The Butcher's table. Sweat on the man's brow, his arm raised. The blade descending. Heat and darkness. Pain and darkness. Devin threw his sword to the ground. “I can't do it, Cornelius. I can't. It's too much. It's too much like him.”

“You will,” the old wizard coughed, “and you must. I trust you will do a more conscientious job than others I could name. You are not a butcher, lad.”

“No,” Devin shook his head. “I am a butcher. I am no better than the Butcher, himself. They all died while I gloated.”

“Devin, look at me,” Cornelius said, taking the youth's quaking hands with a frail grip. “We may have had our disagreements, but you are nothing like him. You are nothing like that despicable excuse for humanity over there.”

“Did you see what I did to all those poor soldiers?” Devin cried, hugging the wizard and burying his face in the man's chest.

“Gently, lad, gently.” Cornelius patted the youth's back as Devin absently twisted the wizard's pants into a crude tourniquet. “No, but I heard what you did afterward. I could hear you screaming from the far side of the Port Eclare and it's an impressive city. Those cries of misery and anguish were not the gleeful sounds of a bloodthirsty brute. You are not a monster.”

“I'm a wolf,” Devin said, hanging his head. “A monstrous, bloodthirsty wolf.”

“So wyvern to wolf, you have traded one animal totem for another,” Cornelius chuckled, coughing up blood and spotting his tunic. “But animals don't feel remorse, Devin, even you precious wyverns. Do you think Captain Vice feels any shame for all the men, women, and children he tortured and killed? Your soul is steeped in blood, yet his soars like a feather. The guilt of your emotions shackles you still. It makes you flawed; it makes you human. Not a wolf. Not a wyvern. Not monster.”

“Not a wyv . . . not a dragon?” Devin whispered. “No, I must be a dragon.”

“Captain Vice is the real animal. He kills for sport under the guise of duty. You fought to defend yourself and took no pleasure in the slaughter.”

“No, I didn't, did I?” Devin raised his head.

“When you chop off my leg with your burning blade, and you must share the secret of that little gem soon, it will be as a surgeon, not as a torturer.” Cornelius smiled wanly.

“Best do it fast, lad,” the general grunted, turning away from Captain Vice for a moment to face Devin. “Your wizard friend is bleeding out and he will lose consciousness soon. Greetings, Captain Vice. Come within the reach of my pike so that I may greet you properly. May the gods rip off your skull and shit down your neck, you miserable, simpering excuse for a soldier. I thought even Black Guards had standards until I met you.”

“Farewell, my dear general,” Vice said, gloating. “When I arrive back at the homeland and trumpet my glorious victory, I will be sure to share the precise nature of your doomed exploits here with every bureaucrat, government lackey, and official quill jockey I can find. I will file reports until it rains ink in the capitol. The Red Army shall never rise again!”

“Was that supposed to be a threat?” General Festus asked, tossing his pike. Devin could hear him unbuckling his armor and throwing it to the ground. “I could beat you right now wearing nothing but my small clothes and armed with no more than what the five gods provided. The Red Army has faced greater foes than a torturer of men and a bureaucrat with delusions of grandeur and emerged unscathed. Shall we fight then, Black Guard? ”

“I will content myself with killing your career and your antiquated military, General,” Vice demurred. “The youth makes a valid point. Slaughtering you after you've lost so many men is petty.”

“I would expect no other form of strategy from you, Captain.”

Vice laughed. “Farewell, General. Old Wizard. Tinker Mage,” Vice said. Devin heard the horse whinny and gallop away.

“I honored your oath, boy,” the general growled, sheathing his sword. “No more killing today. I don't mind admitting that was the hardest thing I've ever done. I trust you can slice off that limb without me holding your hand?”

Devin nodded, raising the sword.

“Then excuse me while I call off the chase and save that miserable fiend. Work quickly lad before you break the oath yourself. Does failing to save a man count as killing him in the eyes of the five gods? Oh damn me, there they go.” His light mail shirt jingled as the general took off jogging down the beach.

“Even if we knew how,” Devin said, cocking the sword behind his head, “we won't be able to grow your leg back, not yet. Or even grow you a wooden replacement.”

“I know, I know,” Cornelius whispered, his eyes half closed.

“There's no magic left between the pair of us. We don't have time to recharge before leaving to save the town and we can't abandon these damn watches.”

“I suppose,” Cornelius agreed.

“Two mages and no magic,” Devin mused as he felt the heat run between his shoulder blades and smelled his hair singe. “Well, this sword should hold the brigands at bay.”

“Yes,” Cornelius said.

“Don't worry, I can cobble something together from all the old armor lying around.” Devin smiled as soft, warm ashes began to tickle the back of his neck. “You'll be more metal than me.”

“By the gods' clenching, putrid assholes, just cut the damn foot off,” Cornelius screamed.

“Cornelius, hold your tongue.” Devin sighted an imaginary line below the old wizard's knee and raised his sword.

“Well, praise the five gods. Got you to stop stalling, didn't it?”

Devin grunted his assent as he sliced. The old wizard fainted. The youth held the molten blade against the raw stump for good measure. As the stench of burnt pork filled the air, Devin realized he hadn't eaten a thing all day. He collapsed and laid his head on Cornelius's undulating chest. The wizard's peaceful, shallow slumber reassured the young artifice mage. Exhausted, Devin curled up and slept.

Some time later, someone prodded Devin with a steel toe. The youth opened his eyes, sat up, and took in the scene. General Festus had donned another suit of armor with the proper general's insignia, but left the helmet behind again. Festus stood at the head of a ragged company of Red Army soldiers which surrounded the old wizard and the youth, but made no move to attack.

“I've explained things to my lads,” the general said, smacking his mailed fist. “Some of them were none too happy Vice got to live. So I told them about the new punishment for cowards and deserters courtesy of my new oath brother, the Artifice Mage: seal the bastards up in their own armor and leave them in a pile for the dragons to pick over come morning.”

“I see all your men follow you? Rather than be entombed alive?” Devin smiled as he stood, jabbed his sword, and pinned Cornelius's fluttering, bloody bandage to the ground. The youth folded his arms over the pommel as molten sand dripped down the blade over the smoldering, twitching fabric, sealing the bandage behind hot, puddled glass. “Ha! Wise choice.”

Several of the closest soldiers shied away as Devin cracked the glass lump with his sword tip, spraying molten shrapnel into their ranks. Muttered curses arose as the vanguard backed and bumped into their fellows.

“They only thought they had a choice,” the general growled. “So, when do we kill Captain Vice? And where? In this town of yours?”

“Thank you for the offer, General, but no.” Devin shook his head and yawned as sleep beckoned. “This is not your fight. Lead your men home. You have unfinished business in the empire. The magistrate and his Black Guards for embroiling you in their conflict. Just as I have unfinished business with one, particular Black Guard.”

“A devious man,” the general said, “who has already escaped punishment several times.”

“He will not escape again,” Devin vowed. “Let me have him, please?”

“We do have pressing business back home. We must avenge our foul betrayal. And yet you ask us to leave the prime agent of that betrayal to you.” The general sighed, waving his hand and fluttering his steel fingers. “Take him with my compliments, oath brother. Just promise me that miserable wretch will suffer untold agony at your hands.”

Devin gripped the hilt with both hands stirred the molten glass with his sword tip. “I will break the law and his bones and make a hot slurry from the cold, grainy specks of his soul. Captain Vice will suffer several times over, I assure you.”

The soldiers cheered and General Festus nodded. “Good enough. More than good enough. Take care of your wizard friend and when he awakens, pray apologize again on my behalf. I acted . . . rashly in my pursuit of Captain Vice. I swear that scheming poltroon makes my worst qualities rise to the surface like rancid cream.”

“I will tell him,” Devin promised, remembering the day Captain Vice had invaded the old wizard's home and mind. Cornelius of all people will certainly understand how Vice's creepy evil ways can seep into a man.

“If I may beg of you one small favor?” the general asked.

Devin held up his hand. “There is no need to make the request. It is my responsibility. I shall make arrangements for a small party to bury your fallen. I will tell the men to erect a cairn and your soldiers will sleep beneath the watchful eyes of dragons. I have friends among the bargemen who ow me a favor now that the “dragons” who were sinking their mates have been destroyed. Your doing, I assume, General?”

General Festus squared his jaw. “I had a responsibility too, lad: to maintain the secrecy of this mission. I'm not proud of it, but I did my duty.”

Devin shrugged “I've seen men hide too many hideous things behind the flag of duty to give you much credit for that, general. Such as our mutual friend, Armand Delacourt Vice.”

“Loathe as I am to admit I have anything in common with that odious man,” the general shuddered, “in this one regard he is a true soldier of the empire.”

Devin snorted. “The bargemen all blame the dragons anyway. I shall not disabuse them of that notion when I tell men of the hallowed battle ground where a small, brave army helped me to slay the rampaging monsters and quelled their fiery wrath. The bargemen will not question the fiction or unravel loose threads. They'll be happy enough to ply the river trade again. They may even erect a monument to those foreign soldiers who sacrificed so much to pierce a dragon heart.” The youth held one hand over his breast and jingled the last gold buttons in his pocket. “With the right incentive of course.”

“That will have to do,” Festus said, removing his gauntlet and holding out his hand. “A more fitting tribute than my last encounter with those scaly deman spawn. Farewell, Artifice Mage.”

“Farewell, General,” Devin said, clasping the man's hand. “I release you from your oaths to share my fate and kill no more. I imagine those might hamper a soldier in pursuit of his duty.”

“Remember, all men are bound by something, Devin.” Festus shrugged and rolled his shoulders as he affixed his gauntlet. “If not by duty, then other fateful strands. Forgive me, but I must chivy my men through that accursed, dragon infested city while the sun sleeps. If our luck holds, there should be an old trade route on the other side and we shall likely be swarmed by cutthroats and thieves.” The general smiled and placed one hand on the pommel of his sheathed sword. “Much more familiar enemies, those.” Festus bowed from his saddle and led his men back towards the dunes. Devin listened to the clattering armor disappear into the night, as his arms formed a pillow to cradle his head, and fell asleep again.

Devin awoke to the sight of dragons soaring in the thermals radiating off the marble rubble. He looked around for Cornelius and nudged the old man. “General Festus was sorry for attacking you. Now time to get a leg up on the enemy and go back to Ingeld.”

Cornelius popped one eye open and glared. “Good for him. And the punning of that wooden abomination is bad enough. Don't you start, too.”

“I miss Styx . . . even the puns. I keep wondering if he's safe. Is he still happy there without me? Does he even need me anymore?” Devin rummaged for a suitable replacement foot for the old wizard among a pile of twisted, metal wreckage.

Cornelius chuckled. “If you only realized how much you sound like Abigail's father . . .” The wizard stared as piece after piece of junked armor sailed through the air. “By the five gods! You really do consider that wooden monstrosity your son, don't you?”

“Yes,” Devin said triumphantly as his hands rose from the debris with a bent metal leg piece. “Call him an abomination or a monster again and I'll make you eat this armor. He is what he is, Cornelius. Now, what did you mean yesterday about my disregarding the dragon allometry?”

Cornelius sighed. “You want to discuss that now?”

Devin gestured with the metal foot to the multitude of dragons festooning the walls and flying through the air. “What better time or place?”

The old wizard squinted in the sun, shielding his face with one hand as he propped himself up with the other. “Where's your iron peg? Why not use that old thing to fix my leg?”

“Too small.” Devin said. “Besides, the peg's in my satchel at the mountain cabin waiting for the right target. What's the allometry conundrum?”

“What are the dragons, all those bulky, huge dragons, doing right now?” The old wizard asked.

“Flying of course,” Devin said, quirking his eyebrow. “Flying and breathing fire are what dragons do.”

“Let us stick to the flying for now. We can address fire later. What else flies?”

“Birds?” Devin asked, flapping his arms.

“And have you ever seen a bird skeleton?” Cornelius snorted. “Even large birds have light, dainty bones with air pockets. A baby could break them. A bird is nothing but a dusting of feathers stretched over a small sack of muscle with dainty bones. Do those dragons look light and dainty to you?”

“No, I suppose not.” Devin said as he dropped armored leg by the old wizard's side. “So, dragons don't have bird bones. It stands to reason because they're not birds.”

“Stands to reason. Of course!” Cornelius snapped his fingers. The hollow, steel foot disappeared. “Whoops.” He snapped his fingers again and the limb reappeared. “Standing. That's it! Consider two terrestrial animals: the mouse and the pachyderm.”

“I've only ever seen pachyderms in picture books, but all right,” Devin said, testing the fit of the armored foot after making several adjustments with his molten sword, including forming a metal cup to cradle the wizard's stump. “Finding a sheath for this thing that doesn't burst into flames on contact may be difficult,” he muttered as the old wizard swayed. “Hold still, Cornelius.”

“What happens if you take a huge, hulking pachyderm and reduce it to the size of a svelte, little mouse?” Cornelius asked.

Devin sighed. “You would have a small, squat pachyderm.”

“What happens if you enlarge a mouse to pachyderm size while preserving its original, delicate proportions?”

“Huge, hulking mouse?” Devin asked, scavenging bolts from another set of armor to rivet a set of leather straps onto Cornelius's new metal limb..

Cornelius slammed his palm into the sand. “Broken rodent. Their legs . . . um, couldn't take the weight.”

“Uh huh,” Devin muttered. “Speaking of which, stand up.” The youth braced himself and offered his arm. The old wizard took the Devin's hand and scrambled to his feet. “What does all this have to do with dragons?”

“I've just explained as clear as glass. The beasts break the laws of physical sciences. You're looking for answers in all the wrong places.”

“Clear as puddled glass,” Devin said, glancing at the light distorting the fabric he had sealed in melted sand the night before. The youth hefted the brass watch surrendered by General Festus, turning it so the sunken finger prints flashed in the sunlight. How is this possible? What physical or magical force could deform an object that absorbs all forces? “What about this little mystery?”

“What did I just say.” Cornelius hobbled around on his stiff, metal limb. “Your salvation may very well lie hidden in that deformed brass case. I can't rob you of such an important, personal, intellectual discovery. Give your brawny magic muscles a rest and exercise your brain for awhile. The poor thing's atrophied with neglect.”

So, you don't know either, you old fraud. “As you say, Cornelius,” Devin said, pointing. “Look, the general left a horse staked out for us. It's a wonder the dragons didn't grab her.”

“Then let's get back as fast as we can,” the old wizard huffed, walking with a crooked gait towards the placid, brown horse. The animal stood at the end of a long tether munching on a patch of burnt grass. “Before Captain Vice destroys the town looking for his answers in all the wrong places.”