Lawrence Watt-Evans - In the Empire of Shadow

Amy or Susan might fit, but the most likely candidate was himself. He was the one doing the talking, after all. He was the one who had insisted they come here.

He didn’t feel very heroic, but then, he’d heard that heroes usually didn’t.

Well, if he was the hero-and he still wasn’t convinced-he might as well carry on with the role.

“All right,” he said. “Let’s hear about it.”

Amy was impressed with Pel’s courage, to stand there and argue with the woman who claimed to be Shadow, or at least to represent Shadow. She wasn’t sure it was really very bright, but it was certainly courageous, after three out of eight of them had been murdered.

She couldn’t believe how calmly she was taking it, that the three had been…had been fried. She had been traveling with those people all this time, and now they were dead, horribly dead, burned; she wanted to scream and cry and faint, but she didn’t dare even do that, because the thing that killed them was still here, all around, and if she did anything it might kill her.

And she did not want to die.

Yet Pel was talking back to it-he was brave, but maybe stupid.

She had resisted Walter, but she had known when to shut up, so as not to be killed; she hoped that Pel knew as much.

And for now, she wasn’t going to say anything. She didn’t want to die.

No one else was saying anything any more, either; were they all as terrified as she was?

Ted was crazy, so he didn’t count.

She glanced back at Susan, who was still on the narrow landing beyond the door, not in the throne room at all, and saw her slip a hand into her purse.

Amy remembered that Pel had talked about emulating Bakshi’s “Wizards,” where the evil wizard was ready for any sort of magical attack, so the good wizard pulled out a pistol and blew him away. She remembered the Arab swordsman in “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” too.

Shadow, despite her power, just looked like an ordinary woman; maybe, if Susan shot her, she would just die like an ordinary woman. Maybe she would die, and Amy would live. And if there was ever going to be a time to use that pistol, Amy had to agree that this must be it-but shouldn’t Susan get closer? She couldn’t be sure she’d hit the woman at all from way back there, let alone kill her with the first shot-and Amy didn’t think she’d have time for more than one.

Maybe Susan was waiting for a distraction; well, Pel was providing that, wasn’t he?

“Let’s hear about it,” Pel said.

That was an invitation to a speech if Amy had ever heard one; maybe the Shadow woman would get talking and forget herself.

Still, Susan was too far away. Amy unobtrusively beckoned her forward, as Shadow said, “I have lived long, little people from realms beyond this world; my magicks have given me years beyond measure, have kept me from aging. I grow, not weary, but bored, and seek distraction.”

“What, so you just want to talk?” Pel asked.

That didn’t seem very likely; this awful woman would scarcely have driven them here with her monsters just to chat. She probably had something gruesome and disgusting in mind, something worse than anything Walter had done.

Amy hoped that Shadow would die before she could do whatever it was, instead of after, as Walter had.

Shadow laughed, a very unpleasant laugh. Amy turned quickly, ignoring Susan, keeping her attention on the horrible woman on the throne.

“Nay, fool,” Shadow said. “I seek to explore new worlds. I’ve my fill of this one.”

She hadn’t noticed what Susan was doing-either that, or she didn’t care. Amy wondered if Shadow could read minds. Prossie couldn’t, here in Faerie, but maybe Shadow could. If so, she was just toying with them all, she knew what Susan had in her purse.

Maybe, Amy thought, I’d better not think about it.

Instead, she tried to concentrate on what Shadow was saying, to involve herself in that-though she hoped it wouldn’t matter what Shadow wanted.

Pel frowned. “So where’s the problem?” he said. “You’re the one who can open those magical portals, right?”

Amy shook her head. Pel was being stupid. He wasn’t leading Shadow on well enough.

“She wants native guides,” Amy suggested. “People who can show her around, keep her out of trouble.” She had moved around to one side a little, hoping to draw Shadow’s attention away from Susan. She didn’t really think that was what Shadow wanted; she just wanted to keep that nasty old woman talking.

“Near the heart, wench,” Shadow answered, “but not to the meat of it.”

“So tell us, then,” Pel said. “At least, if it’s something where we need to help you consciously, and you don’t just need a bunch of blood sacrifices or something.”

“If it’s sacrifices,” Amy added, trying not to sound too upset with the idea, “I think we’d just as soon not know.” She tried very hard not to look back to where Susan was creeping through the door, nearer to Shadow’s throne.

“And what need would I have of your blood that would not be served by another’s, more easily had?” Shadow asked.

“So tell us about it,” Pel repeated.

* * * *

The villains in the stories never needed so much coaxing, Pel thought; they’d start babbling about their plans at the drop of a hint. How was he supposed to play the hero, and find a way out, if Shadow wouldn’t explain what it-or she-was up to? He smiled expectantly at the flabby, blowsy, drab woman that was Shadow.

She hardly looked the part of a world-conquering wizard, but this wasn’t Hollywood.

“Know you aught of matrices?” she asked.

“No,” Pel said. “At least, not the way you mean it, not if you mean magic ones.”

Shadow nodded. “Indeed, magic,” she said. “A matrix is a gathering of magical forces, a construction of magicks, a framework.”

“Valadrakul said something about webs,” Amy said. Pel glanced at her; she seemed to be getting more talkative, all of a sudden.

“Aye,” Shadow agreed. “A web, or a net-i’truth, a matrix can be likened to many things, all in some way truthful, yet none a complete description. And there are some-or there were -who had the talent for the weaving of them.”

Pel nodded encouragingly; she was finally telling her story.

Shadow settled back in her chair. “This was centuries past,” she said, “long ere your fathers’ fathers were born. There were those of us in the world who learned the making of matrices, and we were friends, and teachers, and students, and rivals, one to another, and sometimes we were bitter enemies. We twined our magicks, erected our structures thereof, each after his own fashion, but each learning from the others.

“Thus it was, for many years, for centuries before my own birth; how it began was lost in the past. Magic was loose and wild in the world, free for the taking, so that any person who could speak the words of a simple charm might use it, but only a few of us, only a very few, had the talent for binding the wild magicks and building matrices that we could take with us, that we could send forth, that we could use for purposes more profound than mere kitchen spells.

“Yet the matrix wizards of that time were mortal, and died, and when each died the matrix he had built crumbled, and the magicks bound therein burst free. See you the way of it?”

“I think so,” Pel said. It seemed clear enough.

“See then, in time, certain discoveries were made; a method was found whereby a wizard’s matrix might be taken from him intact, and bound to another, should the binder be present when the wizard failed. Further, ’twas learned how one could turn magic upon one’s own aging and stave off the ravages of time; a matrix wizard need not grow old, should he attain sufficient mastery.”