Lightbreaker

beats air. Even in alchemy, there are Roshambo rules.

As the robe fluttered to the floor, I heard a screech of metal. Behind me. I had lost Doug. Misdirection, not a distraction. The robe had been a decoy. I glanced over my shoulder.

Doug had gone to the bull statue-the sword-wielding aspect on the Wheel of Fortune-and he had extricated the weapon from the statue's hands. Of course, the statues weren't just for show. They would have a deadly practicality. As Doug raised the sword and charged, the Weave twitched and I Saw the pattern. The Prince of Swords. Realized Mind, obsessively focused on a single goal.

Me. Antoine. Doug. We were all the same.

XX

The sword was a heavy two-handed blade, probably not all that sharp, but even a smack with its dull edge was worth avoiding. I back-pedaled and tripped over the flopping robe, which immediately wrapped itself around my left leg. Doug's first swing went over my head, whirring like the wing of a predatory bird.

Doug had no formal blade training, obvious in the way he let the weight of the sword over-extend him. He recovered clumsily, and opted for an easier downward stroke as a follow-up attack. Dragging the cloying robe with me, I rolled away from his swing.

Sparks danced on the riveted floor as the sword stuck. The force of the impact stung Doug's hands, and he struggled with his grip. While he tried to control the blade, I kicked at his knee with my robe-wrapped leg. I missed, but got close enough to confuse the robe.

The spell laid on the cloth was simple and didn't include a decision tree for target resolution. Confronted with choices, the magicked cloth partially unwrapped itself from my leg so as to greedily snare Doug's knee as well. Doug staggered back from the overly friendly robe, dragging the sword across the floor. I flushed the Chorus into my leg, momentarily deadening the liveliness of my flesh. The robe fell off my leg, sensing only Doug's retreating body as an active target. It rippled across the floor and he swung at it.

I scrambled like a monkey for the nearest statue-the rampant lion, pentacle-shaped shield in its paws. As Doug, having slain his creation, came after me, I pulled the shield free and got it up in time to block his clumsy swing. My left arm, braced along the underside of the shield, went numb. He hit the shield again, and my clumsy stance collapsed.

We were close to the edge of the circle, close to the whirling barrier of steel blades. As he swung the sword like a lunatic golfer, forcing me to lower the shield so its bottom edge touched the floor, I realized he didn't need to actually hit me with the sword. He was keeping me off-balance, forcing me to retreat from his wild swings. Forcing me back into the spinning blades. I could hear their hungry whisper behind me, the keening relentlessness of their sharp edges.

Doug knew this arena. The motif was familiar and he knew how to play to its strengths. I was playing catch- up in a game running in sudden-death overtime. I had to wrap my head around a viable strategy. Now. Another step back and I'd be diced.

Doug danced away, giving himself a little space. The wind-up for the big swing. I could move left and right, but I was running along the edge of the ring. How long could I dodge his attacks? To get some real distance, I'd have to run, dropping all pretense of defense. He would have one clear shot. Sharp blade or not, one would be enough.

He spun, bringing the sword around at his waist. Head height for me. I raised the shield and braced myself for the impact. Doug hit hard, and I held my ground by shifting the blow off to one side of the shield. The rim of the shield crossed the plane of the circle though, and with a chattering bite, the triangular blades sheared off an arm of the pentacle.

Too close. The blades tore the shield from my grip, and it clattered against the floor. Out of easy reach. I stayed low, trying to duck-walk toward it.

Doug minced about in a gangly two-step with the sword, trying to keep me off-balance with his unpredictable movements. I couldn't avoid his next strike. His blade or the blades behind me: he liked those odds. Either was fine. Though he'd prefer that I stood there and took his blade.

The Chorus tightened at the base of my neck, squeezing my spine. Two choices. Which one? They rose like a pressure wave, carrying with them a chaotic burst of insight.

Blind Fortune turns the Wheel. Tied to its rim, the vegetable kings are pulled down by its persistent cycle. The cycle of the seasons. Kings are buried by the children; the children become kings. The Wheel, always turning. The alchemical and Hermetic symbol of transformation. Death. Burial. Rebirth.

Thoth guides the newly born. Thoth, who became Hermes in Hellenic Egypt. Hermes Thrice-blessed. Hermes Trismegistus. The only vice of the soul is ignorance. Reason guides the soul; the Enlightened Mind breaks free. The body is buried, and we are reborn by digging out of this grave of flesh. Reason allows us to make choices. Not the random circumstances of fate, but informed choices.

Sword raised, Doug trotted forward to deliver the killing blow. He hesitated at the peak of his back swing, the expression on my face giving him pause.

I was smiling.

This is not a death of my choosing.

'What are you laughing at?' The tip of the sword, raised over his head, trembled slightly.

'Something said to me recently,' I said. 'Ex lux et vita.'

The Chorus erupted in a flash of visible light. Doug recoiled from the starburst, and the sword wobbled in his hands. I kicked his kneecap, connecting this time, and he went down, the joint of his leg bending at an obtuse angle.

He bellowed like a gored wildebeest, hands going to his shattered kneecap. The etheric strands streaming from his head thickened like fire hoses filling with water.

Energy. Channeled energy.

Doug was connected to lines of force, and these conduits were feeding him power. At the other end of the strands were his buddies, the sorcerers sitting in the bleachers. Doug was getting help from the sidelines.

He snapped his leg forward, and a spurt of violet energy around his kneecap popped the joint back into place. The magick nimbus brightened about his head as he near-levitated to his feet. Blood-stained tears-quivering tracks of pink luminescence-spread from the corners of his eye sockets. He interlaced his fingertips, and a storm brewed in the hollow of his hands.

Lightning. I needed a ground, something elemental to hide behind. I scrambled for the damaged shield. The pentacle was the suit of earth, and even with one arm missing, it was my best protection.

A tempest blossomed like a midnight flower between his palms, and with a ragged noise, the storm spat a jagged cable of lightning. The discharge struck the center of the shield, the pentacle attracting the lightning. The shield grew hot against my arm, but most of the energy was dispersed by the earthly ground of the symbol. A shower of crackling sparks, the bitter smell of scorched ozone in their wake, cascaded from the shield.

Doug coalesced energy for another bolt, the force lines pulsating around his head. I had to break his concentration. The weather flower was a volatile construct, difficult to control. I charged, the hot shield raised, and I plowed into him with all the grace of an out-of-control semi truck. The tempest popped, a pressure wave pounding my ears.

We went down in a confusion of limbs. Beneath me, Doug reached around the edge of the shield. A web of electricity danced between his fingers, weather still storming in his hand. He strained to touch my face.

I tucked in my chin and shoved his hand away with the shield. His arm hit the Wheel, sparks erupting from his fingertips. I smacked his unprotected face with the hot shield, eliciting a cry of surprise. I got both forearms behind the shield, ignoring the searing burn of heated metal-it was hotter on the front-and firmly pressed the star-inscribed disk against Doug's face.

He bucked me off, a violent rodeo-worthy undulation. The shield stayed, stuck to his flesh. With a scream that was more outrage than pain, he pulled the pentacle off his burned flesh. The star's outline was livid on his skin; his left eyelid was melted into the socket, a fused tab of burned meat hiding the ruin of his eye.

'That looks like it hurts.' I fed him a smug grin as well.