understanding what the rogue magician brandished in his hand.
A spanner. A large but perfectly commonplace spanner. Dr Tremaine hefted it for a second or two, then raised it over his head. With a grunt that could be heard over the clamour of the fighting, he flung it at the window at his feet.
The window shattered. Immediately the atmosphere in the cavernous place changed, becoming less taut, less strained as the air from the outside world rushed in. Aubrey saw how Caroline, George and Sophie were taken aback for an instant until they found the source of the change. It was only Sophie’s quick action in dragging on George’s arm that prevented him from being swatted by the mechanical golem while he gaped.
Dr Tremaine glanced down and nodded. Then, with one finger, he pointed up at the highest point of the dome directly overhead. Instantly, a large crystal disc detached itself. It drifted down, sedately, and settled precisely into the gap.
Instantly, a column of light shot up, forcing Dr Tremaine to stagger back a step or two, cursing, and the atmosphere in the chamber changed again. The shaft of light splashed against the dome and the entire place tightened, as if every constituent part, every particle, were being squeezed. It became charged with potential, thick with magic, and Aubrey knew that the Crystal Johannes was doing its job.
His magical senses told him raw magic was boiling through the lens and shooting upward like a geyser. A fantastic conglomeration of sensations sprayed from it, spinning off in whorls – a flash of apricot, a greasy noise, a heavy taste, a touch of harsh, discordant sound – then they shifted and a whole new panoply of sensations replaced them.
Aubrey was awe-struck, both excited and dismayed at what he was perceiving. The column of light was the physical manifestation of the magic that came from the people of Trinovant, concentrated by Dr Tremaine into an almost solid shaft, which struck the dome and was fed by the silver tracery all over the arena.
We’re inside a machine, Aubrey thought, still trying to come to terms with what he saw. A machine dedicated to gathering and channelling magic.
Dr Tremaine stood facing the dazzling column of light with his arms outstretched, as if he were about to embrace it, and he began to chant.
Aubrey felt a profound shift about him, as if the entire universe had been lifted for an instant and then dropped back into place. He blinked, saw random motes of queasiness in his vision, and realised that Dr Tremaine had begun the most terrible magical spell in ten thousand years.
George let out an angry bellow and, immediately after, a cry of distress came from Sophie. More shots and Sylvia Tremaine’s laughter, cold and hard, joined the echoes of Dr Tremaine’s voice rolling about the dome.
Aubrey closed his eyes. Magic surrounded him, sparkling along the silver tracery embedded in the dome, the pillars, the floor, boiling in the shaft of light streaming up through the lens. On top of his already awesome power, Dr Tremaine had summoned an unheard-of concentration of magic ready to shape to his will. If he succeeded, not only would he become immortal – he would use up the consciousnesses of those trapped in the pillars about them, and of the populace of Trinovant below.
Aubrey had to do what he could. As much as he wanted to come to the aid of his friends, he couldn’t waste a moment. He was torn and, not entirely sure he was making the right decision, he wished his friends luck and went to work.
His task? As it had ever been: to stop Dr Tremaine.
82
The Law of Division and the Law of Entanglement had been much on Aubrey’s mind. Whenever he had a moment to spare – in between coping with ghostly cavalry raids, summoning the Holmland war leaders and making sure he and his friends weren’t killed in an ornithopter crash – he’d grappled with them. He probed them, he analysed them, he tried to recall everything he’d ever heard or read about them.
The Law of Division was a useful principle used to derive spells where objects were divided into parts, but where the parts had to retain the characteristics of the original. The Law of Entanglement described a peculiar, awkward and little-used phenomenon where magic could be used to unite two objects that could be separated by a distance, but would continue to mirror each other’s state.
It wasn’t their traditional applications that he was interested in. He wanted to use the ‘dividing’ part of a Division spell, and combine it with an inverted form of an Entanglement spell to create something to sever the magical connection Dr Tremaine and he shared.
Aubrey was aware that this was not without its risks. Messing about with magical connectors was fraught with danger, something that he knew more than most, having spent more than a year in a state of near death thanks to a spell that had severed the connection between his body and his soul. The experience, however, had taught him a great deal. He’d learned much about preservation while in a precarious state and he had invented many magical applications to strengthen and promote his essential integrity. Complete restoration had proved beyond him – only a freak accident had reunited his body and soul again – but he did have an almost unparalleled appreciation of the effects of magical connectors.
He was hoping that if he were successful with his spells and was able to sever the connector, both Dr Tremaine and he would be affected by the shock. To what extent and how seriously, he had no idea. The connector had, at times, been a conduit for memories, feelings, impressions, and at times it was almost like an organic link, something that belonged to both of them. Slicing it in two would inevitably debilitate them. He was wagering everything, hoping that his experiences in the past would stand him in good stead.
Firstly, he concentrated on the connector, bringing his magical senses to bear on it. He groped for where it merged with his chest, then he sought for its blend of Tremaineness and Fitzwilliamness. He brought up a version of the spell he’d used earlier to rouse the link. He cast it softly, increasing the intensity factor. The connector became more tangible and he was rewarded with a startled noise from Dr Tremaine, clear even over the sounds of mayhem.
Aubrey was pleased to see a cord as thick as his thumb, snaking and curling from his chest along the floor until it reached the rogue sorcerer – who was still facing the column of magic.
Aubrey lifted the cord to eye level and, for a moment, allowed it to undulate there. It was a strange phenomenon, one that had only been hinted at in a handful of medieval texts he’d found. It bore further study. Who knew how it could be useful, between doctor and troubled patient, for instance?
Plenty of time for regrets later, he thought, as usual.
He began his disconnection spell, starting with the elements plucked from applications he’d constructed using the Law of Division. He favoured the clear, blunt language of Achaean for this and he spoke each term, each operator with as much calmness as he could summon, moving into the elements derived from the Law of Entanglement, inverting each one so that they would work to disentangle rather than keep together.
The spell was monolithic. It felt as if he were a slave of one of the ancient Aigyptian kings, attempting to move great blocks of stone into place. He had to strain, to summon his strength to keep the elements moving, slotting them into their positions one by one. Sweat ran from his forehead and he heard a worrying waver in his voice – but he was nearly there. An element of directionality, one of a particular dimensionality – tricky – then his signature element and he was done.
A glowing knife appeared in his hand. Aubrey’s spell hadn’t prescribed the form it would take. He assumed that it had been plucked from his unconscious, for it was the very model of a cutting implement, an almost perfect representation of sharpness. The handle was golden and the blade curved slightly from hilt to tip, as subtle as a dancer.
Aubrey swayed a little, sapped by the effort of casting the spell, but he gathered himself. He twisted the cord. He manoeuvred the magic knife, inserted it in the loop he’d formed, and he cut.
83
