After the few blank pages at the front, it was solidly filled with spells until a mere five pages from the end. Had Derithon lived to learn more spells, he would have needed a second volume very shortly.
If Tobas were to keep this book for himself and master every spell in it, he realized, he would, beyond any possible doubt, become one of the greatest wizards in the World. That was a very tempting thought. He would not need to eke out a living selling charms and removing curses; he would be able to conjure up almost anything he pleased or sell single spells for roomfuls of coin.
He noted with mild interest that the handwriting had changed from the boyish scrawl of the earliest pages to a smaller, neater, more legible hand as Derithon had aged. Learning and recording these spells had obviously taken the mage a long time; Tobas guessed that Derithon had kept on adding new spells long after he completed his apprenticeship, though it was not clear how he had come by them. From a comparison of the lettering, he judged that the footnote to Thrindle’s Combustion had been added at a time when Derithon had filled fifty or sixty of the book’s pages.
The spells described in the volume varied from “A Fine Blemish Remover” to something called “The Seething Death” that bore a small warning at the bottom: “The full potential of this spell is not known. Its inventor believed that, unchecked, it could destroy all of Ethshar and perhaps the entire World. It has been attempted only twice in all of history and was stopped both times by a countercharm, now lost.” Below that, scribbled in the margin in red ink, a single line of runes read, “DON’T TRY IT.”
Tobas chuckled nervously when he read it. He had no intention of trying anything of the sort.
On the next page after the Seething Death, near the back of the book, he found “The Transporting Tapestry.”
The entry was a long one, the spell complex, with three pages of notes following the actual procedure. Tobas looked around for a chair and noticed for the first time that Karanissa was still in the room, quietly watching him.
“You don’t need to wait,” he said. “This may take a while.”
She shrugged. “I don’t have anything better to do, do I?”
“I suppose not,” he agreed. “Could you pass me that chair?” He pointed at the one he wanted, standing in the nearest corner.
Karanissa turned and looked at it, and the chair walked, stiff-legged and awkward, over to Tobas. He stared at it uneasily for a moment before sitting down, making sure it was no longer moving.
“I am a witch, you know,” Karanissa remarked. “You wizards aren’t the only real magicians around.”
“I never said we were,” Tobas answered.
“Derry did.”
Tobas could think of no good answer to that; instead, he turned back to the Book of Spells.
The Transporting Tapestry required thirty pounds of gold and thirty of silver, he noticed; he had made the right decision in taking the tapestry rather than any of Peren’s small heap of household furnishings. It also required all the usual makings of a tapestry as well as three fresh pine needles, three candles, one white, one black, one blood-red, a white rose, a red rose, a peculiar sort of incense — a footnote referred him to another book that gave instructions on preparing it — and, if he understood the little cross marking correctly, as he was sure he did, an athame.
The athame symbol appeared after each mention of cutting the yarn or spun metal for the tapestry; Tobas interpreted that to mean that every thread used in making the tapestry had to be cut with the athame rather than with scissors or an ordinary blade. Obviously, no one but a wizard could possibly make the spell work.
The initial ritual required one day, from midnight to midnight, and the making of the tapestry called for one full year, though it could be started at any time.
There were no instructions for repairing or renewing a tapestry that had ceased to function.
He stared at the page for a long moment, considering the prospect of spending a minimum of a year in this mysterious castle, with the beautiful Karanissa as his only companion.
Or rather, remembering the way the tray of food had been delivered, his only human companion.
The idea was not wholly unpleasant, actually; he was not particularly eager to go on wandering and he could think of far worse places a man might call home. However, he would have preferred to have a choice. The castle seemed comfortable enough, but he had never pictured himself making a home in another world, cut off from the rest of the human race.
Besides, the wine was terrible.
He looked over the spell again, to see if he had missed anything, and realized that he had badly misjudged the situation. If his only way out was to make an entirely new tapestry, he would be here far longer than a single year; the spell was a high-order one, requiring that every second of that twenty-four-hour ritual be absolutely perfect. He had learned enough from Roggit to know that his chances of performing the spell correctly on the first try, with no other preparation, were very, very slim indeed. In fact, he guessed that it was far more likely the spell would backfire and do something completely different from what he intended it to do, quite possibly something fatal.
Most likely of all would be for it to do nothing whatsoever.
Eventually, of course, he could study and practice and work his way up through the other spells, as any apprentice wizard would do, though he would not have the benefit of a master’s advice and encouragement, so it would probably take a good deal longer than the traditional six years. A good journeyman wizard might manage to make a functioning tapestry if the spell was, say, fifth-or sixth-order, and would probably be safe from any real chance of a serious backfire.
If it were of a significantly higher order than that, as it well might be, well, a journeyman usually took another three years of study to rate as a master, and another nine usually conferred sufficient expertise to use the term “mage.” Some were said to attain Guildmaster status before they were forty, but Tobas understood that to be due as much to politics as ability, and Roggit had once said — enviously — that the youngest grand master was only fifty-eight.
He might be here for a very long time.
Or, looking at the list of ingredients again, he might be here forever if the castle garden did not include roses or pines. Even if Derithon had kept those ingredients somewhere on his shelves, after four hundred years pine needles could not possibly be “fresh,” and roses would have withered. Furthermore, he had no way of knowing when midnight was, and the ritual had to be begun exactly at midnight. There might be no midnight in this void. He might live out his entire life in this castle. Unless, of course, he could determine why the return tapestry was not working and remedy it. He began turning pages, looking for a low-order divination that might tell him what was causing the problem.
He found none; Derithon had apparently not gone in much for divinations. He did come across Varrin’s Greater Propulsion, which he guessed had been the means by which Derithon got his flying castle off the ground, and spent several minutes admiring it, but after that he refused to be distracted further.
With no divination possible, he realized he would have to figure the problem out for himself. He turned back to the description of the Transporting Tapestry and the three pages of notes, and read through them all carefully.
If the tapestry was cut, even so much as a single thread, it was as good as destroyed and would never function again; he would have to check that and hope that was not the cause.
If the tapestry was unraveled, even a single thread out of place, it would stop working, but reweaving the damaged portion in accordance with the spell’s directions would repair it and restore it to operation.
That he thought he might manage; that would require none of the daylong preliminary spell. The actual weaving of the tapestry did not seem to call for anything much beyond his capabilities.
He would have to inspect the tapestry very closely for cuts or raveling, even a snagged thread might count.
The notes explained that each tapestry worked in only one direction and recommended making them in pairs, one for each way; Tobas grimaced ruefully at that advice. Derithon had followed it, but that did Karanissa and himself little good now.
Derithon’s comments also emphasized the absolute necessity that every detail in the tapestry match exactly with every detail in the actual place. The slightest error could result in a tapestry that led to someplace else entirely from the desired arrival point.
