help...”
The woman snorted.“I’m not going after anyone who can fly! If you want to deal with magic, find a magician. I’m just a potter.” She looked back and forth along Newmarket Street. “Are there any more?”
“There were other people screaming earlier, but I don’t-”
Hanner’s sentence was interrupted by the sound of breaking glass.
“I think there are more,” he concluded.
“Then I’m staying inside,” the potter said. “Andyou should go somewhere else.” She pushed Hanner out of the doorway into the street, then stepped back inside her shop and slammed the door shut.
Hanner looked around.
“Go somewhere else,” the potter had told him-but where? He could just go home-while it was his responsibility in general to keep order, no one could fault him for not getting involved with some mysterious magical mess that was none of his doing.
Buthe would fault himself. He and his uncle were the closest thing the overlord had to experts on magic, and it was his duty to find out what was going on.
“If you want to deal with magic, find a magician.” That was obvious advice-and obviouslygood advice. And the best place to find a magician in Ethshar of the Spices was the Wizards’ Quarter.
Presumably the wizards and the rest would already know what was happening, but it wouldn’t hurt to make sure and see whether he could be helpful. If he went on down Newmarket to East Street, then turned left on Fishertown Street...
He began jogging, despite his tired feet.
The route wasn’t quite as simple as he had hoped, as Fisher-town did not go through to Arena Street, but twenty minutes later he was crossing Games Street into the Wizards’ Quarter.
Along the way he saw at least a dozen more instances of the strange magic running amok-looted shops, people or objects flying, doors and windows shattered, and a distressing number of buildings aflame. Although the streets were largely deserted, even more so than usual at this hour, the few people Hanner did see either seemed to be using the magical power, fleeing it, or caught in it. Several people ran and hid at Hanner’s approach.
For his own part Hanner refused to be cowed-he was a public servant, a city official, and was determined to act like one, within reason. He marched on, facing the out-of-control magicians he encountered.
In one case a woman was walking along with a man held screaming in the air over her head-eight or nine feet over her head. Hanner hesitated, considered intervening-but then she took off as well, flying away with the man in tow. Whatever had happened had clearly not been limited to Newmarket and Fishertown; Hanner saw people and things flying about in the Old City, the New City, Allston, and the Arena district. He wondered just how widespread the mysterious effect really was-did it extend outside the city walls of Ethshar of the Spices? Were the other two great cities of the Hegemony affected? Or the Small Kingdoms, or the lands to the north and west of Ethshar?
But that was absurd. Who would unleash a spell powerful enough to cover so great an area as that?
Of course, the broader the affected area, the less likely the effects would be permanent-perhaps the spell, whatever it was and whoever was responsible, would fade away soon, and his trip halfway across the city in the middle of the night would have been for nothing.
He was here now, though-and he was not the only one. He could hear voices ahead, angry voices.
He hoped the madness had not affected any wizards or other magicians-that could bereally dangerous. He forced himself to trot faster.
At the corner of Wizard Street he turned and found himself facing a crowd.
It was perhaps less than an hour beforemidnight, but unlike anywhere else he had been, the street was full of people. Torches and lanterns, ordinarily extinguished by this hour of the night, were brightly ablaze; doors and windows stood open, and dozens, perhaps hundreds, of people were milling about, talking excitedly. Some wore ordinary tunics, skirts, and breeches; others wore the formal robes of magicians; and some had clearly come directly from their beds and were dressed in nightshirts or hastily donned household robes. Most of them looked scared or at least nervous.
No one seemed to be in charge; instead the crowd was gathered into small groups, a few voices in each arguing loudly, while people around the periphery would drift from one bunch to the next. Hanner guessed that these were people at least as confused and frightened by the night’s events as he was, come, as he had, to seek the help of the city’s magicians.
And judging by the snatches of conversation and debate he overheard, no one was getting very satisfactory answers.
He hurried down the block, listening, but heard nothing that hinted at an understanding of what was happening.
These were apparently all wizards here, though, and Hanner thought other kinds of magicians might know more. He turned left at the end of the block, then right, and trotted into Witch Alley.
This area was quieter-witchcraft was generally a quieter sort of magic than wizardry, and its practitioners and purchasers followed suit. Still, there were two or three dozen people clustered in the street and in doorways, talking. Here, too, they wore the same assorted clothing; he even saw one man in the yellow tunic and red kilt of the city guard.
Hanner spotted a familiar face, one he had hoped to see, and called, “Mother Perrea!”
The old woman at the center of one of the smaller groups turned. “Lord Hanner,” she said. She beckoned to him, and ignoring the aching of his feet he ran up to join the handful of people gathered about her. He paused there, struggling to catch his breath, and the witch asked him, “Did the overlord send you, my lord, or your uncle?”
Hanner shook his head. “Neither,” he said. “I came on my own.”
“And have you come to ask questions or answer them?”
“Ask them, I’m afraid,” he said. “Though I’ll answer any I can.”
“Then let me answer the most obvious and say that we do not know who or what is responsible for this outbreak of magical madness.”
Hanner’s face fell. He had told himself, after seeing the situation on Wizard Street, that this was the most likely answer, but he had still hoped. “Do you knowanything about it, then? Is it a wizard’s spell gone wrong, perhaps, like the legendary Tower of Flame?”
Perrea turned up an empty palm. “We don’t know what it is— but we know a few things it isn’t.”
“That would be better than nothing,” Hanner said.
“It isn’t wizardry at all,” she told him. “I don’t know whether the wizards themselves have determined that yet, but I can assure you, it’s not wizardry. The feel of it is entirely different.”
That astonished Hanner; he had not thought anything but wizardry could be so powerfully chaotic. “Is it witchcraft, then?”
“It’s more like witchcraft than wizardry, but no, it’s not witchcraft. A witch could not have the strength to do some of what we’ve seen. Nor is it sorcery, nor theurgy-the priests have consulted Unniel and Aibem, and there is no question.”
“Demonology?” Hanner couldn’t think of any other possibilities that remained. It was unimaginable that any of the lesser magicks he was familiar with, such as herbalism, could be responsible for something like this.
“We have not yet ruled that out, but neither have we found any evidence to support it,” Perrea said. She pointed at a black-robed man a few yards away. “That’s Abden the Black, an excellent demonologist, and as trustworthy as any I have dealt with-”
“Which is not a strong endorsement, is it?” Manner interrupted.
Perrea smiled. “No, I’m afraid it’s not-but he assures me that this is no sort of demonology he knows, and he seems quite sincere. My craft can read truth and falsehood in most people, and although it’s not completely reliable on demonologists, I believe him.”
Before Hanner could ask another question, one of the others in the group interrupted.
“You came from the overlord’s Palace?” she asked him.
Hanner had given the others present very little attention, but now he looked at the questioner and felt himself flush. She was a slender woman of slightly below average height,’ heavily made up. She wore a bright red tunic embroidered in red and gold, cut very low, and a darker red skirt that was slit up one side almost to her hip. Her long, full hair was fiery red as well-an extremely unusual color, though Hanner had heard it was more common
