Forging the Darksword - Margaret Weis [58]
His head bowed in understanding, Father Tolban cast the magi a last, fearful glance, then hurried off.
Kneeling down beside Anja, one of the women moved her hands over the burned body, creating a coffin of crystal around the corpse while the other magi levitated the body of the overseer and sent it drifting toward the settlement.
“If the boy’s truly Dead, you’ve done him no kindness, sendin’ him out there,” remarked a woman, staring into the dark regions of the forest. “He’ll stand no chance at all against the likes of what roams the Outland.”
“At least he’ll have a chance to fight for his life,” Mosiah answered hotly. Catching his father’s eye, he choked and fell silent.
Into each mind came the unspoken question.
What life?
12
Escape
Joram ran, though nothing chased him.
Nothing that he could see, that is. Nothing real. Nothing tangible. The Enforcers could not arrive this fast. The others would protect him, buy him time. He was in no danger.
Still, he ran.
It was only when spasms cramped his aching legs that he finally collapsed onto the ground and knew that he could never outrun the dark and tormented being who pursued him. He could never outrun himself.
How long Joram lay on the forest floor, he never afterward knew. He had no idea where he was. He had an indistinct impression of trees and tangled plant life. Somewhere, he thought he heard the low murmuring of water. The only thing real to him was the earth beneath his cheek, the pain in his legs, and the horror in his soul.
As he lay in the dirt, waiting for the pain to ease, the cold, rational part of his mind told him that he should get up and continue on. But beneath that cold and rational surface of Joram’s mind lurked a being, a dark creature that he managed, most of the time, to keep fettered and guarded. But on occasion it slipped its leash and took him over, mastering him completely.
Night blanketed the young man lying exhausted and frightened in the wilderness, and the coming of night loosed the blackness within Joram. Free again, it leaped out of its corner, sank its teeth into him, and dragged his soul away, to gnaw and ravage.
Joram did not get up. A numb, paralyzed sensation stole over his body, such as one feels upon first awakening from a deep sleep. The sensation was pleasant. The pain left his legs and soon all feeling left his body. He could no longer taste the dirt of the ground in his mouth, where his cheek pressed against the muddy trail. He no longer had any conscious thought of lying on the ground, or of the chill of the evening air, or that he was hungry or thirsty. His body slept, but his mind remained dreamily awake.
Once again he was a little child, crouched at the feet of the stone magus that was his father, feeling that hot, bitter tear splash upon him. Then the tear changed to his hair, tumbling and curling around his face and down his back, his mother’s fingers ripping and tugging at it, tearing apart the tangles. And then his mother’s fingers were the claws of animals, ripping and tugging at the overseer, tearing apart his life.
Then the stone that was his father became a stone in Joram’s hand. Cold and biting, the stone shrank suddenly, becoming a toy, dancing in his fingers and appearing to disappear into the air. But all the while, the stone was safely palmed, concealed, hidden from view. Hidden, until today, when it grew so large in his hand that he could hide it no longer and he hurled it far away …
Only it kept coming back and, once again, he was a child ….
It was night. And it was day. Perhaps it was night again and day again.
Black spells, Anja called these times for Joram, when the darkness of his soul overwhelmed him. They had begun to afflict him when he was about twelve. He had no power over them. He could not fight them,