The Gem Lords

The Conference - Part 4

     Thomas spent over six weeks working with a team of senior wizards headed by Pondar Walton, trying to recreate the spells he'd used against the Garusian warships. He spent the first few days writing down as much as he remembered of the magic words, along with the arm and hand movements that went with them, while Pondar worked from the other end of the problem, starting with the effects they wanted to produce and looking for formulae and incantations to produce that effect.

     Thomas was able to get into Pondar's good books early on by pretending to re-invent Fist of the Father, while being careful not to make it look too easy in case the older wizard guessed that he'd perfected it some months earlier. When Pondar successfully learned the spell and used it to demolish a magically created stone wall, he was so delighted that he gave Thomas the rest of the day off and dashed off to give the good news to the Director.

     The other spells were more difficult, though, and in all the weeks they spent poring over ancient tomes of spell lore and mixing noxious and poisonous potions, they only had one other success, the spell Thomas called Felban's Finger of Fire. Pondar himself failed to learn this spell, but the assistant of one of the other senior wizards, a pale, weakly man who moved with a shuffling limp, used it to set a whole grove of trees ablaze, much to the delight of a crowd of apprentices who shouted their appreciation from a safe distance, behind a row of stern faced proctors.

     Both spells were immediately declared unsafe, though, until they could be tested and evaluated by several different wizards in many different circumstances, a process that could take many years, and only when they were eventually given the University's seal of approval would they be released for general use. Until then, even Thomas himself wouldn't be able to use them. At least, not when there was anyone watching.

     His days were busy, therefore, and there was no rest for him in the evenings either, due to a determinedly insistent man called Teg Burber whose persistence was made even more maddening by the infallibly pleasant and patient way he made his repeated demands. He was one of the archivists, entrusted with the storage and careful preservation of records and documents from centuries past (the desk of Ma-Luma, which Thomas had come across in the Agglemonian University, no longer existed, and no-one he'd spoken to could tell him what had happened to it, or even admit that it had ever existed) This constant immersion in the past had given him a keen interest in the history of magic. He was fascinated by Thomas's memories of pre-Amafrykan Garon, and he visited the younger wizard time and again, begging him to tell him more.

     This was one area in which Thomas wasn't required to co-operate, and after a full day of research and spellcasting all he wanted to do was collapse into a comfy chair and relax, but Teg gradually wore him down and he eventually gave in. Every evening after that, therefore, Thomas would spend three or four hours explaining the intricacies of Domandropolian culture and politics, frequently remembering as he did so details of Tak's life that had still been lost to him until then, such as an early mistress, after the death of Khalkedon but before the arrival of Essca, who'd tried to poison him, and a battle with a Yinnfarsian wizard in which his life had been saved by a tight fitting sandal.

     Lirenna listened eagerly to these newly revealed chapters of the ancient wizard's life, fitting them seamlessly in her mind into the whole story as Thomas had told it. Teg filled notebook after notebook with Thomas's memories, scribbling excitedly as fast as the other wizard could speak, and he declared his intention to write them up into a book on the subject, crediting Thomas as author and with himself as ghost writer and editor. Lirenna watched her husband carefully, though, and chased Teg out whenever she decided he needed a break.

     "You're becoming quite an author!" said Lirenna when he'd gone for the night. "How many books will that make, that you've either written yourself or contributed to?"

     Thomas had to pause as he considered it. "Well, there's 'Conversations with a Slaver'," he said at last. "That's the one people ask me about the most. Then there's my treatise on the denizens of the Underworld. My 'History of Kronos' and my study of the moon trogs, although those two are still under wraps until the observatory becomes common knowledge. Erm, 'The changing face of wizardry' and 'The flora and fauna of Fengalla Forest'. Six. Seven if I ever finish writing up my notes on the Ghost Ocean. You know, I'd forgotten all about them until just now. Those notes have been gathering dust back in our cottage for years now."

     "You left out your collected tales of the Fourth Shadowwar," pointed out Lirenna, "and your biography of the wizard Zebulon. They'll have to add an extra wing to the library just for your books."

     "My observations of Agglemon!" cried Thomas suddenly, and he began searching through a stack of papers tucked behind a cupboard. "I started them just after we came back through the Ring of Salammis, and then Tak's memories started to come and I forgot all about them." He found a bundle of papers tied together with a rough piece of string, but Lirenna pulled him firmly away.

     "Not now," she said with a fond smile. "You need to rest. You'll have plenty of time to finish that when we get back to Haven."

     Thomas nodded, and he glanced regretfully at the papers for a moment before tucking them back where he'd found them, and then Lirenna was pulling him gently but insistently towards the bed.