Spellwright

In an attempt to edit the spells binding his arms, John cast a green sentence from his chin. Nicodemus caught and destroyed it with a disspell. John tried twice more, spitting out the spells like angry words. Even so, he was too slow. Nicodemus censored each sentence with a finger-flicked disspell.

Seeming to realize that he could not compete with Nicodemus magically, John began to flex his massive arms. Two of the binding spells snapped. But even as the big man broke a third line, Nicodemus sent ten more glowing-white sentences, and then ten more.

John made one last, heroic tug, which made him start to fall over. Nicodemus rushed over and grabbed the big man’s arm in time to set him down gently.

John stopped struggling. He was bound as surely as if he were in chains.

“I’m sorry to do this, John,” Nicodemus said. “I’ll untie you when you’re calmer. But you must understand that we are in danger. Unless we take the Drum Tower boys away, they may be hurt.”

John was desperately shaking his head.

“I’m going to wake the boys now,” Nicodemus said. “I’ll come back, and we’ll get you ready to go too. All right?” He moved for the door.

Simple John made a sound then, a faint rumbling, as if a beehive were humming in his expansive chest. “Nnnn… no… nnn,” he growled. “Nnnn… nnn… Nico no.”

“John, you said something different!”

“Nnnnn… Nnnnico not go.”

Nicodemus shook his head. “I need to step out quickly. I’ll be right back. Don’t worry.”

John flinched. “Sstsss… strange man tells Simple John not let Nico go.”

Nicodemus frowned. “Have you been talking to the foreign spellwrights?”

“No! Long before Simple John comes to… comes to here, Typhon tells Simple John not to let Nico go.”

“Typhon?” Nicodemus asked. “Do you mean typhoon? A storm talked to you?”

John had to work his lips to speak. “Typhon… Typhoneus, red hair, shiny black skin… old, old, old.”

Nicodemus studied John. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, and I don’t know how it is you can say all these different things now. But John, we must hurry!”

Tears ran down the big man’s face and caught on his throat’s stubble. “Yes!” he suddenly said. “I will help. But I need… need to get the big parchments.”

“If I release you, you’ll gather your belongings so we can go? You won’t keep me from waking the boys?”

“Won’t,” John said, “block door.”

Satisfied, Nicodemus pulled his spells into his hands. He could always cast them out again.

John struggled to his feet and lumbered into his room. Meanwhile, Nicodemus retrieved his bedsheet-turned-satchel.

A moment later, the large man reappeared holding two parchments.

“John, how can you say all these things when no one has heard you say anything but your name, ‘no,’ and ‘splattering splud’?”

“Splattering splud,” John echoed forlornly. “Long before, Simple John was the son of a tailor in Trilli… Trillinon. But John was stupid so father says get out. Simple John lived on streets for years before Typhon comes. Typhon says he make Simple John unstupid. He can fix all brokenpeople. But says that depends on… Nico. He says Simple John must look after Nico and make sure he doesn’t leave south place… here. Typhon brings Simple John here. Tells me to say only three things. Typhon teaches me big alphabets and tells me to watch Nico. Typhon comes back with emerald every four years to visit Nico when he’s sleeping. And he says to use these”-he held up the parchments-”if Nico tries to go.”

“Emerald?” Nicodemus exclaimed. “John, what are you talking about? You know that someone came to watch me sleep? Did he steal my ability to spell?”

Rather than answer, John reached into his parchment and pulled out a spell that Nicodemus had heard about but never seen.

Written in silvery Magnus, its pumpkin-sized, two-part body resembled that of a spider, but its hundred multi-jointed legs were nothing like the relative tameness of arachnid appendages. These horrific limbs were twice as long as a man was tall and covered with sharp stony barbs. They rasped their tarsals across the floor.

It was a spell, Nicodemus knew, that had been written during the Dialect Wars, when the Numinous Order had entangled itself in the fall of the Neosolar Empire. It was a time when wizard fought wizard, when new magical languages and societies formed, when deceit and bloodspells killed thousands. And on the day the fighting ceased and the new magical societies agreed never to make war again, the aracknus spell-one of which John now held-was forbidden.

Judging from his eyes, Simple John had had no idea what he was about to pull from the parchment. When the bloodspell bloomed in the big man’s hand, he cried out and dropped the construct. With a whirl of legs, the bloodspell shot toward Nicodemus faster than an uncoiling snake.