Roar, page 3
In desperation he reached out to grab on to a concrete post to stop himself. But he'd forgotten – he didn't have hands and fingers any more. He had paws. And instead of grabbing it with outstretched fingers, his claws stretched out and tore great rips in the concrete, before he hit the floor again.
The second time he tried to stand up he took it more slowly and carefully, and somehow made it to his feet. His four feet. And then he stood there, staring at the post, studying the huge gouges his claws had torn into the concrete. That wasn't normal, was it? Claws didn't rip through concrete?
But in time he decided, it didn't matter. What mattered was working out what had happened to him. And that began with light. Not the fading yellow light of the distant paraffin lamp on the far wall. Proper white light that would let him see things clearly. And he had a spell for that. It was one of the first that he'd learned. A beginner's spell.
“Atavar nor –” he began. But then he stopped as what came out of his mouth were only more roars. Growls and snarls. Sounds that had no place in the magical tongue. And worse, he was supposed to gesture with his right hand, turning the fingers out so he could point them at what he wanted to glow. But his arm didn't move that way and he had no fingers.
It was then that he realised that he'd lost his magic too. Or rather he still had the magic. He could feel it inside him. But he couldn't shape it into what he wanted or guide it. Not without the words and the gestures.
Thorm was crushed. Another, terrible loss. He just didn't know how he could cope with any more. Already he was in pieces. But he fought through the shock. He was alive. Healing. And he had the magic within him. And he reminded himself that according to many of the books he'd read, master wizards didn't need the words or gestures. Fell witches didn't either. Or at least not the same way as wizards. They cast more by emotion.
He had the magic. He just had to direct it. Not with emotion like a hag. With reason. In the end he couldn't speak. But he could do everything up to the point of forcing the words out of his mouth. So he drew the magic again, and concentrated on the words. Speaking them in his head. Making the gestures the same way.
It worked! He didn't get light. But he felt the magic responding to him. Weakly. But that was something. So he tried again. Over and over again. Each time concentrating on the words and the gestures with everything he had. As if he was actually performing them.
It was hard and slow. But little by little the magic was responding to him. Getting closer and closer to doing as he wanted.
And then in one glorious moment he succeeded! A tiny ball of white light leapt out from him to bury itself in a brick and cause it to glow.
Thorm almost screamed with pleasure as the light filled his basement. But he stopped when what came out of his mouth was a roar that would shatter ears. Still he let the joy fill him. He still had his magic. He had his life and he had his magic. That was finally something.
Then to celebrate he started casting more of the spells of light. Making brick and stone after brick and stone glow until he could finally see his prison more clearly.
But of course what the gods gave, they also took away. He discovered that as the light not only showed him his basement and the collapsed entrance to it filled with rubble, but himself. When he could finally see that he had golden fur all over him and a long slender tail that looked like a rope with a black tuft of fur on the end of it. When he understood that he truly was a beast. The king of beasts in fact.
He was a lion!
Shocked and disbelieving he walked – or trotted – over to the far wall where a small piece of a mirror was still in its frame, and stared at himself. And his confusion only grew greater. He was a lion, huge and powerful, with golden fur and a white mane just starting to go black at its base. But he had emerald green eyes that almost seemed to shine with their own light.
A white mane, emerald green eyes and claws that could tear through concrete. That didn't sound like any lion he'd ever heard of.
Despite it being the height of pointlessness, Thorm kept staring at his reflection, unable to tear his gaze free. Not until he finally became aware of something else. The smell. The air in his basement wasn't good. And it occurred to him that he would like to keep breathing.
Normally the air in his basement came from above. Through the gaps in the shelves that hid the entrance to it. And through the cleverly crafted air channels that led down to it. But the entrance was now full of rubble. No fresh air would be coming that way. And the air channels in the walls might well be blocked too. It was a large basement, but it didn't have an infinite supply of fresh air. So he needed to bring some in.
There was a spell he could use he knew, to cut some air channels in the stone above his head. Cutting light. And it wasn't a particularly complex spell. In fact it was quite similar to the one he'd just used. But he hadn't practised it in a very long time. Now it seemed was the time to try.
So he called his magic to him and started concentrating on the words and the gestures. Letting them guide the magic into the shape he needed. But this time things didn't go quite as he wanted. The cutting light finally appeared – but it was blue. And it didn't cut as well as it should.
Why was it blue? He understood that it was weak and didn't cut as it should, but not that it was blue when it should have been white.
Still, it didn't matter. He sent the light into the stone and little by little began cutting out a finger width hole in it. One that slowly bit deeper and deeper into it while little rivulets of molten stone dripped down on to the floor.
It took time. Much more time than the first spell had taken. And he kept losing concentration and having to start again. But maybe an hour or so later he could finally see the beginnings of daylight right at the very end of the hole. He could also feel the pain in his head, from having over exerted himself.
That was it for him he realised. He'd done as much as he could. He needed to rest. And after that he could start again. He could cut more channels in the stone for air to travel through. And in time he could begin work on getting out of his basement. Cutting a tunnel down into the sewers – because obviously he couldn't walk through the city as he was. The guards would kill him on sight.
Then he could start hunting for food and water. And begin work on what he feared would be the most difficult quest of his life – regaining his human form.
Why the hag had done this to him, he didn't know. But she was mad, so asking her was probably as pointless as asking the wind why it blew. But in the end, why didn't matter. Only how did. Because while he might not be the most powerful or knowledgeable wizard in the world, he'd never heard of a spell to transform someone into a beast. The bards often sang and rhymed about turning people into frogs. But as far as he knew, that was purely a fantasy. This though, was no fantasy. It could be a nightmare, save that he was still awake. But reason told him one thing. The hag had done it to him, so it was magic. And if it was magic, there had to be a spell. He had to find that spell.
That was his only hope.
Part Two
Chapter Three
It was the little things that got to you, Thorm thought as he struggled to turn the pages of the book. The simple things. The big things you dealt with. Like walking on all fours. Being unable to speak. Having people run from you if they saw you. Having to hide. They were terrible. But he could deal with them – because he had to.
He could also deal with the necessities like finding food as well for the same reason. While he wasn't proud of it, he'd learned to steal what he needed during the dead of night. He had enchanted some stones so that they glowed with a soft white light in the basement, allowing him to see. He had created enchantments to bring in fresh air through the rubble above. But being unable to turn the pages of a book with his fingers; that frustrated him. Even after three years of trying to build a new life, the limits imposed by his new form robbed him of his hope. It left him angry and frustrated.
He supposed he had every right to be angry. He had been trapped in this new body for three years now, and probably would be for the rest of his life. He had been hurt in ways that still returned to him in his nightmares. He had been betrayed in love. And robbed of his family, his career and his future. If anyone had the right to be angry, he did. If he ever had the chance to make those who had done this to him pay for what they'd done, he would have. He would have killed them all.
But there would be no vengeance for him. No making things right. No recovery. This was his life. The life of a lion.
Thorm gave up on trying to turn the page and instead used a spell. He was lucky he still had magic he supposed. Through it he could do many of the things he couldn't do any other way. Then again, if he hadn't had magic in the first place he wouldn't have been exposed by the witch hunter or nearly destroyed by the hag.
Just thinking of the hag was a mistake. Her memory still brought him dreams from the Night Maiden. Surely she was a night terror given form. He still saw her face when he closed his eyes. He felt her impossible power in his quiet moments. And he knew her screaming madness in the parts of his soul that should only have known peace.
She was according to everything he'd read, a fell witch. They were said to be barbarians of magic as they cast purely by instinct and passion. And yet he didn’t remember her that way. While he realised his memory had to be tainted by the terror he had felt at the time, he remembered her as a nightmarish creature of elemental magic. Or a storm raging out of control. Some underworld nightmare that might have actually come out of the tri-consular orb.
At least both the hag and Lord Aston had been hurt. It wasn't a worthy thought he supposed. It wasn't what the priests of the Seven Sisters had taught him. Zara the Sister of Righteousness, would have demanded penance for such thoughts. And he had been raised always to respect her ways. It certainly wasn't what his parents would have wanted him to think. And it wasn't even true. They had been hurt, but not by him. Rather they had been hurt by their own stupidity.
The hag – the Eternal King's truest enforcer of his will – had been physically broken. She now had to be pushed around the city in a wheeled chair by her guards. Her body had been burnt until the skin had blistered and cracked. The healers could do little for her according to the gossip he overheard. And yet as terrifying as she was she was really an innocent in a way. The potions and elixirs the King’s men administered had robbed her of her free will. Eventually they had taken her sanity. The mist had descended behind her eyes long ago and what had been left had been little more than a dangerous animal. An animal with terrible magic and snakes in her hair.
He saw her sometimes, being wheeled around the city by her guards. Always still in chains despite her crippling injuries. And sometimes he felt sorry for her. He might no longer be a man but at least he had his mind. But when he saw her being wheeled around the city from the shadows of the sewer entrances, he knew she didn't. She cackled and she moaned, she made strange noises which only sometimes resembled speech. And when she looked around and he saw her eyes, he knew there was little left of the woman she had once been, whoever that was.
The witch hunter was dead. That was a kindness he supposed. Like the hag she too had been crazed. But unlike her she had had no magic of her own. Just the ability to see it. She was a minor seer, somewhat akin to a sooth sayer. Her gift was based on a deeper and some said mystical, understanding of the world. To have been turned into a magical blood hound by the Eternal King because of her gift must have been torment. Seers usually saw more than just the specific gift they were recognised for. Thorm had no doubt that she would have foreseen the harm her gift would cause used. Perhaps she had even felt it. It must have been a living horror for her. Death had probably been a release.
Several of the soldiers had been killed. Their bronze helms, shields and leather cuirasses had not been enough to protect them from the fury of the explosion. Thorm knew nothing about them. Not whether they were good men doing what they believed was right in serving their King or bad men who cared nothing for such things but only the coin they were given. But he still sorrowed for them.
As for Lord Aston, sadly he had survived. Half his face had been burnt off and now he strode the city streets wearing a mask and a permanent grimace of everlasting hatred. But it wasn't enough. The arse still lived. The rage Thorm knew for him was too great for anything to ever be enough. And he kept thinking that it was in some ways a pity that the Lord did not know he was alive. It would have been nice if the Enforcer believed he had got away. The man's head would have exploded with impotent fury.
But the Royal Enforcer believed he was dead. Killed in the same explosion that had torn a large section of the city apart. No doubt felt he good about that. It was probably the one true happiness in the Enforcer's life. It was probably best for Thorm too. After all, no one hunted a dead man.
And then there was Mara. Even three years later Thorm didn't know how he felt about her. On the one hand he was still hurt by her betrayal. He kept asking himself how she could have done that to him. How she could have allowed any man, let a man as foul as Lord Aston to touch her. On the other he still felt love for her. Even now. Every time he saw her on the streets. Maybe that was purely the mist slowly descending behind his own eyes – he couldn't be sure. But sometimes when he lurked at night in city shadows he saw her. Each time he did he felt an almost overwhelming urge to go to her, forgetting everything that had happened.
Besides, she had paid a heavy price for her betrayal. She had escaped the explosion and run before the first detonation. He had no doubt she had been terrified the Enforcer would accuse her of having known about his magic. In the Eternal City that was almost as bad as having magic.
But running had only saved her from death and physical harm. Learning what had happened, her family had moved quickly to disown her. They had to protect the family name and Mara Dunmore – now Mara No Name had been quickly cast aside. They had betrayed her just as she had betrayed him. He supposed it was only just given what she had done to him. They had left her without a copper to spend.
The price she'd paid had continued to climb. When Lord Aston had recovered sufficiently to name her, she had ended up as a slave. Now she worked on one of the gangs, wandering the city streets, cleaning up horse droppings and the like. Yet each time he had seen her on the streets, cleaning, he had sorrowed for her. From one who had been rich and from a noble family, to a slave – it was a terrible fall. And yet she had betrayed him.
Others had suffered too. Innocent people. Most of his neighbours for one. When the store had exploded it had not just turned itself into a massive pile of rubble covering his basement, it had levelled three more buildings. The fire that had followed had burnt down an entire city block. And none of those burnt out buildings had been rebuilt. Not a single stone had been put back in its place nor a burnt timber replaced in three years. The King's workforce was busy with other matters. Constructing more troll pens at the rear of the city he assumed. The King seemed to have an ever growing list of enemies he needed hunted down. The entire block was now just a wasteland within the city. He hated that his neighbours had also suffered. They were good people. They hadn’t deserved to suffer for him.
In the end many people had suffered because of him, though none by his hand. Many of those who had been harmed he had never wanted to suffer, while those he did want to hurt, he was powerless against.
Thorm railed at his impotence. If he could have only done one thing, then he would have at least wanted to be able to turn his paw against the King. He was after all, the one who had created this entire situation. But the Eternal King lived in his Palace of the Sun. Not an actual palace so much as a walled off section of the city. But he understood there was an actual palace somewhere in the middle of it. A palace that only the King dwelt in. A palace within the palace.
Actually the Palace of the Sun was roughly half the city and was walled off by sixty feet of stone that went nearly as far into the ground as it rose above it. The only way in was via the gate. But despite the name it wasn't a gate so much as a set of stairs that scaled the wall leading to a check point on top where a small army stood guard. They would shoot anyone who tried to enter the palace without permission. There was no way he could get through.
But even if the gods showed him a way through, he still could not attack the King. Because the Eternal King was at all times surrounded by his own personal army. He rarely left his Palace of the Sun save for the most important diplomatic meetings. He certainly didn't wander through the rest of the city. He had people for that. People like Lord Aston. Thorm supposed he had reason to want to stay safe and secure in his Palace. He had a lot of enemies. A thousand years of oppressing his people and murdering others had created a lot of enemies.
Worse than that would be the fate that awaited him on the other side of the wall. Had he made it into the Palace of the Sun, and not been killed, but rather captured, Thorm would have been thrown in the Tri-consulor Orb for a quick one way trip to the underworld. And there the lamaia would have chewed on his soul for eternity. He shuddered a little at the thought.
