As my blood soaks into the moss, I glance up at my friend. “I remember this pattern, all too well. What I wouldn’t give if there were others that could stand in their places. Anything that doesn’t scream that I’m crawling back to him like some pious worshiper.”
Callan arches a brow and holds their hands out. “These three are the basis of this rite, which was created for Thamaos alone. We cannot change that. You know this.”
I do. But after three hundred years, a man can fucking wish.
Grudgingly, I finish the first three runes and look to Callan for wisdom to make certain I get the next part right. “It’s been a very long time since I worked with layering runes, and I’m a bitter son of a bitch, so you should probably guide me.”
“Strength is next,” Callan says, their lips curling at one corner. “So that he knows you are not weak. Then Sacrifice, to show that you have offered your blood for a chance to communicate. Courage, to remind him that you do not fear him. Determination, to announce that you will persist until he answers. Then Need, to make certain he knows you have an unfulfilled desire only he can answer.” They pause. “And last, the Shield of Loria. Because I’m about to pray for the goddess’s favor to fall over you.”
Callan’s chants begin as I draw fresh blood from my palm to form the additional runes. If these don’t work, if Thamaos doesn’t heed my call, I’ll have to try again.
When I finish, a web of light forms around Callan’s ring, spreading from one rune to another, then it begins in my smaller circle, ringing me in protective magick.
Satisfied, I face east for Thamaos’s direction. True disgust saturates my senses as I bow, pressing my forehead and hands to the damp rock as Callan chants Loria’s grace around me.
“Come on, you bastard,” I mutter. “Come and find me.”
It isn’t much of a prayer, and this isn’t much of an altar, but it’s the best this bitter sorcerer can do.
We wait. Minutes pass, until a thin, quick wind rakes its bony fingers through my untied hair, giving rise to goosebumps that chase along my spine and arms. At first, I think it’s Neri, but…
“Alexus, look.”
At the sound of Callan’s command, I glance up. They step back, shielding their face with their cloak, distancing themselves from that same wind from before that’s now growing into a whirling gust inside the second circle. With a whistle at its edges, the air swirls into a funnel cloud, picking up speed, swirling around the stones. It gathers pine needles and detritus and raw, gritty earth, spinning it fine as sand, until the remains fuse, forming into the shape of a naked man standing tall and strong, wearing the face of a long-dead god.
It’s no man though. And it’s certainly no god. Its skin is pale green like the leaves and moss, its hair dark and rich as soil. Its towering body appears smooth and hard, gray as the stones beneath me, wrapped in wooden twigs, its irises bright and clear as a stream in early morning light.
I know what I’m seeing. I know this is only a mirage. An illusion. That unlike Neri, this is Thamaos’s mind, not his soul made manifest. His impossible reach through tactics such as this used to amaze me, and even now, I am shaken by his skill. To manipulate the living world from the depths of the Nether Reaches is a feat. To do it so dramatically an even greater accomplishment.
But most of all, it gives me some idea of what we’re up against.
The forest-made thing smiles, making my blood ice. “Alexi of Ghent, old friend,” Thamaos says in that too-familiar voice. “So we meet again.”
“I didn’t expect you so soon.”
I sit back on my haunches, watching Callan from the corner of my eye. Carefully, they make their way around the stones to stand at my back. Thamaos’s creature watches too, studying Callan with curiosity in its eyes. Even under such scrutiny, Callan continues chanting a prayerful song to the Ancient Ones. To Loria. Their voice is low, but I feel its immense power in the air.
“And I didn’t expect you at all,” Thamaos says. His mirage remains eerily still. “I thought you’d forgotten me.”
There’s a glimmer in the creature’s stare. Some pointed glint of knowing.
“Believe me, I’ve tried to forget you,” I reply. “But you just won’t stay buried.”
That first part is a lie, and when the creature’s mouth curves into a mocking grin, I know Thamaos tastes my dishonesty.
I’ve tried harder than I care to admit to remember our final days together. The entire last year of his existence feels like a blur of time scattered with random memories. Him visiting the library at the scholarada where I was headmaster of the Order of Night and Dawn. The two of us standing together, face to face, tensions high, in the Great Hall of his palace, a place that doesn’t even exist anymore. Him staring down at me as I knelt in my own blood in the ritual circle at Rite Hall.
I tried to be a dutiful servant. Tried to worship him. But those days are gone. Now, my loathing is as vast as the universe, for many reasons, even if I can’t recall some of the more trivial ones. It’s probably best that I can’t remember. I just wish time would erase the damage I’ve done.
His creature glances around, taking in the scenery and the protective web of magick before leveling a stare on me. “What do you want, Un Drallag?”
Always to the point, even now.
I stand upon my stone, feet wide, and lift my chin boldly in his direction. Even still, his animated being is taller than me.
“You’re using the Prince of the East, aren’t you,” I say. “Guiding him. Perhaps controlling him.”
The earthen creature clasps its hands behind its back, an evil grin on its face. Leisurely, it begins walking around the stones, so close to the circle’s salt edge. Callan moves too, safe beyond the circle’s barrier. They keep pace with Thamaos, refusing to show alarm.
