A Practical Guide to Sorcery

Siobhan

Month 9, Day 4, Saturday 2:00 a.m.

After their end-of-term celebratory dinner, Sebastien herded and packed her drunk companions into carriages headed for their respective homes, then took a couple of hours to safely switch to her other body. As Siobhan, she returned to the University in the dead of night.

She stopped at the base of the cliffs and tested to see if the fake version of Archmage Zard’s token would work to activate the transport tubes. It did, which meant that she could enter and exit the grounds without implicating her Sebastien identity.

However, rather than taking the transport tubes, Siobhan moved into the open base of the cliffs where the water from the northern lake flowed through, past the small docks there and into the white cliff. She found the meeting spot from the last time she was here, when Thaddeus had led her and Grandmaster Kiernan up through the stone tunnels and caves to the small room where they kept Myrddin’s journals.

With a bit of concentration, she could remember the path that Thaddeus had led them on. ‘This is safer than leaving a record of my passing, and leaves me much less likely to be caught in some theoretical ambush.’ Even though the long climb made her legs burn, it was nothing compared to some of the things Professor Fekten put them through.

When she finally reached the restricted archives underneath the library building, she stopped to breathe in the smell. Like the wind before a storm, the air felt charged with the promise of knowledge and power that lay within the iron-doored rooms. And it was all just waiting for her to absorb it. This made Siobhan a bit giddy, and since she was alone with no one to judge her for childishness, she grinned to herself and skipped up to the main floor of the library.

She used one of the indexing artifacts to search for restricted books on several different topics. Some might not be indexed, but she had found that they were often shelved by category. Once she found a room with a heavy concentration of texts about shamanry, for instance, she could go there and do a keyword search along all the shelves to find extra relevant material.

After compiling enough texts that she would have trouble reading them over the next week or two, she sat down eagerly at one of the small tables in an out-of-the-way room in the restricted archives. Before she left, she would mis-shelve the texts she still wanted to read so that they would be waiting and ready for her return.

Instead of new information about the causes of break events, she found several descriptions of unusual or particularly dangerous Aberrants, a few of which she found notable.

An Aberrant had caused chaos in a small town near the border of Silva Erde. According to the scroll, this creature could implant false memories into anyone who met its gaze. The victims would suddenly “remember” years of friendship or romance with the Aberrant, complete with detailed shared histories and emotional connections. The Red Guard had only managed to identify the threat because the false memories contradicted each other: one victim remembered the Aberrant as their childhood sweetheart; another was unwaveringly confident it was their long-lost sibling who had been studying abroad for the past decade; and a third knew the Aberrant as their mother, despite having a living mother already. Each was convinced of their version of events, unwilling to believe the others, and even the man whose memories contradicted themselves could not distinguish which was real.

When they killed it, they mourned, as even knowing that they had been deceived did not erase the memories and the emotion that came with them.

The man who had remembered it as his mother was forced to leave active duty and see a mind-healer for several years to try to heal the damage his dissonant memories did to his psyche.

Siobhan wasn’t sure that she would have been able to make such a difficult decision. Damien was probably the closest person to her at this point, and, perhaps, one of the only people in the world who was her friend without any benefit to himself. She’d never had siblings, but maybe this was a little like what having a brother was like. ‘If I found out he was an Aberrant all along, would I be able to kill him?’

A small journal that ended halfway through, leaving mostly blank pages behind, described an Aberrant whose power manifested through lies. It had a huge, toothy mouth, and would seal that mouth against the ear of its victim and whisper some falsehood to them. The lies would burrow into the victim’s ear canal and take form by consuming brain matter, eventually eating their way out through the opposite ear. These “larvae of falsehood” would then grow into monstrous forms that reflected the nature of the original lie, bringing destruction wherever they went.

Siobhan shuddered and scratched at her own ears, which suddenly felt quite strange. She was sure it was a psychological reaction, but not so sure that she didn’t stop and take a moment to cast the airway-clearing spell on the sides of her head. All it retrieved was a bit of earwax, which Siobhan saved in a small, empty jar with some distaste. Earwax was a spell component. ‘Even if it is gross, better to use my own than someone else’s.’ She eyed the jar. ‘Probably.’

The third case that caught her attention detailed an Aberrant that created doorways to what seemed to be an alternate, empty version of their world. Those who stepped through would find themselves completely alone, except for an overwhelming sensation of being watched and pursued. Though no other beings were ever seen in this parallel world, victims reported an intense, primal urge to run. When “caught” by whatever unseen force stalked them, they would simply drop dead without apparent cause. If their bodies weren’t retrieved within an hour, the corpse would vanish. If left unguarded, the doorway itself would disappear and reappear in a new location. In this case, none of those who went through a previous iteration of the doorway would be found, alive or otherwise, when the new doorway opened.

The Red Guard tried to burn the doorway down, but discovered that only caused it to change location. Eventually, they “solved” the problem by cutting the entire doorway out of the building it appeared in, complete with some of the wall and ceiling, and carting it away. Presumably, they would set a guard on it to keep it from moving forever more.

Siobhan closed the latest book with a shudder. Her hands trembled slightly as she reached for her canteen of water, which was faintly stale. The silence felt oppressive, the shadows in the corners more menacing than before.

She tried to imagine what it would be like to face such horrors. The Red Guard walked into situations where a single misstep, a moment’s hesitation, or even just meeting the wrong creature’s eyes could lead to fates worse than death. Even if their bodies survived, their minds could be forever warped. It took a certain kind of courage to sign up for a job like that.

The light-refinement spell might help against some of the more straightforward effects, like the larva of falsehood or the implanted memories. But what about others? Some, she would be completely helpless against.

‘I wonder if this is why the Red Guard places certain restrictions against shamans working in the spirit realm.’ Aberrants created from break events involving the spirit realm would be so horrifically dangerous and difficult to deal with. Even just imagining the possibilities set her ill at ease.

Siobhan’s fingers ghosted over the delicate skin of her temple. Somewhere in there was something malignant, not so different from the monsters she had been reading about. She had several ideas about what avenues of research might provide her a clue to resolving the problem.

One of her first thoughts had been to learn more about binding magic and curses, since it was likely that some of those principles had been used to seal the thing in her mind. After all, Grandfather probably hadn’t engraved a spell array for a containing artifact on her skull.

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But after thinking about it some more, she was skeptical that avenue would yield results unless she just happened to get lucky. True curses all had a particular way to break their effect, but similar to understanding how an Aberrant might be countered, it was important to understand the original magic that had created them.

Without knowing exactly how the Aberrant had been sealed away in the first place, trying to undo or modify that binding would be more likely to break something important than to succeed. In a mathematical analogy, if you wanted to cancel out a number, you needed to add it to the exact negative that would leave the equation at zero.

She wasn’t desperate enough to risk destroying her own mind just to get rid of the creature imprisoned within it. If things got to that point, she would be better off just turning herself in to the Red Guard.

Siobhan’s second stack of texts focused on magical seals, as that was her next idea for a solution. She pulled the first tome toward her, its leather binding cracked and worn with age. The musty smell of old paper filled her nostrils, and she sneezed as she opened it, revealing densely packed text and diagrams.

As she read through the semi-impenetrable material, searching more for a general understanding of the concepts than a deep grasp on the specifics, her initial excitement faded.

Some people considered certain wards a type of seal, as technically, anything that kept something contained inside was a seal. But most of the ones she found had nothing to do with the mind and were meant to keep livestock or prisoners in.

There were extensive details about the mathematical principles behind containing physical—and magical—matter, complete with case studies of failures and the catastrophic consequences that followed.

One particularly graphic example described what happened when someone attempted to seal a herd of magical deer without properly accounting for their ability to phase through solid matter. The resulting explosion of desperate animals trying to escape had destroyed half a village.

Only two texts even approached anything close to what she needed. The first described an attempt to create a room of absolute stillness by sealing away all energy. The researchers had tried to create a barrier that would contain heat, sound, and even magical energy itself. They had failed, but the theory behind their attempt was interesting, as was their theory of “absolute zero.”

The second potentially useful text detailed the sealing of a wraith-like Aberrant in a tower. However, the method relied on gathering shed particulate matter from the creature to attune the wards specifically to it. Siobhan couldn’t exactly gather pieces of whatever was sealed in her mind without defeating the purpose of the seal entirely.

She closed the last book with a sigh, rubbing her tired eyes and contemplating her notes. While the research hadn’t provided an immediate solution, she reminded herself that the entity in her mind had been sealed away for eight years already. It was unrealistic to expect answers after a single night.

‘Knowledge is never a waste,’ she reminded herself. Even Professor Lacer had mentioned that if one learned enough in several different fields, they would realize that at its base, the theory was all connected.

Siobhan’s third approach to researching her mental passenger was to investigate artificial intelligence and consciousness transfer. She found several restricted texts on the topic. Golems were an example of this, though often extremely simple or clumsy, due to the complexity required to encode lifelike functions. It was impressive to have one that could not just carry your belongings, but also sweep your floor without destroying your furniture.

One particularly enlightening tome spoke of magical consciousness transfer—blood magic of the less harmless variety.

The book explained that moving minds between vessels was purely in the realm of transmogrification, as transmutation required a deeper understanding of consciousness than humanity possessed. There had been quite a few experiments during the Blood Empire. The process always resulted in some loss of fidelity, like trying to pour soup through an increasingly fine sieve. The more complex the original consciousness, the more was lost or twisted in transference, and the greater the risk of complete mental dissolution. Often, the existential torture of the technique drove the transferred mind into insanity.

The author described it as trying to force once’s entire foot into a hollow cube, pressing and bending and twisting until the flesh fit. Even if the cube technically had the volume to accommodate the foot, it was not designed to do so.

The author made the obvious connection to Carnagore, Myrddin’s infamous metal beast. Because of the creature’s complex functions that seemed to make autonomous, complex decisions, it had been rumored to be a magically transformed living horse, or at least to house a horse’s consciousness. Of course, other parts of Carnagore’s myth refuted this idea, such as turning into a statue at the top of a mountain.

Another chapter discussed binding spirits into physical vessels, which was how shamans allowed contracted spirits to temporarily inhabit their bodies, sharing power and knowledge. Theoretically, spirits might also be bound into other physical forms besides the shaman themselves, if one knew how to prepare a vessel and give the spirit some method of anchoring and empowering itself.

‘Shamanry again. I really think the answer might lie somewhere in this craft.’ She didn’t remember her grandfather doing much that she could classify as shamanry, but he had been quite old and accomplished, and she had only been learning magic for a short while when he died.

She looked at the unread pile of books and scrolls on the table. Less were related to the craft than she would have hoped. If she didn’t find the answer within these, she might be reduced to physically searching through every word for texts containing relevant keywords.

She set pushed aside the other texts to create a smaller pile focused on shamanry, but froze as a scroll inside of an ornate case caught her attention with its first few paragraphs.

‘This…is about the guiding light ritual? The one I used to create a personal symbol!?’ She bounced in her seat, holding back a cackle of excitement. All the other texts were forgotten as she began to read.

The scroll was old, its paper yellowed and cracking at the edges, but the text within was clear, if semi-archaic in wording and spelling.

The scroll contained three additional functions that could be added to the symbol’s utility, each requiring short rituals. The first modification would allow her to sense through the symbol, though the scroll warned it could be somewhat disorienting. The second allowed her to receive a simple “ping” of awareness—like a gentle tap on the shoulder of her consciousness when someone with the symbol wanted her attention.

But it was the third function that made her breath catch. The scroll detailed a method of sending dream messages to another person who possessed a copy of her symbol. The recipient would need to complete their own ritual and keep the symbol close to their head while sleeping, but it would allow direct mental communication, albeit only through dreams.

The technical explanation fascinated her. Normal mental barriers made direct mind-to-mind communication nearly impossible, but dreams provided a natural lowering of those defenses, and a conduit of sorts for channeling them.

The final third of the scroll’s length contained exercises that would help the thaumaturge send actually coherent messages. Several techniques were similar to those used by shamans to safely interact with or traverse the spirit realm, apparently. There was a reason that in some ancient cultures that realm had been called the river of oblivion. Even without facing any particular danger—of which there were myriad—existence there wore away at the mind and the Will.

‘This is probably why the scroll was included in my search results for shamanic practices,’ she thought. ‘I am very lucky tonight.’

She read through the scroll again, doing her best to commit the entire thing to memory. An alarm spell she had placed on her pocket watch alerted her that sunrise was coming soon. Siobhan had to leave, and though she would have loved nothing more than to continue her research, it had been a long week and she was growing weary.

‘It’s a good chance to visit Liza. I need the sleep-proxy spell refreshed, anyway.’ She changed her disguise—though not her body—before leaving, so that she could travel unnoticed. When a wave of dizziness hit her on her way back down through the tunnels, she realized how long it had been since dinner, and stopped at a restaurant, where she ploughed through almost an entire table of dishes by herself.

With her stomach literally bulging, she arrived at Liza’s apartment. However, no one answered the door, even after she annoyed the metal lion knocker into trying to bite her.

Frustrated but resigned, she transformed back into Sebastien, traveled a strange route to avoid any tail, and returned to her own attic apartment. She took a short nap and then checked the linked journals that she had given to Liza and Gera.

Within Liza’s, she found two messages waiting. One notified Sebastien that Liza had to leave because she’d gotten a lead on a replacement shaman, and specified a very early time that Siobhan needed to arrive by if she wanted Liza’s help to renew the sleep-proxy spell.Nôv(el)B\\jnn

The second message was longer, and was partially faded, as if perhaps it had been transcribed from Liza’s original notes by some sort of image-copying spell. This one contained calculations for converting the sleep-proxy spell into an all-day ritual that could be performed by someone with a much lower capacity than Liza’s. Below that was a hastily scribbled message.

I may be gone for several weeks. Based on what I’ve seen of your Will, you should be able to handle this. Please don’t cause any huge disasters while I’m gone.

P.S. Here is the password for my house. Say it to Mr. Lion. Also, water my plants and take care of the animals.

Below that was a strange series of letters and numbers that ended with the phrase, “I’m an arrogant young prat who keeps too many secrets from the amazing, beautiful, and talented Liza, but at least I can be trusted to look after her house. I won’t snoop in her things or burn the place down.”

Sebastien snorted with amusement, but after reading through the details of the extended sleep-proxy ritual, let out a few choice curse words.

If she tried to avoid sleeping for much longer, her raven would die, and if that happened, it was possible that she would pass out from the sudden fatigue.

The extended ritual would require significant magical stamina—more than the average thaumaturge of her power could safely sustain. There was a limit to human concentration, after all. The only consolation was that she could break up some of the sections and rest in between. Still, attempting such complex magic in her current state would be foolish. Ideally, she would drop the linking spell and sleep for a while—real sleep—before casting a replacement.