Sianim 01 - Masques

blood once a year, and . . . She was grateful when Wolf came to get her. For once she was tired of telling stories.
    “I hope,” she said, as they reached the caves, “that they don’t believe half of what I tell them.”
    “They probably don’t,” Wolf replied. “Your problem is that they will believe the wrong half.”
    She laughed and ducked into the opening in the limestone wall.
    When they reached the library, she noticed that her notes had been scattered around. One of the pages that she had been writing on the previous day was conspicuously situated in the space where Wolf worked. Looking closer at it she saw that it was the one that she’d been using to jot down the stories she’d found in the last book she’d read the day before. She never had gotten around to telling Wolf about the apprentice’s spell that negated magic.
    Wolf took up the paper and read her closely written scribblings with interest—or maybe, she thought guiltily, her handwriting was bad enough it required his whole attention. Aralorn straightened the rest of her papers, then glanced around the library. What kind of a breeze could pull a sheet of paper out from under the books that were still neatly stacked where she had left them? If she hadn’t been here with Wolf, she’d have been worried; as it was, she was merely curious.
    “I assume that if the apprentice who developed a way to negate magic were given a name, you would have told me.” Wolf set down the paper.
    She nodded. “I don’t remember ever seeing that story before, so it can’t be very well-known.”
    Wolf tapped the paper impatiently with a finger. “I have read that story somewhere else, a long time ago. I know that the one that I read gave his name. I just need to remember which book I read it in.” Wolf stood silently a minute before shaking his head in disgust. “Let’s work on this mess”—he waved his hand vaguely at the bookcases—“and hopefully I will remember later.”
    They sat in their respective chairs and read. Aralorn waded through three rather boring histories before she found anything of note. As she was reading the last page of the history of the Zorantra family (who were known for developing a second-rate wine) the spine of the poorly preserved book gave way.
    While inspecting the damage, she noticed that the back cover consisted of two pieces of leather that were carefully stitched together to hide a small space inside—just big enough for the folded pages it contained. Slipping the sheets out of their resting place, she examined them cautiously.

    By this time Wolf was used to Aralorn laughing at odd moments, but he had just finished deciphering a particularly useless spell and so was ready to relax for a minute.
    “What is it?”
    She grinned at him and waved the frail cluster of parchment in his general direction. “Look at this. I found it hidden in a book and thought that it might be a spell or something interesting, but it looks as though someone who had the book before you acquired it was quite an artist.”
    He took the sheets from her. They were covered with scenes of improbably endowed nude figures in even more improbable positions. He was about to give it back to her when he stopped and took a closer look.
    He crumpled the pages and flamed them. Someone had set protection and hide-me spells, doubtless the reason Aralorn hadn’t felt its power, but the old magic wasn’t up to withstanding his will. The drawings—on sheets of human skin, though he wasn’t about to tell Aralorn—flared deep purple and silver before settling into gold-and-red fire. He dropped the flaming bits, and they fluttered to the table, burning to ash before touching down. If it smelled like burning flesh, she’d probably just assume they had been made of goatskin.
    “Wolf?”
    “You were right on your first guess.” He couldn’t look at her. “It is a spell. It’s a rather crude representation on how to summon a demon.”
    “Demon?” asked Aralorn, sounding interested without being eager. “I didn’t think that there was any such thing, or do you mean an elemental, like the one that tried to kill Myr?”
    Wolf tilted his head and laughed without humor. He should just drop it, but felt the self-destructive urge that had been such a huge part of who he’d once been take hold of his tongue. “This from a shapeshifter? Yes, there are demons, I’ve summoned them myself. Not many magicians are willing to try it. Mistakes in the