The Price of a Word
"Writing with one's own blood is very bad form." Jadis scanned the lines of the message. The red had gone to brown in the hours since it was written. Just a few sentences, in an ancient code which very few now took the trouble to learn. She looked down at her servant and smiled as, with a word, she incinerated the page.
"Saddle my horse," she said. "I leave within the hour."
He bowed and scurried away, and she donned a black silk dress, unadorned by anything save a silver charm. She swept down to the stables, found her horse waiting, and mounted up.
"I have gone to pay homage to my mother's grave," she said to the servant.
If her sister inquired, the answer would send her in the opposite direction of Jadis' true destination: Forest Cinder, a wood blackened by the fires of a battle between powerful sorcerers a hundred years ago.
Jadis had never been in the forest before. It was a place where nightmares crept between the charred trunks and smoke still drifted from the scenes of fiercest conflict. She hesitated for only a moment before dismounting and leading her horse into the shadowy wood. A movement out of the corner of her eye; she turned, but there was nothing. Her laugh caught in her throat.
"Even the spirits of the long-dead fear the royal bloodline," she said aloud. "I know you watch me, but I do not fear you."
Her horse whinnied and she pressed against him. He was warm and solid, familiar. But she did so for only a moment. Weakness, in herself, in anyone, she abhorred. Her mission was one which would require all of her strength; she could not give in to fear or the desire for comfort, not now. So she plunged on.
The deeper she went, the darker it became. Huge trees, leafless though they were, blocked out the sun with many twisting branches. Far off she heard a long, drawn out shriek cut suddenly short. Closer, there was an ever-present whisper, always following her. If she looked 'round, it stopped; there was nothing. After the second time, she refused to turn. Her horse became more skittish, dancing in a half circle or pulling up and refusing to be led for minutes at a time. Still she pressed on.
When she reached the very center of the forest, she knew it at once. The presence of spirits, of things just on the edge of sight, became thick enough to suffocate. Her horse let out a scream and tried to bolt, but she yanked him back and spoke harsh words in his ear until he quieted.
Then she looked up. Was it smoke, or evil magic, which hid the small hut from her eyes? She tied her horse to a tree and peered forward until she could see it.
There it sat, hung with bones and herbs, painted with strange symbols. She drew herself up to her full height and knocked twice on the door.
It was opened immediately; her arm was grasped by a bony hand, and she was drawn in against her will.
Her eyes adjusted to the dark interior after a moment and she saw the one she had come to see: an old hag, thin hair straggling to her waist, eyes red and peering, hardly a pound of meat on her whole body. Jadis shuddered inwardly at the revolting sight. Surely this shriveled thing could not be the powerful witch who held the secret of the world's destruction.
For a long moment there was silence, and then the witch spoke. Her voice was as cracked as a droughted land.
"When the ancient king returns to Charn, how will he rule?"
Jadis cast about in her mind for the answer to the riddle.
"He will rule with the clouds as his slaves and the moon as his queen."
"And who is the ancient king?" continued the hag.
"The ancient king is the sun as he used to be in the far off days, giving light and heat to the world."
"Sit there," the hag said. She pointed with a claw to a chair in the corner of the room and settled into another five steps from it. "Tell me what you have come for."
"I have come to learn the Deplorable Word," Jadis replied. "As you well know."
The hag threw her head back and cackled, long and loud. Jadis waited in silence, her revulsion growing deeper.
"The Deplorable Word!" the hag said at last. "It is forbidden to learn it. It is forbidden to teach it. It is forbidden to speak of it. Such a word would spell the ruin of the world. The kings of old may be dead, but their curses live on."
Jadis leaned forward. "I am not ignorant of that, old woman. Nevertheless, I intend to learn it. From you. Your message led me to believe that you could teach it to me. Have you lied, to lure me here? Be warned that I am no stranger to dark magic."
The hag laughed again, more softly this time.
"You do not know what you ask, oh daughter of kings. That word is the most foolish, most accursed word that ever came of a sorcerer's lust for power. What use would it be, to be the only one remaining in a world gone dead? Even you, with the blood of kings in your veins, could not live thus for long. Your soul would shrivel, oh yes, but before that your body would rebel against a land where all that gives it life is gone: food, water, growing things."
Jadis' heart became cold at the words, but she hardened her eyes.
"You do not know everything, hag," she said. "Still I wish to learn the word."
"The curse against any who would teach it is a heavy one," the hag said. "And if I were to give it to you, how then would I be safe? There cannot be two in the world who know such a terrible thing."
"You must surely know portals between the worlds," said Jadis. "If ever I were to determine to use it, you would be warned. I give my solemn oath."
"Oath! What is oath making to the king's daughter? It is as little a thing to break as to make it. You are above the gods themselves. You cannot be trusted."
Jadis felt herself growing angry.
"Then why have you brought me here?" she hissed. "It would have been better to deny any knowledge of the word than to bring me here only to parry words and insult me. If you were anyone else, you would lie dead before me."
"I am old," the witch said. "So old that I can no longer leave this house. It has been long since I have had sustenance of the kind I need. That is why I have brought you here."
Jadis forced herself to sit still as a statue. After all, this old woman might have more power than was apparent. To anger her might prove deadly.
"Then you do not know the Deplorable Word?" she said.
"Oh, I know the word. I know it, and curse the day I learnt it!"
Terror gripped Jadis' insides, now that the truth was out. What, after all, could such an old hag as this do to her, if she had the ability to hold such a secret and not die of it? And how could she be persuaded to part with it?
"If you truly wish to learn the Deplorable Word," the hag said, softly. "I require a price."
"I come prepared," said Jadis. "Name it, and it is yours."
A snake-like hiss. "Oh no," she said, softer still. "It is not power I desire, nor money, nor anything else that a mortal might have a use for."
"And what might that be?" asked Jadis, a chill spreading to her heart.
The witch beckoned to her, and Jadis leaned in, closer and closer. She could feel the hag's rotting breath on her cheek.
"I desire your soul," the hag whispered, so softly that Jadis only just caught it.
Jadis straightened, a laugh rising unexpectedly from her. "My soul?" she said. "Old hag, the common people say I have no soul; and it is true." Relief swept through her. "Ask another price."
"Oh no, princess. Oh no. You have a soul. Everyone does, you know. Unless they have met me. I am not a mortal; I neither eat meat, nor drink water. I am not even alive, not in the truest sense. But to have strength, I must devour a soul once in a great while. It has been long since I took one."
"Very well," said Jadis. "Take it."
"You do not understand." The hag stood and hobbled forward until she stood just in front of Jadis. "I have taken many a soul, some by force, some as payment. They are rare who survived it. There are none who, having survived, would ever willingly go through it again. To take the soul from a mortal being is to take its most essential part, and that cannot be done easily."
"I am strong," said Jadis. "You have never taken the soul of one of royal blood. Look at me! See me as I am. But if you play me false; if you take my soul and give nothing in return, there is nothing that will stand between you and my wrath."
For a long time Jadis stared into the hag's eyes. She tried to probe the thoughts, but the hag had built walls around her mind so that nothing but a glimmer could be read.
"I will not play falsely with you," the hag replied. "I will give you the Deplorable Word – if you survive."
"I will survive," said Jadis.
"Then come."
The hag led her into the back of the hut, through a door which she shut fast behind them. It was all bare, save for a chair against the far wall. Chains hung around the chair.
"You must be bound to it," said the witch.
Jadis went forward, her steps sure though her mind raced. Perhaps there was a way to force the old hag to give her the word without this. What if she did not survive? There was nothing more terrible to contemplate. She must live, to take the throne as soon as her father died. Her sister could not, must not, be empress. She turned, quick as lightning, but the witch with a muttered word threw her against the floor. Jadis lay panting for a moment, then drew herself to her feet.
"Treacherous," said the hag. "I knew you were treacherous. You are afraid, are you not? Then go. The Deplorable Word can do you no good, for what good is a dead world?"
"I will not go until I have what I came for."
"Then sit in the chair."
Jadis lowered herself into it, and the witch bound her. The chains were heavy with spells, and Jadis knew at once that she could not free herself from them. Her heart began to race; it thudded against her chest; her mind whirled. The hag stood at her elbow and spoke a word in a tongue which Jadis had never heard. One word.
Jadis threw her head back and screamed, but no sound came out. She felt the very innermost part of herself was being torn out, slowly, slowly. Blackness came over her vision, her heart pounded in her ears like the temple drums. She struggled, she writhed. The chains must come loose, they must. She spoke all the freeing spells she knew, but none of them passed her throat. She was being sucked down, down into a pit of nothingness. And still the pain continued, drawing every last drop of strength from her body. She was dropping, falling. Cold, empty as the world before the world began. But not silent. Her mind cried out in agony even as her tongue dried and her throat closed until she could not breathe. At once she was horribly present to everything, and she was nowhere. She choked on nothing, she breathed in emptiness, she saw the stars wheeling in a sky where stars could not live.
A lifetime passed in a second, and still she clung to life, though she could remember no reason for it. She had never lived. She had lived forever. Life was nothing, there was no life. And then, at last, one word forced its way out of her. Please. If she could have heard herself, she would have heard utter desperation, a cry of torment. But the roaring in her head made her deaf to her own words. Please. Please. Please.
And then, silence.
She came to herself, her arms bruised and bloodied from straining against the chains, her mouth as dry as if she had eaten sand. She could not move. There was nothing left in her. Her vision came back slowly, and she saw a woman before her. But surely it was not the witch. This woman was young, beautiful with a cold, dead beauty, like a corpse that had been lovely while alive. Jadis' mind moved through thick water; she could not think. Where was she? Why was there such a terrible emptiness inside her? Why did she hurt so deeply that her own body felt numb with it?
The woman's mouth moved, but Jadis heard nothing. The woman stepped forward and unchained her, and Jadis fell forward to the ground. She heard herself hit the floor. She was trembling, trembling so badly that she could not even rise to her knees.
"So you have survived," said the woman, in a smooth, ice-cold voice. "I thought you would not."
With tremendous effort, as if she were trying to lift the world on her shoulders, Jadis turned on her side, caught the chair, and pulled herself up, inch by tortuous inch, until she stood leaning against it.
Her vision blackened and the room turned sickeningly around her. She almost sat down. But no, she would never sit in that chair again.
Pronouncing every word slowly, painfully, she spoke. "Teach me the Deplorable Word, old hag."
An hour later, she stepped out of the hut on legs still unsteady and found that the world had gone from afternoon to night, and from night to mid-morning. With effort she mounted, but already she knew she was growing strong again. And the Deplorable Word was hers.
That very night, the emperor her father was dead.
Finis