Episode 10: The Magic I Know, Chapter 4

The Library was silent. The office was silent. A hush hung in the air like the eyes of a thousand onlookers, maybe more, fixed on the ponderous return of a jury.

"Are you sure you can do this?" Eve asked Ezekiel for what felt like the hundredth time. The Thief shot back a lopsided grin. Eve sighed, her eyes rolling. "Yeah, yeah, I know: World Class Thief."

Turning to her husband, Eve took her place in the circle, gathering in her arms the statue she and Flynn had rescued from its Egyptian home so long ago. Flynn held out to her a smooth, polished crystal chalice, impurities in the crystal creating rainbows of colour that coruscated like glowing liquid within the bowl of the cup. Taking it from him, Eve felt their fingers touch for the briefest of moments. She reached up, running the back of the hand now holding the crystal cup down the line of his jaw. Flynn caught the hand and turned his head to press a gentle kiss to the back of it. Eve smiled. She took in his appearance. A shield the shape of a huge scale was bound to his left arm. Instead of his usual professorial attire, he was clad in a shining, impossibly fine meshwork of chain mail on top of a simple collarless shirt and trousers. He looked like a teacher dragged into the dress up part of a school history trip. The fact that the scale shaped shield was made from an actual dragon scale, or that the hammer resting at his feet once belonged to a god, seemed like the most ridiculous twist of make-believe. He drew her lips to meet his and, for a moment that froze even unforgiving time itself, the rest of the world disappeared.

All too soon the moment ended. Eve was back in the room, surrounded by the most important people in her life: all those she loved best. Each held, wore or stood by two items. In the centre of the circle, Jenkins stood holding a Persian oil lamp. Though not shining with the characteristic lustre of bronze, it gleamed with the glimmer of a blue-green glaze. The faience glazed lamp was simple and otherwise unadorned and unremarkable, save for its presence in the centre of the room. A heavy woollen cloak and broad-brimmed hat swathed the perfect knight in shadow and, with lamp in one hand and staff in the other, one could be forgiven for thinking him a pilgrim on his way to some holy shrine. Only the glint of steel beneath the cloak spoke to a heavier duty than prayer. Jenkins held the lamp out before him, glowing with a light that did not come from any flame.

"Genie, come forth. I, Galahad, son of Lancelot, son of King Ban, and of Elaine, daughter of King Pelles, command you."

Smoke billowed from the spout of the lamp, circling and dancing into a pillar that solidified into the form of a man. "I obey you, Galahad, son of Lancelot and Elaine, grandson of kings. You may demand of me three wishes. No more, no less. I shall be beholden unto you until such time as those three wishes are spent, or death parts our company."

"At the present time, I need only one," replied Jenkins. "Each person here present carries about them two tokens. Tokens that speak to the nature of the Norse avatar they need to embody. I wish that you will empower that change. Magic requires three things: power, focus and effect. They hold the latter two, as do I. You will provide the first."

The genie slowly turned, scanning each waiting person in turn. His eyes rested on Cassandra and a smile warmed his features. "What strange creatures you are," he intoned. "Librarians: the only humans I in my long life have met that, when given the power to wish for anything, will use their wishes for the benefit of others." His eyes took in the ancient vial and box held in the redhead's hands. "Each of you speak the name of the avatar you would receive and, as you do so, receive my power."

One at a time, beginning with Cassandra, the team spoke the name of their chosen deity. A spiral of blue and magenta flame curled around Cassandra, mixing, where the colours of the phoenix and Cassandra's own magic met, into a purplish hue. Jacob Stone spoke next, the shimmer of wyvern dust sparkling up around him and the sword he held aloft. Charlene raised opera glasses to her eyes as she spoke, a golden chain slung over her shoulder bearing the Gjallerhorn, whole once more. Eve held forth the crystal chalice, cradling the cat of Pakhet like a Library version of the statue of Liberty. Gold light erupted from the black statuette, enveloping Eve in her entirety. Flynn raised the dragon scale shield and held aloft the hammer of the gods. Lightning crackled around him and thunder shook the walls of the office.

Then the genie turned to Ezekiel.

XXXX

The walls of the sunken chamber shook, power rolling round like a storm in the mountains. Hel looked around her, surveying with pleasure the first of her followers. To her left, three great wolves snarled, the largest of them wearing a silver chain with the deceptive slenderness of spider silk. At her feet crouched a great dog, saliva dripping from its jaws. To her right writhed the unending coils of a huge serpent, the head, arms and naked torso of Simmonds replacing its own. By him lounged the laconic Loki and, on his far side, opposite her, the giant, flaming form of Surt. The transformations were complete. All that remained was to open the Bifrost and bring forth the cloud that would stretch over the earth, cleansing and renewing the planet; returning it to a simpler time and wiping out the worst of the virulent plague of humanity that was destroying it.

Nothing stood in her way now. It was too late. The Librarian and his cronies had failed. They had failed to find her and failed to stop her. The world would be destroyed and remade according to her wisdom. It would be a fairer world, a more beautiful world, a world that valued knowledge and truth and justice, a world where humans would live in harmony with their surroundings, giving back as much as they took in a mutualistic, symbiotic relationship with their environment, not a parasitic one.

She watched as Surt stepped forward, raising the flaming sword high above his head. The grey suit and hair were gone now, replaced by ashen skin and coal-black armour that surged with the barely contained heat of lava. He began his chant.

From somewhere, deep in the winding tunnels of Hal Saflieni, a horn began to sound.

XXXX

"I don't understand," Jenkins shook his head. "Are you saying you can't do it?"

"The avatar you seek is already embodied by another," replied the genie. "One who also holds powerful totems."

"Mate, I have Loki's own spear!" Ezekiel cried out, brandishing the item in question. "That has to trump whatever they're using!"

"The incumbent in question holds both a powerful emblem of the trickster," said the genie, "and an equally powerful emblem of Loki's travails. There must be a further emblem of the nature of the god if you wish the change to be effected."

"Further emblem?" Ezekiel looked to Jenkins. "You said we'd only need three things, Jenkins. Power, focus, effect."

"And he was right to do so," intoned the genie, solemnly, drawing Ezekiel's glare round to him. "In your case, however, the item you wish to use to power your apotheosis is not powerful enough. My magic can only bestow the avatar upon you once it has been freed from its current keeper. This will require further power, and the obvious source of that power is you. In turn, however, this will make use of the totem you wish to use as a focus of your change. This item must, therefore be replaced. Hence the need of a further emblem."

"We don't have a further emblem," the Thief shook his head, turning back to Jenkins. "Not unless you can magic something out of thin air! I don't even know what we could use: in all the research I did, there were so many different versions of Loki I don't know which one to look to for reference!"

A light seemed to flicker on in the deep recesses of Jenkins' mind. He looked up. "I think I do."

XXXX

Cassandra raced through the tunnels, leading the way in a rainbow shimmer of burning blue, pink and purple flame, the vial of Idunn's apple juice hanging from a golden chain around her neck. The feather was gone: it had become a flame and the flame had become a part of her. She was no longer Cassandra Cillian, Librarian and Mathemagician; she was the goddess of eternal youth, Idunn, and she led the charge in this battle for reality.

"Cassie, slow down," Jacob Stone, now the bold and beautiful Frey, called to his love. "We gotta keep together here, wherever here is."

"Working on it!" Flynn's voice, oddly deepened, called back up the line.

"I have to find her!" Cassie whirled, a human torch of coruscating light. At the wave of heat that suddenly turned in his direction, Jacob pulled up short, Charlene, Eve and Flynn almost colliding with his back. Heedless, Cassandra continued. "My father is trapped in here somewhere and my mother is busy trying to wipe out humanity by messing around with magical forces she barely understands! I have to stop her!"

"Well, you have one thing right, daughter," sighed a voice in the shadows ahead.

Cassandra turned again, peering forward into the gloom. She raised a hand and twirling tendrils of light crept forward into the darkness. The black shadow of a doorway loomed on one side of the tunnel. Edging forward, the others at her back, Cassandra stepped up to the arch and turned.

Perhaps once intended to be the beginnings of a new tunnel, the alcove remained a mere hollow in the wall, large enough to fit a person in, but only just. Within that alcove, bound by a chain affixed to the rock wall with a spike, sat Cassandra's mother. At the back of the small huddle of bodies, Flynn, as Thor, coughed.

"Ahem, well, er…"

Eve, glowing with an inner, deifying radiance, once more rescued her bewildered spouse. "If your mother isn't behind this, Cassandra, someone else is. We'll go on ahead and see if we can find out who. You three get Professor Cillian out of here. No arguments!"

Librarian and Guardian disappeared into the eternal midnight of the tunnels, a faint golden glow reflecting back off the bend in the rock wall. Cassandra turned to her mother. "So, they turned on you just as they did on me," she huffed, studying the chains. "What did you help them with? Was it just the armour or was there more? Did you set up that little trap Jacob and I got stuck in?"

"What trap?" Professor Cillian frowned, rubbing her wrists and arms where the chains, now in a rattling heap on the floor, had cut in. "Cassandra, what's going on? What is this nonsense about magic?"

"Don't play dumb, it doesn't suit you," spat back her daughter. "You've been caught. Just tells us what you did and we might be able to stop it! Where are the others? What have you done with Dad?"

"My dear girl, your mother hasn't done anything with me," crooned a silken voice behind them. Cassandra's mother's eyes widened. "I on the other hand…"

Cassandra felt like she had swallowed rocks. There was a pain in her throat and a heaviness in her heart that dragged at her soul until the vibrancy of the flame engulfing her faded almost to nothing. She turned. There, standing a short distance up the corridor Eve and Flynn had just vanished down, burning with a flame of his own that encircled his brow like a coronet, stood her father. He seemed younger, tendrils of red flickering through his once silver hair like shining ribbons.

Jacob turned to Charlene. "Get her out of here," he ordered, waving a hand at the perplexed professor now loose in the alcove.

"But…" Charlene stated, then bowed, the avatar of Heimdall overcoming her misgivings and following the order of the prince of the Vanir.

"Interesting: so your chosen element is fire also," mused Doctor Cillian. "I wonder if there is a genetic basis for that, or if it is wholly nurture, not nature that makes the difference. I worked so hard on your genetics too, at least as far as my own abilities and the limitations of the time allowed. Such a pity that little sword of Damocles popped up there," he waggled a finger in the general direction of his daughter's stricken brow. "It was all going so well up until then."

"You?" The word hovered on Cassandra's lips, bouncing almost apologetically off the solid stone walls. "Why?"

"Why this?" Doctor Cillian queried, waving his palms around him to indicate the tunnels. "This?" He gestured to himself. "Or this?" He waved the palm in the direction of his daughter. "It's all connected you know. When you failed to work out, however, I had to find a new daughter; a new Hel to my Loki. Perhaps it is just as well. My new daughter lacks the tedious sentimentality that has held you back all these years and understands far more of the lore that you lack. Perhaps I should let you meet her – I believe you have already crossed paths – then maybe she could teach you something of the power you could have wielded."

"I wield my own power," spat Cassandra, the flame within her burning brighter once more, it's colour edging more into the red end of the spectrum.

"You wield your avatar's power!" Doctor Cillian scoffed. His eyes scanned his discarded daughter's form, observing and analysing. "Idunn, I believe. Not even a silent role in the great battle! How ill advised! Killing you will be as easy as swatting a fly!"

"Hey!" Stone stepped forward. Doctor Cillian was faster, the tip of a long staff, an hourglass shaped gourd tied to the top of it, pressed gently against Stone's chest, the gourd bouncing once then coming to rest on the stilled form of the art historian. Jacob Stone stood, frozen, unable even to blink.

"Now who do we have here?" Doctor Cillian mused. "Bragi perhaps? He was, I believe, the consort of Idunn and, if my research does not fail me, as it rarely ever does, you have a turn for poetry as well. An excellent fit. Not much use in this instance, however. Not for you, anyway. For me, on the other hand, you provide an excellent weapon." He nodded at Cassandra. "Kill her."

Stone's body moved with the inexorable determination of a wave up a shingle shore. His hands raised, eyes pleading, he advanced on Cassandra. Every muscle in his body strained against the unforgiving, unstoppable pull of Loki's command. Bathed in fire, Idunn backed away, the flames around her swirling blue as her defensive magic took over. The defensive magic was Cassandra's, though, not Idunn's, and as Loki's magic, coursing through Stone's body, hit the blue shield it faltered. Looking into eyes that could not, would not, shed the tears she felt rather than saw in his gaze, Cassandra felt Jacob's hand close on her neck. They started to squeeze.

"Hey! Priam! Pick on an ego your own size!"

The force in Stone's fingers, clamped around her throat, lessened and Cassandra sucked in a breath, eyes focussing on the sight of Charlene charging past. She watched her father duck out of the reach of Charlene's first swing. Once more the calabash reached out to Stone's shoulder. Once more the cry of "kill her" bounced off the tunnel walls. Once more she felt her lover's hands tighten their grip, squeezing the life out of her. She couldn't speak. All she could do was meet Jacob's eyes with her own and hope he understood the message there: she didn't blame him; it was not his fault; she did, and always would, love him. Then the darkness closed in.

The enchantment faded at the instant Cassandra's body hit the cold stone floor. Shaking, in terror and in grief, Jacob Stone staggered back. The tears he had been denied while Loki's curse held him flooded his eyes, blurring his vision. Hands he would have cut off had he been able, he held as far from him as possible. He couldn't look at what he had done. Not yet. Perhaps not ever. He turned away.

The battle between Loki and Charlene, now fully embodying the avatar of Heimdall, clanged and clattered in the too small tunnel. The sword of Heimdall crashed again and again against the staff of Loki, its calabash bobbing back and forth. It was not an ideal weapon for such a narrow enclosure: longer than a longsword but shorter than a quarterstaff. It looked like Heimdall's golden sabre would win the day. Then a fireball burst against Heimdall's shoulder and she staggered back. Burning with the fire of a volcano, Surt strode into the fight. Shaken from his grief, a new and pressing problem presenting itself, Stone hurried to help Charlene to her feet. Loki laughed.

"Heimdall loses the fight against Loki, just as Ragnarok should be," he chortled, taking the time to draw the short sword at his side. "And the only person left to help you is the god of poetry. A fatal flaw on your part."

Stone drew the sword in his own scabbard. "Actually, the flaw's in your logic," he growled, anger filling the gaping hole where his heart had been. "You assume I'm Bragi because I love your daughter, but like you say: he don't do much in Ragnarok. Instead, we picked a slightly more major player. I ain't Bragi. I'm Frey, and this time, I have my sword!"

Darting out of his hand, the sword deflected another fireball and parried another thrust of the staff and calabash. It rose to catch a downward slash of Surt's flaming sword on the forte of the blade, pushing the blade back with enough force to give Heimdall room to enter the fight once more. As she engaged Loki, defending against staff and sword, Frey engaged the giant Surt, driving the fire giant back with the sword that, for the wise man, fought by itself.