The Illusions In Between Read online

  Still hunted by the church, Zadicayn has remained in hiding with his small family for seven years. But rumors of his location finally reach the Illuminati, a secret underground society of Black Magicians.

  Wanting his magic for themselves, the Illuminati lure Zadicayn to Rome where the last wizard is forced to fight, not only for his life, but for his family, his magic, and for the world. Because his next death will be his last.

  THE ILLUSIONS IN BETWEEN

  The Last Wizard, book three

  J.M. Robison

  Published by Tirgearr Publishing

  Author Copyright 2019 J.M. Robison

  Cover Art: Cora Graphics (www.coragraphics.it)

  Editor: Christine McPherson

  Proofreader: Sharon Pickrel

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  Thank you for respecting our author’s hard work.

  This story is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, incidents are products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE

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  ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

  I want to express my deepest gratitude to Mark James Dunn for swooping down on poetic wings the last minute to rescue me.

  THE ILLUSIONS IN BETWEEN

  The Last Wizard, book three

  J.M. Robison

  Part I

  Chapter One

  Rome, Italy

  1 February 1848

  Pope Pius IX

  The soul is a cavern, much larger than the body containing it. This cavern fills with memories, thoughts, feelings, decisions, and dreams until you are so full of it that surely it bleeds out of your pores and everyone who lays eyes on you while you stand upon the balcony above Saint Peter’s Square can see it. I’m so full of it all that it covers my robes in a blinding white.

  The throng below denies seeing it because the head of God’s holy church does not bow to threats and is not easily swept into coercion. Both of those fill my cavern wall-to-wall, so I can’t even feel the love I express to the people below me with my smile and wave of my hand.

  I pass through the curtains and enter the warmth of my chambers. Silly how the door to my incarceration is made of heavy red silk. If I had magic, I’d sprout wings and fly out of here like Icarus, even knowing what fate befell him.

  But magic is why I’m a prisoner to the Vatican.

  I sit at my table, hand shaking as I reach for my hot tea. I cup it in both hands, hoping the heat will soften the shake, though it’s not from the February chill. My recent plight has called to question many things which a devout, sober, Catholic mind would never have questioned. But my mind is not sober. It’s drunk on fear and desperation, the weight of which has deepened the cavern of my soul to reach new depths, new questions. Like, the Catholic religion should be held as the only religion of the State, that future popes ought never to come to terms with progress, liberalism, and modern civilization…damning thoughts for a pope of the Catholic Church.

  Me. Damning me.

  I flinch when the door opens. I spill hot tea over white knuckles. Carlo Vizzardelli enters.

  I made him cardinal in January. Hard to turn the position down to a man who was awarded the apostolic protonotary and became the consultant to the Sacred Congregation for Bishops. Three days after I gave him the red beret, he wasted no time outlining his position in the Illuminati and flexing the control over his demon.

  It took ten minutes for me to go from Pope Pius IX of the Roman Catholic Church to Slave of the Illuminati. I’d always heard rumors about them, but never that they called themselves Black Magicians and commanded demons from hell to perform wizardry for them. Or threaten me into doing what they want. Which was to rule Rome from behind me.

  The same day as my prayer to the Holy Father for rescue, I received my monthly report from Valemorren, England, concerning the status of the wizard they’ve been unable to capture again. I can’t decide if God wanted to double my worries or laugh at my troubles.

  “Ready?” Carlo barks.

  I nod and sip my tea. He must see the tremor in my hands.

  He sits opposite me, laying a fresh sheet of paper and inkwell on the scatter of documents on the table. The other cardinals must see Carlo as terribly ambitious to meet with me one-on-one so frequently. But that oddity is pushed aside when compared to Carlo’s many other ambitions prior to his arrival to me. I see his own cavernous soul through his eyes. Now that I know him, I see the many tunnels and depths he’s bored to fit all his greed, lust, and hate. I don’t know why I was blind to it until after I knew him.

  He’s talking while he writes, but I don’t listen. I set my tea cup aside and nod when he looks up for my approval. It doesn’t matter what he writes. I’m going to sign it, whether or not I agree. If I don’t sign, he’ll drag me out to the Belvedere Courtyard where he’ll summon his demon and threaten to rip out my tongue, tear out my eyes, something to cause permanent damage to me while still leaving me alive. His threats are good enough; they keep me doing what he wants. Lord give me strength to resist and not care about any mortal maladies he may cause to fall upon me.

  I look at the table, at the documents scattered below the one Carlo writes on. A chunk of Valemorren’s report glares up from the bottom…Ashdowns continue to deny having any contact with their daughter, though we have our suspicions they get into the mountain at least monthly th…Zadicayn must have a secondary way out, as we constantly watch the only entrance we know of, and we have it on good report he appears in Bristol every month…

  “Carlo?”

  “Eh.”

  “Have you heard of a Fae Wizard?”

  Carlo sets his quill down and leans back in his seat, his short, pointed beard aligned with the center of his body. “I have. What prompts the question?”

  I can’t say what prompts the question, only that a damning idea blossoms in my chest because I too, have dug tunnels and depths in my soul searching for the gem which will free me from this man, and I found…this. “There’s a Fae Wizard in Valemorren, England.”

  His eyes light up. Every pontiff has heard at least the title of Fae Wizard. But because the pope before me actually had to deal with one six years ago–who was never caught–the task fell on me. I’m familiar with Fae Wizards, and because of Carlo, I’m familiar with the envy Black Magicians have had of the wizards since antiquity.

  The light in his eyes darken. He sees my intent to get him out of Rome. He leans forward. The malice he invites into the room prickles heat beneath my zucchetto. “Prove it.”

  I’m anxious to divert his gaze off me. I tip my tea off the table without care as I dig through the papers until I unearth the one which has, finally, diverted his gaze.

  He snatches it out of my hand. His eyes bump side to side as he scans the entire page. Though when he puts it down, he’s grinning, and I know he’s read every word.

  “You tempt, Pius. That’s not a Godly trait you should have.”

  I shrug. My heart beats in my throat. If I open my mouth, he’s going to hea
r a rapid thud.

  He looks at the paper again. Black Magicians borrow a demon from Satan, and that demon performs requests for the magician. Since the demons are invisible to everyone but the magician, everyone thinks these performances are magic. Fae Wizards follow a different set of rules. I don’t quite understand the depth myself, but I know they use real magic and it comes from a different entity. And Black Magicians want the same thing.

  He folds the report and tucks it into his robes. He stands. He’s lost most of his hostility, replaced by a greedy aura. “I know you’re doing this to get me out of here, Pius, but don’t think you won’t be watched in my absence. I will know if you do something to betray me, and you will suffer the consequences.”

  I clasp my hands on the table and nod. Carlo sweeps out of my chambers like he’s already missed the train, leaving his unfinished document on the table.

  I slam my eyes immediately in prayer. Dominus vobiscum, Fae Wizard. Defeat Carlo and free me from the Illuminati.

  Chapter Two

  Valemorren, England

  28 February 1848

  Zadicayn

  I hold my breath, but having disturbed the curtains as I tuck myself into the alcove, the unsettled dust catches in my lungs, and I suppress an unsuccessful cough.

  Eudora doesn’t hear me. She walks by, her brown hair flipping side to side as she calls out, “Fǽder? Where art thou?”

  Her calling is useless because she knows the game: Find me using magic. She thinks this game is hard, clutching her Fae-gifted amulet as she mumbles the spell incoherently and the Fae don’t answer.

  “The Fae shan’t answer thy spell if they can’t hear it,” I’ve told her.

  “Can’t I just look with my eyes?”

  When I was of the age of six, I tried doing nothing until I could do it with magic. Sweep? Magic. Clean the garderobe? Magic. I didn’t know a lot of actual useful spells beyond absconding from chores, but even those I forgot during my three hundred and twenty-four-year incarceration. I’ve been learning along with Eudora for the past six years on how to conquer them again.

  A whisper across the stone floor brings a dried leaf to the toe of my boot. Eudora isn’t far behind. She yanks the curtain back, dust settling across my shoulders and hair.

  Just as I’m about to ask about the spell she used to make the leaf find me, she slaps my knee, shouts, “You’re it!” and dashes off down the corridor as if her short legs could outrun me.

  They can’t, but I follow more slowly after her giggles as the skirt of her tiny dress sweeps around the corner. The corner which will take her into the castle parish.

  My breath catches, and I chase her for real. I turn the corner, stopping above the descending stairs, and watch her slippered feet patter across the dark space of stone brightened only by dim sunlight through a dirty curtain.

  I try saying her name, but my breath won’t hold long enough to do more than make whiny sounds. “Eu-Eudor–”

  I step backward, old unreasonable fears having convinced me that hands will shoot out of the hole in the floor behind the altar and pull me in for another three hundred and twenty-four-year incarceration. Despite I burned the trapdoor which now leaves a gaping hole into the undercroft. Despite I ruined the gears and grate which had locked closed my only escape. Despite I broke the stone and made a secret exit in case my fears are real and I’m locked in the undercroft again.

  My daughter scurries across the parish, sliding a leg into the hole to hold her weight on the ladder below. She grins. “Chase me!”

  “Eudora, ye know I don’t want ye playing in here.” Hopefully, she’s still too young to know what the shake in my voice means.

  “Chase me!” She slides her other leg into the hole and disappears inside.

  Her feet tapping against the metal ladder sounds too clearly like my own, having done that thousands of times.

  I leave the parish and walk steadfastly into the kitchen. Brynn stirs soup in a cauldron above the fire, balancing my four-month-old son on her hip.

  I lean against the doorway and fold my arms, trying to not appear strained. “Bellibone, Eudora’s hiding in the undercroft again.”

  Brynn knocks the wood spoon against the edge of the cauldron and hangs it up, handing Levi to me as she walks out of the kitchen. My son burbles and looks at me sideways. In the past, magic had always been born to the first male in the wizard’s family. Like it was born to me. To my father. All the way back to the near creation of the world.

  The Fae commissioned twenty wizards. Three hundred and thirty years ago, nineteen of those wizards were murdered in hopes that the murderers could harvest the wizards’ magic for themselves. It didn’t work.

  Six years ago, I begged the Fae to give the world more wizards, because upon my death the Faewraith would enter our world and consume everyone. The Fae refused my request. When I died, the Faewraith did enter our world. Brought back to life by Brynn’s hand, I made a last, desperate attempt to send the Faewraith away again. This act touched the Fae just enough to honor my request by giving me, my daughter. The first sorceress.

  It would stand to reason that Eudora’s first-born daughter will be a sorceress, so my bloodline of magic to keep the Faewraith away would carry on. However, the fate of the world holds its breath against sudden fates which lie in wait to kill all mortals.

  Brynn enters the kitchen with Eudora in tow, looking appropriately chastised for breaking one of the few rules I hold over her.

  I hand Levi back to my wife, who leans in to kiss me with a tug on my ponytail. A pleasant tingle zaps to my toes. And she asks why I won’t cut it off. She bustles back to finish making lunch. I kneel in front of Eudora whose eyebrows mirror the frown on her lips.

  “Eudora, ye know why I don’t want ye playing in the parish.”

  She cups both hands around her amulet hanging around her neck and won’t look at me. “Because it’s not safe. Why isn’t it safe?”

  I may still tell her when she’s old enough to understand and agree with my unreasonable fears. “I promise to tell ye when ye art older. For now, ye shall have to trust me. Do ye trust me?”

  She hides her hands behind her back and swishes side to side. “Yes, Fǽder.”

  I kiss the top of her head, the scent of her rosemary bathwater long gone. “Let’s eat and be on our way to Bristol, then.”

  Her gold eyes brighten instantly because Bristol means trains, and gypsies, and Great Grandmother Ashdown, and time away from Mother who insists she doesn’t use magic to relocate to the ceiling just so she can avoid chores.

  We sit at the table. I take Levi from Brynn so she can set down bowls and ladle us all soup and thick slices of buttered bread.

  “Do ye want me to bring ye back anything?” I ask Brynn as she sits next to me.

  Her smile glimmers. “Can I have humbugs?”

  “Ye know better than to ask if ye can have something. Ye just tell me when ye want it, and I’ll get it post-haste.” Six years later, and she still doesn’t understand I’d snatch the Koh-I-Noor diamond from Queen Victoria’s crown if Brynn wanted it.

  Levi reaches for my bowl quicker than a cat leaping at a mouse and dumps half the soup on both of us before I stop him. Brynn has the gall to snicker at me. Your turn, she must be thinking. Levi’s excited bouncing and arm pumping further spread the mess over my thighs while I hurry and gobble whatever is left in my bowl.

  Lunch complete, Brynn takes Levi from me, and I make a quick expedition to our room where I change into fresh pantaloons, returning to the kitchen to help gather up the dishes where I dump them in another cauldron of water she’ll boil later. I’ve asked Brynn if she’d like me to hire servants, but she’s fearful of the church finding out how to make entry into my castle vale, so the fewer people who know about it, the better. So far, that list only includes Jaicom and Clarissa Whaerin, and Mister and Misses Ashdown.

  Brynn doesn’t want a creature from the Fae Realm either, so my only option is to ask Lorcrante to stay a w
eek every so often and help Brynn with the enormous responsibility of maintaining the upkeep of an entire castle by herself. I help when she lets me, but that help is using my magic, and we both agree magic should not be used too much, especially within our household. It’s possible for a spell to go horribly wrong, and I don’t have any more Fae Blood to bring me back to life again.

  Eudora dumps her bowl into the cauldron. It thuds against the other wooden dishware floating on its top.

  “Eudora, return to thy room and put on thy Bristol Dress while I say farewell to Modor.”

  Eudora gasps and runs out of the kitchen as if a kiss is the worst thing she could ever see between two people.

  Brynn warms into my embrace. Levi, pressed between us, objects with a “Bgaaaaw!”

  I linger on the kiss. I’ll be back tomorrow night, but three hundred and twenty-four years of total solitude can still amass into a single night and be as miserable. I hope someday I can conquer my insecurities, but it’s already been six years.

  “I shall miss thee,” I breathe against her ear.

  “I shall miss thee, too.”

  I kiss my son and depart from the kitchen, finding Eudora in her room, distracted by the Fae Wood unicorn I made her last month. She touches the spell-activated script on its back. It animates and walks forward.

  “Let’s go, Eudora.”

  She touches the spell again before the unicorn can get too far, and stands, grabbing her travel sack. Brynn packed it for her. A six-year-old doesn’t think about clean socks and a hairbrush.

  My own sack slung over one shoulder, we walk toward the Grand Hall. I stop at the top of the stairs. “Eudora, I want ye to relocate us to the doors.”

  She gasps. “We aren’t in the Fae Realm.”

  “I know, but ye have been doing well, and I want ye to try it outside the Fae Realm.”