Horizon- Chapter 9 - The Bewitched City

Eventually, after several days and nights of what seemed sometimes like aimless wandering, Horizon entered the vast city of Efra and as he came into its centre he saw, upon a street corner, the man called Levil, whom he had encountered earlier in his travels, begging and as he examined him more closely, to his horror, he saw that Levils hands had been chopped off.

“God!”, asked Horizon, “Levil. What has happened to you?!”.

But Levil could not answer except to mumble and point a scarred and bloody stump towards
his mouth, to indicate that those who had cut off his hands had also cut out his tongue.

“How has this man come to be so cruelly maimed”,demanded Horizon of
a local police constable, who had been standing and watching Horizon with suspicion, “Do you know?”.

The constable’s eyes then filled with hatred and, pointing an accusing finger at the crippled Levil,he said “That beggar was found guilty of witchcraft and so, according to the new laws of this city, introduced by our beloved mayor Icondemn, his tongue was cut out so that he may never speak any evil magic and his hands were cut off so that he may not use them to conjure with”.

Horizon was shocked and saddened by this. “Poor Levil”,he said, “even though you abandoned me to face your Demon alone, I cannot hate you now that I see you in this crippled and humiliated state”.

Levil was ashamed to be recognized in his weakened condition and tried to cover
his face although he had no hands to do so.

Horizon could bare to see no more of his friends suffering and so he picked up Levil from where he had been begging and, lifting him onto Volvan’s back, rode him to an abandoned cave outside the city walls where Horizon treated Levil’s wounds with petals from the magic healing flower that his father had given him and, after nine days, Levil’s tongue and hands had miraculously regenerated themselves.

Levil looked at his new hands and saw that his lines of fate had also changed and thought that now he might put them towards the service of good. He felt his tongue had grown back like a lizards tail but also that he must use it to express his gratitude. “Horizon”, he said, “You have restored my hands and my tongue but have also given me eyes and a heart that I never had before. My old master,the demon,came to gloat over my crippled body like a fly upon rotting meat but I feel that I have found a new master and in the service of him I will be free. I am your servant always.”,said Levil.

“I don’t want a servant although I need a friend”,said Horizon, “Now tell me more about this witch hunting Mayor Icondemn that the local citizens seem to so adore”.

Levil spat out the name venomously, “Icondemn”,he said, “He wears a Mayors three-cornered hat and gown but he is as crooked as me. He himself is a witch,you see, who bewitched the people of Efra into voting him into office as Mayor and then,so that he could eliminate any magical opposition,
passed a law against witchcraft and made all the ordinary city folk afraid of magic so that anyone even suspected of practicing magic or possessing magical powers is now rounded up and executed or imprisoned”.

“But you were not executed or imprisoned”, observed Horizon.

“Icondemn wanted a public show of what happens to anyone caught using magic; and those ones which he keeps locked up, he keeps them
as slaves in magic proof manacles and they are forced to use their powers in his service – oh,how long I have starved for vengeance. A
toothless animal can only gnaw at his own heart but now that I have my teeth back, I can sink them into Icondemn's neck”.

“You will have justice, that I can promise you”, said Horizon, “But the first thing that we must do is free your fellow magicians from their dungeon”,said Horizon, “can you think how?”.

Levil then told Horizon that the imprisoned witches were being held in the dungeons of Icondemn’s castle and that in order to free them from their magic manacles, he would have to get hold of the magical key that Icondemn kept hung around his neck.

So Horizon and Levil thought up an ingenious plan. They posed as goldsmiths who wanted to present the Mayor with his weight in gold
but, in order to do so, they would have to weigh him.

Icondemn was so pleased by the idea of receiving his weight in gold that he jumped at the chance and so Levil and Horizon brought a giant pair of scales into his bed chamber and on one side of the scales Icondemn sat while on the other side Levil and Horizon piled up golden ingots.

“Im sorry,your Mayorship”,said Levil,who was astute at lying, “But in order to get a proper measurement you must take off anything which
you are wearing”.

Mayor Icondemn was quite unhappy about this but Horizon accused him of wanting to cheat them out of more gold by making himself heavier
than he was,and so,the mayor,surprised that these gold merchants were being so thorough but still too eager to receive his weight in gold,agreed.

Before long the Mayor was seated on their measuring scales absolutely naked, all except for his magic key. “I dare not take off that key”, he said, “You will just have to weigh me with it on”.

But Levil said, “That key looks very heavy, Mr. Mayor and is made out of some strange metal. It may add a great deal to your actual weight. Furthermore, we will only need to remove it for a few minutes or so and then you can put it back on”.

Mayor Icondemn was even more unhappy at this and yet he was very cold and uncomfortable sitting naked on a huge pair brass scales,not to mention embarassed and he was desperate for the ordeal to be finished, so he gave in and surrendered his key which was eagerly snatched from his hands by Levil who,by power of magic,immediately conjured up a replica of the key and handed the replica back to the Mayor instead.

As soon as the real magic key had been switched with a fake then the Mayor was presented with a large container of something that looked and sparkled like gold but was infact an illusion.

Horizon and Levil then left the Mayor’s castle and prepared for the next part of their plan.

In order to release the prisoners from their dungeons, they would have to get inside the prison and, to do this, Horizon ordered that Volvan transform itself into a mole like creature and dig a tunnel leading up into the dungeons.
Once they had got inside the dungeons, they set free all the witches and magic people who had been manacled and imprisoned using the magic
key which they had stolen from the Mayor.

When all the witches were assembled and free they used they’re collective power to take over the castle of Icondemn and the Mayor soon became their prisoner.

“Please”,begged the evil Mayor,on his knees, “ I will do anything you
want if you don’t hurt me”.

Levil made the mayor break the spell which he had cast over the
people of Efra and remove the law against practicing Magic,
then they put him in his own magic-proof manacles so that he could
never again use Magic to hurt anyone.

All of the witches and wizards who had been prisoners of
Icondemns dungeons were eager to thank Horizon for freeing
them and lined up to meet him and shake his hand. One of them
was a lexicographer of magic who had travelled
all over the world studying and documenting different
magical and supernatural things and he told Horizon
that, in the Land of The Ash-King, within the Ash-kings fortress was
a magical fruit which could heal divisions between people the way that
medicinal herbs heal the wounds of the body.

“This”,said the old Man, “Whose name was Rute, “Is the only
magic I know of that is powerful enough to stop a war like
the one between your giants and your gnomes”.