The Gray Isles

by F. T. McKinstry

  Lorth had known plenty of time at sea in his life, but the waters around the Gray Isles ruffled his animal senses and flooded his thoughts with the strange. Since he had passed into this realm, dreams, impressions, and waking visions had stolen his sleep and released it to the water like ashes.

  The Old One lived and breathed in these waters, hidden in the dark with her eyes open.

  Lorth started like a horse spooked by a weird noise as someone shouted “Land ho!” in Aenspeak, the wizard’s tongue.

  Yawning, Lorth straightened his back and turned as Cimri, the first mate, strode over the deck in a blue-green cloak of the Order of Albatross. Samolan, a lean, black-haired Halnsman, accompanied him wearing the blood red of a Raptor. Called Keepers of the Crafts, these men were trained under the Eye in the skills of their trades: Albatross ruled the waters; Raptor, the blade. They had fought with Lorth in the Black Tooth border wars before any of them had the titles to show for it.

  “Here we are,” Cimri said. His gray eyes shone in the sun. “Far reaches.”

  Samolan carefully opened a familiar bundle of drab green linen he had brought and held out Lorth’s weapons in mock solemnity. “Master.”

  Cimri wheezed a laugh at the Raptor’s rare use of the title. A sun’s cycle had passed since Lorth had received his Raven’s mantle, and he still hadn’t adjusted to the attention he got by his new stature in the world. Fortunately, his companions respected him for more practical reasons than formality, such as skill at arms and a care for watching their backs. But they never missed a chance to tease him about his skittish ways.

  Lorth grabbed his scabbard from Samolan’s arms. He brushed the graying brown braid of his hair aside, slung the sword strap over his shoulder and cinched it down. Then he took his bow and quiver and put them on.

  “Where’s your pretty dagger?” Cimri asked with a raised brow.

  Lorth took the longknife that Samolan handed him and strapped it to his thigh. “In my boot where she belongs.”

  “I told you he wouldn’t part with her,” Samolan remarked sidelong.

  “What was her name again?” Cimri said, his smile widening. “Linet?”

  “Leaf,” Lorth corrected. They knew the story. Before he had entered apprenticeship to the Keepers of the Eye seven years ago, Lorth had basked on the fringe of humanity as an assassin, a well-paying occupation in which he had used magic outside the Keepers’ jurisdiction. He had acquired the blade, which had a silver hilt cast into the shape of a naked, curvy girl, in a skirmish over a young prostitute named Leaf whose life he had failed to save, for all his wiles. But the Hunter’s Rede, unwritten codes called Shades by which his kind lived and died, held no quarter for fools.

  Leaf had come to symbolize his priorities. By learning to break the rules of both wizards and hunters, Lorth had become so skilled in the art of assassination that the Keepers themselves had offered him training as a high wizard and a subsequent position as a siomothct, a hunter in service to the Eye. Not known to most—including Cimri and Samolan—the latter lived in rumors that followed him around like the ghosts of those whose bodies he had returned to the earth.

  Lorth rolled his shoulders and settled into the comfort of his weapons. A silly thing, to bring weapons to Urd. But he had been a hunter too long to ignore a bad feeling.

  Cimri’s blond hair whipped around as he put his nose to the wind. “There’ll be a storm.”

  The sea smiled like a pretty witch holding a knife behind her back. Shining clouds, light, and the cries of gulls blanketed Lorth’s otherwise uncomfortable awareness like thin veneer. Through a legion of hooded, invisible stares, he cast his mind over the skies in every direction. He sensed no storm, but Cimri had better sense. Born to the Gray Isles, the sailor had a way with weather as no wizard Lorth had ever known. It responded like a lover under his hands.

  Samolan, a mountain man, favored skepticism. “Storm, my ass.”

  Cimri tapped the side of his nose. “I can smell ‘er.”

  Lorth crossed his arms over his chest and leveled a hunter’s gaze on his friend. “Go deeper. What else do you smell?”

  The sailor hesitated, as if the question startled him. “Naught but the good sea,” he replied with a fading smile. “But I dinna have the Eyes of Maern.”

  In a cryptic gesture typical of men from the mountainous regions of Haln, Samolan placed a forefinger and middle finger neatly beneath each eye. It was old banter between them, a reference to Lorth’s eyes, greenish gold and penetrating, like a wolf’s.

  “These waters are dark,” Lorth complained. “I haven’t been able to project anything on the grid since we entered this realm. I see only enough to make me nervous.”

  “That’s why they sent you,” Samolan pointed out.

  “I’ll ready a longboat,” Cimri said quickly. He glanced at Samolan. No longer smiling, the men departed to their duties.

  In the shadow of his companions’ change in mood, Lorth returned to the lonely landscape of his inner mind. He leaned heavily on the beam. The Eyes of Maern. A common term. The wise called him a Web, one able to perceive patterns in the time-space matrix through which the Old One made herself known. It wasn’t a forthright skill, or one that could be taught; but one inborn and often unknown to the one who possessed it, aside from an array of mysterious, unwieldy senses and an uncanny proclivity for being in just the right—or wrong—place at the right time. The Old One could be cruel to those she favored to reveal her hand.

  The Aenlisarfon had wanted a Web for this mission, of course. It fit in nicely with Lorth’s initiation to the Council. He was to find and speak to Eadred, once the Raven of Nemeton; now a wayward assassin who had strayed from the Wizard’s Code while on assignment in these isles three years ago. The Council didn’t know what had driven one of their brightest wizards astray; his madness was dark, they said, referring to that opaque, confusing veil that distinguished the Old One’s involvement. Before Ealiron blackringed him, Eadred was not only powerful but also bore a marked reverence for the Old One. His only shortcoming, to Lorth’s mind, was a less than whole appreciation for the arts of siomothct. But that was a matter of opinion.

  Even so, Eadred wasn’t cast from the Order of Raven for failing his assignment as a siomothct. On the contrary, he had received praise for balancing the energies the shadecaster had sent askew with her special, messy brand of magic. Of a worldly, practical nature—and experienced in the sort of things imbalanced women were capable of—Lorth never ceased to marvel at the length and breadth of the blind spots many Keepers cast by the light of their knowledge. And because they had power, their shadows didn’t stay hidden, but emerged painfully into the light as, in this instance, a witch capable of seducing wizards and draining them of essence. As Lorth knew first hand, it wasn’t the first time such a splendid metaphor had stained the Order. It wouldn’t be the last.

  What puzzled him most was Eadred’s flagrant, uncharacteristic disregard for Code that he would involve himself in a war in Haln, a rugged country in the north of Asmoralin that, as far as anyone knew, had no personal interest to him. He had actually used the Eye—a Dismantling spell, no less!—to defeat an invading warlord who, according to Samolan, the Halns would’ve had no trouble driving out on their own. Lorth hadn’t received an explanation for that, either.

  He rested a sullen gaze on the distant smudge of Urd, home of the Urd Conservatory, a prestigious, albeit backwater school for the wizards who ruled the Gray Isles. The Aenlisarfon had banished Eadred here to rest, they said, and calm his mind. They hoped the peace and quiet of a remote, northern isle would bring him around to an explanation; or at the very least, make him amenable to questioning. Lorth hadn’t bothered to remind them that the only sort of questioning he excelled at involved things like knives, potions, and elemental summoning spells. But they knew that, which meant that before he took the ninth and last seat on the Council, Lorth would have to prove his ability to use means they felt were more conventional.

  Not on
e of his strong points, convention. But he excelled at irony. For the reason the Aenlisarfon had sent him here, and that which had his teeth on edge over these restless seas, would also undoubtedly be that which threw convention to the wind.

  *

  The longboat surged into the waters on the southeastern point of Urd. Huddled in his cloak like an old crow, Lorth sat near the bow, listening with half an ear to Cimri and his men singing a rowing song to the rhythm of the oars:

  “When the moon stares dark, she sees true;

  “Beneath the surface, green and blue.

  “Living darkness births the light;

  “Out of sight, out of sight...”

  With his deeper ear, Lorth listened to the sea. The scar on his neck throbbed. The remnants of a deadly spider bite he had received as a younger man in the watery southlands of Tarth, the scar had a weird connection to trouble, and tended to ache when something untoward came near.

  The Urd Conservatory nestled in verdant brush and trees some fifty feet above the shore as if neatly set there by a loving hand. Weathered rooftops shone in the late afternoon sun. The water swirled against a natural rock formation that formed a pier. Three high wizards, a Raven in black and two Ospreys in cerulean blue, stood on the distant landing. One of the Ospreys paced a bit, and then said something to the other, a woman, that caused her to glance at the Raven. He shook his head.

  Two Albatrosses waited on the end of the pier, shifting on their feet. As Cimri maneuvered the boat alongside, one of them spoke in Aenspeak, a sailor’s greeting having to do with gentle waves and fair skies. The oarsmen from the Oak Leaf threw out a line.

  Lorth grabbed his pack, an old leather thing he favored for travel, and had done for many a year. He took an offered arm and climbed out. As he stood and gathered himself on the solid rock, the sailors began to kneel, then hesitated and stood. Lorth turned his head and caught Cimri slicing his hand over his neck to stop them. Good man.

  “You’re welcome to accompany me,” Lorth said to anyone interested.

  The oarsmen gazed up from the cradle of the longboat at the walls of the school perched high above the shore. “We’ll hold the ship,” Cimri said, eliciting the nods and grunts of his companions. Also native to the Gray Isles, these men were here on leave from Sourcesee. Lorth had boarded the Oak Leaf at the last minute, preferring to journey with this lot over the more humorless bunch the Council had slated originally. But Urd didn’t interest them, as they had already replenished their stores and spirits in Waleis. Some of them had even bathed.

  “Very well. Cimri, tell Captain Thorin I shouldn’t be a few days.”

  “Enjoy yourself,” the sailor replied.

  “And you,” he said needlessly. They would all be shit drunk by nightfall. Lorth nodded to his escort, and then fell in step behind them. Enjoy yourself would not likely describe three days in Eadred’s company.

  Perhaps his unease amounted merely to a storm gathering in unfamiliar waters. Possible, but his wolf-sense told him otherwise. He had passed through areas of the world hidden to his mind before; treecloaked, the wizards called it, when a god would hide some part of the earth beneath a canopy resembling a leafy tree, for reasons only gods knew. But this didn’t bear the mark of a treecloak. Furthermore, the Aenlisarfon would have seen it, and they hadn’t sent him an apparition, or a dream, not as much as a shadow of a bird bearing the news, even before he had entered this realm. Now, they wouldn’t be able to.

  The sailors approached the landing, greeted the assembly, and then moved ahead, onto a brushy trail. As Lorth stepped up to his hosts, they bowed their heads.

  “Greetings, Master,” the Raven said in an Asmoralin accent. He had dark brown skin, sky blue eyes and black, curly hair. “I am Farous, Master of Urd.” He held out his arm towards the woman, who had fair skin, green eyes and honey-colored hair with a streak of white on her left temple. “Master Lorth, may I present Faena”—a Northman with reddish-blond hair and gray eyes stepped forward—“and Filothin. They are my highest-ranked Ospreys. Faena and Filothin, this is Master Lorth, Raven of Ostarin, Order of Raptor and Initiate to the Aenlisarfon.”

  Lorth chafed like a newly broken horse under the weight of his titles. But it could’ve been worse. If his darkest title, Siomothct of the First Regard, had been uttered, it would’ve flattened the other three. He tilted his head forward. “Breasin felos oth,” he greeted them, in Aenspeak.

  Farous smiled. “May starlight shine, indeed!” A shadow crossed his brow. Without further pleasantries, he said, “This way.”

  Lorth glanced wistfully over his shoulder at the receding longboat. Cimri lifted his arm high and waved, his teeth flashing as he grinned.

  Bastard, Lorth thought.

  The entourage walked single file along a narrow way crowded with juniper and rhododendron until they reached a steep granite stair. As they ascended, Farous said, “You are armed. Are you expecting trouble?”

  “No. Are you?”

  The Raven of Urd returned his attention to the steps as if he might see an adder spring out at his feet. “No trouble here!” he said with daft enthusiasm.

  *

  A short time later, Lorth lay in a comfortable bed in the guest quarters of the Urd Conservatory. The setting sun glowed in the ivy creeping over the windowsill, and a fire crackled in the hearth. He dozed, his mind clear as his body settled into the earth. Be still now, still as a hunting cat, and observe. Do not fear as the hollow moves, grows, and devours the light. Observe the veil as it parts like a woman’s thighs, silky and soft, beckoning...

  A knock sounded on the door. Lorth rolled over, his heart pounding and his body damp with sweat, despite the cold. The sun had set; the room was dark and the fire had turned to ash. He had slept for hours.

  The knock sounded again.

  He rose, slung his cloak over his shoulders, and went to the door. A young woman stood there in a plain dress, her face flushed and a mop of golden curls shining in the torchlight. She dropped into a brief curtsy. She parted her lips to speak, but as she stared up at him, her voice caught.

  “May I assist you?” Lorth rasped, stifling a yawn.

  “Master,” she ventured. “Have you come from Mimir?”

  Lorth started to reply—then a voice rang out farther down the hall. “Maeve!” a man called out. “What are you doing?” A young Keeper in a Hawk’s cloak came into view, and then blanched and dropped to a knee. He had flaming red hair. “Master.”

  “Rise,” Lorth said tiredly. He looked between them. “What’s this about?”

  “Nothing!” the Hawk said. “Misunderstanding. Forgive us for disturbing you.” He put his arm around the girl and hustled her down the hall. She threw a desperate look over her shoulder as if to say something more, but her companion hushed her.

  Lorth watched them disappear around the corner, then slammed the door and returned to his bed, where he sat and lowered his face into his hands. Evidently, these people had spent too much time out here on this island with the seals and the gulls.

  Unless the shadows on his heart had darkened this place, too.

  He rose abruptly and went for his pack. Once presentably dressed, he left the room and wandered the corridors until he smelled food cooking. He followed his nose to the refectory, where he questioned a cook as to the whereabouts of Farous. He grabbed a piece of warm bread on his way out.

  He padded into a common room. In the center, the high wizards of Urd sat around a long table, waiting for dinner. Despite a roaring fire and the sparkling light of colored-glass candelabra, the energy around the wizards burdened and pinched the air. Far from jovial, several of them leaned their faces in their hands; others looked up at the ceiling as if to pray to a sun god for warmth; one rubbed his face; another fiddled with grapes on a tray; and Farous, cloaked in black and looking every stitch of it, sat back in his chair with an expression that could’ve grown mold on a stone.

  When they realized Lorth had entered the room, the wizards stood up in a ru
sh, sending chairs scraping on the floor, plates and glasses clinking, and a breeze stirring the candle flames. Farous stepped forward, his blue eyes sparkling. “Master Lorth! We didn’t wish to disturb you.” He held out his hand towards an empty chair adjacent to his. “Please, join us. Dinner will be served shortly.”

  As Lorth took the offered seat, the Master of Urd set a glass of pale wine in front of him. Then he went around the table and introduced everyone. After that, silence cloaked the room, giving Lorth the distinct impression that these men and women would’ve been happy to have let him sleep the night, dinner or no. Interesting. For all their respect, they appeared to have dispensed with formality—and hospitality—for fear of interacting with him.

  Something besides his reputation haunted this place.

  Lorth sipped his wine and glanced around at the somber group as they fidgeted and gazed at the fair yet simple layout of their dinner table. He didn’t see Eadred. Not too surprising, as the siomothct had been banished here, but Lorth hadn’t been given the impression that he was kept in isolation.

  Farous turned to him with a kind smile. “Did you rest well?” Several others looked up and took interest. Faena cast the Master a pointed glance that he just as pointedly ignored.

  Lorth nodded as watery darkness swirled and flowed down. “I did, thank you.”

  The tension ebbed as people emerged from the kitchen and began to put food on the table: platters of veal and trout, thick barley soup, and spring greens. Once the spread was laid, Farous stood and raised his glass.

  “To our distinguished guest. We are honored.”

  Everyone followed suit and echoed, “Honored.”

  Faena drank, but didn’t smile. Lorth lowered his glass as he caught a fleeting impression around her heart, a flame through a dark window she had unwittingly left ajar.

  As Farous took his seat, the wizards fell to the meal, passing plates, commenting on the food and making casual talk. On Lorth’s left, Filothin spoke to Farous about the projected height of the spring tide. They included Lorth in their conversation, but his mind lingered elsewhere.