Fletcher

by P. S. Power

  At their table was an ambassador, which might have explained why they did things that way. Or as a treat for his arrival back from the front of a war, after a manner of speaking. Regardless, they had the same bread and stew that everyone else in the room seemed to be having. A hearty lamb, with vegetables, bitters and herbs on the side, coming on their own plate and large pieces of dense black bread. It wasn’t his favorite kind.

  Rye was sour to him. At least the boy inside. Farad tested a bite, being unused to that style of grain from his old life, using his knife and fork to cut a piece off and found it tolerable. It was soft, compared to about half of what he’d eaten in the last months. It was even tasty, being powerful in flavor compared to the normal grains he was used to having.

  “This is rather good, isn’t it? I love the use of rosemary in the stew. The bread is well done as well.” The words had to seem out of place. Captain Ford raised an eyebrow at him anyway. The others simply nodded along with the pleasantries.

  Master Belford nodded slightly, his face bland.

  “I agree. It’s very nice, for a mid-meal. The lamb was young, if I was told correctly.”

  The words were loud, compared to what Anders had said. Designed to be projected to the room, instead of whispered about at their own table. Why the man was doing that kind of thing didn’t make sense. He was clearly trying to affect the entire space, Anders, even the young boy, understood that portion of things.

  What the point was, that didn’t seem to fit with anything.

  Farad looked around, trying to see who, specifically, was being spoken to. Of interest, everyone at the high table looked over. Only one of them, the Master Alchemist, smiled at the words. The others were incredibly blank faced, even having clearly heard the words.

  Plain stew, even one that was rather nice and flavorful, probably wasn’t what would have been served at the table of the King that day. A place from which those others had been banned, or at least not invited to attend.

  The others in the room more or less seemed to be willing to agree with the basic idea, even if they were having rye bread, which was looked down upon as low class. Maligned but eaten. The words were an actual saying about the specific grain in Istlan.

  It was just nice to have bread that wasn’t baked to half hardness each day, at least as far as Anders was concerned. Just a few weeks without that kind of thing had caused him to miss it. Even having eaten well enough each day that he, and the men with him, hadn’t been forced to go hungry for more than a meal or two. That wasn’t the norm, he knew.

  Many of the soldiers had remarked on that inside his hearing, on a regular basis. Not praising his hunting efforts too much, just casually letting him know that it was considered special. Even Prince Alpert and Captain Horner had mentioned that kind of thing, several times.

  Fighting a nod to himself, Anders decided to add that man, Captain Horner, to the list of people to create a specific magical name for. The people at the table, that particular fellow, Master Tolan and possibly Prince Alpert. He was a bit uncertain on that last one. It would be good to have a potential contact for communication in case he was in a different location from his Princess.

  On the other hand, if the man took offense to that kind of thing, feeling it as an impingement of his self, there could be punishment for it. There could be for Captain Horner as well. The difference there was that the Captain was well away from him and would have to reach him before applying a good beating. More, Anders knew him well enough to understand the man wouldn’t complain over that kind of thing. Not even if it bothered him.

  The rest of the meal was all about him smiling, bowing several times and being friendlier than he actually felt. The deaths he’d been part of, the murders he’d committed, still weighed on him. The trick was in not letting it show enough to bother everyone else around him.

  Still, perhaps due to being busy, or possibly being kind and realizing that he might want to be alone, everyone at the table broke up at the end of the meal, making excuses to get away. Even Lyse did it, after being signaled by Baron Kilroy.

  That was done with a subtle hand gesture, lacking even in eye contact. Anders just happened to be looking in the right direction to catch the signal being made at all. His Mother went still for a moment, then nearly… Annoyed.

  “I have some things to attend to myself. I can send a messenger to your room later, Anders? To confirm that tea in a few days. That way you can free your schedule for us ahead of time. When my own son became so busy…” She managed a smile for him and a touch to the arm.

  He knew when that had taken place of course. It had been shortly after waking up with an old historian in his head, after having nearly died. When Farad Ibn Istel had stolen part of the life of her innocent child. A thing that he didn't speak out loud. The boy was still there, a part of him. Blended with an old man, who was set in certain of his ways.

  Even as he tried to do new things, allowing the child within to have a say in what they were doing. Pursuing magic, for instance. On an academic level, Farad was terrified of the power that even he might wield, if pressed to it. The concepts of magic simply made sense to him. Perhaps too much so. Seeing new ways to use it was simple. For him. The skills of the historian, one such as himself, translated in very useful ways to exercising power over the world. Farad knew the mistakes of old, from texts inside of himself. It would be almost easy to reshape the world without those types of things being involved. If only everyone else bent to his will and superior knowledge.

  The old man understood that nothing good could come of that sort of thinking. The world only took harm from people trying to make it perfect.

  Worse, the boy inside of him wanted that kind of power. Not to do evil, merely to have it. To hold something that made him rather more than he had been at the start. Really, anything that would make him special would have done the task for Anders in that way. Being powerful was simply a road that he, the boy within, could see at the moment. It was why he’d wanted to be a fighter in the first place.

  Smiling, he didn't answer his Mother. The words that were needed couldn’t come. Not if he didn’t want to risk the death of little Anders. If it had only been himself involved, Farad would have simply told his story and allowed things to fall to the Earth as they may.

  A thing which may well have ended in his own death.

  The boy didn't deserve to have even more of his life stolen, if it was inside the power of Farad to prevent. Not that life gave anyone that choice, all too often.

  Heading back to his room, he tried to let go of his fear. Farad didn’t have a right to freeze in place or fail Anders Brolly. Even if doing what was correct for the boy might be a bad idea.

  Chapter twenty-eight

  There were two people that Anders felt he needed to get with that day, first thing. One of those was Prince Robarts, since the man had set his schedule previously. It was probably not wanted or needed by the man himself that he do anything of the sort. On a different page, failing to might be seen as an insult, or worse as if he just didn’t care about the man at all. In part that was true, naturally.

  They’d met two or three times in his entire life. That hardly meant they were close associates or anything along those lines. The Prince was important though and Farad understood that getting on his good side might make a difference later on in Anders’s life. He was going to be the King one day. That made him valuable, beyond what the man could do for someone like him in the moment.

  Simply making certain not to anger him was a good enough reason to at least send a message off.

  The other person that he needed to get word off to was, of course, the King himself. The man had sponsored him on the trip, personally. Lending him horses and buying him gear to see to his protection and comfort. Some of that had made a very large difference, in the end.

  Even the fletching gear had changed the course of the battle itself. Without those arrows, Anders would have been overwhelmed on the shore of the lake. Maybe he co
uld have used magic well enough to fight the archers and soldiers off at closer range. Possibly. The chances of that were small. Without the ability to make those arrows, a lot of his fellows there would have died that day.

  That reminded him to thank the Master Fletcher and Bowyer as well. Without what they’d taught him, he would have died rather horribly.

  After getting it all out, every part of his travel kit, cleaning it and then repacking, in case he needed to leave again soon, Anders wrote two letters. Making certain to leave the letters legible, along with enough flourishes that Master Belford wouldn’t beat him too harshly if he ever saw it. They’d have to be delivered by himself, even if that didn’t present them in a very sophisticated manner. There was simply no one else who could come and go to the right areas who would do it for him.

  More to the point, he decided to write out complete reports of what had taken place and present them both to Prince Robarts. Then, if sending that kind of message to the King needed to be done differently, the man himself might get word to him on the topic, or simply not send it along, in order to prevent a social error.

  That meant he was in front of the Prince’s office door, about two hours later, dressed in one of his nicer outfits, which had been changed in color, repaired of any frayed edges and holes, without the fabric being made different seeming. A thing that he could do, in theory, at least once he learned what different fabrics were like on the level of magic.

  After he had that down, the name for silk, or canvas, or even something like leather, it should be possible to alter whatever he had into what he wanted. At least in its surface appearance. A cloth tunic could be made to seem like it was leather armor. It wouldn’t act like it though, when the sword cut came at him. For daily wear that didn't really matter too much. A shirt that looked like silk would be thought of as silk.

  Not having that kind of talent yet, Anders went with making things look as nice as he could, washing first, scrubbing in a bucket of water carefully for a long while. Then, trying to be efficient, moved to make his deliveries.

  Really, he expected to leave the messages on the floor in front of the door. You knocked before doing that sort of thing, always. It just seemed to be sensible to think that the Prince would be off doing important things. Such as meeting about the war that had started, or visiting with his brother, recently returned from battle.

  Indeed, something along those lines might well have been taking place, since the Heir to the kingdom came walking up behind Anders as he knocked. A soft rustling that showed movement got him to turn, then bow almost instantly. The letters came out at the same time, in his left hand for proper presentation.

  The move was smoothly returned and of a kind. The first courtly bow. The only difference was that the Prince took the two messages, smiled at the same time as he bowed and stood up first.

  “Anders! Good to see you. I was just thinking about arranging a meeting with you soon. Did someone get you to deliver messages? That’s rather…” His face looked mildly troubled for a brief moment.

  Standing himself, Anders smiled back. It wasn’t real, if a thing that still needed to be done. After all, the man in front of him had been at least polite on meeting him. Possibly concerned with his wellbeing, or at least willing to pretend to that idea. Doing less than the same would be hard to explain.

  “Well met, Prince Robarts. These are just from me. Reports for you and King Matheus on what the trip entailed. The only difference between them is that I made a point of explaining how the gear provided aided me at each step in the one for the King. It truly did, so that isn’t false flattery or anything. Is that… Too much, do you think? Some of the material sent actually altered the course of the battle. At least for me.”

  Moving past him, the tall Prince, his blond hair well-groomed and his brightly colored bronze and gold colored outfit shining and immaculate, patted his shoulder, nudging him into the room. The other man went first, so didn’t notice that the sudden move nearly cost him his life. Luckily there was no one else there to see it that day.

  Really, if they had, it probably would have seemed like he was flinching from the contact, rather than getting ready to make the man explode. The angle was awkward, thankfully, so he had to turn toward the man first, before doing anything. It was too close.

  Taking both letters, the man moved behind the desk, gesturing for Anders to have a seat, after closing the door. Both were read, with the information being gone over in the report to the Prince twice, before it was folded and settled in front of him.

  “That matches what we were told earlier. In some regards it was more complete. We had been told that you did almost all the hunting, though Alpert didn’t describe how it was accomplished. Do you really think you can establish contact with the men still there in the field? You mentioned planning to use Captain Horner for that… Why not the general in charge?”

  To Anders that part made sense. It hadn’t really made it into the letters, since it was a complicated matter, in some ways. Really, he’d barely hinted at planning to try that sort of thing. Mainly as an afterthought, since the basic technique had worked well enough going the other way around, from the field to them.

  Thinking of that did remind him of a need to see to Princess Aisla as well. That one would be harder to manage, since you didn’t go and ask for a covert meeting with a woman you weren’t directly related to like that. Sending her a letter would probably be safe enough. What wouldn’t be was doing nothing at all. That would probably leave her feeling snubbed.

  “For the spell to work, I have to be able to identify the person I’m trying to contact on a personal level. I spent most of a month sharing the late meal with Captain Horner. The general… I can’t even recall his name, to be honest. We met only once, for less than a single hour.” It hadn’t been a thing that he’d committed to memory at the time. Truly, nothing the man had said to him had felt all that important at the time.

  The words just got a nod from the man across from him. His smooth face seeming pensive.

  “So, if this works, we’ll need to put you with people before they leave? That or send you to them, for that purpose, with you doing the work from that side of things. We can do both, of course, if you’re willing to aid us in that way. Can I get reports on that as well? How your experiments go and perhaps, if it goes well, find some people for you to talk to at some length?” The words were questions, as if he might refuse.

  More, they held a tone that spoke of that being expected, for some reason. As if he might be spiteful or petty about it all. That or ask for something in return.

  Anders simply smiled. A small thing that had to seem rather tired.

  “That’s my plan, or at least it’s the eventual one, if I can make the earlier parts work. They should, really. I just want to test it out first. Really, I should go and meet Depak Sona’s water bucket right now. That’s the first target for practice. People are simple, compared to things like that, being so very different from one and each other. If I can do something like that, a particular plain bucket, that will be a very good sign that my new technique actually works.”

  The Prince stood then, instantly, and walked around the desk toward the door.

  “For my part I’ll deliver this to Father for you. I think it is most timely and appropriate. Too often people fail to actually tell us when we do something right. That or tend to reassure us that everything we do is brilliant. Going into how each part worked and not mentioning those that failed to aid is a good enough plan. I do understand that there are reasons not to list the King’s failures, trust me. This, however, is well timed and placed.” With that reassurance the man ushered Anders to the door and then shut it behind him.

  Leaving him time to get off and do what he’d mentioned. Getting to know a bucket.

  Depak Sona was in a meeting when Anders got there, meaning that letting him in was out of the question. Rather than do that, since whoever was inside might not wish him to know of their presence, the Magician
simply closed the door, then hurried back with a rather well decorated blue and silver bucket. There was a picture of the full moon on the side with an owl flying in front of it. The character of the thing was new, having altered from the last time he’d filled the thing. It was much more like a work of art now, than a simple brown bucket made of well-rounded shakes.

  “I’ll return this as soon as possible. It might take a few hours, even if all goes well. Before the late meal, certainly.” That felt like far too long to keep his wash bucket away.

  Rather than scold him for it, Depak touched his mustache, stroking it.

  “Very good. I should be available then. If not, leave it outside the door? I’ll make haste, regardless. I’m eager to begin the testing of your new method.”

  Then the door was shut quickly, since the man had a guest. One that he didn’t want Anders to know about. Given everything, that was significant. At least it hadn’t happened before in their relationship. He’d been gone and things like that were bound to change for someone high up in the power structure.

  For some reason, he’d truly felt that getting to know the bucket at hand would be more difficult than it was. The thing was highly unique now, making the parts of it easy to commit to memory. Even making up a new word for it, debu, with its own sense of movement surrounded by nothingness wasn’t at all hard to manage. He’d done enough of that kind of thing in the last days and weeks that, while not taking any less time to develop, surely wasn’t difficult to create inside his mind. It required about an hour for him to really get to know and understand the specifics of Debu the bucket.

  Then he worked on filling it, from a distance.