Icestorm

by Theresa Dahlheim

  A son. He needed a son.

  A spell. She needed a spell.

  Maze Island had a huge library, undoubtedly packed with spellbooks. Something like this, something so important to a man, would surely be discussed in the spellbooks. It was like healing, in a way. She would find a spell that would heal him, and he would be able to marry again and have a son. A son would put an end to the rumors and to the king’s schemes.

  “I will find a cure,” she said, then added, “your Grace.” They were not speaking as father and daughter, after all, but as duke and sorceress. If they kept that distance when they discussed this topic, it might be a little easier on both of them.

  She could tell he appreciated her formal tone. He still did not turn to face her, but he seemed to relax slightly as he nodded his head. “I thank you, my lady.”

  Tabitha nodded in reply. As awkward as it all was, she did not stand up to return to the house, and her father did not suggest it. They remained as they were for a little while.

  Everything is changing, she thought. She felt cold. And I don’t think I am ready.

  Chapter 4

  “Time to leave.”

  Tabitha flinched. That voice of his was like a millstone grinding husks to powder. I am not ready, she thought frantically as she stood up from her vanity mirror. But it did not matter if she was not ready. If Lord Natayl said it was time to leave, it was time to leave. If she hurried, she would reach the corridor before he actually entered her chambers. She still could not believe he had done that yesterday.

  Lise held another hairpin ready, but Tabitha waved it away and gestured toward her hat. Lise quickly brought it, but they both grabbed at the ribbons at the same time and Tabitha had to slap her away. She tied the ribbons beneath her chin herself as she left the bedchamber, and Lise trailed her through the sitting room, nearly tripping over the edge of the carpet. She had never been so clumsy back home. Tabitha smoothed the sleeves of her blue silk gown and shook out her skirts as she moved, but there was really no point. The fabric would stick to her skin in this heat no matter what she did.

  Lord Natayl stood at the open door to her chambers, wearing grey magi robes and holding that tall walking stick that, as far as Tabitha could tell, he did not need. He wore the scowl that was as permanent a part of his face as the deep wrinkles and the age spots. After an encompassing glance at her, he turned to leave, and she followed.

  At the bottom of the last flight of stairs, the sorcerer jerked his chin at Lise to tell her to stay. Lise curtseyed and fled back up the stairs without a word to Tabitha. She was no telepath, but she had nevertheless adopted the servants’ silent ways. Lord Natayl continued toward the front door, which told Tabitha that they would again be walking today instead of taking the carriage. She cringed inside as she remembered how he had mocked her yesterday, sarcastically asking if her feet were too delicate to touch paving stones. All she had asked was why they were walking. She had not refused to walk. Today she said nothing, but when she stepped off the porch, the raging heat and light of the afternoon sun wrapped her like a giant hand. She kept her head down as they went to the gate so that the brim of her hat would shield as much of her face and neck as possible. She did not know if sorceresses could be sunburned, but she had never risked it before and would not now.

  It was almost four weeks since she had first met Lord Natayl. After her final day in Tiaulon, she had spent eighteen days on the sorcerer’s ship, which had stopped at virtually every single island in the northern archipelago, big or small, and anchored every night at another port town. After they reached Maze Island, she had passed another six days at the sorcerer’s manor house in the woods, which was the same size and shape as Lord Daniel’s back in Thendalia, from the two main ballrooms all the way up to the attic shutters. She had managed to get some sleep there, finally, since Lise had no longer been sharing her chamber as she had had to do on the ship and in every single inn they had visited during the voyage. At last, the day before yesterday, they had taken a luxurious carriage into the city and arrived at a six-floor townhouse in a block with several others on a quiet street.

  At each stage of the journey, Tabitha had hoped to meet magi women with whom she could be friends. But it had not happened. Lord Natayl had several magi women among his servants, but they were all lowborn and advanced in years, and they gave short answers when she asked them questions. By picking through their comments and deciphering their euphemisms, Tabitha believed that the way they saw Lord Natayl after years in his service was exactly the way she herself saw him after these four weeks: a vain, impatient perfectionist who resented any intrusion on his solitude. How was she supposed to learn something as complex as magic from someone like this?

  All the other people Tabitha had met were men: Lord Natayl’s household stewards, grooms, and gardeners; the plantation managers in the archipelago; the public works administrators here in the city; the priests; and several dozen magi with varied ranks and functions. Some of them spoke to her in mildly charming ways, but all of them seemed as wary of her as of a half-tamed wildcat. What had Lord Natayl told people about her? Were there rumors about Nicolas’s death? Lord Natayl appeared to believe her story that Nicolas had climbed to her bedchamber window uninvited, and that in her fear and anger, she had used her magic to throw him to the ground below. Did the magi men think that if they flirted with her, she might kill them?

  One man, an old priest on the ship, had been given the task of teaching Mazespaak to Tabitha and Lise. He, at least, had been kindly and patient, and had even nodded approvingly when she had remarked that many more Mazespaak expressions were slurred and contracted compared to Thendalian. But outside their scheduled lessons, he had liked to read or sleep instead of talk, and she was not sure what they would have talked about anyway. She missed talk, normal talk. She missed having ladies around her. She knew that hundreds of girls attended Maze Island Academy, right here in the city, and some of them had to be Thendals, so when would Lord Natayl introduce her to them?

  Maybe today. Maybe we are going there now. She followed Lord Natayl down street after street. She could not tell if they walked further than they had yesterday, which had been to Maze Island’s basilica to meet priests and healers. She had no real idea of distances because she had so seldom walked in her former life. She had taken walks, but had almost never walked to get anywhere.

  As she had done yesterday, she distracted herself by peering under her hat at the clothes people were wearing. Leaving aside the southerners in their bizarre garb, she had noticed yesterday that the men wore trousers, either to the knee or to the ankle, and either sandals or boots. Very few wore more on top than a single shirt buttoned up the front, but their sleeves were of all lengths. As for the women, Tabitha had to conclude that what they wore must not be considered scandalous here. Though the fit of the dresses was looser than Thendal fashion dictated, the necklines were low, showing skin almost to the collarbone. The breast bands did not seem to be separate items of underclothing, but integrated into the bodices of the dresses. The sleeves only reached the elbow. The hems were high, displaying lower shins and calves, and the closed-toe sandals showed a lot of ankle. Some girls were even wearing trousers, and not just the split-skirt type that western women wore to ride horses. It all made her nervous, because although she did not want to be out of fashion, she did not think she was bold enough to wear such things. Nan, and all her other governesses, had always taught her to be modest.

  Were they past the basilica? Were they even going the same direction as before? She could not tell. The streets were more crowded, so maybe it was taking longer to go the same distance. No one actually touched her, but the constant traffic, and especially the noise, seemed to press against her as uncomfortably as the sun did. It was a sudden and welcome relief when Lord Natayl led them through a gate in a stone wall into a quiet courtyard surrounded by shrubs and trees. A few steps later they passed through an arch into a garden, and then through a plain door in the side of a whi
te building. Inside, the curving corridor was blessedly cool and dim.

  Tabitha’s eyes had almost adjusted by the time Lord Natayl stopped at a pair of giant doors. They led from the corridor to a room nearly as bright as the day outside, and she had to lower her eyes to her feet again. Their footsteps echoed on the marble floor, which meant the room was large, and if it was large it was probably important.

  “The Hall,” Lord Natayl said, stopping and gesturing with his walking stick, and Tabitha tried not to squint as she looked up at the light pouring into the room from the glass ceiling. The Hall. The Hall! She suppressed a gasp as she realized where she was standing. This was the Hall of the Circle, the Hall of Councils. Now she could see the enormous shape of the Table in the middle of the shining light, and all the tall chairs around it. Nine tall chairs. This was where the sorcerers gathered. This was the Hall.

  “What do you think of our council chamber, my lady?” Lord Natayl asked her.

  What did he want her to say? She had never answered him correctly. “It is beautiful,” she said as she looked at the rainbows that the light cast on the walls, reflecting from the big, clear crystals on the backs of each of the chairs and from the bright, translucent ceiling. She nodded up at it and ventured a question. “Is that Nuru’s Diamond?”

  Lord Natayl barked a laugh. “Of course, the Jewel of Betaul would first note the Diamond. I hope you know that it is not a real diamond.”

  Of course she knew. “Is it cut crystal?” she asked, trying to sound like Beatris.

  “No. It is not a jewel at all. I am sorry for that,” he added mockingly.

  Tabitha said nothing. This was not the first time that he had suggested that she was greedily interested in diamonds and other precious stones. It was not fair. She liked jewelry, as every lady did, but she was not obsessed with it. She had been called “the Jewel of Betaul” since birth, and it had nothing to do with gemstones.

  Lord Natayl gestured toward the chairs. “Thendalia sits in the north.”

  Was he telling her to sit in the chair? Tabitha took a hesitant step forward, but stopped when he looked at her sternly.

  “Do you believe you have the right to take Thendalia’s seat?” he asked.

  Again, she did not know what he wanted her to say. If she said yes, he would accuse her of arrogance. If she said no, he would accuse her of timidity. “I don’t know,” she said finally, which was the honest answer.

  Apparently that was worse than saying yes or no, based on the look of exasperated disgust on the old man’s face. Without another word he turned around and headed for the double doors.

  Tell me what you want from me! Tabitha flung the thought at Lord Natayl’s back like a rock. He gave no sign that he heard it, or received it, or whatever one did with telepathic speech. She felt both frustrated that she could not do it, and relieved anew that he really did not seem to be able to read her mind.

  Lord Natayl led them up a flight of stairs and past an intricate mural to a door with the grey icicle sigil of Thendalia’s sorcerer. This suite of rooms appeared to be where paperwork was done, since stacks of it covered many tables and desks and bookshelves. She met half a dozen more magi, all men, all scribes, all silently returning to their work after greeting her. Once, such rude behavior would have outraged her, but the last four weeks of being the only lady near Lord Natayl had taught her to expect it.

  In one of the inner rooms, Lord Natayl sat down in a much nicer chair at a much nicer table and picked up a piece of paper. He read it while a magus hovered anxiously nearby, and then he signed and sealed it at the bottom and picked up another. Not knowing what to do and not willing to ask, Tabitha found an empty chair against the wall and sat down. Lord Natayl ignored her, continuing to read, sign, and seal documents. Eventually Tabitha took off her hat, since it seemed they would not be going outside again soon, and as she reset the pins in her hair to keep it properly atop her head, she let her gaze wander.

  This room, like the others, was lit by those floating globe-lights she had first seen in the basilica, and cooled by the spinning ceiling-fans that she had first seen at Lord Natayl’s manor house. She knew that living plants somehow kept the fans spinning. She had no idea how the floating globes worked, but light with no flame and no heat would be wonderful for anyone who had to work with books and paper. Why were they not used back home? Did they only work if a sorcerer was nearby?

  At first, on board the ship, she had asked Natayl these sorts of questions during the times he had set aside to teach her magic. But he had so seldom addressed them, instead accusing her of focusing on trivialities. The servants had also proven unwilling or unable to answer her most of the time. How was she supposed to learn anything? Was she supposed to be learning something right now, watching from here? How?

  She fidgeted with the folds of her skirt. Why had he brought her here? Even if she had wanted to work like a scribe, she did not know Mazespaak well enough yet. Of course, they would receive letters from Thendalia, so should she be reading those? Sorting them?

  What if some of them are mine? Piles of letters had arrived for her at her father’s house before she had even left Tiaulon, so there were probably even more being sent to her here. Did the magi scribes open all the letters addressed to the sorcerer, and now the sorceress? Most of them were probably unimportant, but she would have to make certain that all the letters from her family came straight to her, unopened.

  Lord Natayl suddenly stood up, and the magus beside him backed away. “Come,” he growled at her. “You need to meet someone important.”

  Another magus, a more senior one, went with them back out to the corridor, and only when they stopped in front of another door did Tabitha realize that she was about to meet another sorcerer. The sigil on this door was the blue shield of Telgardia, and Tabitha could not help feeling a pang of regret for the prince she had once thought she would marry. Maybe she could impress the Telgard sorcerers by her knowledge of their language. Or maybe she should not try, since she had not kept in practice. She smoothed her skirts as Lord Natayl rapped his walking stick against the door, and she kept her eyes downcast as they waited for it to open. She wondered why a knock was necessary. Why would Lord Natayl not simply speak telepathically to Lord Contare before they even arrived?

  When the door did open, Tabitha could not see anyone from where she stood behind Lord Natayl, but someone spoke aloud to give what seemed like the proper courtesies. Lord Natayl stepped into the room but did not draw her forward, so she just moved a little closer to the doorway, risking a single brief glance into the room. From it she could only tell that there were five or six men in the room, and none of them wore beards. She kept her gaze on the floor while Lord Natayl greeted each of the Telgards, and finally, he turned back to her and gestured. Tabitha raised her face, set her hand as lightly as possible in his, and entered the room.

  The men in the room seemed unremarkable at first glance, except for the two youngest, no more than boys. Maybe they were actually older than that, but since they were young and wore no beards, she could not help but think of them as boys. One of them was handsome, though. His hair was very dark, and there was a sense of mischief in his blue eyes, though his expression was perfectly composed. Was he the new Telgard sorcerer?

  But Natayl turned her slightly. She only had a moment to take in the plainer face and lighter eyes of the other Telgard boy before Natayl placed her hand firmly into his.

  Shocked to stillness, she stared, but could not see. All her senses were enveloped in soft, dark, warm quiet, as purple as approaching night and as thick as a heavy cloak. It was power, his power, so unlike Lord Natayl’s power. It covered her, stifled her, filling her with scents, and her throat closed in panic. She wanted to breathe—

  Then, suddenly, she could. She could breathe, and she could see. She very nearly stumbled, but Nan had taught her too well, and she managed to catch herself before she could do more than sway. The Telgard boy was no longer holding her hand, but he was sta
ring at her, and she could still feel his magic wrapped around her, not as tightly, but still so close. He felt as close as her own thoughts. What had happened? She could feel her heart pounding and was suddenly, fearfully sure that he could feel it too.

  “My lady.”

  Thendalian. She turned toward the sound of her native language by instinct, and saw a nice-looking old man, his eyes sky-blue and the lines of his face still strong and handsome. This must be Sorcerer Contare. He seemed much milder and more gracious than Lord Natayl, and Tabitha immediately felt that if he was her master, he would not avoid her questions and make her feel stupid all the time. He was smiling kindly at her, and he met her eyes directly and tilted his head in the formal gesture that all magi seemed to use. “We are honored to meet you, Lady Betaul. I am sorry we were not given time to receive you more properly.”

  “No apologies are necessary, my lord,” she said, and dipped a curtsey, all by rote. “It is an honor to meet you as well.”

  Lord Contare smiled at her, then spoke to Lord Natayl in Mazespaak. Tabitha kept her eyes on the floor, holding herself still, trying not to think about anything at all as the Telgard boy’s magic pressed against her mind, clouding her eyes and muffling her ears, and filling her breath with a scent, some scent she didn’t know. Finally Lord Natayl guided her out to the corridor again, and when she passed through the doorway, she realized she had been expecting to leave the smothering feeling behind in the room. But it was still there, it was stronger. She could not help looking over her shoulder at the boy to make sure he was not following her, because it still felt as if he stood right next to her, even when the door shut behind them, even when they walked away from it, even when they reached Lord Natayl’s door again.

  “What did he do to me?” she blurted, heedless of the other magi in the front room. “When he touched my hand, what did he do?” She was trembling. How could she still be feeling this? Feeling him?