Icestorm

by Theresa Dahlheim

“If you are on my side,” she said, “you will withdraw all your followers outside the borders of the Betaul Marches. This will stand until the Theocracy of Thendalia recognizes Elder Wendlin’s teachings as canonical.”

  She had told Elder Bear and Partridge this already, and Jackalope merely nodded. But Walkering and Angry Man both stared at her as if she had asked for their fathers’ heads.

  Elder Bear cleared his throat before Walkering or Angry Man could speak. “Lady Sorceress, I need to say, again, that the people of Betaul deserve to hear Elder Wendlin’s message. How can we convince you of this?”

  My last card to play. “I believe that only Elder Wendlin himself has any hope of that.”

  As she, her magi, and her family had all expected, this was not what the heretics had expected. The surprise and even dismay on their faces suggested that these men had contacted her without Wendlin’s consent. Even if he did know about this meeting, Wendlin no doubt thought that he did not need to consider any of the sorcerers to be a threat, since Pascin and Natayl had both let his followers ravage their kingdoms unchecked.

  But he was wrong.

  Partridge half-raised his hand. “My lady, are you asking us to arrange a meeting between you and Elder Wendlin?”

  “Are you able?”

  “Yes.” Partridge glanced quickly at Walkering, then looked back at Tabitha. “It might take a little time, my lady.”

  “I understand. However, all shovel-men must withdraw from the Betaul Marches, as far east as Orsilimie Ford, by the end of this coming month.” Partridge’s eyes widened, and she added quickly, “As a gesture of good faith, I will agree to an experiment of Elder Wendlin’s farming methods near the stream there. Elder Partridge, you may coordinate this, if you wish.”

  Walkering looked ready to burst apart. Partridge smiled and bowed to Tabitha. “If you would excuse us for a moment, my lady, we would like to confer.”

  “As you do so, keep this in mind.” She tried to remember her exact words from their earlier conversation. “Any warlike actions by your people against my people, or their property, is absolutely unacceptable. It will mean you are not on my side.”

  He bowed again, in that pudgy way of his. The Jackalope bowed as well, and Elder Bear hurried to do likewise before turning into the tight circle that was forming around Walkering.

  “Interesting,” Isabelle sent. “They blame Walkering for the burning and pillaging, but they defer to him so easily. Almost unconsciously.”

  “It bears watching,” Clementa agreed.

  Tabitha took the opportunity to breathe, very slowly. She thought that Partridge understood her message, that she had chosen to work with him. She almost dared to believe that he had enough clout with enough of the others that, as a group, they would agree to her terms.

  But what were they talking about right now? Were they arguing? Or were they congratulating themselves for making her fall into a trap so easily? Isabelle had seen more than one trap, but had she seen them all?

  Elder Bear turned to her, swallowing. “Lady Sorceress?”

  “Yes?”

  “Would you be willing to join us at the farms, Lady Sorceress? So we may show you how well Elder Wendlin’s new methods work?”

  They wanted to try to convince her, without involving Wendlin himself. Tabitha hesitated, and then Isabelle raised another point. “Natayl will not allow you to return to Thendalia anytime soon. How would you get around that?”

  She was right. But Tabitha was the sorceress, and as far as the shovel-men knew, she could come and go as she pleased. Natayl was her master, not her owner. “They can’t show me how well Wendlin’s methods work until harvest,” she sent. “That gives me a few months.” Out loud, she said, “Perhaps.”

  Elder Bear bowed again, and the heretics resumed their whispers.

  “Your other friend,” Isabelle sent suddenly. “Jenevive. You said that Jenevive might be pregnant. You could insist on returning to Thendalia to deliver the baby. Natayl wouldn’t refuse that.” She reconsidered. “Or would he?”

  “Honestly, I don’t know.” Tabitha had so enjoyed escaping Natayl for these last few weeks. Being able to do it again later in the year would be wonderful, even if she had to drag Maga Rollana along again. Although, next time, she would invent another kind of distraction to get Maga Rollana out of her way. She felt rather guilty about the noxious liquid that Isabelle had slipped into the older maga’s nutmeg posset last night.

  “If the farms are successful,” Clementa sent, “will you support the shovel-men?”

  Surprised, Tabitha almost turned her head to look over at Clementa. “Of course not. Not until the Theocracy does.”

  “If you speak to the Hierarch about the farms, it might give you a chance to learn what his true feelings about the shovel-men are.”

  “It might.” The fact that the Hierarch himself had not taken a firm stand against the heretics was causing confusion and disorder in the Theocracy. Perhaps Tabitha could remind him of his responsibilities, if she could stand to be around the man for more than a moment.

  Walkering stumbled. Angry Man and Mouse caught him by the arms, and the other three quickly looked from him to Tabitha. They obviously suspected she was doing something to him, but she suspected he was only pretending.

  “I don’t think so,” Isabelle sent. “That’s fresh blood on his nose.”

  Walkering said something urgent to Angry Man. Not for the first time, Tabitha wished that she, or any of her friends, especially Clementa in this case, had the talent for distance hearing. As it was, she could only watch Angry Man’s face as he stood there, torn by indecision. Walkering said something else, and Angry Man finally nodded. Elder Bear said something to both of them, and Angry Man nodded again.

  Then, without asking her leave, without even looking at her, Angry Man started to guide Walkering around the bowl of the ground toward the top of the staircase. Tabitha’s back stiffened, and her voice rang out in the still air. “Do you not agree to my terms?”

  Angry Man did not stop or look up, but for the first time, he spoke to her. His Thendalian was poor. “Lady Sorceress will not heal him. He needs healers. I take him back.”

  “Let them go,” Clementa quickly decided. “Dismiss them.”

  “With a flourish,” Isabelle sent.

  Clementa did not like Isabelle’s idea, but Tabitha did, and she lifted one hand. “The stairs are difficult,” she said to Angry Man. “I will help you.” Her power rose to her call, a wave of fierce itching up her entire back, and she reached her telekinesis toward Walkering.

  Once Clementa realized that Tabitha was truly going to do it, she sent, “Isabelle, focus on his head. I will focus on his feet, and Tabitha, his torso. Let his arms dangle. Stand up on my signal and walk toward the stairs.”

  Tabitha was glad that the three of them had helped lift the new bells to the castle tower before the wedding, since it had given her good practice with holding heavy objects telekinetically, and it had given the three of them good practice with working together. Since the man was much less massive than the bell, the focus here was making sure that each of the three of them kept her magic centered on the assigned body part. Her back and neck prickling under waves of ice, Tabitha centered her own magic just under Walkering’s rib cage, and on Clementa’s word, boosted him up. As his feet left the ground, he made a very strange noise, and Angry Man shouted in alarm and reached up to try to tug him back down. His pulling upset Tabitha’s balance, and Walkering gasped.

  “Don’t touch him,” Tabitha ordered as Clementa gave the signal to rise from their cushions and start walking forward. The other four heretics just stood and stared, but Angry Man continued to try to grab hold of Walkering, who was holding his mouth shut so hard it had vanished into his beard. He rose above Angry Man’s reach and floated toward the stairs, his cloak billowing gently, and Angry Man whirled toward Tabitha.

  “Don’t touch him!” she repeated more forcefully. She, Clementa, and Isabelle were slowly mo
ving toward the stairs, and Walkering was already there, hovering. Angry Man’s glare was murderous. He ran to the stairs and scrambled down them, but did not interfere with Walkering. Tabitha reached the stairs with her magi, feeling the edge of the ward like a thick carpet catching her slipper. As the heretic leader drifted further down the slope alongside the stairs, and the distance between him and Tabitha grew, her grip started to slip. She resisted the temptation to simply drop her burden, and summoned more power, despite the now-painful prickling in her spine. When she firmed her hold, it made his body jerk. Then he vomited. It splattered all over a big rock that lay across Angry Man’s path.

  “Maybe that’s why he wanted to leave so badly,” Isabelle speculated.

  A few moments more, and they were able to drop him onto the pebbles next to the rowboat, where he stumbled and would have fallen if Angry Man had not caught up to him. The oarsmen had all backed away in open-mouthed astonishment, some of them even splashing into the shallow water. Tabitha sighed as she released her hold on the magic, and the itching ice faded from her skin. It was exactly like setting down something heavy with her arms, and she had to ignore the urge to stretch.

  Graegor would have used earth magic to do that. It would have been no effort at all for him.

  “Back to our places,” Clementa directed.

  As they glided toward the cushions, Tabitha asked, “Should we sit?”

  “Yes. They have not yet agreed to your terms, so we are not yet finished.”

  Once she had resumed her seat, Tabitha focused her gaze on Partridge. He had recovered his composure, no longer as wild about the eyes as the others, and when Tabitha broke the silence, he was the only one not to flinch. “Do you agree to my terms? Will the shovel-men withdraw from the Betaul Marches?”

  Elder Bear whispered urgently in Partridge’s right ear while Jackalope muttered something in his left. Partridge tried to answer both of them while keeping his eyes on Tabitha at the same time.

  “Should I give the ultimatum?” Tabitha asked, and when Clementa and Isabelle both agreed, she interrupted the heretics’ indecision. “If we leave this meeting without an agreement, my father will march against you to push you out of Betaul by force.”

  This sparked another round of whispering, but Partridge did not try to answer his fellows this time. “My lady, it surprises me to hear you say this. You abhor violence, do you not?”

  “I do, Elder Partridge. But my father is a warrior, on the seas and in his lands. I can’t tell him how to rule those lands, and I can’t hold him back if he feels it necessary to expel you, which, I will remind you, is within his rights. It is only because I am his daughter that he has stayed his hand for this long.”

  Partridge glanced quickly left and right, and even turned to look over his shoulder at Mouse. When he turned back to Tabitha, he nodded. “Yes, my lady. We agree to withdraw to Orsilimie Ford, where we will plant new fields in Elder Wendlin’s name. My lady, may we remain in contact with you?”

  Tabitha gave a single, regal nod. “Yes, you may remain in contact.” Involuntarily, her eyes flicked to Jackalope. He noticed, and the side of his mouth quirked up. She looked back at Partridge and said, “I remind you that you have until the end of Pennai, just over one month, to complete your withdrawal. Will this pose any problem?”

  Her tone indicated that she would not accept any answer other than No, and Partridge obliged. “No, my lady, not at all.”

  “I must also say that Elder Walkering, and those like him, will need to be …” Isabelle suggested a word, and Tabitha used it. “… defanged. Soon.”

  Partridge nodded. “I understand, my lady.” His expression was calm and intent, but she could not tell if he was satisfied or not. Had she given him too much, somehow? Or not enough, and he was already planning how to get around her terms?

  At this moment, it did not matter. She had spoken and they had agreed. “Elders, I believe we are in accord.” It was exciting to say those words, but she did her best not to sound excited at all, to sound as if she had fully expected this outcome. “You have my leave to go.”

  Each of them stopped in front of her to offer farewells. Mouse was first, stumbling through his bow, never speaking, never looking up, scurrying to the top of the stairs as soon as he could, and cringing when he crossed the wards. Elder Bear was next, and while this final bow of his was smoother than his others had been, his broad face was creased with worry. Jackalope came closer to Tabitha than the other two had, but she kept a stony expression throughout his stylish bow and salacious eyes. She wanted him gone. She wanted them all gone. She wanted to breathe.

  Partridge was last. “Thank you, my lady.” He bowed. “Words are insufficient, but nevertheless, I say again, thank you.”

  She nodded. “Elder.”

  He hesitated, as if hoping she would say something else, but then went to the stairs. In another moment his stout form had disappeared behind the rocks.

  Tabitha sank into herself, her shoulders slumping and her eyes closing. Isabelle stepped noiselessly to the edge of the overhang to keep watch again. Clementa pulled her handbook out of her cloak’s inner pocket, and Tabitha soon heard the scratching of her lead pencil against the page.

  I did it. They will leave Betaul alone.

  Isabelle could see that Walkering and Angry Man were already in the rowboat, and neither of them helped to push it out to deeper water when the other heretics arrived. The oarsmen still looked spooked, and they did not ask the heretics any questions. Everyone piled into the boat and brought out the oars, and they quickly pulled away from the beach.

  Isabelle pushed back her hood, stretched her arms over head, and crossed the bowl-shaped ground toward the flat boulder at the top of the eastern slope. Tabitha got to her feet and was surprised that her legs suddenly felt unsteady. She bent her knees a few times, and then she and Clementa joined Isabelle at the boulder to watch the boat row into the strait.

  “So how did I do?” Tabitha asked after a moment of silence.

  “Quite well,” Clementa sent, with a sense of general satisfaction.

  “I hope your father agrees,” Isabelle added.

  “They are withdrawing, just as he wants.”

  “But, the money …”

  “It will not be my father’s money. He should not object.”

  “But, on principle? He didn’t like any idea that suggested we were buying them off.”

  “We are not paying them to go away. We are funding new farms.”

  “Do we want to do that?” Clementa looked at her. “How will we get rid of them later, if the farmers start to listen to them?”

  “If the farms work like he says they do,” Tabitha sent, “the Theocracy may be willing to declare Wendlin’s teachings canonical, and we will not need to get rid of them.” And it would no longer be her problem.

  Clementa did not answer. Isabelle was brooding as she watched the boat rowing slowly away from the island, and finally she asked, “Tabitha, how will you get money from Natayl? This is not like a merchant’s bill.”

  “It could be. Natayl has never complained about anything I have bought. He acts as if such things are beneath his notice.”

  Isabelle laughed. “I like it. Buy a terribly expensive piece of jewelry, and then replace the stones with glass and send the real ones to Partridge.”

  “Yes, exactly.” Tabitha had not thought the idea all the way through, but that suggestion would work perfectly. It was not as if she would ever need to wear the fake jewels.

  “How do we make sure that he does not just keep it for himself?” Clementa asked.

  After a moment, Tabitha sent, “We will need to work on that. My father might have suggestions.”

  “And what if Lord Natayl does complain about the jewelry?” Clementa asked.

  “I will humbly apologize and promise that it will never happen again.” Tabitha hoped it would be that easy. It should be that easy. He had never complained about that sort of thing before. He seemed to expect
her to spend his money on things he considered frivolous.

  Isabelle puffed out her breath and nodded. “She’s right,” she told Clementa. “Don’t worry about that part.”

  There is too much else to worry about. Tabitha wrapped her cloak closer around herself. “You are sure I did all right?” she asked them. “You don’t think I said too much?”

  “I think you said just enough.” Clementa pushed back her hood and shook out her short, dark hair.

  “I could not have done it without you,” Tabitha told them both. “I am so glad you were here with me.”

  “It is an honor,” Clementa sent, a simple and obvious truth.

  “Of course,” Isabelle sent.

  “You both need to come with me next time too.”

  “I wouldn’t miss it.” Isabelle smiled.

  “I am curious to see what makes Elder Wendlin’s farms so special,” Clementa sent.

  “And maybe see Elder Wendlin himself,” Isabelle sent.

  “I am no longer sure how much good a meeting with him will do,” Clementa sent. “He has lost control of his followers, at least the ones in Thendalia.”

  “It would be good to know that for sure,” Isabelle sent.

  Clementa thought about that, nodded, then glanced around the space. “We should pick up the pebbles.” Thaumat’argent was valuable, and the bits of it that they had used to set the wards had not been easy to get.

  “In a moment.” Isabelle leaned her crossed arms on the boulder and rested her chin on them. Tabitha would never affect so casual a posture, but she, too, could feel herself relaxing.

  She had done it. She had made it through the meeting. The heretics had agreed to retreat from Betaul. Her father would be happy. Graegor would be impressed. And Natayl—

  He will never know, she told herself, forcing her shoulders to loosen and her fists to unknot, hoping that her magi had not seen her cringe. I will be careful. So careful, he will never, ever know.

  Chapter 12

  Graegor was walking back to the Hall from the last ice house with a folder full of reports when Jeffrei called to him. “Hai. Want to celebrate the end of exams with us?”