He swings his feet onto the pallet and draws the quilt around him. Then he takes out the letter and begins to reread the words on the off-white page.
Dorrin-
I had thought to swing back through Rytel and down through the road we had taken to Axalt, but the White guards have blocked the way. They claim that Axalt owes Fairhaven trade duties. This letter, if it reaches you, will have come through friends in Fenard, since apparently only the main routes are safe for one reason or another, and I cannot afford the duties to trade on the wizards’ roads.
Some goods are getting harder and harder to find at any price. Spices are in short supply, as are dried or preserved fruits. If I could obtain it, green brandy from Recluce would fetch two golds a bottle. And so would a cubit-span of wound black wool yarn.
Freidr has urged me to stay close to Jellico, but how can a trader make coins if one doesn’t travel? When I do get to Diev, it will probably be by coaster to Spidlaria or Diev directly, and that means it cannot be until spring when the ice has cleared the Northern Ocean.
Most kinds of cloth are now dearer, because of the need for canvas for the additional ships Fairhaven is building. Some of that is mere speculation, I would guess. That doesn’t make the cloth any cheaper.
I would hope that you might consider making some more models for sale. I could have sold several at that price. I also have more questions for you when next we meet, whenever that may be. I wish you well and trust that you are accomplishing what you find necessary.
Liedral
After his eyes have digested the words yet another time, he folds the sheet and slips it into the back of The Healer. Then he blows out the lamp and draws the quilt around him more tightly.
Outside the wind moans and throws the snow against the wall with such force that a dusting of flakes lies under the door sill and swirls gently across the plank floor.
LXIV
ANYA OPENS THE lower tower door without knocking, enters, and closes it silently. She slides the bolt. The room is lit by an oil wall lamp and one on the side table by the closed window. The winter wind rattles the casement.
Sterol stands up from the screeing table, letting the white mists cloud the mirror. His eyes are dark. “How are you?”
“It’s a strain, dealing with the great lover and chaos master.”
“You don’t have to, you know.”
“That’s easy for you to say. You know what the history of the Whites is for women?”
“Tell me anyway.”
“Don’t patronize me, Sterol. Every one of you is out to lay me, and to prove that, in wizardly matters, I’m no match for any man.”
“You’re better than most.”
“And who will admit it?” Anya slumps into the chair across from the former High Wizard. “Do you have any wine left?”
“Certainly… certainly.”
“Darkness! I told you to cut the patronizing act.”
“My! Aren’t we testy tonight.”
“If you want me to tell Jeslek you’re up to no good, you’re certainly headed in the right direction.”
Sterol retrieves a glass goblet from the top of the bookcase, gently blows it clean of the fine white powder that none of the Whites’ buildings-even the newest-seems to be without, and pours the rest of the red into the goblet. “This is what’s left. You’re welcome to it.” He extends the goblet.
“Thank you.” She sips the wine. “He’s not a very good lover.”
“I wouldn’t have guessed. All force and no technique-like his magic?” Sterol seats himself across the table from her, the mirror between them.
“There is a similarity. His magic has more finesse.”
Sterol swallows silently before speaking. “What does he plan next?”
“He intends to subdue Spidlar, but as he has discussed, gradually. He hid something just before he answered the door, and the energy was still in his glass, and it had the faintest trace of Black to it.”
“Jeslek? Calling on Black energies?” Anya frowns, then takes another sip of wine. “This is turning already.”
“I apologize. It was only brought in tonight. What about the Black energies?”
“It was more like he was studying something Black, but it wasn’t that ponderous feeling you get when you study Recluce.”
“That’s an interesting way you have of describing it. You and Recluce?”
“Just because I’m a woman doesn’t mean I haven’t studied Recluce.”
“So… he’s found something or someone else that’s focusing order. Hmmmm… I’d watch that closely.”
“I intend to.” Anya drains the goblet. “Do you have another bottle?”
“Actually… yes. I thought you might like some.”
“You are thoughtful, Sterol.” The redhead smiles at the former High Wizard before he rises to get the second bottle from the ice bucket.
LXV
DORRIN PULLS OUT the sheet Jarnish had delivered just before supper and slits the seal. Then he pauses. Had Jarnish come all the way to Diev just for this? Had the seal already been broken and resealed? He lets his perceptions study the hardened wax. Then he shrugs. After the vigor with which he has applied his knife to the seal, there is really no way to tell. Besides, what difference does it make whether some factor reads a letter?
Dorrin smoothes out the sheet and begins to read, pausing as he realizes that Liedral had apparently not received his letter when she wrote.
Dorrin-
I was going to travel through Passera and down river to Elparta. That is no longer possible. The road guards now will protect only those traders licensed by Fairhaven. They say that there have been more and more highway attacks and robberies. Even the licensed traders are afraid to take the roads in and out of Spidlar, although some will.
The worst of the famine in Kyphros and Gallos has abated, they say. That is because all those who were starving have died. Most of the herders are gone, and their flocks with them.
The winter snows continue to melt off the new mountains-the Little Easthorns, some call them-that now separate Gallos and Kyphros. Another trader-Dosric- told me taking the wizards’ road is a frightening experience. Snow melts off the hot rocks. That makes a constant fog that you can hardly see through, and nothing grows there yet.
Trade is slow here, and everywhere, but that is true enough in winter even in good years. I hope to see you, somehow, before too long.
Liedral
Dorrin rereads the letter before refolding it and slipping it into the box in which he has her other letter. Then he retrieves the sheet that has his toy plans on it, and stands up, pushing the chair back. His breath steams in the cold room, but the cold does not bother him much anymore, at least not while he is awake. The quilt and blanket are enough for sleeping.
He takes a deep breath. The day has been long already, but he is far from finished. He ducks into the light snow outside, closing the door behind him, and follows the packed path around the smithy alongside the chest-high snow piles beside the building.
Once by the forge, Dorrin lights the single lamp with a pine splinter touched to the forge coals. After setting the charcoal he had brought in before supper around the coals, he pumps the bellows rod until the charcoal catches and the coals reach forging heat.
Dorrin looks at the sheet he has brought, then sets it on the back of his workbench, reaching up and adjusting the lamp. He pumps the bellows rod once.
“Dorrin? Need some help?” Vaos stands by the slack tank.
“I’d appreciate it, but… this is my work, not for any paying customer. At least not yet.”
“Doesn’t matter. It’s cold. Petra gave me another old blanket, but it’s still warmer when you have the forge going. I’m not tired.” Vaos yawns. “Not too tired, anyway.”
“It’s been a cold winter.”
“Coldest I can remember.” The youngster steps up the bellows lever. “What are you doing?”
“Trying to see if I can make some toys.
”
Vaos pauses. “I never had any toys.”
“What kind would you have liked to have?”
“I don’t know.” The blond boy shrugs, and the blanket slips away from his shoulders. He catches it and wraps it back in place. “I never saw any up close, just in Willum’s window. I tried to use a leather knife once to make a top, but it didn’t work real well. Forra beat me ‘cause I dulled the knife.”
“Oh…”
“How hot do you want the charcoal, Dorrin?”
Dorrin studies the glowing carbon, both with eyes and his senses that go beyond sight. “Slow down on the bellows- about half as fast.”
“What are you going to make?”
“A small windmill with a crank to make the blades go, I think.”
“Wouldn’t it be easier to carve it?”
“Yes. But it’s more interesting out of iron, and I can use the template to stamp out the gears.”
“Could you do that with real gears?”
“Hardly. You have to cut them. They use special machines for the pump gears.” He takes the other half of the template, black iron, and sets it where he can reach it quickly. “They have to fit together just right.”
Dorrin takes the tongs and lifts one of the smaller rods from his own rack and eases it into the forge. “Here, for a toy, I don’t have to be quite as exact, but I need to make sure the two gears mesh just right.”
Vaos continues pumping. “This about right?”
Dorrin nods again, watching as the metal heats. When it is cherry red, he brings it back to the anvil and begins to fuller it into a smaller octagonal cross-section. He returns it to the forge as necessary during the fullering. When the cross-section matches the template, he sets the circular die-almost like a round-bottom swage with a square base-into the anvil’s hardie hole, and places the metal in the forge once more.
Next, using glancing blows on the end of the fullered rod, he begins to upset the end that will fit into the swage die. Another reheating, and two solid blows to the unfullered end, and the small gear wheel is forged. A last blow with the hot set to cut the forged piece clean and he sets the wheel on the forge bricks to cool.
“You doing another one?” asks Vaos.
“Probably three tonight. That’s half. I’ll do two more like that, and then three of the end with the crank.”
“That’s a lot of work for toys.”
“That’s just the beginning. I’ll have to grind the edges, file them smooth, and polish them before fitting them to the wood.” Dorrin retrieves the rod stock from the forge. “A little slower on the bellows.”
Vaos wipes his forehead. “Least it’s warm here.”
LXVI
WHEN THE COLD air strikes Meriwhen like a whip, the mare whickers and sidesteps. Zilda backs away from the cold air, looking up at Dorrin.
“I don’t think you want out here,” Dorrin says. The goat chews on a mouthful of straw.
“Easy… easy.” Dorrin pats Meriwhen’s neck, then closes the barn door. The breath from his words drifts away in a white line. He eases up into the saddle, a saddle hard from the cold even inside the barn, and turns the mare eastward, out toward Rylla’s cottage. His hands touch the staff. While he will not need it at the healer’s, he may need it on the way to see Willum.
The strong plume of white from the chimney indicates that the healer has been up for a time, and the two sets of fresh footprints in the dusting of snow that covers the packed snow path to her door show that she has visitors.
Dorrin looks for a more sheltered place to tie Meriwhen before he finally leads the mare up to the south side of the cottage, where he ties the reins to an elder bush trunk. He leaves the staff in the holder-it will be more than safe there.
After stamping his boots mostly free of snow, he knocks and steps inside, closing the door quickly. “Rylla, it’s Dorrin.” He takes the small broom off the stand and brushes his boots clean, then opens his jacket and takes it off, so warm is the cottage.
“‘Fraid I’d have to wait all morning for you, young fellow.”
In the room before the fire are a woman and a child. The girl-although the mother looks barely beyond childhood herself-cradles her left arm with her right, and her face is tight and pinched. She wears a cut-down herder’s vest, so worn that the sheep’s wool is brown and the leather is lined and grimy.
“Little Frisa, here, got her arm caught in a stall door.” Rylla’s voice is almost flat.
“Gerhalm didn’t see her in time. He really didn’t,” explains the mother. Her voice cracks. She wears only a worn and patched wool cloak that may have once been blue.
Dorrin can see the redness in the mother’s eyes, and a different kind of pain than that of the daughter. He takes a step toward Frisa, but the little girl shrinks back against her mother’s stained brown trousers. Dorrin stops, looking around until he sees that Rylla has moved the stool into the far corner, almost touching the small three-shelf bookcase that bears no more than a dozen volumes at most.
“Frisa needs her arm looked at. She’s a mite skittish,” Rylla adds in the same too-calm voice.
The little girl’s dark eyes flicker from the older woman to Dorrin and back to the floor in front of the hearth.
After picking up the stool, Dorrin seats himself and looks at Frisa. “I don’t know much about girls,” he begins slowly, not looking directly at the child, even while he tries to extend a sense of reassurance to her. “I do have a mare. I suppose you’d call her a girl horse. Her name is Meriwhen.”
“Silly name for a mare.” Rylla’s voice is gruff.
“Well, she said her name was Meriwhen. What I could I say?” Dorrin shrugs, then puts his hands on his knees. “Is your name Kitten-in-the-Snow?”
Frisa continues to look at the plank floor in front of the hearth.
“Or is it Filly-Who-Runs-Too-Fast?”
Dorrin lets the silence draw out before speaking again. “I suppose Meriwhen was a filly once. She told me that she hurried too much when she was little, but I didn’t know her then.”
“Horses… don’t… talk.”
“Meriwhen does. When we ride a long ways, she has a lot to say. Sometimes she talks about the grass, and sometimes she complains about the horseflies, and sometimes…” He pauses. “She’s a big girl, but you’ll be a big girl someday, too.” Dorrin swallows at the knife of fear that strikes from the mother, forcing a smile instead, trying to reassure the child. “Meriwhen can be silly. When we’re out in the meadows, sometimes she wants me to take off her saddle, and she wants to roll in the grass. She likes the smell of green grass.”
“You’re… silly.”
“That’s what my mother said to me a long time ago. I guess I never did grow up.”
Frisa looks shyly at Dorrin, but remains with her back pressed against her mother’s legs.
Dorrin looks into the fire, trying to build more reassurance into the frightened girl. “Maybe that’s why Meriwhen and I get along. After we look at your arm, would you like to meet Meriwhen?”
“You really have a horse?” asks the mother.
“He’s not exactly an impoverished healer apprentice, Merga,” Rylla says.
.
Dorrin grins. “Meriwhen is quite real. I did tie her to the bushes next to the house-the elders, not the peppers.”
“She’d better not eat them,” Rylla says.
“I fed her before we left.”
“Can I pat her?” asks Frisa.
“After we fix your arm,” Dorrin responds.
“It hurts.”
“I know. Where does it hurt most?”
“It just hurts.”
Without standing, Dorrin eases off the stool and into a sitting position before the mother and the girl. “Can I see?”
Frisa remains against her mother, but does not shrink away as Dorrin’s fingers brush the arm.
“Needs a splint, I’d bet,” Rylla offers.
Dorrin, sensing the break, nods. He can also fee
l the hunger. “Do you have a slice of bread? If she could chew that…”
“She might choke.”
He looks at Frisa. “We want to fix the hurt. It might hurt more for a moment, but it will get better. When we finish you can have some bread.”
“Can I hold it now?”
“Just an instant, child.”
Rylla appears with the splint-a contraption made of canvas and oak ribs. Her eyes question Dorrin. He nods.
“Help keep her still, Merga. Can you do that?” asks Rylla.
Merga nods.
“Oooooo…” Frisa moans, and tries to twist, but Rylla holds her fast as Dorrin, guided by his senses, lines up the ends of the bones, infusing the girl with order and reassurance as he does. “Ooo…” Her fingers crush the scrap of bread.
Rylla tightens the splint straps while Dorrin keeps the arm straight.
Dorrin touches Frisa’s forehead lightly. “It’s done, Frisa. If you don’t run into anything, it should heal straight.”
Merga looks to Rylla, then to Dorrin.
“Four to five eight-days, I’d guess,” he says slowly.
“Can I see your horse?”
“I’ll tell Merga what to do,” Rylla says. “You show her your horse.”
“Can I have some more bread?” asks the child.
“I’ll get it,” Dorrin says quickly, heading for the kitchen and the breadboard, and ignoring Rylla’s quickly smothered frown.
Frisa grabs for the bread with her free hand when Dorrin comes back, and he scoops her up, deftly, but gently, careful not to touch the splinted arm.
“Bring her back here in two eight-days for me to look at the arm. Don’t let anything hit it…” Rylla speaks slowly to the young mother as Dorrin opens and closes the cottage door.
“Here you are.” Dorrin stops short of Meriwhen. The mare has nibbled on a small elder bush, but halted after a sampling. The healer grins. Elder bushes are bitter, very bitter. “This is Meriwhen.”
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