The Unconquered Mage

by McShane, Melissa

  “Thank you,” Cederic said. “Please be seated, everyone, and I will make introductions.”

  We went around the table, me translating for Mattiak and the rest of the Balaenics. When I got to introducing General Garatssen, Mattiak said, “That is their General? I suspected, from how they were all talking, but—I was expecting someone six feet tall and built like a brick sh— um, wall.”

  “You never say that about Bronnok, and he’s so thin even I could probably break him in half,” I said, grinning at Bronnok, who scowled at me (it was a friendly scowl; he’s gotten used to me).

  “Well, I—” Mattiak realized everyone was staring at us, and subsided. “I still have my prejudices, I guess,” he said, but his eyes kept turning to Garatssen the whole rest of the meeting. She, for her part, gave him a narrow-eyed considering stare when he was introduced, nodded in acknowledgment, and said, in slow and well-enunciated Castaviran, “I hope we will deal honorably with each other, General.”

  “That my hope as well…General,” Mattiak replied in the same language. I really hope they can get along. Mattiak got used to my being in the army, but then I wasn’t ever a soldier. I don’t know whether Garatssen’s obvious competence is going to win him over or alienate him further. Now I can’t decide whether to be relieved that it was so easy to bring the Helvirite troops to our side, or worried that we won’t be able to integrate them. And what if the Balaenics don’t treat the Castaviran women soldiers with respect? Wonderful. Now worry is winning out.

  So we had a long discussion, the result of which is that the Helvirites aren’t coming with us either.

  It makes sense. First, there’s the point about the Brown and Black Armies staying put rather than following us to winter quarters, where we’d have to feed them too; that applies to the Helvirite troops as well. And Garatssen was adamant that even though Domenessar says he doesn’t want to fight until spring, if he sees Teliarne left defenseless, he’ll attack no matter what the weather. Lerongis argued against this for a bit, but in the end he agreed with her, as did Cederic and Mattiak. I think Garatssen’s eloquence and forcefulness impressed him, even if he couldn’t understand most of what she said.

  So the plan now is to continue on to the coast, winter over for a few months, then come back for the Helvirite Army and, Cederic said, the Barrekellian forces. I think he’s overly optimistic and we’re going to be fighting the Barrekellian forces, but he’s right that a lot can change in a few months. I hope he’s right that it’s a good kind of change. We’re leaving several of our mages to begin teaching the Castavirans to speak Balaenic. I don’t envy them. Balaenic is a more complicated language than Castaviran, but the more of them speak it, the greater the chance we’ll be able to integrate the troops in the spring.

  Sleeping in a real bed again. I almost wanted to go back to the camp so I wouldn’t get used to comfort and then have to live with the horrible disappointment of our camp bed. I think we should at least see if they make a wider one. I like sleeping close with Cederic, but there are limits, and one of them is that he sometimes wakes me when he comes late to bed, and then I can’t fall asleep again for an hour. But when I suggested it (going back) Cederic said, “We should not insult our hosts by declining their hospitality. And while I enjoy sharing any kind of bed with you, I prefer one that does not creak so terrifyingly when I climb into it at night.” He has a point.

  Chapter Nine

  12 Jennitar, just after lunch

  Off to the Castaviran city of Pfulerre. We originally planned to go further south, to Lirilla, which is a major Balaenic port city, but after our reception in Barrekel, Cederic judged it better not to risk being turned away again. We were resupplied somewhat in Teliarne, but they don’t have a lot to spare because of supporting the Helvirite Army, so supplies aren’t as plentiful as we’d like. We’ll be pushing things to get to Pfulerre without running out of food—the journey will take most of two weeks.

  It’s only been a few hours (I’m writing this in the wagon) but I’m glad I have a project to occupy myself during those two weeks, because the country we’re traveling through is mostly forest. That’s not true, it used to be mostly forest, but the area around Teliarne is grassy plains and big plantations. My travels through the new combined landscape tell me that at some point we’ll run into that forest, but I have no idea when that will be. So it’s boring plains, and then boring forest, and then we come to the coastal region, which is beautiful even at this time of year. Or was beautiful. Who knows what it looks like now? According to the map, Pfulerre is no more than twenty miles from Lethess, which is a popular place for wealthy people to go to enjoy the warm salt breezes and bathe in the ocean. It would be a real shame if that disappeared. Not that I’m wealthy—I mean, I wasn’t wealthy before, but I stayed there for about a month, recovering from a broken arm, and there’s still plenty to do if you don’t have money (or, like me, have money but are saving it for books).

  Unfortunately, this project isn’t going to require much of my time for a while, because there’s only so much kathana practice you can stand in one day, so I’m looking for other things I can do to keep from going out of my mind with boredom:

  1. Teach Mattiak and the other Balaenics Castaviran.

  2. Practice pouvrin.

  3. Ride with the other mages and bitch about how bored we all are.

  4. Practice riding Acorn, or whatever the hell the horse’s name is. She hasn’t tried anything yet, but I think she’s just waiting for me to let down my guard. My teachers insist she’s a very well-behaved mare, but every one of them rides a great foaming beast with mad eyes that’s about two feet taller than I am, so I think their judgments are compromised.

  5. Ride with Cederic. (This is hopelessly self-indulgent. He doesn’t need me clinging to him all day long.)

  Back to practicing the kathana. I hope we can do it soon.

  15 Jennitar

  Nothing to report for the last three days. We’ve gotten to a point where we can’t practice until we stop for the night, because the motion of the wagon is throwing us off. A few more days and we should have it.

  18 Jennitar

  I’m so tired, and discouraged, and the only reason I’m writing this down is that I don’t want to forget any of that tired and discouraged feeling. Which sounds ridiculous, because who would want to remember such negative emotions? But it’s important to me that I remember everything, not just the wonderful things but the sad and heartbreaking ones as well. Though this wasn’t heartbreaking. It was just a huge setback.

  It’s not a very difficult or complex kathana, not like the convergence kathana, so it didn’t take long for us to understand our parts and practice synchronizing them. I asked Cederic if we could camp early tonight, to give us more light to work by—we still ended up needing lanterns fueled by th’an, but the last of the daylight gave our assistants enough that they cleared a flat space of earth for us before sunset. It hasn’t snowed for a while, just rained, and the ground here is clay rather than soft earth, which is perfect for a kathana circle, and after our assistants finished pulling up the sod with their trenching tools, we smoothed it down flat and marked out a double circle about two feet in diameter. Cederic, who’d asked to be present, stood nearby, watching, and I don’t think I’d realized until then how much he misses doing magic. He doesn’t have time, because as good as he is, there are so many other things only the Emperor can do. I wonder if I should invite him to join us occasionally. He might be busy, but he’s not that busy. I hope.

  Then Audryn, with the help of Terrael referring to a list, began marking out inert th’an in the space between the circles while the rest of us worked out the cardinal and ordinal directions and marked those off too. (You still have to be a mage to scribe even inert th’an, which infuriates me on Terrael’s behalf. I’m afraid to ask him if he minds, in case I’d be rubbing salt into the wound.) Jerussa, Tobiak, and Relania moved to stand at the east, south, and west points respectively. Jeddan stood at the south
east, and I stood at the southwest, because our mind-moving pouvrin are so much weaker than the others. Jaemis went to the north and knelt in the clay with a sharpened stick in his hand. “Are you ready?” he said.

  “Almost,” Audryn said. In a few more seconds she stepped out of the circle and she and Terrael went to where a tambourine and a skinny piece of metal attached to a string waited. Audryn picked up the tambourine, Terrael took the metal and a steel rod about the size of his middle finger, and the two of them messed with the instruments, trying to find the best sound.

  Then everything was quiet. We were far enough from the camp that the noise of so many people sounded more like waves on the beach, or that sound you get when you put a shell to your ear that’s supposed to sound like waves on a beach but really only sounds like the blood rushing through your ears. I imagined I could feel Cederic’s eyes on me—he was standing behind me and to the left—but all I really felt was cold. And nervousness.

  Audryn struck the tambourine, lightly, then harder, then back and forth until she found a sound she liked. She gave three quick taps, then fell into a slow beat, tap tap tap with long pauses between the taps. After she’d done this a few times, Terrael joined in, making his chime ring out between taps and then three times after the third one: tap ting tap ting tap ting ting ting.

  I let my breathing fall into harmony with the beat and counted. As the fifth round began, I started to work the mind-moving pouvra, slowly, letting the shape fill me as I bent my will to meet it. I couldn’t tell what anyone but Jaemis was doing, but I knew I’d begun at the right time because he began scribing th’an to fill the gap at the northern point. The beat accelerated, and I embraced the pouvra and let it work more quickly, directing it at the th’an scribed in the circle rather than at the world. Any minute now, and we’d know if we were right.

  On the seventh round, the ground in the center of the circle began to tremble, and I had to clench my fists to stay focused. Then, between the seventh and eighth rounds, the ground simply hunched itself and rose into a hillock about five feet tall, constrained by the kathana circle. I let the mind-moving pouvra go and sank down to sit next to the hillock. What a colossal failure.

  “So they are interchangeable,” Jeddan said.

  “Looks like,” Jaemis said.

  “It could be a mistake,” said Relania. “I know I was having trouble directing the magic into the kathana. We might have moved the earth with the pouvra instead.”

  “It’s no mistake,” I said. “Whatever condition isn’t being met, it’s not that pouvrin and th’an are different. It would have solved half our problem if they weren’t interchangeable. Now we have to start over.”

  “It is unfortunate that we need to bring the magics together,” Cederic said, “because this is a remarkable discovery. We now know we can teach each other our different magics.”

  “Maybe we should do that anyway, Sai Aleynten,” Terrael said.

  “I am happy to advise, but it is not I to whom you should look for that answer,” Cederic said. He offered me his hand, and I let him pull me up.

  I brushed the seat of my trousers, which were clammy, and said, “I think we shouldn’t let ourselves be distracted. That was exhausting. Imagine if we tried to do both—teach each other magic and try to bring them together, I mean.”

  “It shouldn’t have been this tiring,” Jaemis said. “I think working together—putting th’an and pouvrin into a kathana, I mean—might be more of a burden than I anticipated. We should allow for that next time, Terrael.”

  “Well, at least we proved something,” Jerussa said, then yawned. “You’re right, I feel exhausted. I’m not going to think about this again until morning.”

  We scrubbed out the kathana circle (I don’t know why, it’s not as if anyone’s going to care out here, and it’s not as if we didn’t alter the landscape, but it’s part of the tradition) and went back for a late dinner and then bed. Well, it will be bed for me as soon as I finish this. I’m trying to let Jerussa’s optimism carry me along and not be dragged down by my natural pessimism. We did prove something, even if it wasn’t the something we had in mind. Tomorrow we’ll look at this anew, and I’m going to keep reminding myself we’re one step closer to learning the truth.

  19 Jennitar

  We all felt more optimistic after a good night’s rest, and were able to look at our failure logically this morning. Really, we should be optimistic, because we’re working our way down the list of conditions. Inborn ability, identical magics, the right concentration of magic—all restored. That leaves us with the problem of how will is applied to work magic, which is definitely different between Castaviran and Balaenic magic, and we’re all going to think about that separately and discuss tomorrow.

  We should be in Pfulerre on 21 Jennitar. We’re still traveling through the forest, but the trees have gone from deciduous to evergreen, which has to be a Castaviran feature because not only was this part of Balaen not forested, there aren’t (weren’t?) evergreen forests until you get much further north, near Thalessa. I wonder what Thalessa looks like now. It’s so bleak in the winter, and cold, with icy rain that coats the roads and makes the cobbles dangerous to walk on. I’m just as happy we’re not going that far north.

  I wonder if Mam’s still alive. It bothers me that I don’t give a damn either way. I wonder where Roda ended up. I wonder if anyone in Thalessa even remembers me.

  I don’t know why I’m suddenly maudlin. I’m going to think about magic now. I left my past behind a long time ago and I don’t need it troubling me now.

  20 Jennitar

  Much discussion, much playing around with th’an and pouvrin, ultimately fruitless. This is such a big, nebulous topic—the application of will, I mean—we can’t even agree on where to start discussing it. I told everyone to take a rest day, and we scattered to ride with friends in other wagons, and my wagon ended up singing Castaviran folk songs that made me laugh. I had no idea Castavirans were so dirty-minded.

  21 Jennitar, afternoon

  I was surprised at how relieved I felt to see the coastal landscape unchanged. I guess I think of my time in Lethess fondly. I had an excuse in my injury not to pursue my quest so doggedly as I had for the three years previous, and there’s something about the coast that relaxes you. Relaxes everyone around you, too, and people are so friendly. Even the crime rate is lower in Lethess. I don’t know if it’s the same for Pfulerre, and I have no idea if the climate in Castavir was as lovely as it is in Balaen, but if not, the Pfulerrian citizens have to be praising their God for their good luck. The slushy snow turned into rain a few days ago, then into warm rain, and by the time we reached Pfulerre, late this afternoon, most of the clouds we’ve been traveling under were gone and the sun was shining—weak and watery sunshine, but by comparison to what it was like in Barrekel, very welcome. Still cold, but I’m not going to complain.

  We’re waiting for the envoy to return from seeing the consul of Pfulerre, Daenen Radryntor. No one in our party knows her very well, but Cederic says her relationship with the God-Empress was never very warm—never anything she could be challenged on, but she never went out of her way to court her favor. That was smart of her, because we saw, horribly, what happened to Vorantor when he tried to impress the God-Empress. So we’re feeling confident she will respond favorably. (Confident but not certain, of course.)

  We tried swapping will-invoking methods this morning—doing pouvrin by exerting our will on them, scribing th’an without a strong purpose in mind—and succeeded only in giving ourselves headaches. We already know if you try to force a pouvra into being, it slips away, but I was hoping we might be able to perceive why that happens, or see the effect. No luck.

  The Castavirans were even worse off than we were, because they go through such rigorous training to learn to scribe th’an properly that trying to do it incorrectly was like trying to teach a fish to breathe air. So it didn’t work. I’m marking it as one step closer to finding the truth, because I’m t
rying to be optimistic.

  And speaking of optimism, it sounds as if Terrael’s envoy is back.

  21 Jennitar, evening

  We’ve been given what I assume is the nicest room in the consul’s palace. It overlooks the ocean and has actual glass windows so you can watch the waves, and the ships coming in and out of the harbor, without having to endure the salt wind that comes off the ocean constantly. It might be too warm in the summer, but right now it’s very pleasant, even if the evening overcast I remember from my time here is drifting in. When the sun finally sets, it will be nearly impossible to see where the water ends and the sky begins. It’s disconcerting, but in a pleasantly eerie way.

  I suppose I’m in a good mood because for the first time since we began this journey, our processional came into a city and the crowds lining the road cheered us. Even Pansy, or whatever the hell the horse’s name is, seemed less inclined to throw me off. Possibly she thought the cheering was for her. I was able to wave and smile at everyone, and managed not to feel awkward or nervous at all the attention focused on me. I don’t know if I’m ever going to get used to being watched all the time, but if I can bluff my way into Holaen Manor, I can pretend not to feel as if I’m about to be arrested.

  The consul’s palace has the same southern architecture as Teliarne, except instead of big open windows, everything here has shutters or glass to protect against the spray and sand that gets blown everywhere during a storm. I wonder what it sounds like to hear the wind beating against the windows. It’s too bad we can’t settle here instead of Colosse. Maybe we can have a summer home here.

  True God help me, I can’t believe I just thought that. I have got to stop taking my new affluence for granted like that. I can’t be so careless about my new position. We owe a lot to the citizens of this country, and I don’t want to turn into someone like Brisson Rialen, thinking only of his personal comforts, or true God forbid someone like the God-Empress, seeing everyone around her as playthings. Not that the last would ever happen; I’m not insane. But I’ve been poor and struggling for so long, it’s like a miracle that I don’t have to worry about where I’m going to find my next meal, or where I’m going to sleep—this room is so beautiful I can hardly believe it’s ours.