Stormwarden

by Janny Wurts

  "Is there no man present who dares to remember the meaning of mercy?" He spoke no louder than a whisper, but his outraged accusation carried to the farthest corner of the room. "Give me nothing but a boat. I'll find a way to sail her."

  "Hey, boy!" The black-haired trader rose from his seat near the bar. Respectably clad in wool embroidered with scarlet, he wore a dandyish beard. Sharp features and slitted eyes lent him an expression crafty as a rat's. "I'd give you gold for that cloak, boy." But the price he named was an insult.

  Jaric closed his eyes, anguished by the memory of Telemark's face on the morning he had opened the old cedar trunk and pulled forth his only treasure. The boy's straits were desperate; every man in Mearren Ard knew it. Anyone marked by Anskiere of Elrinfaer had no fate to bargain.

  "Boy!"

  Slowly Jaric turned his head and located the drover who had addressed him.

  The man leaned on the bar, pudgy knuckles crimped around a wine flask. His lips parted with amusement. "Mathieson Keldric has a boat he can't sail any more. Why not ask the old relic if he'd swap his craft for your fancy cloak?"

  By the fellow's derisive tone, Jaric guessed the advice was ill spent, a crass effort to poke fun at his predicament. But the geas blazed like magma through his flesh, making each separate moment an agony more terrible to endure than the last. He had no choice but attempt the trader's suggestion.

  Jaric's reply fell without echo in the packed stillness of the taproom. "Who is Mathieson Keldric?"

  The trader grinned, displaying a jumble of stained teeth. "There, son." And he pointed to the arthritic elder who inhabited the corner table by the hearth, as if he intended to die there. Half crippled by age and disease, the old man was the only villager who had not turned his back on the boy from Morbrith Keep.

  Jaric gathered the ice otter cloak from the tabletop and reluctantly moved toward the fireplace. A chair scraped at his back. Someone whispered an obscenity. Evidently Keldric's boat was the butt of a well-worn joke, repeated out of pity for the old man's plight. But Anskiere's summons left no space for inquiry. With cautious steps Jaric approached the corner nearest the hearth. And Mathieson Keldric watched him with eyes the light clear gray of rain pools, his lips pursed in alarm.

  Suddenly the old man straightened in his chair. He stared in open-mouthed amazement at a point just past Jaric's shoulder and his twisted fingers flew to his face. "Callinde!" He spoke the name barely above a whisper, but to Jaric the sound felt louder than a shout against the blighted stillness of the taproom. Yet none of the bystanders appeared to overhear.

  "The trader mentioned you have a boat you might sell." Jaric ran his fingers anxiously through the silver-tipped fur of the cloak. "I have no coin to offer, but perhaps you would consider a trade?"

  But Keldric acted as if the boy had never spoken. He gazed unresponsively into the air. His lips moved, but no word emerged. For a moment it seemed he would ignore Jaric's need as the others had, leaving him powerless to answer the geas' terrible summons. The boy swallowed, feeling desperation well up inside him. Pressure beat against his ears, savage as the whistle of air off a stormfalcon's wings, and the threat of unending pain raised sweat on his temples.

  "I beg you," he said hoarsely, distressed that his anguish was turned to a public spectacle. "I must have a boat."

  Mathieson Keldric stirred. He looked up at Jaric as though fully aware of his presence for the first time. "Trade? Fer that?" He inclined his head toward the cloak, and tangled white hair fell, obscuring his face. But Jaric thought for a second that the clear old eyes showed a glaze of tears. He started to move away.

  "Well, then," said Mathieson Keldric gruffly. "Ye'll have to come to the docks. My Callinde's a lady, straight down to her keel, an' I'd not let her go to a man who never set eyes on her. Fair?"

  Jaric struggled to suppress the tremor which arose in his knees and traveled the length of his spine. "Fair," he said softly.

  An ugly murmur arose at his back, threaded through by the louder voice of the trader and sibilant whispers of sorcery. Jaric heard; he realized old Keldric's attachment to his boat was legend in Mearren Ard. The fact the man had considered parting with her earned the boy nothing but suspicion from the villagers.

  Forced to move before their muttering metamorphosed into threats, Jaric extended his hand toward the old man. He spoke without urgency, his phrases shaped with the courtesy learned at Morbrith's great hall. "Come, then, and perhaps the lady will approve."

  The voices grew louder. As the old man pushed himself to his feet, Jaric felt the villagers' resentment rise against him, menacing as the rush of breakers over rock. But Mathieson Keldric's lame old body could not be hurried. He walked with painful, halting steps, steadied by Jaric's arm. Bystanders moved grudgingly aside, leaving a wide berth as the pair made their way through the door.

  Jaric drew a deep breath of relief. The night was damp and chill after the close heat of the tavern, braced by the tang of salt. But the cold calmed the boy's nerves. He shortened stride to match old Keldric's limp, grateful for the fog which smothered the lane leading down to the harbor; murky weather at least spared him the accusing observation of the villagers. Soon the last cottage passed behind, lighted windows eclipsed by the black hulk of a warehouse.

  Surf boomed distantly off the barrier point and the air smelted sourly of tide wrack and fish. Mathieson Keldric lifted a lantern from a hook on a piling driven deep into the sand of the strand. He fumbled with crooked fingers to manage the striker, but something about the resistant set of his back warned Jaric not to offer help. Although Keldric was ruinously crippled, he was not incapable; Jaric sensed that the boat he needed so desperately to buy was inextricably interconnected with the old man's pride. To interfere even in kindness would offend.

  The spark spat against the dampened wick and hesitantly caught. Flame quivered behind panes patterned with crystalline whorls of salt as Keldric raised the lantern. The boy stepped behind the old man onto the wet planks of the east dock. Mist rolled past, breaking like ghostly surf over his feet; it seethed through the black teeth of the pilings, stringing droplets on Jaric's hair and clothing. Keldric moved forward, silhouetted against the fuzzy globe of lanternlight. Through the formless darkness ahead, Jaric saw the gleam of a braided painter, then a high curving prow and the angled line of a headstay. But the rank smell of decayed wood warned him, long before the antique shear of the thwart stood exposed in the lanternlight; Callinde was ancient and rotten, and nothing close to seaworthy.

  Painfully aware the derelict hull was Keldric's sole treasure, a shrine preserved in memory of the brighter days of youth, Jaric's first thought was not for himself. For one stunned moment he ignored the inhuman wrench of the geas directive and stared at the elder who waited at his side, gnarled fingers gripping the ring of the lantern with an air of desperate self-sacrifice.

  "Why?" The boy searched for an answer in the clear pale eyes. "Why would you give her up, after all these years?"

  Mathieson Keldric shrugged. "You've the need in you." He glanced at his hands and spat. "I can't so much as plane a timber any more, and Callinde looks sloppy as a whore."

  But Jaric knew there was more. Silently smothering an anger he could ill afford to express, he waited to hear the rest.

  Old Mathieson shrugged again, then glared defiantly at the young man's face. "Well, then. My wife, I saw her standing at your shoulder, back there in the tap. Black-haired she was, full of her youth, and prettier than ever I remembered when she was alive. Seems the old lady would have it so." Suddenly his expression changed to worry. "Ye won't want to be changing her name, then?"

  Jaric turned abruptly away, poisoned by sudden revelation. Taen had intervened, plied her dream-weaver's talents upon a defenseless old man to help buy him passage. But bitterest of all was the recognition that he had no choice but accept; the battered old hull represented his only alternative if he was to escape the insufferable pain of the geas.

  Misinterpreting Jar
ic's stricken silence, Mathieson caught the young man's sleeve in a clumsy attempt at consolation. "She'll bear ye safely, son, my word on't. A grand old lady Callinde might be, but there's no leak to her can't be fixed with tools and a sound bit of planking. Ye'll see, then."

  Jaric straightened, regarding the old man with clear-eyed honesty. "Thank you. And no, I'll never be changing her name." He pulled the ice otter cloak from his arm, draped it across Keldric's stooped shoulders. "If you'll guide me with the carpentry, I'll make her new again, sound as the day she was launched. That's a promise."

  Mathieson Keldric thrust his lantern into the boy's hand and spat on his palm. "Your oath?"

  Jaric nodded.

  The old man pressed his damp hand to his forehead and stared at his feet, abruptly embarrassed to have insisted on ritual. "Well, then," he said briskly. "Tools are ashore, and I sure's tide can't lug them like I did when I was your age. Or did ye not want to start now?"

  "At once," said Jaric. "She ought to be hauled, though."

  Keldric grinned. "Aye. That's work for two stout men." He threw Jaric a look of bright-eyed challenge. "How well can ye row?"

  Jaric smiled back, his frustration partially alleviated. "As well as I must. Is your grand old lady rigged with oars?"

  Keldric answered with a dry cackle of laughter. Aged and lame and heartbroken as he was, Mathieson was villager enough to find humor in Jaric's ignorance. "I've a dory, son," he drawled, and in the foggy darkness the night before spring solstice, proceeded to instruct the boy how Callinde should be towed from her slip.

  * * *

  Enfolded still within the capsule of the Vaere, Taen dreamed she sat in the timeless twilight of the grove. The pale folds of a silk robe clothed a maturity she had only recently come to accept as her own, and a basin of carved crystal lay balanced across her knees, much as it had for the better part of a fortnight while Tamlin taught her the art of casting dream images onto the surface of water. At present three companies of Kisburn's royal troops performed toy-sized maneuvers, bounded by the confines of the chased silver rim.

  To Taen the exercise seemed a frivolous waste of time. Through her mastery of the Sathid, she could tap any mind on Keithland at will, then impart her findings through a dream link with the flawless purity of thought. Causing her recipient to believe he viewed an image within water was bothersome, an added layer of illusion for which she discerned no useful purpose. Taen sighed, while in the bowl the Grand Warlord-General delivered a command to his aide. Trumpets flourished, signaling inspection of troops was complete. Neat squares of pikemen lifted miniature weapons in salute and the lowering sunlight of late afternoon flashed against polished blades. Even to Taen's unpracticed eye the movement described lethal perfection. After rigorous hours of drill the troops were ready for action; Kisburn intended to sail his force to Cliffhaven within the fortnight, and Emien would go with them. Still Tamlin insisted she refine a showy set of illusions designed to add mystery to her dream-weaver's talents.

  Touched by sharp anger, Taen tilted the basin. Water sloshed, scattering droplets over the rim. Kisburn's soldiers streamed into a muddle of scarlet and gold, then vanished as her contact dissipated. "Why?" she demanded, though the clearing at present seemed deserted.

  Tamlin appeared instantly. His bells jangled in dissonant displeasure as he gestured toward the basin. "It's a necessary defense. The demons would kill you should they ever suspect your true capabilities. Not only are they telepathic, they also recall every memory of their forebears, back to the dawn of their history; fortunately for mankind they evolved no cultural need for ceremony or legend or ritualized religion."

  Tamlin folded his arms across his chest, bushy brows knitted into a frown. "Twenty-seven generations have passed since the Great Fall. Through that time, I have cloaked mankind's most precious secrets in the forms of myth and legend. The demons attach no value to such things; they perceive no logic in faith and no reality outside of racial memory. They observe and fail to discover my intent."

  Taen remained unimpressed. Tamlin shifted his weight from one foot to the other and irritably jabbed a finger at the bowl. "If your client believes he sees a vision in water, but that image does not exist for other eyes, then the demon who observes will dismiss the incident as mummery, the time-worn, traditional sort of fortune-telling many a common man will spend copper to hear. The demon does not comprehend man's craving to control his future. In this manner your true talent will pass unnoticed."

  Taen traced her hand over the carved crystal, mollified by the tirade. "I'm sorry. I never guessed."

  Bells clashed softly as Tamlin seated himself in the grass opposite her. He rested his chin on steepled fingers and spoke in gentler tones. "Understand me, child. More of mankind's heritage than is safe for you to know lies similarly concealed. Landfast itself has no other defense. To save its records from the demons, you must trust my judgment. Now engage your craft once again and show me how Jaric fares."

  Taen leveled the basin between her knees, then waited for the water to settle. She needed the interval to steady her own nerves more than any other reason. As often as she looked in on Jaric since Anskiere's geas resumed effect, she had been unable to make peace with herself for his unhappiness; neither Tamlin's insistence nor Keithland's peril could negate her sense of responsibility.

  Taen closed her eyes and carefully cleared her mind. Despite her trepidations, Jaric's presence flowed easily through the channel of her talents; through the process of restoring his memory, she had come to know his mind better than any person living. Her call arose like a bird, sped on the silent wings of thought to the north coast and the village of Mearren Ard. With barely a pause for transition, Taen felt the salty tang of the breeze blow against her cheek, sea-scoured and overlaid by the pungent smell of spruce. Within the crystal basin an image bloomed on the water.

  In a yard beside a weathered shed, new grass lay sprinkled like snow with the delicate curls of shavings; there Jaric bent over a trestle, busily planing a length of wood which would shortly replace a cracked thwart on Callinde's starboard side. Linen cloth clung to his sweating shoulders as he worked, and wood chips speckled his wrists, pale against sunburned skin. Impressed by the play of muscle in his arms, Taen reflected that the wenches of Morbrith Keep would probably treat him to a different sort of teasing were they to observe him now.

  But the unremitting pull of the geas and days of constant toil left Jaric too worn to reflect upon himself; plank by plank he labored to restore Callinde's rotted timbers. The discomfort of Anskiere's summons permitted him no surcease, even at sundown when other men sought rest. Jaric worked through the nights by lanternlight, feverish and driven, until his fingers cramped on the tools and his body collapsed from weariness.

  Watching the strong rhythmic strokes of the plane across the board, Taen ached to reach out, lend him the peace her dream-weaver's powers could provide. But Jaric would tolerate no trace of her contact since the day he had fallen on the decks of Tavish's boat. Convinced she had used him for her own selfish ends, the boy stayed isolated, though loneliness ate him hollow and his arm trembled with fatigue as he lifted the plane to clear the blade. Shavings fluttered to the ground, pale and delicate as moths. For all his inexperience, the boy handled the tool well; even old Mathieson found little cause for complaint. But the dream-weaver saw beyond competence to the measure of pain which inspired it; Jaric acted out of necessity. He derived no joy from his achievements.

  Taen shifted the image, caused the basin's crystal rim to frame Callinde's hull. Whole sections of her starboard side stood stripped of planking, leaving the bared curve of several ribs exposed against the sky. To port, yellow boards contrasted harshly with the weathered timbers of her keel; Jaric had made remarkable progress. Still his craft was days away from launch; Kisburn's army would not wait. Swift as the clouds which hazed the horizon beyond Mearren Ard's docks, the King's ships would cross the sea; even the Kielmark's fortress could not stay demons.


  Suddenly a blur of motion flicked across the edge of the image. Startled by its presence, Taen stiffened. She bent closer to the basin, a disturbed frown on her face.

  Tamlin rose to his feet with a clash of bells. "Something's wrong," he said quickly. "What do you see?"

  "I don't know." Taen focused her attention on Jaric, seeking the source of the shadow which had passed briefly across her contact. Yet the sunlight shone brightly in Mathieson's yard and Jaric worked on undisturbed. Concerned, Taen refined her scrutiny. The fine hands which once had penned copy for a Duke's library were now blistered and raw from handling adze and hammer. Stress had left the boy gaunt and exhausted. Beneath the sun-bleached hair which spilled over his brow, his eyes were deeply circled; but other than fatigue Taen found no mark upon him.

  She looked up, defeated. At a loss to explain the intuitive prickle of warning which stirred the hair at the nape of her neck, she said, "I did see something."

  "I know." The Vaere toyed with his pipe. "There's a reason."

  But he would not say what it was. When Taen pressed for an answer, he simply vanished, and none of the usual cues would call him back.

  Left to herself, Taen lifted the crystal bowl from her lap and laid it aside on the grass. Disregarding Tamlin's directive pertaining to the water, she gathered her powers as dream-weaver and with no more effort than daydreaming bent her thoughts back to Mathieson's yard and Jaric. She would watch, she decided, to see whether the shadow which had grazed the edge of her vision returned.

  Westerly sunlight cast steepening shadows through the opened sections of Callinde's hull. Sheltered from the sea breeze by the angled roof of the shack, Jaric set his plane aside and with a forester's precision laid a fire beneath the steam box. While the planks heated he took up the adze and began to dress an uncut length of timber. Taen watched the chips fly, pale and silver as flying fish in the failing light. The intensity of Jaric's determination awed her. Unlike Emien, this boy had survived the scarring left by the inadequacy which had poisoned his early years. Hurt and pressured and driven, so far he had managed to continue without striking out in hatred. Taen caught her breath. The comparison wounded. Beside Jaric, her brother's shortcomings stood exposed with devastating and bitter clarity. Taen twisted her fingers in the fine silk of her robe. She must not abandon hope. One day perhaps Jaric might guide Emien to regain his faith in human compassion.