The Second Generation

by Margaret Weis

  But this evening was quiet. It was a soft, fragrant summer evening. The twilight lingered on in hues of purple and gold. The birds had sung their night songs and were now murmuring sleepily to their young. Even the old trees of Wayreth seemed to have been lulled into forgetting their guardian duties and slumbered drowsily at their posts. On this evening, the inn itself was quiet, too.

  It was too quiet, so two strangers thought as they approached the inn. Dressed in rich clothing, their faces were covered with silken scarves—an unusual thing in such warm weather. Only their black eyes were visible and, exchanging grim glances, they quickened their steps, shoving open the wooden plank door and stepping inside.

  Slegart sat behind the bar, wiping out a mug with a dirty rag. He had been wiping out that same mug for an hour now and would probably have gone on wiping it for the next hour had not two incidents occurring simultaneously interrupted him—the entry of the two muffled strangers through the front door and the arrival of the servant girl, running breathlessly down the stairs.

  “Your pardon, gentlemen both,” Slegart said, rising slowly to his feet and holding up his hand to check one of the strangers in his speech. Turning to the servant, he said gruffly, “Well?”

  The girl shook her head.

  Slegart’s shoulders slumped. “Aye,” he muttered. “Well, p’rhaps it’s better so.”

  The two strangers glanced at each other.

  “And the babe?” Slegart asked.

  At this, the servant girl burst into tears.

  “What?” Slegart asked, astonished. “Not the babe, too?”

  “No!” the servant girl managed to gasp between sobs. “The baby’s fine. Listen—” A faint cry came from overhead. “You can hear ’er now. But … but—oh!” The girl covered her face with her hands. “It’s dreadful! I’ve never seen anything like it—”

  At this, one of the strangers nodded, and the other stepped forward.

  “Pardon me, innkeep,” the stranger said in a cultivated voice with an unusual accent. “But some terrible tragedy appears to have happened here. Perhaps it would be better if we continued on—”

  “No, no,” Slegart said hastily, the thought of losing money bringing him to himself. “There, Lizzie, either dry your tears and help, or go have your cry out in the kitchen.”

  Burying her face in her apron, Lizzie ran off into the kitchen, setting the door swinging behind her.

  Slegart led the two strangers to a table. “A sad thing,” said the innkeeper, shaking his head.

  “Might we inquire—” ventured the stranger casually, though an astute observer would have noticed he was unusually tense and nervous, as was his companion.

  “Nothin’ for you gentlemen to concern yourselves with,” Slegart said. “Just one of the serving girls died in childbirth.”

  One of the strangers reached out involuntarily, grasping hold of his companion’s arm with a tight grip. The companion gave him a warning glance.

  “This is indeed sad news. We’re very sorry to hear it,” said the stranger in a voice he was obviously keeping under tight control. “Was she—was she kin of yours? Pardon me for asking, but you seem upset—”

  “I am that, gentlemen,” Slegart said bluntly. “And no, she warn’t no kin of mine. Came to me in the dead ’o winter, half-starved, and begging for work. Somethin’ familiar about her there was, but just as I start to think on it”—he put his hand to his head—“I get this queer feelin’.… ’Cause of that, I was of a mind to turn her away, but”—he glanced upstairs—“you know what women are. Cook took to her right off, fussin’ over ’er and such like. I got to admit,” Slegart added solemnly, “I’m not one fer gettin’ attached to people. But she was as pretty a critter as I’ve seen in all my born days. A hard worker, too. Never complained. Quite a favorite she was with all of us.”

  At this, one of the strangers lowered his head. The other put his hand over his companion’s.

  “Well,” said Slegart more briskly, “I can offer you gentlemen cold meat and ale, but you won’t get no hot food this night. Cook’s that upset. And now,”—the innkeeper glanced at the still-swinging kitchen door with a sigh—“from what Lizzie says, it seems like there’s somethin’ odd about the babe—”

  The stranger made a sudden, swift movement with his hand, and old Slegart froze in place, his mouth open in the act of speaking, his body half-turned, one hand raised. The kitchen door stopped in midswing. The servant girl’s muffled cries from the kitchen ceased. A drop of ale, falling from the spigot, hung suspended in the air between spigot and floor.

  Rising to their feet, the two strangers moved swiftly up the stairs amid the enchanted silence. Hastily, they opened every door in the inn, peered inside every room, searching. Finally, coming to a small room at the very end of the hall, one of the strangers opened the door, looked inside, and beckoned to his companion.

  A large, matronly woman—presumably Cook—was halted in the act of brushing out the beautiful hair of a pale, cold figure lying upon the bed. Tears glistened on the cook’s kindly face. It had obviously been her work-worn hands that had composed the body for its final rest. The girl’s eyes were shut, the cold, dead fingers folded across the breast, a small bunch of roses held in their unfeeling grasp. A candle shed its soft light upon the young face whose incredible beauty was enhanced by a sweet, wistful smile upon the ashen lips.

  “Amberyl!” cried one of the strangers brokenly, sinking down upon the bed and taking the cold hands in his. Coming up behind him, the other stranger laid a hand upon his companion’s shoulder.

  “I’m truly sorry, Keryl.”

  “We should have come sooner!” Keryl stroked the girl’s hand.

  “We came as quickly as we could,” his companion said gently. “As quickly as she wanted us.”

  “She sent us the message—”

  “—only when she knew she was dying,” said the companion.

  “Why?” Keryl cried, his gaze going to Amberyl’s peaceful face. “Why did she choose to die among … among humans?” He gestured toward the cook.

  “I don’t suppose we will ever know,” said his companion softly. “Although I can guess,” he added, but it was in an undertone, spoken only to himself and not to his distraught friend. Turning away, he walked over to a cradle that had been hastily constructed out of a wood box. He whispered a word and lifted the enchantment from the baby, who drew a breath and began whimpering.

  “The child?” the stranger said, starting up from the bed. “Is her baby all right? What the servant girl said …” There was fear in his voice. “It isn’t, it isn’t dea-” He couldn’t go on.

  “No,” said his friend in mystified tones. “It is not what you fear. The servant girl said she’d never seen anything ‘like it.’ But the baby seems fine— Ah!” The stranger gasped in awe. Holding the baby in his arms, he turned toward his friend. “Look, Keryl! Look at the child’s eyes!”

  The young man bent over the crying baby, gently stroking the tiny cheek with his finger. The baby turned its head, opening its large eyes as it searched instinctively for nourishment, love, and warmth.

  “The eyes are … gold!” Keryl whispered. “Burning gold as the sun! Nothing like this has ever occurred in our people.… I wonder—”

  “A gift from her human father, no doubt. Although I know of no humans with eyes like this. But that secret, too, Amberyl took with her.” He sighed, shaking his head. Then he looked back down at the whimpering baby. “Her daughter is as lovely as her mother,” the man said, wrapping the baby tightly in its blankets. “And now, my friend, we must go. We have been in this strange and terrible land long enough.”

  “Yes,” Keryl said, but he made no move to leave. “What about Amberyl?” His gaze went back to the pale, unmoving figure upon the bed.

  “We will leave her among those she chose to be with at the end,” his companion said gravely. “Perhaps one of the gods will accept her now and will guide her wandering spirit home.”

 
“Farewell, my sister,” Keryl murmured. Reaching down, he took the roses from the dead hands and, kissing them, put the flowers carefully in the pocket of his tunic. His companion spoke words in an ancient language, lifting the enchantment from the inn. Then the two strangers, holding the baby, vanished from the room like a shower of silver, sparkling rain.

  And the baby was beautiful, as beautiful as her mother. For it is said that, in the ancient of days before they grew self-centered and seduced by evil, the most beautiful of all races ever created by the gods was the ogre.…

  V

  A child deeply wanted,

  a son of the midlife,

  the only daughter

  with the father’s eyes,

  for you, dear children,

  we build these castles

  that the walls may encircle

  your borrowed lives.

  Surrounded by stone,

  by tower and crenel,

  there is no courage

  that is not stone,

  and drawbridge and battlement,

  merlon and parapet

  assemble to keep you

  redeemed and alone.

  O child well-loved,

  O son of the midlife,

  who measured the tendon

  in the span of your hand?

  And glittering daughter,

  image of memory,

  is the heart of your blossoming

  apportioned and planned?

  Where is your country

  and where are your people?

  Where the unblessed

  discontentment with walls?

  Where is the siegecraft

  of heart and autonomy,

  encircling the castle

  as the battlement falls?

  The Sacrifice

  Chapter One

  The last ringing echoes of the chimes, hanging in the clock tower of the Temple of Paladine, were punctuated by the sounds of shutters closing, doors slamming shut, keys turning in locks, and the shrill protests of disappointed kender, who had been discovered poking about among the shelves and were now being tossed into the streets. Six strikes of the bell brought the day’s business to an end. Shopkeepers set about closing for the night; last minute buyers were eyed with impatience and hustled out of the stores as soon as their cash was in hand.

  “Close up, Markus,” Jenna told her young assistant.

  He promptly left his seat at the entrance and began to draw the heavy wooden shutters over the pane glass windows.

  The shop darkened. Jenna smiled. She enjoyed her work, but she liked this time of day best. All the customers were gone, the din of their voices quieted, and she was alone. She paused to listen to the stillness, to breathe in the smells that would have told Jenna—had she been blind and deaf—that she was in a mageware shop: the perfume of rose petals; the spicy smells of cinnamon and clove; the faint, sickening odor of decay, of bats’ wings, and turtle skulls. The smell was always strongest this time of day. The sunlight brought forth the various fragrances, and the darkness enhanced them.

  Markus appeared in the doorway.

  “Anything else I can do for you, Mistress Jenna?” he asked eagerly.

  He was newly hired and already in love with her. Hopelessly in love, as only a nineteen-year-old can be in love with a woman five years his senior. All Jenna’s assistants fell in love with her. She had come to expect it, would have been disappointed—and probably angered—if they had not. Yet she did nothing to encourage the young men, beyond simply being herself, which, since she was beautiful, powerful, and mysterious, was quite enough. Jenna loved another man, and all in Palanthas knew it.

  “No, Markus, you may be off to the Boar’s Head for your nightly carousing with your friends.” Jenna grabbed a broom and began briskly sweeping the floor.

  “They’re just kids,” Mark said scornfully, his eyes following her every move. “I’d much rather stay and help you clean up.”

  Jenna brushed dried mud and a few scattered mint leaves out the door, and brushed Markus playfully along with them. “There’s nothing you can do for me in the shop, as I’ve told you. Best for both of us if you keep out of it. I don’t want your blood on my hands.”

  “Mistress Jenna, I’m not frightened—” he began.

  “Then you have no sense,” she interrupted, with a smile to take away the sting of her words. “Locked in that case is a brooch that will steal away your soul and take you directly to the Abyss. Next to the brooch lies a ring that could turn you inside out. See those spellbooks on the far shelf? If you were to so much as glance at the inscriptions on the covers, you would find yourself descending into madness.”

  Markus was somewhat daunted, but didn’t intend to show it. “Where does it all come from?” he asked, peering into the shadowy shop.

  “Various places. That White Robe who just left brought me the brooch of soul-stealing. The brooch is evil, you see, and she would never consider using it. But she traded the brooch to me for several spellbooks that she has long wanted, but could not afford. You remember the dwarf who came this morning? He brought these knives.” Jenna gestured to a display case in which innumerable small knives and daggers were arranged in a fan leaf design.

  “Are they magic? I didn’t think mages were permitted to carry weapons.”

  “We may not carry swords, but knives and daggers are permissible. And, no, these are not magic, but the dwarves make many items that can later be imbued with magic. A wizard might cast a spell on one of these knives, if he chose to do so.”

  The young man said stoutly, “You’re not afraid, Mistress Jenna. Why should I be?”

  “Because I know how to handle such arcane objects. I wear the Red Robes. I have taken and passed the Test in the Tower of High Sorcery. When you do the same, then you may come into my store. Until then,” she added, with a charming smile that went to the young man’s head like spiced wine, “you stand guard at my door.”

  “I will, Mistress Jenna,” he promised rapturously, “and … and maybe I will study magic …”

  She shrugged and nodded. All her assistants said the same thing when they first came to work for her; none of them ever followed through. Jenna made sure of that. She never hired anyone who had the slightest proclivity toward magic. Her wares would be too strong a temptation for a young mage to resist. Besides, she needed brawn, not brain, to guard her door.

  Only those who wore the robes and the few tradesmen who dealt in arcane merchandise were permitted to enter Jenna’s shop, its doorway marked by a sign with three moons painted on it: the silver moon, the red, and the black. Magic-users drew their powers from these moons, and the few stores in Ansalon that dealt in mageware always marked their shops with these symbols.

  Most citizens of Palanthas avoided Jenna’s shop; many, in fact, crossed the street to walk on the other side. But there were always a few—either curious or drunk or acting on a dare—who attempted to enter. And, of course, kender. Not a day passed but that Jenna’s assistant had to strong-arm, throttle, or otherwise remove the light-fingered kender from the premises. Every mage in Ansalon knew the story of the Flotsam mageware shop. It had vanished under mysterious circumstances, never to reappear. Horrified eyewitnesses reported having seen a kender enter just seconds before the entire building winked out of existence.

  Markus shuffled off disconsolately down the street, to drown his unrequited love in ale. The fabric merchant next door to Jenna locked his door, then bowed to her in respect as he passed by on his way home. He had not been pleased when she had first moved in next door, but when his sales—particularly of white, black, and red cloth—increased, his protests decreased proportionately.

  Jenna wished him a good evening. Stepping inside her shop, she shut her door, locked it, and placed a spell of warding on it. She lived above the shop, keeping her own guard on her wares during the night. Casting a final glance around, she mounted the stairs that led to her quarters.

  A knock on the door halted her.
r />   “Go home, Markus!” she called out irritably.

  Three nights ago, he had come back to sing love songs beneath her window. The incident had been most embarrassing.

  The knock was repeated, this time with more urgency. Jenna sighed. She was tired and hungry; it was time for a cup of tea. She turned, however, and went back down the stairs. Owners of Three Moon Shops were expected to open their stores to any mage at need, no matter what time, day or night.

  Jenna opened a small window set into the door and peered out, expecting to see a Red Robe, humbly apologizing for disturbing her, but could he possibly have some cobweb? Or a Black Robe, imperiously demanding bat guano. Jenna was startled and displeased to find two tall and heavily cloaked and hooded men standing on her stoop. The rays of the setting sun glinted on swords, which both wore on their hips.

  “You have the wrong shop, gentlemen,” Jenna said in excellent Elvish. By their slender legs, expensive, well-tooled leather boots, and fancifully designed leather armor, she guessed them to be elves, although their faces were hidden in the hoods of their cloaks.

  She was about to slam shut the window when one of the men said, speaking halting Common, “If you are Jenna, daughter of Justarius, head of the Wizard’s Conclave, we do not have the wrong shop.”

  “Suppose I am Jenna,” Jenna replied haughtily, though she was now extremely curious. “What do you want of me? If you have a magic item to sell,” she added, as an afterthought, “please return in the morning.”

  The two men glanced at each other. She could see the glitter of almond-shaped eyes in the shadows of their hoods.

  “We want to talk to you,” said one.

  “Talk away,” Jenna said.

  “In private,” said the other.

  Jenna shrugged. “The street is deserted this time of day. I don’t mean to be rude, but you must know that owners of Three Moon Shops are careful about who they let into their shops. It’s for your safety more than mine.”