The Sorcerer’s Wife

by Dolamore, Jaclyn

  The entrance was just a shadowy crevice in the hillside rocks, that suggested a dark cramped space inside. Most men had to duck as they passed through. Velsa’s elbow accidentally bumped Sorla as they stepped into the passage. She sniffed the air, moist and mineral. They turned a corner and the space opened wide, as if the entire hill was hollowed out. She suspected magic had played a hand, probably long ago. The ceiling soared above their heads, with magical lights dancing like stars, casting a bluish glow on the gathering. A woman was playing an eerie stringed instrument at one end of the large room, providing background music. It reminded her of the Peacock General’s parties.

  The lights had lured Velsa’s eyes upward first, but as her gaze lowered she realized that rows of shadowed niches ran up the walls, and in each one was a shrouded form. Some of the shrouds had rotted away, revealing skeletons beneath.

  They were standing in a catacombs.

  Sorla noticed at the same time and made a little squeak of dismay.

  “Welcome, welcome…you look like you’ve seen a ghost. Or, then again, maybe just a hundred old skeletons.” A man waved at them and then worked his way over, patting someone on the shoulder with a murmured, “Good to see you,” before he approached them. “Velsa Thanneau! So you heard about us, huh? And Sorla!”

  “You remember me,” Sorla said, beaming.

  “Are…you Flynn?” Velsa recognized him. He was the Peacock General’s party planner, which certainly explained why the atmosphere was reminiscent. The whole time she had been looking for Flynn, she had already met him.

  “I am Flynn, yes. Your friend Dennis is back here…” He offered a hand and led her toward a side passage. He was a tall, almost gangly fellow with shoulder-length brown hair that fell in his eyes. He had on a black suit, similar to what he wore at Calban’s parties, with a blue necktie. Pin stayed behind, saying hello to a woman who walked with a severe limp. Velsa took Sorla’s hand with her free one, as they maneuvered through a tight crowd. It was claustrophobic on the floor, although the high ceilings helped.

  Flynn squeezed through a small passage into what looked like the tomb of someone particularly honored, with a wooden sarcophagus in the center of the small circular room, and brightly painted and gilded walls. A few dusty scrolls and wooden tools were scattered around, suggesting some looting had occurred.

  “Great place to meet, huh?” Dennis said as they walked in. He was leaning on the sarcophagus. “We love spending time with the ghost of Lord Somebody.”

  Kessily was with him, one shoulder against the wall. He had loaned her his cloak, which hid her wings somewhat. She had shadows under her eyes like she really hadn’t slept much.

  “It’s hard to find a free venue that holds this many people,” Flynn said. “But there are no hostile ghosts. I’ve checked it out.”

  “No ‘hostile’ ghosts?” Dennis removed his hands from the sarcophagus.

  “Why is it called ‘Sweetheart Caverns’?” Velsa asked.

  “There is a legend about two lovers who used to meet here,” Flynn said. “But the rest of the story will do nothing to reassure you about the place.” He waved his hands, brushing off the subject, and glanced at each of them. “Let’s talk a minute, shall we, now that we’re all here? Well—there is no good way to secure these meetings, so I won’t officially call them a rebellion. I am a law-abiding citizen.” He pinched and wiggled his fingers in a gesture employed by dealers in black market goods, that suggested bending the truth. “Besides, these meetings were happening before I came along. I’m just…the party planner.”

  “But you have been exchanging messages about Kalan’s activities. If you’re not really a rebellion, what do you want?” Velsa asked.

  “If we tried to rise up against Kalan all at once, we would be crushed. I’m not stupid. Kalan is a very patient man, and so am I.” Flynn whirled on Kessily. “But—this is dangerous. If the people here see what Kalan did to Kessily, they might be disturbed enough to demand answers, to stir the pot, and…this is no time for that. A real rebellion would be bad news.” He slashed the air for emphasis. “Calban just made that glorious speech. Everyone is dying to know if these promises will come to pass. I think we need to get her out of the country. Dennis, too.”

  “So you’re just going to pack us off somewhere?” Dennis asked.

  “Not just anywhere. To Laionesse. There are pockets of Ven-Diri Daramons there, since ancient times. They’ve remained neutral during most of the wars. It would be a safe place, strategic even. Stirring up rebellion in Miralem lands would be a much better idea than doing it here under Kalan’s nose.”

  Daramons in the Miralem lands?

  Velsa’s mind shot back to the Miralem they had fought on the border. They tried to take Velsa with them, to rescue her from slavery—but she didn’t want to leave Grau.

  A pocket of Daramons who lived with the Miralem would be an ideal situation. The Miralem would recognize her as a true person, and Grau would still be among his own kind, and hopefully shielded from the worst of the animosity between the races. She hadn’t realized there was such a place.

  “How am I ever going to get home if I leave?” Dennis asked. “The portals are here.”

  “But none of us have a prayer of accessing them,” Flynn said. “There is always a possibility that the Miralem will find a way to open the portal—they will certainly try, as the news gets out. You’ll have a better chance with them. Kalan says he’s secured all the portals, which is a blatant lie. You can’t secure portals, unless he really knows something I don’t.”

  “Could we go with them?” Velsa asked. “Grau and Sorla and me? They’re going to send Grau north to fight the Miralem.”

  “If I can get two out, I can get five out,” Flynn said. “But I’ll need a little time to figure out a way.”

  “Not too much time, I hope.”

  Flynn sounded confident as he outlined some nebulous plan to obtain a boat. Then they joined the other Ven-Diri while Dennis and Kessily stayed behind, out of sight.

  Flynn played much the same role here as he did at Calban’s parties. He introduced speakers and performers and made sure everything was running well. When he had nothing else to do, he mingled in the crowd, warmly welcoming people at every turn. The Ven-Diri leaders, men and women alike dressed in somber black, spoke and sang of honoring the dead and the spirit world. Velsa had expected a raucous band of rebels, not ballads pondering the nature of life and death.

  Una Calla, halla calla

  Irshada lem alsam nei

  Wodren zi loshan va

  Hoder nai saleen-sra

  The Spirit Realm, realm of beauty

  No one knows fate’s secrets

  Judgment or blessing

  No man can say

  The message of these songs and stories was clear, without breathing a word of outright rebellion.

  This was a message to every Fanarlem that no one, not even the Wodrenarune, could say they were born to be slaves. As the meeting went on, she heard snatches of murmured conversation around her. A woman had sneaked out of the house to attend, and hated to return—she had been forced into her marriage. A young man who had been blinded in one of the border conflicts felt pressured to commit suicide because he had not yet found another job and according to the laws of fate, a grown man who could not work should kill himself with honor. So much of society was dictated by these laws that had been spoken by Wodrenarune over the ages.

  The meeting felt more like a ceremony, and maybe the catacombs were an appropriate setting after all. Velsa felt the weight of the ages in this cave, the whispers of the spirit world. Around her, heads bowed in their black cloaks while others lifted their eyes to the ceiling—hopeful, fearful. It carried Velsa back to the first night she had believed all the way down to her bones that she was a worthy soul, but that night she was alone. Tonight she was not.

  When they left, after further vague assurance from Flynn, Velsa and Sorla were quiet as they walked, as if words might disturb th
e dream.

  “Velsa.” Sorla finally spoke when the lights of the palace were in sight.

  Sorla didn’t call her ‘miss’ as she usually did. “Yes?”

  “Is it true? Am I really going to be free?”

  “I certainly hope so.”

  “If that happens…will I still be able to live with you and Grau?”

  “Of course,” Velsa said. “We wouldn’t turn you out! In fact, I wouldn’t want you to leave until I felt you could protect yourself. We’re family now.”

  “I thought I had family once before,” Sorla said.

  “The ones who taught you to read?”

  Sorla nodded.

  Velsa shook her head. “It’s not the same. No matter how kind they seemed, masters aren’t family. I used to feel the same way, though. At the House of Perfumed Ribbons, I used to feel like the House Mother was my family, that she really loved me, because she was usually kind to me. But she still told me what to do and what to think. Sometimes I still expect Grau to tell me what to do. Sometimes I even wish he would, because I’m so accustomed to it.”

  Sorla looked at her, almost stricken. “I’ve had so many masters in these past few years. It’s easiest when I’m told what to do, and I do a good job of it, and that’s all. I’ve had such a hard time sleeping since you took me in.”

  “Because I don’t tell you what to do?”

  “Well, that, and—”

  “You worry you’ll form attachments again.”

  “Sometimes,” Sorla said. But she broke off, descending into silence deeper than the moonlit darkness.

  “Sometimes I used to think my old masters were like my parents,” Sorla said. “Like I was just another one of their daughters. It was so stupid, I guess—I was just a kid. When they got rid of me I realized they had never treated me the way they treated their daughters. I clung to these little moments. Like when the mistress would let me help her to dress…When I helped you dress so beautifully, Velsa, I thought of her, but—you’re a Fanarlem like me. I thought—what if—someday—I could grow up to be like you?”

  “You can,” Velsa said. “You most certainly can. But maybe you’ll be even better, because you’ll open your own cafe, and crowds will flock to your door for those tarts.”

  Sorla smiled shyly, but her eyes had a sheen of sadness.

  Velsa suddenly stopped on the path. She threw her arms around Sorla.

  Velsa never had family to hold her, growing up, and she often felt that was why she craved Grau’s touch so much. Velsa and Grau kept a polite physical distance from Sorla. One didn’t embrace a servant like that, or even a friend—but Sorla needed it. Velsa saw that in her eyes. Sorla felt small and child-like in Velsa’s grasp. Her whole body went slightly limp, as if she finally trusted, for the first time, that Velsa really meant her promises.

  “Grau, I need to talk to you about something.” When they arrived home, the words came out in a rush, even when he started trying to interrupt her. She told him about Kessily, about Parsons and Irik, that they couldn’t trust anyone here. “This might be our only chance to leave, and I think we should take it. If we stay, we’re going to live in constant fear, and those fears might very well come true.”

  Sorla sat on the sidelines, listening but keeping quiet.

  “You know I want to leave,” Grau said. “But this plan sounds as insubstantial as bubbles.”

  “Better than sneaking onto a passenger ship!”

  “You know I didn’t mean that…”

  “Didn’t you? And we weren’t at war then. We need to get out. You don’t want to fight for Kalan and you never have.”

  “If we’re caught trying to escape, we won’t be killed,” Grau said. “I realize that now. We’ll be used. We’ll be captured. Forced to work for them. Turned into a bird, maybe.”

  “At least we’ll have tried.”

  “Why did you lie to me?” Grau asked.

  “Because—”

  “You thought I’d forbid you from visiting the vampire?”

  “Well, yes. I was having a conversation with him, and you stormed in there and said I wasn’t seeing him again. You spoke for me then. Why shouldn’t I expect you to do it twice?”

  “You could have talked to me about it, once we got home and I wasn’t all worked up! Stars, obviously I was just worried about you!”

  “You would have let me go to the Ven-Diri meeting?” she asked, her voice edged with skepticism.

  “I’m sure I would have tried to convince you otherwise, but…”

  “You wouldn’t have let me go without a fight,” Velsa said. “And maybe I didn’t want to have to fight my way out of here. This is important to me.”

  “You are important to me.”

  “Grau…I—I lied to you because I needed to know that I could.”

  “Of all the nonsense.” Now he was starting to sound not just worried, but angry. “I’ve told you that you can do stuff I don’t like. Why don’t you just trust me on this? Did you really risk your life just to prove to yourself that you’re a free woman?”

  “I’m trying to save our lives! I’m trying to tell you that I’ve found a way to escape so you don’t have to kill any more dragons or fight for a man you don’t agree with! And—maybe I should have been honest, but…it’s very hard for me to go against your will. I was raised to never, ever do such a thing, and it’s much harder to defy you because I am so grateful to you. But if I’m really going to be your equal, I can’t…just be grateful.”

  Grau’s eyes were dark and hard. He didn’t really understand. She wasn’t sure he truly could. “I never asked for you to be grateful. You’re my partner. I expect honesty and trust from you, not gratitude.”

  “I would never, ever want to really hurt you. I didn’t want to hand you dangerous information before I fully understood it, in case it affected your work, and aroused suspicion.”

  His eyes moved to the print of Kalan Jherin. “I see…”

  For one long moment, they all sat in silence. One electric light, mounted to the wall, provided a glow that had seemed so bright when they first moved in. But she was used to it now, and it didn’t seem as warm as the light of a lantern.

  She remembered how happy they had been to come here, to have a little home all to themselves. That was so short-lived. Maybe she and Grau were doomed to never have a home.

  “I just don’t think I can put us all in the hands of Calban’s party planner,” he said. She could tell he was deeply hurt; she’d never seen him angry in this cold way before.

  “Clearly, he is more than a party planner. It’s a front to get close to the Peacock General,” Velsa said, although her mind flashed back to the couple murmuring about him in Calban’s house, saying they didn’t think he would go through with rebellion, that maybe he even loved Calban…

  She would look completely foolish if she risked everything, only for Flynn to betray them.

  “And what do we do when we get to Laionesse with no friends and no home?” Grau pressed.

  “I don’t know,” Velsa said. “I just—the one thing I do know is that I can’t work for that man. I can’t bear you working for him. Everyone keeps saying how ugly this war will be. Are you going to take other people’s lives, for Kalan Jherin? Are you going to let them take you away from me, for fate knows how long?”

  She shut her eyes, listening to the sound of his boots scuffing the floor. No matter what they chose, it felt perilous to the point of hopelessness.

  “What do you think, Sorla?” Grau asked.

  Sorla had been completely quiet and had hardly moved an inch since she sat down with her arms wrapped around her. “What do…I think?”

  “Yes,” Grau said. “You’re part of the family too.”

  “But I…” She looked a little bewildered.

  “You’ve been in Nalim Ima longer than the rest of us and you have more experience with this rebellion,” Grau said. “If you had to be the one to make the choice, do you think it’s safer to stay here, o
r better to risk an escape with Flynn?”

  “That’s…a good question.” She paused, in a moment of deep consideration. “I don’t know what life is like in Laionesse, so it’s hard to imagine. But I do think that as long as we’re here, we will always be afraid. In the Miralem lands, all Fanarlem are free. I don’t really know Flynn…but I don’t think he would risk our lives if he can help it. He will definitely want to get Dennis and Kessily to Laionesse safely. But…” She ducked her head like she’d had enough attention. “I would hate to lead you astray.”

  “I just want to know what your gut says.” Grau met Velsa’s eyes. “All right—majority rules. I am willing to listen to Flynn’s plan. But I’m not going anywhere unless he actually has one.”

  Velsa couldn’t sleep that night, and it was obvious Grau couldn’t either. He didn’t even hold her, which left her feeling cold.

  “Are you still upset at me?” Velsa asked.

  “Of course I’m upset,” he said. “We’re partners in a very dangerous situation. I want to know I can trust you, too. I need to know.”

  “You don’t trust me to take care of myself. If I needed you to show up with Dennis, I would have called you. I was just scared for a moment and as soon as you felt that, you came in with your fists swinging. I already had it under control by then.”

  He huffed. “Look, I don’t want to fight. I just want to be alone right now. I’m never alone these days, like I used to be…I spent hours on the road, in the marshes…I hate all of this. None of this is me, none of this is what I wanted.”

  She hated going to sleep without his touch. He knew that. She felt like what he really meant was that he didn’t want to hold her. “You bought me,” she said. “You made me yours. That’s why you’re never alone.”

  “Come on…” His voice was partially muffled in the pillow. “Don’t be like that. That time is past.”