At the Seat of Power: Goldenfields and the Dominion

by Jeffrey Quyle

  “Yes, Alec, I want to help you do your healing work. You let me know what you want and I’ll do it,” she said.

  “Well, what I want is for you to be happy,” Alec said. “And if it happens that coming with me makes you happy, then we’re going to do great. I think I may move into the healer house in four or five days. If you’d like to come with me, I’d like for you to continue learning how to use your legs, and then I’d like to start teaching you the ingredients and recipes and doses for some of the common medicines that work to relieve people’s pain. If you want to learn those, I think we can open a shop in the city where you can work at helping people by giving them the simple medicines they need for basic cures.”

  “Does that sound like too much to think about already, or does it interest you?” he asked to finish his proposal.

  Cassie looked directly at him. “If you think I can be a healer, even a little bit of one, and make people feel better, then that is just what I want to do. I’ll even learn to walk if that’s what it takes for you to let me go with you! Though you couldn’t have kept me from doing it anyway.”

  “Great!” Alec said, feeling a weight lift from his chest. He realized that he had very much wanted Cassie to come with him. “Why don’t you start practicing standing up by yourself while I go to sword practice? The sooner you’re walking, the sooner we’ll be able to do some fun things!”

  Alec went to get his rain cover, and as he watched, Cassie carefully spread her hands on the table and her chair and practiced getting up and sitting down. Satisfied, he went downstairs to see if anyone else would go to sword practice with him. He went to Moriah’s room to knock on the door, but hearing low voices inside, he realized that Moriah and Nathaniel were talking about something in what seemed a very serious tone.

  He decided to leave them alone, and to go alone to the palace armory, which was a damp walk though relatively empty streets.

  After a satisfying practice without incident, Alec chose to go looking for furniture, as he had done with Leah back when they first arrived in Goldenfields and needed to furnish their shop and rooms. He looked for shops in the city in which to find furniture, but didn’t locate many of them on his way back to the hill. He decided to ask at the armory tomorrow for advice on where to look for such shops.

  While walking back up the ingenairii hill to the top, Alec stopped in the Healers House, which already had a crew of men and women fixing, painting, and scraping. Alec asked that as a favor they place a long banister-like railing along one wall of one room, in hopes that Cassie would be able to use it for balance as she practiced her walking.

  Later, back at Rubicon’s house, Alec finished his review of weapons to include in his power-image. He felt pleased to have them all done, and hoped that Rubicon would approve the training for the last and final phase he needed to learn about the methods of a warrior ingenaire. Alec went upstairs and found Cassie sitting in the dining room alone. “This doesn’t look like much fun,” he said as he entered the room.

  “Well it’s all I was doing for my whole life up until last week, and here it’s in a nicer place; I know someone will come see me, and I don’t have to sit in filth, so this is actually pretty good, Alec,” Cassie told him. “It’s all in the way you look at things.”

  Alec looked at her. “Well, that’s true. Since there’s so little happening right now, show me how much ability you have for standing or anything more.”

  Cassie put her head down, then held onto the table and chair and stood upright with relative ease.

  “Here, take my hand,” Alec said, walking over to stand next to her. She removed her hand from the chair and placed it in Alec’s, then removed her other hand from the table. “Will you walk with me across the room?” he asked.

  “Go slow,” Cassie cautioned him, and put one foot in front of the other, then took another step as Alec slowly advanced. They made a casual crossing of the room, Cassie showing some wobbles, but never needing more than Alec’s hands to catch her balance. Rubicon came in as they finished the return to the table.

  “Look at you Cassie! You’re ready to practice your dance steps for the Apprentice’s Ball coming up, aren’t you?” he asked.

  Cassie looked at him gratefully. “And you’ll be on my card when I do dance, won’t you?”

  “If you’ll save one dance for me among all your admirers, I’ll be very appreciative,” Rubicon said. “Now, do you know what’s for supper?”

  Neither Alec nor Cassie did. Alec though, asked Rubicon about his next step in training. “I think I’ve finished the list of weapons for my power image to use. May we start the next stage tomorrow?”

  “You’re trying to move pretty fast, aren’t you lad? Let me train with you tomorrow morning and see how I think you’re doing, and perhaps we can shift you up to the hard work. I want to warn you that this last step does take most of us a lot longer than the other stages, sometimes as long as all of them put together,” Rubicon said, trying to cool Alec’s ardor to finish so quickly.

  Alec had a sudden thought, and a quick errand he decided to run. “I need to run out for a bit. I’ll see you both in a little while,” he announced, and ran to put his rain cover on.

  Alec ran down the hill to the water ingenaire’s house. “Is Genia here?” he asked at the door of the first home he came to.

  “Her home is two buildings over to the right there,” an apprentice told him, pointing to a light blue building. Alec thanked him and walked over to the larger house.

  “Is ingenaire Genia available for a visitor?” Alec asked at the door of the second home.

  “One moment please, I’ll check. Come in out of the rain and wait here in the hall,” a very young apprentice, younger than Alec himself, directed.

  Alec stood in the hallway, waiting. A few minutes later, a matronly looking woman came out into the hall to greet him. “My name is Viola, and I am Genia’s assistant. I’m afraid she is not available at the moment. May someone else help you?”

  Alec thought for a second. He had come here on the spur of the moment, and hadn’t anticipated what to do if Genia wasn’t available. “Well,” he began, “I came to ask a favor. If I explain it, maybe you can give me some guidance?” he asked.

  “I’ll certainly try,’ Viola said with a smile. “Come in and have a seat.”

  Alec sat down in a parlor. “This is a nice room,” he commented. “We’ll have to try to decorate one like it,” he said, observing the bright colors that cheered the room up even on the gloomy day, and the tasteful decorations on the walls.

  “Thank you,” Viola said politely. “Are you thinking of building a house?” she asked.

  “We’re getting ready to restore the Healers House, actually,” Alec replied, still craning his head around to try to note details he liked about the room. He suddenly wondered if he should be touring houses and looking at rooms to get decorating ideas. No time for that now he decided.

  Viola looked at him with a puzzled look on her face at first, and then understanding came. “Are you the new healer ingenaire?” she asked.

  “Yes, my name is Alec, Viola,” he answered.

  He watched an embarrassed smile break across her face. “It’s a pleasure to meet you Alec, before we go any further, let me ask you a favor. After we finish with your task, could you examine my stomach for me? I’ve had some bad digestion problems lately.”

  “Certainly,” Alec said politely. “As a matter of fact, let’s do that first.” He asked her to stand, and looked at her with his health vision, examining her carefully. “Do you eat a lot of meats? What about vegetables, how often do you eat those? Do you have these problems mid-day, or are they in the evening?” he asked.

  Satisfied with her answers and his vision, he said “I think that you should eat more vegetables, especially leafy ones for a few days. Also, I’m going to go into the city tomorrow, so tomorrow afternoon I may be able to bring you back some special spring water that will help, or I’ll mix up something else. You sh
ould be fine after that.”

  Viola got a satisfied look on her face. “Thank you so much Alec. It’s wonderful to have a healer around. Now, how can I help you?”

  Alec explained his mission. “I have a house guest staying with me, a girl who would like to go to the apprentice’s ball. But she can’t walk into town to visit dressmakers for a gown, and I can’t judge what is or isn’t a good gown. I was wondering if a lady from here could help us tomorrow select a gown for Cassie to wear if I find a seamstress to come up to our house?”

  Viola sat back and thought. “I know just the person for you,” she said smiling brightly. “We have a senior apprentice, Bethany, who came from a family in the upper gentry, and she always wears very pretty clothes. Let me call her in and see if she can help. Is everything alright?” she asked as Alec’s complexion paled at the mention of Bethany’s name.

  Viola left the room and returned shortly. “She’ll be right here.” Less than a minute later a lovely blonde girl with a full figure entered the room. “Bethany, this is Alec, the healer ingenaire. Alec, this is Bethany, one of our best apprentices,” Viola introduced. Bethany blushed at the introduction to Alec, but didn’t seem to know that he was the reason her skirt had been cut and her behind exposed.

  Alec spoke slowly and cautiously as he explained his quest to Bethany. “You’re asking me to help select a gown?” she asked with a smile, her gregarious personality coming out. “I usually have to be held back from things like that. I’d love to go! When are you going to the city?” She concluded that Alec didn’t realize she had been pulling so many of the pranks on him, and decided to launch one of her winning charm campaigns to become friends with him.

  Alec explained his schedule, and they agreed that Bethany would go with him to sword practice, and afterwards the two of them would visit some seamstress shops Bethany knew to find someone to come up the hill to measure Cassie and select a material. Bethany asked about Cassie’s hair color and complexion and build and other matters that Alec answered, surprised to realize he knew so much about his patient. They parted upon Alec’s departure, with their agreed plan for Alec to stop by and pick up Bethany on the morrow.

  The next morning, Alec arrived at the balcony first, and was soon joined by Rubicon. The older ingenaire made Alec run through a number of tests until he was satisfied that Alec had in fact mastered the range of weapons that the warriors were expected to know and comfortably incorporate into their images.

  “All right Alec, now’s when it starts to get tough,” Rubicon advised him. “You’ve got all the pieces in place, and we need to let you learn how to blend them with one another. This is the stage where you are going to practice fluid manipulation of your image, so that during a battle you might raise or lower the amount of power you receive, or even change the image through which you concentrate that energy, in order to help you be flexible, able to adjust to changing challenges you face.”

  “We’re going to start with an exercise in which you build your image with a weapon in hand. But you have to be able to mentally establish that all your other weapons are with you too, in a pack on your back, for instance,” Rubicon instructed.

  “With a pack big enough for all those weapons, my back will be broken,” Alec protested.

  “You’re an ingenaire. It’s a magic pack. Don’t worry about it,” Rubicon chided him. “What you want is to start with one weapon, and be able to change the weapon you focus the energy through by having that other image-weapon handy.”

  “Once you demonstrate you can do that, you’ll work on thinking about the pipe that brings your power into this world, and how to manipulate it at any moment so that more or less power can be drawn through it with instant changes. I think of it as if there’s a valve on it that opens and closes as I need. When you’re ready to complete that training, then we put the two together in the final step. At that point, you’ll be able in any circumstance to use any amount of power you’re able to handle, with any weapon-image to focus your power most efficiently.”

  “That’s the plan, Alec, although I’ll admit that some of our approved warriors probably aren’t very proficient at doing all that. And most of them, even at their best, wouldn’t muster the strength you can bring without straining yourself. But we need to train you to be the best you can be. When I listen to Aristotle, I understand how important it is that we give our best effort.”

  Alec listened to Rubicon’s explanation and felt daunted. He anticipated a long training program, and wondered if he would be finished with his training by the time he needed to return to Goldenfields, and then hopefully travel to Stronghold.

  They began the training, and worked though the morning. When the breakfast tray came to the balcony, they took a break. Alec went downstairs and visited Cassie. “Would you like to come upstairs?” he asked.

  “If you’ll give me your hand,” she replied, and taking his hand, she stood up on her own with little difficulty. “Since I suppose you’re not going to carry me up, I’ll have to walk, won’t I?” Cassie asked, and took a step forward.

  Alec watched as Cassie proudly took several steps, only lightly holding his hand for balance.

  “That’s fantastic!” he told her.

  When they got upstairs, Rubicon was waiting at the table, eating some of the fruit from the breakfast tray. They sat down and joined him. “Who will take over training now?” Alec asked, not seeing Nathaniel or Moriah appear.

  “Are you so determined to get rid of me that you’re looking for a replacement?” Rubicon asked, affecting to be hurt. “They are both given leave for the day to be free from assignments. I’m not sure where they’ve gone,” he answered.

  “I haven’t spoken to either of them much in the past couple of days,” Alec said, but Rubicon didn’t comment.

  They resumed training, and Alec stumbled through the next three hours. When Rubicon declared the end of their work, Alec leaned back and sighed. “This will take a long time to learn to do right. Thank you Rubicon, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  He left the house and went down to the water house, where he met Bethany, and together they went into the city and the palace, chatting politely along the way, both working hard to avoid revealing what they knew about one another. “I’ve never been back here before,” the blond girl said as they entered the armory. “Is all of this for weapons?”

  Alec explained the use of the armory for storing and providing a supply of weapons, as well as for training. Bethany sat while Alec engaged in the two practice sessions, and then made several introductions requested by the guardsmen, who were all eager to meet the vivacious young ingenaire.

  Together, the healer and the water apprentice left the armory, heading to a quarter of town Alec had never seen before, but one Bethany seemed to know well. “You’re very good with a sword, Alec,” Bethany said. “My brother used to take fencing lessons, and you’re much better than he is.”

  “And you’re very good at causing men to swoon over you,” Alec laughed. “I’ve never had so many of the guards talk to me at once, and they all wanted only one thing -- an introduction to you!”

  “I can’t help that, can I?” Bethany smiled, and Alec agreed she couldn’t.

  They turned onto a street when Bethany stopped. “These three shops,” she indicated, “are the ones that I think will suit us best. We’ll need to ask the seamstress to come visit the Hill with us, and to bring some samples of fabric to look at. From what you’ve told me about Cassie, I think a bright color; a yellow or blue will do best. The ball is only a few days away, so we’ll need to make sure they aren’t already too booked up to get this order done, and you’ll have to pay extra for the rush, just so you know.”

  Alec assured her that he understood, and they entered the shops. Bethany turned out to be a well-known person in those quarters, greeted by name as she entered, and the lack of comment on Alec’s presence made him suspect that she’d had male friends accompany her to these shops before.

  A seamstr
ess from the third shop agreed to meet them at the gates to the ingenairii’ hill in two hours time. As they left the shop and started home, Alec asked Bethany for a favor, despite his misgivings about spending too much time with her; he admitted to himself that she was witty and fun to be with. “Listen, I have to order some furniture for the Healers House; would you mind helping me pick out parlor furniture today for the waiting room, and for the dining room too?”

  Bethany looked at him with mischief in her eyes. “Hmm, would I like to go shopping some more, to spend other people’s money? That’s not hard to answer. Do you have any particular shops in mind?”

  “I don’t, although I just remembered I’ve got to run over to Natha’s dockyard for a quick task. Are there any good ones in that direction, or between there and the ingenairii’ gate?” he responded.

  “You’re just assuming I know where to go shopping for everything, aren’t you?” Bethany said with a dimpled smile. “I’m really not such a dizzy girl, despite what you think. As it happens though, I do know that if we go to the dockyard there will be a furniture store we can visit between there and the gate.”

  Alec led Bethany to the gates of Natha’s dockyard, and asked for both of Natha’s sons by name, as a first hope. As it happened, Drawr, his youngest son, was actually in Oyster Bay examining the operations, and came out to see Alec. “Drawr, my name is Alec, and I’m a healer. We met at your father’s home several weeks ago,” Alec re-introduced himself.

  “Alec, I know who you are, of course. My mother has good things to say about you constantly, and my father has great things to say about the spring water you’ve provided for us. How can I help you and this pretty young lady?” Drawr asked.

  “I’d like to have some of the spring water, if you have any to spare. I just want a jug for now, and then a barrel in the next couple of days. Is that possible?” Alec asked.

  “We can juggle a little bit to make sure you get the next barrel out of the warehouse. For your jug right now, we’ll go tap your barrel,” Drawr suggested. “Follow me,” he told them, and led them back into the yards. He and Alec talked about Natha’s family as they walked, and Alec learned that Rand and Annalea had moved their printing operation into the new larger building they had discussed.