"Are you planning to be like those other magicians?" Alea challenged.
"No!" Blaize declared. "Anything but that!"
"Well said." Conn's voice was approving. "If you ever gain power, boy, remember what you've said here."
"If you don't," Ranulf's voice promised, "we'll remind you." Blaize couldn't help shuddering at the thought of the form their "reminding" could take. "I'll remember!" Then his shoulders slumped. "But I'm not likely to gain much power. So much for my dreams of being a good master!"
"Perhaps it would be better to work to eliminate all masters," Gar suggested.
"As though we could!" Alea scoffed. "You saw yourself how well that worked on Brigante! All they had done was change masters!"
"Well, yes," Gar agreed, "but the Scarlet Company was certainly the mildest lord I've ever seen."
"If it was, why were the people so frightened at the thought of going against its orders?"
"I don't want people to be frightened of me," Blaize said glumly.
Conn's voice heaved a weary sigh. "If you have any power at all, lad, people will be afraid when they stop to think what you can do-and if you don't have power, you can't do good."
"But I can't do evil, either!"
"Which will it be, then?" Ranulf's voice challenged. "Too weak to do any good, or keeping a close watch on yourself to make sure you don't do any harm?"
Blaize lowered his gaze, scowling.
"You have to decide, lad," Conn said. "You can't do the one without doing the other."
"Well-if I must I'll choose to do good," Blaize said, "and trust you to tell me if I'm doing harm." Then he looked up, astounded. "What am I saying? I'm not likely to have the power to do either!"
"Oh, yes, you are," Conn said, "for you're a magician, albeit one who still has a lot to learn."
"You're a ghost leader," Ranulf reminded him, "and you've won two ghosts most thoroughly to your side."
"Won? No! It was Gar who won you over."
"No, lad," Conn's voice said kindly. "It was your own agonizing about trying to make sure you used your power wisely and well."
"If you really mean to help the serfs, though," Ranulf said, "you might start paying attention to them. There are two crouching behind that yew, and three more watching from the rock pile against the cliff face."
Surprised, Blaize started to turn toward the yew, but Alea said softly, "Don't look."
Blaize froze-and found himself staring at Mira, who had been turning to look at the rock pile, too. For a moment, all he could see was her face, her eyes ...
Then Gar's voice broke the spell. "You have to be careful if you try to do the head carpenter's job."
"Yes," said Alea. "You might cut your thumb."
Gar nodded. "So telling a man to do the master carpenter's job is like asking a turtle to dinner."
"Not a good idea," Alea returned, "if they're serving turtle soup."
Blaize stared in consternation, then leaned over toward Mira and asked out of the corner of his mouth, "What are they talking about?"
"Riddles of the Way," she answered, low-voiced. "We've both heard them go on like this, but they always explained them before."
"You mean they're actually trying to confuse the serfs?"
"Confuse them, or make them curious," Mira answered. Blaize nodded slowly. "They're succeeding. They've certainly confused me, and I'm curious as to what they mean."
"Probably nothing," Mira opined.
"The highest virtue is low as a valley," Gar said.
"Yes," Alea agreed, "and the purest seems to be soiled."
"Vast virtue never seems to be enough," Gar lamented. "The virtue of strength seems weak," Alea said.
"When you get right down to it," Gar sighed, "reality is simple, but it keeps seeming to change."
"All virtues are gathered in the Way," Alea answered.
"Of course," Gar said, "since the Way includes everything that exists."
"Including people," Alea said. "The uncarved block of wood is best."
"Yes," Gar said, "but somebody cut it into a block."
They went on and on. Eventually Blaize, confused by conundrums and bored by hearing what he'd heard before disguised as riddles, rose and went to chop some wood of his own. Mira apparently decided it was a good idea, for she came to her feet, went to fetch water, and set a kettle on to boil-without any turtles.
Finally, dazed and inspired, the serfs slipped away. Alea and Gar kept on until they were well out of sight; then Alea said, "I think we impressed them."
Gar's eyes lost focus for a moment. Then he smiled at her. "We did. They'll be back tomorrow, even though they haven't the faintest idea what we were talking about."
"I'm not sure I do myself," Alea confessed.
"Nor I," Gar agreed, "but we managed to get across the basic concept of the Tao and people's proper place in it."
"So tomorrow we work on how they gain and lose that place?" Alea asked with a grin.
"A good strategy." Gar nodded. "We might mention why they should want to."
"All very interesting," Mira called from the campfire, "but the stew is ready."
Gar and Alea stared at one another, then burst out laughing.
The serfs came back the next day, still in hiding-only there were eight of them now. Gar and Alea batted paradoxes back and forth like tennis balls while Blaize and Mira demonstrated how to put yourself in harmony with the Way by doing the camp chores. By the forth day there were fifteen peasants, and the youngest ones were edging closer and closer to the limit of the yew bush and the rock pile, perilously close to being clearly visible.
"Shall we give them the final nudge?" Gar asked. "Let's," Alea said with a mischievous grin.
10
Alea took up the pouches of colored sand they'd collected for the occasion.
Gar tied a string to two pegs, tapped one into the ground for a center, then inscribed a circle in the dirt with the other. Alea sprinkled yellow sand in a tadpole shape that occupied one half of the circle, swelling from nothing at its tail to a bulbous head. Then she sprinkled red sand in the other half, so that she had two tadpoles, nestled head to tail, making up a complete circle. She dropped a little red to make a tiny circle for the yellow tadpole's eye and used yellow sand for the red tadpole's eye.
"Yellow is masculine, red is feminine," Gar intoned.
"Each holds within it the seed of the other," Alea answered. "The masculine element is hot, dry, mechanical, and active."
"The feminine element," said Alea, "is cool, moist, organic, and passive."
Gar put a finger beside the edge of the circle at the midpoint of the yellow tadpole, which was also the midpoint of the red. "When both are in balance, the world is peaceful and prosperous."
The youngest serfs began edging out of hiding, craning their necks to see.
Gar traced a finger along the edge toward the yellow tadpole's head. "When the masculine element grows to take up most of the circle, though, governments are tyrannical. No one can think for themselves; everyone does what the king commands. There is always food, but the serfs are kept poor by high taxes."
The young folk crept closer. The older ones began to sneak out from cover.
Alea moved her finger to trace the red tadpole to its head. "When the feminine element takes up most of the circle, there is no government. Lords are constantly fighting one another, killing the serfs and trampling the crops, keeping people poor."
The young serfs crept closer, so intent on seeing the Great Monad that they didn't realize their shadows were falling across it. "Only when there is balance are the people free, with the chance to find their own happiness," Gar said.
"Only when there is harmony can people be prosperous and safe," said Alea.
Mira came up behind one of the older serfs and said in a conspiratorial whisper, "You might as well sit down, you know. They love answering questions."
The serf jumped as though he'd just stepped on a live wire. "You're all welcome
here," Blaize told the people in the rock pile, "if you really want to learn. Oh, and when you're done, you might take a hand with the sweeping."
The serfs stared at him. Then, one by one, they came out from hiding. "Are-are you sure?" a middle-aged woman asked. "Of course," Blaize said. "They've known you were there for days-"
She stared in fright. "Are they... are they magicians?"
"Not as we usually think of them," Blaize said. "They're sages."
"Sit down," Alea invited one of the younger serfs, "and ask your questions."
The girl sat down at the side of the circle, warily, hesitantly. The boy beside her sat down, too, slowly. "How do you find harmony?" the girl asked.
"By putting yourself in balance," Alea answered.
A young man sat down on the other side of the circle, giving the impression of a rabbit about to bolt. "How do you find balance?"
"By seeking harmony with the Way," Gar replied.
A young woman sat down beside the young man, frowning. "What is this Way you keep talking about?"
Their elders came up behind them, wary but intent.
"The Way includes all things that exist," Alea explained. "Everything came from it; everything returns to it, as the rivers flow home to the sea."
"But the sea is never full," Gar said, "and the Way is empty."
"But it never needs filling," Alea said, "for everything is in harmony." An older man frowned. "How can it be empty and full at the same time?"
"Because it is a paradox," Gar said, "an apparent contradiction."
"But only apparent," Alea reminded them. "It's like a puzzle, and there's always a way to solve it."
"How?" the man asked, totally bewildered.
"By experiencing the Way," Alea told him. "You can't really talk about it, for as soon as you do, as soon as you even give it a name, you limit it, and it isn't really the Way anymore-because the Way is limitless."
A girl asked, "So if I call it the Way, I've lost track of it?"
"Yes," Gar said, "but we have to call it something, and "way" is about as vague as we can get and still have a name."
"But as soon as you name it, it stops being what you named?" an older woman asked.
"That's right." Gar beamed at her. "Any name you can give it won't fit long, because it's always changing."
"But it's always the same, too," Alea put in, "because it's the source of everything."
"But I want to find out what it is!" the boy objected.
"Then you'll find what you expect to find," Gar told him, "but it won't be the real Way."
The older man frowned. "So we can only find it by not looking for it?"
"Exactly!" Alea clapped her hands with delight. "You have to wait until it finds you."
"But how," the young woman asked, totally perplexed, "will we know when it does?"
"Believe me," said Alea, "you'll know."
The serfs left an hour later, confused but inspired.
"They won't come back, will they?" Mira asked mournfully. "Are you joking?" Gar asked. "This is the most exciting thing that's happened to them in years!"
"Learning is always exciting." Blaize beamed, giving the impression that he was about to start bouncing. "I can hardly wait for tomorrow!"
Mira eyed him warily.
Gar decided to build a pavilion to shelter their students from the sun and rain, so he took Blaize downslope to hunt up some reasonably sized deadwood. Mira started making dinner, looking pensive.
"What's the matter, lass?" Alea asked gently.
Mira looked up, startled, then dropped her gaze again. "Oh, it's-it's nothing, Alea."
"Nothing named Blaize?" Alea smiled. "He bothers you, doesn't he?"
Reluctantly, Mina nodded.
"More doubts because he's a magician?"
"No, because he says he wants to be a good man as well as a good magician!" Mira looked up, eyes blazing. "Can he really mean it, Alea? Or was he just spinning a fable, putting on a show to make me think he's really trying?"
"Oh, he's sincere," Alea said. "You can feel the emotions leaking out of him. He means what he says."
"He could be pretending...."
"If he is, he's very good at it, but even the best pretender can't fool a mind reader."
"Magicians can."
"Maybe an expert magician, one who specializes in mind reading-are there such?"
Mira nodded.
"But that's not Blaize's magic," Alea pointed out, "and even if it were, he's still an apprentice. No, he's an empath and he's learned how to project his emotions, but he hasn't learned how to hold them in."
"Is that why I feel as though I'm getting caught up by his enthusiasm?" Mira asked. "Caught up in his-" She broke off, blushing.
"Yes, he does have romantic moods, doesn't he?" Alea asked, amused. "He's still young enough so that they seem a little silly, don't they?"
"No!" Mira cried. "Hopeless and ill-placed, perhaps, and his ardor always seems to come at the wrong time, but I wouldn't call him silly!"
Alea gazed at her thoughtfully, then said, "It's real then, lass."
"What?" Mira asked in confusion. "His romantic notions or his desire to be good and still be a magician?"
"Both," Alea said, "but he'll need a lot of help. It's hard to gain power and not let it corrupt you."
Mira wondered if she were talking about magic or love. Then she began to wonder if there were any difference.
The villagers did come back the next day, but with several replacements, and that was the pattern of it-never more than a dozen, but rarely did one person come more than two days in a row. Over the course of the month, Gar and Alea were sure they'd seen the entire adult population of the village.
"It's their lords," Mira explained, "and the guard who patrols the fields to watch over them. There's only one of him to fifty of them, so he's not going to notice if a few are gone any one day-in fact, if he does, he'll assume they're doing other work, such as gathering wood or mending walls or some such. But if it's the same few every day, he'll grow suspicious."
"So they come here in turns." Alea nodded. She didn't have to ask how Mira knew; it was a good guess that conditions were the same in her home village.
"We could let them come in the evenings," Blaize suggested. "Don't be silly," Mira said. "They have to rise with the sun."
"Besides, the ghosts might put them off," Gar added. That was certainly true. Blaize knew Conn and Ranulf were eavesdropping every day. He could feel their presence, and very often that of other ghosts whom he didn't know, too. In the evenings, the specters appeared to discuss the issues with Gar and Alea with enthusiasm and fascination. Several times arguments broke out between ghosts, and the living people began to realize that some of the ghosts were sages themselves. Finally Mira asked one of them, an old woman in a hooded robe, "Are you a magician?"
"Don't you dare call me that(" the old woman snapped. "Oh, I've seen our descendants take that title and start using the powers to intimidate people, but we didn't! Well, not most of us," she amended. "We were shamans, girl, and don't you forget it!"
"I won't," Mira promised, wide-eyed. "What is a shaman?" The old woman sighed. "A sort of combination of priest, healer, counselor, teacher, and sage, young lady-all that, and more, even, yes, a little bit of a magician. We don't like that term, though: Our descendants have made it an obscenity by their corruption and cruelty."
"You're a wise woman(" A bit of Mira's fear of the supernatural came back-it was never far away.
"That does sort of wrap it all up, I suppose," the ghost said. "Then should I call you Your Wisdom?"
"You should call me Elyena and nothing more!" the old woman snapped. "I might be your great-great-great-grandmother, but don't you dare call me that, either("
Mina didn't think she could manage the string of "greats" everytime she wanted to talk to the old woman. "But-where did you gain your wisdom?"
"Why, from an older shaman, of course-several of them, in fact. But if you mean
where did they get it, why( They took the ideas of the sages and philosophers of old Terra that our great-great-grandparents brought when they colonized this planet, and they mixed it with the discoveries they'd made themselves, generations of sages and gurus and priests. That's what it was by the time I learned it, lass: a wisdom and power that's peculiar to this world of Oldeira, and don't you forget it!"
"I won't." Mira shrank away, then plucked up her nerve and asked, "Is that why you don't like this talk of the Way?"
"Oh, Taoism's sound enough-at least the classical version before the Buddhists got hold of it," Elyena grumbled. "It's part of the foundation of Oldeira's wisdom-but only part, lass! And your friend's trying to make it seem something new, something that will supplant all the philosophy we've had such a time thrashing out and blending these past five hundred years."
"Maybe the serfs need to be reminded of it" Mira felt shockingly bold offering the idea. "Maybe that way the magicians will hear of it and realize they're doing something wrong."
"Stuff and nonsense!" Elyena snorted. "They know they're doing wrong and they don't care a whir! All they care about is wealth, power, and gaining all the luxuries and pleasures they can!"
"You-you think it's wrong of Gar and Alea to try to teach, the Way, then?"
"Oh, it won't do any harm," the old woman said with a sniff, "but it won't do any good, either. You tell them I said that(" Mira did. They thought it was very interesting, but they didn't stop teaching.
After the third week, though, Gar spent an evening sitting cross-legged staring out over the valley and came back to the campfire at bedtime looking very glum.
Mira saw the look of alarm on Alea's face but also saw how quickly she masked it even as she hurried to meet Gar, and for once there was no sarcastic turn to her words. "What's happened? What's the matter?"
"Oh, just the usual human cussedness." Gar tried to smile. "They're excited by our ideas, sure enough, and they're talking about them whenever they're sure the lord's men aren't listening-but they're grumbling and complaining about their lives as much as usual, bickering and taunting each other as much as they always did. The boys are still doing their best to seduce the girls, the girls are flaunting their bodies as much as they can in those clothes, and whenever people try to take a few minutes to meditate, their spouses accuse them of laziness."
A Wizard In The Way Page 11