Valdemar Books

by Lackey, Mercedes

  Ulrich's frown faded when he heard Karal's intentions. "I didn't—think you'd care to be here," he replied, with a hesitancy he had never shown before. "You've been working hard, and I thought I'd been exploiting your good nature. I was afraid we'd overwork you—"

  Karal coughed as his cheeks heated. "Master, one of my duties is to make certain that you don't overwork." He lowered his voice to a near-whisper. "You aren't exploiting my good nature, sir. I am proud to serve and honor you as I would serve and honor my own father."

  Ulrich bowed his head, and he blinked rapidly for a moment. "Karal, you are a remarkable young man. I am proud to be here to help you when I can. Thank you. We can certainly use your services."

  Karal slipped inside the door as Ulrich held it open just enough for him to get inside. There was no furniture, just the bare wooden floor and huge pillows and featherbeds; logical, actually, since this place was meant for the comfort of gryphons, not humans. Firesong was holding forth and did not even notice as Karal took a place on the edge of the gathering, got out his pens and paper, and began taking notes in the middle of Firesong's current sentence.

  "—if all of you are really set on it, I can't see how it's going to hurt anything," the Healing Adept was saying, his voice full of contemptuous amusement. "But I repeat, I don't think that these—craftsmen of yours, these engineers, as you call them—are going to accomplish anything at all useful. Magic simply does not work the way they are used to thinking. Magic is a thing of intuition, of art; you can't dissect it, set down logic, make it march in step."

  "But haven't you been teaching me the laws of magic?" An'desha objected stubbornly. Karal's eyebrows arched in surprise, though he kept quiet, true to his promise. Was An'desha actually disagreeing with Firesong? If so, it must be for the very first time!

  "Yes, but—" Firesong floundered for a moment, then regained his poise. "But the 'laws' of magic are simply guidelines! Haven't Elspeth and Darkwind accomplished things the mages of k'Sheyna thought could not be done, simply because Elspeth was not aware that common thought was that they were impossible? That is because magic simply is not logical. It doesn't always answer the way you think it will. You can't call it to the glove like an imprinted falcon!"

  "But you won't object if I assist the engineers?" An'desha persisted. "So long as I don't use time and energy we need to put into shields?"

  He's opposing Firesong! Has the moon started rising in the west!

  Firesong flung up his hands in defeat. "How can I object to what you do with your free time?" he asked sourly. "If you want to waste it, go right ahead. I simply don't see where you are going to accomplish anything concrete."

  "Well, now that we have that out of the way, shall we get down to the business at hand?" Darkwind asked dryly.

  Firesong shrugged and sat down again, settling into a more comfortable position against one of the huge pillows, a bolster of a green so dark it approached black. Karal noted with amusement that he had chosen the only pillow in the room that harmonized with his brilliant emerald costume.

  "I asked Rris if there was any oral kyree tradition about the mage-storms that followed the Cataclysm," Darkwind told them all. "So here he is, and he's going to recite it to you."

  Rris rose from his place at Darkwind's side where he had been lying like an obedient dog, stepped forward into the center of the room, bowed his furry gray head once to all of them, and sat down on his haunches with immense dignity. :I trust you will not object if I tell it in the traditional manner!:

  "Go right ahead," Firesong said. "You might forget something if you break from tradition, else."

  Rris nodded. :Hear you all, from the times of the Change, from the times of the Falling of the Sky and the Stars,: he began, his mental voice ringing in Karal's mind. It occurred to Karal at that moment, as he scribbled furiously to get all of the story down, that he himself had changed out of all recognition ever since he had come to Valdemar. Not that long ago, simply seeing the kyree would have put him into shock. Now he was taking down what the creature dictated into his mind, without a second thought.

  Was this a good thing, or a bad one?

  Neither, he decided, as his fingers flew across the page, filling line after line with meticulous script. It's just change. You change, or you turn into a dry old stick.

  And another thing occurred to him.

  Dry old sticks break under pressure. So maybe it was a good thing after all. The last thing they all needed right now was one of their number who would snap like a twig.

  It had been a long day; it was going to get longer before Karal saw his bed. Nevertheless, when An'desha intercepted him on his way out of the gryphons' room and asked him to make a map of the way to the Compass Rose, he volunteered to act as An'desha's escort instead, after they both had some supper. Ulrich was to work with the Tayledras and Elspeth, strengthening shields again; that left Karal free to make a hasty copy of the day's notes and show An'desha the way.

  That was why they both found themselves trudging through a night made darker by the clouds still overhead, splashing through puddles left by the rain, with the sounds of carousing coming from the lantern-lit taverns all around them.

  "Thank you for coming with me to where these engineers meet," An'desha said shyly. "I would be very uncomfortable, going there alone."

  Since this would be the first time, to Karal's knowledge, that An'desha had ever left the grounds of the Palace, he suspected that "uncomfortable" was an understatement. Terrified might be more apt.

  But An'desha was set on going. He felt that someone was going to have to try to explain magic to those without it, and that he was the best person for the task. That was the argument Karal had walked in on this afternoon. An'desha had volunteered his services, and Firesong had objected.

  Firesong might be jealous; he might be afraid that An'desha will find someone else he's attracted to. I wonder if that occurred to An'desha as an explanation for all his objections?

  "I have all these notes from our meeting to deliver, and I need to get copies of what they've done for our mages," he replied. "And besides—An'desha, I know you're shy, and I just couldn't let you walk in there alone, face all those people you don't even know. That's what friends are about, right?"

  "I had hoped so." An'desha smiled tentatively. "But you are stretching yourself very thin, running errands for all of us, transcribing the notes of our meetings for us. I hadn't wanted to ask you."

  "Before this is over, we're all going to be exhausted, so don't worry about it," he told the young mage. At that moment, they reached the door of the tavern, and he paused for a heartbeat on the threshold. "Well, brace yourself. This is not going to be like anything you've ever seen before."

  An'desha did visibly brace himself, but he still winced as the door opened and a steady stream of babbling voices poured out over them.

  But the voices all stopped when people noticed just who it was that was standing in the doorway. Natoli hurried over to them, and Master Tarn was right behind her.

  "We've got notes and charts for you," Natoli began.

  "And I've got notes from the mages' meeting for you," he replied. "And more than that, I've got a mage with me who wants to show you some of how magic works." An'desha clearly wanted to shrink back away from all the people, but only his trembling hands betrayed his nervousness. "An'desha, this is Natoli, and this is Master Tarn. Ladies, this is An'desha; he's both Shin'a'in and Tayledras, and he's one of the mages that works with Lady Herald Elspeth."

  "Very pleased to see you, Master An'desha," Master Tarn said, folding her hands together and bowing a little to him, rather than seizing his hand to shake it. That was a rather tactful gesture on her part, Karal thought. "We badly need someone to help us understand how these magic powers of yours work. Right now, we're in the position of trying to read the wind."

  "I can understand," An'desha replied, so softly that Master Tam had to lean forward to hear him. "I am happy to be of help."

  "Well
, come over with us, then. Karal, I think Master Henlin wants your notes so he can have copies made; join us when he lets you go." Master Tarn took charge of An'desha as if she were used to shepherding shy youngsters all the time. Perhaps she was; it occurred to Karal that many of her students might be just as shy and introspective as An'desha. Intelligent children generally got into trouble with their less intelligent peers—it had happened that way to him when he'd been taken by the Priests, after all.

  I only hope none of her students have had half so exciting a life as An'desha. I wouldn't wish that on anyone.

  He brought the notes to Master Henlin, who was in the Masters' Room at the rear of the tavern, presiding over a sea of paper, hundreds of sheets of it, covered with figures and diagrams. Then, relieved of his burden, he hurried back out to see if An'desha was still holding up well under the scrutiny of so many strangers.

  He was—in fact, he was deep in a discussion of where magic energy came from.

  "—so some mage-schools have built up reserves, like a cistern or reservoir, and that is what their Master mages can tap into when they need it," he was saying. "It all comes from the same source, though—the energy of life that is all around us. All of us living creatures shed it as we breathe and move."

  "And what about the Adepts you mentioned?" Natoli asked. "Do they use something special? Or are there other reserves only they can use?"

  "There are," the young Adept replied, nodding. "But they are not the reserves that have been built up by other mages. Rather, they are the reserves that exist where two or more natural lines of force meet. These are called 'nodes,' and they are so powerful that only an Adept can control the energy that pools in them. Anyone else trying would either be unable to touch the power, or would be engulfed by it and devoured. Charred."

  One of the boys shivered. "Not a pleasant prospect."

  "No," An'desha replied soberly. "It is not. But you see, now, that this all does respond to natural laws. The power comes from somewhere, and goes elsewhere, like water flowing to the sea. Where it goes eventually, is to a place we call the Nether Planes, where everything is made of chaos and energy. And I suspect that it comes back into our World Plane from there, through the medium of living things."

  "Time to speculate about that when we have the leisure," Master Levy interjected, spreading a map out on the table in front of An'desha. "We've been over every thumblength of ground a half day's ride from Haven, and this is what we've found so far. Transplanted areas are in green, blasted areas are in red, transformed areas are in yellow."

  An'desha bent over the map to study it; Karal whispered to Natoli.

  "Transformed areas?" he asked. "What are those?"

  "Places where whatever was there was changed," she whispered back. "Everything in them is the same as it was, but inside those circles, it's another season. We're in late summer right now; there, it's fall, winter, or even spring. Plants that should be in fruit are blooming, or dormant, insects are dead or in cocoons or eggs, and birds or animals are in winter or courting colors."

  He blinked at her in surprise; she only grimaced. "Don't ask me, I have no notion what could have caused something like that," she told him.

  He turned his attention back to the map, thankful that there were fewer red dots than green or yellow. There definitely was a pattern there—the dots were spaced out at equal intervals, and if you followed a line of them, they would sequence as three greens, a red, and three greens and a yellow. But there didn't seem to be a center to the pattern, or a point of origin.

  "I wonder—" An'desha began, then stopped.

  "Go ahead," Master Tarn urged. "You know magic, and we don't. If you can suggest some kind of meaning or interpretation, I for one would be happy to hear it."

  "Well—I wonder if what has happened is that with the transformed and blasted places, there was too much energy brought to bear, and that is why the damage?" Then he shrugged. "I am grasping at straws."

  "That's no more than we've been doing," Master Levy confessed to him. "Let's follow that theory for a moment."

  Karal couldn't understand more than half of what either of them said, but they seemed to understand each other, and that was the important part. Since An'desha didn't seem nearly as shy of these people as he had when he'd first walked into the room, and since Natoli was immersed in the discussion and ignoring everything else, Karal finally left them and assigned himself to one of the desks where others his age were making copies of the same chart that Master Tarn had unrolled in front of An'desha.

  I can make a copy of this to take back with me; that will save these others from having to make a spare. He helped himself to pens, ink, and paper, and when he had finished that task, he began making copies of his own notes for the other Masters, just as the rest were doing.

  When his tired eyes threatened to unfocus completely, he finished one last page, and rolled up his map and the pages of descriptions of the "magic circles," and went to find An'desha.

  Despite the latter's promises to Firesong, An'desha had been giving demonstrations of mage-craft to the engineers, and he was tired and ready to go back to the Palace. When Natoli declared her intention to defect as well, the whole group broke up, yawning.

  "I'll walk back to the Palace with you," she said, as Karal handed An'desha back his cloak. "I've got a room in the wing where they put some Blues who don't have patrons or aren't highborn, and who also don't live in town. We share it with the Healer—and Bardic-trainees."

  "I'd wondered," Karal admitted, slinging his cloak around his shoulders, as Natoli found hers in the pile of student Blues. "You kept popping up in the Palace and you acted as if you belong there."

  "In a sense, it's the only home I have," Natoli admitted. "Father was Chosen after my mother died of complications of childbirth. No, it wasn't me," she added hastily. "It was a still-birth, and I was about four. He brought me with him to the Collegium since he hadn't any place else to take me, and I've spent all of my life here. When he went out on circuit, one or another of the Heralds would take care of me until he got back."

  Well, it wasn't the worst sort of childhood, though it was nothing like the warm family situation Karal had enjoyed.

  "It sounds lonely," An'desha said ingenuously as Karal opened the door and held it for the two of them.

  Natoli only shrugged as she stepped out into the dark street. "Mostly, it was odd. When Father was here, he made sure I knew he wanted me there, and that he cared about me. For lack of anything else to do, once I got old enough, I took most courses in all the Collegia except the ones in Bardic that had to do with performing and composing, and the ones in Healer's that had to do with really Healing someone. Then one day I realized what I wanted to do, I went to Master Tam and asked to be taken on, and she asked me why I had taken so long to figure out what I was good at."

  "She would," Karal said dryly. "I have the impression that Master Tam would never take an indirect route when there was a direct one available." Other students drifted along behind them, talking quietly to one another, voices murmuring across the otherwise silent street.

  "She does tend to bludgeon things," Natoli replied, but smiled. "Father was just pleased that I'd found my avocation; he granted his leave, and I've been studying with Master Tam ever since."

  "At least you had some choice in the matter," Karal replied, with some envy. "I was quite literally kidnapped by the Priests." He went on to describe his own childhood, while An'desha and Natoli both listened with interest.

  "Odd that of the three of us, I am the one who had the most normal childhood," An'desha mused. "How very strange."

  "Well, you made up for it." Karal slapped him lightly on the back. "Never mind; I've figured out that anyone who is more intelligent than the people around him has troubles as a child. The important thing is not to dwell on those troubles and make them into all you are. You should do what you can with what parts of your life you have personal control over!"

  "That makes good sense," Natoli
applauded, and changed the subject. "I wonder what late night food we can gain personal control over?"

  Several days passed, with Karal serving double duty: to the mages and with the engineers. As the days went by, the engineers collected more and more information and added it all to their charts, tables, and maps. Florian passed on a great deal more of what Master Tarn referred to as "data" from other Companions out in the field with their Heralds—all of it was pertinent, and most of it was much more accurate than the information coming from humans. After the third day of this, Karal paused in the midst of his copying, struck by the fear that all this might not be the sort of thing Vkandis would approve of his acolyte doing. After all, he hadn't seen Altra in days. Was the Sunlord annoyed with him?

  At that very moment, Altra wandered through the room, tail waving like a banner in a light breeze.

  Karal froze, and not just because Altra had appeared the moment Karal thought of him, but because it was here, in the middle of a crowd of—well—unbelievers. What were they going to think? Altra wasn't exactly inconspicuous!

  But the others did nothing unusual. The other students and teachers saw him—they avoided trampling him when he was in their path—but they didn't seem to see anything odd about him. He jumped up onto one or two tables and surveyed the figuring and charting going on with aloof interest, and none of them stared at him. He might very well have been a perfectly ordinary tavern cat.

  Considering that he was four or five times larger than any domestic housecat that Karal had ever seen, that was certainly strange!

  But Altra eventually made his way to the back of the room where Karal sat staring at him, and gave Karal an approving wink.

  :They see only what they are expecting to see,: the Firecat said cryptically. :I have more information for you. The same patterns are in Karse and southward. Tell the others. You'll get the maps and so forth that Solaris has sent you in a few days.:

  And with that, Altra strolled underneath a table, and did not come out on the other side. Karal sat there with his pen still in his fingers for a long time.