Lady of the Trillium

by Marion Zimmer Bradley

  “What did you do to the weather?” one of them asked in the voice of someone too wretched to care that he was being rude to his social superiors. “It’s not supposed to be wet here! The damp hurts my lungs.” He coughed miserably. The rest of the Vispi just huddled near the fire and looked unhappy.

  He was correct, Mikayla realized. When it snowed here, the air stayed dry. In fact, even the snow in this region was on the dry side for snow. And the air was very thin at this height.

  She remembered Uzun’s laughter when she asked why Haramis didn’t use the Vispi to carry messages to the lowlands. “That’s why you don’t leave the mountain, isn’t it?” she asked. “You’re used to thin, dry air. It’s not the heat that bothers you, it’s the humidity.”

  “My grandsire tried to go down the hill once,” one of the younger Vispi said. “He didn’t go far, and when he came back, he said it was like trying to breath adop soup!”

  “He was right,” Fiolon agreed. “After you’ve been up here awhile, you adjust to the air here. Then when you descend, what you’re breathing feels much too thick and warm.” He shrugged. “I readjusted after a day or so, of course, but I’m not at all sure that a Vispi could. I’ve never heard of one that did.”

  “I shan’t ask any of you to go down the hill, then,” Mikayla said. “As for the rain and the fog, it should be gone in another day or so, or by tomorrow if we’re really lucky. Which reminds me, everyone should stay off the plaza—I’m afraid it’s going to turn into a sheet of ice again tonight.”

  The Vispi groaned, and even the Nyssomu, who didn’t go outdoors, looked depressed. Enya sighed. “Princess, do you mind if I make up pallets on the floor here for the Vispi and let them sleep by the fire?”

  “Not if you don’t mind,” Mikayla replied. “It’s your kitchen. They certainly won’t be in my way here; so as long as they’re not in yours, I certainly have no objection.” She rose to her feet. “Thank you for the hot drinks, Enya. Fiolon and I will get out of your way now. Will an hour from now do for dinner? You don’t have to cook something fancy, anything warm will do—even adop soup.”

  Enya chuckled. “Dinner will be in the study in an hour, Princess. And I think I can do better for you than adop soup.”

  Drying the plaza was a bit more difficult than Mikayla had anticipated. Even when the sun was high the next day, it was still too cold to melt the ice and dry the solar cell. And high clouds kept drifting overhead from the direction of Mount Gidris, hiding the sun a good part of the time. At one point, it even began to snow briefly, causing both of them to dash to the workroom to stop it.

  Finally Mikayla and Fiolon bundled up in warm clothing, took a pair of torches each, and started melting the ice by nonmagical means. Since the plaza sloped gently downhill from the Tower door to the chasm, they started at the door. Once that ice melted, the water was warm enough to help melt the ice farther on. Bit by bit, they worked their way across the plaza. By sunset, about a third of it was clear of ice and dry.

  “I think that’s all we can do for today,” Mikayla said, straightening up with a sigh. Her back hurt from spending so much time stooped over holding a torch near the ground. Oh, well, she thought, at least my feet are warm. “I think we’ll be able to finish this tomorrow.”

  “If we’re lucky,” Fiolon groaned. “And if our muscles hold out.”

  “We may have charged part of it already,” Mikayla said cheerfully. “The torches aren’t just heat, they’re light as well.” She looked at Fiolon. “Do you want to see the ice caves now?”

  A low moan was his first response. Then he added, “Tomorrow, all right? All I want now is a hot bath and a warm dinner.”

  “Me, too,” Mikayla said. “We can check out the caves at midday tomorrow—we’ll be wanting to take a break then anyway.”

  “I don’t doubt that in the slightest.” Fiolon sighed. “Mika, are you sure that this is going to work?”

  “I’m not absolutely positive,” Mikayla admitted, “but I think that the chances are very good. The mirror said that the solar cell needed to be recharged, this plaza certainly looks like the part of the music boxes that has to be exposed to light for the music to play, and we are exposing it to light. So it should work.”

  “It sounds as though it should work,” Fiolon agreed, “and I certainly hope that it does. I would hate to have done all this for nothing.”

  14

  Mikayla went to bed immediately after dinner and slept the sleep of total exhaustion. When she woke the next day, she was horrified to find that the sun was already high; she had slept through half the morning. She scrambled out of bed and into her clothing, ignoring the agonized protests of her sore muscles.

  She went down the hall and poked her head into the room assigned to Fiolon. He wasn’t visible, but the lump in the bed revealed that he had overslept as well.

  “Fiolon!” she called.

  After a minute, the bedding twitched slightly and there was a reply—if one counted “Mmmph?” as a reply.

  “I’m going out to work on the plaza,” Mikayla informed him. “You can join me whenever you’re ready.”

  She stopped briefly in the study on the way downstairs to say good morning to Uzun and to tell him where she was going. The harp returned her greeting but made no other comment. She continued on to the kitchen, where she grabbed a hunk of bread and a couple of torches. She lit one of them in the fire, noticing with a small part of her mind that the Vispi who had been huddled there in misery the other night were gone, and hurried down the remaining stairs and outside.

  She stopped just outside the door and stared around her in amazement and delight. The sky was a brilliant blue, without a single cloud visible anywhere she looked. The sun was shining brightly over the entire plaza, and the air was warm! Actually, the air still felt cool as she breathed it and where it touched her face, but its temperature was obviously above freezing, for nearly all the ice on the plaza had melted. The section she and Fiolon had gone over the day before was still dry, as was an area quite a bit beyond it. Perhaps a fifth of the plaza, closest to the edge, had water running down it, dripping into the chasm below.

  Mikayla ate her bread while she inspected the plaza, then lit the second torch from the first and continued the task of drying the portion of the plaza that was still wet. To her delight, the job went quickly, and she had made significant progress by the time Fiolon joined her. With his help, the job was soon done. By lunchtime, they surveyed a clear, dry plaza/solar cell, which was efficiently soaking up the sun’s light. When Mikayla, out of curiosity, took off her mittens and gloves and bent to touch the ground, she nearly burned her hand. She was so excited, however, that she didn’t care.

  “This should do it, Fiolon,” she said. “The mirror should work now. Let’s go look at it!”

  “Did you eat breakfast?” Fiolon asked.

  Mikayla stared at him. “How can you think of food at a time like this?”

  Fiolon chuckled. “Because it is a time like this, and because I know you, Mika. Once you get into the cave, you’re going to want to spend the rest of the day there. So let’s eat lunch first, all right?”

  “Lunch.” Mikayla looked at him in disgust. “The wonders of the Vanished Ones wait for us and you want to go eat lunch.”

  “The wonders of the Vanished Ones aren’t going anywhere,” Fiolon pointed out. “They’ve been here for at least a couple of hundreds, so they can wait for us a little bit longer. Besides,” he added with a grin, “your stomach is growling.”

  Unfortunately, he was correct. Mikayla’s stomach obviously didn’t share her enthusiasm for research. “Oh, all right”—she sighed with a martyred air—“if you insist.”

  “I do insist,” Fiolon replied, grabbing her arm and towing her toward the kitchen.

  After lunch they took a lantern—Fiolon vetoed torches on the grounds that some of the material stored on the lower level might be flammable, explosive, sensitive to heat, or have all of those properties—and wen
t down to the storage level. Fiolon examined the writing on the boxes with interest. “I wish I could read this language,” he said.

  “Or even puzzle out this alphabet,” Mikayla added. “Maybe we can find some way to learn it.”

  “That would be interesting,” Fiolon admitted, following her into the tunnel.

  Since they had a lantern with them, Mikayla did not bother to light the ones along the tunnel, but simply hurried along until she and Fiolon arrived at the door to the cave. Together they dragged the door open enough for them to go through and then Mikayla led the way to the room with the “magic mirror.”

  “Oh!” Fiolon gasped, obviously impressed.

  “Request, please,” the voice said. The voice was much stronger than it had been a few days before, and Mikayla noticed that there was less frost on the wall around the mirror, giving the mirror a larger surface area.

  “View Princess Haramis of Ruwenda,” she said promptly.

  “Scanning.” The picture appeared in the mirror, as it had before. But the colors were no longer dim, and the details were so clear that it seemed as though one could reach out and touch Haramis, who lay sleeping, with Ayah sitting by the side of the bed, keeping watch over her. Haramis still looked like a sick old woman, but her breathing was strong and regular—and clearly audible through the mirror. Mikayla could even hear the soft creak of the chair when Ayah shifted her position in it.

  “By the Flower,” Fiolon whispered. “I wonder what else it can do?”

  “I wonder,” Mikayla murmured.

  “Request, please,” the voice said again, although the view of Haramis did not change.

  “View Quasi,” Mikayla said, curious as to how their old friend and guide fared these days.

  “Subject not on file,” the mirror replied.

  It doesn’t know who Quasi is, Mikayla realized, but there may be another way to get the same results. “View Citadel Knoll,” she said. The mirror obligingly displayed a picture of the Citadel and the knoll around it. The viewpoint made it appear that they were hanging in midair above it, looking down.

  Mikayla chewed her lip, trying to guess how to word the next request. “View land to the west of the Citadel Knoll,” she said, hoping that the mirror would understand her words as she meant them.

  “Static view or scan?” it asked.

  Since Mikayla wasn’t sure what the choices meant, she picked one at random. “Scan.”

  The picture in the mirror began moving, as though they were flying westward from the Citadel. Mikayla mentally tucked this away as the mirror’s meaning for “scan” and watched carefully for Quasi’s village. “Stop,” she said as soon as it came into sight. She frowned at the picture in the mirror. It didn’t look right. The colors were wrong for this time of year.

  “I wish we could see this closer,” Fiolon muttered beside her.

  “Close view on structures?” the mirror asked.

  Mikayla and Fiolon looked at each other and shrugged in perfect unison. “Yes,” Mikayla replied.

  The village in the picture grew larger, as if they were dropping toward it. Now Mikayla could see why the colors were wrong. The vegetation around the village was dying. As the picture in the mirror got closer to the ground, she could see several Nyssomu sitting on a bench outside one of their huts. Quasi was one of them.

  “There’s Quasi!” Fiolon said excitedly. “I haven’t seen him in ages, not since Haramis brought us here.” He frowned. “He looks a lot older, doesn’t he, Mika? Has it really been that long?”

  Mikayla counted on her fingers as the mirror said, “Identify subject Quasi.”

  “He’s the one in the middle,” she told it absently, while adding to Fiolon, “No, it’s only been two years—or maybe three. I tend to lose track of time here, but it hasn’t been that long.”

  In the picture Quasi’s figure was suddenly outlined in bright red. “Subject Quasi?” the voice asked.

  “Yes,” Mikayla replied. “That’s Quasi.”

  “Subject Quasi marked for future reference.”

  Whatever that means, Mikayla thought. Then the mirror added sound to its picture.

  “The rains are out of season,” one of the Oddlings was saying.

  “And the ground trembles,” another one added as he approached the group on the bench. “These are evil omens.”

  “Why does the Archimage not mend the land?” someone asked. “Quasi, you have met her. Is she not a powerful sorceress? Why does she allow this to happen?”

  Quasi looked unhappy. “She’s ill,” he said. “One of my sisters is a healer—”

  “We know that,” the first Oddling interrupted him.

  “—and she was summoned to the Citadel several weeks ago to treat the Archimage,” Quasi continued. “With swamp-worm venom,” he finished ominously.

  Apparently everyone in the group knew what that implied, judging from the virtually identical looks of dismay. “Will she recover?” one asked.

  “My sister thinks so,” Quasi replied. He looked around at the dying plants. “Let us pray to the Lords of the Air that she will recover soon. It goes ill with the land when the Archimage grows old and ill.”

  Mikayla frowned and noticed that Fiolon looked dismayed as well. Now that Quasi mentioned it, she could feel what he was talking about. Dimly she could sense wrongness throughout Ruwenda, as if the land itself were ill. She felt a bit ill herself. The land was out of control; things were going wrong, and she felt that she should be able to fix them, but she didn’t know how. Obviously her need for magical training had just become much more urgent than it had been when Haramis was well and controlling everything. Which meant that finding Uzun a body so he could train her properly should be done right away. Could the mirror find help for her?

  Mikayla pondered how to word her question. “Scan magicians,” she said, a bit tentatively.

  “Specify all or by race.”

  Mikayla thought about that one for a minute. “Human,” she finally said.

  The mirror displayed a series of pictures of humans working magic, changing from one to another at short intervals. Mikayla recognized one of them as a magician who came to the Citadel from time to time—he had produced some truly spectacular illusions for one of Prince Egon’s birthday parties. Suddenly she gasped and said, “Stop!”

  “Hold this display and mark for future reference?”

  “Yes,” Mikayla said, staring in fascination at the screen. A small group of humans stood around a table on which a wooden statue of a woman lay. One of them was anointing the body with some kind of ointment while one stood at the head, swinging a thurible that gave off a thick cloud of incense, and one held something to the mouth. The statue had painted open eyes and looked amazingly lifelike.

  A man stood to one side, reading aloud. “Opening of the mouth,” he said, obviously beginning a set of instructions. The phrases that followed made no sense to Mikayla, but she continued to watch as they went through the ceremony, dressed the statue in fresh clothing, and lifted it to a standing position. A pile of clothing that had apparently been removed from it earlier lay on the floor next to the table.

  Mikayla looked at their surroundings, trying to find some clue as to where they were. A small room with a low ceiling, which was quite crowded with the number of people in it. The room was apparently cut out of solid rock, but there was no ice on the walls. Mikayla suspected that it was probably in the mountains somewhere, but where? “Where are they?” she wondered aloud.

  “Locate Temple of Meret?” the voice asked.

  “Is this view the Temple of Meret?” Mikayla asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Locate Temple of Meret,” Mikayla repeated.

  The view changed to a map of the Peninsula. There was a black dot, which Mikayla realized was her own location, and a red dot on the north side of Mount Gidris, near the top of the mountain, but definitely on the Labornoki side of the peak. Some lettering appeared next to both dots, but it was in the same unknown al
phabet as the lettering on the boxes outside.

  “I do wish I could read that!” Fiolon said in frustration. Mikayla didn’t blame him. He had been silent and patient while she had been watching the magic, probably realizing, as she did, that the mirror would consider anything said to be a new request.

  Obviously that was how it viewed Fiolon’s outburst. “Initiate reading tutorial?” it asked.

  Mikayla and Fiolon looked at each other, wide-eyed with surprise. What is this thing? Mikayla wondered. I do hope we can get it to tell us someday. In the meantime … She nodded at Fiolon to indicate that he should answer the mirror.

  “Yes,” Fiolon said, his voice cracking with a mixture of excitement and nervousness.

  “Name of student?”

  Fiolon gulped. “Fiolon of Var,” he replied.

  “Name of second student?”

  Mikayla exchanged a glance with Fiolon, shrugged, and said simply, “Mikayla.”

  The mirror went blank and then showed a character, next to a picture of a small house. “Alef,” it said.

  “Alef,” Fiolon repeated.

  The mirror repeated the process with four more characters, and then it showed only a line of five characters without their accompanying pictures. One of them lit up.

  Fiolon was silent, and Mikayla wondered what the mirror wanted him to do. But she didn’t dare ask, or say anything. After about half a minute, the mirror said, “Alef.”

  “Oh, I see,” Fiolon said. “It’s testing me to see if I recognize the letters.”

  “Alef,” the mirror repeated.

  “Alef,” Fiolon replied.

  The letter flashed again, and Fiolon said “Alef” without being prompted. Apparently the mirror approved, for it went on to the next letter. Fiolon rattled them off with no further hesitation. The mirror then repeated the exercise again. Fiolon did it perfectly, and the mirror went back to displaying individual characters, new ones this time.

  Fiolon and the mirror went through the process four more times, with the final display showing twenty-five characters in five lines of five. Apparently this was the entire alphabet, for after Fiolon had named them all correctly, the mirror said, “Lesson One completed for student Fiolon of Var.”