by Amy Keeley
She remembered what it had felt like when she’d touched one of Zhiv’s spells. The moments when emotions had come clearly through probably wouldn’t exist here. The best casters didn’t allow emotions to muddy their spells. She thought of the way the door in the Felldesh manor had felt with its strange magic, and the way Zhiv’s room had felt afterward when he’d helped her sister. What would it be like to touch a spell from the ancient past, one that hadn’t been altered? Would it be worse? Better? Or just strange? Hesitantly, she reached out and touched the top wheel.
A flood of emotions raced through her and it was almost as if the person—no, the woman—who had cast this were standing in front of her. Happiness: the woman had given birth a few months previous and was looking forward to holding her baby when she was finished. Concern: this door had to be kept secret. Clarity: the woman’s mind was even more focused than Zhiv’s if that were possible, the previous emotions melting away into an awareness of a rhythm that hummed under Krysilla’s feet. Because it reminded her of the Disciples’ clock, she listened as well, falling into the thump, thump, thump that vibrated along the floor, going deep into the rock.
And then the rhythm began to speed up. Slowly, she felt a spell wrap around her fingers, traveling up her arm. There was no pain. In fact, it seemed to fit, reminding her of the clock’s gears. In her mind’s eye she saw a vast network of pipes, made out of the rock itself, and in those pipes was heat unlike anything she’d experienced. It flowed like water, and burned like the wood of the furnace except much, much hotter. And it was stopped. Gates prevented the heat from flowing, and she saw water and pipes that connected to the water and a stone door, in the same room as the wheels, so heavy it wasn’t possible for anyone to open it, even using magic. But the magic in the wheels, she realized, opens what blocks the pipes, and that must open the door and—
Someone was calling her name.
She shook her head, unwilling to let go of this marvelous system. How did it work? What would she need to open first? There were multiple pipes. Did that mean each one had to be—someone kept calling her—opened individually, or would the rest—couldn’t this person be quiet for just one—would follow—a hand jerked her back.
She landed with a thump on her back. Her heart stopped. She couldn’t feel it beating. When it did start, it felt as if someone had hit her in the chest with a hammer. She gasped and wanted to arch her back but couldn’t from the pain.
“Krysilla?” The urgency of Zhiv’s tone made her look for him. He was lying beside her, his blanket gone, and his eyes focused on her with an intensity that she realized was near-panic. “What happened?”
She shook her head, unable to describe it at first. “Clockwork,” she finally said. “It’s all clockwork.” Though clockwork didn’t adequately describe it.
“What do you mean?” His palm pressed against her forehead, then her cheek and neck. She realized he was holding the King’s Light above her, moving it around her head as he looked her over. “Are you tired at all?”
“Did you expect me to push myself?”
“I didn’t expect a lot of things that just happened.”
Confused, she shook her head.
“Leaving aside the obvious feel of magic around you, no matter how often I called you, you stared at the wheels, completely transfixed. It was as if you’d fallen asleep with your eyes open.”
“You mean, dreaming.”
“There was nothing dreamlike about it. What did you see?”
She sat up, her chest still aching, and winced. “It hurts?” he asked.
She nodded, and remembered what he’d said. “I thought you said it wouldn’t.”
“It shouldn’t have done anything to you.” Yes, he was very concerned now. “When Daegan and I touched it, all we got was that there was a spell in it and that it used Ornic technique.”
She shut her eyes and tried to think of the possibilities. “Is it based on gender then, casting?”
“No, but I’ve heard stories of casters having an affinity for each other. That’s why some Ornic cast together instead of singly. I’d always thought it was because of friendship or mutual interests or something like that.”
“Perhaps that’s all this is.” She didn’t mention that the woman had been looking forward to returning to her child. That brought back a longing that she knew would turn sharp if she spoke of it. Instead, she tried to describe the other emotions she’d felt, the pipes she’d seen and the heat inside them. She mentioned the water, and the door she’d seen. She even mentioned the strange sensation of a spell creeping up her arm. Certain she’d failed, she rubbed her side when she finished, wondering if she could stand up yet.
Zhiv sat next to her, staring at the floor. “Let me see your arm.”
“It’s probably nothing.”
“If you ever say that about an Ornic spell again I will reconsider everything I ever said about teaching you.”
She held out her arm and he examined her hand, turning it this way and that, holding it with his eyes closed, as he had with the spell bound in her wrist. “It didn’t linger, whatever it was. I can’t find a trace on you.” He got up and examined the wheels as well. “Something’s changed, but I can’t tell what. It’s small. Very small.”
“You don’t sound relieved.”
He sighed. “Ornic spells, from what I’ve seen, are very efficient. Very compact. Some spells nowadays have flourishes or extra movement that’s meant to obscure the actual casting. Not an Ornic spell. And something this complex, with as many pipes as it has—”
She realized he spoke as if he’d personally investigated it. “You already knew everything I told you.”
“Not how you would react,” he said, still looking at the wheels. Tentatively, he reached out and brushed his fingers against their surface, then put a palm squarely on them. Shaking his head, he got up and came back to sit next to her. She had never seen him this troubled.
“Did this ruin a plan of yours?”
His smile was more of a wistful smirk. “Very much so.” He sighed and held up the King’s Light so some of it fell on the wheels. “You have many talents, goodwife. We all do. The ideal Ornic aspired to becoming proficient in all twelve domains. But everyone has one they’re better in than another and yours, I feel, is rhythm. Didn’t you feel a pull in the clock tower? No, you wouldn’t. There’s no spell to make sure the time stays regulated.”
She had never seen him appear so focused or sober. Even when he finally turned back to her, he spoke with a seriousness that seemed out of character for the carefree minstrel she knew. “I brought you here, both to show you this, and to show you some basic defense spells.” He paused, then ran the fingers of one hand through his hair, messing it up worse than before. “It wouldn’t be much.” He stared at the wheels. “Daegan tried, you know. He touched the floor and felt the pipes I’d found, and knew most of what you’d told me.” Zhiv shook his head slowly. “But he didn’t get yanked into it like you did. Just felt a little tired for a few days and that didn’t slow him down.” Zhiv got up and brushed himself off. “Can you stand?”
She wanted to laugh at how their situations had reversed. But the ache in her chest was receding, her heart beating as it always had. Still, there was a terror in each pause now that she couldn’t shake and that made her knees weak as she got up. “I think,” she said, then swayed as the room spun.
Zhiv caught her before she fell. Being in his arms, she thought as she tried to focus, is much nicer than I expected.
“I can’t carry you, goodwife,” he said against her hair. “I’m sorry. We’ll stay here unless you feel well enough to walk.”
She nodded and they sat down on the floor. Zhiv wrapped his blanket around her. “No,” she said. “I’m not the one getting over a fever.”
“It’s gone and won’t come back,” he said. “It’s uncomfortable enough, trying to rest in a room like this. Better to keep you warm, at least.”
He didn’t look at her as he said this and she won
dered if he felt guilty. Trying to get his mind off it, because this had been her choice, after all, she said, “What did you cast before I met you?”
“Hmm?”
“You had a fever when I met you. What had you done?”
He took a deep breath. “Oh, nothing much.”
“You had a fever. It must have been something.”
“I’m a very weak caster.”
“Not from what I’ve seen.”
“Compared to a king—”
“Everyone’s weaker than the King, except the King himself and he stays in his castle to protect his subjects from his own strength.” She recited the words she’d heard all her life. “You stood against a noble.”
“One of the weaker ones.”
“But still a noble. Do you remember what you said to me in the meadow? You held out your hand and asked what I might accomplish, given time.”
“You should rest, goodwife.”
She got up and leaned on one elbow. “I chose this, Hon Mikailsin.”
“So, we’re back to formalities?” He still didn’t look at her. “I didn’t have to involve you.”
“At the Felldesh manor?”
“I meant when I saw you in the market.”
Unsure what he meant, for his words sometimes meant more than they appeared or nothing at all, she waited for him to explain.
“I’d traveled a good while and taken my time. The King was right when he accused me of trying out magic along rivers. It wasn’t anything disruptive. A pull here or there, just to see if I could do it. And I was traveling along the Naryaset that time. It’s big enough, I didn’t think anyone would notice. I should have taken a boat, but the skimmers would have felt me trying to help them move the boat through the water and that was too great a risk with the King wondering if he could trust me or not. I convinced the King to keep the Dogs from the Felldesh manor this time because, I explained, they stand out. Plus, when a Dog is told there might be trouble in an area, they go looking for it and usually find it. If there’s nothing to find, I told him, their presence might create the very trouble we’re trying to stop. This is a sordid affair that should be kept as hidden as possible. Besides, it’s a small, quiet community. The market is nowhere near, the Dogs can patrol that all they want. Just leave the village and the manor alone, as you’ve always done.” He pulled his knees up to his chin. “Did anyone ever tell you that? That the Dogs rarely visited your area?”
“We all knew. Though, I heard they snuck in sometimes, dressed as a tradesman.”
“Possibly a minstrel?” Glancing sidelong at her with a brief smile, he continued. “The King agreed. It was a rare opportunity that I didn’t dare trust. Not at first. But along the way, I found a cave. And inside the cave was a lake. It was perfect. I could practice some water spells and no one would be any the wiser. If any sign appeared above, well, I just had to hope the King wasn’t lying when he said the Dogs wouldn’t follow me there. So I practiced. I tried all sorts of spells that had to do with water, from moving things along its surface, to trying to do so without the item getting wet, to moving the water itself in larger and larger amounts. I spent a whole morning there.” She could tell from his tone and the faint smile growing on his face that it was one of the more enjoyable times he’d had. “When I was done, I dried everything that had gotten wet, even though the casting took a little out of me, and got ready to play at the market.”
“You wanted a stream of income the King couldn’t track?”
Now, his smile grew full. “I can’t make too much or else I can’t explain where it went, but yes, I told the King I play so that I won’t be a drain on the treasury, and I pocket what I can out of what doesn’t sustain me as I travel. It’s not as much as you might think, but more than what most expect for a lowly minstrel.”
“So that’s how you got the fever.”
“I was already feeling unwell when I was at the market, but it wasn’t as bad as it’s been in the past. I saw this woman looking over spellbooks. She was beautiful, her raven hair—”
“No lies. Please.”
He gazed at her for a long while. “Are you sure? I could make the story of our meeting sound like some great romantic tragedy worthy of the ancient tales.”
“And it would be untrue. I’d rather hear how you truly saw me.”
Now he looked uncomfortable. “It was when I saw you had looked at the locksmith book and instead chose a book on baking that I was sure you didn’t need, that’s when I knew I had found something interesting.” He leaned his head against the palm of his hand. “I had no idea what your main strength might be. I considered fire, but that’s a very temperamental kind of domain and you reminded me more of Daegan, whose domain is earth. But I did know that I was out a locksmith. Daegan had too much work. He refused to join me and I nearly told the King I had to have him with me to undo the lock.”
“Why did the King let you go without one?”
“I told him I’d gotten what I needed from Daegan. The rest was just application.”
Krysilla laughed, then winced. Her chest still ached. She remembered his glance when he’d played the music that had gone straight to her heart. “Then you played for me?”
“You looked like the kind who might appreciate a song.”
“It was a very appropriate song,” she murmured. Her instinct back then had been correct; he’d wanted to draw her closer. She wasn’t sure how she felt about that now.
“It was a guess.”
Some of her former anger at him returned at his confession. “You knew what it would do to me, then?”
“If you’re asking if I thought it would make you more pliable, I thought it unlikely.” But that, she noticed, didn’t mean he thought there was no chance. “As I said, you reminded me of Daegan. He’s not completely intractable, but it certainly is a waste of time trying to get him to move when he refuses. And casting a persuasion on you would take out most of the fun.”
“Fun.” Krysilla shifted on the hard cavern floor to get a better view of him. “That’s what you called it?”
“What else was it?”
“Terrifying. My husband treated me worse—”
“Your husband never had much respect for you to begin with. I seem to remember you realized that at the Felldesh manor.” His eyes glittered with remembered fury.
She thought of her husband’s infidelity, of his desperate attempt to forget someone he ended up bedding not long after they were married. And all those long nights when she wondered what she had done to push him away.
Zhiv continued. “I played one song more, then raced down the road, hoping I could find a way to catch up with you.”
He’d noticed her distress then. The thought twisted her inside. “And what did you hope for when you caught me?”
“Oh, I’m sure you know how little I was thinking when we did meet. I barely recognized your face when I saw you looking down at me. Even then, as I slipped back into decent thought, I wondered if I’d just been dreaming when I saw you, and that I’d allowed myself to wander into a trap. When I was coherent, and saw how things had turned out—”
“Your good fortune, you mean.”
He lay down himself, facing her. “Now who’s beginning to sound arrogant.” His grin warmed her heart, in spite of the pain his confirmation of her thoughts gave her. “The more I learned about you, the more I realized you could be part of what Daegan and I had begun to build. And when I found out who you were, who your husband was (and by then I knew what he’d been doing) and I saw you...at the risk of sounding impertinent, you deserved better. You were better than expected with magic not your own, you—”
“When did you decide I was perfect?”
Zhiv hesitated. “When I caught you in the forest. Anyone willing to take a risk, real or imagined, like you did...see, it’s not the talent or ability that’s most important. That’s what I learned watching the nobles that visited the King. It’s the desire. If you want to cast badly enough, it doesn�
��t matter whether you cast well or poorly, starting out. The desire and practice will give you what those lackluster pupils among the noble classes rarely get. That’s what I’ve experienced.”
“And Hon Jixsin?”
“He’s a master locksmith, but he’s not as good as his father, and he knows it. He doesn’t have the interest his father did. That, and a few moments of clarity—”
“Provided by you, I imagine.”
Zhiv only smiled. “Something to show him it might be wise to learn something the Dogs and the nobles can’t get around. Not to mention I’ve got this amazing door that he can’t open. Not even his father worked with a system like this.” He stared ahead, his thoughts drifting away from her.
“So,” she said, “how do I pay you for the spells I’ll learn?”
“You’ll owe me.” A smile slowly spread across his face.
“Owe you what?”
“Whatever I decide the skills are worth. A favor isn’t worth anything until a true need appears.” She had thought he would grow more mischievous as he said that. Instead, the words seemed to make him more tired than before. He closed his eyes. “Enough talking. Rest.”
Krysilla remembered Ziria. “Your sister is supposed to—”
“She’s used to showing up and not finding me there. If she’s brought food, she’ll leave it in the kitchen.”
She thought of the map. “Are we truly hidden here, even with the map in Lord Teranasin’s hands?”
He opened his eyes, and his smile was the one of a man who’s been caught in a lie yet doesn’t mind. “No. Not if Vyomsi is truly alive. Best to get in some rest now while we can.”
“And push ourselves learning spells the rest of the time.”
“Then rest, then push, then rest, and hope we’re prepared when we have to go back.”
Krysilla sat up. “What?”
“Of course. A man kills the royal family and the only witnesses hide out in a cave for the rest of their lives? No. Not if one of them is me.”
That made sense, and she felt miserable that she hadn’t considered it. “Who are we going to tell?”