“If he will hear it from me.”
“You are the only one here except your lord father who can help. Should I ask Lord Zelan then?”
Ander snorted.
“I thought not.” Kirian smiled at him.
“I cannot force Lord Callo to listen to me.”
“No, I will try to do that. You have my thanks, my lord. I do not know why you should care, though.”
“You do not understand either, Hon Kirian.” He looked into her eyes, trying to convey the seriousness of the situation. “I will never be lord here, and I am not yet of age, but these are still my people. If Lord Callo loses control—of what looks to be a strong talent—he will not hurt just himself, but others I have known all my life. He wants to protect me? Gods know, I am grateful you and he happened along last night in time to save me. But an untrained color mage is no asset to us, Hon Kirian. Any mage I know would consider him a threat.”
Kirian inclined her head. “Then I will make sure he understands that,” she said quietly. “Thank you, my lord.”
* * * * *
Ander stood in the clearing, light filtering down through the leaves onto his dark, wavy hair, and held out his arms to either side of his body to illustrate a point. “It’s all about balance,” he told Callo earnestly.
Callo leaned up against Miri’s side as she grazed next to Ander’s long-legged colt. Here in the clearing, just off one of Northgard’s trails, the summer heat was muted to a bearable level, and a slight breeze danced with the leaves overhead. The same current of fresh air lifted tendrils of Callo’s hair from his perspiring neck. It was an afternoon for lying drowsily under the trees, not for learning mage theory from an adolescent. Callo sighed and closed his eyes for a brief moment, then focused on Ander again. As he looked up, he saw the boy’s eyes fixed on his face.
“I recognize that look,” Ander said with a shy grin. “My lord, I have given it to my tutor often enough. I did not expect to see it on your face.”
Callo grinned. “I apologize. It is a sweet day, Lord Ander. Even a man grown can be seduced by a day like this one.”
“I will have to tell Shan-il.—But my lord, we have just a little time today.” Ander looked down the slope, where four guardsmen waited just within sight.
The guardsmen had conceded them a little time to themselves, but would not allow Ander to go out of the immediate grounds of the manse. Safe as it was in Northgard’s territory, there was always a threat to the heir to the throne—especially from the Sword of Jashan, which had been escalating its attacks against the persons and property of the righ.
Callo sighed and stood straight. “Balance. Tell me about this balance, then.”
“My teachers told me that the energies we manipulate cannot be forced. They said the color magery is always there, like the heat under the earth that makes a volcano.”
“It sometimes feels like a volcano.”
“If the pressure lies in the rock unrelieved, forced down, sooner or later it explodes. Mage Oron says it can blow the whole top off a mountain. It must be an amazing sight.”
“I have heard there are volcanoes in the southeastern seas,” Callo said. “But there are no descriptions of their eruption—for good reason, I would think.”
“Shan-il told me that the liquid fire from a volcano can burn everything in its path, even houses and things made of metal.” Ander sounded impressed. He was still holding his arms out to each side, as if testing the breeze. Not for the first time, Callo thought Ander was young for his age. He wondered how the boy had grown up so innocent, being raised at least in part in Sharpeyes’ cynical court. Innocence would not be a factor in favor of Ander’s survival when he eventually inherited the throne.
“Anyway,” the boy continued, “if there are other ways for the pressure to escape, like cracks in the rock to allow the fire to escape, the volcano does not erupt. If it does, it is less dangerous. Its force has been balanced with the outside.”
“Balanced,” Callo repeated, thinking.
Ander said, “The way to cope with the energies is not to try to force them down. We are not strong enough. Not even the King is strong enough for such a thing. Mage Oron told me never to try such a thing, that I could destroy myself and others.”
“Mage Oron is your tutor? He taught Lord Arias as well—my half-brother, you know.”
“The King my uncle introduced me to Lord Arias. I like him. He is always laughing, isn’t he?”
“Yes, he is.” Callo wondered how things were going for Arias, now that he was freed from the Collar. Then he sighed and tried to redirect his thoughts back to the subject at hand.
Ander leaned forward. “You have to let go of some of the color magery, Lord Callo.”
Callo grimaced. “It is a firestorm inside of me, Lord Ander. Letting it go—seems dangerous advice.”
“If you use it, let it balance with the external energies, then you will not be in so much pain. You will be able to accept the rest of it, and take it in.”
Callo tried to deny it. Then he looked at the boy who was trying to help him and decided to opt for honesty. “I am indeed in some pain. But if I release this energy, I fear the consequences.”
“There is a certain way you have to do it. And not through the sword ritual. That is Jashan’s worship, and it will add to the energies rather than help reduce them. It is Jashan’s fire, after all—the color magery.”
Callo’s head was beginning to hurt. “Look, young lord, I do Jashan’s discipline each day. Since I was younger than you are, Jashan has put his shoulder between me and what lives within me.” Callo stopped. There was no way he could explain to this boy that, long before he had known he was a color mage, he had enlisted the god’s help in controlling the psychic magery, so that he would not use it to influence the emotions of others against their will.
Ander must have seen that Callo was closing him out. The boy had stopped his fidgeting. He sat very still, looking into Callo’s eyes. “You have to listen to me or maybe another color mage if you do not trust me. Mage Oron can show you techniques to do this thing. You don’t understand. You can die from this, Lord Callo.”
“Oh, I understand that perfectly.” He remembered too well how he had fought the resurgent energies on the boat that had carried them back to Righar, and how he had almost failed to hold them back. “I will listen. I want you to understand, young lord, that there are circumstances here you do not know. I cannot just—release everything.”
“You may need to, to stay sane.” That was quietly said. At once the boy, who had seemed a fidgety child a moment before, had the solemnity of a future king. “You need Mage Oron, or some other instructor with experience, Lord Callo. Or the consequences may be very bad.”
“I understand.” He gave a short bow. “And I appreciate your guidance, my lord. Now you must allow me time to consider. I will be here, oh, a little longer. I will discuss this with you again.”
Callo turned the matter of the color magery over and over in his head that day, considering it from every angle. He knew he dared not let down his barriers; that would risk losing his hard-won control over the ku’an magery as well. Perhaps as the young lord went back over his instruction, something else would occur to him. Callo knew very well the delicate balance the color mages kept between the world and the magery; he remembered Arias’s mage cloak, which had allowed him to divert a constant stream of the energy into a harmless play of pattern and color. That level of control was far beyond him.
He feared his attempt to control the fire inside of him would be his last. It was better to ignore it, and never use it at all.
Chapter Three
Kirian woke with a hand on her shoulder, shaking her.
“Wake up, Hon Kirian. Wake up! You’re dreaming.” It was an unfamiliar female voice, perhaps a maid. Kirian must have been making quite a bit of noise for a servant to have dared to wake her.
Kirian’s forehead was wet with perspiration, even here on the second floor of the ma
nse where cool air drifted through the window. Her blanket was in a crumpled pile at her feet. She sat up and felt the maid’s hand drop from her shoulder. The muscles of her upper arm hurt as if she had strained them in her sleep.
“I am so sorry, Hon Healer. You sounded so scared.” The maid’s voice trembled, as if she was afraid that Kirian would punish her for interfering. Kirian felt only gratitude. It had been a shocking dream; she could not remember the gist of it, but she felt every nerve scraped raw.
“It’s all right,” she told the maid, recovering enough to speak. “Thank you. You are?”
“Soni, Hon Healer. I was bringing up the tea when I heard you.” Soni shuddered. “You sounded scared out of your mind.”
“You did right. Thank you.” Kirian took a deep breath and looked around at her little closet-like room, at the opened window, at the pearly morning light in the east. The tea, sitting on a tray in the corner, smelled sweet.
“Are you all right now?” Soni asked.
“Yes, thank you. I hope I did not disturb anyone else.”
“I don’t think so, Hon Kirian. Need I stay with you? I still have to take tea to the others.”
“I don’t need any help. You may go.”
Soni bobbed her head and retreated, leaving a cup of tea and taking the tray out with her to finish her rounds. Kirian sat for a moment in the bed, recovering her calm. The dreams had been growing more frequent, and she was beginning to think she knew why.
She had been sleeping in the Deer Hills the night the first strange dream visited her, curled up in a nest of blankets as they fled King Martan’s pursuit and headed to warn the young heir that his sheltered life was about to change. She had another nightmare a few days after, filled with an incomprehensible mourning that dripped from her fingers and toes like sludge. A bad dream here or there—she had thought them the product of all the changes in her life over the last three seasons, her emotions struggling to keep up with the stresses of her days.
This last one had been bad. Her heart was still beating too fast. In addition to the pain in her muscles, a sort of shocked hyperawareness inhabited her now, a remnant of the nightmare. She drank her tea, trying to calm down.
After a few minutes she dressed, used her tooth cleaner, and combed her hair. She stepped out into the corridor. She and Lord Callo were housed here in the east wing of the manse. She knew Chiss slept in the servants’ hall. This was no tremendous castle, like Seagard; this was the manor house of a country lord, and there was little room for other than the lord’s family and house servants.
She went into the kitchen for more tea, since it was too early for breakfast to be set. A scullery maid got her a fresh cup; Kirian thought the girl looked worn and tired. As she thanked the maid and looked around for Chiss, she heard the cook berating the kitchen boy. A crash reverberated through the room, as if someone had thrown something in a fit of temper. It seemed Kirian was not the only resident of the manse that was irritable from sleeplessness this morning.
She found Chiss in the kitchen and drew him aside, where the cook and other servants could not hear them.
“Chiss. Are you well?” He looked wan, his eyes a little red.
He cast her an unreadable look. “Perfectly well, Hon Kirian.”
“And my lord? Is he awake already?”
“Not yet.”
“Chiss, have you been having any unusual dreams?”
Another level glance, full of comprehension. “Why?”
“I must confess, mine are growing—very bad. And more frequent. Are you experiencing anything like that?”
He took a deep breath. “I am.”
“And my lord?”
“I don’t know.”
“Chiss, you know what this might mean.”
Two more servants entered the kitchen. Chiss looked towards them, and then walked out the door. Kirian followed him into an empty parlor. The fire in the room had grown cold. Ashes spilled out over the hearth, which was awaiting a cleaning.
“Hon Kirian, I don’t know what this should mean.”
“Chiss, you must have thought. Could the ku’an magery be causing this?”
“My lord has maintained control of the psychic magery for all his life. The ritual helps him keep it behind a barrier except when he chooses to let it go. Why would his control be failing now?”
“You don’t mean that.” Kirian put her hands on her hips, exasperated. “When all he had to worry about was the ku’an talent, he did very well. Now he is a color mage as well. Lord Ander says the magery is out of control. He told me the first two years of his training were devoted to learning ways to keep the energies under control. Callo has had none of that. I think the stresses are beginning to get away from him.”
“You think these dreams are the ku’an influence? That he is using it without knowing, on you and me?”
“Well, I wonder if that is it.”
Chiss gave a dry laugh. “I beg you will not tell him that.”
“That he is influencing us?”
“He would not take it well.”
Kirian knew Callo had been wary of his ku’an inheritance since he discovered his father was a Ha’lasi mage. He did not trust the ku’an; their sojourn in Ha’las had reaffirmed that distrust. He had even asked his god Jashan to keep him from using the psychic magery he was heir to, except in extremity.
“Chiss, I am worried he could make himself ill, fighting these warring powers.”
“He will not. He has the ritual, and Jashan loves him well. Jashan will not let him be destroyed.”
Kirian was silent at that. There was no arguing with faith. She herself would not put her trust in Jashan. In her experience, gods had their own plans, and they did not change them to accommodate the comfort of mortals, even righ mortals. She resolved to spend time with Callo tonight, and find out what she could about his state of mind.
* * * * *
Northgard’s Healer was a man named Jesel who had graduated the College six years before. Kirian, who was taken in at the College as a required act of charity on her tenth birthday, had been aware of Jesel from an admiring distance; he was clever and handsome, the focus of all the female students.
Kirian’s friend Inmay had hated Jesel. “He’s the worst of our noble students,” Inmay had sneered. “He’s here because he’s a third son with no mage talent, and there’s nothing else for him to do. He cares nothing for Healing.”
Even then, Kirian knew of Inmay’s bias regarding the nobility, and she secretly admired Jesel, watching him from a distance.
She almost collided with him as she exited the manse.
“You must be Hon Kirian, the Healer.” Jesel smiled. “I was looking for you.”
“I remember you,” she said. “I heard you were posted here.”
“I was originally posted at my family’s estate. But Northgard’s old Healer died, and they wanted me to be Lord Ander’s personal Healer.” He said it without arrogance. Jesel had been famous within the stone walls of the Healer’s College for his brilliance.
“How long have you been here?”
“I have been at Northgard for three years. It is nice to see another Healer. In fact, I was really looking for you. Word is that you have lost your bag and everything in it?”
“Yes. I don’t have so much as a dose of mellweed.”
“You lost even your knife?”
“Yes.” The Healer’s knife was a specialized tool each Healer was gifted with by the College upon graduation. It was not easily replaceable.
Jesel let out a breath. “That must have hurt. Well, I cannot replace the knife, but if you come to my rooms, I can replenish some of your other supplies.”
Kirian felt a worry lighten that she had not even known was there. She smiled at Jesel. “Thank you. I have felt helpless without my Healer’s bag.”
“You did all right on Lord Ander’s wound.”
“That was only a scratch.”
“He is proud of his battle scar, though.”
She followed the other Healer across the yard to a group of small buildings she had assumed were outbuildings. Instead, they were houses. Jesel’s looked smaller than Ruthan’s back in Seagard Village; it held one tiny examination room, a combination kitchen and sitting room, and a sleeping room.
“The other houses are for Northgard retainers,” Jesel said. “The steward lives over there, with his family. That is Werli, his youngest.”
Werli was sitting in the dirt, playing with several smooth pebbles. She looked up through messy curls and gave Kirian a smile of pure gold. Kirian smiled back, enchanted. She had seen few small children since she had left Seagard Village. She said as much, to Jesel.
“You seem to have had some adventures.” He moved around his rooms, accumulating a pile of supplies. Kirian saw cloth for bandages, a needle, a little bag of mellweed and some pouches that contained other herbs. He sorted among his pots until he found a cup, adding it to the pile.
“You can spare all this?”
“The old Healer accumulated quite a lot. Also, the woods are rich around here—there’s lots of mellweed, some agnit, oh, plenty of different herbs. What could you carry all this in, do you think?”
“I’ll find something,” she said.
The door swung open and Werli ran inside, looking frightened.
“What’s wrong, child?”
“Men with swords, Healer!”
“Stay in here, then.” Jesel drew the little girl to a chair. “You’ll be safe.”
Kirian could hear the beat of hooves. She could even feel it, through the ground. The men were riding too hard for Hunters leisurely returning to their own base. Something was going on. She said, “I have to go,” and ran outside, following the trail of dust hanging in the air as she headed toward the training ring.
As she arrived there, out of breath, she saw riderless horses being held near the stable. Three armed men came out, swords drawn, and Lord Callo, weaponless, between them. People from the manse were running toward the stable, anxious to see what was happening. She saw Islarian, the old swordsman, peering out from the door of the training shed.
Sword of Jashan (Book 2) Page 3