The Phoenix Endangered

by James Mallory

  He wanted to know what Tiercel had been doing all morning, but even though he was right there beside him at the table, Harrier couldn’t exactly ask him a question—not at a table full of Elves—and Tiercel really wasn’t picking up any of the indirectly phrased hints Harrier was dropping, so after two or three tries, he gave up. He’d get it out of Tiercel later. And nobody was dawdling over the meal anyway, any more than they would have been around the Gillain table at midday back home. There was always work to do.

  After the meal, Harrier helped take down and store away the tables again, and by the time he was done with that, Siralcar came to get him to tell him the baskets were ready for the wagon. They hitched one of the farm’s plowhorses to it to bring it out of the shed where there was better light to work by—no sense in interrupting Nethiel and Dulion’s vacation—and Siralcar and two more craftworkers began the exacting task of fitting the six large baskets to the wagon’s sides. Harrier was interested to see that no nailing or drilling was necessary, merely the removal of a few plugs in the wood that could easily be hammered back into place again later once the baskets were removed. It was as if the wagon had been designed to have hampers attached to the outsides. And for all he knew, it had been: it was an Elven-made wagon, after all, and Harrier already knew how efficient the Elves were.

  Each of the baskets was large and sturdy, bound with leather straps, and could be buckled closed. And—just as Siralcar had said—was fully lined in durable oilcloth, making it entirely waterproof.

  “It’s too bad you don’t trade with us any more,” Harrier said wistfully, examining one of the baskets. “You make so many useful things. I’m sure we could use them. But I suppose we don’t have anything you’d want in exchange.”

  “No single person can know the shape of all the world,” Lanya said reprovingly. She was the elder of the two craftworkers—old enough that her hair actually had some gray in it, so Harrier couldn’t even begin to imagine how old she must be.

  “True,” Harrier said, grinning. “But I find it hard to imagine that you wouldn’t have everything you want right here.”

  Lanya smiled back. “You are young. And one may have all that one needs, and still not have all that one desires.”

  “I suppose you’re right,” Harrier said, surprised. The more he thought about it, the more he was certain that Lanya was right—back in Armethalieh, both he and Tiercel had seen lots of people—both Trade-class and Nobles—who were never satisfied, no matter how many possessions or honors they accumulated. He supposed it was lucky in one way—if people stopped buying things once they had what they needed, half the merchants in Armethalieh would starve. In another, it wasn’t, because if you were never satisfied, then you were never happy. It wasn’t the sort of thing he was used to thinking about. He frowned suspiciously, wondering if this was something to do with the Three Books. He thought, though, that it was probably more to do with walking halfway across the world and having to listen to Tiercel babble at him the entire time.

  IT WAS MIDAFTERNOON by the time the baskets (hampers, really) were affixed to the sides of the wagon to both Siralcar and Harrier’s satisfaction and the process of loading the supplies could begin. Of course, that meant unloading the entire wagon, and that was a task Harrier wanted to do himself. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust the Elves. It was that the whole wagon was full of Tiercel’s junk, and if anybody was going to break it, it might as well be him. And for that matter, the best way to know where everything was in a load was to be the one who packed it. Morcia Tamaricans was Chief Cargomaster at the Armethalieh Docks—you didn’t get a cargo onto—or off of—a ship without her approval as well as Da’s. She’d saved many a ship from going down in Great Ocean simply by refusing to give them their Permit to Sail until they repacked their hull, and sometimes Harrier had helped her. It occurred to him—now, when it was far too late to do him the least bit of good—that he would have made a terrible Portmaster and hated the Customs House, but that he wouldn’t have minded being Morcia’s apprentice at all.

  And while a wagon wasn’t a ship, the bells he’d spent listening to her bellow at ships’ crews about the proper way to stow their cargoes so they didn’t get themselves killed before their ships cleared the mouth of Armethalieh Harbor stood him in good stead now, as he packed away sacks of grain and sacks of salt and sacks of meal and tins of tea and kegs of dried fruit and kegs of crystallized honey and jugs of cider and jugs of liquid honey and a large crock of butter that should keep until it was gone and wheels of cheese and fletches of bacon and a sack of smoked fish and another sack of dried beef and a coil of rope and a big sack of charcoal and some spare horseshoes and nails and a wooden mallet to set the pegs back into the wagon’s walls again sometime. And then all the hampers hung from the sides of the wagon were full, and inside of the wagon was full, too, with clothes and bedrolls and a box that held fishhooks and line and a whetstone and a couple of extra knives, because Siralcar said you always needed one more knife than you had when you were on a journey. And Harrier knew that right now it seemed like an awful lot of food and supplies, and he also knew that it wouldn’t get them even halfway to the Madiran, which was vaguely annoying.

  Just as he was nearly done, Lanya appeared again. She was holding a small object between her hands, and had a large leather bag slung crosswise over her shoulder on a long strap. “I believe you will find this to be what you require. Siralcar told me of your need. It was a simple item to craft.” She held it out.

  Harrier took it and examined it. The outside was copper, but it seemed to be lined in clay. The bottom of the bowl was flat, with three small broad feet sticking out from it—the little brazier looked as if it would rest steadily on practically any surface. “Yes,” he said, bowing. “I think this is precisely what I need.”

  “I have brought a bag as well, so that you may carry it in comfort. And herbs and leaves—the most common ones. For your spells,” she added, seeing Harrier’s look of incomprehension.

  “I… Ah …” He really had no idea of what to say. He’d barely gotten used to the idea that he’d been given the Books at all. He really hadn’t gotten much past that. And he had no idea at all what had given Lanya the idea (even if it might be true) that he might be a Wildmage now.

  “If I am in error, I beg your pardon. But there are few other uses for such an item as this, young Harrier, than to husband the small fires which a Wildmage might need, from time to time, to light. It is true that the magic that returned to the Elves with Jermayan son of Malkirinath, Ancaladar’s Bondmate, does not run in this wise, but Elven memories are long. And we owe a great debt to the Wildmages. We remember.”

  “I—” Harrier took a deep breath. Whatever else he did, he had to stop stammering as if he’d suddenly forgotten how to speak. “Thank you. I don’t know yet if you’re right, but… you aren’t wrong.” Oh, that’s clear as mud, he snarled to himself.

  “Then perhaps my gift to you will ease your way, human child,” Lanya said. “We are told, always, that human memories are short as human lives are brief, but my father was born at the Fortress of the Crowned Horns. I have often thought he would not have been, were it not for Wildmages.”

  “I’m sorry,” Harrier said again, bowing. “I’m afraid what they’ve told you about humans is true. I don’t understand what you’re telling me.”

  Lanya smiled. “Then finish your task, and as you do I will tell you the tale, as I had it from my father, and he from his mother, and you will understand.”

  HE DIDN’T UNDERSTAND—not really—even after she told it, but it was still a fascinating story of the darkest days of a terrible war. The Elves hadn’t known they were going to win. In fact, when Lanya’s grandmother had been sent to the Fortress of the Crowned Horns, the Elves had been pretty sure they were going to lose, and were hoping against hope to save at least a few of their people from the Endarkened.

  One part of the story was recognizable to Harrier, though: the moment when Vimaudiel had stood o
n the battlements of the Fortress and seen nothing but green grass and flowers everywhere she looked, because all the Endarkened were dead and the Great Flowering had swept across the land. She’d gone home—Harrier was a little surprised to learn she’d lived in Sentarshadeen, but of course it had been an Elven city once upon a time—to find that her husband Anamitar had survived as well. And when Sandalon Elvenking of the House of Caerthalien had succeeded his father Andoreniel Elvenking of the House of Caerthalien and decreed that Elvenkind should withdraw beyond the mountains, she had settled here with her family to farm.

  It was a long and fascinating story, and by the time it was done, not only was the packing done and the wagon returned to the storage shed, but Harrier had rinsed off in the watering trough and he and Lanya were sitting in the shade of one of the trees drinking large tankards of berry cider.

  “You have a long history,” he said, when Lanya indicated her story was finished.

  “Ah, Harrier, were I to tell you a long story, we should be here for a sennight, perhaps more. Long stories are best saved for deep winter, when the days are short and time grows heavy.” Lanya glanced at the sky. “But a long enough tale for now, I think, for your friend returns from the fields, and Aressea frets if we keep her waiting when she thinks it is time to serve supper.” Lanya got gracefully to her feet and walked away, and Harrier got much less gracefully to his feet and followed.

  “SO, DID YOU have fun today?” Tiercel asked a couple of hours later.

  It was after the evening meal, and both boys had retreated to their room once more. After breakfast tomorrow they’d be on the road again. Harrier tried not to think about the fact that this might be the last time he slept in a bed in his entire life.

  “I arranged to keep us from starving. How about you?”

  “Oh, I had lots of fun. I cast Mageshield to keep from getting stung by a swarm of angry bees, turned a bunch of rocks into water so the Elves could dig a new irrigation ditch, made another bunch of rocks come up out of a field—Har, you have no idea how many rocks there can be in a field—and then it was back to the bees. If this is what High Mages did with their time, no wonder they all quit.”

  “I don’t see what you’re complaining about. You spent the day casting spells.”

  That startled a laugh out of Tiercel. “You know, you’re right. I did.”

  “And you didn’t throw up or pass out or anything. So go to sleep.”

  THEY WERE UP as soon as it was light. Harrier had slept with the Three Books under his pillow. He wasn’t quite sure why, because if what Kareta had told him was true, it wasn’t as if they could possibly be stolen from him. He just had.

  Both of them did a quick check of the room as they dressed, making sure they had everything, then once they were washed and dressed, Harrier took the pack with their gear out to the wagon and tossed it inside.

  The bag Lanya had given him the day before was hanging on a peg just inside the wagon door, and Harrier lifted the flap and tucked the Three Books inside. He’d think of something else to do with the red satchel later. He looked around the wagon, and took a moment to think that if he and Tiercel were both Mages now (and apparently they both were—or could be—which was the scariest thought Harrier’d had in quite a while) it certainly seemed to be more convenient to be a Wildmage. At least he wouldn’t need to drag a Flowering Fair’s worth of junk around with him everywhere he went.

  The only meal anybody dawdled over in any way at Blackrowan Farm was supper, so it wasn’t long before people were leaving to begin the day’s work. Before they went out to the stables, Tiercel and Harrier made sure to formally thank Aressea and Aratari for their more-than-generous hospitality.

  “It is a gift to repay those gifts which our greatfathers were given,” Aratari answered, bowing in return. “Leaf and Star watch over you until you pass this way again.”

  “And the Eternal Light guide your way,” Tiercel answered simply.

  Six

  The Unicorn’s Beast

  IT SEEMED AS if Nethiel and Dulion were more eager to be on the road than the boys were—or at least eager. The Elven-bred draft horses frisked and skittered about as Harrier led them, one after the other, out of their stalls and lined them up with the wagon-tree to hitch them to the wagon. After so many days of doing this—although it was really only a sennight and a few days since they’d left Karahelanderialigor—it was nearly second nature to him, and Harrier was glad that Elunyerin and Rilphanifel had spent so much time making sure he knew what to do and then leaving him to do it.

  As he tested the girths, making sure that each was firmly and snugly fastened, he saw Tiercel come walking out of the barn carrying Ancaladar’s saddle and harness. Harrier was always impressed that Tiercel could carry it by himself, not because the saddle itself was particularly large (it wasn’t), but because the straps—which were long enough to go around various parts of Ancaladar, after all—really weighed more than the saddle itself. If not for the fact that all the parts of the saddle were of Elven manufacture, and so both stronger and lighter than anything that could be found in human lands, Harrier doubted that Tiercel could have lifted it.

  “See you at lunch, I guess,” Tiercel said, and Harrier lifted a hand in salute.

  He was just about to climb onto the seat of the wagon when Siralcar and Lanya came hurrying out of the house, carrying a large hamper between them. He got down quickly, looping the reins around the hand-brake at the corner of the wagon step. Dropped reins, as he’d learned from bitter experience, tangled, and were Darkness Itself to untangle.

  “Food for the early part of your journey,” Lanya said as he came forward to meet them. “It will not keep above a day or three, but I do not think that you and Tiercel High Mage will find it a hardship to consume it in that time.”

  “No,” Harrier said, bowing. “I’m sure we won’t. I thank you again for all your kindness to us.”

  He quickly went around to the back of the wagon and opened the door, then helped the two Elves settle the hamper into place on the floor, shoving a few items out of the way to make room. From the look of it, there was quite a bit of food inside, and he was tempted to open it and peek, but that would be more than rude. He shut the door and bowed again.

  “A safe journey to you,” Siralcar said.

  “Come back to us, if it pleases you. To hear all that you may wish to tell would make good hearing,” Lanya added.

  “Thank you,” Harrier said. “I will, if—If it works out that way,” he finished awkwardly. Both Elves nodded, as if what he’d said seemed perfectly reasonable to them, and Harrier mounted up to the bench of the wagon, collected the reins, and headed the team up the path back to the main road.

  IT TOOK HIM almost a chime to get the wagon settled down the main road again and he had to rein the horses in the entire way. Usually they were slow first thing in the morning, which was fine—you didn’t really want a draft-horse that was going to take off down the road at a canter and jounce the wagon behind it to kindling—but this particular morning they were frisky with a day and a half of rest, and Harrier thought they might think about cantering. Or at least trotting.

  When he reached the road, he could tell from the position of the sun that it was still several chimes before Morning Bells. Ancaladar made a low pass over the wagon, and Tiercel leaned down from the saddle and waved energetically. Harrier waved back, but if Tiercel had something to say, it was going to have to wait until lunch, since there was no way for them to have a conversation: Ancaladar could do many wonderful things in the air, but as far as Harrier knew, hovering wasn’t one of them. The dragon veered away, sliding up into the sky again, and Harrier watched him go. The air was sharp and cold with early morning chill, but the day was clear, and later it would be warm enough for Harrier to bundle his heavy stormcloak behind the seat and enjoy the sun. He wondered how much colder it was up in the sky. Tiercel had often offered to take him for a ride on Ancaladar’s back—the saddle was built for two—but he�
��d always refused. Maybe—

  “There you are! I thought you were supposed to be in a hurry to get wherever it is you’re going! I almost got tired of waiting! At least you took the time to read your Books!”

  Harrier’s automatic startled tug on the reins brought the wagon to a halt. He took a deep breath—grateful he hadn’t yelped in shock—and glanced down at the side of the wagon. Kareta was standing there looking up at him.

  He resisted his first impulse—which was to deny having read any of the Books at all—and his second one—which was to climb down from the step and try to chase her away. He had the feeling that neither one would work out very well. “Why didn’t you come to the farm?” he asked.

  “You don’t know much about unicorns, do you?” Kareta asked in return.

  “Are they all as annoying as you are?” Harrier asked.

  “I’m not annoying,” Kareta denied. She sounded hurt, but she’d fooled Harrier thoroughly the first time he’d laid eyes on her and he was determined she wasn’t going to do it again.

  “Sure you aren’t,” Harrier muttered. He slapped the reins on the horses’ rumps to get the team moving again. This was probably what Tiercel had been waving at him about a few minutes ago—he’d certainly have been able to see Kareta coming a lot further away than Harrier could. Even if he’d been looking for her.

  “So did you get apples?” she asked, once the wagon was moving again. “And oat cakes? And—oh!—chestnuts for roasting, because roast chestnuts—”