The Congruent Apprentice (The Congruent Mage Series Book 1)

by Dave Schroeder

  * * * * *

  Eynon woke suddenly to find Merry kissing him and pinching his nose. His mind was puzzled by the situation, but his body had its own reaction. He rolled on his stomach, got on all fours, and coughed up half the river into the grass. Eynon slowly leaned back until he was kneeling. Merry stood above him and put her arms around his waist, just above his hips. She pulled up—hard—and the other half of the river left his lungs. Then he fell on his back and looked up at Merry and the sky, glad to be alive. His chest hurt. His legs hurt. His arms hurt, his back hurt, and most especially, his head hurt. He gave Merry a pained smile.

  “Thank you,” he croaked.

  “You’ll live,” she said.

  “Not so sure of that, but I’ll try,” said Eynon.

  “Try hard,” she said. “I’ll need your help to free the boat.”

  “Is my pack safe?” Eynon asked.

  “Yes,” said Merry, “and I’m fine. Thanks for asking.”

  “I said thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Merry knelt close beside him and stared into Eynon’s eyes. He liked that.

  “The centers of your eyes are bigger than they should be, but not too big,” she said. “Doethan taught me to check for that when someone gets a blow to their head.”

  “Doethan’s smart.”

  “Yes, he is.”

  Merry’s fingers moved gingerly around Eynon’s scalp.

  “Ow!” he said.

  Her fingers kept pressing.

  “Ow! Ow! Ow!”

  “Don’t be a baby,” said Merry. “It’s a small lump, no bigger than a couple of cherries. It will be gone in a day or two.”

  Eynon took Merry’s hand. It was damp. He realized both of them were soaked.

  “Help me up,” he said.

  Merry did and Eynon sat up, then got to his knees, then stood. He shook his head and didn’t like the way it felt, but his mind was starting to work again. The center of his back was sore. His left side ached, then hurt more as he bent over and coughed up a minor tributary. He kept coughing until there was no more water left in his lungs or his stomach. Merry stood a few feet away and looked at Eynon sympathetically.

  “I think that’s it,” Eynon said when he’d finished.

  He looked puzzled and turned around, scanning the ground.

  “Have you seen my hat?” he asked.

  “No,” said Merry. “I had a choice. I could save you, or save your hat. Don’t make me regret my decision.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Eynon. “Thank you again for saving me. How are you doing?”

  “I’m wet and I’m tired and I’m worried about the boat, but it could have been a lot worse.”

  “Oh?”

  “If I hadn’t been able to push us to the right, the boat would have flipped when we hit the eddies near the roots.”

  “That would have been bad.”

  “You might say that,” said Merry. She took Eynon’s hand and tugged him along. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

  Eynon squeezed Merry’s hand as they walked the two dozen steps to the river.

  “Why were you kissing me?” he asked.

  “What? I wasn’t kissing you.”

  “Then what were you doing? It felt like kissing.”

  “I was trying to blow air into your lungs.”

  “Hmmm…” said Eynon. “That explains why you were pinching my nose.”

  Merry abruptly dropped his hand and pointed down the steep eastern bank. Eynon saw that the boat was wedged into a pair of large branches at the far end of the trunk. Beyond them, there was just enough room to get the boat through and past the waterlogged oak.

  “We need to cut those branches and free the boat,” said Merry.

  Eynon felt for the axe at his belt. It was still there in its protective leather sheath. He’d have to remember to oil and polish it tonight so it wouldn’t rust—and do the same for his knife as well.

  “Those branches are as thick as my legs,” said Eynon. “It’s going to take us hours to chop through them.”

  “Then we’d best get started,” said Merry.

  “You don’t have a saw, do you?”

  “No,” said Merry. “I only have my axe for cutting firewood. Let’s get busy. Chop, chop.”

  “Chop, chop,” repeated Eynon. “How do we get out to the boat to free it?”

  “We’re wet already,” she said, waving her hands to indicate their soaked clothing, “so we swim.”

  Eynon looked at Merry like she’d grown a second head.

  “I can’t swim.”

  “Of course you can’t,” said Merry, shaking her head. “You’re from the Coombe, where they don’t have boats and they don’t eat fish.”

  She spotted a thick pine branch about four feet long on the bank a few paces away. Half its bark had worn off from its trip downstream.

  “This will do,” she said. “No time like the present to learn. Pick that up and carry it down to the river.”

  “Yes, dear lady,” said Eynon.

  She whacked his upper arm with the back of her hand and Eynon did as he was instructed. The branch was lighter than he’d expected, even though it was as big around as his thigh.

  He brought his burden back to Merry at the edge of the water. Eynon was pleased the current wasn’t very strong at this end of the great downed tree. Most of the flow was rushing by at the root-end of the trunk.

  Merry took the branch and carefully eased it into the river well upstream from the boat. She held on to it with one hand.

  “I’m glad the branch floats,” said Merry. “We’re going to step into the river and hold onto it, so it will help us float.”

  Eynon nodded.

  “Push out from the bottom and keep pushing as long as you can stand,” Merry continued. “Then kick your feet to move us toward the boat. Do you think you can do that?”

  “Step, push, kick,” said Eynon.

  “Good,” said Merry.

  The two of them held on to the log and pushed it ahead of them as they entered the river. Eynon moved his legs in a flurry of kicks, sending water flying everywhere, but not helping them move forward.

  “Look over your shoulder and watch my legs,” said Merry. “Slow and steady is better than fast and choppy.”

  Eynon turned and observed Merry’s technique, then made a reasonable attempt at duplicating it. They soon reached the boat and climbed aboard—or rather, Merry climbed aboard, then helped Eynon. They put the log in the spot where two jugs of cider had been.

  “Time to get out your axe,” said Merry.

  She removed hers while Eynon extracted his from its sheath and began to hone the blade with the whetstone stored in a pouch that rode below the axehead.

  “Want me to do yours, too?” he asked.

  Merry didn’t answer. She located her own whetstone and sharpened her axe silently. Eynon finished first and began to chop at the thicker of the two branches trapping the boat’s prow. His initial stroke bounced back from the wood of the old oak and almost hit him in the forehead.

  “Be careful,” said Merry.

  He aimed his next blow at more of an angle. Merry started in on her branch, but both of them found it hard going.

  “At this rate, it will be a day or two before we’re free,” said Merry, “and my delivery will be late.”

  “It’s not like it’s your fault,” said Eynon.

  “I know,” said Merry, “but I always do what I say.”

  And so does everyone around her, thought Eynon, remembering Derry’s comment at dinner last night.

  “I have an idea,” he said.

  Eynon put his axe down on the bow thwart and reached beneath to extract
his pack, which had somehow managed not to get wet. He noticed that the floor of the boat was covered with widely-spaced wooden slats a few inches above the true bottom, so any water that came on board flowed below instead of on top of them.

  I still have a lot to learn about boats, he thought.

  Merry kept chopping, glaring at Eynon after each stroke.

  After opening his pack, Eynon took out the white linen shirt where he’d wrapped the strange shards. He carefully removed one of them, noting that the shards had cut the fabric in a dozen places. His mother would not be happy—she’d worked hard to weave it.

  The shard he selected looked like a picture he’d seen in Robin Goodfellow’s Perigrinations. The book said it was from a land far to the east across the sea and was called a scimitar. It had a smooth side that described a portion of an arc and a sharp side that seemed very sharp indeed.

  Holding it by the smooth side, he put the opposite edge against the branch he’d been chopping and sawed it back and forth. In seconds, he had to step back as the far end of the branch fell into the boat.

  “How did you do that so quickly?” asked Merry. “Was the rest of the branch rotten?”

  “I’ll show you,” said Eynon.

  He repeated what he’d done on his branch and Merry’s branch fell into the boat after only a few sawing motions.

  “I’m impressed,” said Merry.

  “So am I,” said Eynon. “I had no idea they were that sharp.”

  Eynon used the shard to smooth off the longer of the two branches, turning it into a thick, sturdy pole. They threw the other branch off the stern and watched as it was swept into the maelstrom near the roots.

  “You push and I’ll steer,” said Merry.

  Eynon used his new pole to lever the prow away from the end of the tree and force the boat along to the open channel beyond.

  When the nose of the boat was well past the upper trunk, the current caught it and spun the boat around, sending it downstream at an increasingly rapid pace. Both of them cheered.

  “Thank you for saving my boat,” said Merry.

  “Thank you for saving my life,” Eynon replied over his shoulder.

  “It was nothing,” said Merry.

  Eynon wasn’t sure if Merry was teasing him again, but he didn’t have the energy to come up with a witty reply. The afternoon sun was bright and beginning to dry them both out. He struggled to stay awake as the heat of the warm spring day baked him and the sound of flowing water lulled him until his chin was on his chest.

  “Wake up!” shouted Merry from the stern.

  “Yes, dear lady,” he said after a yawn.

  Eynon reached down and splashed a handful of cold river water in his face. That should keep him awake for a while.

  He’d had more than enough excitement for one day.

  Fercha

  Where was her flying disk? She remembered hiding it behind a rock the size of a millstone, five paces in from the narrow opening to the cave complex. Now she couldn’t see any stones large enough to camouflage a flying disk, let alone one the size of a millstone.

  Something crunched under her boot. Fercha looked down and saw pieces of a broken fired-clay jug on the stony floor of the cave’s entrance. Her avoidance spells must have failed—they were less effective against anyone who was drunk. She picked up a piece of the jug and sniffed, smelling yeast and malt.

  Beer, she confirmed.

  Fercha stepped outside, angry at herself for not storing the flying disk near her emergency kit by the underground lake. On a level spot halfway up a steep slope, she paused to get her bearings.

  The night sky was clear. Stormclouds had left the area some time ago, though the grass was still damp. Fercha dimmed the glow ball above her head to check the stars and confirmed she had four more hours until dawn.

  Applegarth was southeast, on the other side of a mountain, she remembered. Below her was a small stream flowing south. She’d follow its course until it was time to head east and start climbing.

  It would take at least three days to reach her destination and recover her artifact. Fercha pulled her cloak tighter and set out downhill.

  Chapter 7

  “Not every animal that talks and walks

  on two legs is truly human.”

  — Ealdamon’s Epigrams

  “Merry,” said Eynon, “why didn’t your father have me talk to Doethan about what I found? He seemed like he knew a lot more magic than the hedge wizard in Caercadel.”

  “I have a theory about that,” said Merry. “I’ll share it with you later. Why do you think Doethan isn’t a simple hedge wizard?”

  “When I first met him, he said he’d been walking underwater catching fish,” said Eynon. “Then I saw his clothes go from wet to dry in an eye blink.”

  “Interesting,” said Merry.

  Eynon twisted the sleeve of his linen shirt and watched drops fall into the river.

  “I’ve been thinking a lot about dry clothes lately.”

  “Ours will be dry in another hour or so—without any help from wizardry.”

  “Yes, but the wards he put on the boat were more powerful than anything I’d expect a hedge wizard to cast.”

  “A physical aversion spell, plus sounds like barking dogs and cocking crossbows?” said Merry. “Do you have so much experience with wizardry you can judge what it takes to work it?”

  “I only know what I’ve read,” said Eynon. “What about his magic rings? Rock left.”

  “Got it,” said Merry. She adjusted their course. “I won’t second guess Doethan’s skill level. He says he’s a hedge wizard.”

  Something in Merry’s voice made Eynon think she knew more than she was telling.

  “Has Doethan been teaching you wizardry?”

  “Why would you say a thing like that?”

  He had. Eynon recognized Doethan’s favorite misdirection tactic of answering a question with another question. He smiled, glad Merry couldn’t see his face. That explained quite a bit. Eynon wondered if Derry and Mabli knew—and how they’d feel about their only child learning to be a wizard. He realized his own curiosity was growing. He wanted to know the secret of wizardry, too.

  “What’s your theory?” asked Eynon.

  “You’re not very patient, are you?”

  “Cauldron, meet kettle.”

  “Fair enough,” said Merry. “I think my father—and mother—want us to stay together all the way to Tyford to see what develops.”

  “Develops?” asked Eynon.

  “You do have straw behind your ears, don’t you?”

  “Hey,” said Eynon, not turning around.

  “My parents have had every eligible boy in the Rhuthro valley at our dinner table,” said Merry. “I’m their heir and I’m sure Da wants to start training a prospective son-in-law in how to manage his lands as soon as possible, not that I couldn’t do a perfectly fine job of that myself. My mother wants grandchildren, but at least she’s willing to wait until I get back from my wander year to start that project.”

  “Now I understand why you were so horrid to me at dinner,” said Eynon.

  “It was nothing personal,” said Merry. “Sorry.”

  “Uh huh,” said Eynon. “I suppose your parents want you to marry Gruffyd and pop out a squad of little royal guardsmen?”

  “Now you’re being horrid,” said Merry. “I said eligible boys. Gruffyd is only a good match for me in his own head. My parents never invited him to dinner.”

  “Nice to know,” said Eynon. “But isn’t his family wealthy, like yours?”

  “It is,” said Merry, “But I’m not a princess and don’t have to be pushed into a marriage of state. My parents are just trying to hurry things along, that’s all. Most girls in the valley are married by sevent
een, and my mother doesn’t want me to miss out on the right young man.”

  “What about your father?”

  “He wants me to be happy—but he also wants me to find a suitable husband.”

  “He knows my family isn’t rich, right?”

  “Suitable to me,” said Merry. “He’d be happy with anyone I choose. My future mate could be landless, so long as I select one.”

  “Even another woman?”

  “Yes,” said Merry, laughing. “That way there’d be twice as many grandchildren.”

  “There would, wouldn’t there,” said Eynon. “Rock left.”

  “On it.”

  “In the Coombe, villages farm their lands in common,” said Eynon. “There’s usually a head man or woman, but all they do is settle disputes and take the lead negotiating with the baron. I think that’s easier than how you do things along the river.”

  “You’re probably right,” said Merry. “I think my parents like you.”

  “Where did that come from?”

  “I wanted you to know. They’re polite enough to most of the boys they invite, but they were particularly nice to you.”

  “Do you think showing up with a magical artifact in my pack might have had anything to do with it?”

  “Maybe,” said Merry, “but you had good manners.”

  “I am nothing, if not polite.”

  “You said it, I didn’t.”

  Both chuckled. Eynon was glad they were beginning to be at ease with each other.

  “When will we stop today?” he asked.

  “Not for a few hours,” answered Merry. “There are two more toll stations coming up and I want to get well past them before finding a spot to stay for the night.”

  “Do you expect problems?”

  “No,” said Merry. “Certainly not at the second one. The first toll station is a different matter. Mastlands raises pigs. I usually give them a jug for their toll and two more to trade for a couple of their smoked hams. The family has four sons—the youngest is my age—and their father is often away in Tyford.”