“I had been trying to reach him. Magically, I mean. That’s what I was doing when Wilem stopped me, but when you distracted them, I was able to get through for a second and I heard him answer me, which he always told me wasn’t possible, that you can’t actually really talk that way, but clearly you can, because —”
“Calen.”
“Uh, yes. Sorry. Anyway, all he really said was my name, and he started to ask a question, but then everything happened and the connection was broken. I’ve tried reaching him again, but I can’t. Maybe we’re too far away now. Or maybe I’m just not strong enough.”
Hope warred with disappointment within her. “Are you sure? Maybe you should try again.”
“Meg, I’ve been trying, believe me. I can’t reach him.”
“Do you think he might be able to reach you?”
“That’s what I’ve been hoping. But I can’t help thinking that he would have done it by now. He knew something was wrong. I’m sure I got that much across, at least.”
They both fell silent. The fire was crackling merrily, in counterpoint to their own sorrow and frustration.
“Well, look,” Calen said finally. “There’s nothing else we can do tonight. We might as well try to get some sleep. Maybe we’ll have some new ideas by the morning.”
Meg nodded. Sleep definitely sounded good. Except that she wanted her own soft bed, and some hot tea, and her sisters down the hall. She looked at the hard, cold ground and tried not to think about how unpleasant it was going to be to sleep on.
Calen seemed to guess what she was thinking. “I’m sorry, Meg. I’d conjure you a blanket if I could.”
She snorted. “If you could, I’d get you to conjure me a whole bed.”
“And some food, while I was at it.”
“Oh, don’t remind me,” she said. It was hard trying to ignore the rumblings of her stomach. She was merely uncomfortable now, but soon enough it would get much worse.
Meg tried to push all such thoughts out of her mind as she looked around for the likeliest spot to lie down. Someplace close enough to the fire to be warm but not close enough to get burned in her sleep, someplace without too many rocks. . . . She looked over to see Calen already spread out on his back, his head resting against a thick tree root. He was watching her, grinning. “You’re just like a dog, turning round and round before settling in,” he said. “Do you do that at home, too?”
She tried to give him a frosty stare but spoiled it by smiling back. It was a bit funny, she supposed. “How did you find a good spot?” she asked him. “There are rocks everywhere!”
He shrugged. “I didn’t really think about it. Just lay back where I was and tried to make the best of it.” He paused, then added, “Here, wait, let me try something.”
He looked around, then pointed the fingers of one hand at a nearby tree that had lots of long, thick leaves. The branches shook as though being buffeted by a gust of wind, and several bunches of leaves floated free to the ground. Calen got up, gathered them together, and then laid them out like a small sort of blanket.
“How’s that?” he asked. “It’s no feather mattress, but it might help a little.”
“I — thank you, Calen.” His kindness kept surprising her; it was as if he’d been saving it up his whole life, waiting to have someone to be kind to. She wanted to believe that wasn’t true, but from the little he’d told her about his time with Serek and his life as an orphaned inn worker before that, she was afraid it might be. “Did Serek teach you that?”
“No,” he said. He sounded thoughtful. “I just — it just seemed like something that might work. Sometimes things just need a little push to go in a certain direction. Those leaves were going to fall eventually; I just encouraged them to let go a little sooner.” He shook his head. “It’s funny — I keep thinking I need to learn some specific spell for everything, but I know that’s not really true. I just never think to try things on my own that I haven’t at least read about. But magic isn’t like that; you can play with it, try things out . . . I keep having to be reminded.”
“Well,” Meg said. “I’m happy to give you an excuse to experiment. If you want to try out any other magic spells that might make my stay here in the mystery forest more pleasant, please let me know.”
She lay down gingerly on her bed of greenery and found that it wasn’t nearly as bad as she’d feared. Maybe the leaves really were making a difference. She must have been more tired than she’d realized, because she felt herself starting to drift off as soon as she closed her eyes. I can’t even feel the rocks at all, she thought sleepily.
“Meg?” Calen asked softly.
“Mmm?”
“Can you still feel Jakl?
Her eyes snapped open as she suddenly came back to full wakefulness. “No,” she said in amazement. Then —“Wait, yes. But just barely.” She sat up and turned to face Calen. “How could I not have noticed? I haven’t thought of him once, since — well, since this morning.”
Calen shifted up onto one elbow. “You’ve had a great deal on your mind since then,” he pointed out. “But you can still feel him?”
She nodded slowly. “It’s subdued. I can feel him as a presence, but I can’t feel what he’s feeling. Usually at night I’m very aware of him. I think he’s been trying to share dreams with me or something. But now he’s barely there at all.” She felt the beginnings of panic stirring in her gut. “Oh, Calen, what if he tries to look for me? What if he comes out, and they find him?”
“I don’t think that will happen. We haven’t been gone that long. And it seems like you’ve made him understand that he needs to stay hidden. He can probably tell that you’re farther away than usual, but that alone might not be enough to drive him out into the open.” He paused, thoughtful. “Although, if he picked up on any of your emotions this morning, maybe he would suspect that something was wrong.”
Meg glared at him. “Just when you’re starting to make me feel better, you have to go and ruin it.”
“Sorry.”
She waved away his apology. “No, you’re right. But it’s impossible to know.” A thought struck her then. It almost made her laugh, although it really wasn’t funny. “But I think he must still be safe. At least so far.”
“How do you know?” Calen asked.
She smirked. “Because I’m not dead.”
He just stared at her, not seeing it.
“Look, if he had come out and someone had seen him, he’d have been killed. The guards would have torn him apart. They’re not taking any chances these days. And if Jakl had been killed, I’d be either dead or insane, right?”
Calen swallowed and managed, “I — I suppose so.”
“So for now, at least, we can assume he’s still safely hidden away.” She didn’t add what they both knew — that that could change at any moment, and they wouldn’t know until it was too late.
Well, there was nothing she could do. She tried to send calming feelings through her link, to let Jakl know she was all right, but she knew he wouldn’t be able to sense anything from her at this distance. Now that she was aware of how faint her sense of him had grown, she missed him. It was strange to realize how much she’d come to accept his constant presence at the edges of her consciousness.
She lay back down again and tried to rest. The sleepiness that had swept over her so quickly before now eluded her completely. She lay listening to the sound of the fire and Calen’s soft, slow breathing for a long time before the welcome oblivion of sleep finally claimed her as well.
CALEN AWAKENED FEELING STRANGELY STIFF and cold. Had he kicked off his blankets in the night? He opened his eyes and blinked stupidly at the trees for several seconds. Then he sat up and saw Meg lying on her scattered bed of leaves, and all the unpleasant events of the day before came crashing back upon him.
He must have made some noise when he sat up; Meg was starting to stir now, too. He watched her go through the same process of sleepy confusion and sudden, shocking remembrance.
<
br /> “So it wasn’t just a bad dream,” she said quietly.
“No,” he answered. “I’m sorry.”
She nodded wearily and then stretched, apparently feeling the same stiffness in her own limbs. Sleeping outside will do that to a person. At least his body had a faint memory of dealing with this during his travels with Serek. Poor Meg had probably never slept anywhere other than a soft, warm bed.
They each excused themselves to take care of personal necessities and then sat by the cold remnants of their fire and pointedly did not speak of breakfast.
Meg was frowning at the ground. Calen couldn’t tell if she was deep in thought or just grumpy. Her fine dress was dirty and rumpled, and her hair had come loose from its pinnings. She looked like a strange hybrid of her real and fabricated personalities — or perhaps like Mellie the dirty errand girl playing dress-up in some wellborn lady’s castoffs. He was sure he looked no better himself, save that his clothes had not been all that fine to begin with.
“So,” he ventured finally, “should we just keep going?”
She nodded. “But first we need to find some water. Food would be nice, but dehydration is the greater danger at the moment.” She gave him a half-smile. “Plus we could both do with a bit of a wash. I don’t suppose you know how we can go about finding some water, do you?”
“Actually, I do.” He couldn’t believe he hadn’t thought of it himself. What kind of mage was he going to be if he needed other people to suggest his spells to him? Meg was looking at him with a mixture of surprise and admiration on her face. It was a nice change from the usual ways she looked at him.
Calen stood, closing his eyes. Serek had taught him a number of wilderness survival spells. Finding north was one; locating water was another. He had memorized them some time ago, but, not expecting to need them anytime soon, had then filed them away in the back of his brain until Meg reminded him. She was dealing with enough right now; he had to start doing some of the thinking here instead of leaving it all to her. He cleared his mind and reached out with his senses, sending tendrils of invisible white energy out through the forest around them. Almost immediately he picked up a feeling of water up ahead. A small stream, but they didn’t need a giant river for washing and bathing. He marked the spot carefully in his mind and then, suddenly curious, he shifted his focus slightly and looked for salt water instead. Trelian was nowhere near the ocean; Serek had had him try sensing the coast from his study, but Calen had not even been able to tell which direction it was. But now he could sense a large amount of salt water somewhere off to the east. More than a few miles away, but not far. Not far at all.
When he opened his eyes, Meg was watching him intently. Still trying to see the magical energy he was working, he guessed. He pointed toward the location of the stream. “There’s some water up ahead, not too far from here,” he said.
“Excellent. Let’s go.” She started walking.
“Wait,” he told her. He knelt to examine the stone circle he’d arranged the night before, making sure the last embers of the fire were out. He scooped dirt over the site, just to be sure. Meg watched impatiently, and then guiltily as she realized what he was doing.
“Sorry,” she said when he stepped up next to her. “I didn’t even think about that.”
He shrugged. “It’s all right. You’ve never had a campfire before.” They started toward the stream. “What’s worse is that I didn’t think to check for water. You’d think Serek hadn’t taught me anything!”
Meg smiled at him. “Guess it’s a good thing we’re here together, then,” she said. “You take care of the fires and I’ll make sure you put your magic to good use. Speaking of which, you’re sure you don’t have a spell for bringing us home, or sending a message to my father, or anything like that?”
“Meg, I told you . . .”
“Well, just checking. You did forget the water spell, after all.”
Calen couldn’t really argue with that. He rolled his eyes and said, “Yes, Your Highness. I’m afraid I am quite certain that none of Serek’s teaching has prepared me for this particular need. I will continue to dedicate my thoughts to the subject, however, and promise to notify you of any brilliant ideas.”
She gave him her best haughty royal stare. “See that you do.” Then she tossed her princessness aside and was back to being just Meg. She peered at the surrounding trees as they walked. “See any trees that look familiar yet?”
“Sorry.”
She nodded and they continued on their way. Calen had meant his earlier comment to be sarcastic, but all the same, he did turn his mind to sorting through his magical arsenal. Maybe there was something he already knew how to do that could be used to help them in some way. He thought back over the past two weeks of lessons. Now that Serek had really begun focusing on his education, he was aware of just how little teaching had been going on before. He felt he must have taken in a year’s worth of training for every day, and there was no doubt that the magic was coming far more easily to him than it had before. He thought his spark must be trying to make up for all the lost time.
But even so, he couldn’t seem to think of anything he’d learned that would be of much use here and now. There was summoning, of course, but he’d already determined that was useless at this distance, at least at his current level of ability. He could use his fire skills to set the woods ablaze, hoping to catch someone’s attention, but how could they be sure who that someone would be? He still hadn’t perfected his invisibility spell, and he couldn’t see how that would help them even if he had. Potions, locating objects, healing, dream reading, sleep magic . . . nothing seemed the least bit useful. He kept turning over ideas, but it felt like a pointless exercise.
They came upon the stream in less than an hour. After they both drank their fill, Meg headed upstream to wash. A rocky outcrop provided her some measure of privacy, but Calen turned to face downstream just in case. A moment later he heard Meg scream.
He swung back around. “Meg? Meg! What’s wrong?”
Her head appeared around the rocks. She was blushing fiercely. “Nothing. Sorry. Just a fish.”
“A fish?” He couldn’t quite keep the laughter out of his voice. “Was it, um, a scary fish?”
She glared at him. “It just startled me, all right? It — Oh, never mind.” She disappeared again.
Smiling, he turned back to his own task of washing. The chill water would be difficult to endure for long, so he decided to wash only the upper half of his body. That would also prevent him from having to take off his pants, which he wasn’t especially eager to do when Meg could easily come back downstream before he was dressed again.
He pulled his shirt over his head and placed it on a rock to keep it dry. Then he knelt by the water’s edge and splashed his chest and arms until he couldn’t stand to do it anymore. Shivering, he bent forward to wash his face. Cold as he was, it did feel good to wash off some of the dirt and sweat. He dunked his head underwater and scrubbed his fingers though his hair, then swung his head up and back and shook himself like a dog.
Well, he was certainly awake now, at least. And wet, if not exactly clean. He found a spot where the sun reached down through the branches and sat, trying to dry off some before putting his shirt back on.
After a while, Meg called from upstream. “Calen? Are you, um, decent?”
“Yeah,” he called back. She emerged from behind her rocks, carrying her shoes. She had taken out the remaining pins in her hair, and it hung damply around her shoulders. “I forgot about not being able to dry off,” she said, sitting down beside him. “I had to put my dress back on while I was still pretty wet.”
“You’ll dry off as we walk,” he said. “Here, I’ll get my shirt and we can get moving.”
“You wear the sign of the Hunter,” she said suddenly.
He looked down. The charm usually lay beneath his clothing, so he guessed she’d never noticed it before. He picked it up, a half-moon carved in stone on a long silver chain. “All mag
es do,” he told her. “It’s the traditional gift from master to apprentice at the time of initiation. To remind us that all actions have consequences.” Meg came closer, leaning forward to take the charm in her own hand. “We usually think of him as the Harvester, though,” Calen added, “instead of the Hunter.”
Most people, if they wore anything, wore the bright sun sign of the Goddess. The Hunter was a darker figure, dispensing the cold justice people sometimes deserved as a result of their actions. He was also called the Harvester, representing the idea that people reaped what they chose to sow. Serek had always emphasized that point. Some mages become too enthralled with their own power, he’d told Calen more than once. They forget that directing that power appropriately is as important as being able to use it in the first place. You must never let your ability to cast a spell cloud your view of what that spell will achieve. Or destroy.
Meg let the charm fall back against Calen’s chest, smiling bitterly. “Maybe someone should have given one of these to Sen Eva,” she said.
“Someone definitely should have,” Calen said seriously. “She should have received her charm at the same time she received her initiate tattoo. That she has neither of those things . . .” He didn’t know if Meg really understood how wrong it was for Sen Eva to be able to use magic so anonymously. “I don’t know what’s worse,” he said. “That Sen Eva is secretly a mage or that there’s someone out there who was willing to train her in secret. No mage should be willing to do such a thing.”
“Much has happened that should not have,” Meg said quietly. “And our only chance of setting any of it right is getting home as quickly as possible.” She slipped her feet into her shoes and pushed herself up from the ground. He grabbed his shirt and followed her example.
Calen was beginning to get an idea.
He and Meg had fallen back into silence as they continued to make their way through the unfamiliar forest. At first, walking had seemed to make sense, at least made it seem like they were doing something, but it was becoming increasingly clear to both of them that they would never get home this way. And Calen knew that the only real chance they had was sorcery — magic had brought them here, somehow, and he would have to find a way to use it to send them back.
The Dragon of Trelian Page 15