Colors of Chaos

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  A long vine swung by his shoulder, then brushed the bare skin of his upper arm again. It turned woody like a liana, sending forth rootlets to cling to him as though he were one of the massive trees of the unfamiliar forest. The strange and cloying perfume grew stronger… so strong he could barely breathe, and his heart pounded in his chest.

  Cerryl bolted upright in his bed, sweat streaming down his face, as if he were standing at his guard post in full summer sun. Or in a cook fire…

  Chaos flickered from his locked door-a door he always kept locked when he slept-now that he could lock it, unlike when he’d been a student. He slipped toward the door, extending his senses. Without opening it, he could sense the white glow of chaos shielded, could feel the footsteps behind a light shield, could catch the faintest scent of sandalwood perfume.

  Anya… headed along the corridor toward Faltar’s room.

  Cerryl forced himself to take a long and slow breath as he eased back to his bed, where he sat down slowly-suddenly shivering. After a moment, he wrapped the red woolen blanket around himself, then massaged his throbbing forehead with the fingers of his right hand.

  “… only a dream…” Except it wasn’t, not exactly. The forest and the clinging vines had been a dream, but Anya had definitely been outside his door on her way to visit Faltar. He’d sensed her chaos aura before-on all the times when she’d visited Faltar when he and Cerryl had been only student mages. Now that Faltar was a full mage, albeit junior like Cerryl, there was no reason they couldn’t sleep together, but Anya was still sneaking to see Faltar. That meant she didn’t want it known she was seeing Faltar. Was she fearful of Sterol’s jealousy? Cerryl shook his head slowly.

  Lyasa had mentioned Anya and Jeslek-so how many mages was Anya bedding? Cerryl frowned, recalling the words of Benthann-the mistress of the scrivener Tellis, for whom he’d apprenticed before the Guild had found him. What had Benthann said? Something like…

  “Sex is the only power a woman has in Fairhaven. Remember that. Even if she has a strong room full of coins or, light forbid, she’s a mage, sex is the only real power a woman has… The only thing a man offers a woman, really, is power. Coins are power. Don’t forget that. Sex for power, power for sex, that’s the way the world works.”

  So… Anya, powerful a mage as she was, was trading sex for power? Or a future obligation or… something? Cerryl took a deep breath.

  Darkness, he hoped it didn’t turn out that way between him and Leyladin. It seemed different… but how would he know?

  You know… you have to trust yourself… His lips tightened. That was easy enough to think, but he’d already seen how easy it was for people, even for himself, to deceive themselves.

  Will you be able to avoid deceiving yourself? Still shivering under the blanket, he massaged his aching forehead, knowing that the morning would come all too early. Far, far, far too early.

  XI

  Cerryl wiped his forehead. Even in the shaded part of the rampart area of the guardhouse he was hot, and summer had yet to come. The afternoons were getting warmer and warmer, and it would be at least another eight-day, from what he’d heard, before Kinowin split gate-guard duty into two rotations. With his luck, he’d probably get the hot late-afternoon duty.

  Creeaaakkkk… He glanced out along the White highway to the north. A single cart rolled toward the gates. The gray donkey pulling it was led by a white-haired woman who plodded down the road almost as methodically as the beast.

  Cerryl couldn’t sense any medallion on the cart, and he leaned over the rampart. “Gyral?”

  “Yes, ser?” The lanky detail leader glanced up.

  “Do us both a favor and yell to that woman. Tell her that if she doesn’t have a medallion and she gets close to the gates, I’ll have to destroy her cart and take her donkey. Just tell her to turn around and take one of the farm roads-or something. Or that she’ll need to get a medallion right now.”

  The White Guard frowned, then grinned. “You know her?”

  “No. I just don’t like taking things from old women. Maybe she doesn’t know the laws.”

  “I don’t know, ser. Some of them are pretty stubborn. I’ll try.” Gyral marched away from the two other guards toward the approaching peasant.

  Creaaakkk… The cart carried several stacks of woven grass baskets and some of reeds. The woman made her way toward the gates, aided by a long wooden staff half again her height.

  Gyral squared his shoulders. “Woman! You can’t use the White roads without a medallion. If you come to the gates and you don’t have the coppers for a medallion, then we’ll have to take your cart and donkey.”

  The roads be for all. That be what you White ninnies are always saying. I be one of the all, and I need to sell my baskets so that my family can live till harvest. And no spare coppers are you a-getting.“

  “You can’t bring the cart in on the highway,” Gyral answered. “Not without a medallion.”

  “There be no other way. Like as you know that.”

  “We’ll have to take your cart and baskets.” Gyral stepped backward.

  “You and who else, young fellow?” The crone raised the walking stick and brandished it, waving it at the detail leader.

  The lancer backed away and glanced toward Cerryl.

  Cerryl gave an overlarge shrug and called down, “If that’s the way she wants it!”

  Donkey, cart, and woman creaked toward the gate with no sign of slowing.

  “You have to stop,” announced Gyral.

  “I belong not to your White City, and, by the light, I’ll sell where I please. The land gives me those rights, not some man who wears white and rides in a gold carriage.” The crone swung the staff at Gyral and the guard beside him. Both backed away, although they had their shortswords out.

  “Stand back!” snapped Cerryl.

  Even the crone looked up.

  Cerryl concentrated, trying to form a fireball that was part firelance, one that would strike the staff and not the woman.

  Whhssst! The end of the staff vanished in flame, and then white ashes drifted across the stones.

  The crone held a piece of wood no longer than a short truncheon, one that flamed. She dropped it on the granite paving stones before the guardhouse.

  “Darkness and the Black angels take you!” The woman clawed at her belt, and a dark iron knife appeared as she launched herself at Gyral.

  Whhhsstt! The firebolt enveloped the old woman, and when it subsided where the crone had stood was a faint greasy spot and a pile of white ashes that drifted in the light breeze.

  “Stupid woman… mage tried to give her a chance.”

  “Don’t buck ‘em… not if you want to live…”

  Cerryl leaned against the rampart stones, faintly nauseated. He straightened. “Unhitch the donkey and put it in the stable. Unload the baskets. They might be useful somewhere.”

  When the cart stood alone below the guardhouse, Cerryl loosed a last fireball, and, once more, only ashes remained, ashes and a few iron fittings that prisoner details carried away. The highway was empty again in the hot afternoon, and Cerryl sank onto the stool in the shade.

  He wanted to shake his head. Even when you tried to explain the rules or help people, some of them just didn’t believe. The taxes weren’t new. They’d been there since the time of Creslin, something like three centuries or more, and there were still people who disputed them, who refused to accept the laws unless you used overwhelming force on them. Or, like the old woman, people who turned the words to what they wanted them to mean and then attacked when their interpretation was denied.

  He hadn’t had any choice at the end. Even for him, the rules were absolute. Anyone who attacked a gate guard died. Had he made it worse by trying to warn her? Or telling her she needed to pay for a medallion? Would it have been the same either way?

  He wiped his forehead again, then glanced obliquely toward the sun, blazing in the green-blue sky. A long time until sunset-too long.

  XII
/>   Kinowin had a new wall hanging-one with blue and purple diamonds pierced by black arrows, more like crossbow quarrels. The gently flickering light from the pair of wall lamps and the table lamp cast shadows from Kinowin and Cerryl across the hanging.

  Are we as insubstantial as those shadows? Cerryl wondered.

  The overmage followed Cerryl’s eyes. “Do you like it?”

  “The colors are… brilliant, I guess.”

  “It’s Analerian. Jeslek sent it to me with his last dispatch to the Council. He knows I like hangings-and that I dislike being indebted to him.” The big blond mage took a long pull from the overlarge mug on the edge of the screeing table. “Ah… getting hot too soon this year.”

  “Is he going to be High Wizard someday?” Cerryl had no doubts but wanted Kinowin’s reaction and felt he could only seek it while he was still considered inexperienced.

  Kinowin snorted. “The entire Guild decides that.”

  Cerryl had the feeling that the Guild agreed to support the strongest candidate.

  “You don’t think so, young Cerryl?”

  “I do not know enough to agree or disagree, ser.”

  “Carefully said.” The overmage pulled at his clean-shaven chin. “The Guild often recognizes the strongest mage as the most suitable.”

  Cerryl had understood early that the Guild wasn’t about to deny any mage who was strong enough. Since Jeslek was strong enough to create small mountains, sooner or later he would be High Wizard.

  Kinowin lifted the mug again, then looked at the younger mage. “Cerryl, you’ve been on gate duty for nearly two seasons. You’re going to have morning duty at the north gate before long. It’s a little earlier than I would like, but Bealtur, Heralt, and Myredin will be made full mages at the next Council meeting-that’s but an eight-day from now.”

  Cerryl knew Heralt and Bealtur but not Myredin-except by sight and a few casual conversations in the eight-days.

  “Heralt will take afternoon duty. He’s the most dependable.” The overmage studied Cerryl. “You know them. What do you think?”

  “I don’t know Myredin. I know that Heralt is solid and trustworthy.”

  “Carefully said… once more.” Kinowin laughed. “I’d like it if you didn’t tell anyone. Most know, but I’d still like your silence.”

  “Yes, ser.” Silence was usually a good idea, at least when an overmage requested it. When Kinowin requested it, Cerryl corrected himself mentally.

  “Are you still upset about the old farm woman?”

  “Yes.” Cerryl thought and added, “I know that we have to hold to the laws. I wanted to warn her that she needed a medallion.” He paused and cleared his throat. “What upset me was that she wouldn’t listen. It’s not as though the laws are new. But she wouldn’t listen to anyone, and she drew a blade on a guard, and I had to turn her into ash.”

  “Everywhere there are laws,” Kinowin said slowly. “We have laws. Hamor has laws. Even Recluce has laws. No land can long last without laws, and without the people obeying them. Not without thievery and killing and wastes in the streets. Yet, in every land, there are those who feel that they do not have to obey the laws. Some have so many coins that they attempt to buy their way around the laws. Some have armsmen, and some are like the old woman.” The big overmage stood abruptly and walked to the window without speaking, as if he were debating what to say next.

  Outside, the air was clear, and Cerryl could see the deep purple of the early-night sky past Kinowin’s profile.

  “The Guild has laws, too. We are the White Order, and yet… some here also find it difficult to abide by those laws.” Kinowin turned. “Sterol told you how difficult it was for an outsider to become a White mage, and yet, in some ways, you-and I-for the same reasons, understand better than those raised in the creche the need for order. Yet order, because of the Blacks of Recluce, has a bad name in Fairhaven.”

  Cerryl tried not to hold his breath, knowing Kinowin might have more to say and afraid that if he spoke the older mage would stop. He still couldn’t help but think about the old woman, though he knew he could have done nothing else, not as a junior mage and gate guard.

  “The ways to corrupt order are many. The allure of sex, or power, or the desperate desire to be respected-they can all corrupt. Who of us does not wish to be loved and wanted and respected and powerful?” The overmage laughed. “If anyone tells you any of those are not appealing to him-or her-watch that mage most carefully.”

  “Ah… yes, ser.”

  Kinowin turned. “Elsinot will stand your duty on the day the Council meets to confirm the new mages. I will summon you to the dais to tell the story of the old woman. Do not linger over it. Tell it briefly, but tell it with truth. Do you understand?”

  “I will be there, ser. I cannot say I understand why.”

  A sardonic smile crossed Kinowin’s face. “Let us just say that I see the need to let some of the brethren know that we are not universally loved and that our laws-fair as they are-do not seem fair to all.” He gestured to the door. “I have kept you long enough.”

  Cerryl rose from the chair.

  XIII

  The dark ships fitted by Creslin began to ply the Gulf of Candar, seizing all that they could and repaying none, yet all of the plunder laid up upon the stone piers of Land’s End was not enough to feed and clothe and shelter all those who flocked to the once-desert isle.

  The former dark guards of Westwind craved iron for their blades and blood to be shed upon those blades, and the wretched refuse from Renklaar and far Swartheld and Brysta and even those from Valmurl demanded that the Black mages feed and clothe them as befitted the wealthy.

  To draw yet more coins from storm-battered and valiant Candar, Creslin sought greater enchantments and turned foul juice into a green brandy that so bewitched the mind and senses of all that betook of it that they would pay any number of coins to achieve yet another taste.

  With those coins and those minted from the jewelry taken from captives, Creslin sent forth his vessels once more and had them pay whatever the grain factors of the ports of Candar asked, save that those who refused to trade found their warehouses torched by mysterious fires and flames that appeared from nowhere.

  Yet even those coins were not enough, and the black-hearted Megaera mixed both the White and Black and swirled the oceans and had them cast forth all the coins and metals and previous goods that had sunk with the Hamorian fleet… disregarding the lost souls that wailed with the use of each silver, each copper…

  Colors of White

  (Manual of the Guild at Fairhaven)

  Preface

  XIV

  As instructed by Kinowin, Cerryl sat behind a desk in the second row on the north side of the Council Hall, watching and listening as the meeting continued. Both Kinowin and Sterol stood on the dais, but Jeslek had remained in Gallos, and his place beside the High Wizard was vacant as mages stood and spoke and then reseated themselves.

  “… we see no change in trading…”

  “… a season has gone by, and still the Gallosian traders are accepting goods from Recluce.”

  “Not directly, Disarj. They ship the ironwork and spices to Spidlaria, and then the Spidlarians barge it upriver to Elparta.”

  “So? They still evade the surtax.”

  Sterol stepped forward, his hand raised. “Peace! The surtax was imposed here, not a season ago, but by the time scrolls were drafted and messengers sent it has been less than a handful of eight-days since all traders have been notified. Some traders may not yet know. They cannot summon ships back or change cargoes in a matter of eight-days.”

  “They will not change,” snapped the frizzy-haired and balding Disarj. “A serpent will slither all its days.”

  “That may be,” conceded the gray-haired Sterol, his hand touching his trimmed iron gray beard, his red-flecked brown eyes mild. “We have agreed that Eliasar should be dispatched to Fenard shortly with a suitable complement of lancers to offer encouragement to the ne
w prefect.”

  “… make sure there are enough lancers for that encouragement…”

  “… too bad young Cerryl didn’t flame a few more…”

  Cerryl winced at his name but kept his eyes on the High Wizard.

  Sterol waited for a lull in the soft comments. “For us to act before the traders know of the tax will raise unrest even within our own lands.”

  “Our traders are already uneasy,” pointed out the pudgy Isork. “They claim they lose coins every eight-day.”

  Kinowin stepped forward and nodded to Sterol, who nodded back.

  The overmage cleared his throat. “We hear from the traders. That is truth. The traders are not all of those we govern. Those who have the coins or the power to reach us are not a tenth part of the people who depend on us-or from whom we draw our armsmen and lancers. Nor is everything always as peaceable as it seems, even within and around Fairhaven itself.”

  Low murmurs whispered across the chamber. Kinowin squared himself on the dais. “One of our younger mages has been guarding the north gate. He told me of a meeting there. I also asked the guards, and all swore that it occurred exactly as told me. That is as it should be and speaks highly of the training he was given by the honorable Jeslek. Before we discuss matters further, I would like you to hear this story.” He gestured to Cerryl, who stepped forward. “Up here, Cerryl, where all can hear you. Now… tell all of the Guild what you told me.”

  As Sterol eased off the south side of the dais, Cerryl stepped onto the gold-shot marble of the dais. He had to clear his throat before starting. He tried not to look at Anya, with Fydel seated beside her. Faltar was on duty at the south gate. Nor did Cerryl look at Myral, who was in the first row. “It was about two eight-days ago, and I was on duty. I looked out along the highway, and there was this old woman with a staff leading an old farm cart with some baskets in it. I could tell that she didn’t have a medallion. She looked poor and maybe ill. So I called down to Gyral-he was the lead lancer on duty-and I asked him to warn her that she needed to either pay for a medallion or get off the highway.” Cerryl cleared his throat gently, trying to overcome his nervousness before the assembled mages.