Colors of Chaos

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  “I’ll be right there.”

  “Thank you, ser.” The messenger scurried back down the corridor.

  Cerryl straightened his shirt, tunic, and belt, then left his quarters and walked quickly through the Halls of the Mages. He could hear the tumble of apprentices in the commons and in the library, but he did not peer in as he passed. The corridors and courtyards were empty, except for one mage-Elsinot. The two nodded to each other as they passed in the front foyer. Then Cerryl started up to the White Tower.

  The duty guard was one Cerryl did not know. “Ser?”

  “The mage Cerryl. The High Wizard requested my presence.”

  “One moment, ser.” The guard rapped on the door and announced, “The mage Cerryl, at your request, High Wizard.”

  “Bid him enter.”

  “You may enter.” The guard held the door.

  Cerryl closed the door firmly, careful not to slam it. Jeslek, seated at the table, did not rise but pointed to the chair across the polished wood from him.

  “You summoned me?” said Cerryl as he seated himself.

  “I did. What have you discovered? About the road coins? Have you found anything?”

  How could Cerryl explain?

  “Ah… yes… and no, ser.” He pursed his lips, then frowned. Finally, he plunged in. “I have seen things in the glass that would suggest road taxes in Certis are not going where they should, but I could not say for certain that such is so. I could not tell you how many coins are not reaching either the viscount or the Guild.”

  “Go on.” Jeslek sounded almost bored or as if he had expected something of the sort.

  “The man who seems to be the finance minister, he lives in a house that could be a palace. Two of those who seem to work for him, they also live in houses larger than those of the grandest of factors here in Fairhaven…”

  “Good.” Jeslek nodded. “You are making progress. I would like you to see what more you can discover in the next eight-day.” After a hesitation, the High Wizard asked, “How are you feeling?”

  “Much better. I still get tired more easily than I used to, but in a few more days I hope…”

  “You have at least an eight-day. If you can discern more before that, I would like to be informed.”

  “Yes, ser.”

  Jeslek stood. “Until later, Cerryl.”

  Caught by surprise, Cerryl sat for a moment, then stood. “Yes, ser.”

  His head seemed almost to spin as he walked out of Jeslek’s chambers. While the High Wizard had not been caustic or cruel, as he had seemed at times in the past, he had definitely been preoccupied. Were matters in Spidlar getting worse? Or was it Hydlen?

  Cerryl walked slowly down the stone steps of the White Tower, still trying to figure out what had bothered him about the quick meeting. Jeslek almost hadn’t seemed to care, yet he had summoned Cerryl.

  The first dinner bell rang, echoing through the front foyer. In a way, that amused the brown-haired mage, because few, if any, in the front Hall or the White Tower ever ate in the Meal Hall.

  At the moment, the Meal Hall didn’t sound too bad, because his coins were limited and Leyladin had yet to return from Lydiar. His infrequent and quick looks with the glass had shown a healthier-looking boy with her, presumably Duke Estalin’s son. So Cerryl hoped it wouldn’t be too long before she returned. In the meantime, he would eat in the Halls and save his coins.

  Heralt was already at the serving table when Cerryl reached the Meal Hall. Seeing the creamed mutton, Cerryl smiled, imagining Faltar’s choice words about the meat. After filling his plate and taking a healthy chunk of the rye - and - grain bread and a mug of the weak ale, Cerryl joined Heralt at one of the side tables.

  Cerryl nodded as he sat, then took a mouthful of bread. He couldn’t face starting with the mutton, hungry as he was. Next he sipped the ale, followed at last by some of the creamed mutton, which gave off an orangish smell. Orange? He didn’t want to think about it. After several mouthfuls, he turned to Heralt. “How is guard duty going?”

  Heralt looked blankly at Cerryl for a moment, then glanced around the as yet sparsely filled Meal Hall before speaking, his voice lowered. “Things are getting bad. They brought in a trader. Traders dress pretty much the same. Her hair was short, almost like a man’s, and she wore…you know. But she’s a woman, and the lancers brought her in through my gate. They had her bound. It… just didn’t feel right.”

  “How did you know she was a trader?”

  “I was guessing, but it bothered me.” Heralt shrugged. “So I asked Fydel why they were bringing in a trader.”

  “And?” The fact that Fydel was bringing back a woman dressed as a trader bothered Cerryl… something he should be remembering.

  “He told me to ask Jeslek.”

  “That’s odd,” mused the gray-eyed mage. “If she owed road taxes, they didn’t need to bring her here. If she attacked a mage, she’d be ash already.” Female trader? He swallowed-was it the one tied up with the smith that Jeslek, Anya, and Fydel all worried about?

  “You look like you know something-like you were hit in the face with a staff,” Heralt observed.

  “I’m not sure, but… if… well… There’s a female trader that Anya was worried about.”

  Heralt glanced around the Hall again, then at the line of five apprentices who had suddenly appeared at the serving table. “I wouldn’t want to be a woman Anya didn’t like, not one who wasn’t a mage.”

  “Nor I. But I don’t know why she doesn’t like this one,” Cerryl admitted, “except that this woman trader, if she’s the same one, knows a Black smith.”

  “I don’t like it.” Heralt grimaced. “The prefect of Gallos not quite defying the Guild, the old prefect killing Sverlik, the Duke of Hydlen killing the old duke-he was just a child-and trying to kill Gorsuch and then disappearing. Things are getting bad.”

  Worse, Cerryl corrected mentally, much worse, even if you can’t prove it. “It looks that way.”

  “Why?” asked Heralt. “There have been bad years for crops before. That’s not new. There have been viscounts and prefects and dukes who have disputed the road tariffs before. That’s not new. There have been traders here in Fairhaven that didn’t like the Guild, and that’s not new. Recluce has been there for something like twenty-five-score years, always an enemy. Yet we have more mages and more White highways than ever before, and most people in Candar are better off.” The dark-eyed mage spread his hands.

  “I don’t know why.” Cerryl paused. He had been about to say that it seemed no one respected the Guild as much, but was that it? How could the other lands in Candar-and Recluce-not respect Fairhaven after the example of the enormous power demonstrated by Jeslek in creating the Little Easthorns? “I don’t know.”

  Heralt stood. “I have to go.” He grinned. “I’ll see you later.”

  “Who is she?”

  Heralt just shook his head.

  “You’re not saying? Wise man.”

  Heralt grinned, then turned.

  Cerryl finished the last of his dinner alone at the table, ignoring the chatter of the apprentices.

  Instead of going back to his room after eating, Cerryl went back through the fountain courtyard, and the cold and windblown spray, and into the front Hall. He took the steps to the lowest level of the White Tower and eased around the corridor past the guards to Kinowin’s quarters, where he knocked.

  “You can come in, Cerryl.”

  Cerryl closed the door behind him.

  Kinowin looked up. He was standing by the bookshelves and studying a volume half-open in his huge hand. “I hope this isn’t about that Patrol business. You have to talk to Isork about that, if you want to rejoin the Patrol. And it would have to be a year or more from now.”

  “No, ser. It’s not about the Patrol. Not that I know of.”

  Kinowin glanced at the pages before him, then closed the book. “Then sit down.”

  Cerryl sat, his nose twitching. Was it the dust from the old v
olume Kinowin held? He rubbed his nose, and the itch subsided but did not go away totally.

  Kinowin walked toward the window, his back to the purple and blue hanging, his eyes focused out through the thick glass of the window closed against the early-evening chill. “What is it?”

  “Fydel and the lancers brought in a trader, a woman trader.”

  “That bothers you?”

  “Yes,” Cerryl answered directly. “I cannot see any reason for it, not even with all the problems that the Guild faces. Fydel could discipline a trader without using a full lancer detachment.”

  “Strange, yes.” The overmage nodded without looking at Cerryl.

  The younger mage waited.

  “Overmage or not, Cerryl, I am not privy to all that is done for the High Wizard.”

  “Yes, ser.”

  “Why does a simple trader bother you?” asked Kinowin, finally turning from the window.

  How much should he tell Kinowin? He cleared his throat. “Some time ago, I overheard a remark by Anya about a female trader who was linked to the smith in Spidlar-the Black one that Jeslek is following. The one called… Dorrin, I believe.”

  Kinowin raised his bushy blond eyebrows. “Yes?”

  Cerryl shrugged. “It’s not my task. Yet it disturbs me, and I don’t know why.”

  “Those who get involved in what is not their task… What happened with the Patrol, Cerryl?”

  Cerryl winced inwardly at the implied reprimand. “Ser, I have done nothing, nor will I. I know that when something bothers me, such as this, there is a problem. I can do nothing. But I thought you should know, if you did not already. All I can do is bring it to your attention.”

  Kinowin gave a soft laugh. “So you will make this problem mine?”

  Encouraged by the open, humorous tone of the overmage’s laugh, Cerryl gave a wry smile. “Yes, ser. I do not know where else to turn, and you are far more capable at such than I.”

  “Cerryl, that sounds like Anya. Why don’t you say what you mean?”

  Cerryl swallowed. “It bothers me. I think it will not help the Guild. I don’t know why, but I feel strongly. Who else can I let know?”

  “That’s more honest… and more disturbing.” Kinowin paced back to the other side of the room, pausing and fingering a green and silver hanging featuring interlocking triangles. “All I can say is that I will inquire, in my own fashion.” He turned and looked at Cerryl. “Is that enough?”

  Cerryl stood. “Yes, ser. That’s all I can ask.”

  “It’s more than you can ask, Cerryl, but I trust your feelings about the Guild. Now… let a poor overmage have a few moments to read.”

  Cerryl stood, a rueful smile on his face. With a bow he left, heading back to the uncertainty of his room and a screeing glass that showed more and more and revealed less and less.

  LXXII

  Cerryl looked at the chaos swirling across the glass, disrupting his search for Leyladin. Maybe he needed a moment of rest. He stood and paced back and forth across his room. Then he took a sip of water from the mug on the desk.

  Finally, he reseated himself before the glass, but he could sense strong patterns of chaos, far closer than Lydiar-or Certis. Something was wrong in Fairhaven, perhaps even in the Halls… subtly wrong, and wrong at the moment. But what? Do you really want to know?

  He looked down at the silvered mirror on the desk, hoping to trace out the wrongness through the glass. The mists parted, and Cerryl’s mouth opened as he saw the image in the glass.

  Cracckkkk! The White Guard continued to lash the figure strapped facedown on the long table, and a line of red slashed across the legs.

  A white-haired White wizard’s hands moved, as if to fight back something. The mage’s forehead shimmered with sweat, and he glanced at a mirror on a small table, tilted toward him.

  Cerryl frowned, but he could not make out the image in the mirror. He could discern that the White wizard was Jeslek and that Anya stood beside him. The lash cut across the bare shoulders of the figure strapped on the table, and the prisoner shuddered.

  The wizard frowned, glanced at Anya.

  She shook her head and spoke briefly.

  Instead of responding, Jeslek took a sip from a mug. His face tightened in concentration, and he nodded to the guard. The whip snapped across the woman’s bare back.

  Jeslek wiped his forehead and nodded once more to the guard.

  Another lash cracked across the woman’s back.

  The smile on Anya’s face turned Cerryl’s guts, and he swallowed.. By the time he looked again, the guard had unstrapped the unconscious woman and lifted her over his shoulders like a sack. The guard followed Fydel from the lower tower room.

  Cerryl quickly let the image lapse, hoping that Jeslek and Anya had been too preoccupied to notice or, if they had, too much so to determine which mage had been observing. Despite the chill in his room, sweat beaded across his forehead, and his guts still threatened to rise into his throat.

  What can you do? You’ve told Kinowin, and if Jeslek finds out that you’re spying on him…

  For a time Cerryl sat before the blank glass. Then he stood, squared his shoulders, and walked to the window, looking out as fluffy flakes of snow drifted down past the heavy glass.

  After a time, he turned, wiped his forehead, and walked to his door, heading toward the fountain court. He stood by the archway for some time, knowing that Anya would come-should come-sooner or later.

  At last, he sensed the wave of chaos that accompanied Anya as she crossed the front foyer of the Halls of the Mages and headed toward the fountain court.

  Looking worried and as if he were not paying attention, he started across the courtyard at an angle, ignoring the snow that fluttered down and melted on the stones.

  “Cerryl! Watch where you’re going. You almost ran into me.” Anya looked at Cerryl intently. “You meant to catch my attention.”

  “Of course.” Cerryl grinned. “I couldn’t keep that from you.” The scent of sandalwood and trilia was almost overpowering, but he couldn’t let that distract him.

  “But why?” Anya seemed genuinely curious.

  “Do you have a moment?” He pointed toward the bench beyond the fountain before he realized, belatedly, it was wet. He stopped short of sitting as he drew her toward it.

  “You intrigue me, Cerryl. A moment only.” Still, she followed him, and they both stood beside the bench.

  The gray-eyed mage looked directly at Anya. “War or conflict takes force. If you kill the trader woman, you will force that Black smith, whatever his name may be-”

  “Dorrin,” Anya said with an amused smile. “Dorrin.”

  “To attack Fairhaven. Can’t you sense just how much order he embodies? He carries as much order as Jeslek does chaos.”

  “Cerryl… you can see much, but there is a great deal which you do not see.” Anya flashed the bright and false smile. “Of course, the smith embodies great order. But you always did have a soft spot for victims. That was what caused you trouble with the Patrol. Let me assure you that the trader lady will return to her smith, and she will survive.”

  “Then why did you have Jeslek torture her?”

  “Cerryl… do you know what Jeslek would do to you if I mentioned this?”

  The younger mage forced a smile, blocking his true feelings as he had learned to do so long before in order to survive. “Anya… I would tell him that you told me, and he would believe me.”

  Anya’s smile faded. “You surprise me, Cerryl. What is the trader woman to you?”

  “Nothing. I’ve never met her. I’m worried about Fairhaven.”

  For a time the redhead studied Cerryl. Finally, a half-smile crossed her lips. “You really do. You really are like Jeslek. I never would have expected it.”

  Cerryl distrusted the second smile, even more than the first.

  “She will go back to her smith. Never fear. And nothing more need be said. Do you understand?”

  Cerryl understood that he c
ould not trust Anya, but that she told the truth so far as the lady trader’s return went. There was more there, but he didn’t know what else to ask or how to follow up on what he had learned. So he nodded.

  “Good.” Anya turned and left him standing there.

  Once she had left the court, Cerryl took a deep breath. What else could he have done? He couldn’t have approached Jeslek or Kinowin again, and certainly not Fydel. Only Anya was devious enough that she had enough to hide from Jeslek. You hope…

  Slowly… he turned and started back to his room.

  LXXIII

  Cerryl stepped up to the door, but it opened before he could lift the knocker, and Leyladin was in his arms. He held on for a long time.

  Finally, she stepped back. “It’s cold out. You could come in.”

  “I came as soon as I got your message.”

  “I can see that.” She smiled, with a warmth that made him forget the chill and the slush in the streets through which he’d walked, then stepped back.

  They walked into the sitting room to the right of the entry hall. A fire had been laid in the hearth, and the warmth was welcome to Cerryl. A faintly aromatic smell from the fire filled the air, not quite pine, but something resinous.

  Leyladin settled onto the settee, and Cerryl sat beside her.

  “It’s gotten cold and stayed that way.”

  “It’s winter,” Cerryl suggested with a laugh.

  “The weather is colder than usual.”

  “The whole year’s been strange.” Cerryl turned on the settee. “When will your father be home?”

  “Not for a bit.” Leyladin paused. “You almost don’t seem glad to see me, not after the first few moments.”

  “It’s not that.” Cerryl looked past the healer, toward the painting of her mother, and the image’s blue eyes seemed to bore into him.

  “You’re upset. More troubles with Jeslek?”

  “Not exactly…” He pursed his lips.

  “What don’t you want to tell me?”

  “It’s not that.” He paused. “You can’t tell anyone, not even Lyasa.”