Puppy Love: Sagecraft I

by J. C. Hendee

  Though a few initiates looked, not Kyne. She stood silently hanging her head, and both braids of brown-blond hair flopped out of her loose cowl.

  When Domin Ginjeriè said her goodbye to Master Boulg, Kyne was still too quiet and weary. And not from another boring half-day in a public school or too little sleep of late, or even how witless she felt whenever she looked up into Alshenísh’ìn’s sparkling eyes. As the domin led all twelve initiates off on the long walk back to the guild’s keep, Kyne blindly followed between Marten and Grim.

  “What’s the matter with you?” Grim asked. “You’ve been moping for moons. So Journeyor Hygeorht is gone again… and good enough!”

  Kyne clenched her jaw but didn’t look at him or say a word.

  Wynn Hygeorht was the only sage Kyne knew who actually talked about what it was to do instead of read about things. Too many around the guild had called her “Witless Wynn” for all she said about the places she had been and the things she had seen and done. Too many didn’t believe her or refused to. That seemed why Wynn had said less and less over time.

  Now and then, Wynn had talked a little more to Kyne, and Kyne would give anything to be what Wynn was: a sage who did something!

  Marten rolled his green eyes. “Nah, it isn’t the journeyor she’s stuck on.”

  Kyne said nothing to this either.

  They all turned up another street in a double line of short tan robes following Domin Ginjeriè’s sienna one. No passersby gave them much notice, for sages were a somewhat common sight. Everywhere along the way, people went about in the late-late afternoon, finishing last tasks before hurrying off for their homes. A peddler rolled by with fresh baked buns on his cart, some of them glazed with sugar.

  Grim slowed, eying that cart, and Marten reached around to snatch the back of his robe. But Kyne was still thinking about Wynn.

  Journeyor Hygeorht had gone among the Rughìr’thai’âch—the “earth-born,” or rughìr, or what humans lazily called “dwarves.” She had wandered the heights and deep depths of great Dhredze Seatt, their home in the mountain peninsula across the bay. She had also gone among the Lhoin’na to the far south, Alshenísh’ìn’s people, and even out into their wilderness of ancient trees said to make the royal castle’s towers look tiny. And more…

  Wynn had traveled to—and through—the little known other side of the whole world.

  What she had said about that hinted at people, places, and events dark and light, wondrous and frightful, and sometimes all of these at once. Some people could barely imagine such things, but Kyne imagined a lot. Now that Wynn had left again with her companions, yes, Kyne missed the journeyor, but…

  “Ah, no!” Grim grouched, scrunching his small nose in disgust. “Don’t tell me you’re stuck on that pasty, nasty, too-tall outlander you were tutoring.”

  Kyne resisted an incensed glare. Yes, Master Chane Andraso was strange and dour, and as tall as some full-grown lhoin’na.

  Marten stalled in staring at Grim. “What? Are you cracked in the head?”

  “I’m just saying,” Grim added, glancing again at Kyne. “She’s been in a mood for so long.”

  “That guy is a creep… creepy!” Marten added. “I don’t see why even that weird journeyor keeps him around.”

  Again, Kyne said nothing.

  Once, Master Andraso had snarled at her, Marten, and Grim. That night in the guild’s courtyard, the three of them had been arguing again. In not watching where they were going, they shoved open a door too quickly and nearly slammed it into Master Andraso’s face. His long, pale features twisted like a startled animal in snarling, and even Marten had shrieked like… well, like a little girl.

  This was all before Wynn’s tall companion later asked Kyne for help with learning the Begaine Syllabary. She had been uncertain at first.

  Such things were not usually taught to outsiders, and Master Andraso proved a very trying “student.” Not that he was unintelligent; he was quite learned as a fallen noble in his homeland across the world. He was also full of more questions than Kyne had ever been asked about anything, aside from the syllabary.

  And he would not stop with those!

  Actually, that had been nice, in a way. He thought she knew more than others, and that impressed him. Very little impressed Master Andraso from what Kyne knew of him.

  “Nah, it’s not the pasty one she’s stuck on,” Marten quipped.

  Kyne faltered and this time raised her eyes.

  Marten stepped ahead, glanced over his shoulder, and arched an eyebrow at her.

  “It’s the other one,” he added with another smirk. “That big dog… or wolf!”

  Kyne would never know what came over her then. In a sudden fury, she took a lunging step at Marten.

  “Do not call her that!”

  Marten flinched to a stumbling stop, and as he turned, so did Grim. Kyne stepped in on Marten again.

  “I told you—more than once—she is a majay-hì.”

  Marten rolled his eyes. “Oh, don’t start again. There’s no such thing, just children’s stories. It’s a wolf, and that’s all it—”

  Kyne jabbed him in the chest, shouting up into his face, “Do not call her that! And since… because… oh… you never speak of her again, at all. Understand?”

  Marten cringed back. “Okay-okay, no need for a fit.”

  Wynn’s other companion was taller than any wolf—perhaps as tall as some hunting hounds favored by the Rughìr. So tall, in fact, that Kyne barely had to bend down to look that one in the eyes. Even without those crystalline irises, so blue they might have soaked up the sky on a sunny day…

  No one should ever dare mistake “Shade” for a mere animal.

  Marten suddenly turned blurry in Kyne’s sight. Before a tear could form, she quickly dragged her robe’s sleeve across her face. Then she did notice the other initiates staring at her. Some were whispering, and even Domin Ginjeriè watched her in confused concern.

  Kyne felt even smaller than she was. All she wanted was somewhere to run and hide—or better, someone to run to.

  The majay-hì—“hounds of the Fay” or fairy-hounds in what little folklore spoke of them—were something most people didn’t believe in anymore. Kyne was not most, and she read a lot. Down in the guild’s catacomb archives, and long before she had met Wynn Hygeorht, she had stumbled upon the few old tales about this wondrous “people.”

  When Journeyor Hygeorht had first returned from afar, she came alone. On a later night, something—someone—returned with her to the guild’s grounds. A huge black-furred “wolf” stalked in on four large paws, like a watchful and feral guardian at the journeyor’s side.

  Kyne knew on sight of those crystalline blue eyes what—or whom—she saw.

  The one called Shade understood everything around her, as much as anyone else… and maybe more. No mere dog or wolf could do that—only a fabled majay-hì. Even among Alshenísh’ìn’s people, few claimed to have seen one and always from far off, a fleeting glimpse racing away out in their immense forests.

  Wynn had warned Kyne not to talk about what Shade was; it was bad enough that Wynn had brought a huge “wolf” onto the guild grounds. For that and the wild notions Wynn had uttered, she had been quickly thought half-mad… and suspicious.

  Kyne tried to do as Wynn asked. Well, maybe not as much as she should have. Either way, she no longer tolerated anyone calling Shade anything other than who she was. And a memory of combing her little fingers through thick black fur, and watching the shimmer of a creamy undercoat, washed away Kyne’s anger for an instant.

  With a muzzle longer and narrower than any canine, as well as taller ears that peaked sharply, only an ignorant, pebble-brained moron could take Shade for anything other than a majay-hì.

  Wynn had left again, moons ago, taking her companions with her. There had been no goodbyes, not even a last touch of fur or the warm flick of a tongue. That was what the worst of it was for Kyne.

  It hurt more with each passing da
y, for too many days had passed without Shade.

  “Don’t be… so…” Grim whispered. “We were only teasing… I’m sorry.” He turned on Marten, adding sharply, “So is Marten.”

  “Yea… sorry,” Marten mumbled, looking away.

  Before Kyne said or did anything more, there was Domin Ginjeriè standing right before the three of them. The other initiates still watched and whispered and, for an instant, Kyne thought she knew what returning to guild must have been like for Wynn.

  “Come along,” Domin Ginjeriè urged. “We need to reach the guild in time for supper… or I will be in trouble, too.”

  There was no soft smile as she looked down at Kyne. There was only a little worry on the domin’s pretty face as she turned and stepped ahead to the lead the way.

  In the long and quiet walk through the city, Marten frowned, unable to meet Kyne’s eyes, if and when she sullenly looked his way. Grim kept watching her and frowning as well. Neither would ever understand, for they didn’t know what—or rather who—was the one called Shade.

  Even if they did, they didn’t believe.

  When they all stepped out of Leaful Street onto Old Bailey Road, which looped around the guild’s keep and grounds, the sun had dropped so low beyond the city that dark shadows flooded the street stones. But some light still caught tall towers rising out of the corners of tall, stone walls.

  The first castle of Calm Seatt loomed ahead on the right, given over to the guild long ago. Both walls and towers boxed in the keep itself and other structures, and the inner bailey wall around all of this held a couple of newish buildings.

  Kyne spotted the top of one of the latter that she knew well.

  The initiates’ dormitory was built on the southeast side between the keep’s wall and the inner bailey’s wall. Its stones were perfectly fitted without mortar, like all rughìr—dwarven—masonry. That whole building was far less worn and weathered than the keep wall against which it was built.

  Once the whole place had housed the ancestors of Malourné’s royal family. Over hundreds of years, a second and then third castle had been built, each one larger than the previous and closer to the vast city’s vast port. This first “castle” was little more than a huge keep, though perhaps one of the biggest ever seen. As one of the oldest structures in Calm Seatt, to which the guild had made many changes and additions over time, the city had grown around the place.

  Kyne trudged on with Marten and Grim, following their procession toward the front gate through the inner bailey wall. The Old Bailey Road was called so because it looped around that wall. Only sections of the “outer” bailey wall remained on the outside of the loop. Other streets had long ago cut through it, and many shops and buildings now lined its near and far sides.

  Domin Ginjeriè reached the gate, left open late when domins or masters with initiates went out for the half-day public schools. The outer portcullis was still up, and she led the way between the gatehouse’s shorter towers and into its tunnel.

  Kyne, Marten, and Grim entered last as a chorus of little footfalls echoed in that dark stone passage.

  Returning to the guild was now the last place Kyne wanted to go. Even if half of the domins, some apprentices, and a few journeyors were not off on an expedition, the place would have still felt empty for who else was missing.

  Aside from Shade’s absence, all of Wynn’s hints about what she had done and where she had gone were trapped like wisps within Kyne’s head. And days of studying things other people had learned and done became unbearable.

  She needed to do something, and maybe that might take away some of the pain.

  “Kyne, would you please come with me.”

  She halted in the inner courtyard as other initiates raced on for the keep’s main double doors. Only Marten and Grim stalled as Domin Emilia Ginjeriè fixed on Kyne. This time the domin did smile, though it was obviously forced, as she held out her hand.

  Kyne quickly looked to her friends.

  Neither Grim nor Marten uttered a word as they exchanged a puzzled look. The rush and chatter of other initiates ended as the keep’s doors thumped shut. In the sudden silence, Grim gulped.

  There were only two reasons why a superior called any initiate away alone: something good or something terrible.

  “Please,” Domin Ginjeriè urged. “This will not take long, and then you can rejoin your friends at supper. I have something I would like you to do for me.”

  That last bit caught Kyne the most, and she quickly took the domin’s hand.

  They stood there as the domin waved on Marten and Grim. The boys kept looking over their shoulders as they scurried off for the keep’s main doors. And once those two were gone from sight…

  “Shall we go to my study for a chat?” the domin asked.

  Kyne hesitated and then nodded.

  When they stepped through those main doors and into the entryway, Marten and Grim were already gone. Kyne faced a passage running straight ahead that cut through the keep’s far back wall via the central doors into the main library, which was built in the back of the inner bailey.

  She had often spent free time there, though now it was an unbearable sight.

  Domin Ginjeriè turned right down the broad corridor along the keep’s front and away from noise echoing out of the commonhall the other way. Supper had to be in full motion, and most of the keep’s remaining inhabitants would be in there or on duty in the kitchen beyond.

  Kyne was led all the way to the main corridor’s end.

  They turned left down the passage toward the library’s southern entrance, but they didn’t go in there. Cutting through a side passage to the keep’s eastern tower, they went up two levels, and Domin Ginjeriè opened an old oak door.

  All four main towers had additional walls and doors built inside of them long ago. The four levels of each were now small studies and offices for ranking sages of this guild branch.

  Domin Ginjeriè pulled a small, clear crystal from her robe’s pocket, stroked it five times across her robe… and the crystal lit up in her hand. There was a time when this had astonished Kyne.

  It was called a “cold-lamp” crystal because it produced no heat. It ate any warmth given to it and turned that into cool, white light. All sages feared open flame near their precious texts, even in a contained oil lamp. The crystals were specially made by the guild’s order of Metaology, sages who studied religion, metaphysics, philosophy, folklore, and myth… and even some of the three fields of magic.

  Only journeyors and above earned the right to their own crystal—the precious mark of a true sage. One day, Kyne would gain one for herself.

  Domin Ginjeriè led the way into her study as she reached for something tucked into her robe’s belt.

  Kyne had been here several times and knew what lay inside. Still, its assault of little oddities and wonders distracted her.

  The place smelled like freshly turned earth, wild herbs, and musty dust all at once. Bookcases, or just stacks of books, were everywhere along all the room’s curved walls. One near casement was filled with scroll tubes of tin, wood-bound sheaves of loose sheets, and fired clay canisters. Some of the latter might have herbs in them, for a few in the order of Naturology were healers as well. Not to be confused with physicians, of course, but after all, Naturology was the order that studied the natural world.

  A beetle’s black carapace ran with rainbow hues like the inside of an oyster shell where it sat locked forever inside a glass globe. One huge claw as big as a dagger lay on another shelf. There were also rocks, bits of wood, engraved shards of old metal, and last and oddest of all, the tiny bones of a four-legged animal with a thumb-sized skull.

  The skeleton was rigged on a stand as if it might leap off, if it still had flesh. It was so small that it could have stood in Kyne’s hand. Not that she ever dared touch it, for it looked too fragile.

  Domin Ginjeriè once told her it was called an “al’kan’yê”; later, Kyne had been unable to find that name in the library.
The little bones shimmered as if polished but still looked stained, perhaps dug from the earth after too many years to count.

  It had been a while since Kyne had been in this chamber, though she remembered the first time and what Domin Ginjeriè had said about those tiny bones.

  The al’kan’yê, or whatever more than one should be called, had been gone from the world for a long time. When Kyne had asked why, the domin explained that all things come and go, just like one person’s own life. Some began and then ended altogether, while others changed into something else over many generations.

  Either way, what was was gone, as nothing stayed the same forever.

  Even this reminded Kyne of Shade.

  Wynn had mentioned that Shade and her father were not like other majay-hì. Both had been born “different… special.” This puzzled Kyne, for she had never seen let alone met any majay-hì but Shade. Maybe being different was why Shade had left her own far away land… to do something more.

  Kyne certainly felt different after having met Wynn, Master Andraso… and Shade.

  “Come, sit with me,” Domin Ginjeriè urged.

  Kyne stepped closer. The domin opened a glass-paned lantern on her over-laden but orderly desk, tucked her crystal into the lantern’s center bracket, and closed it. The room brightened instantly.

  This lantern was an actual “cold-lamp,” specifically made to hold a sage’s crystal.

  Instead of rounding the desk to her chair, Domin Ginjeriè set something else beside the lantern. Kyne had seen that before as well, for the domin sometimes carried it with her.

  Attached to a finely crafted disc of yew-wood was a braid of charcoal gray hairs, their ends tied off with a tiny bit of green ribbon. The carved disk itself, shiny and polished, held an oak leaf symbol surrounded by curled tiny leaves. It was obviously Lhoin’na craftwork. Kyne had once asked about it, but the domin only said it was a keepsake from bygone days. And that left Kyne wondering…

  Had some tall, young, and handsome Lhoin’na male once sought Domin Ginjeriè? Of course the braid’s dark hairs would never have come from him. Maybe those had come from his favored riding mount, perhaps one which the domin had ridden.