Thornspell

by Helen Lowe

  “Not yet,” the master-at-arms said, when Sigismund finally expressed this frustration. “But the time we have spent together is nothing compared to the years I have spent training and fighting with swords.” The bronze eyes were calm as they met Sigismund’s. “But there is no room for such feelings when you face an opponent. Frustration, anger, fear—they are all distractions that will kill you if you hold on to them, more deadly by far than any enemy. You must let them drain out of you like water through a sieve, until there is nothing left: nothing except you and your antagonist.”

  Sigismund nodded, for they had been through this before and he understood its importance. He was considerably less enthusiastic, however, when Balisan insisted that he learn how to clean and repair his own armor and weapons, and mend his horse’s harness as well.

  “But I will have squires to do that,” Sigismund protested, “and grooms.”

  Balisan’s left brow flared higher, his sardonic expression pronounced. “And if your squires are killed? Or you become separated from your followers and have to depend on yourself to survive? What will you do then?”

  Sigismund shook his head, having no answer for that, but he wished there were a few less things that Balisan considered essential for a king’s son to do well. He learned to be glad of the times when his lessons covered the training and care of hawks, or hunting with hounds, so that he could escape into the sunshine and fresh air, galloping his new horse with the castle hunt. Balisan never hunted with them, but Sigismund would see him sometimes, standing on top of the high tower and looking out over the park and surrounding countryside.

  “Never misses owt,” said the Master of the Hunt the day he tracked Sigismund’s abstracted gaze to the small distant figure on the castle pinnacle.

  “Doesn’t sleep either, from what I’ve heard,” said Wat, one of the younger huntsmen, tossing back his shock of yellow hair. Like his cousin Wenceslas, Wat had been a friend of Sigismund’s since the King first brought him to the West Castle—so Sigismund knew that Wat was immensely proud of his hair and had practiced the toss until it became second nature, especially around Annie and the other maids.

  “And that red mare of his,” Wenceslas put in. “If she was any more knowing she’d talk!”

  No one paid much attention to that, though, because Wenceslas loved stories of animals that could talk. He had them from his Gran, he said, and Sigismund thought he must have caught the storytelling gift as well, for the groom could hold the entire castle spellbound. He had a bench outside the stable where he sat and whittled on the long summer evenings, while the horses gazed over the half-doors of their boxes and the castle folk drifted out to listen.

  Sigismund joined them whenever he could, and sometimes Balisan listened as well, although he came and went like a cat and stood so far back in the shadows that most of those present didn’t realize he was there. Sigismund always knew, although he was never quite sure why. Perhaps it was another of those little shifts in the air, or perhaps it was simply the amount of time they spent together, but his awareness of the master-at-arms’s presence had become like a sixth sense. And Sigismund noticed that the horses would always stir when Balisan arrived, but otherwise there was only the shift and gleam of his eyes to betray his presence—for those who knew where to look.

  Wenceslas’s favorite stories involved both horses and hounds, like the fabled Bran and Mifawn, as well as pigs that talked and birds that granted wishes—if you could catch them—and the shy, sloe-eyed witches who spun their magic in the deep woods. He knew numerous tales of people stolen away into Faerie mounds, only to reappear years or lifetimes later, and all the sagas of past kings and heroes. His voice would sink as he spoke of magic swords and high deeds, faithless friends and noble enemies, and loves that were greater and more passionate than those found in the everyday world. Beasts crept into these tales too: unicorns with enchanted horns and dragons that could change their shapes and walk in the human world to aid or oppose heroes. Needless to say, it was these high tales that Sigismund loved best.

  He found it strange, thinking about Syrica and the sleeping princess, that he might have become part of such a story himself. His everyday life seemed so ordinary, compared to Wenceslas’s legends, that Sigismund wondered if he could have fallen asleep that afternoon in the library and imagined everything that happened afterward.

  “Did I imagine it?” he asked Balisan one night when the storytelling was done. “I mean, you haven’t taught me any magic yet, and everything here is as dull and ordinary as ever.” It had been a particularly long and tiring day, and despite the storytelling he was feeling rather cross.

  Balisan was standing in shadow again, but the torch in the wall sconce cast a halo around his head. “Is it?” he asked, and the hum that Sigismund remembered from the dream was back in his voice. “Some would say that both this castle and the great Wood that is your neighbor are far from ordinary. And it is not everyone who has a faie concealed in the middle of their garden.”

  “I suppose not,” Sigismund mumbled, but he was thinking of Sir Parsifal and the Grail quest, and dragons that wore the shapes of men. Speaking with a dragon, he thought, now that’s what I call real adventure. “They say there are still dragons in the Uttermost East, but you don’t hear any recent stories about them here—not like Sir Andreas’s father fighting the ogres.”

  Balisan’s cat eyes gleamed at Sigismund through torchlight and shadow. “A dragon is the symbol of your House, is it not?”

  Sigismund shrugged. “Master Griff says that half the world uses dragons as an emblem, because they denote power and ambition in the human world.”

  “Master Griff is correct, of course,” said Balisan. “But if you asked him, he would also tell you that the crown prince of this kingdom has always been known as the Young Dragon.”

  Sigismund’s eyes widened. “I’ve never heard that before! I wonder how it came about—do you think there’s a story behind that too?”

  Balisan smiled at his eagerness. “There is a story behind most things, Sigismund. You could probably find out what this one is if you look in Master Griff’s library.”

  But that, thought Sigismund, would mean poking around in dusty books when there were far more interesting ways to spend his spare time. It was harvest again in the orchards and fields, and the castle hunt was out almost every day after game to smoke or salt down for the winter. Sigismund galloped after deer and hare with Wat and Wenceslas and felt the rush of his horse’s speed blow all thought of books and lessons out of his head.

  He still liked the feeling of looking out over the world and continued to meditate on the tower roof well into autumn. The days grew shorter and the nights frosty, and it was on one of these nights that the shift came. Sigismund felt his breath deepen, tuning itself to the slow turn of the earth and the answering wheel of the stars. His bones grew heavy, as though sinking into the stone of the tower and the roots of earth beneath it; his mind was the murmur of the trees in the forest, reflecting the distant glitter of the sky. Energy flowed through and around him, and his whole being reverberated, like a note struck on a great bell.

  The energy was a tapestry: the flicker of small animals in field and hedge, the warmth of kitchen and hearth fire, the laughter, arguments, and grumbling of people going about their lives. Sigismund could see larger currents as well, woven through the physical fabric of the castle and its grounds. He sank deeper into the ebb and flow of his breath, expanding to encompass that larger pattern—and felt another mind looking back at him.

  “You!” he exclaimed, tumbling back into his everyday reality on the tower roof.

  “Me,” agreed Balisan, swinging himself up through the trapdoor. He was silent, looking down at Sigismund, who stared back, his eyes wide and the cold air burning in his throat.

  “I saw you,” he whispered. “Your mind, looking into mine.”

  “Yes,” said Balisan. He knelt on one knee so they were eye to eye. “That is the beginning of seeing. Now you
can begin to learn.”

  Lines of Power

  They went up onto the tower roof every night after that, and Balisan made Sigismund practice sinking into the power flow until it became second nature. They would sit opposite each other, their breath clouding the air, but no matter how far Sigismund extended his perception, he was always aware of Balisan’s eyes, watching, following. Their gleam became like an opponent’s blade, something to be eluded. Sigismund tried to let his awareness dissipate, the same way he let his emotions drain away when he picked up a sword. He curled into ground mist, became one grain of gravel amongst the many lying on the riverbank, and crept through roots and leaves in the castle garden.

  He came back into himself in a white, clear dawn and looked out over a world in which every line and angle was etched in frost. Balisan sat opposite him, unmoving as the stone, his eyes dark, aged bronze. Sigismund felt a little like stone himself, filled with the long night’s silence. He stretched, cautiously, and Balisan smiled.

  “That was well done,” he said. “You swam away from me like a fish disappearing into a dark river.”

  The hand Sigismund lifted felt heavy as stone; his hair crackled with frost as he pushed it back. He shook his head. When he spoke, his voice was a pebble, cast into the chasm of the new day. “Is that what my power is?”

  A bird called from somewhere in the garden below, a single sweet trill. Soon there would be another and then another after that, and the castle would begin to wake up.

  Balisan’s reply was considered, grave. “Your family’s power is rooted in the land and has developed out of love for it, becoming an affinity for the energy that runs through earth, air, and water. But you can also draw on that power, using it to make a shield or barrier, as your great-grandfather did with the interdict. And you have the ability to walk in your dreams, which lets you visit places beyond the limitations of your physical body. It is a skill that served your ancestors well, especially in the early years of the kingdom, when roads were few and travel difficult.”

  Sigismund stretched, enjoying the feeling of muscle and sinew within the layers of his jacket. “Evasion and shielding,” he mumbled, yawning. “But what about attacking?”

  Balisan shook his head. “It is not the way that your family’s power has developed. It might be possible for you to learn such skills, but it would require many years studying the darker aspects of sorcery.” He paused, his eyes tawny in the first light of the sun. “But I do not think that is your path, Sigismund.”

  “Oh,” Sigismund said, trying not to feel disappointed. “But what about weapons of power? Like Excalibur or the belt that Sir Gawain won from the Green Knight? In all the stories they enhance the wearer’s power.”

  Balisan’s mouth twitched. “They do. But such artifacts are rare and very hard to find, not least because they may not wish to be discovered. And depending on who made them, or why, they are often unreliable.” His smile became sly. “I can lend you a book on the subject, if you wish.”

  Sigismund shook his head, and the smile deepened. “You are quite right,” Balisan said. “There are more important things for you to learn.”

  He gave Sigismund the book anyway, but began to teach him the names of the stars and how they shifted to match the seasons and the turning of the earth. They continued to go up to the roof every night, even when autumn became winter with its snow and ice. And on the night of midwinter, the nadir of the year, Balisan explained how the conjunction of certain stars and planets could open gateways and reveal paths into different realms of existence.

  “You must memorize them all,” said Balisan. “But the plane closest to us, the one we know best, is the realm of the faie, which we call Faerie.”

  Sigismund blinked, feeling the wind’s chill through his heavy coat. “But I thought that the faie belonged in this world—like Syrica and the Margravine?”

  It was a clear night, and Balisan’s head was dark against the white blaze of stars. The moon was bright enough that Sigismund could see when he shook it. “The faie have been crossing over into this world—and others—since the beginning of time, and they love it and have power here, but it is not their realm. But there are places where the planes overlap and the fabric of both dimensions is woven so closely together that no gates or powers are needed to cross over—from either side.”

  Sigismund frowned, trying to absorb what he was hearing. He supposed it would explain some of the more fantastic elements of the old stories, like Faerie mounds and the castles full of monsters and wonders discovered by knights on the Grail quest. Then he remembered his dreams of the sleeping castle and the dark forest outside it, full of strange sounds and unseen things stalking him, and shivered.

  “My dreams?” he asked. “Did they take me into Faerie too?”

  Balisan shook his head again. “Not in a physical sense, but dreams are another way of bridging the gap between realms. And the palace you dreamed of is a beachhead, one of those strongpoints where Faerie and the mortal world have always overlapped. Dreaming of it opened you up to the powers and forces present in both worlds—and some of them are not benign.”

  “The Margravine,” Sigismund whispered.

  “There are others,” said Balisan, “but because of her designs on the Kingdom of the Wood, it is never far from her mind.”

  Sigismund leaned his arms on the cold stone of the parapet and thought about that. He tried to remember what Syrica and Balisan had said in the garden, about the Margravine desiring power in the mortal world. “But why not just take it by using her faie powers or bringing a host from Faerie? Why did she have to kill the princess?”

  “Because despite their power, the faie are still bound by laws.” Balisan’s reply was measured. “One of the most binding forbids open war between the faie and humans in this mortal realm. So those faie who desire power here must work through mortal agents, and one of the more popular means has been to marry the rulers and heroes of this world and influence events that way. Some, depending on their disposition, have done this to achieve good, but others have acted solely for their own ends.” He paused, glancing up at the night sky, then down at Sigismund. “The Margravine tried to marry the King in the Wood, but there is old faie blood in that line and he was not fooled by her wiles. To make matters worse, from the Margravine’s point of view, he then married a woman from another family with strong links to Faerie. The Margravine feared that any children born to them would threaten her—which is why she decided that the princess had to die.”

  Sigismund frowned at the black shadow of the Wood. “But,” he said slowly, “wouldn’t Faerie law have prevented the Margravine from working a death spell against the princess?”

  Balisan shrugged. “Every law has loopholes, especially for those who wish to overturn them. Given the inheritance of both the King’s and the Queen’s family lines coming together, the princess is at least half faie—and there is nothing that prevents the faie warring against each other. And because the palace is built on one of the places where Faerie and the mortal world overlap, the Margravine was not obliged to cross over to work her magic. So technically she was not using her powers in this world, even though the effect was felt here.”

  It was Sigismund’s turn to shake his head, half impressed, half appalled. “That was…clever.”

  “The Margravine is clever,” Balisan said. “Fortunately for the princess, she was not the only one. Many knew of the Margravine’s ambitions with respect to that kingdom, but only Syrica foresaw the opening that the strength of the princess’s faie heritage would give her. She was able to undo the worst of her opponent’s spell and bar her from the castle and the Wood at the same time. But the Margravine can still use the realm of dreams to watch over it from a distance. She is like a spider at the center of its web and will always know when something has disturbed the outer edge.”

  Like me, thought Sigismund, remembering his last dream, the one that Balisan had banished. The winter night seemed cold and forbidding, and Balisan
’s presence was stern. There were still a few lights in the castle and village below, but otherwise the whole world lay hidden in darkness. It was mysterious, and full of powers and forces that he did not know but must learn to deal with if he was to survive. He frowned. “But Syrica said that the magic is not certain.”

  He turned, catching Balisan’s nod. “That is the nature of faie power. They love games and contests, even when matters of great importance are at stake. So although the core elements of a spell may be fixed, the rest is left to work itself out in its own way. And once the contest begins all the faie involved are bound to its terms.” He paused, and when he spoke again, Sigismund could hear the smile in his voice. “It is of great importance to the faie, but not something that human sorcerers readily understand.”

  No, thought Sigismund. “Although Syrica did say that only the chosen prince can undo the spell. Apparently the magic is specific about that.” He tipped his head back, counting the stars again. “But will I ever be strong enough to do it?” he asked, half under his breath.

  Balisan’s hand rested on his shoulder, a reassuring touch. “We already know that your family’s power does not bend easily to the Margravine’s will. And the more you develop it, the less ability she will have to influence you, despite the faie blood you have inherited from her.” His clasp tightened briefly. “She will see that inheritance as a weakness, but the flow of magic is always two-way, so the opposite is also possible—it may enhance your capacity to resist her.”

  Sigismund thought about that and also about what Syrica had told them in the lilac garden. “But the Margravine is still powerful,” he said finally. He studied the calm profile beside him. “Aren’t you afraid to be standing in her way?”

  “No,” said Balisan. “I am not afraid of the Margravine zu Malvolin.”