Wren Journeymage

by Sherwood Smith

  “Truth is, I don’t know all that much myself. Mistress Leila appeared just today, with him in tow. We were running about getting everything ready and I had no time to ask.”

  The dinner did not last much longer than that. Halfrid had to return to the island and see to the mages. The Sendimeris twins had the Magic Council waiting for them. Wren knew that her investiture was just one pleasant occurrence among many in their lives, and their responsibilities still awaited them. One day I will be one of those seniors, she thought as she said the last good-bye. Leaving behind a happy young mage and going back to my real work.

  She felt very strange.

  o0o

  After they’d said farewell to the last of the visitors, Tyron tapped Wren on the shoulder. “Connor is waiting upstairs. Teressa, he wants you as well as Wren to hear this.”

  “This what?”

  “My question as well,” Teressa said from Wren’s other side.

  The three sped upstairs to the other end of the royal guest suites, where the Shaltars usually stayed when they visited Cantirmoor. Prince Rollan and Mistress Leila awaited them in the outer chamber. Through the wide windows, cool, fresh air swept in, carrying the scents of wet leaves, grass, and the faint sweetness of summer’s last roses.

  Rollan turned a weather-beaten face to his sister.

  Leila said, “Connor, we first have to ask: are you still planning to wander the world? You’d spoken of wanting to take two or three years, so is this a brief visit, or a return?”

  “A return.” Connor shook his head. “I had fun, but I decided whatever I was looking for was here.” He touched his head. “Not there.” He waved his hand at the window. “And I missed home.”

  Rollan grinned and rubbed his hands. “Well, here’s what: it looks like I’ll be moving to Eth-Lamrec. My princess wouldn’t have me on any other terms.” He chuckled, and Wren vaguely recalled the Princess of Eth-Lamrec who had come at the head of a trained group of warriors to help fight against the Lirwanis, true to their treaty. She’d had a loud, hearty voice, a swinging stride, and a dashing manner. “But there’s Dareneth, my own principality, up in the northern mountains. You already know I head the Brown Riders. I want you to take them over. I already know how good you are in the field, when you have to be.”

  Connor shook his head. “I could ride with them. Maybe. On some missions. I can’t lead, as I don’t carry a sword any more. I can’t take life from living things.”

  “But you don’t need to. We don’t kill anyone, by preference. We keep the peace. The worst you’ll face is renegade Lirwanis who turn to robbery because all they know is how to fight. We round ‘em up and give ‘em a choice of going back over the border for Queen Idres to deal with, or we put ‘em to work in Siradayel.”

  Connor nodded slowly. “I could do that.”

  “They’d accept you. Everyone’s heard of your exploits during the war, and this business about Andreus won’t hurt, either.”

  “But it was Wren’s magic.”

  Leila waved a hand. “By the time rumors—and songs—make their way up here, it will be the two of you against an entire pirate fleet. You don’t have to confirm it, but never deny it. People like that kind of heroic tale. Makes them feel safe.”

  Connor winced. Wren sensed that he felt a little like a fraud. She remembered that feeling.

  “Here’s why we need you,” Rollan said, exchanging a glance with Leila, who nodded. “The truth is, our mother is probably going to step down from the throne. She discovered she likes having nothing to do but socialize. She’s thinking of taking up residence at her lakeside retreat year round, where she’ll probably be joined by the older courtiers of her day. She still gets all the social precedence, but with no work involved.”

  “But who’ll have the throne?” Connor asked, looking appalled.

  “Not Lusra or Kerrith,” Leila said, laughing. “In fact, we’ve just about got them married off. Far away.”

  “You?” Wren asked, breaking in. “Mistress Leila?”

  A nod.

  “I thought you gave up your title, and all that, when you came to the magic school!”

  “I did. For as long as it was needed to keep the family peace, but you don’t actually give up a family unless you move very, very far away. I love my life at the Magic School, but the very things that make me good there have turned out to be useful in running a kingdom. So at my time of life, I am changing places. I never wanted or expected it, but I made peace with it this past year, and will even like it. And it has a practical side, and I don’t mean just being able to control our four foolish siblings. It might not be so bad a thing to have another queen who is also a mage, until we know how Idres is going to deal with her neighboring kingdoms.”

  Teressa said, “I think I can vouch for Idres. At least she seemed willing enough to treat with me.”

  “Yes, but for how long?” Leila asked, turning to her. “She has no loyalties that we can tell, and though we all agree that the Rhiscarlans are smart and powerful, you have to admit they tend to act on inclination more than on principle.”

  Teressa sat back, looking down at her hands.

  Rollan turned back to Connor. “Here’s the other thing we seldom talk about, but the mountains of Dareneth are full of . . . oddities, let’s say. In some of the valleys, the people insist the trees walk. Strange creatures live on the mountain tops, stranger by far than gryphs. Your father said once that there was a reason that the Dareneth family lived there, and though the principality came to the Shaltars by marriage treaty when he died, I really believe a descendant from the Dareneths needs to go back there.”

  Leila said, “Connor, there is even a rumor that your father did not actually die, but took the form of an oak tree. Strange as that sounds.”

  Wren sensed a stillness in Connor that meant the words contained deeper meaning than they seemed to. Rollan smiled at Wren, a funny sort of smile. But all he said was, “How about we talk tomorrow? Take some time to think it over tonight.”

  Leila nodded. “I have to return to the school and discuss my replacement with Halfrid. Wren, if you stay at the school you realize you’re probably going to find yourself with a class this next season, the beginners’ class. Every mage is needed.”

  Danal will be one of those beginners, or I’m a hoptoad. Wren flashed a grin.

  Mistress Leila didn’t wait for Wren to respond, but followed her brother out, talking in a low voice.

  Tyron said, “Teressa, Leila tells me that that the switch of queens will have an unexpected benefit with treaties and even the treasury. Let me tell you what Halfrid thinks. . .”

  Teressa looked from Wren to Connor, then turned away with Tyron, and they passed into the antechamber. Wren watched her go, remembering what Teressa had said about things going back the way they were. Except things never did really go back the way they were, did they?

  Connor said, “Wren, do you think you could live in the mountains some day?”

  Here it was. Wren felt that light, warm glow all over when her eyes met Connor’s and she smiled, but then the meaning of the question really sank in. “I think so,” she said, “but I don’t know.”

  Connor reached and took her hands. “It’s too early for anything. Too many changes too fast,” he said. “For me, too. Oh, I did a lot of flirting on the road. Longface and I met a lot of nice girls in the mountains and along the sea. But those exchanges of kisses never meant much, and there wasn’t a one of them I felt I could tell the truth to. With you, it’s all different.”

  “That’s the way I feel,” she said slowly. “Different.”

  Connor grinned. “It’s enough for now! I’ll go back to Dareneth. There is a castle, but it’s a nice one. I was there a few times, when I was small. I remember a lot of light, and color, and, well, a sense of home, that I never felt at my mother’s palace in Paranir. Your father might even feel at home there, if he decides to stop wandering, for they are so isolated they really cherish storytellers in those
mountains. For that matter, it’s so high that his powers might settle down.”

  Wren was thinking hard. She envisioned a home, with strange creatures passing by and magic all around. She envisioned Connor in that home, and seeing him every day. She imagined finding good work to do, probably helping Queen Leila and even coming south to help Tyron, when he took Halfrid’s position, and Teressa, whose own life was settling more and more into the affairs of a queen.

  She imagined going back home with Connor. It felt right. Good.

  “Well,” she said, “I won’t mind teaching beginners for a year or two. But that’s not what I want to be doing for the rest of my life!”

  When he smiled back at her, a special, tender, private smile, she gave in to instinct, tugging Connor close.

  Anticipation ran through her like thousands of silvery butterflies, all of them igniting into sparks when her lips met his, so soft, so warm, in a first, tentative kiss.

  But rising voices from the room beyond broke the moment, and they pulled away, both a little breathless. Tyron and Teressa were arguing. Again.

  “I just don’t see why I should start strutting around in velvet and lace and all the rest,” Tyron said. “Mages wear robes for a reason—they don’t have to worry about clothes. Velvet! Faugh!”

  “But you’re a part of court,” Teressa said. “Oh, you just don’t understand. You don’t want to understand.”

  “Not if it means wearing lace,” Tyron shot back. “I can leave that to Garian. He likes lace. Teressa. . . . don’t go. Teressa? All right. I’ll do it.”

  “Just for certain events? Formal events?”

  “Yes. For certain formal events.”

  Wren and Connor exchanged grins. That promising beginning was just that—a beginning, one of the nicest yet. There was plenty of time, and plenty to do. Wren’s whole life was just beginning.

  Teressa entered, and put her hands on her hips. “All settled?”

  Tyron pointed an accusing finger. “Wren, if she gets me into velvet and lace, you have to wear it, too.”

  The four of them started laughing.

  Thirty

  As Wren had foreseen, time rushed along in its steady stream.

  Wren taught for two years at the Magic School, until Halfrid and Tyron were able to bring the staff up to its full complement again. Then Halfrid retired at last. Retired from teaching, that is. He was still sent on mysterious errands by the Magic Council.

  Connor took up life in Dareneth, working with the Brown Riders until he felt confident that he could lead them. When Wren left the school (except for sporadic visits back), it was to marry Connor in a great ceremony in Queen Leila’s capital.

  By rights Wren was now a duchess, but she refused to think of herself that way. She was proudest of her white mage’s tunic, and tried to get away with wearing that to court functions, though once in a while, she had to put on her fancy dress. With lace.

  Within another year the first of their several children was born. Arbran, who had resumed his wandering as soon as he recovered, stayed around more often once he became Grandpa Arbran.

  Life in Cantirmoor went on, altering slowly as the seasons slid by. Tyron and Teressa continued to argue, and sometimes they shared kisses, but gradually those were fewer, as were the arguments. Tyron was so busy at the Magic School that he sometimes sent Orin as his substitute to the palace; she and Teressa began their relationship with determined good will, which altered to respect, and that gradually deepened into a genuine friendship.

  Life did not always separate the four. They loved getting together for various occasions, exchanging stories. They knew their lives were entwined, so they were not surprised that the very day Hawk Rhiscarlan rode back through the gates of Cantirmoor, Wren and Connor’s first child went up to play on a mountain crag and turned into a bird.

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