The Obsidian Mountain Trilogy

by Mercedes Lackey

  He thought carefully. Not much there, either.

  What he did know that might be considered potentially reliable came not from his schoolbooks and histories, but from his religious instruction in the Temple when he was much younger. Elves were one of the Nonhuman Races strictly banned from City lands. Occasional Elven trade goods did still arrive in Armethalieh, by way of the Mountain Traders, though their price was beyond the reach of all but the wealthiest of the Mageborn. Elves lived for a very long time, maybe forever, in forests far to the west. They didn’t have any particular magical abilities—not like human Mages—but they were enchantingly beautiful, and if a human ever saw one, the Elf would use that supernatural beauty to lure him to his doom, because, like all the Nonhuman Races, they were essentially inferior and corrupt, poor copies of humanity allowed to exist by the Eternal Light for instructional purposes.

  Only they didn’t seem to have lured Idalia much of anywhere, now that Kellen came to think of it. And if the doctrines of the Eternal Light were as false as the rest of the teachings of the Mages, then Kellen thought he’d better consider the rest of what he’d been taught pretty carefully before trusting—or acting on—any of it.

  “Here you are.”

  Kellen looked up as Idalia returned with a sack and a small iron pot. “Emya roots. They need to be peeled for stew. When you’re done peeling them, take them down to the spring and wash them, then fill the pot with water and bring it up to the cabin. I’ve got some other chores to do, but this should keep you busy and out of trouble. There’s bread and apples inside if you get hungry, and—try not to injure yourself too badly at this chore while I’m gone, brother mine. And remember, a little work is going to help you recover faster.”

  With that she walked off, leaving Kellen staring down at a knife—his own penknife, as a matter of fact—an iron pot, and a burlap sack half full of lumpy brown roots.

  They were going to eat these?

  He picked one up and inspected it dubiously.

  “Good eating, those.”

  Shalkan appeared, seemingly out of nowhere, reached over Kellen’s shoulder, and plucked the root delicately out of Kellen’s hand.

  “Mmm … crunchy,” the unicorn observed, mouth full.

  “Hey! I’m supposed to be peeling those for dinner,” Kellen objected.

  “Then I suggest you get started,” Shalkan said imperturbably, mouth still full.

  Kellen looked around. Idalia was nowhere to be seen. He sighed and reached for another root, watching Shalkan out of the corner of his eye lest the unicorn steal this one, too.

  Shalkan looked perfectly healthy. Idalia hadn’t said anything about healing him; either she hadn’t needed to, or she hadn’t felt it was worth commenting on.

  “I’m glad you’re okay,” Kellen said, feeling awkward. “You … are okay, aren’t you?”

  The unicorn, mouth still full, let Kellen’s question pass without comment.

  I guess that’s a “yes,” Kellen decided, and bent his head to the task at hand.

  He quickly realized what Idalia had meant by her parting comment. The brown exterior of the root was slippery and tough, hard to cut into. It was going to be quite easy to cut himself while peeling these things if he wasn’t careful. The interior was waxy and white, smelling faintly of apples and onions. Kellen supposed that cooking would improve it.

  “So,” Shalkan asked when he’d finished chewing. “Is freedom everything you hoped it would be?”

  “It’s different,” Kellen said, hoping he didn’t sound too grudging about things. Shalkan’s continued presence in his life was another thing he wondered about. It was all very well to assume that the unicorn was here to make sure that Kellen kept his half of the magical bargain he’d made, but surely Shalkan had other ways of knowing that, even from a distance? Was there another reason that Shalkan was sticking so close by—and was there even the faintest possible hope that Shalkan might tell him what that was if Kellen asked him directly?

  Probably not.

  “And now that you have it, you don’t like it?” the unicorn asked archly.

  “I said—ow!”

  In his moment of irritated distraction, the knife had slipped, scoring a thin slice across the end of one of Kellen’s fingers. Kellen stuck the wounded digit into his mouth and sucked on it mutinously. “I said,” he mumbled around the finger, “that it’s different.”

  The pain subsided. He removed the finger from his mouth and inspected the cut. It wasn’t very deep, and the bleeding had already stopped. Kellen took a deep breath, knowing already from the unicorn’s tone that Shalkan wouldn’t stop prodding at him until he was properly answered. “I don’t know yet whether I like it—being free and out of the City—or not. I don’t know much about it yet. But I know one thing; it’s better to be here than dead. And I know another; it’s better to be myself, with all of my memories—or most of them, anyway—and my mind intact, than to be Lycaelon’s obedient puppet with half my mind gone. Now, since I don’t have a lot of choice about being here and ‘free,’ I guess I’d better try my best to like it, hadn’t I?”

  “A good answer,” Shalkan said, nodding. “And lesson number one about surviving in the Wild Lands, Kellen: always pay attention to everything around you and especially to the task at hand.”

  Then Shalkan added, soberly, “Even—or perhaps especially—when people try to distract you from your purpose.”

  WITHIN a few days, the rhythm of the days with his sister had settled into a pattern. They rose at an earlier hour than he would ever have considered possible in the City, but Kellen rapidly came to appreciate the sheer beauty of the dawn here in Idalia’s forest. There were no bells, but every day began with a chorus of birdsong long before the sun was visible, with mysterious threads of fog weaving among the quiet trees. The light gradually increased, and there was a sense of anticipation in the air as the new day began. Then, suddenly, the glory of sunrise—and Idalia took care that they both paused for a moment to appreciate and evaluate it, for the sunrise often gave a clue to the weather for the coming day.

  Then he joined her in putting together breakfast, watching and learning the art of cookery, which at the moment was as esoteric for him as that of magick would be for the common Armethaliehan. Then—then the day’s work began, a series of alternating chores and lessons in various aspects of the Wild Magic. And even if he didn’t consciously remember her from his childhood, there was some sort of visceral memory remaining that made Kellen feel more comfortable with Idalia than he had ever felt with anyone else.

  That was a bit unnerving at first, but it did make life with someone who was otherwise a total stranger a lot easier. Though life in the Wildwood was hard, based on unremitting physical labor dawn to dusk, Idalia didn’t ask any more of him in the way of physical labor than he could do, though she certainly didn’t ask any less, either.

  On the other hand, when he watched her swinging an axe, chopping the wood for the fire that cooked their food and warmed them at night, Kellen felt rather guilty that a lot of the time he was lying about doing nothing while a woman did the work, and was just as glad, all things considered, when she did give him things to do.

  And every day, as she showed him some other small and practical use of Wild Magic, he began to realize that she’d been telling him the simple truth upon his arrival: here in the Wildwood, she was particularly noted for Healing Spells. Given how she had healed him (and presumably Shalkan), Kellen didn’t find himself actually surprised to learn that, and slowly, almost without his noticing, his amazement that a female could do magic faded completely away.

  Of course women could do magic. Didn’t he see his sister doing magic every day?

  “WILD Magic is especially good for healing—almost anything is a Healing Spell when you come right down to it,” Idalia told him a sennight after his arrival, as she used Wild Magic to heal the ankle he’d strained while fishing in a rocky-strewn brook, explaining to him that she was also going to streng
then it so that he wouldn’t repeat the injury.

  Though Kellen had thought he was in pretty good physical condition from his rambles about the City, he wasn’t used to clambering about on the uneven ground out here in the wilderness, much less in the treacherous streambed of the shallow stream that ran behind the cabin, and had turned his foot on a hidden stone. As usual in these lessons, he sat on the chopping stump, and she on the ground, looking up at him. He wondered if that was a deliberate choice on her part, to make the lessons as little like the ones with Anigrel as possible, though of course she could have no idea what those had been like. Anigrel had always looked down at him from a position of authority. Idalia managed to have the authority without needing to make an issue of it.

  “Something like this is trivial, and I can use a keystone to supply all the power I need, but for more substantial injuries, sometimes there is a substantial price to pay. Now, that’s often paid solely by the Wildmage.”

  She held her hands around his ankle, and Kellen could feel a soothing warmth radiating from them that was far more than just the heat of her hands.

  “That hardly seems fair,” he objected. “The Mage isn’t getting anything out of it!”

  “Ah, not necessarily,” she corrected. “The Mage—or Wildmage—often gets paid in goods or services; that’s part of the whole system of barter out here. Now, as it happens, besides that payment, or instead of it, the Wildmage can share out the price the Wild Magic asks for the healing with her patient, if the injury is severe enough,” she explained. “Providing the patient is conscious, able to think clearly, and willing, of course. For that matter, the ‘cost’ can actually be shared among several ‘people,’ such as the patient’s friends or relations.”

  He blinked at that. “Really?”

  “Well, think—it’s not that different from using Talisman-power to do something that really does benefit everyone in the City,” she pointed out logically as she let go of his ankle and flicked a curious insect away with one hand. “There—try standing on that foot now.”

  He did, and was delighted to discover it didn’t hurt and really did feel stronger.

  I wonder what the cost was of healing me after the Hunt, though, he thought, when he suddenly remembered how badly he’d been hurt. He hadn’t been conscious to consent to accept part of the cost—nor had he had a crowd of “friends and relations” to share it with, either. What had the cost been to Idalia?

  “And you know, of course, that the High Mages of Armethalieh do a fair amount of healing; at least, the common ones do. The difference between what the Wildmage does and what the High Mage does now is that the Wildmage is bound to tell the patient and anyone else potentially involved in a spell that she would like help in sharing the cost, and then ask formal permission to do so,” she continued. “Whereas the High Mage just uses Talisman-energy he’s already taken and stored, without asking permission.”

  Something about the way she phrased that caught his attention. “What do you mean, now?” he asked.

  She looked up at him thoughtfully. “I’m not altogether certain that the High Mages have always just taken power without the knowledge or permission of the people of Armethalieh,” she admitted. “Maybe in the past, when the population was lower, they used to ask—” She shrugged. “But to get back to what we do, precisely because of the emotional connection, when the price is shared among a number of those who are connected with the patient, the price that the Wildmage pays is minimal.”

  “What’s ‘minimal’?” Kellen asked suspiciously, sitting back down again.

  “It depends on the extent of the injury, and how quickly it needs to be healed.” Idalia watched him from under her long lashes. “If it doesn’t need to be mended quickly, just mended without scarring or other permanent changes, then even the cost to the Mage is minimal, and it’s all keystone work—which is one of the reasons you slept for a sennight, brother mine. If, however, it needs to be healed right that moment, then the cost is a lot higher, and a circle of supporters is a necessary thing. The more supporters, the lighter the cost, and it amounts to pain-sharing, usually, some personal energy lost, and a lot of weakness, because their strength is given to the patient just as their life-energy is—”

  “Ahem,” Shalkan said from his usual observation point across the clearing. “I believe that you are going to have an opportunity to demonstrate that very point in a moment.”

  Idalia looked at him sharply, but before she could ask any questions, the underbrush at the edge of the clearing rustled and parted.

  And Kellen had to stop himself from staring and gaping like a farmer on his first visit to the City markets.

  He’d never even seen one unicorn before he’d summoned Shalkan. Now here was a whole herd of them! They slipped into the clearing, moving with the same uncanny silence that he’d come to expect from Shalkan; there were a dozen of them, at least, all dazzlingly white, all incredibly beautiful—

  Except for the one in the midst of them, supported by a larger unicorn on either flank, and hobbling on three legs. The fourth leg dripped dark blood, and dangled uselessly.

  “Kellen!” Idalia snapped. “Go help that colt—I can’t touch him—”

  Kellen started, and hurried forward to lend his shoulder to the injured colt, who was quite young indeed, surely not even a yearling. The unicorn colt was clearly spent; his eyes were glazed with pain and exhaustion, and the glory of his coat and budding horn dimmed.

  Idalia ran back to the cabin to collect a basket of herbs and other things. Kellen helped the poor trembling thing to kneel, then lie down; the left hind leg was broken, horribly so; two jagged ends of the bone had come through the flesh and the whole thing just hung limply in a way that suggested the pain must be nearly unbearable.

  “He stepped into a rabbit hole while galloping, Wildmage Idalia,” one of the adults said gravely as Idalia knelt at the colt’s side. “Can you—?”

  “Of course, and much more easily since my brother is here.” She nodded at Kellen. “Little brother, I can’t touch this young fellow without consequences; I can do the healing, but you’ll have to do the manipulation to put the bones back into place.”

  “Manipulation?” Kellen gulped. The mere sight of the mangled leg was making him feel sick, and he cringed inside each time it whimpered in pain. He’d been hoping he could sneak away; surely she didn’t mean him to—

  She did. “You’ll have to straighten the leg and align the bone and hold it in place while I work,” she said, and it was clear from her tone of voice that she expected him to agree.

  The colt made a pitiful mewing sound that wrung his heart, and he found himself saying “Of course,” even though inside he was thinking, Oh, no!

  “And you?” she asked, looking at the adult unicorns.

  “The usual, of course,” said the spokesman, and the others all nodded. “He’ll lose the leg, else, if not his life. What else are families for?”

  Kellen watched closely as Idalia created a pocket-sized fire and quickly brewed something over it, then, at her direction, he held the colt’s head up and helped it drink the warm contents of the bowl. After that, Idalia used a touch of the Wild Magic and a keystone to make it sleep, and Kellen breathed easier as its keening whimpers died away to soft snores.

  But his work had barely begun.

  Now Idalia produced splints and bandages from her workbag—since, as she explained for Kellen’s benefit—the healing would go much more quickly and easily if the bones were close to where they were supposed to be, and Kellen, working at her direction, set the leg.

  What he had to do nearly made him faint for a moment, feeling the unicorn’s blood on his hands, pulling the leg this way and that until all the broken pieces of bone slipped back beneath the skin, feeling—and hearing the shattered pieces slip and grate over each other. He thought it would never be done, and he really did come awfully close to losing his control over his stomach more than once. If the colt had been conscious and writhing
in agony, he would never have been able to bear it, he knew, but through it all the young unicorn slept peacefully.

  At last Idalia was satisfied, and talked Kellen through the process of splinting the leg to hold it steady. When he was finished, Kellen sat back on his heels, sweating heavily, feeling as exhausted and light-headed as he had after the initial flight from the City with Shalkan.

  “Kellen, you’ve done enough; I won’t ask you to share in the price of this healing,” Idalia said then, as he sat there, nauseous and sweating, his hands and arms covered in blood, wanting to leave and unable to move. “But if Shalkan—”

  She glanced over at Shalkan, who shook his head. “Not possible,” the unicorn said, with genuine regret.

  She didn’t question that, though Kellen was a bit annoyed; why shouldn’t Shalkan help, after all? Wasn’t this a colt of the same species? Instead, after Kellen had rested for a few moments, she had him collect one hair from the tails of each of the adults and the colt, added a hair of her own, and dabbled the entire bundle in the blood that had pooled beneath the colt’s leg. Kellen took the opportunity to back away, but not very far. He simply didn’t have the strength.

  Then she pricked the ball of her thumb with her knife, and squeezed out a drop of her own blood, holding the now-bloody bundle of hairs under her hand so that the drop of blood fell on it and mingled with the unicorns’.

  As Kellen watched, curiosity overcoming nausea, Idalia closed her eyes, then held up her hands, palms out, at shoulder height, and for a moment, he wondered just what it was that she was up to. This was nothing like anything the two of them had done together.

  Then Kellen suddenly felt power flare up all around them. And just as he did, a fainter wall of power sprang up, encircling them.

  A wall? Not quite—as he stared at it, startled that he could see it at all, he realized that it wasn’t so much a wall as half a sphere, inverted over them like the bowl of the sky. It shimmered like heat haze in the sunlight, like the barrier that protected the harbor of Armethalieh.