The steward had already arranged a new seat at the High Table, and as they entered the Hall Kordas saw that the entire family was watching the entrance to see who the guest was.
Supper was generally the lightest meal of the day, as breakfast was the most substantial. This, of course, was not how the Imperial Court did things; it wasn’t called “supper,” to begin with (that was far too countrified and peasant-like), and the evening meal was a huge multi-course affair that lasted hours, after which there would be music and entertainment into the late evening. This was a much simpler meal, and Ivar looked relieved to see that it was. It probably matched what Lord Endicrag served.
As he made introductions, Kordas looked directly into Isla’s eyes, and thought, Have you told Delia everything? knowing that she’d take the direct look as an invitation to read his thoughts. At her nod, he finished his introduction with, “ . . . and Ivar is a scout. His father thinks he can be useful to us, or at least, entertaining.”
“You might say I’m afflicted with wanderlust,” the young man laughed as he took his place at table. And for the rest of the meal he kept them well entertained with stories of his explorations—stories that turned the skeptical look on Hakkon’s face into one of satisfaction. Ivar managed to convey his competence without sounding like a common braggart, and his wonderment at the marvels of nature was infectious.
Well, Kordas thought, taking note that not only Hakkon, but Isla and Delia, clearly approved of his choice. That’s one hurdle taken care of.
Now there are only a million more to go.
* * *
—
Delia had to admit she was impressed with the new man. He was able to tell a good tale without boasting, he was deferential without being servile, and from what she could tell from his stories, he seemed to be the ideal choice for the job. Hakkon could have done it, of course—but Hakkon was going to have his hands full for the duration. She could be spared, and she wouldn’t have objected—but she didn’t have nearly the qualifications this fellow did. I’m going to take this as a good omen for our prospects, she thought, as she headed to the stable to work with Star.
But the new man, Ivar, was already there ahead of her. At his side was a massive mastiff—one that had not had his tail docked nor his ears clipped as was fashionable, which was mutilation as far as she was concerned. He went up another point in her estimation.
Grim was already speaking with him as she came in. The dog lay at his master’s feet, looking from one face to the other, as if following the conversation with interest.
“ . . . and how did you want to go about introducing the dog, milord?” Grim was saying.
“Well, that’s not for me to say, Stablemaster,” Ivar replied, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand. “How do you think Manta will take him? And what course of action would you suggest?”
“I’d say, let’s put her in the round training ring on a lunge line, just in case. Have the dog wait outside the ring while I introduce you to the horse, then if you can get him to approach her calm and sociable like, we’ll see.”
“The last won’t be a problem,” Ivar told him confidently. “I’m eager to see Manta, and that’s a fact. I’ve heard a lot about Valdemar Chargers, but I certainly never expected to be given the use of one.”
“You’re being given more than the use of her, milord,” Grim said, motioning to Ivar to come along to the back of the stable. “The Duke was very specific that she’s to be yours, if you get on.”
Delia thought that Ivar looked a bit shocked as well as elated. But then again, she knew the market price of Valdemar Chargers. There were city houses that were cheaper. In fact, there were entire farms that were cheaper.
She decided that Star could wait a little, and followed them as Grim got Manta from her stall at the back of the stable and led her to the training ring, with Ivar and his dog following at a respectful distance. It was clear from the looks that Manta was casting over her shoulder that she was well aware of the presence of the dog, and not entirely happy about it.
Grim put her on a lunge line and motioned to Ivar to come into the ring. Ivar did not march immediately up to the two. Instead, he stood about a length away and spoke to Manta until she flicked her ears forward and lifted her head, looking at him with interest instead of wariness. Then he approached her slowly, with his right hand in a fist; he offered it to her to sniff, then touched her muzzle with it, all the while talking to her. As soon as he had her full attention, he immediately turned to the side. Delia knew what that was—the invitation to the horse to follow.
Manta was clearly very pleased with this mannerly approach, and followed him. He touched her muzzle again with his fist, continuing to talk to her. Grim let out the lunge line as he turned again, and she continued to follow him. Finally he touched her for the third time on the muzzle, and stopped, opening his hand and moving it up slowly to her neck. She arched her neck in an invitation to him to stroke her. This he did for a good long time, before patting her on the neck, touching her muzzle, and looking where his dog lay patiently just outside the fence of the yard.
“Bay, come under,” he said in a quiet voice, and to Delia’s astonishment, the dog crawled beneath the bottom fence-board rather than leaping over it.
Manta snorted. She didn’t like this . . . but she did like the new human, and the human had clearly summoned The Beast. So she was wary, but not quite ready to attack it.
Ivar had his dog approach slowly, a few steps at a time. If Manta showed signs of aggression or nerves, he would tell the dog “back,” and Bay would back up a few steps until told to stop again. Finally they were within a length of each other; Ivar gathered the reins just under the mare’s chin and touched Manta’s muzzle again. “Manta,” he said, and her ears flicked toward him at the sound of her name. “Bay is my friend. If we are going to be friends too, you need to accept him. Come up.”
Now he walked her one slow step at a time to his dog. Bay sat as still as a statue, no whining, no twitching. Now Ivar touched his fist to Bay’s nose, then to Manta’s muzzle. He continued to do this, over and over, until finally Manta reached out with her nose, warily, and sniffed the dog.
Now Ivar praised and made much of her, and took her for a little walk in a circle. Then he brought her back to the dog, and began the process all over again.
By the time the candlemark was over, he was on Manta’s bare back, with the dog trotting a length away, even with his right heel, and Manta was perfectly happy with the situation.
Grim was clearly gobsmacked. So was Delia.
“Well. I never,” Grim said, as Ivar swung his leg over Manta’s shoulder, and dropped to the ground. “That does beat all!”
Ivar blushed, pleased. “I suppose I’ve got a bit of a knack with animals,” he replied. “I like them better than most people. Present company excepted.”
Grim cast a look at Delia that she interpreted as a reminder that she was supposed to be working with her foal, and she scooted back to the stables that held the mares and youngest foals. Ivar was certainly an interesting fellow, and in many ways.
But right now, the important thing was that he was one more piece of the Plan, and a vital one at that.
* * *
—
Kordas was doing his level best to keep his impatience in check, but it was dreadfully hard. He exorcised it as best he could by riding out every single day to the farms and manors of those he trusted absolutely, whose sons and daughters would form the vanguard of the planned migration. This was not a message he wanted entrusted to the written word.
His working plan called for the supplies going out first, accompanied by his first recruits. These were all going to be people no younger than fourteen, and no older than thirty; ideally single and ideally around twenty. They were going to be a mix of farmers and people with at least some experience with weapons. Some of them were coming straight
off the Valdemar Ducal farms, because most, if not all, of the Chargers, the Tow-Beasts, and the Heavies were going to be needed to haul all the barges. Kordas intended to drain the Duchy of its resources before his household and the heads of all the other households took the final trip through the Gate.
This was going to be aided by the fact that the Emperor’s birthday would be in a couple of moons, and the Emperor celebrated his birthday with a Regatta, a boat procession from one side of Wolf Bay to the other. The various components of the Empire were all expected to supply decorated boats and barges. The largest and most splendid of these went on display inside and outside the Bay at anchor, and of course included the warships that were part of the Bay’s defenses. The rest paraded through pairs of Gates on either side of the Bay in a solid formation of craft so dense you could walk from shore to shore without getting your feet wet.
It was ingenious, really. The Gates set their destination by talismans carried by whoever was crossing. So participants decorated their barges, put their talismans for the Bay and back on the prows of their crafts, and lined up for the nearest Gate on the nearest canal (or rarely, river or lake). They’d go through and find themselves staged up in line, each craft given a shove by pole-men on the other side. Each craft would be connected by rings mounted on the front and back, and the continuous shoving in of boats behind would carry the entire line across the Bay to the exit Gate, where hook-men would flip each craft free and pull it through, and participants found themselves back where they started. There were prizes for decoration, though never in anyone’s memory had a craft from Valdemar won such a thing.
For the participants—for the most part—it was the most tedious day of the year. You lined up your barge with all the other locals, often before dawn. You waited your turn as the line crawled slowly toward the Gate. When you finally got to the Gate you were generally hot and tired, and when you went through, you had to put on a show of sorts for the entire time you were crossing the Bay—if nothing else, you had to sing along or pretend to dance with the music from the larger ships. It took at least a candlemark to cross the Bay, and the entire time, your senses were bombarded with music, you were crowded so deeply among the other boats that unless you were lucky enough to be on the outermost layer, all you saw of the procession was your neighbors, and the never-ending colored smokes would leave your eyes red and watering. The only good thing was that it was guaranteed not to rain.
Kordas always participated. His barges always had the same big figures of horses as his great-grandfather’s, stowed in the manor from year to year, brought out, touched up, and decorated with flowers and ribbons. He and his people always returned from the Regatta with watering eyes and headaches, and only the fact that he made sure each barge had enough food and good beer to see them all through the day kept tempers in check. And with all of that, he couldn’t ever recall having seen anything of the rest of the parade, nor having been offered as much as a celebratory candy.
Every so often he’d have an “emergency” that kept him home, usually an illness, and hire boatmen to take his place. His father had done the same, and his grandfather. Everyone did, at least among those who weren’t vying for prizes. So that was what he planned to do this year. So his barges would go out, be seen, and come home—and mingled with them would be the last of the escapees. They would have entirely different talismans on their prows—talismans that would send them to a Gate that “pulled” rather than pushed, talismans that had no return marked on them.
It wasn’t foolproof, but it was as good as three generations of Dukes had been able to conjure.
And it had the advantage that even if someone found out some of the barges were not going where they should have gone, it would be difficult, if not impossible, to untangle the mystery until it was far too late. With so many craft going through the Gates, the Gate “memory” would have been overwritten a hundred times by the time mages came to “read” it.
And if worst came to worst, it would be entirely possible to snatch the talisman from the prow and run for the Gate to escape. During the Regatta, there were no Keepers stationed at each Gate to control the flow of traffic. You might lose whatever you had in the barge with you, but that would be a small price to pay.
Well, that and you’d be swimming when you got to the other side.
Three days after young Ivar had been installed at the manor, Jonaton turned up at breakfast with Hakkon.
If strict protocol had held at Valdemar, Jonaton would have been seated somewhere down among the servants. Very few people were aware he was a mage; those who were aware thought he was a “Magus Minor,” someone far too limited in power to be of interest to the Emperor, and just a small, civilized step above a hedge wizard. He could have been seated at the Head Table if his relationship with Hakkon were known—and sanctioned by the Empire. But that would have created dangers for both of them. It was thought best by everyone not to give the Emperor anything he could use to leverage someone who could legitimately take Kordas’s place.
But strict protocol was scarcely ever applied here, and Jonaton was perfectly welcome at the High Table, where he performed little bits of entertaining sleight of hand on the occasions when there were visitors. Mostly, though, Jonaton talked about geometry, Imaging, herbs and cures, and his cats. Anyone’s cats, really. Often, he brought Imager pictures of various cats, and added funny captions to them. They always raised laughs as they were passed table to table.
This morning, however, he was not here because of a visitor. Through a lifted brow and a couple of coded words, he made it very clear that he was ready to begin the first steps of creating the Gate, and that he expected anyone interested to turn up at mid-afternoon ready to work.
Then, he ate all the honey-melon, took a double-handful of crisp bacon rashers, and left.
Typical, Kordas thought, suppressing a laugh.
Mid-afternoon was the perfect time to initiate such a complicated and dangerous bit of magic. It wasn’t so easy to clear off tasks that had already been scheduled for morning, but at mid-afternoon even Kordas could be expected to take a break for a moment or two to himself. Mid-afternoon was the time when the highest amount of traffic would be passing through existing Gates, mid-afternoon was when most mages were deeply involved in projects of their own or the Emperor’s, and would not necessarily notice something going on elsewhere, and mid-afternoon was when the Emperor himself was most likely deeply engrossed in the business of the Empire. Night—now, night would have been a terrible choice. Not to mention that if Delia was going to Fetch something from the other side of the Portal Jonaton would create, she needed to be able to see what was on the other side.
So, just after lunch, one by one, all the interested parties made their way to what had once been the walls of the previous manor, and were now a series of artificial “ruins” in a garden.
Accessed by three hidden doors were two staircases and a ramp down into what had been the cellars of the previous manor, which were connected to the current manor via a fourth passage that ran beneath the Circle’s tower.
As Hakkon stood watch, Kordas went to a part of the ruins he was known for using as a place to read or even snatch a clandestine nap—a cool little grotto with a smooth stone bench that curved to fit his back admirably, and just happened to have a stone that lifted up to reveal the stair down. He disposed himself on the bench until Hakkon gave a soft whistle, signaling that there was no one watching, and slipped down the stair, dropping the stone in place behind himself.
By the time he got to the cellars, Delia, Isla, the entire Circle, and Jonaton were already there, waiting impatiently, among all sorts of small cats.
By design there was absolutely nothing down here that could have been connected with a magical workspace—not until and unless someone who had been keyed to the place entered it. Then the walls, floors, and ceiling glowed with diagrams, runes, and wards, until you almost didn’t need mag
e-lights to see by.
Each of the seven cellars served a different purpose. The one Kordas entered now was marked “Seeds—Hard Grain—Preserved Nuts”—the least interesting stores a prowler would want a look into, but a logical place to find mousers hanging about. It had been designated from the beginning for the use of whatever mage or mages were going to make that all-important first small Gate into the unknown.
“Well, you took your time,” Isla chided. “I thought Jonaton was going to split himself in two, he’s been vibrating so hard.”
Kordas just shrugged. “I’m here now,” he pointed out, as one of the many, many manor cats twined itself around his ankles and threatened to trip him. “And I see the Preserved Nuts are here.” One of the Circle made a very rude gesture in response. Kordas began unbuttoning his Ducal jacket, starting at the top and ending just past his baldric, then tugged the jacket open, to be more comfortable. As usual, Kordas had a dark gray undershirt beneath the jacket, dyed and embroidered with violent stormclouds. “All right, then, what do you need me for, besides as a source of power?”
“What else are you good for?” jibed Ponu.
“It’s not his jokes, that’s for sure,” Dole groused, then snapped his fingers. “Go.” He pointed to an empty circle on one curve of an immensely complicated diagram on the floor. “Go stand there. Let the adults work.”
“Yes, sir,” Kordas said meekly, and took his place, “rooting” himself into the diagram and gathering up all of his magical reserves, ready to pour it into the work at hand. He exhaled and gazed down at the floor patterns. Some of the curves were clearly rebounds from where other lines clashed, and they looped gracefully to rods or glowing crystals firmly set into sockets. Brass and copper calibrators were tapped into their own sockets, marking the optimal timing for this particular spellwork.
Kordas looked up and gazed in admiration at Jonaton, who was truly in his element. Jonaton had his hair up, with three copper hairsticks holding the loops. Copper earrings and necklaces added to the look, which was paired with a black upper, corselet, and deep brown, leaf-patterned, widelegged skirt-trews. “You look great, Jonaton,” Kordas said.
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