by Linda McNabb
THE CALL OF THE BOOK
“Zaine! You up yet?” A high, shrill voice pierced Zaine’s dreams and he opened one eye reluctantly.
He pushed a sharp piece of straw out of his face and rolled over with a sigh. The sun was just beginning to lighten the sky, and from the window at the far end of the barn he could see that daylight was only a matter of minutes away. He started to snuggle back into the straw – just a few more minutes wouldn’t make any difference – then he remembered what day it was.
Sitting bolt upright and grinning broadly, Zaine ran through the chores he would have to do before he could leave the farm for the day. He only had two days off every cycle of the moon, and today was one of them.
“I’ll be right there, Aunt Tilly,” Zaine called out, as he hurried over to the rope that hung from the open end of the hayloft where he slept.
He slid down the rope easily. Many years of practice meant he did not miss the ladder that Aunt Tilly’s son broke on purpose a few months ago. He knew from an early age that something wasn’t normal about his family. No other families made the smallest boy sleep in the hayloft from when he was only a few years old.
Other children got hugs and gifts on their birthdays, but all Zaine ever got were sneers and extra chores. Older boys weren’t allowed to pick on their younger siblings in other homes, but at the Taitem farm bullying went unnoticed.
The hayloft had seemed a long way up, and scary, when he was just five, but almost eight years later he wouldn’t sleep anywhere else. He dropped silently to the ground and was running almost before his feet touched the warm, hard-packed earth. There was a light coming from the small kitchen window and he could see the tall figure of his aunt walking back and forth. He stopped at the well, drew a full bucket of water and skillfully carried it to the farmhouse without spilling a drop.
“You took your time,” Aunt Tilly snapped, as she grabbed the bucket and poured the water into the waiting pot over the simmering fire.
“Morning, Aunt Tilly.” Zaine greeted her with a grin, ignoring her scowl.
Two people could not have looked more different, and anyone could see in an instant that they were not aunt and nephew.
Aunt Tilly, a tall, thin woman, was dark-skinned. A black so deep that it was difficult to see where her skin stopped and her tough, wiry black hair began.
Her hair was pulled back in a tight bun at the base of her neck and small metal-rimmed glasses perched halfway up her long, slim nose.
Zaine, however, was pale-skinned, almost the colour of the wheat that blew gently in the fields that he tended. His hair was white, when it was clean, and his eyes were a soft blue. He had tried to rub his skin with coal when he was little so that he would look like the rest of his family but all it got him was a dunking in the creek in the middle of winter.
“Your uncle needs you up in the back hills today. There’s stock up there he wants to take to market tomorrow.” Aunt Tilly began stoking the fire, the red embers reflecting dully on her shiny black face.
“It’s my day off today,” Zaine replied carefully, making sure he kept any hint of demanding out of his voice. He desperately needed to get away from the farm for the day but if he upset his aunt there would be no chance.
“Pretor said nothing to me.” Aunt Tilly turned to face him, looking at him hard to see if he was trying to get out of the hard work of chasing stray sheep. “Pretor!”
Her voice carried through the house easily. It could probably pierce an ear-drum if you stood too close. A minute later Zaine’s Uncle Pretor came hurrying into the kitchen.
“Yes, dear. What’s the problem?” Pretor hovered at the far end of the kitchen, eyeing his wife warily, like a dog expecting to be beaten. He was almost as dark-skinned as Tilly, but his hair was turning grey at the temples and it stood out like candles on a dark night.
“Zaine thinks it’s his day off. Tell him you need him to round up the sheep,” Tilly ordered her husband firmly. “We’ve got to make up what we lost in the sales at market last week.”
“I did say he could have today off.” Pretor cast an apologetic look at his wife.
“We must get the sheep to market by tomorrow. We need the money. He will have to stay and help!” Tilly retorted angrily, waving the poker from the fire in a furious shaking motion.
“He has worked hard these last two moon quarters.” Pretor’s voice was fading and wavering, and Zaine felt his day off slipping away.
“He still owes us a jar of silver, and if I say he will work today then he will work!” Tilly was glowering at her husband, her black irises standing out clearly against the brilliant whites of her eyes.
Zaine’s shoulders sagged. Pretor hardly ever won an argument when she brought up the coins Zaine owed. Many years ago he had found out why he looked so different and learned why he owed them so much money. He had heard this speech many times since then.
“When his mother dumped him here as a small baby she said she’d come back in a few years,” Aunt Tilly reminded her husband bluntly. “The money she gave us wasn’t nearly enough to cover this many years of looking after him. By my reckoning he still owes us at least a full jar of silver coins.”
Zaine wondered why the jar he owed never seemed to get any less. At this rate it would take him most of his life to pay it all back.
“It’s not his fault the sheep aren’t fetching what they were before the king died. If we wait until the new king or queen is crowned the sheep will be worth more. What with all this uncertainty about who will be crowned it is hard to know which coins will be worth anything in a few moon cycles.”
It was the longest speech that Zaine had ever heard from his uncle, and for once his wife actually listened to him and didn’t snap back immediately. She pressed her lips together, covering her broken and yellowed teeth, staring intently at her husband as she weighed up what he had said.
“We should wait until the crown has been decided. The sheep will fetch more then,” she concluded bluntly and firmly, as if she had just come up with the idea herself.
“Then there’s really no need for Zaine to be here today,” Pretor said as he nodded in agreement with his wife, and he made a shooing motion at Zaine, urging him to leave while he could. Zaine shot a quick look at his aunt and, seeing that she wasn’t going to stop him, he walked quickly to the door and slipped out into the still half-light of early dawn.
There hadn’t been time to grab any breakfast, but Zaine plucked berries off bushes as he passed them, and by the time he had jogged into the town he wasn’t hungry any more. He crossed the empty streets quickly, as the town wasn’t where he wanted to be but it was the most direct route to get there. He stepped up his pace a little as the first rays of light warmed his face. Davyn would be leaving soon and he didn’t want the herbmaster to leave without him.
He left the cobbled streets, with their narrow, tall houses that hugged the dark alleyways, and headed out into the forest that lay to the north.
A small, well-worn track wove its way into the forest. It was used by the townspeople only once every month, the morning after a full moon, and that was only two days from now. Then they would all gather up their sick children, chickens that had stopped laying and anything else that needed attention and head out to see the herbmaster, Davyn.
“I thought you weren’t coming,” Davyn said, as he stepped into the path just ahead of Zaine. “I was going to wait by the weather tree until it was fully light.”
Davyn pointed up ahead to the huge old tree that grew up ahead and forced the path to go around the base of its massive trunk. It wasn’t called the weather tree for no reason, either, as the townspeople marked the seasons by when it lost its leaves and when they grew back. Right now the leaves were beginning to turn brown, which was a sure sign that summer was almost over.
“I had a bit of trouble getting away,” Zaine commented, and took the canvas bag that the herbmaster held out for him.
They walked quickly along the path in silence for a short while. Zaine
had often wondered how old the herbmaster was. He looked old, his hair and short-cropped beard were white, and his face was shadowed by deep lines and sunken eyes, but his step through the forest was that of a young man, agile and never tiring.
Zaine had made friends with the old herbmaster when he was just a small boy. Perhaps it was because the old man was a loner like him or because they both liked to wander the forests. Every day he had off, Zaine headed up to spend time with Davyn. Sometimes just sitting and watching him mix his herbs, and other times, like today gathering the ingredients of the potions Davyn mixed. Sometimes the herbmaster went away for weeks at a time and Zaine assumed he was off gathering some of the more unusual herbs which did not grow well around here.
“I need to head up towards Widow’s Peak today. I’ve just about run out of a root that grows up near the top,” Davyn said as he kept pace easily with the young boy.
“I could get the others down here. I know what you need. I’ll get a full bag and meet you back at your cottage,” Zaine offered, a little too quickly, as he couldn’t believe his luck. The old herbmaster would be gone for hours. Zaine would be alone in the cottage.
“That would be good, Zaine. If you could sort them while you wait it would be a great help.” The herbmaster seemed pleased with the plan, and Zaine felt a pang of guilt at tricking the old man, but it was for a good cause.
They parted ways half an hour later and Zaine waited until he was sure that Davyn was well gone before he began frantically gathering roots, leaves, bark and berries.
Zaine was breathing hard by the time he came in sight of the small cottage an hour later. The canvas bag thumped rhythmically against his hip, filled almost to the top with the fresh herbs, roots and leaves he had just gathered.
He stopped and leaned against a tall tree as he caught his breath before looking up to check the position of the sun. It was still early and Davyn would not be back until midday at least. That gave him almost three hours alone in the cottage.
He allowed himself a small smile as he slipped the bag from his shoulder and pushed open the unlocked door to Davyn’s cottage. There was no need for the door to be locked as nobody in the town dared to go inside the herbmaster’s cottage, nobody except Zaine.
He carefully placed the canvas bag by the door and hurried across the room in the dim gloom. There were only three small windows in the cottage and they were heavily veiled with black cloth.
Zaine lit a row of candles along the back of the heavy wooden worktable, and cheerful yellow light filled the small, one-roomed cottage. It was sparsely furnished with just a bed, table, two chairs and the heavy worktable and shelf where Davyn practiced his herbcraft. A small fire struggled to remain alight in the fireplace and Zaine threw some wood in to keep it going.
With a nervous glance at the door, he dropped to his knees and pushed his arm deep under the low shelf that ran just above the floor under the worktable. He pulled out a dark-green leather-bound book, which was no bigger than his two hands placed next to each other. He carefully blew off the dust that had gathered since he had last looked at the book.
He knew it was wrong; he knew he shouldn’t even be looking at the book, but something drove him to seek it out whenever he could.
Davyn had gone to a lot of trouble to hide it and obviously didn’t want it to be seen. Zaine knew he should respect that but he couldn’t help himself. He hadn’t been snooping when he had found it. A candle had rolled under the shelf and, fearing a fire that could burn down the cottage, Zaine had reached under to remove it. That was when he found the book, almost five years ago, and it still intrigued him.
“Let’s see how far I get today,” he muttered to himself, brushing his grubby hair out of his eyes, and setting the book carefully on the workbench. He rubbed his hands on his baggy, threadbare trousers to remove as much grime as he could, and then reached out to touch the leather front cover.
There were no words on the cover of the book, just a gold design imprinted on the green leather. Zaine remembered staring at it in confusion the first time he saw it, wondering why the cover would not open when he pulled on it. He knew the secret to opening the book now, and he quickly ran his finger along the golden line, keeping his pressure firm and unbroken.
The cover sprang open with a click and Zaine turned to the first page. There were shapes and designs scattered, seemingly at random, over it, and years ago Zaine had spent many days just staring at it, wondering what the drawings meant. Then, realising that some of them were words, he had professed an interest in learning to read and Davyn had willingly taught him.
Each design had a word beneath it, and he spoke the words quickly, without even having to read them, and traced each design at the same time.
He had once tried to flick through the book to where he was up to, but the book would not allow that. He had to do each page in order before he could turn the page and, if he spoke a word or traced a design incorrectly, the book would not let him continue until he had done it properly.
After several pages there were no words, just designs, and he continued confidently. He had done these pages so many times over the past few years that he could have done them in his sleep if he had needed to.
Each time a new design appeared on a page, there was a word beneath it. Zaine had realised that the book was meant to teach the designs in a purely repetitious way that ensured the pupil would never, ever forget them – but why? Zaine guessed they had something to do with the herbmaster’s craft.
Zaine knew what he wanted to do with his life, if he could ever get away from the farm. He wanted to be a herbmaster like Davyn. It was the only thing that let his mind accept the sneaking around he had to do to read the book. If he could learn enough of the designs then he could surprise the old man by being able to help him out with the dozens of townspeople who turned up on his doorstep the day after each full moon.
Zaine reached the page that had stumped him the last time he had been alone in the cottage. Nervously he glanced around to see if there was any sign of the herbmaster returning yet, but there was no sound other than those of the forest.
“Just one more time,” Zaine said out loud, determination and concentration changing his voice from that of a young boy not quite into his teens, into the deep tones of a confident youth.
He ran his hand over the designs, speaking the words clearly and slowly, but the page remained firmly stuck to the next one, and Zaine frowned.
What was he doing wrong? He was concentrating so hard that he didn’t hear the door creaking open, and it wasn’t until it banged shut that he realised he was no longer alone. He slammed the book shut instinctively as he turned to face the herbmaster, with a look of guilt that said clearly he knew he had been doing something wrong.
Circle of Dreams
Book 1: Runeweaver
All Zaine had to do was reach out a hand and he could take it. Sweat broke out on his forehead as he battled the desire to take the book. If he took it, his fate would be sealed. He didn’t want to be a runeweaver – but he did want to touch the book. He wanted it so badly that he found his hand stretching out to it even as his mind screamed not to…
The search is on for a new king or queen. The search is also on for runeweavers who and help contenders penetrate the Circle of Dreams and win the throne. Zaine couldn’t have chosen a more perilous time to discover his fate. For runeweavers must take center stage in the battle for the new monarch.
He is destined to play a unique and dangerous role – to fulfil a prophecy that could spell great danger, and even death, for young Zaine.
Let the Contest begin!
Dragon Charmers
Book 1: Mountains of Fire
In a world where they can be sung into submission by dragon charmers – people have forgotten the true power of dragons...
Logan lives with Zared, an elderly, absent-minded wizard, in Shanoria - the Kingdom of the Dragons. His closest friend is Alyxa, a dragon charmer with the rare gift of s
oothing and commanding dragons.
But not all dragons are tame, and when feral Reds kidnap the crown prince, Logan and Alyxa are thrust into a fast-paced adventure and go in search of the heart of a dragon.
Dragon’s Apprentice
There’s something odd about 12 year old Toby, and it’s not just his purple eyes or his amazing ability to talk to Klel, the dragon tied up in the castle courtyard.
He’s been sacked from every job at the castle and his new job as page to the mysterious Prince Blaise is his last chance to avoid a cold winter in the poorhouse.
Then Toby learns a terrible secret that Blaise holds in a stone pendant and the prince’s deadly plans for Klel. But Toby finds he has amazing skills that might just be able to help...
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Also by Linda McNabb
The Dragon’s Apprentice
Shadow Hunters
Dragons’ Bane
Circle of Dreams: Runeweaver
Circle of Dreams: Timeweaver
Circle of Dreams: Starweaver
Dragon Charmers: Mountains of Fire
Dragon Charmers: Valley of Silver
Dragon Charmers: Caverns of Gold
Dragon Charmers: Alyxa (Prequel – short story)
Realm of Shadows: Guardian
Realm of Shadows: Well of Life
Realm of Shadows: Rise of the Yarris (NYP)
Seventh Son
Stonekeeper’s Daughter
Puppet Master
Crystal Runners
Last Star
Maze Keepers