“Not aloud. I only heard groaning, as if someone had cut you. That’s what woke me up.” Pen gestured to the open doorway beyond which lay his own small plain room. “I feared you were under attack.”
Terrell scribbled for a few minutes, blotted the page and set it aside. “There. That’s all I remember.” He found himself yawning. “I’m going back to bed, Pen, and you should too. I’ll talk to the Dona in the morning.”
“As you wish, My Lord. Sleep well.” Pen went to the door of his room, paused briefly while Terrell blew out the taper and crawled back into his own bed, and then closed the door behind him.
Terrell curled up in the feather bed, still slightly damp from his earlier dreaming.
This is the third time, he thought. Each one a little brighter, a little stronger, a little worse. If this goes on . . . what’s going to happen to me?
He fell asleep wondering.
* * *
Dona Seraphina DuVigo Abnellambra read his note through twice while Terrell forced himself not to fidget.
“Light?” Dona Seraphina muttered, her brown eyes darting to him. “Are you sure you didn’t simply perceive a source of magical power? Such as the Node under this castle?”
Terrell reflexively reached for the Node with his mind. He touched the upwelling magic that laired hundreds of feet below the castle’s foundations, and withdrew. “I know what the Node feels like, Dona, and my dream was very different.” Terrell groped for the right words. “Much, much stronger and . . . vaster.”
“Vaster,” the priestess repeated. “Hmmm. Hold still while I examine you.”
Terrell obeyed with the practice of years. She had been his physician since his birth. Mother had brought the Orthodox Silbari priestess north with her after the famous wedding which settled the Conquest that left Silbar subordinate to the Gwythlo Empire. He knew that she’d been here twenty-six tendays later to midwife his own birth, and all the chaos that had flowed from it. Her golden yellow aura enveloped him, penetrated his skin, and warmed him inside and out. After what seemed like a long time she withdrew it and tapped his note with one bony finger.
“Your body’s mana conduits are enlarged,” she reported abstractly, frowning at him. “Substantially. Have you been channeling power?”
Startled, Terrell answered, “No! You know I don’t have any talent but the most common one, magesight.”
Her frown turned dour. “Yesterday I would have agreed, but given your ancestry, that may be irrelevant, My Lord. Your mother has none either, and yet she learned to channel the power of Aretzo’s Hill of Sight during a battle.”
“And did it well enough to win a marriage treaty from Father.” Terrell knew a brief flash of pride that he came from two mighty bloodlines.
“Yes.” For a moment the ghost of a smirk flickered across the priestess’ face. “We call that war the Gwythlo Conquest, but who really conquered who?”
Terrell grinned; at seventeen he had begun to understand some of the truths about men and women. A maid in the castle named Serah had made it her mission to teach him.
More seriously the priestess continued, “You appear to be developing a similar capacity.”
Terrell tried to understand. “You mean I’m becoming a real mage?”
“Not in the traditional sense, I suspect. Try to tap the Node.”
Terrell did, with the usual result—nothing. He had enough magic perception to sense the magic source deep beneath the sprawling castle, but it remained stubbornly indifferent to his presence. He sensed three of the staff mages tapping it at this very moment, refreshing the castle wards or powering spells, but he couldn’t even call forth a flicker from it.
“Hmmm. You still show no evidence of any capacity to draw on our world’s inner power, which is the fundamental marker of mage talent.” The priestess drummed her fingers on the table absently. “What I suspect you are developing now is different—the capacity to utilize pre-worked spells, at least those keyed to you or your bloodlines.”
“Pre-worked spells?” That sounded hopeful. Terrell sat up straighter.
“You may be more familiar with the term artifacts, though not all artifacts contain spells and not all pre-worked spells become artifacts. Mage Shimoor will doubtless teach you much more, but I’ll usurp a bit of his prerogatives today.”
She went to a large ironbound chest in a corner of her office, unlocked and opened it. After a few minute’s rummaging she came back to the table with a small object. When she set it before him Terrell stared curiously at a box roughly twice as long as wide and no more than a fingerwidth thick. It featured a polished bronze upper surface above a simple carved wood body. He could see a complex spell within it.
He carefully refrained from touching the object and asked, “What is it?”
“A fixed message sender. It is used to quickly send a simple prechosen message.” She plucked a bit of raw silver about the size of her little fingernail from her purse and fed its magical power into the box; the silver’s native glow vanished. “It is charged. Contemplate the top and, without touching it physically, attempt to trigger the message. It will most likely feel like a narrow bar in your mind, somewhat like a door handle. Try to grasp and pull it.”
Terrell gingerly opened his mind to the device, trying to push his strictly limited magic perception into it. He usually couldn’t do it at all, but maybe if he tried hard . . .
For a long moment nothing happened while he strained like a man trying to move a castle by pushing it with his bare hands. Then light burst as though someone had brought a dozen lit candelabras into a dark room. His awareness dropped inside the tiny space to find light illuminating the box’s twisting interior. Nothing looked solid and sparkles of magic rippled over everything. In the middle a blue bar of elemental light hung unsupported. He wrapped his mind around the wispy thing and tried to pull it. For a while it stayed as unyielding as the New Keep, before abruptly giving way. Something tiny and glowing shot from the end of the box. It sped birdlike through the air to Dona Seraphina. He heard a tiny sound and it vanished.
“I did it! Was that a real message construct?” Terrell asked, excited by his success. He’d never used any magic more complicated than a mage lamp or a fire starter before.
“Yes, a very small one. Try to manipulate the power in this bit of silver.”
She handed him another sliver of the precious metal and he groped for the magic within it, tried to seize and shape it. As with the Node, it didn’t respond at all, though he strained harder and harder.
“Stop,” Seraphina said. “You’ll damage yourself. Do you understand the difference between raw silver and the Keep Node on the one hand, and the message sender on the other?”
“The sender is a spell already prepared and primed; it simply had to be launched, like an arrow from a bow. The Node, and charged silver, are both power waiting to be used, the raw stuff from which that arrow might be made.” His voice fell, and he looked at her pleadingly. “Does this mean that I’ll never be able to wield real magic?”
She shook her head. “Too early to say definitively, but that’s increasingly likely. Mage talent usually manifests before a man’s voice begins to break, and yours changed more than a year ago. I’ve known it to appear as late as a man’s eighteenth birthday and as early as his tenth. You are half a season short of turning eighteen years old.”
She let that hang in the air for a while. Terrell drooped.
“Then I’ll always be only a, a mechanic, operating spells that I can’t cast,” he said dully. He had heard ballads of the great battle mages of the past, especially his grandfather Hywel who had founded the Empire and built this castle. He had hoped—
“Do I hear your vanity talking, boy? Your father is no mage either, yet he’s Emperor of Gwythlo, Silbar, Klinto, and Fehdar, plus sixteen smaller realms. Which he rules very capably indeed, especially with your mother’s aid.”
“But Father has Haroun’s Gift. So does Pen. No mage can stand against them.”
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“Immunity to magical attack only goes so far, Prince. You do not yet know what you may have, or become, but there remains more than one possibility—so don’t wallow in self pity.”
Dona Seraphina had a sharp eye and unsparing attitude, Terrell reflected as he straightened up. “Tell me what else is possible,” he demanded.
“You referred to the use of an artifact as being merely a mechanic, as if that is to be despised, you vain pup.” She glared, and he wondered if she would rap his knuckles with a stick the way she had when he’d been small. “Yet half of your people can’t even do that much. And not one in a million can manage the Great Artifacts. I strongly suspect that you will become one of that small number. But if you approach any Great Artifact with the arrogance you showed to me, it may well kill you! Do you understand?”
This time he made sure to answer meekly. He put his hands together and bowed his head briefly. “Yes, Dona Seraphina.”
She grunted, mollified. “That’s better.”
“But—Dona, does this mean I can use the big artifacts in Aretzo?” He wondered if that meant he would be chosen by Silbar’s Throne to be the next King after his mother died. Not that he would actively wish for her death; he loved both his parents, but it would be enormously helpful to know in advance whether he’d someday rule from the Stone Throne.
“Possibly,” the Priestess temporized. “The minor functions at least; no king has been able to use the greater ones for more than a century. I wouldn’t raise your hopes too high, Your Highness. As I have pointed out, most bearers of such abilities find that they settle at a low level and never progress beyond that. You may grow to be more, but you’ll need training to be effective—and to avoid killing yourself. I can’t emphasize enough; the Great Artifacts are dangerous! Still, your abilities are growing. These special talents often take years to unfold, so we’ll have to see how you develop.”
“Oh.” Terrell deflated again. The prospect of putting up with years of confusing dreams did not entice him. But still—”Do you think Mother and Father would let me go to Aretzo and try one of the artifacts? Not the Stone Throne itself, of course,” he hastily qualified. “But there are safer items that I might try, right? The Guardian, the Vault, the Pool?”
She gave him an extremely dour look. “What part of the word dangerous did you not understand, Prince? Any of those might still maim you. Do you want to spend the rest of your life as a mindless idiot?”
“I don’t propose to try this alone, Dona.” Excitement kindled in him as he dismissed the risk. “I’ll take Shimoor with me! Surely Silbar’s Royal Wizard is the very best mage to guide me in exploring my new abilities. It’s only prudent that I be trained, and Aretzo’s the best place to train any sort of mage talent. And if I’m ever to rule Silbar, I must learn the ways of its capital sooner or later.”
He forced himself to stop his spate of words. He’d made the best arguments he could think of, now let them work on her for a while. Dona Seraphina looked at him thoughtfully. Good. He forced calm on himself and sat still, doing his best to project a patience he didn’t feel. The moments dragged by like hours.
Finally, Seraphina nodded slightly. “I will discuss this with your mother. We shall see what we shall see.”
Terrell managed a dignified, “Thank you, Dona,” and quit her office before she could change her mind. He went to his mother’s chapel, empty at this time of day, and knelt before the icons of the Great Seraphs, Lady Umana and Lord Haroun. Above them towered the closest depiction Silbaris ever made of their God, a many-armed silver and jet swirl.
Please, please, oh Haroun, mightiest of Seraphs, he prayed. Intercede for me with the One God! Let me go to Aretzo and see my ancestral home. Bestow your grace on me that I may prove capable and worthy. By the Unknowable Name I pray, let me become what I hope to be—King of Silbar.
* * *
For Terrell the next two days dragged by more slowly than tired oxen. Mother and Father were away on the annual summer tour of the Gwythlo baronies, reaffirming the oaths that held the Empire’s core together. The first sign of their return came when Terrell and Pen came back from a ride in the Keep’s oak forest to find the stables noisy with returned soldiers. Servants led dozens of clattering horses out to pasture, dogs dashed about yelping and every stable hand rushed to and fro dealing with the hundreds of returning beasts.
“The Silbari Brigade is back!” Terrell told Pen excitedly. “The Caniff Dragoons too! Mother and Father must be home.” He and Pen dismounted in the side court that served the Forest Gate and a groom took their horses. “Viller, have you seen my parents yet?”
Viller bowed and said softly, “No, Your Highness, but Crown Prince Osrick is here.” As he led their horses away he made a motion toward the open doors behind him.
Terrell’s half brother came out of the stables. He had three of his Gwythlo cronies at his back and a Klinto mage behind them. Despite not having yet reached the age of thirty-four, the Crown Prince’s yellow hair had begun to thin and retreat. He walked stiff-legged, both fists clenched and his normally pale face more flushed than sunburnt. He kicked aside a crotch-sniffing dog and glared at his younger half sibling.
Pen quietly stepped up to Terrell’s shield side and loosened his sword in its sheath.
“Welcome home, Osrick,” Terrell greeted cautiously. “How did the Fealty trip go? Did you get a chance for some good hunting?”
The Crown Prince growled, “Not while Father kept me on a short leash, and your bitch of a mother reminded everyone down to the lowest squire about my damn oath!”
“But oaths are how we hold the empire together, brother.” Terrell tried to deflect the anger of his fourteen-years-older half sibling. “They bind and strengthen us all.”
“Strengthen! Forty days of humiliation,” Osrick spat. “She rubbed my nose in my sin every chance she got. Subtle and sly, yes, I’ll grant the bitch that! The whispers were everywhere; fratricide in one hall and kinslayer in another. I wish now that I’d killed both of you in your cradles!”
“Not too late,” remarked one of the nobles. He fingered the grip of his own sword and stared unpleasantly at Terrell and Pen.
Terrell sensed that Pen had gone tense, ready to draw in an instant. But there were four swords and the mage facing the two of them, very bad odds. Terrell’s heart sank towards his boots. He’d never seen Osrick this filled with rage. He eyed the friends and the mage, all mature men with more than a decade of war experience. This didn’t feel like a planned assassination, more like Osrick impetuously seizing an opportunity. The tumult in the stables would hide the clash of swords. Four blades against two—
Terrell swallowed, centered himself. He would have to let Osrick draw first. Could he kill his half brother, even in self defense? Become a fratricide himself? His guts were hollow, but he wasn’t willing to die. He rose on the balls of his feet, ready to dodge and draw.
Osrick’s sword hand moved—
“Pardon me, my lords, but it is indeed too late,” said a new voice. “Far too late.”
A wave of relief swept through Terrell as Pyrull walked out of the stable. The Master Swordsman wore Irreneetha at his hip, as always. The magic sword let out a subliminal hum of power. The Crown Prince’s mage blanched at the sudden sound, backed away, turned and fled.
All eyes followed Pyrull as he leisurely walked around Osrick’s party to Terrell’s right hand. There he stopped, faced the Crown Prince, and smiled pleasantly. His own right hand, browner than Terrell’s, as brown as Pen’s, rested on his sword’s hilt, and now a low shivering growl emanated from the blade. Three brown-skinned men faced four pale ones.
“Your father gave me strict orders not to kill you, Your Highness.” Pyrull still spoke Gwythlo with a Silbari accent, which made his words to Osrick more menacing. “But he said nothing about your friends. It would be a shame to spoil this lovely day with three needless deaths and yourself wounded, don’t you think?”
Osrick’s pale northern skin flus
hed red to the points of his ears. His face twisted into a caricature of rage. For a moment he raised his fists as though about to leap on Pyrull and pummel him.
The face of the angel in Pyrull’s sword manifested in the air between them.
Osrick shied back, cursed, and stormed off into the stables. His cronies hastened after him.
The angel shimmered and disappeared, and Pyrull’s sword fell silent. Pen let out his breath in a gust and released the hilt of his own sword. It clicked against the silver-chased mouth of his scabbard as it dropped back in.
Terrell had to swallow to be sure his voice would come out steady. “Thank you, Magister Pyrull, for that intervention. I would hate to be forced to kill my brother.”
“A shame he doesn’t feel the same, Your Highness,” Pyrull answered. His seamed brown face split in a relaxed smile as white as his hair. “But do not take your own success for granted. Osrick is quite good with a blade and has much more experience than you, my Prince. I am pleased that you were wise enough not to force the fight.”
“I don’t hate him, Magister,” Terrell answered honestly, grieved inside. “I’ve tried to love him like a brother should, but he won’t let me.”
Pen touched Terrell’s shoulder lightly.
Pyrull coughed. “Which does you credit, Your Highness. Unfortunately, it only takes one to hate. Now, may I be so bold as to suggest you and Baron Penghar should go change and ready yourselves to wait on your lord father and lady mother in two candlemarks? They’ve had a grueling journey, but they’ll want to see you when they’ve rested a little. The Silbari brigade won the draw for first turn at cleanup, and your friends among them will want to spend a little time with both of you.”
Terrell agreed, though the delay pained him. Still, it meant Dona Seraphina would see his mother before he could. She might advance his hope of visiting Aretzo.
Gwythford Castle’s huge baths, built by his father in imitation of proper Silbari baths, had a steam room, cold plunge pool, warm pool, bathing room, and ample changing rooms. The cheerful bedlam of returning Silbari soldiers filled it, getting their first chance to wash in days. They welcomed their young lords and for a little while Terrell and Pen got to share again the camaraderie of men with round ears and dark skin like theirs. Men who shared their isolation here among the pale point-eared folk of the cold North. Terrell nearly managed to forget the recent encounter with Osrick.
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