The Language of Power

by Rosemary Kirstein

  Willam intercepted one of the buckets. “Bel, keep your eyes closed, and dunk your face in the water.” The Outskirter did so, came up sputtering. Will inspected her face carefully. “Your eyes don’t hurt?”

  “No. My face does.” Bel’s forehead and right cheek were covered with a multitude of small cuts. Thankfully, none was large, and none seemed deep.

  “All right, then,” Willam said. Bel dried her face on her sleeves, looked about, then at her friends, then at the wizard’s house.

  Orange light, flickering and pulsing in each shattered window. Smoke, streaming up into the night sky. Heat-shimmer, rising from the roof, making the stars beyond seem to twist and shift.

  The roof tiles were blackening. As Rowan watched, yellow lines appeared among them, cracks, which widened. There was a pause, as if the building were itself drawing a breath, and then the roof collapsed, down through the third storey, and the second. A blast of wind and heat, from which everyone present turned away; and when they turned back, the house was a brick shell, holding only flame within.

  Bel turned to Rowan and Willam. “I thought we decided not to kill the wizard.”

  21

  “We didn’t do it,” the steerswoman said.

  Rowan sat with Bel on her right, Willam on her left. Across the large table, crowding close and in some cases tucked behind each other, were the fourteen members of Donner’s city council, and a few other trusted citizens.

  The formal dining room of the Dolphin was dark but for two silver candelabra standing in the center of the table, and one window on the far side of the room. It stood open on a predawn sky of a dull dusky blue, where the last of the morning stars shone faintly.

  Winter stars, Rowan noted distantly. The morning stars of autumn are the stars of winter.

  Joly traced the pattern in the linen tablecloth with one finger. “I can’t say that I’m sorry,” he said, not looking up. “If ever a man deserved to die, it was Jannik.” He raised his dark gaze to the apprentice and the steerswoman. “But if you did not cause the fire, even by accident. . .”

  From the corner of her eye, Rowan saw Willam shift slightly. She ignored him; she could not bear to look at him. She said to Joly, “We believe that was Slado’s doing.”

  Bel sat up. “He saw you?” Rowan turned to her. The Outskirter made a strange sight, cuts strewn across her face like red mud splashes, looking as if one could simply wipe them off. Bel had a clean cloth, and had been wiping. The marks remained, some of them still stubbornly bleeding.

  “We stayed past the updates,” Willam said, from behind Rowan’s left shoulder. “I was so close . . . I thought, if I kept working for just a little longer . . .”

  “The updates ended, and Slado saw,” Rowan said to Bel. “However it is that wizards see these things, he saw.” The steerswoman addressed the gathering at large. “But Slado also saw that Jannik, in the dragon fields, was calling magically to the house, and giving it commands from afar.”

  “Different commands,” Willam put in. “Harmless ones. But Slado couldn’t tell that.”

  “But he could recognize the spell taking place in the house itself. It was . . .”

  “Big,” Willam said. “Loud.”

  “Bright.” Will, you look like a bonfire! “And its nature could not be mistaken. So Slado sent the house a command of his own. He told it to wait for Jannik to come home, and then destroy itself.”

  There was quiet for a space, and then Irina asked the obvious next question. “And did you find what you were seeking, you and your runaway apprentice? Did you learn this mighty secret?”

  It was Bel who answered. “No. They would have said so immediately.” She turned to her friends, disappointed. “You failed. You didn’t find it.”

  “Actually . . .,” Rowan said, and for a moment she regarded her own two hands lying on the tablecloth, locked together, fingers interlaced. “Actually, I don’t know.” And then she did look at Willam: she turned to him and looked directly into those familiar, beautiful, guileless copper eyes.

  Working for Corvus.

  The steerswoman held the wide gaze with her own, her face expressionless. “Willam?”

  “Rowan, I think I did find it.” He spoke as if speaking only to her, spoke with a desperate sincerity almost painful to watch. “What we saw, at the end—I really think that was it. But. . .” His hands moved vaguely, as if trying to grasp, as they had before, insubstantial light. “But I didn’t know what it was. I didn’t know what it meant. It was beyond me.” He dropped his hands. “I was out of my depth.” But then, faintly hopeful: “Rowan, did you—”

  She turned away from him. “It was completely incomprehensible to me.”

  Quiet comments of disappointment among the council members; and Joly sighed. “Then all of this was for nothing.” All the searching, questioning; the slayings done in darkness; the terror in the dragon fields; the revelations and hopes.

  A friend’s betrayal. Naio’s death.

  For nothing.

  “That,” Irina declared, “is your opinion.” She took a moment to adjust her blanket closer about her shoulders, managing to convey, even in her night shift, a graceful dignity. “As I see it, ‘all this,’ as you call it, has had a wonderful result. Donner now has no wizard.”

  “They’ll send another,” Will said immediately.

  Irina sniffed. “No doubt. But we know a thing or two about wizards now. This new wizard will be a stranger, and he won’t know what we’re capable of. We’ll smile to his face and be oh-so-respectful, but all sorts of things can happen when his back is turned. We’ll find ways to work against him.” She looked about the room, and became outraged at some of the expressions she saw. “Well, some of us will, at the least! Persons with both courage and discretion. Are there none such in this room?”

  Reeder, standing behind his father’s chair, spoke without hesitation. “Here.”

  “And here,” Marel said, glancing up at his son.

  “Here,” Joly said, leaning back, studying Irina with new interest.

  Ruffo screwed his eyes shut tight, his face becoming a single immense wince. But: “Here,” he managed to get out.

  “If so, Ruffo, you will definitely have to learn to moderate your volubility,” Irina said.

  “Well, try not to tell me any important secrets.”

  “Secrets come with the territory!”

  The bawdy-house proprietor laced his fingers, placed his hands on the table. “You would be amazed,” he said, with some pride, “at the sorts of things my young men and ladies hear.”

  “Excellent! I believe we have the makings of a cabal in this very room. I’m sure that among us, we can find any number of small, secret, and subtle ways to weaken the wizard’s power over us—”

  Willam sat up straight. “Destroy the dragons.”

  All conversation ceased. Rowan turned to Willam in astonishment.

  He seemed not to notice her. “All of them,” he said to the people of Donner. “They’re complicated devices. They’re hard to make, and they’ll be hard to replace. It will take time. And not only that”—he became eager—“it will take power, and material, and important resources away from other things that the wizards do. Destroying the dragons would cause all the wizards a lot of trouble, all around, for a long time.”

  No one seemed to know how to take this. Eventually Joly said, hesitantly, “But . . . how could we possibly accomplish such a thing?”

  Will immediately stood and moved the candles to the far side of the table; and when he then reached down to the floor by his chair, Bel let out a single “Ha!” and clapped her hands.

  Willam placed a small object in the center of the white tablecloth. “By magic,” he said.

  It was round, slightly smaller than a goose egg, and white. There was a dark band around its circumference with short vertical lines and corresponding numbers, like index marks.

  Willam sat down again. All eyes remained on the object. “Right now,” Willam said, “
the dragons are on standby—” He caught himself, began again. “The control system is down—” He paused, thought. “The spell that tells the dragons what to do was inside Jannik’s house. It was destroyed. That means the dragons have no guidance, no instructions, and they can’t leave the dragon fields, no matter what happens. Someone has to go there, and throw this charm right into the middle of the dragons.”

  The steerswoman sat stunned and speechless; but Bel had no such problem. She laughed out loud, the bright, hard laugh of a warrior. “It will shatter them! Like Shammer and Dhree’s fortress, like that derelict boat in Wulfshaven! Dragons flying apart, in a thousand pieces—Will, that is brilliant!”

  During this, Ruffo had slowly sunk down level with the edge of the table and was now eying the destructive charm across the entire breadth of the surface. He said, in a small voice, “Kill the dragons?”

  Irina smiled sweetly. “Kill the dragons.”

  “Let me do it,” Reeder said.

  “Can you throw?” Irina asked him.

  Marel said, “I’ve seen him fling a ledger across the entire length of the office and hit a dozing accountant.”

  “I’m sure you exaggerate.”

  “Well, perhaps it was only a tally board. Quite a distance, though.”

  Reeder casually leaned, and reached, and picked up the charm. Gasps and murmurs among the people, and those nearby shied back in sudden fear. Reeder ignored them all and coolly examined the object, turning it over in his hands.

  Joly watched nervously. “That . . . small thing will actually destroy the dragons?” he asked.

  “It might take more than one,” Willam said. “I have a dozen with me.” He looked Joly straight in the eye. “You can have them all.”

  Irina gazed at the ceiling with a dreamy expression. “Oh, I find my mind bursting with wonderful plans—”

  “Don’t use them on people!” Will’s sudden vehemence startled them all, but for Reeder, who merely glanced up, brows raised. “Never,” Willam said. His eyes were hard and bright. “That’s wrong. That’s evil.”

  Joly recovered first. He said, solemnly: “We will never use this magic on people. I swear it.”

  Will required the same promise from each and every person present, ending with Reeder, who paused long, carefully studying Willam’s face. Then Reeder reluctantly assented, with a single nod, and turned his attention back to the charm he held. “What are these markings?”

  “That’s a timer.” Willam rose and went around the table to show Reeder. “If you use it, the charm will wait for a while before releasing its power. See? These markings are seconds, and next comes minutes—”

  Rowan recovered her voice. “Willam.”

  “And you turn the ring—no, don’t do it now—”

  “Will.”

  He glanced at her once, then looked back again, caught her expression. And then he stopped: stopped speaking, stopped moving, stopped everything and merely waited for whatever the steerswoman would say next.

  She had found her voice, but words were harder to come by. Perhaps it took only a moment; it seemed far longer to her.

  “This is a wonderful idea,” she said. The statement was inadequate to the depth of her emotion; but at this moment, she could do no better. “Thank you.”

  A small smile, almost shy in its quickness, but conveying in one instant pleasure at her praise, and relief, and gratitude. Willam turned back to continue Reeder’s instruction.

  A series of noises coming from Ruffo’s direction evolved into “But—but—” and drew the council’s attention. “But,” Ruffo said, “what will the new wizard think, coming to Donner and finding all the dragons dead?”

  Willam had the answer to hand. “Blame it on me,” he said smoothly. “The escaped apprentice. But wait until I’m gone to use the charms—”

  “Must you go?” Irina asked.

  “Yes,” Will said with regret. “I must. But if I can, if things ever quiet down, I’ll try to come back in secret. And when I do”—he took the charm from Reeder’s hand and held it up for all to see—“I will teach you how to make these for yourselves.”

  There was more discussion, and ideas arising, and plans made. But all of it was conducted among the people of Donner, and proceeded entirely without the steerswoman’s participation, and without the Outskirter’s, and, quite soon, without Willam’s. The three friends watched for a while as these citizens of Donner devised strategies, formed subgroups, designed clandestine lines of communication, and regathered themselves into a new order.

  Presently Bel leaned forward to catch Will’s and Rowan’s attention and tilted her head toward the door; and it seemed to Rowan that it was, after all, time to go. They waited for an appropriate moment, and made their good-byes.

  Rowan found herself standing by the dining room door, clasping Joly’s large hand, looking up into his dark, intelligent face. “I hardly know how to thank you, and all these people, for the help you’ve given us.”

  “I’m glad we did it. You showed us something, lady: something about ourselves that we didn’t know before. You, and Naio as well . . .” He released her hand. “I believe Jannik was right, in a way. Naio was an example after all.” He glanced back at the table, where people were continuing their work. “I think we’ve learned the lesson, now.”

  “We’ve started something,” Bel said, as Rowan led the way down the staircase. “You may have failed in the wizard’s house, but things have been set in motion here. But this is only one city . . . Rowan, your people need to organize, and they need a leader.”

  “I think you’re right. The Outskirters have one now, and we need—” The steerswoman stopped dead in her tracks at the bottom of the stairs. She turned to Bel. “No. No, Bel, not me! I can’t—”

  “Of course you can’t.” The Outskirter’s expression was disparaging in the extreme. “You don’t have it in you. It would be a disaster.”

  “Well. Thank you for your candor.”

  “But you should keep it in mind, and keep your eyes open for prospects—”

  “Bel,” Willam said. The others looked back and up; he had lagged behind and now stood paused halfway down the stairs. “Slado is in the Upper Wulf Valley.” Bel’s jaw dropped. Will went on: “That’s not where he lives, it’s just where he is now. By the time you get there, or get word there, he’ll be gone. It doesn’t help any. But I have something else for you.” He descended the last few steps to join them. “There are Krue among the Outskirters, and I can show you where they are.”

  Back in her tiny room, the steerswoman pulled the charts from her map case, located her single map of the Outskirts, and handed it to Willam. He glanced at it, then stopped short and regarded her, puzzled.

  “I’m the only steerswoman ever to visit the Outskirts,” she explained. The small chart showed only Rowan’s own route to Tournier’s Fault and back: a wandering line, a few clear landmarks, and vague indications of nearby geography as described to her by others.

  Willam thought. “Then I need a blank sheet of paper, and something to draw with.”

  They used the back of the largest chart of the Inner Lands. It was too big for the table; they set in on the bed. Willam laid Rowan’s little map of the Outskirts at its left edge, and knelt on the floor. “I used to look at the Outskirts a lot. But I’m not good at this.” He moved the pencil, wide, sweeping movements. “The distances may be off, but I’m fairly certain about the landmarks . . .” A cluster of lakes appeared, high in the north, the source of a huge river whose course intersected with Rowan’s own map and continued south. “This goes all the way to the ocean . . .” The coastline was merely a slash, and a scrawled label: Oriental. Will abandoned the ocean as if it were irrelevant and moved north again. His depictions were crude, the labels awkward and outsized, but the steerswoman watched as the unknown lands revealed themselves.

  Then: “Right,” Will said, as if finished; but he did not pause. “Here, and here.” Two xs tucked among the numerous Cat Lakes.
“Those are links.”

  “Wizards’ minions,” Bel breathed.

  “No, not minions.” He added another, south of a series of roughly sketched hills. “It’s a different sort of link, more powerful than minions get. These are Krue.”

  The last thing Willam had done in Jannik’s house, the action that caused Corvus such distress—“You . . Such an odd word; Rowan struggled to recover it. “You pinged the links.”

  He nodded, added another x northwest, quite close to the Inner Lands, one more far to the east. “It’s like a question: ‘Are you there?’ The link will respond, by itself—it has to.” He hesitated, pencil in the air, then added one more x near Tournier’s Fault. “This one might really be two, close together.” And he sat back on his heels, considering his work. Then he shook his head. “That’s the best I can do. It went by so fast. There might be more, but I’m sure about these.”

  The leader of the Outskirters studied the scrawls and marks that located the positions of her enemies. “I’ll send word. We’ll find them.” Bel’s tone left no doubt as to their fate.

  “Bel, think twice.” The Outskirter turned to Rowan. The steerswoman said, “Fletcher was a wizard’s man, but he grew to love your people. He turned. One of these might, also.”

  Bel’s dark eyes moved in thought as she speculated. “More magic on our side?”

  “As much as possible.”

  Willam rose from the floor, carefully rolled up the chart, and set it aside. He sat on the bed. Then he reached down the neck of his shirt and drew something out, and passed it to the steerswoman. Rowan accepted it hesitantly, but did not open it. She waited for Willam to speak, although she guessed what he would say.

  Willam said: “Kieran’s clearance.”

  The Outskirter let out a whoop and fairly threw herself at him, catching him in a huge hug, knocking them both against the wall. “Will, you’re brilliant!” she declared, and laughed. “High clearance, you said before, all the way to the top—”

  Will was attempting to extract himself, and to calm her. “No, no it’s not that good, not anymore.”