The Silver Mage

by Katharine Kerr

  They marched the entire length of the fortress, turned in a perfectly executed sweep, and marched back again. The horns blared, the drums beat steadily, until the priests and their retinue returned to their tower by the door they’d left from. After so much processional music, the silence rolled around the courtyard like sound.

  “Ye gods!” Rhodorix shook his head to steady down his hearing. “What was all that about?”

  “I’ve got no idea,” Andariel said. “Maybe they just wanted a bit of fresh air.” He stood up, dusting the dirt from his knees. “They don’t tell us anything, and we don’t ask them anything. Those young lads with the swords? They have the right to kill anyone who insults a priest, and you never know what might insult them.”

  Rhodorix got up to join him. “Those swords don’t look like they’d cut meat at table.”

  “They look soft, but they’re not true silver. It’s some kind of mix. I don’t know what it is, but the Mountain Folk up in Lin Rej make it.”

  “Oh. Well and good, then, Captain. I’ll remember what you say about the priests. They look a fair bit different than the ones from my own tribe, not that I would have crossed them, either.” Rhodorix paused, remembering Galerinos. “Well, except for the one who was a cousin of mine, but he was just an apprentice. Ye gods, no doubt I’ll never see him again, and that’s a pity.”

  “It’s a hard thing, exile.” Andariel paused to look up at Reaching Mountain and the huge slabs of stone towering above. “I hope to the gods I never have to face it.” He reached out and gave Rhodorix a friendly slap on the shoulder. “Let’s go round up our lads and get to work.”

  After the day’s riding lessons, Rhodorix went first to the bathhouse, then back to the chamber he shared with Gerontos. His brother was sitting in a chair by the window and eating bread and fruit from a tray on the table.

  “What’s this?” Rhodorix said. “Does Hwilli know you’re out of bed?”

  “She does. I’m not to walk any farther than this, but it’s time, she said, to see if the leg can bear weight.” Gerontos gestured at the tray of food. “There’s more there than I can eat.”

  Rhodorix sat down across from him and picked up a chunk of bread and a knife to butter it.

  “I’ve been meaning to ask you,” Gerontos said. “Does Hwilli have a sister or a friend who might—” He let the words trail off.

  Rhodorix grinned at him. “She doesn’t, not one who’s our kind of people.” He let the smile fade. “But she’s mine, Gerro. I know we’ve shared women before, but not this time.”

  “Well and good, then. I just asked.”

  “Naught wrong with asking.” Rhodorix bit off a mouthful of bread and ate it while he thought. “She has a friend named Nalla, though, who’s a bit of a spark in tinder, if you ask me. She might find a different sort of man interesting, like, if you can ignore the ears.”

  “I’ll ask Hwilli if I can meet her, then. It’ll let her know that it’s not her I want to bed.”

  “Very gallant of you.” He grinned again and reached for an apple. “How is the leg, by the by?”

  “Healing, she says, and fairly fast as these things go.”

  “Good. You’ll be riding again by winter, or so I hope.”

  Eventually Gerontos managed, with the aid of a crutch and with Hwilli’s help as well, to hobble out down to the terrace to teach beside his brother, though generally Rhodorix and one of the men carried him back up again. The forty men under their instruction learned to handle the captured mounts in a much shorter time than Rhodorix had been expecting, not that any of them turned into splendid riders in a fortnight’s work.

  The difficulties lay in the mount and dismount. Eventually, the guardsmen all learned how to leap onto the wooden horse, but their nervousness communicated itself to the real horses, who usually refused to stand and hold for the practice. Until they could mount, the men would never learn anything else about riding, so Rhodorix reluctantly agreed to a set of wooden steps, such as the kitchen servants used to reach the nets of onions and apples, the smoked pork and other such preserved foods that hung from the kitchen’s high ceilings. Rhodorix made his men pay for the device with jests and shaming remarks that made them struggle all the harder to learn.

  On a sunny day turned cool by a crisp wind, Prince Ranadar himself and his retinue came down to watch the riding practice. Skipping along beside him was his little son, Berenaladar, or Ren, as he was usually called. Through Andariel and the crystals, Ranadar asked Rhodorix to show him what “this riding thing is.”

  Rhodorix whistled for Aur, the name he’d given his chosen horse, who trotted out of the herd at the command and joined him. His previous Meradani owner had trained Aur well; Rhodorix had spent many a morning learning what his new mount could do. When Rhodorix surreptitiously tapped the gelding on his off fore, Aur bent the leg and seemed to bow to the prince. Ranadar smiled, and Ren clapped his hands with a laugh.

  “I want one of those, Da,” the child said.

  “You shall have one when you’re older,” Ranadar said. “Now hush!”

  “Begging the cadvridoc’s pardon,” Rhodorix said, “but he’s of an age when he should be learning to ride. The younger, the better, honored one.”

  Ranadar considered him with a twisted smile then shrugged. “Very well, perhaps we’ll both come have some lessons with you. Show me what this all entails.”

  Rhodorix saddled and bridled Aur, then leaped into the seat and caught the reins. He walked the horse down to the end of the terrace to let it warm its muscles, then trotted back. He dismounted, made Prince Ranadar a bow, and turned to the guardsmen.

  “Saddle up, lads!” Rhodorix said.

  The men rushed off to fetch their horses, since none had yet trained them to come when called. While they struggled with the tack under Andariel’s supervision, Rhodorix lifted young Ren to Aur’s saddle and told him how to sit properly. The boy’s cat-slit eyes, lavender like his father’s, widened with delight at the sensation of being up so high on horseback. He followed every instruction Rhodorix gave him, then repeated every move on his own. If we live long enough to teach the lads, Rhodorix thought, the People will be as good as we are with horses.

  The presence of their rhix and cadvridoc made the guardsmen even more nervous than usual. Several of them refused to use the wooden steps, but the first man to try the leap put too much spring into his jump, overbalanced on the saddle pad, and slid off to fall in a heap. His horse snorted, danced, and very nearly kicked him. He got to his feet, his face as red as a sunset, and stared at the grass to avoid looking the prince’s way until Rhodorix sent him and his mount back to their respective herds. A second man and a third tried and failed. The entire guard unit turned hangdog, standing heads down with humiliation.

  “Ye gods, that looks difficult!” Ranadar said. “Here, let me try.”

  Andariel protested in a flood of words that Rhodorix couldn’t follow, not even with the crystal, but the prince laughed and insisted. Rhodorix brought Ren down from Aur’s saddle.

  “This is the best trained horse in the lot, honored one,” Rhodorix said. “He’ll stand still for you.”

  On his first try the prince very nearly managed the leaping mount. In fact, Rhodorix suspected that if he’d wanted to, Ranadar could have gotten himself onto the saddle, albeit in an ugly flurry of arms and legs and clutching hands. Instead, the prince made a great show of sliding off and falling into the grass. He laughed and picked himself up before anyone could rush forward to help him.

  “Very difficult,” Ranadar announced. “Don’t feel dishonored on my account, men.”

  The guardsmen cheered him. Rhodorix felt utterly stunned. He’d never seen a man of authority, not Devetianos nor Rhwmanos, voluntarily shame himself for the sake of the men who served him. On a wave of good feeling all round, Ranadar collected his retinue and his son and left the guardsmen to their practicing. Rhodorix watched them as they walked uphill. He’d finally found a leader worth dying for, he realiz
ed, someone with ten times the honor of a Vindex or even a Brennos.

  At the end of the day, when they returned to the fortress to let the men care for their mounts in the newly built stable, Rhodorix and Andariel discussed the various problems that the lesson had shown them.

  “If we ride to battle, then dismount,” Andariel said, “how are they going to get them mounted again after the fighting’s over?”

  “It’ll be worse yet if they’re unhorsed during a retreat,” Rhodorix said. “You’ll have to leave them behind. They’ll never manage to remount a panicked horse.”

  “We don’t have enough men to leave anyone behind.”

  “Well, then, I don’t know what to tell you. It’s all very well to provide a set of wooden steps here in the fortress, but we can’t carry those with us to battle.”

  Andariel sighed and considered the line of saddles perched on a railing. Crystals in hand, the two men were standing in an improvised tack room, part of a storehouse that the prince’s servants had roughly converted to a stable. The saddles were much like those Rhodorix knew from the homeland, simple leather pads with a cinch that went over a heavy saddle blanket.

  “Carry the steps with us?” Andariel said eventually. “That gives me an idea. What if we hung a step of sorts from the saddle itself?”

  “What?”

  “I’m thinking of the rope ladders that lead up to the catwalks on the walls. What if we put straps down on each side of the saddle with loops for a man’s foot to go into?”

  Rhodorix grinned in sheer admiration. “That just might work splendidly, once we got the horses used to the device. Stick your foot in the loop and swing your free leg over.”

  “Just so. I’ll go to the armory and ask.”

  The People knew their craft work. One of the prince’s armorers delivered a saddle with the new idea attached the very next morning. Rhodorix first accustomed Aur to having straps dangle against its sides, then tried out the new way of mounting while the armorer stood watching. Although the foot-loop certainly made getting onto the horse’s back easier, the simple saddle twisted to one side under the pull of his weight. Rhodorix dismounted and led the horse over to Andariel and the armorer.

  “We need to work on the saddle,” the armorer said through the crystals. “Give it back to me. I think I see what’s wrong.”

  Back and forth the saddle went over the next eightnight between the armory and the horse yard. Each time it returned, it was heavier and stiffer, until finally the leather ended up stretched over a wooden frame. The cinch had spawned two additional straps. One went round the horse’s chest, one round its behind, and the new side loops included iron bars to keep them open and stiff. Although Aur disliked this new version of its usual tack, Rhodorix heartily approved.

  With the armorer and Andariel in tow, he rode down to the first terrace, then galloped along its length once. As he walked the horse back to the waiting men of the People, he tried standing with his weight on the new, reinforced loops, then sat back down and howled with laughter. He walked the snorting, dancing horse over to Andariel, who was watching from the side of the courtyard. Still grinning, Rhodorix leaned down to retrieve the black crystal from the captain.

  “A man could swing a sword from horseback like this,” Rhodorix said. “It’ll take some practice, but I think we can put the fear of our gods into the Meradan with these.” He leaned forward and patted Aur’s neck. “Whist! You’ll get used to it in a bit, lad.” He straightened up again and looked at the grinning armorer. “A splendid job! Captain, can he make us more of these things?”

  Andariel spoke briefly with the armorer, who nodded his agreement. “He says,” Andariel said, “that he’ll set his men to work on them this very afternoon.”

  “I have good news for you,” Hwilli said. “Master Jantalaber is going to take the cast off this afternoon.”

  “Splendid!” Gerontos grinned at her over the white crystal, which he was holding. “Although, alas, I’ll miss seeing you every day.”

  “Oh, you’re not rid of me yet! Wait till you see what your leg looks like.”

  “Good.” His smile turned soft.

  Hwilli set the black crystal down on the table beside the bed. She felt uneasy enough to gather up her supplies and hurry out of the sickroom. Brothers always squabble, she thought, but I don’t want them squabbling over me.

  When she returned to the herbroom, Nalla was standing at the table, studying a row of freshly-pulled plants.

  “What are those?” Hwilli said.

  “Comfrey,” Nalla said, “I think, but the roots don’t look right to me.”

  Hwilli glanced at them. “They’ve grown in very poor soil, I’d say. The rest of the plant certainly looks like comfrey.”

  “Ah, you’re right! I hadn’t thought of that. How’s your patient doing?”

  “The master’s going to cut the cast off this afternoon, and then I’ll know. I hope he’s healing well. He’s been terribly bored, and it worries me.”

  Nalla looked up with a grin. “What’s this, he’s interested in you, too?”

  Hwilli felt her face burn. “My heart belongs to Rhodorix,” she said. “And only him.”

  “It’s not your heart that’s the problem, but a very different portion of his anatomy.” Nalla grinned again. “He’s not bad-looking, really, despite those funny eyes.”

  “I’m not going to—”

  “Who said anything about you? I was thinking of providing him a little distraction.”

  Nalla’s grin turned so wicked that Hwilli had to laugh.

  “Just be careful of his leg,” she said. “Don’t undo all my work.”

  When the cast came off, the leg had shriveled from sheer lack of use, and the skin lying underneath had turned as wrinkled as a toad’s. Master Jantalaber brought all his apprentices into Gerontos’ quarters to see the effects of wearing a cast for nearly two months, tested the leg, pronounced the break mended, but urged him, through the crystals, to keep his weight off it as much as possible.

  “You’ll be fine by the spring, lad,” the master said, “if you’re careful now. Hwilli, let’s go to the herbroom. I’ll give you a recipe for salve that you can make up for his skin.”

  Hwilli followed the master into the herbroom as the other apprentices dispersed. Jantalaber went to the massive herbal on the lectern, thumbed through its heavy parchment pages, and opened it flat at a particular page.

  “There you are, Hwilli,” he said. “The formula I promised you. Before you start preparing it, though, tell me how your work with Nalla’s going.”

  “Nalla says I’m doing well,” Hwilli said, “but I think she’s just being kind. I can remember all the information she gives me, but I can’t put it to use.”

  “That takes time, a great deal of time. Keep at it, and the results will come. Can you see the elemental spirits yet?”

  “No, I’m afraid not.”

  “In good time, then, in good time.”

  Hwilli could only hope that the ability would come. It galled her to think that the tiniest child among the People could see the Wildfolk, while to her and her kind, they existed only as tales and jests. And what would “good time” be? Compared to the long lives of the People, she had very little to spare. A few days later, however, her worry proved unnecessary.

  “After dinner tonight,” Jantalaber told her, “Maraladario wants to see you.”

  Maraladario, the head of the dweomermasters’ guild, the most powerful mage that anyone in the Seven Princedoms had ever known—Hwilli caught her breath in an audible gasp. The master smiled at her.

  “She won’t eat you,” Jantalaber said. “In fact, she wants to give you her blessing.”

  Hwilli found herself unable to answer. She laid her hand on her throat and wondered if she’d gone pale. Finally, after another gasp for breath, she managed to say, “I’m so honored.”

  The Tower of the Sages stood at the north end of the main palace, opposite the Tower of the Priests. As they e
ntered through the door at the bottom, Master Jantalaber cast a silver dweomer light on the end of his staff, which he held up before him like a torch. Steep wooden stairs switchbacked up past landings, each with a chamber door marked with various sigils, none of which Hwilli could decipher.

  Maraladario lived at the very top. The stairs ended at a landing of polished wood in four different browns, laid in a pattern of triangles. In the silvery light, the pattern rose up into interlocking pyramids, or so it appeared, rather than forming a flat surface. As her shadow fell across it, Hwilli noticed that the pyramids seemed to flatten under the shadow’s weight.

  Master Jantalaber stepped boldly onto the landing. When he didn’t trip and fall, Hwilli followed him and discovered that the floor was indeed perfectly flat. The red door to Maraladario’s suite bore no sigil or decoration. When Jantalaber knocked, the dweomermaster herself opened it and ushered them inside to a wedge-shaped room lit by golden light. Although Hwilli had seen her from a distance many times, she’d never been this close to the great sage. Maraladario was tall, even for a woman of the People, and slender with long, delicate fingers. She wore her jet-black hair bound up in a green gauzy scarf that matched her eyes, but one long tendril hung down over her cheek. Her long blue tunic shimmered as she moved.

  “Come sit.” Her voice was soft, pleasantly husky. “Would you care for wine?”

  “None for me,” Jantalaber said.

  “Nor me either, Mistress,” Hwilli said. “Though I thank you.”

  “A prudent girl, and well-spoken.” Maraladario grinned at her.

  Hwilli bobbed her head and hoped she looked humble rather than terrified, her actual feeling. The dweomermaster led them to simple chairs, with wooden backs and cushioned seats, placed near a shuttered window. A small table with a mosaic top sat nearby, the only other furniture in the room. As Hwilli sat down, she noticed movement out of the corner of her eye. When she turned her head, she saw a strange little being lurking under the table. Roughly human in shape, with purplish skin and a warty little face, it stood about two feet high. When it saw her looking its way, it stuck a bright red tongue out at her and wrinkled its nose.