The Locksmith

by Howe, Barbara;

  “I’m the housekeeper and chief cook, you see, but the place nearly runs itself. Long ago, we started building up spells that would do as much of the work as possible without supervision, and since they’re all stable, it keeps the magical noise level down to a low hum. Jacques, the caretaker, Master Sven, the tutor, and I are the only magical staff here, and frankly, Jacques and I are as much house parents as we are caretaker and cook. There are only a half-dozen others, all non-magical, for this whole huge place.”

  “Why?” I asked. “I knew it was mostly empty. I read about the guild members moving out of the Fortress and building Blazes during the reign of the sixth Fire Warlock, but the histories didn’t say why.”

  “Because of the interference with the spells for looking for trouble. When the Fortress was built, they thought the Guild and the school would be here even in peacetime, but with all those wizards and witches, the magical activity going on right under his nose blinded the Fire Warlock, so to speak. You would think that somebody would have noticed before they all moved in here, but no, and three of the first five Fire Warlocks died in surprise attacks before they figured out what the problem was. So, we built Blazes, and put a shield over it to protect his eyes and ears.

  “Don’t they move in here when there’s a war?”

  “Yes. The Fortress is big enough that every fire wizard and witch in the country, and all their families and relations and servants, can fit in, but it still gets crowded, or so I’ve heard. The last war was before my time. If the rumours are true, we might have to deal with a siege while you’re still here. I hope not!” She shuddered.

  That was the second time today someone had talked about war as if it was coming soon. Would I get to see the Fire Warlock call down the lightning? I shivered.

  Mrs Cole waved her hand. “Enough of that. That’s months away, at least. The only people living here now, besides the staff, are the guards and their families in the bottom tiers, visiting scholars and supplicants in the middle, and Himself all alone up at the top.”

  “If the castle runs itself why does he want a cook? Or need any servants?”

  “Cooking is one of the few things we haven’t figured out how to set up spells to do completely for us, especially since folks want some variety in their diet. Cooking is still an art, depending on the type and quality of the ingredients available, and some things—like baking—depending almost as much on the weather as anything else. Most of the actual work can be done magically, but somebody has to keep an eye on things, and make decisions about what to fix, which seasonings to use, and so on.

  “And then, too, we’re a bit old-fashioned and frugal here. The spells that run by themselves draw on the volcano, so that’s no problem, but any magic that Jacques or I do drains our reserves. The ideas that you mundanes have about witches and wizards sitting around all day waving our wands are nonsense. There’s usually a fairly steady stream of supplicants to help out. Several of them work in the pantries and get food brought up from the town, but I’ve been doing the cooking by myself here for a few months, and it will be good to have a young pair of hands helping in the kitchen again. Especially as I’ve had to pretty much cut out cakes, pies, and the like, and the Warlock does have a bit of a sweet tooth. Now here’s the kitchen.” The kitchen was large enough to feed Rubierre. The fireplace, big enough to roast a flock of sheep, dwarfed two pots of soup bubbling away over a small fire. I walked over to the fireplace and gawked. Warlock Arturos would be able to stand upright inside it.

  Mrs Cole said, “I should warn you. The kitchen is the only place in this part of the castle where there is always a fire burning, so Himself will sometimes come out of the fireplace on his way to somewhere else. He used to do it all the time, but he doesn’t do it as much now since one helper I had screamed and dropped a platter of ham on the floor. She said she thought it was Old Nick himself. Humph.” She added “Idiot woman” under her breath.

  I shivered. Tales of demons and wicked wizards striding out of the fireplace intent on doing harm were all too common. He seemed kind, but if he came out of the fireplace towards me, I might panic, too.

  Mrs Cole talked about the daily routine as she showed me where things were. “You and I will need to get up early to start breakfast. Then as soon as that’s out of the way, we’ll start working on dinner, which is promptly at one o’clock. We also have to start some soup, and figure out what else should be put out along with it for a light supper—bread, cold meat, cheese, fruit, and so on. The kitchen will take care of putting it all out on the buffet, and everyone helps themselves to supper whenever they want. So, we’re through by dinnertime. You can do whatever you want for the rest of the day.

  “The Earth Guild’s burn treatments are in this cupboard. Do you know how to use them?”

  “Yes, ma’am. I would be scared to work in a kitchen that didn’t have them.”

  “Good. That’s sensible of you. Now let’s go find you a room. We’ll put you up with the staff, around the corner from me. It wouldn’t do to have a chick as pretty as you down by the barracks or in with all the male supplicants and scholars.”

  The room she led me to was five times as big as my attic room at home, with a bed big enough to sleep four. I was turning circles in the centre of the room when she called me into the tiled closet next door. It had a large basin built into the floor, and when she turned a knob, hot water gushed out of the wall and began to fill it. My knees almost gave out. I had heard of such marvels, but had never expected to see them.

  “You mean I can take a bath every day if I want to? And where does the hot water come from?”

  She smiled. “You can bathe twice a day if you want to. We’re living on Storm King, remember? Getting hot water piped in is no problem; there’s plenty of it in a volcano. The part that impresses me is the magic that filters out all the sulphur and other nasties. If it didn’t, this bath would stink to high heaven.”

  As I soaked in a tubful of hot water that night, I recalled my interview with the lieutenant in Rubierre, and laughed. Hard work? When all I had to do was cook for a few hours every day? I’d fallen into the lap of luxury. I fell asleep in the most comfortable bed I’d ever been in.

  I had no forewarning that I would wake in the wee hours, disoriented and thrashing in the bedclothes, too short of breath to scream. I had dreamed that the Office of the Western Gate, looming like Storm King overhead, held me in thrall as its shadow advanced, seeking to blot me out. As it had blotted out all other threats to Frankland for more than a thousand years.

  René and Master Sven

  Mrs Cole knocked on my door early the next morning with her arms full of clothes: two new dresses, a shawl, an assortment of undergarments, a comfortable pair of shoes, and the promise of another summer dress to come.

  All this for me? Servants in our district got an allowance for two changes of clothing a year, and only the wealthiest of women had more than four decent dresses. The clothes were well made of sturdy fabric, but quite plain, not at all fashionable. Claire would have been disgusted. They suited me to a T. I stammered out my thanks.

  She smiled. “Magic does have its advantages. And don’t think this is special for you. We fix up all the supplicants so that you can’t tell whether somebody had been a farm hand or a prince by looking at them. You can tell, perhaps, when they open their mouths and start talking, but not by their clothes.”

  “Why?”

  “Everyone comes here looking for a fresh start. Having decent clothes helps get them into the right frame of mind, and keeps other people from jumping to conclusions about them. Or if it’s a noble, looking like everybody else means he has a harder time lording it over other people.

  “You were in better shape than a lot of people who arrive here, you know, in having a change of clothes with you, but I’m afraid that threadbare dress wouldn’t have done for dining with Himself and the scholars.”

 
; “Dining with him?” I squeaked, and sat down hard on a chair.

  “Oh, yes, honey. You and all the other supplicants and visiting scholars, and Himself, and me—we all sit down and have dinner together. Of course, he doesn’t get to dine with us every day, but he wants to know how the scholars are getting on, and what you youngsters are up to. It’s his way of keeping an eye on how everybody’s doing.”

  I followed her to the kitchen with butterflies in my stomach, but once there she kept me so busy I had no time to think about making a good impression at dinner, and I forgot to worry. I had never before worked in a kitchen that fed so many people, but the basic breakfast was something I could do well, and I enjoyed the bustle.

  As soon as breakfast was over, we plunged straight in to working on dinner. Mrs Cole chattered away while we worked, and I paid no attention to the time. I was startled when the Warlock himself walked into the kitchen a few minutes before one o’clock.

  “Good day, Lucinda. Good day, Rose. How is your new helper working out?”

  “Quite well, Your Wisdom,” Mrs Cole said. “If she keeps going like she’s started I’ll be sorry to see her go when her year is up.” She turned to me. “Now, honey, it’s time for you to take off your apron and head on into the dining room.”

  The butterflies came back. Despite the apron, I had gotten flour on my new skirt, and I suspected I had flour on my face as well; a suspicion only deepened by the arching of one of the Warlock’s eyebrows and the twitching of the corner of his mouth. My attempt to brush the flour off my skirt only spread it further.

  Mrs Cole said, “Don’t worry, dear,” and flicked her wand at me. The flour disappeared.

  The Warlock said, “Much better,” and gestured to me. The Fire Warlock was offering me his arm? I didn’t move.

  He said, “Despite the stories, I do not bite, or at least, not often.”

  Mrs Cole winked. “And if he does, we have the Earth Guild cure for rabies on hand.” I goggled at her.

  He took my hand and placed it on his arm. “More to the point, one never gets a second chance to make a first impression. You will begin on a sounder footing with the rest of the menagerie if you let me escort you in and introduce you than if you try to slip in unnoticed by yourself. It would not work anyway.”

  “Yes, sir. Menagerie?”

  “Not literally, of course,” he said, as we walked down the corridor, “but when an otherwise distinguished and urbane scholar is jealous of another’s work he can give the impression that he is a wild animal going for the other’s throat. That was what I dealt with this morning, sad to say.”

  The doors at the end of the corridor opened by themselves and we walked on through. The three dozen or so men in the antechamber to the dining room watched us walk in. A tall, fair-haired man with a neat beard caught my eye and I stared. Now there was a handsome prince. He met my gaze and bowed.

  “Gentlemen,” the Warlock said, “it is my pleasure to introduce to you Miss Lucinda Guillierre, our most recent supplicant.”

  They bowed, in varying degrees of elegance and depth, and most of the glances seemed either curious or appreciative, although a few seemed hostile. I looked around at the scholars, but aside from the fair-haired man who’d quickened my pulse, there were so many I could not begin to distinguish one from another. Claire would have been in her element. I tightened my grip on the Warlock’s arm. I hoped I could get through this without blushing. I had embarrassed myself too many times yesterday.

  “Miss Guillierre will be assisting Mrs Cole in the kitchen, for the nonce. Master Thomas, Master Sven, René, please join us at the head of the table.”

  The Warlock led me through the crowd and into the hall, where he seated me to his right before sitting himself. A stocky, older man wearing a scholar’s robe sat down on my right. One of the supplicants I had seen that morning working in the food stores, a boy, about eleven or twelve years old, filled the seat at the Warlock’s left, directly across the table from me. The man who had caught my attention in the antechamber sat down next to the boy. He smiled at me, and I fumbled with my fork, flustered.

  The Warlock said, “There are no assigned seats at this table, and I encourage all of my guests to move around so that I have an opportunity to talk to them all and no one is slighted. However, for today, I specifically wanted you to meet these three gentlemen. Starting with Master Thomas.” He indicated the scholar to my right, who nodded and smiled.

  “Master Thomas is a librarian on the castle’s staff. He will help you find whatever you need there.”

  Whatever I need? As if I was a scholar? Roman Warlocks called to me, and I didn’t even need the librarian’s help to find it.

  The Warlock indicated the younger man. “Master Sven’s stated ambition is to become his generation’s preeminent mage.”

  Being designated a mage—one of the select group of top-ranking talents who were also distinguished scholars—was a high honour. I would have been interested in a prospective mage if he had been fat, fifty, and bald. The fact that he was young—late twenties?—and the most attractive man I had ever seen made my heart flutter.

  The Warlock said, “Since I believe that the best way to ensure one’s own mastery of a subject is to teach it to another, I have employed Master Sven to tutor supplicants, such as yourself, who need a better grounding in the theory and history of magic.”

  He indicated the boy to his left. “René is one of the youngest supplicants to ever arrive here.”

  The boy stared at me curiously. I tore my eyes away from Master Sven to return the stare.

  “René has magical talent, but for reasons that we need not go into,” the Warlock shot me a piercing look and I understood the message: none of my business, so don’t ask, “he is studying magical theory here in the Fortress rather than the practical arts at the guild school in Blazes.

  “You will be done with your work in the kitchen after dinner, Miss Guillierre, so I encourage you to spend your afternoons either in the library or in the classroom with Master Sven and René.”

  “Yes, sir,” I breathed. “Thank you, Your Wisdom.”

  “Hey,” the boy René said. “A girl? Can she keep up?”

  The Warlock frowned at him. “René, where are your manners?”

  René said, “Oh, sorry, sir.” He scowled at me. “Can you keep up?”

  The Warlock groaned and hid his face in his hands. Master Sven seemed to be trying to kick the boy under the table.

  I said, “You haven’t given me any reason so far to think that I couldn’t.”

  The Warlock winked at me through his fingers, and Master Thomas said “Touché.”

  Master Sven said, “Please forgive my young friend. He isn’t normally either so rude or so dense. I don’t know what his problem is today. If he were older I’d ascribe it to being flustered at sitting across from a pretty girl.”

  My cheeks got hot. For the first time I could remember, I didn’t curse my face for blushing at the slightest provocation.

  The Warlock said, “No, he does not want your time with him encroached on, and has had so little exposure to anyone, male or female, who is as intelligent as he is, that he assumes the worst of everyone he meets. However, having her study with you will be good for him as well. René, what did I say about Master Sven’s labours?”

  “The best way to learn a subject is to teach it to someone else?”

  “Exactly. Therefore, I challenge you to make sure that Miss Guillierre does keep up, by assisting with the teaching when and where you can.” Looking at René with a baleful eye, he continued, “She has passed through the same three challenges you did, one of them with rather more cleverness than you exhibited. Everyone at this table has earned the right to be here. I beg you to remember that.”

  The boy scowled, and studied me in earnest.

  The Warlock turned towards Master Thomas. �
�There are others here as well who could use a gentle reminder of that fact. I think you know which ones.”

  “Yes, Your Wisdom, I do. I will see to it.”

  The Warlock changed the subject, and I was glad for the reprieve. After all the years with Claire, I was not accustomed to being the centre of attention. He had given me much to ponder, too. I was flattered and exhilarated that not only was he giving me access to his library and a tutor, he was actually encouraging me to use them.

  On the other hand, the Warlock’s interactions with the boy René laid to rest any notions I might have had that I was unique. It was evident that the Warlock enjoyed his role as master teacher, and that he had had many such students over the years. I would need to be careful not to let his attention go to my head.

  Settling In

  Master Sven handed out assignments to his other students with a lack of fuss, then sat down across a table from me and interrogated me far more thoroughly than the Fire Warlock had done. My familiarity with Frankish literature was pronounced limited but sound, my knowledge of magic judged inadequate and the other sciences little better, but I was only a third of the way through the list of histories I had read when he stopped me with a whistle.

  “I may have to appeal to you as the expert on ancient history. You don’t need to read any more—”

  “But, but, sir, I saw several books in the library I want to read—”

  “Don’t look so alarmed. If they appeal to you, I’d be the last to stop you. I’m only suggesting you spend more time on other subjects to become well-rounded. You’ve got a good foundation.”

  He left me reading The Four Magics in a state of warm contentment, and made the rounds of the other students, answering questions, and steering back in line those who had gone astray. He came back to me an hour later, and gave a satisfied nod over the progress I had made. When he dismissed us, I lingered, but after giving me a smile and saying “You’re off to a good start,” he walked away with his nose in a book.