The Locksmith

by Howe, Barbara;

  I watched him go with mixed feelings. He’d treated me the same way he’d treated his male students—with patience, competence, good humour, and a lack of condescension. That was good.

  On the other hand, he’d treated me the same way he’d treated his male students. That was too bad. Even without Claire around, was I still going to have trouble getting a man’s attention?

  I gave myself a mental shake. There was less than an hour of daylight left, and I was wasting time. I picked up my skirts and ran to the library. I pulled Roman Warlocks off the shelf, but hesitated for a moment, stroking the soft leather. I was among friends, both old and new, and it seemed fitting to acknowledge the presence of the others. I ran a finger along the edge of the shelf, and looked around at the library. I had never seen this place before yesterday, but I had come home.

  I carried the book to a window seat, and settled down to read.

  The feeling of being at home grew as I learned my way around and settled into the daily routine in the Fortress. I’d only been there a week when Mrs Cole said, “You don’t need me looking over your shoulder. You do the baking and I’ll take care of the mains. Fix whatever you like for dessert.” The storerooms held every flavouring I’d ever wanted to taste, and many I’d never heard of. In spare moments in the mornings I drooled over Mrs Cole’s recipe books, making lists of new things to try.

  I got to know nearly everyone—scholars, supplicants, staff, and guards—and no one seemed offended that I claimed a window seat in the library as mine.

  It was only late at night that I felt ill at ease. I wanted another girl to talk to. I confess I missed Claire. Why had the Fire Warlock sent her away? He had said why, hadn’t he? It nagged at me, but I whenever I struggled to remember what he’d said, I fell asleep.

  More alarming, the sense of suffocation that I had expected to lose once out of Lesser Campton got worse. A few times I dreamed that I was trapped in a glass cage. I woke gasping for air, frantic that time was running out.

  I didn’t tell anyone about my dreams or feelings of suffocation. They seemed so silly in the bright daylight, and I would have been mortified if the Warlock had thought I was ungrateful for what he had given me.

  I didn’t sit at the head of the table with the Warlock again for several weeks, but two or three days a week I would look up from my work and discover him talking with Mrs Cole. I soon realised that it was part of how he kept abreast of the scholars and supplicants. Mrs Cole would frequently have something to tell him, in low tones that I couldn’t overhear, and he would stroll away looking thoughtful. He never seemed to be in a hurry, and would usually stop and ask how I was doing.

  One morning I was struggling to get cake pans in the oven on time, and the bread smelled about to burn. Out of the corner of my eye I glimpsed someone in servant’s livery come into the kitchen and stand by the door, watching. Over my shoulder I said, “You there, if you’re not busy, could you please put the cakes in the oven?”

  I ran to rescue the not-yet-burnt loaves and put them on the cooling racks. I turned back, and stopped dead. The Warlock, dressed as a servant, was putting the last cake pan in the oven. I stammered an apology.

  He smiled. “Since I dressed as a servant this morning to pass unnoticed where a warlock would not be welcome, I can ill afford to take offense when I am treated as one. You were more polite than several others who ordered me around today.”

  I said, “But you didn’t have to do what I said.”

  “I may not have to, but I should. When I am dressed as a servant I should act like one, using the fourth magic to help me seem like a servant, you see. And the magic is stronger if you or anyone else treats me according to the way I am dressed. If I make a mistake in the Fortress and ignore an order, it is not a serious problem, but it could be somewhere else. Besides, I am in no hurry, and I will enjoy having cake for dessert, too.”

  “Why did you need to pass unnoticed? No one in their right mind would attack you, would they?”

  He raised a sardonic eyebrow. “No, but few welcome my attention. How do you think the king would react if I asked to speak to his servants?”

  “Oh. I guess he’d throw a temper tantrum.”

  “Indeed. There are many among the nobility that wish they could bar the door to me, but would not dare. However, even though they would reluctantly let me in, that would not serve my purpose. I was after information, and servants talk more freely to other servants than to warlocks.”

  “I thought you had other ways to gather information, and never left the Fortress.”

  “There are a number of ways. Talking to people is only one of several, but it is one of the best for keeping a finger on the nation’s pulse. Besides, if I did not venture out at regular intervals I would go mad. Can you imagine being trapped inside this pile for a century? You would not like it either.”

  “I could spend ten years in the library without ever needing to leave.”

  “Oh? Then why were you not there instead of in the midst of that snowball fight between the supplicants and the guards?”

  I started. “Oh! Sir, I am sorry about Scholar Ebenezer’s thesis getting soaked, but he wasn’t paying attention to what was going on, and walked right into the middle of it.”

  He leaned across the table towards me, his eyes dancing, and said quietly, “I could have fixed it for him easily enough, but that version had serious problems. I had been trying for weeks to get him to tear it up and start afresh. He may not thank you, but you have done him a great service.”

  “Yes, sir. Thank you, Your Wisdom.”

  “And if you did spend all your time in the library I would tell Master Thomas to chase you out occasionally. Everyone needs exercise now and then.”

  Warlock Arturos was a frequent dinner guest. He came on business with the Fire Warlock and stayed to talk with René, sometimes until late afternoon. After watching them a couple of times, I invited myself to sit with them and listen. The big warlock’s grin made up for the boy’s dirty looks.

  “Another student?” Arturos boomed. “Good, maybe you can help me knock some sense into this young whippersnapper’s head.”

  “Me? What about, sir?”

  “About control. He wants to talk about power; I want to talk about control. Listen René, they have to go together. Power without control is dangerous, like trying to fix a broken clasp on a lady’s necklace with a sledgehammer. Control without power is ineffective, like using a pocketknife to cut down an oak tree. A good Fire Warlock combines power with control so that he can run the whole gamut. A great Warlock, like the current one, uses the minimum power needed to do the job, and makes both extremes look equally easy.”

  René said, “If he’s so great, why haven’t I ever seen him do anything?”

  Arturos smacked the table with his fist. Sparks flew and I jumped. “Burn it, René, you ought to know better than that. The Warlock’s office is all about control. Most wizards and warlocks struggle to conjure up enough magical energy to do what they want. But the Warlock can tap into Storm King. His biggest challenge is tamping down the energy he brings to bear on a problem so that he doesn’t overwhelm it. How many stories are there about some Fire Warlock trying to solve a small problem and burning it and everything else for five miles around?”

  “Hundreds,” René said.

  “And how many of them have died from calling up more power than they could control, and being burnt up themselves along with everything around them?”

  “Uh, most?”

  “Good, I’m glad you understand that. The Warlock’s power is dangerous, and the person in most danger is the Warlock himself. The Office wants a young man who isn’t yet set in his ways, while also wanting a man old enough to have some sense about when to use the power. We were lucky this time to get a young mage in the Fire Office. That’s why he’s lasted as long as he has. Most of what he does is keep contr
ol of situations so that they don’t blow up and require him to fix them.”

  I said, “So the better the Fire Warlock is, the less we see him doing anything?”

  He grinned at me. “A star student.” René glowered.

  Arturos said, “You don’t see what he does, but I do, and I’m in awe of him. Most Officeholders haven’t been able to switch into that frame of mind. They have all that power to work with, and still act like they need more.

  “I want you to understand something,” he said, speaking slowing and enunciating each word carefully. “When, or if, I become the Fire Warlock, I will fear for my life every time I draw on Storm King. Plenty of ignorant people will think that because I’m flashier, I’m a better Warlock than Warlock Quicksilver. And they will be wrong.” He emphasised the word wrong with a thump on the table. “Maybe towards the end I’ll approach his level of control, and those folk will think I’m losing my touch. But I won’t care. I will be proud.”

  Later, when I recounted this conversation to Mrs Cole, she snorted. “The person in most danger is Himself, is he now? Well, maybe that’s true a lot of the time, but I don’t think either Nicole or Terésa would agree with that, would they?”

  I knew about Nicole and Terésa, of course. The two tragedies were the basis for our greatest works of poetry, drama, and art. Every villager had seen the plays put on by the travelling troupes of actors, or heard the bards singing. About Nicole, the young peasant girl who had dared to love the third Fire Warlock, and who died in the flames of passion on her wedding night. And about Terésa, the fire witch who thought her shields would protect her, but who fatally misjudged the fierce heat of the volcano.

  To me, Nicole seemed so naïve, so passive—a minor character in her own story. I had always preferred the story of Terésa, the fire witch, who was as inflamed by passion as her warlock. She had gone after what she wanted. That was a woman I could look up to.

  I shivered. There was no point in following that train of thought. Like René, I wanted to see the Warlock use his magic, but Arturos was right. Far too many of the old stories ended in death and destruction. The Fire Warlock’s kindness and urbane sophistication was a veneer over a primal power I could only begin to guess at. I did not want to see that veneer stripped off. At some gut level, I knew that if I ever stopped being afraid of him, I could find myself in mortal danger.

  Studies

  A polite cough was followed by, “Excuse me, Miss Guillierre.”

  I looked up from Mrs Cole’s cookbook. One of the more quiet scholars stood by the kitchen door, twisting the hem of his sleeve.

  “Yes? Scholar Andreas, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, miss.” He coughed again. “Those cinnamon rolls were wonderful, and so were the cream puffs.”

  That sounded rehearsed. Had he never spoken to a woman before? “Thank you. I’m glad you liked them.”

  “Master Thomas said you made the cream puffs after he suggested them, and I was wondering…”

  I had been trying out new recipes—breads, pastries, pies, cakes, and sweets of all sorts. The throng at dinner gobbled up with delight even the experiments I considered dismal failures. And now men who had never set foot in the Fortress kitchen before were coming looking for me. Bless you, Mother, for teaching me to cook.

  I smiled at the scholar. “There’s something you would like me to make?”

  “Yes, miss. If you don’t mind. My mother used to make these little cakes with walnuts, and I…”

  “Chopped fine, and sticky with honey?”

  “Yes, miss.” He was almost drooling.

  I’d seen a recipe for them. I flipped back through the pages. “I can make those, but they’ll cost you.”

  He took a step backwards. “Cost me?”

  “Yes. You’ll have to sit here in the kitchen while I make them, and tell me what you’re working on.”

  His eyes widened, and he edged towards the door. “You wouldn’t be interested.”

  “Try me. You’d be surprised what I’m interested in.”

  After listening to him stammer through half-a-dozen false starts, I made out he was working on a revised classification scheme for spells. That was timely. I had flown through the basics of magical theory in a few weeks, so Master Sven had directed me to study spellcraft with René. Reading about the individual spells was fun; understanding where they fit was not.

  I said, “I hope you’re going to make it easier to understand. The scheme we’ve got now looks like somebody mashed together work by two people interested in different things.”

  The scholar gawked. “You know? It was three, actually. I started from first principles to make a new system that’s coherent and obvious even to a layman.”

  Well. He might be shy around women, but there was nothing diffident about that. I pulled out mixing bowls and spoons. “I am interested. Talk. And sit down, you’re going to be here a while.”

  A couple of hours later, the hoarse, beaming scholar left the kitchen with a plateful of warm pastries, and a stern order from Mrs Cole to not eat them all before dinner and spoil his appetite. I was enlightened, on more than one subject: the structure of spellcraft, and how to entice a scholar. Ample reward for a morning’s easy labour.

  “My dear…”

  I dropped a bowl. The Fire Warlock caught it and handed it back to me. “I beg your pardon. I did not intend to startle you.”

  “No harm done, Your Wisdom.” Did he have to sneak up on me like that? Fire wizards were supposed to be loud, but he was as quiet as a cat on the prowl. “Did you want something, sir?”

  He reached for one of the cakes. “One of these, if I may. And to commend you for feeding the scholars’ souls while feeding our bodies and your own curiosity. Well done, my dear.”

  The scholars on either side of me at dinner asked what I was smiling about, but I shook my head and didn’t answer. When René asked the same question in the classroom, I had an answer ready. “One of the scholars described a new classification scheme to me, and it’s a lot better than the old one. It works like this—”

  “What do you think you’re doing? I’m supposed to be teaching you.”

  “Do you understand the classification scheme?”

  “Well, no, but—”

  “Then listen, will you? This new scheme—”

  “It doesn’t make sense. You—”

  “How do you know? You haven’t even let me explain—”

  “Not the classification rubbish. I meant it doesn’t make sense that you’re not a witch. You’ve got to be one. You wouldn’t be so interested in magic if you weren’t.”

  “I am not a witch. A wizard tested me and said I have no talent. Will you please get that through your head?”

  “You keep saying that—”

  “Every day for the past month. You’re making me wish I could be one, so I could flame you and make you shut up. Now let’s get back to the new classification scheme. Will you listen?”

  “New classification scheme?” Master Sven sat down beside René. “You’ve been talking to Scholar Andreas.”

  “Yes, sir. His scheme makes so much more sense.”

  “Does it? Explain it to me.”

  I talked. René doodled, and appeared uninterested, but when I finished, he looked up and said, “You are annoying. It’s bad enough that you’re a mundane, and then you had to go and be a girl, too. You’re not supposed to make sense.”

  Master Sven laughed. “Are you worried she’s going to catch up with you? She picked up a lot about magic from all the history she’s read. She might catch up, if you’re not careful.”

  Might? Hah. Will.

  René said, “Fine. I get the point. But about this new system, can we use it?”

  “It is tempting, isn’t it? But no, you have to know the old one. I prefer the new taxonomy, too, but there’s no
t a snowball’s chance in a volcano it will be adopted.”

  “Why not?” René and I said together.

  “Why not?” Master Sven’s voice rose. “Because this is Frankland, and nothing ever changes in Frankland. We’ll keep on using the old one because that’s what we’ve been using for centuries, and if it was good enough for our ancestors, it’s good enough for us. Change is dangerous and frightening, and we don’t want it. The way it was is the way it always will be. So be it, amen.”

  He leaned back in his chair, flushed and breathing hard. We stared at him. He had always been so calm and cool I had begun to wonder if he really was a fire wizard, but there had been plenty of heat in that outburst.

  “All right everybody, I’m done. Get back to work.” The other students gave him furtive glances over their shoulders before turning back to their own papers.

  “Sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have vented like that. Forget I said anything.”

  I said, “It’s not true that nothing ever changes in Frankland. The aristocracy has been in decline for, oh—”

  “Centuries. True, but not comforting. Our class structure and legal systems are ossified, the obsolete treaties our hidebound diplomats insist on are killing our trade, our—”

  René said, “So why doesn’t the Fire Warlock do something? Especially about treaties. He can do anything.”

  I said, “Not so. The Fire Office limits what he can do.”

  Master Sven said, “And he has to work with the other three Officeholders, and they don’t always cooperate. The Air Enchanter, for example. The sixtieth Fire Warlock tried to make some changes…”

  I fidgeted. Showing interest in a scholar’s knowledge was easy when he was talking about something I didn’t already know, like spellcraft. But I could have done as good a job of retelling this story.