by Martha Carr
The old man nodded, trying not to smile. “Perhaps. I’ll let the hands know.”
She slipped on her boots at the door, muttering to herself. “I can still carry my load.”
Connor cleared his throat as he rose to his feet. “Yeah, and everyone knows it, even if they won’t admit it. Most of the hands don’t do half the work you do. If any of them took a crossbow bolt to the shoulder, they’d take two or three days off and head to the pub. Piss on ‘em. Good to see you, William. Say hi to your folks.”
“Nice to see you too, sir. I will.”
“Come on, William.” Raven pushed the screen door open and stepped out into the sunshine. Her eyes squinted while they adjusted to the brightness. “What do you think happened to your ranch hand?”
William jogged to catch up to her side. “I don’t know. It’s confusing.”
They walked by two men working on a piece of equipment as Raven lowered her voice. “Did you hear about the satellite ranch that was found abandoned? No sign of what happened to the family that lived there.”
“No, and how did you hear about that?”
“Local gossip.”
“Always accurate,” said William, smirking.
“Yeah, well, hard to get wrong that a ranch is just empty. That’s their whole lives. It looks like they just up and left in the middle of the day. Everybody’s gone, food still on the table. Disappeared into thin air. Let’s go this way. I’m headed to the barn with the kids.”
“That’s crazy. What do you think it would have been?”
Raven shrugged. “Maybe the same thing that took your ranch hand. And the same thing that took ours, too.”
“A conspiracy, I don’t know. Why would anyone want them? Trying to build a rogue army?” He let out an easy laugh, but Raven glared at him, and he stopped smiling.
“Okay, I’ll admit it. I’ve heard the same rumors when I’ve been in town.” William stepped ahead and pulled open the door of the barn for her. “But I don’t know if I believe them.”
“Thanks.” She stepped into the barn. “What did you hear?”
“Something about raiders, or maybe the return of the Swarm.” He laughed as he said the last part.
“Yep. I bet there’s evidence out there, it’s just that nobody’s looked yet.”
“Come on, the Swarm doesn’t exist anymore, remember?”
“No one knows for sure because it’s happening outside the wall.” She stopped in her tracks and faced William. “We should check it out.”
William stopped walking. “Stop kidding around.”
“I’m serious! We’ll wait until nightfall, so nobody will know we’re gone. Just sneak out there and take a look around.”
“Look, I don’t buy the whole Swarm story either, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t something out there with a grudge taking out ranchers. Could be a squad of warriors from another kingdom, which would still be deadly.”
“Then someone should know that too. We’ll take a couple of dragons so it’ll be quick. Safer.” She opened the pen to the baby goats. Two of them charged at her feet and began nipping at her toes, the others bouncing on all fours, jumping over each other. “Wouldn’t be a big deal.”
The young man stayed outside the pen by the gate. “Bad idea. You’re a mage in training, Raven, not a dragonrider or a warrior.” William saw Raven clench her jaw and tried to change the subject. “You got a hit from an elf, Raven. Take it easy. Arrow do that to your shoulder?”
She snorted, wincing even as she tried to hide her annoyance. “Yeah. Elf had pretty good aim, but even though I wasn’t armed, he couldn’t take me down.”
William rested his arms on the fencing around the pen. “That is the nice thing about raising dragons. No elves. What’s an elf going to do with a dragon? The damn thing would eat an elf before he would go with him.” They both laughed.
“Ugh, he was a pesky little shit, too.”
“They usually are.” William watched Raven check the baby goats one by one, petting their thick fleece and checking their limbs and faces.
“Look at you, nuzzling all these baby goats like you’re some kind of softie.”
“I’m just doing my job.”
“No, I know that. But you come from a family of such tough, important wizards, and you’re taking care of these delicate, adorable little animals. Meanwhile, I’m messing around with big ol’ fire-breathing scaly beasts that could kill any of us with one swipe.”
Raven examined the legs of a small black goat standing between her feet. “Yeah, well, you’re lucky. At least you chose your path. No one is telling you ‘you’re an Alby, and that means you’re a mage in training.’”
“Sorry about that. I didn’t mean anything…”
“I know you didn’t.” Raven cut him off. She stood straighter, cradling a kid under her free arm. “It’s just that I have dreams too, you know. I mean, maybe I do want to be a mage, maybe I don’t.” Maybe I want to ride a dragon high above the clouds.
William stood and inspected a long scratch on his arm. “Training dragons is hard labor. We’ve got this one dragon that just won’t let up. Fights back every time we try to talk to him. Won’t do anything we need him to do. Getting to be a real problem and, sooner or later, he’s gonna have to take the tests. Dragons suck too.”
Raven set down the kid, watching them all scamper around and jump over each other high in the air. “Oh, and goats are better?” She shrugged. “Look at them. This is pretty much it.”
He opened the gate for her. “Hey, it’s family business versus family business. I didn’t choose to deal with dragons any more than you chose to handle dwarf goats. It’s our lot in life. That’s just how it goes.”
“Your father gave you a choice, and you wanted to stay with the business.” She stepped out of the pen and closed the gate behind her. “Of course, for me, it’s not goats for too much longer.”
“How so?”
“I had my first day at Fowler yesterday.”
“Oh right, the Alby legacy.” They both walked out of the barn. “A tougher calling to turn down. But that’s going to be a while.”
“I don’t know. I’ve already made a huge impression on the headmaster. He says he’s going to keep an eye on me. That means good things. Maybe I’ll skip a grade and start advanced spells.”
“You may have just a couple of things to learn with the rest of the rookies.”
“It’s a big world out there, and I want to go explore it. And if there is a menace, I want to help stop it.”
“You’re an Alby, alright. You get it from your parents. They both commanded respect wherever they went.”
Raven glanced at the sky. “Yeah. I wish they were still around. My grandfather doesn’t get that. He’s always trying to rein me in, stop me from doing stuff. He’ll teach me a spell, then follow me around and warn me to be careful. Or show me how to use a weapon and caution me to use it sparingly. He tells me I’m just like my mother. Endlessly curious. It’s not like I don’t get that’s code for headstrong and always into something.”
William lifted a pole by the gate in front of another pen for older goats, securing it in place. “It must be hard to figure out who you are without your parents.”
Raven crossed her arms over her chest and looked out at the horizon. “I don’t know any other way. Grandpa has done his best. Look, this is who I am!” she said, with more intensity than she intended, lifting her good arm.
William look surprised, his forehead wrinkling. “Yeah, sure. Okay, I get it.”
“Talk much?” Raven tried to smile at him.
“I’m better at staying ten seconds on a snarling dragon,” he said, smiling as he rubbed the back of his neck. “You know, the dragons we’re raising are pretty vicious, right? Breathing fireballs, could eat you in one bite, and God forbid you get hit with one of their paws when they swat at you. Take off an ear. I saw that happen to a guy. You do not want to come back from lunch and find an ear on the ground.”
“My point is dragons wield a lot of power. It’s my job as a trainer to make sure they use their power responsibly. I don’t want to keep them from being powerful, not that I could. I just want them to understand what their powers can do and when to use them.”
They started to walk back up the ranch. “That may be, but I’m not a dragon, dude. I’m a mage.” She pointed a finger at William. “Don’t say in training…”
“Wouldn’t dare. You may have the power already, but you have to learn how to use it and in different ways at different levels. I gotta get back to work. Thanks for the break.”
“Any time. Good luck over there. Let me know if you find out what happened to the ranch hand.”
“Promise me you won’t go looking for clues on your own outside the wall.”
“I promise,” she said, her fingers crossed behind her back.
William waved and ambled up the road toward his ranch.
Raven returned to the shed, where Edward was sorting through tools. He kicked the wall in frustration.
“Problem, Ed?”
He looked over his shoulder. “Ahhh, just missing a harvester.
“We’ve got others, right?” She pointed at a row of harvesters.
Edward nodded, distracted, still rooting around. “Yes, but we need every one of them. Your grandfather wants all the tools organized and kept in the shed. We catch hell if they’re not all in here when they’re not being used.” He took off his hat and held it against his chest, his other hand on his hip. “It’ll turn up. They have a way of doing that. Maybe you can learn a spell or two that can help us find it, huh? How about that?” He smiled, exposing a wide gap in his two front teeth. “Hey, what happened to your shoulder?”
“Elves in the goat pen again.”
“Damn them critters. Pesky little shits. Does the other guy look worse?” He gave another gap-toothed smile.
Raven sighed. “Well, he looked hungry. I kept the goat safe and sound.”
“Well done. Now, if I could just find that harvester.” He wandered toward the back of the large barn, muttering to himself, already on to something else.
Raven walked over to the larger barn to see if she could help feed the goats, still wondering about the whereabouts of Isaac Irving. With her free arm, she grabbed fistfuls of the processed polly grass and tossed it to the little goats, who bounded over to chow down. The remnants of pain from her other shoulder made her take a sharp intake of breath, but she pushed forward, smiling at the goats.
She looked up at the wall again, lost in thought. If only I could see that ranch out there…and get William to go with me.
Chapter Six
Deacon rolled up his sleeves after loading the last glass jug of goat milk onto the wagon, a small, well-built wain. A gentle old chestnut mare, Presley, was attached at the front, pawing at the ground. “Raven! You ready? We have to hit the road! Sun is rising in the sky.” He pulled a handful of oats out of his pocket and held it under Presley’s muzzle, rubbing her head.
The girl sighed as she came from the barn, feeling drained from the wound in her shoulder. “Yeah, I’m coming. Everything loaded up?”
“Yep. Let me help you up, and let’s get going.” He held out a hand, and Raven reluctantly took it, a wave of dull pain sliding from her shoulder into her back. She slid across the bench to make room.
“You do this every day, Deacon?”
“Yes, ma’am. And with Isaac gone, it’s nice to have the company, so thank you for that.”
“That’s nice of you to say, but I know he helped you with the deliveries.”
“I take the days as they come. I tell myself every morning, you have to start from where you are and work with what you got. Good life rule.”
“I’ll remember that.”
“Come on, Presley, let’s get a move on. Time and milk wait for no one.” The wain was bouncing along over the rutted dirt road in no time. Raven kept shifting on the broad polished board that made up the seat. She held her arm against her chest, each bounce sending a jolt of pain across her back.
“Nothing like what they’re gonna teach you at that fancy school, but valuable all the same.” He nodded at the road ahead. “Once we hit the gate, we need to take a sharp right turn, or the wain will go too wide, and we’ll end up in the ditch, and a lot of ruined milk!” He laughed. “Your shoulder getting the best of you? We can take a break and pull over. Presley’s pulling to the right anyway, trying to get to the wild grass.”
“Sorry, Deacon, I may not make it. I should have let you find someone else.” The pain was radiating through her shoulder, but they were still a ways from the first shops. She hesitated, the words coming out haltingly. “I… I uh, could try a spell. I think I have a good one.”
Deacon’s expression changed, and he adjusted the reins in his hand. “You know a spell that could help?” He glanced at her, shaking his head. “I had no business asking you with an injured shoulder. Should have waited for Lincoln to get freed up. Helping me deliver is gonna make you late for school.”
“Hey, there’s no school today…”
He cut her off, the words spilling out. “Magic is precious, Raven, you know that. You use a spell now, you may not have it for something else in a few minutes. You have to think ahead. If we all went around using magic willy-nilly, we’d all be running on low when we needed it. Besides, back in the day when they could use it all the time…”
“There was a time when magic was everywhere? People used it all the time?”
“Oh sure, a long time ago, but magic brings its own set of problems and can even lead to darkness. Do you have a spell in mind? If you don’t, we’ll be fine. We can figure out how to get Presley moving along.” Deacon had slowed down just enough to give the old mare the opening she was looking for, and she was angling the wain to the left to the grassy side of the road.
“I think Presley has another idea,” said Raven, trying to hide her pain with a tight smile.
“I see your point,” said Deacon with a gentle smile.
“Time for the spell?” asked Raven.
“You’re definitely an Alby. Okay, just this once, but nothing flashy. I don’t want to send you to school, and then you can’t do anything in class. Whoaaaa, Presley.” He pulled harder on the reins, getting Presley under control with little success.
“Illustrare.” Raven swiped her arm over the horse as the wagon jiggled and shook, the milk sloshing around.
“Good choice,” said Deacon. The wheels lifted ever so slightly off the ground, rolling along on a pocket of air. Presley whinnied, lifting her head and looking straight ahead. “Do me a favor and act like it’s still tough going.”
“Not a problem.” Raven relaxed against the back of the seat, still feeling a twinge in her injured shoulder.
Deacon shook the reins in his hand, urging Presley to start up again, and she reluctantly pulled away from the grass. “Raven, why didn’t you try a spell to heal your shoulder?”
“The elf’s arrow bit into the bone. There’s no way the healing spell I know would have done enough.”
“You know your limits, that’s good. That won’t last long. You’re smart as a whip, always have been.”
Deacon took a sharp right to go down the road, the shops finally in sight. “Atta girl, Presley. Nicely done. We’ll tie up the wain in the middle of town, and I’ll make the deliveries by hand from there. Usually, Isaac and I would split up, but you can keep me company. It’ll pass the time.”
They rode mostly in silence, getting closer to the town center and occasionally making a delivery.
Eventually, they turned a corner, and the town square was ahead of them. Deacon startled at the sight of a crowd of people milling about. “Ah, shit. The army is doing a draft right now. Let’s pull over there and set up shop. We’re not going to reach the middle, much less the other side.”
Raven waited for Deacon to find a place to hitch Presley and slip a feedbag over her head, le
aving her to munch on oats happily. He hopped into the cart to watch the draft. He sat back on the bench, and she leaned over to whisper. “I thought the next one wasn’t until spring.” She waved her arm over the wagon, removing the spell. The wheels came to rest in the packed dirt.
“Me too. Odd day, wouldn’t you say?”
“From the get-go, and it hasn’t stopped.” She adjusted her shoulder to let her arm rest more comfortably.
A line of young men stood with their hands clasped behind their backs, their chests puffed out, and their shoulders rolled back. Pacing nearby, Cameron Wilson, a tall, well-dressed master wizard, was built like a tank with a barrel chest and a long black wool coat that stretched tightly across his frame. Well known around the city, Cameron had been in charge of protecting it as long as Raven remembered.
One by one, he announced each of the men, then said, “You have all been enlisted into the Brighton Army. As per the law, you will serve a minimum of two years, where you will endure rigorous training and instruction in the services of protecting our kingdom and its people. At the end of the training, a few of you may even become dragonriders.”
The crowd roared with applause.
“Dragonrider,” whispered Raven. She looked at Deacon, watching the gathering with rapt attention.
“Today, you join a long tradition of wizards. You become part of those who have bravely gone before you, dedicating themselves to ensuring peace and safety of us all. We honor your new commitment and service!”
The young wizards turned in a neat line and followed the wizard.
“You know, Deacon, I want to try and help you with the deliveries. It’ll be okay, and it’ll help speed us up. I can take the smaller ones. Really…” It was making her antsy to sit there. Raven was used to always being in motion.
“I’d say no, but I’ve known you since you were no bigger than yea high. Fine, I’ll divvy them up, and you get me if you need anything.” Once they had their assignments, Deacon pulled two large jugs of milk off the cart and carried them down the road, weaving through the crowd of people.
With but one good arm, Raven would have to make her deliveries one at a time. Annoyed, she grabbed the first jug and hoisted it off the cart.
