Growing Up Magic (Wine of the Gods Book 9)

by Pam Uphoff

  But if he was going to start up long hauls of heavy loads he'd be needing some heavier horses. More horses, four per wagon, rather than the two horse hitches that were fine for hauling most things around town. A four horse hitch usually had heavier horses for the wheel pair, and, well, horses like his for the lead pair. Time to start keeping his eyes open for draft or better, part draft horses. For just a moment he wished they were in contact with Earth. He could write his sister, and tell her to send him four draft mares. And impregnate them with clones of that fine colt she'd sent along with the first horses. Well, not an option now. But he could get a couple of draft mares and breed them to Solstice and Blue. That'd get him about what he needed.

  In the morning he hauled his first deliveries, then swung by Duchess Nicole Succuro's mansion. He'd eased back into her life seven years ago, when her elderly husband died. But casually. They were both too sensible, had too many responsibilities . . . Her children were ten, eleven and sixteen now. He was Uncle Day to all of them, even eleven year old Nazar who looked rather a lot like him.

  Staven was just heading for school. "I don't know why I still have to go. In three months I'll be starting the Two Year Rotation. I should be practicing sword fighting." He tossed a hand strike toward Damien, and they had a quick mock fight before the boy headed out the door.

  "That boy's got fast reflexes." Damien stooped to receive hugs from the other two, but when the very young Duke Martin Succuro hung back a bit, Damien stopped and extended his hand instead. The boy beamed, and shook hands. Nicole was keeping him here, out of reach of his eight half-sister's husbands and sons. The King had appointed a governor for the province until Martin was of age.

  Nicole shook her head at him. "You are so good with them. And good with math. I was hoping you'd come by, we're having these problems with algebra . . . "

  Two hours later he was back at the docks and working again.

  Chapter Two

  Early Summer 1386

  Crossroads, Section One, Foothills Province

  Two days later, when an Army officer came looking for a few more wagons to take supplies to a new fort under construction to the northeast, Damien contracted for two wagons and drove one himself and Max the other. It was an opportunity to track down some rumors they'd heard, without arousing curiosity by asking about things they shouldn't be aware existed.

  A week out of the City, Max started fussing.

  "It's good for them." Damien grinned at Max's worried expression. "They're too used to me and you being in control. When we get back in two months they'll be confident and used to doing it all themselves. Code and Vani won't let them go too wrong."

  Max poked the camp fire. "Two of the three of us shouldn't be so out of touch like this. It's not good protocol. Quite apart from Eddy being a horse thief. You should stop adopting orphans."

  "Ah, c'mon. It's been nearly ten years since I brought one home. And Eddy wasn't adopted, he just slept in the hay loft. He only comes to the city to race horses now, anyway."

  Damien waved in a couple of the other drivers as they finished up their horses. "I've been thinking of going to four horse hitches and heavy freight. Those wheel horses of yours don't look like draft horses. Are they halfbreds?"

  That got them all talking about their horses and where they were from, and some suggestions about breeding his mares to produce his own heavier foals.

  One of the men grinned. "And if those horses don't suit, there's always the royal stud. Got a bunch of stallions they breed to the public."

  Max laughed. "I'd love to see the expression on their faces if we brought them a pinto mare to put to one of their champion warhorses."

  "Might do it, remember where Big Blue came from." Damien sobered a bit. The later occurrences of the day hadn't been good.

  "You refer to the spoilt rotten royal brat who 'borrowed' a two year old colt from General Rufi and raced him? And didn't tie him securely so he jumped one of your mares?" Max snorted, and the men around laughed.

  "Damn nice colt she had eleven months later." Damien pointed out. "I still use the old man for work and breeding. Big healthy foals. Maybe I should buy some draft mares to breed him to."

  "There's two types of draft, some people like one, some the other. I like to see feathers on their legs, and a big sensible head. Those clean legged ones with the pretty heads? They're war horses, not proper harness horses."

  Damien frowned. None of his horses had much in the way of feathers. Certainly not Solstice or Blue. War horses.

  Fort Crossroads, when they finally got there, was a well organized construction camp. The fort was going to be mostly wood; their shipments were food and feed and nails and hinges. On the recommendation of the more experienced drivers they moved another ten miles up the road and spent the night at the Fire Mountain Inn. Damien studied the very familiar building, and shook his head, refusing to believe. They can't have moved the whole building. It's just a common style, that I haven't seen anywhere except here and Ash. The barn was full up, but the weather was good. Damien picketed the four mares up on the grassy slope beyond the barn, under the benevolent gaze of a decrepit old draft horse. "Breeding the mares to something about that size would probably get us the kind of foals we've been talking about."

  The old dun gelding pricked his ears alertly and Damien gave the old beast a measure of oats, out of pure soft heartedness. Clean legs, fine head. This is a war horse? Must have retired years ago . . . can't possibly be that old horse from Ash. He was ancient, ten years ago.

  "I hear it works better the other way around, draft mare, light stallion." One of the other drivers was picketing his horses as well.

  "Hmm, can't say I've ever paid much attention." Damien wondered if his sister knew, not that he could ask her, but . . .

  "If we were back home we'd be talking about how to juice up our cars. Funny how things don't change much." Max led the way back to the inn and the tantalizing smells issuing from the kitchen.

  They recced out, in the night.

  There were faint tracks leading from the road, through the grass and up the hill. The first one they followed ended abruptly at an optical illusion. A miss match in the nighttime scenes. Damien walked up, trying to spot the inconsistencies, to see what lay beyond the camouflage mirage. He went one step too far and staggered, a bit of disoriented . . . There were no hills. Flat grasslands, with scattered trees, clearly visible under the gibbous moon. Damien stood very still, observing, then turned very slowly, looking for the mirage effect. A spot where one was looking down hill at grasslands. He walked into the spot.

  Max cussed him. "What the hell is that?"

  Damien looked up at the gibbous moon. "That appears to be something like a Gate. Only less wrenching. Maybe it only goes from one part of this world to another part."

  "Like those corridors they talk about." Max nodded.

  They went back to the road, and walked it slowly, looking for more of the trails through the grass. North of the Tavern there was a trail going each direction. The one to the west looked well traveled. They walked up, and looking through, could see a small town street, quiet and empty in the night.

  To the east, the Gate led to a World lacking even the chirping of insects.

  They walked further up the road, checking everything.

  The last Gate led to an oak forest, dimmly lit by the light refracting through an arc in the sky.

  Max shook his head slowly. "It's a ring, like Saturn's. These definitely go to entirely new worlds."

  "Eight Gates. Permanent, no obvious power draw to hold them open. Much easier, gentler, transition." Damien kept his voice low.

  "Why here? It looks like they aren't even using them."

  "Tech testing area?" Damien hazarded. "It's not like they're over populated."

  "This'll make the brass sit up and take notice."

  "If we ever get in touch with Earth again."

  The trip home was a bit quicker, with empty wagons. A week away from the City, Damien
started buying grain and potatoes. Max shook his head. "You never stop do you?"

  "Why? The prices are good. The horses go through grain like a reaper. I love baked potatoes, and someone has taught all the local women about fries and crisps."

  "Okay, I'll own up to that one. And Jeinah has passed it on to all her friends."

  They argued the pros and cons of taking on the long hauls all the way home. The bottom line was that while they'd made about as much money as they would have doing City deliveries, the gold freighters made nearly double.

  "Sure there's a risk." Damien shrugged. "But they've all got Army escorts and they really don't get raided all that often. The papers like to sensationalize 'The Gold Gang', but read between the lines, they rarely get very much, and always lose people."

  Another traveler, a slinky pale blonde woman looked over at him and winked. "So brave of you to minimize the dangers."

  Damien flushed. "Actually, I haven't done many trips down there, and never caught sight of a single bandit."

  "Well, there's a reason they pay the premium prices. My ex-husband . . ." She shrugged and returned her attention to her dinner.

  Damien attended to his own, and in the morning tried to not eye her hungrily.

  Max shook his head. "I remember the days you used to lecture me about women like that."

  "Ha! I remember lecturing you about Jeinah. So obviously my advice about women is faulty." He nearly cracked his jaw yawning, and requested a quiet day of his team. Madre Mia turned an ear around his direction, but she still pranced for the first hour, aided and abetted by her teammate Cumin. The two chestnuts were their 'respectable' team. Max was driving Chaos and Persimon, bay and white and chestnut and white pintos that got them mistaken for this World's equivalent of Gypsies on a regular basis.

  They pulled into the familiar yards around noon. Andrei stuck her head out and sniffed. "About time! I can't believe you left the children in charge for so long!"

  Damien grinned. "Code's thirty-nine. Hardly a child."

  "Indeed. If only he hadn't run off after his wife, when she took the children and left to become a witch."

  Chapter Three

  Late Summer 1386

  Karista, Kingdom of the West

  "What!" They abandoned their teams and turned to her.

  "You heard me. Vani ran into a real witch, who promised her proper lessons. She popped the children into the wagon and drove off, leaving a note for poor Code. He was so rattled I had to read it for him. Three times. Then he grabbed that Blue horse of yours and rode off. He came back a week later, but at the faintest hint of where they might be, he leaves again." Andrai folded her arms and, from the front porch managed to look down on them.

  Damien blinked. "So you didn't have even a whole team? And . . . and Toni to drive?"

  Andrai snorted. "I sent a message to Marquette and Ross. He came right away, with the two mares and that young stallion you think so much of. So we stayed in business, so to speak. Old Gods know what we'll do this winter, without a closed wagon."

  "Without . . . Oh, Vani took tiger wagon, of course, much better for traveling with a family. Andrai, do you know where they went?"

  "Not a clue. She didn't tell me they were leaving at all when she loaded the wagon. Let alone where."

  Damien looked at her in exasperation, then cast a look toward Bass Lane. He couldn't see anyone, but there were probably at least three women hanging on their every word. "Come inside." He led the way and closed the door. And kept his voice quiet. "Andrai, if she's with the organized witches, up in Ash, we'll have an information conduit."

  Instant change from scolding aunt to professional spy.

  Captain Andrai Andrew's eyebrows rose. "I hadn't thought about the witch being one of them. But the reports did have both males and females at the Canyon battle."

  Max whistled. "And since Vani doesn't know about us, she can't give us away to mind readers."

  Damien nodded decisively. "I need to talk to Code. Then take him up there. I'll go with him, make sure he doesn't get into a fight or otherwise not on speaking terms with Vani, if she's there, and make sure the girls all know they're welcome to come back anytime. This is a break we need to leap on."

  Andrai looked at him approvingly. "Indeed. At a minimum, you need to confirm your 'good old Uncle Damien' reputation with the girls. But stay unobtrusive, don't get fresh with any witches."

  "I'll just sort of fade back and stay out of the argument, and hopefully those witches won't bother reading my mind."

  They headed back out to take care of the horses, and Damien sent Max off to find his wife. "I'll finish here, and pick up any gossip in the Sooty Duck."

  He brushed the mares and put them in the outside corral to relax and roll in the summer sunshine. Then he cleaned up himself and headed down to the rundown bar. He was greeted with glad cries by the contingent of whores. He winced to see Periti's expanding belly, and they all teased him about his impending fatherhood.

  "Hey, what about that Prince? Surely he's the one you want to pin the baby on.

  Periti smirked. "Of course, but that doesn't mean we're not going to tease you."

  Hell he'd been coming here for so long, there was no telling how many children he might have, although the whores had all sorts of herbs, and even mass produced bottled elixirs to prevent conception. Periti obviously had failed to plan ahead for her first time.

  They all knew all about Vani disappearing. He winced to hear that not only did they not know where she'd gone, some of them suspected Code of murdering them all and burying them in Jeinah's vegetable garden.

  Code himself came blasting in as he was finishing his lunch. He winced at the glares of the women and dragged Damien out. "I don't know where to even look!"

  Damien bit his lip. "I know where there are some witches. It's a village called Ash. I'll take you there, but you'd better calm down. You go up there with demands and ordering them around and you'll lose them for good."

  "What? Damien, she's my wife! Those are my daughters!"

  Damien blew out his breath. How to explain this to someone who grew up here? "Code, a wife is not a slave. You don't own her. You have mutual contractual obligations to each other, but either of you can divorce the other. You know how she's always worked to understand her magic. Now she's learning. Maybe she has the option of staying wherever she is. If you want her to come back to you instead, you're going to have to . . . let the choice be hers. Woo her, don't try to force her. Don't turn your children into weapons."

  Code was alternating red faced and pale as he talked, but hadn't interrupted.

  "We first need to find them. Then find out what's going on. For all we know she needs to be rescued – but equally, she might like it there. Don't assume."

  Code nodded jerkily. "She left, and everyone thinks I killed her."

  "We'll leave first thing in the morning, to check this magical village. Code . . . if she doesn't want to come back . . . you are going to have to figure out how to deal with it, how to woo her, help her, even encourage and praise her. Make her like being around you. And maybe you're going to have to leave without her."

  Code gulped. "I'm too old for this. I'm used to just taking her for granted."

  "That happens in marriages. So when you find her, you have to be prepared to remind her of the good parts of your marriage. Not act like an overbearing ass. Right?"

  "Right." He was straightening up a bit, the light in his eyes hopeful instead of desperate.

  Damien checked around and found a small load to haul up to Wallenton.

  By the time he was home with it, the other two wagons were back, the two stallions making threatening noises at each other from opposite ends of the barn. The humans were doing the same, and Damien had to raise his voice and calm them all down.

  They harnessed up Karmageddon and Mama Mia the next morning and drove off.

  "Andrai didn't even make any snarky comments." Code looked back in surprise. "Do you think she really ca
res about Vani and the girls?"

  "The way she used to talk, you wouldn't think so, would you?" Damien slowed the horses as traffic built up going through the gate in the old wall. "Maybe she's learned that she really does need the rest of us. She's over seventy now, so maybe she got a taste of what it's like to be old and alone."

  It was nearly another month to Wallenton, and Damien worried about the winter. Was there hay at the farm, with Ross working in the City? Was anyone buying hay and grain for the two teams they usually kept in the City for the winter? Was he going to get back to Karista for the winter, himself?

  And of course, if Vani and the girls weren't in Ash, they'd have hit a dead end. Both Code's family and the spies' hopes for a peephole into the magic world gone.

  They quickly dropped off the two crates and headed out again, Code so anxious Damien didn't even suggest taking a half day's rest and sleeping in real beds.

  He remembered enough of the route to push the horses into the evening a bit to reach a good camping spot. Perhaps it was just hubris, but he really did think his homebreds were better than the ordinary run of horses. Solstice had a lot of engineered genes. He checked Kar's legs again, but the young stallion was doing fine. He was a golden buckskin with pinto splashes and a faint roaning through the flanks.

  Code relaxed enough to talk horses again. "Is there any sort of odd color that fellow lacks?"

  Damien shook his head. "He's got most of the bases covered. I feel like I ought to buy all solid mares and try to tone things down, instead of thinking about inbreeding. Kar could cover Bazaar and Candy Cane next spring, since his daddy's not related."

  "They're getting pretty old. Ross was thinking they wouldn't be bred again."