An Unexpected Apprentice

by Jody Lynn Nye

  Then, interested, she took a closer look at herself. Her dampened hair was settling into soft curls, making her look more like Teldo than ever before. How she missed him! Could it only be a few days since the thraiks had carried him and the others away?

  While she sewed, she recounted the evening to herself. She thought of the avid looks on the faces of the humans in the room, enjoying her storytelling and her singing. Suddenly, she was filled with shame. The beer, much stronger than what she normally drank at home, had made her uninhibited, and she had forgotten herself, performing in public like a clown. No smallfolk woman should ever have put herself on show like that in mixed company! What if word got back to the Quarters? She’d never be able to show her face in decent company again!

  Ah, well, she thought, tying off the thread and biting it off between her teeth, they weren’t going to want to bother with a girl who had run away to be a wizard anyhow. She would just make sure not to push herself into the spotlight again like that. But it had been fun. She understood why Gosto loved telling his stories. There was an … energy in it. It felt almost as good as making spells. When they worked, that was.

  A thread of moonlight peeped in through the shutters, and Tildi reminded herself it wasn’t that many hours until dawn. She could still hear voices down in the bar, including one upraised in off-tune song, and some loud splashing and swearing that told her the bathing room was again in use, now that it was past midnight. She wasn’t alone. The people below were her friends, now, most of them. She would just have to accept that whoever went through her belongings would remain a mystery.

  She dreamed that the thraik were searching everywhere for her, and they had paid a sheep to search her pack for her brothers. Across the face of the moon was a rune, the same one she had seen in the lord thraik’s eye.

  Chapter Eight

  Tildi all but crept down to the main room the next morning before sunrise. Most of the other guests were snoring heartily in their rooms, but she was wide-awake.

  “I’m sorry for the spectacle I made of myself last night,” she said to Danyn, while the serving maid dished up a plate of eggs and sausage for her.

  “What?” Danyn exclaimed, leaning back with hands on hips. “Why, you were fine! It’s not every guest that can come in here with a fresh story that no one has heard before. Except for that elf, of course. She never acts surprised at nothing. ’Course, she might be a thousand years old. No one can tell with elves. They could be the same age as your grandmother, or older than the mountains. Did someone say something to you?”

  “Er, no. I just hope I didn’t give offense.”

  Danyn grinned, her widely spaced white teeth brilliant. “You are the most inoffensive thing to come through here ever, I might just say. You’re going to need to grow a little gumption if you’re going to stick up for yourself with your fellow students, is what I think.”

  “Oh.” Tildi had never considered whether Olen might have more apprentices than herself.

  “Would you like me to fix you some provisions?” Danyn asked. “It’s two days on foot to the next inn, maybe three for someone your size.” Tildi nodded eagerly, and Danyn moved over to the bar, where she filled a bottle with beer and smacked a cork into the neck. “Three more beyond that to Overhill, but you won’t have to worry once you reach the Eagle, just over the border into Melenatae. It’s a busy road, and there’re guest houses and inns in plenty past the province marker and on near where the road forks for the city. Now, it’s the left fork, remember. The right will take you into Rabantae, and you’re not going that way. It’s well marked. You can’t miss it.”

  “I’m grateful,” Tildi said. “I couldn’t have asked for better directions.”

  “Ah, well,” Danyn said with a grin, handing her the bottle and a wrapped packet. “I meet a lot of first-time travelers, and they never know what it is they should ask. The experienced ones can always tell me they know already. Good journeying to you, Teldo Summerbee. Whatever it is that you’re going to—or going away from—I hope you accomplish what it is you wish.” Tildi felt for her belt purse, but Danyn shook her head and held up the coins Tildi had given her the night before. “Keep that generous heart of yours beating now.”

  “My thanks,” Tildi said, touched by the girl’s solicitousness. She stowed the food away and shouldered the pack resolutely.

  “Come back to us when you become a famous scholar,” Danyn called to her.

  Fortified with a good breakfast and fresh linen, she felt prepared for what might be a five-days’ hike. Tildi marched out into the thin light of dawn, touching the lintel for thanks as she departed.

  She was reluctant to leave the relative safety of the Rushet inn. More than the night before, the sky seemed infinitely open and empty. If the thraik in her dreams was to return, she was vulnerable. Still, now she knew the measure of time it would take her to reach her destination. Five days was bearable.

  Other folk had roused and were preparing to depart for the north at the same time as she.

  Few of the guests were preparing to depart then. The three fishermen had gone to bed with a wineskin apiece to keep them going through the long hours until dawn, and Danyn had had no idea when she would see them surface. The fat man, a carter, had declared the night before that he was staying on until after lunch. No hurry, he had said, as his load of copper ingots wasn’t likely to rot, and he prefered to travel in the day and avoid thieves. The old woman was waiting at the Groaning Table for her son-in-law to come over on the ferry from the other side of the Arown.

  Tildi started off alone; others caught up to her, but with their long legs they soon outdistanced her. The last of her fellow patrons gave her an apologetic glance over his shoulder and a wave as he loped out of sight. Tildi, burdened with her pack and much shorter legs, shook her head and bent to covering ground. No matter; she would have plenty of company at the next coaching inn, and her magic studies to occupy her mind when she reached Olen’s home. If the road stayed this empty, she might even get in a spot of magic practice.

  “May I walk with you?” A voice startled her out of her reverie. She glanced up into the honey-colored eyes of the elf. “I am Irithe.”

  “Yes, of course,” Tildi said, surprised but pleased. “Glad to meet you.”

  “Are you sure? You are new on the road. You ought to know that you can’t trust every fellow rambler just because they seem to be going in the same direction as you are.”

  “I …” That was unanswerable. Tildi had been inclined to trust Irithe just because she was an elf. But what would one of the woodkin want of her? “I’m sure you’re right.”

  “But you wish to stay by me anyhow.”

  “I’ve run into thraiks and—what did you call them?—heurens,” Tildi said. “I’d say they were a common enemy of anyone who traveled these roads.”

  “So you think of the common defense against more powerful enemies,” the elf said. “Curious. But not everyone will have your altruistic outlook. I just give you my advice, for what it is worth. I’ve lived a long time not trusting too readily.”

  “Thank you,” Tildi said thoughtfully. “I wonder why you want to give me such a warning, when I am a stranger, and, as you say, you have your own outlook.”

  “Because you have secrets,” Irithe said. She smiled. “You are illequipped to protect them unless you protect yourself.”

  “Secrets!” Tildi exclaimed. “I have no secrets!” It was an impulsive outburst, and even as she made it she knew how feeble it must sound. She did have secrets. She did not dare to ask her new companion which ones she had discovered.

  “How about the apprenticeship to which you are making your way?” the elf asked, keeping her long stride slow so Tildi could stay level with her. “I noticed how careful you were never to tell anyone you were going to study with a wizard.”

  “How … ?”

  The elf regarded her with large, solemn eyes. “You reacted to Wim Cake’s peacemaking spell, not by calming down, but by lo
oking around for the source. That’s not the reaction either he or I would have expected of those like you. He’s not a magician, as you must have surmised. He only knows that uncovering the amber stone stops brawls. Fortunately, those were simple folks with us in the inn, and none of them paid attention. Because you have faced thraiks and heurens, do not underestimate the danger posed by people who are frightened.”

  “With so much magic in the world, why would people be frightened of it?” Tildi asked seriously.

  Irithe smiled again. “Because they do not see it, and if they did they wouldn’t embrace it. Keep that in mind, too. You must have been very sheltered where you grew up not to know that.”

  “I did know it,” Tildi said softly. So humans were very much the same as smallfolk after all. If that was the case, then she must never let anyone know she was a girl.

  “Don’t let anyone ask too much of you. You’re inclined to give freely, but it might not always be the right choice. I noticed that when you offered Danyn silver. Err on the side of caution. The askers will expect a prudent response, and you won’t be giving offense. Remember, some secrets are worth keeping, even at the cost of your life, and others are not. You will learn to tell the difference, if you live so long. Truth is the best path, but there are many kinds of truth. That, too, you will learn.”

  “I’m grateful for the reassurance,” Tildi said, though she was troubled by some of the elf’s words. She would have a lot to think about later.

  “Good. Then let us enjoy the fine weather.”

  They walked together for two days. Tildi asked Irithe questions, which the elf might or might not answer. She just looked at Tildi when she asked about the animal that ran by them one afternoon that looked like a deer but whose head was larger in proportion than seemed normal. The elf frequently outpaced her on her long legs, leaving Tildi alone with her own thoughts, but made conversation with many humans they met along the busy river road, when they stopped to buy or trade for food or a place to sleep. Tildi had never met anyone like her.

  On the morning of the third day, they passed a milepost that said IVIRENN on the near side and MELENATAE on the other.

  “What is Ivirenn?” she asked Irithe.

  “That is the human name for your homeland and the provinces around it. Humans have a great penchant for naming places and things that do not belong to them.” The thin lips tightened in an expression as close to a smile as she ever wore. “I leave you here, meadow child. Good fortune go with you.”

  “And with you,” Tildi said. “Thank you.”

  Irithe nodded. She walked up the slope and into the trees at the left side of the road. The branches rustled around her, and Tildi lost sight of her at once. Their mother had said the elf folk were one with the trees. They could hide among them like branches, and never be seen unless they wished to be.

  Well, that was a wonderful experience she never would have had if she had remained in the Quarters, or Ivirenn, as she must now think of it, being a woman of the world. She settled her pack on her back and began walking toward the white haze hanging in the air. From the border it was at least two days’ walk to Overhill. How vast must the city be if the smoke from its chimneys could be seen that far away!

  Many more wayfarers had joined the road. Humans taking their rest on the wayside hailed her with a friendly shout.

  “Good day for walking, friend!”

  Joining in the spirit, she shouted back.

  “A fine day!”

  “Going far, little master?”

  “To Overhill. Where are you bound?”

  “To Tillerton! You’ve just missed the spring wine festival! Pity you weren’t two days earlier! Do you want a drink?” Several of them held out bottles.

  “Thanks, but no. Farewell!”

  “And to you, little master!”

  Tildi waved and walked on. She had never known any society but the one in which she had grown up, so she was surprised to discover a kind of fellowship among those who traveled from one place to another. People met and chatted as if they were neighbors, offering news from the places where they had been, gossiping about common acquaintances, the weather, the latest outrages, though it was hard to tell until she listened closely if they were over serious matters or not.

  The world was full of celebrations she had never heard of, kinds of people she had never seen, animals as big as houses. Everywhere lay fresh wonders. And more magic than she had ever dreamed: the mystic runes that existed only on paper in her homeland seemed to be everywhere now. In fact, they were so commonplace that no one ever commented upon them. No one, that was, save for Irithe.

  Travelers on this big main road all troubled to acknowledge their fellow wayfarers, whether by a solemn nod or a friendly hail. Tildi had seen no other smallfolk thus far, so she continued to be an object of curiosity among those who passed her coming or going. A wagonload of passengers bound for Rushet warned her of a blind patch a few miles ahead where the road turned sharply to avoid an ancient oak tree. The place was a notorious hideout for brigands who jumped out at lone travelers.

  “Especially one your size,” they assured her.

  “Brigands?” Tildi asked, alarmed.

  “Get in with a big group,” advised a woman, peeling an apple with a small knife and feeding the slices off the blade to a man lying with his head in her lap. “Safety in numbers. There’s strange things abroad, you know.”

  By the time she got to the dangerous stand of woods, the brigands were not in a mood to attack smallfolk or anyone else. Six rough-looking humans were among a crowd pointing and gawking at a stinking, black hulk that lay among smashed trees.

  “It fell down here several hours back,” a short, freckle-faced man confided to Tildi as she came up to get a look. “No one knows what it is—or was. Horrible, isn’t it?”

  Tildi shed her pack and scrambled up onto the seat of a nearby wagon and peered down at the mass of rotting flesh, from which the crowd was keeping a healthy distance. “It’s a thraik,” she said in amazement.

  “How would a pip-squeak from the country know that?” asked one of the men she presumed to be a brigand temporarily reformed by fear, lifting an unshaven face to hers.

  “Because they attack my country,” Tildi shot back, surprised at her own boldness. “I’ve seen them. I’ve fought them.”

  “Aah,” the man said, waving a hand disbelievingly.

  “What happened to it?” asked a woman.

  “It just came flopping down on us,” the unshaven man said. “Landed flat on Harn, there.” One of the men sat on the side of the road, looking dazed. He was covered with black blood, and some of his own. “He’s out of his wits. Been that way since it happened. We had to move it off him. It was greasy. It … fell apart when we touched it.” Tildi realized that the thraik seemed to have been split in two pieces. Her heart almost stopped in her body. What could possibly have done that to a thraik?

  “It had to have been killed before it fell out of the air then,” another traveler said reasonably. “But how?”

  “How indeed?” echoed Tildi’s confidant. He turned to her. “What a monster! I never thought to see one, alive or dead. You always hear of them flying around, but I’ve always been lucky enough not to be near when they do. Are you going far, smallfolk?”

  “To Overhill.”

  The man looked pleased.

  “Why, I’m going up the Arown toward Rabantae. I can go as far as the confluence of the rivers. I’d be glad if you’d like to ride with me. I want to hear more about these beasts from one who’s seen them up close. My cart’s this way. Will you come?”

  Tildi nodded.

  The freckled man waited until she had jumped down and retrieved her pack. They left the gathering crowd staring at the dead thraik. Tildi kept looking back in its direction until the road had wound, concealing the scene from sight. It could not rise up from the ground and come after her, not cut in two pieces like that. What beast or power could possibly destroy a foe that took
almost everyone in the village to stave off?

  Benrum Pattersley, for that was her host’s name, was driving a load of chickens in wicker cages from a nearby farmstead to a city in Rabantae. The cart had little room for anyone but himself. Even the seat held six cages roped together. He made a little space for her behind him.

  “You can talk to me, then take a rest, if you want one. And if you would like an egg or two, no trouble. Just see to it that my chickens come to no harm, eh? Sometimes boys like to poke sticks at them from the roadside, or try and pull their feathers. I don’t hold with that kind of mistreatment. Now, tell me all about these thraiks … .”

  Benrum was a good listener, who seemed to know just how and when to ask a question, and the trip went swiftly. She was grateful that he asked nothing about her personal life, prefering the sensational tales she had heard about the black-winged monsters. He liked to talk himself, and Tildi found him to be an engaging companion.

  The big-boned mare hauled its squawking burden slowly up a long slope of the busy road until they came to a fork, where the road divided at sharp angles to the northeast and northwest.

  “Down that road is Overhill,” Benrum said, nodding toward the righthand road. He gave her a hand down with her pack. “It’s been a pleasure, Teldo Summerbee. I wish you well.”

  Tildi stretched up her small hand to clasp the poultry man’s big, rough fingers. “The same to you, Benrum Pattersley. Good trading.”

  The freckled man tipped her a casual salute and flicked the reins. The draft horse shuffled into a lazy walk. Tildi brushed off chicken feathers and went in search of her new master.

  Chapter Nine

  The town was built on both sides of a branch of the river, here a wide, placid blue stream upon which boats of every size plied their way up and down. The river valley lifted at its edges like a pair of huge hands cupping the town, out of which the river spilled northeast to southwest. At piers in the center of the metropolis, cargo was being unloaded from three-masted boats with their sails furled tight. Tradesmen hoisted bundles into wheelbarrows and wagons. Outward from the busy port area she counted roofs and treetops and the rainbow of many gardens, some square and some in irregular shapes. She hoped her duties would allow her to explore the city. She had never seen so many colors of leaf, nor of roof tile. Roses as big as her head lolled over garden gates. She could have made a bathtub out of the dock leaves that clustered at the base of the enormous trees.