From a High Tower

by Mercedes Lackey

  “Elfrida is awake now, deary,” came a voice from below. “If you think anyone with magic could sleep through this, you are very much mistaken.”

  Now Elfrida came up the stairs, wrapped up in a woolen shawl even more voluminous than Rosa’s, hair entirely covered by a frilly nightcap of monumental proportions. “Move over and give me some bed room, girls, my old bones cannot take this cold.”

  Giselle did more than that, she got up and stoked the stove, then came back to bed, glad that her bed was a very old one that could probably have held an entire family.

  “We need to keep the others—the ones that are not the Indians, the Captain, or Herr Kellermann—from getting the notion that this is anything other than a normal storm for this part of the world, and panicking,” said Rosa, once Elfrida was under the eiderdown with both of them. The sylphs were paying very close attention to what the three of them were saying; glancing up from time to time, Giselle saw their eyes shining down solemnly in the light from the lamp.

  “Bless you, that will be the matter of two spells at most,” the “kitchen-witch” said with conviction. “One on the oven, and the other on the salt. I’ll bless the salt to drive out evil influences, so even if the bastards out there manage to get something past our defenses, anything cooked with holy salt will keep a body safe, and the Good God knows you can’t bake bread without salt. And the other spell, the one I intend to put on the oven, will handle anything that’s baked in it; that’s all the bread, of course, and we all eat bread three times a day or more, plus all the sweets. Your friends do like their pies. I have never seen pies vanish so fast.”

  “Yes, but what does this other spell do?” Rosa said, a little impatiently.

  “Keep them . . . well . . . tranquil. It’ll make them a bit slow, and it isn’t something I’d set under any circumstances but this, but better that the chores be done slowly, and that they maybe fall asleep over them, than that they panic.” Elfrida nodded as Rosa’s eyes widened. “They won’t notice anything that they aren’t expecting to see, either. I use it when I need to do something, and I don’t want those who I am keeping house for to get a notion I’m unnatural.”

  “That must be very handy,” Rosa said, envy in her voice.

  “It’s also dangerous. Other people outside the family will notice if the family is acting oddly, especially the man of the house, and next thing you know, people are looking for a witch in the kitchen,” Elfrida replied with a frown. “I wouldn’t use it now if I weren’t sure no one’s going to escape it. If you’re worried about the beasts taking fright, we can feed them a bit of bread once a day—”

  “No, I can handle the beasts. They trust me,” Rosa said, and sighed. “All right. I expect that the Captain and the Indians are—”

  “—are violatin’ your privacy an’ comin’ up. Kellermann’s with us,” called Captain Cody from below. “Iff’n yer afraid t’be seen—”

  “Oh don’t be an idiot, get up here!” Rosa snapped, and soon enough, the sound of boots on the stairs heralded two of the three. Fox’s footsteps could scarcely be heard, of course, because he was wearing his usual soft moccasins. They were all in pants pulled hastily over their nightshirts, and wrapped in blankets, including Fox. It seemed that when it came to sleeping in Bavarian cold, he had decided to do as the white men did, and bundle into a warm, thick, red flannel nightshirt. They all pulled chairs up to the side of the bed and huddled in them.

  Rosa and Giselle took it in turns to tell them what they knew, and Elfrida added how she intended to keep the rest of the company from taking fright. When they finished, Cody and Fox exchanged a look and a wry smile. “See, now, Fox, I tol’ ye the ladies woulda figgered out a short plan afore we got up here,” Cody said. “Here’s th’ thing, though. Fox an’ me, we’ve seen a good bit’a fightin, an’ we figger this storm ain’t but the beginnin’. It’s got a evil feel to’t. That kinda matches up with you tellin’ me there’s some Fire Magic mixed up with it, on’y turned t’cold. I ain’t never seen that, but I heerd ’bout it, from a feller in England what recognized me as a mage.” He shook his head. “That feller allowed as how he ain’t never heerd of a Cold Elemental critter that weren’t all bad, clear through. You go makin’ a deal with one’a them, an’ it freezes all the heart right outa ye.”

  “That . . . doesn’t sound good,” ventured Giselle.

  “Yep. An’ it gets worse. ’Cause I kin tell whoever’s out there, if he ain’t a Master, he’s damn close.” He picked at the edge of his blanket. “Still, Rosie, yer right. We cain’t go makin’ no plans without knowin’ who’s behind all this, how strong they are, an’ maybe, iff’n we’re lucky, what their plans are. An’ the good news is I bet they might go guardin’ ’gainst Fire, Air or Water scryin’, but they ain’t gonna ’gainst Earth.”

  “The Earth doesn’t like them,” Rosa muttered, after a long moment; her face was screwed up in concentration. “There is someone in this group that the Earth is powerfully revolted by.”

  “That there’ll work in our favor.” Cody leaned forward earnestly. “Rosie, I gotta say somethin’, cause this ain’t the first magical fight I been in. I know y’all reckon I’m a flibbertigibbet, an’ maybe sometimes I am, but look here, the strongest thing we got workin’ fer us right now is thet we trust each other. We gotta make sure whoever’s out there cain’t work on thet an’ break it. Savvy?”

  Rosa nodded, slowly. “Absolutely. I think . . .” She looked around at all of them. “I think we need to make a blood binding among us. Kellermann too,” she added, and the impresario looked startled. “It won’t take a minute. All I need is a pocketknife, a cup, and a hot coal.”

  “Pocketknife’s here,” Cody said, fishing in a pocket of his trousers and bringing one out, handing it to her.

  “There’s cups downstairs in the kitchen,” said Giselle. “I’ll get a coal.”

  She already had a little brazier she used for incense that required a hot coal to burn up here in her room; the sylphs loved all sorts of incense, and she had brought it in from her vardo. She fished a coal small enough to fit in it from the stove with the tongs and dropped it in, carrying it over to the group. Rosa had directed them to sit on the floor in a circle.

  “Put the coal there,” she said, pointing to the middle. As Giselle did so, and took her place in the space left vacant for her, Rosa stabbed her thumb with the smallest blade of the pocketknife and squeezed out a few drops of blood into the cup Kellermann had brought up. “Now all of you do the same, going clockwise around the circle.”

  They did. When the cup came back to Rosa, she took it carefully in both hands and looked at them all earnestly.

  “Are we all resolved to be of one mind in this undertaking?” she asked them solemnly.

  They all nodded.

  “And are we all resolved that we shall let no difference of opinion, no perceived insult, and no grievance break our bond?”

  “Yes,” Giselle said firmly, prompting the others to answer likewise.

  “Then in the name of the Powers of Light, in the names of the Great Ones of our Elements, and in the name of the Greatest One over all, let our good will and good hearts bind us together and let no evil tear us asunder!” Rosa intoned, holding her right hand over the cup. And when she took it away . . . the blood in the bottom was glowing as hot as the coal in the brazier.

  “So let it be!” she said, prompting all of them to echo her exact words.

  Then she poured the glowing blood over the coal.

  Rosa had expected it to smell dreadful, like her hair burning. Or at least, to smell like cooked meat. But instead, the little puff of smoke when the blood hit the coal smelled . . . like incense.

  “If you are expecting something dramatic,” Rosa said into the long silence that followed, “I am afraid that is as dramatic as it gets.”

  Elfrida giggled, an unexpectedly girlish sound that made them all
laugh, if a little nervously.

  “It is well,” said Fox. “I think we must try to sleep. There is little that can be done until morning, and we must be ready to assist Rosa in her scrying the moment that the storm drops. At that moment, our enemies will be exhausted, and we will have our best chance to work without notice.”

  “I think we should stand watches,” said Cody. “Thet way, the second th’ storm drops, th’ one standin’ watch kin wake ’tothers.”

  “I need to go to the kitchen and put the spell on the oven now, before we start the morning bread,” said Elfrida. “And I will be awake at six in the morning to do the baking.”

  Cody pulled out his watch. “Pshaw. It’s on’y two. I’ll stand the watch till four, wake up Kellermann, an’ he can stand till six, wake up Fox, an’ he can stand till eight, an’ wake me again. An when Kellermann goes t’bed he kin make sure Miz Elfrida’s awake.”

  “How long do you think they can keep this storm going?” Fox asked Rosa.

  Rosa shrugged. “Not longer than twelve hours, I think,” she said.

  “All right then. Back t’our beds,” said Cody. “In twelve hours, for sure, we’ll have more to go on.”

  Rosa and Giselle exchanged a wordless look. “If you three men don’t mind sleeping on the floor beneath us, the three of us can sleep up here,” Rosa said, and Giselle nodded.

  “There should be blankets and cushions enough to make whoever isn’t using the bed itself comfortable,” Giselle added. “They’re stowed in the linen chests. I’m sure you can find them.”

  “Well, I wasn’t gonna ask, but I’m thinkin’ that there’s a right good idea,” said Cody, as Fox and Kellermann nodded. “We’ll do that.”

  “And tomorrow . . . as soon as the storm dies . . . we will find out what, exactly, we are up against, I hope.” Rosa replied, getting up and getting into bed.

  “Who wants the middle?” Elfrida asked, as the men went back down the stairs to make themselves as comfortable as they could.

  “I would,” said Giselle. The bed could easily fit five, it wasn’t as if they were going to be crowded. She got in and let Elfrida take the outside. With three people in the bed it warmed quickly.

  But she lay on her back, staring up at the sylphs on the rafters, unable to sleep. Listening to the storm tear at the tower, and feeling the anger, and the hate, behind it.

  17

  THE storm died away to nothing just after noon. By that time, everyone—except the six conspirators—had eaten two meals with food cooked in the oven, and the effects on everyone who had gorged on fresh bread and butter, baked sweet noodles, and applesauce at breakfast and baked squash, oven-roasted sausages, and roots at lunch were . . . obvious. The howling of the blizzard and the snow piling up past the windows bothered them not at all. Several made jokes about being perfectly happy to be warm and inside until spring, or about wanting to hibernate like bears. Most of them decided that once the animals were fed, there was nothing pressing enough they needed to do and elected to take a nap. The ones that remained awake might as well have elected to take a nap, since they were all settled around the stoves, bundled in shawls or blankets, discussing tobacco, food, beer, and women. Well, attempting to discuss things, since a great deal of the conversation was conducted in sleepy monosyllables. Even the children were drowsing.

  Elfrida had cooked everything they ate in frying pans, and they were making do with what was left of yesterday’s baking. If things had not been so tense, watching the others in their little spell-haze might have been amusing, but Giselle, at least, felt as tense as a taut bowstring, and from their expressions she was sure the others felt the same. The sylphs were still terrified and there were more of them crowding up, not only in her rafters, but in the storage loft over the kitchen. From the way they were acting, it would be impossible to persuade them out.

  Five gathered in Giselle’s room at the top of the stairs, all the conspirators but Elfrida, who said she had nothing to contribute, and went to put similar spells of calm on the horses, cattle and buffalo. “And then I’ll have to make sure the other cooks don’t muddle up dinner,” she explained. “Or chop off a finger, or the like. It’ll take twice as long to make dinner, but better this than dealing with a lot of hysterics.”

  Rosa had rummaged through the cupboard of Mother’s magical items, supplies, and books, and brought up a circular black plate of what looked like glass, like the one Giselle had seen in her trunk, but much more refined. “It’s an obsidian mirror,” Rosa explained to Giselle, as they went up the stairs to join the others. “It’s just about the only way an Earth Magician can scry.” Giselle examined it with curiosity; the back was still rough rock, though flat, but the stone was highly polished on the other side, and slightly concave.

  “How are you going to find them?” Giselle asked, handing it back to her. They joined the others who were all sitting in a circle on the floor, as they had last night. Rosa placed the mirror in the middle, then took her own place in the circle. “They could be anywhere out there.”

  Rosa frowned. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “I suppose I’ll just have to search until I find them . . . I can’t think of any other way.”

  “You couldn’t get my sylphs to budge out of the rafters,” Giselle told them all. “They’re terrified. I think that Air Master out there has them near hysterics.”

  “I have a suggestion,” Fox put in. “My spirits are all birds. None of mine seemed frightened, not even at the height of the storm. I believe this Air Master does not realize that they are spirits of the air. I believe a raven is common enough that no one would notice it even if it ventures quite near. I will send out a raven to search for them. It will not take long.”

  “Oh that would be splendid!” Rosa said, her shoulders sinking a little as she sighed in relief. “If we link the raven to the mirror, we could even see and hear what it does, which would eliminate a traditional scrying spell altogether. If we can do that, a witch would not be likely to take notice.”

  “I reckon the less we do stuff they might know, the better off we are,” Cody observed. He rubbed his hands together to warm them; despite the stove, the room was cold and all of them were draped in blankets now.

  Fox closed his eyes and concentrated for a moment; there was a fluttering of wings over their heads, and a handsome, glossy raven descended from the rafters and landed next to the mirror. He seemed entirely solid and real, as did the sylphs when they wanted to fully interact with objects like ribbons. He eyed Rosa and tilted his head to the side, then looked at Fox. Fox nodded. Rosa put one hand gently on his back, cupped the other over the mirror and muttered something under her breath. When she took her hands away, the raven shook himself and uttered a thoughtful-sounding quork.

  Fox nodded again, and the raven flew up, and through the roof. Just as the sylphs sometimes did, although they preferred to come and go by the windows. After all, a spirit of the air was not exactly limited by things like walls and roofs.

  “It’s working,” said Rosa with satisfaction, and Giselle looked back down at the mirror. She felt her eyes widen, as now the concave mirror reflected a literal bird’s-eye view of the snowscape below the tower, as brilliantly as if the mirror had been of the clearest, best glass, rather than obsidian. The amount of snow that had been dumped on the abbey last night was a little . . . frightening. Six feet at least, and in places it had drifted twelve feet high. She had never seen that much snow at once here, not in the worst of the storms that the abbey had weathered.

  The raven circled the abbey, giving them all a good idea of how the snow lay about the building, then turned his attention out toward the edge of the meadow. She couldn’t see anything that far away, but evidently the raven did. He angled out to the east, wings beating strongly, heading for the forest.

  That’s not where I would have gone, she thought, frowning a little. There’s nothing out that direction but thick woo
ds. The raven evidently knew better, however, and he must have been able to see something that was not visible to their human eyes, even looking through his in the mirror.

  “He is being cautious in his approach,” said Fox, calmly. “I have warned him to act like a real bird, and be very wary, as if he expected to be hunted and shot by man.”

  It was fascinating, and more than a little dizzying, to watch the landscape go by from a bird’s point of view. He moved his head much more quickly than a human would, which was disorienting. “Fox? Can you just choose to see through his eyes?” she asked, never taking her own eyes off the mirror.

  Fox looked up at her, and shook his head a little. “Not without his consent, which would be hard to gain. He is a being, just as your sylphs are, and does not care for the idea of someone else using his senses.” Fox replied. Now that he was no longer playing up his heritage, he had adopted some heavy canvas trousers with suspenders in place of his leather leggings, wore long flannel underwear as virtually every one of the cowboys did, and one of the common wool flannel shirts over that, with a shawl and a blanket draped over everything. Only his long braided hair, his headband, and his features showed he was an Indian. “He does this because this is a time of exceptional need, and because this is nothing more than a reflection of what he sees, rather than a medicine-worker making use of his eyes directly.”

  “And I hope you let him know we are suitably grateful,” Rosa said gravely. “Wait . . . he’s going down into the forest.”

  The raven was, indeed, flying down into the forest. In a moment he was among the branches, skillfully evading them, changing directions so quickly that Giselle clutched her hands together involuntarily. If watching him fly in the open sky had been disorienting, this was very close to being nauseating. According to Mother’s books an Air Master could choose to see through the eyes of any Air Elemental that would let her, but Giselle had never asked. Seeing directly through the raven’s eyes would probably have me throwing up in short order.