by Janny Wurts
The winds slacked. Calm returned to a jumble of confused seas. Sunlight shed gold on the gale-wet coast of Illantyr, and the ruins at Alathir where Morien's lands had so long been held hostage by enemies.
XXII. Council at Dethmark
Sunlight streamed through the vaulted windows of the Archmaster's tower and traced geometries on a floor incised with sigils and patterns of ward; in this well-guarded chamber even dust motes did not stir without leave. Stillness reigned absolute, but the place was not deserted. Eighteen masters of the Council Major sat crosslegged around the walls, the hems of dusky robes tucked beneath their knees. Their faces were creased more by the demands of their craft than age or mortal frailty. Attuned to a force shared equally among themselves, they awaited in perfect patience for their Archmaster, who traveled the otherworld beyond Aerith.
"He returns," announced the tiny, wizened lady who was spokesman in the absence of the master.
The next instant a spatter of sparks erupted from the motionless air. The circles of power on the floor blazed to life, and light speared from the central configuration.
Only one of the eighteen was seasoned enough to interpret. As glare rinsed the chamber with a brilliance that could sear less experienced eyes to blindness, the eldest enchanter of Aerith leaned forward. "He has found them."
An instant later, the spell flare framed the outline of a wizard's gate. Rainbow fires lapped the edges of the void between realities. The phenomenon lasted barely a heartbeat, then flashed out and left the midnight-cloaked form of the Archmaster standing inside rings of inert wards. At his feet, dripping seawater, sprawled an enchantress and two mortals in plain linen.
"Telvallind, well done," cried the ancient. While the other wizards stirred and murmured, he rose from his place by the wall.
The Archmage blinked like a feather ruffled hawk. He did not acknowledge the praise; neither did he excuse his Council Major from their hours of ritual vigil. Instead, he regarded the bodies in sopped clothing that his emergency summons had rescued. His displeased gaze lingered longest on the woman, whose auburn hair draped in tangles over torn man's attire, and the tunic of her black-clad husband. "The others were ignorant mortals, but Ithariel should have known better."
At her name, the Lady of Whitestorm sighed, stirred, and closed her fingers on Korendir's sleeve. Awareness returned and brought an overwhelming urge to scratch her nose; something in the seawater had left an itch. Ithariel opened her eyes. The carved floors where she lay were unique in Aerith, and she knew immediately where she was. As if the association cued recall of the Archmaster's reprimand, she said, "My companions may be fools, and I not one whit better, but the Mathcek Demons are destroyed. Illantyr is freed from the Third Great Bane."
Her announcement caused no stir. Deep silence fell over the Council Major; Telvallind Archmaster considered the woman who had once been his fosterling, and although she was also his granddaughter, his eyes remained unforgiving. "Except the risks you undertook to achieve such a feat were unsanctionable against any threat. You might have brought ruin to all of Aerith!"
Worn from her earlier expenditure of spells, Ithariel was caught at a loss. She had not expected rescue from Alhaerie, far less intervention by the Archmaster and his council. Relations were strained further by the fact her wits were still scattered; her wet clothes bound unpleasantly and the itch in her nose had progressed to a sting that threatened at any moment to make her sneeze. But she did not appeal to childhood ties to mend the rift with her grandfather. Instinctively she sought reassurance through Korendir; her grip tightened on his arm. A tension in his muscles indicated he was both conscious and listening. His eyes remained closed, a habit he had when waking to potential danger. No sign would he show of awareness until he had assessed the nature of his surroundings.
That moment, the drunken fisherman who shared the circle rolled over onto his back. His jaw tipped open, his lungs discharged air, and the slackened membranes in his throat rattled through a disruptive series of snores. Telvallind spun away in distaste. He signalled dismissal to his council and resumed his tirade against Ithariel. "Just because you married outside the White Circle does not give you leave to ignore the restrictions of your rank. Where in Aerith did you think you gained the right to involve a man and an untrained villager in affairs of greater magic?"
"She did not." Korendir's voice cracked across quiet like the sheared ring of swordmetal.
The Archmaster stiffened; a vein pulsed in his forehead, blue as the graining in fine marble. The departing enchanters of his council glanced back, discomfited, as the swordsman arose with the alert coordination of a predator. His hair might be sodden like an otter's, and his clothing be deplorably unkempt, but he still wore his blade. The hand poised lightly on the grip showed not the slightest unsteadiness. "The fisherman was never coerced, but acting in behalf of his village. The right to involve him was mine, as ward of the Lady of Shan Rannok. Lands that her death ceded to my protection were under attack. Do you question my duty to defend them?"
Tall in his gold-sewn robes of office, the Archmaster returned a look like cold fire. "Mortal, you presume far too much. Any documents that prove your claim would be burned by Mhurgai with the keep."
Korendir heard this without protest, but Ithariel could sense his sudden anger. Aware as he could not be that insolence in this place offered peril, she rose and caught his wrist.
But her husband shook her off. He regarded the Archmaster with a control the equal of any mage's, then shifted slightly that his appeal might also encompass the council members who lingered near the doorway. "Then as Morien's surviving son, I claim blood-right to vengeance."
A rustle like wind in dry grass stirred the mages; not a few of them murmured behind their hands, and the eldest one nodded sagely.
Only Telvallind did not accede. He straightened trailing sleeves with a contemptuous flick of his hands and addressed Korendir over the fisherman's snores. "The way of the White Circle does not acknowledge revenge. You might be born of Morien's seed, but you lack any concept of wisdom."
"Whose fault is that?" Provoked, but not to the point where he became inured to his wife's distress, Korendir stepped one pace to the side and supported her waist. His right hand remained curled on his sword hilt, the fingers now dangerously unrelaxed. "I learned my true parentage through the machinations of demons. What laws I transgressed, what risks I undertook in ignorance after that cannot matter. I refuse to be held accountable for restraints your kind never saw fit to explain. My father's killers are destroyed and Illantyr freed from great evil. There is all the justification I require."
A cloud crossed the sun beyond the window; reduced by gloom to a figure picked out in points of gold embroidery, Telvallind Archmaster removed his ring of office. Its tallix setting flashed like a teardrop as he restored the signet to a chain which hung at his neck. "Your deeds have no bearing here, mortal. It is the transgressions of your wife that are at issue. Three times she has shown her imprudence where you are concerned. Now she must face her due reckoning."
Ithariel released a small cry. Wrung to exhaustion from her contest against demons, the last bit of color fled her face.
Korendir moved, very fast, and interposed his person between the Archmaster and his wife. "The lady is my soul-bond, our fates are the same."
"You're not White Circle," Telvallind contradicted. Death-dark as a battle raven, he advanced across the floor. His hand still cradled his signet, and where he passed the sigils flared scarlet. "You are nothing other than mortal, and your presence is no more significant than that of the sot who lies behind you."
"You slight a brave man and a friend," Korendir said tautly. "I don't take that well."
Pressed to her husband's back, Ithariel battled an instinct to cower. The ward-circles themselves reflected the Archmaster's anger and consequences could be dire if restraint gave way to temper. She whispered, "My lord, you must not interfere."
Korendir flung away in white rage. "I wi
ll!" The sight of his lady's distress burned him to killing fury, and he glared across the gathering of mages. "You are the Council Major of Aerith. If demons should be allowed to destroy Shan Rannok's countryside, and if I did wrong to banish them, then let us amend matters now. Show me sound reasons by granting the training due the blood heir of an archmaster."
Silence met his request. He shifted baleful eyes and his hand tightened, sliding his sword in a partial draw from the scabbard. "Or else strike me down, and my curse upon your spirits to spend eternity in the Mhurga's many hells. Kill me with spell-craft, or I'll kill with steel, before I allow hurt to my lady."
"Your threats are ridiculous," the Archmaster snapped. But like a flock that startles one by one into flight, some of the mages disagreed. Unobtrusively they filed from the chamber, while Ithariel subsided into trembling. The wards now burned hot as sunset over water.
"Threats?" Korendir cleared his blade fully, and returned sun flickered down to etch the point in sharp light. "You speak of the only recourse available to me."
At his back, Ithariel held her breath. The snores of the fisherman seemed a distant and incongruous sound, and the sigils in the floor spat white sparks. Into tension as precarious as cracked crystal, the eldest of the mages offered counsel.
"Son, bared steel in this place will harm no one, but only bring woe to yourself. As Morien's heir, and as a man who has proven his worth by defeating a perilous enemy, I say your case merits argument. But not through violence or ill feeling."
A charged moment passed.
Then the wards subsided and dimmed, leaving carvings silvered with old dust.
The Archmaster released his signet with a shrug. "I say this mortal deserves nothing. What is his life but an addiction to adventure and risk? After all he is brother to the initiate whose mistake released the demons to begin with. I suggest that recklessness runs in Morien's line."
Korendir appeared not to move, but Ithariel felt recoil shock through his body. His fingers loosened on his blade, and so softly that her ears alone could hear he murmured, "Brother?"
Ithariel whirled and faced the Archmaster. "You might have spared him that! What malice makes you turn this past sorrow against a man with no memory of his family?"
"Your husband has too much pride." The haughty old wizard inclined his head. "And you, as much folly for choosing him. You sealed your fate to his. Let that bond stand. You will leave Dethmark for Whitestorm, and never again practice spell-craft. The White Circle disowns you, now and for the remainder of your days."
"I'll miss nothing," Ithariel said through whitened lips. Knowing what must follow, she snatched at Korendir's sword arm. He twisted in wordless surprise as the air whirled and closed about them in a nexus of sudden power. The floor underfoot seemed to tilt over sideways. Entangled in the clasp of her beloved, Ithariel spilled off the solid earth and into a void of thick dark.
The spell circles in the chamber at Dethmark lay empty, except for a noisily recumbent fisherman who no longer owned a boat. The Archmage Telvallind sniffed at the odors of rum, stale fish, and sea salt. "You, send this man back to Illantyr," he commanded to his last remaining council member.
The ancient who had sworn first obedience to High Morien received the order with acerbity. "A bit hard on the lad, were you not?"
Telvallind jerked in affront. "That lad as you call him is the most dangerous mortal on Aerith, and not for the reasons told by sailors."
Though nowhere close to deaf, the elder cocked his ear; a spark of incongruous cheer lit his eyes as he shuffled lame shanks toward the circle. "Boy's most like his father, don't you think?"
The sunlight faded from the floor and reappeared; without apparent effort, the elder made a gesture and activated powers that would speed a beloved grandfather home to the house of his kin. As the enchanter's seamed fingers worked spell-craft, his spate of barbed commentary resumed. "After all, Morien was the last rightfully appointed archmaster. The mysteries of investiture died with him, and his rank became heritable by vote only because he died before naming a successor."
Telvallind raised brows that were peaked into tufts like an owl's "I'll thank you to recall I'm not senile."
The elder peered up at his overlord with a smile of maddening tolerance. "No. But neither is the Master of Whitestorm anything close to a fool."
* * *
Korendir and his lady landed one right after the other with a thump in a bed of ripe cabbage. Against Ithariel's expectation, neither one became impaled on the edge of his unsheathed sword. Whether by instinct or unconscious reflex, her husband kept the steel point out from his body even through the vertigo of spell-transfer. Only a slashed head of vegetable emerged the poorer from misadventure.
Korendir rolled on his elbows in the dust. He regarded the spray of severed leaves with an expression of colossal confusion. "Where in the Mhurga's hells are we?"
Ithariel surveyed the view from between two furrows of radishes. "The Archmaster's garden." she managed. "Outside the tower walls. By that we can presume my exile has officially caught up with me."
The Master of Whitestorm spat out dirt and examined his sword blade for nicks. "If pitching his adopted daughter into soil spread over with pig dung is any indication of character, I'd say he's a bitter old man." The blade gleamed reassuringly unharmed; Korendir sheathed the steel and glanced tacit inquiry at his wife.
She rested her chin on muddy knuckles. "Telvallind has reason to be difficult. Majaxin caused the death of his only daughter, after all. I resemble my father too much to allow anyone to forget."
"Then none of the enchanters should have fostered you, Korendir snapped in just anger. He rolled through a patch of late sprouts and recovered his feet, then offered his hand to his wife.
She accepted, absorbed in bitter memories; how much more irate her husband would become if he knew the truth. Telvallind had raised her as personal assurance that none of her father's vices might arise to cause grief m the future. Her every move had been watched with critical analysis, even into adulthood. But those days were behind her now. As exile, she dared not wield power, except in peril of her life. The scope of that loss had yet to sink in.
Recovered enough to notice details, Korendir demanded, "Where's the fisherman?" Pole beans and rhubarb grew undisturbed in rows under southland sunlight, and no sound of snoring intruded to silence the rasp of summer insects.
"He isn't here." Ithariel picked bits of loam from the tangled length of her hair. "Neth, we're a mess. The crusty old bird wouldn't think to send us on with a wash and a change of clothes. But don't worry, he'll look after the grandfather."
Korendir caught his wife's fingers and pulled her close. "I like you fine with sticks in your hair." Then the eyes that searched her face went very still. "Do you regret?"
Ithariel suddenly could not speak; she managed a shake of her head before tears threatened, and she turned her face into his already salt-damp shoulder.
Korendir stroked her neck. "I have a quarrel with the Archmage," he said abruptly. "His council might send the grandfather home, but what about gold for his fishing boat? I had no chance to tell the poor man that Whitestorm would cover the damage."
"Oh, never fret about that." Ithariel caught her breath through teeth clenched hard against sorrow. "The White Circle doesn't interfere often in the affairs of mortals, but when they choose, they manage the details most righteously."
"Well then," said Korendir with that terrible mildness that had won him the woman he had married, "if they're going to discriminate and make us walk, we'll start off by kicking a few cabbages."
* * *
An afternoon hike, followed by a three and a half month sail saw the lord and lady home to Whitestorm. By the time the trader ship that delivered them dropped anchor, night had fallen over the headlands. The tide lapped high on White Rock Head, and would not ebb until morning. Korendir stood on deck, the folds of his much-used cloak thrown over the shoulders of his wife. Together they leaned on dew
-damp rigging, and regarded their fortress by starlight.
Ithariel's powers might be under interdict, but the wardstone in the watchtower shone yet with all of its former radiance.
"I could have told you that would never change," Ithariel chided as she felt a long-buried tension depart on her husband's sigh.
He did not mention that he had been terrified to ask and cause her pain. Instead, he tangled warm hands in her hair and turned her slowly to face him. "What do you think if we make some magic between us, and maybe get a daughter by the spring?"
Ithariel punched him in delight. "They cheated you badly, for not telling. White Circle blood is slow to replicate. Births among our kind are very rare."
Korendir threw back his head, and his laughter blended with the rush of surf against the cliffs where he made his home. "You pose me a challenge," he teased. "Of all the contracts I have undertaken, this one will be joyful to complete."
The ship quite suddenly was too small to contain them. With shameless lack of compunction, Korendir commandeered the longboat and bundled his wife on board. Adrift on the currents beneath Whitestorm, they talked, and loved, and somewhere between passion and sleep Korendir was made to promise that a certain black cloak would be torn up and relinquished to Megga for scrub rags.
That vow he kept, even if he did ask the tailor in Heddenton to cut a replacement before winter. The seasons passed in tranquillity but for the quarrels of the dwarf couple. Ithariel never spoke of the powers reft from her in Dethmark; Korendir was considerate of her loss in his own inimitable way. He learned to read runes, taught her archery and swordplay in return, and rode out often on the High Kelair gray. Nights under stars, or wrapped in furs against the whine of winter storms, the Lord and Lady of Whitestorm lost themselves in each other's arms; but still after a span of four years they failed to conceive any child.
