Valdemar 09 - [Mage Winds 01] - Winds of Fate

by Mercedes Lackey

  There had to be another reason for letting her go on this “quest.” Especially since there were overtones in the Council meetings she attended of “the Brat is getting her way.” It would have been obvious to anyone with half a mind and one ear that now that the initial excitement was over, they regretted giving her their permission to leave, even to as safe a destination as Bolthaven, deep in the heart of her uncle’s peaceful kingdom.

  Even the Heralds on the Council gave her the unmistakable feeling that they were not happy about this little excursion, and they’d gladly use any excuse to take their permission back.

  But they didn’t. Gwena had said repeatedly that they wouldn’t. There was something going on that they weren’t talking about. And it didn’t take a genius to figure out that, whatever it was, the Companions, en masse, were hock-deep in it.

  And did it have something to do with her growing resistance to this compulsion to forget magic, to avoid even thinking about it?

  Once her suspicions were aroused, Elspeth had decided that, before she ran off into unknown territory, she was going to do a little research on the Herald-Mages. Not just to find out their strengths and weaknesses, nor to discover just what the limits and gradations of the “Mage-Gift” were, but to see just how extensive the apparent prohibition against magic was; how deeply rooted, and how long it had been going on.

  And what she had learned was quite, quite fascinating. It dated from Vanyel’s time, all right—but not exactly. To be precise, it dated from the time that Bard Stefen, then an old and solitary man, vanished without a trace.

  In the Forest of Sorrows.

  At least, that was Elspeth’s guess. He was supposed to be in the company of some other young, unspecified Herald, on a kind of pilgrimage to the place where Vanyel died. He never arrived at his destination, yet no one reported his death. Granted, he had not yet achieved the kind of legendary status he had in Elspeth’s time, but still, he was a prominent Bard, the author of hundreds of songs, epic rhymed tales and ballads, and the hero of a few of them himself. He was Vanyel’s lifebonded lover, the last one to see him alive, and Vanyel did have the status of legend. Someone would have said something if he had died—at the very least, there should have been an impressive Bardic funeral.

  No mention, no funeral. He simply dropped out of sight.

  Nor was that all; even if he had vanished, someone should have noticed that he disappeared; surely searches should have been made for him. But no one did notice, nor did anyone look for him.

  He simply vanished without a trace, and no one paid any notice. And that—possibly even that precise moment—was when it became impossible to talk about magic, except in the historical sense. That was when the Chronicles stopped mentioning it; when songs stopped being written about it.

  When encounters with it outside the borders of Valdemar—or, occasionally, just inside those borders—were forgotten within weeks.

  Fortunately those encounters were usually benign, as when ambassadors from Valdemar would see the mages in the Court of Rethwellan performing feats to amuse, or ambassadors from outside of Valdemar would mention magic, and some of the things their kingdoms’ mages could do. The Chronicler of the time would dutifully note it down—then promptly forget about it. So would the members of the Council—and the Heralds.

  Did they attribute all of that to boasting and travelers’ tales? Now I wonder if, when other people read the Chronicles over, do their eyes just skip across the relevant words as if they weren’t even there?

  It wouldn’t surprise her. Elspeth herself had noticed whole pages seeming to blur in front of her eyes, so that she had to make a concerted effort to read every word. She had initially ascribed the effect to fatigue and the labor of reading the archaic script and faded inks, but now she wasn’t so sure. It had gotten easier, the more she had read, but she wondered what would happen if she stopped reading for a while, then came back to it.

  She had even found a report from Selenay’s grandfather, back when he was plain old “Herald Roald,” and the Heir, about his encounter with Kero’s grandmother Kethry and her partner.

  Tarma shena Tale‘sedrin, a Shin’a‘in Kal’enedral, sworn to the service of her Goddess, was plainly some kind of a priest. In fact, much to Roald’s surprise, she had achieved a physical manifestation of her Goddess right before his eyes. Never having seen a Goddess, he was rather impressed.

  So would I be!

  He’d described the manifestation; the impossibly lovely young Shin‘a’in woman, clothed as one of her own Swordswom—but with strange eyes with neither pupil nor white; just the impression of an endless field of stars.

  Brrr. I would probably have passed out.

  He and Tarma had become quite firm friends after that; Roald’s Companion approved of both the priest and her Goddess, which Roald had found vastly amusing. But if Tarma was a powerful priest, Kethry was just as clearly a talented and powerful mage. Roald had quite a bit to say about her; it was evident that he was quite smitten with her, and if it hadn’t been for the fact that she was obviously just as smitten with the Rethwellan archivist they had rescued, he hinted that he might well have considered a try in that direction.

  A superb tactician, however, he knew a hopeless situation when he saw one and wisely did not pursue his interest any further.

  It was Roald’s account of Kethry’s magical abilities that interested Elspeth. It was in this account that she got a clearer idea of the differences between Journeyman class and Master, of Master and Adept. That alone was useful, since it proved to her that what Valdemar needed was indeed an Adept, more than one, if at all possible. Certainly a teacher. There was no reason why the Mage-Gift should have vanished from the population of Valdemar, when it was clearly present elsewhere.

  Roald did not have a great deal to say about Kethry’s magical sword, “Need,” other than the fact that it was magical, with unspecified powers, and would only help women. So at that point in time, the song “Threes” had not migrated up to Valdemar, or Roald would have made certain to mention it.

  Interesting about songs....

  As evidence of just how strong that magic-prohibition had been, Elspeth had come across another fascinating bit of information in the Bardic Chronicles, which were also stored here. The song “Kerowyn’s Ride” had preceded the arrival of the real Kerowyn by several years-ascribed to “anonymous.” Which it wasn’t; several times visiting Bards had attempted to set the Valdemaran record straight. Each time the attribution was duly noted, then the very next time the song was listed in a Court performance, it was ascribed to “anonymous.”

  It was the habit of Master Bards, particularly the teachers, to write short dissertations on the meaning and derivation of popular songs to be used as teaching materials. Out of curiosity, Elspeth had made a point of looking up the file on “Kerowyn’s Ride.”

  At that point, it would have strained the credulity of even a dunce to believe that there was nothing working to suppress the knowledge of magic—for even after the arrival of the real Kerowyn, Master Bards were writing essays that claimed it was an allegorical piece wherein the Goddess-as-Crone passed her power to the Goddess-as-Maiden at Spring Solstice. She found several other papers stating that it described an actual event that had taken place hundreds of years ago, as evidenced by this or that style.

  That was quite enough to get Elspeth digging into more of the Bardic Chronicles, and that was when she discovered corroborating evidence for her theory that something was suppressing the very idea of magic.

  Despite the fact that there had been a concerted effort to get the songs about Herald-Mages and magical conflicts back into the common repertory, despite the fact that this was Bardic Collegium’s top priority—and despite the fact that perfectly awful, maudlin songs like the unkillable “My Lady’s Eyes” stayed popular—the “magic” songs could not be kept in repertory. Audiences grew bored, or wandered away; Bards forgot the lyrics, or found themselves singing lyrics to another song entire
ly. When given a list of possible songs for various occasions, a Seneschal or Master of the Revels would inexplicably choose any song but the ones describing magic.

  Only those songs that did not specifically mention magic, or those where the powers described could as easily be ascribed to a traditional Gift, stayed in popular repertory. Songs like the “Sun and Shadow” ballads, or the “Windrider” cycle, songs that were hundreds of years older than the Vanyel songs and written in archaic language, were well known—was it because not once was there a reference to a specific spell, only vague terms like “power” and “curses?”

  Furthermore, Elspeth herself had heard the “problem” songs being sung, not once, but fairly often, and with a great deal of acclaim and success. So it wasn’t that there was anything wrong with the songs themselves. It had to be because of their content. And was it possible that the reason the songs had been successful was that they were sung in the presence of many Heralds? For that seemed to be the common factor. It was when they had been sung with no Heralds present at all that the worst failures occurred.

  She had learned several other things from the Chronicles of Vanyel’s time—things which had no direct bearing on her present mission, but which explained a great deal.

  For instance: there had been something called “The Web,” which demanded the energy and attention of four Herald-Mages. Those four apparently had been somehow tied to one-quarter of Valdemar each, and were alerted to anything threatening the Kingdom by the reaction of the spell. The problem was, by the end of Queen Elspeth the Second’s reign, there were not enough Herald-Mages to cover the four quarters ... not and deal with enemies, too.

  That was when Vanyel altered the spell, tying all Heralds into this “Web,” so that when danger threatened, everyone would know. Before that, it was only chance that a ForeSeer would bend his will to a particular time and place to see that something would be a problem. After, it was guaranteed; ForeSeers would see the danger, and would know exactly what Gifts or actions were required to counter it. Heralds with those Gifts would find themselves in the saddle and heading for the spot whether or not they had been summoned. The Chronicles were not clear about how he had done this, only that it definitely worked, and there was a great deal of relief knowing that the Kingdom no longer depended on having four powerful Herald-Mages to act as guardians.

  Vanyel had done something else at that time, though whether or not it was part of the alterations to this ‘Web“ or not, the Chronicles were unclear. He had summoned—something. Or rather, he had summoned things. Having called them, he did something to them or with them, somehow gave them the job of watching for mages and alerting Herald-Mages to their presence in Valdemar.

  What happened when there weren’t any more Herald-Mages? she wondered. Did they just keep watching, or what? Have they been trying to alert Heralds, or not?

  At least this accounted for something Kero had said, about why Quenten and the rest of the Skybolts’ mages couldn’t stay inside Valdemar. “He said it felt like there was someone watching him all the time,” she’d told Elspeth. “Like there was someone just behind his shoulder, staring at him. Waking or sleeping. Said it just about drove him crazy.”

  That certainly made a good enough reason for Elspeth; she didn’t think she would want to stick around anywhere that she felt eyes on her all the time.

  Unless, of course, she was a truly powerful mage, one able to shield herself against just about anything. One that knew she was so much the superior of other mages that she felt totally confident in her ability to hide from the enemy.

  Like Hulda, maybe? We still don’t know everything she can do. We’ve been assuming she was just Ancar’s teacher and attributing all his success to Ancar himself.... But what if it’s really Hulda, letting him think he’s in control, while she is really the power and the mind behind his actions ?

  Again, that would explain a great deal, particularly Ancar’s obsession with eliminating Talia, Selenay, and Elspeth.

  It could be he simply hated suffering defeat at the hands of women.

  But it also could be Hulda, egging him on. If he felt somehow shamed at being defeated by females, she could be playing on that shame, making him obsessive about it. After all, she had very little to lose. If Ancar was goaded into defeating Valdemar, she won. And if he lost, or was killed during the conflict—she would be there to inherit his kingdom and pick up the pieces. And Hulda would never repeat his mistakes....

  It all made hideous sense, a good explanation of otherwise inexplicable behavior. And Elspeth didn’t like the explanation one bit. Ancar as an enemy was bad enough. But the idea of an enemy like Hulda who had been plotting for decades-It was enough to send a chill down the toughest of spines. It was more than enough to give Elspeth nightmares for three nights running.

  Elspeth closed the book she’d been reading, fighting down a queasy sensation in her stomach.

  She had just finished reading the passages in the Chronicles about Tylendel, Vanyel’s first lover; his repudiation and his suicide. It didn’t make for easy reading ; it had been written, not by the Chronicler of the time, but by a non-Herald, a Healer, who had been a friend of Tylendel’s mentor. Evidently the Heralds had all been affected so strongly by this incident that they were unable to write about it.

  But that was not why she was fighting uneasy feelings. lyiendel—at seventeen—had evidently been able to construct something called a “Gate” or a “Gate Spell,” which enabled him to literally span distances it would take a Companion days or even weeks to cross.

  Her blood ran cold at the idea, and even though the author had hinted that the mage who used this spell had to know precisely where he was going, that fact was no comfort. Hulda had been to Valdemar—and it would not be very difficult to insert other agents into Valdemar simply to learn appropriate destinations.

  What if Ancar were to control this spell? What if he were able to get it past the protections? There would be no stopping him; he would be able to place agents anywhere he chose.

  In fact—Hulda had been in the Palace. For years. There was probably very little she didn’t know about the Palace.

  She could place an agent in the Queen’s very bedroom, if she chose, and all the guards in the world would make no difference.

  That might even be how that assassin got onto the Palace grounds. She shuddered. I think I’m going to have nightmares again....

  This had not been an easy day for reading. Elspeth was just as disturbed by the Chronicle she had completed before this one, the one describing Vanyel’s last battle.

  The Herald-Mage had commanded tremendous power; so tremendous that the author had made an offhand comment to the effect that he could have leveled Haven if he so chose. Granted, Haven was a smaller city then than it was now, but—the power to level a city?

  It simply didn’t seem possible, destruction on that kind of scale seemed absurd on the face of it. Yet for the writer, such power seemed to be taken for granted.

  At first reading, she had been skeptical of such claims; Chroniclers had been known to indulge in hyperbole before this. She had assumed that the descriptions were the embroideries of a “frustrated Bard,” a Chronicler’s version of poetic license. But on the second reading she had discovered the signature at the end, modestly tucked away in small, neat handwriting that matched the rest of the Chronicle, but not anything else in the book.

  Bard Stefen, for Herald-Chronicler Kyndri.

  Now there was no reason for Stefen to have invented outrageous powers for his lifebonded. There was every reason for him to have been absolutely factual in his account. He was not a would-be Bard, like many of the Chroniclers; he was a Bard, with all the opportunity to play with words that he wanted, outside of the Chronicles. And everything else in those Chronicles had been simple, direct, without exaggeration.

  So it followed that Herald Vanyel had that power, that ability. The ability to level a city.

  And if Vanyel had commanded that kind of power
, there was no reason to suppose that Ancar could not ally himself to a mage with that same power, sooner or later. There probably weren’t many with that kind of ability, but if there was one with the same kind of lust for conquest that drove Ancar, the King of Hardorn would eventually find him.

  Elspeth sat for a moment with her head in her hands, overwhelmed by a feeling of helplessness. How could Valdemar possibly stand against the power of a mage like that?

  By finding another like him, she finally decided. If there is one, there have to be more. And surely not all of them will find Ancar’s offers attractive. And that’s exactly what I’m going to have to do.

  She shook back her hair, and pushed her chair away from the book-laden table. She was a little surprised by the bulk of her scattered notes; she’d been so engrossed she hadn’t noticed just how much she’d been writing down.

  All right, she decided. I’ve learned all I can from books. Now it’s time to get out there and see how much of it applies to current reality.

  She collected her notes into a neat stack, and shoved them into a notebook. Then she rose, stretched, and picked up the books, restoring them to their proper places on the shelves. Finally, though, she had to admit to herself that she wasn’t being considerate of the librarians, she was putting off the moment of departure.

  She squared her shoulders, lifted her head, and walked out of the archives with a firm step—showing a confidence she did not feel.

  Not that it really mattered. This was her plan, and she was, by the gods, going to see it through. And the first step on that road was to go find Skif and tell him it was time to leave; that she had everything she needed.

  If nothing else, she told herself wryly, Skif will be ready. Even if I’m not sure I am.

  Skif was ready; he had wisely refrained from repeating just how ready he was, but he was so visibly impatient that she decided to get on the road immediately, instead of waiting for morning. She headed back to her room at a trot, to throw her personal things into packs, while he had the Companions saddled and loaded with saddlebags. It was, after all, only a little after noon. They could conceivably make quite a bit of progress before they had to stop for the night.