The Mages' Winter of Death: The Healers of Glastamear: Volume Two

by Charles Williamson

  When he entered the tunnel to the mayor’s house, he locked that gate as well. His detect life spell revealed that someone was waiting just beyond the first turn in the tunnel. He made himself visible and walked slowly forward until he saw the dim light of the shaded candle.

  “Mayor Bookman is that you?” he asked quietly.

  “Thank Father God, you’re safe Michael. Please call me Tad; it’s what all my close friends call me. After doing this rescue together, I will consider you my friend for life. Come, let’s get this poor girl to someplace warm.”

  Lady Marsha and her three healer associates were gathered around the children in a room, which had large coal burning fireplaces on opposite walls. The girls were being healed in body, but it would take time for their minds. Each girl would be healed with amnesia release, a spell designed to remove the trauma of recent events by causing the loss of memory of the past few weeks. Unfortunately, they had been taken to the temple six weeks ago, and only the past two would be lost to them.

  He reached out to Diana in Southport and told her of his murderous feeling when facing Xian. He had desired to cast dwarfish strength and strangle the man with his bare hands.

  “My love, you did the right thing. To overcome that hate and loathing proves you were a worthy student of Master William. Few men, even healers, could have resisted murder in those circumstances. I would have found it difficult not to cut his throat as well.”

  “But now, we still face a powerful fire mage with the support of many knight protectors and the mandate for Snowport from the Holy Son in Min Hollow. This evil is still here and still has the power of his knight protectors to support him.”

  “Michael, my love, you can’t solve every problem at once. There will be another time and place to deal with this pervert. I love you my dear.”

  Michael needed to return to Black Sand Beach to join up with the ship headed north. He said goodbye and went to Lady Marsha’s apothecary shop. He retrieved his belongings, packed his fine gray greatcoat and other clothing in the leather pack, transformed into a giant Ki, and flew south toward Black Sand Beach.

  Chapter 17

  As Michael flew over Black Sand Beach in his form of a giant eagle, he saw that the Silver Trident was already anchored inside the reef in which the naiads made their homes. Since the dangerous reef was the location of frequent shipwrecks, the naiads must have towed the cargo ship into the still waters of the bay. The ship was the same one he’d purchased to take cargo to Dragon Crag, the islands where the Southport healers had been exiled.

  Diana had been smart to send this specific ship. It was crewed by three healers, Jake, David, and Marin who already knew of Michael’s elf-like powers. Since they had already seen even more extraordinary things, the fact he could still the largest wave and keep the whole ship as warm as a summer’s day would not seem too surprising for them.

  He landed on the cliff near the dwarfish travel room, in which through dwarfish magic from ancient times, Michael was able to travel to other rooms in different parts of Glastamear. He transformed, dressed, and followed the tunnel that led from the travel room to the underground accommodations that he’d created for hiding healers until they could move on to Rock Point on Mitchell Island, the western most location in the whole kingdom. Rock Point was the safe location in which the Healers’ Guild was rebuilding.

  When he entered the common room, Jim and the Oxbow brothers greeted him. Lady Agnes hugged him and said it was a noble thing for them to return to heal in the inland cities where so many of their friends had died.

  “Michael, forgiveness and generosity of spirit usually benefit the forgiver more than the forgiven. It is a noble thing you’re doing for the same citizens who watched so many healers murdered in the town squares. You have let go of your hate, and I hope the rest of us can as well.”

  “Thank you. I think of William’s training when my temper gets the better of me. I’ve seen things that are difficult to set aside. How soon can we sail, my lady?”

  “Our personal things are already onboard. The tide will be favorable for crossing the reef within the hour. Let’s go. We will have many days to catch up on news as we sail north.”

  Diana had sent along a healer from Southport to lead their horses from Black Sand Beach, where there was no safe place for horses to stable, to the town of Marigold Meadows. The plan was for Michael and his friends to retrieve their warhorses and Michael’s favorite, Black Dash, before they returned to Southport Province.

  At high tide when both Father Moon and Cousin Moon were in the sky, the naiads towed the cargo ship through the treacherous reef. The supply ship set sail and headed north. Michael enchanted a gold ring with the powerful fire mage’s spell of warm blanket. It raised the temperature of the whole ship to comfortably warm from icy cold. Next he enchanted a golden amulet with a spell the naiads taught him, still waters. The man-high waves that had been violently rocking the cargo ship stilled. It was calm seas for about two hundred paces in all directions. The waves seemed to break over an invisible wall in a circle around the Silver Trident.

  Jake of Conch Cove who was piloting the ship remarked, “Michael, I don’t know what you’ve done, but this is like a nice summer cruise down to the Walker Islands rather than a death defying trip to someplace near Snowport. When Lady Barbara asked us to sail to Sand Point in the middle of winter, we all thought she had been inhaling smoke from crazyweed. We wanted to refuse until she said you’d get onboard at Black Sand Beach.”

  “Jake my friend, I’ll be getting off when we deliver the cargo at Sand Point. You’ll need these enchanted objects to get home to Dragon Crag, but they would be very suspicious anywhere else. I have prepared this gold covered wooden box. If you put the ring and amulet in this box, it will block their magic and hide their power. Use them only when you’re far from any Glastamear harbor.”

  David who was standing nearby said, “What if a Great Northern Blast comes at us after you leave. No sailor has ever survived one of those ferocious northern storms that originate in the lands of floating ice and the lands that never know summer.”

  “I have survived one as well as nine sailors on three line fishing ships from Snowport. With these magic objects, you too will even survive such as violent storm.”

  Marin said, “Please, tell us that story.”

  Michael told the story of the desperate journey to Snow Troll Fiord through a Great Northern Blast. He told of the difficulty of getting the Snowport healers to Rock Point and safety. Before the tale was finished, it suddenly grew cold again.

  Michael explained, “We are near Northport. There is an enchanted object in the city that prevents all fire magic. As we sail farther north, we will sail past its effect.”

  The travel to Sand Point was slowed because the seasonal winds required frequent tacking, and they would only use the sail designed for those conditions rather than the much larger gas bag sail used when winds blew from the stern. On shore they could only see the vast expanse of the Great Northern Forest covered in its winter coat of deep snowdrifts. Ice had formed along the shore for about forty paces out to sea, and floating ice mountains caused them to occasionally change directions. The floating ice mountains were more common and a greater danger in summer, and these examples were too large to be missed even in darkness. Michael had allowed enough time, and they reached the ice shelf near Sand Point one day ahead of Michael’s scheduled date.

  There was a thick shelf of ice off the coast about two hands thick. Michael used the skiff to cross over to the ice together with Jim and the Oxbow brothers. He began to melt an opening in the ice slightly larger than the Silver Trident’s width and about twice as long. He was making a place for the ship to dock on the ice shelf. About an hour after he began, Michael motioned for the ship to pull into the opening in the ice shelf to unload. The crew and Michael were busy transferring the cargo onto the ice for the rest of the day. The same spell that kept the ship warm also prevented the ice from reforming within a few hands
of the hull. Once everything was unloaded and pushed about half way to land, the Silver Trident sailed away leaving Michael, Lady Agnes, Jim Neville, the Oxbow Brothers, and the other three healers on the ice with their supplies.

  They walked carefully across the snow-covered pack ice toward the Inn of Restful Repose of the Kindly Merchant, which was visible about a thousand paces to the north. Michael could see that over a score of sleighs were already parked around the inn. As they approached across the ice, the inn’s owner, Sid, came to greet them. He hugged Michael and was introduced to Lady Agnes and her companions. Michael explained that the goods had been offloaded on the ice and the sleigh drivers needed to go out and load them, except for one sleigh, which would take Lady Agnes and the three others into Snowport.

  When they were ready to depart for Snowport, the aristocratic Lady Agnes of Ice Castle and formerly the manager of Northport Hospital commented, “Damn Michael, I grew up in Northport and thought that city was cold in winter, but I’ve never felt anything like this bone numbing cold. If you spit, it will freeze before it hits the ground.”

  Michael took out a small pouch and gave it to her. “My Lady that did occur to me. These four ruby rings have been enchanted with the fire mage spell of warm blanket. You and the other ladies merely need to put them on your fingers to get warm. Unfortunately, they will not work when you get to the city because fire magic is gone from Snowport, but if you travel to the villages of the White Plains, they’ll be useful. My friend Tobias Howardson, will have arranged for warm accommodations for you and your associates until you rent or purchase a house.”

  “Thank Father God for you Michael. You should keep in contact with me using that mage thought-talk of yours.” She hugged him and got into the sleigh with her three friends.

  While the goods were being loaded, Michael, his five friends, and Sid went into the comfort of the inn. The whole floor of the common room was covered with the fur-lined sleeping bags of the sleigh drivers who had spent the night inside.

  “As I promised, I will always have a room for you Michael. Let me get you some warm cider, and we can talk about your trip.”

  They found a seat by the fireplace, and Sid’s wife brought them hot cider, bread still warm from the over, and fish chowder enriched with elk milk.

  Sid handed Michael a pouch of coins and said, “I only had to spend about half of your money. I hired twenty-five sleighs for your goods and five sleeping sleighs. We have ten extra drivers. The plan is to take turns sleeping and not stop except for meals and to let the elk graze. The mayor of Snowport will have his sleighs here by morning. He is also sending along ten archers as guards, but I can’t imagine there will be brigands active in this weather. This has been the coldest winter in my memory We’ve laid in enough extra food to give everyone a hearty breakfast in the morning, and everyone expects to depart for Briarton soon after.”

  “How many days do the drivers think it will take to reach Briarton?” Michael asked.

  “The snow conditions are perfect for snow-elk travel. The lead driver thinks that you’ll arrive in Briarton on the fifth day if you keep moving all night and spend only two hours a day for the elk to feed and rest. These sleighs are faster than any horse drawn wagon. They’re about as fast as a man on horseback.”

  “Sid, you’ve done an outstanding job in organizing this relief effort. You’ll have saved many lives in Briarton. My friend, your debt to me is forgiven.”

  “Thank you Michael. Let me show you and your friends to your room; I need to help my wife prepare for the evening meal.”

  Michael shared the room with Jim and the Oxbow brothers. The room was spacious and already had a fire burning in the fireplace. Michael and his friends rested until dinnertime. When they entered the common room that evening, the boisterous crowd noticed Michael enter and cheered. Michael went from man to man introducing himself. He had a perfect memory for names because of the training of his mentor William, and he asked each man about his hometown and family. Almost all the men lived in small towns and farms in the White Plains or the area directly around Snowport. They all seemed please at the winter trip and the chance to earn some extra money.

  Michael sat with the lead driver, who was a gray-haired senior named Alfred. Since there were far too many people for the number of chairs and benches in the inn, they sat next to each other on the floor eating snow bison stew. Alfred explained the route they expect to travel and talked about the snow-elk that he clearly loved. The animals had huge hoofs that served them like human snowshoes, and they could sprint at impressive speeds to escape from great wolves, snow leopards, and other predators of the far north. Alfred explained that the roughness of the ride would depend on the snow conditions, but Alfred expected it to be exceptionally smooth since there had been little wind to form snowdrifts.

  They chatted through dinner, and Michael made an effort to say goodnight to everyone, remembering every name using the spell perfect recall, which he had learned from William in the first months of his apprenticeship. He found two men in the early stages of the white pneumonia and cured them secretly.

  Chapter 18

  In the morning, the ten sleighs from Snowport arrived with the master healer Lady Marsha of Snowport who was relocating to Briarton. She had been leading the healers of Snowport. Michael greeted Lady Marsha and her three friends, who Michael had first met at Snow Troll Fiord that past autumn. He also introduced himself to each of the Snowport drivers. The drivers all treated Lady Marsha with great deference even though she was pretending to be an ordinary apothecary. Michael suspected that all of them knew she was the most senior healer in Snowport for many years before the pogrom. They realized that she and her friends had returned at great personal risk to help them through what was now always referred to as the winter of death.

  Michael decided to ride in the first sleigh with Alfred. The trailbreaker sleigh was pulled by four snow-elk, instead of the normal two. It had extremely wide runners to create a show path for the other sleighs to follow, and of course, the most experienced man in the group was driving it. Michael kept a cast of detect life and detect all manna as a precaution, but he did not expect any interference from rogue knight protectors this far north. In the Snowport area, they had all been recalled to the temple compound.

  The first two hours of travel thrilled Michael. He was excited by the speed and thought this was the best possible method of travel, except perhaps to glide through the sky as a giant eagle. It was in the third hour that he detected the life signs of eighteen creatures running parallel to the caravan, but invisible to normal sight because of a ridgeline. Michael had brought his armor, but he was wearing his black traveling clothing with his fur-lined overcoat. He removed his heavy mittens, strung his longbow, and notched an arrow. The wolves were still not visible, but Michael could tell they had turned to intercept the caravan. Snow-elk were their natural prey, and an elk in harness would be almost helpless.

  Michael was a good shot but not a great shot; he had trained under his friend Jim for three years. He was not in the league with archer soldiers or even more avid hunters, but he was much better than either a normal merchant or healer. As he stood in preparation, Jim in the sleigh directly behind the lead one noticed Michael’s actions and also notched an arrow.

  When the lead great wolf came over the ridge, two arrows were loosed, both striking it in its heart from slightly different angles. It dropped instantly. The other pack members, seeing their leader fall, retreated.

  Alfred looked at Michael quizzically. “Michael Son-of-William, are you really merely a successful young merchant? You were ready to loose your arrow at the exact spot from which that great wolf appeared before it was even visible, and you and your friend both put your first arrows directly into its heart. What magic is this?”

  “I heard a high-pitched yelp. I was lucky with my shot. My friend Jim is really a much better archer than I am.” Michael knew from his healing training that as men grew older their hearing for high-pit
ched sound declined, and he had designed his lie to consider that fact.

  Alfred was not convinced, but he said nothing else. The pack continued to run parallel to the caravan for another hour, but great wolves don’t have the stamina of an elk, and they gave up and moved away. Later that day, Michael noted the life signs of fifteen enormous creatures. He waited to see if they were the almost mythical creatures known in legend as snow mammoths, but they never came close enough for Michael to know for certain. He reached out with his mage thought-talk and found them to be gentle creatures with few natural enemies. Since he was anxious to see them, Michael mentally encouraged the snow mammoth’s leader to head in their direction. Soon, the herd was standing on a ridge about five hundred paces away.

  “By Father God, those are the first snow mammoths seen by anyone in this province in over forty years. I thought they were gone completely,” Alfred said.

  He slowed the sleigh and watched them wander by. Michael had read that men of the Kingdom of Green Jungle rode such huge creatures to war, but Michael could not fathom how they even got onto the giant creatures’ backs or stayed mounted when the huge beast charged. Like the war monkeys in ancient stories, Michael had always assumed that tale must have been made to impress children.

  Firebreath, the red dragon, had claimed that the three kingdoms of the east would invade Min Hollow and perhaps all of Glastamear in the spring. The kingdoms were the Kingdom of the Yellow Plains, the Kingdom of the Black Forests, and the Kingdom of the Green Jungle. If the men of the Green Jungle really used mammoths in warfare, Michael could not understand how any common soldier could stand against them. Ancient tales also attributed fantastic powers to the lancers of the Yellow Plains and the horse archers of the Black Forest, but Michael thought that surely the armored mammoths of the Green Jungle must be myth. Michael had to reconsider his knowledge of past wars. It might have been that only fire magic had made the defense of the great city of Min Hollow possible.