The Wizard's Daughters: Twin Magic: Book 1

by Michael Dalton

  “And there could not be another who might match you?”

  “No. It does not work that way. When there is a match, there is a match, and that is the end of it.”

  Erich stood there, stunned. He knew that among the Moors, pagans, barbarians, taking more than one wife was not unheard of, but in civilized society . . .

  “Are you sure there is a mage who would do this?” Part of Erich wondered if this was a stupid question. One of them alone for wife would make a prize for most men; surely two would seem a bounty.

  “The match is the match.” She forced a smile. “Now you must tell me something equally grave. What is your dishonor?”

  Erich sighed and looked past her into the sky. “You must not repeat this. Not even to Astrid, let alone your father.”

  “I promise.”

  “I crippled my oldest brother in a duel.”

  Her hand went over her mouth. “How?”

  Erich walked away from her and leaned against the wall around the garden, putting his hand on his forehead. Ariel followed.

  “You must understand I make no complaints about my upbringing. My family is wealthy. We had servants. I had no cares. Being a third son for most of my life was a relief. I had no real responsibilities. My eldest brother was the heir to the title, and my other brother would inherit things as well. That meant they needed to be trained in politics, law, court functions. All my father cared about my learning was the sword.”

  ♦ ♦

  Duke Gerhard of Jülich-Berg spent much of his tenure as the head of the house squabbling and occasionally fighting with other petty nobles in the empire over rights to one patch of territory or another. He won some battles and lost others, and consequently wanted all three of his sons—Wilhelm, Adolf, and Erich—trained for war.

  As the heir, however, Wilhelm was too important to risk in battle. Dying without an heir could have shifted the entire dukedom to another branch of the family, or possibly an entirely different family, and was thus to be avoided at all costs. Such events were an all-too-frequent cause of disputes in the empire.

  With three sons, Gerhard felt it prudent to keep one in reserve, and thus it fell to Erich to be trained to lead the house troops, not because Gerhard felt him more capable or important, but simply that being a third son, he was expendable.

  Not that Erich cared. Like most young boys, he found warfare exciting. He enjoyed swordplay immensely, far more so than his brothers. He also soon found that he was better at it than they were, even though they were older and larger.

  Gerhard retained a respected swordmaster to teach his sons the arts of war, and Erich soon became his favorite—which meant he drove Erich twice as hard as his brothers and expected four times as much. This, not surprisingly, made Erich’s brothers very jealous.

  In the early years of his childhood, they would regularly beat him bloody, using their greater size to overcome his skill. Lothar, the swordmaster, allowed them do it, because he knew it served as motivation. So—in a fury at his impotence—Erich would work even harder.

  While his brothers studied with their other tutors, Lothar and Erich would spar until Erich’s hands bled. Lothar would tie lead weights to his wrists and make him swing bags of sand through the air to strengthen his arms until it felt like they would fall off. He would alternate tying one arm or the other behind Erich’s back until it no longer mattered which one he used.

  Lothar made Erich fight with weapons he hated, with two blades of equal length or different, with swords that were too large and heavy for him, or poorly balanced, or otherwise unsuitable, all in the pursuit of teaching him to fight with his head instead of his blade. He taught Erich to do far more than swing a sword—he taught him how to win a fight by throwing blades, large and small, by tripping his opponent, by spitting, or throwing punches in the midst of duel or grabbing his opponent’s clothes. Lothar would do grossly unfair things like make Erich fight with a dagger while he used a longsword, or fight with his legs hobbled, or fight tethered to a post while Lothar danced freely around him.

  In time, the long and ruthless training paid dividends.

  One day, when Erich was fourteen, his brothers’ size was no longer enough, even when they fought him together. Erich thrashed them both, chasing them about the salon until they cried for mercy. They would make him pay for beating them in other ways, and Lothar promptly thrashed him in turn when they left so that the victory would not go to his head. But his brothers never again defeated him with the sword.

  From that day forward, Lothar held nothing back when sparring with Erich. For months afterward, Erich went to his bed every night gritting his teeth against the pain of his bruises. His progress, paradoxically, seemed to enrage Lothar, who shouted at him over and over that he would die in moments should he ever need to defend himself in a real fight.

  Lothar taught him the most dangerous moves, the means to cripple his opponents, to blind them, to kill with a single cut. And he did it by slapping his blunted blade across Erich’s legs, his throat, his face.

  Erich could have succumbed to this abuse. But instead he redoubled his efforts, determined to win his master’s approval.

  The moment came years later, long after his brothers had refused to continue sparring with him. He and Lothar were dueling with blunted rapiers and off-hand daggers. For weeks leading up to this, Erich had begun feeling he was at last approaching his master’s skill, though Lothar continued to defeat him in the end.

  They fought for long minutes. Lothar threw one attack, then another at Erich, but he had seen all of these so many times and turned them aside easily. For once, Lothar could not penetrate his defenses. Back and forth they went, the sweat beginning to pour down. Erich could hear Lothar’s breath coming more heavily. He thrust, he charged. Lothar turned him aside. Then Lothar came at him—but too slowly, wearied. Erich put his foot out and tripped him, and as Lothar went down, Erich felt a surge of triumph. He thrust his rapier forward and Lothar spun, trying to regain his balance. He fell. Erich pinned him.

  His master dropped his weapons, gasping, trying to catch his breath. All of a sudden, Erich saw him for who he was: an old, gray-haired man trying to keep up with a boy a quarter his age.

  Lothar met his gaze. “I think we are done here. I have nothing left to teach you.”

  ♦ ♦

  But as much as that victory meant to him, it meant nothing to his family. By the time Erich was eighteen, the reality of his situation had become clear. His brothers mattered, he did not, and they made sure he knew this. Erich would essentially be his eldest brother’s hireling when Wilhelm inherited the title. It was for his glory Erich would fight, not his own, and Wilhelm took great pleasure in reminding him of this fact constantly.

  The matter came to a head one night at dinner when Gerhard was gone.

  Both of them had been drinking, though Wilhelm much more than Erich. Erich had been talking about riding with the house troops, how the village girls had watched them in their fine uniforms.

  “You will ride for me one day,” Wilhelm interrupted. “You will do my bidding. Those sluts will give you no mind when I ride past.”

  Erich fumed. “As if you will ever bother to leave this castle and lift a finger to defend our lands.”

  “Dog!” Wilhelm shouted. “You are a worm. An errand boy. You will do what I say when I hold the title. You will lick my boots when I tell you to.”

  “I will bow to no one,” Erich muttered.

  “What was that?” Wilhelm shot back.

  Erich sat back. “I said I will bow to no one. Least of all a coward who sends me out to defend his lands because he cannot wield a sword to do it himself!”

  Wilhelm erupted out of his chair, sending it flying backwards.

  “You will defer to me! You will take that back and abase yourself or I will have your head mounted over the gate!”

  “As if you could take it yourself! You have not defeated me since I had hair between my legs!”

  Wilhelm
lunged for one of the guards and tore the man’s sword from his scabbard. Then he came straight at Erich. Erich drew his rapier, deflecting the first blow, but the magnitude of what was unfolding at that moment exploded in his mind.

  Until that night, Erich and Wilhelm had fought each other only with blunted weapons under Lothar’s tutelage. Now Wilhelm was coming after him with a real sword. Erich had only his rapier and no armor. If Wilhelm landed a single blow, he could easily have killed him.

  Erich parried his drunken brother’s thrusts, but no one was stepping forward to stop this duel. When the point of Wilhelm’s sword laid a thin cut across Erich’s arm, he panicked.

  He did not want to kill his brother, but he had to stop this. He drove forward, slashing at Wilhelm’s legs. One cut across Wilhelm’s thigh threw his brother off balance and left him exposed. Erich stabbed forward the way Lothar had taught him, cutting through Wilhelm’s hamstring. His brother howled in pain but somehow kept to his feet. He slashed his sword at Erich’s head, stumbling forward.

  In a blind rage, Erich did not see that he had won the fight. He lunged again, and with a lighting-quick stab and slash, cut apart Wilhelm’s other leg. His brother fell to the floor, grabbing at his thighs as the blood flowed out.

  At the last possible moment, Erich stopped himself just as he was about to thrust his rapier through Wilhelm’s throat.

  Everyone in the room was staring at them in horror. All at once, it dawned on Erich what he had just done. This was not a battlefield. It was their dining hall, and the man bleeding on the floor before him was his brother.

  “Kill him!” Wilhelm howled. “In the name of God, I order you to kill him!”

  Erich flew from the hall, running for his quarters and barring the door behind him, knowing what disasters awaited when his father returned.

  ♦ ♦

  Ariel’s pale face, if it were possible, had grown even paler.

  “My father’s rage when he saw what I had done,” Erich said, “was unfathomable. He did not care what had caused the fight, only the result. I had, after all, threatened the line of succession by wounding Wilhelm so gravely. He disowned me that night and drove me from the house with barely more than the clothes on my back.”

  “And you have never returned?”

  “I dare not, even though my father is seven years in his grave. My brother, who is the Duke now, would have me killed. He has twice sent hired swords after me.”

  “What you said to Father, about the dangers of your returning to Köln, it is related to this?”

  “Our lands are close to those of Köln, and my family counts the city as an ally. There may be some there who will recognize me, and who might let my brother know of my presence. I must be very careful when we arrive in the city.”

  Ariel nodded. “I will keep your secret. I do not think we should share any more of them, for now.”

  She went to check on the hens briefly, gathering a few eggs, and went into the house.

  11.

  Erich’s warning to Hans, Stefan, and their friends appeared to have the effect he intended, and they no longer troubled Walther’s house or his daughters. One of the blacksmith’s apprentices arrived on the third day to tell Erich his throwing knives were finished, and he followed the boy back to the smith’s shop to collect them.

  The knives were thin, unadorned strips of steel as he had requested. The smith had done a fine job. One by one, he tossed them across the shop into a post. All flew true but one. He tried that one a second time, and again it missed the target. After collecting it and examining it closely, he handed it back to the smith.

  “The balance on this one is a bit off.”

  The smith looked it over for a few moments, tossing it in his hand, and frowned. “I can fix it. Give me an hour or so.”

  Erich took the other knives over to the leatherworker’s shop. He found that the man had already begun the scabbards he had requested, and only needed the knives for a final fitting. That took no more than the hour the smith had requested. The leatherworker had made six scabbards for him: one for each forearm, a double scabbard for the back of his swordbelt, and another double for the upper back of his corselet, which was not quite finished but that the man assured him would be done in another day or so. The last two knives were for his new boots, which he then went to check on. The cobbler promised them the next morning and was true to his word.

  By midweek, Erich was finally back to where he preferred to be when it came to armaments. If his brother sent another band of killers after him when they got to Köln, he would at least be able to defend himself properly.

  ♦ ♦

  On the fifth morning after being hired by Walther, Erich was sitting on his doorstep sharpening the throwing knives. The knives were well forged, but it appeared the smith had left the sharpening to his apprentices, and Erich was particular enough about these things to want to finish the job himself.

  He had honed six of the eight knives into near invisibility when he noticed Hans Bergdahl lingering in the shadows of the house across the street, watching him. Hans started when he saw Erich meet his gaze, then froze.

  Erich waved him over. After a few moments, Hans stepped forward.

  “What do you want, boy?”

  “Sir, I do not mean to intrude . . .”

  “Yet you are doing so after I warned you and your friends not to.”

  Hans was a thin, reedy youth with a high voice, but he did not strike Erich as a bad sort. Flow aside, he might have made a decent husband for one of the girls. Probably Astrid, who would have been able to manage him. He was not sure what Hans would have done with Ariel.

  “I cannot help it. I love them so much.”

  “Yet you cannot tell them apart, by your own admission.”

  “I would take either of them.”

  Erich shook his head.

  “Boy, let me ask you something. Would you rather have a pretty wife or an ugly one?”

  “Sir, a pretty one, most certainly.”

  “Of course. But would you rather have an ugly wife who loved you or a pretty one who did not?”

  “I . . . I . . . I would rather have a pretty wife who loved me.”

  “Yes, wouldn’t we all? Let’s try something else. Suppose you had a pot of gold and it were sitting in the middle of the street. How you would defend it?”

  “With my sword. I am well trained.”

  Erich doubted that very much, but went on. “In your sleep? What would you do then?”

  “I would take the pot of gold and shut it up in my house.”

  “What if the pot of gold wanted to go out? What if it wanted to throw parties and be gay?”

  “I—I do not understand.”

  “What if every man in the town envied you that pot of gold, and schemed to take it away from you? Would you rather it was smaller, or perhaps filled with silver, or copper?”

  A light dawned in Hans’ eyes.

  “Perhaps silver.”

  “From what I have seen, Ariel and Astrid are the prettiest girls in this town. Would you agree?”

  “Yes, sir, most certainly.”

  “Do you think you have more to offer them than any other man here?”

  “I . . .” His face fell. “No.”

  “A pretty wife is like that pot of gold. The prettier she is, the larger the pot. The larger the pot, the more you have to defend. Beautiful women know they are valued. If you want to keep them, you need to be able to protect them, defend them, make them feel valued and special, more valued and special than they would be with any other man. That is not an easy task.”

  “No. I see that.”

  “Women are different from men. It is not that they do not care if their husbands are handsome, but they need a great deal more than that. I would advise you to either lower your eye to a more reasonable match, or raise your worth.”

  “Do you think I could one day be worthy of Ariel or Astrid?”

  Erich rolled his eyes.

  �
�A girl as pretty as they are? Perhaps. But these two are meant for other things. No amount of money or love will change that.”

  Hans looked down sadly.

  “I will take your advice. Thank you, sir.”

  12.

  Walther had disappeared into his workshop for the last five days to work on Fortitude, stopping only to doze briefly in the corner of the room or to consume something one or the other of his daughters brought in and insisted he eat before he expired.

  They had all been through this routine many times before, and Ariel and Astrid had learned to check on him periodically, otherwise he would work until he fainted from exhaustion or lack of food. More than once after their mother (who had long since resigned herself to her husband’s obsessions and learned to accommodate them) passed away, they had come into the workshop to find him out cold on the floor. Since then, they knew not to leave him alone for more than half a day or so. Assuming he had eaten recently, when they found him asleep, they would place a blanket over him and leave him alone.

  He had begun the project by completely disassembling Temperance, making his already cluttered workshop an absolute riot of brass. The parts he did not need or did not care to repair immediately went into a heap on the back workbench, a heap that rapidly spilled onto the floor. The parts he thought he could use went into another pile, while those he knew he needed were carefully (by his standards, at least) arranged on the center table.

  Fortitude was a vastly different design from Temperance, which he had built to assist him around the house. This one was built to defend it. Temperance had been encased in a thin shell of brass; Fortitude was armored in steel. That was the main reason the automaton had taken so long to finish. Walther could work brass, but he needed the smith to create many of Fortitude’s key components. Not just its exterior but also its internal frame. Not all of the parts came back the way he wanted, and the smith had to redo them. (Walther paid him well, so he did not complain.)

  The most difficult tasks had been complete for a while, but the project had taken so long and required so much effort that Walther had found it difficult to return to it and finish, at least until Temperance had self-destructed and Erich had shown up. Most of what remained was the internal wiring and controls, and finishing that really only required a few days of uninterrupted, albeit round-the-clock, work.