“Why did you do that?” he repeated.
“So I could free my hands to pull my wand out,” she deliberately misunderstood his question, then raced up the stairs ahead of him.
He was aggravated all over again, though he had not yet calmed down from the adrenaline rush he had experienced leading up to the sword fight with Cale. He caught up with Grace as she stood in front of the stairwell door aiming her wand at the target above the doorframe.
Grange dropped the load of wood he carried, and he grabbed her wrists with his hands. He raised the captive hands above Grace’s head and pressed her back against the stairwell wall, trapping her in place. He was on the tread that was one step below her, putting their faces on the same level, and he leaned in close to her to talk, while the pieces of firewood clattered loudly on their way down to the landing below.
Her cheeks were flushed and her pupils were dilated. They were both in the middle of emotional arousal, and Grange suddenly felt conflicting urges trying to direct his next action.
“What are you going to do now?” she asked in a low voice, one that sounded sultry in its mocking condescension.
“What are you going to do?” a different voice asked.
Grange’s head turned to see Brieed standing in the open doorway, looking at the two of them.
“Come in and have some breakfast. I’ll send the servants to pick up the firewood you dropped,” he said conversationally, then turned and departed from their view.
“Well, let me go, so we can have breakfast,” Grace told him.
“Why did you slap me?” Grange asked one more time.
“Because I wanted to. Because you could have been hurt doing that,” she answered.
“Do you need help?” a voice asked, and Grange saw a pair of servants standing on the doorway, studying him and Grace.
The girl twisted her hands forcefully, removing them from Grange’s loosened grasp, then she stepped up another step above him.
“Come along, Grangey dear,” she told him mockingly, then she flew up past the two servants and through the doorway, out of sight.
She was infuriating. That’s all Grange’s mind would say. The girl is infuriating.
“Can you send her away, to the other side of the world, maybe?” he asked the jewels.
“No, my lord,” one of the servants answered innocently as he passed by.
Frustrated, Grange trod down the stairs, picked up several of the logs he had dropped, then helped carry them up, despite the protests of the servants that it wasn’t appropriate. They delivered the fuel to a workroom with a hearth, and then Grange received thanks and directions on where breakfast was being served.
He walked down the hall, turned down a narrow side hall he hadn’t notice before, and discovered the aroma of breakfast foods wafting through the air. At the end of the hall was an open door, the source of the enticing smells, as well as the source of voices speaking.
“…he not only knocks the sword out of Cale’s hand, but then he gives the sap a second chance, and does it again!” Grace was excitedly telling someone.
“He was extraordinary,” she continued, “but he could have got us killed, or embarrassed the whole wizard group if he’d lost. I was so angry I slapped the snow-white cheek of his,” she said, just as Grange entered the room.
Grace was sitting with another girl at a table close to the door, and she instantly stopped talking to look at Grange warily as he arrived.
There were perhaps a dozen people eating in the room, with a trio of servants tending to their needs. Eli and Brieed were at a table with another man, and the others in the room were faces unfamiliar to Grange, sitting in twos and threes as they ate their meals. The servants were carrying plates that were covered in food, more food than Grange had ever seen at breakfast, except for the hearty meals that had been served to the apple harvesters during their pilgrimage across the countryside from orchard to orchard.
“Come in young prodigy,” Brieed waved Grange in, though Grange saw a sour expression on Eli’s face as his master invited the newcomer.
Grange stared at Grace, who worked with great effort to not look back at him, then he walked by her, giving her a subtle push as he passed her table on his way to join the wizard.
“Are you ready to begin your lessons today?” the wizard asked as Grange arrived at the small round table.
“I guess so,” Grange replied, having no other answer to give.
“I know you have a great many things you wish to do – such as finding your musical group, visiting your old housemates, and arranging for practice time at the armory – but we’ll have to give you at least this morning’s hours to start to expose you to the practice of being a wizard,” Brieed told him, as the third man excused himself from the group.
A servant came by and placed a large mug of fruit juice on the table, while another servant brought one of the loaded plates of food.
Grange took a bite of the smoked fish, then responded.
“I may wait to go to the armory at a later date,” he offered, certain that he’d receive a cold welcome among the guardsmen there after his run-in with Cale.
“Nonsense! You must go; I promised you that you would, and I’ll live up to the promise,” Brieed waved a hand in the air to dismiss Grange’s protest. “I’m sure that once we have you immersed in your lessons here, and start to learn the secrets of our order, you’ll make up your own mind to cease all these other activities and focus exclusively on your rare opportunity to learn to master the use of the greater energy in the world.”
“If he doesn’t apply himself diligently, he’ll never learn,” Eli spoke up, trying to sound sage with his advice. “I’d recommend that he give up all these other ambitions to find out if he even has the potential to become one of us.”
The comment from the self-satisfied apprentice was all that needed to be said to settle any debate in Grange’s mind.
“I’ll see what I can learn in all areas, and then cut back on some if I have to,” he said, without revealing that he considered the wizardry lessons to be the first thing he would want to cut back on.
He focused his attention on eating the plentiful food in front of him, as the others at his table conversed between themselves, and when he finished, all three of them stood up.
“Come along Grange, let us begin your morning lessons,” the wizard said. “I’ll instruct you myself this first day.”
Grange followed the wizard back out to the main hallway, and they then returned to the room where Grace had started Grange’s work in the morning. The Flame of Focus continued to glow brightly in the air just above the dish where Grace had ignited it.
“Rather well done for one who is so young,” Brieed commented as they walked over to the flame. They took seats on stools next to the table, the tiny Brieed climbing up to his perch with long-practiced ease.
“So tell me, what do you see here?” he asked Grange.
“It’s some kind of flame that doesn’t burn anything,” Grange answered immediately.
“You’re wrong on two accounts: it does burn something, but it’s not a flame,” Brieed corrected him.
“This is the energy of the world. This is a concentration of the great force that the gods collect and use to carry out their will. The force is everywhere, a part of every item, every person, every action that takes place around us. And it is something that everything generates as well – the good deeds that you do, the music you play – these also generate, in a very small way, new elements of the energy,” Brieed explained.
“We light this flame every morning to provide the emblem of the energy all around us, and to give us all the inspiration to see the reality of that energy. It is our goal to harness and control the energy to carry out the wizardly duties we have,” Brieed explained.
“As an apprentice, you need to learn to look at this light, to see how it is drawing in energy from the world around it; the flame is the small concentration of the energy in this room. As you
become better schooled in your lessons, you will come to see the evidence of the power that makes this flame burn.
“Can you see it now? Can you see the power flowing into the Flame of Focus?” the wizard asked. “Look closely.”
Grange was fascinated by the idea of loosely floating power at loose throughout the world, available to be used. He stared at the flame, determined to see the power entering the small glow. His eyes narrowed as he looked, gazing with a deep desire to suddenly see the energy. There were small movements that he suddenly saw, but they were simply motes of dust floating through a narrow sunbeam.
“I don’t see it,” he admitted after two long minutes of silently staring.
“I didn’t expect you to, unless those marvelous allies of yours can do more for you than I suspect,” Brieed said. “I’m going to leave you here for an hour so that I can run off and do a few duties, while you can study the flame and get used to the idea.” He hopped down from his stool. “Just focus – relax and focus,” he repeated to the boy, then he left the room.
“Can you help me with this? Is the wizard telling me the truth?” Grange asked the jewels as soon as the elder man was gone.
This is your test, the jewels said together. We cannot help you.
“Does this work the way he says it does? Is there energy floating all around us?” Grange asked.
It is an approximation of the truth. As best he is able to understand, yes that is the reality of your world, they replied.
“My world? It’s your world too, isn’t it?” Grange was disturbed by the comment.
There was no answer from the jewels.
Grange muttered a mild oath, then stared at the flame once again. It was bright, too bright to truly stare at, but he looked at it nonetheless.
The flame was motionless, simply a bright circle, a tiny sun in the room. Yet despite its appearance of permanence, Grange was certain that he saw motion within it, some whirling of light inside the small globe. He slid off his stool and slowly circled around the outside of the table, staring at the flame, and at the empty air in the vicinity of the flame, trying to detect the motions of the power.
It is our power too, one of the jewels said in a most direct manner. Consider us as you look for the energy.
“Thank you,” Grange replied. He appreciated the hint, sure that it unlocked some secret.
He continued to circle as he tried to find some connection between the jewels and the flame. He had to have the answer immediately available, he was sure, and he wanted to grasp it, to find the ability to see the flows of power.
“Did you make any progress?” Brieed re-entered the room, causing Grange to jump in surprise.
“No, not so far,” he said. “I’ll keep working on it though.”
“You’ll have to do that tomorrow,” Brieed said. “You’ve had two hours here already, and there are others who want to observe the Flame of Focus. Come along Grange,” the wizard instructed.
“Two hours?” Grange asked in shock. The angle of the sunbeams had shifted, he realized. Even his bladder was telling him that time had passed; he suddenly felt his body acknowledge the truth of the wizard’s claim.
“You’re free to go visit your friends,” Brieed told Grange. “Here, give them this subsidy to cover the cost of their apartment,” he said as he dropped a small leather bag in Grange’s hand, “as we discussed.”
“How will I return? I don’t know if the guards will let me in, and I can’t open the doors at the stairs,” Grange explained.
“Pertinent questions – come with me,” Brieed said, and he led the way down the hall to his own work room, where he and Grange had spoken before.
“Here,” the old man rummaged through a drawer in a desk, then pulled out a small square of parchment, one that had a gold seal imprinted upon it. “This will get you past any guards in the palace,” he handed the card to Grange.
“Then, wait just a moment,” he stepped over to a different table, and opened a long, wide, shallow drawer, one that had rows of wooden and metal sticks lined up. He pulled one such stick out, and Grange realized it was a wand, similar to the tools he had seen Brieed and Grace use.
Brieed held the wand in both hands then raised it above his head as he quietly chanted a short formula. The wand glowed momentarily, then returned to its previous state – a dark wooden wand with grainy streaks that circled around it.
“This will open the door one time. Use it only for that,” the wizard handed the tool to Grange, who held it uncertainly.
“How will I make it work?” Grange asked.
“Just point it at the target when you’re ready, then command it to release its power,” Brieed said nonchalantly.
Grange took the wand, and held it in his hands for a moment. He felt the texture of the wood grain, and he tried to feel the energy, to find heat or vibrancy, or some indication of the power that was stored within. There was nothing; it was simply a piece of wood, as far as he could tell.
He tucked it into the band of his pants. “Thank you,” he said. “I’ll be back.”
“If you want to go find your musician friends, you may do that as well. I’ll not expect you back here until tonight,” Brieed said. “But tomorrow, we’ll start your training in earnest, so go enjoy yourself.”
Grange grinned in pleasure. He was going to have something like freedom, the ability for several precious hours to make his own decisions and control his own movements. It was something he hadn’t truly had since he’d been apprehended in Fortune; in the months since then, he’d been under the control of the guards at the canal site, or under the disciplined eye of Ariana.
He turned and left the office, went back to his room, and picked up his sword and flute. Feeling armed and ready, he headed down the hall towards the stairs.
“I need a hand with this. Come here,” he heard Grace’s voice call out.
“I can’t – I have to run an errand for the wizard,” he replied back over his shoulder, and he hurriedly pressed the stairway door open as he heard an indistinguishable sputtering behind him. He ran down the stairs and out the door of the building, then stopped and took a deep breath. He was free – the air even tasted and smelled and felt better!
“Which way to the closest gate out of the palace grounds?” he asked a servant who was carrying a load of linens along the walkway.
“Straight through that way to the red brick smokehouse, then go left,” the man said.
Grange trotted in the direction suggested, eager to avoid any possible recall. He found the smokehouse – both by sight and aroma – then turned left, and saw that the pathway ahead widened out into a fully paved road beyond the next set of buildings, a promising sight.
He trotted in the direction of the exit, came to the intersection with the road, and proceeded on for a quarter of a mile, where he had to stop.
He had to stop. The point was an intersection. The gate was visible just a hundred yards away, but a pair of roads inside the palace grounds came together at that point. And on one roadway, one that was smoothly paved with closely fitted granite stones, the most smooth and durable road that Grange had ever seen, a grand procession of armed and gorgeously uniformed guards were leading a carriage that followed a solitary rider on a grand white horse.
The front of the procession was just starting to pass Grange, on its way out of the palace grounds, and several servants and others along the road were standing respectfully still, their heads bowed.
“Bow your head – it’s the king,” one of them hissed to Grange.
A pair of the horsemen were giving him a hard, unfriendly stare, he realized, and he belatedly put his head down, observing the passing shadows and listening to the crisp sounds of the shod horses’ hooves clattering across the paving stones. The wheels of the carriage rattled closer, and he heard a perfunctory cheer rise from those around him as the king’s white stallion rode by, a cheer that he joined in.
“There can’t really be a war; I don’t know why he is tak
ing this so seriously,” one bystander said to another as the sovereign passed and the trailing cavalry riders rode at the end of the procession. The lead riders were already exiting through the open gates, riding into the city neighborhood beyond the palace wall.
The sounds of the traveling royals faded away, and Grange resumed his journey, passing through the gates, and into the city. He stopped at a corner shop to ask for directions, then headed across the city towards his former apartment’s location.
A half hour later he was on the walk in front of his apartment, in front of the lady with the sewing store, who greeted him with a smile. “We haven’t seen you and your lady friend in three days! Welcome back, young sir,” the woman told him. “There was talk that you’d be moving out.”
Grange thanked her with a wan smile as he walked by. He was going to miss the friendliness of the neighborhood, which he was exchanging for the reserved confinement of the palace. He climbed the stairs, opened his apartment door, and found Deana alone in the apartment.
Grange! Grange,” she said, then flew across the room to squeeze him with a hug.
“We didn’t know what happened to you after that strange concert at the mansion,” she told him. “We heard the story about the drugged drinks and the robbers, and you going to the hospital. But you don’t look injured at all.”
He released his hold on her, astonished at the realization that he had miraculously healed overnight. “I guess it was the wizard,” he said, though his memory grasped for another explanation, something that he thought was sitting just outside of his consciousness.
“Where’s Ariana? Will she be here soon?” Deana asked.
It was the question that he knew he was going to have to answer.
“She left me,” he said hesitantly.
“What? That’s not possible! She was so devoted to you – she had changed from who she was back in the village, become strange – but she absolutely doted on you, always wondering how you were doing and where you were,” Deana said insistently.
“She said we had gone as far as we could together,” Grange replied. “I miss her,” he added softly.
The Elemental Jewels (Book 1) Page 26
