He’d brought back the creatures as proof. True, they were unlike any animals found in Ravanetha. The turtle-like thing was at least as big as an ale cask. The bird sported brilliant green feathers trailing a full arm’s length from its tail. Debate had raged for weeks among the natural philosophers of the University as to whether they were genuine or elaborate hoaxes. They looked real to Gevan, but taxonomy wasn’t his specialty. “They might find an island or two. But the idea that there’s a lost paradise of wizards somewhere in the Eastern Sea is ridiculous. The Matriarch is misled by fools and charlatans who prey on her desperation. She should know better than to pin her hopes on fables of a power that no longer exists. If it ever did.”
Gevan cut off his tirade. He’d better be careful, or his rash words might draw the attention of the Purifiers. If his experiments bore fruit, he’d face their enmity eventually. But he needed to avoid them until he had firm evidence to show, instead of only unproven speculation.
“I wouldn’t know about that.” Arlen shifted his eyes warily toward the window, but the street outside was nearly deserted. The few passers-by hurried on without pausing. “I just think it would be quite something if they did bring back a wizard or two. Imagine, the Mother’s power, just like the ancients had!”
Gevan clenched his jaw and turned away. It infuriated him how the Matriarch’s obsession fueled the ignorance and stupidity of Ramunna’s people. Not much longer, he swore to himself. Soon he would show them the truth behind the myths.
Everything the ancient wizards had done had been accomplished, not by some mystical, vanished magic, but in accordance with the laws of nature. Even the most remarkable of their feats could be duplicated here and now, not by a special few with the Mother’s favor, but by anyone with understanding enough to discover the workings of the world and ingenuity enough to devise ways to manipulate them.
He was so close. Before the day was out, if the new lenses proved adequate, he would recreate the first of the wizards’ powers.
Arlen frowned. Gevan forced his features into a semblance of unconcern. “It would indeed be something. But I’m a historian. I dare say I’m as familiar with the writings of the ancient wizards as any scholar in Ramunna. And I’ve never seen credible evidence that wizards ever left Ravanetha, into the Eastern Sea or anywhere else. The stories that say they did are folk tales and legends, no more.”
“I’m sure you’re far wiser about such matters than I.” Arlen bobbed his head and finally handed over the change.
Gevan tucked the coins into his purse and gathered up the precious lenses. “I don’t like seeing people agitated by empty promises and false hope. New discoveries are being made every day at the University, and no one notices because they’re too busy chasing myths. If you’re a betting man, wager on the greatest wonders coming from our workshops, not the explorers’ ships.” He really must stop talking. Even Arlen might talk to the Purifiers if they questioned him forcefully enough. Gevan backed toward the door. “Good day.”
“Good day.” Arlen stepped behind his workbench and took up his grinding stones. The racks of finished spectacles lining the walls stared at Gevan with sharp, accusing glares as he exited.
The walk to his quarters at the University wasn’t long, but it was enough for Gevan to regain his composure. He took deep breaths of the last cool air in the thick shade of the palms lining the road. The full heat of summer was almost here; it would be many long months before Ramunna enjoyed such pleasant weather again.
Gevan passed beneath an arbor of brilliant orange coral vines and entered a long brick building. He climbed the steep, worn stairs to his suite of rooms on the third floor. Most of the University’s scholars lived in homes in the surrounding city, but a few like him preferred the convenience afforded by remaining close to their work. He passed through the little bare sitting room and into his spacious, cluttered workshop.
The workbench beneath the largest window held the pieces of his last failed attempt to construct a window-glass. Gevan picked up the two nested lengths of rolled tin he’d had a metalworker make for him. They slid smoothly together and apart, just as he’d envisioned, allowing fine adjustments to the distance between the lenses. But the last set of lenses Arlen had sold him had been worthless. No matter how he’d tweaked the length of the device, the image had remained nothing more than a tantalizing blur. It had taken him weeks to locate the error in his calculations that had caused him to specify the wrong shape for the lens.
Gevan removed the unsatisfactory lenses from the tubes and set them aside. He resisted the impulse to immediately fit the new lenses in place and try them out. If this worked, his invention would be acclaimed by historians for ages to come. Best to take the time to do it right, one step at a time, documenting everything so that nothing could later be questioned.
He slid the larger disk from its pouch and set it in upright in a cradle at one end of a long, narrow wooden box. Going around the room, he swung the heavy shutters over each of the wide windows until the room was deeply shadowed. He lit an oil lantern and adjusted the flame until it burned clear and steady. Tin shades slid over the lantern’s panes, allowing only a narrow beam of light to fall onto the lens.
Gevan flipped down the side of the box and fitted a sheet of paper flat along the bottom. A long triangle of light fell on it. He turned a screw until the vertical sliding panel at the far end was close to the triangle’s apex, then twitched it one painstaking hairsbreadth at a time until the light came to a perfect pinpoint. Humming to himself, he measured the distance and noted it down. He traced the bright wedge on the paper, measured the angles, and wrote them down also. Then he repeated the process with the smaller lens. This sort of meticulous attention to detail was tedious, but it was the kind of work he excelled at. Not nearly as difficult as copying and translating a half-deteriorated papyrus scroll from ancient Marvanna.
At last, the preliminaries were completed. The lens was indeed everything he had hoped. None of his previous attempts had produced anything close to the marvelous sharpness of the lines of light. The measurements had come out just as he’d predicted. Now all that remained was the final test.
His hands shook as he unfastened the shutters and swung them open. The wash of sunlight blinded him for a moment, and he blinked until the glare faded. The view looked over the rooftops of Ramunna, all the way down to the sea, where miniature ships bobbed beside tiny docks.
He removed the smaller lens from the holder and inserted it into the smaller tube, tightening the fasteners into place. The larger lens almost wouldn’t fit; he had to loosen the screws to their fullest before he could slide it in. But at last it was securely in place. Gevan fitted the smaller tube inside the larger and slid them to approximately the correct position.
He stopped and took a deep breath, staring at the device in his hands. The Purifiers would consider what he was about to attempt the foulest of heresy. How dare he seek to regain powers the Mother had forbidden to mankind? Even the most open-minded of the Temple Keepers might hesitate. When the ancient wizards had possessed those powers, they had used them to work terrible evil. Surely the Mother had been right to take them from the world.
All nonsense, of course. Gevan was far too sophisticated to believe in a literal personification of the Mother. Whatever power had brought the universe into being could not possibly be reduced to a simple anthropomorphic caricature. Everything he’d learned in his twenty years of study at the University, both from colleagues and his own investigations, pointed to a single conclusion. The world was endlessly fascinating, filled with marvels almost beyond imagining, but it was as cold and impersonal as the gears of a clock, which once set in motion played out their purpose without interference or alteration. If there was any reality to the idea of the Mother beyond a child’s wishful imaginings, surely she could be no more than the craftsman who built the clock, wound it, and left it to run as it was designed.
If what he attempted was possible, it was permissible. He need have
no fear of a cosmic nanny slapping his hand like a child who played with fire.
Gevan lifted the tube to his eye and aimed the larger end out the window. He fixed his gaze on the bright circle of blurry color and slid the pieces further together. For an instant the image became clear, then was lost to fuzziness. He caught his breath, steadied his hands, and tried again. Bit by minuscule bit, he lengthened the tube.
Clear and beautiful, the picture sprang to life. As close as if he could reach out and touch them, the curved orange tiles of a roof appeared within the circle. He saw green moss on the shadowed side and individual grains of dirt in the crevasses. A bird strutted into view. Its toes gripped the tiles, and its beak opened to emit a cry he was much too far away to hear.
His arm trembled and the view within the tube swooped wildly, provoking a queasy feeling in his stomach. He steadied himself and looked again. This time he found the topmost fronds of a palm tree, swaying in the breeze from the sea. He could count each individual leaflet if he wished.
Even the tiniest movement of his hands sent his view sweeping in great dramatic jerks, but Gevan persevered until he gained some measure of control. He located a street and traced it until he recognized the sign of a particular shop at an intersection. From there he followed the familiar pattern of roads down to the docks.
People crowded the waterfront and lined the harbor walls. Banners flew from every building. Gevan focused on the ship drawing everyone’s interest. It was a large trading vessel with a high square stern and three tall masts. On its side, traced in bright gold paint, was its name: Verinna.
A brief wave of disgust penetrated his excitement. Did they really think the Matriarch was susceptible to that sort of flattery? Wasn’t it enough that she was financing this benighted expedition?
But even that couldn’t dim his exultation for long. He swept the circle of his vision along the shore and up to the high point where the Matriarch’s palace stood. The flag at the peak of its tallest tower snapped in the brisk sea breeze. The seagull and star emblem of Ramunna was clear and sharp.
Gevan lowered the tube. He clenched his hands around it, his heart pounding. He’d done it. He’d opened a window to a distant place, just as the chronicles described the ancient wizards doing. He’d proved that no magic was necessary for the feat, only a careful application of natural principles. He’d rediscovered a power that hadn’t been taken from the world after all. Just lost for a time.
If he could discover the secret of one of the wizards’ powers, he could find them all. It was only a matter of time before his calculations revealed how to shape a lens that would bend light from a previous time into the present. He could learn the secrets of the human body and how to wake its healing powers. He could tap into the forces that would allow him to reach across space and manipulate objects without a touch.
Almost dizzy with the prospect, Gevan sat down and set the window-glass reverently on the workbench. He took out a fresh sheet of paper and picked up his pen. It was vital to record every detail of what he’d done in his notes. He would face enormous opposition when he made his invention public. From the Purifiers, of course, but potentially from many other quarters also. He must be prepared to defend himself with the power of reason and truth against those who feared what the return of the wizards’ powers might mean.
Some of his colleagues at the University shared many of his beliefs. He would start with them. They’d demand full documentation, with all the information they’d need to duplicate his work. As soon as he had that ready, he’d present it to them.
And then, after enough people knew of the window-glass and understood its principles that the knowledge would not be lost even if he were silenced, he would go to the Matriarch. She would listen. Weren’t her dearest hopes pinned on finding some way to revive the lost power of the wizards? Even if he couldn’t yet offer the healing power needed to give her the daughter she so desperately desired, she would see the potential the window-glass offered.
Gevan’s hand paused. Perhaps the window-glass could be of immediate use to her. The peace with Marvanna was fragile. There was always the danger that their larger, stronger neighbor to the north might attack again. How much of an advantage would accrue to a commander who could spy on enemy troops without going near them? Or to a naval captain who could identify a hostile ship from leagues away?
He smiled. Yes, that was the way to gain the Matriarch’s support. Once he convinced her, he wouldn’t need to fear the Purifiers. They didn’t yet have as much power in Ramunna as they did in Marvanna. The Matriarch had little use for their fanaticism.
Her favor would shield him. Her patronage would allow him to go forward with his research at a greatly increased pace. Perhaps, in time, he would learn how to grant her desire. If so, the rewards she would shower upon him would surpass even the wealth and privilege the ancient wizards had enjoyed.
Gevan reached out and stroked the cold metal of the window-glass in wonder. Then he bent with renewed industry to his notes.
* * * * *
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Copyright © 2015 by Angela Holder
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