The Serpent's Orb

by Guy Antibes

Jack put his hand on the door latch. “One other thing. The white robes are too tight.”

  “What white robes?” Fasher asked.

  “The robes that Penny gave me to wear.”

  “Robes? I didn’t have any robes made for you. I want you to wear a plain white tabard. Those haven’t arrived yet.”

  “But the robes?”

  Fasher pressed his lips together. “Something for you to ask Penny about, eh, Winder?”

  Jack groaned before he left the wizard’s office. He stepped across the hallway into Penny’s office, but it wasn’t exactly her office. He figured Fasher had put a desk in his study, now that he had time to look at the arrangement.

  “I’ve decided not to wear the white robes,” Jack said.

  “You’ll be fired if you don’t. Wizard Tempest was quite adamant about it.”

  Jack smiled. “I’ll let him fire me, then,” he said as he sauntered through her office into his workroom. He sat on his desk handling the wooden rod. He could feel a trace of power, but couldn’t describe what that felt like.

  “What is that?” Penny said, casually picking up the bag of white robes from the worktable.

  “An object of power,” Jack said. “This one is about extinguished. As payment for healing my face, he told me I had to hold onto this for some time.”

  She laughed. “You think you can restore one of Uncle’s objects?”

  Jack shrugged. “I don’t know how to do that. He told me to hold this for fifteen minutes every hour. Maybe the power goes from me to the object, or maybe having to hold it is a punishment. Have you thought of that?” Jack said.

  Penny looked a bit more uncertain. She narrowed her eyes and grabbed the bag of robes. “If you won’t wear these, I will take them back.”

  “Back to whom?” Jack asked.

  Penny turned red. “None of your business!” She huffed and left the room.

  Jack smiled. In some imperceptible way, he could feel the rod extract something from him. He was certain he was feeling his magic going into the object, but he had no idea how that could be or why it happened by merely touching it. That was something he would have to learn, and he was in the right place to do just that.

  Chapter Four

  ~

  T he wizard called Jack into his office two days later. “I suppose you have organized the workroom, by now?” Fasher asked. He presented Jack with a white tabard, at least that was what Jack thought it was. It was a long white cloth with a hole for his head and ties midway down the sides. It extended from his shoulders down to just above his knees. “You wear this when you are out and about on errands. No need to get it dirty when you are inside my house.”

  “So, this is my robe?”

  Fasher smiled. “No robe needed for a helper. Have you given any more thought to your pouch idea?”

  Jack shook his head. “I will try when I am walking through the village.” He gave the wooden rod back. “I think this is filled up, again.”

  The wizard took it and nodded raising his eyebrows. “An unexpectedly quick job.” He put the rod back into the object drawer and gave him another to restore. “Now you can go back to your book. I’ll have an assignment later today.”

  Penny looked up when Jack walked through the study. “What is that?” She pointed to the tabard.

  “My tabard. I won’t be wearing a robe.” Jack unfolded it and put his head through the hole, letting the cloth drop down. “See? I only have to wear this when I am on an errand.”

  Penny pursed her lips. “You look stupid.”

  “As always,” Jack said with a smirk. “As always.”

  He walked back to the workroom and buried himself in reading the book. It was fascinating to learn about magic. He wondered why Penny wasn’t so interested, but then he wondered: if she wasn’t talented, why was she wasting her time in Wizard Tempest’s office? Maybe he would eventually pry the reason out of her. She didn’t look stupid, but then Jack was often told he did.

  Lunchtime came. Jack promised his mother he would come home for his mid-day meal, so he removed the tabard that he hadn’t taken off, and walked past Penny to go out the door.

  “Where are you going?”

  “My tummy is complaining it hasn’t received the attention it deserves,” Jack said. “It is a chronic malady.”

  “You mean you are going to lunch?”

  Jack nodded. What did she want, an invitation to join him?

  She made a disagreeable face. “You should stay here while I leave. I am the senior among us,” she said.

  So much for her wanting to eat with him. “Tomorrow,” Jack said. “I’ve already made an appointment for lunch.”

  Penny half raised her hand to protest, but Jack ignored her and stepped out into a nice day. He would have to remember to ask the wizard about Penny’s “seniority” when he returned from home. The walk home was pleasant and kept him from thinking about the odious Penny Ephram.

  He walked in the back door and sat at the kitchen table, but his mother wasn’t cooking. Jack called out but didn’t hear anything. Where could she be? He got up and walked to the front of the house, where he gasped. His mother was on the floor. Jack felt for a pulse and found it. He tried to gently shake her awake, but she remained unconscious.

  His father’s shop was just down the road. Jack ran out of the front door and rushed into the shop.

  “Something has happened to Mother,” Jack said. “I found her on the floor unconscious.”

  “Then why aren’t you there? You left her alone?” his father said in an accusing voice.

  “Go to her while I fetch a healer,” Jack said.

  His father’s face softened. “This isn’t another one of your tricks, is it?”

  Jack shook his head. “Not at all. Go!” he said as he took off down the street.

  The healer was out on a call but could find out where. Jack exited the clinic in a bit of shock. Where could he go? But then he thought of Wizard Tempest. He ran to the office, but Penny was gone, and so was the wizard. He paced the office frantically, wondering what to do, and decided to grab the ladle from Fasher’s office. He took off down the street and nearly ran into Penny.

  “Do you know where the wizard is? It’s an emergency!”

  Penny looked at him quizzically. “He went to your house, not a minute ago.”

  Jack was out of breath when he barged through the front door. “Is the wizard here?”

  “Upstairs,” his father said. “No thanks to you. I sent a boy for him.”

  Jack took the steps two at a time and entered his parents’ bedroom.

  Fasher turned to look and breathed a sigh of relief. “Your mother requires more than I can give.”

  Jack pulled out the ladle. “I thought you might need this.” What he didn’t say was that he might have tried to use it himself.

  “Or I could use you,” Fasher said. He sighed, removed the metal ladle from Jack’s hands, and held it while he put his hand on Jack’s mother’s forehead. “Even so, I don’t know if this will work. Magical healing is fickle. You couldn’t find the healer?”

  Jack shook his head. “Only that she was out of her office on a call.”

  “Hold your mother,” the wizard said. “Don’t give up much power, if you feel it begin to drain you.”

  Jack nodded and grabbed hold of the limp hand and looked at her slowly rising chest.

  “Here we go,” Fasher said, and he muttered a few words that Jack couldn’t hear.

  Jack felt the flow of magic move and tried to cut it off; it seemed to lessen. Jack had no idea what he was doing or why, but his mother seemed to respond. She gasped. Her hand gripped his as she opened her eyes.

  “What am I doing here?”

  “You fainted,” Fasher said. “You might have had an episode, but the healer will know how to interpret your condition better than I. Your son and I gave you a boost.”

  “Jack?” She furrowed her brow.

  “What kind of a boost would that be?” Jack
’s father said from the doorway. “Jack just started working for you a few days ago.”

  “A magical boost, Master Winder. He was the one who saved Penny Ephram that night, and this afternoon he saved your wife, or he helped. I’m not sure how much he contributed, but it was enough.”

  “You helped the wizard?” his mother asked.

  Jack shrugged. “I guess so. I don’t know what I’m doing, but it seems I have more magic than I thought.”

  His father snorted. “The wrong kind of magic, I’ll wager. The boy is a menace to the village.”

  Jack wondered why his father was so angry.

  “You are just worried about your wife,” the wizard said. “I’ll take Jack back to the office so you can be alone with her. She is still sick, but we will pass by the healer and leave a note to ask her to stop by as soon as she returns to her clinic.”

  “Thank you, Wizard Tempest,” Jack’s mother said.

  Jack’s father moved Jack aside and sat where the wizard had a moment previously. “Go, Jack.” The tone of voice had no appreciation in it.

  Once outside, the wizard turned to Jack. “There is something unresolved between you and your father?”

  Jack shook his head. “Nothing unresolved on my part. Maybe he doesn’t like me doing magic,” he said.

  “It is deeper than that.” Fasher sighed. “Doesn’t matter. Did you get lunch? Penny said you came home.”

  “I found my mother on the floor before I had a chance to eat anything. I had expected to come home to a cooked lunch,” Jack said.

  The wizard put a hand on Jack’s shoulders. “I haven’t eaten either. Let’s say we go to the pub and find a morsel or two after we leave a message for the healer.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Jack said, disappointed that his eighteenth birthday was coming up in days, yet he wouldn’t be able to have an ale for lunch. He regretted the missed opportunity.

  They slipped inside the pub his father frequented.

  “Jack Winder, as I live and breathe. What are you doing in here?” the barkeeper said.

  “He is accompanying me,” Wizard Tempest said. “We are seeking a midday meal.”

  “Not much to choose from, but what is available is good.”

  Fasher nodded with a grin. “For two, except ale for me and something more suited to a seventeen-year-old for Jack.”

  “An exciting morning,” Fasher said. He pulled the ladle out of his robe. “Now why did you have this in your hands?”

  Jack’s eyes grew. The wizard had caught him. “I don’t know what I was going to do with it. My mother might have been dying. You said you would have used the ladle on Penny. I was wondering if I could do the same if I had to save her life.”

  Fasher shook his head. “You would have likely killed her, even if you knew how to use the power in the ladle. Healing is more than power, Jack.”

  “I haven’t gotten to that part in the book.”

  “The book doesn’t teach you how to use magic, it teaches you about magic. Training is what you need, and that is why you are in my workshop.”

  Jack looked down at the table. “I didn’t know.”

  “Of course you didn’t. I am impressed you were willing to try, but don’t try unless you can do.” Fasher sighed. “That is behind us, right?”

  “Another thing not to tell Penny?” Jack asked.

  That brought a smile to the wizard. “Yet another. Before long we will be burdened by everything we can’t tell my niece. That is why you need to prepare for your trip. We will be working together for the next week. After you celebrate your eighteenth birthday with your family, you will leave for Dorkansee.”

  “The capital? You trust me there?”

  Fasher raised his eyebrows. “Is there any reason I can’t?”

  Jack put out his hands and shook his head. “No, no, no. I will be a good boy, I promise. But Dorkansee, I’ve never been that far from Raker Falls.”

  “I am bound to the village for two more years, and then I might join you on one of your errands,” Fasher said. “Until then, you will be an extension of my hand.”

  The server interrupted them with bowls of a rich, dark-brown stew. It smelled wonderful to Jack, and the bread and pot of butter looked inviting too. Their conversation stopped for a bit while they both began to eat.

  “I have a question. Is Penny my senior?”

  Fasher looked at Jack, not speaking because his mouth was full.

  “Oh. She told me that since she was senior she could tell me when to go to lunch.”

  The wizard swallowed hard. “Not a senior,” Fasher said. “You two can work out when you go to lunch. No one is bound to my workplace on a tether. She had found me on a family matter, which I will attend to after I finish this delicious meal. You can flip a coin or some other way, as long as it isn’t a duel.”

  Jack laughed. “Not that. Another one of her lies,” he said.

  “Penny has some unresolved issues, not unlike your father. She works for me at the request of her father and mother. I think having you around will help her, but don’t pry into her life. Keep our secrets just between you and me. I want you to keep on acting like yourself, understand?”

  “I do. I only have to worry until I’m eighteen.”

  “Are you going to desert me, or something?”

  Jack’s eyebrows rose. “No. I didn’t mean—”

  “You will return, and you will keep acting normally around Penny. That is why I won’t confide anything about her to you, just as I won’t tell Penny about this ladle.”

  ~

  After adjusting his tabard, Fasher had sent Jack off into the village with the wooden rod wrapped up in a cloth. All he had to do was deliver it to a man with a chronic back condition that the healer couldn’t heal. Fasher had to do something to the rod, but Jack didn’t understand the magic behind the activation.

  “It is all about channeling the power. It is called imbuement.” Fasher had said. “You aren’t ready to learn, yet. That is why the ladle would have done your mother no good.”

  Jack walked up to one of the pensioner cottages owned by the village and knocked on the door. The old man looked up at him. “White smock, eh? We haven’t had a helper in the village since I was a little boy and she didn’t last here long,” the man said.

  “Wizard Tempest wants you to hold on to this rod for the rest of the day as much as you can. I will be back tomorrow to pick it up.”

  The patient pursed his lips. “The girl that came with him yesterday is a lot prettier than you are, lad.” He looked around Jack. “She isn’t here with you, is she?”

  “You mean Penny?” Jack asked.

  “Dark hair, pretty? If her name is Penny, that’s her,” the man said, cackling a bit.

  Jack hadn’t really thought of Penny as pretty, but it didn’t matter. As far as he was concerned, she was the enemy in the wizard’s office.

  “Just hold on to it, bare hand to bare wood, for as long as you can.”

  The man nodded, taking one last glance past Jack before he gave Jack a wave and shut the door.

  Fasher had never offered to take Jack on any of his rounds. It was always Penneta Ephram. Jack sat on the top of a low rock wall, looking out at the pleasant late spring day, thinking winter thoughts.

  The wizard nearly treated him like a friend, better than his father ever had, but Penny received all the attention. Was that a sign, or was it something to ignore? Jack smiled as a thought came to him. Perhaps it was time to prank Penny. He had resisted so far, but maybe he could leave Raker Falls on his errand with something that Penny could remember him by.

  His thoughts turned to the pranks he had done in school, not in extended school, for if he did a prank there, he would have been kicked out, and life would have been even more terrible. Were those old pranks too juvenile? He narrowed his eyes as he looked at passersby and at the sun-bathed stone faces of the houses and cottages. Perhaps something innocuous, yet infuriating to Penny, Jack thought.

&nbs
p; Jack rushed back to the wizard’s house with an evil smile. He even chuckled, just a bit, thinking he would save it for the day he left for Dorkansee.

  ~

  With all the preparations for his departure, Jack had forgotten about the prank until the day before he was to leave. He had turned eighteen the previous day, and his family had celebrated with all his siblings and their families joining in for a birthday feast.

  He didn’t know how long he would be gone from Raker Falls, but Jack had long ago learned to ignore the negative sentiments his siblings conveyed with little love for him. His father and mother gave him a new sword for his birthday, something common in the village since many of the youth faced their six-month village guard stint.

  “You know how to use that well enough to keep off the riff-raff, but you aren’t good enough with a sword to fight a soldier or a guard,” Jack’s father warned.

  No one brought up Jack’s encounter with Penny months earlier, and that suited Jack just fine. The sword wasn’t as good as the practice swords the guard let them borrow, even Jack could see, but he didn’t own one, and with his size, strapping one to his waist might serve as a deterrent.

  With his pack nearly full of clothes and the provisions his mother had made, Jack woke up early the next morning and finished his little prank. He was eighteen now, a man in the eyes of the village and the world at large. He was ready to set out on a great adventure.

  Wizard Tempest arrived before Penny, which was the usual case. He called Jack into his office.

  “Sit down, Jack. We have a lot to discuss and only a little time. I have an appointment at noon, and you have your transportation to catch two hours from now.”

  “Transportation?” Jack asked. “I thought I’d be walking or riding.”

  “I’ll give you enough money to buy a horse, but let’s get you out of Raker Falls, first. There is a merchant wagon leaving, and I’ve paid to have him take you to Orderton. There is a stable that sells better horses than any you will be able to buy in Raker Falls.”

  Fasher handed off two pages of instructions. “It is on there, along with contacts in various towns along the way, should you need assistance. Derr Mason is your contact in Dorkansee, and hopefully, he will give you the Serpent’s Orb if you present him with the certificate.”