The Stone Mage & the Sea (Books of the Change Book 1)

by Sean Williams

  Somehow, as though his mind unconsciously needed to distract him from the mental turmoil, the Cellaton Mandala took shape in his mind and remained firm. The circles seemed to rotate around their central point as smoothly as the stars at night, each engaging its neighbor in a complex dance that never repeated itself once. As his conscious thoughts fell away from him, Sal let himself become entranced by the dance. Concerns for his father, the sting of Shilly’s words, nervousness over the Selectors’ imminent arrival, even his sense of time, all faded. What he experienced was better than sleep: more controlled and peaceful, yet more free and invigorating at the same time.

  There was just him and nothing else. He was unsurprised to learn that he liked it that way.

  Lodo returned some time later looking satisfied. Sensing the tension in the room, he sent Shilly out to gather ingredients for the evening meal--”Make them listen to you. Tell them I’ll clog up their chimneys if they don’t.”--while Lodo tested to see if Sal had improved at all.

  “Could you really do that?” Sal asked as they settled into position around the central stone.

  “What?”

  “Clog up the town’s chimneys?”

  “No, not really. A Sky Warden might be able to make them smoky, since it’s an air problem rather than stone. I could only make one or two fall down. That’d be enough, though.” Lodo smiled at Sal’s puzzled expression. “Small magic. Remember that. If someone’s throwing stones at you, don’t throw a bigger stone. It’s always better to make them not want to throw stones at all, however you go about it.”

  Sal remembered the boy who had burned his fingers on the rock he had been about to throw that morning, but didn’t ask. He figured he already knew the answer.

  Lodo tested Sal’s control over the Mandala and declared it much improved. “Still not good enough, though. We’ll have to work together. I’ll make some charms overnight for you to wear. They’ll smooth out the dent you make in the background potential. The physical you we’ll hide using illusion and good old psychology. We’ll start by making you look a little different--darken your skin a little, and your eyes--but not much more than that. The key to this will be to keep you out in the open, where everyone can see you.”

  Sal’s expression gave away his alarm. “But--”

  “This is the only chance we have, Sal,” Lodo said. “Hiding in a crowd is easier than hiding alone. If everyone takes you for granted, why shouldn’t the Selectors? They’ll be expecting you to be hidden away somewhere, out of sight, so they’ll be looking in exactly the wrong places.”

  Sal didn’t argue, although the plan seemed foolhardy. He had promised to do whatever Lodo said and he would honor that. He had no other suggestions anyway.

  Shilly returned with a bag of provisions and retreated to her niche on the far side of the workshop without saying anything. Lodo kept Sal practicing, testing his defenses at every opportunity, to isolate weak points and shore them up. Sal had lost all sense of time so had no idea how long this went on. It felt like days. Still, he was surprised when Lodo called a halt to their exercises and declared that he had to activate the town lights.

  “Got to keep my side of the bargain.” He put on his many-pocketed coat, and gestured for Sal to get up. “Come on. It’ll do you good to get out of here.”

  Sal wasn’t sure about that--the thought of bumping into Kemp in the dark was a concerning one--but he didn’t argue. Shilly said nothing, just watched, looking slightly hurt, as they left. Sal wondered if Lodo ever took her on his evening expeditions. Was that something else she would resent him for?

  The evening was still warm, but becoming humid and unsettled. Clouds were sweeping across the sky, gathering more deeply to the east, and strange gusts of wind darted along the empty streets. The sun was setting in an explosion of reds and yellows, a foreboding of violence the following day.

  “Yadeh-tash never lies,” said Lodo, also studying the sky. He took Sal’s hand and placed it on the worn amulet around his neck. Sal distantly heard a high-pitched voice whispering words he couldn’t quite understand.

  “How does it know?” Sal asked.

  “I have no idea.” Lodo shrugged. “It’s very old, and its maker had far greater skill than I. My teacher gave it to me, along with the scourge.”

  “Why?”

  “Why did he give them to me?” Lodo’s voice was sharp, and for a moment Sal regretted his curiosity. Then the old man sighed, as though releasing a burden. “He had high hopes for me, Sal, and I let him down. It was that simple. By returning to the Strand, I turned my back on everything he had taught me and all that he stood for. I was too busy burning my bridges to notice. He knew better than I that you can never go back.”

  They reached the first of the light poles. It stood on a crossroads Sal vaguely recalled passing on his first full day in Fundelry. If Lodo hadn’t stopped at its base he might easily have walked past it without noticing.

  The old man put both hands around the pole and closed his eyes for a second. The pole seemed to be made out of iron, its surface dark and rough, but it hadn’t rusted anywhere. The spherical globe, as large as a baby’s head, sat in a bracket not much higher than Sal’s hands would reach, balancing on the points of five tapering claws. It wasn’t transparent; the fading light of the sky didn’t pass through it even slightly. It seemed to be made of a cloudy gray crystal with no visible flaws.

  Lodo opened his eyes and raised one hand to touch the globe with his right index finger. Instantly, a glimmer of light appeared in its depths, flickering faintly.

  “Look away, Sal,” Lodo warned with a smile.

  Sal obeyed barely in time. Light blossomed from the globe brightly enough to leave an after-image even out the corner of his eye. Night turned to day in a pool around them. Details stood out sharply, as though every stone or footprint had become somehow more real. Despite that, it cast no heat.

  “It looks easy, doesn’t it?” Lodo guided Sal down the street, away from the globe atop its pole. “Took me years of practice to get it right.”

  “Could you teach me how to do it?”

  “Given the chance, maybe. Not many people have the knack, and I think you’ll find an outlet more suited to your talent, eventually. But as an exercise it would be interesting.”

  They walked unhurriedly from pole to pole. No one paid any attention to them, not that there were many people about. With the storm coming, and the Selectors, the town seemed to have huddled in upon itself. It was going to be a busy morning.

  Sal gradually realized that the lack of interest in them went deeper than the villagers they had other distractions, though. They weren’t just ignoring Sal and Lodo; they weren’t even seeing them. As the lights went on, they blinked and looked up in acknowledgment, but not once did they see the two people standing in the light’s full glare.

  “It’s a glamour,” said Lodo when Sal asked. “The opposite of an illusion, if you like. It won’t work on anyone with talent, so it won’t be of any use tomorrow, but it is useful at night. I like to keep a low profile.”

  The glamour was eerily effective, but Sal remembered the way he had seen through such a trick in the marketplace, even when he hadn’t known then that he had the Change. It was a double reminder: of the old man’s skills and his limitations.

  Lodo’s path from pole to pole led them to the heart of town. The night was almost full by then, and the gaps between each light darker. The ever-present grumble of the sea seemed to be getting louder, too. All in all, Sal doubted he would ever remember nights in Fundelry with any fondness.

  One of the globes rested near the School hall with the weathervane atop its roof. Sal couldn’t be sure, but he thought the silver arrow might have moved slightly, tending more south-east rather than just east. Maybe it was just stuck, as Tom thought, and not pointing toward the Haunted City. A strong gust of wind could easily have knocked it aside marginally
so it pointed in a new direction.

  Then it was on to the square itself, with its eight globes on their poles. The hostel was dark apart from one light on in an upper floor room. Holkenhill, Sal reasoned, boning up for the big day. They circled the square, lighting each globe in turn, Sal conscious of his exposure. Again, though, no one noticed them. It was as though they were ghosts drifting through the streets, as ephemeral as mist.

  Sal was wondering how many more could be left when they exited the square and headed for the prison. His heart lifted at the thought that he might be able to visit his father, but he didn’t let himself become too hopeful. Lodo hadn’t mentioned anything about the possibility, and he didn’t doubt that it would be difficult to organize. But it felt like days since this morning in the cells; he wanted to know that his father was all right.

  Standing alone directly outside the entrance to the prison was a single pole, complete with unlit globe. He hadn’t noticed it that morning, distracted as he had been by the crowd that had booed them. They had, of course, dispersed, lacking further excitement to egg them on. He felt slightly ill, returning to the scene, but didn’t hesitate as Lodo walked past the pole, opened the entrance and guided Sal inside.

  There was one officer seated behind the wide counter. He was instantly on his feet when he saw Lodo and Sal walking in the door. Evidently the glamour didn’t work in the light, or Lodo had removed it.

  “I thought I’d find you on this shift,” said Lodo.

  “And I thought I’d see you before long.” The officer didn’t smile, but there seemed to be no overt hostility between the two men. They clearly knew each other.

  “How is he?”

  “Quiet. He’s slept a lot.”

  “Can we …?” Lodo indicated the door.

  “Not until tomorrow. Sproule’s orders.”

  “When tomorrow?”

  “After he’s met the Selector.”

  “What about the boy?”

  The officer shook his head. “There’s nothing I can do.”

  Sal’s stomach sank.

  “I could ask the Mayor,” Lodo persisted.

  “Don’t bother. She’s up to her eyeballs getting ready for tomorrow.”

  Sal felt tears prick his eyes. He hated the thought of being so close to his father but unable to communicate with him.

  “You won’t let me in?”

  “I’m sorry, kid, I really am. He’s asked about you. I’ll tell him you were here, if you like.”

  Sal turned away to hide his disappointment.

  “Thanks, Cran.” Lodo put his hand firmly on Sal’s shoulder. “We’ll get out of your hair, now.”

  Sal didn’t want to leave. Anger and frustration strained within him to be set free. Part of him resented the fact that Lodo didn’t try harder--but he knew that wasn’t fair. There was little Lodo could have done. The officer had orders he wasn’t going to break. An old man and a boy couldn’t convince him otherwise, let alone overpower him and force their way past him and the probable reinforcement beyond the inner door.

  Knowing didn’t help, but it did make it easier for him to succumb to Lodo’s tug toward the door, acutely conscious of his father just meters away, through a stone wall or two. It also took the edge off Shilly’s words, remembered afresh: if he was like a hermit crab that was only because he had no choice. He was powerless to do anything.

  Outside, the fresh air stung his face, drying the tears that had trickled down his cheeks without him noticing. He wiped his nose on his sleeve and watched Lodo.

  The old man had turned to the pole. Instead of grasping it like he had the others, he stood looking up at the globe for a moment, studying it.

  “I thought so,” he said. He pointed. “Can you see it? There, on the left.”

  Sal squinted. “What is it? A crack?”

  “Exactly. I felt it earlier today. Someone damaged it.” Lodo stepped back. “See if you can get it down for me.”

  Sal stepped forward and reached up on tiptoe. He managed to get his fingers under the globe and push, but it wouldn’t budge. It was firmly anchored in place.

  Moving him aside, Lodo plucked the globe out of its bracket with a single long-fingered hand.

  “Tricks of the trade,” he said by way of explanation, and held the globe up to the light coming through the prison’s front window. To Sal’s untrained eye, the damage seemed superficial. Lodo, however, looked decidedly unhappy.

  “Ruined,” he muttered, putting it into one of his voluminous pockets. From another he produced a replacement. Lifting it above his head, he set it in place. Activated, it shone with a dim red light.

  “Hasn’t had a chance to absorb anything,” he said. “It has been in the workshop for weeks. Give it one good day’s light, though, and it’ll burn as brightly as the others.”

  He nodded satisfaction and headed up the street. Sal looked over his shoulder as the prison receded, mentally wishing his father a goodnight, whatever he was doing, however he was feeling. He couldn’t remember another night they had spent apart in his entire life.

  That seemed to be the last globe, because they headed by a roundabout route for the sandhills, avoiding lit areas and keeping to themselves. The wind had picked up in the hour or so they had been lighting the globes. It whipped around Sal in sudden flurries, wrapped Lodo’s coat around his legs, then dropped back to nothing just as suddenly.

  As they walked, Lodo reached into his coat and produced a leather-wrapped bundle. Giving it to Sal, who was surprised by its weight, the old man indicated that he should unwrap it.

  Inside lay a smaller version of one of the globes, clouded gray like the others but half their size.

  “When we get back to the workshop,” Lodo said, “slip it into your pack. Make sure Shilly doesn’t see. I don’t think she’d understand at the moment. But I want you to have it, anyway. It’ll come in handy one day, I’m sure.”

  Sal protested that he couldn’t. “It’s much too valuable.”

  “A thing is only as valuable as the need it fills,” said Lodo, pushing it back into Sal’s hands. “That’s what my teacher used to say. A trinket designed for storing light is useless to me. I have many such things, and could make more if I needed to. But you, I think, will need a little light in the future, wherever you go.”

  Sal resisted a second longer, then gave up. He could feel the globe buzzing in his hands, as though it was alive. If nothing else, it would give him a reason to pursue his study of the Change; without such mastery, he would never be able to make it work.

  “What was your teacher’s name?” he asked, as they left town and passed through the patchy scrubland leading to the dunes.

  “Skender van Haasteren. He’s probably dead by now.” Lodo put his chin down on his chest. “Everyone I’ve ever known seems to have died, over the years. The load gets heavier, the fewer there are to share it.”

  They walked in silence over the dunes. The night was deep and dark, the sky obscured by clouds and the wind strengthening, carrying with it the smell of rain. Sal thought of Tom. He wondered if the boy was ready for the night ahead--another night waiting for his brother to return. For the first time, he could imagine how it might feel to experience such a loss.

  He put the thought out of his mind and called up the Cellaton Mandala. This night was all that stood between him and the arrival of the Selectors. Lodo seemed worried about it, but not afraid, and Sal tried to emulate the old man’s frame of mind. If it was going to be his last night of freedom, he wasn’t going to waste it on fear.

  Together they walked into the coming storm.

  Chapter 14. “A Bone from the Sea”

  There was no dawn the next day.

  Sal woke early, before either Lodo or Shilly, and was surprised to find the workshop still lit. He had assumed that the lights would go out while their owner slept, but they glow
ed with a warm, red light, like embers. He found it comforting for a while, until he remembered what the day held for him.

  Tossing aside the light rug under which he had spent the night, sleeping fitfully at best, he climbed the tunnel to the entrance in order to relieve himself outside. There, he opened the portal as Shilly had showed him several days earlier: by placing his hand on a protruding spear of rock and willing the wall to part. It did so, dissolving into sand that fell with a hiss to either side, leaving a narrow space in its wake. Water instantly poured in, and he forced himself through the gap as quickly as he could.

  The rain was heavy and fierce. Nearly blinded, Sal stumbled away from the door and into the lee of a large dune. It didn’t make much difference. The storm raged around him like a living thing, worse than the one he had become lost in on the first night he had come to the workshop. Even though he knew his way around now, he still felt threatened.

  Part of that was, again, due to the feeling that someone was looking for him. The sensation was hard to define. It was not literally as though there was a giant eye in the sky staring down at him, although that was how he thought of it. He simply knew that someone was probing through the clouds, through the wind, through the rain, clutching for any sign of him--and coming closer, as though they already knew where he was.

  He called up the Mandala he had practiced all night and felt the gaze of his pursuer slip over him and away.

  Staggering back to the door, relieved on two counts, Sal realized that he didn’t know what time it was. It might have been dawn or afternoon, for all he could tell. The storm had erased all evidence of the sun. Without his father to wake him up, he had no idea when the day had begun.

  An enormous crack of thunder followed him back into the workshop, where he stood, shivering, by one of the heat-emitting stones to dry.

  Lodo rolled over on a bed of pelts and opened an eye in Sal’s direction.