Magesong

by James R. Sanford

  "If you want to keep me from going, you're going to have to beat me in a fight. Do you think you can?"

  Reyin felt the Essa coursing through his body. With one word he could stun the man long enough to pick up a rock and hit him with it. "I see the point you're trying to make." He watched Farlo carefully for a moment. "But right now, in this place, you cannot harm me."

  Farlo responded with an ugly grin. "You can't spend the rest of your life up here.”

  CHAPTER 6: Partners

  The afternoon passed slowly, fair and light as the clouds drifting in from the ocean. Syliva sat on the dunes above the beach at Siadal with Kestrin and Lovisa, working and watching the men work.

  Lovisa said, "They're so, oh, relentless when they get the idea to do something — "

  "Amuck," Kestrin said.

  " — like the waterwheel at the mill, always pushed round and round by the stream."

  “More like they're caught up in the stream," Syliva said, fetching a long sea-green from the pile where dozens dried in the sun, "carried along by a flood." She began crushing it into a huge basket, turning her face away from the sudden sharp odor.

  Reyin had certainly been impassioned by her son's words three nights before. He had returned the next evening from the Skialfanmir, weary and in a kind of fever, saying he had climbed to the top. None in the village knew what to think. That the stranger had made it up the unscalable peak was as fabulous as Jonn's story of the sky boat.

  The morning after, Farlo had rapped on the door early, and the two of them sat at the table for an hour, arguing, agreeing, speaking low and fast in their native tongue, a conspiracy in the making, then off together as to a hunt. Last night, secretly, Reyin had told her in broken Pallenor the he was going off to get something that would put the land to rights. Maybe he had meant something else, but that was what she thought he said.

  "I can't believe," Kestrin said, "that they went across the bay, repaired Reyin's boat, and brought it back all in one day."

  "They simply patched it enough to bring it here without sinking," Syliva said, "and they couldn't have done that without Yothan's help."

  Kestrin looked to where Reyin and Farlo sat unraveling old thick ropes into countless single strands. "Look at them down there. Tight as brothers, like they've known each other for years. What do they keep talking about?" She turned to Lovisa. "Why is your husband working so hard at this? Is he that anxious for Reyin to be gone?"

  Lovisa smiled back at her. "I know someone who is not so happy that he's going."

  "He said he will come back." Kestrin blurted it out with so much conviction that it made Lovisa laugh.

  Syliva laid her hand on Kestrin's arm. "Oh Sweetness, don't let your heart go too far that way. The man earns his bread by travelling; his life is one long voyage. Would you really want a husband who was only home a few weeks each year?"

  "Maybe Kestrin doesn't want to go through all the trouble of a wedding."

  While Lovisa giggled, Kestrin threw wet strands of sea greens at her. "I've hardly even spoken to him."

  "The man is leaving," Syliva said. "I don't think he has romance on his mind."

  "Well," Lovisa said, "if I wasn't married, I'd surely be doing my best to find out."

  They all laughed again.

  "When is he going?" Lovisa asked Syliva.

  "Soon as his boat is seaworthy. Three or four days."

  "Do you think he'll really come back?"

  "I think he will try. I've no idea of the difficulties of life beyond this valley. Simply living here, being a farmer's wife, I find that there are many streams to cross. It's so easy to get caught and swept away."

  They fell silent then, and for a short time each worked alone with her own thoughts.

  "I wonder," Kestrin said, "what is it like, out there in other lands?"

  Lovisa reached for another long leaf. "Farlo says that the big port cities are as wide as the valley, that they are awful, dirty and smelly, and no one knows your name. And even if they did, they still wouldn't help you if you were sick or hurt or hungry. He says that everyone is out to cheat or steal from each other because they're all poor except for the lords and ladies who have all the riches."

  "What about the land outside the cities?"

  "The wealthy overlords own all the land and keep it for themselves. They'll let you live there, but you have to pay them for it every year, and if you don't pay they have men with swords who will come and take it from you."

  "That sounds terrible. Syliva, do you think it's true?"

  "There's probably truth in it, but if that's all there was out there, how could you find people with good hearts like those two men there? One summer when I was a little girl, my father went all the way to Noraggen. He said it was big and busy and full of wonderful things."

  Lovisa turned to Kestrin. "Would you go with him, if he asked you?"

  "Reyin? Of course not, don't be silly," she snapped, her cream-colored cheek flushing to rose. "Why would he do a thing like that anyway?" She stood and shook out her apron. "I need to go see about my father," she said, her voice suddenly dry. "He forgets to eat sometimes." She turned swiftly, her red hair flashing in the sunlight, walking away, then trotting, then breaking into a full run.

  The morning light came stealthily, through a thick grey overcast. Syliva thought that at last a spring shower would fall, but the clouds did nothing more than shut out the sun. Perhaps rain fell in the upper valley where her husband kept watch over their livestock. She wondered what he was eating this morning, if he had slept out on the ground. He was too old to be living like a shepherd boy. The season grew more strange, and some folk had begun showing an odd temper. He should be here. Not that she felt lonely; they had been apart many times before. The Svordens always sent for her when one of them fell ill, and she would at times stay with them for a week or more. He should simply be here, that's all.

  Reyin had spent the night with his boat in Siadal, so Syliva went early to see Lovisa, thinking that Farlo may have stayed in the fishing village as well. As she approached her friend's door, she heard a clatter, then Lovisa speaking heatedly in a high pitch, anger through tears. Syliva knocked loudly. Farlo threw wide the door.

  "Oh," Syliva said, "I thought — "

  "It's alright," Farlo barked, "I was just leaving."

  He snatched a knapsack from a hook, pushed past her and was gone.

  Lovisa sank to the floor, her face in her hands.

  Syliva knelt beside her. "Shh. Don't cry. Don't cry. Tell me what's wrong."

  "He's leaving," she wailed through her hands. "He's going with him on the b-boat. He'll not be here for me. He'll not be here for our child."

  "He will come back. He will."

  "No! They'll catch him and kill him. Or they'll cut his foot off so he can't run away again. Tell him not to go, Syliva. Everyone listens to you. Even the men listen to you."

  "I don't think they will this time," she whispered. She held Lovisa, there on the floor matting, until the fit passed.

  Lovisa pulled herself up to a chair. "I'm alright now."

  "You know that he wouldn't go, wouldn't risk his life with you, unless he thought it was very important."

  "I know. But he's wrong." She went to the water basin and found a damp rag. "He's so full of himself. He thinks no one is capable as he — that if he doesn't go, Reyin will fail to come back with 'that which will make the land aright' as he puts it. What is it anyway?"

  "He didn't tell me, but I had the feeling that it is some kind of charm or rune. Farlo thinks Reyin to be a rune-singer. Did you know that?"

  "No. And that's another point; they are so skulking secretive. Like we wouldn't understand. Oh, I hate it."

  "In their home lands they would be laughed at behind their backs. Many folk there don't even believe in the spirits."

  "Now everyone is going to think Farlo is running away because times are hard." "Lovisa, no one will think that. And even if they did, would you really care?"
<
br />   "No. I just want him here."

  "So do I," Syliva said. "I want him here too."

  Syliva took Reyin's hand and placed the gold coin in it. "Good luck to you. Keep safe."

  Reyin nodded as if he understood. He looked over his shoulder. Farlo stood in the boat, helping Jonn lash down the water keg.

  "Syliva," Reyin said, searching for the Pallenor words, then, with a sheepish smile, he shrugged, unable to find them. "Syliva . . . my friend." He hugged her gently, then, turning to Kestrin and Lovisa, he bowed solemnly as he would taking his leave of noble ladies. Without a word he trudged across the sandy beach to where the rising tide lapped against the keel of the little skiff. He shook Jonn's hand in the Southern style, climbed aboard, and tugged against the mast to see that it was securely stepped.

  After taking a last look at the main halyard, Farlo vaulted the gunwale one-handed, running back to Lovisa to say his good-bye. They were both past terse words or tears. Syliva touched Kestrin's arm and they stood aside, not watching, giving the couple this moment alone. Even over the growl of breaking waves, Syliva could hear the violence of their embrace, the passion in their whispers.

  "Take care of my daughter until I come back," Farlo said, lightly caressing Lovisa's belly.

  "Your son will miss you while you're away."

  He started down the sloping sand, but Lovisa stopped him with a call. "Hey! You forgot this." She held up a lumpy sack, three days worth of hard flatbread for their short run to Noraggen. Syliva had tried to give them dried apple, cheese, and jerked meat, but they would take none of it.

  Farlo came trotting back, flashed the three women a grin and a wink, and carried the sack down to the boat. Reyin climbed out, and the three men pushed the skiff into the surf until the keel floated free on the water. Then Reyin and Farlo leaped aboard, taking their places at the tiller and the halyard. Jonn leaned his thick shoulders into his task, took two long strides, and gave the little boat a tremendous shove, sending it out past the breakers. He stood waist-deep in the cold water, waving and laughing.

  Farlo raised and trimmed the yellowed sail, and Reyin slid the centerboard into place then set the boat on a starboard tack. Reyin glanced behind for a moment, and Farlo gave Jonn a quick salute.

  On the beach, Syliva, Kestrin, and Lovisa watched the sailboat pushing into the wind, closing with the blue and grey horizon. They stood motionless, saying nothing to each other, watching the skiff sail and tack, sail and tack. Nearly an hour passed before the tiny craft made a last turn at the mouth of the bay and slipped out of sight. Only then did they turn toward their homes.

  CHAPTER 7: Sailors

  The breeze blew the waves into a light chop the first day, and Reyin fell seasick before noon. He lay in the bottom of the skiff with his bedding, instrument cases, the spare rope, oars, and other odd items of ocean travel. Farlo easily manned the tiller and the sail at the same time. He spoke loudly, made large movements, had no stillness in him, so animated with the beginning of the adventure was he. But he turned pensive the next day as a squall passed far out to sea, saying little as they watched the towering pinnacles of the coastal range glide by on their right. On the third day, as the sun rose into a fair, springtime sky, he slipped into a brooding that became darker and darker as they began to pass fishing villages and coastal towns sitting among fields of fresh green grass and orchards studded with new blossoms. When, at the end of the afternoon, they sighted the tall masts of ships that lay in the roads of Noraggen, Reyin's spirit soared. They had made good time — over fifty leagues in three days.

  "Let's heave-to and spend one more night outside," Farlo said. "It looks like we can beach her up ahead.”

  "But we have plenty of light," Reyin protested. "In two hours we could be sitting down to a hot meal."

  Farlo gave him a hard look, his eyes staring through a dangerous glaze. Reyin saw in him the man Farlo had been when they first met. He turned the tiller over to make for shore.

  Reyin did not sleep well. Farlo's mood showed no sign of betterment, and Reyin tossed with misgivings about his shipmate. He awoke stiff and tired, his bedding wet with dew. Farlo sat near a pot of dirty water, packing away his shaving brush and a cut-throat razor. He had shaved his head; it looked raw and unweathered, like the pate of a novice monk. His beard remained long and untrimmed. Reyin gave him a questioning glance, but Farlo stayed within himself.

  They ran before a mild wind, reaching the quays of Noraggen by midmorning. A smoky haze lay over the city, and the mountains to the north stood half-obscured, like shadow guardians. Although it lacked the fanciful look of the great Southern ports, Reyin admired the city's unembellished structures of grey stone and rough-cut timbers, a sense of strength, the ability to survive in a harsh land, not the power of opulent wealth. Farlo looked at it as one might look upon a prison.

  Reyin found the city folk to be unaffected and straightforward, even the watchmen on the docks seemed unsuspicious, almost friendly, not looking for ways to lever a bribe from the foreigners as they often did in the Southern ports. The street merchants hawked wares to them in broken Avic, sure that they knew no Pallenor, and Farlo was happy to feign ignorance.

  "We must first sell the boat," Reyin said as they strolled the harbor-side road in search of cheap lodging. He had resolved himself to that before they even sailed. Storing the skiff here for months would cost too much. Indeed, they rather needed the money from its sale for passage to Jakavia. Dimietri wouldn't really mind once Reyin explained why. The fellow would merely order another built. But Reyin hated to take advantage of his friend simply because the man was wealthy. It wasn't Dimietri's fault that he had inherited a fortune. Artemes held him in high regard because he had found the way of the true magician in spite of his riches. He said that he knew of no other who had done so. But Artemes, like everyone in the circle of Ty'kojin's students, always took for granted the support of Dimietri's wealth. Reyin had told himself that he would never do so.

  "Agreed," Farlo said. "You find us a room and take care of that. I'll find a ship bound for the south. See you back here at sunset." And off he went, glancing from side to side as he walked, as if an ambush could lie at any corner.

  Reyin elected to take a room at an old-style inn, the sort built around a courtyard with no outside windows. It cost them extra, but the place was full of odd travellers from other lands, and even Farlo wouldn't seem too eccentric. Perhaps he would be more comfortable in a private chamber than in the common room where others asked about who you were, where you had been, where you were going.

  Finding a buyer for the boat proved more difficult than Reyin expected. He spent the afternoon tramping the waterfront from the fishermen's docks to the harbor master's tower and back again, making inquiries at every pier. At the end of the day he had spoken to only one person willing to look at the skiff, a tax-collector who was weary of hiking to the nearby coastal villages. They would meet the next morning.

  He looked for Farlo at their rendezvous. His companion was late. He descended a narrow set of stone steps and sat atop the seawall watching the wavelets of the harbor turn to ink. In the early twilight, chiming bells from distant ships at anchor punctuated the rattle of street traffic, and Reyin wondered if in Lorendal they were singing the Song of Returning underneath those same first stars he now gazed at overhead. Without hearing his approach, he suddenly discovered Farlo standing next to him.

  "I found an Orianan barque that'll take us all the way to Ava. It sails in three days and we can go aboard a day early if we want."

  "How much will it cost?"

  "Twelve silver-pieces each for common pass passage."

  "You mean living on the exposed deck the whole way?"

  "Right. But listen, they're short-handed, and we can stay in the fo'c's'le and eat ship's food if we work. All you'd have to do is help the cook."

  "What about you, Farlo?"

  "I'd serve as a topman. I've done it before."

  "It would still cost us twenty-four k
andars? That's more than a gold ounce."

  "Of course, but weren't you listening? We'd get hammocks below deck and hot meals and grog. The only other choice is a cabin on a galleon, and that would be more than triple the price and we'd still have to bring our own food and water."

  Reyin stood. "Alright. Let me show you where we're sleeping tonight — I think you'll like it."

  The aroma steaming through the kitchen door made them light-headed as they passed. After entering the common room where supper was being served, they fell to a table and called for food like pirates. While they gulped raw oysters, Farlo ordered roast capon and corn pone. Reyin wanted the venison stew. Both drank heartily of the local beer, which, they discovered too late, proved to be strong as wine. After they finished the pot of stout, they ate cheese and fish cakes, and called for more drink, topping that with gingerbread and sweetnut pie. For a short time, they told each other tales, and laughed, and lived only that moment, at last stumbling off to their beds and to black sleep.

  The next morning they looked at each other with dark faces, as if they had committed a crime.

  "We'll not eat like that again while on this journey," Farlo said, turning away. "I'll not allow it as long as my wife and neighbors have barely enough. We should take meals, to keep up our strength, but not like last night."

  "I don't know what came over me," Reyin said.

  "We got a little drunk. We forgot ourselves. From now forward we won't drink, not even watery grog."

  Reyin searched for his breeches, trying to ignore Farlo's commanding tone. "I think we should forgive ourselves and not do it again. In any case, our finances will keep us away from gluttony, no matter how much money I get for the boat. Right now, I'm going down to see if I can get a hot bath — might be our last chance to do so for a month — then I'm off to meet the tax . . . what is that, are you hurt?" A place on Farlo's right forearm, halfway between the wrist and elbow, was securely tied with a cloth.