The Making of a Mage King: White Star

by Anna L. Walls

  Paddn was twelve or thirteen, and had long since outgrown sitting in his father’s lap, but Sean didn’t know of any other way to do it. It was another way of doing physically what he wanted to do magically. Maybe he wouldn’t need to do it this way next time.

  Hesitantly, Paddn rose and stood a fraction closer. Sean took his hand and pulled him to sit down between his legs. Wrapping his arms around him, and looking over his shoulder, he said, “Pay attention to my words.” He pointed out the orientation of the map compared to the river they had just crossed. He pointed to a dot on the map. “That is the city we just left.” He pointed back along their trail. “That way.” Then he brought Paddn’s attention back to the map, where he traced his finger toward his destination. “This is where we need to go next.” He pointed toward the dark horizon in front of them. “That way.” Then he hugged Paddn close and flew. Sean knew he had succeeded in bringing him with him when he felt the boy’s hands clench his arms to hold on.

  Like an eagle, they flew over fields, pastures, orchards and forests. They spotted tiny villages here and there, but they were dark this time of night and Sean was looking for something much larger. The ground under them rose to leave behind many of the fields, then leveled out again to make way for more, though the main crop here was grain.

  After crossing a vast river that ran east and west, Sean found a fair sized city, but flying through it didn’t reveal a garrison or even a wall. If this is Remi, why is there was no walled garrison or city fortification? But since his flag flew above what looked like the main house, it had to be the district capital. Curious. He flew on, certain he had found a garrison in this area last time he had been through here. Both Ferris and Elias had agreed there was one here, somewhere.

  Sean followed the wide plateau until he found another huge river cutting across the landscape. There, overlooking the river, wasn’t a city after all, but a garrison, standing alone like a medieval fortress complete with a portcullis in the gatehouse, towers at every corner and what might be a castle in the center, though Sean suspected it housed troops rather than a king. He could be wrong, though.

  He circled the walls and saw guards pacing along their tops, protected by fat crenellations. Grimly, Sean turned away from the garrison and began to search for a suitably isolated location for their camp.

  After rejecting several sights, he settled on a location overshadowed by bluffs on the west. There was water, too. The only drawback was that it was over ten miles from the garrison.

  With his search completed and his site located and marked, Sean returned to himself. Paddn still clutched his sleeves and he was panting. Sean continued to hold him until his breath slowed and his racing heart calmed. “Tomorrow, after camp has been packed up, I’ll open a gate and we’ll step directly from here to that campsite below the bluff. That way, no one can follow our tracks.”

  “I don’t think I like to…to fly,” said Paddn, as he succeeded in letting go of Sean’s sleeves.

  Sean smiled as he helped him to his feet without knocking over the lamp. “I suppose it might take some getting used to.”

  Sean stood too and rolled up the map, then he had to catch Paddn as he doubled over to empty his stomach violently. Sean sent his ‘sick’ away so the odor wouldn’t cause another bout, then he rested a hand on Paddn’s stomach and settled it. “Mattie would make you a tea, but she’s asleep and I don’t want to wake her.” The dark circles under Paddn’s eyes stood out in his pale face. “I could help you sleep, if you want.”

  “Are you going to sleep?”

  “I can never tell. I plan to try, though,” replied Sean.

  “Can I lay down by you?”

  “Sure.” Sean wondered about it, though. Was Paddn just insecure, or was there some other reason? He blew out the lamp and they went to retrieve Paddn’s blanket before settling back down by the coals of Sean’s fire to stretch out. After pushing him into sleep, Sean lie there for a few minutes gazing at the moons as they danced with the clouds.

  Thoughts of breaching the castle he had seen evolved into a dream about burning the gate and storming the central castle on Prince with an unidentified someone at his side. At first, he thought it was Manuel, but he wasn’t riding the right horse. Then he thought it was Laon, only he knew it wasn’t. Laon was inside the castle with Jenny, Larry and Errol. The smell of smoke caused him to wake with a start and many of the more confusing parts of the dream only got more confusing in the light of day.

  Paddn was curled up into a tight knot, but his breathing was deep and regular, so at least he was sleeping.

  “What are you going to do with them?” whispered Mattie, indicating the sleeping Paddn as she brought Sean a bowl of cooked oats. He liked oatmeal better, but this was all right. He also missed brown sugar, but the local stuff was good enough, being something like a cross between white and brown.

  “I found us a campsite near my next garrison,” Sean whispered back. “I’m not planning anything else today, so I’ll talk to them. I’ll see if I can help them.”

  She knelt down beside Sean and rested a hand on his face. “You’re running a fever again.”

  “I’ll get more sleep when we get there, I promise.”

  She nodded and moved off.

  I have a fever? What is it this time, the flu? Great. He hoped no shrouded ghosts were involved this time. He finished his breakfast and stood, picking up his blanket to shake it out. Paddn startled awake at the sound. Sean was just about to tell him good morning and send him to find Mattie for breakfast, when he saw him go white as a sheet as his eyes widened with terror.

  Sean turned around to see Ludwyn standing there. He was holding himself rigid. He wasn’t quite an albino, but Sean could see why Paddn had been so terrified.

  “Y-you c-can’t h-hold m-me f-forever,” stammered Ludwyn through gritted teeth.

  “No, I don’t suppose I can,” replied Sean. “As soon as you think you’re ready, I’ll fight you again. Maybe it’ll be more fair next time. Maybe I won’t be drugged out of my head. Unless, of course, you would rather use a sword. You do remember how to use a sword, don’t you? Why don’t you go back to your keepers? We’ll be moving out in a little while.”

  Ludwyn stiffened even more, if that was possible. Sean could see that he was trying to push through his shield. “You b-bastard.”

  Sean grinned maliciously; he certainly felt malicious just then. “I’m your nephew, Ludwyn, and if I’m a bastard, it’s not from lack of proper parentage. My parents were married after all. Now, go back to your keepers.” The last bit was a compulsion and Sean watched him gasp and try to resist. He turned jerking with the effort. Within a few steps, the men who were supposed to be in charge of him ran up to retrieve him.

  “Sorry sir,” one of them said. “He slipped away.”

  “See that you watch him more closely,” said Sean.

  They hurried him away struggling against them and the compulsion without success.

  Sean turned back to his blanket and saw Paddn still sitting frozen where he had been. His blanket forgotten, he knelt down beside him. “Paddn, are you all right? Paddn…Paddn, answer me.” Sean turned his face so the boy would look at him.

  He blinked, and after a few shaky gasps he said, “I thought… He looks…”

  “Yeah, I noticed,” said Sean, “but he’s not. He’s my nightmare, not yours.” Sean looked at his face closer. “Are you all right now?”

  Paddn took another shaky breath and nodded, climbing to his feet. He looked better too, now that he wasn’t sheet-white anymore and the dark circles were gone from under his eyes.

  “Go find Mattie and try to eat some breakfast. We’ll be moving camp soon,” said Sean.

  He nodded and moved off, throwing his blanket over his shoulder. As he went, Sean thought about his words, which had followed his first thoughts as well. He had heard somewhere that royal families commonly intermarried. It only stood to reason that there would be some family resemblances here and there. The on
ly difference between the Nord albino and Ludwyn, aside from age and birthright, was the fact that Ludwyn had black eyes instead of pink. It made him wonder if there had been other resemblances. It also made him wonder if he would meet others like them.

  Preparations for moving didn’t take long; the men were used to it by now and they had been expecting it. This camp had been impromptu at best with only a handful of tents set up here and there. It helped that his tent hadn’t been set up either; it was easily the largest tent in camp, being big enough to stand up and walk around in. Aside from having to look for his lamp he hadn’t missed it, though it had been nice to be inside when it rained.

  The Medicine of Play

  The first thing Sean noticed when he stepped through the gate was that the air was much dryer. It was almost like stepping out of the swimming pool and into an oven, though it really wasn’t much warmer.

  As camp was being reconstructed in full this time, Sean walked around in order to get a better impression of the area, and to ease his aching bruises from having been knocked off his horse. His still had a headache too, though his eye and cheek were still swollen and tender.

  He waded into the ankle-deep creek to a flat stone in its center. The bubbling of the shallow creek was soothing, and it deadened most of the sound from the bustling camp.

  Sean looked down at the rock. It would be tight, but he could do it. He drew his twin swords and began a set. The rock was big enough that, with him standing in its center, he had room for a little better than half a step in any direction, so instead of doing something at speed, he elected to do it all with meticulous slowness. He was hard on himself; if he screwed up and missed a step, or slipped a move, he started over from the beginning. He learned long ago that just learning the routines was all and good, and hard enough, but it’s every bit as difficult doing it slowly and perfectly. At that pace all the little faults show up glaringly.

  Sean closed his eyes, feeling every move, every step, making every flex and arc smooth and slow. After about an hour, his shoulders were starting to ache and he knew that the tips of his swords were no longer steady, so he finished the set and opened his eyes to discover that he had an audience.

  A glance around the camp revealed that the tents had all been set up and the horses were all out grazing. There were still a few things being moved around and settled into place, but essentially the camp was complete and the kids who watched him had finished their chores.

  Sean could see that they were adjusting to their two-dimensional world very well by themselves, but he didn’t think it would be fair of him to put off talking with them any longer. He sheathed his swords and waded back across the creek. He waved them all to follow him, asking the closest if they were all present.

  “Lyra and Sicily are with Kendal,” replied one boy.

  “Go get them, would you? Even the boy; I’m going to find someplace where we can all talk.”

  A few minutes later, Laon came carrying the small boy who must be Kendal, flanked by two older girls who must be Lyra and Sicily; one of them was the girl who had first spoken to him. She was dressed in blue divided riding skirts now; blue looked good on her. The other girl was dressed in brown and mousy gray.

  Sean took the boy from Laon. “You should go back to the camp. It may not be very comfortable around here for you.”

  Laon gave him a critical look, but took his advice and hung back, though he stayed within sight.

  Sean found an accommodating rock and sat looking at all their young faces. His location didn’t allow them to array themselves around him like the petals of a flower, but they still tried to group themselves by their magic prominence. I wonder if they do that by rote, or if it is something more instinctive.

  Sean looked down at the boy, Kendal, in his arms. He was thin and pale, and physically so delicate that he could have been a girl with little imagination. He wasn’t crying anymore, and though his eyes were open, he wasn’t looking at anything.

  He looked over the gathering again. “How many of you want to forget what happened back there? Keep in mind, forgetting leaves you wide open to make the same mistakes you have already made, meaning things done through you before, might be things done by you someday.”

  Sean watched them as they tried to understand what he was saying. “I was able to distance Berck from the memories, and I can do that for you too, but I’d need to do that one at a time.” He looked down at Kendal. I will need to do something more drastic with this one. Sean brushed his hand over the boy’s eyes. “Sleep,” he said the compulsion as softly as he could. “Sleep and forget for a while. When you wake up, you’ll be a brand new person and your memories will be there when you need them.”

  With a tremulous sniff, Kendal closed his eyes and slept. When Sean looked up again there was more than one tear leaking down across a cheek. “Kendal won’t remembers anything when he wakes up, so I expect he’ll ask questions. Be gentle with your answers, but answer his questions; I didn’t take his memories too far away, so your answers will prompt recall.”

  “Kendal’s really messed up,” said one boy in the middle of the group. “I think you should take his memories away completely.”

  “What you suggest might seem like the right thing to do now, but eventually he’d figure out what happened, and without memories he’d be tortured by the belief that surely there had to have been something he could have done. His memories might be horrible, most of your memories are probably pretty bad, but finding out you did terrible things and not remembering how helpless you were, would be so much worse.”

  Some of the boys began to fidget; the subject was depressing. Sean’s original idea of doing some sort of blanket spell over them didn’t seem necessary…not anymore, so he had another idea. “Larry, can you hear me?”

  “Yeah, I hear you. Where are you?”

  “I’m over here at the end of camp. You’re good at sports; come teach these kids how to play soccer.”

  When he showed up around the edge of Sean’s tent, Sean made him a ball and bounced it at him. He caught it deftly. “I’m not sure I remember how; I might be a little rusty,” he said grinning.

  Jenny, at his elbow, was grinning too and she nudged him in the ribs. “Just remember that only the goalies can use their hands,” she said.

  At the sight of a ball, the kids’ faces lit up. They may not know the game, but a ball could only mean one thing: play, and they’d had precious little of that over the past few years.

  Sean watched as Larry and Jenny divided up the teams. They couldn’t play girls against the boys because there were only four girls, so they did their best to make the teams as evenly balanced as they could. Once that was done, they started clearing the field of larger rocks and setting up goals, all while Larry was explaining the rules.

  Due to the difference in ages within the teams they bent a few of those rules, but since the goal was ‘play’, that didn’t matter all that much. The four youngest boys were the goalies, two on each side. The girls were supposed to be the last defensive line, but it all deteriorated quickly.

  As Sean faded again, he seemed to recall Larry scooping up one of his goalies who happened to have the ball, and run, dodging all the players, all the way to the other end of the field so that he could throw the ball past the opposing goalies.

  At Jenny’s laughing protests about him trying to play football, he said, “I didn’t touch the ball.”

  When Sean woke, it was dark and he was in his bed, in his tent. He had no idea if he’d walked here on his own or if someone had carried him. There was one hot body curled next to his side and another one crowding his feet. He turned his head to see who was beside him and his dry throat rebelled. He started to cough and had to sit up until he could control it.

  Laon poked his head in. “Are you all right?” he asked, concerned.

  “Oh just peachy,” replied Sean, as he lay back down. His throat felt raw and the cool air down his back left him chilled. Neither of his bedwarmers had moved
.

  Mattie came in with the morning sun streaking in behind her through the tent flap and her cool hand on his forehead woke him to another bout of coughing that felt like he was trying to rid himself of his lungs. “You’re still running a fever. I think you should stay in bed today.” She chivied Charles out of bed, but didn’t disturb young Kendal.

  Sean agreed with her. He still had a headache, and as soon as he moved, he felt the rest of his aches too. Great, he had an entire castle to conquer only ten miles away and he was doing good to make it outside to pee.

  By the time he got back, Mattie had his breakfast of hot cereal waiting for him, but after a few bites he just couldn’t eat anymore. Chilled to the point of shivering, he crawled back into bed beside Kendal.

  His shivering ultimately woke the kid, who looked at him with bleary eyes. “Why are you shivering? You feel hot to me.”

  Mattie came in then. “He’s sick, Kendal. Why don’t you go outside?”

  He looked confused, but he went. “Is this the first time he woke up?” asked Sean.

  “Yes, it is. Here, I want you to drink this tea, then I want you to go back to sleep.”

  “Mattie, I don’t have time to be sick.”

  She watched to make sure he drank all of the tea. “You have been beating yourself against your wall for weeks now; you’re worn out, it’s pure luck you haven’t been sick before this. If you want to continue to keep the pace you’ve set for yourself, you need to take the time to get better now.”

  “I’m cold,” he said as he handed her back the empty cup. He couldn’t fight her, she was right, but he had never been a good patient; he couldn’t stop himself from complaining either, and he couldn’t think of anything else to say, so he shut his mouth and pulled his blankets up under his chin.

  Sean spent the next two days in bed alternating between sweating and throwing his blankets off, and shivering and wishing he had more blankets. He wasn’t hungry, but he still tried to eat something; every time he did, about a half an hour later, he got rid of it violently, one way or another.