by John March
He lowered the boy to the snow behind a broad tree and calmly stepped forward, controlling his breathing, and relaxing his awareness. Against a group, he couldn't hope to press an attack while still protecting the boy.
Two dozen dark-clad figures moved through the trees towards him, running across the snow with unnatural swiftness. Even at a distance of forty or fifty yards their speed might have allowed for an effective ambush if he'd been unprepared.
The ones facing him slowed as they closed, whilst those on the sides raced forward to outflank him. A detached part of him noted the orchestrated pattern of attack — not chance, but the product of careful training.
Subliminally he registered no tracks in the snow under the feet of most of the figures. So skilfully crafted illusions, copies of the two or three real men, intended to distract and confuse.
He felt surges in his extended awareness from left and right as his real foes unleashed simultaneous attacks. A hail of stones snapped into the air between Orim and the man on his left, each the size of a small egg, hissing towards him like a volley of sling-shots. From the other side, a fraction behind the stones, a shower of razor-edged darts humming in a broad sweep.
Reacting smoothly, Orim flicked out an expanding shield of flame before him, a cluster of tiny flaming motes, each ballooning outwards, and merging together to form a rushing wall of fire across an arc to his front.
The stones fell smoking from the air and came to a rest near his feet, glowing hot, and hissing in the snow. The darts turned to small puffs of flying ash.
As the expanding wave of roiling flame crashed into surrounding trees and slowed, Orim cast his remaining three were-flames directly ahead, aiming at where he sensed the illusionist, the flames growing as they created erratic spark-filled smoky trails through the cold air.
With a flash brighter than the sun, each fireball slammed into tree or earth, and exploded. Fragments of wood flew past Orim and a gigantic eruption of flaming gas rolled outwards from the impact points, shrouding the forest for scores of paces, rising in a couple of heartbeats to many times higher than the surrounding trees.
The shock felt like a single extended convulsion running through the ground, and the illusions flickered, vanishing to reveal two flanking attackers closing fast between the burning trees.
He recognised the tactic now. Most casters would prefer to stay at a distance, having no experience in fighting at close quarters. These men were trained to close quickly.
With a flick of his hand, one of the stones at his feet jumped into the air, another gesture shooting it at the man closing on his left. A dull thud recorded the hit — but Orim had already moved to his right. His final opponent lunged forward with a raking thrust from his short-sword.
The familiar weight of Orim's hidden axe settled into his right hand as he stepped forward, angling inside the attack in a single fluid motion. He swung in a short arc, leaning his weight behind the blow.
The head of the axe caught the man just below his chin, slamming him backwards in a spray of crimson, and Orim allowed the momentum of the swing to carry him round as he dropped to one knee, facing in the other direction with his weapon poised to throw.
Ten paces away, the man struck by his own stone lay motionless with his arms flung out, weapons lying loose in the snow.
Both wore the distinctive black garb of Cassadian mercenary assassins, and contracts for men such as these were always costly.
Without pausing, Orim stood and returned to where the boy lay behind the tree, face bright with fever. Ignoring the choking sounds from the dying man on the ground, he hoisted the boy onto his shoulder, and prepared to return to Fyrenar.
So much trouble for one so small.
A Visitor
EBRYN WAS IN HIS eighteenth year, with the trees turning to shades of rust, and the first icy winter winds blowing from the northern mountains, scattering their broad leaves, when he was summoned to an audience with Lord Conant.
Ezo, the gardener, found him in the stables, brushing down his horse after a morning riding. He'd named the large palomino stallion Soren, in the local dialect, for its wilful temperament. The squeaking of the wheelbarrow that heralded Ezo's arrival unsettled the horse, causing it to pull away, ears folding back.
Ezo appeared at the open stable doors, an empty wheelbarrow in front of him, and peered inside and grunted, “You’re wanted by the lord, there's a stranger f'ya”
Clearly satisfied he'd delivered his message adequately Ezo shuffled round and started back down the path to the manor without waiting for a reply.
Placing a calming hand on Soren's neck Ebryn eased carefully out of the stall. He rinsed his hands in the trough at the front of the stable block before splashing his face and hair.
Watching Ezo make his way slowly down the slope towards the orchard, Ebryn considered whether he should go directly to Lord Conant's chambers, or first change from his riding clothes.
He'd lived here for as long as he could remember, and in all that time Lord Conant had asked to see him on no more than five or six occasions. Only twice before had anybody arrived just for him.
He cast a critical eye over his clothes, brushing away a few stray pieces of straw and horse hair. Now standing nearly a head taller than the average man, Ebryn wore dark grey riding trousers, three-quarter length boots, and a white shirt of heavy linen with leather reinforced doublet.
Good enough, he decided, curiosity getting the upper hand. Better to risk appearing inappropriately dressed than keep a visitor waiting.
Ebryn raced down the path to catch up with Ezo. The gardener had been ancient for as long as he could remember. Short and spectrally thin, with a face like the knot in a tree, the old man had more white hairs growing in wispy tufts from his ears than on top of his head. He wore ill-fitting shapeless russet clothes, a long green gardening apron, with oversized boots smelling vaguely of damp soil and wood smoke.
Ebryn slowed down and fell into step just as he reached the entrance to the orchard. “Who is it? Is it someone from the village?”
Ezo continued to stare directly ahead, not looking at Ebryn. The response took so long Ebryn was starting to wonder if Ezo had heard him.
“Dunno … stranger.”
As always Ezo seemed uncomfortable in his company, something Ebryn attributed to his youthful efforts in the vegetable plots.
Growing plants was something Ebryn had proved extraordinarily skilled at — producing huge quantities of nearly perfect insect-free courgettes, tomatoes, and herbs. As the growing season progressed and the abundance of Ebryn's small section of vegetable patch become obvious, Ezo had become increasingly distant. Confused and uncomfortable at this unexpected outcome, Ebryn made no further attempts at helping in the garden, but the old gardener hadn't softened in all the years since.
A short way into the orchard, Ezo peeled off, mumbling something about plums, pushing his wheelbarrow doggedly across the bumpy ground between two rows of trees.
The nearest entrance to the manor house went through the kitchens. Inside he found Fidela, the housekeeper, cutting up vegetables with a very large knife. Her mouth was pulled into a thin line, and the knife slammed into the chopping board with each cut.
As angry as she appeared, she still looked up to check the state of his boots as he walked in. Ebryn wondered whether, in her never-ending quest to find the one she could mould into the perfect cleaning maid, one of the village girls had upset her again, or perhaps one of the young stablemen had used a word she didn't like hearing.
“Ezo told me there's someone here to see me,” Ebryn said.
The knife hit the board so hard it sent the head of a carrot skittering across the table onto the floor.
“He's in the library. With Lord Conant.”
Ebryn slowed at the door. “Why is Lord—”
“It's rude to keep people waiting.”
“Yes, sorry,” Ebryn said hurriedly as she took a deep breath for what looked like a lengthy tirade.
/> He walked quickly along the passageway and entered the library, stopping just inside the door, feeling suddenly awkward.
He'd spent a great deal of his time in here alone, reading through the extensive book collection, and thought of this space as his own. The last time he'd been in here with another person it had been his final lesson with master Yale.
Two men sat in chairs on a slightly raised dais on the other side of the room, next to a large window. The first, Lord Conant, he recognised, although a number of years had passed since Ebryn had last seen him, but his eyes were drawn to the second man, clearly foreign, who sat on the edge of a high-backed chair.
He had a head that seemed to be too large for his body with a semi-circle of short hair surrounding a large pale bald patch on top, dressed in a long dark robe of midnight blue fastened with a familiar ornate silver clasp.
Ebryn felt a rush of anticipation. Despite his peculiar looking dome and sallow skin, which combined with his dark robes to give the disconcerting impression that his head was somehow detached and floating loosely tethered above his body, Ebryn recognised the style of dress. The same as that worn by his previous tutors. Ebryn stared. Was this the stranger Ezo had said was here for him?
After a few moments they seemed to notice him.
Conant eased himself round in his chair so he could look at Ebryn without turning his neck. “Ah, come in Ebryn.”
Ebryn stopped a few paces from the dais and executed a short formal bow. “Sir?”
Lord Conant was extremely old. He might once have been tall, but his joints and bones had twisted so badly with the advancing years that he gave the impression of a man shrinking into himself.
His back and shoulders were bent. To look Ebryn in the face he had to tilt his head back uncomfortably far on its thin neck. His skin, loose and covered in large brown age spots, had a bloodless papery appearance. Ebryn could well understand why Fidela said he'd spent most of his time in recent years in the town of Vepser for its hot springs, and bathing houses.
Conant regarded Ebryn benignly through rheumy eyes. “Been out riding, I hear?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Excellent, excellent. What else would a healthy young man be doing on a fine day like this? I can tell you there was no stopping me when I was your age, there was no stopping me from anything,” he said, giving Ebryn a conspiratorial wink.
Conant raised an arm with obvious effort and waved it vaguely in the direction of the second man, “This fellow tells me he's here from Vergence for you. Fancy that, Ebryn. Must be what comes of learning to read, eh?”
Conant chortled as if enjoying a private joke. He glanced around at the walls of books with a faintly bemused expression. “Never learnt myself of course — too busy with my duties. Leave that kind of thing to those with nothing better to do.”
Ebryn nodded politely but his eyes were on the other man.
Conant gave his companion a puzzled look, “Don't recall sending for the fellow though. Mind you lad, when you get to my age you'll be lucky to remember your own name. What did you say you were called again?”
The second man shifted in his seat. He looked bored, and one of his feet started to make rapid tapping motions on the floor. “Master Quentyn from Vergence.” His voice was reedy, and had an unpleasant petulant tone.
“Master, eh? So you’ll be wanting to take the boy with you then?”
Quentyn looked directly at Ebryn for the first time. “If he passes the test.”
Ebryn felt like something inside his stomach had flipped over. He looked from Conant to Master Quentyn, feeling oddly light-headed, as if he had suddenly stepped into a dream where he watched himself.
Despite Conant's protestations, nothing about the old man's demeanour suggested the idea of Ebryn going to Vergence was a great surprise. Rather he seemed excessively pleased at the prospect. Perhaps master Yale had planned this with Conant before he left, and neither had thought to tell him.
After a few moments he realised they were both watching him, expecting some kind of response.
“What kind of test?” he asked.
“Ah … it wouldn’t be a test if I told you beforehand, hmm?”
“Secrets, eh,” Conant said, winking at Ebryn again. “Good, good. Now that’s all sorted, I have to return to Vepser. I’m sure you’ll do magnificently young Ebryn — a credit to us all.”
“I’ll do my best,” Ebryn said.
As a foundling, or worse, he knew he had no claim on Conant, and had already benefited from the old man's excessive generosity — raised with privileges fit for the son of a minor lord. All the same Ebryn felt oddly uncomfortable that Conant should take such a huge change to his life so lightly, without either warning or consulting him.
“That’s the spirit isn’t it, eh, Quentyn?” Conant said, leaning forward in his seat. “Give me a hand up then, lad. We can have something to eat and I’ll leave you two to get on with it.”
After a quick meal of flat-bread, cheese, hard-boiled eggs and fruit in the kitchen with Fidela, Ebryn made his way back to the morning room where he'd left Conant and his guest.
Located between the library and kitchens, the morning room was one of the warmest in the building. Even with the onset of winter the room still managed to capture some heat from the low sun and the wall which backed onto the kitchen ovens. Scattered around the room were a number of short tables and an assortment of uncomfortably low couches, and chairs.
He discovered Quentyn there alone, staring out of one of the windows. South-facing full-length windows provided a view of the gardens and, through a gap in the trees, a distant glimpse of the sea.
An untouched roasted wood-fowl lay on one of the tables. At another, next to Quentyn, sat a small device which appeared to be assembled from a bundle of finely drawn silvery wires, with five projecting a short way up like small horns.
Quentyn turned as Ebryn approached and moved to a seat nearest the strange device. It looked like some oversized metallic insect crouched there facing him, and emanated something which charged the air around the table like a developing storm.
“Ah … sit down. This won't take long,” he said, pointing at a chair opposite.
Ebryn nodded at the device opposite him. “What's that?”
“— Just be quiet, I'll tell you what to do.”
Quentyn fiddled and fussed with the device for a while, and at first Ebryn watched with interest. As time went on his attention wandered to the sunlight filtering through the window. He tried hard not to yawn.
After a span, in which the light seemed to shift around the room, Quentyn sat upright with the fingers of both hands resting on the depressions amongst the wires.
“Now try to tell me what you feel happening,” Quentyn said.
“What do you mean?” Ebryn said, staring at the bundle in Quentyn's hands.
“The prongs, if you feel something at the top of the prongs, you tell me.”
Ebryn held out his hand towards the device.
“Don't touch.”
“Sorry,” Ebryn said, pulling back. “When should I start?”
“Um, now.”
Nothing seemed to happen, and after waiting for a while he glanced up at Quentyn. He was about to ask again when he felt something move at the terminus of one of the spikes. There was nothing visible, but it felt to him as if he was being drawn invisibly, almost as if tugged, to a point a thumb's width above one of the points.
“That one,” Ebryn said
Five more times he felt himself drawn to one of the points, a different one each time, and once to an indentation near the base of the contraption, at which point Quentyn released the device and sat back in his chair, mopping at a faint trace of perspiration with his long sleeve.
“What's next?” Ebryn asked.
“The test is complete.”
“Is that it?” Ebryn asked, disappointed. The whole thing amounted to nothing. He'd been expecting something more impressive.
“Yes, finished,�
� Quentyn said, not looking Ebryn in the eye.
Ebryn waited a few moments before he realised Quentyn wasn't going to say anything more.
“How did I do, did I pass?”
“You were … adequate. You may choose to accompany me back to Vergence, if you wish.”
Ebryn stared at Quentyn. “What, today?”
“When arrangements have be made — a day or two. Now, I saw a few promising books in the next room, anything to make the wait bearable, hmm.”
Once in the library Quentyn showed no sign of leaving. And although Ebryn felt some sense of obligation to the man, both as a guest and now, he thought, a fellow caster, his efforts quickly waned.
Quentyn wandered around the library, ignoring Ebryn and examining books, all the while making odd noises. He cleared his throat constantly, hummed in a high pitched tone and made clicking noises against the roof of his mouth with his tongue.
Ebryn wanted to sit somewhere quiet and digest the day’s events, and as soon as he thought he'd remained the minimum time to be polite, he excused himself. Outside, he changed his mind, and headed back to the stables. A ride as far as Conant village, by himself, would help him think more clearly on the decision.
A brisk shore breeze had replaced the chilly northerly of the morning, penetrating the edges of the woods, and blending the scent of sea salt with evergreens.
Ebryn avoided the main lane to Conant village. He preferred to follow wild animal trails between the trees, relying on Soren's sure hooves, enjoying the freedom from curious eyes.
Sarl
BRIGHT RED SPARKS leapt and skipped along the surface of the anvil with each blow, fading to nothing as they tumbled to the dark floor. Sarl's work had achieved a rhythm now as he hammered the end section of a lengthy iron stanchion into a curve around the horn of the anvil.
