“A stupid boy bumped into me in the courtyard, the wizard’s servant?”
Forne sprung to his feet, with uncharacteristic excitement. “You met Lord Salva’s servant? Pray tell, what is he like?”
“An ignorant farm boy, why?” Kyre draped the tunic over the back of a chair.
Forne sat back down. He could see he had work to do. “Ignorant farm boy he may be, but Koren Bladewell is the boy who rescued princess Ariana. In the course of one morning, he scared away a giant bear, saved her from plunging over a waterfall, and held off a troop of bandits by himself.”
Kyre was not impressed. “And in the afternoon, did he slay a dragon and defeat Acedor’s army?” He remarked flippantly. “This just a silly rumor.”
“Sit down, Kyre.” Forne said in a flat voice. There were times when Kyre was the heir of Burwyck province, and other times he was a spoiled, arrogant boy. And times when the spoiled boy part of him threatened his own inheritance. This was exactly the sort of situation Duke Falco expected Forne to handle, to guide his son. “It is not just a rumor, I have heard from good sources that what the rumor says is true. This boy Koren saved the life of our crown princess, even if the entire story isn't true. If you had been paying attention to me, or what is going on at court, you would know that Lord Salva was impressed with this ignorant farm boy, as you described him, and asked the Regent to appoint him as the wizard’s personal servant. You would also know that princess Ariana considers Koren to be her hero.” Forne paused. “Now that I think of it, I don’t know why Carlana didn’t grant the boy a knighthood, at least. That is curious, very curious. I shall have to make inquiries around the court. I have heard that, while Koren recovered from his wounds in Duke Yarron’s castle, he and Ariana spent much time together, and now they are quite inseparable. He rode here from LeVanne in the royal coach.”
Kyre sat down, chastened. Like all eldest sons and daughters of the Dukes who ruled Tarador’s seven provinces, Kyre had on his eleventh birthday been sent to spend four years living at the royal palace. The custom was intended to ensure the future leaders were raised to be responsible, experienced, and loyal to the crown. There was also a darker purpose; while at the palace, they were hostages in case their parents had any ideas of overthrowing the ruling king or queen. Kyre’s father had high hopes, as did the other six Dukes, that his son would marry Ariana someday, and toward that end, Kyre had been instructed to become close friends with the crown princess. So far, Ariana had been civil and polite to Kyre, but no more. “I should make an effort, a strong effort, to become friends with this Koren? If he thinks well of me, and speaks of me to Ariana-“
“Exactly, young Sire.” Forne tactfully agreed with the obvious. “And something else, which can be worked to our advantage-“
“You mean my advantage, Forne.”
Forne bowed ever so slightly; barely enough to show the respect due to Kyre as heir to the dukedom, not so much as to imply that Forne felt any more respect that he was obliged to. “The advantage of the Falco’s, young Sire, I live to serve.”
“Go on.”
“Rumor has it, and my source on this is always accurate, that Koren was abandoned by his parents.” Forne laid out the story of the Bladewell’s banishment from Crebb’s Ford, and how his parents drove away in their wagon, never to return. “My source tells me Koren blames himself for his parents abandoning him, that if he had not caused them so much trouble, they wouldn’t have been forced to leave him alone in the wilderness. In the long term, Sire, it would be best if Koren were not here to be Ariana’s friend, so that she would have to turn to someone else for friendship. If Koren could be convinced that him being a jinx is a danger to Ariana, or that Carlana will throw him out on the street once she grows tired of the boy-“
“I understand, Forne.” Kyre said with a wicked smile. “My father was wise to send you here to serve me. Now there is only one problem you need to help me with.”
“What is that, young Sire?”
Kyre didn’t quite know how to say it, couldn’t believe he would ever in his life have to say such a thing. “How does one apologize to a common-born servant?”
There was a pounding noise coming from the heavy wooden door at the base of the wizard’s tower, three floors below where Koren had set down his satchel. “Hello?” Someone was shouting, although to Koren’s ear, it sounded like ‘Huhloo?’
Koren walked back to the stairway, and leaned out the narrow window to look down. There was a boy, a little older than Koren, dressed in faded, well-worn clothes, and a type of cloth cap that Koren had noticed many of the servants wore. Koren couldn’t decide if the boy’s hair was a dark blonde, or a light brown, it was mostly tucked under his cap. “Hey down there.” Koren called out, since he didn’t know what else to say.
“Hey yourself. Is that you up there, Koren?” The boy asked, although Koren at first didn’t realize what he’d said, for the boy’s accent was so strong that what Koren heard was something like ‘Ay y’sell, izzat you uh thur, ko-en?’
“Uh, yes?” Koren guessed, still not sure what the boy had asked.
“You going to let me in? I ain’t got all day, you know.”
This time Koren figured, more from the fact that the boy was standing at the door than from his words, that he wanted to come into the tower. Koren hesitated. The tower didn’t belong to Koren, he didn’t know who else was allowed inside. “I’ll be right down.”
As he hurried down the stairs, Koren could hear through the windows that the boy outside was talking, either to Koren, or to himself. It sounded like “Be right down, he says, like him’s royalty and me sitting here cooling my heels, sure, why not, I can just stand here until the sun goes down, nothing else to do with my time- hello!” The boy exclaimed as Koren pulled the heavy door open.
“It wasn’t locked.” Koren announced defensively.
“And I’ll not be going in where I’m not invited.” The boy said indignantly. “This here’s your tower to take care of, got enough work, more than enough work, for myself. You can have this dusty old tower, with the weird goings-on in here, strange lights, and explosions, and smoke and mist coming out the windows all day and night, it’s like to give any honest person the creeps, I say.”
Koren gaped, he’d never heard anyone talk so much without pausing for breath. “Uh, hi? I’m Koren, Koren Bladewell of the Crickdon Bladewells, Winterthur province.” Koren announced, assuming from his conversation with Kyre Falco that family name and origins were the usual form of greeting in the castle.
“And Cully’s my name.” The boy snatched off his cap and bowed mockingly. “Oh, the Crickdon Bladewells," Cully said, "everyone knows how high and mighty those Bladewells from Crickdon are, compared to the other no-account dirt farming Bladewells everywhere else. Pleased to meet you, your lordship. Cully Runnet, of the Runnets round here, least, round here the past few years. Before that, round anyplace my Ma and Pa could find work.”
Koren’s face was red. “I didn’t mean- I’m just Koren. Lord Salva’s new servant.”
“I knows who you are, I got ears, I hear things. You can call me your official welcoming party of one.” Cully jerked his thumb back over his shoulder, toward the palace. “I work in the hospital, mostly, sometimes in the kitchens, if they need help. My Ma’s a physician in the hospital.” He looked down at the bundle in his other hand, and gesture for Koren to move aside. “You gonna block the door all day?”
“Oh, I, uh, I don’t know if I’m supposed to let people in.”
“Oh, bah!” Cully elbowed his way past Koren, and headed up the stairs like he owned the place. “Been here enough times myself, bringing firewood and whatnot to the master wizard, you think he fetched his food and firewood and whatnot by hisself? The court wizard?” Cully shook his head at Koren’s ignorance. “Like as not, he’d cast a spell and turn a toad into a servant to fetch his things. Or you into a toad, if you’re not careful, and don’t keep your nose clean and out of trouble, you hear me?”
“Seen it myself, I have.” Cully declared, and Koren didn’t know if he was joking or not. When he reached the landing on the third floor, Cully pushed open a door, went inside, and set down his bundle. “This be your room, I expect.” The room was small, although bigger than the room where Koren had slept in his parent’s home in Crebbs Ford, and there was a window, a wooden chest, and a bed frame with ropes for a mattress, and a small fireplace. “This here,” Cully nudged the bundle with his foot, “is clothes for you, and bedding,” he bent down to unwrap the bundle, “and lunch for both of us.” The lunch was several loaves of good, crusty dark bread, and cheese, and a smoked sausage, and two ripe apples. “It’s not much, but-“
“Not much?” Koren exclaimed. “It’s a feast!”
Cully smiled, and winked as if Koren had passed some sort of test. “Aye, for the likes of you and me, a feast. For the Quality people round here, over in the palace, this is rough fare, why, they’d turn up their noses at such as we say is a feast. The Quality, they have roasted pheasant, and honey cakes, and tarts with strawberries and fresh cream.” Cully spread the food out on top of the chest, and sliced the cheese and sausage with a knife from his pocket. He tore off a chunk of bread, layered it with sausage and cheese, and gestured for Koren to grab some food. “Come on, I’ll show you around.”
They climbed the tower, which was tall, but rather thin so that even at the bottom each level only had three or four rooms, with lots of closets and other cubbyholes. Koren reached out to tug open a door on the fourth level, when Cully slapped his hand away. “Don’t you be touching that, you fool! You see the sign there, that’s Lord Salva’s sign.” Cully pointed to a dark smudge on the door, like a smoke stain, that was vaguely in the shape of a lightning bolt. “Keep away from those, unless the wizard hisself tells you to go in there. Set off the banshees, otherwise, you will, shrieking demons that will wake up the whole castle, and bring a troop of guards pounding up the stairs.”
“Banshees?” Koren looked closely at the door, thinking Cully was playing a trick on him. It looked like any other, old, worn wooden door.
Cully shook his head. “Ah, good thing for you I came along. Don’t you know wizards set spells they call wards, to guard their things? You look for that sign on the door,” he paused, biting one of his knuckles while he thought, “of course, there are also invisible wards, wind you.”
“Invisible?” Koren swallowed hard, his throat suddenly dry, and not just from the bread he was eating. “How am I-“
“Don’t worry yourself about it,” Cully waved his hand assuringly, “I know which doors are warded. Or which doors are usually warded,” he added under his breath, “you never can tell with wizards.” He patted Koren on the shoulder. “I’ll show you which doors not to open.”
“What’s behind the doors that are warded?” Koren asked innocently.
Cully snatched off his cap in exasperation. “There you go, already getting yourself in trouble, scheming to stick your nose where it don’t belong! Can’t leave well enough alone, can you? And of course, I’ll get the blame, Cully, you should have warned the new boy, Cully, it’s your fault, Cully this and Cully that, it’s always me catches it hot when things go wrong around here.”
Koren backed away, holding his hands up, although one hand was still filled with bread, cheese and smoked sausage. “I was just curious, that’s all, I wouldn’t get you into trouble. Had enough trouble myself.” He said, trying to calm the other boy down.
“You best not.” Cully mumbled, calming down as quickly as he had exploded. “What’s behind those doors is none of our business, that’s what’s behind those doors. Especially not the business of a boy who just got to the castle, stepping right off the farm.” His voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper. “I seen behind a few o’ those doors a time or two, strange stuff in there. Potions, and scrolls, and books likely filled with dark magic, powerful dark magic. You best stay away, if you can.” He gestured for them to go up another floor in the tower. As they climbed, Cully patted Koren on the shoulder. “I hear you did get in trouble. Poaching in old Duke Yarron’s woods, eh?”
“I didn’t get in trouble for that!” Koren protested over a mouthful of sausage. “It was only a few fish, anyway.”
“Only a few fish, you says. No deer, no rabbits, that must grow thick in the duke’s private hunting reserve, and you wasn’t tempted, even with a hungry belly?” Cully winked. “Don’t you worry about it, the royalty taxes us, I say we tax them right back, by taking a couple deer once in a while, to fill our bellies.” They stopped in front of a door that displayed the faint lightning bolt symbol, Cully pointed to it, and Koren nodded that he understood. “Only a few fish or not, you coulda got in big trouble, if you hadn’t saved our princess. Say, is that story true?”
Koren hastened to repeat the story that Paedris had given to him. “I don’t know which story you mean, there’s a lot of wild tales going around, I hear. She fell in the river, and it was cold, and I was there to pull her out, before her guards could get there.” The genius of Paedris’ tale was that every word of it was true, so Koren didn’t have to remember much of a lie.
Cully seemed disappointed. The stories he’d heard, of a giant bear, and a raging river, and bandits, were so much better than the truth, he wished he hadn't asked. “You saved her, whatever the story is. And isn’t that like the Quality, huh? You save them, and the reward you get is to be stuck cleaning a dusty old tower for a wizard, who is likely as not to turn you into a frog someday, when he’s brewing up potions and not paying attention.”
Koren was about to protest that princess Ariana had treated him very well, and anyway, living in a castle was better than shivering and starving in the woods by himself over the coming winter. But just as he opened his mouth, Cully excitedly pointed out a large door, which Koren saw didn’t have any lightning bolt symbol.
“This door! This one!”
Koren saw that it was a large door, heavier that the other doors in the tower, and the wood was reinforced by iron bands. It had a large but simple lock. “What about it?”
“Stay away! You stay away from this door. That lock may look simple to pick, if you know how, but this is one of those doors I told you about, that has invisible wards. Or it did. Anyways, stay away, unless the master wizard tells you to go in there. And even then, you watch mind your business, and get out quick as you can.”
“I will. Thanks, Cully.” Being servant to a wizard was going to be a lot more complicated than Koren had thought.
"Now, here," Cully announced after they'd climbed another set of stairs, "is the wizard's bath room."
"A bath room?" Koren asked, peering over the other boy's shoulder to the partly open door. "What is a bath room for?"
"For bathing, you dimwit! What else would it be for?"
Koren's mouth dropped open. "There is an entire room just for taking baths?"
"Sure," Cully said matter of factly, enjoying the chance to play the role of a sophisticated castle resident, to Koren's country hick. "Where else would you bathe?"
Koren shrugged as he walked into the room. "We had a tub we'd put in the kitchen, that's where the stove is for heating the water."
"Oh." Cully was sorry for putting on airs in front of Koren. "That's what my family did, too. Before we got here, leastwise. The Quality, like the wizard, they use a room like this."
"Everyone has a room like this?" Koren's eyes fairly popped out of his head. Such luxury! He could scarcely imagine it!
"No, you dum-dum. Not me, and not you. But you think the princess bathes in a little metal tub? No, she has a bathing room that makes this," he gestured around the wizard's stone and tile bathing chamber, "look like a chicken coop."
Cully was going on about something, but Koren's brain was frozen on the image of the crown princess in her bathing room, her robe slipping down over her shoulders-
Koren coughed, shaking his head and thumpin
g his chest. "Sorry." He needed to get his mind off the princess, get his mind away from what was probably a treasonous thought, certainly dangerous. Looking at the large bathing tub, he groaned. "Ahhh, I have to haul buckets of water all the way up here?" He tried to figure how many buckets of water he needed to haul up to the fourth floor of the tower. And how was he going to heat that much water? By the time he had a couple buckets of water heated and poured into the tub, the water already in the tub would be cold! Who ever saw a tub that big? The wizard was a tall man, and even he could stretch his legs all the way out. A person could duck their head completely under the water!
Startled, Koren realized Cully had been snapping his fingers in front of Koren's nose. "Hey, ho, you listening to me?"
"Huh, sorry."
"I said, you don't need to haul any water up here, it comes out of the tap." Cully pointed to a metal pipe which came out of the wall and extended over the lip of the tub. Koren had been wondering what it was used for.
"The tap?"
Cully blew out a long breath, flapping his lips in exasperation. "The tap, the pipe, the water pipe." He turned the valve on top of the pipe, and water flowed out, into the tub, splashing loudly in the stone-lined room.
Koren jumped back. "Are you a wizard?"
"What? Me, a wizard? What in the world makes you think I'm a wizard?"
Koren pointed to the splashing water with a shaky finger, water which came from nowhere he could see. "That's magic?"
"Magic? You think that's magic? It's plumbing, you numbskull."
"Plumbing." Koren repeated the word slowly. "What is plumbing?" Carefully, hesitatingly, he touched the pipe with a finger, then drew back. It hadn't hurt.
Cully himself had only a vague idea of what plumbing was and how it worked, but he wasn't going to let Koren know that. "There's water pipes like this running lots of places in the castle, and especially in the palace. It comes from, from the river, and there's wheels, and," he guessed, "pumps and stuff that push the water along. So, when you open the tap, water comes out."
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