Cloak of the Two Winds

by Jack Massa

  "A jewel box," she said, lifting the hinged lid.

  It looked to Lonn that a pink mist sprayed into Karrol's face. She took a loud gasp of air and then sneezed, dropping the box back into the chest. Immediately she sneezed again, doubling over at the waist.

  "I warned you," Kizier intoned.

  Karrol sneezed a third time, and uttered a curse on the windbringer's roots. Her klarnmates gathered around her in concern.

  "What happened?" Lonn demanded, as Karrol sneezed again, more violently than before.

  "A cantrip," the windbringer answered, "a minor design laid on to discourage petty thieves. The sneezing will last a day or two, I suppose. You are lucky it was nothing worse."

  Karrol stood, both hands covering her nose, and continued to swear with tearful intensity between sneezes. Draven and Brinda stood patting her shoulders.

  "We'll force no more locks," Glyssa declared, shutting the lid on the small chest. "These things we've already unpacked, let Kizier tell us about them."

  "Yes," Eben said. "What are these books for?"

  The bostull's flexible stalk rotated so his eye could look at Eben. "Mostly they are treatises on witchery, containing designs and cantrips, as well as maxims and theoretical discourses."

  "But how does the witch use them?" Eben said, holding open one of the books.

  "She reads them, of course. The words, in their patterns, help to focus the power of her mind."

  "But how does this thing hold words?" Eben demanded with angry frustration.

  The bostull's eye grew rounder, and he made a noise like a sigh.

  "What is this for?" Glyssa asked, holding up one of the feathered ornaments.

  "It is called a desmet. It too is used to enhance the mind's force. By its placement in relation to other hanging trinkets it helps to concentrate thought energy, whether for knowing or shaping."

  "What do you mean by knowing and shaping?" Eben asked, and Karrol punctuated the question with a sneeze.

  "I mean the two basic arts of witchery," Kizier answered. "These ideas are commonplace in most of the human realms, but obviously not here. You who dwell farthest south in the world truly are as children compared to the peoples of the Three Nations."

  "Yes, so we've heard before, from the Tathians," Lonn grumbled. "But explain your meaning. What are these two magic arts?"

  "In Larthang they are called wei-shen and wei-xang, deepseeing and deepshaping. For both depend on the practitioner's ability to merge with the Deepmind."

  "And what exactly is the Deepmind?" Eben said.

  "Ah, my honorable barbarians. When you have answered that question you have done with all wisdom. For the Deepmind is indefinable and inexplicable. It is the very urge of creation, the unfathomable principle that makes and moves all things. The sages of Larthang call it the Ogo—the 'drift.' But all these words can only suggest, never encompass its nature. Truly the Deepmind is beyond understanding."

  "And how does the witch merge with what is beyond understanding?" Lonn demanded, baffled and annoyed by these mental gyrations.

  "By deepening her own mind, by turning inward. In so doing one may learn to perceive the patterns of the Ogo beyond the limits of ordinary senses. This is the way of deepseeing. And, with more application, one may learn to participate in the forming of the Ogo's manifestations. This is the way of deepshaping, by which small cantrips are fashioned and mighty ensorcellments woven."

  "We have shamans among the Iruk," Draven said, "Wise ones who speak with spirits to learn things, and can enlist their aid in forging charms. The two arts you describe sound much the same."

  "No doubt your wise ones practice rudimentary forms of magic," Kizier answered. "But the arts of the Larthang have been refined by thousands of years of practice, proven, and recorded in writing."

  "These trinkets we've taken from the witch," Lonn said. "They help her in these arts? Truly, they must be valuable then."

  "Not in any way you might think," the windbringer replied. "The trinkets were mostly made by Amlina herself, useful only to her, or perhaps to another with her knowledge and skill. In a remote colony such as Fleevanport, they're not likely to attract much of a price."

  "We should never have stolen them," Karrol moaned, woefully massaging her sinuses.

  Draven clapped her on the back. "Don't despair, mate. I still trust Lonn's dream over the word of this bostull—who is a friend of the lady we robbed, after all. Let's take the hoard on to Fleevanport and see what price it brings."

  "Draven is right," Lonn asserted. "Let's drink another round to toast our prospects."

  "But only one," Glyssa said. "This drink of Nyssan is potent."

  Lonn laughed and went to refill the wineskin. His mates packed up the witch's possessions, Glyssa putting things away with care while the others just tossed them into the basket and chest.

  After they'd shut the lids and lashed them down, the Iruks guzzled the sweet brandy, emptying the wineskin in a single round. Then the crew prepared for bed. They made the tent larger, adding skins and rope supports until it covered most of the area between mast and prow. The chore progressed none too smoothly, the crewmembers' hands and brains befuddled with all the drinking, but at last it was done.

  Karrol, still sniffing and sneezing, volunteered to keep lookout, saying she could not sleep anyway. She wrapped a bed-fur over her shoulders and climbed to the masthead.

  The others carried their furs into the tent and spread them out. They removed their capes, harnesses, and boots and put their weapons aside, then lay down close together to share warmth.

  But Lonn had trouble sleeping. The brandy was even stronger than he had reckoned. It made his head swim and his belly seethe. And Karrol's loud sneezing and swearing overhead kept startling him awake. The snatches of sleep he did get were troubled by weird dreams.

  First, he saw his mates back on board the Larthangan ship, inside the witch's cabin. But this time when Draven snatched her cloak away the witch sat up. Her face was hard and white like bone, and her eyes were mirrors. Lonn stared into one of those mirrors and saw himself and Eben and Draven, but they were older; with long beards and silken robes, holding strange colored lanterns.

  Later, Lonn dreamed of the dojuk hurtling over ice, chased by the other boats of the hunting fleet. Lonn kept yelling orders to his mates, but each of them worked to a different purpose, as though they couldn't hear or understand him. The dojuk careened wildly about, out of control and almost tipping over. Then the craft righted itself and started racing faster and faster, heading straight for a pressure ridge on the ice. Lonn yanked frantically at the tiller, but the boat would not respond, and the wall of ice reared closer and closer…

  Lonn awoke shivering, his skin covered in sweat. He pulled on his boots with shaking hands, grabbed his cape and crawled from the tent.

  Above him, Karrol had bound herself to the masthead. She seemed half asleep, breathing in long broken snorts and sneezing them out again. She took no notice of Lonn.

  The night was cold, bright with the vivid iceglow and with multitudes of stars. Speedy, red-faced Rog hung low in the northwest and Grizna, the huge peach-colored moon, had risen in the northeast, a bloated half-circle. Polar auroras glimmered and pulsed to the south, a series of white arches shrinking away to the horizon.

  Lonn walked aft and sat down beneath the tiller. Wrapped in his cape, hugging his knees, he pondered the evil dreams. The witch's mirror-eyes came back to him. What did the image mean? And the dojuk racing out of control—clearly a warning, but of what?

  Nothing in the dreams made sense, and Lonn soon lost hope of interpreting them.

  He had always been prone to powerful dreams. As a child it had even been suggested that he might be gifted as a dreamseer, might eventually train to become a shaman. But, though a sensitive child, in his heart he longed to be a hunter, to have his own boat and sail it fleetly over ice and sea. So he had learned to contain his deeper feelings, control them with the cold determination of a warr
ior.

  Still, when dreams as strong as the one of the treasure ship came, he felt compelled to believe in them. And when dreams like the ones tonight arose, he felt baffled and frightened.

  Head aching, he stared into the dazzling chaos of the sky. To the Iruks, the world was chaos—beautiful but terrifying. A warrior shielded himself from the terror by clinging to courage and action, to ritual and song, and most of all to the power of the klarn, the group soul that gave strength and protection.

  But what if those were not enough? What if Lonn's stubborn insistence that they steal from the witch had exposed his mates to dangers they could not imagine?

  Lonn gazed into the bright heavens, numbed by a fierce sense of foreboding. He pondered again, as he often did, if the others had chosen wisely in making him leader. True, he was best at piloting the boat, and as fierce a hunter as any. But being the leader required other skills, in which he felt himself sorely lacking—the ability to balance everyone's feelings and views, wisdom, diplomacy. Glyssa might have been a better choice, with her quick mind and easy nature, her gift for being liked. Or even Brinda, who though quiet and self-contained, never seemed ruffled and always acted with good sense.

  But everyone had decided Lonn was the best choice, had assured him he would learn. Tonight, more than ever, he was doubting the wisdom of their choice.

  Something moved forward on the boat, and Lonn jerked his head to look. But it was only Eben and Glyssa emerging from the tent. They knelt fastening on their capes and pulling up the hoods. They spotted Lonn in the stern and came toward him.

  "Are you all right?" Glyssa asked.

  He nodded. "Drank too much. Couldn't sleep."

  "Same with us," Eben said.

  "I heard you moaning," Glyssa remarked, leaning over close to Lonn. "Bad dreams?"

  "Nothing worth telling."

  "Are you sure?" Glyssa asked, looking anxious.

  "They were vague and stupid dreams," Lonn grumbled, not daring to show weakness. "I hardly remember them now."

  Glyssa frowned, unsatisfied, but did not press him further.

  "Brinda and Draven are the only ones sleeping well tonight," Eben said. "We decided to come and have words with the windbringer."

  Glyssa crouched beside Kizier and ran her gloved hand over the shiny base, where the brain was. The green eye above it flicked open, fully alert, for bostulls never slept and were easily roused from trance.

  "We've been thinking of what you told us about the magic of Larthang," Glyssa said. "We would like to hear more."

  "Indeed? What would you like to know?"

  "The Tathians say that the witchery of Larthang is the oldest and strongest in the world," Eben said. "How did they come to possess such wisdom?"

  "That is a vast question," Kizier replied. "To answer it thoroughly one would need to recount almost the whole history of Glimnodd."

  "You may do so," Glyssa answered. "We will listen."

  The windbringer shook a little, as though with laughter. "I will give you a shortened version then."

  Lonn moved closer to better hear the windbringer's words. He put an arm over Glyssa's shoulder, and the three Iruks huddled close together.

  Kizier recounted how the first deepshapers were witches of Larthang, who developed their arts more than seven thousand years ago, at a time when humans were the only sentient species in the world. By their witchery, he said, they made Larthang the greatest of nations, and lorded it over all of the world for centuries.

  But these ancient ones were careless, ignorant of the effects their powers could have. Eventually, the world began to show strain from their immense meddling in the Deepmind. The weather grew colder. Snowstorms blew for months on end. New islands reared up while others vanished forever into the sea. It was even recorded that one of Glimnodd's moons flew off into the void, leaving only the two now known.

  And nonhuman sentient species began to appear. Among these were the torms, winged people spawned by birds; the myro, sprite-like beings born of dolphins; and the bostulls, known to humans as windbringers. All of these sentient races had some ability to penetrate the Deepmind, but none that could match human deepshapers. That was until another kind of creature appeared in the sea—the serds, a kind of intelligent fish. These were few in number but great in their mental powers, and they lived for many times a human lifespan. The serds used deepshaping to make themselves able to breathe the air, then came out of the sea and enslaved the human world. They reigned over Glimnodd for many centuries, a time that came to be called the Age of the World’s Madness. During that age, humans and other races were subject to the serds' cruelties and abominations.

  But finally the reckless deepshaping of the serds brought about their downfall. The scales of the Deepmind tipped back, and a new race of humans came into being. These also were people of Larthang, but their powers in the Deepmind were greater than those of their ancestors, whom the serds had defeated, and far greater than the suppressed powers of their immediate forbears, whom the serds had kept as servants and pets. Led by the Witch King Tuan Tuo, this new generation rebelled against the serds, slaying many and driving the rest back into the sea. A few serds, descendants of those survivors, are thought to dwell still at the dark bottoms of the ocean.

  "The Dynasty of Tuan Tuo reigns still in Larthang," Kizier explained. "One hundred and fifty-three Tuans have held an unbroken line of succession for more than 29 centuries. Over all those generations, the arts of the Deepmind have been studied and refined by countless practitioners. But the greatest of these was unquestionably Eglemarde, the Archimage under the Fifteenth Tuan."

  "The Weaver of the Winds," Glyssa said. "We have heard her name. Some Tathians worship her as a goddess."

  "Indeed, and with fair reason," Kizier said. "For it was Eglemarde who recognized that the centuries of disruption, and the reign of the serds, had been brought about by too much witchery. She perceived that more cataclysms would inevitably come, unless some balance could be achieved. So, by a monumental feat of magic called the First Great Ensorcellment, Eglemarde bent the course of the Ogo. From that time onward, excessive shaping forces have spilled out of the Deepmind and into the sea. Thus the surface of the seas came to glow night and day with witchlight.

  "But this design alone proved insufficient, for the Deepmind was still reacting to the enormous stresses caused by the serds. So Eglemarde wove a Second Great Ensorcellment. She altered the workings of air and sea so that, at the times of greatest stress—which tend to correspond with times of changing weather—the magic winds would blow over the sea, venting the excess forces by changing the water to ice or the ice to water. The Two Winds she called Icemaker and Thawbringer, though they are now known as Glazer and Aubergale to the folk of Tath."

  "It is over two thousand years since the Two Winds first blew on the sea," Eben said. "This we were told by a wandering scholar in Fleevanport."

  "Two thousand, one hundred and twelve years," Kizier replied. "Thus it is recorded in Minhang the Beautiful, the Larthangan capital from whence the great design was cast. I see that you Iruks are more that is supposed in the Three Nations. You are ignorant, it is true, but not simple-minded. You have a thirst for knowledge and wisdom."

  "You are no common windbringer either," Glyssa observed. "Your kind is deemed wise, but not with human wisdom. Our windbringer Azzible seldom speaks to us at all, except about calling the winds, or the warming and tending he gets."

  "Indeed. An interest in human affairs is rare among bostulls. I am ... an eccentric in this regard."

  Lonn thought he sensed concealment in Kizier's pause, as though the bostull had started to say something else.

  Kizier resumed, "I hope you will consider seriously what I've told you, that you may recognize what powers can be unleashed from the Deepmind, and how dangerous it is to meddle with such things."

  Glyssa and Eben appeared to ponder the windbringer's words. They eyed Lonn solemnly.

  "We're not meddling," Lonn answered. "W
e're exchanging items for ransom. Our trade is piracy, not witchery."

  "You are carelessly handling objects of great power," Kizier said. "All things that partake of the Deepmind may be fraught with hidden perils and unforeseen consequences. You would be wise to turn around and take Amlina's things back to her."

  His warnings fanned the fears that Lonn had been struggling to suppress. But Lonn reacted with defiance. "Don't think you can scare us, little one-eye. We are Iruks, known to be fearless. We have won this loot fairly, and we are taking it to Fleevanport."

  "You might not make it that far," Kizier replied. "By tonight or tomorrow, Amlina will have wakened and learned what has happened. She will order the captain to follow you."

  Lonn watched a shadow of fear cross Glyssa's face. "The witch doesn't know where we're bound," he insisted.

  "Your boat contains her possessions. She'll have no trouble following their emanations."

  Glyssa winced, and now Eben too was frowning.

  Lonn stretched, forcing a yawn. "Don't let this bostull worry you. His stories contradict. He says the witch's things are objects of great power, but that their worth in money is nothing. Then he warns that the witch will find us, but first he tells us to turn around and find her. Enough of his prattle. I'm going back to bed."

  Glyssa rose and walked beside him. "I don't know, Lonn. This whole venture makes me uneasy."

  Lonn put an arm protectively around her waist and kissed her on the forehead. "Don't worry, mate. We've got a lookout set. Hey, Karrol! You're awake up there, aren't you?"

  Her bulky form shifted on the masthead. "Yes, I'm awake," she grunted, and sneezed.

  Three

  The dojuk raced before the fair wind over glassy wind-smoothed ice. A day and night's running brought them near the Iruk Isles.

  But next morning the weather changed. The wind blew strong and raw from the south, pushing wadded blue clouds across the sky. Lonn sailed close-hauled all morning, passing reefs and islands off to larboard—pieces of the Iruk Archipelago's outer crescent. In the middle of the afternoon they raised Ilga.