“Allow?” asked Wendrel.
“On its own ground, I think that stone could stand against the Grand Wizard herself,” replied Colrean. “And it must be allied to, or at least have permitted the rowan to grow…and that tree isn’t much younger than the stone! It’s older than any of the trees in the forest, even the giant redwoods or Grand’s Oak, over by the broad water. Ordinary rowans do not live so long.”
Wendrel asked no more questions, and was silent, her brow furrowed in thought. They walked on, crossing one of the rivulets that fed the Undrana. Colrean’s oddly heavy, nailed boots boomed on the old log bridge, accompanied by the soft patter of Wendrel’s sandals and the almost imperceptible scuffing of the children’s bare feet.
They left the forest fringe soon after, to follow the well-trodden path along Gamel common’s western boundary wall. The villagers were back at their reaping, for the harvest could not wait for anything save obvious, immediate threat. Sheaves of barley dotted the common, waiting for the older children to pick them up. But there was a noticeable lack of activity toward the top of the common, where the Corner Post loomed with its attendant rowan, the lesser trees and shrubs about it like beggars waiting for bounty from a king and queen.
“You had best leave me, and come no closer,” Colrean warned Wendrel and the children, as they drew near the copse. He could feel the staff’s presence now. It was making his thumbs prick and shiver as if a horde of minute insects stuck their prongs in his flesh, and there was a cold, wet draft caressing his bare neck, though no wind ruffled the barley stalks.
He looked up again at the sun, and the few tufts of scattered cloud dotted across the great stretch of blue sky—clouds that dissipated even as he watched.
“I think it will be safe enough till dusk. But you need to warn everyone to stay away from the Corner Post. They must be inside well before full night. The livestock too. Salt thresholds and windowsills. Stoke the hearthfires up and keep cold iron close.”
“What’s going—”
“To happen?”
“Perhaps nothing,” said Colrean, attempting a smile to reassure the children. They were not reassured, for the smile was unlike any expression Colrean had made in their sight before, and were they asked what he tried to convey, would have said he was in pain. “The staff in the stone may call…creatures…who are dangerous. I will stay here. If anything comes, I will make sure it can do no harm. Now go!”
The children, well versed in obeying their elders, skipped off at once. But Wendrel lingered, concern on her face. As she had said, her powers lay with the living, most particularly attending upon births and deaths. She was thus well acquainted with fear, and the small indications of it upon an otherwise well-composed face.
“Do you have such power, to assure no harm will come to us?” she asked.
Colrean shook his head. “But I may be able to divert the course of whatever does come for the staff. Delay acts of small malevolence, and I hope give warning of anything worse.”
“Why would you do this for us?” asked Wendrel. “To heal the hurt from a millstone, to aid in a birthing—these things do not risk your life. But surely you do now.”
Colrean half shrugged, as if he did not know how to answer.
“This is my homeplace now,” he said. “I have grown fond of some…many of the people. I have found peace here.”
“A peace soon to be disturbed, if you are right,” said Wendrel. “Almost, you remind me of the wizards of the old tales, who would appear without word on the eve of some storm or terror, come to defend the common folk. Only to leave when the danger has passed, as unheralded as they came, without thanks or payment.”
“Wizards are only found in the cities now, bound by gold and oaths to serve the Mayors,” said Colrean. “And I have been here two winters already. I hope this acquits me of being thought some bird of ill omen. Besides, I certainly do not wish to leave. Or seek payment.”
Wendrel did not say anything for a moment, and silence fell between them. Colrean turned his head to glance at the Corner Post. But his body remained still, and he did not otherwise move, or take his leave, seemingly caught in indecision on the moment of commitment to a likely short-lived future.
In the distance, one of the reapers nicked herself with her sickle, and swore. Her harsh words brought Colrean back into the present. He blinked and looked at the midwife, who returned his gaze with a concern he recognized from seeing her with patients.
“I will bring you one of Rhun’s second-best blankets, a waterskin, and food. Is there aught else you will need?”
Rhun was Wendrel’s husband, save his wife the youngest of the elders of Gamel. He was barely old enough to bear the title without ridicule, having gained his position not from mere seniority, or as in Wendrel’s case her wisdom, but in recognition of him being the best weaver in the three villages, and in fact for many leagues around. Even Rhun’s second-best blankets were thicker, heavier, far more water repellent and more attractive than the city-bought ones Colrean had back in his lodge.
“All will be welcome, and a blanket perhaps most of all. It will be clear and cool tonight, and I must stay until the dawn. But be sure you come and go before nightfall.”
“There is time enough,” said Wendrel.
“Do not approach the stone,” added Colrean. “Leave everything by the wall here; I will fetch it.”
“As you will,” said Wendrel. “I hope…I hope you are wrong about the staff, and nothing will come.”
“I hope so too,” said Colrean. But he knew he was not wrong. Whether he had become more accustomed to it, or the stone’s grip on the staff was loosening as the day faded, he was much more aware of the silent call of magic emanating from whatever was in the Corner Post. If the children had not come to him, he would still have been drawn here, by sunset at the latest. And there were creatures far more sensitive to magic than he was, more sensitive than any mortal. They would come, once the sun was down.
Unless a wizard claimed the staff.
That would be another problem, perhaps no less dangerous than the creatures. For despite what he had said to Wendrel, not all wizards were bound to the Mayors by oaths and gold. There were some who considered themselves above the concerns of ordinary folk, and only sought to please themselves. They were kept in check by what they called the tame wizards of the cities, but that was in the cities.
Not out here.
Here there was only Colrean.
Who realized he had been woolgathering again, delaying the inevitable. Wendrel was already hurrying after the children, and he could hear them excitedly calling out his warnings to the harvesters, the repetition of “salt your windowsills” clear.
Colrean walked over to the Corner Post, pausing by the rowan to bend his head respectfully, as if the tree might bar his way or take umbrage at his presence. But the rowan gave no indication it was anything other than a normal tree, leaves and branches still in the quiet air. Colrean would have welcomed a breeze, particularly a brisk southerly, for that wind was antithetical to some of the creatures that might come in the night. But there was no wind, and it seemed, little chance of one.
Colrean passed by the rowan and cautiously approached the Corner Post, each of his six clumsy steps slower and shorter than the last, till he shuffled as close as he dared go, almost but not quite in touching distance.
There was a staff in the stone.
Colrean didn’t really need to look at it to know it was indeed a wizard’s staff. But he cautiously examined the exposed length that projected from the ancient stone, wondering why the staff was placed so high. Indeed, either an extraordinarily tall wizard had plunged it into the stone, or they had brought a ladder, which seemed unlikely. Even if so, why bother to put it out of easy reach?
This was not the only puzzle. Only three or four inches of the dark bog-oak beyond the bronze ferrule on the fo
ot of the staff was exposed, and there were no obvious runes or inscriptions that might have helped him identify the staff’s provenance. All he could tell from sight and his sense of the unseen was that this staff was very old, and very powerful.
Colrean could tell it was not a single staff at all, but a composite of many. Staves were made by wizards to store more power than they could hold in their own fragile bodies or in other tools of the art, and particularly powerful staves were made by a process of accretion, combining a new staff with the old.
But as making a wizard’s staff was a time-consuming and potentially dangerous process, there were renegades who would simply take or steal the staves of weaker or unsuspecting wizards, using whatever means necessary—including such things as poison and assassination. Then they would combine the stolen staff with their own, growing more powerful in the process, and thus be able to take even more staves from other wizards.
“Better and better,” muttered Colrean to himself, meaning quite the opposite. For a moment he contemplated touching the end of the staff, for that would reveal to him from whence it came, and might even give him the name of the wizard who had put it here. Though Colrean could not think why a wizard would want to put their own staff in such a place, or indeed, why a wizard would put someone else’s staff there.
Unless it was a trap or a lure of some sort…but he could sense no other magic-worker nearby, nor see anything that might be one in another shape. There were no new trees, no odd horse, no peculiarly large raven watching from the stone wall…
Colrean also contemplated placing his hand upon the Corner Post itself and beseeching it to inform him what it knew of the matter. But it was not a serious thought, and was immediately dismissed. He knew more about such stones than he had revealed to Wendrel. Most were long dead—or their animating force dissipated—but the few who retained their power were typically averse to interaction with any but the most innocent of mortal folk, and were best left very much alone.
Though, in this case, the stone must have allowed the staff to be placed where it was, else there would have been a dead wizard among the barley, pieces of broken staff strewn about the commons, fires burning, people screaming, and no need for anyone to summon him from the forest.
It was all a great puzzle.
Colrean sighed and found a place to sit some twenty paces from the Corner Post and the rowan, where the ground rose a little, giving him a longer view. He sat with his back against the Gamel-Thrake border wall and settled into the reverie magic-workers called dwelm, calling forth power he had stored over time in various items about his person, drawing it either into himself or reapportioning it among his objects of power.
This was a key part of any magic-worker’s preparations, for there were things that stored magic well but were slow to give it up, and objects that released power swiftly, but could not hold it for any length of time; or some combination thereof that was necessarily a compromise. The first were typically made of stone, petrified wood, amber, and/or gold, sometimes rubies or emeralds; and the latter silver or bronze with moonstones and diamonds or any of the paler gems, and younger wood or porcelain.
A properly prepared staff of ancient bog-oak, shod in bronze and tipped with iron, was unrivaled as a magical instrument, in that it could store power very well and release it reasonably quickly. There was a good reason every wizard had a staff. Though a wand of well-aged willow, with bands of gold and silver, could serve near as well, if there was some reason to dissemble and appear to be some other kind of magic-worker.
But Colrean had neither staff nor wand, nor, it seemed even a mere sorcerer’s ring. His fingers, still somewhat stained with pheasant blood, were bare.
The sun had begun to set by the time he emerged from the dwelm trance. Wendrel had been; there was a basket sitting on the wall some distance away. He went to fetch it, taking it back to his chosen position where he could keep watch over Corner Post, rowan, and most of the three commons, though one area was obscured by the copse.
As expected, it began to grow cool almost immediately after the sun went down. Colrean unfolded the blanket and arranged it over his shoulders. Wendrel had provided bread, cheese, and sausage, and he made a quick meal of this and drank some water, while he watched the moon begin its rise and the stars come out. It was a very bright night, with the sky clear. Several small shooting stars sped by near the horizon, watched carefully by Colrean in case they grew brighter, or shone red, as true portents would. But they seemed to be nothing out of the ordinary. Such tiny fading sparks of brilliance could be seen on any clear night out here.
Colrean dozed a little then, rather uncomfortably, trusting to his otherworldly senses to jolt him awake should something happen. But when he did wake, it was from the simple discomfort of his bladder. Stretching to ease the kinks of dozing against the stone wall, he limped some distance away to urinate, not wishing to offer any disrespect to the Corner Post.
Coming back, he noticed it had suddenly grown quiet. His own footfalls were the only sound, where even a few moments before he had heard crickets sawing at their music; night-birds calling; the shrill shriek of a shrew caught by an owl; the muffled crackle and thump of hares disporting nearby in the barley stubble. All were silent now, and the air was still.
Colrean opened his eyes wide, calling power into his dormant mage-sight. The world grew brighter, moon- and starlight intensified. Shadows lengthened from stone and tree…and sprang out from a dozen previously unseen creatures that had made their characteristically stealthy way from the forest and across the common, and were now only nine or ten yards from the copse. Even through a mage’s eyes their shadows were easier to see than themselves, but in essence they were somewhat like foxes and somewhat like human folk, walking upright on their hind legs, and possessing tool-using hands, but they also had tall brushes, russet fur, cunning fox-masked faces, and sensitive, sticking-up ears.
Those ears twitched in unison as Colrean spoke.
“How now, my lords and ladies! What seek the Rannachin at the Corner Post?”
The twelve spread out in a line without any obvious command or discussion, and there was the glitter of obsidian blades in their paw-hands, the shine of teeth bared in long snouts.
“I think not,” said Colrean. He mumbled something, cupped one hand and drew power. A blue flame burst from his palm, the air roaring as the fire grew taller than the man. “You recall the stench of singed fox fur well, I think?”
Again there were no visible signs of debate, but as one the Rannachin’s weapons were put away, the jaws closed, and the fox-people turned and slid away into the night, as unobtrusively as they had come.
Colrean watched them for some time, keeping the flamecast ready, as it was quite possible they would turn back and try to rush him. But they did not. Quite possibly in the short time they had spent near the Corner Post they had already deduced the staff was too powerful for them to steal, or dared not risk the displeasure of the stone. It was even possible they thought Colrean too great a foe, though in the past he had never had to deal with more than three or four Rannachin at once.
He let the fire die when they were out of sight, and allowed the power to ebb from his eyes as well. He had to carefully husband his strength, particularly that drawn from his own blood and bone. There would doubtless be worse than Rannachin to come that night. He could sense the staff calling ever more clearly and strongly in the clear, cool night. It would bring others.
Colrean ate a little more bread, but did not sit down again. Instead he limped about the edge of the copse, and once again paid his respects to the ancient rowan. This time he not only bent his head, but slowly went down on one knee, as he might to a Grand Mayor or the Grand Wizard. He stayed there for some time, listening and thinking, comforted that the world around was full of small sounds again, and the sky remained clear, the stars and moon bright—and there was no sudden shower of bloo
dred sparks in the heavens above.
The rowan gave no sign it was aware of his obeisance, neither during his uncomfortable kneeling nor when Colrean pushed himself up and wandered off again, this time returning to his watching spot. Feeling uneasy, he carefully climbed up on the wall for a better view. This was a chancy maneuver given whatever was wrong with his leg, and was made no easier by the age and construction of the wall. Though the stones were cunningly set together, no mortar held them in place. Neither he nor the wall fell, but Colrean was not comforted by what he saw.
There was a fog rolling across the Seyam common, as if a single dense cloud had somehow fallen from above, though the sky was clear and there was no fog anywhere else.
Even as he saw this sudden, inexplicable mist, Colrean’s otherworldly senses twitched, and he felt a spasm of intense fear grab his guts and grip him about the lungs. He fought off the sudden, sensible urge to flee and instead took a quick, shuddering breath. Climbing down from the wall, he hurried as fast as he could, almost hopping back to the rowan. Under its branches, he quickly took out one of his few objects of power, a knife of whalebone with a solid silver hilt that had been hidden under his jerkin. Calling on the power stored in this, he drew a circle about himself in the earth, mumbling memory-hooks, the words magic-workers used to safely recall exactly how the power must be called and used, words that the uneducated thought of as spells.
When it was done, the whalebone blade blew into dust like a kicked puffball, and the silver hilt crumbled in Colrean’s hand, as if it had been buried in a tomb for a thousand years and could not stand the corrosive effect of open air. He had drawn every last scrap of power stored in the weapon, all at once, and so it could never be used again, never refilled. Two years to make and fill it to the brim with power, all gone in a matter of minutes, a treasure spent.
Spent wisely, Colrean hoped. He reached into his jerkin again, fingers closing on the silver chain around his neck, making sure it was secure and that by its weight he could feel what hung suspended there.
The Book of Magic Page 32
