The Silver Mage

Once they were sitting in the refectory with food spread on the table in front of them, gratitude won a temporary victory. Hwilli reminded herself, as she generally did, that she’d been lucky to be chosen to study with a master healer, to live here in the fortress and have plenty to eat. She’d been born and raised in huts that always smelled of the manure and mud that filled in the chinks in the walls. Her parents had worked so hard that their backs were permanently bent and aching. Her father had died, feverish and half-starved, long before he’d grown old. Her own life, even though brief compared to the spans allotted to the People, would be comfortable and respected because of her knowledge. But so brief, she thought. Still so brief.

Envy rose like bile in her throat. While the other women ate, chatting and laughing, she crumbled a bit of bread between her fingers and watched them. Despite their cat-like eyes and furled ears, they were beautiful, young and beautiful, and they would still be lovely hundreds of years on, when she’d been dead and forgotten for those same hundreds of years.

‘Hwilli!’ Nalla said. ‘Try some of this roast partridge.’ She leaned over and placed a choice slice onto Hwilli’s plate. ‘It’s awfully good.’

‘My thanks.’ Hwilli managed to smile. ‘I was just thinking.’

‘About that handsome stranger?’ Nalla said. ‘And he is handsome, or he will be after a bath. His brother’s good-looking, too. Now, don’t deny it.’

‘Oh yes, I suppose they are. For men of my kind.’

‘Well.’ Nalla paused for a grin. ‘If you shut your eyes, you could ignore their ears.’

When the other women laughed, Hwilli decided that hatred tasted like sour wine. She gathered a few bitter remarks, but when she looked Nalla’s way, Nalla rolled her eyes with a shrug toward the laughter, and Hwilli kept the remarks to herself.

Caswallinos, or so he’d often told his apprentice, had also realized that distance and time meant nothing to Evandar, but much to the elder druid’s surprise and Galerinos’s relief, the river did lie where that supposed god had told them. As they came down from the hills they could see the gleam of water far ahead, winding through a grassy plain scattered with huge boulders and dotted with the occasional copse. Laughter and cheers rippled up and down the line of wagons. The horses and cows raised their heads and sniffed the air, then walked a little faster.

As they hurried across the plain, Galerinos noticed several long and oddly straight lines of small stones. The savages had laid them out, he assumed, though the landscape made him think of old tales about the giants of olden times and their furious wars. Perhaps the Devetii had wandered into an armoury of sorts, with rocks laid ready for some battle that had never occurred.

Just at sunset they reached the river. The Devetian line of march spread out along its banks to allow their weary horses to drink. After them came the cattle and sheep. Only when the animals had drunk their fill, and the mud had had time to settle, did the humans wade into the river to drink and to collect the precious water in amphorae and waterskins. As priests, Galerinos and his master received their share first. After they slaked their thirst, they stood by their wagon and looked out across the stone-studded plain.

‘This is a very strange place,’ Caswallinos remarked.

‘It certainly is, your holiness! All those rocks! Do you know why they’re here?’

‘The Wildfolk told me that a big sheet of ice crawled down from the north. When it melted, it dropped them.’ Caswallinos shook his head sadly. ‘The Wildfolk lack wits as we know wits.’

‘So they must.’

‘But rocks or no rocks, the land looks good enough to plant a crop in. We need to get the winter wheat in the ground.’

‘Are we going to settle here for the winter?’

‘We can’t march in the snow, can we? Think! Besides, we’re going to have to build a bridge to get the wagons across that river. It’s far too deep to ford.’

‘You’re right, and my apologies, but it wearies my heart. This will be our second winter in Evandar’s country. Do you think we’ll ever stop wandering?’

‘Eventually even our cadvridoc will grow tired of slaughtering the white savages. I’ve given him that omen to look for, one we can arrange when we find a suitable place.’

‘Arrange? You mean you lied to him?’

‘Let’s just say I created a soothing truth.’

‘But that’s still lying –’ Galerinos caught the grim look in his master’s eyes and stopped talking in mid-sentence. ‘Apologies.’

Caswallinos snorted with a twist of his mouth.

Cadvridoc Brennos had reached the same conclusion, that the Devetii would set up a temporary settlement near the river and plant their carefully hoarded seed grain. That night, in the midst of campfires he called a general council of the vergobretes, the clan heads, and every free man who wanted to attend. Once the crowd had gathered, he stood on one of the smaller boulders and raised his arms for silence. In the firelight his golden torque and arm bands winked and gleamed. His stiff limed hair gave him the look of a spirit from the Otherlands.

‘You all know,’ he began, ‘that we travel east in search of the omen granted to us by the gods. By another river we’ll find a white sow who’s given birth, and there we’ll found our city.’

The gathered men murmured their agreement.

‘But the year turns toward the dark,’ Brennos continued. ‘According to the bronze marker of days that our druid carries, soon Samovantos will be upon us. We must plant our crops somewhere and build ourselves shelter. Now, right here the gods have given us plenty of stones to work with – an omen, or so I take it. I’d say that this is the place for our winter camp.’

More murmurs, a few cheers – as usual, Brennos had carried the day. Not even Bercanos of the Boar stepped forward to argue, an omen in itself, or so Galerinos thought of it.

‘For the first days here,’ Brennos began speaking again, ‘we’ll camp in our usual order, all together in case the savages attack us. After that, we can build farmsteads and walls to protect ourselves.’

More cheers, more murmurs of assent.

‘While everyone was watering our stock,’ Brennos continued, ‘I rode a little ways south. I found a grand supply of stone, waiting for us right beside a spring. We can use that to build a dun that’ll strike fear in the hearts of the savages. What say you?’

The entire assembly cheered him. The men of the council of vergobretes stood and threw a fist into the air to show their support. As the crowd scattered back to their various wagons and tents, Caswallinos and Galerinos left the camp to walk down by the river, rippled silver with moonlight.

‘Now,’ Caswallinos said. ‘Tell me about that curse.’

In as much detail as he could remember, Galerinos described what had happened up on the hillside. Caswallinos listened, nodding now and then.

‘I never dreamt you had this much of a gift,’ he said at last. ‘It’s time to let you know a few secrets, lad. The first is very simple. The power behind that curse didn’t come from the god. It came from your own soul.’

Galerinos stared at him with his mouth slack. I must not have heard right, was his first thought. Caswallinos laughed, just softly.

‘Don’t believe me, do you?’ the druid said.

‘Of course I believe you, but I’m just surprised.’

‘There are bigger surprises ahead. This will do for tonight.’ Caswallinos glanced at the sky, where the full moon hung like a beacon. ‘I’d ask you to show me that blue fire, but I don’t want you setting fire to the grass or boiling any undines out in the river, either. Huh. That reminds me.’

The elder druid frowned at the water and whispered a message to Evandar. Galerinos waited, unspeaking.

‘There, I’ve told the Wildfolk,’ Caswallinos said at last, ‘though I’ve no idea if they’ll find Evandar or not. I haven’t forgotten your two cousins, lad. I know how close the three of you are, raised together like that.’

‘They’re more like brothers, master.’ Galerinos’s voice went unsteady with fear. ‘I’ll pray he brings them back to us.’

But Evandar never returned. Late that night Galerinos woke from an omen-dream of loss and realized, deep in his heart, that he’d never see his bloodkin again.

Rhodorix woke to the sound of the bronze gongs booming over the fortress. Dawnlight streamed through the window, touching the painted walls with silver. His back ached from his night’s drunken sleep on a thin carpet over a stone floor. He sat up, yawning and stretching the pain away. The chamber door opened to admit the healer and the pale-haired woman. They ignored him and marched over to the plank bed where Gerontos was lying. The healer held a knife with a long, thin blade.

Rhodorix scrambled to his feet – what were they planning on doing to his brother? But as he watched, the healer deftly ran the blade under the cast around Gerontos’s broken leg. The honey had stuck bandages and leg both to the planks as the cast had dried overnight.

With the leg free, the pale-haired woman helped Gerontos sit up, then slid him back to lean against the wall at the head of the bed. She turned away and called out. Servants hurried in, carrying food, fresh water, and an empty shallow pot covered by a cloth, which one of them handed to Rhodorix. Puzzled, he stared at it until the healer laughed and took it from him. With a few deft hand gestures he explained its use. The woman was grinning at him. Rhodorix felt his face turn hot with a blush, but he knew that he needed the thing after all that wine. The woman obligingly stepped out of the chamber.

Once he and Gerontos had relieved their aches, the servant whisked a cloth over the chamber pot and took it away. The woman came back in, carrying a basket.

‘Ah gen Evandares,’ she said.

She set the basket down on the table, then brought out a pair of crystal pyramids, one black, one white, glittering in the morning sunlight. She handed the black to Rhodorix but kept the white. When she gestured with her free hand, Rhodorix realized that she wanted him to hold the pyramid close to his face. She smiled when he did so, then spoke into her crystal.

‘My name is Hwilli.’ Her words seemed to come out of the black crystal, yet at the same time he heard in the normal way her speaking in her unfamiliar tongue. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Rhodorix, and my brother is Gerontos.’ He aped her mannerism and spoke directly into the crystal.

‘What strange names!’ Yet her smile made the comment pleasant. ‘My master has asked me to talk to you and for you, because you and I are both children of Aethyr.’

‘Children of what? My apologies, but I don’t know that word.’

‘The word doesn’t matter.’ She smiled again. ‘Let’s just say that you and I are more alike than we’re like his people.’

That’s as true as it can be! Rhodorix thought. Aloud, he said, ‘Then my thanks. Can my brother’s leg be saved?’

‘It can, though I doubt me if it’ll heal perfectly straight. Still, he should be able to walk without pain.’

Tears of relief welled up in Rhodorix’s eyes. He brushed them away, then repeated the news to Gerontos. Gerro grinned so broadly that his smile was all the thanks that anyone needed. The healer patted him on the shoulder, then spoke to Hwilli, who in turn spoke to Rhodorix through the crystal.

‘Your brother needs to rest. Give him plenty of water whenever he asks. And make sure he eats, too, will you?’

‘I will, and gladly.’

‘In a little while a servant will come to lead you to the bath house. Others will help your brother get clean here. Um, your people do bathe, don’t they?’

‘Whenever we can.’ Rhodorix ran one hand over his stubbled face. ‘We shave, too.’

‘I’ll tell the servant that. I’ll leave this piece of stone with you. If you need something, give it to the servant and ask through the black one.’

‘Very well. One last thing, though. What’s in that stuff you smeared on his leg?’

‘Wine, honey, and egg whites. It stiffens the linen as it dries.’

‘So I see, and my thanks.’

Hwilli set the white crystal down upon the table. The healer and his retinue left, talking among themselves. Much to Rhodorix’s surprise, he could pick out three words that he understood – heal, leg, and water – words Hwilli had used when she spoke to him through the pyramid.

A bath, a clean tunic, and a good bronze razor went a long way to making both Rhodorix and Gerontos feel like men again. Later that day Hwilli returned with a flock of servants and a litter. She put the crystals into their basket, then gave orders to the servants. Rhodorix followed as they carried Gerontos to another chamber, this one with a bed that sported a straw mattress and blankets, big enough for the two brothers to share. Once they’d got Gerontos settled, Hwilli dismissed the servants. She handed Rhodorix the black pyramid and took up the white.

‘You’re a fighting man?’ she said.

‘I am that.’ He hesitated, then decided that she needn’t know of his shame. ‘So is my brother. We know swordcraft.’

‘Good. Our rhix needs swordsmen. Will you fight for him?’

‘It would gladden my heart to repay you for the aid you’ve given us, but truly, who is your rhix? Is he the head of your clan? I’ve never heard of him or this dunum until Evandar said its name.’

She stared at him slack-mouthed, then laughed. ‘You must come from very far away.’

‘We do. We were fleeing the Rhwmanes.’

‘Ah, so that’s what you call them! Master Jantalaber thought your tribe might have been trying to escape them. The master is the man who set your brother’s leg, by the by. The rhix is Ranadar of the Vale of Roses, cadvridoc of the Seven Cities, Master of Garangbeltangim.’

‘My thanks. I’d not heard of him before this day.’

‘I see. Master Jantalaber mentioned that Evandar favoured you.’

‘Well, he saved my brother and me from death.’

‘A sign of favour, sure enough!’

For the first time it occurred to Rhodorix to wonder why the god had come to their aid. Perhaps he wanted them to join this clan’s warband. Doing the will of the god, in that case, looked far better than either killing himself or returning to his own clan and facing his father’s outrage at his blunder over the ambush.

‘Is your rhix fighting those white-skinned savages?’

‘He is.’

‘Then it will gladden my heart to serve him.’ He glanced at Gerontos, who was listening intently, at least to Rhodorix’s half of the conversation. ‘Evandar brought us here to help the rhix who’s the master of this dunum. His name’s Ranadar.’

‘Then as soon as I can stand, I’ll fight for him,’ Gerontos said. ‘I owe these people my life.’

‘So do I.’ Rhodorix returned to speaking into the crystal. ‘It will gladden our hearts to swear loyalty to your cadvridoc.’

‘Splendid!’ Hwilli said. ‘I’ll tell the master of arms.’

Some of the words she spoke in her own language, those he heard as an echo to the words from the crystal, made sense to him, he realized. Somehow the crystal was teaching him her speech at the same time as it transformed it into his own. I wish we’d had these in the homeland, he thought. It would have made learning that wretched Rhwman tongue easier. As the eldest son of a clan head, he’d been expected to learn Latin in order to speak to the conquerors and a little Greek as well in order to bargain with merchants.

Rhodorix and Gerontos received their chance to swear to Ranadarix, as they called him, when the prince himself came to their chamber. His retinue, six men with spears, four with swords, marched in first. They all wore polished bronze breastplates, each inlaid with a red enamel rose, over their tunics.

The prince followed, unarmed, wearing no armour, though a glittering belt, inlaid with gems in a pattern of overlapping triangles and circles, clasped in his rich red tunic. Around his neck he wore an enormous sapphire, as blue as the winter sea, set into a gold pendant three fingers wide. He was a tall man, dark-haired, with lavender catslit eyes and the strange furled ears of his people. Behind him came a child, dressed in a simple white tunic, who looked so much like him that Rhodorix could assume him to be the prince’s son.

A swordsman picked up the white crystal and handed it to the prince. Rhodorix took the black, then knelt on the floor in front of the cadvridoc.

‘I understand that you’ve chosen to join my warband,’ Ranadarix said.

‘We have, honoured one,’ Rhodorix said, ‘in gratitude for the aid your people have given my brother. We both can fight on foot with swords or on horseback with javelins.’

‘On horseback?’ The prince suddenly grinned. ‘Well, now, this is a welcome thing! None of my men can do that. Horses are new to me and my people.’

Rhodorix stared, his mouth slack, then remembered that he was talking to a cadvridoc and a rhix. ‘Forgive me, honoured one. That surprised me, about the horses, I mean. We’ll be glad to show you what we know.’

‘Splendid! Then you shall be weaponmasters and serve me doubly.’ He turned and beckoned one of the swordsmen forward, a pale-haired man with deep-set green eyes. ‘This is Andariel, the leader of my personal guard. In the morning, he’ll fetch you, and he’ll show you what horses we have. Obviously your brother needs to rest.’

‘So he does, honoured one. If Andariel approves of my skill, then I’ll teach your men everything I know.’

Ranadarix repeated this to Andariel, who smiled and nodded Rhodorix’s way. Ranadarix set the white crystal down, then turned and walked out with his son and the guard following. Rhodorix got up from his kneel and sat on the edge of the bed to talk with Gerontos.

‘What’s so surprising about the horses?’ Gerontos said.

‘He told me that they were new to his people.’

‘New? That’s cursed strange!’

‘So I thought, too. Well, it’s good luck for us, though. If we prove ourselves, we’ll be weaponmasters and have some standing here.’

‘Splendid.’ Gerontos abruptly yawned. ‘Ye gods, I tire so easily! But truly, Evandar’s brought us good fortune. This Ranadarix must be as rich as a Rhwmani propraetor!’

‘And a lot less corrupt.’

‘Huh! Who isn’t?’

They shared a laugh, interrupted by the boom and clang of gongs from the towers outside. When Rhodorix went to the window and looked out, he saw that the sun had reached zenith.

Servants appeared, carrying food, which they silently put on the table, then bowed their way out. While they ate, Rhodorix found himself thinking about Hwilli. If he and his brother became weaponmasters, he’d have the standing he needed to keep a woman. She appealed to him a great deal more than the longeared people who ruled this dun. When he considered their cat-slit eyes, he wondered if they were truly human. He doubted it, but as long as they treated him and his brother so well, he would serve them as faithfully as he could.

Since they kept the herbroom locked, the scent of the pharmacopeia lay heavy in the air. When Hwilli walked in, she could smell a hundred different tangs and spices. Master Jantalaber was standing by the marble-topped study table. He was turning the pages of a small leather-bound book, but when he glanced up and saw her, he shut the book and shoved it to one side. Hwilli glanced at it but saw no name on the plain brown cover. Beside it on the table sat a basket of dried plants.

‘A good morrow to you, child,’ he said.

‘I am not a child.’ Hwilli drew herself up to full height. ‘By your own reckoning, I’ve seen seventeen winters.’

‘That’s true.’ He smiled at her. ‘I call you “child” out of affection, you see.’

‘I –’ Hwilli felt her anger spill and run like water from a broken glass vessel. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘Come now, I know it must be hard on you, living here, so far from your own kind. But you have a mind, Hwilli, true wits, something I’ve not noticed much among your people, and you belong with us.’

Who has the leisure to grow their wits? We work too hard growing crops for your kind to gobble up. Aloud, she said, ‘Thank you. I know I’m lucky to be here.’

‘And someday, after you’ve passed over the great river and seen the black sun rise in the otherworld, you’ll be reborn as one of us. I know that deep in my heart.’

Tears filled her eyes, hot tears of rage at a promise, oft repeated, that seemed utterly empty to her, but she mumbled another thank you. When the master turned his back to arrange the dried plants on the study table, she wiped the tears away before he noticed them. He set the empty basket down on the floor.

‘Before we start our lesson, I want to ask you about those strangers,’ Jantalaber said. ‘Have they ever told you where they came from?’

‘Only that it’s very far away. Their name for the Meradan is “Rhwmanes”, though. Roseprince told me that much.’

‘Roseprince? Is that truly his name?’

‘Well, that’s how the crystals translate it. It sounds like “Rhodorix” in his own tongue. His brother’s name is Oldman, or Gerontos.’

‘Ah, I see. The crystals find the root meaning of words.’

‘Yes. The strangers’ word for prince seems to be rhix, but I have the feeling it doesn’t mean quite the same thing as our word.’ Hwilli considered for a moment. ‘The words that come from the crystals have odd echoes to them. I’m afraid I can’t explain it any better than that.’

‘The whole thing is very odd, but then what else would one expect from the Guardians?’

They shared a smile.

‘Every now and then,’ Hwilli continued, ‘Rhodorix uses a word that sounds familiar to me, one that my own kind would use, I mean.’

‘I see. No doubt his people are related to yours somehow, then. You see, that’s what I mean about your wits. You observe things, you’re precise.’

‘Thank you.’ Hwilli could barely speak. The master rarely praised any of his apprentices. He smiled as if he understood her confusion.

‘Now, you’ve studied very hard, and you’ve learned remarkably fast. I’m going to put you in charge of healing Gerontos’s broken leg. You can always ask me for advice, of course, but the decisions will be yours.’

‘Do you truly think I’m ready?’

‘Yes, I do. In a bit you can go to his chamber and take a look at him. See if he’s feverish or ill in any way beyond the pain of the break. Report back to me when you’ve finished. Now, however, let’s look at our plants. These five are all vulneraries.’

When Hwilli returned to the sickroom, she found Gerontos sitting up. His colour looked normal; his forehead felt cool; the skin on his thigh above the cast looked normal as well.

‘You’re doing as well as we can expect,’ she said through the crystals. ‘The Rhwmanes smashed the bone, I’m afraid, and there are chips.’

Gerontos blinked at her, then spoke to his brother. Rhodorix laughed and took the black crystal from him.

‘The Rhwmanes aren’t the white savages,’ Rhodorix said. ‘Our homeland’s across the great ocean. The Rhwmanes conquered it, so we left with Evandar’s help. We wanted to be free, you see, not their subjects.’

‘I do see,’ Hwilli said. ‘Now.’

Rhodorix grinned at her. He had an open, engaging smile that made her feel pleasantly warm. His dark blue eyes, so different from the ice-blue common to her people, intrigued her. She liked the way he moved, too, with the muscular grace of a wolf or a stallion. One of my own kind, she thought. It’s a relief, to see a man of my own kind after living here so long. ‘So,’ Hwilli said, ‘your homeland lies to the west, then?’

‘Well –’ He hesitated, and his eyes narrowed in puzzlement. ‘It must. Except, when we left, we sailed west, you see, toward the setting sun. But then when we arrived at the harbour up north, we were sailing east, toward the rising sun.’

‘That doesn’t make any sense.’

‘I know. That’s why I’m puzzled.’ He frowned at the floor for a long moment, then dismissed the problem with a shrug and looked up. ‘But here we are.’