The Black Raven

KATHARINE KERR

THE BLACK RAVEN

Book Two of the Dragon Mage

DEDICATION

For my grandmother, Elsa Petersen Brahtin 1899–1985

The courage in her life amazed me

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Dedication

A Note on the Deverry Sequence

Prologue: Winter, 1117 Bardek

Part One: Winter, 1117 Deverry

Part Two: Deverry

Epilogue: Spring, 1118

Keep Reading

Appendices

Glossary

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Also by the Author

Copyright

About the Publisher

A NOTE ON THE DEVERRY SEQUENCE

It occurs to me that readers might find it helpful to know something about the overall structure of the Deverry series. From the beginning of this rather large enterprise, I have had an actual ending in mind, a set of events that should wrap up all the books in dramatic conclusion. It’s merely taken me much longer to get there than I ever thought it would.

If you think of Deverry as a stage play, the sets of books make up its acts. Act One consists of the Deverry books proper, that is, Daggerspell, Darkspell, Dawnspell, and Dragonspell. The ‘Westlands’ books, A Time of Exile, A Time of Omens, A Time of War, and A Time of Justice, make up Act Two, while Act Three will unfold in the current quintet, ‘The Dragon Mage,’ that is, The Red Wyvern, The Black Raven, the volume you now have in hand, and its ‘sister’, The Fire Dragon. The Gold Falcon and The Silver Wyrm will bring the sequence to its end at last.

As for the way that the series alternates between past and present lives, think of the structure of a line of Celtic interlace, some examples of which have decorated the various books in this set. Although each knot appears to be a separate figure, when you look closely you can see that they are actually formed from one continuous line. Similarly, this line weaves over and under itself to form the figures. A small section of line seems to run over or under another line to form a knot.

The past incarnations of the characters in this book and their present tense story really are one continuous line, but this line interweaves to form the individual volumes. Eventually – soon, I hope – the pattern will complete itself, and you will be able to see that the set of books forms a circle of knots.

Katharine Kerr

PROLOGUE

Winter, 1117 Bardek

Always the sorcerer must prepare for hindrances and set-backs. Before any working of great length and import, he must spend long nights in study of the omens, for if the Macrocosm can find a way to defeat him, it will, preferring in its laziness the natural order over any change wrought by our arts, no matter how greatly that change will be to its benefit.

The Pseudo-Iamblichus Scroll

‘Marka, dearest?’ Keeta said. ‘I’m sorry. There’s something wrong with him.’

Marka tried to answer, but her throat filled with tears. Her youngest son, not yet two years old, sat on a red and blue carpet in a patch of sunlight that spilled through the tent door. He was frowning at the edge of the brightness; over and over again he would reach out a pale brown hand and touch the shadow next to it, then draw his hand back and frown the harder. Tight brown curls hung over his forehead; now and then he would bat at them as if they bothered him, only to forget them again in an instant.

‘He does know his name,’ Marka said. ‘He may not have any other words, but he does know his name.’

Keeta sighed and sat down next to the boy, who ignored her. They made an odd pair, Keeta so massive and dark, Zandro so slender and pale. Even though she had taken over the business end of managing their travelling show, Keeta still juggled, and her long arms sported muscles many a man had envied over the years. In her curly black hair, which she wore cropped close to her skull, grey sprouted at the temples.

‘I’ve been afraid for months,’ Marka said at last. ‘He still can’t use a spoon.’

‘Is it that he can’t use one?’ Keeta held out her hand to Zandro. ‘Or that he simply won’t?’

Zandro whipped his head around and bit her on the thumb. Calmly, without speaking, Keeta put her other hand under his chin, spread her fingers and thumb, and pressed on both points of his jaw. With a squeal he opened his mouth and let her go.

‘That’s better,’ Keeta said to him. ‘No biting.’

His head tilted to one side, he considered her. She pointed to the teeth marks on her thumb.

‘No! No biting!’

All at once he smiled and nodded.

‘Very good,’ Keeta said. ‘You understood me.’

This he ignored; with a yawn he returned to his study of the edge between light and shadow.

‘Ah ye gods!’ Marka said. ‘Just when I think it’s hopeless, he’ll do something like that. Understand a word, I mean, or even do something kind. When Kivva fell and cut herself yesterday? He came running and kissed her and tried to help.’

‘I saw that, yes. At times he’s really very sweet.’

Marka nodded. In the twenty years since her marriage, she’d borne nine pregnancies, not counting the miscarriages. Six of the children had lived past infancy – Kwinto, their first-born son; Tillya, the eldest daughter; Terrenz, born so soon after Tillya that they loved each other like twins; their sisters Kivva and Delya, named after Keeta’s long-time companion, who had died in the same fever that had killed another infant son. Zandro would, she hoped, be the last. She wondered how she was going to find the love and strength to deal with him, who would demand more of both than all the rest of them put together. Keeta must have been thinking along the same lines.

‘It’s not like you don’t have enough troubles on your mind already. What with Ebañy’s’ – a long pause – ‘illness.’

‘Oh, come right out and say it!’ Marka snapped. ‘He’s gone mad. We all know it. And now his youngest son is obviously mad, too. Why are we all being so coy? How would Ebañy put it? He’s demented, lunatic, deranged, insane –’ Tears overwhelmed her.

Marka was aware of Keeta getting up, then kneeling again next to her. She turned into her friend’s embrace and sobbed. Keeta stroked her hair with a huge hand.

‘There, there, little one. We’ll find a way to heal your husband yet. We’ll be playing in Myleton next. They have physicians and priests and the gods only know who else, and one of them will know what to do.’

‘Do you think so?’ Marka raised a tear-stained face. ‘Do you really think so?’

‘I have to. And so do you.’

The tears stopped. Marka sat back on her heels and wiped her face on the sleeve of her tunic. A sudden thought turned her cold.

‘Wait – where is Ebañy?’ Marka scrambled to her feet. ‘Here we are, on the coast, with the cliffs –’

‘I’ll stay here with the child.’

Marka ducked out of the tent, then stood blinking for a moment in the bright sunlight. Around her the camp spread out, a grand thing of white tents and painted wagons, the biggest travelling show that Bardek had ever seen. At the moment, however, the camp seemed curiously empty. Most of the performers had retired to their tents to sleep away the noon heat. Since she could see none of their animals, some of the men must have led them to the water trough by the public fountain, hidden from her sight by trees. Nowhere did Marka find Ebañy, but in the far view, at the edge of the caravanserai, between the palms and the plane trees, she could see the cliffs and distantly hear the sea, pounding on rocks below.

Marka trotted off, panting a little for breath in the hot sun. All those pregnancies had buried the slender girl acrobat somewhere deep inside a thick-waisted matron who had to bind up her heavy breasts for comfort’s sake. At those moments when she had the leisure to remember her younger self, Marka hated what she had become. Especially when she looked at her husband – as she hurried along the cliffs, she saw him at last, strolling along and singing to himself a good safe distance back from the edge. Her relief mingled with anger, that he could still look so young and so handsome, with his pale blond hair and his pale grey eyes, his pinkish-white skin just glazed with tan and as smooth as a young lad’s. When he saw her, he smiled and waved.

‘There you are, my love,’ he called out. ‘Do you have need of me for something?’

‘Oh, I was just wondering where you were.’

‘Enjoying this glorious day under the dome of the sky. The sea’s full of spirits, and so is the wind, and they’re all enjoying it with me.’

‘Ah. I see.’

Not of course that she did see the spirits teeming. He often spoke of spirits, as well as demons, portents, and visions, all of them invisible to everyone else. Still, she had to agree about the glory of this particular day, with the sea a winter-dark blue, scoured into white caps by the fresh wind.

‘I’ve been thinking about the show,’ Ebañy said. ‘I want to add something new to my displays, in the parts with the coloured lights. I’m just not sure what yet.’

‘It’ll come to you. I have faith.’

‘Well, so do I.’

They shared a smile. Hand in hand they walked back to the camp while he sang in the language of far-off Deverry.

‘A love song,’ he said abruptly. ‘For you, my beautiful darling.’

And he did love her, of that she was sure. Never in their years together had he spurned her, never had he amused himself with the young women who performed in the troupe, not even once, no matter how old and thick and worn she’d become. For that alone she would always love him, even though at times, such as now, when he studied her face with a strange intensity, she wondered what he was seeing when he looked at her.

With a squeal of delight Zandro came trotting to meet them. Keeta strolled after, shaking her head, as if to say that he was beyond her control. It was one of the strangest things about the boy, that he could walk as well as a much older child, yet not be able to form a single word.

‘Well!’ Marka pointed them out. ‘Look who’s coming.’

‘I see him, and a fine sight he is.’

When Marka said nothing, Ebañy paused to look at her.

‘You’re frowning,’ he said. ‘Why?’

‘I’m just so worried about our Zan. He’s just not right. We can’t go on hiding it from ourselves. I mean, he should be talking more, and then –’

‘What? No, he’s fine for what he is. He’s a very young soul, just born for the first time. And he’s not human, truly. You can see it in his aura.’

He bent down and scooped the boy up. Laughing, Zandro buried his face in his father’s shoulder.

‘What do you mean, aura?’ Marka said.

‘Look for yourself.’ Ebañy waved his free hand around the boy’s head. ‘All the colours are wrong. What are you, my son? One of the Wildfolk, seeing what flesh feels like? Did you choose this, or did we trap you, my wife and I, when we were making a body for someone to wear?’

Marka felt her hands clenching into fists as if she could pummel his madness into silence. When Ebañy looked into Zandro’s eyes, the boy stared steadily back.

‘Not one of the Wildfolk,’ Ebañy said at last. ‘But some spirit whose time has come to be born. You’ve a lot to learn, my darling, but now the world is yours and all its marvels too.’

Carrying Zandro, Ebañy walked back toward their tent. Marka lingered, fighting back tears, until Keeta laid an enormous hand on her shoulder.

‘I’m so sorry,’ she murmured. ‘It’s so sad.’

‘Yes.’ Marka wiped her eyes on her sleeve. ‘It came on so slowly, didn’t it? I wonder now how long he’s been this way, and I never would let myself notice.’

‘None of us wanted to notice. Don’t berate yourself.’

‘Thank you. When he’s not – well, when he’s not saying peculiar things, I can pretend that we still have our wonderful life. But then he’ll come out with something, like just now, and I don’t know what to say.’

‘There probably isn’t anything to say. Ah well, we’ll see what Myleton brings us.’

* * *

Wherever Ebañy walked, the Wildfolk went with him, sylph, sprite, and gnome, and in the water undines, rising up to beckon him into the waves. In the fires the salamanders played, rubbing their backs on the logs like cats, leaping up with the flames. At one time in his life he’d called himself Salamander, back in the land of his birth. That he did remember, though a great many other memories escaped him. The world teemed with visions that drove out the ordinary details, such as the names of the cities they visited and at times even the names of his wife and children. That they were his wife and children he never forgot.

At night when he slept, his dreams took him to strange worlds filled with stranger spirits. On purple seas he travelled in a barge while a sun of poison green hung at zenith. Enormous undines followed and held out long grey hands while they asked him questions in a language he’d never heard. Other nights he climbed mountains of crystal where the rivers ran with blood, or he would ride six-legged beasts like emerald insects across sand dunes to the ruins of cities.

Every dream ended the same way. He would reach his destination, whether a city of gold by a harbour or a cavern glittering with sapphires and emeralds, and walk into a building – a temple, perhaps, to unknown gods or a tavern filled with incense smoke and plangent music. The room would annoy him, and he would leave it, going from chamber to chamber or down long halls until at last he would see the door. It was always the same, this door, a solid thing of dark wood bound with iron. He would remember that in the room behind this door lay a magical book. If he could read that book, he would once again know who he was.

When he pushed on it, the door opened easily, but instead of a room, he would find himself in a large canvas tent, lying on a sleeping mat. Usually sunlight would glow through the walls, and he would see wealth around him: brightly-coloured tent bags and carpets, rolled mats, wooden stools, big pottery jars. Sometimes people with dark skins and black hair would be sitting nearby. He would find his clothes lying beside him on the floor cloth, and he would dress, looking round at the objects in the tent and trying to remember their names while the Wildfolk flocked around him or chased each other back and forth.

Some while later, he would realize that he was awake.

A city of trees and broad avenues, Myleton lay on the northern seacoast of Bardektinna, the biggest island in the vast and complex archipelago that Deverry men call Bardek, lumping all the islands together with a fine disregard for their inhabitants’ politics and geography both. It was a rich city, too, where the public buildings gleamed with pale marble and the homes of the prosperous aped them with white stucco walls. Just to the south stood a public caravanserai with good deep wells and shade trees. After Keeta bargained with the archon’s men – public servants in charge of the campground – the troupe pulled in and got itself settled. Since the rainy season had begun, they had the caravanserai to themselves.

‘At least there won’t be strangers,’ Marka said. ‘Sometimes when Ebañy’s babbling, and there are strangers listening, I just want to die.’

‘Now, now, little one,’ Keeta said. ‘It’s no fault of yours, and who cares what strangers think? I’m more worried about the children, myself. Their father’s madness – it can’t be good for them to see him like this.’

‘It’s not, no. I try to talk with Kwinto, but he just shrugs me off. After all, he’s almost a man now, he keeps things to himself. But Tillya – she’s truly upset. She loves her father so much, and she’s old enough to understand.’

Marka and Keeta were walking through the public bazaar, which, here in winter, stayed open through the midday. In the centre of the white plaza, public fountains gushed and glittered in the cool sunlight. Around them a sea of brightly-coloured sunshades rippled in the wind over the hundreds of booths. Close to the fountains lay luxury goods such as silver work and brass ware, oil lamps, silks, perfumes, jewellery, strangely shaped knives, and decorative leather work, while the practical vegetable and fish stands stood at the downwind edge of the market. Here and there a few performers struggled to get the crowd’s attention – inept tumblers, a clumsy juggler, a pair of musicians who showed talent but needed practice.

‘There’s nothing here to compete with us,’ Marka said. ‘Good. And Myleton knows us. Everyone will come running to see us. Particularly Ebañy’s act.’

‘And so they should,’ Keeta said. ‘It’s spectacular. I’m not prying into his trade secrets, mind, but you can’t help wondering how he gets those effects. I’ve never seen him mixing chemicals or anything like that.’

‘Do you want to know what’s really strange? I don’t know how he does it, either.’

‘Really?’ Keeta stared for a moment. ‘Well, by the Wave Father! Your man’s a tight-lipped fellow, that’s for sure. I hope he’s at least teaching Kwinto.’

‘No, he’s not. He keeps saying it’s all real magic, just like they have in Deverry. There’s a funny name for it. Dwimmer or something. But Ebañy said Kwinto doesn’t have the talent for it. That’s why we have him juggling instead.’

They walked a ways in silence, then paused by the fountains, where clean water bubbled up into white marble basins.

‘I know it sounds like I’ve gone mad myself,’ Marka said at last. ‘Talking of magic, real magic I mean.’

‘Well, yes, but what if it isn’t mad? What if your husband’s telling the plain and simple truth? They always say that studying sorcery drives men insane, don’t they?’

‘But it can’t be true!’

‘Why not? The sun rises and sets again on many a strange thing. If Ebañy says he calls fire out of the sky with magic – well, do we have a better explanation?’

Marka merely shook her head.

‘I keep thinking about Jill,’ Keeta went on. ‘You remember her – she was travelling with Ebañy when we first met him, all those years ago now, but I can still see her in my mind quite clearly. A wandering scholar, she called herself. Huh. She was a lot more impressive than that.’

‘Well, that’s true,’ Marka said. ‘And Ebañy was always trying to get her approval for things, but he was afraid of her, too. I never knew why. Ye gods, I was so young then! I don’t suppose I really cared.’

‘Well yes, it was a long time ago, all right. My memory could be playing tricks on me, but you know, looking back, I really do wonder if Jill was a sorcerer, and if your husband knew a great deal more about such things than we would ever have believed.’

Marka could think of nothing to say. The idea made a certain bitter sense.

‘Ah well,’ Keeta went on. ‘After the show tonight, when we know how much coin we have to spend, I’ll come back into town and start asking about the priests. If one of them can drive out demons, everyone will know about it, and maybe it’s only a demon that’s troubling Ebañy so.’

Since in winter the Bardekian days ended early and lacked a proper twilight, the troupe of performers went into Myleton well before sunset. At nightfall the western sea swallowed the sun in one gulp to leave only a faint greenish glow at the horizon. As oil lamps began to flicker into life in the bazaar, the troupe set up for a show. Although they carried a portable stage of planks in their caravan, Myleton supplied – for a suitable bribe to the archon’s men – a better stage than that, the long marble terrace running alongside the Customs House at the edge of the bazaar. While some of the acrobats set up brass poles for the standing torches, the musicians, led by Kwinto and Tillya, paraded through the crowd and cried the show with a loud banging of drums. Below an audience gathered, small at first, then suddenly swelling as the word went round the bazaar: the Great Krysello is here! He’s going to perform! By the time the parade returned, there were too many spectators to count.

The Great Krysello, or Salamander, as Ebañy thought of himself, because on that particular night Salamander was the only name he could remember, waited in the darkness at the far side of the stage while the dancers performed, swirling with scarves to a flute and drum accompaniment. While he watched, he sang along to the music and laughed. Once he stepped onto the stage, he felt in command of himself again, sure of where he was and what exactly he should do there.

Many years ago he’d been a juggler, and juggler only, and to warm up the crowd he still tossed scarves and juggled eggs and such, talking and singing all the while. But somewhere along the years he’d discovered he could do much more to entertain. Or had he perhaps always known he could summon the Wildfolk of Fire and Aethyr to fill the sky with fire in lurid colours? Dimly he could remember being warned against such things. An old man had spoken to him harshly about it, once a long time ago. Somewhere in his mind, however, he also remembered that this fellow was no one. Since nothing was left of the memory but those words, ‘he’s no one,’ Salamander could assume the memory image of a tall old man with ice-blue eyes and white hair was just another dream come to walk the day.

And on nights like this one, when he walked onto the stage and looked out at the dark swelling shape of the audience, a single animal it seemed, lying just beyond the glare of oil lamps and the torchlight, he forgot any strictures he might have once heard. When the crowd roared and clapped, he felt its love pour over him, and he laughed, throwing his arms into the air.

‘Greetings!’ he called out. ‘The Great Krysello gives you his humble thanks!’

From his sleeves he flicked scarves and began to circle them from hand to hand, but always he was aware of the Wildfolk, sylphs and sprites, gnomes and salamanders, gathering on the stage, forming above the incense braziers, flocking around him and flitting this way and that, grinning and pointing at the crowd. In a flood of Elvish words he called out orders, and for the sheer love of play they obeyed him. Suddenly, far above the crowd, red and blue lightning crackled. With each boom of false thunder, sheets of colour fell and twisted in every rainbow the Wildfolk knew. The crowd roared its approval as the sheets broke into glowing drops and vanished just above their heads.

A green and purple mist burst into being around the stage, and deep within it voices sang alien songs. Once the crowd fell silent to listen, Salamander added explosions and bursts of gold and silver. Then back to the colours sheeting the sky – on and on he went until sweat soaked his costume and plastered his hair to his head. He let the colours fade and the music die away, then bowed deeply to the crowd.

‘The Great Krysello is weary! But lo! we have other wonders to show you.’

At the signal Vinto’s acrobats, all dressed in gaudy silks, rushed onto the stage. The crowd roared and threw coins in a copper and silver rain. As they tumbled around the stage, the acrobats scooped them up. Salamander stepped back to the shadows at the rear. While he mopped the sweat from his face and hair with a scarf, he looked out over the crowd.

One man caught his attention immediately, a tall fellow, standing right in front. His body seemed to waver like a reflection on moving water, and his clothes looked more like wisps of fog or smoke hung around him, or maybe just placed in his general vicinity, than solid cloth. Yet no one standing near him seemed to notice the least thing unusual. When the acrobats arranged themselves into a human pyramid, he clapped and smiled like anyone else. The flute and drums began their music; applause rippled, then died. The flickering stranger crossed his arms over his chest and stood reasonably still.