The Dragons of Dorcastle (16 page)

The display of confidence worked. The common nodded rapidly, his face still averted. “The blue markers, Lady Mechanic. On the road. The trolley which stops at them goes to the Hall of Government.” His voice held fear but also resentment.

Mari just looked at the common for a long moment, trying to figure out how to handle him. According to all she had been taught, she should unleash a series of threats and put the common in his place, but even if that worked she would hate herself afterwards. “That’s all.” She walked onward, looking for the blue markers.

The trolley proved to be a horse-drawn wagon moving at glacial speed. The operator at least knew better than to ask a Mechanic for a fare, though he did betray the same fear and resentment as the earlier common had. Bad attitudes from commons weren’t unusual, but this intensity of them, the openness of them, was abnormal. Was it just Ringhmon? Or was this part of the problem which had erupted at Julesport? Surely the commons here knew that if they created a big enough problem for the Mechanics Guild, the Guild elders could simply provide the Empire with the assistance to reach their city in overwhelming force and turn Ringhmon into a conquered outpost.

Mari sat glumly watching the glorious and grimy city of Ringhmon roll past at the slow clip the single horse pulling the trolley could manage. The city appeared to be overrun with guards and police as well as negative behaviors.

At least the presence of all of those guards was reassuring. Mari wondered if the riders she had seen yesterday actually had been unrelated to the bandits. Everything she had seen of Ringhmon so far made it seem unlikely that people could ride freely through the place brandishing weapons. Unfortunately, that was the only thing she had seen about Ringhmon so far that wasn’t unpleasant.

Thoughts of the bandits led her back to thoughts of the Mage.
I wouldn’t have made it here without his help. At least he knows what help means now. I hope his Guild Hall in Ringhmon treated him better than mine has so far.

* * * *

Alain traded the dim passages of the Mage Guild Hall for the bright sunlight of the streets outside. A night of meditation and a morning of darkly suspicious Inquiry had become a day of more light but no further enlightenment.
I will not allow the insults of elders who do not know me to affect me. I will not allow a brief encounter with a Mechanic to destroy my future as a Mage. The elders cannot change me, and the Mechanic cannot control me. And I will not allow foresight I do not understand to continue to unsettle me.
His thoughts going around in circles, Alain sought release in movement and the distraction of a strange city.

On a whim, as he left the Guild Hall Alain wrapped himself inside the spell which bent light and made him virtually impossible to see. Even another Mage could only sense his presence and location. The spell took effort, but he maintained it for a while, strolling along invisible to the commons and the occasional pair of Mechanics he spotted, just like an acolyte hiding from other acolytes who had not developed their skills enough to sense him. The Mage elders would have been annoyed to observe him playing with that spell. Perhaps that was why he was doing it.

As he crossed a street, Alain could see that the stone edgings were cracked and chipped, and in some cases well out of line with their neighboring stones. The buildings revealed the same sort of evidence of long decline. What commons and Mechanics called reality was only an illusion, but it took careful study of the illusion to know what to change, so Alain took in every flaw, every variation in the buildings.

He walked down a street lined with what at first glance were grand mansions with fronts of fitted stone. But the “stone” was another attempt at illusion by commons, just wood planks beveled at intervals to look like stone blocks and then covered with paint mixed with stone dust.

Alain found himself wondering what the Mechanic would have thought of these attempts to mimic other substances.
What would she say? Something I could not understand, probably. The words she used did not seem to mean the same things as the words I use. If I could ask—

No. Stop thinking about her
.

Still unseen inside his spell, Alain glanced at the commons who unknowingly shared the street with him, all of them plodding along with expressions that seemed to combine stubbornness and weariness. The pride of the city of Ringhmon appeared to exist mainly in the minds of its leaders.

As Alain went deeper into the city he could see that many of the street intersections were guarded by tough-looking individuals whose leather armor marked them as some sort of local militia. They all wore short swords and carried wooden clubs about as long as Alain’s forearm. The citizens kept well away from the toughs, averting their eyes. Sensitive to the emotions which shadows displayed, Alain felt as if he were drowning in a sea of despair and oppression.

Alain finally dropped his concealment spell, getting a little perverse satisfaction from the panicky way nearby commons reacted to the sudden appearance of a Mage among them. He strolled over to examine a monument commemorating some great event, but when Alain got close enough to read the inscription he found that the “victory” involved one of the failed Imperial expeditions through the desert waste. Alain studied the images of larger-than-life warriors carrying banners from the city of Ringhmon as they trampled Imperial legionaries. In a corner of one “gold” panel, he saw where the thin layer of gilt had been worn away, exposing a dull grey metal beneath. Another illusion of wealth, this one within an illusion of victory. Layers of falseness. Did the commons here believe any of it?

Shaking his head, he turned away to see several citizens of Ringhmon standing close and watching him with wary eyes. They appeared abnormally bold in their attitudes, so Alain gave them the dead, emotionless look of a Mage and they scattered hastily. He had been told that commons believed Mages could use spells on them, changing their shape and nature, turning them into animals or insects, or overturning their reason. Alain knew this was false, that no Mage could harm or change a shadow directly, yet the Mage Guild had encouraged such superstitions, seeing them as a good way of keeping the commons properly subdued and fearful. He probably should have simply ignored the commons, though. If the elders at the Guild Hall could see him playing such tricks on shadows they would call him young indeed.

Alain squinted upward, seeing that the morning had advanced. The day was already once again hot and unpleasant, and the cool, dark rooms of the Guild Hall were beginning to seem a lot more attractive.The Hall would have a records section, a place holding the words of others in which he could find relief from the emptiness of the world.

Alain started back the way he had come, crossing a large street. A trolley had just passed, moving slowly away under the pull of a large draft horse which seemed either old or simply as dispirited as the people of this city. Alain felt a sensation as if he were being watched by sightless eyes, or as if his name had been silently called. He looked toward the trolley. Most of the seats were packed with commons sitting with their backs to him, but one bench held only a single individual, someone wearing the short, dark jacket of a Mechanic. Just as unmistakable as the jacket was the shoulder-length, raven-black hair of the Mechanic wearing it.

Master Mechanic Mari.

Alain came to a halt, oblivious to the carts and wagons which had to veer around him.
Mechanics are shadows. None of them matter. She does not matter. I should walk on and return to my Guild Hall.

Yet, how odd that in this city our paths crossed in this time and place. Some of the elders at Ihris told me that the illusion which is this world guides us in certain ways, sometimes toward wisdom, sometimes toward error. What led me to this street at this time? What led that Mechanic to be on that particular trolley?

How did she make me look toward her?

Did she cause that? She has not looked back. Why attract my attention in such a subtle manner and then avoid even meeting my eyes?

I am on this road for a reason. I feel that. But is this the road to wisdom or error? Is it a road the Mechanic chose for both of us? Or did something else place us both on it, both unwitting?

He knew what the elders here in Ringhmon would say. Alain considered that, thinking of the difficulty those elders would have controlling their outrage, thinking of their dismissive words toward him.
If nothing matters, then nothing matters. Why not see where this road leads?

Still, the consequences if he were seen near this Mechanic again…

Uncertain, Alain took another look at the back of Master Mechanic Mari. His expression did not change, but his breath hissed in between his teeth in a momentary reaction that he could not suppress. The foresight had come to him again, once more centered on this Mechanic, and the dark mist was more ominous than what he had seen in the waste. Black as the darkest night and shot with red veins, the mist foretold danger and violence in terms he needed no elder to interpret. Oddly, once again he sensed the storm clouds from his earlier vision, pressing in toward the Mechanic from the fringes of the dark mist.
The Mechanic is in peril still. Does it have something to do with this thing which thinks but does not live? What is such a thing? The Mechanic knew when I spoke of it, though she tried to hide it.

Is it some form of Mechanic troll? Trolls do not truly think or live, and Mechanics are not supposed to be able to make such things. Do I not have an obligation to learn if Mechanics can do this, so as to warn my Guild?

And if this Mechanic can control the actions of a Mage such as I, make me think certain thoughts and react to calls which were not made, then that too the Mage Guild must know.

This is not about the Mechanic. She is nothing. I have already given her warning of danger here, a warning she seems not to have heeded. I am doing this for my Guild.
He repeated that to himself, but wondered how much of an illusion his rationale really was. At least it served to justify his actions while he decided what to do next.

Why hadn’t the Mechanic taken his warning? Alain felt rising irritation and ruthlessly restrained the emotion. And why, when the other Mechanics he had seen this morning had all been in pairs, did she travel alone? Was she so careless?

She had not acted careless in the waste. Desperate, certainly, especially when she risked them both to confront what proved to be the salt caravan.

What were the Mechanic’s elders like? She had said they were like his own, strange though that sounded. Did they listen to her? Had she passed on the warning, only to have her elders dismiss her words as Alain’s elders had dismissed his?

He suddenly felt certain that this Mechanic had no choice but to go onward to danger. Once again, he knew how she must feel. A strange sensation, worrisome. How to make it go away? How to release the hold she had placed upon him?

She had saved his life. Alain almost smiled before he caught himself. That was it. Several times she had “helped” him. The Mechanic had used that to influence him. No wonder the elders warned against helping.

How to cancel it out? Like canceled like. Power could defeat power. She had saved him, she had helped him. He would help her, perhaps even save her life. That would cancel whatever the Mechanic had done to him. He would be free of her.

The logic had no flaws. This must be wisdom. Alain began walking behind the trolley, staying close enough to keep it in sight, which was easy enough to do given its slow pace. The way out of error led through this Mechanic. He had gotten into it by associating with her, and now he had to get out of it the same way.

* * * *

Mari reflected glumly that the only good thing about this journey was the fact that no one dared share a bench with a Mechanic, so that no matter how crowded the trolley got, Mari still had plenty of room to herself. Unfortunately she also had plenty of time to think: about Senior Mechanics who seemed determined to trip her up, about Mages who didn’t act like Mages were supposed to act and gave warnings about things they weren’t supposed to know, and about a city full of hostile commons who seemed ready to blow like a boiler under too much pressure.

She felt some sympathy for the Senior Mechanics concerned that Ringhmon could erupt like Julesport had, but only a little. Senior Mechanics insisted on the policies which kept the commons not only under control but resenting their inferior status. As an apprentice, Mari had gotten into more than one heated argument with other apprentices over her belief that the commons could be controlled without rubbing their noses in it. She had been gaining converts to her point of view when those arguments were abruptly halted. She was called in for some extremely serious questioning by the Guild Hall Supervisor at Caer Lyn, ending in a very clear order.
We know what we’re doing. We have centuries of experience. A few years ago you were living in a hovel among the commons, thinking you were no better than them. You were wrong then and you’re wrong now. Listen, learn and obey.

She had shut up like a good little apprentice, because she wasn’t stupid. But she hadn’t understood then and still didn’t understand why the Senior Mechanics refused to consider a different approach. It wasn’t as though the superiority of the Mechanics was artificial, something made up. The commons couldn’t do the things that Mechanics could. They needed Mechanics. That reality couldn’t be altered by treating the commons with a little dignity.

Nothing is real.

Blasted Mage. He believed some really strange things, and she would do best to forget them as soon as possible. She knew what was real and what wasn’t.

It wasn’t until she had spent a few moments studying the distant shape of a Mage crossing the road ahead of them, easy to make out because of the way the commons left a wide berth around him, that Mari realized she had been looking for a glimpse of one particular Mage. That one ahead couldn’t be him. Too short and too wide.