The Awakened Mage (22 page)

“Sink me bloody sideways! Who told you?”

“It was the talk of the Goose last night. If you weren’t famous before, my friend, you will be after! An Olken sitting in judgment at Justice Hall? You’re a man of hidden talents, Asher.”

“I’m a man of many headaches, is what I am. I’ll see you later, Matt. I got some business to attend to.”

As he left the stable yard, frowning, a nasty thought occurred. Yesterday Gar had gone to his family’s crypt to create the effigies. But that wouldn’t have taken all day and night. Not unless—

—unless something had gone horribly wrong.

Brisk walking turned into a fast jog, then an all-out run as he headed for House Torvig’s private burial vault. He was panting, streaming sweat, by the time he reached it. Glimfire still burned in the passageways; not a good sign. He took four wrong turns before finally stumbling into the small glimlit room Gar had selected to house the coffins.

He found his king sprawled facedown on the flag-stoned floor.

“Gar!”

There was a pulse, praise Barl, and slow, measured breathing. Gar’s skin was dry, cold, his eyes gently closed Even as Asher poked and prodded and shouted his name he stirred. Coughed. Woke and stared around him, confused.

“Asher?”

“Barl bloody save me,” Asher muttered, and helped him to sit up. “Are you all right? What happened? Don’t tell me you decided to
sleep
in here! ‘Cause that’s takin’ reverence for the dead just a—”

“No, no,” said Gar, and pressed a hand to his head. “I was molding the effigies and—I can’t remember—there was pain, and a bright tight, and—” His expression changed, confusion to caution to sudden fear. “Help me stand.”

With a grunt Asher hauled him to his feet. Gar swayed for a moment, finding his balance, then looked at the three coffins. Sucked in a great gasp of air and blanched fish-belly white.

“Barl bloody save me,” Asher said again, and this time it was a prayer. Serene, peaceful, exquisite: the faces of the queen and her daughter slept side by side, a song and its echo. But Borne’s face was a monstrosity.

On the left side it was perfect. An immaculate representation of the man. The right side, though, was twisted. Melted. The stone eye in its socket had boiled and burst, dribbling marble tears down the sunken cheek. It was as though the effigy were made of wax, not stone, and some mad magician had breathed on it with fire.

“What happened? What went wrong?”

“I don’t know,” Gar whispered. “It’s all a jumble. Barl have mercy, Asher. His
face!”

Asher stepped between Gar and the dead king’s coffin. “Don’t look at it. Just listen. This happened ‘cause you’re coming apart at the seams, Gar. Nix’s bloody potion ain’t fixing you, it’s just been keepin’ you glued together. Except now even that ain’t working. And folk are startin’ to notice.”

“What folk? What are you talking about?”

“Darran’s been on at me. He can see how poorly you’re looking, and so can everyone else.”

Gar frowned. “Don’t. Not in here.”

“Where then? Gar, it’s time you came to your senses. Durm’s no closer to gettin’ out of bed today than he was three weeks ago and a blind man can see you need a Master Magician now.”

“Must I make it a royal command? I said I won’t discuss it!”

“You have to.” Heart thudding, Asher shoved his fists in his pockets. “You’re so bloody worried about betraying Durm. What about him?” He stepped aside, revealing Borne’s disfigured face. “If you work yourself unconscious or worse, into a fit that
kills
you this time, you’ll be givin’ this kingdom giftwrapped to Conroyd Jarralt. And if that ain’t a betrayal of your da I don’t know what is!”

For a moment he thought Gar was going to hit him. Then fury faded, and Gar turned away. “I know.”

“You need help. With the WeatherWorking, your magic. You need someone who understands what it means to be Doranen. I can hold your coat for you while you make it rain, and mop you up with cloths and water afterwards, but I can’t tell you how to control your power.”

“I know that too,” said Gar, and turned round again. He looked shattered. “I know I’ve been postponing the inevitable. And I know it has to stop.” He looked again at his father’s ruined effigy and flinched. ‘This is a sign from Barl, I think. A warning.”

“Then take the hint”

Gar nodded. “I will. Tomorrow. Today I must rest. There’s WeatherWorking tonight and I need to regain my strength. If what happened here should happen while I’m in the midst of a Working …” He shuddered.

“Fine,” said Asher, and started backing towards the chamber door. ‘Tomorrow. And don’t think I won’t hold you to it. That bloody Darran’ll never let me hear the end of it otherwise.”

Pale again, and somber, Gar followed. As he passed his father’s coffin he paused, bent low and pressed his lips to the cold, marred stone of his brow. “I’m sorry, Father. I’ll return soon and make this right. I promise.”

“Course you will,” said Asher, waiting in the doorway. “It only happened ‘cause you’re tired.”

“Yes,” said Gar, still staring at his father’s face. “I expect so.”

Something in the way he said it prickled Asher’s skin. He took a step back into the chamber. “Gar?”

“I’m fine. It’s just—”

“Gar, don’t. Magic ain’t like the spotty blisters. You don’t catch it then get over it. Even I know that much. If you start thinkin’ like that—”

“Like what?”

“Like maybe… maybe …” He couldn’t say it If the words remained unspoken …

Gar’s lips twisted. “Like maybe my magic is failing?”

_Damn. _”No! That’s daft. How can magic fail? It’s magic. I mean, you’re the historian, Gar. Has there ever been a case of a Doranen’s magic failing? Running out? Drying up?”

Slowly, Gar shook his head. “No. But then there’s never been a ease of it manifesting at such a late age either.”

“So now you’re not just studyin’ history, you’re makin’ it,” he said, itching to shake sense into him. Shake out fear, and doubt. “You’re
tired,
Gar. That’s all. For the love of Barl, don’t you start lookin’ for things to fret on! We got problems enough as it is.”

Gar sighed. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”

“Aye, well, don’t be sorry. Just be walkin’, eh? Some people have got work to do.”

That made Gar laugh. “You are so rude.”

He grinned, flooded with relief. “I ain’t rude. I’m just me.

“Yes, you are,” said Gar. “And praise Barl for it.”

After seeing Gar safe and sound to his apartments, and narrowly avoiding both Darran and Willer, Asher lost himself in yet another day crammed top to bottom and side to side with meetings. Decisions. Authority. Things he was getting used to, but slowly. He saw Dathne only in passing. She smiled at him, her eyes warm, and his spirits lifted. Telling her his secret was dangerous but he couldn’t be sorry. Nothing would make him regret feeling closer to her.

The day ended, at last. He ate his dinner down at the Goose, suffering with as much goodwill as he could muster the whooping and hollering and rib-tickling about his upcoming appearance in Justice Hall. Matt’s lads promised to fill his boots with manure for good luck. Behind all the joshing and jibing, though, was genuine admiration. A kind of rough-spun awe. He was one of them, one of their own, and yet he was different. Not better. Just… special.

The idea made him laugh.
Tell that to my brothers.

With several hours to go before he was due to meet Gar for WeatherWorking he distracted himself playing darts with Matt and a few of Pellen’s lads. Hoped Dathne might stop by for a pint, but she didn’t show. Just before closing he paid out the money he’d lost in wagers, said his goodnights and made his circumspect way to the Weather Chamber.

Gar arrived some ten minutes after he did, brisk and rested and uninviting of personal inquiries. “Any crises occur today I should know about?” he asked, conjuring pale gold glimfire.

“None I couldn’t handle.”

“Darran told me about Glospottle,” Gar said with a sly smile. “Don’t worry. I’ll see you through Justice Hall.”

Asher nodded. “Appreciate it. What’s on the menu tonight then?”

“Rain on the Flatlands. Snow in the Dingles. And the River Tey is overdue for freezing.”

So. A long hard night then. Wonderful. Swallowing a sigh, Asher settled himself in the armchair conjured for his comfort and waited for the show to begin.

Braced for the coming onslaught, Gar raised his left hand. Closed his eyes, murmured a brief prayer and traced the first sigil on the waiting air. The magic ignited, feebly. Asher frowned.

“Gar… that were the wrong sigil.”

Gar’s look would have burned stone. “It was not.”

“You just drew the third sigil for the right hand. Not the first for the left.”

“I did
not.”

He sighed. “I’ve watched you call rain enough times now that could I teach the incantation in a classroom. That were the wrong sigil. And you didn’t walk widdershins.”

“Asher!”

He sat back. “Fine. You’re the king.”

Walking this time, Gar started again. Waved his hand through the incorrect sigil, dispelling its energy, and this time drew the proper one.
“Tolnek.”

He winced.
Luknek,
Gar was supposed to say
luknek
first. “Gar…”

“Be silent!”

Asher bit his tongue.

Breathing heavily, Gar raised his right hand and drew the fifth sigil, not the second. Instead of burning brightly it hung wraithlike for mere seconds, then faded. On a stifled curse he tried again, and this time managed the correct sign.

Increasingly uneasy, Asher watched Gar stumble through the rainmaking incantation. This was
wrong.
By now the power should be rising, but the atmosphere in the chamber was unstirred. Instead of painting the sigils smoothly on the canvas of waiting air, Gar’s fingers clawed the shapes without grace or commitment. All his precision was gone, and with it his accuracy. His confidence. This Working was a mishmash of meaningless gestures, a litany of misremembered words. A travesty.

At last he could bear it no longer. He got to his feet and moved to intercept Gar’s disjointed procession. Held out his hands and said, rough with compassion, “Stop. Gar, just stop.”

“No,” Gar said, and shoved him aside.

Stepping in front of him a second time he said, “You ain’t rested enough. Leave it. The rain can wait.”

“It can’t wait. Without the Weather Magic the Wall will fall.”

“In one night?”

Gar dragged a shaking hand down his face. “You’ll have to help me.”

“
What?”

“The words are in here!” said Gar, rapping his forehead with his fingers. “And the sigils. But I can’t quite see them … grasp them…”

“Me, help?” He tried to swallow, but his mouth was too dry. “With magic? Are you mad?”

Impatient, Gar looked at him. “You said it yourself: you know the incantations back to front and inside out. Guide me through them. Say the words and draw the sigils so I can copy them.”

“You are mad,” he whispered.

“Weren’t you
listening?
“[__] Gar’s eyes were feverish. “I can’t remember the incantation’s proper sequence! If you don’t help me then it won’t rain tonight and that will be all the provocation Conroyd needs to challenge my fitness as WeatherWorker.”

“And if I do, and he finds out, that’s
my
head usin’ a wooden block for a pillow!”

“How would he find out?”

Asher opened his mouth. Closed it. Glared.

“I’m not asking you to break Barl’s First Law,” Gar said with quiet intensity. “I’m asking you to help your king.”

Shit.
Shit.
He could just see the look on Dathne’s face if he told her about _this. _”I don’t know.”

“
Please.”

Stomach churning, he took refuge in movement

Stamped back and forth across the chamber, anger fueled by resentment. He could feel Gar’s eyes on him. His tension and barely controlled fear. Echoing in memory, a promise to an unwell man.
I’II
look after him.
He stopped.

“All right. I’ll do it, on one condition.”

Gar couldn’t hide his wild relief. “Name it.”

“First thing in the morning you go see Nix and tell him you’re sickenin’ for something. You drink whatever disgusting muck he puts in your hand. And then you pay a visit to Conroyd Jarralt and congratulate him on his promotion.”

A long silence. A reluctant nod. “Very well,” said Gar.

He looked as though his heart was breaking. Asher didn’t care. “Then let’s get this over with. Before I come to my bloody senses.”

“How do you want to do this?” said Gar, frowning. “Long-winded explanations won’t work.”

He shrugged. “You ever play a mirror game?”

“When I was three!”

“You got a better idea? ‘Cause I’m all ears!”

They stood face-to-face beside the Weather Map, arms outstretched and fingertips touching. Torn between fear and feeling stupid, Asher closed his eyes. “You ready?”

“Yes. When the power ignites, be sure to get out of the way.”

He snorted. “Like 1 need tellin’.”

Stepping slowly sideways they began the Weather Working dance. Not exactly meaning to, with his inner eye Asher saw the Flatlands in full sunshine. The rolling hills and the nodding grasses, burdened with tiny birds. Tasted the clean tang of open air and heard the curlews crying. Closing his eyes he commanded from memory the exact sequence of signs that would summon the rain. Then, hesitantly, he raised his left hand. Gar’s hand lifted with it. Together, they drew a picture in the air. His voice whispered,
“Luknek.”
Gar echoed him. Walk, walk, walk. Raise the right hand. Draw the second sigil.
“Tolnek”
Another echo. Walk, walk, walk. Raise the left hand. Draw the third sigil. It was getting easier somehow.
“Luknek.”
Again, the echo. Asher frowned. Was it his imagination or did his fingers just tingle? No. It was nothing. The blood not getting to his fingertips properly, that was all.
“Tolnek.”
Gar cleared his throat. “Asher…” His voice sounded strange.