The White Order (7 page)

Unto the generations stood the black tower on the heights of the Westhorns, and from it issued forth the demon warriors and their blades, controlling trade and using the very blood of those who displeased them to create the mortar that bound their stone roads.

   Nor did they suffer any man grown to survive upon their heights, discarding him like an empty husk of maize once they had wrested his seed from him ...

   For all this wickedness, Westwind survived and prospered, until the day when the Guild at Fairhaven sent a hero to Westwind, a stranger who beguiled the Marshal of the heights with song. Yet once she had borne son and daughter, the Marshal laughed and sent away that hero. In her evilness, she had her guards slay him in the depths of the Westhorns.

   That son, who was called Creslin, grew strong, and cunning as his mother the Marshal, and before he was grown to the age of death or exile, he sneaked away from the heights, taking the talismans of darkness that had held the forces of white and right at bay for long generations.

   In time, he came to Fairhaven, pretending to be but a poor soldier, but the brethren were not deceived, and they discovered his deception and captured him and bound him to be a stoneworker on the great highway, far from Fairhaven.

   The powers of darkness, in their sinuous way, corrupted a young woman and a white mage from the far west, deceiving her into thinking that she was but escaping from the captivity of darkness, and enticed this mage Megaera into freeing the black demon that Creslin had become . . .

         Colors of White

         (Manual of the Guild at Fairhaven)

         Preface

In the continuing diffuse light of the summer evening, Cerryl glanced around his room, scarcely bigger than a closet. He glanced at the door, then took the small silver-rimmed mirror from its hiding place behind the wall board under his cubby. His own reflection glimmered back at him-dark brown hair, a face almost triangular with a broad forehead, wide-spaced gray eyes, and a narrow not-quite-pointed chin.

   He felt his chin-still no signs of a beard, and near-on fourteen years. Finally, he set the mirror on the seat of the stool. After that came the miniature knife and sheath.

   He slipped the knife from the sheath and studied it, with eyes and senses. Too small even for an eating knife, the blade was not iron or anything like it, but a whitish gold or white bronze that shimmered like polished silver or almost like a mirror. The metal held an inner light, a white radiance with the faintest touch of red, but a radiance Cerryl knew that only he-or the mages of Candar-could sense.

   He wasn't a mage, not yet, perhaps not ever. Yet he could sense some things that he thought only mages could sense. Was that the way his father had felt?

   With a last look at the shimmering blade, he slipped the knife into the sheath and replaced both knife and sheath behind the board. Straightening, he sat on the edge of his pallet-little more than a sack filled with straw lying on a plank platform, and covered with a tattered gray blanket.

   So much there was that he needed to know, and dared not ask, not with what had happened to his father. Yet... a mill hand for life? He was beginning to understand what had driven his father-even as he understood how unlikely it was for his father, or himself-or any poor child-to have the chance to become a mage.

   He shook his head, almost violently. Why does it have to be this way? A mill hand? Why?

   Later, after calming himself with deep breaths and the thoughts of a quiet hillside spring, he squared himself on the edge of the pallet and looked down, concentrating, staring at the silver-rimmed screeing glass Until the familiar white mist covered the silver. He continued to push his thoughts at the mists, seeking, asking, searching. “Somewhere ...” A face filled the center of the glass, sweeping back the silver mists, the face of a girl with blond curls, curls bearing a hit of red, and green eyes that seemed to look out of the mirror at Cerryl, eyes that looked within him and found him wanting.

   “No...” The word was half-gasped, half-grunted as his head felt almost jerked back by the force of her gaze, an expression that swept aside the distance and the mists of the screeing mirror as if neither existed.

   When he looked down at the glass again, it was but a mirror, blank, reflecting but his own sweat-wreathed face back at him.

   Who was she? How could a girl so young have such power? Was she the daughter of a white mage? Or had what he'd seen been just an illusion? Cerryl shivered, then slipped the glass back into its hiding place.

   Who was she? The question remained unanswered, even in his mind. He stood and walked to the door, his hand on the door latch. Then he shook his head and opened the window door to let the cooler evening air ease into the room, hoping the breeze wouldn't bring too many mosquitoes with it.

   Turning back toward the pallet, his eyes were drawn to three books lying there-Olma's Copybook, The Naturale Historic of Candar, and the battered one on the end, Colors of White. If he understood the few pages of Colors of White he had puzzled and labored through, the book had two parts, but the second part had been ripped off. The first part told how the white mages had come to build Fairhaven, and the second part was supposed to be about how chaos and order worked, and that was the part he needed to have and to learn about.

   What good was history? Some parts of history might be interesting-like the fall of Lornth and the rise of Sarronnyn or the stories about ancient Cyador-but most of it seemed useless for what Cerryl needed-an understanding of what a white mage was, what skills and talents were needed, and how to train and develop those talents.

   Besides, the history book was hard to read, even slowly, with so many words he could not recognize. He took a deep breath, and his eyes turned back to the middle book, the one Erhana had lent him-

   Olma's Copybook. It was a little child's book of letters, but Cerryl had forced himself to work his way through the pages, struggling with and learning everything on each page before going to the next.

   With a sigh of resignation, he opened the copybook.

   At least in the summer, there was some light after he finished at the mill and supper, although even without lighting his stub of a candle, he could see perfectly well. As he'd gotten older his night vision, or sense of things, had continued to sharpen. In pitch darkness, he had trouble reading, but it would be a while before that occurred, and long before that he would be too tired to continue his self-taught lessons in letters.

Cerryl stepped out of the warmth of the kitchen into the comparative cool of the porch, his stomach almost feeling distended from the amount of mutton stew he had eaten. His arms and legs and back all ached. He'd spent most of the past eight-day up in the higher woods with Viental and Brental, learning how to judge when a tree could be felled and whether it should be. That part had come easily. Not so easy had been working with the ax and the two-man saw.

   The ax bothered him, in the same way the mill blade did-the darkness of the honed iron feeling both like fire and ice at the same time. The oiled and honest iron of the ax even felt hot to his touch, nearly hot enough to burn his fingers, calloused or not.

   Perhaps Erhana would come out on the porch after she helped her mother clean up after dinner. Cerryl hoped so. He walked to the north end of the porch and looked toward the higher hills, where he'd spent most of his time lately. The low buzz of insects and the scattered chirps of crickets rose out of the growing dusk.

   “Dylert's got lots of woods up there,” said Rinfur from behind him. “They say the family patent goes back to his great-grandsire.”

   “Too many woods,” puffed Viental, standing on the top porch step. “Too long a day. Too much logging. I need to lie down.”

   “That's not because of your logging,” laughed Rinfur. “It's your earing. You swallowed enough stew for three of you. And one of you is more than enough.”

   “Most funny,” said Viental. “We should make you saw the trees. Your horses do all the hard work.”

   Rinfur laughed, a good-natured tone in the sound. “That's 'cause I'm smarter than they are.”

   “Not much,” answered the stocky laborer as he started down the Porch steps.

   “Just enough,” admitted Rinfur, stepping up beside Cerryl and standing there silently for a time. Behind them, in the kitchen, the sounds of voices and crockery and pans continued.

   To the north, the sun that had dropped behind the hills backlit a low cloud into a line of fiery pink.

   “Like this time of day,” said Rinfur. “Quiet... not too hot, not too cold, and the work's done, the belly full.” Cerryl nodded.

   “Think I'll walk over to the stable, see how the gray is doing. Worry about that hoof still.” With a nod, Rinfur turned and crossed the porch, leaving Cerryl alone at the railing.

   The youth ran his hand through hair still slightly damp from a quick rinse before dinner. He watched as the cloud slowly faded into gray. The door from the kitchen opened, and he turned. “Oh... I didn't know you were out here, Cerryl,” blurted Erhana, her hands around a book.

   “I was waiting for my lesson,” he answered with a careful smile. “This is the more advanced grammar.”

   “I can try.”

   Erhana shrugged and sat on the bench. Cerryl sat beside her, careful not to let his leg touch hers. She opened the book, and Cerryl followed her as she slowly read aloud.

   “... the cooper fashions barrels from staves of wood. Barrels are used to store flour and grains. Some barrels hold water and wine ...” Cerryl wondered if all grammar books said things that people already knew, but he said nothing and tried to match what Erhana read with the letters on the page.

   “It's getting dark,” Erhana said after a while. “Can you even see the book?”

   “I can still see it,” answered Cerryl. “What's an 'acolyte'?”

   “That's not in the copybook.”

   “I know, but I wondered.”

   “I can't help you if you ask me about things that aren't in the books.”

   “I'm sorry.”

   “Why do you want to learn your letters?” Erhana asked abruptly, closing the grammar book and letting it rest on her trousered legs.

   “I need to learn things,” Cerryl answered, shifting his weight on the hard surface of the bench.

   “They don't write about sawmills in books, silly boy.” Erhana laughed. “Not about how the mill works, anyway.”

   “They should,” Cerryl offered. “Everyone knows about coopers and fullers and smiths.”

   “Of course. You begin to read by learning how the words you know are written.”

   Cerryl refrained from wincing at Erhana's self-satisfied tone.

   “Isn't there a book that has all the words you don't know?”

   “That's a dictionary. Siglinda has one. They have lots and lots of words and how to spell them and what they mean.”

   Cerryl fingered his chin. Where could he find one? “A dictionary?”

   “That's right.” Erhana sighed.

   In the momentary silence, Cerryl could hear voices in the kitchen. He strained to pick out the words.

   “... no sense in telling him now ... good thing he was up in the woods when Wreasohn came ...”

   “Have to tell him sooner or later, Dylert...”

   “Can't stay here, not forever ...”

   “Hush... he's still on the porch. We'll talk about it later.”

   “Best let Erhana help him with his letters, then. Poor lad.”

   In the growing darkness, Cerryl swallowed. Something awful had happened to Syodor and Nail... but what? And why? Who would harm a partly crippled old miner and his consort who were helping a cousin raise sheep?

   “You're quiet, Cerryl,” ventured Erhana.

   “Oh, I was still thinking about dictionaries,” he lied quietly. “They must be hard to come by.”

   “I guess so. Siglinda always says hers is worth its weight in gold.” Erhana shrugged. “I don't know as they're worth that much.”

   “Books aren't cheap,” he pointed out. “They have to be copied page by page.”

   “Siglinda says there are lots of scriveners in Lydiar. When I'm rich, I'll hire one and have him copy all the books I want.”

   The porch door opened, and Dyella peered out. “Are you still out here, Erhana?”

   “Yes, Mother.” Erhana stood, clutching the grammar. “I'm coming.”

   “Best you be. Canning the early peaches we are tomorrow.” Dyella glanced toward Cerryl. “And more logging for you as well, Cerryl.”

   “Another side slope.” Dylert's voice rumbled out from the kitchen.

   “Yes, ser,” said Cerryl, easing his way toward the steps. “I'll be ready.”

   “Till the morn,” said Dylert just before Dyella closed the door behind Erhana.

   Cerryl's boots clumped on the planks of the porch, noisy because he was too tired to move silently. He walked slowly down the steps and the path to his room. His legs and back still ached. He glanced back at the house, looming up like a black blot in the late twilight. What had happened to his aunt and uncle? Had they died in a plague? Of the bloody flux? In an accident?

   Around him, the chorus of insects rose and fell, rose and fell as he meandered slowly down toward the finish lumber barn.

   Why didn't Dylert want to tell him? How could he find out?

   He almost stumbled as he opened the door to his cubby room. The screeing glass? That he could try.

   After closing the door, and the window door as well, he eased the silver-rimmed mirror from its hiding place and set it on the stool. Then he sat on the edge of the pallet and began to concentrate, trying to visualize Syodor's weathered face, strong hands, and leather eyepatch, Nail's gray hair and probing eyes.

   The mists swirled ... finally revealing a burned-out cot. The roof timbers were black, the mud-brick walls cracked. The windows, ringed in black, gaped like a skull's eye sockets. Lines of blackness seared the grass around the walls.

   “No ...” Cerryl tightened his lips, refusing the tears that welled up inside him. “No.”

   He sat, rigid, on the edge of the pallet, well into the full darkness of night, the blank mirror on the stool before him showing nothing.