Sorcerer's Son (17 page)

“Quite a few, Master Cray. Quite a few. There was a whole village went mad some years back, joined hands and went dancing across the countryside, every man, woman, and child. Except the youngest, who stayed behind in their cradles.”

“What happened to them?”

“The babies? They starved, for their parents never came back.”

“And the others?”

“They danced till they dropped,” said Sepwin. “It took days, and whether it was hunger, thirst, or exhaustion that finally ended them all, I don’t know. There’s a road south of here lined with their graves— the local inhabitants buried each dancer where he or she died and marked their headstones with a sign to ward off evil. They said it was sorcery.”

Cray shook his head slowly. “I don’t know. I don’t know what sort of magic could do that.”

“There was an old woman they offended,” said Sepwin. “She passed through their village and no one would give her hospitality because she was so very ugly. It’s said that she laid a curse on them.”

“Who said it?”

“Who?” Sepwin pursed his lips. “Well

I don’t know. Someone from the village, I suppose, before he died. I heard the tale from a blacksmith.”

“You never saw any of the dancers?”

“No, it happened a long time ago. Maybe before I was born.“

“Cray raised one eyebrow. “Are you sure it happened?”

“Well

no. But what reason would the blacksmith have to lie to me?”

“I have no idea. Perhaps he was merely passing on a diverting tale he’d heard from someone else. Do you always believe everything that people tell you, no matter how outlandish?”

“I don’t know what is outlandish, Master Cray. I’ve seen things on my journey with you that I would have thought outlandish before we met.”

Cray inclined his head. “True enough, Master Feldar. I should not belittle your gullibility. I’m sure I could show you more marvels yet. Though nothing as wonderful as making a whole village dance.” He rubbed at the side of his nose with an index finger. “Perhaps

if there were vermin in their clothes, biting them constantly, they might appear to be dancing

or flying insects buzzing around them, stinging them

But if the old woman were truly one of the sorcerous breed, she would hardly need their hospitality, she would be quite capable of looking after her own requirements. I wonder what they really did to her.”

“You see,” said Sepwin, “you accept it as magic.”

“I accept it as a strange puzzle,” Cray replied, “that may or may not have some basis in fact.”

“Some basis, I think, or I wouldn’t know so many similar stories.”

“Of whole villages going mad?”

“Not quite that, no, but I know of crops that failed for no reason, wives and children who disappeared, homes that burned when there was no flame to touch them off—oh, we beggars pick up stories in our travels.”

“I look forward to hearing them all,” said Cray. “The road to the East March is a long one.”

“Did your mother never tell you such stories when you were a child? Mine did.”

“No, my mother’s stories dealt with the natural world, with animals and plants and rivers and mountains. They didn’t often include people or the things that concern people.”

“Then you will have a few tales to tell me on our journey, too,” said Sepwin. “Though I suspect we will run out of stories before we reach our destination.”

“I am grateful for your companionship, Master Feldar.”

Sepwin shrugged. “Falconhill or East March—it makes no difference to me where I go. But

do you think the second knight could have been from the East March?”

“What? And followed my father all that way? I doubt it greatly. If it were true, he would have been waiting outside Spinweb, surely, when my father left; he was inside quite long enough for anyone to catch up with him.”

“Not if the pursuer left the East March much, much later than he.”

“Are you seeking some danger at the East March, Master Feldar?”

“I am only being cautious.”

“Well, I respect your caution,” Cray said, “but I think it is misplaced in this instance. My own feeling is that my father and this other knight had some quarrel earlier upon the road. Perhaps they even clashed then, and the fight was indecisive. Perhaps the other knight was dazed, or perhaps he pretended to give over the fight and go another way and then, when my father arrived at the old man’s hut, his enemy rushed after him, to surprise him.”

“You spin a fine tale, Master Cray.”

“Do I?” Cray sighed. “Well, I confess, it is only a tale, I won’t try to make myself think otherwise. But it makes neither more nor less sense than an old enemy come from the East March to settle an old quarrel. Why journey so far from home to kill a man? And if the East March were not the other knight’s home

then, Master Feldar, we have nothing to fear by going there and claiming my father’s place.”

“Perhaps he didn’t want word of the deed to get back to the East March

”

“And if that is the case, and he is there, he won’t dare to expose himself, and we will still be safe.”

“Until you win your knighthood and leave on some quest

”

Cray half-turned away from him, arms akimbo. “All right, Master Feldar, we will be careful. With you to remind me of such dangers, I’ll be jumping at every shadow in the East March. And I don’t even know who he is.”

“He wore black armor, you know that.”

“With no device on his shield. That was a disguise, I’m sure. But if I should happen to encounter a black knight, I’ll certainly be wary.”

“You’ll kill him, won’t you?” asked Sepwin

“I think he’d be more likely, just now, to kill me,” replied Cray.

“He’s fifteen years older.”

“And fifteen years cannier. Don’t let our little adventure at the village give you an exaggerated notion of my knightly prowess. I’d be no match for a real knight. I don’t intend to throw my life away for vengeance.”

“It’s a better motive than some I could think of.”

Cray gazed at him sidelong. “It wouldn’t bring my father back.”

Sepwin stared down at the ground. “I don’t suppose there’s any magical way

” he murmured.

“He’s dead. Nothing can change that. Not even sorcery.”

“I’m sorry, Cray. Truly I am.”

Cray made no reply, only stood still and looked past Sepwin, at his horse, at the shield, half hidden behind his own; and the silence that had suddenly descended between the would-be knight and the former beggar stretched and stretched until it was broken by a powerful blast of wind.

“What’s happening?” cried Sepwin, and he stumbled sideways, clutching at the branches of the nearest tree to keep from being knocked over.

“The map!” shouted Cray, and his voice could hardly be heard above the roaring that had arisen from nowhere. Tree limbs swayed around him, branches dipping and crackling in the blow, leaves rattling wildly. Dust from the road kicked up, whipping against his skin like shards of glass, and he covered his eyes and nose and mouth against them with both hands.

The branch that Sepwin grasped broke with a loud snap, and he fell, rolling, till he fetched up against a tree trunk, and he huddled there, white-knuckled hands scrabbling for purchase on the rough bark.

“You wouldn’t do this if my mother were here!” Cray shouted to no one visible, and then he was pushed against a tree and pinned there by empty air while leaves slapped him like so many hands.

Abruptly as it had begun, the wind ceased, and in its wake floated light laughter, receding, ever receding into the dim distance. At Cray’s feet lay a roll of parchment. He bent to pick it up, to unroll it carefully. “The map,” he said, turning it so that Sepwin could see their route laid out on the pale surface.

Sepwin was rising gingerly to his feet. He said, “Is it over?”

“I should think so. Look here—an excellent map.”

I think I’ll bathe my hands first. They’re pretty badly scraped.” He edged to where the horses stood, his eyes never ceasing their search to one side and another, as if he thought he would see another wind coming. The horses stood unconcerned where they had been tied, not a hair of their manes or tails disheveled. “I wish I could be as calm as these two,” said Sepwin, reaching for a water flask.

“They were beyond the range of the effect,” said Cray. He sat on the ground now, the parchment spread across his knees as he studied it

“Effect?”

“The demon’s effect.” Cray looked up at him. “That was an air demon. It was just having some fun with us.”

“My hands don’t think it was fun.”

Cray tossed the parchment aside immediately and strode to where Sepwin was fumbling with the water. “Let me see.” He scrutinized his companion’s palms, found them abraded and bloody. “You shouldn’t have tried to hold on to anything.”

“Should I have let myself be blown away?”

“You wouldn’t have gone far.” He pulled the kerchief from Sepwin’s neck and, wetting it, dabbed at the wounds, which were superficial and soon stopped bleeding.

“Next time you expect something like that,” said Sepwin, “please warn me. Remember, I’m not as accustomed to magic as you are.”

“I didn’t expect such a playful demon.”

“Playful?”

“We’re neither of us really injured, so that was play. Air demons can be rough, but it’s all innocent enough, if you’re not an enemy. Be glad it wasn’t a fire demon—one visited my mother’s castle once, and when it left, all the leaves within ten paces of where it had stood were singed. She had a word with its master for that, I’ll tell you.”

“Dangerous creatures, these demons.”

“They have moods.”

“Like human beings,” said Sepwin.

“You might say that. Now come here and look at the map.” He spread it out upon the grass and pointed with an index finger to a meandering line on the left side of the sheet. “This is the road we’re on now. Here we are, you see, there’s my name, and two horses to show both of us. The road goes south to Falconhill, down here, you see?”

“Certainly looks like a castle to me. I suppose those symbols say Falconhill.”

“Yes.” He looked at Sepwin sharply. “You can’t read?”

“Not many people can, Master Cray. You don’t need letters for farming.”

“Hmm. Well, yes, that says Falconhill. Now, before then, you see there’s a road crosses this one, and its eastward branch passes through the swamp and eventually meets another road here that veers northeast to our destination.”

Sepwin’s eyes tracked the route that Cray’s finger had indicated. “How far would you say that is, Master Cray?”

“Well

judging from the distance to my mother’s castle from where we are now

if the map is to scale

I’d say three months and more.”

“Summer will be gone by the time we arrive.”

“Nearly, yes.”

“It might be a good place to winter, the East March.”

“It might,” said Cray. “Warm and dry, at any rate.”

Sepwin peered at the parchment. “Where is your mother’s castle?”

Cray smiled slightly. “You will not find it marked on any map. Sorcerers do not reveal their homes so. And I have no need of a map to find the place where I was born.”

“I didn’t mean to pry,” said Sepwin. “I was only curious.”

Cray clapped him on the back. “I understand, Master Sepwin. Now shall we find ourselves some lunch and then get on with our journey while the sky is still light?”

“By all means,” replied his friend. “All this talk of traveling has given me a considerable appetite.”

Eastward they rode, through the hot days of summer, and every cultivated field they passed bore grain stalks taller than the last. Some days it rained, and they sheltered with peasants, returning labor for hospitality, chopping wood or milking goats; or, if no humans lived nearby, Cray fashioned a lean-to of leafy branches woven so tightly together that the wet could not penetrate. On those rainy days in the lean-to, they played games with pebbles Cray had gathered, games ranging from the simplest of children’s diversions to the most complex contests of strategy that Delivev had ever taught her son. Sepwin proved an apt pupil, and soon he and Cray were so evenly matched that one game could encompass an entire rainstorm. And sometimes the two players remained hunched over the pieces long after the rain had done.

“So this is how sorcerers amuse themselves when they don’t feel like moving mountains,” said Sepwin one gloomy afternoon.

“Not sorcerers, Master Feldar,” said Cray. “Kings and queens. I have seen them in the webs, and learned some of my own strategy from them. Sometimes they even wager on the outcome.”

“Well, I think I shall pass that opportunity, unless you’ll accept a few leaves as a decent wager.”

Cray laughed. “I’ve no doubt we’ll see such wagering at the East March castle. My mother said it was a great holding, and I have noticed that the great holdings are always wealthy places indeed.” He weighed a pebble in his hand before adding it to a half-finished pattern. “I think I’m a rather good player; I might be tempted. I have a little silver.”

“You might have less after such wagering.”

“I used to win sweets from my mother.”

“And what did you offer on your side of the wager?” asked Sepwin.

“Kisses.”

Sepwin laughed then. “Didn’t you like kissing your mother?”

“Oh, I liked it very much. Sometimes I kissed her even if I won. Have you ever made a wager, Master Feldar?”

“Only once. I lost. I had to spread manure on the fields for days afterward. I have had no great desire to wager since then.”

“But you play quite well.”

“So you say, Master Cray. But perhaps if I played someone else, I would learn otherwise.”

They passed through several villages and then, at the very edge of the great swamp, through a market town. At mid-afternoon, the market was bustling, men and women hawking everything from pigs to pots, cloth to cough remedies, and everywhere they offered the flapping, clip-winged waterfowl of the swamp. Cray and Sepwin stopped to buy a little wine to cheer their journey, but not the birds, which Cray thought he would be able to net easily enough once they were inside the swamp. As they stood sipping their first measure of wine, a vendor approached them, a bolt of fine, white gauze slung over his shoulder.