All The Turns of Light (3 page)

Meralda took in a breath.
Sometimes I wish he weren’t quite so perceptive
, she thought.

“I have news.”

Donchen leaned forward and brought his hands together below his chin, fingertips just touching.

“It isn’t good news.”

“No,” replied Meralda. “It isn’t. Donchen, have you had news from home lately? Family news?”

“Tirlin is my home now, delight of my heart.”

Mug simulated a faint gagging noise, which ceased when Meralda glared his way.

“No, I have had no news.” Donchen sat back. “My decision to remain here was the final straw, as you say. I am
sohata
, for now and forever.”

Sohata. Hang for ‘ghost.’ Which meant he was dead to his House, dead to his father, his mother, any family anywhere he might have, including his grandfather, the Emperor.

Meralda struggled to find the right words.

“The Emperor,” Mug said, turning his eyes away from Goboy’s glass. “He is ill?”

Meralda took Donchen’s hands in hers. “I’m afraid so,” she said. “Gravely ill.”

Donchen’s expression did not change. “The weight of years, or something else?”

“There was no mention of foul play. Just the weight of years. I am so sorry.”

“He gave me a golden dragon, when I was nine,” Donchen said. “An enchanted toy. It walked and roared, and spat tiny flames. He told me to enjoy the magic while it lasted, because all things pass from this world to the next. I was heartbroken on the day my dragon walked no more. We buried it in the garden, but he said my dragon would live on forever, in my heart.” He smiled wanly. “Thank you, Grandfather. I see the lesson now.”

Mug turned all his blue eyes on Meralda. “There’s more, isn’t there?”

“Not now, Mug.”

Donchen’s smile vanished.

“It’s about that bloody great whale of an airship, isn’t it?” Mug grumbled.

“Mug!”

As if in answer to her raised voice, a pair of flitting shadows darted from the Laboratory’s shelves. The dark splotches remained close to the ceiling, hiding themselves in the flickers of Meralda’s electric lamps, but Meralda knew they came to rest directly above her.

She acknowledged the ancient staves with a silent greeting.
Nameless, Faceless. All is well. Thank you, but I do not require any assistance.

Mug snorted. “Oh, the sticks are paying you a visit now?” He waved his leaves in the air. “Shoo, the both of you, before I have you chopped into kindling!”

Donchen stood, worry creasing his brow.

“The
Intrepid
?” he asked.

“That numbskull King is getting ready to launch it early, isn’t he? With you aboard, I assume, to sit astride the flying coils in case they stop working halfway to Hang?”

“Of course not, Mug. And show some compassion. Donchen’s grandfather is ill.”

“I’m sorry about that.” Mug turned half his eyes toward Donchen. “I truly am. But I’m right about them hauling you aboard for the first airship crossing of the Great Sea, am I not?”

“Nothing of the sort has been discussed by the Court, much less ordered by the King,” Meralda retorted.

“Ha,” Mug said. “Then where have you been all day?”

“With Shingvere and Fromarch. We were touring the docks, yes, but that’s all. Touring.”

“Touring.” It was Donchen who spoke. “And I assume your elderly friends made no mention of any impending airship voyages?”

“We both know the elderly gentlemen are prone to engage in the worst sort of baseless, idle gossip,” Meralda said.

“Told you so,” Mug said.

Goboy’s Glass flashed, and Mug’s reflection wobbled as though cast in troubled waters. Mug’s reflection vanished. In its place, a stylized image of the Tower appeared.

Mage Ovis,
the Tower intoned, its ancient and brooding voice clear and calm as it emanated from the glass.
Pardon the interruption. But you did ask to be notified when I was able to locate the item employed for communication between the Palace and the Hang.

Donchen raised an eyebrow.

“Spying now, are we?” Mug asked.

Meralda raised her hand for silence.

“Thank you, Tower. You have found it, then?”

Yes. It is of Hang origin. It appears to be an ornate box, from which a hornlike apparatus protrudes.

“Is this hornlike apparatus decorated with repeated images of fire-breathing dragons, each of which has six legs, and with this symbol emblazoned on each dragon’s forehead?” Donchen moved to Meralda’s worktable and scribbled quickly on a scrap of paper. When he finished, he held it up toward Goboy’s Glass.

The symbol was Hang, all lines and flourishes. Meralda could identify perhaps two dozen Hang word-signs, but this was not one she knew.

That is the symbol. You know this device?

Donchen lowered the scrap of paper. “Direct your focus beneath the box, close to the legs,” he said. “Do you see what appears to be a series of childish scribblings, and one crude image depicting a little boy and an old man?”

The image in Goboy’s Glass flashed and wobbled before revealing the shadowed underside of a gold-gilded box. There, drawn in faded black ink, were two crude stick figures. One was much taller than the other, and had a beard. Both were smiling beneath a decidedly lopsided sun.

Yes. Are these the markings?

Donchen nodded. “I never possessed a knack for drawing,” he said.

Meralda touched his arm. “You drew that?”

“This device was my grandfather’s. He loved it, and it never left his side, even after Grandmother passed away. It is old beyond measure. I often hid beneath it while Grandfather slept. I think he knew.” He shook his head sadly. “I’m sure he knew.”

“So it’s a communication device,” Mug said.

“It’s more than that,” said Donchen. “It’s a family secret. No wonder he left it here when the fleet departed last year. It would surely have been burned upon his death. No sorcerer in history has been able to discern its workings. It works over distances as vast as those across the Great Sea. Any words exchanged over this device between King Yvin and Hang are absolutely secure from prying Hang sorcerers. Prying Vonat sorcerers too, who I’m sure would love to eavesdrop.”

“What about that, Tower?” asked Mug. “Have you found a way to defeat the box’s magic, and eavesdrop on secret conversations yet?”

I have made no attempt to do so, construct,
replied the Tower.
Mage? Is it your wish that I meddle with this implement?

“No,” Meralda said. “But do listen in on the room. If news of the Long Dragon arrives, I want to know it immediately.”

As you wish.

“Like I said, spying! And on the Court and the Crown, no less!” Mug hooted. “Mistress, I am so proud of you!”

“I’m hardly spying.” She laid her hand on Donchen’s. “But you have a right to know. If we wait for the Court to relay the news, you might get part of it, or none of it.”

“Please don’t imperil yourself over this,” said Donchen.

Meralda shrugged. “I am not the first Mage to peek through Palace walls. I imagine they quite expect it by now.”

I am confident my surveillance of the room will go undetected.

“Maybe.” Mug tapped on the desk with a tightly-rolled leaf. “Let’s hope the Long Dragon recovers, and enjoys many more years on his throne. Perhaps by then you’ll be retired, Mistress, and at little risk of being ordered aboard untested airships on some daft voyage across the Sea.”

“No daft voyages, Mug.” Meralda leaned down and put her eyes close to Mug’s. “No ocean crossings, no airships. Now let’s get your new coils wound, shall we?”

~~~

From the private journal of Mugglesworth Ovis, October 32, RY 1969

Two months to the day.

That’s how long it took for that blithering idiot of a King to order my Mistress to join the crew of the
Intrepid
and charge off on the very daft voyage she promised me she’d refuse.

And she did refuse. At first.

But in the end, she relented, and now we are both making preparations to board the doomed airborne contrivance, wave farewell to Tirlin and, I am sure, vanish forever the instant we lose sight of land.

Thus this journal. I’m going to keep it handy, from the moment we cast off from the Docks until the moment we plunge screaming down toward a wet and doubtlessly messy demise.

I’m also keeping a bottle and a cork handy. Maybe someday a beachcomber will happen upon this journal, recognize my name, and say to themselves, “So that’s what happened to poor Mug and Meralda the great Mages of Tirlin! If only they’d listened to Mug!”

If only.

But as it is apparent, my words, no matter how wise or persuasive, fall on nothing but deaf ears, I shall recount our (brief) adventures herein, so at least some record of our final days remains.

Today we visited our quarters on the
Intrepid
, and much ballyhoo was made over the placement of Meralda’s gear and various comforts. My own suggestions that each item be tested first for buoyancy and resistance to ravaging fires were viciously ridiculed and unjustly dismissed.

The
Intrepid
includes two decks of cabins, sufficient to house the 162 drowning victims which shall depart in a mere three days. The King, of course, is not among these poor unfortunates. Nor is any member of his family, or indeed any royal family of the Realms save the Alon Queen. I suspect she is being forced into taking the journey by a rival clan, which shrewdly estimated an airship disaster would prove cheaper than outright assassination.

We were even allowed onto the
Intrepid’s
flight deck. Mistress keeps going on and on about the quality of the work, and the genius of the design. But make a comment about the legendary flammability of lifting gas, and one finds oneself shut in a closet. Shut in a closet!

I know you are shaking your head in dismay. So was I, even in the darkness of the closet with no one to share my miseries!

Fromarch and Shingvere have been raising a stink, demanding passage as well. They even took to circling the Palace in that motor-car of theirs and taking turns shouting through Amorp’s Strident Horn. That dunderhead of a King ordered the street blocked, so they took to the sidewalk, drove through two newspaper stands and a diner, and sent all the bills to the Palace.

I wish the old Mages would take me with them when they go out for such a lark.

The Mages won’t be crossing the Great Sea, of course. And neither will Donchen.

I really can’t fault King Dunderhead on that count. On the slim chance that the
Intrepid
makes it across the Great Sea intact, the last thing you want your Hang hosts to see is a rival for their newly-vacant throne waving merrily from the windows of a foreign airship. Donchen accepts this.

Mistress, not so much. She wakes up in a foul mood. She moons about all day. At first she started tearing up at any passing mention of Donchen’s name.

Now it’s any word containing the letter ‘D.’

And all those long, misty-eyed stares? All that quiet hand-holding, all those murmurs and whispers?

I may need to petition the Exchequer for a Royal Allowance so I can get a flat of my own if all that keeps up.

If there is any bright side to this whole wretched mess, it’s that we don’t have much longer to wait. The
Intrepid’s
first test flight is scheduled for tomorrow. It won’t be much of a flight–just out of the Dock and right back in, mainly to see if she will bury her nose in the dirt before they actually take her more than twenty feet off the ground. The flying coils won’t even be engaged. Just a quarter-fill of lifting gas and a pair of small fans.

Mistress won’t be there. She’s working out some minor issue with the seawater purifiers, which in truth is merely another excuse to aim six hours worth of poignant gazes upon her brooding beloved. With any luck, the King will bore everyone to sleep with some bombastic speech and the
Intrepid
will pull loose from its moorings and float harmlessly away.

Thus ends this, my first entry into what I fully expect to be my last written work. Put forth by my hand (well, one of them), on this 32
^nd
day of October in the Realm Year 1969.

If only they’d listened!

Chapter 3

A brass band played, rather poorly. After that, a trio of Airship Guild officers ascended to a hastily constructed podium and spoke. Each speaker, it seemed to Meralda, spoke longer and was less animated than the one before.