Apprentice (8 page)

“It’s a Westren coin, they speak and write differently there,” Orafin told him when he saw Benen’s close scrutiny of the writing. Benen put the coin in his right shoe-bag and tied that one extra-tight. They were ready, all that remained was waiting for the wizard to land the tower. Their hope was that he would land it somewhere near some village or town.

It was a little bit after sunset, after all tasks were taken care of, when the wizard started landing the tower. It became more and more obvious to the rat and boy, as they looked out the windows and saw the landscape gradually come up toward them. The movement downward itself was imperceptible and there was no jar upon landing.

Orafin went to see where the wizard was to be found, to make sure they wouldn’t run into him as they were leaving. He came back in an agitated state.

“The wizard is outside, he’s taking some things left near where we landed!” Orafin said, panting.

The two made their way to a place in the tower where they could look out and see what was happening on the ground at the base. There were bundles of what looked like supplies in piles on the ground, the whole tidily stacked.

“That’s where all the stuff we eat comes from!” Benen realized, answering a question he had yet to have asked himself.

“Tribute, I guess,” said Orafin. “From the villages in his domain.”

“Why would they give him tribute? Does he hurt them if they don’t?” asked an outraged Benen. He could sympathize with bullied villagers.

“I think they have an agreement with him. He’s sort of the owner of this land.”

“Really?”

The rat nodded, “It’s named after him.”

“What? Are we still near my home village of Oster’s Gift?” asked Benen.

“In the same region. This area is Osteria, after Oster, the wizard.”

“No! Really? But, is he really eight hundred years old then?”

“I think so,” Orafin said. “Wizards extend their own lives with magic, that much I know.”

Benen was speechless. This could be him someday. Eight hundred years seemed an eternity!

“It’s like living forever,” he said, his voice full of awe.

“I guess,” the rat said, less impressed. “You know the world is much older than you probably think. Millions of years old, some say.”

Benen laughed out loud at this claim. They spoke no more of such things for the moment. They could see the wizard had finished levitating the various supplies into the tower and had returned inside. Orafin left to see what the wizard was doing, returning a few minutes later with news that he was hard at work in his laboratory.

“We probably have a few hours. It takes him so long to do these sorts of things,” the rat commented. “He’s very fussy about all the details.”

Benen didn’t think it was strange to be fussy when it came to magic; his one experience with casting a spell had nearly killed him because he didn’t know enough and couldn’t be fussy about the details.

Reassured the wizard was preoccupied, the pair left the tower as stealthily as they could manage. Benen ran while still within line of sight of the tower, but slowed to a walk once he had reached the cover of a stand of trees. Orafin, sitting on Benen’s shoulder, pointed out some smoke rising into the sky in the distance and Benen headed in that direction.

It had felt great to run from the tower. Benen missed his time as a child when he had run everywhere, playing tag and other silly games with his friends. There had been chores then, but nothing like the unrelieved work, toil, and learning of his time since coming to the tower.

Why don’t I just run away tonight?
he thought.
I could keep walking, leaving this wizard’s land behind.

It was no good to fantasize like this though; he knew the wizard would track him down and find him, maybe only so that he could kill him. He couldn’t risk it.

These hours of freedom will have to do
, he told himself.

The village, once they arrived, looked very much like his own. Some exceptions were obvious though. Where Oster’s Gift had a windmill, this village had a watermill, taking advantage of the river running through it. The river was another big difference, of course. Also, this village had a building that looked like a proper tavern and inn. This was where Benen headed.

The entrance to the inn led directly into a tap room filled with some of the folks from the village. Mostly it looked to be men having a drink together, all seated at one long table. There seemed to be a separate clique of younger men, really older boys, seated at their own table. Finally, there were two foreigners seated together. The foreigners looked to be a peddler and his guard.

Benen froze in the door. It was strange seeing people he didn’t know after so long. He found he was oddly afraid of what they might say or do. He considered leaving again, but not seriously so. As much as he might be afraid of the people, he was even more fascinated by them, especially the foreigners.

With hesitant steps, Benen made his way to an empty table and took a seat. He could feel everyone looking at him; no one was talking anymore. The only noises were kitchen noises. One of the younger men called to Benen.

“Don’t drink alone, come and join us.”

His fellows echoed the request. Benen reddened, but went to their table. The stranger having been welcomed and settled in with some of the locals, talk resumed around the room.

“Hey Glenda, we need some ale here!” yelled another of the youths once Benen was seated.

“What’s your story then, boy?” asked one of the boys who looked at most two years older than Benen.

“Story?” said Benen, overwhelmed by the attention he was getting. He’d hoped to blend in, but should have known it would be like this. He imagined all small places were like this; everyone knew each other, and strangers were valued for their novelty. “I’m travelling with my master. We’re camped outside of the village. He’s given me the night to myself.”

“Camped outside of the village?” said a youth, “That’s not safe, not with the wizard having just come for his bounty.”

Glenda came to their table with a pitcher of ale then, disrupting the conversation, for which Benen was grateful. The bar wench was a girl about his own age and when Benen saw her, he was smitten. She was slight and had long brown hair that defied any attempt at being tied together. Her eyes were large and brown and when he looked at them, they looked back with a brief smile as she poured ale for him and the other young men. She disappeared again as quickly as she had come and Benen was sorry to see her go.

“You like our Glenda, eh?” the other boys teased Benen. He decided he needed to get a handle on who his company were.

“I’m Benen, my master is a travelling scribe and I hope to one day be the same,” he and Orafin had worked out the cover story together, deciding it fit well.

Introductions followed from the others. The tall blonde man of twenty was Eggan; the short boy with the big ears was Tunney; the one missing the fingers was Fillen; last but not least was the outgoing boy who had originally called Benen over, his name was Ward.

The boys encouraged Benen to flirt with Glenda, telling him to grope at her when she came near to refill their glasses, but Benen couldn’t possibly be so forward and scowled when the other boys demonstrated for him how to do it. This chilled things for a while and Benen regretted it. To make things up, he offered to pay for the rounds, producing his silver coin. The boys all looked at it in awe.

“It pays well then to be an apprentice scribe,” Ward commented.

“Not so well, this is a lot of my savings,” Benen said, trying to deflect attention from the money. Glenda brought him back his change for the piece, it was more change than he had expected; it seemed ale was inexpensive in this small village.

In an attempt to change the subject Benen asked after the peddler.

“No one really knows. I don’t think he tried to sell any wares here; he doesn’t speak Estren,” Tunney said.

Benen paid for two more rounds, barely denting the change he had gotten back from the silver coin and then it was time for the inn to close to the public. By then the older men had already retired and only Benen, the younger men, and the peddler’s party remained in the tap room. The younger men ordered one more round to go and invited Benen to come with them, to drink in Eggan’s da’s barn. When Glenda refilled Benen’s mug for this final round, she slipped him a note discreetly. He unfolded it under the table and snuck a glance at it when he found a moment where no one was looking at him. It had four round circles on it. The circles were covered by a big X. Benen didn’t know what to make of it, he put it away. He was disappointed it wasn’t a note asking him to meet Glenda somewhere in the village for a tryst and the strange pictures just confused him.

He left the inn with his new friends and walked into the night trying to sing along to the song the other four evidently knew by heart. He was a little bit drunk and was overall happy with his evening. Orafin, in the bag slung across Benen’s middle was restive and Benen took this to mean that maybe it was time to be leaving and returning to the tower before the wizard took off again or missed him. But he was having such fun he didn’t want to go just yet. He figured a little while longer wouldn’t hurt.

The group walked a little way out of the village proper, singing the while. Once out of sight from anyone in the village, Ward pushed Benen over, making him fall to the ground. Confused, Benen didn’t have a chance to figure out what had happened before feet started pounding into his side. He covered his head with his arms and tried to curl up into a ball with Orafin in the middle.

The beating didn’t last long, for which Benen was thankful. The kicks stopped soon after they began, with Tunney saying that should be enough. Someone, Ward, Benen thought, reached down and grabbed his purse of coins.

“We’ll drink to you for a week or two, Benen, thanks,” said Ward with a laugh. Then he turned to go and Benen saw him stop cold. Standing in the way of their route back to the village was the foreigner and his guard.

The foreigner said something incomprehensible, in Westren, Benen presumed.

“Stay out of this, you cow-lover!” Ward said, the other kids laughed along. There was a nervous quality to their bravado now. The foreigners didn’t understand the insult, neither did Benen really, and the guard drew his long curved blade from its sheath.

At this, Ward and the others held out their hands in a pose unmistakable even to a foreigner.

“Don’t you hurt us, my father and his brothers will make you eat that sword,” said Ward, although he kept his tone such that without knowing what the words meant, you might think he was begging for his life.

The guard motioned to the pouch with his sword and pointed at Benen’s fallen form.

“Come on,” Ward said. “This isn’t your business.”

The guard repeated the motion, impatiently.

“You’ll regret this in the morning, when my father hears of it,” Ward threw the pouch to Benen; it
thunked
against his arm and fell near him on the ground.

Using the sword again, the guard indicated the thugs should leave and this was exactly what they did, with all haste. The guard said soothing things to Benen in his language as he helped him back to his feet, handing him the pouch he retrieved from the ground as well.

“Swoldon do speak you not tongue,” said the other foreigner, the presumed peddler.

“Oh, I didn’t think either of you spoke Estren,” Benen said.

“Tongue no good speak but okay do understand.” Benen couldn’t argue with that. The man’s speech was hard to follow, but he had little accent and seemed to understand fine.

“Thank you for rescuing me,” said Benen and after a pause, “and my purse.”

“Brother Brother always help.” Benen wasn’t sure what to make of that and must have looked puzzled because the foreigner tried again.

“Brothers help Brothers always?”

“But I don’t know you,” Benen said.

“Both Benders,” the man said. “Brother Benders.”

Benen looked at him uncomprehending. Orafin, in his satchel bag came out and said, “He means you’re both magicians.”

Both foreigners jumped on seeing Orafin, speaking in their own tongue what Benen assumed to be hexes against evil. Orafin said some words to them in Westren and they calmed down and came closer. Orafin served as interpreter thereafter.

“The older man, his name is Blon, he’s a magician, what he calls a Bender of the World. The big guy is his brother Swoldon. They’re travelling, seeking a constellation that only rises in the south from here.”

“Why did they need to come east to go south?” Benen asked Orafin.

“Political reasons. I guess the direct southern route is not friendly to wizards or perhaps to anyone. Not sure. Blon recognized you as having talent. Figured you were an apprentice. He says that he would have lost much standing if he had let someone’s apprentice be so mistreated. He hopes you and your master would do the same for his own apprentice should he ever take one.”

“Tell him I thank him deeply and will endeavour to help my own ‘brothers’ as he has helped me,” Benen told Orafin.

The rat looked at him for a moment, “No mention of your master doing the same?”