Aquamancer (mancer series Book 2) (2 page)

Like all momentous events, the Battle of Sea had been followed by a great many important things to be done, like the marvelous Homecoming Party at Wizards’ High late the last summer. Now, Douglas hoped, things were getting back to normal—whatever normal was for a Journeyman Pyromancer.

“I choose breaking my fast anytime,” chuckled the old Fire Wizard, throwing the broom and the duster into the farthest corner of the workshop, where they got together to continue the cleaning without supervision. “And if this cleaning didn’t get done
last
spring, what makes you think I’ll do it
next
spring? No, I’ll do it after breakfast. After you leave, that is.”

This last he said with a touch of sadness, for Douglas’s new journey promised to be a long, dangerous one. Flarman had once been content to be a solitary practitioner of Fire Magic, almost a hermit, but that was before Douglas had come to be his Apprentice. Soon they had grown to be the fastest of friends, boon companions.

There had been nothing but company since they had helped put an end to the wickednesses of the Ice King.

“This is the first time in months and months we’ve had the place to ourselves for a few days,” observed young Douglas as they ate griddle cakes with fresh-churned butter and maple syrup, flipped high and hot from Blue Kettle’s cast Iron Griddle. “The Homecoming Party and the visitors since we returned to the High...”

“...and a Wedding scheduled for the next Midwinter’s Day after this one,” added Bronze Owl, who never hungered nor ate, being solid cast metal. He was the guardian of the front door to the cottage, and Douglas’s wise teacher in all matters of animal and fairy worlds. He came to the breakfast table just for the conversation.

“And a Wedding, which is a tremendously long way off! Does anyone miss Myrn as much as I do?” wondered Douglas, wistfully. He stared mournfully at his latest forkful of pancake, then popped it into his mouth and sighed at the same time.

“Hardly!” laughed Flarman, spearing his own fourth, fifth, and sixth of the fluffy, golden brown pecan pancakes from Griddle. “But then, none of the rest of
us
plan to marry the lass.”

“Perhaps not,” said Owl, “but the place seems emptier without Myrn Manstar blithely about and around. She brings her own kind of sunshine, doesn’t she?”

“I’d groan with agony,” said Douglas, “except it isn’t becoming for a Journeyman Wizard to display such emotion.”

“Ha!” snorted Flarman. “Bawl your head off if you like! No one will notice!”

“But even you must admit that Wizards’ High just isn’t the same without pretty Myrn,” said the Owl, “or is it my imagination?”

“Not at all!” said Flarman. “Myrn Manstar, soon to be Brightglade, is already a part of me and mine, I’m happy to say. Has she written us this week yet, m’boy?”

Douglas pulled a carefully rolled piece of parchment from his left sleeve—he had long ago taken to carrying important things in the deep, wide sleeves of his Wizard’s robe, as did his Master—and held it out to Flarman.

“No, no!” said the Wizard, shaking his head vigorously. “Read the parts you want us to share. I know all about lovers’ letters.”

Douglas was a bit startled at his revelation. He’d never imagined Flarman as a love-struck youngster.

“Come to think of it, I don’t see why not,” he said, although Flarman thought he referred to reading the letter aloud.

Douglas read (in part):

“‘My
Dearest Douglas,

I have a few moments now to write, between day’s work and night’s sleep, both of which I anticipate with much joy, as they bring me closer to the things I am most eager for
—
and I hardly need tell you what those are! The lessons are hard but fascinating, and my Master says I am learning them well, and fast!

“‘
All goes smoothly for a Flowring Isle lass whose ambitions a scant year ago were simply to own and sail her very own fishing smack, get married, and have at least four or five sons and daughters to be pearl fishers after her.

“‘At the moment I am just beginning to learn the making of tea. Yes, this is a very important aspect of Aquamancy, my Master tells me. The powers of prognostication come, he says, from the water. The tea leaves are only a catalyst. I actually managed, yesterday, to predict the exact hour of our daily rainstorm…no great feat when you know it comes each afternoon at the same hour.

“‘But I don’t want to spend these precious few minutes with you talking shop. Suffice to say, I brew and pour very good teas, which would surprise my good mother!

“‘Living on Waterand is luxury compared to life on Flowring, although I often wish I were home, sailing on Father’s boat or diving for pearls, as I did before I met a certain young Fire Wizard, whom I miss even more than sailing…

“‘Augurian just knocked on my door to tell me that the Mail Porpoise is about to leave for the Mainland, and can carry this letter to you although not as quickly as our old friend Deka, but the good Wraith is very busy these days. So I’ll close. My Master says to say that he is well and very busy, or he would bring me by for one of Blue Teakettle’s wonderful dinners.

“‘As for me, if I had time I would pine for your touch and your smile…and Flarman’s and Owl’s and everyone’s there at the High. As it is, I must close and send with this all my love, husband-to-be! Write to me soon!

“I am, then, yours... entirely! Myrn’”

“I’ll be with Augurian in a week or so,” murmured the Wizard. “Have you answered her letter?”

“I’ve written a short note only, telling her about my departure and reminding that I will probably not be able to write regularly for some time,” said Douglas, handing him another piece of parchment. “I expect you will keep her informed, too?”

“As well as you keep
me
informed. She’d rather have it direct from you, of course. You can perhaps find some messengers where you’re going, to carry your letters to her—and to Augurian and me on Waterand, too. And there is always Deka the Wraith.”

This friend, an ephemeral interdimensional Emanation, could carry written or memorized messages great distances in a wink.

“I’ll save Deka for emergencies, as when I can’t stand being alone any more,” the Journeyman said softly, pushing away from the table. “It’s time I started.”

His farewells at the big double front door were affectionate but brief. Flarman shook his hand, then gave him a loving great bear hug. Bronze Owl clapped his brazen wings together so hard nobody could hear for a moment. Blue Teakettle stayed in the kitchen and scolded Scouring Pad for doing a perfect job on Griddle. She dribbled hot tears on Stove, making a rather mournful sizzle.

Black Flame, the older Wizard’s Familiar, came and rubbed against the Journeyman’s legs, purring loudly, and his two wives jumped to Douglas’s shoulders and tickled his ears with their whiskers.

The Ladies of the Byre mooed farewell from the meadow, turning their heads together in the direction of the cottage. In the thatched roof above, the Mouse family cheered and waved bits of red flannel to their friend and provider of bits of cheese and soda crackers on cold winter nights.

Douglas quickly said his farewells to one and all, then strode off down the cottage walk, through a rickety wooden gate, down to the River Road, and on to the bridge. He paused to wave once again to the rather forlorn group on the door-stoop of the Wizards’ cottage.

Flarman would love to go along.
Douglas thought to himself as he crossed Crooked Brook.
And I’m surprised that Bronze Owl didn’t decide to come along, too. Black Flame would never leave Flarman, of course, but he wishes he were on the road again, I’m sure.

He stopped to say good-bye to Precious and Lilac, the High’s nearest neighbors. They were winter-pruning their apple trees. This elderly couple were like fond grandparents to the young Pyromancer.

“Is the Lady Myrn in good spirits and health?” asked Lilac. She was already at work sewing Myrn’s wedding gown. “She must be beside herself, being so far away from you.”

“As we would be, if we were separated,” said her husband, smiling fondly at her. “Take a pocketful of these late-autumn keepers with you, my boy. Nothing like apples to keep you in good health...An apple a day keeps the bedbugs away...Or something like that,” he added, quite seriously. “Keeping bedbugs under control is important for travelers, I should think.”

“Old Man,” his wife gently chided, digging a sharp elbow into his ribs, “what do you know of traveling? You’ve never been farther than the Oak ‘n’ Bucket in Trunkety!”

“I did, too, travel in me youth,” protested Precious. “Before I got good sense and married you, that is.”

“I wish I had time to listen to your travel stories,” said Douglas with genuine regret, for the old man was a very good tale spinner and well worth the listening. “But I want to be down at least to Farango Waters by nightfall.”

“To visit your Lady Mother and your father,” Lilac said, nodding in approval.

“That’s my plan, but I must start now to get there before dark.”

“Go on, then,” said she, drawing him into her arms and giving him a warm kiss on each cheek. Precious started to shake his hand but turned the handshake into a grandfatherly hug, instead.

“Go in good health, and don’t forget to eat those apples each day,” called the orchardman after him.

****

With the warm feeling that comes from being loved, Douglas walked briskly down the southern bank of Crooked Brook, past the high-arcing Victory Fountain in midstream, installed by the Water Adept, Augurian, to commemorate the defeat of Frigeon. He recrossed Crooked Brook at Trunkety Bridge, following the Trunkety Road into the center of Valley’s largest—and only—town.

On the broad, oak-shaded Green, he looked in first at the Oak ‘n’ Bucket but found no one there except the red-cheeked Innkeeper, who was busy sweeping out the debris of the night before: pipe dottles and chestnut shells and occasionally a broken glass. Douglas loved the tobaccoey, winey, beery smell of the taproom, but he didn’t linger longer than to tell the Innkeeper that he was on his way and to send any messages he might receive on to the High.

Crossing the Green, he met the town’s Schoolmaster amid a chattering, leaping, laughing, excited crowd of Valley youngsters. They clustered about him like a swarm of happy honeybees, all dressed in their very best, faces scrubbed to a shine and hands scoured spotless.

“Hello, Frackett!” greeted Douglas. “Good morning, children!”

“On your way again?” said the onetime Wizard. “A Journeyman must journey, they say. Well I remember ...”

“We’re on our way to visit Wizards’ High!” interrupted several of the children, forestalling one distraction, as children do, by creating another.

“Yes, the Wizard Flarman has kindly invited us to spend the afternoon with him,” said Frackett. He was no longer the morose, low-bent, and lonely old man Douglas first had met many months before. Frackett had spent two centuries as an outlooker in the wilderness of Landsend, far to the northeast, marking the comings, goings, and nefarious doings of Frigeon on his glacier. With the fall of Frigeon, he had returned to civilization and a happier, more sociable life, as Trunkety’s Schoolmaster.

“Well, now, little friends,” Douglas said to the class, “you’ll truly love every minute at Wizards’ High, I know, but take my best advice and don’t put your fingers or noses into places where they don’t belong. Some things at the High are extremely dangerous, if you don’t know what they are!”

“We won’t, we promise!” cried the children, and they trooped off after Schoolmaster Frackett while Douglas strolled into Dicksey’s Store to purchase a few last items to bring to his mother.

Dicksey himself, looking plump and prosperous once again after the severe trials of Dead Winter and Dry Summer, was waiting upon two Trunkety housewives. He nodded to the newcomer and the ladies curtsied gracefully with broad smiles and a few words of affectionate teasing, mostly concerning the year-off midwinter wedding.

“We’re getting ready already,” said one. “Embroidering and sewing, preserving jams and jellies, and pickling and planning the banquets. We can hardly wait!”

“Nor can I,” agreed the Journeyman Wizard, much to their delight. Douglas was a complete favorite with everyone in Valley, but especially the housewives and farm wives. As Apprentice he had done all of the shopping for Wizard’s High at the Trunkety Tuesday Market and he knew them all well by name and reputation.

The ladies wandered off to examine some of the many wondrous new goods Dicksey had on sale. Increased ease and safety of travel on Dukedom’s highroads since the end of the war had returned prosperity to Valley. The proprietor bustled about collecting the baking chocolate, sewing needles, and silk thread that Douglas’s mother required.

“And next week, please, send a sturdy, reliable boy up to the High to get Blue Teakettle’s shopping list,” Douglas reminded him. “Left to himself, Flarman would forget to buy food when he’s hard at work.”

Dicksey made a note of it on his slate and shortly saw the young Wizard off at his door.

“Fair journeying!” Dicksey called after Douglas. The housewives came to add their farewells. Squire Frenstil, just arrived on horseback from his farm outside town, stopped to say hello and good-bye.

“Sure you don’t want to borrow a mount?” he asked.

“No, but many, many thanks,” said Douglas. “I’ll be going by packet from Perthside to Westongue and it would be much too long before you got your horse back.”

“Ye must enjoy tramping in winter,” observed the gentleman farmer, who had once been the Master of Horse of the late Thorowood Duke, sire of the present Duke, Thornwood. “Well, I don’t blame you! If I were younger, I’d beg to go along with ye.”

“And you’d be welcome,” said Douglas.

He waved and set out again, determined not to be delayed further by the many friends who seemed to have made it a point to be along his road just by accident this morning.