Lesson of the Fire (48 page)

Her breath caught. They were her parents.
She raced toward them, abandoning the adepts.

“Mother! Father! What is going on here?”

As she neared them and saw their eyes, saw
the screams they couldn’t sound, they raised the twigs in their
hands. Flames engulfed her, and she fell to the soggy ground
wondering why her parents would hurt her so. Behind her, the adepts
screamed. She closed her eyes in pain.

Sven, you were wrong. They’ve conquered the
Protectorates.

* * *

Less than an hour after Erika left the camp,
the wand-wielders came for the adepts. Pondr could see a thousand
Mar with vacant eyes in the clearing fog, and he could see the
wands in their hands. The adepts formed in ragged ranks, trying to
remember the finer points of magical combat they had been
taught.

“What’s going on?” Asa asked. “Where’s
Mom?”

Pondr grabbed her by the hand and pulled her
to the back of the small army of adepts. He looked desperately for
somewhere they could hide, but this part of the Morden Moors was
treeless and fairly flat. Nor would black cloaks hide them among
the reds and purple of the sedges that covered the landscape.

At the front of the adepts, Nanna took
command of the situation as best she could. “Power adepts to the
front to defen’.”

The shuffle of bodies began.

“Energy adepts, center ranks. When I give
the order, attack. Vitality adepts, rear ranks. Keep the others
healthy. An’ spread the line out. We’ll want to use ochre tactics —
surroun’ them.”

Like we have the numbers
for that,
Pondr mused sadly.

He knew this wasn’t everything they had been
taught, but only a few of the adepts had ever seen combat before.
Best to keep the strategy simple.

It will do them no good. These are
mapmaker’s odds.

Pondr squatted in front of Asa and brushed
away her frightened tears awkwardly, feeling at least as out of
place here as she must. He commanded no magic that could burn or
pummel men into submission. He didn’t even have a real weapon —
just an eating knife.

A roar rose from the adepts’ ranks,
shattering the mist and shaking the earth. Pondr felt it to the
core of his being, felt the water shudder under the primeval war
cry of the Mar. It did not die out for several minutes, and the
enemy’s returning silence proved powerfully effective.

“Hold your ground!” Nanna shouted, but her
voice was lost in the din.

By a mutual consent akin to that of
migrating birds or stampeding animals, the adepts charged.

“Climb onto my shoulders, Asa, and I will
tell you another story.”

She did. Pondr walked away from where the
armies gathered as quickly as he dared. This was no place for
either of them. The screams of rage and pain followed him as he
fled. The Traveller began to speak, trying to keep himself and the
girl calm.

* * *

There was a time, Asa, not too long ago,
when there was no war. Mar did not fight Mar. Many of them never
left their own homes. The duxies were strong and stood apart from
each other except in Council, and they kept a tight rein on their
provincial magocrats.

Oh, surely, the land was dangerous. Drakes
abounded. Dinah’s Curse was as deadly as ever. Towns were
necessarily small, generally unhealthy, and people died from
disease and starvation and stupidity. But they didn’t die at the
hands of their protectors, like the armies in the field now.

Into this time of peace, your father was
born, the second child of Pitt and Tyra Gematsud. His older sister
is your aunt, Katla Duxpite. Like you are your mother’s daughter,
Katla and Tyra shared a strong bond — one that she carries to this
day. Flasten took Tyra as a slave, though, when your father was
your age, and this story began there.

Your grandmother was a remarkable woman,
Asa. In those days, a mundane was as roots under a magocrat’s boot,
a slave as mud. With noses high and gloved hands to ward off
diseases from even clean Mar, no weard would help except under
duress. I didn’t say it was a better time — just a peaceful one.
Everyone had a place, and everyone knew it.

But Tyra Gematsud made a friend of her
magocrat, who respected her reputation for beauty, charm,
friendliness and willingness to help her neighbors. Tyra’s spark
kindled minds and lives for miles around her village, and those who
knew your grandmother tried to be like her. Yes, Asa, like your
father, but she never became as powerful as he is. She never had
the chance.

Flasten sent magocrats to snatch people from
Gunne to sell as slaves in Wasfal. Her magocrat couldn’t drive them
away on her own, so the wizard had to leave to go get help. She
went to the Dux of Gunne, who made promises for a year but kept
none of them. Meanwhile, Tyra’s village ran out of food and wood,
as Flasten kidnapped more and more of their hunters and
foragers.

Your grandparents held their village
together throughout the long and terrible winter. They kept them
from arguing with each other or giving up. They took turns risking
themselves on expeditions to find food and fuel for the village, so
of course everyone who knew Tyra did, too. Though many people
didn’t survive, most of them did because your grandparents wouldn’t
let anyone give up and wouldn’t let anyone starve or freeze.

You may wonder, Asa, where was the kind
magocrat in all this? When she finally decided the dux wasn’t going
to help, she went to her old teacher, Nightfire, who agreed to move
all the people in the magocrat’s care to a place beyond Flasten’s
reach.

By the time Nightfire arrived with all the
wizards from his Academy, though, a Flasten magocrat had kidnapped
Tyra. Everyone was very sad, especially your dad and your aunt, but
they couldn’t find Tyra no matter how hard they looked, and they
had to leave. The passage was long and hard, and the magocrat and
many other people died along the way. But because of Nightfire,
they eventually made it safely to Rustiford.

And what happened to your grandmother? That
is a sad story, but an important one. She endured many humiliations
on her long journey to Wasfal Palus, where the magocrats of the
Duxy of Flasten sold her to Aflangi traders from beyond the great
plateau. For twenty years, she worked as a slave to a foreign dux
who did not speak her language. Life was harder than she could have
ever imagined, and she missed her friends and family terribly, but
she tried to be a comfort to those around her who were also
suffering, for the foreign duxy was always at war with its
neighbors.

During one of those wars, her dux was
killed. In the confusion, Tyra led a handful of the slaves in a
daring escape, but she suffered a mortal blow during the chaos. On
her deathbed, she made one of her companions swear to the
Oathbinder that he would go to Marrishland to tell her family what
had happened to her and to help her children as much as he
could.

The oath-bound slave died of fever long
before reaching Marrishland, but he told Tyra’s story to the
healers who tried to help him. The healers told the story to their
neighbors, and a trio of young mapmakers set out to carry out the
dead slave’s last wish. Two of them starved to death before
reaching Marrishland, and the third fell prey to Dinah’s Curse
within a span of his arrival in Wasfal Palus. The tale passed from
person to person as a curiosity, but no one set out to carry out
Tyra Gematsud’s final wish.

At last, the tale reached the ears of a
Traveller who, though not in the least interested in carrying out
the wishes of some slave woman he had never met, could not resist
the lure of finding out how the story ended. It took years of
research in the deepest parts of Marrishland’s swamps to discover
what happened to Sven and Katla — that they had both become
powerful wizards. The Traveller couldn’t find Tyra Gematsud’s
daughter, but her son had recently seized the Chair, so he went to
Sven Takraf to learn the story from the man’s own lips.

In picking up the ragged end of Tyra
Gematsud’s story, the Traveller found himself ensnared by it. He
was a part of Tyra’s story now, and it would give him no rest until
he told it to someone who could carry out her final wish. Though he
had sworn no oaths to help Tyra’s family, he found the urge to do
so irresistible. So long as he kept her story to himself, no harm
would come to him, but he would also find it impossible to escape
from the role it assigned him.

* * *

The sounds of battle faded into silence as
they left the armies behind them. Pondr knew how it would end. It
did not take a veteran general to recognize a hopeless battle or a
merciless opponent when he saw one. Some adepts had tried to
surrender, no doubt, but they would have received no quarter from
the glassy-eyed Mar.

There is surely
enchantment at work here,
Pondr
thought.

“Your grandmother was very brave, Asa. Now
it is your turn to carry her story and your turn to tell it. She
would want you to tell her story to your father. I’m just a
stranger to him.”

“You know it better, though.”

He smiled sadly. There had not yet been any
sign of pursuit, but Pondr had encountered wizards and enchanters
too many times to think he could escape the one who turned innocent
mundanes into an army of mindless wand-wielders.

“I’m a Traveller, Asa, and I know how
stories work — whether I hear them, see them or live them. Your
father’s enemies will come for us soon. Tyra Gematsud’s story
cannot save me this time, but it will protect you, if you’re brave
like she was.”

“Where is Mom?” she asked suddenly.

“She’ll be safe, but your father. … I know
you have his kind of memory. No matter what happens, tell him the
stories I told you, and I might still be able to help.”

She tensed, but Pondr felt her right hand
leave his shoulder. “I swear by the Oathbinder to tell Dad the
stories.”

“Good girl, Asa.”

It was nearly dark before the wizards came
for them.

“Did you really think you could outrun a
wizard?”

Pondr had only met Weard Wost a couple times
— not enough to recognize his voice — but his Flecterran accent
gave him away. The Traveller stopped in his tracks and very gently
set Asa down without turning to face Robert.

“What you have done is forbidden by the laws
of your land and theirs, Weard Wost.” Pondr shrugged off the
rucksack where he kept his journal and handed it to Asa.

“Do not lecture me about laws, Traveller.
You surrendered your immunity when you aided the Mardux.”

Pondr turned slowly to face the farl,
raising his hand in the Mar gesture of salute and surrender. “Don’t
be so certain, Robert. I’m as entangled in this tale of gods,
heroes and fire as you are, but at least I recognize it.”

“Sven is not the Guardian!” Robert snarled.
“The Mar love their epics and legends, but I know a myth when I
hear one. I do not believe in that one any more than I believe in
their gods!”

Pondr lowered his hand so no one would
notice how much it was shaking. “Or in the power of a Traveller’s
stories?” He met Robert’s gaze and struggled to keep his voice from
cracking. “I have heard stories from your history, as well. Your
teacher was a priest among the farls, was he not? Oh how you must
have hated him for how he treated you.”

Robert took a step back, and his lip curled.
“Shut up,” he said, pointing at the Traveller.

Pondr heard Asa screaming at Robert as he
collapsed into the mud. Then a final silence fell upon the
Traveller, and his journey came to an end.

* * *

“You should have let the Traveller go,” Ari
said softly, handing Robert a bowl of steaming soup. “Have you
never heard of the Traveller’s Curse?”

“Of course. I have also heard of
fire-breathing guer called draxi.” He sneered. “They are just as
mythical. I was less concerned about his Curse than his stories. A
dead Traveller is less trouble than a living one.”

Ari sighed and sat down on a wicker chair.
“Marrishland saw many kinds of magic before the Mar were born. It
is said some of our ancestors could only wield magic when they were
dead.”

“Nonsense. You Mar did not even have a
written language until the Gien Empire crushed your army like so
many irritating mosquitoes.” He closed a fist in the air in front
of him to capture an imaginary insect. “Half your history is myth,
and the other half is extrapolated from myth.”

Ari said nothing.
You farls share territory with two other races
whose magic behaves nothing like mine or yours. And you know Mar do
not see the myst the same way you do.

“How are our hostages?” Robert asked,
sipping.

“Einar continues making gloves,” Ari said.
“I see what you mean now. No wonder Weard Takraf took the Chair so
easily.”

“Volund was a fool not to see it. Takraf’s
mystique blinded him to the obvious.”

“The Mardux’s wife has recovered, though we
are dosing her with morutsen. She might only be an apprentice, but
she has long been close to powerful wizards, so it is likely she
can wield magic well enough to escape.”

“She would not get far.”

“Well enough to inconvenience us, then. Her
daughter has quieted considerably now that her mother is safe. She
is reading some books the Traveller carried with him.”

“Good. I have finished preparing our
welcome. Send the messenger to Domus Palus and offer the Mardux our
terms.”

“Yes, Weard Wost.”

Ari stood up and left the large hut that
served as their headquarters in Leiben. Once he had been pacified,
Einar had removed the defenses so they could use it as a base of
operations.

Sven would not accept Robert’s terms, Ari
knew. Eighth-degree wizards were not known for their devotion to
family, and Sven was ambitious even among his peers. He glanced in
the direction of the hut where his stepfather labored on Blosin
gloves for Robert’s conquest.