The Book of Deacon (33 page)

"Well, the finest warriors, wizards, and
adventurers the world had to offer began to file one by one into
the cave. The first to return with the head of the beast would be
hailed for all of time as the greatest warrior that ever lived.
Now, it became clear to each individual adventurer that it was the
cave itself, and not some beast, that had taken all that had come
before, but that epiphany usually came moments before they joined
the fallen.

"Eventually, a remarkable wizard by the name
of Azriel found this paradise. She felt that if there was a beast
in that cave, then this must be its belly. She was going to turn
around and return to the outside world to tell the others, but she
needed time to recover. As the days turned to weeks, she fell in
love with this place. In time, a second warrior made it through,
and then another, and then another. This place became a village
populated by the best of the best. With each new arrival, the
knowledge pool increased. Now we live to teach, and we live to
learn. Unfortunately, in the last few decades the flow of fresh
blood has slowed to a trickle," he said.

"Yes, well, these days we have found a much
more efficient way to rid ourselves of our finest men and women,"
she said.

"I assume you speak of the war. So the war is
still on? Good heavens, the last new arrival was over thirty years
ago and he assured us that the north was on its last legs," he
said.

"It has been for some time. Somehow we still
manage," Myranda said with a sigh.

"I wonder how the army has managed to . . .
one moment, we have a visitor," he said.

Myranda turned to see a dragon, mostly gray
with a slightly lighter shade on his belly, push the door open. To
her surprise, the creature was only a bit larger than Myn, perhaps
as large as a mastiff.

"Solomon, this is Myranda. Myranda, this is
Solomon--I was telling you about him," he said.

Myranda crouched down and began to scratch
the dragon on the head the way she knew Myn liked.

"You didn't tell me he was just a little
baby," she cooed.

Rather than the joyous look that Myn tended
to give, Solomon wore a very stern look on his face. Deacon wore a
look of concern.

"Myranda . . . Solomon is among our eldest
and most sage wizards," he said.

"Oh. I . . . I am sorry. It's just that, oh
my, he is so small. I didn't know," Myranda said, mortified.

The dragon turned to Deacon and began what
must have been a conversation. Solomon spoke in a near inaudible
series of low hisses, guttural growls, and slight movements. Deacon
did the courtesy of answering in northern dialect, so that at least
she could follow half of the conversation.

"Yes, she did bring the other dragon in. . .
Well, we had to do some reconstruction on the legs of the other
newcomer and she was protecting him from the healers. . . I would
have, but Myranda here was closer, so I asked for her help first. .
. Yes, she did," he said, turning to Myranda. "Unprecedented, by
the way--I've checked. You and your friends are the first to ever
enter this place after the falls had given way."

He turned back to the dragon and
continued.

"Yes. . . As a matter of fact, I was able to
test my temperature restoration spell on her. . . Well, clearly she
is. . . Oh, it is not that dangerous." He turned to her. "You feel
well, correct?"

"Yes," she said, made a bit nervous by the
direction the conversation was taking.

"There, see? . . . I do not know." He turned
to her one last time. "Do you speak any languages besides the
northern one?"

"I am rather well-versed in Tresson," she
said.

Solomon's reptilian eyes rolled. He let a
harsh, grating hiss loose that startled Myranda. His mouth then
yawned wide and cracked and snapped as he tested its movement.

"Of the two . . ." he said in a very harsh
but understandable voice. Another hiss, twice the intensity of the
first, was released before he finished the statement. "I prefer
Northern."

After clearing his throat, the dragon's voice
was smoother. It was deep, but not outlandishly so, and resonated
with power. There was an unquestionable sense of authority in his
words. His tone was steady, and there was a slow deliberate cadence
to his speech.

"Where did you discover your dragon?" he
asked.

"I was in Ravenwood. It was beginning to
snow, and there was a cave nearby. I ventured inside for shelter. I
didn't know that there was a dragon inside. Then a second one
arrived and they began to fight. I blacked out, and when I awoke,
Myn was on top of me," she explained.

"Then she is wild-caught. Have you trained
her?" he asked.

"Whatever she has learned, she has learned on
her own. And I did not catch her. She followed me. I tried to get
her to stay, but when I found that her mother and siblings were
killed, I couldn't bear to leave her," Myranda explained.

Solomon gave her a long, calculating stare.
Finally he spoke.

"Send her to me first. I want her before any
others," he said. "And I want to meet the dragon when she
awakes."

With that he turned and marched out of the
eatery. Deacon leaned close to Myranda.

"This is a great honor. Solomon has chosen
you as a pupil. I myself had to endure more than three years of
training by lesser teachers before he would see me," Deacon said.
"I see great things in your future. Which reminds me. Now that I
know that you did not come here as a test of skill, I wonder, what
skills have you to test?"

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"Are you a warrior of any sort?" he asked,
quickly pulling out the book from his bag.

"No. I can use a short sword and a dagger,
but I don't like to," she said.

"Well, that is going to change. Now, magic.
Anything?" he asked.

"I just got through learning a bit of healing
magic. What do you mean 'that is going to change'?" she asked.

"A healer? Excellent! We do not get many new
healers, and even fewer that are native to the north," he said.

"What were you saying about the warrior part
changing?" she asked again.

"You are required to pass a few basic
weapon-handling and combat trials, aside from whatever magic you
may wish to learn. We like to be complete. The northern side of the
village is what we call the Wizard's Side. As a healer, I assume
you will be spending most of your time there. Here in the south
side of the village, Warrior's Side, you will be learning a bit of
combat theory and master three types of weapons at the very least.
It is the minimum required physical instruction," he said.

"I don't want to learn that. I hate weapons.
I hate the war! If I learn how to kill people, I become a tool of
the war like the men and women who have been forced to squander
their lives in the pursuit of ending other lives," she said.

"I don't think you will need to worry about
that. You see, we won't be letting you kill any of us, and you are
not likely to encounter anyone else. It is entirely academic," he
said. "So, what sort of healing have you learned? Our healers tend
to specialize in--"

"You are talking as though I am never going
to leave this place," she interrupted.

"Very few of us ever do leave," he explained
matter-of-factly.

"Am I a prisoner here?" she asked.

"In a way, but not because of us. That
waterfall is blocking the only semi-safe means of egress, and it
stops its flow for only a few days every few months. When the falls
have relented, escape is possible, but . . . well, for most of us
there is nothing for us outside. Here there is comfort, safety, and
enough knowledge to live a long, full life learning and perfecting
it. I, for one, have never even become curious about the outside,"
he said.

"You have never been outside of this place?"
she said.

"As I mentioned, we have not had a newcomer
in more than thirty years, and I am only twenty-five. I was born
here," he explained. "Frankly, being outside would be unbearable to
me. There is so much to do here. So much that needs to be done. If
I had to worry about things like the war or where my next meal was
coming from, I would never get anything done."

"That seems sad to me," Myranda said.

"There is no need to pity me. If you are
through eating, I would like to show you around this prison you are
so sympathetic about," he said.

She agreed and the two were off.

Out of habit, Myranda braced herself as they
left the dining hut, ready for a blast of cold, but none came.
Anywhere else that Myranda had ever been would still have patches
of snow at this time of year, but here it was heavenly. The air was
cool, the breeze was mild.

There was something majestic about the
waterfall to the west as it fell from ledge to ledge along a sheer
cliff, finally reaching the ground to bathe a corner of the valley
in its fine mist. The whole of the village was in a vast,
half-moon-shaped valley. The curved side was composed of the cliffs
of the mountain. On the other side, the ground dropped off sharply.
Beyond that was ocean. The end result was a sparse village spread
out over a piece of land the size of a large city, nestled in a
notch cut into the endless forbidding seaward-face of the
mountains. They were far too high to be seen by a passing ship, and
Myranda had heard tales of the rough seas that plagued the east
coast of the continent. It was no surprise that none had ever seen
this place.

None, of course, but the people who now lived
here. In a way, the people made the place all the more wonderful.
In the north, there was naught but a mass of gray-cloaked forms. No
faces, no conversation, just a cloak marching along, stopping here
or there to spread the latest word of the war. Here, there was more
than the scraps left by a war that had picked the populace clean.
There were men, women, and children of all ages. More incredible,
there were examples of virtually every race. Peoples she'd seen
only a few examples of in her life were plentiful. Stocky dwarfs,
graceful elves, and many she'd never seen before. Each spoke their
own tongue, filling the air with a symphony of different languages.
When approached, some were too busy, but most would offer a hello.
Deacon would translate as pleasantries were exchanged, and they
would be off.

Their wanderings took them to the Wizard's
Side once more, and Deacon began to explain the different areas.
There were the yellow-clad novices studying wind magic as a
specialty. The people wearing aqua, most lingering near a small
lake on the eastern edge of the village, were water wizards and
their students. Those dressed in brown were focused on earth magic.
Fire apprentices and instructors wore red. The white tunics
belonged to healers, and those in black were the war wizards, black
magic users.

When someone recognized Myranda as a
newcomer, they would sometimes approach her and make a few remarks
in their respective language, and Deacon would explain the
circumstances of her arrival.

They were engaged in just such a conversation
when they were rudely interrupted. Deacon had begun to brag about
the spell he had cast on Myranda again, prompting more than a bit
of concern from the white-robed elf he was talking to, when a pixie
of some sort flitted up and positioned herself directly between
them. She began to speak in an agitated manner. Her voice was
musical, and the language was bizarre. It rose and fell in tone
like the work of a talented flutist.

"All right, all right. Calm down. Yes, this
is Myranda . . . Myranda, did you ask to be placed under Solomon's
tutelage, or did he ask you?" Deacon asked.

"He asked me," she said.

"There, you see . . . Well, I don't know. Let
me ask her . . . She cannot answer directly because she speaks
Northern . . . Oh, it is not a vulgar language," he said.

"It is. Listen to me. I sound like an
animal," the tiny creature said, shifting languages abruptly.

"You sound just fine. Myranda, this is Ayna.
She recently earned the position of Highest Master of Wind Magic,"
he said.

As he spoke, Ayna was darting around Myranda,
inspecting her from all angles. Myranda tried to turn to face her,
but the fairy just flitted in another direction in a blur.

"You don't seem to be anything special," she
said.

"I never claimed to be," Myranda replied.

"Still, Solomon has been at this for quite a
while. He ought to know a prime pupil. It is just like him to
snatch up the first good one in years. I want her first," Ayna
declared.

"I'm afraid Solomon made it quite clear. He
was to have her before all others," Deacon said.

"So I'll challenge him," she said. "Why
should he get to influence the newcomers with his element and
prejudice them against mine?"

"He holds seniority over you. He can take his
pick of any student," Deacon said.

"Fine. I want her next. Immediately. I mean
it, as soon as she passes his trial,
that
day
I want her in my grove for her first
lesson," Ayna said.

"I'll mark it down," Deacon said.

"See that you do. And you, Myranda. Don't let
all of that fire nonsense cloud your mind. Air is the true essence
of this world. Oh, and do ask Deacon here to teach you a decent
language. It must be awful to be confined to this wretched little
dialect," she said.

In a flash she was gone.

"What just happened?" Myranda asked.

"It would seem you are caught in a little
power struggle. That makes two of the Highest Masters who have
demanded you be passed right to them. This is a huge opportunity
for you. If you pick things up quickly, you can trim
years
off of the path to
mastery! Outstanding!" he said.

"Air magic, fire magic. I never said I wanted
to learn anything like that. All I ever wanted was to heal people,"
Myranda said.