The Road To Vanador

A Travelogue

A Spellmonger Story

By Terry Mancour

Copyright © 2019

Part One

Farewell to Sevendor

Dad had the cart and team waiting for me when I’d said my final farewells to the folk of Sevendor Castle, my home for years. The home I had built from a few poor huts and a ramshackle castle into the greatest mageland in the kingdom.  The home I had fought for, defended, invested in, and nearly died for.  I was leaving home.

It wasn’t the streets, stately homes and gleaming white castle that I’d miss the most, of course – the worse part was saying farewell to the people who had been around me, supporting and working with me to build and run the place.  Everyone from my Castellan – no, he was Steward, now – Sire Cei to my old Tal Alon chambermaid, Daisey.  I had known some of them so long I had watched them marry, have children, and prosper.  Others, like Sister Bemia, the castle chaplain, or Olmeg the Green or Zagor had been there for me and my family steadfastly, and I was loath to abandon them.  The people who had been in my life more than the kings, dukes, Alka Alon masters and wizards who occupied my time and attention . . . I would miss those folk the most, I realized, as I said my good-byes.

Tears were shed, and I contributed my share.   I had to embrace, kiss, or salute to so many old friends that morning that it’s a wonder I ever left.  As I gave my final address to the castle staff from the cracked table in the Great Hall, my throat nearly closed with emotion as I spoke.   The speech itself was nothing special, from what I recall – it was the usual praise for their diligence, hard work, loyalty, and dedication to Sevendor, and my confidence in their ability to keep the place running in my absence.  It was all entirely sincere, but it wasn’t rhetorically significant.  At the end there was thunderous applause, shouts of support, and cheering.  And a lot of tears. 

“Three years is not a long time, Minalan,” Sire Cei soothed, as he escorted me from the hall.

“It is far too long,” I muttered, as I clasped hands with a few in the crowd.  “All sorts of terrible things can happen in that time.  And will,” I predicted.  “Don’t hesitate to summon me, if you need me.  I can pop back here through the Ways in an instant, if I need to.”

“You won’t need to,” he assured me.  “Our borders are secure, our markets are filled, our people are settled and content,” he reminded me.  “We have no strong enemies, and we are wisely led.”

“And if another dragon shows up?”

“Then you have left a Dragonslayer in charge,” he said, with a touch of that cocky arrogance that underlay Sire Cei’s stoicism.  “Between the Hawkmaiden and the Dragonslayer, we shall guard the land.”

“We’ll be ready for them, this time,” Dara agreed, from behind us.  “Any dragon who sniffs around Sevendor again is going to get a nasty surprise, as long as I can get my birds in the air!”

“We’ll be fine, Minalan,” Sire Cei assured.  “The existential danger for Sevendor exists only if you remain,” he said, sadly.  “A tragic irony.”

“Not tragic, merely inconvenient,” I corrected.  “As annoyed as I am about my exile, there is good work to be done in the Wilderlands.”

“The Magelaw,” Dara corrected.  “You are the Count of the Magelaw.”

“A realm for the making,” Sire Cei agreed.  “And there is no one better suited for its defense than you, Excellency.  As a Wilderlord, I am relieved that you are going to protect and re-people it.”

“And as a Sevendori,” Dara added, “I am relieved that you will be attracting dragons somewhere else.  Don’t worry, Master, by the time you return to Sevendor, it will be better than ever,” she pledged, confidently. 

Sister Bemia was waiting outside, and gave me Trygg’s benediction with weepy eyes. After commending them all into the capable hands of Sire Cei and Dara, I took my seat next to my dad and began the long journey from the eastern Riverlands to the northern Wilderlands.  I tried not to look back.  We stopped in town to make one last pilgrimage to the Everfire – and so that Dad could say goodbye to the two sisters and sons-in-law and grandchildren who were staying to run the Sevendor bakery – and get Flamemother Antara’s blessing on the journey.  

It was a busy time, as Briga’s Day was near and the temple was making preparations for the annual pilgrimage.  But everyone stopped to say farewell to us.  My brother-in-law had a kingly gift for me, too: a small wand Banamor had enchanted.  He had filled it with an entire bake’s worth of bread, which could be dispensed a loaf at a time, as fresh and hot as it was when it left the oven.

Then we got back in the wain, threw our cloaks over our shoulders, and began the journey in earnest.

We didn’t say much, that first cold winter’s day.  The two rounceys who pulled the wain were lively enough, but not interesting enough for either of us to comment upon.  The weather was overcast, and the streets and roads were wet from the previous days’ rain.  Dad was kind enough not to try to distract my attention from what I was feeling, as we left my home. 

We made good time.  No, we made exceptional time, thanks to the magical enhancements both team and wain enjoyed.  The axles turned with far more efficiency, the wheels were mage-hardened against casual wear, and even the horseshoes on the two draft animals were enchanted to propel them farther with less effort.  It was a far more comfortable ride than most carriages could boast, even if it appeared to be merely a well-constructed wain.

I think Dad appreciated that, too, despite his usual disdain for magic – the “easy way”.  He’d enjoyed my hospitality for two years, now, and while he was as proud of me as you could ask, he was anxious to return to his old, comfortable life in Talry.  But he also felt like he had unfinished business with me, for some reason.   He had insisted on accompanying me on the long trip to Vanador, and he would not take no for an answer. 

I didn’t argue.  I was feeling sulky, and Dad was about the only person in the world beyond my wife and mother who wasn’t in danger of my temper. 

We rolled out of the great gates at the Diketower half an hour later – though that was a poor name for the place, anymore.  While Tyndal and Rondal’s first posting was still there, it was a fairly minor part of the defensive works, now.  A new wall stretched from cliff to cliff behind the great berm, a wall with turrets and towers of its own.  The dike in front of it seemed a minor inconvenience compared to the great wall of mage-cut stone.

Despite myself, I heaved a heavy sigh as we passed through the gates.  I bent my head under my hat, and tried not to attract attention.  I didn’t want anyone to make a fuss.  As far as my people knew, I had already departed for my new home by the Ways.   Thankfully, a flash of my pass to the sentry had him nod us through, and we were no longer in Sevendor.

“That must have hurt,” Dad grunted, as the roads began to worsen under our wheels.

“Yes,” I agreed, feeling a pressure in my chest.  “Far more than I expected.”

“It’s only three years, Son,” he consoled me.  “I spent two years here, and if flew by like two months,” he observed.  “Glad I came.  Glad I’m leaving.”

“I’m trying to be philosophical about it,” I promised.  “I’m trying to look at this as another great adventure, an opportunity.  That’s what Wisdom dictates,” I assured him.

“Yet if you were actually feeling that way about it, you wouldn’t be brooding like this,” he pointed out.  “So . . . tell me why you’re pissed off,” Dad directed.

“What possible good would that do me?” I asked, a little irritated.

“Let’s find out,” he proposed.  “What troubles you so much about leaving Sevendor?”

“The fact that it’s still recovering from a dragon attack?” I asked, sarcastically. “That it is the target for the ire of Prince Tavard?  That it’s the richest domain in the Bontal Vales, if not the kingdom?  That most of my friends and allies are here?  That this has been my home for nearly seven years, now?  And now I’m leaving it all behind?  Perhaps any of those might be bothering me?”

“I figured as much,” he said with a chuckle.  “Every single one of those things is eating at you.”

“So?” I asked, growing more irritated.  “What good does it do me to relate them?”

“It’s good for you to speak them aloud,” Dad assured me.  “You’re going into exile.  You’re pissed off about it.  It’s best if you know why.”

I wanted to groan at my father’s attempt to dispense wisdom, but my great respect for the man forced me to stifle the urge.  I knew he had a point – it’s a central dictum of spellcraft to speak your intent as part of the formation of a spell.  The wisdom of that is implicit: if you don’t understand your goal and your desire for attaining it, everything else gets muddied as you’re trying to work with arcane energies.  Clarity is key for success.

Of course, hearing that from your dad about your personal life is a different matter, emotionally.

“It still doesn’t change the fact that I am, indeed, going into exile,” I offered, instead. 

“No, it doesn’t,” he admitted, as the wagon reached the bottom of the hill and started up the next one.  “Watch this next part, there are spells in the road that make you sorry you’re departing Sevendor,” I informed him.

“Sad we’re departing?” he asked, skeptical.

“It’s one of Banamor’s.  Part of his commercial effort to increase business.  Pure psychomantic bullshit, and no more than a temporary pang of regret, but it can be disconcerting, if you’re not prepared for it.”

“That seems . . . like cheating,” my dad said, a moment later, as we passed through the glyph.  “I suddenly want to go back and check on the ovens,” he admitted.

My own experience of the spell was dampened, thankfully, by the defenses in the Magolith.  But I could still perceive what my own level of regret might have been, and it would have been bad.  Banamor’s spell (well, he commissioned a much better mage to cast it) took a person’s base regrets and magnified them a hundred-fold, along with a jolt of compulsion.  For most people it was effective to

“The ovens are fine,” I chuckled, humorlessly.  “It’s just a trick.  But more than one poor merchant has found himself back at the Diketower taverns, with no understanding of why.  Coming from the other direction, during the Fair and on market days you get filled with enthusiasm and excitement.”

“Not fair at all,” dad chuckled.  “You wizards cheat!”

“That’s the entire purpose of magic,” I agreed.  “Our craft subverts the nature of the very cosmos.  Thankfully, not all of us are as mercantile as Banamor.”

Dad nodded, but didn’t comment – he had a low opinion of most merchants, and magical merchants had not been any improvement, from his perspective.  Not that Banamor was a cheat – he gave fair value to his customers, else I would have heard of it – but that didn’t mean he wasn’t also a sharp dealer.

“We’re making pretty good time,” Dad commented, as we emerged from the Enchanted Forest and into Hosendor.  The new castle expansion loomed ahead of us, on the right. 

“We will,” I agreed, trying to relax and enjoy the ride.  It was interesting, I had to admit, to see Sevendor from this unhurried perspective.  “This is an enchanted wain.  There are spells all the way through it to reduce or improve friction, maximize pull from the team, and even reduce our apparent mass by about two-thirds.  The team’s shoes are enchanted to improve pulling power, their harnesses are enchanted to keep them from tiring early, as well as make them enthusiastic to pull the load quickly and efficiently.  Wizards cheat,” I reminded him.

“That should improve our rate.”

“By more than double,” I predicted.  “And there are . . . other features.  I’m sure they’ll come up along the journey.  But if all goes well, then we should be outside the barony well before nightfall.  And arriving in Sendaria Port tomorrow afternoon.  By barge downriver from there, and then up the river to the upper Riverlands, before we’re back on a road, proper, once again.”

“And your barge is as enchanted as this wain?”

“I’m the Spellmonger,” I shrugged.  “Not using magic just seems . . . pointless.”

We lapsed into a silence after that, as I watched the scenery roll by.  For the most part it was a dramatic improvement over the scenes I’d witnessed from the saddle seven years before, when I’d first come to this region with a deed in my hand and optimism in my heart.  Sevendor was to be my experiment to prove that magic in the service of the people could improve the lives of everyone, from noble to villein.

What I saw was encouraging, even if not all of it could be definitely attributable to magic.  The little village had been transformed from a circle of huts no better than the original Sevendor Village into a tiny township with several two-story shops and houses along the modest High Street we rode through.  There was only one or two of the old huts left, mostly in the back of the village.  It seemed as if most had been made into barns or sheds as the people had improved their homes.

None of it had been due to magic – it had been due to the village’s proximity to Sevendor.  There were three new inns in the village, now, built to sustain the trade caravans that now regularly made their way to my fief.  A new temple to Huin was being constructed between the village and the castle on the cliff overhead.  The market wasn’t any bigger than Brestal’s, but it now boasted a cobbled court.  There were permanent wooden stalls there, too.  When I’d arrived seven years ago there hadn’t been anything to it but a mere lot of packed earth.  Progress.

Even the peasant cottages we passed once we were beyond the village were better, on the whole, than they’d been when I’d arrived.  Commerce from Sevendor had improved the lots of everyone, it seemed, regardless if they were involved in the magical economy or not.  Of course, the further we went from Sevendor, the less you saw that improvement reflected on the countryside around us.  By late afternoon, as we were rumbling across the frontier of Kest into Trestendor’s lands, there was little sign of Sevendor’s mark.  Not unless you knew where to look.

We made it as far as Gosset that night, the border of Arathanial’s barony.  We stayed at a nice inn, for the most part unrecognized by our fellow travelers.  Only the innkeeper knew me, as he had fought with Trestendor as an ally of Sevendor and had been to the domain.  A few silver coins and he was happy to not recognize me.

I wasn’t trying to attract attention, you see.  I wanted to slip away, quietly and unnoticed.  That was to confound the spies of Prince Tavard, who were sure to report my faithful acceptance of his sentence of exile . . . but I didn’t want to make things easy for them.  I was dressed in my brother-in-law’s clothes.  As far as anyone knew, we were a baker and his journeyman going about their way on business.

I’d hidden most of the obvious signs of my true profession.  The Magolith was secure in the cart, though it would come to me with a thought.  I carried no wands, and had replaced my mage’s hat with a baker’s cap.  I didn’t even carry a staff, though if I needed one both Pathfinder and Blizzard were lurking in hoxter pockets in my rings, available to me at a command.

While evading spies was my primary goal, I also wanted to enjoy a bit of anonymity that the journey afforded.  I’d been playing Spellmonger and Magelord so long, it was good to shift my perspective and be just Minalan, son of the best baker in the Riverlands, for a change.

“I’m gonna miss this country,” Dad admitted, as we settled into our seats for dinner, that evening.  No one else had recognized us, thank Briga; the last thing I felt like doing was being the Spellmonger, when I’d been so recently exiled.  “The land is good, almost as good as the Burine country.  The people are nice.  It’s like home, but . . . different.”

“It’s still the Riverlands,” I shrugged.  “It’s more or less the same until you get to Gilmora.  Then it just gets more pretentious.  Once we hit the Wilderlands, you’ll see some differences,” I promised.

“I never thought I’d see another country,” Dad said, shaking his head in wonder as the innkeeper’s daughter brought a giant venison pie to us, with an earthenware pitcher of ale.   “I thought Drexel was the biggest city in the world, when I was a youth.”

“I’ve seen estates around Castabriel larger than Drexel,” I chuckled.  “Farise has slums bigger than that.  But I’m going to miss this country, too,” I admitted.  “I love the Wilderlands, but there is something . . . settled and civilized about the Riverlands.  Less adventure, but more security,” I decided, as I cut into my side of the pie.

“I’ve had enough of adventure, thank you,” Dad assured me.  “I want to see you settled in your new place and then get home to my ovens.  The boys have them running, now, but they don’t know how to tend them just right without me.” 

Dad was convinced that no one else could read his two great ovens better than he could, no matter how many times my brothers-in-law had managed to turn out truly superior bread from them without his assistance.  If he wasn’t involved in the bake, he always found some fault with the product.  It was a matter of common discussion in the family, when Dad wasn’t around.

“They’ll muddle through,” I promised.  “You trained them.  Besides, I’m going to want you to set up another oven in Vanador, when we arrive.  I don’t trust anyone else to do it.”

“Just about any master baker could do it, Min,” he sighed.  “I’m sure there are a few in . . . Vanador?” he asked, more than said. 

“Vanador,” I assured him.  “No, you haven’t heard of it, before.  It didn’t really exist before a year ago.  In fact, it doesn’t really exist, now.  It’s just a couple of rural villages in the middle of the wilderness, at the moment – and a giant refugee camp.  And a couple of wizards, to keep everything running.”

“Wizards just go around conjuring towns, now?” he asked with a twinkle in his eye.

“The ones I know do,” I nodded.  “You can blame me for starting the trend.  I first heard of the site on the Great March.  It’s a big mountain in the middle of a rolling plain, sticking out of the earth at an angle.  The locals call it ‘the Anvil’, because it looks like one, kind of.  But it’s big and secure enough to hide an entire city, under the overhanging rock.  Not quite the kind of castle we’re building in Sevendor, but it should be defensible against dragons.”

“Dragon-proof,” Dad nodded.  He didn’t like dragons, after seeing what one could do in Sevendor. 

“Dragon-resistant,” I corrected.   “But it’s a good place to start.  There’s already a kind of little village there.  When we freed all those slaves, we built a few places to help out.  Now that I’m in charge, a bunch of wizards are trying to turn it into something worthy of the Spellmonger.  They’re even building a hall for me and Alya.  It will be ready before we arrive.”

“But no castle?” he prodded, between bites.  Dad had a commoner’s opinion of castles: expensive pains-in-the arse . . . but he didn’t want to live anywhere he couldn’t find refuge in one.

“We’ll build one,” I promised.  “The castles that are there are primitive, ruined, or occupied by goblins, so we’ll have to. I’ll also have to build an army, a market, and a bunch of temples.  It’s fine,” I assured him.  “I’ve done this before in Sevendor, remember?”

“I know, it just seems like an awful lot of trouble,” he shrugged.

“It will be easier the second time,” I said, half to myself.  “I can avoid a lot of mistakes I made in Sevendor.  And try some things I couldn’t in the Riverlands.”

“What kinds of things?” he asked, curiously. 

“There are limits with what I can do with magic, in a place like Sevendor.  Having giant magical constructs walking around, lifting loads and such, for instance.  That would disturb even my allies, if I tried doing that,” I guessed.  “In the Magelaw, we should be able to do that sort of thing.  When goblins are your only neighbors, you don’t have to worry about gossip as much.”

That caused a chuckle in the old man.  “It sounds like you’re doing more planning,” he observed.

It was my turn to shrug.  “I have to, I think.  I’ve been thinking about this obsessively, Dad: all the places where I went wrong along the way.  All the places where I made mistakes that I shouldn’t have, with a little planning.  I pride myself on my ability to make things up as I go, but I’m realizing that there are limits to that kind of improvisation, too.  It’s sloppy,” I admitted. 

“You have been a bit introspective, lately,” Dad commented, dryly.  “You’re just like your mother, that way.  She can throw a good brood like no one else.  But don’t beat yourself up, Son.  You’ve managed.”

“Have I?  When I actually get lucky and things work out, everyone thinks I’m a godsdamned genius.  Then they tell me I’m a godsdamned genius, when I just got lucky.  And that’s dangerous.  Because eventually I’ll start thinking I’m a godsdamn genius.  And if there’s one thing I’ve learned from studying history, that sort of thing leads to calamity, more often than not.”

“So what are you going to do?” he asked, pouring his mug full.

“I’m going to try something novel: planning.  Towards an achievable outcome.  I think my days of wildly grasping at flashes of inspiration are over.”

Dad frowned.  “I don’t think your life is going to encourage that, Son,” he informed me, sadly.

“It’s certainly not going to help,” I agreed.  “But I’m starting from nothing, once again, and need to build it into something. Fast.  That’s a goal I know I can do.  Hells, I’ve done it,” I reminded him.  “If I can do it when I don’t know what I’m doing, think of what I can do now that I know what I’m doing.”

“You know what you’re doing?” he challenged, an eyebrow raised.

“I’m the godsdamned Spellmonger,” I sighed, gloomily.  “I’d better know what I’m doing.  This time, I have definite goals and easily-defined assets with which to meet them.”

“Such as?”

“Getting a town up and running properly within a year,” I said, ticking my goals off on my fingers.  “Getting tens of thousands of former slaves back into real homes with real futures.  Building a fortification that can protect all of those, as well as my family.  And making it attractive enough to my foes to distract both the goblins and Prince Tavard away from the Riverlands.”

“Goblins?” he asked, surprised.  “You’re taking my grandchildren into a war zone?”

“Dad, the Wilderlands is where the invasion started.  Half of it is under shadow, now,” I reminded him.  “Vanador is much, much closer to them than Sevendor is.  If I make it an attractive enough target, perhaps they’ll spend their time focused on it, instead of the Riverlands.  Once it becomes known that the Spellmonger is in charge, I’m going to attract new foes like a pretty widow attracts suitors.”

“Along with my grandchildren,” he stated, unhappily.

“Yes, along with your grandchildren!” I snorted.  “Dad, I haven’t been in a safe place since I was drafted,” I reminded him.  “I spent years as a mercenary, after Farise.  I thought I was getting away from that when I moved to Boval Vale and tried to be a spellmonger . . . and you see how that turned out.”

“I don’t know what I did to inflict such misfortune on you, Son, but—”

“Oh, it was nothing you did, Dad,” I promised.  “It was entirely my fault.  And the gods’.  You did fine,” I insisted.  “As much as any father could.  But I had to go and develop rajira and then get trained and drafted, and . . . well, everything after that is on me.  You have other grandchildren,” I reminded him.  “Almost ten, now.  Probably more, in a few years.  Let me watch Minny and Almy.  They’ll be as safe in Vanador as anywhere,” I promised him.

“I think a tiny village in a nameless domain would be safer,” he suggested.  “I’d recommend Talry, but we’ve had our fill of wizards, there.  But there must be someplace else . . .”

“We can’t live in fear, Dad,” I countered.  “Not and survive.  Not and win.  Believe me, there is far, far more going on than you’re aware of.  And stakes higher than my children.  Or all of the children in Sevendor.  If I hide Minny and Almy away, they might survive . . . for a while.  But if I fail, it won’t matter where they are.”

“You really believe that?” he asked, skeptically.

“If I didn’t, I’d be doing something else,” I offered, pushing the remains of my pie away.  “I’m not exaggerating my own importance to say that a lot rides on what I’m doing.  For every man in the Five Duchies.  I could explain, if you’d like.”

“Don’t bother,” he said, shaking his head.  “It was bad enough when you got ennobled, and were consorting with nobility.  Then it was the elves.  Then you were attending coronations and feuding with Princes.  Going to war against strange folk in foreign parts for no good reason.  Nay, I’ve given up trying to understand your world, Min.  When I saw a dragon – an actual dragon – fly over my house, it convinced me that whatever you were doing was beyond my ken.”

That was a powerful admission from a proud patriarch.  But that was the kind of man Dad was.  He didn’t overlook his own limitations.

“It flew over my house, too,” I reminded him.  “And it had a similar effect on me.  The problem is, Dad, there isn’t anyone better to contend with this.  I’m now responsible for . . . well, a lot more than Sevendor.  And my family.  The things I’ve learned about our world would make you swoon,” I predicted.  “Explaining them to you would not comfort your dreams, I’m afraid, but inflame them.”

“Then don’t tell me,” he insisted.  “I have plenty that I’m responsible for already.  If you think you can handle this—”

“I really don’t, but there’s no one better available,” I sighed.  “If there was, we’d be headed to his house, now.  No, this is a hole I’ve dug for myself, like it or not.  I can either continue to pretend that what I do doesn’t really matter, or I can stand up and take responsibility for what I’ve been given.  I really wish it didn’t matter,” I added, wistfully, as I dug out my pipe from my belt.  I’d left my rich-looking pipe in my baggage, electing to use a non-magical one to avoid attracting attention on the road.  It was beautiful, a well-polished burl of walnut with a stem only five or six inches long – a traveling pipe.  I didn’t even use a cantrip to light it, opting for a taper instead.

“I do, too,” Dad agreed, gloomily.  “I don’t like the idea of my grandchildren in danger.  Any other man, I’d ride across kingdoms to rescue them, myself.  But I’ve got to trust you, Min,” he sighed.  “That’s something I have learned, in the last two years.  You do know what you’re doing, despite what you say.  Even if you don’t realize it at the time.  That’s a hard thing for a father to admit about his son.”

“That I know what I’m doing?” I asked, surprised.

“Yes,” he nodded, as he pushed his own portion of pie away.  “Do you have any idea how terrifying that is?  Just wait until Minny grows up,” he warned.  “It’s one thing when the little idiot is making common mistakes that you can easily point out to him.  When he starts making mistakes and you have no idea what he’s doing? 

“That’s real fear, Son.  If you were just screwing up the dough, that’s easy to criticize.  But I’ve been out of my element since you went to school.  I can’t tell you how to cast a spell or whether you should.  I can’t tell you how to . . . charge an enemy, or storm a breach, or whatever it is you did as a warmage.  And when you were in charge of an entire domain?  What in three hells could I have said to you?  I had to learn how to trust you, when I didn’t know what you were doing or why.  You put gray in my beard,” he accused.

“It’s just flour,” I countered, lighting his pipe for him from my own.  “Besides, after raising five daughters I doubt you had any brown left in it.  What I contend with now makes running a domain look like baking bread,” I offered.  “Especially after storming Olum Seheri, and dealing with the Alka Alon.  I learned a lot of disturbing things that makes the dangers of even the war seem minor, in comparison.”

“Exactly what I mean,” he nodded, as he pulled on the pipestem and surrounded himself with sweet-smelling smoke.  “What is a father to say to his son, after hearing that sort of thing?  ‘Don’t screw it up, Boy’?”

“I would hope that goes without saying,” I agreed.  “And I’m trying.  But I’m working with incomplete information and an imperfect understanding of the situation.  That makes it easy to make mistakes, if I’m not careful.  Or even if I am careful.”

“So what are you going to do?” he asked.

“The very best I can,” I pledged, with a heavy sigh.  “First, I’ll set up Vanador as a proper mageland, with as impressive defenses as I can.  Then in a few years I’ll goad the enemy to breaking their armies on the Anvil until they get tired.  Meanwhile, I’ll search for the hidden secrets of snowstone and discover the lost secrets of our ancient civilization.  All while raising my children and keeping my Prince from ordering my execution.”

“Just what did you do to piss him off, Son?” Dad asked.  “I met him, when he came to Sevendor.  He seemed all right, for a noble.”

“He’s not just noble, he’s royal,” I reminded him.  “That’s an entirely different level of asinine, believe me.  He knows how to act to the public – especially a commoner, during a public event.  In private he’s less . . . gracious.  Particularly to anyone he thinks outshines his glory,” I added, sarcasm dripping from my voice.  “He blames me for his son’s death, in Castabriel.  Not the thousands of others I didn’t save, but his son, in particular.”

“I can see that,” Dad sighed, heavily.

“So can I, actually,” I agreed.  “If something happened to Minny . . . but that’s why.  That, and my support for his cousin, Anguin.  I can only hope that I can fade from his notice, if I go to the Wilderlands.  In a few years his anger will cool, hopefully.”

“And what if it doesn’t?”

“We’ll cross that ford when the road comes to it,” I shrugged.  “Until then, I’ll retire to the Magelaw, build my new city, raise an army, and bide my time until my exile is over.  Maybe I’ll get some reading done.”

Dad snorted.  “I wouldn’t count on it, Son.”

Part Two

The Bontal Snowflake

Thanks to the swift cart ride, we were through the gates of Sendaria Port before nightfall the next day.  I didn’t mind tarrying there for another evening, as it allowed me to stop by Andalnam’s shop and chat with his daughter, and complete a few other errands.  The next morning the barge was waiting for us at the appointed dock. 

The Bontal was muddy and choppy, that day, swollen with winter rain and melting snow.  The water seemed dark and, if not angry, at least discontent, eager to get on with its journey.  By contrast, the small barge that awaited us seemed placid and merry, compared to the river.  It was a wide-berthed, flat bottomed boat only twenty-five feet or so long, but nearly half that wide.  The low prow and wide stern gave ample room for our wagon and team, with plenty of space for some cargo.  It was called the Bontal Snowflake.

The master of the craft was a young man of around twenty named Captain Seston.  He and his young wife and their four-year old boy tended the barge.  Seston was hired by Andalnam, who had taken charge of the project, once Banamor proposed it the year before.  Andalnam’s familiarity with Sendaria Port’s docks allowed him to secure both boat and master.  Then he’d detailed his younger two daughters to enchant it for me, as an exercise in their craft.

The Bontal Snowflake was the result, and I could not fault their work.  They’d done an excellent job on the spells.  Andalnam had purchased the boat, only two years old, and had it drydocked for a season in Sendaria, where it was refitted to our specifications.

The barge sat lightly on the choppy water – the hull was extremely hydrophobic, reducing the friction and drag on the boat.  They’d augmented the poles of the barge so that the force exerted from a push against the bottom was more than double.  A dozen other spells further increased the efficiency of the transport from sail to rudder to bright green trim until it was, by all accounts, one of the fastest boats on the river.  The Snowflake was usually used for quick trade trips between Sendaria and the bigger markets downriver, or more determined voyages upstream.   But it waited in Sendaria, at our disposal.

“I like being back on a river,” Dad sighed, as we cast off from the dock.  Seston and his two polemen steered the craft into the current with practiced ease.  “Sevendor is lovely, and the mountain air agreed with me, but I miss the river.” 

I knew what he meant.  The River Burine had been a constant in my family’s life, a source of commerce and news.  There was always something going by, either upriver or downriver.  In Sevendor, if a stranger happened to your door you expected he intended to go there.  It was remote – quiet, but remote, compared to a river town.  I suppose that’s why I’d always enjoyed my times in Sendaria, I realized.  They reminded me of my first home.

“You always said there was no need to go off in search of adventure,” I recalled, as we settled into a bench and pulled our cloaks close against the damp.  “That the river would eventually bring the world to you.  But you’re about to see a great part of the world, by river.  We’ll be going through a good bit of the Riverlands, and thence to Gilmora by way of Barrowbell.”

“I’ve heard of Barrowbell,” Dad grunted.  “Something about the road?”

“And the lights,” I agreed.  “Barrowbell is pretty, you’ll like it.  But we’re skipping Castabriel, though it’s not too far out of our way.  No need to antagonize Prince Tavard by lingering in his capital.  It was damaged more than Sevendor, and will take longer to recover.  Though I’d like to take you to see the new Royal capital, someday.  King Rard has the beginnings of something impressive, there.”

“Grand palaces aren’t my style,” he said, proudly. 

“Nor mine.  I prefer my palaces to be cozy,” I said, earning a snort.  “But it might be nice for you to see where some of your tax money went.   It’s functional, as much as it is ornamental, I’ll give Rard that.”

“You feel entitled to criticize a king, do you?” he asked, wryly.

“When I helped put him on the throne, I do,” I agreed.  “My father taught me to hold the miller to account.  Rard is just a miller on a grander scale,” I decided. 

“What does he use for grist?” Dad asked, enjoying the metaphor.

“Power,” I said, ticking it off my fingers.  “Our taxes.  Authority.  Leadership.  The kingdom he built is designed to grind all of those into something the people can use to bake bread – their prosperity.”

“You know, when you use baking metaphors with me, it sounds more than a little condescending,” he pointed out.

“It’s not indulgence, it’s actually a good metaphor,” I said, warming to it.  “Rard has built his government on the proposition that he can take the disparate interests of three duchies and make them work more efficiently, under his leadership.  He convinced and bribed Remere, and tricked and murdered Alshar into obedience.  But if his governance isn’t better than the old ways, he’ll lose the support of the very Counts he now depends upon for . . . for the grist.  They supply the grist.  He grinds them into something everyone can use,” I concluded.

“With royal authority being the millstones to do so,” Dad reasoned.   “And the armies to enforce it.”

“The armies come from the counts,” I reminded him.  “If they don’t like his administration, they won’t answer his banner call.  That was the general consensus at the Curia,” I explained.  “We agreed to try Rard’s new taxation scheme and pledged to follow his military orders.  But there were a lot of powerful men, there.  The Counts are willing to gather taxes and administer in Rard’s name if he proves a wise leader.  If his flour is properly ground, at fair value.”

“Or if it just enriches their pockets,” Dad said, shaking his head.

“Some, perhaps,” I conceded.  “They certainly work toward their own interests.  But those interests include a happy and prosperous people and a well-ordered realm.  That’s their first priority.  Without that, wealth is something you have to protect, not something you can cultivate.  They are the King’s first and largest customers, the ones on which he depends to keep his treasury filled.  If anyone has a right to criticize and hold Rard to account, it’s us.”

“You don’t seem to have any problem including yourself among their number,” Dad observed, raising an eyebrow as he packed his pipe. 

“Once you’ve been made a baron, rank stops being such an impressive thing.  The power relationships are the same in any system.  Rard’s administration is supposed to turn out good, wholesome, well-ground flour – the conditions necessary for the common folk and the artisan classes can prosper.  When the flour is good, the bread is good.”

“A shitty baker can spoil good flour,” Dad pointed out.

“That’s not Rard’s problem – he’s only responsible for milling flour.  As long as he does that, the rest is up to us.  But we have to watch him, and watch what effects his policies have on our lands.  We hold him to account.”

“Who holds you to account, then?”

“Me?  Personally?  My father, actually,” I chuckled.  “I’m an exception.  Most high nobles are held in check by a balance between their vassals and their liege – the duke or king.  If I started oppressing the peasants, Duke Anguin might have something to say about it.  Or he might not,” I conceded.  “In my case, if I fail at baking my bread, I’ll lose my new lands to goblins, so . . .”

“So you’d better not screw up the dough,” Dad finished.  “I think this metaphor has run its course.”

“Perhaps.  But I hope you understand my perspective.  I take my duty to my people more seriously than a lot of counts, I expect, but none of them are immune to the problems an incompetent monarch could bring them.  One bad edict, and they could be facing peasants’ revolts or riots in their towns.  No one wants that.”

“You think that’s likely?” Dad asked, suddenly concerned. 

“No, not at present,” I soothed.  “In fact, so far Rard’s policies have been well-received.  Commerce is expanding, there is coin flowing, and we even have peace, technically, with the Goblin King.  On the other hand, he’s lost Farise, and gained Enultramar only by proxy.  But those are far-off lands.  One reason I’m going to Vanador overland, instead of just popping through the Ways, is that I want to survey the kingdom for myself to determine that very thing.”

Dad snorted smoke out of his nose.  “And you think you can fix it, if it’s broken?”

“It depends on how broken, and where.  But I at least need to see for myself.  And I wouldn’t mind a few days of quiet reflection, before I plunge into the task ahead.  One thing I’ve learned in military service is that hearing a report is no substitute for an inspection.  So I’m taking this chance to sift through the flour.”

“Wise,” Dad conceded, through a cloud of smoke.  “What happens if you don’t like what you see?”

I shrugged.  “Then it will factor into my plans.  If Rard has a long and prosperous reign, then I should be able to support him enthusiastically.  If he starts screwing things up . . . then I’ll make contingencies for that.”

“You’d rebel?” he asked, surprised.

“I’d advise, more likely.  A few of the counts are friends of mine.  More would listen to my counsel.  And I have the power of the Arcane Orders behind me, too.  But I’d rather not bother,” I explained.  “I have . . . bigger things to occupy my time than politics.”

“Bigger than pissing off the prince?”

“Yes, if you want to know the truth.  His Highness’ feud with me is inconvenient and annoying, but it’s not my largest concern.  But he lingers on my horizon,” I admitted.  “Someday, gods willing, he will be king.  Hopefully, by the time Tavard gains the throne, his wrath will have mellowed and his wisdom will increase.  May that be many, many years from now.”

“An awful lot could happen, betwixt now and then,” Dad reflected.

“That’s what I’m counting on,” I nodded.  “Until then, I support Rard and his policies, as long as the realm is prospering and protected.  And as long as he supports me.  He gave me a lot of leeway with Sevendor, even though it was in the middle of his duchy.  He’ll do likewise with Vanador out of necessity, if not by policy.  By the time Tavard is crowned, I’m hoping Vanador will be strong enough to resist any . . . poorly ground flour.”

“At this point, you’re torturing the metaphor, Min,” he chided.  “You and the Prince don’t get along, ‘tis clear.  But what about this other duke?  Anguin?”

“Oh, he won’t interfere,” I assured him.  “He’ll let me do what I wish with the Magelaw.”

“I wasn’t so much concerned about him interfering,” Dad observed, “as much as I was about you being beholden to him.  A man who serves two masters . . .”

“There is a danger to that,” I admitted.  “And while Anguin and I are on excellent terms, that could change.  Thankfully, he is preoccupied with establishing his court in Enultramar, far to the south.  That’s why he appointed me, because he can no longer devote the attention to the Wilderlands as he once could.”

“If you say so, Min,” Dad said, shaking his head skeptically.  “I suppose I sound provincial, when I tell you to beware of the promises of nobles—”

“Quite the contrary,” I chuckled.  “Since I became a noble, I think your warnings were far too tepid, Dad.  The only agreements with the nobility you can count upon are those backed up with force.  That said, I’ve been allowed to accumulate a little force.  I’ll be able to use that, I think, to protect myself while I’m off being concerned with other things.”

“As long as you aren’t listening to them drone on about honor and duty, while they’re picking your purse,” he nodded, sagely.  “A man’s duty is to his family, and his honor descends from seeing to it properly.”

“I couldn’t agree more,” I said, sincerely.  “Vanador will be, I hope, the place where I can restore mine.”

We were silent, for a while, as we contemplated the future and watched the world flow past our eyes as we sailed downriver.  When it resumed, our discussions revolved around my sisters and their children, husbands, and their plans for the future.  Good, wholesome family business.  From which honor descends.

Dinner that night included bread from my wand, salted riverfish stew, beans and some of the rich yellow cheese Sendaria produces for export.  The overcast kept me from one of my favorite pastimes during barge travel – laying on the deck under the stars – but it allowed Dad and I to play a few games and share a bottle of wine under the magelight I cast on the deck. 

It was interesting, to me, that though I had gotten to know my dad as a father and a patriarch over a large family, this was really the first opportunity I had to get to know him as a traveler.  I have it on the highest authority (Herus, the God of Travelers, if you’re looking for a citation) that a man’s true soul can be revealed on the road, if you caught him in the right mood.  Of course, Herus is full of such divine observations: how distance and style can turn any man into an expert, how travel can excite the lusts of the most demure maiden or widow, or allow a wife to forget her virtue with a stranger, or how opportunity and remoteness can turn any man into a robber, a murderer, a rapist . . . or a saint.

Herus says a lot of crap like that.

But I did learn a lot about Dad on that journey, much to my surprise.  Among the biggest revelations to me was that Mother was not his first choice of wife, exactly.  Nor his first lover.

“That was a lass named Nianci, the daughter of a miller over in Marvos Ford, south o’ Drexel,” Dad informed me, as we passed a bottle between us before bed.  “Not the comeliest girl, perhaps, but she was . . . persuasive.  And persistent.  She told me it didn’t count against her virtue, as we were trade-bound together!” he laughed.  “Thing is, I never questioned her virtue.  But Marvos was a lonely place, I suppose.  And I was from Drexel, the big, important town.  She treated me like I was a lord, when her father wasn’t about.”

“So I could have been Nianci’s son?” I asked, surprised.

“I suppose so, if I hadn’t been swifter,” he admitted.  “Although you’d be heavier set, I think.  She was an ample girl, even back then.  But pretty, in her way.  I often wonder what happened to her.”

“Was she prettier than Momma?”

“Ishi’s tits, no!” Dad swore, uncharacteristically.  “Your mother was beautiful, far prettier than Nianci.  But not so persuasive,” he chuckled.  “She made me work for it, she did.  I had to court her proper,” he said, respectfully. 

“Alya and I . . . well, she was a pretty young widow,” I explained, as if he didn’t already know.

“Oh, I know, Son, and to hear her tell the story . . . or, at least, when she was . . .”

“I know,” I sighed.  “I’m sure it was quite amusing, from her perspective.”

“Amusing?  She said you rescued her like a hero from legend,” Dad revealed.  “She told the story a dozen times, when she was with us at Talry.   Enough so that your sisters didn’t believe her.  They didn’t think their scrawny little brother could be, ah, so . . .”

“Manly?” I suggested.

“Competent,” Dad supplied.  “Sorry, Min, but she spooned the honey on the porridge pretty thick, when it came to you.  You were big, brawny, handsome, wise, kind, compassionate . . . so it was hard for anyone who knew you to take it seriously,” he said, apologetically.  “Your sisters used to make faces and tease her, behind her back.  Good-naturedly,” he assured me.  “But they couldn’t believe poor Alya’s version.”

“I filled out a bit, in Farise,” I reminded him, half-heartedly.

“Oh, it wasn’t a commentary on your prowess, Min, it was . . . that girl loved you, she thought the world of you,” he explained.  “And that was before you took in her entire folk, at your expense.  She mentioned her first husband, sometimes, but never spoke of him the way she did you.  Of course, we were your kin . . .”

“Alya’s not given to idle flattery,” I noted, wryly. 

“Your sisters noticed that, they did,” he chuckled.  “That made it even harder for them to credit her opinion of you.  And all the wonders she said you did in that castle.”

“I was just desperate,” I dismissed.  “She was scared and easily impressed.”

“No doubt,” Dad nodded, taking another sip from the bottle.  “But the truth is, you didn’t have to come back for her, and she knew it.  She was loyal, as a result.  And believe me, the womenfolk were eager to find some fault in her devotion to you.”

“Why do they do that?” I asked, suddenly.  “Why do women try to find fault with each other like that?  Unless they’re defending each other to the death,” I added.

“I’ve got one wife, one mother, four sisters and five daughters, Min,” Dad sighed.  “I have no idea.  Ask Ishi, next time you see her,” he suggested.

“Don’t think I won’t!”

“They’re all as close as sisters, now,” he pointed out.  “Even that sister o’ hers, Ela.  Strange girl.”

“I got the better of the two,” I nodded.  “I don’t know how Sagal puts up with that woman.”

“All of us husbands agree to put up with our wives’ madness, when we say our vows,” Dad reflected.  “One man’s honey is another man’s harridan.  In turn, they agree to put up with ours.  Or cut our throats in our sleep,” he shrugged.  “It’s a matter of compromise.  In your case . . . you’ve just got a bit more madness to contend with, now, is all.”

“A bit more?  She’s getting better,” I said, pouting a little.  That was true enough – Alya was speaking and talking and holding conversations, tending to her own simple needs, feeding and dressing herself, and recognizing people she knew from day to day.  Compared to the vegetative state she’d lived in for a year, it was amazing.  Compared to the bright, intelligent young woman she’d been before the Mage War, she was still . . . shattered.  The Handmaiden had done incredible, even miraculous things.  But Alya was still far from Alya, yet.

“Aye, she is, she is,” Dad conceded.  “But you’ll have to be careful with her, Son,” he counseled.  “She’s going to be delicate for a while, I think.  Fragile.  I don’t know what to tell you to do about it, but . . . be gentle,” he suggested.

“I will, Dad,” I sighed.  “I fought for her at Olum Seheri.  I’ll keep fighting for her in Vanador.”

“I expect no less, Son,” he agreed. 

*

*

*

It only took three days to travel down the Bontal to where it joined the Ansus at Drexel, where I got to hear hours of unlikely stories about Dad’s apprenticeship.  Another half-day later we came to where it joined the Burine, at Dad’s barony of Varune.  I caught him looking longingly down the channel toward home, as the bargemen polled us into the other direction.  But then he sighed and turned, and didn’t look back.  He wanted to go home, but he wanted to be here with me, too. 

I appreciated his sacrifice.  Mom and the rest of his household had already taken this route back to Talry, and were waiting for him just a half-day’s journey upriver, from where we were.  But he’d committed to seeing me to Vanador, he wanted to see new country, and I think he was curious about what kind of man I’d become.  Despite having lived in my domain for two years, Dad and I hadn’t spent much time together, alone.

In fact, our course would take us near to a friend and colleague I wanted to visit, as part of our journey.  A day after we turned course away from Talry, I had the captain steer us upriver to a small but bustling little domain: Robinwing, one of the first of the Magelands.

While Sevendor had blossomed into the magnificent, snowstone-powered power I’d made it, Robinwing was much closer to how a “normal” mageland was administered, in my opinion.  Forandal, Magelord of Robinwing, didn’t have near my resources at his disposal, but he had invested liberally in many of the innovations arising from Sevendor’s advancements in enchantment.  A brief mental consultation with Banamor confirmed that Forandal had purchased nearly a score of agricultural wands from the bouleterion, a large number of taperwands, some carpentry and masonry wands, and a wide selection of specialty enchantments in the last few years.  Robinwing was one of his better, more reliable customers, and Banamor brought me up to date about the political situation there.

Forandal married the daughter of one of his vassals and is raising a family – boy and girl, so far, the wizard informed me.  He’s managed to successfully recapture the loyalty of his vassals by buying out their debts to the town, and he’s re-negotiated the town charter on highly favorable terms.  All in all, a well-run mageland, he commended. 

No challenges, then? I asked, surprised.

Challenges?  There are always challenges, Min, Banamor demurred.  Forandal has been tested at least three times by his neighbors in the last few years.  Border raiding and punishing tolls, that sort of thing.  Magelord Forandal responded to them forcefully and with great wisdom.  He’s politically astute, if not politically adept – or at least not politically ambitious, he amended.  He’s happy with his domain and a few choice estates he’s purchased outside of it.  He’d rather be the king of his little castle than rule over the Riverlands.

Banamor proved correct about everything but the size of Robinwing Castle.  Already an imposing drum keep situated on a steep, easily-defendable promontory, I could see from the river that Forandal had expanded the bailey and added a trio of new towers to the well-constructed structure.  Similarly, workshops and halls filled the bailey and the road up to the castle had been widened and improved.

“Pretty castle,” Dad admitted, as the men poled us upstream toward the dock.  “Looks like a tidy village, too.”

“Forandal was raised a proper Riverlord,” I told him.  “Warmagic was as close to being a knight as he could get, but he’s always been a Riverlord at heart.  Robinwing won’t be much different from Talry, I’d expect.”

“As long as they have ale and a proper privy, I’ll be happy,” Dad nodded.  “Are we going up to the castle, or are we going to skulk around the waterfront like a couple of spies?”

“A little of both, I think,” I said, as I went to discuss my plans with Captain Seston.  “Forandal doesn’t know I’m coming, but we’ll head up to the castle this afternoon, if Forandal is about.”

Robinwing village was as tidy up close as it seemed from the river.  It was the usual collection of temple spires, grain silos, and shingled rooves, with a cobbled High Street and a prosperous marketplace.  The old Imperial goddess involved in the founding of the town was evident in the art, signs, and decoration throughout the town, from an inn called the Cozy Scroll to the spacious parchment shop at the edge of the market adorned with quills and inkpots to the owls and acorns that were, apparently, sacred symbols of the goddess.  

Though it was at the center of a mageland, Robinwing seemed much more like Talry or Sendaria than it did Sevendor.  But there were subtle differences.  Mage-kilned and -planed timber in the construction; the uniform nature of the street cobbles, bereft of normal ice and snow; the lack of smoky haze in the air.  Cottages and homes using heatstones didn’t burn near the fuel that a normal home did, and Forandal had purchased more than a hundred for his people.  There were still cooking fires and oven fires about, but Forandal’s foresight had allowed the folk of Robinwing to forego the endless feeding of the flame all winter long merely to survive.

I was gratified to see a pillar of snowstone at the center of the marketplace.  I’d gifted many of my friends with them, in the early days of Sevendor’s rise.  They provided a means of lowering the local thaumaturgical resistance, which meant magic was just easier to do in its proximity. 

But he’d done more than that – he’d had someone carve the block of white basalt, or at least the head of the pillar.  It sported a relief of his arms and a dedication to the local gods, as well as an instruction for all magi to report to the village Spellwarden.  The lower parts of the slab were filled with additional parchments soliciting or offering a number of goods and services, for the literate amongst the marketgoers.  We stood and stared at it, reading a few of the notices and advertisements, until a local merchant noticed us.

“New to Robinwing, are you?” he asked, in a friendly tone.

“Just visiting,” Dad grunted.  “From Talry-on-Burine.”

“Ah, upriver!” the man nodded.  “Well, that’s a genuine magical pillar, that is,” he assured us.  “Only one around, they say.”

“What makes it magic?” Dad asked, curious. 

“At twilight it creates a great light overhead,” the merchant told us, sketching the sight out for us with his hands.  “A sphere twelve feet wide, that lights the whole square.  It’s . . . it’s a spell,” he confided.  “A magic spell, placed there by our master.  A magelord.”

“You don’t say?” Dad said, playing the role of the provincial lout.

“Oh, Aye, Magelord Forandal is one of the mightiest wizards in the land,” he bragged, tucking his broad hands into his belt.  “He’s down here casting spells every month, it seems.  Anything from lights to checking the scales.  Magelord Forandal doesn’t countenance cheating in the market,” he warned.

“What is a ‘spellwarden’?” I asked, innocently.  I was still wearing a baker’s cap, after all, and I wanted his candid opinion.

“Oh, that’s just the fellow who keeps track of the wizards in Robinwing,” he explained.  “An office that Magelands have, now.  He’s Demaran the Spellmonger, over there on River Street,” he said, pointing to a sturdy brick building, like a burgher’s shop.

“The spellmonger?” Dad asked, humoring me.

“Oh, not THE Spellmonger, just a spellmonger,” the man quickly corrected.  “He’s not that bloke that fights the Goblin King.  But our lord is a close friend of his.  Nay, old Demaran runs a normal shop.  He’d faint dead away if he saw a goblin.”

“I might just speak to him,” I suggested.  “He does the usual spells?”

“Aye, though he’s best on keeping things from leaking,” the merchant advised.  “He’s keen on barrels and bottles.  But he’s there.  Tell him Fym sent you!”

“You want to see a spellmonger?” Dad smirked.

“Actually, I’m required by law to do so,” I chuckled.  “A rule I helped write.  All visiting magi have to register with the spellwarden of a particular town or village, if they want to practice magic there.  If I so much as cast a magelight, hopefully this fellow’s spells will detect it, and find me.  I considered doing that, just to test him, but this is more convenient.”

“You have to register with a local wizard?” Dad asked, surprised.

“It’s the law,” I affirmed, as we made our way to Master Demaran’s shop.  The traditional three magestars were displayed over the door, along with a depiction of a spellmonger’s cap.  Both were mildly enchanted to attract attention – one of the more tasteful little spells my former profession employed.  “Banamor holds that office in Sevendor, though he usually gets a deputy to do the actual work—”

“I’m shocked,” Dad said, dryly.  He was highly suspicious of Banamor – not because he was a wizard, but because he was a burgher and a merchant. 

“—but it’s just a formality.  You couldn’t just start baking bread here without a license, could you?” I asked as I pushed open the heavy wooden door.

“Depends on the circumstances,” Dad admitted.  “Since I’m a master and a member of—”

“We’ll discuss it on the boat,” I said, quietly, as we went in.  The air within was warm and pleasant, and a small fire was lit on the hearth.  A tiny, bright magelight in the center of the narrow room was far more responsible for the light.  I could feel the insulating spells and the heatstone in the corner without magesight, thanks to the Magolith. 

The shop was actually better-appointed than my old one, and far less cluttered than many of the other spellmonger shops I’d seen.  Master Demaran had elected to furnish his professional workshop with efficiency in mind, not impressing his clients.  The tapestries on the wall were modest examples of painted cotton, not embroidered wool, and they depicted some basic runic combinations and categories of glyphs and sigils – the sort of thing used to train apprentices, but look mysterious to the uninformed. 

A single lad of fifteen or so, wearing a woolen tunic and an apprentice’s pointed cap, was sitting on a stool dutifully going through accounts when we came in.  He immediately got to his feet and gave a curt bow.

“I’m afraid Master Dameron is out on a call.  I am his apprentice, Marvek.  May I help you goodmen with something?” he asked, in a tone that was polite but bored.

“I need to register with the Spellwarden,” I informed him, straightening.  “I’ll just be here for a day or so.”

“You need to register?” he asked, surprised, glancing at the baker’s cap I wore.  “Are you a sport?”

“Spellmonger,” I admitted.  A sport was someone whose rajira was often inadequate for learning real magic, but who could perform some arcane manipulation, often in a single capacity. 

“Really?” he asked, his eyebrows raised.  “Are you in Robinwing on business?”

“Aye, I’m here to see the Magelord,” I agreed.

“Very well, then,” the boy said, pulling out a scroll from a pile and plucking a quill from the cup of them.  “Name?”

“Minalan,” I supplied, dutifully.   He dipped his pen and started to write.  He got the initial letter done before he stopped.

“Minalan?” he asked, unsure if I was jesting.

“Minalan the Spellmonger,” Dad provided. 

“Like . . . like the . . .”

“Very close to that, yes,” Dad nodded, stonefaced.

“Precisely like that,” I sighed.  “Minalan the Spellmonger,” I repeated.

“Credentials, rank and position?” the lad asked, meekly, as he continued with wide eyes.

“Certified mage, trained at Inarion Academy and chartered under the Castali court wizard.  Trained warmage, since the Farisian campaign, licensed to practice warmagic.  Magelord of Sevendor,” I recited.  “Baron of Sevendor.  Count Palatine of the Magelaw.  Permanent member of the Royal Court.  Head of the Arcane Orders.  I can delineate each of my titles for each individual order, if that is helpful,” I added.

“That should . . . be . . . sufficient,” the nervous young man said, as he neatly scrawled out my name and title.  “Do you plan on performing any commercial magic or magic for hire while within the bounds of Robinwing?”

“I’m not planning on it, but it might happen,” I conceded with a shrug.  “I do that sort of thing all the time.”

“Then we’ll give you a visitors’ pass, and if you do end up doing any magic for pay in Robinwing, please notify this office and apply for an upgraded Visiting Professional pass,” he recited, as he copied down my name and titles on a separate sheet of parchment.  I could see most of the pass had been written out, already, with just my name, the duration of my stay, and what type of pass it was.  No doubt many of the lad’s idle hours were spent practicing his penmanship, so.

“I’ll try to restrain myself,” I agreed with a small smile as he finished recording my visit.  “Does this cover theurgic magic, too, or just thaumaturgy?” I asked.  “Professional interest,” I explained.

The apprentice got a troubled look on his face.  “How can you . . . practice . . . theurgy?” he snorted. 

“If a god shows up and wants to lob a couple of miracles across town, do they show up in your scrying?”

“I . . . I have no idea,” he admitted, glancing at the dark green glass bowl he no doubt used for the purpose.  “I’ve never had it happen.  I don’t think the regulation from the Arcane Orders makes a distinction between thaumaturgy and theurgy,” the apprentice said.

“Nor does it mention necromancy – an oversight that should be addressed at the next Convocation.  Have you been?”

“To the Convocation?” he snorted.  “The Magelord has been, a few times.  The first one was here, but . . . but I suppose you knew that,” he said, remembering whom he was addressing.  “Say . . . begging your pardon, uh, Excellency, but . . . are you here about the disturbances?”

“The disturbances?” Dad asked, curious.

“No, I was just happening by, and wanted to stop in and see my friend Forandal.  Why, what happened?”

“Oh, I doubt it’s my place to say, Excellency,” the apprentice said, swallowing nervously. 

“I think I’d very much like you to say, young . . . what was your name?”

“Marvek, Excellency, Marvek of Robinwing.  And if you wish . . . well, there were some disturbances, out in the estates this autumn.  Right around Luin’s Day.  Riots, they said.  Almost an uprising.  Apparently some folk were displeased at harvest that there wasn’t the work there normally was, on account of the new wands.  The manors only used about half of the folk they used a few years ago, and for less time.  And the manors used villeins almost exclusively, not hiring the freemen like normal.  The harvest boon was . . . meager, it was said,” he added, shaking his head.

“Well, that’s not a good sign,” Dad agreed.  The harvest boon was the food served to the laborers by the manor – part of it as a feast, and part of it as a bonus to take home to their families.  A skimpy harvest boon could get a manor muttered about, in the labor-intensive peasant economy.  It usually meant a poor harvest or a stingy manor lord – neither one a good harbinger at the Luin’s Day harvest festival.

“Nay, my lord, it is not,” Marvek agreed.  “The first year Magelord Forandal brought in the wands, the peasants rejoiced – who wants to do plowing and mowing?” he snorted.  “But when they didn’t have the coin they earned from that, they had a lean winter, and some fell into debt.”

“Did Forandal not take action?” I asked, concerned.

“Oh, aye, Excellency, he did: he employed a few hundred freemen in paving and public works, expanded the castle and paid good coin, too.  But that work was finished last year.  This year, there was no paving nor digging for hire.  Those poor souls who didn’t think ahead found themselves behind in their rents and at the temple dole,” he said, sympathetically.

“And then there were troubles?” Dad prompted.

“At one of the northern manors, yes,” Marvek nodded.  “When thrice as many bodies showed up than there was work for, an argument broke out over who would get hired.  Someone threw a rock, a fight started, and next thing you know there were barns burning and wains wrecked on the road,” he informed us.

“What did Magelord Forandal do?”

“Oh, he set things right, quickly enough,” assured the apprentice.  “He led a company from the castle to put down the riot.  But not before it spread to a few other estates.  Then a couple of monks showed up, preaching about fire and revolution, and stirred the chamberpot.  The Magelord had to hang a few, before things settled down,” he finished, troubled.

“The monks . . . what sect?”

“Some Eastern goddess.  Like Huin, but . . . mean.”

“Thanks for letting me know,” I said, pressing a coin into his hand.  “This should cover my fee – consider the rest a tip toward a journey to the Convocation.”

His eyes went wide at the weight of the gold coin.  He could buy a cottage, for that.  Or make it to Castabriel.  “Excellency!  Thank you!” he gasped.

We were headed out the door when he overcame his astonishing new wealth and reminded me to take a cheaply-made wooden talisman bearing the arms of Robinwing and the seal of the Spellwarden. 

“To . . . track you,” Marvek admitted, apologetically.  “To identify you if you do, indeed, practice magic.”

“That was interesting,” Dad murmured, as we returned to the market square.  “Your little wands have interfered with the natural order, Min.”  Dad enjoyed digging at me and my profession, especially my altruistic attitude toward magic.  He’d seen what it could do when it was allowed to, in Sevendor.  But that included both the good and the bad.

“They’ve simplified farming,” I countered, knowing what was coming.  “They’ve eliminated the brutal work of plowing and mowing.”

“And scything,” Dad agreed, innocently.  “Of course, it may not have occurred to you that they would also eliminate a good number of good people who depended upon it.”

“I know, Dad,” I shot back.   “This isn’t Sevendor,” I continued, more quietly, as we crossed the square toward the High Street.  “Forandal doesn’t have the resources I do, either magical or financial.  He’ll sort it out,” I said, unconvincingly.

“One man in five is a cottager, in Talry,” he continued, conversationally.  “Not more than twelve, maybe twenty rods of land to their cots, if they’re lucky.  Even worse, in some places.  Just barely enough to grow a few peas and greens.  If it wasn’t for the plowing, planting, mowing and harvest, most would starve.”

“I know, Dad!”

“Almost impossible to raise a family, without that,” he continued, ignoring my tone.  “A young man can’t get ahead enough to rent a few acres, without that.  And a maid isn’t likely to wed a fellow who can’t feed himself, much less a couple of babies.”

I sighed.  “What do you want me to do, Dad?  Dispense alms until every young couple in Robinwing is set for life?”

“I have no idea,” he shrugged, amused.  “I’m a baker, not a wizard.  I’m just pointing out the problems for the Wise among us to solve.”

“Well, what would you do?” I asked, accusingly.

“I’d find something else to employ those men,” Dad nodded.  “Roads and bridges and ditches are fine, as far as they go.  But if you want a village to thrive, then there has to be opportunity for all.  Not alms,” he quickly corrected.  “I’ve seen the poor wretches who haunt the manors and castles for alms, and that’s no way for a man to live, begging,” he said, with a mixture of disgust and sympathy.

“Then what?  Holy orders?  Military service?”

“Neither one will help a man start a family, not a proper one,” he sighed.  “Only so much trade to be had, in a town this size.  Honest, Min, I don’t know what the answer is,” he admitted.  “I just know it’s a problem.”

“I know, Dad,” I said, quietly.  Right now, there were a few hundred sets of agricultural wands being employed in the fertile Riverlands.  They were among the most popular and lucrative devices for the Sevendori enchanters to produce.  Banamor saw the potential to sell thousands more.  Every manor who had a set reduced labor costs for growing grain by two thirds, in some cases.  That made it a lot more profitable, which was all the incentive one needed to make the investment.

Yet there was more to it than pure profit, I saw.  Or pure magic.

“Well, what problems magic creates, it can solve,” I said, resolutely.  “It just requires study, consideration, and foresight.”

“Such as?” Dad prompted.  “My bakery used to employ three families of woodcutters and charcoal burners . . . before you enchanted my ovens.  Now we’ll use one, and only half the fuel that we used to.”

“Isn’t that better?” I challenged.

“For me?  Sure,” he nodded.  “I get to eat the savings, if I don’t lower my prices.  But for the two families I don’t need, anymore?  What do they do?”

“They’re not your responsibility, Dad,” I said, patiently.

“Aren’t they?  No, not officially.  But those were good men with children of their own.  I feel guilty about it,” he confessed.  “They’ve surely found other jobs, now, I suppose, but once they had a good thing, with me.  Now, they don’t.”

“And you’re able to provide either cheaper bread or a better life for your family, without cheating anyone,” I countered.  “How is that a bad thing?”

“It’s not, Min,” Dad agreed.  “But it’s not natural.”

“It’s not what you’re used to,” I said, shaking my head.  “Dad, that sort of thing changes all the time,” I pointed out.  “You left Talry for two years, and all of those families had to find other work.  Things change,” I reasoned.  “It’s not always pleasant, but they work out, one way or the other.  It’s the nature of the universe.”

“Is it, now?” Dad asked, sensing a challenge. 

“Sadly, yes,” I sighed.  “New ways of doing things are tried.  Old things wear out.  People move, have children, they work.  They grow old.  People die.  All of those are changes we have to contend with, and we prepare for them as best we can.  In addition to all of the changes we aren’t aware are going to affect our lives that we cannot prepare for.  I feel bad for your woodcutters, and even for those cotters who couldn’t get work . . . but you cannot avoid that sort of thing any more than you can avoid bad weather,” I said, a little sourly. 

“Well, aren’t you the philosopher!” he snorted.

“You can’t study magic, and the infinite interconnectedness of all things and all systems, without recourse to philosophy,” I grumbled.  “Like madness, it’s an occupational hazard for a wizard.”

The rest of the town was just as neat and tidy as the marketplace.  The High Street, though short, was filled – no vacant shops, no empty lots.  The townspeople hurried on their errands through the wintery cold, their cloaks pulled up around them.  The great temple where we had held the first meeting of the Convocation was impressive, from the outside, and I considered going in and looking up the high priestess who was so helpful and considerate to the Arcane Orders at their inception, but that would have been far more of an entanglement than I was seeking, here.

Instead, after touring the small town we made our way up the steep road toward the castle.  The guards at the bottom of the road waved us through without confronting us, but another guard post half-way up the hill was more thorough.  Apparently, Magelord Forandal had many magical visitors because the guardsman on duty didn’t do more than glance at my Spellwarden’s talisman, ask our names and business, and waved us through when we said we were seeking consult with the Magelord.  Either the man didn’t realize that I was Minalan THE Spellmonger, not Minalan, a spellmonger, or he was just cold, bored, and wanted to get back into his hut and out of the wind as quickly as possible.

“Nice castle,” Dad murmured as we started up the steep final approach to the gatehouse.  

“He’s expanded it, in the last few years,” I commented, as we huffed up the incline.  “That entire section of bailey is new, as are those three halls.  That tower, too, if I recall correctly.  Forandal isn’t the sort of lord to invite attack from his neighbors, but he’s also the kind who prepares for such a thing.”

“He a friend of yours?”

“More of an acquaintance, actually.  He wasn’t at Boval Castle, but he fought well in the Wilderlands campaign.  He earned a stone and his lands for his service, there.  Unlike the rest of us, he’s kept out of greater politics and wisely tended his own land.  Those riots are the first tale of trouble I’ve heard about Robinwing.”

It took only twenty minutes after we introduced ourselves to the assistant castellan at the gatehouse (who only believed I was the real Spellmonger when I produced my baculus, Insight, from a hoxter pocket in front of his disbelieving eyes) before we were ushered into the chamber of the Magelord.

Forandal looked fit and well, and seemed as pleased with my unexpected appearance as he was surprised.  He’d filled out a bit in the last few years, and domestic life had been kind to him – though he had a few new gray hairs than the last time I’d seen him.  He was respectful, meeting my father, and invited us both to dine with him in his chamber that night, as his wife and new child were visiting her parents in the countryside.

“So what brings you to Robinwing, Minalan?” he asked, once the wine was poured.  After the chill of the hike up the mountain, the warmth and the delicious wine conspired to make me want to nap.  But I couldn’t be rude to my host, who was genuinely curious about my surprise visit.

“Exile, actually,” I admitted.  “I don’t know if you’ve heard, but Prince Tavard has exiled me for three years.  Ducal prerogative.  Over the attack on Castabriel and the death of his son.”

“That was . . . unchivalrous of the Prince,” Forandal admitted, hesitantly.  His reluctance was understandable.  Criticizing a sitting duke was dangerous, even in your private chambers.

“It was understandable, and it’s preferable to war,” I countered.  “I’m headed to the Wilderlands, now.  The northeastern portion has been granted to me as a palatinate.”

“The Wilderlands?” he scoffed.  “I’m afraid we get little news here, in Robinwing, particularly about the Wilderlands.  Is there anything left of it, at this point?”

“Barely.  But the High Magi have been using it as a staging area for attacks against the shadow for years, now.  Duke Anguin has given it to me to make into a new mageland: the Magelaw.  I’ll be inviting many of my colleagues to join me there.”

“I . . . I hope you haven’t come to enlist me, Minalan,” he said, slowly.  “While I appreciate the—”

“After what I’ve seen of Robinwing, Forandal, you are exactly where you need to be.  This is a model mageland,” I observed, “from its administration to its construction.  It’s like Sevendor, only without Sevendor’s problems.  No, I’ve merely stopped by to see how you were faring.  I am satisfied.  The only thing that concerns me is the riots . . .”

“Yes, the ‘Red Harvest’, the peasants are calling it,” he said, troubled.  “Sorry you heard about that.  It’s not as bad as it sounds, actually, but we had a few tense weeks, there.  Had to hang a monk – that’s never a good thing.”

“No, it isn’t,” I nodded, as I sipped wine.  “But when they’re preaching revolution and sedition, and getting people hurt, you don’t have much choice.”

“It’s a perplexing problem,” Forandal agreed.  “The yields on my estates have gone up dramatically, since we started using the wands.  The price of grain at market was low, even for a harvest season.  I’ve nearly run out of make-work to take up the slack in labor, but unless I want to pave the roads from here to Castabriel, or build a castle as big as Darkfaller, there just isn’t much pay work available,” he said, glumly.  “I’ve doubled the number of servants hired here at the castle, and increased them on my estates.  I’ve even increased the number of petty officials to put some coin in the pockets of the peasantry, but . . .”

“It is perplexing.  We’re facing the same issues in my barony, but we have better resources.  And a mountain of snowstone to throw at the problem.  The thing is, if we don’t solve this problem soon, those radical monks will start preaching in earnest, and we may be looking at a peasant’s revolt.”

“Yet I cannot merely hand them money,” Forandal continued.  “I’ve increased my alms to both temples and the poor in general, but my treasury cannot support a population of destitute peasants.  I’m looking at new edicts to prevent evictions for back rent, and having the cottage rents at my personal estates reviewed to see if they’re too high.  But we have little industry, here, to absorb them.  No mines, no great forests, no sprawling vineyards.  It’s getting so that I’m contemplating a small war just to employ them as troops.”

“Nay, that’s no solution,” Dad interjected.  “Begging your pardon, my great and powerful lords, but consider the opinion of an artisan: wars make the people hate the nobility.  Especially small, petty, pointless wars.  You want to give those men jobs, of some sort, but jobs that don’t make widows and orphans.”

“That would be my preference, Goodman,” Forandal assured, “but without an alternative . . .”

“Oh, I understand,” Dad nodded, firmly.  “Look, no man wants to go through life dependent on alms and make-work – that’s no way to raise a family.  Nor does every man want to be a soldier.  Men want to work, and work on something important.  Something impressive.  Something that promises them a little more than a few coppers for a day’s digging.”

“Can not the temple hire more?” I suggested.

“More illiterate cotters?” snorted Forandal.  “They have plenty, for preparing parchments and pigments.   They’ve even taught a few how to illuminate and a very few how to read and write.  No, the Temple faces the same issues we do.  They have their own estates, with the same problems.”

“Well, anyone who is vocal in their opposition, send them to Vanador,” I proposed.  “It will be a tough life, but the land is cheap and the opportunities will be great, I’m hoping.  But . . . well, this reminds me of something I’ve been discussing with Pentandra and the other High Magi.  We’ve been talking about establishing a few archives outside of Sevendor and such places.  After the dragon attack knocked over the Chapterhouse’s spire and nearly caught the place on fire, we figured a repository duplicating some of those old records and spells would be wise.  Perhaps we can build it at Robinwing.  That would solve your problem, temporarily.”

“Build another temple here?” Forandal asked, surprised.

“Not a temple, merely a chapterhouse of the Arcane Orders.  Someplace where we can keep copies of irreplaceable texts.  You already have the temple, with a number of literate clerks.  If you can spare a few acres for the site, I’ll get the Orders to approve the funding.  That should take a few years to build, and you can hire plenty of peasants to construct it.  Along the way, perhaps we’ll teach a few how to read and write.  We’ll need clerks for that – lay clerks.”

“You want to teach ignorant peasants to read?” the magelord asked, skeptically.  “I doubt you’ll find more than a dozen with the intelligence for that.”

“The Kasari tribes manage to teach all of their people how to read and write,” I countered.  “It’s not impossible.  But it may just absorb the slack in your labor market, locally.  At least mitigate it.  And that sort of thing attracts visitors, magi, scholars . . . there will be additional benefits.”

We continued to discuss the possibility during dinner, a somewhat scrawny goose, and by the time Forandal’s castellan showed us to our room for the night, the magelord was positively enthusiastic about the idea.

Dad wasn’t so sure.

“What are you going to do, build one of these chapterhouses at every village in the duchy?” he asked, when we were alone.

“One problem at a time,” I dismissed.  “Robinwing is a good place for it.  And I can get the Arcane Order to pay for it.  It shouldn’t cost more than a thousand ounces of gold.”

“A thousand . . . you think your Order has that much?” he asked, his eyes wide.  Dad wasn’t aware of the economics of my profession, even though he’d lived among magi for two years.  “When we raised funds for the temple annex in Drexel, it took us a year to raise three hundred silver!  A thousand gold?  That’s enough to build a castle!”

“Perhaps a small one.  If you had a lot of free labor.  But it won’t trouble the orders.  Do you have any idea how much the fees for a witchstone are?  Planus paid fifty thousand ounces of gold for one.  A thousand spent on a chapterhouse won’t break us.”

“Why not just donate the gold to the peasants, then?” he challenged.

“Because we don’t do that,” I stated, as I began to get ready for bed.  “We support legitimate arcane work, and a chapterhouse is a legitimate expense.  Building it will employ hundreds.  Once it’s built, it will employ dozens more.  And I wasn’t lying about the increased travel – right now, there are a very limited number of places a wizard can do research.  There are damn few in the central Riverlands, outside of Castabriel.  An archive placed here serves many purposes,” I said, my mind starting to supply a few clandestine purposes Dad wouldn’t understand. 

For example, if Tavard’s wrath continued to grow, and he turned his attention to the Orders, then having an archive of our records in reserve would be helpful.  I’d already planned on building such a thing in Vanador, out of Tavard’s reach, but having one here, under his nose, suited me.  And securing some of the Order’s holdings outside of the capital was just prudent.  I couldn’t see a dragon going after Robinwing – it just wasn’t strategically important enough.

Dad went to bed thinking it was a dumb solution to a crushing problem, but I was satisfied with the answer.  It didn’t solve the larger problem, as he’d pointed out, but it kept my friend Forandal from facing an anti-magic peasant’s revolt, led by religious fanatics.  That was worth a thousand gold, right there.

The next morning we departed after breakfast, and by mid-morning we were headed back down the river toward its confluence with the Forkine.  I spend much of the morning discussing my plan with various Order officials, from the head on down to the Master of Works and the Mistress of Archives, until I got their assurance that the order would be taken up and the funds would be granted.  They were a bit reluctant, at first, but being the Spellmonger and the official head of the Orders gave me a lot of pull.  By noon, I ended my mind-to-mind contacts and opened my eyes.

“It’s done,” I sighed.

“Really?” Dad asked.  “That quickly?”

“When you talk to people in your head, they can’t really avoid you,” I chuckled.  “By this time next year, the chapterhouse should be under construction.  Hopefully that will reduce the strain on Forandal’s lands.”

“Why do you take on that kind of responsibility, Min?” he asked, suddenly serious.  “You have no obligation to solve your friends’ problems.”

“They aren’t just my friends’ problems, they’re everyone’s problems, Dad,” I pointed out, as we cruised downriver and I watched the banks roll by.  “Solving problems is what wizards do.”

“Not every wizard feels compelled to get involved, like that,” he countered.  “It seems as if you are taking on problems just for the fun of it.”

“It’s not fun.  It’s necessary,” I stressed.  “Besides, this was a minor problem, and one that will be faced by a growing number of lords.  I need to test ways to counter it, and Robinwing will be one such trial.  Magic should serve and benefit the people, not ruin them,” I stated, authoritatively.  “If I can figure out how to sustain both more efficient agriculture and improve the lives of the peasantry, I succeed.”

“And that success brings you . . . what, exactly?”

“Satisfaction,” I sighed.  “Really, Dad, when you’re contending with the big, existential things, focusing on the small matters – like the livelihood of the peasantry – gives one a remarkable perspective.  As much as solving Callidore’s problems matters to me, solving Pug the Peasant’s problems has an appeal.  It gives a wizard a sense of satisfaction that merely casting a complicated spell doesn’t.  At least, this wizard.”

“So why you, and not some other wizard?” Dad prodded.

“Because it needs to be done, and I’m the only one who can even attempt it.  Blame fortune, my own ego, or the whims of the gods – I’m certain all three played a part – but I’m the only one who has the means and the desire to . . . do all of this.  And I’m fairly certain I’m screwing it up,” I confessed.  “But I’m equally as certain that no one else would care as much as I do about . . . about the lives of the peasants when the fate of the world hangs in the balance.  The worst part?” I chuckled, mirthlessly.  “History is replete with tales of men, just like me, whose intentions were just as noble.  And who were responsible for the greatest catastrophes.  They didn’t have a tithe of the power I have, now.”

“That’s a big responsibility, Son,” Dad soothed.  “I don’t envy you.  But you’re doing the best you can,” he reasoned.  “Keep doing that.”

“That’s what I’m trying to do,” I sighed.  “The world’s still here, so far.  I suppose I have to consider that a victory.”

“You wizards think too much,” Dad said, suddenly.  “Or, you don’t think enough in the right way.”

“How so?” I asked, curious about his perspective.

“Sometimes, a man just needs to . . . to relax, and let the current take the boat where it will,” he suggested, gesturing to the side of the barge.  “It takes a lot of work to push a barge upstream.  Those husky lads are exhausted, after a day of such work, even the strongest of them.  You wizards seem to be pushing even when the boat is going downstream,” he explained.

“You think I should lay down my pole and let the world go by without me?” I asked, intrigued by the idea even as I dismissed it. 

“I think there’s more than one kind of pole on a boat,” he countered, as he reached behind the bench and opened a locker.  Inside were two short-hafted fishing poles, spools of fishing line, hooks, and other accoutrements.  “I bought some grubs from the dockman, before we departed.  I thought they’d be useful,” he said, pulling a pouch out of the locker and plopping it on the bench.  “You missed out on a lot of fishing, when you went to school.  That’s an important part of your education that you lost.”

I shook my head and chuckled.  “Dad, I’m a lousy fisherman.”  That much was true.  Everyone in the village had the right to fish from the Burine along Talry’s small docks, and most took advantage of it.  Riverfish was an important source of protein, particularly among the cotters, and even the artisans regularly took advantage of the right.  I recalled Dad taking me with him, a few mornings, right before my rajira arose and I went off to school.  After that, other interests took precedent.  I think I tried my hand at ocean fishing, on the way back from Farise, but other than that I’d avoided the art.

“You just need practice.  And patience,” he urged, as he started to nimbly dress a line.  “I’m serious, Min: there is a kind of mindful attention involved in fishing that can inspire a man.  The Goddess likes that sort of thing,” he added, pausing to make a quick holy sign.  “I’ve done some of my best thinking, fishing.  Without thinking about much at all.”

I was tempted to roll my eyes.  Instead, I shrugged, as he passed me the dressed line and pole.  “I’m not doing anything more exciting.”

“Exactly,” he agreed, as he began dressing a second line.  “You remember how to bait a hook?”

***

So Dad and I fished our way down the river, until it came to the fork with the Forkine, and it gave me some satisfaction to prove to my father that I was, indeed, absolutely correct: I’m a lousy fisherman.  Dad pulled one squirming fish after another into the boat, while I managed perhaps one for every five fish he caught.  We were using the same bait, the same hooks, the same poles, fishing side by side in the same river . . . and Dad’s success was staggering.  He threw more than half of his catch back, unconvinced of their size or flavor, but the basket in the locker slowly filled up with our dinner over the course of the day.  Largely because of his effort.

It got to the point where I began to suspect Dad possessed some weird magical sport Talent I’d never been aware of before.  Or perhaps Briga was screwing with me by blessing his efforts – I wouldn’t put it past her.  But Dad proved an amazing fisherman, to the extent that the bargemen began to watch his success with interest. 

But Dad never gloated, and he was full of useful advice about how to improve my fishing.  I have no idea if it made any difference, but I’d like to think so. 

The fish weren’t the point of the exercise, I quickly discovered.  It was the conversations.  And the long, comfortable silences between them.  The cultivated patience and the controlled expectation of the experience forced you to, indeed, think in a slightly different way than normal.  At least, that’s how the wizard in me saw it.  I did relax, remarkably, in ways I didn’t know I was tense.  I was not rushing into battle, after all, or going to confront a disgruntled overlord.  There weren’t any dragons in the sky, nor undead lurking along the banks.  There was nary a goblin in sight.  For once, I wasn’t the Spellmonger, or a Count Palatine, a Baron, a Knight Mage, Magelord, or even a warmage.  I was just Min, and that was sufficient.

I learned a lot about Dad in a short time – and a lot about the greater family.  Stories about my mother’s many brothers, and Dad’s extended family.  No great tales of adventure, just normal incidents of import in any family, and a great many humorous incidents that bore retelling.  The lives of artisans and peasants are not epic in scope.  But that doesn’t mean they aren’t interesting. 

But the silences were just as important as the stories.  Long, undramatic stretches of silence where the only noise was the lap of the water against the bow, the cry of birds overhead, and the cold wind blowing over the gunwales.  Those seemed as meaningful to the experience as speaking.  It was a time of contemplation, where thoughts of fish and bait mixed with far more philosophical musings.  My problems with the Prince, the ongoing conflict with Korbal, the arrogance of the Alka Alon, and the destiny of humanity on Callidore faded in importance in my mind.  What kind of men my sons would be, and what women would emerge from my girls came to the fore.

Boys and girls.  My family was larger, now, and I had to consolidate it, I realized.  Keeping the Greenflower children in Castal was not only a danger, but it deprived them of any kind of relationship with me.  As fraught with conflict as it might become, I knew I had to bring them to Vanador, and soon.  I didn’t know, exactly, how that would happen or when, but it became important for me to do so.

That led to considering my new home and its resources.  I’d been to the Anvil many times, now, thanks to Pentandra’s interest in the place.  Now that it was to become my capital – Vanador – I wasn’t exactly certain how primitive conditions would be for any of my children.  I knew Carmella had dropped everything and completed a decent-sized hall for us, when she’d heard of the exile, but beyond that there just wasn’t much else left in the Wilderlands.  I would have to build it.

That brought me to the vague, dreamy state of mind that a wizard often struggles to attain for certain kinds of thaumaturgical work.  Much to my surprise, right around twilight on the second day of our fishing, I was staring at the spot where the line hit the water, not thinking about anything in particular, when I found myself in an unexpected moment of profound introspection.

I can no more describe the state adequately than I can explain, in words, the complexities of the arcane.  My mind went a bit blank and then I was aware of . . . everything.  Not just my surroundings, which were acutely impressed on my mind, but all of my mental architecture was laid bare in front of me for my inspection.

It had to be the influence of the Handmaiden, I realized in retrospect.  Some change she had made in me, some small alteration of my soul had permitted the slip into the state so easily.  At the time, I wasn’t aware of what was happening even as it happened, much less deconstruct the experience to find its cause.  I just knew . . . well, everything that could be  known about Minalan, called the Spellmonger.

All the problems, conflicts, worries, anxieties, fears and aspirations were displayed for my review.  Not just displayed, but arrayed in context to each other in a magnificent manner.  I could see each individually, and all at once, with simultaneous appreciation and insight.  Whatever alterations the Handmaiden had wrought in me allowed me incredible perspective, in the moment.

With breathless understanding, I examined my internal world and allowed my mind – the same mind, I reminded myself, that had concocted the mystery of the Snowflake – to traverse the length and breadth of my inner landscape and make a couple of decisions.

And, lo, as if the hand of a god or two was involved, those decisions led to other courses of action that led to consequences and repercussions that resulted in further events that affected other things that would therefore lead to certain circumstances, some of which would be significant enough to mandate action on behalf of various parties in disparate directions which, if my brain could be trusted, might produce a result that I would be pleased with – personally, professionally, and politically.

Call it a Fishing Epiphany, but one moment I was considering the life of a grub and wondering if there would be cornbread with dinner, and the next . . . well, in the next I was the master of my personal world . . . and a plan emerged.

Not just one plan, but a plan that required contingencies and assumptions and room for changing circumstances.  A plan about how I could proceed, using what resources I had available, to achieve the results I wanted.  Just like a spell, only far more complicated and expensive.

Complexity didn’t scare me, and I had more money than I could ever spend.  My wife and kids were safe, but ever in danger.  I had responsibilities and duties, but I also had power and authority.  I don’t quite know what shifted, in my perspective, but from that moment arose a confidence – an assuredness in the outcome of events – that gave me hope and ambition.

When I did dissect the experience, later, I also realized that I had finally shed the specter of the Aronin’s songspell upon me, the one that compelled me to fight against the forces of darkness overrunning the land.  The darkness was still there, and in even greater force, and I was committed to fighting it.

But I think that moment of clarity while fishing was, in part, me leaving behind the shroud of anxiety the spell had given me.  I was fighting Korbal and Sheruel because I wanted to and needed to, not because I was being forced to by someone else.  It was the compulsion my soul rejected, not the purpose.  And the arrogance of the Aronin who had used me so damnably.

That was gone, now.  I was my own man.  More, I was a great and powerful wizard who could commanded armies, theoretically.  I had managed to maneuver in the complex world of Kingdom-level politics and survive with little more than a metaphorical bloody nose.  I had to know what I was doing because I had done it.  Without the burden of the Aronin’s compulsion, I felt free to attack my problems from new directions, and respond in my own way for my own purposes.

I suppose I jerked, or something.  The line in the water twitched just as the orange and purple reflections of the winter sunset reached an intensity that caused the ripples from the water to explode in concentric circles of vivid color.

“Bite?” Dad inquired.

“No,” I dismissed with a sigh, as I emerged from the moment of reverie.  I was both reluctant and enthusiastic for the experience to conclude.  It had been profoundly informative and deeply reflective.  “I just figured out what to do.”

“With what?”

“With . . . everything,” I decided, as the orange light on the water faded into a deep purple.  “I’ve got a plan, of sorts.  I just . . . I know what to do,” I stated, simply.  I was struggling to explain, in words, the magnitude of the experience I’d just had.  The questions that it answered, and the answers that it questioned.  Matters from the divine to the mundane had sorted themselves out in my head, and given me clarity I hadn’t realized I’d needed.  I anticipated a couple of probing questions about it, perhaps, to help me order my thoughts into words.

“Good,” Dad nodded, firmly.  “About time.  You ever find a spell to clean fish?”

“What?  No,” I said, after a moment’s thought.  “Why?”

“Because it’s dinner time, and my eyes are too bad to clean fish in this light.  I guess you’ll have to do it the normal way.”

“I . . .” I struggled, my brain losing control of my tongue.  How do you explain such a thing?  How to you convey to others something that belied words?  “I just came up with a plan to handle . . . everything.  And you want me to clean fish?”

“Son,” Dad sighed, “wizard or not, the mysteries of the universe, as compelling as they can be, aren’t going to get those fish cleaned.  I’m certain your plan is brilliant, cunning, and subtle.  I’d expect no less.  But,” he continued, pulling one last fish – a largish bass – into the boat at the end of his line, “dinner doesn’t happen until the fish get cleaned.  And I appoint you to do it.  So get to it, so we can eat.”

“But . . . I have a plan . . .” I protested, as he removed the hook from the fish’s mouth.

“So did he,” Dad grunted, nodding toward the fish.  “Look at what happened to him.  Now get to it,” he directed, flopping the impressive catch into the hamper.  “My plan includes dinner.  I’m going to go wash up,” he said, putting the pole away.

I was about to call out to him again, but I realized he was right.  Those fish needed to be cleaned.

Part Three

Snowbound In Barrowbell

The next day we didn’t fish, as we would be departing the barge.  Toward midnight, the captain changed course to take the fork up the Forakine River.  His men began pushing the boat northward again the next morning, where we joined a small flotilla of other barges hurrying upstream to make port.  The wind had picked up, and a special chill in the air promised a storm. 

The freezing rain began about the same time we started up the Forakine, and the deck soon became too slippery with patches of ice to fish or even stand long uncovered.  We huddled in the cabin, with magic and the woodstove keeping us cozy, if cramped. 

We arrived at the little village that served as the riverport for Barrowbell.  We were in Gilmora, now, if the very eastern part.  From those docks millions of pounds of cotton had been sent downriver, to be sold to Castali merchants.  In many ways those docks represented the crux of the great dispute over Gilmora between the Castali and the Alshari.  They didn’t seem like much, but then many major economic features didn’t look special, if you weren’t aware of their importance.  Wars had been fought over those docks.

“We’re going overland, now,” I explained to Dad, as the wagon was unloaded.  “We’ll catch another barge on the other side of Barrowbell.  Then we’ll head north.”

“Not before that storm hits, my lord,” the captain said, grimly.  “I’m a stranger to this river, but that sky tells me that we’re in for a real chiller,” he predicted.  “I’ll be grateful to be headed back south, as soon as you’re unloaded and on your way.”

“It won’t take long,” I said, passing him a small purse of silver as a tip.  “We’ll make the gates of Barrowbell long before dusk.  If we have to stay a few days while the weather clears, well, there are worst places to endure a storm.”

“Oh, aye!” the man said, with a knowing leer.  “Every bargeman enjoys a layover in Barrowbell, especially at festival time.  I might enjoy getting snowed in there.”

Dad was less enthusiastic – he was no fan of snow, despite my livery.  Or, rather, he enjoyed it in the strictest moderation.  He immediately began worrying about the possibility of lodgings.

“With the storm moving in, we’ll likely have to struggle to find a place in the hall, much less a room,” he fretted.

“It won’t be a problem,” I assured him, as the team struggled through the rain down the cobbled road – the famed Road to Barrowbell.  “Barrowbell has scores of inns.  During the summer it has accommodations for thousands of visitors.  During the winter, most of those rooms are empty.”

“Still,” he said, looking at the sky suspiciously.  “The captain was right: that’s a snow sky.  You can smell it,” he insisted.  “And that wind will cut right through you!”

“The town is just a few miles ahead.  We’re making good time.  We’ll beat the storm.”

And we did – by a whisker’s breadth.  We had just come within sight of the gates of Barrowbell, proper, when the rain turned to sleet and snow.  The cobbles underfoot became slippery, and while the enchanted shoes of the horses kept them from slipping, the wheels of the carriage spun and slipped when they hit a patch of ice or a slippery puddle.  Something I could correct for, magically, once we were stopped.  It wasn’t making enough of a difference yet to warrant a stop.  By the time we were approaching the guards at the gate, the sky had gotten dark enough to trigger the string of centuries-old magelights that illuminated the famed Road. 

“Pretty,” Dad grunted, as the faintly-glowing globes of magical energy lit up in a line back the way we came.  “Not nearly as impressive as Sevendor,” he added. 

“This helped inspire Sevendor,” I reminded him.  “These date back to the Magocracy.  It’s amazing they still even work.  Sevendor’s will last much longer.”

The guards let us in after directing us to various points of interest around the city.  Dad made them give three different inn recommendations, because he didn’t want to be steered someplace sleazy because a guard got a referral fee.  I should have stopped him, but I enjoyed hearing him banter with the men.  Their Gilmoran accents were enough different from Dad’s more nasally tones to make it a comical scene. 

“I think the third one they mentioned would be best,” he confided to me, as we climbed back into the wain’s seat.  “It’s got a stable and private rooms.  The second one sounded . . . sordid,” he said, condemningly.  Dad had a villager’s opinion of cities, in general.   He stared around at the buildings, near the gate, some three and four stories high, as if they were conspiring against him.  “Make sure you keep your purse near you, too,” he added.

“That won’t be a problem,” I assured him.

“Of course it will be a problem!” he insisted.  “These places are full of cutpurses and footpads.  One moment you meet a nice fellow in a tavern, maybe play a friendly game of dice, and the next thing you know you’re trying to explain to the innkeeper why you can’t pay the shot!”

“Oh, that sort of thing doesn’t happen much in Barrowbell,” I tried to explain.  “The town depends on its hospitality, and you’d have to go to some of the darker corners to be in danger of that.  Besides, I’m a wizard,” I reminded him.  “The man who tries to steal my purse is in for an interesting evening.”

“You’ll get a knife in your back, with that kind of attitude,” Dad growled.  “No one here knows who you are.  You’re just another nameless traveler the monks find with his throat and purse both slit.  Or worse,” he warned, darkly.  “Whatever you do, don’t speak to the women.  They aren’t what they seem.”

It was amusing to hear him lecture me about the perils of the road – when I’d been an itinerant warmage for years, following my service in Farise.  I’d stayed in some truly scrungy dives, over the years, places that made Dad’s worst fears manifest.  I’d been to battle a number of times, situations where my impending death was always a possibility.  I’d dueled Korbal the Necromancer to a standstill – with help – and defeated legions of goblins.

But Dad thought a murderous whore in a tavern would be my end. 

“I think you’re exaggerating,” I chided, as I guided the team down the main street and began searching for the sign I was looking for.  “The inns of Barrowbell are famed for their hospitality.  I can’t imagine that would be different in winter.”

“You’re too trusting,” Dad said, shaking his head. 

“And as for no one knowing who I am in Barrowbell, I’ll have you know that the entire city turned out in celebration after my victory over the dragon at Cambran Castle,” I lectured.  “Thousands of people filled the streets and chanted my name.”

“Your ego is going to get you killed one day, you know,” Dad replied, dryly.  “Weren’t you supposed to turn down that street?  The one with the brass lantern?” he asked, looking around, confused.

“Only if we were going to the Bushy Boll, which we aren’t,” I informed him.  “I told you I’d arranged for accommodation along the way.”

“You know of a better inn?  A safer inn?” he asked, skeptically.

“Better.  A friend of mine owns a townhouse, here.  He’s . . . elsewhere, but he offered it for my use.”

“A townhouse?  A friend?  Who?  That Pentandra girl?”

“No, but she’d love to have a place in Barrowbell, I think.  It’s her kind of town.  Mavone is an old war buddy of mine, a High Mage and an expert on military intelligence.  He’s also a Gilmoran, and he and his cousins purchased a small place in Barrowbell a few years ago.  They stay there, instead of risking the dangers of a public house,” I chuckled.

“A wise move,” Dad agreed.  “Where is this place?”

“We’re almost there.  In fact, after this turn, it should be a few blocks off the main street.”

“That’s convenient,” he said, surprised. 

When we pulled up in front of a stately, brick-faced house Dad’s eyes travelled up the ornate façade, which was rapidly collecting snow and ice, and his jaw fell.  It was his first encounter with the legendary Gilmoran sense of style: ornate gaudiness on an epic scale.

The house was four stories high, and the high peaked roof was covered with expensive red clay tiles.  The small garden in front of it was filled with shrubs and planters, now filled with snow, and sculptures and frozen fountains seemed to protrude from everywhere. 

“Are you certain this isn’t a bordello?” he asked, suspiciously.

“You know, Mavone would be flattered to hear you say that,” I chuckled.  “Astyral even more so.  No, this is a fairly standard example of Gilmoran nobility’s sense of style.  There’s a coach house around the back,” I told him, as I pulled the team to a stop.  “I’ll fetch the servants.”

“Servants?” Dad asked.

“A lot of servants,” I nodded.  “That’s just the Gilmoran way.  It’s all about status and display.  Even my friends are subject to it, I’m afraid.  But don’t worry, they aren’t intrusive.”

Dad had gotten used to the servants in my household, but had rarely employed additional help in his own.  My sisters and nieces were instead employed at the many tasks involved in keeping the place running, overseen by Mama’s critical eye and sharp tongue.  That was as true in Baker’s Hall in Sevendor as it was at Dad’s home in Talry. 

But they do things differently, in Gilmora.  Even petty nobles and middle-class artisans had a few hirelings around, or villeins from their estates who were specially trained for service.  More important nobles had armies of liveried servants attending to their needs, wants, and desires, according to their purse.  Mavone’s and Astyral’s townhome had a mere quartet of them to see to our comfort: a cook, a butler, a footman, and a groom.  The groom took charge of our team at once, and the footman ran to inform the butler and cook of our arrival.  By the time the butler took our cloaks and offered us mulled wine against the chill, a fire was roaring on the hearth and the smell of food wafted up from the basement kitchen.

Dad was uncomfortable with being waited on in such a fashion, but the servants were gracious and friendly.  We were dining on hot soup, good bread and a heap of fried potatoes soon after we arrived.  Mavone’s small dining room overlooked the garden from the second floor, and was as magnificently appointed as anything in Sevendor.  My experience in Barrowbell informed me that his décor was sedate and dignified, compared to most gentlemen of his age and station.

“This . . . this is nice,” Dad admitted, when we finally pushed away our bowls and got out our pipes.  The butler took away the remains and replaced them with glasses of spirits – brandy – and stood quietly by with the decanter to recharge them at need.  “Much better than an inn,” he conceded.

“I’m glad you think so,” I murmured around my pipestem.  “It is, as you said, convenient.  And timely,” I added, gesturing toward the window.  It was glazed, with a milky white pattern of glass filling most of the arched frame with a small, bold ribbon of red glass framing it.  In the very center there were panels of nearly transparent glass allowing one to see the weather outside . . . or spot one’s rival’s wife at your door, below.  Gilmorans actually plan for that sort of thing.  “That snow is starting to pile up.  If we were even half a day behind, we’d be stuck on the river in that.”

“Good liquor, too,” Dad said, as he sipped the strong spirits.  “Tasty.  Who did you say this Mavone was?  And what does he do to afford . . . all of this?”

“He’s a soldier and a warmage, and he currently works for me,” I explained, sipping my own crystal glass.  It burned exquisitely on my tongue, fruity with a hint of burnt cinnamon.  “He’s one of the men I’ve convinced to help me tame the Wilderlands.  He’s in Vanador already, trying to see what kind of defenses I’ll be working with.”

“You pay him enough to afford all of this?”

“He’s been amply rewarded by the crown for his efforts in the war.  And his cousin Astyral was just made a baron, north of here.  Between the two of them, they can afford this place out of their alms bucket,” I snorted. 

“Who else did you rope into this Wilderlands adventure?  Pentandra?” he asked.  It was odd, hearing him take an interest in the details of my plans, but I suppose he had his reasons.  Or it was the brandy talking.  Every time either of our glasses got below half empty, the butler would unobtrusively refill them.  Like magic, only easier.

“No, Penny’s having babies in the southlands,” I sighed.  “Even though she’s technically baroness of Vanador, on parchment, she’s got her hands full with her girls and restoring Anguin to full power.  Anguin and Rardine,” I corrected.  “They’re getting married, next year.  I’m invited.”

“You should go,” he nodded.  “Weddings are always fun.  Even yours.”

“Dad, I had two rogue Censors show up and hold the wedding party hostage!” I protested.

“But the reception turned out well,” he countered.  “And it was fun.  Say, whatever happened to those fellows?”

“Penny took care of it,” I admitted.  “And no, you really don’t want to know what happened to them.  Pentandra’s husband, Arborn, might help out.  He has lands in the area.  Beside Mavone, I’ve convinced my friend Sandoval to come work for me as my Constable.  And Terleman is staying behind as Penny’s Deputy Court Wizard, in charge of the Magic Corps.”

“That seems like an awful lot of soldiers,” Dad remarked, grimly.

“We need a lot of soldiers.  Warmagi, to be precise, but we need plenty of the regular sort, too.  I’m going to draft Tyndal to aid me, which will give him something to occupy himself while Rondal is in Enultramar, preparing for his own wedding.  I’ve got other warmagi there, too, and the pele towers I built a few years ago.  Each of them has a contingent of wizards.  A magical swordsmith, Master Cormoran—”

“I’ve met the gentleman,” Dad recalled.  “Nice fellow.”

“He is.  And he’s taken charge of our pet Dradrien, who will be setting up a foundry and forge, there.  And Gareth is there, running the refugee camp and building the town as Pentandra’s steward.  For a town that isn’t really built, yet. 

“But I’ll need more.  It’s the Magelaw, I’ll recruit more wizards.  Of all sorts.  I’m bringing the core of my household from Sevendor, a couple of birthsisters to watch after Alya and the children, the cook, a few of our Tal Alon servants.  Ruderal, of course.  A few others.”

“You can’t make a country out of just wizards,” Dad warned, as he watched the snowflakes fall through the window.  “Someone has to bake the bread.”

“I’m counting on you to send me a few bakers,” I countered.  “And I was serious, when I told Forandal to send me any men who were without prospects.  Many of the tradesmen in Tudry relocated there, but we’ll need more.  A lot more, to build the kind of city I want.”

“Like this one?”

“Barrowbell is pretty, and its fun, but it’s not the kind of town I want Vanador to be.  Vanador will have to be tough.  Nor like Sevendor.  It’s a city of commerce.  Vanador will need to be a city of industry, in time.  The iron deposits there are first-rate, from what I understand, and there is coal in abundance.  That was why Master Cormoran went to Tudry in the first place.  If I can turn that iron into weapons, and the poor men of the Wilderlands into warriors, then Vanador may flourish.  If I don’t . . . well, a whole lot of people are going to die,” I said, glumly.

“You did remarkable things in Sevendor, by all accounts,” Dad reminded me.  “Sire Cei thinks you worked miracles.”

“He’s my castellan – he has to say such things about me.  It’s his job.  That said, I did learn a lot from Sevendor.  And I do have some expert help.  With some luck, time, and a lot of gold, I may have a chance at success.”

“If I’ve learned anything about my son, you’ll have more than a chance,” Dad grunted.  “I’m no warrior.  I’ve never held a blade in my life,” he confessed.  “The most frightening thing I ever had to do was see you go off to Farise, after you worked so hard in school. 

“But you survived.  More than survived, you were good enough to be a professional warmage for a few years,” Dad reminded me.  “I suppose I didn’t get your true measure, when you were but twelve years old, but I didn’t think you had a warrior’s spirit, Min.  No offence meant, Son, but our folk are artisans, not warriors.  I thought it perverse, when you went into the sellsword’s trade—”

“Technically, I was a sell-wand,” I corrected.  “Which isn’t a real term-of-art, professionally.  We’re mostly just called ‘Sparks’, in the trade.”

“Regardless,” Dad said, with a paternal glare, “I was worried sick about you.  Best day I had since your oldest nephew was born was getting the letter that you were going to head West and become a spellmonger.”

“Yeah, that turned out well,” I said, dryly.

“It sounded like a good career move, at the time,” Dad soothed.  “I didn’t know much about spellmongering, and still don’t.  But it had to be better than being a warmage.”

“For six months, it was grand,” I agreed, with a sigh.  “After that . . . well, every profession has its challenges.”

“My point, Min, is that I underestimated you, and for that I am sorry,” Dad said, ignoring my jests.  “Every man wants to believe his son can do anything he sets his mind to.  Most fathers are disappointed, one way or another.  I’m not.  You’ve . . . what you’ve done is no less than remarkable.  And I feel ashamed that I ever doubted you.”

“You doubted me?” I asked, surprised.

“Son, you were a wizard and a bit of a screw-up,” Dad said, after a thoughtful pause.  “I’d be an idiot not to be skeptical of your success.  Hells, I’d be an idiot to think you’d return from Farise alive, though I lit a candle and prayed to the Flame That Burneth Bright every night for two years and more for that very thing.  I wanted to think you were clever enough and lucky enough to stay alive, but . . . well, when you were twelve, I wasn’t entirely certain that you wouldn’t accidently drown yourself in the river or inspire an irate father to show up on my doorstep in the middle of the night.  Don’t think less of me if I wondered at your chances in the jungle.”

I chuckled, despite myself.  I couldn’t really argue with his reasoning.  I had a seven-year old myself.  Minalyan showed every sign of ingenious intelligence, the kind that makes a father simultaneously both proud and anxious.  But, at the same time, hearing that your father didn’t have complete confidence in you was . . . disheartening.  At least he felt sorry about it.

“You were nearly right,” I admitted, recalling far too many close calls in Farise.  “It was a grim journey.  Perhaps those candles and prayers helped,” I soothed, committing myself to asking Briga about that next time I talked to the goddess. 

“That’s why I’m sanguine about your chances of . . . of doing whatever it is you wizards do.  Build a city.  Build a civilization.  Defeat the Goblin King.  Argue with kings and princes.  If you managed to survive a war when you were young and stupid, your chances only go up, now that you’re old and . . . less stupid.”

“Would it kill you to admit that I have some wisdom?” I complained.

“As I gave it to you, it goes without saying,” Dad dismissed. 

It wasn’t much.  But it was the best I was going to get out of the old man.

We woke late the next morning, for once, in a warm and comfortable bed.  The streets outside were covered with snow, as was every roof and window sill.  Four inches of the stuffm, and it was still coming down – far more than Barrowbell normally gets.  From what I understood from a brief conversation with the butler, the town usually only got two to three snowstorms a year, and rarely more than a few inches.  This was an aberration.

I didn’t mind.  There are far worse places to be snowed in than a city renowned for its ostentatious decadence.  Barrowbell in winter time was a shadow of its summer excess, but that was still a pretty long shadow.

After breaking our fast on ham, eggs, porridge, and pear preserves, Dad and I took a walk around the snow-covered city just to see the sights.  Dad was impressed – Barrowbell dwarfed both Sevendor Town and Drexel, the two cities he knew.  He gawked like the provincial he was at the temples, the shops, the floridly colored storefronts, now shuttered against the cold and snow.  Townhomes as high as six stories towered overhead, and ornate shrines dotted corners and lots, the snow making them seem even more pristine and otherworldly than their architects intended.

“Just how big is this city?” Dad asked, as we ranged more than a mile around the center of Barrowbell, with no clear end of the town in sight.  “There are more people on this block than live in all of Talry!  I don’t see how so many people can possible live in one spot!”

“It’s an art, an imperfect one,” I agreed.  “It takes a lot of organization and cooperation.  And a lot of money.  I’m not fond of city life myself, but there are some comforts and conveniences that make it worthwhile.”

“It feels like too many rabbits in too small a warren,” Dad grumbled, loudly, after a pause.  “Always tripping over your neighbors, never knowing who the strangers are when they pass by, odd fellows looking at your daughters . . . it’s three kinds of hell,” he condemned.

“Not to mention the old men raving in the streets,” I added, as a burgher’s wife or senior servant at some prestigious house glared at Dad’s outburst as she passed us in the street.  “No, if you want peace and quiet, village life is preferable.  But there are things in this city you’d never see in Talry,” I suggested. 

“Like what?” he asked, skeptically. 

“Bide,” I offered, stopping in the snowy street.  As the flakes fell around us from a gray overcast, I reached out with my mind and mentally spoke to a friend who would know.  In a moment, the mental voice of Astyral filled my mind.

Minalan!  What can I do for you, my friend? The magelord asked, his Gilmoran accent echoing in my head. 

My father and I are snowed in at Barrowbell, I informed him.  We’re en route to the Wilderlands, and just made it to the city.  But the way it’s coming down, we’re going to be here for a few days.

Why not just use the Ways to go directly? He asked, confused.

Because I want to make sure that Prince Tavard knows I’m going, and the longer I drag that out the more irritated he’ll be.  Besides, my wagon is filled with moss, seedlings, and such that can’t go through hoxters, I explained.  So we took the long, scenic route.

And ended up in Barrowbell – how splendid!  I do hope you’re staying at our townhouse . . .

Mavone insisted.  I think he resents paying servants to sit around on their butts when no one is there. 

My cousin has no sense of class, sometimes, Astyral said with a mental sigh.  Idle servants are a sign of culture and status. 

Of course, I said, automatically.  One doesn’t debate such matters with a Gilmoran unless one has time and a bottle of wine.  I’m here with my dad and I need to show him something special, something . . . Gilmoran.  Something other than a temple or shrine, I added, hurriedly. 

If it was summer, I’d suggest the great tournament fields outside the city.  If it was spring, I’d tell you to visit the festival grounds outside of the Temple of Ishi.  In autumn, Glassblower’s Street has a delightful little display . . . but winter?  I don’t think I’ve ever wintered in Barrowbell.  And this time of day? 

There has to be something, I urged.

Well . . . where are you?  If you don’t mind someplace cozy where you can have a cup of something exotic, I think I can direct you.  I know all the best wineshops, taverns and dens of iniquity.  Don’t worry, I can find you something special, he assured.

Once I figured out where we were, Astyral directed us to a small shop three streets down.  It was behind a tailor’s shop, down a sunken stairwell on the side of a narrow alley, behind a nondescript door.  The sign was a stylized pillow and a needle, the carefully-painted board old and faded under the line of snow. 

Dad pushed the door open cautiously, as if he was exploring a dangerous ruin.  Thankfully no hidden goblins or ruthless footpads attacked.  Instead our noses were pleasantly assaulted by a rich, exotic aroma.  The chimes on the door twinkled merrily as we entered the darkness.

Once our eyes adjusted from the blinding snow to the gloomy interior, I was surprised to be in a largish chamber filled with tables, comfortable-looking chairs, and incredibly attractive serving girls.

“Welcome my friends!” came a jovial, professionally enthusiastic voice.  “I don’t recognize your faces, I’m afraid . . .” the host of the establishment said.  As my eyes adjusted, he was revealed as a well-fleshed man in stylish clothes, with a fringe of hair desperately attempting to cover far too much bald head. 

“We’re friends of Magelord Astyral,” I answered, as we removed our hoods.  “He recommended we tarry here, since we were snowbound in Barrowbell.

At the mention of Astyral’s name, the man’s eyes lit up like a beacon.  “My friend Astyral!” he said, as if he’d just won a lottery.  “Oh, what a fine gentleman the magelord is!  One of my most distinguished patrons,” he gushed, indicating that Astyral had apparently dropped a purse of gold at this place in the past.  “Indeed, he recently placed a rather large order for his new estates in Losara – only the finest, of course.  His Excellency has exquisite taste,” he assured, reverently.

“A large order of what, exactly?” Dad asked, cutting his eyes at the pretty young girls attending the room.  There were only a few other patrons there, which had the staff outnumbering the patrons by three to one. 

“Why, quality bed linens, my lords,” the proprietor said, confused.  “The Perfect Pillow has provided the gentry of Gilmora with the finest available finishings for the bedchamber for over century, now.”

“Sheets and pillows?” Dad asked, in disbelief, as he looked around at the opulent chamber.  “You need all of this to sell sheets?”

“The folk of Barrowbell are refined and cultured,” I said, gently, handing the man our cloak.  If Astyral recommended the place, I’d trust him.  It was always possible that he was playing a joke on me, but I doubted it.  He wasn’t that sort of fellow.  “I’m sure the gentleman can show us something we like.”

“That is our very purpose, vocation, and desire, my lords,” he said, accepting Dad’s traveler’s cloak gingerly.  “Why, before the great change, we provided the linens for the Gilmoran estates of the Alshari dukes, themselves.  Today we count some of the high nobles of the land as some of our most devoted customers.  And the Temple of Ishi insists on first selection of our new stock.”

“I don’t care if Count Whatshisname likes them, I want to like them.  And I think we’ll be having brandy in preference to wine, at this time of day,” I insisted, lapsing into the arrogant pose of a rich and powerful patron.  It was mostly affectation, but I’d learned enough about Gilmorans to understand the best way to ensure quality service with their artisans: be a complete asshole.

It earned me a startled look from Dad, who had much more sensible interactions with merchants. 

“I will ensure that you do, my lord . . .”

“He’s a godsdamn count, if you can believe it,” Dad said, gruffly, as our host passed off our cloaks to a serving girl and escorted us to a pair of well-padded comfortable chairs.

“A count?” the man asked, surprised.  I gave him a single nod, along with a steely stare that dared him to inquire further.  His smile flickered the briefest of moments before it returned.  “Then of course my lords will want to see our absolutely finest wares.  I am Comoday, Master of comfort in Barrowbell.  Brandy!  Brandy for our guests!” he ordered, sending the servant scurrying to the buttery on the other side of the room.  “Now, what exactly are my lords seeking in their linens?”

That inspired a long and stuttering conversation that revealed very quickly that neither my father nor I had ever given the essential role of bed linens the proper consideration in our lives.  In fact, I’d given far more thought to chamberpots and their utility than I had to my sheets.  As far as I knew, Alya and I had gotten some for our wedding and bought some more at Chepstan, the first year we were in Sevendor.  Dad had even less idea of where his bedwares came from, and when.

“Do not worry, gentle masters,” Comoday assured.  “I am here to educate as much as I am to sell.  We carry the finest cottons from Gilmora, the sheerest linens from Cormeer, the most exquisite silks from Unstara!  Woolen blankets of the purest Riverlands wool, pillows of the softest Remeren down, all selected to enhance my lords’ nocturnal experience.  Each fabric conveys a particular virtue, providing dreams of solace, significance, or sensuality, when chosen by a knowledgeable student of the art of sleep,” he said, with authority and understanding. 

I don’t know if Master Comoday knew sackcloth from satin, the man knew how to make a sales pitch.

“Are you gentlemen married?” he asked, politely, as two fair maidens brought Dad and I each a crystal cup of golden brandy.  When we both nodded, he continued in a cultured tone.  “Then you understand the nocturnal demands imposed on a man: the need for quiet repose, often at odds with the desire for passionate embrace.  Yet,” he continued, expertly skirting the intimate nature of his craft with an upraised finger, “the line between blissful comfort and marital ecstasy is a thin and constant challenge.  With our consultation, gentlemen, I assure you that your slumber shall be as profoundly restful as your wedded comforts are fruitful.”

“You illuminate a pretty poetry, Comoday,” I said, sternly.  “I do hope your wares match your words.”

“My wife has never been overcome by the magnificent virtue of her bedclothes,” Dad scoffed, good-naturedly.  “Aye, it usually takes a bottle or two.”

“Perhaps the quality of her sheets has been so poor as to spare her the inspiration, my lord?” Comoday asked, with practiced ease.  “Has your lady wife ever cavorted on the sheerest milled satins from Remere’s famed weavers?  Their secret techniques polish the threads to a sheen that will send a shiver up the spine of the most jaded matron – I have testimonials from gentlemen of the highest reputations to confirm that claim,” he added, modestly.  “So tell me, gentle lords, what is it you desire most, when you retire?”

A long, sometimes confusing conversation ensued as Dad and I tried to convey what we anticipated most about going to bed.  Comoday listened with far more attention than is granted by most priests to their faithful, and seemed to take note of our particular tastes, augmented by some piercing questions about our sleeping habits.  Among others.

As our second brandies were poured, it occurred to me that this had to be a slow day for Master Comoday and the Perfect Pillow.  No doubt he catered to several well-heeled clients every day, but due to the season and the snow we foreign visitors were the focus of his attention.  I began to understand that Master Comoday was, indeed, truly concerned about the length and quality of my sleep.  And my marital life.

The discussion careened from the importance of a good pillow to the merits and deficiencies of various mattress-filling material.  I amused myself by pretending I had a well-reasoned opinion on such things, and watching Master Comoday shift the way he touted his stock in response was entertaining.  The discussion did not amuse my father, however, and when Comoday went to fetch samples and swatches, Dad leaned over to me.

“Why are you being such an asshole?” he snarled, under his breath.  “There’s no need to treat an honest artisan like that!”

“Relax!” I urged, in a calm tone.  “If I didn’t act this way, he wouldn’t think we were serious.  This is the way all of his good customers act toward him,” I explained. 

“Are we serious?” he asked, surprised.  “About sheets and pillows?”

“Why not?” I countered.  “I’ve got a new hall to outfit, and I’m sure Mama would appreciate a nice gift when you return.  Why not bedding?”

Comoday’s return prevented Dad from listing the reasons we should pay for overpriced bedware, and in a moment our senses were being assaulted by a pile of tiny, pretty pillows, each made of a different fabric and filled with a variety of stuffings.  Each one had the sign of the Perfect Pillow embroidered on it in a variety of stylish needlework.  And each was perfumed with a different floral or herbal scent.  It was a highly effective presentation. 

For the next hour Dad and I rubbed each and every one of those tiny pillows on our faces and hands as Comoday extolled the virtues and discussed the origins and manufacture of each one.  Price was never mentioned – as I expected.  The types of people who purchased fine linens were unconcerned with price.  Each new basket of samples was accompanied by a fresh round of brandies, so our discussions about softness, fabric weight, threadcount, and fullering became increasingly animated and interesting.

“I think I like the Cormeeran medium-weight linen over the Benfradine light cotton,” Dad said, his authoritative manner undercut by how he was starting to slur his words. 

“Really?” I asked, surprised.  “Over the Unstaran double satin?  How can you resist?”  I may have been slurring a bit, myself.  It was really good brandy.

“Oh, it’s far too soft and slippery.  I’d feel like I was sleeping in the mouth of some horrible creature all night,” he said, absently scratching his chin.  “No telling what my dreams would be like.  A man feels more secure in his sheets if they aren’t devouring him,” he said, philosophically.

“The Unstaran satins are oft favored for wedding gifts, or for bride sequestrations,” he informed us.

“For bride what?” Dad asked, confused.

“Ah.  You gentlemen are Riverborn,” he realized.  “You do not have that custom, I don’t believe.  In Gilmora, during a dowry negotiation between noble houses, occasionally conflict will arise between the parties and one side or the other will . . . well, they essentially kidnap the bride.  Usually to stuff her in an allied temple or abbey, until negotiations are successfully concluded.  It’s customary to send gifts to her, through intermediaries, to make her sequestration more comfortable.  And in anticipation of a speedy conclusion to the negotiations.  Hence, the satins are especially cherished,” he explained.  I didn’t see how that followed at all, but I trusted the man to know his business.

“They kidnap . . . a bride?” Dad snorted.

“Technically she is not yet a bride, my lord,” Comoday explained.  “In Gilmora such unions often involve the transfer of great estates and large sums of coin.  It is not a matter to be taken lightly.  And the comfort of the bride is of paramount importance.  If she’s been mistreated in any way, that can ruin the negotiations.  Thus, ensuring that she is kept in the greatest of comfort . . . with Unstaran satin sheets.  Shall I prepare the samples then, my lords?” Comoday asked. 

“One of each,” I stated, decisively.  I had no idea what he was talking about.

“I will attend to it at once, my lords,” he assured, happily, and scurried away.

“You have to admit, Dad, the service here is outstanding,” I pointed out, as a trio of lovely young ladies in revealing gowns retrieved the baskets of samples, smiling coyly at us as they left.

“I’ve never felt so well-attended when buying sheets before,” Dad agreed, finishing his brandy.  “Of course, I’ve never actually bought sheets before.  That’s your mother’s purview.”

“I’ve mostly left such things up to the castellans,” I admitted.  “I doubt they get this kind of treatment at Chepstan Fair.”

“We are ready for you, my lords,” Comoday announced, when he returned a moment later.  “I have you in the east chamber, and you in the north, Excellency,” he said, bowing to me.

“We need to be in a chamber?” Dad asked, confused.

“To inspect the wares before final purchase,” Comoday explained.  “If you gentlemen will follow me . . .”

I looked at Dad and shrugged, and then pulled myself awkwardly to my feet.  As I stood I realized just how much brandy I’d had.  “Let’s go inspect the sheets,” I agreed.

A moment later, I realized just why the Perfect Pillow was such a popular and opulent vendor: there was a bed in the small chamber Comoday escorted me to, a thick down tick the aristocracy favored, covered with the Unstaran satin sheets I’d selected, along with a small, elegant pillow.  And a smiling naked maiden.

I stared at her, slack-jawed, as Comoday carefully pulled aside the top sheet to expose the sheer luxurious sheen of the splendid white satin expanse that draped the bed.  In doing so he also exposed a fair amount of the maiden, who was wearing only a headband and what Trygg had gifted her upon her birth. 

“I . . . I don’t understand,” I mumbled in confusion.

“Most of our patrons insist on trying out our wares before they make a final selection,” Comoday explained, as smoothed the sheet over the pretty girl’s shoulders.  “Due to the nature of our product, it is difficult to accept returns, so all of our sales must, regrettably, be final.  We want our patrons to be absolutely certain of the selection before delivery . . . and we would not want you to have a poor experience with our product.  Thus, we have created these little demonstrations as a means of allowing our patrons to give our bedware a thorough trial before a purchase is made.  I find it keeps both merchant and patron happy with the transaction.”

“And the girl?” I asked, as the maiden smiled at me invitingly.

“Oh, she’s here to represent any potential bedmate my lord might have.  And to assist you in making a purchasing decision.  I think you will find that Maid Muria, here, is extremely knowledgeable about our stock,” he said, proudly.

“And so . . . you want me to . . . sleep . . .”

“I trust my lord’s discretion to come to a decision on the product,” Comoday assured me, as he retreated out of the chamber and closed the heavy curtain.  “Now let me see to the older gentleman, and then I will return in half an hour to hear your decision, my lord.”

“Of . . . course . . .” I said, to myself and the nubile young girl staring at me from under the satin sheets.

“Will my lord disrobe?” she asked in a polite, businesslike manner.  “Most of our patrons prefer to sample the wars in the nude.  It gives you the best opportunity to determine the comfort of the sample,” she said, patting the mattress next to her.

“Well, that just makes sense,” I agreed, blearily, as I began removing my tunic.   “I mean, you can’t very well know what a sheet will feel like on your backside by just rubbing a swatch on your face.”

“My lord understands entirely!” the girl giggled, as I struggled with my hose.  “After a goodly trial, my lord can make a purchasing decision confident that he has tested the wares to his satisfaction.”

“And you’re going to help me with that . . . how?” I asked, unsteadily.  “I mean no offense, but . . . you’re not a whore, are you?”

“I merely assist in the sale, my lord,” she said, demurely.  “I am here to answer any questions you might have, and act as a surrogate for your lady wife.  You do have a lady wife, do you not?” she asked, conversationally.

“Indeed, I do,” I agreed, with a pang of regret.  I stopped, one boot in my hand.  “I am not certain she would approve of this . . . sampling,” I said, struggling with how to phrase it.

“My lord, if you are faithful to your vows before Trygg, rest easy,” she assured, sitting upright . . . and allowing the sheet to fall from her shoulders.  “I would never tempt a man so devoted to his marriage.”

“And . . . if I wasn’t so devoted?” I asked, my mouth suddenly dry. 

“It has been known for maids to help a gentleman explore all aspects of his potential bedware,” she admitted, her eyes darting away for a moment.  “Usually in return for a generous tip.  But I leave that to your discretion, my lord.  Sometimes we merely assist a patron in replicating the slumber he enjoys at home.  Particularly our older patrons.”

“And just how do you help persuade such older patrons?” I asked, as I sat my naked arse down on the smoothest, most luxurious expanse of the weaver’s art it had ever been privileged with. 

“Discussion, explanation, perhaps a light massage,” she considered.  “I have a passing fair voice, my lord, if you would like me to sing to you while you slumber.”

“This,” I announced, as she pulled the satin sheet over both of our naked bodies, “is the single greatest sales technique in history.”

I swear to Trygg All-Mother, guardian of marital fidelity, that I did not seduce the girl.  She gave me a gentle massage and the opportunity to paw her through the satin, but I made no attempt on her virtue.  I don’t know how I managed that – perhaps I’m just getting old – but in ten minutes I found myself dozing off in a warm brandy-fueled haze, my head against the two most perfect pillows in the place, while my skin was delighted by the superior caress of truly high-quality satin bedware. 

When Master Comoday discreetly coughed outside of the curtain, Maid Muria gently urged me to awaken by tenderly scratching my head.  “My lord,” she murmured quietly in my ear, “our trial is at an end.  Master Comoday will speak to you about your selections, but I do hope you will mention if I gave superior service.”

“It exceeded my expectations,” I agreed, groggily, as I rose and reluctantly started dressing.  “You were . . . most persuasive.”

“Thank you, my lord!” she said, smiling broadly.  Her teeth were a bit crooked, but her dimples more than made up for it. 

I don’t know how I got back out into the main chamber, but soon Master Comoday was taking our detailed orders on a sheet of parchment, his short pen making quick, neat strokes in the gloom.  My mind was spinning as I ordered bedding for Alya and my new bedchamber in Vanador, as well as sheets for guest beds and some for the children.  Pillows and blankets were also added to the order.  Dad quietly ordered a full set for his home in Talry, as well as a few additional sets, presumably for my sisters.

The bill was substantial – if I’d shown it to Dad, he would have fainted dead away at the extravagance – but I was paying for it, and I was rich.  What’s the point of being rich if you couldn’t buy quality linens?  I added a generous tip for both sample girls, and had the entire lot shipped to my apartments at the Arcane Order motherhouse in Castabriel, where I could have it delivered by hoxter to Vanador and Tudry.  Then I impressed Master Comoday by producing a purse from thin air with just over the amount on the bill, and bid him keep the rest. 

As we left back out into the cold, the taste of one last brandy on our lips, Dad and I studiously did not look at each other. 

“I’m a married man, you know,” he said, accusingly, as we trudged back to the townhouse through the snow.

“As am I,” I agreed.  “I love my wife.”

“I do, too,” Dad assured.  “Near forty years, now.”

“I didn’t—”

“I don’t want to hear a word,” Dad interrupted with a snap.  “Not a godsdamned word, Minalan.  What happened in the . . . sample chamber is between you and Ishi, and that’s where it should forever remain.  And as far as your concerned, all I did was discuss threadcount.  You understand?”

“Yes, of course,” I agreed in a mumble.

“Good.  Because your mother wouldn’t.  Nor would Alya.”

“Dad!  We just bought sheets!” I insisted.

“Damn right, we did,” he agreed, grimly.  “That’s all we did.  We bought sheets.  I’d swear that before the throne of Trygg,” he assured.

“And pillows,” I added.

“Ah, yes.  The . . . pillows,” he said, smirking at some joke he didn’t bother sharing with me.  “Big, soft, fluffy pillows.”

“Amazing pillows,” I agreed.  “The softest of pillows . . .”

We walked awhile in silence, save for the crunch of our boots through the snow.  It had stopped falling from the sky, for the moment, but it wasn’t done yet, I could tell.  Dad started looking up and around at the architecture of the town more, the further we retreated from the Perfect Pillow, and by the time we were within sight of the townhouse we had both nearly returned to normal.  Whatever sins Dad committed in the sample chamber were his, alone, to contend with.

I really had no doubts, I reflected as we headed inside.  Dad had been completely devoted to Mama forever, and I’d never seen him pay more attention to another woman than was reasonable for a married man.  Oh, he would flirt with his female customers outrageously, if Mama wasn’t around – but it was part of his charm, not a serious attempt at seduction.  To my knowledge Dad had never been unfaithful to her.  Nor did he ever express any desire to.

But Dad was a man, and any man is going to be tempted by an attractive naked girl in a pristine, astonishingly comfortable bed.  I’d like to think he had the fortitude to resist his maiden’s charms as much as I did, but I could be wrong.  Men are notoriously weak. 

Whether he did or didn’t, it wasn’t my business.  Nor did I feel compelled to ever relate the episode to anyone.  We hadn’t gone to a brothel, or a dancing hall, or any other den of iniquity, I consoled myself.  But anytime a man is confronted with the fact that his father is, too, a man, it can become uncomfortable.  I eventually concluded that it was a harmless indulgence in sensuality, and didn’t require further thought.  Dad and I both liked pretty girls.  That was hardly newsworthy.

The rest of our stay in Barrowbell was spent in closer vicinity to the townhouse, where we rode out the storm with the servants and some games.  Dad didn’t usually have much time to play more than a few games of chess or rushes, and I’d seen him play at dice with the charcoal burners a few times in my youth, so it was the first time I’d seen how he played.  Not well, as it turned out. 

“So do you think we’ll be able to leave, tomorrow?” he said while we were playing on the third day, after the storm had passed.  Though six inches of snow still clung to the rooftops around town, the streets were already beginning to melt.  “This is a nice place, but I’m getting antsy,” he confessed.

“More than likely,” I agreed.  “The road west should be clear by then, I think.  Barrowbell devotes a lot of labor to civil projects like that.  Have you had enough of the city?”

“I’m a villager,” Dad nodded, proudly.  “This place is too much like rats in a cage.  Where do we go, from here?”

“We’ll hire a barge headed north, through Gilmora.  Up the Poros, actually, for a ways.  That’s the river the Dead God froze a few years ago.”

“So we’re essentially just revisiting the sites of your past military victories,” Dad said, dryly, casting his dice. 

“It’s purely a coincidence,” I assured him.  “This is just the most expedient over-land route, if we want to avoid more snow like this.”  That was true, but I didn’t mind that the route would take us through the recovering heart of Gilmora.  I wanted to see how the land fared, after the invasion and recovery.  “We’ll stop briefly in Losara, to see my friend Astyral, but then we’ll be headed back overland to Vorone, and thence to Vanador.”

“Looking forward to it,” he admitted.  “I’m starting to think I need to get sheets for your nieces and nephews.”

I looked at him thoughtfully.  “Yes, we can leave in the morning,” I decided, earning a grateful look in return. 

Because I’d been thinking the same sort of thing.  I’m faithful, as much as I can be, but the allure of quality bedware was just too great.  We needed to escape.

Part Four

An Interlude With Astyral

We actually didn’t make it out of the city until late the following afternoon.  Though work levies exhaustively shoveled snow out of the way, it took time to clear enough of a path for carts, not just foot traffic.  We had to stop and wait several times, and twice, in a fit of frustration at the wait, I used magic to eliminate the snow. 

“Why didn’t you just do that in the first place?” Dad complained, as we proceeded through the steaming puddle I’d created. 

“I was trying to be respectful of their work.  But we’ll have to hurry, if we want to make it to the inn by nightfall, now,” I explained.  “I don’t have time to wait.”

“Why would a man object to magic completing his task?” Dad asked.

“Would you like it if I found a way to magically bake bread?” I challenged.  “That would be easy enough, I think, if I put my mind to it.”

“I see your point,” Dad chuckled. 

“Being a wizard implies using magic wisely,” I continued.  “Making a job easier is one thing.  Eliminating it is quite another.”

The countryside was beautiful, under the freshly fallen snow.  Though the wheels slipped more than I’d prefer, the team was sure-footed and spirted, in the snow.  We made good time and came to the village on the River Dreadwell, where we could hire a barge headed upstream.

That proved more difficult than I expected.  The inns where such hires were made were nearly shut down by the heavy snowfall, and many of the barges expected had not arrived on time.  It was another day before I was able to hire a boat willing to take us up the Dreadwell as far as Cambrian . . . for a high enough fee.

This barge was far larger than the one that had brought us to Barrowbell.  It had a five-man crew and a sail, though the winds were rarely strong enough to employ it.  Only the heaviness of my purse and the promise of magical aid convinced the captain to head upriver in the face of the melting snow. 

The rivers got twistier, here, even as the land flattened out.  On the west bank of the Dreadwell the rolling hills around Barrowbell quickly flattened into hectare after hectare of flat, snow-covered fields.  Come late summer, they would be white with a different kind of white: cotton.  Gilmora’s rich soil and hot summers produced some of the finest cotton in the Five Duchies, if not on all of Callidore.

The Barony of Farintosh is where the Cottonlands really begin in Gilmora.  From here clear to Vengly, near the frontiers of the Westlands, every acre that could support it grew cotton, cotton which fetched a premium price in ports across the Shallow Sea.  Farintosh had scores of domains, hundreds of vast manors, all dedicated to the singular purpose of producing the richest cotton possible.  It was a process that required a lot of labor, more than mere wheat or barley required.  That encouraged large families, from the peasantry to the nobility, and a stable society that could provide plenty of strong backs and nimble fingers on demand.

Farintosh was orderly; a continuous patchwork of neatly-tended fields, tidy hamlets, stately manors, ornate temples, and well-organized towns laid out in well-conceived grid designed to facilitate the flow of cotton from the fields to the ports.  There was a hint of Riverlands sensibility apparent in the landscape, still, but the Gilmoran propensity for ostentatiousness was already visible in every shrine and manor hall we passed. 

Dad was intrigued by the change in landscape; this was the first place outside of the Riverlands he’d ever been.  The cotton boll-shaped domes on top of the temples were a novelty, and the flatness of the landscape was startling to a man who had always expected at least a bit of an incline on the horizon.

“This is Gilmora, then,” he pronounced, as we ate lunch the first morning. 

“Part of it,” I agreed, picking my way through the grilled salt pork the cook had contrived.  “Gilmora is a large province.  Not all of it is even in Castal.  And not all of it is as woefully flat as Farintosh.  Or as decadent as Barrowbell.  Most of Gilmoran society is as conservative as the Riverlands, once you get outside of the cities.  Different customs,” I conceded, “but just as stubbornly flat-headed, about certain subjects.  People tend to be people, no matter where they live or how they make their living.”

“But the goblins invaded Gilmora,” Dad pointed out.

“Not this far south and east,” I countered.  “We stopped them around Castle Cambrian.  That’s still fifty miles upriver.”

Dad paused a bit, as he chewed the tough but flavorful pork.  “This isn’t that far from Barrowbell . . . which isn’t that far from Castabriel . . . which isn’t really that far from Talry,” he concluded, thoughtfully.

“Now you understand why I spent all that time fretting about the gurvani,” I pointed out.  “If I’d let them get this far, we would all be doomed.”

Dad grunted, unwilling to concede that I’d done something wise, important, and significant, but unable to propose another theory.  It was easy enough to envision a horde of gurvani destroying the tidy orderly hamlets and cotton-boll-shaped domes on the temples of Farintosh. 

It was too cold to fish, anymore, and the barge had a cabin large enough for a bit of recreation, and not just sleep.  Dad and I spent our time on the Dreadwell drinking and playing games in between meals.   Chess, charges, rushes, go, dice, and a couple of games I’d never heard of before, and had to have the bosun explain them.

Dad was a crappy player, compared to me.  I’d spent endless hours dicing and playing, particularly in the army.  But even in Inarion Academy games were a passionate pass-time for me.  Wizards love games.  They remind us of the logical and emotional processes needed to cast a spell.  And we like to gamble.

Dad, on the other hand, liked to talk.  He spent hours telling me tales as we played in the cabin, stories of my sisters’ antics, the adventures of my nieces and nephews in Talry, and a decade of gossip I’d missed since I’d left for the academy.  It was fascinating, seeing what Dad thought was important to relate to me, out of boredom or for a purpose.  I learned a lot about my family I’d never heard before, tales of Poom Hamlet and legends of Manuforthen out of our distant past.

In a few days, we finally arrived at Cambrian, where I bid the captain to tarry.  I gave Dad a tour of the ruined castle, showed him the remains of the dragon that had been slain there – a few bones were left, no more – and allowed him to see me praised and feted by the noblemen of the domain.  That awful day would ever be a part of local history, and the man who engineered the death of the dragon would ever be feasted in Cambrian.  The Spellmonger, Hawkmaiden, and Dragonslayer would always be welcome there.

We departed the barge at Cambrian, taking the wagon north overland along the Cotton Road for a ways.  I gave Dad a running account of the battles and attacks that had seen the region until he just shook his head.  We passed several villages and manors that bore plain signs of the invasion, though it had been a few years ago. 

“Once, this place was more densely populated than Farintosh,” I explained.  “When the goblins came through, they focused their efforts on capturing, not conquering.  Much of the folk of this region were enslaved, driven north along the road in endless coffles, to labor in the fields and foundries of the Penumbra.”

“As opposed to the fields and foundries of Gilmora,” Dad pointed out.

“The rewards in Gilmora are superior,” I countered.  “If you irritate your master in Gilmora, you might find yourself in manorial court.  If you do that in the Penumbra, you find yourself in the soup pot.  The poor sods we liberated during the Great Emancipation were Gilmoran,” I informed him.  “Imagine the folk you’ve met, here, forced to labor without so much as a courtly function to be excluded from.  The Wilderfolk who were captured were tough, to begin with – you can’t survive north of Vorone without being tough.  Most of the Gilmorans who were rescued were the most desperate of the survivors of their ordeal,” I informed him.

“I can’t imagine the horror,” Dad admitted.  “I’ve tried to, from your tales, but the idea of being taken from my home, forced to work under the lash, with nothing but the soup pot to transport me to the afterlife . . . it’s a hell I can’t imagine.”

“It’s a hell no one should have to experience,” I agreed.  “The survivors of that trauma are going to be my new subjects.  The largest of the three encampments of freedmen are within my new domain.”

“Why would they not return to these lands?” Dad asked, curious.  “It cannot be such a hard life.”

“Why would they?” I countered.  “Most of them served their manors in the same capacity as their grandsires.  With no hope of improvement,” I pointed out.  “A Gilmoran peasant has less chance of improving his station than a Riverlands peasant.  What the manors don’t strip from him by custom and law, the guilds prohibit him from advancing his station through skilled labor.  Gilmora is sick from the cotton trade,” I pronounced.  “Castal has encouraged nothing but the cultivation of cotton for fifty years, on top of a century of Alshari obsession with the commodity.  The peasantry have no recourse, and the artisan class has no reason to betray their traditional prerogatives.  Trygg strike me, but I think sometimes that the invasion was the best thing to happen to Gilmora in generations.”

“Is that any different from the way the Castali barons demand wheat for tribute?” Dad countered.  “Baron Lithar increases the amount he demands from his estates every year, regardless of the yield.”

“You can eat wheat,” I countered.  “You can’t eat cotton.  Most of the poor villeins of Gilmora survive on maize, oats, and beans from their own gardens.  They tend the same strips their fathers did, and custom keeps them from even thinking about apprenticing or becoming merchants.  The manors and estates only see value in cotton, not wheat or barley for their peasantry.  Cotton pays five times the profit that wheat does, and nine times a barley field.  Gilmoran culture is too stratified,” I pronounced.

“At least it’s stable,” Dad replied, after a pause.  “Or it was.  Min, you have to appreciate the importance of that.”

“I run an entire barony, it’s come up,” I riposted.  “Really, Dad.  Stability is important.  So is social mobility.  A man who has no chance of improving himself and lacks the freedom to do so is lost.  He doesn’t marry, he doesn’t pursue a family, he doesn’t increase his holdings.”

“Some would see that as how things should be,” Dad said, quietly.

“Not me,” I insisted.  “Sevendor taught me that.  So did Farise.  A man who doesn’t see a better life in his future becomes embittered and causes trouble for his neighbors.”

“A man who thinks his circumstances may change for the worse is unlikely to make such an investment,” Dad proposed.  “I’ve watched Talry administered by a fair lord for half of my life.  I’ve also watched less well-maintained domains.  Those lords who impose high taxes and unreasonable tribute, make too many rules and hire too many inspectors and reeves to rob a man’s purse.  It’s a delicate thing,” he warned.  “But both are preferable to the lord who doesn’t know his arse from a tabby cat, and lets things go to pieces.”

“In the Wilderlands, things are already in pieces,” I reminded him.  “Pouring those pieces back into Gilmora will do neither land a service.  I’ll not keep a man in the Magelaw who wishes to leave, but I won’t force a man to leave if he’s done nothing wrong.”

“Well spoken,” Dad affirmed with a nod.  “Now convince the lords of those estates, who see those villeins as their property.”

“Vanador is a long, long way from Gilmora,” I reasoned.  “I doubt they’ll raise too much fuss.”

Dad shook his head wryly.  “You underestimate the sense of entitlement of the nobility, Min,” he sighed.  “Not the warriors and statesmen you know, but the petty nobility.  The country knights, the lords, bannerets and barons, the ones who have the most estates.  To them a villein is a resource to be exploited for work and rents, not a man with a family.  If they think they can recover their resources, they’ll make a fuss, mark my words,” he warned.

“Let them,” I snorted.  “The truth is, I see them as resources, too.  Only I’m inclined to offer them a better bargain than debt slavery and social stagnation.  I’ve got land that needs to be held.  I don’t care much about the taxes, I need the people.  I’ll fight to keep them, if need be.”

We continued bantering about good governance and the pettiness of the petty nobility for miles overland between Cambrian and Gavard Castle, site of the last official battle of the war. 

After two days we stayed the night in a fancy inn in Karindor, seat of the local count and home of one of the larger weavers guilds in the north of Gilmora.  The town had barely survived the invasion behind its stout wall, after a goodly number of the knights of the region met the enemy in the field north of town.  There, they’d amassed in their ornate tournament armor and hastily-conscripted peasant levies and bravely defended the town and their country . . . for all of ten minutes.  Then a large portion of the reserves had withdrawn, hundreds of knights deserted the field, and the rest were slaughtered.

The survivors retreated back to Karindor Town and managed to defend it as the hordes passed by on their way to Gavard.  They’d endured a siege that lasted until the close of the war without falling, but it had been a near thing.   Terleman had been involved in ensuring they were provisioned, but the experience had left a permanent impression on the man about the Gilmorans.  He’d heard more excuses from the Karindori than a pregnant nun, he told me one night after the war.

I could see why.  Karindor was a nice enough town, but when the war was mentioned – which was often – and the inevitable tale was told, almost every man I heard had a very good reason why he had, alas, been occupied elsewhere at the time. 

Almost every man.  Apparently the Weavers’ Guild had all but taken over management of the siege and provided crossbowmen to man the walls while the “military aristocracy” met continuously to discuss how dire their situation was . . . and who was to blame.  The weavers, spinners, and artisans of Karindor defended their homes.  The knights and lords argued and bickered, until Terleman’s troops lifted the siege.  Resentment lingered, I could see, and the artisans were quick to point out their service.  While propriety kept them from accusing the nobility of outright cowardice, the scorn in their voices was clear.

“Now that’s a place ripe for a riot,” Dad observed, as we left Karindor the next morning.  The weather was starting to warm up a bit, which was nice.  “When the lords can’t protect the people, what use are they?”

“That’s started as many peasant revolts as taxes and famine,” I agreed.  “The Wilderlords met the gurvani in the field, too, and were wiped out.  But they tried, and the Wilderfolk knew it.  Their crime was not cowardice, but a lack of numbers.”

“Sire Cei doesn’t seem like the type to run from a fight,” Dad agreed.

“He’s typical of the ignorant, stubborn, iron-headed fighting men who are to be my new neighbors,” I agreed.  “The few who are left.  But here?  The knights are landholders or bureaucrats.  When the domains war against each other here, it’s by clearly-established rules in pre-designated battlefields.  It’s not much more than a glorified tournament, where capturing and ransoming a foe is more important than slaying them.  Warfare in Gilmora was more a social convention.  When the Gilmorans met real danger, they shattered like a tournament lance.”

“Then they deserve to lose their estates,” Dad concluded.  “When you have one job, and you cannot see it done, there are consequences.  Men who despise their masters will find ways of starting trouble,” he predicted. 

We arrived at Gavard at dusk, during a light snow shower, and found a room at a near-empty inn right on the road.  I spent an hour walking the village with Dad and telling him about how the place played an important role at the end of the war . . . and signaled the beginning of a much bigger, darker, and more dangerous conflict. 

He gawked at the gaudy wedding-cake castle with good-natured disgust at the ostentation of the aristocracy, while I told him war stories from the frozen Poros.  We left early the next day.  From the center of the bridge we could see how both banks had flooded in the aftermath, when untold gallons of river water had erupted downstream for hundreds of miles.  Though the waters had receded almost as fast as they’d risen, the damage had been severe, and after years it was still plain on the landscape.

Things had been even worse upstream, in the Westlands, but for Gilmora the flooding had been a grievous insult after a grave injury.  Thousands had perished, and tens of thousands had lost their homes.   Debris still hugged the banks in the river, and piles of mud still clung to the struts of the bridge.  It was a somber scene.

Beyond Gavard, things got a little better as we continued up the Cotton Road toward Losara.  Astyral was waiting for us there, at an estate he owned near the frontier of the two baronies he ran.  I figured a day or so hearing his assessment of the health of Gilmora would prove instructive.  The snow lingered in more places, the further north we rode, but it only partially concealed the ruins and empty cots we saw.  About one house in three had been destroyed or abandoned.  But as commerce returned to northern Gilmora, people were starting to resettle along the blood-stained road. 

We came to Astyral’s stately manor, known as Shariseen Estate, a few days later.  Shariseen was a productive manor, before the war.  The tenant lord had evacuated most of the folk to Tantonel Town during the invasion and the grounds had been lightly looted but relatively undamaged, Astyral reported, mind-to-mind, when I let him know we were near.  He was using the estate as an administrative center for both of the baronies he was now responsible for. 

When our cart arrived at Shariseen I could see its location wasn’t the real reason Astyral had chosen the place.  Shariseen had been built at the height of the Alshari possession of Gilmora and reflected that distinctive style of ostentation.  The ornate spiral columns along the front of the house touted it as a reflection of Gilmora’s past glories under the Anchor and Antlers.  Astyral had managed to find a house that combined convenience with his politics.

“Your friend lives here?” Dad asked, with a incredulous smirk, as we rode up the way.  “That’s no proper manor – that place is huge!  And as tacky as a forty-year old whore!”

“Don’t say that to Astyral,” I cautioned.  “I don’t know if he’d be insulted or pleased.  Or both.  Gilmorans are . . . odd.”

“It was a country home to the baron,” Astyral explained, an hour later, after he and a battalion of servants welcomed us to Shariseen, brought us inside to his private chamber, and plied us with rich mulled wine to keep us from the chill.  “Hunting and fishing, mostly; there’s a big wood to the northeast that’s just thick with deer and boar, streams full of trout, and meadows perfect for hawking.  And a series of cozy little cottages where the baron kept his mistresses,” he added.  “Thus, there wasn’t much for the scrugs to take, and there weren’t many people here to begin with.  But the architecture is lovely,” he sighed. 

“It’s . . . certainly lively,” Dad said, in a rare example of tact.

“Wait until you see my baronial castle, at Daronel,” he bragged.  “I’ve spent a fortune having it remodeled and upgraded.  The same architect who built Daronel built Shariseen,” he confided.  “It will be incredible, after I’m done with it.”  He frowned.  “You don’t have a castle in the Wilderlands yet, do you, Min?”

“I’ll have to build one,” I admitted.  “More than one, most likely.  There are a few baronial castles left, but they’re inadequate.  Thankfully Carmella has been surveying, plotting and planning.  I’m sure she’ll have some recommendations for me.  I hope you’ll visit Vanador often,” I added.

“I’m certain of it,” he assured, as he poured us more wine.  “Barrowbell and Lion are boring.  Vorone is where the fun is, these days, and I’m anticipating Vanador to be quite interesting, once the Spellmonger takes a hand.  Besides, my gallant Tudrymen would miss me, if I was too long absent,” he added, affectionately.  “With the Ways, I can enjoy lunch in Vanador and still have supper at home in Losara.  If there is any lunch worth having, in Vanador.  The last time I looked it was a lonely, muddy patch under a rock.”

“Carmella and Gareth have been working on improvements all winter.  She built me a hall there, already.  And once I start attracting magi to Vanador, I expect things will develop even faster than they did at Sevendor.”

“Well, you’re certainly better funded, now,” he agreed.  “And it will be fun to watch.  More fun than sorting out who still owns what in Losara and Tantonel.  And who should be in charge of what.”

“I have a fair amount of that myself ahead of me in Vanador,” I reminded him.  “There are still a few Wilderlords holding on, up there.  Not all of them went south into the Wilderlaw.  There aren’t just vacant estates, there are entire provinces that have been depopulated back to a few villages.  I have to find competent lords to re-establish everything.”

“Yes, but you’re largely creating from scratch,” Astyral countered.  “I’m contending with two centuries of local custom and law, dozens of families with missing heirs and competing claims to estates that are falling into ruin from neglect, if they weren’t ruined already.  I’ve had to call a truce on two different dynastic feuds, lest my baronial meetings descend into dueling.  Everyone sees opportunity as much as disaster in the invasion.”

“Whereas I just have to return a land that was already marginal to begin with into a functioning state before the goblins destroy it,” I offered. 

“I’d prefer goblins, to some of these aristocrats,” Astyral sneered.  “They aren’t going to be happy with some of the changes I’m going to make.  Goblins have more reasonable positions on most matters.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, next time I’m in the field against them,” I chuckled, holding out my glass for a third cup.  Astyral keeps a notoriously good wine cellar, and whatever spices he’d added to the hot vintage complimented the flavor perfectly.  He’s annoyingly adept at things like that.

“You do realize that the two of you are speaking of ruling like you’re a couple of plowmen arguing over whose fields are rockier,” Dad pointed out.

“How did you expect the nobility to talk shop?” I asked.  “Every man’s job is the same, at a certain level.  Being a baron isn’t all dressing for court and hawking parties.  A baker and a baron have the same basic issues: people, resources, and superiors who screw around with your people and resources.  Why shouldn’t we get to complain about the challenges of our position?”

“Because you’re arse is sitting on a chair worth more than most cottages, you’re drinking a cup of wine worth a meal at a good inn, in a manor hall that’s as close to a palace as I’ve ever seen,” Dad retorted.  “What do you have to complain about?”

“Wealth does not, alas, reduce a man’s worries, but expands them,” Astyral lamented.  “You are not wrong, Goodman – and I envy you your perspective.  And I can appreciate it,” he added.  “Spending five years as a military governor in a war zone shows you the very worst that humanity can suffer.  When one is worried about your next meal – or even your next day’s existence – such issues are intellectual fantasies. 

“However, once the basic needs of food, shelter, family and security are met, they do come to the fore, in one way or another,” our host continued, philosophically.  “Most men simply want . . . better, in life.  If their immediate needs are fulfilled, they have no difficulty finding new worries that seem just as important.  For example,” he said, sizing up my father, “you seem to be a good professional man who toils for a living,” he guessed.  “Indeed, Min goes on and on about your admirable dedication to your vocation and your mastery of it.”

“You do?” he asked me, surprised.

“I do?” I asked Astyral, surprised.

“Constantly,” he agreed, rolling his eyes.  “You’ve mentioned your honest, hard-working father back in Talry-on-Burine so much that it’s become a bit of a jest, amongst your closest friends.  We mean no ill by it – we love you dearly – but we understand it as a loyalty to the values of your class, as much as it is filial affection.  My point in bringing it up, my friend, is to invite a comparison of scale. 

“If someone was to hand you a fortune, enough for you to live in peace and security for the rest of your life . . . would you be content?” Astyral proposed.  “All of your food, your home, everything is taken care of.  Do your worries therefore evaporate?”

“Of course not,” Dad agreed, gruffly.  “No man with daughters is free from worry.  Your point?”

“You just made it,” Astyral said, with an unsarcastic bow.  “Every man has concerns, Goodman.  Wealth and position merely change the scope and scale of those worries.  As professions go, Minalan and I are charged with the administration of territory – in Min’s case, more territory than any magelord has held since the Magocracy’s fall.   If it would please you to see us discuss these concerns over weak ale, squatting on rude wooden stools in a hovel, we could arrange that.  But how would that improve things?  You may take issue with the chair, the wine, and the manor hall, but the vintner, carpenter, and furniture maker see this ostentatious wealth as their own profit.”

“I see what you’re saying,” Dad agreed, defensively.  “I charge more for festival breads, and a bit more for pastries for the castle.  Adds a bit of coin and a touch of class to the trade,” he admitted.  “It’s just . . . to hear rich men bemoan their problems while they sit in luxury pains a working man.”

Our host chuckled.  “Just as seeing peasants relax and enjoy themselves irritates some of my duller relatives,” he nodded.  “It’s appalling, to hear them ride by a festival and sneer at honest men enjoying a day off work, as if they had no better purpose than toil.  Yet that is the attitude they hold.  In my experience, every class holds their prejudices against the others, whether it’s legitimate or not.  The artisans sneer at the peasantry, who resent the artisans for their wealth even as the nobility looks down on them both.  The clergy have their own prejudices, as do the magi.  I find wisdom in not holding it against anyone, save when it impedes discussion.”

“A fair point,” Dad grunted.  “But when the world seems to conspire against you, it can make a man . . . mean.”

“Another human universal,” Astyral said, raising his glass in a toast.  “One that infects princes as much as peasants.  Yet without resistance from the world, would what we strive for have meaning?  A discussion for another time . . . I think supper is ready,” he said, as a silver bell tolled a single note from somewhere.

Astyral included a few of his men in the discussions at dinner, using the opportunity to continue to boast about his wine cellar and give his talented cook a reason to show off.  They were a mixture of local magi he’d hired for his staff and warmagi from Tudry he’d recruited for his new position.  He was following my example in Sevendor of installing warmagi among his vassals, or making them his vassals, to help take control of two baronies. 

They were good men, too, a credit to Astyral’s eye for talent.  We spent hours discussing the challenges they faced in restoring the estates, roads, and towns of northern Gilmora, and I learned a lot.  While the Duchy had offered scant help, save in the forgiveness of tribute for two years, the local barons and counts were starting to provide support for the restoration effort.  Everyone understood that the riches of Gilmora were vested in cotton, and getting the trade re-established was the common priority.

From there, the warmagi launched into a lively debate about what kind of government the Magelaw would have.  By that point we were deep into Astyral’s wine selections, and the proposals got increasingly bold and scandalous.

But there were some good ideas that arose from that evening, as fuzzy as the details are in my memory.  Astyral’s men were intelligent, educated wizards who had fought and worked under the old system and the new, and they had a lot of insight into the problem of incorporating magic – and magi – into the larger society in a way which would benefit them both.  One of the advantages of consorting with wizards is that they tend to be learned men and women with a better understanding about things like scale, scope, iteration, conjunction, and all of the other abstract concepts that continuously guide our lives, whether we understand them or not. 

Dad didn’t, but I neither pitied or envied him, I realized that night.  He was intelligent enough that he could have pursued a more learned profession, had his stars moved in those courses.  If he’d manifested rajira, I could easily conceive of him as a competent mage.  But I didn’t feel compelled to lecture him on the nature of the universe, as seen through magic and science, history and art.  He might be entertained by them, briefly, for novelties sake, but the fact was that my father the baker just didn’t need to know those things in order to happily pursue his life.  The wisdom he’d cultivated as a father, husband, and businessman was sufficient.

We spent a full day at Shariseen Estate. Dad rested up a bit from the road and I spoke at length with Astyral.  He was surprisingly adept at both organization and political matters, and he had a lot of excellent advice about the great task ahead of me.  I found he helped me plan almost as well as Pentandra did.  With her involved in the challenges of both Enultramar and new motherhood, I felt compelled to handle minor matters – like establishing a functioning state in the ruins of the Wilderlands.  Astyral did the job handily.

“Much will shake out of its own accord,” he assured me, after dinner the second evening, as we smoked and sipped spirits around a fireplace.  “With Terleman running your army, Mavone running your military intelligence, and Sandoval responsible for building an army, you can be confident that you will be defended.  Cormoran is puttering around the iron mines there.  Carmella is attacking the challenge of building your town like a child playing in a sandpit.  That young man Gareth is remarkably adept at civil administration –”

“He essentially ran much of Sevendor Town, before he left,” I conceded.  “If anyone can make a city out of a refugee camp, it will be him.”

“My point,” Astyral nodded.  “You already have good people in place.  Hells, even Thinradel has a house there, now.  Add a little gold, a little magic, and the rest will unfold of its own accord.”

“You don’t really believe that, do you?” I asked, after a thoughtful pause.

“Ishi’s tits, no,” he said, instantly.  “It’s going to be a hellish mess.  But you’ll muddle through.  I’ll help,” he offered.  “More, I’ll visit, and lend my class and culture to the experiment.”

“Won’t you be busy here in Losara?”

“With the Ways, I can be busy in two places, now,” he reminded me.  “If I’m going to restore Losara and Tantonel to their glory, I’m going to need help.  The local counts are not particularly inclined to cooperate,” he confided.  “I’ve already run into problems of supply from southern Gilmora, as my politics are out-of-favor, at the moment.  The Castali faction is in control, and they want to remind us Alshari-favoring nobles of our place.  The Count of Nion has made a name for himself driving the mercenaries out of Gilmora.  He’s in the ascendency.”

“I remember him from the Curia,” I recalled.  “Bit of an ass.”

“He’s entirely an ass,” Astyral corrected.  “And he’s one of Tavard’s biggest supporters in Gilmora, a member of the ducal court.  Naturally, he’s rallying the Castali faction and suppressing the Alshari faction . . . which includes me, as Anguin’s vassal.  So my shipments are getting delayed, and some merchants won’t deal with me,” he lamented.  “I’ll need an alternate source of supply, if this persists.  I’m counting on Vanador being one.  Once you get it built,” he added.  “Do hurry up with that.”

“Consider it done,” I chuckled.  “Give me a year, I’ll build a city.”

“You know, Min,” Astyral said, thoughtfully, “any other man who said that, I’d be skeptical.  You might actually pull it off.”

Part Five

A Truly Divine Dinner

From Losara, things started to get rough on the road.

The weather returned to its normal winter bluster, adding fresh snow and ice to the ground and making our travel more treacherous.  After we passed through the troubled, half-empty shell of the town of Murai, the Cotton Road turned into a tenuous path through the rugged country commonly known as Alshari Gilmora.

It was unlike the broad, flat cotton fields we’d passed between Barrowbell and Murai.  There were still cotton fields, I knew, but they were carefully planted in the bottomlands between rolling ridges, not stretching from horizon to horizon.  There were more woods than fields, now, and the villages we saw were decidedly smaller and more spread out.  There started to be more smallholders, and the towers and castles we saw in the distance were more robust than the dainty fortifications of Castali Gilmora.

Alshari Gilmora is the margin of the province, what the Dukes of Alshar managed to hang on to after the great rebellion that allowed Castal to take control.  It was the tough outer crust of the Gilmoran pie of richness, sharing a culture and common roots but with out the ability to produce cotton in the same abundance . . . and, therefore, only of marginal interest to the Castali dukes.  After that rebellion, many loyal Gilmorans had relocated to their lands and estates of Alshari Gilmora, rather than live under the Rose and Sword. 

It had been a hotbed of angry resistance, during the early years.  Even now the region had a reputation for stubborn loyalty to their far-away duke and a pronounced antipathy for the Castali.  They generally viewed the current situation as a foreign occupation.  As just about every pro-Alshari noble house in northern Gilmora had kin or cadet branches in Alshari Gilmora, they also had a pool of mercenaries and auxiliaries they employed in their feuds.

The invasion had done Alshari Gilmora no favors.  Most of the settlements along the Cotton Road had been razed by the gurvani, and it was said that there were still hidden enclaves of gurvani in caverns and bunkers who would steal out at night to raid.  The forests on the ridgetops were infamous for harboring bandits and rebels who preyed on the richer lands to the south.  Then there was the perpetual threat of raids from the fearsome Pearwoods clans to the north.  And in the case of any war between the duchies, Alshari Gilmora would be a major staging ground and target for attack. 

That encouraged everyone in the region to be a bit paranoid . . . and heavily armed.

Grand estates were infrequent, compared to the fortified manors of freeholders and independent-minded lords.  There was still the Gilmoran obsession to ostentation abundantly apparent, as we passed by mere cottages that were adorned with gilded pillars and elaborate balconies, and common vegetable gardens were laid out with the precision and care usually reserved for the plantations of the southern valleys.  Even the privies were decorated as gaily as palaces.

In the summertime, it’s a pretty, green country, a gentle prelude to the rugged landscapes of the Wilderlands.  The people have the courtesy and graciousness that Gilmorans were famous for, even when they were cutting your throat or robbing your wagon.  I’d done a few small jobs in the region, back when I was a mercenary.  In the summer.  In winter, it was a bleak, barren land that inspired a sense of unease and paranoia among native and visitor alike.

We were on our second day slowly pressing on, the road rising and falling through countless ridges and valleys.  It twisted and turned around hilltops and across numerous streams by bridge and ford.  Every curve and hill could conceal just about anything on the other side: bandit king, feuding petty lord, or murderous band of goblins, Alshari Gilmora was a dreadfully interesting place.  Or an interesting dreadful place, depending on your perspective.

The second day out was the worst, as the weather warmed the slightest bit and some fickle weather goddess decided to send us miserable freezing rain, instead of pretty snow, with a blast of wintery wind to make things fun.  Dad looked more and more grim as we went, and our conversation dried up even as our cloaks became caked with ice.

We weren’t suffering, understand – it was just unpleasant.  I had enough magic to keep the worst of the storm from blasting us, and keep the horses pulling. 

Worse, our pace was cut dramatically, as visibility declined and the road became icy.  My spells kept the team from hurting themselves, but nothing could have encouraged them to pull faster, their faces to the wind. 

I was near to calling a halt, as the north wind picked up even more, hoping to find a place I could pitch my magical canopy, so we could wait out the storm.  But then the forest on either side of the road cleared, and we came to a tidy, cozy little inn.  A wooden sign bearing the painted symbol of a golden cauldron.

It was entirely unexpected, in such a place, but entirely welcome.  I didn’t even have to tell Dad to pull the wain up to the door of the place.

“I’ll put the team in the barn,” Dad called through the sleet.  “You go introduce us.”

“Aren’t you worried about the seediness?” I asked.

“Any place with a fire, a roof, and walls would be welcome, and if it had ale, too, I would count it a gift from the gods,” Dad assured me, as he unhitched the team.

I didn’t know how apt that was until I went inside.

The interior of the inn was dark, as such places are, but the big fire on the broad hearth lit it up merrily.  Two lanterns were hung, one from each end of the long hall, and a number of pots were simmering in the coals around the fire already.  A pair of trestle tables flanked the fireplace, each with a long bench facing the flame. 

“Welcome, travelers!” a familiar voice called out from one of them, as my eyes adjusted to the light.

“Brother Hotfoot,” I nodded, as the silhouette of the monk resolved from the gloom.  “What a surprising coincidence.”

“I was just passing by,” he assured me.  “But, then, I’m always just passing by.  I thought I’d take the opportunity to catch up to you before you got to your new lands.  I have news,” he added, as he sipped soup from a hornspoon. 

“What kind of soup?” I asked, as I shed my cloak and hung it on a peg.

“Mutton and potato,” the monk said, approvingly.  “It’s delicious.”

“It’s one of my magical sheep,” another voice called from behind me.  A glance over my shoulder revealed a rotund man in a long apron, with a wide face and curly brown hair and beard.  He was hauling a great earthenware jug to the table from the buttery behind him.  “I’ve got bread coming,” he promised.

“Couther,” I nodded.  “I doubt you’re just passing through.  To what do I owe this divine visitation?”

“There is an inn here, abandoned during the invasion,” he explained, as he set the jug on the table and produced two more wooden mugs, as if from nowhere.  “Herus suggested we have a chat, and I obliged.”

“I appreciate the intervention,” I said, carefully, as I took a seat.  Dad came in behind me, and began taking off his hat and cloak without noticing whom I was speaking to.  “It was nasty, out there.  I hope you didn’t do all of that for me.”

“Not our sphere, we just took advantage of it,” Herus assured.  “It’s not often that you’re on the road, these days.  It’s hard to get an appointment.”

“I’ve been in several inns,” I countered.  “You could have talked to me then.”

“Not enough privacy,” Couther grunted.  “Have to be careful, in urban areas.  This kind of place is more my style.”

“Fair enough.  Dad, you remember Brother Herus, otherwise known as Herus, God of Travelers?  And this is Couther, God of Innkeepers.”

Dad looked startled.  Then he relaxed.  “I should have suspected,” he said, as he took a seat.  “Best looking stable I’ve seen this entire trip.”

“I keep a clean place,” the God of hospitality assured.  “Dinner in a moment.”

“News, first,” Herus nodded, as he continued to sip.  “The first item is the most important: the attempt to call Avital into manifestation, alas, failed.  The young priest who undertook the ceremony did his best, but . . . well, these things are hard to control,” he confessed.  “Conditions seemed right, but . . . it just didn’t happen.”

“That is a pity,” I agreed with a frown. 

“What, you were trying to . . . summon a god?” Dad asked, incredulously.

“It was a long shot to begin with,” Herus said, sadly.  “But it’s not the only attempt we can make.  I’m working on a few things . . .”

“We’ll adapt,” I agreed.  “You have other news?” I asked, as I was served a bowl of stew by the hand of a god.

“Plenty,” Herus continued.  “Second item: the plague of undead in the Westlands has slowed, thanks to the weather, though the walking corpses emerging from the swamps of Enultramar are spry enough.  Korbal has sent dark lords of great power to lead his forces.  They are gathering forces and preparing new avenues of attack, across the west.  No less than three Nemovorti have been tasked to assail the north.  They will come against you from the moment you set foot in the Magelaw, and struggle against you until they are destroyed.”

“I don’t much like your friend, Min,” Dad said, as he ate sacred soup.  “He tells dark tales.”

“Only darker, for being true,” Herus agreed, grimly.  “Marcadine will strive with two Nemovorti who are assigned to destroy the Wilderlaw.  Two or more build fortresses in the Westlands and plot to conquer.  Three more vie to tear Enultramar asunder . . . and yet more linger in the shadows, their errands unknown.”

“You’re gods,” Dad pointed out.  “Shouldn’t you know?”

“Omniscience apparently takes all the fun out of divinity,” Couther shrugged, as he set two golden loaves down next to our bowls.  “Try the ale,” he encouraged.  “It’s quite good.”

“There are limits to our perceptions,” Herus said, diplomatically.  “But that is the size of the foe we face.  Korbal has the foundation of a strong army, and his vassals are remarkably ingenious in their own right.  The best we can do for now is to muster our own forces and destroy them, one by one.”

“I’ll take care of my three,” I assured him.  The ale was incredibly good, as rich and hearty as you could ask for.  It seemed to send a warm, golden glow into my cold limbs.  “We can set others against the rest.”

“Only if they are powerful, and armed with potent weapons,” Couther said.  “You must use your Dradrien servants to do that.”

“Is that prophecy?” I asked, surprised.

“It’s a strong suggestion,” the god corrected.  “You have the skills of the Iron Folk at your disposal.  Use them,” he urged.

“You should have ample opportunity to expand your thaumaturgical knowledge in Vanador,” agreed Herus.  “I foresee that it will be a prime destination.  Which brings me to my third piece of news: the Sea Folk have sent their emissary forth to Sevendor, seeking you.  I have taken the liberty of re-directing him, once he arrives, but sooner or later he will come and present a demand for further snowstone,” Herus promised.  “Discovering the secret of its creation should be a high priority.”

“It’s on my list,” I agreed.  “Are they open to reasonable negotiation, do you know?”

“As long as it results in a larger supply of snowstone, I believe so,” Herus nodded.   “They are quite uninterested in the details of how it comes.  The Sea Brethren have a little leeway in how they carry out their masters’ direction, but only a little.  The Vundel, on the other hand, are quite adamant.  They will have it.  So you must make more, or they will take what you have.”

“I’m working on it!” I insisted, a little irritated.  “It involved divine magic, you know.  Your kind is on the scale for this, too.  It might be helpful if one of you dropped a hint, at least.”

“We’ll help out when we can,” Couther soothed.  “That sort of thing isn’t exactly in our spheres.  Briga will send inspiration, of course, as she can, but the rest of us . . . of what use are we?  Avital was your best hope of that kind of divine intervention.  I don’t even know Avital.  You’re the wizard,” he pointed out.  “Figure it out.  It’s a thaumaturgical problem.”

“With a theurgic component,” I countered.

“Min, if we can help, we will!” Herus insisted.  “But you can’t force this sort of thing.  Mysterious ways, you know.  That’s how it works.  Let us do what we do, you wizards do what you do.   At the proper places, at the proper times, we’ll provide assistance in the ways we’re able.”

“That’s frustratingly unhelpful,” I said, flatly.

“Noticed that, did you?” Couther asked.  “Most divine magic is.  Blame the human subconscious.  If you people were tidier in how they thought about the universe, perhaps we’d be able to hand you the answers properly.”

“I’ll be sure to bring it up at the next meeting,” I retorted.  “I’ll do my best, but you realize that I’m going into exile in the middle of the Wilderness, away from all of the resources I’ll need.”

“I think you’ll find the natural environment soothing,” Herus offered.  “Thaumaturgy is mostly a mental art, anyway.  You just need the right minds, thinking the right thoughts.”

“Get them in a cozy place, with really good ale, and encourage them to talk,” Couther agreed.  “The right people will be available at the right time.  That’s how things generally unfold.”

“That doesn’t inspire a lot of confidence,” Dad observed, looking from one deity to the other.

“It’s what we have to work with,” Herus insisted, a little irritated.  “When the need is great enough, the divine will manifest.  That’s the difference between theurgy and thaumaturgy.  With thaumaturgy, it’s all about intent.”

“With theurgy, you have to be subtle and sneaky about it,” Couther nodded.  “It’s inherently unpredictable, theurgy is.  Divine energies respond to a different set of invocations.  You’re really going to have to need an answer to manifest.”

“Is not the survival of the species on this world a big enough incentive?” I challenged. 

“Then dream up a divinity whose sole purpose is to do that, then,” snorted Herus.  “I just carry the messages.  I’m way out of my element, as it is.”

“You can’t just dream up a new divinity,” I shot back, just as irritated.  Then I stopped.  “Can you?”

That resulted in an exchange of looks between the two gods.  I hesitate to say I understood the naked face of the divine, but there was no mistaking that look.

“What?  What is it?  What do you know?” I demanded.

Herus sighed.  “Ever since the Nemovorti met one of the gods in Vorone, some of them have been fascinated by the concept.  It’s totally foreign to the Alka Alon understanding of magic, and divine power violates some fundamental laws.  It’s the same adjustment the Alka Alon had to make, when our lot first showed up on Perwyn.”

“The Alka Alon, back then, realized that divine magic was a spontaneous, unpredictable and wholly unique manifestation of the human mind interacting with Callidore’s Magosphere.  They took action to control it by controlling humanity.  The Nemovorti are still intrigued with the novelty of it.  They don’t understand the dangers of messing around with human divine magic, yet,” Couther explained.  He shrugged, when I looked at him in surprise.  “A lot of thaumaturgic students talk in taverns and inns.  I hear things.”

“Some of them are starting to do experiments with divine magic,” Herus agreed, gravely.

“Wasn’t necromancy enough?” I gasped.  “How can they do that?  Divine magic is the province of humanity, alone, I thought.”

“They happen to have several thousand humans to practice with,” Herus reminded me.  “They are conducting trials with their slaves, to explore the limits and dimensions of human emotional response.  The experiments are, frankly, even more gruesome than their necromancy.  But I fear what they might discover.”

“Imagine the horrific gods that could crawl from the minds of tortured slaves,” Couther suggested.  “We really don’t need that sort of thing right now, don’t you think?”

“No, no, we really don’t,” I sighed, feeling disturbed by the news.  “How do we stop that?”

“Minalan, in case you haven’t figured it out, that’s your job to figure out,” Herus said, gently.  “Vanador is your staging area.  You’re to take what you’ve learned in Sevendor and apply the lessons in Vanador.  Assemble your learned masters.  Recruit your army of mighty warmagi.  Construct the ideal state to counter the forces in the Penumbra.  Convince the Alka Alon to rouse themselves from their lethargy and face their responsibilities.  Bargain with the Vundel to bring their aid, if need be.  Vanador is to be the city in which you rally your forces and stand against Korbal and his ilk,” Herus predicted. 

“You’re putting a lot of faith in my abilities,” I warned, shaking my head.

“Faith is what we do,” Herus reminded me.  “Honestly, I don’t know if you can pull it off,” he admitted.  “But you keep surprising us.”

“He excels at inspiring low expectations,” Dad observed, unhelpfully, as he took a long pull from his ale cup.

“I won’t deny I have some ideas about . . . about this whole chamberpot of problems,” I said, with a deep sigh, “but I don’t really feel up to it.”

“Who would?” Herus pointed out.  “By my aching feet, Minalan, there is no secret workshop where we gods construct epic heroes.  It’s a much more organic process than you might think.  We see who rises to the occasion and then support them . . . until they get killed.  Then we look for the next one.”

“It’s not terribly efficient,” Couther admitted with a scowl.  “That’s why you need to build Vanador.  That would be a good place to do that sort of thing.  Wizards, warriors, sages, all under the wise leadership of a proven master . . . I could see an entire course of mighty heroes arising from that sort of place.”

“There’s still no guarantee you’ll be successful against the Nemovorti,” Herus continued, “but it will be glorious to watch you try.  I’m sure your efforts will be instructive to the next generation of brave idiots.”

“Gods like you make a man reconsider religion,” I complained.

“You’ll make a wonderful story,” Couther consoled.  “If there’s anyone left alive to tell it.”

*

*

*

The next morning, we arose refreshed and invigorated . . . and alone.  The inn was empty of gods or man, though the fire still burned and there was a bubbling pot of porridge on the hearth and a pitcher of weak ale on the board.  The inn seemed to have lost its cozy glow, too. 

We continued our journey under fairer skies.  The weather had settled into a grim overcast, with only occasional bouts of snow or rain.  It was dreary enough, at least, to keep bandits away.  We emerged from the hills and into the long, low vale where the Cotton Road joined the Great Western Road.  We were in the Wilderlands, proper, now.

The lands east of Vorone and north of Gilmora have the worst traits of both cultures.  Caught between the haughty Alshari Gilmorans and the barbaric Pearwoods tribes, they tended to be surly, suspicious, and mean. 

Which would explain why, a few miles from the crossroads, we came across a monk tied to a tree on the side of the road in the freezing rain, a noose dangling around his neck.  It’s the sort of thing that makes a man reconsider religion.

Part Six

A Monk In The Road

“Why would anyone tie a monk to a tree?” Dad asked, as we surveyed the poor man from the wagon. 

“I can think of a number of reasons,” I offered.  “None of them are particularly pleasant.  But the people in this region are notoriously surly.  When they aren’t pissed drunk on Pearwoods brandy, they’re accusing you of stealing them blind while they’re stealing you blind.”

“They don’t seem particularly well-disposed to the clergy,” Dad observed.  “Should we cut him down?” he asked, with a mixture of skepticism and sympathy.  “He’ll freeze to death if we don’t.”

“I think we have to,” I answered.  “I think we’re supposed to meet him.”

“Why do you say that?”

“We just had dinner with a couple of gods last night,” I reasoned.  “We asked for help—”

“You asked for help,” Dad objected.  “I just wanted a spot by the fire.”

“A fair point.  Well, I asked them for assistance.  And lo, we have a monk on the side of the road.  Clearly, we’re meant to save him.”

“He can’t be a very good monk, if he’s tied to a tree,” Dad pointed out. 

“I don’t think that matters.  He’s the monk they provided.  I’m sure he’ll be of some utility.  Besides, you are right: he’ll freeze to death, if we don’t cut him down.”

Dad and I got down from the wagon and I cut the ropes that bound the poor man to the tree.  There was a satchel next to him, filled with scrolls and parchment.  Someone – several people, I decided – had defecated in it.  The monk’s long, thin face had been beaten, and the rain was already freezing on his tonsured head.  He was unconscious, and moaned piteously as we lowered him from his ignoble perch.

His limbs were numb and cold as we hefted him into the back of the wagon.  I produced a flask of spirits and held it to his lips.  He sputtered a bit, and his eyelids fluttered, but he took a grateful sip.

I covered him with a blanket and my spare cloak and tried to see to his comfort.  He was starting to slip into hypothermia, so I cast a quick enchantment to keep him warm.  A few moments using Insight told me that he had no serious injuries, but that he’d sustained a painful trauma.  The noose around his neck and the feces in his satchel supported that.

I left him to sleep, and we continued on our way.

“So, we’re rescuing strange monks on the side of the road, now?” Dad asked.

“Occupational hazard of the professional wizard.  Besides, it was a kindness to save his life.  I think he’s a lawbrother,” I suggested, nodding back toward his soiled satchel. 

“Not a very good one, apparently,” Dad noted.

“I’m sure it’s a fascinating story.  He should survive, with some rest and some warmth.  In a few days we’ll be in Vorone,” I reasoned.  “We can drop him off there.”

“I thought he was some divinely-sent gift?” Dad asked.

“He might just be a smelly old monk,” I decided.  “Let’s keep our options open.”

A few miles later, Dad reached back and pulled a small musical instrument from under the tarp that protected our baggage. 

“A mountain guitar,” he explained, as he tuned it.  “A gift from Couther, while you were in the privy.”

“I didn’t know you played!” I said, surprised.

“I didn’t take it up until after you left,” he admitted.  “I started playing in the mornings, while the dough was rising.  Mine is bigger than this one, but the strings are the same,” he said, as he examined the instrument with a critical eye.

“It’s a literal gift from a literal god,” I pointed out.  “It’s exactly the same, I would wager.  You learned to play?” I asked, still surprised I didn’t know this about Dad.

“It brought me some peace, when I was missing you.  Just something to pass the time,” he insisted, as his fingers began to move over the strings.  Music began to come out.

“Not bad!” I said, after hearing him play for a few minutes.

“It just took practice,” he said, as he strummed.  “I was pretty bloody awful, the first few years.  The cats would flee when I played.  But it was something to do,” he shrugged.  Then he began to play

He was good.  Not great, but good.  Years of practice had, indeed, improved his performance.  I had no trouble recognizing the song – a bawdy Riverlands ditty called Kayli’s Lament, about a randy young widow.  Then he started to sing it, enthusiastically.

He was awful.  His singing was tone deaf to the extreme, to the point where it hurt my ears to hear his competent playing be tortured by his voice.  He couldn’t quite settle on a key.  He attacked the lyrics with eagerness, and left a bloody pulp in his wake.  I can’t deny that there was a certain charm in his horrible delivery, but he caught me wincing when he butchered the chorus.

“My playing improved,” he explained.  “My singing didn’t.  It’s appalling.  It always has been.”

“I didn’t mean to criticize,” I said, diplomatically.

“Oh, I know it’s bad, Son,” he assured me, as he continued to play.  “The only one who likes it is your mother, and she’s biased because she has to sleep with me.  Everyone hates it when I sing,” he said, cheerfully.

“And yet you persist,” I observed.

“Indeed I did,” he said, proudly.  “Because I enjoy it.  Even if no one else does.  I learned a couple of dozen songs,” he said, proudly.  “I do well, on the instrumentals.  But when it comes to singing, I’m bloody awful.”

“And so eager to share,” I chuckled.

“That’s kind of my point,” he said, as he began playing a surprisingly intricate tune that required some adept fingering.  “That’s a lesson I didn’t learn until you left, Min, and one I wanted to pass along to you: you don’t have to be good at something to enjoy it,” he said, philosophically.  “I’ve always loved music, but I never thought I had any talent at it.  And I don’t.

“For years, that kept me from enjoying it,” he continued, his spoken voice so much preferable to his singing.  “I avoided places where I might have to sing.  But when you left for Inarion, I got melancholy.  I wandered around in a haze, even got your mother worried.  Nothing seemed right, with my boy gone. 

“But then I heard a Calrom tinker play, that summer, and something changed.  I bought his instrument and paid him to teach me a few things.  After that, every morning I’d get up, start the bake, get the dough ready, check the ovens . . . and I’d play.  Every morning, for an hour or so, I’d struggle through the few songs I knew until I was better.  Then I learned a few more.  My playing got better.  My singing never did.”

“It’s really fine, Dad,” I soothed.

“I know it is, Son,” he agreed.  “I mean, I know it’s bloody awful, but that’s fine.  I had to learn that it was all right to enjoy something you weren’t good at, for the pure indulgence of it.  I’ll never make it into a trade, or earn a penny from my playing.  But in the midst of my melancholy about you, I found that sometimes a man just has to throw his head back and sing . . . no matter how it sounds.”

“It made you feel better?  I had no idea my leaving was that hard on you,” I said, guiltily.

“It’s not as if you’d died, but that made it even harder, sometimes,” he said, quietly.  “Music gave me something to focus on, instead of how badly I wanted to row downriver until I got to you.  Even the cats got used to it, eventually.”

He proceeded to launch into a series of simple, quick-tempoed village songs that were popular back home.  Songs I remembered from my youth, and occasionally heard with other words in other places.  And every new song was a fresh opportunity for Dad to show off just how bad his voice really was. 

Dad didn’t care.  Indeed, I understood that was the point of the exercise.  He was singing for the pure fun of singing, for his own amusement and for no lesser purpose.

“By the sacred scrolls, if you swear to stop that noise I vow to happily submit to another beating!” came a weary voice from the back of the wagon.

“The monk is awake,” I noted.

“The monk is alive,” Dad said, stopping his playing.  “My music clearly has restorative powers.”

“I cannot deny it was inspirational, my friend,” the monk called.  “Indeed, it convinced me that the oblivion of unconsciousness was not as preferable as it appeared, if I was to be subjected to such . . . entertainments.  Where am I, my friends, and who are you?”

“You are in the back of a wagon, miles away from where we found you,” I informed the man, as he sat up and looked around.  “You were beaten and near frozen to death.”

“Your timely arrival and intervention was the answer to my prayers,” the thin monk assured us, dejectedly.  “And I’m not a particularly devout monk.”

“If having a noose around your neck doesn’t inspire divine devotion, nothing is likely to,” my father agreed, reflectively.  “It’s the type of situation that can test a man’s faith.”

“You speak as a clergyman,” the monk noted, keenly.

“I’m a senior laybrother of Briga, Drexel Temple,” my father admitted. 

“You’re a sacred smith?” he asked.  I could understand why he would think so.  Dad was a big man, even before decades of hauling bags of flour and kneading untold amounts of dough had built his arms and shoulders. 

“Baker,” Dad grunted.  “Thirty years, now.  But I’ve faithfully attended to my spiritual duties.”

“We all seek the divine through our own means,” the fellow said, philosophically . . . though I could detect a note of condescension in his voice.  Dad could, too, but he let it pass.

“Briga makes the dough rise,” Dad said, quoting a proverb. 

“And Luin brings light and order to human society,” the monk countered, conversationally. “My name is Brother Bryte the Wiser,” he introduced.  “Practicing Lawbrother of the Temple of Luin.”

“The ‘wiser’?” I asked, curious.  “Don’t you mean ‘the Wise’?”

“Alas, that title was taken, when I was a lexit newly admitted to the temple,” he sighed.  “There was a senior brother, Lamisar the Wise.  Argumentative bastard,” he grunted at the memory.  “During the spring debates my first year he invited all comers.  He styled himself as Wise.  I boldly called myself Wiser.  I won the debate against him.  It stuck.”

I got the distinct impression that he was the sort of fellow who looked for nearly any opportunity for an argument.  That was a good thing for a Lawbrother to have, I suppose, but experience had shown me it wasn’t necessarily advisable in a traveling companion.  

“I’m Rinden, this is my son, Minalan,” Dad said, as he put his guitar away.  “We’re headed west.  Does that suit you?”

“Anyplace that wasn’t where you found me suits me well, Master Rinden,” he sighed.  “I suppose I should thank Briga for my delivery, then, since Luin was clearly ignoring my prayers.  Which one is a greater reflection of the divine, I wonder?”

“Which one can you go four days without and not be ready to riot?” my dad asked.  “Everyone needs a baker.  I’ve known men who’ve died happy never meeting a lawbrother.  And plenty who’ve gone to ruin for their acquaintance.”

“Yet if it was not for the order Luin brings to the world, the baker would not be safe to perform his holy rites,” the monk reasoned.  “For you to prosper and bring bread to the people, you need to ensure you can purchase flour without being cheated, sell your bread for a fair profit, and protect the fruits of your labors,” he proposed.  “A man might starve after four days without bread, but he may suffer far longer and die by more brutal means without law and order.”

“Aye, I’m not ignorant,” my father sighed.  “Luin and Briga and all the other temples have their role in the functioning of society.  But I find more meaning in providing the bread of life to my fellow man than I ever could in . . . lawbrothering.”

“Yes, well, the legal rites attract a certain kind of character and intellect, to be performed properly.  And it might surprise you to know that I am not entirely in disagreement with your assessment of my order.  Far too many have exploited the very canons they have sworn their souls before the Scales and Sword to protect and enforce, or rendered corrupt judgments.  But as you can tell by the state of my attire and my condition when you found me, it was not corruption that guides me.”

“‘Never hire a skinny lawbrother,’” I said, with a chuckle, quoting an old market saying.

“Just so,” Bryte sighed, depressed.  “As is all too often in my order, youthful ideals die quickly to cynicism and corruption.  I was in that village to defend a client – for a pittance of a fee – and used a novel legal argument in the purest pursuit of the legal ideal.”

“And lost, apparently,” my dad smirked.

“Actually, I won the case,” Brother Bryte reported, proudly.  “I cited a county-level precedent and produced the documents to attest to it.  In the face of that evidence, the magistrate was forced to rule in my client’s favor.”

“So, how did you come to be tied to a tree with a noose around your neck?” I ventured.  “That seems an unlikely punishment by the court.  In a civil case.”

“Thankfully, you are correct,” Bryte agreed.  “The punishment was not ordered by the court, but enacted under local custom.  By my client,” he added, ruefully.  “The details would only be of interest to a fellow in my craft, but suffice it to say that while he prevailed in court, he felt poorly used by my tactic.  He paid me . . . and then arranged for a mob of his relatives to consign me at the border of the barony.”

My dad shook his head in mock sadness.  “I would consider swearing out a warrant, if I were you, Brother.”

“Not under that magistrate,” Bryte shuddered.  “I will content myself with my life, my coin, and an unexpected rescue by a couple of kind-hearted bakers.  Although they did take a crap in my satchel.  That’s more reward from the Lawgiver than I could have asked for after two days on that tree.  This road is not as well-traveled as I’d hoped.”  He looked around at the countryside rolling by at a good pace, relaxing into his place amid our baggage.  “Considering I would have to slog my way to the next jurisdiction, I count myself especially blessed.”

“The power of prayer,” my father agreed. 

“I’ll settle for amazing fortune,” the monk professed.  “Being bakers, you gentlemen wouldn’t happen to have any bread you could spare, do you?” he asked, hopefully.  “I haven’t eaten in two days.”

“Does it look like I carry an oven in my pocket?” Dad demanded.

“I thought it was worth asking,” the monk sighed.  “If the gods were feeling generous enough to save me, I thought they might consider feeding me, too.  Why else would they send me a couple of bakers?”

“Well, you are incorrect on two counts, my friend,” I chuckled.  “Firstly, that the gods were answering your prayers.  I believe they were fulfilling my need, not yours.”

“You need a lawbrother?” he asked surprised.

“Apparently so,” I decided.  “As to your second mistake, we aren’t two bakers.  My father is the baker.  I’m a spellmonger.”  I took the wand Banamor made for me out of my belt.

“A spellmonger,” he repeated, dully.  “Oh. Well, a good and useful trade, I suppose.”

“More than you might think,” I said, activating the wand and producing two piping hot loaves of bread in his lap.  He looked up suddenly, aware, at least, of how unusual such a trick was.

“You aren’t an ordinary sort of spellmonger,” he shrewdly observed, as he began to tear into the first loaf.  “Luin’s staff, this is still warm!”

“I’m good at what I do,” I said, putting the wand away.  “Now tell me, Brother Bryte, why you’re not the ordinary sort of lawbrother.”

*

*

*

That was a fascinating journey, from that point on.  Once Brother Bryte knew who I was, where I was going, and why, his entire demeanor changed.  Talking out of his sleeve to a couple of bakers on the road was one thing.  Having the ear of a freshly-minted Count Palatine, on the way to take his seat, was quite another.  The discussion quickly shifted from the foibles and viscidness of his vocation to a greater discussion about law, authority, philosophy, order, sovereignty, and a host of other issues he felt a ruling lord was responsible for.

I learned a lot – not the least that Brother Bryte was passionate about his craft and devoted to its ideal execution.  He treated law like I treated thaumaturgy, a subject of endless fascination and debate. 

“Law is the rule that sets human society to order,” he lectured, as the miles rolled past.  “Though we give the credit to the divine, in fact it is the human application of those divinely-gifted laws that bring us out of a state of chaos.”

“Like my new province suffers,” I observed, as I got out my pipe.  I listen better with a pipe in my mouth.

Brother Bryte sucked in his breath.  “By all accounts, the Wilderlands, as such, is a disaster,” he agreed.   “I did a circuit with a magistrate in Nandine, in the far north, when I was a Lexit.  A simple, rustic people, with little knowledge of the intricacies of the law,” he concluded.  “But dedicated to fairness.  I wonder how Brother Iskal fared?”

“Nandine is utterly destroyed,” I reported, flatly.  “As are most of the large towns you would have passed through.  Many, if not most, of the residents were killed or captured in the invasion.  The lucky ones fled south to Tudry or Vorone.  There weren’t many lucky ones,” I added, discouraged. 

“So . . . what is left to administer?” Brother Bryte, asked, confused.  “From what I understand, Tudry is burned, and Vorone is . . . compromised,” he said, diplomatically.

I couldn’t let it go.  “Compromised?  How, compromised?” I quietly demanded.

“I’ve heard . . . I’ve heard all manner of tales from poor Vorone,” Brother Bryte admitted.  “Most must be mere rumor, they are so outlandish: the tale that the animals of the wood war in the streets, that the Orphan Duke makes love to Ishi, herself, in his palace while the town rots away . . . or that the whores have taken over civil administration, and everyone is a lot happier, now,” he finished.

“Not a bit true, the parts that edge close to fact,” I advised, my teeth clenched around my pipestem.  “Vorone has had its share of drama, it’s true, but it is stable, now.  But Vorone remains the Ducal capital,” I advised.  “I have no sovereignty over a ducal capital.”

“So you are condemned to administer a bunch of freeholds and independent domains in the far north,” Brother Bryte said, philosophically, but with undisguised skepticism. 

“’A bunch’ might be overstating the matter,” I agreed, through clenched teeth.  “I have been given an impoverished province.  I seek your learned counsel.  What guidance can the Lawgirver grant me to turn it into something . . . more?” I challenged.

The monk took a far longer time in contemplation than I would have guessed.  “Where others see ruin, Luin sees opportunity,” he quoted.

“Opportunity for what?” I demanded.  “And don’t; give me some erudite reason I need to do things precisely the way they’ve been done for centuries,” I added.  “As the Spellmonger, I have a certain reputation for novelty to uphold.”

“Novelty?  I daresay with your current reputation, you have every expectation of being able to rule by decree, without a dissenting voice.  Particularly if Nandine is ruined, and the magistrates and burghers there fled or enslaved.  They were a contentious bunch.”

“Now they are a manumitted bunch,” I countered.  “Most of my new subjects were recently held captive by the gurvani,” I explained.  “It was only last summer that we were able to affect their rescue.  Largely peasants, both from the Wilderlands and Norther Gilmora, where late the gurvani have invaded.”

“Oh, I heard,” the monk assured me, sadly.   “Indeed, I was holed up in Wilderhall when the news arrived.  “You say that many have been rescued?”  News doesn’t always travel fast or well, in a feudal society.

“Over a hundred thousand,” I agreed, with a modicum of pride.  “That was the purpose of the raid.  We resettled them in two large camps on the east bank of the Wildwater.  A third camp lies south of Vorone, in the new Wilderlaw palatinate, under Count Marcadine’s protection.”

“So, your mandate includes re-settling a bunch of former slaves in abandoned Wilderlands holdings,” he concluded, sagely. 

“In a country where the ruling class has been all but wiped out,” I nodded, grimly.  “Most of the northern Wilderlords perished early in the invasion, or later at Timberwatch.  I’ve been encouraging the importation of magelords to take up the slack.”

“Magelords,” the monk repeated, absently, a far-away look in his eye.  “That is a term I haven’t heard outside of old legal briefs from the Magocracy.”

“Indeed,” I nodded, enjoying the rich taste of pipesmoke as the wagon rumbled along.  “I’m the first, but by no means the last.  It’s an ambiguous honor,” I chuckled, humorlessly.  “Most of the new nobility are warmagi ennobled for their service in the war.  The rest have successfully had their patents of nobility re-instated by the Crown – part of the bargain I worked out with King Rard,” I added.  What point is there to being the Spellmonger if you can’t drop the occasional name?  “But it is an uneasy development, particularly for the mundane nobility.  As there is damn little mundane nobility left in the Wilderlands, it might be the one place where we can develop without undue strife.”

“The lack of opposition brings its own troubles,” the monk pointed out.  “Still, it is a fascinating prospect,” he admitted, licking his thin lips.  “An empty land, barren of law and order, with but a few magelords and a bounty of poverty-stricken peasants to contend with.  Facing an enemy too dire to contemplate, with no real support from outside.   Duke Anguin will be unlikely to assist in his internal exile.”  Apparently, the news had not yet reached Brother Bryte about the Restoration currently occurring in the South.

“That’s not entirely true,” I sighed.  “I have the friendship and support of Duke Anguin of Alshar.  But he is a little preoccupied, at the moment.  The Four Counts Rebellion unexpectedly collapsed, and His Grace has re-taken power in Enultramar,” I informed him.  The startled look in his eyes confirmed that he was unaware of the development. 

“Duke Anguin no longer sits in Vorone?” he asked, confused.  “I was under the impression that the Orphan Duke was attempting to re-establish a power base there!” he said, dismayed.  “I was going to ask him for a job,” he added, a little guiltily.

“You’re an Alshari?” Dad asked, surprised.  “Your accent would suggest you’re Riverborn,” he suggested.

“Aye, before I was Brother Bryte the Wiser, I was once Bryte of Hunter’s Wood, the barony of Callot, in the upper Riverlands.  My father was a well-regarded man-at-arms for the baron.  A most canny commander, for a mere commoner, according to his reputation and acclaim.  He was not pleased that I took up the scroll and not the sword, as he did,” he added.  His tone suggested that there was considerable conflict involved with that decision.

“Aye, it breaks a father’s heart when his son discards the carefully-laid plans he’s made for his future,” Dad agreed, wryly. 

“Dad, I’m a Count Palatine of a region larger than your county, answerable only to Duke and King!  I’m the head of the Arcane Orders, a knight mage, and acknowledged master in my field!  I’m accounted one of the greatest thaumaturges of all history!  Not to mention being rich beyond the dreams of mortal men,” I added, which made Brother Bryte perk up. 

“But you could have been a hell of a baker, you have to admit,” my father countered, dismissively.  “You had real promise in that, promise I was ready to fuel.  In just another year, I could have taken you to apprentice, and then set you up over in Hoxly Village, under Old Samfar, as a journeyman.  He died two years later with no heirs and no recent journeymen.  You could have had that entire bakery before you were nineteen,” he said, regretfully. 

“And that’s . . . better than being the Spellmonger?  A noble?  A baron?  And a Count?” I asked, shocked.

“It’s honest work,” he grunted.  “Not the kind that sees you fleeing your home in the middle of winter because you pissed off a duke.” 

“So all of my accomplishments mean nothing to you?” I asked, in a teasing manner. 

Dad sighed, shaking his head.  “Of course they do, Son, and I’m proud of you.  Always been proud of you.  Always will be,” he added.  “You’ve done great and mighty things.  More importantly, you’ve made a family, which makes my family larger.  Your wealth and power are impressive, but it’s your character I’m most concerned with.  As for that, I’m satisfied.

“But when a man has a son and a life’s work, it’s something he wants to share, to pass along,” he sighed, wistfully.  “My girls – gods love and protect each one! – they are my joy, but you are my pride.   I wanted to leave my legacy to you, and work beside you until I could be satisfied you had mastered the trade and even bettered me in it.  That was my dream,” he emphasized.  “That doesn’t mean I’m unsatisfied with the result.”

“So you’re proud of me, even though I’m rich, famous, and of high position?”

“Of course I am.  But a man dreams his son will live a rich, happy, and secure life.  Secure in a stable trade.  Not killing, not ruling, but working, and earning the respect of his fellow men.  I’ve oft thought it would be better if you quit all this magelord nonsense and went back to being a regular spellmonger.  Alas, that cake is burnt,” he sighed.

“To ashes,” I agreed, heavily.  While I understood the simple reasoning and sincerity of his explanation, it didn’t make me feel much better.  No one likes to disappoint their father.

“But that’s water downstream,” he sighed.  “I once wanted your sister to – never mind.  No need to tell tales you won’t want to hear.  We’ve all had eventful lives, in one way or another.  Yours has just been more dramatic, in some ways.  All turns out right in the end, I suppose,” he concluded, philosophically.

“In my case, I saw the future my father envisioned for me as tedious, dangerous, and . . . sweaty,” Bryte said, distastefully.  “Two summers drilling with the levies in preparation for service convinced me that literacy was a better skill to develop than swordplay.  My father was disappointed when I announced I was taking holy orders, but also, I think, a little relieved.  I was never going to be a decent soldier, and I think we both knew it.  I certainly did.

“But let us return to this news of the Orphan Duke – he is returned to Falas?” he asked, dismayed.  “There is no court in Vorone?”

“Vorone remains the Summer Capital, but the Magelaw and the Wilderlaw, two Counties Palatine, now lay astride it.  I command the north, Count Marcadine commands the south.  Anguin has returned to Falas with the bulk of his court, leaving a Steward to rule Vorone in his place.  But as many of his current court are loyalists cultivated from the Wilderlands last year, I can assure you that His Grace will return to the summer capital frequently.  Especially now that he has powerful magelords in his cabinet.  Likely after his upcoming wedding to Rardine of Castal.”

“That is . . . a lot of news,” Brother Bryte admitted, as his dark eyes revealed a mind furiously at work.  “To answer your earlier question, Goodman, I was seeking Anguin’s court at Vorone because such daring political moves can provide opportunities for employment,” he admitted.  “Indeed, such marginal states oft provide an excellent chance to practice the kind of law I enjoy.  Arguing petty crime or banal commodities contract disputes is . . . well, it’s just simply boring!” he spat.

“Having sat baronial court, I cannot disagree.”

“Oh, with respect, Your Excellency, you had the easy part of the proceedings.  Most of the legal work is done out of a proper court.  But rarely do you get a case that isn’t as numbing to the senses as a pint of spirits . . . and far less wholesome.  I was looking forward to at least a bit of intrigue, either working for the court or in opposition—”

“You would oppose the court at Vorone?” I asked, surprised.

“Legal opposition,” he clarified.  “For where there is a strong court, there is the need for strong advocacy for those caught up within it.”  That earned a snort from my father.

“That figures,” he chuckled.  “Reminds me of the story of the poor lawbrother who came to a prosperous village and near starved for a year . . . until another lawbrother showed up.  By the next Yule they were both rich men, though the village wasn’t nearly as prosperous before.”

“Yes, an old and tired cliché regarding my profession,” Bryte agreed, his nostrils flaring.  “But therein lies a kernel of truth.  Negotiated conflict requires relatively equal advocacy on both sides of the scales, or corruption results.  No doubt that mythical village was prosperous, but rigidly corrupt.”

“Aren’t they all?” Dad asked, rhetorically.  “Seems like most goodmen would prefer to hash out their differences honestly, between themselves, without paying a bunch of lawbrothers to do it for them.”

“That is the preferred method, but when something goes awry ‘tis better to have recourse to courts than the sword, would you not say, Goodman?  But we digress.  I am still trying to understand the current situation in the WIlderlands, as how it affects my own.  And yours, to find out.  May I ask what plans you have for your new lands?”

“Work like hell to build a civilization more or less from scratch,” I admitted.  “I’ve called in a bunch of my friends and comrades to help.  I’ve got a lot of magic to throw at the situation.  And some coin.  Beyond that . . . well, despite my commitment to planning for the future, I am making it up as I go along.”

“As we do,” Bryte agreed.  “Have you selected an official seat, yet?  Or are you planning to work from Vorone?”

“My official seat will be at Vanador,” I informed him.  “And no, you’ve never heard of it.  We’re building it from scratch, too.  On a site in the eastern highlands, on a plateau at the base of the Kulines.”

“So you’re trying to simultaneously build a city, a county, and a thousand villages,” he said, shaking his head in wonder.  “You must be very confident in your magic.”

“I’m very confident, in general,” I countered.  “That doesn’t mean that things don’t go horribly wrong with frequency.  My lands in the east were attacked by a dragon just months ago, for example.  That’s hard to plan for.  But I can supply and fund the enterprise for a while, and I believe I have the raw materials to begin the effort.  Indeed, it has already begun.  My primary duty will be to keep the goblins out of the way while it gets done.”

“An admirable pursuit.  But have you considered the legal and political form your new charge will take?” he challenged.

“I’ve invited the clergy to Vanador,” I nodded.  “They will get that sorted out.”

“They . . . well, of course they will . . . eventually,” the monk said, with a sour face.  “But without any kind of sovereign guidance on the matter, they will be doing so in a haphazard manner.  Not the best way to make law,” he added.

“We have the Laws of Luin to guide us,” I pointed out, a little annoyed.  That much should be obvious.

“They are adequate as a start,” he agreed, “but they are only the foundation of our great legal tradition.  Every region develops its own body of laws and regulations suited to local conditions, each in need of application and interpretation.  Every country is different, in regard to how the law plays out.  What precedents are acknowledged and used as guidance are dependent upon that law.  It is often whispered in my circles that adequate foresight in a law’s inception is a damn sight better than a poorly-managed and frequently-mis-applied precedent.”

“You seem to be asking for a job,” I suggested.

“I am merely investigating an opportunity,” he insisted, proudly.  “You have a whole country without such laws.  Precedents involving the Wilderlords will mean little in a land with few of them in it. 

“But have you considered what kind of advantages you could bring to the quick and wholesome development of your country with the clever establishment of law suited to your country?  And not to the Wilderlaw, or the Riverlands, or Gilmora or elsewhere?”

“Won’t that come in time?”

“How much time do you want to waste?  And money?” he countered.  “Really, Minalan, I assure you that establishing a lot of thoughtful law early on will not only reduce the kind of headaches you had as a baron sitting court, it can actually make your realm more prosperous.”

“You have an example?”

“Hundreds,” he assured me.  “It’s a bit of a hobby of mine.  You say you have naught but peasants and wizards with which to make a nation?  Then do not penalize your peasantry for the aggrandizement of your wizards,” he suggested.  “Craft laws designed to encourage a prosperous agriculture, and fair access to the marketplace for all.  Sand away at the hoary laws of inheritance that keep so many in poverty.  Establish good, common-sense laws that do away with feudal privilege and legal theft, so that your people know the ground upon which they walk. 

“Most lords attempt to obfuscate their ambitions behind a miserable fog of regulation.  Make yours clear, clean, and easy to interpret.  Then merchants will flock to you, peasants will be able to prosper in peace, without fear of losing their holding over some obscure text, and tradesmen can practice confident in knowing their claims will be supported by a fair and equitable judiciary,” he concluded, triumphantly.

“My primary duty is to security,” I reminded him.  “Civil administration is left to the Baroness of Vanador, Pentandra.  Current Court Wizard to Anguin.  Or her steward, Gareth, I suppose.  But he used to work for me, too.”

“The security of a state lies ultimately on the prosperity and loyalty of its subjects,” Brother Bryte agreed, thoughtfully.  “Without the chivalry and nobility to compel them, getting them to fight in their own defense might be difficult without good laws.  It would certainly help encourage the effort.”

“So how would you contrive my son’s realm, Brother?” my father asked . . . inviting Bryte to launch into a three-hour long lecture on the best-possible body of law that would see my fallow realm flower . . . in theory. 

I’ll give the monk credit: he sketched a society where each class and occupation knew where it stood under the law, where bondsmen were discouraged or prohibited, where the focus of the law would not be to enforce feudal privilege, but the ability of each man to work toward his ambitions freely. 

I won’t go into the detail of that speech.  It was fascinating, listening to a man who had clearly fantasized about such a thing his entire life, being given the opportunity to present his plans to a man who could actually see them come to fruition.

But there was much in Brother Bryte’s proposals that went hard against the old feudal order.  We argued for an hour over the needs of the military in the Magelaw – particularly as it was in a state of perpetual war in the Penumbra.  But once Bryte recognized my focus was not the elevation of the chivalry, but the protection of the realm, he compromised.  He was surprisingly willing to do so, when presented with compelling arguments.

“You two are jabbering like a couple of young girls,” Dad complained, when we stopped to water the horses and pee.  “I thought you were bad, but that monk could talk a starving dog off of a wagon full of meat.”

“I think I know why we encountered him, now,” I offered, apologetically.  “I have a lot better idea of how screwed I am with Vanador, now.”

“You needed divine help to see that?” Dad chuckled.  “I could have told you that before we left Sevendor.”

“He’s just the kind of young firebrand I can use to start off Vanador properly,” I decided.  “He’s enthusiastic, well-read, visionary . . . we’ll be doing new things, in the Magelaw.  We’ll need a fresh approach.”

“Check with the temple, when we get to Vorone,” Dad suggested.  “See if he’s in any kind of trouble.”

“You think he might be?” I asked, surprised.

“I think any lawbrother you meet who’s wearing a noose, you need to be cautious of,” he said, after a moment’s consideration.

It was a fair point.

We stopped in Vorone for a day for no other reason than we were sick of being on the road all the time, and wanted a break.  After Barrowbell, Vorone seemed small and quaint, rustic and unsophisticated.  That seemed to suit my father just fine.  The Summer Capital offered great diversion for Dad, who had seen but a few large towns, and for Lawbrother Bryte because it allowed him a chance to register with the local Temple of Luin and present his credentials. 

I spent a good part of that day inspecting the area damaged by last year’s dragon attack, and the rebuilding effort as part of my survey of the recovery.  Most of the palace debris had long been carted away or stuffed in a hoxter.  I noted some of the stonework had been salvaged to ring a memorial garden that lead to the new complex: Anguin’s Castle Vorone.  Designed by Carmella and built partially with Malkas Alon craftsmen, the visible symbol of the Orphan Duke’s authority in the north continued to be constructed, though Anguin himself had returned to Enultramar.

I noted with approval how subtle Carmella’s design was as I walked around the outside of the massive structure.  The keep was forty feet tall at the battlements, and had towers that stretched to over sixty . . . so far.  Raised on a motte of magically compacted earth, the castle loomed over the rest of Vorone like a protective falcon, preening in the glory of Anguin’s rule.  It could be seen from every point in the city, I noted, and though the uppermost spires were still climbing behind a curtain of scaffolding, it seemed impossibly tall and lofty already.

I examined the place more closely with the help of Insight, my thaumaturgical baculus.  Every powerful wizard has a collection of wands, staves and rods to assist his professional life, and Insight was among my most powerful tools for this sort of thing.  Within a few moments of directing its attention at the castle, I realized what Carmella had done . . . and I had to chuckle.

Castle Vorone was imposing, it was true . . . but Carmella had used dozens of optical illusions to amplify the impressive visual effect of the keep without compromising its function in the limited space it occupied. 

It was delightfully subtle work.  The massive bricks used at the base of the walls and towers, and those of the great keep, were oversized, compared to usual foundation stones in castle walls.  They lent the impression of great, impenetrable mass to the viewer, a tangible symbol of Anguin’s power.  But as your eye traveled upward to encompass the height of the structure, it was fooled by the use of increasingly smaller bricks that your mind did not realize were dissimilar to the large stones at eye level.  That gave the castle a far more formidable appearance than could be accounted for by its actual height.

Further, Insight revealed to me that many of the structures on the upper floors and towers of the place boasted additional features among the machiolations and turrets that weren’t particularly functional for defense . . . indeed, they appeared to be purely ornamental.  There were turrets, windows, and balconies that had no purpose other than to provide distraction.  But in aggregate the mind saw a complex and active defense, with strong lines and intricate purposes.  Though much of the fortress was designed as one of the more advanced castles of the Wilderlands’ plain style, some elements from Enultramar and even Gilmora had been included in the topmost portions of the castle – that is, the areas everyone could see. 

Carmella had finished the top chambers with a cunning mixture of wood and stone, and favored both the broad windows of the South and the use of Gilmoran-style decorative columns in intriguing patterns.  Where chambers were being covered, I saw that the high-peaked rooves were being shingled in a dark green slate tile . . . once again using overlarge pieces at the bottom and much smaller tiles at the top to give it more impact.  Dozens of small turrets, with more traditional Wilderlands’ style wood-shuttered windows, each sported a miniature balcony that implied a minister hard at work within.  Upon close inspection with Insight I saw that more than half of the “balconies” and “windows” were mere decoration. 

The visual tricks made the complex design imply that the upper rooms of the palace were where great and weighty decisions were being made.  I was so impressed by that that I hunted down a junior assistant castellan – the seniormost officer on site, on market day – and quietly pulled rank on the startled man to demand a tour.

Castle Vorone was known in the mercenary’s trade as a full drum keep.  The central donjon was a massive oval, though your eye wanted to think it was circular.  It was three stories tall from the main gateway, but the way the windows were set it appeared to have five levels of windows before the main roof.  Around the perimeter of the “drum” were six wide towers that looked impressive, but whose machiloations and thick buttresses were only marginally functional. 

Above the keep was where things got complicated.  A great hall was built at one end of the roof, nestled amidst the surrounding towers with its back to a thick watchtower that pierced the sky like Donrard’s Spire, in Castabriel.  But a host of smaller chambers was clustered around the bottom and sides of the penthouse, while the other side of the keep’s roof sprouted no less than five main towers and plenty of turrets, as well as a complex series of catwalks and arches that convinced your heart that Something Important had to be going on up there, even if your mind knew better.

Up close, the effects were even more intricate.  Carmella had hired Rumel’s folk to build the place, and their penchant for grotesque decoration and complex geometric designs was barely constrained by human artistic sensibilities. 

The result was a bold series of “woodland spirits”, goblins, forest nymphs and effigies of Wilderlords, gods, goddesses, and various Alon woodland species engaging in a continuous dance around the walls of the castle.  Each turret seemed to contain a menagerie of curious creatures and fascinating abstract design that enchanted the eye without recourse to the arcane.  In deference to local politics, the Antlers and Anchor device was used frequently in the carvings, though the Antlers, alone, seemed to enjoy a prominent place as well.

Carmella had wasted no space or opportunity to boast, architecturally-speaking, in constructing the outer walls.  Though strong and impressive-looking, they were in fact far less thick than ordinary castle walls.  Insight revealed that they were only six feet thick on the outside – less than half the usual fifteen-foot thick military standard.  But Carmella had made liberal use of magic to strengthen and reinforce the walls so that the additional space could be used for better purpose.

Indeed, the interior was ringed by chambers far larger than the masonry would suggest; but instead of stables, smiths, storerooms and barracks, the buildings contained the various ministries of government, separated by department.  Those were still being finished off, though the lower floors were already in use.  But unless you knew the trick, you would conclude that this castle was bristling with soldiers and knights, not clerks and courtiers.

Betwixt the walls and the keep were numerous gardens and permanent pavilions planned for court functions, ceremonies, and luncheons.  The eastern side of the compound boasted six small but distinctive chapels to Orvatas, Trygg, Huin, Luin, Duin, and Ishi, while a central circular wooden pavilion to the district included shrines to dozens of other divinities.  

Another precinct within the walls was made specifically for the delight of the palace children, surrounded by a thick berm and hedge and containing simple amusements and even more outrageous effigies for them to enjoy.  Amid the wonders and splendors of the yard was a miniature model of the castle above them, complete in every detail down to the golden antlers on the summits of the topmost tower.  It was enchanted with tiny magelights that mirrored the larger. 

Nearby was a wooden statue of a comical-looking dragon, seemingly fearful of the glorious castle.  A wooden Wilderlord on a wooden horse on the other side of the model gave some additional reason for the dragon to cower.  Both works were clearly of Wood Dwarf design and construction, and were durable enough for children to crawl upon them.  I knew my kids would be delighted by a garden meant for the whimsy of children.

Directly before the palace’s forbidding entranceway, behind a triple-arched door that appeared larger than it was, a Grand Pavilion was being built that could shelter thousands for public events.  Around the western side of the keep was an elaborate garden with dozens of tiny pavilions suitable for discussion, conferences, or liaisons, depending upon the needs of the courtier.     The space was cunningly designed so that even though the decorative shelters were close together, the way that garden walls and garden plots were designed one felt as if you were secluded and alone.

Scattered between the pavilions and gardens were a number of beautiful ponds that no doubt doubled as cisterns in times of emergencies. The gatehouse of the castle was far more useful, militarily, than the rest of the structure.  Containing the barracks for the Palace Guard and the residence for the Lord Steward and his men, the two massive square towers that loomed over the gardens and public square below provided a sense of protection and a promise of ducal authority, doled out by mailed knights, if necessary.  It was a far more reassuring edifice than the old palace had been.

Carmella had chosen to leave the supporting buttresses (which didn’t seem particularly necessary, to my eye) unfaced stone, and had finished the exterior walls with a deep brown ochre that gave the impression of treebark.  The upper stories were more lightly colored.  And at dusk an eruption of pre-cast magelights lit up the spires and chambers brilliantly.

Militarily, it was only marginally better than the original palace had been.  But as a statement of political power and sovereign authority, it was ideal.  This was the castle of a Duke who fancied himself a Wilderlord.  A Wilderlord with an excellent Court Wizard.

I was intrigued to discover during our brief stay that the folk of Vorone were continuing to prosper, even in the absence of the Duke in the palace.  In fact, there seemed to be a more relaxed atmosphere at the upscale inn near the new castle we dined at, that night, than I recalled from my last visit.  There were the usual mixture of courtiers and mid-level bureaucrats who haunted such places, as well as senior artisans, merchants, and a few burghers.  I wondered if Ishi’s influence lingered, still.

But while the serving girls were attractive, they had no suggestion that they were anything but seductive.  Friendly, even flirty, but not possessed of the wide-spread divine glamour that Ishi, in the guise of Lady Pleasure, had imposed upon the town.  Ishi had kept her promise, I confirmed.  She had turned her divine attention to other areas which needed it.

Dad was delighted by the novelty of the place, which was far more richly and entertainingly ornamented than Barrowbell had been.  I had to explain that Vorone was not typical of the oftentimes dour ideas of décor most Wilderlords have, and gave him a brief history of the town, without explaining how Ishi had been protecting it in her spare time.  I found he enjoyed the rustic charm of Vorone far more than he had the sophisticated feel of Barrowbell.  He was still intrigued by the well-rendered scenes of Wilderlords hunting, hawking, and fighting that were colorfully painted on the walls of the inn, for example, and the many outrageous hunting trophies that were displayed everywhere. 

Unsurprisingly, Brother Bryte was more intrigued by the curious state of legal affairs in Vorone, now that the Duke had left to take control of Falas. 

“I presented my credentials and paid my fee to practice in Alshar,” he reported, “but there doesn’t seem to be much law going on, at the moment,” he related, as he hungrily worked his way through a bowl of thick venison stew.  “Apparently Anguin tore through almost all of his backlogged cases before he left – really unheard of, in a seated duke.  All that’s left here are contract disputes between burghers and artisans, a few unresolved inheritance cases, and the usual petty crime.  And surprisingly little of that,” he admitted.  “I expected Vorone to be more exciting than this.”

“It was, a year ago,” I consoled him.  “But Anguin’s court was efficient, if small.  And from what Lady Pentandra told me, when much of the ruling class has been wiped out and the lands over which they fought were conquered, it was pretty easy to resolve the docket.  Besides, Anguin needed the money,” I added, a bit cynically.

That didn’t seem to brighten Brother Bryte’s disposition.  “The place seems almost depressingly well-run, now,” he nodded, somberly.  “The new Lord Steward is quite the taskmaster, hardly prone to the kind of fits of whimsical tyranny that leads to the employment of a lot of lawbrothers.  Worse, he’s utterly reasonable about most things, according to the gossip at the temple.  He prefers to negotiate and compromise instead of having recourse to the law,” he sighed.

“He’s likely sensitive over his father’s execution and reputation for corruption,” I pointed out.  “Baron Edmarin’s death was really the inaugural event of Anguin’s reign.  Though the Lord Steward is nothing like him in temperament, he no doubt wants to escape his sire’s tarnished legacy.  The castellan I spoke with mentioned that he’s forbidden the men of the palace, and even the city guard, from taking so much as a penny for a bribe under pain of expulsion.”

“That explains the cautiously optimistic attitude of the artisans of Vorone, then,” Bryte agreed.  “I abhor such corruption, of course, but it’s indicative of greater issues in a municipality.  The sort that lead to legal cases.  Content artisans don’t oft resort to lawbrothers,” he lamented.

“It’s an odd world when a monk complains the people are too well-governed and happy,” my father observed, philosophically.  “Like a physician complaining that his patients are too healthy.”

“A baker needs hungry customers,” I reasoned.  “A lawbrother needs contentious clients.”

“I’m a patient man,” Bryte countered, with good humor.  “Human nature is irresistible.  Corruption and dispute will return here soon enough.  Some laws are eternal,” he quoted.  “It just means I’ll have to take work as a scribe or counting-man until it does,” he said, discouraged.

“That doesn’t sound so bad,” I suggested.

“Would you prefer to trade your fancy magical globe and titles for performing tricks for children on market day?” he countered.  “It’s well within my capability.  It is not, alas, what I have trained for.  Nor is it particularly lucrative.”

“A religious man would look upon such an occasion as a sign from the divine,” my father told the monk.  “When my son came to me and asked me to give up my regular trade to help him out with the Great March, I was hesitant.  But I had a vivid dream that night in which the Flame that Burneth Bright appeared to me and gave me sanction for it.”

I winced when he said that, and I’m glad he didn’t catch it.  Of course Briga sent him a dream to ensure his cooperation.  She was working directly with me at the time.  I felt a little guilty about that, but things had worked out well enough. 

At least Brother Bryte had the wit to recognize the irony in my father’s words.  He grinned, stretched, and looked around.  “Perhaps you’re right, Goodman.  Where I’ve suspected the unlikely intervention of Luin I my life, I’ve always been skeptical.  In retrospect, perhaps I shouldn’t have been so willing to disbelieve.  On the other hand, I could be the Lawgiver’s little joke,” he suggested.  “It must be terribly amusing to see one so devoted to the Law treated so harshly by the world he strives to serve.”

Dad snorted.  “Now you’re just bitching,” he corrected.  “I don’t know much about Luin,” he admitted, “but a sense of humor is rarely one of his attributes.”

“Not unless you have a deep appreciation of irony,” Brother Bryte said, mostly to himself.  “If Luin brought me here, through the agency of you two gentlemen, the question is why?”

“Perhaps because Vorone is not our final destination?” I suggested.  “We travel north from here, on the morrow.  I go to construct and order my realm.  I could use a good lawbrother to do so.  Hells, I could use a poor lawbrother – things are pretty chaotic in Vanador, at the moment, with the wizards in charge.”

Dad grunted at that but didn’t comment.  He’d seen both the good and bad that had accompanied the rise of the magi.  He wasn’t particularly impressed with the way we sometimes went about things, even when the effect was wondrous.

“Are you offering me a . . . a job?” Brother Bryte asked.

“Indeed, I’ve been waiting for days for you to ask me for one,” I smirked.  “For a lawbrother you seem to miss opportunities most would suspect you’d leap upon.”

“Blame my upbringing,” he said, sourly.  “I did not want to presume on your graciousness after you have already carted me half-way around the world and fed me at your expense.  My mother was very insistent about such things.”

“Well, I have a job if you want it,” I offered.  “It pays standard rates, whatever they are, and include standard duties, which I hope you’re familiar with because I’m not.  Not particularly,” I corrected.  “I’ve recently spent far too much time with lawbrothers.  Enough to convince me I need one.”

“If you’re a sovereign count, you’ll need an entire set,” he counselled, suddenly looking more hopeful.  “Not just for internal administration, but for taxation, criminal proceedings, and international relations.  But I’m hardly the man to oversee all that,” he said, in a rare display of humility.  “I’ve only been ordained a full brother for a few years.  You don’t want a young, idealistic lawbrother to order your realm, if you’re smart.  You want an old, cynical coot who has been practicing for decades,” he advised.  “One with real gravity and skepticism in his heart.   Lawfather Ambrose was appointed regional justice for Vanador at Yule, I’m informed,” he added.  “He would be perfect as a count’s adjunct.”

“He’s already got a job.  If I was a Wilderlord or Riverlord, I might consider it,” I conceded.  “Especially if I was assuming control of an existing land.  But I’m not.  I’m a Magelord, and I’ve got Trygg’s own chamberpot of a mess that I’m suddenly in charge of.  I need some of that youthful energy and idealism to contend with that.”

“You realize that such an offer is obscenely appealing?” the monk asked, thoughtfully.  “So appealing that I am automatically skeptical of its allure?  Every time I have taken such a chance during the brief course of my career, it has seemed doomed to misery and heartbreak.  Whereas the boring cases, they have been the most financially lucrative.”

“Never have I seen a man of faith present so little actual faith,” Dad said, shaking his head in wonder.  “A man offers you a dream job, you accept it!  The gods work in our world, in subtle ways, usually.  They don’t often invite you in and have an ale with you and discuss their plans.  Either you have the sense and wit to recognize it and cooperate, or you should consider another occupation,” he pronounced, as he flagged down a girl to refill his mug.

“How can I not question the offer?” he whined.  “What have I done to deserve it?”

“You won your last case,” I pointed out, helpfully.

“And got beaten and tied to a tree while an idiot peasant took a dump in my satchel!” he fumed.  “Hardly the kind of divine affirmation one usually seeks!”

“Unless one has a deep appreciation for irony,” I countered.  “My father is right: you were steered into my path just as I was steered into yours.  I know about as much theurgy as I do law, but I do understand the principal of divine guidance.  From what I understand, it’s usually pretty messy.”  I recalled conversations of with the gods that confirmed my suspicions.

“Come now, Minalan,” he said, quietly.  “I respect you, as you are clearly an educated man.  Yet you act as gullible as a peasant when it comes to discussions of the divine.  The gods are important, in abstract, to our functioning society . . . but to ascribe coincidental events to them as purposeful actions . . .” he said, shaking his head doubtfully.

“There’s a forty-foot eternal flame in the middle of my barony that says otherwise,” I informed him.  “Perhaps the Temple of Luin can pretend that the gods are useful abstractions, but as a wizard I can attest to their agency.  To the skeptical layman, it does often appear that such things are reasonable coincidences.  But, as you said, I’m a learned man.  And magic is the science of coincidence,” I concluded.

Brother Bryte started to say something, then closed his mouth when he caught a paternal glare from Dad.  He has a way of silently directing a man to think, rather than speak.  I learned that the hard way, as a boy.

Finally, the lawbrother sighed, and tossed his shock of black hair out of his eye.  “I would be grateful to consider such a posting,” he said.  “It will likely see my neck in a noose, once again, but I cannot deny the . . . compelling nature of the coincidences at hand.  At some point, even a reasonable man has to accept the highly unlikely as mathematically impossible.  All right, you have yourself a lawyer, Your Excellency,” he said, his voice growing deeper.  “May I ask what the position pays?”

“Three ounces of silver a week,” I said, figuring that was a reasonable fee. 

“Three . . . ounces?” he asked, his dark eyes flashing with wonder.  “A successful practicing lawbrother rarely makes half that!”

“It helps to be unreasonably wealthy.  And makes you more resistant to bribery.  Three ounces, plus livery and housing allowance.  And an allowance for your office shrine, as needed.”

“And my duties?” he asked, suspiciously.

“You’ll work directly for me, as Count, and advocate thoroughly on my behalf.  Your duties may include things you think are outside of your purview – I expect you to do them, with no complaints, unless you have a compelling reason not to.  I expect your absolute best work, your unquestioning loyalty, and a willingness to contend with the sometimes colorful personalities of the magi in my court.”

Dad chuckled at that.  Living in Sevendor for nearly two years, he’d seen what men like Lorcus, Terleman, and Azar could do. 

“That is . . . acceptable,” he said, trying to conceal his eagerness.

“Be warned, there might not be many places to spend your wages,” I added.  “Vanador is more refugee camp than town, at the moment.  The Baroness is still importing grain to feed everyone.  The local economy has utterly collapsed since the invasion, and conditions are going to be primitive for some time.”

“As long as there is a tavern, I should be fine,” he dismissed.   I could see in his eyes that his mind was already working furiously.  “Is there any way we could delay our departure tomorrow for a few hours?  If I am to take this commission, there are some supplies that I should secure before plunging into the wilderness, and it sounds as if Vorone might be the very last stop in which to find them.  Oh, and I will have to register as your advocate with the Temple, if you want me to be able to work in your name,” he added.   “But that will have to be in the morning.  The Temple is closed, right now.”

“We can delay until noon,” I agreed, as I summoned a small purse with about five ounces of silver in it from a hoxter pocket.  I had dozens of purses like that, in various denominations, ready to conjure at a moment’s notice.  I pushed it over to the monk.  “That should cover fees and supplies.  Stock up on ink, too,” I added.  “From what I understand, while you can get decent parchment and quills aplenty in Vanador, such luxuries as ink are rare, yet.”

The lawbrother took the purse like it was irionite, and held it up to the light, weighing it in his palm.  “You’re serious, then.  You’re actually offering me a job as your advocate and adjunct.”

“That’s what he’s been jawing about for the last twenty minutes,” my father assured.  “Take the damn job and be happy about it, Bryte!” he instructed.  “Trust your god, for once.”

“I will,” he agreed, though I could tell he still harbored doubts.  “I’m certain you’ll sack me, before long, out of blatant incompetence, but even a few weeks as a count’s advocate will appear impressive on my Legacy papers.”

“Oh, don’t worry about Min sacking you,” my father assured the monk.  “He employs a righteous number of fools, back in Sevendor.  Not all of them are even human.  He’s too lazy to let them go.  I’m sure you’ll fit right in.”

I shot Dad a nasty look but otherwise ignored the jibe.  He wasn’t wrong.  Just impolite.

“Then it appears I have a lawyer,” I smiled, instead.  “Welcome to my court, Brother Bryte.  I have no doubt it will be a fascinating experience for the both of us.”

Part Seven

The Corpse Of Tudry

“From here, things get rough,” I warned Dad and Bryte, as we departed the northern gates of Vorone.  “The terrain gets rocky, the hills are taller, and the rivers are all but unnavigable.  The roads are abysmal,” I said, though the track we were following had been well-maintained – part of Pentandra’s efforts at public works projects for Vorone, I figured.  “Barring weather delays, bandits, or goblin attack, we should be in Vanador within the week.”

“You make my new posting sound so charming,” Bryte complained. 

“The scenery is nice,” I offered.  “Beautiful, in fact.  It abounds in resources,” I lectured.  “Iron and coal deposits, copper, even a little gold.  Miles and miles of forests, broad meadows, and brooks filled with fish.  And all the women have well-formed legs,” I added, with a smirk.  “Because everywhere you walk is uphill.”

“Min hiked the lot of it, a few years ago,” Dad said, with reluctant admiration.  “Took a few thousand kids to safety in Castal.  I took a hand in that,” he added.  “Baked for all of them, all summer long.”

“That rabble of children who came near Wilderhall a few years ago?” Bryte asked in surprise.  “I was handling a case around there, I recall.  You were involved with that?  You upset the locals,” he reproved.  “Some wanted to call the banners and drive them off.”

“Prince Tavard wasn’t keen on it, either.  That’s when my troubles with him started, I think.”

“You travel in interesting circles, Excellency,” Bryte said, shaking his head.  “Sometimes I think I’m still tied to that tree, descending into madness before I freeze to death.”  He reflected, for a few moments, as the wagon rolled through the village to the north of Vorone.  “It is a strange coincidence, though.  After that commotion with the children, I took a few days and went to see an oracular nun – Temple of Briga, of all things, way in the north country.  I had to deliver a summons, anyway, but while I was there I stopped and paid my professional respects.

“It seems the old girl could tell a man what he’d be best suited to become, in life.  An intriguing idea for an ordinary man, but for a lawbrother it holds particular excitement . . . for I do not know a single colleague who does not regularly doubt the path Luin’s staff has drawn for him.  Indeed, it is a common refrain, in temple circles.”

“Is there a point to this story?” Dad asked, impatiently.

“Of course,” Bryte continued, ignoring Dad’s manner.  “When it was my turn to see the Flamesister, she took one look at me and . . . well, she had a bit of a shudder.  A full body shudder, from the top of her wimple to the soles of her boots.  Then she looks me dead in the eye and tells me that I am best suited to be a Lawgiver, and to the West my fate and fortune lay.”

“Aren’t you a Lawgiver?” Dad asked, confused.

“Oh, no, no,” Bryte said, with a wry laugh.  “Sorry, it’s a technical term.  I am a Lawbrother,” he explained.  “It is my calling to know and argue the law on behalf of my clients.  A Lawfather sits in judgement of those arguments.  The law we know and argue is established, by divine write, executive edict, precedent, or custom. 

“But every lexit learns how, at certain times in history, a scholar comes forth who has the rare opportunity to formulate law from scratch, as Luin did: a Lawgiver.  It’s a rare occurrence, but they tend to be decisive and important events.  Like the Charter that ruled Perwyn before the Magocracy, or the Edicts of Gamerlain that ordered the Late Magocracy after Perwyn sank.  The Code of Cormeer was established by a great Lawgiver, Victor of Costasol, and . . . well, there are a few more examples.  But it hasn’t happened, really, since the Conquest, when the King’s priest of Luin, the Venerable Darklaven, codified the King’s Law that ruled over the conquered.”

“Briga’s biscuits, do you fellows get paid by the word?” Dad demanded.

“Dear Luin, would that not make my fortune?” Bryte retorted.  “My point is, I thought the nun was lapsing into senility with her prediction.  A Lawgiver?  It would be as if she said you could become Archmage, or that you could become . . . whatever the ultimate example of the baking arts is,” he shrugged.  “It was a fantasy,” he pronounced.  “A laughable, terrible, humiliating comic jibe from the rest of the universe.  As if Luin, Himself, was taking a piss on my head and was telling me it was raining.  A Lawgiver!  Really, it was just madness.  I tipped her a penny and got the hell out, and sulked all the way back to Wilderhall.  The gods were mocking me.”

“Yet, here you are, in the West,” I observed.  “Surely that gives you pause.”

“It’s an ironic coincidence, I’ll grant you that,” Brother Bryte countered.  “My friends, enemies, and professional colleagues have oft predicted a variety of sad outcomes to my life.  Becoming a Lawgiver was not among them, to my knowledge. ‘Wastrel’ and ‘drunkard’ usually top the list.”

“The ways of the gods are mysterious,” Dad dismissed.  “A man can drive himself mad, trying to understand them.”

“I should probably leave that to the contemplative orders,” Bryte agreed, reluctantly.  “To be honest, it makes me morose to think about such things.  And when I’m morose, I drink.”  He pulled a bottle of spirits from his satchel and took a sip.

“Are you feeling morose, now?” Dad asked.

“No, I’m feeling bored,” Bryte countered.  “I’m in the back of a wagon like a sack of potatoes being carted off to market.  I’m going to be spending a week watching where we’ve been, punctuated by an endless trail of horse droppings.  Which will lead me to contemplating my past and my future, which will lead me to regrets and recriminations.  That, my friend, is what will make me morose.  Being drunk for that is just good planning.”

“Do you really need a lawbrother?” Dad asked, skeptically, in a quiet voice.

“They’re all the fashion,” I nodded.  “Besides, it will keep me from doing that sort of thing, when I have plenty of other things that require my attention.  If it doesn’t work out, I’m a count.  I can always return him to the tree.”

“Good point,” Dad conceded.

That final stretch up through the heart of the Wilderlands put a strain on the team, as it always does.  The roads were even more abysmal than I remembered, often declining in quality to the point of a single narrow track that was barely visible in the snow.  About the time that we left the immediate precincts of Vorone, the drifts along the roadside conspired to cover it completely, making our wheels slip and slide.  That didn’t make the horses any happier.

We stopped at the edge of the first great stretch of forest and I took the time to transform the wheels.  I had planned on this – or, rather, Master Andalnam’s enchanters had.  The wain came with an enchantment that tucked all four wheels away into hoxter pockets, replacing them with sleigh rails.  After that, our progress improved dramatically, and the horses were far less concerned about unexpected torque on their harness.

Though we had left Vorone only recently, the landscape around us was nearly deserted, with far fewer villages along the route than one would expect for a such a large city.  True, the region north of Vorone is the least fertile and most rugged of the surrounding territory, but even taking that into account there was still a dearth of settlement, there. 

The next day we came to the ruins of Tudry, and I could see why. 

“Well, we are officially within the frontiers of my realm,” I sighed, as I looked at the long, blackened expanse that was once a squalid little town after pulling the team to a stop.  “Welcome to the Magelaw.”

“Luin’s staff!” Brother Bryte gasped, drunkenly, from the back of the wagon.  “What happened here?”

“That was a town called Tudry.  I burned it.  Or, had it burned,” I conceded.  “Most of the Tudrymen relocated to a safer location.  Your new post of Vanador.”

“By the Flame that Burneth Bright, Min,” Dad swore, uncharacteristically, “you ordered that town burned?”

“It was necessary for the prosecution of the war,” I insisted.  “Tudry was becoming untenable.  It was expensive.  And it was a poor fortification, at best.  Astyral did wonders, while he ruled it, but in the end, it made more sense to raze it and start anew.”

“So . . . my new boss burns down entire towns,” Brother Bryte, said to himself.  “That is good information to have.”

For some reason, despite all the evidence that I was, indeed, a powerful noble and the most potent wizard in the world, despite having witnessed wonders in Sevendor, up to and including me fighting a dragon, I don’t think Dad really understood what I did until he saw the long, burned-out stretch of Tudry.  The weeds and even trees had begun to overtake its outer precincts. 

But seeing hundreds of homes, houses of men just like him, burned to a crisp at his son’s command, for some reason that sent home a sobering realization to Dad.  I had made this destruction happen.  I may have mitigated the way in which it was done, and assured that all within had been relocated before the act, but Minalan the Spellmonger was the one who had taken this century-old town and put it to the torch.

That affected Dad, for some reason, impressing him in ways that my gleaming white castle or my giant falcons didn’t.  Before he saw Tudry I was his son, the fool wizard.  After Tudry, he understood the grave responsibilities I’d had to shoulder along the way perhaps a bit more.  It shook him.

“An entire town,” he said, shaking his head in disbelief.

“Tudry was far from the only town to fall in the war,” I soothed.  “Just the most recent.  Nandine, Sarsguard, Glandon Town, Mardine, just about every town and village of any size that was within reach of the gurvani fell.  Tudry was the exception, and only because I rescued it.”

“And then burned it to the ground,” Bryte said.

“Not for a few years,” I explained.  “But we held them at Tudry, and that allowed us to keep the roads to the north more or less open.  But it was poorly situated and not designed for the kind of fight we face.  When the time came, burning it was the wise thing to do.”

“That’s a lot of houses, Min,” Dad said, his expression clouded.

“And the people who lived there have new houses, now, or are building them.  In Vanador.  They’d not be there, if I hadn’t done what I did.  I had to make some hard choices, Dad.  Sometimes you have to burn down a town to save the people in it.”

“But why did you have to make that decision?” he asked, sourly.

“Because I’m the one whom the gods decided would make it!” I said, a little exasperated.  “No one else would make it, and it had to be made.  I’ve made better decisions, but I’ve made worse, too.  A lot of people lived in Tudry.  A lot of people from Tudry now live in Vanador.  It’s unfortunate we had to sacrifice the town, but those are the fortunes of war.”

“That’s not the kind of life I wanted for you, Min,” Dad said, seriously, as if he was realizing what I’d done in my career for the first time.  “No man should be forced to do that.”

“I wasn’t forced.  It was a calculated ploy.  One I gave a lot of thought to.  And one of my more successful plans,” I added.  “Thousands of goblins died in that fire, and in the battle.  It was a success.”

“If that’s your idea of a success, boy, I don’t want to see you fail,” Dad said, urging the horses forward past the ruins. 

It stung, a little, to hear Dad’s disapproval after the relatively good journey we’d enjoyed.  Certainly, I was used to his skepticism about my profession in general, and his amusement with my being ennobled, and running my own estate.  Brilliant magelights, heatstones, and magic spells, civic functions and aristocratic behavior were things he could understand.

But when Dad saw the result of my tenure as a soldier, and a commander of soldiers, it changed his perspective.  He was silent for miles and miles, to the point where even drunken Bryte noted it.  He eyed every burned-out hovel we passed with new appreciation, after that.  Not just for the horrific destructive power of the foe I’d fought, but for the brutal places that fight had dragged me.  Dad was a peaceful man, unafraid to fight but not inclined to.  He’d never had to stand under orders while unfriendly people tried to kill him.  He’d never killed another man, to my knowledge.

To see that his son had been required to all of those awful things bruised his sense of the world, I think.  Not only was the danger from the goblins now more real to his mind, but the understanding of what a man had to do to himself to meet that danger also haunted him.  I had ordered men to their deaths and had commanded towns to be razed.  I was not just his slightly-goofy son the wizard, anymore in his mind, I was someone who could alter the fortunes of men whose names I didn’t even know.  That was a responsibility far beyond his understanding of the world, and I think Dad suffered from it.

“What happened?” Brother Bryte asked me, bluntly, when we stopped at a ford to water the horses and stretch our legs.  “Your father isn’t his usual self.  He’s brooding.  I am of only short acquaintance with the man, but my keen jurist’s eye for detail tells me that something is bothering him.”

“He’s just experiencing some . . . readjustment to his perspective,” I suggested.

“That was needlessly obscure,” Bryte observed, after a moment’s consideration.

“It was meant to be,” I affirmed, as I lit my pipe.  “His thoughts are his to keep.  But if I had to guess, I would say that he’s starting to see that my life hasn’t been all thrilling adventure and amusing magical spells.  I learned how to bear that burden long ago.  He’s seeing it for the first time.”

“He’s a good man,” Bryte pronounced.  “A bit stubborn, but most artisans are.  It’s been interesting, watching you two, in the context of my own sire.”

“And your conclusions, Counselor?”

“My sire sings better,” Brother Bryte decided.  “Beyond that, yours is superior in all other ways.”

Dad did, eventually, come out of his brood, and I largely have Azar to credit for that, of all people.  We had come to the outskirts of Megelin Castle, near twilight, where my friend met us in a tavern in the castle’s village with an honor guard of his men. 

He was as pleased as Forandal and Astyral were to see me, and even more deferential to me and my authority.  Azar has a way of improving his own status by admiring others, and I was one of his favorite points of social leverage.  He feasted us heartily in that tavern, and spent all night telling thrilling tales of our battles in the Wilderlands, in Farise, against the dragon in Vorone and in the terrors of Olum Seheri. 

Dad wasn’t any more impressed with the glories of war as he’d ever been, though he appreciated the humor in some of Azar’s tales.  But he listened to each one more thoughtfully, now, alert for those stories in which he could catch a glimpse of my own moral struggles along the way.  Thankfully, Azar’s stories were scant with those sorts of examples.  But there were a few places where he raised one of Dad’s eyebrows.

It wasn’t anything in particular Azar said, I think; in retrospect, I believe that Dad was affected by the contrast between my warlike friend and me.  Azar seemed to fulfill all of Dad’s requirements of a ruthless noble, unconcerned with casual violence or unintended casualties.  The way Azar sees battle and war involves single-minded determination, a fostering of naked will and resolve that is so strong as to be unstoppable.  Defeating the enemy was the only valid consideration to any course of action.  That’s apparent from the moment you meet the man.  It’s what makes him so good at being a warmage: the development of that level of determination is not only essential in professional warfare, it was just as indispensable for high-level magic.

Compared to Azar, I suppose, Dad must have seen me as a far more compassionate and reasonable warrior.  Azar would have ordered Tudry burned the first time, perhaps out of spite or a sense of power.  He’d actually burned one of the Tudry burghers to death with magical fire in the middle of a council – the man had difficulty with subtlety.  In comparison, my approach to war was more complex but less efficient. 

It also seemed far more humane than Azar’s.  That, I believe, restored some of Dad’s opinion of me and my career.  No matter how brutal his son’s life and the decisions I made had been, I could have turned out a callous and bloodthirsty bastard, like Azar.  I suppose that gave him some consolation.

Dad never mentioned his misgivings, after Tudry, and I respected that.  I’m certain that it was a difficult thing for him to navigate.  In all honesty, my concern wasn’t about his opinion of me, as you might think . . . but for his peace of mind.  No father wants to ever think ‘my gods, what kind of monster have I unleashed on the world’?  Seeing Azar, and the realistic possibilities of my profession, I think he took a lot of solace that I turned out as well as I did, under the circumstances.

All I know is that the next day he got out his guitar and played, while we continued north.  And sang.  Brother Bryte complained bitterly about it, and kept drinking spirits until he was drunk enough to join in.  Brother Bryte’s voice isn’t nearly as bad as my dad’s.  Still, the experience was jarring. 

We taught Dad The Road to Barrowbell, and then I taught them both the Road to Sevendor, and we repeated both until we could all hash out a disturbing rendition.  I suppose we could have been attracting bandits and goblins, and should have been more careful, but I was . . . I was in my own lands, I realized, as we topped a rise north of Megelin.  This was the Magelaw.  I owned it, now.

Or it owned me.  As I had quickly learned in Sevendor, having title to lands is far more about your responsibility to them than it is your possession of them.  It wasn’t that all of these rustic vales and quaint hilltop settlements now owed me tribute; it was that it was now my sworn duty to secure, protect, and provide for them. 

As I sang a jaunty tune and we rolled the wagon down the next long slope, the stiff, cold north wind picked up in our faces, challenging us to project our voices into the wilderness.  I glanced at Dad, who was strumming and smiling as he belted out the refrain, and he gave me a quick wink.  Brother Bryte was doing a passable job with the tune, but his timing was abysmal, and got worse with every swig from his bottle.  He was about three choruses from passing out cold, I realized. 

I had a lot of work ahead of me: castles to build, armies to raise, a city to construct, plots to hatch, and grand inquiries into thaumaturgy to begin.  The fate of the world was literally upon my shoulders.  The decisions I would have to make, and the actions I would have to take, would make the resolution of Tudry seem like an afterthought, a minor part of a much, much larger story.  The very gods were compelling me to step forward and challenge the foes of humanity.  They had arranged an unrivaled opportunity to do so, and I had to seize that chance as resolutely as anything I’d ever done.

But spending a few weeks on the road and in a boat with my dad was a glorious way to begin the endless task ahead.  I knew we would arrive in Vanador soon, and this brief interlude would be over.  I would have to be the Spellmonger again, and he would eventually return to his home in Talry, and his simple, comfortable life.  Our time would be over, and I doubted we’d ever have another like it.  Such experiences happen in the cracks of our existence between more important events.  They aren’t planned, as such, and they cannot be arranged.  They happen of their own accord. 

If they happen to us at all.

I grew to know the man who sired me more on that journey than I’d had in the thirty years before.  I got to know him as a man, not just as my father – a man who farts, belches, swears, and has low, unpopular opinions.  A man who loved his wife and children, and their children, and was devoted to protecting them at all costs.  A man who valued wisdom over status, friends over riches, honest work over clever schemes.  Dad had proven to be a man of simple tastes and stubborn resolve.   I’d learned he liked to fish and play guitar and sing, and that he didn’t like his sheets too slick or his pillow too soft.

It’s not often you get to know a man like that.  Herus was correct: you do get to know a man’s true self on the road.  There was something sacred about sharing such an intimate journey, and doing so with the man who father you, and then was forced to give you up, was a rare opportunity to discover the secrets of the universe, through his eyes.  How he saw the gods, his community, and his dearest kin defined the man in ways a simple profession of faith did not.  You saw who a man was by what he did when he was a stranger in a strange country, performing a mission that took him outside of his own world.  I’d watched dad put aside fear, regret, worry and his own sense of propriety to get me from one side of the kingdom to the other in the middle of winter. 

But while I knew he was eager to return to the sunny, green river country he’d built his life in, I also knew he appreciated this time as much as I did.  He said as much, in that wink.  And he needn’t say another word about it for me to understand the sincerity and depth of his feeling.  My dad loved me, and was proud of the man I’d become, despite his misgivings.  And he trusted me to do the right thing. 

That was worth more than a pyramid of gold or a mountain of magical rock, to me.  Indeed, it was what made the entire hopeless enterprise ahead of me worthwhile.

“Y’know,” Brother Bryce said, slurring his words already, “They should really make a song called ‘The Road To Vanador,’ now,” he proposed. 

“I was just thinking the same thing,” I agreed, taking my pipe out of my pouch.  “Shall we begin?”

The End

Be on the lookout for the next book in the Spellmonger Series, Book 11: Thaumaturge!  Due out early 2019!

As always, you may contact the author at tmancour@gmail.com