“You are in love with her?”
“Did I say I was?”
“That is what you told her.”
He smiled and leaned back in his chair. “I see you are not a man of the world, bard. Have you never slept with a woman?”
“That is a singularly intrusive and impertinent question,” I told him.
“Then you have not. I see. Is it boys, then?”
“It is not! How dare you?”
“Oh, I am not criticizing, man. I was merely trying to ascertain your knowledge of affairs of the loins. There are rules, you see, governing all things. If you wish to bed a lady, you must first declare your love. If you wish to bed a peasant, you must first declare your wealth. You understand? Well, this one was a lady. So I told her I loved her.”
“And she believed you?”
“Of course. She wanted me in her bed. I knew that from the first moment in the marketplace.”
“What happened?”
He sighed. “Women play by different rules. She decided she wanted to run away with me, to live in some distant place where we could walk naked among the flowers or suchlike. In short, she became boring. So I left her.”
“And then?”
“It always happens. Her love turned to anger, and she told her husband about me. It is partly my fault—I should not have taken all her jewelry. But I had gambling debts, and anyway, I think I earned some reward for the pleasure I gave her.”
“You stole her jewels? What kind of a man are you?”
“I thought we had decided that question. I am a thief.”
“It sounds to me as if you broke her heart.”
“I never touched her heart,” he said with a chuckle. He stood and walked to the window, gazing out over the city. “This will not last long,” he whispered, his voice losing its lightness of tone.
“What do you mean?”
“Ziraccu is finished. The war will come here. Siege engines will sunder the walls; armed troops will rampage through the streets.”
“But this is not a battlefield,” I said.
“The Ikenas have a new king. Edmund, the hammer of the Highlands, he calls himself. He says he will not rest until the northern kingdom is overcome. I believe he means it. And that will mean new rules of engagement.”
“How so?”
“A lot more death, bard,” he said cheerfully. “You can forget about set battles and ransomed knights. This Edmund believes in victory, and he’ll not stop until all his enemies are worm food. Mark my words. He’ll attack the cities and raze them. He’ll end the Angostin Wars once and for all. But I’ll not stay to see it. I have no wish to be trapped here like a rat in a pipe.”
“Where will you go?”
“Somewhere where the women are warm and the gold is plentiful.”
“I wonder if there is such a place,” I said, forcing a smile. “But tell me, how did you know I received two gold coins as a reward?”
“Bellin’s wife whispered it to me just after … but you don’t want to hear about that.”
“His wife?”
“Yes. Nice woman. Very open. But I’d love to have her and the daughter in the same bed. Now, wouldn’t that be a pretty sight?”
“No, it would not. And you are a disgraceful man.”
“I try,” he said, laughing aloud.
2
JAREK MACE RECEIVED his reward from the innkeeper and, with a fine smile and a wave, walked away from the tavern. I felt a sense of loss at the time and could not understand it. But life moved on. I stayed several days at the Six Owls and even entertained the regulars on my last night.
They were common men and women, and I did not bore them with the Dragon’s Egg, which is for the cultured. I gave them what they required—the Dancing Virgin. It is a simple piece of magick involving a silver tray that floats in the air while a girl no taller than a man’s forearm dances upon it, her body swathed in shimmering veils of silk.
It was not a great success, for there are many talented magickers who have debased the piece, introducing male partners and allowing them to simulate copulation. I could, of course, have duplicated such a scene, indeed, achieved a far more powerful display of the erotic. But I had always felt it wrong to pander to the lust of the mob. There were several coarse shouts during my performance, which unsettled my concentration, but I continued and finished the display with a burst of white fire, a glowing ball that circled the room before exploding with a mighty bang.
Even after this the audience was apathetic in its applause, and I leapt from the table and walked to the long bar feeling somewhat depressed.
Few understand the emotional strain of magicking, the sense of fatigue and weariness of the soul that follows a performance. I drank heavily that night, and it was very late when Bellin informed me that he would need my room for guests arriving the following day.
It seemed I had outstayed my welcome.
For the next few months I performed at several weddings and two funerals. I like funerals; I enjoy the solemnity and the tears. I do not mean to sound morbid, but there is something sweet and uplifting about grief. The tears of loved ones are more powerful than any epitaph on a man’s life. I have seen the funerals of great men, with many carriages following the hearse. Great speeches are made, but there are no tears. What kind of a life must it have been that no one cries for you? There is an eastern religion that claims that tears are the coins God accepts to allow a soul into heaven.
I greatly like that idea.
Man being what he is, of course, the eastern men pay people to cry for them at their funerals.
However, I digress. The months flowed by, and I struggled to earn enough money to pay for my meager requirements. The war was affecting everyone now. Food was in short supply, and the prices rose. The Ikenas king, Edmund, had been true to his word. His army swept through the land like a forest fire, destroying towns and cities, crushing the armies of the north in several pitched battles, coming ever closer to Ziraccu.
There were tales of horror, of mutilation and torture. A nunnery, it was said, had been burned to the ground, the abbess crucified upon the main gates. Several noblemen captured at the Battle of Callen had been placed in iron cages on the castle walls and left to die of cold and starvation.
The Count of Ziraccu, one Leonard of Capula, declared the city neutral and sent emissaries to Edmund. The emissaries were hanged, drawn, and quartered. Left with no choice but to fight, Leonard began hiring mercenaries to defend the walls, but no one believed they could resist the might of the southern Angostin army.
It was not a good time to be a bard. Few wanted to hear songs of ancient times or listen to the music of the harp. What they desired was to realize their capital and head for the ports, setting sail to a continent where the baying of the hounds of war would not carry.
Houses were being sold in Ziraccu for a twentieth of their worth, and rich refugees left in their hundreds every day.
I had intended to wait in Ziraccu until the spring, but on the seventh day of midwinter—having not eaten for several days—I realized the time had come to make my way north.
I had no winter clothing and stole a blanket from my lodgings that I used as a cloak. I wrapped my hand harp in cloth, gathered my few possessions, and climbed from the window of my room, sliding down the roof and jumping into the yard.
The snow was deep everywhere, and I was faint from hunger by the time I reached the northern gate. Three sentries, sitting around an iron brazier glowing with coals, were eating warmed slices from a large meat pie. The smell of beef and pastry made my head spin, and I asked them for a slice. Naturally they refused but, recognizing me for a bard and a magicker, told me they would give me food if I performed well. I asked them what kind of performance they required.
They wanted the dancing girl and her partner, several partners, in fact.
I learned then that principles rarely survive an empty belly, and for a large slice of meat pie I gave them what they required. No subtlet
y, no silken veils. A small orgy performed above a brazier of coals. Warmer and with a full belly, I walked out into the night, leaving the lights of Ziraccu behind me.
When I reached the foothills, I turned for one last look at the city. Lanterns were glowing in the windows of the houses on the heights, and Ziraccu appeared as a jeweled crown. The moon hung above the highest hill of the city, and spectral light bathed the marble walls on the count’s palace. It was hard to believe in that moment that this was a country at war. The mountains loomed in the distance, proud and ageless, in what seemed a great circle around Ziraccu. It was a scene of great beauty.
Two months later the city was conquered by Edmund and his general, Azrek.
The slaughter was terrible.
But on that night all was quiet, and I walked for upward of an hour toward the distant forest. The temperature had plummeted to well below freezing, but a magicker has no fears of the cold. I cast a small spell that warmed the air trapped within my clothing and strolled on.
The night was clear, the stars bright. There was no breeze, and a wonderful silence lay upon the land. There is such beauty in night snow, it fills the soul with music. I had a need upon me to lose the images I had created for the guards, and only music could free me. I waited until I had reached the outskirts of the forest; then I found a hollow, cleared away a section of snow, and magicked a fire. There are some who can hold the fire spell for hours, never needing fuel. I could not achieve this, but I could maintain the flames for long enough to burn into gathered wood. I found several broken branches and added them to my flames. Soon I had a fine small blaze. I did not need the heat, but there is a comfort in fire, especially in lonely places. I did not fear trolls or demons, for they rarely came close to the habitats of man, and I was but two hours from Ziraccu and still on the trade route. But there were wolves and wild boar in the forest, and my fire, I hoped, would keep them from me.
Unwrapping my harp, I tuned the strings and then played several melodies, tunes of the dance, light and rippling. But soon the unheard rhythms of the forest made themselves known to me, and I began to play the music the forest wished to hear.
I was inspired then, my fingers dancing upon the strings, my heart pounding to the beat, my eyes streaming tears. Suddenly a voice cut through my thoughts, and my heart lurched inside my chest.
“Very pretty,” said Jarek Mace. “It will bring every robber within miles to your fire!”
His appearance had changed since last I had seen him. He had grown a thin mustache and a small beard shaped like an arrowhead; it gave him a rakish, sardonic look. His hair had been expertly cut, and he wore a headband of braided leather. His clothes were also different, a sheepskin cloak with a deep hood, a woolen shirt edged with leather, and a deerhide jerkin. His boots were the same, thigh-length, but he had gained a pair of leather trews that glistened as if oiled. A scabbarded long-sword was belted at his waist, and he carried a longbow and a quiver of arrows. He was every inch the woodsman.
“Well, at least one robber has been brought to my fire,” I muttered, angry at the intrusion.
He grinned and sat down opposite me, laying his bow against the trunk of an oak tree. “Now who would rob you, bard? You are all bones, and your clothes are rags. I’ll wager there is nothing left in the pocket of your boot.”
“That’s a wager won,” I told him. “I did not expect to find you here.”
He shrugged. “I stayed for a while in Ziraccu, then headed north after the suicide.”
“Suicide? What suicide?”
“The woman whose jewels I stole. The stupid baggage tied a rope to her neck and threw herself from the staircase. After that they were really after my blood. I can’t see why; I didn’t ask her to do it.”
I sat and looked at him in disbelief. A woman who had loved him so desperately that she had killed herself when he left her. And yet he showed no remorse or even sorrow. Indeed, I don’t think the event touched him at all.
“Did you feel nothing for her?” I asked him.
“Of course I did; she had a wonderful body. But there are thousands of wonderful bodies, bard. She was a fool, and I have no time for fools.”
“And who do you have time for?”
He leaned forward, holding his hands out to the fire. “A good question,” he said at last. But he did not answer it. He seemed well fed and fit, though he carried no pack or blankets. I asked him where he was staying, but he merely grinned and tapped his nose.
“Where are you heading?” he asked me.
“I am heading north.”
“Stay in the forest,” he advised. “The Ikenas fleet attacked Torphpole Port and landed an army there. I think the forest will be safer for a while. There are plenty of towns and villages here, and the tree line extends for two hundred miles. I can’t see the Ikenas invading it; it will be safer than the lowlands.”
“I need to earn my bread,” I told him. “I do not wish to become a beggar, and I have little skill at husbandry or farming. And anyway, a bard is safe even if there is a war.”
“Dream on!” snapped Mace. “When men start hacking away with swords, no one is safe, not man, woman, or child. It is the nature of war; it is bestial and unpredictable. Face it, you are cut off here. Make the best of it. Use your magick. I’ve known men to walk twenty miles to see a good ribald performance.”
“I do not give ribald performances,” I told him curtly, the memory of the meat pie display surging from the recesses of my mind.
“Shame,” he said. “Perhaps you would consider the shell game. A magicker ought to be magnificent at it. You could make the pea appear wherever the least money was bet.”
“Cheat, you mean?”
“Yes, cheat,” he answered.
“I … I … that would be reprehensible. And anyway, the magick would soon fade if I put it to such use. Have you no understanding of the art? Years of study and self-denial are needed before the first spark of magick can be found in a soul. Years! It cannot be summoned for personal gain.”
“Forgive me, bard, but when you perform in taverns, is that not for personal gain?”
“Yes, of course. But that is honest work. To cheat a man requires … deceit. Magick cannot exist in such circumstances.”
He looked thoughtful for a moment, then added several small sticks to the fire. “What of the dark magickers?” he asked. “They summon demons and kill by witchery. Why does their magick not leave them?”
“Shh,” I said, alarmed. “It is not wise to speak of such as they.” Hastily I made the sign of the protective horn and whispered a spell of undoing. “They make pacts with … unclean powers. They sell their souls, and their power comes from the blood of innocents. It is not magick but sorcery.”
“What is the difference?”
“I could not possibly explain it to you. My talents are from within and will harm no one. Indeed, they could not cause pain. They are illusions. I could make a knife and thrust it into your heart. You would feel nothing, and no harm would come to you. But if … one of them were to do the same, your heart would be filled with worms and you would die horribly.”
“So,” he said, “you will not play the shell game. Well, what else can you do?”
“I play the harp.”
“Yes, I heard that. Very … soulful. Sadly, bard, I think you are going to starve to death. Gods, it is cold!” Adding more fuel to the fire, he once more held out his hands to the flames.
“I am sorry,” I said. “I have forgotten my manners.” Lifting my right hand, I pointed at him and spoke the words of minor enchantment that warmed the air within his clothes.
“Now, that is a talent!” he exclaimed. “I hate the cold. How long will the spell last?”
“Until I fall asleep.”
“Then stay awake for a few hours,” he ordered me. “If I wake up cold, I’ll cut your throat. And I mean that! But if I sleep warm, I’ll treat you to a fine breakfast. Is it a bargain?”
“A fine bargain,” I told him
, but he was immune to sarcasm.
“Good,” he said, and without another word stretched himself out on the ground beside the fire and closed his eyes.
I leaned back against the broad trunk of an oak tree and watched the sleeping man, my thoughts varied but all centered on Jarek Mace. My life as a bard and a storyteller had been filled with tales of men who looked like Jarek, tall and spectacularly handsome, confident and deadly in battle. It had almost become second nature in me to believe that a man who looked like him must be a hero. Part of me still wanted—needed—to believe it. Yet he had spoken with such lack of care about the poor dead woman back in Ziraccu. I did not know her, yet I could feel her grief as she tied the noose around her neck. I tried to tell myself that he did care, that he felt some sense of shame but was hiding it from me. But I did not believe it then, and I do not believe it now.
He had been drawn to my fire by the sound of the harp, but he had come to rob a lone traveler. And had I been carrying a coin, I don’t doubt he would have taken it and left me, throat slit, on the snow of the forest floor.
Now he lay still, his sleep dreamless, and I, frightened of his threat, remained awake, my spell keeping him warm.
I thought back to our conversation and realized that I had seen yet another Jarek Mace. His speech patterns were subtly altered. In Ziraccu he had sounded for the most part like an Angostin, except in those moments when anger had flared and his voice had lost its cultured edge. Now, in these woods his speech carried the slight burr of the Highlander. I wondered if he even realized it. Or did he, like the chameleon, merely adjust his persona to suit his surroundings?
A badger moved warily across the hollow, snuffling at the snow. She was followed by three cubs, the last of which approached the sleeping man. I created a small globe of white light that danced before the cub’s eyes, then popped. The cubs scampered away, and the mother cast me a look that I took to be admonishment. Then she, too, disappeared into the bleak undergrowth.