C. Dale Brittain_Wizard of Yurt 01 Read online

I went up the stairs without the heart to turn on the lights, keeping my head low. So far I had been able to remove the king, at least temporarily, from whatever supernatural influence in the castle was harming him, and had been able to change the weather so he shouldn't get very damp out in his rose garden, but in my bones I feared it was too late.

  Candles were burning on the chapel altar. A figure in black and white linen was stretched on his face on the floor in front of the altar, arms outstretched. I started to step forward, started to cry out, terrified that now Joachim had been struck dead—perhaps by lightning.

  I stopped myself in time. He was praying. No wonder, I thought, I hadn't been able to touch his mind. Magic is, as I kept telling people, a natural force, and he was in company with the saints.

  He was totally still, except for the slight rising and falling of his shoulders as he breathed. I tiptoed back out, though I doubted that even my thunderstorm had disturbed him.

  I returned slowly to my rooms, physically and mentally exhausted, from flying, from working spells, and from fear for the king. I changed my clothes, intending to go back out to the rose garden to see if I could be of any assistance, but first I stretched out on my bed, just for a moment.

  The next thing I knew, I woke up, ravenously hungry, confused at finding myself fully clothed. My magic lamps, which I turned on yesterday afternoon, were still burning, though natural daylight made them seem pale. The angle of the sunlight through my window showed it was long after Gwen usually brought my breakfast.

  I swung my feet to the floor, then remembered. If no one had come, then that meant—

  I didn't know what it meant. I was afraid to probe for the king's mind because I might not find it. I brushed a hand across my hair and found my shoes, then opened the door to the courtyard.

  Assembled in the courtyard, in a semicircle around my door, were most of the people from the castle. As my door swung open, a shout went up. "The Wizard! Hail the Royal Wizard! His magic has saved the king!"

  I concentrated on the important point. "The king's alive?"

  "Yes, and he's not just better, he's completely better! He's stronger than he's been in months, in years! You saved him! You saved him! Our Royal Wizard saved him!"

  They had clearly been preparing themselves for hours while I slept. I didn't even begin to know what to say.

  And then I saw King Haimeric himself, coming across the bridge to the courtyard, arm in arm with the queen. I had never seen him so vigorous, or her so beautiful.

  I ran across the cobblestones to greet them. Not even bothering with the formal bow, I dropped to my knees before them.

  The king took me by the shoulders to pull me up. "Let's not have any of your modesty, Wizard," he said with a laugh, "when you've just saved my life!"

  I was still stronger than he was and remained determinedly kneeling. "I had nothing to do with saving your life."

  "After your long night's vigil of magic? They told me your light was never extinguished all night."

  Even though I knew that my orders that he be moved into the rose garden and be given fresh soup could not have saved him, it hardly seemed worth explaining that I had spent the night not in magic but in sleep.

  "It was the chaplain," I said. "Even the best magic cannot save human life, when that life is truly draining away, as I fear yours was, sire. Only a miracle can save a man then."

  "The chaplain?" said the king in some surprise. "I've spoken to him, of course, but he said nothing about a miracle."

  "He's showing Christian humility," I responded, "but he spent the night in prayer, and he interceded for you with the saints."

  The people around heard me and, after a murmur of surprise, seemed to believe me. However, it did not seem to make them feel any less favorably toward me.

  "Then we have both the best Royal Wizard and the best Royal Chaplain a kingdom could have," said the queen. "We were all just going to go to the chapel for a service of thanksgiving to God. Won't you join us?"

  "With greatest pleasure," I said, scrambling to my feet and brushing off my knees.

  IV

  I was sitting in my chambers, quizzing the Lady Maria on the first points of the Hidden Language, when a knock came at the door.

  She was not doing well on the first-grammar. Her enthusiasm for learning magic was as high as ever, and I think she really wanted to study hard, but she seemed distracted.

  Maybe, I thought, she was the only other person in the castle, besides me, still to be worrying about the king. A month after his recovery, he seemed to be growing even stronger. After a week in the rose garden, he had moved back into the castle, so far without any ill effects. But I still sometimes felt that lurking sense of evil and worried that he might weaken again. Or maybe the Lady Maria was not worrying about anyone else, but only about the three gray hairs I had spotted that morning among the golden curls.

  "Come in!" I called, thinking it might be Gwen with tea. She often brought a pot if I had someone visiting in my chambers, but if she were jealous and checking up on what I and the Lady Maria were doing she certainly gave no sign.

  But it was the constable. I was surprised; he rarely came to my chambers.

  "Excuse me, sir, I hate to interrupt you and the lady, but there's a —person here who wants to see you at once."

  Maria jumped up. "I can't concentrate this afternoon anyway," she said, before I could tell the constable to have this mysterious person wait a few minutes.

  "Shall I see you later today?" I asked. But she had rushed out already. "Show him in," I said to the constable.

  "Excuse me, sir, but he wants you to go outside."

  Shaking my head, I went out, stopping only long enough to put the magic lock on my door, and followed the constable across the courtyard to the main gate and the bridge.

  Waiting on the bridge was an unmistakable figure: tall, lean, with a tall red hat and a long white beard. It was Zahlfast.

  I rushed forward, hands outstretched to greet him, and although he tried to give me a look of stern dignity I could see a smile already lurking at the corner of his lips. That was why I had chosen to write to him.

  "Welcome to Yurt!" I said inanely. "Come in! Did you have a good trip? Are you just stopping by, or can you stay for a while?"

  He returned my handshake vigorously but resisted being drawn into the castle. "It's such a beautiful day," he said, "and there won't be many more this fall. Didn't I see a little garden over there where we could sit?"

  We proceeded to the rose garden, where only the queen's rose bush, of all the bushes, was still blooming. I continued to chatter to hide my surprise at his arrival.

  "I was glad to get your letter," said Zahlfast when we were seated on the bench where the king often sat. "Is your king still sick?"

  "Oh, no. He was cured by a miracle a month ago."

  Zahlfast shot me a sideways look, then looked away. "Good," he said and then added, "We never talk much about miracles at the wizards' school."

  This of course I already knew. "The chaplain cured him. The chaplain's my friend," I added, feeling the same need to justify my friendship that I had felt with the old wizard. I started to say, that is, I think he's my friend, but decided not to raise doubts.

  But I should have remembered Zahlfast was the sharpest of my teachers. "You sound somewhat dubious about this friendship."

  "Not dubious. But he had insulted me, and I insulted him, and I tried to apologize but, in a way, he wouldn't let me—especially since, I'll admit to you, I'm almost in awe of him after the miracle."

  "Don't stand in awe of those who deal with the supernatural," said Zahlfast as though making a key point at the front of the lecture hall. "Wizards too can deal with forces beyond the natural, indeed have the special training to do it. And always remember, those who can heal with supernatural aid can always sicken."

  Abruptly he changed the subject. "Anyway, it sounded from your letter as though you might be lonely, so, as I was flying in this direction any
way—" I was surprised to realize he was having almost as much trouble feeling at ease as I was. He was still my teacher, but this was my kingdom, and I was no longer a student. "It really wasn't time yet for your first checkup—"

  "My first checkup!" I cried, devastated. "You mean you go around checking on us after we leave the wizards' school? No one ever told me! Or is that just one more thing I missed?"

  "We don't tell the young wizards," said Zahlfast with an amused smile he tried to suppress. "In fact, many are checked and never even know it, at least for some years. But I knew you were sharp enough to guess it wasn't just friendly interest in seeing an old student that brought me here, after I got your letter."

  The compliment softened what would otherwise have been another devastating blow. And I had even hoped he remembered me fondly! But now I began to wonder what ulterior motive he may have had in passing me in that transformation practical—was this an experiment to see just how badly a young wizard could do?

  "So what are you checking for?"

  "In your case, I was interested in your progress. In general, it's a continuation of the school's original purpose, to organize and rationalize the practice of wizardry, to be sure it doesn't go astray. That's why I wanted to learn more about your study of herbal magic and who has been teaching you."

  "It's my predecessor. He lives not far from here, and he's taught me the rudiments," I said, feeling somewhat defensive, whereas I had expected to be proudly demonstrating an unusual accomplishment when I first met a wizard from the school again.

  "He's your friend, too," said Zahlfast. It was a statement, not a question. "There aren't many young wizards who are even on speaking terms with their predecessors."

  "Is that what you mean when you say I'm sharp?" I said, hoping for another compliment.

  "Why do you think you were hired as Royal Wizard of Yurt?"

  "I'd assumed I was the only person who applied."

  "You may have been; I'm not sure. But when I heard you'd applied, I talked to the Master, and we agreed. I wrote to the constable of Yurt and told him not to hire anyone else."

  "That was the constable who you met at the gate," I said, wondering again why Zahlfast had not wanted to come in. But another question took precedence. "Why did you want me in Yurt? Was it to keep me out of the way?"

  "Not at all. We knew something was happening in Yurt, something odd, and it needed someone who combined your intuitive flair for magic with the potential, at least, to work hard and master academic magic. Neither careful mastery of spells nor innate ability would have been enough without the other. Also, of course, we hoped that here, away from the distractions of the City, you might meet enough challenges and find enough leisure that you really would set yourself to learning the magic we had tried to teach you."

  There was not nearly enough of a compliment in this to mitigate the sting. "You mean you knew all along what was going on in Yurt? Why didn't you tell me?"

  "Actually," said Zahlfast, with a snort that could have been amusement, "I have no idea what's going on in Yurt. I was hoping you would tell me."

  "There's an evil presence in the castle," I said slowly, looking at my hands. "I don't know where it's coming from, and sometimes I can hardly even sense it. Most of the time I think it's a person, but I don't know how to find out which one. Once or twice I've thought it could be a demon, but the old wizard says there was never any evil presence in the castle before I arrived, and I don't think even I could have summoned a demon by mistake."

  "An evil presence," said Zahlfast, as though this answered a question. "We've known in the City for several years that there was a supernatural focus here in Yurt, or at least nearby, but it was impossible to localize it precisely or even to say whether it was for good or evil. Several of the wizards at the school thought it might be a witch living in the forest who had taken the step into black magic."

  "It's not in the forest," I said positively. "It's here in the castle. It was coming home to his kingdom that nearly killed the king."

  "I knew it was here in the castle when I got your letter."

  "But how could you know that? I didn't say anything about it."

  "The very paper your letter was written on was permeated with the supernatural. Didn't you know that? That's why, when I arrived and discovered that the supernatural influence stopped at the moat, I asked you to meet me outside."

  "But how could you tell anything from the paper?" I demanded, intensely frustrated, thinking the wizards of the school had been deliberately withholding information from me. But then I saw Zahlfast smiling and said in a lower voice, "Was that maybe in one of the lectures I missed?"

  It turned out that it was. There was a rather simple spell to recognize the presence of a supernatural influence, a modern, more universal spell than the one the old wizard had taught me for detecting magic potions. I glanced over the garden walls at the turrets of the castle and felt my heart sink. I didn't want to try the spell. Yurt was my kingdom, and I loved it, and if I confirmed my fears I might never feel the same about it again.

  "Do you think the king will become sick again?" I said.

  "You think he was made ill by supernatural forces?"

  "Dominic thought an evil spell had been put on him," I said, "even though I didn't believe him at first." I gave Zahlfast a quick summary of the king's three-year illness and miraculous recovery.

  "If he really was healed miraculously," said Zahlfast somewhat dubiously, "he should be safe from black magic, or at least from the effects of the particular evil spell that was put on the castle."

  "But will the spell now turn against someone else?" I said, "such as the queen?" This was not a possibility I had contemplated until I said it, but it suddenly seemed fearfully likely. "Or do you think it's not merely a spell, but a demon loose in the castle?"

  Zahlfast did not answer for a minute. "I'm not the person to ask," he said at last. "I specialize in transformations, not demonology." I remembered then a conversation I had had with him in the City several years ago, during which it had become clear that he was just as terrified of demons as I was. But he stood up. "I'll come into the castle with you and see what I can tell."

  But the first thing he said, as we entered the courtyard with its whitewashed walls and green shutters, was, "What a lovely little castle! None of the other young wizards can have as charming a kingdom."

  In my chambers, however, he looked around quickly, then said, "The supernatural influence is quite strong here."

  I was about to demand whether he could think I was practicing black magic myself, but then I looked at his face and decided it was safer not to ask.

  Instead I said, "Let me show you my glass telephones. They don't work, but they're very attractive."

  At this he actually laughed. "Somehow, when you left the school, I never imagined that you were the type of wizard who becomes a telephone technician."

  "Neither did I," I said cheerfully. "That's why they don't work. But the queen wanted me to try." I thought guiltily that it had been some time since I had tried anything new.

  "I'll show you something, though," I said, reaching one of the telephones down from the shelf. "Watch the base." I set the instrument down, lifted the receiver, and spoke the name attached to the wizards' school.

  "Pretty amusing, isn't it," I said as the faint ringing came through the receiver and the base lit up to show the school's telephone on its table, with someone reaching to answer it. "Wait; it gets even funnier. Try to talk." I handed him the receiver.

  Just as the Lady Maria and I had done, he shouted, "Hello? Can you hear me?" to an unhearing wizard at the other end, even though that wizard's voice came through faint but clear.

  But when the other wizard hung up and the telephone base went dark, Zahlfast was not laughing. "You realize, of course," he said with what I might even have imagined was awe, "that no one's ever been able to do this before: attach a far-seeing spell to an object."

  "But it doesn't work as a teleph
one. Sometimes I've even thought that whatever evil spell was put on the castle was hindering my magic."

  "I think you'll be able to make it work," he said in his school teacher voice. "Keep working at it."

  At that moment we were interrupted by a knock. I opened it, expecting the Lady Maria ready to resume her lesson, and was surprised to see Joachim.

  I tried to draw him inside, to introduce him to Zahlfast, but he wouldn't let me.

  "I'm going," he said, "and I wanted to let someone know I probably won't be back for morning service. The king and queen aren't here."

  "I think they went hunting. But where are you going?"

  He paused as though unwilling to say, but his enormous black eyes steadily met mine. "A girl down in the village, five miles from here, was bitten by a viper last week," he said at last, as though there had been no pause. "The doctors have tried all their draughts and potions, but nothing has availed. She's near death. They want me to pray for her."

  He turned and was gone before I could answer, striding across the courtyard to where one of the stableboys had a horse saddled and ready. A man in a brown tunic was mounted and waiting by the gate.

  "Is that your friend the chaplain?" said Zahlfast behind me.

  I nodded, watching the two ride through the gate and away. I knew, without the chaplain telling me, that the news of the king's miraculous recovery must have spread at once throughout the kingdom, and that anyone now who needed a miracle would not be satisfied with their local priest but would want the castle chaplain.

  "So tell me more about herbal magic," said Zahlfast.

  Although I had had some success teaching a little magic to the king and the Lady Maria, it was extremely odd to be suddenly explaining something to my former teacher. It was also difficult to do with no herbs at hand; the sense that the old wizard had taught me, of how to determine a plant's properties just by handling it, was difficult to put into words.

  But I had been able to explain at least some of the basic principles when I heard voices, the sound of hoofs, and the queen's laugh in the courtyard and realized the hunting party had returned. "You'll have to stay for dinner," I said, "and I'd be delighted to have you stay with me if you were willing to spend the night. Even for you, a two-hundred mile flight can't be easy."