THE WITCH AND THE
   CATHEDRAL
                        C. Dale Brittain
  Copyright © 1995 by C. Dale Brittain



                         DEDICATION
  For Bruce and Doug, who thought it would be mushy




                            PART ONE

                         The Cathedral
   That morning I thought my main problem was the three drunk newts.
But that was before I got the telephone call from the chaplain. He was not
in fact the chaplain anymore, but then a minute ago the newts had been
three drunk students.
  I had been sitting in on Zahlfast's class at the wizards' school. He
paused in his description of the basic transformations spell to explain the
dangers inherent in its use. Any magic spell, even illusions, can have
repercussions far beyond the expected, and advanced spells if not done
properly can lead to loss of identity or even life.
  The three drunk wizardry students, sitting together and laughing
quietly in the back, had apparently decided to test for themselves what
these dangers might be.
   We dived for the newts before they had a chance to disappear into
cracks in the floor. "Hold on to those two, Daimbert," said Zahlfast "I'll
start on this one."
   Hie newts wiggled in my hands as I tried to hold their smooth bodies
gently. The loss of a tail or a leg as a newt would mean permanent damage
to the student as a human, and if they escaped as newts we might never be
able to return them to themselves. They were quite attractive, light green
with bright red spots, but their tiny newt eyes looked up at me with
human fear.
   The rest of the class had retreated to the back of the room. Zahlfast
glared at them. "What are you waiting for? This is all the demonstration
you'll get today." The students left in some confusion, and he returned to
his spell.
   It is harder to undo someone else's spell than one of your own. As I
started on one of the newts I was holding, Zahlfast finished with his, and
suddenly a student stood before him, or rather slumped. He was slightly
green, but I think that was from feeling ill rather than the aftereffects of
being a newt.
  I finished with mine and handed the third to Zahlfast. "How can they be
drunk so early in the day? I didn't think the taverns down in the City were
even open yet."
  Zahlfast spoke the final words in the Hidden Language to break the
spell. "Bottles in their rooms," he said as the last dazed and frightened
newt became a dazed and frightened wizardry student.
   "We never had bottles in our rooms when I was a student here," I said
self-righteously.
  Zahlfast looked at me sideways, a smile twitching the corner of his
mouth. "As I recall, you had plenty of trouble at the transformations
practical exam, even perfectly sober."
  I preferred not to recall all my embarrassment with those frogs, even
twenty years afterwards, so I loftily ignored this comment. I had, after all,
become a perfectly competent wizard in the meantime--or at least had
managed to persuade the wizards' school of my abilities enough that they
had invited me back for a few months as an outside lecturer.
  "Now," said Zahlfast to the students. "Are you sober enough to listen to
reason?"
   "Spill a spell, spoil a spell," blurted one and collapsed on his face. I was
interested to see that they still excused themselves for magical mixups
with the same catch-phrase we had used years ago.
  At that moment one of the other young wizards came in. "Telephone
call for you, sir," he said to me. I excused myself and followed him out and
down the hall.
   I felt as I always did a stir of pride in using a telephone with a magical
far-seeing attachment, allowing one to see as well as hear the person at the
other end. Although I had invented the attachment essentially by accident,
as my first and only success in technical wizardry, it had over the years
become widely adopted.
  The view-screen lit up, showing the face of the man waiting to talk to
me: gaunt, with deep-set eyes over high cheekbones and a mouth that
looked as though it rarely smiled. It was Joachim, dean of the cathedral of
Caelrhon.
   His dark eyes looked at me unseeing. Without a far-seeing attachment
on his own telephone, he could not tell I was there until I spoke. The
bishop, always dubious about magic, had doubtless considered it enough
of a concession to institutionalized wizardry to allow the installation of
even an ordinary magic telephone.
   "Hello!" I said. "I haven't heard from you in ages!" Although
traditionally priests and wizards never get along, Joachim and I had been
friends, at least most of the time, since I had first taken up the position of
Royal Wizard of Yurt and found him Royal Chaplain there.
   "I'm glad I was able to reach you, Daimbert. I need your help." Joachim
had never been strong on social chit-chat. "As you may have heard, we're
just starting construction here in Caelrhon on a new cathedral. But now
something very odd is happening--something which may involve magic."
   I was flattered but surprised. Since Joachim had become dean of the
cathedral, he had studiously acted as though wizardry had nothing to offer
a priest. "What land of problem is it?"
  He hesitated. "I would just as soon not explain over the telephone,
especially as I haven't talked to the bishop yet. Is there any way you could
come here?"
  It must be serious, then. "I would, Joachim, but there's one difficulty.
Caelrhon's not my kingdom. You need to talk to your own Royal Wizard.
He would be furious to find another wizard interfering in his kingdom."
  I didn't mention that long-ago incident, when I had been in Yurt only a
year, when the king of Yurt had told the king of Caelrhon that if his wizard
couldn't install a magic telephone easily he could offer my services. I had
innocently assumed that Sengrim, Caelrhon's wizard, knew all about it,
but he had come home to find me seated like an invader at his desk, his
books scattered all over his study. When he burst through the door, I was
so startled I dropped and smashed the glass telephone I was working
on--the spells hadn't been working right anyway--and gasped, "Spill a
spell, spoil a spell," which hadn't helped. Neither had sending him as a
peace-offering an inscribed copy of Zahlfast's new edition of
Transformations for Beginners when it came out the next year. He had
returned it with a frosty note saying that he had no books for beginners in
his library. Ever since then, Sengrim had done his best to suggest that I
was incapable of even the simplest illusions.
  The dean lifted an eyebrow a fraction. "I would have asked for that
wizard's help," he said dryly, "except for one thing. I officiated at his
memorial service last week."
   "He's dead?" I demanded with a rather slow grasp of the obvious, and
feeling instant remorse for all the times I had thought of Sengrim as a
bitter old man who wasn't nearly as good a wizard as he wanted to be
considered. "Nobody here at the school has heard about it! Do you know
what happened?"
   "He seems to have blown himself up in his study," said the dean slowly,
"taking half the tower with him. Apparently he had just had some sort of a
quarrel with his crown prince, and most likely his anger made him
careless with his chemicals and herbs. There was not enough left of him to
bury. . . ."
  I had to tell the masters of the school about this at once. They avoided
checking up too often on all of us Royal Wizards of the western kingdoms,
but they would certainly want to know that Sengrim was dead. And the
royal court of Caelrhon would doubtless be asking soon for a new Royal
Wizard.
  "So," said Joachim, "can you come?"
  "The series of lectures I'm giving will finish this afternoon," I said,
dragging my attention back from the image of Sengrim blowing himself
up in the royal court of Caelrhon to the question of magical problems in
the cathedral city, ten miles down the road. "I'd been planning to return
home shortly, but I can visit you first. Would tomorrow be all right?"
  He did smile then. Tomorrow would be excellent." He rang off, and I
hurried away to find Zahlfast again.
   The rest of the day was very busy, as I gave my last lecture, talked
afterwards to several of the more promising (or least discouraging)
students, then packed up my clothes and books to have them shipped back
to Yurt. Those who had known Sengrim were saddened, although the
students' reaction didn't go much beyond commenting that they were just
as glad that modern wizardry had essentially eliminated herbs and
chemicals. At the end of the afternoon I went to talk to the Master of the
school.
   There had been talk of my organizing some workshops after the lecture
series was over, but I was just as happy to abandon this project. They had
assigned me to the technical wizardry division although as a student I had
managed to avoid any courses there. More than once I had felt like a
fraud, lecturing away to a group of intensely serious and pale-faced young
wizards who, in at least some areas, must know more magic than I did.
   I had only found enough to say to fill the lectures by trying to make
them think about magic beyond their textbooks. What would they do, I
challenged them, if they discovered themselves in a situation where the
dry series of spells which modern wizardry does so well failed them and
they had to improvise? They had given me puzzled looks and asked me to
write out the improvised spells so they could memorize them. Some of the
other teachers had started coming to my class, sitting quietly, at the back
of the room, and I was fairly sure they were collecting stories about my
experiences.
   The Master was in his study. Years ago I had gotten over my old terror,
but I still stood in awe of him. The story was that he had started the
wizards' school a hundred and fifty years ago as a retirement project, but
his ice-blue eyes were as sharp as ever.
   He was (gratifyingly) sorry I was going, but not (disappointingly)
because he wished he could enjoy my company longer. Rather, he was
concerned that I was going to help a cathedral dean. "You know wizards
try to stay aloof from the Church and their worries about sin--after all, we
don't want priests interfering in magic."
   I had heard all this many times. It is best not to get involved in the
Church because the priests think they have the right answers, whereas
instead we wizards have the right answers all the time, "He's not
interfering in magic--as soon as he ran into a magical problem, he had the
sense to send for a wizard."
  He nodded slowly. "All right, but remember: our responsibility is to help
mankind, and mankind would be helped more by technically trained
wizards who also knew now to improvise than by priests talking about the
supernatural.'
   I thought he was through, but after a moment's hesitation he spoke
again. "While I don't want to sound as though I'm accusing your friend,
there have been rumors, stories, the last month or two, apparently
centered in the twin kingdoms of Yurt and Caelrhon.. .. Some members of
the aristocracy are starting to talk as though they don't need wizards, even
as though they resent us. Something like this must have been behind the
quarrel Sengrim had just before his death. Though I must say he had been
acting erratic lately; he even became furious with me because none of us
here were interested in some ideas he had about teaching different kinds
of magic. But his behavior must have intensified local opposition to
wizardry. When I telephoned the royal constable of Caelrhon a short time
ago, he was very brusque and unhelpful and said his king had no intention
of hiring a new wizard. Our first idea, of course, is that these rumors are
being fueled by the priests. So while you're at the cathedral, keep your eyes
open."
   In spite of going to bed late, I awoke before dawn. I rolled over with the
feeling that I was being pulled away from something indescribably sweet
and realized that I had been dreaming about Yurt. It was little more than
a sensation, but I recognized in the dream the kingdom as it had been
when I first arrived there, while everyone was still alive, before anyone
started to grow old.
   I looked out my window toward the eastern sky, where a faint yellow
glow presaged the sunrise. In many ways my life as Royal Wizard had
grown better and better over the years, as I became more sure of my
abilities, as I was able to work out plans and programs and see them take
effect. But six years ago, during the terrible winter of bitter cold and
raging fever throughout the western kingdoms, the old fang of Yurt had
died. Starting then, I had begun to feel nostalgic, sometimes even
melancholic, as though the best part of my life had already passed by.
   It was also that winter that several members of the cathedral chapter of
Caelrhon had died, including the dean. Joachim, who a few years earlier
had finally yielded to pressure to leave the royal court and join the
cathedral, had immediately been elected to replace him. With his new
responsibilities as the chapter's senior officer, I doubted that he had any
time to look back nostalgically to what once had been.
  I swung my feet out of bed, too awake to go back to sleep. I was much
too young to start living in the past-- I probably had a good two hundred
years to go, barring run-ins with demons or dragons. During these last
months at the school there had been hints that I would be welcome if I
decided to stay on. I would not of course join the small group of
permanent faculty members, all far older than me and much better at
magic, but there was plenty of other occupation available here, assisting
in advanced courses or aiding in administration, as well as giving the
occasional series of lectures.
  I had always brushed aside such hints. Being back in the great City with
money to spend had somehow not turned out to be as exciting as I had
imagined when an impoverished student. But now I found myself
considering whether I ought to take the opportunity once I had solved the
cathedral's problems for them. Leaving Yurt for the school would be better
than allowing myself to be permanently homesick for a life that no longer
existed.


                                     II
  Zahlfast came to see me off. We stood on the little plaza in front of the
wizards' school, on the highest point of the City. Clouds whipped miles
above us across a pale blue sky.
  "I'm glad you were able to give your lecture series," Zahlfast said. "I'm
sure the students benefited."
  "How are the newts today?"
   He laughed. "Once they'd sobered up, I think they were thoroughly
frightened--now I just hope that none of the other students try something
similar."
   "Is it my imagination," I asked, "or are some of the students even more
irresponsible now than they were when I was here?"
  Zahlfast shook his head ruefully. "If you're imagining it, then so am I.
You know we used to warn students against summoning, and normally
wouldn't even teach them the spell? Well, now we don't even mention it
exists for fear that the warning would only incite them."
  I had a secret about the summoning spell, but as the secret was now
twenty years old it would keep a while longer.
  "Elerius has been saying we need to tighten down on the students,"
Zahlfast commented, "give them real discipline from the beginning rather
than allow them as much room to find their own way."
  "Elerius?" I asked in surprise. Elerius, three years ahead of me, was
rumored to have been the best student the school ever produced. He was
now Royal Wizard of one of the largest and wealthiest of the western
kingdoms. I had always viewed him with a certain suspicion, but I had
never been sure how much of that was merely jealousy of his abilities. "I
hadn't realized you were putting him on the faculty."
  "No," said Zahlfast with a smile. "I doubt we'll add anyone to the
permanent faculty for years, though it's always worthwhile to hear the
thoughts of our former students. The Master and I haven't felt that
wizardry needed a more rigid structure--but if there's a recurrence of
newts I may change my mind. Elerius always has ideas; not long ago he
even tried to persuade us to teach the magic of fire here on top of
everything else."
  Zahlfast and I chatted for a few more minutes, the slightly awkward
conversation of two people when it is time for one of them to go, and yet
their friendship makes them want to delay the parting.
  And then Zahlfast startled me much more than I wanted to admit, by
speaking to me direcdy, mind to mind. "Beware of the Church. The priests
hate and fear wizardry, and they seek to destroy you."
   His eyes held mine steadily. I shook my head without responding.
Although all young wizards learn in their final years of training to
communicate with each other without speaking, telepathic
communication is extremely rare at the school. In speaking mind to mind
one's own mental fences are down, and in an atmosphere of unruly
students it is usually safest to keep one's thoughts sealed up securely. All I
could think was that Zahlfast wanted to impress his warning on me with
special emphasis.
   The alternative was that someone was watching us from hiding, and
Zahlfast wanted to warn me without him overhearing, but this seemed
highly unlikely. Whatever odd stories there might be about priests and the
aristocracy resenting wizardry, I doubted it had progressed to spies
infiltrating the school.
  "Good-bye," I said, shaking Zahlfasf s hand. "Thank you again for
having me here." I took off flying, soaring high over the City's spires and
then inland, where the dense urban area quickly gave way to the fields,
woods, and isolated villages of the western kingdoms.
  It was a beautiful day of late spring, and the earth below me was spread
with a hundred shades of green, but I thought less of the scenery than of
Zahlfast s warning. It was tantalizingly unspecific. Several times I had
wondered if the older wizards deliberately withheld information from us,
perhaps as self-sufficiency training or even as a test, and they might be
doing it again. I didn't like it, especially since I hadn't been their student
for close to twenty years.
  The magic required for flying is hard mental and physical work, so it
was with relief several hours later that I saw the sharp cathedral spires of
the little city that served as commercial and religious center of the twin
kingdoms of Yurt and Caelrhon. To preserve the sensibilities of cathedral
priests who might not know their dean had sent for a wizard--and who
apparently hated and feared me--I dropped to the ground half a mile from
the city and walked in.
  A band of Romneys was camped in the meadow in front of the city
gates. Horses and goats were tethered behind their brightly painted
caravans. The smoke of a dozen fires rose lazily upwards. Several children
came running to meet me, black eyes shining.
  "A magic trick, a magic trick!" the oldest cried, while the younger ones
whispered to each other in the Romney language. Even the smallest girl
wore big gold hoop earrings.
  "All right," I said with a smile. A lot of people were suspicious of the
Romneys, but I liked them. There were stories that they practiced a little
magic themselves, secretly and without proper training, which meant that
the unwary were in constant danger of slipping over into black magic. I
myself had never seen anything either evil or magical about them.
   I put a few words of the Hidden Language together and in a few
moments had created an illusory scarlet dragon. It reared back on its
fourth and final pair of legs, roaring silently and growing until it stood ten
feet high.
  The children seemed oddly unimpressed. "Well, it's a nice dragon," said
the oldest boy. He reached his hand toward the metallic gleam of the
scarlet scales, and a vicious but insubstantial set of claws passed
harmlessly through his arm.
   Even though illusions are among the first things taught at the wizards'
school, it takes years of practice to be able to do them quickly and
consistently. The first time I had ever made an illusory dragon, it had not
been nearly this good and yet it had thrown the royal court into a blind
panic. Whose illusions had these children been seeing that they could refer
to my dragon as "nice"?
   "Rather than just an illusion," continued the boy, clearly disappointed
in me but trying to be polite, "could you show us some real magic? Maybe
some invisibility, or a cloak of fire?"
  Before I had a chance to answer, a woman in a red shawl came hurrying
up. Both her front teeth were gold. She spoke quickly in Romney to the
children, who dispersed reluctantly, looking back over their shoulders at
me and my now dissolving dragon.
  "I'm sorry, sir, if the children bothered you," she said. "They're just so
curious, and they love to see magic. How about if I tell your fortune to
repay you for your trouble? I'll even do it for free!"
  I was standing in what I thought of as my wizardly pose, absolutely still
except for slow breathing, hands folded and eyes fixed intently on
whomever I was facing. I had picked it up from the older wizards at the
school and had become quite good at it.
   But the Romney woman gave me a good-natured smile. I abandoned
attempts at dignity and smiled back. "How will you tell my fortune? You
know natural magic is useless for predicting the future, and I hope you
aren't stirring in a little of the supernatural!" I was able to speak lightly
because I had already probed delicately for magic and not found any.
   "We have our ways," she said. If she was trying to be awe-inspiring, she
was having no more success than I. "Now let me see!" She walked around
me slowly, examined the front and back of my head, squeezed my arm
above the elbow, plucked out a hair and held it up to the light, and finally
stared at my shoes.
   "Yes," she said at last, and this time without a smile. "I can see your
future. Shortly you will meet someone beautiful and mysterious, and you
will fall deeply in love."
   This was so stereotypically what Romney women told young men at the
fairs--and not even for free!--that I had to laugh. "Don't you have any
other fortunes? You know wizards never marry."
  "Love and marriage are two different things," she said as though the
platitude had great significance. "Now, if you will excuse me, sir."
   She returned to the caravans where the children had been watching us
impatiently, and I continued toward the city gates. Although I was not
particularly concerned about meeting someone beautiful and mysterious, I
did wonder who had given the children a demonstration of magic. It is far
harder to make something invisible than to make an illusion appear, and
to be able to surround oneself in real fire without being burned takes
powerful magic indeed.
   Inside the gates, I threaded my way through the narrow streets to the
little plaza in front of the cathedral. The last time I had been here it had
been full of the carts and stalls of farmers, merchants, and foodsellers.
Now it was a construction site, jammed with lumber, heaps of cut stone,
workmen's huts, the vats where mortar was mixed, and the wooden forms
used to lay out the stonework patterns on the ground before they were
hoisted up. A huge windlass was being erected, its treadmill big enough
for three men.
   I paused for a moment at the edge of the site. The old cathedral was still
intact, and they seemed to be planning to build the new, larger church
around it. So far they had concentrated their efforts on the west front,
building a new fagade and towers thirty feet in front of the old main steps.
One of the new towers, hung with scaffolding, was already as tall as the
towers of the old cathedral.
  After working out the route that would be least likely to end in
something being dropped on my head, I hurried across the plaza toward
the church's entrance. Above the old doors, the figures of Christ and the
apostles still stared stonily down, and the figures of the damned and the
saved still pleaded or prayed at their feet.
   All around the air was loud with the shouts of workmen and the sounds
of hammers and stone chisels, and my nose was assailed by the mixed
smells of mortar, sweat, and the sausages someone was grilling for lunch.
But when I went through the heavy doors of the old cathedral I passed
from noise and bright sunshine into the dimness and stillness of the
church's interior.
  While I was still blinking a young man came up, a junior priest or a
seminary student. "The dean's expecting me," I told him. There was a
quick step outside the little office off the nave where the young priest had
put me to wait, and Joachim came in. "Good," he said. "I'm glad you've
come."
   I seized his hand, delighted to see him, even though lately he had always
seemed older than I remembered. His handshake was still much stronger
than mine, but the once black hair was gray at the temples, and his face
had lines I had forgotten. My own hair and beard had turned snow white
before I was thirty, but other than that I looked almost exactly the same as
when I graduated from the wizards' school. When I had learned the
complex spells that slow down aging, I had not counted on all my friends
leaving me behind.
  "Sit down," said the dean without preamble. "I have only a few minutes
now, and I need to tell you about our problems."
  "Do you think you could have a demon here?" I asked cautiously. I had
been wondering what would be serious enough to make Joachim call me.
  "Of course not," he said with a faint smile, about all he ever allowed
himself. "Would a priest ask for help from a wizard against the
supernatural? I think the problem's natural, but it's magic."
  I was fine as long as I stayed away from the supernatural battle between
angels and demons. "So you think someone's practicing renegade magic?"
  "That seems the most likely explanation. Construction on the new
cathedral goes well during the day, but something happens at night. The
watchmen have seen lights, even what looks like a flame flickering on the
new tower. In the morning, the workmen sometimes find material moved
around, stones, scaffolding, things no one should be able to move
unaided."
  The Romneys," I said. "It must have something to do with what the
Romney children saw."
  He nodded slowly. "Several members of the cathedral chapter have
thought it was the Romneys' doing. You must have seen them as you came
in--are they capable of casting powerful spells?"
   "Not the Romneys themselves. But I talked briefly to some of the
children--I even made them an illusory dragon--and they seemed
disappointed in my illusions. They hinted they had recently seen someone
else doing much more powerful magic."
   "This band has been camped outside the walls for about six weeks. The
bishop, the city mayor, and the constable of the castle have all been
unhappy about having them there, but they do not hurt anyone so there
has been no reason to drive them away."
  "What is it," I said, "maybe ten years since the Romneys first started to
appear in the western kingdoms? I wonder where they were before then."
  "Probably in the eastern kingdoms," said Joachim without interest.
"Look. I shall be busy all afternoon, but I want to have dinner with you and
we can talk more then. Do you think you could go up on the new tower to
search for magical influences? Now is a good time, while the workmen
take their noon break."
   Far above us, a bell began ringing. Joachim stood up and pulled a silk
stole across his shoulders. "I must go; I'm performing the noon service at
the high altar." But he paused at the door to smile before he was gone. "It
is good to see you."
   Being the head of the cathedral chapter, I thought, had given him an
attitude of command he had never had in Yurt I didn't mind him ordering
me around, but I wondered if he even realized he was doing so. I watched
his black-clad figure hurry down the nave toward the high altar, where an
acolyte was lighting the candles.
   As I went back out through the heavy cathedral doors I was
immediately struck again by the sounds, the smells, and the brightness of
noon. Workmen were starting down from the scaffolding. I would have
liked some lunch myself, but I had been told to look for magical influences.
  First I found the crew foreman. "The dean's asked me to look over your
construction site. I'm a wizard, and he told me you had been having some
sort of problem."
   "All right," said the foreman. His manner was not insolent, but it was
certainly not respectful either. "If you're a wizard I guess you can fly, so I'll
let you have a look. But I wouldn't let anyone else!"
   He was short, thin and wiry, with very long fingers. I glanced down at
his bare feet; his toes too were unusually long. The workmen now
assembling were all built similarly. I remembered hearing that there was a
valley somewhere far to the north that produced men both strong enough
to move great stones and agile enough to carry them up a precipice.
  The lower part of what would become the main stairs of the southern
tower was finished, so I started climbing. The recently quarried stone was
smooth and light-colored, still covered with a fine coating of dust. I didn't
want to fly, at least at first, because I hoped to tell better what was
happening from close up.
  By the time I reached the fifth landing my legs had begun to ache, but I
kept on. The last workmen shot by, jumping down whole series of steps
with little apparent regard for their safety. What would one day become
highly complex stone sculptures on the wall were now just roughed in, and
the many windows were still no more than openings in the walls, without
their tracery or glass.
  And then the stone stairs ended and I was out in the open. I could just
detect a faint hint of magic, as though a spell had been cast nearby
sometime earlier.
   The tower continued above me, though in much less complete form.
Rough wooden steps continued upwards, and after a brief pause to catch
my breath I followed them. Wind whirled around me, tugging at my
clothes and hair.
   The wooden steps were succeeded in turn by a series of toeholds. I
glanced down and wished I hadn't. The tower zoomed downward,
narrowing dizzily at what seemed an impossible distance. The workmen,
their sheds and fires, and all the piles of materials were reduced to
indistinct lumps. I could hear voices but very faintly, like the voices of
insects.
 But the magical influence seemed stronger here. I breathed deeply for a
moment and began climbing again.
   With sheer force of will I made my hands, one after the other, leave the
crevices they were gripping and feel upward for the next. My knees
trembled so hard that it was difficult to make my toes follow my hands. I
had climbed as high as the towers of the old cathedral, and was abruptly
started by the sound of the bells. I plastered myself against the vertical
stone face of the half-finished tower. If I could I would have held on with
my ears.
   When the bells stopped ringing, I made myself continue to the final
scaffolding where I sat quietly, careful to make no movement that would
start the board swaying on its ropes, waiting for my heartbeat to return to
normal
   This is ridiculous, I told myself. I was supposed to be a competent
wizard. The workmen went up and down here all the time, and they
couldn't even fly! But knowing that I could save myself even if I suddenly
hurtled toward the ground was not reassurance enough. I tried to distract
myself by probing again for magic. Although there was no other wizard on
the tower at the moment, the faint trace of magic certainly suggested
someone had been here earlier--probably someone who had had the sense
to fly up, rather than letting his body discover, by climbing every step, just
how high he had ascended.
  But what would a wizard be doing here? Someone trained in the school
would have received all the same warnings I had about getting involved
with the Church. I tried to analyze the faint traces of magic; it was hard to
be certain, but I did not think it was a school spell. It might have been cast
by a very old wizard whose training predated the school.
  There could also have been a magician here, I told myself, or even a
witch. A magician would know a little magic, probably from a few abortive
years of training at the school. But most of the young men who left
without finishing the wizardry program also left without learning to fly.
   Witches I knew less about. Women were not admitted to the school,
although the possibility had sometimes been raised in recent years. But
there were always rumors of women who had learned a little magic,
doubtless dark and arcane. I had never actually seen a western witch, but
the one witch I had met, in the East, had mixed the supernatural power of
evil into her spells.
   I recalled again the Romney children and their disappointment over my
spells. They had clearly seen someone working magic more powerful than
the illusions a magician might use to make a living at the fairs, more
complex than something a witch might be expected to know. But
speculation was neither stopping whoever had been on the tower nor
getting me down. I took a deep breath, deciding there was nothing more
to be learned here, and forced myself to let go.
  As I dropped into open air, I had half a second's doubt whether vertigo
might have made me forget how to fly. But I swooped downward easily as I
had on a thousand other occasions and landed in the middle of the
construction site, where the workmen had just finished the sausages.
  "I'm through checking the tower for now," I told the crew foreman. "I
won't be in your way any longer."
   He smiled at me almost impudently, wiping the grease from his mouth.
I wondered if he guessed my terror up among the scaffolding. "And what
did you find out?"
  "Someone has certainly been practicing magic up there, probably
another wizard, although not today."
   "The priests worry a lot," he said, having apparently no more respect for
them than he did for me. "We were concerned at first; after all, we don't
want anything stolen or our work set back. But then we realized it's
nothing serious. My men and I have been working construction in this
part of the world for many years, but in the valley we came from, far up in
the north, you learn not to worry too much about the Little People or fairy
lights at night"
   Fairy lights, I thought. This was a different interpretation than the
flickering fire Joachim had mentioned. I wasn't sure I believed in fairies.
They were a popular feature in children's stories, and hearing my
grandmother's stories about them when I was little was probably one of
the reasons I had been attracted to magic in the first place, but they had
always had an unreal quality to them. On the other hand, the dragons that
also appeared in children's stories were certainly real.
  "Well," said the foreman, "it's time we were back at work"
  I excused myself and found a path out of the construction site, then
turned to look back at the half-finished tower. The small figures of
workmen were already clustered along the scaffolding, and several were on
the treadmill, winching up a load of stones.
    An inn opened onto the street in front of me. Feeling a strong need for
lunch after my experiences, I ducked my head and went inside. I wondered
if the mothers in the northern valley worried about their children climbing
too high or going too close to precipices, or whether they encouraged them
in such explorations.
    After a plate of sausages and a mug of beer, the terrors of clinging to
the vertical side of a tower a hundred and fifty feet up had receded nicely.
Since Joachim had said he would be busy, I went to see what diversion the
little city of Caelrhon offered.
   I had come here relatively frequently over the years. It was the closest
city to the royal castle of Yurt, even though located in the adjacent
kingdom, and the royal family of Yurt owned a small castle here. They
came for fairs and carnivals and occasionally for services in the
cathedral--the late king had married his queen here, over twenty years
ago.
   After spending the last three months in the great City by the sea,
however, I found the streets and shop windows here held little to interest
me. After wandering around for a quarter hour, I decided to try again to
talk to the Romney children. I went out through the open gates toward
where they had been camped that morning.
   But the brightly painted caravans were gone. Less than four hours
earlier, dozens of men, women, and children had been here. Now there
was only a broad patch of trampled grass and the ashes from their dead
fires. I walked around the abandoned campsite for several minutes
without finding anything of interest other than a single gold earring, small
enough to be a child's, which I slipped into my pocket.
   I hesitated, wondering if I should follow the Romneys. They couldn't
have been on the road for long, and their shaggy horses would not be able
to pull loaded caravans very rapidly. Flying, I could quickly search all the
roads leading out of the city.
   But was there any reason to find them? They had, according to
Joachim, been camped outside the city for six weeks, which I thought was
fairly long for them. It must be simple coincidence that their decision to
move on came the same day as my arrival.
  Playing with the earring in my pocket, I wondered if returning it to its
owner was excuse enough to catch up to the Romneys and decided that it
was not. If their departure was indeed coincidence, then they would have
nothing to tell me that I needed to know. But if they had moved off as a
result of my appearance that morning, fearing that I would further
question the children about the person they had seen working powerful
magic, then even if I caught up to them they would deny any knowledge of
anything.
  I turned to go back through the city gates. If whoever had been casting
magic spells on the new tower, fairy or wizard, was with the Romneys,
then maybe I had scared him off and Joachim's problems were over. But I
didn't believe in fairies and had been, at least a few hours ago, fairly sure
that no one in the Romney encampment knew magic.
  Late afternoon found me in the cathedral listening to the organ.
   From the main doors I had followed the Tree of Life worked in mosaic
tiles the length of the nave. I started with the tree's roots and walked
across branches and leaves among which appeared first fish, then insects,
serpents, toads, rabbits, and deer. Now I leaned against a pillar at the
transept, my feet among men and women, old and young, lords and
peasants, sinners and saints.
  Even before coming through the doors I had heard the organ. From
outside, its notes competed awkwardly with the lighthearted songs the
workmen were singing as they closed down for the night, but inside the
organ swept all other sounds away. The sun's horizontal rays poured
through the stained glass, lighting up a church interior that had seemed
dim at midday. The row of organ pipes, ranging in size from scarcely
bigger than my finger to the diameter of a young tree, glowed like red
gold. A high melody rose in a hymn of praise while great chords rolled
below. The pillar against which I leaned, the stones under my feet, and the
very air around me vibrated with the bass.
   The organist finished with a flourish. As the thunder of music died
away, I became aware of Joachim beside me. I had no idea how long he
had been there. "It would make someone believe in God even if he didn't
already," I commented.
  He gave me a quick, sideways look. "That is the idea. Come to dinner,
and we'll talk."
  We went out a small side door and around to the back of the cathedral.
Here on a quiet cobbled street, at the opposite end of the church from the
new construction, the cathedral priests had their houses. As we walked
down the street a priest emerged from a covered porch to stare at us.
"Father Joachim," he said in greeting, dipping his head to the dean, but
me he glared at as though I had the word WIZARD (or even DEMON)
emblazoned on my forehead.
  "Father Norbert," Joachim replied with a nod. When we were past he
said in my ear, "Don't mind him. He's never had much use for wizards."
   The dean's house was at the far end. The carved wooden porch and the
cathedral looming over the street made the entrance very dark, but as we
stepped inside we were greeted by light. Many-paned mullion windows on
the far side of the house looked out over a hillside that sloped sharply
down toward the river and the tiled roofs of the artisans' quarter of the
city.
   A servant in black livery met us. "We'll just wash up, and then we'll eat
right away," Joachim told him. "Once we are served, you can leave us."
The servant nodded silently and disappeared.
   A senior officer of a cathedral, I thought as I dried my hands, lived fairly
well. But good living had not filled out Joachim, and his face was as gaunt
as ever. I wondered briefly if I should suspect him of being behind some
veiled attack on organized magic--which Brother Norbert appeared ready
to join--but I dismissed this. I had known Joachim too long, and, besides,
he had asked for my help.
  The servant lit the white candles on the table, served us from a large
platter, and withdrew, still without a word. As we ate, the sky outside the
window became gradually dim, and the candle flames seemed to grow
brighter and brighter, their light reflected from the polished surface of the
woodwork.
   "I climbed up the new tower after I talked to you," I said once I had
finished a plateful of chicken. "How did you find those construction
workers? It's terrifying being up on the scaffolding, yet they seem totally
fearless. Maybe their long fingers and toes allow them to cling to a surface
like tree frogs."
  "I did not hire them myself. Even though I am the elected 'head of the
cathedral chapter, the provost and the chancellor are in charge of the
cathedral edifice itself and of raising money to pay for its upkeep. There
had already been discussion for years before I arrived about building a
new cathedral. The provost had heard good things about this construction
crew from the priests of another church on which they had worked."
   "They also aren't very concerned about the strange lights at night," I
continued. "They come from somewhere far up north, and they seem to
consider magical occurrences fairly ordinary. After all, I gather that if one
went only a little further than their valley one would reach the land of
dragons. And up there it's all wild magic, not organized and channeled as
in the western kingdoms."
  "My colleagues do not like any kind of magic, wild or organized," said
Joachim, a glint in his eye. He paused to refill my winegjass. "I'm sorry if I
seemed abrupt earlier. I have a lot on my mind." Tact had never been his
strong point; although he had become no more tactful over the years, at
least he worried about it more. "When I told the bishop today I had sent
for you, he was very unhappy about bringing a wizard into the affairs of
the Church."
  "You can tell him that the wizards at the school weren't any happier
about it," I said cheerfully.
  This seemed to surprise him, but he made no comment. Instead he
asked, "And could you tell if the lights at night and the material being
moved around on the tower were due to a magic spell?"
  "Someone's certainly been working magic up there. But I'm hoping he
may have left with the Romneys." I told him about the Romney woman's
eagerness to chase the children away and the abrupt departure of the
entire camp that afternoon.
   "That would indeed solve the problem," said Joachim thoughtfully,
twirling the stem of his glass and looking somewhere over my head. "But
you say the children expected to see something spectacular, as though the
last magic-worker they had seen had not been a member of their band but
an outsider like yourself. They hoped for as good tricks from the new
wizard they had just spotted as they had from the last."
   I ignored his implication that my scarlet illusory dragon had been less
than spectacular, "If the magician or wizard is still here," I said, "the most
direct approach would be to put a spell on the tower, a magical shield that
would keep any further spells from working."
  "And could you do it?"
    I knew he'd ask that "Actually, no. I know such spells are possible, but
it's very advanced magic, and I don't have my books with me."
  "What else can you do?"
   "The other possibility would be to sit on the construction site every
night, watching for signs of magical activity, and then go up and confront
the magician if he reappears." Joachim did not answer at once, and I
hoped he was not summoning his small supply of tact to ask me to spend
the summer with the watchman. "Why are the members of the cathedral
chapter so concerned anyway? The crew foreman said it hasn't been much
of a problem. He told me he thought it was little People."
   Joachim fixed me with his enormous dark eyes. "I thought fairies were
just a story."
  "Down here, in the western kingdom, they probably are, but I'd believe
anything of the land of dragons."
  "Fairies or wizards," said Joachim, "it's sacrilegious. The bishop feels
that someone is violating the sanctity of a new edifice that will be
consecrated to God."
   "And that's why he didn't like it when you sent for me? He felt that
being saved by wizardry is scarcely an improvement over being violated by
wizardry? I hope you explained to him that bringing in a wizard to deal
with a magical problem is much more effective than trying to pray it
away. The saints have better things to do than to worry about whether the
new cathedral has fairies living in it. Besides, it may even be good for the
bishop's soul to have to deal with magic, and I'm sure the saints know
that."
  Joachim gave me a look without answering, having had long practice in
ignoring my humor.
  "Do you want to go out and see if we can spot the magician tonight?" I
asked.
   It was now full dark, and we had been slowly finishing the cheese.
Joachim pushed back his chair and rose at once. He lit a lantern, and we
stepped out his door under the low porch into the street
   "How long is it going to take to finish the cathedral?" I asked. We
walked slowly because of the unevenness of the cobblestones; neither the
lantern nor the shuttered windows of the other priests' houses did much to
light up the street. Shadows danced crazily around our feet.
   "Originally they had spoken of being done within fifteen or at the most
twenty years. But I think the provost may have changed his calculations.
The workmen are certainly working hard, but there is a limit to how fast
anyone can erect that much stonework. Some of the supplies are proving
much more expensive than the chancellor had hoped; it's possible
construction may have to stop for a time while we raise more money. It is
good that it was decided to leave the old cathedral intact, within the circle
of what will be the new one, as long as possible-- it may even be
generations before the new edifice can be dedicated." His voice was
troubled. Since Joachim was dean, I reminded myself, the cathedral was
his as much as Yurt was my kingdom.
   We came around the side of the cathedral to the edge of the
construction site. So far, they had completed half a tower. I didn't want to
think what this part of the city would be like once they had to start tearing
down houses and moving streets to accommodate the new, wider size of
the rebuilt church.
  "I like your cathedral," I said. "Why not just leave it as it is?"
  "It's six hundred years old," replied Joachim. "It's dark, it's
old-fashioned, and its roof is too low, even compared to some of the
regional parish churches that have gone up in the last decade or two. A
cathedral is the heart of the Church's administration and care of souls,
and it must reflect the glory of God."
   The watchman on the construction site came toward us when he saw
our light, holding up his own lantern to illuminate our faces. "Good
evening, Father," he said, recognizing the dean. "There have been no
disturbances so far tonight."
  "I have brought a wizard to check for the presence of magic," said
Joachim.
   We made our way through the maze of materials, even more difficult to
negotiate at night than during the day. Quick, cool breezes, twisted and
turned by the piles of building materials, whirled around us. There were
lights in the workmen's huts at the far side of the site, but the bulk of the
tower was completely dark. We leaned our heads back, looking up to
where it blocked out the stars.
  "Maybe I'll go up again to where they've got the scaffolding," I said. "Do
you want to come?"
  "I'm not going to climb up in the dark, if that's what you mean."
  "I'm going to fly. I can take you with me." I knew this was audacious.
Not only had I never suggested such a thing to Joachim before, but it was
potentially dangerous to lift anything heavy while concentrating on one's
own flying. But the night breezes and the wild shadows cast by our lantern
had made me reckless.
  Although I expected him to refuse at once, instead he hesitated so long
that I started to wonder if he was outraged or indeed had even heard me.
"The bishop would not like it," he said at last
   "But the bishop isn't here. No one will see us." The watchman had not
followed us, and the workmen were out of sight.
   Maybe the night had made him reckless too. "Just don't drop me," he
said, setting down his lantern with what might have been a chuckle. "It
would be hard to explain in the morning."
  I paused for a few seconds to find the right words in the Hidden
Language, then rose slowly and majestically up the face of the tower,
Joachim at my shoulder. His vestments fluttered slightly in the breeze. I
had been right that afternoon. Without the process of climbing, my body
had no sense of how high we had risen and no irrational fear of hurtling
downwards. I set us on the ledge at the top of the last flight of wooden
stairs with a sense of triumph.
  "Are you all right?" I asked Joachim. He had not made a sound while we
were moving upward, perhaps not even breathing.
  He let out his breath all at once. "Yes. I'm fine. It's a strange sensation.
It-- It must be what ascension would feel like."
  As there had been earlier, there was a hint of someone's magical spell,
but faint and distant, as though cast several days earlier. "Certainly no one
but me is practicing magic here at the moment," I said. "Maybe the
magician did leave with the Romneys."
   I turned back toward Joachim to ask if he wanted to catch his breath
for a few more minutes or if we should go even higher, then suddenly
staggered. Delicately, fleetingly, another mind had touched mine.
   I stumbled against a wooden brace, leaned on it, and probed in return,
but found nothing. Holding on hard to the brace, I let my mind slip lightly
from my body, searching more widely while never allowing myself to forget
for a second where I was standing. Below us in the city were a great mass
of minds, many of them already asleep, A few I could recognize, such as
the crew foreman, but most were unfamiliar and hence indistinct. None of
them seemed to be practicing magic.
   Had I imagined it? Far beyond the old cathedral, a half moon rose
slowly above the eastern horizon. The wind was rising. With the workmen
talking of fairies and Joachim of ascension, it was possible to imagine
anything tonight. The dean was whistling almost soundlessly, but I could
recognize the hymn the organist had played that afternoon. "Are you ready
to go back down?" I asked. If the magician or wizard was somewhere in
the city, probing for my magic as I was probing for his, he was at any rate
not up on the tower.
  Our descent was again silent. I was glad that I had not felt that fleeting
touch while trying to lift Joachim, or I really would have had a lot to
explain to the bishop.
  We recovered the lantern and picked our way back out of the
construction site. "Good-night," Joachim said gravely as we passed the
watchman, the first thing he had said since leaving the tower. But he
whistled again as we walked back to his house.
   Inside, however, in the light of the relit candles, his eyes looked
distressed. "Would you like some tea?" he asked distractedly.
 "Let's just finish the wine." I wondered if I should mention a delicate
mental touch I was still not completely sure I had felt.
  He emptied the bottle into our glasses. "I'm in much too responsible a
position to enjoy magical flying," he said bitterly.
  I thought about this, sipping my wine slowly. He had enjoyed flying, and
he had telephoned me to come help him in spite of the bishop. "Tell me
what's really troubling you," I said. I considered adding, "Confession is
good for the soul," but rejected the thought.
   He hesitated. I waited, knowing that at a certain level anything he said
to me was a betrayal of his position in the Church. For that matter,
Zahlfast's warning to me may have included conversations such as this
one.
   "The bishop has been bishop for nearly forty years," Joachim said at
last. "He had already been here for many years when I first came to Yurt."
  I nodded, studying his face. It had always been hard to read, and I could
only see now how truly worried he was about something.
  "This last year, he has become extremely weak. His mind is as clear as
ever, and he still directs the affairs of the diocese. But he never leaves his
house, even to go to service in the cathedral, and for the last month he has
not even left his bed. The doctors say he does not have long to live."
  I contemplated the blow it would be if I heard the old Master of the
wizards' school was dying and nodded again.
   "When they made me dean, I knew that most commonly a new bishop is
elected by the cathedral priests from among the senior officers of the
chapter. Any member of the Church could of course be elected, but
cathedral priests usually have a preference for their own officers. But since
I've only been dean for a few years, I had not thought this would be a
concern in my case. I had in fact always assumed that Norbert, the
cathedral cantor, would succeed. He is quite a venerable scholar if not a
senior officer, and very dedicated to the Church's welfare--you saw him in
the street this afternoon."
  "And aren't you the youngest of the senior officers?"
  He did not seem to hear me. "This last week both the provost and the
chancellor spoke to me, separately and privately. Neither mentioned
Father Norbert. Both said they were too old and comfortable in their
present offices to seek the position of bishop. When the old bishop dies, I
fear they may elect me bishop in his place."
  "But that's wonderful," I said. "It's an enormous honor."
  "It is an enormous responsibility," he answered with a flash from his
dark eyes. "And I know I am not worthy."
   "I'm sure the old bishop thought exactly the same thing when they
elected him," I said encouragingly.
  "But why me? What have I done to deserve this?"
  "You were Royal Chaplain of Yurt for years," I suggested.
  "A position as chaplain to an aristocratic court has never been
considered a great sign of spiritual purity."
  "And you've been to the Holy Land."
  "So have several other members of the cathedral chapter, including the
chancellor. What special merit can they imagine I have?"
  I took a sip of wine I did not want while wondering whether to remind
him. "You brought someone back from the dead."
  'That had nothing to do with my merits," he said, staring straight
ahead. "Besides, it was so long ago I doubt they remember, even if they
heard about it in the first place."
  When there was that note in his voice, I knew better than to argue with
him. Instead I said, "I think you'd be a very good bishop."
  The edge of his mouth twitched in what might have been a wry smile.
"The good opinion of a wizard is not what I need."
   I knew him too well to worry that this might be an insult. "At least if
you were bishop you wouldn't have to worry about someone else's
disapproval if you needed help with another magical problem."
   He leaned forward, resting his forehead on his fists for a moment, then
shot me one of his piercing looks. "I realize wizardry does not demand the
same level of spiritual commitment as religion, but maybe I can explain it
to you. I know my own weaknesses. My fears of being unworthy are not a
meaningless or automatic response. Do you remember the very first day I
met you, when you had just become Royal Wizard of Yurt? You were
talking about the land of wild magic and said that you had never been
there because you were 'not yet worthy of the voyage.' Do you remember?"
  "Yes, I might well have said that."
  "Have you been there yet?"
   "Well, no. They used to have field trips from the wizards' school, but I
was never invited to go. I guess I could have gone myself any time in the
last nineteen years, but somehow I haven't." Wild magic had been to meet
me once too often; I had no desire to go meet it.
   Then even you, with the audacity wizardry gives a man, know what it is
like to feel unworthy."
  Actually I had always had an excellent idea of what it feels like to be
unworthy, or at least incompetent, but I had never let it bother me.
   He sat back as though he had just explained something important. I
still thought he would be an excellent bishop. "If they do elect you," I said,
"I'll go to the land of wild magic. Maybe I can find the Queen of the Fairies
and make her stop sending her fairies to your cathedral."
  Joachim said nothing but just looked at me.
  "Or," I added, warming to the topic, "you and I could try to arrange
better relations between wizardry and the Church, so that bishops aren't
always warning young priests and old wizards warning young wizards
against each other."
  I was pleased to see that this idea distracted him. He played with his
empty wineglass, thinking about it.
  There are three who rule the world," I quoted, "the Church, the wizards,
and the aristocracy."
  "And the greatest of these is the Church," he said absently.
  "Hey! They never added that when learned the proverb!"
  This actually made him smile. "Did they tell you that the greatest were
the wizards? It is a good saying. The Church is concerned with the souls of
men and women in this world and their salvation in the next, and wizards
with keeping the peace and keeping dragons away."
  "And the aristocracy with law-giving and administering justice, with
wars--when we let them--and with the extremely vital mission of
providing the income for priests and wizards. We don't actually say that
wizards are the greatest, you know, even if we are; after all, we've always
served the kings."
  "That leaves the peasants and the artisans and the merchants."
  "Of course they don't have time for anything as foolish as ruling the
world," I said. "They're too busy producing what everybody else needs."
  Joachim smiled again and worked the cork out of another bottle. I was
delighted to see him feeling less bitter. Maybe sometime he'd even want to
go flying again. "But we are not discussing social theory," he said. "You're
trying to cheer me up, and it may be the sin of despondency to resist such
cheering, even from a wizard." He filled our glasses; he had switched from
white wine to red, and it glowed the color of rubies in the candlelight "I
still often feel like a callow priest fresh out of the seminary, but maybe
even the most powerful men feel that way sometimes."
   I remembered him having an air of mature gravity from the day I met
him and very much doubted he had ever been callow and shallow--unlike
the young priest who was now chaplain of Yurt But I did not mention this,
and also did not mention that he seemed to have done a very good job of
overcoming the same fears of unworthiness when he was first invited to
join the cathedral chapter.
  "Lately I've found myself wishing," I told him instead, "that we could go
back to Yurt the way it was when we first arrived here."
   "Of course you have to remember," he said thoughtfully, "that Yurt as it
first was' is different for me than for you. I had already been royal
chaplain for several years when you arrived. I remember the queen's old
nurse living in the chambers they later gave you."
   I had never quite gotten over the feeling that I would have been much
more awe-inspiring in a dungeon or a tower, but I very much liked my
chambers in the royal castle, looking out into the courtyard through a
tangle of climbing roses. It was by now far too late anyway to become
frightening and mysterious.
   "Speaking of the queen," added Joachim, "I meant to tell you. I received
a letter from her yesterday."
  I was jealous at once. I hadn't had a letter from her since the first week I
had been in the City.
   "I had not heard from her in months, maybe a year, but she wants to
find out what she needs to do to reserve the cathedral."
  "The cathedral?"
  "Yes. She is thinking of marrying again."
    I stared at him, unable to answer. I was devastated. The old Romney
woman, in prophesying that I would fall deeply in love, had been almost
twenty years too late. I remembered my wineglass just in time not to drop
it. "But she can't get married!" I finally managed to gasp.
  "Why shouldn't she? She has been a widow for some six years, so
remarriage would show no disrespect to the king's memory. Doesn't Paul
come of age this summer? Once he is eighteen her regency will be over,
and she will be free to leave Yurt if she wishes." This was even worse. "She
can't leave Yurt!" Joachim looked at me quizzically. "You seem very
disturbed by this."
   "I am disturbed," I said desperately. "I've never told you this before, but
I love the queen."
  "Of course. Everyone who knows her must love her That is why we
should welcome anything that makes her happy."
  I thought, not for the first time, that it was a good thing he was a priest.
 "You can see her letter if you like. She did not tell me the name of the
man she is thinking of marrying."
  He got it from his desk. It was a real letter, not one of the tiny
rectangles that were all the carrier pigeons could handle. She must have
found someone heading to the cathedral city to carry her letter by hand. I
read it avidly, looking for hidden clues as to why she should suddenly have
made such a bizarre decision, but there was nothing in it besides what the
dean had already told me. I found myself remembering various men over
the years who had looked admiringly at the queen, all of whom I now
detested. Joachim was right that everyone loved the queen, and not
everyone was a priest.
  "I'll have to go back to Yurt at once." When Joachim gave me
another*puzzled look, I added lamely, "They'll need the Royal Wizard to
help prepare for the wedding festivities."
  "I had hoped you could stay at least a few days. If she is only just now
inquiring about the availability of the cathedral, she cannot be planning to
marry in less than six months."
  He was right, of course. And if I had left the wizards' school earlier than
planned to help out an old friend, I couldn't very well abandon him after
only twelve hours in town.
   Joachim tipped up the bottle. "This is almost empty; we might as well
finish it. There is a guest house down the street we use for visitors to the
cathedral. Or you can stay here with me; I have an extra room."
   "Thank you. I'd be very happy to stay here." I sipped the last of my wine,
listening to the wind. The moon outside the window kept appearing and
disappearing behind shreds of clouds. I hadn't mentioned that mental
touch up on the tower, and I was still not sure how real it had been, but if
someone was practicing magic with evil intent--or if there really was
priestly intrigue against organized wizardry here in Caelrhon--I felt much
safer with Joachim than I would somewhere down the street.
 But how could I go on as Royal Wizard of Yurt if the queen moved away,
married to somebody else?




                            PART TWO

                            The Queen
  I stayed with Joachim for four days. The cantor Norbert avoided me
pointedly, the rest of the cathedral priests ignored me, and none of them
showed any sign of trying to destroy me.
   Every night I went out to check for magical influences on the new
construction, and every night I found nothing. Although in the evenings
the dean and I caught up on some of the conversations we had not had
since he left Yurt, there was little for me to do during the day except fret
about the queen. I did not even feel again the fleeting mental touch which
I now concluded I had imagined.
   "Telephone me if anything else happens," I told Joachim as I prepared
to leave. "But I really do think the magician or whoever was responsible
must have been warned by the Romneys. Once he realized a wizard had
arrived in town, he decided it was safest to stop his mischief." "I would
certainly like to think so. Give my best wishes to everyone in Yurt."
   Though I left the quiet cobbled street behind the cathedral on foot, once
I had made my way through the city streets and out the wide gates to
where the Romneys had been camped I soared upward for the flight home.
The whole way, I was trying to imagine what could have possessed the
queen to want to marry again.
  I came over a stretch of thick forest and saw before me the fields and
castle of the kingdom of Yurt. It always looked from the air like a perfect
child's toy of a castle, with its whitewashed turreted walls and the
pennants snapping from the towers. As I swooped down I noticed someone
working in the old king's rose garden, just outside the moat, so I landed
there.
  She saw me descending and came to greet me. I was flabbergasted. It
was the queen, and for the first time in six years she was not wearing
black.
  "You're home!" she said with delight. She had a smile that lit up her
whole face and made whoever saw it want to smile too. "When your books
arrived from the City, I knew you couldn't be far behind!"
   "I've been down in the cathedral city of Caelrhon, visiting the dean for a
few days," I said, wondering how I could possibly have stayed away as long
as three months.
  She gestured toward the garden. "As you can see, I was pruning the
king's roses. But I've just finished. Shall we go inside?"
  The queen swung the gate shut and slipped one arm through mine,
holding her gardening gloves and pruning shears in the other hand. She
was wearing a very simple, but also undeniably very bright red dress. Red
had always gone well with her complexion and her midnight hair.
Although her hair now had an attractive white streak in it, red still suited
her. She was, as she had always been, the most beautiful woman I had ever
met.
  I squeezed her arm with mine and said, "It's good to be home."
  "If you've seen the dean, maybe he's told you my news," she said gaily as
we crossed the drawbridge into the castle. "I'm thinking of marrying
again!"
  I realized from the thud of my heart that I had been hoping for four
days that it was not true. But hearing her talk about it so blithely made it
real in a way that seeing the words on paper had not. "Who are you
marrying?" I asked and was surprised to hear my voice sound almost
normal.
   "His name is Vincent," she said, again with that smile but this time not
directed at me. "I'm sure you've met him, as he's visited here several times
over the years. He's the younger son of a king--in fact the king of Caelrhon,
where you've just been."
   I did indeed remember Vincent, well enough to detest him now. "But a
king's younger son!" I protested, "He is not worthy of you, my lady!" I
stopped myself just in time from adding that he was much too young for
her.
  "You forget that I myself was only a castellan's daughter before I
became queen of Yurt," she said with a laugh. Then she answered my
unspoken comment as well by saying, "With him I feel almost like a girl
again! Vincent is very different from King Haimeric, but I'm sure he would
be delighted to see me happy again."
  She was at least right, I thought gloomily, about the old king of Yurt. He
would have approved of the marriage even though I did not. "What do
your parents think?"
  "They're pleased, of course. But you ask," she added with another laugh,
"as if I were still a girl too young to know my own mind!"
   It was not hard to think of her as a girl in spite of the white streak in
her hair. She gave a quick little whirl, almost a dance step, and said,
"Vincent's coming tomorrow so you can renew acquaintances. Your
chambers should be ready. The constable put your books inside, but he
didn't unpack them--he was afraid his eye might fall on a spell
accidentally and he would turn himself into a frog!" And she went off
laughing at her own joke.
  I was gloomily reshelving books when I heard a knock at the door.
"Come in!" I called, hoping it was the queen come to say her plan to marry
Vincent was just another joke, and in rather poor taste. But it was Prince
Paul, royal heir to Yurt. He seemed to have shot up several inches in three
months and had to duck through the doorway. "Welcome home! I just
heard you'd arrived. Did you have a pleasant stay in the City?" His good
manners did not mask the intensity of whatever had brought him here. I
had barely begun a congenial response when he added, "I need to talk to
you privately. Can you come for a ride?"
  Paul loved riding and was very good at it. I thought ruefully that I was
going to be made stiff after months of not being on a horse, especially at
the pace I was sure he would set. He led the way across the courtyard with
rapid strides; his legs still had the slenderness of a boy's, but they were
appreciably longer than mine.
   In a few minutes we were mounted and riding out across the bridge, me
on an old white mare and Paul on a gelding. "I think Mother's going to get
me a horse for my eighteenth birthday," he said in a low voice, smiling in
anticipation. Temporarily, his other concerns seemed forgotten. "I heard
her talking to the constable about horse breeders and about the horse fairs
this summer. They didn't know I was listening so I had to slip away, but
I'm fairly sure she knows I want a roan stallion."
 "Your mother is a good judge of horses," I said. "She used to ride a
magnificent black stallion before you were born."
  "I know," he said regretfully. "I still don't understand why she sold him.
But then," with a grin, "I've never liked black horses that well anyway."
Paul kicked his horse to a faster pace. He was bareheaded, and the wind
swirled his hair. When he was young his hair had been so blond it was
almost white, and even now it formed a golden halo around his head.
  We rode for a mile, more rapidly than I would have liked but not as
rapidly as I had feared, down the hill from the castle and then along a
deep tree-shaded lane by the meadows. Larks soared over the long grass,
and in the distance I could see people starting to harvest the hay.
  Paul tied his reins to a branch and threw himself down on the grassy
verge. "No one will overhear us," he said, intense once again.
   I reminded myself as I eased out of the saddle that I couldn't treat him
like a boy. Legally he would be of age in another three months, and with
his mother's fire and his fathers sweetness of temperament he would be a
formidable king. If I let his boyish enthusiasm for horses remind me too
strongly that I had given him horsie-rides on my knee not long ago, I was
never going to have his confidence. "What's bothering you?" I asked,
seating myself beside him. "Is it your mother's remarriage?"
  "Yes," he said gloomily, lying down with his hands under his head "It
wasn't hard to guess, was it?" He jerked back up to a sitting position.
"How can she do it? Why would she want to marry anyone, after Father? If
she has to marry somebody, why does it have to be Prince Vincent?"
   Since I had been asking myself exactly these questions, I found it
difficult to answer.
   Paul was now examining one of his riding boots, rubbing his thumb on
a scrape. "I even tried talking to Aunt Maria," he said. "If Mother
remarries it will affect the entire kingdom." He shifted his attention to the
other boot. "But she just said something foolish about how a woman like
her deserves her happiness."
  As I had been about to say something similar, I was glad I had not
spoken. Instead I asked, "What are you afraid will happen to the
kingdom?"
  "Vincent will move here," said Paul from the depths of despair, "and
nothing will ever be the same again."
  "You mean your mother isn't planning to leave Yurt?" I asked, trying
with only moderate success to keep the excitement out of my voice.
  "Why should she?" said Paul, ignoring my tone if he even heard it.
"She's a queen, and back home in his kingdom he's just the young prince.
He'll come here and change everything."
  "But there's a limit to what he'll be able to do. After all, you're going to
be king, not he."
   "I don't mean he's going to introduce bad laws or anything," Paul said
in irritation. "But we've been so happy and comfortable here, and now
everything will be different."
  I observed with interest that nostalgia was perfectly possible even for
someone thirty years younger than I. The afternoon breeze was a caress.
The thought that the queen would not be leaving was so cheering that it
was hard to be properly sympathetic.
  "So what can we do?" He looked straight at me for the first time,
waiting for an answer. He had the same brilliant green eyes as his mother.
   Short of assassinating Prince Vincent I had no good suggestions. I was
still unable to speak reassuringly of how the marriage was really best for
the queen, especially since this was apparently what everybody else had
been telling him. "I honestly don't know, Paul. I was just as upset as you
are when I found out."
  "So that's all we can do, be upset together?"
  "And learn to live with it. People can learn to live with a surprising
number of problems. Yurt has gone on without your father, though when
he died I never thought it would."
  Six winters ago, I reminded myself, was far more recent to me than it
was to Paul. He did not find my comment reassuring. "Mother's certainly
recovered nicely from her loss," he grumbled. "You would have thought at
her age she'd be much too old for love."
  Since I knew no good way to contradict this foolish idea without also
pointing out that I thought eighteen was much too young to know
anything about love, I said nothing.
   "And this Vincent is younger than she is by at least five years; she won't
tell me exactly. I think he's deceiving her terribly. She goes around telling
people she feels like a girl again, while it's clear that his only interest in an
old woman is to get hold of her kingdom."
    I had to smile at this, but since Paul had rolled over onto his stomach
he fortunately didn't see me. I would have been in love with the queen even
if I had been eighteen and she was forty-three. "Do you know when they're
planning the wedding?" I asked with remarkable calmness.
    "Not yet--I guess there's still hope she'll discover her mistake before it's
too late. She told me she didn't even want to start plans for the wedding
until after I come of age, and the dean of the cathedral sent her a note that
if she wanted to get married there she would have to reserve the church
six months ahead of time. And she said she didn't want to get married
during the winter."
   So they might not be getting married for close to a year. I agreed
silently with Paul; the longer the wedding was put off, the more likely that
she would have the sense not to go through with it.
  He changed the subject abruptly, turning toward me with arms
wrapped around one knee. "So what have you been doing the last few
months in the wizards' school?"
   "I ended up teaching improvisational magic to technical wizardry
students. In spite of all the formulas and books we have, you still have to
be able to create your own spells--and to know when to try something
unusual. Of course," I added with a chuckle, "sometimes the unusual is not
a good idea." I went on to tell him about the three drunk newts.
    Paul laughed, pulling up and twisting together blades of grass. "I think
I'll go study at the wizards' school," he said thoughtfully.
  This made me sit up sharply. "Do you mean that?"
  He looked at me with surprise. "Is there a reason why I shouldn't?"
  "No, but-- Usually members of the aristocracy don't become wizards.
The training is too long and too hard and the rewards too negligible in
comparison to aristocratic rule."
  "But aristocrats become priests sometimes.**
  "Well, yes, but I've never heard of a king doing so. And there are a lot
more priests than there are wizards. I assume a lot of men have a religious
calling or something."
  "So would I be the only king at the wizards' school?"
   "That's right," I said, hoping desperately he was just casting around in
his mind for an alternative to living with Vincent.
  "What is it, an eight-year program?" he asked, positioning a blade of
grass between his thumbs. He blew on it and seemed pleased to produce a
high, blatting tone. "Maybe you could just teach me a little magic here."
   "I could certainly teach you a few simple spells," I said, trying to hide
my relief. I liked Paul tremendously, but I could not imagine him in the
wizards' school-- nor imagine Yurt abandoned by its new king. "Real
wizardry training," I went on, "has almost all taken place at the school for
the last century and a half. There are thousands of aristocratic courts in
the western kingdoms and probably hundreds of seminaries, but only one
wizards' school. Since the old apprentice system died out, everyone's been
trained the same, and most of us know each other. But there are still a
number of people, not wizards, who know the odd spell or two. Your father
tried to learn to fly once though he never got very far. And your Great-aunt
Maria wanted me to teach her wizardry; her problem was that she got
bored with the first-grammar of the Hidden Language."
   "I never knew she was interested in magic," said Paul in surprise. "The
last couple of months, while you've been gone, she claims to have gotten
very interested in theology." It was my turn to be surprised. The Lady
Maria had a lively mind and had made early chapel service every morning
for years, but she had always become quickly bored by anything
intellectual. "Your father was interested enough in religion to go on
pilgrimage," I said.
   "But Father was different. Besides, that was when the old chaplain was
still here," meaning Joachim. "He wasn't too bad, and I also liked that
priest whom the old chaplain had take over for him. But last winter, when
he got a chance to go be a chaplain in the City, we ended up stuck with the
chaplain we've got now.
   "If you ask me," he added in tones of disgust, "it isn't religion she's
interested in at all, but that young chaplain. She acts moonstruck when
he's around. I decided I had to speak to her firmly. 'Aunt Maria,' I said, 'I
hope you remember that priests have to swear a vow of chastity. And you
know what she said? She told me I had an 'impure mind. All I can say,
there are too many people in this castle who ought to know enough to act
their age."
   Since I didn't like the young chaplain either, I didn't say anything. The
problem with being mature was that I was always feeling that I ought to
tell young people things for their own good when they were things I
wouldn't have wanted to hear myself.
  "I'll tell you who has an 'impure mind': it's that chaplain."
   "Have there been any particular incidents of impurity?" I asked in some
alarm.
   "Of course not. Everybody but me thinks he's fine." I relaxed again. "But
I can tell from his laugh and his handshake that he's really a goat."
   Since these had never conveyed anything of the sort to me, I attributed
this statement to Paul's dislike of any change of personnel in Yurt. But an
uneasy thought sent cold fingers walking down my spine. I had assumed
that Zahlfast, in warning me against priests who would estroy me, was
warning me against the cathedral. He might instead have been warning
me against the young chaplain of Yurt.
  Paul jumped to his feet, looking as satisfied and resolute as though we
had decided something, which as far as I could tell we had not. "Race you
back to the castle," he said, reaching for his horse's reins.


   At dinner that night the queen formally welcomed me home to Yurt. We
ate as we always did in the great hall of the castle. A brass choir, seated on
a little balcony, played as the serving platters were brought in. Suspended
beneath the high ceiling were the magic globes made many years ago by
my predecessor as Royal Wizard, casting a sparkling light on the crystal
and silver. The tall windows stood wide open, but a blazing fire on the
hearth took the chill out of the spring air.
  As regent, the queen sat at the head of the main table where the king
had once sat, and Paul sat at the opposite end. I wondered where Vincent
would expect to be seated once he married the queen.
   I dined as I always had with the Lady Maria on my right hand and the
chaplain facing me across the table. Paul's Great-aunt Maria now had hair
as white as mine, but her manner had scarcely changed since she had
worn her golden curls in girlish locks bedecked with bows.
   "It was not the same here while you were gone," she said, fixing me with
wide blue eyes. "All that arcane wisdom you wizards acquire makes you
uniquely capable of counseling a court on all sorts of worldly matters, not
just those involving magic." She paused for a bite. "But there are other
matters," she added, "where even a wizard's wisdom does not reach: these
are the affairs of the soul. And it is the inner soul, the inner heart, that
drives women and men. I may seem to be an old woman leading a quiet
life in a small kingdom, but within this heart are scores of adventures, of
triumphs, of tragedies, of fears and hopes each day."
   I had forgotten in my months away how irritating the Lady Maria could
sometimes be. This sounded like the result of what Paul had characterized
as theological discussions with the young chaplain.
  He smiled and bobbed his head at her. To me he seemed much too
young to have the responsibility for the souls of the royal court--he was
even younger than I had been when I first came to Yurt. He had a very
wide, congenial smile, but somehow I had never felt it was sincere. If
Joachim did become bishop, I thought, I would ask him for a different
chaplain.
   "We know what you wizards do down at that school," continued the
Lady Maria, jabbing me playfully with her elbow. "You plan to coordinate
all your efforts, both against the western kings and against the Church!"
   "We certainly try to coordinate our wizardly efforts for best effect," I
said, startled to find that I was considered one of the wizards down at the
school. "It's always hard, though. I'm sure you know that wizards are
generally in competition with each other--and not always friendly
competition. And if wizardry and the Church are rivals," I added
graciously but insincerely, "I think the Church may be winning."
   "But is it really true," the Lady Maria asked, "that your school now
intends to put a wizard not just in every royal or ducal court, but in every
castle and manor house?"
  The young chaplain widened his eyes at me as though trying to signal
that he was not responsible for her. I found this highly unlikely.
   "I wouldn't call it an intention," I said uneasily. What had the young
chaplain been telling them while I was gone? It was a good thing that
Joachim's call had taken me away from the school sooner than I had
planned, or there might have been a full-fledged plot against
institutionalized magic here by the time I finished making improvisation
into an organized discipline. "It's certainly true that more noble
households have hired wizards during the last generation or so, but that's
only because the school has made more fully qualified wizards available."
  I added to myself that it was a good thing I had graduated when I did.
Without an honors certificate or even areas of distinction, I might not be
able today to become Royal Wizard at even as small a kingdom as Yurt,
and I could instead be casting spells in a ramshackle manor house in the
foothills of the mountains.
   We were interrupted at this point by the arrival of dessert, raspberry
pudding, my favorite. I looked over to the side table where the servants
were sitting and signaled my approval to the cook. She smiled back, highly
pleased. The cook was now a full-bosomed matron and had a daughter
almost as old as she had been when I first met her, but we had been
friends ever since she was a saucy kitchen maid.
  If it had not been for the Lady Maria and her questions, I would have
assumed that the whole court was as happy to see me again as I was to be
here. Now I was beginning to wonder.
  "Wizard!" called the queen down the table. "We missed your illusions
while you were gone. Could you entertain us over dessert as you used to?"
   My entertainments went over very well. I made the same scarlet dragon
I had tried on the Romney children, and this time it got the appreciation
it deserved. I finished by creating a pair of golden crowns, glittering with
enough jewels to be worth a small kingdom by themselves if they were
real, and had them whirl through the air and settle on the queen's and
Paul's heads.
  Thank you!" said Paul with a laugh. "Everybody else keeps trying to
remind me that I still have three months to go!"
   As the Illusions faded away, people began to disperse. The young
chaplain startled me by touching my elbow. "Would you care for a final
glass of wine in my chambers?"
   For a moment I was unable to answer. Even aside from my suspicions of
him, coming back to Yurt had revived long-forgotten memories of the day
I first arrived here. We had eaten in the same hall, its doors and windows
open to the air; I had had the Lady Maria beside me; and after dinner I
had asked Joachim to have a glass of wine in my chambers.
   The young chaplain seemed to take my silence as a symptom of
abstemiousness. "The Apostle tells us to take 'a little wine for thy
stomach's sake,' " he said with a genial chuckle, patting the organ in
question, "and we shouldn't disobey the Apostle, now, should we?"
   "I'm sorry," I said. "I was thinking of something else. I'd be very happy
to join you."
  I turned toward the stairs that led up to the small room both Joachim
and his immediate successor had had, but the young chaplain turned the
other way. I hurried after him, recalling some problem which had made
him ask for different chambers.
  "So how are you settling into your new duties?" I asked as I caught up.
"You'd been here a month with the previous chaplain, but you'd only been
on your own for a few weeks when I left." I wondered jealously if he now
thought of Yurt as his kingdom.
  "Very well, I hope. But maybe you shouldn't be asking me," he added
with another chuckle, "but those I try to serve!"
   He opened his door and motioned me to precede him. I observed at
once that he had more space than I did. But I was also relieved to see that
his chambers did not suggest an impure mind. The rooms were furnished
sparsely, with nothing on the walls but his seminary diploma and the
crucifix at the head of the narrow bed.
  "You probably wondered why I asked you to join me," the chaplain said,
opening a bottle, "especially after the Lady Maria seemed to imply that
you and I ought to be fierce competitors!" He gave a broad smile and
handed me a glass. Even though it had always bothered me that Joachim
had a rather limited sense of humor, I would at the moment have
preferred his sober intensity.
   "So she's been taking her instruction in directions you hadn't
intended?" I asked, taking a sip. The first night I had met Joachim, we
had put away several bottles of City vintage between us. I had been
determined to show him that no priest could out drink a wizard, and
although I had never asked him about it, I had the impression he didn't
want to let a wizard think he could out drink a priest.
   "Well, her comments have put me in a delicate position," said the
chaplain with well-modulated cheerfulness. "You may not believe me" --I
didn't-- "but it was not I who originally pointed out to her the growing
role that wizards are taking in all noble courts. While naturally I have
stressed the position of the Church in my little chats with her, it was
someone else who planted the first seed of the idea that wizards are
manipulating the secular rulers of society."
  'Then who was it?"
  "Christian charity forbids me from speaking his name."*
  Prince Vincent, I thought with sudden conviction. He must be behind
the rumors the Master of the school had heard.
   "But I will try to make amends," continued the chaplain, "by asking you
to join us in a conspiracy!"
  I barely avoided choking on my wine. "What sort of conspiracy?"
  "We want to make sure the queen does not make the error of marrying
Prince Vincent."
  Immediately I liked the young chaplain much better. I could sort out all
these strange rumors later. "And who is we?" I asked with an
accommodating smile.
  He looked down for a moment as though embarrassed, then smiled
again. "Well, I sounded pretty self-important there for a moment, didn't I!
So far, the conspiracy is mostly myself. The Lady Maria is of course in
agreement with my purposes."
  "I would have thought she'd adore the romance of a love match."
   "In a way she does, but there is a core of wisdom in what you might
think is just a silly head. I did not point out that I had probably known the
Lady Maria since he was a child begging his mother for extra snacks.
"How about other members of the court?"
  "No," he said, shaking his head regretfully. "When I tried to broach the
topic to one of the knights, he said something--I know you'll find this hard
to credit--about the Church needing to stay out of the affairs of the
aristocracy!" So if members of the court were being taught to distrust
wizards, I noted with interest, they also distrusted the chaplain. "I would
like to bring Prince Paul into our plans," he added, "though at his age it is
hard to trust his judgment."
   I thought uncharitably that the chaplain was not very much older. "I
can understand why Paul doesn't like the thought of his mother's
remarriage," I said. "He's had her all to himself, and he doesn't want any
disservice to his late father's memory. But I don't understand your own
objections."
  He leaned forward and spoke gravely. The candlelight made flickering
points of light in his eyes. "A woman, once widowed, does better to devote
herself to God than to another temporal spouse."
  "So you think widows should never remarry?"
   The Apostle tells us it is best that they do not. I can see that she felt she
had a moral obligation to raise her son to manhood before retiring, but a
woman of true religious sensibilities would now be planning her retreat to
a nunnery. The Nunnery of Yurt has an excellent reputation for holiness
and was in the past, I understand, supported by generous and pious gifts
from the royal family of Yurt."
  I was unable to answer at once. The queen had in fact, when very young,
contemplated entering a nunnery rather than marry someone she
detested, but she had instead married the king, whom she loved. I could
not see her in a nunnery, then or now.
  "Have you mentioned this to the queen?"
   "I tried to suggest to her delicately that perhaps remarriage would
distract her from the higher affairs of the soul, but she just laughed."
   I gave him my wizardly look. "Surely I do not need to tell you that to
force a soul into suitable religious behavior will not help that soul's
salvation." I rose to my feet without waiting for an answer. "Thank you for
the wine. It is good if representatives of wizardry and the Church can
agree on issues of mutual importance."
  As I strode with self-conscious gravity from his chambers and crossed
the courtyard toward my own, I found myself wondering if a belief that the
queen's soul would be improved by a nunnery was his only consideration.
Might he have some ulterior motive for wanting her out of the castle?
  I awoke to the chapel bells the next morning with the happy realization
that I was back home in Yurt, far from technical-division wizardry
students. This cheerful thought was followed however almost immediately
by the distressing knowledge that Prince Vincent was coming today.
   He had telephoned that he planned to reach Yurt in the afternoon. The
queen was busy bringing heaps of roses into the great hall, arranging
them in vases and attaching bouquets to the dark stone walls. I myself
wandered out across the drawbridge, gloomily convinced that he was the
mysterious person inciting aristocrats to distrust their wizards. At least
the queen and Paul seemed unaffected so far. I looked down the hillside
sloping away from the castle, past the walled graveyard where the king
was buried.
   A distant group of tiny horsemen emerged from the woods, far earlier
than anyone had expected. Faint on the wind came a trumpet call. Knights
and ladies poured out across the bridge behind me. Even the queen,
flushed, laughing, and pinning a white rose into her hair, came running
out.
  The trumpet sounded again, and the horsemen kicked their steeds for
the last ascent. The man in the lead, whose golden surplice left no doubt
he was a prince, was mounted on a red roan stallion. I looked
surreptitiously for Paul, who I knew would be furiously jealous. He stood
motionless among the members of the court.
   With a jangling of bells and clatter of hoofs, the knights pulled up their
horses. Vincent vaulted from the stallion and swept the wide velvet hat
from his head. "My lady!" he cried and knelt before the queen. The jeweled
scabbard of his sword and the long feather of his hat dragged unheeded on
the brick road. With one hand he took both her hands and kissed them
gravely.
   She blushed charmingly and tugged to bring him to his feet. He leaped
up, smiling all over his face. He was graceful and muscular, with hair mat
glowed like burnished copper, and very obviously in love. He was, I
thought ruefully, a truly glorious knight. Thirty years ago, before I had
decided to become a wizard, I would have wanted to be just like him.
 We had not expected you so early," said the queen. "You must forgive
me if you find me in some disarray."
 "You should have known, my lady, I would not stay from your side one
moment longer than I could help. And I came to see you, not your array."
  The other knights were dismounting. "Where is Prince Paul?" Vincent
called in a high, ringing voice that cut across the other voices. "I have
something to give you!"
   Paul came slowly forward. His mouth was grim, but he determinedly
looked Vincent in the eye. I knew him well enough to realize that he did
not want anyone to think that he was sulking.
  "My prince!" cried Vincent. "When I left here three weeks ago, everyone
was talking of preparations for your coming of age ceremony later this
summer. I remember what it was like to be eighteen, and how long a few
months could be. I thought then that you might not want to wait for all of
your gifts, so I brought you one now. It's this stallion: he's yours, I bought
him for you, take him!"
   For a second all the color drained out of Paul's face, then he stepped
closer, stiffly, unbelieving, unable to speak. Vincent handed him the reins.
  I had to fight against my initial hope, that Paul would refuse the gift
and would cast the reins into Vincent's face with a rebuke for the
patronizing note I thought I had heard.
   But I need not have worried. I saw all of Paul's objections to Vincent
cracking and dissolving away like ice in the sun. A smile started small and
stretched until it threatened to crack his face. He found his voice at last.
"Thank you! How did you know? He's exactly what I wanted, more than
anything!"
   He swung up into the saddle. The stallion arched its neck and took a few
quick steps. In spite of the long trip to Yurt which had left the other horses
lathered, the stallion seemed nearly fresh. Paul brought him around, the
horse answering instantly to the reins- Then, reluctantly, the prince slid
back to the ground. "You've just been riding him rapidly, and I don't want
to push him, even though I can tell he's ready to go again. Thank you!" It
was going to be hard after all for the young chaplain to incorporate Paul
into his "conspiracy."
  "I thank you too," said the queen to Vincent, her emerald eyes dancing
with delight although she managed to keep her manner sober. "You have
done my son a signal honor. Now, would you enter my castle?"
   I watched jealously to make sure they weren't holding hands, but they
walked side-by-side in perfect dignity across the drawbridge and through
the castle gates. Stable boys came to take the horses, although Paul took
charge of the stallion himself, and the constable directed our new guests to
their quarters. I lingered outside the castle for a moment, looking across
the green hills of Yurt, wondering if the queen had secretly loved Vincent
for years as I was sure he must always have loved her, or if her feelings
were only a product of a few short weeks of courtship while I was not there
to stop it.
  When I looked into the great hall a few minutes later, to see Vincent
and the queen finishing arranging vases of roses, she motioned me over,
smiling with a tenderness I knew was not meant for me. "Vincent, I'm sure
you remember our Royal Wizard."
   "Of course, though it's been several years," he said. "You performed
some really spectacular illusions after dinner." Flattery was not about to
win me, but I nodded my head. For the queen's sake I had to be polite. At
least if he thought all wizards were plotting to take over the western
kingdoms, he was too well bred to say so.
  "You've been in the City, I understand?" he went on. "You missed what I
gather has been the talk of Yurt, our whirlwind courtship!"
   "Don't make it sound too rapid," said the queen with a laugh. "We had
after all known each other for years, and it was scarcely my fault when I
invited you to stay for a week that you stayed for eight!"
 "And even so, when I left three weeks ago you still wouldn't say you'd
marry me."
   The queen laughed again. "I waited a week before I telephoned him to
say Yes, and I still told him he couldn't come back right away. Do you
think me very heartless, Wizard?"
  "Entirely heartless," I agreed. I was sure the fact of their eight-week
courtship was accurate; they wouldn't tell me something anyone might
contradict. But I wondered why they should go out of their way to tell me,
when it was none of my business, that the queen had initially hesitated to
accept Vincent's proposal, and why they should do so in a manner so
ostentatiously cheerful, affectionate, and in perfect dignity.
   Were they trying to distract me from why Vincent had left and why he
had come back now? Was it accidental that the queen had invited Vincent
to visit shortly after I had left for the City? Had something happened
during those eight weeks he was here, something they hoped was hidden
from everyone else and they didn't want me to look for? Then I had to
smile at myself. Now I was developing an "impure mind."
   "We want you to know," the queen continued, "that you'll continue to be
a valuable part of Yurt even after Paul becomes king and Vincent and I are
married. We wouldn't dream of getting rid of our Royal Wizard."
  This came as a serious shock. I had certainly never dreamed of this.
That she would even bring it up meant that they had indeed considered it.
   Though my first reaction was horror at realizing how close I had come
to having to leave Yurt and join the Romneys, my second thought was to
wonder why Vincent--he must be responsible--wanted to get rid of me.
Was their cheerful unanimity a mask for severe disagreements, of which
the question of whether to tire the wizard was only one? If so, the queen
had apparently won this round, but might she lose the next?
  "I thank you, my lady, my lord," I managed to say and retreated before
they could spring any more devastating surprises.
   The decorations were for the dance the queen had planned in Vincent's
honor, and in the late afternoon I could hear from my study the brass
choir being tuned. Reluctantly I was drawn back to the hall; I had always
liked the royal musicians' playing.
  In spite of several suggestions from the ladies of the court, most playful,
some even serious, that I join in, I sat obstinately in the balcony and
watched. Even Paul was dancing, leading around women his mothers age
with charming grace.
   The queen and Vincent led every dance. The last of the sunlight, the
flickering fire, and the glow from the magic lamps made the room bright
as though the dancers themselves were filled with light. Vincent really was
younger than the queen, maybe ten years younger rather than the five that
Paul had guessed.
   But there was nothing about him to support Paul's suspicion that he
wanted the queen's kingdom rather than her person. He had his eyes on
her constantly as she turned in the intricate steps of the dance, with an
open affection that was almost too personal to watch. Even though for the
most part her own expression was amused or even mocking, he several
times said something in her ear that turned her laugh into a smile of
undisguised pleasure.
  They were only a couple in love, I told myself, and their unanimity, their
cheerful picking up of each other's lines, did not show any plotting or
planning but only how closely their minds and spirits were intertwined. I
only wished I believed it.
  In the morning I heard from my chambers the clatter of horses being
brought from the stables. A surreptitious glance out the window
confirmed that the queen and Vincent were going hawking. I would stay in
my study, I decided, until they were gone.
   I was leafing through the third volume of the Arcana, looking for spells
that might help the cathedral keep fairy lights off their new tower, when
there was a knock on the door. "Come in!" I called, assuming it was the
kitchen maid come to get my breakfast tray.
   But the door burst open with a bang that the kitchen maid would never
dare. I swung around to see my doorway blocked by a dark form,
silhouetted beyond recognition by sunlight outside. But unmistakable was
the naked sword it held.
   I didn't even think. Two words in the Hidden Language and the figure
staggered; three more and the sword clattered to the flagstones while the
figure dropped as though hit with a plank. I strode across the room to
retrieve the sword, then turned to see who had unwisely tried to attack a
wizard.
  It was Vincent. He sat up and tenderly felt his ribs. "I guess there's
nothing broken," he said and gave me a rueful smile. "Help me up?"
  I took the proffered hand and pulled him to his feet, but I held on to his
sword.
   "I'm sorry!" he said with apparently real penitence. "I was going to ask
if you wanted to come hunting, and I thought it would be fun to pretend to
attack you-- just a joke, you realize, just to show you a trained warrior's
power! I had no idea you'd react like that."
  "Wizards always react rapidly," I told him sternly. "Suppose a trained
warrior burst into your room. Wouldn't you draw your sword first and
inquire who it might be afterwards?"
  "I guess I'm lucky you didn't kill me, in that case," he said cheerfully,
brushing himself off. "After my brother's experiences, I should have known
better! Let me have my sword back, and I'll certainly never try a joke like
that on a wizard again. Now that I'm here, do you want to go hunting?"
  I handed him his sword since I could think of no excuse to keep it.
"Thank you for the offer," I said, more sternly than ever, "but I need to
spend the day in the perusal of my magic spells." What could Vincent
mean by his brothers experiences?
  "We'll see you later, then," he said, uncowed. I closed the door firmly
behind him and sat at my desk, doing nothing but listening until I was
sure the hunting party was gone.
   Then I did turn again to my books, looking for a spell that might protect
against the action of any other spell. In an hour I determined that there
actually was no such thing, but with enough effort I might be able to
create one.
  I put the volumes back onto the shelf, hoping I would not have to try.
Even the simplest spell can have unforeseen results, and a spell against
magic would create enough tensions within the natural fabric of the
cathedral city that I might end up with the whole church sinking into a
giant hole in the earth.
   Instead I reached for another book. If I saw the Romney children again,
I wanted to be ready with something to impress them.
   It had been years since I had tried to make myself invisible. When I first
came to Yurt, I had become quite good at making my feet disappear, but I
had never been able to become invisible above the waist. Now, after
reviewing my books, flipping back and forth between several volumes with
fingers and three pencils marking different places, I thought I finally
understood the problem.
   I stood up, took a moment to review the spells in my mind, and began.
As the heavy syllables of the Hidden Language rolled into the silent room, I
slowly became invisible, starting at the feet and working up to my head. I
looked into the mirror with delight. Nothing was there.
   There was a sharp rap on the door. "Come in!" I called without
thinking.
   This time it was the kitchen maid. "I'm sorry, sir," she said, coming in.
"But with the extra people staying, I'm afraid I lost track of your breakfast
tray, and so--" She stopped, not seeing anyone. I smiled to myself and
tried not to breathe. "Sir?" She looked directly through me to my bedroom
beyond.
   She shrugged then and picked up the tray. For a moment I was tempted
to break the spell and appear abruptly before her, preferably with a flash
and a lot of smoke. I went as far as to tiptoe over to the doorway where she
would pass directly by me.
   But I resisted. She was a very young kitchen maid, and it would not be
fair to make her suffer for Vincent having surprised me. Besides, I didn't
want to have to sweep a lot of broken crockery off my clean flagstone floor.
I stepped silently aside and let her pass.
   As she swung my door back open, sunlight poured in from the
courtyard. She didn't see it, but I did. My shadow stretching out from
invisible feet. The door swung shut and the shadow was gone, but I was
left considering. My spell of invisibility made me and my clothing invisible
to the human eye, but apparently not to the sun,
   I snapped my fingers, said the two words to break the spell, and
reappeared in the mirror. I doubted even the wizard or magician the
Romney children had seen could have made his shadow disappear. Now
all I had to do was to find a way to make a cloak of fire.
   Since the spring morning was so warm, I had not lit a fire. Now I knelt
at my hearth and put a pile of kindling together. Some wizards, I had once
heard, could create fire straight from the air, but that was something
never taught at the school.
   The challenge with a cloak of fire would be to surround oneself with
living flames yet emerge unscorched. Once I had a small fire burning, I
pulled another book off the shelf and started putting a promising spell
together. Sitting with one hand holding the volume, I tentativel reached
the other hand toward the flame and then rapidly drew it back. This
particular protective spell didn't seem to do anything against heat
   I tried a different spell, one that I knew was effective against arrows.
But it worked no better against fire than the first. The third spell I tried
seemed to have potential until I realized that I was able to put my hand
closer to the flame only because the flame was dying.
   I stood up, sucking the burnt back of one knuckle. "If the Romney
children aren't satisfied with illusions and invisibility, then it's no use even
trying to satisfy them," I told myself and went out.
  Gwennie, daughter of the cook and the constable, was crossing the
courtyard, staggering under a pile of leather-bound ledgers. I hurried to
help her, putting a lifting spell on the volumes. "Where are these going?"
   She gave me a quick and grateful grin and pushed the hair back from
her face with a dusty hand. To the storeroom. I decided Father doesn't
need all these old ledgers cluttering up his office. Some of them even date
from before I was born"
  I had to smile because I well remembered when she was born, which
didn't seem long ago to me. "I would have thought you'd be helping your
mother in the kitchens instead of your father."
   Gwennie shook her head bard "Not me! I'll never be a cook. I've decided
I'm best at organizing and keeping track of things. I'm going to be
constable of Yurt some day, like my father."
  "Do you think people will approve of a woman constable?" I asked
amused.
   "Well, Paul approves," she said proudly, adding, "Prince Paul, that is,"
after a very brief pause. She flushed a little and looked away as I
considered her thoughtfully. She and Paul were nearly the same age and
had been childhood playmates, but I had assumed the prince and the
cook's daughter had drifted apart in the last ten years.
  "I want to tell you, Wizard," she said hastily as though wanting to
change the subject, "that the staff all support you." She unlocked the
storeroom and showed me where she wanted the ledgers. "We don't think
that wizards have to be stopped before they wrest control from the
aristocrats. After all, we've known you for years, and you'd never be able to
take power from anybody!"
   She realized at the last minute that this was not coming out the way she
intended and started to blush again. I excused myself before she could
become any more embarrassed. But as I crossed the courtyard toward the
main gates I decided I had better find out more of what Vincent seemed to
have been telling the court.
  On the grass beyond the moat a table was set up. The young chaplain
and the Lady Maria sat in the sun, playing chess.
  "Checkmate!" cried the Lady Maria in delight as I came toward them. If
she was indeed moonstruck by the chaplain, as Paul had suggested, it
wasn't stopping her from beating him. "You moved right into my trap!"
The chaplain gave me a complacent smile over her head as though to
suggest that he and I both knew he had deliberately let her win. He didn't
fool me for a minute.
  "Did Prince Paul go hunting with the others?" I asked.
  "He rode out by himself," said the Lady Maria. "He took his new horse
and told his mother she wouldn't be able to keep up with him!"
   The chaplain was busily putting the chess pieces back in the box, clearly
in no mood for another game.
  I leaned on the back of the Lady Maria's chair and smiled down at her.
"The chaplain tells me you're opposed to the queen's marriage yourself,
even though you did tell Paul a woman like her deserves her happiness. I
would have thought you'd love it: after all, who else could plan the
wedding but you?"
  "Surely, as I told you the other night, in the case of a widow--" the
chaplain began, but I ignored him.
   "Well," Maria began, confused now and not wanting to meet my eyes, "I
did hope to reassure the boy. And normally I would love planning the
queen's wedding. You never saw anything as beautiful as her first one, so
many years ago! And although of course she wouldn't wear a white dress
for her second nuptials, I had thought that pink, both for her dress and for
her bouquet, or maybe light blue--"
  The chaplain cleared his throat meaningfully.
  "But in the last few weeks I have come to think about it differently,"
Maria continued resolutely. "The chaplain has made it clear to me that, at
a certain age, only a heavenly spouse will do."
 "Are you going to join the Nunnery of Yurt, then, my lady?" I asked in
mock surprise.
  "Of course not" she replied in real surprise. "I've never married--at least
not yet!--so it wouldn't apply in my case."
  I moved in rapidly with my real question. "Aren't you worried that if
Vincent doesn't marry the queen, there will be no one here to protect Yurt
against the conspiracy of the wizards' school?"
  Her brow crinkled in distress and her blue eyes widened. "When I
mentioned that-- When I repeated what Vincent had told us-- I hope you
realize, Wizard, I never meant you!"
   "Yes, yes, I realize that now," I said in reassurance. No question then
that the prince of Caelrhon was behind this oblique attack on wizardry,
and not the priests as the school had thought. Regretfully, I gave up my
suspicions of the chaplain. I would have to telephone the school and also
have a long chat with Vincent; my dislike for him now felt entirely
justified.
  But would Zahlfast have been so insistent that priests were seeking to
destroy wizardry only on the basis of some foolish statements made by the
younger son of the king of Caelrhon?
  I looked up to see someone riding toward us. It was Paul. "Back so
soon?" I asked.
   His expression was radiant, almost as though he had had a religious
vision. The stallion snorted and tossed his head as Paul reined in and
dismounted.
  "I'm almost frightened of him," he said. "I've never seen a horse this
good. Walk with me; I want to cool him down."
   I nodded to the Lady Maria and the chaplain; I wasn't sure Paul even
realized they were there. Maria, recovering quickly from her distress, said
to the chaplain, "Don't tell me you put the chess pieces away already. We
still have time for another game before lunch."
   "He's as fast as the wind," said Paul, "probably faster. He jumps like a
dream--and I really mean a dream, one of those where you feel yourself
floating effortlessly through the air."
  I nodded, knowing what he meant. I still intermittently hoped, usually
when half asleep, that flying could be like that instead of a lot of hard
work.
  "I know he'd be willing to run all day--look at him now, still ready to go.
But he never fights the bit, takes commands almost before I give them. I
can't do any more now."
 We continued our circuit in silence for a moment. Paul was breathing
much harder than the horse.
  "Do you remember me asking about fairyland?" he said suddenly. "It
was years ago. My nurse told me about a place where you could go and see
the fairies, and I asked you how to get there."
  "And what did I say?"
   "You gave me a very good answer. You said that there was indeed a land
of wild magic thousands of miles away, but that if I wanted fairyland, the
real fairyland where lights glitter, the trees are covered with gold and
flowers, and dreams come true, I would have to find it here in Yurt."
  I couldn't answer, being much too embarrassed that I had ever been
that sententious.
   "When I was young, of course," Paul continued, "I took your advice
literally. I kept on peeking out my window at night, hoping to see the fairy
lights, and when I walked in the woods I went quietly so that I might
surprise them. Then as I got older, I thought I understood what you really
meant. But now Vincent gave me this stallion, and it's as though I finally
found fairyland after all. This horse is like something I looked for when I
was six, that I'd long since realized was only a metaphor, but suddenly it's
here."
   I glanced sideways at his shining eyes, decided it would be completely
inadequate to agree that this was indeed a fine stallion, and remained
silent.
   We walked on slowly for another minute, then Paul turned toward me,
really looking at me for the first time this morning. "You know what I like
about you, Wizard?" he said with a grin. "You're the best person to talk to
I've ever known."
  "I'm sorry you never had more boys your own age here," I said. "Then
you might have had more people to talk to." If this stallion stepped in a
rabbit hole and broke its leg, Paul might never recover.
   "Oh, I've missed them sometimes," said Paul. "But I know why it's been
like this. 'Only a count's or duke's son is fit to be raised with a future king,'
as I've heard often enough. Neither of Yurt's counts had sons old enough
to start knighthood training with me, and the duchess only has daughters.
I guess I could have gone to live at the royal court of a larger kingdom, but
I never wanted to and Mother didn't want me to go, especially after Father
died. Besides, first I had my nurse to talk to, then my tutor, and all the
time you!"
  I felt depressed at this enormous responsibility I had apparently had
without even realizing it. We finished circling the castle and returned to
the chess players by the gate. The Lady Maria had already captured
several of the chaplain's pawns and both his bishops.
  The stallion shook his head, ringing the bells on the bridle. Paul laughed
suddenly. "He knows he's a real horse, not just a vision, and he knows he
can run a lot farther today!" I gave the prince a boost, and he scrambled
up into the saddle and sat for a moment, silhouetted above me against the
sky. "I'll be back later!"
  He touched his heels to the stallion's flanks and was off, down the field
and across the meadows, sailing effortlessly over the hedges until horse
and rider disappeared into the distance.
   I was waiting by the gates at the end of the afternoon when Vincent and
the queen returned from hawking. Paul had finally come in an hour
earlier, looking transformed, as though beyond happiness. It was a relief
in a way to see that the engaged couple were merely extremely happy
   "You missed some good hunting," said Vincent, swinging down from
the castle gelding he had been riding, the game bag in his hand. "We'll
have geese for dinner tomorrow. You know," he added to the queen with a
smile, "I can't even begin to tell you how much better it is to be here than
at home."
   "How nice," I said, not interested either in Vincent or in geese. "My
lady," to the queen, "I need to talk to you. Now. It's about Paul."
  "Of course," she said, naturally surprised. "Give me ten minutes."
   While I waited for her I wondered what I was actually going to tell her,
since I wasn't sure I trusted myself to speak coherently. I intended to have
a long talk with Vincent tomorrow, so I need not bother her yet with his
perverse views of wizardry. But I did feel a need to warn her that Paul had
been bewitched by a horse, but there was also much more. What I really
wanted to say was that she couldn't marry Vincent under any
circumstances but that I couldn't explain why.
  The queen came back out, still wearing her riding habit. "Can we go
somewhere to speak privately?" I asked.
  A vision of being invited to her personal chambers flashed through my
mind, but instead she said, "I've been riding all day and feel a little stiff.
Let's go for a walk until dinner."
  She went first, holding the narrow train of her habit looped over one
arm, the polished leather of her boots brushing through the sun-warmed
grass. She sang softly as she walked, and our shadows stretched out long
behind us. I had a new vision, of sinking into the grass with her in my
arms, but while it was fairly easy to imagine myself kissing her, it was
much harder to imagine her kissing me back.
   She paused half a mile from the castle. Swallows swooped across the
meadow, passing close to us as they dove for insects. Although the sun was
near the horizon the sky was still fully blue, and the day seemed caught in
a never-ending pause between afternoon and evening.
  "What did you need to talk to me about?"
  "Paul doesn't want you to many Vincent," I said, much more abruptly
than I had intended.
  She looked thoughtfully out across the countryside and started slowly
walking again. I strolled beside her. "I know he doesn't," she said after a
minute. "It's not surprising--at seventeen, he only thinks of me as his
mother, not as a woman. He's had a happy youth in Yurt, and he distrusts
anything that might interfere with that But there will be many changes,
most of them good, once he comes of age, so my marriage will seem less
threatening. And after our whirlwind wooing, we may want to wait a few
months to marry!"
   A suspicious thought flashed through my mind, that Vincent had no
intention of marrying the queen, that he had wooed her only because, as a
welcome visitor to Yurt, he now had the opportunity to carry out some
nefarious plan of his own. I found this thought so appealing that I wished I
could believe it.
  "So I hope that Paul will become reconciled to the idea," the queen
continued. "I wouldn't want to marry in the face of his opposition. But,"
looking up with a smile, "don't you think he may already be changing his
mind?"
 'The roan stallion seems certainly to have been well thought out as a
means to reconcile him to Vincent."
  She laughed. "You make it sound like some sort of conspiracy. I'd had
no idea Vincent was going to give him that horse, although it was no
secret that that's what Paul wanted--I had been hoping to find him a
suitable stallion myself for his birthday. I think it shows a real sweetness
on Vincent's part!"
  I actually agreed, but I wasn't about to say so. "In fact I'm rather
worried about Paul's reaction to that horse. He not only likes it, he loves,
he adores it. I think at the moment it means more to him than any of us
do, or even the kingdom of Yurt."
   She laughed again. "It's the novelty. You sound as though you thought
this attitude would continue. I'm not worried."
   I looked at her profile as we continued walking. She had very faint lines
at the corners of her mouth, the result of years of smiling. The air around
us was fragrant with mown grass and moist earth.
  For nineteen years I had known the queen, and I had been in love with
her since the first moment I saw her, but in some way I felt I hardly
understood her. If I did know her, I thought, or if she really knew me, I
would be able to explain better my concern about Paul.
   But then I wasn't entirely sure myself what was worrying me. She was
right, of course; a boy could become quickly and entirely enthralled with
the horse of his dreams without losing track of all else in his life.
  Paul was not my principal concern and never had been. "My lady, I
don't want you to marry Vincent either."
   She stopped and turned toward me. Her emerald eyes danced with
amusement--I wondered suddenly what Vincent had told her of his mock
attack on me. "If you were still worrying that a king's youngest son is not
worthy of a queen, or whatever you were trying to tell me, I hope that
seeing him here has cleared up your concerns."
  "It's not that," I said, amazed at my own audacity. "I couldn't bear to
see you married to someone else."
   "Someone other than King Haimeric?" she asked, looking at me with a
faint, puzzled frown.
  Now that I had started I couldn't stop. "Someone other than me."
   All the laughter went out of her face. For a horrible moment I feared she
would recoil in disgust, but her only expression was one of distress. She
slowly started walking again, looking not at where she was going but at
me. Her eyes went over my face as though she had never seen it before.
  "I thought wizards never married," she said as though from a
considerable distance.
  "They don't. I don't care. I'd give up wizardry for you."
  "But you're a very good wizard."
   I was about to protest, to tell her that I hadn't even known how to make
myself completely invisible until this morning, then realized that she was
trying to shift the conversation. "It doesn't matter. Nothing matters. I've
loved you since the first day I met you. I loved the old king as well, and as
long as I could serve you both, and as long as you were caught up in his
memory, I could say nothing. But now I find you are ready to love again
and I have to speak."
   Her foot caught on a tussock of grass, and she stumbled and almost fell.
I caught her by the elbow and steadied her just in time. Once I touched
her I couldn't pull my hand back again. Her eyes were turned away, but
the curve of her cheekbone was only inches from my face. I moved my
hands to her shoulders, drawing her toward me. I could feel her shoulder
blades, her rib cage through her clothes. Someone's heart was pounding
terribly loudly; it might have been mine.
  She kept her face down so I couldn't find her lips. But I could hear her
voice, faint against my shoulder. "Don't. Please don't."
   I let go of her as though she were made of fire. I turned abruptly away,
feeling my face go scarlet. It was growing dark at last; the sun hesitated on
the horizon but would be gone in a moment. "Forgive me, my lady," I
managed to gasp. "I'm sorry, I'm terribly sorry. Please don't think too ill of
me. I would never have forced you."
   She did not reply. Her breathing was broken, and in a moment I made
myself turn toward her again. She had her hands over her face, and I
thought I could see tears running between her fingers. I stifled the impulse
to take her in my arms and comfort her and instead sat down in the damp
grass.
   In a minute she sat down too, a few feet away. I looked away. "I shall
leave Yurt, of course," I said to the darkening sky. "I think they'd like to
have me stay permanently at the wizards' school as an assistant. It would
be a good position, and I could make sure that you and Paul got a
competent new Royal Wizard." I noticed with detachment that the
swallows had all gone for the night
  "I never knew!" the queen burst out suddenly, as though she had not
heard me. "I've lived beside you, what is it, close to twenty years, since
before Paul was born, and I never knew! And all the time I thought I
understood you. Maybe I don't understand anyone in Yurt."
  "Maybe no one fully understands anyone else--we may not even
understand ourselves."
  Fortunately she also did not seem to hear this highly inadequate
platitude. "I think I thought of you as I did the chaplain," she went on, her
voice somewhat steadier, "someone serving a function, someone I liked
and appreciated, but never someone I thought of as a man. I must have
been so cruel to you, and I never even knew it! Do you think you could ever
forgive me?"
   "There is nothing to forgive," I said stiffly, looking out across the
twilight landscape. The fault is entirely on my side, for presuming where I
had no right to presume. Unless--" I had thought I had frightened her
with the impetuosity of my embrace, but she was now sitting next to me
with no suggestion of fear. For two seconds I allowed myself to hope that
she had been frightened not of me but of herself, that she had been about
to give way to passion. "Unless you could love me instead of Vincent."
  When she did not answer, I turned slowly to look toward her. She shook
her head hard, her hands over her face again.
  "Do you truly love him, my lady?" I asked gently. This time she nodded.
"And he loves you?" "I know he does." "Then why are you crying?"
  She wiped the tears from her cheek with an almost angry gesture.
"Because I am terribly sorry to have hurt you!"
  I had imagined so many times over the years telling the queen I loved
her that our conversation seemed almost unreal. But I knew I was not
imagining this. If I had been, it wouldn't have been going this badly.
   Neither of us spoke for several minutes. Then she struggled to her feet. I
stood up as well. Her face now seemed composed but the smile that almost
always lurked near her lips was gone. It did not seem worth asking her
again if she might change her mind.
   She turned toward me and slowly reached out both hands, first to touch
my beard and then to cup my face. It was rapidly becoming dark, but her
emerald eyes seemed to glow at me. With one finger I delicately traced the
line of her jaw.
  I waited for her to speak, but when she did not, I finally said, "I hope
you realize, my lady, that in a minute I'm going to kiss you."
  "I owe you a kiss, at least," she said and tilted back her head.
   Though I told myself that I would not take a kiss given only because it
was owed, I found myself kissing her before this thought had had time to
take effect. With one arm around her shoulders and the other hand still
lightly touching her cheek, I kissed her for what seemed about half an
hour. She kept her hands to her sides and her body drawn back an inch
from mine.
  She turned her head away suddenly. I let her go and shivered,
immediately feeling extremely cold. In a moment I would start crying
myself.
  "We should get back to the castle," she said in a calm, almost flat voice.
"We're terribly late for dinner."
  We turned together and started stumbling back across the fields. The
yellow lights of the castle shone at us from narrow windows a mile away.
  At the moment it was still my castle, but I did not know for how long. I
had resigned as Royal Wizard, although the queen may not have heard
me. Even if she had not, I did not see how I could go on living in Yurt. In a
minute she took my arm. I would have told her she wasn't helping any, but
then she would have let go again.
  As we came up the hill toward the gates, we heard someone whistling,
and a dark shape came across the bridge to meet us. "There you are," said
Paul's voice. "I knew you'd be along soon."
   The queen let go of my arm. "I hope you haven't been waiting all this
time."
  "Vincent told me you'd gone off to talk about me, so when you weren't
here for dinner we knew it must be something important." His voice
managed to be casual, but I could hear the intense curiosity lurking under
the surface.
   "It wasn't particularly important; it just took more time to discuss than
we'd expected," the queen lied cheerfully. "The wizard wanted to go over
all his duties with me, to review what might change and what might stay
the same once you become king." She, at any rate, did not seem to realize I
had resigned.
   "And I have a message for you, Wizard," said Paul, seeming to accept
this account. It was too dark for him to see the tear smudges on his
mother's face. "The dean of the cathedral telephoned for you, maybe an
hour ago. I told him I'd have you call as soon as you returned."
   I excused myself and hurried off to the telephone with relief. To return
to the cathedral city would give me an excuse not to face the queen again.
  Joachim's black eyes burned at me a moment later, even though I knew
he could not see me. "How soon can you come?"
   "What's happened?" I asked, startled out of my own concerns by the
intensity of that stare.
  "The lights are back. And this time it's not just lights."
  "What is it?"
  He hesitated. "I don't know."
  "Have you seen it?"
  He paused for a moment as though wondering if he dared tell me, then
plunged on. "It lit on the tower at twilight. Dozens of people saw it. It's
enormous, five times the size of a man, and it has the wings of a bat."



                          PART THREE

                             The Witch


  Prince Paul came into my chambers. Books were scattered across the
room, their pages marked with pencils, scraps of paper, and the covers of
other books. Leaning on my desk with a magic globe glowing at my
shoulder, I madly scribbled spells.
  "So you have to return to the cathedral city?" he asked. "I'd been hoping
you were back home for good."
  "So had I," I said without looking up.
  "Do you need to take a lot of books?"
   I slammed one book shut and tried to find my place in another. "I have
to go now, tonight, and my books are too heavy for me to carry them all
and fly at the same time."
   Paul was clearly not interested in my books. I checked another spell,
folded up the paper on which I was writing, and stuffed it into my pocket.
I assumed he was hoping to hear more about the conversation I had had
with his mother, but he was certainly not going to hear it from me.
   "Even if you have to stay away a long time," he said, "you will be here
for my coming of age ceremony won't you?"
  "Of course," I said, trying to sound jovial. "You didn't think I'd forget
something that important?" I had completely forgotten about it. I tossed a
few of my most basic books into a box with a change of clothes, began to
reshelf the rest, then decided just to leave them.
  "Did you know it's starting to rain?" asked Paul.
  I didn't, but at least it couldn't make my mood any worse. I turned off
the magic lights and stepped into the dark courtyard. A fine rain made the
cobblestones slippery. I turned to Paul. "Good-bye. Tell your mother I was
very sorry not to see her again before I left."
  This too was a lie. As I flew up into the black sky, I wondered what she
had told Vincent. I said a prayer to whatever saint might listen to wizards
that she would not tell him the real story.
   It was a long way to the cathedral city. On horseback it took a day or
more, and it was more than an hour's flight even in daylight, not carrying
anything. But I was constantly concentrating on keeping my small box
flying with me and on finding my way. The moon was hidden, and if I flew
high enough to avoid the trees I had trouble picking out the road. The wet
countryside was dark, spotted only occasionally with the lights of a house
or village. I flew in and out of fog, of sudden rain showers. At first I tried
to maintain a protective spell against the rain but I didn't have the
concentration for it I gave up and got wet.
   Constantly running through my mind, interfering with my spells, were
all the things the queen and I had said to each other. They burned in my
brain as though written in fire, and turning them over did not improve
them. I wondered if she, lying alone in bed--that is, I hoped she was lying
alone--was awake and thinking the same thoughts.
   At least she had no reason to feel my bitter shame. I was ashamed that I
had tried to tell her I loved her, even though I had had nineteen years in
which to realize it was foolish to do so, and ashamed that I had made her
cry. The time for impetuous avowals, I told myself, was many years past.
Paul was more accurate than he realized when he said there were people
in the castle who should know enough to act their age.
   The rain was letting up and the eastern sky was gray as I finally
approached the cathedral city. Its streets were dark and quiet. I rose to
the height of a quarter mile and swooped over the new construction,
though I saw nothing unusual in the murky light of early dawn. Just as
well--I was in no shape to meet a monster. But even at this height I could
feel the presence of wild magic.
  I descended to the street behind the cathedral, staggered under
Joachim's porch, and knocked on his door. In a moment he answered it
himself, dressed in a long nightshirt and carrying a candle. He looked
understandably startled but pulled me through the door and closed it
against the damp.
   "When I asked if you could come at once," he said, "I meant tomorrow. I
never intended you to come tonight." The candle made light and shadow
flicker across his face.
  "I had to. If you can give me a dry jacket, we'll go find out what was on
the tower."
  "Did you see something?"
  "I saw nothing, but it's still nearly dark."
  "It wasn't there at midnight." Joachim pushed me into a chair. "You
should go to bed at once. You're exhausted. We can talk about it when
you've had some sleep."
  "How do you know it wasn't there at midnight?"
 "I went up, of course," he said, giving me a sharp look. "The head of the
municipal guard, the crew foreman, and I all climbed up with torches."
  "It's a long climb."
  "I know. Especially in the dark." He gave a wry smile. "Flying was a lot
easier. But we were able to ascertain that, whatever it was, it had left
under cover of night." He pulled me back to my feet. "I'm putting you to
bed. I'm cold and you must be frozen. We'll discuss it in the morning."
   "But I can't stay here with you," I said, weakly holding back. "I've
probably gotten you into enough trouble with the bishop as it is. I should
stay across town in the royal castle."
   Joachim didn't even bother to answer but propelled me into his spare
room and threw in extra blankets after me. I peeled off my wet clothes and
fell into bed. In spite of the contradictory voices clamoring through my
mind I fell asleep at once.
  I awoke several hours later to the smell of bacon frying. Outside the
window the sun was sparkling. The clothing I had left in sodden heaps on
the floor was gone, but my box had resisted the rain and my spare clothes
were dry. The contents of my pockets, including my spells, were arranged
neatly on the desk. I got dressed and went to find breakfast.
   In the kitchen, wet clothes hung in front of the fire, and Joachim's
servant was setting plates on the table. He smiled and motioned me to sit
down. When I asked where the dean was, he simply nodded and started
serving.
  I remembered on my second serving of bacon and fourth piece of toast
that I never had gotten any dinner last night. I wondered why, since food
and a few hours sleep could not change what I had said to the queen, they
seemed to have made it an experience I might still survive.
   The front door opened and Joachim came in, dressed in his formal
black vestments. He sat down across from me and poured himself some
tea. He looked, as always, composed and well brushed, not like someone
who had been scrambling around on a rain-soaked tower at midnight
looking for a monster, or who had had his sleep interrupted after only a
few hours by a wizard arriving on his doorstep. "I certainly hadn't
expected to need to call you again so soon," he said, "but it's always good
to see you."
  "I had to come right away," I said lamely. "You have a magical problem
and no wizard here to take care of it"
   The servant put breakfast in front of the dean and disappeared. "I've
just come from morning service in the cathedral," Joachim said. "There's
no sign of any damage to the tower according to the workmen, and with
the sun shining like this one could almost imagine all of us were seeing
things--but not quite."
 "Even if it was only an illusion, someone with enormously powerful
magic is operating in the city. Tell me, did it roar or bellow?"
   "It just looked at us--it had eyes like coals, very visible even at a
distance."
  I shivered in the warm sunlight and took a hasty gulp of hot tea. "With
bat wings, it could be some kind of dragon--or a demon."
  Joachim met my eyes levelly "If a demon appears in a church, it means
that one of the church's priests has sold his soul to the devil."
  I too hoped it was not a demon. It had been entirely on purpose that I
had left my copy of the Diplomatica DiaboUca behind in Yurt.
  "Could you tell if there was a supernatural presence here?" Joachim
asked.
    'The whole church is full of the supernatural," I said, "but one would
expect that anyway, from the presence of the saints. Magic can only
indicate if there's something present from outside the natural world, not if
it's good or evil."
  "And a dragon?"
  "Dragons are natural--wild, deadly, and unlike anything else, but
natural nonetheless. They're not even, strictly speaking, magical, because
they aren't formed by spells. If you do have a dragon, we might do better
overcoming it by force than by magic."
  Unaccountably, I suddenly felt almost cheerful. A dragon I thought I
could deal with. It might very well kill me, but it was the sort of problem
any competent wizard should be able to face with some hope of success,
unlike a ruined love affair. And if I failed, I told myself, at least I would not
spend the next two hundred years being melancholic.
  "I told the workmen to proceed with the construction," said Joachim. "I
hope I have done right."
   "Of course you have. To let something like this stop the work would be
to give it control over you. Oh, I was trying to tell you, rather than staying
here I should go across town to the castle. It does after all belong to the
royal family of Yurt."
  "Stay here with me. I think even the bishop now realizes we need a
wizard. Anyway, the royal heir is in the castle."
  'The royal heir? You mean Paul? But he's home in Yurt!"
   "I don't mean the heir to Yurt. I mean Prince Lucas, the heir to
Caelrhon, this kingdom. He arrived in town early this morning, just in
time for service. The chancellor is worried that he may be hoping to play a
role in the first election of a new bishop here in forty years, although I
discount that."
   "That reminds me." I was uninterested in the political relationship
between a hypothetical new bishop and a kingdom's heir but wondered if
it was only coincidence that a bat-winged monster had appeared just
before Vincent's brother Lucas arrived in the city. I reminded myself
firmly not to let my dislike for Vincent cloud my judgment. "The queen is
planning to marry the younger son of the king of Caelrhon." I tried to keep
my voice casual and natural.
  But I should have known better. Joachim looked at me sharply. "Is
Prince Vincent in Yurt now?"
  "He arrived the day after I did."
  "And you do not approve of him?"
   At least, I thought, whatever Joachim suspected it was highly unlikely
to be me kissing the queen at twilight. "It's hard to think of her married to
someone else, after the old king," I said. This was something I wasn't even
going to try to explain. "Paul feels the same way, I think, although he
seems to like Vincent personally."
   Joachim appeared to accept my words at face value. "It's just as hard
for me to imagine Paul as king of Yurt," he said. "You know, I've scarcely
seen him since I left the court."
  "You may not recognize him," I said. "He's really grown."
  "I may go to Yurt for his coming of age ceremony," said Joachim. "The
queen invited me, and I would enjoy seeing everyone again."
  Paul I could talk about with no problem. For a moment, the apparition
on the cathedral tower seemed comfortably far away. I mentioned
Vincent's gift to Paul of a roan stallion.
 "I wonder if it's the same horse," Joachim surprised me by saying. "I
may have seen it earlier this spring. For a while the Romneys had a
magnificent red roan for sale."
  "Does anyone know where they've gone?"
    "Not that I've heard." He paused, then looked at me soberly. The
monster was not going to be far from his thoughts for long. "I know we'd
hoped that whatever wizard was here had left town with the Romneys, but
if so he must have returned on his own."
  "I'll find him," I said with my best effort at confidence. "A
wizard--much less a magician--shouldn't be able to hide for long from
another wizard. By the way: is your servant mute?"
  Joachim shook his head, a faint amused glint in his eye. "He served the
old dean before me, and one night many years ago, having I believe drunk
unwisely, he stood in the middle of the market square shouting the most
scandalous things. Since that one lapse he has spoken as little as possible.
He imagines that I never heard about the incident." He rose. "I have to get
back to the cathedral."
   "And I need to begin my search for renegade magic." We were
interrupted by a banging on the door. "Father Joachim! Come quickly! It's
back!"


                                    II
  Joachim took the young man at the door firmly by the shoulders. "Tell
us exactly what you saw."
  He wore the uniform of the municipal guard. "Maybe it wasn't the same
one," he said, breathing hard, "but it was horrible! It was a whole lot
smaller--maybe the size of a hound." I could see him trying to concentrate
under the dean's intense eyes. "It was red, like an enormous red lizard,
with maybe eight legs. It had wings--and when it saw me and reared up, I
could see that on its front legs it had hands."
    A red winged lizard with hands. No wonder the young guard's eyes were
so round. "Go on to the cathedral," I told Joachim. "Keep everyone calm.
I'll deal with this." I might not be Royal Wizard of Yurt anymore, but when
it came to magical apparitions I was still in command.
  The construction site swarmed with activity as the guard and I pushed
our way through. No one else seemed aware of the winged lizard.
Cartloads of cut stone were arriving, drawn by oxen, and workmen
unloaded and stacked them, easily levering the stones up and down ramps.
The new tower's light-colored stonework was almost white against an
azure sky. There was nothing ominous here in daylight, but it did not need
very complex spells to realize mat the whole city was permeated with
magic.
   "It was on the docks by the river," the young guard panted as we
hurried through the narrow streets. The dean led the climb up the tower
last night, so I ran for him at once. I didn't tell anyone else except my
captain." "Good thinking," I said. "We don't want panic." But the docks
were no more ominous than the construction site. We wove between
stacks of cargo crates, coming into the city or ready to leave. I probed for
magic and found very little. The aura that fingered seemed wild and
unfocused, nothing like the tightly constructed spells used for
illusions--but then I had never expected any of this to be illusion.
   An older guardsman joined us, lifting his eyebrows at me. "So the
mayor's sent for a wizard," he commented. I didn't have time to correct
him. "What happened to the winged lizard?" I probably would have called
it a small dragon myself, but "lizard" did not sound as horrible.
   He shook his head. "It's gone. It disappeared with a pop, right into the
air. I tried thrusting with my sword into the space where it might be, but I
didn't hit anything." He paused. "Just before it disappeared, I had the
impression it was picking up some of the cargo crates... . "A sword won't
find it," I said grimly. "It's going to take magic. Stay on guard here in case
it returns, and tell the dean at once if it does. I'll search the rest of the city
for it." As I hurried away from the river, I asked myself if a winged red
lizard, the size of a hound, could have been what they all saw on the
cathedral last night But I rejected this idea---Joachim would certainly
know the difference. But why should terrifying magical creatures suddenly
be appearing in Caelrhon?
  I turned a corner and thought I saw Prince Vincent. After a startled
second I realized the lord coming toward me could not be Vincent himself.
He was slightly taller and quite a bit heavier, as well as several years older.
He had the same burnished copper hair, the same wide-spaced eyes and
firm jaw, but not the same easy and confident way of walking.
   I gave all my suspicions free rein and stepped into his path. "Excuse me,
let me introduce myself. I am Daimbert, the Royal Wizard of Yurt. You're
the heir to Caelrhon, Prince Lucas if I recall correctly. We met several
years ago; I don't know if you remember."
  His reaction did nothing to lessen my suspicions. He gripped his sword
and his eyes narrowed. "And what are you doing in my kingdom he
demanded."
  I took a step backwards as he thrust his face toward mine. "The
monster," I babbled. "The dean of the cathedral asked me to come. I heard
that your own Royal Wizard had an unfortunate accident, so--"
  "We dismissed him even before his accident," said Lucas, glowering.
"We have no more use for magic-workers in Caelrhon."
  "But-- But why not?"
  "You keep it so discreet you think we won't notice," said Lucas coldly.
"But after my experiences, my eyes were opened. We know you wizards are
plotting to throw off the 'service' you claim to practice. 'Establishing peace
throughout the western kingdoms,' you like to call it, but I know better.
And now I wouldn't be surprised to learn that you're hoping to influence
the election of the next bishop. If you really are here at the invitation of
the cathedral--something I intend to find out!--then all I can say is that
the bishop should know better."
   Shocked at his open vehemence, I didn't reply but made him the formal
half-bow and hurried away. None of this made any sense. Even though
Sengrim, Caelrhon's wizard, had always treated me rudely, I could not
imagine what he could have done to get himself dismissed with harsh
feeling that would persist even after his death.
   As I walked I kept probing with magic but found no sign of either an
enormous bat-winged monster or a giant lizard with hands. Regretfully, I
had to conclude that neither of the princes of Caelrhon could be
responsible if they no longer even employed a wizard. I reached the gates
of the city and went out into the field where the Romneys had been
camped a week ago. The new grass, growing rapidly, had nearly covered
the marks left by their caravans.
  For a moment I hesitated, then rose into the air for the flight back to
the kingdom of Yurt. If someone had brought monsters here and then
taken them away again, he must have somewhere to imprison them. There
was one place I knew where it might--maybe--be possible to do so, and
the quickest way to find out was to look.
   I scrupulously went nowhere near the royal castle of Yurt, instead
heading for the magical valley at the other end of the kingdom. Prince
Vincent could now persuade the court all he wanted, I told myself, that
aristocrats would be better off without their wizards; it no longer
mattered to me.
   In the valley was concentrated a pocket of forces left over from the
creation of the earth, as well as the home of a wood nymph and the shrine
to Yurt's own Cranky Saint, a place where spells always worked especially
well. Here it might be possible for a master wizard to find the power to
bind even a monster from hell.
  The saint's shrine had been served by an old hermit when I first came to
Yurt, but a much younger man, ascetic, earnest, and with a shaved skull,
now lived at the hermitage. I thought gloomily that this was one more
example of everyone around me growing older.
   I approached cautiously, but the little green valley dreamed peacefully
in the sun. I slowly flew its length above the sparkling river, seeing no
monsters and noting with some detachment that I was capable of being
back in the kingdom, within thirty miles of the queen, without disturbing
the emotional scab that had formed over my bitterness and pain.
   The valley was so permeated with magic that it was hard to find specific
spells, but after half an hour I was fairly sure no one had used its powers
to conceal the cathedral's monster. It was afternoon when I arrived, hot
and tired, back in Caelrhon, feeling intense frustration at not being able to
find a monster that dozens of people had seen.
  Ox carts laden with cut stone were coming toward the city gates. The
oxen plodded slowly, their wagons creaking and the loads appearing to
rock dangerously. Walking beside the oxen or sitting on the loads were the
drivers, lazily flicking long whips, more to remind the oxen of their duties
than to hurry them on.
  But on one of the loads of stone rode a ragged magician.
  My discouragement fell away, and I stepped casually to the edge of the
road. "Greetings, Magician," I said as he drew even.
   Although from the nature of the magic that had been going on in the
city I had expected a fully qualified wizard, I felt I had solved the mystery
at last The unkempt beard and filthy clothes could conceal unusual
abilities. After all, some magicians specialized to the extent that, in one
small area of magic, they might be better than most wizards.
   He gave an abrupt start. "Greetings, Wizard," he managed to say,
though his voice came out an indistinct mumble. Squinty eyes stared at
me from under scraggling brows. Between his eyebrows and beard, his
face was almost completely obscured.
   I could have tried probing magically to get a better idea what he looked
like, but another magic-worker would know at once what I was doing and
be grossly insulted. He was certainly old even the best magic cannot
reverse or conceal the natural forces of aging. "Why don't you get down so
we can have a talk?" I suggested.
  He hesitated a moment, then grunted and slid down from the moving
wagon. "Thanks for the lift, driver!" he called.
  "How far have you been riding?" I asked.
  "Just a couple of miles," he said in a surly tone. His small eyes kept
shifting, not quite meeting mine. For a second I had an impression of
great magical power here-- maybe even, strangely enough, the spells of
two separate wizards. But the next instant the impression was gone. I
mentally shook my head. I was, I knew from long experience, highly
capable of jumping to unwarranted conclusions and then convincing
myself that they were true. And I so much wanted to believe that I had
found here the source of the cathedral s problems.
   "Look at my shoes," the magician continued. "If yours were like this you
wouldn't walk a hundred yards farther than you had to." The uppers of his
shoes were badly cracked and the soles flapped loose. "I begged a ride not
far from the quarry, paid the driver with a few illusions--pretty racy ones,
too!"
   I had never been sure what Zahlfast had seen in me in my student days,
why he had passed me in spite of the disastrous transformations practical,
but I knew how perilously close I had come to being a magician making
his living by selling pathetic scraps of magic wherever he could. But this
magician, I reminded myself, might have made a giant bat-winged
creature appear on the new cathedral tower. "Where were you last night?"
I demanded.
  "Asleep in a haystack, and getting pretty wet, too," he said grumpily.
"But what is it to you?" the last almost in a shout. "Since when does a
wizard want to keep an honest magician from earning a living?"
  I would have offered him money except that I knew any such
condescension would have made him even more indignant. "You were not
perhaps here in the cathedral city, calling up a monster.
   "No," he said almost hesitantly, then "No!" quite explosively. "I've had
enough of self-satisfied wizards like you without you starting to accuse me
of nonsense!"
  "Glad to hear it," I said, taking a step backwards.
   He had worked himself up into a fury. Half of what he said was
unintelligible, and for the rest he seemed to group me with an apparently
diabolical conspiracy of wizards from the school, all bent on starving him.
He seemed to have several vicious things to say about other important
members of society while he was at it. I took the opportunity while he was
distracted by his own anger to check again for signs of great magical
power and this time found nothing. The brief impression I had had of
some sort of double power also disappeared on closer examination---just
my overactive imagination again.
   "The reason I asked," I said when he paused for breath, "is because
whoever is practicing magic around the new cathedral will be in serious
trouble, and I thought I should warn you to stay away."
  "It wouldn't be you, would it?" he snorted.
  I shook my head. "But if there's a renegade wizard here in the city,
especially one practicing black magic, I'm going to find him,"
   The shifty eyes became guarded. "I don't call up monsters" he said after
a minute, as though settling on a plan of attack. "I study the magic of
fire."
  He waved his hand, muttered a few quick words, and the grass around
my feet burst into flame. I jumped back, and his beard split in a grin. But
the damp grass blazed for only a few seconds, and I quickly stamped it
out. A few final wisps of smoke curled up.
   That's marvelous!" I cried. "I don't know how to do that. Can you teach
me how? I'll pay you well!" Elerius had apparently tried to persuade the
school they should teach fire magic, but as far as I knew none of the
teachers had ever learned any.
  But the old magician was backing away. "I guess they don't teach you
everything, then," he said with a bitter laugh, "even the ones of you they
coddle. Be jealous of me for once, and see how you like it!" Empty carts
were coming back out of the city gates. The old magician waved one down.
   He was much too ragged for me ever to be jealous of him, no matter
what skills he possessed. But I was delighted. I could no more have created
fire out of air than I could have a few minutes ago, but in the moment
when he made the grass blaze I at least thought I had an inkling how to
begin.
   As I headed back into the city I glanced over my shoulder. The magician
had successfully negotiated a trade of illusions for a ride. Over the ox cart
rose the insubstantial form of a naked woman, not quite life-size, moving
in awkward gestures apparently meant to be obscene. I turned my back.
  I wanted to tell someone what I had just realized about fire magic, but I
wasn't sure whom to tell. In the meantime, although I did not like the
coincidence of the magician appearing here only a day after the monster
appeared on the tower, I was inclined to believe it had nothing to do with
him. It was time to start searching the city itself more thoroughly.
  But first, I thought as I walked through the gates, I needed to speak
with the mayor. He might not be among the "three who rule the world,"
but the elected head of Caelrhon had the right to be consulted about a
monster in his own city.
   "There must be a very powerful wizard operating nearby," I told him. I
had been ushered at once into the mayors study when I told the official at
the door the reason for my visit, and the mayor seemed to have abruptly
left a meeting in order to talk to me. "Creatures from the land of wild
magic shouldn't just appear by themselves in the lands of men. That's why
the cathedral dean sent for me at once."
  He played with the heavy chain of office that hung around his neck. It
must have had twice as much gold in it as anything I had ever seen the
queen wear. He looked as though his normal expression was genial, but it
was not genial this afternoon.
   "Fighting wizardry with wizardry," he said thoughtfully and tugged at
an earlobe, not quite meeting my eyes. "How can we be certain you are
truly here to help us and are not the wizard who made a monster appear
here last night?"
   If this is what the city council had been discussing when I pulled the
mayor out of the meeting, I had gotten here just in time. Had Lucas's
distrust of all wizards now infected the local merchants and artisans as
well? "Good question," I said with all the confidence I could. "But you see,
I'm school-trained."
  "And why should we trust a school we've never seen, whose methods and
purposes are hidden to us?"
   This would have been easier with less astute questions. "Then don't
trust the school," I said, seeking to be genial myself. Trust the dean. He's
known me for twenty years."
  Unexpectedly the mayor smiled. It looked as though he had missed all
day being able to smile. "You've chosen the best man in the city to be your
guarantor. We would of course prefer not to have to rely on arcane spells.
But if religion and magic can work together, perhaps we may still hope."
   When I left the arched porch of the municipal building a few minutes
later, the streets were still full of people, shopping, offering goods for sale,
carrying water from the fountain, hurrying somewhere. Most were too
absorbed in their own concerns even to notice me.
  But as I passed one young woman she looked directly at me. She had
amethyst eyes and a mole high on one cheek. For a second she smiled.
Then she was past me and I was left looking after her, at a swirl of loose
nut-brown hair over a dark shawl
   In spite of people pushing me from behind I stopped dead in the middle
of the street. For reasons I did not understand her glance brought back all
my shame and sense of loss with the force of ripping the top from a
wound. Only a short while earlier, I had begun to hope that time had
already begun to heal; now I knew that I had only been numb.
   I was in exile from the royal castle of Yurt, probably permanently. I had
lost any chance to see and talk freely with the queen, as I had done for
close to twenty years, and with it I had lost my home, all because I had
been a complete fool.
   After a moment I forced myself to keep walking, trying to decide what it
was about the young woman that brought this knowledge so vividly to me.
It was not her appearance. As I tried to picture her face, I decided it was
probably attractive, but it was nothing like the queen's. I had passed
dozens of other women in the street without any such reaction.
  But those women had all looked past me without even noticing. This
woman had looked at me as though she were my friend.
  "I saw a magician today," I told Joachim that evening. We again ate at
the table by his eastern window, watching the sky darken.
   "Did he summon the bat-winged monster?" "I doubt it," I said, wishing
I had a more productive answer. "At first I thought I sensed some strange
power in him, but then I realized that was only because he knows fire
magic, of a very different sort from the magic they teach us at the school."
I decided not to mention my fleeting impression of two different sets of
spells lingering about him, not wanting to bother the dean with my highly
unlikely speculations about Sengrim's dead spirit returning bodiless to
possess a carnival magician. "He probably didn't have anything to do with
the monster or the giant lizard, but I still warned him away. If I'm going to
find who in this city is working renegade magic, I don't want to be
distracted by some half-competent magic-worker. Do you have magicians
here often?"
  "There is sometimes a magician in town for market day, and always for
the big festivals," said Joachim. They do magic tricks on the corners for a
few coins. But tell me: When will you find out why there was a monster on
the tower and make sure there never is again?"
    I looked into his intent dark eyes and felt embarrassed. Both of us
looked away. "I can't tell you," I said. The whole city feels full of magic, but
it's very unfocused." For some reason I was reminded of the woman with
the nut-brown hair, but there was no way I could mention her or the effect
she had had on me.
   We were both silent for a moment. "I called the wizards' school from
your office in the cathedral late this afternoon," I added then. "I hope you
don't mind." The dean shook his head without looking up. I thought about
that conversation, about Zahlfasts' surprise that I was back in Caelrhon
again. It had been disconcerting, after years of using telephones with
far-seeing attachments, not to see him as I spoke to him.
   "I already warned you about the priests," he had said, uncomfortably
loudly and clearly considering that I was talking to him on the priests'
telephone. "And Elerius tells me that Sengrim had long had disagreements
with the crown prince of Caelrhon." I didn't like the suggestion that
Elerius knew more than I did about the kingdom adjoining Yurt, but I did
not interrupt. "You knew, didn't you, that Sengrim only received the final
year or two of his training here at the school, but it's no use yet trying to
persuade the royal family that a completely school-trained wizard would
be less irritating to them. Let the prince's resentment die down before we
introduce a new wizard into the kingdom."
  The Master was telling me there was some concern that aristocrats
might be turning against their wizards," I said. "You can reassure him
that there's nothing more to it than Prince Lucas."
   Zahlfast had not sounded as reassured as I expected. Instead he said
slowly, "We've had indications that more is involved. . . ."
  Joachim poured himself another half-glass of wine but did not drink it.
Instead he stared at the bottle. "The bishop wants to see you in the
morning," he said at last.
  The bishop? But I thought he understood that the cathedral needs a
wizard here. Has Prince Lucas been talking to him?"
   "I don't think he's going to order you away," said Joachim, slowly
enough that I began to fear that was exactly what he would do. Since no
one wanted me here, not Prince Lucas, not the city council, and not the
school, it would be entirely appropriate if the bishop didn't either. "But
anyone who serves the interests of the cathedral is to some extent under
his authority, and he wants to meet you."
   I was not going to leave here without doing what I had come for, no
matter who wanted me to go. The school, I told myself, was wrong, and I
actively wanted to irritate the princes of Caelrhon. Besides, Joachim
needed me. "Do you think I should entertain the bishop with some magic
tricks?" I suggested.
   He smiled, although rather faintly. "I thought you were a fully-qualified
and competent wizard, not a magician," he said, which was apparently
meant as a joke. "You won't need to do any flashy tricks; I think he mostly
wants reassurance that you are not acting with any disrespect for
religion."
   That depends," I thought but had the sense not to say, "on whether
you're defining religion as Christianity or the organized church." Instead I
changed the subject. "I was starting to tell you about this magician. His
illusions are very poor; they wouldn't fool anybody. But he knows the
magic of fire!"
  The magic of fire?" Joachim asked politely.
  "Even you priests know there are several different lands of magic,
corresponding to the different natural elements," I said. "Most of the
magic they teach in the school, including the whole technical magic
division, is the magic of light and air. But there are other sorts of magic as
well. There's the magic of earth, herbal magic for the most part, which has
never been incorporated into the school texts but which I learned from my
predecessor at Yurt."
  "Indeed." Joachim attempted to look interested.
   "And there's the magic of fire." We had finished eating and were sitting
back in our chairs, our legs stretched out under the table. "It's a different
branch of magic, with different rules and different spells. It doesn't have
very many applications unless you want to be able to start a blaze without
flint and steel or to walk through fire without being burned."
  "So could this be what the Romney children had seen, a magician
practicing fire-magic? Might this be related to the lights the watchmen
have seen on the tower?"
   If he thought I was trying to distract him from his concerns about the
cathedral, he must feel I was doing a very poor job. "It's possible," I said,
making one more attempt, "but the children also suggested they'd seen
someone make himself invisible. That's the magic of air, and hard
magic--that ragged magician couldn't possibly have done it, that is unless
he'd somehow gotten hold of a ring of invisibility. You can attach a spell to
a physical object, you know, and then the spell will work for anyone."
   "We have to find out who is summoning monsters and make him stop,"
said Joachim, abandoning any pretense of interest in different kinds of
magic and their uses. "What will happen if enormous lizards start
appearing all over the city? Half the cathedral priests are already terrified,
thinking that we saw the devil last night and he'll be back for them
tonight. The other half are outraged that anyone dare mock us like this.
   We are trying to act for the glory of God, and we are either being
threatened or laughed at by a beast from hell-It did sound serious when he
put it like that. I had been waiting to see if he would open a second bottle
of wine, but instead he rose abruptly and started gathering the plates. "We
should make it an early night," he said. "The bishop will want to see you
first thing in the morning."
  I had expected the bishop to be tiny and frail. Instead there seemed to
be a lot of him, or at least a lot of unexplained lumps under the blankets
on the bed. Only his head protruded, propped up by pillows against a dark
carved headboard. His skin was pale and he had no hair left.
  "Come here, my son," he said in a voice that would have been
appropriate for someone tiny and frail. I advanced slowly toward the bed,
Joachim one step behind me. There was a faint movement under the
blankets and a white hand emerged, beckoning. On the hand was a ring,
an enormous ruby with a cross cut in its surface.
   I started, then probed magically, just one tiny respectful spell. But this
ruby ring, unlike the last one I had been acquainted with, had nothing
magical about it. I went down on one knee as Joachim had told me I had
to do, murmured, "Your Holiness," and kissed the ring. I just hoped the
Master of the wizards' school never heard about this.
   Then I took the chair toward which the bishop waved me and looked at
his face properly for the first time. His wide eyes brimmed with love and
intelligence but seemed to do so from a considerable distance, as though
the real bishop were not lying here slowly dying.
  "My son the dean has told me he asked you to help us," said the bishop.
He spoke so softly that I had to lean forward to hear him. "I am afraid he
called you without consulting me, but prompt action in the service of God
is always commendable."
  I nodded without speaking.
  "But he has put us in a delicate position" the bishop continued. "If we
are being threatened by magic, some of my priests feel the last person we
should ask for help is another magic-worker."
  Doubtless starting with the cantor Norbert, I thought. Joachim stirred
beside me but I spoke first. "You aren't being threatened by wizardry in
the abstract" I said. "You're being threatened by someone working spells
against the cathedral, and the dean knows that the quickest way to
overcome magic spells is to find someone with powerful magic to break
them."
  "And do your spells have power against the devil?"
   "Of course not. Only God and those who serve Him have power against
the devil" I said generously. "But you aren't facing the devil here. You're
facing a wizard working natural magic."
   The bishop closed his eyes for a moment. The blankets rose and fell
slowly, and for a moment I wondered if he had even heard me. But when
he looked at me again it was unexpectedly shrewdly, as though the real
bishop's mind and ideas had come close to this room again. "You wouldn't
be casting magic spells yourself as an excuse for the wizards to get a
toehold here, would you? I hear the wizards' school in the great City is
trying to expand its placement."
  "I can assure you," I said with dignity, "that I am not responsible for
whatever is happening here." So Lucas's and Vincent's accusations against
wizardry had now even reached the cathedral. "I neither want to mock the
church nor gain any 'toeholds. "
   The bishop started to cough. A young doctor in white, who had been
standing silently on the far side of the room, came forward and offered
him a cup. He took a sip and closed his eyes again. But when he opened
them he continued as though there had been no pause. "When will you
have banished evil magic from our cathedral?"
  "I hope soon. I've only been here twenty-four hours, and I didn't see the
monster myself. Until I have a better sense of who is working magic and
what spells he is using, it may be difficult to counter him. I'll do my best to
be quick and discreet."
   Joachim rose to his feet, so I did as well. He knelt to kiss the bishop's
ring before leaving, but I felt once was enough. The bishop's eyes closed
again as we went out
   "It is an enormous responsibility he carries, and yet he seems able to do
it still, in spite of his weakness," said Joachim as we reached the street.
"The doctors say he may only have a few weeks, but they have already said
that many times."
   I considered asking Joachim if he would expect me to kiss his ring once
he became bishop but was able to resist doing so. I realized we were
entering the side door of the cathedral, on our way to early service. No
hope for breakfast then until service was over. But it was a good chance
for some of the other cathedral priests to see me and realize how reverent
and discreet a wizard could be.
   I spent the morning irreverently practicing magic within twenty yards
of the bishop's palace. First I tried a number of spells from the collection I
had brought, shaped to reveal a hidden magic-worker. I was disappointed
that none of them worked, because it would have taken a master wizard to
shield his mind against all of them, but it was a further indication that
whoever was working here was indeed a powerful wizard and not just a
renegade magician with one good trick. I would certainly have been able
to find the magician I had met the day before if he tried to sneak back into
town, with his weak illusions and not enough flying ability to save his
shoes. It was distracting that the face of the woman with the amethyst
eyes kept appearing inexplicably in my mind in the middle of my spells.
   When this search got me nowhere, I started again trying to work out
the principles of the magic of fire. My books had only the faintest hints
but I had a few ideas, extrapolating from the other sorts of magic that I
knew. Herbal magic, I recalled from when I had first learned it, was set up
with its spells quite separate from the magic of light and air, as though on
a track that started parallel but quickly veered away in a different
direction.
   If the magic of fire worked similarly, I reasoned, I had to find the
direction in which its magic veered. In the Hidden Language, one not only
said specific spells but entered into the very fabric of magic's four
dimensions. The direction in which one entered that fabric exerted a very
powerful flow, and one had to remember that other directions were always
possible.
  Knowing that I was deliberately avoiding thinking about a bat-winged
monster five times the size of a man and doing so anyway, I worked on a
candle in my room. I could with no trouble make the wick glow and even
emit a plausible cloud of smoke, but it remained obstinately cool. Yet
perhaps with a spell from another angle--
  I emerged from a struggle with the forces of magic and gave a shout of
delight. Joachim's servant put his head in, alarmed and then puzzled. I sat
by a sunlit window, triumphantly holding up a lit candle.
 "It's all right," I said. "I was just excited because I lit the candle flame.
Will your master be home for lunch?"
  But the servant was gone, doubtless thinking that his master was
harboring a madman.
  I extinguished the candle and lit it again to be sure that I could. Once
more, with two words and a snap of my fingers I caused a blue flame to
blossom on the end of the wick. It was a real flame, too, no illusion; I
nearly burned my fingers. So far I could only create fire, not protect myself
against it.
   I settled back, feeling a great reluctance to do anything else after my
frantic efforts of the day before and then this morning's unsuccessful
attempts to find another wizard Sitting in the dean's house felt so safe and
normal that I could almost imagine that nineteen years of romantic
dreams were not shattered, that I had not resigned the only post I had
ever had, and that an enormous monster with eyes of fire had not landed a
very short distance from here. If I didn't think about any of this, maybe
none of it would be true.
   Again I wondered why Prince Lucas had come to the city just now, and
why he seemed so furious with organized wizardry. He might have come
here at his father's direction, I thought, to protect the largest community
in their kingdom from a magical attack. In that case he might well suspect
me of having something to do with the monster. But could he have learned
of its evening appearance in time to arrive at dawn the next morning?
   When I heard the noon bells ringing in the cathedral, I began waiting
for Joachim's return. But time passed, time enough for the noon service
and enough more that I realized he was not coming.
  Unless I merely waited for the monster to reappear, something neither
the bishop nor Joachim would want me to do, I would have to search it
out. By sheer willpower I dragged myself to my feet. The cathedral tower
might offer more clues if I looked again.
  As I shouldered my way through the crowded streets, thinking of my
best approach, I suddenly froze in the middle of a step. A light touch once
brushed across my mind. This time it was not just a touch but a voice.
  It spoke one word, "Wizard." It might have been a statement, or it
might have been someone addressing me. I looked around wildly but could
find no clue. The mental touch was gone as quickly as it had come. But
that single word inside my mind had sounded as though spoken with a
woman's voice.
   No wonder, I thought grimly, that the town seemed full of magic. It
would appear to have almost as high a density of magic-workers as the
great City. Besides me, there was whoever had the power to make a
monster do his bidding; plus the magician I had seen outside the gates;
plus the wizard who had impressed the Romney children; and finally
whatever witch had first touched my mind up on the scaffolding and had
just done so again.
  Then out of the corner of my eye I saw a head of nut-brown hair over a
dark shawl.
  In two steps I was beside her, the monster and Prince Lucas forgotten.
"Excuse me," I said and touched her on the shoulder.
   She turned quickly toward me, but where I had expected a startled look
I found a smile that put a dimple in her cheek.
   "I am Daimbert, Royal Wizard of Yurt," I said, flustered. "But I'm afraid
I don't know who you are."
  "My name is Hieodora." Her voice was almost musical in its lilt and
deeper than I had expected.
  Theodora," I said. "It is a very lovely and unusual name."
  "It was my mother's and grandmother's name, and I believe my
grandmothers mother's and grandmother's as well."
  "Were all of them witches as well?"
  She burst into laughter. "I never thought of myself as a witch. Isn't that
something wicked?"
  "Well," I said uncertainly, because she certainly did not appear to be
wicked, "witches are women with strange powers."
  "Sometimes I call on serpents from deep beneath the sea," she said,
looking at me with teasing amethyst eyes.
  "But they haven't answered me yet. Does that make me a witch?"
 "How about bat-winged monsters?" I said, finding it coming out much
more harshly than I intended. "Do you call on them too?"
 That's why the mayor sent for a wizard, isn't it," she said, sober for a
moment, and I recalled that the first time I had seen her I had been
coming from the municipal building. "I didn't see the creature myself, but
it must have been terrible." Then her eyes danced again. "If you think I'm
a witch, why are you surprised that I would want to meet the
magic-worker brought in to deal with a monster?"
  "Why do you think the mayor himself would have sent for a wizard?" I
asked, feeling reluctant to tell a witch that the cathedral dean had invited
me here.
  There are three that rule the world," she quoted, "the wizards, the
Church, and the aristocracy. We who are the merchants and the artisans
and the farmers don't count as rulers."
  "My family ran a warehouse in the great City," I said defensively. "Most
wizards don't come from ruling families."
  "You have authority now. But this social structure gives someone like
the elected mayor of a town a flexibility to do whatever he wants. He can
ask for help from wizards or priests or aristocrats, whereas those three
would be embarrassed to call on each other. I suppose," the dimple
coming back, "if I called on monsters and they answered, then I probably
would be a witch, but I'm not."
  "If you're not a witch," I said, trying not to sound accusing, "how were
you able to speak inside my mind?"
  Instead of answering she took my arm. "If we're going to chat and get
acquainted, let's not do it in the middle of the street. I was just going
home for lunch. Won't you join me?"
   Stories I had half-heard twenty years ago flashed through my mind,
stories of witches luring men into their caves, of what they did to them
there in their mad lusts. The young woman beside me did not appear to be
racked with mad lusts. Maybe I was developing an impure mind.
   "I'd be happy to eat with you," I said, "but you may not have enough to
spare for a stranger. There's an inn right around the corner; I'll even pay
for both of us!"
   "Now," I said again when we were seated at the inn and I had ordered,
"tell me, if you're not a witch, how you can speak with me magically, mind
to mind."
  She bent her head to reach up and unknot her shawl. Her profile and
the angle of her neck made a delightful silhouette against the window
beyond her. "Are you a witch?" she asked me.
   "I am a wizard. But only men can be wizards, because only men are
trained properly in magic. A witch is a woman who has picked up a few
rudiments of magic and, being untrained, uses them at best awkwardly
and at worst in the service of darkness." Everything I said sounded in my
ears as though I were charging her with unspeakable crimes.
  "I am a woman," she said with a laugh, "and I do know one or two
rudiments of magic, but I would not say I was untrained, and I certainly
don't serve the powers of darkness!"
   Our mugs of beer were brought, and she looked at me with dancing eyes
over the rim of hers. I noticed how long her lashes were. I felt no touch in
my mind, but her look implied that she could see all my thoughts and
intentions and overall, surprisingly, rather liked what she saw.
  "Were you trained by an old ragged magician?"
   This she seemed to find the most amusing yet. "Of course not. My
mother trained me. In fact, I taught the magician a little fire magic a few
years ago. All he'd had before then were some rather flimsy illusions." If
she had known him for several years, I thought, then I could give up my
rather vague suspicions that he was a very powerful wizard in disguise,
who had for reasons unclear come here to attack the cathedral.
  Theodora looked down at her plate for a moment, then toward me
again. "You're one of the wizards he told me about, aren't you, one of the
ones who finished the whole program at that school?"
   "Yes, I am, but that doesn't mean I know all the different sorts of magic
there are. Watch this." I snapped my fingers, said two words, and the
candle on the table came alight. "I worked that out this morning, but only
this morning, and I'm afraid it's all the fire magic I know. Could you teach
me more?"
   "And could you teach me illusions? Yours, I know, would not be flimsy
or pathetic. It hardly seemed worth it to ask the magician to teach me his
magic, and I was always afraid he would think I was trying to compete
with him, keeping an "honest magician' from earning a living."
   We both laughed at this. Our conversation seemed to be going nowhere,
and almost every question was answered with a different question, but I
felt intrigued. Something about her resisted my efforts to understand her,
yet in a very few minutes I had started to feel I had known Theodora for
weeks or even longer, and she seemed always to have known me.
  "Are you perhaps one of the Romneys?" I asked as we ate. I brought out
the gold hoop earring I still had. "Did you lose this?"
  She brushed back the hair from both ears, tilting her head forward in
the angle I liked. Long pendant earrings sparkled against her cheeks.
"Doesn't it look like I still have my earrings?"
  "But are you a Romney?" I persisted.
  "No, I've lived all my life in the kingdom of Caelrhon, and as far as I
know all my ancestors have too," she said, giving me a straighter answer
than most. "But I've become friends with some of the Romneys. There's
one band that often camps outside the city."
  I thought rapidly. "Why didn't they want me to know about you?"
   "Did they try very hard to deny my existence?" she said with an amused
glance.
   "Maybe not. The old Romney woman implied I would meet you." I
paused, remembering exactly what the woman had said. "But were they
afraid of my discovering there was someone who knew magic in the city?"
  "Why would they do that?" she replied
  "They certainly left town in a rush, I assume to avoid telling me."
   "But if I were with them, how can I be here now? Or is that just another
of my witchlike tricks?"
   I was fascinated by her hair, a dark brown that caught gold highlights
as she moved her head. It looked luxuriantly soft. "What are your other
witchlike tricks?" I asked, almost wishing after all that I had accepted the
invitation to her cave.
  "What I actually like to do best of all isn't even magic." She paused
briefly; I could tell this was very important to her. "I like to climb."
  "To climb?"
   "I have to do it at night for the most part. It would cause scandal in the
city to have a woman scrambling around on towers in broad daylight. But
it gives me a sense of mastery, of power over my own body and over the
world around me, to know there is nothing too steep or too tall for me to
climb if I want."
   "Then you have a power over your body I don't have over mine. I went
up the new cathedral tower last week, and it gave me vertigo. If you're not
a Romney, are you perhaps related to those workmen working on the new
church?"
  "I thought they were from far away in the north somewhere," she said
with another smile. "Do they enjoy climbing too?" She had not actually
answered my question, but it was too pleasant to have an attractive
woman paying close attention to whatever I said to worry about it.
                                        V
   Even after we finished our food we continued sitting and talking, a
conversation of unrelated questions and oblique answers, where she
seemed continually amused by me. At last she looked out toward the
street, where the movement of the sun over the housetops had cast the
cobblestones into shadow. "I have a lot to do at home," she said, as though
surprised herself at how much time had passed.
  "I'll walk you back."
  She took my arm again. "You school-trained wizards may luxuriate in
royal courts," she said with a smile, "pondering the meaning of magic, but
those of us who work for a living actually have to work."
   We walked rapidly through twisting streets. Timbered house fronts
leaned over us, seeming to stare down from multipaned windows. We
emerged in a quarter of small houses near the river, overlooked by the
backs of the tall homes of the cathedral priests. Theodora stopped by a low
door and turned her key.
   "Maybe it's just as well you didn't come here for lunch," she said
apologetically as she opened the door. "I'd forgotten I left everything so
scattered." inside was a rather dimly lit but completely conventional room.
I had a brief glimpse of the black and white tail of a cat disappearing
under a chair. Spread out on the table and chairs were brightly colored
embroidered pieces of cloth. "I do embroidery for some of the merchants
and the garment retailers," she said. "The best piece I've done recently is
no longer here, but if you're in the cathedral you'll see if the cloth on the
high altar."
  Joachim or whatever cathedral officer bought altar cloths, I thought,
must not know that the skilled local embroideress he had hired was a
witch. I was not going to tell him.
  "Usually I try to work at midday because the light is best," she said.
"The drawback to fire magic is that you never end up with anything better
than candlelight. But I did enjoy talking to you."
  "I hope I'll see you again," I said
  "Of course you will. You promised to teach me some of your magic. An
embroideress could use magic globes to shine beside her."
  I tore myself away and started back up the hill. I thought I knew now
the source of the lights the watchman had originally seen on the new
tower. But I knew even less the source of the bat-winged monster.
   The dean was very quiet at dinner that night, as though he had decided
it would not be tactful to keep quizzing me on my progress. I took
advantage of his silence to think about Theodora. But, as usual, tact lost
out.
  "My servant told me you were lighting candles in broad daylight this
morning," Joachim burst out at last. "Are you trying your own version of
an exorcism?"
   "No, nothing like that," I answered vaguely. "I was working on a
different aspect."
   For close to twenty years, I had been the wizard of Yurt. When I had
gone to the school for a few months, it had been with the assumption that
life in Yurt would be the same when I returned. Now, in the last week, I
had discovered the queen was getting married, had resigned as wizard of
Yurt, and had met Theodora. With all my habits and suppositions shaken
up, I had to remind myself that for Joachim, to whom the monster on the
cathedral tower was of overriding concern, nothing was happening at all.
   "I did find out one piece of information which may reassure you," I
continued. "The flickering lights on the construction at night, and maybe
even the disturbance of materials up on the scaffolding, were due to the
influence of a harmless magical being."
  "Do you mean a wizard?"
   "Actually something closer to the fairies the workmen suggested," I
said, avoiding the word "witch." But I wondered even while I spoke
whether Theodora, even if she lit magical fires while scaling the
scaffolding at night, would be capable of shifting heavy stones and
equipment
  "But what about the monster?" said Joachim, looking at me with
enormous black eyes. I had always found it difficult to hide anything from
those eyes.
  I dropped my own gaze to my plate. "I haven't made as much progress
with that as I hoped," I confessed. "If it was called here by a wizard, that
wizard is hiding very thoroughly from me."
  Joachim started to speak, stopped himself, and then spoke anyway. "I
know you don't need me to remind you that the bishop was hoping you
could be quick."
  "And discreet," I added. "Look on the bright side. If I can't find out
what's happening, and the bishop blames you for bringing in a worthless
magic-worker, then maybe the priests of the cathedral chapter won't elect
you bishop after him."
  Joachim took a deep breath. "Forgive me if I have in any way suggested
you are a 'worthless magic-worker.' It is just hard to wait for it to appear
again."
  "It may not appear at all," I said "Remember, while I was here last week
there weren't even any flickering lights. The guard saw a giant lizard with
hands yesterday morning, but that was only a few hours after I arrived,
and there's been nothing further today. Maybe the monster is afraid of
what it at least considers a highly competent wizard. I could stay here for
a while, keeping it away by my very presence."
  "But you want to get back to Yurt"
  And Father Norbert isn't the only priest who wants one less wizard on
the street, I thought "I can stay for some time," I said airily. "For various
reasons I don't need to return to Yurt right away."
  Joachim stood up, and I started to rise to help him collect the dishes,
but he had only gone to the sideboard for a second bottle of wine. I
watched his face as he worked out the cork and filled our glasses; he
seemed even more sober than usual.
   "I may not always understand you," he said after we had sat in silence
for several minutes, "but I know you better than you think I do. Something
has upset you, upset you terribly. What is it?"
  "Why do you think I'm upset?" I said lightly. I took a drink of wine to
avoid looking at him,
   "Or made you angry, or frightened, or filled with sorrow. I know you
were a little disturbed when you heard the queen was getting married,
because you felt she was being untrue to the memory of the king we all
loved and served, but this goes beyond her marriage. I first knew
something was wrong when you arrived here yesterday at dawn, totally
drenched. Since, then you've acted distracted, and I know you well enough
to realize that you've been thinking inappropriate thoughts even when you
are not saying them."
  It was a good thing, I thought, that he didn't hear some of the more
inappropriate things I had refrained from saying about the organized
church.
   "And then this evening," Joachim went on inexorably, "it's as though
some new and very strange ideas had come to you. I'd assumed you were
as worried as all of us about the magical apparitions, but I soon realized
that was not all. What then is it?"
   This was the one question I felt I could not answer. I knew he would be
shocked if I told him I had tried to propose to the queen, even if I could
make him understand why I had and why her refusal was so devastating.
And I certainly couldn't tell him that I had just met an extremely
intriguing witch, even though, I reminded myself firmly, our relationship
was completely innocent and was going to stay that way.
  "I'm more upset about your cathedral than I think you realize," I
prevaricated, still not looking at him. "It's a blow to my self-esteem as a
wizard not to be able to find out yet who or what caused the bat-winged
creature to appear. And the wizards at the school specifically warned me
about threats to wizardry from the priesthood. I know it's not you, but it
makes me uneasy to be surrounded by so many priests without knowing
what's behind the warning." I dared at last to look up; I had been clasping
my empty glass and staring into it. Joachim reached for the bottle and
poured both of us more wine.
  "And you think this goes beyond the general fear by wizards of
becoming involved in religion," he said, "where all the shortcomings of
wizardry will be revealed?"
   "I'm not sure how seriously to take it," I answered, relieved to have
distracted him from his original question and deliberately ignoring the
second half of this statement. "And then your bishop tried to suggest that
the wizards are trying to get a toehold in all the cathedral cities. Do you
know where he got that idea?"
  The dean shook his head without answering.
  "And did you know that Prince Lucas, Prince Vincent, the royal
chaplain of Yurt, and apparently a lot of other people are talking about a
wizardly plot to dominate the aristocracy?"
   Joachim cocked an eyebrow. "The chaplain accused you to your face of
this plot?"
 "Forgive me," I said, "but I don't like that young chaplain. He gets on
my nerves somehow--maybe because he's so unlike you."
   "I didn't appoint him," said Joachim, "but I had thought you'd be
pleased to have someone else at court who enjoys a hearty laugh."
   "Lots of people in Yurt already enjoy a good laugh," I said, "from the
queen and Paul down to the stable boys. But I wouldn't call the chaplain's
laugh hearty. This may sound odd coming from a wizard, but I like to see
a chaplain with more moral depth." What I would really have liked,
though I knew it was impossible, was to see Joachim back in Yurt again.
   The dean looked at me with raised eyebrows, considering. "I am afraid
that too many seminary students these days do use the knowledge that the
world is God's creation as an excuse to enjoy it too fully, without
considering their ultimate responsibility to save human souls. It would
certainly be possible to give the royal court of Yurt a different chaplain,
but I would not do so without a better reason than personal antipathy
from the Royal Wizard."
   But then, I thought, I wasn't Royal Wizard of Yurt anymore. "Paul
thinks he has an impure mind."
  Joachim looked alarmed. "What does that mean?"
  "I think it means that Paul distrusts the discussions the Lady Maria has
with him."
  "I believe the Lady Maria can defend herself from impure thoughts very
well," said Joachim. If he was making a joke he looked perfectly sober.
"Perhaps you should discuss this wizardly 'plot' with Prince Lucas," he
continued, "while you are both here in Caelrhon."
  "He won't want to talk to me. He almost attacked me today."
  "Maybe some way could be arranged for the two of you to spend time
together," said the dean thoughtfully.
  I took a sip of wine and leaned back in my chair. "Did you ever think," I
said, changing the topic abruptly, "that it might be nice to give all this
up?"
  "Give what up?"
  "These responsibilities. I know you feel the burden even more than I do.
We're supposed to be responsible for the young wizards and the young
priests, for organizing and carrying out the important functions of our
institutions, but after a while who wants the aggravation?"
  "What are you suggesting we do instead?"
   "I think the Romneys have the right idea," I said, pushing my glass
forward for more wine. "When they get tired of being in the same place
too long, they leave. I know they're rumored not to be Christians, so you
might not want to travel with them, but we could have our own caravan,
drawn by our own pony."
  "And what would we and our pony do ?" asked Joachim. A faint smile
hovered near his lips.
  "We could go from town to town, see all of the different cities and
castles--and even the pilgrimage churches-- in the western kingdoms, and
when we had finished with those we could start on the eastern kingdoms."
  "What would we live on?"
  "I could do magic tricks, and you could work a few simple miracles, and
people would pay us."
   Joachim poured out the last of the wine. "You realize of course," he
said, "that that's your most inappropriate suggestion yet." But the smile
had reached his eyes.



                            PART FOUR

                              Theodora

   During the following weeks I saw Theodora every day. The first morning
I strolled through the city for several hours, probing for wizards or
magical creatures and seeing no one I knew except Prince Lucas, who
turned deliberately away. Finally I spotted her coming out of a garment
retailer's. But after that I abandoned all pretense and we arranged our
meetings.
   I did not telephone the school again. Zamfast thought I should be home
in Yurt, and I was unsure how to tell him I had resigned. And, at least so
far, my presence did seem to be keeping monsters away from Caelrhon.
And it was easy to find excuses to stay in the city now that I had met
Theodora.
   We usually got together late in the afternoon, when the light was poorer
for close hand-sewing. After a few hours every morning of searching in an
increasingly desultory way for a powerful wizard I did not particularly
want to find, or of going through my spells once again in a fruitless search
for one that might work against monsters, I was gladder each day to see
her. Strolling in the fresh air outside the city walls or sitting in the grass,
thick with wildflowers, where the Romneys had camped, Theodora and I
discussed magic. She explained fire magic to me, and I taught her some of
the magic of light and air.
    "You call it the Hidden Language?" she asked. "My mother simply called
it the language of magic. She said it had no grammar, only words and
phrases to be memorized, but I've long suspected it must have an internal
logic of its own. Otherwise, you couldn't create new spells."
   I felt vaguely uneasy teaching magic to a witch. The Master of the
wizards' school, I suspected, would disapprove. I rationalized that I was no
longer Royal Wizard of Yurt, and that I would not want to return to the
school either if they persisted in their belief that I would be good at
teaching in the technical division, and thus I was not bound by the
practices of institutionalized magic. Besides, this was not some witch in
the abstract this was Theodora.
  The grass grew so tall around us that someone else would have spotted
us and stepped on us at the same time. She sat with her legs tucked
demurely under her while I sprawled back on my elbows, looking up at
her. The breeze blew tendrils of hair across her face, half obscuring it.
"And have you created any new spells of your own?" I asked.
   "Just one that works reliably." She snapped her fingers and said the two
words to fight a flame, but this one appeared not on the ground but in the
air in front of her. It died out of course almost immediately, but another
appeared just above it, then another, until a string of twenty tiny flames,
each lasting only an instant, had climbed an arc up into the afternoon sky.
  "So that's what you were doing up on the cathedral scaffolding?" I asked
casually.
   Theodoras' dimple appeared. "I knew you were going to ask me about
that sooner or later. The scaffolding presented a much better challenge
than anything else in the city--and since my mother and I always
embroidered for the cathedral, I felt secure there. I know the priests
disapprove of magic, but as the tower wasn't consecrated yet I thought
they couldn't object"
  "They did object" Once again I sounded accusatory. At least so far she
had not seemed offended.
  She looked down at me and smiled. "That's what the Romneys guessed.
Isn't that why the mayor sent for a wizard, even before the monster
appeared, to find the source of the lights?"
   "But the mayor didn't send for me." For reasons not entirely clear to me,
I had not yet told either the dean nor Theodora about the other.
  She plucked a long stalk of grass and tickled my nose with it. "The
Romneys always worried about me," she said. "They said I couldn't be a
wizard because I didn't know how to fly. They never told me I couldn't be a
wizard because I was a woman. I still don't understand why you don't let
women into your school."
   This topic had come up more than once. Since the more I knew her the
less I agreed with the school's policy, it was hard to be convincing in my
answers. "I've already told you," I attempted, "that some of the wizards
have been contemplating for years whether and how the policy ought to be
modified."
  "Then they ought to have been able to work it out by now.
   Theodora learned so quickly, and she had so much magic of her own to
teach me, that I kept finding myself thinking of her as an equal. Even
without what I would consider proper training, she learned faster than
most of the wizardry students. I had only rarely in the last twenty years felt
I was meeting someone else's mind on an equal level in the area of magic.
Joachim was my friend, but our areas of expertise were so different we
were sometimes strangers to each other, and even the teachers at the
wizards' school had to work to remember I was no longer their pupil.
  "Change can take a long time," I said, shaking my head. The old Master
must be hundreds of years old by now, and he isn't going to make
innovations rapidly. But there's something else, something I've felt
uncomfortable telling you. The real objection raised to training women in
wizardry is that women already have a creative power men don't have. You
can create life in your wombs."
  "You men are just jealous," said Theodora.
   "But it causes very serious problems," I persisted. "A woman with the
full knowledge of wizardry could create and give birth to a monster."
  "And school-trained wizards can transform ordinary creatures into
monsters," she replied. "I thought your training was supposed to make
sure that wizards knew the responsibilities of magic as well as its uses.
Why not train the witches too as long as you're so worried?^
  "I have been training you in the magic of light and air," I said "I just
don't care to start on women in general. For one thing, most women
wouldn't have all that you have to teach me."
   "And you wouldn't be interested in a witch if I didn't have fire magic to
teach you?" she asked, giving me a sideways glance from her amethyst
eyes, a glance that might have been teasing and might have been
accusation.
  "I wouldn't be interested in you if you weren't Theodora."
   "Fear of monstrous babies has nothing to do with your school's
attitude," she said. "The real reason is that men already feel threatened by
women. You're desperately trying to keep mastery in at least one area."
  I sat up and frowned, wondering if she was serious. "Theodora, what are
you talking about?"
  "You're smart. You'll figure it out."
  I didn't answer. She started braiding stalks of grass together, not quite
looking at me. I felt my irritation drain away as I watched her hands, the
way she moved her head, the slow movement of her chest from her
breathing.
   Theodora spoke several words of the Hidden Language hesitantly, so
slowly that the spell she was creating trembled on the edge of dissolving,
but then the grass braid she held was suddenly diffused with light.
   She laughed with excitement and looped it around her arm. "It will fade
in a moment," I said. "Do you want me to put on a spell to make the light
permanent?"
  "No," she said, as the glow slowly dimmed. "If I put a permanent light
on something, I want it to be something better than stems of grass.
However," starting to rise to her feet, "the day is also dimming; I need to
get home."
   Without even realizing what I was doing, I took her hand, pulled her
back down beside me, and kissed her lightly. "Let's go, then," I said. "What
time will I see you tomorrow?"
   My dinners with Joachim became almost silent as the days passed. The
dean may have feared my brief visit was going to stretch on forever. I
could see burning in his eyes the constant question, the constant concern
for his cathedral, but he did not want to ask me again. Since I did not feel
I could discuss with him any of the topics I wanted to talk about, I found
that I too had little to say.
   Once Joachim became bishop, I knew, he would no longer feel
comfortable with our late night talks. By not arguing theology and human
nature with him now, as we had done for years, or even discussing my own
difficulties in tracking the monster, I was wasting what might be my last
chance for such conversations.
   He handed me a letter that evening at dinner. "It came via the pigeons
from the City," he said, eating as though not tasting his food.
   I took it in surprise, wondering who in the City even knew I was here.
Then I saw it was from Elerius and had been sent from his kingdom and
relayed through the City's postal system.
  "Just a friendly word of advice, Daimbert," read the letter from the
school's best graduate. "I hear you've gotten yourself maneuvered into
trying to help the Church. The Master, I'm sure, will not be happy to hear
this, especially now that the priests are conspiring against wizardry. Keep
your distance, or at least keep your eyes open."
  I crumbled the letter in my hand. Anyone, much less Elerius, should
have known that such a patronizing "word of advice" was enough to make
a wizard do just the opposite. I turned to Joachim and tried talking to
him.
  "I'm starting to feel as though I've lost control of my own life," I told
him. "Events keep happening faster than I expect, and I do things that
surprise myself."
  "If you wish to go back to Yurt," he said slowly, "I shall not keep you. I
understand if you feel you cannot oppose another wizard's magic."
  "That's not what I meant at all!" I said in exasperation. "I intend to stay
here until I find out what's happening to your cathedral. I'm just sorry I
haven't made progress as fast as you hoped."
  "We're grateful for whatever assistance you can offer," he said stiffly
and rose to gather up the dishes.
  I would have moved out, gone to the the castle across town, except that
Prince Lucas was still there. I thought that he, too, might be waiting.
   "Do you know why Prince Lucas is here?" I asked Theodora the next
afternoon.
   Rain hissed on the street outside as we sat in her house, drinking tea on
a cleared spot in the middle of a table scattered with spools of thread and
scraps of colored cloth. Her cat, who had become used to me, purred by
the fire, its paws tucked tidily together. Some of Theodora's completed
work, stacked on a nearby chest, was worked with simple designs, but
some was embroidered elaborately with flowers or with geometric
patterns. On all of it, whatever design she was following, Theodora used a
distinctive stitch: across three threads, skip one, then across two more.
"And why should a great prince tell an embroideress why he comes and
goes?" She seemed, as always, to find me highly entertaining. "Well, you
live here in the city, and I understand he comes here often." I paused for a
moment, thinking.
  "Why, when Caelrhon is so much larger a kingdom than Yurt, does the
king of Caelrhon not even have his own castle in his own cathedral city?"
  "I'm sure you don't want me to tell you," said Theodora, trying to
suppress a smile, "that great princes don't explain these things to
embroideresses."
   "Paul will know," I said. Theodora knew about Paul. I had told her a
little about Yurt, hoping that in return she would tell me more about
herself. But from my account she would have gathered that after the old
king had died the royal heir brought himself up with the aid of his
great-aunt and the castle staff, for I never mentioned the queen.
   I thought, as I already had several times, that I was caught between
finding Theodora highly elusive and knowing her better than I had ever
known anyone. She had quickly learned everything--or almost
everything-- important there was to know about me, and yet I often felt
there were whole aspects of her life that were still hidden. But then she
would casually tell me something in a way that suggested she had never
meant to keep any secrets.
  I'd like to meet Paul," she said thoughtfully.
  Reason reasserted itself after two jealous seconds. Paul must be ten
years younger than she was and would probably consider her a
contemporary of his Aunt Maria.
   On the other hand, I reminded myself, she was twenty years younger
than I. For the first time since I had become a wizard, I wished that I
looked less old and venerable rather than more so. "Has it ever bothered
you that I have white hair?"
  "No," she said, with a teasing smile that brought out her dimple. "I
assumed that that was just an emblem of your wisdom."
  "You still haven't told me," I said. "Why, when the Romneys left town to
avoid telling me about you, did you seek me out yourself?"
  "I had to see whether I approved, of course, of the man who was
supposed to use his magic to protect the cathedral. And did you ever think
you aren't like most wizards?"
  I wasn't sure what this meant and thought it safest to leave it while it
might still be a compliment. "Did you ever meet Sengrim, the late Royal
Wizard of Caelrhon?"
   "He was here in the city a number of times over the years," she said
slowly. "I wouldn't say I ever actually met him." Her tone suggested that he
was one of the wizards I was not like.
  "Prince Lucas dismissed him, and I wish I knew why."
  "A secret quarrel, clearly not suitable for witches to hear," she said with
another smile. "Shall I make more tea?"
  I nodded but refused to be distracted. "I have an idea about that
wizard," I said. "I notice Prince Lucas's wife isn't with him."
   "I remember his wedding," Theodora said reminiscently, refilling the
pot with boiling water from the hearth. "It was one of the most exciting
events in the city in years. They were married in the cathedral on one of
the hottest summer days I've ever seen. The princess had her own gown
made in the great City by the sea, but I helped make some of the
bridesmaids' gowns. The princess paid better than anyone around here; I
lived on the money for three months. I hope she hasn't found life in a small
inland kingdom too dull--though she does have her children now."
   "But she found a way to liven up her life!" I interrupted. "I think she
Had a torrid romance with their Royal Wizard! That's why Prince Lucas
dismissed him and became so furious when I even mentioned him. You
don't think-- you don't think Lucas deliberately arranged for the 'accident'
that killed him?"
  Theodora poured out the tea, looking at me from under long lashes.
"Why would a wizard have a romance with a princess? I'd always heard
they were as chaste as priests."
   I knew she was teasing me again but answered seriously. "It is
traditional that wizards never marry, but it's very different from the
situation in the priesthood. A wizard is not considered to have sinned
against wizardry and blackened his soul by being with a woman. Most
wizards just prefer to keep their own counsel."
  "I see," she said, her back to me while she set the teapot down. When
she turned around she was smiling. "I like your idea, it's very dramatic
and romantic, but you still need to explain one thing: why would a
princess possibly be interested in a wizard?"
  When I left a little later, I kissed her, tipping up her face with a finger
under her chin. For a moment I felt the pressure of her forearms against
the sides of my neck.
   "I'll see you tomorrow," she said, stepping back. "Keep practicing your
fire magic until then; you seem to be a very promising pupil!"


                                      II
  We arranged to go on Sunday to the stone quarry three miles from
town. Theodora said she had always wanted to climb the steep limestone
outcropping from which they were cutting the blocks for the cathedral,
but she couldn't go during the week while they were quarrying and said
she felt uncomfortable going alone on Sundays.
  There are some rough men who camp there," she said. "It's far enough
away that the municipal guard doesn't pay attention to them."
  "But isn't that a problem for the men working in the quarry?"
  "I think a lot of them are the men working in the quarry."
   She was so good at some aspects of magic that I kept forgetting how big
were the gaps in her knowledge. Without knowing how to fly, she was
limited to running from danger. Climbing around the cathedral tower at
night must have seemed less threatening than facing strange men in
daylight.
   First thing Sunday morning, however, I went to service in the cathedral.
I sat with the servants of the cathedral priests, doing my best to look
serious and not at all like a wizard. The cantor Norbert, however, standing
in front of the choir, seemed to have no doubts about me.
   Joachim led the service, and, watching him, I realized something that I
should have realized much earlier. The reason he was always so busy was
that he was already effectively the bishop. It should have been the bishop
standing at the high altar on Sunday morning, the dean taking the noon
service, but Joachim was doing both. In his care for the diocese, for the
cathedral edifice, for the rest of the priests, for the seminary itself and all
the young would-be priests, he must also be doing double duty.
   The congregation came out of the cathedral into brilliant sunshine,
rolled on a wave of organ music. Joachim caught up to me at the door.
"We just have time for breakfast," he said, "and then I have to ride out to
a village five miles from here for a baptism. The baby was born too soon,
and they're afraid that bringing her into the city might kill her, but they
want her baptized as soon as possible. I'll have to hurry back, because
after the noon service a castle chaplain is coming for his annual spiritual
examination."
  After that I certainly couldn't tell him I was going to spend the day with
an attractive witch. "I hope it goes well," I said gravely.
   But as Theodora and I walked out the city gates an hour later, I was not
thinking of the heavy responsibilities of cathedral priests. "I really should
teach you how to fly," I told her. "Then you'd be able to get to realty high
places to do your climbing."
  "Could you really? Could a witch learn to fly?"
  By the time we had walked the three miles to the quarry, Theodora was
able to lift herself about six inches off the ground, although she kept
laughing, which broke her concentration.
   The quarry itself was silent, and there seemed no one around but
ourselves. The sun beat warm on our heads, and larks soared and sang
around us. The actual quarry was a great gash in one side of the limestone
outcropping, but the other side was untouched. "I'll try climbing here,"
said Theodora.
   She unbuttoned and stepped out of her skirt--I was intrigued, but
underneath she wore men's leggings-- and braided up her hair. Then she
rubbed a little dirt into her palms and, her head back, considered the
steep surface. It was pocked with cracks and fissures; even a few flowers
grew in tiny pockets of soil. Then she began to climb.
  "Remember those words of the Hidden Language," I said quickly. "If
you start to fall, you might be able to slow your descent with the flying
spell."
  Theodora finished shifting her weight from a lower to a higher toehold
and paused. "Maybe I shouldn't let you teach me to fly after all," she said.
"This wouldn't be as challenging if I knew I was always perfectly safe."
   She went back to climbing, moving slowly but steadily, finding crevices
in the rock which I would never have found, trusting herself to them when
I would have been paralyzed. Although she did not have the long toes and
fingers of the workmen on the cathedral, she moved with the same
apparent disregard for height.
   At first I watched her from the ground, then I flew up to a ledge and
watched as she went by. She broke into a light sweat as she climbed,
making her tunic stick to her back. She seemed to have an exquisite sense
of balance and an absolute confidence that her body would obey her mind.
   At the end of a half hour, Theodora had almost reached a deep crevice
in the rock face. But the last few feet of cliff jutted outwards. She worked
her hand into a narrow crack, made a fist so that the hand would not slip
out again, and braced her weight against it as she scrambled for purchase
with her toes. For a moment she became motionless, then her knees
started to tremble and she began quietly swearing.
   I reached with magic to catch her, but then she flung the other hand up,
grabbed the lip of the crevice above her, kicked her way upward, and
folded herself into it. I let out my breath all at once. "I'm going to rest
here!" she called cheerfully. "I think there's enough room for you, too."
  I flew up to join her. "Are you all right?"
  "Of course. I apologize for the cursing. There's always a moment, usually
just before you reach the top, when you think that this time you'll never
make it and you have to yell at your body to keep it moving at all."
  There was just room in the crevice for a second person. Although not
nearly as supple as she, I managed to fit most of myself in. Our faces were
very close together and our shoulders collided I was surrounded by the
scent of her, a combination of sweat, lavender, and clean hair.
  "I'm extremely impressed," I told her honestly. "Did your mother teach
you climbing as well as magic?"
  "It was my father, actually," she said. "He died in a fall when I was only
ten, but he'd already taught me everything he knew."
  "Oh, I'm sorry," I said inadequately.
   "It's a long time ago now. Besides, I don't think of him as being dead. I
think about what he used to say to me, how he used to encourage me when
he first took me out to practice on little ten-foot boulders. Sometimes
when I'm climbing I can still almost hear him."
   I thought to myself that theirs must have been a very unusual family.
But I was distracted by the realization that her lips were less than an inch
from mine. It seemed perfectly natural to start kissing them. Even though
I could not embrace her, as my arms were needed to hold me in the
crevice, I kept on for some time. Theodora seemed to be enjoying this as
much as I was.
  I had almost decided I could spare one arm to put around her when the
corner of my eye caught a glimpse of empty air. If I wasn't careful, both of
us would be down at the bottom of the cliff.
   Very delicately, I pulled my head back. Her eyes smiled into mine. "Is
this what you're imagining the princess and the royal wizard doing?" she
asked.
   I wasn't at all sure she believed my theory about Sengrim--I wasn't sure
I believed it myself. But being reminded of him calmed me down enough
that I noticed how cramped I had become jammed into the crevice. "I'm
going to slip out now," I told her. "Were you planning to climb any
higher?"
  "This is high enough for today," she said. "It always takes longer to go
down than up. We'll have to come back here again."
  I rolled out into the air and hovered, watching as she extended first one
long leg and then the other. She found toeholds and started easing herself
down.
  As she descended I hovered to one side, trying to stay far enough away
that I would not distract her and yet close enough that I could catch her
with magic if she slipped. She would probably object if she knew what I
was doing, but her father had fallen to his death.
   Somehow and quite mistakenly I had assumed going down would be
easier than ascending. Instead of looking above her for the next tiny ledge
or crevice, Theodora had to feel below her with a toe. When she was
twenty feet from the ground I went down and stood below her, thinking
that if she did fall I could cushion the impact with my body. Suddenly I
heard voices.
  Coming around the corner were three men. They had the massive upper
arms and chest muscles of men who spend their days swinging hammers
against solid stone. "Hey, look!" said one of them. "It's a girl on the cliff!"
  The other two laughed. "Let's get her down!" They ignored me, an
ineffectual looking white-haired man. They brushed past and looked up
the cliff as though about to start climbing.
  A pebble rolled past my head as I heard Theodora shifting. I looked
toward her and froze. She was gone.
  The men were equally startled. "Hey, where's the girl?" The leader
looked at me for the first time. "What did you do with her, old man? Are
you a magician or something?"
  "I am the Royal Wizard of Yurt," I said loudly, doing my best to give
him a piercing look. Inside my head I was yelling, "Theodora! Where are
you?"
   "A wizard, huh? Did you make the girl disappear? What did you do that
for?"
  "To keep your unwanted attentions from her, of course," I said and
extended a hand. With a small bang and a burst of pink smoke, the grass
caught fire at his feet.
   "Very good, pupil!" said Theodora's voice inside my mind. I stole a
quick glimpse up the rock face. The sun was at an oblique angle, and the
crevices and odd bits of plant growing out of the limestone made a jumble
of shadows, but there was a larger shadow where I had last seen Theodora.
  The men stepped back, temporarily startled. The leader regained his
composure first. "You want to fight, is that it?" he cried and charged.
   I would never have been able to hold him off if he had reached me, but
fortunately I did not have to. I lifted him six feet off the ground and held
him suspended. "All right," 1 said to the other two. "Would either of you
like to take your turn?"
   The man in the air kicked and bellowed, but magic held him firmly. I
shifted my attention to the second man and started lifting him slowly. I
did not have to lift him far. He tried to jerk away and cried out with fear
as all but the tips of his toes left the ground. I let him go, and he dropped
heavily. He caught his balance, spun around and began to run. The third
man was already gone.
  "Keep this in mind as a useful warning," I said to my remaining
audience. "Never try to attack a wizard," But I went up into the air myself,
above the reach of his powerful arms, before letting him down. He gave
one snarl in my direction and followed his friends.
  "Theodora!" I called, trying to find her shadow. But the shadow was
moving. In a few minutes it had reached the bottom of the cliff and
Theodora reappeared, taking one hand out of her pocket
 I put my arms around her. "Thank God. Are you all right? How did you
make yourself invisible?"
  "How did you lift him off the ground?" She was smiling with delight "Is
that a variation of the flying spell?"
  "It's related," I said. "I can teach it to you too. But I didn't realize you
knew any of the magic of light and air." "You mean making myself
invisible? Isn't a witch entitled to a few secrets?"
  She was enjoying teasing me, but I had been too worried about her to
be teased right now. I still had an arm around her firm, muscular
shoulders. "What is it, a ring of invisibility?"
   She became serious and reached back into her pocket. "I hadn't wanted
to tell you at first, because I was afraid you would tell me it wasn't
something suitable for a witch and try to take it away from me."
  "What have I done to make you think that?" I protested.
  "My mother had it before me," she said, "and her mother and
grandmother before her." She had it in her palm, a heavy gold circle
without any stone or ornament. I took it carefully and looked inside. It was
engraved with very tiny letters, too small to see clearly without a
magnifying glass, but they looked like the angular letters of the Hidden
Language.
  "What's the inscription?" I asked, handing the ring back.
  "I don't know. It might be a spell of some sort."
  "I'll read it for you if I can look at it with a glass," I said. "Do you always
carry the ring?"
  "Always. But I don't like to use it very often, especially since I started
seeing those things."
  "What "things'?" I demanded.
   But she was smiling at me. Thank you for rescuing me. Even with my
ring, I can't hide my shadow." She put Her skirt back on and shook out
her hair. Although I was fairly sure that, with her climbing ability and
ring of invisibility, she would have been able to protect herself quite well,
it was gratifying to be considered a rescuing hero.
  "Rings of invisibility are rare," I told her as we started to walk back
toward the city. "But the spell to make things invisible is so difficult that
wizards who can master it attach that spell to rings more than any other
kind of spell."
  "Can you make yourself invisible with just your Hidden Language?" She
gave me a challenging look from under long lashes.
  "I can, but don't ask me to do it now. I know you'll make me laugh, and
then it won't work."
   "You're just nervous about having to see those things." "What 'things'
do you mean?" I asked again, "I don't know what wizards call them. Those
little creatures--except some of them aren't very little. I don't see them
every time; I didn't see them this time."
   "Oh," I said, wondering what she could possibly have seen. I would have
to look at the inscription on the ring very soon.
   "I've already taught you most of my fire magic," said Theodora, "even
though you still need to practice the spells against being burnt. Maybe in
return for your magic I should teach you how to climb the real way,
without flying."
  "But I don't have your suppleness or your muscles." "That takes practice
too, just as magic does," she said in the tone of a reproving school teacher.
   I laughed and put my arm across her shoulders. She was exactly the
right height to fit under my arm. She put her own arm around my waist
and we walked hips together, matching strides, back toward town.
   On the walk out to the quarry, I had thought three miles long, in spite of
the sunshine and flower-scented air. Now I would have been happy to walk
twice as far. At some point without noticing I seemed to have fallen in
love.
                                   III
  Joachim asked me somewhat stiffly the next morning if I would mind
not joining him for dinner that night. "I have invited the other officers
over," he said, "so that we may discuss in perhaps a more relaxed setting
than the cathedral office what we shall need to do as the bishop's illness
continues."
   "Of course," I said, thinking that the dean was surely hoping to get
some of the other cathedral officers to take up some of the double burden
he was carrying, while the rest of them were doubtless intending to accuse
him of introducing into the city the wizard responsible for all their
problems--and maybe even the bishop's illness itself. The cantor Norbert,
whom I suspected from something Joachim had said of having long had
aspirations of being elected bishop himself, would doubtless lead the
accusations: from his point of view, the dean was assuring his own
election by taking over the bishop's duties now. "Are you sure you wouldn't
feel more comfortable if I moved out," I asked, "maybe went to stay in an
inn?"
  The dean looked up. "I asked you to stay with me, Daimbert," he said
soberly and apologetically, "and am sorry if you are still uneasy here."
   I shook my head and went out, mumbling something unconvincing
about still looking for traces of magical apparitions. But Theodora was
busy finishing a new dress for the mayors wife, so I was back not much
later, letting myself in quietly with the spare key Joachim had given me
because I knew he would be at the cathedral and I didn't want to disturb
his servant.
  But as I stepped inside I heard a voice from the study. It was Norbert
"Remember," he was saying, low and fierce, "you never saw me here."
 Intensely interested, I went still and amplified the sound of voices with
magic.
   But I heard no one answer Norbert. He spoke again. "You seem to pride
yourself on rarely speaking. Trust me: your silence now will be for the good
of the Church. So just don't speak this time." There was another pause.
"Do you want me to tell the dean about that time you stood shouting and
cursing in the middle of the market square? It happened before he moved
here from Yurt, and I doubt he's ever heard the story. I'm sure he'd find it
most interesting."
  There was another silence. "Good," said Norbert with satisfaction.
"Remember, I have not asked you to do anything to harm your master.
Just don't tell him I was here or touch this."
   Rapid steps were coming my way. I made myself invisible just in time.
Norbert came within an inch of brushing against me as he opened the
front door. Fortunately the entry was dim and I cast no shadow. His face,
close to mine, did not look evil, but there was a desperation in his eyes
that contrasted with the good-natured if somewhat self-righteous lines
that the years had put around his mouth.
  Could he have summoned a bat-winged monster to the cathedral? Not
without a lot of help, I concluded, just barely getting in a quick magical
probe before the door slammed behind him. There was not the slightest
indication that he knew any wizardry.
   But what had he left in the dean's study? Still invisible, I went quietly
into the room, in time to see Joachim's silent servant, his expression
anguished, hurrying out the far side.
   It didn't take long to find it. On the bottom shelf of a wide oak
bookshelf, tucked almost entirely behind some heavy theological treatises
so that no one would see it unless they were looking for it, was a book of
magic.
   I pulled it out carefully. To a wizard it almost shimmered with the
residual spells of the magic-workers over the generations who had used it
And it had been used for generations. It was written on parchment sheets
in a number of different hands, bound in calf made rough by long use.
Half a dozen names had been written on the flyleaf, below five stars and a
pentagram, but all the names were heavily crossed out. The parchment
leaves were soft with much handling, but the book fell open to a place
marked with a fresh red velvet ribbon. Above the words of the Hidden
Language was a heading in the sharply angled handwriting of a wizard or
magician who might have been dead for centuries: "How to poison a rival
with a slow-acting poison."
  I slammed the book shut and retreated to my room, so indignant and so
furious that it was lucky for Norbert he was no longer in the house.
Nobody was going to plant false evidence, accusing Joachim of poisoning
the bishop, while I was in Caelrhon.
   But once I calmed down a little I realized that transporting Norbert up
to the top of the new tower and dropping him off would not help the dean.
Joachim, I was afraid, would be sorrowful but forgiving when I told him
about this. I somehow had to find a way to reveal Norbert's plot in a way
that would discredit him so thoroughly that he would not try something
similar again, but I would have to do so without warning Joachim ahead
of time.
   Norbert's plan was fairly clear. He had brought the book here, with the
marker carefully in place, and threatened Joachim's servant with
revelation of his old shame if he even mentioned the cantor's visit. He
intended to "accidentally" discover it that evening, in the presence of all
the cathedral officers, thus casting the dean under so much suspicion
regarding the old bishop's illness that he would no longer be a viable
candidate for bishop himself. Even if Joachim convincingly denied all
knowledge of the book, the suspicion would fall on me, and hence reflect
very poorly on the dean who should have known better than to harbor a
wizard who had probably already brought a bat-winged monster to attack
the new cathedral.
   Should I, I wondered, weighing the worn magic volume in my hand,
suspect Norbert after all of calling the monster? But it was hard to
imagine someone who had resorted to a rather petty if despicable trick
like this of being behind something so spectacular as having a creature
five times the size of a man land on the tower.
  On the other hand, where had he gotten the magic book?
   I examined it again. Nothing about it gave any clue. It must long
predate the school and its cleanly printed books on magic. Unless I was
going to assume that Norbert himself, a cathedral priest for decades, kept
a collection of arcane tomes, he must have gotten it somewhere on
purpose to discredit Joachim. Perhaps he had been able to overcome his
aversion to wizardry enough to find and deal with a wizard--but who? And
could it be the same one who had been behind the monster, the one I still
couldn't find?
   Suddenly I smiled. Joachim, if I told him about it, would have called it
totally inappropriate, but I had a plan.
   I lurked, invisible, while the cathedral officers assembled that evening. I
had started to think that Joachim was growing old, but compared to the
rest of them he was positively youthful. Most had white hair and faces that
had started to sag around the jawbones, but they all seemed
conscientious, polite, and genuinely concerned about the welfare of the
diocese. They did not go into the study as I expected but instead passed
into the dining room, with a rustle of vestments and a faint scent of
incense and talcum.
   While they ate dinner I retreated into my own room to take a break
from invisibility--always a difficult spell to maintain. Besides, I really
didn't want to hear all the details of diocese management. An hour passed.
Listening to the distant clinking of plates and silver, I started growing
hungry enough to wonder if I could slip out to an inn for a bite and be
back before anything happened.
   But then I heard the scraping of chairs and the sound of feet moving
toward the study. I quickly wrapped myself in a spell of invisibility and
took the old magic book out of the bottom of the box where I had hidden
it under my own books. Silently I slipped out into the hall, sliding the book
above me along the high ceiling.
  "You certainly have a good theology collection,
  Joachim," I heard Norbert's voice. "I might like to borrow some of your
books sometime."
   I stopped outside the study door, afraid of having one of the cathedral
officers bump into me, but peeked around the edge as I continued the
book's progress into the room. No one looked up to see it.
   Norbert bent toward the bottom shelf of the wide bookcase. "Now this
work, for example--I haven't seen it since seminary!" His voice was just a
little too loud and his manner nervous; he was clearly unused to plotting
and deception. For a second I even allowed myself to feel sorry for
someone so desperate as to resort to plots he would have denounced if
presented to him in the abstract. This went far beyond jealousy of the
dean-- he must be genuinely worried about the church's welfare. "Let me
see," he continued, pulling out a large theological volume. "But wait!
Joachim! What's this I see behind it?"
  Joachim politely bent to look. 'There is nothing behind it"
   "Of course there-- Don't tell me he--" Norbert dropped to his knees to
look for himself. The other priests glanced at each other in surprise.
   The cantor, bent over with his face thrust into Joachim's innocuous
theology collection, presented much too tempting a target for me to resist.
I dropped his magic book from the ceiling and hit him square on the
fundament
  He jerked, banging his head on the shelf, and spun around. "Here it is!"
he cried, picking it up. "Joachim! I am deeply shocked!"
   The priests all looked at each other again. "Where did that book come
from?" several asked in surprise, and "The dean didn't do it," added
several others.
   "But look what he has on his shelves!" Norbert cried, vicious and
triumphant, pushing himself to his feet and opening the volume.
"Joachim, you know I don't shock easily, but I am deeply disappointed!
It's-- Why, look!" holding up the title page to snow the others. "It's a book
of magic!" He leafed through. "And here, marked with his own marker--"
He stopped, unable to find the poison spell because I had taken the
marker out.
  There was a short silence. Norbert seemed to realize that this wasn't
coming out quite the way he intended. One of the priests, the one I
thought was the chancellor, asked quietly, "Why did you think the dean
had such a book in his study, Norbert? And how did you know even before
you opened it that it was a book of magic?"
  He looked around desperately. "That servant of yours--" he tried.
  "I hope," said Joachim mildly, "that you did not bring this book in here
earlier and threaten my servant with exposure of what he still believes is a
secret, to keep him from informing me of your visit."
   In the subsequent uproar everyone seemed to forget the magic book's
abrupt arrival on the scene, except for Joachim, who looked thoughtfully
at the ceiling. I slipped back to my room as Norbert, apparently deciding
that at this point full confession would work better than denial, threw
himself at the dean's feet, quite real tears running down his cheeks.
   This I didn't need to see. I quietly opened my casement window,
stepped out into the air, and flew off, still invisible, in search of supper.


                                      IV
  Even with a magnifying glass, it was hard to read the inscription in
Theodora's ring by candlelight. I tipped the ring back and forth and
wished for one of the excellent magic lamps from Yurt.
  "It's a spell, certainly," I told Theodora. We sat by her hearth, where she
had been trying to teach me the spell for a cloak of fire.
   "It's really very easy," she had said "Make yourself a net of anything that
will burn quickly--dry grass works very well. Then ignite it while
simultaneously saying the spell against being burnt." We practiced while
sitting almost all the way into the fireplace. She had moved her piles of
cloth well away to keep them from sparks. "My hands do all right," I said.
"You know you used to scold me about drawing them back, but I hope you
notice how much better I've become. But my head still worries; my hair
and beard know they're going to catch fire at any second."
   This she found hilarious, and by the time she recovered her breath I
decided I had had enough for today of trying to establish the same sort of
authority over my body that she seemed to have without the slightest
effort over hers. These recent weeks felt to me like something flaring and
flashing just barely within my control, but so far-- I hoped--I had avoided
being scorched.
   Even though Theodora's magic and mine were so different, I felt a
companionship with her that I had never felt with anyone else. Now that I
had admitted to myself that I was in love with her, I kept wondering what
would happen next. I found it difficult to imagine being back either in
Yurt or at the wizards' school with Theodora at my side. But it was equally
difficult to imagine being anywhere without her.
   Although I had told the queen I would give up wizardry for her, I knew I
could not. It had become such a part of me that it would be like trying to
give up breathing. I loved Theodora and wanted her, but it would still be
impossible never to practice magic again. On the other hand, I told myself,
just because I gave up all recognized posts for wizards did not mean I
would have to give up practicing magic. I could be another itinerant
spell-caster, just one who happened to have a degree from the school.
Maybe, I thought, Theodora and I could take off in a caravan with a pony.
But I had promised Joachim he could come in my caravan, and he might
not like her company. Or maybe I could settle down here in the cathedral
city and do tricks in the marketplace, even if the old magician did become
furious at me. I had thought when I met him that doing simple magic
tricks for pennies would be a degrading way to spend ones life, but if
Theodora were with me it might have unexpected benefits,
  I wondered briefly if she had been falling in love with me as I fell in love
with her, or if she had picked me out even before we met face-to-face. If
so, was it with the intention from the beginning that we fall in love? But I
didn't like this line of thinking and tried to dismiss it. "Maybe I can make
your ring glow itself with a spell of my own," I suggested.
   The spell worked even better than I had hoped; the gold blazed into
light while the letters remained black and finally intelligible, spelling out
words in the Hidden Language that I recognized.
   Carefully I put the magnifying glass down, feeling stabbed with cold.
"Theodora, this is a spell to reveal what is hidden. When you put on the
ring, you not only make yourself invisible, you make yourself able to see
other invisible creatures. You've got to tell me about these 'things' you see.
Are they here in the city now?"
   "I don't know," she said slowly, completely serious for once. "I try not to
use my ring very often and, as I already told you, I don't see them every
time."
  "When was the last time you saw them?"
  She closed her eyes. "I don't like thinking about them. It must have been
two months or so ago."
  I put a hand on her arm. "Where were they?"
   She opened her eyes and put her hand over mine. "On the new cathedral
tower. I had been climbing up there at night. When I was near the top,
where the workmen had some cut stone piled ready for use, I noticed it
was all in disarray as though the piles had been pushed over. And then as I
was coming down I almost ran into the watchman. I put on my ring just in
time."
   I could feel her trembling and realized that she had been deeply
frightened. "And then?"
   "I saw two of them, almost like big lizards. I just caught a glimpse of
them out of the corner of my eye. But they had wings and--and what
looked like hands."
   The winged red lizard the guard had spotted down on the docks. It had
disappeared into the air--made itself invisible. Though I had assumed
there was only one, and that whatever wizard had brought it had taken it
away again, maybe there had been several of them in the city the whole
time. The dean wasn't going to like this at all.
   Neither one of us said anything for several minutes. This then explained
the tumbled building material that had originally appeared on the new
tower at the same time as Theodora's magic lights. But I still did not know
what relation it might nave to the bat-winged monster. The room was
silent except for the occasional tap-tap of steps going by outside. The cat
made me jump by suddenly meowing. Theodora picked it up and stroked
it until it began to purr.
   "Somebody's working magic here besides you and me," I said at last.
"Whoever it is must be bringing creatures from the northern land of
magic and making them invisible." Might the Royal Wizard of Caelrhon
have been dismissed just before his death for summoning enormous
lizards?
  The cat was going to sleep in Theodora s lap. "Do you mean it's
something to do with this city, and not with my ring?"
  "Unless the world is fuller of invisible creatures than I had thought," I
said grimly.
   "You do know," said Theodora, "that there's another wizard in the city
right now."
  I took her by the shoulders so sharply that I jostled a highly indignant
cat off her lap. "Another wizard? Here? Now? No, I didn't know!"
  But I should have known it perfectly well. After all, Norbert had gotten
that book from somebody. I had grabbed a quick breakfast while Joachim
was still at morning service and gone out before he returned, preferring to
postpone a discussion of books falling from the ceiling. Thinking about
Theodora had distracted me from what I knew I should have been doing.
  She pulled back as though almost frightened of me. In the uncertain
candlelight her eyes looked gray instead of amethyst. I made myself loosen
my fingers from her shoulders. "He's been in town all week," she said
"Haven't you felt his presence?"
  I put my forehead on my fists, feeling like a fool. A wizard who had
resisted my best spells to find him seemed to be transparently obvious to a
witch. I stopped myself from asking Theodora why she had not told me
about him. I had not asked her.
  I forced myself to look up. "Where is he right now?" I judged how
devastated I must look by Theodora's expression.
   She put out a hand and touched my face. "I don't know where he is, but
I can help you look for him."
   Might it be the old magician I thought I had warned away? Someone
that destitute might have been forced by hunger to sell even his tattered
old book of spells if Norbert had offered him enough. Maybe, and I
clenched my jaw at the thought, just as he had persuaded Theodora to
teach him a little fire magic he had persuaded some wizard to teach him
how to summon invisible and even demonic creatures.
  "Not demonic," I said. "They're not demons."
   "How do you know?" I didn't realize until she spoke that I had said it
aloud.
  I pulled her toward me. "I don't."
   She started kissing my face, my cheeks, my eyes. In a moment I thought
that she was doing a remarkably good job of making me forget my fears.
"I'm afraid I haven't been entirely frank with you," I said, pulling back.
"You already know that I came here to find the source of the magical
apparitions here in the city. The mayor didn't send for me, however; the
dean of the cathedral did."
   This did not seem to strike her as a particularly startling revelation.
"Maybe you haven't been able to find the other wizard because he's afraid
of your powers and is deliberately hiding from you," she said, "whereas it
never occurred to him he had to shield his mind from a woman."
  "Well, then," I said, trying to regain my good humor, "if you can help
me find him, maybe I can make sure he doesn't summon any more
invisible creatures to bother you."
  "Come on," she said, jumping to her feet. "We'll look for him now."
   But Theodora and I were unable to locate the wizard or magician. She
could find his mind quite easily but not actually touch it, so she had no
information on his exact location. I could not find him at all.
   "You don't sense him?" she said in frustration. "You don't find him
right--there? Are you sure you're using the right words of your Hidden
Language?"
  "Maybe witches are just better at finding other people than wizards
are," I said, equally frustrated. "You found me long before I found you." I
was using discovery spells powerful enough that I doubted I could have
shielded against them myself, school spells that should have sliced straight
through the old magic of earth and herbs, without the slightest result.
  "Let's not stand here being irritated any longer," Theodora said with a
sudden smile, taking my arm. Market day was finishing, and we had been
pushing through the jammed streets on our unsuccessful search. "Let's
walk outside the walls and think about something completely different.
Then if he thinks he's safe and lets his guard down, we'll have him."
   In the weeks I had known Theodora, the season had passed from spring
to summer. The early wildflowers were over, but the flowers that bloomed
in the high grasses of summer were crowding toward the sky. While we
normally had the Romneys' old campground to ourselves, today because of
all the people in town for market the area was scattered with carts and
tents. Even market stalls had spilled out from the crowded streets.
   She settled herself among the sun-baked blades and I flopped beside
her, pulling her down so that her head was pillowed on my shoulder. It
was very easy like this not to think about the wizard. The late afternoon
sun cast shadows across Theodora s face. She had unfastened the neck of
her bodice, and with my free hand I stroked the side of her neck, then the
line of her collarbone.
  She smiled up at me through a veil of nut-brown hair. I wondered what
she would do if my hand kept going. While wondering I started to kiss her
and she kissed back, pressing herself close against me. Her fingers
caressed my face, then slipped lightly across my chest and down my side
and hip. Once again, it seemed, events were happening faster than I could
plan or control them, and once again I seemed about to have a remarkably
interesting series of experiences.
   I drew back to catch my breath and look into the amethyst eyes so close
to mine. There was no hesitation there, only affection. "You know," I said,
"nothing like this has happened to me since-- Well, not for longer than I
can really say." Yurt was much too small a kingdom for private romantic
interludes, and, besides, for close to twenty years I had been in love with
the queen. I started kissing Theodora again.
  This time she drew back, a smile flickering on her lips. "This isn't
exactly the most private place in the kingdom."
   I sat up abruptly, distracted and pulling bits of grass out of my beard.
She was quite right. Although tying down we were hidden from view,
several groups of people were walking or standing within twenty yards of
us.
  "Come on," I said, standing up and holding out a hand for her. I didn't
know where we were going, but I did know I had never been so excited in
my life.
   Theodora straightened her skirt and rose. She took my hand and led me
purposefully. Having trouble focusing on anything but her, I staggered
along as well as I could.
   She took a shortcut between two large silken tents. Although there were
voices all around us, the narrow space between the tents was sheltered
from view. I clasped Theodora to me and kissed her face, her neck, her
shoulders, murmuring endearments I had not realized I knew. My blood
was rushing through my head so fast I felt half blind.
   Then I could feel her shoulders shaking, and I pulled myself away in
alarm, incoherent pleadings frozen on my lips. But she was laughing. "Do
you just not like privacy?"
  'This is private!"
   "Until someone else decides to take the same shortcut Come with me; I
told you I knew where to go."
   Once again she led me by the hand, away from the market stalls, the
tents, and the people. I passed my free hand over my brow. It felt fevered,
in spite of the breeze dancing around us.
   We walked a mile toward a small grove of trees, at the edge of which
blackberry bushes created a nearly impenetrable tangle. Theodora had
started to pull long, thorned stalks back to make a path when I
remembered that I was a wizard and flew both of us up and over the
brambles.
  Beyond the briars enormous trees stood tall and still. Very little
underbrush flourished in their shade. Theodora kept on walking. The
grove felt permeated with magic, the same wild mix of unfocused magic
that could have concealed any number of spells as in the valley of the
Cranky Saint back home in Yurt. But I had no attention to give to spells.
   "No one comes here," Theodora said The trees opened out suddenly,
and a spring bubbled out of the ground in the center of an emerald stretch
of grass. I saw that someone had built a little springhouse, but the
stonework looked ancient. Beyond the spring, looking out of place, was a
jagged boulder twenty feet high. "My father knew these woods," she
continued, "and he used to bring me here to practice climbing when I was
very small."
  I was not interested in her youthful climbing experiences. I turned her
toward me. "Is this then finally private enough for you?"
   She gave me a long look from beneath her lashes. "I should certainly
think so," she said with a smile, and I took her in my arms at last.


                                     V
  Afterwards we lay on the soft grass and watched the sun turn red
beyond the trees. I felt happier than I ever had in my life. "Will you marry
me?"
   Theodora had been lying with her head on my chest. Now she sat up
and scrambled around to face me. For a second she seemed almost
alarmed, then she smiled, although somewhat tentatively. This seems an
odd time to ask!"
  "I mean it. I'm just sorry I didn't ask you before."
  She lay down beside me again, one arm across me and her lips grazing
mine as we talked. "But everyone knows wizards don't marry."
  I was getting tired of hearing this. "Don't you know I love you,
Theodora? This isn't just a pleasant interlude during an extended visit to
town. I don't want to go on unless you're beside me."
  Her amethyst eyes again looked troubled, but then she smiled. "Aren't
you going to have trouble explaining this in Yurt? No king wants to have a
Royal Witch alongside his Royal Wizard."
  "It won't, be a problem. I should have told you this long ago. When I left
Yurt, I resigned as Royal Wizard."
   "But what will you do?" she asked in what sounded like genuine
distress.
   "I thought we could have a caravan like the Romneys. If an old magician
can make a living doing magic tricks at fairs, we should certainly be able
to as well--after all, our magic is a lot better!"
  She was silent for a moment, and I could sense a tension in her that I
had not expected at what seemed to me a delightful proposal. But in a few
seconds she relaxed and smiled
  "Let me give you my eagle ring, then," I said, encouraged, and started
tugging at it
   She forestalled me with a hand on mine. "I can't wear a wizard's ring
that's too big for me!" she said with her usual amused look. "Besides, I
already have a magic ring of my own. What I have from you is much more
valuable than any ring. Come on! We'd better get back to the city soon,
and it won't be fun scrambling through the briars once it gets dark."
  With clothes neatly arranged and hair smoothed, we walked through
the silent trees like a decorous couple coming home from an innocent
ramble. Once again I flew us over the briars. Outside the woods the breeze
found us, cool now that the sun was setting. A mile away, the last of the
sunlight glittered on the cathedral towers. I put my arms around
Theodora and kissed her thoroughly. Her firm, slim body in my arms
seemed like a gift not mine by right but given to me.
  "You still haven't said you'd marry me," I said, smiling down at her.
  "Isn't a woman supposed to have a little time to consider a proposal?"
she said with a teasing look. "After all, it seems that if I accept you I'll be
accepting a caravan and a pony."
  "We can work something out," I said comfortably as we strolled back
toward the city. "We could have a donkey or a horse instead of a pony."
  It was nearly dark by the time we reached Theodora's house. She
paused with her key in the lock. "Well, goodnight"
  "What do you mean, good-night? I can't leave you now!"
  She stretched up to kiss me. "Your friend the dean will be horrified if
you spend the night with a witch."
   I hated to leave her, but she had a point. I'll see you tomorrow, then," I
said and turned away quickly before the desire to go inside with her
became overwhelming.
   Whistling, hands in my pockets, I walked back toward the cathedral. It
was only as I reached Joachim's door that I realized that, for the first time
in weeks, we had not arranged where and when to meet the next day.
   A loud knocking woke me in the middle of the night. I had been happily
dreaming of Theodora, and it took me a few seconds to realize where I
was. The knocking was at the outside door, and in a moment I heard it
open, letting in the sound of rain. There was rapid conversation, too low
for me to understand, although I could recognize one of the voices as
Joachim's.
   There was a confused sound of further voices, the banging of box lids,
rapid steps, and then the slamming of the door. The house was now totally
silent. I lay tense for a moment, wondering if the monster had returned to
the cathedral tower. But Joachim was highly unlikely to go face a magical
apparition without the wizard he had brought in especially to deal with it.
I rolled over and went back to sleep.
   When I awoke several hours later the house was still silent, although I
could hear, or rather, feel the heavy booming of the organ from the
cathedral. Thinking it was a little late for early service and that I had
never heard the bells, I dressed quickly and uneasily. When I went into the
kitchen, the fire was cold. I found the tinder to boil some water and looked
around for the bread. While I was rummaging through the cupboards,
Joachim's silent servant came in.
  "What's happening?" I asked, wondering if he would even answer me.
"Where's the dean gone.
   The servant turned his eyes toward me, not with Joachim's piercing
look but with something close, as though he had been trying to emulate it.
On the surface he looked very sober, but there was a look of relief
underneath; maybe, I thought, he had finally confessed his youthful
indiscretions to the dean. He spoke for the first time since I met him. "The
bishop is dead."
  "Oh," I said, and then, "I'm very sorry to hear that." This then explained
the sudden summons to the dean in the middle of the night. The water I
had put on the hearth was close to boiling, and I realized I was standing
with a loaf in my hand. "Is it all right if I make myself some breakfast?"
   The servant did not speak again. He nodded gravely and left the room. I
consumed tea and toast rapidly and stepped out into the normally quiet
street.
  It was now thick with priests, most of them sheltering under umbrellas
against the continuing rain. They went in and out of the houses, in and
out of the side door of the cathedral, and gathered in little knots to talk. I
could usually keep myself dry against the rain with magic, but out of
respect for the dead bishop I let the rain fall on my head as I hurried down
the street and into the cathedral.
   The inside of the church had been transformed The altar cloths were
gone from all the altars, and the crucifixes had been draped in black. The
bouquets of flowers which normally clustered in front of the statues of the
saints were also gone, and no candles burned. The organ, which I had
heard increasingly clearly as I came down the street, played deeply and
solemnly.
  As I hesitated in the doorway, I heard a confusion of voices and
footsteps in the street, I stepped quickly into a side aisle as a small
procession came in. They paused briefly to remove the cover from the
burden they were carrying, then proceeded toward the high altar. It was
the bishop.
   I did my best to make myself invisible without actually employing
magic. Shielded by a pillar, I watched the priests arrange the bishop's
body in front of the altar. He looked in death both older and smaller than I
remembered. He was dressed in his full formal vestments; the brilliant
scarlet made the only spot of color in the dark church. A tall white and
gold, hat covered his bald head. His eyes were closed peacefully, and his
hands were folded across his pastoral staff. As banks of candles sprang to
light around him, I could see the flash of reflected light from the bishop's
ruby ring.
   The organ kept playing its dirge. When the priests began to kneel, I
slipped from behind my pillar and darted back out into daylight
  As soon as I was away from the cathedral I set up the spell to keep off
the rain. I walked toward Theodora's house with my head down, thinking
that now Joachim really might become bishop.
   The news of the bishop's death had already spread through the city. I
heard it discussed at open windows and where people sheltered under
broad eaves. I wondered what Theodora would think of the event; the
bishop had held office here since long before she was born.
  But when I knocked on her door there was no answer. I peered through
the window into the dark interior, seeing nothing, and rattled the door
handle to find it locked. I told myself that she had probably gone around
to some of the garment retailers to pick up or drop off embroidery, but I
felt strangely uneasy.
   When I discovered that virtually all of the shops in the city were closed,
I became even more concerned. Shades were pulled, and black ribbon
hung on the doors. In a cathedral city, I thought, the death of the bishop
must be one of the major events of the generation. The inns were still
open, but I did not spot Theodora there either. Thinking that she must
have gone out and then returned home when she found the shops shut,
and that I had simply missed her in the streets, I hurried back again to
her house. But it was still dark and silent; my knocking did not even gain a
response from the cat.
  This is silly," I told myself, trying to stem an irrational panic. "We just
didn't happen to plan where to meet, and now with the bishop's death
she's probably out looking for me." Leaning against her doorway, I closed
my eyes and stepped into the flow of magic.
  My mind raced across the hundreds of minds in the streets around me,
not quite touching them, moving so lightly they would never know I was
there. Most of the minds were unfamiliar, and I slid across them without
pausing. Some were people I had come to know more or less well: Prince
Lucas, one of the innkeepers, a few of the cathedral priests.
   I was startled in brushing the edge of Joachim's servant's mind to find
it a dense turmoil of thoughts. Somehow I had assumed his thoughts
would be as silent as his voice. For a second I even wondered if he might
be the evil wizard, but I dismissed this at once; if I could actually touch a
wizard's mind, there was no way he could conceal his magic from me. I
did not find Joachim or most of the other priests, but this was not
surprising. Deep in prayer, their minds would have entered the
supernatural realm of the saints and thus be beyond the reach of my
magic.
  But I also did not find Theodora. My mind slid back to my body, and I
opened my eyes. There was no emotion in the deep silent tunnels of magic,
but once back to myself I felt a sharp fear. Where could she be? Within the
square mile or so of the city, she should not have been able to hide from
me unless she were cloaking her mind thoroughly. This meant that she
had either left the city and was already a good distance away or else was
deliberately hiding from me.
  I hurried back to the cathedral through the wet and slippery streets. All
activity on the construction site had ceased. The tall front doors of the
church stood open. A few townspeople were going up the stairs to them,
almost shyly. None of them was Theodora. I joined them, and we entered
the dim church and walked the length of the nave to where the bishop lay
before the altar, surrounded by candles. After a brief pause and a brief dip
of the head, the townspeople quietly walked out the front doors again, but
I slipped around to the side entrance.
   The street behind the cathedral was quiet once more. I hurried down to
the dean's house and went inside. He was there, but I did not think he
even heard me come in. He sat at the table, all in black, his face buried in
his hands.
  I tiptoed past him and went into the room where I had been staying.
The only thing I could do was leave at once. I gathered up my clothes and
books and packed everything neatly in my box.
   But where could I go, and, even more importantly, where was
Theodora? Maybe she had had a fit and died in the night. Maybe the old
bishop, in dying, had reached out a demonic hand to take her soul with
his.
  This last was too unlikely, even in my worried state.
  But I did not like my other ideas any better. Had she been kidnapped
and dragged from the city? Had an evil wizard ambushed her and taken
her to wherever he and his nefarious magic were hiding?
  Or, most devastating of all, did she not want to see me?
   "No," I said aloud. I could not think of this as the most devastating, no
matter what it did to my self-esteem. I would rather have her alive and
furious with me, for reasons I could not begin to fathom, than to have her
in dire captivity or even dead.
   Had Theodora felt violated by my attentions? I found it hard to accept
this; it was she who had led the way to the grove. Since I was a wizard, not
a priest, I had, as I had told her, not sinned against institutionalized
magic by being with her. But if I had somehow, unintentionally but
horribly, frightened her or hurt her, I had sinned against Theodora herself.
As I thought again of our walk back to the city last night, it became more
and more clear that she did not want to marry me.
  Had she all along been the sort of witch I had feared when I first met
her, only interested in men to satisfy her mad lusts? Maybe the woman I
thought I had come to know and love this summer had all been a facade.
  "Theodora!" I shouted inside my mind. "Where are you?" Any wizard or
witch within five miles should have been able to hear me.
   There was no response, but I had expected none. After sitting glumly on
the bed for a few more minutes, I stood up abruptly to go out. Joachim
had not moved. I closed the door quietly behind me as I stepped into the
street.
  The rain had let up. As I came around to the front of the cathedral, I
saw that the numbers of townspeople coming to pay their final respects to
the bishop had grown.
   I headed out through the city gates and wandered through the long, wet
grass, finding no clues and not even sure what I was seeking. I stared out
along the road leading from the city, and, in the distance, could see a
galloping horse coming toward me.
  It was a red roan stallion, and in a moment I could see that the rider
was Paul. No one was with him, and he rode as though pursued by
demons. My heart felt as though a hand had clutched it.
  With Theodora either held captive by an evil wizard or furious with me,
and with Joachim lost to me forever, I had been thinking that nothing
worse could possibly happen. But now I knew it could.



                            PART FIVE



                           The Funeral


  Paul reined in the stallion and leaped off lightly. The sun broke from
behind a cloud at the same time. "Wizard!" he cried with a smile. "I've
come to look for you!"
  I went weak in the knees as I realized that nothing could be as horribly
wrong in Yurt as I had feared. "But why are you alone?" I managed to ask.
"And why were you riding so fast?"
  "Bonfire loves to run," he said nonchalantly. Indeed, the stallion did not
seem at all winded by the gallop. "I must have left the other knights some
miles back."
  "It's dangerous," I said sternly, "for a prince to ride around
unprotected."
  Paul smiled again. I had not remembered that he was half a head taller
than I. "I've got my sword and shield," he said, "and I know how to use
them. And Bonfire can outrun any bandits in the western kingdoms.
Besides, I don't think there even are many bandits anymore-- haven't you
wizards from the school gotten rid of most of them?"
  I would have been interested in Paul's thoughts about the wizards'
school, but not now. "You haven't said why you're here."
   We went in through the city gates, the stallion's reins looped over Paul's
arm. He saw the black ribbons along the street. "Has someone important
died?*
  "Yes, the bishop. But why are you here?" I persisted.
   "Mother wanted to find out how you were doing, and she said she didn't
like to telephone the cathedral to ask about a wizard. Did you find their
monster?"
  "Not yet," I said cautiously, wondering what intention of the queen's
might lie behind this terse message.
  "So the bishop died," said Paul. "He was very old, wasn't he? I wonder
who the new bishop will be."
  I realized we were walking briskly through the city streets as we talked.
"Where are we going, anyway?"
   To the castle, of course," said Paul in surprise. "That's where I'll be
staying."
  "But Prince Lucas is there."
   Paul was even more surprised. "Prince Lucas? Mother mentioned that
she'd sent him permission to make a brief stay, but he should have been
gone weeks ago." He grinned disarmingly. "Well, we're both royal princes,
but I'll be king of Yurt in not much more than a month, whereas he may
not be king of Caelrhon for years, and it is, after all, our castle!" He
continued on, apparently looking forward to putting Prince Lucas out by
force if necessary.
   I hurried behind him. "I've never known," I said as I caught up again,
"why only the king of Yurt has a castle here in the cathedral city when the
city is located within the kingdom of Caelrhon."
  "Did you never study the history of Yurt?" asked Paul.
  "Of course not," I said in exasperation. I felt myself fortunate to know
what little I did about the history of wizardry.
 "Well, Father taught it to me. It's actually quite interesting now, with
Mother planning to marry Vincent, because--"
  He stopped without finishing the sentence. Before I could do more than
note that he now seemed capable of speaking of his mother's marriage
without despair, he reached into his pocket "I'm sorry, I almost forgot
Mother said to give this to you."
  It was a large white envelope, sealed with the queens crimson seal, and
much too heavy to have been sent by the pigeons. The image on the seal
was a tiny picture of a crowned woman, and around the edge ran the
inscription, "Regina Regensque Yurtiae," Queen and Regent of Yurt
   I tore the envelope open while Paul stood a short distance away, trying
to appear politely uninterested in my correspondence. At first I thought
the letter was shaking, and then I realized it was my hands.
   In spite of Theodora, I realized as I saw the familiar black sprawling
handwriting, I was still in love with the queen. A very faint scent came
from the letter; it must have been a perfume she always wore of which I
had never before been consciously aware.
  The message was brief. "I don't know what you have thought or what
you have imagined, but you are still Royal Wizard of Yurt. Come home as
soon as you can. Give our love to Father Joachim." At the bottom of the
page, squeezed in as though an afterthought, were the words, "Paul and
Vincent and I all need you."
  I was still wizard of Yurt, even if she sent her love only to Joachim and
not to me. I didn't know if I was glad or not I looked up and met Paul's
inquiring eyes. "Your mother wanted to make sure I was back for your
coming of age ceremony," I said
  He smiled "But I told her you'd promised to be there! And of course," he
added casually, "you'll be there for the wedding the next day."
  I caught my breath between my teeth. "Her wedding?" I said slowly over
the hard pounding of my heart. "I thought she didn't plan to marry for
months and months!" I was the cause of this, I thought. My impetuous
avowals had made the queen move up her wedding to avoid anything
similar in the future.
   "That's because she and Vincent had originally planned to be married
in the cathedral here," said Paul. He spoke without concern, but for a
second I thought I spotted behind his calm words a determination not to
make a childish fuss over something he could not change. "But then they
realized that as soon as I'm king, there will be nothing improper about the
queen mother marrying the prince of the neighboring kingdom. So they'll
have the ceremony when everyone is already assembled at Yurt for my
coronation."
   I found I had nothing to say. We turned a corner and reached the little
castle that belonged to the royal family of Yurt. Paul stepped boldly up to
the knight in Caelrhon's livery who stood at the door. "Inform your
master," he said, resting his hand casually on the pommel of his sword,
"that the heir to Yurt demands that he vacate this castle at once and make
it available for our use."
  Inwardly I smiled, distracted for the moment from the devastating news
about the queen. Paul was so confident, so bold, and still so young. A stray
beam of sunlight made his hair shine like a crown of pale gold. I waited,
ready in case the knight tried to oppose him by force.
   But after one hard glance at us the knight grunted, "Wait here," and
disappeared into the castle. While we waited, I took the queen's letter
back out and looked at it again. Apparently she was willing to go on living
in the same castle with me on the same terms as during the previous
nineteen years; the only question was whether I was equally willing.
  This thought shocked me. How could I even be considering going on as
wizard of Yurt when I loved Theodora?
  Prince Lucas's knight returned. "He will receive you within, sir."
   Paul handed him the stallion's reins. "Watch him for me until I return.
But be careful. He's wild, and he'll kill anyone but me who tries to mount."
He grinned as we went up the steps, leaving the knight looking dubiously
at the stallion. "In fact, Bonfire is as gentle as a kitten," he said in a
whisper.
   Prince Lucas met us in the castles great hall, doing his best to appear
gracious; I did not judge the effort a great success. "I am delighted to see
you, Prince," he said to Paul, but looking at me with thorough
disapproval. "I just wish you had warned me of your coming to Caelrhon,
so that we might have been prepared to greet you more suitably."
  The two princes kissed each other on the cheeks, their hands stiffly
placed on each others shoulders. Paul was as tall as Lucas, although I
doubted he weighed more than half as much.
  "My mother and I are deeply surprised to find you still here in our
castle," said Paul with comparable courtesy. "If you had warned us you
wished to extend your stay, it would not now be necessary to ask you to
leave."
  "Let me make a suggestion," said Lucas. "We were unavoidably
detained in the city by certain business, and now, with the bishop dead
and the funeral scheduled for tomorrow, it seems inappropriate to leave
immediately. There is plenty of room for both of us. I will vacate the royal
chamber, of course, but it would be unsuitable for a prince such as
yourself to stay here alone."
  "I nave three knights coming to town behind me," said Paul, "and of
course our Royal Wizard will stay with me. But for one night we are
willing that you stay here as well. The royal heirs of the twin kingdoms will
be suitable representatives at the bishop's funeral."
  Prince Lucas looked at me even more sourly but nodded "May I have a
few hours to make the appropriate arrangements?"
  "Certainly," said Paul. "I'll be back later this afternoon." He gave me
another grin as we went back out of the castle, proud at how he had
handled a potentially delicate situation.
   "I think I know," he said, once we were outside and he had reclaimed
his stallion, "why Lucas stayed on in the city all this time. He was hoping
to outwait you."
  "Outwait me?"
  "Of course," said Paul. "He must assume that you're here on some secret
business of the royal house of Yurt. Since he knows he can't discover your
real business, he has to wait until you actually do what you're planning to
do."
  "But what sort of secret business could there be?"
  "That's right; you don't know anything about the history of Yurt.
Remind me to tell you later. Where are we going, by the way?"
   To the cathedral," I said. "I've been staying at the dean's house and need
to get my things."
   Paul waited at the end of the street. Joachim's door was locked, and no
one answered. I unlocked the door and went in. The house was completely
silent except for the distant sound of the cathedral organ. I got my box
and went out again. For a second I hesitated on the porch, Joachim's
spare key in my hand, then locked the door and slipped the key under the
mat. I doubted I would ever be back.
  "Yurt and Caelrhon used to be all one kingdom,'' said Paul. We sat at a
table in the inn, having dinner. The royal heir to Yurt seemed to be
enjoying eating with the ordinary townspeople of Caelrhon. The last time I
had been here was with Theodora.
   For a terrifying moment I feared that the events of the last six weeks
had all been imagined. In many ways Theodora was the woman of my
youthful dreams, coming to meet me a generation later. But then
rationality reasserted itself. My memories were much too vivid to be
illusory. Besides, if I had been creating an imaginary woman for myself, I
would not have created an amethyst-eyed witch who climbed steep cliffs
unaided by magic.
   I dragged my attention back to Paul, who was giving me a quizzical
look. "I'm sorry," I said. "So Yurt and Caelrhon used to be all one
kingdom? How long ago was that?"
   "Until--" he paused to calculate "--until two hundred and fourteen
years ago. That's when the twin heirs to Yurt decided not to fight any
longer but divide the kingdom between them." He put down his knife and
fork to explain more fully. Although I had no appetite, Paul had been
eating with gusto. The three knights from Yurt, who had finally reached
the city at the end of the afternoon and were seated across the room,
seemed likewise absorbed in dinner.
  "The one twin, the younger, took the part of the kingdom with the
cathedral city in it, and indeed his share was larger in terms of total area.
The older brother took the smaller share, but his had much richer land,
and he kept the royal castle of Yurt. The younger brother had to settle for
making what had been a small, dependent castle into the royal castle of
Caelrhon. And of course it was understood that Yurt was the senior
kingdom."
  I paid proper attention now. "And is your mother's marriage to Prince
Vincent going to reunite the two kingdoms?"
   "Of course not," said Paul, with disdain for my inferior understanding.
"Vincent is the younger son, not the heir, and besides, I'm going to be king
of Yurt, so it won't matter whom Mother marries. But one thing I did find
out from Prince Vincent--although I don't think he realizes I know this--is
that certain members of the royal family of Caelrhon, especially Prince
Lucas, are terrified that Yurt is planning to reconquer their kingdom."
  "You aren't, are you?" I asked dubiously.
  Paul laughed. "Yurt and Caelrhon will still be separate kingdoms. Prince
Lucas has waited too long to be king to want to risk losing the crown."
  "Would he like to unify the two countries himself?"
  "He'd have to get rid of me first," said Paul, young enough to feel
immortal.
  "But he fears I'm the spearhead of a reconquest?" This was rapidly
becoming too complicated for me in my present state of mind. "But why
then is Vincent marrying the queen?"
   "Vincent thinks that his older brother doesn't entirely approve," said
Paul, as though this explained everything. "You know," with an expression
of disgust, "they really do act as though they're in love."
  And I was in love with Theodora. I dropped my forehead onto my fist
and tried again to reach her mind. But I hesitated to use the most
powerful spells, the ones I had already tried unsuccessfully against the
wizard, which should reveal almost anyone trying to shield his mind from
magic. If she was deliberately hiding from me it would be unfair to use my
better knowledge of magic to force her out of hiding.
   Paul was saying something, and I looked up quickly. "Are you feeling all
right?"
  "Oh, yes." It did not sound convincing in my own ears.
   But Paul seemed ready to believe me. "Anyway, as I was saying, some of
Vincent's ideas make excellent sense. On this he and his brother do agree.
It really is true that the kings of the western kingdoms have acted in the
last few generations as though we're not truly rulers of our own peoples
and destinies."
  Now I was alarmed. I pushed my uneaten plate of food away,
half-nauseated from the vertiginous feeling of being flung from one
emotion to another. "But what is Vincent planning to do?"
  "Everyone knows the saying about the 'three who rule the world, " Paul
continued, staring fixedly at the candle flame. Although he spoke fairly
casually, I realized he did not want to meet my eyes. "But the world is in
many ways ruled only by two, the church and wizardry, and it's only
because those two have a traditional rivalry that the aristocracy is allowed
even the smallest role."
   This did not sound at all like Paul. Won over by the gift of a red roan
stallion, he seemed willing to believe whatever Vincent told him.
  "The princes have relied too long on the advice of their advisers," Paul
went on as though repeating something he had been told. "It is very well to
be guided by the Royal Chaplain and the Royal Wizard in affairs of the
soul or in magic spells. But the Church has long had its own organization
and institutional goals, and the wizards have molded their school on the
seminary system, only making it more centralized. Now that there are
wizards being placed in every castle and manor-house in the western
kingdoms, no aristocrat will be able to have an independent thought
again. When the wizards first started putting an end to warfare, everyone
accepted it at first as an excellent improvement. But only now, when it's
almost too late, are the aristocrats realizing that the real purpose behind
it all--"
  I had to stop him before he went any further. Several people at
adjoining tables were looking toward the prince with surprise. I put my
hand on his arm, making him jump. "Paul," I said gently, "I'm a wizard,
and my chief concern is the welfare of the kingdom of Yurt."
  He looked at me then, his eyes wide. "I didn't mean you"
  "But I think Prince Vincent did."
  This isn't something Vincent told me; I worked it out for myself"
   "Come on, Paul. Your Aunt Maria told me what Vincent had been
saying to the court. You know that we wizards tend to fight among
ourselves so much it's lucky we get anything accomplished at all." If I were
conspiring to give the aristocracy more power, I thought, I would have
started by trying to discredit organized religion, but the princes of
Caelrhon seemed to have started with organized magic. "If you keep on
believing in a wizardry conspiracy," I continued, "soon you'll start
sounding like the young chaplain."
  As I hoped, this brought an expression of disgust to Paul's face, and
then he smiled. He glanced at my plate. "You didn't eat your lamb chop.
Don't you want it? Do you mind if I take it?"


                                      II
  We arrived early at the cathedral, the two princes dressed soberly in
black. I mingled with their knights, trying my best not to look like a
wizard The bishops body still lay in front of the high altar, surrounded by
candles. One of the flagstones to the side of the altar had been taken up
and stood on its edge, next to a dark pit.
   The church filled with town dignitaries and wealthy merchants and
many ordinary citizens, everyone dressed formally and somberly. Even the
workmen from the cathedral construction wore shoes over their long toes
for the first time since I had met them. I recognized the mayor, who
arrived wearing all his chains and medallions of office. As people slid
quietly into the pews, I kept looking for Theodora.
   When we had been there nearly an hour, and Paul was starting to swing
his legs restlessly, the deepest bell began to toll in the tower above us. I
started counting the strokes, lost track around forty, and realized they
must be tolling a stroke for each year the bishop had lived. The bell went
on for a long time, until the prolonged, deep strokes seemed to beat along
with my heart.
   The bell was still at last All of us took a deep breath, and then the organ
began. It played deeply and slowly, all in the bass, as a young boy dressed
in white proceeded down the aisle swinging a censer. Then the cathedral
priests filed solemnly down the nave and took their positions around the
altar. Joachim walked at their head, taller and gaunter than any of the
rest. I got a close look at him as he went by, but I did not think he saw me.
His face looked as though he had never smiled in his life.
   He led the service, his voice ringing clearly through the packed church,
but I knew him well enough to recognize the enormous strain behind the
calm voice. The bishop had been a father to him for over twenty years. As
Joachim spoke of the bishop's goodness, humility, and spiritual guidance,
I felt my own eyes stinging.
  The priests began to sing then, and the congregation rose to sing with
them. We of the royal courts of Yurt and Caelrhon scrambled to our feet
only a few seconds behind the rest.
   When the singing ended, while the last organ notes still lingered, there
was a brief scramble at the door and four seminary students came in,
carrying an enormous coffin between them. There was dead silence except
for the sound of their footsteps. They brought the coffin up to the altar
and set it down. A priest stepped forward with a candle snuffer and one by
one put out all the candles.
   I understood at last what Joachim had meant when he said his
cathedral was too dark. In spite of the high stained-glass windows, the
church was extremely dim on this overcast day. The priests who lifted the
bishop's body and placed it in the coffin were only dark shapes.
   Joachim's voice rose as though disembodied. "As for man, his days are
as grass. As a flower of the field, so he flourished. For the wind passeth
over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof stall know it no more. . ..
  He cometh forth like a flower, and is cut down; he fleeth also as a
shadow, and continueth not."
  There was more rustling by the altar. Then came the clang of a lid
closing, a creak of bolts being tightened, and the faint sound of heavy
breathing, even a grunt or two, as the dark shapes lowered the coffin.
Finally came the hard report of stone being dropped into place.
    After a long pause, the priests of the cathedral chapter began to sing.
"Kyrie eleison, Christe eleison, Kyrie eleison." For a moment their song
filled the dark church, but then their voices died away. Again there was
total silence.
   Then Joachim began to speak, and as he spoke lights sprang up on the
altar. "I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, though
he were dead, yet shall he live. ... I create new heavens and a new earth:
and the former shall not be remembered. I create Jerusalem rejoicing, and
her people a joy. And the voice of weeping shall be no more heard in her....
And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no
more death."
  The black veils were gone from the altar, and the gold of the crucifix
seemed to burn with its own light The organ struck a new note, of utter
seriousness yet great joy.
  The choir began to sing again, a hymn of glory and triumph. At the
same time, the sun finally emerged and struck through the stained glass to
cast a brilliant glow on the replaced flagstones around the altar. The
priests kept singing as the congregation slowly filed out of the church.
  We emerged blinking into sunlight in the construction site in front of
the cathedral Lucas kept glancing around in a manner I considered highly
suspicious. "Well, I thought they carried that off fairly well, everything
considered," he said, as though wanting to make light of the whole matter
and not quite daring to do so.
   Paul paid no attention to his tone. "It was good that we were here," he
said, extremely seriously. "A man like that, who has guided the souls of
our two kingdoms for forty years, deserves every gesture of respect we can
pay him as he goes to his last rest."
   I found myself thinking two quite different thoughts: that if Joachim
became bishop I might be attending his funeral in forty more years; and
that by the time I finally got used to Paul alternating between being a boy
and being a man he would have stopped being a boy at all. "Yes, as
representatives of royal rule, it certainly was good that we--" Lucas
stopped speaking abruptly. "What's that?" he said in an entirely different
voice.
  Paul and I swung around. And then I felt it, a surge of enormously
powerful magic which could only come from the wizard Theodora and I
had been unable to find. Townspeople started looking up too, following
Lucas's arm. Most of the priests had come out of the cathedral. I heard
one saying, "I wonder if it would be disrespectful to go get a drink," before
he caught the mood of the little group of people gathered around us.
"Look! Don't you see it? It's coming!" cried Lucas. Now I could see it. It
could have been a bird, but it was far too big. It flew faster than any bird,
across the fields and straight into town toward the cathedral. It was five
times the size of a man, and it had the wings of a bat
   Several of those around us began to scream. "Our swords!" Lucas yelled
at Paul "We must get our swords!" The two princes raced off while
townspeople darted for cover. I saw the mayor upended in the rush, then
he scrambled to his feet and ran, his gown hitched up to his knees. The
priests flung themselves against the tide of people still coming out of the
cathedral, fighting their way back inside.
  Only I stood still, while the creature settled on top of the half-completed
tower, the tower that was not yet consecrated, and stared down at me with
burning eyes. Though vaguely human in shape, it was covered with scaly
hide, and its mouth and fangs were much bigger in proportion to its face
than any human's could be. This was no illusion. This was real.
  And this was why I was in the cathedral city. I took a deep breath and,
without the slightest idea what I would do, launched myself into the air.
  The creature watched my approach with interest. It had folded its
wings and seemed content to sit where it was. As well as long fangs it had
enormous, curved claws. As I flew closer it extended its claws as though in
anticipation of sinking them into me.
  My immediate need was to get it away from Joachim's cathedral. I
hovered thirty feet away and tried a lifting spell. It shifted a little but that
was all. Either it was too heavy or its magic too strong against mine. The
evil lips pulled back in a grin, and the bat wings rose slightly.
   I backed up warily. A hideous stench wafted toward me. I had defeated
a dragon once, but I had had the old wizard of Yurt to help me, and I still
had come remarkably close to a funeral of my own. I caught a brief
glimpse of white faces far below me and wondered if they would mention
in the eulogy that I had been trying to destroy the monster when it killed
me.
   Abruptly and with a loud bang it was gone. But not gone, I told myself
grimly, only invisible. I could still smell its stench, and somewhere in the
air, horribly near, I heard a hungry slobbering.
  There were faint, excited shouts from below, but I ignored them. I
retreated rapidly toward the main body of the cathedral and braced
myself on the slates of the roof, my feet in a rain gutter, hoping it would
not follow me to a consecrated church. But it might still attack the people
below, especially now that it was invisible.
  Desperately and without success I tried two school spells, and then the
powerful spell inscribed inside Theodora's ring, to reveal all that was
hidden. I shouted the words of the Hidden Language, my fingers grating
on the slates and eyes staring.
   It appeared directly in front of me, its mouth wide open and one set of
claws only a foot from my chest.
  I spun away and fell into space, expecting to feel its touch on my skin
any second. But I did not hear the slobbering behind me, and in a quarter
mile I looked back. It had resettled itself on the half-finished tower.
  It was not alone. Scampering around the tower were several red lizards
the size of dogs. They must have been there all along and only been
revealed by the spell.
   But I had no time for them. I approached cautiously, watching for the
monster to leap toward me. For a second I thought I glimpsed in the
square below a woman's face with amethyst eyes, framed by nut-brown
hair, hut I could not look. I remembered Theodoras spell to create a series
of tiny flames and began saying it rapidly, over and over, until the very air
around me began to burn, and I hurled balls of tire toward the monster.
   It sprang backwards, spreading its wings, one of which was already
scorched. It gave a guttural cry as it staggered toward the pile of cut
stones set ready for the masons. With clawed hands, it heaved up a piece
of rock as big as I was and flung it toward me.
   I whirled out of the way, but the stone hurtled downward, toward the
crowd below. I flew after it, madly seizing at it with spells until its fall was
slowed. People had just enough time to see what was coming and scatter,
screaming, before the stone crashed into an empty spot where seconds ago
a dozen had stood.
   I found my feet and looked up. The monster had another enormous
stone ready to hurl.
   "Into the church!" I shouted, though I wasn't sure anyone could hear me
through the general cries of panic. "Get inside the church!" I flew up,
dodging the stone and trying to slow it with magic at the same time.
Barely, just barely, I was able to reduce the speed of its descent, even guide
it a little sideways. By the time it reached the ground, the construction site
was nearly empty.
  I could not take time to rest, but if I did not take at least a few seconds
my lungs would burst. I leaned against the stone, which had shattered the
paving where it landed, and took deep, sobbing breaths.
  There was still wild scrambling at the cathedral doors but almost
everyone was inside. One figure, however, watched with attentive interest:
the foreman of the construction workers.
  I flew back up. The monster's eyes glowed, but it threw no more stones.
My balls of fire had lit the scaffolding timbers, which now blazed merrily,
and the monster seemed afraid of fire. I eyed it warily as I approached.
  The scorched wing was extended at an awkward angle as though it
might not be able to fly, but I feared a trick. I wrapped myself in the spell
Theodora had taught me against fire and waded into the middle of the
blaze, screaming insults and challenges at the monster.
   I had suspected it was trying to mislead me with its wing, but I was not
suspicious enough. With a single leap it was beside me, careless of the
blaze. I ducked barely in time to avoid being disemboweled by raking
claws. But the monster's other arm caught me. It sprang into the air with
a great flap of its bat wings and began to squeeze.
   Desperately I raced through all my spells of attack, but I had never had
very many of them, and none of them worked. The monster kept squeezing
tighter. The only advantage I had was that I would already be unconscious
when it began to eat me.
   My last hope was a transformations spell. Zahlfast had taught me
something important about transformations spells, I vaguely recalled,
something highly important, something I ought to know right now--he
had even been talking about it the day I visited his class. I did not have
time to remember.
   Because I could not wait to see if my spell would work, I coupled it with
another spell, a spell I had never used in my life but which I, along with
several of my friends at school, had looked up very late one night in the old
Master's library. It was the spell to summon a human mind. To summon
another human against his will, we had been taught, was the greatest sin a
wizard could commit. I found and summoned the monster's mind and
stuffed it into the middle of my transformations spell.
   The grip around me was released so suddenly that I collapsed, losing
parts of my spell against fire. My hair was ablaze and both hands were
tightly grasped around something. I readjusted my spell to put out the fire
and looked down. I was holding on to a frog.
   I realized then I was not really flying but only floating, and not very well
at that. Consciousness kept threatening to leave me, and the frog struggled
in my hands. I set myself back down on the tower, away from the fire.
There I found a piece of rope and, with the last of my concentration,
attached the most powerful binding spell I knew to it and tied up the frog.
   The red lizards all seemed to have scurried away. Still hanging on to the
frog, I stepped out into space, only to recall too late that if my magic was
deserting me it might have been better not to try flying.
   But my spells stayed with me long enough for me to descend at only a
moderate pace. I hit the ground, staggered, and fell, the mass of rope and
frog a hard lump under my stomach.
  "Get up!"
  I could not move.
  The toe of a boot kicked me. "Get up! Now!"
   The toe turned me over. Prince Lucas stood over me, a naked sword in
his hand and his face dark with fury.


                                     III
  I felt gentle hands then and heard Paul's voice. "Lucas! What are you
doing? He conquered the monster, but he's been burned badly!"
  I closed my eyes. It was quite clear that I would die before being able to
get up.
  "Conquered the monster!" said Lucas in utter scorn. "Can't you see it
was a magical creature he summoned himself? He played with it for a
while, then sent it away again. All of us came out of the bishop's funeral in
sorrow and awe, yet all he could do was perform a few flashy tricks to
show wizardry's utter lack of respect!"
  This last was said in a shout, for the benefit not just of Paul but of the
others who had begun gathering around At this I did manage to open one
eye.
  Paul pulled back sharply. I could hardly blame him. The timing had
been too good, too carefully planned to show disrespect for the old bishop.
And it would be hard to explain that this tied-up frog, still very much alive
and struggling in spite of being rolled on, was a monster.
  For a second I thought I saw someone black-bearded, someone I did not
recognize but who seemed strangely familiar, step forward from the
crowd. The sight of Lucas's blade distracted me from a closer look.
  "I'll show him now to avenge the church!" bellowed Lucas. I ached so
badly that death at the moment seemed rather appealing.
  But if he was trying to win Paul's support, he had gone too far. I heard
the metallic hiss of another sword being whipped from its scabbard. 'Then
you'll have to kill me first," calmly replied the royal heir to Yurt.
   There was a brief pause. I could see a corner of Lucas's face, and he
looked as though he realized his miscalculation. The ugly murmuring
against me which had started in the rapidly gathering crowd changed its
note.
  A firm set of steps advanced across the pavement "In the name of
Christ!" came Joachim's voice. "The bishop has not yet been buried one
hour, and the cathedral has just been successfully defended from the
powers of evil incarnate, and all you princes can do is start fighting each
other!"
  I closed my eyes and began to believe, for the first time since Lucas had
pointed toward the sky, that I might actually live. Joachim had never
properly understood the fundamental difference between wild, natural
magic and supernatural evil, but I didn't feel like trying to explain it now.
  He knelt beside me. "Can you hear me? Do you think we can move you?"
 I discovered I was still capable of speech. "Moving me couldn't possibly
make me feel any worse than I already do."
  "Good," said Joachim in a tone of authority. "Here, some of you, help
me get him onto a board so we can carry him inside. He's saved the
church in its greatest need, and we can't let him die a martyr."
  I heard two swords being sheathed. People who a moment ago had been
murmuring against me now came forward, volunteering to help. "He set
the new cathedral tower on fire," said Lucas almost plaintively.
   "Only in overcoming the monster," Joachim replied, "and the workmen
already have the fire mostly out." I did my best to focus on the tower and
could see several workmen scrambling around on it. To my surprise, being
shifted onto a board actually did make me feel worse.
   Paul saw the frog. "Ugh, what's this?" He reached for it, but I held on
tight
  "This is the monster. I've transformed it, and now I've got to take it
somewhere I can destroy it. I must get to a telephone."
   Paul clearly did not believe me, but he decided to humor me. I rather
hoped the dean didn't believe me, because he might not want even a
transformed monster in his church.
  "We'll take the wizard to the cathedral office," said Joachim, lifting the
head of the board. Paul had the foot, and several townspeople stood
around in helpful attitudes. Lucas followed slowly.
  A seminary student was sent for the doctor, but even before he came I
insisted on using the telephone. In a minute, I had reached the wizards'
school and was talking to Zahlfast.
 "I need the air cart," I said in the husky voice that was the best I could
manage.
  Without a far-seeing attachment I couldn't see him, but he could see
me. He drew in his breath in a sharp gasp. "Where are you? Aren't you
home in Yurt? What have you been doing to yourself?"
 "I've been fighting a monster in Caelrhon. I don't know what it is, but it
must be from the northern land of wild magic."
  The foreman of the construction crew had slipped into the office with
us. I wondered rather distantly if I should suspect him. "It was a fanged
gorges," he said quietly.
   "It was a fanged gorges," I repeated for Zahlfast, wondering with mild
curiosity if there was also a non-fanged variety; if so I doubted it would be
a substantial improvement. "But it isn't one anymore. That's why I need
the air cart; I need to get it back north before it breaks out of the
transformations spell."
  "Out of the what?"
  "I turned it into a frog."
   And then Zahlfast said something I had never heard him say before.
"Dear God." He paused for several seconds. I wished again I could see his
face. "You realize transformations spells don't work against creatures of
wild magic."
  "Yes, I know. I remembered after I did it. I used a summoning spell at
the same time as the transformations spell. Please don't be angry; I know
you never wanted us young wizards to know summoning, but I learned the
spell years ago."
  "Used the summoning spell," said Zahlfast slowly.
  "And now I think I've destroyed all my own magic. I couldn't say
another spell to save my own life, which may not last long anyway."
  "Nonsense," said Zahlfast in something closer to his usual brisk tone.
"You're just worn out. I'll send the air cart at once." But he paused then
and added, "Have you remembered my warning?"
   "Yes," I said wearily. At this point I neither knew nor cared whether
priests hated and feared wizardry, but I did know that if Joachim wanted
to destroy me I would do nothing to stop him.
   Paul sat beside me, offering me drinks of water and brandy and
ineffectually straightening the blanket while we waited for the doctor. He
felt guilty, I guessed, for having believed, even momentarily, that I might
have called the gorgos myself. "You know," he said, "I'm not sure I'd ever
seen you really using your magical powers before. I've heard of course
about your fight with the dragon, but that was before I was even born."
   If I was going to serve Paul when he was king of Yurt, I thought, maybe
it was just as well he realized that a Royal Wizard could do more than just
after-dinner illusions.
  "Thank you for standing up to Lucas," I told him. "Usually a wizard can
defend himself, but I certainly couldn't now."
   "I'm almost sorry Father Joachim stopped us," he said with a grin and a
quick look across the room to make sure we were not overheard, "It would
have been my first real fight." But then he became more sober. "Can that
frog really be a transformed monster?"
   I had continued to cling to the frog. It stared at me with vicious eyes, "It
is indeed. I don't know if you heard what I said on the telephone, but I'm
going to take it back to the land of wild magic."
   Then I'll go with you!" said Paul in a joyous shout. "What better way to
finish my minority than helping our Royal Wizard destroy a monster? I've
wanted to go on a quest since I was eight years old, and this time no one
will stop me!"
   Lucas came and stood over me, fists on his hips. "What makes you think
this wizard really does plan to destroy his gorges," he demanded of Paul,
"if he hasn't just hidden it somewhere and substituted a frog to deceive
us? Don't you think it more likely that he is planning to call up even more
monsters?"
  I squinted at him suspiciously from under half-closed eyelids. Lucas had
seen the monster before any of us. Even if this was merely due to excellent
eyesight, he had certainly moved rapidly to take advantage of the
opportunity to discredit me. The dean looked across at him. "Then go with
him, Prince," he suggested.
  Startled, I pushed myself up on an elbow. Although I had certainly not
planned to take Lucas with me, if I did I could keep an eye on him. And it
might be good for him to see how useful and indeed necessary wizards
were for the western kingdoms. "Go pack some clean socks," I told him
quickly, "and blankets and enough food for all of us for two weeks."
   Lucas hesitated, a hard curl to his lip. But he was rapidly losing the
momentum that would allow him to refuse. "Do you not think it your
duty?" the dean asked him sternly. "Do you not, as royal heir, need to
witness the destruction of a monster that almost destroyed the major city
of your kingdom?"
   "Of course, Father," Lucas said, flustered and scowling. The two princes
started to leave together, then Paul stopped. "Wizard! Is there going to be
room for Bonfire?"
  "Of course there isn't going to be room for a horse," I said in
exasperation. Tell the knights from Yurt to exercise your stallion every
day, and he'll be fine. And send a message to your mother to tell her where
we're going. Give her everyone's love."
   The doctor arrived as the princes clattered out. He clucked over me,
putting ointment on the burns and pronouncing none of my ribs cracked,
after an examination that I was convinced cracked several.
   As he left again and the dean prepared to follow, I put a hand on the
latter's arm. At least the bishop's death and the monster's attack seemed
to have made Joachim lose track of whatever embarrassing questions he
might once have been going to ask me about how the cathedral cantor
came to be struck in the rear by a book of spells. "What do you expect me
to do with Prince Lucas?" I demanded.
   He cocked an eyebrow at me. "I have no idea. But if he did not go he
would be here, worrying the cathedral chapter about the election of the
new bishop, becoming increasingly irritable because he did not leap as
Paul did at the kind of adventure he thinks is the function of the
aristocracy. His younger brother would have needed no such prodding.
And I have noticed this about you, Daimbert. You are at your best when
everyone has been caught off balance, because you improvise better than
anyone." At the moment I felt at my worst, but I did not interrupt. "You
need to talk to Prince Lucas, to find out why he is accusing you of a
wizardly conspiracy, and now will be your chance."
  "But suppose he had refused to go?"
  "It is his duty. And after he announced himself as protector of the
Church, he could not very well refuse a suggestion from the man who is
now the most powerful religious leader in the twin kingdoms."
  I lay back down again. "I'm sorry," I said. "I'm sorry the bishop died,
and I'm sorry I set your tower on fire."
  He looked at me a moment and nodded gravely without speaking.
   "Thank you for saving me from Lucas and from a riot." Joachim gave
me another long look. He did not smile, but at least his face looked as
though he might once before have smiled in his life. "Thank you for saving
us all from the monster. If Prince Lucas wants to incite a riot, he will have
to do better than that." Then he was gone.
   When at last, toward dusk, the air cart landed in front of the cathedral,
I hobbled out to it with Paul's support. Several hours' sleep had made me
feel, if not exactly better, at least as though living might be worthwhile.
The air cart was the winged skin of a purple flying beast that had
originally come, long ago, from the northernmost land of magic. Even
after the beast had died its skin kept on flying if governed by magic
commands.
   Paul looked at the frog to which I continued to cling. "Why don't you
just kill it here?" "You're welcome to try. But don't cut the rope." Paul set
the frog on the paving stones and hesitated, his sword in his hand. I could
tell he did not like killing a helpless creature. But he trusted me, and in a
moment he lifted his blade and drove it down against the kicking green
form.
  His sword sprang back so abruptly it was jerked from his grip. Paul
recovered it with a startled look, "What have you done to this frog? Its
skin is made of iron!"
   "That's what I was afraid of," I said. "You can't really transform
creatures of wild magic. Spells are the orderly channeling of magical
forces, but creatures like this cut right across order. The gorgos is now no
bigger than a frog and looks like a frog, but I'm afraid it's still a gorgos."
   "But is it going to start looking and acting like a monster again?" "I
hope not--or at least not right away. That's why I need to get it back to the
land of magic before it can recover its powers." I wondered sourly just how
powerful the hidden wizard here might be, whether his magic might even
be strong enough to bind two separate monsters at the same time. In that
case, he might bring out the second while I was off taking care of the first.
But I forced myself to dismiss the thought. If my opponent was that good,
there was nothing I could do about it.
   In the bottom of the air cart was a small box, absolutely black. I tried a
gentle probing spell, the first spell of any sort I had tried for hours. It was
a binding box, set about with spells to secure whatever was in it. Zahlfast
must have decided to include it I pushed the frog inside and slammed the
lid.
  Paul boosted me over the edge of the cart, and Lucas climbed in
without a word. While I was searching for the words of the Hidden
Language to guide the cart, a short, wiry figure came toward us from the
huts. It was the foreman of the construction crew.
  He leaned casually against the side of the cart, not quite looking at me.
A pack was slung over his back. "So you're going up to the land of magic,"
he said at last. "Have you ever been there?"
 "No." Normally I would have tried to justify or explain, but now the
monosyllable sufficed.
  There was another pause. "Would you like a guide?"
  There was more here, I thought, than helpful concern for a confused
wizard, but I was too tired to work it out. "Have you been there?"
  "Not right up in the wild magic. But I come from the borderlands."
  "Borderlands?" asked Paul.
   "Of course, lad. You don't think the western kingdoms stop at a line on
the map and the land of magic starts right there, do you? There's a stretch
of territory several hundred miles wide in which the lands of men and the
land of magic penetrate each other. Some places you can go just a few
miles from an ordinary village to the castle of a will-o'-the-wisp."
  Paul's face lit up. "It would be like stepping into fairyland!"
  I kept a dignified silence. "Well," said the foreman, "do you want a
guide or not?"
  "Of course," I said. The foreman could prove useful, and I wanted to
know how he had recognized a fanged gorgos. "But aren't you needed
here?"
   "I've been talking to the provost, and he seems to feel there's no use
trying to get much work done in the next few weeks, before the new bishop
is elected. My lads can repair on their own the damage the gorgos did to
the tower."
  Then climb in," I said. "It's time to start."
                                      IV
   Dusk rose from the narrow streets of the city, punctuated only at
intervals by the yellow gleam of lanterns, even while the sky above us was
still pale blue. Laden with two princes, a wizard, a construction foreman,
and a transformed monster, the air cart rose gracefully, spun around
twice, and headed north. Though it flew no faster than I normally could, in
my present exhausted state I could never have made the trip unaided,
especially carrying a monstrous frog.
   As the city dropped away behind us I leaned on the edge of the cart,
looking back as intently as though I might be able to see Theodora from
this height. I had not seen her for forty-eight hours.
  If she had not been kidnapped, she must be hiding from me
deliberately. But how could she have been so warm one day and flee me
the next? Her reserve, the private inner thoughts to which I had only
sometimes felt admitted, now took on an ominous interpretation.
   She was, after all, a witch. Had she never loved me at all, only set out to
distract me while her partner in evil, the hidden wizard, brought his
gorgos to Caelrhon?
   I gritted my teeth until my jaw ached. I could have sworn she loved me
as much as I loved her.
   "So you've got the gorgos in the box," said the foreman, leaning next to
me, his long fingers folded over each other. I forced myself to stop thinking
of Theodora. Cool air streamed by our faces. Everyone was avoiding the
black box; Lucas especially made sure to stay on the far side of the air cart
from it.
  "That's right, and I hope I can keep it there until we reach somewhere I
dare let it free. You know, I'm afraid I don't even know your name."
  "Call me Vor," he said with a quick, sideways look that made me
wonder if this really was his name.
  "All right, Vor, maybe you can give me some suggestions what to do
with an indestructible gorgos."
  "First you have to decide," he said slowly, "whether you particularly
want it dead."
   I hadn't thought about it in those terms. "I would have killed it if I
could," I said, "to keep it from attacking the people in the city, but I don't
think I can. That's why I'm taking it north. If I let it go, do you think it will
return to its gorgos shape and come back to Caelrhon again?"
  "But you don't want to kill it out of revenge for nearly killing you?"
   I looked at the motionless black box, a more solid piece of darkness
inside the dark air cart, and wondered hopefully if the monster had
suffocated. But Vor seemed to be asking something more. "No, I'm not
interested in revenge."
   Vor nodded as though I had clarified an important point. Below us dim
hills and valleys streamed by. The air cart was high enough that it only
had to rise for the steepest hills. Tiny figures of men and horses were
coming in from the fields to villages where firelight welcomed them. No
one looked up to see us.
  "You can't actually kill a gorges," Vor said at last. "Or, if you do, they're
even worse dead than they are alive. I knew a man once who decided to kill
one out of vengeance. Once it was dead it took possession of him, mind
and body."
  He fell silent then. I decided that I was happier not knowing the details
and started putting together the spell to slow the flight of the air cart. "We
must have come over fifty miles already," I told the two princes. "We'll
camp in a field tonight and fly on in the morning."
   It took us over a week of flying to reach the borderlands of the land of
magic. The air cart did much of the flying on its own, needing only a
steady low-level attention from my own spells to keep its flight smooth and
on course. At first much of the land we crossed was rolling hills and
farmland, similar to that of the kingdoms of Yurt and Caelrhon, but as we
went north the season seemed to retreat, so that we started seeing again
flowers that had already passed in the fields outside the cathedral city.
Then we began to cross dense forests, where only occasionally we saw a
track that might have been made by humans, and rocky, barren stretches
where there were very few farms.
   For most of the trip the weather was fair, and we flew during the day
with the wind in our hair and slept under the sky at night The stars were
much brighter in the thin northern air, away from the smoke of the city,
than I ever remembered seeing them. But one day it rained steadily for
nearly twenty-four hours. I was able to rig a spell to keep us dry while the
air cart flew on, but that night we had to overturn the cart in a partially
successful attempt to keep the rain off, and all of us slept uneasily.
  Being cramped in a small space all day was especially hard for Paul.
Every evening, as soon as the cart touched down, he was off running,
sometimes for as much as an hour. Prince Lucas, gathering fuel the first
night for a fire to try to stew up some of the dried beef he had brought
along, grumbled that the other prince was deliberately shirking his
responsibilities, until Paul came back with fresh bread and lettuce bought
from a farmhouse over the hill.
   Vor exercised by walking on his hands, doing bends and twists of which
I would not have thought the human body capable. Prince Lucas practiced
swordplay against his shadow. I, still recovering from my wounds, mostly
worried about the gorges frog.
   Paul and I sat by a small fire one evening, watching the sun set behind
the graceful branches of an oak. He was back from his run but the others
were still gone. The heir to the throne of Yurt pulled off his boots,
stretched, scratched, and flopped back cheerfully on the grass. I found
myself imagining that if I had met the queen on one of her trips to the
City, back when I was a wizardry student and she still only a castellan s
daughter, he might have been our son.
   A stream gurgled nearby, and the grass on which we sat was
intertwined with wildflowers. "You know," I said to Paul, "we'll probably
never see this spot again."
   This didn't seem to bother him. "There are a lot of nice places," he said
lazily, "many of them in Yurt. But traveling like this has made me want to
travel more, to see all the beautiful spots in the world. Mother makes a
good regent; maybe I'll just let her rule Yurt a few years more."
  I did not like at all the idea of him taking off across the western
kingdoms, but I let this pass in silence, hoping he would forget it as
quickly as he had forgotten wanting to become a wizard.
   "This is silly," Paul added after a moment, abruptly serious and looking
off into the distance. "I'm going to be king very soon. I know I don't have
the wisdom Father had, and I don't think I have the courage of Uncle
Dominic, who loved Yurt more than his own life. He might even in other
circumstances have become king instead of me. What do you think,
Wizard, do I want to travel only because I'm afraid I won't be an adequate
king? But then you've probably never known what it's like to feel unworthy
of your position."
  There was no possible way to answer this. I watched the flickering of
our fire for a minute, feeling the evening air grow chill around us. "We've
come so far and so fast," I said, "over land that none of us know.
Sometimes I wonder if we'll ever find our way home again."
   But this didn't bother Paul. "Of course we will," he said, cheerful again,
lying on his back, supporting his hips on his hands and kicking long legs
into the darkening sky. "If we get lost, all we have to do is go west until we
reach the ocean, and then follow the coast south to the great City. It's easy
enough to get home to Yurt from there."
  He was right, of course, but as the days went by I kept feeling that I was
astray in a strange world, with no landmarks and no way to find my way
back to the world I had always taken for granted.
  After a week the land below us began to rise sharply and all signs of
human habitation disappeared. Soon we were crossing a jumble of sharp
peaks, topped with snow.
   "Wild magic starts not long after the mountains," Vor told me, looking
down at the air cart's shadow far below us, darting wildly up and down the
steep mountainsides.
  "So you came south through the mountains?"
  He nodded. "Years ago. That's why I want to go back now." He paused,
then pointed down. "See that river?" A thin, dark line cut a twisting slice
through the mountains. "There's a track that follows it all the way
through."
  At least one person, then, had known where we were going. The laconic
suggestions he had made on our route in the previous days now made
more sense. A cloud came toward us, looking, as always, incredibly soft, as
though one could sink with delight into its feathery blue shadows. As
always, when the air cart plunged into it the cloud proved to be nothing
more than fog, blocking out the sun and putting drops of water on our
hair and clothes.
  "I know a good place to get rid of the gorges," Vor said suddenly. But he
turned away from me as he spoke, discouraging questions. I wondered
uneasily if he had a plan of his own for the monster.
   If only, I thought, I were more confident of my magic. So far every spell
I had needed on the trip had worked But I had the disconcerting feeling
that I had, before the bishop's funeral, known more magic, and that not
only the spells themselves but the knowledge that the spells existed had
been wiped from my mind.
  The teachers at the school had warned us against summoning as the
greatest sin a wizard could commit, because it violated the integrity of the
human mind. But, I thought now to myself, reckless summoning,
practiced by someone remembering something he had learned twenty
years earlier, might also destroy the person who practiced that spell. In
summoning the monster, I might somehow have intermingled a part of its
mind with my own.
  "Did you ever decide where the fairy lights came from on the new
cathedral tower?" asked Vor. They weren't caused by the gorges, were
they?"
  "No," I said slowly, "nor by one of your Little People. They were caused
by a witch."
  He nodded as though he had expected as much. "Down in your part of
the world, if it's not a wizard with a heavy dose of formal magic it's
probably a witch."
  "Do you know anything about the witch?" I asked at once, trying to keep
the eagerness out of my voice. But he shook his head.
  I looked down at the trackless snowfields below and wondered if I would
ever see Theodora again.


                                     V
  A steep mountain peak rose before us, far higher than any other we had
passed. Its snowy top, thrusting into the sky, glinted like gold in the early
morning sun. As we flew toward it I heard, first distantly and then
increasingly clearly, a call coming from it, and realized it was calling me.
  I gave the magical commands to turn the air cart. Instead of circling
the peak we started straight up its side.
  There's a wizard on the top of the mountain," I told the princes, who
looked toward me in surprise. "I'm going to talk to him." Suddenly I did
not feel as hopelessly lost as I had all week.
   The air off the snowfields became rapidly colder, and we pulled blankets
around our shoulders. I took mouthfuls of the thin, frigid air, my heart
beating rapidly, either from the altitude or from excitement For the first
time since transforming the gorgos, I began to think I might someday be
able to practice real magic again.
  A sharp wind scraped ice from the peak into a swirling cloud that half
obscured it. At the very top of the mountain, just under the final, jagged
knife-blade of ice, was a small level area where all the snow had been
swept away. Here was a bright blue house.
  I set the air cart down by the door, vaulted out, and tied it to a ring in
the doorpost. Leaning into the wind, I lifted a fist, but the door opened
before I had a chance to knock.
   A wizard put his head out I recognized him at once. He had graduated
from the wizards' school three years before I had, then stayed on as a
teaching assistant I had not seen him in nearly twenty years, but he still
looked exactly the same.
  "Well!" he said with pleasure. "If it isn't good old "Frogs'!"
   I stiffened. I had had no idea the other students at school had given me
a nickname derived from my disastrous experiences in that
transformations practical. But several comments I had half-overheard at
the time now became horribly and mortifyingly clear.
   "My name," I started to say in cold fury, "is Daimbert!" But I managed
to stop myself. After all, I was delighted to see him.
  I turned back toward the cart where the other three were hesitating.
"Come on!" I called. "Prince Lucas, Prince Paul, Vor, I'd like you to meet
an old friend of mine from the wizards' school."
  They climbed out, and the princes gave the formal half-bow, while Vor
dipped his head. "He graduated second in his class," I continued
cheerfully, having an inspiration how to get my own back, "and would
easily have graduated first most years. We used to call him
'Book-Leech'--behind his back, of course."
   Good old Book-Leech froze for a second, then smiled. "Welcome,
welcome, come in! It's much too cold to leave this door open." As we filed
past him, he said modestly, "Well, I don't know if I ever could have been
first in the class, as there's always someone-- But Elerius was good, wasn't
he! Do you correspond with him at all, Daimbert? I hear he's Royal Wizard
now at one of the most powerful of the western kingdoms."
  I graciously overlooked the inherent insult in this comment. Yurt might
not be the most powerful kingdom, but I liked it best. And if the queen
took me back, I would not have to live in a blue house three miles up on
top of a snowy peak.
  Inside the house a fire roared in the fireplace, and the morning sun
through the windowpanes made rainbows on the floor and furniture. We
pulled off our ice-encrusted jackets, and the wizard hurried to make tea.
   "You have no idea how pleased I was when I first sensed another
wizard's mind here in the mountains," he said. "It does get lonely here, in
spite of all the advantages. I'd known you would be coming across the
mountains of course--they'd telephoned to warn me you were taking the
air cart up to the land of magic. But I hadn't dared hope you'd come so
close that I could call you and have you stop."
   The water boiled and he poured it into the pot. Vor and the two princes
sat rather stiffly against the wall, still startled to be suddenly in a real
house again after days outdoors, much less a wizard's house on an
inaccessible mountain peak. This, I thought, would be an especially useful
lesson for Lucas, to see wizards serving mankind even in the northern
mountains.
  "What happened to your hair?" the wizard asked. "Your face looks
burned."
  "My hair caught fire," I said. "I was fighting a fanged gorges."
  "A gorges? And you won?" He stirred the tea leaves and chuckled. "Well,
you must have won or you wouldn't be here. But how did you do it? Who
wants sugar?"
   He poured out the tea into a row of mugs. "I transformed the gorges
into a frog," I said modestly. "I've got it out in the cart, inside a binding
box. I know one shouldn't be able to transform creatures of wild magic,
but I put a summoning spell on it at the same time, and at least it's now a
very small and frog-shaped gorges."
   He was actually silent for a moment, looking, I thought, suitably
impressed "Well," he said to the others, "I should have known. 'Frogs' here
always had a real genius for improvisation. The rest of us were always
jealous."
  "Nonsense," I said. "No one at the school was ever jealous of me."
   "Yes, we were!" he said, quite seriously. "All of the rest of us would
spend hours with our books, preparing for an exam, but you would come
strolling into class late, probably not having studied, doubtless having
spent the evening down at the taverns, maybe not even owning the right
books."
  Paul gave me an odd look. Perhaps it was good that he realize I had not
always been the staid, even stodgy old wizard he doubtless imagined me to
be.
   "And then," the wizard continued, turning to the others, "he'd try to
make up for his lack of application with sheer flair. Sometimes of course
he failed spectacularly--I'll never forget the expression on Zahlfast's face
that time!" He chuckled appreciatively at the memory. I did not join in.
"But more likely than not, he'd manage something. You know, Daimbert, I
think you were the despair of our teachers."
  This at least I could agree with.
  "I hear they had you teaching improvisation at the school this spring,"
he said, sipping his tea. "How did it work out?"
  "Not quite as well as I'd hoped," I said. "Whenever I tried to explain to
the students of the technical magic division that sometimes you have to
put spells together in new or unexpected ways, they always wanted me to
make explicit which ways, so that they could practice their improvisation
and be ready."
  "Excuse me," said Paul to the wizard, "but what are you doing here, on
top of a mountain at the edge of the land of wild magic?"
  "Guarding the border, of course," he said in surprise. "Your wizard
must have stopped here twenty years ago to meet the border-guards when
he took his field trip up here from the school."
   "I was never invited to go on the field trip." I was quite sure he knew
this; after all, he had been one of the assistants taken along to help guide
the few chosen wizardry students. "As you said, I think I was the despair of
our teachers."
  "But why are you guarding the border?" Paul persisted.
  "Making sure creatures of wild magic stay where they belong rather
than coming down into the land of men."
  "Do you mean," said Prince Lucas, speaking for the first time, "that
there would be monsters down in our cities all the time if it weren't for
you wizards? I must say, you can't have been doing a very good job or the
gorgos wouldn't have gotten to Caelrhon."
   "It's not that simple," said the wizard crossly. "Wild magic tends to stay
in place north of the mountains, and it would most of the time even
without us. And we can't stop a creature that's been called by very
powerful or even black magic from going south. I expect that's why you
had gorgos problems. There were always hermit-wizards up here, but it's
all become much more orderly and reliable since the school was founded.
Now we can stop most of the creatures that would otherwise wander south
by accident, and we telephone the City to warn them about any unusual
activity,"
  "So you do have a telephone." I glanced around without seeing one but
assumed it was in the other room. The thought that the City was only a
call away was very cheering.
  "Yes indeed. With one of your far-seeing attachments, of course," he
added generously.
  "But doesn't it become dreary, being up here alone?" This was Paul.
    "Not dreary. You lads won't understand this, but Daimbert will. There's
something enormously seductive about the land of magic. All one's spells
work much better. Flying isn't an effort anymore. Even here, at the border,
one can feel the difference. None of us are posted here very long, and they
say it's because they don't want us to become too lonely, but I think in part
it's because they don't want us going over the edge.
    "It is lonely, of course," he continued. "The air cart brings us supplies,
but only irregularly, when no one else needs the cart. The school ought
somehow to arrange for a second one. We can talk on the telephone, but
it's not the same. I've already been here two months, and I'll be here for
another two, and you're the first people I've seen."
  "Then if you were at the wizards' school two months ago," I said in
surprise, "you were there at the same time I was."
   He waved his hand vaguely. "Well, there are always a lot of people at the
school, and one doesn't see everybody." It was true that, between the
teachers, the students, the young wizards, and the older ones coming and
going, there were always a lot of people at the school. But he had known I
was there. He had just not wanted to see foolish old 'Frogs' until now,
when he had no other wizards to talk to. "So I'm delighted I'm having a
chance to see you now," he added.
  "I'm sorry in that case to have to leave," I said, standing up, "but we
really need to get the monstrous frog up further into the borderlands,
somewhere we can dispose of it. Thank you for the tea. Maybe we can stop
here again on our way back."
  "Then I'll hope to see you all again in a few days. Very nice meeting you
young fellows."



                               PART SIX

                        The Borderlands
  The air cart came down out of the mountains. The snow lingered on the
northern slopes, but finally we dropped enough that the land beneath us
was green again, and we spotted miniature flocks of goats followed by
miniature goatherds. These were the first humans, other than the wizard,
we had spotted in three days.
  I filled my lungs with cold air and almost felt confident again of my
ability to practice wizardry. But I reminded myself that this might only be
due to the influence of the land of magic, not a sign of returning abilities.
   Vor pointed. "There's my valley." Ahead of the air cart was a deep gash
in the mountain slope, perhaps a mile wide and ten miles long. The sun
had not yet reached down the sides of the rift, but I could see a waterfall
pouring into it from the mountains and a dark green river winding the
length of the valley.
  The air cart slowly descended beside the waterfall, its roar loud in our
ears. The tumbling water rushed downward like something solid, and
drops of spray nearly reached us. Vor leaned what I considered
dangerously far over the edge of the cart, staring ahead. The valley floor
was a patchwork of fields, but there were no buildings. "So where do your
people live?" I started to ask and then saw them.
   Their houses were built into the nearly vertical rocky sides of the valley,
half-hidden by gnarled trees. A network of steep stairs, ladders, and
toeholds connected the valley floor with the doors of dwellings burrowed
back into the rock. Theodora, with her love of climbing, would like this
valley.
  "How long is it that you've been gone?" I asked as though casually.
  "Years," Vor replied briefly.
  "Why haven't you been home again?" asked Paul.
  "Three thousand miles is a long way on foot," said Vor. "My men and I
reckoned we might not be home again in our lifetimes."
   As we moved slowly downward, I could see people on the ladders,
looking up. To them, I thought, we must appear as frightful, appearing
without warning out of the sky, as the gorges had appeared to the citizens
of the cathedral city. "We don't want to terrify anyone into falling," I said
anxiously.
  Vor tore his eyes away from the valley long enough to give me a quick,
amused glance. "Everyone knows these purple flying beasts aren't
dangerous. The only surprise will be when they see us inside the skin." I
was interested to realize that the flying beast from which the air cart had
been made was not unique, as I had always supposed. I found myself
wondering if we could find an aged flying beast and induce it to come
back south with us, so that after it died a natural death I could have an air
cart of my own.
  The air cart was now level with doors and windows, and heads
protruded, staring at us. Paul waved cheerfully, and several people waved
back. We landed with a bump in a meadow by the river, a mile
downstream from the waterfall.
   Vor leaped out at once and was off, springing from tussock to tussock
across the meadows damp surface. Other people came running toward
him, all with the short stature and unusually long fingers and toes of the
cathedral's construction crew. He had seemed calm and unhurried the
whole time I had known him, but now he spoke animatedly, waving his
arms, pointing toward the sky and toward us. Several people threw their
arms around him, and he embraced them with fervor. Everybody was
talking at once; they seemed to be calling him a name I did not catch, but
it was not Vor.
  That's curious," commented Lucas. "From several things he said, I had
the impression he'd had to leave home, yet everybody seems happy to see
him back again."
  I had had the same impression, but all I said was, "Long absence makes
quarrels seem trivial."
   Paul was looking not at Vor but at the houses. Think what it must be
like to live there!" he exclaimed. "In the heat of the summer, it would be
comfortably cool, and in the winter it would be as cozy as a den. Will we
still be here tonight? I can't wait to see the hillsides all dotted with
lamplight!"
  Vor came back over to the cart. "I don't want to interrupt your
reunion," I said "Perhaps we should leave you here and continue north,
until we find a good place to get rid of the gorges."
  He was smiling as broadly as I had ever seen him. "We can go dispose of
the gorges whenever you like," he said
   The air cart rose back out of the valley, and, with Vor's direction, I
guided it northward. We rose over a last range of hills that protected his
people's valley. The high snowy peaks were behind us, and before us a dry
rocky land stretched out desolate. All of Vor's cheerfulness left him as soon
as we left the valley, replaced by a tension so tight it almost vibrated.
  Thirty miles beyond the valley, just as I had been about to ask if he
really knew where he was taking us, he pointed downward. There. Put the
cart down there."
   I saw nothing to distinguish this particular patch of loose boulders from
any other, but I obeyed. "Do you think we're far enough from your valley?"
I asked. He nodded emphatically and kept peering about as we descended,
apparently not seeing whatever he was seeking. I preferred to think this
was good. Just before we landed, I spotted something odd about some of
the boulders. Rather than being scattered, they seemed to be piled up, as
though to form a monstrous hut. I nudged Vor and pointed, but he just
shook his head, and in a second the hut or whatever it might be was
hidden beyond other rocks. At any rate I saw nothing alive. We hit the
ground hard, and the cart tilted to one side.
  "So what do you suggest?" I asked Vor, picking up the binding box from
where it had slid down with the rest of our baggage.
  "Just take it out and release it," he said shortly.
  I put one leg over the edge of the air cart "All of you stay here," I said.
"By now you've heard me say many times the two words of the Hidden
Language that will get the cart off the ground. Use them if you have to."
   Carrying the heavy black box, I walked slowly away from the cart, trying
to probe for magic. What I found was almost overwhelming. I was used to
the orderly channeling of magic, but here magic whirled and spun in
complete confusion. There was too much detail, too little focused, for me
even to try to identify the source.
  I closed my mind resolutely against these magical influences. This must
be one of the spots in the borderlands where human habitation was only a
short distance from wild magic.
   Fifty yards from the air cart I set the black box down. Slowly,
cautiously, I pulled open the lid and peeked inside. The frog was still there,
glaring at me furiously. As soon as daylight touched it, it began to back.
The rope with the binding spell in which I had originally tied it was gone;
I wondered if the frog had eaten it
   I swung the box forward, catapulting the gorges frog out. It hit the side
of a rock, rolled down, and righted itself. I realized I was trembling as I
watched. It started to work itself along, although a frog's feet do not do
well on rough stone.
  "Go ahead," Vor called. Turn it back into a gorges."
   I hesitated. There seemed no reason not to leave it a frog. Sooner or
later it might be able to overcome the transformations spell by itself, but
in the meantime we should be able to get well away.
   On the other hand. I feared that part of my own mind might still be
attached to the gorges. I had summoned it to me while transforming it,
and there might still be enough attachment that it would be compelled to
follow me.
   Carefully, feeling my way into my own magic and trying to avoid the
swirling alien magic around me, I put together the words to break the
transformations spell. When I said the final syllables to restore the gorges
to itself, my mind leaped back out of the calm channels of magic into a
body whose heart was pounding madly.
   It had worked. The gorges crouched on the ground where the frog had
lain a second before. It was appreciably larger than I remembered,
especially the fangs.
   Both terrified and exhilarated, I started flying backwards toward the air
cart. My mind was clearer than it had been for a week, and for a second I
felt that nothing could overcome me and my magic. The gorges seemed to
be startled at its abrupt return to itself. It glared about with burning eyes
and scratched its side with long, curved claws.
  Then, behind me, I heard a shout. I spun around. It was Vor.
  Beyond the tumbled boulders, in the direction in which I thought I had
seen stones heaped into a hut, I heard an answering bellow.
  The gorges spread its bat wings and rose into the air, looking back
toward the bellow but moving toward me. I retreated more rapidly.
  And then I saw, rising over the boulders, a second fanged gorges.
  The first gorgos, my former frog, saw it too. He turned from pursuing
me and, with a great flap of his wings, launched himself toward it. The
two monsters rushed at each other, slavering mouths wide open, claws
ready to rend each others flesh. Just before they met, I thought I sensed
something very odd about the second gorgos.
   Not stopping to analyze it, I rushed after the air cart, which had taken
off and by now was careening across the sky. The two gorgoi roared and
screeched, apparently ripping off major parts of each other's bodies.
  I caught the cart after a mile's pursuit The magic words to lift off had
put it into the air, but without further direction the purple flying beast's
skin had started flying on its own with little regard for the people in it.
   Vor and the two princes clung to the edge, looking ill. I dropped inside,
stopped the cart's spinning, and straightened out the course. "Back to
your valley?" I asked Vor, as calmly as if I dealt with gorgoi every day.
  He blinked. "Yes. That would be good."
  Paul looked at me wide-eyed. "I don't know how I could have gone all
these years without realizing what a good wizard you are." I nodded
gravely at his praise from my future king.
  The cart banked and started to return. I could still hear faint bellows in
the distance. I turned from Paul to address myself to Lucas. "I trust,
Prince, that you will be able to report to the dean that I did indeed destroy
the gorges."
  His lips tight, Lucas nodded slowly. I had plenty of questions for him
now that my mind was abruptly clear again, but even more pressing were
my questions for the construction foreman.
   "You knew about the second gorges, Vor," I said "Ever since the first
one appeared in the cathedral city, you've been working to bring the two
gorgoi together. Now that, I hope, they're finishing destroying each other,
I would like you to tell me what's really been happening."
  Vor looked at me in silence for a moment The two princes leaned back
against the far side of the air cart, their elbows hooked over the side. Paul
appeared interested and amused, Lucas suspicious.
  "The second gorges wasn't really a grigos," I prompted Vor. "It's
something--or someone--turned into a gorges. Was it a person?"
  He smiled suddenly and fleetingly "The prince is right--you are a good
wizard." I had scarcely received so many accolades in one day before. I
hoped they would remember to relate all the details when we stopped at
the blue house on top of the mountain on the way home.
   "It used to be human," Vor continued, "a man from my valley." Once I
had him talking, he seemed uncharacteristically willing to continue. "As
I'm sure you already guessed, it was the man I mentioned to you, the one
who determined he was going to kill a gorgos. He did kill it, too, but its
gorges spirit overwhelmed him, body and soul, as it died."
  "And that's why you warned me not to try to kill the gorgos frog."
   He nodded. "Maybe another wizard could have overcome your gorgos
with wizardry." So much for the compliments! "But when it became clear
that you were either going to have to take it back to the land of wild magic
or else kill it by force, I decided I'd better come along. I knew where to find
a second gorgos, and I knew if they killed each other they would both be
dead, with no more humans taken over by their spirits."
    "There's more to it," I said, watching Vor's face. His willingness to tell
me all this now, I thought, was an attempt to hide something else. "You
didn't merely want to dispose of the gorgos from the cathedral city. You
had always known about the gorgos here, and you had been wanting to kill
it for years." He blinked in what might have been agreement.
  "You brought me and the transformed frog up here on purpose to kill
the gorgos that was already here," I continued, holding him with my eyes.
"The gorgos here, the one that used to be a person: that was the reason
you left your home in the valley originally. What did it do to you?"
  Again he gave that fleeting smile. "It killed my father," he said in his
normal laconic tone.
  As he seemed unwilling to add anything else, I said, "So is that why you
had to leave? You couldn't live on in your valley with your father
unavenged, but you couldn't avenge him without becoming a gorgos
yourself?"
   He did not answer. My brain, awakened fully from the miasma into
which the gorgos had dragged it, had at last worked out something
important. Let the others imagine that I had realized it all along. "Vor," I
said with my best wizardly scowl, "this all started when you became
involved in the plots of a renegade wizard. Since his gorgos nearly killed
me, I think I have a right to know about it."
  The two princes looked startled, but I ignored them,
  "Nothing worked out as you had planned, Vor," I said sternly, "at least
until the two gorgoi destroyed each other. Did you think that I would
believe it was sheer coincidence that a gorgos should appear in the very
cathedral city where the foreman of the construction crew wanted revenge
on a gorgos? No," shaking my head, "it was not coincidence."
   The air cart flapped steadily, carrying us across the brown borderlands
of the land of magic. I paused to let Vor say something, but he seemed
willing to listen in silence. "You had struck up a friendship with a certain
wizard," I continued, "and he knew you'd come from the borderlands. He
asked you, very casually, what would be a good type of creature to call to
the city. And this is where things began to go wrong. Not letting yourself
think about why a wizard would want to call a monster, you suggested,
equally casually, that a gorges would be just right. If the gorgos who had
killed your father left the borderlands for Caelrhon, you thought, you could
go home again without shame--especially if, as you let yourself imagine,
the wizard planned to destroy it. But he called the wrong gorges!"
  Vor answered at last "It wasn't like that! I would never have had
anything to do with him if I'd known he was planning an attack on the
cathedral. He told me the wizards' school was trying to find a good kind of
monster so that the young wizards could practice their new antimonster
spells."
  "And even when the gorgos, the wrong gorgos, showed up at the
cathedral instead of at the wizards' school," I asked, "did you still hope
these 'new antimonster spells' were real?"
  He did not meet my eyes, but a slow smile spread across his face. "I did
admire your technique."
  "But who was the wizard?" I insisted, not about to be flattered now.
"Was it that old ragged magician who knows fire magic?"
   Vor looked surprised "Not him. He could never master a gorgos. It was
one of you school-trained wizards, but I'd never seen him before. A
relatively young one--no gray in his beard."
   Lucas interrupted before I could press for details. "All right, Wizard," he
said brusquely, "you've made your point that wizards may occasionally be
useful against creatures of wild magic. But now you have to answer to
me!" He tapped his fingers on the pommel of his sword. "You and your
friend the dean--and I certainly hope the cathedral chapter has enough
sense not to elect him bishop!--may have forced me to come with you, but
now that you can't threaten me with your black box anymore, I think it's
time to teach you your place!"


                                     II
   I'd credited you with more intelligence than this, Prince," I replied
sternly. "I don't have to answer to you, but you to me! You're three
thousand miles from home, without a horse or a map. The only people
here are half-fey themselves. If you try walking back south through the
mountains, you will find very few people who have even heard of the
kingdom of Caelrhon, and even fewer impressed by the crown prince of
Caelrhon. It's no use trying to overpower me, because you'd be trapped
here without my magic."
  I took a deep breath. "Now! I'll give you a choice: between explaining
why you contracted with a renegade wizard to bring a gorgos to the
cathedral city, or staying in the borderlands of magic the rest of your life."
  The hard curl of Lucas's lip was very pronounced. He must know I was
bluffing and looked obstinate enough to dare me to leave him behind. I
did not want to have to explain to the king and the royal princess of
Caelrhon that he wasn't coming home. He had children, too, I
remembered unhappily.
  "You dare," he began, "you dare accuse me of summoning a monster--"
  And then he did the last thing I expected. He jumped me.
   I was so startled that he had me on my back on the bottom of the cart,
his hands around my neck, before I could react. The cart tipped wildly. "I
know how to fly this air cart," he grunted, digging a knee into my
midsection, "and I--"
   His eyes went wide and his grip slackened as the air went solid around
his own neck. Gripped by a slightly tardy binding spell, he fell backwards
as I pushed myself up, furious. "Suppose I turn you into a frog for the rest
of the trip," I said between clenched teeth, "so you don't give me any more
trouble."
   But suddenly my attention was distracted. The air cart was beginning
to wobble badly as it flew. I glanced downward and realized we were no
longer heading back south toward Vor's valley. Instead we were heading
east, much more rapidly than the cart normally flew. I gave the commands
to correct the course, but the cart did not respond. Instead it picked up
speed.
  "This isn't the way back to the valley!" cried Vor.
   "Someone else has control of the cart!" Closing my eyes against the
others' alarmed faces, I slipped into the stream of magic, trying to find in
the welter of influences around us the magic that made the cart ignore my
commands. I found it in a few seconds, but finding it was no help. The
wizards at the school had long ago worked out, by trial and error,
commands the cart would obey, but someone here had specific knowledge
of this land of flying beast and had used that knowledge in the moment I
had been distracted. Even a dead flying beast's skin could not resist spells
shaped especially for it
  "Hold on to me, all of you!" I cried. "We've got to get out!"
  Paul and Vor seized my arms at once, but Lucas clung to the cart's edge.
"You mean you're going to start flying with all of us trying to hang on to
you?"
  That was exactly what I meant "Yes, yes, hurry! I can't break the cart
out of the attraction spell."
  "And then you'll drop off those of us you don't like?"
  "Come here!" I dragged him to me with magic and quickly started
putting a lifting spell together. I had never tried to fly with three other
people before.
    But it was too late. As Lucas struggled in the grip of my magic, making
it impossible for me to hold on to him and the other two at the same time,
the cart began spiraling downward. Below us was a circular green plain
rimmed with low dark hills, a dense grove of trees in the middle. We were
heading for those trees.
  The air cart swung low, tipping until all of us piled against one side,
Lucas still struggling. With a twitch it tossed us out.
   We spun out into the air, Paul and Vor nearly pulling my arms from
their sockets. I applied enough lift to them to ease my arms and almost
reluctantly looked for Lucas.
  I caught him barely before he hit the first tree, just soon enough that he
did not crash into it at full speed. But he disappeared from sight with a
gratifying yell and a rapid breaking of twigs.
   The air cart hesitated above us, abruptly freed from the attraction spell.
I yelled commands at it in the Hidden Language and followed Lucas
downward. The air cart shot off to the south, and we descended through a
canopy of leaves to the thin grass below.
   I came down prepared to face an unimaginable enemy but found only
Lucas, green shadows, and an uneasy silence. Lucas, I was glad to see after
all, seemed essentially intact. Paul and Vor collapsed without a word. The
air that had been cool and brisk in Vor's valley was here sensuously warm.
I closed my eyes for a second, concluding that there really must be a saint
who looked after wizards.
  Paul raised himself on his elbow after a moment "What happened?"
  "Someone or something wanted us down here and didn't particularly
care how we got here."
  "Who is it?" He scrambled to his feet
  "I don't know. I'm trying to locate him, but now that he's no longer
drawing us with magic, I'm having trouble."
  Paul had his sword out and looked around intently, but he had no more
success with his eyes than I was having with magic. "How are we going to
get back?"
   "Walk to Vor's valley. I sent the air cart there as soon as it was freed
from the attraction spell."
  "Or we could ride," Paul suggested, which made no sense at all.
  "I can't walk!" groaned Lucas. "You've broken my ankle!"
   "You're lucky I saved your life instead of killing you," I said grimly.
Dropping out of the sky had diverted my attention, but I had plenty of fury
left. "It's entirely your fault we're here. If you hadn't attacked me, I could
have kept someone else from taking control of the air cart. If it weren't for
the oaths the school makes us swear to serve mankind, you'd not only be a
frog but a very dead frog-"
  Lucas looked quickly toward Paul and Vor, but it was clear he would get
no reinforcements there. "So are you just going to stand there and
threaten me?" he said, attempting a sardonic smile. It was not improved
by a grimace of pain.
  "No. But I am going to demand to know why you believe that wizards
are conspiring against the nobility, and why you summoned a fanged
gorges to the bishop's funeral."
   He reached for his sword, but I froze it in his sheath. "I thought you'd
discovered that violence against a wizard won't work, Lucas," I said
fiercely, standing in front of him with my arms crossed. "And I already
know most of it. It starts with your plan to use a gorgos to discredit both
the Church and organized magic!
  "You and your brother," I continued sternly, "have developed the foolish
idea that the power of the aristocracy, even that of the kings of the
western kingdoms, is being diminished And you blame the priests and the
wizards for this. Because you imagine that the kings could do better
without their spiritual and magical advisers, you--"
   "I know nothing of the gorgos," interrupted Lucas. "I'm not going to
dignify such accusations with a response. But the power of kings is being
daily diminished by wizardly scorn!" Sometime soon I really would have to
find out what purported failings had led to Sengrirn's final argument.
Should I start suspecting Lucas of having murdered him, then deliberately
replacing him with a renegade who paid no attention to the school and its
oaths to help humanity?
    Lucas looked as much toward Paul as me as he spoke. "Did you hear
that wizard up on top of the mountain? "Young fellows,' he called us. And
it's not just scorn for our position. It's a determined effort to weaken us
collectively! Even the feeblest and silliest kings are allowed to survive and
flourish. Before the wizards' school, when wizards owed their allegiance to
their kings rather than the school in the City, bandits and ruffians were
found in great numbers, and princes could earn their spurs in combat.
Then a few short wars by the strongest took care of the weak and foolish,
and kings could stand proudly in their castle halls, rather than amusing
themselves with illusions and fairy stories."
  Paul looked toward me with a forced smile, as though trying to
persuade me he had never believed such things.
  "Did you consider the gorgos a fairy story?" I demanded of Lucas.
   He ignored me. "Not very long ago, all my worst fears were confirmed. A
nobleman from the City stopped by our castle on a journey. And this man,
as it turns out, is a close friend of the Master of the wizards' school. He
confirmed that the school is plotting very soon to break all purported
obedience to the aristocracy!"
  "The Master has no close friends among the aristocracy," I said,
surprised. "Just who did this man claim to be?"
  "He was a nobleman, all right," said Lucas testily. "I don't remember his
name, but he had a black beard and hazel eyes--wore a big ring. And he
seemed remarkably well informed on how the school operated."
  "I spent all spring at the school, and I never saw anyone who--" The
words died on my lips. Standing before us, where a second ago there had
been no one, was a pale green woman.
   She was green all over, naked skin the color of the first leaves in spring,
eyes and hair a rich jade hue. She had round, uplifted breasts, a tiny
waist, and almost unbelievably long and graceful legs. Clouds of dancing
lights, like tiny stars, surrounded her: almost, but not quite, keeping her
decent.
  "Is this one of your Little People?" I asked Vor in a low voice.
  "She is not little," he said with the hint of a smile. "She's a nixie."
  "Of course I'm a nixie," she said in a mellifluous voice, taking a step
toward us. "And I'm delighted that four men have chosen to visit me."
   Vor turned to her, smiling fully now. "I wouldn't have said we chose to
visit you, Lady. But you do have a charming grove."
  "And even more charming treats await you, as I'm sure you realize."
   "I realize that, of course, but you must understand that this is rather
startling for all of us."
   "Did you bring me here?" said Lucas, glowering balefully at her. "I am
leaving now."
   "But you can't leave," she said with a tinkling laugh. "None of you can.
Not until you've fully satisfied me. He knows what I mean," with a glance
at Vor, "and the rest of you will find out quickly. But don't worry. You'll
enjoy it fully as well!" She leaned down, breasts near Lucas's face, and
kissed him on the top of the head.
  Paul took an involuntary step backwards. His sword, forgotten in his
hand, clanged against a root.
  She said a quick word and it spun out of his grip. "No weapons here, or
at least not weapons of steel!" she said coyly. "Come now, which of you
would like to be the first?"
   I shot Vor a despairing look. "It's late in the day, Lady," he said
smoothly. "We've had an exhausting time, and, as you can see, one of us is
injured. We wouldn't be able to satisfy you very well this evening. Perhaps
if we could eat and sleep first?"
  "Very well," said the nixie with the same coy smile. "Come with me!"
  We followed her a short distance through the grove; Lucas, supported
by Vor and Paul on either side, managed to hop. I came behind, trying to
sort out magical influences. It was unexpectedly easy, and then I realized
that this was because no magic now penetrated from outside the grove.
   Under low-hanging branches were spread four beds, piled high with
pillows. On tables next to each were bottles of wine and baskets of red and
yellow fruit. She had clearly been expecting us.
  "There!" said the nixie to Vor. "Is this what you wanted?"
  "This will do most excellently, Lady."
   "Then I shall leave you to your dreams." She kissed him quickly and
slipped away through the trees.
  Vor looked after her, rubbing his lips with his knuckles. This will be a
new experience. I've never been caught by a nixie before."
   "A new experience for all of us," I said. I wondered briefly if the stories I
had sometimes heard at the wizards' school, of witches and their mad
lusts, were in fact garbled stories of nixies.
  The others sat down on the beds. Lucas looked fairly subdued now. I
was still furious with him, but it would have to wait. "I'm going to find out
how thoroughly the nixie has us imprisoned," I said. "Paul, come with me.
Vor, see if you can make Lucas's ankle more comfortable."
  As we walked under the trees toward the edge of the grove, Paul asked
with distaste, "So she expects us all to satisfy her before she'll let us go?"
  "That's certainly what she says."
  After a short pause, he continued, "Is flying always like that?"
  "It's not usually that exciting. Generally I'm not trying to lift three other
people at the same time."
  Paul nodded, seeming reassured. "I'd gotten used to the air cart this
week--or as used to it as one can get. It's like being in a boat; you know
you're suspended far above the bottom of the lake or ocean, but you still
feel as though your feet are solidly planted. But coming down ... I was
amazed you're willing to fly at all!" At least he didn't say that flying made
him think of ascension.
  "Maybe we can see the horses again once we get out of the trees," Paul
added.
  "What horses?" The prince seemed to think about horses at entirely
inappropriate times.
   "Didn't you see them, out on the plain? I spotted them just before the
air cart tipped us out."
   "I was too busy trying to save our lives to give anything else much
attention," I said sharply.
  "There was a whole herd of them," he continued, unabashed. "And they
were running like the wind."
  Before I could answer, my nose was abruptly flattened by something
invisible. I stopped, rubbed my nose delicately, and reached out a hand.
The air had become solid before us.


                                     III
   Paul put out his hand too and rapped on the invisible wall. "I was afraid
of this," I said. "The air's been turned to glass. We can't get out of the
grove, and no magic can pass in or out."
   "Let's see if the barrier's impervious to steel," said Paul, drawing his
sword. To my surprise, the blade went straight through up to the hilt, but
his hand was stopped. "It's as though it's only a spell against humans," he
suggested.
   This was a new land of spell to me, but I admired its ingenuity. By being
specific to humans, the spell could allow wind and rain--and presumably
birds and insects-- to reach the grove, but would keep us firmly inside.
  We continued our circuit of the grove. At one point Paul spotted the
herd of horses in the distance, and I somewhat reluctantly agreed that
they did indeed appear to be beautiful animals.
   I wondered if I ought to take this opportunity of being alone with Paul
to warn him against the nixie. His mother, I was sure, would want me to.
Naked women making open invitations could not have been a common
part of his experience. But if we made it back to Yurt alive, he would very
shortly be my king to whom I owed respect. Even as a prince, he was old
enough to make his own decisions.
  I stopped to pick some leaves growing under one of the trees. "Herbal
magic," I explained to Paul. "I've never seen this particular species before,
but the old wizard of Yurt taught me enough of the magic of earth and
growing things to be able to recognize a plant's properties. I hope it will
help Lucas's ankle."
   He helped me gather a double handful of it, and we walked back toward
the center of the grove. Just before we reached the others, he turned with
a smile and said, "You know, when you asked me to accompany you, I was
afraid for a minute you were going to preach at me about nixies and
morality. I have to apologize for even imagining you would--that's more
something the chaplain would do!"
  "Of course," I said, not looking at him.
  Lucas was eating strawberries, his shirt off and his foot up. His
undershirt had been ripped into bandages and firmly wrapped around his
ankle. "I don't think he's broken it," said Vor, "but it's badly sprained."
  "I think it's broken," contradicted Lucas.
   "I brought some herbs that may help," I said. I soaked them in wine,
because we had no water, and slipped them into the bandages as gently as
I could. He grunted as I worked, as though to remind me that it was highly
painful.
  "If you've got such powerful magic," he said, "why don't you just heal
the broken bone?"
  "Magic has never been much good at altering the cycle of sickness and
health," I said, sitting on the bed across from him. "You would need
supernatural power to do that. Even herbal magic isn't practiced much
anymore; generations ago the wizards let the doctors take over the herbs
that worked reliably."
  Lucas clearly considered this a feeble excuse to mask my own
inadequacies. "If you're so good at transforming things into frogs, why
don't you just transform me into a prince who doesn't have a broken
ankle?"
   "I could transform you into a number of different creatures," I said as
patiently as I could, "some of them rather nasty, but all of them would be
wounded in some way if you were." Lucas grunted without answering and
lapsed into silence.
  "So the nixie really is interested in us, as men?" Paul asked Vor. "Why
would she use her magic to draw in four men she'd never seen before?"
   Vor gave him a sideways look and handed him an apple. "I think this is
all we're getting for supper," he said. "Where did you think baby nixies
came from?"
   Paul thought about this. "You mean that nixies and humans can breed?
It wouldn't be like trying to breed sheep and cattle to each other?"
  "Of course not. Since all of them are women, they need human men.
Didn't your tutor ever teach you about nixies? I thought princes were
supposed to be well educated."
   Vor counted himself as a human, I thought, and yet there remained
something almost magical about him, as though his people were the result
of generations of breeding between humans and something out of the wild
land of magic. I found myself yawning hugely. In the morning, I would
have to test to see if he were stopped by the invisible wall as Paul and I
had been, but not now.
   "Tomorrow," I told the others, "before the nixie comes back, I'm going
to try to get us out of this grove. But I can't work magic when I'm this
tired." I looked rather groggily toward Lucas, but he had stretched out and
was already beginning to snore. I was asleep even before my head reached
the pillow.
  Snuggled luxuriously amidst pillows and comforters, dreaming of
Theodora, I heard a bird singing. For a few moments I was able to
incorporate the sound into my dream, but at last, reluctantly, I opened my
eyes. A brilliant scarlet bird hung on a branch two feet above my head,
pouring out a golden song to greet the morning. It flew away as I rose on
one elbow and looked around. It was already full daylight, but lumps in the
other three beds showed that I was by no means the last awake.
   I lay down again, hoping to recapture my dream, but the realization
that Theodora was three thousand miles away, and even if she was still
alive and well did not want to marry me, brought me fully awake. It had
been a remarkably vivid dream, in which she had had no reservations
about marrying me or about anything else. The nixie, I thought, had been
influencing our sleeping minds for her own purposes.
  The other three also stretched and sat up, not meeting each others' eyes.
"One problem with nixies," said Vor, "is that they're not very subtle."
  We had fruit and wine for breakfast; the bottles and the baskets had
been replenished while we slept. "Is your ankle any better?" I asked Lucas.
  "It doesn't hurt with every breath the way it did last night," he
admitted, "but I certainly couldn't walk on it"
  "Tin going to try to break the spell that's holding us in the grove," I said.
"Until I do, I'm afraid we're going to have to stay here--unless of course we
decide to take up the nixie's offer."
  "But Lucas is married," said Paul puritanically. "If she wants us all
before she'll let any of us go, that means we're trapped here."
  Lucas gave him a sour look, and I almost expected the older prince to
say that, married or not, he could and would do anything he wanted. But
instead he turned away to finish the strawberries.
  "Come with me, Vor," I said. "I want your help."
   "What should we do if the nixie comes back?" asked Paul in some
alarm.
   "Be polite," said Vor. "Call her Lady. Nixies like that. And don't even
bother trying to explain that it's hard to feel in the right mood to respond
to her charms when you've been imprisoned against your will. That's
something nixies never have been able to understand."
   The invisible wall at the edge of the grove once again met my
outstretched hand. It was as impenetrable to Vor as to Paul and me. I
tried several variations on dissolving spells, but none of them worked. Vor
tried pushing other objects through the barrier and found they passed
without difficulty. He was even able, by holding on to a leafy branch, to
push most of his arm through. But as soon as he reached the rest of his
body, not surrounded by leaves, the wall stopped him solidly.
  "How about turning us into birds?" Vor suggested half-seriously. "We
could fly through. The real birds are coming and going without any
problem."
   "I've thought of it," I said, entirely seriously. "The problem is, if I turned
myself into anything nonhuman, I wouldn't be able to say the spell to
return us all to ourselves. I'd even been thinking that I could turn the three
of you into some other creatures so that you could escape, and stay here
myself, but that wouldn't work either. Human magic doesn't penetrate
this wall, so you would all have to remain birds."
   "Could you turn us into some creature that it would be nice to be for the
rest of our lives?"
  I gave this suggestion more attention than it probably deserved. When I
had been at the wizards' school in the City by the sea, I had often gone
down to the breakwater to watch the dolphins playing in the surf. But
being a dolphin would be difficult in these dry borderlands of the land of
magic.
   "I wish I had my books," I said. "I'm not familiar with the kind of magic
that formed this barrier, and it will take me a while to work it out from
first principles."
  "I know what we could do," said Vor, almost playfully. I was quite sure I
had never seen him being playful before. "We could all turn into nixies."
  "We could what?"
   "If we were nixies, the nixie of this grove wouldn't try to stop us from
leaving, and we could pass right through this barrier. But we'd still be able
to speak, so you could turn us back into ourselves once we were out in the
plain."
  "Transformations spells cannot be used frivolously," I said firmly,
inwardly appalled. "Besides, the princes would never agree."
  "I'm not sure I would agree either," Vor said lightly. "But at least it was
an idea."
  When we returned to the beds under the trees, Paul said, "The nixie
came while you were gone. We called her Lady and managed to persuade
her that we weren't in the right mood. She went away again, but now I'm
wondering if she's poisoned the fruit."
  "Poisoned the fruit!"
   "Usually in the morning when I'm home I can't wait to get outside, to
ride, to run. We slept better on these beds last night than we've slept the
whole trip, so I should be brimful of energy. But now I don't feel like
moving at all--and look at Lucas!"
  The older prince rolled over and opened his eyes at the sound of his
name. "I'm not asleep."
  But Paul was right. The nixie was affecting more than our dreams.
Making us feel languorous, making us playful, in a few days she would
have us forgetting the world outside her grove.
   "I don't think it's the fruit," I said. "I think it's in the air. I'd better work
fast."
  Lucas stretched and sat up. 'Tell me, Wizard," he said in much better
humor than I expected, "what real harm would come to us if we did take
up the nixie's offer?"
   I shot Vor a quick glance. He shook his head and said, "Complete
exhaustion, but it should wear off." Paul glared at Lucas, indignant on
behalf of the crown princess of Caelrhon, but the other prince ignored the
look.
  I took a deep breath. "The three of you can do what you like. But Paul
was right that the nixie won't let us go until she's been satisfied by all of
us. And as a wizard, I am bound by iron oaths." This was a prevarication,
because the oaths I had taken had nothing to do with chastity. But I didn't
want to explain that, in love with both Theodora and the queen, I found
the nixie's advances repellent--though even that might change in a few
days in this soft air.
   Instead I folded my arms. "While we're all here," I said, "I want to take
the opportunity to finish the discussion we were having yesterday." This at
least took the rather listless half smile off Lucas's face. "I'm getting very
tired of having to drag this out of you. You keep talking, Prince, about
aristocrats needing to break free of their wizards. Then how do you
explain waiting in the city of Caelrhon until the old bishop died, to make
sure that a renegade wizard you'd hired yourself insulted his memory by
attacking the cathedral?"
   Lucas gave me a vicious look; I was actually rather pleased to see that
languor had not yet taken him over. But he had the sense not to try to
jump me again. "I stayed in the city all summer to defend it from you!"
  He seemed to mean it. "What threat could I possibly be?" I demanded
indignantly.
  "Why else," shifting his scowl from me to Paul, "would the wizard of
Yurt spend so much time in Caelrhon unless planning an attack on my
kingdom? Would you care to tell me, Prince, just what plot you have been
concocting against me?"
 Lucas feared an attack from Paul? Everything had made sense for a
moment, but now suddenly all my suppositions were disintegrating.
   I expected Paul to reply hotly but he only laughed, momentarily easing
the tension. "Our wizard was in Caelrhon at the request of the cathedral,
to defend the church against the monster some other wizard had already
brought there--at Vor's suggestion."
   Vor was about to reply, but I interrupted him. "Wait," I said. Try to sort
it out one piece at a time. "You mean, Lucas, you weren't anticipating the
gorges at the bishop's funeral?"
   "My father got a telephone call from a dark-haired girl none of us
knew," Lucas growled, "saying that 'something rather striking'' was about
to happen in the cathedral city, and that if we considered that spectacular
we should wait until the bishop died! I headed for the city at once, of
course, but when I got there I found the gorges had already been
seen--and you had just arrived. And you wonder why I decided to wait you
out?"
   So the renegade wizard I couldn't find had actually sent the royal court
of Caelrhon a warning two months ago, boasting obliquely of his gorgos?
He must have persuaded one of the Romney girls to telephone for him; no
wonder the band had left town in a hurry!
   "Sengrim wanting revenge on me I could have understood," continued
Lucas grimly, "for dismissing him after years as Gaelrhon's Royal Wizard.
But when magical dangers persisted even after he blew himself up, I
realized that more of you school wizards must be involved in a conspiracy
of vengeance. But the gorges on the cathedral and you, Wizard, in the city
made it clear that I wasn't the only target for wizardly revenge. The goal
was the destruction of both the cathedral and the kingdom of Caelrhon."
  "I've never plotted against anybody in my entire life," said Paul calmly.
"And our wizard certainly wasn't in Caelrhon at our orders; we'd been
wondering all summer when he'd come home."
   One piece at a time. The wind whispered through the branches of a tree
behind me. I found myself reluctantly admiring Lucas's courage. He had
stayed in the city for weeks, convinced there was a wizard there seeking
his own death but still determined to defend his kingdom and the church.
Little wonder he had been so surly with me, both in Caelrhon and on this
trip, if he thought I was that wizard! And his rapid looks around at the
end of the bishop's funeral, which I had found so suspicious at the time,
came from the threat of 'something spectacular'--a threat Lucas could not
tell to either Paul or me since he thought we were behind it.
   "You're right, Prince," I said, "that there has been a renegade wizard in
Caelrhon. The only flaw in your logic has been thinking it was me." That
and persuading himself that if wizards were eliminated, aristocrats could
become glorious heroes out of legend, but I wasn't about to tell Lucas that.
"This wizard's real goal is the destruction of the Church," I continued. The
gorgos's attack on the cathedral was intended as a direct insult to the
memory of the old bishop." Joachim, I thought, should hear me now--or,
for that matter, Zahlfast.
   But I kept on coming back to the unanswered question of who this
renegade might be. Any wizard could have asked Vor about a gorges, but
it would have taken enormously powerful magic to call one from this
northern land to Caelrhon and then to imprison it somewhere for weeks,
much less elude all my efforts to find him.
  I even wondered briefly if Elerius, who had graduated far ahead of good
old Book-Leech with half the effort, might have been involved. Elerius's
magic would certainly be stronger than mine, and Zahlfast would respect
his judgment. My old teacher's sudden and irrational conviction that
priests were working to destroy wizards made much more sense if he had
been told this by someone he trusted, someone who, on the contrary, was
seeking to destroy priests. But a wizard with a post at one of the most
powerful western kingdoms would not become involved in the affairs of
Yurt or Caelrhon. And, I reminded myself, a remarkable number of young
wizards had graduated ahead of me.
  "There are plots within plots here," said Vor to Lucas. Unlike me, he
seemed full of theories. "Someone, probably even starting while your
wizard was alive, arranged an elaborate masquerade to persuade you and
your father to turn against wizardry." His eyes gleamed in the forest
shadows. "Who would most like to see you helpless, with no wizard to
come to your defense? Isn't it most likely to be Prince Vincent, your own
younger brother?"
   Lucas gave a start but did not answer immediately-- he had considered
this explanation. But this was terrible! Had Vincent contracted a
nefarious plot to ensure that he, and not his brother, became king of
Caelrhon? And only one man stood between Vincent and the crown of
Yurt, once he was married to the queen the very day after Paul's
coronation: Paul himself.
   "What are you implying about my brother?" roared Lucas to Vor,
finding his voice at last and, I thought, roaring even louder to cover up his
hesitation. He might have plenty of suspicions of his own about Vincent,
but he was not going to let anyone else voice them.
  I ignored him, having for the moment an even more important concern.
"Paul," I said, "I want you to promise me not to ride your stallion
anymore."
  "Not ride Bonfire?!"
  "Vincent gave him to you. He's a trap. He's planning to use that horse
somehow to kill you."
 Paul regarded me stiffly. "I can decide for myself what horses to ride,
Wizard."
  I didn't have a chance to answer. Lucas pushed himself up onto his one
good foot. His hand on his sword hilt, he hopped and shouldered his way
between the two of us, making for Vor.
  But before he could test whether the sword was faster than the spell,
Paul leaped up. "Stop it! All of you, stop accusing each other for one
minute!" A stray ray of sunshine had worked its way down through the
leaves and glinted on his hair. "We've all been working against each
other," he announced, "and we've all got to stop! No more accusations, no
more lies, no more attempts to overpower each other. We need each
others' help, not just to get away from the nixie but to save your kingdom,
Lucas."
  I watched him admiringly. I did hope we made it home to Yurt alive,
because he would be a superb king.
  "So you, Wizard," Paul continued, turning on me, "have got to stop
acting as though only you were wise and knowledgeable." I opened my
mouth and closed it again. "Vor, you've got to think less of your revenge
and more of the welfare of the city where you now live and work. And
Lucas, you have to admit that you've been deceived" It took Lucas about
ten seconds to make up his mind. But then he took a deep breath and said,
"All right I agree we're going to have to work together. But first I want
some reassurance, real reassurance, that you are not plotting to reunite
Yurt and Caelrhon with yourself as king."
   There was a tinkling laugh behind us. All of us froze, then turned slowly.
The nixie stood surrounded by her glittering stars. She was even more
alluring than I remembered.
  "Come now," she said with a smile. "You had tried to tell me that you
had no energy, but for the last hour you have been quarreling with each
other! That seems energetic to me!"
   Paul threw himself on his bed, his back toward her. Lucas let himself
down more gingerly. "You're offering us something delicate and enticing,
Lady," said Vor. "We may need just a little more time to let the sour taste
of the outer world pass away."
   "If you keep on putting me off," she said with a coy smile, "I may have
to take affairs into my own hands."
   I sat down, not looking at her. Trapped here in the borderlands I was
powerless to find the wizard who must be behind it all: the magical
attacks on Joachim's cathedral, the vague warnings I had received against
priests, Vincent's abrupt wooing of the queen.
   I lifted my head. Vor and the nixie were still exchanging light banter.
He seemed to be enjoying their conversation hugely, but he also seemed to
have put her off again. "Then I'll see you tomorrow morning!" she said and
slipped away. The dancing stars lingered for a few seconds behind her.
  None of us felt like talking when she was gone. After a few minutes,
Lucas reached for the apples.
   When the silence threatened to last all day, I said, "I guess I'd better
start on my spells to get us out of here. I'll try to work fast."
   I went to the edge of the grove and sat down, my back against a tree,
and started probing the magical structure of the invisible barrier. Paul
followed me. He pressed his face against the barrier as against a window,
looking for the horses. I had closed my eyes but opened them when I heard
a sharp whistle. Paul was trying to attract the horses' attention.
   The herd was closer than it had been yesterday. They cocked their ears
at the sound of the whistle. They were all different colors, bay, black, gray,
and sorrel, none of them red roan. But they had the same light step, the
same delicate noses and wide-spaced eyes as Bonfire. When Paul whistled
again they turned as one and ran, manes and tails floating behind them.
  A week passed. The second day the nixie became petulant, and I told
her brusquely, "I'm sorry, Lady, but we aren't interested."
  "Then you'll have to stay here the rest of your lives," she said, not
smiling at all. I turned my back on her, and in a minute she went away
and did not come back.
   In the following days, the air seemed less sensuous, still soft and
perfumed but without the overwhelming sweetness it had had when we
first arrived. Languor seemed to have overtaken Lucas completely. If
pressed, he would admit that his ankle was healing, but mostly he slept
and ate fruit. Vor too lapsed into inactivity.
   Paul and I however remained occupied. Every morning, he
determinedly trotted around the grove twenty times. He also continued
trying to attract the horses; by the fourth day they approached rather than
ran at the sound of his whistle, but they still remained well back, snorting
and flicking their tails nervously. And I wrestled with the nixie's magic.
   I felt a desperate urgency to be back home, to stop the renegade wizard
from doing what he was planning-- or at least to be there when he did it.
If he had been at all checked by my presence in the city, he certainly had
nothing to fear now. His gorges had gotten me out of the way almost as
surely as if it had killed me.
  If Vincent was working with him--maybe having turned against his own
brother--I didn't want to imagine what he might be planning against the
queen, though his plots against Paul seemed horribly clear. And I also did
not want to imagine why and for what purpose he had captured Theodora,
unless it was to silence the only person in the city who seemed able to
detect his magic. The gorgos's attack on the cathedral at the time of the
old bishop's funeral might only be a preparation for a much worse attack
when the new bishop was elected. His wizard, apparently much more
powerful than I could ever be, had in his control, directly or indirectly, the
two women I loved, the dean, and the young man I hoped would become
my king.
   "Look at the stallion," said Paul, interrupting my thoughts. I looked out
obediently. Only ten yards beyond the invisible barrier, the bay stallion
stood watching us, pawing the ground with one foot, shaking the mane
from his eyes with a proud toss of his head.
   I closed my eyes again. I almost thought I understood the structure of
the magic barrier now, after a week of studying it. Several times I might
have had it, and several times on closer examination I had been wrong. I
was having to improvise everything, and I kept having Theodora's feeling
of being almost at the top and yet knowing that this time I would never
make it. If I ever saw the school again I would have to relate my
experiences to the technical division students as an example of improvised
magic.
  But this time-- Quickly, delicately, I started putting a spell together, one
designed specifically to overcome the spells that kept the air solid before
us. I said the words of the Hidden Language and confidently reached out
my hand.
   It struck solidity so hard I bruised my knuckles. I probed again for the
structure of the nixie's magic. The spells had all been changed.
  "What's wrong?" Paul turned as I slumped down.
   "She's changing the magic structure of the barrier. I'd wondered why I
wasn't doing any better overcoming her magic, but now I know. As soon as
I work out how to overcome one set of spells, she switches to another."
  "And then can you overcome the new set?"
  "Yes, in time--just a few seconds slower than it takes her to change the
spells again."
   There was a quick flutter of leaves, and the nixie burst into view. With a
tinkling laugh, she planted kisses on Paul's lips and my own and
scampered away again.
   "I have an idea," said Paul with a half smile that made me hope he was
not serious. "You and Lucas don't want anything to do with the nixie, and
I can't say about Vor, but suppose just one of us were able to 'fully satisfy'
her. Do you think she'd let us go?"
   Out of several things I might have said, I chose, "When she was hoping
for four men, I don't think she'd settle for one."
   "Oh, I think I might be able to serve in the place of four men if I wanted
to," said Paul with that same half smile.
  "I have a better idea," I said. "Try to get some of your horses into the
grove. They might be able to pass through the barrier the way the birds
do, and maybe we could ride them out."
  "Of course," said Paul in surprise. "What did you think I was doing?"
   If the nixie was still nearby and listening to our conversation I had just
given away what might have been our last chance. Even now she might be
altering her barrier so that horses could not pass through it any more
easily than could humans. Our only hope was that the nixie might never
have needed spells to imprison horses.
  "Quickly!" I said, low and urgently. 'Try to lure the stallion in here. We
have to go now! I'll get the others."
  "I'm working as rapidly as I can," said Paul mildly.
  But as I hurried away through the trees he started a different series of
whistles, so enticing that even my feet slowed for a second.
   Both Vor and Lucas were asleep. I woke them with a quick hand on
their shoulders. "Come on," I said in a low voice. "We may be able to
leave."
   I lifted Lucas with magic before he could protest and hurried back
through the trees, Vor close behind. Because Lucas was well off the
ground, his head some two feet above mine, several times he got a face full
of leaves before he could duck, but I ignored his insults.
  We stopped well back in the trees so as not to startle the horses. Paul
was talking to them now, softly, alluringly. If the nixie was listening, I
thought, she must wish Paul would talk that way to her. The stallion and a
black mare were only a few feet beyond the invisible barrier.
  A bird shot by suddenly, scolding, and the horses tossed their heads,
wheeled, and ran. I tried to swallow bitter disappointment.
   But Paul kept on whistling and calling, not at all dismayed. Most of the
herd stayed a quarter mile away, but the stallion and the one mare
approached again, less cautiously this time. "Come, my beauties, don't be
afraid, we won't hurt you, come, my lovely ones," Paul was saying.
   He held out one of the nixies apples. The stallion snorted and stretched
his neck forward, still ten yards away. He took one stiff-legged step, then
another. And then he was coming through the invisible barrier.
   None of us breathed. Very solemnly and deliberately, the stallion took
the apple from Paul's hand and crunched it between powerful teeth. With
his other hand, Paul held another apple toward the mare. For a moment
she held back, then with a nicker she too stepped into the grove.
   My impulse was to leap forward, to seize the horses, but even I knew
that would be fatal. Paul was stroking the stallion's neck, still talking softly
and constantly, his voice like a running brook where the words mattered
less than the sound. And then abruptly he took a handful of mane and
swung up onto the stallion's back.
   The horse jumped, all four feet together, and then whirled and began to
run. The prince was almost lying on the horse's back, his head down and
his legs pulled up so that no part of his body touched the nixie's barrier. It
parted and let them through as though it were not there.
   And then the two horses were off, racing across the plain, Paul clinging
like a burr to the stallion's mane. "He's not abandoning us," said Vor, but
his tone made the statement almost a question.
  "No, he's not," said Lucas before I could answer. "He has to accustom
the horse to being ridden before anyone else can even try."
   The stallion reared, trying to shake Paul off. There was nothing I could
do but watch; my magic could not penetrate the nixie's barrier. The
stallion came down again, Paul still firmly on his back. The whole herd
swept off, galloping across the plain, and disappeared from our view.
   The nixie's not going to wait passively for two hours or two days or
whatever it takes Paul to calm down that stallion," said Lucas. I thought
this one of his more intelligent recent observations.
   Vor seemed to think so too. "There's only one thing to do," he said with
his quick, fleeting smile. "I'll try to keep her occupied."
   Lucas and I both turned to stare at him. "Oh, I'll readily admit I'm not
in the right mood right now," he said playfully. "But nixies, happy nixies,
can put one in the mood very easily. They do say that, if you live through
the experience, satisfying a nixie is something you never forget."
  Lucas cleared his throat as though about to speak but changed his
mind.
  "The two of you are bound by oaths of marriage and of wizardry," Vor
continued, "but as long as I'm back home in the borderlands, I might as
well take advantage of an opportunity I'm not likely to be offered down in
the cathedral city among all the priests. With a little conversation, a little
wine, and a few games, I should be able to stretch it out for several hours."
  Lucas and I had nothing to say. "Oh, Lady!" Vor called, moving back
toward the center of the grove. "Where are you? Could you bring your
delightful form closer to mine?"
   He was gone. Lucas and I looked at each other. I arranged him as well
as I could, his leg propped up before him, and sat down to wait.
  An hour passed, and the horses reappeared in the distance. I thought I
spotted a dark shape still clinging to the stallion's neck. The stallion was
not running now but walking.
  "It looks like he may be taming that stallion," said Lucas with reluctant
admiration. "Look at how easily he's sitting now."
   Paul slipped down from the horse's back, a hand still in the mane, then
leapt back up again. The stallion jumped, but this time only a small jump,
and Paul guided an incipient gallop back into a trot.
  Then he was off the stallion's back again and moving toward the black
mare. I could see him stroking her, talking to her, and then suddenly he
was on her back and she was running, and the entire process started over
again.
   The whole herd disappeared around the far side of the grove. I thought
of following them but was afraid of doing anything that might startle the
horses. Paul was going to need absolute concentration to try to tame two
wild beasts that galloped like something out of legend.
   I wondered again where Bonfire had really come from. Having seen the
bay stallion and the black mare up close, I was now certain that Paul's red
roan stallion had come from these borderlands. If the renegade wizard had
been up here to find a gorgos, he might have taken back a horse for Prince
Vincent at the same time. I was even more convinced that that horse was
a trap.
  Another hour passed. I was so tense that the very tension made me
yawn with exhaustion.
   And then Paul was back, appearing abruptly before us, riding the
stallion and leading the mare with a hand on her mane. Both kept taking
nervous little steps and jerking their heads up, but they kept coming. They
passed without difficulty through the nixie's barrier. Extreme fatigue and
delighted pride were both on Paul's face, but all he said was, "Where's
Vor?"
  I let my mind slip away through the trees until I found him. Standing in
the flow of magic by the edge of his mind, I called softly, "Vor. Paul's back.
We're going now."
   Very few people not trained in magic can hear a wizard speaking to
them directly, mind to mind. But there was an abrupt stir and I returned
to myself, knowing he had heard. "He's coming," I said.
  'The mare's a little gentler," said Paul. "You and Lucas try mounting."
  I rose up in the air, bringing Lucas with me, and set us down on the
mare's back as gently as I could. Vor came out of the trees, his face ashen
and running with sweat but giving us a complacent smile. Paul reached
out a hand, and Vor scrambled up behind him.
  "Hold on to my waist," said Paul. "All of you, keep your heads down and
tuck up your feet. Let's go!"
   Paul urged the stallion forward, and the mare followed. 'The stallion
was out in the plain again in a second, but Lucas's wounded leg stuck out
sideways from the mare's back, and it hung up on the nixie's barrier.
   Lucas grunted with pain, and I caught him just before he was dragged
backwards off the horse, just before the mare bolted out from under both
of us. With a firm hand on her mane and my best imitation of Paul's voice
in her ears, I turned her in a tight circle and tried again.
  And this time we went through, free of our leafy prison. "Run!" cried
Paul. "Here comes the nixie!"



                          PART SEVEN



                          The Bishop I


  The graceful green form stood on the edge of the grove. Waves of
sensuous emotion broke around us, but we kept galloping.
  When the nixie's call to us did not succeed in a few seconds, she tried to
call the horses. Paul's stallion threw up its head and stopped so suddenly
Vor almost slid off. The mare too skidded to a halt and looked back.
  But while a dead flying beast's skin has no choice but to answer a call
designed for flying beasts, a living horse can make a choice. Paul shouted
to the horses and, almost reluctantly, they turned away from the grove,
and abruptly the attraction spell dropped and we ran again.
  Although Paul had been riding these horses hard for several hours, they
showed no sign of slowing now. Half my attention had to go to the lifting
spell that was all that held Lucas on the mare's back. I was not nearly the
horseman Paul was, and I quickly fell behind.
  But it did not matter. We were free.
   After five miles, at the hills that ringed the plain, Paul pulled up the
stallion. "The horses don't want to go farther," he said. "And I don't want
to exhaust them." A light dampness had finally broken out on their coats.
  "We'll have to walk the rest of the way. Lucas, the wizard can carry you."
  None of us objected, not even Lucas, whose ankle had been healing
nicely in the nixie's grove until the slam against the invisible barrier had
twisted it anew. We slid to the ground and Paul embraced both horses,
putting his cheek in turn against each of their necks. "Goodbye, my
beauties, my lovely ones. I'll give your greetings to Bonfire."
   He then turned to the rest of us. "The nixie made us fight among
ourselves, but if we are going to make it home again we all have to help
each other." All of us nodded soberly. Paul was clearly our leader now. I
thought it a nice diplomatic touch for him to blame our disagreements on
the nixie. We stumbled up into the rocky hills, Lucas hovering a short
distance above the ground due to my magic, and the horses pranced away
across the grass to rejoin the herd.
   It took two days to get back to Vor's people's valley. Vor was able to
climb up and down even the steepest inclines without difficulty, but on
several occasions I had to carry both princes up a nearly vertical slope or
across a crevice.
   Late the second day, when cool blue shadows stretched out across the
barren land, we finally reached a river, rimmed on either side with
verdure, and followed it upstream until we came through a narrow divide
into the valley.
  Word spread quickly that we had arrived, and people came hurrying
down from their homes in the cliffs to greet us. I was too tired to notice
much of what was happening, except that Vor gave everyone a lively
account of our exploits. Several long-fingered women brought hot stew,
which certainly helped. As the stars came out, lights twinkled on all up
and down the cliffs, and, as Paul had hoped, it looked like fairyland.
Someone realized that, although Vor seemed prepared to talk all night, the
rest of us were about to fall asleep sitting up. We were boosted up ladders
and given blankets and dropped into oblivion at last.
  "Vor," asked Paul, "do you want to come back to Caelrhon with us, or do
you want to stay here with your people?"
  The air cart, I was happy to discover, had indeed obeyed my last
commands after tipping us out, and it had returned to the valley. In the
morning we were preparing to fly home.
  "I'll come back with you," said Vor in his normal laconic style. "The lads
will want me once they start construction again."
  And they might be starting again very soon, I thought. It had already
been three weeks since the old bishop's death, and I did not think they
would delay the election of his successor for long.
   Paul echoed my thought. "I wonder if we'll be too late for the new
bishop's enthronement."
  "We can telephone from the mountain and find out what's been
happening," I said.
   And so once again, after a day of flying, we came up the icy vertical side
of old Book-Leech's mountain and landed next to the little blue house. I let
Paul tell most of the story.
   "Well, I've heard about nixies, of course, but I've never met one," said
the wizard, pouring out tea. "I'm sure you found it all a, well, interesting
interlude." Paul blushed up to his hairline. "That was certainly clever of
you, young fellow, to find a way out of her grove--guess old 'Frogs' has
been teaching you his tricks, eh?"
  Paul had tried to downplay his role in saving us, but Book-Leech, of
course, had realized what an accomplishment it in fact was. It really had
owed nothing to me, and I said so.
  "I'd like to use your telephone," I said in a pause in the conversation.
The priests of the cathedral will want to know that the gorges has been
destroyed."
  I expected him to offer me the phone at once, but he hesitated before
answering. "Well, you're welcome to use it, of course, but I'm not sure it's
working."
  "Not sure it's working?!"
  "It may be because we're so far away from any other telephone," he said
apologetically, "or because there's interference due to the magical
influences from the north."
  "But there have been wizards posted here for years--"
   "Well, you see, it used to work. But it didn't use to have a far-seeing
attachment. It was just put in this summer, and, well... Elerius himself
installed it, so I know it must have been working at first, and now I'm
afraid I've broken it somehow. I've never been any good at technical magic
myself. Could you look at it? It is, after all, your invention."
   I took a deep breath. I had invented the far-seeing attachment
essentially by accident and still had no good idea how it worked; wizards
from the technical division had had to take apart my rather haphazard
spells to be able to duplicate it. "Let's look at it together."
  He took it out of a drawer. "It does work for the school to call me. That's
why I didn't realize at first there was a problem."
  A quick glance at his shelves showed that he, like me, owned no Books
that might have helped. "If you can't telephone the City for help," I asked,
"what's the point of having you posted here? I would think they would
want to have this fixed immediately."
   "I can usually get it to work once" he said, "so I could call the school if
there was any sudden problem up in the land of magic. But-- Well, I guess
I can tell you this without embarrassment. I don't like to tell the school
that I, a thoroughly trained wizard, can't solve a magical difficulty."
  It was rather reassuring that someone who might in another year have
been first in his class could also have patches of incompetence. But I
myself had had so many blows to my pride over the years that I might
have been willing to admit my failure in a case like this.
  The two of us bent over the telephone, probing its spells,
communicating mind to mind. Suddenly I thought I saw the problem.
Breaking off pieces of the flow of magic with words of the Hidden
Language, I adjusted the spells, reorienting the telephone within magic's
four dimensions.
  "There," I said aloud. "I think it should work now."
  "Of course it will. That's the spell I have to use to get it to work at all.
You can make one telephone call now if you like, but you won't be able to
make another until tomorrow. So who do you want to call?"
   I considered. I could continue to try different spells on the telephone,
but they were as likely to make the instrument stop working completely as
to fix it. I wanted reassurance that the queen was alive and well, but
whatever Prince Vincent might be plotting he needed her so he could
marry her. I needed to talk to the wizards' school, but it would have been
much easier to do so without the princes standing there. One call should
reassure me that no new monster had appeared in the cathedral city.
  The telephone view screen lit up, and I saw one of the young priests of
the cathedral. "Hello?" He could not see me.
   I'd like to speak to the dean. Father Joachim," I added as he seemed to
hesitate. "This is Daimbert, the wizard who was staying with him." The
young priest's face changed slightly. "I know he'll want to talk to me," I
said urgently.
  "The dean cannot speak with anyone at the present time," said the
priest in icy tones.
   Then give him my message, please," I said, speaking rapidly. Tell him
that I've destroyed the monster and will be back in the cathedral city in a
week." I tried to read something in the young man's motionless face. Could
Joachim have left explicit orders that he did not want to talk to me? Had
the cantor Norbert decided to get revenge for his humiliation by
launching a new, more deadly attack against the dean, perhaps with the
active assistance of an evil wizard? "No new monsters have appeared on
the cathedral tower, have they?" I asked in panic.
   "No, and I trust you are not disappointed." And then he did ring off,
leaving me hoping that he would convey my message.
   "I'll send the air cart back to the City as soon as we're through with it," I
said as we were leaving the mountaintop. Having not seen any other flying
beasts in the borderlands, I had to give up my plan for an air cart of my
own. "So the school will be able to send you more supplies whenever you
need them. Swallow your pride and ask them to send out some technicians
at the same time."
  He nodded ruefully. But during the week it took us to fly home I gave
him no more thought.
   Paul and Lucas spent much of the trip working out elaborate methods
to trick and overcome whatever renegade wizard was operating in
Caelrhon. Vor was unable to give any more exact description of him than
that he seemed fairly young and had a black beard. He commented, rather
surprised himself, that he could not really recall the man's face, though he
did remember his white jacket, emblazoned with yellow suns glowing by
their own light, a jacket that I could certainly not remember anyone at the
school wearing. The two princes speculated at some length on Vincent's
role, concluding that he must have been deceived by the renegade, and
drew up plans in which they were able to gallop, formidable and glorious,
across all their enemies. I could have told them none of them would work.
  "I'll be eighteen in two weeks," said Paul. "I hope Mother has been going
ahead with the preparations without me. You were going to be at my
coming of age ceremony anyway, weren't you, Lucas? I'll need you now
especially, because the wizard may be planning some attack to coincide
with the event."
   " If the renegade wizard was planning some outrageous further assault
on the cathedral, I needed warn the Church. Once Joachim was elected
bishop I'd hoped that I could still get in to see him in spite of the other
priests' suspicions of magic-workers, suspicions doubtless increased by
Norbert's experiences.


                                     II
  We reached Caelrhon at sunset and saw both the new and the old
towers of the cathedral rising before us. They are back," noted Vor.
   Not just the Romneys. As well as their caravans, I saw a large number of
silk tents pitched outside the the walls, far more than one usually saw for
market day. . Set the air cart down in front of the gates. We climbed out,
leaner and much more ragged and dirty than we had been when we left,
and smiled to think what we must look like to people in the tents.
  "First thing I'm going to do," said Lucas cheerfully, "is to take a very
long bath." I was giving the air cart the commands to return it to the City.
"Don't use up all the hot water," said Paul. "I'll need to see how my lads
are doing," said Vor and slipped away. The air cart soared upwards into
the darkening sky. "Save some hot water for me, too," I said to Paul.
  "I'm going around by the cathedral, to tell the dean not to worry about
the gorgos anymore. I don't trust that young priest to have given him the
message."
   The construction site in front of the cathedral was dark and still, except
for the construction crew's huts on the far side. Then I heard sudden loud
and cheerful voices as Vor arrived. I saw the watchman's lantern but
detoured around him to reach at last the quiet cobbled street behind the
church, where thin lines of yellow light came into the street from
shuttered windows.
  My footsteps echoed as I hurried down to the house at the end I stepped
up into the dark porch and knocked. For a long moment there was no
response. Then there was a click as the door was unlocked, and a candle
shone in my eyes as it opened.
  I had expected to see Joachim's silent servant. Instead I saw a man I
had never met in my life. "I need to see the dean at once," I said. There
was probably a good reason why Joachim had someone else opening his
door. "It's very urgent."
  He hesitated, apparently trying to decide if I was dangerous, then
nodded. "Wait here, please."
  There was another long pause, and I could hear faint voices. Then the
candle appeared again with someone else carrying it. He was dressed in
the black vestments of a senior officer of the cathedral, but he was not
Joachim.
   After a panic-stricken moment in which I imagined that we had
somehow come to the wrong city, I remembered seeing this man last
month at dinner at this very house. He was older than Joachim, with an
intelligent face if not the dean's intense expression.
  "Excuse me, I expected to see Father Joachim," I managed to say.
  "He is at the Episcopal palace, but I am sure I could help you."
   Joachim was alive, but I was too late. I tried to smile and shook my
head. Thank you, but it wasn't important. Sorry to disturb you." The
priest stood in the doorway, still holding up his candle, watching me as I
slowly walked back down the street.
  At the castle, Paul met me in great excitement. He seemed younger
somehow than he had in the past weeks. "We got back just in time!
They're going to elect the new bishop and have his enthronement
tomorrow! Everybody's here--Mother, Prince Vincent, the old king and
queen of Caelrhon. And they say that not only are all the lords of the two
kingdoms here--that's why we saw so many tents--and all the bishops of
the nearby dioceses, but the bishop of the great City himself! I'm afraid
the castle is very cramped with the royal courts of both kingdoms, and
there's hardly any hot water."
   I felt swept with relief to hear that the queen was all right. Now all I had
to do was find Theodora. "And have there been any more manifestations
from the renegade wizard?"
  "No. Lucas told me he was going to talk to his brother immediately, of
course. But I've seen Bonfire, and he seems well--my knights did
remember to exercise and feed him."
  There was one more important point in what Paul had said. "And they
haven't elected the new bishop yet?"
   "Well, not really. I've just been hearing about this. They hold the official
election right before the enthronement, but in fact they have to decide
much earlier. It would never do to have everyone there for the ceremony
and then have a split election! The priests keep the results secret, of
course, but there are plenty of rumors.'"
  "And who is rumored to have been elected?" I asked, but I already knew.
   "You'll never guess. It's Father Joachim, our old chaplain! We'll find out
for sure in the morning."
  The morning found us all in the cathedral very early. I kept probing for
another wizard in the city, but I could not find him. I also found no
monsters, not even the red lizards with hands, although I had flown
surreptitiously over the new tower, repeating the spell to reveal what was
hidden. This absence of other wizards and of magical creatures was not
the relief it should have been, because I also had not been able to detect
the wizard even when Theodora had. I wondered if he planned some
outrage for the middle of the ceremony or if, as at the old bishop's funeral,
he would save his surprise for the end.
   The church was even more crowded than it had been for the funeral,
because as well as all the townspeople there were all the aristocrats of two
kingdoms, with their trains. Quite a few wore their swords, a surprising
sight in church. 1 spotted Yurt's two counts and the duchess several rows
behind us. The duchess was flanked by her tall husband and their twin
daughters. The girls waved at us and Paul waved back. I even saw the
Romneys, in their bright red and gold best, squeezed into a back pew.
   Prince Vincent sat with his own family, including his parents, his
brother Lucas, the crown princess and their children, in the front pew on
the far side of the church, so Paul and I had the queen to ourselves. As we
waited for the service to begin, Paul continued telling his mother the story
of our adventures which he had started last night. The nixie, I noticed,
became changed in the telling into a rather ill-defined although still
malignant magical creature.
  I was almost overwhelmed to be sitting so close to the queen again,
smelling her scent, seeing her smile, hearing her voice. She addressed me
perfectly naturally, as she always had, and I did my best to be equally
natural.
  But I still glanced surreptitiously around the church, looking for
Theodora. She could have been there but I would not have seen her in the
throng.
  Then the organ began playing, and conversation quickly died away as
aristocrats and townspeople settled back as well as they could in the
crowded pews. Through the great doors of the cathedral came half a dozen
bishops in brilliant scarlet robes. All of them seemed quite old and highly
venerable. They walked solemnly the length of the cathedral, across the
mosaic Tree of Life, to stand around the altar.
   When the last bishop had taken his place, the doors opened again, and
all the cathedral priests came in. I looked for and did not see Joachim. But
the other members of the cathedral chapter filed slowly up the aisle to
stand in a group beside the bishops.
   One bishop stepped forward: the bishop of the great City. I had seen
him once when I was in school. The great mane of hair protruding below
his miter had been gray then and now was white, but his booming voice
was unchanged.
  "Dearly beloved," he began, speaking into a profound hush, "we are
gathered here to observe one of the most important ceremonies of the
Church, the election of a new bishop."
   I rather doubted that I was his dearly beloved. Although Joachim had
forestalled an incipient riot against me, after I left there would still have
been strong feeling against both the magical monster who had attacked
the cathedral and the wizard who "must" have had something to do with
its appearance. Perhaps Norbert had tried to cover up for his humiliation
by lashing out against me, even if not against Joachim, once I was gone.
The City's bishop would certainly not be impressed at hearing from one
wizard that another wizard was planning some sort of attack on the
Church.
   "In the Church, as you know," he continued, "we bishops are brothers,
brother shepherds, guiding the Christian flock in the ways of God with
each others' assistance and guidance. Because each bishop is elected by
the priests of his own cathedral, that is the men who will serve under him,
only the most holy and worthy men are sought for the position. We who
are bishops know in our hearts how far we fall from the ideal, but the ideal
is clean piety, intelligence, judgment, dedication to the Lord's Word."
  I became tenser and tenser, waiting for what must be coming, but a fast
and irreverent magical probing still located no monsters.
   The bishop opened his Bible. "The office of bishop was laid down from
the beginning, and the Apostle tells us the necessary qualifications: A
bishop must be blameless, vigilant, sober, of good behavior, apt to teach,
not greedy of filthy lucre, but patient, not a brawler, not covetous, one that
ruleth well his own house. A bishop must be a vessel unto honor,
sanctified, and meet for the Master's use, prepared unto every good work."
  He closed the Bible complacently, as though congratulating himself that
he was prepared for every good work, and turned to the assembled
cathedral priests. "You have heard the inspired Word regarding the sort of
man whom God calls to the Episcopal office, speaking through the will of
the cathedral chapter. Are you ready now to elect such a man?"
  "We are ready." I noticed that the priest who was apparently now dean
spoke for the chapter.
  "Then let your deliberations begin."
  The priests filed gravely out the side door of the church. They had been
gone for ten minutes, and Paul had started to swing his legs and I was
wondering if there would be a recess, when they all filed back in again.
This time they had Joachim with them.
  I strained forward to see better. He was dressed in scarlet robes and
was bareheaded. His eyes turned toward us, but he did not seem to see us.
  "We have made our choice," said the new dean.
  "And do you all agree in this choice?"
   "We are all agreed, in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy
Spirit" The priests spoke together, but I heard Norbert's voice loudest of
all.
  "Then send your candidate forward!"
   The priests stepped aside, and Joachim walked slowly to the front. I
would have been intimidated by those enormous black eyes in his
completely sober face, but the bishop of the City met him placidly.
"Joachim! You have heard the will of the cathedral chapter. Do you accede
to this election?"
  "If God has called me," said Joachim in a low, grave voice, "in speaking
through the chapter, then I must accept, although I know in my heart I
am not worthy."
  I had to disagree with this. I thought he met every criteria the bishop
had mentioned.
  "Brother bishops!" turning to the others. "Do you accept Joachim as
your brother?"
  "We accept him with joy," said the bishops, all speaking together.
  "And you, the People of Yurt and Caelrhon," turning to the
congregation, "do you acclaim him as your spiritual father?"
  There was a general affirmative murmur from the crowd.
  "Then kneel down, Joachim." Joachim knelt, and the bishop took a
crystal ampoule of oil from the altar. He unstoppered it and poured two
drops on the lowered head before him. He then took a tall gold and white
hat, like his own, and fitted it on.
   "Rise then, anointed of the Lord, and fellow bishop!" Joachim stood up,
and the two men kissed each other on both cheeks. "Take these symbols of
your office." He put a shepherds crosier into his right hand and slipped a
ring onto his left. The enormous ruby gleamed in the candlelight, the ring
I had last seen on the dead bishop's finger.
  "Then let us all sing Alleluia to God!"
  The congregation scrambled to its feet, the organ began to play, and a
great song of praise rang out Joachim stood still, not singing. I tried to
catch his eye as he was only about twenty feet away. But I doubted he saw
me. His eyes were again elsewhere. He was bishop now, burdened with the
souls of two kingdoms, with responsibilities that went far beyond the
worries of a wizard he had known when they both were young.
  When the hymn died away and the congregation sat down again, two
acolytes brought forward a throne. It was heavy, and they dragged as
much as carried it in front of the altar. When it was properly positioned,
they stepped back and Joachim sat in it.
   "My people!" he said, addressing us all. "I come to you an unworthy
man, but one who will do his best to guide your souls to God, with His aid.
I would now like to ask those of you who govern our people's physical
bodies to come forward, to dedicate yourselves and your purpose to the
same divine purpose that guides us all."
  Another week and Paul could have taken part himself, but the queen
was still regent. She rose, holding Yurt's silver ceremonial sword, then
walked slowly forward to the altar, laid the sword on it, and knelt before
the throne. She kissed the Episcopal ring, and Joachim put his hand on
her head and blessed her. Then he took her by the shoulders and drew her
up.
  "Rise, my daughter, and govern well," he said, and handed her back the
sword.
   She returned to her place, squeezing in between Paul and me, and then
it was the turn for the king of Caelrhon. The ceremony was repeated with
our duchess, then Caelrhon's dukes, then the counts of both kingdoms,
followed by the castellans and the lords of manors. It occurred to me as
the ceremony progressed that it would be very easy for an unscrupulous
lord to use the opportunity to plunge his sword into the bishops heart.
  But everything progressed with perfect correctness. When the last lord
had returned to his place, and I was starting to wonder if we might still
escape without a magical attack, Joachim rose and stepped forward.
  He was now only a few feet away and I was sure he saw me, though he
gave no sign of recognition. Instead he raised his arms to bless the
congregation.
  But I did not hear his words. I stared instead at the sleeve of his robe.
   It was a brand-new robe, clearly made just for him since he was taller
than any of the other priests. Worked across the bottom of the scarlet
sleeve were intertwined roses and crosses. They were done in a distinctive
stitch, where the embroidery thread crossed three threads, slapped one,
and crossed two more. That was Theodora s embroidery.
  Theodora was alive and free in the city.


                                     III
   We poured out of the cathedral into the noon sunshine. "A fine
ceremony, a solemn ceremony," said the young chaplain of Yurt as though
he had been personally responsible. "He's a fairly young man to be elected
bishop; we may not see very many more Episcopal elections in this city in
our lifetimes."
 "Have you invited him to my coming of age ceremony?" Paul asked his
mother.
  "He'd accepted when he was still dean," she said, "but he may not now
be able to get away from his new duties."
  "'Were you surprised he was chosen?"
  "He was an excellent chaplain," said the queen with a smile. "You would
not even have been born if he hadn't saved your father's life. I think he'll be
an excellent bishop."
 I hardly listened to their conversation. I scanned the skies for some new
monster and the crowd for Theodora, seeing neither.
  Several minutes passed, and nothing happened. Might the wizard be
saving his next attack for Paul's coronation? The duchess and her tall
husband, Prince Ascelin, came over to talk to us. "I haven't seen the royal
family of Caelrhon in months," Ascelin said with an almost shamefaced
grin and a glance in their direction. "I wonder if Prince Lucas is still not
talking to me."
  "But what's the problem?" asked the queen, concerned.
   "We were here in Caelrhon this spring at the same time as he was.
Lucas was talking about his wife-- justifiably, I'm sure!--about all her
beauty, skills, and accomplishments. Not to be outdone, of course, I
started talking about the duchess," with an affectionate glance toward his
wife. "I told him there was no one in the twin kingdoms, man or woman,
who could compare to her in riding or hunting."
   I paused in scanning the sky to feel briefly sorry for Lucas. When he was
already feeling royal power diminished, it must have been bitter to hear
himself compared unfavorably to a duchess.
   "He seems to have taken it as an insult to the crown princess," Ascelin
continued, a smile crinkling the tanned skin by his eyes. "He challenged
me to a sword fight-- a bad idea, since I would have disarmed him
immediately. Fortunately his wizard stopped the fight before it even
started: paralyzed him where he stood and took the sword from his hands.
Lucas transferred all his fury from me to his Royal Wizard, and I was able
to escape, calling apologies over my shoulder, while the prince was
starting to tear into his wizard for lack of respect."
  I didn't wait to hear any more. "Excuse me," I said to the queen. "I'll see
you at the castle a little later." To the young chaplain I added, "I hope
Joachim outlives you." And I hurried away.
   Cutting around the cathedral's hill, I headed for the artisans' area to the
east, the area where Theodora lived. I kept passing groups of townspeople,
all in their Sunday finery, talking about the election. Normally I would
have been interested in their reaction to their new bishop, but now I
brushed past.
   At the foot of Theodora's street I paused. I could see her door and the
upstairs window. It looked dark. A black and white shape darted in front
of me: Theodora's cat. I bent down, made clicking noises, and held out one
hand. The cat hesitated, then recognized me and came to rub against my
hand. It, at least, was happy to see me.
   After a minute's petting, the cat turned and trotted purposefully up the
street. At its door, it sat down and began to meow. I came up quietly
behind it. The door opened. "All right, kitty, come on in."
  The cat walked in, tail high. I took hold of the door to keep it from
closing and found myself looking at Theodora.
   Before I could think, I had clasped her in my arms and buried my face
in her hair. Not until she pulled back a little, trying to wipe the tears from
my cheek with one hand, did I realize I was crying.
  "Daimbert?"
   "Dear God, Theodora, for the last month I've thought you were dead." I
seized her again as though my embrace would make her immortal.
  "But I'm not dead," she managed to say, with the light, almost teasing
note I knew so well. After envisioning so many horrible things, including
that I had only imagined her existence, the feel of her in my arms was even
better than I remembered.
   "Or I thought you'd been captured by the wizard-- or, or had even
joined him."
  "What wizard?"
   We were standing just inside her half-open door. I released her enough
to be able to see her face in the light from the street. "I have two very
important questions for you. First, will you marry me?"
  "I told you before," she said with a half smile, "a witch needs time to
consider."
  And a month had apparently not been long enough.
  I knew the answer with the certainty of a blow to the stomach.
   But I still managed to bring out my second question. "Last month there
was a powerful wizard in the city, someone you could sense but I couldn't.
Is he here now?"
  She turned her head away, slipping for a moment into her own magic.
Then her amethyst eyes met mine. "No. If he's here, he's shielding his
mind as effectively from mine as he is from yours."
   So perhaps I need not fear an immediate attack. Looking at Theodora it
was almost impossible to imagine her working with an evil renegade. I
dismissed him from my thoughts. "If you don't want to marry me, would
you consider living with me, even for a little while?"
  She smiled. "I suspect this conversation may take a while. If we talk
here, we may be interrupted. How about if we go to the grove outside of
town?"
  I was naturally intrigued by this suggestion, even though I realized she
had not answered my question. I rubbed my eyes with my fists, and
Theodora got her key to close the door behind us. As she stepped into the
street, I noticed for the first time that she wore a black and gold dress
with a bright red apron and shawl.
  "You were at the new bishop's enthronement," I said with sudden
comprehension, "sitting with the Romneys."
  She gave me a sideways smile. "I saw you with your royal court, but I
was fairly sure you didn't recognize me. I was wearing a head-scarf, too. I
thought the pew with the Romneys an appropriate place for a witch. Was
that extremely good-looking young man your Prince Paul?"
  I nodded and reminded myself not to be jealous. Whatever reason she
had for not wanting to marry me had nothing to do with Paul.
   She tucked her arm through mine as we walked, one more couple out
for a stroll on a fine afternoon after the Episcopal election. Her earrings
moved in and out from behind her hair in the charming way I
remembered. "Isn't the new bishop your friend the dean?"
  "That's right."
   "He looks very intense," she said, "as though he doesn't worry about the
things that worry ordinary people, but always tries to look through to
spiritual issues." I nodded again; it seemed a good assessment "But tell
me--does he ever smile?"
  "He's been known to," I said, smiling myself. "But not often. He'll be an
excellent bishop, but I'm afraid some of the young priests will find him
hard on them."
  "You've been away for weeks," she said. "Where have you been?"
   It occurred to me only then that she might have been as worried about
me as I was about her. "And where do you think I've been?" I said
teasingly, using her trick of answering a question with another question.
   "I knew you defeated the monster that appeared right after the old
bishop's funeral," she said. "Everybody in the city was talking about it."
Maybe I wasn't being blamed for as much as I'd thought. "But the rumor
was that something was still wrong, or the monster wasn't fully defeated,
and you had to go thousands of miles to find out where it had come from."
   "Close enough," I said. "I've been up at the border of the northern land
of wild magic." The borderlands seemed much less interesting at the
moment than the shape of her mouth, the way she held her head, and the
color of her eyes. 'The fanged gorges, the monster, came from there, and I
had to take it back to destroy it"
  Somehow she had me talking easily again, as I had always talked with
her. While we walked through the city, out the gates, and past all the
crowds and the tents and the Romney caravans toward the little grove a
mile away, I gave her a quick overview of our adventures. The grass that
had been long and green when we last walked here together had been
browned by the summer's sun and trampled by many feet.
   She was, as I had expected, fascinated by my account of the valley
where everyone lived in houses built into the cliff. She was also very
interested in the nixie's barrier that specifically would not let humans
pass. It was good to talk about magic with someone who understood it,
and who I did not feel was in competition with me.
  "So what would you have done," she asked with a laugh, "if your prince
hadn't been able to attract those horses? Would you have given in to the
nixie's charms at last?"
  I didn't reply--in part because I did not know the answer. We had
reached the edge of the woods, and I prepared to fly both of us up and over
the blackberry tangles.
 But she forestalled me. "I've been practicing while you've been gone.
Watch!"
   Slowly and deliberately, her lips moving silently, she rose into the air on
her own magic, went over the tops of the brambles, and disappeared from
view, a delighted grin on her face. From the thump and the sudden laugh
on the far side I knew she'd come down faster than she intended.
  I followed her, landing more gracefully, and we walked together to the
center of the grove where the spring still played and the emerald grass
grew long. The air was still permeated with unfocused magic, but not
nearly as strongly as I had remembered.
  "Let's sit down," she said in a different voice than she normally used. "I
want to tell you something." She sounded as sober as Joachim.
  I had been about to take her in my arms but hesitated. We sat down
next to each other, not touching. "What is it?"
  "I am going to bear a child."
   There was a long pause. I put a hand over my eyes and called myself all
the insulting names young wizards use for each other; the list was fairly
long. A second-year wizardry student would have known better. But when
I took my hand down I still had to ask, "And--it's mine?" "Yes," said
Theodora, less soberly, "yours-- She'll be yours and mine."
  "It will be a girl? You're sure?" A small smile had again reached the
edges of her lips. "Of course I'm sure. After all, I'm a witch."
   This certainly ended the vague plans I realized I had been making about
somehow having both her and my position in Yurt. Whatever
institutionalized wizardry tolerated in its wizards, it was not being the
fathers of families. "Theodora, you know I want to marry you. I'll be happy
to live wherever you like."
   The smile was gone again, and she took my hand. "But I never intended
to marry you."


  Christ, this was bad. I had thought my self-esteem had suffered so many
blows over the years that I was fairly immune, but I had been mistaken. I
had never loved the queen as much as I loved this woman.
   "Theodora, I--" I tried to find some way to phrase it delicately so it
would not be an insult, and ended up not finding any and saying it baldly.
"So you made me fall in love with you deliberately, not interested in me at
all, only--only using me the way the nixie wanted to use us!"
  "Daimbert, it wasn't like that," she said mildly.
  But now that I had started I couldn't stop, "Once you had what you
wanted, you didn't need me and didn't care to see me again." I had
jumped up and was pacing back and forth while she sat quietly, listening.
"You managed to hide from me with your damned ring of invisibility, and
when I left the city you were delighted, hoping I wouldn't come back. If
you hadn't opened the door for your cat without taking the precaution of
peeking out first, I never would have found you."
  "I'd always hoped to see you again."
  But I wasn't going to be interrupted. "Of course you didn't tell me, then,
that you didn't love me. You had to be sure you were pregnant first,
because if you weren't you needed to lure me back for one more try."
   I threw myself on the grass, my back to her. In a moment I felt a hand
stroking my hair. As she'd stroke her cat, I thought bitterly.
  "Daimbert, I do love you."
  "Odd that you never mentioned it before," I said, but less bitterly.
  There was a catch in her voice that, in a moment, made me sit up and
turn around to look at her. Her cheeks streamed with tears. To my
questioning look she said at last, "I feel so bad to have hurt you!"
  I turned away again. This wasn't helping. The women I loved could
never love me. All I could do was to make them cry when they realized how
deeply I was wounded.
   There was another long pause, then she began tugging at my shoulders.
I allowed her to pull my head into her lap, where she continued stroking
my hair, but I kept my eyes shut against her.
  "Let me tell you how it appeared from my side," she said at last, her
voice somewhat calmer. "I wanted to meet you from the first time I sensed
your mind here in the city. And before you say anything, let me make clear
that I was not planning from the beginning to seduce you. I just wanted to
get to know a wizard."
  "You were already friends with the old magician, and if you'd wanted
you could have met the Royal Wizard of Caelrhon any time before his
death."
   "I told you, Daimbert, you aren't like other wizards. Old Sengrim would
have had nothing to offer me--if he'd even cared to get to know me. I knew
at once that you were the only one I'd ever come across who might be at all
interested in teaching a witch his magic." "Magic first, children second," I
mumbled. "And once I met you," she persisted, "I realized that I could
gain from you far more than I'd hoped. And not what you're about to say!
What I gained from you was friendship."
   "Friendship," I repeated. It seemed a weak enough word "You're the
only person I've been able to talk to about magic since my mother died.
You were even interested in learning my magic, which I won't teach
anyone again until our daughter is old enough to understand. And you're
funny, and affectionate, and enthusiastic, and treated my ideas with
interest and respect. Is it any wonder I fell in love with you?"
  "Odd you never mentioned it before," I said for the second time,
  "That's because I was hoping you weren't in love with me," she
answered. "I knew you were Royal Wizard of Yurt, and I knew wizards
don't marry. If I made it clear how strongly I felt about you, you would feel
compelled to resign your position, and I also knew the conflict would
destroy you emotionally."
  "As opposed to feeling like this," I said with intentional sarcasm. But I
did open one eye for a quick glance at her face. She wasn't crying anymore
but looked down at me affectionately. I closed the eye again.
  "Your stay here, I knew," she continued, "would not last long. You'd
been Royal Wizard for years, but you'd only known me a short time. Before
many more weeks had passed, I realized, you'd solve the cathedral's
problems and go home to Yurt. I'd always hoped to have a daughter, and I
knew I couldn't find anyone better to be the father."
  'Then having gotten what you wanted from me, why did you hide?"
  "Because you asked me to marry you." "And you certainly didn't want to
do that"
  "No," she said, very quietly, "because I did. If you had asked me again I
probably would have agreed."
   "And would you agree now?" I asked, sitting up and compelling her eyes
to meet mine.
  But she shook her head. "I've had a month to strengthen my resolve.
Please forgive me."
   I could manage no better answer than a snort. "I'd hoped you'd forget
me. Well, no, not hoped. I always wanted to see you again, and I certainly
had to tell you about our daughter. But when you left the city so abruptly,
I anticipated that by the time you came back and went home to Yurt you
would be ready to put the whole interlude behind you. I did hope that you
would at least think of me warmly sometimes."
  "But I already told you I resigned as Royal Wizard!"
  "And had your resignation refused. I saw you sitting with your royal
court this morning."
  She had me there. "Then I'll just resign again."
   But she could be as stubborn as I. "No. Now listen to me. I've had plenty
of time to think about this. You've been involved in wizardry your entire
adult life. It's as much a part of you as your bones and skin. You're also a
very good wizard, and you're respected at the school. You couldn't give up
magic, and you also could not be satisfied doing odd tricks at fairs. I know
you. I've heard you make disparaging remarks about magicians having to
make their livings from pathetic scraps of magic, spells done for no better
purpose than the entertainment of the ignorant. You'd do your best to
hide it from me, because you are very affectionate, but there would always
be a gap in your life."
  It would have been easier to argue with her if she hadn't been right "But
there will always be a gap without you!"
   She ignored the interruption and pushed on. "And I thought about
myself. I've lived on my own for ten years and come to value my privacy.
It's been a good ten years. I have my embroidery and my magic and my
climbing-- though I won't be doing any of that for the next year or so--and
soon will have our daughter."
  I thought glumly that it was a sign of how much she valued her privacy
that we were having this conversation here in the grove, not in her house.
   "The cathedral probably won't give me any more needlework once they
decide I'm a loose woman, but I'll still make a good living; I'll be able to
live for months on what the priests paid me these last few weeks."
  "So you don't want anyone else disturbing your life."
   "That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying I wouldn't make a very
satisfactory wife to a wandering magic-worker. No matter how much I
loved you, I'd miss my independence, and I'm afraid I'd take it out on you.
No, I think I'm the kind of person who is much better for short visits than
for a permanent stay."
  There didn't seem to be any way to answer this, even though I knew she
was wrong. Theodora would be highly satisfactory for a permanent stay.
But I considered for a moment what she'd just said. "Then you wouldn't
mind if I visited you sometimes?"
  I would want you to visit as often as you could. You realize, Daimbert,
there wasn't anyone before you, and there won't be anyone after you."
   She smiled, for the first time in a long time. I seemed to have agreed to
an arrangement that in fact I still refused to accept. But I was tired of
arguing, and she had said, undeniably, that she loved me-- "Is it all right if
I kiss you?" The smile widened "I'd been hoping you'd suggest that."
  The sun was low as I walked through the narrow city streets to the
castle. I wondered vaguely if I was too late to get anything to eat.
  Paul met me in the courtyard. "There you are. We wondered where
you'd gone. You have a dinner invitation."
  "A dinner invitation." This didn't make any sense.
  "A priest came by from the Episcopal palace an hour ago. The bishop
wants you to dine with him."
  The bishop?" I repeated stupidly.
  Paul laughed. "I thought you'd be flattered by the honor! There can't be
many wizards asked to dine by bishops the very evening of their
enthronements."
  I managed to pull myself together. "Oh. Yes. The bishop. This will be a
good time to warn him."
  All summer I had known that if Joachim became bishop our long
evening conversations would be over for good. But now he was bishop, and
he still seemed willing to talk to me. I should have been delighted but felt
no emotion at all. Besides, it would all be different.
  "I've got something else to tell you," said Paul, somewhat sheepishly. "I
know you didn't want me to ride Bonfire. But I did anyway. I can't believe
Vincent meant him as a trap, and, besides, I couldn't help myself. Was
there ever something you wanted to do so badly you didn't care about the
consequences?"
  I nodded without speaking.
  "Bonfire really is as gentle as a kitten, and can he run! He's even faster
than those horses in the borderlands."
  "All right, then, but be careful," I said inadequately. I hurried inside to
scrub my face and to brush the bits of grass out of my hair and beard.
   As I walked toward the cathedral a few minutes later, I tried to recall all
the concerns I had about a forthcoming attack from an evil wizard. I had
feared no one in the Church would be willing to listen, but if Joachim had
invited me to dinner he would certainly let me speak.
   A young and rather nervous acolyte met me at the palace door, but
inside I was pleased to see Joachim's silent servant, apparently forgiven
for his complicity in
  Norbert's plot He nodded gravely and motioned me toward the study.
  "Uh, Your Holiness--" I began awkwardly, dipping my head and
wondering if Joachim expected me to kneel.
   The bishop had been reading his Bible, but he immediately rose to greet
me, taking both my arms in his strong grip. "I am glad you were willing to
come," he said with a smile, a genuine smile such as I had not seen on his
face very often. "I had been afraid you would refuse. You have been out all
afternoon, I understand? You must be starving. Come into the dining
room, and we can eat at once." He wore his ordinary black vestments
again rather than the scarlet robes of this morning, although the ruby ring
was still on his finger. He looked more comfortable and relaxed than I
could remember seeing him for a long time. "And don't call me Your
Holiness, Daimbert, unless you expect me to start calling you Your
Wizardliness!"
  The candles were lit, and the bishop's servant brought the soup, I sat
down in something of a fog, but as soon as we started to eat I realized that
he was right I was starving.
   "I want to thank you, and I want to apologize," said Joachim. "You
removed the magical danger to the cathedral, at much greater personal
risk than I had anticipated--although I should have known better. When I
got your telephone message last week I drew a relaxed breath for the first
time this summer."
   I had to warn him that the magical danger was not all gone, but he was
still talking.
   "And all the time that you were marshaling your forces against the
monster, I selfishly ignored you. I was so caught up in my own concerns,
worrying about the bishop, worrying about whether I would be elected
myself, that I paid no attention to you. But now the bishop is safely in
Abraham's bosom, and I have been elected to succeed him, for good or ill.
I think all the members of the cathedral chapter had a serious lapse of
judgment, but, with the help of God I will at least not lead my flock into
evil."
   "As you know," I said, "I'd always thought you'd be a good bishop. And,
do you remember?" with a fair approximation of a smile. "I promised you
two things if you were elected. I said that I'd go to the land of wild magic,
and I've done so--or at least to the borderlands, which were wild enough
for me. And I promised that I'd try to work with you, to find ways that
wizards and priests could stop distrusting each other."
  This might be hard, I realized, since the first thing I was going to tell
him was that there was an evil wizard loose in the twin kingdoms. But the
servant came back before I could say anything more, to take away our
soup bowls and serve the lamb and carrots.
  "Put the cheese and fruit on the side table," said Joachim, "along with
the rest of the wine. We can serve ourselves."
  The servant closed the door behind him as he left. Joachim turned his
enormous dark eyes on me. "Now I'd like you to tell me what's really
bothering you."
   "I'm afraid a wizard I haven't been able to find is plotting some massive
attack," I said. "It was he who called the gorges, and I can't even imagine
what he's planning next."
  Joachim had put down his fork and was watching my face.
   "I don't know where he is now. I came back from the borderlands as fast
as I could because I was terrified he might try to attack the cathedral at
your election the way he did at the old bishop's funeral. Nothing
happened, and I can find no sign of wild magic in the city, but that may
only mean he hasn't been able to get a new monster from the north--yet.
And I doubt I'll be able to get any support from the wizards' school."
  The bishop nodded gravely, still watching me. "But you don't sound as
though you anticipate a magical attack tonight"
  "No, or at least I hope not."
   "Good. Then you can tell me all about it a little later." He took a few
bites, then looked at me again. "Right now you can tell me what's
happened to you, you personally, these last few months. Because
something has happened which has affected you even more profoundly
than your fight with the monster."
   I forced myself to adopt a light tone. "What makes you think something
out of the ordinary has happened to me, besides of course nearly being
killed by a gorgors?"
   This was far too flimsy for him. "As I told you once before, I know you
better than you think I do. You put me off then, but I can't bear to see you
like this any longer. Something terrible has wrenched your soul, and if I'm
supposed to guide the souls of this diocese I can't leave my oldest friend to
suffer unaided."
   I tried not to meet his eyes. "You don't need to hear all this. Half of it
you wouldn't understand, and the other half you'd just say I was receiving
a sinner's just reward."
  "And are you?"
  I looked up in spite of myself. "Joachim, I don't even know anymore."
  "Then why not try to tell me?"
  I took another bite of lamb--it really was very good-- then pushed my
plate away. "This may take a while."
  "We have a while."
   I took a deep breath. "It starts back when I first came to Yurt. I've tried
to tell you this several times, but you never seemed to understand. Until
this summer, I've always been in love with the queen."
  I knocked on Theodora's door just before dawn. "Theodora. It's me."
  She opened the door looking extremely charming in a white nightgown,
her hair tousled and her cheek still bearing a crease from the pillow.
"What is it?"
  "I've come to invite you to Prince Paul's coming of age ceremony."
  "But--" I gave her a good-morning kiss while she tried to object. "They
won't want me there--they don't even know me. And Daimbert!" with an
exasperated laugh. "What will the neighbors think if they see me standing
here in my nightgown, kissing someone at this hour of the morning?"
  Then I'll come inside," I said cheerfully, closing the door behind me. The
cat rose from the hearth, stretching itself to twice its normal length and
yawning widely. "I hope you realize the neighbors will start thinking all
sorts of things in a few months anyway. But don't worry about the
cathedral. They won't think of you as a loose woman, but more as a
woman who has been sinned against, so you'll continue to get
commissions from the priests."
  She rubbed her eyes and sat down, pulling a shawl across her shoulders.
"What's happened to you? You look almost feverish. Did you even go to
bed last night?"
  "No," sitting down beside her. "I've been talking to the bishop."
  "The bishop! You've been telling him about me--"
   I smiled at her concern. "I certainly told the bishop the most important
details, such as that you are the most wonderful woman in the world, and
I love you. I didn't tell him you're a witch--the Church has long experience
in dealing with sin, but even Joachim has always had trouble with magic."
  "So you let the bishop condemn you as a sinner?"
  "Joachim thinks of everyone as a sinner, starting with himself. He's
never held it against anyone."
   She started to look amused in spite of herself. I put my arm around her.
"If it's any comfort," I said, "he thinks you're right, that I belong in Yurt
and you here. Both of you are wrong, of course."
  "Then why do you seem so happy this morning?"
   "Maybe the Church has a point, that confession is good for the soul. But
I think the real reason is my relief that I'll finally be able to find the
renegade wizard; Joachim has a plan to draw him out of hiding."
  "What's his plan?"
  Looking into her intelligent amethyst eyes, I realized that Joachim had
actually been quite vague about his precise intentions. Last night, after he
had listened to my long, disjointed story about the queen and Theodora,
once I finally told him my suspicions of a renegade, he had said with calm
assurance that locating him would not be a problem. At that point,
emotionally drained, I had been glad to believe whatever he told me.
   "It involves Paul's coming of age ceremony," I said, feeling light-headed.
I knew I remembered the bishop saying that. Did the plan also involve
Norbert? No, I was quite sure it didn't, although I had confessed my
involvement in that to Joachim along with everything else. He had placidly
refused to attribute any worse motives to the cathedral cantor than
misplaced distrust of magic and a rather sad and petty jealousy, though
he said he expected that the wizard who had sold Norbert the book, the
wizard who had fostered his jealous plot, was still here in the city.
  The only problem with the bishop's plan," I extemporized when
Theodora seemed to be expecting more, "is that it depends on me being as
good a wizard as Joachim thinks I am, which is better than I think I am.
That's why I need you to help me at Paul's coronation. I'm a member of
the royal court of Yurt and can invite anyone I please."
  "But I can't-- How would I--"
   "You're going with the Episcopal party," I said. "It's all arranged. The
bishop will provide a horse for you. And be sure to attend morning service
at the cathedral, an hour from now. Joachim will be giving his inaugural
sermon, and it's going to be highly interesting."
  "If there's a dangerous renegade wizard loose," she asked, "shouldn't
your school be able to help?"
  That's one of the wizards best ploys. By having his gorges appear on the
new cathedral tower originally, he's made it appear this is something in
which the school should be reluctant to be involved. By waiting until the
Royal Wizard of Caelrhon had died, he hoped there would be no one here
with the magic to oppose him."
  I kissed Theodora and stood up to go. "The queen and prince are riding
back to Yurt this afternoon. I need to go with them."
  A smile she tried to suppress twitched the corners of her mouth. "It's
odd that you never told me your queen was so lovely."
  I sat down again. "Theodora, you have to understand that--"
  She gave up trying to hide her smile. "Of course I knew there was a
queen of Yurt, even though you never mentioned her. And I'd seen her
several times over the years, and I'd certainly noticed she was very
beautiful. That's why, when you very carefully never referred to her, I knew
there was a reason."
  ""But there's never been any--" I protested.
   "I knew that all along." She smiled at me, amethyst eyes dancing.
"When the king of Yurt was still alive and they came here together, she
and he were inseparable. Now that she's been a widow for several years
she might be willing to start looking at other men, but she'd be looking for
a prince or another king, not a wizard. This was all clear to me, but I could
never be sure if it was clear to you."
  If I had spoken to Theodora several months ago, I might have saved
myself a lot of anguish. But then I hadn't known her several months
ago--and might never have if it weren't for that anguish.
   "It put me in a difficult position," she continued thoughtfully, "because
I didn't know if you loved the queen while knowing it was hopeless, or if
you'd deluded yourself that you might someday have a chance with her. I
would hate to see you deluded, but on the other hand, once I found myself
falling in love with you, it made it easier if I could reassure myself that
your real affections were already engaged elsewhere."
  There didn't seem to be any way to answer this.
  "What I am truly sorry about, Daimbert," she added, "is that I never
realized, not until I saw you sitting with your royal court yesterday, that
you'd discovered for yourself that your love was hopeless. For a witch, it's
embarrassing to have to admit I overlooked something that evident."
   "You mean-- It's so obvious that I had loved her but she could never
love me that someone could spot it across a crowded church?"
  She gave me an amused look. "Remember that witches understand all
sorts of hidden feelings that ordinary mortals--and even wizards--can't
know. Besides, I know you better than anyone else does."
  Enough people seemed to know me better than I thought they did that
soon I wouldn't be able to have any secrets at all. "But if you knew all this
yesterday-- you didn't say anything about the queen then!"
  "Of course not. You were too upset already. But I don't know," she
continued, "exactly what happened between you and your queen to make
you realize your love for her was hopeless."
  I looked away as I answered. "I asked her to marry me."
   She made a small incoherent sound. "I'm sorry, Daimbert," she said
after a moment "No one should be refused twice in one summer."
  I thought of telling her she could solve that problem for me but knew
better. "And I don't love the queen. I never really loved her. I only love
you."
   She laughed and pushed me away. "Of course you love your queen. You
have for nearly twenty years. Now hurry back to the castle and get ready
for church service."
  But she was wrong, I told myself. I didn't love the queen.
   A few left but almost everyone else returned for the bishop s inaugural
sermon.
   After changing my clothes and drinking several cups of strong tea back
at the castle, I felt almost coherent again. Among the people coming in
was a woman dressed in an elegant dress of dark lilac silk. A few strands of
nut-brown hair emerged from under a chaste white wimple. I slipped into
the pew next to her. "You look like a castellan's lady, if not a princess," I
whispered with a smile. "I scarcely recognized you as my beloved
embroideress."
  The dark lilac of the dress brought out the color of her eyes, even in the
dimness of the cathedral's interior. "Of course," she replied. "It's not for
nothing that I make my living by sewing. If I'm really going to go to your
prince's coronation, I have to look suitably regal. What will happen here?"
   "You'll see," I said, wondering myself. "Joachim's not just the new
bishop; in some ways he's now the most powerful person in two
kingdoms."
  The organ's tune changed to a deep and solemn processional march,
and the cathedral priests filed in, sober in black and white, led by their
new dean. When they had assembled around the altar, Joachim appeared,
walking by himself across the mosaic Tree of Life.
   As he took his place at the lectern in front, resplendent in the scarlet
robes that Theodora had embroidered for him, he appeared almost
cheerful. No one who did not know him as well as I did would have
noticed, for his lips did not smile, and his dark eyes were as unwavering
and compelling as always. But his voice, as he read from the Bible and
then proceeded to speak of the love and brotherhood that should bind
mankind together under God, had none of the anguish in it I had heard so
clearly at the old bishop's funeral. Rather, he spoke with both assurance
and humility.
   "As this is my inaugural sermon," he said, putting down his Bible, "I
would like to address to you, my people, a special request." This, I thought,
was where his plan began. I remembered clearly now: he had said he
would lure the wizard out of hiding through an idea planted in his first
sermon.
  But Joachim's next words were entirely unexpected. "For too long there
has been at best an uneasy truce, if not indeed outright enmity, between
the Church and organized wizardry. While I am bishop of the kingdoms of
Yurt and Caelrhon, I would like to see this stop."
  Theodora looked at me from under raised brows, and I thought I heard
an uneasy shuffling from where the cathedral priests were sitting.
  There has been talk, groundless talk, of the wizards' school seeking to
infiltrate all aspects of life in the western kingdoms, of abrogating the
authority of lords and even of kings." I gave the royal princes of Caelrhon a
quick glance to see how they were taking it. It was their turn to shift
uncomfortably in the pew.
   "This talk was started by someone who is an enemy of the people of our
two kingdoms! Unfortunately it has been picked up, both by some laymen
who may be in the congregation today and by some officers within the
Church. As of today, I want this foolishness to cease." Joachim looked at
all of us with burning eyes, and his voice rose clear in the silent cathedral.
"Priests and wizards need to work together, beginning at once."
   This was starting to sound dangerously like heresy to me. I wondered
what the bishop of the great City would say when he heard about it;
relations between his cathedral and the nearby wizards' school had always
been strained. I had been hoping Joachim would be bishop for forty more
years; at this rate, he might not last forty more days.
  "These rumors against wizards were started as a smokescreen,"
Joachim continued, "to try to force a wedge between institutionalized
wizardry and organized religion, between the wizards and the people they
serve with their magic." I did my best not to look like a wizard. "Once this
wedge was in place, the enemy of all our people, inspired by the devil, was
planning to attack the Church! He thought he could do so safely, because
the powers of magic, that otherwise would have come forward to serve
Christianity, would already have been driven away. The ultimate attack on
the Church is still to come."
  There was no doubt that Joachim had his audience's entire attention. "I
do not know for certain when this attack will arrive but it will be soon.
Therefore we must be ready, all of us, churchmen, wizards, lords, and
townspeople, to oppose it together. I have already spoken to the Royal
Wizard of Yurt, who has pledged his support" He caught my eye for one
second "But I also have a task for the dukes and counts and for the
castellans and manorial lords who are here.
   "Yesterday, on the day that I was elected, you all laid your swords on the
altar in symbol of your pledged service to the Church. I ask you now to
fulfill that pledge! Next week I must be away from the city for a few days,
to attend the coming of age of the young king of Yurt. The royal family of
Caelrhon will also be there. I now fear that someone will take advantage of
our absence to stage an assault on this church. You will all remember with
horror the outrageous attack at the time of the old bishop's funeral, when
one brave wizard was able to save us." He did not try to catch my eye this
time, which was just as well. "This time the attack may be even worse, and
that wizard will be in Yurt, with me, and unable to come to the rescue.
   "Therefore! I want all of you to be ready, priests with your prayers,
magicians with your spells, and the lords of men with your swords. I do
not know if there will be another monster as we had before, or even a flock
of monsters. But with the help of God, the attack will be averted."
   He stepped then from behind the lectern to bless the congregation, as
calmly as though he had not just offered the olive branch of peace to
institutionalized wizardry. As the congregation rose, rather shakily, for the
final hymn, I thought he had managed well something I had had trouble
with myself, even in talking to him: he had issued a warning against a
magical attack without warning against magic.
  He disappeared out the side door of the church as the organ notes died
away, and the congregation, buzzing with rapid conversation, poured out
the great front doors into the muddle of the construction site. Now that I
had heard his plan, I did not like it at all. I found myself glancing up at the
sky as Theodora and I passed through the doors and wondered if I would
ever again be able to come out of an important service in- the cathedral
without looking for monsters.
   "You told me the bishop's first sermon would be highly interesting,"
said Theodora, looking at me as though not sure whether to smile, "and
you were certainly right. He spoke as though--as though he didn't care
what anyone would think, either the people here or the rest of the
Church."
  I shook my head. "I don't think he does," I answered absently. "He
answers to God and to his conscience, and it may not even occur to him
that most people also answer to the opinions of others." I took a deep
breath. "Come with me," I said. "I have to talk to him."



                           PART EIGHT


                          Coming of Age

  The narrow street behind the cathedral was full of priests. They looked
up in surprise as we approached, then resumed their conversations behind
us. I tried to decide if they were making negative comments about
Joachim; but as far as I could tell they were wondering what they could do
to keep his respect.
   When I knocked at the Episcopal palace, the acolyte who answered first
tried to make us go away, saying the bishop was busy and that we should
present ourselves and whatever business we had to the priest who would
be on duty at the cathedral office in mid afternoon. When I showed no
signs of leaving, he gestured to someone I could not see for
reinforcements.
  But then I heard Joachim's voice from within. "Is that the wizard? Send
him in, and bring more tea."
  The acolyte fell back, defeated, and Joachim's silent servant led us into
the dining room. The bishop, still dressed in scarlet, sat at breakfast.
   He rose and came forward to greet us. Theodora, abashed, knelt to kiss
his ring. As she rose again, he took her by the shoulders and looked at her
face. 'Theodora," he said. "I am delighted to meet you properly at last. I've
seen you often before, of course, but I never knew your name. Isn't this
your embroidery on my sleeves?"
   I hoped that Theodora realized that Joachim never said that he was
delighted to meet someone unless he meant it He brought up chairs for us,
dismissed the servants, and poured us tea.
  "Is that what you had in mind," he asked me, spreading jam on his
toast, "when you said you wanted priests and wizards to stop distrusting
each other?" He spoke soberly, but something about the angle of his
eyebrows made me think he was enjoying himself.
  "I hope you understand what you've just done," I said darkly. "Talking
about how the city of Caelrhon needed to be defended didn't fool anybody.
You dared the renegade wizard to attack you next week in Yurt, using
yourself as bait to draw him out!" This was, after all, Joachim's own plan,
and I knew he would sacrifice himself quite willingly if he thought it
necessary. "And after putting yourself in danger like that, you then
decided to preach on harmony between wizardry and the Church?"
  "If there are important thoughts and attitudes that need to be changed,
one should start changing them at once," he replied calmly.
   "You certainly got the attention of your cathedral priests. They're
standing out in the street wondering what they should now do
differently--even Norbert, I'm sure. With someone else, they might have
balked at the idea of becoming friends with the wizards, but they're too
much in awe of you to do anything but agree."
   "They're not in awe of me," said Joachim casually, and with what I
thought was a thorough lack of insight, "just of the authority of my office."
He started to refill our teacups and looked concerned that mine was still
full, though Theodora had retreated from the conversation by sipping
hers.
   "But how about the other bishops?" I demanded. "They won't be in awe
of your office. Aren't they going to reprimand you for heresy?" At this rate,
I thought, he might not even live long enough to be reprimanded.
   Joachim cocked his head at me as though wondering what I meant. "I
said nothing that could possibly be considered heresy. I only preached the
brotherhood of mankind and told everyone that I wanted unfounded and
untrue rumors to stop." He broke into an unexpected smile. There are
advantages to being in the Church rather than connected to your wizards'
school. We don't have the central organization you do; there isn't a Master
like the Master of your school to whom I have to answer." There was no
doubt about it, he was enjoying himself. "Bishops in council can of course
discipline erring brethren, but no one could possibly call a council against
me for urging priests and wizards to serve God's purpose together."
   Considering how reluctant he had been to be elected bishop, I thought,
he was not at all reluctant to exercise the authority of his position once he
had it. "But how about you?" I persisted. 'You've certainly told me enough
times over the years how inferior magic is to religion."
   He gave me a long look from eyes in which a glint of humor lurked. "It
is, of course," he said. "But I've probably been too dismissive. After all,
even wizards-- strange as this concept may seem to you--are the children
of God."
   I shouldn't waste my time worrying about priests and bishops reacting
to the new bishop of Caelrhon. Joachim as bishop might be hard for me to
deal with. I gave up the effort and laughed. "All right, Joachim. I can tell
your own personal safety is much lower on your list of concerns than it is
on mine. I'll try to protect you. I have to get back to Yurt now, but I'll see
you there very soon.
  "And you'll be riding up with our party, I believe?" Joachim said to
Theodora, who had been too overcome by the honor of drinking tea with
the bishop to say anything. "Good. We shall be able to talk properly then."
He rose. "I do indeed have a lot I need to do, but I have an advantage that
makes many things easier for me now than when I was dean." The glint
was back in his dark eyes. "I have a dean to help me!"
  But before letting us out he rested a hand gravely on Theodora's head.
"Bless you, my daughter," he said, "and the child that you carry."
   "So you did tell him everything," said Theodora. I walked with her
through the city streets to her house. It wasn't exactly an accusation, but
from someone who valued her privacy as much as she did it was also not
an endorsement of my night-long conversation at the bishop s palace.
   "I already told you that," I said. "I had to tell him I was going to be a
father because he wouldn't have let me go until he found out why I was so
upset." Although I had said highly insulting things to her just the day
before, I now felt I had to phrase it diplomatically. "You did rather
manipulate me, you know. But there are all sorts of things the bishop still
doesn't know about you. You can tell him yourself that you're a witch, to
keep him amused during your long ride to Yurt together."
  She looked at me as though wondering if I was serious. "You don't seem
very respectful toward the bishop."
   "Of course not. Even if we're going to start working together now, I'm
afraid my habits of disrespect toward the organized Church are too deeply
ingrained to change."
  She started to smile in spite of herself. "I used to think it was a shame
there weren't more wizards like you. Now I'm beginning to think its just as
well."
  "Many wizards would agree," I replied. "But I must say I find it
disturbing that you're always teasing me but treat Joachim with awe.
After all, we were at Yurt together for years, and we're the same age."
   She shook her head, still smiling. "You two may have once been the
same age, but you've stayed the same while he's twenty years older. And he
isn't royal chaplain of Yurt anymore--he's the bishop."
  As we walked, I kept glancing at her out of the corner of my eye,
wondering if I dared ask her again to marry me. The picture of standing
with her before Joachim to be married was so intensely real that I could
not let myself believe it might never happen. But if I asked her too often it
would become nothing but a joke between us, which she at any rate would
never take seriously.
  The royal party headed back through sunny valleys and hills toward the
royal castle of Yurt. Paul rode his red roan stallion, but he had acceded to
my concerns enough to stay within sight of the rest of us.
   My eyes were starting to feel gritty from lack of sleep, and even though I
knew I would be stiff at the end of the day from jouncing on an old mare, I
still preferred to let her do the work of transporting me home. There was a
spell I could use against fatigue, but I hesitated to use it; after its effect
wore off, I always felt worse than before. I hoped Joachim would be alert
enough to attend to his new duties today. But maybe people with pure
minds needed less sleep.
   At the moment, my thoughts kept me from dozing. I was extremely fond
of the queen, I told myself, as I was of Paul, and for that matter of
everyone else in the court of Yurt. The queen was just as lovely as she had
always been, her nature as spirited and as affectionate. But nineteen years
of daydreams about her seemed gone as though they had never existed.
Even the memory of kissing her in the twilight in the fields outside the
castle seemed so far away that it might have happened to different people.
   Partly my daydreams had been driven out by Theodora's reality, I
reasoned, and partly my unspoken imaginings had been dissipated by
telling Joachim about them. But it made it much easier than I could have
expected to ride next to the queen and to talk to her.
   Now, if it had not been for Theodora, I told myself, I could have
imagined nothing better than continuing as Royal Wizard of Yurt. I
thought I would even have been able to think approvingly of the queen's
marriage to Prince Vincent, if I hadn't been so sure that he was only using
it as an excuse to get into Yurt and seize it for himself. I tried to sound her
out, to see if she might know something that would help me even if she did
not realize she knew it. "Why did you decide to move up your wedding, my
lady?" I asked casually.
   She looked up sharply, the sunlight gleaming in her emerald eyes. In
spite of her easy and natural manner, I thought, she did remember our
last real conversation. But what she saw seemed to reassure her. I wasn't
sure if this meant she too knew me better than I thought she did, or if it
meant she didn't really understand me at all. She answered without
awkwardness or embarrassment. "We just couldn't bear to wait any
longer"
  The sudden constriction of my chest made no sense, I chided myself,
because I was now ready to hear her talk of such things without pain.
   "It seems," she continued, "that all I've done recently is prepare for the
two ceremonies: Paul's coming of age and my own wedding. It would have
been easier, of course," she commented wryly, "if he'd been in Yurt during
the last month. I let him go to the cathedral city for a few days, and next I
know you've kidnapped him!" "I apologize for taking him with me," I said,
thinking that it could not indeed have been easy to make preparations for
a once-in-a-lifetime ceremony when the key person in that ceremony
wasn't even there. "But if it hadn't been for Paul, the rest of us might still
be up in the border of the land of magic."
   She looked thoughtfully toward the red stallion and its rider, running
long loops next to the road while the rest of us proceeded more sedately.
"He tried to downplay it when he told me about it," she said, "but I could
tell that he had been responsible for finding a way for you all to escape. Of
course, I know perfectly well, Wizard," she added generously, "that you
would have come up with something of your own in not much more time."
   "He got to know Prince Lucas much better during the trip, too," I said,
hoping to work the conversation back to Lucas's younger brother Vincent.
"It's good that the two future kings of Yurt and Caelrhon should be
friends."
  "He tended to gloss over the dangers of the trip," said the queen with a
smile, "but I could tell there were at least a few places where you might all
have been killed. That's not the sort of thing a mother likes to hear about,
but, now that it's all over safely, I can reassure myself that maybe he
needed a little real adventure. We've always tried not to spoil him, but
there's no question that he's been somewhat sheltered."
   So far I was no closer to finding out anything about Vincent I could talk
indefinitely to the queen about Paul, even though he would be exasperated
to know we were talking about him like this. But I still needed to know if
she had observed anything about Vincent. "When I came back from the
City and first met the prince, my lady," I began, "there was something
about the way that the two of you treated each other which I can only
characterize as odd,"
  She gave me a surprised look, as well she might, but said nothing.
  "You and he seemed happy to be together," I plunged ahead, "but I had
the strangest feeling that I was watching a play, that you had rehearsed
what you told me about your whirlwind courtship."
   The queen blushed most becomingly and tugged at a loose stitch on one
of her riding gloves. I let the silence stretch out, knowing she would have
to answer eventually.
  Having exhausted the possibilities of her glove, the queen glanced
around to be sure no one else was within hearing distance, cleared her
throat twice, and gave what I had to call a giggle. "I hadn't realized it was
that obvious," she said. "Maybe we were acting in a play, although I hadn't
thought of it that way. But it would have been rather embarrassing to
admit that I had been courting him."
  "You were courting him," I repeated.
  "I wouldn't tell anyone other than you," she said, which I presumed was
meant as a compliment "But this winter, when I realized that my baby boy
was going to be king very soon, and it had been six years since King
Haimeric had died, I decided I would remarry. I was never meant to be a
nun."
  I nodded but did not trust myself to speak.
  "Even you going back to teach at the wizards' school," she continued
without looking at me, "made me realize that the years were passing, and
that if I wanted another husband I should choose him soon. Going over
the possibilities, I quickly picked out Vincent. That's why I invited him to
come stay in Yurt this spring."
  I rode in silence without answering. It all sounded coldhearted and
calculating to me, not at all like the queen.
  "It sounds very coldhearted when I put it like that," she went on, as
though reading my thoughts. "But I wasn't deliberately planning to marry
him, because I didn't know if I would love him. Rather, I thought I would
review my options, to see if I could come to love someone else after the
king."
  She gave me a quick glance, as though wondering if she should
apologize again for never having considered me as a candidate. If so, she
decided against it. "Vincent seemed from the beginning the most likely of
the lords and princes I knew."
  "So he doesn't mind that you picked him out?" I managed to ask.
  "Not at all! He was highly flattered. He was just a little irritated with
me at first for inviting him to Yurt to see if he might be the man I would
want as a husband, and then being so slow to make up my mind. You see,
he'd always been secretly in love with me." She gave a dreamy smile that I
would gladly have missed. "His only problem was his family; he said his
older brother kept suggesting that this might be a chance for Yurt to take
over Caelrhon. Vincent, I'm afraid, has always felt somewhat stifled living
under his brother's shadow. He has no use for politics himself, of course."
  This time she fell into a silence that she seemed to have no intention of
breaking. I did not believe a word of it.
   Or at least I did not believe what she had said about Prince Vincent,
even if she thought it was true herself. Her own motivations, I thought
reluctantly, might make sense. This was, after all, the same woman who
had threatened her parents with becoming a nun many years ago, when
they had tried to marry her to someone she did not like. If the young
chaplain had started pressuring her to join the Nunnery of Yurt, her
immediate reaction would have been to marry again.
  And she had always loved parties and dancing. If nothing else, working
her way through the eligible men in the adjacent kingdoms would have
promised several seasons of festivity.
  She pulled her horse over to the side of the road and called to her son.
"Paul! I think you've tired your horse until mine can match him. I'll race
you to the woods!"
  Watching the two of them gallop ahead--the queen had always been an
excellent horsewoman--I felt a profound if irrational certainty that
Vincent had much more in mind than the kisses of a beautiful woman.
   I came home to Yurt as though I had been gone for years. The trees and
grass around the castle had the rich dark green of late summer. I happily
reshelved the thoroughly battered books of spells that I had taken with me
to the cathedral city, and from there to the borderlands, to Vor's valley
back to the cathedral city, and back home finally. Now that I was
apparently once more Royal Wizard, I thought I might be in control of at
least parts of my life again--except for finding the renegade wizard.
   Activity in the royal castle of Yurt was frantic. The staff were busy
cleaning and airing all the guest rooms, as well as decorating the great
hall; the knights were preparing for a tournament such as had not been
held at Yurt for years; and the cook was constantly getting in and
preparing the food for days of festivities. The queen's parents arrived the
day after we returned, to be there for their grandson's coming of age.
   Trying to stay out of everyone's way, I worked long and late on my
spells, setting up magical protective barriers so that no creature could
land on the walls or the tops of the towers, not even something invisible,
without triggering alarms. But I wished I knew something, anything,
about the wizard who had brought a gorgos to the old bishop's funeral and
might be showing up in Yurt to attack the new one.
  My only possible lead was the cantor Norbert, who had certainly
obtained the old book of spells from a magic-worker, a fairly young,
dark-bearded wizard according to his account to Joachim, a wizard
wearing the same star-studded jacket Vor had described. But it had
always been hard to see the scholarly old priest behind the gorgos, and he
would scarcely have told the bishop all about the wizard from whom he
obtained the book if he was still conspiring with him.
  I took Paul quietly aside to warn him that we might see another
monster at his coronation. He grinned, intrigued by the possibility. When
I asked if he thought we should scale back the festivities, he only laughed.
"We can't very well cancel the ceremonies unless a dragon is actually on
us!"
 "I don't want you out in the open when the wizard brings on his next
monsters."
   "But you wouldn't have me begin my rule as king cowering timidly
inside," replied Paul. "Especially if it comes during the tournament we'll
be ready for it, since all the knights will be in armor. Maybe this time I'll
even get a chance to fight it myself, since you didn't let me last time." At
least he didn't seem bothered that I had not tried to incorporate any of his
and Lucas's elaborate plots into Joachim's plan to lure the renegade
wizard into the open.
  The rest of our guests arrived at Yurt the day before Paul's birthday: the
royal family of Caelrhon, the duchess and the two counts of Yurt with all
their families, and all of Yurt's manorial lords. The stables were packed,
the guest rooms full and overfull; and most of the visiting knights ended
up pitching tents beyond the moat.
  There was a surprise when the royal family of Caelrhon rode up, for the
king was not with them. The queen of Caelrhon was accompanied by her
sons Lucas and Vincent, Lucas's wife and children, and a dozen knights,
but not her husband.
  "He's staying in the cathedral city," Vincent told my queen, holding her
hands and looking at her in adoration. "Father thought he'd better be at
the cathedral to defend it from attack."
   If the king of Caelrhon had passed up Paul's coronation to protect the
bishop's church, I thought, I hoped he would not be too disappointed
when nothing happened-- assuming, of course, that Joachim's plan
worked.
  The bishop's party arrived last of all. It was just growing dark when we
saw a small group of horses, led by a banner with a cross, emerging from
the woods. Fireflies winked in the grass by the road as I went out to meet
them.
   The young chaplain came with me, all aflutter in brand-new vestments.
I wondered how he would hold up during his first spiritual examination by
the new bishop.
   Joachim, Theodora, a young priest, and two knights rode up the last
rise to the castle. Their horses were the only ones to arrive all day without
the tinkling of harness bells. The riders listened while the chaplain rattled
through his speech of welcome, full of phrases from the Bible and
expressions of hope that the bishop would not find this small castle too
unworthy of his attentions. But my attention was distracted. Emerging
from the woods and starting up the brick road toward the castle were
several caravans, lanterns swinging from them as the horses labored in the
final climb.
  "The Romneys," I said out loud, too startled to realize I was interrupting
the chaplain until I had done so.
   That's right," said the priest who had come with the bishop, in tones of
disapproval. "We passed them on the road late this afternoon. They said
they wanted to be here to see the prince crowned."
  This was something I had not counted on. There should be nothing
wrong with the Romneys being here, and yet all my calculations were built
on knowing exactly who was going to be where at all times. I shook my
head at myself. I was already as tense as a bowstring, and some of the
other guests were bound to do something innocent and unimportant that
would throw me into a panic,
  The chaplain had trouble finding the thread of his welcoming speech
again. Joachim thanked him and shook his horse's reins, and his party
moved across the drawbridge into the courtyard. The Romneys pulled
their caravans off the road a little distance short of the tents of the visiting
knights.
   The queen came out to welcome the bishop, both more sincerely and
more simply than the young chaplain had. Paul stood beside her, looking
extremely solemn. He stepped forward as the bishop's horse was led away
to the stables.
   "Holy Father, I have a request to make," he said, speaking rapidly, as
though afraid the bishop would walk away before he could say it. "As you
know, I will be spending tonight, the night before my coronation, in prayer
in the chapel. It is traditional that a priest come to counsel me at some
point, and I would be honored-- very highly honored--if you could do so."
  The young chaplain looked surprised; I expected he had been busily
preparing spiritual counsel himself for the new king.
  "I would be delighted," Joachim said gravely.
  A smile lit up the prince's face. "Wonderful. Come around midnight."
  The queen turned to greet Theodora. The two women looked at each
other for a long moment; Theodora, I expected, wanted a good look at the
other woman who had refused my proposals and the queen wondered who
this young woman could be although she was much too tactful to ask.
   The last available room in the castle, at my request, had been reserved
for Theodora. It was a small room at the top of a flight of stairs, but in the
morning the windows would look into the dawn sky. With the queen's
permission, I had cut some late roses from the king's garden and arranged
them in vases.
  "I wanted to let you know," said Theodora as I set down her bag in the
room, "that the old magician is with the Romneys."
  "The old magician? You mean the man who was so furious that I might
be interfering with his 'making an honest living,' the one to whom you
taught a little fire magic?"
   "That's right. I hadn't seen him since the beginning of the summer,
since even before I met you, but when we caught up to the Romneys he
was riding on one of the caravans."
   I nodded slowly. "I hope the worst he'll do is to make some scandalous
illusions at an inappropriate time in the ceremony, but while I'm waiting
for the renegade wizard this magician's magic may prove distracting."
  "This is the closest I've ever seen your queen," Theodora continued
"Have you told her all about me as well?"
   "Of course not!" I started to protest indignantly, then realized she was
teasing me. "I just told her that you were an important lady from the
cathedral city," I added with dignity, "who I wanted as my special guest."
  "Then you'd better go out with the others," she said with a smile,
"before they all start wondering just how 'special' a guest I am!"
   But she kissed me before I left. As I went back down the stairs, I realized
that in her own way she was as little concerned about public opinion as
Joachim. She would always do exactly what she wanted, rather than what
she thought others would want her to do, but as a single woman, one
without any authority whatsoever, she had to avoid attracting attention to
herself that might keep her from her privacy or what she had been
intending.
  One of the servants found me as I came back out into the courtyard.
There's a phone call for you from the City."
   My heart pounded rapidly as I picked up the receiver and looked at the
face of one of the young wizards of the school. "Zahlfast said that you'd
asked us to call you if there was any unusual activity up in the land of
magic," he said. "I wasn't sure I should call you, since nothing came of it,
but then I decided I'd better."
  "What is it?" I asked impatiently. The wizard who had summoned a
gorgos to the cathedral city would not be casting spells from which
nothing came.
   "We had a call about an hour ago from the wizard who's posted up at
the borderlands. He said a very small dragon had suddenly started south,
but he was able to fly down and get ahead of it and put a magical barrier
in front of it When it bounced off his barrier, the dragon turned around
and went straight back. I wouldn't have bothered you for such a trivial
event, but Zahlfast told me you'd been very insistent"
   I thought rapidly. "Do you know if the school ever got that telephone
fixed?"
   "The telephone? You mean the one up in the borderlands? I didn't think
it was ever broken."
  I took a deep and ragged breath. "Is Zahlfast there?"
  "No, I think he went out to dinner. Shall I have him call you?"
  I hesitated a moment, then shook my head. When I had spoken with
Zahlfast the day before, he had seemed miffed that I was still worrying
myself over what he considered the Church's problems. I was not going to
get any help from him. "Just tell him that phone is broken." I rang off. I
didn't need any more phone calls to tell me what would happen.
  They had put Joachim in his old room off the chapel. He looked up
soberly as I came in. "A monster from the land of magic is heading toward
Yurt," I said without preamble.
  "How close is it?" he asked quietly.
  "Not close, not yet," I said, sitting down. "But if it hasn't left yet, it will
be doing so shortly." I told him quickly about the strange problem with
the wizard's telephone in the northern mountains, the phone which could
make only one call a day.
   "I should have realized then that it had been deliberately broken," I
said. "And I should have insisted that it be fixed. Someone summoned a
dragon earlier today, but without using a particularly powerful spell. The
wizard up there turned it back, but because he then called the wizards'
school to tell them about it, he won't be able to make any other calls for
another twenty-four hours. In that time, anything else could--and surely
will--come over the border, without his being able to give warning."
  "How long will it take the monster to reach us?"
  I noticed that Joachim was gripping his crucifix. That's not going to be
very useful," I said. "I know I've explained this to you before: the forces of
wild magic are not the powers of darkness."
   "And I have explained to you before," he said with a lift of one eyebrow,
"that there is plenty of evil in the world that is not embodied in demons."
   He was right, of course, but this seemed to me a situation where magic
was going to have to be opposed by magic. "It's at least three thousand
miles up to the edge of the land of magic," I said. "It took us a week in the
air cart, although I'm sure a monster could fly far faster than that I
presume it will reach here sometime tomorrow."
   "If it indeed is heading for Yurt," said Joachim, and I knew he was
thinking of his cathedral.
  "You've left your church well protected. Besides the king of Caelrhon
and various knights, you've got Vor and his workmen."
  "We're even better protected here," said Joachim. "You're an excellent
wizard." I didn't have the heart to tell him he was wrong.
  "Well," I said, "we'd been guessing something like this would happen.
Maybe we should just be glad we were right. Do you think we should have
them cancel Paul's coming of age ceremonies?"
   Joachim shook his head. "Your renegade wizard seems to have excellent
information on what's happening in Yurt and Caelrhon. If we hide, he will
too. We have to get him out into the open."
  I stood up. "I'm going back to my room to work on my spells. If you're
working on your prayers this evening, pray for me."
  The castle was up at dawn on a beautiful late summer day. I had only
dozed fitfully after finally putting away my books. I walked out over the
drawbridge for a look at the northern sky.
  The grass was damp with drops of dew glinting in the rising sun. Bird
songs reached me from the meadows and the woods below the hill. The
knights' tents were still quiet, but I saw smoke starting to rise from the
Romneys' camp. The clear sky was absolutely empty, and the fresh air
seemed to promise a morning in which nothing evil could possibly
happen.
   When I walked back inside a few minutes later, the courtyard had
already filled with lords and ladies, dressed in their best finery and talking
excitedly. The frantic preparations the constable and his men had been
making the last few days seemed to pay off. Soon we all found ourselves
eased unobtrusively into rows according to our stations. Gwennie, the
constable's daughter, grown-up and formal in blue and white starched
livery, helped arrange us.
   I caught Theodora's eye and smiled. Regal in lilac silk, she was
attracting both curious and admiring glances.
  A clear passage was left down the center of the courtyard. Talking died
away as two men came out from the great hall, unrolling a long red carpet.
They stretched it out through the gates and over the drawbridge, then
onto the hilltop beyond. The castle's brass choir began to play, clear,
bright notes, a song of triumph and joy.
   And then Paul appeared. He had come down the narrow stairs from the
chapel and through the great hall and now, following the red carpet, he
stepped into the courtyard. He wore blue and white velvet and had a white
velvet cap on his golden hair. He looked straight ahead as he walked. The
brass choir continued to play, but the only other sound was the clinking of
the silver spurs on his heels.
   As he walked out through the gates, the rest of us moved forward to
follow. A clear space had been left on the hilltop, between the drawbridge
and the knights' tents. Here the constable's men had brought the throne
from the great hall. Paul stood beside it, leaning on the arm, looking
toward all of us and not quite seeing us.
  We wizards do not have public ceremonies, coronations or
enthronements, celebrations of critical turning points in one's life. When
our lives changed, as mine irrevocably had, it was due to more private
events.
  The last notes of the processional faded away, then the members of the
brass choir hurried to join the rest of us in a respectful semicircle around
Paul and the queen. The greatest lords, including the royal family of
Caelrhon, were at the front, with the rest of the guests and the royal staff
behind them. The Romneys, I noticed, were standing in front of their
caravans a little way down the hill, watching attentively.
   "My people!" said the queen. Her voice and the calls of birds were the
only sounds. Even the Romney children, clustered around their parents,
were wide-eyed and silent. "For six years I have served as regent of Yurt. It
is now time to turn that rule over to your new king. Prince Paul, my son
and the son of your late King Haimeric, is eighteen today. Today he comes
of age, and today he shall be king!"
   Surreptitiously I again looked toward the north. If my calculations were
right, we might still have a few hours of safety. Joachim stood calmly on
the far side of the crowd, surrounded by the chaplains and priests whom
several of our guests had brought with them.
   "I swear," the queen continued, "that he is King Haimeric's son, born to
be king. You all have grown to know him well, and, I hope, to love him."
The queen, all in red, looked radiant. The golden circle of her crown
glinted in her midnight hair. Most of the guests were looking toward Paul,
but Vincent, I noticed, had his eyes fixed on her. "Do you all agree that he
should be your king, to lead you in war, to lead you in peace, to lead you in
wisdom and judgment?"
  "We agree." "We agree." "We agree." The murmur went quickly through
the crowd. Only the priests said nothing. The Church was not under the
authority of kings, and therefore could not agree or disagree to their
coronations. I wasn't sure of the official status of wizards here, but I
certainly agreed that Paul should be king.
  "Then come forward, Paul, to receive the crown of Yurt!"
   He came slowly forward, pulling off his cap, and went down on one knee
before his mother. The great royal crown of Yurt sat on a stand beside her.
It was plain hammered gold except for the diamond set into the front.
   The queen was speaking again, describing the duties of rule, but I had
trouble concentrating on what she said. The disruption of the telephones, I
thought, might all be a ruse, and whatever was going to attack us might
not now be flying down from the north, but might instead already be here.
   I knew that the gorgos who appeared at the old bishop s funeral had not
just flown south that morning, for it had already been seen earlier. In the
intervening time it must have been in or near Caelrhon, under a powerful
binding spell, waiting to be released. What might already be here in Yurt?
   I started delicately probing for magic and was so surprised I almost
cried out when I found it at once. There was another magic-worker here,
neither me nor Theodora. But then I realized it was only the old magician.
I spotted him for the first time, standing with the Romneys, his squinting
eyes almost the only part of his face visible behind his thick beard. He
appeared a little less ragged than when I had seen him last; I guessed his
jacket came from the Romneys. He looked in my direction as I looked in
his, and, although I could not be sure at this distance, his look seemed
venomous.
  A spy for the renegade wizard, I thought with abrupt certainty. He had
been sent here by his master to watch for the best moment to attack.
  The queen had finished the formal recital of a king's responsibilities.
Paul gave the formal acceptance of those responsibilities, although in so
low a voice it was hard to catch the words. The queen then lifted the heavy
gold crown and placed it on her son's head to the accompaniment of a
flourish from the brass. "Rise then, King Paul, ruler of Yurt!"
  He rose slowly, with a dignity appropriate for someone three times his
age. He held both arms straight out for a moment, a silver sword in one
hand and the royal scepter in another. Then he mounted his throne and
turned to look toward all of us. "With the aid of God and with your
counsel," he said, in a voice clear but just a little higher than he might
have wished, "I swear that I shall guard you, lead you, and rule you justly.
Come forward, then, my people, to renew your allegiance to the crown of
Yurt."
   For the next hour, the lords and knights of Yurt came forward one by
one. Each knelt before the throne and recited the fairly long oath of
allegiance to their king, holding up their clasped hands to Paul. When
each had finished, he put his hands around theirs, drew them up, and
kissed them on both cheeks. He then presented each with a small box tied
with blue ribbons. The men received silver belt buckles, and the few
women, such as the duchess, who ruled in their own right received silver
brooches.
   The servants had melted back into the castle at the beginning of this
part of the ceremony. The rest of us who did not swear formal allegiance
to the king of Yurt, that is the priests, the royal family of Caelrhon, and I,
stood together at one side, watching. Although as the first of the lords
came forward there was absolute stillness for the oaths, as the hour went
by people started talking ,in low voices. Delicious smells began to waft out
from the castle toward us.
   When the last knight had given his oath, the constable brought out a
portable altar, and all talking ceased. Joachim took his place behind the
altar, the constable's men passed out hymn books, and we all gave thanks
to God and prayers for the health and long life e of our king while the sun
continued to climb in a cloudless sky--a sky still free of monsters.
   At the end of the service, Paul again stepped forward. As though
realizing only now that everything had gone smoothly and that he was
indeed king of Yurt, he broke into his first smile of the day. "My people! I
thank you again for all being here for my coming of age and coronation. I
thank you for your allegiance and for your prayers. And now I would like
to invite you all to the feast!"
  There was applause as the guests moved toward the bridge and the
castle. So far, I thought, so good. I just wondered how long our reprieve
would last.
   In the great hall, long trestle tables had been set up and spread with
white linen cloths. I ended up at the high table, next to Paul's Aunt Maria,
as I had eaten so many meals in Yurt over the years. The queen's parents
faced me on the other side. Paul now sat at the head of the table, with the
bishop in the seat of honor to his right, while the queen sat at the foot.
The new king took off his heavy crown and set it beside his plate while the
servants hurried up and down with the heaping platters. I spotted
Theodora at a side table, surrounded by lords of manors and their ladies.
Laughter drifted in from the courtyard, where Paul, in the spirit of
hospitality, had insisted that the constable set up tables even for our
unexpected guests, the Romneys.
   Though there was no sign yet of trouble, I almost wished that whatever
would happen would start at once, to break the tension. However, no one
else appeared apprehensive. Joachim attentively followed the conversation
at his end of the table, and Paul had gone from being solemn to being
almost boisterous, making jokes, telling stories from his youth, and eating
as if ravenous.
  "It was so beautiful," said the Lady Maria at my elbow, "that I'm not
ashamed to tell you the tears ran down my cheeks." I realized with a start
that she had been speaking for several minutes.
   The meal continued to progress in spite of my fears, with new courses,
musical interludes from the brass choir, a display of tumbling by several of
the Romneys, and happy conversation by everyone but me. After the trout,
after the chicken, after the roast lamb, after the salads and custards and
savory sausage and pies, when the servants had stopped bringing out new
bottles of wine and the level of the ones on the table stopped receding
about three-quarters of the way down, Paul stood up.
  He waited a moment to give the conversation a chance to fade, then
called for the cook to come forward. Pushed by her kitchen maids she
came toward the head table, embarrassed, laughing, and highly pleased.
Paul thanked her for the meal and kissed her to general applause. He then
called on the constable to come receive congratulations for organizing
everything so well, and issued a general thanks to all the staff.
  "And now," he continued as the applause died away, "I would like to
announce what you have all been anticipating: this afternoon's
tournament. We will have horse races, jousting, mock battles, and trials of
skill on horseback. To give you all time to prepare your horses and
armor--and to digest this excellent dinner!--the tournament shall begin in
three hours. Listen for the trumpet's note that will announce its
beginning."
   People slowly started rising from their chairs as general conversation
started again. I, however, started at once for the drawbridge. If I kept my
eyes on the sky, no dragon should appear without warning. I wondered if
Zahlfast would come if I pleaded with him, or if it would be too late by the
time he arrived. As I reached the doorway I spotted Theodora across the
room, frowning in my direction, and nodded at her encouragingly.
  But then I realized that all conversation throughout the great hall had
abruptly ceased. All the lords and ladies stared toward me, even Paul and
the queen. Their expressions were disconcerted, even worried.
   They all knew, then, I thought, feeling my ears go red. No chance now to
slip away unobtrusively. Somehow word had gotten around the hall that a
magical attack was planned for today, and yet the Royal Wizard did not
know how to deal with it. When the floor refused to swallow me I bowed
stiffly to the crowd, who now seemed to be looking past my shoulder, and
backed toward the door.
   The duchess broke the silence. She gave a great laugh and slapped the
table before her. "Well, Wizard!" she called. ""You've done some wonderful
illusions for us in the past, but these are the best yet!"
   I felt a prickling as all the hair on the back of my neck stood on end. I
whirled around and saw them, and knew what I had been expecting all
day had begun at last. These were no illusions. Peering into the great hall
from the courtyard were creatures like lizards, but far bigger than lizards
and bright red. They crept on their bellies with the front halves of their
bodies arched upwards, because instead of forefeet they had human
hands.


                                    IV
   They saw me looking at them, and the one in the lead spread its red
wings and began to hiss. I started desperately on a paralysis spell. It had
been useless against the gorgos, but these were smaller creatures. After
only two seconds, before I had the spell more than half assembled, they
disappeared with a bright flash.
  I darted out into the courtyard, gritting my teeth, and threw Theodora's
spell to reveal the invisible into the spot where they had been creeping.
  They reappeared just as abruptly as they had disappeared, closer to me
than I had expected I backed away cautiously. Their clawed hands looked
powerful enough to take me apart
   I put together the final words of the Hidden Language, and the
creatures all froze. I hesitated, suspecting a trick, but they were as still as
stone. I probed carefully and found them trapped within my paralysis spell
as though frozen in ice. Wings, scales, claws, and eyes were still and silent.
Without the will or ability to move, inside my paralysis spell they could do
no more than breathe.
   I passed my hand over my forehead. "That was too easy," I thought.
Laughter and clapping came from the great hall behind me, but I paid no
attention. If a renegade wizard was planning a massive attack on Yurt, he
should be able to do more than this. Might all this be an effort to lull me
into a false sense of security while the real attack was prepared?
   And then, abruptly, the Romney children were all around me. The oldest
boy looked at me with admiration in his black eyes. "Did you make them?
How do you make them move? Are they going to start moving again?" To
my alarm, some of the younger children were now among the creatures,
feeling their rough scales and tugging at their wings.
  "I wouldn't do that," I said. "They're paralyzed now, but I can't
guarantee they won't wake up. Have a look at the claws."
  But my paralysis spell held. "I hadn't realized you could do real magic as
well as illusions!" the boy continued.
   The Romney woman with the gold teeth hurried toward us. She started
shooing the children away in what I thought justifiable concern. I reached
into my pocket and found I still was carrying the gold earring I had picked
up at the beginning of the summer. I held it out on my palm. "Does this
belong to any of you?"
  The younger Romneys, who had started moving across the drawbridge
and toward the caravans, returned to cluster around me. One of the
younger girls gave a squeal of delight- She flipped back black curls to show
that the two earrings she was wearing were not a pair: one was a gold
hoop, like the earring in my hand, but the other a simple silver stud.
   I gave her back her earring to the approving shouts of the other
children. Before they could all move off again, I took the older boy by the
arm. "I didn't make the lizards," I told him. 'I've only paralyzed them.
Have you seen someone else do magic like this?" The renegade wizard, I
thought, must be very close, but he was shielding his mind from me as
effectively as ever.
  "Of course not," the boy said in surprise. "Thanks for the
demonstration!"
   The other children, led by the girl with the earring, were now running
back toward the caravans. "Before you go," I said to the Romney woman,
"I want to tell you something."
  She turned good-natured black eyes on me. "Those were the earrings
she got at her naming ceremony when she was four, and she's been
devastated since she lost the one."
   But I was not about to be distracted by earrings. "Do you remember you
told me my fortune? You told me I would meet someone beautiful and
mysterious and would fall deeply in love. I wanted to tell you that you were
right-She gave a gratified smile before hurrying after the children. I
turned back to the lizards.
  At the moment they still seemed paralyzed, but a wizard with the
powerful magic to summon them would be able to break my spell. I lifted
them magically, one at a time, and carried them across the drawbridge
and out onto the grass. Several lords and ladies clustered in the courtyard,
watching. Opinion seemed divided on whether the lizards might be a
threat or were merely part of the planned entertainment.
  I had to call the school. If they could send the air cart, I might be able to
ship the lizards to the City, out of the wizard's range, and where teachers
with more powerful magic than mine could put long-lasting binding spells
on them. I pushed through the crowd, ignoring all questions, until I found
Theodora.
  "Watch them," I said. "If they start to move, even the slightest twitch,
call me at once. And try again to find that wizard." She looked at me with
amethyst eyes wide. "Yes, they must be the same creatures you've seen
when you wear your ring."
   A moment later I was connected to the wizards' school. A very young
wizard, no more, I guessed, than a second-year student, appeared in the
glass base of the telephone. "No, Zahlfast isn't here. And the Master isn't
either. In fact," in a frightened rush, "there's no one here at all. All the
teachers left."
  'They left?" I said incredulously.
  "They left last night. I don't know where they went, but they seemed
very worried. All they told us was to keep reviewing our lessons and
working on our spells until they came back."
  "Well, if they get back soon, have Zahlfast call me," I mumbled.
   This was terrible. What could possibly have caused all the teachers to
leave the school? All I could think was that the wizard had a much larger
and better coordinated plan in place for today than I could possibly have
imagined. I would certainly receive no help from the school, nor was I in
any position to help them.
   My heart pounding, I ran back outside. There was no change yet in the
lizards. Theodora gave me what was probably meant to be a smile of
encouragement. My own answering smile wasn't any better.
  "How did they get here?" she asked, quietly.
  "I wish I knew. The wizard must have brought them, but I can't find
him. He may even be lurking in the castle, invisible." I slapped a fist into
the other hand in frustration. "How could a renegade wizard be so good at
magic? I've been trying to find him since I first heard of the problems the
cathedral was having, way back in the spring, but he's been hiding from
me as effectively as if he didn't even exist!"
  "I'll look for him," said Theodora. "If I put on my ring of invisibility, I
should be able to see what is concealed,"
  "And send that old magician out here too," I said. "He probably trusts
you, since you taught him fire magic. Just don't mention that I'm going to
take him apart if I find out he's been spying on me for the wizard."
  As she hurried away, I decided that as long as I was effectively trapped
here with the lizards, I ought to talk to Vincent. "Paul!" I called, seeing
him standing with some of the knights, and motioned him toward me
with a jerk of my head.
  Then I remembered. All summer I had been trying to remind myself
that he would shortly be king and that I should treat him accordingly.
Now that he was king I was back to treating him like a boy.
   He came over, not seeming to mind my inappropriate summons and
flushed with high excitement. He still wore his blue and white velvet.
   "Excuse me, sire," I said, trying to speak formally to make up for my
lapse. A very quick smile crossed his face; I had never called him "sire"
before. "The wizard who attacked the cathedral sent these giant lizards.
I've been able to paralyze them, but I don't know how long I'll be able to
maintain the spell if he tries to free them."
  "We could use them as targets in the tournament," Paul suggested.
  It was an appealing idea, but I didn't like the thought of the lizards
coming suddenly back to life directly under a horse's hooves--maybe the
hooves of the king's horse.
  "I haven't had a chance to talk to Prince Vincent," I went on. "Do you
know if Lucas has been able to find out anything from his brother?"
  "Not that he's told me."
  "Could you find Vincent and ask him to come here? If he is working
with a renegade magic-worker, he may be planning far worse."
   "Vincent himself told us that wizards have ways to make someone reveal
all their secrets!" said the king with a grin. "I'll get him. And I have faith
in you to stop whatever's coming."
  I didn't remind him that the gorgos had very nearly killed me, and I had
only been able to overcome it with a spell that was not supposed to work.
   Vincent came out of the castle a few minutes later, already dressed in
the padded linen shirt and trousers he would wear under his armor. Even
without his finery, he walked with the grace and assurance of a prince--
or, I thought, of a man who planned very soon to be king.
   He poked a finger into the side of a motionless lizard, "Monsters don't
stand much of a chance with you, do they, Wizard! I still remember how
you knocked my sword out of my hand when I tried to tease you. I could
have warned these creatures to stay away. Where did they come from,
anyway?"
  But I was not to be distracted "I think you know more, Vincent," I
replied sternly, "than you've cared to say about them."
  He took a step backwards. "I? I know nothing about them!" He was so
obviously staggered that it was hard not to believe him. However, I was
successful in doing so.
  "They were summoned by a wizard," I said shortly, "with whom you
have been plotting to overthrow both the Church and organized wizardry
and, incidentally, to seize the kingdom of Yurt for yourself."
   Vincent stared at me with a complete lack of comprehension. Then he
shook his head, as though not sure whether he should smile, and sat down,
his arms resting on his knees and his hands hanging loose. I remained
standing. It seemed I had spent much of the summer accusing people of
sinister plots.
  But I got a very different reaction from Vincent than I had from his
brother. "Paul's been trying to tell you that you stand in the way of his real
development as a king, is that it, Wizard?" he asked sympathetically.
"Believe me, I never intended to turn him against you personally."
  'Then what did you intend?" I demanded.
   "Sit down," he said, gesturing. "We can talk more easily. Lucas came
back from your trip to the land of magic all full of accusations about how I
was plotting against everybody--him especially--but I hadn't expected you
to believe it too."
   I hesitated, then sat down beside him. The midday sun was bright on
our heads and made his copper hair gleam. The lizards, frozen in positions
of attack with their clawed hands upraised, stood before us.
   "Sometime this winter," Vincent said, "our late wizard started playing
on Lucas, telling him that there was no longer room for courage and
character in the western kingdoms, because the wizards and priests
between them had ended most wars and adventures. Lucas has always
been worried, you see, that he was going to grow old, like Father, without
ever having done anything. I myself was not so sure that the old wars were
ever as glorious as they seem in the legends, but I knew better than to try
to tell my brother that."
   He had been staring at the lizards as he spoke, but now he turned to
look at me. "One thing did seem strange, that our wizard seemed to be
trying to discredit the wizards' school, pointing out such things as that
there were now wizards in more and more courts, and talking about a plot
to wrest control from the kings. It didn't make any sense to me for
someone I knew had graduated from the school."
  It didn't make any sense to me either. I remained silent and let Vincent
continue.
   "I guess I just never took him seriously--or I felt that if princes should
distrust wizards, I would start by distrusting him. Then he died, of course,
which made it all moot. But it certainly made a good story, and I must
admit I told it to your Prince Paul."
  I gave Vincent my wizardly glare, but he was looking away. As he sat
here, talking in a half-amused, half-apologetic manner, I thought that, if
he were not planning to marry the queen and murder Paul, I would find
myself liking him quite a bit. "Paul believed you," I said.
   He smiled ruefully. "That's your real problem, isn't it, Wizard." It
wasn't, but I did not answer. I'd been trying all spring to win his
friendship, and it occurred to me that to give him a share in a secret,
something we princes could work against together, might make him a
little less distant toward me."
  "You bought his friendship with the red roan stallion."
  Vincent chuckled. "Come on, Wizard. You and I don't need to be rivals
for Paul's affection."" We had actually been rivals for the queen's affection.
This conversation was getting more confused by the moment. "And I
wouldn't say I 'bought' his friendship. I knew he wanted a red stallion, and
when the Romneys had the horse for sale I thought I'd better buy it at
once. There can't be many others like it They knew it too--they certainly
charged enough! I'd also thought, of course, that Paul was a little timid
and deferential for someone who was going to be king so soon, and that if
I said a few things to make him rely on himself rather than others' counsel
it might help a bit. But from what Lucas told me, your trip up north did
much more for him than my hints and suggestions ever could!"
   Ever since Joachim first telephoned me at the wizards' school, to tell me
there were twinkling lights at night on his new tower, I had been creating
and disposing of a long series of theories to account for the events in
Caelrhon and Yurt. Long after I knew that the original problem had been
Theodora practicing climbing and using magic at the same time, new
crises and diabolical plots kept appearing. The only two points on which I
was now firm was that a renegade wizard, who hated the Church, had
brought a gorgos to the cathedral city, and that Vincent was trying to
seize Yurt for himself.
  A quick glance at the sky still revealed no dragons. "I want to ask you
about that stallion," I said.
  Vincent gave me a look of genuine amusement "Lucas told me you
thought the horse was a trap. It's an intriguing theory, but it's certainly
not true."
  "Where did the Romneys get the stallion?"
  He shrugged. "You don't ask horse-traders where they get their horses.
But the Romneys are right here if you want to try."
   I was not yet ready to give up my suspicions of him. "If you didn't
intend the horse as a trap," I asked, "how were you planning to murder
Paul?"
   Vincent jumped to his feet. Shock, fury, and then incredulity passed
across his face in a series of waves of white and red. I saw him ready to
attack me, then remember both that he was unarmed and that a sword
wouldn't do much good anyway. Very slowly, he sat down again, staring at
me. "Are you serious?"
  It was exactly what I would have expected him to do if I was wrong.
"How else did you plan to become king of Yurt?"
  Both of us sat in silence for a moment, trying to sort out our thoughts.
Vincent continued to stare. Below us, the constable's men were finishing
preparing the lists for the tournament A number of the knights already
had their armor on and were walking back and forth between the tents,
showing off for each other. The horrible certainty that I had just created a
diplomatic crisis between Yurt and Caelrhon grew on me.
  V
  "Well," said Vincent after a minute, "maybe I had that coming, for
spreading rumors about a wizardry plot against princes. But I do want to
reassure you I never intended to be king of Yurt."
  "Then why are you marrying my queen?" I demanded.
  "Because I love her, of course," said Vincent with a smile. "I know you
wizards never marry, so you probably haven't noticed, but she's the most
beautiful and the most delightful and desirable woman in the western
kingdoms."
  The one positive thing I might be able to salvage from this conversation
was the knowledge that the queen had never told Vincent about my
proposal to her.
   "I hope you appreciate how ironic this is," said Vincent. "My brother is
terrified that when I marry your queen, Yurt may make it an excuse to
take over Caelrhon. And now I find out that you have been expecting the
exact opposite!"
  I felt I ought to apologize but didn't know what to say.
   "Look, Wizard," Vincent went on. "Let's be reasonable about this. The
queen and I both want you to stay on as Royal Wizard after we're married,
and I'm certain Paul really does too, even if I may have inadvertently
turned him against you for the moment. When you were off at the school
this spring, the queen wondered whether she might have to get a new
wizard if you ended up staying there, but she also told me she hoped that
you'd be back. So let's forget all this and forgive each other. All right?"
   He started to rise, taking my agreement for granted, but I was not
through with him yet. "A wizard brought a gorgos to the cathedral city
last month, and brought these creatures here today. What do you know
about him?"
   He paused on one knee. "I don't know anything about this. Lucas
refused to hire a new wizard after Sengrim's death, and the only other
magic-worker I've spoken to since then is you." He stood up. "Now, if you'll
excuse me, I really do need to get my armor on."
  Without waiting for an answer, he started back toward the bridge into
the castle, whistling. Just before he reached the bridge, I called him back.
"Prince Vincent!"
   He turned back slowly but not, I thought, particularly grudgingly. If I
had been a prince instead or a wizard, I really would have wanted to be
just like him. "Can it wait?"
  "I have a quick favor to ask you." He came back and stood before me,
hands on his hips. "Could you see if you could find the Romney from
whom you bought the horse? Even though"--I just barely kept myself from
phrasing it as "Even if "--"you have no plots against Paul, it's possible
someone else does."
   He shrugged. "All right. But I don't want to be late for the tournament!"
He went off through the tents, greeting the knights and joking with them
as he went. In a few moments, I saw him reemerge from beyond the tents
and this time go directly into the castle. At least, I thought, I had not
actually created a diplomatic rift between the twin kingdoms.
  A Romney man walked slowly toward me, not uncertainly but as though
he wanted me to realize that he moved at his own pace, not mine. I
swallowed my impatience and waited.
  He sat down next to me and adjusted his red kerchief. "A lot of the
knights of Caelrhon have horses they bought from me," he said casually.
"Were you thinking of buying one yourself? I'm afraid we don't have much
with us right now, but I could find you a good steed by next week."
  I had to admire the Romney's ability to turn any opportunity into a
potential sale. "I wanted to ask you about the red roan stallion you sold
Prince Vincent at the beginning of the summer," I answered. "I might
want one like that--no ordinary horse for a wizard!"
   He gave me a shrewd look from intensely black eyes. Neither one of us
believed for a minute the talk about buying a horse. "It might be hard to
find one just like that," he said. "Horses that good are scarce, as you
realize. I might be able to have one in a few weeks. If you gave me a down
payment now, it might make the search easier."
  I abandoned the pretense of wanting a horse like Paul's. "You got that
horse from a wizard, didn't you."
  He looked at me in apparent disappointment, though I wasn't sure if he
was disappointed at losing a sale or just at cutting our sparring short.
"Well, I did," he admitted, "though I trained the horse myself. A beautiful
animal it was when I got it, but wild."
  "Have you seen the wizard at all recently? Might he be bringing more
horses from wherever he got that one?"
   He shook his head, almost imperceptibly. "I haven't seen him in
months. Though of course I didn't tell him I'd buy anything he found, I
think he realizes I would if they were like that stallion."
   Vor, Norbert, and the Romneys had all been able to see this
wizard--why couldn't I? And, I thought with a surge of jealousy, he must
have an air cart of his own, to be able to transport horses from the
borderlands. If I was somehow able to overcome him maybe I could have it
for my own.
  But this was an unprofitable line of thought. Much more pressing was
whether the horse might still be a trap, though to be triggered by the
wizard himself, not by Vincent. "Thank you for the information," I said.
"Do let me know if you have any horses like the red stallion again."
   The Romney man returned to his caravans without pressing the issue of
a down payment. At the bottom of the hill, ladies and attendants were
already trying to find the best seats in the stands.
   The chief outcome of my conversations was that I knew 1 had to find the
wizard. But I seemed no closer to doing so. He must be here, but he was
still thoroughly concealed. I realized uneasily that it had been some time
since Theodora had gone to look for him. ...


   A trumpeter appeared in the lists below. Lifting the horn to his lips, he
blew a single long blast, then began a lively tune with the rhythm of horses
galloping. To general shouts, the knights around the tents mounted their
horses. Paul came out of the castle, riding Bonfire. His new armor shone
like silver, and he carried a plumed helmet in one crooked arm. For the
tournament all weapons were to be blunted. Only the new king himself
wore a real sword.
  He was halfway down the hill when Vincent came out of the castle,
pushing his horse to a trot. He waved as he went by. I had already seen
Lucas going down, riding easily with no sign of pain from his ankle. A
number of the castle staff, young Gwennie among them, hurried to join
the lords and ladies in the audience.
  In a few minutes the tournament was under way. The Romneys stood on
the sidelines. From where I sat with the lizards, I had a clear view of the
sky. I kept looking and kept seeing nothing but birds.
  I heard a step beside me, jumped, and turned to see Joachim. He
regarded the lizards curiously for a minute, then sat down on the grass
beside me, arranging his robes around him.
   For a second I considered ordering him back into the safety of the
castle, bishop or no bishop, then realized he was probably deliberately
making himself visible in order to bring on a wizardry attack. "These are
the creatures that were moving stones around on your new tower," I told
him. "They can't do any harm now, as long as they're paralyzed, but if I
leave them the wizard will probably break my spell at once."
  In the field below the castle's hill the first event began, a horse race. I
noted that Paul had had the good taste not to participate; Bonfire could
easily have outrun any horse there.
   "I've just talked to Prince Vincent. I'd believed all summer that he and a
renegade wizard were planning a joint attack, but I realize now that this
belief wasn't the product of wizardry insights, only of jealousy. Everything
I saw as signs of a despicable plot--the way he and the queen behaved
toward each other, the fact that Yurt and Caelrhon were once one
kingdom, even Vincent's gift of a stallion to Paul--had a simpler and more
innocent explanation. All my suspicions were so incomprehensible to
Vincent that he decided I must in fact fear he would turn the young king
against me. He forgave me. But while I've been wasting my time worrying
about an attack on the queen and on Paul, the wizard may be doing
something horrible down in the City."
   I told him about the mass exodus of the teachers from the school.
Joachim nodded slowly. "But these lizards show he's not ignoring Yurt," he
said. "He may be attacking on two fronts."
   The wind cut silver paths through the long grass on the castle's hill and
the fields below. The area of the tournament was already becoming
trampled and muddy.
  "But where is he?" I burst out. "Is this all? If he's here, what will he do
next?"
   The knights in the tournament lists were now preparing for the tests of
skill; mounted men would gallop at top speed toward a ring dangling from
a thread and try to thrust their lances through it.
  "Theodora's looking for him," I added, then stopped, realizing that I
couldn't tell him more without revealing that she was a witch.
   "I was glad to have a chance to talk to her yesterday while we were
riding," said Joachim. "At first she seemed shy of me, almost awestruck. I
had hoped that if I became bishop I could make people realize that
bishops are not like princes, men of authority and command. Rather, we
are shepherds, sinners ourselves but chosen by God to help and guide
other sinners. But I've been bishop for over a week, and I'm still being
treated as a lord of men."
   This was much too complicated to try to explain to him now. Shouts
from the base of the hill showed that one of the riders was doing very well;
it appeared to be Vincent.
  Theodora reminds me somewhat of you," Joachim continued,
"especially you twenty years ago, when I first knew you. You both have the
same sense of humor, where it's often difficult to tell if you're making a
joke or not." Normally I would have been afire with curiosity to know if
they had talked about me, and what they had said, but now I was too
worried to care.
   "What's my priest doing?" said Joachim in quite a different tone. I
looked down toward some of the spectators milling around at the edge of
the lists. The young priest who had come with the bishop was in the
middle of a crowd of Romneys. I didn't know what it looked like to
Joachim, but to me it looked like he was placing a bet.
   "Maybe I should go down there for a little while anyway," said the
bishop. "I cannot approve of battles, even mock battles, but I do not want
to appear to be avoiding the festivities deliberately." He brushed himself
off and walked quickly down the hill.
   1 watched him go, feeling increasingly uneasy about Theodora. But then
I saw a dark lilac dress approaching rapidly from the direction of the
deserted Romney caravans. At the same time a servant in Yurt's blue and
white livery shot out of the castle and over the bridge. He was running and
reached me before she did.
  "Come right away!" he cried. "It's a telephone call from--from someone
named Zahlfast! He said he must talk to you at once, about the safety of
the wizards' school!"
   Theodora!" I shouted to her, jumping up. "Stay here and watch these
lizards!"
  "Wait! I have to tell you--"
  "Tell me when I get back." I flew straight up and over the castle wall, the
quicker to reach the telephone.



                            PART NINE
                            Renegade I


  Zahlfast's face looked as haggard as I had ever seen it, and he breathed
hard. He stared at me blindly; he must be calling from a telephone
without a far-seeing attachment "Thank you," he said. "I wanted to tell
you we got the warning in time."
  "What warning?" I appreciated the thanks but I had no idea what he
was talking about.
  "When I got back to the school from dinner last evening, the young
wizard relayed your message that the phone in the watch-station up in the
borderlands was broken. That fool hadn't told us, of course," meaning
good old Book-Leech. "Instead he thought he'd try to fix it himself, though
he's not competent to do so."
   Zahlfast paused, then continued in something closer to his normal
schoolteacher tone. "Maybe we should make a series of courses in
technical magic a required part of the curriculum, rather than an elective
option. Because I've never found that kind of magic congenial myself, I'm
afraid I haven't pushed for it, but in modern times all young wizards really
should know modern magic." "But what's happened?" I demanded.
"Where are you?"
  "I'm not sure. We're in the royal castle of--" Someone behind him
provided a name. "I think we're about a thousand miles north of the City"
  "You and all the teachers?"
  "Just three of us are here; the rest are spread out over hundreds of
miles. It didn't take us long, once we'd heard that something was wrong
with the phone at the watch-station, to guess that the weak attempt of a
very small dragon to fly south was a feint and that something much worse
would soon follow. So we tried to telephone to the watch-station at
once--and got through. We could always phone him, which was why we
hadn't realized there was a problem."
  Zahlfast wiped the sweat off his brow. I almost danced with impatience.
"As I'm sure you already guessed," he went on, "a whole horde of dragons
had just flown up over the mountains and started south. Maybe a hundred
of them."
  I froze in horror. This was even worse than I expected. "Were they
heading for Yurt?"
  "No. They were heading for the City."
  "And that's why all the teachers went."
   "The dragons scattered when they met us," Zahlfast continued. "One did
come close to Yurt--it was finally killed a quarter mile from the cathedral
city of Caelrhon."
   Then those waiting to protect Joachim's cathedral from danger had
seen something worth waiting for. I paused. "All of you overcame them all,
I assume.
  "Well, yes," said Zahlfast, with a flicker of a smile. "Otherwise, I
wouldn't be talking to you. Thank you again."
   "Wait, before you hang up! I have to ask you something. This spring
when I left the school, you gave me a warning. You said that priests hated
and feared the wizards and sought to destroy them. I know we've never
gotten along well with the Church, but this was different. You were trying
to keep me out of the affairs of the cathedral of Caelrhon. You have to tell
me: had Sengrim, the Royal Wizard of Caelrhon, given you that warning
before he died?"
  "Yes, he did," said Zahlfast in surprise.
  "He must have had an apprentice," I said grimly, "someone none of us
even knew existed. Find him. He might be here in Yurt, or he could be
anywhere. He's the one who disabled the telephone, and he's the one who
summoned the dragons."
  For one of the few times since I'd known him, Zahlfast looked shocked. I
hung up and ran back outside. Even if the hundred dragons had not been
successful in destroying Yurt or the school--or both--they had effectively
kept me from having any help here from another wizard for at least
another day.
   Theodora waited by the motionless lizards. I had grown to despise the
sight of them. "Come on," I said. "I'm going down to the tournament
grounds to make an announcement. Thank God, the worst that I'd feared
is not going to happen."
  "Daimbert, listen to me," she said desperately.
  "Tell me in a minute. The bishop and Paul and probably a lot of the
others know I've been expecting an attack of dragons or worse, and I have
to reassure them it won't happen."
   The knights had now finished riding at the ring and had begun the
jousts, the heart of the tournament. One joust had just ended; neither
rider had been unhorsed, and they were waiting for the judges' decision.
The queen came up to me with a rather quizzical smile as we reached the
lists. "Vincent's been telling me about a very odd conversation the two of
you had," she began.
   But I couldn't take time to listen to her right now any more than I could
listen to Theodora. "I have an announcement!" I called, then realized no
one could hear me. There was a spell to amplify one's voice; it took me a
moment to find and apply it. "I have an announcement!" I tried again.
   This time my voice boomed out gratifyingly loudly. The queen and
Theodora, who had been standing on either side of me, both took a quick
step back. The riders readying themselves for the next jousts had trouble
reining in their startled horses.
   "I've just been talking to the wizards' school," I said to a rapt audience,
"and I wanted to tell you all that an attack on Yurt has just been averted!"
It was in fact an attack on the school instead, but I didn't have time to go
into detail. "A hundred dragons were summoned from the land of magic
by an evil wizard. But the masters of the school were able to overcome
them all."
  There was a rapid buzz of conversation at this unexpected
announcement The bishop looked as though he had known all along that I
was an excellent wizard. The riders, including Paul on his red stallion, had
their mounts under control again. The young king settled his plumed
helmet over his head.
   "Daimbert, you must listen!" Theodora tried again. I turned toward her.
"I've found the wizard. He's right here. He's been hiding from both of us."
  The pit of my stomach felt as though it had turned to ice. I grabbed her
by the shoulders and turned her toward me. "Where? Where is he?"
 "We should have known!" she cried in despair. The old magician, the
man we never worried about He's the wizard in disguise!"
  He had been hiding right under my nose. And I had just told him, as
well as everybody else, that his most elaborate plot had failed.
   "But where--" I needn't have asked. There was a crack and a flash like
lightning, a burst of blue smoke, and he appeared directly before me.
  The wizard's disguise of ragged robes and heavy eyebrows were gone.
His white beard whipped in the wind from his spell. And I recognized him
now, the renegade who had eluded me for months. It was Sengrim, the
wizard everyone had thought was dead.
   Theodora and the queen retreated rapidly in opposite directions.
Behind the wizard I could see several horses rearing straight up at the
smoke and lightning. For a second even Sengrim was unimportant. Paul's
stallion had reared higher than any other horse and was going over
backwards. But before I could seize him with a lifting spell, Prince Vincent
had leaped forward to grab the dangling reins. With a sharp tug at the
head, he steadied the stallion enough that Bonfire was able to find his
balance and come back down safely. The king kicked his feet free of the
stirrups and sprang off, and he and Vincent gave each other triumphant
slaps on the back.
  I swung my attention back to the wizard before me. "So you think you
and your school are safe now, Daimbert," said Sengrim in cold fury. "But
my magic is much stronger than yours!"
   Behind me, I heard a strange hissing and honking sound. My head
jerked around, and I saw that the red lizards, which I had been busily
watching for hours, were now free of the paralysis spell and had started
toward us.
   Everyone in the lists seemed as paralyzed as the lizards had been a
second ago, and for one horrible moment I thought the spell had been
transferred to them. But they were not held prisoner by a spell, only by
shock. They stared in horror from the lizards to the commanding figure
before them.
  And one person was moving, Paul. He had his sword out, the only real
sword in the tournament He very slowly advanced toward the wizard from
behind.
   I didn't dare motion toward him. All I could do was to give him a quick
stare that I hoped was a warning-- if he could even see it through his
visor.
 "You're so sure of yourself that you even tried to patronize me when we
met in Caelrhon," the wizard said grimly.
  "But I thought you were just an old magician!" I protested. If I could
keep him talking for a few more minutes, I thought, desperately trying to
put a spell together, I might have a chance.
   "Can you cast a spell like this?" cried Sengrim. Where he had been
standing there was suddenly not a wizard but a pillar of fire, twenty feet
high. Enormous eyes glared down from the top, and an enormous laugh
rang out from the flames. Paul had the sense to back up rapidly.
  Sweet Jesus, he was good. I had never seen anything like this.
  A tongue of flame licked toward the wooden stands where the
spectators were sitting, and in two seconds they were ablaze. The paralysis
broke as people screamed and struggled, trying to get out.
   I abandoned the spell I had been working on and grabbed at what I
could remember of Theodora's fire magic. The only calm person in the
crowd seemed to be Gwennie, directing people down the steps away from
the fire. In a moment I was able to reduce the level of the flames enough
that everyone was able to get out of the stands, beating at their burning
clothes.
   They tried to run, but they could not run far. Sengrim had set up an
invisible barrier around the lists, as strong as the nixie's, against which
they shoved helplessly. The lizards were within that barrier and drawing
dangerously close to the crowd. And then another tongue of flame came
toward me and surrounded me. Protected from the blaze after two
scorching seconds by Theodora's magic, I advanced toward the pillar of
fire, one arm held out.
  "Stop!" I cried out, in a voice amplified by magic. "We both learned
wizardry at the school, and we're both sworn to help humanity!"
   The pillar of fire seemed momentarily to contract, and I hoped for an
instant that he was listening to me. But then I realized he was not reacting
to what I had said. He was under attack by Theodora.
  With another blinding flash of light, the pillar of fire was gone and the
wizard was back. I realized that Theodora must have helped me put out
the fire in the stands. In the five desperate seconds of breathing room
which her magic gave me, I managed to cast a new paralysis spell toward
the lizards. This time it held.
   "So you think you've got a witch to help you," the wizard said with
bitter scorn, not even bothering to break my new spell. He waved out the
last of the flames with one hand. Clearly fire magic had possibilities I had
not yet explored. "No woman can know real magic. Just one more sign of
your true debility, Daimbert!"
  "But what are you talking about?" I demanded. "What can you have
against me?" Again, I had to keep him talking while I tried to put a
complicated spell together. Figuring out what had happened, why he was
even alive, would have to wait.
  Almost everyone had pressed themselves against the invisible barrier, as
far from the wizard as they could go, except for the queen and Theodora,
who stayed rooted where they had been when the wizard first appeared,
and Paul, who again began a stealthy approach from the rear.
   "Brute force is no more useful against me than magic!" cried the
wizard. "I know you're back there, knight!" He whirled and started firing
knives toward Paul, real knives, no illusion, powered by magic. They
clattered off his armor, sending him staggering back.
  I gave up any hope of trapping Sengrim with a binding spell, or even of
being able to oppose his spells individually. I briefly considered
summoning him, regardless of whether summoning was the greatest
wizardly sin, but then I would only have his deranged mind even closer to
mine.
  My only hope was to build around him a magic structure that would
make it impossible for him to practice any magic within it. I had told
Joachim, what seemed years ago, that I might have to put such a spell on
their cathedral. At the time, I had had no idea how to do so; now, after
spending the last week with my books, I might
  That is, if I even had a chance to finish assembling the spell. With Paul
out of the way, the wizard turned his magic knives on me. The barrage
went on for ten seconds, and I jettisoned my growing spell to repel them.
   "Answer me!" I cried when the knives stopped coming. "I had nothing
against you! Why are you so set against me?" I snatched up the remnants
of the spell I had started building before it faded away completely.
   "They always preferred you down at the school," the wizard said
bitterly. This was better. I could listen to him and work on my spell at the
same time. But Paul was starting again what I feared was a suicidal
advance.
  "They made you, you, wizard of Yurt nineteen years ago," he cried,
"even though you'd barely been able to graduate, even though as wizard of
Caelrhon I deserved to be transferred to the more senior kingdom and
they've never offered me!"
  I'd never known a wizard who lost his mind before. Normally I would
have been interested in observing the symptoms.
   "Even when you abandoned the principles of wizardry by making
friends in the Church, the school refused to believe the worst about you!"
 I almost had my spell together. If I could keep him talking just a few
more seconds, if Paul would only stay back, if the spell even worked--
  He didn't give me a chance to find out "And you can't even begin to
match spells with me!" he cried. "Can you do this?"
   He held both arms straight out, and lightning flashed from each hand.
Thirty feet on either side of him, crevices in the earth opened up, opened
directly beneath the queen and Theodora.
  I had no time to think, only time to react. I couldn't possibly save them
both. I grabbed the queen with magic and tossed her to safety.
   As I flew toward the crack where Theodora had vanished, the pillar of
fire reappeared, swirling with diabolical laughter. But as I dropped down
the crevice I finished my spell and hurled it at him.
  The crevice was some twenty feet deep. Theodora lay limp at the
bottom. I snatched her up and flew out as the ground shifted with a roar
and the crack slammed back shut.
   I had him. Highly startled, the wizard stood within my trembling spell,
his magic stripped from him. His barrier around the lists collapsed, and
with it many of the people who had pressed against it I dropped to the
ground, Theodora in my arms. Her eyes were shut but she was still
breathing.
  "It won't work, Daimbert!" roared Sengrim. "I may not be able to work
magic while I'm standing here, but I can walk right out of your spell!" And
he proceeded to do so.
  But he had not counted on Paul. The young king's long, stealthy advance
had finally reached its goal. He sprang forward, naked sword in his hand,
and thrust it with all his strength into the wizard's back.
   Blood spurted over Paul's silver armor. He wrenched off his helmet; a
stripe of red across his eyes showed where the blood had penetrated the
visor. He slowly pulled his sword back out of the wizard's body and wiped
his face with the other hand.
  Clasping Theodora against me, I went to look. The wizard lay without
moving. It all came back to me why I had taken Paul to the borderlands: I
had wanted his sword arm between me and danger.
  The flow of blood from the hole in the wizard s back slowed to a trickle
and stopped. I turned him over with one foot. He flopped lifeless, his eyes
open and empty. "Thank God," I said. "He's dead."
   "My God," said Paul, his face under the blood completely white. "I've
killed him."


                                    II
   The constable had, of course, arranged for a doctor to be present at the
tournament. I dragged him away from attending to our guests. Due to
good fortune and to Paul, none of the knights or spectators had been
killed, although most had burns, bruises, or at least badly strained
muscles. The worst off were two knights who had been less quick than
Paul at getting off their spooked horses--one had cracked ribs and another
had a crushed leg where his horse had rolled on him.
   "She's going to be all right, I should think," the doctor said sourly,
looking at Theodora lying stretched out on the queen's bed, absolutely still
except for the faintest rise and fall of her chest. "She got a bad scare and a
bad knock on her head, but her skull's not cracked, and I don't think her
neck is broken. Sleep's the best thing for her. Now, if you'll excuse me--"
He escaped back to the wounded knights before I could say anything else.
   I had already flown madly around the castle's hill, ripping up whatever
leaves and twigs seemed at all promising for herbal magic, and had made
a poultice which I put on the bump on her head. The doctor had shaken
his head at it but said nothing.
  I took her hand. "Theodora," I said, both aloud and directly to her
mind. "It's me, Theodora." There was no response.
  Joachim put his head in, as sober as I had ever seen him. "How is she?"
  The doctor claims she'll be all right. But I'm not so sure." I seized him
by the arm. "Please, will you pray for her?"
  He opened his mouth to say something but stopped. Instead he nodded.
   "I know what you're thinking," I said desperately. "You heard Sengrim
call her a witch. You think a witch is something evil, but it's not--it's only
what wizards call women who know a little magic. She does know magic, a
little magic, but she's not evil. You talked to her. You must know that.
Please, Joachim."
   He took a deep breath and eased his arm out of my grip. He looked at
her for a moment, then turned his enormous dark eyes on me. "I realized
all along that she knew magic," he said quietly. "I told you she reminded
me of you. All I had been going to say was that I was already praying for
her."
   I sat down on the bed next to her. "Will you stay with us?" I asked
timidly.
  "I can't. Your royal chaplain has just told me that Paul's up in the
chapel, lying sobbing on the floor in front of the altar. I've got to go talk to
him." He was gone before I had a chance to answer.
   The queen sat with me later that day, watching Theodora. It was still
daylight, though it felt like the middle of the night. The rest of the
festivities had been canceled. The castle around us seemed silent as a
tomb.
  "Her color looks a little better," said the queen, though I hadn't noticed
any change myself.
  "Suppose she never wakes up?"
   "She will," said the queen positively, though she had no basis on which
to be so positive. But I appreciated the gesture and tried to smile. "Thank
you for saving us all again--especially me," she continued. But then she
remembered that in saving her I had let Theodora tumble down the
crevice. She became silent, rubbing absently at a bruised arm.
  "How's Paul?" I asked after a moment, because staring at my clasped
hands seemed fairly fruitless. "Have you talked to him?"
  "Only very briefly. The bishop spoke with him at some length. He's
never killed anyone before, of course--and as a mother I'd hoped he'd
never have to. When I talked to him, he was both horrified that he'd killed
the wizard and deeply distressed at the blow he thought he'd done to his
honor by attacking him from the rear. He's asleep now--sleep can do a lot
when someone is eighteen."
   I spared Paul some sympathy. 1 had never had to kill anyone either,
although I had come extremely close to my own death a few times. I
wondered if the latter might even be preferable. Whatever Joachim had
told Paul, it was unlikely to be that the sixth commandment did not apply
in cases where a wizard had lost his mind.
  Neither the queen nor I said anything more for a few minutes. I took
one of Theodora's hands. It was warm and completely unresponsive.
  "She is very dear to you," said the queen then. It was a statement, not a
question, but I could hear the intense curiosity behind it.
   "I met her in the cathedral city this summer," I said in answer to the
question she had not asked. "It was after I'd briefly stopped off here, after
teaching at the wizards' school--the visit when you told me you were
marrying Prince Vincent."
  She nodded, understanding what I had not explicitly said.
  "Yes," I said, "she is very dear to me."
  What had once been an elegant silk dress was now stained and tattered.
I thought inconsequentially that if Theodora woke up she would find this
highly irritating.
 "I understand that your wizards' school doesn't want its graduates to
marry," said the queen after a moment.
   That's right," I said. I saw the sympathy in her emerald eyes and
considered sobbing with my head in her lap. "And not just the school. Its a
tradition that goes back to the beginning of history. Wizards are supposed
to be wedded to magic." I stroked Theodora's hand for a moment in
silence. "Besides," I said at last, "she doesn't want to marry me."
   The queen took my other hand in hers. She started to say something
and changed her mind. But I knew what it would have been. She, like
Theodora, had been going to say, with great sympathy and absolutely no
offer of help out of my sorrow, that no one should have to be refused twice
in one summer.
   The queen was too tactful to ask more, but talking to her was better
than sitting silently, watching Theodora's face for nonexistent signs of
returning consciousness. "She told me she would miss her independence if
she was tied to someone else, but that's not the only reason. The other
reason, and I think the real reason, is that she knows that I couldn't be a
professional wizard if I was married to her, and that I wouldn't be happy
working illusions at fairs. She's right, but I'd be delighted to sacrifice all
that to be with her. The problem is that she decided to sacrifice herself
before giving me a chance to do so first."
  "It sounds like she loves you," commented the queen.
   I nodded. "She does, almost as much as I love her. But I know that if she
recovers, she'll want to go back to the cathedral city and leave me here. I
still refuse to accept this arrangement." I glanced toward the queen and
wondered if what I was saying was a speech of resignation.
  "She may give you no choice," said the queen, which might have been
an unwillingness to accept my resignation.
   She stood up suddenly to turn on the lamp. Daylight was fading at last
behind the drawn curtains. The magic globe of light made what had been
a dim, sad room almost bright and cozy. I could even imagine that a little
pink had returned to Theodora's pallid cheeks.
   "Even if she won't marry me," I said, to make sure the queen knew that
I would not renew my proposals to her, "I will always consider myself to
belong to her."
  The queen looked at me, blinking in the bright lamplight. She realized
there was more and waited to see if I would tell her.
  I knew this was the final conversation like this I would ever have with
the queen. If I was indeed going to stay on as wizard of Yurt we needed to
have everything open between us, so that we could be comfortable and
natural with each other and never have to discuss it again.
 "There's one more thing you should know," I said at last. "She's carrying
my child."
  The queen went completely still, not even breathing for five seconds.
Then she gave my hand a final squeeze and reached over to stroke
Theodora's brow.
    What had been one of the happiest and most private moments of my
life, I thought, that afternoon in the grove outside the cathedral city, now
threatened to become public knowledge. I reminded myself that having
the queen and the bishop know about it was not the same as having it
known to everyone in the twin kingdoms. I just hoped Theodora would see
it that way.
  This topic seemed to have run its course. "You started to ask me
earlier," I said into a silence that threatened to stretch out indefinitely,
"about my conversation with Prince Vincent." The queen looked up in
surprise, then remembered. "I hope he told you I don't suspect him
anymore."
  "Yes," she answered slowly. "He did feel he'd answered all your
concerns. But to suggest that he planned to murder Paul!"
   I looked away. "Maybe I just have a suspicious nature. I know now I was
highly mistaken. But when I learned that the wizard of Caelrhon was
planning an attack here" --I felt no necessity to explain that I had not
realized the elusive renegade wizard was Sengrim until he actually
appeared before me-- "I thought that the prince of Caelrhon might well be
implicated. After all, wouldn't it make sense for someone who would
otherwise never be king to want to gain a wife and a kingdom at the same
time? I know now how wrong I was!" I added hastily.
 "You do realize, Wizard," she said after a minute, "that I am going to
marry Vincent tomorrow, and we intend to live in Yurt."
  "I know," I said. "And therefore I feel I must offer you my resignation."
  There, I had done it at last. This time there was no ambiguity. When
Theodora learned I was no longer wizard of Yurt, she would have no choice
but to marry me.
  "You can't offer me your resignation," she said with the faintest trace of
a smile. "I'm not regent anymore."
  Then I'll tell Paul I'm resigning."
  "He would never accept your resignation. He thinks much too highly of
you."
  "He'll accept my resignation if I tell him I've grossly insulted his mother
and her future husband."
   She shook her head. The faint smile was still there. "And I'll tell him
that you only imagined the insult. No, Wizard, both Vincent and I would
ask you to stay on, even if Paul were not here, even if Vincent really was
going to become king of Yurt. All I ask is that you and Vincent seek to be
friends. We couldn't let the wizard get away who had saved us all from
renegade magic. I can't force you to stay, of course, and she"--with a nod
toward Theodora's still form--"may still change her mind. But please. I
want you to be Royal Wizard as long as I live in Yurt."
  There didn't seem to be any way to refuse this. It was at any rate
unambiguous.
   The queen left a little while later to go sleep in Theodora's room. I
offered to move her, but the queen dismissed my suggestion. "I told you to
bring her in here so you wouldn't have to carry her up those stairs. I'll be
tine. And I think she'll be fine by morning." She was gone with this
statement of what I considered unwarranted optimism. I stretched out
next to Theodora and slept a little myself.
   Toward dawn, I awoke abruptly from vague and depressing nightmares
to feel a stir next to me. "Daimbert?" came a sleepy voice.
  I was too overcome to answer. I put my arm tight around her and
buried my face in her pillow.
   When she spoke again, it was with the slightest hint of her customary
teasing tone. "Are these your chambers? From what I can see, the room
looks much fancier than I had imagined. Don't you think everyone will be
shocked when we come out to breakfast together?"
  I sat up and turned the lamp back on to look at her. "These aren't my
chambers; they're the queen's. She had us bring you here. Do you
remember what happened?"
  Theodora closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them again.
"What happened to the wizard?"
  "He's dead. Paul killed him."
  She lay quietly for a minute, then reached for my hand "Please believe
me, Daimbert. I taught him a little fire magic a few years ago, when I just
thought he was an old spell-caster, but I never taught him that."
  "I know you didn't," I said. "But do you remember how you came to be
knocked unconscious?"
  "It's a jumble," she said after another long pause. "But--the last thing I
remember is a crevice opening in the earth under my feet. And at the
same time, I think--I think the same thing happened to your queen!"
  She gave a jerk and tried to sit up. I pushed her gently back (town. "But
the queen!" she said. "If these are her chambers, what's happened to her?
Did he kill her?"
   "No, no," I said reassuringly. "The queen is fine. I already told you, she
suggested herself that we put you here." But now I had come to the one
thing I had dreaded about Theodora's waking. "I saved her. The two of you
were in opposite directions from me, and I had only a fraction of a second,
not time to save you both." I had my face in the pillow again. "I swear
before God," I said indistinctly through the feathers, "that I love you more
than I do her."
  "I know, I know," she said and tentatively stroked my hair.
  "But you don't know," I said, pushing myself up again. "I didn't even
choose--there wasn't time. Afterwards, I had to ask myself why I turned to
her, rather than you. And I realized" --I hoped this didn't sound like an
accusation-- "I realized it was because I believed you could fly."
  Theodora thought about this for a moment. "I don't think I'm as good a
pupil as I should be. I would have needed a few seconds to put the spell
together. I can't remember even trying."
   She reached a hand slowly up to the bump on her head. "Did I hit a
stone? I can almost remember falling. One thing climbing teaches you is
how to fall. I must not have gotten my arms over my head in time." She
was irritated with herself at this lapse. "I seem to have completely ruined
my dress, too," she said ruefully. "Could you help me up so I can change?"
  I held her down with a hand on each shoulder. "You can't change here,
unless you were planning to put on something of the queens. And I don't
want you to move at all until I have the doctor back in to look at you
again. Even if your head is all right, I want to be sure about your back and
your neck. And," after a pause, "our daughter."
  She smiled somewhat sleepily. "She's fine. Babies are fairly well
protected the first few months. And you know I'm a witch, Daimbert," to
my worried expression. "This is something I can be certain about" She
yawned. "It isn't really morning yet. If you won't let me up, I'm going back
to sleep." She smiled, closed her eyes, and proceeded to do so. I turned off
the lamp and sat next to her while outside it gradually grew light.
  The queen and Vincent were married by the bishop in a quiet ceremony
the following morning, and our guests began to leave in the afternoon. No
one really had the heart to continue the festivities. The cook said darkly
that she hoped that those of us who stayed had good appetites, or a lot of
good food was going to go to waste.
   Paul stood at the gates, thanking each person individually for coming
and apologizing for their burns and bruises. Lucas slapped him on the
shoulder in good fellowship. "Now watch yourself, young king," he said
with just the faintest hint of jealousy. "You have to realize it can't all be
like this. You're not going to turn eighteen, be crowned king, and have a
chance to save your kingdom from peril all on the same day again!"
   I thought Paul recognized the irony of having the departing guests treat
as a glorious deed out of legend something that he himself considered the
worst experience of his life. But he said nothing about this. Some people,
however, may have wondered why he did not seem to smile.
    The Romneys were already gone. They had guessed all along, I thought,
that Sengrim and the ragged old magician were the same person, and they
didn't care to answer questions on this topic. They also did not want to
discuss the telephone call one of the Romney girls had placed to the royal
court of Caelrhon of behalf of the "magician," and they did not want any
further discussion on the topic of the red roan stallion. Sengrim had given
it to the Romneys as a bribe or a reward for their silence, I realized,
knowing that they would love the opportunity to tame such a superb horse
and that they would be able to get a substantial sum from the right buyer.
Vincent, I thought, must have paid them a good half of the spending
money his father allowed him in a year.
  We buried Sengrim in the castle cemetery, where kings of Yurt and
servants of Yurt had been buried for generations. The young royal
chaplain read the service with what I thought was exaggerated
seriousness. Paul listened while staring expressionless into the distance,
then tossed the first shovel full of dirt onto the coffin and went back to the
castle without waiting for the rest of us.
   By the end of the afternoon, the bishop's party were the only guests left.
I went up to the chaplain's old room to talk to Joachim.
  "Do you think Paul will be all right?" I asked. "I hope you haven't told
him that he's irretrievably damned for eternity for killing the wizard."
When Joachim didn't answer, I continued, "Come on, I know that in the
past you've felt the bishop wouldn't approve if you revealed the secrets of
the confessional, but you are bishop now."
   He took a deep breath, and his mouth moved slightly in what might
have been a smile. Joachim had always taken the oddest things for jokes.
"I still wouldn't reveal the 'secrets of the confessional,' as you put it," he
answered, "but I can tell you that I most certainly did not tell your King
that he was damned for eternity. To kill is always a sin, but this world has
been imperfect since the Fall, and one cannot always make a choice
between good and evil. Sometimes the only choice is between one sin and
a worse one. The worst possible sin for a king, sworn to defend his people,
is to let them be killed. He has a stain on his soul, but he should be able to
recover from it."
  "I hope you explained all that to Paul."
   He lifted an eyebrow. "Of course I did. Don't you have any confidence in
me as a priest?" I couldn't tell if he was serious or if this was one of his
jokes.
  We sat in silence for a moment. "How long can you stay?" I asked then.
  I'll wait until Theodora feels well enough to travel; that will give my new
dean a chance to get some experience on his own. I am very happy to see
her recovering so well."
  "As am I, thanks to your prayers."
  "And to your herbal magic," he replied, "and her own youth and health,
and maybe even the doctor's draughts."
  I hadn't asked Theodora again to marry me, feeling that it would be
unfair to press her in her weakened state, but I feared I already knew what
she would say. Even without my assent, we seemed inexorably to be
moving toward an arrangement where she and our daughter would live in
the cathedral city while I stayed in Yurt "But I want to ask you something,
Joachim. You seem remarkably unconcerned for a bishop about an
expectant mother refusing to marry."
   "I thought you knew that marriage was a sacrament, created by God.
The essence of a valid marriage is free consent. It would be a great sin to
force someone to marry against her will. I cannot approve, of course, of
unmarried women having children, but it would be even worse to force
such women into marriage."
  Clearly I wasn't going to get any help from him. "Your child was
conceived in sin, but then so were we all, ever since the children of Adam.
You do realize, Daimbert, that Theodora's unwillingness to marry you
gives you no license. You have repented sorely of what you have done, but
it would not be true penitence if you intended to do it again. I spoke with
her while we were riding here, and she agrees. Your relations from now on
must be of the purest."
  This was worse and worse. "But I love her!"
   "In this fallen world," Joachim continued, holding me with his eyes,
"love is often an opportunity for sin, but remember that love remains one
of the first gifts of God to His creation."
  "How would you know?" I asked bitterly. "You've never tried love
yourself,"
  "Of course not," he said in surprise. "I'm a priest."
   Considering how much trouble we had understanding each other, it was
a wonder that Joachim and I were friends at all. "Now that you're bishop,"
I said, "you're responsible for the whole of the twin kingdoms. You can't be
responsible for my soul anymore."
  "Of course," he said, immediately and contritely. "Forgive me. I was
speaking as though I were still your chaplain."
   This didn't help. I certainly wasn't going to discuss Theodora with
Yurt's new chaplain. "Don't you think you could look into getting us a
different one?"
   He looked amused but shook his head. "I've talked to your chaplain, and
there's really nothing wrong with him, Daimbert. He doesn't have an
impure mind, or whatever you once tried to tell me. He might never make
a great theologian but he's a perfectly competent priest" I bit my lip. "I
was afraid you'd say that." By talking about the young chaplain, he had
made it almost too late for me to say that I had no intention of keeping my
relations with Theodora of the purest. If she agreed with him, I would at
any rate have no choice. Besides, I didn't want to argue with Joachim. "I
hope you don't think that I have sunk irretrievably into sin."
   He looked at me a long moment without answering. "No," he said at
last. "Not irretrievably. Not that I know about. Not yet."
   Theodora and I walked slowly around the castle's hill in the early
morning two days later. She and the bishop's party would shortly be
leaving to ride back to the cathedral city.
  "Before you ask me," she said, "let me tell you the answers. Yes, I love
you very much and will never love anyone else. No, I can't marry you. No, I
can't come live with you here, getting in your way as Royal Wizard,
defying the bishop, and probably getting you into serious trouble with
your school. And no, I don't want to wander around from fair to fair doing
magic tricks."
  This did indeed seem to answer all possible questions in advance. I put
my arms around her and gently kissed the purple bruise on her forehead.
"You realize," I said, "that I am going to come visit you very often,"
   "Of course. I thought we already agreed on that" We continued walking
for a few minutes, then she said, "I do feel embarrassed as a witch that I
never realized the Royal Wizard of Caelrhon was the same person as the
old magician I'd known for years. What is your school going to do?"
  "I haven't had a chance to tell the school much more than that he's
dead. All the teachers have been up north, and I just spoke very briefly to
Zahlfast last night when he returned. I need to call them again. But I've
been trying to work some of it out myself. An enormous amount of
Sengrim's madness was directed personally toward me."
  She nodded without speaking.
   "Sengrim had hated me for years. He was a good wizard, really good, or
he would never have been able to master a gorgos. And he knew it, and it
ate into him that no one else knew it. I've always just considered it a sign
that even intelligent wizards can have errors in judgment that they asked
me to teach at the school, but for him it must have been the final blow to
his self-esteem."
  "It can only be a small proportion of the graduates who are ever invited
back to teach, even just a short series of lectures."
   "That's just it. But Sengrim didn't realize how inadequate I felt. All he
knew is that I've had my name in every copy of Ancient and Modern
Necromancy for years, because of accidentally inventing a telephone
attachment, and that I'd been invited back to the City and he hadn't. To
plot against me without suspicion, he decided to fake his own death.
   "It started with me, but it didn't end with me," I continued. "At this
point I'm guessing, but I think he turned his jealousy of me into hatred for
all the wizards at the school. And the Church was a tempting target, since
no wizard, other than me, would be very concerned about strange
apparitions on the cathedral."
  "What it comes down to, then," said Theodora, "is that you and Paul
have not only saved the people here but the church and your school."
  "Not at all," I said in surprise. "Well, maybe Paul has. But I can't take
any credit. All I did all summer, while Joachim thought I was trying to
find a way to protect the cathedral from peril, was to fall in love with you."
  She made a noise that was almost a snort.
   "All right," I conceded, "I did get the gorgos back up north. And I found
out that Lucas had gotten himself into a state where he wanted to discard
both priests and wizards, and I talked him out of it. But I'm going to have
to phrase it all rather delicately when I explain it to the Master of the
school."
  We kept on walking. "The bishop likes you," I said after a minute.
   "I still find him a little intimidating," she said, "but at the same time,
strangely, I find him a good person to talk to. Though one thing is odd,
Daimbert. Because I'd known he was your friend I'd expected him to be a
lot like you, but he isn't at all."
  "The priesthood doesn't allow people like me."
   She smiled and squeezed my arm. "Probably just as well. But I wanted
to ask you" more seriously now, "how many people in Yurt know about our
daughter. First you told the bishop, and now you told the queen! How
about the teachers at the school?"
  "So far," I said, smiling down at her, "we're up to two people."
  "And the school?"
   "I have no intention of telling them. They don't want married wizards,
but if you won't marry me then the rest is none of their business. Even if I
am at some level answerable to organized wizardry, I still, as a
theoretically competent wizard, have to be able to make my own decisions.
I'm not even going to tell them that I taught-- or tried to teach--a witch to
fly!"


                                     IV
   After watching the bishop's party ride away, I did not go back inside the
castle. Instead I went into the old king's rose garden and sat on a bench
for a while, then wandered up and down the rows of rosebushes, trying to
distract myself by remembering what he had long ago told me about
where he had obtained or how he had bred each one. The blue rose that he
had brought back from the East was blooming: an enormous, brilliant
sapphire flower. I could never forget how he obtained that one.
 After an hour I came out again and looked out across the fields of home.
Whatever else had come out of this summer, I seemed cured of being
homesick for the Yurt of years ago. If everything had stayed exactly the
same, Paul would not now be my king, and I would never have met
Theodora.
   Years of warding off thunderstorms during harvest time had made me
aware of what crops looked like when they were ready to be gathered in. I
smiled and estimated that the barley would be ripe in about a week. It was
time to review my weather spells.
   Off in the western sky I saw a speck approaching. My heart gave a hard
thump, but that was out of habit. I knew what was coming. Zahlfast had
said he would send the air cart for the red lizards. I walked around the hill
to where they still stood. I was actually rather pleased with my paralysis
spell, which I had not expected to last this long. But it might be hard to fit
them all into the cart.
   I looked again toward the speck, which was close enough now that I
could tell it was purple. But something was odd about it. I rubbed my eyes
and looked again, and this time there was no doubt. It was not one air cart
coming but two. So much, I thought, for getting my own air cart. Sengrim
must have had one which, it now appeared, the Master had appropriated
for the school's use.
   The two carts dipped, banked, and landed beside me. I loaded the
lizards carefully, packing the heads, wings, and legs in as well as I could.
There was just enough room left in the second cart for a man.
   I ducked back across the drawbridge and found Gwennie. "I was looking
for the constable," I told her, "but you'll do fine. I have to go down to the
City but I'll be back tonight or tomorrow." I did not trust Sengrim's lizards
not to come back to life if left to themselves. I had, perhaps unjustifiably,
come out of this business quite credibly, and I didn't want to ruin it now.
   Gwennie waved as the lizards and I took off. It took until early afternoon
to reach the white spires of the City and the school perched on the highest
central point. The lizards remained paralyzed the whole way. As the carts
landed in the school courtyard, I thought that these creatures might prove
useful after all for the students to practice their "antimonster" spells.
  As I unloaded the stiff bodies, with the help of a teaching assistant and
several students, the cheerful conversation and questions around me
suddenly stopped and I looked up to see two senior wizards: Zahlfast and
the white-bearded Master of the school.
  Zahlfast walked around the lizards slowly. "Nice paralysis spell,
Daimbert," he said in his schoolteacher voice.
  "I know you gave Zahlfast a quick overview on the telephone of what
happened," said the Master, "but I'd like to hear more. How about if you
come to my study?"
   Leaving the assistants to finish dealing with the lizards, I followed the
Master with a cold feeling in my chest. It seemed ominously significant
that the two wizards had appeared together. Although there had never
been any formal announcement, it had become clear over the last few
years that Zahlfast had gone from being the head of the transformations
faculty to being the de facto second in authority at the school.
   Inwardly I was in turmoil. While my own role in killing Sengrim, I was
now ashamed to admit, had not bothered me in the slightest, it suddenly
seemed highly likely to be a heavy black mark against me in the eyes of the
school. No one expected wizards to get along well with each other, but
killing each other was something else.
   In the Master's study, I told them everything that had happened as
honestly as I could, neither trying to justify or to boast, starting with the
lizards on the new cathedral tower, and including the gorges, the strangely
out-of-order telephone at the watch-station, and my final spell against
Sengrim. All I left out was Theodora. I ended with my guesses why he had
been so jealous of me. "One thing you can tell me," I concluded. "Was he
just very good at magic, or was he working with a demon?"
 Zahlfast and the Master looked at each other. "There is nothing that
makes us think," said Zahlfast, "that he'd taken the step into black magic."
  "Good," I said. "We gave him a Christian burial."
   "You may be correct," said the Master, ignoring this comment, "that he
was eaten up with jealousy. I must say I'd never known a student of mine
to summon a hundred dragons to attack the school. If your king hadn't
killed him, I wonder what his next effort might have been--but thanks to
you, we will never have to know!"
   Zahlfast said thoughtfully, "I wonder if we ought to keep somewhat
closer track of the wizards after they leave the school, to make sure
something like this doesn't happen again. We'd seen him this spring, only
a short time before he faked his death, but we believed him when he said
everything in Caelrhon was fine."
  "Was that his air cart?" I asked abruptly.
  "Why, yes. He told us that he'd been able to obtain a Purple flying beast
up in the land of wild magic. I presume he got it at the same time as he
was capturing the gorges and disabling the telephone system. The cart will
be very useful at the school now that he won't be needing it. "Just as I had
thought. The Master leaned toward me, his hands on his knees. "So. What
it all comes down to, young wizard, is that you defended your kingdom
successfully from someone who knew a lot more magic than you do."
  "And in the process," added Zahlfast, "you and your local bishop worked
out an agreement that priests and wizards ought to stop working against
each other."
   I looked at him sharply. I hadn't said anything about this, as not being
directly relevant.
  "Yes, we've heard about it," said Zahlfast with a smile. "You weren't the
only wizard in Caelrhon, you know."
  "Since Sengrim was so good at magic," I asked, changing the subject
because I didn't want to have to justify my friendship with Joachim, "why
was he still wizard of Caelrhon? If Yurt's the smallest of the western
kingdoms, Caelrhon has to be the second smallest."
  Zahlfast looked as though he was going to say something about how the
school did not discuss one wizard's career with another, but the Master
answered me without hesitation.
   "There's a lot more to being a good wizard than being good at spells.
Some wizards stay at their first posts for their entire lives, some move to
richer courts in just a few years, some stay at the school as assistants,
some come back to work at the school after years away. It all depends on a
number of factors, including the wishes of the wizard himself, how well
he's doing where he is, and what other opportunities may be available. In
his case, he'd applied for other positions over the years, but none of them
were quite right for him."
  "Including Yurt," I said. "I still don't understand why you made sure
that I became wizard here."
  "We told you that years ago," said Zahlfast. "You were the best qualified
person for the position."
   "Caelrhon will need a new Royal Wizard now, of course," said the
Master. "The king telephoned the school after the royal family realized
that Sengrim really wasn't a good representative of a school-trained
wizard. There is someone we had in mind for the position, and we would
like your opinion. His name is Evrard, and I believe he was briefly ducal
wizard of Yurt fifteen or twenty years ago."
 I was surprised but pleased. "That's a fine idea. He'll be a good Royal
Wizard of Caelrhon."
  "And that brings us," said the Master, "to the real issue."
   This was it, I thought, the reprimand for which I had been waiting the
last hour. My only hope was that even if they wanted to install someone
else as wizard of Yurt, they couldn't do so over the objections of Paul and
the queen.
  "We want you to stay here and teach at the school."
   This was both unexpected and anticlimactic. "But I was just here this
spring," I said. "I would have thought I did a poor enough job inspiring
your technical division students that you wouldn't want me to try again
already."
   "It seemed like a good idea at the time," said Zahlfast, "and in fact I
think those students will get more long-term advantage out of your
lectures than you realize. But you may well be right that the technical
division isn't the best place for you. You could teach in one of the other
faculties this fall."
  I shook my head. "I appreciate the offer, but I really can't. I've been
away from Yurt much too much this year anyway. Paul's just become king,
and he needs his Royal Wizard with him as he adjusts to his new
responsibilities."
  "Maybe you don't understand what we're saying," said Zahlfast. "We're
not asking you to stay at the school for a series of lectures. We're asking
you to join the permanent faculty."
   This was certainly not what I expected. I looked from one to the other,
my mouth doubtless gaping. "But--" Out of several things I might have
said I chose, "But I thought the two of you were going to punish me for
being implicated in the death of another wizard."
  Zahlfast started to chuckle. "So you told us the whole story, expecting at
any moment that we would accuse you of being a traitor to organized
wizardry?"
  "And you're not going to?" I said cautiously.
   "Haven't you been listening?" asked the Master, the twinkle in his
frost-blue eyes pronounced, "The school certainly doesn't want its
graduates killing each other, but the first oath you all take is to serve
humanity. Very few wizards are ever asked to join the permanent faculty.
We very much want you."
   I had again the feeling that I had irretrievably lost my way, but now it
was worse. Not only had I become lost wandering in a wood, but the forest
floor itself had been whipped out from under me. "But I have just been
talking to the queen about my position," I said. This point at least was
firm. "She and King Paul very much want me to continue as Royal Wizard
of Yurt."
  Zahlfast waved away this objection with a hand.
  "I have to warn you," I went on, "I'm as interested in establishing
cordial relations with the bishop of the twin kingdoms of Yurt and
Caelrhon as he is with wizardry."
   "That is in fact part of it," said Zahlfast. "Maybe we've been too
dismissive in the past. Even though religion is inferior to magic, priests
are still part of the humanity we serve. I can't abide the bishop of the City
myself, but he won't be bishop there indefinitely. We'll be in the City far
longer than he is, and when his successor takes over it might be a good
time to start establishing better relations. You'd be the perfect person to
do it."
  "So, what do you say, Daimbert?" said the Master cheerfully. "We want
you to join us permanently at the school, not because you're good at
certain spells, but because you're a good wizard. You're not like most
wizards, but more and more we've come to realize that that can be an
advantage. We'll even let you have a hand in choosing an appropriate
young wizard to succeed you in Yurt. Will you do it?"
  "No."
  Not an explanation, not an excuse, just a straight negative. The
monosyllable hung in the air, out before I even had a chance to consider.
But I had no intention of calling it back.
  Zahlfast looked both startled and disturbed. "Maybe we haven't
explained it clearly enough."
   "You've made yourself very clear," I said. "But I wouldn't be a good
teacher." This wasn't the only reason, but it would do for a start. "If I were
going to train young wizards, I'd have to know five times the magic I do.
The only way I got through the lectures this spring was by emphasizing
ways of thinking rather than content. Even after close to twenty years past
my own graduation, there are probably major areas where the average
new graduate knows more than I do--and I don't just mean in the
technical division."
   Zahlfast looked at me thoughtfully. "Encyclopedic knowledge of spells
isn't what makes someone a good teacher of magic. If that was all that was
required, we wouldn't even bother teaching--we'd just make the students
memorize Thaumaturgy A to Z. It's only the bad teachers who think they
know everything. Every good teacher has stood in front of a class one time
or another and felt like a fraud trying to explain something."
  This did not at all accord with my memories of the enormously
knowledgeable teachers at the school. It slowly sank in that I really was
being asked, and by people who recognized a major proportion of my
shortcomings, to come back and be their colleague.
  "We can start you off easily," said the Master, "just give you classes
where you feel comfortable already. You will, after all, be the most junior
wizard on the faculty by a considerable margin, and we don't want to
overburden you. What do you say?"
  "It's still no."
   I wondered if I had looked as distressed to Theodora when she kept
refusing my proposals as the two older wizards now did. "I recognize the
honor," I said. "In fact, I'm almost overwhelmed by the honor. And I
recognize that every wizard has a duty to institutionalized wizardry to
serve it as best he can. But I can't leave Yurt."
  "Why not?"
  "I love the people there."
   They looked at each other as though hoping the other would
understand. "Maybe there's something you haven't thought about," said
Zahlfast slowly. "Wizards live far longer than ordinary humans. If you
become too close to the people there, you'll just be hurt when you have to
leave them behind."
  "Fine," I said. "Invite me to the school in fifty years."
  In fifty years, Joachim and the queen would be dead, and Theodora and
Paul, assuming they were still alive, would be happily watching their
grandchildren grow up and would no longer need me. In Theodora's case, I
reminded myself, they would also be my grandchildren. I had a sudden
doubt whether fifty years would be long enough.
   Zahlfast thought the same thing. "If you decide to stay in Yurt because
of the people, Daimbert, you do have to realize that new people are going
to appear, and they may engage your affections as well. Now you say you
want to stay in part because of your king--King Paul, isn't that
right?--and yet I don't think he was even born when you first went to
Yurt."
  "We're asking you," said the Master slowly, "because we think you have
unique abilities that ought to be put to the use of wider wizardry."
   I shook my head. "It wouldn't work. You're hoping that I'd be able to
open communications with the bishop of the City. But I have no inherent
ability to make priests give up their suspicions of wizards. All I have is my
friendship with Joachim, the new bishop of Caelrhon. If the church and
wizardry are going to start working together, you'll have to start with him
and me, not with the bishop of the City and a representative of the
school."
  I could have added that the reason I had, even if highly reluctantly, let
Theodora refuse to marry me was because she thought I would be more
happy and comfortable as Royal Wizard of Yurt. I had not given up life
with her and our daughter to go live in the City.
  "You sound quite definite," said the Master.
  "I am quite definite. You seem to think I'd be good for the school
because I'm different from most wizards. Maybe I'm also different in that I
don't consider a post here the most desirable thing in the world."
  "I'm afraid this isn't what we expected," said the Master.
   "That's all right," I said, forcing a smile. "It wasn't what I expected
either."
  "You seem fairly firm about this," said Zahlfast, "but give it some
thought. It will be fine if you want to change your mind."
  "I will indeed give it some thought," I answered. This was an
understatement. "Don't forget to ask me again in fifty years."
   "Then let me ask you something else in the meantime,'' said the Master.
"Is there something we could do for you or give you? You may not
appreciate this properly, but you did save the school from tremendous
peril by your warning."
   I thought for a moment. Everything I had hoped for this summer had
reached a dead end. Even though Joachim and I might still be friends now
that he was bishop, I would see him even less than I had before. The queen
was lost to me forever, and Theodora did not want to marry me. There was
just one thing left I had wanted.
  "Yes," I said slowly and smiled. "You can give me one of the air carts."



                             EPILOGUE
  I took off in my air cart in late afternoon, but instead of heading toward
Yurt I flew southeast from the City. With Sengrim's death, everything
seemed wrapped up to everyone else's satisfaction, but not to mine. After
half an hour I saw a castle's towers rising before me in the darkening air.
More than twice the size of the royal castle of Yurt, it perched on a high
pinnacle above a fertile river valley. As I approached magic lamps winked
on in all the windows.
   The air cart stopped abruptly, jerking me forward. The wings continued
to flap, but we made no progress. I probed for spells and discovered that
the air had been made solid: impermeable, as far as I could tell, to any
sort of magical flying creature, but not, I discovered as I thrust an
experimental hand through, to me. It looked as if someone had been
taking lessons from the nixie.
   I set the air cart down at the base of the rocky pinnacle and ascended
the steps, my heart beating fast. Guards with halberds barred my way at
the top. "I would like to speak to Elerius, your Royal Wizard," I said, but
already I could see a black-bearded figure coming up behind them. He
must have been warned by the triggering of the protective spells he had
set up to guard his castle from creatures from the land of wild magic.
  "How delightful to see you, Daimbert," he said, as hearty and
welcoming as good old Book-Leech on the mountaintop in the
borderlands. I just wished I could believe him equally sincere. "Come to
my study. And I understand that congratulations are in order!"
   Then I had reached him before the news that I had refused the position
at the school. "I turned the Master down," I said casually. "How much of a
role did you play in setting up the offer?"
   This startled him. He stopped dead in the middle of asking a
deferentially hovering servant to bring us tea, then whisked me up the
stairs into his study and slammed the door. I had never seen so many
books in one place in my life. In a moment Elerius had regained his
cheerful composure, but I could tell it was not the same.
   "Zahlfast and the Master must have been quite surprised!" he said,
smiling while his hazel eyes looked me over intently. "How could you
refuse an offer to join the permanent faculty--something they have offered
no one in thirty years? Is Yurt so charming, or do you have your eye on a
bigger kingdom somewhere else? Or," and he paused for a few seconds, "is
that witch in Caelrhon more appealing than the City?"
  That was the final evidence I needed. That he would threaten--even
obliquely threaten--to blackmail me meant I must have information about
him that he wanted kept secret.
   "Don't smirk, Elerius," I said quietly. "You can guess and insinuate all
you like. But if you push me too far I'll just tell the Master I'm leaving
organized wizardry to spend the rest of my life doing illusions at fairs--
after I tell him that you were behind Sengrim every step of the way."
   We were interrupted before he could answer by the entry of servants
with tea. It was quite a production: four servants in livery, one to open the
door, one to carry the teapot, one to carry the tray with cups and spoons,
and one to carry a plate of gingerbread puffs baked in brightly colored
foils. I bit into one when it became clear that the servants would not go
until everything had been found satisfactory. Not bad, although Yurt's
cooks were better.
   Elerius had had time to prepare his response by the time the servants
finally left. "I did befriend Sengrim a few years ago," he said
good-naturedly, pouring tea, "back when he was trying to persuade the
school that we needed to do more with fire magic and no one else would
listen to him. Everyone at the school knows about that. But that hardly
means I was 'behind him every step of the way!"
   "It means you brought a fanged gorges to Caelrhon which nearly killed
me," I said, looking at him levelly over my teacup. "Sengrim would never
have managed that on his own. He had to be working with a demon-- and
Zahlfast said he wasn't--or else an extremely good wizard. Theodora--the
witch you seem to know about-- touched a wizard's mind in the cathedral
city, but this wizard was not anyone she recognized. And that means it
wasn't Sengrim, not even in his disguise as the old magician. Both the
cathedral cantor and the construction foreman mentioned dealing with a
wizard, but somebody young, not old like Sengrim."
  Elerius's teacup gave a sudden rattle in its saucer. I looked at him
sharply but he only smiled, waiting for me to continue.
   "And then Zahlfast and the Master seemed well informed about the
bishop's inaugural sermon, saying there was another wizard there. They
didn't say who, but it must have been someone they trusted. You knew all
along I was in Caelrhon, because you sent me a letter urging me to leave,
realizing full well it would have exactly the opposite effect; I should have
been suspicious at the time that you even knew I was there. The Master
forgave me for being indirectly responsible for Sengrim's death. Did you
think he would forgive you for being directly responsible for mine?"
  "You were never in serious danger, Daimbert," said Elerius, passing the
gingerbread puffs. This wasn't how I remembered it. "I was of course
interested to see how you would do against a gorges with your particular
style of magic, but I was there, disguised, among the townspeople." The
image of a face I had seen in the crowd, past Lucas's shoulder, as I lay on
the paving in front of the cathedral suddenly clicked into place. "Another
minute in your fight with the gorges, or another move by Caelrhon's crown
prince, and I would have had to intervene." I didn't like his timing; there
hadn't been any minutes or moves to spare. "And you would never have
been in any danger at all if you hadn't been so precipitate. Sengrim was
intending to defeat the gorges himself--with my help, of course."
   "You say Sengrim intended to overcome a gorgos he had himself
brought from the land of wild magic," I said slowly, peeling foil with
fingers that I kept from trembling by sheer will. "You realize, Elerius, that
this makes no sense whatsoever. So far you've helped a renegade wizard
turn on his own employer, attack a cathedral, summon a hundred dragons
from the land of magic, and nearly kill scores of people at the coronation
of the king of Yurt. This is scarcely suitable in the school's best graduate! I
came to talk to you before telling the Master any of this, but if you don't
have an adequate explanation I'm heading straight back to the city
tonight."
   Unless you imprison me, I thought, keeping my thoughts well shielded,
or unless you instructed the servants to poison the gingerbread puffs.
   "A good idea, talking to me first," said Elerius with a remarkably
genuine smile. "I know there have been a few occasions in the past,
Daimbert, where you ended up looking like a fool. It's this habit of acting
on instinct, you know. It may serve you well in your personal sort of
improvisational magic, but it's a poor guide in ordinary affairs. No sense
letting the school think they had a narrow escape when you turned down
their position!"
   I waited silently, knowing he would have to say more. Outside it was
fully dark, and the magic lights were reflected in the windows. On the wall
hung Elerius's diploma from the school, nearly six feet long, with his name
written in letters of fire at the top and the lower half dense with mentions
of honors, distinctions, and areas of special merit. Stars twinkled all
around the edges. Mine in my chambers in Yurt had my name and the
twinkling stars and nothing else.
   "Sengrim, as I mentioned," Elerius said at last, "first came to my
attention several years ago when he was trying to persuade the school that
they ought to offer at least a series of lectures on fire magic--with him
teaching it, of course. The Master wasn't interested; there's that one
course I occasionally teach myself on the old magic, and he seemed to feel
that was enough. Besides, I believe he wasn't sure Sengrim would be an
appropriate mentor for the young wizards--he was acting rather strangely
even then. He wouldn't even say how he'd learned fire magic. . . ."
  "I know how he did," I said shortly. "Go on."
   Elerius lifted sharply peaked eyebrows at me but continued. "I was
interested myself, however, both for my own course and because I believe
wizards shouldn't reject anything that might prove useful. And that's why
Sengrim came to consider me his friend, and why he turned to me this
spring when he quarreled with his prince, pretended in a fit of pique to
blow himself up, and then decided rather belatedly to try to reestablish
himself at Caelrhon. I agreed, somewhat reluctantly I must say, to
Sengrim's plan to prove to his king and prince what a good wizard he
really was. I have to admit I originally thought his plan as nonsensical as
you do: first to bring a monster from the land of magic and then to
overcome it in a very public setting to show his competence, amazing
everyone by his extremely timely return from the dead. But when it
became clear that he would do it with or without me, I decided it would be
better to help."
   "So you decided after talking to the construction foreman," I said
slowly, "that a gorges would serve his purposes nicely, and you helped him
go up to the borderlands and capture one--as well as a horse for the
Romneys, who he was afraid might reveal that the ragged old magician in
the area was in fact the supposedly deceased Royal Wizard in disguise.
You helped with that disguise too, didn't you--something thorough
enough to fool even another wizard. Just out of curiosity, exactly where
near Caelrhon did you manage to imprison Sengrim's gorges?"
  "There's a little grove a mile outside of town, a grove thick with
unchanneled magic. It wasn't difficult to channel it, to make a chamber in
the ground under the spring where the gorges could be bound until it was
wanted."
  I closed my eyes for a second. I had been heedless of a number of things
the day I went there with Theodora.
   Elerius poured out the last of the tea. "I'm afraid, Daimbert," he
continued, "that you rather spoiled Sengrim's plan for him. It was
supposed to end with him triumphantly telling Prince Lucas that even the
bravest and most able kings needed wizards to protect their kingdoms
from wild magic, and being welcomed again into the royal court. Instead
it ended with the prince threatening to kill you. Even though it could just
as easily have been him, rather than feeling gratitude for your fast action
Sengrim became extremely bitter toward you. And I understand the two of
you had had some sort of earlier misunderstanding?"
  I did not deign to answer.
  "He was already furious with the school," Elerius continued, "which he
thought had unfairly given you opportunities he deserved himself. I
seemed to be the only school-trained wizard he trusted as he started
imagining plots against him from the faculty and trying to create
counterplots. At any rate, at this point it became obvious that he was
growing seriously deranged, so I thought it best to distance myself from
him. The rest, including the dragons and the unfortunate attack on your
king's coming of age festivities, was entirely his own work. I was pleased to
hear that you had once again triumphed"
   He fell silent but looked at me as though waiting for my reaction. "So
this is your entire story?" I said at last. The story you would have told the
Master if 1 accused you of being involved with Sengrim ?"
  "Of course. Truth is always wisest."
  "What about the rumors of the school plotting to put wizards in every
castle and manor to seize control from the aristocracy?"
  Elerius shrugged. "Rumors are always flying on one topic or another."
  "How do you explain leaving to his own wild devices a wizard you
thought had become deranged?"
   "You know I have no authority over any other wizard." Elerius shook his
head regretfully. "I have sometimes tried to persuade the Master and
Zahlfast that the school needs tighter discipline, but as long as they keep
only a loose, almost informal organization, there is really nothing a wizard
can do in a situation like this." He set down his empty cup and rose briskly
to his feet. "Well, did you plan to return to that little kingdom of yours
tonight, Daimbert, or would you like to stay here? I'm sure a set of
chambers could be arranged."
   I gave him my best wizardly glare from under my eyebrows and
remained seated. I had suspected Theodora of manipulating me coldly,
Lucas of bringing the gorges to Caelrhon himself, and Vincent of plotting
to murder Paul and the queen. All of them had managed to talk me out of
my suspicions. But someone, if not the princes of Caelrhon, had been
working with Sengrim. And I would not give up these suspicions so easily.
  Elerius looked down at me quizzically. "I'm sorry, Daimbert. I should
have realized when I saw you devouring the gingerbread that you had not
had any dinner. Shall I order you a tray?"
   I was not going to be talked out of valid suspicions and I was not going
to be patronized. "Sit down," I said as though this were my study rather
than his.
   Surprisingly, he sat down at once. Emboldened by this small triumph, I
leaned forward, still glaring. "Let me point out a few things that your
explanation doesn't cover. You were not just trying to assist Sengrim in a
plan to recover his position. You were using him for your own purposes."
  "And what might these purposes have been?" Elerius asked as though I
had suggested something rather amusing.
   "You want to establish a firmer organization at the school. Zahlfast told
me that at the beginning of the summer, and you just said the same thing
yourself. The best way you knew to make the school draw tighter together
was to make it feel threatened: threatened by an embittered wizard turned
renegade, by a church that hated wizardry, by aristocrats threatening to
dismiss all their wizards, and by dragons coming over the border. This all
started without any help from you, when Prince Lucas quarreled with his
Royal Wizard because Sengrim stopped him from a fight in which he
would have been bested at once. But you took advantage of the situation
because it fit in well with your own long-term plans. Did you think I would
not find out that you yourself had installed the far-seeing telephone on the
mountain at the borderlands--the phone that wouldn't work?"
   "I heard about that," said Elerius easily. "But the spells for the
far-seeing attachment have always been a little haphazard. Didn't you
invent it yourself, Daimbert?"
  I ignored this latest jab. Yurt's own telephones had worked perfectly for
years.
   "And what better way," I continued, "to make the school feel itself
beleaguered by the church and the aristocracy than actually to make
certain that it was? You showed up at Caelrhon's royal court in disguise,
telling the king you were a City nobleman who had learned of the schools
"plots' against aristocrats, plots you invented in the hope-- nearly
realized--that threatened royal courts would turn against the school. I had
been wondering for some time who this purported aristocratic friend of
the Master's might have been, and I only realized now, when you
mentioned being in the cathedral city, that Lucas's description matched
you. I gather you play the nobleman well, Elerius. Haven't I heard some
strange rumors about your parentage? Perhaps a birth on the wrong side
of the blanket in some royal castle . . ."
   But he did not take the bait, only following me intently, his eyebrows
slightly raised, almost as though--pleased?
   I pushed on. "By having me, a wizard, in the city of Caelrhon all summer
even if no other wizard was in evidence, and by having the gorges appear
at the old bishop's funeral, you were certain the priests would blame the
monster on institutionalized magic. Your only miscalculation was not
taking Joachim into account-- the dean of the cathedral, now bishop. He's
the most powerful churchman in two kingdoms, but he's also my friend."
  "That is something about you I have found intriguing, Daimbert,"
Elerius said as though in calculation.
  "And which you mentioned to Zahlfast when urging him to hire me
permanently at the school. This is the one aspect I haven't worked out yet:
why you want me on the faculty, when your ultimate purpose is to
reorganize the wizards' school--with yourself in charge!"
  Elerius leaned back in his chair and laughed. "This is even better than I
imagined, Daimbert! I enjoy watching your mind work. So now you
suspect me of going renegade and hatching a plot to overthrow the school?
  You really should have your friend the bishop say a suitable prayer of
gratitude that you didn't take this story to the Master!"
  "It's more subtle than that," I said, watching him without smiling. "You
aren't like Sengrim; you haven't lost control of your mind and your magic.
You haven't even forgotten your oaths to help humanity. If you had, by
now I'd probably either be dead or a frog--or both.
  "This was all carefully planned," I continued. "You meant no harm to
anyone, or at least that's what you tell yourself. But you have a vision of a
drastically reorganized wizards' school, one in which the students follow a
highly structured, highly rigorous program--a program from which I
would never have graduated-- and where the school continues to maintain
careful control even after the young wizards have taken up their posts.
Through no coincidence, you would be at the head of this school."
   I paused to let him say something, but he only continued to listen,
intent tawny eyes holding mine and an indulgent smile on his lips.
  "Hints of danger from priests and aristocrats, you realized, would not
be enough to give you the chance to remake the school in your own image.
But again Sengrim gave you an opportunity. You knew I would work out
eventually that he brought the gorges to Caelrhon--and that even if he had
overcome his bitterness toward me enough for rational conversation, he
would have been too proud to mention your role in helping him. So you
decided--and quite rightly--that if dragons attacked the school Sengrim
would be blamed for that too."
   "Then I am supposed to be responsible for those dragons?" He was still
giving his indulgent smile.
   "Sengrim could never have called that many by himself. He was in Yurt,
with the lizards he had learned to master several years ago, when someone
else brought dragons over the border. You didn't go to help the masters
fight them even though your kingdom is so close to the City. You have
spells of your own around this castle that would have warded off dragons.
I'm sure you were able to persuade yourself that none of the faculty would
actually be killed, that fighting dragons in the City streets would be messy
but not actually fatal if everyone kept their heads and worked together.
But a battered school with a badly wounded faculty would need someone
to step in and take charge, someone who would quickly assure that
wizards, rather than being just one of the 'three who rule the world would
be the only rulers."
  The late summer evening was growing cool in this tower high above the
plain. Elerius snapped his fingers, said two words, and lit the kindling in
the fireplace. The flames quickly caught the dry wood. When he looked
toward me expectantly, I said a few words of my own in the Hidden
Language to light a tiny cascade of flames in the air before us.
   "Not bad, Daimbert," he said appreciatively as they flickered back out
of existence. "Did you come here then to match spells with me?"
   I shook my head hard. "Your spells are better than mine. I've always
known that That's why I want to know why you seem to want me, whose
only strength is in improvisation, in a school that you plan to remodel as
rigorous, standardized, and monolithic."
   "Don't assume your imaginings about my 'plans' are real, Daimbert," he
said slowly, looking into the fire and not smiling any longer. "You have
speculation but not a shred of evidence. If you tried to take any of this to
the Master, you realize, I would only deny it all, and you would come out
looking an even bigger fool than you did all those years ago at Zahlfast's
transformations practical."
  He spoke so soberly that for a moment I began to doubt my own reason,
and I wished wildly for Theodora's ring of invisibility so I could escape
before I embarrassed myself any further.
 "But," and he turned his eyes sharply toward me, "let's assume for a
moment that you're right."
  I took a deep breath and let it out again.
   "Don't you think the idea deserves better than your dismissal? For
generations before the Black Wars, the aristocrats controlled the western
kingdoms and used their strength and even their wizards against other
kings and lords. The result was the bloody wars that so sickened the old
wizards that they, contentious and individualistic as they were, finally
banded together to stop the fighting. So we know that aristocrats can't be
allowed to make the great decisions. And the priests with their prating
about sin and morality would not be any better. So who does that leave
but the wizards?"
  "Why does anyone have to rule the world?" I demanded "Why can't the
townsmen rule their towns, the kings their individual kingdoms, and the
priests their churches?"
   "Since in fact we already are the ultimate rulers," Elerius went on
without answering my question, "then it would be best to plan ahead,
rather than simply reacting to events. The Master did an excellent job in
setting up the school in the first place, coordinating the teaching of
wizardry, making sure young wizards learned magic's responsibilities as
well as its spells. But the time has come to think of the next necessary
steps. Those of us of the next generation, trained in the school and its
methods but with visions of our own, are ready to go beyond the victories
already won." He paused and smiled. "You realize, of course, I am
speaking hypothetically."
  "And what would I, hypothetically, have to do with all this?"
   "You and I have crossed paths before, Daimbert," said Elerius
thoughtfully, stroking his beard. "You have an uncanny knack of
disrupting my plans. If I actually had intended to use dragons to attack
the school, then I might be quite angry with you for warning Zahlfast in
time. Some wizards in such a situation, I might imagine, would realize
that you had most likely not told anyone in the City that you were coming
here, and that with the king of Yurt thinking you were still at the school,
the school thinking you were back in Yurt, and the witch in Caelrhon
thinking you had loved her and left her, it might be a very long time before
anyone came to my kingdom to ask awkward questions. . . ."
  "So far," I said evenly, clenching my fists until the nails bit into my
palms, "you have tried denial, blackmail, and threats. All this has done is
make me more certain than ever that I'm right."
   "And you're holding out for bribery?" Elerius asked, showing his teeth
in a smile. "Since this is all hypothetical and indeed quite imaginary, I can
say honestly that you are providing me one of the most entertaining
evenings, Daimbert, I have had in a long time. But I was about to add that
I am not one of the wizards who reacts simply by eliminating all potential
opposition. I already told you that I believe one should not reject anything
that could prove useful. Anyone who has the ability to thwart me--even if
not always intentionally--has strengths it might be best to have on my
side."
  "This is the bribe, then?" I asked, fists still clenched along my sides. "I
get hired onto the permanent faculty of the school now, in part so you can
keep a closer eye on me, and then you promise that when you take over I
can stay?"
  "Wouldn't you find this a tempting bribe, Daimbert-- if I were making
one?"
   "No. I am Royal Wizard of Yurt. And I do not want to be part of any
attempt to control the rest of the world. I know you are a better wizard
than I could be in a thousand years, but even you can't control it. If I have
thwarted you, it's not because I have outmaneuvered you. It's because the
world, and that includes me, is much too messy and unpredictable,
impossible for even the best wizardly planning to guide successfully." I
rose abruptly to my feet. Get out while I was still alive. "Thank you so
much for tea, but I should get home to Yurt tonight."
   Elerius rose too and went to the door, the gracious host, to see me out. I
followed him, feeling sweat trickling down my neck. Almost I was almost
out of here to safety, but he paused with his hand on the latch.
   "Don't take accusations to the school, Daimbert, when you have no
proof," he said quietly. "You can take pride in having kept organized
wizardry unchanged if that was your goal. But I would still like to be your
friend. Think over these ideas how the school might be improved. Anyone
who can overcome a fanged gorges with spells that shouldn't work,
become friends with a bishop, and make such imaginative and highly
romantic guesses about what I might have been planning, deserves closer
study!" He opened the door. "Have a pleasant trip home--but keep in
touch."


                               The End