‘We need to work on the saddle,’ the armourer said through the crystals. ‘Give it back to me. I think I see what’s wrong.’
Back and forth the saddle went over the next eightnight between the armoury and the horse yard. Each time it returned, it was heavier and stiffer, until finally the leather ended up stretched over a wooden frame. The cinch had spawned two additional straps. One went round the horse’s chest, one round its behind, and the new side loops included iron bars to keep them open and stiff. Although Aur disliked this new version of its usual tack, Rhodorix heartily approved.
With the armourer and Andariel in tow, he rode down to the first terrace, then galloped along its length once. As he walked the horse back to the waiting men of the People, he tried standing with his weight on the new, reinforced loops, then sat back down and howled with laughter. He walked the snorting, dancing horse over to Andariel, who was watching from the side of the courtyard. Still grinning, Rhodorix leaned down to retrieve the black crystal from the captain.
‘A man could swing a sword from horseback like this,’ Rhodorix said. ‘It’ll take some practice, but I think we can put the fear of our gods into the Meradan with these.’ He leaned forward and patted Aur’s neck. ‘Whist! You’ll get used to it in a bit, lad.’ He straightened up again and looked at the grinning armourer. ‘A splendid job! Captain, can he make us more of these things?’
Andariel spoke briefly with the armourer, who nodded his agreement. ‘He says,’ Andariel said, ‘that he’ll set his men to work on them this very afternoon.’
‘I have good news for you,’ Hwilli said. ‘Master Jantalaber is going to take the cast off this afternoon.’
‘Splendid!’ Gerontos grinned at her over the white crystal, which he was holding. ‘Although, alas, I’ll miss seeing you every day.’
‘Oh, you’re not rid of me yet! Wait till you see what your leg looks like.’
‘Good.’ His smile turned soft.
Hwilli set the black crystal down on the table beside the bed. She felt uneasy enough to gather up her supplies and hurry out of the sickroom. Brothers always squabble, she thought, but I don’t want them squabbling over me.
When she returned to the herbroom, Nalla was standing at the table, studying a row of freshly pulled plants.
‘What are those?’ Hwilli said.
‘Comfrey,’ Nalla said, ‘I think, but the roots don’t look right to me.’
Hwilli glanced at them. ‘They’ve grown in very poor soil, I’d say. The rest of the plant certainly looks like comfrey.’
‘Ah, you’re right! I hadn’t thought of that. How’s your patient doing?’
‘The master’s going to cut the cast off this afternoon, and then I’ll know. I hope he’s healing well. He’s been terribly bored, and it worries me.’
Nalla looked up with a grin. ‘What’s this, he’s interested in you too?’
Hwilli felt her face burn. ‘My heart belongs to Rhodorix,’ she said. ‘And only him.’
‘It’s not your heart that’s the problem, but a very different portion of his anatomy.’ Nalla grinned again. ‘He’s not bad-looking, really, despite those funny eyes.’
‘I’m not going to –’
‘Who said anything about you? I was thinking of providing him a little distraction.’
Nalla’s grin turned so wicked that Hwilli had to laugh.
‘Just be careful of his leg,’ she said. ‘Don’t undo all my work.’
When the cast came off, the leg had shrivelled from sheer lack of use, and the skin lying underneath had turned as wrinkled as a toad’s. Master Jantalaber brought all his apprentices into Gerontos’s quarters to see the effects of wearing a cast for nearly two months, tested the leg, pronounced the break mended, but urged him, through the crystals, to keep his weight off it as much as possible.
‘You’ll be fine by the spring, lad,’ the master said, ‘if you’re careful now. Hwilli, let’s go to the herbroom. I’ll give you a recipe for salve that you can make up for his skin.’
Hwilli followed the master into the herbroom as the other apprentices dispersed. Jantalaber went to the massive herbal on the lectern, thumbed through its heavy parchment pages, and opened it flat at a particular page.
‘There you are, Hwilli,’ he said. ‘The formula I promised you. Before you start preparing it, though, tell me how your work with Nalla’s going.’
‘Nalla says I’m doing well,’ Hwilli said, ‘but I think she’s just being kind. I can remember all the information she gives me, but I can’t put it to use.’
‘That takes time, a great deal of time. Keep at it, and the results will come. Can you see the elemental spirits yet?’
‘No, I’m afraid not.’
‘In good time, then, in good time.’
Hwilli could only hope that the ability would come. It galled her to think that the tiniest child among the People could see the Wildfolk, while to her and her kind, they existed only as tales and jests. And what would ‘good time’ be? Compared to the long lives of the People, she had very little to spare. A few days later, however, her worry proved unnecessary.
‘After dinner tonight,’ Jantalaber told her, ‘Maraladario wants to see you.’
Maraladario, the head of the dweomermasters’ guild, the most powerful mage that anyone in the Seven Princedoms had ever known – Hwilli caught her breath in an audible gasp. The master smiled at her.
‘She won’t eat you,’ Jantalaber said. ‘In fact, she wants to give you her blessing.’
Hwilli found herself unable to answer. She laid her hand on her throat and wondered if she’d gone pale. Finally, after another gasp for breath, she managed to say, ‘I’m so honoured.’
The Tower of the Sages stood at the north end of the main palace, opposite the Tower of the Priests. As they entered through the door at its base, Master Jantalaber cast a silver dweomer light on the end of his staff, which he held up before him like a torch. Steep wooden stairs switchbacked up past landings, each with a chamber door marked with various sigils, none of which Hwilli could decipher.
Maraladario lived at the very top. The stairs ended at a landing of polished wood in four different browns, laid in a pattern of triangles. In the silvery light, the pattern rose up into interlocking pyramids, or so it appeared, rather than forming a flat surface. As her shadow fell across it, Hwilli noticed that the pyramids seemed to flatten under the shadow’s weight.
Master Jantalaber stepped onto the landing boldly. When he didn’t trip and fall, Hwilli followed him and discovered that the floor was indeed perfectly flat. The red door to Maraladario’s suite bore no sigil or decoration. When Jantalaber knocked, the dweomermaster herself opened it and ushered them into a wedge-shaped room lit by golden light. Although Hwilli had seen her from a distance many times, she’d never been this close to the great sage. Maraladario was tall, even for a woman of the People, and slender with long, delicate fingers. She wore her jet-black hair bound up in a green gauzy scarf that matched her eyes, but one long tendril hung down over her cheek. Her long blue tunic shimmered as she moved.
‘Come sit.’ Her voice was soft, pleasantly husky. ‘Would you care for wine?’
‘None for me,’ Jantalaber said.
‘Nor me either, mistress,’ Hwilli said. ‘Though I thank you.’
‘A prudent girl, and well-spoken.’ Maraladario grinned at her.
Hwilli bobbed her head and hoped she looked humble rather than