Guild Mage: Apprentice-Chapter 105. May Not Feed the Wicked

It was dark by the time Liv went downstairs to join her friends, and the oil lamps had been lit. Someone - Liv wasn’t certain who - had settled them all in a sitting room, and the girls were nestled under a mass of warm furs, all on a cushioned bench. Arjun must have slipped out, after Auris had passed, because he’d taken a seat in a nearby chair. There was a pot of tea on the table, and Liv poured herself a cup in something of a daze. The only person she did not see was Keri.

“I’m so sorry, Liv,” Rosamund said, pushing aside the furs to rise and embrace her. Sidonie and Tephania followed in turn, and for just a moment, Liv allowed herself to close her eyes and be comforted. Then, she took a deep breath and stepped back.

“Oh! Your cheek,” Liv exclaimed, reaching out to touch Tephania’s face. The small cut she’d picked up during their flight from the shoals was now a crust of dried blood.

“It’s nothing,” Tephania said.

“No, Liv’s right,” Arjun broke in, draining his cup of tea and setting it aside. “I just needed a moment before working on it.”

“Do you have enough mana?” Liv asked. It was good to have a problem in front of her, something small and manageable that she could solve. “I have a bit stored...” She dug around in her purse, and pulled out two black pearls, one of which she offered to Arjun.

“That will help,” he said, and cradled it in his palm. Small wisps of blue mana floated off it, then fell into his hand, before Arjun passed the pearl back to Liv.

“I actually intended to give the second one to you,” Liv said, thrusting it at Rosamund. “I noticed you didn’t bring anything into our duel, and I thought it might help you out. You could have it set into a ring, or a necklace.”

“Thank you,” Rosamund said. “My instinct is to tell you that you shouldn’t have, and to keep it, but I suppose that’s pride, isn’t it?”

Liv made her way over to the couch, and settled herself into the blankets. Sidonie joined her, and put an arm around Liv’s waist. “I’m guessing I’m the only one who’s ever actually been inside an eruption?” she asked.

While she spoke, Arjun raised his hand to Tephania’s cheek, murmured an incantation under his breath, and began the process of healing her cut. The injured girl gasped, and Liv realized that she’d probably never been healed before.

Rosamund shook her head, but Sidonie answered out loud. “This year,” she said. “Now that I’m a journeyman. They keep us around for the first king tide of the year - sometimes the only one. But now, they’ll send us off to get experience in culling teams. It’s just a question of when the requests begin to come in, and where they send me.”

Liv reached over and plucked her cup of tea from the table. Her eyes hurt from crying, and she imagined that she looked a mess. “When you’re inside it, you do what you have to do,” she said. Images of the giant stone-bat, beneath Bald Peak, surfaced from her memories. “You use what you have to use, or someone is going to die. Pride’s got no place in it.”

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“In that case,” Rosamund said, “I’ll just say thank you.” She joined them on the cushions, and after a bit of rearranging furs, Liv allowed her thoughts to drift. Two attacks on the Eld, now. She supposed it made sense: it had been her father’s people - no, her people - who practically begged Lucania to help, after the Day of Blood. Her thoughts were interrupted by her father, who stepped into the sitting room.

“Thank you all for accompanying my daughter here,” Valtteri said. “I apologize that we have not been the best hosts, and I hope you can understand what a difficult day this has been for us. But I would like to meet you all, and it means a great deal that Livara has friends willing to stay with her right now. My name is Valtteri Ka Auris kæn Syvä, and you are welcome in Kelthelis. My mother will be down shortly, but I believe I speak for her when I say that you are all welcome to remain for the funeral, and we will sort rooms for you shortly.”

The funeral. Of course, Liv thought, dully. She felt as if she was walking about in a fog, but the idea of herbs for the pyre seized her. She would go down to the kitchens, she decided, and see what could be found. When they’d burned Master Cushing, Gretta had sprinkled sage, lavender, rosemary, rose petals, and chamomile. Liv wasn’t certain she could find all of that so far north, but she resolved to do her best.

Liv shook herself; her friends had finished introducing themselves, and her father was talking again.

“I want to thank you in particular, Arjun,” Valtteri said. “For easing my father’s pain, and giving him a moment to speak with us. That is not something our family will ever forget. Know that you are always welcome here, and if we can ever offer you aid, we will do so.”

“I am a healer, Lord Valtteri,” Arjun said. “It’s no more than what I would do for anyone - what any of my jati would do. I’m only sorry that I couldn’t do more.”

“I want to know what happened,” Liv said, before she could second guess herself. Her mind was leaping from one thing to another, unwilling to settle. “All of it. Keri said House Iravata, and something about wyrms, but I don’t - I don’t know who that is,” she admitted.

Her father’s gaze passed over each of her friends, as if assessing them. “Perhaps it would be a good thing,” he decided. “For more than one voice to bring word of this back south. Perhaps it will lend greater weight to the story. For I fear that Lucania will remain idle, until something terrible happens to stir them. But I would prefer to tell the story with Inkeris here, as well.”

“He said he was going to the stables,” Sidonie said. “To see what he could do to help the horses. Most of them weren’t doing very well.”

“They’re not bred for the cold this far north,” Liv said. “I didn’t have enough heat to help them, not and keep you all warm as well. I’ll go fetch him.” She extracted herself from the blankets and set off for the hallway that connected the main part of the palace with the stables. It was her fault, after all; she’d known the horses weren’t suited for the journey, but she hadn’t been able to say no to her friends.

She found Keri with his hands, outstretched and shining, in the stall with Sidonie’s mare. Stepping into the light was like walking out into a summer day - warm, bright, the kind of magic that brought a smile to your face no matter how dark the rest of the world was.

“I’d only ever seen you fight before,” Liv said. “I didn’t realize your word of power could do this, as well.”

“Savel. It is the word for sun, given to us by Bælris, Vædic Lord of Light.” Keri glanced up at her, but did not move his hands. “I’m warming them as best I can,” he said. “I think it’s good they were ridden hard the entire way; it means they weren’t out there for as long as they could have been. I’m not certain they’ll be ready to make the trip back, however.”

“We can borrow horses from my father, if we need to,” Liv said. “I’m glad they’ll survive.”

“Your grandfather?”

“He’s passed,” Liv said, and the words threatened to set her to crying again. “My father was just about to tell us of the attack, and he thought you should be there as well.”

Keri nodded. “Yes, I think that’s a good idea.” The sunlight dimmed, and Liv felt as if winter and night had returned all in a moment; there was a part of her that longed to ask him to bring it back. Instead, she led him out of the stables and back to the sitting room, where everyone else had gathered.

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☙

“Calevis.” Liv repeated the name, tasting it. Before, it had no meaning: now, it burned and stung. “That’s one of the names - “ she almost said Wren’s name, and then caught herself. No need to share that particular piece of information with anyone who didn’t already know. “- we were given. One of her commanders.”

“The House of Iravata was one of the Unconquered Houses,” Keri explained. “Eld who never fought against the Vædim. My family is another, but for different reasons. Bælris stood aside from the conflict, and in the end he freed his servants and left our world, rather than be drawn into the fighting. But the Lady of Wyrms bred clutch upon clutch of monsters, and taught her most favored descendents how to command them. That is their word of power.”

“But from the description of what happened,” Sidonie pointed out, “this man used a spell that combined the words for blood and fire. There are quite a few parts of that that are disturbing.”

“For one thing, three words is more than average, even among our people,” Liv’s grandmother said. She’d had a second pot of tea brought, as well as plates of caribou steaks, cooked in a mix of northern berries and nuts, and served with flatbread. Liv decided she would try to remember to thank her grandmother later for not serving seal blood, or some of the other more peculiar dishes prepared at Kelthelis.

“And if he truly combined two words of power, that means he has a level of skill roughly on the level of an archmage,” Sidonie pointed out.

“I can see where he’s imprinted the word for blood,” Liv said. “Fire is another matter.”

“Not really,” her father said. “It’s a common enough word up here. He could have made some sort of bargain or arrangement long since, and it wouldn’t have drawn any particular notice.”

“Remember Liv, things in the north are not like they are in Lucania,” Keri added. “We don’t hoard our words and punish those who learn them. I’ve been putting some thought into a second word myself, lately.”

“I don’t even know that you need one,” Liv said, before she could think better of it. “Your word is amazing. Like a perfect summer day.”

“Anyway,” Rosamund said, “it sounds to me like they caught you off balance. You being your whole society, I mean. You were still thinking that this place -”

“The Hall of Ancestors,” Eila said.

“Right, that.” Rosamund nodded. “Point is, you thought you were safe there, but things had already changed. We’re past the point of talking things out - it’s time to throw punches. They hit before you were ready, and they hit hard. Now the fight’s on, and you can’t go on pretending that talking is still an option.”

“House Keria has volunteered to march on the Iravata holdings,” Valtteri said.

“Airis Ka Reimis?” Liv asked.

“Yes. You know him?” her father replied. “Come to think of it, that’s the second time you’ve mentioned his name.”

“He came south once, after the eruption when I was little,” Liv said. “I met him then. He told me a bit about my aunt, and I asked him to keep it our secret. I was a bit afraid of what would happen if word got out I existed, at the time.”

“He would have,” Eila said. “He wanted Livara to be his kwenim. He was very persistent.”

“Regardless,” Valtteri said, “I trust him to deal with the Iravata. In all honesty, they’re fools if they haven’t already moved their people out to Varuna. I suspect he’s going to find nothing but empty buildings when he arrives. The real fighting will be over the ocean, and that’s where I intend to be.”

“I want to go with you,” Liv said.

“We will speak of it after the funeral,” her grandmother declared. “But remember what your grandfather wanted, Livara. He had very good reasons for asking you to wait.”

Liv bit her lip, but Eila’s words brought something else the dying man had said to mind. “He told me that I needed to go down into the Tomb,” she recalled. “And get something inside. What did he mean?”

“Rifts formed in places where the Vædim built, long ago,” Keri said. “Their palaces, their workshops, their places of power. If you go in far enough - past the shoals, into the depths - you can find all manner of ancient things they left behind. The problem is getting out alive.”

“It’s the same nonsense that got your aunt killed,” Liv’s father said, his voice full of anger and pain. “And it isn’t worth throwing your life away, like she did. Our ancestors defeated the old gods at the height of their power. We can kill one who’s just returned.”

“Perhaps we should get our guests settled in their rooms,” Liv’s grandmother said, rising from her seat. “Come along, girls. Valtteri, take the boys, please.”

Liv accompanied Rosamund, Sidonie and Tephania up the stairs, and did her best to make sure they were settled, even after her grandmother had left them to their own devices. There was some doubt about sleeping in rooms made of ice, but Liv assured them they would be warm enough.

“And after all,” she said, when they’d all gathered in her bedchamber, “it will only be for a night or two. The funeral will be held tomorrow, I’d guess.”

“Are you going to be alright to sleep alone?” Sidonie asked. “I could stay with you tonight, if you’d like.”

“We all could,” Tephania offered. “There’s room enough in your bed.”

“No,” Liv said. “But you’re all sweet for offering. I think I just want a bit of space.” Once she’d ushered them out, she undressed, setting her armor on the stand, and finding a clean shift from the clothing she kept at Kelthelis. Then, she sat on the bed, gathered the furs around her, and began to sing the Maiden’s Charm.

☙

The next morning, Liv was up early. She found sage and sweetgrass in the kitchen, where the cooks were happy to let her help prepare sachets of herbs to be strewn into the pyre. She’d been correct, when she guessed that the funeral would be held immediately, and the warriors of House Syvä were already building the pyre. Her father, Keri, and Arjun all helped.

“Wood is too precious to waste, this far north,” her grandmother explained to the girls over a morning meal. “They’ll lay down a lattice of bones, instead, and fill it with moss, cotton grass, and oil.”

“What has bones big enough to support a grown man like that?” Tephania asked. The poor girl’s eyes seemed perennially wide with surprise and wonder. Liv suspected that, until going to Coral Bay, she’d never left her home at all.

“Hastim,” Eila answered. “Great, shaggy beasts that travel in herds, with ivory tusks that descend from their mouths. They’re a terror when they wander into shoals, by the way. You’re lucky you haven’t encountered one yet, Livara.”

When breakfast was finished, Liv and her grandmother left the girls behind. As the closest living women to her grandfather, they washed and dressed his body themselves. The sight of the black wound on his shoulder brought Liv to tears again, despite her best efforts. They dressed Auris in a fine gray robe, and braided his hair.

It was harder work than Liv had been expecting: the body was heavy, and difficult to move. But like gathering herbs in the kitchen, it was good to be doing something. If she’d been stronger, she would have offered to help build the fire, but one glance at her father, Arjun and Keri coming in to eat, exhausted, was enough to convince her that would have been a bad idea.

By the time everything was ready, the sun was setting again.

“I can’t believe how short the days are up here,” Rosamund murmured, as they trudged out through the gates onto the open plain together. Their boots crunched on the snow, and the wind whipped their cloaks about as if it wanted to tear the wool from their bodies.

“It happens in the very far north and south,” Sidonie said. “Fascinating, really. I’m told that in the winter there are days when the sun never rises at all.”

“When I come in the summer, it never sets,” Liv told them. “At the darkest, its something like twilight.”

To her surprise, there was no priest. Instead, her father spoke, while the warriors of the house held lit oil lamps, waiting to be thrown on the pyre.

“When my father was born,” Valtteri said, nearly shouting to be heard over the wind, “he was born a slave, to a mother who was a slave. He died a free man, with a free family gathered around him. I think it is difficult for us to understand how important that was to him. We speak of the changes that Sitia brings over the course of a single life, but this man saw the liberation of our entire people. He is one of the last who remembers those days.”

Liv watched her father take a long moment to compose himself, and she wondered whether he would be able to continue. With a few quick steps, she walked across the snow to join him at the head of the gathering, reached out and took his hand in hers. When he began the prayers, she said the words with him.

“What is death, but another change?” The words came to her without prompting. “After a life wracked by storms, a life of striving to live up to our potential, Sitia welcomes us into her arms. Like any other change, death is frightening - but it comes to all of us. Remember, the Lady lends us strength. You who remain, send this man on his way with your love, and take comfort in each other. Auris Ka Syvä, we give your body to the fire, so that your mortal blood may not feed the wicked. May your soul be free at last.”

The warriors of House Syvä threw their oil lamps onto the pyre; with a breaking of glass, the oil spilled and the flames spread.