“They did what?” Diato’s voice vibrated through the Great Hall of Merisgale Castle as he stared at the young wizard with wild eyes. The maids who were serving Thestian his supper cringed and then scampered from the room when Thestian took pity on them and dismissed them with a slight wave of his hand.
“I suspected it would happen.” Thestian could see the anger rising in the captain of the guards. The man looked as if he was ready to burst, eyes wide, hands shaking, jaw clenched in an effort to control his temper.
“He must have tricked her,” Diato reasoned through gritted teeth. “Took his role in carrying the sword seriously. As if he were really a guard. She may have even protested.” He was only making himself even angrier with every word he spoke.
“There seemed to be no trickery involved,” Thestian said in a soft voice and crossed his arms. “I don’t know if they felt emotion for one another. Only that they joined. Emotion could make delivering the sword more complicated. The dark forces can use the heart to weaken people.”
Diato’s entire body was shaking. “When did it happen?” His fingers dropped to the sword that rested in the sheath on his hip. He gripped the hilt tightly.
Thestian sighed heavily. “You do not want details…”
“When?” Diato forgot himself and raised his voice.
The young wizard was not offended. In fact, he understood Diato’s anger.
“Yesterday, in a cave. In the foothills of Jobi Mountains,” Thestian told him quietly.
“A cave?” Diato laughed at that but it was not a laugh of humor. It nearly sounded maniacal. Thestian rose from his chair and moved toward the window, placing distance between Diato and himself.
“I’ll kill him,” Diato threatened. “I’ll kill them both.”
“I thought I understood that the two of you were no longer together.”
“She’s mine.” The possessiveness in Diato’s voice thickened his words.
“Well, you should remain calm. You are no use to me in this crazed state,” Thestian warned but he couldn’t be sure that Diato even heard him. When he turned from the window, the man looked changed, maddened with jealousy. Thestian could see his true nature easily now. Diato did not care if Fiona didn’t want him. He could live with that. But if he couldn’t have her, then no one else could either. And that made Diato more dangerous than Thestian had ever imagined.
Diato suddenly looked up at Thestian. “It could jeopardize the mission.”
The wizard nodded. The captain obviously hadn’t heard Thestian’s warning of the same thing only moments before.
“You said Fiona was the only one to do this mission, that she was the best person for the job,” Thestian reminded. “I trust you did not lie to me.”
“I did not but I had not considered the blacksmith would be a man of such low character that he would attempt to manipulate her with sex to do as he wished,” Diato said, clearly placing full blame upon Ronan Culley.
“She may have manipulated him,” Thestian suggested quietly. “I would guess her an aggressive woman by the way she used her sword.”
“She did not manipulate him,” Diato argued, his voice trembling. “I did as you asked. I looked into the blacksmith’s past. It seems Ronan Culley is not just a man who bends metal.”
“Oh?” Thestian’s brow arched.
“He is a wizard,” Diato continued. “An ignorant wizard but a wizard none the less. He never even went to a monastery. The sword may be in danger.”
Thestian studied Diato’s face for a few moments. “What do you suggest is the appropriate course of action?”
“Interception.” Diato did not even hesitate before answering. “I could round up some of my men and ride out tonight. We could intercept them within a week.”
Thestian sighed heavily. “It seems there is no other choice. Round up your men. Leave in the morning.” Diato bowed respectfully before leaving the wizard to do as he was bid.
–
“Damned changelings. They are taking over everything,” Arneld growled, slamming his large hand down on the table. His brown eyes were filled with cold hatred. “A man can’t get a decent job anymore. It’s all changelings or worse, half beasts.”
“Arneld, not in front of our son,” Marjorie warned softly but Arneld’s head snapped around so he could stare at his young son. The boy stared at his father with wide eyes, having never seen him so angry in all his eight years.
“The sooner he learns the way of things the better off he’ll be,” Arneld argued. “It’s better he gets the truth about magic before it’s too late.”
“No, we always said we would not teach him to hate.” Marjorie placed a gentle hand on Arneld’s shoulder. “It will upset him.”
“Men are tainted if they have magic. It’s the truth. We are the only things pure of magic anymore. I am through with any who do have magic.” Arneld’s hand clenched, his knuckles whitened. “I was the best man for that job. I can do the work. That damned changeling transformed himself into a mule and did it in the half the time.”
“Arneld…” Marjorie tried to stop him again.
“No! My son will not grow up thinking it is acceptable to let those freaks take what is his. I won’t have it. A changeling is no friend. I know that and now he will too. Boltic was my friend and he stabbed me in the back. Pulled that job right out of my hands, knowing my family needs to be fed.”
“Boltic’s family has suffered too,” Marjorie said.
“That was my job! He wouldn’t have even known about it if I hadn’t told him! They aren’t welcomed in this house ever again. Don’t let the boy go playing with their son anymore. No changeling will ever set foot on this land as long as I live here!”
“But, Egle is my friend,” A tiny voice dared to whisper from the small chair at the table.
“And you will not be my son if you go against my wishes, boy! I’ll beat the breath from you and put you out if I ever catch you taking up with a changeling. They are tainted and evil! All magic is evil!” Arneld’s words brought tears to the boy’s eyes. He’d never threatened violence against his son before.
“Egle is not evil.”
“I say that he is!” Arneld bellowed and the boy grew silent.
“Arneld! He’s only eight.” Marjorie cried. Tears sprang to her eyes as she looked down at the deflated expression on her son’s face. Arneld stared at her, then rose and stormed into the back room. He slammed the door behind him so forcefully that the walls of the cottage vibrated.
Marjorie sighed, looking at her son. “Don’t you listen to him. Egle is your friend. He can always be your friend.”
“Father says that magic is evil.” The boy’s lips quivered.
Marjorie looked toward the door her husband just disappeared behind. She knelt beside the boy’s chair, lowering her voice. “You aren’t evil. We just won’t tell him about the things you can do. He never has to know. It will be our secret. Will that be alright?” She smiled when he nodded and leaned forward to press her lips against his forehead. “Egle is still your friend. Neither of you are evil. You are my special little boy. My very special little boy.”
“Father will hate me now.”
Marjorie closed her eyes and kissed his forehead again. “No. Your Father just hates the life he has.”
The boy said nothing for several minutes then threw his arms around his mother. “I love you. I always love you.”
Marjorie smiled. “And I love you too, Ronan. Forever.”
Ronan woke with a start, eyes wide and a large lump in his throat. A dream. But it had been so real, as if he stepped right into the memory. The image of his father had been clear.
He rubbed a hand over his face and sat up. As he stood, he was careful not to stir any that slept around him. He stepped over them carefully and from the cave into the night air.
Three deep breaths that pulled the chill into his lungs and still he felt no better than before. He’d hated his father’s bigotry. It had driven a wedge between them that had never been mended. But as long as he kept the truth of what he could do a secret there was peace.
Now his secret was out. Fiona had said the words he’d always feared to hear. You are a wizard. He’d hid from that fact, tucked that part of him away. He’d stopped playing with the gifts he knew he had as teenager but he’d sworn to himself that he would never slight someone for being different than him, or the same.
“Ronan?” Ula’s voice found him, drew him from his thoughts. He didn’t look back at her as she shuffled forward to his side.
“You should rest while you have the chance,” he told her.
“What about you?” Ula touched his arm. He felt her shiver and reached back, draping his arm over her thin shoulders, offering her a bit of warmth.
“I needed some air.” He glanced down at her worried expression. “Too many bodies cramped into such a tight space.” The moon cast a ghostly glow on her face and when she smiled, her wrinkles dug dark shadows into her skin.
“You did not think it was cramped earlier.” She was teasing him and he gave her shoulders a squeeze. “Just be cautious. Someone is not…”
“What they seem,” he finished and nodded. “Yes, I believe you’ve mentioned that.”
“I have another feeling,” she said after some hesitation. He looked down at her again.
“What is it?”
“Something is coming. Something dangerous.” Her voice trembled.
Ronan’s brow furrowed. “What?”
“I don’t know. I think it means to kill you.” Ula’s hand eased around his waist and hugged.
“For the sword.” Ronan sighed heavily, dropping a hand to the sheath on his belt.
“I don’t like it.”
“Neither do I. I’ve seen enough trouble that I do not welcome any more.” Ronan frowned. They both grew silent and Ronan glanced around at the night. Nothing stirred. It was as peaceful in moonlight as it had been beneath the sun.
“I am a wizard.” He hadn’t expected the words that formed on his own tongue. Ula didn’t gasp or try to pull away from him.
“I know.”
“How do you know?” he demanded, looking at her black eyes.
“You stilled the waters of River Blanch.” She shrugged beneath his arm. “Unless a person is dimwitted, they know only a wizard could control another source of magic like that.”
Ronan felt stupid. “I’ve not used any kind of magic since I was a boy. My father disapproved of any kind of person who had it and my mother wished to keep it a secret, to keep peace.”
“They are dead now,” Ula said and Ronan winced. “The pain is still raw?”
“Not because of him. But my mother…it is unimportant.” Ronan bowed his head. “That’s not true. I could have saved her if I had used what I knew I had in me.” Ula gave him another squeeze and Ronan took a breath.
“I know nothing of this magic business. I decided the day my mother died that if I couldn’t use it to save her, I would never use it.” Ronan’s voice was barely above a whisper.
“But you have,” Ula pointed out and Ronan nodded.
“It’s as if it has a mind of its own. I do not call it to surface.” His frown deepened. “And because I’ve never used it, I don’t know much of what to do with it now that it is here.”
“You will learn,” Ula offered quietly.
“Yes, but at what cost?” He let his arm slip away from her. “It comes as it pleases. And if it’s so powerful to stop another magic, I could…it could bring death.”
“Yes.”
“How do I prevent that?” Ronan turned to face her.
“Don’t wish for someone to die,” she said simply but it was not a simple answer. How could one control what inner impulses and thoughts they had? It was impossible.
“Thank you for listening to me, Ula.” He turned from her again. She lingered a moment more, then retreated back into the warmth of the cave.
The rain began close to morning and Ronan remained outside in it. He sat on Arien’s boulder and watched the drops create ripples on the surface of the lake. Everything in his life had come full circle. He couldn’t hide from his past anymore. He was a wizard and he carried the King’s Sword, a weapon that he had labored over, to a brother wizard who was to rule over the land of Meris. That was the reality of things.
Only a wizard could use the sword. And Ronan had used it several times. But he’d drawn no blood. He certainly wouldn’t be allowed to use it against the dark forces. The consequences of that were more than Ronan wanted to consider at the moment. He would have to learn to use his wizard powers without the sword. That was the only alternative.
His eyes lowered to a smaller stone below him. He focused on it. Could he move it without the use of his hands? As a boy, it would have been an easy trick. But that was years ago. He concentrated. Nothing happened and Ronan sighed heavily.
He just wanted the stone to move! Suddenly the stone skittered across the bank of the lake and plopped into the pond. Ronan stared at the spot it had disappeared. Stupid. The power worked through will.
Ronan willed the rock to float back to the surface and it did easily. He wove it through the melody of raindrops, like a little white boat chugging across the water. Then it skipped, rocking side to side so that it splashed up water as it went.
“Playing in the rain?” Keegan’s deep voice brought a smile to Ronan’s face.
“I’d hoped I wouldn’t be caught.” He looked down at the horseman who stood watching the little stone’s water dance. Keegan did not look surprised at Ronan’s use of magic. No doubt they all knew.
“I suppose you are feeling the burdens of your life just tripled.” Keegan rested his foot on the boulder, folding his arms over his deep chest.
Ronan looked back at the little rock as he tumbled it across the surface. “As if my life is no longer made by choice but by obligation.” He sighed, lifting the stone in the air so he could twirl it around by will.
“You always have choice,” Keegan argued. “You made a choice to take up the cause of delivering the sword. It may not have been a choice you felt was fair at the time, but it was a choice.”
Ronan nodded. The horseman was right. “I never wanted to be a wizard,” he admitted.
“I can’t say that I blame you. I hear they have no women at the monasteries.” Keegan smiled when Ronan grinned down at him. “And you would have had to spend most of your life there.”
“I’ve also heard they are very much like prisons.” Ronan willed the stone closer, having it toss in the air as if manipulated by an invisible hand.
“Prison is a place that you are bound. At least a monastery you graduate from.” Keegan’s voice was low, causing Ronan to glance down at him.
“What did you do before you bred and raised horses?” He hoped Keegan wouldn’t dismiss the subject again.
Keegan sighed heavily. “I was not the same man you see before you today. I was wild and had nothing in life to show me what I could be. I was like Arien, orphaned and left on my own. Arien found you before trouble could find him. I found no one.”
“What kind of trouble found you?” Ronan pressed, forgetting his stone play.
“I…I killed a man.” Ronan could tell it was difficult for Keegan to say the words. “I killed him with my bare hands.” The horseman’s eyes locked on the toe of his boot that rested against the white of the boulder.
“Once you kill a man, and you are of a bad sort anyway, you can wager your soul that you will kill again,” Keegan murmured.
“And did you?”
“Yes. Many times,” Keegan answered honestly. “I was numb to it, chased away my conscious with liquor and women. I had nothing to lose. The world was against me anyway. I was certain I would die so I would live recklessly as I pleased until that day.”
“What happened that changed you?” Ronan tried to imagine the man as he described but could not.
“I was sent to Merisgale prison when I killed a King’s guard. I didn’t know he was a guard. Stupid. It was over a woman.” Keegan frowned. “I spent many years there. I had a cellmate, Orin Yore. He saw something in me worth saving.”
“Yore is not your given name?” Ronan watched Keegan shake his head.
“Orin chose me a new name and gave me his last. He said I needed a new name for my new birth in life.” Keegan sighed. “He set me in the right direction and his last request was that I was freed from prison. They granted him that wish and that’s when I started over, with horses.”
Ronan could see the sadness in the man’s expression. “That’s a life most would not see in you.”
Keegan smiled. “No, they don’t. I tell you now, only because I mean to tell you that every choice you make can lead you somewhere better, no matter how difficult it may seem at the time you make it.”
Ronan grew silent, thought about his words, accepting the bit of wisdom the horseman offered selflessly.
For a moment, Keegan lingered, then turned to retreat back into the cave.
“What was your name before you went to prison?” Ronan called after him.
“It does not matter now.” Keegan mumbled before disappearing into the cave.
Ronan stared after him then turned back to the lake. His eyes found the rock, hovering in the air, awaiting his will to bid it movement. With just a blink of his eyes, Ronan sent the stone lightening fast through the air, to the other side of the lake. Where it landed was where Ronan left it.
Jobi village was even smaller than Ronan had imagined. “I know these people.” Fiona called from Ula’s horse. “Let me talk to them first.” Ronan inclined his head as they rode into the village. Within moments, every person who dwelled there had stepped to the side of the road, scrutinizing them curiously.
Fiona swung to the ground. “Be at peace, people of Jobi.” She lifted her voice, so all around them could hear. “I travel with the wizard Ronan, his woman, and two of the King’s guard to Merisgale. We carry the King’s Sword to the wizard Thestian.” A few gasps echoed through the small crowd but the caution in their eyes lifted. Ronan imagined a village this small could not be too trusting of travelers.
“I wish to speak with Smellir.” She turned to Ronan and gave him a nod so he swung from Sorcha’s back, aware that every one of the villager’s had their gazes locked on him. “The wizard Ronan requires another horse and your hospitality.”
The crowd suddenly came alive. Women bustled to bring food forward to those who’d ridden into their village. A couple of men brought forth their horses for Ronan to choose from. Boys moved to care for the Dulcet horses, eyes shining with their eagerness to please, while the girls, especially those closer to womanhood, stood back watching the men of the party curiously.
“Keegan Yore is an expert in fine horses. He will pick for me.” Ronan told the men and they turned to the large man that dismounted when Ronan lifted a hand in his direction.
“My horse is the fastest of any of these,” One of the men spoke when Keegan faced them.
“But mine is stronger,” Another said.
“Nags. This is a fine horse, gentle for even the least experienced rider.” Still another one piped. Keegan had to call for them to be silent several times while he inspected the horses. Ronan left him to it, following Fiona when someone started to lead her away from the crowd.
“Who is Smellir?” Ronan asked lowly at her side.
“He is the leader over this village,” Fiona answered. “It is a sign of respect if you request an audience with him when passing through the village on important business.”
“I see.”
Fiona glanced at Ronan. “He may help us if the centaur comes this way.” Ronan glanced back at the crowd. He wasn’t sure how, unless they mobbed Bryan and worshipped him to death.
The one that led them stepped aside when they approached the doorway of a small thatched house. Ronan stepped inside behind Fiona, eyes sweeping the interior. A cot, small table, and a few clay pots hanging in the corners. Nothing more. And seated at the table was a short man with a very round middle.
Smellir. He had white hair that was balding and a nose that seemed too small for his fleshy face. But when he smiled, his smile reached the light blue of his eyes.
“Fiona!” He greeted warmly with wide arms. He embraced her and then stepped back, gaze flicking curiously at Ronan.
“Smellir, this is the wizard Ronan…Ronan Culley. We take the King’s Sword to Merisgale.” She told him and his blue eyes rounded. “We need your help.”
“My help?” His chest puffed up as his gaze slid back to Fiona.
“There are some who mean to stop us,” Fiona told him. “One in particular may follow us through your village. A centaur who goes by the name of Bryan.”
“Consider him dead,” Smellir said simply but Ronan stiffened.
“No.”
Smellir’s head snapped around and he stared at Ronan, “No?”
“I don’t want him to die. He is not evil nor of the dark forces. He means well and does not deserve death.” Ronan glanced at Fiona when she frowned.
“Ronan, this is no time to start feeling sorry for…” she began.
“Detain him. Anyway that you can. But he must not die.” Ronan interrupted, dismissing Fiona’s warning as he watched Smellir scratch his bare top of head. “I have plans for him once I reach Merisgale and deliver the sword.”
“Plans?” Fiona stared at him.
“Yes.” Ronan nodded.
Smellir thought a moment. “We could detain him. For how long, Wihr?” Ronan blinked at the title that Smellir offered easily.
“Just a few days, maybe a week,” Ronan answered. Smellir nodded again and then clapped his hands.
“Fiona, you look well. You stay away too long. I do not get to see you enough.” He slipped a pudgy arm around her waist and indicated they walk outside into the sunshine. “That man has given you no more problems?”
“What man?” Ronan asked, looking away when Fiona’s eyes darted toward him.
“The man she was seeing many months ago. He was a rotten kind. Treated her poorly. She should have hugged him more.” Smellir grinned when Fiona looked down at him with confusion. “She could have squeezed him to death.”
Fiona’s laughter lifted around them and Ronan smiled at the sound as he added, “Or given him a deadly kiss.” Smellir’s grin widened.
“This wizard is your new man? He will be better for you. You can see it in his eyes,” Smellir continued, causing Ronan to look away again.
“I am only here to help him get the sword to Merisgale,” Fiona explained.
“Stay the night here. We’ll have a celebration,” Smellir suggested.
“A celebration of what?” Fiona chuckled when Smellir rolled his eyes skyward, obviously thinking of a reason to celebrate. He snapped his fingers and smiled.
“We will celebrate the call to service we are granted. It is not often Jobi is held in such high regard that they are asked to help a wizard.” Smellir’s smile was smug, satisfied with his answer.
“And Jobi will be remembered when I deliver the sword,” Ronan promised causing Smellir’s chest to puff out anymore. Fiona just rolled her eyes.
“We shall stay the one night but we will leave at first light. I don’t want to give that centaur a chance to catch up with us,” Ronan agreed.
“Once you are gone, he will not catch up. We will make certain of it,” Smellir promised.
“No death,” Ronan reminded him.
“There are a great many things other than death than can stop someone from continuing.” Smellir nodded. “As you wish. No death.”