It was a saga of love indeed, among other things, and unhappily unlike any other Perulan had ever written. People died unhappily and for no reason at all, true loves proved false, Priests of the Light were corrupt, servants betrayed and were betrayed by their masters for personal gain, masters repaid the loyalty of lifelong servants with indifference, discarding them to poverty when they were no longer useful…
In short, it was "reality," and not fantasy, unvarnished, unmasked, and horribly uncomfortable. It was not the escape that the readers of Perulan's previous tales would expect, and in a lesser author, disgust would lead a disappointed reader to fling the book across the room. But Perulan was skilled, highly skilled, brilliant even. No, the reader would persist, drawn into the story against his will, and when he was finished—
Discontent. Unhappiness. Restlessness and a sense of injustice that would seek an outlet.
This cannot possibly be published!. Lycaelon thought in stormy shock, and felt the assent of the Mages around him as his knowledge of the manuscript spilled into the Judgment Spell. This was nothing less than an attack upon the City itself!
"Is this your only copy? You cannot recreate this book? Answer truly," Lycaelon said.
Out of Perulan's line of sight, Banarus's fingers went up to touch the Talisman around his neck as the Undermage cast a Truthspell upon the writer, cued by Lycaelon's demand for the truth. Perulan's next words would be the whole and complete truth, whether he wished to tell it or not.
"Lord Arch-Mage, this is truly my only copy of the book. I burned all my notes and drafts. I spent years writing it—it comes from my heart—I can never recreate it. It is my finest work—a work of truth—the truth that no one wishes to see."
The truth-aura around him burned blue and steady to Lycaelon's Mage-sight. Perulan was telling the truth. In all things. The foolish man really believed it was a masterpiece, the crowning achievement of his career.
Idiot. He was Mageborn; he should have known better. Of all things, the Mages could not tolerate discontent. Just as there could be no new and strange goods in the markets to startle people and make them think that other places might be better, there could be no new thoughts in books, no new ways of painting a picture, no innovations in music, because all of those things would wake up the imagination. There must be nothing within the walls of the Golden City that might make her citizens think, wonder—and start to look outside the walls.
For only within these walls could there be safety. Without lay chaos, madness, and anarchy, the years of Blood and Darkness awaiting the spark that would kindle their rebirth. To open Armethalieh to change was to court her destruction.
"It cannot be published," Lycaelon said flatly. He held out his hand over the manuscript and spoke a simple spell: Magefire. There was a bright flash, and the manuscript and its leather wrapping were gone, burned away to a few wisps of ash.
Perulan cried out, once. It was a heartrending sound, not loud, but so full of pain that it gave even Lycaelon pause for a moment. Half protest and disbelief, half wail of despair, like a mother who sees her child murdered before her eyes. Perulan's face went grey, and he swayed unsteadily on his feet.
"How could you?" he whispered in a shaking voice. "It was my life! All my skill—all I knew…"
"It was not suitable," Lycaelon told him sternly. "Why, when it is unsafe to go outside the City walls, should you write some poisonous fable to make the people of Armethalieh doubt that their rulers know what is best for them? Why should you seek to make them believe that their betters rule only for the sake of gain, and not to make them safe and happy? Why, above all things, should you write something that was calculated to stir rebellion in their hearts and discontent in their souls? They might begin to believe that other places are better than here; they might begin to believe that they would make better rulers than those who are wiser than they. And, in their profound ignorance, they might seek to put themselves in our places, and that would be—not to be thought of. Go, and write something more pleasing next time—or don't write at all."
Perulan only stared at him, eyes wide with shock, as if he had not heard—or did not understand—Lycaelon's words. The Arch-Mage gestured impatiently, and Banarus half led, half carried the writer from the Council chamber. Perulan accompanied him like a man in a trance, moving as unsteadily as one who has received a mortal wound.
What a fuss to make over a few scraps of paper and a silly story! Just as well Nadar excised the Magegift from his mind; the man was far too emotional to ever have been trusted with the disciplines of the High Art…
Lycaelon dismissed the matter from his mind. Banarus would see to the man, and do all that was necessary to conclude the matter properly.
"Well, that was unpleasant enough," Lord-Mage Perizel said sourly when the door had shut behind the pair.
Lord-Mage Meron, sitting beside him, nodded his head. "Won't be the end of it. You mark my words, my lord Mages. Talespinners! Always scribbling something, and all of it nonsense."
There was a general murmur of agreement, and Volpiril leaned close to Lycaelon. "If you will permit, my lord Arch-Mage, perhaps someone should be placed in Perulan's household? He might bear further watching—just to make sure he doesn't do something foolish, of course."
There was no expression on his bland face, but Lycaelon, who was about to order the same thing, wondered why Volpiril felt it necessary to suggest such a move before Lycaelon could do so.
"Of course," Lycaelon said, keeping his own countenance as bland as Volpiril's. "Are we all in agreement on that? I will leave you to see to it, Mage Volpiril."
And I will remember that you will bear further watching, as well, my lord Volpiril …
He glanced down with sudden distaste at the mass of ashes and crisped leather on the table, and added, with just a touch of venom, "And someone clean up this mess!"
AS the shadows lengthened and the cool spring air filled with the music of Evensong, Kellen realized, with resignation and great reluctance, that it was time to be returning home. It wouldn't do for him to be anywhere but his rooms when his father arrived—Lycaelon had made it clear on several memorable occasions what he thought of a scion of House Tavadon wandering the streets of Armethalieh like one of the common folk.
But with any luck, his father would still be busy at the Council House, and Undermage Anigrel would have found something else dull and boring to do as well—something that would keep him away from both Tavadon House and Lycaelon. No one needed to ever know that Kellen hadn't gone straight home after his unfortunate early dismissal from his lessons. With further luck, Anigrel might even forget to tell Lycaelon about the whole incident, though that was probably too much to hope for.
Kellen approached Tavadon House through the mazelike network of back and side alleyways that ran between the great houses of the Mage Quarter. It was easy to get lost here—there were no signs, and nothing to distinguish one seamless Magecrafted stone wall from another, but Kellen had no difficulty in finding his way. He knew the back alleys of the Mage Quarter as well as any refuse hauler or rag-and-bone dealer did; the narrow streets were much used by those vendors and tradesmen whose business was not quite appropriate for the front doors—or even the main service entrance—of the imposing houses of Armethalieh's Mageborn aristocracy.
The Mageborn preferred that the messier aspects of life be tended to invisibly, and the noble and wealthy aped their habits. Kellen doubted that any of them had ever seen a refuse hauler in their lives.
But in his seventeen years of life Kellen had discovered, as many had before him, that there was no privacy to be had in a house full of servants, and if he did not want to alert everyone in House Tavadon to all of his comings and goings—most of which weren't supposed to be taking place in the first place—the best thing to do was to find a more private way in and out of the house. Though he could not use it too often without drawing attention to it, the small side door at the bottom of the kitchen garden, where the garbage from the kitchen was left every morning in neat bins, filled his needs nicely: he could let himself in and out whenever he wanted without alerting the servants, and if anyone missed him and wanted to make a fuss, who was to say he hadn't simply been somewhere in the formal garden—or the house—the whole time he'd been supposedly "missing"?
Though of course the door was warded against intruders, as a son of the house, Kellen could pass through those wards without triggering them. And although it was kept locked from the inside, Kellen simply took the key with him when he went and left the door unlocked behind him. The servants rarely had business in the garden, and the gardener never bothered about anything that close to the house itself. So far his tampering had gone undiscovered, and Kellen had been able to come and go as he pleased.
He reached his destination—a nondescript (though, of course, costly and well-made) wooden door set into the tall, plaster-covered brick wall— and confidently gave it a shove, expecting it to swing inward, revealing the sere Tavadon garden.
The door didn't move.
Kellen tried again, pushing more slowly and with greater force. Still nothing. The door was locked. Sometime in the last several bells, some overzealous servant must have come down into the garden and locked it.
Well, that was all of a piece with the way his day had been going until now. Kellen sighed, reaching into his belt-pouch for his key, only to discover that his bad luck was still in full flower, and likely to get worse.
His key wasn't there.
Oh, no —
Now what was he to do? Never mind that Anigrel had virtually ordered him to go hare off on his own. Anigrel would be certain to deny it, and say he'd meant Kellen to go home and study, and certainly that was what an obedient son of House Tavadon would have done. If anyone found out he'd actually been wandering around the City until Evensong, he'd really be in for it!
Not yet in a panic, but not far from that state, Kellen spun around, gazing around the empty alley wildly, as though by some miracle the key to the garden door might suddenly materialize.
Think, you doudwit!
He was sure—he was almost sure—he'd had it with him when he'd left for his lesson with Anigrel this morning. Could he have dropped it somewhere? It was a big heavy brass key; he was certain he would have noticed the sudden absence of its weight from his pouch, or heard the noise it would have made when it fell to the street.
Unsurprisingly, the key was nowhere to be seen; after all, he hadn't left by this door. And retracing his steps—well, that was an exercise in futility; a key that big would have been found and picked up, for the value of the scrap metal if nothing else…
Kellen sighed gustily, running his hand through his disorderly mop of long brown curls distractedly. Where was the Light-forgotten thing?
All right. No need to get in a state. Nothing's going to happen just yet. If the garden door was locked, there was still the front door… but that meant going in past the mastiffs, and that would rouse the servants— there'd be no chance of sneaking in. And if his father or Anigrel had left instructions that he hadn't been here to receive… well, it would mean an unpleasant scene at the least. If his father found out he hadn't gone straight home from his morning's lesson, Lycaelon would want to know where he'd been, and if he couldn't think of something innocuous and impossible to disprove, he'd be in deeper trouble yet.
Why is it that everything I do ends up with me in trouble?
No. He'd find another way.
He looked up at the wall, gauging his chances of simply scaling the wall. But the wall had been plastered smooth to discourage just such a possibility, and the errant coil of bramble-rose vine that trailed down just above his head was far too slender—and prickly—to serve as a climbing rope. He couldn't use a cantrip to unlock the door from outside, either, even if he knew the right spell, because the locks were counterspelled against just that.
But there was another way. He had his new magick. And if he couldn't use it to unlock a door (and so far there didn't seem to be an Unlocking Spell anywhere in the three Books, or at least not one that he'd discovered), he could use it in some other way to get in. And the simplest was— to find that blasted key.
With the Wild Magic, he could cast a Finding Spell, get his key back, open the door, and slip inside. He'd be safe in his rooms before Lycaelon arrived, and no one would be the wiser about just how long it had taken Kellen to come home from lessons. And a Finding Spell was such a small magick—harmless. All it involved was getting back what was his in the first place. What could that hurt? No one would see, and no one would know. And he had everything he needed to cast it right here: his desire— and a drop of his own blood was easily come by, with the bramble-roses to help.
Pleased at his own cleverness at finding so simple a solution to a potentially embarrassing problem, Kellen reached up and pulled the bramble-vine down toward him. He selected a particularly large and sharp-looking thorn and drove it into the ball of his thumb, wincing at the sudden pain, and as the bright drop of blood welled out, he focused all his will on the key to the garden gate and his need to have it in his hands.