A prologue
The gale beyond his window raked the trees scattering the first of the autumn leaves. The season stood at the gates of a change and not just beyond his house. He sighed, a sound of pain.
Reluctantly he turned to look at the objects on the table. Perhaps he thought they would be gone if he delayed confronting them long enough, but they were still inconveniently present.
He looked at his daughter’s governess, who studied him patiently awaiting his decision. Then he again studied the objects on the table.
There was a yard-square parchment bearing a pentangle. All scattered with runes he did not comprehend. Then there were the black candles, a ram’s skull, miscellaneous herbs, various crude wands of rowan, ash and lime, all manner of so-called natural objects; he did not even want to look in the box.
“Where is she?” He asked.
“She stands in the corner on the upstairs landing in nothing but her shift if she knows what’s good for her.” The governess adjusted the birch rod under her arm to a more a comfortable position.
“You mean to thrash her then?” He could think of no other course.
“Unless you wish to do it?” The governess fixed him with a hard stare. She was a bitter woman in her late 30s. She might even have been attractive if she had ever smiled.
“I doubt I could do her justice given the gravity of…” He left his words hanging and gestured to the evidence of witchcraft on the table. Then he added in a whisper. “I always was too soft with her.”
“Never fear Sir Mark, she will rue the day she ever dabbled in such things. I’ll warrant that she won’t sit down for a fortnight by the time I’m finished with her.”
He nodded. He didn’t want any details. Katrin had dabbled in witchcraft against his expressed orders. Now she would have to take a medicine of another kind.
*
Far way on the edge of the Shining Sea, Tabatha cast one last longing look at her beloved desert and then turned for home.
The ptarmigan felt heavy and she hefted in satisfaction. Tonight the whole family would eat. Not that Tomas would be pleased. He never was when she was successful at the hunt. Tomas never caught anything anymore. Once he had been the best hunter on the Silver Shore, which is why her mother had married him, but no longer.
Not that any of the other hunters fared any better. For most of her people it had been a lean time for game of all kinds. Tabatha let out a heavy sigh and cast her dark brown eyes back to face the desert, her short soft black curls rippling atop of her smooth dark face.
The more she thought about it, the more she realised that Tomas would be angry. It was bad enough that the men now relied on the women and their fish to survive, but to be out hunted by a mere slip of a girl. Yes, Tomas would be angry. He might even spank her; for taking his bow without asking at the very least.
She reached under her short leather skirt and rubbed the smooth naked sand-brown flesh she found there. Her bottom was neatly rounded and set high and tight. It would fit neatly enough over Tomas’s knee she knew. Her stepfather’s hands were hard and his hunter’s arms strong. She would not sit easy for a day or two and mother would confine her to the house and give her extra chores.
Still that was nothing. If Tomas or Mother found out her secret, of how she could hunt ptarmigan when the men could not… well she would be flogged naked in the town square and probably sold off for service in the city somewhere.
No if she could feed the family with her gift, then a spanking was a small price to pay.
The Man from Pandoria
Crane had heard the rumours of Sir Mark’s daughter all the way to the city. Dark rumours that spoke of witchcraft and other dark deeds considered inappropriate for a young noble woman.
He hated the country, filled as it was with superstitious peasants, but he had a nose for these things. Katrin De Lacy sounded like a good prospect for Pandoria. Not only was the girl possible talent, but as a noblewoman she may well be paying talent.
It was this that had brought him to the De Lacy estate.
He chose a small inn in the village of Downley, which was on the edge of the estate. It was a one-room affair with a thatched roof and boasted two vacant rooms to let in the attic above the stable block to the rear.
Crane pushed through the rickety old door, which opened with a squeak on the flagstones within. The bar room beyond was gloomy and smelt of stale beer and wood smoke. The man behind the bar was fat with short curly grey hair. His dull sunken eyes looked everywhere but at him as he entered, although Crane knew he was being studied hard.
“You looking for work?” The innkeeper sniffed in his direction. He didn’t like the look of the tall thin stranger. For one thing it was still too early in the year to wear a heavy leather three-quarter-length coat as the stranger did. For another he had reddish-brown hair worn long in the style of a Westerner. There may have been peace at the moment, but war with the Westerners was never far away.
“Not so much,” Crane drawled as he scratched his beaky nose and let his small dark eyes slide lazily in the innkeeper’s direction.
The innkeeper relaxed a little. The man had an educated accent and was obviously well-versed in the common tongue. Perhaps the long hair was a city affectation from down south. It would certainly explain the hair colour. Most Westerners were blond.
“Tell me, what do you know of the De Lacys?” As he threw out the casual question he placed a silver mark on the bar, enough for a week’s stay at this out-of-the-way establishment.
*
Crane stood under the shadow of an oak tree regarding the house pondering his next move. Confronting noblemen could sometimes be a delicate business, especially when it concerned their only child.
He had learned from the innkeeper that Katrin De Lacy was a local scandal. Even at 19, she was rarely presented to any of the neighbouring nobility. It seemed she preferred to spend her days running wild in the woods and consorting with an old herbalist who lived as a hermit.
Belinda, the herbalist, was widely regarded as a witch, and although on further inspection Crane had decided that the woman had a small gift in the magical direction, it was hardly enough to get her admittance to the merest of covens. Detecting no threat, he had decided to confront her.
Belinda had been forth coming enough and had even declined Crane’s offered bribe.
She was old and plump with thick curly silver-white hair, from under which she studied Crane intently with pale blue eyes.
“What is your interest in Katrin De Lacy?” She asked suspiciously.
“A mutual opportunity,” Crane had replied simply.
“Oh yes?” Belinda’s attitude of suspicion was not diminished. “Have you seen her?”
“No.” Crane folded his arms and leaned back against the door frame of the small cottage.
“So you didn’t know she was beautiful?”
“No I didn’t. Is it important?”
Belinda relaxed. “What exactly is your interest?”
Crane smiled and indicated a chair, but waited until Belinda nodded before he sat down. “I am a talent scout of sorts,” he began, “and I have reason to believe that Katrin De Lacy is a witch, or aspires to be one.”
“Ah.” It was a long knowing sound accompanied with a strong smile.
Belinda had gone on to tell him that Katrin had come to her for lessons in magic. The idea, the herbalist said, amused her as Belinda knew none. All her skill lay in herbs and if she had picked up a few simple spells along the way to help guide the simple natural effects… “Well, where’s the harm?”
“She is a dreamer that one,” Belinda had continued. “Although, if I am any judge, she has something of a gift and for what it’s worth I taught her all I know.”
“What about this talk of demons?” Crane had pressed her.
“Stuff and nonsense.” Belinda had laughed. “The girl has access to some old books and legends. She makes half of it up. The rest she does not understand.”
Now Crane had to decide how best to broach his proposition.
*
Katrin was miserable. She had been forbidden from going out on pain of another birching. Her hand strayed to her behind and she winced.
“I might never sit down again,” she moaned to the reflection of herself captured in her bedroom window as she looked out at the garden, although there was no one to hear her.
She was not tall, but her willowy slender body made her appear so, an effect that was exaggerated by her long straight dark brown hair that closed about her face under a low fringe in a vain attempt to obscure her beauty. Her lips were full and even in profile, she seemed to have a semi-permanent pout, but it was her eyes that held any observer’s attention. They were the colour of polished wood, a thousand different shades of brown set in perfect clear white almonds each framed with long thick lashes.
The loose silk red and black paisley dress clung to her, revealing her small pert breasts and prominent well-defined bottom, chafing her there so that she made small winces at the slightest movement.
The previous evening father had given her over to her governess who had gleefully stripped her and bade her lie face down over a pile of cushions on her bed.
Then her unrelenting mistress had birched her offered backside in slow heavy strokes for minutes without end. The fire of it had clawed at her bottom until she had thrashed about and chewed the bedspread to stifle her screams. The governess had had no mercy as she whipped-in scoring vivid welts into every curve of her flesh. She had not even deigned to stop when Katrin had begged her.
It had been the kind of birching that caused tiny beads of blood on her ravaged skin, although later there was not the least sign of broken skin; her governess was skilled in her art.
Still her entire bottom held a purple rash that blazed with a screaming sting even a night and a day afterwards. Her father must be angry indeed. So much so that she was beginning to see that her unnamed ambition was to be crushed. She had been defeated and it would be a long time before she dared go near Belinda and all thoughts of hiding books or apparatus in her room had been banished.
Nevertheless, there was something. It hung in the air like a tickle on her skin, only this feeling scratched at her from somewhere deep in her soul. There was a change.
“Something comes,” she whispered.
The spoken words gave her feelings added force and she was afraid.
*
“Sir Mark, there is a… person to see you,” the retainer said with disdain.
Sir Mark nodded dismissively and beckoned. This was a sign that he would see whoever it was.
The retainer, a short pot-bellied man bowed curtly and slid away to fetch the visitor.
Sir Mark looked up from his desk expecting to see a jongleur or travelling salesman of some kind seeking permission to set-up shop in the village. Instead he saw a scruffy city-dweller with an air about him.
The nobleman had seen many places before settling down and he knew a magician when he saw one. The man before him had all the signs. Apart from the lack of a staff and the colour of his coat, Sir Mark would have taken him for a mage.
“You do not look like an apprentice, is your master nearby?” Sir Mark threw out a guess to keep his guest off-guard and let him know he was not easily deceived.
“My…?” Crane frowned and then inclined his head a little with understanding. “No Sir, it has been many a long year since I last had a… master. I am my own man, a freelancer so-to-speak.”
Before Sir Mark could say more, Crane bowed and expanded on his identity.
“I am an Adept, a graduate of Pandoria. I represent that noble institution and have come to…” Crane shrugged and allowed his hands to turn expressive circles in the air before continuing, “…make you an offer.”
“Go on.” Sir Mark’s eyes narrowed. He did not trust magicians or their ilk. In his experience, power tended to corrupt, that in part explained his extreme hostility to his daughter’s ‘hobby.’
“As I said, I represent Pandoria, you have heard of it?” Craned eyed the nobleman for signs of recognition. This would go far smoother if he did not have to explain too much.
“Who has not?” Sir Mark said in an offhand way, still trying to gauge his visitor.
“I have heard that you have an untutored witch under your roof. That can be a dangerous thing.” Crane said smoothly.
“What are you suggesting,” Sir Mark bellowed drawing himself up and reaching for his, luckily for Crane, unworn sword. “There are no witches here, I…”
“Please Sir Mark,” Crane said placatingly. “Perhaps I misspoke. I mean to say that I have it on good authority that your daughter…”
The thunderous expression did not leave his face, but Sir Mark let out a long breath and lay back to sit on the edge of his desk. “Katrin,” he sighed.
“Quite so,” Crane said sympathetically.
“You think she really is a witch then?” Sir Mark asked bitterly.
“I cannot say without examining the girl, but… I already sense something. However, witchcraft is a… varied and thorny area. As you may know, we at Pandoria prefer to pursue more respectable and disciplined approaches. Perhaps your daughter could learn to channel her interests… in another direction.”
“You mean intellectual magic, thaumaturgy?”
“Quite so.”
Sir Mark was dumbfounded, his daughter, a mage?
“She may not have the talent. Very few do,” Crane continued. “However, as long as the fees are paid… well, Pandoria is a good school in its own right. Even our lesser students are sought out for high office or in your daughter’s case… well I mean to say… royal concubines or even wives have been educated at Pandoria.”
Sir Mark pondered. He had already decided that unless Katrin could be married off, then he would have to find a school for her of some kind or place her in another nobleman’s court where she would have duties to keep her occupied.
“If she does turn out to have a gift then… who knows?” Crane said carefully. “In any case, her magically aspirations will be contained and you will be spared hearing about your daughter’s future excesses of sabat orgies and the like…”
“Yes, I see,” Sir Mark said as he nodded, lost in thought.
The Mage
Three weeks later the white ship slid into the small harbour barely making a ripple in the glass smooth mauve sea. The world was all bright blue and white against the looming red desert. Katrin looked up at the three crisp white triangular sails that cut the deep the blue cloudless sky above them and gave a happy sigh. So much had changed for her in the last month.
First she had been discovered dabbling in her forbidden hobby and soundly whipped. Then Crane had come and suddenly there was no more governess, no more Downley and her future was filled with wonder.
She recalled the strange meeting in her father’s study weeks before when her farther had informed her that once he had verified Mr Crane’s credentials she was to get her wish and was to be allowed to study magic.
“If you must pursue this nonsense then you will do it properly.” That had been her father’s final word on the subject.
Little more than a week later Crane had returned to escort her to Gantly at the start of their 10 day voyage to the Silver Shore.
“But why are we going there Mr Crane?” Katrin had asked. “I thought Pandoria was in the Northern Isles?”
Crane had fixed her with a withering stare and bade her to be silent. In fact for all his charm with her father, he had become quite tetchy and distinctly uncommunicative since they had begun their journey.
“Don’t ask so many questions girl,” he barked at her on several occasions. “Save all your questions for Dr Fear.”
“Who is Dr Fear?” Katrin had asked.
“That is a question. Now be silent.”
Eventually Katrin had gleaned that Dr Fear was her sponsor and that all students to Pandoria needed to be introduced by a mage. Dr Fear, was a mage, so it seemed. Evidently the reason they were going to the Silver Shore was because that was where this mage currently had business to conclude.
The ship touched the rough stone dock and was at once boarded by dozens of small half naked men who helped secure her. No sooner had they done so, then they set about unloading.
Katrin had been warned that she should be packed by the time the ship docked. Not that she had really unpacked since coming aboard. She had managed to live out of her travel bag for most things, leaving the trunk unopened lest the damp get at her gowns, of which she had a great many.
“Follow me,” Crane commanded as he strode onto the gangway. Then before Katrin could ask about the bags he jabbed his finger at some porters on the dockside. “You, you and you two, bring those two bags and that… trunk thing,” the last was said in open disapproval, “and follow us.”
Katrin was not used to walking in public, let alone behind a commoner, but once her father had signed the contract, Crane’s façade of deference to her nobility had evaporated. He had even gone so far as to snort derisively at any attempt at haughtiness on her part. To make matters worse, once they were away from the cooling sea-breeze the heat became intolerable.
So it was that after a rapid walk through the small dusty desert town they came to a door in a long wall that led down to some steps into a dark underground room. At least it was cooler, Katrin thought as she struggled to unpick her surroundings in the gloom.
The steps led down into a long open room full of babbling people; all in huddles, all conducting various bits of business, Katrin guessed. Crane stopped only to point a corner out to the porters and toss them a coin each, then he strode on towards the back of what Katrin had decided was an inn of sorts. Here it was better lit and a decidedly better furnished. The first class section perhaps, Katrin guessed again. In light of Crane’s lack of explanations, guessing was becoming a habit, she realised.
Crane led her to a corner table at the back at which sat a large man wrapped in a coarse black cloak despite the heat. Next to him sat a young dark-skinned girl with short tousled black hair and dark inquisitive eyes; pretty enough for a peasant girl, Katrin thought, although all her attention was taken with the man.
He was younger than her father, perhaps only 35, but something about his eyes reminded Katrin of her grandfather. They were steel blue and beheld her with a quiet wisdom, kindly yet severe, exactly as her grandfather had been. His hair, although showing every sign of being naturally thick and dark, had been razed down to a rash on his head, which served to emphasise his prominent square jaw. Perhaps he spent much of his time in this heat, she supposed.
“She is beautiful and from the looks of her rich,” the man said to Crane. His voice, whilst not being deep like her father’s, was a smooth baritone and carried with it an edge of command. The compliment was marred by the fact that he had ignored her and Katrin bristled indignantly.
“You haven’t let your judgement be swayed have you Crane?” The man added without humour.
“Since when have I ever?” Crane inclined his head a little and smiled. “Who is the girl Fear?”
“Ah, now there’s a story,” Fear replied. “Another one for your pot, which reminds me, you owe me 20 crowns.”
Katrin thought the girl looked a little sheepish; she was no more part of these men’s conversation than Katrin herself. She looked back at Fear, impressed despite herself that she was in the presence of a real mage.
“Twenty is it?”
“Well I assume you want the finder’s fee for Tabitha here?”
Crane’s face cracked and he nodded.
“Here,” he said putting a small bag of coins on the table. “There should be enough gold there. What’s her tale?”
Fear turned to look at the girl beside him, who blushed.
“Hmmph,” Katrin coughed.
“Oh this is Katrin De Lacy, your new apprentice, your other new apprentice,” Crane amended. “Katrin this is Dr Arlon Fear, as an apprentice he may permit you the informality of addressing him as Master.”
“Indeed, the doctorate is an imposition, I would say just call me Fear, but you had better not, as it tends to be rather frowned upon at Pandoria. This is Tabatha. Apparently she does not rate another name. She is to be a fellow student.”
“Delighted to meet you Dr Fear,” Katrin extended her hand, not quite comfortable with calling him Master. “I thought mages were usually addressed as Maestro?”
Crane exploded in laughter. Fear didn’t and turned his severity up a notch and gave her a look. Katrin shuddered, realising she had committed some dreadful faux pas.
“I’m… sorry, perhaps… well I am here to learn… aren’t I?” Katrin stuttered,
“Well recovered,” Crane chuckled. “Maestro is the correct form for a mage, unless they happen to have a doctorate. Fear is a black mage, which means he has at least two masters’ degrees, the cloak is the giveaway. It is polite to assume one such as he has been so elevated. In actual fact Fear has two doctorates, which makes you one very honoured little girl.”
Katrin almost snapped that she was no one’s ‘little girl’ but something about Fear’s manner persuaded her to quit while she was ahead.
“So Fear, you were going to tell me about this other little one,” Crane said turning his attention to Tabitha.
*
After Crane had arranged some food and drinks, Katrin was relegated to sitting in the corner next to Tabitha while the two men talked. She was seething at having been dismissed so, although Tabitha didn’t seem to mind.
“Until Dr Fear came I had never met an outsider before,” she gushed in her slightly strangled accent with its long vowels.
“Shush,” Katrin said irritably as she tried to follow what the men were saying.
“I came looking to find out what had happened to all the game on these shores. I suspected a dragon. There were certain signs. Instead I found this little one. She claims that she can feel the ptarmigan with her mind and calls them to her. The Wild Magic is strong in this one, but I tested her and she has a strong affinity for Air magic, as well as possibly Water.”
“A good find, but why my friend do you wish to allow me to collect the finder’s fee?”
Fear shrugged. “I am no talent scout, my reputation… How would it sound if it were known that Fear was troubling himself with collecting waifs and strays for Pandoria?”
“You have a point I suppose, but now you have two apprentices, do you intend to leave them both at Pandoria or…?”
“I intend to stay there awhile, I have some research of my own to follow, but I shouldn’t think I’ll have much to do with these two sprats for a while, so I will be free to come and go as I choose.”
Crane nodded and took a sip of spice-beer. “Do you think either will go the distance? Or are we just rehabilitating wayward witches?”
“Does it matter? Anyway I have yet to test your proud aristo, what was your guess?”
Katrin pricked her ears up and held her breath.
Crane slid his eyes to the right without turning his head and took a long hard look at Katrin De Lacy and then shrugged non-committally. “She has something, what with being a noble and such a beauty; she would be a prize for any coven looking to make up their numbers. I’ll leave it to you to decide what she is.”
Fear looked around and met Katrin’s eyes. She found the courage not to look away.
“I will test her before we sleep,” he said at last.
Katrin’s head was buzzing with so many questions. Belinda had mentioned Wild Magic and Elemental Magic, but she claimed not to know much.
*
Katrin stood outside Fear’s room hardly daring to knock. After supper, Crane had told Katrina that she was in Fear’s care now. He impressed upon her that he was her legal guardian in every way that mattered.
She had been told this when she left home, but only now did it begin to sink in. She might be at Pandoria for four, five or even up to seven years. If and when she saw her father was for Fear to decide. Crane had said she shouldn’t hope to see her father more than once a year, although at the time she had pushed the idea away. She had been too excited. Now that she had met the man, she was afraid. He was far from her idea of a mage. For one thing, he was far too young.
“Come in if you are going to.” The voice form inside the room made her jump. How had he known she was there? She drew herself up with more confidence than she felt and opened the door.
The room was dark, lit by a single candle in one corner and a small flame burning in a large golden bowl on the table.
It was this last object that drew her attention. It was priceless, she realised; a treasure beyond compare. The curve of the bowl was exquisite and so fine that it seemed to float on a very small point of contact with the table it stood on.
“I see you recognise its import,” Fear said, his voice sounding strange as if he were already in the grip of some dark magic. “Go to it and look inside. Do not touch it.” The last was a command and Katrin felt that she might die if she disobeyed.
For some unaccountable reason she was terrified of what lay within the bowl and for several seconds she did not move. Fear waited.
Was this part of the test? She wondered. She took a deep breath and took three tentative steps forward until she could see into the bowl. She relaxed.
It contained nothing more than four small clay pots balanced exactly on some strange runes engraved on the inside surface of the great bowl.
In one burned a small flame, sustained by a little flammable oil; another held only water. Yet a third some sand and the fourth contained nothing at all.
“Notice the arrangement of the four cups,” Fear intoned.
Katrin looked but saw nothing unusual. Then on closer inspection she saw that the runes that each pot stood on were more like glyphs or… symbols of the four elements, of course.
“They represent the four elements,” Katrin said.
“Of course, that is obvious, but what about the arrangement, that was your question?”
Katrin blushed and looked again. “The fire and water are opposite, as are the sand, the earth I mean, and the… is it supposed to be air?”
“Signifying?”
“Fire and water do not mix, they are… opposites in nature as they are in the bowl.” Katrin looked at Fear for a hint of approval, but he said nothing. “The same thing applies to the earth and the air I suppose. They cannot be mixed.”
“Exactly so.” Fear said curtly. “As it is in nature it is in magic for all magic is natural. All magic is order.”
It sounded like a mantra and Katrin said nothing.
“Take hold of this staff. Just one end, I will hold the other.” Fear extended a six foot long staff towards her and she took one end gingerly into her right hand. It tingled a little, or did she just imagine it.
“Now call to the elements in the bowl. Call to them with your mind one after the other until you can picture each clearly in turn, one after the other.”
Katrin did as she was told although for the longest time she could not see clearly. Even with her eyes closed.
“Open your eyes and pour your will into it even as you picture each element in your mind.”
Katrin nearly protested, that was impossible, but she tried again. Instead of the small runes or little cups, she thought of great winter fires at home and water as it fell from the mountain. She thought of the mountain itself and the sky above it which sent lightening down to set a fire, quenched by water as it fell from the mountain below the sky from which held a blazing sun soon obscured by the rain which fell…
She gasped. The bowl began to move. A little at first, but soon it began to spin rapidly.
“Close your eyes and repeat, ‘earth, wind, fire, water.’”
“Earth, wind, fire, water; earth, wind, fire, water,” Katrin sang feeling the magic in the air all around them.
This continued for some time until Fear said; “Open your eyes.”
She did.
The bowl had stopped. The sand was nearest to her, but only by two thirds. The next nearest was the water.
“What does it mean?” Katrin whispered.
“You have some ability. You have a strong affinity with Earth Power and a little to its complement, water.” Fear seemed satisfied.
“Its complement?”
“Yes. Earth and water can mix, they complement one another, as do earth and fire or air and water.”
“Or fire and air,” Katrin said hurriedly, she understood.
“Exactly so, the stronger ones affinity to an element, the weaker your gift in its opposite, there is always a balance you see?”
“Yes. But what if…? What if you have talent in all four elements?”
“A perfect balance of gifts? It is rare, very rare. I know of only one such. Crane. He has strong and equal gifts in all the elements. He will never master any of them and so can never be a mage. However, he makes a passable sorcerer or what some of the uninitiated call a wizard.”
“You mean…?” Katrin gasped in wonder not knowing what she asked. She had seen magic, real magic and the world was suddenly a different place. The haughty noblewoman faded for a moment and she looked lost.
“You have much to learn and I will teach you. Or see to it that you are taught, which is much the same thing. And believe me you will learn or I will know the reason why.” And then Fear actually smiled.
To be continued.
