KATHARINE KERR

THE BLACK RAVEN
Book Two of the Dragon Mage

COPYRIGHT

HarperVoyager

An Imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by Voyager 1999

Copyright © Katharine Kerr 1999

Cover design and illustration by Micaela Alcaino © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2020

Katharine Kerr asserts the moral right to

be identified as the author of this work

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Source ISBN: 9780006482604

Ebook Edition © NOVEMBER 2013 ISBN: 9780007378159

Version: 2019-12-10

DEDICATION

For my grandmother, Elsa Petersen Brahtin 1899–1985

The courage in her life amazed me

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

A Note on the Deverry Sequence

Prologue: Winter, 1117 Bardek

Part One: Winter, 1117 Deverry

Part Two: Deverry

Epilogue: Spring, 1118

Keep Reading

Appendices

Glossary

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Also by the Author

About the Publisher

A NOTE ON THE DEVERRY SEQUENCE

It occurs to me that readers might find it helpful to know something about the overall structure of the Deverry series. From the beginning of this rather large enterprise, I have had an actual ending in mind, a set of events that should wrap up all the books in dramatic conclusion. It’s merely taken me much longer to get there than I ever thought it would.

If you think of Deverry as a stage play, the sets of books make up its acts. Act One consists of the Deverry books proper, that is, Daggerspell, Darkspell, Dawnspell, and Dragonspell. The ‘Westlands’ books, A Time of Exile, A Time of Omens, A Time of War, and A Time of Justice, make up Act Two, while Act Three will unfold in the current quintet, ‘The Dragon Mage,’ that is, The Red Wyvern, The Black Raven, the volume you now have in hand, and its ‘sister’, The Fire Dragon. The Gold Falcon and The Silver Wyrm will bring the sequence to its end at last.

As for the way that the series alternates between past and present lives, think of the structure of a line of Celtic interlace, some examples of which have decorated the various books in this set. Although each knot appears to be a separate figure, when you look closely you can see that they are actually formed from one continuous line. Similarly, this line weaves over and under itself to form the figures. A small section of line seems to run over or under another line to form a knot.

The past incarnations of the characters in this book and their present tense story really are one continuous line, but this line interweaves to form the individual volumes. Eventually – soon, I hope – the pattern will complete itself, and you will be able to see that the set of books forms a circle of knots.

Katharine Kerr

PROLOGUE
Winter, 1117 Bardek

Always the sorcerer must prepare for hindrances and set-backs. Before any working of great length and import, he must spend long nights in study of the omens, for if the Macrocosm can find a way to defeat him, it will, preferring in its laziness the natural order over any change wrought by our arts, no matter how greatly that change will be to its benefit.

The Pseudo-Iamblichus Scroll

‘Marka, dearest?’ Keeta said. ‘I’m sorry. There’s something wrong with him.’

Marka tried to answer, but her throat filled with tears. Her youngest son, not yet two years old, sat on a red and blue carpet in a patch of sunlight that spilled through the tent door. He was frowning at the edge of the brightness; over and over again he would reach out a pale brown hand and touch the shadow next to it, then draw his hand back and frown the harder. Tight brown curls hung over his forehead; now and then he would bat at them as if they bothered him, only to forget them again in an instant.

‘He does know his name,’ Marka said. ‘He may not have any other words, but he does know his name.’

Keeta sighed and sat down next to the boy, who ignored her. They made an odd pair, Keeta so massive and dark, Zandro so slender and pale. Even though she had taken over the business end of managing their travelling show, Keeta still juggled, and her long arms sported muscles many a man had envied over the years. In her curly black hair, which she wore cropped close to her skull, grey sprouted at the temples.

‘I’ve been afraid for months,’ Marka said at last. ‘He still can’t use a spoon.’

‘Is it that he can’t use one?’ Keeta held out her hand to Zandro. ‘Or that he simply won’t?’

Zandro whipped his head around and bit her on the thumb. Calmly, without speaking, Keeta put her other hand under his chin, spread her fingers and thumb, and pressed on both points of his jaw. With a squeal he opened his mouth and let her go.

‘That’s better,’ Keeta said to him. ‘No biting.’

His head tilted to one side, he considered her. She pointed to the teeth marks on her thumb.

‘No! No biting!’

All at once he smiled and nodded.

‘Very good,’ Keeta said. ‘You understood me.’

This he ignored; with a yawn he returned to his study of the edge between light and shadow.

‘Ah ye gods!’ Marka said. ‘Just when I think it’s hopeless, he’ll do something like that. Understand a word, I mean, or even do something kind. When Kivva fell and cut herself yesterday? He came running and kissed her and tried to help.’

‘I saw that, yes. At times he’s really very sweet.’

Marka nodded. In the twenty years since her marriage, she’d borne nine pregnancies, not counting the miscarriages. Six of the children had lived past infancy – Kwinto, their first-born son; Tillya, the eldest daughter; Terrenz, born so soon after Tillya that they loved each other like twins; their sisters Kivva and Delya, named after Keeta’s long-time companion, who had died in the same fever that had killed another infant son. Zandro would, she hoped, be the last. She wondered how she was going to find the love and strength to deal with him, who would demand more of both than all the rest of them put together. Keeta must have been thinking along the same lines.

‘It’s not like you don’t have enough troubles on your mind already. What with Ebañy’s’ – a long pause – ‘illness.’

‘Oh, come right out and say it!’ Marka snapped. ‘He’s gone mad. We all know it. And now his youngest son is obviously mad, too. Why are we all being so coy? How would Ebañy put it? He’s demented, lunatic, deranged, insane –’ Tears overwhelmed her.

Marka was aware of Keeta getting up, then kneeling again next to her. She turned into her friend’s embrace and sobbed. Keeta stroked her hair with a huge hand.

‘There, there, little one. We’ll find a way to heal your husband yet. We’ll be playing in Myleton next. They have physicians and priests and the gods only know who else, and one of them will know what to do.’

‘Do you think so?’ Marka raised a tear-stained face. ‘Do you really think so?’

‘I have to. And so do you.’

The tears stopped. Marka sat back on her heels and wiped her face on the sleeve of her tunic. A sudden thought turned her cold.

‘Wait – where is Ebañy?’ Marka scrambled to her feet. ‘Here we are, on the coast, with the cliffs –’

‘I’ll stay here with the child.’

Marka ducked out of the tent, then stood blinking for a moment in the bright sunlight. Around her the camp spread out, a grand thing of white tents and painted wagons, the biggest travelling show that Bardek had ever seen. At the moment, however, the camp seemed curiously empty. Most of the performers had retired to their tents to sleep away the noon heat. Since she could see none of their animals, some of the men must have led them to the water trough by the public fountain, hidden from her sight by trees. Nowhere did Marka find Ebañy, but in the far view, at the edge of the caravanserai, between the palms and the plane trees, she could see the cliffs and distantly hear the sea, pounding on rocks below.

Marka trotted off, panting a little for breath in the hot sun. All those pregnancies had buried the slender girl acrobat somewhere deep inside a thick-waisted matron who had to bind up her heavy breasts for comfort’s sake. At those moments when she had the leisure to remember her younger self, Marka hated what she had become. Especially when she looked at her husband – as she hurried along the cliffs, she saw him at last, strolling along and singing to himself a good safe distance back from the edge. Her relief mingled with anger, that he could still look so young and so handsome, with his pale blond hair and his pale grey eyes, his pinkish-white skin just glazed with tan and as smooth as a young lad’s. When he saw her, he smiled and waved.

‘There you are, my love,’ he called out. ‘Do you have need of me for something?’

‘Oh, I was just wondering where you were.’

‘Enjoying this glorious day under the dome of the sky. The sea’s full of spirits, and so is the wind, and they’re all enjoying it with me.’

‘Ah. I see.’

Not of course that she did see the spirits teeming. He often spoke of spirits, as well as demons, portents, and visions, all of them invisible to everyone else. Still, she had to agree about the glory of this particular day, with the sea a winter-dark blue, scoured into white caps by the fresh wind.

‘I’ve been thinking about the show,’ Ebañy said. ‘I want to add something new to my displays, in the parts with the coloured lights. I’m just not sure what yet.’

‘It’ll come to you. I have faith.’

‘Well, so do I.’

They shared a smile. Hand in hand they walked back to the camp while he sang in the language of far-off Deverry.

‘A love song,’ he said abruptly. ‘For you, my beautiful darling.’

And he did love her, of that she was sure. Never in their years together had he spurned her, never had he amused himself with the young women who performed in the troupe, not even once, no matter how old and thick and worn she’d become. For that alone she would always love him, even though at times, such as now, when he studied her face with a strange intensity, she wondered what he was seeing when he looked at her.

With a squeal of delight Zandro came trotting to meet them. Keeta strolled after, shaking her head, as if to say that he was beyond her control. It was one of the strangest things about the boy, that he could walk as well as a much older child, yet not be able to form a single word.

‘Well!’ Marka pointed them out. ‘Look who’s coming.’

‘I see him, and a fine sight he is.’

When Marka said nothing, Ebañy paused to look at her.

‘You’re frowning,’ he said. ‘Why?’

‘I’m just so worried about our Zan. He’s just not right. We can’t go on hiding it from ourselves. I mean, he should be talking more, and then –’

‘What? No, he’s fine for what he is. He’s a very young soul, just born for the first time. And he’s not human, truly. You can see it in his aura.’

He bent down and scooped the boy up. Laughing, Zandro buried his face in his father’s shoulder.

‘What do you mean, aura?’ Marka said.

‘Look for yourself.’ Ebañy waved his free hand around the boy’s head. ‘All the colours are wrong. What are you, my son? One of the Wildfolk, seeing what flesh feels like? Did you choose this, or did we trap you, my wife and I, when we were making a body for someone to wear?’

Marka felt her hands clenching into fists as if she could pummel his madness into silence. When Ebañy looked into Zandro’s eyes, the boy stared steadily back.

‘Not one of the Wildfolk,’ Ebañy said at last. ‘But some spirit whose time has come to be born. You’ve a lot to learn, my darling, but now the world is yours and all its marvels too.’

Carrying Zandro, Ebañy walked back toward their tent. Marka lingered, fighting back tears, until Keeta laid an enormous hand on her shoulder.

‘I’m so sorry,’ she murmured. ‘It’s so sad.’

‘Yes.’ Marka wiped her eyes on her sleeve. ‘It came on so slowly, didn’t it? I wonder now how long he’s been this way, and I never would let myself notice.’

‘None of us wanted to notice. Don’t berate yourself.’

‘Thank you. When he’s not – well, when he’s not saying peculiar things, I can pretend that we still have our wonderful life. But then he’ll come out with something, like just now, and I don’t know what to say.’

‘There probably isn’t anything to say. Ah well, we’ll see what Myleton brings us.’

* * *

Wherever Ebañy walked, the Wildfolk went with him, sylph, sprite, and gnome, and in the water undines, rising up to beckon him into the waves. In the fires the salamanders played, rubbing their backs on the logs like cats, leaping up with the flames. At one time in his life he’d called himself Salamander, back in the land of his birth. That he did remember, though a great many other memories escaped him. The world teemed with visions that drove out the ordinary details, such as the names of the cities they visited and at times even the names of his wife and children. That they were his wife and children he never forgot.

At night when he slept, his dreams took him to strange worlds filled with stranger spirits. On purple seas he travelled in a barge while a sun of poison green hung at zenith. Enormous undines followed and held out long grey hands while they asked him questions in a language he’d never heard. Other nights he climbed mountains of crystal where the rivers ran with blood, or he would ride six-legged beasts like emerald insects across sand dunes to the ruins of cities.

Every dream ended the same way. He would reach his destination, whether a city of gold by a harbour or a cavern glittering with sapphires and emeralds, and walk into a building – a temple, perhaps, to unknown gods or a tavern filled with incense smoke and plangent music. The room would annoy him, and he would leave it, going from chamber to chamber or down long halls until at last he would see the door. It was always the same, this door, a solid thing of dark wood bound with iron. He would remember that in the room behind this door lay a magical book. If he could read that book, he would once again know who he was.

When he pushed on it, the door opened easily, but instead of a room, he would find himself in a large canvas tent, lying on a sleeping mat. Usually sunlight would glow through the walls, and he would see wealth around him: brightly-coloured tent bags and carpets, rolled mats, wooden stools, big pottery jars. Sometimes people with dark skins and black hair would be sitting nearby. He would find his clothes lying beside him on the floor cloth, and he would dress, looking round at the objects in the tent and trying to remember their names while the Wildfolk flocked around him or chased each other back and forth.

Some while later, he would realize that he was awake.

A city of trees and broad avenues, Myleton lay on the northern seacoast of Bardektinna, the biggest island in the vast and complex archipelago that Deverry men call Bardek, lumping all the islands together with a fine disregard for their inhabitants’ politics and geography both. It was a rich city, too, where the public buildings gleamed with pale marble and the homes of the prosperous aped them with white stucco walls. Just to the south stood a public caravanserai with good deep wells and shade trees. After Keeta bargained with the archon’s men – public servants in charge of the campground – the troupe pulled in and got itself settled. Since the rainy season had begun, they had the caravanserai to themselves.

‘At least there won’t be strangers,’ Marka said. ‘Sometimes when Ebañy’s babbling, and there are strangers listening, I just want to die.’

‘Now, now, little one,’ Keeta said. ‘It’s no fault of yours, and who cares what strangers think? I’m more worried about the children, myself. Their father’s madness – it can’t be good for them to see him like this.’

‘It’s not, no. I try to talk with Kwinto, but he just shrugs me off. After all, he’s almost a man now, he keeps things to himself. But Tillya – she’s truly upset. She loves her father so much, and she’s old enough to understand.’

Marka and Keeta were walking through the public bazaar, which, here in winter, stayed open through the midday. In the centre of the white plaza, public fountains gushed and glittered in the cool sunlight. Around them a sea of brightly-coloured sunshades rippled in the wind over the hundreds of booths. Close to the fountains lay luxury goods such as silver work and brass ware, oil lamps, silks, perfumes, jewellery, strangely shaped knives, and decorative leather work, while the practical vegetable and fish stands stood at the downwind edge of the market. Here and there a few performers struggled to get the crowd’s attention – inept tumblers, a clumsy juggler, a pair of musicians who showed talent but needed practice.

‘There’s nothing here to compete with us,’ Marka said. ‘Good. And Myleton knows us. Everyone will come running to see us. Particularly Ebañy’s act.’

‘And so they should,’ Keeta said. ‘It’s spectacular. I’m not prying into his trade secrets, mind, but you can’t help wondering how he gets those effects. I’ve never seen him mixing chemicals or anything like that.’

‘Do you want to know what’s really strange? I don’t know how he does it, either.’

‘Really?’ Keeta stared for a moment. ‘Well, by the Wave Father! Your man’s a tight-lipped fellow, that’s for sure. I hope he’s at least teaching Kwinto.’

‘No, he’s not. He keeps saying it’s all real magic, just like they have in Deverry. There’s a funny name for it. Dwimmer or something. But Ebañy said Kwinto doesn’t have the talent for it. That’s why we have him juggling instead.’

They walked a ways in silence, then paused by the fountains, where clean water bubbled up into white marble basins.

‘I know it sounds like I’ve gone mad myself,’ Marka said at last. ‘Talking of magic, real magic I mean.’

‘Well, yes, but what if it isn’t mad? What if your husband’s telling the plain and simple truth? They always say that studying sorcery drives men insane, don’t they?’

‘But it can’t be true!’

‘Why not? The sun rises and sets again on many a strange thing. If Ebañy says he calls fire out of the sky with magic – well, do we have a better explanation?’

Marka merely shook her head.

‘I keep thinking about Jill,’ Keeta went on. ‘You remember her – she was travelling with Ebañy when we first met him, all those years ago now, but I can still see her in my mind quite clearly. A wandering scholar, she called herself. Huh. She was a lot more impressive than that.’

‘Well, that’s true,’ Marka said. ‘And Ebañy was always trying to get her approval for things, but he was afraid of her, too. I never knew why. Ye gods, I was so young then! I don’t suppose I really cared.’

‘Well yes, it was a long time ago, all right. My memory could be playing tricks on me, but you know, looking back, I really do wonder if Jill was a sorcerer, and if your husband knew a great deal more about such things than we would ever have believed.’

Marka could think of nothing to say. The idea made a certain bitter sense.

‘Ah well,’ Keeta went on. ‘After the show tonight, when we know how much coin we have to spend, I’ll come back into town and start asking about the priests. If one of them can drive out demons, everyone will know about it, and maybe it’s only a demon that’s troubling Ebañy so.’

Since in winter the Bardekian days ended early and lacked a proper twilight, the troupe of performers went into Myleton well before sunset. At nightfall the western sea swallowed the sun in one gulp to leave only a faint greenish glow at the horizon. As oil lamps began to flicker into life in the bazaar, the troupe set up for a show. Although they carried a portable stage of planks in their caravan, Myleton supplied – for a suitable bribe to the archon’s men – a better stage than that, the long marble terrace running alongside the Customs House at the edge of the bazaar. While some of the acrobats set up brass poles for the standing torches, the musicians, led by Kwinto and Tillya, paraded through the crowd and cried the show with a loud banging of drums. Below an audience gathered, small at first, then suddenly swelling as the word went round the bazaar: the Great Krysello is here! He’s going to perform! By the time the parade returned, there were too many spectators to count.

The Great Krysello, or Salamander, as Ebañy thought of himself, because on that particular night Salamander was the only name he could remember, waited in the darkness at the far side of the stage while the dancers performed, swirling with scarves to a flute and drum accompaniment. While he watched, he sang along to the music and laughed. Once he stepped onto the stage, he felt in command of himself again, sure of where he was and what exactly he should do there.

Many years ago he’d been a juggler, and juggler only, and to warm up the crowd he still tossed scarves and juggled eggs and such, talking and singing all the while. But somewhere along the years he’d discovered he could do much more to entertain. Or had he perhaps always known he could summon the Wildfolk of Fire and Aethyr to fill the sky with fire in lurid colours? Dimly he could remember being warned against such things. An old man had spoken to him harshly about it, once a long time ago. Somewhere in his mind, however, he also remembered that this fellow was no one. Since nothing was left of the memory but those words, ‘he’s no one,’ Salamander could assume the memory image of a tall old man with ice-blue eyes and white hair was just another dream come to walk the day.

And on nights like this one, when he walked onto the stage and looked out at the dark swelling shape of the audience, a single animal it seemed, lying just beyond the glare of oil lamps and the torchlight, he forgot any strictures he might have once heard. When the crowd roared and clapped, he felt its love pour over him, and he laughed, throwing his arms into the air.

‘Greetings!’ he called out. ‘The Great Krysello gives you his humble thanks!’

From his sleeves he flicked scarves and began to circle them from hand to hand, but always he was aware of the Wildfolk, sylphs and sprites, gnomes and salamanders, gathering on the stage, forming above the incense braziers, flocking around him and flitting this way and that, grinning and pointing at the crowd. In a flood of Elvish words he called out orders, and for the sheer love of play they obeyed him. Suddenly, far above the crowd, red and blue lightning crackled. With each boom of false thunder, sheets of colour fell and twisted in every rainbow the Wildfolk knew. The crowd roared its approval as the sheets broke into glowing drops and vanished just above their heads.

A green and purple mist burst into being around the stage, and deep within it voices sang alien songs. Once the crowd fell silent to listen, Salamander added explosions and bursts of gold and silver. Then back to the colours sheeting the sky – on and on he went until sweat soaked his costume and plastered his hair to his head. He let the colours fade and the music die away, then bowed deeply to the crowd.

‘The Great Krysello is weary! But lo! we have other wonders to show you.’

At the signal Vinto’s acrobats, all dressed in gaudy silks, rushed onto the stage. The crowd roared and threw coins in a copper and silver rain. As they tumbled around the stage, the acrobats scooped them up. Salamander stepped back to the shadows at the rear. While he mopped the sweat from his face and hair with a scarf, he looked out over the crowd.

One man caught his attention immediately, a tall fellow, standing right in front. His body seemed to waver like a reflection on moving water, and his clothes looked more like wisps of fog or smoke hung around him, or maybe just placed in his general vicinity, than solid cloth. Yet no one standing near him seemed to notice the least thing unusual. When the acrobats arranged themselves into a human pyramid, he clapped and smiled like anyone else. The flute and drums began their music; applause rippled, then died. The flickering stranger crossed his arms over his chest and stood reasonably still.

But always his eyes searched through the shadows. Salamander knew at once that the man – no, the being, some strange non-human thing – was looking for him. He could feel a gaze probing, feel alien sight run down his body like clammy hands. With a shriek lost in the music, he turned and leapt down from the stage, then took out running through the night. Down long streets he raced, panting for breath; in alleyways he stopped and looked around him. The door. He had to find the dark wood door bound in iron.

Past taverns, past craftsmen’s shops he jogged, looking at each door, peering into shadows while cold sweat ran down his back and his chest ached – nowhere did he find it. He ran again, then slowed to a stumbling walk. Around him the city lay dark and silent. The night hung over the river, an oily rush of dark water against a darker sky. Salamander stopped, listening. Water slapped against wooden docks. Footsteps rustled on stone. With a roar to the Lords of Fire, he spun around and flung up both hands. A gust of silver flame towered up and lit the alley in a cold glare. Black shadow outlined every stone on wall and street and seemed to carve some incomprehensible meaning into them. Thieves shrieked and ran, dashing away down the alley – two small men, carrying knives. In the dying light from the silver flare he watched them till they skittered around a corner and disappeared. Salamander laughed, then headed to the river bank. He could follow it upstream to the caravanserai.

He arrived to find the troupe clustering around a fire and talking. Marka paced back and forth at the edge of the pool of light, and every now and then she raised her hands to her face as if she wept.

‘Here!’ Salamander called out. ‘What’s so wrong?’

The troupe froze, then burst out laughing and cheering all at once. Marka ran to him and flung her arms around him.

‘My thanks to every god!’ Her voice quavered on the edge of sobs. ‘I was so worried.’

Salamander slipped his arms around her waist and held her while he murmured small soothing noises. At last her trembling quieted.

‘Have I been gone so long?’ he said.

‘Well past the midnight bells, yes.’ She looked up at him. ‘Why did you run like that?’

‘I don’t remember.’ He felt himself yawn and shook his head. ‘I’m exhausted, my love. I’ve got to go lie down.’

That morning Marka gave up on sleep early. When the sun was rising in a pink blaze of distant fog, and the sea wind was making the tents flap and rustle, she put on a short dress and went outside, yawning and stretching in the cool air. As she glanced around, she saw a stranger, dressed in Bardekian tunic and sandals, leading his horse through the camp. He saw her, waved, and strolled over. His skin was as pale as Ebañy’s, and his eyes a strange turquoise colour, as vivid as the stones, but since he wore a leather riding hat pulled down over his ears, she could see nothing of his hair.

‘Good morning,’ Marka said. ‘Are you looking for someone?’

‘Yes, actually. The magician who performed in the market place last night.’

‘Indeed? Well, I happen to be his wife.’

‘Ah. How do you do?’ The stranger swept off his hat and bowed to her. ‘I’m a friend of his father’s.’

Marka stared like a rude child, then pulled her gaze away. His ears were impossibly long, impossibly furled, and pointed.

‘Well, then, good sir.’ She found her voice with a little gulp. You’re certainly welcome in our humble camp.’

‘Thank you. My name is Evandar.’

‘My husband’s still asleep.’ Marka glanced back at the tent and saw the flap moving. ‘Or no, here he is.’

Salamander stepped outside, saw Evandar, and screamed aloud.

‘No, no, no!’ Evandar said. ‘I’m here to help you, truly I am. What’s so wrong?’

‘There’s nothing to you,’ Salamander said, and he was shaking so badly his hands knocked together. ‘You’re not really here.’

‘Well, I’m here as much I can be anywhere.’ Evandar looked down at himself and frowned. ‘Everyone else always thinks I look solid enough. Your charming wife, for instance, didn’t shriek at the sight of me.’

‘Indeed?’ Ebañy turned to her. ‘What do you see, when you look at him?’

‘Just a man like any other, as pale as you are, and so I guess he must be from your homeland. But I don’t understand what you’re saying. His ears are – well, forgive me, sir – but they’re awfully strange, but otherwise, he looks ordinary enough.’

For a long moment Ebañy stood unspeaking, glancing back and forth between the two of them. Behind him Kivva, their second daughter, flung open the tent flap and stared out, a tall girl, dark like her mother, with tight black curls cut close to her head. Zandro wiggled out between his sister’s legs, saw Evandar, and squealed one high-pitched note. He laughed, stuck out his tongue, then threw his head back and pranced around in a tight circle whilst waggling his fingers in Evandar’s general direction. Everyone stared, speechless, until Marka found her voice.

‘Zan! What are you doing? Stop that!’ Marka stepped forward and grabbed. ‘This man is our guest, and taunting him is very rude.’

Giggling, Zandro raced back into the tent. When Marka pointed, Kivva obligingly went in after him. Marka turned back to find Evandar considering her with a smile as sly as any merchant closing a deal.

‘Please, let me apologize for my son,’ Marka said.

‘Oh, no apologies needed,’ Evandar said. ‘He must be an unusual child, yes? Difficult to handle, perhaps?’

‘Well, yes.’

‘I’m not surprised. He’s not really human, you see.’

‘That’s what my husband says!’ Marka turned to Ebañy. ‘I don’t understand any of this!’

‘No doubt.’ Evandar bowed to her. ‘But I see this interests you. Perhaps we can discuss it?’

Ebañy merely glared at him, trembling on the edge of rage.

‘The Guardians,’ Evandar hissed. ‘Does that name mean anything to you?’

All at once Ebañy laughed, relaxed, and began speaking to him in an incomprehensible language. For a moment Marka felt like screaming herself, but the stranger seemed to understand the words; he answered in the same tongue. When she started to ask them what it was, Ebañy silenced her with a wave.

‘I’m sorry, my love, and truly, I’m forgetting all my manners.’ Ebañy laid a soft hand on her arm. ‘We have a guest, a stranger in our camp!’

‘So we do.’ She saw her chance for escape and took it. ‘We’ll all have a lovely breakfast. I’ll go attend to it.’

‘None for me!’ Evandar broke in. ‘I don’t exactly eat, you see.’

There seemed to be nothing to say to this announcement. Marka hurried away, calling to her daughters to come help with the meal.

Inside the tent Salamander offered his guest cushions, and they sat across from each other on a flat-woven carpet of green and blue. Kwinto, dark and graceful with his father’s long fingers and slight build, sat cross-legged on the floor cloth nearby. When Salamander glanced his way he found the boy’s face a tightly-controlled mask.

‘Did I ever tell you about the Guardians?’ Salamander said.

Kwinto shook his head.

‘They’re a race of spirits, like the Elementals, but far far more advanced and more powerful than that. This fellow, sitting here? The man you see is just an illusion.’

‘A bit more than that, please,’ Evandar said. ‘I don’t know what I make myself out of, exactly, but it suffices.’ He picked up a silk scarf, flicked it, then tossed it to Kwinto. ‘Illusions don’t have hands that hold and touch.’

Kwinto smiled briefly, then ducked his head to study the scarf as if perhaps he could read the secrets of the universe from the pale gold silk. Marka and the girls came in, set down plates of bread and fruit, cups, and a pitcher of water laced with wine. When they started out, Salamander called Marka back but let the girls run off.

‘Come sit with me, my love,’ he said. ‘I think this news concerns you, too.’

‘Where’s Zandro?’ Marka said. ‘I should go see –’

‘Terrenz has him.’ Kwinto spoke up, his boy’s voice cracking. ‘They went out the back when we came in.’

‘Leave him be, my love,’ Salamander said. ‘Sit down.’

When he shoved a cushion her way she sank onto it. For a long moment an awkward silence held, as Evandar studied her and Kwinto both, but neither would look his way. Salamander poured himself a cup of water.

‘I should tell you why I’m here,’ Evandar said at last. ‘Your father is worried about you. He wants you to come home.’

‘My life lies here.’

‘And it seems to be a busy one, I must say.’ Evandar glanced around the tent. ‘And prosperous. Your tents are much richer than your father’s.’

‘Bardek’s a richer country than the Westlands.’

‘Just so, but your father’s getting on in years. He desperately wants to see you. He worries about you, too, off in this far country. And now I see that he has grandchildren, and here he doesn’t even know it.’

At that Marka made a little whimpering sound, quickly stifled. Salamander glanced her way.

‘If he dies without seeing you,’ Marka started, then let her voice fade away.

‘And then there’s your brother.’ Evandar leaned forward, smiling at Kwinto, to press his advantage. ‘Did you know you have an uncle, boy? In far-off Deverry? His name is Rhodry Maelwaedd, and he’s a great warrior, one that poets make songs about.’

Kwinto’s eyes widened. Salamander held up a hand to keep him silent.

‘My father’s concern,’ Salamander said, and he could hear the bitterness in his own voice, ‘my father’s concern comes a bit late. When I rode with him at home all he ever felt for me was contempt.’

His voice drained all the colour from the tent and the people in it. He saw them all turn grey and as stiff as those little drawings a scribe makes in the margins of a scroll. The wind lifted the tent flap, and Devaberiel walked in to stand with his thumbs hooked in his belt. Salamander got to his feet.

‘What are you doing here?’ he snapped. ‘Evandar just said you were back in Deverry.’

His father ignored the question and stood looking around the tent with a little twisted smile. He was a handsome man, Devaberiel, in the elvish manner, with moon-beam pale hair, and tall, walking round with a warrior’s swagger as he looked over the tent and its contents.

‘You could at least talk to me!’ Salamander took one step toward him.

Devaberiel yawned in complete indifference.

‘Curse you!’

‘Oh please!’ Marka rose to her knees and grabbed the edge of his tunic. ‘Ebañy, stop it! There’s no one there!’

She was right. His father had disappeared. No – he’d never really been there, had he? Salamander turned toward Marka and found her weeping. He could think of nothing to say, nothing at all, but he sat down next to her and reached out a hand. She clasped it in both of hers while the tears ran down her face. In a rustle of wind the Wildfolk crept into the tent and stood round the edge like a circle of mourners. Am I dead then? he thought.

At the thought he felt his consciousness rise and drift free of his body. Although the light turned bluish and dim, he could see his body slump and fall forward, spilling plates and cups alike. He could also see that he now occupied a strange silver flame-like shape, joined to that body by a mist of silver cord. Marka clasped her hands to her mouth to stifle a scream; Kwinto leapt to his feet. Evandar got up more slowly.

‘Follow the cord,’ he said. ‘Follow the cord back.’

With a rush of dizzy fall Salamander felt himself descend and slam back into the flesh so hard he groaned aloud. He lay on his back amid spilled food and stared at the peak of the tent’s roof, which seemed to be slowly turning.

‘This is terrible,’ Evandar was saying. ‘What’s happened to him?’

‘He’s gone mad,’ Marka said. ‘It’s been coming on for a long time, but now – it’s – it’s taken him over.’

Salamander watched the roof spin and tried to think. He could hear Marka and Evandar talking, but their words made no sense. Was he mad, then? Were the marvels he’d been seeing signs of madness and naught more?

‘It’s the curse,’ he whispered. ‘When Jill left us she cursed me. That much I can remember.’

Evandar dropped to one knee next to him and caught his hand.

‘Try to remember. Why would Jill –’

‘I don’t know. Something about dweomer.’

The tent spun to match the roof and dropped him into darkness.

With Kwinto’s help Marka got Ebañy settled, then left the boy there to watch his father and followed Evandar out of the tent. Sun and air had never seemed so wholesome, nor a breeze so clean. Together they walked to the edge of the caravanserai and stood in the shade of the rustling trees. Far below them on its rocks the ocean boomed and hissed.

‘Good sir,’ Marka said. ‘You seem to know a lot about all these strange things. Is Jill really working a curse against my husband?’

‘Hardly.’ Evandar paused for a short bark of a laugh. ‘She’s dead.’

Marka felt hot blood rush into her face. She could think of no apology that would matter.

‘I’m very very sorry to see your husband in this state,’ Evandar said after a moment. ‘I’ll have to do something about this.’

‘Can you help him? Oh, if you only could, I’d – well, I don’t know how we’d repay you, but we do have coin.’

‘Hush! No payment needed. I made his father a promise, and I intend to keep it. I can’t cure your husband, no. But I might know someone who can.’

Marka wept in sheer relief.

‘But it’s not going to be such an easy thing,’ Evandar went on. ‘This person is far away in your husband’s homeland. The kingdom of Deverry. Do you know about it?’

‘Well, a little. It’s supposed to be a horrible place where everyone’s a barbarian, and all the men carry swords and get drunk and chop each other to pieces.’

‘A slight exaggeration.’ Evandar grinned at her. ‘Be that as it may, Deverry’s also a wretchedly long way away, across a mighty ocean and all that, and I’m not truly sure of how we’ll get there, or if she – the person I’m thinking of – can truly heal him once we do.’

Hope sank and left her exhausted. She rubbed her face with both hands and tried to think.

‘My apologies,’ Evandar said. ‘I wish I could offer you a certainty. Although, don’t lose heart! If the person I’m thinking of can’t help, there may be others.’

‘If anyone could do something – I’m just so frightened.’

‘No doubt. Well, I’ll be off then to see what I can find.’

Evandar bowed to her, then turned and began to walk toward the cliff’s edge. He stopped and glanced back.

‘Take care of my horse, will you?’ he called out. ‘I won’t be needing him.’

He walked two paces more, then set one foot on the air as if it were as solid as a step, hauled himself up, and disappeared.

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