A Tapestry of Spells (14 page)

The mage looked at them both for a moment in silence, then he put his face in his hands and began to sob. It was done in profound silence, which made it all the more terrible. Sarah perched on the edge of the man’s chair and put her hand on his back. He reached up and fumbled for her hand until she gave it to him. He held on tightly and continued to grieve.

Sarah looked up at Ruith. “What do you think happened to him?”

His expression was very grim. “I’m not sure.” He pulled up a stool and sat down in front of the old mage. “Can you tell us what befell you?”

It took another few minutes before Master Oban finally dragged one of his velvet sleeves across his face, then nodded. He seemed to recapture something of himself, because he suddenly waved his wand around furiously, sending more spells scattering around him. Sarah watched them bounce harmlessly off things and disintegrate. He then leapt up and began an involved pantomime where he played two characters: himself, by all accounts; and apparently another evil, sneaky mage. A fight ensued and, despite Oban’s masterful strategies and impressive defenses, his voice was taken from him.

Sarah caught sight of Ruith’s face during the last bit of Oban’s tale and was surprised by his expression. He said nothing, but he watched Oban as if he’d seen something almost too horrible to face. She almost reached out to him, but stopped herself just in time. He visibly shook aside whatever had troubled him, then assumed an expression of sympathy.

Curious.

She turned her thoughts to what the runes below had proclaimed about Oban’s utter magnificence. She wondered about her brother and how Ruith had been certain he didn’t have enough power to do anything but be an annoyance. But what if he had found a way to take things from others?

Their voices, perhaps?

Or their power?

The thought was so horrifying, she instinctively turned away from it ... and then she looked at it again. How many times had her mother wished aloud that she could add to her own power and lamented the fact that she knew no spell for such a thing? How often had Daniel simply listened to her rattle on without adding to the conversation? Sarah had always assumed he was simply allowing their mother to go on so she would think kindly of him when he wanted something from her. Now Sarah began to suspect he might have been thinking about something else entirely.

Her only question now was how in the world he ever would have found such a spell.

“Master Oban,” she said slowly, “did someone steal more than your voice?” She paused. “Perhaps your power, too?”

The mage stopped in mid-retelling of his tale, then turned to her and nodded vigorously, but that shouldn’t have caused the sound of breaking glass. Sarah realized then that the glass Ruith had been holding had slipped through his fingers and shattered against the marble floor. She rose from where she’d been sitting on the edge of the chair to help him, only to find Master Oban in her way. He held up his thumb and forefinger pinched together and looked at her pointedly.

“But only a bit,” she guessed.

He looked down his nose at her and jerked his head once in a brisk nod. Of course. It likely wouldn’t do for anyone to believe he was less than he had been.

She cleared her throat. “Was it a man, a dark-eyed man with blond hair?”

Master Oban’s eyes widened suddenly, and he nodded.

“I fear that was my brother,” she admitted. “We’re trying to find him and stop him from doing any more damage—”

The mage pulled his cloak more closely around him and tapped her aside with his wand before he marched unsteadily toward the door. He looked back over his shoulder at them, then pointed pointedly at the passageway.

Sarah looked at Ruith. “I think he wants to come with us. Do you need to rest—”

“Nay,” he said hoarsely. He rose, crunching glass under his boot. “I am well.”

He didn’t look well, but she wasn’t going to argue. She followed him from the chamber not out of any desire to defer to him, but rather because she thought she might better catch him that way if he keeled over.

Master Oban, however, seemed perfectly happy to be off hunting Daniel, if the alacrity with which he descended to his kitchens was any indication. He found a rucksack and began to load it with dainties that likely wouldn’t survive the trip out of town. She watched him for a moment or two, then looked up at Ruith, who looked better than he had before. Then again, he’d poached a substantial piece of cake and was putting it where it was intended to go.

Man first, mage second, apparently.

Master Oban paused in his packing and wandered out of the chamber.

“I believe we’ve made another acquisition,” Sarah said with a sigh.

“He’ll slow us down,” Ruith said grimly. He poured two glasses of wine, handed one to her, then sipped at his own. He paused, then drained the entire glass in one slow pull. He drew his sleeve across his mouth and shook his head. “Give me a reason, any reason at all, why we shouldn’t leave him behind.”

“Because he might know something useful?”

He cursed, set his glass down, then began to pace restlessly. Master Oban came trotting back into the kitchen from points unknown with several bottles that he shoved into his sack without regard to the cakes and delicate pastries he’d already packed first. Sarah watched him hurry off to rummage through his silver, then looked again at Ruith, who had stopped pacing and was merely standing there, watching grimly.

“What befell him, do you think?” she asked before she thought better of it.

He looked at her, opened his mouth, then shut it again and shook his head. “What I’m thinking doesn’t bear repeating. ’Tis so fanciful that even I think I’m mad to entertain it.” He scratched his right wrist, then flinched. “I forget about this.”

“I wish I could.”

He studied her for a moment, then sighed. “I’m sorry for it. As for the other, I think we can safely assume that your brother was about his business, then left town before he was caught. Unless you think he might still be loitering somewhere here.”

“He might be at a bookseller,” she said without hesitation. “He was always looking for more spells, and ’twas certain he couldn’t find them in Doire—”

She jumped at the sound of a pounding on a doorway at the front of the house. Oban popped up from where he’d been rustling around in a chest of linens, stuffed a handful of things into his pack that was already overflowing with spoils, and hauled it up onto his shoulders. He waved for them to follow and sprang for the back door.

She followed, with Ruith hard on her heels. They slipped through the garden and out into a street she hadn’t seen before. Sarah wasn’t sure who had been trying to get into the wizard’s house, but she knew she didn’t want to meet them if Master Oban didn’t.

She supposed it might have been easier to blend in if she hadn’t been hurrying off with a tall, profoundly dangerous-looking man and an ancient wizard dressed in purple velvet robes and a tall, pointy purple hat, and waving a wand that scattered spells around him like seeds.

’Twas little wonder Ruith was cursing rather more loudly than necessary.

He finally stopped them on a corner. “I have to have my gear,” he said in a low voice, “and we have to get out of the village before we’re not able to.”

“I’ll fetch Ned-”

He shook his head. “Too dangerous. Just take Oban and wend your way east until you reach the road. Many companies stage their wagons there. I’ll follow with the lad and your hound.” He paused. “If the choice is between you and the mage, leave him.”

She nodded, though she wasn’t sure she could do it. She watched Ruith walk off swiftly into the light of the setting sun, then turned to Master Oban.

“Listen to me,” she said sharply. “If you want to live, hide your gear, keep your head down, and follow me.”

His mouth fell open, but he took off his hat and put that and his wand under his cloak just the same.

Sarah towed him along behind her, ducking into the first shop she saw when she heard shouts in the distance. It happened to be a bookstore, which she thought to be fortuitous for a potential sighting of Daniel—until she realized she’d lost Oban. She found him fondling what were obviously books of spells, but she didn’t have time to look and neither did he, no matter how vigorously he flapped his arms in protest when she pulled him away.

It took a good half an hour to duck in and out of front and back doors, but she finally found herself on the outskirts of town with the sun going down behind her and a road full of dust in front of her. She looked over the wagons critically, wondering which one might be willing to take on an unusual quartet of travelers without asking too many questions.

She selected a likely suspect, then walked over. The four horses already hitched were large and sturdy and the wagon seemed to be well stocked. Her coin might buy them at least a few meals from the wagon master if she were very polite.

She left Master Oban thinking on her command that he not move, then approached the man and waited until he’d turned from his business to greet her. To her profound surprise, the man turned out to be none other than Master Franciscus.

“What are you doing here?” she asked in astonishment.

He shook her hand with a smile. “Deliveries in the north, my girl. What are
you
doing here?”

“Don’t ask.” She pulled her purse from her feed sack and held it out. “I need you to hide us.”

“Us?”

“That mage there, Ned, me ... and the mage from up the hill.”

Master Franciscus ignored her coins and instead put his hand on her head the same way he’d been doing for as long as she could remember.

“I sense quite a tale here, but I’ll wait until we’re a more comfortable distance from Bruaih to pry it from you. I assume your other companions will find us?”

“I certainly hope so.” She paused. “Do you have oats, perchance? Or carrots?”

“Carrots?”

“I brought Castân. He won’t need many. Ned will eat what he doesn’t, I imagine.”

“And the lad from up the hill? What will he require?”

She looked at him sharply. “What did you call him?”

Franciscus lifted an eyebrow and smiled. “I’ve shared the occasional cup of ale with him, Sarah, and I’ve two good eyes. I assume you do too.”

“I—”

“I’d better go see to your other mage before he becomes a little too cozy with any of my kegs,” he said, turning away. “We’ll set off momentarily. Don’t lose yourself.”

She wasn’t sure she hadn’t already begun to. She paced restlessly until Franciscus was ready, then followed along after his wagon as he drove off into the twilight. She had the oddest feeling, as if she were walking in another world that wasn’t hers. She drew her hand over her eyes and shook her head for good measure, but that didn’t help her any. Her surroundings seemed sharper somehow, no matter what she did. In time, she gave up trying to ignore those surroundings and settled for concentrating only on the ground in front of her feet.

Ruith and Ned caught up to them before long, with Castân trotting along dutifully behind them. Sarah walked along behind them all far enough into the night that she was very grateful indeed when Franciscus called a halt and they made camp.

Ned wolfed down a supper suitable for a lad of ten-and-six, rolled up in a blanket, then closed his eyes and began to snore happily. Castân deigned to lie down, but he made a particularly horselike noise as he did so. Ruith reached over and fed him a wizened, nasty-looking carrot. Castân crunched it happily, then rested his head on his paws and looked at Ruith worshipfully.

Sarah sat on the other side of the fire from them and watched as Ruith pulled out a stone and began to sharpen one of his knives. He looked much better than he had before, so much better that she wondered if she’d imagined his actions in Oban’s private chambers.

Only she could still see the trail of spell on the back of his hand, glinting silver in the moonlight.

She looked up from her contemplation of his hands working his steel to find him watching her. She attempted a smile, but failed.

“I’m worried,” she admitted. She glanced at Oban, because she couldn’t help herself, then looked back at Ruith. “Can Daniel be found without magic?”

“We’re only a pair of days behind him and I can’t imagine he suspects he’s being hunted,” Ruith said easily. “He’ll become careless, and then we’ll have him.”

She wished she had that sort of faith in her brother’s stupidity, but she knew him better than that.

Ruith set his knife aside. “You should sleep. The road will be long tomorrow.”

She shook her head. “You first. I have too much on my mind now. Besides, Master Oban will keep me company”

He hesitated. “I’m not entirely convinced we won’t see more of those trolls. They move silently”

“I’ll listen carefully.”

He hesitated, then nodded. “Very well, a pair of hours. No more.”

She nodded, then watched him stretch out near the fire. Castân rose, lumbered over, then lay down at Ruith’s back, snorting a time or two contentedly before he stretched his front feet out and rested his head on them. Sarah would have smiled, but the sight of her horse who was now a dog because of things she couldn’t control was too unsettling to allow her to. She rose and began to pace the perimeter of the camp silently. And she hoped Ruith was right about Daniel, that his conceit would be his undoing.

She didn’t want to think about what other lives he would ruin if not.