Magic in Ithkar (31 page)

She sighed as she turned back to the tapers she was dipping. Her father had taught her well when it came to candlemaking, but he hadn’t thought to teach her how to handle Garak. He and Garak had been drinking companions during the fair in previous years, but Garak had always treated Eirthe as part of the furnishings of the candlemaker’s booth. Now, however, her father was dead, and Eirthe was the candlemaker. And she didn’t think that she’d care to take Garak, with the hasty temper and pride that covered his incompetence as a wizard, as a drinking companion ... or any other kind of companion, either. Frowning, she jerked the candles out of the caldron, splashing hot wax into the fire below. The fire responded with a surprisingly loud hiss.

“I’m sorry, Alnath,” Eirthe hastily apologized as a patch of red-gold flame moved to another part of the fire and regarded her with unblinking eyes.

“You should be,” the salamander replied. “Even overlooking the fact that you’re splashing wax on me. You’re going to ruin those tapers. You know that they have to be dipped smoothly and evenly.”

“I certainly should know; Father told me often enough. I wish he were here to cope with Garak.”

“Why? What’s that blustering fool up to now?” Alnath separated herself from the fire and came to rest on the back of Eirthe’s left wrist. Since this was her habitual perch when she condescended to leave her home in the fire, Eirthe had long since become accustomed to the heat on her skin and no longer found it particularly painful. Her hands were always a mess from hot wax and heavy caldrons anyway. She reached out a callused finger and scratched Alnath gently behind the ear.

“He wants me to make some people candles for him.”

“Why not? After all, you are the best candlemaker in the fair. Probably even better than your father was—your candles are more alive.”

“True,” Eirthe said grimly, “and that’s exactly why Garak wants them—in die likenesses of the richest merchants in the fair. If I put enough life into them in the making, even he will be able to bind them to the people they resemble.”

“You mean using the law of similarity? I suppose he could. He does have some magical ability, though not much. But what would he gain by it?”

“Remember the old goldsmith who died last year, near the end of the fair? I know father made a candle of him, but it disappeared. Three nights later the goldsmith burned to death in his bed, and it is said that the blankets weren’t even charred. And after that, Garak had quite a bit of money for a mendicant wizard. I think he’s running a protection racket.”

“What are you going to do about it? Denounce him to the fair-court?”

“Using what for proof? That was nearly a year ago, and the people who actually knew anything aren’t going to want to remember. But I’m not going to make candles for him, no matter what he offers me. I don’t need more wealth than I have—especially if it makes me a target for every greedy man around. I’d go mad in luxury with nothing useful to do. I can only wear one dress at a time, sleep in one wagon, and eat and drink as much as will fit in my stomach. And I like making candles. Garak is badly mistaken if he thinks he can turn my head with promises of great riches.”

“Unfortunately, he’s likely to try to harm you if you don’t do what he wants.”

“Oh, he was making dire, if unspecified, threats when he left. But we both know that his magic isn’t up to much. He’ll be furious with me, but he’ll probably bluster it out and go away, just like he did today.”

“He’ll be back.”

“So will the Three Lordly Ones.” Eirthe chuckled.

“Seriously, he’ll come back tomorrow, I’ll tell him I won’t do it, he’ll mouth gibberish at me and make dire predictions about all the terrible things that will befall me, and then he’ll stalk off, the very picture of a mortally offended wizard, and life will go on.”

“You’re probably right.” Alnath shrugged herself off Eirthe’s wrist and back into the fire. “If you want to finish that batch of tapers today, you’d better get back to work.”

Garak showed up again the next day around midafternoon, all dressed up to intimidate. With his black robe covering his paunch and the hood pulled forward to shadow his face, he actually did look rather imposing. But there are certain difficulties inherent in an attempt to intimidate the daughter of one’s drinking companion: it is necessary for her to forget all the times she has seen you slouched on a bench leaning against the side of the wagon, with wine dribbling down your beard and staining your robe. Eirthe was not obliging enough to forget that, and that was the vision which superimposed itself over Garak’s shrouded form. Great wizard indeed, she thought.

“Well, young woman?” Garak intoned. “Have you come to your senses?”

“I have never been out of them,” Eirthe replied calmly, “and no, I will not make candles for you. Go and play your games by yourself; I’m not interested.” She hung the tapers she was holding on the rack and reached for the next batch, confident that Garak would bluster and then leave if she simply ignored him. With that firmly in mind, she concentrated on her work, not noticing what happened next.

Garak drew himself up to his full height, which was about the same as Eirthe’s, and began to chant in some unknown language while waving his hands about in what were presumably magical gestures. Eirthe continued to dip tapers with a steady rhythm, but several passersby stopped to stare.

Suddenly she heard a warning hiss from the fire, where Alnath watched. Sneaking a glance out of the corner of her eye at Garak, she saw him shiver, as if a wind passed through him from head to feet.
What’s wrong?
she thought at Alnath.

Alnath’s reply formed in her head.
He’s invoking Thotharn
—
and the god is answering.
Alnath sounded uneasy, and Eirthe, remembering the stories she had heard of this alien god, did not feel able to offer any reassurance.

But why should the god answer him?
Eirthe protested.
He’s not a priest.

Maybe he’s a tool. But Thotharn is definitely with him.
Alnath paused, listening.
He’s putting a cold curse on you, saying that your candles will never burn, your fire will go out
— The fire went out, and Alnath’s scream split Eirthe’s head apart as she blacked out.

Her head hurt dreadfully, and she was lying on the ground. Eirthe cautiously opened her eyes. Garak was gone, but so was Alnath, and her fire was still out. She dragged herself painfully to her feet and fetched the tinderbox from the wagon, but her attempts to rekindle the fire were unsuccessful; she couldn’t get so much as a spark from the flints. The wax in the caldron was still liquid, so she hastily poured it into a storage crock. There was no point in adding to her misery the task of having to chip out an entire caldron full of hardened wax.

She looked at the surrounding booths, wondering what the neighboring craftsmen had made of the incident. From the determined way in which they all carried on their normal business while being careful not to look in her direction, she gathered that they had all decided it was safer to ignore the whole mess. Well, she couldn’t blame them for that. She wished she could do the same.

She picked up the tapers she had been working on, which were near enough done to use anyway, and retreated to the privacy of her wagon to take stock. Garak had said that her fire would go out and her candles would not burn. Her fire was out all right, but she wasn’t going to take his word for anything. But her efforts to light the tapers she held were unsuccessful, and when she tried to light one of the molded images of the Three Lordly Ones she had made several days earlier, it wouldn’t light, either.

“That’s wonderful,” she muttered. “Just what I don’t need, a retroactive curse.”

There was nothing she could do about the candles at the moment; she had enough money, so she didn’t need to worry about starving for a while, and her headache was wearing off. That left her free to worry about Alnath. She remembered hearing her scream just before she fainted, but she didn’t feel that Alnath was dead. She might be hurt, though, and in any case Eirthe was not about to abandon a creature that had been her best friend since early childhood. She would have to find her.

“So how do I find a salamander? Start with fire; who uses fire?” Eirthe picked up her cloak and went out into the darkening twilight, trying not to think about all the fires that would be lit as the sun set.

* * *

Several hours later, well past suppertime, Eirthe purchased a meat pie from one of the food stalls and collapsed dejectedly on a nearby bench to eat it. It wasn’t exactly that she felt hungry, but she was cold and very, very tired, and she hoped that hot food might make her feel a little better. All she wanted to do was crawl back to her wagon, crawl into her bunk, and sleep for the rest of her life. Her head was hurting again after hours of wandering around calling Alnath, and there was still no sign of her. She wasn’t within range of the goldsmith, the silversmith, the armorers, the alchemists, or the herbalists, she wasn’t near the potter’s kiln, and she was nowhere in the vicinity of the bakers, cooks, and pastry chefs. Who else used fire?

Eirthe took another bite of her pie and forced herself to chew and swallow it. Idly, with no real hope of receiving an answer, she broadcast another call to Alnath. To her astonishment, she caught an answering flicker, accompanied by a picture of Alnath flaming in a large glass sphere. Eirthe hastily shoved the remaining portion of the meat pie into her mouth and practically swallowed it whole as she went to follow the picture to its source. Alnath felt unhurt, but why was she surrounded by glass instead of being in a fire? Had Garak somehow managed to imprison her?

She hurried away from the food and clothing booths and had almost reached the eastern boundary—her section—when a small ball of flame came flying through the air and settled on her wrist.

“Alnath.” Eirthe smiled tremulously and stroked her head. “Are you all right?”

“Yes. I’ve found a nice place. Warm.” Alnath flitted away, and Eirthe followed her to a nearby booth where she settled back into the glass sphere that Eirthe had seen a few minutes before. Now she realized that it was part of the wares of the glassblower’s booth, though it was an unusual design for a bowl.

What is that, Alnath?
she asked silently.

Alnath shrugged. “Warm.” She subsided into the bottom of the strange bowl and flickered contentedly.

“Ah, a fair maiden.” A drunken voice issued forth from the shadows cast by Alnath’s fire, followed by a young man clutching a wineskin. His brown tunic stretched over a paunch that would have done credit to a priest, and his large chest and callused hands—even worse than Eirthe’s—showed the effects of years of glassblowing. All in all, he looked like a short, and not unfriendly, bear. “Have you come to laugh at my misery, too?”

“I have quite enough misery of my own, thank you. I don’t need to go looking for any more—even to laugh at.” She looked around at his wares, neatly arranged on shelves around them. There were dozens of goblets, all exquisitely shaped, a good variety of animal figures, and the odd bowl in which Alnath was resting. “Why are you miserable? Your work is beautiful.” She ran a finger over the smooth glass of Alnath’s bowl. “Not so much as an air bubble in it.”

“It’s absolutely perfect,” the glassblower agreed. “My finest work to date. And—until that accursed Garak passed by this evening—it was destined as a gift from the high priestess to her sister. It was to be a home for her ornamental fish—and now look at it!” He gestured dramatically with the hand holding the wineskin, then took another healthy gulp of wine.

“Garak certainly seems to have been busy today,” Eirthe remarked bitterly. “What did he do to you?”

The glassblower froze, wineskin just touching his mouth, and looked at her over it. “He do something to you, too?”

Eirthe nodded, fighting a sudden desire to burst into tears. She blinked rapidly and felt the wineskin thrust into her grasp as surprisingly gentle hands guided her to a bench.

“Here, sit down. Have some wine, you look like you need it.”

Eirthe took a large mouthful of wine and choked it down, feeling it warm her. The second mouthful felt even better. “Thank you, sir.”

The man laughed. “No need to be so formal. I’m Cadmon, glassblower.”

“Eirthe, candlemaker.” She passed the wineskin back to him, and he took another swig and passed it back.

“So. Eirthe, what makes you wander about alone after dark?” Cadmon leaned back, obviously ready to listen to a long story.

“I was looking for my salamander,” Eirthe began, indicating Alnath, who was still curled up in the bowl. Cadmon sat up abruptly.

“Is that a salamander?” he asked in amazement.

“Of course,” Eirthe replied, puzzled. “What did you think it was?”

“I thought it was just part of the curse.” She looked questioningly at him, and he continued to explain. “You see, Garak doesn’t like me, and hasn’t for a long time. I don’t show sufficient respect for his robe—decrepit piece of fabric that it is.” Eirthe giggled and he grinned at her. “And I certainly wasn’t about to give away my beautiful goblets for what he wanted to pay for them. Besides, he wouldn’t appreciate them. No soul.

“Anyway, he came by late this afternoon, in a truly foul mood, and demanded the fishbowl to use in his scrying. Now I rather doubt that he could scry with the whole ocean to work with, but I was polite. I didn’t tell him that. I quietly explained that the bowl was a special commission for the high priestess. I expected him to drop the matter right there, but he got really funny. He said that she, and all the priesthood, were children playing with toys they didn’t understand, but that he understood true power and soon they would all serve him.

“I must have smiled or something, because he got mad and started cursing me. He said that anything put into my vessels would burn and be instantly consumed. And then he stalked off—and it was true! Look.” He picked up a goblet and poured a small amount of wine into it. The wine flamed briefly and the goblet was empty. “I can’t even make mulled wine! I—the finest glassmaker south of the steppes—reduced to drinking from a common wineskin.” He suited the action to the words. “It’s disgusting.” He lowered the skin and looked owlishly at Eirthe. “And what did he do to you?”