The Witch & the Cathedral - Wizard of Yurt - 4 (11 page)

A red winged lizard with hands. No wonder the young guard's eyes were so round. "Go on to the cathedral," I told Joachim. "Keep everyone calm. I'll deal with this." I might not be Royal Wizard of Yurt anymore, but when it came to magical apparitions I was still in command.

The construction site swarmed with activity as the guard and I pushed our way through. No one else seemed aware of the winged lizard. Cartloads of cut stone were arriving, drawn by oxen, and workmen unloaded and stacked them, easily levering the stones up and down ramps. The new tower's light-colored stonework was almost white against an azure sky. There was nothing ominous here in daylight, but it did not need very complex spells to realize mat the whole city was permeated with magic.

"It was on the docks by the river," the young guard panted as we hurried through the narrow streets. The dean led the climb up the tower last night, so I ran for him at once. I didn't tell anyone else except my captain." "Good thinking," I said. "We don't want panic." But the docks were no more ominous than the construction site. We wove between stacks of cargo crates, coming into the city or ready to leave. I probed for magic and found very little. The aura that fingered seemed wild and unfocused, nothing like the tightly constructed spells used for illusions—but then I had never expected any of this to be illusion.

An older guardsman joined us, lifting his eyebrows at me. "So the mayor's sent for a wizard," he commented. I didn't have time to correct him. "What happened to the winged lizard?" I probably would have called it a small dragon myself, but "lizard" did not sound as horrible.

He shook his head. "It's gone. It disappeared with a pop, right into the air. I tried thrusting with my sword into the space where it might be, but I didn't hit anything." He paused.

"Just before it disappeared, I had the impression it was picking up some of the cargo crates... . "A sword won't find it," I said grimly. "It's going to take magic. Stay on guard here in case it returns, and tell the dean at once if it does. I'll search the rest of the city for it." As I hurried away from the river, I asked myself if a winged red lizard, the size of a hound, could have been what they all saw on the cathedral last night But I rejected this idea—-Joachim would certainly know the difference. But why should terrifying magical creatures suddenly be appearing in Caelrhon?

I turned a corner and thought I saw Prince Vincent. After a startled second I realized the lord coming toward me could not be Vincent himself. He was slightly taller and quite a bit heavier, as well as several years older. He had the same burnished copper hair, the same wide-spaced eyes and firm jaw, but not the same easy and confident way of walking.

I gave all my suspicions free rein and stepped into his path. "Excuse me, let me introduce myself. I am Daimbert, the Royal Wizard of Yurt. You're the heir to Caelrhon, Prince Lucas if I recall correctly. We met several years ago; I don't know if you remember."

His reaction did nothing to lessen my suspicions. He gripped his sword and his eyes narrowed. "And what are you doing in my kingdom he demanded.” I took a step backwards as he thrust his face toward mine. "The monster," I babbled. "The dean of the cathedral asked me to come. I heard that your own Royal Wizard had an unfortunate accident, so—"

"We dismissed him even before his accident," said Lucas, glowering. "We have no more use for magic-workers in Caelrhon."

"But— But why not?"

"You keep it so discreet you think we won't notice," said Lucas coldly. "But after my experiences, my eyes were opened. We know you wizards are plotting to throw off the

'service' you claim to practice. 'Establishing peace throughout the western kingdoms,' you like to call it, but I know better. And now I wouldn't be surprised to learn that you're hoping to influence the election of the next bishop. If you really are here at the invitation of the cathedral—something I intend to find out!—then all I can say is that the bishop should know better."

Shocked at his open vehemence, I didn't reply but made him the formal half-bow and hurried away. None of this made any sense. Even though Sengrim, Caelrhon's wizard, had always treated me rudely, I could not imagine what he could have done to get himself dismissed with harsh feeling that would persist even after his death.

As I walked I kept probing with magic but found no sign of either an enormous bat-winged monster or a giant lizard with hands. Regretfully, I had to conclude that neither of the princes of Caelrhon could be responsible if they no longer even employed a wizard. I reached the gates of the city and went out into the field where the Romneys had been camped a week ago. The new grass, growing rapidly, had nearly covered the marks left by their caravans.

For a moment I hesitated, then rose into the air for the flight back to the kingdom of Yurt. If someone had brought monsters here and then taken them away again, he must have somewhere to imprison them. There was one place I knew where it might—maybe—be possible to do so, and the quickest way to find out was to look.

I scrupulously went nowhere near the royal castle of Yurt, instead heading for the magical valley at the other end of the kingdom. Prince Vincent could now persuade the court all he wanted, I told myself, that aristocrats would be better off without their wizards; it no longer mattered to me.

In the valley was concentrated a pocket of forces left over from the creation of the earth, as well as the home of a wood nymph and the shrine to Yurt's own Cranky Saint, a place where spells always worked especially well. Here it might be possible for a master wizard to find the power to bind even a monster from hell.

The saint's shrine had been served by an old hermit when I first came to Yurt, but a much younger man, ascetic, earnest, and with a shaved skull, now lived at the hermitage. I thought gloomily that this was one more example of everyone around me growing older.

I approached cautiously, but the little green valley dreamed peacefully in the sun. I slowly flew its length above the sparkling river, seeing no monsters and noting with some detachment that I was capable of being back in the kingdom, within thirty miles of the queen, without disturbing the emotional scab that had formed over my bitterness and pain.

The valley was so permeated with magic that it was hard to find specific spells, but after half an hour I was fairly sure no one had used its powers to conceal the cathedral's monster. It was afternoon when I arrived, hot and tired, back in Caelrhon, feeling intense frustration at not being able to find a monster that dozens of people had seen.

Ox carts laden with cut stone were coming toward the city gates. The oxen plodded slowly, their wagons creaking and the loads appearing to rock dangerously. Walking beside the oxen or sitting on the loads were the drivers, lazily flicking long whips, more to remind the oxen of their duties than to hurry them on.

But on one of the loads of stone rode a ragged magician.

My discouragement fell away, and I stepped casually to the edge of the road. "Greetings, Magician," I said as he drew even.

Although from the nature of the magic that had been going on in the city I had expected a fully qualified wizard, I felt I had solved the mystery at last The unkempt beard and filthy clothes could conceal unusual abilities. After all, some magicians specialized to the extent that, in one small area of magic, they might be better than most wizards.

He gave an abrupt start. "Greetings, Wizard," he managed to say, though his voice came out an indistinct mumble. Squinty eyes stared at me from under scraggling brows.

Between his eyebrows and beard, his face was almost completely obscured.

I could have tried probing magically to get a better idea what he looked like, but another magic-worker would know at once what I was doing and be grossly insulted. He was certainly old even the best magic cannot reverse or conceal the natural forces of aging. "Why don't you get down so we can have a talk?" I suggested.

He hesitated a moment, then grunted and slid down from the moving wagon. "Thanks for the lift, driver!" he called.

"How far have you been riding?" I asked.

"Just a couple of miles," he said in a surly tone. His small eyes kept shifting, not quite meeting mine. For a second I had an impression of great magical power here— maybe even, strangely enough, the spells of two separate wizards. But the next instant the impression was gone. I mentally shook my head. I was, I knew from long experience, highly capable of jumping to unwarranted conclusions and then convincing myself that they were true. And I so much wanted to believe that I had found here the source of the cathedral s problems.

"Look at my shoes," the magician continued. "If yours were like this you wouldn't walk a hundred yards farther than you had to." The uppers of his shoes were badly cracked and the soles flapped loose. "I begged a ride not far from the quarry, paid the driver with a few illusions—pretty racy ones, too!"

I had never been sure what Zahlfast had seen in me in my student days, why he had passed me in spite of the disastrous transformations practical, but I knew how perilously close I had come to being a magician making his living by selling pathetic scraps of magic wherever he could. But this magician, I reminded myself, might have made a giant bat-winged creature appear on the new cathedral tower. "Where were you last night?" I demanded.

"Asleep in a haystack, and getting pretty wet, too," he said grumpily. "But what is it to you?" the last almost in a shout. "Since when does a wizard want to keep an honest magician from earning a living?"

I would have offered him money except that I knew any such condescension would have made him even more indignant. "You were not perhaps here in the cathedral city, calling up a monster.

"No," he said almost hesitantly, then "No!" quite explosively. "I've had enough of self-satisfied wizards like you without you starting to accuse me of nonsense!"

"Glad to hear it," I said, taking a step backwards.

He had worked himself up into a fury. Half of what he said was unintelligible, and for the rest he seemed to group me with an apparently diabolical conspiracy of wizards from the school, all bent on starving him. He seemed to have several vicious things to say about other important members of society while he was at it. I took the opportunity while he was distracted by his own anger to check again for signs of great magical power and this time found nothing. The brief impression I had had of some sort of double power also disappeared on closer examination—-just my overactive imagination again.

"The reason I asked,” I said when he paused for breath, "is because whoever is practicing magic around the new cathedral will be in serious trouble, and I thought I should warn you to stay away."

"It wouldn't be you, would it?" he snorted.

I shook my head. "But if there's a renegade wizard here in the city, especially one practicing black magic, I'm going to find him,"

The shifty eyes became guarded. "I don't call up monsters” he said after a minute, as though settling on a plan of attack. "I study the magic of fire."

He waved his hand, muttered a few quick words, and the grass around my feet burst into flame. I jumped back, and his beard split in a grin. But the damp grass blazed for only a few seconds, and I quickly stamped it out. A few final wisps of smoke curled up.

That's marvelous!" I cried. "I don't know how to do that. Can you teach me how? I'll pay you well!" Elerius had apparently tried to persuade the school they should teach fire magic, but as far as I knew none of the teachers had ever learned any.

But the old magician was backing away. "I guess they don't teach you everything, then," he said with a bitter laugh, "even the ones of you they coddle. Be jealous of me for once, and see how you like it!" Empty carts were coming back out of the city gates. The old magician waved one down.

He was much too ragged for me ever to be jealous of him, no matter what skills he possessed. But I was delighted. I could no more have created fire out of air than I could have a few minutes ago, but in the moment when he made the grass blaze I at least thought I had an inkling how to begin.

As I headed back into the city I glanced over my shoulder. The magician had successfully negotiated a trade of illusions for a ride. Over the ox cart rose the insubstantial form of a naked woman, not quite life-size, moving in awkward gestures apparently meant to be obscene. I turned my back.

I wanted to tell someone what I had just realized about fire magic, but I wasn't sure whom to tell. In the meantime, although I did not like the coincidence of the magician appearing here only a day after the monster appeared on the tower, I was inclined to believe it had nothing to do with him. It was time to start searching the city itself more thoroughly.

But first, I thought as I walked through the gates, I needed to speak with the mayor. He might not be among the "three who rule the world," but the elected head of Caelrhon had the right to be consulted about a monster in his own city.

"There must be a very powerful wizard operating nearby," I told him. I had been ushered at once into the mayors study when I told the official at the door the reason for my visit, and the mayor seemed to have abruptly left a meeting in order to talk to me. "Creatures from the land of wild magic shouldn't just appear by themselves in the lands of men.

That's why the cathedral dean sent for me at once."

He played with the heavy chain of office that hung around his neck. It must have had twice as much gold in it as anything I had ever seen the queen wear. He looked as though his normal expression was genial, but it was not genial this afternoon.

"Fighting wizardry with wizardry," he said thoughtfully and tugged at an earlobe, not quite meeting my eyes. "How can we be certain you are truly here to help us and are not the wizard who made a monster appear here last night?"

If this is what the city council had been discussing when I pulled the mayor out of the meeting, I had gotten here just in time. Had Lucas's distrust of all wizards now infected the local merchants and artisans as well? "Good question," I said with all the confidence I could. "But you see, I'm school-trained."