Master of the Books Read online

  Tilwith was fast asleep, helped by Burgher William’s wine, giving Fergus time to light a candle before he put his hand over her mouth. She woke instantly, bucking to be free, but the candlelight let her see Fergus’s face and once she had recovered from the shock, he took his hand away.

  ‘What are you doing here? One scream from me will bring the entire town here to arrest you.’

  ‘And I’ll tell them all you’re a witch.’

  ‘Not any more. All my powers are gone. I’m plain Miss Breda now.’

  ‘I don’t believe you,’ said Fergus. ‘You’ve cast some kind of spell on that poor wool merchant, haven’t you?’

  ‘He’s not so poor,’ she said with a witch’s chuckle.

  She’d stopped pretending, but a little too easily for Fergus’s liking. In the many months of living by his wits, his ears had learned to pick out the smallest sound and his eyes to catch every movement. Tilwith was whispering beneath her breath and on the dressing table near the window moonlight reflected briefly from a polished surface. If Fergus had turned to see what it was he would have died there beside her bed. Instead, he ducked as something flew across the room, gathering pace as it came until it lodged in the wall with a dull thud. He was up again in an instant and reaching for it. A dagger came away in his hand and before Tilwith could move, he had its blade at her throat.

  ‘Your powers are as strong as they ever were. I should kill you now and do without your help.’

  ‘No, please,’ she croaked. ‘I’m sorry I tried to kill you. Old habits die hard, but I’m trying my best. Listen to me, whatever your name is, it won’t do William any harm being married to me. As long as I keep up the spell he’s the happiest man alive, and with his money to spend I’ll be the happiest woman. Is that so wrong after the years I spent with that brute in the forest? I’m still young; I could have a baby of my own instead of the one I had to steal from that farmer’s wife.’

  Mentioning little Hein didn’t help her cause until she asked with surprising tenderness, ‘How is he? Did you take him back to his family? I cared for him, you know. He was all I had.’

  Was this another trick of magic? Fergus was almost convinced by her sincerity, but he’d risked this dangerous venture for his own purpose and her pleas only served to give him the upper hand.

  ‘Hein is safe and well loved, and as for your rich burgher, I don’t care whether you marry him or not, but I need your witch’s powers. Help me and I’ll leave you to your new life.’ He pressed the dagger lightly into the flesh of her neck to show what would happen if she refused.

  ‘I’ll do what I can. What magic do you need?’

  ‘I want to find someone, a man who was once a prince of Elster.’

  ‘But not any more I’d guess by the tone of your voice,’ she said, putting a hand to her neck now that Fergus had taken away the blade.

  ‘No. He’s a murderer and a traitor of the worst kind.’

  ‘Good, the blacker his heart, the easier it’ll be to find him,’ and getting out of bed she padded across to the dressing table. A pass of her hand unlocked the drawer and she removed the bag she had taken with her on her hasty departure from the giant’s cave.

  ‘Your witch’s tools?’ Fergus said.

  ‘If you want to call them that. You’re lucky I haven’t thrown them all away.’

  She loosened the string that secured the opening and took out a thin brass rod about the length of her hand. A piece of twine was tied around its centre so that when she held it delicately from her fingers it balanced perfectly.

  ‘See how one end comes to a point? It will show you the way.’

  ‘To Damon?’

  ‘That’s his name, is it? Well, you’ll need more than that. Have you got something of his — a handkerchief, a feather from his hat?’

  Fergus’s heart sank. He’d encountered the man twice, and if he’d known of this magic, he could have snatched something as a deadly keepsake. But he hadn’t and said so with a sigh.

  ‘I can’t help you then. The magic won’t work unless you have something that belonged to him.’

  ‘I told you, I haven’t got … No, wait,’ he said, growing excited. ‘I have this,’ and digging in his pocket, he took out the piece of rag and opened it up so Tilwith could see what it held.

  ‘Is that what I think it is?’ she said, leaning away in disgust.

  ‘His earlobe.’

  ‘Better than a handkerchief or a feather,’ she said, giving another witch-like chuckle. She caught herself. ‘I have to stop doing that. Now then, this is how it works.’

  She held the twine perfectly still, at the same time moving the gruesome earlobe in a wide arc around the diviner. Moments later the rod moved, apparently of its own accord, until it stopped again with its tip pointing to the south.

  ‘Use this to set your path each morning and you’ll find him eventually,’ she said.

  ‘But I have no magic in me.’

  ‘Doesn’t matter, the magic lies in the rod itself. Here, take it,’ she urged, thrusting the rod into Fergus’s hands. ‘It’s true what I told you — I aim to be done with magic soon enough and then I’ll have no use for my trinkets.’

  Fergus didn’t know what to make of this gift. Only ten minutes ago Tilwith had tried to kill him, yet amid her cool disdain he’d sensed a good soul who was tired of the cruel magic she practised.

  ‘All right. I’ll take the rod and go. Good luck with your burgher.’

  Tilwith offered no thanks or wishes of good luck in return. As Fergus slipped a leg through the window and searched around with his foot for a solid grip on the roof tiles, she whispered her farewell.

  ‘If you ever cross my path again, I’ll kill you.’

  Fergus descended across the tiles with the deftness of a cat to where Gadfly was waiting patiently, and as soon as he lowered himself onto her back, they left the village. Tilwith didn’t need to worry; Fergus had what he wanted and he would never return.

  IN THE DAYS THAT followed, Fergus did as the witch had shown him. He held the twine between his fingers until the rod settled, then, sometimes riding, sometimes flying, he guided Gadfly in the direction it pointed. Day after day the brass rod pointed south, but Fergus didn’t lose faith. Eventually, he told himself, the tip would point out a different path, perhaps even the opposite direction. Then he would know that he had passed Damon, and by backtracking he would find him.

  His faith was tested though when on the sixth day they reached the ocean. The brass rod still pointed to the south. How far south did he have to go? Gadfly’s wings could take him across the water as easily as the land, but …

  ‘What if you’re too exhausted to keep flying? We could end up a long way from land.’

  Gadfly glared at him as though this was an insult, but she was flesh and blood and, like any other animal, needed rest and time to feed on sweet grasses to replenish her strength. Fergus’s own strength needed replenishing too. He spent two days hunting for cockles and little crabs among the rocks at the water’s edge, staring out to sea whenever he dared. By the third day he’d made up his mind.

  ‘If we drown, our quest is over,’ he said to Gadfly, ‘but at least we didn’t give up.’

  Soon after, horse and rider leaped from a cliff high above the waves and they set out southwards, towards the horizon.

  CHAPTER 12

  Cadell

  A STURDY ROPE WAS tied between the two ships and, with Lord Tironel’s weather magic providing the wind, they set off towards Cadell. At the invitation of the captain, Marcel, Nicola and Finn travelled aboard the undamaged vessel, which allowed Lady Liana to take Nicola under her wing. By the next morning, the shirt and britches the girl had worn since fleeing Elstenwyck had been replaced by a dress of crimson and gold.

  Marcel watched his sister emerge from the lower deck; if it wasn’t for the drooping shoulders and windswept hair, he thought, she’d look every inch the princess he was used to seeing around the palace. She glanced at him briefly w
hen he joined her in the bow, then went back to studying the horizon.

  ‘Have you thought any more about what I told you last night?’ he asked.

  ‘About Fergus being our cousin instead of our brother? I don’t know what to think really. I wish he hadn’t run off, but the way he seemed so unhappy in the days beforehand, maybe we should have expected it. It was just the sort of thing he’d do, after all. Poor thing, he’s going to be even more unhappy when he finds out who his true father is.’

  ‘You don’t look very happy either,’ said Marcel, surprised at the melancholy he saw in her face. ‘You got what you wanted out of this journey, didn’t you? No new Book of Lies, no magic to choose your husband.’

  She shrugged without enthusiasm and turned away, trying to ignore him as she’d done before, but he’d already seen the tears misting her eyes. ‘I’m so ashamed about the way I acted yesterday,’ she said. ‘It was awful. It just makes me so angry when he takes charge, like he’s the grown-up and we’re children.’

  ‘Lord Tironel?’

  ‘No, Finn!’ she said hotly, as though he should have known without being told. ‘I had no right to say those things to him, not in front of the wizard and his wife, and the captains too.’ She paused for a few seconds, gallantly controlling the urge to cry. ‘Did he … has he said anything about it?’

  ‘Not a word. He hasn’t even mentioned your name,’ said Marcel, relieved that he could be entirely honest with his answer. But instead of bringing his sister the comfort he expected, his reply produced an enormous sob and, with her hand to her mouth to stifle it, Nicola hurried away, leaving her brother thoroughly confused.

  He had his own worries, of course. His hopes of breaking the curse had vanished the moment Rhys Tironel revealed his new title. How was he going to save Fergus from the injustice he had brought about with his own magic?

  These thoughts lay even more heavily on him when the Grand Master appeared on deck to check the wind.

  ‘You do it so easily,’ Marcel said to him. ‘For me, every piece of magic goes wrong. I’ve even put lives in danger. I don’t know if I’ll ever be a proper Master of the Books.’

  ‘That would be a shame, when you have already done remarkable things. Tell me, how have you learned your magic?’

  ‘From Lord Alwyn’s books. I study them for hours every day.’

  ‘You were his apprentice then, before he died?’

  ‘Well, actually, no. I must have borrowed books from him, or taken them from his room at least. I think he knew. It’s hard to tell, because I have no memory of that time.’ Marcel took a few minutes to explain what had happened after his mother’s death.

  ‘I knew your mother years ago and I was very sad to hear that she’d died,’ said the wizard in a tone that conveyed that sadness even now. ‘So you don’t remember how you obtained your first skills?’

  ‘No, Lord Tironel. I’ve tried to use my powers to bring the memory back but so far nothing has worked.’

  ‘I’m not one for formalities, Marcel, even if I do have a grand title. Please call me Rhys.’

  Marcel found himself liking the man more with every minute he spent in his company. Overhead, the clouds had long since disappeared and the busy wind only seemed interested in the sails, leaving the deck to an inquisitive line of seagulls perched on the rail and the two human beings who settled into easy conversation.

  ‘You study the sorcerer’s arts for hours every day, is that right?’

  ‘Yes. My father wants me to be his Master of the Books for Elster, so the chancellor keeps me at it.’

  ‘You don’t sound very pleased. I wouldn’t be either, at your age.’ Rhys leaned closer to Marcel as though about to whisper a secret. ‘I shouldn’t tell you this, not when I’m about to become the most important scholar in Noam, but not all sorcerers learn their craft from books. Many do, of course, and become great wizards, like your Lord Alwyn. Their spells work because the many enchanted verses they learn let them command the forces of nature. It sounds as though this is the kind of sorcerer your father expects you to be.’

  ‘There’s another kind?’

  ‘Oh yes, some are born with magic alive inside them, like another beating heart. It’s best if these sorcerers learn their craft from books as well, to perfect the skills, but for them magic comes not from words and charms but from their own will. They don’t command, they exert their desires directly into the world around them to make things happen. As you can probably guess, this second kind of sorcery is the more powerful, but only if the boy or girl picked out for such rare gifts becomes aware of them. Many go through life never knowing what they are capable of, or why strange things occur simply because they want them to.’

  ‘What kind of sorcerer are you?’ Marcel asked, intrigued.

  ‘Me — oh, I have some of both in me. Perhaps that’s why I’ve been chosen as the new Master of Noam, but it’s you I want to talk about, Marcel. Tell me how you defeated Mortregis.’

  ‘I don’t know how I did it, that’s what scares me. All I remember is a sense of enormous power through every inch of my body. I was terrified but I was angry too. Mortregis was going to kill us all, not just me, but Nicola and Fergus, my father, half the people in his kingdom. I couldn’t let it happen and so the power in me acted somehow. I don’t know what focused it on the huge dragon. I felt enough strength in me that night to destroy the whole world, just by wanting it.’

  ‘It seems likely then that you were born with the powers in your bones.’

  ‘I wish I wasn’t,’ he said with an honesty that cut deeper than a knife. He was shocked to hear himself say it and yet relieved at the same time in a way he didn’t understand.

  ‘There are many men, even wizards, who would give anything to have the power that resides in you,’ Rhys Tironel said.

  ‘I’d give them mine, if I could. They’d make better use of it.’

  ‘Would they, Marcel? Men can do great things with such sorcery, but they can also conjure the greatest evil.’

  ‘And what have I done with it?’

  ‘Killed a dragon — that’s not a bad beginning. But you’ve been afraid of that power ever since, haven’t you?’

  ‘It’s terrible. Every time I try to work some magic, it’s there again.’

  ‘So you hold back.’

  ‘Yes, in case it goes wrong, in case my magic brings about some kind of catastrophe. So I hold back the power and it still goes wrong, even in simple things. I set my friend’s wooden sword alight for fun and nearly burned down the stables. I turn my cat into a snarling beast but the spell doesn’t last. It doesn’t seem to matter what I do, whether I try difficult, important magic or simple tricks, I —’

  ‘You have trouble willing the magic into being as it should be.’

  Marcel slumped against the ship’s bulkhead and let himself say things that had circled treacherously in his mind for months. ‘If I gave up my powers I couldn’t cause any more harm. Can I do that? Can I give back what was born in me whether I wanted it or not?’

  ‘With help, it is possible.’

  ‘Help from you?’

  Rhys Tironel took his time before answering, studying the boy carefully before he spoke. ‘Yes, but it’s not a step to be taken lightly, Marcel.’

  ‘Mortregis is dead. My magic isn’t needed any more.’

  ‘Don’t be so sure. Fate guards its heroes jealously and has a habit of using them more than once. Don’t be so quick to give away what was born into you.’

  ‘But I had no choice in that.’

  ‘No, you didn’t choose, any more than those gulls over there chose to be what they are. They don’t seem to regret the life of a seagull,’ he said, tossing them a hank of bread he’d conjured from nothing with a simple sweep of his hand. A chaos of white wings and screeching, squawking beaks swooped instantly on the morsel until the largest and the quickest flew out across the waves with the prize. ‘You are feeling sorry for yourself, is that it?’

  This stu
ng Marcel. Was Rhys Tironel right? Was he simply feeling sorry for himself like a little child sulking in the corner because he couldn’t have his own way? He didn’t want Rhys to think of him like that, yet he was angry to be dismissed so curtly. He wanted Rhys to understand and so more came tumbling from his mouth, things he hadn’t told anyone else, until now.

  ‘When I faced Mortregis, even though the struggle only lasted a few minutes, I was exhausted, as though I’d climbed an enormous mountain without resting at all. The force I used to drive the dragon down into the flames was draining the life out of me, and if it hadn’t ended when it did … I was afraid it would kill me — not the dragon, but my own magic.’

  ‘Yes, that can happen. For sorcerers who learn their craft from books, the magic remains separate from the one who performs it. That is not how it works for wizards like you and me. The power lies in our will and that isn’t so easily divided from the magic itself. Because it comes from within, it feeds on our own bodies. I won’t mislead you about this, Marcel, a gift like ours can take all you have and leave nothing but a lifeless shell for your friends to bury.’

  THE SHORES OF TAMERLANE were sighted late the following day, and by mid-afternoon the ships had entered Cadell’s harbour through the opening in a massive sea wall that stretched out from both sides like the arms of a giant. Above the docks, the city clung to steep slopes leading up to a citadel built of greystone blocks that looked out over the ocean behind them.

  Marcel stood at the rail with the others, noting the maze of narrow streets, until their attention was snatched away by a gruff challenge. ‘Ahoy on deck! Stand where we can see you and keep any weapons out of your hands.’

  They were coasting slowly towards a dock where the shouting had come from. There they found a row of archers staring at them suspiciously, each with an arrow ready to fire.