Northern Storm

Chapter Six

Velindre, come in.’ The man opening the age-darkened oak door was at least half a head shorter than the tall, blonde woman he welcomed.

‘Cloud Master.’ She inclined her head, face expressionless as she swept across the threshold. Her firm chin was held high, the long plait of her golden hair falling straight as a rule down her spine.

‘Rafrid will do. This is all quite informal.’ He was quite possibly twice as broad across the shoulders as his visitor, with a barrel chest for good measure. With his long back, the way he belted his blue woollen tunic under his paunch made his grey-breeched legs seem incongruously short. The hobnails of his sturdy leather half-boots had scarred a path across the polished floorboards from the door to the table laden with books and parchments, and from the table to the tall triple-mullioned window on the far side of the room. The sky beyond the diamond-shaped panes of glass was the same soft grey as the narrow slivers of the stone walls visible between bookshelves burdened with scholarship past and present. The man’s eyes were a harder, flinty grey, age and experience lining his brow and dusting his dark hair with silver. ‘Please, have a seat. Can I get you something to take the chill off the day? A little wine or cordial? A tisane?’

His manner was brisk rather than solicitous as he gestured towards the modest hearth where a polished copper kettle hung on an iron spar ready to be swung over the self-effacing flames. An oil lamp glowed golden on the table even though it was barely midday.

‘Thank you, no.’Velindre took a ladderback chair from an irregular circle of mismatched seats. She set it between the table and the fireplace on a rug whose pattern had long faded into obscurity. Sitting with her back straight, she folded her hands in the lap of her indigo gown, its full skirt cut short enough to avoid the worst of winter’s mire. As she crossed her long legs neatly at the ankles, her black leather boots, finer sewn than Rafrid’s, showed that she’d been through a succession of puddles on her way there. ‘You know why I wanted to see you.’ Rafrid sat in his own round-framed wooden chair, shoving at the cushions behind him as he looked expectantly at Velindre.

She laced nail-bitten fingers together, knuckles whitening. Not really.’

An angled crease between Rafrid’s grizzled brows deepened. ‘If you’re as unforthcoming with the apprentices, I’m hardly surprised I’m hearing complaints.’

‘From whom?’ A faint blush highlighted Velindre’s angular cheekbones and she silently cursed her fair complexion. ‘Excuse me.’ Standing, she moved the chair a few paces from the fire and sat down again. ‘I’m a little warm.’

‘And you one of the most talented mages born to command the air here in Hadrumal?’ Rafrid wondered sardonically. ‘I find it difficult to believe that you can’t keep yourself cool.’

Velindre folded her arms tightly across her modest bosom. ‘If you won’t tell me who, you might tell me what’s being said about me.’

‘You spend very little time with the new apprentices compared to the other mages of your standing.’ Rafrid leaned back in his chair, tossing a battered patchwork cushion to the floor. ‘And I gather that any of the more experienced apprentices making a formal request to study with you as your pupil can expect refusal without explanation or apology.’

‘There are plenty of wizards keen enough to nursemaid the new anivals.’Velindre shrugged one shoulder, her face impassive. ‘I’ll take on any apprentice with two or three years’ learning to steady their affinity who comes up with a course of study I consider worth pursuing.’

‘You’re not excused from your responsibilities just because others are more mindful of all they owe to this island and these halls of learning,’ Rafrid began sternly. ‘We all have our own magical interests to pursue. It’s not the business of other wizards to give you the leisure to concentrate exclusively on your own studies.’

‘I am fully mindful of all I owe to Hadrumal and my fellow mages,’ Velindre said frostily. ‘I have lived here all my life.’

‘I’m well aware of that.’ Rafrid scowled, resting his elbows on the arms of his chair and twisting a heavy ring around the middle finger of his writing hand. A sizeable sapphire, dark and mysterious, was set deep into the silver. You’re Hadrumal born, as were your parents, both of whom have added significantly to the scholarship of wizardry. Yet your parents have always found time to nurture the lads and lasses arriving on our dockside still reeling from the shock of discovering their magebirth. As for further study, your mother in particular has an unequalled record for guiding pupils on paths that seemed entirely unpromising at first glance.’

Velindre sat in silence, her narrow lips thinned almost to invisibility. Rafrid drummed his thick fingers on the edge of his table, his square jaw hardening.

‘You used to spend more time with apprentices,’ he pointed out with a visible effort at reasonableness. ‘You’ve had past pupils who made notable progress and not just in the understanding of the element of air. Why the change of heart over this last winter?’

‘Tell me how much time I’m to set aside for apprentices.’ Velindre uncrossed her feet and stood. ‘And how many pupils I’m required to take on.’

‘Kalion did you no favours encouraging you to think that you stood a chance of being elevated to Cloud Mistress,’ said Rafrid bluntly.

Velindre lifted her chin defiantly. ‘I suggest you take that up with the Hearth Master.’

‘I have done,’ Rafrid assured her dourly, ‘with him and Troanna both. Our esteemed Flood Mistress is under no illusions about what I think of her meddling.’

‘I’m surprised you want me spending time with apprentices, since you think so little of my abilities,’ said Velindre tartly.

‘Don’t be a fool,’ he retorted, scathing. ‘I think very highly of your wizardry. Your admirable focus on our element has led you to some remarkable insights. I can’t recall seeing anyone with more feeling for the elemental air in the twenty years I’ve known you. What you’re lacking are the necessary instincts for the demands of an office such as this.’

He waved a curt hand at the parchments littering the table. ‘As Master of Hiwan’s Hall before my elevation to this office, I got used to keeping all these balls in the air, better than a festival juggler. You’ve always been able to put your own interests first, and that’s all very well, but an element master—or mistress—needs to take a wider view. He can’t stay aloof if his feelings have been hurt. He can’t turn unapproachable if he doesn’t want his studies disturbed for days at a time. He needs to keep an ear to the ground, not have his head in the clouds.’

‘And you had Planir’s ear when it was time for him to make his nominations to the Council.’ Velindre came perilously close to sneering.

Somewhat to her surprise, Rafrid laughed, a full-throated chuckle. ‘You flatter me if you think our esteemed Archmage would hand me such an honour just because I fancied wearing this pretty blue ring myself.’ He leaned forward, waving the faceted sapphire at Velindre, who flinched as if he’d offered her a blow. Rafrid scowled blackly for an instant before he continued. ‘The only opinion of mine that Planir sought was who should replace me as Master of Hiwan’s Hall. I don’t know who first suggested that I should be elevated to this rank of Cloud Master, but I do know that Planir took a long time to think it through and consulted with wizards far more eminent and experienced than you or me, here in Hadrumal and beyond.’

He paused for a moment and when he went on, his voice was level, even kindly. ‘I don’t pride myself on defeating you, Velindre. I simply want to justify the faith our fellow mages have shown in me. I’m charged with the better guidance of those born to master our element and with helping those born with an affinity to another to a fuller understanding of the interactions of air with earth, fire and water. I want your help, not your hostility. That’s what the apprentices need, and our pupils.’

Velindre said nothing, her sharp face icy calm.

Rafrid sighed with exasperation. ‘Make yourself available to any apprentice wanting your instruction from breakfast till noon. Your time’s your own after that. I’ll let it be known that you’ll be considering new pupils over the Equinox festival. There should be two or three keen enough and bold enough to put forward their ideas for your consideration. After Solstice, you can expect your contemporaries studying the other elements to recommend their most promising pupils in the normal fashion.’

‘As you wish, Cloud Master.’ Velindre turned to depart, her hazel eyes impenetrable.

As she reached for the door latch, the Cloud Master spoke again. ‘The next time a bunch of apprentices come to me, I want it to be because they can’t sing your praises loudly enough. I told this last lot that you’re one of the most skilful wizards on this isle. Don’t let me down.’

Velindre showed no response as she opened the door, about to step out on to the stairs.

‘Give some thought to what Otrick would have made of your behaviour lately,’ Rafiid called after her. Velindre slammed the door behind her so hard that the reverberations echoed all the way down to the bottom of the stairwell, pursued by the angry clatter of her booted steps on the aged treads. ‘What would Otrick have made of all this?’ she muttered, furiously scrubbing away the sting of angry tears with the back of one hand as she snatched her thick cloak from a peg. ‘What would he have made of your prosy lecturing? Do you think he’d have started apprentices on summoning showers to freshen up a turnip’s wilting leaves?’

Her stride lengthening, Velindre crossed the flagstoned courtyard walled on all four sides with ranges of accommodation. She glanced up at the garrets with their little gabled windows jutting through the stone-slated slopes of the roofs, chimney stacks spaced between them. Which of the apprentices crammed into those poky rooms had had the gall to complain about her?

Her gaze slid down to the first—and second-floor rooms, wider windows shut firmly against the bitter weather. Who were those ungrateful pupils who’d begged for her guidance and now felt entitled to whine when she’d cast them off to stand on their own two feet?

They were better off trailing around after the likes of Colna and Pemmel anyway, she thought with contempt. The uninspired deserved the insipid. Let them coddle the apprentices and the pupils; she had better things to do. She would find some insight into magic that would restore her reputation within the higher ranks of Hadrumal. She would find something to make Planir sit up and take notice, something to make the Archmage regret his mistake in passing her over.

She glanced back over her shoulder at the central tower of the wizard hall, at the triple-mullioned window of Rafrid’s eyrie at the centre of the four quadrangles. What would Otrick have made of him as Cloud Master? The old scoundrel would have laughed himself breathless and then sent everyone into hysterics with his incisive dissection of Rafrid’s inadequacies.

She raised a hand to her eyes as the pain of ()tick’s loss stabbed her anew, heading blindly for the dim passage that threaded through one corner of the courtyard.

‘Excuse me, miss.’ A laundry maid tried to step out of Velindre’s path, hampered by her wide wicker basket.

‘I beg your pardon.’ Velindre flattened herself against the plastered stone wall to let the servant pass. She felt the damp and cold on the back of her neck and pulled up the hood of her midnight-blue cloak, tying it loosely. The first impetus of her anger spent, she walked more slowly out through the gate and into the narrow lane running behind the Leeward Hall. So her mornings were to be taken up with the misapprehensions and misunderstandings new apprentices always spouted.

No, you’ve not been sent into some irreversible exile. Ships that have the Archmage’s trust come and go from Hadrumal all the time,’ she mouthed as she walked along the cobbles. ‘Yes, you’ll be able to go home to visit your families—once you’ve learned how not to set chimneys alight when you’re angry or freeze the water in the well when you’re miserable.’

Velindre felt a measure of sympathy for the magebom of the mainland, most without any wizard nearby to guard and guide them through the first manifestations of their affinity, never mind the fearful rumours still perpetuated by the ignorance of the mundane populace. Then resentment put such feelings to flight. No, the Council of Wizards isn’t a cabal of astute and powerful mages secretly directing kings and princes down the paths of wisdom. Don’t you think the mainland might be less riven by faction and self-interest if that were the case? No, it’s a circle of self-satisfied men and women who struggle to look beyond the sea mists they use to hide Hadrumal, scrying spells notwithstanding.’

She took a still narrower lane cutting across her path and leading between high stone walls towards the long, curved high road that was the backbone of the modest city of Hadrumal. Behind her lay the warren of humbler buildings housing the craftsmen and tradesmen who supported the island’s mages in their studies. Reaching the high road, Velindre looked towards the fog-shrouded hills gently rising beyond the city, where the island’s yeomen raised their stock and tended their fields, the remote towers of the wizard halls a distant curiosity.

She could go and stay with her father’s brother. Let these apprentices who were so keen to study with her prove their worth by traipsing all that way every morning. Let Rafrid make a fool of himself trying to drag her back to the city. And her aunt and cousins wouldn’t give a Lescari penny piece for the gossip around the wizard city, any more than they had in those timeless summers she had spent on their farm as a child. There wouldn’t be whispering in corners and bright-eyed, hushed speculation as to just why it was that Archmage Planir had found her lacking and why the Council had handed the prize that should have been hers to Rafrid, of all people. No. That would be running away. Neither her father nor her mother would approve of that, always supposing they looked up from their books and parchments for long enough to notice her absence. As she walked along the flagstones, she glanced at the pale tower of Wellery’s Hall, its yellow stone a contrast to the grey sky. Over to the east, the squat stump of Atten Hall’s central tower was barely visible over the intervening roofs.

They would be expecting her to still be working towards a seat on the Council in her own right. They’d set that path before her ever since they’d first encouraged her adolescent fascination with her burgeoning affinity. Hadrumal needed to be guided by wizards with a sound understanding of the full potential of magic in the wider world. Then the clear-sighted leaders of this hidden isle could instruct the blinkered rulers of the mainland along better paths than the ones they inevitably chose for themselves. Velindre’s mouth quirked wryly. That remained to be seen. No matter. Her stride lengthened again, setting her cloak flapping, its azure silk lining bright as a summer sky. She passed the dark hollows of several gateways before turning into a courtyard with a fountain at its centre. The basin was dry and the statue at its centre invisible beneath a swaddling of straw and sacking. Was there no one in this hall with the time to spare for a charm to protect the stone from the frosts?

As Velindre passed the fountain, a stairwell door in the far wall opened and a slight woman emerged. She was almost as heavily muffled as the statue, with a mossy green scarf pulled right up to her vibrant chestnut eyes.

‘Ely.’ Velindre moved to intercept her.

The woman twitched her scarf down with a gloved hand to reveal a fine-boned face with wisps of black hair just visible around the edge of her knitted cap. ‘Whatever you want, keep it short.’

‘Rafrid’s just lectured me about my responsibilities to the apprentices.’ Velindre grimaced extravagantly. ‘You must know who Troanna would like to see given a leg up, or Kalion, perhaps?’

‘You still think it’s worth keeping in with them?’ Ely cocked her head to one side, birdlike. Naturally,’ said Velindre, unperturbed. ‘And Rafridcan go jump a rope if he doesn’t like it.’

‘I’ll see what I can find out.’ Ely shivered inside her cloak and her turquoise earrings trembled. Did Rafrid say anything else?’

Velindre shrugged. ‘About what?’

‘He’s one of the few who get to see our esteemed Archmage in private.’ Ely’s elegant, finely plucked brows disappeared beneath the ribbed welt of her hat. ‘Did he let slip anything about Planir’s mood? Any clue as to what might be going on behind that granite facade?’

Velindra shrugged again.

‘Oh well.’ Ely’s carefully painted mouth tightened with irritation—‘Have you seen Galen anywhere?’

‘I came here looking for him.’Velindre raised her pale golden brows at Ely. ‘You and he are keeping company again?’

‘He has his uses,’ Ely admitted with a sideways smile. ‘Especially when it’s this cold.’

‘More fun in your bed than a warming pan?’ Velindre wondered with faint amusement.

‘Sometimes,’ Ely said a trifle sourly. ‘Still, who knows, he might make Stone Master someday.’

‘Who knows,’ echoed Velindre. ‘I won’t keep you. Just send any likely apprentices my way’ Ely pulled her scarf up over her face again. ‘Keep your eyes and ears open for news of Planir, if you’re playing the dutiful underling to Rafrid.’ She clumped away across the empty courtyard in bulky sheepskin boots and vanished beneath the arch of the gateway. Velindre looked up at Galen’s windows. He had no more chance of becoming Stone Master than he had of becoming Archmage, even if Planir consented to relinquish the lesser of the two offices he held. Ely was deceiving herself if she thought she was going to enjoy any influence as Galen’s lover. She had better stick to seeking advancement through the gossip she garnered and supplied to Flood Mistress Troanna and Hearth Master Kalion. She certainly wasn’t going to win a Council seat on her own merits. Ely’s promise as an apprentice had never really come to much.

Velindre chuckled as she made her way from the courtyard. She hoped for Ely’s sake that Galen had learned more of a lover’s skills than he’d had when they had all been pupils together, in those days when anything had seemed possible. Her smile faded.

Hadrumal’s high road was largely deserted. A few carts trundled along the cobbles to deliver faggots of firewood or anonymous sacks and chests to the closed shop fronts of the tailors and cobblers, the bookbinders and ink-sellers. One wine seller had opened his shutters and profligate candles brightened the interior, soothing chilled apprentices cradling cups of mulled wine fragrant with herbs and spices. Velindre slowed as she caught the tempting scent of new bread, warm from the oven. Then she picked up her pace. She was hardly in the mood to swap pleasantries with neophyte mages half her age. Stepping across the runnel of muck and rain in the gutter, she crossed to the opposite flagway where mismatched shop fronts yielded to the ancient stonework that bounded the paradoxically named New Hall. Passing beneath the black shadow of a gatehouse with carvings long since weathered to obscurity, Velindre crossed a courtyard where hollows in the flagstones worn by countless generations of feet were dark with moisture. Reaching beneath her cloak, she drew out a keychain and unlocked the iron-studded door at the base of the central tower. Inside, a stair spiralled tightly upwards. Snapping her fingers, Velindre summoned a pale-blue flame to light her way up the dark stone stairs. She passed the door to the rooms on the first floor without slowing. At the door to her second-floor sanctuary, she paused, keys in hand, looking up the silent stair towards the empty rooms above. What would Otrick have said to her? It was becoming difficult to recall the exact sound of his voice. There were days when memory of his face was blurred in her mind’s eye.

She unlocked the door and walked into her study, flicking the pale flame into the fireplace where kindling laid ready instantly caught fire. Dust from the coal crackled. The brass catches and polished chestnut of the tall cupboards set on either side of the fireplace glowed as the flames grew stronger. The opposite wall was shelved from floor to ceiling on either side of a narrow door, books and parchments neatly ordered. A few curios inten-upted the array: a flute made from a bird’s hollow bone and a small glass case containing a precisely labelled collection of winged seeds dried to papery fragility. Propped here and there were studies of birds and precisely detailed seascapes, some in oils, others in chalk or ink. A single high-backed, leather-covered chair stood beside the fireplace while two uninviting, unpadded chairs flanked a wide table where leatherbound books ordered by size awaited her attention, inkstand and quills precisely arranged to hand. Velindre ignored the books in favour of the fresh, floury rolls and a slab of dense yellow cheese left by one of the hall’s maidservants. A substantial chunk of sweet bread thick with preserved plums had its own plate, flanked by a small flagon of red wine and a crystal jug of well water. What would Ely do if Galen offered to marry her? Velindre wondered idly as she tore open one of the rolls. Did she know he’d once had the folly to propose to Velindre? Was he still looking for something between a wife and a mother, who’d darn his socks and sew his buttons and tempt him with dainty meals, and certainly never threaten him with wizardly talents outstripping his own? Well, that hadn’t been the first dalliance Velindre had had sour with such rivalry, nor the last.

Otrick never had felt threatened. She poured half a glass of the rich, red wine, and, lifting her eyes to the plaster cornices of the ceiling, silently toasted the old wizard’s memory. The most powerful Cloud Master Hadrumal had seen in twenty generations had never known any such insecurity.

Sipping her wine, still standing by the table, Velindre stared out of the window across the roofs of the quadrangle and beyond to the sodden meadows with their dull green tussocky grass, the salt marshes beyond sere and dun. Winter wind tossed the dead reeds this way and that and Velindre watched the eddies and flurries of the air only visible to those who shared her affinity.

Beyond the salt marshes there was the dull rolling grey of the sea that sent the ever-changing clouds and storms to break on the rocky shores of Hadrumal. Rising swells rimmed with white merged seamlessly into the leaden sky. She watched the damp air above the waves rising sluggishly, helpless to resist soaking up the seductive warmth brought up from the sun-kissed southern seas by the mysterious currents that threaded through the pathless ocean. The barely warmed air soared high into the uppermost reaches of the sky. Velindre watched the roiling mass cool and shed its load of moisture to swell the towering clouds. Perversely heavier now, the chilled air slid haphazardly down the sky, driving a rising wind to whip the waves to higher crests and steeper faces, until the swells collapsed in a crash of foam and fury. Above, the clouds darkened and the first flashes of lightning presaged the coming storm.

How often had she stood here to look out at the weather with Larissa? How long would it be before she could no longer recall Larissa’s face or voice? Velindre set down the glass of wine and bent to unlace her boots, kicking them away to land with a thud on the floorboards. Ely and Galen and Kalion and all the rest of them had better watch their step with Planir. The man was entitled to grieve, Archmage or not, and his liaison with Larissa had been no casual sport. Velindre knew that from the late-night confidences they had shared. Perhaps it wasn’t in her best interests to tie herself too closely to Kalion in particular. There had been precious little sign of Planir’s usual good humour when the Archmage had been dining in the common hall with the apprentices a few nights ago.

‘Velindre!’

The faint voice was so unexpected that she started, knocking into the table, sending wine spilling around the foot of the glass. She whirled around, long plait flying wide.

A disc of ochre light as big as the palm of her hand burned in the middle of the empty room. It grew, rimmed with searing scarlet brilliance.

‘Who’s there?’ Velindre asked calmly, collecting herself, ‘Dev.’ The voice was faint but she recognised him at once.

The circle of magic was now the size of a hand-held looking glass. Velindre stood before it. ‘Where are you?’

‘Where do you think?’ Magic flowed down the ochre disc like thick golden oil trickling down a coloured window. ‘The Archipelago and a long way south.’

‘I can see that.’ The blurred radiance cleared and Velindre could see Dev’s bald head and that familiar wicked grin. ‘What do you want with me? You’re Planir’s eyes and ears in the Archipelago, aren’t you?’ she said waspishly.

‘Still sulking?’ Dev’s grin broadened. ‘I heard he’d passed you over for Cloud Mistress. You didn’t really think you’d be raised so high, did you?’

‘Go and impress Planir with your mastery in working a bespeaking over such a distance.’ Velindre turned her back on the magic.

‘It’s you I need.’ Dev’s irritation set the spell ringing like a plucked wire.

‘Why?’Velindre turned back to study the circumscribed vision within the burning circle. Where exactly are you?’ She sat down on one of the upright chairs and picked up her wine, blotting the spillage with the muslin that had wrapped the cheese. ‘What have you got yourself mixed up in now? Is that armour you’re wearing?’

The spell flickered a little as it widened. Which was hardly surprising given the countless leagues the magic was reaching over, Velindre thought privately. She saw Dev standing on the deck of a small sailing boat on an open stretch of sparkling cobalt sea. The Aldabreshin sun was so bright in the dimness of her room that she could almost feel its heat on her face.

‘You’re never going to believe this,’ grinned Dev. .

‘Wait,’ Velindre interrupted sharply, sitting forward to peer through the clouded magic. ‘Who in Saedrin’s name are those two?’

A dark-skinned man in richly exotic Aldabreshin armour stood some way behind the wizard. The Archipelagan was braced protectively in front of a slightly built girl wearing loose creamy trousers and tunic and a vivid red scarf over her shock of black hair.

Dev moved aside and extended a mocking arm. ‘Velindre Ychane, mage of Hadrumal, may I present Chazen Kheda, warlord of the Archipelago’s most southerly domain. Oh, and Risala, who’s probably spreading her legs for him, though that’s the least of her considerable talents.’

‘Who presumably don’t speak Tormalin,’ said Velindre caustically. Both Archipelagans were squinting suspiciously at the circle of the spell, with no sign that they had understood Dev.

‘I speak some of your northern tongue.’ The girl surprised both wizards with her retort. ‘So don’t think you can lie to us about what she’s saying, Dev.’

The bald mage recovered quickly. ‘A girl of considerable talents raised in a northern domain that evidently trades with the mainland.’

‘And she’s got your measure.’Velindre noted the female talking to the warlord. ‘Tell me, how are you expecting to escape an Aldabreshin warlord without being skinned alive now that you’ve openly worked magic in front of him?’

‘It’s a long story.’ Dev grinned.

‘One you don’t want to tell Planir?’ Velindre guessed shrewdly. ‘What makes you think I want to hear it?’ Instead of answering, Dev asked his own question. ‘What do you know about dragons?’

‘Dragons?’ she repeated with a frown.

Dragons,’ confirmed Dev with smug excitement.

‘Those dragons that survive live in the far north, beyond the far peaks of the Mountain Men’s territory.’ Velindre spread her hands, mystified. You won’t see them in the Archipelago.’

‘We’re seeing one now,’ said Dev robustly, ‘come from somewhere to the south. And there are mageborn living out somewhere beyond the southern horizon, because they turned up here last year and wreaked every kind of havoc. They’re nasty bastards, Velle.’

‘With dragons to command?’ Velindre let him see her scepticism.

,ast year it was just howling savages throwing spears and handfuls of fire.’ Dev was suddenly all seriousness. Which, as you can appreciate, was remarkably effective against these Archipelagans who pride themselves on staying free of filthy sorcery. Kheda here had the sense to find me to put paid to the wild wizards and plain steel cut their followers down nicely enough after that. We thought we’d come and mop up the stragglers and soon be on our way home for wine and cakes, but a dragon’s turned up and it’s eating anyone it reckons looks tasty. We must have let one of their mages slip through our net,’ he concluded with savage bitterness.

‘You think this wizard summoned the dragon? Why now?’ Velindre demanded. ‘Why not summon it when you attacked him and his allies with your magic? What exactly did you do?’

Never mind,’ said Dev impatiently. ‘What I need to know more about is dragons and just how they’re summoned. Maybe this mage has simply lucked into the trick of it.’

‘I don’t think it’s something you stumble on by accident,’ retorted Velindre. ‘Otrick was the only mage in Hadrumal who had the knack of summoning a dragon and he was the finest Cloud Master inside the last ten generations. And I’m sony, Dev, haven’t you heard? He’s dead.’ The usual dull grief gnawed beneath her breastbone.

‘I know that, and I know you were his longest-standing pupil and closest to him in every sense.’ Even in his intensity, Dev couldn’t restrain a lascivious smile. ‘Come on, Velle, didn’t he let something slip by way of pillow talk?’

‘Otrick didn’t need to boast about his magical prowess to convince any girl to slip between the sheets with him,’ Velindre said pointedly.

‘It was always worth your while bedding me, don’t pretend differently.’ Dev grinned, unrepentant. ‘There must be something—in Otrick’s journals, in his records. He was a secretive old bastard but he knew what he owed to wizardry as Cloud Master. There must be some clue.’ His voice gained an edge. ‘If one of these wild mages is still alive and he’s learned how to summon a dragon, there’s nothing to stop him between here and Hadrumal. I’ve seen these bastards let loose and I wouldn’t give—’

Dev clapped his hands to his ears as the girl’s piercing scream startled him. In the same instant, the Aldabreshin warlord began shouting, a torrent of words that rang with horror. The ship rocked madly from side to side, all three of them staggering. The girl would have lost her footing but for the warlord’s strong arm catching her.

‘Ah, shit!’ The bespeaking dissolved on Dev’s raw yell of fear and fury.

‘What is it?’Velindre shouted impotently at the empty air. Dev!’

The only reply was a faint ringing struck from the crystal water jug.

Velindre sprang to her feet, the chair falling away behind her. She ran to a cupboard beside the fireplace and flung it open. Pulling out a shallow silver dish, she sent pewter plates bowling noisily across the floorboards. Ignoring them, she reached up to a neatly ordered row of stoppered and sealed bottles. Her hand hesitated, then, biting her lip, she snatched at one, leaving the cupboard door swinging as she hurried back to the table by the window.

She emptied the crystal jug of well water into the silver bowl and, hands trembling, tried to unstopper the little bottle. Her fingers slid on the wax, bitten fingernails giving no purchase. Velindre slammed the bottle down on the table before taking a deep, calming breath and then carefully working the stopper free of the neck. She let a few drops of dark-green oil fall into the water, the piercing aroma of volatile herbs stinging her eyes for an instant. Ramming the stopper home, she set the bottle aside and placed her hands on either side of the bowl.

‘If you can bespeak me over that kind of distance, Dev, you bilge rat, I can sure as curses scry back to you.’ She stared into the water with grim intensity.

The drops of oil spread into an infinitesimal rainbow lustre on the surface of the water. Emerald fire flared in the depths of the bowl, reflections striking back from the curved silver sides. The radiance shimmered against the oily sheen, fluttering, darting back to the bottom of the bowl before striking up again only to meet the same bather. The light doubled and redoubled, still confined within the bowl. Velindre stood motionless, hazel gaze fixed on her spell. Only when the captive brilliance rivalled the lightning now flickering in the clouds beyond her window did the magewoman release the magic.

In a flash, the surface of the water reflected the distant scene she sought. Velindre flinched, then froze, poised over the bowl, mouth open on an incredulous gasp. All she could see was some portion of a massive scaly back and the flexing of a great leathery wing. The scales were dark crimson, thick and uneven along the creature’s spine, the wing a lighter red, more vivid, almost waxy with the sun shining off the ridges of the bones.

A dragon born of fire, mused some dispassionate corner of her mind even as the rest of her wits went begging for some explanation.

She slid one palm around the side of the bowl. The vision shimmered for an instant and then shifted, as if Velindre was now some bird, like one of the great white wanderers that drifted on the winds of the southern oceans. She flew high above the dragon on the wings of her spell to get a better look at it. Now she could see what the beast was about. A chill went through her that had nothing to do with the wintry storm now enveloping Hadrumal.

The dragon was circling the ship she’d seen Dev on. Twisting in the sky with startling agility for such a mighty beast, it bated like some enormous hawk before darting around in the other direction. The downdraught from its wings tossed the vessel this way and that like a child’s nutshell boat on a puddle. The little ship’s sail hung in rags from its ropes. Velindre held her breath as Dev’s boat rolled over on to its beam ends, wallowing for an agonised breath before hauling itself back upright once more.

Where was Dev? Where were the other two? Velindre searched the deck. There was nowhere for them to hide and no one to be seen. Had they gone below?

The dragon obscured her view, diving closer to scour the deck with a sheet of flame from its gaping razor-toothed maw. The wood blistered and charred, remnants of canvas and rigging flaring to blow away as ash on the wind. The dragon drew a tight circle around the ship and lashed at the single mast with its sturdy tail. The pine cracked and splintered, crashing down on to the deck

Velindre’s spell brought her no noise of the distant destructioin. The only sound in her dim study was her own breathing, harsh with helpless distress. The dragon smashed its tail down on the burned decking, making surprisingly little impression. Mouth wide in a soundless snarl, it shot up into the air, wings beating strongly. Tumbling over itself, it dived straight down towards the crippled ship.

Velindre whispered, disbelieving. Surely a dragon born of fire couldn’t risk diving into the sea? At the last instant, the dragon pulled out of the stoop, swinging its hind legs forward to pound the scorched deck into broken splinters even as it clawed at the sky with its forelegs. Wings beating, it dragged itself away from the murderous embrace of the ocean, climbing back into the sky.

There was no escape for the boat. The weight of the dragon, even for that fleeting moment, had pushed the shattered deck below the surface of the ocean. White seas roiling with the downdraught of the dragon’s passing flooded across bow and stern and poured through the cracked and broken planks. The ship floundered helplessly as more and more water cascaded into the hold, relentlessly forcing the hull beneath the waves. In a final convulsion, the vessel’s bow came up, stern disappearing into the blue depths. The sharp prow slid down, vanishing in a flurry of foam. The dragon swooped low one last time, circling the hidden grave of the little ship. It flapped its wings and flared a crest of scales around its head in what looked uncomfortably like triumph.

Velindre searched the bland face of the ocean. Had Dev died in the ship’s hold, dragged down into the drowning depths? A fire mage, even one of his talents, would be hard pressed to work any magic to save himself, engulfed by the very antithesis of his element. Had he swum for it before the beast made its final attack? What about the other two. All she could see was nameless detritus floating up from the wreck, nothing big enough to be a man’s or a woman’s body.

The inconvenient beast was filling her view once more. She could see its head clearly for the first time, as if it were coming straight towards her. Ruby eyes glittered above its broad, blunt muzzle, heavy crimson scales fringing its jowls and bristling in a mane of spines around the back of its head. It opened its mouth and she saw its brilliant daggerlike teeth.

Longer than daggers, that same dispassionate voice within her mind commented silently. The dragon’s red tongue flickered in and out and she noted a searing red illuminating its eyes from within. The light playing on her face turned from blue-green to greenish gold.

Velindre cursed the beast absently under her breath and drew back from the bowl, waving a hand across the water to lift the spell’s vision still higher above the sea, to give her a wider view of the immediate area Was there an island close enough for Dev to have swum to?

Nothing happened. The dragon still filled the spell. Now its wings were lost beyond the edges of the magic, just its head and body visible. With every beat of its wings, it grew bigger within the silver confines of the bowl. Now all she could see was its head. It opened its mouth and a coil of flame burst out towards her, white hot with unstoppable magic.

Velindre recoiled as the water within the bowl boiled, steaming and spitting, sending splashes leaping over the rim to mar the polished table top. She thrust her hands out before her, repudiating the magic she had worked. The water calmed but the scrying held, vivid emerald light shining up from the bowl with a halo of sunset gold. The magewoman moved slowly forward, irresistibly drawn by intolerable curiosity. The breath catching in her throat, she looked warily down into the water.

The dragon looked back at her. There could be no question of it. Against all she had ever been taught. Contrary to all she had ever read or surmised of this scrying spell. In defiance of everything Hadrumal’s wisest men and women had told her about remote magics. The dragon could see back through the spell as clearly as if it were looking through a pane of clear glass. More than that, the beast was looking straight at her, wild curiosity lighting its fiery eyes. The water began boiling again, and with some sense that she could not explain, Velindre could feel the dragon’s intent. It wanted to find her. It wanted to destroy her with the same savagery it had loosed to annihilate Dev, his companions and the very boat they had been standing on.

Velindre knocked the bowl off the table with a wild sweep of her ann. It went flying, water splashing to stain the plaster below the window with oily streaks. Irrational fear seized her and the crystal jug followed, shattering into countless fragments. Upturning the table completely, Velindre stumbled backwards, tripped over the chair she’d discarded earlier and fell heavily to the floor.

The room remained gloomy and grey, the sun far distant behind the clouds now wrapped around Hadrumal. The only sound was the distant crack and rumble of the storm. None of the drops and puddles of spilled water glowed with any hint of magic. Velindre lay motionless for a few moments, skirts in disarray around her stockinged legs, waiting for her pounding heart to slow.

Sitting up slowly, she rubbed her bruised elbow thoughtfully. She smoothed down her gown and stood, absently rubbing her hip, still stinging from the impact of her fall. Leaving the calamitous scene of by the window, she went to recover her boots and pulled them on, face pensive. A pang of hunger surprised her and she spared a glance for the bread and cheese and plum bread that had bounced across the floor. Shards of glass and earthenware now rendered it all wholly inedible.

No matter. She had better things to do than eat. Moving briefly to the mantel, she tugged the bell pull to summon some nameless maid to deal with the mess. Leaving the door ajar behind her, she ran lightly up to the floor above, her urgent steps echoing down the stone spiral. Heart racing once again, she laid a pale hand on the latch of the study door and whispered the old mage’s name under her breath. The tumblers of the lock clicked obediently and the door swung open.

What would Otrick have said to that? To the notion that a dragon had been looking back through the magic of a scrying spell to see who was working it at the other end? He’d have been intrigued by the idea. He’d have been utterly, resolutely determined to learn how such a thing might be so, to ascertain how he might do just such a thing in turn.

The faceless maids came here, too. The table was polished and gleaming. Even the haphazard parchments on the bookshelves were somehow kept free of dust. The cushions in the corners of the tall winged chairs on either side of the fireplace were plump and neatly placed. The hearth was laid ready with kindling and coal.

A fall of soot prompted by the dampness in the air had spotted the hearthstone and the raw smell caught in the back of her throat. Velindre shivered with distaste. This ordered emptiness wasn’t Otrick’s. The sideboard had been cleared of the old pirate’s prized collection of cordials and wines summoned from merchants trading from one end of the long-lost Tormalin Empire to the other. He had always boasted that he had the finest palate on Hadrumal, even with his breath redolent of the acrid sweetness of chewing leaf.

Velindre turned her back on such bittersweet memories and studied the bookshelves with a frown. There were gaps. Too many gaps. Some of the general tomes had doubtless been returned to the archives and libraries. The old mage had been an inveterate borrower of books and remarkably negligent when it came to returning them. Where were his journals, and those carefully bound records of his own thoughts and investigations into every aspect of the elemental air he had been born to command? Otrick had been meticulous in recording his conclusions and his musings on how he might make further trial of his affinity, of his powers and how they might rival or complement those of other wizards born to different disciplines.

Of course, other wizards and their pupils had sought and gained Planir’s approval to compare their own deliberations with the dead Cloud Master’s recorded wisdom. Velindre scowled as she tried to put names to the faces who had trooped up and down past her door. She was paying the price for ignoring them now. No matter; she’d just have to make a list. Sitting at the empty table, she opened a drawer to find parchment inside and one of the steel-tipped reed pens Otrick had favoured, but when she flipped the brass top of the inkwell open, she found that the crystal vial offered only a stain of dried darkness. Lightning flashed and thunder followed, a crack as if the sky itself had split. Rain lashed the lofty tower, a buffeting wind howling at the tall windows where she had stood with Otrick, listening rapt as he revealed so many mysteries of the magic that they shared. The rascally old wizard’s reputation as the finest Cloud Master Hadrumal had seen in an age was no idle boast. Velindre gazed out of the window, lost in memory as the storm raged unheeded.

Though there was the one crucial mystery he had never shared with her. Otrick had been able to summon dragons. Well, one dragon, at least—a creature of cloud and fury only loosely under his command. That much he had admitted to her in the warm intimacy of one chilly midnight, moonlight lancing through the snow falling slowly outside the narrow window to spill on the coverlet like the fall of her long golden hair on the pillow. She’d never seen it herself, but mages who had no reason to lie swore to it. Besides, Otrick had never lied to her. Now Dev had seen a dragon. Dev, who would lie black was white and fire was water if it would serve his purposes, which were rarely honourable and always self-interested. But she had seen it for herself, so that was hardly an issue. And this wasn’t one of those rare beasts glimpsed above the most distant northern peaks where not even the hardiest Mountain Men could claw out a living. This was a dragon born of fire threatening to set the Aldabreshin Archipelago ablaze.

And Dev had been fighting mysterious wild mages down in the uncharted southern reaches of the Aldabreshin Archipelago. Did Planir know about this? Surely such news should have been brought before the Council of Hadrumal? Untamed magic was a threat to every mage, those in Hadrumal and those living less exalted lives among the mundane populace of the mainland. What would Kalion make of such news? What use would he make of such news, and the realisation that Planir had kept such a secret from the Council?

The memory of the dragon’s burning eyes drove such thoughts of petty alliance and connivance out of her head. Had the dragon been summoned by some wild wizard, using whatever lore Otrick had kept such a close secret? How else could it have come there?

Dev wanted to know how such a thing could be done.

Why? To confront this mysterious mage with a dragon under his own command? Could he do it, if he had the lore? Was he strong enough in his wizardry to make such a challenge? Dev had certainly been talented, and supremely arrogant besides, when they’d both been apprentices in Hadrumal. What had he learned during his years of snooping around the Archipelago? What could he have discovered in realms where death was the penalty for using magic?

Otrick had been able to summon dragons but he was dead and ashes in a funerary urn. Dev wanted to know how to summon dragons but he might very well be dead and food for the fishes of the southern seas. Who else was thinking about dragons, across the whole of wizardry? No one, not as far as Velindre knew.

What if she rediscovered this lore? What if she learned how to summon a dragon and bend it to her will? More than that, what if she was the one who put paid to this wild magic coming up from the south, saving Hadrumal from a threat more destructive than any whirlwind? Wouldn’t that earn her a place on the Council as of right? Wouldn’t that make Planir choke on his choice of Rafrid for Cloud Master? Wouldn’t that silence the whispers behind hands raised in the libraries and the sniggers behind her back as she passed through the halls?

So where was the lore? Velindre’s gaze slid to the door leading to Otrick’s spartan sleeping chamber. It wasn’t a memory of that winter night that spurred her to her feet but recollection of a distant summer. She had been revelling in the first maturity of her magic and in the flattering attention of Otrick, then in his prime and so different from the callow youths who were her fellow pupils. Walking slowly across the study, she pushed at the bedroom door.

She had been asleep under a thin linen sheet, no coverlet necessary in the still heat that was slow to fade even in the late watches of the night. Something had woken her and she had found herself alone in the bed. Otrick had been sitting in the window seat, relaxed in his nakedness and absorbed in his writing. She had watched him for a few moments before falling asleep again. His hair had still been dark then, not yet faded to the icy grey of his latter years. Not that white hair had made him look any less piratical or diminished any of his appetites.

Cross with herself, Velindre brushed aside such reminiscences and walked quickly to the window seat. She threw aside the long, flat cushion and tried to lift the planking beneath. After a sharp tug, the wood came free and she summoned a tongue of magelight to illuminate the hollow beneath. Small books bound in brown leather were stacked in piles ten deep. She reached for the topmost, then, changing her mind, delved deeper, down to the bottom of the hidey-hole.

She stood up with her prize and crossed over to sit on the bare mattress of the bed, flicking through the pages to see Otrick’s familiar irrepressible scrawl, now sorely faded. The magelight blinked out at the snap of her fingers and reappeared to hang by her head, shining a fierce light on the open book. Returning to the beginning of the journal, Velindre began reading with steady concentration. Some considerable number of pages later, a note caught her eye.

Dragons would appear from time to time among the crags of the Cape of Winds that is the last reach of southernmost Tormalin. No one knew where they came from. Few knew the secret of killing them. Those that did could live like kings for a year on the proceeds, if they ever brought the spoils back to a safe harbour. That’s what Azazir has been saying, anyway.

Velindre turned the page and read on, oblivious to the storm tearing the clouds to rags and drenching the city beyond the windows with rain.