Magi'i of Cyador

LXXXI

THE WAYSTATION IS silent, under an early summer sky so cloudless, dark, and still that not even the stars overhead twinkle. Lorn does not look skyward as he slips silently across the granite stones of the courtyard to the small side postern that is neither locked nor guarded. Wearing the Brystan sabre on his right hip, in addition to his lancer sabre on his left, Lorn slides into the shadows, melding with them as he opens the gate and departs, walking silently southward on the stone walkway that flanks the walls.

Once clear of the walls, he places his boots as quietly as possible on the dry deadland soil, for he would rather not take the narrow road that leads from the front gates of the waystation past the perimeter road and inward to the ward-wall. Even so, his steps carry him steadily through the darkness toward the ward-wall and the presence that looms behind the whitened granite and the chaos-net that flares above it-a net unseen except by the Magi’i-and a lancer who remains magus.

He stops on the inner wall road, where he studies the subtly glowing granite, the chaos net, and the deep twining of black order and golden-red chaos. He wonders again how something that incorporates such chaos can be as evil as the Magi’i have depicted. Yet there is no denying the animositythat the forest creatures have toward the engineers and the lancers. Or is it exactly animosity?

“Do you want to try this?” he murmurs to himself, knowing as he does that merely continuing as a skillful lancer is not enough. After winter and spring, with summer continuing the same pattern of scattered Forest shoots and too many fallen trees, and escaping creatures too swift and numerous and dangerous for the numbers of lancers and firelances in Second Company, he knows that sooner or later, he will make a mistake that will be fatal-or that could be, and he has no wish to trust his future to fate alone.

He unsheathes the Brystan sabre, holding it before him. Then … Lorn concentrates, much as he once did in transferring chaos from the tower in the Quarter of the Magi’i to the chaos cells that power the firewagons of Cyad. Except this time, he merely shifts that energy away from a single ward, in order to create an unshuttered window-or a door temporarily open-to the Accursed Forest.

With the fading of the small section of chaos-net, Lorn can fully sense the power-the white chaos and dark order of the Forest that is greater in its own way than the combined energy of all the chaos towers that weave the chaos web that holds the Forest within its bounds. And he understands, and he shudders.

A dark lance flares through the window in the ward-wall, straight at Lorn, attacking the lancer-magus as if he were the Forest’s gaoler.

Lorn lifts the Brystan sabre, lifting untested chaos-order shields, shields he has practiced only in private since leaving the Quarter of the Magi’i, and letting the ordered iron within the cupridium catch the Forest’s bolt of order-chaos … catch and turn it upward into a flare that flashes upwards.

Nonetheless, he staggers, and with his staggering releases his hold on the chaos diversions, and the chaos-net surges back, confining the Forest.

Lorn’s face burns, and sweat drips from his forehead. He has been foolhardy … and survived by luck, and his own lack of chaos control. He smothers a bitter laugh, knowinghe has barely begun to understand what he must learn.

As he walks back through the darkness he glances at the sabre once more. Within the shimmering cupridium is a core of ordered iron-and iron that feels darker, almost black, and far stronger than either the original wrought material iron of the blade or of the comparable cupridium lancer sabre that remains in his scabbard.

A faint glow surrounds the Brystan sabre. Lorn sheathes it carefully and walks even more silently and circuitously back toward the side gate from whence he had departed. Overhead, the stars have begun to twinkle once more with the slight breeze that helps to cool his fevered countenance.

Lorn slides through the shadows, and is walking across the courtyard, almost to the courtyard door that will lead to his quarters.

“Ser! That you, Captain?”

Footsteps cross the stones, and Lorn hears the hiss of a drawn sabre.

“Yes. I just wanted some air. It’s all right.” Lorn lets the lantern show his face.

“Ah … yes, ser.” The sabre is sheathed. “You see that, ser?”

“See what?” Lorn temporizes.

“Been so quiet … then there was this flash out by the wall. I thought maybe another of those big trees falling. But nothing happened. Thought I heard footsteps, you know, but there was just a glow moving by the wall, and it vanished.”

“You can’t ever tell with the Accursed Forest,” Lorn points out, truthfully.

“No, ser. Sorry to bother you, ser.” The lantern is lowered.

“It’s not a problem. I’m glad you’re watching for us.” Lorn inclines his head, though he doubts the lancer can see the gesture fully. “I’m going to turn in. We still have a long ride tomorrow.” And again the day after, and the day after that-and for who knows how many more days and seasons of trees falling and creatures escaping.