The White Order

XII

CERRYL RUBBED HIS forehead again, trying to massage away the dull ache from somewhere deep within his skull. The massage didn’t help, and he resumed restacking the flooring planks, ensuring that there were indeed ten in each pile, as Brental had instructed him-a dozen stacks of ten.

He paused, his eyes going to the half-open mill door and to the steady rain beyond, rain that had fallen from gray skies for the past two days. He looked back at the span-wide planks, his eyes watering. With a sigh, he counted the last stack again. Ten.

Why did the steady rain give him such a headache? Syodor had said it affected all the white mages. He could use his mirror fragments to pull up images-places like Fairhaven, the white city, and even the cows in the lower pasture. Did those things mean he was a mage-or could be? Or that the mages would kill him, as they had his father, if they discovered him?

He’d only been able to have a few sessions with Erhana and her copybooks, but already he could pick out some of the letters in his books, although the script was curved and more elaborate than that in hers. He could make out a handful of words, not enough to read anything. . not yet.

His fingers went to his belt pouch and tightened around the talisman-was that what it was? — that Syodor had given him. Had it been his father’s? Or had his father picked it up somewhere?

“. . afore midsummer, Dorban will be here for the seasoned oak-the big timbers for the shipyard. .” A good thirty cubits away, Dylert’s voice trailed off.

“He always complains,” said Brental, “but he comes back.”

Cerryl did not turn his head. He’d learned years earlier that his hearing was sharper than that of most folks. He’d also learned that he gained more information by not letting on.

“He hopes that we’ll lower the price if he complains enough. .”

Cerryl kept listening as he started in on the third pile.

“Oooo.” He stopped and carefully eased out the splinter. Although he tried to be careful, wood had splinters, some of them sharp enough to cut deeply if he was careless or if his mind wandered-as it just had.

Cerryl shook his head. Was Erhana right? That he’d spend the rest of his life in the mill, the way Rinfur was?

His lips tightened, but his eyes and attention went back to the hardwood planks.

Standing closer to the big blade of the saw itself, Dylert and Brental continued talking, but Cerryl shut out their words.

Outside the mill, the rain continued to fall, beating on the roof, on the stones, and inside Cerryl’s skull.