Aquamancer (mancer series Book 2) (38 page)

“They’ll always return here to rest or recover from injuries,” said proud Finnerty. “We don’t want them to think our sweet savannahs are all of World there is, you see, although we want them to think of it as home.”

“What noble beasts!” exclaimed Wong as they flew east again.

“We’ll stop to say hello to the people of Summer Palace,” decided Douglas, “and then leave in the morning to reach Westongue by tomorrow’s dusk.”

“A feast with Delond and dinner with Thornwood!” exclaimed Marbleheart to Flarman. “I call that excellent planning.”

“We should be safe at Wizards’ High tomorrow before supper,” added Douglas to Myrn. “Your Feather Pin is certainly a wonderful way to travel!”

Delond, the former Majordomo of Summer Palace and now Mayor of the slowly reviving city, greeted them with great warmth and a touch of the old formality, too. He eagerly described the renewal projects the Waiters had undertaken—among them, to renovate the huge, rambling, ornate seaside palace itself. They planned to reopen it as a resort hotel.

“Live like a King, dine like royalty, enjoy the service Kings and Queens once enjoyed, and have Sea breezes, clean sand beaches, clear waters, the wildlife of the river and the delta wetlands, too!” Delond was lyric. “I believe we’ll attract more guests than we can handle.”

“Don’t clear away all these magnificent ruins,” Myrn urged. “They’re ever so romantic! Perhaps you and I can come this way on our wedding trip,” she added aside to her husband-to-be.

“What’s for lunch?” asked Marbleheart. “To pay for it, we’ve returned your gondola that we borrowed. Douglas shrunk it to pocket size and carried it along in his knapsack!”

Thornwood was working on papers, alone on the porch of Sea House at dusk, when a V-shaped flight of very odd-looking birds flashed overhead with shouts and cries of “Hello! Hello! Ahoy!” and landed on the strand in front of the house.

“I say!” he exclaimed. “You pick strange ways to come a-calling!”

“Thornwood, old Sea urchin!” shouted Flarman. “I have to admit that flying like a bird has its advantages. One of your ships is just over the horizon. She’ll be here by dawn, I would say.”

“‘Twas
Donation!”
exclaimed Caspar, who was not all that enthusiastic about flying, himself. “We left her, Wong and I, off the coast of Choin and we’ve beat her home! Won’t my crew be amazed!”

Thornwood ordered a dinner to be prepared and they sat on the porch, enjoying the cool Broad breezes until well after midnight, telling their stories all over again.

“Pargeot worked out a-right?” Thornwood asked Myrn, privately.

“Oh, simply wonderfully!” the Apprentice said. “He’ll stay in Old Kay for a long while, to help them put things back together, now that the Coven is destroyed.”

“I’ll send him word that I approve, although he is a free and independent man, not sworn to me in any way except his personal loyalty,” said the Duke of Dukedom. “Knowing his sort, however, he will eventually return to Sea. It is in his blood.”

“We understand that,” Myrn said. “We Seafaring people.”

In early morning Douglas and Myrn walked with Marbleheart down to see the ships in busy Westongue harbor. Stevedores were already hard at work loading and unloading interesting cargoes from all over World. The place was as busy and cheerful as any place Douglas had seen. When a number of Seamen recognized them and asked Myrn what had become of their old shipmate Pargeot, much of their story had to be told once more.

“Pargeot has found a way to atone for losing
Pitchfork
and her crew,” Myrn told them with a happy laugh. “He’s become a schoolmaster, at least for a while.”

“Do you think he’ll come back and sail with us again?” asked the young sailors.

“Of course he will,” replied Douglas. “Once a Westongue sailor, never happy as anything else.”

Flarman rescued them for breakfast, and shortly thereafter they were aloft again, bound for Valley, and home.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Home Again

Party and Pert led their latest litters across the cobbled courtyard from the cottage to the Wizard’s vast, cool underground workshop, enjoying the first really hot morning of summer.

Bronze Owl might have been dozing, if he were made ever to sleep, on his favorite nail in the middle of one of the leaves of the big, double front door to Wizards’ High.

The Ladies of the Byre were already contentedly chewing their morning’s cud in the shade of one of the very old and twisted willows beside Crooked Brook.

The family of Thatch Mice in the golden reeds over the southwest corner—above Douglas’s own room—paused to listen to Blue Teakettle’s cheery whistling in her big and sunny kitchen. Easy Chair, in the front parlor, dozed away peacefully, facing the fireplace, cold now that it was summertime.

Brown-and-red hens led a platoon of new chicks in a wide circle to avoid the kittens, just in case, and showed their fluffy, yellow sons and daughters how to prize tiny bugs and bits of flower seeds from between the cobbles.

“I know something nobody else knows!” Blue Teakettle sang. “Move it, you loafers! We’ll need five of your best, tastiest white breads before nightfall, believe you me! Grater! Grater! Where have you got to? There’s cheese to be grated so I can make a rare feast this evening.”

“Huh!” sniffed Bronze Owl, grumpily. “That Teakettle thinks she knows when the Wizards are coming back. Well, she’s wrong, I say! I would know first if they approached.”

He noisily flipped himself off his nail and flopped with disapproving clatter of his metal wings to the cottage’s roof-tree—just in case. He saw nobody coming by the brook or by the road from either direction. To the north he surveyed the low hills that separated Valley from the rest of Dukedom, now a haze of blue-green marked with the time-worn paths of the upland flocks.

Southward, he peered for a long moment toward the rocky hills between Valley and pleasant, seaside Wayness.

“Teakettle’s wrong,” he said aloud to himself.

“Teakettle is seldom if ever wrong,” said Flarman Flowerstalk.

Spinning about like a weathercock, Owl confronted the plump, grinning Fire Wizard, who was floating in midair not five feet away.

“Blue Teakettle! He’s here!” cried the metal bird, all but falling off the rooftree in surprise. “And Douglas and Myrn and Augurian and Caspar and a stranger in a gold robe and a red hat, carrying a lacquered fan. You were right! How
does
she do it?”

“Old Blue?” asked Flarman, allowing himself to sink slowly out of sight beneath the eaves. “No telling how she does her things, is there?”

Owl threw himself over the edge of the roof and dived to greet the travelers at the door, as was his duty.

“Here is Wong Tscha San, a Choinese Magician from far south over Sea,” said Douglas. “And this is Marbleheart Sea Otter, my Familiar.”

“Familiar? He’s not at all familiar to me,” said Bronze Owl, cocking his head to one side with a loud clang.

“That’s
Familiar—
with a capital F,” retorted the Otter.

“Oh!” cried Owl.
“That
kind of Familiar. Well, come on in. Come in! Come in! I’ll introduce you to Black Flame, Flarman’s own Familiar. He can teach you things about Familiarity that you’ll never find in the old Familiar text books.”

Myrn and Douglas drew Wong into the bright kitchen and sat him at the enormous kitchen table to watch. Blue Teakettle’s lively utensils hustled about to prepare an early, hearty dinner—and what a show it was!

Slicer and Grater got into a good-natured duel over counter space, while all the Knives and Cleaver fell in line to slide, one by one, down Whetstone’s hard, smooth surface, until their edges were sharp enough to cut silk thread.

Sugar Caster bobbed politely to the distinguished visitor and rushed off to sprinkle the tops of a pan of scones that had just popped out of the big Oven, steaming fragrantly and singing prettily in harmony, led by a tall, thin cinnamon stick.

The Silverware proudly trooped out of their drawers and stood at attention in serried ranks, waiting while the snow white, starched Napery performed amazing gymnastics to fold themselves to look like wide-winged doves at each place setting. When they were finished, the Silverware marched triumphantly around the table, setting place after place in a series of precise and highly polished maneuvers.

Laughing and applauding until there were tears in his bright eyes, Wong himself produced a pair of delicately carved ivory Chopsticks. They performed a series of breathtaking aerobatics over the table at his bidding before nestling down next to the forks by the linen Napkins at his place.

Blue Teakettle, clearly intrigued by this strange, new kind of tableware, stood on the edge of the stovetop spouting pinkish steam in awe while the Chopsticks flashed about overhead. When they were settled, she led her kitchen crew in cries of “Bravo! Bravo!” and everything that could, clapped, snapped, or clashed together loudly, making quite a happy din.

Blue Teakettle ordered the dinner bell beside the back door to ring out, and the Wizards and their guests trooped in to take their seats.

“I’ve heard all manner of men say that there’s no place like home,” chuckled Wong as Soup Ladle carefully spooned from Tureen a hot, savory ham-and-beans soup. “No one can say it more honestly than you, Flarman.”

“Wait ‘til you’ve tried the main course,” challenged Flarman, reaching for the Shakers. “Oh, and Blue Teakettle wishes you would teach her the cuisine of Choin, as she is not familiar with it at all.”

Wong, delighted, promised to spend lots of time in the kitchen with the plump little housekeeper.

“I’ve got twelve weeks to cram for my orals,” said Douglas that evening. He and Myrn sat on the curb of the Old Well in the lower lawn, overlooking Crooked Brook. Fireflies came to say “welcome home!” and the stars blinked down at them merrily. Somewhere a bullfrog was singing in a deep, bass voice a song about calm waters and clear skies.

“Lucky!” murmured Myrn, very content just to sit leaning against him and watching the stars spin sedately around the tail of the Small Bear. A waning half moon was rising. “I’ll be very surprised if I pass to Journeyman before midwinter myself.”

Douglas sat up in alarm.

“It won’t delay the wedding, I hope?”

“Oh, of course not!” She laughed at his worry. “If I don’t pass before then, I’ll have to pass
after
and that may delay our housewarming party, love.”

“Oh, well, if that’s all it will delay.” Douglas sighed in relief.

“And I’ll have to do my cramming at Waterand, in that case.”

Douglas considered that news in silence. There was plenty to do about the Frigeon spells there on Waterand. He would follow his bride to Warm Seas.

Flarman and Black Flame, accompanied by Marbleheart, strolled down the lawn toward them.

“My! I do love this place,” exclaimed Flarman. “Every time I come back I always wonder why I ever leave.”

“As do I,” agreed Douglas, and Myrn nodded, saying, “Waterand is beautiful and most comfortable and I love it, and Flowring Isle is my home and hearth, but of all places in World I’ve yet been, I like Wizards’ High the best.”

“You’ve seen very little of World, my dear girl, to make so sweeping a statement,” Douglas snorted
.

“Is there so much, really, left to discover?” she teased innocently.

“Yes, there is,” the Fire Wizard stated flatly, to her delighted laughter.

“Did you come to speak to Douglas alone?” Myrn asked “If so, too bad, because I’m much too comfortable to move, just now.”

“No, stay where you are,” said Flarman, taking a seat on the well curbing also. “You should hear what I have to say, also, seeing as you are a member of the Fellowship as well as our family.”

“Uh-oh!” Myrn said, sitting up straight. “This sounds ominous!”

“Not really,” said the Pyromancer. “I just want to ask that Douglas prepare to go to Serenit in New Land on a small problem our former foe has detected.”

“I was planning to do some studying,” began Douglas, gathering some heat.

“A Wizard is a terrible thing to waste,” quoted Flarman, ignoring the outburst. “There’s three months between now and your examination. We must use Douglas well in that time, my dear. You can understand, I’m certain.”

He patted Myrn’s hand consolingly when she pulled a long face.

“It shouldn’t take him long. Just something that Serenit has found that he can’t explain, under the melting glacier. He draws on the experience of some centuries as a Wizard himself, and says it should be looked at by someone with full Wizardly powers. His very words, I swear to you.”

“I wouldn’t mind seeing how Serenit and Clangeon are doing, now that the glacier has melted back some miles,” mused the Journeyman. “It shouldn’t take long, Apprentice.”

“I’ll tell you this,” said Myrn, firmly, punching her husband-to-be in the ribs. “If you delay our wedding because someone has enchanted a ton of ice cubes in Far North, I’ll...I’ll...I’ll...”

“What?” asked Douglas, innocently.

“I’ll take your Familiar away from you!” cried she in mock dudgeon.

“I think I’ll take a midnight swim in the brook,” said Marbleheart, hastily. “Maybe it’s a good time to look up my cousins, the River Otters.”

He slid down the grassy bank and splashed happily into the dark water. He was watched with lofty, feline disapproval by the ever-dignified Black Flame, who never got himself wet unless it couldn’t be avoided. Black Flame wasn’t convinced yet that an Otter, with that species’ bubbly sense of fun and love of food, was altogether suitable to be a Wizard’s Familiar.

Oh well,
Black Flame thought, exchanging a quick glance with his own good Wizard.
Marbleheart’ll do just fine. It’s the quality of the Wizard that counts, after all... not the Familiar.

“I agree with you,” chuckled Flarman Flowerstalk, Pyromancer, and the two young Wizards thought he was agreeing with Myrn’s last words.

Actually he was speaking to the big, black tom.