The Dragon of Trelian (18 page)

Sen Eva merely shook her head. “Oh, Meglynne,” she said. “I cannot tell you how much I regret finding you here. I assure you, however, that I am not the traitor. If you want to lay blame, look toward your own family. To further his misguided and selfish agenda, your father helped murder my husband and son.”

“That is a lie,” Meg said quietly.

Sen Eva smiled sadly. “I wish it were, my dear. In any case, whether or not you choose to believe me, I’m afraid you’ve placed me in a difficult position.”

Wilem stepped forward. “Mother —”

“Quiet,” she said, not taking her eyes from Meg. “No one will miss the mage’s apprentice, I wager. But what am I to do with you?”

“I will not allow you to harm Calen, or to murder my sister,” Meg replied. “You have to realize that you cannot succeed in this.”

Calen was astounded by Meg’s self-control. He could never have managed to sound so calm, or, more likely, to even speak at all. Sen Eva spoke of killing him as easily as she might talk about swatting a fly. Despite her words, she probably had every intention of killing Meg as well. Why not? She was already plotting to kill one princess. They had to do something, but what could they do? Sen Eva stood between them and the door, with Wilem only a few steps away. If they tried to run, they’d never make it. Not both of them, anyway.

There had to be some kind of spell that would help in a case like this, but unfortunately Calen had no idea what it might be. He had learned a lot in the past weeks, more than he once would have thought possible, but Serek had never taught him anything about striking out with magic as a weapon. Mages weren’t supposed to use magic in that way, except as a last resort, and it’s not like either of them ever imagined he’d be faced with a situation like this one. He tried desperately to think. Was there anything he knew, anything at all that could help, that might distract Wilem and Sen Eva or incapacitate them until he and Meg could get away? He wondered if Meg was trying to stall for time in order for him to work some kind of magic in their defense. If so, he thought bitterly, she was about to be sorely disappointed. For the first time in his life, he wished Serek were there.

Something suddenly clicked in his mind.
Idiot,
he chided himself fiercely. Of course there was something he could do. Serek had been teaching him summoning. All he had to do was call to Serek, using a summoning spell. Well, that and then stall long enough for Serek to reach them. Assuming Calen managed to work the spell correctly. And assuming Serek chose to respond.

Calen brushed all that aside. No sense worrying about what might go wrong. Meg and Sen Eva were still staring each other down, trading sharp, clipped sentences about who was or wasn’t going to kill whom and why. Calen closed his eyes and cleared his mind, relishing briefly how easily that came to him now, even in his current circumstances. Then that thought, too, was gone and he was ready.

Quickly, he created an image of Serek in his head. It wasn’t hard — the gods knew he had stared often enough at that man’s face with varying degrees of hatred and annoyance and grudging respect. He knew every line and feature. He pictured Serek’s cold blue eyes; his thick black hair, kept short; the downward turn of his mouth. He saw the master tattoo spiraling down his right cheek and extending across his face, its complex tendrils and small symbols, which Serek had always refused to explain. Once the image was complete, he held it firmly in his mind, preparing to reach through the image to the flesh-and-blood man it represented.

Now — what to send, exactly? Summoning didn’t allow you to communicate actual words; he wouldn’t be able to give any kind of rational explanation or call for help. Basically it was just a call for someone to come to you, but it was possible to shade the call with an emotion, and that’s what he needed to do now. Serek would never respond to a simple, basic summons. He’d probably just ignore it and plan to make Calen sorry later for disturbing him at work. Calen needed to make Serek aware of the danger somehow, of the fact that he needed serious, immediate help. He tried to let a little of his fear back into the cleared space in his mind. Not enough to dismantle the spell, but enough, he hoped, to get through to Serek.

Taking a breath, he reached out through the image he’d created, trying to connect. To his inner eye, his sending appeared as a white cloud of energy, formless at first but then strengthening into a solid beam of communication. He focused on the beam, willing it to reach his master, to get his attention and make him aware of Calen calling to him. Almost, for a moment, he thought he might have broken through —

Someone shook him, roughly, and his eyes flew open. Wilem had his arm and shoulder in a tight grip. “None of that,” Wilem said angrily. “Whatever you’re up to, stop it.”

Beyond Wilem, Calen saw Sen Eva smirking at him contemptuously. “I don’t know what you’re attempting, boy, but you might as well save yourself the trouble. Trust me. Whatever small magic you have at your disposal, it will not be enough to save you. I have suffered too much and worked too hard to allow some worthless apprentice to interfere with what I must do.”

Fear and despair shot through him. Calen struggled not to show it. He didn’t want to give Sen Eva the satisfaction. Or to shame himself in front of Meg, who was always so brave and sure. It was hard, though. Very hard. He really didn’t want to die.

“No!” cried Meg. And then she shocked them all by launching herself at Sen Eva, shrieking and clawing like a wildcat. Sen Eva stepped back, trying to hold the girl off. Wilem dropped his hold on Calen and went after Meg instead.

Calen seized the opportunity, closed his eyes, and had his mental picture of Serek back in an instant. He gave up any semblance of control and simply sent every shred of fear and panic and need in a pure beam of white energy directly to where he felt Serek to be. Almost at once, he felt Serek stagger from the impact at the other end of the delicate, fiery bond that suddenly connected them.
Calen,
the surprised thought came back at him clearly, defying what he’d been taught about the limits of summoning.
Calen, what
—

And then the bond was ripped apart as Meg came hurling into him, thrust away from Sen Eva by her son’s rough and angry hands. Wilem was glaring at Meg as if furious for making him behave in so undignified a manner. Calen regained his balance for once and reached out an arm to steady Meg. She grabbed his hand and stood by his side, waiting.

Sen Eva quickly recovered her equilibrium but no longer bothered to hide her anger. It practically shone from her like a force in itself, glowing like red fire.

Dark Lord and Bright Lady,
Calen thought suddenly, numb with the shock of realization.
She’s casting
,
the woman’s a mage —

The red fire burst forth from Sen Eva’s outstretched hands. Without thinking, Calen shot out his hand, flinging up what he could only interpret as a field of blue energy, not knowing what he was doing but just wanting to shield himself and Meg from the red force of death and destruction the woman was firing at them. He could see her spell clearly, no squinting required, and there was no question in his mind that she was attempting to kill them both.

The red fire met the blue shield and exploded in a blinding flash of violet light. Calen felt himself falling, like the day he had first met Meg, falling from the treacherous ledge, but this time no strong hand would pull him back because Meg was falling, too, her hand still tightly gripped within his own, and together they fell and fell and fell and he thought,
This is it, we’re dead, we’re falling, I’m so sorry Meg I’m
—

And then he felt the ground beneath him and had just enough time to realize that it didn’t hurt as much as he’d expected before he blacked out and thought nothing else at all.

“Calen?”

Meg’s voice, calling from some strange distance but slowly growing closer.

“Calen?” He felt her hands then, touching his face. “Calen, please. Open your eyes.”

He opened them. He was lying on the ground. Meg’s worried face was looking down at him. She didn’t look dead.

“You don’t look dead,” he told her.

She stared at him. Then one of her familiar scornful looks stole across her startled features and she shook her head, starting to laugh. He was glad to hear it. Dead people didn’t laugh at you. They were too busy being dead. And if she wasn’t dead, then probably he wasn’t either. Carefully he raised his head and looked around. They were in a forest. He was lying in the dirt and grass on the forest floor, near the base of a large, dark tree. The tree was of a species he’d never seen before. Which was very strange. He sat up.

Meg had stopped laughing and was sitting with her legs tucked underneath her, watching him. Her pale skirts were smudged with dirt. The forest was quiet, and dark for the middle of the day. The thick branches overhead blocked most of the sun.

“Are you all right, Calen?”

“I think so,” he said. Nothing felt broken, anyway, or permanently damaged. It was beginning to become clear that they had not, in fact, fallen from the window ledge. Or at least, if they had, they had not landed in the courtyard. No prickly animal-shaped hedges. No castle, for that matter. Just this quiet forest of strange trees.

“Where are we?” he asked finally.

Meg’s eyes widened slightly. “You don’t know? I thought — I thought you brought us here, somehow. To get us away from . . .” She stopped and shook her head. “What happened, Calen? She was waving her arms around and shouting out words that didn’t make any sense, and then
you
started waving
your
arms around —”

“She’s a mage,” he said quietly. “She was casting a spell, trying to kill us.”

“But — that’s not possible. She’s not a mage. How could she be a mage? She’s a scholar. An advisor. She doesn’t even have the marks.”

“I know. I don’t understand it either. But trust me, that’s what she was doing.” He felt cold inside. All mages wore marks. It was — more than law. To have that sort of power, and walk about unknown . . . There had been a time when mages ruled lands and led countries, when they joined together into bands and small armies, long before the present standard of solitary mages pledging their crafts to individual kings and households. It had been a terrible, chaotic time, and only the formation of the Magistratum, the careful application of laws and boundaries, and the clear marking of anyone taught to use the magical arts had been able to restore order and allow non-mages to feel safe in the knowledge that mages would never again seek to use their power to rule and control and destroy.

It had been nearly three hundred and fifty years since the Magistratum was created, and since that time, mages had dedicated themselves to the proper and responsible use of their skills and talents. It was unthinkable to conceal one’s ability to use magic. And it should have been impossible. Every apprentice was given his first mark immediately upon commencing his education. Sen Eva’s face was untouched.

Everything about this was wrong.

Meg stood up, brushing twigs and grass from her dress. She looked very out of place in the forest. “All right. Let’s — let’s just figure out how to get back. We’ll get back, and we’ll tell my parents what happened, and what we heard, and they’ll — they’ll take care of it.” She looked at Calen, despair fighting with hope in her expression. “Are you sure you didn’t bring us here?”

“Yes. At least, I think I’m sure.” He tried to remember exactly what he had done. He had been trying to protect them from whatever Sen Eva was casting, instinctively reaching for what he thought of as blue energy — the color he associated with sleep magic, water magic — maybe just somehow trying to quench the red fire of whatever deadly spell she was weaving. It sounded rather stupid now, but he hadn’t had much time to consider; he had simply acted. He had never tried anything like that before. And all he had been going for was a sort of shield — certainly not a transportation spell of some kind. He didn’t have the first idea of how to go about something like that. He didn’t even know if it was possible.

He shook his head. “I don’t know, Meg. Maybe whatever I did reacted with Sen Eva’s spell in some way and sent us here as a result. Or maybe my magic didn’t do anything, and this is all Sen Eva’s doing.” But he didn’t think so — that red fire had been death, he was sure of it.

“Well, could you try? I mean, try to send us back? Not to that same room, of course, but . . .” She trailed off, watching him shake his head again.

“That sort of magic is completely beyond my ability, Meg. I’m sorry. I wouldn’t even know how to attempt it.”

She sighed, then planted her fists on her hips, thinking.

“All right,” she said finally. “First things first. Let’s try to figure out where we are. How’s your geography?”

“Not very strong. I know Kragnir is northwest of Trelian, in the mountains, and Eldwinn is far to the south. I know the towns we passed through on our way from Eldwinn to the capital. I know where Haverton is, where I was born.” He shrugged apologetically. “That’s about it, I’m afraid.”

Meg stared at him. “Well. You weren’t kidding. Not very strong, indeed.” After a minute she sat down next to him. “I’m sorry, Calen. That was unkind. I’m just — upset. And frightened. If we don’t get back in time . . .”

“I know,” Calen said softly. He looked around again. “Well, I can tell you this much. We’re not anywhere near Trelian.”

“How do you know?”

He pointed. “These trees. I’ve never seen this kind of tree before.”

“What does that have to do with anything? Maybe you just never happened to see one.”

Calen got to his feet and touched the bark of the nearest tree, looking up into the branches. The leaves were a very dark green, shaped like five-pointed stars. “Serek makes me study trees. And plants and flowers and herbs and anything else that grows from the ground. It’s important for healing, and lots of other kinds of magic. I’ve painted charts for him detailing all the trees in your father’s kingdom. These were not among them.”

Meg digested that for a moment. “You don’t just mean near the castle.” It was not a question. “You mean we’re not anywhere in my parents’ lands.”