The Magician's Apprentice (30 page)

Crannin had emerged from his house now, and invited the magicians to eat with him as they discussed plans. He apologised that there was no room for the apprentices now there were so many here, but a table and food would be brought outside as soon as possible.

So once again I’m left out of the important discussions
, Tessia thought wryly,
but this time at least I’m not the only one.

As the magicians disappeared inside Crannin’s house, the apprentices hovered by the front door, eyeing each other and saying nothing. They looked exhausted. Tessia guessed they had ridden here as quickly, or near to it, as Dakon had to reach Mandryn.

After a few minutes some men from the village emerged from another house and brought benches and tables out of a stable. They washed them down then threw cloths over them. Women emerged from Crannin’s house carrying food and wine and laid out a small feast. The apprentices sat down to eat and soon quiet conversations began among them. They directed all their questions about Mandryn and the Sachakans at Jayan, but Tessia was happy to stay silent and let him deal with them. To her surprise, he was less descriptive than she had been when telling the village women about the attack.

“I don’t think we should tell anyone too much,” he murmured to her after a while. “I’m not sure how much Dakon wants people to know.”

Tessia felt a pang of worry. Had she told Nivia anything she shouldn’t have?

“Like what?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” he replied, a little irritably, turning to face one of the villagers as the man approached. She realised the man was looking at her.

“Apprentice Tessia. Forgive me if this is too bold,” the man said. He paused, then hurried on. “You carry a healer’s bag.”

“Yes,” she said when he didn’t continue. “How do you know that?”

“I’m sorry. I thought it smelled of cures so I had a look inside. Who does it belong to?”

“My father,” she answered. “Or it did. He…he was Mandryn’s healer.”

The man’s face fell. “Oh. I am sorry. I had hoped… sorry.”

As he began to back away she reached out towards him. “Wait. You don’t have a healer here, do you?”

The man shook his head, his expression grim.

“Is someone ill?”

He frowned. “Yes. My wife. She…she…”

“I was my father’s assistant,” she told him. “I may not be able to do anything, but I can have a look.”

He smiled. “Thank you. I’ll take you to her. And have someone bring your bag. ”

To Tessia’s surprise Jayan stood up and followed her. When they were out of the hearing of the other apprentices he caught her arm.

“What are you doing?” he said quietly. “You’re not a healer.”

She turned to stare at him. “So? I might still be able to help.”

“What if Dakon calls for you? You’re an apprentice now, Tessia. It’s not…not…”

“Not…?

He grimaced. “You can’t go off playing healer whenever you want to. It’s not… appropriate.”

She narrowed her eyes at him.

“What’s more or less ‘appropriate’, Jayan: letting someone sick or in pain stay that way – or perhaps even die – because you’re worried about what the other apprentices or their masters might think, or sitting around being a useless waste of space and food?”

He stared back at her, his expression intense and searching. Then his shoulders sagged.

“All right. But I’m coming with you.”

She bit back a protest, then sighed and hurried after the man whose wife was ill. Let Jayan see the woman he would have abandoned to whatever ailment she suffered, for the sake of being “appropriate”. Let him see that there was more to healing than being able to call a person a “healer”. Let him see that the skill and knowledge she had was valuable, and know it shouldn’t be wasted.

She grimaced.
I had better be able to help this woman, or I won’t be letting him see much at all.

The house the man led them to was at the edge of the village. Their guide only paused once to ask a boy to fetch her father’s bag. Once in the house, he led them up the stairs to a bedroom, where a woman was dozing on the bed.

That the woman was ill was undeniable. She was so thin the skin of her shoulders, neck and face was stretched over her bones. Her mouth was open and as Tessia entered she quickly and self-consciously wiped away a line of drool.

Tessia moved to the side of the bed and smiled down at the woman.

“Hello. I’m Tessia,” she said. “My father was a healer and I was his assistant most of my life. What’s your name?”

“Paowa,” the man said. “She can’t talk easily.”

The woman’s eyes were wide with fear, but she managed a faint smile and nod in response.

“Let me have a look then,” Tessia said.

The woman opened her mouth. At once Tessia felt a shiver of sympathetic horror. A growth filled one side of her mouth.

“Ah,” Tessia said. “I’ve seen this before, though most often in men. It hurts when you eat, or even smell food, right?”

The woman nodded.

“Do you chew or smoke leaves?”

The woman looked at her husband.

“She used to chew dunda until this stopped her,” he said. “Her family were hunters a generation back, and they kept some of the mountain ways.”

Tessia nodded. “It’s a hard habit to break, I’ve heard. This is called ‘hunter-mouth’. I can cut out the lump and stitch you up, but you have to promise me two things.”

The woman nodded eagerly.

“Use the mouthwash I give you. It tastes utterly foul and dries you out so much you’ll swear you’ll never have any spit ever again, but it’ll stop the cut fouling.”

“She will,” her husband said, smiling. “I’ll make sure of it.”

Tessia nodded. “And stop chewing dunda. It’ll kill you.”

A glint of rebellion entered the woman’s gaze, but Tessia stared back, keeping her expression serious, and after a moment it faded.

“I’ll make sure of that, too,” her husband said softly.

“Now, let me see how much there is.” Tessia gently probed inside the woman’s mouth. Lumps like this had been treated by her father before. While removing them was usually successful, some of the patients sickened and died within a year or two. Others lived to old age. Her father had a theory that this was related to how strongly the lump had “stuck” to the flesh around it.

This one felt loose, like a large, slightly squishy stone inserted under the skin. Promising. Tessia removed her fingers and wiped them on a cloth that the woman’s husband offered her. She considered briefly whether she should attempt to cut the lump out.

As Jayan said, I’m not a healer. But I’ve seen this done. I know how to do it. It won’t be long before the lump grows so large she’ll either starve to death or suffocate. I have all the equipment… well, except the head brace.
Her father used a brace he’d devised and had the metal worker make for him to hold open the mouth of patients when working on teeth and such. It prevented them from biting him out of pain or panic.

A knock at the door took the husband away, and he returned a moment later with her father’s bag. She asked him to clear the table beside the bed and, while he did so, performed her father’s routine check of a patient’s heart and breathing rhythms. When the space was clear she opened the bag and began to remove tools, salves and a calming tonic.

“Take this first,” Tessia told the woman, giving her the tonic. “I need you to lie on your side. Right on the edge of the bed. Arrange pillows behind you and under your head. Any blood and spit will drain out, so you’ll want to protect the bed with cloths and put a basin underneath.” The couple obeyed her instructions without question, which for some reason made her less certain of herself. They were relying on her. What if she got it wrong?

Don’t think about that. Just act.

Remembering her father’s advice about involving family members, she instructed the husband to rub a numbing salve inside and outside the woman’s cheek. This had the added benefit of making sure Tessia’s own hands weren’t affected by it.

She took several blades out and checked their sharpness, but as she began to remove the burner she heard Paowa whimper. Looking up, she realised the woman’s breathing had suddenly become rapid. Paowa’s eyes were on the blades. Tessia felt a pang of sympathy.

“It’s going to be fine,” she told the woman. “It will hurt. I’m not going to lie about that. But the salve helps and I’ll work as quickly as I can. It will be done and over with soon, and all you’ll have is a cut in your mouth all stitched up neatly.”

The woman’s breathing slowed a little. Her husband sat on the bed behind her and began rubbing her shoulders. Tessia took a deep breath, picked a blade and realised she hadn’t yet seared any of them.

And realised if she delayed much longer fear would overtake the woman’s reason.

No problem
, she thought, and with a slight flexing of her will she seared the blade she was holding with magic. Then she set to work.

It was not easy, but nothing unexpected or disastrous happened either. After half an hour she had coaxed out the lump, sewn up the cut and applied a protective paste. Then she checked the woman’s rhythms again and pronounced her work a success. As the woman rolled onto her back, exhausted from pain and fear, Tessia rose and swayed, suddenly dizzy with weariness.

“Sit down.”

She blinked in surprise at Jayan’s voice, having forgotten he was there. He was offering a small wooden stool. Gratefully, she sat down and immediately her head cleared. Drawing her father’s bag closer, she rummaged inside and drew out a familiar wound cleanser.

“Have you a small clean jar with a lid?” she asked the husband. “And a bowl of clean water?”

The man produced the items, and she set about ensuring the jar was clean by steeping it in water she set boiling with magic.

The man watched calmly without comment, as if water boiling by itself was an ordinary and regular occurrence.

Into a measure of water she counted drops of the cleanser. As she gave it to the man she instructed him how it should be used, and when he should cut and remove the stitches. He drew out a pouch and she heard the sound of coins clinking.

“No, you don’t need to pay me,” she told him.

“But how else can I repay you?” he asked.

“Your whole village is feeding and accommodating us. That’s got to be cutting into everyone’s food stores and stock. My master would not approve of me taking money for this, either.”

He reluctantly pocketed the pouch again. “Then I’ll make sure you two have one of my fattest rassook each for dinner,” he said, smiling.

“Now
that
I could not easily refuse,” she replied, smiling ruefully. “We’d best get back in case our master needs us.” She looked down at Paowa. The woman was asleep, her mouth closed and face relaxed. “And remember, no more dunda.”

“I will. Whether she does . . .” He shrugged. “I’ll do what I can to help her stop.”

They walked in a weary, comfortable silence back towards where the apprentices were waiting. From the shadows cast by the trees, she guessed only a few hours had passed. Paowa’s husband left, at her request, to take her father’s bag to Crannin’s house instead of the stables. Next time someone took a peek inside they might not be as sensible or respectful of the contents.

As they came in sight of the apprentices she realised Jayan was watching her, and glanced at him. He was looking at her with a quizzical expression.

“What?” she asked.

“I, ah, I’m impressed,” he said, his face reddening. “What you did back there… I’d have given her up for dead.”

She felt her own face warming. He was acknowledging her skill as she had wanted, but for some reason it didn’t feel triumphant. Just… embarrassing.

“It just looked impressive,” she told him, looking away. “But it was simple, really. Routine work.”

“Ah,” he said, in a tone that was too accepting.

No, it wasn’t simple!
she wanted to say.
I don’t know why I said that!
But his attention had moved away, to the apprentices, and even if she could think of a way to correct herself without sounding a fool it was too late to try.

The last rays of sun tinged the highest leaves of the forest when the magicians emerged from Crannin’s house. A feast began, served on makeshift tables outdoors and lit by numerous torches and lamps. When Tessia and Jayan were served a large, fat rassook each, Jayan had smugly commented that Tessia certainly had a way with villagers and he would not be surprised if she could charm pickpockets into putting money
into
her wallet.

Only after the meal was done did Dakon find a moment in private to talk to his apprentices. He led them away from the main table, walking down to the end of the village, then turning back. From there the sight and sound of laughing and drinking gave the impression of a festival day. It only made the ache and guilt at the loss of Mandryn harder to bear. He turned to Tessia and Jayan. Both looked tired despite not having spent the day in the saddle.

“So what can you tell us?” Jayan asked, the tension in his voice obvious despite the quiet pitch.

Dakon sighed.
How much can I tell them?
The magicians had agreed that secrecy was necessary for their plans to work, but from what some had said it was clear they intended to let their apprentices know at least the general gist. Dakon too did not think it fair or wise to drag apprentices into danger without their knowledge.

“We’re going to rebuild Mandryn,” he said.

Two pairs of eyebrows rose.

“But . . .” Jayan paused to glance at Tessia. “But who is going to live there? Nearly everyone is dead.”

“People will come from other parts of the ley, or other leys, once it is known that there is no further danger. And we will eventually need a place to live.”

“Eventually,” Jayan echoed. “And in the meantime?”

“We deal with the Sachakans.” Dakon shrugged. “Which involves finding them, of course, then driving them out of Kyralia and making sure, by placing a watch on the mountain passes, that they do not return.”

“Drive them out?” Tessia looked surprised. “Not kill them?”

He looked at her, wondering if she was disappointed or angry. If she wanted revenge. She stared back, her expression growing uncertain.