The Princess of Trelian (8 page)

Meg stepped back and turned to signal the guards, who were watching attentively. As they began jogging toward her, she looked back at Wilem.

“I will increase your guard. If anything . . . changes, if the dreams get stronger, if you find yourself acting on anything . . .”

“I will tell you at once, Princess. Thank you.” He seemed genuinely relieved. Grateful.

Meg turned away. She didn’t want to look at him anymore. The guards arrived, and she gave them instructions to increase the security detail assigned to Wilem both day and night. Especially night. They acknowledged this without question, and Meg left them to it. She would have to go find her parents and let them know what Wilem had told her. Once Calen and Serek returned, they could ask Serek to investigate; surely there was some way he would be able to tell if magic were being used against Wilem in that way. Or against Meg.

She thought she would leave out the part about her own dreams when she spoke with her parents, however. Just for now, just until she could find out more about what they meant, or didn’t mean. Her parents were concerned enough about her right now. There was enough they were still trying to get used to. This new issue, the dreams — the dreams could wait.

She felt Jakl tugging at her and suffered a twinge of guilt. He would have to wait, too.
I’m sorry,
she thought at him.
Just a little longer. I have to take care of this. I’ll be there as soon as I can.
He didn’t like that. She could feel him pulling her, wanting her to come
now,
but she had no choice. With an effort, she made the barrier a little stronger, pushing him more firmly away. Once again, it seemed a lot harder than it should have been.

Calen,
she thought desperately, quickening her steps as she approached the castle doors.
Please come back soon.

T
HE COUNCIL HAD DECIDED TO COMBINE
the meeting with the evening meal. Calen found himself juggling a pair of plates piled high with dinner while trying to find Serek and the seat he hoped his master had remembered to save for him. Long, cloth-draped counters covered with food lined one side of the meeting chamber, and pitchers of water and wine had been set out among the tables where people were sitting. This was a different room from the one in which the ceremony had been held. While that space had been designed so that one person or a small group could present information to an audience, this one was set up as a series of large concentric circles — the intention being, Calen supposed, that everyone would mostly be able to see one another, and they could have a discussion as a group.

The mages were all talking among themselves, still clearly agitated about the afternoon’s events. Calen thought he’d heard his own name mentioned more than once. It made sense, he supposed — the attack had happened during his marking ceremony. But it still made him uncomfortable. And it still seemed that certain mages’ eyes kept lingering on him as he passed by.

He spotted Serek at last, seated in the second circle from the center. Calen made his way down the narrow aisle, edged behind the chairs of several other mages — none of whom seemed the least bit inclined to slide their chairs in to make his progress any easier — and finally reached the spot where Serek sat talking with the mage next to him. The seat on the other side of Serek was empty, Calen saw with relief. His arms were getting tired from holding up the heavy plates. He set Serek’s plate down before him and then his own beside it. Then he slipped into the seat and tried to listen to Serek’s conversation without seeming to.

“If you’d have asked me yesterday, I would have sworn there was no way anyone could penetrate the Magistratum’s defenses like that,” Serek’s companion was saying. He seemed to be a fair bit older than Serek, but his face was not as heavily marked. His beard was entirely gray, and what little hair there was on top of his head was white. “Can’t imagine how they managed it,” the man went on, shaking his head. “I keep turning it over in my mind, listening to the theories being thrown around — all nonsense. No one really has any idea at all.”

“Something will come out in the meeting,” Serek said. “No one can cast something that large without leaving some trace behind. Not in the middle of a room full of mages.”

“Which begs the question, of course: why there and then? You don’t suppose —?” His eyes flicked up, and he suddenly noticed Calen sitting there. “Oh, ah . . . your apprentice has joined us, I see.”

Serek turned to take in Calen and the plates of food. “Ah, thank you, Calen. Mage Anders of Everton, may I present Apprentice Calen of Trelian. Calen, Mage Anders is an old friend of mine.”

“Old, indeed,” Anders said, giving Calen a little nod of greeting. He seemed friendly enough, but he gave Calen one of those overly long looks that had been making him antsy all afternoon. “Congratulations on your marking, young Calen. A mage’s first true mark is not an experience he ever forgets. Of course, yours may be more memorable than most, I suspect. Quite a show we had this afternoon, wasn’t it?”

“Yes, sir,” Calen replied respectfully. He was still stuck on the idea that Serek had called this man his friend. He hadn’t thought Serek had any friends.

Anders opened his mouth to say something else, but just then the sound of a bell rang out. The council masters were sitting in the center circle, a quarter of the way around the room from where Calen and Serek were. Mage Renaldiere was holding a silver bell aloft in one hand. The other council members were seated along the same row to either side of Galida and Renaldiere. Conversations around the room quickly died down, and all the mages turned their attention to the center.

“I don’t have to emphasize how serious the events of this afternoon were,” Mage Galida began. “The members of the council have spent some time reinforcing our defenses and constructing several new layers of wards and alarms, but since we thought we were already adequately protected before . . . well, obviously we want to figure out what exactly happened, and how, and who was responsible. As we were unable earlier to determine anything about the source of the spell, we are here to see what further information we might be able to pull together and to determine appropriate action.” She turned to look at Serek. “Mage Serek? I believe you have something to report.”

Suddenly all the eyes in the room were on them. Calen swallowed nervously. He’d known he would have to tell about the colors; he just hadn’t thought it would be the very first item on the agenda. He wasn’t ready to have everyone looking at him again already.

Serek nodded. “Thank you, Council Master.” He looked around and addressed his words to the surrounding tables: “As many of you have heard by now, my apprentice has a unique gift. He is able to see colors when magic is cast nearby, and is beginning to be able to identify types of magic by the colors associated with the casting. I know we meant to have a separate discussion about his ability, but in light of today’s events, I thought it might be helpful to hear his interpretation of what happened in the assembly hall.”

He looked expectantly at Calen. A murmuring had broken out among the mages, which only made it harder for Calen to will himself to speak. Did they have to stare and mutter like that? He was intensely aware of Serek’s gaze, which seemed to be growing ever so slightly impatient.

Stop being such a baby,
he told himself, and strangely it sounded like Meg’s voice in his head. She would have no problem speaking in front of a crowd, of course. But more important, she would do whatever needed to be done without whining about it. He had a responsibility to help here if he could. He opened his mouth. “Well —”

“With all due respect,” another mage broke in, “we as yet have no documented proof of the apprentice’s alleged ability to see these colors. How do we know that what he saw was anything other than his own imagination?”

“It was
not
—” Calen began, but Serek laid a warning hand on his arm.

“Why don’t we hear what he has to say before arguing about its validity?” Galida said dryly. After a moment, the mage who had spoken nodded in acquiescence. All eyes turned back to Calen. He found it was easier to speak now that he was angry.

“I do see colors when people cast,” he said, directing his words toward the council masters. They, at least, seemed to want to hear what he had to say. “When I cast, or when other mages cast around me. It is stronger with spells I know well, but over the past few months, I’ve been able to see more, even if the spells are unfamiliar. I didn’t realize for a long time that I was the only one. I thought everyone could see the colors.”

“And what did you see today, Calen?” Renaldiere asked.

“Everything,” Calen said. “I mean, it seemed to be all different kinds of magic together. More colors than I’ve ever seen at one time before. And I could see the creatures that were attacking. I mean, before you and Mage Serek cast that spell to make them visible. They were completely made up of magic energy, a lot of black and red and purple, but also some green, and some other colors — so many that it was hard to sort anything out, especially because I don’t know anything about that kind of spell — making things, creatures, out of magic that way.”

There was a great deal of muttering at this. Calen looked at Serek nervously.

“It could be that the unusual variety of colors Calen saw reflects the fact that the spell was designed to be hard to decipher,” Serek said.

An older female mage from across the room raised her voice to be heard over the continued muttering from the other mages. She bore many marks, and her white hair was pulled back from her face with a bright, rose-colored scarf. Calen recognized her as the one Council Master Galida had been speaking with on the stage just before the mass casting. “I did sense a great, tangly confusion of magic this afternoon, friends. And”— she raised her eyebrows and glanced around significantly —“you all know I normally don’t need to stretch to tease out what’s being cast around me.”

There were nods and murmurs of agreement at this. Anders leaned over and whispered to Calen, “Lisbette is highly skilled at sensing magic. She can usually identify a spell even from the energy that lingers afterward; it’s quite extraordinary.”

Mage Lisbette went on, “That spell didn’t feel like anything I have ever sensed before. I am willing to believe that what the young apprentice says is true. Which says to me we are dealing with some kind of magic unfamiliar to the lot of us. Which is, to say the least, a matter of more than passing concern.”

More muttering, more nods, some head shakes, lots of worried faces.

A man sitting a few rows back spoke next. “We have not yet discussed the possibility that the attack is connected to the recent events relating to the woman Sen Eva and her efforts to aid in the return of Mage Krelig.”

Calen sucked in his breath. He had hoped he was just being paranoid about that.

The other mages had erupted into side conversations again at the man’s words, and Council Master Renaldiere had to ring his bell for quiet. Then he nodded and said, “We might as well begin tonight. That topic is, of course, the main reason we called this general assembly. There does not seem to be any doubt that Sen Eva’s benefactor is Mage Krelig; we are agreed on that. Mage Serek’s report suggested that Krelig’s attempt to return was thwarted by the events at Trelian, but as long as Sen Eva is still at large, we must assume that she may still be working toward that goal.”

“But how
can
he return?” one of the apprentices Calen had noticed earlier asked. “Isn’t that supposed to be impossible? Wasn’t he exiled to keep him away forever?”

“They should have killed him when they had the chance,” an older apprentice said. There were many mutters of support for that sentiment among the other apprentices, but also a lot of head shaking from the full mages.

“Mage Krelig was too powerful to either compel or kill,” Galida said. “He had abilities beyond most of his peers, and no hesitation about using his powers to achieve whatever he wanted. Ironically, the early founders of the Magistratum were at a distinct disadvantage, as they were bound to follow the laws they wanted to impose on all mages, whereas Mage Krelig was free to cast whatever he wished. We think the only reason the mages of his time were able to manage exile was that he had been caught unaware, not expecting that particular form of attack. That might have been his weakness — he himself would not have thought of exile, since he usually just killed anyone who got in his way.”

“As for whether he can truly return, we fear that is a real possibility,” Renaldiere said grimly. “Mage Krelig had — has — the Sight, and we believe he has had a vision showing him how to get back.”

“Part of what he requires is apparently a war,” Serek said. “That’s what Sen Eva was trying to achieve. She was trying to renew the war between Trelian and Kragnir in order to set certain elements in place for Krelig’s return.”

Calen shocked himself by speaking. “He said — when Meg — when Princess Meglynne — and I saw him, in the portal that Sen Eva opened, he said something about Queen Lysetta, the queen of Kragnir who died when she was visiting Trelian. He started the war, back then, with Kragnir, but I guess there was something else he needed, too.”