Wizardborn (15 page)

“Some people do,” Binnesman said. “As for myself, I like plants about as much as I do people. When I was a boy, I used to love to walk in the meadows and count buttercups, or the number of seeds on a sheaf of wheat. For hours I used to study how ivy curls its way up a tree. Sometimes I felt as if I were waiting for a revelation. I used to … I would sit and listen for the dry summer grasses all tangled with weeds to whisper some cosmic truth.

“I used to try to think like an oak, and imagine how far
the tangled roots of an aspen traveled, and wonder what dreams the willow dreamed.

“Tell me, do you ever do that?”

“You sound crazy!” Averan blurted.

Jerimas barked out in laughter, and said, “Now there's
e
child who speaks her mind!”

“I suppose I do sound crazy,” Binnesman admitted. “But everyone has a touch of madness, and those who can't admit it are usually farther gone than the rest of us. Wizards are, as anyone can tell you, quite demented.”

Averan nodded, as if that sounded reasonable.

“I love the Earth,” Binnesman explained. “And what's more, I know that you must love it, too, in your own way. Loving it so much is not bad, or shameful. You'll find great power in moving outside yourself. There is power in studying the ways of plants and animals and stones. It lies at the heart of the Earth Powers.

“The green in your hands comes because Earth Blood flows through your veins.”

“But…” Averan said. “I… it was an accident. I got the green woman's blood on me.”

Binnesman shook his head. “No, Earth Blood was inside you all along. It has always been a part of you, ever since you were born. You are wizardborn. But among us creatures of the Earth, blood calls to blood. That's why I came to the garden just a moment ago. I felt you here. What's more, I suspect that you summoned my wylde from the sky. And when you touched the green woman's blood, you couldn't get it off because it flowed to you. Like was seeking like.”

“I've felt so strange ever since,” Averan argued. “I've had … queer new powers.”

“You would have developed those powers in time,” Binnesman assured her. “The extra Earth Blood just speeded the process, heightened your awareness. But I assure you, if you had not already been a creature of the Earth, the blood would have washed off your hands.”

Iome listened in fascination. She stared hard at the girl.
Averan had red hair and freckles, and in every way other than the odd tattoos of green on her hand seemed a normal child. But she had an intensity to her gaze, a fierceness of spirit, and a maturity that Iome would have found surprising in a woman twice Averan's age.

Gaborn ventured a question. “You say that you've developed strange powers. Tell me about them.”

Averan glanced up at the men in the inn, as if afraid to speak openly, as if afraid that no one would believe her.

“Go ahead,” Binnesman urged.

“Well, for one thing,” Averan said, “I can't sleep very well unless …”

“You're buried underground?” Binnesman asked.

Averan nodded bravely. “And the sun hurts me now. Even when it barely touches me, I feel like I'm getting a sunburn.”

“I can fix that,” Binnesman said. “There are runes of protection from such things—spells so potent that they'll almost let you walk through fire. I'll teach them to you.”

“And I can feel where food is—like carrots underground, and nuts hidden in the grass.”

“That's also a common gift for Earth Wardens,” Binnesman said. “The ‘Fruits of the Forest and of the Field' are all yours to eat. The Earth gives them to you freely.”

“And I used to be able to see the Earth King,” Averan said. “I could close my eyes, and see a green flame, and imagine precisely where he was. But… that doesn't work anymore.”

She looked at Gaborn doubtfully. There was no condemnation in her eyes, no accusation. But Iome knew that she knew for certain that he had lost his powers.

“Well,” Binnesman said in surprise, “that's one for the books! I've never heard of any such power before. But every wizard has his own gifts, to suit his own needs. I'm sure that you'll discover more as you grow. Is there anything else?”

“Just the reaver's brains,” Averan admitted.

All the time that this strange little girl had been speaking,
several lords leaned close, drawn by her peculiar tale. Iome did not notice it consciously until one of the lords guffawed, as if unable to believe her.

“Where did you get the reaver brains?” Binnesman asked.

Averan pointed up to the green woman. “Spring killed one on the road and started eating it, and it smelled so good, I couldn't help myself. Afterward, I had strange dreams—dreams that let me see what it was like to be a reaver, to think like a reaver and talk like one and see like one.”

“What did you learn?” Jerimas asked.

“I learned that reavers talk by making smells,” Averan said. “The philia on their faces let them ‘listen' to each other, and the ones above their bungholes make smells.”

A skeptical lord crowed, “So you're telling us that they talk out their asses?”

“Yes,” Averan said. “In that way, they're not too different from some people.”

Jerimas laughed aloud, and said to the lord, “She got you, Dullins.”

But the mocking affected the child. Averan withdrew, and she began to tremble just a bit, staring from person to person. “I'm not making this up!” she said. “I couldn't make this stuff up.”

Iome knew that she was right about the smells. There had long been a debate among lords as to whether reavers emitted any odors at all. Most swore that you couldn't smell a reaver. Others believed that they disguised their scent. But yesterday, at Carris, the fell mage had sent waves of reeking odors over Gaborn's armies, causing terrible damage.

“I'm not lying,” Averan said. “And I'm not crazy. You can't think I'm crazy. I don't want to be locked up in a cage, like Corman the Crow.”

“We believe you,” Iome said, smiling gently. She'd never heard of Corman the Crow. But sometimes there was nothing that could be done with a madman, and such unfortunate souls had to be locked away for their own good,
in the hope that time would cure their minds.

“I know you're not crazy,” Gaborn said. He seemed to want to draw her back out of her shell. “So reavers can talk in smells?”

“And read and write, too.”

Iome felt perplexed. She'd never suspected such a thing.

“How come we've never seen their writing?” Gaborn said.

“Because they write with smells. They leave smells written on stones along every trail. That's the way that they like to talk best. In fact, it's easier for a reaver to write a message than to talk face-to-face.”

“Why?” Gaborn asked.

Averan struggled to explain. “For a reaver, a word is a smell. Your name and your smell are the same thing, so that all a reaver has to do to say ‘Gaborn' is to make your smell.”

“That sounds simple enough,” Gaborn said.

“It is, and it isn't. Imagine that we are talking, and you said to me, ‘Averan, that's a beautiful pair of rabbitskin boots you're wearing. Where did you get them?' And I said, ‘Thank you, I found them by the roadside, and no one claimed them. So now they're mine.'

“When we talk like that, every word goes out of our mouths and stays in the air for a moment. Then it fades all by itself. So our words are a line of sounds, coming out of us.

“But with reavers, words don't disappear on their own. All those smells, all those words, simply hang in the air—until you erase them.”

“And how is that done?” Binnesman asked. Everyone in Gaborn's retinue crowded round Averan, as if she were some great scholar in the House of Understanding. They hung on her every word.

“After I create each scent, I have to make its opposite, the unscent that erases it.”

“What… ?” Binnesman asked. “You say ‘I.' But you mean the reavers?”

“Yeah, I mean the reavers make the unscent.”

“The scent's negative?” Gaborn asked.

“Yes,” Averan said, uncertainly, as if she'd never heard the word
negative
before.

“So when I say the word ‘Gaborn,' I have to create a scent that says ‘not-Gaborn,' before I speak again. I have to take the word ‘Gaborn' from the air.

“And that can be very hard to do,” Averan said. “If I scream the word, if I make the scent strongly, I must un-scream it too. And the farther away you are, the longer it takes for you to get my message. So reavers learn to speak when they're close together, to talk softly, to make scents that are so faint, other animals can't even smell them. They're just whispers that float in the air.”

“Wait a minute,” one lord said. “You say you have to make this word disappear. But why couldn't you just make all the scents anyway? You can walk into a room and smell carrots and beef and turnips all boiling at the same time.”

“You can,” Averan said, “but it doesn't
mean
anything. To a reaver, it would just be a jumble of words. Imagine if you took all the words I've said in the last two minutes and said them all at once. Could anyone make sense of it?”

“The reavers must talk slowly, then,” Gaborn mused.

“Not much slower than how you and I are speaking now,” Averan said, “at least when they're close together. But it's hard to understand each other across great distances.

“So reavers do write,” Averan continued, “all the time. If a scout passes down a trail, he'll leave messages behind, telling what he sensed on side journeys, where he last saw enemies.”

This news astonished Iome and everyone else in the room. For ages men had wondered how reavers communicated. Most men assumed that they did it by waving their philia about. But Averan's words would profoundly change the way that men perceived reavers. The girl knew this, and now seemed to have lost her inhibitions.

“And another thing,” Averan said. “Reavers don't see
like we do. They can only see close by, and they see the world all in one color, but it isn't a color. I can't explain it, but it's the color of lightning. Lightning blinds them. When it flashes, they feel the way you would if you were staring into the sun. It's very painful.”

“You're a brave little girl,” Gaborn said. As if she had been waiting for his reassurance, Averan's resolve broke. Tears suddenly filled her eyes, and she began to sob. “Your tale brings certain questions to mind.”

“What?” Averan asked.

“For example, can you tell me about the nature and disposition of the reavers' troops?”

Averan stared at him blankly. “Nature?”

“The reaver armies,” Gaborn clarified. “Do you know how many reavers there are?”

Averan shook her head. “I… one of the reavers I ate was a scout. The other a mage. I don't know about numbers.”

Gaborn turned back to Averan. “Let me pose it another way. You don't have any idea how many reavers there are in the Underworld?”

Averan seemed to gather herself. She closed her eyes for a long moment and said, “The Underworld is full, but the reavers—they can't live just anywhere. Food is scarce.”

And we're food, Iome thought. Gaborn glanced back at his counselors. The Wits showed little emotion.

“Your Highness,” Averan continued, “I'm scared.”

“Of what?” Gaborn asked softly.

“The One True Master has unraveled much of the Master Rune. Yesterday, you destroyed the Seal of Desolation that her apprentice laid on Carris.”

Gaborn nodded. Gaborn had killed the most powerful reaver mage ever mentioned in the tomes. Some small part of Iome had been clinging to the hope that Gaborn had already slain the most powerful of all reavers. But this child described it as being a mere “apprentice” to a far more powerful master.

“Tell me about her,” Gaborn demanded.

Iome's glance flicked up to Binnesman. The mage, with his perpetual stoop, looked suddenly pale. He leaned on his staff, as if seeking support.

“In the Underworld,” Averan said, “the One True Master is taking endowments. And she's giving them to her leaders.”

“Reavers have always been able to eat one another and grow that way,” Gaborn said. “Are you sure it isn't the same?”

“This is different,” Averan said. “Reavers can eat each other's brains to learn. And they can eat the musk glands under their arms to grow. But now they've discovered rune lore. She's already deciphered the runes of grace, scent, and brawn. Now she's trying to perfect metabolism.”

There was a moment of silence as warriors looked at one another meaningfully. Facing reavers was bad enough. Facing one that had endowments of metabolism was terrifying.

“But there's something more,” Averan said. “I don't understand it at all. The Seal of Desolation that you destroyed, that was part of something bigger. She plans to bind a Seal of Desolation to the Seal of Heaven and the Seal of the Inferno.”

Binnesman drew back, leaned on his staff for support. “That… that's not possible! No one could decipher so much of the Master Rune!”

“It is possible,” Averan said. “I saw the runes taking shape at the Place of Bones! You saw the Seal of Desolation—”

“But,” Jerimas blurted, “it has taken mankind thousands of years to decipher the shapes of even the smallest of runes—brawn and wit! How could one reaver learn so much?”

“She divines them by looking into the fire,” Averan said.

Binnesman backed away. “By the Tree!” he swore. His face was hard. He looked bewildered, as if someone had just bludgeoned him for no apparent reason. “By the Tree…” He knew something that Iome didn't, she felt sure. Or perhaps he merely suspected something. “You're
sure that this One True Master is a reaver, not some other creature?”