It had taken the Healer several weeks to repair Aurian’s damaged shoulder, but she couldn’t remember anything of those first days, when Meiriel had labored endlessly with Healing-magic to save her arm. She had pieced together fragments of shattered bone with painstaking skill, and repaired the severed muscles. Meiriel had then used her powers to accelerate the body’s natural healing, a process which sapped a great deal of the patient’s own resources and left her in a deep sleep for several days while her body recovered its energies. When Aurian finally awoke, the wound had closed and was mending fast, though her arm was still stiff, feeble, and sore. Naturally, she had wanted Forral. At first her mother kept putting her off, but in the end, on Meiriel’s advice, she had relented, and given Aurian the letter. By now she knew every terrible word by heart:
“Aurian love, I’m sorry I can’t be here when you wake, but if I stayed to say goodbye, I would never be able to go. I don’t know if I can explain so that you’ll understand, but I’ll try. Don’t blame your mother—she didn’t send me away this time. I’m leaving because I am horrified at what I did to you, I had no right to expose you to such risks. The Lady Meiriel says you’ll be all right and have full use of your arm again, and I only thank the Gods I didn’t kilLyou outright. As it is, I can never forgive myself.
“I had to tell your mother why we started with your sword training, but don’t worry—she’s not angry, unless it’s with me for not telling her sooner. Anyway, she and the Healer want you to go away to the Academy at Nexis to be trained properly, which is only right, because you are a Mage after all. I thought about going back with you and joining the Garrison again so that we could see each other, but it wouldn’t be fair to you. You need to settle down with your own kind and learn to use your gifts, and I would only be in the way. So I’m going away soldiering again.
“Aurian, please forgive me for leaving you like this. It breaks my heart, but it’s for the best, truly. Please don’t forget me, as I’ll never forget you. And never doubt that someday we’ll meet again. I’ll think of you always. All my love, Forral.”
The following weeks had passed in a blur of misery. Nothing mattered now that Forral had gone. Had she been wrong about the swordsman? If he had truly loved her, how could he have left her like this? Aurian, numb and aching inside, had simply done what her mother and the Healer told her, and gradually her body recovered sufficiently for her to make the journey back to Nexis with Meiriel. But even the sight of so much unfamiliar new country had failed to lift her spirits. The weather, unremittingly cold and bleak, was a perfect match for her mood as they rode: first over wild and snowy moors, and then, once they had reached the great road that led to the lower country, through tame and tended farmland and forest. All this was lost on Aurian, however. She was barely aware of her surroundings, let alone the import of the journey she was making.
It had taken the city to bring Aurian sharply out of her self-pity. After spending almost all her life in the solitude of her mother’s isolated Valley, Nexis, with its looming buildings and hordes of people, had terrified her. Everything was so big, noisy, and crowded that she couldn’t breathe. She hadn’t known that there were so many people in the world! Meiriel, in her own brisk way, had been sympathetic. “Brace up, child,” she had said. “Don’t panic, they won’t hurt you! Take deep breaths, and stay close to me. It’s a lot more peaceful at the Academy, and you’ll get used to the city in time.”
Aurian doubted that she would ever get used to the city or the Academy, Meiriel’s pristine infirmary was very different from the familiar clutter of her mother’s tower, and since everything was so alien to her, she lived in constant fear of doing or saying something wrong. She longed for the sanctuary of her own room, and the strong, comforting presence of Forral.
To bolster her faltering courage, Aurian clung tightly to the hard, slender shape of her sword. She slept with the sheathed blade every night, for it was all she had left of Forral.
As soon as she had recovered sufficiently from her injury to walk, she had gone to the clearing where they had spent so many happy hours in practice. Her precious sword lay untouched on the ground where it had fallen. Its leather scabbard was already stiff and starting to discolor, its blade spotted with rust. Shaking with sobs, Aurian had gathered it up carefully and taken it home. She spent hours cleaning and oiling both blade and scabbard with the greatest care, pausing often to wipe off the tears that threatened to mar her work. And despite the objections of Meiriel and her mother, she had refused to be parted from it, reacting so violently to the very suggestion that they had relented and allowed her to keep it. Holding tightly to the sword, Aurian cried herself to sleep, as she had done every night since Forral had gone away.
In her quarters, Meiriel listened to the soft sounds of weeping, regretting that it had been necessary to wrench the child away from home like this. When silence fell at last, she crept to Aurian’s bedside to assure herself that she was truly asleep. Then calling a servant to watch her charge, she flung a cloak around her shoulders and set off across the frost-silvered courtyard to the Mages’ Tower. A red light burning high in the crimson-draped windows of the uppermost floor showed that the Archmage was in residence.
“How goes it with the child, Meiriel?” The Archmage, like all his kind, was very tall. With his long, silvery hair and beard, his bony hooked nose, his dark, burning eyes and haughty demeanor, he looked the very epitome of the most powerful Mage in the world. His scarlet robes swept the richly carpeted floor as he crossed the room to pour Meiriel a goblet of wine.
As Meiriel took a seat, the Healer saw the slim, silver-clad figure of Eliseth sitting in the shadows by the window, and frowned. She neither liked nor trusted the scheming, ice-cool Weather-Mage. “I thought this was to be a private meeting,” she objected.
Miathan handed her a brimming crystal goblet. “Come, Meiriel, don’t be foolish,” he chided. “Since we received your message, Eliseth has been helping me to make plans. If what you say is true, Geraint’s child has talents we can use, and will need very special handling. I should hardly have to remind you that we need the utmost loyalty from all our people these days. The Magefolk have dwindled. Our powers are severely proscribed by the Mages’ Code, and dissension against us among the wretched Mortals grows ever stronger. I still control the Garrison’s voice on the ruling Council of Three, but Rioch will be retiring before long, and there is no suitably accommodating successor among his warriors. And the new Merchants’ Representative, that jumped-up ruffian Vannor, is already giving me trouble.”
The Archmage frowned, and took a sip of wine. “Because a Magewoman loses her powers during pregnancy, our race has always been slow to breed, and no new children are being born to us. We’re seriously outnumbered by the Mortals. Not counting Eilin, who refuses to return to us, that only leaves seven Magefolk: you and I, Eliseth and Bragar, the twins, and Finbarr. And of those, the twins seem unable to access their full power, and Finbarr never leaves his archives—no offense, Meiriel. I know he’s your soul mate, and I regret that we can’t spare your Healing skills long enough for you to lose them during a pregnancy. And of course we can’t spare Eliseth, for the same reason. Her studies are at a critical point—”