Zagarus's wings lifted in a shrug. Sounds to me like you should thank her. Now you're going to be a knight after all, just as you'd agreed.
"I don't want to be a knight!" Guerrand said furiously. He was tired of living a lie. The lie would just continue in a different place, with different people. He snatched up Ingrid's silver necklace from the small table on which it lay and squeezed it as if to crush it. "And I don't want to be married to Ingrid Berwick."
What do you want? Zagarus asked, his voice unnaturally soft inside the human's head.
The question surprised Guerrand. In recent years he'd spent more time thinking about what he didn't want. He sucked in a breath. Had he used Cormac's hatred of magic as an excuse to protect himself from failing? Guerrand had long ago convinced himself it wasn't his fault he'd not been allowed to study as a mage. And if he never tried, he'd never fail.
Guerrand picked up the small fragment of mirror behind the washbowl. "I want to be a mage. I want to become apprenticed to a mighty wizard and eventually take the Test at Wayreth."
What? It was more an exclamation of startlement than a question.
Guerrand told Zagarus of his meeting with Belize. He described his wonderment at the spells the mage had used so casually, told him of the thrill he'd felt when Belize invited him to Wayreth. Last, he set the mirror on the table and explained its role in capturing Quinn's killers.
The bird flapped over to the table and pushed the mirror with his foot. This little thing showed you where the bandits were?
"Easy, now," admonished Guerrand, extending his hand. "I don't want it broken."
Zagarus cocked his feathered brown-black head to the left and closed one eye. Does it do anything else?
"Frankly, it hadn't occurred to me that it could," Guerrand admitted. The young man peered at the mirror closely. "Do you suppose I can use it to see anything I want?"
You're the mage-in-waiting, replied Zagarus. His attention was riveted on a beetle crawling across the table toward the mirror. Tentatively, the insect felt its way onto the glass. As it approached the center, Zagarus struck, his head darting down to snatch up the hapless bug.
But instead of striking the glass, as he expected, Zagarus's beak closed around the beetle and kept on going. He froze, wide-eyed. Zagarus could feel the beetle squirming slightly against his tongue, and so he swallowed the tasty morsel. He could see his eyes reflected clearly in the mirror, which was practically touching his forehead. But he couldn't see his beak; it was inside the mirror!
The curious bird pushed his head forward and completely through the mirror. He looked right and left, up and down. The view was the same: gray and featureless. He could see only a few rods in any direction before even that view was obscured by a thin, dry, multicolored mist.
Without removing his head from the mirror, he called to Guerrand. Guerrand, can you still see me?
For an answer, Guerrand, a look of horror on his face, grabbed the bird by the wings and hauled his small head from the even smaller mirror. "What have you done, Zagarus?"
Zagarus blinked. I just pecked at the beetle, and there I was with my head in the mirror.
Guerrand could scarcely believe what he had seen. The bird's head looked to have disappeared into the impossibly small looking glass. "Were you really 'inside' it, Zagarus? What did it look like in there?"
It's hard to say, replied the sea gull. I can tell you that this mirror is a lot bigger on the inside than it looks from out here. Zag flexed his wings and tilted his head. I'll just take another look. Be right back!
"Wait!" cried Guerrand, but he was too late to stop his familiar from wiggling forward to push his neck through the mirror. There was a pause. Zagarus flipped his tail into the air the way Guerrand had seen him do countless times diving for food in the strait. It seemed quite impossible, but the bird's body, at least four times wider than the mirror, slipped between the edges and disappeared!
Guerrand lurched forward and stared, breathless, down at the mirror. He was afraid to touch it. All he saw was the reflection of his own eyes, big as shields. But the image in his mind was his last view of Zagarus, wiggling as he disappeared. Guerrand still could not understand how the much larger bird had fit through the tiny mirror, even though he'd seen it happen. Somehow, when it was happening, it made sense; the perspectives and proportions seemed right.
Zagarus had been gone some time, and Guerrand was beginning to get concerned. He called the bird mentally. Zagarus! Come out of there this minute!
Suddenly the shiny dark head popped straight up through the mirror. What now?
"Good gods, Zag, you terrified me!"
With a wiggle and a hop, Zagarus popped back out of the mirror and stood on the table. Guerrand shook his head in disbelief.
You're a mage, said Zagarus. How does it work?
"I'm not really a mage, and I don't know how the mirror works." Guerrand sat down heavily on the bed. "That pretty much sums up my whole problem, Zag. I'll never be a mage or know more about such magic if I stay here."
He dug the heels of his hands into his eyes. "I can't shake the feeling that this is my last chance to decide how I'll spend the rest of my life," he said. "If I'm still here when the sun comes up, Cormac will have me. I'll be married to Ingrid Berwick and become a merchant lord and be miserably responsible forever."
So what are you waiting for? demanded Zagarus. You said before that it was your greatest wish to travel to Wayreth and become a real mage. He hopped toward the window and onto the sill, where soon the nearly full white moon, Solinari, would be visible.
"It's not that simple, and you know it. There's just so much to consider. What would I tell Cormac?"
That's simple, snorted the gull. Nothing. You tell him nothing. He'd stop you for sure, probably lock you up until the ceremony.
Guerrand frowned. "He's not a cruel man."
"Maybe not, but he's a desperate one."
Guerrand's frown deepened, knowing Zagarus was right. He knew, too, what he had to do. He couldn't stay for all the reasons he'd told Cormac; he'd stomached all he could of his older brother. Taxing the locals was an accepted way of life for nobles. Enabling Cormac to rob the Berwicks was entirely another thing.
But more important than the reasons Guerrand couldn't stay was the reason he had to go. This was his last chance to change his life. If he didn't leave to study magic now, then he never would.
"We're going to leave tonight," Guerrand said aloud.
Does that 'we' include Kirah?
Guerrand gave Zagarus a haunted look. How could he drag Kirah cross-country? Even if he did take her and was lucky enough to be given an apprenticeship, what would he do with her then? Belize had made the point about Ingrid, and it applied to his little sister as well. She would be safer at Castle DiThon.
"No, it doesn't include Kirah." Once the words were out, Guerrand felt a wave of guilt wash over him. He and Kirah and Quinn had been a team since they were children. Quinn had broken up the team when he'd left on crusade, and death had made that split permanent. How could he divide its last two members? A memory in Kirah's own voice supplied the answer to that. "Guilt is an excuse used by people who are afraid to do what they want. I am never afraid to do what I want."