He’d seen cattle now and then in the markets, and had passed a few on the way from Ethshar to the Inn at the Bridge, but up until now he had never come directly into contact with the beasts. They were, he discovered, quite large, completely solid, surprisingly warm to the touch, and not very pleasant company.
He stood there, half-smothered by steerhide pressed against his face, for what seemed like half of eternity, getting bumped back and forth and scraped about.
Several of the steers were lowing plaintively, their hooves were thumping loudly on the decking, and people were shouting incomprehensible orders, adding up to a real cacophony. The stink of unwashed, frightened cattle was thick and foul in his nostrils. He could see nothing but brown hide.
Then the barge began moving, and though the shouting died away the cattle made more noise than ever, stamping about and bellowing. Dumery waited, concentrating on continuing to breathe.
He was considering several interesting questions, such as whether it was time to reveal his presence to the crew, whether he wanted to reveal his presence at all, how he could attract their attention in the first place, and whether he was going to survive this little escapade, when he raised his head to take a breath and found himself looking up directly into a man’s face.
“Just what the hell are you doing there, boy?” the man demanded, in oddly-accented Ethsharitic.
“Mmmph,” Dumery said.
“Hai!” the man called; he slapped the steers surrounding Dumery, and they parted, as if by magic.
Relieved, Dumery obeyed the man’s order to march up to the little deck at the bow of the barge. The man followed close behind.
Dumery found himself the center of attention for the five-man crew as he clambered up onto the narrow deck; all eyes were on him.
“Who areyou?” one man demanded.
“Dumery of Shiphaven,” Dumery replied. There wasn’t any point in lying.
“And what are you doinghere?” asked another.
“I needed a ride north,” Dumery explained.
The five just stared at him for a long moment, and he added, “I can work for my passage. I have no money, but I really want to go up north...”
The five men exchanged glances with one another.
“You’ll work?” one of them asked.
Dumery nodded. “Whatever’s needed,” he said, “if I can do it, I will.”
Another man grinned. “Kid,” he said, “I think you’ve got a deal.”
“Hey, Kelder,” another called, “where’s the shovel? We’ve got someone here who’s really going to need it!”
Chapter Twelve
“Well, now,” Thetheran said, “it’s not really my specialty, finding things...”
“Dumery is not athing,” Faléa said. “He’s our son.”
“Oh, I know, I know,” Thetheran assured her. “I merely meant that locative magic is outside my usual practice.”
“Your sign says you’re a mage,” Doran pointed out, “and when I brought my boy here I was told you were one of the best wizards in the Quarter. Are you telling me you can’t even find my son?”
“Oh, no, no, nothing like that,” Thetheran said hurriedly. “Merely that it’s not a spell I commonly use, so that I may not have the ingredients readily available! I’ll need to check. And I’m not sure just which spell would be best. Do you merely wish to knowwhere he is, or do you want to know his state of health? Do you want a message conveyed? Would you...” He stopped, catching himself. He didn’t want to promise anything he couldn’t deliver. The truth was that he had no idea what spells he had that might apply in this case, or which spells he could buy from the neighbors without his customers finding out about it.
“Well, we certainly want to know if he’s still alive and well!” Doran snapped.
“It isn’t going to do us any good to locate a...” Suddenly realizing that completing the sentence with the word “corpse,” as he had intended to do, might upset his wife, he let it drop and instead said, “I mean, yes, we want to know the state of his health!”
“And if there’s some way we could talk to him...” Faléa added, ignoring her husband’s blunder.
“Ah,” Thetheran said, stroking his beard. “Well, if you actually want totalk to him, that will call for a little research. Tell me, do you have any idea at all where he is? Is he still inside the city walls?”
“We don’t know,” Doran said, annoyed. “All we know is he’s gone.”
“Well, then,” Thetheran said, “I suggest that the two of you go keep yourselves busy for an hour or two while I investigate the matter, and when you come back I hope to have a spell ready for you.”
Hehoped he would, but he admitted to himself that it wasn’t very likely.
The merchant and his wife hesitated, and whispered to each other for a moment, but then they rose from the velvet chairs and made a polite departure.
The moment they were outside Thetheran slammed the door and ran for his laboratory. He snatched his personal book of spells from the shelf and began flipping through the pages, encountering one useless or inappropriate spell after another.
“Eknerwal’s Lesser Invisibility,” he muttered to himself, “Felshen’s First Hypnotic, The Polychrome Smoke, the Dismal Itch. Damn. Love spells, curses, invisibility, levitations, nothing about finding anything. The Iridescent Amusement. Fendel’s Aphrodisiac Philtre. The Lesser Spell of Invaded...”
He stopped, and turned back.
“The Lesser Spell of Invaded Dreams,” he read. “Requires fine grey dust, incense tainted with morning mist...” He nodded to himself as he read over the instructions and the lessons of his own long-ago apprenticeship came back to him.
Then he got to the detailed description of the spell’s effects and stopped, cursing.
“Thatwon’t do,” he said. He stood staring at the page for a moment, then looked up at the ceiling, thinking. “There’s something, though. This isn’t quite what I remember.”
Then it struck him. “TheLesser Spell,” he said, and he began hurriedly flipping pages again.
He found what he wanted and stopped. “Ah!” he said, tapping the page with his finger. “Here we go!” He began reading avidly.
An hour later he was waiting in his cozy front room when Faléa and Doran knocked on the door. Thetheran sent the sylph to let them in, while he stood and adjusted his robe to make the most imposing figure possible.
“I believe, Doran of Shiphaven, Faléa the Slender,” the mage declaimed as the pair entered, “that I have just the spell you need.”
Doran was suitably impressed. Having spent the intervening time buying and eating a more-than-adequate luncheon, Doran was in a much better mood than before. “Oh?” he said, politely.
Faléa had spent the entire meal worrying about whether Dumery had found anything to eat in the past day or so, and was too upset to say anything.
“Yes,” Thetheran said. “It’s known as the Greater Spell of Invaded Dreams. It will permit me to speak to your son in his dreams, and to question him regarding his present circumstances. By performing the spell in a certain way, I believe that I can put one of you-not both, however-into the dream as well, so that you, too, will be able to speak to him. Thatis what you wanted, I believe?”
Both of Dumery’s parents nodded, Faléa with rather more enthusiasm than her spouse.
“I cannot perform the spell with any chance of success until the boy is asleep, however,” Thetheran explained. “That means that I had best wait until well after dark tonight. I will also need to know the boy’s true name, if it is not Dumery of Shiphaven...”