From the center of the courtyard, a gigantic fist of red-hot rock smashed its way into the sky and shattered the castle like a man kicking apart an anthill. The towers almost exploded with the force of their destruction as Aeron deliberately battered Raedel Keep to pieces, allowing the hot fire of his rage to strike again and again. Phoros and the guards disappeared beneath tons of seething lava, crushed and burned past recognition. The white fury burned hotter in Aeron's breast as the world dissolved in raging chaos and incandescent destruction, until he lost himself completely in the storm of violence.
Aeron awoke on the Forest's Stonemantle, weak and disoriented. The sun was red and low in the west, and the air had taken on the cool damp of evening. The dark stone bluffs around the heights gleamed with ruddy light.
Fineghal gazed silently over the forest, wrapped in a cloak that fluttered softly in the wind. Aeron pushed himself upright, studying the elf's tall, weathered figure against the sunset.
"Aeron! You're awake!" Eriale scrambled to her feet beside him, rubbing her arms against the damp breeze. "Fineghal wasn't sure if you would return."
"I'm here, Eriale," Aeron said. He pressed his hand against his head and stood. "I… I think I'm all right now."
The elven mage turned at his words. His mouth was a thin white line across his face, and he regarded Aeron with a look of such intensity that the forester took a step back. "What do you remember of your test?" he demanded.
"I was in Raedel Keep. I watched my father hang. And then they were going to hang me. But then. ."
"Go on."
"I touched the magic," Aeron whispered, staring at his hands with unseeing eyes. He remembered the sweet fire singing in his heart, in his blood. "I wielded magic!"
"Aye. And you used it to destroy Raedel Keep."
"Assuran's tears," he breathed. "Is it truly destroyed?"
"Why?" asked Fineghal. "Is that what you wanted? Is that the best use you can think of for the marvelous gift you possess?" The elf lord trembled with suppressed emotion. With a visible effort, he forced himself to relent. "The castle is unharmed. It was only a test, an illusion you wove for no one but yourself."
"Did … did I pass?"
Fineghal barked acerbic laughter. "In the sense that you demonstrated that you can grasp and wield magic, oh, yes, you passed, Aeron. You have extraordinary potential; you nearly exhausted my power in your enthusiasm to raze the castle. I never expected such strength in a stripling."
"Is Aeron going to be a mage?" asked Eriale.
The elven lord nodded. "He must be, Eriale. He will consume himself if he does not learn to wield his power."
"What power?" Aeron asked crossly, rising to face the elf lord. "I've never even thought of magic before today. What's so special about me?"
"You don't understand yet what you are," Fineghal said. His expression softened. "Whether you know it or not, most people can't do what you did; almost anyone can learn to touch the Weave, if only for a moment, but those who can truly perceive it and seize it with will alone are rare indeed. It's your elven blood, Aeron. It runs strong in your veins."
Aeron hugged his chest, pacing away in amazement. The memory of power tantalized him, and he furrowed his brow as he tried to reach out and gather the living magic again. "But I feel nothing now," he said.
"You will learn to see with new eyes, to hear with your heart. My spell of testing allowed you to borrow my strength, if you had it within you to touch the Weave."
"So you'll let me stay and study with you?"
Fineghal's expression became stern. "Yes. But you must swear to abide by my judgment of what you will learn, and when, and how you will employ your knowledge. You have great potential, Aeron, but it is potential for harm as well as good. Do you understand me?"
"I think so," Aeron said slowly. But deep within his heart a dark, triumphant voice added, He fears me. He fears what I can do.
"Good," said Fineghal. He held Aeron's gaze for a long moment before turning back to Eriale. "Now, Eriale, let's see you home. Your father must be worried about you." He started down from the windswept cliff.
Aeron scrambled down after him, but Eriale caught his arm as he passed her. She gazed into his face, her open features taut with concern. "Do you know what you're doing, Aeron?"
He attempted a reassuring smile. "Eriale, if you could have touched it, you'd understand. I have to go with him."
She held his eyes for a long moment more and then smiled weakly. "If you think this is right, Aeron, then I won't worry about you." She caught him around the shoulders and hugged him spontaneously. "Just promise me you'll be careful."
Three
Aeron expected Fineghal to begin by teaching him how to summon and control the magic, but he was disappointed. In the weeks that followed, the elven mage barely spoke a word about the working of spells. After they returned Eriale to Kestrel's house and retreated into the depths of the forest, they traveled from sunrise to sunset each day. Fineghal seemed absorbed by his own thoughts, leading the way with an easy, absentminded stride that Aeron found hard to match. Baillegh ranged far ahead, bounding through the green shadows like a silver phantom.
Sometimes they rested in the vine-covered ruins of elven towers, but most of the time Fineghal passed the night in clearings beneath the open sky. By starlight or moonlight, he taught Aeron the names of the creatures and the growing things of the Maerchwood as the elves knew them when the world was young. The ancient elf rarely slept; instead, he gazed at the stars as Aeron drifted off to sleep.
Slowly Aeron learned Tel'Quessir, the elven language, and Fineghal shifted his lessons to his native tongue. "Tel'Quessir is a language made for magic," he explained one night. "It will be much easier for me to teach you when you can read and write in the runes of Espruar."
"Do all mages speak their spells in Elvish?"
"All elven mages do, and some humans. But others study ancient human sorceries and use forgotten human tongues."
Aeron sat up straight, intrigued. "There's more than one way to wield magic?"
Fineghal smiled, a ghostly expression by the clear starlight. "Oh, yes," he said quietly. "When an elf creates a spell, he beckons to the magic, calling to the Weave that surrounds us. The old human ways are different. A human wizard's words force his will upon the Weave around him, demanding compliance."
"Which way is better? More powerful?"
"I know only the elven spells, Aeron; I can't teach you human magic. Since you ask, it is my opinion that human magic is easier to employ and a more dangerous weapon than elven magic. But it exacts a greater toll."
"When will you show me how to cast a spell?"
"Be patient," Fineghal said. "You have much to learn yet." He fell silent for a long time.
The long summer of the Maerchwood passed swiftly, and the short, wet fall came over the forest, drenching the land with cool rains. Aeron and Fineghal had circled the forest several times in the months that he'd journeyed with the elven mage. From one end to the other, the Maerchwood was almost one hundred miles in length. Aeron had seen the golden Maerth Hills to the west, the fiery peaks known as the Smoking Mountains, and the wild rushing waters of the untamed Winding River. He was beginning to gain a sense of the immeasurable moods of the woodland, the pace of life in different regions and in different seasons.
Hardened by his endless trek, he could now keep up with Fineghal without trying, and he moved through the trackless maze of the forest's hidden depths with the skill and silence of a full-blooded elf. On a clear, cold day late in the season, Fineghal led Aeron to a dark, rock-walled valley in the heart of the forest, a place Aeron knew as Banien's Deep. They halted by a cold, rushing stream that tumbled out of the stony heights and into the forest below. Fineghal shrugged his slim pack from his shoulders and surveyed the clearing. "This will do," he announced.