The Book of the Blessed

The Everdeen district

As Pol lifted a finger and went to the bar to order drinks, Ash, now in a brown traveling cloak and not the wonderful red one, murmured, “Drinking in the middle of the day. How very decadent.”

“What was all that business about telling him how handsome he is?” Anson demanded.

“Well, he is.”

“Were you trying to make me jealous?”

“Cousin,” the brown skinned magician said with a heavy emphasis on that word, “Did it make you feel jealous?”

“I don’t understand you,” Anson said, shaking his head.

“There’s a great deal you don’t understand, I’ll wager,” Ash said. “But I don’t think it’s me you’re not understanding. By the way, I love that dimple in your chin.”

“See, damn you! You’re doing it again.”

Ash clapped his hands, and laughed, reaching into his cloak and pulling out a wooden cigarette case.

“I just wondered…” Anson began, hunkering down, his shoulders close together, looking a little away from Ash, “if you did all that because it was you who was jealous. Because…”

Through his dark ivory skin, Anson went red and he said, “Now, I sound like a fool.”

“You are not a fool, Cousin,” Ash said, and Anson could smell the smoke of his cigarette. “You are, by everyone’s standards, the most handsome man in Kingsboro, everything a Prince should be. War hero—”

“I could do without that.”

“Soldier among soldiers, gambler, drinker, dashing lover and able ruler. I have been far off in Chyr. I did not expect you to not have beautiful men in your bed.”

“But, there will be time for us—” Anson began.

Ash was quiet now and Anson stopped talking, because Pol had returned to the table.

“A lager for fhe lager haired prince, a stout for the serious magician—I almost said stout magician, but I thought you might take it the wrong way—and something fruity,” Pol gestured to the colorful glass, “for the fruit.”

“Or rather something so sweet for one so sweet,” Ash noted.

“See,” Pol grinned at Anson, “Why don’t you ever say shit like that?”

“I know you too well.”

“Pol is your friend, and he knows what I am,” Ash said, “and so we may as well speak frankly.”

Anson frowned and even Pol said, “Lord Ash, are you sure this is a safe place?”

“Oh, this is the safest place there is,” Ash said.

“Anson, I have never tested you for the Skill.”

“The Skill? You mean magic?””

“I mean nothing else.”

“But… that is you,” Anson said. “I have never been to the Rootless Isle. Nor the Hidden Tower. My training is in battle.”

“You lived the first five years of your life on the Rootless Isle.”

“Well, yes, but I barely remember it, and have not been back since.”

“You have had no visions? No sign of the Sight? Nothing has happened?”

“Not to my knowledge. Not to my memory. Ash, I doubt very much I have the Skill.”

“Your mother had the Skill. Her mother was my aunt, and the Dame of the Rootless Isle, the most powerful of enchantresses. Nor was she the first to marry into the ancient line of Westrial. My grandmother was Messanyn, the greatest Lady of the Rootless Isle and her mother was Lady before her. You are the great grandson of Messanyn, and her father was the mage Ruardarch.”

Anson had always been outcast for as the son of the strange Queen Essily, but aside from her being strange, and kin to Ash, a powerful sorcerer, Anson had not given his mother’s family much thought. He was a soldier, a rider of horses, a leader of men and, sometimes he noted, ruefully, a rider of men as well. Magic was not in him. So he asked Ash:

“Why are we speaking of this now?”

“We ought to have spoken of it before.”

“Look,” Ash said, “soon your brother will come to the Low Throne, and it will be whispered about that you are not only jealous, but bear the Witch Blood and possess the Skill.”

“And if it’s whispered, then it might as well be true,” Pol lifted his glass and Ash nodded.

“That is why, if the power is in you, I want to see it brought out immediately.”

The Near West Country

“My good lady!” he called out. “My good lady!”

Myrne turned to see the man on the horse. He looked worse for wear, certainly, but not harmful.

“You are… calling me?” she said, after a time.

“I see you are a lady,” the man said, “and I judge you to be good.”

“Well, we will see soon enough,” she answered, “but how can I help you?”

“You look to be from around these parts.”

“Well, then you are already deceived,” Myrne said. “But let me see if I can help you.”

“I thought I had an impeccable sense of direction—” the young man started, and Myrne was about to comment that most men thought so too, “but I think I am lost on my way to the great city.”

“You do not—” she began, then, “You are not of Westrial? How far are you from home? Are you of Hale?”

Hale had many poor associations for her but, after all, she was on her way there, herself.

“No, no, from Elmet.”

“Well,’ Myrne said. This man was obviously Hale, but in the long ago days when the Hale had first arrived in the north, they had married with the Royan. In time the Royan kingdoms of Rheged and Elmet had arisen while Hale and North Hale arose west of them, but even the whitest man had Royan ancestry and many of Hale descent lived in the Royan lands and pledged their loyalty to the thrones of Elmet and Rheged. Myrne, herself, was from the north, paler than this man, and yet she had spent these last years in the south, like her mother and her mother’s mother and long lines of women before her, learning from the sorceresses of the Rootless Isle and now, at last, she was on her way back home.

“My family moved there after hard times,” he said, “They call me Wolf.”

“They call me Myrne,” she said, “and if you get on the road you saw me getting off, you and your old horse will meet with the main road soon enough, and it will not be three days before, traveling south, you are in Kingsboro. As for me, I’m traveling as far from there as I can get.”

“Oh me too,” Wolf said, “In the end. I am going north, but first I must go to the city.”

She was a pretty girl, tall, black haired, wide eyed and pale. Wolf bit his lower lip before speaking.

“We could travel together.”

Myrne did not like men. She did not trust them, really. Her childhood before going to the Rootless Isle was spent being teased by them, grabbed by them, looked at like a horse by them or threatened with marriage to one. But this one, with his silly leather half helmet half cap, and his open face, his dirty cloak, seemed genuinely friendly. It could be from never having lived in Sendic lands. Maybe the Royan were kinder. She’d often felt that.

“I am sure you are a wonderful man—” Myrne began.

“And you are a lady traveling on your own.”

“I can defend myself.”

Wolf nodded, thrust out his lip. “I imagine you can, Miss.”

“I am going in the completely opposite direction of you, and I am in some hurry.”

Wolf nodded, lifted a finger, and went to his bag. He pulled out a small purse and gave it to her.

“You may need this, to get yourself a new horse.”

“Sir!”

“I am servant to a rich master, one whom I am about to meet. Do not worry. Take this.”

Wolf hopped up on his old horse, and it gave a sort of grunt, actually looking stubborn when he coaxed it to move.

“Sir, I do not need your money.”

“Ah,” Wolf said, as he rode away from her, up the hill to the road from which she had come, “you don’t need anything, do you?”

But before she could respond, he was laughing, and his laughter was the last thing she heard of him.

“A damn proud woman,” Wolf murmured, riding south, looking over his shoulder to see her making her slow progress.

“O’course in the world, such as it is, I imagine a lass would have to be. She’ll let no man step on her back, that’s for certain.”

Suddenly he heard the woman called Myrne cry out, “Hey!”

With effort he turned the old horse that was more draft horse than race horse about and waited for her.

She was some time in coming up the hill.

“Do you know the best way to the Mirren Fens?”

“The road you were taking, but avoid the New Forest.”

“I was going to cut through the smallest part of the New Forest, Angledon Wood.”

“You may,” Wolf allowed. “I’ll not tell you what to do, but there are brigands all through it. They say Michael Flynn and his Pranksters live there.”

“I don’t know who that is.”

“Outlaws from Inglad, made outlaw by King Edmund. It is said they steal from the rich and give to the poor.”

“I’m not sure I believe in that.”

“I’m not sure I do either,” Wolf said.

“I think you have magic about you, but there are even free guild mages among them. I would not take my chance through that wood, but go through the Kimmerly Pass. I do not know much about the south, but I can guide you through the North Country. On that note,” Wolf saluted Myrne, “Good day.”

Myrne seemed to be considering something, and at last, she said, “Sir… Wolf?”

He laughed so hard he almost fell off his horse. Wolf doffed his leather cap and he had a shock of rough red hair.

“Sir Wolf! Next you’ll be calling me Lord Fox! Earl Weasel!”

Myrne wanted to be offended, but Wolf’s laughter was infectious and she said, “I grew up in courts, and if you had too, you would know just how many lords are foxes and how many more earls are wolves!”

“Well played, Mistress!” Wolf nodded, delighted. “But what was it you were going to say?”

“I was abrupt, and a fool, and it is a great fool who cannot admit her foolishness. I would be grateful for your company, and traveling with you, or at least traveling a night and waiting for your return, would be much wiser than my going on alone. Doubtless, Mother Amana sent you to me. If you would, then let us travel on.”

Wolf said, “I would.”