Magician

Chapter 1-2

He peeked down again. The prince had sat down, disconsolate, on a large rock. His shoulders slumped.

Lorre considered options. He did not help people, famously so. If he did so once, others would expect it. If he reappeared, he’d disturb the world: a power reemerging. If he took sides in a ridiculous tiny Northern border conflict—

He was actually considering it. He’d spent too long with rocks for company.

Gareth got up. Lorre blinked, startled, and paid attention.

The prince spent some time gathering stones. Setting them out. Making a message on the sand: PLEASE HELP US.

That was also fairly clever. A constant reminder, not as obnoxious as hurling stones at the barrier, but visible.

The day had become afternoon, all gold and green and blue and white, sun and sea and sky and sand. Lorre, sitting on his rock balcony, one leg swinging, listened to the leap of distant dolphins and felt the purr of the world under his hand, resting on stone. The waves coiled and crashed, steady as tides.

Gareth was making a shelter out of branches and fronds, building a small firepit, evidently having decided to settle in. Lorre had had heroes attempt to outwait him before; it never worked.

Gareth, once satisfied with the shelter, added a new rock-message. This one said: I CAN WAIT.

He meant it, too: he pulled out a book, and sat back down on the big sun-warmed rock. After a few minutes he took off his boots, and wiggled toes in hot sand.

Lorre caught himself wanting to laugh. He’d done the exact same thing upon first finding this island: boots off, bare skin, luxuriating in the feel.

And the prince had even brought a book. So well prepared. And so literary. Lorre could count on about three fingers the number of mighty-thewed questing heroes who’d done that.

He rather wanted to know what book it was.

Gareth said, after a few moments, “I see why you like it here, you know.” Once again he sounded utterly at ease with addressing the air, as if they were having a conversation. “I do too. It’s warm, and peaceful, and there’s not a world out there, waiting…you can be alone. And I expect magicians need to be alone. I feel like I would. I imagine it’s like being a prince, everybody asking you for help, for solutions…”

Well. Yes. And no. Lorre stopped swinging his leg and leaned in again, halfway up a cliff.

“Or it’s not like that at all. I wouldn’t know. Not being magical. But the problem is…I am part of the world. I can’t not be. And so are you. You must be.” Gareth glanced around. “It is lovely here. And you haven’t thrown me out yet, like you did with the Prince of Thistlemare, so you are listening.”

“I am not,” Lorre said, half irritated and half fascinated; and then he realized that of course emotions became deed for him half the time, and the prince had definitely heard his voice.

“I thought so,” Gareth announced, somehow managing to be smug without being too obnoxious about it. “Of course you care. You’re only seeing if I’m determined enough to be worth helping, right?”

Lorre, properly horrified, snapped, “Not at all. I’m waiting for you to give up and go away. What book are you reading?”

“This?” The prince held it up, turned it about. The gilt letters on the scarlet binding flashed in sun. “Come out and I’ll tell you. Do magicians like being bribed with books?”

“I’m not a kitten and you’re not dangling a fish.” And this was now easily the strangest conversation he’d had in literal years, not counting attempts to wrap his head around being a rock. “I could simply take it.”

“But you won’t.”

“What makes you think I won’t?”

“You haven’t yet.”

“I’ve decided I ought to dislike you.”

“I’m very sorry about that,” the prince said, and he even sounded genuinely apologetic. “Will that matter? If I’m asking for your help?”

Lorre slid down from the ledge. The fall would’ve hurt if he’d been someone else, including his younger self once upon a time. This afternoon he merely stepped down through air, let himself become air fleetingly, let the impact dissolve and fade. He left his illusion-barrier up, and kept himself unseen, walking over.

Now that they stood on the same ground, he noticed that the prince was a fraction shorter than his own height. Good. “Why should I help you?”

“It’s a worthy cause—”

“They always are.”

“Our home is—”

“In peril. Those always are, too. Or if not your home, your beloved betrothed. Or your enchanted sword. Or your favorite horse. Something.”

Gareth’s cheeks had gone pink with embarrassment or anger; he had such fair skin that emotion showed readily. But he managed to keep his voice even. “My home. My brother. Our people. Is there anything you care about? Anything you’d fight to save?”

“Not necessarily,” Lorre said. “I’ve found it depends on the circumstances and the context. Why did you think I might help you? I don’t help anyone.”

“You wouldn’t—” Gareth stopped. His eyes changed. “Not even yourself?”

Lorre couldn’t help it: he had to laugh. “A threat? Honestly?”

“It’s not a threat. You wouldn’t even fight to protect yourself?”

“I’m capable of great and terrible things,” Lorre told him. The sand felt soft, white and hot, shifting underfoot. “It’s always possible the world would be better off without me in it. There are other magicians you could’ve found. I’m not the only one.”

“You’re not. But you’re the most powerful.”

“And you need the most powerful.” The words hurt. He had not expected them to. They were true: he was indeed, without exaggeration, the most powerful magician that he knew of. He had said as much himself, both with and without arrogance, on many occasions.

He did not think, these days, that most powerful meant best.

He crossed both arms, scooped some falling robe back onto a bare shoulder, felt a brush of breeze against his skin. He did not know what his hair might be doing; he’d run fingers through it that morning and told it to behave. It mostly did.

Perhaps his appearance would inspire a lack of confidence. And this disconcerting young prince would go away.

He did not entirely make a decision, but part of the concealing shield-barrier faded anyway: present, faintly shining, but now more transparent.

Gareth’s breath caught.

Lorre raised an eyebrow. “Surprise. I’ve been here all along.”

The prince’s eyes got wider, taking him in. Up close, their color held layers of cinnamon-bark and spice-brown, rich and velvety, a few shades more chocolate than his autumn hair.

Lorre, not used to being looked at by anyone but waves and stones and vines these days, wondered briefly if he’d forgotten something about tying a robe and visible anatomy. He checked, glancing down, but the important bits seemed to be covered up. And he didn’t think he’d lost any pieces of himself; the edges might be a little indistinct, a little hazy, but he was relatively sure he wasn’t made of stone or sunlight.

He surreptitiously did a check of that too. No, still the body he remembered: lightly tanned skin, lean muscle, messy blond hair, blue eyes Lily had once compared to sapphires in a way that hadn’t been a compliment, sharp as jewels. Older, but he’d never shown his age; he suspected he constantly made himself look the way he thought he should look, not entirely consciously. He felt older, though.

He sighed. He’d probably forgotten something about boring human etiquette. Shocked a sheltered rustic goat-herding prince. “Should I have put on shoes? Or trousers? I might have some someplace.”

Gareth, still gazing at him, breathed, “You’re not what I expected.”

“What did you expect? A long white beard and general benevolence?”

“No. I know you’re…I know the stories. Some of them.” A pause, a lip-lick. “I don’t know what I expected. But I need your help. Please.”

“I’m not considering it. What would you want me to do? If I did.”

“Magic,” Gareth said. His expression was far too hopeful.

“Yes, thank you, magicians do magic, and I can’t imagine you’re asking for my skill at embroidery. What are you asking for, precisely? Turning your invaders into sheep, transforming all their ale into milk, mystically beheading their leader in the dead of night? Shoring up your brother’s claim on the throne, after? Helping him seek revenge? Assisting in his slow takeover of the North, perhaps, and reestablishing the old Winter Empire?”

“The sheep might be useful. I promise you we’re not planning any of that. Embroidery?”

“So many kings make promises.” Lorre scooped a ball of seawater out of the ocean, spun it around, made it orbit his hand: blue-green and luminous. Gareth’s gaze tracked this casual display of power; Lorre mostly simply liked having something to do with his hands, and the ocean didn’t mind. “And thread-magic’s a skill. Anything can hold power if you weave in enough, and I used to like the idea of sending someone a hand-stitched gift with a hidden charm.”

“And,” Gareth said, “the idea of being more clever than anyone.”

“Magicians are all arrogant,” Lorre said. “And brilliant, and duplicitous, mostly because we can be. Anyone who tells you otherwise is lying. What book is it, again?”

Gareth looked at the spine. Light glinted from gilt. “Is it a trade? Do I need to bargain with you?”

“Oh, for the last time—” He flipped the sea-ball into the air, let it drop swiftly, caught it right above Gareth’s head. Gareth, he observed, did not flinch. “This isn’t a bargain.”

“I think you’re wrong,” Gareth said.

“Sorry, what?”

“About yourself. Being duplicitous. You haven’t lied to me once yet.”

Lorre looked at his illusion-wall, and raised both eyebrows.

“You gave me a challenge,” Gareth said. “That’s not a lie. You’ve been nothing but honest. About not wanting to help, needing convincing, all of that. You wanted me to think about the consequences of bringing you to the North, and I have. You keep suggesting I tell you about my book, so I’m assuming there’s some sort of rule and you can’t tell me directly but you’re trying to help.”

Lorre sputtered, disarmed by persistent misreading of himself as somehow benevolent. Gareth did know who he was; how was this terrible interpretation possible?

The prince added enthusiastically, “It’s a copy of Lady Mariah Cavendra’s Moon-World, if you haven’t read it. Philosophy, but also sort of a novel. From about a hundred years ago, but fascinating. The other worlds she imagines—travel to the stars—”

“I have read it,” Lorre said. “Not for eighty-two years, though. I’m in it. Briefly. The very attractive young man who dismisses her ideas as silly and unimportant, near the beginning. She didn’t like me much.”

“Why not?”

“She thought I was a myopic ass who believed that magic alone could solve the world’s problems, when I wasn’t busy seducing attractive and useful courtiers. She was right. How do you like it? The book.”

“I’ve read it before,” Gareth said. “I do like it. It’s optimistic about people and what they can do. Do you want it?”

“Optimism is generally misplaced. And her characters aren’t realists. And—”

“That’s not a no.”

“That’s not—” Lorre flicked the sea-ball back into the ocean; he felt it lose its shape, unfurling, water flowing back into the whole. A small fish darted up, a curious silver quickness along a string of power, a strand in the web of the world. “Come up and have tea with me. Or wine. Or whatever I’ve got. Tell me how you managed to find me here. I’m not leaving with you.”

“Still not a lie,” Gareth said serenely. “You just don’t believe I’ll succeed. Tea, please, if you’re offering.”

“I could poison you.”

“You could’ve disposed of me without ever saying hello. How do we get up there? Scale the cliff? Or is there a magic door?”

“There’s magic, like this,” Lorre retorted, possessed by a strange burning impulse to show this irritating unflappable young man precisely what the most powerful magician alive could do, and put a hand on Gareth’s wrist.

The sand, the warmth, the nearness of the sea: those all melted away, dissolved into rock and sun and a cave-mouth like watercolors overlapping, smudged and wet and blurring. The air was not precisely air, and Lorre’s chest felt tight, the way it always did in the space between spaces; he could step from one frame of the world to the next, moving through moments in a painting of time and the world, but it was one of the harder skills to practice even with his heritage and talents, and even harder to bring someone along.

Gareth’s wrist was tangible and very human in his grip, a recognizable solid point. The young prince was both a reassurance and a bit more weight to pull through the threads of the tapestry, but the distance was short and familiar. Lorre could manage that much with ease.

Besides, he wanted to see Gareth’s face on the other side.