Magic's Promise

Vanyel shut the door to his room behind him, and set his back against it, breathing the first easy breath he'd taken since he left his chamber this morning. 'Gods!' he gasped. 'Sanctuary at last! Hello, Medren. Oh, you brought wine-thank you, I need it badly.'

The boy looked up from tuning the new strings on his new lute. Giving it to him had given Vanyel one of the few moments of unsullied joy he'd had lately, a reaction worth ten times what Vanyel had paid.

Medren grinned. 'Mother?'

'That was this morning,' Vanyel replied, pushing away from the door, heading for the table beside the window seat and the cool flask of wine Medren had brought. 'I swear, she chased me all over the keep, with stars in her eyes and the hunt in her blood.'

Poor Melenna. Gods. She's driving me insane, but I can't bring myself to hurt her. I've been the cause of so much hurt, I can't bear any more.

'And lust in her -'

'Medren!' Vanyel interrupted. 'That's your mother you're slandering!'

'- heart,' the boy finished smoothly. 'What did you do?'

'I took a bath,' Vanyel replied puckishly. 'I took a very long bath. When I finally came out, she'd given up.'

'So who was chasing you this time, if it wasn't Mother?'

'Lord Withen. On the Great Sheep Debate. Meke wants to keep the sheep on Long Meadow until spring shearing; Father wants yearling cattle back there immediately, if not sooner.' Vanyel groaned, and held both hands to his head. 'If it wasn't for the fact that once this door is shut they leave me alone-gods, the Border was more peaceful!'

Water droplets beaded the side of the flask and ran down the sides as Vanyel picked it up. 'Whoever gets you as protege will bless you for your thoughtfulness, lad.' He poured himself a goblet of wine, and took it with him to sip while he stood over Medren at the window seat. No breath of air stirred without or within, and even the birds seemed to have gone into sun-warmed naps. 'That instrument still as much to your liking?'

Medren nodded emphatically, if with a somewhat preoccupied expression. He was tuning the last string, a frown of concentration making his young face look adult.

Vanyel warmed inside, as he picked up his own lute.

It takes so little to make the child so happy - and gods, the talent.

'Well, then,' he said, laying a hand on the boy's shoulder, 'Ready for your les - '

The boy winced away from the light touch on his shoulder. Not in emotional reaction - but in physical pain.

Vanyel snatched his hand away as if it had been a red-hot iron he'd inadvertently set on the bare skin of the boy's back. 'Medren! What did I-'

'It's all right,' the boy said, and shrugged-which called up another grimace of pain. 'Just-old Jervis reckoned we all ought to see how you could trick somebody into dropping his shield and then come in overhand. Guess who got to be the victim.' His tone was so bitter Vanyel could taste it in the back of his own mouth. “Like always.'

The blur of the blade coming for him, always coming for him; the weight of the shield on his arm getting heavier by the moment. The shock of each blow that he couldn't dodge; shock first and then pain. Breath burning in lungs, side aching with bruises; cramps knotting his calves. Stumbling backward, head reeling, vision clouding.

'Van?'

Cold sweat down his back and the taste of blood in his mouth. Bitter, absolute humiliation. Metallic taste of hate and fear.

'Hey, Vanyel-are you all right?'

Vanyel shook his head to clear it, and locked down his own agitation as best he could, but the memories were crowding in on him so vividly he was almost reliving that moment so many years ago when Jervis finally got him in a corner he couldn't escape.

'I'm all right.' His left arm began to ache, and he massaged the arm and wrist, reflexively. It still aches, after all these years. I still have numb fingers. Oh, gods, not Medren.