'Oh, yes!' she responded. 'My mother's was like mine, all warm golds and yellow-browns; it tastes of cinnamon and saffron, and feels like velvet warmed in front of a fire.'
She tastes and feels her magic? Good Lord—she's stronger in it than I thought!
'Well, mine's greens and turquoise, and it tastes of exactly what you'd expect—water. Every kind of water there is, depending on where I am and what I'm doing,' he told her. 'It feels like water, too—in every way that water can be felt, especially things like currents. If I'd been Fire, I'd see and feel things about Fire that are just as subtle. I'd also have recognized that you were Earth, and have known—just in the way that you can recognize the familiar accent of someone from India speaking English when you hear it—that Earth can support Fire, or smother it. Now, Earth and Air have no affinity at all, and if I'd been Air, I would have felt that as well—a lack of anything connecting us. Earth and Air are the complete opposites; so are Fire and Water.'
'I should think more so—with Fire and Water,' Maya said, weighing her words. 'Wouldn't they be enemies?'
She picked up that quickly enough. 'Ye-es, sometimes. Mind you, any mage who's gone over to the Black Lodges can be the enemy of any mage of the White. But, well, it's prudent on the part of a Fire Master to be circumspect with a Master of Water. In a duel of equals, should it come to that, Water almost always has the advantage.' Which might account for the way that Alderscroft treats me. 'By the same logic, though, Air and Fire are natural allies, and work very well together.'
'And so are Earth and Water.' She tilted her head to one side, and added dryly, 'How fortunate for me.'
'So are Earth and Earth!' he said hastily. 'The only reason I haven't turned you over to an Earth Master for training is that there aren't any in London. They don't like cities, as a rule. I don't think you've got the time to trot out to Surrey two or three times a week or more—that's where the nearest one I know of is—and I couldn't get Mrs. Phyllis into London with a team of horses dragging her here. Peter Almsley's got another in his family—a cousin—but that's even farther out, and Cousin Reuben won't ever leave his gardens or his flock. He's a vicar, you see.'
'I can't say that I blame him,' Maya replied, with a hint of a wistful note. 'No, I can't leave my patients any more than he can leave his charges. Not at the moment, anyway. If I'm to go baring off into the countryside, I'll have to find another physician to take some of my days at the Fleet, and that won't be easy. Not a full physician, anyway, not even another female physician; they all have their own concerns.' Once again, she was thinking aloud, and he was secretly pleased that she had sufficient trust in him to relax enough to do so. 'I might be able to get those who want surgery practice, though, so they can be certified ... if I offer to pay them for other work on condition they act as surgeons for gratis.' Making her own calculations, she didn't need any opinions from him, and Peter held his tongue. 'It can wait, though—• you said as much. You can teach me for now, without my trying to find substitutes.'
He nodded. 'It's the affinities—Water can serve as an initial teacher to Earth easily enough, just as Fire can to Air. And vice versa, of course.'
'Of course,' she echoed, her eyes reflecting that her mind was already elsewhere. 'Is that why you became a man of the sea? That you were already a Water Master?'
Oh, he liked the quick way she picked up on things! 'I wasn't a Master at the time, but yes.' He nodded. 'I went straight off to the first ship that felt right, and applied as a cabin boy when I was eleven. Would it surprise you to learn that the captain of that ship was a Water Master?'
She looked amused. 'Not very, no.'
He made a gesture with his upturned hand. 'There you have it. If we have the choice, mages tend to pick occupations that reflect their magic, and if they aren't singled out by a Master of their own element, they go looking for one. Earth—well, you get some trades that are obvious, farmers, herdsmen, herbalists, gamekeepers, gardeners—but there are also a fair lot of mid-wives, animal handlers, and trainers, and although you're the first physician I know of, there're clergymen, a lawyer or two, and the odd squire here and there. Water's almost always a sailor or fisherman, a riverman, a canal worker, but I know of a couple of artistic types, another lawyer and an architect and several fellows who work in the city and never have anything to do with sailing. And Lord Peter, of course; he's some sort of diplomat. Fire—metalsmiths, glass-workers, firefighters, but also soldiers, the odd lad in government service. Air, though, they tend to be the scholars, the artists, or the entertainers. Lots of creative types in Air.'
'But not always.'
'But not always,' he agreed. 'Lord Peter Almsley's Water and, as I mentioned, diplomat—I think. They're always sending him off to the continent chasing this or that, anyway. He's really creative in his own sphere; he's certainly entertaining, and he's as persuasive a speaker as any great actor. It isn't his Element that gave him his purpose and job, it's his glib tongue. It's not just the magic, you see, it's what situation in life you were born to, and your natural talents, which don't necessarily march in time with your magic. And anyway, you never start with learning Elemental Magic.'
Her eyes grew puzzled. 'Why not?'
'Because you either have to coax or coerce the Elementals to work for you, and that takes practice and working in the raw basics first. Not all Elementals are—nice.' He thought for a moment about some of the habits of his own affinity. 'Some are vicious. If they heard your call, they might come to it, just so they could hurt you. If you weren't strong enough to defend yourself, they would. Hurt you, that is.'
