Owlknight

fog, when you haven’t even seen where the target is placed first. We’d either have to have more power, or be a great deal closer to him to find him.”

“And there’s an awful lot of ‘north and west’ to be searching in,” Darian sighed. “Firesong - ”

“Don’t make any decisions yet,” Firesong cautioned. “We haven’t begun to exhaust all of our resources. There may be someone among the tribesmen coming here for Healing who can give us clues, or even a real direction.”

Darian grimaced. “And this is where you counsel me about patience. My head knows you’re right, but - I don’t want to sit around and wait, I want to be up and doing something!” He unclenched a fist he wasn’t even aware he’d made. “I have been patient. I’ve undergone trials, travels, and ceremonies until my ears could bleed. I’ve been in fights that scared me to death and done responsible things for others enough to be Knighted, and even that was to better do the duties demanded of me.”

Firesong nodded, and a lock of his snowy white hair fell over one eye. He said nothing in agreement, but also said nothing disapproving.

“I’ve given and given to this Vale. And to the village, and to Valdemar, and even the Northerners. I have had some wonderful times and great benefits, and I don’t have too many regrets. I have not done these things so I could stack up favors to call in.” Darian paused for a long deep breath then continued. “It is just that - the things I have done over the past few years have been almost all for others, but this is for me.”

Firesong brushed the stray hair away from his face, still seemingly impassive as he listened, then said levelly, “Go on.”

Darian set his jaw and then concluded. “Firesong, I want this one. I want this one for me and for my family. I’m horribly afraid that if we wait too long, something will happen to them. . . .” His voice faded as he contemplated that terrible notion, that he would learn his parents were alive only to discover they’d perished just days before he could reach them.

Firesong shook his head slightly while he steepled his fingers. “I understand. But Darian, they’ve survived this long, surely they can survive the summer!”

“If I knew where they were, and what the situation was, I’d be more inclined to agree with you. But what if they’re alive now only because they’re being kept as a death-sacrifice by Blood Bear or some other tribe like them?” Darian protested.

“That is as may be, but it could as well have happened two years ago as not, or never,” Firesong replied blithely. “What needs to be done is for you to balance and measure the likelihood of results with the risks to be taken, with what powers can be brought to bear with the time you have.”

Darian looked unhappy with such an objective assessment, but he knew that Firesong was right. What they did know was that his father was in passable, maybe excellent health; the first spell had told him that much, and he had to presume that Starfall and Firesong working together had confirmed that. If a man lacking a foot and marooned in the far north was in any health after all these years, that argued for his continued survival.

But it was hard, so hard, to simply sit there and discuss logistical possibilities with Firesong, when what he wanted to do was to get a score of dyheli volunteers and go north as fast as they could carry him, carrying whatever food and equipment he could gather in a dash through his quarters, trusting that luck and his own magic would give him a direction.

But even at his most optimistic and foolhardy, he knew that such a plan would be ridiculous. Luck only favored those who didn’t need it, an old saying went. . . .

Besides, Keisha deserves to hear about this.

That was another consideration altogether. He couldn’t just go haring off without telling her.

“Of all the things in the world, I think being patient is the hardest,” he moaned, and Firesong nodded.

“I know quite a few people who would agree wholeheartedly with that sentiment,” his teacher replied, with true sympathy. “That includes the man I was for the first half of my life. As the Shin’a’in shaman say, though, ‘Every scar is a lesson remembered.’ “ His face wrinkled in pits and creases as he smiled sideways. “I think that while we plan and prepare for what you will do about your parents, you ought to go find something useful that will occupy your mind.” He closed the book firmly, caressing its spine before looking to Darian.

“I think you’re right,” Darian said after a pause, and got to his feet. “Have you any suggestions?”

But when Firesong also rose, a wicked gleam in his eye, Darian knew he had asked the wrong question.

“Of course, my dear student,” Firesong said in tones of silk. “After all, just because you’ve become a Master, that doesn’t mean you’ve stopped needing to learn, does it?”

The next several hours of magical work left him exhausted in mind and body; Firesong’s idea of something that would “occupy his mind” was a set of exercises that took every iota of his thoughts and left him nothing to devote to his own problems.