All the Paths of Shadow

“Hardly,” said Shingvere. “As I recall, skinny here used foul language. Something about dogs and swine and parentage, I believe. And the houseplant called for the king to make war.”

“While certain Eryans vowed to visit a variety of embarrassing afflictions on all of Alonya,” muttered Fromarch. “Just before he went into a fit of shoe throwing. But sendings? No.”

Mug stirred, waving his leaves in the sunlight from the mirror. “He’s got holes in his socks,” he said, his voice sleepy.

Fromarch shook his head. “You know we’ve got better sense than to try and pass spellworks through a scrying glass, Thaumaturge,” he said. “We aren’t daft.”

Meralda nodded and sipped her Nolbit’s. “Of course, of course.”

They seem to be telling the truth, she thought. But if not the mages, who?

“You saw spell traces in the safe room?” asked Fromarch, joining Meralda in frowning at the glass. “From the spot where the mirror was watching?”

“I saw something,” said Meralda. “It could have been the initial formation of a projected spellwork.”

“Wasn’t us,” said Fromarch. He lifted an eyebrow. “Could it have been the scrying glass itself?”

Meralda nodded. It could have been, she thought. Old Goboy left no notes, and we know so little about his glass. Why, though, did I only see it briefly, and only once?

Mug’s leaves quivered in a long vegetable yawn. Meralda yawned, too, unable to resist. “I’m exhausted,” she said aloud. Exhausted, and seeing ghosts in all the shadows.

“I thank you for your help, gentlemen,” she said. “Even the shoe throwing and cursing.”

Shingvere finished his bottle, searched the ice bucket for another, and frowned when he discovered it empty.

“We’ll call the day done, then,” he said. “The Tears are found, war is averted, and we’re all out of Nolbit’s.” He rose, took the bucket by the handle, and lifted an eyebrow at Fromarch. “You coming?”

Fromarch rose and gathered empty bottles. Meralda watched, bemused, as the aging wizard collected a full dozen and dropped them in the wastebasket.

“I’m coming,” Fromarch said. He wiped his hands on his pants and paused at Meralda’s side. “You ought to get some sleep,” he said. Then he hesitated, shoved his hands in his pockets and rocked on his heels.

“Oh, tell her you’re proud of her and let the woman be,” said Shingvere as he stamped toward the doors. “Bloody ice will be all melted before a pair of Tirls can work up the courage for a heartfelt goodbye.”

Fromarch laughed, squeezed Meralda’s shoulder, and stamped out after Shingvere.

The mirror wavered again, and when it steadied the sky was full of blackbirds. They cast brief darting shadows across Meralda’s desk, and then they were gone, and the glass was bright and still.

“Ah,” said Mug. He opened a dozen eyes, swung them close to Meralda.

“Hello, Thaumaturge,” he said, dreamily. “Here’s a riddle for you.”

Meralda groaned. “Not now, Mug.”

Mug ignored her. “What goes round and round the Wizard’s Flat,” he said, “and says ‘Vonashon, empalos, endera,’ to meddling Tirlish thaumaturges?”

Meralda stared. “How do you know-?”

“You sketched the flying things on one of your Tower drawings.” Mug opened another dozen eyes. “And you wrote the words below it. In quotes, no less. I saw the drawing, mistress,” he said, his tone injured. “When were you going to tell me?”

Meralda sighed.

“It’s been a very long day,” she said. “I found the Tears, nearly started a war, pretended I was safe behind a ward spell that wasn’t there, and slapped an Alon necromancer. And I still don’t know what I saw flying about the Tower, or what spoke those words to me in the park.” She raised her hand as Mug bunched his eyes. “All right,” she said, closing her eyes. “I won’t deny this might be related to Otrinvion. I won’t deny the Tower might be, for all practical purposes, haunted by his shade. I won’t deny there are forces at work here I do not understand.” She opened her eyes. “There. Are you satisfied? I’ve said it. The bloody Tower might bloody well be haunted, and now I’ve got to go back inside it and find out by what, or who.”

Mug’s leaves went utterly still.

“You’ve got to go back?” Mug asked, incredulous. “Inside the Tower?”

Meralda nodded. “Yvin wants me to proceed. I talked to him this afternoon, just before we dined,” she said. “I am to move the Tower’s shadow, and use my efforts to do so as a means to investigate the masses about the flat.”

Mug brought all his eyes upon her.

“Mistress. That’s insane.”

“No,” said Meralda, rising. “That’s my job. I’m the thaumaturge. I’ve seen evidence that the Tower or something within it is casting or directing spellworks.” Meralda bit her lip, considering. Might as well say it out loud, she thought. “And consider this, Mug. What if my latch damaged the Tower spell as much as the Tower damaged my latch?”

Mug’s eyes all opened at once.

“Exactly,” said Meralda. “What if I’ve unknowingly meddled with a hidden Tower maintenance spell?”

Mug shook his leaves. “Hold on a moment, mistress. How do you know some passing Vonat didn’t cast a spell on the Tower last week?”

Meralda shook her head. “If the Vonats could cast spells on the Tower, Mug,” she said, “we’d all be speaking Vonat and hauling rocks right now, and you know it.”

“Have you told Yvin?”

“I told him I saw what might be an original Tower spellwork, about the flat,” she said. “I told him my latch might have interfered with its function.”

Mug whistled. “Now that must have taken the steam out of the we-found-the-Tears victory feast.”

“He didn’t even curse.” Meralda yawned. “He just looked tired. Told me to deal with it as a threat to Tirlin, and use the shadow moving project as an excuse to study the Tower.”

“Meddling with the likes of Otrinvion represents a threat to Tirlin,” said Mug. “Not to mention the threat to the meddler, who certainly isn’t that fat-headed king.”

Meralda stretched, and her eyes sought out Mug’s bed sheet, which lay wadded on the floor a few steps away from her desk.

“Enough,” she said. “Let’s go home.”

Mug fell silent, and turned most of his eyes away. “You really don’t have a choice, do you?” he said.

“Not in this,” she said. “It’s take off the robe, or go back to the Tower.”

“I don’t suppose a career with the guilds holds any appeal, does it?”

Meralda pushed back her chair, covered Mug’s cage, and made wearily for home.

Chapter Eleven

Meralda’s next four days passed in a blur. The Vonats arrived, to little fanfare, and were stationed in the vacant north wing. The Hang held a feast of their own, complete with Hang delicacies prepared aboard the Hang flagship, served with Hang eating utensils consisting of a pair of plain wooden sticks. Meralda was told that Yvin made a great show of using the chopsticks, until Que-long relented and handed Yvin a fork.

Were it not for the papers, the Bellringers, and Mug, Meralda would have heard nothing. She saw no Vonats, dined on cold sandwiches, went nowhere save the laboratory and, twice, the park.

She sent Donchen a letter, begging pardon for her absence at his table, and other court functions since. She had given as explanation only “pressing business for the king,” and she hoped that was sufficient.

Well, it’s absolutely true, thought Meralda, with a frown. Even so, she had very nearly dropped her work and gone to the feast aboard the flagship. Only the thought of losing yet more sleep, and the sight of her bloodshot eyes and wild hair in the mirror, had kept Meralda in the lab and working.