All the Paths of Shadow

Meralda lifted an eyebrow. “And yet you’ve learned our language and our customs,” she said. “How very perceptive of your naturalists.”

Donchen laughed. “Of late, I confess, our landings have grown more direct,” he said. “But out of necessity, not a desire for mischief.”

Meralda started walking again. “What sort of necessity, Donchen?” she asked. “Since we’re trading state secrets,” she added.

“Two reasons,” said Donchen. “First, because contact is now inevitable. The Great Sea is no longer wide enough to prevent your airships from completing the journey.”

Meralda frowned. “We’ve tried,” she said. “The Yoreland-”

“Was within a few days of sighting land,” said Donchen, gently. “Had they not turned back, they would have seen the coast. Had they come down for one last look at the sea, they’d have seen driftwood. Had they been paying attention to the sky, they’d have seen gulls.” Donchen shrugged. “Had they not been so weary, Thaumaturge, you would not be the only Tirlish woman in the world to know what you know.” He smiled. “But I would have missed telling you,” he said.

Meralda bit her lip. “The king doesn’t know all this?”

“He knows the important parts,” said Donchen. “But he doesn’t know that I grew up reading the Post and the Times, or that I’m about to give you this.”

He reached inside his shirt, and withdrew a piece of paper. “Even your king has not seen it.”

Meralda made herself look away from the paper, and straight into Donchen’s grey eyes. “What is it?”

“The world, of course,” said Donchen. “All of it.”

Meralda took the paper.

“I should go now,” said Donchen. “I’m sure you have things to think about.”

The paper in her hands was strange. It was brilliant white, thin, yet stiff and smooth to the touch. Faintly, Meralda could see the outlines of what might be part of a map, and her heart began to race.

The world. All of it. At last.

“All the notations and measures are in New Kingdom,” said Donchen. “And I’ll be happy to supply you with a whole book of maps, later, if you wish.” He made a small bow. “But for tonight, I hope this will suffice.”

“It will,” said Meralda, and her voice nearly caught in her throat.

Donchen turned, casting his gaze down the aisle of glittering mageworks. “Is the door that way?” he asked.

Meralda nodded. “One last question,” she asked.

Donchen turned back to her.

“Anything, Thaumaturge,” he said.

“Were you the man who appeared in the palace and asked Yvin for permission to bring your ships into the harbor?”

Donchen’s half-smile vanished. “I was not,” he said. “Nor is that man among our party.”

Meralda began to speak, but Donchen held up his hand. “He was probably Hang, yes,” he said. “And the formal request for passage and lodging is an ancient tradition among our Houses. But I assure you that no one of the House of Que-long would have dared such an act, in the palace of your king.” He bowed. “That is another reason we have come,” he said. “For now that contact is inevitable, it seems there are those from both our shores who would see our peoples spend the next hundred years glaring suspiciously at each other from across the Great Sea.”

From both our shores? Meralda lowered the map.

“The Vonats,” she said.

“I believe so,” said Donchen. “And a certain small number of my people.”

Meralda gaped. “The Accords,” she said, biting back mention of the strange spells in the palace and the disappearance of the Tears.

“Precisely,” said Donchen. “Destroy the Accords. Sow discord and mistrust. Provoke hostility and suspicion.” His half-smile vanished. “We stand at a crossing of ways, Thaumaturge,” he said. “Willing or not, we will write our own history, in these next few weeks. It is my wish to avoid including the terms warfare and bloodshed.”

Meralda nodded absently in agreement, and looked again at the folded paper in her hands. “And so you’ve decided to trust me,” she said. “Knowing that I might go immediately to the king, or the papers, or both.”

Donchen shrugged. “That is for you to decide, Thaumaturge. If you choose such a thing, I am undone, but that is your choice.” He bowed, and when he rose his smile was back, and his eyes were merry. “But I must go, before friend Cook misses his serving cart. Do give my regards to the Post.”

“I shall do no such thing, and you know it,” said Meralda, unable to frown at Donchen’s smiling face. Meralda shook her head and sighed in exasperation. “Though it’s lucky for you Mage Fromarch isn’t still the thaumaturge in Tirlin.”

“Indeed,” said Donchen, as he backed the last few steps out of the aisle. “I am most fortunate. Good evening, Thaumaturge, and thank you for your company.”

And then he turned, and walked away. After a moment, the serving cart wheels squeaked, and Meralda heard the laboratory doors open, Donchen spoke to the Bellringers, and then footsteps came into the laboratory.

“Thaumaturge?” said Tervis. “Thaumaturge, where are you?”

“I’m here,” said Meralda, striding forward, out of the aisle. “I’m all right, Guardsman,” she said.

Tervis was just inside the laboratory, one hand still on the door.

“You can come in,” said Meralda. “I’ve set no wards or guard spells.”

Tervis let the door shut. “Just, um, checking, ma’am,” he said. “Mr. Donchen just left, and we didn’t see you.”

Meralda sought out her desk, shoved aside her refracting spell papers, and pulled back her chair.

“Is that what I think it is?” said Mug, all his eyes open and straining.

“It is,” said Meralda. She sat, then turned to face Tervis.

“Coffee, please,” she said. “A pot.”

“Yes, ma’am,” said Tervis. He wiped his chin with his sleeve. “Not bad grub, whatever it was.”

Meralda smiled. “No,” she said. “It wasn’t.”

And then she unfolded the map, and Mug wordlessly swung all his eyes to bear on it, and they looked in awe upon the world.

Chapter Twelve

Meralda didn’t take to her bed until two of the clock, and even then she tossed and turned and wrestled with the sheets. Her wonder at seeing the world on Donchen’s map was giving way to a niggling whisper of fear. The Realms were so tiny. Small and alone on the wide Great Sea, and the land of the Hang, once so far away, was nearer now, and so much bigger.

Indeed, Donchen’s homeland dwarfed the Realms. Hours after putting the map away, Meralda could still see it in her mind’s eye. Especially the set of drawings which represented the world as a globe, as if they had taken a child’s kick ball and drew all the lands upon it. The Realms were a fingertip-sized dot on one half of the ball, alone in the Great Sea. But turn the ball around to the other side, and the land of the Hang occupied half of the hemisphere, with a spray of islands running nearly to each pole from both the north and the south.

Half a dozen of these islands were at least equal in size to the Realms.

Down on the street, a cab rattled past, and a man who must have been perched atop it was bellowing out a rude tavern song. Meralda leaped from her bed with an Angis-word, stamped over to the half-open window, and was about to shout down at the hoarse-voiced reveler when Mrs. Whitlonk’s window slammed open and without a word or a warning the elderly lady hurled a flowerpot down toward the cab.

The pot smashed on the cobblestones just behind the open carriage, the driver snapped his reins, and the singer fell over backwards into the carriage bed to gales of laughter from his fellows. The carriage sped away, and in a moment the street was quiet.

Mrs. Whitlonk’s window closed with a gentle click, and Meralda laughed, and suddenly weariness swept over