The compliment softened what would otherwise have been another devastating blow. And I had even hoped he remembered me fondly! But now I began to wonder what ulterior motive he may have had in passing me in that transformation practical-was this an experiment to see just how badly a young wizard could do?
“So what are you checking for?”
“In your case, I was interested in your progress. In general, it’s a continuation of the school’s original purpose, to organize and rationalize the practice of wizardry, to be sure it doesn’t go astray. That’s why I wanted to learn more about your study of herbal magic and who has been teaching you.”
“It’s my predecessor. He lives not far from here, and he’s taught me the rudiments,” I said, feeling somewhat defensive, whereas I had expected to be proudly demonstrating an unusual accomplishment when I first met a wizard from the school again.
“He’s your friend, too,” said Zahlfast. It was a statement, not a question. “There aren’t many young wizards who are even on speaking terms with their predecessors.”
“Is that what you mean when you say I’m sharp?” I said, hoping for another compliment.
“Why do you think you were hired as Royal Wizard of Yurt?”
“I’d assumed I was the only person who applied.”
“You may have been; I’m not sure. But when I heard you’d applied, I talked to the Master, and we agreed. I wrote to the constable of Yurt and told him not to hire anyone else.”
“That was the constable who you met at the gate,” I said, wondering again why Zahlfast had not wanted to come in. But another question took precedence. “Why did you want me in Yurt? Was it to keep me out of the way?”
“Not at all. We knew something was happening in Yurt, something odd, and it needed someone who combined your intuitive flair for magic with the potential, at least, to work hard and master academic magic. Neither careful mastery of spells nor innate ability would have been enough without the other. Also, of course, we hoped that here, away from the distractions of the City, you might meet enough challenges and find enough leisure that you really would set yourself to learning the magic we had tried to teach you.”
There was not nearly enough of a compliment in this to mitigate the sting. “You mean you knew all along what was going on in Yurt? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Actually,” said Zahlfast, with a snort that could have been amusement, “I have no idea what’s going on in Yurt. I was hoping you would tell
“There’s an evil presence in the castle,” I said slowly, looking at my hands. “I don’t know where it’s coming from, and sometimes I can hardly even sense it. Most of the time I think it’s a person, but I don’t know how to find out which one. Once or twice I’ve thought it could be a demon, but the old wizard says there was never any evil presence in the castle before I arrived, and I don’t think even I could have summoned a demon by mistake.”
“An evil presence,” said Zahlfast, as though this answered a question. “We’ve known in the City for several years that there was a supernatural focus here in Yurt, or at least nearby, but it was impossible to localize it precisely or even to say whether it was for good or evil. Several of the wizards at the school thought it might be a witch living in the forest who had taken the step into black magic.”
“It’s not in the forest,” I said positively. “It’s here in the castle. It was coming home to his kingdom that nearly killed the king.”
“I knew it was here in the castle when I got your letter.”
“But how could you know that? I didn’t say anything about it.”
“The very paper your letter was written on was permeated with the supernatural. Didn’t you know that? That’s why, when I arrived and discovered that the supernatural influence stopped at the moat, I asked you to meet me outside.”
“But how could you tell anything from the paper?” I demanded, intensely frustrated, thinking the wizards of the school had been deliberately withholding information from me. But then I saw Zahlfast smiling and said in a lower voice, “Was that maybe in one of the lectures I missed?”
It turned out that it was. There was a rather simple spell to recognize the presence of a supernatural influence, a modern, more universal spell than the one the old wizard had taught me for detecting magic potions. I glanced over the garden walls at the turrets of the castle and felt my heart sink. I didn’t want to try the spell. Yurt was my kingdom, and I loved it, and if I confirmed my fears I might never feel the same about it again.
“Do you think the king will become sick again?” I said.
“You think he was made ill by supernatural forces?”
“Dominic thought an evil spell had been put on him,” I said, “even though I didn’t believe him at first.” I gave Zahlfast a quick summary of the king’s three-year illness and miraculous recovery.
“If he really was healed miraculously,” said Zahlfast somewhat dubiously, “he should be safe from black magic, or at least from the effects of the particular evil spell that was put on the castle.”
“But will the spell now turn against someone else?” I said, “such as the queen?” This was not a possibility I had contemplated until I said it, but it suddenly seemed fearfully likely. “Or do you think it’s not merely a spell, but a demon loose in the castle?”
Zahlfast did not answer for a minute. “I’m not the person to ask,” he said at last. “I specialize in transformations, not demonology.” I remembered then a conversation I had had with him in the City several years ago, during which it had become clear that he was just as terrified of demons as I was. But he stood up. “I’ll come into the castle with you and see what I can tell.”
But the first thing he said, as we entered the courtyard with its whitewashed walls and green shutters, was, “What a lovely little castle! None of the other young wizards can have as charming a kingdom.”
In my chambers, however, he looked around quickly, then said, “The supernatural influence is quite strong here.”
I was about to demand whether he could think I was practicing black magic myself, but then I looked at his face and decided it was safer not to ask.
Instead I said, “Let me show you my glass telephones. They don’t work, but they’re very attractive.”
At this he actually laughed. “Somehow, when you left the school, I never imagined that you were the type of wizard who becomes a telephone technician.”
“Neither did I,” I said cheerfully. “That’s why they don’t work. But the queen wanted me to try.” I thought guiltily that it had been some time since I had tried anything new.
“I’ll show you something, though,” I said, reaching one of the telephones down from the shelf. “Watch the base.” I set the instrument down, lifted the receiver, and spoke the name attached to the wizards’ school.
“Pretty amusing, isn’t it,” I said as the faint ringing came through the receiver and the base lit up to show the school’s telephone on its table, with someone reaching to answer it. “Wait; it gets even funnier. Try to talk.” I handed him the receiver.
Just as the Lady Maria and I had done, he shouted, “Hello? Can you hear me?” to an unhearing wizard at the other end, even though that wizard’s voice came through faint but clear.
But when the other wizard hung up and the telephone base went dark, Zahlfast was not laughing. “You realize, of course,” he said with what I might even have imagined was awe, “that no one’s ever been able to do this before: attach a far-seeing spell to an object.”
“But it doesn’t work as a telephone. Sometimes I’ve even thought that whatever evil spell was put on the castle was hindering my magic.”
“I think you’ll be able to make it work,” he said in his school teacher voice. “Keep working at it.”
At that moment we were interrupted by a knock. I opened it, expecting the Lady Maria ready to resume her lesson, and was surprised to see Joachim.
I tried to draw him inside, to introduce him to Zahlfast, but he wouldn’t let me.
“I’m going,” he said, “and I wanted to let someone know I probably won’t be back for morning service. The king and queen aren’t here.”
“I think they went hunting. But where are you going?”
He paused as though unwilling to say, but his enormous black eyes steadily met mine. “A girl down in the village, five miles from here, was bitten by a viper last week,” he said at last, as though there had been no pause. “The doctors have tried all their draughts and potions, but nothing has availed. She’s near death. They want me to pray for her.”
He turned and was gone before I could answer, striding across the courtyard to where one of the stableboys
