Wizards Conclave

'I am referring to how you got those fish! That was corruption-you sucked the energy out of the very air! How dare you?'

'Dare I?' The girl was irritated by the stupid question. 'I have been fishing like that since I first learned to use a bow. What harm did I do?'

'Harm?' Jenna drew a breath and made an obvious effort to control her-to Coryn-surprising anger. 'Didn't your grandmother teach you anything? '

The girl bit back her growing temper. 'Umma taught me a lot, nearly everything that I know!' she retorted. In the face of Jenna's stony silence she continued. 'About that, what you call 'wild magic,' I guess I figured some things out for myself. But Umma knew and didn't care. Why are you so upset?'

'You wouldn't understand,' Jenna said sternly.

'Of course not! You won't tell me anything! How am I supposed to understand anything?'

'Now is not the time. Throw those fish away-I will not eat them, and neither will you. We have plenty of flatbread and dried fruit for dinner. That will serve us as well tonight as it has for the past weeks.'

Coryn stared at the older woman. Jenna met her gaze directly, but her eyes glanced down at the fish with an expression of real disgust. Slowly Coryn came to a surprising realization: Jenna was not so much angry as frightened!

Still reluctant, the girl went back to the stream, and dropped her catches into the flow. Swiftly the three dead trout were carried out of sight.

They ate their bread and fruit in silence, Cory stealing sidelong glances at the woman in the red robe. Jenna had stored her books away, and now she seemed distracted, looking into the surrounding woods with an intense, staring expression. Coryn cleaned up their few dishes, banked the fire against the morning's chill, and then sank into her bedroll with a strong sense of unease.

The tension lingered as she lay on the hard ground, staring at the small patch of stars visible through the ring of trees. She turned to look at Jenna, who was wrapped up in her own blankets on the other side of the fire, and who, from the sound of steady breathing, was sound asleep.

In the darkness and the silence of the deep forest, Coryn began to muster her defiance. Someday soon she would confront Jenna about her mysterious edict. Why did she fear the wild magic? The girl felt certain that Jenna was no stranger to magic! Jenna's lighted medallion was but one small example of things Coryn had observed. But why would one kind of magic cause her to react with such fear, when she willingly used her own powers with merely a whispered word, or the deft maneuvering of her fingers?

She knew such whispered words from Umma's books, the books that she had committed to memory years ago. One word, spoken by pure instinct, had saved her from the walrus-men as it whisked her, still wet from lying in the soggy snow, onto the floor of Umma's cottage.

She remembered the word Jenna murmured when she summoned the light from her medallion. Would that word work for her?

It was with a sense of rebellious determination that she rolled onto her side, her back toward the low fire and the sleeping woman beyond. Cory didn't have a medallion, but reaching out a hand, she felt around until she found a small stone, small enough that she could easily hold it in the palm of her hand.

As softly as she could, she whispered the remembered word, focusing the power of the magic on the stone cupped in her fingers. Immediately, to her delight, it came to light, spilling a surprising brilliance over the ground, across the clearing, and into the nearby fringe of woods. The girl listened for any disruption in Jenna's breathing. Convinced that the Red Robe still slumbered, the girl uncapped her fingers slightly and let the beams of light play across the trees, the moss-draped branches, and the trailing vines…

And then she saw the black-cloaked figure standing there at the edge of the woods, regarding her with an expression of keen interest.

Coryn gasped and sat up, raising the stone so that its full light spilled wildly into the woods. With a grimace, the stranger-he was a rather handsome man, she noticed vaguely-raised a hand to shield his eyes from the rays.

'Would you mind?' he asked, pleasantly enough, as he strolled forward into the clearing.

'I–I don't know how to stop it,' Coryn admitted, though she cupped the stone tightly to cover its brightness.

'Then your mistress is doing a poor job of teaching you,' the stranger remarked. He was dressed in a sleek black robe, the fabric intertwined with silvery threads that picked up and reflected the light. He had an expression of mild amusement on his face as he looked past Coryn toward the sleeping Jenna.

'Mistress?' Coryn suddenly realized she needed to raise an alarm. 'Jenna-wake up!' she cried. Her eyes remained fixed upon the robed traveler, as Jenna immediately stirred herself.

'Of all people-Dalamar!' she snapped, her tone angry. 'What are you doing here? Get away from her-get away from both of us!'

'Not so quickly, mistress of the Red Robe,' said the man dressed in black. He walked past Coryn as if the girl didn't exist, his eyes fixed upon the woman, his face still creased by that expression of mild amusement.

He was the most magnetic person Cory had ever seen. His eyes were wide and unusually large, shaped kind of like almonds, she decided. His face was so smooth that, though he was clearly an adult, his skin showed no signs of ever having been touched by a razor. The cowl of his black hood covered much of his head, but she could see enough of him to realize that he had light-colored, beautiful hair. He walked with a sense of utter assurance, and even as he crossed the grassy ground-littered with fallen twigs, as she had noticed when gathering firewood-his steps made no sound.

'You are a difficult person to find,' said the one called Dalamar. 'I have been seeking you for some time, but did not expect to run into you so far from your usual haunts. What brings you here, to wild Qualinesti?'

'I needed to get out of the city,' Jenna retorted, without conviction.

'I suspect there is more to it than that. I think you are here for much the same reason that I am here. What I can't figure out-at least, I couldn't figure out until tonight-is why you brought this girl.'

'You've been spying on us?' blurted Coryn. 'For how long have you been hiding there in the woods?'

'It is no use asking questions of one wearing the black robe,' Jenna interjected sharply. 'His answer will be what he wants us to hear, but it will bear no relation to the truth.'

'Tsk, tsk,' Dalamar chided. 'Leave it to the Red Robe to lecture about self-serving behavior.' He turned to regard Coryn, favoring her with just a hint of a smile. 'Has she been treating you well? Teaching you things, is she?'

'I-well, yes. She treats me fairly.' Cory was confused, her mind whirling. She felt oddly compelled to come to Jenna's defense. 'She is my mistress, and I try to serve her well. But you are wrong about one thing: She is not my teacher.'

At that, Dalamar smiled broadly. 'I see… you're just a humble servant girl who makes pebbles glow in the dark. Well, that certainly makes sense-can't have the servants stumbling around in the thick of the night. I don't know how many times I've heard Jenna say those very words.'

'Who are you?' demanded Coryn. She was undeniably flattered when he bowed, deeply, looking out from the cowl of that dark hood to look her squarely in the eyes.

'Forgive me. I am called Dalamar the Dark, and I have long been an associate of your mistress.' Startlingly, he winked. 'You can tell by the warm greeting she has offered an old friend, after a long time apart.'

'Get away from her-and me. I mean it, Dalamar,' Jenna was saying. She stood now, wearing her red robe and glaring at the intruder. 'She is the granddaughter of an old friend and has nothing for the likes of you.'

Still those almond eyes lingered, making Coryn suddenly conscious that she wore only her nightshirt. She pulled the blankets up over her chest, but continued to meet Dalamar's eyes until, with visible reluctance, he turned back to Jenna.

'I have no ill designs on her, or yourself, for that matter,' he said pleasantly. 'But we do need to talk, and I have come a long way to find you. Perhaps your… 'servant' could add some wood to this fire, and we might make ourselves comfortable.'

Coryn watched Jenna, who glared at Dalamar with an expression of furious distrust. Nevertheless, Jenna finally sighed and nodded in acquiescence. 'Bring some more wood,' she said to the girl. 'And heat some water for tea.'