The Magicians' Guild

Chapter 3

Old Friends

'She's a tag.'

The voice was male, young and unfamiliar. Where am I? Sonea thought. Lying on something soft, for a start. A bed? I don't remember getting into a bed -

'Not a chance.'

This voice was Harrin's. She realized he was defending her, and then the significance of what the stranger had said sank in and she felt a belated relief. A tag was a spy in the slang of the slums. If Harrin had agreed, she would be in trouble ... But a spy for whom?

'What else could she be?' the first voice retorted. 'She's got magic. Magicians have to be trained for years and years. Who does that stuff 'round here?'

Magic? Memories came back in a rush: the square, the magicians ...

'Magic or no magic, I've known her as long as I've known Cery,' Harrin told the boy. 'She's always been right-sided.'

Sonea barely heard him. In her mind she saw herself throwing the stone, saw it flash though the barrier and strike the magician. I did that, she thought. But that's not possible ...

'But you said yourself, she's been gone for a few years. Who knows who she's been hanging about with.'

Then she remembered how she had drawn upon something inside her - something that she should not possess ...

'She's been with her family, Burril,' Harrin replied. 'I believe her, Cery believes her, and that's enough.'

... and the Guild knows I did it! The old magician had seen her, had pointed her out to the others. She shuddered as the memory of a smoking corpse flashed through her mind.

'I warned you.' Burril was unconvinced, but sounded defeated. 'If she squimps on you, don't forget who warn -'

'I think she's waking up,' murmured another familiar voice. Cery. He was somewhere close.

Harrin sighed. 'Out, Burril.'

Sonea heard footsteps moving away, then a door closing.

'You can stop pretending to be asleep now, Sonea,' Cery murmured.

A hand touched her face and she blinked her eyes open. Cery was leaning over her, grinning.

Sonea pushed herself up onto her elbows. She was lying on an old bed in an unfamiliar room. As she slid her legs down to the floor, Cery gave her an assessing look.

'You look better,' he said.

'I feel fine,' she agreed. 'What happened?' She looked up as Harrin moved to stand before her. 'Where am I? What time is it?'

Cery laughed. 'She's fine.'

'You don't remember?' Harrin crouched so that he could stare into her eyes.

Sonea shook her head. 'I remember walking through the slums but...' She spread her hands. 'Not how I got here.'

'Harrin carried you here,' said a female voice. 'He said you just fell asleep while you were walking.'

Sonea turned to see a young woman sitting in a chair behind her. The girl's face was familiar.

'Donia?'

The girl smiled. 'That's right.' She tapped a foot on the floor. 'You're in my father's bolhouse. He let us put you here. You slept right through the night.'

Sonea looked around the room again, then smiled as she remembered how Harrin and his friends used to bribe Donia into stealing mugs of bol for them. The brew was strong and had made them giddy.

Gellin's bolhouse was close to the Outer Wall, among the better built houses in the part of the slums called Northside. The inhabitants of this area called the slums the Outer Circle in defiance of the inner-district attitude that the slums were not part of the city.

Sonea guessed she was in one of the rooms Gellin let out to guests. It was small, the space taken up by the bed, the tattered chair Donia sat in and a small table. Old, discolored paper screens covered the windows. From the faint light shining through them, Sonea guessed it was early morning.

Harrin turned to Donia and beckoned. As the girl pushed herself out of the chair, Harrin hooked a hand around her waist and pulled her close. She smiled at him affectionately.

'Think you could fish us up something to eat?' he asked.

'I'll see what I can do.' She sauntered over to the door and slipped out of the room.

Sonea sent Cery a questioning look and received a smug grin in reply. Dropping into the chair, Harrin looked up at Sonea and frowned. 'Are you sure you're better? You were out of it last night.'

She shrugged. 'I feel good, actually. Like I've slept really well.'

'You have. Almost a whole day.' He shrugged, then gave her another appraising look. 'What happened, Sonea? It was you who threw that stone, wasn't it?'

Sonea swallowed, her throat suddenly dry. She wondered for a moment if he would believe her if she denied it.

Cery put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed. 'Don't worry, Sonea. We won't tell anybody anything if you don't want us to.'

She nodded. 'It was me but ... I don't know what happened.'

'Did you use magic?' Cery asked eagerly.

Sonea looked away. 'I don't know. I just wanted the stone to go through ... and it did.'

'You broke through the magicians' wall,' Harrin said. 'That would have to take magic, wouldn't it? Stones don't usually go through it.'

'And there was that flash of light,' Cery added.

Harrin nodded. 'And the magicians' sure got fired.'

Cery leaned forward. 'Do you think you could do it again?'

Sonea stared at him. 'Again?'

'Not the same thing, of course. We couldn't have you throwing stones at magicians - they don't seem to like it much. Something else. If it works, you'll know you can use magic.'

She shuddered. 'I don't think I want to know.'

Cery laughed. 'Why wouldn't you? Think of what you could do! It'd be fantastic!'

'No one would ever give you any rub, for a start,' Harrin told her.

She shook her head. 'You're wrong. They'd have more reason to.' She scowled. 'Everyone hates the magicians. They'd hate me, too.'

'Everyone hates Guild magicians,' Cery told her. 'They're all from the Houses. They only care about themselves. Everyone knows you're a dwell, just like us.'

A dwell. After two years in the city, her aunt and uncle had stopped referring to themselves by the term the slums dwellers gave themselves. They had made it out of the slums. They had called themselves crafters instead.

'The dwells would love having their own magician,' Cery persisted, 'especially when you start doing good things for them.'

Sonea shook her head. 'Good things? Magicians never do anything good. Why would the dwells think I'd be any different?'

'What about healing,' he said. 'Doesn't Ranel have a bad leg? You could fix it!'

She caught her breath. Thinking of the pain her uncle suffered, she suddenly understood Cery's enthusiasm. It would be wonderful if she could fix her uncle's leg. And if she helped him, why not others?

Then she remembered how Ranel regarded the 'curies' who had treated his leg. She shook her head again.