Tales of Ethshar

toward the cluster of buildings that he could not help thinking of as a village, though he had no idea whether that was really an accurate description.

As he drew near he decided that they were indeed houses, and did indeed comprise a village. They were built of some hard, golden-brown material — stone or brick or dried mud, he couldn’t tell which. There were many small windows, and a few arched doorways. Arvagan had said that the builders might not be human, but the proportions looked right for humans; Hanner didn’t see anything particularly odd about the houses.

Beyond the village the land continued to fall away, and he could see the ocean, or something very like it, spreading out in the distance. A tree-lined stream gurgled its way past the village, which accounted for the splashing he had heard, and the leaves rustled in the gentle breeze.

It was very pleasant, really. Arvagan had said that he couldn’t guarantee anything about this place, that there might be hidden dangers, anything from insidious poisons to rampaging monsters to distorted time, but to Hanner it looked calm and inviting. The stream would presumably provide water, and the land looked fit for growing food; there might be fish in the sea, or even clams to be dug along the shore.

Or if appearances were deceiving, and that somehow proved impossible, if the tapestries continued to work as promised he could still have food and even water brought in from Ethshar.

Unless there were some nasty surprises awaiting him, he had his refuge — a place where warlocks could come to escape the Calling.

He wandered around for what felt like an hour or so, exploring the houses. They were largely unfurnished, as if their intended inhabitants had never arrived, never brought their belongings.

That was fine. That was perfect.

The air was sweet, the sun was warm, and there was no Call. It was everything Hanner had wanted.

And in one house, just as Arvagan had said, was the other tapestry, the one depicting the attic of Warlock House that had once belonged to Hanner’s uncle, Lord Faran. That bare, dim room looked dismal compared to the bright sunlit refuge, but Hanner did not hesitate; he knew his wife was waiting for him there. Mavi and the children had been worried about him; this refuge would be a relief for them all, even if none of the others ever set foot in it. Hanner walked up to the tapestry, and put a hand and a foot out to touch it, eager to tell Mavi the good news.

He knew the Calling would return, but he assumed it would take a few seconds to reach its old force. He thought he was ready for it.

Then he was in the attic, back home in Ethshar of the Spices, and he was wrong. There was no delay at all. The Call was instantaneously a deafening, irresistible screaming in his head, and he had had no time to prepare, no chance to brace himself; after an hour of freedom his resistance was gone, and he could not restore it quickly enough. There was one final instant of clarity, one glimpse of Mavi waiting, staring at him as he appeared out of thin air, and then there was no room in his mind for any thought but the desperate need to get to Aldagmor as fast as he could, by any method he could. Nothing could be permitted to stand in his way, and with a wave of his hand he shattered the sloping ceiling, splitting the rafters and tearing wood and tile to shreds as he soared out into the sky. He could not spare so much as a second to tell his wife goodbye before flying northward.

He did not hear Mavi call his name, did not hear her burst into tears as he vanished. He did not see Arvagan’s apprentice rush up the attic stairs to her side, to catch her before she collapsed.

By the time the apprentice brought Mavi to Arvagan’s shop, Hanner was thirty leagues from the city. By the time word went out to the Council of Warlocks, Hanner was in Aldagmor. He could not tell them what had happened. He could not tell them that the refuge was a success, and only failed because he had been caught off- guard by the sudden instantaneous return of a Calling he had only barely been able to resist before he stepped through the tapestry.

All they knew was that Hanner, Chairman of the Council, had stepped through the Transporting Tapestry still able to fight the Call, and upon emerging had instantly flown off to Aldagmor.

There were some who theorized that the Call was somehow stronger on the other side of the tapestry, some who thought the magic of the tapestry itself somehow added to the Call’s power, some who really didn’t care about the details, but the Council as a whole agreed: The Chairman’s attempt at creating a safe haven for high-level warlocks had failed. The tapestry was rolled up and stored securely away — after all, it was bought and paid for — and a new Chairman was elected.

And the Calling, that inexplicable melange of nightmares and compulsions, continued to snatch away any warlock who grew too powerful.

About “The Frog Wizard”

Okay, this one needs some explanation, as it’s never been published in this form before.

Long ago I bought a blank book, wrote and illustrated a story in it, and gave it to my girlfriend for Valentine’s Day. Then later, when she had more or less forgotten about it, I stole it back and wrote and drew another story in it, and gave it to her for Valentine’s Day. I did this until the book was full — not every year, but most.

They weren’t romantic stories; they were silly children’s stories. One of them was called “The Frog Wizard.”

Many, many years later, after the book was long since full and she and I were long since married, I read some of the stories to our kids, and it occurred to me that a couple of them might be worth reworking and selling. I proceeded to rewrite “The Frog Wizard” in several versions — six in all. One of them was an Ethshar version. I actually sold one of the other versions, though; it was published in the January 1993 issue of Science Fiction Age . The Ethshar version was shelved and forgotten about — until I started assembling this book, when I realized that if I was going to be complete, it needed to be included. So here it is, a technically-never- before-published Ethshar story. And yes, it’s canon; the wizard’s spell is a variant form of Llarimuir’s Mass Transmogrification, and Mreghon is in the northwestern Small Kingdoms.

The Frog Wizard

Long ago, in the Small Kingdoms, in the most easterly corner of a land called Mreghon, there lived a wizard whose name is forgotten.

He never used it much in any case, since a wizard’s true name gives power to other wizards who know it, and any name used often enough might become a true name. His neighbors were generally content to simply call him “the wizard,” and he was content to be called that.

However, as it happens, he was not really very much of a wizard, despite his best efforts. No matter what he did, no matter how hard he tried, no matter how much he studied, he could work only one single piece of real, genuine magic.

His neighbors were not aware of this shortcoming, because he was very good at sleight-of-hand and at all manner of stunts that looked like wizardry. He could convince anyone who dropped by that he knew all manner of fine spells, could make small objects appear and disappear, could transform handkerchiefs into pigeons, and so forth.