Guild Mage: Apprentice

4. Magic is Like Fire

One of the two guards who had carried her up to Master Cushing’s chambers got Liv back down the servants’ stairs to the small room she shared with her mother, while the other man held doors. They introduced themselves as Ansel and Jacob; she’d always been a bit afraid of the Baron’s men, but they seemed nice enough. Once she was tucked into bed and wrapped in blankets, with her ankle up on a pillow, and Rosie under her arm, they returned to their duties. Gretta bustled in the door with a steaming bowl in her hands.

"I thought everyone went to the Frost Fair," Liv asked her.

"If I was ten years younger," Gretta said. "Last thing I need is to fall on the ice and end up with a broken ankle." She winked, and Liv pouted. "As soon as I heard your mother come crashing down the stairs like a bull in flood season, and she told me what happened, I knew you could do with a bowl of hot stew."

"Eat up, dear," Mama urged her. "I’ll fetch chairs from the kitchen."

The bowl was filled with drover’s stew, so hot that Liv needed to blow on it to avoid burning her tongue. Chunks of beef, bacon, sausage, potato, corn and beans threatened to spill out onto her lap, and the broth was flavored with garlic, onion, and peppers from the south. Though she’d stuffed herself with brisket only hours before, Liv crammed spoonful after spoonful into her mouth until the bowl was empty. Between the blankets and the stew, she finally felt warm and cozy, and neither Mama nor Gretta left her the entire time she ate.

"Kale Forester’s daughter?" Gretta asked, as Liv set her spoon down in the empty bowl. She realized they must have been speaking for sometime, but she hadn’t heard a word.

"That’s right," Mama said, taking the bowl away from her and setting it down on the floor. "Livy was the only one who saw her skating toward the thin ice. You scared me so much, dove," she said, reaching out to put a hand on Liv’s forehead. "Your hair is a rat’s nest. Let me comb it out for you."

"I didn’t actually get to her, though," Liv said with a frown. Her mother fetched the aspen-wood comb and began from the bottom, working the knots out of her damp hair. When it was wet, it looked more gray than white.

"Not with your body, no," Master Grenfell’s voice broke in from the doorway. "May I come in? I’ve visited little Emma, and I can tell you for certain, Liv, that you did save her life. Her father has her warmed up now, and I daresay she came out of the entire thing better off than you did."

"Please, come in, Master Mage," Mama said, leaving off with the comb and rising into a curtsy. Gretta followed, though not as quickly. The black mouser, Charlie, wound himself past their legs and hopped up onto the bed next to Liv.

"I’ll clear the bowl," the old woman said. "And you can take my chair, Master Grenfell. Would you like a bit of something to eat? I have more stew, and you’ve missed your evening meal at the fair."

"That would be quite nice, actually," the mage said, taking the chair. "You may be seated, Miss Brodbeck. You will want to be present for this conversation, I believe." Once Liv’s mother had taken a seat and gone back to work with the comb, Grenfell continued.

"Can you tell me what high magic is, Liv?" he asked, sitting back in the chair and fixing her with his eyes. She had the feeling that she was being tested or judged, and it made her nervous.

"What mages do," Liv answered. "And nobles." Charlie curled up in her lap and began to purr.

"That is true," Grenfell said. "But why? What makes it different from low magic - the kitchen songs you all sing down here, the spark charm to light the hearth? Your mother must know quite a few."

"Aye," Mama admitted. "The maiden’s charm, the charm of the whetstone…"

Grenfell nodded. "Good. How do those work, Liv?"

"Tamiris’ Gift," she said. "Everyone knows that. Like in the stories - after the old gods went away, he gave us magic."

"Charms are not precisely ours," the court mage said. "Think of them like a lock in a door. The lock is there, whether you have the key or not. It has been, since the day the door was hung."

Liv frowned. "So I can’t do magic, afterall?" she asked.

"Precisely the opposite," Grenfell said. "You can. What you did on the ice today was magic - not a charm, but high magic. You used a word of power, Liv, and that is a very special thing indeed. A special thing, and a dangerous thing."

The wooden comb yanked at a particularly vicious knot, and Liv yelped. "Don’t scare her, please," Mama said. "She needs to rest."

"She does," Grenfell agreed. "But she also needs to be safe. And that is why I am talking to her tonight. Liv, think carefully for me. Do you remember the word that you spoke today? Do not say it out loud, but just see if you can recall what happened and answer my question."

Cel?v?tis. The word came to her mind as easily as her own name, as the scent of the spices in the kitchen. The very thought made Liv shiver, and once again the image of snow-covered peaks filled her mind. "I remember," she told the mage. She had thought it would be the correct answer, but he frowned.

"It might be better if you had forgotten," Grenfell muttered. "First, Liv Brodbeck, I want you to make me a promise: you will not say that word again."

"Ever?" Liv asked.

"No," the mage said with a heavy sigh. "Promise me you will not use it within the castle, and not at all until I give you permission. Save in the defense of your own life, or the life of others."

Liv blinked. That was a lot, but she thought that she understood well enough. "Not indoors," she said. "And not until you tell me. Unless someone is in danger."

"That’s correct," Grenfell said.

"I promise."

"Good." The mage’s shoulders relaxed slightly, and when Gretta stepped through the doorway, he accepted the bowl of stew she offered.

"But why?" Liv asked. It was like trying not to brush a cut in your mouth with your tongue, now that she’d thought of the word. It wanted to be said; it was practically vibrating through her body in an effort to get out, but she had promised she wouldn’t.

Before he answered, Grenfell took a large spoonful of stew, chewed, and swallowed. "This is excellent," he complimented Gretta. "Young Miss Brodbeck. Where do you put a pot of stew to cook it?"

"Over the fire in the hearth," Liv said. She knew that nobles and mages had servants to cook for them; perhaps he had never made a meal in his life.

"Just so. Fire is very useful," Master Grenfell said with a nod. "We can cook with it. We use it to warm our houses and castles in the winter, to heat water for bathing. We use it to forge metal. But what would happen if you put your hand into the fire in that hearth?"

"I’d be burned," Liv answered.

"Magic is like fire," Kazamir Grenfell told her. "It is very useful. Tamiris’ Gift allows us to do many things - things far more wondrous than simply heating water, or making a stew. Not to disparage the skill of our cooks," he said, turning to Gretta and Liv’s mother with a smile and inclining his head. "But like fire, Liv, magic can burn you. You have a word of power, but not the slightest bit of training in how to use it. Have you ever baked a cake?"

Liv shook her head. "I help Mama stir the batter."

"If I gave you the ingredients, but no one to help, do you think you could do it alone?"

Liv thought about it, then shook her head. "I could do something," she admitted, "but it wouldn’t be right."

"Using that word is much more complicated than baking a cake," Grenfell told her. "And more dangerous. If you made a mistake, you would not simply be throwing out an overcooked dessert - you could hurt or kill yourself, or someone else. Today should be all the proof of that you need. You saved a little girl, but you also encased yourself in ice and nearly froze to death. The only reason that no one else was hurt was that you had run out from the crowd, and no one was close to you. It will not be safe for you to speak that word until you have been taught to use it."

Liv nodded; when he put it like that, things made a lot more sense. The word still vibrated restlessly somewhere in her chest, but she silently told it to go to sleep. "Will you teach me, then?" she asked the court mage. "So it’s safe?"

Grenfell frowned and leaned back, but it was Mama who answered. "Master Mage Grenfell already has students," she said. "And they pay for the privilege."

"Oh." Liv tried not to look disappointed.

"How much does it cost?" Gretta asked.

Master Grenfell looked over to the old woman, measuring her for a long moment, and then spoke. "The Mayor and Master Mason each pay me thirty-two gold crowns a year to tutor their daughters."

"We understand," Mama said. "We can’t afford that. She’ll just not use the magic, then."

"Nonsense. I will pay it," Gretta said.

"You can’t," Liv’s mother protested.

"Of course I can!" Gretta smiled. "I have no children, Maggie. The closest thing to a granddaughter I’ve got is our Livy. What else should I spend my wages on? I live at the castle, I eat in the kitchen. I don’t need new clothes or fancy things. What good will it do me to save a pile of gold for when I die?"

Grenfell turned to Liv. "It will be difficult," he warned her. "You will have to learn to read, first of all."

"I know how to read," Liv said. "At least, a little."

"We’re cooks," Mama explained to the mage. "We don’t read books, but we keep recipes. You’ll find she knows a bit of arithmetic, as well, Master Grenfell. Enough to measure cups and spoons. And she already knows the spark charm. She’s a bright girl."

"Very well," the mage said. "I will speak to the baron to see that you are excused from your duties for lessons. I suppose that at the same time, I will speak to him about your broken ankle, if Master Cushing has not already done so. Since you can read, I imagine you can write a little, as well?"

"A little," Liv agreed. She hoped that Master Grenfell would not ask her to show him; her letters were awkward and ill-shaped. To her disappointment, he removed a small leatherbound book, no larger than a man’s hand, from a pocket in his robes. With it, he produced a quill and a small bottle of ink.

"I would like you to write for me," Grenfell said, opening the book to a blank page, "the word you spoke today."

"I’m not certain how to spell it," Liv admitted.

"That is fine," the mage assured her. "Simply write it how it sounds to you."

"Is it dangerous to write?" Mama asked him.

"If it was, he wouldn’t ask," Gretta pointed out.

"Not dangerous at all, Miss Brodbeck," Grenfell assured her. "Not unless she were to write in the sigils of the old tongue. Which I believe we may safely assume young Liv does not know."

Liv shook her head, lifted the quill, and pulled the cork out of the bottle of ink. She rested the bottle on the bedside table, set the book in her lap, and dipped the quill. Carefully, she wrote out: Kelevatis, set the quill aside, and gave the open book to the mage.

Grenfell examined the page carefully. "Is there a reason you chose to use a ’k,’ rather than a hard ’c?" he asked her.

"I don’t know," Liv said. "I’ve never seen it written, I can just…hear it. How it sounds. Is that wrong?"

"That is the way the Eld of the North would write it," Master Grenfell said. "I thought it interesting, that is all." Liv felt as if the tips of her ears were on fire, and she resisted the urge to raise her hand and touch one. Grenfell blew gently on the ink, and rose from his chair. "Tomorrow is the eleventh day of the month," he said. "You will attend me in my chambers, with the other students, at the ninth hour. You will do so on every morning that is not a festival day or market day, so long as your tuition continues to be paid."

He rose from his chair, but did not move to leave the chamber, instead packing away the ink bottle, once again corked, in his robes. "When I give you work between lessons, you will complete it," he instructed her. "It is up to you to find the time between your duties to the baron and this castle. I will not accept excuses."

"Understood, Master Grenfell," Liv said, and raised her hand to cover a yawn.

"With that, I believe I will leave you to rest." The mage gathered up his book, holding it open, and the quill in his other hand.

"Let me get that door for you," Gretta said, and the room began to empty out. Liv, suddenly wanting nothing more than to curl up in her nest of blankets, turned over on her side, closed her eyes, and before she knew it, was asleep, with the cat snuggled up against her.

?

Liv wasn’t certain whether it was the throbbing ache from her ankle that woke her, or the fact that she was alone in the bed. She’d slept with her mother for as long as she could remember, since she was an infant, and it helped to keep them both warm on the coldest winter nights. But tonight, even the cat had gone, and the castle was a drafty place.

Outside in the hallway, something creaked.

Castle Whitehill was old, and as Gretta said, old buildings made noise. It was nothing to be frightened of - though the woman certainly enjoyed telling Liv ghost stories. Whether there was actually a rusted old axe at the bottom of the river that had been used to murder a man or not, Liv didn’t know. She did know that what she was hearing was not a normal night sound. It was the creak of a door.

The two castle mousers, Charlie and Peg, were usually silent unless they’d caught prey. Everyone had chamber pots in their rooms, so there was no cause for anyone in the servants’ quarters to be out of bed at whatever hour it was. Who was creeping about in the middle of the night?

Carefully, Liv pushed back her blankets, rotated her body, and got her good foot on the ground. She found that she could support her weight on one leg easily enough, and that by keeping a hand on the wall, she could hop along without much trouble. Her mother would be furious if she was caught, but what if something was wrong? Clad in her stockings and shift, Liv opened her door as quietly as possible, and ducked her head out into the hall.

She was just in time to see the door to the servants’ stairs swing shut. That meant that someone was heading up into the rest of the castle, where none of the servants should be in the middle of the night. For a moment, she considered going back into her room and looking for the crutch that Master Cushing had promised her, but it was dark and she might be left behind. Instead, Liv hopped out of her room and down the hall. When she got to the door, she cracked it open and peeked up the stairs.

Was that the faintest glow from a candle? She thought that it might be. Liv considered the problem of the stairs, and made a trial of putting her hands out to press against the stairwell on either side. She could support her weight with both hands, for a moment at least, while she swung her good foot up to the next step.

Liv hurried up the stairs as quick as she could, and did her best to remain quiet. She knew she wouldn’t be able to keep up with whoever was ahead, but the creak of another door told her their destination was on the second floor, right above her.

When she finally got out into the hallway, Liv couldn’t see any sign of where the mystery person might have gone to. She was just about to admit defeat when a chill breeze blew down the hall, lifting the hem of her shift. Liv set out into the wind, and found that the door to the Room of Curiosities was ajar.

If no one from the servants quarters should be on this floor, that went double for the Old Baron’s collection. The things in that room were precious, even Liv knew that, and none of the servants had any business with them. Perhaps Master Grenfell had come down to take a midnight snack from the kitchen, and then gone up to do more work? If so, she would feel rather foolish, but also a bit relieved.

Carefully, Liv made her way over to the door, being as quiet as she could. Rather than hop, she slid her foot along using her stocking, and leaned against the stone wall of the corridor. When she reached the door to the chamber, Liv saw the faintest glow of light from within, and the shadow of a person retreating from the window.

A cloud must have passed, because the pale light of the moon and the ring overhead flooded into the chamber all at once, revealing the face of Bill, the footman. Liv was just about to step forward and ask him what he was doing when a bat flew in through the window, just like the one she’d found in the morning.

Seeing the bat, Bill turned and hurried out of the room. Liv pressed herself back against the wall of the corridor, in the deepest shadow she could find, hoping not to be seen. He never even once looked in her direction, however, and headed directly for the servants’ stair, as if afraid.

Liv risked one look back into the chamber. The bat was gone, replaced by the shape of a woman, whose mane of dark hair rustled in the cold night breeze.

"Wren?" Liv asked, before she could think better of it.