Through the Darkness

At last, the Algarvians stopped pounding the encampment. Maybe they ran out of eggs, Garivald thought. He couldn’t think of anything else that would have made them stop. He got to his feet. Obilot was rising from another hole a few feet away. They gave each other shaky smiles, glad to be alive.

“No more magecraft!” Munderic was screaming at Sadoc. “No more, do you hear me?” Garivald couldn’t make out what Sadoc answered. He just wished Munderic had done his screaming sooner.

Vanai’s heart thudded. She hadn’t known such a blend of fear and hope and excitement since that time in the oak woods when she first decided to give herself to Ealstan. She glanced over to him. “You know what to do in case this goes wrong?”

“Aye.” He held up the leaf of paper she’d given him. “I recite this and, if the powers above are in a kindly mood, it cancels the whole spell, including whatever’s gone awry.” He looked anything but sure the counterspell would perform as advertised.

Since Vanai wasn’t sure it would, either, she said, “I hope you won’t have to worry about it.” She took a deep breath. “I begin.”

This time, the spell was in Kaunian. Logically, she knew that didn’t matter; mages who worked in Forthwegian--or Algarvian--could perform as well as any others. But, as soon as the first words fell from her lips, she felt far more confident than she had when reciting the muddy, muddled Forthwegian spell in You Too Can Be a Mage. Here, in this version she’d shaped, was what that spell should have said. Rightness seemed to drip from every word.

She hadn’t changed the passes much, nor the contact between the lengtlis of golden and dark brown yarn. The trouble had lain in the words. She’d known as much when she tried the Forthwegian version. Now she’d fixed those words, or thought she had.

I’ll know soon. She wanted to look at Ealstan, to judge by his expression how things were going. But she didn’t. She made herself concentrate on what she was doing. She was no great mage. She would never make a great mage, and knew as much. But that was all the more reason to concentrate. A great mage might get away with a lackluster bit of sorcery. She never would. She knew that, too.

“Transform!” she said, first in the imperative--a command to the spell--and then in the first person indicative--a statement about herself. And then she did let her eyes go to Ealstan. Either the spell had worked, or it hadn’t.

To her intense relief, Ealstan still looked like his Forthwegian self. She hadn’t given him the seeming of a Kaunian, as she had in her last foray into magecraft. But what, if anything, had she done to herself? She looked down at her hands. They hadn’t changed, not to her eyes. But then, they wouldn’t have. She couldn’t see the effects of a transformation spell on herself, not even in a mirror.

Ealstan’s eyes widened. Something had happened to her, but what? When he didn’t say anything, Vanai asked, “Well? Am I still me, or do I look like a golden grasshopper?”

He shook his head. “No, not a golden grasshopper,” he answered. “As a matter of fact, you look just like Conberge.”

“Your sister? A Forthwegian? Really?” Vanai sprang out of her chair and threw herself into his lap. After she kissed him, she leaped up again. She wanted to bounce off all the walls at once, because the flat would imprison her no more. “A Forthwegian! I’m free!”

“Hang on.” Ealstan did his best to sound resolutely sensible. “You’re not going out into Eoforwic just yet.”

Vanai put her hands on her hips. “And why not?” She did her best to sound dangerous. “I’ve been cooped up here the past year and a half. If you think I’m going to wait one instant longer than I have to, you’d better think again.” She glared at him as fiercely as she could.

Instead of intimidating him, the glare made him laugh. “Now you look the way Conberge does when she’s mad at me. But I don’t care whether you’re mad at me or not. I’m not going to let you go out that door till we find out how long the spell lasts. Wouldn’t do for you to get your own face back in front of a couple of redheaded constables, would it?”

As much as she wanted to stay angry at him, Vanai discovered she couldn’t. He was sensible, and he’d just proved it. “All right,” she said. “I don’t suppose I can quarrel with that. And I don’t suppose”--she sighed-- “another little while in here will matter too much. But oh!--I want to get out so much.”

“I believe it,” Ealstan said. “How long do you think the spell will last?”

She could only shrug. “I have no idea. I’ve never done this before--except when I turned you into a Kaunian that one time, I mean. It might be half an hour. It might be three days, or even a week.”

“All right.” Ealstan nodded. “We’ll find out. I’d bet practiced mages can tell right from the beginning how strong a spell they’re making.”