L. Modesitt - Wellspring of Chaos

“Are the east and west of Austra that different?”

“They are indeed.”

“Will the merchants and factors stand behind Lord Ghrant? I’d heard that someone on the factors’ council…”

“Guillam has left Valmurl. The others will hold for Ghrant, but it will be a hard battle because Ilteron has more than a few companies of Hamorian-trained free armsmen.”

“Free armsmen?”

“Armsmen who serve the highest bidder.”

“The Emperor of Hamor is paying them, you think?” asked Kharl. “With the brimstone going there, isn’t that likely?”

“How would one know? I would guess so, but that isn’t something that’s proof…” Hagen shrugged. “The highland barons love warfare, and they have waited for years to take revenge on the easterners and merchants.”

“If they are so warlike, how-”

“They are fewer, and they could never long hang together, and when Lord Estloch’s great-great-grandsire subdued them, he stationed armsmen all along the borders and stopped their raids. It was bloody, because the easterners lost twice as many men, but Lord Isthel kept the highlanders from getting enough food. After three years, they were starving, and he marched into the highlands and leveled all their keeps and took all their weapons. For two generations, he and his son garrisoned the west.” Hagen laughed, ruefully. “Then the garrison commanders became the lords of the highlands…”

Kharl shook his head.

“Seems like what the fathers learn, the grandchildren forget,” Hagen said. “Enough of that. I’m keeping you from your work, and we’ll need the Seastag back afloat as soon as we can.” He nodded. “Good to have you back.” Then he was gone.

Kharl turned his attention back to the planer and the next set of measurements. As always, he recalled his father’s maxim: Measure twice, cut once.

But he still fretted about landowners who seemed just like Egen. Did every land have them? What did it take to keep them from their evil? Was greater power or violence always the only answer? Then he shook his head, ruefully. Just what could a carpenter do?

Abruptly, he stopped.

Taleas had said that if he did not learn more about himself and the staff, he would end up as dead as Tyrbel. With turmoil everywhere he went, those words carried more impact.

For the next several days, Kharl and the rest of the crew worked from just before dawn to after dusk. By twoday of the following eightday, Kharl and Tarkyn had replaced all the damaged planks in the Seastag , including several that Tarkyn had not realized were damaged, but that Kharl’s order-senses had discovered. Kharl had been careful enough to show the damage with a hammer and chisel, rather than claiming anything.

In the evenings, on a straight-backed chair pulled up under one of the few wall lamps in the common room of the bunkhouse, Kharl had taken to reading and rereading sections of The Basis of Order .

He was puzzling over a phrase-“the greater the concentration of order within objects, the greater the amount of free chaos in the world.”

At that moment, the door to the outside opened, and a gust of wind whistled through the room for the instant that it took a short and stocky man in a brown cloak to enter and close the door behind him. The newcomer glanced around the common room before his eyes lighted upon Kharl. Nodding, as if to himself, he stepped forward.

Kharl closed the book, still holding it, and stood. Although he had never seen the man, he could sense the darkness of order surrounding him.

“I’ve heard about you-felt you as well.” The man was well muscled, if graying, and his hair and the tunic under his heavy brown cloak were almost the same shade. He pulled up a chair and seated himself but a few cubits from Kharl.

Kharl sat down slowly. “Felt me?”

“Bit old for a blackstaffer, though.”

“Blackstaffer?” Kharl shook his head. “I’m not from Recluce. I’m a cooper from Brysta. Or I was.” Who was the man, and what did he want with Kharl?

“You can’t stay as a ship’s carpenter forever, much as Hagen would like to keep you. Sooner or later, you’ll do too much, or one of Lord Ilteron’s mages will discover you’re here.”

“An assistant to a carpenter?”

“You’re a better carpenter than Tarkyn is. He knows it, and that’s why he has you doing the precise work. He’s been around long enough that it doesn’t bother him, and it makes his life easier.” The other smiled.

“Why are you here?” Kharl asked. “Who sent you?”

“No one sent me. I came to see you, to offer you some insight…if you’re interested. You should be, if you’ve got any sense.”

Kharl still felt uneasy and off-balance. “Why did you mention Lord Ilteron? And not Lord Ghrant?”

“Lord Ghrant doesn’t have any mages.”

Kharl guessed. “He has you…doesn’t he?”

The other smiled. “Such as I am, I suppose. I couldn’t do much against true chaos-wizards. My little tricks wouldn’t even slow them down. That’s why I stay away from the Great House. I’d just call attention to Lord Ghrant’s lack of magery.”

“What kind of tricks?”

“Each skill has to be learned. Most cannot be taught.”

Kharl snorted. “I can’t teach coopering to everyone, but I can teach it to those who have the good hands and the wish to learn. I don’t see that magery is that much different.”

“It’s not. But the costs are so much higher if the student is ungrateful.” The mage, if indeed he happened to be one, rose from the chair. “Now is not the time or place to talk. If you want to learn more, not that I can offer you more than a small portion of what you could do, you need to come find me. I’m in the Nierran Hills. That’s just northwest of here.”

“You walked here?”

“Why not? It’s only five kays, and I had to see who was creating such an order-focus. Besides, I could use the exercise.”

“Order-focus?” Kharl frowned and, when the other did not respond, asked, “Who told you to come to me, and how would I get away?”

“Just tell your captain that you’re going to see Lyras.” He wrapped his cloak around himself and walked to the bunkhouse door. With a brief wave, he was gone.

“Who was that?” called Reisl from the corner where he and several others were gaming.

“I don’t know,” Kharl said, then added, “He said his name was Lyras, but I’ve never seen him before.”

Reisl offered a cryptic smile and went back to gaming.

Kharl looked down at the book in his hand, thinking about what Lyras had said about the costs of magery being so much higher than those of coopering. After a time, he opened the book once more and began to read. He found it hard to concentrate on the words…or what they meant.

By midmorning of fiveday, Kharl knew he needed to talk to Hagen. After three days of thinking, of evenings spent reading The Basis of Order and learning little new from it, the words of both Taleas and Lyras had continued to hammer at him. So…during a break from working with the lathe to turn shafts for a bench back in the mess, Kharl eased away from the shed and toward the other side of the dry dock, where Hagen and Furwyl were standing and surveying the Seastag .

Kharl stood well back, under a welcome and even slightly warm sun, with the first clear skies in almost an eightday, waiting for the captain and first mate to finish their conversation, hoping for a break before too long.

“…tomorrow…the caulk’s set…after that?”

“…timbers not as seasoned as we’d like, ser,” Furwyl replied. “We’ll have to watch that for near-on half a year…couldn’t get the best seasoned timbers, not ones that’d take copper…”