John Dalmas - The Lion Returns

They made excellent time, by normal standards, but they could have done better.

Macurdy and Vulkan crossed the Big River to Parnston, in the Outer Marches. Macurdy rode a ferry, while Vulkan swam, his body unseeable but his wake quite visible. If one looked. It was the odd sort of sight people tend to suppress, denying their senses.

Vulkan "talked" less than he had early on, but still from time to time he spoke at some length, usually in response to a comment or question by his rider. On the first morning north of Parnston, Macurdy was worrying about the powers they were up against in the Voitusotar.[1] "The voitar I've known were all a lot more talented than me," he said.

‹What of Corporal Trosza, of whom you told me?›

Macurdy frowned. "Trosza wasn't typical."

‹In what respects was he not typical?›

Macurdy regarded the question for a moment. "Actually he probably was fairly typical. What I should have said was, my voitik instructors at Schloss Tannenberg and Voitazosz were a lot more talented than me. But people like them-masters and adepts-are what I'm worried about the most."

‹Concern is appropriate, for they are indeed formidable. But in some respects less than you imagine.›

Macurdy didn't reply. He sensed there was more to come.

‹Their psychic powers are narrow. As straightforward magicians, they are not exceptional. I doubt very much that any approach Sarkia in breadth and flexibility of magical response to situations. I speak, of course, of Sarkia as she was before her decline. And probably none of them approach you in psychic perception. Their great superiority is in major sorceries, sorceries requiring time and favorable circumstances to engineer, so to speak.› He paused. ‹I do not refer to arrangements or alliances with demons or the devil. Neither of which exist in the occult sense, though some voitar-and some humans and ylver-can behave quite satanically. What voitik adepts, and particularly masters have is an ability to manipulate astral matter, and susceptible forces of nature known as elementals. A talent largely absent among human beings and ylver.›

"Wait a minute!" Macurdy said. "How do you know all that?"

‹I have access to areas of general knowledge, with regard to sentient beings in this particular pair of universes. It is attributable in part to my status as a bodhisattva, and to those areas of knowledge I was given access to in preparation for my task. Knowledge now clarifying for me as my task clarifies.

‹Beyond that it derives from my own observations of humans and ylver.› He turned his head, regarding Macurdy with one red eye. ‹But what I know of the Voitusotar is partly from one of my own land. He has paid no attention to them for some time now, and they were never his focus. But at one time he made a minor study of them. Through proxies. Your own observations fit his knowledge nicely.›

"You mean there are giant boars across the Ocean Sea?"

‹Two of them. One in the west-west central, actually-and one in the east. We communicate from time to time, as the notion takes us.›

It was Macurdy's turn to be silent. He had things to ponder, and he wasn't much for pondering.

Several days later, at a village three miles south of Ternass, they encountered a half-starved child, seated on a bench outside a tavern. One leg was crudely splinted, and a crude crutch leaned beside him. He was, Macurdy thought, about ten years old. The boy's aura told him what the problem was-a crush fracture of the lower leg, both tibia and fibula. The pictures embedded in the aura showed Macurdy more than enough, and the event that broke the leg was not the worst.

Clearly the leg would mend crooked and short; the boy would be seriously crippled. Macurdy went over and squatted in front of him. "What happened?" he asked softly.

"I got run over by my dad's cart," the boy answered. His voice was a soft monotone.

"It must be a heavy cart."

The boy pointed at it, a dozen yards away. It held a dozen large burlap sacks of coal. A tall jaded mule stood harnessed to it, hitched to a rail.

"It was piled high with wheat sacks that day," the boy said.

"How did he happen to run over you?"

The answer was little more than whispered. "It was an accident."

"How come you're here, instead of at home?"

The boy said nothing.

"Is it all right if I heal it? I'm a healer."

The boy looked at him, but did not meet his eyes. "You better ask my dad."

"In there?" Macurdy gestured at the tavern.

The boy nodded.

"How will I know him?"

"He's big, and his clothes has got coal dust on them."

"Thank you," Macurdy said, "I'll ask him," and went inside.

The Marches were prosperous enough that glass was commonplace, and the tavern was decently lit, through windows less dirty than they might have been. There were only four customers at that hour. Macurdy spotted the carter and walked over to him. "What are you drinking?" he asked cordially.

Whatever it was, the man had had a few already. He scowled at Macurdy, who as usual had left his sword on a saddle ring. "I never seen you before," the carter said. "You got no business with me."

"I used to be well known around here, when you were young. Really well known at Ternass. You just don't recognize me."

"When I was young, you weren't hardly born."

"I'm a lot older than I look. My name's Macurdy."

The man glowered. The barkeeper and the other patrons had been more or less aware of the conversation; now the name Macurdy locked their attention. One of them in particular stared. His stubbly beard was gray, his hair getting that way. "God love me, it is him!" he murmured. "Or his double!"

Macurdy ignored them. "I saw your boy on the bench out front," he said to the carter. "He's going to be a cripple. Unless I heal him."

"He's none of your business, and neither am I."

Macurdy reached into his belt pouch and took out several silver teklota. "I thought I'd take him to Ternass with me, heal him, and leave him at the fort."

The man's voice raised. "Trying to buy him, are you! Healing's no part of what you got in mind! Get out of here before I call the constable!"

Macurdy grabbed the man's heavy wool shirt front and jerked him close. "Call the constable," he hissed, "and I'll tell him what you accused me of. In front of witnesses."

The carter's defiance took a shriller sound. "They heard nothing! They're friends of mine!"

He looked around. No one said a word. They weren't his friends; they knew him too well. Macurdy let the man go and turned to the tavernkeeper. "Drinks for everyone; whatever they're drinking." He gestured at the carter. "Him too. I'll have ale."

The middle-aged tavernkeeper had never set eyes on the Lion of Farside before, but it seemed to him this was the man. He began to draw drinks.

The carter had turned away from Macurdy, to sip from the mug he already had. Macurdy rested a heavy hand on his shoulder. "I'm a wizard, you know. I can look at the boy and see what's happened to him. All of it."

The man didn't speak, didn't look at him, only took another swallow of ale. His aura had darkened as if with smoke from the coal in his cart.

"You got a wife?"

The head shook no.

"Died, did she?"

The head nodded, the aura darkening further. Macurdy wondered what she'd died of. "Ah," he said. "It's got to be hard, bringing up a boy without a woman in the house. Working all day to buy food. Hardly anything left for a drink after a hard day of loading, unloading, carrying… I bet you had it tough when you were a boy, too, eh?"

A remarkable tear swelled and overflowed, running down a grimy cheek to lose itself in stubble. Lightly, Macurdy clapped the man's shoulder. "Tell you what," he said. "I'll give you this gold imperial to close the deal. In front of these witnesses. I'll take him off your hands-" he paused "-and off your conscience. I'll take him to the fort, to their infirmary, heal him body and soul, and leave him with the commandant. They'll see he's taken care of, and you'll never see him again." Again he paused. "Never trouble him again."