Мерседес Лэки - Passages

She felt Timiyon crouch beside her, taking her arms and lifting her to her feet; then his hand traveled up her arm to her hand. He cupped her hand and gently finger-spelled his question, then finished by drawing the questioning glyph on the back of her hand: (Where?)

She reversed their hands and replied. (Inside something. Like egg.)

(Trap spell.)

Even Shasta recognized that.

(Light?)

Light, she could do. It was the first and simplest magic she ever figured out for herself. She reached into the magic within her, concentrated, and wove spiderwebs into a wan ball of amber light that appeared over her open hand. In a brief moment, she could see herself and Timiyon reflected in the curved surface around them before the light flared so blindingly and brightly white that she closed her fist and canceled the spell. She blinked several times to clear the sunspots and tears from her eyes.

Timiyon dropped her hand, and she suspected he was knuckling his eyes to dry them. It was a long moment before he took her hand in his hands again.

(Recognize spell. Trap for Mage. Daren’s grandfather took throne from oathbreaker brother. Mage ally made spell to trap royal Mages.)

Shasta smiled. He might not know magic, but royal history he knew very well.

Timiyon continued. (Spell famous. Court Mages copy.)

(This happened to Thayler?)

She could feel him nodding through the shaking of his hands. (Think so. Followed Vkandis. Always had light. Then darkness. No light. No sound. Vkandis Hell. Shock anyone.)

(No sound?)

(No sound. Trap silenced. Like you now.)

(How get out?)

(Unlock outside. Needs Mage.)

Shasta nodded; that was understandable, the spell was a jail, and that meant a jailer, and keys. (Master?)

(Journeyman locks, unlock. Simple spell, was told.)

Shasta made a silent vow to herself and to whichever gods listened to never learn or cast the trap spell, ever, if she ever completed her Journeyman Trial. (Only way?)

(Break spell from inside. Dangerous.)

(How?)

(Reflects spell like mirror.)

Shasta thought a moment. (Does more. Makes bigger.) She had felt the magic of the trap amplify as well as reflect the magic of the light.

Timiyon was still and silent for a long moment. (Very dangerous.)

(Now what?)

(What can we do?)

(We escape!?) Shasta couldn’t help her hands shaking, but she couldn’t tell whether it was from anger or fear. If there wasn’t another Mage to unlock them, then she had to do it herself.

(Why?) Shasta was certain Timiyon agreed, but he was testing her again.

(Mage escape. Jail still locked. We stay.) After all, jails were not meant to unlock themselves. (We escape, catch Mage.)

(Mage careful. Knows trap sprung. Not panic.)

Shasta pondered that point for a long moment. (Mage planned escape?)

(Mage smart. Retreat planned.) Timiyon was back to using military analogies, expecting the worst of his opponents. (Candlemark across border, disguise, Sunsguard bribes, safety.)

Shasta pondered that point for a long moment. (Wait candlemark, then release?)

(Maybe not from distance. Mage safe, why bother? Bigger problem. Not made for two people. Air gets stale. We fade, we die.)

Shasta gulped and clapped her other hand across her mouth. (How long?) And how did he know that? Timiyon was constantly bringing up odd bits of information like this. The one time she questioned him about it, his silent sad smile and slow shaking head told her it was a question best left unanswered.

(Can’t tell. Small space, two of us, think not long. Candlemark, maybe two.)

(We escape.) This was now more than just a matter of justice in Shasta’s mind, it was a matter of survival.

(We escape, chase Mage, maybe catch Mage, we live. Not escape, Mage escapes, maybe we die. Agree. Escape.)

(How?)

Timiyon was very still for several long breaths. (Don’t know.)

(Scared.)

(Scared, too.)

Not right! The thought tore through Shasta’s mind, and she lashed her fist out against the mirror wall. Her fist bounced back forcefully, causing her to ram the point of her elbow into the opposite wall. It was only by jerking her arm around herself, and almost striking Timiyon, that she avoided striking the near wall again. She bit her lip as tears flowed from her eyes.

(What?)

She was so distracted by the pain that she barely felt Timiyon’s question until he repeated it, again. She finally spelled out her response through the pain. (Hit mirror. Mirror hit back. Hit elbow. About hit mirror again.)

Timiyon’s fingers trembled on her own for a long pause. (Spell hit mirror. Mirror send spell back. Hits mirror, not you. Repeats.)

(So?)

(Spell break mirror, or spell drain magic. Trap breaks.)

Shasta thought about the idea, and she also thought about being trapped here with a spell bouncing around like an angry wasp. (Can’t control direction.)

(Make pipe. Direct spell.)

Shasta pondered the idea of a pipe, just big enough to guide a spark of a spell down its center, back and forth. She reached for the magic inside her and around her and wove a pipe out of spiderwebs between the closest, flattest sides of the mirror, taking special care to keep the pipe from touching the sides. She had to pause more than once, reaching for more magic, melding the rifts in the pipe, making sure to leave a seam to insert the critical spell. But when she reached for the magic around her to create the spell, all she found were tattered ends that sparkled into nothingness at her touch.

Shasta sagged back against the mirror. (No more magic.)

Timiyon took her fingers gently. (Always magic. Find magic.)

She gripped his hand so hard that it hurt her fingers, too. (Can’t!)

Timiyon gently pried her fingers apart. (Magic is. Trust self. Imagine what is.)

Water. Timiyon had told her that Mages said magic was like water, how it moved and flowed, how it carved channels and made streams and rivers. Magic didn’t feel like that to her; it wasn’t water, something poured out of a cup. Magic was pieces, a start and an end, of different lengths, of different colors. Then she remembered her mother’s sewing room and the skeins of thread hanging on the walls, so many colors, so many thicknesses, so many of them. (Thread! Magic is thread!)

(Imagine magic threads. Color? Shape? Size?)

Shasta gulped several deep, calming breaths. She was very good at imagining things. What would a stream of magic threads look like? She imagined a stream of threads, thin threads, thick threads, like the varied warp and weft of her mother’s rag-rug loom, flowing in many directions at once, and found it around her. (Yes.)

(See it. Touch it. Feel it.)

She imagined dipping her hand into the slow-running streams. They flowed around her fingers; some of the streams stung like nettles, some tickled. She reached for a thin, passive thread, plucking one color from a twisted skein that slithered along like a serpent. The thread was straw-amber in color, smooth and slippery as the finest silk, about the length of her outstretched hand, and no thicker than a strand of her hair. She imagined, no, she felt the thread pulse in time with her heartbeat.

(Take it. Hold it. Use it.)