Colors of Chaos

XV

AS CERRYL CROSSED the courtyard in the early afternoon, his eyes went to the blonde-haired figure in green in the shadows behind the fountain.

“Leyladin!” He hurried over to her. “When did you get back?”

“Late last night.” Her smile warmed him. “I slept for a while. I knew you were on duty early. Myral said you’d be here sometime after midday.”

“I have to report to Kinowin for the first few days on summer duty. That’s where I was. Tomorrow will be the last day of that.”

“Have you seen him? Today?”

Cerryl grinned. “Just left his quarters.”

“Could I entice you into something to eat at the house?” The green eyes danced.

“You could.” You could entice me into more than that…“I haven’t eaten much today.”

“I’m ravenous. Let’s go.” Her eyebrows arched. “Don’t expect me to be enticing in that way.” A playful smile followed.

Even as Cerryl flushed, he wondered if his thoughts had been that obvious.

They walked past the fountain and its cooling spray and through the entry foyer of the front Hall and out onto the Avenue, turning north. As they passed the square, Cerryl glanced westward where white clouds were beginning to pile into the sky. “We might have some rain this afternoon.”

“It rained almost every afternoon in Lydiar. There was mold everywhere.” Leyladin shuddered. “It’s a dirty place.”

“Compared to Fairhaven, everywhere I’ve been is dirty.”

A city patrol appeared ahead on the eastern side of the square, three guards in lancerlike uniforms, followed by a mage Cerryl didn’t know, escorting a man in chains along a side street away from the Avenue.

“You don’t see that very often,” Leyladin said.

“The patrols? No. That’s only the second or third time I’ve seen them since I’ve been in Fairhaven.”

“Sometimes you forget there are patrols.”

“Well…they do supply the prisoners who clean up the stable at the gate and the ashes if we have to destroy a wagon or cart.”

“They do? I didn’t know that.”

Cerryl glanced sideways at her, but Leyladin seemed perfectly sincere. “You’ve lived here all your life.”

“People here know the rules.”

The White mage reflected. For the most part, people did know the rules and abided by them. They put their refuse in the rubbish wagons, their chamber pots in the sewage catches, and there were no brawls or fights in the streets. There were seldom any brigands, and no beggars or homeless urchins-not that he’d seen. He frowned. “What happens to the really poor people?”

“Most of them live on the southwest side of Fairhaven.”

“I meant the ones without homes.” In his almost five years in the city, Cerryl had been so busy he’d never really thought about the homeless. In the mine and farm country where he’d grown up people and children worked or died, and he’d never had the time to really explore Fairhaven.

“The Patrol sends them out of the city. If they come back, they go on the road crew, except for infants or small children. They go to the other crèche. When they get older, they get apprenticed somewhere.” Leyladin made a vague gesture.

The road crew? For life, like all the others? He moistened his lips but concentrated on her words and offered a response. “Probably to the tanners and the renderers and trades like that.”

“It’s better than dying. It’s a trade and a living.”

Cerryl contained a wince. He could have been one of those children, but Leyladin was right. Even the road crew was better than dying, and not that much worse than grubbing in the fields for life-or working for a renderer.

“It’s a pretty day, much nicer than in Lydiar.”

“I’m sure,” he answered.

South of the Market Square, Leyladin turned left, and they walked the block to her house. There the blonde healer took out a large brass key and inserted it in the lock. “Soaris is off today, and Father is back in Vergren again. Then he’s going to Tyrhavven.”

“He was in Vergren the last time I talked to you.”

“He’s worried about something, but he hasn’t said much about it. I think it’s timber this time. That’s why he has to go to Sligo.” Leyladin opened the door and held it open.

Inside was cooler than in the afternoon sun, much cooler, and Cerryl blotted away the dampness on his forehead, hoping he would cool inside the granite dwelling.

“Meridis!” The blonde walked through the foyer into the silk-hung entry hall and then through another door.

Cerryl followed her into the kitchen.

The gray-haired Meridis, wearing a pale blue shirt and no overtunic, looked up from the worktable where she was rolling out something. “Lady, I did not expect you so soon.”

“We need something to eat. Nothing fancy. Fruit, cheese, some bread…”

“Aye, those I can do.” Meridis wiped her hands on the weathered gray apron cinched around her. “Go and sit down. Be but a bit. Even have some cool redberry. Now…you sit down.”

Feeling almost shooed from the kitchen, Cerryl followed Leyladin into a small room where a golden oak table with four chairs sat halfway into a hexagonal room, the outer three walls comprised of floor-to-ceiling windows facing north. Leyladin plopped down in a chair on one side of the table, her back to the windows.

Cerryl sat across from her. “Redberry?”

“I drink it when I can. Too much wine or ale, and I have trouble with healing. They say that the full Blacks on Recluce don’t drink wine or ale or spirits.”

Meridis appeared with a warm loaf of dark bread, a bowl filled with early peaches and green apples, and three wedges of cheese-one yellow, one yellow-white, and one pale white. Setting those down, she departed, only to return immediately with two platters and cutlery. A third trip brought two of the crystal goblets and two pitchers. “Redberry and golden ale. Now…eat afore you both melt.” A brusque nod preceded her departure.

“Ah…she…”

“Meridis is family. She’s not hesitated to let me know when she disapproved. She likes you. That’s why the ale.”

“How would she know?” Cerryl couldn’t help frowning. “She’s only seen me once-that I know of.”

“She makes up her mind quickly. She doesn’t change it easily.” A smile crossed Leyladin’s lips. “She’s usually right. Not always, but enough that I’d never wager against her. Neither would Father.” She poured ale for Cerryl and redberry for herself.

Cerryl waited for her to take a sip of her redberry before tasting the ale. “It’s good. Then, everything here is good.”

“Everything?” She arched her eyebrows.

“Everything.”

“I’m glad you approve. Have some cheese…or something. You’re pale.”

Cerryl cut several slices of cheese off each wedge and nodded to her.

“Thank you.” The healer took a wedge of the white and one of the yellow, then broke off a chunk of the dark bread.

Cerryl tried the pale white with bread. Before he knew it, he’d eaten three wedges of cheese with bread.

“You were hungry.”

“It’s been a long day,” he admitted.

“Yesterday was for me. I just about fell into my bed last night.”

“How is Duke Estalin’s son?”

“He will recover. He wasn’t that sick.” Leyladin shook her head. “Sometimes…” She looked at Cerryl. “You heard about Duke Berofar, didn’t you?”

He frowned. “Heard what? I don’t hear that much, not on gate duty, and not when I really don’t know that many of the full mages-the younger ones, I mean.”

“It couldn’t hurt to eat with a few others,” she pointed out. “The more who know you as a real person…”

He nodded. That made sense. “What about Duke Berofar?”

“He died. Gorsuch…I just don’t know.”

“Don’t know what?” Cerryl continued to feel that the more he learned about anything, the less he really knew. He took one of the green apples and cut it into wedges, then offered them to Leyladin.

“Thank you.” She took one and ate it. “Berofar-he’s from the old line out of Asula, and his first consort and his son and daughter died of the raging fever. That wasn’t ten years ago, and that left him without an heir. I don’t think he cares much for women. Still, he needed an heir, and that’s why he consorted again. Young Uulrac was born at the turn of spring four years ago.”

Cerryl ate two of the apple quarters and offered the last to the blonde healer. He cut another wedge of cheese for himself and listened.

“I think the Council will suggest that Gorsuch be one of the regents.”

“He’s the Council representative to Hydlen?”

She nodded. “Doesn’t it seem strange to you?”

“What?”

“Jeslek has you kill Lyam-and Lyam wouldn’t go along with the road taxes and tariffs, and the new prefect of Gallos knows that he could be removed if he doesn’t. The old Viscount of Certis opposed our tariffs, and he and his entire family died of the bloody flux. Duke Berofar was trying not to provide levies and troops for us…and as soon as I’m tending one duke’s son-where my absence would be a problem-Berofar dies…”

“Strange” wasn’t the word Cerryl would have used. He could see the patterns once he had the facts. He just didn’t know enough and wondered if he ever would. Fairhaven seemed so open and simple on the surface, like a calm ocean or lake, but most of what went on was below the surface. Was it that way everywhere?

“It’s possible,” he agreed.

Her eyebrows raised, as if in a question.

“That Sterol decided Berofar was a problem. I don’t think any of the more powerful mages-Sterol, Jeslek, maybe Anya, or Kinowin-would stop for a moment to remove a ruler who might thwart Fairhaven.”

“Doesn’t that bother you?”

Cerryl shrugged, then took another swallow of the ale and refilled his goblet before answering. “It does, and it doesn’t.”

“That’s a safe answer.” Her tone was bitter.

“That’s not what I meant. I haven’t seen any place like Fairhaven. The streets are clean. There aren’t many thieves. You can drink the water. You can buy most anything if you have the coins. People seem happy, most of them, and happier than the other places in Candar where I’ve been.”

“That’s because we push out those who are too poor or put them on road crews-or kill some of them if they make trouble.”

“True. But what’s the difference? In Fenard, the urchins live in the streets, and I’d wager most die young. Everyone has to worry about thieves and brigands, and there’s flux and misery everywhere. There the prefect lets people die and others do the killing. Either way, the poor either find a way to make a living or die. Here, though, everyone else is better off as well, and I’m probably proof that an orphan has a chance.”

“Don’t you see, Cerryl, that’s why you’re a mage? So that Sterol and Jeslek can say that even a poor boy can rise to being a White mage?”

“What about Heralt? Or Kinowin? And I don’t think Kiella exactly comes from coins.”

Leyladin looked down at the polished white oak table. “It’s the same thing.”

“Maybe.” He shook his head. “Maybe I am lucky. Am I supposed to turn away from it?”

“No. You have to make it better.”

“Me? A junior mage who’s a gate guard?”

“Myral said that you would be High Wizard.”

“Me?”

“He has these visions.”

Cerryl frowned again. High Wizard? A boy whose father was a renegade? That’s hardly likely. “Once…he did mention that he’d seen the future, after the Guild had fallen, and that Candar was filled with mad chaos wielders…I wondered.”

“Trust him. He sees more than he says.”

“So does Kinowin,” Cerryl said wryly, not wanting to think too much about Myral’s visions for him, not at all. “In a different way.”

“He does. Did you know that Kinowin’s a lot older than he looks?”

“Myral told me that.” Cerryl shook his head. “I wouldn’t have believed it.”

“Believe it. He’s like Myral. Very careful about how and when he raises chaos. You should follow their example about that.”

Cerryl nodded. He didn’t want to mention that he’d already patterned his use of order and chaos after Myral’s precepts-and what he managed to figure out from Colors of White. He cleared his throat, not wanting to dwell on the matters the healer had raised, not until he’d had a chance to think more. “I remember when I ate here before and I said how good everything was. You and your father looked at each other. That was because what you fixed was a simple meal for you, wasn’t it?”

Leyladin looked down, then at him. “Yes. I was afraid if you saw a real full-course dinner, you’d be so upset that you’d never see me again.”

“I’d see you again,” he protested. “I’m here.”

“I don’t know, Cerryl. You…when we were at Furenk’s…you were pretty stunned.”

“I didn’t know about the rear dining area. I’d eaten in the front before.”

“And you’d wondered at that.” Leyladin offered a small smile. “Didn’t you?”

“Ah…yes,” he admitted. “But I’m getting used to good food.”

“Then you will stay for dinner?”

Cerryl flushed. “I’d be hard-pressed to leave, lady.”

“I’m Leyladin, not lady.” She grinned.

“I’m Cerryl, and I would be delighted to stay.” He returned the grin. “Leyladin.”

Her deep green eyes danced, and with her smile, warmth flowed up from within him.