The Flying Sorcerers

Blue twilight had faded and flashed into red dawn before we found a place to stop. We were on a rocky outcrop over-looking a series of rolling hills, a black wooded slope, and beyond that we could make out the vague distant shapes of a village of brooding housetrees.

Behind us, what had been a desert was fast becoming a sea.

It was not necessary to give the order to halt. Instinctively we knew we had done enough traveling for one day. Exhausted, the women sank to the ground, discarding their heavy packs and burdens where they fell. Children sank immediately into fitful slumber, and men stooped to massage their tired legs.

We were a sorry, shabby crew. The healthiest of us was in none too good a shape. Many had lost most of their body fur, and the rest had lost their grooming. (The knots and tangles in my own fur would be there until they grew out; they were too far gone for repair.) Open and running sores were not uncommon, and too many of our ailments did not respond to Shoogar’s ministrations.

My number two wife, one of the balding women, began to lay a meager meal before me. Under any other circumstances I might have cursed the poor quality of the food and beaten her for there being so little of it — but under our present conditions I knew that this was a hardwon feast. She had probably spent many hours searching for these pitiful greens and nuts. Still, it wasn’t what I was used to and I forced myself to eat it only with the greatest distaste.

As I sat there, silently chewing the tough vegetable fibers, a figure approached. I recognized the now nearly hairless Pilg; once our village crier, now a homeless vagabond, as we all were. He was thin and wan and his ribs made an ugly pattern under his skin.

“Ah, Lant,” he cried effusively, “I hope I am not interrupting anything.”

He was and he knew it. I pretended not to hear him at first, and I concentrated on a particularly tough root instead.

He threw himself down in front of me. I closed my eyes. “Lant,” he said, “it appears that we are nearing our journey’s end. Doesn’t that gladden your soul?”

I opened one eye. Pilg was eagerly eyeing my dinner bowl. “No,” I said, “it doesn’t.”

Pilg was uncrushed. “Lant, you should look on the joyous side of life.”

“Is there one?” I choked down the root and bit off another, smaller chunk.

“Of course. You should count your blessings. You still have four of your children and two wives and all your hair — and your first wife is with child. That is far more than I can claim.”

That was true. Pilg had lost his only wife and all but one of his children — and that one a girl — no credit there. Yet what I had lost was greater than what I had saved. I could not help feeling bitter.

“We have lost our whole village,” I said. I spat out a bitter shred at Pilg’s feet. He eyed it uncertainly, but pride won out over hunger. He would not eat it unless it was offered to him.

I would not do so. I had fed him three times in the past three hands of days and I had no intention of taking Pilg any closer into my family than that.

“But in no time at all, we will have won a whole new village,” Pilg exulted. “Surely, Shoogar’s reputation as a magician must have preceded us here. Surely, they will honor him and us alike.”

“And surely they will just as soon wish us elsewhere, Pilg. Look behind us. Look at where we have come from. Boggy marsh! And beyond that, water! The oceans are rising almost as fast as we can travel. The darkless season is upon us, Pilg. Hard times for any village. Surely they will have harvested their crops by now, and stored up only enough food to last them through the wading season. They will have none to spare for us. No — they won’t be very happy to have us join them.”

My mention of food had caused Pilg to salivate; the spittle ran down his chin — but social protocol held him back. He glanced again at the discarded bit of root near his foot. “But, Lant — look at the lay of the land here. This village that we are approaching is on a slope overlooking a great plain. They will have at least another twenty or thirty days before the water menaces them.”

“Granted,” I swallowed the mass I had been chewing.

“Perhaps we will be able to exchange some of our skills for some of their food.”

“And what skill will you trade them for?” I grunted. “Rumormongering?”

Pilg looked hurt. Immediately I felt sorry, it had been a cruel and unkind thing to say. Pilg had indeed suffered more than I, and it was unfair for me to add my mockery to his already heavy burden. “That was cruel, Lant,” he said, “if you want me to go, I will.”

“No,” I said, and immediately wondered why, for I did want him to go. “Don’t go until you have at least had something to eat.”

Curse it!

He’d done it to me again! I had sworn I was not going to invite him to partake — but he had annoyed me until I had insulted him, and then to assuage the insult, I had to prove to him that he had not annoyed me. I wondered if I was going to have to start eating my meals in secret just to avoid Pilg.

But he was right about that one point. Perhaps we would be able to trade some of our skills for some of their food. Probably my own trade of bonemongering was not as skill-fully practiced this far south as it was in the land we had journeyed from.

But so much of it depended upon the magician of this village. Would Shoogar be willing to swear an oath of truce for the duration of the wading season? Would the new magician even want Shoogar around, considering the strength of his reputation? Would you feel safe if a magician of such power wanted to move into your neighbourhood? If this new magician could not match Shoogar’s knowledge and skills, would Shoogar deign to treat him as an equal? Was there a magician anywhere who could match the powers Shoogar had already so dramatically demonstrated?

Shoogar might, just might, consider dueling this village’s magician for the right to rule the magic of this area. If he lost (an unlikely chance), we would have to keep moving — only this time without our magician. More likely, if he won, we would incur much ill will in this area, for is it not said that a new magician must take nine generations to be accepted by a tribe?

I feared for the inevitable meeting with these villagers and their Guild of Advisors. Hopefully, we would have time to rest before that meeting, but probably not. As soon as they became aware of our presence here on the slopes of their mountain, they would send an emissary.

There wasn’t much left of our Guild — we would be a sorry group of representatives: myself, of course; Hinc the Weaver, Pilg the Crier, Damd the Tree Binder, the one or two others. Ran’ll the Quaff-Maker had drowned in one of his vats, Tavit the Shepherd had been lost with much of his flock, and none of the remaining shepherds was yet old enough to replace him in the Guild. Some of the others had not survived our long trek south.

But the two Guilds would meet and hopefully we would work out some kind of agreement whereby we could camp on this land until the waters should withdraw. Then we would either seek a new area to plant our village, or petition for the right to remain.

But again, so much depended on the magicians.