The Flying Sorcerers

I trudged back down the hill toward the village. Spread below me was another facet of the airboat’s construction. Great swatches of cloth had been spread out across an unused slope and Grimm the Tailor was sewing them together to make the first of Purple’s giant airbags.

This was cloth that had already been treated in houseblood and tested for its water tightness. As it was sewn together, the seams would also be treated. The cloth was light and airy, and a gusty wind swept across the hill making ripples in its surface, despite the weights that were holding it down.

I had not realized that we were this far along. I had imagined many more hands of days before we had enough cloth. Apparently, Purple’s prophecy had been correct, “It may seem like a long time before we see any results, but when they do happen, they will seem to happen overnight.”

Now, all of a sudden, the airboat was almost complete, the first of the bags was being finished and Purple was making a large-scale gasmaker.

As I approached I noticed Shoogar also was working with Grimm. He was holding a copy of — of Purple’s blue-drawings! He seemed to be directing something. When I came closer I realized that Shoogar either had figured them out or —

No, it soon became apparent. He was directing the transference of the pattern onto the cloth. Knowing that the bag would form a sphere when inflated, Shoogar wanted the proper spell markings on it. Accordingly, he was using ; the best flying spell available — Purple’s. After all, weren’t the blue-drawings the airship itself? Wouldn’t it be necessary to have blue-drawings on the balloon in order to make it lift? Shoogar had taken on two apprentices, and they were painting the lines in wide swatches.

I continued on down to the village, where I ran into a disgruntled group of villagers. They were setting up tents beneath their housetrees. “I am not going to live in a prickly plant,” Trimmel was saying. “I absolutely refuse.”

Others murmured their agreement. I tried to quiet them the best I could. “As your Speaker —” I began.

“Some Speaker — you were part of the dancing!”

“Uh, it is necessary for the Speaker to be on good terms with the magician,” I said. “He invited me to dance. I couldn’t very well refuse.”

“All right,” grumbled Snarg. “What are you going to do about it now.”

“I’m not going to do anything — Shoogar is. He has promised to reconsecrate all your housetrees as soon as he gets a chance.”

“As soon as he gets a chance? That could be days!”

“Don’t worry,” I said. “He has authorized me to give you blue spell tokens. You will be able to redeem them later.”

There was some grumbling at this, but no serious dissent. Spell tokens were accepted in both the villages now.

A voice called, “So where are the tokens?”

“My apprentices are making them,” I said. I hurried back to my work area and quickly stained some bone chips blue. I directed my assistants to stain as many blue ones in the future as purple ones. We would need both.

I returned to the villagers and began distributing the tokens. There was a little more grumbling about the houseblood-gathering teams. Some villagers felt that the magicians had no right to take their housetree blood, even if it was a prickly plant now. I paid them a purple token for Purple, and they were satisfied. They disappeared into their nests to sleep.

I wandered downward to the weaving pastures. The weavers were grumbling because Shoogar had not shown up today to offer the morning blessings. I gave them some blue spell tokens in lieu of the blessing. “These are spell tokens too. Shoogar spell tokens. They are just like the Purple ones, only Shoogar will redeem them.”

They eyed the blue chips warily. They hadn’t liked the purple ones that much, but they had been forced to accept them. Now they were having another chip introduced, and they liked it even less.

I prevailed upon them. “Shoogar will redeem these as soon as he has time. This is only the promise of a spell. As soon as he catches up with everything else, he’ll come by and consecrate the cloth. Go ahead and weave.”

Glumly they did so. Now they were getting paid in blue chips and purple chips.

I pocketed the balance of the tokens; I was carrying several of each, and wandered back up to the village. Here and there were a few people I had missed earlier in the day, still moaning about not wanting to live in prickly plants. I gave them some tokens, blue ones for the reconsecration spell, purple ones for the use of their housetree blood.

Having solved those problems, I felt that I had earned my pay as Speaker and went downslope to see Ang the Net Tender. “Ang, have you a fish for my dinner?”

He produced a fine flatfish, already plucked. “I will trade you for it,” he said.

“A bone utensil?”

“No,” he shook his head, “bone rots here.”

“H’m, how about some of the new cloth.”

I put my hand into my robe fold and found one last blue token. “How about a magic spell?”

“You’re not a magician.”

“No, but Shoogar is. I will give you this token, which is the promise of a spell.”

“H’m,” he eyed it warily, “I would rather have one from Purple.”

“I can do that.” Fortunately, I still had a few Purple tokens with me. I gave one to him for the fish. He handed me the fish and a bluetoken. “Here is the difference between the value of the fish and the value of the purple token. One Shoogar.”

“How did you get a blue token?” I asked. I had just distributed them a few hours earlier. I had not given one to Ang.

“I traded a fish for three blue tokens earlier. Also, I traded for some cloth, but they didn’t have enough for me, so they gave me some tokens in exchange, telling me I can trade them back later.”

“Oh.”

Something about that troubled me. While my wives prepared the flatfish for dinner, I realized what it was. People were trading those spell tokens as if they were the actual spells themselves. But they weren’t. They were only the promises of the spells.

But then again, a promise is a symbol of an act, and a symbol is the same as the act itself.

They were trading magic!

It suddenly occurred to me that it was possible for a magician to make enough “promises” to release an inordinate amount of magic into the village. There would have to be controls of some kind. Oh well, it was Shoogar’s problem now, not mine.