“No, not all. Only you had the gift in any strength that day, Girton, but you were all the children of magic users or relatives of those with the gift.”
“But how?” I felt like I was shouting but was unable to raise my voice above a hoarse whisper. “How can that be? The children and family of sorcerers all join the desolate. They all die, they all bleed into the land.”
“No, Girton. The Landsmen are as corrupt as any other power in the Tired Lands. They find some harmless wise woman eking out her power to heal wounds or ease childbirth and lock her in a blood gibbet.” There was a quiet but forceful anger in my master’s voice. “Then they take all the adult relatives to join the desolate, but they sell the children off to slavers and line their own pockets. They send them far away and think that is enough to stop it ever coming back to haunt them.”
“I thought you chose me for who I am—” I could feel my words turning into a sneer “—but you chose me for what I am.”
“No!” She sounded desperate. Tried to grab my hand again but I pulled it free. “I was not there to recruit.” I stared into her face looking for a lie but found only pain and fear. “I chose you, Girton. I chose you. I saw a life about to be wasted and I could not bear it. I chose you.”
I lifted my hands and stared at them. I half-expected them to burst into flames or leak poisonous black liquid. “I don’t want to suck the life out of the land, Master. I don’t want to be like the Black Sorcerer.”
“Girton,” she said, holding my head in her hands and making me meet her gaze, “every day we are lied to. Magic is part of nature and it is no more evil than an angry mount or a hailstorm. It is a tool to use and those who misuse it do so because they lack discipline. You have discipline, you have been trained and trained well. You are no danger to yourself or the land. Nothing has changed, Girton.” She let a heartbeat pass. “You have not changed.”
I could see how desperate she was for me to understand, but all I felt was betrayal. Everything I knew had been turned on its head. I was something terrible, and she had always known. She could have told me at any time but she had not. If not for Kyril’s death, would she ever have told me? Or would she have waited until I ripped a new souring into the land?
“I’m tired,” I said. The words came out parched of emotion. My master nodded.
“I understand.” She stood away from me, glanced back and then blew out the candle. In the darkness I curled up into a ball and, wrapping myself around a centre of anger and betrayal, tried to ignore the sound of my master quietly sobbing until she fell asleep. Far beneath, the world carried on. In the townyard the fires of Festival sparkled like a mirror of the cold stars in the night sky above. All indifferent to me, Girton Club-Foot.
Girton the mage-bent.
Interlude
This is a dream.
They are running. In the distance he sees Rufra. Following Rufra is his master. Following his master is Drusl.
They run through the loose dirt of the sourlands and for every ten steps run they only make one step forward. They run hard but the land is against them. The stink of it is thick in their nostrils. On the horizon the sky is gold as if a huge fire burns beyond it.
There are dogs behind them. Big dogs, small dogs, medium dogs, black dogs, white dogs, tan dogs and brindle dogs. All snarling. All barking. A roiling wave of sharp teeth and dripping saliva, eager to catch them.
They are running. Not speaking, not able to speak. Only able to run. Only able to lift their legs and pump their arms but the ground gives way beneath their feet and the golden sky never comes any closer.
He’s scared. Even though he knows this is a dream, knows it completely.
Wake me.
This. Is. A. Dream.
Wake me, Master.
He wakes. The room is pitch-black and his master is not there. He gets out of bed. Drusl is there but she doesn’t talk to him. She turns away. In front of her the corridor of whitewashed stone elongates and he feels like he’s falling. Rufra appears further up the corridor and from behind Rufra comes his master.
The barking starts.
This is a dream.
Rufra runs, then his master and then Drusl. They don’t speak to him and he doesn’t speak to them. He wants to shout and tell them to run harder but the words are held in his mind the way the dry, dead earth of the sourlands holds his feet. For every ten steps he runs he only makes one step forward.
Wake me.
Teeth shine in golden light.
Wake. Me.
Snapping mouths splash saliva against his legs.
Please, Master, wake me.
He wakes. He is in the warm absolute black of the rafters of the castle. He reaches out but there is no one there. A torch bursts into life, golden light that shows Drusl, Rufra and his master. He is naked but he feels no shame. He looks over his shoulder and sees the dogs, a wall of dogs coming on impossibly quickly. He runs. The loose, warm, dead earth of the sourlands is trying to hold on to his feet. For every ten steps he runs he only takes one step forward.
He realises he cannot escape.
They’re not real! Wake! Wake!
He stops. Turns. Spreads his arms as if to embrace another.
Wake. Me.
The dogs.
A snapping, stinking, yapping, barking wave of furious animals. But there is no pain. There are no bites, no ripping or tearing or crushing. Instead he is lifted by them, buoyed up on a tide of heavily muscled canine flesh. The wave rises and breaks. He becomes dogs, and dogs become him. His arms end in sharp mouths. He sees through hundreds of glowing eyes. His body is a hunched, muscled mass of brindle fur. His legs are powerful and clawed. He is fast and dangerous and out of control.
He shouts, but his voice is a hideous un-symphony of barks.
Drusl is first.
Jaw-hands rip into her under the golden light of the sourlands sun. She doesn’t scream, but he sees the agony in her eyes as he tears her apart. The sourlands sop up her blood. His master next. For all her arts and training she can no more avoid the dog beast than Drusl—the sourlands soak her up as if she had never been. Then Rufra, who turns and stares as he bears down on him. In his hands he holds a flaming silver sword.
Wake me.
He is unstoppable.
Wake me.
This is a dream.
Chapter 13
I woke alone and scared. The idea I could somehow harness magic was ludicrous, I was Girton, born a slave boy. Had I dreamed the whole thing?
It felt like it.
A note written in scratch was pinned to the door.