In Service of the Light

In Service of the Light

  Breaking Traditions, Vol 2

  Marie Brown

  ©2012

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1: Snorffle

  Chapter 2: Dark Mage

  Chapter 3: Ansha

  Chapter 4: Confrontation

  Chapter 1: Snorffle

  The horse ran smoothly through the woods, muscles clenching and releasing with a steady rhythym. Lydia kept her weight balanced over his withers and a light contact on the reins. Behind her, Meeplar clung like a burr to her pillion pad. Energy passed in a smooth flow from Lydia, to Meeplar, then the amplified energy came back to Lydia and she passed it on to her horse and the other three running alongside, keeping their muscles working tirelessly and their lungs functioning smoothly long past the point when an unassisted mount would have collapsed.

  Ahead of them, a brilliant flare of light bounded away, hovering over the head of their target as it ran for its life, dodging and twisting among the trees. It was an ugly beast, the fourth such thing Lydia and her cluster had hunted down today. Once it might have been a boar. Now vastly overdeveloped mounds of flesh made it look more like an oval blob of muscle with little stick legs and delicate boar hooves. The poor things could hardly even see anymore, with only one eye almost obscured by a roll of bulging, overhanging neck muscle. Ugly. Pathetic, even. But a pack of them had been sent in to ravage the countryside around a small village and the desperate village council had sent for the Circle of Light to help. The irony of the situation was not wasted on Lydia: the village was Greentree, where she'd been born.

  The snorffle ahead of them faltered and slowed. Although a creature born of magic, it couldn't compete with horses that felt constantly rested even at the fastest pace they could maintain through the trees. Kesh, the swordsman, called out and gestured with his boar spear for the Cluster to fan out.

  Lydia helped pen the snorffle between horses so it couldn't escape, but she wasn't too eager to get blood on her own spear. She felt bad for the creature, although she knew it had to die. It wasn't the snorffle's fault someone had changed it with magic and set it on helpless villagers.

  “I think that's the last,” Kesh said, once the beast lay twitching and bloody on the ground. “Back to the village?”

  “I hope you're right,” Marlan, their loremaster, said, wiping sweat from her face with a grimace. “I hate chasing monsters.”

  “You hate anything that's not reading,” Kesh teased.

  “Not true,” Marlan said, tossing her irrepressibly curly hair over her shoulder. “I don't hate food. Or sleeping.”

  Everyone laughed.

  “I need to make a couple stops before going back to Caissa,” Lydia said, rubbing her horse's neck. “Will you all wait for me, or go on alone?”

  “Stops? What kind of stops?” Healer Larissa asked, fastening her boar spear into its carry position on her saddle.

  “I need to visit family,” Lydia confessed. She hadn't told anybody that part.

  “Family? You have family?”

  “I wasn't spawned from the forest floor, Kesh,” Lydia said dryly. “My parents live here, and my former Master lives a few miles down the road, in Vallan. I promised to come back for a visit when I was allowed to travel.”

  “But you've been—oh. That's right. They didn't allow you to travel until you got your Cluster. Sorry, I forgot.”

  “It's okay,” Lydia said. She hadn't minded the restriction on travelling much, not after that rotten experience her first year. The Circle had done everything it could think of to shelter its youngest, most powerful member. Sometimes the care was enough to smother her, but Lydia knew it was better than the alternative. Sometimes she still wished the power would go away and she could just be an ordinary baker, but it wasn't going, and that was that. For whatever reason, destiny or freak of nature, she held more power than any other living mage in the entire Circle of Lights, and she understood the need to keep safely away from those who would try to take it from her.

  Of course now, the story was different. Sixteen years old, fully trained, and with her Cluster around her, Lydia was as ready to face the world as she'd ever be, and the Circle had sent her out with great expectations.

  Of course, she wondered how in the world she was supposed to fulfill those expectations if the Circle kept sending her out on such boring missions. Rampaging changelings? Come on. Any would-be hero or adventurer could take care of such things.

  “Who said anything about going back?” Marlan spoke up as the horses began to pick their way back through the trees to the village. “I think we need to find out who sent the snorffles, and why.”

  “Good idea,” Lydia agreed readily. “They certainly aren't native to this place. Anyway, can you all make the report without me?”

  “At least stick around long enough to help the horses get back to the village,” Larissa said, rubbing her mount's neck. “We ran them a very long way. I don't want them to collapse without your support.”

  “Of course,” Lydia nodded. “They're perfectly fine at the moment, but you're right, that could always change. And we might always see another of the ugly buggers.”

  “They are ugly, aren't they?” Marlan agreed, with a shudder. “All that flabby flesh. Ick.”

  “Why do people make such things, anyway?” Kesh wondered. “Lydia? You're a mage, tell us why someone would do that.”

  “Because they can?” Lydia shrugged. “I don't really know. The changelings are useful for playing war, and that's about it. They don't have any practical purpose beyond fighting and raising havoc, as far as I know.”

  Meeplar chirped behind her, tugging at Lydia's light mail shirt. “What is it, Meep?”

  The fuzzling chittered, and sent a feeling of just wanted to see you jump.

  “Oh, you,” she said, fond and exasperated as she frequently was by her mischievous familiar. She twisted around and rubbed the fuzzling vigorously.

  “What is it?” Kesh said, scanning the trees for any sign of danger. He might not be able to see the fuzzling, but he could hear her, and trusted her warnings.

  “Nothing. She was just feeling a little neglected.”

  “Silly beast,” Marlan said, without rancor. “I do wish I could see her. It seems so odd to see you having conversations and other interactions with a creature that doesn't exist for the rest of us.”

  “I know,” Lydia said, then shrugged. “But what can I say? The only way you can see her, or any other creature from another plane, is to have magic in your soul. Otherwise, you just have to take my word that she—and they—are real and here.”

  “Oh, I do. I just wish I had that ability, at least a little bit.”

  “So do lots of other people,” Lydia said, giving Meeplar's ears a final scratch. She'd run into some jealousy over the years, even in the Hall of Lights. People wanted to see her fuzzling, to have one of their own, especially since having a fuzzling around at all marked a mage as very powerful. But there was nothing anyone could do about it, so she just dealt with the problems and moved on.

  They reached the village shortly before dusk. A child lookout spotted them returning, and by the time they reached the village square, nearly the whole town was assembled.

  “The beasts are destroyed,” Kesh announced to the expectant crowd. The villagers cheered.

  “Tomorrow we ride in search of who sent them,” Marlan said. This brought another cheer.

  Lydia spotted her father in the crowd and gaped for a moment. He looked so old! Then she hopped off her horse, put Meeplar down on the ground, and made her way to him.

  “Hello, father,” she said.

  “Lydia!” The old man's face crinkled into a big grin, and he hu
gged her. “You looked so magnificent up there on your fine horse, daughter. I see you've done well for yourself off in the big city.”

  “Yes, I have.” Lydia looked around. “Where's mother? And what of my brothers and sisters?”

  “Your mother's feeling poorly these days, so she stayed home. As for your brothers and sisters, well, you know they're all out and about, scattered every which way. The only one that really comes by anymore is Janos, because the others are out making their ways in the world, just like you. But Janos brings the grandchildren by and makes your mother happy, and everyone writes at least once a year or so.”

  “I'm sorry I haven't been able to visit,” Lydia said, sad at the dispersal of her family. They'd been fairly close, once. “But you know they wouldn't let me out until I got assigned to a Cluster.”

  “Yes, no harm done. Bring these friends of yours by the house, we'll give them a good dinner and make your mother feel better. She loves having visitors.”

  So Lydia found herself bringing her Cluster home for dinner. Her mother was overjoyed to see her, of course, and one of the townsfolk sent a child to tell Janos and his family the news. So everyone showed up, for an impromptu reunion and party.

  Larissa had a good time, up to her ears in little ones. Janos and his wife had produced four children over the last eight years, and they loved the Healer. As for the others, Kesh was curious enough to start Lydia's mother talking about Lydia's childhood, and wound up unable to get the old lady off the subject. Marlan was a bit uncomfortable, with the strange people, the overexcited kids, and nobody to talk about her favorite subjects with. Meeplar stalked children and had a blast making them squeal and jump. One child, the youngest, could even see her.

  Lydia was a little—okay, more than a little—uncomfortable. She hadn't seen her family in eight years. They were the same. But she. . . she wasn't. She was a mage now. The power was in her always, even here, singing with a seductive song. These people, these simple, honest, hardworking people, would never know or understand what it felt like to control mage-power. . . the power to change and shape the very world. So she smiled, and laughed, and all the while knew that she probably wouldn't be back.

  Before the end of the evening, Lydia made sure to pull her brother off to the side.

  “What's on your mind?” Janos leaned against a wall, watching the antics of the children and their invisible playmate with a small smile.

  “That,” Lydia nodded at the youngest child, who reached out and captured Meeplar from behind, squeezing the fuzzling with a triumphant squeal. “Little Sophie has mage power.”

  “What? Really? How do you know?” Janos's eyes widened, and he looked more closely at his youngest offspring.

  “Easy. It's the same way people knew about me. She can see Meeplar.”

  “Well. . .” Janos shook his head slowly, although his eyes began to light with pride. “Mage power. Who would have guessed. . . What should I do with her?”

  “Nothing, really. Just love her, and take care of her, and make sure she knows she'll be a mage when she grows up. Then you can drop her off in Caissa just like you did me, and the Circle will take it from there.”

  “Mage power. . . amazing.” Janos smiled.

  “Oh, and you might want to give her a use-name now, too, so she can get used to it. I still haven't found one.”

  “Why?”

  “Mages are vulnerable through their real names. We can be attacked at a very unpleasant, deep level by people that know our names and what to do with them. But I'm too used to my given name, I haven't been able to find one yet I like to replace it. I've got to do that, and soon. I feel. . . naked. Vulnerable. Like I'm running around the wide world with my ass uncovered.”

  Janos snorted. “Right. A use-name she will have, then, before week's end. And for yourself, why not just take mother's name? Or grandmama's?”

  Lydia squirmed. “That's the first option I thought of, but. . . I don't know. Would you want to be called Harn?”

  That was their father's name. Janos grinned. “Point taken. What about. . . hmm. Can't really call yourself Little Bug, that's just not dignified.”

  Lydia laughed.

  “Have you got a favorite animal?”

  “Fuzzlings,” Lydia said, without hesitation. Meeplar leapt on the back of a child and they went to the floor in a laughing, meeping heap.

  “That won't do. Hmm, I see what you mean. It's almost worse than choosing a child's name, because the baby has no choice in the matter, and you do. Got a favorite bird, maybe?”

  “I thought about Linnet, but it just didn't sit well. I could never—”

  “Hey!” Janos interrupted, after a thoughful gaze out the window. “How about Aurora?”

  “Aurora? Hmm. . .” Lydia turned the name over in her mind. Aurora. Not bad. She'd always loved the auroras that happened once in a while in the winter, usually accompanied by one of the region's rare snows. “That might work. Just a minute.” She looked at her Cluster, then waved to attract Marlan's attention. The loremaster picked her way across the seething heap of children on the floor and joined them.

  “What are you two doing, off in the corner?”

  “Jannos is trying to help me pick out a new use-name,” Lydia replied. “What do you think of Aurora?”

  Marlan smiled. “It's a very pretty name. And it's worlds better than running around with your real name out in public. Would you remember your new name?”

  Lydia grinned. “Maybe, if you lot remember to use it.”

  “Trust me, we'd remember. None of us likes being out in the world with a mage that's not only powerful enough to attract the attention of any other mage within three counties, but vulnerable as well. I'm still surprised the Circle let you out without a use-name.”

  “Sounds like we might have a winner, then,” Janos said. “Sister, I hearby name you Aurora, from this day forward.”

  “Aurora,” Lydia—Aurora—repeated. “Good. I like it. But let's not tell mom and dad.”

  Janos laughed. “They might not like it, hearing you've changed the perfectly good name they gave you.”

  “Probably not. Thanks, Janos. And now you and your wife get to do the same thing all over again, for Sophie.”

  “Thanks so much, sister,” Janos said, with a roll of the eyes. “But I'm glad you told me. It'll be easier for her to know about herself, instead of finding out like you did.”

  “What about the little one?” Marlan asked, one eyebrow raised.

  “She's going to be a mage,” Aurora replied. How long would it take to get used to the new name? Hopefully not very. “She sees my familiar.”

  “I wish I could see your familiar,” Marlan said. “From what you've described, she sounds adorable.”

  Aurora glowed with pride. “She is. She's also a silly little fluffball, in case you can't tell.”

  “Yes, but she comes through when needed.”

  “Yes, she sure does. I'm glad she chose me. I don't like to think of doing all the magework on my own.”

  “What do you do, anyway?” Janos asked, which led into a discussion of what a Cluster in general did on assignment, and what Aurora's particular roll was. They found chairs, mostly out of the way of the rolling mass of children and fuzzling, and talked until the kids were worn out and everybody dispersed.

  Aurora's parents protested her decision to stay with her cluster in the village common house, but they couldn't really argue with her logic. The house was small. Her Cluster consisted of fully-grown adults. Many children fit in here, it was true, but the children's leftover beds were small, sized for the little bodies that used to fill them. Also, there were four horses to consider.

  So the Cluster left, after a somewhat tearful farewell from Lydia/Aurora's parents. They rode the horses slowly through the moonlit night, and Aurora told her group about her new name. They uniformly shared Marlan's reaction, and Aurora felt a stab of guilt. She hadn't known how uneasy they all felt at her personal
vulnerability.