Color Mage (Book 1) Read online

  Title Page Information

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and events in this novel are either fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or persons is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2012 by Anne Marie Lutz

  Cover Art © 2012 by Neal Seamus

  Map © 2012 by Neal Seamus

  Edited by Barbara Taft Verducci

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced, stored, archived or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission from the publisher.

  Loconeal books may be ordered through booksellers or by contacting:

  www.loconeal.com

  216-772-8380

  Loconeal Publishing can bring authors to your live event. Contact Loconeal Publishing at 216-772-8380.

  Published by Loconeal Publishing, LLC

  Printed in the United States of America

  First Loconeal Publishing edition: September, 2012

  Visit our website: www.loconeal.com

  ISBN 978-0-9850817-8-2 (Paperback)

  Dedication

  To my mom, who always knew she'd hold a book of mine in her hands. And to Steve, for his love and support through draft after draft of this novel.

  Acknowledgements

  I've had a lot of help from family members (some of whom also double as first readers). Thanks to all of you! Also, thanks are due to the members of the North Columbus Fantasy/SciFi Writers group—I’ve learned a lot from all of you, and no doubt will learn more in the future. Good luck to all of you in your writing.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page Information

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Table of Contents

  Map

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Author Information

  Publisher Information

  Chapter One

  Kirian stepped down the dusty wooden steps of the caravan and looked around. The road to SeagardVillage dropped off precipitously from the wagon road on the ridge. A medley of rocky outcroppings and scrubby bushes, leading to a distant slate-colored sea foaming against wet rocks, spilled out below.

  The caravan master shouted to someone inside the baggage wagon to hurry with the Healer’s bags.

  “Kirian, let me come with you!”

  She turned and smiled at the young man who stood there staring at her. Everything Inmay did was intense; it made her only more anxious to leave him behind.

  “You know you can’t come with me. I want to focus on learning from the old Healer, and I won’t have any time for you. Besides, Inmay, you have your own posting.” She let the smile vanish as she spoke; there was no point in encouraging him.

  “I didn’t choose my posting any more than you did yours.” Inmay brushed his hair back with nervous fingers. A gleam of premature gray showed in the pale yellow strands.

  “You agreed to go.”

  “I had no choice! They would have exiled me.”

  Kirian sighed. The man refused to understand how dangerous he was perceived to be in the homes of the powerful. “You’re lucky, Inmay. The last person who helped a slave escape was publicly beheaded. If you hadn’t been who you are—now, here come my bags! I have to go.”

  The caravan master placed her bag in the dirt next to her. He bowed. Dust clung to his hair and to his sweaty face.

  “Good journey, good luck,” he said with spurious goodwill.

  “Thank you. Good journey to you as well,” Kirian said. She had no money for a tip, but good wishes were free.

  The caravan master shook his head at her and waved to his lead driver. “Let’s move!” he said, swinging onto the wagon. The driver snapped the reins against the sweated flanks of the horses. Inmay, in the third wagon back, called good luck to her. His head vanished inside the limp hangings that protected the passengers from the dust of the road. Kirian had no such protection; the horses’ hooves kicked up the dirt of the ridge road into a gritty cloud as the caravan groaned into motion.

  The dirt track of the Seagard road dribbled down to the distant village, which Kirian could barely make out. She sighed, hoisted her Healer’s bag over one shoulder and secured her heavier bag in her right hand, and set out. The way was rough, with rocks sticking out of the track here and there, but the breeze was cool and carried the taste of the nearby sea. The mountains were shadowed by an early dusk and struck a warning chill. Sea birds called and complained along the cliff edges. As dusk came, the sky was a cobalt blue, like a gem, a color Kirian had never before seen. If she were not so weary, she would have enjoyed the walk.

  But she had come from Sugetre that day, coughing up the dust on the wagon road, and she was not used to the mountain terrain. Her bags grew heavier, and she discovered that her shoes were all wrong. She fell once, scraping her knees and doing further damage to her already irritable temper. When she finally reached the foot of the track and walked into Seagard, she was not at all in the correct frame of mind for a Healer newly come to her town.

  A woman, bent with age or with the weight of the wooden bucket she carried, stood near a gray shed with a half-open door. Kirian knew what was in the bucket—she had been smelling fish for the last five minutes.

  “Hello!” Kirian said. “I bring greetings from Sugetre, from the Healer’s College.”

  “Welcome, child!” the old woman said. “Come in, come in! I know who you be, the healer Ruthan’s been waiting for this last week.”

  Kirian was disarmed by the old woman’s friendliness. In Sugetre one was never welcomed with such pleasure—in fact, in Sugetre people were often glad to see the back of you, unless they were in immediate need of your skills as a Healer. This old one looked to be in reasonably good health, and Kirian was a perfect stranger to her, but she set down the stinking bucket and escorted Kirian inside.

  Kirian looked around the cramped space. There was a wooden bench and an overstuffed chair that had seen better days. A long table filled the center of the room. The remains of a meal for three littered the table—dirty plates, frayed cloth napkins, fish bones and a half-empty dish of turnips.

  “Sit, sit!” demanded the old woman. “I be Marka, Ruthan’s friend. I’ll send my daughter Missa for her as soon as can be.” She set down the bucket and bustled around the little house, speaking to someone in the back room. A younger woman brought a mug of bitter ale, and Kirian sipped it gratefully. In a few more minutes, Kirian heard a door close in the kitchen. The young woman ushered in a very tiny, bent woman cloaked against the night sea mist.

  Kirian stood. “Hon Ruthan, I am Kirian. I am sent to help you and learn from you by Master Raiko at the Healer’s College. I am very glad to meet you.”

  The old woman looked up with eyes as blank as boiled eggs. Kirian stopped, taken aback. There were no pupils to the old woman’s eyes, only endless whites. She hesitated with her hand out, feeling stupid for her instinctive reaction. How could a blind Healer work?

  “She can see you just fine,” Missa said gently.

  Ruthan took Kirian’s hand with perfect ease. Her blank eyes stared into Kirian’s. Kirian looked away.

  “My eyes are all colors instead of just one,” the old woman said. “I can see perfec
tly well your lovely face and your bright eyes, young Kirian. That hair will be the talk of Seagard by tomorrow morning. Is that a new style in Sugetre?”

  Kirian relaxed a little. “No, Hon Ruthan, it’s my own choice.” Her hair was cut very short, like that of a boy who studied arms and wanted to keep his locks out of his face. Sometimes, when it was humid, it spiked.

  Ruthan grinned. “I like it. Elder Hame won’t, and Lord Alkiran won’t, so be prepared. But don’t change it.”

  “I won’t.”

  By this time they were all seated again. Ruthan looked small and frail in the place of honor in the overstuffed chair, but Kirian recalled the grip of the old Healer’s hand. She was stronger than she looked.

  “Forgive me,” Kirian said. “But how—?”

  “Healer Ruthan was gifted with her Sight by them up at the Castle,” old Marka said.

  “Now I can truly see, young woman,” Ruthan said. “With the Sight I can see if sickness lies still in the blood after I think I have purged it out. I can see if the bones in a broken leg lie together just right, before I bind them up. I can see how the babe lies when a woman is ready to give birth. Ah, they are a blessing, these eyes of all colors. I’ll never regret the day I asked Lord Alkiran for them.”

  The old Healer must have done some significant service to the old lord to receive such a blessing. Far from being blind, Ruthan could see better than anyone Healer Kirian had ever known. Kirian sipped her ale to gain a moment to gather her thoughts; in one short hour she had lost her arrogance. What could Kirian, a twenty-six year old with a few years’ book-learning, bring to this village that an experienced woman with Ruthan’s gift could not?

  Ruthan stood, leaning on Missa’s arm. “Ah, I am glad to see you, young woman. I look forward to long talks about what you have learned from old Raiko. You will be a freshening sea breeze around here, I can tell, especially with that assertive hair. Will you come? I have a room set up for you, and a place for you to put your things.”

  “Gladly,” Kirian said sincerely. “I am honored to be here.” Nodding to Marka, she hauled the baggage to her shoulder and followed the old Healer as she led the way out of Marka’s house and down a stony lane to the Healer’s house.

  “Missa and Marka are the roots of this village,” Ruthan told her. “They’re the ones you’ll see at all the festivals, setting up games for the little ones, and at all the houses when someone’s ill, bringing fish soup and bread. You’ll see them often.”

  Kirian nodded. Missa and Marka were the mothers of this village. She did hope, however, that she would not have to eat fish soup anytime soon.

  Ruthan’s house was a wooden structure from which any traces of paint had been stripped by the salt breeze. Its siding blended with the dusk in a monochromatic gray. Inside, two cramped outer rooms were clearly dedicated to Ruthan’s work, containing simple cots, shelves of labeled jars, blankets, earthenware bowls, and a tray of bandages at the ready. She had sacrificed a parlor for her healer’s rooms; farther in were her kitchen, crammed with a table still spread with her interrupted dinner, a small pantry, and two bedrooms. Ruthan directed Kirian to one of these with a tired gesture.

  “Is there anything I can help with here tonight, Hon Ruthan?” Kirian asked. The old Healer looked weary; so was Kirian, but she was young and strong, and she couldn’t bear to start out life in this little village resting in Ruthan’s spare room while the old woman scraped plates and did dishes.

  But the old lady shook her head and waved Kirian away. Kirian was relieved. The dust from the road still coated her throat, in spite of the ale, and her knee throbbed where she had fallen on it. Most of all she was feeling overcome with the strangeness of everything. She closed the door, took off her cloak and shoes, and lay down fully clothed on the neatly made bed.

  She let her eyes drift closed and calmed herself with images of home–images of the students in the dormitories; of her roommate Sindar laughing; of Mistress Urasha in the supply room laying out stacks of brown blankets, vials of remedies, and bags of fragrant herbs for the Healers who traveled; and of the warm stone of the College itself, that drew the day’s heat in and then threw it back in the evenings, toasting the students’ backs as they sat against the stone walls. She thought of Inmay, on his way to his new posting while wishing he was back in the capital with the slave woman he had tried to free. Thoughts of her noble classmates, with their thinly-veiled scorn for her, intruded only briefly before she swept them away.

  After a while, thought faded. Only the soothing roll of waves lapping up to the shore broke the darkness. Kirian listened for a while, and then smiled before she let sleep draw her away.

  * * * * *

  In the next sennight, Kirian learned the village. She saw the men and a few of the women go out to sea in their boats in the gray mornings, rocking on the water below the strip of beach Seagard owned. They brought home fish of various colors and sizes, most of which Kirian was unfamiliar with, and they brought lobsters once, several of which were sent to the lord and his family up in the castle.

  Some of the villagers who did not go out to sea tended sparse gardens, from which they coaxed greens and other produce to fill the stew pot. Some had a goat or a pig, and everyone, including the livestock, ate fish. Marka wove jewel-toned blankets from the wool of sheep that were kept somewhere high up in the mountains. The blankets were sent out on the monthly caravan to be sold at a shop in the city.

  Kirian helped Ruthan augment her income by packaging a remedy or two when a particular herb was abundant. She gathered the herbs on long walks up the cliff path into the brush, and along the Two Merkhan road.

  “Give me some more gidroot, young Kirian,” Ruthan said as they sat outside the door on a sunny day. Kirian collected a handful from the drying rack, feeling the bristly leaves brush against her skin. They stripped the dried stems from the fragrant leaves, and then they put the leaves into a mortar. A few grinds reduced the leaves to powder, which was then put into colorful glass vials.

  “These are beautiful, Ruthan,” Kirian said, turning an amethyst-colored vial back and forth in the sunlight. “Where do these come from?”

  “These? From the south. They make them to hold perfumes. There was a chest of them on board a ship that wrecked on the rocks in a storm a few years ago.”

  “Why is it so dangerous?”

  “There are rocks that are only exposed in the low tides. There’s a warning light on the High Rocks, but they don’t always see it.”

  “So these sell well at Two Merkhan?”

  Ruthan chuckled. “Very well! And gidroot is the most popular of all, though I’ve told them it won’t do a thing to make a woman fertile.”

  “I suppose they’re desperate,” Kirian said, filling another jar.

  “Kin and Rashiri take these to Two Merkhan every month or so, when I have them. They fish and then sell at the market there—about the only ones around here who do.”

  Ruthan spent a lot of time that first sennight telling Kirian about the people who lived in the village. In a full month, Kirian did not set foot in the castle. After a while, she thought this was odd; the Healer’s first duty was to attend the nobility up at the castle, and the presence of the Alkirani was the only reason a little village like Seagard rated a college-trained Healer at all. Kirian had inquired about the Alkirani before she left Sugetre, so she knew the Alkirani were friends of the King, related by marriage. The current Lady Alkiran was sister to the King.

  “Oh, they’re busy,” Ruthan said, when asked about this omission. “They’ve company this sennight or two. We’ll go up and introduce you after the party from the city has gone.”

  “Do you like them, the Alkirani?” Kirian asked. “What are they like?”

  “I like some of them,” she replied, “And that’s the best any Healer will be doing with any noble righ patrons, my dear, so don’t be expecting to be invited to dinner with them. We are servants to them. They’ll call when they need us, and dismiss us without
a thought, seeing we have done our job. Lord Forell won’t listen to you at all and will complain of you to his father, Lord Alkiran, when he falls ill from the overindulgence you warned him about. Shala Si, the concubine, will ask for potions that we don’t provide, the ones they use in the heathen city she comes from. But Lady Alkiran is pleasant enough, and so is the girl, Litha Sira.”

  “What about Lord Alkiran?”

  “He is a Collared Mage, and requires what’s due him. That’s all. Best not to talk to him more than you have to. I don’t.”

  “He’s dangerous then?”

  Ruthan snorted. “They all are, the righ lords. He’s no exception. He has a temper. Wants what he wants, when he wants it, and has the power to get it.”

  “What happens when he’s displeased?” Kirian asked.

  “He’ll throw sparks,” Ruthan said quite seriously. “There’s not a one of them who can keep the color magic under control when he’s put out.”

  “I meant . . .”

  Ruthan shook her head, her white eyes catching the firelight and gleaming ocher. “Never forget that, unlike me, you are a college Healer. You are under the protection of the Lord Healer. What would Lord Alkiran do to such a one?”

  “That’s the question,” she said, dropping her eyes to her work. Kirian didn’t know how much protection she could expect from the college. She had been a rescued street-child, admitted to the college as one of their required acts of charity, and trained along with the children of the merchant and noble classes who were the other students. She had no wealthy patron or family to argue her case if she felt she was unfairly treated at school. She had been raised to thank the Unknown God for rescuing her from the slavery that would have been her lot as an unclaimed girl-child in Sugetre. Then the College had sent her here. Inmay was right; she had no choice in her posting.

  Kirian knew she was fortunate; however, she thought that Lord Alkiran could probably get away with any kind of treatment of her that he wished, without any risk of reprimand from the College.