The Far Side Of Forever Part 4

The sun wasn't up very high when I went outside the next morning, but there's something about sunlight after hours and hours of candlelight that makes you want to squint and go back indoors. Much as I would have enjoyed it I had no time for going back indoors, so 1 went instead to the group of hprses and people who waited in the middle of the squarish, rustic yard. Giant-sized, squarish, rustic yard.

Leave it to Graythor to be consistent even outdoors.

' "You look as though you had little in the way of rest, girl," the redheaded Kadrim Harra remarked as I reached for the only unclaimed set of reins in sight, which tied a big gray to the hitching post the boy stood beside. His own mount was an even bigger golden palamino, and the stal- lion danced with excess energy and an eagerness to be away. The other four were involved in a discussion which seemed to be centered around Soffann Dra, which some- how wasn't very surprising.

"1 had no rest at all," I told the boy without looking at him, getting more enjoyment out of the sight of the beauti- ful gray horse that was to be mine for a while. He snorted softly with pleasure when he saw he wasn't to go un- claimed after all, and lowered his nose so that I might stroke it. "I'll catch up on what I need when we stop tonight."

"When we left one another after the discussion last darkness, we were all bidden to rest ourselves well," the

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boy said from my left, his deep voice beginning to fill with disapproval again. "Though you gave the wizard little of the respect due him with your words, surely you were not so foolish as to disobey his commands as well? We mean to ride far and hard this day, and one who is weary will have difficulty in keeping up."

"You're worrying about my being able to keep up?" I asked with a snort of ridicule, finally turning my head to look at him. "If I were you, little boy, I'd spend my time worrying about myself instead of the adults around me, especially an adult who also happens to be a sorceress.

And if I'd wasted my time sleeping instead of learning the spells Graythor wanted me to leam, there might have come a time when you and the others had trouble keeping up with life. Aren't we ready to leave yet?"

By the end of my speech he was blinking at me with surprise and a very becoming silence, then turned to see, as I already had, mat our four companions had ended their discussion in favor of mounting. Before he could turn back to me I walked the few steps to the gray's side, got my left foot into the stirrup, then pulled myself up to the saddle.

The gray waited until I was firmly seated with both feet in the closed stirrups before beginning to dance like me palamino, and that left only the boy who wasn't ready to go. For some reason he grinned up at me with a lot of amus.e.m.e.nt before turning to his own mount and leaping onto the giant beast without using the stirrups at all. The only thing he'd used to help him had been his hands on the pommel, but before he could start bragging about how athletic he was. a different voice came to us across the yard.

"It's true!" Soffann Dra exclaimed in delight from where she cantered slowly around us, left hand on reins, back straight but easy, wide-skirted green gown spread out over the saddle of her beautiful white horse. "He's really done it! I've never so much as been on a horse before, but I can ride as though I've done it all my life! The wizard has given me the ability to ride!"

Zail T'Zannis and Rikkan Addis grinned at the girl's delight and enthusiasm, but Targa Emmen Su Daylath was too distracted to do more than smile. The big woman's 43.

attention kept being drawn to the road leading out of the yard, and a minute later she was following that road on the big paint horse she sat with accustomed ease. Soffann Dra quickly followed after her with the clear intention of catch- ing up, which drew the two men in her wake. Since it was clear Graythor wasn't going to be coming out for any last good-byes I took my own turn at following, and the red- headed boy brought up the rear.

The gray's gait was smooth and easy, his response immediate to the lightest touch of my heel, the least movement of the reins. We moved up the road in ground- eating strides, the early morning sparkling around us, Graythor's giant-house shrinking into the distance. To ei- ther side of the road were green and flowered fields for at least a mile, with nothing but trees rising in the near and far distance, nothing of houses even of normal size. The air was still comfortably cool that early in the day, but I could feel that once the sun rose higher the heat would do the same. The road was heading us toward woods which would surely help for a while, but the woods were unlikely to last forever.

"You must forgive me, lady, for having spoken to you as I did," a voice came fronnny right, deep and smooth and at least trying to be conciliatory. "I had not realized that your weariness came from laboring on our behalf, and I would offer my apologies for having given you insult."

The red-haired Kadrim Harra had brought his palamino up beside my gray, and he really did seem to be sorry for what he'd said. I glanced over at him where he sat his mount looking down at me, and simply shook my head.

"I wasn't insulted," I grudged, wis.h.i.+ng I could find more pleasure in the beautiful day all around us. "It's just that this quest is so important to me, so important to everyone of this world-I'll do anything I have to to see that it turns out right, and losing a night's sleep is so unimportant an anything-1 didn't mean to imply that you weren't one of us because you're not as old as we are- You're not really all that young-"

My stumbling explanation finally ran out of steam, just as it usually did when I tried to tell people why I'd done as I had. I couldn't quite understand why 1 was bothering to

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explain things to a boy who was probably too young to comprehend what I was saying, but rather than looking blank, another glance showed him smiling.

"Your concern is natural and understandable," he said in a way that was supposed to be soothing, his tone brus.h.i.+ng aside any insult on his part. "Were it my people who were in jeopardy, I, too, would be difficult to speak with. Have you any further knowledge of the worlds to be traveled through than that which was given us by the wizard?"

"Unfortunately, no," I answered, watching a small flight of birds lazing through the early morning air. "There are too many gates and too many choices at each gate for any one person to know them all, even if they've lived as long as Graythor has. I haven't lived nearly as long, and don't even know me two worlds he was sure of. I can see I should have traveled more."

"Even should one attempt to live one's life antic.i.p.ating difficulties, one would still be caught by the surprise of the unantic.i.p.ated," he said, those steady blue eyes putting surprising weight behind the statement. "Your power is meant to guard and a.s.sist us through these worlds, a thing we are sure to find of great benefit, yet are those of my own world largely unfamiliar with me doings of magic.

What are these-spells-which were taught you through the darkness, and in what manner will they be of aid to us?"

"What I learned was a special group of protective spells designed to guard us from magical attack," I explained, privately wondering how anyone anywhere could be unfa- miliar with magic. "One of the spells creates a large.

invisible sphere around us which will keep anything of a magical nature out. Another of the spells builds a wall of the same kind, a third a platform which will also raise us into the air, and the rest are of the same sort. For anything nonmagical in nature, I already have the necessary de- fenses. What took so long was memorizing the details of spells mat work against other spells, which means I'm practically working without the Sight. I won't be able to See if I'm constructing them properly against what's com- ing at us, so I can't afford to forget the least little-"

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The frown on his face made me break off the explana- tion, telling me it wasn't explaining anything at all to him.

Just what part he wasn't getting was another question, though, as I found out when he shook his head.

"1 have no knowledge of what sight you speak of, nor do I understand what difference there might be between spells," he said, looking as though not understanding annoyed him- "Are you able to say in what manner / would need to labor in order to leam what you have?"

"But you couldn't leam it, not unless you had the Sight," I protested with a laugh, then understood how much he was actually missing. "Maybe I'd better start from the very beginning, and explain it to you that way.

People are born either with the Sight or without it, and if they're without it they can never learn to do magic no matter how hard they try. You can't have just a little bit of the Sight, you either have it or you don't. Are you with me so far?"

His nod was definite despite his silence, and for some reason I had the feeling that he was keeping himself from making a comment. That unwavering blue gaze seemed to be just a little put out, but I couldn't imagine why.

"Now, if you have the Sigh^you have the ability to do magic, but the keys to real power are how much strength you can bring to bear, and how complete your control is of the things around you. If we were standing together some- where and you began to walk away when I didn't want you to, I could reach out a hand to grab your sleeve to stop you physically. How well I did stopping you would depend on how good a grip I had on your sleeve; a light or badly placed grip would be one you could pull away from, but a strong, full, sure grip would keep you from getting very far. Have you got that?"

"indeed," he said with a faint smile, and then the smile widened. "And yet do I believe that my halting would require one with hands less slender and considerably more powerful than yours. Even had I a sleeve which might be grasped."

"That was just an example," I told him patiently, half expecting his remark. Boys always have to be so-ignorant- about everything. "With magic, the way to get a firm,

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sure grip on something is to See it clearly and in detail, the more detail, the better the grip. At the same time you must describe what you're Seeing, since it's that description and the strength you exert mat gives you power over what you See. If someone has a red hat, people without the Sight will see nothing but a red hat; people with the Sight, however, will See the exact shade of that color, me exact shape of die hat itself, the thickness of the material the thing was made from, the strands or layers involved, all the way down to the smallest mote mat's a part of that hat.

Seeing it lets them describe it, and describing it gives mem power over it. Spells are the verbal description of what someone with the Sight Sees."

"These spells, then, must be complex indeed," he said, back to frowning in an attempt to understand. "Even to describe what / am able to see of a thing would be complex, and never have I been able to see to the core of an object."

"Not all spells are that complex," 1 corrected, pleas- antly surprised that he seemed to be following my explana- tion. "If the details needing to be described had to be spoken in this language, it would take hours simply to describe enough of that red hat just to lift it in the air. The language used for spells is sort of a-short-cut code, I suppose you might say-that lets you describe hours' worth of detail in only one or two words. If I wanted to change that hat instead of simply lifting it, my description of it would have to be a lot more detailed so that I had more power over it. A spell like that could run five or six words, depending on just what change I wanted to make. And, of course, some descriptions can be added to with gestures rather than words. There are a lot of different getures, all standing for different things, and that's where the old saying comes from. You know. the one that goes, 'One gesture is worth a thousand words.' "

"That adage is more familiar to me in another form,"

he muttered, clearly trying to decide whether or not to be impressed. His big hand rubbed at his face as his mind worked behind distracted eyes, and men his attention was mine again. "Then all those with the-the Sight-have power over that which is about them. Why is it, then, that 47.

some have more power than others? For what reason was it necessary that you leam-spells-from the wizard which your own-Sight-should have found it possible to give you?"

"I think I'll answer the first part of your question first," I said with a smile, really pleased with how bright he was. He was having trouble with unfamiliar phrases, but he wasn't using them wrong. "Some with the Sight have more power than others for a variety of reasons, one of which is how long they've lived. The longer you study it, the easier the language of spells becomes, and the easier it becomes, the more power you can exert over what happens to be around you. Also, you've learned to See things in greater and greater detail, which gives you more to describe, which in turn gives you more power over them. You have to leam how to look at things, you know.

in magic as well as in anything else. To someone who didn't know about hats, our red hat would be nothing but a red hat. To a maker of hats, though, it would be of such and such a style, that color and this shape, individually dyed or batch dyed, st.i.tched or woven, made by someone with skill or without, old and well worn or new and unfaded- There's so much to know about things that the amount is incredible, and some people with the Sight are too lazy to leam it all. That's where a lot of them run into trouble.''

"I do believe I would dislike trouble of that sort," he said, a reluctant but definite admission. "Of what does their dereliction consist?"

"Well, some of them tend to be the sort to believe that any hold at all on a sleeve is enough to stop the person wearing the sleeve," I said. "They describe as little of the thing they're looking at as possible, exerting only a tenu- ous hold over it, then try to make it do what they want.

Sometimes they're successful, usually they're only half successful, and sometimes it doesn't work at all. They're the ones who are too lazy to really leam me language of spells, but mere are some who don't have the brains for it.