Chapter Text
The Northern Citadel is beautiful, in its way. It’s nothing like the village where Mako was born, all green and smelling of the sea, and nowhere near as grand as the courts of the Summerlands. But the mountains here stretch up like spindly fingers grasping at the sky, and there’s a stark beauty to that, too, that Mako finds breathtaking as they come up the path. And the castle itself, when they come close enough to see, imitates the shape of the mountains, with tall spires reaching up so high a watcher could see for miles.
Mako rides close behind her sensei. The paths here are narrow and sometimes dangerous, and she’s not a very experienced rider. Sensei is teaching her everything he can, but Mako is brand new at being a squire, and there’s so much to learn. Some of it comes easy, but other skills will only come with time.
She watches Sir Stacker and tries to imitate his seat in the saddle. It’s different than riding over flat ground, and no matter what she does, she feels unbalanced. But she’s getting there.
Sensei is a fine figure of a knight, tall and sure, his armor gleaming in the evening sun. His gear is well cared for, Mako notes with pride; that’s her doing. A squire’s first duty is to see her knight prepared for battle, and while Sir Stacker’s sword and tack and armor have all seen hard use, none of it will fail him in time of need. And he looks respectable, which, for their current mission, is even more important.
Sir Stacker turns in his saddle to look back at her, his stern expression softening just a bit.
“All right, Miss Mori?” he asks.
“Yes, sir!” She’s tired and sore, and shivering even in her fur-lined cloak, but she can press on. She could ride forever if her sensei asked it of her.
“Distance in these mountains is hard to judge. We won’t reach the castle before nightfall. Help me find a good place to make camp, will you?”
“Yes, sir,” she says again.
This is another test, of her judgement and of the skills her sensei has taught her in their weeks of travel. Mako smiles. She’s more than ready to pass any test he gives her. She’ll choose the best campsite he’s ever seen.
It isn’t until the next afternoon that they do ride through the castle gates.
“They call this the zwinger,” Stacker says as they traverse the crooked path between the first gate and the second. “Know why there are two parallel walls?”
“If an invader got past the first one, they could still defend the inner wall,” Mako guesses. “And these gates are staggered, so you can’t come straight on.”
“Right. No army has attacked the Northern Reaches in a hundred years, but this is a very old castle, built for defense. See how they’ve used the mountain’s terrain?”
“Only one point of entry, so no one can sneak up behind while they’re defending the gate,” Mako says, and is pleased to receive her sensei’s nod of approval.
“What else?”
“Um…” She looks up, at the curtain wall rising above her, and the castle towers rising above that. “They have the higher ground?”
“You can’t get much higher than the top of a mountain,” Sir Stacker agrees. But that’s not true, not completely. There are dragonlings in this country, and some of them fly.
The gate is guarded, but it stands open, the portcullis drawn up and out of the way. Beyond it, the outer bailey looks like any bustling village, with a market along the main entryway, cottages gathered against the wall, and livestock grazing on the fertile grounds. There are even small farms stretching out of sight along the curve of the innermost wall, enough to feed the castle and village in case of a siege without relying on the lowlands for help. Mako spots both a blacksmith and a bakehouse near the gate on this third wall; she imagines either would be a welcome respite from the cold here, but she especially wishes she had the free time to duck into the smithy and see the swordsmith’s technique.
Sir Stacker points out more defensive measures as they ride through to the upper bailey. Within the inner wall is an open courtyard where a group of young soldiers runs sword drills at the pells, under the supervision of a woman in heavy armor. Beyond that are stables and outbuildings, the greathall where the royal court resides, and an immensely tall freestanding tower where the people can retreat as a last line of defense when all other hope is lost. Mako should be paying attention to the military tactics he’s trying to teach her, and she can see its value as a watchtower, but all she can think is that the view must be incredible from up there.
The woman breaks away from the training session and strides over to greet them, moving as if her armor weighs nothing at all. Mako sits straighter in her saddle. She’ll be that strong someday, when her training is done.
“That’ll be Sir Karla, the captain of the guard,” Sir Stacker says, then adds, offhand, “the king’s daughter.”
A princess? Mako has never seen a real princess before, but she’s always imagined them like in the stories, beautiful ladies in silk gowns, working at their embroidery. This princess is all leather and steel. She has the broad shoulders and callused hands of a person who keeps herself in fighting trim. A real knight, not a sheltered noble in a ceremonial position of power. That’s good to know. Mako likes pretty stories as well as any other girl, but she can’t imagine a gentle lady would know how to aid a band of heroes on a quest. The Captain of the Guard, at least, will hear them out.
“Well met, travelers,” Sir Karla says with a respectful nod to Sir Stacker.
“Captain,” he responds, with the kind of bow that’s possible from the saddle, before he swings his leg over and dismounts. Mako follows suit. “Sir Stacker Pentecost, and my squire, Mako.” Mako stands straighter, proud to be acknowledged, and receives a nod and a smile from the knight. “The king is expecting us.”
“Of course. I’ll walk with you, sir, if you’ll allow one of the lads to see to your horses.”
“We’d be very grateful,” Sir Stacker agrees. One of the young trainees comes running to take the reins. Mako gives her pony a farewell pat on the neck.
“We had word you’d be here soon,” Sir Karla says as she leads the way to the greathall. “But we’ve only heard the vaguest sorts of rumors about what your people are actually doing out there. Are you really going after True Dragons?”
“Not exactly. Dragons are nearly extinct, but there is something else, something new to this world. You won’t have seen them in these parts yet, but we’re seeing them move farther from the oceans every year.”
“Sea serpents,” Sir Karla says dismissively. Sir Stacker shakes his head.
“Nothing so common. Miss Mori, here, is from the Dawnward Isles. She’s seen sea serpents every year of her life. She knows them well.” He looks to Mako in silent invitation. He will not force her to speak of the disaster so recently past, but he will give her the space to do so if she’s ready.
“We might lose a fishing boat or two to the serpents during mating season, if we were very unlucky,” Mako says. “But that’s all. We know how to handle them. But something came out of the sea three months ago that we had never seen before. It destroyed my village.” Tears prick at her eyelids, but she blinks them away. That creature killed her parents, and it killed Sir Stacker’s traveling companion, and Mako would be dead now too if her brave knight had not slain the beast and carried her away. It was something far more dangerous than an ordinary offshoot of dragonkind. “It was tall enough to blot out the sun,” she says, a poor description, but the best she can do with her memories rising up to choke her.
Sir Stacker rests a hand on her shoulder, a brief gesture of encouragement. She is his squire now, and she’s safe with him.
“We’ve been seeing more and more of them recently, everywhere you turn, from Tidepull to Golden Horn Bay, all along the Midlands and the Amazons’ Coast, and as far south as Warrane Harbour,” Sensei explains. Sir Karla stops short, shocked.
“But that’s all the world,” she protests. “If these things are as dangerous as you say, how has anyone survived?”
“We do have ways of fighting them, but my Defenders lack the manpower to do it effectively. I’ve ridden out in search of volunteers, of gold, and of any scholars we could set to studying the problem, to stop it at its source. These things have been growing bolder, Captain, traveling farther inland before they can be stopped. If we don’t put an end to it, they will threaten all the world, even you here in the high reaches.”
“I see.” She studies him thoughtfully for a moment, then nods. “I’ll announce you to my father. He’ll listen. He’s not an easy man to sway, but he will listen. Please don’t take offense if he asks my brother to scry out the truth of it.”
“Of course,” Sir Stacker agrees.
Sir Karla leads them into the greathall, and leaves them in a foyer where several others are awaiting their audiences with the king. Mako looks them over, but doesn’t find much worth noticing. They’re all warmly dressed. Even the poorest-looking wears a thick knitted tunic and fur-lined boots, which she guesses says something good about the prosperity of the castle town. The king must be a good ruler; all his subjects seem to be in good health. But she can’t tell if they’re happy or not.
She loses interest in the people and finds her attention drawn instead to the portrait on the far wall. It’s quite a grand portrait, showing the royal family in all their majesty. She doesn’t doubt for a moment who the painting portrays. Sir Stacker has set her to learning the names of all the royal families they may have to petition on their journey. The Northern Reach is held by the House of Gottlieb: King Lars, his daughter Karla, and the two princes, Dietrich and Bastien. She recognizes Sir Karla, although the girl captured in oils is much younger, slimmer, holding a rapier far more delicate than the broadsword sheathed at the real knight’s side.
The young princess stands beside an empty throne that would have belonged to the queen, if she were still alive. Beside that one is a larger, grander throne occupied by a stern-looking man who must be the king. He has a face like a hawk, and Mako has a moment’s irrational fear that he’ll swoop down on her and eat her the moment she enters his throne room. But she squares her shoulders. She is Sir Stacker Pentecost’s squire, survivor of Onibaba’s rampage. Why should she be afraid of a king?
Beside the king’s throne is a young man who looks very much like him, but with a fuller face and softer eyes, and far less sense of danger barely leashed. He must be the heir to the throne. He holds the scepter that symbolizes the office he’ll one day step into. And next to him is a younger, fair-haired boy holding a wizard’s focus. It’s a good painting, meant to show off the gifts of the royal children in all the traditional roads to power: rulership, strength of arms, and magic.
But next to Karla is a shadowed space gone to waste in this well-considered portrait, and when Mako looks closely, she can see the faintest image of another person standing by the princess. They’ve been painted over, whoever they were, and that makes Mako terribly sad to see. They only do that to official portraits if someone has died before the last coat of paint is dry, and by the size of the ghostly image and the ages of the others, this lost prince or princess might have been no older than Mako when they met their untimely end. Far from grown, anyway. She wonders what symbol of power the lost one would have held if the portrait had remained intact.
“Mako.” Sir Stacker calls her back to his side. Their turn has come.
Mako follows him into the throne room, wondering if it’s a good sign that they’ve been skipped ahead of all those others. The king must be willing to take them seriously.
In the audience room, two thrones of polished wood sit on a platform raised high enough to remind all supplicants of the king’s majesty. He’s high above them, and wants them all to know it. King Lars sits in the larger, grander throne, with his eldest son at his side in the smaller seat that would once have belonged to the Queen Consort. The prince watches them with quiet interest as they approach. The king’s gaze is sharp, taking in Sir Stacker but dismissing Mako from his attention. She doesn’t mind that so much. Mako will be a knight one day, but for now she’s no one important, and being overlooked makes it easier to simply observe. She learns a lot that way.
Sir Karla stands as a sort of honor guard at the king’s other side. She gives Mako a tiny wink before returning to her impassive neutral stance.
“Your Grace.” Sir Stacker bows before the king. Mako does the same. She’s a village girl with no courtly manners to carry her through, but she trusts her sensei. She does as he does.
“Sir Stacker Pentecost. You’ve traveled far to reach us.” The king’s voice is stern, but not as frightening as his face. He speaks to Sir Stacker with just as much respect as a seasoned knight is due. As much, and not a snip more.
“Such is the life of a knight errant,” Sir Stacker says, his tone as perfectly correct as the king’s. Sir Stacker is as proper as any gentleman, but he never gives an inch of ground, not to anyone.
“And what brings you so far north?” the king asks. He looks no more interested than he would be in a traveling minstrel of uncertain talent. But that’s all right. Sir Stacker will convince him.
“I trust Your Grace has heard of the great beasts attacking the coastlines?”
“Yes, rumors have reached us even at this distance. Some new species of dragon?”
A ripple of unease goes through the room at that, but both Sir Stacker and the king remain calm.
“These beasts are like nothing we’ve ever seen before,” Sir Stacker explains. “The people of the Dawnward Isles call them kaiju. They are an unprecedented threat.”
“To the coasts,” says the king.
“To the coasts now, and the rest of the world soon after, if they’re not stopped in time.”
Mako watches the king’s face carefully. He has no idea what the kaiju really are, and he has no reason to care, as far as he knows. He’s responsible for his people here in the mountains, far inland, and he must believe they’ll be safe here. He hasn’t seen what Mako has seen.
“When the first kaiju emerged from the ocean, we were able to defeat them. Those of us trained to slay monsters put our skills to use. But each one that arises is more powerful than the one before.”
“Too powerful for a knight of your stature?” King Lars asks wryly.
“Alone? Certainly. Your Grace should know better than most the folly of fighting monsters singlehanded.” He has no shame admitting it, but why would he? Even an ordinary dragonling is a challenge for a single knight to face, and the kaiju are far more than that.
“And what is it you would ask of me, Sir Knight? We have monsters of our own here, and few enough to fight them.”
“Few, but well trained. Your people are renowned for their dragonslaying skills. If you could spare even a few brave souls who would rather venture out into the world than stay safe behind these walls, or someone to train my recruits, it would do a world of good. We’re also in need of scholars to study the beasts, and supplies and armaments to support the undertaking.”
“Gold,” says the king. “You’re here to beg leave to raid my treasury.”
Sir Stacker inclines his head in what should be a gesture of respect, but from her position, Mako can clearly read his irritation with the king’s attitude. King Lars doesn’t think much of Mako’s sensei, and Sir Stacker just has to put up with it. This king is allowed to treat him like dirt. And nobody can say anything, because they are desperately in need of whatever they can get if they want to stop the kaiju.
The king waits for a long moment, enjoying her sensei’s show of submission, before he says, “Very well. If you’re in need of scholars, I’ll give you one. My younger son is clever enough, and a skilled magician. He’ll put his mind to fighting your monsters.”
“That would be Prince Bastien?” Sir Stacker asks, an eager gleam in his eyes. They haven’t found any wizards yet, and he badly wants one. Where strength of arms fails, magic could turn the tide.
“My son at your side will show the rest of the world that you have my support. Should make others easier to convince. And the boy is an expert in divination. I’m sure you’ll find a use for him.”
This is one thing they’ve been hoping for for a long time. Sir Stacker will be happy to have a mage, but Mako isn’t looking at him now, or at the king either. Her eyes are on Sir Karla, who regards her father with a flinty glare. She doesn’t like what he’s saying. Is she angry that he’s come to his decision so easily? He doesn’t seem to care that he’ll be sending his own son away, maybe into great danger.
Maybe she would rather go herself. A trained knight, a dragonslayer, would be far more suited to the task at hand. And yet the king has chosen to send a scholar, and like Sir Stacker, the princess is not allowed to argue.
“We would be most grateful for the prince’s assistance, if he’s willing,” Sir Stacker says.
“He won’t say no.” The king’s sharp eyes fix on Mako for the first time. “He’ll be in the bergfried. Send your squire to fetch him down, and we’ll discuss the rest of the details.”
Mako bows low, as she’s been taught. Sent by a king to summon a prince. Since the day she met her sensei, her life has become very strange indeed.
Mako is peasant-born, a swordmaker’s daughter raised in a seaside village with no need for defenses greater than a storm shelter. She does not know castles, though Sir Stacker is doing his best to teach her. She has never heard the word “bergfried” before.
Fortunately, there are plenty of locals around to ask. A boy carrying a sack of grain points her to the great freestanding tower behind the gates, so tall it must command a view of the mountains for miles and miles. No one could ever approach this castle unseen, not with someone on watch at the top of the tower. But what a prince would be doing there, she doesn’t know.
“You’re not going all the way up, are you?” the boy asks. “Nobody ever goes up there. It’s where the Mad Prince does his spells.”
“The Mad Prince?” She wouldn’t have thought that sunny young gentleman in the portrait was mad. But then, if he was, the artist wouldn’t have wanted to offend the king by painting him that way.
But is he really? Is the king playing some awful trick on them, sending them off with someone useless or even dangerous, just to get him out of the castle?
Seeing her doubt, the boy says, “He brought a dragon’s curse down on us. Made a pact with it, out in the wilds. The day he dies, it’ll come back here and blow the castle to rubble and burn what’s left. It said so, my ma heard it shouting down from the sky. Now he stays up in his tower where he can do his witchy things with no one to stop him. Nobody’s seen him in years. He never comes down.”
Mako’s frown deepens as she thinks that over. Is any of that true? If so, Sir Stacker needs to know it before they ride away with this person. But she can’t go running back to tell him, and disobey an order from the king. Besides, she’s not a silly child spreading stories before she finds out if they’re true.
“How does he eat?” she asks.
“What?”
“If the prince never comes down, and no one ever goes up, that means no one brings him his meals. He should have starved to death a long time ago,” Mako says. The boy shrugs.
“Maybe he charms birds down from the sky and roasts them alive with his witchfire. I don’t know, he’s eldritch.”
“Sounds like a lot of nonsense to me,” Mako decides.
“It’s all true!”
“Maybe, maybe not. There’s only one way to find out.” She has to go up there and see the Mad Prince for herself.
The boy makes a sign over her to ward away evil, and because he means it kindly, Mako doubles it back at him. But the prince in his tower is probably just a perfectly respectable wizard who keeps to himself and studies magics his people don’t understand. Mako isn’t afraid of him.
Not much, anyway.
She has to put her shoulder to the door to force it open, heavy as it is. The hinges cre-ea-ak as it swings inward, revealing a round storeroom stuffed with boxes and casks. It’s dark, the gloom only slightly lifted by what light spills through the open doorway, and much quieter than outside. The stones of the tower are as thick as the outer walls, designed to withstand a siege.
There are stairs curving up along the wall, narrow stone without a railing that don’t look at all safe to climb. No wonder no one ever goes up. No servant would willingly take on that duty. But Mako is surefooted. She won’t fall.
She makes her way up, step by step, wary of the smooth stone that at any moment could betray her footing and send her tumbling down into the darkness. A dozen steps up, and then a dozen more, and more after that. She’s tired by the time she reaches the second landing, an empty wooden platform with a hole cut out of the center. She’s already higher than anyone bothers to go for their storage needs. And still there’s so much more.
Each floor has that same hole cut out of the middle, so she’s not left completely in the dark despite the lack of windows. But somehow, that makes it spookier, traveling up and up until at last she emerges into—
Sunlight, is the first thing she notices. The wide open windows along each wall are a shock after the gloom below. And it’s cold as a serpent’s heart, despite the fire burning merrily in a raised hearth set over the hole in the center of the floor. There’s a bed on the far side of the chamber, piled high with furs, and a curtained off area that might be a privy. The prince would need one, if he really never comes down from this place. Shelves are placed all about, crammed with books and loose papers, and sketches of bizarre mechanical devices are scattered over every available surface, some of them reproduced in reality, and others, she has to assume, purely theoretical. There’s a huge chalkboard covered in symbols she can’t begin to read, and various things she can’t identify that must be magical in nature. And at one window is a man, hunched over some sort of contraption he has pointed at the sky, wrapped in a heavy cloak with a fur-lined hood that’s fallen forward to obscure his face.
The Mad Prince.
“Excuse me,” Mako says.
The man waves a dismissive hand behind him without bothering to turn and look at her.
“Set it down, set it down. Didn’t anyone tell you? You can use the basket next time.”
“Basket?” Mako asks.
“Mm, yes. Needn’t bother with all those stairs. Aha!” he shouts, loud enough that Mako nearly jumps out of her skin. But he isn’t shouting at her. He straightens up from his contraption, pushing back his hood and reaching for a gnarled staff leaned against the nearby wall.
Mako watches him take a few hobbling steps to the chalkboard. She wonders if the staff is for magic, or just for walking. But more than his limp, she notices the color of his hair. Dark, like the king’s, and like Sir Karla and Prince Dietrich. He’s not the sandy-haired prince from the portrait.
“Are you…”
“Right, I was right,” the wizard mutters, more to himself than to her. “Completely miscalculated the angle of the ecliptic, damn fools at the university won’t make use of all their fine equipment…” He snatches up a piece of chalk and scrawls more symbols across the board, so fast it makes Mako’s head spin.
She creeps a little closer, trying to make sense of the chalk writing, and the wizard half-turns toward her with a frown. He has the same angular features as the king, sharp cheekbones and a mouth that looks as if it never smiles, but there’s something quite different about him, too. He doesn’t frighten her. He’s just a person after all, maybe a cousin of the royal family, or an unacknowledged byblow. Neither mad nor a prince, if she guesses right.
“You’re still here,” the wizard says. He doesn’t sound unhappy, just curious, so Mako has to assume he isn’t going to throw her out.
“I…”
“Here, hold this.” From somewhere deep inside his cloak, he takes a pale green gemstone as big as a fist, and drops it into Mako’s hands.
Mako gasps. It’s warm to the touch, and more luminous than the reflection of sun and firelight off its facets should account for.
The wizard’s eyes sweep down over her mail and leathers, and back up to her face.
“You’re not from the kitchens,” he observes.
“No, I…”
“I suppose they’ve forgotten me again. Never mind. Step back, miss. I need a distance of six or seven feet.”
Mako steps back. In her hands, the gemstone vibrates slightly. The wizard nods in satisfaction.
“Still not the right resonance, but promising. Yes, stop just there.” He tucks his staff against his body and uses both hands to pluck rapidly at the air as if playing on a harp, but instead of music, his fingers leave the faintest of shimmers drifting through the air.
“What is that?” Mako asks.
“Ah, you can see it. Just as I thought. But your affinity is water, I think. Here, let be bring it into focus for you.” His fingers glide upward, and it suddenly appears, a cat’s cradle of glimmering blue woven between his hands, with strands spiraling out in all directions only to vanish in the distance. A thick cable of intertwined strands runs from the wizard’s hands to Mako’s gem, and now that she can see it, she can hear it humming as well.
“How beautiful!” she says. The wizard looks pleased, but he doesn’t respond to her, not directly.
“Have to alter the frequency. The lines still won’t converge. Ah, well.” He pinches the glowing strands together, and they all wink out of existence. The gem in her hands goes cold. “That was a great help, young lady.”
“But, I didn’t do anything…”
“Never underestimate what you can accomplish with a second pair of hands. I don’t suppose you’re here for lessons?” he says hopefully. “It’s been ages since anyone’s come.”
“I was sent to find Prince Bastien,” Mako says. The wizard looks awfully disappointed at that.
“You won’t find him here,” he says. “Bastien’s out hunting just now. Hardly ever finds his way up here anymore. He’s learned all the magic he cares to know.” Then his face brightens. “Would you like a cup of tea? Afraid I haven’t anything else you offer you, but I ought to be getting a delivery any minute now. They’re late, as usual, but if you wait long enough, there’ll be fresh—well, there’ll be bread, anyway.” He wrinkles his nose in annoyance. “They think I won’t notice the difference if it’s gone stale. But, never mind that. I have the tea, at least.”
“Thank you very much,” Mako says. She really shouldn’t be stopping for tea when she has a job to do, but she doesn’t want to hurt his feelings. He must be awfully lonely, if no one ever comes to see him. She wishes she could offer something to have with the tea. Something more substantial than a stale crust of bread.
The wizard clears a stack of papers off a wooden chair to give her a place to sit, then pours what looks like cold tea into a stoneware mug. He draws a pattern on the side of the cup with his finger, and then, to her surprise, when she takes it, it’s piping hot.
Magic does have its uses, doesn’t it?
“Do you want your emerald back?” Mako asks.
“Hm? Oh, just set it down anywhere. I’m sick to death of tinkering with it. And it’s a green sapphire, if you want to know. Holds a better charge than emerald. Much less prone to shattering.” He pours and heats his own cup of tea, then sits across from her. “All right, then, young lady, who are you, and what brings you all the way up here in search of my little brother?”
“My name is Mako Mori. Squire to Sir Stacker Pentecost, at your service, sir,” she says proudly.
“A pleasure to meet you, Squire Mori. Hermann Fitzroy, House Gottlieb.” He inclines his head in the sort of courtly bow a lord can make from a seated position. Mako returns the gesture. It might be more proper to do it standing, but she still isn’t sure exactly who he is and how much deference she owes him. He says he’s Bastien’s brother, but according to the records, there is no such person.
“The king sent me…” Mako says uncertainly. She’s realizing now that he never actually said Prince Bastien’s name. “I was supposed to find his son in the bergfried. Am I in the right place?”
“You are, indeed. You have a message from my father?”
Mako bites her lip, debating again about the wisdom of telling her sensei about the king’s underhanded dealing before they commit. King Lars didn’t say, but he implied that he was sending Prince Bastien away with them. She knows nothing of a Prince Hermann, but Sir Stacker might.
“Is this a prison?” Mako blurts out gracelessly. She can’t imagine why he would be locked away and neglected at the top of a tower unless he’s done something terrible, or is something terrible, a curse or a monster or a shameful secret to be hidden from the world.
“This is my refuge,” Hermann says, not in the least offended. “A wizard needs a workshop, and this is the best place to view the stars at night. Besides, I’m free to leave at any time.” He laughs, with an undertone of bitterness. It’s plain to see that, with his limp, all those stairs would be difficult if not impossible to manage on his own. This place is functionally a prison, whether he calls it that or not.
“Would you want to leave?” Mako asks. “My sensei is looking for scholars to study the kaiju, and help us stop them. You’d have to travel to the other side of the world, but we’d give you a workshop at least as good as this one.”
“And just what is a kaiju?” Hermann asks, with a definite gleam of interest.
So Mako explains about the great beasts rising from the sea, and long before she’s finished, he’s already started to pack.
Hermann doesn’t take much. A change of clothes goes into a bag, along with the sorts of necessities any seasoned traveler knows to take on a long journey. Several pouches of herbs follow, and a dizzying array of potions in tiny vials, packed row by row in a box with cotton wool in between to protect the glass. After that comes a truly enormous pouch of jewels, to which he adds his green sapphire.
“For spellwork,” he explains. “So my father can’t possibly object to my taking them. But I could bring myself to part with a few if the expedition happens to run short of funds.”
All that goes into a satchel, which goes into a basket, which he lowers on a rope through the hole in the floor, down and down until at last the rope goes slack as the basket touches down at the bottom of the tower. Then Mako offers the wizard her hand to help him down all those stairs.
“Thank you, Miss Mori, but I’ll be taking an alternate route down.”
“Something magic?” Mako asks. Maybe he’ll turn himself into a bird and fly out the window.
“Have you ever travelled by Gate?” the wizard asks.
Mako nods. Gates are a magic so old, no one understands how they work anymore. But they do work, some of them. A person with the right touch can open the door, walk through the ancient stone circle in one place, and come out somewhere entirely different. In old stories, it was more likely to be Ælfland or the realms of the dead than a simple jaunt to the other side of the river, but that sort of thing was lost a long time ago, with the other secrets of the Gates.
“Have you ever wondered how the ancients created them?”
“No one knows that. It can’t be done anymore,” Mako says.
“And yet, it was done once.” He smiles mysteriously. “Mind your footing on the steps, young lady. I’ll meet you at the bottom.”
Mako leaves him scribbling away in a notebook, shaking her head as she makes her careful way back down the stairs. He can’t really mean to imply that he’s uncovered those lost spells. More likely he’s just teasing her, no more straight-talking than the king.
She winds her way back down, one hand on the wall for balance, although her grip there is no more secure than her feet are on the stairs.
Maybe he has a man-sized basket he can put out the window, and lower himself down that way. Or a pair of wings he can strap to his back. She does wish she could have spent more time poking around in his workshop. In all the things he’s built up there, there must be all sorts of interesting things. She wonders if he’ll regret leaving all that behind.
On the ground floor at last, Mako retrieves Hermann’s bag from where it’s landed among the stacks of boxes, then goes outside to wait for him.
And there he is. Unnaturally pale and sagging against his staff, a faintly glowing circle just fading away from the packed earth at his feet. A second satchel drops from his hand to spill an assortment of books and papers out across the ground. The wizard’s knees buckle, and Mako catches at his arm to help keep him upright.
“Well, that seems to have taken a great deal more effort than anticipated, but I think I can mark the first attempt down as a success.” He blinks a few times, and sounds a bit less dazed when he says, “Hello again, Miss Mori.”
“You really did it,” she gasps. “You Gated without a Gate!”
“Might have been easier just to take the stairs…” He digs his staff into the ground and straightens himself up. “No matter. I’ll refine the equations before I try it again.”
“But how did you do it?” The cleverest wizards in the world, with access to all the libraries and archives and the Gates themselves, haven’t been able to work that out for hundreds of years. And he’s done it with…just mathematics?
“I’ve been up in that tower a very long time,” Hermann says. “One needs a bit of mental stimulation, you know, when there’s no one around to talk to.”
“That seems like more than ‘a bit,’” says Mako.
Hermann looks immensely proud of himself, but all he says is, “Everyone needs a hobby.”