Guild Mage: Apprentice

61. Steria

When the Talbots' back door swung open, it did not reveal either Cade or his father, but instead a woman dressed in the plain skirt, apron, and cap of a maid. "Please tell Cade that I'm in back," Liv said. "I'll wait here."

"Yes, m'lady," the maid said, made a curtsy, and disappeared back into the house. Liv wandered about the practice yard for a moment, and wondered if there might not have still been a small piece of garden, with a bench to sit on, if his mother had survived. It was growing quite chilly as the sun descended, but she preferred the cold to Baron Talbot.

"Liv!" Cade called, rushing out the back door. "I wasn't expecting you. Is everything well?"

She nodded. "Yes, I think so. Only, we're leaving to go back to Whitehill in the morning, and I wanted to say goodbye to you before we did."

"We're staying for however long the council lasts," Cade complained. "Though I expect all the most exciting parts have already happened. Duchess Julianne was confirmed in her new station today, and renewed her pledge of fealty to her father. There will be a good bit more discussion about the Eldish blood cult, but the Archmagus announced the mages' guild is sending two expeditions to Varuna."

"Yes, we talked about that a bit at the conclave," Liv recalled. "If we were older, we could go."

"Would you want to?" Cade asked. "A lot of people never come back from those jungles."

"I think I would," Liv said. "Someday. I feel involved, already. And there's someone that I want to track down, and ask a few questions. But none of that is why I came by. I wanted to ask if you would write to me?"

"Of course," Cade said. "And perhaps we can even arrange a visit."

"That would be nice. Only I think you would need to come to me," she decided. "It's going to be so odd to go back to Whitehill without all of you. I feel like, in just a short while here, I got a taste of what it is like to have a few friends - you, and Beatrice, and if we'd had more time maybe even Sidonie. And now it's back to none of that."

"You don't have any friends in Whitehill?" Cade asked her. "I find that hard to believe."

"One," Liv admitted. "Emma. But she's getting married soon, and I already don't see as much of her as I did a few years ago. There were plenty of girls interested in following Matthew around, but I'm - well, it's different than here. Anyone who looks the same age as me, I remember them as a small child. And anyone actually my age is grown with a family. I suppose I'm just too strange. Here I could pretend I wasn't different, because I was meeting you all for the first time."

"You said you're going to Coral Bay in what, five years?"

"Six," Liv said.

"And I'll be there in four," Cade told her. "Which means we'll have half our time there together. I'm sure I'll have met a few people by the time you arrive, and I'll introduce you around. And I'll keep writing you, of course, when I get there. You'll know all about the place in no time."

"That would be nice," Liv said, but privately she wondered. It was one thing to court someone who was right there in front of you, with exciting masques at the palace and duels on the shore and all of the intrigue of her short time at Freeport, but six years was a long time. And there would be plenty of other girls at college for Cade to pursue, while she was stuck in Whitehill. Liv was surprised to discover the idea of him forgetting about her was upsetting.

"Is something wrong?" Cade asked, and she realized that she'd spent too long drifting in her thoughts.

"No," Liv said. "Only I shouldn't stay long, I suppose. Don't forget to write to me." On a sudden impulse, she decided to give him a reason to remember her, bounced up on her tip toes, and pressed a very quick kiss to his lips. Before she could do anything else to embarrass herself, she spun around and fled through the menagerie and down to the beach, cheeks and the tips of her ears burning.

☙

Early the next morning, dressed in winter skirts and cloak for the journey, Liv found herself introduced to the oddest horse that she'd ever met. The mare was somewhat squat, with unusually short legs and a very round body covered in a thick, shaggy coat, all of light grey that reminded her of the stones washed smooth by waves down on the beach.

"Her name is Steria," Liv's father explained. "She is four years old, and well trained. I brought her for you, when I came." He motioned to his own horse, clearly of the same breed, though colored bay. "We've bred them for over a thousand years to live in the north, and to survive conditions that would kill any other horse. They can find grass to eat even under snow, and hibernate on their feet like a bear does in its cave."

Liv couldn't stop grinning at the feel of the mare's nose snuffling against her palm after a bit of carrot. "Star. I love her," she said. "Thank you."

"My motivations are selfish," Valtteri admitted. "You'll need her to visit Kelthelis, and riding will also give us an opportunity to speak privately while the others are riding in carriages."

"I forgive you," Liv said, and handed her staff off to Thora. "Give me a hand up?" Her father bent over and cupped his hands together for Liv's boot, then lifted. Only after she'd gotten herself situated sidesaddle, and arranged her skirts, did she reach down to accept the staff back from Thora.

"Good," Master Grenfell said. "One right." Together, the four of them gathered around the correct symbols, crouching down on the waystone and pressing their hands together. "Just like the last time," her teacher said. "Only this stone is larger, so the drain will be more. Liv, why don't you begin, this time."

"Alright." She swallowed, then closed her eyes. It helped to have felt Master Grenfell do it once before, and Liv also thought that having spent an entire night moving her mana throughout her body gave her a better idea of what to do now. It was still a bit slow and sluggish to get started, but once the first hint of her mana touched the waystone, everything changed, just as she remembered.

Again, she had the mental image of thin ice breaking, and wondered whether that was only because of the particular word of power she used. Mana poured out of all four of them in a flood, and she counted eight rings, at least, before blue light began to rise from the waystone. Finally, the pull on her reserves cut off, and Liv pulled her hand off the stone.

"Good," Duchess Julianne said. "Excellent job, Liv." She patted Liv on the arm, then turned and followed Master Grenfell back into their carriage.

"I would recommend remaining seated here," Liv's father said, so she shifted to cross her legs and sit back on the stone. The two of them waited, to either side of the sigil, until the count of two hundred had passed. Then, for the second time, a brilliant white light burned through everyone and everything, obliterating the world around her.

This time, the dark place was not so unexpected, and Liv had an infinite moment to cast whatever she was about. There was nothing to see, to feel, to hear or taste or touch, but she did not feel alone. In fact, she was quite convinced that though the world was very far away - or perhaps it was Liv who was very far away - there were other presences close by. Before she could try to reach out to them, the world returned.

Liv drew in a deep breath and opened her eyes. The bluff over the Aspen River was cold with morning frost, and there was the bite of coming snow in the air. The horses whinnied and pranced, and overhead white clouds were lit by mountain sunlight.

"How does it work?" she asked her father, who had already scrambled to his feet. He reached down a hand, and Liv accepted it. Valtteri easily pulled her upright, and seemed to consider his response while he helped her mount Steria once again. It was only once the entire procession had moved off of the waystone and over the wooden bridge toward the south road that he made an attempt at an explanation.

"The Vædim could do things with magic that they never explained, even to their most favoured servants," her father began. "The waystones fall into that category. I can tell you why sections of the network are failing," Valtteri said. "Or at least our best guesses. But even the Vakansa who survive with memories of life before the war have never been able to build a new waystone. I think the answer to your question begins with another question: what are you?"

"Me? Half Eld, half human," Liv answered easily. Many of the trees along the side of the road had lost their leaves, in the short time they'd been gone, and the difference was jarring.

"What separates you from some other girl with a human mother and an Elden father, then?"

"Are there any?" Liv shot back.

"A few, mostly in Al'Fenthia," her father confirmed. "But why are they distinct from you? From Livara?"

"Well, they don't have my exact parents, in any case," she said. "And they didn't grow up in Whitehill, or know the people I've known. They might not have a talent for magic, and they won't have done the same things as me."

"Are we only the sum total of our experiences, then?" Valtteri asked her. "We are exposed to different pieces of the world, at different times, and it acts upon us, shapes us into something distinctive? That would be a very passive view of the world."

"No, I think we're unique," Liv said. "And then the things we experience make us more so."

"What is it, precisely, that is unique?" her father asked. "We both have arms and legs, eyes and ears. You look a great deal like my sister did. If we dressed you in her clothing, and had your hair done the way she wore it, you might even pass for her well enough to fool someone."

"It isn't something physical," Liv said, and tapped a finger against her forehead. "It's in here, and here." She dropped her hand to rest it over her heart. "I'm me. I don't know a better way to put it, but I'm no one else."

"There it is," Valtteri said. "Not something physical. Would you continue to be you without your body, then? If an avalanche of stones and snow came down from that summit right now," he asked, pointing an arm up at Bald Peak, "and ripped an arm from your body, would the loss of it mean you were no longer Liv?"

"No, of course not," she said. "My arm isn't me."

"Time comes for all of us, sooner or later," her father said. "Whether it takes fifty years or five hundred. Your skin will wrinkle, your vision dull. Your back will bend. When my precious daughter is an ancient crone, will you still be Liv?"

"Yes, though I'm not certain I want to think about that," Liv told him, with a grin.

"There is your answer, then. There is some part of us that is untouchable," Valtteri said. "That persists, even after death. Whether the mana changes your physical form into raw energy and sends it coursing through the earth in an instant, or whether it breaks your body down into nothing and rebuilds you at your destination, I cannot say. But that essence of you is moved - taken out of this world, perhaps, and then returned in a different place."

"Wait," Liv said. "Is that actually how it works? Which one? Is this even my body?"

"You just said your body wasn't you," her father said, with a laugh. "Of all things in the vast world, don't think about this one too hard. Come on!" He squeezed his heels into the flanks of his bay gelding, and the northern horse bolted forward, running off the side of the road to pass the slower carriages. Unwilling to be left behind, Liv flicked her reins and followed, letting Steria stretch her legs under the endless mountain sky.