Swords & Dark Magic - By Jonathan Strahan Page 0,55
Tewk. Tewk was smart in different ways than Master. There were things still to learn.
Places to go.
He nodded, looking out on the dust of the Alley.
Fact was, Tewk needed him. He wasn’t the only one who put illusions on things. Cousin in Peghary, hell.
Maybe there even was a cousin.
“Sure,” he said. “All right. I can ride.”
* * *
Raised in rural Vermont, K. J. PARKER is part of the new generation of fantasy writers who, over the past ten years, has been publishing work that has been redefining sword and sorcery. Parker’s first novel, Colors in the Steel, appeared in 1998 and was followed by two further volumes in the Fencer trilogy, the Scavenger trilogy, and the critically acclaimed Engineer trilogy. Parker’s most recent books are novels The Company and The Folding Knife, and novella “Purple and Black.” Having worked in law, journalism, and numismatics, Parker is married to a solicitor, lives in southern England, and, when not writing, likes to make things out of wood and metal.
* * *
A RICH FULL WEEK
K. J. Parker
He looked at me the way they all do. “You’re him, then.”
“Yes,” I said.
“This way.”
Across the square. A cart, tied up to a hitching post. One thin horse. Not so very long ago, he’d used the cart for shifting dung. I sat next to him, my bag on my knees, tucking my feet in close, and laid a bet with myself as to what he’d say next.
“You don’t look like a wizard,” he said.
I owed myself two nomismata. “I’m not a wizard,” I said.
I always say that.
“But we sent to the Fathers for a—”
“I’m not a wizard,” I repeated, “I’m a philosopher. There’s no such thing as wizards.”
He frowned. “We sent to the Fathers for a wizard,” he said.
I have this little speech. I can say it with my eyes shut, or thinking about something else. It comes out better if I’m not thinking about what I’m saying. I tell them, we’re not wizards, we don’t do magic, there’s no such thing as magic. Rather, we’re students of natural philosophy, specializing in mental energies, telepathy, telekinesis, indirect vision. Not magic; just science where we haven’t quite figured out how it works yet. I looked at him. His hood and coat were homespun—that open, rather scratchy weave you get with moorland wool. The patches were a slightly different color; I guessed they’d been salvaged from an even older coat that had finally reached the point where there was nothing left to sew onto. The boots had a military look. There had been battles in these parts, thirty years ago, in the civil war. The boots looked to be about that sort of vintage. Waste not, want not.
“I’m kidding,” I said. “I’m a wizard.”
He looked at me, then back at the road. I hadn’t risen in his estimation, but I hadn’t sunk any lower, probably because that wasn’t possible. I waited for him to broach the subject.
By my reckoning, three miles out of town, I said, “So tell me what’s been happening.”
He had big hands; too big for his wrists, which looked like bones painted flesh-color. “The Brother wrote you a letter,” he said.
“Yes,” I replied brightly. “But I want you to tell me.”
The silence that followed was thought rather than rudeness or sulking. Then he said, “No good asking me. I don’t know about that stuff.”
They never want to talk to me. I have to conclude that it’s my fault. I’ve tried all sorts of different approaches. I’ve tried being friendly, which gets you nowhere. I’ve tried keeping my face shut until someone volunteers information, which gets you peace and quiet. I’ve read books about agriculture, so I can talk intelligently about the state of the crops, milk yields, prices at market, and the weather. When I do that, of course, I end up talking to myself. Actually, I have no problem with talking to myself. In the country, it’s the only way I ever get an intelligent conversation.
“The dead man,” I prompted him. I never say the deceased.
He shrugged. “Died about three months ago. Never had any bother till just after lambing.”
“I see. And then?”
“It was sheep to begin with,” he said. “The old ram, with its neck broke, and then four ewes. They all reckoned it was wolves, but I said to them, wolves don’t break necks, it was something with hands did that.”
I nodded. I knew all this. “And then?”
“More sheep,” he said, “and the dog, and then an old man, used to go round