8. DEVIN, YEAR 494

Devin awoke on a cold hearth wrapped in his red cloak. The chill seeped through the wool and his back molded into the smooth lumps.

I might as well be sleeping on the cobblestones outside, he thought, groaning.

Devin pushed himself into a sitting position and leaned against the hearth, running his hands along the stones to search for a hint of warmth. His dark, linen tunic was rumpled and dried sweat had plastered the fabric to his back. Devin winced. Sitting hurt.

He grabbed the stones and pulled himself off the floor. The youth strapped his metal foot into place, shrugged into a wool shirt, stepped into a pair of woolen leggings, and then slipped into his travel beaten leather shoe. A stale odor emanated from the shirt, but Devin hardly noticed anymore. The communal imperial bathhouses with their steam saunas, soft lathery soaps, and patterned tile floors were a distant memory, almost a dream. A Corelian bath was a bucket of tepid water and a sponge with a gritty brick of lye soap for the lucky few. Devin had heard whispers among the villagers of the copper baths, scented oils, and hot water reserved for nobles and royalty. By the gods' armpits, I'm turning into a native. Devin sighed, looking down at his feet. Someday, I'll wear clean clothes and two shoes again. Not today.

The youth arched his back and rubbed the kink below his shoulders. The muscles knotted tighter every night, but after days upon days as Cornelius's guest, he was starting to get a feel for the town: tourism was the mortar which held the place together. Cornelius kept promising him a bed if he stayed long enough and to teach him to control his magic if he stayed even longer. Yet here he was with no bed and no lessons. Devin had started to lose faith in the wizard's promises.

Devin yawned and glanced around the tiny two room house. The kitchen dominated the front area and he could glimpse Cornelius's bed in the back room with a large stone chimney separating the two halves. Pride of the place belonged to the large table which sprouted like a tree trunk under a window, its branches extending and weaving to form a large, round table top. The chairs looked like living wood, too. Devin kicked one to make sure it had not taken root through the stone floor and then plucked a small, green leaf off the seat to smell it.

“You're still not used to those?” Cornelius asked, emerging from the bedroom, struggling to button a pale linen robe with one hand while holding a sloshing mug in the other. His bare feet slapped the stones as he walked over to the tree table. “I know the floor makes a poor mattress. Sit.” He gestured with the mug and a trickle of wet foam dripped down one side. “Let the branches caress your aching back and ease all your cares away. Once you've sat on these, my friend, you'll never want to sit on one of those dead, dry wooden chairs again. Oh, speaking of wood . . .” Cornelius gestured with his mug again and several logs flew into the hearth, arraying themselves under the kettle. He fluttered his fingers and the logs burst into flames.

The youth eased into one of the chairs, letting the knots in the wood untangle the knots in his back. He wiggled his shoulders as the living wood massaged and relaxed his muscles. Devin reached out with one limp arm and crooked a lazy finger at the doll who had remained standing in the corner all night. “Come on Styx, rest those wooden bones.”

“No thank you, Father.” The automaton waved his arms. “I find myself arrested by the sight of these young sapling chairs, instead, a prisoner to my inhibitions. Would you sit on a big baby human's lap and wriggle your shoulders like that?”

The wizard grabbed a second mug from the cabinet above the stone sink, pushing aside a small pile of turnips with his elbow to clear space for both mugs. Cornelius waved his hand at the cutlery arranged over the sink and a knife descended and started dicing the turnips. Devin's eyes followed the staccato rise and fall of the knife handle and drifted up to the cast iron hand pump arching behind the sink.

Factory-made cast iron here in the land of wizardry? The tendrils of the empire must reach deep into Corel. Then Devin remembered the hordes of imperial tourists he'd seen in the streets reaching deep into their pockets. Which of my countrymen gave Cornelius an iron pump? What service did the wizard perform for them? Or did this come from one of his students?

Cornelius poured for himself and the youth from a tall carafe. “Fresh bread should be here shortly. To the mysteries of magic!”

“To magic!” Devin clinked his glass, wrinkling his nose.

“It's a new liquorice-mint tincture I've been brewing,” Cornelius said, sipping and smacking his lips. Then off the youth's quizzical stare, he elaborated. “It's steeped, flavored water. Like a weak tea. Hides that flat, boiled taste. You think I would serve ale for breakfast?” He snorted and set the mug down. “Magnus might. When I see some of the slipshod work those apprentices turn out, I despair.”

“The weak tea is fine, I was wrinkling my nose at the dinner you're preparing. Turnips, again, Cornelius? And what were those sour gobs of flesh in the stew last night?” Devin glanced at the pump, wanting to break off the conversation and hunt for a factory stamp. The local blacksmith did not handcraft that. Such mechanical wonders could only come from imperial artificers.

Cornelius glared over the top of his mug. “Those 'sour gobs' were a magic delicacy fit for a king. As for the turnips, what sort of feast do you expect at winter's end except the last of the root crops? This isn't the Iron Empire where sweetmeats and fresh fruit rain down from the sky every night. ”

“We were toasting magic, Cornelius?” Devin raised his glass. “Any chance of you ever demystifying those mysteries? Maybe teaching me to make that fruit rain from the sky?”

“Your problem is almost everything you know of magic comes from here,” Cornelius poked Devin's chest, “when it should be coming from here.” He tapped the youth's skull. “It is vital that you gain a better understanding of where your magic originates . . . and your food.”

“So teach me, Professor,” Devin said, swatting the wizard's hand away. “And it doesn't rain fresh produce in the empire. Food's grown on rooftops in public double pane greenhouses to supplement winter diets. The whole skyline sparkles like a necklace of flashing jewels when the sun rises. It's beautiful, but I was always too self absorbed to see it. I never truly appreciated what I left behind until the day I walked away from it. Beautiful city, brilliant future, bright family. Gone one sunny morning.”

“Greenhouses on rooftops, eh?” Cornelius said, turning aside while Devin wiped the tears from his eyes. “So it really does rain fresh fruit from the sky in that mechanical wonderland.”

Devin shrugged. “Once I helped a journeyman service and repair the convective flow through regulation system on the greenhouse over a factory. Hot gases were ducted from the chimneys through one way valves right beside the grow beds. The roof vents were tied to temperature sensitive pistons. Soot from the factory was gunking up the gears. A practical system. Simple to understand. The functional rules are apparent and easy to manipulate. Unlike magic.”

“Manipulating magic is a serious business, Devin.” Cornelius fluttered his fingers and the knife ascended back to its hook above the sink while the turnip slices zipped across the room into the large kettle hung over the fireplace. “As simple in its own way as your pistons and gears once you understand the principles behind it. I have been waiting to see whether you had the makings of a serious scholar. I judge you worthy of learning, but I don't think you're ready to start experimenting with magic.”

“That took all those days huddled over books and touring the town?” Devin asked, glancing at the neat pile of books Cornelius had made him stack on the table before going to be the night before. “I'm ready to start learning something other than basics and theories and where all your students live, Cornelius. I'm an artificer. I know how to run tests and conduct experiments. I know how to examine theories and refine techniques. I am ready to start learning magic.”

The relief of not finding himself chained to another traditional apprenticeship had already started fading. At least those chains were familiar. The rules governing scholarly partnership seemed to change according to Cornelius's whims. They had yet to start reviewing the rules governing magic. How could they be true equals when the old wizard refused to share his secrets?

As if sensing his thoughts, Cornelius placed a pebble on the table. “Perhaps you are ready for something basic. Unlocking the secrets of magic all starts with a single, simple experiment. Consider this a chance to explore the first dimension. I want you to practice holding this rock above your head. With your mind. Stationary. For as long as you can, lad.”

Devin tossed the pebble in the air and caught it. “And this will teach me magic?”

“As well as melting scrap metal teaches you to forge new machines. Magic is a mysterious process.”

A mysterious process? The man seemed to treat magic like a shrouded, complex machine emitting low pitched metal growls and curious vibrations hidden beneath a large, black tarp. Cornelius had eagerly explained the significance of every contour of the dark, heavy fabric. The old wizard kept saying that Devin must truly understand how the world worked before manipulating it. They had poured over manuals of useless esoterica until Devin was beginning to regret his desire for diagrams.

Cornelius had buried the youth under a pile of books detailing mathematics, natural history, physical sciences, and everything but magic. Devin wasn't sure if the old man was stalling or just over proud of his bloated, ponderous education. But after two years of searching for answers, all the youth wanted was to bury his fingers in the greasy mechanics of sorcery, to strip the thing to pieces and discover how all the components meshed together. Now, it seemed Cornelius was finally ready to discard the books and get his hands dirty.

“But simple exercises will not address your base problem: your magic is uncontrolled and reckless. You cannot replicate that which you do not consciously understand. Do you want to learn how to use magic properly without relying on bursts of instinct?” Corenlius asked, swirling the dark liquid in his mug. “You want to direct that fantastic talent of yours instead of letting it direct you?”

“More than anything.” Devin's gut clenched. Was it finally time to start learning how to tame his wild magic powers?

“There is one paramount thing you must do. It cannot be taught. It must be felt. It is knowledge you must grapple with before you can even begin to comprehend it.”

“Yes? Yes?” Devin leaned forward in his chair.

“You've been pestering me about secrets?” Cornelius set his mug aside and crossed his arms. “Well, this is the secret to controlling magic. The one trick which separates true wizards from the bunglers.”

“Yes?” The youth quivered. “Tell me!”

“You must face the tiger.”

“What?” Devin rocked back in his chair. In his mind, the black tarp shrouding Cornelius's mysteries had now acquired gaudy, orange stripes. The wizard peeled this fabric skin to reveal a grotesque, pulsing block of flesh and metal. A four stroke pump drove viscous, black blood through a web of pulsing, metal veins. The block uncurled into something vaguely cat shaped. Steam hissed through a vent shaped like a feral smile of sharp, iron teeth while green, glowing eyes stared and started to blink. “You're not serious? A . . . tiger? Cornelius, you tell worse jokes than Styx.”

The old wizard shook his head. His beard swayed. “I knew you weren't ready.”

“Ready for tigers?” Devin asked, shaking his head, replacing the mental image of the machine beast with a striped kitten. He formed his hands into little claws and pawed the air. “Are you trying to tell me that magic is like a giant cat?”

Cornelius assumed that particular trilling monotone cadence and slipped into what the youth had started mentally calling the Cornelius Lecture Voice. “Kings, queens, and despots may run their little kingdoms, but magic rules the world. It is the wild, primal force that flows unchecked through plant and man and beast. Magic is an ancient, mythical force of nature, a spirit who grants power. Close your eyes. Feel around the edges of your consciousness. That is the magic, prowling, sniffing, examining your worth. Let it take shape in the foggy corners of your mind. Its lanky, muscled shoulders. The sinuous, twitching tail. Those long, dagger canines. Magic is a prehistoric, saber-toothed beast. Reach out, Devin. Touch the tiger.”

Devin sighed. He was almost afraid to ask if ancient tigers had stripes. He opened his eyes.

Cornelius faced him, nose tip to nose tip. He could smell the man's sour, minty breath. “Touch the tiger.”

Devin scooted his chair back. “I have wrestled with magic these last two years, Cornelius, but with myself, not some mystical animal. I never saw any magical tigers prowling through my mind. All the power comes from a well within my gut.” Devin smiled, patting his stomach. “From the belly, not the beast.”

“Your core, boy. Magicians call that the core.”

“There were no tigers, Cornelius. Not a whiff. Not one hair. No twitching tail. You're draping a fur hide over a gift from the gods.”

“Well, magic takes different forms for different people, Devin. Yours may not be a tiger. You might see a bird or an otter or a fish. A magic fish swimming around inside you.”

“I don't want a magic fish swimming around inside me.” Devin rose and smiled as the thought came to him, finger poised in the air. “What about a dragon?”

“A dragon?” Cornelius snorted. “Representing the spirit of magic with a magical creature? The thing cannot symbolize itself. I've never heard of anything so ludicrous. You may as well ask a sword to forge its own steel or a quill to ink its own feather. A frog or a newt would be stretching the bounds of propriety, but an actual dragon? Be sensible!”

“So is this tiger like a spirit animal?” Devin slumped in his seat, still dreaming of dragons, and the seat flexed playfully. If the old wizard was going to personify magic as an animal, why not a magic animal? “The northern tribes in the empire worship animals. The men paint black and red tattoos on their bare, hairy chests. It's all very sweaty and barbaric. I thought you were a scholar, not a heathen. Do you worship tigers, Cornelius? Can I see your little tiger tattoo?” He stretched and started plucking the buttons on the wizard's robe. The old man's chest was surprisingly hairy.

“I have no barbarian tattoo. The very idea,” Cornelius sputtered, changing direction with all the grace of a paunchy, wingless wyvern. “So your magic comes and goes, does it?”

At last, he's done talking about tigers, Devin thought. “Constantly rising and falling. Like an old stone well with a broken pulley cable that keeps getting narrower and narrower. It all started about three years ago when I . . . ”

“Yes, yes,” Cornelius waved, distracted by his own thoughts. “Masters Azumel and Ranunculus provided concise reports on the nature of your affliction.”

“Reports on what?” Devin cried. “I did not spend one whole afternoon with the pair of them.”

Cornelius quirked an eyebrow. “They are both talented, ancient Masters of Wizardry. How much time do you think they required to probe an unstudied, spontaneous mage talent such as yours? Never mind that, their reports contained more questions than answers. I think they merely sent them to vex me.”

“Oh,” Devin said, feeling slightly better, but puzzled as to why. Surely, I should prefer to have my questions answered? Will working with Cornelius generate more questions than answers?

“I just wanted to hear this alternate magic condition in your own words. Odd that you should conceptualize magic, a process rooted in nature, as a mechanical device of cables and pulleys. That implies some sort of imperial cultural bias. Fascinating.”

Devin repressed the perverse urge to leap to the defense of a country which mutilated and exiled him. Years of working up to my elbows in grimy machine parts is all it implies. “What imperial cultural bias? And who says magic must come from totemic nature spirits? The very idea is an affront to the five gods. What is so wrong with the notion that magic comes from the spirit of men?”

Ahem, are the artificer and I not some form of spirit, too? Oh, we can be spirits of men, the mage chuckled. So, either these affronts to the gods are real creatures . . .

The artificer sighed. Or the will of the five gods remains inviolate and we cannot manifest outside your thoughts. The logic is irrefutable.

Oh, there's still plenty of violating, the mage said. Your mind is our plaything, boy. Because either these strange wild spirits exist or magic is slowly driving you insane.

“Maybe it does and maybe it doesn't, lad. Whatever the source, you certainly gave Azumel a fright. He usually lets his apprentice applicants finish their tea before he expels them. I thought the old twig would burst into flames describing what he saw lurking in your head. I cannot delve so deeply into the mind myself, but anything that shakes up that hidebound coot has my full support.”

“My magic comes from me and me alone,” Devin said, squelching the voices in his head.

“Of course, any magician could say the same, but where does it ultimately derive? I've never heard of magic like yours. Those periodic fluctuations and this well make quite the academic mystery. It bears investigating. In the meantime, there's something we can try in a few days to widen that well and get your magic flowing again after we review the basics.”

“Thank you, Cornelius. I'm looking forward to it.” Devin clapped his hands together. “So when do we get started on those lessons, Professor?”

“Patience.” Cornelius held up his hands. “We shall investigate your magic together. Slowly. Meticulously. Just one of the many scholarly questions along our path. Did I not tell you magic is the study of a lifetime?”

“Knock, knock. Bread delivery.” Abigail pressed her face against the window. “Talking about magic, sir?”

A woman interested in magic? Would that make her an aspiring witch?

“Abigail, how long have you been listening?” Cornelius asked.

“Only long enough to catch all the juicy bits, sir.” She opened the window and the scent of yeast and dough wafted inside.

“I have told you young lady time and time again that magic is an improper pursuit for the gentle sex.”

“I respectfully disagree.” The young woman shook her head and her ponytail bobbed. “Magnus says gentle sex is a myth, sir. Then he teaches me to bend horseshoes with my bare hands.”

“This is the rest of your payment for the next class, I presume?” Cornelius asked. “Is there another reason you're here?”

Abigail passed her breads to the wizard and leaned across the window ledge. “Master Magnus wanted me to apologize to that boy sitting over there. Not the boy's fault he's a disrespectful lout. You got a metal foot, boy? Master Magnus is really excited about that.”

Oh, to talk about the craft of metal working with someone knowledgeable again, Devin thought wistfully. Even if he is just a blacksmith. He hadn't realized how much he'd missed it.

“Master Magnus,” Cornelius snorted.

“Yes, I do.” Devin smiled and propped his foot on the table.

“Yep, that thing's as ugly as I thought it would be,” Abigail said, turning towards Cornelius. “Why not make this boy a proper wooden foot, sir? You built that wooden automaton; how hard can a wooden foot be?”

“You will discover just how hard a wooden foot can be when I kick you if you do not stop insulting my father,” Styx said, entering the kitchen and hugging the youth. “Grandfather, why do you not evict this vicious vixen from our house?”

“Ha!” Devin slapped his knee and grinned.

Abigail stared at the wooden man as though unsure what to make of him. Then she smiled. “Vixen. I like it.”

“It's my house,” Cornelius said. “I will have whomever I please in my house without permission from the talking blockhead and it pleases me to have Abigail in my house.”

“Why thank you, professor.” Her gaze fixated on the Professor's open robe as she dimpled and curtsied. Cornelius continued drinking his weak tea, oblivious to the girl's prying eyes.

Devin frowned. She's not interested in magic. She's interested in the magician! He's old enough to be her grandfather, yet the girl won't even glance at me. That's just disgusting. His eyes dropped from Abigail's smug face to the wooden coins clutched in her hands. “What's wrong with metal?” Devin asked, patting Styx on the arm and then pushing him away. “We use it for everything in the empire. Did you bake that bread in a wooden oven?” Going to defend the empire again, are you?

“My family crafts our bread in a proper earthen oven, thank you very much. No metal boondoggles or iron stoves for us.”

“The money that pays for that bread is metal. Unless the whole misbegotten country barters like Cornelius. I've been to your bakery and I've seen money change hands, Abigail.”

“The professor's money is his business. Wooden tokens and barter work just fine. Who buys a gold ingot's worth of bread?”

“How much would I get for two brass imperials?” Devin struck.

“Two brass? Six loaves.”

“Ha! So you do deal with real money.”

“I handle pig shit sometimes, too. Doesn't mean I like it.” She shrugged. “Brass, silver, and gold spend sweetly enough if they're solid royal mint.” She put her head in her hands and sighed. “The king is stingy minting any coins but brass, though. Not that we see much gold at the bakery.”

“Brass imperials, I said.” Devin rubbed his fingers together. “We mint . . . they mint . . . they mint all sorts. Never see any proper imperial coinage in this backwater town?”

“Most of our customers are foreigners with their weird coins and funny accents. Proper coinage? Don't make me laugh. The empire adulterates all its coins with iron fillings. Magnus could melt the worst of them to make horse shoes.” Abigail crossed her arms and leaned over the window ledge to glare at the youth.

“So much better to use wooden coins and empty promises,” Devin said, turning his chair away from Cornelius and Styx to confront the girl. He scooted closer to the window.

“At least tokens and barter are honest,” Abigail said. “They're a transaction built on trust. Can't trust an imp: coin or citizen. You think you're the first one I've seen?”

“You are the first imperial wizard she's seen,” Cornelius said, pulling Devin and his chair away from the window. “Peace, Abigail! He's not some customer trying to swindle you.”

“Imperial wizards,” the girl said, looking Devin up and down, “are such dull, endangered birds. Normal imperials have such striking, satin feathers when they land in my store. Lost your flock?”

Would those imperials in her shop even recognize me as one of their own? Devin pinched his rough, linen tunic between his thumb and trigger finger. Am I transforming from the outside? Neither Imperial nor Corelian?

“Quiet, Abigail. I shouldn't have to remind you that you know exactly what it's like to lose family.” Cornelius turned to the youth and shrugged. “I don't meet many imperial mages either, Devin.”

“Can't imagine why.” Devin tapped his iron leg. “Mages tend to keep themselves hidden in the empire. Officially, we don't exist.”

“At least our mages strut their plumage. You imp mages cower like fat, little quail until they flush you out,” Abigail said.

“Prudence is not a crime, Abigail.” Cornelius shook his head and patted the youth's shoulder. “Devin here is lucky to be alive. Perhaps luckier than he realizes.”

Devin smacked the floor with his iron peg, letting the pain spike up his leg. “I don't feel so lucky.”

“Luck nothing, boy,” Abigail said. “Don't you know what the Iron Empire does to the wizards they capture in their realm? And you imperials call us uncivilized. It's grotesque.”

“What is your fascination with wizards and birds today, girl?” Cornelius chuckled as he carried the loaves to the back of the kitchen. He turned around and reached up to store the bread in a wooden cage suspended from the ceiling.

“I must be hungry for some meaty drumsticks,” Abigail said, tapping her fingers on the window sill, eyes staring past Devin.

Devin followed the girl's eyes as they swiveled like a hawk's. She ignored him. Elbows propped on the window ledge, the older girl squeezed her breasts a little watching the wizard's robe rise like a theater curtain to reveal the main attraction: the man's thighs.

Sick. It's like watching a steam engine explode. All the shards and metal springs are shooting right at my face, but I can't look away. She stabbed my eyes.”

“What was that?” Cornelius jiggled as he flexed and latched the bread cages. “Stabbed? Did someone hurt themselves?”

Oh, by the wrath of the five gods. That's right. Some wizards can pluck the thoughts from your mind. Damn the girl, now I'm thinking about his drumsticks, too.

“Of course I'm catching your thoughts,” Cornelius said. “Your emotions are buzzing like a bee skep. What's going on?”

Devin stared at Abigail. “You don't want to know, sir,” he said with absolute, blank sincerity.

Cornelius followed the direction of the youth's gazing eyes and a knowing smile spread across his face. “Hmmm, so I see. Just as well you're sleeping on the hearth.”

What is wrong with these people? The whole town sick.

Cornelius coughed into his hand. “No, the town is quite healthy, I assure you. Winter is safe enough here in the country so long as we ration our food supplies. Most of our sustenance is dried and bland. We have the bakers like Abigail to thank for her fresh, baked goods to liven up our palettes.” He turned to face the girl. “No muffins today?”

Abigail startled from the window and raised her arms. “No, professor. Not today.”

“Are you feeling unwell, lad? The wasting diseases typically arrive later in the year with the warm spells.” Cornelius sounded concerned as he wound down his lecture like a rumbling flywheel. He placed one hand on the Devin's forehead. “You don't feel sick. You are a pampered city youth, aren't you?”

“I grew up in a village,” Devin protested.

“He's defective,” Abigail said, playing with her pathetic, wooden coins. “Are you not aware what the Iron Empire does to the mages they capture, boy?”

“Of course, I know what the empire does to mages.” Devin turned back towards the girl. “I lived through it. They round them up. They take them away. They do things like this.” He propped his iron peg on a chair. “How can you ask such a horrible thing? Do you have a wooden heart, too?”

Abigail looked at him with pitying eyes and Devin was reminded of the fat wizard, Ranunculus. “No, you got off light. Did you slip through a crack? Are you even a real mage? Can you actually not know how your own government treats real mages? He doesn't know. Isn't that fascinating, Professor?”

“Light?” Devin slammed his iron peg on the table. He tried to gouge the living wood, but the tree table resisted. “Does this thing sound light to you? Does this look light to you? I walked across your whole miserable kingdom with this dead weight strapped to my leg. Every step feels like sharp, little nails driving into my flesh. Don't tell me I got off light.”

Even as he protested, Devin couldn't quite convince himself. He pushed away the memory of Captain Vice leering over his tray of sharp, little tools. I escaped . . . for now.

“Boys,” Abigail huffed. “Always so literal. I didn't mean the horrible things what all they did do to you. I meant all the horrible things they did not do to you. I can tell you all about it . . .”

“They execute us,” Cornelius interrupted. “End of story.”

“Oh no, sir. That boy deserves to know to full flavor of what's in store for him. It's the Iron Empire. They don't merely execute people in the Iron Empire.” Abigail chewed on the ends of her ponytail. “It's so much more titillating than that.”

“That's enough, Abigail!”

“How did you get away, boy? Are you a spy?”

“I'm an artificer,” Devin protested. “I'm not a boy and I'm not a spy.”

“As if the imperials needed to infiltrate any spies into this town, Abigail,” Cornelius shook his head. “Far easier to bribe the tourists for information. Devin is as much a wizard as I am, albeit untrained. And an artificer of course. He's a scholar, too. His collection of books rivals my own. A lad of many parts. Don't forget it.”

“If you say so, sir. But if that little artifice boy is a mage, how come his magic is always disappearing? If he's some kind of scholar, how come he doesn't know anything about how his own country works? He's suspicious.”

“All artificers are scholars,” Devin said. “We know how the world works because we built it.” Little artifice boy.

“Don't mettle with things you don't understand, girl. Shouldn't you be getting back to your father? Good day, Abigail.”

“Have a wonderful day, sir.” Abigail retreated from the window. “Goodbye, boy.”

“Really, Devin, the sour look on your face. You need to meet the town herbalist, next. Come with me. Perhaps an empirical exploration of magic is in order rather than all this talking.”

Devin followed the wizard into the bedroom behind the kitchen. He dragged Styx along behind him. Cornelius was standing next to a tall wardrobe and gesturing at the bed. Both appeared to be the same living wood construction as the table and chairs in the other room.

“I know you're feeling a little skeptical, so I thought I would demonstrate a few practical applications of getting to know your inner tiger. Break a fresh leaf off the bed post, won't you? Make certain the petiole is still attached.”

“The what?”

“The twig-like part at the base of the leaf.”

“Here, Cornelius. Why did you not just ask for the little twig-like bit?” Devin plucked a leaf and handed it to the wizard. The youth sniffed his fingers and wiped the musky woodland odor on his pants.

“Magic, like vocabulary and grammar, requires precise finesse. Don't artificers use their own jargon to describe gears and pipes and little metal geegaws? Magic is the language of the natural word and if you speak it fluently, you can parse and reorient that world. Again, much like artificers, I suppose, except mages can reshape so much more than mere metal.”

“You are such a teacher, it's painful.” Just who do you think you're impressing, Cornelius?

“Whom do I think I'm impressing.” Cornelius closed his eyes and concentrated. The leaf surged with a whiff of wood pulp and grew into a twig. “There. The petiole became a proper little twig-like bit. That's something like what you were attempting with the rose hips earlier. I call this level of magic sniffing the tiger.”

“Sniffing its butt?” Devin sniggered.

“Don't be crude,” Cornelius said. “Besides, only dogs do that. This is entry level magic where you are interacting with the force at minimal capacity. It is safe, easy, and simple. As you get to know the tiger better, and it accepts you, other feats are possible.”

Cornelius led him to corner of the large chimney away from the fire place. He focused on the twig and it vined around his hands. The wizard cursed and wrestled with the vine, shaping it into a square and then a post and then a frame. The shape of a small bed began to emerge. He smiled and with one final flick of his wrist, the tip of the bed erupted into soft, green leaves.

“You may sleep here. No guests. I have a spare blanket in the armoire.”

“Wow. I couldn't have done that with the rose hips, Cornelius.” Are all his lessons going to be pithy, little demonstrations? I'm hungry for more. Teach me, Cornelius.

“Of course not, Devin. Such an uncomfortable bed.”

“That is not what I meant.”

“Yes, I know. One day, you will make beds of roses until your fingers bleed. Then you will lie on the rose mattress and the thorns will pierce your flesh and flay your skin and your blood will stain the petals.” Cornelius winced and grabbed his skull. “What visceral imagery. I am so sorry, Devin. A strange man is projecting his rage and violence into my mind with gleeful fantasies to make a corpse blush. Someone I've never met. Someone nearby.”

A vague uneasiness settled over Devin's mind. The wizard's description of the gleeful, twisted thoughts seemed hauntingly familiar. Someone knocked at the door. The sound of a heavy, metal gauntlet pounding on oak had a distinctive timbre. Devin eased away from the entrance. Don't answer that . . .

“It seems a strange man with an armored fist is at my door.” Cornelius shooed the youth behind him, sighing as he glanced down at his open robe. He rebuttoned the garment and padded barefoot to the door to look through the peephole. “And I am hardly attired to receive visitors. Hmmm, an imperial citizen venturing to a nondescript house where tourists seldom tread. Coming for tea and cake, I shouldn't wonder?”

“Tea and cake?” Devin hissed as large invisible, claws reached through the door, plunged into his gut, and squeezed his intestines. All those times looking over his shoulder at shadows gave those claws an icy grip. The sharp, little icicles had been growing and expanding for years as little frets and worries trickled through in his mind and hardened into fears. The unseen giant peering over the mountains from the east ever since he had been exiled had finally stepped out from the shadows. Just when he thought he'd found another home, a new place for himself, the empire had come to tear it all down again.

“Such horrific thoughts on that man. I will warm the kettle regardless. That white plume is distinctive. Take a look.”

The wizard gently nudged the youth with one elbow and Devin peered through the hole. The rough wood scratched Devin's face as he pressed his cheek against the door and cold air crept through the gap in the sill, chilling his bare legs, but those were trivial discomforts against the harsh sight of the man standing on the front stoop. The wood pounded against Devin's head as the visitor knocked again. The man had exchanged his white apron and cap for tall boots and a large, wide-brimmed hat boasting a white, plumed feather half as wide as his head. He wore one of the black, mechanized gauntlets on one hand and held a large, brass pocket watch cocked in the other.

Devin pushed away from the door and turned to Cornelius. “His name is Armand Delacourt Vice. He took my leg.” The artificer startled at the sound of his own voice. How quiet and calm he sounded. He squeezed his fists to stop his hands quaking, and his heart thundered so loudly in his chest, he was amazed the old wizard couldn't hear it.

“Anybody in residence?” The Butcher looked at his watch and then smiled at the peephole. “I'm just a poor lost traveler and a loyal citizen of the Iron Empire. I find myself missing the sights and sounds of home. Is one of my countrymen in there with you, perchance? A gangly young man with a metal foot?”

Abigail was right. Mages never escape the empire. Exiling me wasn't enough. He's tracked me down. He's come to . . . finish the job. “You can't refuse him, Cornelius. Black Guard armor is assembled by teams of elite master artificers, the best craftsmen in the world. Even unpowered, that mechanical gauntlet can destroy the door with ease. And that man has the might of the empire standing by his side.” He took a deep breath, forcing his heart to settle back into his chest. Devin squared his shoulders and faced the door, balling his fist and squeezing a trickle of sputtering flames through his fingers. He shook his fist at the door. “I am ready. Let him come.”

“You most certainly are not.” The wizard snorted as a curious, high-pitched whining noise came from the other side of the door and Devin's flames extinguished. “Sacrificing yourself, already, boy?” Cornelius grabbed Devin's shoulders while the youth flexed his clenched fingers and glared at his latest magic failure, turned the youth around, and gave him a little push. “Is my company so dreary? Go crawl into the armoire in the bedroom. Here, take my key. Lock yourself inside. I will entreat with your villain. Go and hide, lad. Go, now!”

Devin ran to the bedroom. He parted the clothes hanging in the armoire and burrowed into them. Then he closed the doors and waited.