Chapter Two
Jarek Mace received his reward from the innkeeper and, with a fine smile and a wave, walked away from the tavern. I felt a sense of loss at the time, and could not understand it. But life moved on. I stayed several days at the Six Owls, and even entertained the regulars on my last night.
They were common men and women and I did not bore them with the Dragon’s Egg, which is for the cultured. I gave them what they required – the Dancing Virgin. It is a simple piece of magick involving a silver tray which floats in the air while a girl, no taller than a man’s forearm, dances upon it, her body swathed in shimmering veils of silk.
It was not a great success, for there are many talented magickers who have debased the piece, introducing male partners and allowing them to simulate copulation. I could, of course, have duplicated such a scene – indeed, achieved a far more powerful display of the erotic. But I had always felt it wrong to pander to the lust of the mob. There were several coarse shouts during my performance which unsettled my concentration, but I continued and finished the display with a burst of white fire, a glowing ball that circled the room before exploding with a mighty bang.
Even after this the audience was apathetic in its applause, and I leapt from the table and walked to the long bar feeling somewhat depressed.
Few understand the emotional strain of magicking, the sense of fatigue and weariness of the soul that follows a performance. I drank heavily that night and it was very late when Bellin informed me that he would need my room for guests arriving the following day.
It seemed I had outstayed my welcome.
For the next few months I performed at several weddings and two funerals. I like funerals; I enjoy the solemnity and the tears. I do not mean to sound morbid, but there is something sweet and uplifting about grief. The tears of loved ones are more powerful
than any epitaph on a man’s life. I have seen the funerals of great men, with many carriages following the hearse. Great speeches are made, but there are no tears. What kind of a life must it have been that no one cries for you? There is an eastern religion which claims that tears are the coins God accepts to allow a soul into heaven.
I greatly like that idea.
Man being what he is, of course, the eastern men pay people to cry for them at their funerals.
However, I digress. The months flowed by and I struggled to earn enough money to pay for my meagre requirements. The war was affecting everyone now. Food was in short supply and the prices rose. The Ikenas King, Edmund, had been true to his word. His army swept through the land like a forest fire, destroying towns and cities, crushing the armies of the north in several pitched battles, coming ever closer to Ziraccu.
There were tales of horror, of mutilation and torture. A nunnery, it was said, had been burnt to the ground, the Abbess crucified upon the main gates. Several noblemen captured at the Battle of Callen had been placed in iron cages on the castle walls, and left to die of cold and starvation.
The Count of Ziraccu, one Leonard of Capula, declared the city neutral and sent emissaries to Edmund. The emissaries were hanged, drawn and quartered. Left with no choice but to fight Leonard began hiring mercenaries to defend the walls, but no one believed they could resist the might of the southern Angostin army.
It was not a good time to be a bard. Few wanted to hear songs of ancient times, nor listen to the music of the harp. What they desired was to realize their capital and head for the ports,netting sail to the continent where the baying of the hounds of war would not carry.
Houses were being sold in Ziraccu for a twentieth of their worth and rich refugees left in their hundreds every day.
I had intended to wait in Ziraccu until the spring, but on the seventh day of midwinter – having not eaten for several days – I realized the time had come to make my way north.