* * *
When Bronwyn finally released him, Wiz went looking for Donal. He found him alone in the armory, replacing a strap on his chain mail hauberk by the light of a magic globe.
“I wanted to thank you for this evening,” Wiz told him. “You saved my life, I think.”
“So clumsily you needed the attention of a healer to put your shoulder right,” Donal said wryly.
“I’m alive and that’s the important thing. Thank you.”
Donal stared down at the new strap. “As you saved mine beneath the City of Night.”
“Still . . .”
“Lord, if you wish think of it as payment of a debt.” He turned back to the job of threading the strap into place.
“You know, I think about the time we spent at Heart’s Ease. You, I, Kenneth and Shiara.” His mouth twisted into a half-smile. “Back when there was a clear, simple job to do and all we had to do was do it.”
“Yes, Lord,” Donal said without looking up from tying the strap into the chain mail.
“Now everything’s so complicated and there’s so much more to it.” He sighed. “What do you do when you’re overwhelmed?”
“You do the best you can for as long as you can, Lord.”
“And then?”
Donal jerked the strap tight and looked up. “Then, My Lord, you put your back to something and go down fighting.”
“I don’t think that really applies here,” Wiz said.
Donal fixed him with his icy blue eyes. “Lord, I hope you are never in a situation where it does apply.”
* * *
“Subtle,” Bal-Simba said at last. “Subtle indeed. But so subtle it is not sure.”
Arianne smiled nervously. “If you mean to make me doubt my suspicions, Lord, you may spare yourself the effort. I do not know if I believe this or not.”
“Oh, it is believable,” Bal-Simba rumbled. “Overt magic in this place would be too easy to detect—and to trace back to its source. Wiz is known to be clumsy and an accident would be easy to accept. An attack using just the tiniest of magics to set up a mischance could perhaps pass unnoticed. And if the first one did not succeed, the next one might, or the next after that.”
“That is my thinking, Lord.”
He shook his head. “We have grown lax, Lady. With the Dark League broken we have let down our guard.”
“You suspect the Dark League?”
“Who else? They are not all gone, after all, and those who are left would have ample reason for harming our Sparrow.”
“There is one other thing, Lord.”
“Eh?”
“I did not come by this on my own. Another first suggested the idea to me—before today.”
“Who?”
“June, the orphan servant girl. She is convinced Wiz is in danger.”
“How is your shoulder?” Moira asked as soon as Wiz came in.
“Fine now.” He windmilled the arm. “See?”
“I am glad,” she said quietly.
“What’s the mater?” he asked, dreading the answer.
Moira bit hr lip. “Wiz, we have to talk.”
“All right.” I’m losing her, he thought. I’m blowing it and I’m going to lose her.
“I am sorry, I cannot go on like this.”
“I know. I’ve got to stop ignoring you.”
“Wiz, you are killing yourself,” Moira said desperately. “Your ignoring me, that I could live with—I think. It is in a good cause. But you are burning yourself out trying to do too much.”
“I’ve got to do it. Bal-Simba won’t let me off the Council and we’ve got to have a version of the spell compiler anyone can use.”
Moira bit her lip and considered. This wasn’t just about her needs. As a hedge witch she had been inculcated with the idea that service to the community came before personal needs. The whole World needed Wiz and what he could do. She pushed her feelings to the back and tried to look at the situation as the helper of one of the Mighty with an important task to perform.
Wiz, lost in his thoughts, missed the shift completely. “I dunno,” he sighed. “Sometimes I think it’s getting worse instead of better.”
“Worse than you know,” the redheaded witch said. “There are some who claim you hide your secrets from us behind a veil of deliberate obscurity. That in this way your power among us grows.”