High Iron Read online

  High Iron

  By Tim Craire

  Copyright © 2017 by Tim Craire. All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced in any form, except for the quotation of brief passages in reviews, without prior written permission from the author.

  Cover art and map by Luka Cakic

  White Cedar Press

  New York - Miami - Auckland

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  

  Chapter One

  I was fourteen when I first saw the wizards of Varenlend. Three of them appeared over a hilltop and walked down toward me as I sat cross-legged monitoring our sheep.

  “Monitoring;” that was what my father called it. He thought that merely “watching” sheep, or “shepherding” them, made us sound like simpletons.

  My two dogs had heard or smelled the foreigners long before I noticed them, and now trotted on either side of the three as they came down the hill. The wizards—two women and a man—paid them no mind.

  The two women were younger than the man, and they walked in front. One of them was quite young, perhaps two years older than I. The other was an adult. The man looked to be around sixty.

  I had seen them down in town in the previous week. Perhaps it was not these three, but some others in their party. A small group had traveled here, the first known visitors from their city we had ever seen in Emmervale.

  All three smiled, now. They spoke among themselves as they descended the hill. They still ignored the dogs, whose ears were raised. The dogs maintained their distance, and were silent, but both would have tried to rip the strangers apart had they felt any threat.

  I stood. The adult woman spoke first when they came near.

  “You would be Aiman.”

  “I would be.”

  “Son of Anders, and family of The Marshal.”

  “That’s so.”

  “Doing your family’s work,” she continued.

  “A part of it,” I said. “That’s right.”

  “You’ll pardon us for coming to you out here,” she said. “We have questions for you, and perhaps an invitation.”

  “What sort of questions?”

  “Personal questions. About your abilities, Aiman. And your learning.”

  They were too smart to look around condescendingly at the sheep. They kept their eyes on me. I should have told them to speak to my father, if they had anything to say to me, but that occurred to me only after. I was not used to dealing with strangers far up here in our hills as I monitored our walking wool.

  I made no answer to her words about my “learning.” They waited, and then the woman continued.

  “We have come from Varenlend. I am sure you have heard of us already. I am Annira. This is my cousin Annelle, and this is Sokran, our chief instructor.”

  Annelle, the very young woman, nodded to me. She was smiling. Sokran stayed behind the two of them. I still did not say anything.

  “Sokran is our chief instructor of mages,” she added. “Aiman, we have heard of you in town.”

  I admit that, at age fourteen, I was not surprised to learn that someone had recognized my brilliance. I did wonder how exactly they had learned of me, but I did not think it unusual that they considered me to be out of the ordinary. I asked:

  “What have you heard?”

  “We have heard that you are possessed of a mind that is probably not challenged enough out here. You are a young man whose thoughts are on power; perhaps steam, or perhaps magic.”

  Annelle now spoke:

  “We want to demonstrate something for you, Aiman. Our skills, and your potential.”

  These three were making no mistakes in their pitch to me—complimenting my formidable intellect and then having this sharp young woman take over. She was striking: tall, with black hair falling down her shoulders, and clear gray eyes. She addressed me with a slight but warm smile.

  Their approach would have worked with any adolescent boy, of course. No such boy with even a handful of ambition would be content to sit and watch sheep for hours, and none would have minded being singled out by this lovely, urbane young enchanter (who was, for good measure—I eventually learned—likely to rule Varenlend one day).

  She turned and spoke quietly to the man, Sokran, in their own language. We called this language Cranam, or Oppidan. I understood it, although I would not have wanted to converse with her in it. Everyone in my family learned Oppidan; my father made sure of that. She was quiet enough that I caught only the word “green.”

  She turned back to me, held out one hand, and extended her fingers. Suddenly the air around me was warm; as warm as an early summer day. In reality, it was just the beginning of spring, in fact one of the first days we had bothered to take the sheep out to graze. The ground cover was barely greening up after the winter.

  For a moment I wondered if the warmth was just due to Annelle’s eyes, and so on, but I realized the temperature was real. She, or one of the other two, had warmed up the hillside.

  “You feel the air,” she said. It wasn’t a question. “You know we are able to do this in Varenlend. It is one thing we can do. One of many.”

  “I have heard as much,” I said.

  “Your animals are searching for grasses,” she said.

  “Yes,” I answered. I wasn’t sure of her point. “Grasses, weeds. Whatever they can find.”

  “We could help them find more.”

  This early in the season the flock was making do with the barest growth. Tufts of snowpetals had been out for about a week, and patches of what we called thaw grass were also now rousing themselves. But it was too early for much else.

  Annelle glanced around her, then, and beds of hill mint, which were all around—and which had been pale and wilted—suddenly turned green. Like a carpet unrolling, but in all directions, the hillside jumped ahead a month in just a moment.

  This included the ground beneath the sheep. They tore into it. I guessed they appreciated the change.

  Annelle stood there, smiling. The white of her robe contrasted with the rich hill mint, now.

  “That is impressive,” I said.

  “Aiman, we think you could do this, also. For example you could make it all wither again. You could do this right now. Try.”

  I had hoped to appear mature and confident throughout this encounter, but at that point I’m afraid I must have looked around in confusion, plainly bewildered. I took her word for it, that I might change the weather on this hillside, but of course I had no idea how to do so.

  “Will it,” she said. “Just channel the power. It is here already. Draw it back out of the ground and disperse it into the air where it came from.”

  I looked around at the mint and thought of it pale and matted. All of it promptly fell back to the way it had been. The stems drooped and the color washed out. This fade happened even more quickly than the original greening of hers.

  “That was your doing,” she said.

  “How do I know you didn’t just end it yourself?” I asked; but I knew the answer:

  “Because you feel it,” she said, and she was right. I did feel it. I had thought about all that growth returning to normal, and willed it, a bit, and it had done so. I felt that I had effected the change just as directly as when I whistled for my dogs. She was right: there was energy, power, in the air.

  The three of them looked at me, apparently appreciative, as I st
ood there atop the fallen spring weeds.

  “Aiman.”

  The voice came from further down the hill. It was my father.

  I turned. He did not say anything further—no reprimand—but I saw concern in his eyes as he continued up.

  “Anders Shearer,” Sokran said. “Pardon our intrusion. This is gorgeous land you own.”

  “This is town land, here, not ours. But you are right. The views are very inviting, I know.”

  “You won’t mind us speaking with your son. We knew we would have to come up here to find him. Your family is always working.”

  “As is yours,” my father said. With these three simple words I understood that he was letting them know that he was aware their visit was carefully planned—carefully premeditated—with an important goal.

  “Aiman here is very talented,” Annira said.

  “Indeed he is.”

  “I won’t waste your time, Anders Shearer. We would invite your son to return to Varenlend with us. We believe he could learn very much there.”

  “You should speak with me about this,” my father said, “not him. He is still a boy.”

  “Forgive us,” Sokran said. “We wished to meet him.”

  Annira then said:

  “You are beginning to prosper, here in Emmervale. We would like better ties between your city and ours.”

  “We have been prospering,” my father answered, “since the day we walked down those mountains and reclaimed this town. And many thanks for calling us a city, but we know we are a simple village. We are content here.”

  “You may be a simple village, but someday you will be a target for the dunters to your west,” Sokran said. “You cannot lard up too much wealth without drawing their attention.”

  “I have walked for days to our west and never seen a dunter,” my father said. “The land between our town and their hovels is vast. It may as well be an ocean.”

  “An ocean they will cross. You won’t want that, and we don’t want it either.”

  Sokran sounded genuine, as he said this. Genuinely concerned for our welfare.

  My father tilted his head. “Well. We are not unaware that they are our neighbors. Our distant neighbors.”

  Sokran raised his eyebrows briefly but did not pursue this, and neither did the other two. The three of them spoke a few more words and took their leave. They were very kind to me, of course, throughout. Sokran inclined his head to us, before they departed. Annira reached to touch my elbow, and Annelle actually took my hand and held it in both of hers. She was my height. Her eyes were a light gray—perhaps I have mentioned that already.

  The three of them walked past my father and me, and headed down in the direction from which he had come, toward town. After they had moved well down the hill, my father spoke again. His voice seemed very spare there, just the two of us now with the heedless sheep and vigilant dogs beyond us.

  “I’m sure it is very pleasant to be singled out for attention like that, Aiman. And you do have a fine mind. I understand that. But I’m afraid they were not coming to you because of your talents.”

  “I know, Father,” I said.

  “Do you?”

  I shrugged. “I would guess they see me as one of their easier chances to wield influence here in Emmervale. A way to have a tie to you.”

  He looked at me and said nothing.

  “They should have tried that wizarding invitation when I was a bit younger,” I continued. “But I’ve seen them in town this past week, Father. They’ve nearly been weighing and measuring the place.”

  “Down in town.”

  “Yes.”

  “They haven’t come up here before?”

  “No. I’ve seen them down at our mills. And along the river. I suppose it is good news that they think us worth noticing. But from what I know of Varenlend, I doubt they are looking for equal partners.”

  “Indeed,” he said. “And they know who we are, you and I.”

  “Yes. They mentioned our family.”

  “I think,” he said, “that is more important to them than your formidable mind.”

  “I assume so,” I said. “If they are looking for true brilliance they could speak with Britta.” She was my cousin.

  My father smiled, and shook his head once.

  “Aiman. For all their words I think they have no idea just how wise you are.”

  All this was well and good, and I was glad enough—and am still glad today—that I did not pack my bag and march off with them back to Varenlend to be educated in sorcery. But I admit that those sheep never looked as gray, and our hills never seemed so far from the cities of our world, as when those three visitors turned their backs on me and returned to town. My father walked back down shortly after they did, and I was left alone again. My dogs were loyal, but their company was nothing like that of a gray-eyed young noblewoman. I thought of Annelle many, many times in the following years. After long days up in those hills I sometimes believed that I had imagined the visit. It seemed beyond reality that three such prominent mages would journey out there to the edge of Emmervale to address me. I sometimes wondered if it ever actually happened. But my father would occasionally tease me, during our more tedious chores, about the “job” I had turned down.

  I walked to town myself, the next day, to watch them leave. Word had made it back up to us—to my father, this time—that I was welcome to present myself in Varenlend if I ever changed my mind. So I knew they were departing.

  There were eleven in their party: the three I had met, plus four soldiers, and four others who looked to be more wizards, or perhaps Varenlend aristocrats. All wore white, and their horses were either white, gray, or black. They made a fine picture as they rode west out of Emmervale. I stood atop a low hill on the north side of town and could see them well enough. There was a sway to their movement, a confidence; it was hard to describe. Their horses’ tails swished easily side-to-side, and those in front frequently looked behind them to chat with their companions. Annelle’s waist bobbed slightly as she rode—but I probably just imagined that. I could not even be completely sure which one she was, from my distance.

  After they left, I learned more about the three who had spoken to me. Annira was a niece of the current ruler of Varenlend, a powerful mage titled Vizer Ruhallan. He had appointed her to govern the urban center of the state; and given the prominence of that city, she was essentially in charge of everything worth directing. Sokran was indeed the master instructor of mages, and students from not only Varenlend’s territory but even that of Caranniam came to him to study. The wizards of Caranniam had always considered themselves the finest in the world, so this showed the esteem in which he was held.

  Annelle—her full name was Annelle WhiteStone Vizer—was the heir to Annira; this was because of her family but also her talent in wizardry. She would likely someday take over rule of the central city of Varenlend, and then eventually the entire state. She had been recognized at a young age as a gifted and clear-headed prodigy.

  These were the people who had invited me to learn alongside them.

  I sat up there in the hills instead, watching the sheep.

  But I knew:

  These were Mourno sheep, our finest. No one outside of Emmervale raised them, and even here there were only a few families doing so. Soon, later in the spring, we would shear them, and we would get an average yield of eight pounds apiece of the best wool in the world. We could trade this wool with elves for their steel, or with dwarves for their muskets. We could take the wool to Caranniam and sell it for forty crowns a bale, or to Searose or other coast cities for twelve skenders a bale, or to Varenlend itself for thirty bars a bale. With the amount of money we would earn we could rebuild half a dozen burnt-out houses, or put up a bridge, or start a school.

  We had been free of the dwarves of Stenhall for twenty-five years. This was nearly twice as long as my entire life, at that point, but I knew that we were still a very young and precarious town—because my father and all the ot
her elders drilled it into us. Everyone over thirty years old could remember the day our people had twisted out of the grip of the dwarves and walked down the mountainside to the remains of old Emmervale. All remembered how little they owned, back then, and what a task they had before them to rebuild. We never forgot that this work was still in progress. Some of our elderly remembered not only the day they had come out of the mines, but the day they had walked in. They exhorted us to build and rebuild, plant and grow, watch and multiply.

  We were doing so. I was helping. Varenlend was a great city, but Emmervale would one day be great, also. And some of this progress depended on these sheep. I kept my post.

  Chapter Two

  Seven years later we were up to eleven hundred sheep, and I did not monitor them any longer; we hired for that. Emmervale continued to grow. We were adding not only our own children but also occasional migrants from Searose, Varenlend, Caranniam. Yes, citizens of Caranniam and even Varenlend itself traveled to our hills to start new lives. I wondered what Annelle and Sokran would have thought of that. Not bad for a “simple village,” as Sokran had called us.

  (One of those emigrants of Caranniam was a vintner whom my father hired to work our land. The hills around us were good for grapes, but I think my father also just wanted someone around who was fluent in Cranam. My father saw to it that I spent a lot of time with the vintner, and he was often invited to our meals. My Cranam became quite good, because of that, and I would not now have been reluctant to speak it with strangers, even the very beautiful ones.)

  Our only real concern was a rumor of burgeoning growth in Red Gorge City, the nation of the dunters to our west. Sokran, it turns out, had been prescient. It had been only a few months ago that we in Emmervale were still assuming, as we always had, that the dunters would stay far away, as they always had. The truth hit us rudely:

  First we were told that a sprawling army of them had departed Red Gorge and was marching toward Emmervale. This was in early spring, once again. The alarm was brought to us by a lone traveler from the west; we sent out scouts to verify.