Page 36 of Valdemar

“Well, that’s . . . odd,” said Kordas, gazing at the anomaly in his horse pasture across the river with extreme puzzlement. Of course, there was nothing to be seen by those with no mage-Gift, but to him and Sai . . . this otherwise ordinary stand of trees was lit up like a festival.

“That’s what we all think,” Sai replied, arms folded over his chest. “All of us have been out here poking at it since young Lobo found it. I know it hasn’t been there long. It’s not connected to anything at all, much less anything inimical—and believe me, if it had been, you’d have thought Pebble’s mother had returned when we got done scorching the earth. In fact, it seems inoperative and benign. As if someone was preparing the ground for a major Working, like a Portal, then changed their mind.”

The “anomaly” was, essentially, something like, but not identical to, a summoning circle. Except there was nothing about it suggesting who or what had created it. More than that, there was nothing at all linking it to something to be summoned. Every summoning circle he had ever seen was heavily and specifically linked to exactly what you wanted to summon, usually by inscribing its various names and attributes.

Try not to scare yourself by thinking it’s for something there are no names for.

He was not surprised no one had noticed that this place was now very different from the rest of the pasture, even though plenty of people came and went here, tending to the horses. Even the horses showed no reaction to it. To non-magicians, there was nothing at all different about this grove of lovely trees—well, except that about half of the trees were not a variety a Valdemaran could name right off the top of their head. These were Hawkbrother remnants, like other groves scattered about this field. Unlike the giants that supported ekeles, or the tender growth that could not take a hard winter, these were native to the area, and handled winter weather just fine. Some of these groves had once surrounded dwellings, some had merely been pockets of seclusion in the otherwise busy Vale, and some had been cultivated to conceal a hertasi tunnel entrance or something else “unsightly,” like one of the many tunnel vents that allowed fresh air to flow underground.

No, there was nothing about this grove that looked out of the ordinary to the naked eye. It was only when you looked with mage-sight that you saw it was very different from the meadow around it. A perfectly formed circle surrounded it, but a blank one, as if someone had changed their mind in the middle of their working—or been interrupted—and just left it. He could tell from the movements of energy around it, however, that nothing he or his mages could detect ever would or could be purposed on it. It was not only blank, it was protected. Nothing would be “written” there. Nothing could be written there. It was a perfect, fully ordered, charged circle, but one that was as impossible to alter as fire-glazed pottery.

“What—why?” he asked Sai. The old mage shrugged. Jonaton interjected, from inside an array of brass and wood tripods and instruments that resembled a land surveyor’s full kit, “I can tell you some interesting things about it, Kordas.” Jonaton, with his sleeves rolled back, looked very free right now. He was in his element completely. He whistled and gestured for the rest of the onlookers to go to where the King was, and they ambled over. When it looked like they were within earshot, Jonaton spoke like a lecturer. “I don’t know who it’s from, but there’s an energy grain to it. Squint hard with your mage-sight and get very close, and there are radiating surface imperfections all over this thing.” With a bit of extra effort to make the illusion-work more understandable for those with impaired senses, Jonaton conjured a teaching diagram—a kind of simplified, very legible illusion used to show moving examples of places, items, or energies. It was many mages’ favorite thing, both for its clarity and for its usefulness for proving someone—anyone—wrong. “In concentric rings, at widening intervals from the center. If there’s one thing I know, it’s explosions.”

Kordas chuckled a little, as did a few of the Old Men. Back on the old manor fields, there were more than a few water holes not dug by the tools of laborers. Wis said loudly to Koto, “You hear? One thing! He knows one thing! The boy’s been holding out on us!”

“These same dynamics are found in near-surface explosions,” Jonaton continued, unperturbed. “And they imprint like this, too, except far more violently. In mage-sight, it is much clearer to see, once you know the range to look for.” His illusory drawings, bright against a darkened background, faded in an ice-blue mountainscape of representative peaks and valleys, symbolizing shock waves, over the map of the immediate area. A sphere was expanded up to illustrate a falling fireball. “I’ve got a theory I’ll get to later.”

Ponu grumbled, “All I know is, there it is, and it can’t be used by anything. I’m going back to bed.”

Sai took up quickly, hearing his annoyed tone. “Maybe it’s a gift of the gods? The Palace doesn’t have a temple, and it ought to, or a meditation place, anyway. The timing’s right for it to have been made during the celebrations after the coronation. I’d feel perfectly comfortable meditating here, myself.” Sai scratched his head. “Sydney went in there, walked around, found a warm spot, and lay down in it, and cats have an instinct for things that are safe, magically speaking.” He chortled. “And unsafe! Whenever Sydney flees Jonaton’s rooms, we all know to prepare for something going wrong in there! Thank the gods it’s usually just bad smells and scorched clothing!”

“I’ll take that idea under advisement,” Kordas replied. A temple wasn’t a bad idea, actually. There’d been a chapel to Epona in the Ducal manor, but the Mother hadn’t built a chapel into the Palace because Kordas hadn’t thought to specify one. He had a moment of guilt over that.

“If you could make it sort of a—I don’t know how to put this—neutral ground for everyone? You know, include the symbols for everything you can think of in the decorations, and lots of things like stars and moons and trees?” Sai continued. “Some of your courtiers are pretty religious, and they’d appreciate a place like that. It’d be useful for weddings and namings and funerals.” Now he rubbed the top of his head. “But just going by my instincts, I can’t feel that it ‘wants’ to be anything. It doesn’t lean in any direction, good or ill. It’s almost as if this place was created with neutrality in mind.”

“That still begs the question, who or what created it?” Kordas replied, not entirely happy that something or someone had come right into his back garden, so to speak, and planted a magic construct there. Even if it was a god, which was looking more and more likely by the moment. First the silver horses in the illuminations, and the “Red Thing,” and now this?

“If it’s a god,” Sai replied, “and said god didn’t sign their handiwork, so to speak, it’s because that god doesn’t want you to know which one it is. Normally I’d be the very last person in this Kingdom to say this, but—let well enough alone.”

Kordas gaped at him.

“No, I mean it. Do get Silvermoon or some other Hawkbrother out here to look it over, surely. But after that? Accept the gift horse.” He shrugged. “I can think of a lot of things that could have caused this. A latent Change-Circle. Old Tayledras magic bubbling up to the surface. Something they built and forgot about, and maybe the Mother woke it up again—or it could be something by the Mother. Maybe something from some Elemental friend of Pebble. But given the timing and that it looks to me as if it’s deliberately neutral, that makes me think it’s a little gift from the gods, and you don’t ask too many questions about what gods give you, if you know what I mean.”

Kordas did, in fact, know exactly what Sai meant. If you are very unlucky, the gods will answer your pleas. The saying had two meanings: gods would help someone who cried for their help to survive misfortune, but if called upon without great need, the gods might give their attention in unanticipated, even cruel, ways.

So, gingerly, he stepped over the border of the circle and into the grove. It looked as if this had been one of those groves that concealed a nice, secluded spot for—well, plenty of things. Maybe a little tea house. Maybe a place to meditate. Maybe a trysting place. Maybe a spot where two people would work out their differences without any interference. There was a path into it, and it was hollow, with a tiny meadow inside it, and yes, it was just big enough for a modestly sized temple or chapel.

Most likely a tea house was here. One of those things with a tent on a platform. There’d be no trace of it at this point except this pocket meadow.

He stood in the middle and cautiously allowed all his shields and protections to drop, knowing that Sai was out there and could protect him if—

Except Sai wasn’t out there. Sai himself had stepped into the little meadow, strolling as if he wasn’t walking on ground so highly charged with magical energies that it glowed to mage-sight.

He stood next to Kordas and nodded. “Go ahead, keep on with what you were doing.”

Kordas sighed. “All right.” There was no point in remonstrating with Sai now. The old man was a force of nature like Jonaton, and did what he pleased. Kordas continued to drop his protections until he stood there, magically naked to the world.

And felt nothing but a deep sense of peace.

No. Wait. Not peace. Not exactly. More like . . . like one of those places where the Tayledras had performed what they called a “thorough cleansing.” A sense of transformation permeated the space. As if something bad had been here, but had been turned into this, leaving nothing of its original behind. It wasn’t an absence, it was . . . potential. Readied for what would become of it.

With his eyes closed, he continued to let the sense of the place soak into him, and described what he experienced to Sai. Then he opened his eyes again.

The old man’s weathered, wrinkled face was thoughtful. “Now, that’s interesting. I can think of something else now, though. Wait just a moment.” He made a few gestures in the air, mage-energies leaving a trail of light behind his hands as they moved, then whistled.

And then he held his hands palm up, and filled the space with his own energies—but not bound to anything. The power was . . . well, it was like a bowl of magic, just waiting for something to come drink from it.

And drink from it, something did.