Sianim 02 - Wolfsbane

was young.” He shrugged.
    “It amazes me,” she said thoughtfully, “how many people knew you were working black magic and never stopped to ask how you learned such things on your own—or wondered why the ae’Magi didn’t stop you.”
    “Everyone knows that there are books if you know where to look for them.” He sighed softly and returned to the original topic. “It could be Kisrah, I suppose. Hatred and vengeance are corrupting emotions. Perhaps they could have caused him to use black magic. I would hate to see him caught in a web spun by my father.”
    “It could be Nevyn,” she offered. “He might have found the connections between you and me, and between us and the ae’Magi’s death. He knows that I am a spy in Sianim, and he knows Kisrah. Kisrah could have told him about seeing me at the ae’Magi’s castle the night he died, described me well enough that Nevyn identified me. Nevyn loved your father—he used to tell me stories about him—and he certainly loves my father. Since he distrusts magic of any kind, black magic might not bother him as much as it would Kisrah.”
    Wolf thought a moment—or else he dozed; Aralorn couldn’t tell which—then he shook his head. “The croft, perhaps, might have been possible for Nevyn. It wouldn’t have called for much skill, but the spell binding your father was done with both power and craft. Poor Nevyn had more teaching than he wanted, but he fought it. I heard Kisrah fussing over him to my father—all that talent and too scared of magic to use it.” He gave Aralorn a bleak look. “My father would pat him on the back and commiserate with him. Told him that a Darranian mage was bound to be a mess.” Geoffrey ae’Magi, Wolf’s father, had been Darranian. “They would laugh and then my father would tell his good friend how worried he was about me, about how I was fascinated by the darker magics.” He closed his eyes for a deep breath. When he opened them again, he said, “My father was afraid to teach me, I think, for fear that the monster he created would be too powerful for him to control. Kisrah tried his best with Nevyn, but I doubt that he knows much more than I do.”
    He turned to her, a mockery of his usual graceful movements, and made a negating gesture. “He was given to Kisrah to apprentice partially because of Kisrah’s easy nature but also because Kisrah had the power to control a rogue sorcerer. When he was first apprenticed to Santik, Nevyn had the potential to become a master, maybe even ae’Magi. By the time he went to Kisrah, he was capable of little more than lighting candles. Santik was brought up on charges of abuse and neglect, his powers sealed away from him by the ae’Magi. Ironic isn’t it, that my father convicted another mage of abuse? Kisrah worked with Nevyn, but finally gave in to Nevyn’s own wishes once he was certain that Nevyn knew enough for safety. So Nevyn is much like me—a powerful mage who doesn’t know what he’s doing. Which is why I don’t think he’s our villain. He simply does not have the skill to create something like the spell that holds your father. He’s a good man, Aralorn. I don’t think he did this.”
    Aralorn looked at Wolf, surprised at his long speech.
    It made her suspicious.
    She thought about what had happened that night and realized why Wolf was painting such a clear picture for her. Poor Nevyn indeed. A decade of spying and influencing the thoughts of others without attracting their attention had honed her instincts: She knew when someone was trying to manipulate her in return.
    So Nevyn was a powerful mage, was he? Hurt by someone who should have protected him. A good man.
    Wolf, on the other hand, was a devious man, her lover: She had a weakness for devious men.
    “I am certain,” she said slowly, “that you believe Nevyn had nothing to do with this.” Or he wouldn’t have offered the man to her on a platter.
    Sometimes, she thought, you had to tell someone that you loved them; sometimes you had to beat them over the head with it.
    “I don’t love you for your powers, Wolf. Nor for the beauty of your body.” His hand twitched toward his scarred face. “I certainly don’t love you because you were abused by your father.” Her voice began to take on the bite of her anger, not all of which was feigned. “I certainly don’t love you because you are a powerful mage. Nevyn’s powers or lack of same may have made a half-grown child look at him twice, where one