Sianim 02 - Wolfsbane

welcoming than they had been earlier that day.
    “Tell us,” he continued, taking a seat on the floor and lifting one of the youngsters onto his lap, “the story of the Tear of Hornsmar, who died at the hands of the shapechangers in the mountains just north of here.”
    She was going to have to teach her brother some subtlety, but she could work with his suggestion. She needed a long story, to give Wolf as much time to recover as possible. One came to mind as if it had been waiting for her to recognize it.
    “A story of the Wizard Wars, then, but the story of the Tear is overtold. I have instead a different tale for you. Listen well, for it contains a warning for your children’s children’s children.”
    Having caught their attention, Aralorn took a breath and sought the beginning of her tale. It took her a moment, for it wasn’t one of the ones she told often.
    “Long and long ago, a miller’s son was born. At the time, this hardly seemed an auspicious or important event, for as long as there have been millers, they have been having children. It was not even an unusual occurrence for this miller, because he’d had three other sons and a daughter born in a similar fashion—but not a son like this. No one in the village had ever had a son like this.” She saw a few smiles, and the hall quieted.
    She continued, punctuating her story with extravagant gestures. “When Tam laughed, the flowers bloomed, and the chairs danced; when he cried, the earth shook, and fires sprang up with disconcerting suddenness. Concerned that the child would set fire to the mill itself and ruin his family, the miller took his problem to the village priest.
    “In those days, the old gods still walked the earth, and their priests were able to work miracles at the gods’ discretion, so the miller’s action was probably the wisest one he could have taken.
    “And so the boy was raised by the village priest, who became used to the fires and the earthquakes and quite approved of the blooming flowers. The miller was so relieved that when the temple burned down because of a toddler temper tantrum, he didn’t even grumble about paying his share to rebuild it—and he grumbled about everything.
    “Now, in those days, there was trouble brewing outside the village. Mages, as you all know, are temperamental at best, and at their worst ...” Aralorn shuddered and was pleased to see several members of her audience shiver in sympathy. At her feet, Wolf made a soft noise that might have been laughter. Kisrah smiled, but in the dim light of the great hall, she couldn’t tell if it was genuine or not.
    “Kingdoms then were smaller even than Lambshold, and each and every king had a mage who worked for him. Usually, the most powerful mages worked only for themselves, for none of the small countries could afford to hire them for longer than it took to win a battle or two. The strongest mages of them all were the black mages, who worked magic with blood and death.”
    Gerem straightened, and said, “I never knew black magic was more powerful than the rest.”
    Aralorn nodded. “With black magic, the sorcerer has only to control the magic released; with other magics, he must gather the power as well. Collecting magic released in death takes nothing out of the mage . . . except a piece of his soul.”
    “You sound as if you’ve had personal experience,” said Gerem challengingly.
    Aralorn shook her head. “Not I.”
    When Gerem looked away from her, she continued the tale. “This balance of power had worked for centuries—until the coming of the great warrior, Fargus, and the discovery of gold in the mountains of Berronay.” She rolled out the names with great ceremony, like the court crier, but added, much less formally, “No one knows, now, where Berronay or its mines were. No one knows much more about Fargus than his name. But it was his deeds that came close to destroying the world. For he ruled Berronay shortly after its rich mines were discovered and before anyone else knew how rich that discovery was. He amassed a great army with the intent of conquering the world—and he hired the fourteen most powerful mages in the world to ensure that he would do so.
    “Tam’s village was the smallest of three in the kingdom of Hallenvale—that’s ‘green valley’ in the old tongue. It was located in the lush farmland in the rolling hills just northwest of the Great Swamp.” Aralorn paused, sipping out of a pewter mug of water someone