Fortress of Ice

“Or like friendly old men who come offering help in the middle of the night?”

That rash outburst won a sidelong look, a terrible look. The old man dropped the stick he was using, lifting his hand, and that hand glowed with blue fire. Elfwyn scrambled backward, came up against his sleeping brother, and shook at him, holding him in his arms; but Aewyn hung entirely limp in his embrace, like the dead.

“You might be in a predicament,” the old man said, “if I weren’t who I say I am. But I am. And you and your brother are as safe as I can make you.” The blue fire died. “He oughtn’t to hear certain things. He’ll sleep. He’s quite safe. Let him lie.”

“Emuin.” He had to try to believe it. They both might have been dead, and the book taken, if he were not who he claimed. “Master Emuin, then.”

“Good.” The old man nodded, placid again.

He still trembled. “You taught my father.”

“Indeed I did.”

“You might—” He knew he had just been reprimanded, might be tested again, and that the circumstance was dire. He hardly dared voice his ambition again: ambition did not become him, in his circumstances, but his father had encouraged him. “You might teach me. If all the things you say could happen could come to be, you could show me how to avoid them. If I’ve made mistakes, then you could teach me how to protect myself, and my brother, andthe little princess.”

“Teach you wizardry? Useless. Teach you magic? I ca

“Sihhë!” He laughed bitterly, refused this time with nonsense.

“Sihhë, I say. A spirit the like of which I could never conjure, nor could Tarien. Such a conjuring weakened Mauryl Gestaurien to his death, and he was ten times the wizard I am, not to mention a hundredweight the worth of Tarien Aswydd. Born or called—you are half his brother, at least have trust that thatside of the blanket is not in doubt. Doubt your mother’s half of the proposition instead. Neither she nor your aunt could have done this unaided.”

“Riddles, again! Don’t trust her, you mean? I never trusted her, and I never knew I had an aunt.”

“Riddles I hardly know how to say—except you are the living Gift. Otter. Elfwyn. Elfwyn. Elfwyn. Say a thing three times and it binds. I suspect you were bound to that name long, long ago, and your mother had no choice in naming you.”

“Tell me what you mean!”

“I mean,” Emuin said, “that you have already gone to the proper source to learn certain things, and left it, one supposes, uninformed. Perhaps even hefailed to know you.”

“Lord Tristen? I asked him to teach me, and he wouldn’t. He told me I was Elfwyn, not Otter.”

“He wouldn’t teach you, or he couldn’t,” Emuin said, and frowned darkly. “And he named you. Then I suspect he did see what I see.”

“What? Give me the truth, Master Emuin! What did he see? What do you?”

“A conjuring,” Emuin said. “A Summoning that opens a door.”

“What door? Make sense, please, sir!”

“ Yougovern what door, if you have the will. Doyou have the will, Spider Prince?”

He drew a deep breath and balked, growing angry, angrier than he had been since the day Gran died. “I have the will for anything, sir, if I’m informed. I’m Otter, if you like. Lord Tristen said I should be Mouse, not Owl. And he said nothing at all about spiders.”

“Good,” Emuin said, looking squarely into his eyes. “Very good, Spider Prince. Otter. Mouse. And Elfwyn. But never Owl? Probably a good idea.”

“Damn you!”

“Oh, that would notbe easy,” Emuin said, laying a hand on the emblem at his breast. “And many have tried. But gratitude… that, I would think, I am due, at least a little, for coming out here in the cold.”

The anger fell away from him. Embarrassment took its place, for ever asking what was beyond his station in life and for ever cursing this man, no matter how desperate. “A great deal, Master Emuin, a very great deal, only—”

“Guard yourself from such words and such thoughts as damning folk. When you were a child you could let words fly. Now, when a man’s mind stirs in you, such things become dangerous. As for the Gift, you could easily make that recalcitrant candle burst in flame.”

“If I could have done it, sir, I certainly would have. I tried. I did try.”

“While you believe you ca

“I never can!”

“So you say now,” Emuin said gently. “But the years roll on, and time changes us. You may need to renounce Aewyn to protect him from your enemies. Think of that, Elfwyn Prince.”

A bitter laugh rose up in him. “I’m no prince. And I’ll never renounce my brother or my father.”

“Every person has will, and while wizards have more force than most, the collective populace can be gathered, and swayed, without magic—indeed they, being blind to it, can be swayed that much more easily. They are deaf to magic, but their will, my boy, can be as potent as a wizard’s conjuring—more so than some. So know what you defy, when you send your wishes toward the people. Passion can do a great deal to awaken that giant. Beware of stirring it. And beware, too, of ordinary men: thwart our wishes, that they can, and open doors, or simply leave them unlatched—that they will do with amazing fecklessness, or spite. They can be the hands and feet of a wizard’s wish, individually. They can open any door at all. Never, never discount them. Never trifle with them. And beware of using them. They have their own interests. They fear magic greatly, and will hate you for it if they detect it. They will often turn contrary, when they know they’re meddled with.”

“They already hate me.”

“They scarcely know you exist,” Emuin said. “And they have not decided what you are. That is why I counsel you, beware of waking that giant. Be the spider. Or be Mouse. Use the edges of the walls. Find crevices from which to watch and live quietly, if you can manage it, while you learn.”

“If anyone harms Aewyn,” he began.

“Let no enemy find out how much that would move you, or I assure you that will be their first recourse. Let no enemy know your weaknesses. Strive to be your own master. That is my advice. Know whence come the motions of your heart, Spider Prince, whether they are light or dark, fair or foul, whether they be what you will or what you would not: know them for what they are, and shape yourself as you would wish to become. That will be magic enough, for a start at it. Go to sleep. I shall watch.”

He didn’t want to. But his eyes grew heavy on the instant. He snapped them right open.

“Strong-willed,” Emuin said. “But if you can’t trust me in this, you can trust me in nothing. Trust me, I say!”

Something thumped, outside, in the wind. A good many things had flapped and bumped in the wind, but this came at the door. And Emuin looked that way, sharply, and set his staff against the floor to rise, not with the alacrity of a young man.

“Master Emuin?” Elfwyn asked, and leapt up and took his arm.

“Hold your brother,” Emuin snapped. “ Hold on to him!”

The door burst open. Bitter wind rushed inside, scattering coals, bringing dark as the fire blew up the chimney. Elfwyn flung himself to Aewyn’s side, seized up his brother in his arms as Emuin reached them.

“Hold on!” Emuin shouted at them. “Hold my hand! We are going to your father!”

He reached. He grasped Emuin’s fingers, and the wind caught them, whirled them away through gray mist, a spi