Wizard of Jatte by Rowan Erlking (ereader ebook .TXT) 📖

into the stream of light, scanning the skin, stretching out his hands and fingers among the floating dust specks around it to make sure what he was seeing was not a lie. Yet there it was, under the bandages as plain as anything. The sunlight revealed a clean clear palm. No cut. No redness. Only a faint white line as proof that he had been sliced by the bailiff the night before.

He turned with a glance at Theissen. His little fists were clutched tight, his body curled in the hay, leaning only a little on his older brother’s side, his tears now dried yet the redness still around his eyes. Dalance looked at his hands again. Of all the magic he had seen his little brother do, this was the most amazing.

Peering at his perfectly healed palm once more, Dalance wondered mildly if they would have to get their hands cut open again, if what his brother had done would have been considered cheating the law. Tears seemed to cloud his vision. He felt like laughing, celebrating. It was so hard to contain his relief that Dalance nudged his brother awake.

He whispered, “You did this. Right?”

Theissen’s eyes bugged wide, and he looked from left to right before ducking close to his ear. He barley spoke. “I had to. I couldn’t let your hands get cut. You were going to be a journeyman soon. Dad was so happy. He was buying your tool kit.”

Nodding, Dalance found it hard to keep the tears in. His dad had been proud. He only wondered what his father thought of him now. Perhaps he was now focusing on preparing Kinnerlin for his journey. For his brother, it would not be for three more years. Still, his father probably thought his eldest was now destined to rough furniture making instead of the fine art he had been taught; a lackey in a shop rather than a craftsman.

“You stayed with me.” Theissen snuggled close. “I’m glad you are my brother.” 

Dalance rubbed his little brother’s head. “So am I.”

 

Their father claimed them that evening.

The carpenter’s eyes were swimming with tears when he collected both of his boys, reaching out almost immediately once they were heading back down the road to look at his eldest son’s hands, taking care as he unwrapped the bandages. “I will still train you. What you did was a noble thing. A brave thing. These things can be overcome. They—”

He stared at his son’s clean palm.

“How? I saw them. I know they did it.” His father turned to stare at Dalance. “How is this possible?”

Dalance sneaked a glance at those watching them walk down the road from their homes, seeing the pitying expressions yet not really looking at them as if feeling shame for punishing such young brave boys. He said, “Theissen.”

The carpenter looked down at his younger son, immediately pulling up Theissen’s hands. Theissen winced. With the bandages off, the carpenter saw that this son’s palms were still cut. The scabs still bled when the boy moved his hands. The carpenter blinked and stared.

“Why? Why did you not heal yourself too? Can you not do it for yourself?”

Theissen drew back his hand, feeling with his fingertips the cut that was healing. “I can. But…. No. I will keep the scars to remind myself never to steal again.

“Besides,” he looked up at his father. “They aren’t so bad as Dalance’s were. I can still learn to be a carpenter.”

He paused, looking pleadingly at his father’s face.

“Can I?”

Pulling both his sons in close, the carpenter found it hard to stop his tears. “Of course you can. Of course you can.”

Chapter Three: So Magic Flows Like a River

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Some said the experience of punishment and prison changed Theissen overnight. His old carefree babyish way of looking at things had transformed him into a not only responsible child, but one with a strong sense of justice.

Others said it only made things worse. The magician was one of the latter group of course. So were a few of the village boys who didn’t like Theissen’s looks of you-shouldn’t-have-made-me-do-it.

Another change was in Dalance. Almost no one noticed that he could still carry on the carpenter’s trade despite the corporal punishment that should have marred his hands for life. Instead, people noticed how he devoted himself more seriously to his carpentry, advancing much farther than even his father had anticipated by making ornate carvings that rivaled even his father’s skills. By this time the last stretch of preparations for his journey was in the works, and his adulthood ceremony had been scheduled with the village elders.

Dalance was to go out after the spring thaw had finished, setting off on the dry ground of summer. In the mean time he helped his father in the shop work on tables and cabinets ordered by wealthy landowners and businessmen in distant towns and cities. The horse drawn carts sent to claim the merchandise had arrived, leaving them busy with the packing and obligatory feeding of the animals. Their owners waited in the village inn in the mean time.

Leading the horses to the river to drink, the carpenter’s sons took off their socks and shoes, wading the cool water to pass the time. The shoemaker’s eldest son played with them, mostly to catch one last time he could be with Dalance. Unlike the carpenter’s family tradition, the shoemakers did not leave their village to practice their trade. Instead the eldest son inherited the shop and the younger brothers worked under him. Or at least that was how it was supposed to work. Migdrin Shoemakerson hated the craft and refused to be apprenticed in it. Instead he was hired out to work on the farms telling the rest of the world that one day he would become an important businessman. It was his younger brother Lonse that would inherit, and he only did it grudgingly. Both boys preferred playing rather than work.

Kicking the water with his feet, Migdrin made the rush of the ripples splash over Kinnerlin.

“Stop that!” Kinnerlin stuck his tongue out at him. He had been attempting to fish, though there really wasn’t much to be had in the spring except for the tiny guppies and newly hatched trout. Nearby Theissen stood ankle deep in a small pool along the edge looking for frog eggs, hoping to find tadpoles. The spray Migdrin was making caused him to look up.

“Weakling. It’s just a little cold water,” said Migdrin.

Theissen made a face and continued to look for tadpoles.

“Hey! I saw one!” Dalance shouted, pointing at a large bullfrog. “There under the rock.”

Migdrin turned with a snort, peering over at the pool where both brothers were looking. “Honestly, Dalance, you’d think you were still a kid. It is just a frog.”

But Dalance only smirked. He spent a great deal more time with Theissen since prison and didn’t seem to care what anyone said about it.

“It is big,” Theissen said, ignoring Migdrin. It was hard to, especially when Migdrin suddenly walked through their pool and scared the frog away. Both brothers stood up, giving him a disapproving glare.

“Not funny,” Dalance said, walking back to shore where the horses were starting to raise their heads, satisfied from their drink. Tolbetan had been attending to them but he had gone for more feed a little while ago and had yet to come back.

Migdrin followed him, sloshing more so that he splashed Kinnerlin with a larger wave of water. Kinnerlin protested with a shout. Migdrin’s smile curled, ignoring his protests. Instead he kicked harder, making an even larger wave. “I thought you weren’t going to go on this trip. Things will get so boring when you leave.”

“Cut that out!” Kinnerlin shouted.

Dalance shook his head with a smirk. “Of course I am going to go. I told you I was. I’m sixteen now. That’s when my father left on his journey. It is about time I went on mine.”

Theissen grinned at his older brother. He had found the frog. It was now swimming towards him as if to have a conversation. It hopped into Theissen’s outstretched hand, landing on the scar that had since healed into a clear pink line. Migdrin turned his eyes away as if watching the frog hop out of the water onto Theissen’s shoulder was the most disgusting sight he had ever beheld yet he pretended not to see. Kinnerlin grinned, crossing over to touch the frog also.

“But who am I going to talk to when you’re gone? These twerps?”

Kinnerlin cast him a glare. “Don’t bother. We don’t want to listen to what you have to say anyway.”

“Shut up!” Migdrin snapped, shoving Kinnerlin back.

Kinnerlin only made a face and petted the frog’s head when Theissen held it out, grinning with personal pleasure.

“Come on. You can’t go. All that will be left here of our old pals is Perdif Innkeeperson and Cornik Bakerson, and they’re already busy in their trade. What am I supposed to do? Hang around with Yuld Scribeson?”

Dalance cackled at the thought. “Oh, that would be funny.”

“Sure would,” Kinnerlin murmured, but he ducked out of the way before Migdrin could kick water at him again.

Casting Kinnerlin a glare, Migdrin said to his pal, “You can’t go.”

“I’m leaving next month.” Dalance barely shrugged. “Maybe you ought to rethink about just working as a hired hand. Go back into shoemaking.”

Migdrin stuck out his tongue as if he were vomiting into the river. “No thanks. Stuck smelling tanning fluid, glue, and leather all day? Be serious. I hate that shop. When I can, I’ll move far away from it.”

“Then why should I stay if you are planning to move?” Dalance asked with a smirk. He started to pull on the horses’ halters again, checking their bits and eye shields to make sure they were resting comfortably. He adjusted the buckles so they were not strapped too tight.

With a shrug, Migdrin cast Kinnerlin a devious look and said, “Oh, just to keep it lively.”

He then pushed Kinnerlin to the river.

Coming up, sputtering for breath, Kinnerlin shivered with a glare. He wiped his sopping hair out of his eyes. “You toad! I said stop that! Now Mom is really going to let me have it!”

Migdrin only snorted, wading over to him. “Wimp.”

The frog hopped out of Theissen’s hands, diving straight under the rock that hung over the edge of the small pool.

Jumping to his feet, Kinnerlin held up his clenched fist. “You cow clod! Leave me alone!”

But Migdrin fixed a darker look on him. Then without even stopping, though Dalance called for him to ignore Kinnerlin, he shoved the younger Carpenterson into the water then held him down.

“Cow clod?” he shook Kinnerlin as the boy gasped for air. Then he shoved him under again. “You termite!”

“Hey! Get off him!” Theissen shouted, pushing at Midgrin’s side. He could not budge the sixteen-year-old, too small to make him do nothing more than rock a little in the water.

“Migdrin, stop it!” Dalance hurried back into the river.

But Migdrin did not let Kinnerlin up, growling and shaking him as he held him underwater while the other boy groped upward to claw his way out. “You mouthy little dung worm! I’ll teach you!”

“No!”

Migdrin looked up to where Theissen had been shouting, casting a dirty glare as if to say he was