“Never harm the spriggan mirror in any way— esku!”

Several nearby spriggans applauded at that.

Tobas raised an arm to shield his eyes as Gresh flung a third dose and announced, “Never take the spriggan mirror to a place where wizardry does not work— esku!” The spriggans applauded more vigorously as Gresh capped the jars of powder and put them away. Tobas stood, looking around at the hundreds of leaping, cheering creatures.

Then Gresh pulled the wrapped mirror from his pack and ceremoniously handed it to Tobas.

“Your mirror, sir,” he said. “I expect my fee will be paid at the first opportunity.” Tobas accepted it gingerly. He partially unwrapped it and peered at it in the gloom as he said,

“You might have waited until I had my clothes on. And I can hardly see anything in this light!” Karanissa stepped forward with a hand raised; a dull orange glow illuminated the glass disk in the wizard’s hand.

“That looks like it,” Tobas agreed, studying the mirror.

“We saw it produce spriggans,” Gresh said. “Unless there are two of the confounded things, that’s it.”

Tobas looked up. “But it’s not producing any spriggans now?”

“No. And with luck, it never will again. I can explain it to you later, if you like.”

“I heard most of it—dragons really do have good ears—but I’ll want you to do that.” He turned.

“Ali, are you all right?”

“I’m fine. Can we go home now?”

“Yes,” Tobas said happily. “Yes, we can, as soon as I’m dressed.” He trotted toward the carpet holding the mirror triumphantly before him, while the spriggans cleared a path for him.

“Come on,” Gresh said, following in the naked wizard’s wake.

Karanissa hesitated. “Wait a minute,” she said. “What about my duplicate?” Gresh paused, startled, then looked back.

The other Karanissa was still in the cave, watching events with evident incomprehension.

“Come on,” Gresh called to her, beckoning. “We’ll take you with us.” The reflection hesitated, then followed.

A moment later, when the mirror was safely tucked away in the wizard’s leather valise and Tobas was pulling his rather damaged tunic over his head, Gresh and the two Karanissas arrived at the carpet; Alorria stared up at them in shocked horror.

“Two of her! Tobas, what’s going on? How can there be two of Kara?”

“We had a little magical accident,” Gresh explained. “Don’t worry about her; she’s quite harmless—and she’s not really another Karanissa. She just looks like her. See, she’s two inches shorter?”

“But....” Alorria was plainly not happy, but was having trouble finding the words to express her displeasure. She looked down at baby Alris, who had fallen asleep at the breast and was not helping her mother convey her annoyance.

“Ask her, Ali,” Karanissa said. “She’ll tell you she isn’t me.”

“I don’t know exactly who I am,” the reflection said. “I was only created a little over an hour ago.”

“Are you married to my husband?” Alorria demanded, pointing at Tobas as he struggled to get his left arm into a badly sewn sleeve. Her motion jiggled Alris, who burped without awakening.

“Not that I know of,” the image replied, puzzled. “Wasn’t he a dragon originally? You were married to a dragon?”

“Only for a little while,” Gresh said. “I turned Tobas into a dragon for a few hours, and now he’s back to his proper form.”

“Oh,” the reflection said, sounding unconvinced. “I’m fairly sure I never married a dragon. Or anyone else, for that matter. Isn’t there some sort of ceremony when one gets married?”

“It is customary,” Gresh agreed. “So if we’ve established that Tobas has not acquired a third wife, could we please get moving? It’s already almost dark, and it’s a long way to Dwomor Keep.”

“But if she isn’t really Karanissa, why is she coming with us?” Alorria asked.

“Because stranding her alone in the mountains at night seems rude,” Gresh said. “Now, may we please find seats?”

Alorria did not seem entirely satisfied, but she moved to one side and let the others crowd onto the rug.

“Four spriggans!” a spriggan reminded Gresh, as he pushed several of the little creatures clear of the carpet. “You take four!”

“Right,” he said. He pointed to four who happened to be nearby. “You, you, you, and you. The rest of you, clear away.”

The chosen four squealed with delight and clambered onto Gresh’s lap, pushing at one another to make room. One of them yipped, “Fun!”

“We’re taking them with us?” Alorria protested, staring at the foursome in horror and clutching her sleeping child to her breast.

“Yes,” Tobas and Karanissa said in unison, as they took their own seats. Karanissa took a moment to get her reflection settled onto the fabric; then Tobas turned to look at the others. He gave Alorria an embarrassed glance, then whispered to Gresh, “Could you use the Restorative on my clothes?

I know it’s waste to use high-level magic for such a thing, and Ali did her best, but she hadn’t come prepared, and I’m afraid these breeches are chafing horribly.”

“If it will get us airborne,” Gresh said, fumbling to find the right jar of powder. Karanissa provided a handful of light, and a moment later a faint blue shimmer suddenly settled Tobas’s rumpled garments back into their proper shapes.

Gresh was still tucking the box back into his shoulder-pack when Tobas settled cross-legged on the fabric and gestured. The carpet rose silently and smoothly.

“Can you see well enough to get us safely back to the castle?” Gresh asked, as he looked around at the blackening sky and shadow-filled landscape. Stars were appearing overhead, and he wondered whether the greater moon would be visible that night, and when the lesser would next rise. He could not see either of them at the moment.

Some of the stars didn’t seem to be staying; apparently clouds were starting to gather, which would not help matters.

“I hope so,” Tobas said, turning the carpet to the southwest. “I’m hoping to navigate by the glow from the castle windows.”

“They don’t close the shutters?” Gresh asked, startled.

“They usually miss a few,” Karanissa reassured him. Tobas was too busy peering into the gloom to respond.

“We could stay up here on the mountain until morning,” Gresh suggested, as he noticed the carpet drifting closer to a sharp-looking tree than he liked. “It might be safer than flying in the dark.”

“No! ” answered Tobas and both his wives. The carpet picked up speed.

“I wish I knew where we’re going,” the reflection said plaintively, as she looked around in obvious consternation. “It’s windy up here.”

“We’re going to Dwomor Keep, assuming we can find it in the dark,” Gresh told her. “It’s a big old castle, but reasonably comfortable.”

“Is it? Why are we going there?”

Gresh tried to explain, with both the human reflection and the four spriggans listening intently and asking questions, and that kept him and the real Karanissa busy for the better part of an hour. By then the sky was overcast, hiding the stars and moons, so that the carpet seemed to be soaring through nothingness. Alorria was dozing, and Alris was still sound asleep.

Gresh leaned forward and whispered to Tobas, “Do you know where we are?”

“No,” Tobas admitted. He explained that he no longer had any idea where they were. He was just looking for a light, any light, that he could aim for. Gresh pointed out a faint orange glow far off to their left, but Tobas shook his head.

“That’s not it,” he said.

“How do you know?” Gresh demanded.

“Because that’s the Tower of Flame,” Tobas said. “I’ve seen it before. It’s a good thirty leagues away. It would take hours to get there, and there’s nothing there we want.”

“Oh,” Gresh said, staring at the distant glimmer. He had heard of the legendary Tower of Flame all his life, but he had never seen it before.

From this distance it really didn’t look like much.

“There’s a light,” the reflection said, pointing ahead

“Where?” both men asked, turning to see.

“There.”

She was right; a faint flicker of orange was visible, and Tobas steered the carpet toward it. He did not know what the light was, but it appeared man-made and was not the Tower of Flame. At this point that was good enough.

They wound up as guests for the night at a small farmhouse where the man of the house had been out with a lantern, checking on a soon-to-calve cow.

When they first arrived and asked the startled and drowsy farmer where they were, they were assured that they were only a mile or two from Dwomor Keep. Upon hearing the castle was close Tobas wanted to continue on and try to find it, despite the now-total darkness, but just then the first drops of rain began to fall, and the others unanimously overruled him. They hastily hoisted their luggage, rolled up the carpet, and hurried into the cottage, Gresh almost banging his forehead on the lintel.

After the wife and teenaged sons were awakened, Gresh paid the family of farmers generously for a late supper and the use of several beds, even though the beds were just piles of straw and some rather malodorous blankets crowded into various corners of house and barn.

Unlike the sleeping accommodations, the meal was entirely satisfactory, as the family had just that day butchered a hog and had a good supply of vegetables and beer to accompany the fresh pork. The entire party ate heartily after their long and weary day, then tottered off to bed with as little conversation as possible.

Gresh had slept on worse bedding on occasion, on various buying trips; he awoke feeling fine.

Most of the others had no real problems, but Alorria had not done as well as some and was alternately yawning and complaining as the company gathered in the main room of the farmhouse shortly after dawn.

Gresh was mildly surprised to discover that all four spriggans had stayed the night and not wandered off seeking fun, but there they were when he arose, clustered around Tobas and his luggage, ready to continue their adventure. As their hosts fried up a pound or so of bacon for breakfast, Gresh and Tobas studied the spriggans carefully and concluded that these were, in fact, the same four, and there were no others to be seen, either running loose or in Tobas’s valise. The mirror had not produced any more during the night. Presumably the mirror in the spriggans’ world was safely shut away in a box and would never again spew unwelcome visitors into the World.

Since they had opened the valise to check for spriggans, Tobas lifted out the mirror for inspection. “You really did it,” he said, marveling as he turned carefully wrapped glass over in his hands.

“You got me the mirror.”

“It’s my job,” Gresh replied gruffly. “You saw it last night.”

“But it seems more real by daylight. Before I’d only just been turned back to my natural form and was surrounded by spriggans. It was hard to be sure just what was real under those circumstances!” Gresh could not argue with that.

An hour later the ten of them—Gresh, Tobas, Alorria, Alris, Karanissa, the reflected Karanissa, and the four spriggans—spilled off the carpet onto the platform outside the tower window at Dwomor Keep.

The Spriggan Mirror

A Legend of Ethshar

Chapter Twenty-Four

Gresh decided to spend a day or two in Dwomor before heading back to Ethshar of the Rocks to collect his fee; after all, once he was paid he would have all the time in the World. Besides, he had spent more than enough hours crowded onto the flying carpet, and a brief stay would allow him and Tobas to tidy up loose ends, such as making certain no more spriggans were emerging.

That was easy enough to ascertain, since the mirror was wrapped in cloth—so long as the wrappings stayed in place, no spriggans had appeared, since any new arrival would have had to loosen the bindings to fully materialize. They had been too tired to fully appreciate that at the farmhouse, but now it seemed sufficient evidence.

The mirror was carefully placed in Tobas’s tower workshop, where the four spriggans were set to watch over it with strict orders not to touch it, or to meddle with anything else. Gresh had some doubts about ordering them not to meddle and considered using Javan’s Geas on them, but eventually decided that if Tobas wanted to risk it, that was his problem, and Gresh wasn’t going to waste a bunch of valuable magic safeguarding anything. Especially since he still didn’t know whether or not Javan’s Geas would work on spriggans.

As for the enchanted powders themselves, Gresh had tucked the pack in a corner when they first came in from the flying carpet’s landing platform. He saw no need to move them; none of the residents of Dwomor Keep were going to be foolish enough to steal from the wizard’s apartments.

Figuring out what to do about the false Karanissa was a little more difficult. By general consent of everyone involved except the image herself—and even she didn’t seriously object—she had been locked away in one of the four small bedrooms in the wizard’s tower, out of sight of the castle’s other inhabitants but with an adequate supply of food and water, until such time as the others had decided how she should be handled.

Karanissa thought she was harmless and should be released; Alorria thought she was a monster that should be destroyed; and the two men did not yet have fixed opinions.

Over breakfast and a subsequent glass of wine, Gresh explained to Tobas exactly what had happened in the cave and detailed his theories of just how the mirror’s magic worked, which included a description of the reflection’s initial appearance. That did not bring them to any quick agreement on what should be done with her.

Alorria did not stay around to listen to the debate; she had stated her position and had more urgent concerns, such as showing Alris off to the king and queen again. Karanissa stayed, but had little to say; for the most part she left the discussion to the two men.

“She’s just an image. We should use Javan’s Restorative to make her disappear,” Tobas said.

“Would it do that?” Karanissa asked.

“I think it would,” Tobas said. “The Restorative turns things into what they were before they were enchanted or broken or transformed, and she wasn’t anything before she was enchanted.”

“If that would work on her, it would work on spriggans,” Gresh said thoughtfully. “That might be a way of disposing of them. An expensive one, though. I wonder if it would work?”

“It ought to.”

“Then it could be used to make any magical creation vanish?” Tobas hesitated. Gresh suspected he was reconsidering his position. Javan’s Restorative was a powerful countercharm, but surely it wasn’t that powerful!

“I think we should try it on her,” Tobas finally said.

“Why?” Gresh demanded. “She hasn’t done anything to harm anyone. How sure are you it will make her disappear, anyway?”

“I’m not sure at all,” Tobas admitted. “I’m not comfortable having her around, though—she’s an imitation of my wife, after all!”

Gresh glanced at Karanissa. “One wife, yes,” he said. “Which is probably why the other wants her destroyed. She feels outnumbered. And you probably find it unsettling, having a copy of one of your wives. If she weren’t a second Karanissa, but the image of a stranger, would you still want her destroyed?”

“Probably not,” Tobas admitted. He frowned thoughtfully. “All right, you’ve made your point.” Gresh was not at all sure he had adequately conveyed his feelings on the subject, partly because he was not entirely certain himself what they were. He had originally been considering finding a way to erase the reflection himself, but the more he thought about it, the more repulsive the idea seemed. He was beginning to suspect it would amount to murder; the reflection certainly considered herself a person, and anyone seeing her would think she was human.

He had already decided that killing half a million spriggans would be wrong; how would killing this one pseudo-human be any different? These magical reflections might not be entirely real, might not be

“complete” in some way, but they certainly seemed to have feelings and desires and intelligence—they could speak and act and showed every other sign of being rational beings. Calling it “erasing” or

“unmaking” didn’t change the fact that it was killing, ending a life.

But turning a reflection loose in the World didn’t seem like the best idea, either. Where would she go? What would she do? If she was like the spriggans she didn’t really need to eat. She couldn’t starve to death, but she would get painfully hungry if she didn’t get regular meals.

Gresh could easily imagine her winding up as one of the miserable, homeless residents in Soldiers’ Field, or as a slave, or as one of the whores in Wargate; he didn’t like any of those ideas.

Of course, she was an attractive woman; she might be fortunate enough to find a trustworthy protector. And she might be a witch; no one had yet determined that definitively, one way or the other.

Using Lirrim’s Rectification to turn her human might be a good idea—assuming it would work—because at least then she would be no more tempting to abusers than any other homeless and beautiful orphan. Gresh had some unpleasantly lurid thoughts about what might happen if a slaver or a Wargate pimp found out that an indestructible woman was available and unguarded; it would be better to remove that possibility. The Rectification might fill in some of the holes in her memory—assuming they were holes. She had been created with a complete working knowledge of the Ethsharitic language and an understanding of such concepts as marriage and dragons, but had not known whether she was a witch, whether she was married, or any number of other things. If she had arrived completely ignorant, like a baby, needing to learn to walk and talk, that would have made sense. If she had started out believing herself to be Karanissa, with all Karanissa’s memories, Gresh would have understood. This halfway state, where she had most or all of Karanissa’s general knowledge but none of her personal and specific knowledge, was confusing. Lirrim’s Rectification might change that.

Or there might be other spells....

“We should ask her,” he said, abruptly arriving at a conclusion he now thought he should have reached long ago.

“Ask her if she wants us to erase her?”

“No—or rather, not just that. We should offer her all the options we can think of and ask which she wants.”

“Without promising she’ll get her first choice,” Tobas said. “If she says she wants to marry me, the answer’s no—I can barely handle two wives, and three is out of the question.” He grimaced. “For one thing, Alorria would kill me. Or her, or both of us.” He glanced at Karanissa. “I doubt Kara would be pleased, either.”

“You know, in her present condition, she can’t be killed while you’re protecting the mirror.”

“Ali would find a way.”

“Or I would,” Karanissa interjected.

“One of you just might,” Gresh agreed. “So the marriage option is unavailable—but really, we ought to let her choose what she wants.”

Tobas sighed. “I suppose. Or perhaps we could just deliver her to one of the Guildmasters, and let the Guild decide?”

“No,” Gresh said. “She wasn’t part of our agreement, and I’m not giving her to Kaligir.”

“I was also thinking of Telurinon.”

“Nor him.”

Tobas gave in. “All right, then—we’ll ask her what she wants.” Gresh finished his wine, set the glass on the table, and rose to his feet. “Now?”

“I don’t see any reason to wait.” Tobas stood, as well, and the two men headed for the stairs.

Karanissa gulped the last of her wine, then followed.

In the tower apartment they made their way up the stairs and unlocked the door to the little-used bedroom where the reflection had been confined. They found her seated on the edge of the bed, staring intently at a tapestry she had taken off the wall and now held stretched across her lap.

She looked up at their entry.

“What are you doing with that tapestry?” Tobas asked, puzzled.

“Seeing how it’s made,” the image replied. “Studying the weave.” Gresh suspected that further inquiry about her activities would be a waste of time, and before Tobas could say anything more he said, “We’ve come to ask you a few things. Important things.”

“I’m not sure I know anything important,” the reflection replied.

“Actually, we came to ask what you want, not what you know,” Tobas told her.

“Oh?” She lowered the tapestry.

“We’ve been discussing what we should do with you,” Gresh explained. “We finally decided that it wasn’t really up to us— you should decide.”

“But you know so much more about the World than I do!”

“But it’s your life we’re discussing.”

“Well, that’s true. So what is it you want me to decide?” Tobas and Gresh exchanged glances; then Gresh said, “I know you consider yourself a person, but you aren’t exactly a human being; you’re a magical reflection of one. You were created fully grown, instead of being born and growing up; you have no name; and the witch here says that there are parts missing—it may be that you don’t have a soul, she isn’t quite sure. If the spriggans are right, you’re bound to the mirror that made you in several ways and immune to physical harm as long as the spell is active. You aren’t entirely real; you’re a magically solidified image that thinks it’s real.”

“I am? Is that what I am?” She looked fascinated, but not particularly troubled by this revelation.

“We’re fairly certain,” Tobas said. “But it’s possible our theories are wrong.”

“As a magical creation of this sort,” Gresh said, pressing on, “you may have some difficulties in dealing with human society. In any case, you definitely aren’t going to be permitted to stay here in Dwomor Keep; your resemblance to the woman you’re reflected from, Karanissa of the Mountains, would make your presence inconvenient and upsetting to several people here.”

“Where else is there?” the image asked.

“Hundreds of places, from uninhabited wilderness to huge cities,” Gresh told her. “You can go wherever you please, so long as it isn’t here.”

“Then why did you bring me here?”

“Because we were coming here, and we hadn’t yet decided what to do with you. It seemed cruel to leave you alone in the mountains.”

“But now you want to send me away?”

“Eventually, yes. But there are a few other matters to resolve first.”

“Go on.”

“We have some magic powders—they’re downstairs, where I left them. We think one of them would undo the spell that created you; if you don’t care what happens to you, it would be simplest for us if we just un created you. If we’re right about what the spell would do, you’d just cease to exist; there’d be no pain or discomfort of any kind. You’d just be gone. We aren’t sure it would work, but we think so. Would you... would that be acceptable to you?”

She stared at him. “I don’t think so,” she said. “I’m not suicidal.” She frowned. “I thought you were having trouble with an excess of spriggans. Aren’t they the same sort of reflection I am? If you have a spell like that, why haven’t you uncreated them?”

“Two reasons,” Gresh said. “First, it’s ordinarily a very expensive spell. I only have a supply of the powder form because the Wizards’ Guild wanted me to be well equipped for dealing with the magic mirror. Second, up until we actually found the mirror, and saw you come out of it, we had no idea how it worked and didn’t think the spell would do anything to spriggans. We didn’t know they weren’t entirely real.”

“Oh. I suppose that makes sense. But I still don’t want anything to do with it.” Gresh sighed, though he wasn’t surprised. “All right, then. We have another spell that transforms things into what they were meant to be. We think—again, we aren’t absolutely certain—that it would turn you into a real human being. After that you would be free to go wherever you chose, other than this castle, and do what you please.”

“Interesting. Do you have any other spells? Perhaps the one that turned him from a dragon to a man?” She gestured at Tobas.

“That’s the one that would unmake you,” Gresh said. “He was a man first.”

“Then what about the spell that turned him into a dragon?”

“I don’t think that would do anything to you; it might be interesting to try it and see, though.”

“Would it turn me into a dragon?”

“No. I think I can say that much.”

“Oh. Are there any others, then?”

Gresh and Tobas looked at one another, then back at the reflection.

“Not really, no,” Tobas replied. “That’s the lot.”

“So my choices are to remain as I am, to cease to exist, or to turn human?”

“Yes. We think.”

“If I turned human and didn’t like it, could you change me back?” Tobas and Gresh exchanged glances again. “The Spell of Reversal?” Gresh asked.

“It ought to work,” Tobas agreed.

Gresh turned back to the reflection. “You’d have about half an hour to decide; after that, I don’t think we could turn you back.”

“Javan’s Restorative might work, too,” Tobas suggested.

Gresh frowned. “Maybe,” he admitted.

“Well,” the reflection said, “if I have a choice of two possible modes of existence, it seems to me that I ought to try them both before deciding which I want.” Gresh nodded. “Very sensible,” he said. “Then you want us to turn you human? Or rather, try the spell that we think will turn you human?”

“You aren’t sure?”

“I’m afraid not. But we both really do think it will work.”

“Then I’ll try it.”

Gresh smiled reassuringly. “I’ll go fetch the powder.” He turned and left the room, bound for the stairs.

Just outside the bedroom door he almost tripped over a spriggan, but caught himself against the wall of the passage. “What are you doing here?” he demanded.

“Heard voices,” the spriggan said. “Came to see whether voices were bad mirror thieves trying to sneak up on us.”

“There aren’t any mirror thieves around here,” Gresh said, annoyed. “That’s why we brought it here, so it would be safe.”

“Yes, yes. Sorry sorry.” The spriggan scampered back toward the stairs. Gresh watched it bound up a few steps, then pause to catch its breath. Gresh decided not to waste any more time on it. He marched down the passage and down the stairs to the sitting room, then crossed to the corner where he had left his pack.

He considered hauling the whole thing upstairs, but he was afraid that if he did, Tobas and Karanissa might get caught up in the excitement and start throwing spells around, wasting the powders.

He had gotten a little carried away himself out on the mountain. It was the first time he’d ever had so much magic right there in his own hands, and he’d been perhaps a bit careless with his powders, but he was calmed down now and didn’t see any need to put needless temptation in anyone’s path.

He thought he understood now why wizards didn’t ordinarily keep many spells around in powder form. It was too easy to use them. The temptation to just fling a powder and say a word was much stronger than Gresh had imagined. Working a spell from scratch every time meant that a wizard had to think about what he was doing, instead of acting on impulse. Gresh knew he had been lucky that none of his enchantments had ended in disaster, and he did not want to push his luck too far. He intended to take the remaining powders and potions back to Ethshar with him and, if the Guild did not reclaim them, sell them for a healthy price. He did not care to let anyone else experiment with them, trying them all out to see what they might do to the reflected Karanissa, or to spriggans.

So he did not bring the whole box. Instead he opened the pack, pulled out the box, and found the jar of white powder, still mostly full—he had used only one pinch from this one so far, less than any of the others. He pulled it out, pushed the pack back in the corner with his foot, and then headed back up to the bedroom. He heard the spriggans squeaking somewhere above him as he climbed the stairs, but ignored them as he marched back up the passage.

He did wonder idly how much damage they were doing to Tobas’s laboratory, but did not let it concern him.

Tobas and the two Karanissas were waiting in the bedroom; the two women were seated side-by-side on the edge of the bed, the wizard standing before them. For a moment Gresh was uncertain which woman was which, but then he got close enough to see the height difference.

“Are you ready?” he asked, opening the jar. “You’ll have about half an hour to decide which sort of existence you prefer. If you wait any longer than that the Spell of Reversal won’t change you back, and we don’t know whether Javan’s Restorative will work.”

“It ought to,” Tobas said.

“I’m ready,” the image said. The original Karanissa moved down the bed, farther away from her duplicate, to make room.

Gresh flung a generous pinch of white powder at the smaller Karanissa and proclaimed, “Esku! !” There was a blinding silver flash; Gresh blinked, trying to clear his vision. When he did he saw two identical Karanissas sitting on the bed—truly identical; the size difference had vanished.

So had all differences between their facial expressions and even their position. Both were sitting bolt upright, staring at their own hands. Both spoke in perfect unison, saying, “By all the gods, Gresh—what have you done?”

The Spriggan Mirror

A Legend of Ethshar

Chapter Twenty-Five

“I don’t understand,” Gresh said, looking from one woman to the other. “What happened?” Both of them looked at him, which was oddly reassuring, because at least it meant they were no longer in exactly the same position. “Don’t you see?” they said, still speaking in unison. “It turned the reflection into what it was meant to be—but it wasn’t just meant to be human, it was meant to be me!”

“What?”

“We’re both me!” they insisted. “I have two bodies, but they’re both me! I can still remember everything from the moment I emerged from the mirror—we can both remember it—but we’re both Karanissa!”

“Gresh, I think we better undo this,” Tobas said.

The two women turned to look at one another, moving in perfect synchronization. “Oh, how strange!” they said, as they stared at one another. “Yes, I think we should reverse this!” Gresh stared, fascinated. “But this is.... Shouldn’t we....What is it like?” Karanissa—both of her—looked at him. “It’s very hard to describe,” they said. “When I used witchcraft to hear people’s thoughts it was.... Well, no, it wasn’t anything like this, really, because there isn’t anyone else, there’s just me, but I’m in two places at once.”

“Do you see things double, then?”

“No, no—I just see more.”

“Gresh, I don’t think this is the time....” Tobas began.

Gresh turned. “It’s exactly the time,” he said. “We have half an hour before we need to reverse the spell, so why not try to learn more about it while we can?”

“Because we might lose track of time. Could you at least go get the powder for the Spell of Reversal and keep it ready?”

“I think that would be a good idea,” the Karanissas said, turning to look at one another again. “I really don’t think I want to stay like this indefinitely.” Reluctantly, Gresh acknowledged the wisdom of this. “I’ll go get it, then—and meanwhile, Karanissa, could you please take note of anything particularly interesting?” As the two women stared at each other they made an odd noise that Gresh took for agreement.

He turned and headed for the stairs.

Something green peeked up over the steps, then squeaked and scampered down. That spriggan was clearly bored with watching the mirror do nothing, Gresh thought, as he reached the head of the staircase and started down.

At the foot of the stairs he turned toward the corner, then froze in horror.

He had shoved his pack into the corner by the door to the platform, but he had not bothered to fasten it. Now he found himself looking at all four spriggans, each of them holding one of the jars of magical powder—two in the sitting room, one on the sill of the open door to the platform, one on the platform itself.

Even as he stared, readying an angry shout, he mentally cursed his own stupidity. He knew spriggans were attracted to magic; he knew the spriggans were getting bored guarding the mirror; he knew they had been told not to touch anything in the workshop. No one had said anything about not touching the contents of the sitting room.

“Put those down! ” he bellowed.

All four spriggans immediately dropped their jars.

The two jars in the sitting room landed with a slight thump, undamaged.

The one on the doorsill flew up out of the startled spriggan’s hands, came down hard on the stone, and cracked.

The one on the platform was not so much dropped as flung sideways; it landed rolling, and both Gresh and the spriggan watched in helpless dismay as it kept on rolling, right off the edge of the platform.

As the label and clear glass alternated Gresh could see dark powder inside, but he could not be completely certain whether it was blue, purple, or dark red.

A few seconds later he heard the distant sound of breaking glass as it shattered on stonework somewhere far below.

“Oops,” the spriggan on the platform said. It looked up at Gresh with an embarrassed grin.

Gresh stared at it, wanting to scream at it, but unable to think of any words that were even remotely appropriate. Then he marched forward to collect the jars before any more damage could be done and to see which spells he still had.

The two unharmed jars held Javan’s Restorative and the Spell of the Revealed Power.

The cracked jar contained the dark red powder for Javan’s Geas.

The jar of purple powder that could produce the Spell of Reversal was gone.

“Oh, blood, pain, and death!” Gresh cursed, as he hurried out on the platform and looked down, hoping that perhaps part of the jar had survived, intact enough to hold a dose of the powder. Perhaps if he used the potion for the Spell of Retarded Time he could climb down and collect enough of the powder and still get back before the half-hour was up....

“Jar broken,” the spriggan said sadly, as it stood beside Gresh and looked over the edge with him.

“Could fix it?” another spriggan said, coming up behind them.

“Fix how?” the first spriggan asked.

“With magic powder?”

That was a possibility Gresh had not yet considered; he started to say something, but before he could, the spriggan who had dropped the jar on the platform leaned over the edge and shouted, “Esku! ” at the top of its squeaky little voice.

There was a red-gold flash, and a suddenly intact jar came sailing up at them; Gresh stepped back, startled, and narrowly missed being hit by it as it flung itself onto the platform and rolled to a stop at the spot where it had been dropped.

Gresh stared at it, astonished. He had not thought of that, and the spriggans had. They had recognized the powder by color and had known how to use it from watching him back in the cave.

Furthermore, they had actually done it, and it had worked! He had not known spriggans could actually work that sort of magic—but then, it was the powder that really did it; all anyone else had to provide, once the powder was flung, was the trigger word.

“Jar fixed!” the spriggan said happily, pointing.

“Yes, it is,” Gresh agreed, as a horrible suspicion struck him. He reached down and picked up the jar and held it up to the light.

It was empty.

Words once again failed him; he bit down so hard he thought his teeth might crack. That spell had retrieved the jar, but it had used up all the powder! It had all been flung, and it had all been consumed in one flash—enough powder to work the tenth-order Spell of Reversal eight, or nine, or perhaps even ten more times, all of it gone to repair a cheap glass jar.

He stepped quickly in off the platform, before the spriggans could find a way to break any of the other jars.

“Don’t touch these!” he ordered emphatically, pointing at the three he held. “Ever!” Then he tucked them all back into the box in his pack, hoping the cracked one wouldn’t shatter, put the lid on, pulled the drawstring tight, lifted the pack onto his shoulder, and hurried upstairs, hoping that Tobas was right about Javan’s Restorative being sufficient.

He was almost at the top when he heard the sitting room door open and Alorria’s voice call,

“Tobas? Are you in here?”

“We’re up here,” he called over his shoulder as he turned the corner into the short corridor. He did not wait for Alorria to respond, but hurried to the bedroom.

Tobas and the two Karanissas were just as he had left them, save that all three looked worried.

“What was the shouting about?” Tobas asked.

“The spriggans spilled the powder for the Spell of Reversal,” Gresh explained. “We’ll have to use Javan’s Restorative. And Alorria’s here.” He set the pack on a bedside table and fumbled with the drawstring, which he now found he had pulled so tight it would not loosen.

“Didn’t you say you didn’t think that would work?” both Karanissas said.

“Tobas is the wizard here, and he thought it would—ow!—work,” Gresh said, as he struggled with the pack.

“It ought to,” Tobas said nervously.

“But what if it doesn’t?”

“Well, it can’t hurt you,” Tobas said. “It restores anyone or anything to its healthy normal state.” The Karanissas looked at one another. “But what’s normal for a magical image?” they asked.

“What’s going on in here?” Alorria asked from the doorway, just as Gresh finally managed to unjam the cord and open the pack.

“We’re just trying a few things,” Gresh said, as he carefully pulled out the jar of orange powder.

“Might she entirely cease to exist?” the Karanissas asked.

Alorria stared at the two women on the bed. “What did you do?” she demanded. “I can’t tell them apart, and they’re both talking at once!”

“It’s possible,” Tobas told Karanissa.

“Tobas!” Alorria shouted. “I asked you a question!”

“A spell went wrong,” Gresh said, as he closed the pack and set it on the floor. “We’re trying to fix it, but the spriggans have been making it difficult.”

“What kind of a spell?”

“Fifth-order,” Gresh said unhelpfully, as he opened the jar.

“I’m not sure this is a good idea,” the Karanissas said, eyeing Gresh as he approached, orange powder in the palm of his hand.

“I’m not, either,” Tobas said. “Gresh, I know what I said earlier, but I’ve changed my mind.”

“We have to do something,” Gresh said. “What kind of a life can she have like that?”

“How can you tell which one is which?” Alorria asked.

Gresh had been about to fling the powder at the Karanissa on the right, on the assumption that she was the rectified reflection and the spell would restore her to either her former state as a solidified image, or to nonexistence, but he suddenly stopped.

“She might just disappear,” Tobas said. “That would be murder.”

“She might,” Gresh agreed, staring at the right-hand Karanissa.

“She isn’t real!” Alorria protested.

“This one is the copy, isn’t it?” Gresh asked, gesturing at the right-hand woman.

“Yes, it is,” Tobas said. “They didn’t switch while you were away. But really, Gresh, shouldn’t we....”

He stopped as Gresh flung the powder—on the left-hand Karanissa.

“It can’t hurt her,” he explained. “Esku! ” There was a golden flash.

For a moment, no one moved; then the two Karanissas turned to look at one another, but Gresh could see that it wasn’t the same inhumanly synchronized motion they had displayed before. Both were still full-sized, however; the right-hand one had not been shrunk back to her original size.

“That was....” they both began—but their voices were not perfectly matched anymore. They both fell silent; then the right-hand one pointed at the other.

“I think it worked,” the left-hand Karanissa said.

“I’m still rectified, still human,” the right-hand one said. “But we’re separate.”

“I’m just me again,” the left-hand one—the original—said. “I don’t have her memories anymore.”

“But I still have hers,” the right-hand one said. She frowned. “I suppose that means she’s Karanissa and I’m...someone else, a blend of the two.”

“Fine,” Alorria said. “Then you can go back to Ethshar with Gresh. One witch-wife around here is plenty!”

“But I remember—I was married to you,” the right-hand witch said to Tobas. “I’m your wife.”

“Oh, no,” Tobas said. “No, you aren’t. Two wives are plenty. I’m married to her, and her, and nobody else.” He pointed first at Karanissa, then at Alorria.

The nameless woman looked at Karanissa for a moment, and Gresh was certain that even if they were no longer the same person in two bodies, they were still both witches capable of communicating silently. He wondered what was passing between them.

“You need a name,” he said, before Tobas or Alorria could say anything more. “Any suggestions?”

“You could call yourself Assinarak,” Alorria suggested. “That’s the mirror image of ‘Karanissa.’”

“That’s not a name!” Tobas protested.

Gresh caught himself just before he said “Not to mention stupid and ugly” aloud; there was no need to antagonize the king’s daughter.

“And I’m not just a mirror image any more,” the nameless woman protested. “I intend to be my own woman, not just a copy. No, I’ll call myself Esmera.”

“I like that,” Karanissa said. “But then, I would.”

Gresh smiled. He recognized the roots of the name—it was a sort of pun and could mean either

“from glass” or “a marvel” in Old Ethsharitic, which seemed very appropriate. “Esmera it is, then. It’s a pleasure to meet you. I take it you’re satisfied with your current condition and don’t want Tobas and I to attempt any further magic?”

“Yes, this is fine—there’s much more to me now than there was before. I can feel what Kara meant about my not being whole before.”

Karanissa smiled at that, and in fact the whole party was now smiling happily at one another—except Alorria.

“Now that you have a name, Esmera, could you please do something so that I can tell you apart from my husband’s other wife?” she demanded. “We’ll need to find you a place to sleep tonight—I’ll talk to the chamberlain. And of course, you will go to Ethshar with Gresh, won’t you? It would be much too confusing having you around here. I don’t think my parents would like it.” Esmera glanced at Tobas, then at Karanissa, then at Gresh. She turned up an empty palm. “All right,” she said. “I could put my hair up, I suppose.”

“That would do nicely,” Alorria acknowledged.

Esmera started to say something to Karanissa, but before she could say a word Karanissa said,

“You can use my things, of course—you know where the combs and ribbons are.”

“Thank you.” Esmera rose, said, “Excuse me, Ali,” to Alorria, then slipped past her and out the door.

“You call me Alorria!” Alorria called after her. Then she turned and started toward the door, clearly intending to pursue Esmera.

“Ali,” Tobas asked. “Where’s Alris?”

Alorria paused. “With my parents and Peren and Tinira,” she said. Her anger vanished, and she looked down at her hands, looking suddenly shyer and more appealing than Gresh had ever seen her. “I was hoping we might have a little time together, just the two of us. It’s been... well, a while. There’s the baby, and we were traveling, and everything. I let you and Kara have the tapestry castle to yourselves in Ethshar of the Sands, and I wanted a turn, but you were all here casting spells....”

“Oh.” Tobas blushed. He glanced at Gresh and Karanissa.

“I’ll go see if I can help Esmera with her hair,” Karanissa said.

“Ali, I need to talk to Gresh for just a moment, but if you could wait for me, I’ll be right there.” Alorria watched Karanissa leave the room, then looked back at Gresh and Tobas. “Don’t be long,” she said. Then she, too departed, leaving the two men in the room.

For a moment neither spoke. Then Tobas said, “You and I are leaving for Ethshar first thing in the morning, and we’re taking what’s-her-name, Esmera, with us, and not my wives, and you are going to be sure to never leave Esmera and me alone together for an instant and be ready to swear to that if Ali ever asks. Having the three of them in one place is much too complicated.” Gresh understood perfectly, but could not resist asking, “What do you expect Esmera to do with herself in Ethshar?”

“Anything she pleases. She’s a grown woman, a witch, with four hundred years of memories, even if they aren’t really her memories. She can take care of herself.”

“I think it would be fair to provide her with a small sum of money—traveling money.”

“That seems reasonable. If you insist, I’ll do that, but you could equally well give it to her from that down-payment you got and charge it to the Guild as an expense.”

“So I could; I’ll do that.”

“Thank you. We don’t have a great deal of cash on hand.”

“Will you be bringing the mirror with you?” Gresh asked.

Tobas hesitated, then said, “No, I don’t think I will. Either Telurinon or Kaligir would probably want me to give it to him, and thanks to your spell, I can’t. Better I leave it here, so that the issue won’t come up right away, and we’ll have time to explain the situation.” Gresh nodded. “A wise choice, and one I was going to suggest. You do realize, though, that the geas won’t do anything to stop anyone from taking the mirror from you? You’re only forbidden to give it. You aren’t required to keep it, or retrieve it if it’s lost.”

“Yes, I know—but it really is my mirror, and I think I want to hold on to it, at least until I get my new tapestry.”

“Good for you. If I might make a suggestion, though, perhaps you might tell them, with the Spell of Invaded Dreams or something of that sort, that you’re coming and that you aren’t bringing the mirror?

You’ll want to make absolutely sure of its safety here, too.”

“That’s a good point,” Tobas conceded. “I’ll send a message tonight, and I’ll put Karanissa in charge of the mirror.”

“You could even ask the king to post guards, or at the very least to watch out for spriggans in the vicinity.”

“I’ll consider that.”

Gresh realized he was nearing the end of Tobas’s willingness to listen to advice. “We’ll meet here first thing in the morning, then?” he asked.

“First thing. I’ll pack and see to the rest of it this evening, and ready the carpet. Now, if you don’t mind....”

“Your wife is waiting. Go.”

Tobas went.

The Spriggan Mirror

A Legend of Ethshar

Chapter Twenty-Six

Gresh arrived at the tower door while the sky was still gray. The dawn was not yet broken. He knocked gently; no one answered. Presumably they were all still asleep. While Tobas had said “first thing,” Gresh knew he had probably not expected anyone to take it quite so literally. Gresh had kept a book at the top of his bottomless bag for such an eventuality; he lit the lamp above the stair, settled himself on the staircase, and began reading.

He had not yet finished the second page when Esmera appeared below him, at the curve of the stair; she still wore the same red dress, and it occurred to him that she probably had no other clothes—Karanissa had provided her with combs and hairpins, but so far as he knew, nothing more than that. She certainly had no luggage with her beyond a small purse on her belt.

Her hair was still up, as she had arranged it the night before—tied into a long braid and coiled on the back of her head. He did not think it an especially flattering style, but it did distinguish her from Karanissa, and apparently it was easy to maintain—it either hadn’t come undone overnight, or she had been able to restore it unaided. He wondered which it was—wouldn’t it have been uncomfortable to sleep on it like that? Perhaps if her bed had been soft enough that wasn’t an issue; he wondered what accommodations the chamberlain had been able to provide. Gresh had not accompanied her while those arrangements were made. He had been busy double-checking on the spriggans and the magic mirror, using up the remaining supply of Javan’s Geas to order the spriggans never to move the mirror, and re-packing his bottomless bag, and making sure that the packet of Lord Peren’s hair was secure.

He hoped that Javan’s Geas worked on spriggans; he was not at all sure of it. He had tried it anyway, but there was no obvious way to test it.

The mirror was no longer his responsibility, though. He had delivered it as agreed. Now all he had to do was get home and collect his fee—and perhaps help Esmera find a home.

She was looking hesitantly up the stair at him. Gresh closed the book and smiled at her. “Good morning,” he said. “I see you rose early, as well.”

“I didn’t want to keep anyone waiting.”

“That doesn’t appear to be a problem,” he replied. “No one answered my knock.”

“So I see. May I join you?”

“Of course.” He moved over on the step, making room for her, and pushed his bag further back, out of the way.

She climbed the stair and seated herself beside him, tucking her skirt carefully. “Thank you,” she said.

He nodded, and said, “It occurs to me that this must seem very unfair to you.” She looked up at him, startled. “Oh?”

“Well, yes. After all, you remember being Tobas’s wife, you must surely think of yourself as the woman he married six years ago, and now he says you aren’t. You remember owning an entire wardrobe and all you have now is this one dress, which still has dirt from the cave on it and snagged threads where thorns or spriggans caught at it, while the other pretty clothes all belong to the other Karanissa. That can hardly seem just.”

“But I’m not Karanissa,” Esmera replied. “I know that. I’m an exact copy—and I wasn’t even that until you cast Lirrim’s Rectification on me. You and the enchanted mirror created me; Karanissa didn’t, so why should she have to give up any of her belongings, or share her husband with me?”

“But don’t you think of yourself as her, still?”

“Sometimes. I know I’m not, though, however much I might feel otherwise. What I try to do is think of it as if I was her, but now I’m someone else. I’m trying to think of it as an adventure, starting a new life on my own.”

“That’s probably a wise attitude.” Gresh considered her for a moment, and then said, “I suppose I did more or less create you, didn’t I?”

“Not deliberately.”

Gresh grimaced. “And how many children are created without that being their parents’ intent?

That doesn’t reduce the parents’ responsibility, and I don’t see why it should reduce mine.”

“But you didn’t know the mirror could produce something like me.”

“Well, that’s true, and perhaps that does lessen my burden somewhat, but all the same, now that you’ve pointed your parentage out to me, I feel I must assume some of the responsibility for your well-being. I have already spoken to Tobas, and we’ve agreed that I should provide you with funds until you can make a place for yourself, in Ethshar or elsewhere. This money should be considered part of my expenses in obtaining the spriggan mirror—after all, I would not have figured out how it worked if you hadn’t climbed out of it. But beyond that, I think I should also offer you the hospitality of my home, such as it is, and perhaps one of my sisters can see to your education and find you employment. One of them, Tira of Eastgate, is a witch—she ought to be able to provide some guidance. Ekava the Seamstress may be able to help with clothes.”

“Thank you,” Esmera said, lowering her eyes.

“You’re quite welcome—and I would like to make something clear; I’m doing this not as a father, but as a friend who feels responsible for your situation. I am not your father; we share no blood.” He was fairly certain that as a witch, able to sense his emotions, Esmera would know exactly why he was making this point. She had Karanissa’s memories; she would recall his reaction to that white dress she had worn a few days ago. And Esmera, unlike Karanissa, was not married.

He also thought she would be tactful enough not to say anything about it directly.

She raised her gaze and smiled up at him. “I’m glad of that,” she said. Then she turned and looked at the door. “Karanissa is awake,” she said. “I can sense it. She slept better than I did—her bed was familiar, and her hair didn’t get in the way.”

“Ah,” Gresh said. “Shall I knock?”

“She’s on her way,” Esmera replied.

Indeed, a moment later the door opened without further action on Gresh’s part.

Half an hour later the flying carpet rose from the platform, bearing Tobas, Gresh, and Esmera, as well as Gresh’s bottomless bag and a small chest holding a few of Tobas’s things. It sailed upward, circled the castle towers once, and then headed westward, gathering speed as it went.

They once again ate lunch at the Dragon’s Tail, in Ethshar of the Spices, but since they had so little baggage they rolled up the carpet and took it inside with them, rather than leaving it hovering.

They reached Ethshar of the Sands while the sun was still a hand’s breadth above the western horizon and spent the night in Tobas’s little house near Grandgate. All three slept in the upstairs rear; no mention was made of the tapestry hidden behind the draperies just the other side of the stairs.

While they ate a simple breakfast the next morning, Tobas reported that he had dreamed a reply—his own message about having the mirror secure in Dwomor had been received, and they were to proceed onward to Ethshar of the Rocks without talking to Telurinon. Kaligir would be meeting them at Gresh’s shop to discuss the matter.

“Why did they send a new dream?” Gresh asked. “Didn’t you talk it out in the one you sent?”

“No,” Tobas said. “I used the Lesser Spell of Invaded Dreams, which only sends. It doesn’t receive.”

Gresh blinked. “Why?”

“Because that’s how the spell works.”

“No, I know how it works. I mean why didn’t you use the Greater Spell of Invaded Dreams?”

“To save time and because I didn’t have all the ingredients for the Greater,” Tobas said defensively.

Gresh started to argue further, intending to point out that the only additional ingredients the more powerful spell required were blood and silver. Tobas had certainly had blood available if he bothered to prick his finger, and he ought to have access to a silver bit or two given he was the court wizard and the castle presumably had a treasury or at least a petty cash fund somewhere, but then he caught himself.

It didn’t really matter why; it was over and done. Tobas was right that the Greater Spell took about half an hour longer to prepare than the Lesser, and if he chose to devote that saved half-hour to getting more sleep or saying goodbye to his wives, that was his business. If he didn’t want to cut anyone for a few drops of blood, nor borrow a coin, that was his prerogative, as well.

If the real reason was that he hadn’t felt comfortable using a fourth-order spell when a second-order one would serve, as Gresh suspected, there was nothing to be gained by forcing him to admit it.

They finished breakfast in silence and were soon on their way west and north, toward Ethshar of the Rocks.

It was very nearly noon when the carpet soared between the towers of Eastgate and descended toward Gresh’s shop. The trip had been far more comfortable than the eastward journey, owing to the lack of crowding, greater familiarity with the hazards of flight, and the absence of a baby, but there had still been relatively little conversation, and Gresh was very glad to stretch his legs after sitting for so long.

Twilfa was standing in the open door of the shop, waiting for them. She waved and called a greeting as the three of them climbed off the carpet onto the street.

“Did you find the mirror?” she called as they approached.

“We did,” Gresh replied. “Have you heard from Kaligir?”

“No; should I have?”

“Not necessarily, but it seemed likely, since you seemed to be expecting us.”

“Oh, Dina told me you’d be home about now. I suppose she heard from Kaligir. So you really found the mirror? May I see it?”

“It’s safe in Dwomor; we didn’t bring it with us.”

“You didn’t? But why...?”

“I’ll be happy to explain everything once we’ve had some food, rest, and beer,” Gresh told her.

“Oh!” Twilfa realized she was blocking the doorway and stepped aside. Gresh and Esmera moved past her into the shop; Tobas was rolling up the carpet. Twilfa looked at him, then at the pair inside, and asked, “Where’s the other one, and the baby?”

“I left my wives in Dwomor,” Tobas said, as he hoisted the carpet on one shoulder, picked up his case, and strode to the door. “Both of them.”

“But that’s....” Twilfa turned.

“That’s Karanissa’s sister,” Gresh told her. “Esmera. She’ll be staying with us for a few days.”

“Sister?” Twilfa stared.

“I’m told the resemblance is strong,” Esmera said, smiling.

“Esmé, I have eleven sisters, and no two of them come close to that strong a resemblance!” Twilfa said. “Are you twins?”

“No, Karanissa is older,” Esmera replied, her smile widening. “Quite a bit older, actually.”

“About that food?” Gresh asked.

“Oh! Yes, of course.” Twilfa hurried toward the kitchen, leaving the three of them in the shop’s front room. Tobas looked around for a convenient spot to put down the rolled-up carpet. Gresh closed the front door.

That gave the three of them a little privacy. “It occurs to me—do you want your origins kept secret, or would you just as soon let everyone know you’re only a few days old?” Gresh asked Esmera, as she headed toward the chairs in the corner.

“I think I’d prefer to keep it to myself,” she answered.

“We’ll probably have to tell Kaligir,” Tobas remarked, as he thumped the rug down in front of a large brass-bound chest.

“If you must,” Esmera replied. She sat down in one of the velvet chairs and began undoing her braid.

“What are you doing?” Tobas protested.

“I’m letting my hair down, now that I won’t be flying anywhere, and I don’t need to worry about you confusing me with Karanissa.” She had the braid uncoiled and was untying the ribbons that held it together.

“But I’m still.... I mean, people will think you’re her!”

“Tobas, I am not going to keep my hair up forever; I’ve braided it for traveling often enough, but I’ve never worn it coiled up that way before, not in four.... I mean, Karanissa never wore it that way, in four hundred years, and I don’t like it any better than she did. I’m done traveling, so I don’t need the braid, either.”

“But everyone....”

“Tobas.” She stopped unraveling the braid and put a hand on his. “I am going to be living here, in this city. People are going to see my face, sooner or later, and whether my hair is up or down, they’ll notice the resemblance to your wife. There’s no point in trying to hide it, or pretending I don’t look exactly like her—of course I do, because I’m her reflection made flesh. You know that, I know that, and Gresh knows that. I’ll be happy to use the twin-sister excuse instead of the truth, just to save a lot of tedious explanation, but I’m not going to ignore the fact that I’m physically identical to her. It would be silly to try. I will try to hide that I have all her memories, to save on explanation, but even that is my business, not yours. Now, calm down, sit down, and wait for Kaligir.” Tobas looked down, remembered that she was not who she appeared to be, and snatched his hand away. Then, reluctantly, he settled onto the other velvet chair.

Gresh hesitated; he wanted to give Twilfa some help in the kitchen and start getting caught up on business matters, but he had promised Tobas he would never leave him alone with Esmera.

“Will you two be all right here if I go give Twilfa a hand?” he asked.

Tobas threw Esmera a quick glance, then said, “I would really prefer....”

“Could I come with you?” Esmera interrupted. “I’d like to meet all your sisters and get to know them, if I’m going to be staying around here.”

Tobas looked relieved. “I’ll stay here, to let Kaligir in,” he said.

That was not exactly what Gresh had wanted, but it was close enough—and it really would be a good idea for Esmera to get to know Twilfa. “As you please,” he said.

Together, Gresh and Esmera made their way down the passage to the kitchen, where Twilfa was filling beer mugs from the keg in the pantry. A tray of black bread and hard cheese stood ready on the table.

“I thought you’d want something simple and filling,” Twilfa explained, with an uncertain glance at Esmera.

“Excellent,” Gresh said, not mentioning how similar it was to the breakfast they had eaten in Ethshar of the Sands. “Esmé, could you fetch that big jar of apricots?” He pointed, and then picked up the prepared tray.

As Esmera lifted the heavy jar down from the shelf, Twilfa leaned over and whispered, “Are you sure she isn’t Karanissa?”

“Quite sure.”

“But she isn’t really a sister, is she? Isn’t Karanissa four hundred years old?”

“Yes.”

“So she’s, what, a homunculus of some sort? A shapeshifter?”

“More of a magical accident—and a witch, just like the original, so she can hear everything we’re saying.”

Twilfa threw her a quick, guilty look. “Oh.”

“That’s all right,” Esmera said, as she turned, holding the jar. “Of course you’re curious; anyone would be. As Gresh says, I’m an accident—remember, he went to find a magical mirror? Well, he found it, and it is a mirror, as well as the source of the spriggans. I’m a reflection turned human.”

“Oh.” Twilfa’s voice was noncommittal, but her expression was frankly baffled.

“But I really am human now and would prefer to be treated as such.” There was a faint tone of warning in Esmera’s voice.

Twilfa did not miss it. “Oh, of course,” she said. “I’m sorry; I didn’t mean to be rude.”

“You weren’t,” Esmera assured her, relaxing again. “And as a guest here, I’m sorry if I’ve made you uncomfortable.”

“It’s nothing....”

Just then the doorbell jingled.

“That will be Kaligir,” Esmera said. “Shall we go?” She hoisted the jar of pickled apricots and led the way back to the front room.

The Spriggan Mirror

A Legend of Ethshar

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Kaligir stood in the doorway, looking around distastefully. He wore the same red-and-black formal robes and black cap he had worn for his first visit, a couple of sixnights earlier.

Tobas was already on his feet, saying, “Welcome, Guildmaster,” when Esmera, Gresh, and Twilfa emerged into the room bearing food and beer. Gresh set the tray of bread and cheese on a table, while Esmera opened the jar of fruit, and Twilfa distributed beer.

“A pleasure to see you, Guildmaster,” Gresh said, wiping his hands on his breeches.

“I’ll go get more beer,” Twilfa said. She had brought only three mugs.

“Don’t hurry,” Kaligir said.

Twilfa glanced at Gresh, who nodded; they both understood that Kaligir did not want a mere supplier’s assistant listening to Wizards’ Guild business.

“Shall I give her a hand?” Esmera asked.

“I think we want you here,” Gresh said, before either of the other men could respond. “Here, take my beer; I’ll wait for another.” He took a mug from Twilfa and handed it to Esmera.

Twilfa had already provided Kaligir and Tobas with their drinks; thus unencumbered, she hurried away.

The others watched her go; then Gresh, Tobas, and Esmera turned expectantly to Kaligir and waited for him to speak.

The Guildmaster did not waste time on pleasantries. “I understand from my communications with Tobas that you have found and obtained the magic mirror, but have not destroyed it,” Kaligir said, looking directly at Gresh.

“I was not engaged to destroy it,” Gresh replied mildly. “I delivered it to Tobas, as our agreement specified.”

“Don’t play the fool with me, Gresh. You know what the Guild wanted.”

“You said that you wanted to ensure the mirror would stop producing spriggans. It has stopped producing spriggans, and it’s safely in Tobas’s possession. That was the full extent of my agreement; I never promised to do anything more than deliver it, and I’ve done that. If you aren’t happy that he isn’t delivering it to you immediately, well, yes, in order to obtain it without undue difficulty I placed Javan’s Geas on Tobas, ensuring that he will never give the mirror to anyone else. But the Guild can take it from him, should you choose. There’s nothing to prevent it, whatever the spriggans may think.”

“Nothing to prevent it? So anyone can take it? And what if the spriggans take it from him?”

“I don’t mean it’s unguarded; I mean that Tobas can make it possible for the Guild to take it, should you want to. As for the spriggans, they have agreed not to retrieve it—and even if they do, it’s no longer generating spriggans. It’s harmless, regardless of who has it.” Kaligir glanced at Tobas, who gulped beer; then he turned his attention back to Gresh. “The spriggans have agreed to this? And you believe them?”

“I do,” Gresh said quietly. “Seriously, have you ever known a spriggan to break a promise?”

“I have never been in a position to hear one of the little pests make a promise!” Gresh turned up a palm. “Well, there you are, then,” he said. “That’s why you couldn’t find the mirror, and I could. Because I thought to ask the spriggans where it was. Because I took the time to talk to them and made an effort to understand them, instead of simply chasing them away. I negotiated terms with them, as one speaking creature to another. I treated them, annoying as they are, with a trace of respect.”

Kaligir blinked at him. “Is that how you found it? You asked them?”

“Well, that, and some careful questioning, and a little sorcery.”

“So you talked to spriggans who led you to the mirror and who promised not to take it back—but what makes you think they spoke for all the half-million of the creatures who are roaming the World? Why shouldn’t some other bunch of spriggans snatch the mirror away?”

“I have reason to believe the ones I spoke to represent the majority and that many of the others don’t concern themselves with the mirror at all.”

Kaligir frowned. Gresh met his gaze calmly.

“I promised only to deliver the mirror,” Gresh said. “Holding on to it is not my problem. I would have thought that the Wizards’ Guild could manage that without my assistance.” Kaligir said nothing more for a long moment, but finally demanded, “And once you had the mirror, why did you and Tobas not see to its destruction? You say that it’s no longer producing spriggans, but destroying it would seem a far more certain way to ensure that no more spriggans would be produced than whatever you did do.”

“Well, Tobas cannot destroy it—I placed a geas on him to that effect.”

“Why did you do that? Having done it, why did you not destroy it yourself? Tobas could not destroy it or give it back to you, but surely you, more than anyone else, could just take it. Why didn’t you?”

“There are three reasons, each of them sufficient,” Gresh said. He raised a finger. “First: We conducted a test where we broke the mirror into four pieces and discovered that this resulted in multiplying that half-million spriggans to two million. Using Javan’s Restorative to repair the mirror reduced that number back to the original. This leads me to suspect that destroying the mirror may have unanticipated and unfortunate results, and until we know much more about it, it would be unwise to risk doing anything that might multiply the number of spriggans, rather than reducing it.”

“Ah,” Kaligir said, stroking his beard with one hand, while the other still held his untasted beer.

“Is that what that was about? We did notice a very brief increase in the number of spriggans.”

“Yes. Shattering it is a very bad idea. I doubt other obvious methods would be better.”

“I see your point. Go on.”

Gresh raised another finger. “Second: I gave my word to the spriggans who had possession of the mirror, and who allowed us to take it, that neither I nor Tobas would attempt to destroy the mirror.

We did not say anything to bind the Guild, but I did give my word about my own actions and Tobas’s.

My word is good.”

“Fair enough, if somewhat inconvenient,” Kaligir agreed. He looked down, as if just now noticing he held a mug, and took a sip.

“And finally,” Gresh said, holding up three fingers. “I refuse to participate in the murder of half a million speaking beings. Aren’t we taught that what made humans more than mere animals was that the gods taught us to speak? Well, spriggans can speak, too. They can make and keep promises. They can understand far more than you might think. They were bright enough to figure out things about the mirror that we might never have guessed. If they hadn’t told me what they knew, I might not have guessed as much of the mirror’s true nature as I have. I don’t say they’re human—they’re stupid and annoying and troublesome, and I don’t want them in my house—but they are thinking, speaking creatures, and killing them indiscriminately is wrong. I won’t be a part of it. Destroying the mirror might kill them—so I won’t do that. I know better than to think I can stop the Wizards’ Guild from doing whatever it pleases, but I will do what I can to keep you from exterminating the spriggans. I’m sure you can find ways to kill individuals who are especially troublesome or dangerous, if you must—I could even suggest a few spells that might help. I’ll do nothing to stop that, any more than I’ll stop a magistrate from hanging a murderer.

But I won’t help you to wipe them all out, guilty and innocent alike.” Kaligir took a long, thoughtful swig of beer before replying, “It seems to me that your first and third reasons contradict each other. Destroying the mirror cannot both multiply and exterminate the little pests.”

“There’s a contradiction, yes. That’s because I don’t know which is true. Destroying the mirror might kill them, or it might multiply them infinitely. I don’t know. And neither do you.”

“Not yet,” Kaligir admitted.

Gresh nodded. “Well, then—I’ve explained my position. I delivered the mirror. I ensured it would not produce more spriggans. I have fulfilled my end of our contract; I expect the Guild to honor its end. I trust my shop will be permitted to resume normal business operations immediately? And my fee will be paid promptly? And that my bill for expenses will be honored, when I have prepared it?”

“The shop can re-open, of course, and your expenses will be paid. We will expect the return of all remaining powders and potions. When we have verified that the mirror is truly in Tobas’s possession, and that it really is the correct mirror, Enral’s Eternal Youth will be cast on you.” Gresh smiled. Returning the powders and potions was not ideal, but otherwise he appeared to have won on all points. “Excellent!” he said. “Thank you!” He lifted a hand in salute, regretting that he had given Esmera his mug.

Tobas, Esmera, and Kaligir all drank in response. Kaligir wiped foam from his beard and said, “I do have a few questions, though. You said you have ensured the mirror would not produce any more spriggans. How did you do that?”

“That’s a long story.”

“And Tobas, you said in your message that you were not bringing your wives—it’s of no consequence, but in that case, why is Karanissa here?”

Tobas had been caught with his mug to his lips; he spluttered. “That’s not Karanissa,” he said.

“It’s not?” He turned to Esmera.

“My name is Esmera,” she said, and curtsied.

Kaligir stared at her for a moment. Then he looked at Gresh. “Is she part of your long story?”

“Yes, she is,” Gresh said.

“Then I think I would like to hear the tale now.”

“Of course; if you would join me?” He gestured at the velvet chairs.

There were not enough seats for all four of them. Esmera said, “Shall I go help Twilfa?”

“If you would,” Gresh agreed.

Then he sat down with the two wizards and began explaining everything that had happened over the past several days.

By the time he finished, all three of them had consumed a mug or two of beer, as well as a modest amount of the bread, cheese, and fruit the two women had delivered. From what Gresh saw of them, Twilfa and Esmera appeared to be becoming fast friends—they were laughing happily at each other’s jokes as they brought out the food and drink.

He also noticed that a spriggan had slipped into the shop and was listening from a nearby shelf.

“So you believe that there is a corresponding mirror in another reality,” Kaligir said thoughtfully.

“And you’ve convinced the inhabitants to seal it away in a box.”

“Yes.”

“And what happens if it is taken out of that box?”

“Then we would once again have reflected spriggans emerging into the World,” Gresh said.

“Which is why I did not leave the mirror in the spriggans’ possession—I wanted it somewhere we could keep a watch on it.”

Kaligir nodded. “You would send messages by writing them on spriggans, and using the Spell of Reversal, reflect those into the spriggans’ realm.”

“That’s one approach,” Gresh said. “After seeing what happened to Esmera, though, I can suggest another—cast Lirrim’s Rectification on a spriggan, and it should become a part of its original in that other realm, providing a direct and more efficient means of communication. This would also, incidentally, render the spriggan vulnerable to ordinary weapons and magic; it might be a suitable punishment for troublemakers.” He looked up at the spriggan on the shelf. “You might want to spread the word about that.”

The spriggan squealed and ducked out of sight behind a stuffed owl.

“That’s a very interesting possibility,” Kaligir remarked, as he glanced at the now-empty bit of shelf.

“There are a good many other possibilities here, as well,” Gresh said. “It seems to me that it should be possible to put the spriggans to use—yes, they’re stupid and clumsy and absent-minded, but they can be made to cooperate. I think they might be very handy as messengers, for example.”

“Or spies,” Kaligir murmured thoughtfully.

Gresh did not comment on that; he had thought of it himself, but had doubts about how well it would work.

“Then the outcome is satisfactory?” Tobas asked. “Even though there are still half a million spriggans in the World?”

“We’ve survived them this long,” Kaligir said. “Now that we know more of their true nature—assuming that Gresh is correct—I think we ought to be able to manage them.”

“Then might I ask about my fee, for services rendered? The tapestry?” Kaligir blinked. “Oh, that’s between you and Telurinon. I don’t see any reason that it shouldn’t be started, though.”

“Oh.” Tobas looked annoyed, but said nothing more.

“And Esmera?” Gresh asked. “Does the Guild have any interest in her?”

“The reflection of Tobas’s wife? No—as far as I can see, she’s just another animation, like Lady Nuvielle’s miniature dragon, or those teapots so many people like. She’s none of the Guild’s concern unless she starts casting spells herself.”

“She’s a witch,” Gresh pointed out. “She does cast spells.”

“But not wizardry. Witchcraft is the Sisterhood’s problem, not the Guild’s.” He stood and held out a hand. “I believe we’re done here, then.”

Gresh rose, as well, and took the wizard’s hand.

“Thank you for your services,” Kaligir said. “Send me the bill for expenses at your earliest convenience, and I’ll see that it’s paid. Give me the unused powders and potions; I’ll take those with me.

Then I’ll see about having Enral’s Eternal Youth cast.”

Gresh nodded. He crossed to the bottomless bag to retrieve the rather battered box that held the remaining jars.

Five minutes later the doorbell jingled as Kaligir departed, box in hand.

“That went more smoothly than I feared it might,” Gresh remarked.

“Yes, it did,” Tobas agreed, picking up the flying carpet. “I suspect that there’s been discussion within the Guild we weren’t privy to, and that worked out in our favor. If you don’t mind, though, I’d like to go now and see if I can get back to Ethshar of the Sands before dark. I want to get that tapestry started!”

“Of course,” Gresh said. “Shall I call Esmera, so you can say goodbye?” Tobas glanced uneasily at the passage to the kitchen; soft feminine laughter could be heard from it.

“No,” he said, grabbing the handle of his case. “She’s not my wife, after all—just someone I met a few days ago.”

“As you please,” Gresh said. He did not offer to shake hands; Tobas’s hands were full. He did hold the door for the wizard, though, and watch as he unrolled the carpet and set his chest and himself securely aboard it.

Gresh waved a farewell as the carpet rose. Tobas waved back as it glided away with a faint whoosh, rising as it went.

Gresh stood in the familiar street for a moment, watching as the people of Ethshar went about their everyday business. Then he turned and walked back into his shop. He paused there, as well, taking in the tidy but heavily laden shelves, the locked cabinets, the vault door, the velvet chairs, and all the rest of it.

This comfortable and familiar shop was his and would be his as long as it lasted. He had just earned himself a way out of aging and eventual inevitable death. Oh, he could still die, certainly, but it was no longer guaranteed.

That was a very pleasant thought.

And all in all, the errand had not been so very difficult or time-consuming.

And there might be other benefits, besides his official pay. He ambled down the passage to the kitchen.

“Oh, there you are!” Twilfa said, looking up at his entrance. “We were just discussing where Esmera would sleep.”

“Anywhere she likes, I suppose,” Gresh said. He smiled. “She’s certainly welcome in my bed!” Twilfa made a disgusted noise, but before she could say anything more, Esmera said, “Then I won’t be needing that cot made up after all.”

Twilfa stopped and stared at her, then turned her astonished gaze on Gresh.

He was struggling to hide his own pleased surprise. He hadn’t expected it to be quite that easy.

He turned up an empty palm.

Twilfa’s astonishment turned to disgust. “Oh, you two are just hopeless,” she said, as she stamped away.

Esmera and Gresh looked at one another, smiling.

Then they were in each other’s arms and using their mouths for something a little more intimate than smiling.

The Spriggan Mirror

A Legend of Ethshar

Chapter Twenty-Eight

“I had thought better of Tobas,” Esmera said, as she stretched in the morning sun. “Abandoning me here without even a farewell.” She was standing naked by the window of Gresh’s bedroom.

“He already has his Karanissa,” Gresh said, as he watched her admiringly from his bed. “I think he was afraid that if he allowed himself to have anything to do with you, he’d wind up with three wives, and Alorria would never forgive him.”

“I suppose — but it still isn’t very considerate of my feelings! I was married to him for six years, after all — or at least, that’s how I remember it.”

“But it’s not what he remembers.”

“Hmph.” She stepped away from the window and returned to the bedside.

“Is your very enjoyable presence here a sort of retaliation for how he mistreated you, then?” Gresh asked.

“Not exactly — but being cast aside so very definitely certainly made it easier to be here.

There’s no lingering regret.” She turned and looked at him intently. “If Tobas has managed to avoid making any comparison between Alorria and myself for six years, I would hope I can do the same after a single night.”

“I didn’t say a word!” He grimaced. “I can see that being married to a witch could have its drawbacks.”

She stared at him silently for a moment, then said, “I won’t hold you to whatever might be implied by that mention of marriage.”

“And I won’t rush you,” Gresh said. “I haven’t offered; you haven’t accepted. Marrying a witch might not be the best idea for keeping peace in my family and business, in any case. All of my sisters except Tira might consider it inappropriate favoritism, and my customers, almost all wizards, might think it odd. I’ve been happily unmarried all my life, though a few women have clearly been willing, so why should I change? All that said, though, right now, looking at you and listening to your voice, I think it might be worth it.”

“That’s very sweet — and I have no intention of rushing into anything.” She turned to the window. “For one thing, I think I might like to travel before settling down. I’ve seen so little of the modern World! When I did travel, it was always with Tobas and Alorria — Alorria would not allow me to go much of anywhere without her.”

“You aren’t Karanissa anymore,” Gresh reminded her. “She was the one Alorria insisted on accompanying.”

“But it’s hard to stop talking of myself as if I were. I am her, in so many ways!”

“Of course. I expect you’ll grow apart in time, though, as you each have your own experiences.”

“I suppose we will.” She sighed. “I might want to go back to Dwomor briefly, to visit her.”

“Really? Alorria wouldn’t like that.”

“Really. Who cares what Alorria wants? She isn’t family anymore.”

“But her father is still king of Dwomor. Was living with her so very difficult?”

“Sometimes. Not always. Not even usually. She was generally pleasant when she wasn’t being jealous.” She sighed. “She was much better before the baby came.”

“Then perhaps you’re the lucky one, abandoned outcast that you are, being free of her. It almost makes me feel sorry for Karanissa.”

Esmera did not answer; she stood, still looking out the window.

“But you miss Tobas,” Gresh said.

“I’m sure I’ll get over it in time,” Esmera said. “But yes, these last few days have not been pleasant, having him shun me.”

“If you go back to visit Karanissa and see him again?”

She turned up an empty palm.

Gresh was no witch nor seer, but he was fairly sure he could guess what Esmera was planning.

“You’re thinking of trading places with her for a while, aren’t you?”

“Possibly. No one would ever know, not even Tobas.” She turned. “Not even you.”

“You may be underestimating us.”

“I suppose I might be.” She did not say aloud that she doubted it, but Gresh could almost hear the words, all the same.

“And which of you would come back to me, here in Ethshar?”

“What makes you think either of us would?” She turned to glare at him.

“My high opinion of myself.”

She smiled. “Well, you might be right. One of us might come back. Karanissa would probably be curious about you, if nothing else.”

“Karanissa is married to someone else. That doesn’t bother you?”

“Tobas has two wives. Would it really be so terrible for Karanissa and I to share two husbands?”

“I thought you weren’t ready to marry me.”

“I’m not. I’m just considering possibilities.”

“Ah, I see. Would it bother you if Karanissa shared my bed for a time?”

“I’ve never been the jealous type — not with Derry, not with Tobas, not with you. Would it matter to you if it were Karanissa here, instead of me?” Gresh hesitated.

“I hope so,” he said. “You aren’t the same person anymore. You’re the one I want here.” She laughed. “You couldn’t tell the difference!”

“I don’t know. I think I might.”

She laughed again — and then her laughter changed, and she was crying. He leapt from the bed and took her in his arms.

As he stood there, holding her and trying to comfort her for the loss of her husband and her past life, he kissed the top of her head and wondered whether he would know if she traded places.

He hoped he would never have occasion to find out. He wanted this one to stay. He wanted her to stay for a long, long time.

Thanks to Enral’s Eternal Youth, it might prove to be a very long time.

The Spriggan Mirror

A Legend of Ethshar

Epilogue

Piffle slipped into the room as silently as it could — and as it was a wiry young spriggan, that was very silently indeed. It looked around.

There was the black box, just as the stories said, atop the giants’ table. Piffle looked up at the looming structure, then grabbed one of the table legs at head height and began pulling itself up.

It was perhaps halfway up the table-leg when a gigantic hand closed around it, pulling Piffle off its perch. It found itself swept up in the air and turned to face the immense hairy face of a He-Giant.

“Now, what do you think you’re doing?” the giant demanded, in its impossibly deep, rumbling voice.

“Nothing!” Piffle said. “Do nothing, really!”

A She-Giant appeared beside the He-Giant, looking at Piffle. Her incredibly long, lush hair spilled down around her. Piffle had never before seen a She-Giant’s hair so close up, and he was impressed.

“It just looks like an ordinary mirror,” she said. “You don’t need to see it. There’s nothing special about it — except when giants are climbing out of it. If you look at it, that might just happen.”

“I would think you’d consider eight of us to be quite enough,” the He-Giant said. “Especially after we smashed up those shops when we first appeared.”

“Yes, yes!” Piffle said, nodding wildly. “Enough giants!”

“Then don’t open the box!” the He-Giant bellowed.

“Yes yes yes! Put Piffle down now? Please?”

With a snort, the He-Giant set Piffle back on the floor. Piffle turned and scampered away. The He-Giant watched it go.

“Silly spriggan,” he said.

“They’re just curious,” the She-Giant told him.

“And attracted to magic.”

“That, too.”

The He-Giant glanced at the box. “Do you think more giants would really come out of it? Or did our mysterious message-writer have some other motive?”

She spread empty hands. “Who knows?”

“If more giants appeared — well, it might be nice to have more company.”

“Female company, you mean? I’m not enough for you?”

“Of course you are! I didn’t mean that. But where we’re all so much alike, the four of you sisters and my three brothers and me — aren’t there any different people wherever it is we came from? It might be nice to talk to someone who isn’t just like us.”

“Just talk? So you aren’t hoping that someday a beautiful woman might come climbing out of the magic mirror, so you’d have a choice, and not just the four of us with the same boring face?”

“You’re more than beautiful enough! Besides, now that I think about it, it’s just as likely to be another man, and I’m not interested in sharing you. Better we keep everything balanced, four and four.”

“Or maybe we’d get worse monsters next time,” the She-Giant mused. “Remember, we got those funny false spriggans before. We could get anything — it’s not as if we have any idea how the magic works, or where we actually came from.”

“Right.” He glanced at the black box, still securely sealed.

He wondered who had sent that message, sixnights ago, not much more than an hour after their own arrival — “SHUT THE MIRROR IN A SOLID BOX, AND NOTHING ELSE WILL COME

OUT OF IT.” Why had it been written across a false spriggan’s belly? Why hadn’t the mysterious magician sent a piece of paper?

He shook his head.

They would probably never know — but they would do their best to see that the mirror stayed safely locked away. It was just too dangerous to let out.

They didn’t really need any more giants. The fact was, the He-Giant rather liked being one of only four men in a world of spriggans, an object of awe to all the millions of little green creatures. It was really quite enjoyable — so long as there were four women, as well!

The Spriggan Mirror

A Legend of Ethshar

Notes Regarding Gresh’s Family

Keshan the Merchant married Piri of Ethshar before the Magistrate of Bywater in Ethshar of the Rocks on the tenth day of Newfrost in the Year of Speech 5187. Their first child, a daughter, was born on the nineteenth of Greengrowth, 5188, and named Dina, a name they mistakenly believed to mean

“fortunate.” (The actual root means “leader.”)

Dina showed a keen mind and an interest in magic from the first. As Dina the Clever she was apprenticed to a wizard, Ziridin of Farmgate, in Summersheat 5200. She completed her apprenticeship on the fourth of Summersend, 5206, and after various occupation as a journeyman, purchased a shop on Wizard Street in her native city of Ethshar of the Rocks in Icebound, 5212, and set up in business under the rather unimaginative name Dina the Wizard. She was granted master status by the Wizards’ Guild, allowing her to train apprentices, in Rains, 5213. Despite offers, she has never married.

Difa was born on the thirtieth of Greengrowth, 5190. Despite her parents’ attempts to prevent it, she spent much of her childhood as Difa the Sneaky, a name her older sister had bestowed upon her. On the fourth of Summerheat, 5202, popularly referred to as “the Night of Madness,” she had not yet been found an apprenticeship. Having been disappointed to discover that this new magic had bypassed her, she was delighted when the Council of Warlocks was established and an announcement was made that warlocks were to operate on the same basis as other magicians. She leapt at her chance, and on the twenty-ninth of Summerheat became the first girl in Ethshar of the Rocks to formally apprentice herself to a warlock, a former mason named Senden of Crafton.

She completed her apprenticeship on the thirtieth of Greengrowth, 5208, worked as a journeyman for three years, and was recognized as a master warlock by the Council in Summerheat, 5211. After sharing quarters with two other warlocks for a time, she bought her own shop in Rains, 5213. In Harvest of 5215 she married a magistrate’s aide by the name of Zarek of Hillside; they have two sons and a daughter.

Tira of Eastgate was born on the thirtieth of Snowfall, 5191, served as apprentice to Sensella the Witch from the fifth of Rains, 5204, to the sixth of Rains, 5210, and remained as Sensella’s associate until Sensella’s death in 5226, whereupon she inherited the shop. Tira married a theurgist named Dar of Norcross Street, some ten years her senior, on the sixth of Leafcolor, 5210. They have four children, two of each sex.

Chira the Clever — known as Chira the Also Clever until her oldest sister began her apprenticeship and moved out of the family home — was born on the seventeenth of Leafcolor, 5193.

She served her sorcerous apprenticeship from 18 Leafcolor 5205 through 16 Leafcolor 5214 under the famous Thellesh of Tazmor and wed Cardel the Locksmith on the eleventh of Newfrost, 5214, setting up her business in his existing storefront at the corner of Wizard Street and Tinker Street in Eastgate. They have seven children; five girls and two boys.

Pyata was born on the third of Newfrost, 5195, and apprenticed to Alladia the Priestess on the first of Newfrost, 5208. She never formally completed her apprenticeship, leaving Alladia’s home and shrine in 5213 when she felt her master was behaving unreasonably. The tantrum that prompted this turned out to be an early symptom of Alladia’s final illness; Alladia died before Pyata could be convinced to return. Under the name Pyata the Divine she has done well for herself despite her lack of credentials, thanks to an unusually high success rate in her invocations. She has never married.

Shesta was born on the twenty-first of Thaw, 5196, and apprenticed to Garven the Demonologist at an undetermined date in Rains, 5209. She completed her apprenticeship some time late in 5214 and took the name Shesta the Black, but for health reasons did not actively go into business until 5220 — demonology is not a healthy business. She was able to make ends meet by hiring herself out as an intimidating presence, more or less.

In 5220 Garven made a fatal error of some sort, though the resulting fire was put out by neighbors before his home and shop were destroyed. His last apprentice, Neran of Pawnbroker Street, sold the ruins and remaining supplies to Shesta at a bargain price and gave up demonology.

Shesta married Ferral the Black, a warlock, in 5224. None of their three children survived infancy; demonic influence is suspected.

Gresh was born on the twenty-second of Greengrowth, 5198, and served an apprenticeship with his father from 5210 to 5216 before setting himself up as Gresh the Supplier. He has not yet married and is unaware of having sired any children.

Setta was born on the nineteenth of Icebound, 5199, and studied herbalism under multiple masters from 5211 through 5220 before using her family’s money and contacts to go into business as Setta the Green. She married Abran the Chandler, son and heir of one of her father’s oldest friends, on the fifth day of Festival, 5224. They have one daughter, Tarissa the Fair, born on the thirteenth of Midwinter, 5226.

Akka the Graceful was born on the second of Midwinter, 5201, and admitted into the Eastgate Circle as a trainee in Summersheat, 5214. She married Tresen the Handsome, of no fixed address or recognized occupation, on the twenty-fifth of Thaw, 5218. She was elevated to full participation as a ritual dancer in the Circle on the third day of Festival, 5220. She and Tresen have no children.

Neva the Strong was born on the seventh of Greengrowth, 5204, and went to sea as a deckhand aboard the freighter Swift Profits in the summer of 5217. She married Derath the Pilot on the fourteenth of Longdays, 5221. They have one son and two daughters.

Deka the Strong — known in childhood as Deka the Also Strong — was born on the twenty-sixth of Longdays, 5206, and enlisted in the city guard of Ethshar of the Rocks on the fourth of Newfrost, 5222. She married Kelder the Armorer on the fourth of Newfrost, 5224. They have one daughter, Piri the Younger, born in 5226.

Ekava the Nimble was born on the thirtieth of Icebound, 5207, and apprenticed to Inririan the Dressmaker from the sixteenth of Thaw, 5219, to the seventeenth of Rains, 5226. She married Agaram of the Golden Dagger, a journeyman wizard, on the thirtieth of Longdays, 5227; they have no children as yet.

And Keshan and Piri’s thirteenth and last child, Twilfa the Helpful, was born on the twenty-ninth of Snowfall, 5210, and hired on as her brother’s assistant in Greengrowth of 5226.

The Spriggan Mirror

A Legend of Ethshar

“Sirinita’s Dragon”

(a companion piece)

“You’re going to kill him?” Sirinita said, staring at her mother in disbelief.

Sensella of Seagate looked at her daughter with surprised annoyance.

“Well, of course we’re going to kill it,” she said. “What else could we do? In a few weeks it’ll be eating us out of house and home — and in a year or two it might very well eat us. Just look how big it’s getting!”

Sirinita looked.

She had to admit, Tharn was getting large. When he had first hatched she could sit him on her shoulder, with his tail around her neck, and almost forget he was there; now she could barely pick him up with both hands, and he certainly didn’t fit on her shoulders.

And he did eat a lot.

“Really, Sirinita,” her mother said, “you didn’t think we could keep a full-grown dragon around the house, did you?”

“No,” Sirinita admitted, “but I thought you could just let him go, somewhere outside the walls —

I didn’t know you were going to kill him!”

“Now, you ought to know better than that,” Sensella said. “If we turned it loose it would eat people’s livestock — and that’s assuming it didn’t eat people. Dragons are dangerous, honey.”

“Tharn isn’t!”

“But it will be.” Sensella hesitated, then added, “Besides, we can sell the blood and hide to wizards. I understand it’s quite valuable.”

“Sell pieces of him?” This was too much; Sirinita was utterly horrified.

Sensella sighed. “I should have known this would happen. I should never have let you hatch that egg in the first place. What was your father thinking of, bringing you a dragon’s egg?”

“I don’t know,” Sirinita said. “Maybe he wasn’t thinking anything.” Sensella chuckled sourly. “You’re probably right, Siri. You’re probably just exactly right.” She glanced over at the dragon.

Tharn was trying to eat the curtains again.

Sirinita followed her mother’s gaze. “Tharn!” she shouted. “Stop that this instant!” The dragon stopped, startled, and turned to look at his mistress with his golden slit-pupilled eyes.

The curtain, caught on one of his fangs, turned with him, and tore slightly. The dragon looked up at the curtain with an offended expression, and used a foreclaw to pry the fabric off his teeth.

Sensella sighed. Sirinita almost giggled, Tharn’s expression was so funny, but then she remembered what was going to happen to her beloved dragon in a few days’ time, and the urge to giggle vanished completely.

“Come on, Tharn,” she said. “Let’s go outside.”

Sensella watched as her daughter and her pet ran out of the house onto the streets of Ethshar.

She hoped they wouldn’t get into any trouble. Both of them meant well enough, but the dragon did have all those claws and teeth, and while it couldn’t yet spit fire it was beginning to breathe hot vapor.

And sometimes Sirinita just didn’t think about the consequences of her actions.

But then, that was hardly a unique fault, or even one limited to children. Sensella wondered again just what Gar had thought he was doing when he brought back a dragon’s egg from one of his trading expeditions.

One of the farmers had found it in the woods while berry-picking, Gar had said — had found a whole nest, in fact, though he wouldn’t say what had happened to the other eggs. Probably sold them to wizards.

And why in the World had she and Gar let Sirinita hatch the egg, and keep the baby dragon long enough to become so attached? That had been very foolish indeed. Baby dragons were very fashionable, of course — parading through the streets with a dragon on a leash was the height of social display, and a sure way to garner invitations to all the right parties.

But the dowagers and matrons who did that didn’t let their children make playmates of the little monsters! The sensible ones didn’t use real dragons at all, they bought magical imitations, like that beautiful wood-and-lacquer thing Lady Nuvielle carried about, with its red glass eyes and splendid black wings. It moved and hissed and flew with a perfect semblance of life, thanks to a wizard’s skill, and it didn’t eat a thing, and would never grow an inch.

Tharn ate everything, grew constantly, and couldn’t yet fly more than a few feet without tangling itself up in its own wings and falling out of the sky.

Sirinita adored it.

Sensella sighed again.

Outside, Sirinita and Tharn were racing side-by-side down Wargate High Street, toward the Arena — and Tharn was almost winning, to Sirinita’s surprise. He was getting bigger. He was at least as big as any dog Sirinita had ever seen — but then, she hadn’t seen very many, and she had heard that out in the country dogs sometimes grew much larger than the ones inside the city walls.

Much as Sirinita hated to admit it, her mother was right. Tharn was getting too big to keep at home. He had knocked over the washbasin in her bedroom that morning, and Sirinita suspected that he’d eaten the neighbors’ cat yesterday, though maybe the stuck-up thing was just hiding somewhere.

But did Tharn have to die, just because he was a dragon?

There had to be someplace a dragon could live.

She stopped, out of breath, at the corner of Center Street. Tharn tried to stop beside her, but tripped over his own foreclaws and fell in a tangle of wings and tail. Sirinita laughed, but a moment later Tharn was upright again, his head bumping scratchily against her hip. If she’d been wearing a lighter tunic, Sirinita thought, those sharp little scales would leave welts.

He really did have to go.

But where?

She peered down Center Street to the west; that led to the shipyards. Tharn would hardly be welcome there, especially if he started breathing fire around all that wood and pitch, but maybe somewhere out at sea? Was there some island where a dragon could live in safety, some other land where dragons were welcome?

Probably not.

There were stories about dragons that lived in the sea itself, but somehow she couldn’t imagine Tharn being that sort. His egg had been found in a forest, after all, up near the Tintallionese border, and he’d never shown any interest in learning to swim.

The shipyards weren’t any help.

In the other direction both Center Street and Wargate High Street led to the Arena — Wargate High Street led straight to the south side, four blocks away, while Center looped around and wound up on the north side after six blocks.

Could the Arena use a dragon?

That seemed promising. Dragons were impressive, and people liked to look at them.

At least, in pictures; in real life people tended to be too frightened of adult dragons to want to look at them.

But Tharn was a tame dragon, or at least Sirinita hoped he was tame. He wasn’t dangerous, not really. Wouldn’t he be a fine attraction in the Arena?

And she could come to visit him there, too!

That would be perfect.

“Come on, Tharn,” she said, and together the girl and her dragon trotted on down Wargate High Street.

There wasn’t a show today; the arena gates were closed, the tunnels and galleries deserted.

Sirinita hadn’t thought about that; she pressed up against a gate and stared through the iron grillwork at the shadowy passages beyond.

No one was in there.

She sat down on the hard-packed dirt of the street to think. Tharn curled up beside her, his head in her lap, the scales of his chin once again scratching her legs right through her tunic.

People turned to stare as they passed, then quickly looked away so as not to be rude. Sirinita was accustomed to this; after all, one didn’t see a dragon on the streets of Ethshar every day, and certainly not one as big as Tharn was getting to be. She ignored them and sat thinking, trying to figure out who she should talk to about finding a place for Tharn at the Arena.

There was one fellow, however, who stopped a few feet away and asked, “Are you all right?” Sirinita looked up, startled out of her reverie. “I’m fine, thank you,” she said automatically.

The man who had addressed her was young, thin, almost handsome, and dressed in soft leather breeches and a tunic of brown velvet — a clean one, in good repair, so Sirinita could be reasonably certain that he wasn’t poor, wasn’t a beggar or any of the more dangerous inhabitants of the fields out beyond Wall Street.

Of course, people who lived in the fields rarely got this far in toward the center of the city. And there were plenty of dangerous people who didn’t live in the fields.

She had Tharn to protect her, though, and she was only a few blocks from home.

“Is there anything I can help you with? You look worried,” the man said.

“I’m fine,” Sirinita repeated.

“Is it your dragon? Are you doing something magical?”

“He’s my dragon, yes, but I was just thinking, not doing magic. I’m not even an apprentice yet, see?” She pointed to her bare legs — if she was too young for a woman’s skirt, she was too young for an apprenticeship.

In fact, she was still a month short of her twelfth birthday and formal skirting, which was the very earliest she could possibly start an apprenticeship, and she hadn’t yet decided if she wanted to learn any trade. She didn’t think she wanted to learn magic, though; magic was dangerous.

“Oh,” the man said, a bit sheepishly. “I thought... well, one doesn’t see a lot of dragons, especially not that size. I thought maybe it was part of some spell.” Sirinita shook her head. “No. We were just thinking.”

“About the Arena? There’s to be a performance the day after tomorrow, I believe, in honor of Lord Wulran’s birthday, but there’s nothing today.”

“I know,” Sirinita said. “I mean, I’d forgotten, but I know now.”

“Oh.” The man looked at them uncertainly.

“Do you work in the Arena?” Sirinita asked, suddenly realizing this might be the opportunity she had been looking for.

“No, I’m afraid not. Did you want....” He didn’t finish the sentence.

“We were wondering if Tharn could be in a show,” Sirinita explained.

“Tharn?”

“My dragon.”

“Ah.” The man scratched thoughtfully at his beard. “Perhaps if you spoke to the Lord of the Games....”

“Who’s he?”

“Oh, he’s the man in charge of the Arena,” the man explained. “Among other things. His name is Lord Varrin.”

“Do you know him?” Sirinita looked up hopefully.

“Well, yes,” the young man admitted.

“Could you introduce me?”

The young man hesitated, sighed, then said, “Oh, all right. Come on, then.” Sirinita pushed Tharn’s head off her lap and jumped up eagerly.

Lord Varrin, it developed, lived just three blocks away, in a mansion at the corner of Wargate High Street and, of course, Games Street. A servant answered the door and bowed at the sight of the young man in velvet, then ushered man, girl, and dragon into the parlor.

A moment later Lord Varrin, a large, handsome man of middle years wearing black silk and leather, emerged and bowed.

“Lord Doran,” he said. “What brings you here?”

Sirinita’s head whirled about to look at the man in velvet. “Lord Doran?” she asked.

He nodded.

“The overlord’s brother?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“But I... um....”

“Never mind that,” Doran said gently. “Tell Lord Varrin why we’re here.”

“Oh.” Sirinita turned back to the Lord of the Games, grabbed Tharn by his head-crest to keep him from eating anything he shouldn’t, and explained.

When she had finished, Lords Varrin and Doran looked at one another.

“I’m afraid,” Lord Varrin said gently, “that your father is right; we don’t ever keep dragons inside the city walls. It simply isn’t safe. Even the most well-intentioned dragon can’t be trusted not to do some serious damage — quite by accident, usually. A full-grown dragon is big, young lady; just walking down a street its wings and tail could break windows and knock down signboards. And if it loses its temper

— anyone can lose his temper sometimes.”

Sirinita looked at Lord Doran for confirmation.

“There’s nothing I can do,” that worthy said. “I’m not even sure my brother could manage it, and I certainly can’t. Our duty is to protect the city, and Lord Varrin is right — that means no large dragons.

I’m very sorry.”

“Not even for the Arena?” Sirinita asked.

Lord Varrin shook his head. “If we ever really needed a dragon,” he said, “we could have one sent in from somewhere, just for the show. We wouldn’t keep one here. And we’d have a dozen magicians standing guard every second, just in case.”

“So Tharn has to die?”

Varrin and Doran looked at one another.

“Well,” Doran said, “that’s up to you and your father. We just know he can’t stay inside the city walls once he’s bigger than a grown man. That’s the law.”

“It’s a law?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Oh.” She looked down at her feet, dejected, then remembered her manners. “Thank you anyway,” she said.

“You’re welcome. I’m sorry we can’t do more.”

The servant escorted Sirinita and Tharn back out onto Wargate High Street, where she looked down at Tharn in despair and asked, “Now what?”

He snorted playfully, and the hot, fetid fumes made Sirinita cough. She also thought she might have seen an actual spark this time.

That would be the pebble that sank the barge, Sirinita thought — if her parents found out that Tharn was spitting sparks out his nose they wouldn’t allow him in the house, and that “few days” her mother had mentioned would disappear. He’d be chopped up and sold to the wizards today, she was sure.

Ordinarily, when confronted with an insoluble problem, she might have thought about consulting a wizard herself. She couldn’t afford their fees, but sometimes, if they weren’t busy, they would talk to her anyway, and offer advice. She had never needed any actual magic, so she didn’t know if they would have worked their wizardry for her.

This time, though, wizards were out of the question. They were the ones who wanted Tharn’s blood for their spells. Lord Varrin had said that magicians could control dragons in the Arena, but if they could control them well enough to keep them in the city, wouldn’t they have already done so?

Besides, there was that law — no grown dragons inside the city walls.

Well, then, Sirinita told herself, she would just have to get Tharn outside those walls!

She looked around.

Games Street led northeastward — didn’t it go right to Eastgate? And of course, Wargate High Street went to Wargate, but Wargate was down in the guard camp with the soldiers; Sirinita didn’t like to go there. She didn’t mind the city guards most of the time, but when there were that many all in one place they made her nervous.

Eastgate should be all right, though. She had never been there, let alone out of the city, but it should be all right.

Grandgate or Newgate might be closer than Eastgate, but she didn’t know the streets to find them. Eastgate was easy.

“Come on, Tharn,” she said, and together they set out along Games Street.

It took the better part of an hour to reach Eastgate Plaza. Sirinita didn’t think the distance was even a whole mile, but there were so many distractions!

Games Street, after all, was lined with gaming houses. There were cardrooms and dice halls and archery ranges and wrestling rings and any number of other entertainments, and there were people drifting in and out of them. One man who smelled of oushka offered to gamble with Sirinita, his gold against her dragon; she politely declined. And dragons weren’t often seen in Eastside, so several people stopped to stare and ask her questions.

At last, however, she reached Eastgate Plaza, where a few farmers and tradesmen were peddling their wares in a dusty square beside the twin towers of Eastgate. It wasn’t terribly busy; Sirinita supposed most of the business went on at the other squares and markets, such as Eastgate Circle, four blocks to the west, or Farmgate, or Market.

The gate towers were big forbidding structures of dark gray stone, either one of them several times the size of Sirinita’s house, which wasn’t small. The gates between them were bigger than any doors Sirinita had ever seen — and they were all standing open.

All she had to do was take Tharn out there, outside the walls, and he wouldn’t have to be killed.

She marched forward resolutely, Tharn trotting at her heel.

Of course, it meant she would have to turn Tharn loose, and never see him again — she couldn’t live outside the walls. Her mother would never allow it. And besides, there were pirates and monsters and stuff out there.

But at least he’d still be alive.

That was what she was thinking when she walked into the spear-shaft.

She blinked, startled, then started to duck under it, assuming that it was in her way by accident.

“Ho, there!” the guard who held the spear called, and he bent down and grabbed her arm with his other hand. “What’s your hurry?”

“I need to get my dragon out of the city,” Sirinita explained.

The guard looked at Tharn, then back at Sirinita. “Your dragon?”

“Yes. His name’s Tharn. Let go of my arm.” She tugged, but the guard’s fingers didn’t budge.

“Can’t do that,” he said. “Not yet, anyway. Part of my job is to keep track of any kids who enter or leave the city without their parents along. If, for example, you were to be running away from home, and your folks wanted to find you but couldn’t afford to hire a magician to do it, it’d make things much easier on them if they could ask the guards at the gate, ‘Did my girl come through here? A pretty thing in a blue tunic, about so tall?’ And I’d be able to tell them, so they’d know whether you’re inside or outside the city walls.”

Sirinita blinked up at the man. He was a big, heavy fellow, with deep brown eyes and a somewhat ragged beard.

“What if I went out a different gate?” she asked.

“Oh, we report everything to the captain, and he tallies up the reports every day, so your folks could check the captain’s list. Then they’d even know which gate you went out, which might give them an idea where you’re going.”

Sirinita said, “My name’s Sirinita, and I’m just going out to find a place for my dragon. I’ll be back by nightfall.”

“Just Sirinita?”

“Sirinita of Ethshar. Except the neighbors call me Sirinita of the Dragon.”

“I can understand that.” The guard released her arm. “Go on, then.” Sirinita had gone no more than three steps when the man called after her, “Wait a minute.”

“Now what is it?” she asked impatiently, turning back.

“What do you mean, ‘find a place for your dragon’?”

“I mean find somewhere he can live. He can’t stay in the city any more.”

“You don’t have any supplies.”

Sirinita blinked up at him in surprise. “Supplies?”

“Right, supplies. It’s a long way to anywhere it would be safe to turn a dragon loose.”

“It is?” Sirinita was puzzled. “I was just going to take him outside the walls.”

“What, on someone’s farm, or in the middle of a village?”

“No, of course not,” Sirinita said, but the guard’s words were making her rethink the situation.

She probably would have just turned Tharn loose on someone’s farm.

But that wouldn’t be a good idea, would it?

“Um,” she said. “I’m going to take him to my grandfather, I’m not going to turn him loose.” Her grandfathers both lived in the city — one was a Seagate merchant, the other owned a large and successful carpentry business in Crafton — but she didn’t see any reason to tell the guard that.

“Your grandfather’s got a farm near here?”

Sirinita nodded.

The guard considered her for a moment, then turned up an empty palm. “All right,” he said. “Go ahead, then.”

“Thank you.” She turned eastward once again, and marched out of the city.

She wondered what sort of supplies the guard had meant. Whatever they were, she would just have to do without them. It couldn’t be that far to somewhere she could turn Tharn loose.

She looked out across the countryside, expecting to see a few farms and villages — she had seen pictures, and had a good idea what they should look like, with their half-timbered houses and pretty green fields.

What she actually saw, however, was something else entirely.

The road out of the city was a broad expanse of bare, hard-packed dirt crossed here and there with deep, muddy ruts. A few crude houses built of scrap wood were scattered around, and people stood or crouched in doorways, hawking goods and services to passersby — goods and services that were not allowed in the city, and Ethshar was a fairly tolerant place.

A hundred yards from the city the farms began — not with quaint cottages and tidy little fields, but with endless rows of stubby green plants in black dirt, and rough wooden sheds set here and there.

The only roads were paths just wide enough for a wagon.

Sirinita was surprised, but walked on, Tharn at her heels.

She was still walking, hours later, when the sun sank below the hills she had already crossed. She was dirty and exhausted and miserable.

She had finally reached farms that more or less resembled those in the pictures, at any rate — not so clean or so charming, but at least there were thatched farmhouses and barns, and the fields no longer stretched unbroken to the horizon.

But she hadn’t reached forests or mountains or even a fair-sized grove. The only trees were windbreaks or orchards or shade trees around houses. As far as she could see, from any hilltop she checked, there were only more farms — except to the west, of course, where she could sometimes, from the higher hills, still see the city walls, and where she thought she could occasionally catch the gleam of sunlight on the sea.

And everything smelled of the cow manure the farmers used as fertilizer.

The World, she thought bitterly, was obviously bigger than she had realized. No wonder her father’s trading expeditions lasted a month at a time!

Tharn had not enjoyed taking so long a walk, either; he was a healthy and active young dragon, but he was still accustomed to taking an afternoon nap, to resting when he felt like it. He had not appreciated it when his mistress had dragged him along, and had even kicked him when he tried to sleep.

And when the sun went down, he had had enough; he flopped onto a hillock, mashing some farmer’s pumpkin vines, and curled up to sleep.

Sirinita, too exhausted for anger or protest, looked down at him and started crying.

Tharn paid no attention. He slept.

And when she was done weeping, Sirinita sat down beside her dragon and looked about in the gathering gloom.

She couldn’t see anyone, anywhere. They weren’t on a road any more, just a path through somebody’s fields, and she couldn’t see anything but half-grown crops and the shadowy shapes of distant farmhouses. Some of the windows were lighted, others dark, but nowhere did she see a torch or signboard over a door — if any of these places were inns, or even just willing to admit weary travelers, she didn’t know how to tell.

She was out here in the middle of nowhere, miles from her soft clean bed, miles from her parents, her friends, everybody, with just her stupid dragon to keep her company, and it was all because he was growing too fast.

And Tharn wouldn’t even stay awake so she could talk to him. She kicked him, purely out of spite; he puffed in annoyance, emitting a few sparks, but didn’t wake.

That was new; he hadn’t managed actual sparks before, so far as she could remember.

It didn’t matter, though. She wasn’t going any further with him. In the morning she was going to turn him loose, just leave him here and go home, maybe even slip away while he was asleep. If the farmers didn’t like having him around, maybe they’d chase him off to the wilderness, wherever it was.

And maybe they’d kill him, but at least he’d have a chance, and she just couldn’t go any farther.

Tharn breathed out another tiny shower of sparks, and a stench of something foul reached Sirinita’s nostrils; Tharn’s breath, never pleasant to begin with, was getting really disgusting — even worse than the cow manure, which she had mostly gotten used to.

Sirinita decided there wasn’t any need to sleep right next to the dragon; she wandered a few paces away, to where a field of waist-high cornstalks provided some shelter, and settled down for the night.

The next thing she knew was that an unfamiliar voice was saying, “I don’t see a lantern.” She opened a sleepy eye, and saw nothing at all.

“So maybe she just burned a cornstalk or something,” a second voice said.

“I don’t even see a tinderbox,” the first replied.

“I don’t either, but what do I know? I saw sparks here, and here she is — it must’ve been her.

Maybe she had some little magic spell or something — she looks like a city girl.”

“Maybe there was someone with her.”

“No, she wouldn’t be lying here all alone, then. No one would be stupid enough to leave a girl unprotected.”

The first voice giggled unpleasantly. “Not if they knew we were around, certainly.”

“She’s pretty young,” the second said dubiously.

Sirinita was completely awake now; she realized she was looking at the rich black earth of the farm. She turned her head, very carefully, to see who was speaking.

“She’s awake!” the first voice said. “Quick!”

Then rough hands grabbed her, and her tunic was yanked up, trapping her arms, covering her face so that she couldn’t see, and pulling her halfway to her feet. Unseen hands clamped around her wrists, holding the tunic up.

“Not all that young,” someone said, but Sirinita couldn’t hear well enough through the tunic to be sure which voice it was. Another hand touched her now-bare hip.

Sirinita screamed.

Someone hit her on the back of the head hard enough to daze her.

And then she heard Tharn growl.

It wasn’t a sound she had heard often; it took a lot to provoke the dragon, as a rule.

“What was that?” one of her attackers asked.

“It’s a baby dragon,” the other replied. The grip on her left wrist fell away, and she was able to pull her tunic partway down, below her eyes.

She was in the cornfield, and it was still full night, but the greater moon shone orange overhead, giving enough light to make out shapes, but not colors.

There were two men, big men, and they both had swords, and Tharn was facing them, growling, his tail lashing snakelike behind him. One of the men was holding her right wrist with his left hand, drawing his sword with his right.

The other man, sword already drawn, was approaching Tharn cautiously.

“Dragon’s blood,” he said. “The wizards pay good money for dragon’s blood.” He stepped closer, closer — and Tharn’s curved neck suddenly straightened, thrusting his scaly snout to a foot or so from the man’s face, and Tharn spat flame, lighting up the night, momentarily blinding the three humans, whose eyes had all been adjusted to the darkness.

The man who had approached the dragon screamed horribly, and the other dropped Sirinita’s wrist; thus abruptly released, she stumbled and almost fell.

When she was upright and able to see again, she saw one man kneeling, both hands covering his face as he continued to scream; his sword was nowhere in sight. The other man was circling, trying to get behind Tharn, or at least out of the line of fire.

And Tharn was growling differently now, a sound like nothing Sirinita had ever heard before. His jaws and nostrils were glowing dull red, black smoke curled up from them, and his eyes caught the moonlight and gleamed golden. He didn’t look like her familiar, bumbling pet; he looked terrifying.

The uninjured man dove for Tharn’s neck, and the dragon turned with incredible speed, belching flame.

The man’s hair caught fire, but he dived under the gout of flame and stabbed at Tharn.

Tharn dodged, or tried to, but Sirinita heard the metal blade scrape sickeningly across those armored scales she had so often scratched herself on.

Then Tharn, neck fully extended and bent almost into a circle, took his attacker from behind and closed his jaws on the man’s neck.

Sirinita screamed — she didn’t know why, she just did.

The first man was still whimpering into his hands.

The second man didn’t scream, though; he just made a soft grunting noise, then sagged lifelessly across Tharn’s back. His hair was smoldering; a shower of red sparks danced down Tharn’s flank.

Sirinita turned and ran.

At first she wasn’t running anywhere in particular; then she spotted a farmhouse with a light in the window. Someone had probably been awakened by the screaming. She turned her steps toward it.

A moment later she was hammering her fists on the door.

“Who is it?” someone called. “I’ve got a sword and a spear here.”

“Help!” Sirinita shrieked.

For a moment no one answered, but she heard muffled voices debating; then the door burst open and she fell inside.

“They attacked me,” she said. “And Tharn killed one of them, and... and... “

“Who attacked you?” a woman asked.

“Two men. Big men.”

“Who’s Tharn? Your father?” a man asked.

“My pet dragon.”

The man and the woman looked at one another.

“She’s crazy,” the man said.

“Close the door,” the woman answered.

“You don’t think I should try to help?”

“Do you hear anyone else screaming?”

The man listened; so did Sirinita.

“No,” the man said. “But I hear noises.”

“Let them take care of it themselves, then.”

“But....” The man hesitated, then asked, “Was anyone hurt?”

“The men who attacked me. Tharn hurt them both. I think he killed one.”

“But this Tharn was all right when you left?” the woman asked.

Sirinita nodded.

“Then leave well enough alone for now. We’ll go out in the morning and see what’s what. Or if this Tharn comes to the door and speaks fair — we’ve the girl to tell us if it’s the right one.” The man took one reluctant final look out the door, then closed and barred it, while the woman soothed Sirinita and led her to a corner by the fire where she could lie down. The man found two blankets and a feather pillow, and Sirinita curled up, shivering, certain she would never sleep again.

She was startled to wake up to broad daylight.

“You told us the truth last night,” her hostess remarked.

Sirinita blinked sleep from her eyes.

“About your dragon, I mean. He’s curled up out front. At first my man was afraid to step past him, after what you’d said about his fighting those two men, but he looks harmless enough, so at last he ventured it.”

“I’m sorry he troubled you,” Sirinita said.

“No trouble,” she said.

“I have to get home,” Sirinita said, as she sat up.

“No hurry, is there?”

Sirinita hesitated. “It’s a long walk back to the city.”

“It is,” the woman admitted. “But isn’t that all the more reason to have breakfast first?” Sirinita, who had had no supper the night before, did not argue with that; she ate a hearty meal of hot buttered cornbread, apples, and cider.

When she was done she tried to feed Tharn, but the dragon wasn’t hungry.

When the farmer showed her what he had found in the cornfield she saw why. Both her attackers were sprawled there — or at any rate, what was left of them. Tharn was still a very small dragon; he had left quite a bit.

She looked down at the dragon at her side; Tharn looked up at her and blinked. He stretched his wings and belched a small puff of flame.

“Come on,” Sirinita said. She waved a farewell to her hosts — she never had learned their names, though she thought they’d been mentioned — then started walking up her own shadow, heading westward toward Ethshar.

It was late afternoon when, footsore and frazzled, she reached Eastgate with Tharn still at her heel. She made her way down East Road to the city’s heart, then turned south into the residential district that had always been her home.

Her parents were waiting.

“When you weren’t home by midnight we were worried, so this morning we hired a witch,” her mother explained, after embraces and greetings had been exchanged. “She said you’d be home safe some time today, and here you are.” She looked past her daughter at the dragon. “And Tharn, too, I see.” She hesitated, then continued, “The witch said that Tharn saved your life last night. We really can’t keep him here, Siri, but we can find a home for him somewhere....”

“No,” Sirinita interrupted, hugging her mother close. “No, don’t do that.” She closed her eyes, and images of the man with the burned face screaming, the other man with his hair on fire and his neck broken, the two of them lying half-eaten between the rows of corn, appeared.

Tharn had been protecting her, and those men had meant to rape her and maybe kill her, but she knew those images would always be there.

Tharn was a dragon, and that was what dragons did.

“No, Mother,” she said, shuddering, tears leaking from the corners of her tightly-shut eyes. “Get a wizard and have him killed.”

The Spriggan Mirror

A Legend of Ethshar

Afterword

The Spriggan Mirror is the ninth novel in the Legends of Ethshar, while “Sirinita’s Dragon” is one of the seven shorter works in the series so far. When I began writing stories set in Ethshar I had intended each one to stand on its own, and most of them do, but I must admit that The Spriggan Mirror probably works better if you’ve already read With a Single Spell, The Spell of the Black Dagger, and maybe Ithanalin’s Restoration. I’m assured by those who have tried it that it makes sense even if you haven’t read any of its predecessors, but I suspect it makes more sense if you’re familiar with at least the first of those three.

In assembling the second editions of the first six Ethshar novels I tried to pair each of them with a short story that was somehow related to the novel — for example, the heroine of “Portrait of a Hero” is a member of a family that plays a significant role in The Blood of A Dragon, so those two were paired. In the present volume I didn’t really have a choice, since only one short story had not yet been reprinted, but by good fortune there are some connections — The Spriggan Mirror and “Sirinita’s Dragon” both start and end in Ethshar of the Rocks, both have dragons in them....

Well, it’s something, anyway.

I do wish “Sirinita’s Dragon” didn’t have quite such a downbeat ending, though; it’s not a happy note to close on.

For the serious Ethshar fan, “Sirinita’s Dragon” may have confusing moments, since it doesn’t say which of the three Ethshars it’s set in, and there are references to Grandgate. Don’t let that fool you.

Yes, the big famous Grandgate is in Ethshar of the Sands, but there’s a Grandgate in Ethshar of the Rocks, as well, where the old coast road enters the southern part of the city. It was originally intended to be the main entrance, but was quickly superseded by Eastgate, where a newer highway begins.

The Lady Nuvielle mentioned herein is indeed the same one who appeared in Ithanalin’s Restoration, but Lord Varrin has no connection with the famous wizard Varrin mentioned in The Spriggan Mirror, who created various spells a century or two back. Certain Ethsharitic names, such as Varrin, Dabran, and of course Kelder, recur fairly often.

“Sirinita’s Dragon” was originally written for an anthology called The Ultimate Dragon. This is its second publication.

The Spriggan Mirror was originally written as a reader-supported online serial; the text herein is roughly 5,000 words longer, and more polished than that first version. If you’d like to know more about that serialization, or about other Ethshar stories, past or future, please visit the Ethshar website at

http://www.ethshar.com.

— Lawrence Watt-Evans

Gaithersburg, December 2005