A glance around the room soon told me who had and who either had not or was a wizard to avoid meeting over a game of runes or Raven. I saw a faint smile in Usara’s eyes as he looked around the room, halting briefly at Planir, bowing slightly before continuing.
“Mentor Tonin’s researches suggest that this potential is a collective phenomenon, a reservoir of power without defined boundaries. I am sure he will be only too happy to go through the evidence if any of you wish to consult him later. For the moment, it is sufficient to say that two groups wielding aetheric magic may oppose each other absolutely, be convinced of radically different philosophies or ambitions, yet remain linked by the underlying principle.”
With a wave of his hand, Usara’s bar became the beam of a balance, a pan on either end heaped high, one with black crystals, one with white.
“The Lady Guinalle was certainly learned in the practical applications of her Artifice but I get no sense that she, or indeed any of her teachers, fully understood the fundamentals of the power they were using. Her youth alone suggests no lengthy period of study. Our contention is this: in removing such a large number of people from the equation, including a disproportionate element trained in focusing the aether or as they called it Artifice, Guinalle inadvertently unbalanced the entire supporting structure of that power.”
Usara snapped his fingers. The white crystals cascaded toward the floor to be followed by the black as the balance swung wildly up and down. He bowed at the faint ripple of applause and amusement running around the room and picked the rod out of the air, crystals and scale pans disappearing with a flash.
“That is all very interesting but we should address ourselves to the Tormalin—” The wizard Kalion was up in the next instant, struggling to hide a scowl as Usara’s theatrics diverted the attention of the gathering from his intended purpose for the debate.
“Kindly allow the rest of us to participate in this discussion, Hearth-Master.” A tiny, wrinkled woman in a crumpled leaf-green robe stood with some effort, leaning heavily on a carved, crooked stick. Nevertheless her voice cut through the room like a hot blade through wax. She fixed Usara with a glittering eye, keen as a dagger. “Young man, I find it very hard to believe that these people, with all the tradition of scholarship of which we have been told, had so little understanding of the fundamentals of their art that such a mistake could be made. No mage here would make such an error; few apprentices beyond their first season’s training could!”
One of the younger wizards in gray with a discreet scarlet trim to his tunic stood, his expression thoughtful and his manner assured despite his lack of years in such a company. “I think, Shannet, that it would be more accurate to say that no apprentice would have the opportunity to make such an error these days. Here in Hadrumal, we have twenty generations of research and scholarship to support us, a thorough understanding of the laws of magic as they pertain to the elements. Yet we have all read the diaries of those who first came to this island with the founding Archmage Trydek, have we not? Those early wizards were working with purely empirical knowledge, mere fragments of the understanding we now have. What little learning those mages came with was garnered from widely differing traditions, acquired in an entirely haphazard manner. The early history of Hadrumal is one of experimentation, trial and error, is it not? Magic was used extensively for many generations with a very imperfect understanding of its nature. I see no reason why these Ancients should not have been using their Artifice with as little basis on true wisdom.”
“Given they believed their power was god-given, why would they have felt the need to explain its origins anyway?” a wizard similar enough in age and appearance to the first to be his brother chipped in, not bothering to stand.
“Who’s to say it was an error, anyway?” A tall, spare man in ocher robes got briefly to his feet. “This girl may have known exactly what she was doing, killing two birds with the one stone as it were; saving her folk and striking at the enemy in the one enchantment.”
The immediate doubt in my mind at this proposal was unmistakably tinged with Temar’s reactions.
“But what of the effect on the Empire in Tormalin?” protested a motherly-looking woman. “Granted Nemith the Last’s misrule had seriously undermined Tormalin power by that point, but it was the collapse of the magic that precipitated the final downfall!”
“I think you will find all the writings on harmony and balance date from the generations immediately after the Chaos,” a nervous-looking young man near Usara bobbed up to speak. He looked as if he had more to say, but he lost his nerve and sat again.
I gritted my teeth and ignored the stray thoughts trying to hook my attention, concentrating hard on the increasingly wide-ranging debate as further wizards discussed the nature of the scholarship of magic. Most of it went completely over my head, so I watched Planir and Kalion instead, the former silent and poised like a waiting hawk, the latter visibly irritated at his inability to steer the meeting in his chosen direction. I can’t be sure but I think I saw a brief glance exchanged by Planir and the mage Rafrid before the latter rose to speak again.
“I think we can agree to accept Usara’s contention as a working hypothesis until more compelling evidence emerges to refute it, can’t we?” said Rafrid mildly. “Interesting though this debate has become, I would like to know what those scholars working with Mentor Tonin feel their next step should be?”
All eyes turned to Tonin, who got slowly to his feet, a sheaf of parchments in one hand betraying him with a faint fluttering. “Now that we have the Arimelin archive from Claithe to complement the records of the Dimaerion traditions in eastern Solura, I am hopeful that we could attempt to reunite the minds and persons of these ancient Tormalins, were we able to bring the artifacts and bodies together. We have increased our understanding of the lesser uses of the aetheric principles in recent seasons and I am hopeful that we have identified rites that would reunite that which Artifice presently keeps separate.”
My own surge of hope at Tonin’s quiet words was echoed by an answering desire ringing through the back of my mind. I was suddenly convinced Temar was as eager to be free of me as I was to be rid of him.
Rafrid stood patiently as a surge of speculation ran around the room, eventually subsiding as the assembled mages looked at each other and finally back at him. He looked around the room. “Should we consider doing this?”
“Of course,” said the woman who had first answered Kalion. “Think of the information they could give us, about this aetheric magic, about all the mysteries of the Ancients that were lost in the Chaos.” She shot a hard glance at the fat wizard. “Then we will know exactly what we are facing in these Elietimm and their peculiar magic.”
“These people have been lost for, what, twenty-five generations or more?” scoffed a balding man in brown, “and you are proposing to restore them to life again? Their families are long gone, any land or possessions scattered to the four winds, in every sense that matters, these people are as good as dead. I appreciate there are many scholars curious about the fall of the Tormalin Empire, but I hardly think it reasonable to thrust these unfortunates into our world, when so many changes have happened, when so little from their own age has survived, just to satisfy an intellectual curiosity. What’s done is done. These people should remain at rest. Nothing will be gained by such an attempt at rescue so long after the event.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” one of the younger mages spoke up, again without standing. “Read the primary sources, Galen. Look at the language and ideas. Consider the vast amount of knowledge lost in the Chaos. I’d say we of this generation have more in common with the people of the last days of the Empire than with almost any generation in between.”