From Whence You Came (2 page)

“You bring proof of this?”

“We bring our word, and the loss of three ships, and all aboard them!” 

The carter who had not yet spoken placed a hand on his more outspoken brother's arm, as though to caution him.

“Three ships, and all hands and cargo. Gone,” Hernán said flatly.

That would explain why the carters were there; it must have been their cargo the ships were transporting.

“My spellwines work,” Bradhai said again. “The fault was not within them.”

“We must have proof of that, Vineart Bradhai. Else all our ships are at risk – and your reputation with them.”

 It was a mildly worded statement, but even an isolated Vineart knew a threat when it was issued. “Come, then. Let me show you.”

o0o

No outsider entered a Vineart's workroom; not even a Washer, the Scions of Sin Washer himself, who held themselves responsible for maintaining the Commands, would dare. But the House itself was open to all who were invited, and so the three men followed Bradhai without hesitation, up the pebbled walkway away from the Yards, to where a modest house waited.

Unlike a princeling's villa, which might house two dozen or more servants and half again as many family members, the building housed only Bradhai, two kitchen-workers, and Yakup.

The boy met them at the door, his plain trou stained with
mustus
, his shirt open at the neck and his hair tied back.

“Master.” 

“Go back to work, boy.”

Yakup bowed in acceptance, his gaze flitting over the visitors but showing no other curiosity. If his master told him to return to work, then all was well, and not for him to question.

“You have a student.”

“Obviously.” Bradhai didn't mean to be curt, but that seemed another foolish observation: the boy was here, in his house; clearly he was no longer a slave. Vineart did not marry, did not take mounts, did not raise children. So the boy could be nothing save a student.

The House had three floors: above, the sleeping quarters, below ground, where the earth kept them cool, the workrooms, and the main level of kitchen, dining area, and the single room he kept for meeting with outsiders. He led them there, and closed the door behind them.

There were no windows in the meeting room, but as they entered, magelights sprang to life in small niches in every wall, casting clear white light that gave off no heat. The three men did not utter a sound, but Bradhai heard their steps falter ever so slightly, and he smiled to himself. Firevines were common enough, but they were none of his growing; to have such at command meant that he had trade enough to afford them from another Vineart, rather than making do with lesser spells or – worse yet – flame.

The room was large enough to house his worktable and the testing apparatus, a contraption of metal and wood that held a handful of flasks at the ready, at one end, and a smaller table with chairs at the other, with an expanse of cool stone floor between. He led them to the chairs, taking the largest one, and letting them choose who sat where among the remaining.

“Vineart, we have no-” the Shipsmaster began.

“You asked for proof of my work,” he said. “And this I will give you.” There was a small table by his chair, with a pitcher and glass on it. Lifting the pitcher, he poured a measure of liquid into the glass, and handed it to the nearest man, who happened to be the scowl-faced carter. 

“And what do I do with this?” he demanded, holding the glass away from his face as though the faintest waft of its aroma might harm him.

“Oh, for Sin Washer's Love,” Hernán said, disgusted. “He's offering you
vina
. If you don't know how to handle it…”

Apparently the carter didn't, for he handed it, carefully and with obvious relief, to the Shipsmaster. The latter looked into the glass, then held it to the light. Glassware was only slightly more common now than it had been when Bradhai was a slave, but Organ handled it with assurance.

“Deep, but pale, the shade of a morning's sun,” he said. “Your aetherwine. I am honored.”

“You have questions as to its efficacy,” Bradhai said. “I seek to reassure you. That is from the same pressing as your house acquired this year past. This is a clearing spell. You know it?”

Unlike the carters, a Shipsmaster knew how to use spellwines, and did not fear the Vineart meant to poison him, for he raised the glass to his lips and took a delicate sip.

Letting the liquid rest on his tongue, Hernán drew in air over it, a slow steady inhale, and then – his lips barely moving – murmured near-silent words of a basic decantation, triggering the spell meant to clear a room of noxious fumes.

As the magic within the spellwine responded to the decantation, a faint rustling came from the scraps of parchment and paper on the desk, and, although there was no window in the room, the distinct sharp tang of sea air swirled around them, many miles from the sea. 

Hernán opened his eyes and smiled at Bradhai, an unexpectedly unguarded moment of peace.

“That proves nothing,” the first carter said. “This works, but that is not to say his others do.”

“If there was any failure of my spellwines,” Bradhai said, “then it was in the decanting of them, not the making or incanting.”

“Indeed,” Hernán said, still smiling. “Then we need you to test the casks themselves, under maximum stress, to show us wrong.”

“You brought casks with you?” He had seen none, but they might have left them elsewhere, in a cart, not wishing to bring too many strangers into his Yards.

“No. You must come with us. We must see it work properly, under proper conditions.”

o0o

“Master, what?” Yakup was not questioning, but startled.

“I must go.”

“Go?”

“Are you a halfwit, boy?” Bradhai slapped him sharply across the ear, the usual tap to remind him to learn more quickly, and ask no foolish questions. “I must go and you must stay. At most, I will be gone a week, perhaps not even three days.” It was a day's ride to the shoreline, and then a day back again. He had argued, but the three men remained firm. Bradhai must prove himself, and his work, with what remained of the casks he had sold them, under the conditions intended for their use. So he would see their ships and their casks, and raise the wind for them, show them they were in error, and then he would come home.

“Master?”

This time, Bradhai did not chastise the boy. His uncertainty was understandable: Vinearts did not leave their Yards, and they certainly did not leave a half-trained boy in charge.

“Pep knows what to do in the yards,” Bradhai said. “The old man has seen more grapes born than you and I placed together, for all that he has not the Sense. Let him be your guide, and continue the work you do here.”  

Yakup had been with him three years in the House, long enough to be trusted with the basic incantations, and the spellwines that needed only turning within their racks as they strengthened.  

“You will do fine.” Bradhai paused in his packing, letting the fine linen shirt rest in his hands, and looked at the boy. “You will do fine.”

Bradhai was more worried for himself. He knew his spellwines had not failed, but what would it take for the guilds to accept it? Would they hold him responsible, no matter what the cause?

He finished packing, enough for a week's travel, and slid the leather strap shut. “Bring this downstairs,” he ordered. Their visitors had taken their leisure on the grassy expanse by the road, their horses brought out for them, waiting for him to be ready. There had been no question of waiting: all four were anxious to be done with it.

The boy nodded, then picked the rucksack up and carried it away.

Bradhai looked around his chamber. It was a simple room, with a bed, a braided rag rug on the slate floor, and a chest of drawers that some long-ago tinker had painted with a design of twirling vines, and large, oddly green grapes, as though the unripe fruit had somehow swollen to full size. It had been his masters' before him, and perhaps his master's before that, and it still struck him with awe that it was his, now. 

He would go, prove the efficacy of his work, and return. Annoying, but simple enough. And yet….

Through the window, the shutters open to the warming air, he heard the nicker of horses, and the low voices of men talking, and farther beyond, the shouts of the slavemaster, and the calls of slaves, working below in the yards. And under all that, the constant soft whisper of his vines, telling him that all was well.

For the first time, Bradhai doubted that reassurance.

o0o

The trip down through the valley and to the port-town of Vélezsur had not been unpleasant. Bradhai was no horseman, but he could sit the sturdy bay gelding they had given him well enough, and the saddle was deep and well-worn, the sort best-suited for long, steady journeys. Still, it was a painful pleasure to slide off the horse's back, his boot soles hitting solid earth, even as his thighs cramped and his backside ached.

“A warm bath and a warmer drink will set you to rights,” Arias said. Once away from the yards he had relaxed, and become a decent companion. They were in the courtyard of an ostlery, the hard-packed dirt worn under his boots from the countless wagons and hooves – of all sorts of creatures – that had passed through. Torches burned overhead, the crackle and scent of burning pitch, making Bradhai's nose twitch. To use open flame this close to buildings made him uneasy; could they not have afforded even a single firespell to tame them?

“He should go to the shipyard straightaway,” Muño grumbled, but looked to Hernán, as Bradhai discovered was usual, for the final word. The Shipsmaster was in charge of this unlikely trio, for certain.

“It is full dark,” Hernán said, “and we are done-in. I see no point in rousing the ship's captain and crew when the tests are best done in daylight.”

The ostilarius came up to them as they dismounted, his leather apron tied at his hip, his shirtsleeves rolled down, and his hair slicked back. He was already bowing and scraping when he saw Hernán. “Shipsmaster, welcome, welcome. We have your usual room, and one for your companions, as well? You'll be joining us for eve-meal, or a private sup in your rooms? I-” and his quick gaze jumped over the carters, familiarly categorized, and landed on Bradhai. Boots, low and of worn leather. Clothing, dusty and worn. Hair, untrimmed in the older style. Nothing to take second note of, save that his gaze slipped back to Bradhai's waist, where the double-wrapped belt gave his identity away, even before the silver tastevan swung into place as he turned. 

“Vineart,” the ostilarius said, his tone caught between awe and worry. “You honor my small respite.”  

“He travels with us, Suero.”

“Ah. Of course. Two rooms for the masters, and another for your companions?”

“That will do. And we will dine in your private room, if it is available.”

“I will ensure that it is so, Shipsmaster, Vineart.” Suero paused, and then nodded at the carters, as though barely willing to acknowledge that their company gave them rights above his.

“Impudent get,” Muño muttered, but it was less in anger than resignation. 

“He is as he is,” Hernán said. “And he has the best meals and the cleanest beds on all the Long Road, as you well know – and as he knows even better. Come, and let it go, old friend. We have greater worries than one innkeeper not giving you proper respect.”

The private room was a small space. The table was solid, battered wood, laid with four places. A basic spell-light, not the more expensive coldlight, burned in the lamp on the table, and open flames flickered in niches in the wall, adding a warm yellow to the light that was not displeasing. 

“Sit by me,” Hernán said. “We may speak while we eat.”

As though on cue, the moment Bradhai slipped into the indicated chair two young girls appeared, bearing platters almost as large as they. There was meat, a roast sliced thick and warm from the fire, and bread that was likely fresh that morning, and even a pot of creamy yellow butter. And, to show the innkeeper's esteem for them, there was also a small saltcellar, if the meat was not done to their liking.

The four men fell to their food without further comment, the only sound that of chewing and the occasional clatter of heavy mugs as one of the girls refilled them with
vin ordinaire,
a vina that had not been potent enough for incanting. Bradhai wafted it under his nose, and identified it as a firewine, likely Berengian in origin. He sipped, and nodded. Berengian, and of a good vintage.

“Bradhai. That's an odd name,” Arias said, his mouth still stuffed with food, spilling crumbs as he spoke. “You Vinearts come from anywhere, but I've traveled near-everywhere and it's still strange to my ears.”

Bradhai paused, a chunk of bread dripping with gravy clutched in one hand. “It isn't really a name. It was the only thing I said when the slavers found me.”

He had not spoken any language the slavers knew, not Iajan or Berengian nor Ettion, the trade-tongue. But the origin of his name did not matter for a slave, and even less for a Vineart.  Bradhai they called him, and so Bradhai he was. “What is a name, after all, but what you come to when called?”

“A Vineart with a philosophical bent? Interesting,” Hernán said. “You have no knowledge of where you came?”

Bradhai shrugged, still eating. “It was not a thing that mattered.”

“Slavers,” Muño said, shaking his head. “I do not understand how you countenance such things. Bad enough that you may not take wives….”

“It was Sin Washer's will,” Bradhai said. “To maintain the balance.”

“Thanks to Sin Washer, for his Solace,” the other three men murmured hastily, and tucked back into their meals, no more said about slaves, wines, or names. 

Only Vinearts owned slaves. Only slavers – like traders, insular and close-lipped, with regulations and rules – could take a child from its home, with the parents' blessing or without, if they felt the stir of the Sense within them. Then he would be piled into a cage with a number of other boys, some of them beaten until bloody, and paraded in front of Vinearts until one of them paid his fee, and took him home, either as labor for his Yards or, if he proved to have the Sense as well as the flicker, to be a student, and some day, if he were lucky, a Vineart.