Fall of Angels (The Saga of Recluce #6)(92)

Relyn pursed his lips. "You made those devil blades that cut through armor, did you not?" Half his words were Old Anglorat. "And you used the flame of the angels?"

"I did, but that's a form of machine, not magic."

"The singer, she says that you used magery to twist the flame in a way that no one else could."

"I suppose that's true," Nylan admitted. "And I can use that ability to chisel stone a little more easily."

"I saw you carve that hard black stone like it might be wood. No stoneworker I have seen could do that."

"Does a name matter?"

"Names are important," insisted Relyn.

"Are they?" asked Nylan. "Substance lies in what is, not what people say."

Relyn frowned. "Words cause people to act. If someone calls you evil angels, then that gives others a reason to destroy you."

"That's true," Nylan admitted, "but only when you talk about inspiring people to act. Their actions cause destruction, not the words directly. All the words in the world will not make me into a white wizard. All the words in the world will not bring back your hand."

"I do not know about that..." Relyn muses. "Do not the white wizards whisper incantations to bring about their actions? Did I not hear you talk to yourself when you guided the green flames of order?"

"Did you not talk to yourself when you practiced with the blade?" countered Nylan. "The actions matter, not the words which surround them . . . although words can certainly inspire actions." He cleared his throat, then paused as a violent gust of wind rattled the windows and shutters and shivered the great south door on its heavy iron hinges. "That's often the problem with rulers. They move people with their words, and because they do, they believe that they can use words to change the physical world. They can change people's minds and feelings, but unless those people use shovels and some form of power, the words will not move the mountains." As he finished, the engineer looked down at the table. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't talk so much."

"You are a mage, a different mage, but a mage, and how will I learn about what you do if I do not listen? I can see your actions"-Relyn lifted the artificial metal hand-"but not your thoughts."

"I'm not sure that my thoughts are terribly important." Nylan laughed. "The marshal's perhaps, but not mine."

"She thinks great and terrible thoughts, I fear."

Nylan thought the same of Ryba's thoughts, but he only answered, "She does think great thoughts, and she will change this world."

"So will you, Mage."

"Me? Only so far as .. ." Nylan stopped. "I do not think so."

Relyn laughed. "More so than you think." He stood. "But I must think more. Thinking is harder than the blade."

Nylan frowned. "There's no reason why you couldn't re-learn the blade with your other hand. Saryn could certainly teach you."

Relyn paused. "A left-handed blade?"

"No worse than a black mage," countered Nylan.

Relyn laughed harshly, then turned.

As the former noble walked toward the stairwell and up the steps, Nylan glanced back at the now-empty tables and the cold hearth. After a moment, he crossed the great room and headed down to the tower's lowest level.

In the kitchen, the heat radiated from the stove where the long loaves of bread baked. Nylan took a deep breath, enjoying the aroma. Kyseen and Kadran worked at the blocky worktable, its surface already marked with the imprints of knives, slicing potatoes into circles and dropping them into the largest caldron. Both wore rough shirts with the sleeves rolled up. Kyseen set down her knife and, taking a pad made of rags, opened the stove grate, easing in two chunks of wood, one after the other.

"We'll need to saw some more small stove wood," Kyseen told Kadran, checking the coals in the stove, with the door open.

More heat welled out into the lower level, enough that Nylan, even by the foot of the stairs, could feel himself getting warm and dampness on his forehead. He unfastened the light ship jacket.

"It's your turn," Kadran said back to Kyseen.

"All right."

Cloaks wrapped around them, Narliat, Hryessa, and Murkassa stood in the alcove between the side of the stove and the central stairwell.

"Narliat, and you two-you could do some woodcutting," suggested Nylan. "It might even warm you up."

"Friggin' right," whispered Kyseen to Kadran, who nodded.

"Kyseen will show you what to do," Nylan suggested, before heading toward the other side of the lower level and the rudimentary carpentry which awaited him. Carpentry? He really didn't have that much of a feel for wood, but he had no real tools for working metal. By the next winter, he really should think about building another structure, a small smithy where he could learn, one way or another, more traditional metalworking. Even with his ordering ability, he suspected it would be a long summer and hard work, but there were too many tools and items that Westwind needed-and too few coins to purchase them. On the other hand, with the lander shells, there was metal, even if it did take his strange ability to work it.

Ayrlyn gave him a crooked smile as he stepped toward the planks.

"Where do I start?" he asked, repressing a shudder at the thought of trying to cross deep powdery snow on a pair of carved boards.