Fire Angels

Chapter 3 Part 1 Family Secrets

Chapter 3

If we had all followed our own wishes, we would have set off the very next day like heroes in some old tale. First however there was the matter of how to be safe in Moria.

Here Tomas took control. As I had discovered under mind search, he was indeed experienced at smuggling magic into Moria and since he had no guilty memories of failure, I had to assume he was successful at it. Certainly he seemed to know what he was doing.

The first thing next morning, he sent Hamel into the village to find a horse and some suitable clothes for me. He asked to see my hands and was torn between disapproval and relief that they were much more work hardened than the hands of mages normally are.

"Don't you use magic for anything, Dion?"

"If most mages have nice hands," I said tartly, "it's because they get servants to do everything, not because they choose to waste magic on household tasks. My foster father and tutors would be most disapproving of the mundane things I use magic for."

Most magic users needed to marshal their powers or they quickly became exhausted and were unable to call on those powers in emergencies. I had never had a problem with this. Magic seemed to just flow and flow from me and so I used it for unpleasant tasks like cleaning out Pony's stable, or bringing wood into the house on cold nights. I had a positively luxurious system of transporting water. A small stream ran through the nearby forest and I had set up a pipe to it. I could magically draw water up through it at will and even heat it on the way.

Other things however like weeding the garden or picking apples I did by hand, partly because I enjoyed the physical exercise and partly because old habits die hard. My foster father for mysterious reasons of his own had never told me that I was more powerful than other mages although he'd never had any qualms about telling me I was more silly. I, isolated under his care, had no way of knowing otherwise and so for the first 17 years of my life I had nurtured and rationed my strength just like any other mage. I still felt uncomfortable taking it too much for granted.

My brother shrugged at my forthrightness and changing the subject asked for pen and paper.

He seated himself at my table and began writing, copying from a paper that he spread out on the table. When I had finished my chores, I came and watched him. I felt better now that the decision had been made. My mind felt free to think about other things, like my mother for instance. The memory of her had been even more present in Tomas's mind than in Hamel's. In Tomas' mind she shone brightly surrounded both by love and admiration, almost like the icon of a saint. I was interested in her despite myself. As I watched him writing, I wondered how to bring up the subject.

Tomas wrote in a fine and aristocratic hand and he wrote in old Aramayan, the language of legal documents.

"You speak Aramayan?" I said surprised and wondered then if I had been tactful.

He smiled at me.

"No. I only know some phrases. Like those suitable for travel documents which is what I'm copying out now. Nice handwriting isn't it?"

"Aye indeed it is."

"It's my brother's. I came to writing very late, but I've really taken to it and I must say I think I do a very creditable job of forgery."

"Your brother's?" I asked mystified.

He grinned.

"Aye Lucien Sercel, my half-brother. Our mother furnished me with a very nice class of relative. So just you show some respect."

"So he's related to THE Sercels? The Lord Electors of Middle Moria?"

"My dear little sister, he IS one of the Sercels. My father is Sandor Sercel, the Lord-Elector himself. Now don't you look so doubtful. It's not proper to doubt your big brother."