Feast of Souls by C. S. Friedman Read Free Book Online

the first time she has ever asked such a thing directly. He is about to give the easy answer when he hesitates and thinks suddenly, No. She deserves the truth. At least that much, to take with her into Transition .
    “No woman has ever been presented as a Magister.” He picks his words slowly, carefully, not wanting to say too much. That is always a danger. An apprentice who learns the truth might react badly. There are a few on record from the early days, when teaching was different, who bolted and ran as soon as they were informed. One almost got away before his Magister hunted him down, and was going to spill the precious secrets he had learned to all the townsfolk, as an act of misguided philanthropy. It was a wake-up call to the sorcerous community. No one takes such chances now. “It is generally said that none of them survive Transition. I am not so sure anyone knows this for a fact. A percentage of those who gain the power of a Magister are driven mad by the process, and must be destroyed by their teachers. It may be that women have gotten that far. No one speaks of failed apprentices.”
    “Why are they driven mad?”
    He shook his head with a faint tsk-tsk sound. “Now now, Kamala. You know I’m not going to tell you that.”
    “That’s on the list of things I’ll understand when I get there.”
    “Yes,” he says.
    Soon. Very soon.
    She sighs, and the unbrushed corona of her hair sends a few red tendrils down across her eyes. She pushes them aside with a careless hand, not much caring what it looks like as long as it stays out of her way. Her casual disregard for her own appearance should have resulted in a less appealing creature than what stands before him, he reflects. But Nature is cruel that way, and will resign the princess in her ivory tower to a lifetime of paints and curling irons trying to mimic that natural beauty which, in a moment of whimsy, she granted a peasant-born whore. Kamala’s lean and athletic frame might not please men seeking dumplings in the cheeks of their women, but any man who values the spark of fire in womankind, whose desire to possess is aroused by independence, who is drawn to fierceness rather than languid beauty, will surely find her maddening.
    If she ever walks among mortal men again , he reflects darkly. That has yet to be seen .
    “So what is my lesson today, Master Ethanus? Or does it even matter anymore? Shall I simply move the clouds about, back and forth, until my athra is exhausted?”
    She voices the question lightly but he does not answer her lightly. His eyes fix upon her with a sudden and disarming solemnity. Her tentative smile flickers out like a candle flame in a gust of wind.
    “Yes,” he says. “Move the clouds.”
    He sees her tremble, but she voices no questions. Good. She understands.
    She goes outside. He follows her. Twilight has come and the sky is a resonant blue, agonizingly beautiful, that shivers black about the edges. The clouds are misty ghosts that gather about the face of the full moon just above the crowning of the trees. A perfect night for such an exercise.
    He watches as she takes her place in the center of the clearing, facing the moon. He can sense her reaching inside herself to the source of all power, a process she once described to him as “turning one’s soul inside out.” He can see how much effort it takes her to do it this time, and how weak the result is. Her life force is nearly exhausted, burned out in a handful of years by magical exercises designed to empty her soul of all its natural strength at an unnatural pace. She is young still, strong in body, but almost lacking in that inner fire that keeps a human body alive. Tonight… tonight that last precious spark will go out. And if she is lucky, if she is strong, if she is above all else determined … something else will take its place.
    Whether she can endure living with that something is another question entirely.
    With a grace that seems more ghostly than human