The Magician of Hoad by Margaret Mahy Read Free Book Online

Moving beside him,
Stretching before,
His dark and breathless shadow
Engulfs the bright, breathing land.
    Days became a week… three weeks… and Linnet grew bored with the city of tents, the distant, glittering King, and the cold wind with its taint of decay. She began to long for home. But perhaps everyone had grown weary. Lila told her one evening that, on the very next day, there was to be a break in the negotiations. Lords who lived close to the plain would get a chance to go back to their homes for a few days. Even the Hero was going to ride back to Cassio’s Island. And though the King was staying on the battlefield, along with his sons, there were to be festivities. On the next day there was to be a picnic, and both she and Prince Dysart were to take part. Linnet was delighted. She was longing for something to happen: She was longing for changes.

BROKEN GLASS
    Out on his farm in County Glass, Heriot Tarbas was sitting on his own in a corner, playing cards. He was draped in a thick woven rug with a hole for his head and slits for his hands. A chilly wind was blowing around the courtyard, but apart from any wind or weather, he was now in the habit of covering himself up as much as he could. The cats suddenly looked up, then flattened themselves to the ground and fled, but his little cousins clustered around, staring in amazement at the stranger who rode into the courtyard, staring at his long, green coat edged with fur and his boots, so soft and polished they looked as if they were made of silk rather than fine leather. He wore gloves, and the fingers of the gloves were crowded with rings. His face was far older than his short, bright chestnut curls might have suggested.
    Heriot stared like everybody else at this shiny insect of a man, out of place yet utterly commanding in the Tarbas courtyard. His authority sat on him so naturally that everything around him immediately grew subservient, yet hisvoice, when he spoke to Joan, was gentle rather than commanding. Heriot couldn’t hear all that was being said, though he gathered that Great-Great-Aunt Jen’s presence was being demanded. What he could make out was an unfamiliar accent, much quicker and more clipped than the family voices, and more careful.
    Joan hurried off. Lord Glass turned and looked around him. A breeze turned back the edge of his green coat to show a scarlet lining embroidered with gold. Heriot’s mouth opened a little. He was bewildered to think that a man might ride with such a coat belted across when he could ride with it open, showing off that wonderful lining.
    A progressive disturbance, beginning somewhere on the second floor of the house and rattling down the stairs, marked Great-Great-Aunt Jen’s rapid descent into the courtyard. Out she came, hesitated, and then gave a stiff bow to Lord Glass, who immediately dismounted and turned toward her, holding out his hand.
    “Jenny Tarbas,” Heriot heard him say, and thought that “Jenny” was an unexpectedly sweet and yielding name for a woman as dauntless as his great-great-aunt Jen. She was taller than Lord Glass, but he acted as if he were the taller, easily accepting a square of bread and a glass of wine from Wish.
    “Through this gift of bread,” he was saying in a formal ritual, “obligation returns to your Lord and magnifies the King and the Hero who are boundless in the land.”
    Heriot knew Lord Glass was not just Lord of County Glass, but Castellan, Lord Palantine, the King’s Devisor, and one of the Council of Ten (those of the GeneralCouncil who most closely advised Hoad the King, a man who had given up his own name and taken the name of the land when he first came to the throne, and who would not reclaim his given name until he died). Lord Glass was one of the Lords on that mysterious plain on the other side of the hills, where the King and the Hero, together with Lords and Dukes, were struggling to negotiate a peace of some kind with the Dannorad, that ancient enemy of Hoad.