projecting from beneath her conversation, the warps should be stronger when she had respun them than they were originally.
Gran added an iridescent blue powder to the yellow fluid, and curls of green smoke interlaced with the yellow wafting toward the string-tied bundles of herbs that hung so thickly from the ceiling that Maggie sometimes felt she was walking upside down in a meadow. “I have always considered that a very silly practice, Magdalene. Tin is much more useful.” Gran always put on her most dignified air when practicing her craft. Maggie had received instructive lectures at these times, surrounded by noxious fumes and falling bits of materia medica from the ceiling, and was always addressed during these sermons as “Magdalene,” her full name, which she particularly disliked.
Turning on the bench to face her grandmother’s back, Maggie leaned against the front beam of the loom, her right foot swinging, rumpling the striped rug she’d woven for Gran’s floor. She’d have to reweave another bald spot, she noted. Gran was always spilling something caustic and burning it, or the cat was kneading it bare. “I’m going down south, Gran.”
“So Ching told me.” She set the beaker of liquid down and faced her granddaughter. “Don’t you think it’s Amberwine’s business who she chooses to go with?”
“I suppose so.” Maggie frowned at her nails and tried to explain the uneasiness she had felt since hearing the minstrel’s song. “But she’s not like us, Gran. I mean, she was always having to remind me to stop and think how what I was doing was going to make other people feel—she never just DOES things.”
“You think she was coerced?”
Maggie nodded. “Or something like that. Or Rowan’s mistreated her—though I rather think she’d have been back home by now if that were the case. Anyhow, whatever she’s doing, she won’t mind a visit, will she? And I shall finally see somewhere besides this stupid village. Do you know, one of the guards who accompanied Rowan to the wedding told me the flowers are already out down there this time of year?”
“That’s not all that’s out, dearie.” Gran regarded her severely. “Our climate may be inhospitable a great deal of the year, but it does serve to discourage a lot of the nonsense they put up with down south. I had a message from your Aunt Sybil only a month or so ago, that she had seen bandits from across the Brazorian border destroy a mountain village right near Rowan’s territory. And there’s dragons and werewolves and ogres and pirates out there as well,” she sat down, wearied by the length and import of her list, “and lions and tigers…”
“Don’t forget the bears,” Maggie said drily.
“And bears. And don’t you laugh at me, my girl. Even a unicorn can be very dangerous, if startled. Worst of all, though, are the people. Witches and wizards can be very territorial, so you’d best be a bit more polite to strange magicians than you are to your old granny. And men, of course. Speaking of which, Magdalene, I do not think your father very wise to send you off with that scandal mongering Songsmith character.”
“Don’t be silly, Gran. He’s just a musician—he doesn’t have any magic at all.”
“Don’t be silly yourself. You don’t know if he has any magic or not, and he’s a man, isn’t he? How do you suppose there got to be more of them than there are of us, and why do you suppose our powers are getting weaker every generation?”
“Surely this is not MY Grandmother Brown getting all moralistic with me?” Maggie grinned.
Granny looked embarrassed. “Of course not, you impudent wench. But pairing off, if done at all, should be done only after your powers are fully developed and tested. Your poor mother never did amount to anything, witchwise, getting involved so young and all…”
“Now don’t go blaming Dad…”
“I’m not. I’m hardly the bigot some folks are, but…”
A playful rapping at
Gran added an iridescent blue powder to the yellow fluid, and curls of green smoke interlaced with the yellow wafting toward the string-tied bundles of herbs that hung so thickly from the ceiling that Maggie sometimes felt she was walking upside down in a meadow. “I have always considered that a very silly practice, Magdalene. Tin is much more useful.” Gran always put on her most dignified air when practicing her craft. Maggie had received instructive lectures at these times, surrounded by noxious fumes and falling bits of materia medica from the ceiling, and was always addressed during these sermons as “Magdalene,” her full name, which she particularly disliked.
Turning on the bench to face her grandmother’s back, Maggie leaned against the front beam of the loom, her right foot swinging, rumpling the striped rug she’d woven for Gran’s floor. She’d have to reweave another bald spot, she noted. Gran was always spilling something caustic and burning it, or the cat was kneading it bare. “I’m going down south, Gran.”
“So Ching told me.” She set the beaker of liquid down and faced her granddaughter. “Don’t you think it’s Amberwine’s business who she chooses to go with?”
“I suppose so.” Maggie frowned at her nails and tried to explain the uneasiness she had felt since hearing the minstrel’s song. “But she’s not like us, Gran. I mean, she was always having to remind me to stop and think how what I was doing was going to make other people feel—she never just DOES things.”
“You think she was coerced?”
Maggie nodded. “Or something like that. Or Rowan’s mistreated her—though I rather think she’d have been back home by now if that were the case. Anyhow, whatever she’s doing, she won’t mind a visit, will she? And I shall finally see somewhere besides this stupid village. Do you know, one of the guards who accompanied Rowan to the wedding told me the flowers are already out down there this time of year?”
“That’s not all that’s out, dearie.” Gran regarded her severely. “Our climate may be inhospitable a great deal of the year, but it does serve to discourage a lot of the nonsense they put up with down south. I had a message from your Aunt Sybil only a month or so ago, that she had seen bandits from across the Brazorian border destroy a mountain village right near Rowan’s territory. And there’s dragons and werewolves and ogres and pirates out there as well,” she sat down, wearied by the length and import of her list, “and lions and tigers…”
“Don’t forget the bears,” Maggie said drily.
“And bears. And don’t you laugh at me, my girl. Even a unicorn can be very dangerous, if startled. Worst of all, though, are the people. Witches and wizards can be very territorial, so you’d best be a bit more polite to strange magicians than you are to your old granny. And men, of course. Speaking of which, Magdalene, I do not think your father very wise to send you off with that scandal mongering Songsmith character.”
“Don’t be silly, Gran. He’s just a musician—he doesn’t have any magic at all.”
“Don’t be silly yourself. You don’t know if he has any magic or not, and he’s a man, isn’t he? How do you suppose there got to be more of them than there are of us, and why do you suppose our powers are getting weaker every generation?”
“Surely this is not MY Grandmother Brown getting all moralistic with me?” Maggie grinned.
Granny looked embarrassed. “Of course not, you impudent wench. But pairing off, if done at all, should be done only after your powers are fully developed and tested. Your poor mother never did amount to anything, witchwise, getting involved so young and all…”
“Now don’t go blaming Dad…”
“I’m not. I’m hardly the bigot some folks are, but…”
A playful rapping at