Disclaimer – I do not own BMT world, it belongs to Trudi Canavan
Breaking In
Sonea soon found the turning she needed and pushed Trouble along at a reasonable pace. She was pleased with the way she was riding the horse. It seemed that necessity was a better teacher than all of Akkarin's years of advice. She wished he could see her now, fully in control and even enjoying the ride. A near-miss with a low hanging branch, however, soon brought her back to her senses. She wasn't a good rider and if she were coping now it was because the horse was tired.
As she continued on her journey, another thought suddenly struck her. Trouble was known to be Jalette's favoured riding horse. The stable lads would remember bringing it out to her when she set off for Corres Fort and anyway, there was always a careful record kept of who had what horse. How could she explain it being in the stables at the Guild, when Jalette was supposed to be riding it home? She berated herself sharply for not thinking of this before. After several minutes mulling over the problem. Sonea came to the conclusion that she would have to leave the horse somewhere near to Imardin and hope that it would eventually be returned to the Guild's stables. The Guild marked all its horses, so someone was bound to recognise the incal sooner or later. Hopefully, by the time it was returned, circumstances would have changed and it would no longer be necessary to keep up the fiction of Jalette's presence at Corres Fort.
Sonea smiled wryly to herself. In addition to smuggling herself unnoticed back into the Guild, she now had to find a suitable place to leave Trouble. She hoped that there was nothing else she had forgotten. Akkarin wouldn't have forgotten, her mind remarked snidely. Sonea laughed aloud, because it was true. His planning was excellent except when she did something unexpected, like refusing her judgement. She had asked him once how he had become so good at thinking through various possibilities. He said it was all due to some game that members of the Houses played from their early childhood. She had forgotten the details, but it involved moving pieces around a board is a very complicated manner. To win, Akkarin had said, you had to think several moves ahead, working out what your opponent was likely to do. He had offered to teach her, but she had refused, knowing her own limitations. She hadn't the patience for long term speculation, she liked action, and the sooner the better.
After an hour's ride, she began to feel the usual aches in her back and thighs. She tried Healing, but there was not enough power to draw on. Without her noticing, the creation of the illusion and the maintenance of Jalette's physical form until very recently had drained most of her magic. Luckily, her actions had not drained it completely, otherwise she would be in deadly peril, but there was not much of it left.
She halted Trouble and slipped from his back. She led him over to some lush looking grass and tethered him loosely so that he could eat. She had to find some power quickly. There were only one or two trees in the area, as the vegetation was mostly scrub with a few straggly bushes. She walked over to a likely looking tree. It was not a big one, but it looked healthy. She made the cut with her black magician's knife and held her hand over the wound. She had hardly enough power available to drain the tree's magic and for a few minutes she feared failure, but then she began to experience the faint trickle of green magic. There wasn't much, but she took it all.
She looked around. The only other suitable tree was along the trail. She checked on Trouble. He was enjoying his unexpected meal so she left him to it and walked down to the tree. When she reached it, she noticed it was even smaller than the previous one. Not much power here, she thought despondently. She had no choice, however, so she took what she could. On the way back to collect Trouble, she took power from a bush or two and even tried a country rose that was entwined amongst the bushes. None of it amounted to much, but at least it gave her power source a small boost.
She untethered the horse and scrambled on his back. No levitation available for almost powerless Sonea and she still could not access her Healing. Luckily there was no one watching to see how ungainly she was! Trouble was not best pleased at being torn away from the grass and it took a few minutes before she could settle him down to continue their journey.
After a while, the track broadened out and she began to see houses and other buildings dotted around the countryside. They were not that far from Imardin now, so she had to concentrate on the next phase of her plan. Her intention was to climb the wall at the very back of the Guild, where she and Cery had often broken into the grounds. If her memory was correct, there was some tree and shrub cover. Once over the wall, she would be able to take cover until she could see the way clear to getting back to her rooms. One thing she would need to do first was to ditch the rather bright Healer's robes she was wearing. It wouldn't do for Sonea to be seen as a Healer when everyone knew she should be wearing black robes.
Originally, she had assumed she would have enough power to disguise herself, or if not that, then at least disguise the robes, rather like she had done when she left the Fort, but with her power levels so low and the prospect of their remaining so for some time, she was no longer able to do anything like that.
I shall have to steal some other clothing, she thought. It will be just like old times, stealing something, then breaking into the Guild! She was a little shocked at how much she was looking forward to seeing if her old dwell skills were still as good as ever. Once a dwell, always a dwell!
Her second priority was to find somewhere for Trouble. She had to balance her need to get as close to the back wall as possible, with finding somewhere a suitable distance from the Guild to delay the horse's return. Not for the first time, she cursed her poor geography. Although she remembered the general route to the spot where she could safely get into the Guild, she had no clear idea of the buildings, farms and fields along the way. There were bound to be people working in the fields, or walking to and from Imardin. She muttered a quick prayer to the Eye that when the time came, she would be lucky once more.
The closer she came to the city, the more buildings and people she encountered. Luckily, the sight of a Healer on the road back to the Guild was not an unusual occurrence, so people didn't give her a second glance. She slowed to walking pace, looking around for a likely spot to leave the horse. She was beginning to think she would never find one, when she noticed a country lane leading off the road and up a slight incline. As far as she could tell, there were fields on either side and not many buildings. She turned into the lane and urged Trouble into a trot. She passed one small house, with a barn attached, but then she found herself in open countryside with no buildings or people in sight.
She was still too near the road, to risk leaving the horse, so she continued up the hill until she was almost at the top. She stopped and took a long look round. As far as the eye could see there were fields, small woods and a few animals, nothing else.
"I think this will do, Trouble," she said as she slid from his back. The horse flattened his ears but otherwise took no notice.
She walked him over to where there was a gate. She fiddled with the opening, then pushed it open and leading the horse, went inside. It was a large field and over at the far edge, she could see one or two other horses. Even better, she thought, he will be less conspicuous than in a field on his own. She tethered Trouble while she fumbled with the saddle fastenings, eventually they were all undone and she eased it off his back. Trouble began dancing again, turning his head as far as he could and rolling his eyes to see what she was doing. She spoke softly to him, hoping to keep him calm because she now how to undo his bridle. She never liked doing this at home with her own horse, and Trouble looked as if he could bite.
In the event, Trouble allowed her to remove the bridle without much difficulty. The horse was now free and she slapped him on the rump to encourage him to move away. For a moment, it looked as if he would be difficult to the end and refuse to move, but then he kicked up his heels and took off for the other horses at a gallop.
Sonea stuffed the saddle and bridle under the hedge and covered them as best she could with vegetation. Hopefully no one would find Trouble for a few days and there was plenty of grazing for him, so he should come to no harm. Without a backward glance, Sonea left the field, carefully shutting the gate behind her and set off for the road to Imardin.
She had obviously travelled farther than she had thought because it took her a good half and hour's walking at a brisk pace to reach the point where she had turned off. There were a fair number of people on the road, so to avoid any unwanted questions or conversation, she pulled up the hood of her robe, looked directly ahead and strode along, almost daring anyone to speak to her.
The nearer she got to the Guild, the more concerned she became about her Healer's robes. She couldn't change her appearance and unfortunately after her recent very public return to the Guild, all magicians would be able to recognise her and realise she was wearing another magician's outfit. That would create the very thing she was trying to prevent. She needed to sneak back in.
There was no other option but to steal some ordinary clothes. There were consequences to a magician found not wearing robes, but she had broken so many rules in her time as a Guild magician that wearing clothes rather than robes didn't really matter. She kept an eye out for a washing put out to dry. If she were quick, she could grab some trousers and a shirt before anyone noticed.
It was a warm day and there was plenty of washing drying on lines or draped over convenient bushes, but none of it was suitable. To Sonea's disgust, it was mostly children's clothing festooning the bushes. She kept telling herself that it was only a matter of time before she came across something that would do, but the longer time went on, the less that thought cheered her. Just at the point where she had almost given up hope, Sonea spotted a row of trousers, skirts and shirts blowing in the breeze. She stopped and pretended to fiddle with her boots, all the while looking around to see if she could see the owners. It was obviously the home of a washer woman because the variety of clothing was too much for one household. Usually these types of places had a washing area separate from the house and if her luck held, the washer woman would be in there getting the next batch ready for putting out.
Sonea slipped into the garden. She had already decided exactly which garments she wanted. She waited for a moment to see if she would be challenged, but nothing happened. It took only a few seconds for her to grab the two items she wanted and stuff them under her robes, then she was off and away from the place as quickly as she could, half expecting to hear an annoyed shout from behind her. But her luck held and she made a clean escape.
Once she found somewhere to change her garments, she stripped off the Healer's green clothing and replaced them with her ill-gotten gains. She looked around for somewhere to hide the green clothing. There was nothing obvious, but there was a pile of rubbish a few feet from where she was. She glanced around but there was no one taking any interest in her. She quickly hid the robes out of sight then resumed her march towards the Guild.
By the time she reached the back wall of the Guild, Sonea was tired, hungry and rather thirsty. She had no money with her to buy anything and she couldn't bring herself to steal anything else as her conscience was pricking her about her stolen garments. She looked up. The wall seemed much higher than she remembered and there was no Cery to offer a helping hand. She knew too that Warriors patrolled the walls although there was a significant amount of time between their passing a particular point.
She looked around for something to help her scale the wall. Most of the trees she remembered from memory had gone, but there was a tree some distance away. It seemed to her to be at least as high as the wall. She hurried towards it, but when she got there, she could see that where the tree stopped and the top of the wall, there was a gap she would have to negotiate.
She hauled herself up to the first branch and took stock. This area at the back of the Guild was often deserted and now was no exception. She should have enough time to climb the tree and get over into the grounds. The only problem was the patrolling Warriors. She would have to depend on her hearing until she was in a position to look over the wall.
She had loved climbing as a young dwell and there was something satisfying about revisiting it. She was surefooted as she moved from branch to branch, climbing higher and higher. Towards the top of the tree, the branches became much thinner and her progress slowed. She began to hear voices and childish laughter, so she froze as a noisy group came running along the path. They didn't look up or see her, but she remained still for some time after they had disappeared into the distance.
Now her problem was getting from the tree to the top of the wall. The distance was about the same as her height. She couldn't jump that far and she had no power to rely on for levitation. She examined the wall closely. It was solidly built of large blocks of stone, mortared together. In places the mortar had worn away, leaving small gaps into which she could put the toe of her boot. She also had her knife, so she could make the gaps bigger if necessary. She thought she could stand on the last remaining solid branch and gouge a series of gaps to provide a form of ladder.
There was no point in waiting. Sonea set about her task. The mortar was flaky in places and it didn't take much time to create a gap. She was able to reach up for about half the distance between the top of the tree and the top of the wall. That would have to be enough. Hopefully she would be able to pull herself up the rest of the way. All the while she was working, she kept an ear out for sounds of the Warrior patrol. She heard nothing at first, then the sound of steady pacing gradually became louder, before dying away as the Warrior continued on his rounds. She anticipated she would have at most ten minutes before the next patrol came past her section of the wall.
She put her toes into the last gap she had created and reached up with her knife to create a finger hold. Slowly, inch by inch, Sonea pulled herself up the wall until she could reach up with her arms and grab hold of the top. With no magic to help her, it was hard work. She was very tired, but the thought that she might be seen from the tree side or be noticed by the patrol provided the impetus to make her finish quickly.
She pulled with all her strength until she was lying along the top of the wall. Although it was risky, she stopped for a moment to catch her breath. Then she looked down into the Guild grounds. It was a long way down and this time there was no tree. There was no help for it but to lower herself by her arms as far as she could, and then let herself fall, hoping she wouldn't damage anything in the process. There would be no Healing if she did.
She estimated she had about 3 minutes before the patrol reappeared, so there was no time to lose. She thought back to her youth when she and Cery were always climbing into places where they shouldn't be. She remembered one piece of advice they had been given. If you have to fall from a height, try to roll when you land. It had been a long time since she had put that advice into practice but she would have to try it again.
Sonea let go. She was conscious of scraping her knees as she fell, but she didn't have long to worry about it as the ground was coming up to meet her fast. Just before she landed, she curled into a ball. The shock of hitting the ground winded her, but she kept rolling away from the wall towards the undergrowth. Already she could hear the Warrior nearing her position. She slid into the vegetation and kept still as he passed.
It was only after he had disappeared that she became aware of what her body was trying to tell her. She hurt. Her arms felt as if they had been pulled from their sockets. Her knees were sore and she felt bruised all over. She sat up, biting her lips to prevent a groan escaping. She looked down. Her trousers were torn at the knee, blood oozing from a deep graze. It was tempting to stay huddled on the ground until she felt better, but she needed to get back to her rooms. There she could clean herself up as well as changing into proper robes.
She got shakily to her feet. Luckily she had not damaged her ankles and although her knees smarted, she was able to walk. She was not far from the stables and she knew of a passage nearby which would get her across the grounds to the magicians' quarters without being seen. How she got into the building after that was another little problem she needed to solve. Sonea brushed herself down, mopped up the blood as far as possible and set off.
