Ten Apprentices

  Ten Apprentices

  by Mette Ivie Harrison

  Copyright 2012 by Mette Ivie Harrison

  Smashwords Edition

  Table of Contents:

  Binding

  Pi (originally published in Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show issue 10 2008)

  The Magician’s Apprentice

  Needle and Spit

  Jonas

  Delilah’s Apprentice

  The Taste of Story

  The Undertaker’s Magic

  The Forgotten Mountains

  Nor Will I Ever

  BINDING

  Twice a year, at the beginning of spring and the end of fall, a fool was bound.

  My mouth. My eyes. My arms. My spine. My lungs and heart and stomach.

  My mind.

  And it hurt. Oh, how it hurt. Like fire, at first, and then like ice. And then, months later, it would throb still, like water dripping from a broken Roman pipe, one that no one knew how to fix anymore. So they kept the water moving through it, hoping it would not break this year. Or the next.

  But it always did.

  #

  It began when I was five years old.

  My parents had no say in the matter. The king had seen me in the street, had seen my blond hair and my straight teeth. He’d seen me hop and dance, and he’d chosen me to be his fool’s apprentice.

  There was no gainsaying the king.

  I tried not to hate the fool for it, as well. He was old. He had served his time. Fifteen years of his life, from five to twenty. I pitied him and his misshapen body, the hump on his back, the tortured movements that the king insisted upon still, despite the fool’s age and the pain in his joints that got worse with bad weather.

  I saw my parents now and again, when I rode in the wagons with the king’s whole court, as we changed from winter to summer, and back again. But it was always just before the binding, and when I looked at them, I could not help but think that they should have protected me. They should never have let me out in the street when the king was known to be riding by. They should have kept me inside, all the time. No matter how I complained, they should have done it. They should have taken no risks.

  On those days when I rode past them, I would sometimes stare them straight in the eye until they looked away. My father first, then my mother, with tears in her eyes.

  Other times, I would not look at them at all. I would hold my head high and let them look at me, if they would. I would not care.

  But I could not often hold it. I would look back, or try to find them out of the corner of my eye. And if they were not there, I would be the one to weep. I could never be entirely sure, however. Perhaps they came and I could not see them. I had been too stubborn to see them.

  I hated myself then, because I knew it was my fault that I was no longer their son, that I had become, in truth, part of the king’s court.

  #

  The older I grew, the more often I performed for the king, and the more often I saw a distant frown on his face.

  I thought this was because the king missed the old fool. The king asked for him, when he had consultations with the lesser kings, when he had treaty negotiations with our enemies.

  What use he was, I did not know. To me, it seemed he mostly sang, for he could no longer dance or tumble. He sang or played his eerie lute with those stubby fingers of his.

  He played with finesse, with beauty, but not with vigor.

  He was terrible to look at, now horribly deformed in shape. His head was too large for his shrunken body, his whiskers strangely dark and rough on a child’s shape. And when I saw him, I knew he was the man I would be, if I lived through the bindings.

  It was no different than others at court.

  Pages would become knights.

  First sons would become lords.

  Princes would become kings.

  We all had our place in the world.

  And why should I complain? I was living at court. I wore fine clothes. I ate hot food every day, for the cook would keep it for me even if I performed through dinner. And there was always wine in plenty.

  I slept where I fell, most nights. But if there was no entertainment at dinner, or if the king was in a mood to allow only the old fool in with him, I slept on a true bed, such as my parents had never seen. With a mattress made of feathers, set up above the ground so that the rats found it more difficult to get to me.

  I was warm, even through winter. There was no fire in my room, but if ever I was cold, all I had to do was find a spot just outside the kitchen, where the knights and pages and others in the king’s court took their sleep. They did not mind snugging me in next to them. They saw me as the fool, as part of the court, and while I doubt they would have let me do swordplay with them, I belonged in their warmth.

  They laughed when I told my jokes. They sang along with me when I played, or when the king insisted that I use my high voice to sing the songs he said his mother once sang to him, many years ago. I had a good voice, and knew it. The compliments I was given were not false.

  And yet.

  I was still the fool.

  I would die young. At thirteen, I had perhaps fifteen years of life left to me. A good life, and longer than many would get. Most knights would die long before that, in battle, or of a wound in practice when they were drunk.

  My parents could well be dead next year, if there was a drought in the land.

  I would not die of that.

  But with all the comfort, there was still the pain.

  I clenched my teeth at it and tried to bear it like a man. I looked at the pages and saw the cuts on their arms, the bruises across their cheeks, the blackening of their eyes. They, too, had pain, and it came unexpectedly. At least I knew when mine would come. I should be grateful, and praise God.

  #

  There was a girl named Lucy.

  I will admit truthfully, she was pretty, but not beautiful. She had a tiny nose and hair cropped short, as if she had recently been pretending to be a boy. She had come to the court from a farm, and perhaps that is why I was immediately drawn to her. She smelled familiar. She moved as a farmwoman did, slowly, with deliberation. No hurry in her, despite who shouted at her.

  And she had breasts.

  I will not pretend that I did not notice such things.

  I was half her size by then, my eyes coming to her waist, tiny as it was, if I was close to her. So I tended to be a few steps further away, to enjoy the view better, so to speak.

  She thought of me as a child, that was clear. She petted my head when I walked by and offered me sweets, and spoke to me in that tinny voice that is good for pet goats—and children who are still learning what to do with their fingers other than suck on them.

  If I were not a fool, it would be different.

  She was not indifferent to the charms of young men. I saw the way that her eyes lingered on the backside of one particular page, with dark curls that he liked to push back from his face. He did not notice her, however. He was too interested in the knights.

  If I had never been bound, I let myself daydream, she would have loved me. She would have looked up into my eyes, instead of the other way around. She would have put her hands across my shoulder, and kissed me when she told me she thought I had done well.

  She might have let me into her bed.

  But even if a fool had a lover, no fool married.

  What woman would want a fool for a husband?

  A man whose only purpose in life was to make others laugh, or cry? Who rolled about on the floor like a dog with a ball? Who was up all hours, and was no part of the king’s deliberation? The king’s friend, but not his advisor?

  What woman would want a man who could not lift her chin to hi
s mouth? Who was in pain such that he wept at night half the year? Who trembled when the time of binding came close, and retched as he walked the stairs to the magician who would do it?

  What woman would want a fool for the father of her children?

  And what fool would want to father children? I could not bear the thought of my child becoming a fool. I also could not bear the thought of my child choosing to be something else. There is something selfish in me there, I know. Could I not be happy if my child were to have a better life than mine?

  But what of me? A child who could not admit me to be her father, who turned away every time I came near—how could I love such a child? And one who was proud of me would be one who had his brains pickled and I could not wish for that, either.

  Because I love her, I saw that Lucy was a girl who should have children. Scores of them, boys who would adore her and bring her wildflowers on her birthday, and girls who would pull at her skirts and beg her to kiss them on their cheeks. I told myself I would give up my selfish infatuation and show my true love of her by wishing a better man than myself on her. A man with prospects. A man who would make a good father of children.

  Not that idiot with the dark curls, however. He would never have her!

  There are plenty of knights who marry, and their wives are perfectly happy with the life. The knights die eventually, and then the widows get the king’s pension to live on.

  But Lucy should have more than that. She should have true wealth and position!

  #

  Soon, the king had a ball in search of a new wife (his first wife died years ago in childbirth, along with a weakly son, leaving the king without an heir). Because of Lucy, I risked much to make sure that each of the women presented to him were shown in their true colors.

  The duke’s daughter with the bad teeth, who had been taught carefully to hold her lips over them, for example. I pranced around her, doing back flips and making sounds like a donkey, then impersonating her father so well, complete with his farting, that she could not help but laugh out loud.

  A moment afterwards, she remembered, and put a hand over her mouth. But it was too late by then, the king had seen her clearly, and he did not look at her again.

  She had no idea that I had done her in.

  She saw me only as the fool, who had no power in court at all. But she left that night, and was never heard from at court again. I suppose her father married her to some foreigner across the sea, who had seen her only in a portrait, and one that concealed carefully her teeth, even against a truth spell.

  I made sure that the king realized that the lord’s sister could not speak an intelligible word. I do not say that she was a half-wit. Her eyes seemed to say that she had a mind in there somewhere. It just had no connection to her tongue.

  Her father was always speaking for her, whenever anyone asked her a question. And for the sake of politeness, it was let go. Except that a fool’s apprentice did not have to be polite.

  So I kept at it, asking her question after question, too fast for her father to answer them for her. And at last, when there were four all strung together, hanging in the air, waiting for her, she gaped and swallowed, and sputtered.

  Syllables came out. “I—that—uh—once—that is—I hope—”

  Others might have felt sorry for her as she fled the room in tears, but not I.

  Her father stared at me. There was something like knowledge glittering in his eyes.

  But the king called me to him, as if to remind the lord that I was under royal protection.

  And the lord walked out.

  He may try to kill me, but I will not care if I am dead. So long as the king is married to my Lucy.

  The last of the three (do they always come in threes?), was an older woman, one closer to the king’s own age. She was the widow of one of the lesser kings, and held power in her own right. She had managed to keep the king’s brother from taking her place, by the sheer virtue of being a better leader than he was. And ten years later, she was still the most popular in the kingdom, save for the high king himself.

  Some said she poisoned her own husband, others that she strangled him in bed, while he writhed with pleasure. No one much cared.

  She was handsome, but in a sturdy way, not delicate and fresh way like Lucy. She wore her hair carefully coiffed, in ringlets that were pulled off of her wrinkled face. I did not mind the sight of her heavy breasts, but they were lined with blue vines I could see when perched above her, reciting bawdy poetry.

  I made sure the king thought of her age when I told the story of the man who married an older woman so that he would not have to worry about getting children on her.

  The king could take no chances. He needed a woman who would bring him an heir. A beautiful woman who would give him ease, as well. A woman who would be no part of his dreary life at court, I thought. And a woman who could bring him hot little cakes in her hand, her cheeks stained with cold, while her breasts heaved with running.

  The old fool looked me over carefully that night, as he went away with the king to the king’s own chambers. They were up late, but afterward there was no call for new brides to be brought for him to look over. There were rumors that the king had sent letters to a foreign court to offer for the hand of a bride who would bring him treaties, but I did not believe them.

  The king was not a fool.

  #

  It was spring soon, and time for my binding. That year, for the first time, the time snuck up on me without my thinking of it until the very morning of. Then I woke with a start, my heart pounding in my throat as if the devil himself had chased me from my sleep. It took me a moment to realize what was wrong.

  And I thanked Lucy for it.

  She had distracted me from thinking about this, and ruining the few good days of the last month.

  My terror was worse than it had been on other years, but it lasted only hours. I would trade it again any day for what I normally endured.

  The magician lived in the tower above the stables. The smell was notoriously bad, though there were arguments about whether the magician made the stables smell worse, or it was the other way around. I had never seen the man outside of his tower. Even the king himself had to walk up the stone steps to get to him.

  It was dark inside. No light sconces, and the magician would not allow candles, for he claimed they stole his magic from him. This seemed unlikely, but one did not say that the magician was a liar, not even far away from him. The magician could hear everything said in the castle.

  My legs were shaking as much when I went up as I knew they would when I came down. I stumbled, nearly fell, but caught myself, tearing open the skin on one hand. I sucked at it, and continued up.

  When I knocked on his door, the magician said, “I’m waiting.”

  I pushed open the heavy wooden door, and stepped inside. For some reason, I was never more conscious of my lopsided gait than here, where it had been created on purpose. It was not enough for me to be tortured into a small size, and for me to be ugly as a newborn bird. I also had to limp, for that was what a fool did. It was tradition.

  The magician kept his face to the wall, tucked into his hood. I had never seen anything more than the tip of his nose and his chin. From the way he moved, I suspected he was old, but I did not know for sure. Ugly as I was, perhaps, and that was why he was so good at his job.

  “Stretch out your hands,” he said.

  I no longer believed that he needed me to do this, he with all his magic. But I did what he said. This was my sacrifice, if God was watching. I offered my willingness to be bound, if Lucy would be married to the king.

  The pain was only in my hands at first, and I thought for the first moment, this will not be so bad as before. I am almost past growing, anyway.

  But it was a lie.

  As soon as I thought I was in control of it, it doubled. And doubled again.

  I cried out in agony.

  My hands pulled away from the magician’s rough touch, and
I forgot about my bargain with God. I shouted out curses to Him, that He would do this to me, that He would choose me for this.

  I do not know when it stopped. There is a line which, once crossed, blurs the senses. I never lost consciousness, but I could only feel pain. When the magician ceased to pour the magic into me I did not know.

  He stood over me when I shivered in awareness of the fact that I had pissed myself. Again.

  I was embarrassed and thought about who must clean up these messes.

  But I did not ask to do it.

  I could not.

  I came gradually out of the curled position I had been in. Then brought myself to a kneeling position, one hand still on the sharp stones.

  I could taste blood in my mouth. My tongue was swollen and ragged.

  I dared not spit and show my disrespect. I swallowed instead.

  “So,” said the magician. “Who rules here? In the castle? In the kingdom?”

  I was dumfounded.

  The magician had never spoken to me after the binding before.

  “Who?” he asked again, this time grabbing for my sore fingers and pressing so hard that it felt he was crushing them.

  I sobbed. “The king,” I got out at last.

  He let go of my fingers. “You are not fool enough for that,” he said. Then after a moment, he looked into my eyes. “Or are you?” he asked.

  I gasped at the sight of the magician’s face, for it was the same as the king’s. Altered a bit around the eyes, a longer face, eyes that seemed older and angrier. But the same face.

  “The day of the brides, you showed me you knew the truth,” he said.

  My mind raced back. I had danced and cavorted in front of the king to prove that each of the women was unfit to be his bride. But surely the magician did not mean that I—and not the king—had ruled that day?

  “The binding,” he went on. “What does it do? Tell me.”

  “It makes me shrunken,” I said. “Small and misshapen and in pain.” I could not help the hint of reproach in my voice, though I knew the magician was bound in his own way, to serve the king.

  “What else?” the magician demanded. “You must know. I have watched you. Think back, on what you were like when you came here, and what you have become.”