The Prodigal Mage by Karen Miller

Author:Karen Miller [Miller, Karen]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: FIC009020
Publisher: Orbit
Published: 2012-04-06T18:13:32+00:00

Rafel wondered, just for a moment, whether he should risk Da’s wrath and step between him and Fernel Pintte before they came to blows. Snatches of their heated brangle blew to him on the lively breeze, words like fool and dangerous and arrogant. Fighting words. Jabbing fingers. Waving arms. Any ticktock they’d be rolling on the pier like tomcats, surely.

But Da won’t thank me for sticking my nose in. Da ain’t interested in anything I’ve got to say. I wasted my time traipsing all the way down here. I should’ve stayed in Dorana and helped Goose make his ale.

Temper simmering, he glanced around the pier. Behind him, Mama stood with Deenie, who’d done nowt but sigh and mope ever since they’d reached the coast. Arlin Garrick and his da, and the other Doranen mages, they were huddled whispering and pointing out to the reef. Making their plans to see it broken once and for all. Westwailing’s mayor and his followers milled about like lost sheep, casting anxious glances first at the Doranen and then at Da and Fernel Pintte, still arguing. The other Olken on the pier, the fishermen, ignored everything save the task of getting their smack ready to brave the distant reef.

The rest of Westwailing’s fishing fleet floated at rest, tucked safely out of the way of the upcoming magework. Rafel frowned at it. Funny. The family had visited the coast a handful of times in his life. He’d even been out on a fishing boat once, with some of the cousins he counted practically as strangers. Hadn’t much cared for it. Found it hard to imagine Da living that life, fish and stink and guts and hard work, scales and blisters and calluses and salt. Da still talked of moving back down here, leaving the City and coming to live beside the ocean.

He can if he wants. Mama too, and Deenie. But I won’t. That’s his dream, not mine. I’ve got my own dreams and no matter what he says I’ll live them. Whatever he says, I will be a great mage.

“Rafe…”

Mama. He shoved his hands in his pockets and kept on staring at the moored fleet. He didn’t want to hear her defending Da, again. Taking his side, again.

Once, just once, I wish she’d take my side.

“I could do it, y’know,” he said, letting his gaze stray from the tethered smacks to the reef. If he squinted, hard, he could just make out the waterspouts dancing beyond it. “I wouldn’t disgrace you in front of Rodyn Garrick and his friends.”

“Disgrace us? Rafe—” Mama took hold of his arm and pulled him round to face her. Her eyes were shocked. “This has nothing to do with Rodyn Garrick or any Doranen, or with us fearing you’d let us down. This is about doing what’s right.”

“What Da thinks is right,” he muttered. “But Mama—”

Her fingers tightened on his sleeve. “No, Rafe. Not again. And you should know better. There’s not a mage in this whole kingdom, Olken or Doranen, who understands the way your father does that some things are best left alone.

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