The Sorcerer's Widow. Lawrence Watt-Evans

You’re from Ethshar of the Sands?”

      “Yes.”

      “From Morningside?”

      Kel blinked in surprise. Morningside was one of the wealthiest districts, and although the tunic he wore had been a good one when it was new, he had thought its shabby, worn condition, along with his lack of a hat or other accessories, would make it clear that he was not rich. “No,” he said.

      “Where, then?”

      “Smallgate.” Desperate to change the subject before he gave anything away, he added, “Are you from that village?” He gestured back over his shoulder.

      “Me? No.”

      “Where are you from, then?”

      “Oh, another village.”

      “What village? What was its name?”

      “We called it Gaffrir.”

      “Is that a Northern name?”

      It was Dorna’s turn to hesitate. “I don’t know,” she said.

      “It doesn’t sound Ethsharitic.”

      “No, it doesn’t, does it? Not like Smallgate.” She smiled at him. “Tell me about Smallgate.”

      Kel looked around at the countryside, at the blue sky and green fields and tidy white and brown farmhouses, hoping for inspiration, then turned up a palm. “It’s just like any part of the city, I suppose—streets and houses and shops.”

      “You’ve lived in Smallgate all your life?”

      “More or less.” He looked down at the footboard, wishing she would change the subject.

      “Did you serve your apprenticeship there?”

      Kel turned to stare at her. “Apprenticeship? I never served an apprenticeship.”

      “You didn’t?”

      “No!”

      “But I thought Ezak said…”

      Kel shook his head vigorously. “I was never an apprentice. If Ezak told you otherwise he was joking. He does that, sometimes—makes jokes. I don’t always understand them. They aren’t usually very funny.”

      Dorna smiled. “No? I think he’s funny.”

      “You’re smarter than I am.”

      Dorna seemed to consider that for a moment before saying, “Tell me about your family.”

      “Don’t have one,” Kel answered, looking away. “Ma died when I was eight.”

      “What about your father, or your grandparents?”

      “I don’t have any, so far as I know.”

      “Is that why you never served an apprenticeship?”

      “That, and other things. I didn’t especially want one.” That was not entirely true, but he did not care to discuss his background with the sorcerer’s widow.

      “No? You didn’t want to be a sorcerer, like your friend Ezak?”

      Kel spread empty hands.

      “Did you ever have any brothers or sisters?” Dorna asked.

      “Don’t know. Did you?”

      “I have a younger sister. I haven’t seen her in years.”

      “Why not?”

      “Because…well, she doesn’t live around here.”

      “What about your parents? Are they back in Gaffrir?”

      “No. My father’s dead, and my mother went home to her parents, in Aldagmor.”

      “So you do have grandparents?”

      Dorna shook her head. “No,” she said. “At least, I don’t think so, not anymore. But they were still alive when my father died.”

      Kel nodded.

      They rode on in silence for a few minutes, then Dorna asked, “How did you meet Ezak?”

      “Don’t remember,” Kel said.

      “You don’t?”

      “We were little.”

      “Oh. So you’ve been friends all your lives?”

      Kel nodded. “Our mothers were friends. He looked after me after my mother died.”

      “So you went with him when he was apprenticed?”

      Kel knew that Ezak’s real apprenticeship, to a potter, had lasted all of a sixnight before Ezak’s master threw him out for stealing, but he knew Dorna meant Ezak’s imaginary training in sorcery. He certainly wasn’t going to try to tell a bunch of complicated lies about that that might or might not match Ezak’s; instead he told one simple half-truth. “No,” he said. “I stayed in Smallgate and looked after myself. I was bigger by then.”

      “So Ezak came back and found you when he was a journeyman?”

      “Yes.”

      “So what do you do for a living? Are you his assistant?”

      “No. We’re just friends. I do odd jobs. What about you?”

      Dorna stared at him for a moment, then laughed. “I’m a housewife,” she said. “Though I did help Nabal look after his things.”

      Kel gestured at the wagon. “So you know what all those things back there do?”

      Dorna hesitated. “Some of them,” she said.

      Kel knew this was his opportunity to learn something really useful, to find out what some of the talismans did, and maybe which ones would be most worth stealing, but he couldn’t think of how to phrase a useful question. Talking to Dorna wasn’t like talking to Irien; it had been easy to get Irien talking about herself, about innkeeping, and about her family, but Dorna didn’t seem to want to say much. Her answers seemed short and uninformative—just as Kel tried to keep his own answers. She kept asking him new questions, instead of saying more about herself.

      Ezak was going to be disappointed if Kel wasted a chance to find out more about sorcery, but he just could not come up with a good lead-in. And after all, it wasn’t as if Ezak had done all that well himself.

      Finally, Kel just said, “Oh?”

      “Some of them,” Dorna repeated. Then she leaned back on the wagon-bench and looked at the road ahead, ignoring Kel.

      They rode most of the rest of the afternoon in silence.