Only one man had reached this skill, only one, in the age of the Old Kingdoms.

A second had reached for it, at the dawn of the Sihhé.

A third attempted it, this night. His name was Mauryl Gestaurien.

And the magic he wrought was not a way to peace.  That, too, was characteristic of his kind.

He spoke a Word. He stared into a point in the charged insubstance of the air, tinier than a mote of dust. He was at that moment aware of the whole mass of stone around the room, aware of the Shadows among the gables, that insinuated threads into cracks and crevices of shutters, that crept among the rafters, seeking toward his study. He drew the light in Ynefel inward, until it was only in this room.

In that moment, Shadows edged under the doors and ran along the masonry joints of the walls. Shadows found their way down the chimney hole, and the fire shrank.

In that moment a wind began to blow, and Shadows jumped and capered about the rafters above the study, and seeped down the chimney like soot.

Came a mote of dust, catching the light, just that small, just that substantial, and no more.

Came a sparkle in that mote, that became a light like the uncertain moon, like the reflection of a star.

Came a creaking of all the ill-set timbers of the keep at once, and a fast fluttering of shadows that made the faces set into the walls seem to shift expression and open their mouths in dread.

Came a sifting of dust of the walls and dust from the wooden ceiling and the stone vault; and the dust fell on that point of light, and sparkled.

A gust of wind blasted down the chimney throat, blew fire and cinders into the room. Shadows clawed at the stones and reached for the spark in the whirl of dust.

But the spark became a sudden crack of lightning, whitening the gray stone of the walls, drinking the feeble glow of the fire into shocked remembrance of bright threads weaving, turning and knotting and coming apart again.

Mauryl groaned as the scattered elements resisted. He doubted. At the last moment—he attempted exception, equivocation, revision of what he reached for. On the brink of failure—snatched, desperately, instead, after simple life.

A shadow grew in the heart of the twisting threads, the shadow of a man, as the light faded.., shadow that grew substantial and became living flesh and bone, the form of a young man naked and beautiful in the ordinary grayness of an untidy room.

The young man’s nostrils drew in a breath. His eyes opened. They were gray as the stone, serene as the silence.

Mauryl shook with his effort, with the triumph of his magic ...

Trembled, in doubt of all his work, all his skill, all his wisdom.., now that done was done and it stood before him.

The light was gone, except the fire tamely burning in the hearth, amid a blasted scatter of chimney ash across the stones. Mauryl stretched out his hand, leaning on his staff with the other, the room gone close and breathless to him, light leaping in ordinary shadow about the clutter of parchments and birds’ wings, alembics and herb-bundles.

Mauryl beckoned, crooked a finger, the one hand trembling violently, the other clenched on his staff. He beckoned a second time, impatiently, angrily, fearing catastrophe, commanding obedience.

Slowly the youth moved, a tentative step, a second, a third.

Alarmed, Mauryl raised the knobbed staff like a barrier, and the advance ceased. He stared into gray, quiet eyes and judged carefully, conservatively, before he lowered that ward and leaned on his staff with both arthritic hands, out of strength, out of resources.

The Shadows lurked still in the corners of the study, moving quietly in the gusting of wind down the chimney. Thunder muttered from an outraged and ominous heaven.

The young man stood still and, absent the focus offered him by the lifted staff, gazed about his surroundings: the hall, the cobwebby labyrinth of beams and wooden stairs and balconies above balconies above balconies ... the cabinets and tables and disarray of parchments and oddments of dead animals and leaves. Nothing in particular seemed to stay his eye or beg his attention: all things perhaps were inconsequential to him, or all things were equally important and amazing; his expression gave no hint which. He put a hand to his own heart and looked down at his naked body, which still seemed to glow with light like candleflame through wax. He flexed the fingers of that hand and watched, seemingly entranced, the movement of the tendons under his flesh, as if that was the greatest, the most inexplicable magic of all.

Dazed, Mauryl said to himself, and took courage then, though shakily, to proceed on his judgment. He came close enough to touch, to meet the gray, wonder-filled stare of a fearsome innocence. “Come,” he said to the Shaping, offering his hand. “Come,” he ordered the second time, and prepared to say again, sternly, in the case, as with some things dreadful and unruly, three callings might prove the charm.

But the youth moved another step, and, feeling increasingly the weakness in his own knees, Mauryl led the Shaping over to sit on the bench by the fireside, sweeping aside with his staff a stack of dusty parchments, some of which slid into the fire.

The Shaping reached after the calamity of parchments. Mauryl caught the reaching arm short of the fire. Parchment burned, with smoke and a stench and a scattering of pieces on an upward waft of wind, and the Shaping watched that rise of sparks, rapt in that brightness, but in no wise resisting or showing other, deeper thought.

Mauryl braced his staff between himself and an irregularity of the hearthstones, whisked off his own cloak and settled it about the boy, who at that instant had leaned forward on the bench, the firelight a-dance on his eyes, his hand ...

“No!” Mauryl cried, and struck at his outreaching fingers. The youth looked at him in astonished hurt as the cloak slipped unnoticed to the  floor.

A dread settled on Mauryl, then.., in denial of which he set the cloak again about the youth’s shoulders, tucked its folds into unresisting, uncooperative fingers. To his vexation, he had even to close the young man’s hand to hold it.

“Boy.” Mauryl sat down at arm’s length from him on the bench and, seizing the folds of the cloak in either hand, compelled the youth to face about and look him full in the eyes. “Boy, do you understand me? Do you?”

The youth blinked. The dip of his head that followed might have been a nod of acceptance.

Or an avoidance—as the gaze skittered aside to the fire.

Mauryl put out a hand, turned the face toward him perforce. “Boy, do you recall, do you remember.., anything?”

Another redirection, a blink, an eclipse of gray eyes, blank and bare as a misty morning. It might have been confirmation. It might equally well have been feckless bewilderment.

“A place?” Mauryl asked. “A name?”

“Light.” The youth’s voice began as a breath and grew stronger. “A voice.”

“No more?”

The youth shook his head, eyes solemnly fixed on his the while.

Mauryl’s shoulders sagged. His very bones ached with loss.

The eyes still waited for him, still held not the slightest comprehension, and Mauryl drew a breath, thought of one thing to say, that was bitter, and changed it to another, that accepted all he had.

“Tristen. Tristen is your name, boy. That name I give you. That name I call you. To that name you must answer. By that name I compel you to answer. My name is Mauryl. By that name you will call me. And I do need you, I do most desperately need you, —Tristen.”

The gray eyes held ... perhaps a spark of life, of further, dawning question. Mauryl let go the cloak, stared at the boy as the boy stared at him, open to the depths, utterly naked, with or without the cloak.

“Have you,” Mauryl asked, “no thought of your own? Have you no question? Do you feel, Tristen? Do you feel at all? Do you want? Do you desire? Do you think of anything?”