Page 13 of Overexposed

Owain looked a little confused there, and I was certain that he had no idea what a ward was. In the end, he nodded.

“Good. What I have not yet told you is that I am a magician. Not the kind you see in the village sometimes, with their cheap charms that will offer you Thor’s protection or Frey’s. I can do real magic.”

“You can?” Owain asked. “Are you like Mother Hulda, then? Do you have an apple tree that tells you when its apples are ripe? And a magic oven that always bakes fresh bread?”

Tove hmm-ed. “There are apple trees on my island, but I don’t think they speak, nor does the kitchen hearth as far as I am aware. So no. But I have to use magic to take us back home, to my castle. Do you understand, Owain?”

“We don’t have to walk there?”

“No, we do not. But for the spell not to fail, you must keep your eyes shut. It’s important, Owain.”

Now, let me halt and explain. If I had been Tove and standing in the darkness with a scared orphan boy I had basically just abducted, albeit out of charity, I would have entranced him, much like I entranced you that first time at the church. I did that to save you from sights you wouldn’t have been able to unsee, I did it to keep your body from rushing down that slope of fear.

At the time, I didn’t even know that entrancement existed. Tove, being a natural philosopher at heart, had a rule whereby he didn’t use entrancement unless it would allow him to feed unseen or to prevent greater harm from befalling the living. Those rules, I learned of only later, after he had made me. His rules never became mine, in part because my skill for entrancement surpasses his by far. All our gifts are different, after all. You have to remember that.

But even so, entrancing a scared child would have been kind, even if Tove’s skill would have only allowed a light sleep, a subtle trance. I thought about it much. I think he wanted to teach me a lesson on that lonely road. I believe he wanted to teach me that words win someone’s trust truer than entrancement. It is a good lesson, and yet. Owain was a child, not a lesson.

Tovewasgood, of course. He got Owain to wrap his scrawny, filthy arms around his neck. Tove easily held me with his other arm, and even the two of us weren’t much of a weight to him.

I remember thinking that the flight was very long -- long for a child to not open his eyes -- and cold. When we landed outside the tall front door to Tove’s castle, both I and Owain were shivering. Owain probably more so since he was wearing rags.

My mother met us in the solar, confused we were back so soon, I was sure, and confused we had brought a strange child along with us.

She took one look at Owain, then focused Tove in a cool gaze, and said, “You made me a promise, Tove. You said there were things you would never do.”

Tove lifted his hands submissively. “And my promise stands. This is Owain. He is to be Auris’s servant, nothing more. Maybe he’d even like to help you in the kitchen or with harvesting the apple trees.”

My mother’s eyes narrowed on first Owain, then me. “Well, the child is filthy. Both of them are. I keep telling you to at least get Auris bathed before you bring him back, but you never do.”

“I can heat the water for a bath, Mother,” I said. I knew my adventure had been cut short, and I was glad for that. A little work was a small price to pay.

“The fire is still hot, but I’ll stoke it,” my mother said and left us with regal strides.

“Is that your wife?” Owain asked Tove. “She wears men’s clothing.”

“That was Liv, Auris’s mother. Not my wife, but my apprentice. She wears whatever she wishes.”

If the flight hadn’t given Owain reason to think Tove was a magician, then seeing my mother, the apprentice, had. Then again, Tove was of the old world, and there was running water in his house, something you would recognize as a boiler. Believe me, for those who’ve never seen it and who know only the backbreaking work of carrying water and heating it in a pot over the fire, a running faucet is more magical than any wand or spell book.

Over the next several weeks, our small household adjusted to the new addition. Owain, while apparently determined to do his job well, didn’t have the first clue about what things needed doing and how to do them. I taught him how to clean boots and brush out the day’s clothes, how to swipe the ashes from the fireplace and which fires to light when. He was adept at kitchen work, and Mother had him fetch things, boil water, knead bread, and any number of those chores I’d been responsible for when I was about Owain’s age.

At the same time, Tove went back to furthering my education. Those trips where I was left in a place for days or weeks still happened, but one warm summer’s night, he walked into my room on silent feet, handed me a knapsack, and informed me we would be traveling together for a few days.

“It will be a longer flight than normal. Dress warmly and meet me outside,” he told me.

I hurried to comply while Owain was busying himself with closing the shutters in my room. Ah, Ethan, you would have liked it in Tove’s house. It was full of murals, full of corners where light caught and shadows gathered. I slept on a wool mattress under silk covers, and at night, the wave song sang me to sleep.

At any rate, Owain was lingering and staring in a way that told me he was trying not to get caught at it.

“I’ll be back soon,” I said, adding to myself,I hope. I could never be entirely certain of that.

“Are you going to go flying?” Owain asked. His voice was a few notes higher than normal, wonder brightening it.

“Yes,” I said.

He gnawed on his bottom lip. “Can you fly? Like Lord Tove can?” he asked, and I was never sure when exactly he had started calling Tove “Lord.” It probably amused Tove to be called a lord. He had opinions about royalty, the establishment of the day. In current terms, you’d call him a hippie, and no, my sweet, you are not to make comments about vampire hippies, and you are certainly not to joke about vampire hippie cults.

“No, I can’t fly like Tove can,” told Owain.

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