The Raging Fires Read Online Free Page A

less, I’m afraid, about controlling your pride.”
    I glanced at him bashfully as I slid the staff into my belt. But before I could speak, Rhia chimed in. “Come now, Merlin. Play something for us on that little whatever-it-is.”
    My mother nodded. “Yes, do.”
    Cairpré allowed himself a grin. “Perhaps you could sing with him, Elen.”
    “Sing? No, not now.”
    “Why not?” He regarded me thoughtfully, his face both anxious and hopeful. “If he can, indeed, make the psaltery play, it will be true cause for celebration.” For some reason, his expression seemed to darken. “No one knows that better than I.”
    “Please,” urged Rhia. “If there’s any celebrating to do, there’s no better way to do it than with one of your songs.”
    My mother’s cheeks flushed. Turning toward the rippling leaves of the rowan, she pondered for a moment. “Well . . . all right.” She opened her hands to the three of us. “I shall sing. Yes, a joyful song.” Her eyes darted to the poet. “For the many joys of the past year.”
    Cairpré brightened. “And of the years to come,” he added in a whisper.
    Again my mother blushed. Just why didn’t concern me, for I, too, shared her joy. Here I stood, with family, with friends, increasingly at home on this island—all of which would have seemed utterly impossible just over one year ago. I was now fourteen years old, living in this forest, a place as peaceful as the autumn leaves I could see drifting downward. I wanted nothing more than to stay in this very place, with these very people. And, one day, to master the skills of a wizard. Of a true mage—like my grandfather.
    My fingers squeezed the psaltery’s frame. If only it would not fail me!
    I drew a deep breath of the crisp air buffeting the hilltop. “I am ready.”
    My mother, hearing the tautness in my voice, brushed her finger against my cheek—the same cheek that, long ago, had been scarred by a fire of my own making. “Are you all right, my son?”
    I did my best to force a grin. “I’m just imagining how my strumming is going to compare to your singing, that’s all.”
    Although I could tell she didn’t believe me, her face relaxed slightly. After a moment, she asked, “Can you play in the Ionian mode? If you will just strike the root chord, and play for a while, I can fit my song to your melody.”
    “I can try.”
    “Good!” Rhia leaped up to catch hold of the rowan’s lowest branch. She swung to and fro, releasing a belllike laugh as golden leaves rained down on us. “I love to hear a harp, even a tiny one like yours. It reminds me of the sound of rain dancing on the summer grass.”
    “Well, the summer has passed,” I declared. “Yet if anything can bring it back, it will be Mother’s voice, not my playing.” I turned to Cairpré. “Is it time, then? For the incantation?”
    Even as the poet cleared his throat, his expression darkened again—this time more deeply, as if a strange, contorted shadow had fallen across his thoughts. “First there is something I must tell you.” He hesitated, selecting his words. “Since time beyond memory, any Fincayran boy or girl with the promise of deep magic has left home for an apprenticeship similar to yours. With a real wizard or enchantress, preferably, but if none could be found, with a scholar or bard.”
    “Like you.” What was he leading up to? All this I knew.
    “Yes, my boy. Like me.”
    “But why are you telling me this?”
    His brow grew as wrinkled as his tunic. “Because there’s one more thing you should know. Before you play your psaltery. You see, that apprenticeship—the time of mastering the fundamentals of enchantment, before even starting to make a musical instrument—normally takes . . . a long time. Longer than the eight or nine months it has taken you.”
    My mother cocked her head at him. “How long does it usually take?”
    “Well,” he fumbled. “It, ah, varies. Different, you see, from one person to the