Before The Mask by Michael Williams Page A

acquainted, like weathered, familiar rivals in the shaky truce of the
     gebo-naud, and with that acquaintance, outright hostility had become as difficult as
     friendship.
    During long hours of instruction, when Verminaard sat on his stool in the northwest tower
     and nodded at Cer-estes' lectures on spellcraft and alchemy, he had seen out the window
     where Aglaca wandered through the gardens north of the walls. The gardens were still
     immaculate despite the ten years' absence of Mort, the gardener who had left this spot
     when Daeghrefn's temper turned. In this sanctuary, Aglaca would stoop to examine a sprig
     of cedar, to smell a flower, then vanish altogether behind a blue stand of evergreens.
    Why, the boy is only a gardener at heart, Verminaard thought scornfully. A floral fool.
    And Verminaard would return to his lessons, delighted when the smoke rose from the palm of
     his hand, or when a brief, clumsy incantation drew water from the dark wall of the castle.
    He did not realize that, from the gardens, Aglaca had also glimpsed his hulking shadow at
     the window of the tower. Nor did he suspect that Aglaca knew of his secret envy, the envy
     any prisoner of scholarship feels toward those who are free. Whenever Verminaard watched,
     Aglaca ducked behind the big stand of aeterna to practice his other studies. There he
     would mimic the movements of the mantis, standing with his arms poised above him in a
     grotesque, almost silly position, then bringing his hands down suddenly, repeatedly,
     tirelessly, in deadly accurate blows.
    The months passed, and his reflexes quickened. Once the mantis had taught him speed, he
     picked up
    the sword he had hidden amid the blue-needled branches. And in what remained of
     Verminaard's mother's rose garden, he would wheel and dance, his feet stepping lightly and
     harmlessly between the roses, his deft hands whirling the sword above his head. Then
     suddenly, violently, as though taught by nature and blood for a thousand years, he would
     bring the blade whistling down to the tip of a rose petal. The metal edge would shear in
     precise halves an iridescent, predatory beetle, but leave the blossom intact, untouched
     even by the wind from the blade.
    Verminaard never saw Aglaca's private schooling, but the Solamnic lad did not go
     unobserved. Under orders from Daeghrefn, the seneschal Robert would watch from behind a
     blue topiary,
    marveling as the youth grew in wisdom and stature and grace.
    Nor did Aglaca always study alone. Since a month after he took up residence in Castle
     Nidus, a cloaked woman would meet him in the garden's seclusion. There she taught him herb
     lore, self- defense, and a muted, rudimentary magic. Robert would crane through the blue
     branches to overhear the both of them, and the woman's voice, tantalizing at the edge of
     hearing, charmed him with its music and lilt.
    And its familiarity. The seneschal had heard that music before. On one sunlit day in
     midspring, the woman had turned toward him, looked right at him through the network of
     branches . . . Auburn- haired and tall and dark-eyed. He remembered the face at once.
     L'Indasha Yman smiled and winked at Robert. For a week afterward, the seneschal slept
     fitfully. The druidess was somehow spiriting herself onto castle grounds, and he wondered
     if she were treacherous enough to betray him or reckless enough to risk her life and his
     by these visits in broad daylight. Yet daily he saw her, and there was yet no alarm from
     the keep, no
    midnight summons from the Lord of Nidus. Robert breathed more easily, until the day he saw
     Daeghrefn himself in the garden.
    Aglaca and L'Indasha were bowed over a rose, and the druidess was lecturing the Solamnic
     youth about Mort the gardener. He was a sturdy, warmhearted man from Est-wilde who had
     weathered the surliness of Daeghrefn while planting lilies and roses throughout the keep.
     But in Verminaard's second year,