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men’s training.”
    “No, I’m fine, General,” said Raettonus, waving him away. With barely a word more, Tykkleht departed.
    Raettonus eyed the boys appraisingly as he crossed the room. The children got to their feet as quickly as their conditions would allow. He could see that they were evaluating him, as well. For a while they stood in awkward stillness, all staring at each other. Finally, Raettonus broke the silence and said, “My name is Raettonus. You will address me as Raettonus. Never as ‘Magician.’ Not even as ‘Magician Raettonus.’”
    “Yes, Raettonus,” said the boys in unison.
    “Go ahead and sit down,” Raettonus said, leaning against the windowsill. He nodded toward Dohrleht. “What happened to your leg?”
    “I broke it when I was a kid,” he answered, still studying Raettonus with his moss-colored eyes. “I was learning to joust, and I got my hoof stuck on a rock and slammed through a fence. It broke in a couple places and never healed right.”
    “Raettonus,” ventured the younger brother timidly. Raettonus turned his pale gaze on the boy. “Y-you’re from… Well, they told us that you’re from another realm. That’s… that’s true, right?”
    “Yes, that’s right,” Raettonus answered, crossing his arms and readjusting himself on the sill. The naked rapier shoved through his belt clinked against the stone behind him.
    Maeleht’s eyes widened in awe. “Truly? Another realm?” he asked, leaning forward, his elbows on the table. “What was it like? Will you tell us?”
    “Some day, maybe,” Raettonus said, glancing out the window. In the yard below the soldiers were practicing, and Brecan was down there with them, Daeblau at his side. “It’s nothing very interesting, I’m afraid. We don’t have gryphons, or unicorns, or dragons where I’m from, you know.”
    “Dragons aren’t interesting, anyway,” Dohrleht said. “We see them all the time, lurking up on the cliffs. Dad killed one two days ago.”
    “His men did most of the work,” Maeleht said quietly. “But he struck the killing blow through its eye. Are you really going to teach us to do magic?”
    Raettonus looked at him out of the corner of his eye. “That’s the plan, yes,” he said. “Though, really, it all depends on whether you can learn it or not. Some people don’t have it in them. Some people won’t work hard enough.”
    “We’ll work hard,” Maeleht assured him, balling his tiny hands into fists. “I want to do magic!”
    “You’ll have to do more than ‘want,’” Raettonus told him. “Magic comes hand in hand with pain, boy. That’s the kind of magic we do—the painful kind. The kind that kills.”
    “Will you teach us other types of magic too?” the younger boy asked.
    “He doesn’t want to kill,” Dohrleht said knowingly. “He’s afraid to.”
    “I am not afraid!” Maeleht protested. “I just think it’d be neat to do other things with magic. That’s all.”
    Raettonus straightened up from his place at the windowsill. “Yes, I can teach you other things, I suppose,” he said. “There are lots of non-lethal magics I could show you.”
    “Could you show us right now?” Maeleht asked. “Some magic? Dad said you were the greatest magician in all of Zylx.”
    “And outside of it,” Raettonus said. “Yes, I suppose I can show you something.”
    He took a seat beside their table. The two boys’ attention was fully on him, but behind them Ebha was staring blankly at a wall, in her own little world. Raettonus lifted up one of his hands and reached forward into the empty air. He imagined himself reaching into a space between realms—a room unaffected by time with a few trinkets lying about inside it. His fingertips explored the space, sliding across cloth and steel and leather and cold flesh. He continued to probe that unseen place between places until his fingers brushed against a smooth, cold ceramic handle and he grabbed hold of it. Dohrleht and Maeleht gasped