A Sudden Wild Magic

They swept up the mages from Records and congaed on toward Calculus. There Sandra, sobbing inside a concerned crowd of mage- calculators, looked up, saw the line, and shouted, “Yes! Conga him out, man!” And the entire Horn joined in. Warm and rhythmic, they bounced and shot legs out, downward to collect the cadets next. To Sandra, with her arms wrapped around Brother Gamon and her face in the prickly blue cloth of his uniform, it was as if life suddenly became new and clean and simple. By the time the line had collected the servicemen and bounced on to sweep in Maintenance Horn and Defense, the surprising pain of love, of the conflicting loyalties Sandra felt at all times, had melted simply to rhythm and song and to Brother Gamon bouncing in front of her, as if difficulties had never been. Absurd mirth flooded her as they swept down on Alchemy Horn. The cadets and servicemen, like a lusty shot in the arm, were roaring out what they thought the words were.

“Bets and balls and bonkers — AH!”

In fact, since the line was now a quarter of a mile long, there was the usual difference of opinion as to just what the words were. Alchemy Horn was certain they were “Can’t stand it all much longer — AH!” and Crafting sang, “Wronger still and wronger — AH!” while Observer Horn, when the mages there found the capering line roaring through their midst, joined it eagerly under the impression the words were “The High Head is a plonker — AH!”

Roz stood for a minute aghast, then for another minute with her arms folded and her lip curled — it was unbelievably silly and nonserious — but, as the blue-clad capering line receded from her down the corridor, where the front of it was already jolting and singing up and around the ramps on the next level, Roz was aware she had a choice. It seemed to be handed to her by the citadel itself. For the first time she became conscious that the place did indeed have vibrations, potent and awesome, like a voice. It spoke to her. Either she could join in this unusual and crazy piece of magic and become part of it, or she must stay aside and remain aside forever. She was suddenly aware there were others refusing to join in. She sensed Brother Wilfrid for one, hiding in a cupboard full of spare uniforms, and the obdurate Horn Head of Defense, who was still single-handedly guarding Arth from nonexistent invaders. Roz could be like those, the citadel told her, or — But Roz was always one who could not abide to be out of things. She sprinted after the capering line and flung herself onto the end of it. Step and step and step and step and boot in! And yelled out her own individual words. “If you can’t beat ‘em join ‘em— Ah!”

On the upper level the line was snaking through dormitories and recreation halls, where it swept up any mages who happened to be there and went snaking on down to Kitchen. Some accompanied the line as outriders and spectators. There were a number of mages up there too elderly to dance, and these followed excitedly, the way people follow processions, limping hurriedly through corridors parallel with the dancers in order to intercept them as they went bouncing and yelling uproariously through the kitchens and gathered in everyone at work there.

Brother Milo fled the line, to an alcove in the corridor beyond, appalled and shaken by the fierce new vibrations the dancers brought with them. But in the alcove he found himself pressed against the angular warmth of another body. He sprang around to find it was Helen. “What are you doing here? I thought you were banned from Kitchen?”

“I am indeed,” she told him, “and if you notice, I’m not in there. Your bloody High Horns made it physically impossible for me to cross the threshold.”

“No doubt he knows best,” Brother Milo piously said.

Helen’s reply was blasphemous, but Brother Milo was saved from hearing it. The conga was upon them, and past, and still going past, and continuing to pass them, an apparently endless line of blue-clad bouncing, yelling mages, a mere body-width away in the corridor. “Hellband fall on wrong uns!” Brother Milo heard. But next second the words seemed to be “Spells are all much stronger — ah!” or were they really singing, “Helen’s food will conquer — ah!” or was it again “Blessings fall upon her — ah!” Helen, he noticed uneasily, was jogging to the time of the ditty, with her widest, coolest smile. She bent down to him to shout, “I want you to join in this!”

He shouted back, “Are you trying to seduce me again?”

“No!” she bawled. “I gave that up days ago. I know you’re a saint!”

“Naturally celibate,” he yelled reprovingly. “I told you — I keep my Oath.”