Flesh and Fire by Laura Anne Gilman Page B

its stone tail dropping straight down like a sculpture, save for the occasional twitch of its pointed tip.
    “Are you ready, Jerzy?”
    Ready for what? “I don’t know.” He might have lied, but what was the point? The room was cooler than expected, and he was glad he had taken the time to dress warmly.
    “A fair answer, considering you don’t know what is in store. Nicely diplomatic. Your lessons are beginning to pay off.”
    Jerzy didn’t know what Master Malech meant by that, either, so he just sat quietly and waited.
    Malech placed his glass on the table in front of him. “The Washers tell the story of how Vinearts came to be: the guardians of a limited, reduced magic, the heirs of our forefathers’ foolish arrogance. How we now, by Sin Washer’s Command, turn inward and husband our vines rather than power over men. We are more than what the stories claim, and less. We are not the mages of generations past, no. And yet, a Vineart crafts more than spells, Jerzy. He crafts solutions, possibilities. Some are good. Some are. . .not good. Some heal; some cause harm. None of them are anything more than tools. A man who drinks a spell-wine and kills another man, is he any different from the man who takes a knife and kills? No. The responsibility for the action is the same.
    “There are those who say that we who craft these tools are responsible as well. That it is our hand that kills. . .and our hand that heals, as well.”
    Malech paused and looked at Jerzy, as though expecting him to say something. So Jerzy asked the next question that came into his head. “Can spellwine make someone do something they don’t want to do?”
    His master touched his bearded chin with a forefinger, his dark blue eyes half lidded and his expression thoughtful. That wasn’t, Jerzy realized, the question his master had expected, but the Vineart answered it anyway. “In the southern regions of Altenne grows a spellwine, a healwine they call Lethá. It fogs the mind, but you must drink deeply and allow it to take effect. Can a spellwine cause a man to do a thing he does not wish? No. Not even a Master Vineart can do that, not with the most potent of grapes, no matter how deeply he might drink.”
    “Could the prince-mages do it?” Jerzy held his breath, sure that this time he had asked a forbidden thing. No matter that Malech himself had spoken of the old vines, the First Growth of the prince-mages; merely to mention them was to receive a lecture from the Washers about the wages of arrogance and prideful folly.
    His master, however, merely said: “The old vines. . .We have no idea what they could truly accomplish, left with only legends that grow into impossibilities with every generation. I suspect the prince-mages, yes, could force another to do their will. But those wines and the prince-mages who crafted them are long gone, and not even the scholars of the Altenne can bring back their knowledge.”
    Malech leaned forward, his dressing gown falling open as he rested his hands on his knees. His intense gaze held Jerzy motionless, his eyes, in the dim light, seeming to glow from within. “But there is much knowledge we have reclaimed. Much we can do, within our limited modern scope. And I will teach you this, as my master taught me, and you will add to the knowledge.”
    “Yes, Master.”
    “And what will you do with that knowledge, once it is yours?”
    Jerzy blinked. Things had happened so quickly, he was still dizzy, half expecting it to end as suddenly as it had begun. He had certainly not thought about that, never looked beyond the day, the week, the thought of the learning itself so overwhelming there could be no room for anything else.
    Malech was waiting for his answer, and so he said the first thing that came to mind. “Use it to learn more.”
    Malech leaned back, and rubbed his close-cropped beard with one long finger again, this time with obvious pleasure. “Then let us see what you are capable of, young Jerzy. Let us