Tamora Pierce, Emperor Mage
Simon Pulse, 1995
The wrath of Daine!
I lost my temper.Daine to Numair
In the third book of the Immortals quartet Daine finds herself part of a diplomatic delegation being sent across the seas to Carthak to take part in peace negotiations. An unusual position for a fifteen-year-old, but her task is to user her wild magic to heal the emperor's birds who are beset by a mysterious illness.
Also returning to Carthak for the first time since his imprisonment and subsequent escape is Daine's mage teacher Numair Salmalín. Then known as Arram Draper, Numair had been a student at the university for eleven years—more than half his life. Accused of treason against his friend, now Emperor Mage Ozorne, he had been arrested and thrown into the dungeons. He had barely managed to escape alive. Eight years later, he was now one of the most powerful mages in the world, and was returning to Carthak as part of King Jonathan's Tortallan delegation, though slightly suspicious of the fact that his one-time friend-turned-enemy Emperor Ozorne had granted him an official pardon.
However, despite the emperor's alleged promise of negotiating a peace treaty with Tortall and its allies, the visitor are uneasy, right from delegation leader Duke Gareth of Naxen, through Lady Alanna the King's Champion and Numair, to young Daine. The reason is not just that they find the Carthaki way of life alien—in some ways distasteful. Divine portents signal that something is seriously amiss in Ozorne's kingdom and the gods are not happy. The excessive show of imperial wealth seems in bad taste with people starving in the kingdom, and the practice of keeping slaves makes Daine extremely uncomfortable.
But when it comes to his birds and his menagerie of animals, Ozorne seems to be a completely different person, warm and caring, attentive and affectionate, and Daine struggles to understand the man who seemingly has two sides to him. She also finds herself drawn more and more to Crown Prince Kaddar, and gets friendly with animals and slaves in and around the imperial palace. Prince Kaddar, unlike his uncle, the emperor, seems to be a rather reasonable young man, worried about the future of his land, and Daine finds herself beginning to trust him. She also meets Lindhall Reed, Numair's former teacher and friend, as well as Varice Kingsford, his former lover.
Sick birds, imprisoned immortals, ruined temples and conspiring nobles—the young wild mage certainly has her hands full. And when it appears that the gods have plans that involve using her as a vessel, she is far from happy. Not only has she no idea what is going on, she has to deal with a strange new addition to her powers. As usual, there are plenty of animals in Emperor Mage—rats, exotic birds, a marmoset, hyenas, bats—and even immortals, including a Stormwing called Rikash who actually seems, if not friendly, not hostile. In fact, brought to believe that Stormwings are brutal, disgusting creatures, revelling in waste and destruction, dirty and stinking, Emperor Mage, continuing from the previous book, shows them in a rather different light, yet without attempting to justify what they are. In fact, Rikash tells Daine, "You ought to try our shape sometime. People expect you to be crude. I'm told it's liberating for most humans" (p.129)!
At places the Immortals books remind one of Enid Blyton's farm stories, with plenty to learn about animal behaviour and the relationship of human beings to them. But Pierce manages to weave in other lessons as well. Just as Wolf-Speaker dealt with environmental disaster, this one touches upon evolution.
For the first time, there is a subtle hint that Numair and Daine's relationship might be undergoing a shift from a strictly teacher–student one despite the fact that Daine is fifteen and Numair twenty-nine. Of course, if one has read the Keladry books, one already knows what happens! In those books Numair is a brooding, awe-inspiring mage to the pages and squires. Quite different from the almost-father-figure, looking out for his "magelet".
Where there is no mistaking the genuine affection Numair and Daine have for each other, there are now times that the mage is noticing the woman rather than the child in Daine. Of course, it has been suggested earlier that he shares not just his knowledge but his bed with her, something that Numair has laughed off and Daine taken offence at on his behalf. Yet when she finds Numair flirting with Varice ("How could I forget you, my dear. You're lovelier than I remember.... Are you married? May I kill your husband?" [p.47]!), and comes across indications that she has been spending nights with him, it disturbs her:
A midwife's daughter, she knew very well that men enjoyed going to bed with women they weren't necessarily married to. Lately, the knowledge that Numair had such affairs had begun to irk her. She didn't want to mention that to him; she was afraid he'd laugh.(p.141)
But the tall mage is, for his part, fairly protective of Daine. Honourable as his intentions are, he gets rather shirty when he finds Prince Kaddar spending a lot of time with his magelet, and embarrasses her to death by confronting him in public:
"Stop kicking me, Daine. You understand, she is very important to a number of powerful nobles and mages in Tortall." Numair's voice was quiet, almost friendly; his eyes were hard.... "All of us would take it amiss if we thought for one moment she was being trifled with, particularly by a young man who wasn't free to do the right thing by her."
"Numair," Daine growled. "Can I speak to you privately for a moment?"
"No. Stepping on my foot won't work either. Do I make myself clear, Prince Kaddar?"....
"I'm going to kill him," she whispered, shamed almost to tears.
(pp.185–86)
To cut a long story short, Emperor Mage is once again an animal story and fantasy adventure rolled into one. It is about a young woman and her loyalty to those she loves most—both two-legged and four-legged. Even though at places the conversation is a bit awkward and there really are far too many editorial errors, there are enough thrills and twists and laughs to make it a really enjoyable read.
RATING: 8/10
The Immortals quartet:
Book I: Wild Magic
Book II: Wolf-Speaker
Book IV: The Realms of the Gods