“I loved your father very dearly, that you know, but this you do not know: when we were very young, not yet twenty, we saw, with our own eyes, and exhibition by the Corsican Wizard, Bastia.”

“I know of no wizards.”

“It is the rank beyond master in swordsmanship,” Yeste said. “Bastia was the last man so designated. Long before your birth, he died at sea. There have been no wizards since, and you would never in this world have beaten him. But I tell you this: He would never in this world have beaten you.”

Chapter 5