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Young Wizards

New Millennium Editions

Book 9:

A Wizard of Mars

Diane Duane

Errantry Press

A department of

The Owl Springs Partnership

County Wicklow

Republic of Ireland

Copyright page

A Wizard of Mars

New Millennium Edition

Errantry Press

County Wicklow, Ireland

Original edition copyright © 2010 by Diane Duane

Revised edition copyright © 2012 by Diane Duane

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Requests for permission to make copies of any part of the work should be mailed to the following address:

Donald Maass Literary Agency

Suite 801, 121 West 27th Street

New York, NY 10001

USA

Publication history:

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt North American hardcover edition, April 2010

Magic Carpet Books paperback edition, August 2011

Errantry Press International ebook edition, 2012

This Young Wizards New Millennium Edition of A Wizard of Mars follows the text of the 2012 Errantry Press International Edition, and has been revised and updated to reflect the new timeline that begins in the New Millennium Edition of So You Want to Be a Wizard.

Dedication

For Kim and Ben and Greg

and Jules and ERB,

and, most affectionately, for Ray and Robert:

…because (one way or another)

we are all Martians:

— and for Peter Murray,

much-missed moderator of

the Young Wizards Discussion Forums,

something he’d really have liked:

that pesky timeline, sorted at last

Rubrics

…Mars, why art thou bent

On kindling thus the Scorpion, his tail

Portending evil and his claws aflame?…

Why planets leave their paths and through the void

Thus journey on obscure? ’Tis war that comes,

Fierce rabid war: the sword shall bear the rule…

(Pharsalia, Marcus Annaeus Lucanus: Book 1)

The one departed | is the one who returns

From the straitened circle | and the shortened night,

When the blue star rises | and the water burns:

Then the word long-lost | comes again to light

To be spoke by the watcher | who silent yearns

For the lost one found. Yet to wreak aright,

She must slay her rival | and the First World spurn

Lest the one departed | no more return.

(The Red Rede, 1-8)

Truth is always late, always last to arrive, limping along with Time.

(The Art of Worldly Wisdom, Baltasar Gracián, §146)

Time fix

Late June, 2010

1: Terra Cognita

The problem, Kit thought, scowling at the paper, isn’t the basic shape, so much. It’s what to do with the legs…

He briefly glanced up from the pencil sketch he’d been doing in the margin of his notebook and looked wearily up at Mr. Machiavelli, his history teacher, as if he’d actually been paying attention to anything the Mack was saying. It was hard enough to care, this time of year.

One more week till school’s out. One more week!— and especially late on a Friday afternoon, when the air-conditioning was broken.

Again! Kit thought. He was sweltering, along with everyone else in the place. Only little, balding Mr. Mack, strolling back and forth in front of the blackboard and holding forth on Asian politics of the 50s, seemed untouched by the heat and humidity. He paused to write the word “Pyongyang” on the board, pausing in the middle of the process to stare at the word as if not sure of the spelling.