“War is most definitely not a gentleman’s game, my friend,” Tamas said. “Else I wouldn’t play.” He glanced at Olem. “Give us a minute.”
Olem moved out of earshot, still coughing. Tamas joined Sabon beneath the parasol. He produced a letter from his pocket and gave it to Sabon.
“Your new commission,” Tamas said.
Sabon took the letter. “What?”
“I’ve put Andriya and Vadalslav to sniffing out more powder mages. With the royal cabal dead, I think the mages will be more likely to come forward. Not to mention the pay we’re offering,” he said. “They’ve set up shop outside of town, near the university, and will soon be heading to Deliv and Novi and Unice to recruit. I want you with them.”
“No,” Sabon said, trying to give the letter back.
“I’m your commanding officer,” Tamas said. “You can’t say no.”
“I can say no to my old friend,” Sabon said.
“Why won’t you do it?”
Sabon grunted. “Andriya and Vadalslav are more than enough to take care of recruits. You’ve sent the others to the Gates of Wasal. Taniel is chasing a ghost around the city, and despite the fact that you assigned Vlora to your staff, you’re still too angry to even speak to her. I won’t leave you without another mage.” He gestured toward the barricades. “The Kez ambassador will be here within a week, and you’ve still got this mess to clean up. Do we even know if the Barbers were successful?”
“You’re worried about me?” Tamas said. “That’s your excuse?”
“Worried that you’ll bugger it all up and need someone to clean up things after you.” Sabon paused. They could both hear shouting from beyond the barricade. “Perhaps we should help them,” he said.
“Damned Barbers can do it themselves,” Tamas said. “I won’t fret if they all get themselves killed. Don’t try to change the subject. Vadalslav said they’ve already found seven candidates with a little talent. They say three of them have potential.”
“It takes years to fully train a powder mage,” Sabon said. “They need to be taught to control their powers and how to be a soldier all at the same time.”
“That’s why I want you there,” Tamas said. “You trained Taniel and Vlora practically single-handed. Now Taniel is the best marksman in the world, and Vlora can detonate a keg of powder from half a mile.”
“That’s not the same, and you know it.” Sabon was angry now, his dark eyes glinting dangerously. “Taniel has been shooting since he could hold a gun. Vlora… well, she’s just a prodigy.”
“You don’t have to go recruiting,” Tamas said. “But I want you to start a school. You’ll have a line of credit and will have say over all happenings. You’ll never be more than a few hours away from me. If I need help, I’ll summon you immediately.”
“I have your word?” Sabon said.
“You have my word.”
Sabon stuffed the envelope in his pocket. “I want to be here when the Kez ambassador arrives.”
“Certainly.”
“And don’t look so pleased.”
Tamas stifled a smile.
“Sir!” Olem returned. He pointed toward the barricades.
A figure was slowly picking his way over the barricades and then down into the street, where he maneuvered among the untouched earthquake rubble. He wore a long white apron over a white shirt and black trousers. The apron front was covered in red.
The man headed straight toward them. He snapped open a razor, the blade glinting in the sunlight. Tamas saw Olem tense. The razor was touched to the man’s forehead in a mock salute.
“Teef, sir, of the Black Street Barbers,” the man said. “The barricades are yours.”
“The royalist leaders?”
“Dead or captured,” Teef said. “But mostly dead.”
Tamas snorted. “Women and children?”
The man snapped his razor shut and opened it again. He nervously ran the flat of the blade gently along his own throat. “Uh, there were a few bad occasions. Some of my boys have problems, sir. I, uh, dealt with it permanently.”
Tamas squeezed his hands into fists. This has been a mistake. “And General Westeven?”
“He was dead, sir. As you said he’d be.”
Tamas had hoped that the wound Westeven had taken in the brief melee after the parley had been just that: a wound. But his whole arm had been gone, and Westeven was old and no powder mage. “Olem, see that the Black Street Barbers are rounded up and kept safe until we have a chance to pay them.”
“Now, look here,” Teef said, taking a step toward Tamas. Olem was between them in a second, his bayonet a hair from Teef’s bloody apron. Teef swallowed.
Tamas gestured for the closest mercenary captain. “Don’t worry, Teef,” Tamas said. “If you kept your side of the bargain, I will keep mine. I’d love to throw you into Sabletooth, but I’m a man of my word. And… you may prove useful in the future.”
Tamas left Teef behind and approached the barricades with Sabon, Olem, and an entire company of the Wings of Adom. Tamas reached out with his senses, looking for powder charges. He sensed a small munitions dump near the barricade and a scattering of discarded powder.
Tamas climbed to the top of the barricade and looked around. From the few barricades they’d captured he knew what to expect: the semblance of a soldier’s camp, the street clear of debris, makeshift flags hung above the doors of homes and shops that’d been turned into barracks.
The streets were filled with people. Far more of them than Tamas had expected. Hundreds of women and children. Far fewer men. Their faces were painted with fear, with dejection, with loss. The faces of people who awoke to find their husbands, their friends, and their fathers and leaders with throats cut in their beds. People had little fight in them after an experience like that.
Each huddled group of people had a Barber watching over them, armed with a pistol or a club, sometimes with nothing more than a bared razor. It seemed to be enough.
“Brigadier Sabastenien,” Tamas said.
The young brigadier climbed the barricade to stand beside him. “Sir?”
“Have your men relieve the Barbers. Begin filing these people out of the barricades.”
“To Sabletooth, sir?”
“No,” Tamas said. He surveyed those faces once more. “I suspect that those most responsible for the royalist uprising have already met their fates. I want all survivors taken to the old bailey. Disarm them, but then feed them. Have them checked by doctors and given beds. They’re no longer royalists. They are citizens. They are our countrymen.”
“My men aren’t nursemaids, sir.”
“They are now. Dismissed.”
Tamas watched as mercenary soldiers went down among the royalists. Voices were subdued, quiet, and for the most part everyone went willingly. Soldiers began the work of dismantling the barricades. Every so often, heads would turn when cannon fire echoed from the south.
“Sabon, send word to Brigadier Ryze. Tell him we’ve taken the main barricade. Tell him to offer parley. Every royalist not of noble blood will be pardoned. If the Barbers have done their work through the whole royalist camp, I suspect the offer will be taken.”
“You intend to pardon them all, sir?” Olem asked.
“If I treat them like animals, like criminals, then I will have a second royalist uprising on my hands. If I treat them like citizens, if I restore them to their places in this city, if I make them belong, that is the best solution. I will not perform another round of executions.”
“Probably wise, sir,” Olem said.
Tamas gave the man a long look. “I’m glad you approve.”
“Well, sir, even with you offering a month’s wages, no one will clean the blood out of Elections Square. Stained the stones rust. They say the dried blood is a half-foot deep in some places. Wouldn’t want to add to that.”
“Elections Square?”
“Formerly the King’s Garden, sir. It’s been renamed.”
�
�I hadn’t heard that.”
“Well, you’ve been awfully busy, what with the barricades and all.”
“Why Elections Square?”
Olem chuckled. “Well, kind of a dark joke, that. See, the people see those executions as a kind of election.”
“There was no voting.”
“I think the vote was cast when the people tore those Hielmen to shreds.”
A mercenary soldier came jogging toward them through the now orderly lines of royalists leaving the barricades. The man snapped a salute. “Sir, Brigadier Sabastenien said you’d want to know. We found General Westeven.”
The general was in a small room behind what had once been a flea market. His quarters were damp, cold. They seemed too small for such a great man. Tamas had to duck to enter the room.
Westeven lay faceup on a cot. A few meager possessions were scattered on the dresser—aside from the bed, the only piece of furniture. They included a pocket-sized portrait of Westeven’s late wife; a Gurlan hunting knife, the handle well worn; a beaded native’s fetish; a pair of spectacles; and a neatly folded handkerchief.
Tamas frowned down at the body. Westeven lay beneath a thin blanket, far too short for his long body, stockinged feet sticking out the bottom. They’d cleaned up his body, but burns were still visible. His eyes were closed. Even in death his one good hand still clutched at an old leather-bound book. He’d survived losing an arm, it seemed—if only for an hour or so. The man’s aged fingers were bent from rheumatism.
Tamas turned his head to read the title of the book in Westeven’s hand: The Age of Kresimir. He hadn’t known Westeven to be religious.
Tamas picked up the Gurlan hunting knife and the native’s fetish. “Brigadier,” he said softly.
Sabastenien ducked beneath the entrance and joined him. There was barely enough space in the dark room for them both.
“Have the general’s body sent to his next of kin.”
Sabastenien took off his hat. “I don’t believe the general has any living relatives.”
Tamas felt a lump in his throat and swallowed. When he’d regained his composure, he said, “I will claim the body. Send word to the city reeve. I want full honors for the general’s burial—a state burial. No expense is to be spared. I’ll pay for it from my own pocket if need be.”
Sabastenien didn’t answer. When Tamas turned, he saw that unshed tears glistened in the young brigadier’s eyes.
“Sir,” Sabastenien said. “I formally request that General Westeven be buried in the Wings of Adom cemetery. I’m sure Lady Winceslav would agree.”
Tamas lay a hand on Sabastenien’s shoulder. “Thank you,” he said. Such a thing was the greatest honor. The Wings of Adom were tough ranks to join living, harder to join dead.
Sabastenien left Tamas alone with the body. Tamas lay his hat on Westeven’s chest and took a deep breath.
“A poor scrap to go out in,” Tamas said. “I’m sorry, my friend. Yet you went out fighting for what you believed. I’ve got the Kez to deal with next, and how I wish I had you by my side for that.”
CHAPTER
13
She’s here,” Julene said.
Taniel frowned at the Privileged mercenary. She wore a wicked small smile, tugged up farther on one side by the scar on her face, and her eyes were unnaturally wide. It reminded Taniel of a cougar he’d once seen at a circus. They stood at the front gates of Adopest University. The walls surrounding the collegiate town were little more than crumbling relics beyond which flags waved in the brisk breeze on the towers of the university buildings. Taniel could hear the sound of students laughing. This was not a good place to confront a Privileged.
Yet far better than the crowded city.
“You sure?” Taniel asked. He’d not opened his third eye in days. The last time, he’d nearly collapsed. He told himself it wasn’t because he’d been in a powder trance for four weeks running. He wasn’t powder blind. He wasn’t addicted.
He snorted a line of powder off the back of his hand and shivered.
Julene ignored his question. “Well?” Taniel asked Gothen.
The magebreaker nodded. “She’s here,” he confirmed.
Taniel looked around for Ka-poel. She was studying the gargoyles above the gate. A group of male students were studying her. Taniel glared at them, setting a hand on the butt of his pistol.
“Is that a real savage?” one of them asked.
“You have to have a permit to carry a weapon on university grounds,” another informed him.
“Sod off,” Taniel said. “Wait. Where can I find a map of the university?”
The boy—Taniel thought of him as a boy, though he might have been the same age—sniffed. “Sod off yourself.”
Taniel turned toward the group until they could see his powder keg pin.
“That supposed to impress us?” the boy asked.
Taniel grinned. “It will when I beat your teeth in.” He snatched his pistol from his belt and flipped it around until he held it by the barrel. He flipped it again, then spun it around his middle finger until he held it the right way.
“Fancy,” one of the boys said with a laugh. “Administrator’s office. Head through the gate, take a right. You’ll run into it eventually.”
“Thanks,” Taniel said. “And yes, she’s a savage. My savage.” His grin disappeared when he turned to find Ka-poel glaring at him.
He cleared his throat. “Let’s find a map of the university. Julene, how close can you get to her without her sensing you?”
“I don’t care if she knows I’m coming.”
“I do,” Taniel snapped. “Don’t be a damned fool.”
Ka-poel tapped herself on the chest, then walked a pair of fingers through the air.
“You can get close?” Taniel said.
Ka-poel rolled her eyes.
Of course she could. Ka-poel could practically walk up and poke a Privileged without being noticed. Taniel wondered where his mind was at. It was the damned powder, he decided. When this was over, he’d go a month without touching the stuff.
“All right. Pole, find the Privileged. I want to know exactly where she is, down to the building and the room. You two,” he said, pointing at the mercenaries. “Wait for Captain Ajucare.” The captain had been trailing them for a week at Tamas’s orders. Far enough to stay out of the way, and close enough to be there if he was needed.
A quick glance down the road gave Taniel a glimpse of men on horseback in the distance. “Tell him to begin evacuating the university. We’re going to take this Privileged here, now. Gothen, will you be able to cut off her access to the Else?”
“Of course.”
“No problems this time?”
“None,” Gothen said. “I won’t make the same mistake I made last time.”
All that was needed was for Gothen to be able to get close enough to cut off her sorcery. If bullets and blades weren’t enough to kill her, it would give Julene the chance she needed to use her own sorcery.
“An evacuation will tip our hand,” Julene said.
“I’m not going to let a bunch of students get killed in the crossfire if we mess up and the two of you begin to throw around sorcery.”
Julene sneered at him.
“I’ll be back,” Taniel said.
Taniel headed through the gates and toward the administration building. A series of signposts gave him better directions. The place was practically a town in and of itself. The buildings were huge, built of somber gray stone with towering spires and wide arches. They were separated by open spaces where students lounged on the grass. Taniel walked through a large quad and past the library. His rifle was getting looks.
“Can I help you, sir?”
A man of perhaps forty intercepted him as he headed up the stairs of the administration building.
“Powder Mage Taniel,” Taniel said. “Who are you?”
The man drew himself up. “Assistant to the vice-chancellor. Professor Uskan, at your service.”
“Professor,” Taniel said. “Is the vice-chancellor here?”
“He’s in Adopest on business. Pardon me, are you Taniel Two-Shot? The field marshal’s son?”
“Look, I’ve got a company of soldiers about to come pouring through your front gate. There’s a rogue Privileged on your university grounds. We’re hunting her on orders of my fa—on orders of Field Marshal Tamas.”
Uskan’s eyes grew wide. “Wha… No, you can’t fight here. This is a university.”
“We’ll do our best not to. Do you have an evacuation plan?”
“What? No…”
“Well, you should come up with one. Now. The soldiers are from the Wings of Adom. Send word for the students to get out.”
“Get out? We have almost five thousand students here! The campus is nearly a mile across! What do you expect me to do?”
“Think of something.”
“What about the Privileged?”
“We’ll deal with her.”
The man wrung his hands. “Privileged! There could be wholesale destruction! The repairs…”
“I’m sure it won’t come to—” Taniel froze. There she was, coming out of the library not a hundred yards away. Taniel began to breathe quickly. She wasn’t wearing her Privileged gloves. That gave him an advantage.
“Go on,” Taniel said. “You should evacuate the premises.”
“But what do I say?”
“I don’t know,” Taniel growled. He slowly reached for his pistol, trying not to look obvious.
Uskan swallowed hard and looked Taniel up and down. He gave him a beseeching look. “Just be careful of the Applied Sciences building,” he said. “It’s brand-new.” Taking a deep breath, he suddenly threw his arms in the air.
“Free lunch!” he yelled. “Free lunch, outside the north gate!” He began to run across the quad.
“Shit,” Taniel said.
The woman stared at him. He snatched a pistol from his belt, hesitated. People on the quad were slowly following after Uskan. Taniel gritted his teeth.
The woman began to sprint in the opposite direction.
Taniel aimed his pistol and pulled the trigger. The shot echoed across the quad. Taniel nudged the bullet at the last second to avoid hitting a student, cursing under his breath. The bullet missed the Privileged and lodged in the wall of the library. There was a scream. Students began to run.
The Powder Mage Trilogy: Promise of Blood, The Crimson Campaign, The Autumn Republic Page 17