Tamas prayed the Privileged would turn his head just a little bit so Tamas could get a look at his identity.
The Privileged stopped to talk to one of the soldiers. The voices were too low for Tamas to make out. The soldier gave the Privileged a brisk nod, then turned to the others. “We leave in two hours!” he said loudly. “Anyone who’s not ready to move out by dark will be shot.”
Tamas’s gaze was still locked on the Privileged in the tricorne. It had to be Nikslaus! But Tamas still couldn’t see his face. Whoever he was, he chatted amiably with the young lady beside him.
They had just mounted the steps to the mansion when a messenger came galloping hard into the courtyard and came to a stop in a spray of gravel. The messenger leapt from his horse and ran to the Privileged.
Tamas felt his heart begin to beat faster.
The messenger saluted and breathlessly gave his report. The Privileged pushed him away with an elbow and spun toward the mansion.
Tamas heard the doors below burst open. The Privileged’s voice echoed through the building.
“Get everyone!” he screamed. “All my Wardens, to me! I want five hundred soldiers here in twenty minutes. Give the order! We leave within the hour!”
“But, sir,” Tamas heard someone say, “the city!”
“I don’t give a pit about the city. Deliv can enter the war with Adro for all I care. He’s here, you fool! He’s here!”
“Nikslaus,” Tamas whispered.
Tamas watched as messengers scrambled out the front mansion drive, going out to give Nikslaus’s orders.
“Well, Demasolin,” Tamas muttered, “you have your distraction.”
Urgent steps sounded on the staircase in the foyer accompanied by Nikslaus’s frantic orders.
Tamas looked down to find one hand already on the grip of a pistol, the other on the hilt of his sword. His fingers itched.
“He’s coming,” Andriya hissed from his station by the door.
“Do we wait for him here?” Vlora said.
Tamas blinked and saw the bodies of Deliv politicians hanging from the steeple of the Alvation cathedral. He saw Sabon’s dead eyes gazing up at him from Charlemund’s gravel drive, and the countless soldiers Tamas had lost trying to catch Nikslaus.
He saw Erika’s head floating before him. Her face, frozen in horror, blond hair caked with blood, skin severed neatly at the neck. He saw Nikslaus’s grin as he presented Tamas with the head of his dead wife.
Tamas poured an entire powder charge into his mouth. His body felt like it was on fire as energy coursed through him. Vlora must have seen something on his face.
“Pit,” Vlora swore. “Andriya, get out of the way.”
Tamas burst through the double doors of the office, drawing his pistol in one hand.
“Nikslaus!” he bellowed.
CHAPTER
43
Citizens of Adopest,” Lord Claremonte’s voice boomed.
The shock of the amplified sound made Adamat’s knees grow weak. “Pit,” he hissed, “he has Privileged with him!” It was the only way he could be heard above the roar of the crowd like this.
“My friends,” Lord Claremonte continued, “my brothers and sisters. My countrymen! I bring you greetings from the farthest corners of the world. I have come today to meet you, my fellow Adrans, and to lower myself humbly before you on gracious knee to offer myself as candidate for the post of First Minister of our fair country.” At this, Claremonte lowered himself down on one knee and bowed his head. A moment passed and he rose back up, spreading his arms as if to embrace every man, woman, and child on the riverbank.
“This is a great nation! We have so much. We have the unions, the army, the Wings of Adom, the banks, and the Mountainwatch. We have industry unparalleled in the modern world. We have the mightiest heroes that any country could hope for in the likes of Taniel Two-Shot and the late Field Marshal Tamas.”
Lord Claremonte sighed and bowed his head, as if overcome with emotion. “Field Marshal Tamas died for you, my friends. He died for me. For all of us to be free of the Kez tyranny. He had such incredible vision and stride, and I will not let it die with him!”
The crowd was utterly silent now. Adamat heard someone drop a coin, and he cursed himself for waiting with bated breath for Claremonte’s next words.
“For what this country needs now is hope. And for that, I have brought with me nine thousand of Brudania’s finest soldiers to throw in with the Adran army and push back the Kez aggressors.” He threw his hand back toward the line of Trading Company ships waiting in the river. “I have brought cannon, and rifles, and supplies. I have brought food, and money. I bring treasures from the four corners of the world, all of which will be put toward the war effort against the Kez.”
“I do this freely. I ask no thanks, nor hold back any of my wealth on reservation. I only ask that you consider me a worthy candidate for the coming election.”
Adamat noticed that other longboats were being lowered now. These ones were filled with Brudanian soldiers, and they were free once they hit the water and began rowing toward the riverbank. Claremonte’s own longboat had drawn anchor and was slowly drifting closer to the amphitheater.
“My countrymen,” Claremonte continued in the silence that followed, “this country needs change. This is a forward-thinking nation! A place of intellectual and industrial prowess. In my ministerial duties, I will continue to support that change and push us forward into the coming century. We will forget the old ways. The superstitions. The foolishness.
“Gods—what have they done for you?” He shook his head. “Nothing. These rumors you’ve heard about Kresimir and Adom returning? They are true! But know this; we will not tolerate them. They have no place in this world of ours, and I mean to show them that.
“We may be mortal, but we are fierce and we are proud, and even the gods will tremble at this mighty nation of Adro.
“It starts today, my friends. Our new world.”
The final word seemed barely a whisper, but Adamat felt his heart hammering in his chest. Something was happening. What was Claremonte about to do? What could he possibly be…? Adamat brought the looking glass in his hands, hitherto forgotten, back to his eye and focused on Claremonte.
Claremonte turned to a woman at his shoulder. The woman raised her hands to reveal white gloves covered in crimson runes—a Privileged.
Adamat read the inaudible words on Claremonte’s lips: “Bring it down.”
Sorcery cut through the clear sky, eliciting a gasp of terror from the assembled crowds. White lightning, like knives flashing, cut through the air above the amphitheater and smashed into the Kresim Cathedral. Dust billowed in great clouds above the immense building as invisible blades sliced clean through the stone façade.
An invisible fist smashed into the dome of the cathedral, and all at once the building collapsed in on itself. People ran from the falling stonework, screaming in terror, but the destruction was contained by sorcery, and to Adamat’s eyes it looked as if no one was harmed.
When the dust had settled, Adamat turned his eyes back on Claremonte. Once again the man stepped to the prow of the boat to address the crowd. He raised his arms.
“This is only the beginning, my brothers and sisters. This world. We will take it back!”
Tamas’s first bullet would have taken Nikslaus through the eye if a Warden hadn’t flung the Privileged aside. The bullet slammed into the Warden’s shoulder, making him jerk. The twisted creature drew his sword and bounded up the stairs toward Tamas.
Tamas drew his sword and charged the Warden. The creature bellowed a challenge, and Tamas answered with a silent snarl. Their swords clashed loudly once, twice, and then Tamas was inside the Warden’s guard. He grabbed the Warden by the neck, feeling the strength of the powder coursing through him, and tossed it off the hallway balcony to the foyer below.
Nikslaus had rolled down the stairs and picked himself off the marble floors. One of his gloves had come off—Tamas
paused at that. No, the whole hand had come off.
He had been wearing false hands. A ruse to fool his own soldiers into thinking he could still do sorcery? Perhaps. Tamas didn’t care as he flew down the stairs three at a time.
Nikslaus fled toward the front door, gesturing wildly at Tamas and screaming at his men, “Kill him!”
The air was already bitter with the scent of black powder. Tamas felt a surge of energy, and an explosion tore through the Kez soldiers as Vlora ignited their powder.
Soldiers came at him with swords drawn. Nikslaus was smart enough to keep some of his soldiers without powder, it seemed. Tamas caught a thrust with the tip of his sword, flipping it to the side and ramming his own sword into the soldier’s chest. He kept moving forward. Nikslaus backed away from him, face painted with terror.
A knife spun past Tamas’s face and clattered against the marble banister behind him. He spun toward its owner, a Warden, and grunted as the creature hit him with the force of a charging bull.
Tamas felt himself lifted into the air and then slammed into the banister. It cracked from the force of the blow, sending him and the Warden tumbling over the edge of the stairs and a short drop to the floor.
He felt the creature’s fingers close on his throat. Tamas grasped it by the wrist and slammed his other palm into the Warden’s elbow. The creature’s arm snapped, bending ninety degrees the wrong way. Tamas grabbed the Warden by the lapels and kicked, flipping it off of him.
By the time Tamas had gotten back to his feet, the room was filled with soldiers. Most of them were dead or dying, shot by a mage or blown to bits by their own powder horns, but there were still enough of the Kez to get in the way.
Tamas spotted Nikslaus as he fled down a side hallway.
“Pit!” Tamas swore. He lurched to his feet only to fall again. The Warden with the broken arm had grabbed Tamas’s leg. It swung a knife at Tamas.
Tamas jerked his leg out of the Warden’s grip, and its knife slammed into the marble floor. The beast surged forward, and Tamas deflected the knife with the guard of his sword. He pummeled the Warden’s face with his hilt, then danced back out of range of another knife thrust.
The creature got to its feet.
And came crashing down again as Andriya leapt from the upstairs hallway and landed behind it, bayonet ramming through its skull and brain.
“Well,” Andriya said, running toward the Kez infantry, “go kill the duke!”
Tamas dashed toward the hallway where Nikslaus had disappeared. It was a long hall, perhaps a hundred yards into another wing of the manor. Tamas opened his third eye, fighting off the dizziness, and searched for signs of Wardens or the Privileged.
A soldier leapt out of a side room with a shout. Tamas closed his third eye, reeling back as he felt a sword slice cleanly along the side of his stomach. He fended off another thrust and drew his second pistol, firing from the hip. The shot took the Kez soldier in the chest. The man lurched forward, then tried to step back. A look of surprise crossed his face as he fell to the ground.
Tamas left him where he was and sprinted along the hallway. The pain of his bad leg throbbed like the beat of a drum and the cut along his side stung in the open air. He slowed as he rounded the corner at the end of the hallway, only to find another hall leading off a hundred paces long.
No sign of Nikslaus.
“Sir!” Vlora came up beside him, breathing hard.
“He came this way,” he said.
She nodded and trotted out ahead of him.
Vlora was about fifteen paces ahead of him when a Warden burst out of the cover of a doorway and slammed into her. His momentum took them both across the hallway and out of sight, into another room.
“Vlora!” Tamas ran forward, only to stop when a voice called out.
“No closer.” Nikslaus. The voice came from just inside the doorway where Vlora and the Warden had disappeared.
“I’m coming to kill you,” Tamas said.
“Not if you want this one alive.”
Tamas looked down. Both pistols were spent. He might be able to angle a bullet around the corner. No. He knew he could.
“Vlora?” Tamas called out.
No answer.
“If she’s dead,” Tamas said, “I’ve no reason to stop myself from coming around this corner.”
Tamas heard a deep, angry grunt, and then Vlora’s voice. “I’m all right, sir.”
“For now,” Nikslaus said, “but if she bites my Warden again, I’ll let him snap her neck. I’m using her as a shield, Tamas. If you angle a bullet around that wall, it’ll hit her.”
Tamas sheathed his sword and drew a pistol. He reloaded quickly, steadily, and then shoved it in his belt so he could reload the other.
“How is your leg?” Nikslaus called. “I’m surprised you can put that much weight on it.”
“It was healed by a god. It feels fantastic. How are your hands? Did Kresimir grow them back for you?”
Tamas was satisfied to hear a low curse.
“Surrender, Tamas, or I kill the girl.”
“Kill her,” Tamas said. “I don’t care.”
“I think you do. I recognize this one. Vlora. I never told you that was one of my little schemes, did I? Having her seduced.” Tamas heard another low grunt—the Warden—and then Nikslaus’s laugh. “You probably thought it was the nobility. Well, that’s what the fop thought, too.”
“She betrayed Taniel,” Tamas said. “Like I said: kill her.”
Nikslaus clicked his tongue disapprovingly. “Oh, Tamas. I know everything about you. I know your hopes and your fears. I know your favorites. She’s always been one of your favorites. Did you think about bedding her after Taniel canceled the wedding? I know you did. So suddenly available. How that must have tempted you.”
Tamas opened his third eye and stepped away from the wall. He could see Nikslaus’s bright glow in the Else through the wall. It was several dozen paces back from the corner. Closer, he could see the dull glow of the Warden and the barely perceptible glow that Vlora gave off in the Else. The Warden was using Vlora as a shield. Tamas would likely hit Vlora if he tried to angle a bullet around the corner.
“Throw your pistol down, Tamas, and I’ll let her live,” Nikslaus said.
“Why should I trust you?”
“You’ve no choice. The courtyard is filling up with soldiers. I don’t care how many mages you brought, you’re outnumbered and outmatched. You throw down your weapons and come out, and I give my word that this girl lives.”
“Why so magnanimous?” Tamas said. He drew his second pistol. He aimed one at the glow of the Privileged and one at that of the Warden.
“Not sure what’s come over me,” Nikslaus said. “Maybe it’s the prospect of your head on a pike!” His voice rose to a shout. “Think of it, Tamas. Only a couple months ago, it was me trapped inside a manor, while your soldiers filed into the courtyard. What a reversal of fortunes! Maybe I’ll cut off your hands before I kill you.”
Tamas examined the walls. Marble over limestone, most likely. To pierce it, he’d have to put half a horn’s worth of powder behind a bullet, and concentrate energy around the bullet to keep it from fragmenting. One, he could do. Not two.
“I wouldn’t take the time,” Tamas said. He lowered the pistol aimed at Nikslaus and uncocked the hammer. He set it on the floor and slid it out into the middle of the hall where the Warden could see it.
“I’m unarmed. Now let her go,” Tamas said.
“When I see you on your knees!” Nikslaus screamed.
Tamas focused on the smudge of color in the Else that was the Warden. He concentrated on his bullet, and set the barrel of his other pistol against the wall and pulled the trigger.
He dropped the pistol as soon as he’d pulled the trigger and leapt and rolled into the hallway, snatching up the other pistol and coming up into a crouch. The pistol kicked back in his hand as he touched the powder with his mind.
Both shots had hit the Warden. Th
e first, through the wall, had gone low, cutting through the creature’s neck. The second took it between the eyes, just over Vlora’s shoulder. The Warden collapsed backward, Vlora still in its grip.
Tamas caught sight of Nikslaus running across the room behind the Warden.
Tamas gently wrested Vlora from the dead Warden’s grip. The creature had been holding a knife to her throat. She had a cut there, leaking crimson, but Tamas could not tell how deep.
“Vlora. Vlora!”
Her eyes were slightly glazed, her face panicked. There was a shard of marble embedded in her cheek. Tamas pulled it out, brushing her hair out of the way with one hand.
She shook her head suddenly, as if coming out of a dream. “I’m alive,” she said. “I’m alive. I’m fine.” She seemed to be speaking more to herself than him.
Tamas removed a handkerchief from his pocket and pressed it to her throat. She could still speak, so the cut wasn’t too deep. “Keep pressure on it.”
“Go,” Vlora said. “Go after him.”
Tamas took off his greatcoat and wadded it into a ball. He lifted Vlora’s head and put it underneath. “Andriya! Pit, where is he? Andriya!”
Leone appeared suddenly, her bayoneted rifle held at the ready. She set her rifle on the ground and squatted beside Vlora.
“Stay with her,” Tamas said. “Vidalslav makes the cleanest stitches. When the fighting dies down, make sure she sees Vlora first.”
Tamas retrieved his other pistol and checked the room. Nikslaus had fled through a side door. He caught sight of the Privileged running across the lawn, heading for the front gate.
“Sir,” Leone said, “we’ve taken the house, but the courtyard is filled with soldiers.”
Tamas dropped a bullet down the barrel of one of his pistols and rammed cotton batting down to keep it stable. “I don’t care,” he said. “I have a man to kill.”
Taniel sagged against the rough-hewn wood of the beam from which he hung, what little strength he had sapped from his struggles.
The Powder Mage Trilogy: Promise of Blood, The Crimson Campaign, The Autumn Republic Page 104