Call of the Hero

by Robert J. Crane

  “And yet it is,” Alaric said, “and we are fighting it as best we can.”

  “I wish you some luck with that,” Mazirin said, then muttered something in her own tongue to the men with the chest. “They will carry this wherever you would like. In return, I only ask one thing – please do not involve us in your problems again.”

  Alaric thought of something to say – a thousand somethings, really – but none of them came out. Instead he offered a short bow to Mazirin. “I will trouble you no more, Captain.” And with that, he let his footsteps – low and thumping, not so mysterious now – carry him back down the ramp, the gold in tow, and away from the Yuutshee.

  Chapter 78

  Baynvyn

  The dankness of the place was hardly a concern to Baynvyn, who had been raised in the dark embrace of Saekaj Sovar, but the sound of dripping – drip, drip, drip – in the distance was slightly maddening.

  If he weren't already half-mad.

  The glowing portal stood behind Malpravus, who rested on a throne. That was new. He'd been sitting there when Baynvyn had come for his audience, and the wonder was whether he'd come through the portal or just been in the chair all along? Baynvyn thought not, given his knowledge of magic. Malpravus looked at least slightly improved over how he'd appeared last time they'd spoken, and that did not merely come from adequate rest.

  “My friends,” Malpravus croaked, in that weak, high voice of his. “I am most disappointed in your efforts this night.” His face was shrouded by a cowl, but his skeletal jaw was visible beneath it.

  Baynvyn looked to his left, then his right. He was hardly the only one called upon the carpet. Qualleron was on bent knee next to him, the subservient, honor-bound fool. Piña stood to his right, no need to take a knee, she was so short. She barely came to his knee, in fact.

  Malpravus did not smile, but the other attendee of the meeting did, standing at the necromancer's right hand. Coordinator Stiehle was a right bastard, in Baynvyn's eyes. Most other eyes, too, he imagined, at least the ones that Stiehle hadn't plucked out in sheer cruelty.

  “This should have been a morning that brought us closer to our goals,” Malpravus said. “That brought Reikonos a touch closer to surrender. That would bring the people back to my breast.”

  Baynvyn barely held back a sneer of disgust; anyone suckling at Malpravus's teat was going to die of starvation. Or revulsion.

  “Have any of you an answer for this...failure?” Malpravus asked, looking down at them. It seemed obvious Stiehle had succeeded in whatever endeavor he'd been assigned, but the rest of them were hung out to dry for the docks. Which wasn't entirely fair. They weren't Baynvyn's or Qualleron's or Piña's docks to defend, after all.

  “My clockworks were destroyed,” Piña said simply. “I don't know how.”

  “I was fought to stalemate by an honorable man,” Qualleron boomed, unashamed. “His quality was undoubtable, his army firm and able to sweep yours before them with ease. I have no shame in my failure, for I struck my blows true, and, if not for the failure of the forces around me to keep the field, I would have been able to win, eventually.”

  That caused Malpravus's near non-existent lips to pucker in displeasure. He turned to survey Baynvyn from beneath the cowl. “And you? I see you have lost your blade as well as your pistol. Now all you have left is that remarkable rifle of yours.” He made a low noise of disgust that reminded Baynvyn of a cat preparing to cough up a hairball. “Not so remarkable at all, then. They sell them in Firoba, after all, and better in Coricuanthi or Amatgarosa.”

  “I was beaten by Cyrus Davidon,” Baynvyn said calmly. “No impersonator. The real man. The now-god.”

  “He is no god.” Malpravus's eyes flashed beneath the cowl.

  “He is no mere man, either,” Baynvyn said. “Yes, he has taken from me my weapons. No man has ever done that.”

  “That is hardly proof of his godhood,” Malpravus said, leaning forward. “To my eyes, it seems more proof of your weakness than his strength.”

  “He turned your City Watch against you,” Baynvyn said. “Killed your Machine men. Beat your champions.” He looked to Piña, then Qualleron. “No mean feat given their pedigree. But if you want to single out my failures – fine. I failed. I am hardly done at this defeat.”

  Malpravus looked from Baynvyn back to Piña, then to Stiehle. “Oh, I don't know about that. I gave you two commands, after all.”

  Baynvyn bristled. “Piña was to carry out the second.”

  Malpravus smiled from beneath the cowl. “Piña is working to carry out the second. But she discovered a most curious bit of information in the process.”

  He clapped his thin hands together, and Piña lifted her hand. Upon it was wrapped a small piece of clockwork machinery. Small to him, anyhow; it covered her arm from elbow to wrist. A circular lens sat in its middle, and with the flick of a button, lit up, shining onto the floor.

  It was a sepia-toned painting of light.

  Of him – and Cyrus Davidon.

  Baynvyn watched it curiously, noting that it was of his earlier battle upon the wall. Cyrus was moving to disarm him upon the picture, and it unfolded, with even the sound. The voice of Cyrus Davidon boomed, tinny, from Piña's wrist. “I'm sorry, son, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to take away your toys until you learn to behave better.” His father's face wore a leer of victory. “Who's your daddy now?”

  The light of the picture faded. Baynvyn stared into the space where it had been, blinking in disbelief at what he'd just seen. Impossible, magical, and yet it was the interaction he'd had with Cyrus Davidon–

  Stars blazed in Baynvyn's eyes as something struck him in the back of the head. Qualleron?

  No.

  Baynvyn lurched forward and hit the ground, chin making firm contact with the glowing stones that had been beneath his feet only a moment earlier. Lights flashed before his eyes in the dim, the dank. Qualleron stood to the side, regarding him with a curiosity bordering on indifference.

  Stiehle, though, he was smiling, standing over Baynvyn. He'd struck the cowardly blow, circling around while Baynvyn had been watching the picture of the battle. Now he took the rifle from Baynvyn's shoulder, slipping it free while he was stunned.

  “I find it eminently fascinating,” Malpravus said. “Your parentage, I mean. It seems to me that this is information I could have used before your father disarmed you of nearly everything else of use. Still,” and he waved a skeletal hand, and Stiehle rained another cowardly blow down, down upon the back of his head, “I think I might have some use for you yet,” Malpravus said, with undisguised glee, as Baynvyn slipped into the comfortable dark of unconsciousness.

  Chapter 79

  Curatio

  “We are supposed to be sending out more gold,” Curatio said, regarding the chest of gold and the men carrying it with vague amusement, “not bringing more in.”

  “It comes with the regrets of Captain Mazirin,” Alaric said stiffly, leading the men. They were in the offices nearest the main gate, a small building with only a few rooms for the employees of Reikonos's civil service. All were at their desks, though most seemed to be gossiping about the new management rather than doing any real work. “The Yuutshee is not presently, ah...airworthy, I suppose? So she returns this to us.”

  Curatio made a motion to the men, who dropped the chest in the corner and retreated without another word. One of them was even kind enough to close the office door on the way out, muffling the sound of the gossiping civil servants outside as Curatio turned his attention to the Ghost of Sanctuary. “Is that it, then?”

  “For her?” Alaric said, sounding quite tense. “I think so, yes.”

  “There is more to it, I trust?”

  Alaric hesitated. Serious indeed, it must have been, then. “She is displeased at being caught up in our revolution.”

  Curatio waited. There had to be more. Still, some coaxing might be warranted. “I imagine given a world of this size,” and here he turned around a book that h
e had been pondering, left by the last owner of the office, for Alaric to see. Within was contained the most amazing thing – a drawn map of an ovoid world larger in scale than he had ever imagined. He rested a finger on the far corner, a tiny landmass the size of his fingertip in a drawing that filled both open pages of the tome from edge to edge. “There is a revolution going on every single day.”

  Alaric craned his neck to look, then moved closer and leaned in. “This...” He pointed where Curatio rested his fingertip, “...is Arkaria?”

  “And here, Luukessia,” Curatio said, shifting it slightly to a smaller mass yet. “We are but dots of ink in the sea of this world, Alaric.”

  “We are small indeed,” Alaric said. “I had no idea the world beyond spanned so huge.”

  “Insects in a kingdom of elephants,” Curatio agreed. “It is strange to think your life so encompassing as mine only to realize at last that you are nearly insignificant after all.”

  Alaric's shoulders slumped a bit, which confirmed for Curatio a suspicion. “Insignificant indeed. Yet we have a task.”

  “Then why does your manner sag, my friend?” Curatio asked. He tried to avoid a teasing prod, but did not entirely succeed. “It is but one ship and one captain, who, as you say, does not wish to be involved.”

  Alaric took a moment to construct the lie, but it was still obvious when it left his mouth. “Of all the captains, Mazirin was the only one we'd had dealings with. She'd helped us before, and I suppose rapport made me think that perhaps she might help again, and with more certainty than we could expect from any of these strangers motivated by gold.”

  That was enough. Curatio chuckled, and it turned into a full-bodied laugh. When he caught Alaric's cocked head, the look of skepticism, he could hold it in no more. “Oh, come now with that nonsense,” Curatio said, smiling, “you may fool the others – though I find that prospect doubtful – but you cannot fool me, old friend.”

  “I have no idea what you mean,” Alaric said. Perhaps he did not.

  “I have seen that look on your face before,” Curatio said, unable to spare the puckish smile. “And though it has been over a thousand years and my memories many, I quite recall what occasioned it then.”

  Now Alaric was bristling. He stood straight-backed in his armor, and his eyes narrowed. He moved his helm subtly at his side, as though tempted to put it on to hide his face. He did not, though. “I don't know what you think you saw–”

  “Stop lying to yourself,” Curatio said gently.

  “I am not–”

  “You are,” Curatio said, letting his neck sag beneath the weight of his head. How could a man so long-lived, so brave, so true in so many other regards, be so blind to himself? “You are playing yourself for a fool if you do not see this affinity you have for Captain Mazirin for what it is – the idle crush of a schoolboy infatuated with every facet of a girl he has just met.”

  Alaric's mouth moved, several times, with no noise resulting. When finally he regained, speech, he produced nearly only gibberish. “That – I – utter foolishness–”

  “I agree it is foolishness,” Curatio said. “'Utter' might be a bit far, as those feelings you are choking on have in fact produced all the generations of both our species and presumably many more, from the goblins to the trolls. I admit some skepticism that trolls might be included, at least until Vaste met Birissa and we all witnessed that ungainly and peculiar dance, but now it seems empirically certain than even trolls fall in love–”

  “I am not in—” Alaric roared, then caught hold of himself. “Love,” he finished with a whisper, still in fury. “I just met this woman, for pity's sake–”

  “Yes, I feel much pity right now. And tenure of knowing has hardly any bearing on intensity of feeling. Depth, perhaps–”

  “I am not–” Alaric caught himself spilling outrage, eyes flashing. Under control, he breathed, more patiently, “You are mistaken in your observation.”

  “I have witnessed this peculiar series of emotions more times than years you have lived, old friend,” Curatio said, as gently as he could. “I have even been a party to it myself to my occasional shame, as well you know.”

  “Your only shame was in choice of where to land your affections,” Alaric said, a bit stiffly and begrudging. “Caraleen ended up unworthy of either of us.”

  “Be that as it may,” Curatio said with some chagrin, “I see your cheeks aflame beneath your beard and I wish you would not feel so chagrined. For there is no shame to be had here. Not for this feeling. It is hardly a matter of control, after all–”

  “I am helping to lead a rebellion right now, Curatio,” Alaric said in a hushed whisper, as if they might be overhead, the story repeated far and wide by those gossipy civil servants. “I don't have time for...this.” He paused, then lowered his gaze. “And she has no interest, in any case. She has shut the door quite firmly on any further dealings with us, and I can easily infer that includes me.”

  “Perhaps it does,” Curatio said. “Perhaps it doesn't.”

  Alaric studied him with curious intensity. “Does your perception of emotions extend to hers, as well?”

  Curatio shook his head. “I don't know her as well as I know you, and the captain is exceedingly disciplined in controlling herself.

  “Nor does it matter,” Alaric said, heating up. “We have a task and a duty. Whatever foolishness and frippery you think I have in mind, I assure you, my mind is focused. Too long Reikonos has rested in that hands of that lich. Our absence has provided him license to do terrible things unchallenged. That must end, and soon. Whatever other matters you think weigh on me, this is the one I must keep my eye upon.”

  “Heavens, you sound like Cyrus in his bleating denials,” Curatio said, rolling his eyes. “As though you can hold but one thought a time. As though there is no room for more to crowd your head. Well, I tell you this, Alaric – you are a juggler in this, and one of the things you are desperately trying to pretend you are not dealing with is how this impression of Mazirin has grown in your mind, how it shapes your movements, the directions you go, the choices you make.”

  “What of it, if so?” Alaric asked. “I won't let it own me. It's but a small thing–”

  “Perhaps it should be a greater thing,” Curatio said softly, “if you but let it.”

  Alaric let a low, short laugh. “That sounds like you are advocating for it.”

  “Well, I'm not advocating against it.”

  “Not now,” Alaric said finally. “Whatever the case...not now. She's made her desire to be clear of this place glasslike in its clarity. And I have work to attend to. A city to save, and an army whose minds are nearly as distracted as my own, it seems.”

  Curatio smiled. “Even with half a mind on the task, we shall see it done and Reikonos freed.”

  Alaric hesitated, placing a hand upon the door before turning the knob. “Why?” He looked back, and there was a striking uncertainty in his bearing. “Because righteousness is on our side?”

  “Hardly,” Curatio said, placing his hands upon the back of the chair behind the desk. “Righteousness was on our side before, as you recall, in Sennshann, on the night that the old gods cast their burning spell and sacrificed the entirety of the population to their apotheosis. It did not save the occupants of that city then, and it shall do no better here, for it is a poor shield. No, it is not righteousness I would have on my side, but the combined might of Ulric Garrick, Cyrus Davidon, myself, Vaste – and the others.”

  “I have not been called Ulric in a very long time,” Alaric said. “Sometimes I think it is easy to forget who I was. I awake Alaric, go about my day Alaric, never thinking of the pathetic, weak lord of Luukessia that I was born. That I left behind so long ago.”

  “We are all more than we used to be,” Curatio said. “And less, as parts of us are cleaved off by time and grief. But there is much added to you, friend, since you were Ulric. Much that has made Alaric the man needed here. And perhaps...more yet to learn, even for an
old knight.” He smiled.

  “I hope you're right,” Alaric said, turning the doorknob, “for I wouldn't want to consider the sort of defense that Ulric Garrick would have mustered in my stead.” He smiled, so thinly, and then was gone, leaving Curatio alone in the office, with nothing but the whispers of the workers outside as he stared down at the map of a world he did not recognize at all.

  Chapter 80

  Alaric

  “Walk with me,” Alaric commanded, breezing out the office door into the dockyards. Guy was lingering outside, along with Hiressam, who was keeping one eye on the front gate and the other on the roguish Machine man.

  “Do you want me to–” Hiressam started to ask.

  Alaric waved him off. “If I can't keep one good eye on him...” He made a weak gesture toward his eye patch, and smiled. “Stay here. Tend to your duty.”

  Hiressam gave him a firm nod. “As you wish, Guildmaster.”

  Guy slouched along behind Alaric, saying nothing as they followed the wall around the perimeter of the docks. He did not speak until they had nearly reached the far gate, and one of the airships was taking off in a loud wash of dirt and wind. He turned his face from it, squinting against the granules of dust blowing down the roads between ships. “Not as many gone as I would have thought. By now, I mean,” Guy hastily amended.

  “None of us have run an airship dock before,” Alaric said, glancing back but not breaking stride as he walked toward the eastern gate out of the docks. The guard was thick, and already he could see them taking notice of their approach. “We have members of the City Watch trying to learn how to unlock the clamps, to vector the ships out as the current workers do it.”