Wizard's Resolve (Ozel the Wizard Book 3)

by Jim Hodgson

“I did, Your Majesty.”

  “How long have you known Ergam?” Elgin asked.

  “I don’t know him that much at all, Your Majesty. I was asked by one of the elders to speak with him when he came to the tunnel site. I grew up the daughter of a watchman, learned some techniques of investigation. In my second life I was owned by Ferdi Pocan and worked as a security and loss prevention agent. One of Ergam’s father’s associates asked me to look at the area where King Sakir was abducted to see what I could find.”

  “And did you find anything?”

  “He was certainly taken by force, most likely by the hill people. The tracks indicate a struggle. Two people at first, then others. I believe King Sakir was dragged to the top of one of the peaks and then forced to participate in some sort of …” She searched her mind for the right word, but came up empty. “I’m sorry, Your Majesties, I don’t know what to call it.”

  “That’s all right,” Elgin said. “Just do your best.”

  “The story gets a bit graphic from here,” Kadin said.

  “Everyone in this room has been forced to do graphic things in the service of their duty,” Usta said.

  Kadin nodded. “It appears King Sakir was chained to a tall metal pole. It looks like there were quite a lot of chains, probably because he was able to break some of them. Whoever was detaining him used fire magic to keep him in his position. Somehow he was blown apart.”

  “I don’t understand how anyone was able to overpower King Sakir,” Wagast said. “Your average extramortal should be able to handle a dozen hill people. Even if they caught him by surprise he should have been able to cry out, should he not?”

  “I believe they may have had some method of keeping the king quiet. Is there such a thing as a quiet spell?”

  Wagast tilted his head. “There is, indeed.” He looked at Yonca. A significant silent communication of some kind passed between them.

  “Madam Onan,” Yonca said. “Would you mind excusing us for a moment? Ozel and Aysu, would you accompany her outside briefly? Your Majesties, may I have a moment?”

  “Of course,” Elgin said.

  Ozel and Aysu smiled at Kadin and led her toward the door. She followed, leaving the package of King Sakir’s items behind.

  “One more thing, Madam Onan,” Yonca said. “If you were looking for an assassin in the city of Dilara, where would you start?”

  Kadin, without thinking about it, said, “I suppose I’d start wherever your spiders aren’t.”

  Yonca, Wagast, Elgin, Alabora, Nazenin, and Usta all looked at one another.

  Chapter 30

  The Gerent and his party were moving with haste, but not headlong flight yet. He had the sense a party of Yetkin was behind him, but no firm reason to think that other than his instincts. He needed to know what he was dealing with, but in order to find out he would need a little luck. A few moments later, he found what he was looking for. The small rise wasn’t perfect, but it would do.

  He ordered the bulk of his party to cut right at the base of the hill, then circle around. He and his best scout dismounted, threw their reins to other party members and ran headlong up the hill and over the back side of the rise. After checking to make sure they would have a good line of retreat, they hid themselves among the rocks and waited.

  The Gerent’s heart pounded in his ears as he lay on the cold ground. He could hear the other man’s breath coming in gasps. They were thankful that conditions wouldn’t cause their breath to steam, giving them away.

  Visibility had improved since the sun had burned off some of the fog, but some mists lingered. Through the low wisps the Gerent saw what he was looking for. Sure enough, there was a Yetkin war party on their trail. They came running down the mountain in the same exact path. They were moving quickly. A small contingent, but they also looked a lot stronger than any of the Yetkin they’d run across so far. The Gerent’s raiders would be victorious, surely, but they’d lose a couple of good men in the process. Was it worth it?

  He tapped the scout on the back and pushed himself up, then stayed low to retreat from the top of the hill. Once they were down a few feet, the crouch became a dead run. He could hear the other man pounding along behind him. They mounted, and the entire party was with them. The Gerent didn’t like some of the looks he got, but he knew the very same men would thank him when they were in bed with their wives a week hence rather than rotting corpses on some Yetkin mountainside.

  It was also good luck they’d seen the ocean, since they knew their bearings now. The Gerent led them, headlong, toward home.

  It almost felt good. Sure, they were turning tail and fleeing, but they’d come farther than any other Ilbezian party. They might have made it farther into Yetkin territory than any Ilbezian ever. There was a certain duper’s delight in fleeing.

  But the Gerent’s enjoyment was cut short when he realized he could hear, impossibly, the whoops and cries of running Yetkin behind him. He looked over his shoulder and, sure enough, somehow the big beasts were running as fast as the Ilbezian mounts. It was like waking up one morning to discover that your hands were bigger than your face. Yet there it was. The Yetkin were gaining ground.

  The Gerent didn’t have time to muse about what had made these Yetkin beasts so fast. If they were going to overtake them, and it looked like they would despite all history to the contrary, then he had to prepare his men for attack. His men could and would still defeat these beasts.

  The Gerent yelled commands. Operating like the born warriors that they were, the raiders obeyed without a moment’s hesitation. They split like a river against a rock, half flowing left and half right to circle back and engage the Yetkin. It was a strategy they’d employed many times before because the big dumb beasts were always confused by it. The Yetkin would usually split themselves into two groups as well, then the Ilbezian parties would use their greater speed to gang up on whichever group of Yetkin was smaller.

  But when his half of the party wheeled around to bear down on the enemies, the Gerent could see that the Yetkin hadn’t split their group. They had formed themselves into a wedge with one of their number protected in the middle. As usual, the Yetkin didn’t seem to have any ranged weapons, so the Gerent changed tactic. He yelled to his men to stay clear of the wedge, but to focus any ranged weapons on the figure in the middle — who must be important somehow. As the Gerent drew closer on his horse, he saw that he had made a mistake. The Yetkin in the center was a mage. The very idea of a Yetkin Mage made the Gerent’s blood turn to snowmelt. He yelled to change tactic again.

  He could see already that it would be too late for the leaders of the two halves of the groups. They had circled around and were poised to throw spears, but the mage had cast a gout of green fire. The Gerent hauled on his reins, trying to get away, but the flame was becoming an ever-expanding wall, burning everything in its path. There were screams behind him as he turned his mount, then he felt the heat on his back like nothing he’d ever imagined. His mount stumbled, regained its footing, then fell hard, throwing the Gerent down as well. The Gerent scrambled, drew his weapon, but what he saw when he turned almost made him drop it.

  His entire party was wiped out. The wall of fire had burned men and mounts to crisps. The men closest to the spell had been killed instantly, their black bodies curled on the ground like driftwood. Others were screaming, trying to crawl away on legs and arms burnt to cinders. His own horse had thrown him because one of its hind legs had been damaged so badly by fire there was hardly anything left of it. The big Yetkin had broken their wedge and were stalking through the members of the Gerent’s party, killing man and mount where they lay. Behind them, the Yetkin mage’s huge monster-like mouth twisted in a cruel grin as smoke from the fires rose.

  So, the Gerent thought. Today is the day, eh? So be it. He gripped his sword hilt, crouched, and charged. He closed the distance between himself and the nearest Yetkin in a few steps. It brought him close enough to the mage that he’d surely be vaporized, but he’d take at l
east one beast with him. He raised his weapon.

  Instead of meeting his charge, or even flinging a weapon up to protect itself from the Gerent’s strike, the Yetkin sidestepped, and something hit the Gerent like he’d been horse-kicked in the chest. He staggered, trying to regain his breath, but he was hit again. This time the blow lifted him. He felt his feet leave the ground, but he never landed. He just floated away into blackness.

  When the Gerent regained consciousness, he wished he hadn’t. Various parts of his body were screaming in pain. He was being shaken, which made all the pain worse. He opened his eyes and they seemed to be rolling in opposite directions. The sensation made his stomach convulse, but he must have already been vomiting because nothing came out. It was just as well. There was a rag over his mouth.

  A Yetkin beast was in his face, with its yellow skin and stinking breath. It emitted a series of grunting noises and stepped aside, revealing the mage behind.

  The mage stepped forward, a slight grin on its lips. It stuck something black and oily-looking in its mouth and chewed thoughtfully. Then it said, “You are surprised, aren’t you, little human?” It smiled. “We are not what you expected, are we? A few changes, yes?”

  The Gerent couldn’t have spoken if he wanted to. His vision was still swimming, although he found that if he concentrated he could keep it still. The effort made the splitting pain in his head worse. He felt the blackness closing in on the edges of his vision again.

  “No, no,” the mage said, a hand out.

  The Gerent snapped back to full, painful consciousness. He tried moving his limbs. They were bound behind him. There was no way he could get a hand into any of his pockets.

  “You keep your hands off my man!” someone shouted. The voice was thick, as though the person shouting was choking on something. “It’s me you want! I’m Gerent Ormuz, you bastards.”

  The Gerent choked on his rag. He wanted desperately to rail against this voice, trying to steal his identity in what must be his final moments. It must have been Burkut, trying to draw attention to himself, away from the Gerent.

  The mage flicked a finger in irritation. The Gerent saw one of the Yetkin beasts move forward. The choking voice cried out, then was silenced with a final wet thud that could only have been that voice’s death. When the Yetkin beast stepped back into view its sword dripped with blood.

  The mage put his hand out over the Gerent’s face and began to hum as it worked its jaw. There were lumps and staccato sounds in the humming, almost like it was speaking a language. If it was a language, the Gerent either couldn’t understand it, or his consciousness was slipping again. Then the mage hummed more, sounding interested. Finally, it grunted with dissatisfaction and removed its hand.

  “So,” it said. “Your man lied to save you. It hasn’t worked. Does that make you feel as helpless as you look?”

  There was a tinkling sound and some guttural shouts outside of the Gerent’s field of view.

  The Gerent thought, Perhaps.

  Chapter 31

  To say that it was a strange feeling for Kadin Onan to walk through the front door of the Dilara watch house was an understatement. She had so many memories here, so many dreams about her life. Nothing had turned out the way she’d thought it would, of course. When she’d been a little girl she’d dreamed of someday being the commander of the City Watch as her father had been. It had been impossible because she was female, but she dreamed it anyway. Now look at her. She wasn’t officially commander or anything, just temporarily deputized to handle some watch duties while Alabora and Nazenin’s men were busy with the defense of the country. But even so, here she was, in the watch house, an officer at His Majesty’s service, and still female, if slightly less alive. How the world did go on.

  She found, once inside the watch house, exactly what she’d expected to find; a man with his boots up on a desk. He was fast, though. He had his boots on the floor and was standing in seconds.

  “Madam Onan,” he said. “Samuel Postlethwaite are your service.” He grimaced when he heard himself say “are” rather than “at,” but didn’t try to correct it.

  Kadin realized, looking at him, that he was not a man at all, but a boy. His voice even squeaked. He was wearing the uniform. That was good. But there was a smell in the air that wasn’t so good.

  “Have you been drinking, Postlethwaite?”

  “Absolutely, ma’am,” Postlethwaite said, his eyes fixed on the wall at a point over Kadin’s shoulder.

  “Is that a good idea?”

  “Don’t rightly know, ma’am. I only had a little nip with dinner. I’m just a bit scared, ma’am.”

  “Scared? What of?”

  “Well, ma’am, you’re dead, ma’am.”

  Kadin sighed. “Well, I can see you’re going to make one hell of a watchman with detecting skills like that.”

  Postlethwaite’s eyes went back and forth as he considered his options. Finally he just said, “Yes, ma’am.”

  Kadin let the silence sit on him a moment to see what else he would say. He kept quiet. Smart kid. “Listen, Postlethwaite, things are going to get weird around here with an extramortal in the watch house. But we can handle weird, all right?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Postlethwaite barked.

  “We’ve got to figure out who tried to kill the king and his future wife, because I’ll tell you, they might be royals, but I’ve met them and they’re all right, understand?”

  “Yes, ma’am!”

  “Dilara has had more than a few nobles who were no better than a mad snake in a sack of wet shit, agreed?”

  “Yes, ma’am! Terrifying bastards, ma’am!”

  “Have you had any training?”

  “Not much, ma’am.”

  “How’d you come to be in the Watch?”

  He coughed. “Too young to be in the army, ma’am.”

  “Can you tell if a man is lying just by looking at him?”

  Postlethwaite scowled. “No, ma’am. Some people are very good at it.”

  She laughed. “They are at that. All right, Postlethwaite, at ease. You can call me Kadin.”

  “Yes, ma’am. You might as well know most people call me Post.”

  “You probably shouldn’t drink on the job, Post.”

  “Am I to be disciplined already, then?”

  “No, I honestly don’t give a fuck if you do. I’m just saying you probably shouldn’t. How well do you know the city?”

  “Very well.”

  “Good, take me around on a patrol.”

  Post winced.

  “Yes?” Kadin asked.

  “It’s nearly eleven,” he said. “Was rather hoping to catch a little sleep.”

  Kadin put her hands on her hips. “All right then, Post. Bright and early tomorrow, then.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  She shook her head at him. “Youth is truly wasted on the living.”

  Kadin had a walk around the city by herself. Whenever she saw a guardsman in uniform she stopped, introduced herself, and showed the badge she’d been given. Nobody gave her any problems about it, which she credited to the strength of Alabora and Nazenin’s leadership.

  Much of the city had changed. A few shops she’d gone in when she was alive were boarded up. Others had been turned into pubs or homes. The city seemed to be healing, for lack of a better word, from the battle that had been fought for it. Then again, maybe the more impactful thing that had happened to Dilara was when it had been forced to stop relying on extramortals as slaves.

  She wondered how she would feel, if something she’d always considered to be an inanimate tool she owned suddenly turned out to be a living thing that expected certain freedoms. It would be a shock, to be sure. But in walking around the darkened city of Dilara she didn’t get the sense that this was a city in strife. Why should it be, after all? It was still allowed to do the things cities did; feed people, give them a vocation, maybe sell them a pint.

  She stopped near the open door of a pub. There w
ere still two men at the bar, despite the hour, possibly because there was no bartender behind the bar to stop them. The street was dark, but the sky overhead was considering a sunrise. The men both looked unsteady.

  “…why I say them dead folk leaving Dilara was the best thing,” one said, then burped. “Best thing ever happened to us. Cities ain’t for the bloody dead, are they? S’not natural!”

  “Kanat is for them,” the other said.

  The first drunk ignored this point. “Why, if they hadn’t left, we’d have had to throw them out. They. Ain’t. Natural!” He banged his fist on the plank that served as the bar in cadence with the last three words, causing the other man to put his hand over his pint to stop any beer escaping.

  “‘Ere now,” the second man said. “Quit your banging.”

  “No, Kutlu. Listen. You listen. I’m telling you. Listen.”

  “Bah,” Kutlu said. He drained his pint, spilling most of it on his vest. “I’m going to bed. Go on home.”

  “You ever see one of them … things? Without their cloak on? Scare you half to death.”

  Kadin, in the street, took her coat off. She hung it on a thick post with an iron ring in it, then took her hat off and placed it atop the post. She even brushed her hair out of her eyes.

  “I’ve asked you once,” Kutlu slurred. “Don’t make me ban you from the pub again. Now go on home.”

  The drunk was just trying to get to his feet when Kadin ran in. She rushed him, arms wide, hair flying, screaming at the top of her lungs. Kutlu, the bartender, screamed too. The drunk staggered backward and knocked his stool over. Kadin doubled over laughing.

  The man on the floor was making whimpering sounds.

  After a few moments of Kadin’s laughing, the whimpering sounds coming from the floor trailed off. The drunk frowned, understanding he was the butt of a joke, and began to get testily to his feet. The bartender peeled himself off the barrels into which he’d been trying to dissolve and brushed his wet vest as if to clear it of crumbs.