The Conspiracy of Unicorns

by Michael Angel

  I wasn’t going to argue that point. We’d all set off to Lord Quinton’s castle before a proper breakfast, and my stomach was starting to gnaw on my backbone in desperation. Rather than ask Galen to expend more of his magic, we made the climb up the long stairway to the dungeon.

  With all my travels between Los Angeles and Andeluvia, I’d been putting some effort into getting into better shape. Extra morning hikes helped, at least a little, but by the time we’d reached the Dame’s Tower, my thighs had started to seriously burn.

  My three companions hadn’t even broken a sweat, of course. This was one of the downsides of associating with four-legged creatures. You’re always the one bringing up the rear.

  Galen held my office door open while Liam and Shaw moved to one side to let me enter. They’d started doing this ever since I’d knighted them as part of my Order. It still felt a little odd, but I figured that, if this bit of formality made them feel better, I would just play along.

  Galen glanced inside, raised an eyebrow, and spoke to me as I limped up the final steps.

  “It appears that your page is here to greet us,” he noted. “Perhaps that is convenient.”

  “I hope so,” I said. “He’s shown up to announce some sort of crisis a bit too often for my tastes as of late.”

  I ducked under Galen’s arm and walked into the official headquarters of the Order of the Ermine. The windows were thrown wide open, letting the cooling breeze pass through. The slate blackboard containing my handwritten notes was rolled off to one side to allow me easier access to the stairway leading down to the next level. The room’s table sat smack in the center, empty save for a strange-looking object on a wooden base. Said base was being hurriedly polished by a towheaded boy in the sky-blue outfit marking him as a royal page.

  “What’s going on, Percival?” I asked.

  He all but jumped to attention. “Dame Chrissie! I’m so excited that you are here, look what arrived today!”

  Percival moved to one side, extending his arms towards the object with a little flourish. Ta-da! It was a showy move, but he obviously took great pride in whatever he’d brought up to the tower room. The sunlight fell fully upon the whatever-it-was, but my brain refused to process what I saw for a moment.

  “Is that…” Liam breathed, as he moved to stand to my right.

  “Aye, ‘tis none other!” Shaw answered, as he padded over to my left.

  “Quite the remarkable transformation,” Galen stated approvingly.

  I finally forced the words out. “That’s Grand Master Mothball!”

  The weasel’s dung-colored, moth-eaten coat had been replaced by a sleek white one. The thing’s fur had been combed to sit perfectly in one direction, from the dots of pink at the ears all the way to the spot of black at the tip of the luxurious tail. The face had been made fuller, so the eyes didn’t bulge out cartoon-style anymore. Even the silly buckteeth fit better, looking appropriately ferocious and fanglike instead of comical.

  A tiny whiff of mothballs still emanated from the Order’s mascot. I wouldn’t be changing his name anytime soon. But the look of the mounted and stuffed weasel had completely transformed from something ratty into a nice work of art.

  Percival looked at me eagerly. “Do you like it, Dame Chrissie?”

  “Like it? I’m amazed!” I admitted. “But…how? I didn’t order this, and I sure as heck couldn’t pay someone for it, either!”

  The little page coughed into his hand. “I was told not to tell who it was from.”

  Shaw chuckled. “Dayna, thou dost have a talent for gaining allies in unexpected places.”

  I worked my jaw for a moment in thought. This was a very nice gift, indeed. But I had enough on my plate without adding more unsolved mysteries. If I had a secret helper around, I wanted to know who it was.

  “I believe I can anticipate what you are considering,” Galen cautioned. “If your page has been tasked with not revealing the patron’s identity, you should not force him to breach his word.”

  “I’d never force anyone to do that,” I said, as both Liam and Shaw nodded in support of Galen’s statement. “But I’m starting to figure out how things work in your world, and oaths – even informal ones – can be very specific.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Percival,” I began, as I turned to address him. “You’re not allowed to tell me who sent this gift, correct?”

  He bowed in response. “Yes, Dame Chrissie.”

  “So…that means you’re allowed to tell me who didn’t send it.”

  Percival scratched his blond mop of hair in confusion. “I, uh, guess so.”

  “Good,” I continued. “Lord Behnaz and Lord Alvey didn’t send this, right?”

  “Oh, of course not, my lady!”

  “Lord Ivor and Lord Ghaznavi didn’t send it, did they?”

  “No, my lady.”

  “This wasn’t sent by Herald, the Lord of the Pursuivant, was it?”

  A shake of the head. “No, it was not, Dame Chrissie.”

  Shaw let out a grumble. “‘Tis ridiculous! I cannot believe this is working!”

  “Hush,” Liam murmured. “Something’s going well for us for a change.”

  “Hmm…” I said contemplatively. “It wasn’t Lady Behnaz, was it?”

  The page shook his head. “No, my lady.”

  I rubbed my chin in thought. “I’m running out of individual candidates, so I better change things up a little. Percival, this wasn’t sent to me by anyone who’s not human, was it?”

  “Oh, certainly not, Dame Chrissie!”

  Percival’s insistence on that point told me that whoever sent it was someone he knew. And since it wasn’t from any non-human creature, that ruled out beings like Albess Thea or Regent Magnus.

  “Okay…this wasn’t sent to me by anyone on the Royal Court, was it?”

  For the first time, the page hesitated. “Um…well, not really.”

  That gave me another clue. This wasn’t anyone who attended regularly, but only occasionally, but that would apply to several of the lords and knights. About the only people who attended every single meeting would be the King and the Commander of the Royal Guard.

  Wait a minute!

  Commander Yervan was bound to attend every Royal Court, but he regularly rotated the knights who stood guard over the meetings. Sir Quinton had told me that very thing when Rikka and I had first met him at The Quiet Peasant.

  “Percival, this wasn’t sent by a member of the Royal Guard, was it?”

  Abruptly, the boy’s face flushed. “Um…I can’t quite say that.”

  “I would prefer to not cause problems for the lad,” Galen put in. “Percival, we require your services to procure lunch before Grimshaw decides to add ‘Royal Page’ to the list of ‘To Try’ items.”

  On cue, Shaw loudly snapped his beak. Percival vanished as quickly as his feet could take him. Galen cleared his throat and continued.

  “I saw no remaining need to continue your questions, Dayna,” the Wizard assured me. “Of the remaining members of the Royal Guard, there is only one person who could have sent our weasel mascot back to us in this condition.”

  Chapter Seven

  “All right,” I said, as I crossed my arms. “I’ll bite. You think you know who sent us this gift?”

  “Indubitably,” Galen assured me. “By chance, I learned that the second in command of the Royal Guard, Captain Murren, is a skilled taxidermist. Only he could have upgraded ‘Grand Master Mothball’ to his current status.”

  “Murren? I’m not familiar with the name,” Liam said. The Protector of the Forest looked to Shaw, who shook his head. The drake didn’t know who Galen meant either.

  Even I had to rack my brain a little bit to match face to name. When I did, I had to admit that things made an uncommon amount of sense. I absently brushed Mothball’s fine white fur with a finger as I spoke.

  “Galen and I met Captain Murren the evening after the wyvern attack on King Fitzwilliam.
When I took Fitzwilliam to my world for medical help, the kingdom came within an inch of civil war. Commander Yervan ordered Murren and the rest of the Royal Guard to bar the way into the throne room to anyone but the Heads of the Knightly Orders.”

  “I recall you telling us that you convinced him to let you into the throne room,” Liam remarked. “Specifically, you got him to do that against orders from his commander!”

  I nodded. “Which is part of the reason he wanted to thank me, I think. The knights of the different factions had been trying to force an entry all day in order to sway the decision of who would rule the land. By the time Galen and I arrived, half of Murren’s men were either wounded or dead. When Murren let me pass, he was gambling with his honor that I would be able to restore order before his men were worn down and slaughtered.”

  “‘Twas a gamble that was richly rewarded,” Shaw concluded.

  There was a knock at the door, which Galen trotted over to open. Percival and two other pages stepped through, bringing in our lunch. They’d arrived in record time, so either someone had been busy readying large batches of food, or they really were worried about Shaw eating someone. I moved Mothball off to a side shelf to avoid getting anything on his mint-condition fur as the pages set out plates, cups, and silverware.

  Percival set out a silver plate stacked high with bright-red berries on the floor next to Liam. He then placed a couple of wide-mouthed tubs nearby with water for the fayleene and his griffin friend. Shaw dug into the somewhat-roasted flank of pork the other two pages lugged in as soon as it was slid off onto a nearby platter. Judging by the size, shape, and condition of the entrée, the kitchen had simply bisected an entire pig and waved it a couple of times over the fire before sending it up for the drake.

  Jugs of the slightly bitter black tea served throughout the palace were set out on the table for me and Galen, along with a tub full of cracked ice. Trays of cold sliced pheasant breast followed, complete with the Andeluvian equivalent of a gravy boat, filled with a strange purple sauce. This was rounded out with smaller trays of glazed carrots, cone-shaped dinner rolls, and twin tubs of butter and crumbled salt.

  “Should you need anything else, just summon me, Dame Chrissie,” Percival said, once everything had been laid out. Since I’d stuffed my mouth with a huge bite of pheasant, I just gave him a ‘thumbs up’ as he and his fellow pages left the room. Conversation ground to a halt as Liam munched his way through the berries, Galen consumed his pheasant slices with even cuts of his two-tined fork, and Shaw tore into and devoured the pig carcass in a way that would have made Queen Nagura jealous.

  I guess everyone had been hungry.

  The purple sauce was the only sour note in the mix for me. Quite literally, as it tasted like a puree of blueberries, licorice sticks, and balsamic vinegar. One spoonful was enough to send me back to the glazed carrots and poultry.

  Eventually, after my brain had finally registered that the fuel tank wasn’t running on ‘empty’ anymore, I got up from the table. I carefully made my way around where Shaw was still gnawing at the leftover pork bones, as I didn’t want to lose a foot on the way to my destination. I pulled the wheel-mounted slate board into its usual place so I could write on it.

  Each of the categories I’d put on the board since last autumn were still on there, albeit with more notes scribbled below. While my friends began to taper off their chewing and gobbling, I decided to make a few updates.

  I glanced briefly at the last three items I’d chalked in. Each described one of the unexplained, vivid near-dreams I’d had recently. According to Master Zenos, these dreams were a kind of prophecy. Some potential future that hadn’t manifested yet.

  Destry talks with someone in the dark. That wonderfully vague dream had almost messed up the aftermath of a rather satisfying date with Esteban. The words were what had stuck in my mind. Destry had been speaking to someone in tones so muffled that all I could make out were a few words. ‘Safety’. ‘Darkness’. ‘Turned’. It wasn’t much to go on, but it was less cringe inducing than the next entry.

  Dayna goes to the beach. Seriously, that was it. I’d spoken to Zenos in detail about this one. About waking up from a nap on a warm, sandy beach, the coconut scent of suntan lotion rising from anyplace on my body not covered by my bikini.

  Zenos had seemed more interested in finding out what a bikini was than what the dream meant. Honestly, it was probably my subconscious longing for a vacation. Like that was ever going to happen at this rate.

  Two wizards in combat. Of the three dreams, this one was the most puzzling. I’d watched a dark-skinned man and an olive-complexioned woman in the middle of a magical duel. They’d faced off on a staircase running along a curved wall. I tapped this one and put a checkmark next to it.

  Under the entry KORR, I reread his final words, the ones that had puzzled us for so long. A vision, from the time of the Old War, thirty centuries ago.

  A shining city with towers shaped like mushrooms. High walls, guarded by lizards garbed in green and black.

  Underneath, I’d added: ENEMY OR FRIEND OF THE ‘SCRIVENERS’?

  First, I drew an arrow from Korr’s statement about lizard guards down to my six-word notation. Then I wiped away the first four words of my note, as well as the question mark. Queen Nagura had answered this for us.

  The Hakseeka had turned out to be the ‘THE SCRIVENERS’. The shining city with towers had been the Hakseeka’s home city of Teyana. Now, they were lost in the mists of time. Only their ruler’s sister had survived while humans claimed the ruins of the wyvern city as their own.

  That brought me, with a ‘thud’ in my chest, to the last three lines of Belladonna’s visons.

  These verses of the griffin’s prophecy remained where I’d chalked them in.

  The dream horses sow the seeds of their fall.

  The humans dwell upon the bones of their nemesis.

  One who might yet save us lies beyond the light of the hearth.

  I’d added topics branching off from these lines. One jumped out at me: ‘WHO IS GRAYSON ARCHER?’ I drew a line from that question up to my prophetic dream. Two wizards in combat.

  Could there be a connection there? I set the chalk aside as I considered it.

  “Galen? I’m thinking about the last time I met Grayson Archer in Chief McClatchy’s office. When I asked him about ‘keeping his honor’.”

  “You said that you got a reaction out of him,” the Wizard recalled. “It does imply that he was once a knight or lord from Andeluvia.”

  “What’s more, he must have more than a novice level of magical training. From what I can tell, novices can’t set up wards of protection, let alone create magic-based weapons like the ‘Demon’.”

  “Of that, we are in firm agreement.”

  “As I said to Queen Nagura, it is curious…why haven’t I heard of any human wizards?

  Galen took a final sip of tea from his cup, setting it aside before answering.

  “Perhaps it is that they do not wish to be known. Ever since I began my studies, it has been my understanding that the Deliberati have kept their identities hidden from public view.”

  “The who?” Liam asked, with a cute cervine frown.

  “That is the colloquial name for the Deliberation of Wizards,” Galen explained. “The council of the most senior and powerful wizards in Andeluvia. Men and women who have chosen to fade into the backdrop of the world to run the Wizard’s Guild, as well as advise the guilds of the Archivists and the Soothsayers.”

  I immediately thought of the first time Galen had spoken of the Deliberati. They’d recently turned down his application for Archmage status, the top classification for a wizard in this world. I’d thought of them as a certification body, similar to what many professions had in Los Angeles. But maybe there was more going on here.

  In fact, I was suddenly sure of it.

  “Fading into the backdrop…” I murmured. “Are there any other practitioners of magic out there? Surely they can’t all
be part of this shadowy council.”

  “Well, they are certainly not as well known outside their field of expertise. Morith the Wise, for example, is only celebrated for spellcraft involving plants and herbal remedies. Hermator the Self-Banished specialized in alchemy, but as you can guess, he mostly kept to himself. And Nembari the Great created the Staff of Stunning, but never seemed to get the credit.”

  “All right, maybe they weren’t the best at public relations,” I said, trying my best not to start pacing. “But are any of them still around? Considering what the kingdom’s been going through, you’d figure that at least one of them – or the wizards of the ‘Deliberati themselves – would have offered their services!”

  “The three wizards I mentioned passed on decades or centuries ago.” Galen clopped his forehoof loudly against the stone floor as he added, “Now that I think of it… Jastrum, the last Archmage-level human wizard, died of old age here in the palace, many years before I arrived. I inherited his laboratory, as a matter of fact.”

  “Doesn’t that strike you as a little…odd?”

  “Maybe,” Liam put in, “there simply haven’t been any more wizards born to the humans.”

  “Possible, but unlikely,” Galen said. “At least one in a thousand children in this kingdom are born with some innate talent. But to become a wizard, a young boy or girl must be taught how to apply their skills. Elsewise, they couldn’t learn more than basic wards and charms.”

  “Okay,” I allowed. “Then that begs the next question: how does someone learn how to be a wizard?”

  “Aye, thou hast brought up something that has puzzled mine own brain for some time,” Shaw agreed, as he absently stropped a claw against my poor carpets.

  “It depends on one’s species,” Galen explained. “We centaurs possess no formal ‘academy’. Rather, once our talent manifests, we are given the choice to study the texts possessed by our family’s House. As a young colt, I spent many hours going over the basics from the scrolls kept by House Friesain.”

  “And these scrolls…are they old centaur texts?”