King Bjarni decided he’d take off his robes and shirt as well. The Bifurland monarch wasn’t chiseled, precisely. His body looked more like it was formed from clay, with a bit extra daubed on here and there. His back and chest were covered in thick hair. It was hard to tell where his beard ended and his chest hair began. As Felix had reported, the king’s forearms were larger than his thighs. They were larger than Quin’s thighs, for that matter. Bjarni’s biceps bulged when he flexed them as he took the stool across from Quintillius.
“How does this work?” asked Quin.
“I’ll show you,” said Queen Signý. She looked at his forearms, then her husband’s and took four one-inch thick disks of braided horsehair from a servant and put them under Bjarni’s right elbow. “There. That should make it easier for you to clasp hands without twisting your wrist down. Grab hold.”
Blast! thought Mafuta. So much for leverage.
Quintillius did. He and the king both shifted to find a firm, comfortable grip.
“What are the rules?” asked Quintillius.
“Grip the peg with your left hand,” said the queen. Quintillius did. “If you release the peg, you lose. If you lift your elbow, you lose. If you break your grip, you lose.”
“How do I win?” asked Quin.
“By pinning the back of my wrist to the table,” said Bjarni.
“How do you win?” asked Quintillius with a smile.
“By having new land to give to my thains,” said Bjarni. “I may even keep a farm there for myself.” He tightened his grip. Quintillius did the same.
“What if neither one of us can pin the other?” asked Quintillius. “What happens then?”
“It never happens,” said Queen Signý. “Someone tires eventually.”
I hope it’s not Quin, thought Mafuta. She was pleased to see that even Deena and Ríga had come back to watch the contest play out. She wished she had a goblet of wine, or even a mug of mead for herself.
Queen Signý held up a gold coin. “I’m going to drop this on the table. When you hear it strike the surface, begin.”
Mafuta had done her research. Traditionally the coin went to the victor. Now the stakes were a great deal higher.
Signý held the coin lightly between her pinched fingers and let it drop. Mafuta was sure she heard a hundred spectators inhale as the coin descended. She was one of them. Then the coin struck the table with a muted clunk and the competition began.
Mafuta was most worried about the first fifteen seconds. She’d learned that many arm-wrestling bouts were decided by an initial surge by one participant that overwhelmed his opponent. She was pleased to see that Quin was holding his own past that point, and then past half a minute. Quin’s greater leverage, of sorts, was compensating for Bjarni’s raw strength.
She had advised Quintillius to seek out the best arm wrestlers in the legions and learn their tricks. Quin had been wise enough to do so, taking half an hour while a boat was located.
Traveling by water had made more sense than flying, given the size of their party. Quin’s scouts had found a fisherman willing to rent them his boat for the evening. The legionnaire designated to handle the negotiations said the fisherman had been quite accommodating and pleased with the proposed rent, though the rest of the squad of soldiers with the negotiator may have provided encouragement.
Mafuta had watched grizzled veterans from the legions show Quintillius how to twist his wrist, vary his force, and appear to lose, only to redouble his efforts and pin his opponent. She hoped the veterans’ quick lessons would be effective.
Back at the table, both Bjarni and Quintillius were starting to sweat. It was cool enough that you couldn’t see any droplets on their torsos, but their furrowed foreheads were slick with perspiration. Mafuta was pleased she’d given Quin a mixture of fruit and vegetable juices to drink before the competition. It might help him last longer.
She looked away for a moment to observe the queen and the crowd. Every eye was focused on the two straining men. She heard Signý gasp and quickly turned back to the table. Quintillius was forcing Bjarni’s wrist down toward the table. Already, it was halfway there. Bjarni was struggling to keep the back of his hand from touching. He looked at Quintillius imploringly. Quin nodded in a way that made it seem like it was just part of his effort to defeat the Bifurland monarch.
Mafuta saw Signý’s face brighten as Bjarni struggled back. He forced Quin’s arm up and back to vertical, then past vertical. With a tremendous effort and shout, Bjarni pressed the back of Quin’s hand into the wood of the tabletop. The gold coin bounced and rattled from the impact. Cheers erupted from from the Bifurlanders. Queen Signý clapped and so did a young girl with blonde braids like Signý’s who’d recently taken a spot on the queen’s lap. A daughter, assumed Mafuta. Then the wider implications struck her. Laetícia’s not going to be happy.
Bjarni jumped up and embraced Quintillius.
“Well fought,” said the king. “Well fought indeed.” He pounded Quin’s back.
“And you, my friend,” said Quintillius.
“Yes,” shouted Bjarni. “The Roma are now our friends. We will get our new lands—half of one of Occidens Province’s greatest treasures.”
There was more cheering across the ship. Bifurlanders were shaking hands with the guards. Some even went to their knees to hug the Parvi, including the one with the deep scratch Felix had just healed. Others brought drinks to Ríga and Deena. A thoughtful woman approached Mafuta with a goblet of wine. The older Roma wizard quickly checked it for poison, found none, and drank three swallows. She was still worried about Laetícia’s reaction.
With help from a few warriors, Bjarni climbed up on the table and stomped his foot for attention. Only three-quarters of the people on the flagship noticed, but that was enough to lower the noise level so his next words could be heard.
“Yes,” he said. “The Roma are now our friends—and that is why our fleet will soon go to Nova Eboracum to engage Tamloch’s fleet and ensure the treasure is still Quintillian’s to give.”
The king’s announcement earned still more cheers. Bifurlanders love a fight, thought Mafuta. This should make Laetícia a lot happier.
* * * * *
Dawn wasn’t far off when the Roma travelers were back in their borrowed boat heading north up the river. Mafuta and Quintillius spoke softly from their seats side by side on the middle thwart.
“Why did you lose on purpose?” asked Mafuta.
“King Bjarni didn’t want to lose face in front of his people,” said Quin. “He made that plain to me with his expression. I knew he’d make good on supporting us with his fleet if I did.”
“That was a lot to wager on reading someone’s face,” said Mafuta. “What if you were wrong?”
“I wasn’t wrong,” said Quintillius.
“What is this chunk of land that’s a treasure of Occidens Province you’re giving away? I want to know how far away I should get when you tell Laetícia.”
“She knows my plan,” said Quintillius. “She even helped me refine it.”
“That’s reassuring,” said Mafuta.
Quin told her.
“You gave Insula Longa to the Bifurlanders!”
“Only the eastern half,” said Quintillius. “That part of the Long Island is across the sound from Tamloch and there are plenty of Tamloch settlers already there. Bjarni’s thains will help me clear them out and provide a buffer for us against future Tamloch attacks.”
“Until they’re dug in and their harbors become staging areas for future attacks from Bifurland,” said Mafuta.
“That’s what I like about you,” said Quin. “You always see the bright side.”
“It’s not funny, Quin.”
“I know,” said Quintillius, “but take an even longer view and consider how valuable a fleet of five hundred or a thousand dragonships would be when its time for me to cross the Ocean and claim the imperial throne.”
“Oh,” said Mafuta. “That’s different.”<
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Chapter 47
Doethan
“Higher,” chirped one small child.
“Up, up!” exclaimed the other.
“Later,” said Doethan. “It’s dark and I want you both to be safe.”
“You make light,” said the first child, pointing at the glowing sphere above Doethan’s head.
“More light than when we’re up to feed the chickens,” said the other.
“Shush, children,” said the innkeeper.
“Plenna, Mercha, pipe down and don’t annoy the wizard,” said the cook.
Doethan smiled. At least he knew the children’s names now, though he didn’t know which name went with which child. Come to think of it, he didn’t know their mothers’ names, either. Both problems could be addressed easily.
“Good ladies,” said Doethan, “I’ve enjoyed your cooking and your hospitality—and your children, for that matter—but we haven’t been formally introduced. If we’re going to be exploring an old quarry together close to midnight, the least I could do would be tell you my name. I’m Doethan.”
“Wizards are funny,” said one small child.
“He could have said, ‘My name is Doethan. What’s yours?’” said the second child.
“I’m Plenna—she’s Mercha,” said the first child who seemed indistinguishable from her sister. “I want to be a soldier,” she continued.
“I want to be a cook,” said Mercha.
“Both are respected professions,” said Doethan, smiling to himself so the girls didn’t think they were being patronized.
“I’m Coegi, and my wife is Gwest,” said the thin, long-haired cook. The two women had empty rough-woven bags in each hand, the kind grain was stored in for transport.
“The girls can be a handful,” said Gwest. Dimples formed in her cheeks when she smiled.
“We’re a handful and a half,” announced Mercha proudly.
This time, Doethan couldn’t keep from smiling.
“I hope you young ladies are good at collecting blue pebbles,” he said. “I’m going to need a lot of them.”
“We are, we are,” said Plenna. “We feed them to the chickens for their gizzards. It makes their eggs extra special.”
“I’m sure it does,” said Doethan. He wondered if that contributed to the taste of Coegi’s excellent chicken-and-egg pie.
“You’ve been to the quarry before?” he asked the girls.
“Lots of times,” said Plenna.
“But not after dark,” said Mercha. “We’re afraid of the monster.”
“It snores,” said Plenna.
“I’m afraid of you falling in the lake,” said Gwest.
“I wouldn’t like that either,” said Plenna. Doethen looked down and saw the girl shake her head. “You won’t let us fall in the lake, will you, good wizard?”
“I won’t let you fall in the lake or be eaten by a monster,” he said.
Plenna and Mercha smiled at Doethan and squeezed his hands. The two didn’t take up much room on his flying disk.
The girls and their mothers were quiet for a few minutes as they walked along and skimmed above the gravel road heading west from the Dormant Dragon. Doethan saw steep cliffs rising ahead of him. He made his sphere of illumination glow brighter and realized they were more than two hundred feet tall, with a wide opening ahead, like someone had cut a wedge out of a pie.
I shouldn’t snack after bedtime, thought Doethan. Everything reminds me of food.
“The quarry is just through that gap,” said Mercha.
“Both our moms won’t let us go there by ourselves,” said Plenna.
“Your mothers are wise women,” said Doethan. “You should aspire to be like them.”
“What does aspire mean?” asked Plenna.
“I know,” said Mercha. “It’s like a tower at a castle.”
“That’s a spire,” said Coegi.
“I mean you should hope you grow up to be as wise as they are,” said Doethan. He was enjoying himself. He hadn’t spent time with small children since Salder and Merry were little.
A few minutes later, they were in the gap in the cliff wall. Doethan’s glow light seemed brighter, reflecting off the stone walls that ranged in color from white to dark-blue. Doethan was impressed by the way the layers of rock seemed to be folded on top of themselves, like the blankets on a haphazardly-made bed. He resolved to return to the quarry in the future for a more detailed inspection.
If I live through the upcoming battle, he considered.
Soon the gap opened into a broad bowl-shaped quarry with high walls and a lake taking up two-thirds of the bottom. Tens of thousands of stones, from dust to boulders, covered the quarry’s floor. It shouldn’t take long to gather enough magestones for his needs, thought Doethan. He lowered his flying disk and the girls ran off to hug their mothers.
“What do you say to forming mother-daughter teams to look for stones,” said Doethan. “I’ll give each team its own ball of light.”
Gwest and Coeli nodded. Doethan could see they didn’t want the girls to wander off as their own team. He said Llachar! twice and made two new glowing spheres above the women’s heads, keeping the original sphere for himself.
“Only gather the stones and pebbles that are blue,” said Doethan. “The deeper the color the better. The gray and white ones don’t have magic in them.”
“We can do that,” said Plenna. She tugged Gwest off to the left.
“Here’s a sack for your collection,” said Coegi, tossing one to Doethan as she was pulled to the right by Mercha.
“Thanks for your help,” he said softly. The mother-daughter teams were already too far away to hear him.
Doethan modified his glow sphere to shine a bright beam of light on the ground in front of his eyes. He paced forward slowly, bending down to pick up promising blue rocks and pebbles when he saw them. He wondered why the quarry was no longer used for magestones. He was only familiar with Melyncárreg and three quarries northwest of Brendinas used by most wizards in Dâron’s Conclave. He’d found his own magestone in the middle one of the three more than a quarter of a century ago.
The stones he was collecting were small, but seemed of high quality. He’d have to ask Damon why it had been abandoned. Damon might know, unless it had happened before his time. Doethan’s light touched the edge of the lake and he smiled. Perhaps part of the quarry filling with water had something to do with it.
He walked back and forth in a zigzag pattern between the lake and the gap until his sack was half full and growing heavy. He made a megaphone of solidified sound and called to his companions. “Time to go!” he shouted. His words echoed off the quarry’s vertical walls. They seemed louder than they should because everything else around him was quiet, including his new friends.
Then he heard Mercha’s voice off to the right.
“What is it, Mother?” she asked.
Doethan left his sack near the gap and ran toward the glowing ball above Coegi and Mercha. He could hear footsteps that must belong to Plenna and Gwest behind him.
“I don’t know,” he heard Coegi answer as he got closer. “It doesn’t feel like stone.”
Doethan saw what they were looking at—an odd blue triangle poking out from the floor of the quarry. It was big, nearly four inches thick, as tall as his outstretched arm, and as wide at the base as the distance from his fingertips to his elbow.
“I wouldn’t touch that,” he said.
Coegi removed her fingers from the triangle and held Mercha back when she reached for it.
“Wow!” said Plenna, who had just arrived. She stepped toward the triangle with her hand stretched toward it. Gwest put her arms around her daughter’s waist and lifted her up. Plenna’s legs still churned below her.
“What is it?” Mercha repeated.
“I don’t know, and we don’t have time to investigate tonight,” said Doethan. “Please stand back. I’m going to ensure it’s not disturbed until I return.”
Coel
i and Mercha moved five steps away. Both mother-daughter teams stared at Doethan as he created a solid-blue sphere of solidified sound around the triangle to protect it from small children and their parents.
“Did you find lots of stones?” he asked.
“Lots and lots,” said Mercha.
“I can hardly lift my bag,” said Plenna, pointing to it proudly.
“Excellent,” said Doethan. “So did I. Now I have to join the king and the royal army. I have plenty left to do tonight, and these stones will help me do it. You’ve all been a big help, thank you!”
“Yay!” shouted the girls.
“I’m going to put the bags on my flying disk and head back at high speed,” said Doethan. “Your glow spheres should stay in place for a few more hours to light your way back. I promise I’ll return to give you girls a ride high in the air in daylight.”
“That will be fun!” exclaimed Mercha.
“And a wyvern ride!” added Plenna.
“I’ll talk to Eynon and see what can be arranged,” said Doethan.
He hugged the girls and nodded his thanks to their mothers, then hefted the sacks of stones onto his flying disk, rose up and flew northeast. Cooking fires should make it easy to spot the army’s encampment from the air. Someone on Duke Háiddon’s staff would be sure to know a good place to establish the gate at this end.
Chapter 48
Túathal and Gwýnnett
“Hello, my dear,” said King Túathal when Princess Gwýnnett was escorted into his tent. Her gown and coat were soaked and water from her wet hair dripped down her back. She did not look happy, but she waited until the servant withdrew before sharing her thoughts with the king.
“You despicable cross between a skunk and a scorpion,” she began. “How dare you…”
The intensity of Túathal’s harsh gaze closed Gwýnnett’s mouth momentarily. The king clapped his hands twice, sharply, and Uirsé, the dark-haired young wizard Verro had assigned him, entered the tent and looked at Túathal for instructions.
The Congruent Wizard (The Congruent Mage Series Book 2) Page 28