by AC Cobble
“Speaking of moving, let’s get going and eat on the road.” Ben gestured toward a dark cloud moving down the river valley. “I’ve gotten used to city life and don’t relish the thought of what that rain will do to this dirt road.”
Weeks later and back in The City, Ben surveyed their new building. After the Vis trip, they’d finalized the deal with Lord Reinhold and moved the operation from the musty cellar to a spacious warehouse off the island. It was near the foot of one of the bridges, so Ben didn’t think it’d be an issue getting back and forth. The area of town was a little rough, but as Reinhold said, the price was right.
With the new space and an influx of Reinhold’s gold, Ben had been able to get proper fermenting tanks and other equipment for a full-scale brewery. They’d also hired new staff including assistant brewers and several more porters. It felt like they had a small army at their disposal and now Ben spent more time managing the people than he did actually brewing. He was responsible for the brewery operation and the money. Renfro was handling sales and deliveries. Renfro kept mentioning that he was willing to do the accounting, but without saying it outright, Ben declined because he didn’t fully trust his friend.
Still, the partnership with Reinhold and the rapid expansion seemed to have lifted Renfro out of his dark mood. He was spending more time visiting reputable alehouses and less time in the sinks. He hadn’t brought up anything about Gulli in a week, and Ben silently hoped that episode was behind them.
The assistant brewers did most of the activity now, following Ben’s recipes, but he still liked to walk the floor and monitor the quality. He felt like none of them cared about it as much as he did. Then again, it was just a job for them.
While he was circling the room, one of his assistants caught his attention near the entrance and waved him over. A strange young man was standing with him. He had shaggy, unkempt hair and ill-fitting, nearly worn-through clothing. Prospective employee, thought Ben. It wasn’t uncommon now that they’d expanded. Young men saw the growth and wanted to be part of it.
“Hi, what can I do for you?” Ben asked. Now that he was close, he noticed the boy kept fidgeting and glancing around the wide-open room like he thought someone was watching him.
“Can we speak in private?” the straw-haired boy croaked.
“Sure. Come on to the storage room,” Ben said and then shot a quizzical look to his assistant. The man just shrugged. “What can I help you with? What’s the secrecy about?”
“I… I saw you visit the Sanctuary, right?” The boy was sweating and hadn’t lost his anxiousness as they stepped into the storage room. It was half-packed full of bulging sacks of barley and hops.
“Yes,” replied Ben tentatively.
“Who are you visiting there?”
The question and the attitude raised Ben’s hackles, but the boy didn’t appear to be a threat. “I visit my sister and a friend. They are Initiates there.”
A wave of relief swept through the boy’s scrawny frame and he rubbed a hand over his face. “Your sister, good. I thought so.”
“Why? What is going on? Is Meghan in danger or something?”
“Oh, I don’t know. I don’t know her,” replied the boy. “Maybe.”
Ben’s concern grew. “What do you mean, maybe?”
“My sister Issabelle. She is an Initiate too, but I haven’t seen her in weeks. She’s stopped writing. When I ask about her, the guards tell me maybe she doesn’t want to talk to me anymore, or they tell me maybe she’s left. They tell me to forget about it and leave. She’s my sister. She would never do that to me! What could they have done to her?”
The emotion painting the boy’s face told Ben all he needed to know about his story.
“Maybe she’s just been busy,” answered Ben lamely. “The studies there are taxing. Sometimes my sister tells me all she wants to do is sleep on her free days.”
They both knew that didn’t explain why Issabelle would stop writing. There had to be an explanation, though.
“Tomorrow is the next free day,” Ben continued. “I’ll ask my sister about her. If they’re both Initiates, surely they know each other.”
“Yes, thank you!” the boy cried out and moved to embrace Ben.
After the boy left—Segor was his name—Ben couldn’t shake the image of his tear-streaked face. Segor was assuming the worst, and based on what he said the guards told him, Ben thought something unusual must be going on.
The next morning, Ben left early for the Sanctuary. He usually arrived mid-morning and found the girls waiting for him, but he couldn’t wait today. He had barely slept the night before, mulling over what Segor said and thinking about his encounters with Meghan and Amelie over the last few months. There was no question they were healthy and didn’t seem to be in immediate danger. Now that he thought about it though, he realized they’d shared nearly nothing about what they were doing there. Lots of studying, that was all they’d told him.
He approached the massive copper gates that marked the only opening in the outer wall of the Sanctuary. The two faces—one old woman and one young—seemed to sneer instead of smile down at him.
One of the four guards posted at the entrance stepped out and rested a hand on his sword hilt. He wasn’t blocking the path through the open gate, and the other guards didn’t move, but his wide-legged stance was clearly meant to intimidate.
Ben strode close and the man grunted. “Worried about something?”
“What do you mean?” asked Ben.
The man’s eyes flicked down to Ben’s belt and Ben suddenly noticed the weight of his sword. It wasn’t exactly illegal to carry weapons in the City, but it was frowned on in most establishments.
“Oh, I, uh, didn’t even notice I was wearing it. Is there a rule against being armed here?”
“No,” the guard answered coolly, “there’s no rule against it. There are more dangerous things than steel inside these walls, boy. You try to start anything and you’re going to find out what.”
Ben flushed and skirted around the guard who stood rooted on his spot in the middle of the gate. The man left a hand on his sword and slowly pivoted on one boot as Ben passed. Ben broke eye contact and cringed as he imagined the guard’s sword slicing his back.
Once in the gates, though, he felt some of the tension dissipate and had an unimpeded walk to the Initiate’s Garden. He only spotted a few guards scattered loitering in the distance and they made no move toward him. There were certainly more of them than usual, but none spoke, and none seemed overly concerned about his sword. He cursed himself for thoughtlessly strapping it on. If he wanted to lay low and avoid suspicion, coming into this place armed was the exact opposite of what he should have done. Besides, the guard was right. Any of the mages here could fry him to a crisp before he got close. What did he think he was protecting himself from?
In the garden, Meghan and Amelie had not yet arrived, so Ben strolled around watching the other initiates and visitors out of the corners of his eyes. The guard presence here was increased also. There were two of them now as opposed to one. They both seemed bored and uninterested and were playing some sort of head-to-head card game.
Despite his watchfulness, he was surprised by Amelie when she came up behind him.
“Ben, when did you get here? I’m sorry I wasn’t out earlier. Usually you come half a bell later.”
“Oh, I haven’t been here long,” he started. It was hard to drop the polite conversational conventions. He took a deep breath and started again, “I came early because I was worried. Speaking of which,” he peered around behind Amelie, “where is Meghan?”
“She studying,” griped Amelie. “She doesn’t do much else these days. We have a test later this week and that’s all she’s concerned about right now. Lady Towaal is briefly in town and has taken time to personally tutor her. It’s rare we get time with a mage other than our assigned instructors. I’m sorry, Ben. I’m sure if it wasn’t such a big test she’d be happy to come see you.”
“No, that’s all right. I’m just glad she is okay.”
“What do you mean?” questioned Amelie. “Why wouldn’t she be okay?”
“I heard there is another girl that might not be.” He looped his arm in Amelie’s and led her away from the guards and other people in the garden. “Issabelle?”
He caught Amelie as she nearly stumbled. She hissed, “How did you hear that name? I don’t think it’s a good idea to speak about her here. Or outside of here either.”
“Her brother,” he quietly responded. “He came to find me.”
“Oh,” said Amelie. She covered her mouth with her free hand. “I didn’t know she had a brother. Why… How did he find you?”
“He hasn’t been able to reach her and no one is talking to him,” said Ben. “So he followed me back from here one day. He said it took him a week to work up the courage. He asked me to find out what happened. He’s looking over his shoulder and afraid of talking to anyone.”
“I don’t think he needs to be afraid.” She sighed. “But then again, maybe he should be.”
“You do know her, then. What happened to her?” asked Ben.
Amelie carefully scanned the garden to be sure they were out of range for anyone to hear them. “You mustn’t speak too freely about this. Not even in front of Meghan. The Sanctuary wouldn’t look kindly on it, and they deal harshly with those who upset them. But if he’s her brother, he has a right to know. Not all of our tests are in books, Ben. As we’ve spoken about, there are two parts to being a mage. One is knowledge. We are tested on that regularly. There are examinations, essays, debates, and other things that aren’t so different from what my father’s tutors had me do as a child. The other part, will, is tested differently. Sometimes, it can be dangerous to not pass the tests.”
“Dangerous. How do you mean?” asked Ben.
“Things can happen when your will breaks. It might be a short depression that you quickly get over. Sometimes it’s worse. In the very worst cases, you may not want to go on living.” She looked at Ben out of the corner of her eye and he knew Segor’s worst fears had come true.
His grip tightened on her arm. “You and Meghan are taking these tests too?”
“Don’t worry. Both Meghan and I are strong-willed. It is hard, very hard, but we both have a natural ability for this sort of thing. Issabelle was a sweet girl, but she was not made to be a mage. She shouldn’t have been here. Once Issabelle realized it, it was too late for her to leave. I know you must tell her brother something. Tell him it was a terrible accident. The less he knows… maybe it will be better for him. He needs to stop asking questions.”
“Why? What will happen to him?” worried Ben.
“The Sanctuary doesn’t like to admit failure. A girl like Issabelle should have been let go by the instructors before… before what happened. They made a mistake, or even worse, maybe they knew. These kinds of things are kept behind the walls. If this brother wasn’t told a story or paid to vanish, well, he must not be someone they consider important enough to bother with. He must not be someone they think would be missed. Ben, you know Rhys and what he does. Not everyone who works for the Sanctuary is a nice person.”
Ben was sickened at the thought his friends may participate in this kind of thing. If this girl Issabelle knew the risks and took them, he could understand that, but keeping it from her brother, it just didn’t make sense.
“Are you saying that they’d hurt her brother if he knew about this?”
“Not if he knew about it. If he spoke about it. Really, I don’t know what they would do. I just know what they are capable of doing.” She glanced at Ben. “You do too. Think about Lord Frederick in Whitehall and what happened to him. If it was something that mattered to the leaders here, like the reputation of the Sanctuary, there is nothing they would stop at.”
Ben managed to leave without further encounters with the guards and breathed a deep sigh of relief when he turned his back to the scowling faces on the copper gates.
The City swirled by in flashes of movement and color as he walked, but his thoughts were moving even quicker. He felt terrible for Issabelle and Segor, but there was nothing he could do. Meghan and Amelie were still at risk, though. He wracked his brain, trying to think of anything he could do to help them.
Crossing the bridge from the island to the bank where their new warehouse sat, he saw a small boat drifting in the shallows. A ragged fisherman was hauling in a net and Ben saw when he lifted the tangle of twine out of the water that it was empty.
He passed over the bridge and his mood soured further. There had to be something he could do. Amelie seemed unconcerned about her own safety, but that’s the way she always was. The rumors of secret meetings, what happened to Issabelle, and even his friend Rhys—everything he learned about the Sanctuary pointed toward it being a place he didn’t want Amelie and Meghan involved with.
“Ben, come on!” A shout startled him out of his winding thoughts.
Renfro was leading two of the porters, Evan and Red, up the street toward him. They were hauling an empty handcart and were moving quickly.
“One of the carts broke a wheel and we have five kegs sitting unattended down by the granaries,” huffed Renfro.
“The granaries?” Ben was trying to comprehend what Renfro was saying.
“We made a sale to a dive down there earlier this week. It’s a rough area, Ben. If someone hasn’t already rolled off our kegs they’re probably sitting in the street drinking them. Come on!”
Ben fell in behind Renfro and the porters and saw Red give him an odd look. The man was big, but unlike most of the porters, it appeared to be blubber instead of muscle. He was named after his wild spray of red-gold hair that stuck up oddly and responded poorly to his constant efforts to pat it down. He was sweating profusely and nearly tripped forward into his cart when he saw Ben watching him.
“Let’s get moving,” encouraged Ben with a friendly grin. Red never really fit in with the rest of their team, and Ben felt bad for the man. He was regularly the target of rough teasing from the others.
The granaries were towering stores for grains, beans, and other foodstuffs and were all clustered along one section of the riverbank. No one typically lived or worked near them because the dust had a bad habit of exploding when a careless worker would introduce open flame in the enclosed spaces. During harvest times they were a hive of activity. During the other seasons, it was quiet with just the occasional wagon of product being hauled off.
“How did you find this place? I can’t believe there’s anyone down here who’d want to order five of our kegs,” asked Ben skeptically.
They were surrounded by towering silos and bins. The hard-packed dirt streets were deserted.
“I didn’t find the place,” replied Renfro. “Red did. You think I’d be wandering around down here by myself? Evan, where did you say this wagon broke down? I don’t see anything or anybody around here.”
“It wasn’t me,” mumbled Evan as he walked ahead to peer down a cross street. “Red told me someone lost a wheel down here.”
Renfro turned. “Red?”
The man stared straight ahead.
“Uuaagh!” cried Evan.
They all spun and saw a bald, thickset man standing over the prone porter. The man had a rag tied around the bottom half of his face and was holding a stout club.
Suddenly, Red lifted the heavy handcart over his shoulder and swung it with all his might at Renfro.
“Watch out!” yelled Ben.
The cart crashed into the side of Ben’s little friend and sent him flying across the street. He landed in a heap, but before Ben could run to check on him, another masked man stepped out, also brandishing a club.
“There were supposed to be two. The little thief and one employee,” growled the new man.
Red quaked. “This one is the other owner. He saw us walking over here and followed.”
The man met Ben’s eyes then menacingly raised his club. “Well then
.”
Without thinking, Ben smoothly swept his sword out of his scabbard and set his feet. There were three of them, but he had the superior weapon. Still, he thought, those heavy-looking clubs would do serious damage.
“Drop it son, and we’ll let you live. This is just supposed to scare you a bit. You want to get serious though,” the second masked man slapped his club against a meaty palm, “then we’ll get serious.”
Ben waited.
Red made the first move and charged, wildly dragging the handcart behind him. Ben rushed forward before Red could raise the cart, startling him and slowing his charge. The big man didn’t expect Ben to charge and didn’t move quickly enough to prevent Ben from smashing the hilt of his sword into the side of Red’s sweat-streaked face.
The two masked men weren’t surprised so easily. Both were quickly closing when Ben stepped over Red’s limp body.
He had heartbeats to observe their movement before they closed. The first man who’d assaulted Evan moved a bit slower and had a slight limp with his right leg. The second man was the more dangerous of the two. He carried his weapon like he had plenty of experience using it.
Ben knew there was no use waiting anymore and rapidly sidestepped several times to his right to put the first man between him and the second. The man grunted and pivoted, giving Ben an opportunity. While the man was still turning, Ben darted in and slashed at his weapon arm. Ben felt the blade slice through flesh. The man screamed and flailed backward, dropping his club.
Splatters of crimson blood painted a dark pattern on the dirt streets.
Without his club and injured, the man shouldn’t be much of a threat. He would live though. Ben hadn’t intended to kill him. He wasn’t sure who these men were or why they were attacking. By wounding one, he hoped he’d be able to question him later.
Renfro stirred in the street and Ben felt a trill of relief. The heavy cart had crashed into his friend hard.