That was hard to explain to a foundation crystal. The concept of money in general baffled the magical artifact, which existed primarily in the First Foundation where the line between thought and reality was blurred. Why trade chunks of metal for goods, when you could simply imagine the goods into being? Only, that didn’t work here in the fifth Foundation. At least, not for one so inexperienced as Mithris. His apprenticeship had been short by several decades.
Why not simply conjure more of the shiny metal?
“Because that’s forbidden.” Mithris shook his head, noticing as he did several nearby pedestrians eyeing him oddly. “Great,” he muttered. “You make me look like a madman.”
I don’t make you anything, responded the crystal.
“Just…shut up for a few minutes,” the shivering apprentice said. Adjusting his cloak again, he lowered his head and pressed on. Rounding the next corner, he spotted his destination. The squat wizard’s tower he’d glimpsed in his wash basin.
Mithris crossed the street and bought a meat pie from a street-corner hawker. He handed over the coin grudgingly, then moved away munching on the hot, juicy pie. His eyes never strayed from the tower at the end of the street.
It was far more impressive in reality than it had been in his dingy wash-water. While Mithris watched, a trio of apprentices came out into the plaza fronting the tower. They wore robes similar to his own, though in much better shape. One of them, a tall and haughty looking young woman with lustrous black hair and pale, chiseled features, stepped forward of the others and waved at a fruit-seller lounging against his cart.
The merchant rose slowly and cast his eye around the plaza before going to join the apprentices. Mithris continued watching as the young woman pointed her finger at the merchant’s chest and scowled. After a few minutes, the merchant tossed up his hands in resignation. She handed over a small purse with a smug grin, then turned and went back inside. She left the other two apprentices behind to haul in what she had purchased.
Mithris licked the last crumbs and juices from his fingers and turned away. It was getting late in the day, and he needed to head back to the inn and prepare for his nightly performance.
We’re not going into the tower?
“Not yet.” Mithris spoke under his breath, trying to move his lips as little as possible. He didn’t like strangers staring at him like a lunatic. “We know where it is now. I’ll figure out a way to get inside tomorrow. Besides, we still need to make sure it’s in there.”
It is inside. This is certain.
Mithris frowned. “How can you be so sure?”
Where is your left foot?
“What’s that got to do with it?”
You do know where your foot is?
“Of course I do.”
How can you be so sure?
Frown deepening, Mithris stopped in the middle of the street. People moving this way and that jostled him as they went past, some glaring angrily at the fool standing still in the middle of traffic. Not wanting to draw attention, Mithris hurriedly resumed his pace.
“I don’t get it.”
I can sense the other foundation crystals, explained the voice in his head. Just as you can sense the various parts of your body.
“How?” asked Mithris. “It’s not part of you, the way my foot is part of me. Isn’t it more like…like a long-lost twin brother, or something?”
Yes. And no. Likely, you wouldn’t understand.
“Try me,” Mithris growled. These days he didn’t have much patience for the crystal’s confusing explanations.
Very well. We are all part of the same…body, I suppose you might call it. All the First Foundation is…connected in this way.
“But you’re separated now.”
On this plane, that is the case. There are other levels of reality. Within the First Foundation, we are never apart.
Mithris rounded a corner, turning onto the street that led to his inn. He turned the idea over and over in his head as he walked.
“If you’re never truly apart,” he said after a moment, “then why do you need me to go in there and collect the other one?”
Because Depths isn’t happy there.
That nearly brought Mithris to a halt again, but he stumblingly kept walking. The inn was in sight. Depths? There were four burly men in matching, rough-spun brown coats lounging against the wall out front of the inn. Isn’t happy? What did that mean?
Later, the crystal answered his unspoken questions. I think we’re about to be too busy for long explanations.
“Huh?” Mithris looked up in surprise. The four men he had noticed stood straighter now. To a man, they were staring his way. Now they stepped out into the street, each man drawing a long, shimmering knife from his belt. Their faces were set, their movements fluid and sure.
“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me,” said Mithris. The leader of the thugs grinned at him. They attacked.
Chapter 14
Thieves in the Night
Mithris had not been slacking on his studies. With the help of a foundation crystal, he had even made some impressive progress. He might still be a long way from mastering the more complex spells in Deinre’s grimoire, but he thought he was doing very well indeed for a mere nine-year apprentice.
As the four bandits advanced on him, spreading out to the sides to attack on all fronts, Mithris threw up one hand and shouted a guttural word of magic. He squeezed his eyes shut in the same instant.
A blinding flash of light burst in the air between Mithris and his foes. For a moment only, night’s darkness was utterly banished from the narrow street. The toughs howled in astonishment and pain, throwing arms over their eyes. One dropped to his knees, tears streaming from dazzled eyes.
The light winked out as abruptly as it had appeared. Mithris opened his eyes and dropped back one step, drawing out his slender willow casting wand from the special pocket at the hip of his robe. The willow danced in the air like an orchestra conductor’s baton. Mithris barked three words of magic, concentrating on the texture of crumbled chalk.
Beneath the feet of the four thugs, cobblestones wobbled in their places and lifted ponderously from the street. Gaining speed as they rose, the stones flung themselves at the attackers.
Three of the grunts had recovered from the blinding spell, and blinking watery eyes they advanced. But the improvised missiles veered at them unerringly, striking true. The fourth tough guy, who still knelt on the ground and clutched at his head, never had a chance. Four unconscious thugs lay in the street, blood trickling from their heads.
Mithris surveyed his handiwork, not without a hint of pride. Half a year ago, he’d likely have soiled himself in terror. But that was back before he’d killed omnitors and banished a summoned devinist. The former apprentice had learned to take care of himself.
That’s quite enough self-congratulation for the time being, wouldn’t you agree? As always, the voice of the foundation crystal was smugly superior in the back of his thoughts. You were lucky that spell took all four of them. Why didn’t you put up any wards?
“I didn’t need the wards,” snapped Mithris.
I don’t know why you’re so touchy about it, the crystal said, in a voice which made clear the crystal knew perfectly well. Master Deinre had always been a stickler for practicing wards. The magical barriers, which came in many varieties, could often prove the difference between life and death for a dueling wizard. Most wards could be penetrated by a determined foe, but it would take time—time in which the threatened wizard could prepare a more effective defense.
“These were no demons,” Mithris said, forcing a measure of patience into his tone. He did not want to antagonize the foundation crystal. He just wished it would afford him the same consideration. “Not omnitors, not devinists. Not even a magic-user among them. I didn’t need the wards to take out a foursome of common street thugs.”
Be that as it may, countered the crystal, you were reckless. Overconfident. I won’t be able to protect you when
you make a mistake. It may be your undoing.
Mithris sucked in a breath, considering. Again, the apprentice he had been six months back would have quailed at that. He would have felt exposed, vulnerable, unprotected. The thing was, he had learned a lot since then. He was no longer the boy who would run hide behind Deinre’s robes. In the end, Deinre and all his centuries of magic had been no protection. Mithris had been forced to defend himself, and he had come through the stronger for it.
He did not need the wards.
The peculiar youth who had felled Yuric’s thugs stood muttering to himself in the middle of the street for some minutes before finally shaking himself off and hurrying away. Away from the inn where he was staying, Yuric noted.
The heavy-set, shaven-headed mercenary stepped out of the gloomy shadows of an alleyway and stared cautiously after the youth for a long moment after Mithris vanished around the corner. Palinar, most trusted of his lieutenants, stepped up beside him and let out a low whistle as he surveyed their fallen men.
Both men wore mismatched armor, dented and oft-repaired. The shine of the metal was dulled by soot and ashes rubbed thick, and further hidden by full cloaks of midnight blue which enveloped the men but could be quickly cast aside to free their sword arms. Those arms were decorated with intricate trails and spirals of ink, the mercenaries’ tattoos telling many tales to those with the knowledge to read them.
These men had faced dangers together. They had killed together, watched their brothers bleed out and privately wept together. The four men lying in the street bore similar ink and shared history. Yuric’s jaw set in a hard line. His men had failed him.
“He expected attack,” said Palinar in a whisper. “Ready for it, he was.”
“Yes.” Yuric scowled, crossing heavily muscled arms over his barrel chest. “It seems the untrained apprentice has more tricks up those baggy sleeves than we’ve been led to believe.”
Palinar’s head jerked around, and he fixed his leader with a sharp look. “What is it you’re contemplating, brother?”
Yuric shook his bullet-shaped head slowly. “We need a new strategy,” he said, turning away from his fallen men. Those that survived the blows to the head would wake eventually, and make their way back on their own.
Mithris strode angrily along the streets of Avington, teeth clenched together and hands balled to fists. The attack had not been random. He was sure of it.
Avington was a small city. For the most part, it was a quiet one. That was not to say that every street was safe at night. There was crime, as in any place where men chose to build walls of stone. If he went to the city watch, they would put it down to a random attack by a gang of street thugs. But Mithris knew those men had been waiting for him.
The question was, who had set them to it?
You don’t think it was the same wizard who killed your master?
Mithris shook his head. That one had sent omnitors and a devinist after him. Four louts with no magic made no sense as a next move. This must be something else. He thought back over his short time in Avington. He could think of no one he had slighted, no one he had quarreled with. Mithris had been keeping as low a profile as possible since leaving Nethrin’s tower. When he practiced his spells, he did so far away from any watching eyes. He had only started giving the common room performances recently, when his coin ran out.
He would not go back to the inn. He had left nothing of any value there. Deinre’s spellbook was snug and secure in his oversized pocket. He had his wand. The foundation crystal never left his side. There was nothing else that could not be replaced.
You have enough of that glittering metal to sleep in another bed?
“You pick a fine time for suddenly understanding the concept of money,” grumbled Mithris bitterly. One hand reached for the purse hanging from his belt, but he stayed the motion. He knew how much silver was there. What he did not know was how long it would be before he could add to that meager bank.
Mithris sighed.
“Tomorrow, we visit Ileera,” he told the foundation crystal.
You suspect her of sending the ruffians.
“That I do.” Mithris shook his head once, ruefully. “She may be innocent. I can’t be sure. We’ll find out. Tomorrow.”
And tonight…?
“Tonight, we sleep rough,” answered Mithris, turning his steps toward the nearest city gate and the mostly barren countryside beyond. The ground out there was cold and hard, more frost than soil, and there would be sparse cover besides. But Mithris had slept in the open before. He’d make do.
Chapter 15
A Dagger and a Smile
Mithris awoke with the dawn, stretching uncomfortably before crawling out of his hole. He’d slept in a shallow cave in the foothills a league beyond the city walls. He emerged sore and blinking in the cold gray light.
Rubbing his arms, he set off for Avington. The long walk would help warm him up and get his blood flowing. It would also give him time to think.
He had slept little. Sitting with his back against the rear wall of the cave, Mithris had watched the narrow opening and thought long and hard over what he would do. He thought he knew a way into Ileera’s tower. But he was not sure he’d be able to slip inside, finish what he came for, and get back out without being caught.
What would he say to Ileera? Should he approach her openly first, or stick to his daring—and far more dangerous—plan? Mithris had not reached any satisfactory answers last night, so he mulled it over as he walked. The foundation crystal was curiously silent in his thoughts.
“It’s not like you, keeping quiet,” he said aloud.
You said we couldn’t be sure, came the reluctant reply after a long minute. You said you suspected her only. That we would discover the truth today.
“That’s right.”
You’d discover the truth by robbing her tower like a sneak-thief? There was no mistaking the crystal’s troubled tone.
Mithris considered it. He had no proof Ileera had been behind the attack. But he could think of no one else. The wizard who killed Deinre would have sent something far more formidable. Perhaps this Ileera got word of a young magician playing the common room of an inn in her city. Perhaps she had felt a territorial hostility. Perhaps she’d meant only to frighten him from Avington.
Or, perhaps, she had nothing to do with it.
“Perhaps,” allowed Mithris. “Perhaps.”
A short time later, he walked through the western gate into the city of Avington. The buildings were all thick, off-white stone with flat roofs. Few stood higher than a second floor. The round, glassless windows were few and far between. Those that Mithris passed were uniformly blocked on the inside with thick, heavy curtains fixed tight against the apertures to bar out the cold.
The streets were cobbled, though there was little other than foot traffic in the city. Horses were uncommon this far north. Most of the carts or wagons Mithris passed were drawn by shaggy-haired oxen. Their snorted breath misted in the chilly morning air.
Before he had gone two streets from the gate, Mithris picked up a tail. He spotted furtive motion from the corner of his eye as he went around a corner. A moment later, the foundation crystal confirmed his immediate suspicion.
You’re being followed.
Mithris nodded in silent acknowledgment, continuing down the street. He paused outside an open-fronted silver-smithy. A long trestle table was set up before the wide entryway, laden with brightly gleaming silver-work. There were several display cases which held sample eating utensils, a knife and two-tined fork resting on dark velvet linings inside each one. There were ornaments and jewelry. But what caught the young wizard’s eye were the hand-mirrors, delicately worked in an assortment of styles. Selecting one, Mithris picked it up to examine the reflection.
The flat surface was perfectly smooth and polished. It offered Mithris a sparklingly clear reflection of his own face. He turned the mirror in his hand. Further away, the reflection became murky. Silver made decent m
irrors, but at a distance even his wash-water divining had been clearer.
It was clear enough, though. Mithris saw a heavily muscled man with shaven head and nondescript clothing come around the corner then stop as if in surprise. Hurriedly, the man turned and went up to the display table out front of the weaver’s shop across the street. Mithris set down the mirror, waved off the approaching silversmith, and continued down the street.
He knew the big man would follow.
Ten city blocks lay between Mithris and Ileera’s tower, but the youthful magician was not overly concerned. So long as it was only the one ruffian tailing him, he felt confident in his ability to deal with it. What troubled him was that the man was there at all. Street thieves wouldn’t linger in sight of guardsmen at the city gates, waiting for a mark that got away. If there had been any doubt those men last night were sent specifically for him, it had vanished in that silver mirror.
As he walked—a steady pace, so as not to alert the tail—Mithris considered the cantrips he had committed to memory these past months. The simplest spells in any wizard’s arsenal, cantrips were easily memorized and generally quick to resolve once cast.
The cantrips Master Deinre had taught him were mundane. The spells were for everyday tasks: the lighting of candles, the heating or cooling of a room; spells to fetch books or stir potions in the cauldron. Spells like those could make a wizard’s life easier, but they were not much use in a fight. Luckily, Mithris had found a few more interesting cantrips indexed in a section of Deinre’s spellbook. Those spells, like the light-burst he’d cast last night, were for dueling.
That would have been the chapter immediately following “Wards,” wouldn’t it? Yet again, the foundation crystal reminded him of Deinre’s constant watch-word. Wards. Mithris shook his head. Wards were difficult to resolve when you were in motion. And it was just the one ruffian following.
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