by Lynn Kurland
“Rubbish,” she said faintly.
“Or not, but we can argue that later. It is also possible if a mage is either exceptionally gifted or perhaps even more cynical, to take a decent amount of his own power and bind it into some small object along with a spell of his choice. Elves do it constantly with their damned runes they draw on each other for their own fathomless purposes.”
“Why?” she asked, though she honestly wasn’t sure she wanted to know.
He shrugged lightly. “Such a thing might come in handy if a mage didn’t particularly care to make a display of his own mighty power.”
“Or if he couldn’t use any of that mighty power?”
He looked at her seriously. “Precisely.”
She found she had absolutely nothing to say to that. All she could do was stare at him and wonder how she had ever become caught up in events so far beyond her ken. She was fairly sure it had all begun in a barn, which she knew she should have found appalling somehow.
“The spell I’m seeking,” Acair continued, “has the delightful ability to explode into scores of shadows that then distract and disorient an enemy. Better still, as we’ve already discussed, it requires nothing more to set events in motion other than to find itself flung in the proper direction.”
She set aside her first instinct, which was to roll her eyes, and forced herself to think in a different way. She considered, then looked at him. “Could anyone use something like that, or must you be a . . . well, you know.”
“Ah,” he said, nodding knowingly, “now it begins. Thinking to take it out for a trot around the meadow if you find it first?”
“Perish the thought,” she said without hesitation. “I’m just wondering about the danger of someone else finding it before we do.”
“More an annoyance than a danger,” he said, “but I would rather have it in my pocket than someone else’s. Hence my interest in Master Odhran’s work chamber.”
She wasn’t about to argue with him, and she absolutely didn’t want to know anything else. Unfortunately, she felt something run down her spine, her own fear or perhaps even the icy breath of someone she hadn’t seen come into the chamber. She glanced over her shoulder to make certain they were still alone, then watched Acair continue to sift through his tailor’s scribblings.
She didn’t see anything that looked out of the ordinary, but what did she know? She was a stable hand with a love for horses and a healthy skepticism for anything she couldn’t, as Acair had so correctly put it, take out for a trot through a meadow. She was accustomed to scanning the earth for unstable footing, not—
She put her hand on Acair’s arm more suddenly than she meant to, but he didn’t seem to mind. She pointed to the corner of something that was peeking out from beneath a pile he had yet to go through.
Acair took the piece of paper with a hand that was far steadier than hers holding the candle. He glanced at her, then took the candle from her and held it over the missive.
I’m watching you, but you knew that . . .
“Rubbish,” he said crisply.
That wouldn’t have been her word for it, but she didn’t think she needed to say as much. “It looks familiar,” she offered.
He pursed his lips. “Are you telling me that when I examined a similar piece of refuse in Mochriademiach of Neroche’s private solar, you were merely pretending to doze in front of his fire?”
“I’m a light sleeper,” she said, “and you were swearing rather loudly at the time.”
“I was expressing a polite bit of dismay.”
“You almost put out the king’s fire with your shouting—”
The sudden banging on the front door sent her stumbling into his side. He shoved the missive into a pocket, smothered the candle flame, then reached for her hand.
“Side door,” he said quickly. “Trust me.”
Surprisingly enough, she did. She took a brief moment to appreciate the concessions Master Odhran had apparently made for those who might want to make a less-than-visible exit from his shop, then followed Acair quickly out into the night.
She was lost within moments, but that didn’t surprise her. She hadn’t been able to keep track of all the twists and turns they’d taken simply to get to the tailor’s shop. Running through alleyways and as many unlit streets as possible left her utterly disoriented. The only thing that eased her mind any was realizing that the doorway Acair soon found for them to rest in was empty and the pounding she was hearing was only the blood thundering in her ears, not booted feet chasing them.
She propped herself up against the very worn doorway and looked at him, leaning over as he was, gasping for air with almost as much enthusiasm as she was herself.
“Were those palace guards?” she whispered.
“More than likely.” He heaved himself upright, then collapsed back against the door with her. “Not lads I would care to encounter at the moment.”
“Have they come after the book you have?”
He hesitated. “Possibly.”
She shot him a look. “Are you going to explain, or should I guess?”
He chewed on his words for a moment or two, then sighed deeply. “’Tis possible that the king made a bargain with an extremely powerful and canny mage to exchange this unimpressive book of spells for a rather generous amount of the world’s power.”
She wondered if the time would come where she was no longer surprised by what came out of his mouth. “Is that what you did?”
He opened his mouth—no doubt to give her the entire tale—then swore softly instead at the sound of a shout or two in the distance. He pulled her over more fully into the shadows of the alcove. Shadow was, of course, not a word she was particularly fond of for reasons she didn’t need to explain to herself.
It was also fairly inaccurate given that the whole damned place was dark. They had definitely left behind anywhere that boasted streetlamps, something she suspected Acair had planned. She could scarce make out his face in the darkness, but she supposed she didn’t need to look for signs of lying. His greatest fault, according to the man himself, was his lamentable propensity to always tell the truth.
It also wasn’t as if she needed him to give her the particulars. She had recently listened to an elven king and his lads go on at length about Acair’s having attempted to steal quite a few things, including all the world’s magic. At the time, she had thought the entire lot of them absolutely barking. Now, though, she had to admit she could see it was exactly something Acair would have done.
That she was taking any of it seriously . . . well, she was past the point where she could do anything but shake her head over her ability to accept things she wouldn’t have wasted the effort to disbelieve but a fortnight earlier. She closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the wood of the door behind her until the voices had faded and they were left with nothing but silence. She opened her eyes and looked at her companion.
“And?” she prodded.
He pulled her closer and wrapped his cloak around her. “If you must know the particulars, I did indeed promise Simeon power in trade for the book that is currently leaving bruises on my poor back.”
She was shivering because it was very cold out, not because the thought was so ridiculous she could hardly stop herself from snorting in derision.
Surely.
“So, this isn’t just a nasty rumor started by the king of those elves?” she asked.
“I’m afraid not.”
She took a deep breath. “Did you manage it?”
“Sadly, nay,” he said, “and that wasn’t for a lack of trying, believe me. I beg you not to force me to reveal any of the more humiliating particulars. There are many and each equally unflattering.”
“I’m surprised you failed.”
“Ah, your faith in my ability to make mischief is heartening, to say the very least.” He s
ighed deeply. “I will admit that Simeon’s spellbook was something I wanted rather badly, as you might gather from the lengths I was willing to go to in order to have it.”
“I’m not surprised by that.”
“I am a simple man,” he agreed, “with simple needs.”
She was too tired to even smile. “I suppose he wouldn’t have merely let you have a look out of the goodness of his heart.”
Acair snorted. “The man is notoriously stingy. It was all or nothing, as they say. He was willing to part with the entire thing in return for power enough to restore his kingdom back to rights, but that was the only bargain he was willing to make.” He paused. “It begs the question of where all that power went to begin with. Was it lost at the gaming table with his crown or had it been already lost and the wager was an attempt to regain it? Whatever the case, Diarmailt has certainly suffered for it.”
“His home was a bit worn around the edges,” she said, “for something meant to be a palace.”
“The whole bloody country could use a bit of sprucing up,” he agreed. “As for any bargain we might or might not have made, in the end I was forced to offer my regrets when I wasn’t able to obtain what I needed for the trade.”
She pulled away far enough to frown at him. “So you went ahead and stole the book just the same?”
“I hadn’t intended to steal it,” he said, sounding offended. “I was just planning on having a look, memorizing the useful bits as I went along.” He looked at her archly. “If you must know, I wasn’t entirely certain that rustic gadfly you went off with tonight was capable of keeping you safe. I thought being to hand might be useful. If I happened to linger in the king’s solar whilst on that errand, well, so much the better.”
“You are incorrigible,” she said in disbelief.
“Opportunistic,” he said, “which seems to go along quite nicely with all that altruism that afflicts me like a constant rash. Unfortunately, tonight I was forced by circumstances I hadn’t planned on to simply filch and flee, as my mother might term it.”
“You could have left the book undisturbed, you know.”
“I could have, but I didn’t want to because Simeon is a colossal ass—and a rather dangerous one.” He frowned fiercely. “There it is again, that damnable impulse to do good that I am finding myself less and less able to control. I should leave the whole bloody world to its own sorry fate, but there I seem to go, endlessly into the breach.” He looked at her seriously. “You must admit that he is a vile little man.”
She let out her breath slowly. “I didn’t trust him.”
“Neither do I, which is why I wonder what it was in his book that could possibly be worth such a price.”
“You haven’t looked yet?”
“Haven’t had time for anything but a glance. So far, it is absolute rubbish. Hardly the sort of stuff that one might use in ruling a large kingdom, unless one fancies childish spells of revenge and nastiness.” He shrugged. “Honestly, I had intended to have a look at it overnight, then leave it with my tailor on our way out of the city. He would certainly have found a way to see it returned to the proper royal hands.”
She shivered. “Impossible now.”
“Thoroughly. Now, ’tis left to me to find another way to return it to Simeon with a polite note of regret over the tome having inadvertently fallen into my clutching hands.” He shrugged. “One attends to social niceties as best one can.” He leaned past her a bit to look up and down the street, then nodded. “We should go whilst we can.”
She took his proffered hand and was probably more relieved than she should have been that his fingers weren’t chilly. It was ridiculous perhaps, but she was more comfortable when Acair of Ceangail was striding off to do foul deeds than when he was hesitating to do the same.
“Is the king vengeful?” she asked quietly as they walked. “Or was that just my impression of him at the palace?”
“He’s a right proper bastard, but without any of the charm and elegance possessed by the rest of us,” Acair said easily. “Vindictive enough to murder those who cross him, surely.”
“Did Master Odhran vex him?”
He paused in mid-step, then continued on, frowning thoughtfully. “I wondered the same thing, but there was something about that scene in the front of his shop that struck me as odd. I’ll have to give it thought when we’re free of the city and relaxing in front of a hot fire.”
“Any ideas on where that fire might be found?” she asked, fully expecting to hear that such a thing lingered in some mythical elven king’s hall she would never manage to reach.
“I believe we might wish to make a visit to my mother.”
Léirsinn swallowed with no small amount of difficulty. “Isn’t she a witch?”
“A superior specimen of the same,” he said cheerfully, “but I am her favorite son and you breathe fire. We’ll at least have a decent meal out of her before she comes to a decision about how long she’ll allow us to live. All in all, not our most pressing worry.”
He said it with ease, but she suspected he didn’t mean it as easily. She understood. The journey to Eòlas had been dangerous, their time spent there too short, and what they were taking away was apparently not very useful.
Never mind the message she supposed Acair had tucked into his purse with the other one he’d been given in Tor Neroche.
“Let’s go fetch our pony and be away,” Acair said. “Lovely night for flying, what’s left of it.”
She had several things to say about any sort of night that might require them to fly and lovely didn’t find itself on that list. But she was traveling with a black mage who was being pursued by a nameless enemy and he’d just added an angry monarch to his own list of unlovely things.
She sincerely hoped that might be the last of the unpleasant things they would need to put there.
Six
Acair kept to the shadows, though he had to admit he wondered why he bothered.
I’m watching you, but you knew that . . .
He did, though he’d be damned if he had any idea who that watcher might be—and that in spite of now having had two of the same sort of messages delivered to him. It was obviously a poor jest. His brothers were too stupid to have concocted such a dull piece of sport, so perhaps when he had an opening in his diary he would take the time to speculate on which of his enemies might have had the wit to combine the same. It would be an extremely short list, to be sure.
That he might not have any name to put on that list was what was leaving him looking over his shoulder far more often than he usually did. It was that looking over his shoulder that was surely the only reason he almost walked himself and Léirsinn directly into a clutch of mages.
He pulled her off the street and into a darkened corner so quickly, he feared he had caused her to squeak. That she didn’t bloody his nose for the way he wrapped his arms around her and voiced a few endearments of the sort a man with a paid companion might offer was something of a mercy.
“To the eastern gates, then,” said a voice behind him. “We’ll lie in wait for him there.”
“Won’t he be expecting the like?”
There was a lengthy discussion about where the most advantageous spot for snaring an unsuspecting mage might lie. Acair suppressed a sigh. It was honestly a wonder he hadn’t simply perished from boredom long before the present moment. So few decent mages possessed the ability to execute a decent bit of mayhem. Obviously, based on what he was hearing, Simeon wasn’t able to pay what a more exclusive worker of magic would require.
A tap on his shoulder almost sent him pitching forward into Léirsinn, but he maintained his composure and limited himself to a grunt of annoyance.
“Seen any suspicious lads in the area,” asked the mage behind him, “or were you too occupied with your very pedestrian business there?”
“Oy, master,” Acair sai
d in his best workaday accent, “I’ve only a bit longer ’afore me witch at home wakes, so I’ve no time for lookin’ about.”
The cluster of fools laughed, entertaining themselves with comments about the superior nature of their magely endeavors and the substandard entertainments of the local rabble before they walked off. Acair shook his head in disgust. He despaired for the future of his profession, truly he did.
He waited until the hunters had disappeared around a corner before he pulled back and looked at Léirsinn.
“My apologies,” he whispered.
She looked unsettled. He wasn’t sure if it was because of him or those feeble lads he’d just avoided, but decided abruptly that it might be best just not to know.
“The king’s mages?” she managed.
“If they could be termed thus,” he said, “aye.”
“What are we going to do now if they’re hunting you?”
“We’ll do our best to keep our unflattering comments on their skill to ourselves and settle in for a bit of a wait. It might be useful to have somewhere to hide.”
“But we’re not going to look for Mansourah,” she said, shaking her head as she said it.
Acair took that as a sign that she didn’t particularly want to go look for their companion and he was happy to agree. He suspected that not even that notorious busybody Soilléir of Cothromaiche could determine the whereabouts of that bumbling prince of Neroche, who had admittedly done a fine job of allowing them time to get out the window but was currently making up for that by not being anywhere he could be easily found. Acair could only hope they weren’t trapped thanks to the delay.
He considered the things he could do to keep himself awake for the foreseeable future and settled for the idea of having a quick peek at Simeon’s spellbook. It might be the only thing that kept him out of trouble where that red-haired horse miss was concerned.
“Let’s find a bit of light,” he said. “I’ll have a look at my prize whilst we’re waiting.”