by C. Greenwood
I looked for Jarrod in all the places I could imagine a youngling hiding. The most secluded gardens of the Beautiful district. The abandoned warehouses fronting the wharf at the far side of the city. I wandered the market square, where sellers were stowing away their wares for the night as dusk settled over Selbius.
I didn’t find Jarrod, and no one I questioned on the streets had seen any boy answering his description. Or if they had, they’d been too busy to take notice and remember him.
A light drizzle began to fall, slicking the cobbled streets and forming shallow puddles in my path. Curfew was approaching, the hour after which citizens roaming the streets risked arrest by the city guard. I realized I had no choice but to end my search and return to the castle.
But not before making one final stop. It wasn’t in search of Jarrod or to seek shelter from the rain that I turned onto a narrow lane lined with dilapidated buildings. I had found my way to the poorest part of town. Here the upper stories of the cheap lodging houses overhung the road on either side. There were one or two dingy storefronts, boarded up for the night, their interiors dark and silent.
Passing a chandler’s shop, I ducked suddenly down an alley between two buildings, trotting to the end of the way, then clambering over the sagging fence that rose up to block my path.
It occurred to me my bodyguard would never trust me again. But there was no help for it. What I did now I must do in secret or I risked endangering others.
Dropping down over the rickety fence, I found myself in a small yard at the back of one of the lodging houses. Even in the dark and the rain, I knew this one apart from the others by the scraggy tree growing behind it, the only tree on the street. In daylight, I would have known by the blue tiles of the roof, but there were no discerning colors at this hour.
I had never visited this site in person before, and I prayed the description I had been given by Dradac was a true one. If I burst into the wrong house…
Near a coop of softly cooing birds that looked in the darkness like pigeons, I discovered a scattering of wet moldy straw on the ground. I kicked this aside, revealing the cellar door concealed beneath. As expected, the entrance was unlocked. The door creaked slightly as it was lifted, and remembering the close proximity of my Fist shadow, I scrambled down quickly into the black interior and closed the door softly above me.
It was completely dark in the cellar. As I made my way blindly along the walls, I upset a stack of something, empty barrels, perhaps, that tumbled noisily across the floor, shattering the heavy stillness.
After that, I was more cautious and drew a thin stream of magic through my dragon scale to form a tiny orb of golden light. Scarcely bigger than a candle flame, it hovered above my upturned palm. It illuminated a filthy, crowded storage space that I made my way hastily through to reach a set of rickety stairs leading up into the house. The door at the head of the steps gave no resistance, and I let myself easily through.
But I got no further into the house before a dark shape lunged out of the shadows to confront me.
I had barely got my hands on the knives tucked up my sleeves and was just drawing them free when a quicker blade came to rest against my throat.
“Be you friend or intruder?” a menacing voice growled.
Mind racing as I faced the indistinct figure in the gloom before me, I thought of punching one of my knives into his gut. But I had a strong suspicion my throat would be slit before I could complete the action.
I decided to try a different tactic, asking, “Who but a friend would know to use the secret entrance?”
I felt him relax slightly. His knife eased away from my throat.
“You’re from Dimmingwood?” he asked
“I need to see Kiril,” I said by way of answer. “I think you’ll find he knows me.”
At mention of the outlaw runner, the stranger dropped the last of his caution and lowered his weapon.
My hands moved away from their knives too.
“Any friend of my cousin Kiril’s is welcome,” he said. “Sorry about greeting you at knifepoint and making you drop your candle. It gives a fellow a natural start to hear someone rattling around in his cellar after dark.”
I had extinguished my glowing orb—or candle, as it must have appeared to my host—in the instant of our confrontation. Now the big stranger provided a shuttered lantern, which shed enough light to illuminate the combined kitchen and living space around us.
I sat alone in the shadows before a cold fireplace while Kiril’s cousin disappeared to fetch him from the next room.
When Kiril was brought to me, it was clear he had been sleeping. But he quickly became alert as I relayed the message I needed him to carry to Dimmingwood. He must inform Dradac the outlaws’ arrangement with Praetor Tarius held good and the pardons were as safe as I could make them. And he must discover what word Dradac had of Skeltai movements along the border where the enemy’s Black Forest met our own Dimmingwood.
It was a brief meeting, ending with the outlaw messenger promising to set out for the forest at dawn and bring me back a swift response.
Leaving the house by the same means I had entered it, I felt a degree of relief in knowing I had made the best arrangements I could for my friends. I didn’t know what the future held now the old ways of life were forever closed, not only to the others but to me. I couldn’t even be sure if all the outlaws would stick to their end of the bargain or if they would return to their usual illegal methods of survival. But at least they now had a fresh chance if they wanted it.
Outside again, the drizzle had turned into a driving rain that beat down on my head and shoulders and made my loose hair cling wetly to my face and neck. My hooded cloak was thoroughly soaked. The only warmth I felt came from the bow riding snuggly across my back.
____________________
Jarrod reappeared the following day. I found him midmorning inside a dilapidated private garden lining the keep’s south wall. The boy had been perfectly safe and skulking around the castle since the previous day.
I was in the middle of unleashing my full anger on him for the worry he had caused when he cut me off to insist his disappearing had not been without purpose. He had lurked around the hidden parts of the castle, spying on its inhabitants and hunting for clues about my poisoner. His idea was to prove himself useful to me so I would allow him to stay.
Sitting the boy down in the shadow of the wall, I started to explain the need to send him away had nothing to do with usefulness and everything to do with his safety.
But he forestalled my planned lecture by asking, “Don’t you even want to see what I found?”
Before I could answer, he victoriously produced a blue glass vial and offered it to me as proudly as if he were delivering the head of my enemy. The glass jar was dusty except for a few layers of fresh finger marks around the rim. Inside was a tangle of roots soaking in murky liquid.
“And what exactly is this?” I asked, unimpressed.
Unfazed by my lack of enthusiasm, he uncorked the vial. “Take a sniff and see.”
He shoved the jar up to my nose, where I caught a familiar bitter odor wafting up from its depths. The smell of the stuff was as distinctive as the taste.
“Wormroot.”
“And lots of it,” Jarrod agreed. “My stepfather used to put it around in our loft to kill the rats. But it’ll kill people plenty good too if it lands in their food.”
“All right,” I acknowledged. “You’ve earned the right to look smug. Now tell me where you found it.”
“In the chambers of Counselor Delecarte.”
“Counselor Delecarte?” I repeated incredulously. “How did you gain access to his rooms?”
He shrugged his skinny shoulders. “I’m a good sneaker. There’s not many places I can’t get into if I’ve a mind to.”
I guessed growing up with a stepfather who was ill-tempered and quick with his fists would have taught the boy how to creep about and avoid notice. It was probably necessary for his d
aily survival.
“It wasn’t hard to find the jar,” Jarrod continued. “It was just tucked away in a chest full of clothes—one of the first places I looked.”
He wrinkled his nose. “These noblemen aren’t very smart, are they? If I’d poisoned somebody, I’d have got rid of the proof right quick, not kept it close to give me away.”
I was thinking the same thing. A man like Delecarte hadn’t gotten to be the Praetor’s advisor by being a fool or taking unnecessary risks. But someone wanting to turn me against Delecarte might plant the remaining poison where it could be easily found to deflect suspicion from themselves.
I took the blue vial from Jarrod and examined it. There was something familiar about the object. A clear image flashed through my mind. The small blue vial lined up with a row of similar bottles and jars on a cobwebbed shelf in the secret tower room at the top of the keep. The Praetor’s locked chamber or ‘mage’s lair’.
I had no sooner connected the poison with my memory of the tower room than I formed a powerful notion of who was behind the attempt on my life. I didn’t know the how and wasn’t even close to fathoming the why. Those were questions only my would-be killer could answer.
“Keep this discovery to yourself,” I told Jarrod, “until I’ve had the chance to confront someone.”
“Wait. Where are you going?” he asked as I walked away, leaving him standing.
“To find the Lady Morwena.”
____________________
Only three people had cause to know about the secret room at the top of the keep. One of them was me, and I certainly hadn’t poisoned myself. Another, if Lady Morwena was to be believed, was Praetor Tarius.
Killing me wouldn’t suit any plan of Tarius’s. Not because the man wasn’t ruthless enough but because his healing me afterward proved he wanted me alive. I was useful to his cause. That left only one person with knowledge of the tower room and its contents. Her motives were unclear, but I meant to find them out.
But I didn’t get far in my quest to confront the Praetor’s ward. I was stalking toward her chambers when I encountered a servant in the halls who quietly slipped me a written message.
I’d never know how Fleet managed to bribe so many of the Praetor’s people into doing his stealthy errands for him, but I was grateful for the secrecy it afforded.
Ducking into an alcove, I read his note beneath the glow of one of the flickering torches that illumined the gloomy halls.
The missive was vaguely worded, probably as a precaution lest it fall into the wrong hands. “Have made contact with persons of interest. Await further enlightenment with the gray robe,” I read.
I chewed my lower lip in thought. If this meant what I believed it did, the contingent of magickers from Swiftsfell had arrived in Selbius. And Fleet had hidden them away someplace safe. Awaiting enlightenment. Where would you find enlightenment but in a temple? And “the gray robe” was a name the river people had long ago given Hadrian. The choice of words indicated Fleet had stowed the magickers among the priests at the Temple of Light. Or was I misreading?
Rot Fleet and his cryptic messages. Couldn’t he have been a little more specific?
I crumpled the letter and stuffed it into my belt pouch. My confrontation with the Praetor’s ward would have to wait. I suddenly had more pressing matters to attend. Like keeping the presence of a bunch of illegal magickers concealed from Praetor Tarius.
Chapter Fifteen
They numbered seven, the magickers from Swiftsfell. It was unexpected that so many would have come in response to my invitation. I had expected two or three. Possibly even a lone ambassador to speak for them all. Seven was surprisingly generous. And dangerous.
As there were too many of us to fit into Hadrian’s cramped private chambers, Hadrian, the seven magickers, and I gathered in the temple’s main library. It was a vast room with soaring ceilings and row after row of books that seemed to stretch on into infinity. I was painfully aware of a couple of temple priests wandering quietly among the shelves but comforted myself that they were out of earshot.
“I am grateful to you all for coming.” I greeted the group, shaking hands with the white-haired old man in charge of their party.
I had met this man, Calder, briefly before, during my recent travels through the Cros province. He was an elder in the community where my grandmother, Myria, had lived. I was mildly surprised the people of Swiftsfell could spare him for this mission.
I said, “It has not been long since I sent out my call for help. May I ask how you arrived so quickly? We had not expected you for weeks yet.”
Hadrian and I exchanged uneasy glances, and I hoped it wasn’t evident to our guests what I was thinking. That we had been caught unprepared.
Calder nodded his snowy head. “On a matter of such importance, we hastened our travel through magical means.”
I winced as his voice echoed across the tiles of the open space. As an outsider, perhaps he had forgotten magic was not a topic openly discussed in this province.
Perhaps he sensed my feeling, because he lowered his voice. “Many in Swiftsfell were unwilling to come to the aid of Ellesus. I am sure you can forgive them that, as we remember your Praetor was responsible for the deaths of so many of our kind. Some inhabitants of our community have escaped this province once before and have no wish to return to it. But the seven of us felt differently. When your message offered a chance for magickers to make peace with the Praetor, we knew we owed it to those of our brothers and sisters still living in this place to buy them that freedom. We do not often use our magic for violence, but we come prepared to do what we must. For too long the magickers remaining in this province have suffered under Praetor Tarius’s laws and have been forced to practice their talents in secret. If we have the opportunity to improve their conditions, we are prepared to deal, even with this evil Praetor, to achieve that.”
I squirmed uncomfortably. “So you have come not to save the province from our enemies but to save the magickers in it from the Praetor’s law.”
“Of course,” he said. “As one of our own, I assumed your hopes would be the same. We can make use of this chance to gain better treatment for the magickers of Ellesus while also defending the province from your Skeltai neighbors.”
I should have guessed at such a motivation. If the Swiftsfell magickers had in their possession a bargaining chip that could buy safety and freedom for all magickers in the province, why should they not use it? Why should they not lift the shadow that had covered Ellesus for over a decade?
To Calder and his companions I said, “I must warn you I have not yet secured any promises from Praetor Tarius, not even for your own immediate safety.”
It was a massive understatement of fact. The truth was the Praetor had originally forbidden me to send for aid from Swiftsfell. If he had any notion these magickers were here in his city, he might well have them arrested. Possibly even killed.
I continued. “Tarius is coming around to the idea, but I need a little more time to negotiate with him. If the Skeltai come in full force, he will have need of you. I think he knows this but is not quite ready to admit it. That’s why I must ask you to lie low here at the temple until I can speak with him.”
Calder and his companions agreed, and I took my leave of them.
On my way out of the temple, Hadrian caught up to me and pulled me aside. “Ilan, you must know I cannot guarantee these magickers the protection you imply.”
“I know, I know,” I said. “You will be making preparations to leave for the Lythnian coast soon.”
He dismissed the suggestion. “That is nothing and can be delayed. But there is a larger problem. Even if I can persuade the temple priests to allow our friends to reside here for a short time—an arrangement which would be highly unusual and bound to excite curiosity—word of their being here will spread quickly. Such unusual strangers in the town will attract notice, if they have not already. I estimate you have a day or two to settle things with the Praeto
r. Maybe less. After that, matters may be taken from our hands.”
I tried to brush aside the possibility of failure. “If anything goes wrong, we’ll find a way to evacuate the Swiftsfell group quickly. I know the risk I’m taking.”
“Yes, you do,” he answered quietly. “But do they?”
Guilt stirred within me at the mild reproof. When I initially invited these magickers, I had behaved almost as if I had the authority of the Praetor behind me. I had hinted any magickers coming to the aid of the province would be protected. That had not been my promise to make. If it cost them their lives now, their blood would be on my hands.
____________________
Leaving the temple, I wasted no time in going to the Praetor.
At this hour, he was in his audience chamber. I burst into the big room with no care for the supplicants who waited there ahead of me hoping to lay their problems before their lord.
“I must speak with the Praetor on an urgent matter,” I informed the room, striding up to Tarius’s throne-like chair atop its dais.
At my hurried entrance and abrupt manner, a pair of guards stationed nearby moved their hands to their sword hilts and looked to Praetor Tarius.
The Praetor gave a slight inclination of his head, indicating I should be permitted to approach.
I skipped the niceties. “My lord, we’ve spoken before of the possibility of outside help to eliminate the Skeltai threat.”
Tarius looked impatient. And ill. The shadows beneath his eyes were dark, the tense lines around his mouth more pronounced than ever.
“If you refer again to the idea of an alliance formed with magickers, I have already given you an answer,” he said shortly. “That discussion is postponed indefinitely.”
I didn’t argue. If my time in the castle had taught me nothing else, it was that reason and diplomacy could sometimes be as powerful as a battering ram.
Mindful the Praetor would be less tolerant of my usual impudence now we were in the presence of others, I chose my words carefully. “I understand my lord would rather we fought our own battle. But I fear that option may no longer exist. I have been in the darkest depths of the Black Forest and witnessed the strength and numbers of our enemy. More, I have seen the power of their mighty shaman warriors. I am offering more than a guess when I say we do not stand a chance of defeating them on our own ground or any other. Should they throw their full force into an attack on the capital city, we will fall quickly and our casualties will be massive. Even if we summon every fighter in the province, any man or woman capable of wielding a weapon, we will not hold Selbius. And without Selbius, what hope is there for the rest of the province? We cannot keep them back.”