The Seven Signs: Three Book Collection

by D. W. Hawkins

  “Nor I,” D’Jenn said. D’Jenn, however, sounded more thoughtful than offended. He watched Victus through narrowed eyes. Dormael calmed himself, and took his cue from D’Jenn.

  Victus sighed. “We all know that things are bad. Things are terrible. It isn’t just this, you know. There’s violence in the south, some war between the Rashardians. The Galanian Empire is on the march again, and now this vilth has appeared—and mark my words, boys, Jureus probably wasn’t his only apprentice. The Sheran Oligarchy is deteriorating, and there are rumors of a horde of Dannon horsemen massing somewhere on the Steppe. All of Eldath is going to shit, boys. Things are going to get bad in the next few years.”

  Dormael hadn’t heard that bit about the Steppe. Borders, the town in Cambrell where they had found the ship that took them across the sea, had been on the southern end of the Steppe. He thought back to their late night flight into the Darkroot, and the sight of the grasslands spread out to the north. There had been no campfires, no tribes massing for war.

  One thing that was always certain, though, was the speed at which things could go to shit.

  Victus continued. “Lots of people—myself included—don’t think that the Mekai is up to this challenge. He’s old, boys. We’ve had relative peace with the rest of the world for a long time, and he’s not ready to deal with the war that will come for us.”

  And there it was. The words of the Administrator again came to Dormael’s mind. The wizards had all come crawling back to Ishamael to witness failures of the Mekai’s leadership. The words hung in the room for a moment as everyone took them in.

  “He serves for life,” D’Jenn said. “Unless he steps down. Is he planning on stepping down?”

  Victus smiled. “I don’t think so, that’s not what I meant. I mean that we need to try and convince him of the danger, to make our points known and understood. Didn’t you see how he rushed out of here when the issue was put to him? He doesn’t have the stomach for war, boys, and war is what’s coming.”

  Dormael had seen that, and he had also seen the suspicion in his eyes. Apprehension tightened his shoulders as Victus spoke. The conversation was quickly becoming uncomfortable.

  “War is the Tal-Kansil’s area of responsibility,” Dormael said. “The Mekai doesn’t lead the Sevenlands to war.”

  “Of course not,” Victus said, but then he leaned forward and looked into Dormael’s eyes. “But what if that war comes with the Galanian Emperor at the head of an army, with vilthinum as allies, and an arsenal of infused weapons? Does that sound like something you’d trust the Tal-Kansil, the Council of Seven, or the Mekai to deal with? Look me in the face, Dormael, and tell me that you trust them to see us through a crisis of that magnitude.”

  Dormael opened his mouth to reply, but stopped the lie before it could escape.

  “It won’t be just them, though,” D’Jenn said. “We’ll all meet them, if it comes to that. The Council, the Mekai, everyone—we’re all on the same side.”

  And then Dormael saw it. He’d been trained to look for the tiny inflections of voice, the tightening around the eyes, the lips going thin. He didn’t believe it at first, not coming from a man like Victus.

  But there it was.

  “Of course we are,” Victus said, his eyes tight and his lips drawing flat. “I just wanted to be sure that I could count on you boys to be there, to do what’s right when the time comes.”

  “Of course you can,” Dormael said, hiding his own emotions behind a bland look. “We’ve been loyal to the Conclave since you trained us. You know that.”

  Victus smiled and stood from the table, hitting it a couple of times with his fist as if to adjourn the meeting. He clapped Dormael and D’Jenn both on the shoulder before moving for the door.

  “I know,” he said. “You’re two of my best Warlocks, boys. It’s good to have you home.”

  With that, he exited the room, leaving Dormael and D’Jenn alone at the huge, dark table.

  “Did you catch that?” D’Jenn asked, turning a troubled eye on Dormael.

  “Aye,” Dormael nodded. “He was lying.”

  ***

  Inera stared over the scene where the camp had once stood, taking stock of the damage. She could feel the power that had been used here undulating over the ground like a misty shadow. It was difficult to sense the magic that had been at work here, the residue of power, but she could just manage it.

  Jureus had been here—that much she had discovered. A large mass grave had been dug on the hill—with magic, of course—and somewhere around thirty bodies dumped inside. Inera had picked through them, but the corpse of Jureus was nowhere to be found. It was all the same. The boy had been an idiot.

  The Red Swords loitered nearby, shooting her nervous glances. They had been with her for a good while, and had learned the cost of her displeasure. The first man to voice a complaint to her had been killed and made strega. No one else had complained.

  She delved the grave with her Kai, trying to pull out the melody that clung to the remains like dust on a boot. Magical residue faded with time, but if one got to it fast enough, it was possible to hear the song of the wizard responsible. The wind blew through the passes, filling her ears with noise. Inera took a deep breath, and listened harder to the song her Kai was sensing.

  It was a charming melody, fast and aggressive, but lilting and pleasant. Inera closed her eyes as she heard it, the song bringing back a flood of memories that almost brought her to her knees. She stood against the tide of emotion that welled in her throat, and concentrated on keeping her feelings in check.

  It couldn’t be.

  The first time she had heard that song, she had been a different woman. That had been before the invasion. It had been before her capture.

  It had been before him.

  It could not be!

  Your feelings are irrelevant, her shadow said, flitting up behind her in the odd way that it moved about. The facts are before you. If you wish to grovel and cry like a sheep, then slit our throat and be done with it.

  “I’m not groveling, nor crying,” she said under her breath, hoping that the Galanians couldn’t hear. Others couldn’t see her shadow—not even her Master. He had one of his own, of course. All necromancers did.

  You are distressed because you recognize the song of this one. Because you have lain with him, mated with him. This sentiment is weak. You should rid yourself of it as I have been telling you. Only then will our power be enough to take us down the path.

  “I’m fine,” she hissed.

  If anything, this is better than we expected. Use this to our advantage.

  Inera kept her answers to herself. She didn’t need to talk to the thing, she knew that. It could see into her mind, feel her emotions, experience her life through her senses. The shadow was her connection to the Lord of the Void, her conduit to his power. It was part of her, and part of him at the same time.

  Even as she turned from the grave, the shadow flew from her in misty fits and spurts, appearing over the shoulders of the different Red Swords in turn. It enjoyed whispering to them, twisting them with slow inevitability. Over the last season, the men had become hers. They had belonged to the emperor, but not anymore. Now they enjoyed the tasks to which she employed them.

  Turning from the grave, she walked out to a ledge where she could look down upon the valley below. Ishamael stood like a scattering of stones around both sides of the river, which was also named for the ancient Sevenlander chieftain. She could almost feel Dormael there, pulsing like a beacon in the distance. She knew such a thing was nothing more than her fancy, but her memory played her the notes of his Kai as if he were standing next to her. She took a deep breath and drew her cloak around her shoulders again, leaving the ledge behind.

  “Let’s go!” she snapped at the Red Swords. “I aim to be in Ishamael by tomorrow.”

  The Truth About Kitamin Jurillic

  The Concave was a sprawling compound.

  Wizards filled the Green, and
chattering conversation filled the spaces between them. Dormael tried his best not to favor anyone with a sour look when they searched his face, but it was a difficult thing. His body hurt, his head was killing him, and the constant pall of political turmoil that hung over the Conclave had driven him from its halls.

  Dormael tried his best to keep his breathing steady, as the hand-shaped bruise on his chest throbbed in time with his steps. His body felt like it had been dragged behind a mad horse, then stomped on by the same for good measure. He knew it was healing—his lucidity was evidence of that—but he wished the damned process would hurry itself along.

  He’d awoken irritable and restless. Even during his morning meditation, when he’d let his magical senses commune with his environment, he could feel the buzz of tension vibrating in the very stones of the Conclave Proper. It felt like insects scratching at something just out of sight, a constant burr on the back of his mind.

  Warlocks and Philosophers, Hedge Wizards and Scouts—everyone had something to say about the Galanian Empire, and whether or not the Mekai’s response was appropriate. Dormael had been surprised to overhear how many of his fellows and friends felt angry with the Mekai, as if he had betrayed their people to a foreign enemy. Political discussions in the Conclave were known to be hyperbolic and emotionally charged, but over the last few things things had taken a darker turn.

  The entire feeling of the place was like that of a simmering pot.

  Or the calm before the gods-damned storm.

  The Council of Seven had called a meeting two days past—a closed meeting, which was rare in the Sevenlands. Meetings of the Council were open forum by tradition, meaning that any Sevenlander could attend and listen in on the proceedings. This time, however, the Council had closed the great doors of the Hall of Kansils, and posted guards around the building to ensure privacy. In all the time he’d been alive, Dormael could count the number of closed meetings of the Council on one hand. The Conclave had held its breath for the outcome.

  There had been nothing—no announcements from the heralds, no official proclamations plastered to walls, no meetings of the Conclave disciplines, or secret assignments issued to the Warlocks. By the next day, there were open arguments in the hallways of the Conclave Proper, and even Initiates were taking sides. Dormael had stopped an Initiate in the hallway during the evening, asking about a red band he’d tied over his blue tunic. The boy had informed him that it was to show solidarity with the prisoners of Galanian Death Camps, and the color was red for the blood on the Mekai’s hands. Dormael had almost smacked the boy. He had commanded the child to remove the band from his uniform, and informed him that an Initiate’s place was to clean and learn.

  He then gave the boy a magic lesson while the lad swept his rooms.

  There were two factions in the Conclave. One faction called for patience, diplomacy, and faith in the Mekai’s judgment, while the other screamed for Galanian blood, and the Mekai’s immediate resignation from his seat. Various friends had called upon him, or found him in the dining hall, to ask after which faction Dormael supported. All of the Warlocks, of course, spouted Victus’s lines as if they’d all read a book he had written on the subject.

  Dormael wasn’t sure how he felt about the whole thing. He felt a deep respect for Victus, but every time he felt his sympathies shifting toward him, he remembered Victus’s face during the meeting with the Mekai. He remembered the Mekai’s suspicion, and the lie that had come out of Victus’s mouth. Between the political tension, and the unwelcome news of the death of a third of his classmates, Dormael had needed to get out.

  Bethany had found him in the morning, wishing to go down to the Bruising Stretch and learn to use her knife. Dormael had sent her there with an Initiate, and instructions regarding where she was allowed to go within the Conclave without supervision. He knew Shawna would be there giving impromptu instruction on the proper way to use a blade, so he told her to find Shawna if she got bored. She had become a celebrity on the Bruising Stretch since the moment she stepped foot upon it, which was no surprise to Dormael. The students followed her with their eyes popping from their heads, and drool dropping from their mouths. Bethany would have no trouble locating her.

  Dormael would have joined them, had his body felt like doing anything but wilting into a ball and crying for ten weeks straight. Instead, since Bethany was occupied for the day, he decided to limp out into the city and tip back an ale for the souls of his friends. He’d slipped a few daggers into his clothing, tossed a cloak over his shoulders, and made his way outside.

  He limped to the river, which split the Conclave—as it did the entire city—in two. Winding down a white stone path, he descended the stairs to the Conclave Docks, where there were always enterprising citizens willing to ferry a wizard anywhere along the river. A whole troop of them waited alongside the docks, floating in a plethora of different boats.

  “Where to, Blessed?” asked a young man with short-cropped brown hair, and a distinctive line of tattoos down one thin forearm. He sat leaning on the side of a beaten old canoe, the oars dipped into the brown water beside him.

  “East Market,” Dormael replied, grunting as he stepped down into the canoe and got situated, “the quicker, the better.” He tossed the young man a few bronze marks. The boy snatched them out of the air, and without another word, pushed out from the Conclave Docks and into the river Ishamael.

  Ishamael was an expansive city. It sat in the middle of a valley that was just on the northern side of the Runemian Mountains, north and west of Soirus-Gamerit. There was a lot argument between Conclave historians about when the city had been founded. Some believed it was one of the first cities in the entirety of the Sevenlands. Others said that it was simply the first city built after the Sevenlands had unified. Before that, they said, there was no Ishamael, only the seven warring city-states of the Vendon people. Some even said there had once been more than seven tribes, but the others were lost to the various trials of antiquity.

  Ishamael had no walls, so it had spilled out over the countryside through the years, growing like moss along tree roots. The residents of Ishamael and the leadership of the Sevenlands had never been afraid of being attacked in their capital city. Even during the turbulent years of the Second Great War, when the Dannon armies had ravaged the Sevenlands, Ishamael had remained unspoiled. In fact, it had been given a wide berth.

  No one wanted to attack a city which contained so many of the Blessed.

  The day was cold, gray, and bitter. Storm clouds gathered in the mountains, threatening the city with rain. The wind whipped by in no certain direction, blowing the cowl of Dormael’s cloak about his head. He ignored it. He was in no mood for storms.

  The oars made sloshing noises in the river as the young man dipped them into the green, choppy water. The current was with them, since it flowed from north to south, and the canoe slipped through the water at a steady pace. The fishy smell of the river filled Dormael’s nose, but it wasn’t altogether unpleasant. There was a peacefulness to the river, and Dormael tried his best to soak it in.

  The lad was skillful on the oars, and guided them between the larger vessels that crowded the harbor. Ishamael didn’t have the thriving coastal markets of Mistfall, but the harbors in Ishamael were abuzz with activity year-round. Dormael gave the boy an appraising look and wondered how well his business was doing. He could earn more than a dockworker just ferrying people around, especially wizards, who usually had the money to be a bit more generous.

  The young man pulled the canoe to an innocuous dock. It bumped against the posts, and the lad whipped a rope over it in one deft movement. He pulled the canoe up to the side, and gave Dormael a smirk.

  “Right. East Market, just like you asked, Blessed.”

  “Just as I asked,” Dormael said, grunting in pain as a muscle in his stomach spasmed.

  “I can wait here for you, for a small fee.”

  “Larger than I’d want to pay you. I’ll be getting drunk for the foresee
able future, anyway, lad. I’ve no plans to come back in your direction.”

  “A man’s got to have priorities, Blessed.”

  “That he does, boy. Run along, now.” He climbed from the canoe and tossed the boy a silver mark—more than ten times what his ride was worth. The boy snatched it from the air and made it disappear in the space of a breath. His smile deepened, and he offered Dormael a seated bow.

  “Always a pleasure serving the Conclave, Blessed,” the lad said as he pushed off.

  “I’m sure,” Dormael muttered. He turned to head into the city.

  The East Market of Ishamael was a sprawling chaos of taverns, shops, brothels, smithies, and vendors who hawked their wares from covered wagons. A web of streets criss-crossed the Market, full of choking points where the sea of humanity slowed to a crawl. Men and women haggled over items of every sort, and children dragged parents to beg for the ownership of new treasures. Dormael enjoyed the press of people, and the low buzz of humanity that surrounded him. Having been shut up in the Conclave for a few days, it was nice to be surrounded by conversation that wasn’t so charged with anger.

  Dormael wove through the throng of people, his pace as quick as he could manage. He shouldered his way between groups of singing drunks, and slipped by mothers carrying their babes in tight bundles. He dodged carts and horses, and smacked the hands of a few cut-purses who tried him. His body hurt, but the movement itself was making him feel better.

  Thunder rumbled in the distance, the mountain stirring the coming storm to a boil. Rain began to patter onto the cobblestone streets, and various cheers issued up from the crowd. Dormael pulled his cowl over his head and shrugged deeper into his cloak. He spared a thought for using magic to stay dry, but using any sort of spell would play his melody through the ether, which would alert any nearby wizards to his presence. He wasn’t in the mood for any sort of attention, unless it involved a pretty girl. He endured the rain.