The sky turned white, blinding Breaker momentarily, as another closer, brighter flash of lightning blazed out; this time the earsplitting roar of thunder followed almost immediately.
“What should we do?” the Beauty asked.
“It can’t hurt us,” the Scholar shouted back. “Our magic protects us.”
“What can’t hurt us?” the Archer demanded. “It’s just light and sound!”
The Scholar shook his head. “No, it’s more than that. It’s . . . the flash is from a thing, an effect, a force. The actual lightning bolt. It can knock down trees, start fires, kill a man by touching him. I don’t really understand how . . .”
And then the third bolt flashed, and the thunder boomed, and all of them were blinded and deafened momentarily.
Even before Breaker could see again the smell reached him, a strange, sharp odor he had never smelled before, and then the scent of cooking meat.
And then the Seer was screaming, and the Speaker was babbling, and the Leader barking orders, and the three of them were kneeling in the mud and rain, huddled around something, something lying on the ground, something that smoked . . .
“The guide,” the Scholar said. “Lightning hit the guide!” He turned and ran to help, Breaker and the Archer and the Beauty close behind.
It was obvious at a glance that nothing could be done; Breaker took one look and turned away, sickened by the sweet smell of cooked meat.
He had thought he had seen horror in the scattered bones in Stone-slope, the tiny skull the Seer had displayed, the pitiful remnants of ordinary life, but now he had learned a new and greater horror. A woman he had known and liked, however briefly, had just died before his eyes, roasted like a pig by magical fire from the sky—and for what? Surely the Wizard Lord must realize this would only increase their determination!
Rain spilled from his hat as he straightened up, and rain ran down his face; Breaker did not know whether he was crying, whether the moisture on his cheeks included his own tears.
“She must have died instantly,” the Leader said.
“Lightning can stop a person’s heart as if a hand grabbed it and squeezed,” the Scholar said. “It can blast one’s brain to pudding. She probably never felt a thing; she was most likely dead before she hit the ground.”
The Seer gagged.
“You aren’t helping, Lore,” the Archer said.
Breaker was unsure whether the Scholar’s words were any comfort or not; so far his reactions were too visceral for mere words to matter. The odd smell of the lightning and the ghastly smell of cooked meat, the memory of the guide’s blackened and smoking face, were far more immediate.
“No more guides,” the Beauty said. “We’ll have to travel unaided.”
“Indeed,” the Leader agreed.
Breaker swallowed, and forced himself to speak. “Did the Wizard Lord do this intentionally?” he asked. “Can he steer these lightning bolts so precisely?”
“Yes,” the Scholar replied instantly.
“Then you’ve all seen, now,” Breaker said. “He killed an innocent woman. We can no longer doubt the need to remove him.”
“I think we’ve all seen enough,” the Leader said, getting to his feet. “Come on—we still need to reach shelter before nightfall.”
“Are we going to just leave her here?” the Archer asked, shocked.
“We can’t spare the time to do anything else, not in this storm,” the Leader said. “We’ll tell the townspeople in Riversedge.”
Lightning flashed anew, and the crack of thunder blended with the crack of breaking wood.
“Stay away from any trees,” the Leader said. “Lore says lightning can knock them down—that means it can knock them down on us. We need to stay in the open.”
“Where the storm is worst,” the Archer said.
“Of course.”
“You know, I wanted to kill him anyway, but now I am really beginning to hate the Wizard Lord.”
“I don’t blame you,” Breaker said.
“Come on,” the Beauty said. “All of you. We can talk in Riversedge.” She matched her actions to her words, rising and trudging onward.
One by one, the others followed.
They reached Riversedge around sunset—they had not seen the sun in hours, of course, but the skies were growing even darker, and there could be little doubt that the faint daylight was dying.
The boundary shrine had tilted slightly in the mud, but was still easily seen; Breaker stopped to say, “We come in peace, O ler, and beg you receive us kindly.” The Speaker paused as well and said something that sounded like no imaginable human language; the others marched past without stopping.
They passed the farmers’ fields, now flooded and lost beneath black water; before them the village was a darker gray outline in the deepening gray gloom. Breaker saw no lights, and for a moment felt an uncontrollable surge of terror—had the Wizard Lord destroyed the town, as he had Stoneslope, so that its residents could not aid the Chosen? Would they find roofless ruins and staring corpses, rather than welcoming fires and cheerful hosts?
But then he glimpsed a yellow flicker, and another—the lights were there, but doors and shutters were tightly closed, shutting out the storm and the encroaching night.
“Hey!” the Archer shouted, as they entered the main street. “Hello in there!”
“Shut up,” Breaker told him. “We’ll knock at the inn—there’s no need to wake the whole town.”
“And where is this inn?” the Leader asked. “I was the high priest’s guest when I came through before, and needed no inn.”
“There,” the Seer replied, pointing.
A moment later the Seer and the Archer were pounding on the door of the inn, calling for succor, while the other five stood back.
And a moment after that—a long and frightening moment, in which Breaker feared that his fantasy was true after all, despite the lights—the door swung open, and the seven tumbled in, one after another, spilling rain from cloaks and hats and packs.
The landlord stared at them.
“What’s happening?” he demanded. “Who are you people? What were you doing out in this storm?”
The Leader spoke, of course, as the others shook off the worst of the rain.
“We are traveling from Winterhome, on our way to the Galbek Hills,” he said.
“In this storm?”
The Leader grimaced. “We didn’t have much choice.”
“And where is your guide?”
At that, the seven Chosen fell silent. They stopped wringing out sleeves to stare at one another.
“Dead,” the Leader said at last. “She’s dead. On the road, a mile or two east.”
“Dead? The ler?”
“The lightning.”
The innkeeper flinched. “The flashes—that was lightning? And it really can kill?”
“Yes.”
“What’s happened? Why is this happening? Are the ler angry? Is a rogue wizard responsible? Why doesn’t the Wizard Lord do something?”
“The Wizard Lord has gone mad,” the Seer said, before the Leader could reply.
“Indeed,” the Leader agreed, not bothering to hide his annoyance at the Seer’s interruption. “The Wizard Lord has gone mad, and sent that storm to stop us.”
“To stop you?”
“See for yourself,” the Leader said, gesturing at the still-open door. “Now that we’re safely inside—well, look!”
The Scholar opened the door wide so that the innkeeper could see that the wind had dropped, and the rain and lightning had stopped.
“But—are you wizards, then?”
The Leader gave an exasperated sigh. “We are the Chosen,” he said. “Not wizards.”
“The Chosen—going to the Galbek Hills?” The innkeeper gaped at them. “The Wizard Lord has gone mad? What, have I fallen into one of the old stories? That’s absurd! It’s been a hundred years!”
“Do you think we don’t know that?” the Archer snap
ped, as he tugged at his wet garments.
“That doesn’t make it any easier for us,” the Beauty said, as she struggled to squeeze enough water from her scarf that it would stop falling from her face.
“Did you think it could never happen again?” the Seer demanded, as she found the poker and began stirring the fire. Breaker thought that was unfair; the innkeeper almost certainly had thought it would never happen again. Breaker had thought so, or he would not have taken the role of Swordsman in the first place. Thinking it would never happen again seemed very common.
“Regardless of who or what else we may be, my good man, right now we are customers—cold, damp, hungry, tired customers,” the Leader said. “We’ll have all night to tell you our tales, if you wish.”
“We need to sleep,” the Seer said. “We’ll need all the rest we can get. We’ll face more of the same tomorrow.”
“Eat first,” the Archer protested.
“And find a guide to our next destination . . .” the Scholar began.
“No,” Breaker interrupted. “No guide. No more guides, ever.”
“Oh,” the Scholar said, as several of the others glared at him. “Of course. No guides.”
“I can guide us,” the Speaker said. “Now that my guardians are agreed on our goal, I can bespeak the ler of the road and find our path.”
“Good,” the Leader said. “I’m pleased to hear that. Landlord, you’re still here? Food! Drink! Seats! Beds!”
With that, the innkeeper finally remembered his duties, and hurried toward the kitchens, calling, “Wife! We have customers!”
Breaker looked around, then, and realized that the seven of them were the only customers—save for themselves and the innkeeper, the common room was deserted. The fire was banked, chairs and benches pushed against the walls, tables bare and empty.
But that made sense; after all, who would venture out on such a day, in such a storm? The people of Riversedge were undoubtedly safe in their homes, huddled around their hearths, waiting out the weather.
Though now that the rain had stopped, some might well feel like discussing the storm with their neighbors over a good mug of beer; Breaker suspected that the tavern would not remain empty for long.
And that would undoubtedly mean explaining the situation several times.
Breaker was not looking forward to that—especially not when it came to their poor guide. He really did not want to think about that.
How could the Wizard Lord have done such a thing? Burning down an innocent old woman like that!
But then, the Wizard Lord had slaughtered an entire village. It was hard to think about that, too.
At least in Stoneslope Breaker hadn’t seen anyone die—or worse, smelled it; he had seen the bones and the ruins, and felt the fear and anger of the dead, but that had been less immediate. Those were quite bad enough, horrifying and infuriating and frustrating, but not nauseating. He doubted he would ever forget the smell of the guide’s death, that strange mix of that sharp, magical odor and the stench of charred flesh.
He pulled a chair over to the nearest table and sat down; a moment later the Scholar was seated at his left, the Beauty at his right. She had somehow managed to get her scarf secured in place, despite its utter saturation, but it was clinging, outlining her jaw; Breaker found himself staring without meaning to. He had never seen so lovely a chin. And he could see her fingers, though she had tucked her hands back into her sleeves, and they were beautiful, long and tapered . . .
Then he realized what he was doing and tore his gaze away.
The Archer had sat down on the far side of the table; he was staring openly at the Beauty. Breaker frowned.
“We can’t go on like this,” the Beauty said. “We need that wagon.”
“Getting it ready may mean staying a few days here,” Breaker said.
“It would be worth it,” the Beauty said.
“I believe she’s right,” the Scholar said.
Breaker nodded. “I won’t argue.” He looked at the Scholar—partly just to avoid looking at the Beauty again—and asked, “In all the stories about the other Dark Lords, is there any mention of storms or lightning?”
“Oh, yes, of course,” the Scholar said. “The Dark Lord of the Midlands was before the Wizard Lords had full control of the weather, but he did manage to gather clouds around his fortress—I’m not sure why. The Dark Lord of Tallowcrane brought landslides down on the Chosen, and killed the Seer that way. The next two retired, rather than be slain, but the Dark Lord of Kamith t’Daru used rainstorms to create floods to slow the Chosen when they neared his keep. The Dark Lord of the Tsamas used a lightning bolt to burn a siege engine the Leader was constructing, and rain to make footing treacherous.” He frowned. “The Dark Lord of Spider Marsh and the Dark Lord of Goln Vleys did not use weather—I don’t know why not. And I don’t recall any tales of using storms as the Dark Lord of the Galbek Hills does.”
“The Dark Lord of the Galbek Hills.” Breaker had never heard that phrase spoken before, had never thought it himself, but it was now obvious that was indeed who and what they were up against.
“The Dark Lord of the Galbek Hills.” He, as the Swordsman, was on his way to kill the Dark Lord of the Galbek Hills. It still didn’t seem entirely real, somehow. Dark Lords were monsters of the ancient past, not part of the peaceful modern world.
But the present Wizard Lord had slaughtered a village—and killed their guide.
The Seer, satisfied with the fire, pulled another chair up, between the Scholar and the Archer. The Leader and the Speaker remained apart, seated on a bench by the far wall, talking quietly.
“How many people has the Wizard Lord killed?” Breaker asked the Seer, without preamble, as she settled onto her chair.
“What?”
“All told, in his eight years, or nine, how many people has the current Wizard Lord killed?”
“I . . . I don’t know, exactly. I don’t know how many were in Stoneslope—enough that I sensed them as a mass, rather than individuals.”
“Well, other than that, then—how many besides the people of Stoneslope?”
“Well, you saw,” she said, startled. “He killed our guide!”
“No, besides that. How many rogue wizards, real or alleged?”
“Oh! None.”
It was Breaker’s turn to be startled. “None?”
“No, of course not.”
“But isn’t it his duty to kill rogue wizards?”
“Yes, of course, but he hasn’t found any to kill.”
“Have you asked him?”
“No, I . . . No.”
“Do you think he’s recruited them?” the Archer asked. “That they’re working for him?”
“Maybe,” Breaker said—though in fact he had not thought anything of the sort; he hadn’t yet worked that far through his ideas.
“I don’t think there were any,” the Seer said.
“Seer, how long have you been the Seer?”
“Thirty-two long, tiresome years. Since a little after my twentieth birthday. Why?”
“How many Wizard Lords have you known?”
“Three. I don’t see why this matters.”
“The other two—how many people did they kill?”
“None. They weren’t Dark Lords.”
“But rogue wizards . . . ?”
“There aren’t . . . oh, I don’t know.”
“There aren’t any more rogue wizards?” Breaker asked. “Is that what you mean?”
“Maybe. I don’t know. There haven’t been any for thirty-two years.”
“Longer,” the Scholar said. “The last confirmed instance of a Wizard Lord killing a rogue wizard was during the reign of the Wizard Lord of Greensand, about three hundred years ago. In fact, when the Dark Lord of Spider Marsh resigned he cited the dearth of rogue wizards as one reason he had attempted to alter the system.”
Breaker and the Archer exchanged glances.
“It seems to me he had a point
,” Breaker said.
“The Council of Immortals felt otherwise,” the Scholar said. “They said that it was proof the system was working just as it was—the presence of the Wizard Lord prevented wizards from going rogue in the first place.”
“The presence of the Chosen is supposed to prevent Wizard Lords from going dark, but how many have there been since then?” Breaker asked.
“Since the Dark Lord of Spider Marsh? Just the Dark Lord of Goln Vleys, and now the Dark Lord of the Galbek Hills.”
“So we’ve had three Dark Lords, and no rogue wizards, in that time?” the Archer asked. “That sounds to me as if the cure is worse than the disease.”
The Scholar shrugged. “Perhaps. But remember, the Wizard Lord also regulates the weather, to ensure good crops and safe passage, and his presence deters bandits and other criminals as well as rogue wizards.”
“Don’t the priests bargain with the ler for good crops?” Breaker asked. “Ours certainly did in Mad Oak.”
“Well, with earth ler, certainly,” the Scholar answered, disconcerted. “But the wind and rain . . .” He hesitated. “You know, I don’t know whether that can be controlled locally. I would think it could be—but then why do we have the Wizard Lord do it?”
“My parents told me the Wizard Lord spent his time hunting down rogue wizards,” Breaker said.
“But if there aren’t any . . .”
“I thought there were,” the Seer interrupted. “I swear by all the ler, I thought there were still rogues, and they had simply gotten better at hiding themselves. When the Wizard Lord told us he had wiped out a nest of them at Stoneslope I believed him, because I wanted to believe him—it meant the system was working. But I should have checked, I shouldn’t have just accepted it without question for five years!” Her face crumpled as if she were struggling to hold back tears; Breaker had never before seen a woman her age look like that.
“But there’s no real harm done,” Breaker said soothingly. “He didn’t kill anyone else—well, not until today. And now we know, and we’ll stop him.”
“But the guide—if I had checked years ago, she might . . .”
“She might have been just as horribly dead five years sooner,” Breaker said. “And when you saw your mistake, you set out to correct it, didn’t you? And here we are.”
The Wizard Lord Page 29