“Magi?” Livorus said, almost idly.
“In limited numbers, yes.” Maranata’s voice was cautious. “We would have to negotiate how many. We would prefer to keep the majority for self-defense.”
Livorus glanced at Erida. “And you, Lady Erida. What is your government’s position at the moment?” Chaldea was a thin strip of a nation, located almost entirely along the eastern side of the Wall.
She folded her hands neatly in front of her. “We have a very similar proposition for you, propraetor. However, our concern is that we could suffer repercussions for withdrawing from the Empire. Our citizens currently serving in Persia, proper, could be prevented from returning home. Our country could become a battlefield.” Her expression was neutral. “We would require certain provisions for our protection. Of course, as subject kingdoms, Rome would be required to protect us, yes?”
Livorus smiled faintly. “Yes, we would be required, in the spirit of reciprocity, to defend you. Which would put Rome in direct conflict with Persia for the first time in over a century. You would have to give us something of equal worth to that risk. For example, we already have ports on the Caspian Sea. What can you offer, above and beyond your magi, to make the risk of open hostility all that much more palatable to Rome?” He tapped his fingers together. “With that being said, of course, as subject kingdoms, you would be required to cease and desist in any hostilities across the Wall, against Asia Minor, the Eastern Carthaginian provinces, and Judea.”
Dark glances exchanged between the two other envoys. “And here it is, we were told that you, Propraetor Livorus, would be interested in undoing some of the wrongs of the past, and not merely interested in the monetary and political gains of the Empire,” Maranata said, dryly.
“Oh, but I am. But I will not commit Rome to a struggle that is largely for the convenience of outsiders, without ensuring that Rome sees something from the bargain.” Livorus smiled thinly. “Come now. Let us bargain in trust and in fairness with one another. You are, many of you, summoners. Surely, you must have some experience with the concept.”
Sigrun watched the table, keeping one ear on the conversation, and one ear on the hustle and bustle of the conference hall outside, as the three envoys began to get past the ‘good faith’ generalities, and start negotiating in terms of hard facts. Livorus wanted conditions that protected all sides, and told the others, with brutal frankness, “I fully expect that, should your civil war not materialize, you will not be looking to Rome, but continuing to look to Persia.”
“If the emperor died tomorrow, there would be civil war. The longer he lives, the longer his various sons have time to make alliances, solidify power bases, and attempt to kill one another,” Erida acknowledged, with equal, and breathtaking honesty. She slid a glance towards her chief bodyguard, and added, “I don’t suppose that Rome would be interested in speeding Persia’s slide into civil war?”
They’re lovers, Sigrun thought, instantly. She could read the glances, the body-language, but there was something . . . off about it. She loves her bodyguard. Trusts him, implicitly. And he made that suggestion to her before they entered the room. Why? Her eyes flicked to the body-guard, the one who carried the sword and the bow, and caught the hard look in his eyes, the way his body actually faced away from his lover, not turned towards her, though his eyes didn’t leave her face. That’s not actually a guarding position. He’s not watching the room. He’s watching her, to . . . make sure she says it? . . . and his body-language says disaffection, not intimacy. What does that even mean? Sigrun watched as the man slid a hand under the table, and kept her eyes open, even as she said, silently, Lassair?
Yes?
Please ask Trennus to watch Erida’s chief bodyguard. Something’s amiss with him.
Yes. We know. He doesn’t look right to me. I . . . can’t focus on him. One moment he’s there, one moment, he . . . looks like the woman. Distress in Lassair’s silent voice. We think it’s some form of a misdirection enchantment, one designed to draw pursuers to him, instead of her.
What would be involved in that?
Blood. Hers. Menstrual, by preference. A charm would work better, if she bled directly into a vial, but even rags soaked in her blood would do.
. . . All right. More than I needed to know. Tell the others?
I will pass the information to them, yes.
Out loud, Livorus was responding to Erida, “No, I think not. It is not in the Empire’s interest to deliberately destabilize Persia. To do so would be to strengthen the Mongolian Khanate and the Qin Empire.” His blue eyes were level as he added, calmly, “Beyond the mere practicalities, there is also that old-fashioned notion of Roman honor. I may not be much for the days of the old republic, but there are principles from that era which I do admire.”
Erida actually smiled, faintly. “I rather thought you might say that, propraetor. But you will admit that it was necessary for us to know if you were a man of principle or not.”
“Oh, I am thoroughly unprincipled, when the occasion demands it. This does not.” Livorus turned a page in his notebook, and began writing once again.
______________________
Outside, in the convention center lobby, people continued to file through the single set of opened double doors. It was hot today, miserably so, even by Judean standards, though it was early Maius. Everyone agreed that the unseasonable torrential rains of yesterday had contributed to the mugginess that now left everyone in line with a severe case of lassitude . . . but that meant that vendors were doing a brisk business pouring cold beer and honey mead into paper cups, and handing over paper cones filled with shaved ice to people in the lobby. Past the double doors, guards stood by the turnstile attendants, who were tearing tickets and letting people through the mechanical arms that barred their way through the doors.
It was hot, boring, dull work. And the members of the JDF had no idea why military backup had been requested, above and beyond the military police on hand to make sure that no one did anything untoward to the aircraft on exhibit in the parking lot. “Would be better if we could stand inside with the booths,” one of the young soldiers commented, wiping his face and adjusting his rifle on its strap around his neck. “At least there’s air conditioning inside.”
“And there are pretty girls in skin-tight silvery spacesuits inside to look at? Mind on your work.” The young soldier’s lieutenant glanced up at a man that the attendants had stopped at the entrance. He saw olive skin, dark hair, neatly cut, and a couple days’ growth of beard, and light khaki shirt and jeans. The young man also had a paper sack in his hand, wrapped around a bottle, the neck of which barely protruded from the paper.
“I’m sorry, sir. No outside food or drink inside the main exhibition hall. There’s a recycling bin over there for glass,” the attendant told the man helpfully.
“Sorry,” the man replied, in good Latin, smiling. “Let me just finish drinking this, and I’ll toss it.” He turned away towards the recycling bin, tilting the bottle back to his lips, and then slid it into the receptacle with enough care to ensure that it didn’t shatter inside. He walked back over, bought a map of the booths, and wandered inside with the rest of the crowd.
The young lieutenant relaxed back against the doorframe. He’d just come on-shift at two postmeridian, and he had a good five hours of his shift left ahead of him. He’d wondered at the man who’d just walked in . . . it seemed early in the day to be drinking hard liquor, but it could have been one of those fancy new individual beers in a glass bottle. There certainly hadn’t been much smell of liquor as the man had passed. But, it was warm, and in the end, the man hadn’t been a problem. He’d done what he’d been asked to do, and left the prohibited item outside.
___________________
Back in the conference room, after three hours, and several trays of dormice on sticks, hardboiled eggs, pickles, and a variety of other foods had been moved to the room to remain almost entirely uneaten by the envoys themselves, it was well after eight
antemeridian, and dark outside. The convention center would remain open for at least another hour, and Sigrun was slightly restless. The more so, as details began to be hammered out. Entering the Roman empire brought with it attendant problems and privileges. The fact that Babylon itself would be now so close to the edge of Roman territory, being adjacent to Chaldea, was a problem. Agreeing to allow Roman garrisons inside their territories was another, and deciding what percentages of foreign levies, such as the Judean air force, could be admitted inside their border would largely have to be handled at another time.
It was boring, tedious work to partake of, and to listen to. Thus, Sigrun wasn’t particularly surprised when the various bodyguards all began to stand up and move around, in turn, trying to stay awake. Alert. On guard. Eventually, Erida’s chief bodyguard stood, himself, and moved back from the table. Found a comfortable place along the wall, just halfway through the sound-dampening field, just as Sigrun herself still stood against the wall by the door. He was directly behind his protectee, and still watching her, and the room, warily. Sigrun wasn’t entirely sure why she was uneasy with him, but it all boiled down to what she called her truth-sense. It was partially a godly power, true, but it wasn’t entirely magical. She was simply very much in tune with facial expression. Body language. What she called the lie in someone’s eyes was really a matter of both. And this man was lying, to his protectee, at least, and it put Sigrun on edge.
So she was only partially distracted when one of the other bodyguards dropped a wineglass with a loud shattering sound, and she caught, out of the corner of her eye, the lead bodyguard’s hand dropping to his pocket. “Hey!” Kanmi blurted, his head snapping up. “Someone just transmitted a radio frequency signal—” his head swiveled towards the lead Chaldean bodyguard. “You son of a bitch!”
Magic. Magic happening faster than even god-born senses allowed her to see. Kanmi was rarely an attacker. He followed principles akin to those of martial arts in his magical practice; he used other people’s powers, other people’s attacks, against them. This was one of the rare exceptions, and Sigrun felt the wave of raw force as it slammed into the Chaldean man, pinning him to the wall . . . but she could see some sort of an energy shield in place over the man, like a shell, keeping Kanmi’s attack at bay. “What’s going on?” Erida demanded, raising her own hands into position to incant, and energy flaring to life around her. “What’s the meaning of this?”
Kanmi struggled to hold the Chaldean bodyguard in place. Chaldeans had been, as he’d reminded the others just hours ago, the first organized magic-users in recorded history. That didn’t mean they were the best. But it meant that their entire culture was steeped in lore. Every child born in Chaldea grew up hoping he or she was a magus. It was a ticket out of poverty and privation, and every child was tested for the gift of magic when they were eight years of age. The Magi were their heroes. The closest thing to god-born that the Chaldeans had were sorcerers and summoners. And it felt, very much, as if this bodyguard were both. The wave of force that Kanmi had slammed the man with had been pulled from the batteries in his pockets; he had nothing ambient here to work with, besides cold, clear, air-conditioned atmosphere, and the warmth of human bodies.
Starting from nothing was the very hardest thing a sorcerer could do, nothing more than will and their own body. Come on, Kanmi thought, trying to hold the man pinned, one hand out in front of him as if he’d slapped the bodyguard to the wall like a fly. Try something. Give me something to work with. Or just stand down. Make my life easy for once. But it was like trying to nail butter to the wall. Everything he did, there were . . . shields around the bodyguard, and they weren’t made of sorcery, but of spirit-energy. “Matru!” Kanmi snapped out, too busy to bother with the full name. “Get ready to banish—”
The man against the wall raised his head, and a single drop of blood trickled from the corner of his mouth, testimony to how hard Kanmi had hit him. A rippling wave of words in Chaldean, and Kanmi could feel the energy coming at him, and tried to parry it, but it wasn’t force. Wasn’t heat. It was like trying to parry fog. Ah, shit. He’s an elementalist, and he’s not specialized in fire. He’s water.
The spell hit his body, and Kanmi felt his veins bulge, could see them rippling in his forearms as his blood pressure suddenly spiked. Pain. Searing pain, as the water in his body began to migrate, forcing its way out of his veins, leaving red blood cells like jelly, abandoned in its wake. Ah, shit, shit, shit, Kanmi thought, struggling with it, trying to get a grip on the enchantment. It’s all going to pour out on the floor . . . .
. . . and then, instead, he realized that he couldn’t breathe. His breath was coming in short, quick pants from terror already, but he couldn’t get the breath down any further than his trachea. His son, Himi, was asthmatic. He knew the panicked look in his son’s eyes when he suffered an attack, and knew it was reflected in his own now, as the water from his body rose up in his throat, and Kanmi dropped to the ground, coughing and choking, trying to expel his own body’s fluids that threatened to drown him. Drowned on dry land. I said it hours ago. Fuck you, Chaldean. You die. The thoughts were muzzy, however. Kanmi knew all too well that if the attack weren’t stopped, he’d die inside of a minute. Not enough liquid blood to pump through his heart. The turgid flow was already causing his heart to spasm. Even if the spell stopped right now . . . Kanmi’s thoughts were distant, but frighteningly clear. Even if he resisted, the sticky globules of blood clotting in his body could turn into pulmonary embolisms. Could become a stroke.
He needed to reverse this. He could reverse this. He knew he could push the water back into his veins and ease his own blood-flow. He just couldn’t. The knowledge of how was there, but drowning creates a reflexive panic. The body itself takes over. Fights to live, when it’s the mind that will save someone. Someone kill this son of a bitch. Someone save my life.
___________________
Sigrun had already fallen in beside Adam and Trennus, guarding Livorus; Adam had pulled a pistol . . . and she could feel the backwash of energy moving across the room, like a whip uncoiling from a practiced hand. The Chaldean bodyguard had one fist raised, and was muttering under his breath, rapidly. He was a Magus, and his incantations were just as fast as Kanmi’s. Eshmunazar tried to catch it, but it wasn’t force, it wasn’t heat, it wasn’t energy . . . it was . . . pressure, and it was subtle. Kanmi swayed on his feet, and began to gasp and choke, and he began to cough up red-tinged, frothy water from deep inside his lungs. Sigrun’s eyes widened.
He’s drowning in his own fluids, Lassair hissed from Trennus’ shoulder. The water in his blood is passing into his lungs. The blood is left to congeal and curdle in his veins. Stop the dark summoner!
“Call off your bodyguard and I’ll call off my lictor,” Livorus told Erida, but before anyone could so much as move, the lights in the building went out, followed by screams, clearly audible as Kanmi’s sound-dampening field dropped. Even emergency lightning systems were down, and Sigrun’s skin crawled. She could still see energy fields and spirits, but not the people that the fields surrounded, or the spirits attended upon. She had less than a second to register that, and then she heard a groan and a thump from Kanmi’s direction. Split-second to make a choice. The source of the spell, or her drowning friend?
Shouting, “Stay with Livorus!” at Adam, Sigrun launched herself for where she could still see the energy field of the bodyguard . . . only to be caught, in turn by something that materialized between her and her target, blocking her view. She slammed into it full speed, unable to stop herself in time, and felt whatever it was lurch a little at the impact . . . and then she looked up and met green-glowing eyes in the darkness, three feet over her own head. Could smell something wild and unkempt, like wet dog fur, and foul breath passed over her cheek as clawed hands dug into her upper arms. Light, Sigrun thought, and channeled power through her body, illuminating herself from within. Light, light, light!
From the middle of her self-enkindled blaze,
Sigrun looked up into the huge maw of what looked like nothing so much as a hyena, mouth open and slavering down at her . . . but it was a hyena that looked something like a man, as well. Rail-thin body, sparse fur, dark and barely dappled with lighter speckles . . . clawed hands, tearing into her skin . . . and green-glowing eyes. The creature bared its teeth at her and howled with laughter, a mad, wild sound that chilled Sigrun into her soul.
Chaos. Madness, as several of the bodyguards in the room turned to run, bursting through one of the other doors and out into the darkened hallway. The lead Chaldean bodyguard leaped from the wall to his envoy, and snaked an arm around Erida’s waist, settling a knife at her throat. Trennus, shouting at the bodyguards fleeing the scene, “No! Stay in the light! Stay in the light!” even as he tried to stand in front of Livorus, and Kanmi, on the ground, continued to heave out his life’s fluids from his lungs.
Lassair flared into brilliance, and Sigrun knocked the alu-demon’s hands away from her arms, even as Adam’s hand dropped into place beside her, holding a revolver . . . and fired, point-blank, on the demon. Sigrun spun away from the sound, flinching instinctively, but the demon had already leaped backwards and out into the darkness of the hall, crashing through the closed door, leaving nothing more than trails of smoke . . . and leaving them in a room with the Chaldean envoy, who now had a knife pressed to her throat by her own bodyguard, while screams and cries of mortal terror and mad laughter echoed from the convention hall outside.
The Valkyrie (The Saga of Edda-Earth Book 1) Page 66