by J. S. Morin
"Loramar never had this," Jinzan said. He tried to raise his voice but it came out choked.
"Father, look!" Anzik called out from below as he made his way up the stairs. "His name was Sazan and he shared his bread with me." Behind Anzik came a boy about his own size with a vacant look in his eyes. "I saw how you were putting the aether back into the broken men and I did the same to fix Sazan."
"I'd like separate quarters for this trip. I don't even care where you're taking me, just keep this crew of yours well clear, and I'll be no trouble," Tanner said.
"Excellent, Mr. Tanner. I like you better in this world already."
* * * * * * * *
"You must be running short of important folk to bother about all this drivel," Axterion groused. "Hardly a word to me a tenday at a time, but someone slaughters half the empire's simpering bootlicks and the Inner Circle, and you're here daily, is that it?"
"Something like that," Kyrus admitted. Axterion snorted. "Besides, you make a lot of sense. I think you play at being senile because you prefer being left alone. I need you."
"Bout time someone did," Axterion replied. The old sorcerer bit a strawberry in half, tossing the leafy cap into a bowl with a dozen others like it, and chewed as he spoke. "You got yourself quite a quandary though. Got near to everything you asked for, and don't know what to do with it now?"
"Well, we have peace now, but Rashan is going to be around constantly. I need some way to find the information I need without being obvious about the search. I never imagined he would drop the war as if it were a game of chess he had grown bored of," Kyrus said. He eyed the bowl of strawberries but decided against the distraction.
"You and that girl of yours are together in the other world, right?" Axterion asked.
"Yes."
"Maybe you can have her read you the book," Axterion suggested. "Keep a copy of it over there, maybe. Your grandmother always kept her really confidential information written down there." Axterion paused for a moment and turned to frown off into the distance. He scratched at his head. "At least, she told me she did. No real way to be sure, of course."
"That might work for one book she has. But what if it lacks want I need? I suspect it does. I would rather not have Rashan stumble across me reading up on demons and how they might be killed," Kryus said. He laced his fingers behind his head and leaned back in his chair. The front legs lifted up off the ground.
Axterion scratched his head. "Well, you can find some other cause to send him off after. Of course, he's like as not to start killing everything that comes at him from the corner of his eye, but at least it wouldn't be you."
"I just got him to stop warring. It would have to be something entirely different."
"You can get lackeys. I've always been partial to those, but good ones are hard to sniff out. Most of 'em get snapped up quick as biscuits, soon as they show any worth. You can train 'em up if you know what you're doing, and what to look for in a raw one. Or, you could try poaching—you know, buy one from someone who can't pay as well as you can afford. Of course that doesn't get you the loyal ones. Best is to find someone with potential that other folks are overlooking, preferably someone who has some ideals to hedge against greed. Fearless, if you can manage it, since you don't want a lackey that can be bullied," Axterion said. Kyrus could begin to picture what he must have been like as a younger man, still in full control of his aether. A strong High Sorcerer who commanded respect and obedience, who had once helped right the sinking ship of a Kadrin Empire that had made many enemies, one that had lost its warlock protector.
"You know ... I think I may just know where I can find someone like that," Kyrus replied.
"Oh? Where?" Axterion asked. The old man waited. Though Kyrus knew him to be nearly blind and reliant on aether-vision, he still kept the habit of pointing his eyes where his attention lay. Kyrus waited under that milky, vacant stare until realization dawned. "Oh no, you don't! I'm retired. I draw a pension from the Imperial Circle and everything. It's all very official. Besides, I was High Sorcerer for three of your lifetimes with enough summers left over for an Academy education; I'm well past being anyone's lackey."
"Covert researcher?" Kyrus suggested. "I can be flexible on the title."
"It's not just the title—"
"You mentioned your pension. I could certainly find a way to get you an honorarium for your services," Kyrus offered. "And I act with the emperor's authority, so on technicalities I outrank the High Sorcerer. This would not be a demotion, High Sorcerer Axterion ... uh, Grandfather." Kyrus corrected himself when he noticed the old man frown.
"Thought of everything, have you, smarty-boy?" Axterion asked, raising his eyebrow. It was an expression that likely had carried more weight when it had more than a few wisps of hair left to it.
"No, not at all. The whole of this was your idea."
"Bah." Axterion slouched back in his chair and crossed his arms. He snatched another strawberry from the bowl, bit it in half, and threw the leftover leafy top at Kyrus.
* * * * * * * *
"Do you think you are up to the task? Your performance at Founding Day seemed to show your faculties are fully recovered, but what about the rest of you?" Rashan asked. The warlock sat perched on the table next to Faolen in one of the palace's sitting rooms.
"I am recovered, certainly. Who is to say whether I am equal to the task? Does anyone know Brannis's limits? I doubt even he does," Faolen argued. He fidgeted under the demon's stare. "Several times a day the city shakes with his transferences. You are the only other one I have ever heard of using them besides him; not even Dolvaen trusted them. But he bumbles about most of the time; I doubt he knows a dozen proper spells. Can he see us even here, from halfway across Kadris and through warded walls?"
"Yes, yes, point taken, but I shall brook no cowardice. You are one of my Unfettered, even after your failure with the Staff of Gehlen. Besides, this is Brannis. He might take up his sword in battle against goblins or ogres, but he quails at the thought of killing humans. You are more likely to die by accident around him than by his design. He held Dolvaen and Caladris both by the throat for nearly a season, and played them against one another rather than destroying them—or even just putting them before me to handle."
"What in particular are you trying to determine? If you could tell me that, I might better recognize what I see," Faolen said. Rashan looked away, allowing Faolen a moment's respite from the intensity that rarely left the demon's eyes.
"He is clever; oftentimes I underestimate him, even knowing that. He runs much of the empire by my arrangement. He has as good a strategic mind as I have seen, even if he lacks the stomach to plan ruthlessly. He helps me at every turn and his advice has always proven sound. He has turned me from my intended path more than once and I have seen that it was the right choice. Still, for all that, something in my gut tells me that he might still harbor some plot against me ... that maybe for all the tangled schemes that I caught Caladris and Dolvaen in, Brannis might have sacrificed them as pawns in a plot one layer thicker," Rashan said. "Vexed" was not often a word that could describe the warlock, but the adversarial relationship with his disciple Brannis could make it fit him.
"I will do what I can. He will be suspicious, you know."
"Not if you are as good as you tell folk. A lot of rumors return to me. I have ears under every floor," Rashan said.
"If you have so many ears, what do you need with mine?" Faolen asked.
"I employ hired ears aplenty, but there is a shortage of brains between them. You are a sorcerer and twinborn, and you managed to conceal the latter for a very long time. Just trail him until the first day of summer. That ought to be long enough to satisfy my worries," Rashan said. The warlock put a hand on Faolen's shoulder. He stiffened, afraid to move.
"Oh, and are you still traveling with that Megrenn boy's twin?" Rashan asked.
"Yes ..." Faolen swallowed. He had avoided entanglements between worlds for so long, only to end up caught in the worst
net into which he could have blundered.
"I want to see something ..."
Rashan removed his hand from Faolen's shoulder and placed it on his forehead.
* * * * * * * *
The Starlit Marauder drifted in bright sunshine, shielded from view from the ground by dark storm clouds below it. Everything was dripping from their ascent through the rain. Along the ship's railing, Ushiqa's children watched the clouds below, oblivious to the wetness. Juliana watched them anxiously, expecting one to fall overboard at any moment. They chattered to one another in Safschan, pointing, shouting, laughing. They knew that their father was alive, though Juliana had omitted Tiiba's bargain when she relayed the story to Ushiqa. With that one worry laid to rest, they were enjoying a grand adventure.
Ushiqa came up from below with an armload of morning feast foods for everyone. She had taken the news in stride, unsurprised that Tiiba had fought off the infamous demon who had plagued their land.
She called out to the children. Some of the words were likely names, but Juliana understood only a word or two and nothing that lent meaning to the interaction. Instead she judged by the children's reactions. They scrambled from the railings, the sky’s wonders momentarily forgotten in the face of mealtime.
"Do you worry about them playing on deck?" Juliana asked. She took a strip of salted, smoked pork, one of the few morsels that the children had not grabbed in their frenzy.
"No. They are children, not fools," Ushiqa said. "They are not so small that they would jump off. Mushina would scold the younger ones if they began to get rowdy."
"Do you have someplace you can take them?" Juliana asked. "I don't know how far the war has spread, but I can take you anywhere."
"I have family in the North."
"Fine then, north we go," Juliana replied.
"What about you? Do you not have to return to Kadrin?" Ushiqa asked.
"I'm not sure when it will be safe to go back there, if ever."
A crash of thunder boomed beneath them. My whole life is upside down, Juliana thought.
* * * * * * * *
Jinzan sailed carefully. It was as alien an experience as he had ever encountered, sailing amid the clouds. The sea was in his blood. It was familiar and reliable. The Katamic Sea held firm to the contours of a well-crafted hull. In the air, the winds leapt suddenly, taking the Kadrin airship along, unwilling. The Black Gull flew askew in the currents, its stern always twisted slightly to the starboard side.
Despite the quirks of navigation, the airship’s captain and sorceress were keeping it on course. All the dead seemed sluggish in their movements: a resigned, plodding sort of existence. It reminded him of Denrik's fellow inmates on Rellis Island. The dead feel no pain? I wonder if I will find that they do, after all.
Anzik came over to him. The boy had been poking about the ship, examining both it and the crew since they had taken off. The boy stopped before Jinzan, looking at him with bald curiosity. Jinzan thought to ignore him, but Anzik was his son, not some underling to be brushed aside.
"Anzik, it is rude to stare. Go find something to play with or read," Jinzan said.
"Someone wants me to tell you something," Anzik said. Jinzan looked at the boy once more, fixing his gaze to the aether. There was nothing that he could see influencing the boy. Someone is influencing his twin?
"What?" he asked.
"Well, it's more of a question really, so I think they phrased it wrong. They should have asked me to ask you something, not to tell you—"
"Just tell me what it is," Jinzan snapped.
"He wanted me to ask if you have been playing with Loramar's books," Anzik said. A pensive look scrunched up his face and he paused. "So, 'have you been playing with Loramar's books?' Oh, and who is Loramar? That was my question, the last one there."
"Anzik, who is the one asking?" Jinzan felt a twinge of pride that he had managed to remain calm despite his suspicions. His heart had not raced; neither had his breath quickened.
"Me. I just asked you," Anzik said.
"Yes, but who is asking you?"
"My apprentice," Anzik said with a smile. "He's just like me but doesn't know magic."
"No. That is not what I mean. Who wants to know?"
Anzik shrugged. It was a gesture that signaled a blind canyon of inquiry.
"Oh," Anzik added. "He also wants you to know that he is still planning to come to retrieve your skull, and that you shouldn't fall asleep. Do you have a skull that you're planning on giving someone? Can I see it?"
Anzik squeezed his eyes shut, shaking his head. He wobbled on his feet then slumped to the ground, fast asleep. Jinzan scooped him up in his arms and carried him to one of the crew quarters belowdecks. His spell had robbed Anzik of his wakefulness and Rashan of his puppet.
Filthy demon! Leave the boy out of this.
* * * * * * * *
Rashan laughed as he pulled his hand away from Faolen's forehead. The coolness of the demon's skin had left no sweaty imprint and a welcome sense of relief. Back in Tellurak, Wendell released Jadon in the same manner, allowing the sleepy boy to return to his bed. The demon's spell had taxed Wendell's Source to its limits, but he had been able to see through Jadon's eyes and Rashan through his own.
"What did that all mean?" Faolen asked. "Why ask about Loramar?"
"Well, did you not notice that the crew were all living corpses? Someone has been practicing necromancy, and there is no better authority on the subject," Rashan explained.
"I thought you hated Loramar."
"I have no quarrel with books, whoever wrote them. Besides, I had a healthy respect for the shriveled old death-herder. No one has ever posed a greater threat to the empire."
"Do you really think that Jinzan Fehr is trying to become a necromancer in the mold of Loramar?" Faolen asked. It occurred to him then that he had not just revealed Jadon's sights to him, but Wendell's in the process.
"Possibly. He certainly is trying his hand at it, wherever he is getting his techniques. If he had found any of Loramar's research though, it would seem that Ghelk would be the likely hiding place for them."
"The Grand Necromancer's crypts were all found and destroyed after your final victory. The Circle saw to it as part of the peace treaty," Faolen said. "I would suspect that somewhere there was someone else who tried to replicate the process."
"Well, I just happen to know someone who was around for those treaty negotiations. I think it may be about time I pay him a visit."
As soon as Rashan had gone, Faolen slumped back in his chair. He reached for a decanter on the side table, pulled the stopper, and drank his fill without so much as checking to see what it was.
* * * * * * * *
Axterion was sitting with his feet soaking in a sulfur-salted basin and a pipe in his mouth when Rashan arrived. The smoke and water warmed and soothed him at both ends, but his demon grand-uncle put a chill in his belly.
"What brings you to my bedchambers, old man?" Axterion greeted Rashan. "Did the rumor get free that I was better company than I've been letting on? I just chased Brannis out of here not long ago. Talked my ears raw."
"No preamble this evening? I can appreciate that," Rashan said. He lifted a high-backed chair, toted it across the room to face Axterion's foot bath, and sat down. "You answered at least one of the questions I came here for. I had heard Brannis spent much of the day here, but I knew not why. He took you into his confidence, then?"
"Confidence? Confidence would have been if he had taken my advice over that bloated son of mine. I think I'm more of a last resort. You're too busy to while away the day yammering over a bowl or two of strawberries with him. Me? I'm slow-moving and got nothing better to do with my days. Worst yet, he knows it," Axterion complained. He blew a long jet of smoke from his nostrils.
"Well, nice as it is to know that Brannis has someone to confide in, I came about another matter," Rashan said. "How much do you remember about the end of the Third Necromancer War?"
"Why does ever
yone always assume I don't remember anything? After my fifth or sixth springtime I have a fair recollection of my life, you know." Axterion gave the warlock his best "crotchety face" and dared him to question his memory again.
"Well, fine then. You oversaw the destruction of Loramar's strongholds, did you not? You made sure that all traces of his necromantic work were piled up and burned?"
"Between you, me, and the walls? Nah," Axterion replied. He winked at Rashan, teasing him before revealing his reasoning. It was going to be entertaining working for Brannis if folks started visiting more often. "I had to burn most of it, for appearance's sake of course. But I was a right bastard in those days, and I had a glut of 'mean' in my blood. Wasn't feeling too generous toward those dome-dwelling death puppeteers. I took a good look through Loramar's notes and research, and torched the best bits of it. I left the rest though, enough to get someone in a heap of trouble if they tried it with all the precautions, remedies, and work-arounds gone to cinders."
"Do you think it possible that someone is reconstructing Loramar's work from those leftovers?" Rashan asked.
"No, entirely impossible," Axterion quipped. "Can't see how anyone could have read a bunch of books, done what it says inside them, then replicated the results." He shook his head.
"Why might it have taken this long for someone to uncover the secrets? Have you heard reports of a major necromancer emerging while I was away and covered it up?" Rashan asked. Axterion sneered, annoyed that the demon had ignored his sarcasm.
"Well, if you must know, I gathered everything up in a single crypt: books, papers, trinkets and gewgaws. Then I put a ward up on the door. I'd looked at enough of Loramar's works by then to be able to do a fair imitation of his runecarving. It was sloppy for someone with his reputation, so I embellished a bit with some proper Kadrin forms; made it good and strong too, built it to last. I modeled it after the one from your own chamber door. Didn't want any stray washerwoman, rat-catcher or second assistant arse-wipe apprentice getting delusions. I wanted to snare some real potential madman, do a bit of good by my little trap."