Bookworm

by Christopher Nuttall

  She shrugged. “I just kept putting it off,” she said. But the orphanage tutors had never taken the homeless children on field trips. They’d been more concerned with teaching the skills that would make the orphans capable of holding basic jobs. The only part of her pre-Peerless School schooling she remembered with any enthusiasm had been the tutor who’d taught her to read. “Thank you for coming with me.”

  Bee smiled, holding her hand. It was funny how comforting she found that gesture, even though she knew that he could do nothing to help her once the new Grand Sorcerer was enthroned and made a decision about her future. At least Lady Light Spinner owed her some gratitude. Kane didn’t know her and Administrator Mentor knew her as a girl who had been sent to him for punishment, if he remembered her at all. But then, Lady Light Spinner knew – already – that Elaine knew secrets that should never be spoken out loud. That alone comprised a good reason to kill her.

  “You’re welcome,” Bee said, looking over at one of the cabinets. “Do you think that that is actually the sword of the Witch-King?”

  Elaine followed his gaze. The greatest of heroes – and villains – carried swords that were far more than just swords. Some had carried an entrapped demon within their metal, turning them into unstoppable weapons, while others were infused with magic that gave them a certain kind of intelligence. The sword in front of them certainly looked impressive – it was dark, so dark that it gave the impression of absorbing all light into its darkness – but she knew better than to assume that it was real. An artefact created by the Witch-King would be targeted by every would-be dark sorcerer with delusions of grandeur. If the Grand Sorcerer hadn’t been able to destroy it, he would have tossed it into a volcano or sent it spinning through the dimensions to somewhere far beyond the reach of mankind. The dark sword in front of them was nothing more than a duplicate, warded just enough to prevent anyone from discovering its true nature.

  “Perhaps,” she said, finally. Why spoil Bee’s illusions? “Its true name has been lost long ago.”

  Bee shrugged and moved onto the next cabinet, housing potion gourds from a tribe of warriors who had resisted the empire for nearly a hundred years, thanks to potions – brewed by their druids – that gave their men superhuman strength. Eventually, the empire had come to terms with them, after developing counters that neutralised the effects of their magic potion. Two nearby cabinets showed two warriors from the tribe – a short thin man and a tall fat man, both smiling pleasantly at the crowds – in full tribal outfits. Had anyone really shown off half of their chest when fighting? The short one carried a sword, but it didn’t look like he had ever really needed it. Below them, a small black-and-white dog pretended to cock its leg against the side of the cage.

  Bee seemed more interested in mundane artefacts recovered from the era before the First Necromantic War. Elaine smiled as she considered a blackened piece of metal, recognising it – from the knowledge in her head – as a kind of iron dragon. The pre-war empire had been supposed to be a wonderful place, although wonderful was always determined by the people writing the history books. They’d had magic and technology that her own era was just starting to redevelop. And then the undead had risen from the grave and set out to slaughter the entire world. By the time the fighting had finally come to an end, the empire had been devastated...

  And then the Witch-King had come within moments of final victory.

  “They don’t tell us much about the wars in the South,” Bee said, as they studied drawings and paintings of battles between the living breathing humans and the undead hordes. One of the undead was easy to stop – their limbs could be chopped off, or their bodies incinerated by magic – but an entire army was a far tougher proposition. The undead grew smarter as they grew in numbers, yet even without brains four of them could hack a living soldier to death while he was trying to destroy one of their comrades. And a single bite would be fatal to their victim. “We never really believed that they were as horrific as you claim.”

  “Even when the refugees fled to you?” Elaine asked, mildly. “And your own soldiers saw the undead walking out of the water and advancing on your shores?”

  Bee nodded, pointing towards one of the other paintings. The Battle of the Silver Desolation had been the first major battle between the Witch-King’s forces and the Southern Continent, which had largely believed itself isolated from the necromancers and their war. But the Witch-King had known just how vitally important the South had been in the First Necromantic War and he had taken steps to destroy it in the Second War. An army of undead didn’t need to breathe, or to rest, so there was nothing stopping them from marching under water until they reached the South and then walking up onto the beach. The South had suddenly found the war developing a new front located within their territory.

  “All we had were the undead,” Bee reminded her. “They were nasty, true, but the Witch-King never turned the fullness of his wrath on us. The rest of the tales...”

  Elaine nodded. The Battle of the Bottles, where both sides had been forced to unleash demons against the other. Thankfully, even the Witch-King had realised that unleashing demons would eventually destroy the entire world and refrained from unleashing any more until the very last days of the war. It had been too late to save his base from being scorched by the first Grand Sorcerer. And the Battle of the Rift, where a sorcerer had opened a canyon below the ranks of the undead, watched them fall into thin air and then closed the canyon again, crushing them to bloody pulp. It was said that nothing grew on the land tainted by the undead. And the Battle of Long Beach, where a handful of soldiers and a single combat magician had held off the undead just long enough for reinforcements to arrive. They had all died, but they’d saved two whole cities from a fate worse than death.

  Memories that weren’t hers flickered through her head. They hadn’t all been victories, not by a long chalk. The Storming of Helgoland, when the undead had marched up to the walls, building a pile of their bodies large enough to let them climb over and run down into the city, killing everyone inside. And they’d all risen as undead and joined the colossal army. If anyone had survived, no records had been taken of their existence. There was the Sack of Kamet, a small town that happened to be in the path of a demonic army; rumour had it that anyone who visited the remains of the city heard the screams of the damned as they promised their captors everything, if only they would let them go free. And not all of the atrocities had been committed by monsters. One city had been sacked by an army of humans, humans who had been under no magical compulsion at all, and the population had been systematically robbed, raped and killed. It said something about the final years of the war that no one had raised a voice in complaint when the state that had provided the army was wiped out completely by the Grand Sorcerer, without a single child being spared. In a war that had had far too many atrocities committed by all sides, the Sack of Kamet still stood out as a monument to human barbarity. The demons had been demons; the Witch-King had been mad. What excuse was there for humans who turned on their fellows so savagely?

  Bee caught her arm. “Are you all right?”

  “Just tired,” Elaine said. She managed a wink. They hadn’t managed to get much sleep last night and that had mainly been her fault. Not that Bee had been complaining, of course. He’d been a willing participant in their shared pleasure. “Maybe we should move on to the next section.”

  The next chamber paid homage to all the Grand Sorcerers, from the very first one to the man who had died only two weeks ago, leaving a power vacuum in the heart of the Golden City. They hadn’t stated his date of death yet, Elaine noted; they wouldn’t do that until the next Grand Sorcerer was in place, with the city swearing loyalty to him. She couldn’t remember if there had been a reason for the tradition or if it had been someone’s whim that had become tradition when everyone had forgotten why it had been started in the first place.

  She smiled at the thought that they’d tried to cover up his death. Every magician in the world would h
ave felt the Grand Sorcerer die. Maybe it could have been hidden from the rest of the population, but Elaine doubted that it would have lasted more than a few days. Even up to his death, the Grand Sorcerer had been very busy hearing petitions and standing in judgement of magical crimes. A few days absence would have started tongues wagging all over the city.

  “I never understood why you all swear loyalty to the Grand Sorcerer,” Bee said, as they looked at the last painting. The Grand Sorcerer seemed to be scowling disapprovingly at them. He’d never been fond of the perks of power and had been known to sack his assistants for enriching themselves or using their positions to surround themselves with luxury. It had been a policy that had found favour with most of the city, who wanted their taxes spent on important issues rather than enriching politicians. “Why do you swear to serve him?”

  They didn’t, Elaine knew. Few magicians would willingly swear an oath that would place them so firmly under someone’s control. They’d sworn to uphold the system instead, to ensure that the next Grand Sorcerer was chosen properly rather than hundreds of wizards and magicians fighting it out for supremacy. Civil war within the Golden City would have wiped out most of the population and brought the empire crashing down in ruins. It crossed her mind that that might have been what the mad Prince had had in mind, but even that didn’t explain everything about his plan. She wondered briefly if he’d prepared something that would have allowed him to rise from the dead, yet the Inquisitors would have thought to check for that. They might have decided to destroy the body rather than returning it to Ida for burial. No one who bore witness to the battle that had nearly destroyed High Tory would have spoken out against such a decision.

  “Because that’s how the system works,” she said, finally. It wasn’t something she felt comfortable with, even with Bee. The first Grand Sorcerer had devised a structure to prevent his comrades from fighting...and dressed it up neatly to prevent them from rebelling against it. “We don’t question it.”

  She turned...and stopped dead as she saw a hulking figure standing in the doorway. Judd was standing there, his immense form blocking the light. Elaine was astonished to see him – as far as she knew, he was never allowed to leave Lord Howarth’s mansion – and why was Lord Howarth showing any interest in her now? What had changed that he actually knew about?

  “You are summoned to face your Guardian,” Judd said, in his grating voice. “You will accompany me to Howarth Hall.”

  “Now wait a minute,” Bee said, quickly. “We’re on a date...”

  “I have to go,” Elaine said, wearily. She’d never actually formally claimed emancipation from Lord Howarth, if only because he’d shown no interest in trying to actually serve as her Guardian. An oversight, she realised; an oversight that she should have corrected while she had a chance. Lord Howarth might believe that he could push her into working openly for him. “Can you go back to Daria and let her know what happened?”

  Bee stared at her for a long moment, and then nodded. “Good luck,” he said, and gave her a kiss. Elaine returned it, wondering if watching them kissing would irritate Judd. But his expressionless face was still blank when Elaine broke the kiss and stepped up to the butler. Bee looked after her. “Do you want me to come meet you...?”

  “Lord Howarth will summon you when he wishes to meet with you,” Judd informed him. He looked back at Elaine. “You will accompany me now.”

  He spun around and marched out of the building, moving almost like a parody of a soldier. People saw him coming and scattered out of his way, even the ones who couldn’t sense his true nature. Judd seemed like an unstoppable iron dragon as he ploughed through the streets. Elaine followed him, trying to resist the temptation to try to pump him for information. Judd had never been a great conversationalist and much of his conversations to her over the years had been thoroughly unpleasant. No wonder people were scared of him.

  The walk to Howarth Hall took less time than she had expected, but she was panting because of the effort involved in keeping up with Judd. She saw the gates open to admit them as they approached, before closing behind them with an ominous thud. This time, the gardeners had introduced a collection of wild birds from the far islands into the garden, clearly trying to maintain the appearance of wealth and power. She wondered, absently, how long it would be before Lord Howarth ran out of time and had to admit that he was broke?

  She walked through the interior of the house, looking around. One side effect of Duke Gama’s spell had been to enhance her memory, even the parts of her mind that didn’t deal directly with magic. Some of the tacky but expensive artworks and trinkets were gone, suggesting that they had been sold on to produce money for their owner. Others seemed to have been moved to one side, earmarked for disposal. A painting that had been charmed to hold an impression of a long-dead woman’s personality – she had screamed abuse at anyone who came into the house without the proper level of aristocratic blood, including Elaine – had been removed from the wall and placed against it, blocking the woman’s sight. Elaine guessed that she’d seen Lord Howarth selling off the family trinkets one by one and hadn’t been shy about making her opinion known.

  Judd opened the door to Lord Howarth’s study and allowed her to walk inside. Lord Howarth was nowhere to be seen, but as Elaine sat down she realised that a number of the books on the bookshelves had been removed. She felt a brief pang of pity for them – they’d been published in the days before the printing press – before hearing Lord Howarth coming down the other corridor towards her. The door crashed open and Lord Howarth stepped inside.

  He looked ghastly. His clothes were a mess – he’d always prided himself on being a dandy – and his face was blotched with the effects of too much alcohol. Elaine guessed that he hadn’t been able to pay the druids for rejuvenation spells and treatments that would have helped mitigate the worst effects of whatever he was drinking.

  “Lost everything,” he said, as he slumped into a chair. “Will lose the home soon; will lose everything soon. Will have to leave the city and go die out in the countryside. But house there no longer exists...”

  Elaine frowned. He sounded drunk too, she realised. His words were slurring together as he spoke, almost as if he couldn’t quite focus on whatever he was trying to say. If he was broke, if he was running out of things he could sell without tipping off the rest of his creditors, his social standing was about to drop to rock bottom. Elaine felt a flicker of pity, even though he’d ignored her for most of her life. She doubted that that was about to change.

  “Had only one thing left,” Howarth muttered. “Someone came to me; offered to pay my debts. Gave me enough Crowns to go to the club and get lucky on the tables and...”

  He gasped, almost as if he couldn’t speak the words out loud. “Only thing I have left is you,” he said. Elaine realised what he meant in an awful moment, just before she felt strong hands grabbing her neck. How the hell hadn’t she sensed someone behind her? “I sold you. I gave you to someone who wanted you and...”

  Elaine started to struggle, trying to draw on her magic, but there was a brilliant flash of light and she plunged down into darkness.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  “I know you’re awake,” a calm voice said. “You may as well open your eyes and join me for a drink.”

  Elaine cursed inwardly. She’d come back to awareness only ten minutes ago, but she’d kept her eyes closed in the hope of not alerting them to her listening ears. Instead, whoever was in the room had somehow sensed her awakening and waited, patiently, for her to open her eyes. All she’d been able to feel was that she had been placed in a chair and metal bracelets had been wrapped around her hands and ankles, as well as making it harder for her to work magic. Escape would be almost impossible.

  She sighed and opened her eyes, trying to shield them against the light. A man was looking down at her, studying her thoughtfully. She recognised him – and then wondered why she was so surprised. Wizard Kane also wanted to become Grand Sorcerer and Ela
ine was still the quickest way to gaining the knowledge that would make someone the most powerful person in the world. And very little was known of his background....

  Something clicked in her mind as she realised who he resembled. The colouring wasn’t entirely correct, and the eyes certainly weren’t, but the cheek structure was unmistakeable. Kane looked like a younger version of Duke Gama. Elaine had only seen graven images of the Duke, or she would have recognised him earlier. And yet he didn’t look as though he had come from Ida.

  She smiled. “You’re the Duke’s son, aren’t you?” she asked. “His illegitimate son.”

  Kane didn’t bother to try to deny it. “My father seduced a woman who was part of a visiting mission to Ida,” he said, without bitterness. “She got pregnant; her family were furious and threatened to kill her for having a child with a man she hadn’t married. And my father couldn’t marry her because he was already married.” He shrugged. “Not that I blame him for cheating. His legitimate wife is so cold that no one would dare put their manhood inside her, for fear of it freezing solid and then breaking off.”

  He chuckled. “The bitch made my life hell for the first few years,” he added. “It wasn’t until Hilarion came along that she lightened up a little, partly because I got on well with the little Prince. We were close friends for quite some time. Oh, there were times when I felt bitter because any son the bitch had would inherit everything my father owned, but...well, Hilarion was being groomed as the Crown Prince and he hated the protocol lessons. And my father was decent enough to ensure that I got a good education too.”

  Elaine stared at him, trying to reconcile everything she’d learned in Ida with what Kane was telling her. “But I am forgetting my manners,” Kane said. He picked up a cup and passed it to her. “You can move enough to drink, but not enough to get out of the chair.”