by D. P. Prior
UNANSWERED QUESTIONS
The black chamber, the winged staff, the gold-trimmed scarlet robes, the blazing violet eyes—it was all an affectation. Tey was hard-pressed to stop the Witch Woman from laughing out loud at the old man on the throne. She should never have taken that extra potion when the Lakeling summoned her.
[The flames are an illusion,] the Shedim told her, even as she stepped across their boundary.
Well, that wasn’t obvious.
She misstepped with her taloned foot and stumbled into Snaith, who was watching her with barely disguised revulsion on his face. Either that, or it was surprise. He reached out on reflex to steady her, but it was his injured arm, all stiff and purplish, with fingers curled into claws. She flashed him a smile full of teeth, and he looked away. Part of her was glad to see him here, wanted to hug him and cling on tight. But it was a diminishing part, drowning in a riptide of moonshine and powder.
The violet glare ebbed from the Archmage’s eyes. The yellow one looked genuine enough; maybe he’d eaten the wrong kind of mushroom and was in the process of dying a long and painful death. The blind one, though: she wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d done that to himself, just for the sake of appearance. Theurig’s stories had been littered with one-eyed wise men, as if there were some virtue in cataracts.
The Archmage touched a ring, and immediately Tey’s skin started to tingle. Her hair stood on end, but at least it was out of her face. She tried to suppress a giggle. Failed.
[Tread warily,] the Shedim said. [He has real power—Hélum trinkets. Lore stolen from my people.]
“Well, well, well. Slyndon Grun’s usurper,” the Archmage said in a booming voice that resonated around Tey’s skull and convulsed her into fits of laughter. He sounded like a declaiming actor from one of the morality dramas that taught the ordinances of the Weyd. Except he’d barely moved his lips.
The Archmage leaned half out of his chair. “You know who I am, girl?”
Tey sobered in an instant, her mirth razed by murderous anger. She kept her eyes downcast, lest the Archmage read it in her face. Girl! That’s what her father used to call her.
“No answer?” the Archmage said. His tone softened, and whatever power he had unleashed dissipated. Tey’s skin ceased to tingle, and her hair fell in tousles over her face, a curtain that hid her assassin’s eyes.
“What did the Clincherman call you?” the Archmage said. “The Witch of the Valks? Are you a witch?”
[You must speak,] the Shedim urged. [Answer him.]
“Have you nothing to say?” Strained patience tightened the Archmage’s voice, threatened an eruption. “No curse to sling at me?”
Hate turned to promise as Tey lifted her chin from her chest and swept the hair from her face. She let murder melt into doe-eyed passivity that told him she was his to do with as he wished. She wanted him to witness his own baseness reflected in her gaze. Wanted him to know she had seen to the heart of him, a man like any other.
The Archmage surged out of his chair, staff raised to strike her. “Answer me, you insolent—”
Snaith stepped in between them, good hand held out in placation, bad one frozen mid-clutch. Tey could almost see tongues of dark sorcery dancing on the curled-claw fingertips. She blinked and it was gone—the effect of the moonshine, no doubt. Or the flicker cast by the circle of flames.
“Excellency,” Snaith implored, a whine in his voice. “She is touched. Unwell. I don’t think she understands.”
“A simpleton and a murderer? Bah!” the Archmage said. “Slyndon Grun was no fool, and no fool would be able to take him unawares.”
“No, not a fool,” Snaith said. “Damaged. Her father—”
“Don’t!” Tey said. “Don’t you fucking dare!”
Snaith flinched at the ferocity of her outburst. The Archmage took a step back.
Tey tightened her face into a grin. Glaring at Snaith, she raised her hand to her mouth and licked each of her fingertips in turn. Crimson flushed Snaith’s face, and she gave a disparaging laugh.
“Enough,” the Archmage said, voice low and measured. No theatrics this time. No bluster or shouting. Much more effective.
Tey looked at him with newfound respect. He’d surprised her, and that didn’t happen often. The Witch Woman’s virulence gushed back into the pit it had come from, leaving her numb, bereft, not quite knowing who she was now, how she should act.
Nodding in acknowledgement of order restored, the Archmage sat back down in his chair. “Talk or don’t talk,” he said. “It matters not to me.”
He was good. Just that statement alone made Tey want to open up to him, tell him anything he wanted to know. Please him. But now she felt unworthy. She was only too aware of the grime on her skin, the fur coating the inside of her mouth, the rankness of her breath. And her leg: hard and scaled and unnaturally strong… What was she? What must she have looked like? She withdrew her taloned foot beneath the hem of her dress and kept her eyes averted.
“I know about the burial mound,” the Archmage said. “I know about the Hand of Vilchus. What I don’t know is how you found it; how you knew where to dig.”
[Say nothing,] the Shedim warned her.
That was just the prompting she needed. “The Shedim,” she said. “The Shedim told me.”
The Archmage glanced at Snaith, who shrugged.
[Be silent!]
“What makes you think it was the Shedim?” The Archmage’s voice had a gentle quality now. He didn’t believe her. He was humoring her, as if she were a child claiming there were dryads at the bottom of the garden.
She hitched up her dress and put her scaled leg forward.
The Archmage’s throat bulged as he swallowed. Again a glance at Snaith, this time met with a bewildered shake of the head.
“Help me,” the Grave Girl whispered.
The Archmage cupped a hand to his ear and leaned closer. “I’m sorry?”
This time, it was all Tey could do to mouth the words, but no sound came out. Help me. Tears welled at the corners of her eyes. Her stomach clenched with the need to have the Shedim ripped from her. But it was weakness speaking—the Grave Girl’s, not her own. She was too strong for this sort of thing. She was the one in control.
“Who did this to you?” the Archmage said, now a devoted grandfather. “Slyndon Grun? The Clincherman? I knew they were working on some dubious things, but this…”
“The bear attack—” Snaith started.
“Would not cause this,” the Archmage snapped. “Are you an idiot, boy?”
Snaith clamped his jaw shut. Tey didn’t miss the flash of rage in his eyes. He was a killer, her Snaith. Always had been, even if he still didn’t know it.
“The Shedim were banished,” the Archmage said to Tey. “You know this, right? Oh, some of the sorcerers still use their name for scaremongering—Theurig among them—but they no longer walk the surface of Nemus.”
“On the way here,” Snaith said, “Theurig and I spent the night at a ruin. There was a mosaic floor, and outside, a font set within an amphitheater—”
“So?” the Archmage said. “Such ruins litter the wilds of Branikdür. Remnants of the Hélum conquest. They were built atop the sites of pre-existing ancient structures attributed to—”
“—and there were shadows,” Snaith interrupted, as if he were reliving the experience. “Ghosts… some kind of wraiths.”
“—the Wakeful,” the Archmage finished with a frown. “Ghosts, you say? You are a sensitive?”
Now it was Snaith’s turn to frown.
“You see things that others do not? You wouldn’t be the first. The spirits of the Wakeful, the sires of the Shedim. The great evil that breached the wards that surround the world and infected Nemus from within. It has long been said that, after their defeat, their essence seeped into the very bedrock of Branikdür, the heart of their dark empire. It is even said their lingering presence was the real reason the Seven abandoned these shores and returned to Hélum, haunt
ed, terrified, afflicted by infernal dreams.”
[They ran,] the Shedim said to Tey. [Fled the Dark Isle. They should never have stolen from us, never turned our lore against us. The Wakeful—but shadows on the walls—drew substance from this betrayal, from the need to avenge us.]
“You’ve read Cawdor?” the Archmage asked.
Tey shook her head.
The Archmage smirked at Snaith. “You should lend her your copy. But this leg of yours,” he said to Tey, “is something of a mystery. Bear indeed! Now, that’s a point,” he said to Snaith this time. “Show me your arm.”
Snaith started to roll up his sleeve.
“No, no. Shirt off,” the Archmage said. “I want to see all of it.”
Snaith hesitated, then unfastened his cloak and pulled his shirt over his head.
No sign of the vile, and certainly no scales. But the Archmage barely looked at the arm. He was far more interested in the tattoo on Snaith’s chest.
“The Wyvern of Necras. Who… Where… Theurig did this?”
Snaith gave a guarded nod.
“The sly, conniving… And you’re certain he didn’t know about what you found beneath the tumulus?”
“He wasn’t there,” Snaith said. “So, unless he was told…” He looked at Tey, and she glared back at him. “No, Slyndon Grun came to take you. There’s no way Theurig could have known.”
The Archmage rapped his staff on the polished black floor. “So, what is he up to? Currying favor with the Seven? His master Kardish tried that. Ask Theurig where it got him. Did he tell you he visited Hélum as an apprentice? Oh, it was a very long time ago, but these alliances, these intrigues foment over years or even decades, an insidious crawl up the ladder of dominion. The Seven encourage it: Hélum’s is a dog-eat-dog empire. Calzod Murcifer is the same: always up to something I can’t quite put my finger on.” He bit his bottom lip and drew in a labored breath, thinking, agitating. His yellow eye flicked left and right, hunting out betrayal in the shadows. He gave Snaith a considered look, then Tey, fingers clenching and unclenching around his staff. Pressing up close to Snaith, he asked, “Do you know something?”
Snaith mumbled his denial.
The renewed violet glare of the Archmage’s eyes splashed across Snaith’s face. When he spoke this time, it was in a voice of thunder. “Do you?”
“No,” Snaith said. A tic started up on his cheek as he held the Archmage’s gaze unwaveringly.
“Has Theurig spoken with Calzod since your arrival? Did they talk at the Proving?”
Snaith gave a slow shake of his head.
After an age, the Archmage looked away, nodding. He appeared suddenly stooped, bowed by some invisible weight. He turned to face Tey, and again his eyes blazed, but before any words left his lips, the glare died down and he sighed.
“No, you wouldn’t know. Neither of you would. Theurig’s too devious for that.” He gave a low chuckle and drew himself up. Confidence, purpose, control he donned like a seamless garment. “Put on your shirt and cloak,” he told Snaith. “And don’t let on that I know. Whatever Theurig’s game is, we’ll let it play out. As for your leg,” he said to Tey, “it is beyond my ken. Perhaps when the delegation from Hélum arrives, their warlocks will know what it is.”
[And they will kill you,] the Shedim said. [Or worse.]
Tey’s body clenched, and her hands bunched into fists. Death was her companion, but only when she chose it for herself. She winced as her fingernails cut into her palms. She was shaking, and she saw the Archmage acknowledge the fact with a widening of his yellow eye.
Snaith watched her, an inscrutable look on his face. Did he hate her now? Find her disgusting? He’d be right to. She started to reach into her satchel for a potion; withdrew her hand. There was just the one left. What if she needed it later? Sweat broke out on her forehead, rolled into her eyes, stinging.
“Now, before we get back to the cavern and the tedious task of approving all these apprentices,” the Archmage said, “is there anything more you want to tell me? Either of you?”
Again, the kindly voice. Tey wanted so badly to trust him, to tell him how she had gained entry to the burial mound. In response, the Witch Woman came streaming back, and clamped her lips shut as she glared defiance.
“Well,” the Archmage said, “the Hélumites are sending a warlock named Imtep Khopeth to investigate. He is not a man to be trifled with.” He let the words hang in the air then banished the circle of fire with a wave of his hand. “But don’t concern yourselves. I have no intention of sharing your story with him. The Hélumites would assume I knew about the Hand all along and didn’t alert them. There would be consequences. Ignorance is our best defense in this situation. Come now. Let’s get this over with, and then we can go feast.”
A WARRIOR’S ADVANTAGE
“You were in there a long time,” Theurig whispered as Snaith sat down next to him on the rock-carved bench. “Far longer than I was.”
Pressure once more began to build in the air, and invisible insects scuttled across Snaith’s skin. All along the front rows, sorcerers and apprentices ceased their chatter as the Archmage emerged from the tunnel behind the dais and resumed his throne.
Snaith glanced over his shoulder at Tey, who squeezed in between Vrom and the sorcerer Pheklus. The dog was awake now, sitting on its haunches, wagging its stump of a tail and looking at the Clincherman imploringly.
“Well?” Theurig said. “Are you going to tell me how it went?”
“Later.” Snaith turned back to face the front, leaning forward to make it clear he wanted to hear what the Archmage had to say.
Again, the violet eyes and the booming voice. “A delegation is being sent from the city of Hélum.”
At mention of the Empire’s capital, most of the apprentices looked to their masters for an explanation.
They haven’t been told, then. And they haven’t worked it out for themselves.
Branikdür wasn’t the bastion of freedom they’d been led to believe it was. It was a vassal state presided over by puppet rulers. Snaith thought about the High King and the terrible fate that awaited him. And he thought about the warring clans, the squabbling sorcerers all vying for position. The fact that he was numbered among them, the dupes of the Hélum Empire, caused him to chafe. His good hand clenched into a fist, and jolts of pain lanced through the bad, from where he tried to will the fingers to uncurl from their claw.
“They’ve done this sort of thing before,” the Archmage continued, voice still carrying but gentler now, reassuring. “Apprentices, ask your masters to explain it to you, once we are done here. Hélum does not come for war. We are… allies. Knitted together as one. Now, be seated and be calm. Sorcerers of Branikdür, we are all to assemble at Gosynag Bay, twelve days hence, at dawn.”
Grumbles immediately started up among the sorcerers.
“I know,” the Archmage said. “Some of you have further to travel than others. Those from the northern Hebrud or west of the Caerryg Divide will remain here, as my guests. Missives have already been sent to all the clan chiefs. They will meet us at the bay. A decree has gone out across Branikdür: an armistice by command of the High King. No warring until the order is rescinded. The clans must come together: not to repel invaders from Vanndyr this time, but to extend our full welcome to the visitors from Hélum. Each will send ten warriors along with the chief. And of course everyone here will be in attendance.” The emphasis was aimed at Pheklus the Clincherman.
Some of the sorcerers were vigorously shaking their heads.
“This is not up for debate,” the Archmage said. “We must put our best foot forward. The Seven are sending a high-ranking legate. Some of you older sorcerers have no doubt heard of the warlock Imtep Khopeth. He is not a man any of us would want to offend.”
Silence. Nervous glances.
Calzod Murcifer coughed into his fist. “Excellency, are we to be party to what exactly transpired at Malogoi? If Imtep Khopeth is coming, it must be dire indeed. We h
ave a right to know. What is it that has drawn the eyes of the Seven?”
“Discuss it with Theurig,” the Archmage said. “When we’re finished here.”
But Theurig doesn’t know, Snaith wanted to protest. Maybe that was the point: to foster suspicion and rivalry. Has Theurig spoken with Calzod since your arrival? the Archmage had asked. Did they talk at the Proving? For some reason he suspected Theurig and Calzod of conspiring against him. Was he mistaken, paranoid, seeing threats where there were none?
“So, on with the approvals,” the Archmage said amicably, the violet blaze leaving his eyes. “Theurig’s apprentice I have already seen, and I acknowledge the usurpation of Slyndon Grun by the Witch of the Valks.”
Snaith craned his neck to gauge Tey’s reaction, but she was slumped over in her seat, hidden beneath a greasy veil of hair. Vrom nodded proudly. Nauseating little turd. The Clincherman merely reached into his coat pocket and held out something for his dog. It looked like an ear encrusted with dried blood, which made Snaith think of his mother. Every muscle in his body clenched in response.
“He’s approved you already?” Theurig muttered. “But I’m supposed to be present.”
Calzod Murcifer caught Theurig’s eye. Something was communicated between them, and Theurig gritted his teeth.
The approvals themselves were a rather staid affair. One at a time, sorcerers led their apprentices to the Archmage’s throne and a brief conversation transpired, none of which could be heard from the seating. There were nods and smiles, and the apprentices invariably returned to their seats wide-eyed and puffed up with a sense of their own importance. Interestingly, everyone was approved. Even Vrom, who went up at Tey’s bidding. This wasn’t so much a validation of the sorcerers’ choices as it was a show of allegiance.
Finally, when the last apprentice—a red-haired woman with a half-melted face—returned to her seat, the Archmage said, “Before we feast, perhaps the Clincherman would like to tell us when, if ever, he intends to pick a successor. None of us is immortal, Pheklus. Even Theurig Locanter brought an apprentice this year.”