by Lyndon Hardy
The door swung open and Alodar saw two figures clashing long staves against one another in the large courtyard. Vine-covered walls ran around the periphery, meeting either side of a two-story structure at the far end. Large wooden racks of precisely hung clubs, swords, and maces hid all but one small doorway, and the windows above were crowded by cabinets of daggers, crossed halberts, and double-headed axeblades secured to the wall. Circles and squares of dusty chalk divided the hard clay ground into the pattern of an often-patched quilt, and in the arena nearest the building the two men struggled. Alodar’s irritation over the servant’s manner vanished as he advanced to meet them with a rapid stride.
“No, no, no,” the taller of the two growled. “If he thrusts with both hands equally extended, push your staff perpendicular to it. If you do not, he will slide around your guard and drive home like this.” With these words he dropped his left hand from his stick and, swinging with his right, soundly thumped it against the ribcage of his opponent. The second man yelped with surprise and tripped to the ground in a tangle of arms and legs.
“Enough for today, Dartilon.” The victor dismissed the other with a flourish. He smoothed back into place short, silvery hair and twirled the end of his waxed moustache into sharpness. His eyes were an unblinking steel blue and his cheeks axeblade flat about lips drawn into a firm thin line. The skin on his bare arms and legs showed the crisscross of many scars and blotches of age but stretched tight like a drumhead across his thickboned frame.
The fallen man scurried away into the house at the courtyard’s end, rubbing his side, and Alodar seized the opportunity to speak. “Warmaster Cedric, have you room on your calendar for yet another? I cannot pay as well as some, but I will be an attentive pupil and learn well what you may teach.”
“My fee is a gold brandel per lesson,” Cedric rasped. “Does your eagerness extend that far?”
“A gold brandel, no,” Alodar said. “At least not at once. Not until I receive return on my formula.”
“Alchemy,” Cedric snorted. “Hardly a stable undertaking on which to depend. I have a cousin, Saxton, who practices the craft in some little shed out on Honeysuckle Street. He toils alone from sun to sun and all of his hard labor keeps him no more than days away from beggary. I prefer to instruct one whose purse always jingles, regardless of the luck of each morning’s brew.”
“It is from Saxton, in fact, that I come,” Alodar said. “And surely you had rather someone asking to learn than some lord’s son sent because it is the fashion?”
“I take the rich men’s gold because they thrust it upon me. If they wish me to ride on past laurels instead of upon the horse of the commander, then it is only just that I do so. Time with you only deprives me of coin for my purse. Be gone with your ideals so we can both spend our time more profitably.”
“I come on no idle whim, warmaster Cedric,” Alodar persisted. “I am determined to learn the craft of fighting and seek to learn it from him who teaches best.”
“Determination, my scars.” Cedric waved aside Alodar’s words. “Determination until you feel the first true stab of pain and realize that it is not some glorious game for the sagas.”
With these words, Cedric suddenly lashed out with his staff and knocked Alodar’s feet from under him. Alodar’s eyes blazed, but he understood the intent and choked down his cry of protest. He slowly rose, rubbing his shin. Through clenched teeth he said, “Such a blow I can stand, warmaster.”
“Indeed so,” mocked Cedric and he flicked out and tripped Alodar to the ground once more. Alodar grimaced from the shock to flesh already growing sore, but scrambled upright, reaching out wildly for the end of the stick which now quivered tantalizingly in front of his face. As he extended his arms, it whizzed through the air with lightning swiftness and pounded his stomach with three quick thrusts. Alodar involuntarily doubled up, grasping his hands to his middle, helpless to ward off a series of blows which now rained down upon his unprotected head.
In an instant the barrage stopped, and he huddled, licking blood, ears ringing, barely able to understand Cedric’s words.
“What now of that determination, lad? Do you still want to be the mighty warrior?”
Alodar struggled to his feet a third time, still clutching his stomach and squinting to see through eyes beginning to puff shut. “If this is the way you instruct, let me have the other staff and continue,” he spat out. “By the laws, yes, I am determined.”
Cedric lowered his weapon and intently studied the figure Alodar cut before him. “Yes, let us test it fairly,” he said as he scooped up the second staff and tossed it in Alodar’s direction.
As Alodar reached for it, the master’s stick sprang to life, whirling, thrusting and pushing with lightning speed. Alodar, numbed as he was, could only imitate a stance he had practiced as a boy and thrust his staff horizontally forward. Cedric whipped his erect and cracked Alodar upon the top of the head and then each shin, Alodar shifted his stick vertically to ward off the blows, and Cedric replied with lunges to both sides, methodically hitting shoulders, arms, thighs, and calves. In desperation, Alodar released his left hand and swung his staff in a slow arc towards Cedric’s dancing body. Cedric smiled and cracked Alodar’s knuckles. The stick dropped once more to the ground.
Now defenseless, the barrage increased in intensity and Alodar huddled, hands over his head in helplessness. As the shower of pain continued, Alodar curled up smaller still, saying not a word but tightening his lips as each blow again hit his swollen knuckles and the puffing welts forming on his back. Finally Cedric tired of the sport and stopped the pummeling. “And the determination, now?” he taunted.
“As before,” Alodar croaked, struggling to rise on quivering legs. “Let us go at it again.”
Cedric dropped his staff and stood a long time in silence. At last he said, “You are either addlepated or burn with desire, my lad. What indeed pushes you so?”
Alodar managed to pull himself erect and return the older man’s stare. “I wish to prove myself worthy,” he said. “Lord Feston spoke highly of the value of your teaching and his reputation at arms is great.”
“Sweetbalm for reputations. More come from circumstances than from merit. Ambrosia is babbling even now about how this Feston, one of my former lordlings, bettered fifteen men on the walls of Iron Fist. Fifteen men surely all like yourself. Yanked from some town or field, dressed in leather and told that they were now warriors. Why, with any training at all, one could hack away among the likes until his arm grew tired, with no threat upon his own person. But true skill in arms is not measured by such petty reputation. It is by trial in which yours is not the only sword that bites deep. And such skill is achieved at no little cost. Can what you seek be worth the agony of this morning and the days to follow?”
“Yes,” Alodar answered simply, holding fists tight against his sides, determined not to collapse until the interview was over.
“Valdo, tend his wounds with sweetbalm.” Cedric turned suddenly and beckoned to the servant still at the gate. “And fit him sparring gear for the morrow.”
“Sparring gear?” Alodar asked. “For tomorrow?”
“Yes,” Cedric said. “My pupils need practice against the lesser skilled order to build confidence and polish their technique. They would never dream of testing themselves against one another, and you can serve their needs admirably. And if you watch while I instruct, you may learn enough to fend against them. Can your determination take day after full day of that?”
“It can,” Alodar said. “It will have to.”
Cedric gave Alodar one last look. “A hero and a fool,” he muttered and walked out of the courtyard.
CHAPTER SIX
Luck of the Potionmakers
ALODAR pushed the cork into the last flask and sat down on the small stool beside the workbench. He shook his head to clear the numbness and looked through fatigued eyes at the two rows of transparent liquid that barely covered the bottoms of their containers. Only sixty-three, h
e thought, sixty-three small flasks to represent the results of over five months of labor.
Saxton placed a fleshy palm on Alodar’s shoulder and rose on his tiptoes in a back arching stretch. “Well done, my lad,” he yawned. “You have been an apt pupil and we have accomplished much. Four steps completed and six more to try. If all the rest go right half of the time, then we have about three chances in four of producing the ointment. And with fewer repetitions to run at each stage, we will progress all the more swiftly.”
“From such speed we can well benefit,” Alodar said. “The monotony of repetition bothers me less than the time remaining before we must make good the loan from Basil.”
“There is an additional matter for concern,” Saxton said. “I have traded what useful stock I could for ingredients to get this far but can continue in the same manner no longer. The sixth step requires peat tar dug in darkness and Basil virtually monopolizes the entire supply. Either we deal with him or attempt instead to use a substitute.”
“I would rather not give him further claim upon our futures when we have come this far on our own,” Alodar said.
“Nor would I,” Saxton replied. “I have escaped the snare in which he has entrapped others by bartering but modestly and then only when I had no other choice.”
He stopped and ran his hand over his head, his eyes frowning in thought. “And by the laws,” he said, “we may as well try. There is more danger if we substitute in a formula this potent, but if we do not, we increase our risk as well. Let us look in the almanac and see what signatures must be provided.”
Saxton reached up on the shelf and pulled down one of a matched set of volumes placed in a neat line amid his jumble of assorted grimoires.
“Yes, peat tar, here it is,” he said. “‘Thick, sticky black liquid with pungent odor.’ Well, the thickness and stickiness are well enough understood. Almost all of the more complex formulas that have many diverse ingredients need some substance to bind them together. The other properties are a little more ambiguous, depending upon the final objective. For transfigurations, black provides the animal’s coat, for invisibility, the quenching of light, and so on. Ah, this is the entry. For heat-shielding, black gives the dissipativeness of empty space. Let us see, for the pungent odor there are likewise many interpretations but they all seem to deal with repulsion. In our case, yes, here it is. For shielding ointments, the odor repels heat.”
Saxton slammed the book shut and replaced it on the shelf. He closed his eyes, folded his arms across his chest and rocked back and forth on his heels.
“Sap from the maple tree,” he said at last. “I have some here. And if somehow we could use the powder of distaste with it, the signature should be close enough to work.”
“You have the powder as well,” Alodar said. “I came across it while looking for more of the syrup of narcissus.”
“But as you said, we can ill afford the labor,” Saxton replied. “The powder binds but poorly with any other substance. It would float on the surface of the maple sap like oil on water. We would have to force each gram into the liquid one at a time and hold it there until it was soaked through and would stay. And for each of our flasks we need hundreds of grains. Your task with the spider eyes was a small effort by comparison.”
“Does the soaking require an activation,” Alodar said, “or merely the effort to bring it about?”
“There would be no alchemy in the preparation,” Saxton said. “That would follow when we had the peat tar substitute ready for use.”
“Then I have the solution,” Alodar said excitedly. “What you describe is but a perfect application of thaumaturgy. We can hold one grain in a bead of sap and, with a simple spellbinding, the others will follow.”
Saxton wrinkled his nose and frowned. “I have no need for another craft,” he said, “and certainly not for another craftsman. Besides no thaumaturge would accept an invitation to my shop even if I were to extend one.”
“I can do what has to be done,” Alodar said. “Let us pour out the sap and I will show you.”
Saxton looked at Alodar a long time, then shrugged his shoulders and pointed to one of the shelves. Alodar slid off the stool and retrieved a glazed jug with a stopper crusted with mold and hardened streams of sap running down the sides like candlewax about a bottle. He decanted a generous amount into a large shallow pan and, sucking on a glass tube, extracted a droplet to place in a vial nearby. He found the powder of distaste and grabbed a pinch between thumb and forefinger. Like a cook spicing a stew, he sprinkled the dark black powder over the open dish. Then, with a pair of tongs, he extracted a final grain from the small square tin.
He looked at the anthanor flame burning nearby and spoke the words he had not used for the long months he had labored at his new craft. Then, with a sudden motion, he plunged the tongs into the vial and turned to watch the surface of the pan. The powder disappeared from view, sinking into the darkness of the sap and leaving sluggish ripples in its wake.
Saxton crept closer, his squinting frown replaced by eyes wide with curiosity. He looked at the uncluttered surface of the liquid in the pan and then to the tongs in the vial. “The quarter part of an hour should be enough,” he said quietly as he studied the mixture.
Some time later, Alodar released the connection and pulled the empty forceps from the small vial. The grains of powder remained where they were, floating in suspension. “We are ready with the substitute peat tar,” he said with a smile.
Saxton grunted at Alodar’s success and motioned him aside. He picked up the first of the stoppered flasks and carried it across the room to a ring above a small smoking flame. The soot immediately began to blacken the bottom of the glassware and send wisps of carbon up the sides. Saxton removed the cork and added to the clear solution some of the impregnated sap, using a large bulbed pipette. Then as he watched the liquid simmer, he began to copy a parchment scrap onto clean paper.
“By the signatures, why must the good formulas all be such a bother?” he wondered. “Ten steps in this one, each with no more than an even chance of proceeding correctly. Ten steps, by the laws. One thousand setups for the first, so we get about five hundred successes. Five hundred successes so we can have step two go right in about two hundred and fifty. Here we are at the fifth and must try it no less than the full sixty-three times just so we have two chances of having the final activation succeed. Were the stakes not so high, I would be tempted to make one lot and be done with it. Would that these formulas could be multiplied as are those of a cook without a corresponding decrease in their potency.”
Before Alodar could reply, Saxton had completed all but the final symbol and raised his pen-hand high. All was ready, and Alodar tensed as the quill descended to the paper.
The room suddenly exploded in light, and Alodar’s eyes pulsed with pain. He blinked once and then twice more. All was strangely dark except for a dull glow in the direction of the flask, which remained even when his lids were closed. Saxton lurched against him, and both fell to the floor in a crash of splintering boxes and the tinkle of broken glass.
“Hellfire,” Saxton coughed. “We have to get out.”
Alodar opened his mouth to reply but quickly shut it again, gagging on a thick, stinging vapor which burned the linings of his throat. He raised one hand to cover his nose and felt a trickle of fresh blood on his palm. He stood upright, crunching glass, and flailed blindly with his free hand until he found Saxton’s arm. The doorway should be behind them. As he pulled the alchemist to his feet, he began to grope towards the exit.
More glass clattered as they staggered together, stumbling against the gear scattered about the floor. Alodar banged his shins against a heavy iron bar across their path and fell to his knees. He rose and limped forward, free hand in front reaching for a familiar object. He took three more steps and then stopped, feeling the blank wall that separated the workroom from the front of the shop. He reached back, placed Saxton’s hand on his shoulder, and began inching to the doorway on
the right. His lips started to quiver behind his guarding hand and he fought to hold back the growing demand for air.
Each cautious blind step seemed to be his last, but he pushed on for another until he felt the jamb of the door. He could hold breath no longer and bolted into the front room, ricocheting into the walkway beside the counter. Saxton scurried behind, and together they crashed forward, ripping the latch from its guide, and out into the street.
Alodar stumbled for the last time and sprawled on the sidewalk planking. He took a tentative breath; although it was tainted with the smell from the workroom, it filled his lungs with air. He rolled over and looked at the sky. The dull glow was still there, but fainter now, and the dim outline of the moon began to form beside it. He turned to his side and deduced that the mass beside him must be Saxton, panting rapidly, but alive as well.
“Cut short your stay at Cedric’s tomorrow,” the alchemist rasped. “We will journey to the apothecary and barter for what we need. So Basil has all the supply of peat tar. It is well worth whatever price.”
Alodar ducked behind his shield and the padded club whizzed over his head. Unarmed grappling, staves, broadsword and shield, and now the mace, he thought. The months of monotonous execution of the first steps of the formula had given him time to observe Cedric well. Well enough that Alodar was beginning to be a true match for Dartilon and the others like him.
His opponent staggered as he halted the rush of his missed blow, and Alodar seized the opportunity to strike. He thrust his shield diagonally across his body, blocking Dartilon’s arm at the top of its backswing. Reaching out with his own mace, he swung it in a wide arc, catching the young lord squarely on the back of his unprotected head. Dartilon sagged to the ground, momentarily dazed by the blow.
“Enough,” he said weakly. “I am tired from the festivities at my father’s manor last night. Enough for today. When I am fully awake and fresh, we shall see who can better handle the club.”