Upland Outlaws

by Dave Duncan

  Even Shandie roused from his reverie to look interested. Acopulo and Sagorn exchanged glances.

  “Promote a votary?” the jotunn suggested, but his craggy face showed that he expected to be corrected.

  “Sometimes,” the king admitted. “But it’s not a popular solution, as you can guess-wardens tend to look down on sorcerers who get trapped that way. And sometimes there is no vacancy to fill, as when Zinixo overthrew Ag-an. Usually the remaining three issue a proclamation; they call for volunteers. Then the in-fighting starts! It’s quite simple. In mundane terms, if you want to spread news you slip a groat to the town crier, right? And he shouts the word all around. Same principle. “

  He frowned, rubbed his forehead, and took a drink.

  “You mean you could just, er, shout?” Shandie said disbelievingly. “And all the sorcerers in the world would hear you?”

  “I’m not strong enough. Three wardens together can cover all of Pandemia. Raspnex alone might do most of it, at least as far as the stronger listeners were concerned.”

  Everyone looked to the dwarf, who pulled a truly gruesome dwarvish scowl. “And the Covin would be on me like a cat on a rat. “

  “Ah! ” Shandie nodded sadly. Of course there had to be a catch.

  The sailor wench spoke up from her comer. “If he had some other sorcerers to protect him, he could probably survive long enough to pass the message.”

  Raspnex turned his big head to glower at her. “If you can’t make sense, stay silent. Suicide is an offense to the Gods! I don’t plan to try it and I certainly wouldn’t ask you to.”

  The big woman flinched at the reprimand and looked away. The warlock was not being very consistent. The previous night he had sacrificed several votaries in making his escape. No one seemed inclined to comment, though, least of all Ylo.

  Then the faun said, “It would solve all our problems, but I can’t see that a proclamation would work. You might get out a word or two, but the Covin would blast you before you got farther than that. It would need an army to protect you, and an army is what we don’t have. Pity. “

  When the big man spoke like that, there seemed nothing more to say.

  The wind must be rising. The ship was pitching harder, and the creaking noises were growing louder. A vessel with three sorcerers aboard should be safe enough, shouldn’t it? The king of Krasnegar caught Ylo’s eye and raised an empty glass meaningfully. Ylo rose and fetched the bottle. To his surprise, it was full. He went unsteadily around the group, refilling goblets, and it was still full when he laid it down. He wondered if he could ask for it, to keep as a souvenir.

  Shandie stirred, preparing for business. “I like your new protocol, Rap. I like it a lot.”

  “Yours, sire.”

  “No, yours. Even if we did not have Zinixo to worry about, it would be an improvement on the old one. If I could ascend my throne tonight, I should summon the wardens and urge them to adopt it. It would make a better world!”

  The faun smiled bashfully. “Yes, I think it would. As the countess pointed out, sorcery could become a force for good.”

  “The key to it is the ban on votarism, of course,” Shandie said. “Do you suppose such a reform has been suggested in the past?”

  “And rejected?”

  “Yes.”

  “Probably.” Rap chuckled. “Then if we can pull this off, Zinixo will have done us all a favor!”

  Everyone was carefully ignoring Raspnex.

  “Good frequently comes from evil,” Acopulo remarked primly.

  “I know Olybino fairly well,” Shandie said, “as much as a mundane can ever know a warlock. He would not willingly give up his occult minions, I am sure. Under your new order, he would soon be demoted by a stronger sorcerer. “

  “That’s better than what Zinixo might do to him. “

  The imperor murmured agreement. “But the new protocol will do no good unless the sorcerous can learn of it, and I know of no sorcerers except yourself and the wardens. “

  The faun sipped his wine thoughtfully. “The wardens are important. They have votaries to form the basis of an army, but we also need their authority and support. We have your signature on the new protocol, and Raspnex’s. We must try to collect the other three also. They will give us authority, and credibility. Lord Umpily will get word to Lith’rian if anyone can. Your Omnipotence, have you any idea at all where Olybino has gone?”

  The dwarf grunted and shook his head. “Not a clue. He may well be dead.”

  “Why do you say that?” Sagom demanded. The old scholar had chosen a high, hard chair, which stressed his height. He had been following the conversation intently. With beak nose and scraggy neck, he resembled a hungry vulture looking down on a battle far below.

  “Because he’s a very old man,” Raspnex said. “It’s sorcery lets sorcerers live so long. “

  “Ah! And now he does not dare use his power lest he give himself away?” The jotunn beamed fiercely and turned to the faun. “There is an advantage you overlooked, lad! The Covin is a threat to free sorcerers in a way we had not thought of ! “

  The faun nodded, but with a quiet smile that hinted he had already seen the possibility. “And what of Witch Grunth?” The warlock shrugged his big shoulders. “She probably went back to the Mosweeps.”

  King Rap sighed. “So one of us will have to go there. “

  No one made any encouraging noises. Ylo drained his goblet. If anyone tried to volunteer him for such a mission, he would desert at once-defection beyond the call of duty! Of course a troll would go to the Mosweeps to hide. Trolls were not exactly inconspicuous people. But to find anyone in that soggy, impenetrable jungle would be impossible, and trolls were the most solitary of races, with no social organization at all.

  “There is another reason to look for sorcery in South Pithmot,” Acopulo said, smirking as he did when he thought he was being clever. “Someone has been freeing slaves there.”

  “Slaves?” The faun raised an eyebrow. “In the Impire?” Shandie grimaced. “Not officially. My great-grandmother abolished slavery a hundred years ago, but the army has been flouting the law. It’s common knowledge that the army trades in trolls. That was going to be one of the first things I looked into … will look into. But for the last year or two, these so-called penal workers have been escaping with surprising frequency. Legionaries trying to track them down have been blocked. Someone has been using illicit sorcery in the Mosweeps.”

  “Grunth?” The king looked to the dwarf.

  “Naw.” The little man pulled the gruesome expression he used as a smile, and scratched at his beard again noisily. “She denied it. Said it was nothing to do with her, but it was in her quadrant and she wouldn’t let Olybino interfere.”

  “Why didn’t he complain to the Four?” Shandie demanded. “He did.”

  “Grandsire told me he hadn’t heard from the Four in a couple of years … How did the vote go?”

  “Well, Grunth voted against him, of course, and so did Yellowlegs. So he lost.” The dwarf’s pebbly eyes twinkled. There was a pause. Shandie smiled. Then Sagorn. The others were catching on, one after the other …

  The only politics Ylo knew was what he had picked up as a child from listening to his father, plus some tips he had gained from Shandie. Everyone else in the room was grinning by the time he worked it out. A dwarf would never willingly side with an elf, so when Lith’rian supported Grunth, Raspnex had just abstained. If he’d voted against them, the Four would have been evenly divided and the decision would have gone to the imperor. Had Emshandar still been capable of understanding, he would inevitably have supported the army. So Raspnex had let Grunth have her victory without actually backing the same side as the elf-typical occult politics.

  “Well, that settles it,” King Rap said. “One of us must go to the Mosweeps. And probably go on to the Nogid Archipelago, too. “

  Shandie looked disbelieving. “Why there?”

  “Because the source of-” The faun winced and shook
his head. “Can’t say. Because the Impire has never managed to subdue the anthropophagi. It hurts sorcerers to talk about sorcery, did you know that? Just take my word for it, the Nogids are a very likely place to find sorcerers.”

  “You’ll get yourself eaten.”

  “I’ll try not to. Which reminds me … is anyone ready for dinner, or shall we have some more of that rotgut wine?” Ylo took the hint, and went to fetch the ever-lasting flagon and refill the goblets. He was a little more unsteady than the ship’s rolling justified. It was potent stuff.

  “So we try to track down Grunth,” Shandie said. “You must have some more ideas than that?”

  “The answer lies outside the Impire, I think,” Rap said. “It will be very hard for us to do much here without giving ourselves away. We shall have to start with the mundane authorities, you see, and ask them to spread the news. I can’t think of any alternative. That means the outlying races.”

  Shandie laughed. “Nordland, for example?”

  “Very much Nordland! Remember Kalkor?”

  “Not well. I was only a kid, and in bad shape the day you killed him. You know that. But you mean you’re serious-“

  “Kalkor liked to make out that he was only a humble raider, but he was a sorcerer. Yes, I’m serious! Words are assets and can be looted like other valuables-one at a time, of course. I’d bet there’s barrels of sorcery rolling around Nordland.”

  “You think the thanes know of it?”

  The half jotunn king smiled his faunish smile. “They will deny it vehemently! Sorcery is sissy stuff ! Sailors hate it. Nonetheless, I ‘spect your average thane has a fair idea who within his domain has occult powers. That’s not important, though. All we need ask is that they spread the news. We’re not secret slave-hunters like the Covin. We’re publicly calling for volunteers, and there we have a huge advantage over Zinixo. “

  “We’ll need it.” Obviously Shandie was not enthusiastic about Nordland. “I’d sooner argue with a pack of polar bears than a group of thanes. “

  “Certainly. Anyone would. But for centuries the jotnar have enjoyed immunity to magic because of the Protocol. They won’t like the idea that Zinixo may now decide to enthrall them.”

  “Could be an improvement. Will he?”

  “If they annoy him, yes. He won’t feel safe until he rules the world. Not even then, of course, but that won’t stop him. Certainly we must get word to the thanes.”

  Shandie frowned. “Jotnar? How about goblins?”

  “Goblins. Djinns. Trolls.”

  The frown became icy. “You make me feel like I’m rallying the outlanders against my own Impire!”

  As if abashed, the faun ran fingers through his shaggy hair. “Sorry, but in a sense you have to. Zinixo holds the Impire now. “

  Acopulo coughed. He was wearing his most priestly expression, Ylo noted. If Sagorn was a vulture reading the menu, the little man was a sparrow hopping around a stable yard in total disregard of the great hooves all around.

  “Krasnegar, sire? The preflecting pool told you to go to Krasnegar. Wherever the rest of us go, that must be your destination. “

  Shandie looked to the faun, who had not moved from his sprawled position, but who suddenly seemed larger, and very threatening. For the first time Ylo saw the jotunn in him.

  “The harbor will be frozen for half a year yet,” the imperor said. “I can’t hope to sneak across the whole width of the taiga without the goblins seeing me. Correct, Rap?”

  “Correct! “

  “So, Acopulo, how do I get to Krasnegar in midwinter?” The scholar shrugged his narrow shoulders. “Perhaps you don’t, but you should strive to think on a larger time scale. This struggle may well go on for years! The War of the Five Warlocks lasted a generation.” He shot a sly glance at the faun. “The king got out. Can’t an imperor get in?”

  King Rap thumped a fist on the arm of his chair. “The pool did not direct you to Krasnegar. It didn’t show you being there. It showed you my son. He’s your only, single reason for wanting to go to Krasnegar.”

  The imperor nodded. “That’s how I understand it. “

  “Name of Evil! He’s only just turned fourteen! Today’s his birthday. “

  “My daughter has only just turned two.”

  The two monarchs glared at each other. Perhaps they both knew that tragedy was inevitable. As soon as the preflecting pool had shown the boy’s face to the future imperor, the king’s son had been branded a participant.

  “He won’t stay fourteen for long,” Shandie said harshly. “The Impire takes the big ones at sixteen. I’ve sent beardless boys into battle often enough and watched them become heroes, at least in their own eyes. “

  “And seen them die?”

  “Die like men, kill like men. Physically, Rap, there’s very little you can do that that son of yours can’t. Judgment and experience, yes, you’re his master there and always will be. In some things he’s yours already. “

  Fauns were notoriously stubborn. This one was no longer the bantering humorist who had played jokes with magic wine bottles. He looked implacable and dangerous. “You stay away from my son!”

  Shandie tried again. “This is Gath’s world we’re fighting for. Wars eat young men and die of starvation when they’ve eaten up all the young men. Gods save me, Rap, I didn’t choose your son! I didn’t choose this war! I didn’t even choose you. Now, do I have your consent to go to Krasnegar and talk with him?”

  “Talk? What in the Name of Evil would the two of you have to talk about?”

  “What else would I do? Do you think I can take him by force? Will Inos sell him to me? I can’t imagine why he is important-“

  “Perhaps he isn’t!” Acopulo said. “Never jump to unwarranted conclusions! The pool showed me Doctor Sagorn but the result was that we met King Rap and the warlock. Sagorn was a sort of signpost. The boy may just be another.”

  Mm! Sometimes the old relic came up with intriguing ideas. Ylo’s improbable vision of Eshiala might have also been a diversion-except that the only real change it had produced in his life was to keep him away from Rivermead. Surely nothing that might have occurred there could be worse than what he had landed in now.

  The imperor had never taken his eyes off Rap. “I promise that I will not lie to him, nor to your wife. What else can I swear? That I will abide by her wishes, not his? I can guess what a fourteen-year-old’s will be. “

  The king sat up straight, as if about to launch a physical attack. His face held all the menace of a naked blade. “You will not go to Krasnegar! Don’t you see the risk? I told Tiffy my name. Zinixo must know by now that I was in Hub that night. Warlock-does he know my power is not what it was when I thrashed him?”

  Raspnex uttered a low, rumbling laugh. “He didn’t before, or he’d have settled with you long since, I think. He may know now, but he won’t ever rely on it. He sees tricks in blue sky. I’m sure he died a million times from sheer terror when he found you’d emerged from your lair at last, and on the very night he made his move. “

  “So the Covin must be hunting me just as hard as it’s hunting Shandie? “

  “Likely.”

  “And if Zinixo ever gets a hint of my whereabouts, he’ll blast me with everything he’s got, just to be on the safe side?” The king scowled all around, to see if anyone disagreed with the logic. “And he will have set a watch on Krasnegar!”

  Remembering the legends of the Dark Times and the Dragon Wars, Ylo realized the cause of the faun’s anger-he dared not go home now, lest the whole town be blasted to cinders, as had happened to cities in those days. At Lutant the harbor had boiled.

  “Surely the watchers will be looking for yourself, not his Majesty?” Acopulo muttered with none of his usual smug confidence.

  “How do you know he hasn’t smashed Krasnegar already?” Sagorn inquired waspishly. “Spite would be in character.”

  “I don’t, of course,” Rap said.

  “Naw. ” Raspnex scratched his wiry
beard audibly. “He wouldn’t take the risk just in case Rap’s still a demigod, just in case it’s a trap. He’ll make sure of Rap first. Then he’ll go after his family.”

  “Then I should go and warn them of their danger,” Shandie said quietly.

  The king opened his mouth, but the warlock spoke first. “Say, that’s a good idea! And you going to Krasnegar is so evilishly improbable that it could well foul up whatever sorcery my nephew’s setting up. “

  Now it was the dwarf’s turn to endure the faun’s deadly glare. Eventually the king climbed to his feet. “Let’s eat,” he said.

  6

  All through the meal, Sagorn and Acopulo discussed elvish philosophy. Possibly they were being tactful. Perhaps they were baiting the dwarf. More likely they were just showing off, unwinding logic as snarled as kittens in a string bag.

  Ylo did not listen to a word of it. Instead, he thought about Krasnegar. From the look of the place in Jalon’s painting, it would never be worth the trouble to visit it. The journey would be hard and dangerous. It would take months-time that could be much better spent in other pursuits. If Shandie dragged his signifer off on such a fruitless expedition, he was going to finish it alone. Ylo would double back to Yewdark.

  He might, he decided, go along as far as Rivermead, just out of curiosity. There could be no harm in that. He had not seen the ancestral home since he was a child, but after one quick look he would desert and head back to Eshiala. And then … rich widow?

  The chicken dumplings were superb. So was the blueberry pie that followed, and the wine flagon dispensed an exquisite elvish liqueur to wind up the meal. The deckhouse rolled remorselessly from side to side, yet his meal stayed where it was supposed to. Marvelous stuff, sorcery.

  Warm, sleepy, and replete, Ylo returned to his comfortable chair to watch the council of war resume.

  The Krasnegar Question, Round Two: Fauns and dwarves were the two most stubborn races in Pandemia. Which would yield?

  It was Acopulo who set the discussion going again. “Does your son possess any occult powers, sire?”