by Ari Marmell
“You don’t know that, Lorum,” the knight said gently. “And if we’d faced them before Rebaine fled, before they were demoralized and disorganized, there’s no telling—”
“And that, too,” the regent interrupted. “Word of Rebaine’s disappearance is only just now spreading through the armies—and I’ve already had two Guild emissaries demanding I return command of their forces. We haven’t even secured the damn city, let alone started to help the people rebuild, but do they care?
“Maybe …” Lorum sighed and looked down at his feet. “Maybe Rebaine should have won.”
He heard the both of them gasp, looked up into Rheah’s horrified eyes and Espa’s furiously furrowed brow. “At least someone would damn well have been in charge,” he growled. “It can’t have been worse than the Guildmasters’ games, can it? Maybe then all this death would at least have meant something.”
“He’s young,” Espa said swiftly as Rheah spun away. “He’s angry. He’ll learn better.” But the sorceress was already gone. With a glare, Espa waved the regent toward him. Not speaking, neither meeting the other’s gaze, they rode slowly back toward Lorum’s soldiers.
NATHANIEL ESPA, as it turned out, had been mostly right. Lorum had calmed down quickly enough, and he’d come to truly understand, in the weeks, months, and years that had followed, why the Eastern Terror could not have been allowed to win, that a warlord like Corvis Rebaine could never be permitted to rule. The regent had swallowed his distaste and worked alongside the Guilds—though it had been a near thing—even learning to argue against those nobles, like Jassion of Braetlyn, who believed as he once had.
But even to this day, Lorum didn’t think he’d been entirely wrong, and wondered how much better things might be if someone—the right someone, not someone like Rebaine—were truly able to rule.
And right now, the Guilds certainly weren’t doing a whole hell of a lot to change his mind.
“Can I have your attention please? Can I … ladies and … Ah, the hell with it. Rheah, would you mind?”
As she’d done once before, Rheah Vhoune stepped to the front of the dais, traced several intricate patterns in the air with her fingers, and spoke her words of power. And as before, the shock wave blasting through the crowd—setting flesh to stinging and ears to throbbing—instantly grabbed the undivided attention of what was previously an unruly, unlistening mob.
Where she’d last been forced to take such measures in the hall of a single Guild, she stood now upon the podium in Mecepheum’s great Hall of Meeting. Where she’d previously addressed the disorderly mass of humanity that was the Merchants’ Guild, she now faced an entire pack of Guildmasters and nobles, representing every Guild of influence and every major territory throughout Imphallion. And where she’d once come near to deafening a similar crowd for the sake of a single Guildmaster, she now drew their attention to the Regent Proper of Imphallion, His Grace, Duke Lorum of Taberness.
When the sudden booming finally rebounded off the far walls and faded away, Lorum nodded politely to Rheah and stepped to the fore. Dressed again in formal navy, the great bear and broken crown gleaming gold upon his tabard, he looked every inch the noble.
To his right sat Rheah Vhoune and Nathaniel Espa, to his left, Baron Jassion of Braetlyn and Duke Edmund of Lutrinthus. Before him, crowded into various chairs, benches, and pews, was the hostile and unwavering sea of men and women, all of whom were determined that, regardless of what was happening outside these city walls, the regent himself was the real enemy.
Only a single chair, deliberately pushed apart from the rest of the room, remained vacant in the otherwise congested chamber. A ceremonial seat, coated in dust, it had lain empty at every meeting of the Guilds for hundreds of years. It stood as a symbol, intended to remind them that they were incomplete, that even the power of the Guilds was not unbreakable. Most of them considered it a misuse of space.
Once upon a time, it housed the representative of the Sorcerers’ Guild, until the day Selakrian threw down that organization, declaring that such a gathering of powers was dangerous to all, wizard and common man alike. Some thought it heroic; others felt that the greatest magic user ever known had simply considered the Guild a threat. Whichever the case, that day saw the last attempt at organization among the wizards’ community.
Lorum watched Rheah Vhoune’s eyes flicker, as they so often did, to the old and decrepit red cushions. It was, she’d once told him, why she had joined the Merchants’ Guild, why she was so determined to master the ins and outs, the nooks and crannies, the tiniest details of Guild operation. Soon—when this nonsense with Audriss and Corvis Rebaine was over—she intended to seat herself in that chair, the first members of a fledgling Sorcerers’ Guild around her.
Lorum wasn’t entirely certain how he felt about that idea, but that was for later. The stubborn, mule-headed morass of Guildmasters and lords was now.
“Now that I have your attention,” Lorum said, hands clasped behind his back, “I have something to say. We—”
“Why are you bothering, Lorum?” a voice shouted from the rear. Salia Mavere, priestess of Verelian the Smith and councilwoman of the Blacksmiths’ Guild, rose to her feet. A large woman, with the heavy musculature common to the profession, she wore her dark hair short, and dressed in the formal robes of her religious office, emblazoned with the hammer and anvil. “You know damn well the Guilds won’t hand over our armies to you. You’ve asked us about three dozen times now over the past months, and you still refuse to accept our answer. I’ve worked with solid iron bars less dense than you seem to be.” There was general acclaim and no small amount of chuckling from the crowd.
“And the fact that Audriss is nearly here, his armies no more than a few days’ march from our gates, isn’t enough to make you reconsider?” Lorum asked calmly.
The laughter died away, and Salia’s face grew tight, but she shook her head. “Lorum, no one here denies the need to defend ourselves. But we can do it without granting you full command over the armies. We made that mistake once, remember? You took three years to give us back our rightful authority.”
“And if I had not done so at all,” Lorum snapped, his patience giving way, “we wouldn’t be in this predicament now!”
With a deliberate exhalation, he forced his features to relax, clasping his hands once more behind him. “But that’s behind us,” he said more calmly. “So even the threat of the Serpent will not make you reconsider?”
“As we’ve told you time and time again, Your Grace,” Salia told him.
“Then what of Corvis Rebaine? Surely you acknowledge the need for a unified authority to defend against the Terror of the East!”
“Rebaine,” the priestess scoffed, her sentiments once more echoed in the mumbling of those around her. “We’ve all heard that particular rumor, Lorum. There are those,” she continued slyly, “who have accused you of making it up yourself to give some extra weight to your case. I’d never believe such a thing myself, of course, but I felt you should know. If you continue to insist on this, it may erode what support you do have. I … What’s that?” She gaped, as did the entire assembly, at the dull black object Rheah Vhoune produced from nowhere and placed in the regent’s hand. Smiling grimly, Lorum held it over his head for all to see:
A dark metallic shape, with a yellowed bone spike protruding from it, the mirror image of the spaulder Espa hurled from the battlements at Pelapheron.
“Is there anyone here,” Lorum asked simply, “who does not know what this is?”
Had the silence grown any thicker, the duke’s ears must surely have burst from the pressure.
“Is there anyone here,” he began again, his voice suddenly harsh, “who truly believes I, or Lady Rheah, would fake or forge something of this magnitude?”
Surreptitious gazes danced through the assembly. A few present were suspicious enough to believe just that. But none was willing to speak out on his or her own, and none willing to be the first. So each turned from the imp
loring glances of compatriots, and the chamber remained silent.
“Rebaine was here!” Lorum told them, his voice thundering through the room. His right hand gestured violently, chopping downward in cadence with his words as though he would batter the very air into submission. “Imprisoned in the cells beneath my own castle!”
The silence finally shattered as the throng erupted into disjointed exclamations, oaths, questions, and demands. Like a wall, Lorum stood, letting the confusion and rage and fear of the crowd wash over him. Then he signaled, a simple crook of a finger. Rheah Vhoune rose once more, hands raised.
It was, as the duke anticipated, sufficient. The throng quieted once more, glaring balefully at the sorceress.
“Rebaine was held here,” he reiterated, speaking calmly but clearly. “He is here no longer. He escaped.”
The crowd buzzed angrily but restrained itself from another full outburst.
“Escaped, with outside help.” The regent’s piercing gaze swept the room. Several of the onlookers could have sworn they felt their hair rustle as it passed over. “A small group of men—we don’t know exactly how many. But we do know they killed several guards on the way out, guards found drained of blood.” He scowled darkly. “I think we all know what that means. And who was behind it.”
“Then it is all true!” The voice belonged to Bidimir Vrenk, a scrawny, whiny-voiced scarecrow of a man. Dressed to make even a rainbow look subdued, he carried a gold-engraved harp slung over his shoulder. Vrenk represented the Minstrels’ Guild, and as much as for his skill with harp and lute, he was known for his unfortunate habit of speaking as he believed the heroes of yore spoke, inspired by the hundreds of ballads and epics he’d read in his time. Vrenk either failed to realize he sounded the idiot, or simply didn’t mind. “The Terror and the Serpent are in league, one with the other! Can we do nothing to avert the doom creeping upon us from the long night?”
Lorum rolled his eyes. “Audriss has been spotted leading the main body of the troops. Rebaine himself travels with a smaller division, less than a day behind the main force. An elite division, we assume.
“The bulk of the army will be here in a matter of days. We are facing not only a force numbering upward of twenty thousand, accompanied by ogres, gnomes, and the Endless Legion. We are facing the combined might, the combined magics, and the combined knowledge of Rebaine and Audriss.”
The regent slammed a fist upon the lectern, and the old wood cracked audibly beneath his blow.
“We’ve no more time for this!” he shouted. “No more bickering! No more politics! No more! We stand as one! One army, one authority, one community!
“Or we die.” Once more, the duke grew quiet, speaking so softly that the assembly now strained to hear. “Mecepheum will fall. We will fall. The Guilds, the nobles, all of us. And Imphallion …” His voice trailed off, then resumed. “Imphallion, too, will fall.
“We survived the Terror of the East almost twenty years ago. We did so only because we provided a single, cohesive front. If we are to survive him now, we must do the same.
“I call for a vote of this Assembly. Think hard on your choice here today, my friends. Think very hard. This will be the last time I ask this of you. Choose well, and there will be no need to do so again. Choose poorly, and go to your graves, content with the knowledge you have maintained the ‘sovereign rights’ of your Guilds, and your houses—and all it cost you was your homes, your kingdom, and your lives.
“Let us vote.”
“DAMN him!”
Fingers clenched in impotent fury, Audriss peered through the thinning smoke that hung across the dawn like morning mist. Around him, men tiredly trod from the nearby stream, a line of ants feeding their colony, buckets clasped in white-knuckled grips. Before him, atop a small hillock, lay the charred and sodden remains of what was once his massive tent. From the ashes of the canvas climbed occasional serpents of smoke, spawned of a few smoldering flickers not yet extinguished. Here and there protruded the scorched leg of a table or chair, the blackened corner of the iron maiden. His papers, his plans, his notes-all gone.
/It could have been worse,/ Pekatherosh noted clinically. /It could just as easily have been you, not merely your furniture./
“Hardly. It takes more than a simple fire …” The Serpent trailed off into dark mutters. “This is very upsetting. All the things I’d prepared for him over the next few days … such a waste!”
/So tell Corvis. Send a messenger or something. He’s a reasonable fellow. I’m sure he’ll come running right back once you’ve explained the situation to him./
“You saw him, damn it!” Audriss erupted, gesticulating contentiously. “He couldn’t move, let alone escape! He killed … How many men did he kill?”
/The guards on his tent, another who apparently stumbled over him while he was creeping up on your tent, and three more on his way out. Or rather four, since it’s unlikely Evral will survive another day./
“Six or seven men. Not to mention stealing his equipment back from my own tent and setting the bloody thing on fire!” Behind featureless stone, Audriss scowled furiously. “He had help, Pekatherosh. He must have.
“They lied to me. This is why they wanted him back here in the first place: so he’d be near enough for them to work their magics.”
/You didn’t suspect it might be a trick when they made their offer in the first place? You’re not exactly the brightest star in the firmament, are you, Twinkles?/
“I underestimated them,” Audriss admitted in a low growl. “Look at everything we’ve built here, Pekatherosh. Imphallion has never seen an army such as mine, not even during Rebaine’s own campaign. No one has come close to what we’re about to accomplish.
“But I have no illusions, demon. This isn’t about a cause. This is about me, and the fact that I can pay or otherwise compensate those who follow. If I fell on the field of battle tomorrow, this entire army would evaporate like so much steam.”
/And you assumed Rebaine’s people were the same. That they would fall apart before they could make any real effort at retrieving him./
“I did. It is not a mistake I intend to repeat.”
/I’m so glad. There are so many new mistakes you’ve yet to make, I’d hate to see you wasting your time on old ones./
The Serpent glared at the gleaming ring. “I don’t suppose you’d care to say something useful for a change, instead of just being a bloody nuisance, would you?”
/That would be a novel experience, wouldn’t it? Might be interesting./
“Good. I—”
/On the other hand, there’s something to be said for consistency./
A pause, punctuated only by the gnashing of teeth and a subaudible murmur that might, or might not, have qualified as speech.
/I’m sorry, I don’t believe I caught that./
“Never you mind.” Without warning, Audriss lashed out and grabbed the nearest soldier, dragging the wide-eyed fellow by his collar. “Find my heralds,” the warlord said coldly. “Tell them to call for general assembly and then to break camp. I want to be at Mecepheum before the month is out.”
“Yes, my lord!” the man acknowledged, grateful to have escaped the dozen unnamable dooms that flashed through his head when the Serpent seized him. Except …
“Um, my lord?” he asked tentatively, mouth dry, palms sweating.
From the midnight hood, a gloss black mirror stared at him. “Yes?” The warlord’s voice was calm, neutral, inhuman.
“I … I’m sorry, my lord, but you’re … that is, you’re still …”
“Ah.” Audriss released the soldier’s tunic, taking a moment to pat the worst of the wrinkles from the material. “Is this better?”
“I … Yes, my lord, much better.”
“Then I suggest you make haste.”
“At once, my lord!” He all but sprinted into the encampment, knocking over breakfast pans, stepping on feet, and drawing a veritable retinue of curses in his wake.
“A
s soon as we’re fully assembled, Pekatherosh, he’s all yours.”
/Really? Not to sound ungrateful, Audriss, but may I ask why?/
“I want my people scared of me, but not so much so that they can’t function. Any man that nervous around me is useless.”
/If you say so./
“I do indeed. I say, too, that it’s about time we began the last phase of this little endeavor, Pekatherosh. We’ll be standing at the gates of the capital in two weeks. It wouldn’t do to be unprepared. Contact our friend; tell him it’s time.”
/Are you sure? You yourself said it might raise unfortunate questions./
“Doesn’t matter anymore, Pekatherosh. It doesn’t matter at all. In two weeks, the Serpent’s army will be camped outside the walls of Mecepheum.
“At that point, let Rebaine question whatever he wants. It won’t help him now. And if he shows up at Mecepheum, well, he was the first to go after Selakrian’s spellbook. Since it means so much to him, I’ll be happy to show him what it can do.”
CORVIS REBAINE WAS CLAD in most of his infamous armor. The confining helm leered at him from atop the table, along with the heavy gauntlets, and the missing spaulder had been replaced from a standard suit, transforming his left shoulder into a single spot of bright and burnished silver amid the unrelenting black. He sat on a heavy stool and stared at the parchment reports scattered across the table without really seeing them. As had become unconscious habit, he rubbed absently at the fresh scar that pulled at the skin of his left cheek.
“Are these numbers accurate?”
“As best we can determine, my lord,” Losalis told him. “I have only the scout’s estimation to work with, but I’ve known the man for years. If he told me the grass was purple over the next rise, I’d be inclined to believe him.”
The warlord grimaced, the fingers of his right hand drumming miniature hoofbeats on the wood. “Then Lorum’s finally done it. He’s forced the Guilds and the houses to cooperate.”
“So it would seem. I don’t see any other way he could have fielded a force that size.” The looming man grinned through his beard. “And all it took was an army camping on the doorstep. Threaten a man’s home, it always brings out the protective instincts.”