“So it was the girl they were after then,” Durmet concludes. “And not you.”
“Yeah.”
“And now we owe Julien another favor,” he says with less enthusiasm.
“Yeah,” I say in matched tone.
“Again.”
“Yes!” I hiss.
He flies to my desk, claws clicking and clacking as he lands, and his fangs make an appearance. “We’re supposed to get paid for our services, boss.”
“We can’t service anyone if I’m dead.”
His head drops in apology, or maybe just agreement, and he says with less bite, “Well, there is that.”
“Your concern is touching, my friend. You’re getting rather sweet these days.”
“You know what I mean.” Then he perks up like a dog catching sight or sound of a chittering squirrel up a nearby tree.
“What?” I ask.
“Dessert.”
I stare blankly at him.
“Dessert, Giddy,” he says, wings twitching in anticipation. “You said you had the dessert packed in a tin.” Papers rustle as he takes eager flight, zipping here and there in my office, a predator in search of prey.
I can do nothing but laugh at him. “Sorry to say, partner, but it’s somewhere back near Julien’s place.”
He ceases his zipping to and fro and hovers in the middle of my office. “You lost it?”
“It’s the thought that counts, right? Besides, I had more immediate concerns. Like staying alive.”
Durmet’s tail flicks viciously back and forth and I half-expect to hear the crack of a whip accompany it. But he accepts the fact that he won’t be having any sweets and alights on my desk, where he nudges my six-spell with a foot.
“I’m surprised you did manage to stay alive.”
“Hmm?” I pick up my wand, and immediately see what he’s referring to. The shaft is cracked and splintered. Must be from when I turned the knife blade aside. I angle it this way and that, marveling that I’m still breathing.
“Broken like that,” Durmet points out, “that last fireshot you got out could have easily backfired and cooked your tender hide.”
“I’m not tender, Durmet.”
“Ha! With the beatings you’ve been taking lately, you’re as tender as a royal butcher’s prime filet.”
I ignore him, intent on my useless wand: broken shaft, four of the six crystals discharged. I drop it back to my desk then think twice and put it atop the newspaper to keep it in place. It’s not totally useless, I think.
Another expense I don’t want to have to think about. As if reading my mind, Durmet walks to the edge of my desk and leans over to open the top drawer. “At least we still have coin left from hawking the candlestick.”
“True.”
I fish out a handful of coins from the drawer. While I’m at it, I pull out the six-spell I’d gotten from Anderest’s vault. It’s loaded with the cartridge with my initials on it, so I unscrew that one and screw on the other ivory cartridge; there’s not much room for deniability if it’s monogrammed.
I stand, holster the wand at my hip, and pocket the coins.
Durmet perks up at my preparation. “So, what’s our next move, boss?”
“Time to pay off some debt,” I say. “And this time, you’re going with me.”
For anyone who’s ever seen a puppy roll around in grass and dirt, their tongue lolling out in bliss, I won’t have to describe Durmet’s next actions as he flaps into the air with much the same enthusiasm.
—-
It’s called the Arcanium to most outsiders. The Dark College, to most students of the arcane arts. And to those who’ve come and gone, those who’ve lived to walk away with the arcane mages’ blessings, it’s simply the Crag.
Situated on the extreme northwestern shores of Wrought Isles, the Crag’s dark stone is cracked and weathered, in places seemingly held together by more moss and lichen than mortar. Three spires trident into the foggy afternoon air, the westernmost spire highest among the trio. They rise from the crenellated walls of a fortress originally built to withstand the deathblows of seaborne cannon that now houses the residences and training grounds of arcane mages and those aspiring to be.
Durmet pads alongside me in cat form, ink-stained tail and snowy white ears twitching at every little sound in the surrounding grass along the worn cobblestone causeway leading up to the Arcanium. A wind has swept in, carrying with it the dense banks of fog that will shroud the place entirely by nightfall. It’s always made me wonder how nature seemed to gather the true nature of the place, working by some law of physics or at the behest of some god, and acquiesced into lending more of an unearthly aura to the environ once evening begins its reign.
After the causeway increases in a sharp grade, we hit the main plateau and the first of the outlying buildings. Out here in the fields before the numerous switchbacks that wind up to the entrance, small communities have sprung up. Unholy magic or not, a fortress the size of the Arcanium depends on the mundane citizens to keep it fed and cleaned.
The Arcanium churns out mages practiced in the art of destructive magics; those who draw upon the power of the dead through necromancy, some who utilize pacts with demons and devils to eke out enough power to manifest incantations that would otherwise be impossible for a mere mortal to control, and many who train solely as battle mages, turning useful fire, wind, and light incants into flesh-searing, bone-bruising, and mind-numbing attacks.
All that terrifying power, and still those deadly mages need someone to mend their torn fabric, tend to their laundry, supply them with wax, oil, and even perfumes. And don’t even get me started on the ego of many that reside inside the Crag. Put two or three arcane mages up against a three-headed dragon, and none would balk at the notion. Put those same three in the kitchens and tell them to wash their dishes and prepare the next day’s bread and you would soon find a crater where once you found sink and oven.
Most buildings we pass are stout, more stone than lumber, and many serve as the proprietors’ place of residence as well as business. Children are about, playing games of tag and laughing and shouting at one another. Generally, the young ones do their utmost to disrupt the livelihood of the adults who are readying their shops to close or getting underfoot of those taverns and diners that are preparing for the tide of students to come crashing down from the Arcanium for the evening.
“Something to help garner a woman-lady’s unyielding affection for the evening, Master?”
I turn at the old crone’s voice and saunter over to where she’s set up a half-cart with her nightly wares. She’s stooped by age, her grey hair done up in a tight bun, and she sports warts as a child does freckles. As I peruse the trinkets and vials displayed carefully atop the velvet sheet draped over her cart, I chuckle and say, “I think I’ve got enough going on my own in that department, my fair lady.”
She cackles. “Fair, you say? You do me an honor, sir. Truly, you do.” She looks at her wares with practiced precision, then after what I believe she wants me to think is careful deliberation, picks up a small pinwheel made of iron and presents it to me with gnarled hands.
“This,” she says when I take it from her and hold it up to the lone torch to one side of her cart, “will grant you extreme luck at games of fortune.”
“I’m sure it will,” I say, hiding my skepticism well, “but as I’m short on coin, I can neither afford this exquisite piece nor spare coin for gambling.”
“It is but a small investment—”
“I’m sorry,” I say, handing it back. I begin to offer my goodbye when my cat leaps atop the cart and meows insistently at a brooch. It’s a dragonfly made of tarnished silver, with red-colored beads of glass for eyes and green beads dotting its wings.
Durmet cranes his head up to me and I in turn look to the crone.
“It is a sleep warren,” she says, ancient eyes lighting up with the prospect of making a sale.
“And it does …?”
“Why, it
keeps nightmares at bay! And those rubies and emeralds are an investment all on their own.”
I shake my head. Those glass beads could never be mistaken as the real deal, even in the flickering torchlight and fog-dampened light of late day. But Durmet is insistent in his purring and mewling, and after a short bout of haggling, I part with a silver-and-two and pocket the trinket.
I leave the crone, dodge children and a few flocks of ambling goats, and start up the switchback to the Crag.
“That came out of your funds, Durmet,” I say when we’re alone on the causeway.
“Worth it, boss,” he says, tail twitching in what I take as self-congratulating.
“What is it really?”
“Don’t know, but it reeks of Arcane magic.” He pads ahead, turns around, and proceeds to walk backwards in a feat no natural cat has ever achieved. “I don’t think the old woman even knew what it was.”
“Stop walking like that,” I hiss at him. “We’re nearing the walls and I don’t want someone seeing you like that.”
With a growl, Durmet sits, plopping down on his hindquarters and waits for me to come abreast of him. When I do, he jumps, flipping over and twisting around so that he lands facing the same direction as I.
“Durmet,” I warn.
“Sorry, boss.” Nothing in his tone smacks of regret.
I really do need to let him get out more.
As the Crag looms ahead of us, I say, “I won’t be able to bring you in with me.”
“I know.”
“But I did bring you here for a reason.”
“Didn’t realize my mere company was contingent.”
I glare down at the back of his furry head. “I’m going to seek an audience with Master Zwim. You recall where his office is?”
His ears perk and angle this way and that, like some divining rod, and he cranes his neck upward. “Middle spire. Third window from the left, down two from the arch.”
“Right.” I’m impressed with his memory. “I’ll need you to be my eyes and ears tonight. While I’m in there, I don’t want to be sprung upon by unwanted visitors.”
“Why not just send a missive to Zwim? Have him meet you out here in one of the taverns?”
“Because I want this to be as unexpected as I can make it. I trust the man, but this is the Arcanium we’re dealing with, after all.”
“Got it.” He pads ahead to where a small boulder juts from the ground and slinks behind it. Moments later, a large raven takes perch atop the boulder. I nod to him as I pass and as I make the final turn that leads to the grand entrance of the Crag, he takes off in whispering flight. Soon enough the thickening fog deadens his departure and I am left alone.
Two free-standing torches on either side of the open gateway illuminate the lone guard posted at the entrance, the lever for the portcullis within easy reach. He looks up at my approach, hands easy at his side, no sense of urgency about him.
I stop within the torch light. “I’m here to see Master Zwim.”
“Is he expecting you?” the guard asks lazily. His post is, at the heart of it, nothing more than a checkpoint. No one in their right mind would dare enter the Arcanium with devious intentions.
“Not that I know,” I say, trying to match his tone, “but you never know with necromancers. Who knows who they’ve been talking to, eh?”
The guard laughs at this, and that small break in his dreary existence is enough to earn me a clap on the shoulder followed by a gesture to go on in.
The Arcanium is immaculate inside. Every surface capable of being polished is as reflective as a lazy pond in summer. Tapestries line the grand entrance, telektric lights defend against unruly shadows, and chandeliers bigger than a dragon’s maw dangle from every other vaulted arch.
People of all ages—not to mention genders, races, and nationalities, as the Arcanium is impartial as to whom they train—scurry about on errands and tasks. Some smile as they go about their business, others, mostly the younger ones, have their faces pinched in thought as the day’s lessons settle into their impressionable minds.
I don’t recognize any I pass but that’s to be expected, as I haven’t stepped foot in these halls for years. Most offer nods when our eyes meet and only a few are a bit more curious at seeing an unfamiliar face. All in all, the denizens of the Dark College are an amicable lot when in their own environment. In essence, even aspiring arcane mages are everyday people, with everyday issues and everyday desires.
I head to what is commonly called the Post Station, a large sitting room just off the main entrance that would fit in just fine at any reputable inn. A number of students, ranging from teenagers to greying adults, lounge on couches and chairs that line the art-adorned walls, perusing newspapers that litter the knee-high tables before the chairs as they wait for whatever reason they’d been sent here. A couple of the students look up at me and relief flushes their faces when they don’t recognize me. Their fate has been suspended for a few minutes longer.
Ah, the good old days. I remember sitting in those very chairs, pretending to read the papers as I waited for the headmaster or one of his lackeys to walk in and dole out my punishment for one transgression or another.
The post mistress, the same woman who’d held the station back in my days, looks up at my entrance and bewilderment flashes in those half-lidded eyes of hers. The look reminds of a fisherman who’s just hooked a fabled fish. She ducks behind the counter as I head her way and by the time I rest my forearms on her battlements, she’s popped back up, leather tome in hand.
“Gideon Knell,” she says without looking up.
One of those times that I wish I wasn’t such a memorable person.
I wait in silence, feeling like I’m ten years younger and have just been caught red-handed sneaking into the liquor pantry afterhours, while she flips page after page of her tome. The post mistress was aged back then, and though years have paraded by, she seems to have plateaued. Or maybe I’m just catching up to her.
She’s got a few more wrinkles around her mouth and her eyelids seem to be a bit heavier, but her straw-colored hair is vibrant as ever. I try not to stare as she runs her ruined hand down the page she’s stopped on. Pinky, ring, and middle fingers of her right hand are stubbed at the knuckles from some accident with volatile powders when she was a mere student here.
“You have quite a bit of back tithe, Knell,” she says when she locates my name in the tome.
“That’s what I’m here for, Mistress.”
She looks up at me and the corner of her lips struggle to remember what a smile is supposed to look like. “At least your manners have not left you.”
I incline my head and bite my tongue.
“Well then,” she says, palms flat on her tome. “I can accept your tithe here. It stands at four-and-five.”
“What?” I blurt out, eyes going from tome to post mistress and back again. “By my count, it should be only three silvers and two coppers at most.”
She folds her hands. “That was before you turned away our collectors earlier this week.”
“I didn’t turn them away so much as turned the other cheek.”
“Even so,” she states, “I must see to their compensation. Four silvers and five coppers, if you please.”
“What compensation? The worst I did was bruise their fists with my face.”
“Four-and-five, Knell,” she says, no brooking the argument.
“Fine,” I relent, “but I’ll pay Master Zwim.”
She cocks her head. “Why? We can handle it here. Nice and easy. And off you pop your merry way ’til next month.”
I step back from her withering gaze. “I haven’t seen Zwim in a while. While I’m here, I figure I’ll pay him a visit. Two birds and all.”
The post mistress turns to glance at the large pendulum clock behind her. “He should be in his offices—”
“Great!” I jump on her words. “I’ll head on up.”
“Let me get you a page,” she says. She snaps
her fingers and the students waiting in the chairs and sofas look her way. I can practically hear their silent cries for the chance to leave the Post Station, to slip their necks out from the noose.
“I remember the way, Mistress,” I tell her, and head for the main hallway again before she can muster another word. I pass by a young boy, stout and built like a rock—I surmise he has more dwarfish blood than human in his veins—and shoot him a sympathetic look.
Sorry, kid, but we all have to face the music eventually.
I hit the stairs, ascend three flights, and cross through a series of corridors on my way to the next stairway. I pass many doors, and here on the fourth floor, a few are locked and guarded by men and women who, unlike their counterpart at the Crag’s entrance, are stationed here with intent.
Up another flight of stairs, spiraling up for four more floors, and through telektric lit hallways, I reach my destination. The iron-bound door is ajar and firelight dances into the hallway through the crack. I announce my presence with a stout knock that doesn’t budge the door an inch.
“Come,” my old teacher says from within, and I do as bid, glancing back down the hall before closing the door behind me.
Gerhardt Zwim keeps his office neat and ordered, always has, and likely always will. The hearthstones of the fireplace to my left are scrubbed clean, and the supply of wood is stacked precisely next to the polished poker. The radiance of the fire joins the glow of the single telektric lamp hanging above to reveal dust-free shelves, weighted with history books and innocuous keepsakes from his travels around the continent when he was much younger. How much younger, I never learned, as Zwim is rumored to be quarter elfish, and that fair blood has led to a longevity that would see a normal human named great-grandfather twice over by the time of his passing.
His hair, dark as a raven’s tail, is gathered into a tight bun at the base of his neck and his eyes, a bright fire-orange like clouds in a midwinter sunset, light up as they take me in from behind his desk.
“Gideon! Oh, my boy, it has been too long.” He springs to his feet and waves for me to pull a chair before his desk. “Much too long.”
The Amethyst Angle Page 15