She didn’t dare reveal herself. She might be one of the best assassins in the Elendil Order, but she couldn’t overcome so many. Sure, she could drop down and take out one, maybe two, but then she’d be surrounded by heavily armed men. Assassins did not grandstand. They did not engage in pitched battles where their concealable weaponry would be pitted against full-sized swords and axes. Assassins who did that might as well run around in plain sight.
The door opened. Angrod and a capran came out. Something was different about the boss. Her mind kept slipping off the idea. She shook her head. Focus, she thought. What was wrong?
The capran—Arawn, she assumed—motioned with his hand. He repeated it, and she recognized the signal they’d rehearsed for such an occasion. Disguise rings, of course. A carriage drove up, and one of the warriors brought Angrod’s horse. She’d ridden double with him to get there but it seemed she’d have to follow on foot.
The snow fell harder. I drew my borrowed cloak around me and shivered. I missed my magic already.
“Is that the horse I gave you?” Arawn asked. “She got fat! What have you been feeding her?”
“Kate is not fat! She is my fastest steed.”
The bodyguards had mounted up. All of them were sticking to the carriage.
“You aren’t taking any men?” I asked. “Will you be all right?”
“I’ll take off this ring soon. Anonymity shall be my shield. Farewell, my friend!” He vaulted into the saddle. “Pony! We must ride like thunder!” He galloped into the night.
“Spirited man, that Angrod,” Tamril said. “Shall we go, milord?”
“Yes. Yes of course.” I climbed into the carriage and she closed the door behind us.
“I’m so glad we got out of the cold. Don’t you think so, milord?”
It was a small carriage, with just one bench. We sat very close. She snuggled closer. “What’s the matter, my husband?”
Oh gods.
“Just, ah—”
“Do you want to take me now, here?” She snuggled even closer. “You’re so romantic!”
Please take care of my people, Arawn had told me. Leave the kingdom the way you found it. Fool that I was, I hadn’t asked if he had a family.
Tamril started kissing my neck. “Perhaps some oral relief?”
Damn that man!
The Silver World is a lot like the First Realm. I don’t know if they’re parallel worlds, but the landscapes are almost identical. The vegetation’s a bit different and the seasons aren’t in sync (it was spring here) but otherwise I knew my way around.
It was a secret mission, so once through the portal we travelled at night, spending each day in some secluded clearing. We couldn’t use the inns, but Arawn’s personal guard were good at making camp. There lay the problem. How could I refuse Tamril her wifely dues when our tent was so cosy and private?
“What’s the matter, my husband?” She cuddled up beside me. “Why won’t you kiss me?”
Arawn is a big scary guy. He moves like a master swordsman. And then there’s the fact that he’s a king, with an entire nation at his command. His retinue alone can shoot and dress game on the gallop. You do not antagonize people like that.
But he’d failed to mention that he had a wife. A clingy wife. A very clingy, cuddly, sweet-smelling wife. Oh gods.
“I don’t feel well,” I said. “Brandish winters do not agree with me. Just… let me rest.”
“Okay, love,” she said, and she fell asleep while spooning me.
I should mention that Tamril sleeps in the nude.
Stepping out of the royal tent, I ran into the guards posted some distance away. They saluted and asked if I needed anything.
“I’m going for a walk in the woods,” I said. “I feel like some fresh air.”
One of them pointed. “There’s a tree bog over there. Will you need any toilet paper, Your Majesty?”
Capran toilet paper, or at least the royal kind, comes in a small square package. Each quilted sheet was moistened with something that smelled like flowers and glowed in my Sight. Some sort of potion—it left me remarkably clean. The otherworldly wet wipes did their job, then crumbled to sawdust. Very tidy.
I still clapped my hands out of habit, cleaning spells being one of the first things elven children learn. Then I remembered that the disguise ring was using up all my magic. I was closing the door behind me when someone tapped me on the shoulder.
“Yaaugh! Dagonet, you scared the crap out of me! No… you waited till I was finished.”
She looked haggard. Running to keep up with horses can do that.
“Must’ve been a rough day for you.”
She shrugged. “I was discharging my duty.”
“Need some toilet paper?”
She glared. “Do you know how long I’ve been here? Waiting for you?”
“Long enough to report on troop movements?” I raised my hands. “Okay, I’ll be serious. You need horses and supplies. Steal them.”
She raised an eyebrow. I brought out a purse. “This is enough for a good horse.” I counted out a few local coins. “And this should cover your supplies. Don’t get spotted, but try to pay for what you steal.”
She took the purse. “Not getting spotted is what I do. I never leave any tracks.”
“You must wipe very thoroughly.”
The rest of the journey was uneventful. Tamril continued to try and get more intimate—carriage sex was one of her favourites. But telling her I had a headache usually worked. So did pretending to be asleep. What really fixed things (at least for the trip) was when I claimed travel sickness. Any more motion might make me vomit, I said.
“Are you sure you won’t take a potion?” she asked.
“Potion sounds too much like motion. Ugh, I’m nauseous, I’m nauseous, I’m nauseous…”
Probably out of character for Arawn, but not once did anyone suspect. Even though I’d exchanged more than a few words with them.
“What language am I speaking?” I asked Tamril after she’d given up renewing her membership in the Mile Post Club. “What language are you speaking?”
“We’re both speaking Caprish. Are you all right?”
“Fine.” I was speaking Caprish, a language I’d never learned. The disguise ring, of course. Its imprint of Arawn included not only his appearance but also some of his skills. I hadn’t forgotten to speak Elvish, but I had a compulsion to answer in whatever language I was spoken to. “Tell me what you think of this.” I recited a dwarven battle song.
“What is a Worm of Dread?” she asked.
“Hell on gardens, I think. What about this—”I recited a Northland limerick. Heronimo had taught it to me without bothering to translate. He told me it was incredibly filthy, enough to make any human woman blush.
“No idea,” she said.
So. The translation magic only worked with languages you understood.
It was a long journey. I had plenty of time to examine the ring’s intricate enchantment. Since my Sight was a passive ability, it was the one kind of magic I could still use. The disguise didn’t change my appearance. I wasn’t any hairier. It only made people think I looked like the capran king. To do that took a great deal of magic. It even took over parts of my brain in order to broadcast suggestions. It sounded a bit like I am Arawn, I am Arawn, I am Arawn… From time to time even I would forget that I was not him, that I was an elf on a mission of honour. I found myself sitting closer and closer to Tamril.
“I am Arawn.”
CHAPTER 10: MEERWEN
To the pilot of the ice yacht, Mina and I weren’t passengers so much as temporary crewmen. The three of us put on goggles and helmets and pushed the yacht to a running start. When we were fast enough the pilot jumped into the rear cockpit. “Get aboard!” he said. We scrambled into the cockpit amidships. “Mind the boom!” We ducked and the yacht turned. The portside outrigger threatened to lift up and we shifted our weight to steady it. The steel runners rasped as we picked up speed. The stea
dy rasp became a growl as the ice blurred and the wind rushed past. The city shrank in the distance.
Ice yachts can go many times faster than the wind. They’re surprisingly agile too, making them the obvious choice when you need swift transport in mid winter. There were worse ways to travel. Then again, there were more pleasant travelling companions. Mina sat sullenly beside me, arms crossed. She was dressed thickly enough that she couldn’t have been cold.
“You comfortable?” I had to lean over to make myself heard.
“Not really. I’m imagining what could happen if we fell into the ice, or if a runner caught on a crack. The speed we’re going, just hitting a snowbank would break our necks.”
“I wouldn’t worry. This yacht may not be dwarven-made, but it can handle a crash. Our captain is a skilled pilot and hedge wizard who can see where the ice is thickest.”
“I’m not feeling any better about this.”
“Well, maybe if you could see things the way we do.”
“D’you think I’m half-blind because I lack the elven Sight? I manage fine with my dwarven senses.”
We shifted our weight into another turn. “Why are you so hostile?”
“I’m not hostile!”
“And stop yelling.”
“I am not yelling!” She closed her mouth. “Okay, maybe I was yelling.”
“Are you mad at me personally, or is it something else?”
She stared out at the scenery for a few miles. Then she said, “It’s not you, it’s your world. Have you ever wondered about doorknobs? Of course you don’t. You’ve never had to think about them because they’re always at the usual height. Do you know, I keep a footstool in every room in Angrod’s castle? I do the same thing in our Drystone home.”
I shrugged. “So you’re short compared to elves. Why let that bother you? I’m sure I’d be as uncomfortable in a dwarven fortress.”
“But most don’t have sizeable populations of elves, do they? To say nothing of halflings and humans. Halflings are just stockier elves, but Heronimo keeps bumping his head and getting stuck in chairs.”
“You come to our cities and complain when they aren’t made for you?”
“Oh, should I be grateful for the privilege of being there? Remind me to thank you next time I trip over the stairs.”
We leaned into a turn and I looked at Mina. The goggles didn’t fit and neither did the helmet. “Heh. How do you like that bucket seat? You seem to be slopping over the sides.”
She frowned, then looked down. I continued to grin and she shook her head. “Okay, I do look funny. These chairs weren’t made for my hips.”
“Could use a little more padding, wouldn’t you say?”
“Bitch. You could use more padding.”
We laughed. “Okay, maybe I should’ve gotten a different helmet,” I said.
“I booked this yacht. There wasn’t any time… it just seems unfair. Did you know that most dwarves are left-handed? It’s true, right-handed dwarves are the minority. In the undercities the tailors use left-handed scissors, the musicians strum left-handed guitars, and everybody writes from left to right.”
“That can’t be fun for the right-handed dwarves.”
She smirked. “They use the stuff we make for export. The point is, this is a basic fact about dwarves and you’ve never heard about it until I told you. Dwarves know a lot more about elves than the other way around. We need to. Our tailors and shoemakers know your sizes. There are craftsmen who have never seen the surface but could talk for hours about your fashions. You may say that my people make the best stuff, but our survival depends on elven customers.”
“We rely on you to produce quality stuff. Isn’t it an equitable arrangement?”
“Elves don’t kn
ow the first thing about dwarves, but every dwarf has to take classes. Does that sound equitable to you?”
We stopped at an inn toward dusk, when it got too dark to continue. We ate and went quickly to bed and an early start. The next day found us back in the ice yacht. I’d gotten extra cushions for Mina so she had a somewhat better view.
“You can fly, right?” she asked. “Why’d you need transport in the first place?”
“For the same reason I didn’t sprint the whole way. Flying is unbelievably tiring—it’s not something you risk without good tactical reason.”
“I’ve never heard of a female wizard. How good are you at spellcasting?”
“I’m on par with Angrod, though my magic is more internal. Does that make me a combat mage? Hard to say—I never went through a proper apprenticeship.”
“Your father is one of the top ten wizards in the world.”
“He’s why I have any magical training at all. Traditionally, only sons of nobility can learn serious magic.”
By the time a boy turned twenty-one he was expected to have learned to read, to reason, and to reckon. Naturally he had already picked up the hedge magic that every household used—spells to light fires and sweep floors. It was at this point that he was apprenticed to a master, who taught magic as it applied to a particular craft. An architect might show him how to build a house in a half hour, while an alchemist might show him how to make plastics out of pigshit. For the theoretical side of the apprentice’s education the master’s guild would host lectures and assign papers.
Finally the young man’s thoughts would turn to the arts of war. It was then that his House revealed its secrets—spells to split the air and scorch the earth, spells to outshine the sun and boil the sea.
“Every Noble House maintains its own school of war magic. Combat mages tend to share techniques by practicing them on each other. They’re encouraged to duel, actually.”
“I’ve always wondered how they determined who could be a gray or black mage,” Mina said. “Elven mages were rumoured to never wash their robes. The robes started out white, grew darker with each battle, and were finally dyed red with the blood of one’s enemies.”
I laughed. “That’s a myth! Can you imagine the smell? Mother would never have let Father into the house.”
“I always thought it was odd, using blood as a dye. You’d end up with brown robes. And I never heard of any brown mages. Do they work in the sewers?”
Apprentices in peacetime gained prestige through academic duelling. They battled among themselves, accumulating victories until the senior wizards had reached a consensus. Only then were the students allowed to wear ash robes.
“Combat mages are fiercely protective of their symbols. It’s not illegal for the uninitiated to wear gray robes, but they risk being challenged.”
Past the first rank, the duelling became serious. There were fewer rules and no nearby teachers to act as referees. Only an elf’s natural caution kept fights from turning lethal.
“Mages die anyway, because in battle it’s easy to forget that you have centuries to look forward to. In battle you care only about defeating your opponent and surviving the next few moments. Otherwise you lose.”
To earn the right to wear red robes, you had to prove yourself equal to a red mage. And all red mages duelled to the death.
“So your father—” Mina said.
“Killed a man, yes. They met over the sea, where nothing would burn. My mother told me it looked like an approaching storm. There was lightning, and thunder, and clouds of steam. It rained fish next morning.”
If you aren’t friends before you travel by ice yacht, you will be after the first day. There isn’t much room in the passenger cockpit, and stopping to stretch one’s legs isn’t worth the trouble.
“That’s better.” Mina covered the chamber pot. “My back teeth were floating.”
“Beer for breakfast will do that.”
We watched the scenery go by, but didn’t pay much attention. You can only see so many winter scenes before they start to blur together.
“It wasn’t a traditional apprenticeship with me,” I said. “When your father is a red mage you pick up more than hedge magic. He started tutor
ing me when he noticed I knew more than a girl should. He told me that as long as I was going to be an oddity I might as well be a good one.”
“Did you ever fight a duel?”
I grinned.
CHAPTER 11: MEERWEN
“Fight! Fight! Fish-Girl’s gonna fight!”
Belrothien wasn’t the smartest, but he was a decent student mage. We probably would’ve never come to blows if his friends hadn’t pushed him into it. Or pushed him into me.
“Hey, watch where you’re going!” he had said, even if I was the one on the ground.
Iron Elf - A Race Reborn (Book 2) Page 6