Colors of Chaos

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  He stopped, looking over where Jeslek had been. Jeslek was gone.

  Jeslek gone? The greatest… or most powerful White mage… perhaps ever? Gone?

  Cerryl took a step, then another, still searching for the High Wizard.

  Anya stood by the shattered remnants of the small table, binding her arm. Fydel rose from one knee behind her.

  Cerryl tried his order-chaos senses again, but there was no trace that Jeslek had ever been there, except for the gold amulet that lay amid the disintegrating pieces of a white tunic. Nor was there any sense of the order that bespoke the Black smith. The only body was that of a White guard. Cerryl shook his head. Jeslek dead… like that? He glanced at Fydel.

  “He’s dead… gone,” Fydel affirmed.

  Cerryl rubbed his forehead, and his fingers came away slightly streaked with blood.

  “It happens.” Anya stooped and lifted the gold amulet from the pile of dust and clothes on the trampled and burned grass. Stepping around the dead guard’s body without even looking down, she dangled it toward the bearded White wizard with the gash across his forehead “Would you like it, Fydel?”

  “Darkness, no! Give it to Sterol.”

  She turned to Cerryl. “Would you-”

  Cerryl stepped back, almost involuntarily. “It’s past time for games, Anya. Sterol should have the amulet returned to him. Especially now.” How can she just ignore Jeslek’s death? Did he mean that little? Is she that cold?

  “Don’t tell me that you two brave and strong White brethren are afraid of a poor Black smith and healer who must stoop to stealth and murder?”

  Fydel looked away.

  Cerryl did not, instead meeting Anya’s eyes. “He was rather effective, wouldn’t you say?” His arm gestured at the pile of dust that had been Jeslek, the two bodies, and the missing side of the tent ringed with charred patches. “There were three of them-just three, according to Jeslek. Between them, they’ve destroyed more than half our forces, a half-dozen of the White brethren, and the High Wizard. Just what would happen if they had decided to have sent a few more-perhaps older and more experienced order masters and Black warriors?” Cerryl’s smile was crooked. “For such reasons, I would prefer to defer to one of great experience, such as Sterol.”

  “Do we wait for him… to finish this rabble?” snapped Anya. “No! Cerryl, you need to lead the pursuit of the smith. Now!”

  “No. I think not. I think we can proceed-but slowly.” Jeslek… gone? Like that? Cerryl felt his thoughts were running in circles.

  “You are always so cautious, Cerryl,” Anya said brightly, her voice tight. “Do you think that the Council-or even Sterol-would let the blues get away with this? The High Wizard has been killed, and you wish to proceed slowly. Oh, so slowly.”

  “When one cannot rely on sheer force of chaos, dear lady,” Cerryl forced out the deliberate words, “one must needs be cautious.”

  “Bah… let’s get the troops moving.” Fydel blotted the blood from his forehead and stepped through the space where the tent wall had been. Then he paused and pointed toward the remaining two bodies on the ground-those of the guards who had stood outside the tent. Fire flared, and only ashes remained. With another snort, Fydel marched toward the hut where the march captains waited, not even looking back at the other two mages.

  Anya and Cerryl raised their eyebrows simultaneously, even as Cerryl turned toward Anya.

  “Well, Cerryl?” asked the redhead. “Are you with us, or will you remain here and be cautious?”

  “I’ll be ready to lead the vanguard shortly. As the High Wizard’s most trusted and valued assistant, you should draft the scroll to the Council-and Sterol-and then direct Fydel, as you have already been doing. Perhaps you should also inform the armsmen that Jeslek is dead. It might be a good idea, you know?” Cerryl turned and walked heavily across the damp and matted grass toward the tie-lines where Hiser and Ferek and his lancers waited.

  Beyond the first tie-line, Fydel had mounted and was talking to the march captains.

  Is this wise? Cerryl glanced back toward the ruined tent, then up at the dark clouds that had already begun to disperse. He kept walking.

  “Ser? What happened?” asked Hiser as Cerryl neared his detachment.

  “The Black wizard killed the High Wizard. He got away in the storm and the chaos.”

  “Killed the High Wizard?”

  “He killed the High Wizard…”

  “… High Wizard’s dead.”

  “… can’t believe that…”

  “… light help us now.”

  “Enough!” snapped Cerryl. “It wasn’t his order powers. He used an order-based crossbow or something. Then he ran away and hid in the storm.” Cerryl stepped up to the gelding and fumbled for the glass packed in his saddlebags. You’re not about to go charging off after that smith until you know what he’s doing, Anya or not.

  He found his hands shaking ever so slightly as the impact of Jeslek’s death began to settle on him. Jeslek dead? What had the smith done- and how? How could they just march into Diev? Then, how could they not-if the Guild were to be respected? The Guild had to be bigger than the High Wizard.

  Cerryl pulled out the glass and set it on the clay, concentrating and ignoring the headache he hadn’t even realized that he had.

  When the silver mists cleared, Cerryl took in the scene-an uncounted horse circling in the water behind the strange craft that was the smith’s, the fighting on the deck of the smith’s ship, and the smith dropping a blue armsman with a staff, then dropping another before taking a slash and staggering. As the White mage watched, the last figure in blue pitched forward, and the smith sagged onto the deck Sails furled, impossibly propelled by something churning the water beneath the stern, the ship edged out the channel toward the breakwater.

  “What the darkness is it?” demanded Ferek.

  “A dark creation.”

  “Cerryl?” called a voice from a mounted figure riding toward him.

  Recognizing Anya’s voice, Cerryl released the image. “I was check-ing where the smith was. He’s on his ship, leaving the harbor at Diev.”

  “No matter,” snapped the redhead. “The blockade ships will take care of him and his ship.”

  I wonder. A faint smile creased Cerryl’s mouth, an expression that faded as he recalled the dead Spidlarian armsmen on the ship. The smith is far more ruthless than even Jeslek-or Anya. “We can’t. Not now that he’s at sea.”

  “Then get on with it.”

  Cerryl nodded, packed the glass, and then swung clumsily into the saddle. His head throbbed. “Hiser, Ferek…”

  “Yes, ser.”

  Cerryl ignored their doubtful tones, his headache, and Anya’s eyes upon his back as he rode to the head of the column. Jeslek… dead? He forced his concentration on the task ahead.

  CXXXVI

  The three mages stood on the edge of the quay, looking out into the empty harbor of Diev. The cool breeze off the water cooled them but carried the odor of dead fish and other decay-possibly bodies washed under the piers.

  “We need supplies,” said Anya. “Cerryl, send out a force to gather what we need.”

  “We can’t pillage everything,” the younger mage noted.

  “Why not?” Fydel asked. “They killed half our men. They don’t deserve any better.”

  Cerryl refrained from noting that earlier Fydel hadn’t much worried about how many levies had died in taking Spidlar. “If we keep taking things, we’ll never govern this place. We wouldn’t keep seizing things from the farmers around Fairhaven.”

  “This isn’t Fairhaven,” said Fydel. “Never will be.”

  “Maybe we’d better think about making it so,” answered Cerryl quietly. “The other way hasn’t been working all that well lately.”

  “That will be the noble Sterol’s decision, as you keep reminding me, dear Cerryl,” answered Anya in an overly sweet voice. “I do not care how you obtain provisions, but provisions we must have. You seem best fitte
d for it, and Fydel must organize patrols to keep order.”

  “I’ll take care of it.” All Fydel knows about peacekeeping is how to kill peacebreakers.

  “I am so sure you will, Cerryl. You always do.” Anya flashed her bright smile. “You always do.”

  “Just do it,” added Fydel.

  “We’ll need some of the golds we took from the traders in Spidlar.”

  “You wouldn’t if you just took them,” pointed out Fydel.

  “Where would we get provisions next eight-day?” asked Cerryl. “Or the one after that?”

  “You can have some golds,” conceded the redhead.

  “Thank you, Anya.” Cerryl nodded, then walked back along the quay toward the spot where Ferek and Hiser and their lancers waited. His eyes drifted to the harbor, where but a day before a ship had moved to the sea without sail, under the power of some device, some engine, developed by the smith.

  Cerryl offered himself an ironic smile. If the smith but knew what change he had already wrought. That may be but the beginning. The smile faded into a frown as he neared the two subofficers.

  “You don’t look too happy, ser,” observed Hiser.

  “We get to find provisions-without pillaging and disrupting things,” Cerryl answered as he mounted. “So I suppose we’d better see if there are any traders left around.”

  “Traders?”

  “I’d rather have a local do the hard work. Besides, they probably know better where to find things-especially since we’ll be able to pay a little.”

  “Where do we start?” asked Ferek.

  “At that warehouse there.” Cerryl pointed toward a timbered building several hundred cubits to the west of the end of the quay.

  When they rode up, Cerryl could tell the warehouse had been stripped. The door hung open, and the shutters had not even been closed. “We’ll try another.”

  They tried almost a dozen. Of all the buildings that had held factors or traders, only the chandlery remained occupied, and a thin trail of smoke wound upward from the chimney.

  Ferek gestured, and a lancer dismounted and pounded on the door. After a moment, the door, recently reinforced on the outside with heavy planks, opened a crack.

  “Open for the mages of Fairhaven,” snapped Ferek.

  A thin figure scuttled out under the overhang of the extended second story. “Sers… we have but little.”

  “That’s what you all say,” said Ferek.

  “Sers… true it is… true indeed.”

  “You are the trader Willum?” asked Cerryl, reading the carved signboard.

  “No, ser…”

  “Where is he?”

  “He… ser mage,” stammered the thin-faced figure, “he was killed by bandits more than a year ago. I was his clerk. I help his widow and young sons.”

  Cerryl concealed a wince. He had no doubt who the bandits had been. He glanced toward Hiser. “Hiser, you and your men work with this fellow to round up whatever supplies are left. Have him keep track of them, and we’ll use his warehouse to store them.” Cerryl looked at the trembling clerk. “You work with us, and you and the widow and her children will be fine.”

  “Yes, ser mage… yes, ser.”

  “Thank you.” Cerryl nodded at Hiser, then turned to Ferek. “We need to check out the last two at the end of the short wharf there.”

  Ferek remounted, and half the lancers followed as Cerryl rode through the summer heat toward the still water of the back harbor, not all that far from where the smith had launched his vessel.

  The vessel was still at sea, for Cerryl could not find it in his glass and would not be able to do so, he suspected, until the smith ported, wherever that might be.

  The sound of the lancers’ mounts echoed hollowly on the pavement, reminding Cerryl of just how deserted the city-or port town-had become. Was that what always happened in war?

  He shrugged. He’d promised Leyladin to do what he had to do and say little, but he’d already said too much beyond that, he feared. His eyes landed on the warehouse ahead, apparently abandoned like the others. A long day… many long days to come.

  Part IV

  Colors of Change

  CXXXVII

  Cerryl… what do you want?“ Anya asked idly from where she stood by the railing of the White Flame beside Cerryl.

  “What do you mean?” Cerryl’s eyes flicked from Anya toward the bow.

  Just aft from the short forward raised deck, Fydel stood, the wind blowing his dark hair back, a big hand on a rigging cable, confident-appearing in the cool sea air under the bright green-blue sky.

  “Jeslek wanted to be the greatest and most powerful White mage ever. What do you want?” Anya asked again.

  The thin-faced mage glanced back at the headland beyond which lay Diev, now in the hands of Syandar. Eliasar had agreed that the three should return to Fairhaven with the amulet, but by ship, so that all the lancers could remain to help keep the peace in Spidlar. Cerryl had the feeling that the older arms mage had almost been happy to see them leave and allow him to get on with putting Spidlar firmly under the thumb of the Guild, as he had in Renklaar.

  “I’m not sure I know,” Cerryl said. “I wanted to be a White mage ever since I was a child, and I am.” He shrugged and offered a wary smile.

  “Cerryl, you have bigger goals than that.”

  “Well…” Cerryl paused. “I think Fairhaven needs to be stronger for Candar to prosper, because none of the other rulers think beyond their own borders. If they don’t, sooner or later, Recluce will, in fact, rule Candar without ever sending a single armsman.”

  “Do you see Prefect Syrma or Viscount Rystryr allowing that?” Anya laughed, a hard and brittle sound. “They will fight their endless little wars and slaver over a few chests of golds while their merchants sell all that is dear to the traders of Recluce.”

  “If matters change not,” Cerryl conceded, “that will happen. I’d like to change matters. I cannot say I know how, or that I could even if I did possess that knowledge. Look at Jeslek.”

  “You seem to be saying that Candar cannot prosper if the wars are endless,” Anya answered. “Do you really think anyone can change what people are? Most are greedy fools. The best are smart and greedy.”

  “I can’t gainsay that, either,” Cerryl admitted. “That is why I cannot see any land, any force, but that of Fairhaven being able to impose rules that will allow prosperity for all. Nor will Candar prosper without the rules and harmony such as those of the White City.”

  “Do you really think that is possible?” A touch of scorn colored her voice.

  “Look at Fairhaven-or even Elparta. Neither has folk begging in the streets. They are cleaner, and the average soul is happier.”

  “The traders are not.”

  “In Fairhaven, the traders prosper.” Cerryl grinned in spite of himself, wondering just how Anya would twist the conversation to her ends.

  “They’re as bad as those elsewhere and, given the chance, would build palaces on the backs of the poor and the Guild.”

  “The Guild does not give them the chance.”

  “The Guild cannot be everywhere.” Anya tossed her head as if to dismiss Cerryl’s observation. “Nor can it dictate everything to its traders, not if it wishes to hold to its powers.”

  That observation bothered Cerryl, another feeling that, again, Anya had more to do with the traders than anyone in the Guild knew-or, at least, wanted to pursue. He refrained from shaking his head as he recalled how he had been dissuaded from following the missing trader and the stolen silksheen-although it was clear that trail had led to Jiolt, whose son was consorted to Anya’s sister.

  As the White Flame pitched through a trough, Cerryl reached out and steadied himself on the rail.

  “Let us say that you,” continued Anya, “or some High Wizard does unite Candar or the east of Candar. After him, then what? More squabbles and wars? What is the purpose of such a great achievement? To end up withering away like Kinowin or Myral or being kill
ed like Jeslek? Or to turn what you have done over to another like Sterol to dither it away?”

  “You think so little of Sterol?” Cerryl smiled. “Sterol is what Sterol is,” Anya responded. “Just as Jeslek was.” After a moment, Cerryl spoke. “You asked me, but what do you want, Anya?”

  Anya flashed the smile that Cerryl distrusted. “I think we want the same thing. We want something that gives meaning to what we have done-something that will have meaning after we are gone.” She shrugged. “Is that not what anyone wants?”

  Cerryl mistrusted the shrug but remained silent. “Some folk find such in their children, but that is hard for mages, and especially hard for a White mage interested in a Black.”

  “We’ve managed.”

  “Children would likely kill Leyladin, so strong are both of you.”

  Anya offered another shrug. “So you must find a meaning to your life in other fashion.”

  “What about you?” Cerryl countered.

  “I could have children. A White can have children by a White. I could have had Jeslek’s child, or yours.”

  Cerryl wanted nothing to do with that line of talk. “I suppose we’ll have to find other means of making a mark.”

  “Like all the other mages who have tried, Cerryl, your mark will survive for a time, then vanish-just like this sea swallows all traces of those that travel on it.”

  “I will have tried.”

  “Just like Jeslek. Or Myral. Or Kinowin. Or Jenred the Traitor. And for what? Best you think long about that, young Cerryl.” Anya turned to watch the whitecaps-as if to say that she wished to talk no more.

  After a moment, Cerryl nodded to himself and walked forward and across the gently rolling deck to the other side of the bow from Fydel. Once more, he needed to think.