Highlords of Phaer (Empire of Masks Book 1)

by Brock Deskins

  Nahuza tilted her head and frowned. “You want them to assault me?”

  “Yes, Highlord. I recently hanged two of the group’s supporters quite publicly and challenged their cowardice in hopes of drawing them out, even to the point of doing something so foolish as to mark you as a target for their revenge.”

  “And you are here to protect me from these rabble-rousers?”

  Quinlan smiled and shook his head. “Not at all, Highlord. I have no doubt that you are far more capable of protecting yourself than I could ever be, but I would like to be close at hand when they fail. In that, I would beg you to restrain your righteous retaliation so that I might capture at least some of them alive. It is much easier to interrogate a prisoner than a corpse.”

  “But not impossible?”

  “Not for me, Highlord. I have been given a small measure of leave to delve into the necromantic arts in order to facilitate the execution of my duties.”

  Nahuza cast a stern frown at the inquisitor. “Just be sure not to overstep your authority, Chief Inquisitor Quinlan. That leave is very small indeed.”

  Quinlan gave the highlord a vigorous nod. “I am ever aware, Highlord.”

  Nahuza glanced at the carriage waiting to take her to the palace. “Well, if I am to be bait, I suggest we walk. I have been cooped up on my yacht for the better part of a week and would appreciate the exercise.”

  Quinlan extended an arm. “Of course, Highlord, after you.”

  It amused the inquisitor that the highlord considered her voyage so arduous, and it had nothing to do with the fact that she sailed on a luxury yacht. A week to travel from Phaer to Velaroth was extraordinarily swift. Cargo ships and even military vessels took at least three times as long to cross such distances.

  She must have sailed under power the entire way here instead of relying on the wind to propel the airship. It would take somewhere in the neighborhood of a dozen innervators, sorcerers with the singular purpose of keeping the heart stone charged with arcane power throughout the entirety of the voyage. Without them constantly supplying energy to the massive highlord-crafted gem, the stone would have drained in hours and the airship would no longer fly.

  The highlord and Quinlan strolled down the lane lined with spectators buttressed by the gendarmes. No one actually tried to push past the soldiers, knowing that the powerful sorcerer could, and likely would, swat them away with the brush of her hand.

  “You are a brave man, Inquisitor,” Nahuza said without taking her eyes from the throng of lowborn. “An audacious inquisitor might think of using me to draw out his enemies, but it takes a great deal of courage to confess it openly.”

  “Such is my high regard for both your power and wisdom, Highlord.”

  Nahuza’s lips creased into a wry smile. “Clever too, I see. Rey…you are first-generation highborn?”

  “I am, Highlord.”

  “You have adapted well to your new station. Others new to sorcery have had more difficulty. They most often find themselves working as innervators in the bowels of airships to keep them aloft unless they have a skill for piloting.”

  “My father is a printer, and he encouraged me to read, with a switch to my backside if he thought me faltering in my education. When my talent was discovered, his strict nurturing only increased.”

  “He appears to have done well with you.”

  Quinlan nodded once. “Thank you, Highlord.”

  Nahuza glanced up the lane and saw that they were nearing the edge of the palace grounds where Overlord Alexis and her retinue stood waiting for her arrival along with a host of city officials and several slaves.

  “We are nearly there, Inquisitor. I hope your assassin has not lost his nerve.”

  Quinlan grimaced as he scanned the crowd for daggers waiting to be unsheathed. He was going to feel quite foolish if his preparations were for naught.

  “What is that contraption there? Is that Alexis’ son Auberon atop it?” Nahuza asked, eyeing the scaffolding erected just before the palace gates.

  “It is, Highlord. Sah Auberon has concocted some sort of display, but what it is I cannot fathom. I inquired about it but he was reticent in disclosing details.”

  “He always was an interesting boy. I am sure it will be entertaining.”

  ***

  “Prepare yourself, Jareen, the highlord is nearly upon us,” Auberon said as Nahuza and her personal guard tromped toward them.

  “I am ready on your say, sah,” Jareen replied as he knelt next to the primary fuse with a burning brand in one hand.

  Auberon’s body tingled with a mix of dread and excitement. He wished he had had at least a week to perfect his pyrotechnics. If a canister was packed too loose it would just sputter and spark. Too tight, or if the grains were too small, it could explode. If the fuses were not cut to the proper lengths or their burn rate was off, they could detonate prematurely or fall back to the ground amongst the crowd before exploding. So much hinged on dozens of variables all performing as desired.

  “Now, Jareen!” Auberon ordered.

  Jareen touched the brand to the fuse and watched it hiss and spark. The crawling ember reached a fork in the fuse and multiplied, one traveling onward while the other disappeared inside a tightly rolled paper tube. The powder inside the tube ignited and spun a pinwheel, casting out a glorious shower of sparks. Small rockets lifted off and exploded a hundred feet or so over the crowd with red, green, and orange fiery streamers.

  Auberon shook Jareen’s shoulder as he looked out over his captivated audience. “It’s working, Jareen!”

  ***

  Two more sets of eyes watched for the show to begin with eager anticipation, but for very different reasons.

  Camron peered between a set of bed sheets hanging on a line to dry atop the roof of a building two blocks from where Auberon had constructed his scaffold. “She’s getting near, and it looks like Jareen is about to light up that contraption.”

  Aiden knew all about the presentation Jareen and his master had prepared for Highlord Nahuza’s visit and had positioned his ambush accordingly. With her attention hopefully focused upon the coming spectacle, she would not be prepared to defend against his attack.

  “As soon as she rounds the bend and puts her back to us, take down the sheet,” Aiden ordered.

  The highlord and her retinue turned the corner in the street and began walking away from the two assassins. Camron pulled down the bed sheet obscuring their position. Aiden lined up his shot and held his breath. The highlord had taken only a few steps away from them when Jareen’s contraption began spewing sparks and smoke.

  The group stopped and stared, giving Aiden a stationary target. Nahuza’s guards gave her enough space that he had a clear shot at her back without fear of one of them intercepting his bolt by accident. His eyes shifted to the man standing next to her, and he had to fight the urge to target him instead. He could not let his personal hatred for the man who killed his friends disrupt the plan. It was too great a sacrifice for the sake of his vengeance.

  Aiden braced his feet against the manuballista’s footholds designed to help him steady the weapon. He squeezed the trigger and the weapon bucked despite being bolted to the roof as it released all of its pent-up energy into the solid steel bolt. The shaft’s flight was brief, its trajectory nearly flat even at over a hundred yards. Aiden smiled. Halfway to its target, he knew his aim had been true.

  ***

  “Well, that is certainly unexpected,” Nahuza said as she watched Auberon’s scaffold spew smoke, fire, and sparks like a possessed forge.

  “What in the world could be its purpose?” Quinlan asked.

  “I suppose what we see is its purpose, putting on a display. The lowborn seem to enjoy it.”

  “There is a saying about those who enjoy simple pleasures.”

  “Too right, Inquisitor, but I am interested in its potential. I should like to speak with young Auberon regarding this alchemic creation and what he has in store for it.”

 
“If you see something in it beyond the obnoxious then your foresight is certainly greater than mine, Highlord.”

  Nahuza leaned back when Quinlan’s arm snapped up as if to strike her. Even when the sharp metal rod appeared as if magically conjured and plunged toward her, she looked at it with more confusion and surprise than true alarm.

  Quinlan fought the bolt’s inertia and smiled as he reined it in. “Ah, for a moment, I feared our assassins had lost their nerve. Thankfully, stupidity is the one emotion that most often trumps fear.”

  Nahuza followed the inquisitor’s gaze to a rooftop two blocks away. Pulling energy from the earth and air, she concentrated it into a sphere the size of a man’s head and launched it toward the building. The orb was nearly invisible, having no more substance than the heat waves radiating off hot sand. The orb raced up and over the nearby roofs before streaking down to smite the would-be assassins.

  The arcane globe, seething with pent-up energy, punched through the roof between the two men and unleashed its fury. The building’s entire lower levels blew out in a cloud of dust, debris, and destruction. Without walls and floors to support it, the roof fell in, taking the killers with it.

  “That is the limit of my restraint, Inquisitor. I hope it is sufficient enough for you to complete your duty,” Nahuza said, hiding her righteous anger behind a stony façade.

  Quinlan studied the bolt in his hand and felt a gentle tugging as if it were making a feeble attempt to escape his grasp. “It was a perfectly measured response, Highlord. Thank you.”

  Nahuza’s guard pressed in around her, but she drove them away with a harsh glare before returning her attention to Quinlan. “Shouldn’t you be running off to chase your fugitives?”

  “In my dress uniform? I think not, Highlord. Besides, I want them to scurry back to their den before I cast my net over them. It saves me a great deal of time and effort.”

  Nahuza glanced at the bolt in Quinlan’s hand. “An interesting use of your ward, extending it around the bolt in midflight so that you catch it like a firefly in your hand. Did you think mine was insufficient to protect me?”

  “Not at all, Highlord. I did not want your ward to contaminate any residual aura left on the bolt by the last person to handle it, is all. I am intimately familiar with my own and will have no problem separating it from that of the bolt’s owner.”

  “You have impressed me, Inquisitor Quinlan, and I am not one easily given to praise. I shall say as much to Overlord Alexis and Emperor Arikhan.”

  Quinlan bowed deeply. “I am humbled by your generous praise.”

  Nahuza chuckled under her breath. “I do not think humility is in your nature, but you do a wonderful job of simulating it. Come, the overlord awaits and I am sure she is having a fit just now. When can I expect to speak to these ruffians?”

  “I should have them tonight, tomorrow night at the latest depending upon how quickly they return to their warren.”

  “Excellent. Lead on, Inquisitor.”

  ***

  Aiden’s grim smile fell when the damnable inquisitor’s hand reached out and plucked the bolt from the air just inches from its target. “No, no, no,” he whispered hoarsely.

  Fear welled up inside him like a volcano preparing to erupt. He looked out across the expanse straight into the inquisitor’s eyes, and then the highlord was staring right at him, her hands moving before her. Aiden knew next to nothing about magic, but he was sure this did not bode well for him or Camron.

  “Run!” Aiden shouted.

  Camron turned to make for the hatch leading into the building, but an invisible force tore through the roof and halted both men in their tracks. A split second later, the building beneath their feet exploded. The walls blew outward and the two men scrambled to maintain their footing as the roof sagged and tilted violently as Camron’s end collapsed.

  Aiden dropped to his backside and slid down, grabbed a protrusion, and managed to arrest Camron’s fall by grasping onto his wrist. Camron’s legs dangled over a precipice. The two floors that once separated the basement from the roof were now gone, leaving only an open pit. Aiden swung his friend by the arm as Camron pumped his legs to urge his body into motion. Aiden’s muscles cried out at the big man’s weight, but he held his grip.

  Camron called out a count as he swung. “One, two, three!”

  Both men released their hold on each other’s wrists. Camron arced toward a section of floor still intact thanks to the support beam buttressed against the basement floor. By a stroke of luck, the boards did not collapse beneath him upon landing. Aiden dropped his legs over the ledge, swung his body as best he could, and trusted Camron to catch hold of him before he plummeted past and broke his legs, or suffered an even more grievous injury, upon meeting the basement floor.

  Camron grabbed onto Aiden before he fell and pulled him onto the small platform. The two men leapt the chasm separating their tiny island from the building’s foundation, caught the rock ledge, and pulled themselves up onto the debris-littered street. They ran across the city, down alleyways, and through various buildings until they thought their lungs would burst.

  Velaroth was an enormous city, and neither man stopped running until they collapsed some two miles from the site of their failed assassination. Both men held themselves on trembling hands and knees not far from the towering wall surrounding the city’s outer border. They breathed in bellowing gasps, their throats burning as if the air were some caustic gas.

  “Do you think they followed us?” Camron asked when he was able to control his breathing enough to form words.

  “I—I don’t think so,” Aiden replied. “We need to lay low for a while. All of us. We’ll have to warn the rest to do the same.”

  “When?”

  “Tonight, at the meeting. No one is going to do anything today. Tonight should be fine.”

  CHAPTER 7

  It was late and the sun had set by the time Jareen shuffled through the door. The heavy scent of food in the air indicated that dinner had finished cooking long ago and had been awaiting his arrival for hours. He had not eaten all day and was famished, and yet he had little appetite.

  Auberon had been absolutely apoplectic when he realized there had been an assassination attempt against the highlord and that his experiment may have played a part in providing the distraction. He had ordered Jareen to tear it down and stormed inside the palace to await Highlord Nahuza and his mother’s displeasure. He had not seen or heard from him since, except when he ordered Jareen to go home. Auberon had not even opened the door to his rooms, and ordered him away through the wooden barrier.

  “Jareen, is that you?” Claire asked before stepping into the foyer to meet him.

  Her voice trembled and she wrung her hands in her apron. Jareen noted her ashen face and nervousness.

  “Claire, what is it? What’s wrong? Is Tyler all right?”

  Claire forced a smile and bobbed her head. “He’s fine. He was just tired after supper. I’ve kept the food warm on the stove for you. Go sit down and I will bring you a plate.”

  Jareen strode forward and took his wife by the arm. “Someone tried to murder Highlord Nahuza today.”

  Claire tried to pull away but locked her smile in place. “Yes, I heard. It was all the women at the drying lines gossiped about. Did she really destroy an entire city block?”

  Jareen released her arm. “Just one building.”

  “Have they caught the man yet?”

  “I don’t know. Claire, what is wrong with you?”

  “What? Nothing. I mean, my son is blind and my husband was standing near to where someone tried to murder a highlord who could have killed everyone within a mile in a fit of anger. I suppose that might have me a bit on edge.”

  “Claire,” Jareen said with forced patience, “if Aiden was involved in this—”

  “He wasn’t! He might be a loudmouth and a troublemaker, but he wouldn’t do something so foolish.”

  “If Aiden had something to do with this, th
en you need to take Tyler and flee,” Jareen continued. “If he or any of his rabble-rouser friends are behind the attack, the highlord, gendarmes, and the inquisitor will stop at nothing to find them, and when they do, they will not be the only ones to suffer. You know how highborn justice works!”

  “We will be fine. Even if Aiden was involved, if they can find him, do you really think I could hide from them, me and a blind child?”

  Jareen opened his mouth but was unable to form words.

  “Go sit down, and I will get you your supper.”

  Jareen walked with leaden feet to the dining room and sat at the table. He stared at the walls around him and felt the oppressive weight of their impending collapse. Not just the walls of his home but of his entire world.

  ***

  Aiden peered into the darkness, searching for signs of danger or anything out of place. After half an hour of observation, he left his hiding place in the alley across the street and entered the tavern. Silence fell over the crowd the moment he entered, but talking quickly resumed. Janice jerked her head toward the private room, and he cut through the tables and chairs to his group’s meeting place.

  He breathed a sigh of relief when he found Camron sitting at the table with his friends. The two had split up after fleeing, thinking it safer for the both of them not to be together. Aiden had hidden out in the basement of an abandoned building the group had set up as a sort of safe house. He assumed Camron had done likewise. The group had several such rooms throughout the city.

  “Anybody seen anything unusual?” Aiden asked as he took a seat at the table.

  Gill replied, “Gendarmes are swarming the streets like a kicked anthill. Nothing other than that.”

  Aiden nodded. “That’s to be expected. No one arrested that we know of?”

  “Several, but no one who knows anything,” Tanner answered. “Just your typical catch, interrogate, and release.”

  “We knew that would happen. I hope no one gets too roughed up, but that’s the cost of doing business. I think it goes without saying that we all need to lay low for a while.”