Between Their Worlds

by Barb; J. C. Hendee

  Four sages stood before him, two wearing brown robes and the other pair in the midnight blue of metaologers. They were not gathered as a group but spread in an arc, all facing him. One brown-robed sage was a small, pretty woman. Chane had never spoken to her, but through Wynn he knew who she was. Ginjeriè was the youngest sage ever in the Order of Naturology to be appointed as a domin.

  “Please stay where you are,” she told him, and the two metaologers stepped forward.

  They were waiting for him. How had they known he was coming? Had someone seen him go inside?

  “Is there a problem?” Hawes’s voice sounded behind him.

  Chane glanced back and found her standing outside the door he had just exited.

  “No, Premin,” Ginjeriè said, bowing her head slightly. “Premin Sykion wishes to speak with this man. We were sent to bring him.”

  Chane wanted to wince. The Premin Council knew he had returned, and he was being called before them, likely to give his own account of the long journey south with Wynn. Both he and Wynn had expected them to corner her first, though not quite in the way it had been done. The situation had suddenly changed again. Perhaps in questioning him first, they thought to gain something to trip her up.

  Chane glanced back at the other four sages.

  Could he refuse to go? Unless he had broken a law, the council had no legal hold over him. But he guessed that the council had not been adhering to the law of late, and the fact that two of the four sages were metaologers struck him as suspicious.

  He would avoid hurting a sage for almost any reason; he had self-sworn this upon returning tonight and while waiting for Wynn. Flawed as the guild might be, those who lived, worked, and studied here were still far above the common cattle of mortals.

  Yet he still carried the scroll.

  That meant everything to what Wynn saw for the future. He could not allow himself to be hauled before the Premin Council, or, worse, to be locked inside a room by Hawes’s potent thaumaturgy. He knew firsthand what she was capable of.

  Chane tensed as the two metaologers took another step, and he heard Hawes approaching from behind.

  Wynn waited in her room for Dorian to return with Shade, but sitting still grew too much for her. She began taking stock of her belongings, wondering what to hide should the council decide to confiscate anything. Not that she had many places to hide something in this little room.

  She’d already passed the content of all her old journals to Shade via memory-speak and then burned them. Memory-speak was as easy as talking for Shade, and she never forgot anything once it was soundly lodged in her understanding. She was the perfect vessel for secrets that no one could open, even if someone ever figured out that she held them.

  Wynn’s one remaining journal contained only convoluted encryptions of a few key notes to help her as needed. Even sages fluent in the Begaine syllabary would need a long time to decipher it. But there were other items here that Wynn feared losing.

  In the far corner beyond the door, a long staff leaned against the wall. Its upper end was covered in a leather sheath a half foot long and bound in place by a cinched cord, making it easy to pull free in an instant. Beneath the covering was a crystal like no other, for unlike those used in cold lamps, this one produced a light like the sun.

  The sun crystal was all Wynn had besides her knowledge and wits in facing the undead. But, really, where could she possibly hide a staff in this little, sparsely furnished room? Even if she did, any search would uncover it quickly enough.

  “Please stay where you are.”

  Wynn froze as she heard those words in the courtyard outside. Surely it had nothing to do with Chane. Plenty of time had passed—enough that he could’ve twice over reached the library’s window and the keep’s back wall. She rushed to her window and peered out, and her breath caught at the sight below.

  Down in the courtyard, Chane faced four sages, with Premin Hawes coming up behind him. One of the sages was Domin Ginjeriè, a gentle young woman who most often tended to the initiates. Ginjeriè said something but spoke too softly for the words to reach Wynn. What was Chane doing still inside the courtyard? And why had Ginjeriè intercepted him . . . with others present?

  The two metaologers took another slow step, not toward Chane but to either side of him. Wynn’s small fingers pressed against the sill’s stone as she realized they were going to try to take Chane. And if he fought back . . .

  Premin Hawes waved one hand in a sweep, and both metaologers halted. Ginjeriè took a half step, but Hawes cocked her head slightly, uttering something that made Chane spin around toward her. Ginjeriè appeared to hesitate and then bowed her head. Wynn couldn’t hear anything that was said, but the young domin of Naturology turned away with the other sage dressed in brown. Both headed toward the keep’s main doors.

  Reduction in the numbers around Chane didn’t relieve Wynn—quite the opposite. Premin Hawes had dismissed everyone but the metaologers. Whatever was happening, it wasn’t good. Was Hawes up to something she didn’t want anyone but her own order to know about? Or did she simply wish to . . .

  Wynn whirled around, looking about her room for any options. Metaologers were certainly not defenseless, though they rarely displayed abilities in plain sight. Chane was facing only three, but Hawes was worth a dozen of them. The last time Wynn had been called before the council, Hawes had driven and shut out Chane with barely two gestures.

  Chane could be in serious danger.

  About to run for her door and try to get to the courtyard, Wynn glanced out the window again. Movement near the keep’s main doors caught her eye.

  Shade came trotting out as a frustrated Dorian held the door, and then he rushed after her. Both of them halted when they spotted the others in the courtyard. Wynn hesitated, as well, in watching.

  Leesil crouched in an alley’s mouth across the road that looped around the guild’s grounds. Magiere and Chap were close behind him. From his vantage point, he studied the keep’s front in wondering how they were going to help Wynn—if Wynn was in any real danger.

  His stomach growled and he tried to ignore it. Chap was probably hungrier than he, as none of them had eaten since breakfast. In their haste to reach the city and Wynn, they’d pressed hard, expecting to find food, beds, and even a bath waiting for them. None of that had been forthcoming.

  At present, they had no lodgings at all. In addition to the travel chest, they were still carrying their packs, and Leesil didn’t care to be so weighed down amid a possible crisis. He twisted about in his crouch, but Magiere now stood above him, her gaze wandering over the keep in the dark.

  “Magiere . . .” he began, lost as to how to best suggest the obvious. “Maybe we should—”

  The sound of multiple hooves on cobble cut him off, and Chap quickly shoved in beside him as they both peered up the road.

  Five riders appeared from out of the mainway that led directly into the city, and they were heading toward the bailey gate. All wore red tabards and swords. The leader rode a white horse. Likely they were armored, though Leesil couldn’t be certain from a distance.

  “Constabulary?” Magiere whispered, echoing his own silent question.

  Leesil didn’t think so, not by their uniforms and mounts. Those were too military for civilian constables.

  “Something else,” he answered.

  Perhaps they were a special unit attached to the city or the rulers here. But again, why had they shown up at the sages’ castle in the middle of the night? This place was filling up with too many things they didn’t understand, and it was no place to go snooping about until they did.

  Leesil glanced back along the cutway. He gestured to the main road, away from the bailey gate toward where the castle road’s southern corner met a side street. A faded sign in dim lamp light read LEAFUL STREET. At least he’d learned enough Numanese to read it.

  When he slipped out, heading toward it along the near side of the looping road, Magiere and Chap followed without a word. Wh
en they reached the meeting of that side street, Chap slipped ahead, but Magiere grabbed Leesil’s arm and jerked him around.

  “Wait. Where are we going?” she whispered. “I thought you were just moving us farther back.”

  He didn’t pull away but kept his voice firm. “To find an inn. We need food, a place to store our gear, and time to figure this out.”

  “We’re not done here. We should at least check all sides and get the lay of it.”

  “That wasn’t just some local constabulary,” he argued, and he looked back at Chap, who waited for them. “Did you pick up any memories, especially from the leader on the white horse?”

  Chap studied them both, and finally huffed once. Leesil’s mind instantly flashed to numerous memories. Chap could show Leesil only his own memories, so at first he wasn’t certain of their meaning as an answer to his question.

  First came an image of a tall young man in Voldran armor. He rushed out of a city gate with his men to defend peasants fleeing for the city across the border in the Warlands, Leesil’s birthplace. The second memory, farther back in time, was more to the point.

  Over a chain vestment, a tall, beefy, bulky man wore a white surcoat emblazoned with two sea hawks, the royal crest of Belaski, far across the world. Upon the table sat his helmet, which had three ridges, the center one rising from a nose guard and decorated with a plume of feathers. With a blunt nose and a mass of dark brown curls that hung from his head, he had eyed Magiere a little too affably for Leesil’s taste.

  It was Captain Chetnik of the city guard in Bela.

  Leesil scoffed and turned to Magiere. “Chap thinks they’re military, a contingent for the city’s safety and law enforcement . . . like Chetnik, back in Bela.”

  Another memory rose in Leesil’s head. He saw Wynn . . . and then the rider on the white horse. Leesil looked back to Chap.

  “That one knows Wynn?” he asked in surprise. “The one on the white horse was remembering her?”

  Chap huffed once again for “yes.”

  Magiere released Leesil and stared up the road toward the bailey gate. That was enough for Leesil, and he reached for her arm. She jerked it away at the first touch of his fingers.

  “Did his memories seem threatening . . . angry?” she asked without turning.

  Again, Chap hesitated, but he huffed twice for “no.”

  Although relieved, Leesil wondered about Chap’s pause. Was Chap just saying this to keep Magiere in check? Leesil waited, but Chap raised no more memories for him. Then the loud, creaking sound of the rising portcullis carried down the street, suggesting the contingent was being allowed inside.

  “This is more than we can deal with,” Leesil said, and stepped in close at Magiere’s side. “We won’t figure it out by skulking here in the dark.” He carefully gripped her hand. “We need to find lodgings, stow our gear, eat something . . . and talk in private.”

  Magiere still gazed up the road toward the gatehouse, but then dropped her head with an exhalation. She didn’t argue again.

  Leesil looked to Chap for support. “Agreed?

  Chap immediately huffed once and wheeled to head off down Leaful Street.

  When Leesil pulled on Magiere’s hand, she resisted slightly before giving in.

  Chane stood flanked by two metaologers as Premin Hawes stepped wide around him.

  She gestured once at her subordinates with a flip of her hand. Both halted their creeping, watchful approach and sidestepped toward each other. All three stood directly in front of Chane, but this made him more wary, not less, than when they had tried to flank him. It was more disturbing than when Hawes had dismissed those two naturologists, leaving him alone with only metaologers. And Hawes now stood in his way.

  “Premin,” he rasped carefully. “I have no wish to speak with the council. I am only a guest here, and as I told you, I am off to seek lodgings elsewhere.”

  Her hazel eyes did not blink. “If the council wishes to speak with you, it would be best for you to come with us.”

  Chane caught the underlying threat in her words. She had dealt with him once before and with little effort on her part. That she stood just barely beyond a weapon’s reach, so poised and calm, truly unnerved him.

  He gauged the distance of the sage off to her left. If this came down to violence, he would have to put all three of them down very fast. Of the three, he would have to disable Hawes first. The other two might be dangerous enough, but not like her. And his own skills in conjury, mostly by ritual, were paltry and slow compared to what he had seen of her thaumaturgy by spellcraft.

  A movement off to the left caught Chane’s eye.

  Shade trotted out of the keep’s main doors and stopped at the sight of him. The guardian sage behind her did the same. That was all Chane needed—another unknown metaologer. Shade’s head shifted suddenly, and she stared in turn at the two sages flanking Hawes. Her jowls pulled back once in a quick, silent snarl.

  Chane did not know what worried him more: that Shade might assault a sage or that she had a reason to do so beyond what he could speculate. Had she seen something surface from the sages’ memories? He must be in greater danger than he realized.

  Shade’s hackles began to rise as she turned her full attention on Premin Hawes, but the other sage behind the dog crept closer and raised a hand in the air.

  “Premin!” that one called out in warning.

  Chane’s hand dropped to his sword hilt.

  “Open up!” someone else shouted.

  The sharp command echoed out of the gatehouse tunnel and was followed by the clanking of the chains and gears for the outer portcullis. Both Chane and Hawes quickly glanced down the tunnel.

  This was Chane’s only chance. He tried to think of a way to signal Shade, to tell her what he would do, and hopefully she would do nothing to make things worse.

  Without warning, Shade shot forward, leaving her escort behind as she rushed the sage on Hawes’s right.

  Chane bolted for the gatehouse tunnel, pulling his dwarven longsword. He focused all his effort on speed as he breached the tunnel’s mouth, his eyes on the rising portcullis.

  “Captain!” Hawes shouted from behind him. “Watch out!”

  In the instant it took for those words to sink in, Chane saw something between the portcullis’s upright beams. He caught a glimpse of men in red tabards on horseback, and the lead horse was pure white.

  There were mounted Shyldfälches, city guards, on the other side of the rising portcullis.

  Wynn gasped, her feet seemingly stuck, as Shade charged a metaologer and Dorian lunged after the dog. Premin Hawes turned toward the disturbance, and then Chane broke away, racing into the gatehouse tunnel. Wynn heard the premin’s sharp shout of warning.

  Captain Rodian had come, and Wynn came to her senses. She ran out her door, down the passage to its end stairs, pushing herself to reach the courtyard before anyone went after Chane.

  Chane was almost to the portcullis when he spotted the boots of three guards hitting the ground as they slid off their horses. There was no choice but to fight, and there were too many in his way to be careful about it.

  Shade suddenly bolted past him, barking and snarling.

  Chane almost stalled as she charged under the rising portcullis, snapping savagely at the white horse’s legs as she passed. There was no time for him to consider how she had gotten away from those sages or why she had not stayed behind for Wynn.

  He ducked his head, lunged under the rising portcullis beams, and found himself face-to-face with the white horse. It was stomping and sidestepping after Shade’s passing, and atop the mare sat Captain Rodian.

  “You!” Rodian shouted at the sight of Chane.

  Shade’s snarls and the shouting of the other guards seemed to come from all around. Behind Rodian was a bald city guard, still mounted. All that Chane could think of was to put the captain off before the others overwhelmed Shade.

  Chane lashed out and punched the captain’s horse in the face.
/>
  Wynn flew out the barracks door into the courtyard, and the eyes of all four metaologers turned to her. She made a dash for the gatehouse tunnel, but barely halfway there, something jerked hard on the back of her downed cowl. The cowl’s base cinched against her throat, choking her as she flailed to a stop.

  Even as she gagged, struggling to pull free, the grip on her cowl was released as someone tried to grab her more solidly from behind. Light-headed and panicked, Wynn reacted without thinking.

  She stomped back, trying to hit her assailant’s foot, and missed. Her sudden rearward shift backed her up against someone tall. She twisted hard as the grip latched onto her cowl again.

  Wynn wildly lashed back and upward with her little fist. It collided with someone’s face, and her hand went numb in a shock of pain.