Mageborn

by Stephen Aryan

  “Busy day?” said a familiar voice as she came around the corner. The frown lifted from her face at the sight of Kovac. He looked tired and dusty from the road, but that didn’t stop her pulling him tight against her. He tasted of spicy food from his trip to the north and smelled of horse.

  “Very busy.”

  “Do you have time for a drink?”

  “It’s going to be a late night,” she apologised. “Tomorrow might be better.”

  Kovac seemed to be weighing something up. In the end he shook his head. “No, you should hear this tonight. It can’t wait.”

  “It sounds serious.”

  Again he paused and Tammy knew he was holding something back. Part of her guessed what it was about but she was afraid to ask. “I’m staying at the Golden Harp. Come and find me tonight. It doesn’t matter what time. We can talk then.”

  “If it’s urgent, tell me now.”

  “Not here on the street.” Normally she was the stubborn one but this time Kovac wasn’t budging. She stared at him for a long while, trying to work out what he wasn’t saying, weighing up if she really wanted to know. Reading people was part of her job but it was more difficult with him because she was too close and emotionally involved. There was no way to guess if it was good or bad news. Tammy decided to take the plunge.

  “Let’s go in there,” she said, gesturing at the nearest tavern down the street. They walked in silence to a small and expensive place called the Queen’s Rest. This close to the palace the prices were exorbitant, the clientele consisted of nobles and rich supplicants and the place was spotless. The owner glanced up from behind the bar, frowning when Kovac came in first, his face changing slightly when he saw Tammy’s Guardian uniform.

  “Do you have a room we can borrow for a little while?” she asked, ignoring the glances from other patrons. “Somewhere private.”

  “If you’ll follow me,” said the owner, sniffing at the dirt on Kovac’s boots and the muddy footprints he was leaving on the clean floor. They were led down a short corridor to a private dining room that was elaborately furnished with polished wood on the walls and silver ornaments hanging from the ceiling. Fresh flowers sat in a vase and bright watercolour paintings decorated the walls. Most important of all, it was quiet and private. Tammy shoved some money into the man’s hands, thanked him and closed the door in his face.

  Kovac took off his sword belt and sat, staring down at his hands as he gathered his thoughts. She’d never seen him so pensive before. Tammy sat down opposite. Normally when they were together she felt as if they were a team. She trusted him with her life, but at this moment it was as if he had become a suspect and she the interrogator. The uniform had never come between them. Until now.

  “Start at the beginning,” she said, falling back into old habits. Kovac raised an eyebrow and she tried to relax. “I’m sorry. What happened in Zecorria? Talk to me.”

  “I did as you asked. I kept digging into what happened to your husband. At first no one would talk to me. But after a few drinks, once they realised I wasn’t there about the money, people opened up.”

  Part of her had hoped there wouldn’t be anything to find. That the mystery would remain unsolved and nothing would change. For the most, she was content with her life. Her family was well and her son receiving far more than she was capable of giving him. Her only real regret, the only thing that gnawed at her, was not knowing who had murdered her husband. She both loved and hated mysteries.

  An unsolved mystery niggled at her like a stone in her shoe. But finding the truth, no matter how ugly, was enormously satisfying. It showed her there was a pattern and a reason for everything if you kept digging for answers. Her sister believed there was a higher power at work. For Tammy it fed into her sense of justice. She didn’t believe in waiting for divine intervention to punish the guilty. There was no coincidence or fate, merely patterns waiting to be identified and unravelled.

  At the beginning she had tried to find answers about her husband, but the wound had been too raw, her emotions too wild. She’d broken down a few doors and cracked some heads, but no one had been willing to talk. Eventually she’d learned how to live with it, burying it under years of other memories. But somewhere, deep down inside her, it still waited. The grief. Even now, if she dwelled on it for too long it had the power to bring tears to her eyes.

  Tammy realised there would be no rest without a resolution.

  “Tell me what you found.”

  Kovac nodded. “I will, but tell me something first. Who did you used to work for back in the day?”

  “The head of a crime Family. A man named Don Lowell.”

  “And what did you do for him?”

  She’d never volunteered information about this part of her old life and Kovac had never asked. Just as she’d never questioned him about what he’d done before becoming a mercenary. Once he’d mentioned trusting the wrong man, but had never elaborated on it. Some things were better left buried in the past.

  “I collected debts for him. Sometimes I fought in the pit fights for money, but mostly because I enjoyed it.” The scars on her hands spoke of the punishment she had doled out to her opponents. Some of her nightmares were filled with brutal images of the pain she’d inflicted. At times it was hard for her to recognise who she used to be.

  “I found out that your husband worked for Don Lowell as well, but no one would tell me about his job.”

  “He was good with locks, but mostly he dealt with the money that was collected. Why?”

  “That makes sense,” said Kovac, before taking a deep breath. “I found out who gave the order to have him killed.”

  A tense silence filled the room. Thoughts of her old life, before his murder, began to swim to the surface. Days when she’d been a wife and a mother. Someone with family and roots. It was all gone now, like ash on the wind. That was another person and another life. She needed to cut the final thread that was tethering her and move on.

  “Tell me,” she whispered.

  “Are you sure?”

  “I need to know, Kovac. I’ve been carrying this around inside for too long.”

  “Your husband stole from Dońa Jarrow. I couldn’t get all the details, but I know that it was a lot of money. He was careful but eventually someone talked and she found out.”

  “Why now?” asked Tammy. “Why are people willing to talk about it now but they weren’t years ago?”

  “Because Dońa Jarrow is dead and the money is still missing. No one, except your husband, knew where it was buried. He was murdered before being questioned and his accomplices didn’t know. There have been rumours, but no one ever found it. Dońa Jarrow had people searching for years without success, but now that she’s gone it’s a free-for-all.”

  “I never wanted it to be like this,” she said, slamming her hands on the table. “To find out who was responsible, only for her to be dead.”

  Tammy felt no sense of closure, only seething anger that Dońa Jarrow would never be brought to justice for his murder. She should have told Kovac to leave it alone. This was worse.

  “It wasn’t Dońa Jarrow.” Kovac’s voice was little more than a whisper but she heard it above the pounding of her heart. Her fists uncurled and she looked up at him, torn between wanting to know while fighting the urge to run from the room. Unable to speak she gestured for him to continue. “Dońa Jarrow wanted your husband’s head, but out of decorum she asked Don Lowell first, since Kurne was one of his jackals. Don Lowell gave her permission.”

  Tammy gripped the edges of the table, suddenly feeling sick and dizzy. It was as if the whole world was shaking with her caught in the middle of a violent storm. Her fingers dug into the underside of the table, her knuckles turning white from the pressure. A wail of grief escaped her lips. The lies and the betrayal burned her. Her eyes were full of stinging tears.

  After all these years to find out it was the one person she had trusted from that time. Don Lowell had sworn vehemently to help her find the killer. He
had consoled her during the funeral, which he had paid for, and ordered all of his jackals to find those responsible. They were a family and someone had murdered one of their own. He’d offered a huge reward for any scrap of information and had given her time off to investigate any lead that came up. This had gone on for months and every time she seemed to be getting close to the truth it had ended in bitter disappointment.

  The normally calm Don Lowell had raged at his people, from the low-ranking Paper jackals right up to his Silver and Gold. He’d cursed them all for their repeated failure. All the while, Tammy had stood by his shoulder, believing he was on her side and that they were a family.

  “He swore an oath to my face, by the Blessed Mother and the Maker, that he would find those responsible.” She was beginning to feel numb. “All of it meant nothing. It was all just a game to him.”

  “What will you do?” asked Kovac.

  It was too much. She didn’t know how she felt, never mind what she would do next. “I don’t know. I can’t think right now,” said Tammy getting up, idly noting the marks her hands had left on the table. “People are waiting for me at Unity Hall. I have reports to deliver and there’s so much work to do without the Old Man.”

  Kovac had come around the table without her noticing and she jumped when he gripped her hands. The physical contact brought her back to the present but her mind was still lurching as if she were drunk. “Whatever time you finish tonight, come and find me.”

  “I have to get back to work.” She didn’t want to promise him anything in case she didn’t turn up. He seemed to understand and didn’t push.

  Normally Tammy was in control of her emotions. She could keep them separate until after the event, allowing her to analyse it carefully, but right now she felt muddled. She focused on the task ahead. She had to find out what Munroe had discovered. The work. That was something she could control.

  “I’ll talk to you later,” she said, hurrying out of the door.

  By the time she arrived at Unity Hall Tammy felt more in control but all of it was just under the surface. She knew it wouldn’t take much for it to boil over. As she came down the corridor towards the Old Man’s office she overheard raised voices and an argument.

  The new Rummpoe was unsuccessfully trying to deal with three Guardians at once while a fourth sat off to one side, watching it all unfold with an amused expression. The Guardians were all firing questions at Rummpoe, demanding her attention and that she prioritise their request the next time she contacted the Khevassar. As soon as Tammy entered the outer office Rummpoe looked towards her with a pleading expression, desperate to be rescued.

  “Quiet!” shouted Tammy, letting off a little of the anger inside. “One at a time.”

  “Have you just been to see the Old Man?” asked one of the Guardians, a fastidious man called Krolla. He glanced at the notes she was returning and tried to grab them out of her hand but she was too quick. “Is one of those for me? Did he give you any information for me on my case?”

  “Rummpoe will go through these notes and pass along the information from the Old Man in due course.” Tammy folded her arms and took a deep breath, towering over everyone in the room. “In the meantime, I suggest you try investigating by yourself.”

  Krolla sneered and opened his mouth to reply, but the words died in his throat when he saw her glare. Instead all that emerged was a sour grunt. The other two Guardians shuffled away with offhand apologies to Rummpoe. Once they were gone Tammy turned towards the fourth Guardian who had been quietly chuckling to himself. Guardian Faulk had been on the job for a long time and Tammy knew him to be an accomplished investigator, despite his left eye staring off in a different direction from his right. His appearance was permanently rumpled and his teeth stained black from chewing tarr.

  “Something I can help you with, Guardian Faulk?”

  “No, I was just here to drop off a report. Background information about Torran Habreel’s former colleagues. I thought you might like to read it.” He passed her the report which she flicked through briefly.

  “I’ll take a look at it soon.”

  Faulk shrugged. “The information is a couple of years out of date, so it might be worthless, but it’s a good start.”

  “Thank you.”

  “No problem.” He stood up to leave and then stopped, staring at her expectantly.

  “Is there something else?” asked Tammy.

  “Just one more question,” he said, scratching one side of his stubbly face. “Aren’t you friends with the mage Munroe?”

  “Yes. I was just on my way to speak with her. Why do you ask?”

  “Oh, no reason, but you might have trouble talking to her. She’s being held in one of the black cells under armed guard. Guardian Yedda is in charge.”

  Tammy sighed, dreading to think what might have happened to cause Munroe to be locked up. Yedda was an insufferable pedant from a noble house in Yerskania. He thought it entitled him to order around other Guardians as if he was their superior. “Thank you for the warning.”

  Faulk gave her a little salute as he went out. Tammy dropped off the notes from the Old Man and then went in search of Munroe. The black cells were in the lowest level of Unity Hall and were reserved for the most dangerous and vicious criminals. These were people who were a threat to anyone who came within arm’s reach. Such prisoners were housed alone and all questioning was done with a steel gate in between them and the Guardian.

  The cells were isolated and access meant going through several locked doors that were guarded at all times. No one was allowed down there without express permission from the Khevassar. She knew the Old Man had not given Yedda permission to house anyone in there and that he must have decided by himself to lock Munroe up in one of the cells.

  It took a little persuasion, some bullying and a few hard stares before she finally made it into the cell block. Standing outside Munroe’s cell she found Yedda and four armed members of the Watch, all holding loaded crossbows. As Tammy approached she overheard Yedda asking a series of questions that showed his ignorance about the situation.

  “Who gave you permission to be down here?” he asked Tammy, somehow managing to look down his nose at her despite being significantly shorter.

  “I was about to ask you the same question.”

  He sniffed and ran a hand through his immaculately coiffed blond hair. “In the absence of the Khevassar, I took it upon myself to act as he would regarding this vicious and dangerous criminal.”

  Tammy moved closer until she could look through the bars into the cell. Munroe was sitting on a stone shelf with metal shackles around her wrists and ankles. Thick steel chains connected them to iron rings in the walls. “Hello, Munroe.”

  “Hello, Tammy.”

  “Been getting into trouble?”

  “Oh, you know me,” said Munroe, picking at what looked like dried blood on her trousers. There was more of it on her jacket and shirt. She’d scraped her palms clean but Tammy could see blood under her fingernails. “There’s always something.”

  Yedda had been watching them both but now he turned towards Tammy. “Do you know this criminal?”

  “She’s a friend.”

  “Well, your ‘friend’ is a mage and a murderer.” The pompous ass probably didn’t have any friends, just servants.

  “As I’ve already told you, ten times, the Guardian killed herself.” Somehow, despite the situation, Munroe seemed incredibly calm while Yedda was getting more irate.

  “That’s ridiculous. Guardian Brook would never kill herself.”

  “What happened?” asked Tammy, directing the question at Munroe.

  “That is what I’m trying to establish,” shrieked Yedda. “She killed Guardian Brook and a man named Grell.”

  Tammy ignored him and his tantrum. “Start at the beginning.”

  “As you suggested, I had a little chat with Grell. I was making some progress when Brook came barging in. She said the Old Man had given her orders to take Grell to
the palace for questioning.”

  “That’s a lie. I’ve been with him today and he never gave that order.”

  “You gave her access to a suspect?” asked Yedda, his voice turning shrill again.

  “How do you think she gained access to an interrogation room in the middle of Unity Hall?” asked Tammy.

  “I hadn’t really thought about it,” admitted Yedda. Tammy rolled her eyes and gestured for Munroe to continue.

  “Something was wrong with Brook’s story and she started to get twitchy when I questioned her about it. For some reason she didn’t want Grell talking to me. It was as if she was afraid of what he might say.”

  “Why?” asked Tammy, a second ahead of Yedda.

  “I think she knew him. Or at least, she had something in common with him. She tried to yank him out of the room just after I got a name.” Munroe raised a hand to scratch her face which yanked the chains, startling the armed guards. Two of them raised their crossbows and the others looked at Yedda for guidance.

  “Are they really necessary?” asked Tammy, gesturing at the armed members of the Watch.

  “You haven’t heard what she did,” said Yedda. “Tell her.”

  “When Brook realised I was on to her she panicked. She stabbed Grell and shoved him into me. I heard her calling for help and by then I was covered in his blood.” If Tammy hadn’t spent some time with Munroe even she would have to admit it sounded implausible. “She sent half a dozen Guardians after me and tried to escape.”

  “She viciously attacked them!” said Yedda, waving a finger at Munroe. “Two of them were knocked unconscious and the rest have nasty bruises.”

  “When Brook realised she was trapped, she took her own life rather than be questioned.”

  Yedda scoffed and shook his head. “Ridiculous. Why would you believe her story?”

  Tammy folded her arms and gestured at Munroe. “How, exactly, did you apprehend this dangerous criminal mastermind?”

  Yedda pouted and scratched the side of his head. A wave of doubt moved across his features. “Well, a few of us restrained her.”