by Rachel Aaron
“As you see,” he said, tapping the numbers under his portrait, “my head, dead or alive, is currently worth twenty thousand gold standards. This price is guaranteed by five countries, each of which pledged a little of its hard-earned money to entice men like yourself to try and catch me. Since you’ve made such a fuss over how you can’t pay the whole amount of your ransom at the moment, I’m going to cut you a deal. All you have to do to buy your freedom is top what those countries have offered by pledging your ransom to my bounty. Minus, of course, the five thousand in cash we’ll be taking with us. Still, that means the kingdom of Mellinor will be responsible for the remaining thirty-five thousand only in the unlikely event of my capture. Now,” he said, folding the poster back into a square, “I think that’s more than fair. What do you say, Mr. King?”
The king didn’t have much to say to that, actually. This was either the worst kidnapping in history or the best Council fundraiser he’d ever seen.
“So,” he said slowly, “Mellinor pledges the thirty-five thousand to your bounty, we give you five thousand in cash, and you let me go. But,” he said and paused, desperately trying to find some sense in what was happening, “that will bring your bounty to fifty-five thousand gold standards. It doesn’t make sense at all. You’re a thief! Won’t having a higher bounty make stealing things more difficult?”
“Any thief worth the name can steal,” Eli snorted. “I, however, am not just any thief.” He straightened up. “I’m Eli Monpress, the greatest thief in the world. I’m worth more gold dead than most people will see in two lifetimes, and this is only the beginning.” He leaned down, bringing his eyes level with Henrith’s. “A bounty of fifty-five thousand puts me in the top ten percent of all criminals wanted by the council, but so far as I’m concerned, that’s nothing. Child’s play. One day,” he said, smiling, “I’ll be worth one million gold standards.”
He said it with such gravity that the king couldn’t help himself, he burst out laughing. He laughed until the ropes cut into his skin and his throat was thick with grit from the dirt floor. Eli just watched him convulse, a calm smile on his face.
At last, the king’s laughter receded into gasps and hiccups, and he slumped to the floor with a sigh. “One million ?” he said, chuckling. “Impossible. You could buy the Council itself for that much. You’d have to kidnap every king in the world!”
“If they’re all as easily gotten as you were,” Eli said with a grin, “that won’t be a problem.” He gave the king a pat on the head, like he was a royal puppy, and stood up. He stepped over the sprawled king and crouched down behind him, where the king’s hands were tied.
The king wiggled, trying to get a look at what Eli was doing. But the thief put his boot on the king’s side, keeping him still while he reached down and brushed his fingers over the rope at the king’s hands and ankles. “Thank you very much,” Eli said. “You’ve been most helpful. I think he’s got the point, though, so you can let him go now.”
Henrith was about to ask who he thought he was talking to when the rope at his hands wiggled like a snake. He jumped as the rope untied itself and fell into a neat coil at his side. Eli reached down and picked the rope up, leaving the king slack-jawed on the floor.
“Good-natured rope,” the thief cooed, holding the coils up. “It’s always such a pleasure to work with.”
He left the king gaping in the dirt and went over to a corner where a small pile of leather packs leaned against the wall, well away from the fire. He tucked the rope carefully into the pack on the top and began to dig through the others, looking for something.
Henrith sat up gingerly, squeezing his hands to get the feeling back and trying not to think too hard about what had just happened. By the time he got the blood flowing in his fingers again, Eli was back, this time shoving a pen nib, ink pot, and a sheaf of slightly dirty paper into the king’s hands.
“All right, Your Majesty,” he said, grinning. “If you would write a letter detailing what we talked about, I’ll make sure it gets sent to whoever deals with this sort of thing. Be sure to stipulate that you will not be returned until I see my new wanted poster—that part is key. With any luck, this will all be over in a few days and we’ll never have to see each other again.”
He clapped the king on the shoulder one last time and stood up. “Nico,” he said. “I’m going to find someone who wants to carry a letter. Would you mind watching our guest? I want to make sure he doesn’t get any ideas that might come to a sad conclusion.”
The girl nodded absently, never looking up from the fire. Eli gave the king a final wink before opening the cabin door and walking out into the sunlight. The swordsman, who had long finished skinning his rabbits, picked up his iron sword and followed, leaving the king alone in the small, dark hut with the girl.
Her back was to him, and King Henrith flexed his newly freed hands again. The door was only a few feet away.
“Whatever you’re thinking, I wouldn’t suggest it.”
The sudden edge in her voice nearly made him jump backward. He froze as she turned to look at him. When her brown eyes locked with his, the feeling of oblivion came roaring back. Suddenly, it was very hard to breathe.
“Write your letter,” she said, and turned back to the fire.
He took a shuddering breath and spread the paper out on his knee. With one last look at the girl’s back, he leaned over and began to write his ransom note.
“That was stupid,” Josef said, closing the rickety door behind him.
“Why do you say that?” Eli asked, scanning the treetops. They were standing in the small clearing outside of the forester’s hut that Eli had “repurposed” for this operation. High overhead, sunlight streamed through the treetops while hidden birds called to one another from their branches. Eli whistled back.
Josef scowled, leaning against the small trees that shielded their hut from view. “Why did you put that part in about seeing the poster? This job has dragged on long enough already. We’ll be here forever if we have to wait on Council politics.”
“You’d be surprised how sprightly they can be when there’s a lot of money involved,” Eli said, and whistled again. “The Council gets a percent fee on capture for every bounty posted, and fifty-five thousand is a lot of money, even for them.”
“It wouldn’t be so bad if there was something to do,” Josef said, stabbing his iron sword into the patchy grass at their feet. The battered black blade slid easily into the dirt, as though the hard, rocky ground were loose sand. “There’s no challenge in this country. The city guards were a joke. The palace had no swordsmen, no wizards. I don’t understand why we even bothered to sneak in.”
“A job finally goes smoothly,” Eli said, “and you’re complaining? All we have to do is lounge around for a few days, collect the money, get my new bounty, and we can be on our way.”
“Smooth jobs are boring,” the swordsman grumbled, “and you’re the only one who enjoys lounging.”
“You might like if you tried it,” Eli said.
Josef shook his head and Eli turned back to the leafy canopy, whistling a third time. This time something whistled in answer, and a small falcon swooped down to land on the moss beside him.
“You needed a break anyway,” Eli said, kneeling down. “You’re too tense these days.”
“I’m not tense,” Josef said, pushing himself off the trees with a grunt. “Just bored.”
He yanked his sword out of the ground and walked off into the forest, tossing the enormous blade between his hands as though it were made of paper. Eli watched him leave with a mixed expression, and then, shrugging, he turned back to the falcon and began talking it into taking a message to the castle.
CHAPTER
5
Miranda stood at the center of the empty prison cell, her bare feet resting on a springy bed of new moss that spread out from the moss agate ring lying in the middle of the floor. The heavy door to the cell was open, though it would have been useless even if closed, owing
to the gaping hole in the middle where the wooden boards should have been. The boards themselves lay in disgrace a few feet away, piled against the far wall of the cell.
She could feel the moss humming under her toes as it crept across the stone, feeling for slight changes in the dust. “He’s very light-footed; I’ll give him that,” the moss said. “It feels like he spent most of his time by the door, but”—Miranda got the strange sensation that the moss was frowning—“every spirit here is dead asleep, mistress. If he used any spirits, he was uncommonly quiet about it.”
Miranda nodded thoughtfully. “What about the door?”
“That’s the strangest bit.” The moss crept over the pile of boards, poking them with thousands of tiny rootlings. “The door is sleeping soundest of all.”
“Thief nothing,” Miranda said, rubbing her palms against her temples. “That man is a ghost.”
The cell was only the latest in a long line of failures as night turned to morning. “Well,” she said, “Eli’s not a Spiritualist. Maybe he used something else.”
“Enslavement, you mean?” The moss wiggled with displeasure. “Impossible, mistress. Enslavements happen when the wizard’s will completely dominates the spirit’s until it has no choice but to obey. It’s not a subtle thing. Why, even a momentary enslavement just to open the door would spook every spirit within earshot. They’d be moaning about it forever. But this room is so relaxed even I’m feeling sleepy. If you hadn’t told me otherwise, I would have guessed these idiots hadn’t so much as smelled a wizard in a hundred years.”
“Why do you say that?” Miranda sat down on her heels. “If he didn’t do anything flashy or dangerous, like enslavement, I doubt these rocks would notice a wizard standing right on top of them. Most spirits won’t even wake up enough to talk to a wizard unless we stand around making a racket for a few hours. Remember how long it took me to get your attention, Alliana?”
Alliana ruffled her green fuzz. “Spirits might not always respond, but we always notice a wizard. You’re very distracting.”
“You mean we’re loud and obnoxious,” Miranda said. “But then why did no one notice Eli?”
“Sometimes, spirits choose not to notice,” the moss said wistfully. “There are some wizards it’s better not to look at.”
“What do you mean?” Miranda leaned closer to the moss’s fluffy green surface. “Is Eli one of those?”
“I wouldn’t know,” Alliana said with a huff. “I’ve never seen him.”
“Then what—”
“It’s no use asking any more questions, mistress,” the moss said. “I can’t say it any clearer. It really is too bad you humans are spirit blind. It’s so hard to explain things like this when you can’t see what I’m talking about.”
Miranda blew the hair out of her face with an exasperated huff. Spirits were eternally complaining about the human inability to the see the spirit world, as if humans chose to be blind out of sheer stubbornness. As always, she tried to remind herself that it was very hard on spirits. All humans had the innate ability to control the spirits around them, though only born wizards could actually hear the spirits’ voices, and thus actually use their power. But this power came with a price, for, wizard or not, no human could see as the spirits saw. It was as if the whole race lacked a vital sense, and this lack was a source of endless frustration for both sides. It wasn’t that Miranda didn’t appreciate the difficulty. She did, really. For Alliana to explain how a wizard was distracting would be like Miranda trying to describe the color red to a blind person. Even so, it was impossibly frustrating when, every time she got a little closer to finally understanding, the spirit would pull the whole “Well, you can’t see, so I can’t explain” cop-out. Her spirits might serve her willingly, but sometimes she got the feeling she didn’t really understand them at all.
“Let’s move on,” she said. “Go ahead and wake up the door. You said Eli spent all his time beside it. If he’s as powerful as Master Banage seems to think he is, the wood should have noticed something.”
The wood was not cooperative. First, it took thirty minutes of Alliana’s poking to wake it up. Then, as soon as the wood recognized the moss as a wizard-bound spirit, it shut itself down in protest. Even after some direct threats from Miranda herself, the most she could get out of it was that Eli had been a nice and helpful human, with a strong implication that she was not. After that, the door buried itself in a sound sleep and nothing Alliana did could wake it.
Miranda threw herself down on the cell’s narrow bench with a frustrated sigh and began to tug her socks back on. She still didn’t know how Eli had escaped, but at least the door had mentioned him. Her attempts in the throne room had been a disaster. The officials had trailed her every step, muttering suspiciously, while the spirits remained sleepy, distant, and decidedly unhelpful. Ten hours wasted, altogether, and nothing but frustration and an attack on her personality to show for it. It was enough to make her spit.
She called Alliana and the circle of bright green moss began to shrink, returning to the moss agate ring that lay on the floor. When the moss was completely gone, Miranda bent down and picked the ring up. She ran her fingertips lovingly over the smooth stone, soothing the moss spirit into a light sleep. When Alliana was quiet, Miranda slipped the ring back onto its home on her right pinky finger.
“What are you doing now?” a perky voice behind her asked. “Did you find anything?”
Miranda’s smile vanished. She’d almost forgotten about the girl.
Of course, Mellinor, a country that had built a long and proud tradition out of hating wizards, wasn’t about to let one roam around alone. When it became clear they couldn’t follow her all night, the masters of Mellinor had insisted on providing a “guide” who stayed with her at all times “for her convenience.” Unfortunately, because of that long and proud tradition of hating wizards, volunteers for the position of wizard watcher had been scarce. Finally, the masters had given the job to the only person who actually seemed to want it, an overly inquisitive junior librarian named Marion.
Marion peered through the doorway, her round face beaming. “Are you done growing moss?”
“In a manner, yes.” Miranda leaned back against the cool stone.
The girl poked around the cell, growing more excited by the moment. “Amazing! The moss is gone! Was that a spell?”
Miranda rolled her eyes. A spell? No one had talked about magic in terms of spells since before the first Spirit Court. “The moss was my servant spirit,” she said, and she held up her hand, waggling her fingers so the rings glittered in the torchlight. “She was very helpful, but, unfortunately, we’re no closer to finding where Eli took the king. I’d like to try—”
“Did the spirit cast a spell?” The girl looked hopeful.
Miranda pressed her palm hard against her forehead. “Marion, this would go more smoothly if you wouldn’t ask questions.”
The girl’s face fell, and Miranda immediately felt awful. Fabulous effort at making a good impression, she thought. The one person in the whole kingdom who doesn’t think you’re the living incarnation of all that’s wrong in the world, and you yell at her.
“Look, Marion,” Miranda said gently, “how much do you know about wizards?”
“Not much, really,” Marion said sheepishly, tugging at her long, formless tunic dress, which Miranda had come to recognize as the Mellinorian librarian uniform. “All the books about wizards were destroyed generations ago.” She reached furtively into one of her cavernous side pockets and pulled out a slim leather book. “This was all I could find. I’ve practically memorized it.”
The book looked ancient. Its leather cover was cracked and worn and missing chunks in several places. Miranda took it gently and stifled a groan when she read the title, Morticime Kant’s A Wizarde’s Travels. Of course, the one book the Mellinorian purge missed would be the most ostentatious, misinformed plague on wizardry that had ever stained a page. If you wanted someone to get the wrong idea about m
agic, this was the book you would give them.
Out of morbid curiosity, she flipped it open to a random page and started reading a section labeled “On the Dress and Manner of Wizardes.”
“A wizarde is easily separated from his fellow men owing to the Presence of his Person. Often he will carry the Fragrance of Old Magic, gained from his years over the cauldron brewing his fearsome Magical Potions. If you do not wish to step close enough to determine his odor (for doing so may put you in his thrall, beware!) you may determine his demeanor from a safe distance, for all wizardes wear, by oath, the marks of their Station, namely the ever present flowing Robes of State, the flashing Rings of Enchantment, and the long-pointed, elegant cap of a Master of Magicks. Further more—”
Miranda snapped the book shut in disgust. Whoever had purged the library had probably left it on purpose.
“Well,” she said, handing the book back, “that explains much.”
The girl cringed at the scorn her voice, and lowered her head until the thick woolen veil that covered her blonde hair slid down to hide her face as well. “I did not mean to offend, lady wizard.”
“Spiritualist,” Miranda corrected gently. The girl peeked at her quizzically, and Miranda tried again. “Let me explain. Wizards don’t do magic—at least, not like the book describes it. What Kant calls ‘magicks’ are actually spirits. The world we live in is made of spirits. Mountains, trees, water, even the stones in the wall or the bench I’m sitting on”—she rapped the wood with her knuckles—“they each have their own souls, just as humans do. The word ‘wizard’ is just a catchall name for a person who can hear those spirits’ voices. Now, it’s possible for anyone to hear the spirits if they are seriously injured or dying. Death brings us as close as humans can get to the spirit world. What makes a wizard different is that wizards hear spirits all the time, even if they don’t want to. But a wizard’s real power is not just hearing the spirits, it’s control. Wizards can exert their will over the spirits around them and, if the wizard’s will is strong enough, control them. Though, of course, this control must always be used responsibly and only with the spirit’s consent.”