by Ted Neill
He changed quickly, his clothes stale from the night before. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes, locked his chamber door behind him, then ran the length of the corridor to the assembly room. He let out a sigh of relief as he slipped in through the side door, smoothing down his doublet, and saw that the room was empty. His advisors, including Felix, were still outside the main doors, which parted and opened just as he sat down in his oversized throne.
It was a large crowd that filed in, Gregor noting Felix last, studying his face more than the others for any sign of surprise. It was difficult for there were strangers present, traders it appeared, seeking an audience. A glance at the southern window of the hall revealed to him a ship’s mast that had not been there the day before. Felix was conversing with a tall man with a blond beard and mustache who wore a long sword and an extravagant leather greatcoat. Gregor was not sure if he imagined it or not, but Felix’s eyebrows arched with the slightest hint of surprise. It was fleeting, however, and his chief advisor easily fell into the routine of ceremony.
“Oh great Twiceborn Lord Lachnor, he who hath conquered death to lead our order. Our shores are graced with the presence of merchants this morning, who offer to do business that might add to our ranks of labor.”
Gregor did his best to hide behind a mask of inscrutability, studying the flesh trader and the two specimens he pulled forth on a chain. Both slaves held their heads stiffly with the forced posture of the iron thrall collars around their necks. One was a man with lank hair down to his collar, a scar on his jaw, and the tip of a tattoo showing just below his neck. Next to him, a woman was chained, her hair in tight braids, her skin the comely color of tea with cream. Gregor had heard of dark-skinned people from southern climes but never had he seen one with his own eyes or anticipated such beauty.
“The man looks to be from good stock but what do I want with a woman, the kitchens are staffed.”
“Perhaps as a personal servant?” Felix suggested. “To replace your manservant who seems to be missing . . . .”
By the look of her stature, her toned muscles, and the hardened expression on her face, Gregor imagined he would end up dead by her hand before the sun rose the next morning.
Perhaps that is just what you want, Felix.
“My manservant does not need replacing. He is busy with other duties this morning.”
Felix’s face showed no emotion.
“I’m sure she can be of some sort of service,” the flesh trader said. His was a broad, northern accent. Gregor feigned contempt and turned to Felix.
“Who is this stranger who addresses me without introduction or title?”
“Apologies,” the flesh trader said, casting his bright blue eyes to the floor as he took a knee. He yanked on the chain so that the two slaves did the same. “My name is Twenge, Victor, Twenge.”
Chapter 14
Unraveling
The prices for the slaves were more than reasonable. Twenge intimated that they could be a fractious lot, but Felix urged Gregor to approve the deal, reminding him that the castle could use more servants and they certainly had the power to put down any further uprisings.
The cooks prepared a noon banquet to close the deal. Twenge and his first mate, a man a size too small for his own greatcoat, accompanied him to the table but said nothing. The first mate’s face was too kind for a slaver, and he spent most of the meal picking at his food and running his hand through his hair, allowing Twenge to carry forward the conversation. The flesh trader told stories of turning tribes against one another so that they would sell their enemies for weapons, even trinkets. Felix leaned close, taken with the business, or perhaps it was just his sycophantic nature—Gregor was unsure how to read his chief advisor any longer.
“And the business turns a healthy profit?” Felix asked as Twenge took a drink from his goblet.
“It can,” Twenge said, setting down his drink and twisting a chicken leg free from its carcass. “But it takes a fast ship, a firm hand, and a bit of luck to outsmart the High Council’s enforcers.”
“We have our own ways of dealing with them,” Felix said, tipping his own goblet to his lips. Felix was right, of course. The Servior could be formidable merchants in such a dark trade. Something about the notion roiled the contents of Gregor’s stomach just as a novice served him a roast of lamb.
“Maybe I could return at some point and we could discuss further arrangements,” Twenge said, covering his goblet with his hand to defer more wine offered from another young novice. Gregor noticed his own advisors were not exercising the same restraint. Their faces were flushed and their voices grew loud. He imagined they would be cancelling their classes that afternoon.
“That could be mutually beneficial to all parties involved,” Felix said, raising his goblet in a toast.
Gregor stared down at his food. He had barely touched it and he only drank from the pitcher of water on the table, the same pitcher available to everyone seated. He pushed back from the table. “If you will excuse me, I must prepare for my rounds with the novices.”
“Of course,” Twenge said, standing and offering a shallow bow. Gregor’s advisors were too drunk to notice he was leaving, but Felix did, nodding at him over his blood red wine.
“Shall I send a novice to attend to you in your chambers?” he asked. “In case your manservant is still, occupied?”
Gregor paused. “The north wing remains my sanctuary. I prefer it that way.”
“Of course, I just thought if he is so busy, you might need another.”
“One is sufficient,” Gregor said, his pulse beating in his temples. He swept up his doublet from the back of his chair, using the time to don the coat as an opportunity to think of a further response. “He is quite, indispensable.”
Felix let out a peel of laughter. “I’m sure our friend Victor Twenge here would disagree. After all, every slave is expendable, are they not?”
“Absolutely,” Twenge said, his voice ringing out over the din of the drunk advisors.
Gregor gave his own shallow bow. “Good day, then.”
He walked at a brisk pace back to the north wing, running down the last corridor to his chamber door. When he had opened it, he found Haille pale, but sitting up, wrapped in a blanket. Gregor offered him a heel of bread he had swiped from the banquet table. Haille ate it slowly, then asked, “I don’t suppose you have any water?”
Gregor shook his head, searching the chamber for a container that might not have been compromised, but came up with nothing. It was too late. Haille began to wretch and vomited up the bread—soggy with bile—into the chamber pot.
“Sorry,” Gregor said. “I’ll try to find something when I make my rounds this afternoon. I’ll take a flask from a novice or something.”
Haille winced and leaned back into the bed. “The fact that I’m still alive feels like some sort of progress.”
“It is. I think the worst has passed. Wish I knew which spell it was that worked. I really just tried everything in the books. It would be good to know the enchantment to cure apple thorn poisoning.”
Haille grinned before his laugh turned into a cough.
Gregor kept to his scheduled activities, supervising the novices in their studies and trials that afternoon. He saw things he had never noted before: the competitive nature of the students, their petty rivalries, the contempt they bore for each other, outdone only by their contempt for outsiders, outdone once more by their eagerness to impress Gregor. These were the breeds that the Servior attracted and nurtured, a nest of vipers, full of deceit, bereft of friendship.
And what will they do to me when they realize I am an impostor?
They needed to escape, but how still eluded him. With the other advisors and instructors sleeping off their wine from the banquet, Gregor dismissed his own students early and returned to his chambers. Haille was sleeping again. Gregor settled into his reading chair, realizing just how weary he felt as well.
He woke after moonrise. A frigid wind was blowing in
from the open window and when he went to close the shutters, he could see the ghostly outline of the breakers roaring on the rocks below. The sea was restless. Lightning veined the clouds on the horizon and stray drops of rain struck the windowsill like pebbles.
The hair on the back of Gregor’s neck stood on end and his temples tingled in a familiar way.
He was not alone.
He turned. The room was dark, except for the pulsing of lightning. Illuminated in the brief flashes, he could see the outline of a tall cloaked figure standing over the bed where Haille shook and murmured in a fever dream. The cloak rustled, the dried flesh creaked, dust scattering on the floor, and the narrow blue eyes turned on Gregor. In the darkness he could even see the cold orb of the moonstone set in the collar around the revenant’s neck. Its light trembled with rage.
“Master, you have returned,” Gregor said, dropping to his knee.
“What is this?” the voice hissed like the wind tapping at the shutters, like a spray of foam smashed on the rocks below from the rising waves.
“This is my manservant, poisoned by—”
“Kill him.”
Gregor’s voice caught in his throat. He moved his mouth but no sound came. His ears rang in the wordless pause that lengthened between them. Finally, he managed a weak, “Why, my Master?”
“You dare question my imperatives?”
“Only because he is my only ally in the castle, in the whole of the island. Sire, the enterprise unravels, Felix knows I am a fraud. He knows the order has been fooled.”
The figure of death stepped towards him, the corpse breathing out an odor of rot. “I have given you the tools to protect yourself. How many novices are loyal to you?”
“I have no way of knowing.”
“Then what have you been doing?” the voice asked, the edge sharp.
Making a friend. Something you never gave me.
“Practicing my craft, sire.”
“You are lying. What are you hiding from me?”
The revenant stepped even closer and took the edge of Gregor’s doublet in his fist. The scent of putrefaction was overwhelming. Gregor thought he would gag but before his master could ask anything further, they both turned at the sound of feet approaching the door. No sooner did the bell in the courtyard begin to peal. The door shook with pounding and Felix’s voice came from the other side.
“My Lord, forgive my intrusion but a dire situation arises.”
The revenant dropped him. Gregor scrambled in the darkness, taking in gulps of fresher air as he moved to the door, turned the lock, and swung it open.
Felix waited on the far side, a lantern swinging from his hand, his face glistening with a sheen of sweat, his eyes wide and peering into the darkness over Gregor’s shoulder where he beheld the eyes of the revenant. He turned back to Gregor.
“My Lord, it is another revolt. The slaves, the new ones, and the old ones, they have somehow escaped from their cells.”
Gregor, even if moments before he had been groveling, composed himself back into his role of commander and lord. He straightened his collar, snapped his fingers, and at once the candles in the room took light. The wide shoulders, long limbs, and the taut face of death were even more horrifying in the light than the darkness. The corpse moved its arm and replaced its hood, then waited for Gregor’s command.
“See to the rabble,” Gregor said with as dismissive an air as he could muster. The revenant, playing the role of servant once again, stepped forward. Gregor could sense his hesitancy. Had his master not told him that Gregor himself was to handle the next uprising lest he lose face with the Servior? But now he had caught even his master in a bind, for he could not pretend to be disobedient before Felix. The revenant swept across the room and into the hallway, snapping at his cloak as he passed by Felix.
Haille was sitting up, blinking, taking in the scene with a confused look on his face. He still leaned heavily to the side, one hand sinking into the mattress for support. The wind was blowing through another open window and drawing the curtains outside, so Gregor moved to snap the frame shut. When he turned, he saw Felix closing the door on the receding shape of the revenant. The advisor placed his palm flat on the door as it clicked into place and then he turned the key in the lock, removed it, and dropped it in the pocket of his jacket.
“We are alone at last.”
Gregor took in the room, the furniture: desk, reading chair, wardrobe, bedside table, chamber pot, a rack of firewood, and a fire poker—reading out his avenues of movement, escape, and attack. It was his own room, his most private sanctum, but something had shifted. He felt like a fighter in an arena. He could only hope Haille also sensed their danger.
“Felix,” Gregor said, adding as much steel to his voice as possible. “I shall send you to supervise the novices until the insurrection is put down.”
He had dropped his voice into his lowest register, so perhaps the tone of authority would overcome the tension he felt in his shoulders, the fluttering in his stomach, and the tremor in his hands. When Felix did not leave or respond but instead crossed his arms and set his feet shoulder-width apart, Gregor did his best to muster impatience.
“What are you waiting for?”
“How long will you continue this charade?” Felix said, his voice flat and nasal, his lip curling.
Haille slipped off the bed, sliding into his boots. Gregor moved away from him, remembering what Haille had taught him of physical combat and outflanking an opponent. Gregor knew he had to place himself and Haille in the periphery of Felix’s vision.
Force him to divide his attention.
“What charade is this?” Gregor asked, stalling.
“You should have been able to cure this manservant quickly, a man of your power, your experience, your age. A slight poisoning should be nothing to a man who has conquered death to be reincarnated.”
“I said I wished for you to supervise the novices, Felix. Why have you not complied?”
“Make me.”
The enterprise unravels.
Gregor’s gaze fell on the locked door. In his mind’s eye he pictured the revenant growing more and more distant. He was not without his own resources, he reminded himself, flexing his fingers, his knuckles cracking. He pushed his sleeves up his forearms.
“What is your game, Felix?”
“The game is all yours, boy. I knew Gregor Lachnor. I served him and you are not he.”
“Careful how you speak to me.”
Felix barked out a laugh. “When will you quit, boy. You are an imposter. The Servior need a real ruler.”
Gregor had heard enough. He flung out his arm and cast a spell to incapacitate Felix, light arching from his fingers across the room his hand hot with the flow of power. But the bolt stopped short of Felix, as if hitting a shell of glass.
“You think I have not prepared my defenses against you? The true Gregor Lachnor would be able to penetrate these shield walls with ease.”
Gregor sent a second bolt surging across the room, but it too fizzled short of his target. Felix struck back, splitting the air with a charge of his own a razor of yellow light that Gregor deflected only at the last moment, the force of it sending him stumbling backwards while rays of energy ricocheted and set the drapes on fire. Haille gasped in pain, his own boundaries barely established. Gregor realized the flashes of power would be excruciating to someone so uninitiated. Gregor reached out with his aura to enclose Haille as well, but it diminished the potency of his own attacks.
Felix knew it. He waved his hand, trapping the chandelier in a withering spell of heat. The air shimmered and reduced the twisting iron limbs to molten metal that he sent in a sizzling rain at them both. Gregor countered with a gust of wind that threw most of the furniture and odds and ends into a pile against the hearth. The fire dimmed then brightened as it spread to the debris and sucked at the gust of air in the room. Gregor sent more bolts at Felix—powerful spells of pain and maiming, comets of fire, spinning discs to rent his fl
esh—all enchantments taught to him by his master. But Felix’s defenses were powerful and elaborate. He was more a mage than Gregor had realized. They circled one another, animals in a cage vying for an advantageous angle, but neither found one. The room was becoming smoky as the fire spread among the furniture. Clouds of dust rose from bricks shattered by explosive spells. Gregor was aware of the bell clanging on the far side of the castle, the crashing of waves outside, and the shaking of the shutters in the wind. Felix lunged, leading with a bright flurry of incantations, tangled with the shield walls that protected him. It took everything in Gregor just to hold the attack at bay. Felix stumbled, his foot caught on a curl in the rug, swept out of place by the swirl of elements. Sensing an opportunity, Haille grabbed the end of the rug closest to him and yanked it. Felix lost his footing and tottered over. Gregor fired such a gale of wind that his advisor smashed against the wall.
But Felix was quick and skilled. He countered with a spell to knock himself out of the blast and flatten him against the floor. Then with preternatural strength, he pushed upwards, leapt the length of the room and landed on Gregor, his hands on his neck. They tumbled close to the spreading fire, Gregor redirecting his energies to protect himself from the scalding heat, while Felix focused his own mind on growing the flames. The light danced in his eyes and on his face, his teeth showing in a smile of satisfaction.
Gregor’s vision clouded with spots. This was the physical violence that he was so inexperienced in. But some of Haille’s training came back to him. His magical powers at a stalemate, he turned to the hearth, caught sight of the fire poker growing red hot in the flames, and summoned it to his hand. It burned the skin of his palm but he swung it nonetheless and connected with Felix’s temple.
It was no mighty strike, but Felix had been prepared for a magical attack, not a physical one. He let go of Gregor’s neck to block the next blow. Sweet air returned to Gregor’s lungs, blood to his brain, and he aimed the poker at Felix’s eyes. He missed, catching Felix instead in the neck, sending him back, gagging.