Arm Of Galemar (Book 2) (3 page)

The guard did not ask why.  Such was above his
station.  Traders Tongue commenced among the group.

Adrian hoped this final query might reveal the detail
he needed.  Working in the highest ranks of his government, he understood the
truth about secrets in regards to the aristocracy.

The harder one tried to keep a secret, the more likely
it would leak out.  Over the years it had amazed him how many commoners were
privy to information relating to investigations that had nothing to do with
them.

Especially if the secret was of a dark nature. 
Guardsmen discovered a highborn’s smuggling scheme only when reports of missing
persons kept being filed by residents living near the storehouse.  The sadistic
tendencies of a court baron’s son were well known in the local brothels long
before the disappearance of another baron’s daughter.  Whenever nobles wanted
to hide their dirty dealings, their first priority was to hide it from their
peers.  Coins shut a commoner’s mouth, or perhaps a knife in the dark if the
stakes were high.  If this threat foreseen by the seers stemmed from the
Tullainian aristocracy, then the locals might have seen the signs, even if they
did not recognize them for what they were.

Surely even the minor signs related to an evil capable
of threatening the whole of Arronath would have put fear into these common
hearts.

When the guard finished translating Adrian’s question,
the general watched six pairs of eyes turn as one to the Taur behind him. 
“Besides us!  Well?”

The guardsman answered after receiving theirs.  “The
merchant says his worst fears were the closing of the trade routes due to the
high-lords’ war.”

Adrian gazed coldly at the man, who avoided meeting
his eye.  He felt like sighing, but this was hardly unanticipated.  No one,
despite the promise of release, ever wants to admit their darkest fears to a
stranger.

“Continue.”

“One of the women says she will never go near the
cesspit.  It’s a great hole in the ground outside the city where refuse is
dumped.  It’s deep and no one can see the bottom, but rumors say strange things
live down there.”

The general raised an eyebrow.  This was more
promising.  He nodded once.

“The other woman fears a man named Creem.  He’s beaten
two wives to death and she says he has an eye on her.  Both servants say they
fear the fall of their lord’s house.”

Adrian almost snorted; he would have except it would
alienate his own aides.  It was a proper response for a servant, though he
wondered if they truly felt so or if they only offered it because they
knew
it was the proper response.  “What about the magistrate?”

“He says his greatest fear is a disease he calls
‘whore’s blossoms’.  Those are the literal words in Traders.”

“A sterling example of a proper magistrate.”

Though he said it under his breath, the guardsman
overheard.  “Sir?”

“Never mind.”  Adrian considered the six sitting on
the floor.  “Very well.  Take everyone but the magistrate out to the
probationers.  I’d like to talk to the magistrate later.  Lock him down.”

Adrian collected his aides while the five semi-free
Tullainians were gathered to join their fellows outside the estate walls. 
There, they would be read the new laws they must abide by while under
Arronathian rule, including the punishments resulting from violations.  They
would be assigned a duty or allowed to return to their normal lives as best
they could.

When he left the courtyard, Adrian spoke to nobody in
particular.  “Send men to investigate the cesspit outside the city.  Collect
soldiers on punishment details and reassign them to the duty.  They can be the
first to investigate the depths.”

The general issued several other orders on the way to
his chambers, intending to review the latest field reports over lunch.  He was
waylaid a hallway from his goal.

“General, sir!”

A young guardsman dashed toward him.  Adrian frowned
slightly. 
It looks bad to the under-officers when you run.
  “Yes?”

“Colonel Mendell has just come in with a captured
foreign lord!”  The young man seemed overly impressed; whether with the feat or
with Mendell, Adrian could not say.  His frown deepened before he regained
control over his expression.

Colonel Mendell, and Colonel Harbon.  The two men he
had most wanted to leave behind in Arronath.  The two men he had been required
to shuffle into this campaign by his king, the royal orders relayed through
Councilor Xenos.

There might be no denying their combat abilities…yet
Adrian disliked them.  Men should
earn
their rank.  Unfortunately, he
saw no way to shunt the two into makeshift assignments, not unless he wanted to
anger Xenos, the mysterious new power in the court.  Any scorn he showed these
two would eventually find its way to the councilor’s ear.  Adrian would rather
put up with the men, as long as they didn’t fail in their duties, than tangle
with his king’s counselor.  For the present.

“Lead on.  Let’s see what the colonel has brought in.”

The grinning young man did exactly that with an air of
suppressed hyperactivity.  He almost burst with the honor of escorting his
commanding general, barely restraining the urge to break into another run.

They arrived at a room off the servants’ wing,
protected by a heavy oak door with giant iron hinges.  Two guards recognized
their general and opened the door without waiting for the order.  Twin
surprises awaited him within.

The first, sitting in a chair at ease, was Colonel
Mendell in person, without an apparent care in the world.  Under the far wall’s
window stood the second surprise.  This imprisoned lord had not been bound in
any manner.  Standing tall, fiercely proud, he met Adrian’s gaze without
flinching.

Like the two women earlier, the lord had dressed in
loose white breaches that flowed around his legs, and also a long-sleeved white
shirt, both in silk rather than cotton.  Over these was a similar type of
garment worn by the women, though without sleeves and with the hanging flaps
trimmed in gold.  Perhaps it might not be a dress after all.  It looked
strange, with the cloth flaps hanging to the man’s ankles, elaborately
embroidered.  A silk sash wound around his waist, concealing the slit tops.

What set this lord apart further from the women were
oversized shoulder guards hidden by the white cloth of a draping cape.  They
extended in giant, foot-long plates curved like fingernails, enwrapped in the
cape, the exact nature of their metal type hidden.  The cape wrapped scarf-like
around his neck and dangled from the shoulder guards to his boots.

Mendell waited several moments before standing, as if
only then noticing the new visitor, and presented his prize.  “General,” he
said, instead of ‘sir’, a minor habit that always felt to Adrian as though the
man were mocking him.  “May I present the one time owner of this fine abode. 
The Tullainian High-Lord, Markis-gune.”

*        *        *        *        *

Marik Railson hesitantly stood in a gloomy hallway. 
He had come to this hallway because, unless he wanted to climb three stories of
rough wall to scramble through a tiny window, it was the only way to gain entry
into the room beyond.  Only the closed door barred his entrance.  A door that
had never yet been locked in his entire history with this particular doorway.

It was knowing what the man on this door’s opposite
side would likely say that dampened his enthusiasm to take the last steps. 
Marik had successfully avoided Tollaf during the long trip back to Kingshome
from the Galemaran/Nolier border.  Skiving off the old fart must have served to
make him more irascible than usual.

He would as soon avoid talking to him today as well. 
Unfortunately, he had made a promise to Torrance, the commander of the Crimson
Kings Mercenary Band.  In accordance with that, Marik had learned the basics in
magecraft the winter previous.  The time had come for the next step, to expand
on that training, much as he hated the mage talent lurking within him.

So given that the confrontation was inevitable, Marik
finally opened the door, entering Chief Mage Tollaf’s primary workroom.  The
old man was sorting through towering paper stacks at a table and glanced up at
the intrusion.

“I was wondering if you would ever show your hide,” he
spat, his tone waspish as ever.  “Hasn’t anyone taught you how to knock?”

“What’s the point when you can see me through the
door?”

“It’s a basic gesture of courtesy.  I’ve given up hoping
for respect, seeing as it’s so antithetical to your nature.”  He paused, and
Marik sensed the old dried-up stick preparing to launch a speech he must have
been practicing during the entire trip back from the warfront.  “In fact, I’ve
about given up all hope for you, boy!  The one time you show initiative with
your talent, and you use it for sword fighting!”

“What’s that have to do with anything?”

“A mage doesn’t fight with swords, gods damn it!  You
need to train and learn how to use your mage talent!”

“Why?” Marik asked with a trace of smugness.  “My way
was effective.  Didn’t you tell me that surprise is a valuable asset on the
battlefield?”

Tollaf almost leapt off his stool at having his own
words thrown back at him.  “You can’t do that!”

“I also remember a different conversation where we
agreed most of the discoveries made in magic were the result of not knowing it
couldn’t be done.”  He smirked, enjoying having the stronger arguments on his
side for a change.

“That’s an entirely separate matter!  You’re limiting
your effectiveness as a mage by tying yourself to that blasted sword!  A good
mage is worth an entire unit of fighters, even when he’s exhausted, ill and
falling-down drunk, and you’re throwing that away!  How in the hells did you do
that, anyway?”

Marik’s smirk widened.  “Well, I suppose I don’t want
to be giving my secrets away, do I?  Then everyone would be able to do it.”

“Don’t by sly with me, boy.  I’ve been over every
report from witnesses, and it’s
impossible
for any man to physically do
what you did.  You were using your talent somehow!  I want to know what you
did!  You couldn’t knock a tankard off the table before the war!”

“Then it should be easy for you to work out how I did
it, isn’t that right?  You spend most of your time picking things apart to
learn how they work.  You know what I was capable of, so figure it out.  And
let’s not forget that
you’re
supposed to be the instructor, not me. 
It’s time for my scrying workings.”  Marik sat down hard on a smaller stool to
make the point.

“What makes you think you’re anywhere close to being
ready for those?  You still only know the most basic shields, never mind your
pathetic attempt at an attack.  Your repertoire of workings couldn’t fill a
thimble!  Your mastered skills are still short of a basic apprentice’s
compliment.”

“I think it’s clear I’ll never be good at fighting
other magic users, so why waste the time trying to make me into a battle mage? 
Besides, Torrance is expecting me to become a scryer, so I don’t see where you
have a choice in the matter.”

“As soon as you become serious about magecraft, I’ll
teach you about scrying!  Lor’Velath, you hardly possess any knowledge at all
about the craft!”

“I came today to start on the scrying workings you’ve
been promising me, since you aren’t good enough at them to find my father.  If
you want to waste time, then I’ll leave and spend the afternoon in the training
areas.  Feel free to explain to Torrance why I’m so far behind.”

Tollaf’s face darkened and he looked ready to burst. 
He barely held his rage in check until a calculating expression surfaced. 
Without a word, he jumped off his perch to rummage through a small closet on
the far wall.  When he returned, he dropped a thick tome on the table beside
Marik.  It fell with enough weight to make the oak table vibrate.

“Fine,” Tollaf said in a calm voice Marik had never
heard from him before.  It sounded far too courteous to be the same desiccated,
usually furious, always irritated, chief mage.  “Be my guest.  Everything you
want to know is in there.”

Tollaf retook his tall stool to poke at the paper
mountains again, completely ignoring his apprentice.  Marik shifted the large
book around.  He was impressed that the old man could carry it.  It was sixteen
inches tall and five inches thick.  For such a large tome, the writing had been
scribed incredibly small.

The first few pages were a vague introduction, the
index Marik sought conspicuous in its absence.  With a grunt, he flipped the
book over to scan the final pages, finding the index absent there as well. 
Whoever wrote the book either knew where all the information could be found or
had deliberately made it difficult to peruse in order to protect its secrets
from casual snoopers.

Without turning, Tollaf commented, “Since you are so
certain your reading skills are as adequate as they ever need be, I’m sure this
minor inconvenience poses no problem for you.”

Marik scowled at the mage’s back but refrained from
comment.  Instead he opened the book to a random page and focused on the
writing.  At first he felt as he used to whenever presented with a lettered
sign before he could read.  The squiggles on the page resembled no letters he
knew, let alone words.