Firehurler (Twinborn Trilogy) (39 page)

The others in the room collectively held their
breaths, wondering if there soon would be a third empty seat in the Sanctum.
Rashan glanced about the room at the reaction, frowning slightly.

“Three today were killed for treason, and I have
already said that those remaining were to be given a second chance. Whatever my
reputation has become over the past century, I do not slay sorcerers of the
Empire for asking questions.

“I have no more right to the position than Gravis
Archon. That much I will grant. His treason, however, was not that he stood in
regency over the Empire, but that he was complicit in supplanting the dynasty
in the first place. Had the imperial royal family died during his tenure as
high sorcerer, it would have been fine for him to seek regency until the
succession could be resolved,” Rashan said.

“And how do we fit in?” Brannis asked, spreading his
arms wide to indicate himself and the three sorcerers with him in the middle of
the chamber.

“Well, Jurl is just here to act as herald. Many things
will need to be explained and announced, and I was made to understand that Jurl
has a rather excellent memory,” Rashan told them. “As for the rest of you,
there are changes to be made. The Empire is in need of a bit of upheaval.

“I find that the warning we had given regarding the
goblins in Kelvie Forest has gone largely unheeded. While the threat was
acknowledged, the generals of the army seem to have decided that there are
sufficient troops in the region, and any potential reinforcements would not
make it so far in time to matter. They are leaving the western reaches of the
Empire to their own resources.

“We have apparently been making a habit, these past
few decades, of relinquishing lands we conquered, as we are driven out of them.
Megrenn is free and sacking our outposts, and we have done nothing substantive
about it.

“Brannis, I am putting you in charge of the Imperial
Army. You have the mind for it, and I know you can be trusted. The latter
cannot be underestimated, given that I may face challenges from within, should
my largess regarding amnesty be taken advantage of. This current crop of
knights feels weak to me, as well. I have heard little so far, but what little
I hear is enough to turn my stomach. We have bred a generation of tower guards
and called them knights. You fight to win. When we are finished here, Jurl will
accompany you to army headquarters, where you will relieve whoever is in charge
these days.”

“That would be Sir Hurald Chadreisson, Warlock,”
Caladris added sullenly. His normally jovial demeanor was, quite reasonably,
dampened by the recent death of his brother.

“Well, he will not be in charge much longer,” Rashan
said. “Your first assignment, Brannis, will be to find where the goblins intend
to invade and to drive them back. We will discuss this later and in greater
detail. I have not fought a war in far too long, and I will not sit idly by for
this one.

“As for you two …” Rashan gestured to Iridan and
Aloisha, still standing roughly in the middle of the chamber. “… we have two
seats to fill here. Aloisha, you will take the seat that Stalia Gardarus once
occupied. We will have someone from House Gardarus come to fetch her things
later today, and you may have her offices as well.”

Aloisha looked stunned. She had long expected to one
day ascend to the Inner Circle, but she had always thought it would be many
long summers away.

“But I am not next in line,” she said. “There are
others with seniority who—”

“And they will continue to wait,” Rashan said.
“Seniority is something of an issue for me. It bespeaks laziness and
entitlement. Power was always supposed to matter, and competence as well.
Sitting comfortably in these throne-like seats in a tower as the Empire shrinks
around you,
that
is what leadership by seniority accomplishes. Aloisha,
I hear nothing but good things about you, from what little time I have had to
decide on a replacement. You are also kin, and I am not ashamed to admit to
favoring House Solaran when there is little else to go by.”

“Yes, Warlock. I accept the honor you are bestowing on
me,” Aloisha spoke, still seeming numb and dizzy with the heady realization
that she had just been given one of the most powerful positions in the Empire.

“Lastly you, Iridan. I must confess I have done wrong
by you.” Rashan paused and swallowed, as if unsure how to continue. “You have
struggled and fought against a system that favors the purest of the bloodlines.
Brannis told me that you finished top ranked your final four summers of the
Academy and still garnered only token respect for it. You entered the Imperial
Circle as a nobody, albeit a talented one. You were not arranged a wife, since
a lone sorcerer in a peasant bloodline is just a fluke, not to be trusted until
generations of sorcerers had proceeded from your line. How do you feel you have
been treated by the Circle? Speak plainly now,” Rashan commanded.

“Held back,” Iridan answered, seemingly uncomfortable
with saying so in front of so many that had been in charge of the system that
had favored weaker sorcerers from better families over his. “Like I would never
be good enough because my parents are peasants.”

“Do you think that traditional wisdom is wrong? That
the blood does not tell? That talent may turn up unexpectedly, even in the most
unlikely of places?” Rashan asked one question after another, giving Iridan no
time to answer in between.

“Yes, I think I do,” Iridan answered proudly, lifting
his head.

Rashan was about to elevate him to the Inner Circle,
Brannis realized, and Iridan seemed to want to end the talk that his pedigree
was not good enough.

“You are
wrong
!” Rashan shouted.

Iridan’s eyes widened in shock. It was surely not the
response he was building up in his head.

“Iridan, you have the purest blood in this room,”
Rashan said. “You are no more a fluke than I am. When you were born, I was not
ready to return to Kadrin, but I wanted you to be raised in the Empire, without
revealing that I was still alive. You are
my
son, not the son of those
kindly farm folk we left you with.”

“What?” Iridan whispered. “I … Son?”

“Yes,” Rashan said, “I did not choose to follow your
band of refugees from Kelvie Forest because of my distant relation to Brannis,
or the fact that he carried Heavens Cry and did not know it—though I admit that
intrigued me as well. I followed you because I heard about your battle with the
goblins and how you acquitted yourself,” Rashan rambled, getting caught up in
finally revealing his relation to Iridan.

“But I … I nearly killed myself,” Iridan said.

“But you did not,” Rashan countered. “You took an
instinctive step on the path to becoming a warlock. You used silent
spellcasting in the furor of battle successfully. You have a natural talent;
the rest is merely training.”

“Wait, what? Warlock? Me?” Iridan sputtered.

Brannis could understand that Iridan felt
overwhelmed—on two fronts, no less: first, hearing that he was going to be
elevated from Fourth Circle directly to the Inner Circle, then being told that
Rashan Solaran was his father. Now he was to be trained as a warlock as well?

I suppose I should have seen the resemblance
, Brannis mused, feeling curiously detached from the proceedings.

It was all too impossible to be real. His dreams
actually felt more plausible than his own life, where he had just been the
beneficiary of some sort of well-meaning reverse coup, where the usurpers had
just been overthrown, and which had resulted in him being given an army.

There is a hole in the side of the Tower of
Contemplation. Three members of the Inner Circle are dead, including my father.
Rashan is Iridan’s father? I am supposed to orchestrate the attack to drive
back the goblin army. Oh, and apparently there has been no emperor in my
lifetime.

I would much like to wake up from this dream, too.

*
* * * * * * *

Brannis did not get to wake up from the strange world
he was now being dragged into. Instead he found himself at the center of a small
parade, headed for the army headquarters. At the head of the procession was
Jurl, who had transcribed Rashan’s proclamation into a set of written orders,
which the warlock had signed. Two sorcerers walked next to him, his cousin
Hernus Gardarus, and Iridan—
Solaran?
Brannis mused. Surrounding the lot
of them to the sides and rear were a dozen of the Tower’s honor guards.

The inclusion of Iridan—at his own request no
less—made Brannis a bit more comfortable. He was unsure of the reaction he was
about to receive. Just the previous evening, he had been in Sir Hurald
Chadreisson’s office, taking the reprimand he knew he had coming for the loss
of so many of his men. Now he was on his way to deliver orders requiring Sir
Hurald to cede command to him. The general would be furious, to say the least.

If Rashan had known the general, he might have sent
more guards along.

The trek across Kadris to army headquarters on foot
was long enough that word spread ahead of them. The streets were lining
themselves with Kadrin citizens, eager to begin putting the puzzle together of
what had occurred that morning. Gossip was clearly raging already, and people
shouted questions at them as they passed, occasionally calling out to the
members of the procession by name if they recognized someone they knew. The
guards were able to keep the curious at bay—a trick that being armed and
accompanied by sorcerers made easier—but the press of onlookers blocking their
path slowed them considerably, as the numbers in the streets swelled.

They slowed to nearly a halt as the mob grew too large
to get out of its own way, the ones nearest the procession being pushed forward
by those far back trying to move closer.

“People of Kadrin,” Jurl called out, “stand aside, in
the name of Warlock Rashan.”

This caused a buzz to go through the crowd as ale-room
historians and quilting circle politicians circulated fresh gossip based on
this newest revelation. Not one in four truly knew who Rashan was the night
before, other than perhaps knowing the name from “somewhere.” By midday, all
would have heard news of his return, and his history.

The crowd was curious but had not been especially
spurred to react in any sort of path-clearing manner. The foremost rows
directly in Brannis’s path tried to edge sideways, but the constant press from
behind would only allow for so much movement.

From beside him, he heard Iridan chant,
“Glaenu
chukchaawe sevaani mafalu anahio.”

Brannis turned to see what he was gesturing, but
Iridan was quick; he finished before Brannis had a chance to see what he had
just done.

A clear, shimmering liquid spread beneath the feet of
Brannis, Iridan, the other two sorcerers, and the guards. It formed a small
pond under them all, and once it had everyone supported, it began to rise up
from the cobblestones. The feeling was disconcerting initially, but the gooey
liquid seemed sturdy enough—akin to standing in very wet mud.

“Nicely done,” Brannis congratulated Iridan.

But his friend was paying him scant attention.
Iridan’s eyes were unfocused, likely lost in aether-sight, Brannis guessed.
Once they had risen above the heads of those in the crowd, the liquidy mass
began to move. Unfortunately it did not pull everyone along with it; Iridan
began to walk, and the rest followed his example. The surface tugged at their
feet slightly as they lifted them, and there was an echoing ripple of sound,
similar to a drop of water falling into a full bucket, with each step. The
sound of sixteen pairs of feet made for an odd symphony as they walked.
Fortunately the honor guard had been assigned to the Tower of Contemplation for
long enough that unannounced bits of magic were merely unusual, rather than
shocking.

Iridan had not lifted their conveyance much more than
head height, and hands reached up from the crowd to touch the magical
walking-water as it passed above. Magic was quite far from unknown in the
Kadrin Empire, but most often it was done out of sight of the common folk. It
was a rare treat to see such a display, and diverted much of the crowd’s
immediate attention from gossip to wonderment. In the meantime, Brannis,
Iridan, and the rest of Brannis’s escort made haste for Kalak Square, where
they would find the headquarters of the Imperial Army.

A few paces into their midair journey, Iridan shook
his head, clearing his sight back to normal vision and reorienting himself as
he walked.

“Thank you, I quite like this one,” Iridan said,
belatedly accepting Brannis’s compliment.

“So, um, Iridan,” Brannis began, “I guess this means
we are … cousins.”

“I will need to see a family tree at some point, I
suppose, but I think we are four generations or so apart from being cousins. I
cannot rightly say what we are. For all I know, I could be your thrice-great
uncle, despite being just a month older,” Iridan replied.

It seemed to Brannis that he had already given the
topic some thought.

“Welcome to the family, in any event. I imagine that
you can move to the family estate if you would like. It seems rather clear that
Rashan favors you,” Brannis observed dryly. “You might ask for any room you
like.”