Gold Throne in Shadow (12 page)

Dereth was arguably the second man Christopher had hired, but it didn't seem politic to bring it up. Fae was certainly the second employee he had ever had, and that topic seemed safer.

“What about Fae?” he asked.

Jhom dismissed the suggestion with a shrug. “She is ranked,” the smith said. Professions were a different world. Unfortunately, the two worlds were not equal; the mundane one that Christopher was equipped to deal with was so insignificant to the other as to be nigh invisible.

Just as Christopher was feeling marginally optimistic about facing the wizard of Carrhill with a smoothly running industrial empire at his back, Lalania showed up again. He wondered how she managed such excellent timing. Before he could ask about it, she frowned at him.

“That was not wisely done,” she said.

“What now?” Christopher asked in alarm. He had thought the plan to distribute rifles to the peasantry was subtle enough to evade attention.

“To slay a shopkeeper is no great matter; to deny a dozen a significant portion of their income is altogether different. The Wizard's Guild seems unlikely to turn a blind eye to yet another offense.”

“What are you talking about?” Christopher exclaimed.

“Paper, of course,” she said, annoyed at his denseness. “I realize you do your Church a good turn, and turn a profit for yourself, yet the damage seems unworthy of the gain.”

“I only sell paper to this Church,” he objected, “because there are no wizards here.”

She cocked an eyebrow at him. “But I saw your product in Samerhaven and at the Cathedral to boot.”

He was completely lost until Lalania set him on the right path.

“Just how much paper do you sell here?” she asked, and he went to saddle his horse and face down his latest betrayer.

The Vicar received him in her office, as cool and urbane as the Sphinx with its secret smile. She answered his garbled accusation with calm precision.

“When a Church has an oversupply of any particular item, it generally shares it with the others. Paper is only a single example. No one can fault me for giving my excess to our sister Churches.” Paper that cost her a fraction of the usual cost, now that he made it industrially.

“But how do you profit from this?”
Other than stirring up trouble for me
, he wanted to add.

“I spend what I always have spent, while the other Churches spend nothing. I aid my brethren at no cost to myself. Would you deny me this?”

“The cost is to my reputation,” Christopher said sourly. “The wizards will not approve.”

“Poor Christopher,” she said pityingly. “The wizards cannot hate you any more than they already do. Consider: what do they despise the most? The holy symbol, for our magic competes with them, and the sword, for its power frightens them.”

“But my holy symbol
is
a sword,” Christopher said, stupefied, as she gently shooed him out of her office.

Disa only made it worse. Having promised to tell him what she knew of the master of Carrhill, she regaled the dinner table with tales of darkness.

“He only comes out at night, draped in black robes. Those who have seen him, a glimpse under the hood or a hand out of a sleeve, claim his flesh is more leather than skin. Few who go into his tower ever come out of it, and those who do speak of a crypt, not a castle. He perfumes himself with saffron, to the point of a cloying stench, and once, when there was no spice to be had, he resorted to garlic. This is taken as proof that he douses himself not to attract but to disguise the reek of decaying flesh. It is said the wizard has ruled from the tower for over two centuries.”

“Is that possible?” Christopher asked.

“No,” Svengusta declared. “No magic can extend a man's natural life.”

“Nobody said anything about extending his
natural
life,” growled Gregor. “I have heard a word whispered in connection to his name, but I confess until now I thought it only rumor.”

“I have no firsthand knowledge,” Disa was quick to remind them. But she had also lived next door to the county, which was more than any of them had ever done.

“What word?” Christopher, as usual, had to ask what everyone else knew.

Lalania could never resist a dramatic moment. Leaning forward, pitching her voice softly so that the word would not escape the table, she whispered the dreaded phrase. “
Lich
.”

A collective shudder went around the table. Except, of course, for Christopher. He sighed, and waited like a particularly obtuse child for an explanation.

“Your performance is wasted on our good Curate,” Svengusta laughed.

Lalania was too surprised to counter. She stared at Christopher, worried, and causing no little worry in him. If he kept making mistakes like this, he would never have to tell her that he came from a world without magic. She would figure it out on her own.

Torme did his job and rescued his boss. “No doubt they are called differently in your homeland. She means the ultimate creatures of darkness, the masters of the soul-trapped, the ministers of death. They are akin to a zombie, but they trap their own soul in their own body.”

“Doesn't that mean their body has to be dead?” While Christopher didn't know much about zombies, this much seemed fundamental.

“Yes, it does. The wizard is so enamored of life that he kills himself to gain eternal undeath.”

Then Torme undid all his good work. “What do they call them in your land?” he asked Christopher innocently.

Christopher dodged, answering with a question instead. “Is it possible we didn't have any?”

“Probable, even,” Lalania agreed. “They are extremely rare. And I don't believe any decent Kingdom would tolerate such a creature. Surely the King would view a lich as a hunting opportunity, not as a vassal. Our good King might have his flaws, but his dedication to the cause of Men cannot be questioned. And a lich is no longer a man.”

Christopher, who had recently spoken with the King, was not so certain of the strength of his principles.

“I would think the fact that the wizard of Carrhill tolerates a White chapel in his lands is proof he is not a monster of the Dark,” Svengusta said.

“It does seem uncharacteristic,” Disa conceded. “Still, who knows how a mind like that would work?”

Christopher couldn't help himself. He immediately looked at Torme. The table followed his gaze. The man seemed to take their stares as simple curiosity rather than reflexive accusation.

“How long has the chapel been there?” Torme asked.

“Since the war,” Disa answered. “Ten years or so.”

“Then it seems unlikely,” Torme said. “For the Black to have that much patience is unprecedented. Either he only pretends to be Black, or . . .”

“Or what?” Christopher demanded.

“Or he is a fiend beyond all our experience,” Lalania finished sourly. “And since we have no experience of liches, we must now consider it a possibility.”

Only Gregor found her words heartening. “This could turn out to be a really interesting trip,” he said with a grin.

The cavalry was still in training, so it would have to catch up later. This meant Christopher was marching without Karl or Gregor, and the prospect daunted him. He'd lost a chunk of his officer core, too, staying behind to run the training camp for the boys who would be arriving soon, leaving him responsible for the organization of a two-hundred-man march. Even Lalania deserted him, saying she would make her own way to Carrhill and meet him there.

His worst concern was that without Karl or Lalania, he would commit some inexcusable faux pas.

But of course, that was what he had Torme for. The man would need an officer's title. “I'm making him a lieutenant,” he told Karl, “and you a major. I'll make myself a colonel.” The names meant nothing yet. Captain was the only title that translated, meaning the head of a company, and you were supposed to be at least second-rank for that. The head of his company could only be himself, so to avoid long and potentially difficult explanations he just skipped that one for now. At least the militia was not taken seriously, and he could assign titles there without raising eyebrows in anything other than gentle derision.

Finally he realized all this self-promotion was just a way of avoiding his nervousness, as was the constant planning. Time to go. “We march in three days,” he told Torme, “whether we are ready or not.” The deadline made real, things and people and horses fell into place, and on the third day he set out again, like he had only a season ago.

Except this time it was different. The men did not march so much as strut, yet they managed more efficiency and orderliness than he would have thought possible. The road took them through Knockford again, and the mood of the town was also changed. Not a festival, with people admiring the fine uniforms and pretty young men, but a deep and quiet pride. The older men nodded to the young soldiers like they were equals, the women smiled and flirted with grave dignity, and the children stared in open awe.

Christopher could feel the tension generated by this wholly unusual atmosphere, even though the scene seemed normal to him; this was how he was used to people treating men in uniform, after all. But he could not stop glancing around in false alarm, as if a dark and mysterious panther were stalking him from the back-alleys and side streets of town.

The Vicar pounced on him from one of those side streets, where she stood watching the parade go by. Her lips pursed in dismay, she scowled at him, but when she spoke, it was with a soft voice.

“They will follow you to Hell,” she told him. “Through the very gates of the lowest plane, singing all the while. Watch where you walk. An army cannot back up.”

After this cryptic advice, she pointedly ignored the men and horses clogging her highway, pretending that nothing out of the ordinary was occurring. It was a pretty good act, he judged. It would probably fool the lower gentry. But if there was anyone in this crowd with Lalania's talents, he would be setting off fire alarms across the entire realm. The thought spurred him, so he spurred his horse and his army, and they spent the night on the open road, a few miles south of town, under the brilliant stars and the cool spring air.