Journey into the Void (16 page)

Tasgall slid a glance at Rigiswald, who could perfectly read the man's thoughts as though he'd spoken.

“This child is a malevolent creature of the Void?”

Rigiswald clasped his hands together, rocked back on his heels, then forward onto the balls of his feet to keep the circulation in his legs going, and wondered how all this would end. Badly, he thought.

The Regent announced that the monk had come to New Vinnengael in order to bring them sad news. Gustav, Lord of Knowledge, a noble and honored Dominion Lord, was dead. He had died in far-off lands and had been buried in a mound of dirt by the barbarous Trevinici. The Regent proposed that a delegation be formed to travel to Trevinici lands to recover this noble lord's body and bring him back for a proper burial.

The crowd grew restless during this harangue. Surrounded by ten thousand fiends of the Void, the Vinnengaeleans were thinking fearfully of their own deaths, not some elderly knight who'd been half-mad anyway. With his insane quest to find the Sovereign Stone, Gustav had been an embarrassement to the Council of Dominion Lords. The only real emotion felt on hearing of his death was relief.

Rigiswald wondered if the monk had told the Regent that Gustav had found the portion of the Sovereign Stone intended for the humans.
If so, Clovis did not mention it to the assembly. Rigiswald couldn't blame her. She couldn't very well tell this volatile crowd that the Sovereign Stone had been found, but that no one had any idea where it was. Most of them would immediately leap to the conclusion that the Church had hidden it, storing it to use later for its own purposes.

The monk retreated into the background, taking a seat in one of the chairs that ranged along the wall. The Omarah loomed over the wizened old man. All eyes turned to the Regent. Everyone waited tensely to hear what she had to say, most of them prepared not to like it.

Clovis once again opened her mouth, but her speeches were apparently doomed to go unheard this day. One of the Temple novitiates who served the Regent came racing breathlessly into the hall. The novitiate was making straight for the Regent, when he realized by the sudden humming that everyone in the room—including the king—was staring at him. Abashed, he froze midway. The Regent's sharp tone commanded his attention. Recalling himself, the young man hastened over to speak to her.

The Regent's eyes widened. A baffled look came over her heavyset, jowled face. Confounded by whatever news she had just heard, Clovis would have probably given a great deal to have been told that news in private. As it was, she could not leave the room. The crowd had begun to comment on the novitiate's arrival, and some of the barons demanded to know what was going on.

“Your Majesty,” Clovis said, turning to the king, “the enemy commander has asked that he be permitted to enter New Vinnengael under a flag of truce. He has no wish to attack us, he says, and suggests that we try to find a peaceful solution. We must decide whether or not he is to be admitted.”

In the stunned silence that followed this pronouncement, the young king's high shrill voice rang out clearly.

“We say ‘yes,'” said Havis III. “Permit him to enter our city and have speech with us.”

Clovis gave a little gasp. She had spoken to the young king out of a politic desire to silence the clamorous barons. The king was supposed to say that the matter was up to her. She had certainly not intended for the king to make his own decision, and she was startled and displeased that he had done so.

“Your Majesty, we should discuss this matter privately—”

The king slid from his throne, stood facing her. “We say that this commander should be permitted to enter the city. We wish to see him and hear him. That is our will, and you will obey.”

Cunning, that Vrykyl, thought Rigiswald. He looked at Tasgall, to see what he made of his kinglet now, but couldn't catch the man's eye. The battle magus was intent upon the Regent.

Clovis was “in a pickle,” as the saying went. She clasped her hands together over her ample stomach and glared down at the king, trying to cow him. She did not succeed and was forced to speak.

“Your Majesty, as your Regent, appointed by the Church and sanctified in the eyes of the gods, it is my duty to guide your decisions. Everyone knows of your concern and care for your people, and we know that you want to do what is best for them. To that, I impute the earnest desire of yours to speak to this evil man, and I will take your wishes under advisement. A matter this serious, however, should not be decided lightly. I propose that we take some time to consider.”

Clovis turned to the chamberlain. “His Majesty will retire.”

His Majesty didn't look at all pleased about that. He frowned, and one small fist clenched. He seemed on the verge of arguing, but on second thought, decided against it. He would look like a petulant child and lose ground in consequence. As it was, men and women who had formerly regarded him with pity were now eyeing him with respect. He could only gain by behaving graciously. The chamberlain and the house guards escorted the king out of the hall.

The Regent spoke briefly to the novitiate, who left the chamber in haste, then said loudly, “This assembly will adjourn. We will reconvene in an hour. At that time, we will give this man our answer.”

If she thought she was going to be able to leave without further talk, she was mistaken. Clovis might have been Regent, but the Regent wasn't the king. She was immediately surrounded by the clamoring barons and knights. Even the head of the Association of Merchants' Guilds put himself forward, shouldering his way into the crowd to express his opinion.

The Regent, her face grim, her cheeks flushed, tried to force her way through, but without success. Tasgall and his battle magi finally cleared a path. The Regent summoned the heads of the Orders to her side, and they left the room, guarded by the battle magi.

Abandoned, the barons and the knights and the other courtiers clustered together in their own groups, their voices raised in ire, sprinkled with threats that the Church wasn't going to have its way in this.

Rigiswald made good his own departure, gliding out of the room just in time to see the heads of the Orders walking to the far end of a long corridor lined with portraits of past kings and queens of Vinnengael. The Regent stopped at the end of the corridor. The heads of the nine Orders gathered in a huddle around her. Several battle magi formed a cordon across the corridor to give them privacy for their hasty meeting.

Rigiswald wandered a short distance down the corridor, affecting to be absorbed in admiring a portrait of young Havis's deceased mother. Standing in front of the painting, his head tilted to one side, he estimated the distance between himself and the gathering of magi.

Approximately two hundred feet. Removing a vial of water he had stuffed up the tight-fitting cuff of his gown, he pulled out the stopper with his teeth and shook a few drops onto his fingers. He whispered the words to the spell, then flicked the water in the general direction of the crowd around the Regent. The spell worked. Within moments, he was able to hear their conversation quite clearly.

“Of course,” the Regent was saying, “this man who calls himself Lord Dagnarus has taken a good, hard look at our defenses, and he has come to the realization that he has no chance of defeating us. The best he can do is besiege us and, so long as our ports remain open, this will be naught but a minor inconvenience. I am not about to negotiate with him.”

“A siege would be more than a minor inconvenience, Regent,” stated Tasgall bluntly. “Their siege towers are armed with orken jelly. This Lord Dagnarus could create a firestorm that would wipe out half the population of this city and reduce homes and businesses to charred ruins.

“However,” he added, his voice grim, “that is preferable to surrender. I heard what horrors these fiends inflicted on Dunkar when that city surrendered. I agree that we should fight, but we should know the worst that can befall us before we commit ourselves, and prepare for it.”

“Revered Brother Tasgall speaks wisely, Regent,” said the head of the Order of Inquisitors. “According to our sources, the enemy army is made up of taan, a race skilled in the use of Void magic. And it is not just their shaman who can make use of this foul magic. The ordinary soldier has
the ability to use Void magic whenever he likes, without suffering any debilitating consequences.” The Inquisitor was a tall man, big-boned, and so excessively lean that he seemed almost cadaverous. He had lank, gray hair and the large, protruding eyes of those afflicted with a goiter. His bony jawline and high cheekbones gave his face a skeletal look, and the current joke among the novitiates was that he had summoned himself from the graveyard. Devoid of warmth, sarcastic, and ill-tempered, the Inquisitor had not been well liked before he was named to head the Order of Inquisitors, and now he was universally detested.

The Regent was clearly shocked by his news. “How is that possible?” she demanded. “And why wasn't I informed of this before?”

“Indeed,” Tasgall agreed angrily. “The battle magi should have been told about this before now!”

“Before now, you would not have been interested,” countered the Inquisitor.

“Void magic by its very nature takes a toll upon the bodies of those who cast it,” stated the Regent. “I think you have been misinformed, Inquisitor.”

“What we have learned we have learned at great peril from those of our Order who have risked their lives to walk among these creatures,” the Inquisitor returned, his tone cold with anger at being doubted. “The taan are able to achieve this by the use of stones embedded beneath their hide. We do not know for certain how these stones work, but we theorize that the taan draw on the energy of the stones to power the magic, rather than being forced to draw on their own life energy.”

“However they do it, Regent,” Tasgall stated, “if what he says is true—and I suppose we must believe him—this means that there is a possibility that every single one of the enemy coming over our walls is a Void sorcerer, capable of wielding spells of death and despair as well as steel.”

The Regent looked appalled, then her lips tightened. She shook her head.

“I am not suggesting we surrender,” Tasgall added, reading her thoughts. “We will win, of that I have no doubt. The gods could not allow it otherwise. But the battle will be bloody and destructive.”

“Is there anything else you have learned about these taan that you haven't told us, Inquisitor?” the Regent demanded.

“Several of the undead knights of the Void known as Vrykyl are among the army of Lord Dagnarus,” said the Inquisitor, unperturbed by her accusation. “Vrykyl that are far more powerful than the one that was slain two nights ago by the heroic actions of our battle magi. The Vrykyls' command of Void magic is immense. Witness how many of our battle magi were required to bring down one of them, and one of the weaker. No disparagement on your gallant actions, my lord.”

The Inqusitor bowed to Tasgall, who bowed back, but said nothing.

“If our Dominion Lords were present, they would be able to face these Vrykyl on equal terms, but as I undestand it, Regent, you disbanded the Council and sent the Dominion Lords away from the city.”

“I followed the will of the gods,” Clovis returned through gritted teeth. She was rattled, losing control of the situation. “These Dominion Lords were created by imperfect means and thus are themselves imperfect. Mad Lord Gustav was a prime example.”

“‘Mad' Lord Gustav was wise enough to find our part of the Sovereign Stone, which had been missing for two hundred years,” said the Inquisitor.

Gasps of astonishment came from most of the assembled heads of the Orders, who turned their startled eyes on the Regent. Tasgall, head of the Order of Battle Magi, and the Seneschal, head of the house guard, were the only ones to whom this news did not come as a shock.

“Is this miracle true, Most Revered High Magus?” demanded the head of the Order of Diplomacy.

“Praise the gods,” said the head of the Order of Scribes.

“I wouldn't be too quick about that,” said the Inquisitor dryly. “Lord Gustav recovered the Stone, but he died before he could deliver it. The Stone has since gone missing. Unless you have been successful in locating it, Regent?”

“No, I have not,” the Regent answered in dour tones. “And I will thank you to keep your voice down, Inquisitor.”

“A pity,” said the Inquisitor. “The Stone might be of some use to us in repelling these Void monsters.”

“As a matter of policy—” the Regent returned angrily.

“The Void is at work here,” Tasgall intervened. “I trust you are all aware of that.”

The argument ceased.

“And now, what is to be done?” Clovis asked. She turned to Tasgall. “Do you actually recommend that we negotiate with this Lord Dagnarus?”

“His Majesty has decreed it,” Tasgall stated.

“His Majesty is a child,” the Regent retorted.

“A child who has put us in an untenable situation,” Tasgall returned. “The barons are already unhappy with the fact that the Church has gained control over the monarchy, or at least that's how they see it. If we go against the king's wishes in this matter, we will further alienate the barons and the knights whose support with troops and money we will need if we are attacked.”

He hesitated, then asked, “Do you know why His Majesty took it into his head to intervene in this matter, Regent?”

Ah, thought Rigiswald, pleased. You're thinking now, Tasgall. You're starting to wonder if I am right. Very good, sir. Very good.

“His Majesty is a little boy and, as such, he is extremely interested in the prospect of battle,” said the Regent. “He spends all his time in his room, staring out the windows at the enemy army across the river. When he isn't looking out the window, he's fighting mock battles with his toy soldiers. It is no wonder that he wants to meet the man who has launched this attack on the city.”