Lesson of the Fire (27 page)

At last, she found her voice, but it was
faint, pained. “You killed … non-wizards?”

Horror abruptly overtook Sven’s glowing
delight. He gave the gloves a look as if it had all been their
fault, and then scrubbed a hand over his chin. He looked at his
hands.

What am I doing? Protecting mundanes by
killing mundanes? Buying the lives of Tortz’s people with the lives
of Flasten’s mundanes? I should be ashamed.

He wasn’t. He couldn’t remove all the traps
guarding Tortz’s perimeter. There were too many wizards for him to
fight alone, and if he didn’t defeat this invasion, those magocrats
wouldn’t hesitate to enslave the people of Tortz. All but two
hundred had evacuated, but Sven knew the Dux of Flasten would not
stop here. If the dux’s magocrats won too easily in Tortz, they
would know the Protectorates were vulnerable — ripe for
conquest.

“I cannot undo it,” Sven said softly, head
bowed.

“Come to bed,” she said, and he heard a note
of pity. “Leave the defense of Tortz in the hands of the gods for a
little while.”

The gods? There are still plenty of traps
left, if they don’t counter them all with Elements.

But he said nothing, merely obeying her.
Outside, the snow whirled, and Heliotosis’ icy breath bit even
harder.

* * *

A whiter morning Sven could not have
imagined. The snow had piled up fully sixteen inches and showed no
sign of melting anytime soon, though the clouds had thinned out
such that only a few flakes still descended from the realms above.
The watch on the hills reported that the magocrats’ army was now
visible on the moors below, the drab clothing of the mundanes
standing out no less than the green, auburn and amber of the
wizards on the white blanket. Sven bundled up in two green cloaks
and went to the top of one hill to wait.

It was obvious that the fifteen surviving
wizards had completely run out of torutsen. A hundred mundanes
marched toward the hills nervously, only slightly more afraid of
the magocrats’ wrath than they were of the renegade town’s
defenses. Many of the attackers looked on the point of dropping
from exhaustion and the cold, as if the blizzard and the bitter
wind had battered them even more than the traps had.

The amber stepped forward, and Sven
immediately recognized Arnlaug Saugen. “Defenders of Tortz, we
demand your surrender!”

Sven took a sip of torutsen, slipped on a
fresh pair of gloves and stepped forward so they could see him on
the wall. He tried to match the amber’s haughtiness. “Weard Saugen,
I warned you what would happen if I saw you in Tortz again. Do you
remember?”

Arnlaug opened his mouth to answer, but Sven
didn’t wait. He wiggled a finger, and a ray of heat sliced off the
amber’s head. Arnlaug’s corpse collapsed into the snow.

As easy as that. I expected him to be
better-prepared.

The wizards took several steps back, their
faces masks of shock.

You’d think I’d just used
morutmanon,
Sven thought.
Of course, no green could have done that, so I
suppose they just don’t know what to expect next.

Something tickled his mind, telling him
there must be more to it than that, but he pushed it aside, for
now.

“These are Tortz’s terms. Leave or die. Tell
your dux this town owes him no tribute. If he sends another army,
he will lose another army. Is that understood?”

One of the two remaining auburns nodded her
assent, but none of them spoke. She jerked her head, and the
withdrawal began. The greens collected the body of their fallen
leader, and the remnant of the Duxy of Flasten’s army returned from
the direction they had come.

Not all of them reached the edge of Tortz’s
reconnaissance. Some fell prey to traps, others to Heliotosis’ wind
or Dinah’s Curse. Dissent and desertion would plague them on the
way back. But most of them would return to Flasten Palus to tell
Volund of their defeat at the hands of a single green.

A green who had killed the dux’s youngest
son in cold blood without hesitation or remorse.

* * *

“Why did you not tell me he was Dux
Feiglin’s son before I killed him?” Sven demanded.

Brand drummed his fingers on the arm of his
chair. “Would it have stayed your hand?”

Sven considered this, but Brand didn’t
wait.

“You told me you were not in the habit of
killing magocrats. I took you at your word.”

“I said I would be more forceful if they
came back.” Sven frowned. “You did not expect me to be here when
you returned, did you?”

Brand gave him a weak smile. “You should not
have had a chance against the first attack, much less the
second.”

“I should have lost the second battle. The
snow was higher than the level of the recon stone’s scans, and they
could not see the myst in the blizzard, so of course they blundered
right into the traps as soon as they were under attack.”

Brand shook his head, expression serious. “I
do not know where you learned these magical applications, Sven, but
it is not right for you to wear the green any longer. You should
leave Tortz before Dux Feiglin shows up to exact his revenge on
you.”

“He has no legal grounds against me.”

Brand barked a mirthless laugh.

Sven sighed. “You’re right. That won’t stop
him. Still, too many of his magocrats have seen my face.”

“You are my prisoner,” Brand said, his tone
matter-of-fact. “You acted in Tortz’s defense under duress. I have
been holding your apprentices hostage, and I have threatened to
murder the people of your Protectorates if you do not obey me.”

Sven was in no mood for levity. “Very funny.
I am sure they will believe … ”

“When was the last time I let you leave?”
Brand asked, removing a flask from his cloak pocket. “And is not
Erbark late returning?”

Sven stiffened and stared hard at Brand,
searching for some sign that this was a joke. He glanced at the
closed chest of metal-studded gloves three paces away.

Brand followed his eyes. “You know why that
would be a bad idea, right?”

Sven glared at him. “Even if I am fast
enough, even if you are bluffing, even if you have not used
Elements to disperse the spells in them, killing you will not stop
Flasten from coming.”

Brand smiled with satisfaction. “It is good
that you remember that. If you kill me, who will you blame for all
those wizards you murdered?” He waved the flask at Sven.
“Drink.”

Sven snatched it and took a sip of the
morutsen, tasted its sickly sweetness. “Volund will not care if I
am your prisoner.”

“He will not,” Brand admitted with a shrug,
“Unless you can convince him that you are more valuable to him
alive than dead.”

“How do you expect me to do that?”

Brand snorted a laugh. “You can be very
convincing when you try. He may hate you, but he can not help but
respect the effectiveness of your traps.”

“I trust Volund with my knowledge even less
than I do you.”

“So be it. The best you can do is to die
without betraying your interest in the Protectorates. If you return
there, Volund will hunt you and enslave them all just to avenge his
son.”

Sven seethed. “And that is where you will
be. If I tell the dux where you are, he will hurt the people of the
Protectorates to punish you.”

“Yes, but do not think I will be idle. The
defenses will give me time to train many, many adepts in the
Protectorates. Even Dux Feiglin has limits to his power over his
magocrats.” Brand smiled at him wickedly. “You did not really
expect an oathbreaker like me to stay true to a promise like that,
did you?”

“At least take Erika with you, Brand. You
have nothing to fear from her, and as long as she is there, you can
be assured I will not betray the Protectorates.”

Brand shook his head. “You missed your
opportunity. She stays in Tortz.”

Sven stood up and tried to call the myst
before remembering the morutsen.

“None of that, now,” Brand said, and a wave
of Power threw Sven to the ground. “Goodbye, old friend.”

Then a fist of force hit Sven in the temple,
and darkness descended.

* * *

What if Brand had told you he had been
instructed to abandon you?

I would not have believed him. Why would my
patrons treat me so cruelly?

You do not feed an entire tree into your
fireplace. You must chop it into pieces first. You do not pour soup
onto a log. You fashion the wood into a bowl first.

You were shaping me to be the Guardian.

You blamed yourself for your successes. You
thought yourself worthy of them because of your intellect and
talents. You were too proud to learn faith. Only a miracle could
have convinced you. Until you lost everything, you would never
appreciate anything, least of all the gifts we gave you.

Tortz was when I started to suspect. If the
snow had not hidden the traps, or if Arnlaug had attacked from
another direction, I would have been defeated.

Yes. Who commands the snow? Who grants the
gift of wisdom? Who rules the waters? Had Volund led an attack from
the north with a hundred gallons of torutsen, Marrish himself would
have defended you that day. The gods wanted you to make use of the
gifts they gave you. We wanted you to know that you are strong
because of us.

I do not feel strong now.

No leader is stronger than those who share
his vision.

I must make the Mar stronger.

* * *

“I have been ordered to kill you, Sven
Takraf.” The voice was Katla’s.

Ordered by whom? Volund?

Still drugged with morutsen, he couldn’t
summon the myst. He was as helpless as he had been in Tortz.

“I will not do that, even if it means
Marrishland will burn. You must act quickly. The wizards are not
here. It is too late for the Domus army to intercept the Flasten
army.”

“Too late?”
So the deadline passed while I was ill. This will
be tricky.

Sven tried to raise his arm, but he couldn’t
hold it up very high. “If Flasten’s army makes it here, they will
not be able to take Domus. There are still thousands of people here
to protect the city.”

“It will not be enough. You must make peace
with Flasten before they reach Domus Palus, or all is lost.”

Now I can pass the amendment. Flasten will
be removed.

“Have you nothing to say for yourself?”

Every one of my ten thousand mundanes will
learn magic.

“It appears I will have to save you once
again.”

Sven did not notice Katla vanish into the
Tempest.

Chapter 22

“
The Mass is the true reason the wizards
maintain their numbers. As the number of magic-wielding Mar rises,
the Drakes become more aggressive. Legends say that it is the Mass
that guides Dinah’s Children against us. Some say it becomes more
powerful every time we activate the myst, like a magical leech. Its
power spawns more Drakes, and these Drakes descend upon our towns
to destroy them.”

— Nightfire Tradition,

Catalogue of Drakes

“Where is Eda Stormgul?” Sven shouted,
irritable.

Here he was, healthy again, sitting upright
by himself — at least, with the help of pillows — and he couldn’t
go out and do anything with it. He had been wise enough that when
Erika had said, “Go ahead, dress yourself if you want,” he had
known he wouldn’t be able to. He hadn’t even tried. But it made him
angry.

Horsa answered his question. “She went with
Bui Beglin and his men as per your orders before your
condition.”

Sven recalled the orders. “I did not order
her to go. I told her to send someone.”

Horsa remained silent.

Then Sven remembered what
he had planned to do with Bui ...
Did my
patrons plan this, too?
His mind raced to
trace what could happen. Twenty thousand trained wizards against
twenty mundanes and a cyan.

Bui and his nineteen “guerrillas” will die.
Eda will die with them.

He shrugged it off as a
best-case scenario.
Is obedience to me for
the sake of revenge pleasing to my patrons?
Sven knew he could not answer that.
Sooner discern the motives of the Mass.

“Horsa, where is the army?”

Sven had used Horsa and another priest to
create a new reconnaissance stone, one that could be transported.
Horsa was adept at the use of Vitality, and the latest stone now
showed a relief map of the city, every tree pulsing with life. Not
quite as bright as the little figures that marked Drakes, wizards,
mundanes and slaves, but with some distinction between them.

Horsa gestured. “Well within the Duxy of
Flasten, as per your orders.” He frowned. “They would have had to
turn back several days ago to be able to intercept Flasten.”

Sven waved off his obvious statement. “Where
is Flasten?”

“At the border, here. Between them and us
are about a hundred and fifty towns, most of which still have their
residents. Very few people wanted to leave their homes.”

As expected,
Sven thought.
But they
will slow Flasten.

He did the vectors in his
head.
The Domus army will reach Flasten
Palus three days ahead of the Flasten army reaching here — and that
is still a month away. Can I train enough mundanes between now and
then?
He wanted to hit himself.
The Drakes would have been perfect to attack
Flasten, if I could have brought them to bear.
Instantly he saw a way he could have used the Drakes, but it
was too late now.

“We need the Law,” Sven said. “Or we are
defeated.”

“I did not quite catch that, Mardux.”