Love's Labor's Won (42 page)

“Magic will help protect us from the smoke,” Imaiqah said. “But it isn’t really enough.”

“No,” Emily agreed. The study of basic chemistry, as opposed to alchemy, was in its infancy, but she knew it would eventually solve the problem. “We will solve it one day.”

She sighed, inwardly. If she’d known she would be spending the rest of her life on the Nameless World, she would have memorized as many textbooks as possible on everything from medicine to military technology and tactics. Even looking at a page for a moment would be enough to create an impression she could dig up with a memory charm and put to use. But all she had was her very limited knowledge. Given time, the problem
would
be solved, yet she had no idea how long it would take. Earth had taken centuries to move from basic cannons to machine guns and nuclear bombs.

But I built a small tactical nuke
, she thought.
Someone else could do the same
.

“Take aim,” Paren ordered, as the apprentice lifted the musket and pointed it towards the target. “Fire!”

The apprentice fired.

Emily watched as he hastily reloaded his weapon — it wasn’t remotely automatic, not yet — and fired again. She’d read that the Duke of Wellington divided his soldiers into two ranks, one firing while the other reloaded, but she hadn’t understood why until now. For all of her talk about how the day of the horseman was over, a savage charge could break a line of infantrymen while they were busy reloading. And yet, if they fired enough bullets, it wouldn’t matter if they needed to reload. The horsemen would be wiped off the field.

“No hits,” Imaiqah said, quietly.

“It won’t matter, if there’s enough of them,” Emily said. A memory surfaced in her thoughts, something to do with rifled barrels. She would need to meditate and see what came out if she concentrated on the thought. “But how strong will the impact be?”

The apprentice carefully cleaned his weapon, then turned to Paren. “My Lord,” he said. “Will you have need of me later?”

“I do not believe so,” Paren said. “Finish putting the cannon in the shed, then take the rest of the day off.”

Frieda peered towards the targets at the end of the field. “Emily,” she said slowly, “I could shield myself against...against one of those.”

“Maybe,” Emily said. “But you’d be expending magic trying to protect yourself.”

“But...” Frieda shook her head. “I protect myself all the time.”

“You protect yourself against hexes and jinxes,” Emily said. She’d wondered that herself, back during First Year. “They’re magic. Your protections are designed to break them up into unusable spellware. But a bullet would be a physical impact.”

She scowled as another memory surfaced. Travis had knocked her down once, in a sparring match, and he’d done it despite all of her protections. It required more defenses to protect oneself from a physical blow, Sergeant Miles had said later, and it could drain one’s magic quicker than anyone would prefer. Normally, a mundane posed no threat to a magician — there were no shortage of spells that would stop a non-magical person in their tracks — but now...how much magic would need to be expended to keep a magician safe from a swarm of bullets?

And if someone can stop a pistol shot
, she thought,
could they stop a machine gun
?

“If that’s true,” Frieda said, “why don’t more magicians use their fists?”

“Unmannerly,” Imaiqah said, as they turned to go back inside. “What sort of magician would settle a fight by punching the other?”

Emily looked down at her hands, thoughtfully. On both Earth and the Nameless World, the strong tended to dominate, but the definition of strength was different. She thought of some of the bullies she had known on Earth and wondered, briefly, what they would do if she turned them into snails. The experience would shatter their minds. But, on the Nameless World, it was magic that defined strength. She could turn Frieda into a toad, if she wanted to expend the energy, but Jade? He would reflect the spell back at her, at the very least.

Which is why we’re not allowed to prank students younger than us
, Emily recalled. The Grandmaster had made it clear at the start of Second Year and the rule was enforced, vigorously.
No First or Second Year should be a match for a Third Year
.

“Because if you tried to beat up a stronger magician, you wouldn’t last long enough to kill them,” Emily said, slowly. “And if you faced a weaker magician, why use your fists?”

To conserve your magic
, her thoughts answered her.
But what good is conserving your magic when you’ll be having it drained to protect yourself
?

“We have around two thousand Mark-VII muskets right now,” Paren said. “Training soldiers to use them has not been easy. Many of the hired swords I selected were reluctant to learn how to use the weapons. Even the ones that weren’t reluctant were...unsure of themselves. It may take time for a full unit of soldiers to be deployed.”

“The king will need to be kept informed,” Emily said.

“He is,” Paren confirmed. “But he’s leaving it in our hands, for the moment.”

Emily wondered, absently, just what King Randor was thinking. The temptation to just ban gunpowder and bury the new concepts had to be overwhelming. But he owed Emily — and Paren — and turning on his supporters was just
asking
for another coup. And besides, even without Nanette, the formula for gunpowder might already have escaped. It wouldn’t be long before other kings started fielding their own gunpowder weapons.

And the necromancers have their own armies
, she thought, remembering the horde of monsters Shadye had massed in front of Whitehall, then hurled into the school.
Muskets may tip the balance in our
favor.

“Keep me informed,” she said, finally. “What about the cannons?”

“We have ten,” Paren said. “But producing them should speed up, now we’ve worked out most of the kinks. The real problems lie in powder safety, so we’ve adopted the precaution of keeping the gunpowder isolated from everywhere else and putting the safety officer’s apartment on top of the powder store.”

Emily laughed. They’d done the same in Elizabethan England, if she recalled correctly. She didn’t know if it had actually
worked
, but it would definitely tend to concentrate the man’s mind on safety. On the other hand, if he happened to have a subordinate who hated him, he’d be in the perfect place for assassination.

“I’m surprised the king hasn’t demanded more control,” she said. The cannons weren’t
that
powerful, but they could do a great deal of damage to a castle. “Does he know how fast you’re advancing?”

“I think he has a great many other matters on his mind,” Paren said. “Besides, we have yet to field a proper unit.”

“Take volunteers from the cities,” Emily advised. She knew next to nothing about military training, and most of what she
did
know was suspect, but she knew how hard it could be to unlearn something. “People who are willing to serve, yet don’t have any prior experience.”

Paren frowned. “Why?”

“Less to unlearn,” Emily said. “They wouldn’t have grown up thinking that swords and sorcery settle everything.”

“There might be problems,” Paren said. “The king would object to recruiting random commoners from the cities.”

Emily sighed, inwardly. The base of the Royal Army — and the private armies the barons had enjoyed, before the coup — had been composed of former peasants, with a hard core of professional fighters. It made a certain kind of sense; the peasants might be ignorant, but they were used to following orders without question, as well as being immensely tough. But people from the cities tended to be more inclined to question orders.

“Then see what you can do without it,” she said.

There was another concern, she suspected. The peasantry wouldn’t question...and they wouldn’t seek to duplicate the weapons for themselves. But city-folk,
they
might question — they might work out how to make gunpowder themselves, and then start designing their own weapons. And who knew where that would lead?

“I will try,” Paren said. “For better or worse, I will try.”

“Good,” Emily said. “This will change the world.”

She looked down at the floor, and smiled tiredly to herself. The gods might have made men, she misquoted, but perhaps she had taken the first steps towards making them equal after all.

Not quite the same
, she reminded herself.
What sort of gun can turn someone into a frog
?

But it might not matter
, her own thoughts answered her.
People always have different levels of skill
.

Chapter Thirty-Four

T
HE DRIVE BACK TO THE CASTLE
was spent in pensive silence. Frieda seemed lost in her thoughts, while Emily thought hard about what she’d seen. Gunpowder had been hard enough to reinvent, but guns? Matters were moving ahead faster than she’d dared believe possible. Who knew
what
would happen when guns spread to the rest of the Nameless World?

She was still mulling it over when the coach entered the courtyard and came to a halt. As soon as the door opened, she jumped down to the cobbled tiles and looked around, half-expecting to see some traces of disaster. But there was nothing, apart from a pair of horses that eyed her with dark unpleasant eyes. Emily sighed — she had never liked horses — and turned to follow Frieda back into the castle.

Inside, Bryon was waiting for her. “My lady, you have petitioners who wish to speak with you,” he said. “They have brought lawyers.”

Emily blinked. She had never had much respect for lawyers, but she had to admit she hadn’t had much contact with them either. The Lawyer’s Guild of Zangaria was notorious for living down to the stereotype, yet it had managed to survive when the Accountants had faded away and the Scribes had been forced to reinvent their business model. Emily would have been impressed if she hadn’t known that King Randor insisted that all major deals had to have a lawyer involved, even merely to draft the contract. It ensured there was always work for the lawyers.

“I will be in the Great Hall in ten minutes,” she said. She would have preferred longer to freshen up, but if someone had been waiting for her it would be rude to
keep
them waiting, even if they
had
brought lawyers. “Please have them brought to me after I arrive.”

Bryon bowed. “Of course, my lady,” he said. “I will see to them at once.”

Emily sighed, bid goodbye to Frieda, and walked back to her room, splashed water on her face, and changed into a new dress. The weight of the battery in her pocket mocked her, reminding her that she could be performing more experiments with the devices Yodel had made, but she pushed temptation aside and strode back to the Great Hall. Someone had been busy, she noted; the tables and chairs had been thrust to one side, allowing the petitioners to stand in front of her seat. She sat down and pasted a controlled expression on her face as Bryon entered the room. Whatever it was, she would deal with it...somehow.

“My lady,” Bryon said. “May I present to you Freeholder Jack, Freeholder Muick and Misters Clermont and Darnel, of the Guild of Lawyers.”

Emily sighed inwardly. Freeholders were a rank above independent farmers, although they were liable to pay more taxes. It didn’t exactly make them gentry, Emily thought, but they enjoyed considerable status in their communities. They also enjoyed exemptions from some of the other duties barons could assign to their thralls, including military service. It was not a rank anyone would care to abandon, if they had a choice. Both Jack and Muick looked prosperous; Jack was clearly several years older than Muick, with hair going white at the roots. Behind them, the lawyers looked surprisingly like monks, complete with brown robes and tonsures. She couldn’t help being reminded of Master Grey.

“Your Ladyship,” Jack said. “We thank you for seeing us at such short notice.”

“You are welcome,” Emily lied. “Time is not on my side at the moment, so could you please move straight to the point?”

Jack and Muick exchanged glances. “Your ladyship, you became the baroness two years ago, after the late unlamented baron met his timely end at the hands of the king’s executioner,” he said. “You have made many changes to the law, for which we are grateful.”

Emily sighed inwardly.
This
was getting to the point?

“However, your changes raise the issue of how contracts, signed and sealed in good faith, should be applied,” Jack continued. “Some of those contracts are now due.”

“I see,” Emily said. She had a terrible feeling she knew where this was going. “And what do those contracts involve?”

“Your ladyship, I have only a daughter,” Muick said. “My daughter cannot inherit the farm, by ancient law. It was my intention, therefore, to wed her to Jack’s son and allow them to combine our lands into one. She was to wed last year...”

“But she is now underage, by my laws,” Emily finished. “And even trying to marry her to someone against her will would also be against my laws.”

“Yes, your ladyship,” Muick said.

Mister Darnel stepped forward. “I have consulted the record books dating from the establishment of Zangaria as an independent kingdom,” he said. “There is no disputing your right to change the law as you see fit, your ladyship, as long as the king’s laws are not bent or broken. This was established when King Alexis I severed our formal ties to the remainder of the Empire, then reconfirmed when King Alexis III regained control over his kingdom.”

He took a breath. “However, it could be argued that your changes
have
infringed upon the king’s laws,” he continued. “In choosing to declare numberless contracts invalid because they break your laws, you may well be breaking the
king’s
laws.”

Emily had to admire his nerve. Baron Holyoake would have summarily thrown Mister Darnel into the dungeons for daring to challenge his authority. Emily was almost tempted to do the same. No matter what he thought he was doing, he was upholding two acts that Emily held to be criminal beyond all hope of redemption: marrying a girl off without her consent, while she was still underage.