Magic Casement (39 page)

The
chaplain pursed her lips disapprovingly. “Very wellMaster Rap. The king
is alive, but every day seems like to be his last, poor man. Even the cordials
that Doctor Sagorn left will barely ease his pain now. We who are close to him
pray for his release. It seems astonishing that he has survived so long. “

“He
has a word,” Rap mumbled.

She
raised her eyebrows and paused. “Perhaps! What do you know of... But, of
course, you must have one, also. Foolish of me. “ She fell silent,
reconsidering. The old hostler grinned fiendishly-a rare and unpleasant
sight-and helped himself to some of the bread before it all vanished.

Mother
Unonini continued, seeming now to choose her words more carefully. At times Rap
had trouble understanding her-like most Krasnegarians, he spoke a pidgin of
impish and jotunnish. Inos could switch from that to pure impish and back
again. So did the king and his senior officials, but they did not sound as
prissy as the chaplain, who had a southerner’s accent worse than Rap had
ever heard, even from sailors.

“The
city is badly divided-between imps and jotnar, of course. The imps believe that
the princess went to Kinvale to marry her cousin the duke, who has a good claim
to the throne. They expect him to return with her. But the imps themselves are
divided; many would prefer that the city be annexed as a province of the
Impire. The jotnar are unhappy at either prospect. They talk of Thane Kalkor of
Nordland, who has a claim at least equal to the duke’s.”

“Foronod
is their leader,” Hononin interjected. “Some want to put him on the
throne himself, but he seems to be supporting Kalkor. He’s written to
him, they say.”

The
chaplain frowned, as if he were giving away too much. “Rap ought to know,”
the old man snarled. “Foronod was howling for his heart over the horses.
If he hears that Rap summoned the princess back, then he will be even worse.”

She
nodded. “Certainly we must smuggle Master Rap and his friend back out of
the city tonight. As soon as possible.”

Rap
stopped eating. After coming so far he was expected to leave?

Hononin
cackled suddenly and they all looked at him. “I should warn you, Mother.
When you see that jaw set like that, you might as well save breath. Obviously
Master Rap is not leaving.”

“He
must!”

Hononin
shook his head. “Perhaps, but he won’t. Even when he was this high,
that jaw was the signal.”

Rap
grinned suddenly. He had been right to come to the cantankerous old hostler,
and it was good to find a friend at last. “We shall see!” Mother
Unonini set her own jaw.

“And
you?” Rap glanced from her to the hostler and back. “Where are your
loyalties?”

He
was being presumptuous; the chaplain frowned again. “My objective must
always be the greatest good. Civil war would be a great evil-life is precarious
enough here without that.” She considered for a moment and added, “If
I had the power to impose a settlement... Inosolan is not yet of age. A regency
council would be a fair solution-Factor Foronod and Chancellor Yaltauri,
perhaps.”

Lukewarm
at best, Rap thought. He turned to the hostler. “I’ll try to keep
your neck its present length, lad,” the old man said, “even if it
was my horses you took. But I’m staying out of politics. Too dangerous at
my age.”

Was
no one loyal to Inos, then?

“Can
you speak between gulps now, young man?” the chaplain inquired.

“I
think so, Mother. It’s a long story. You knew the man called Andor?”

She
nodded. “A fine gentleman.”

“No!
I thought so, also, and I trusted him when he suggested that the two of us go
and tell Inos--”

“Stop
right there! Only two of you went?”

Rap
nodded, surprised. She glanced at the hostler.

“I
told you there were only two bedrolls missing,” he said. “And the
tent was too small for three. “

“Three?”
Rap echoed.

“Doctor
Sagorn,” Unonini said. “He left, also. It did not matter, for he
had trained the nurses in the use of the cordial, but he went with you, we
thought. “

Sagorn,
also? Of course! And Darad.

Rap
pushed the remains of his meal away and started to talk. He was interrupted no
more. In the corner Little Chicken ate steadily, while watching the
incomprehensible talk with suspicious eyes, but it was a long tale, and even
the goblin’s appetite was satisfied before Rap finished.

The
hostler and the chaplain looked at each other.

Hononin
nodded. “I believe him. He’s a good lad-no, a good man. He always
was. “

She
nodded reluctantly and studied her fingers for a moment. Then she rose and
started to pace back and forth across the little room with her hands clasped
behind her. It was a strangely unfeminine action, and she had an awkward, jerky
gait on her surprisingly short legs. She no longer seemed tall, as she had in
the chair. At last she seemed to reach a conclusion, returning to her seat.

“Very
well!” she said. “The hostler supports you, Master Rap, and that
carries weight. But I have been thinking, also, of what the Gods want. It is
common knowledge that a God appeared to Inosolan and myself. They gave her
orders, and now I suspect that those referred to you.”

Rap
tried to remember what Inos had told him of the God and Their words, but it was
a long time ago and his memories were blurred. He was about to ask, but she
gave him no chance.

“I
shall accept your story,” she said pompously. “Obviously there is
sorcery about, and you are probably right-someone is after the royal word of
power. Inosolan will be in grave danger if she learns it. She may not, you
know. The king is rarely conscious now. Yet you think that Andor and this Darad
are the same man? “

“And
Sagorn! And Jalon the minstrel, also!” He explained how Sagorn had
appeared in the palace the previous summer without entering the gate-and Sagorn
had returned in the fall at about the same time Andor had arrived, on the night
of the blizzard, when Rap’s farsight had become general knowledge.

Jalon
had spoken of Darad. Andor had known Jalon, and Sagorn.

Yet
it was incredible, even to Rap. He had met Sagorn once. He had shared a meal
with the minstrel. Neither had been Andor, and certainly neither had been
Darad. To think of the dreamy, amiable Jalon and the savage Darad was to link
water and firethey were incompatible. There was more than shape-changing
involved here. If Jalon could turn himself into Darad at will, as Andor seemed
to be able to, then why had he not done so when he was alone with Rap in the
hills? Darad would surely not hesitate to use any means at hand to extract a
word if he had the opportunity. For that matter, why had Andor not done the
same when he had Rap alone in his attic those many long evenings?

Suddenly
Hononin snapped his fingers. “The keys! You say that Andor got them from
me? But I never saw him all that day.”

“What
happened to them?” Rap asked.

The
hostler scowled hideously at him and then at the chaplain. “I don’t
know. Found them on the stable floor; thought I’d dropped them. Id been
sure they’d been on my belt as usual. It wasn’t Andor, certain! Nor
that Sagorn man.”

“So
he may have other shapes?” Unonini said. “That is bad news. And yet
he can’t be a sorcerer. If he is, then he does things the hard way.”

“And
what about this army?” Rap asked. “I don’t know why Inos is
bringing troops, but they must be stopped.”

The
chaplain shook her head. “Inosolan may have no choice. And we don’t,
either. Sergeant Thosolin and his men can’t fight two thousand. “

“Let
them in?” Hononin looked disgusted.

“We
must,” she said. “What alternative do we have? They could burn the
town and starve out the castle. You and I cannot even warn anyone without
saying how we know, for then Master Rap would be in jeopardy. Inosolan is with
them. Why should they savage her realm?”

“Why
savage the goblins?” Rap asked bitterly. “They do no harm except to
themselves.”

That
remark raised eyebrows and produced an awkward silence.

Little
Chicken let out an enormous belch and grinned.

Little
Chicken-who would be Death Bird now, had Rap and Andor not blundered into the
Ravens’ territory-how much of this conversation was he managing to
follow?

“I
have a question, Mother,” Rap said reluctantly. “Tell me about the
Four, please. “

The
chaplain started. “What about the Four?”

“Who
they are, what they do.”

Her
eyes narrowed. She dropped her gaze to her fingers and kneaded them for a
moment. “I really know no more about them than you do-than anyone else
does. What were you taught in school about the Four?”

“Nothing.
I haven’t had much schooling, Mother. “

She
nodded, disapproving. “I see. Well, back in ancient times, the Dark
Times, Pandemia was a very violent land. There was magic about, and much evil
in it. Sorcerers set themselves up as kings and waged war among themselves.
There are legends of great massacres, of pillage and destruction, of men
fighting dragons, monsters appearing and destroying whole armies, sheets of
fire blasting hapless cities, and there are stories, too, of armies being
released from binding spells and falling on their own leaders. It was a wicked
time. You must have heard such tales!”

Rap
shook his head, although he knew a little. “Is this relevant?” she
asked, staring.

“I
think so.”

Now
the chaplain shot a worried glance at the hostler, who shrugged.

“The
Imperor Emine II set up the Council of Four almost three thousand years ago. He
gathered together the four most powerful sorcerers in all Pandemia and charged
them to guard the Impire against sorcery. Hub is the city of five hills, you
know. “ She sighed. “The city of the Gods! The most beautiful
place, the center of the Impire, on the shores of Cenmere. I spent three years
there attending... But I suppose that doesn’t matter now. Well, the
imperor’s palace is in the center, and each of the four warlocks has a
palace, also: North, East, South, and West. The imperor himself must always be
a mundane, to preserve the balance. No one may use sorcery against the imperor
himself, or his court, or family.”

Rap
nodded and waited for more.

Unonini
seemed reluctant to give it to him, but after a moment she licked her lips and
continued. “The system has worked, with a few temporary breakdowns, to
this very day. Balance is the key, you see, just as the balance between the
Good and the Evil rules the world, so the balance between the warlocks rules
the Impire.”

“If
an evil sorcerer arises, then the wardens of the Four combine against him.
Sorcerers are human, too, Master Rap. They are torn between evil and good, as
we all are-more so, perhaps, because their power to do good or evil is so much
greater. And if one of the Four falls into evil ways, then the other three can
combine against him. It is the only way to prevent the sort of anarchy that
prevailed in the Dark Times. Balance!”

Rap
nodded. “But tell me of the present wardens.”

“Why?”

“I
think I met one. “

Unonini
gasped, then again looked to the hostler, who scowled. “Which one, lad?”

“A
very old goblin woman?”

The
chaplain closed her eyes for a moment, and her lips moved. “Tell us,”
Hononin said, looking grim even for him.

So
Rap told of the two occasions on which he had seen the apparition, and of how
she seemed to have a special interest in Little Chicken. He kept his eyes off
the goblin; he spoke as fast as he could, and in the best impish he knew.

There
was a pause, then the chaplain shuddered. “Bright Water,” she
whispered, and the hostler nodded.

“It
sounds like her,” he said. “Rap, lad, I think you did meet one. She’s
witch of the north, and legend says she’s about three hundred years old-sorcerers
live a long time. She’s been one of the Four longer than any. “

“And?”
Rap said.

Again
it was the hostler who spoke, and even he had dropped his voice to a whisper. “They
say she’s totally mad.”

Rap
glanced uneasily at Little Chicken, and his odd-shaped goblin eyes were very
intent. He grinned his giant teeth at Rap. “Flat Nose, you did not tell
me this.”

“No,”
Rap admitted. “I thought maybe it was me who was mad. I’ll tell you
later. I promise.”

The
goblin nodded.

“Tell
me of the other three, Mother,” Rap said.

She
was reluctant. “I do not care to discuss them. No one does. There is only
one witch at present. The other three are men, warlocks. South is an elf, East
an imp, and the newest is West, a young dwarf. I don’t know very much,
Master Rap. You haven’t met any of those, have you?”

Rap
shook his head, and she looked relieved.

The
hostler laughed uneasily. “There is one other thing that everyone knows
that we can tell him, though. As well as claiming a quarter of the compass,
each of the four has a speciality.”

The
chaplain choked back an exclamation, as if she had not thought of that.

“What
sort of speciality?” Rap asked.

The
old man smirked. “Little things like dragons.”

Mother
Unonini thumped her hand on the arm of her chair, expelling a cloud of dust and
feathers. “We don’t know this! It is a commonly held belief, maybe,
but people don’t go round questioning sorcerers, Master Hostler, and
especially not warlocks. Who can say what they do or don’t do?”

Hononin
glared at her. “I know what I was told, and no one’s ever told me
different. Earth, water, fire, and air-so my grandpappy said.”

The
chaplain glared back, then turned to Rap. “Tradition says that even Emine’s
compact did not stop the troubles at first-that the Four turned out to be as
bad as any other group of sorcerers and strove among themselves for dominance.
Eventually-I am cutting a thick story thin-eventually the Four agreed to share
out the powers of the world between themselves. They had already divided
Pandemia itself into quarters, calling themselves North and East and so on, but
then they each took charge of a mundane power, also.”