Rise Of Empire (96 page)

“Yes,” Arista told her.

“And what if you are caught? Will you betray the empress by revealing the aid she has provided you?”

“No, of course not. I would never do anything to harm her.”

“Why are you asking this, Amilia?” Modina looked from her to Nimbus and back again. “What do you know?”

Amilia hesitated for only a moment, then spoke. “There is a Seret Knight standing guard in the north tower.”

“I’m not familiar with your palace. Is that unusual?” Arista asked.

“There’s nothing to guard there,” Amilia explained. “It’s a prison tower, but none of the cells hold prisoners. Yet last night I watched two fourth-floor guards deliver a pot of soup there.”

“To the guard?”

“No,” Amilia said, “they delivered the soup to the tower. Less than five minutes later, I arrived. The soup was gone, pot and all.”

Arista stood. “They were feeding a prisoner, but you say there are no occupied cells in the tower? Are you sure?”

“Positive. Every door was open, and every cell vacant. It looked to have been that way for some time.”

“I need to get in that tower,” Arista declared. “I could burn a hair in one of the empty cells. If he’s nearby, that could really tell us something.”

“There is no way you are getting in that tower,” Amilia told her. “You’d have to walk right past the knight. While the chief imperial secretary to the empress might get away with such a thing, I highly doubt the fugitive Witch of Melengar will.”

“I bet Saldur could walk in and out of there without question, couldn’t he?”

“Of course, but you aren’t him.”

Arista smiled.

She turned to the tutor. “Nimbus, I have a letter for Hilfred and another for my brother. I wrote them in the event something happened to me. I want to give them to you now, just in case. Don’t deliver them unless you know I’m not coming back.”

“Of course.” He bowed.

Amilia rolled her eyes.

Arista handed the letters to Nimbus and, for no particular reason, gave him a kiss on the cheek.

“Just make certain when you are caught that you don’t drag Modina into it,” Amilia said, leaving with Nimbus.

“What are you planning to do?” Modina asked.

“Something I’ve never tried before, something I’m not even certain I can do. Modina, I don’t know what will happen. I might do some strange things. Please ignore them and don’t interfere, okay?”

Modina nodded.

Arista knelt and spread her gown out around her. She took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and tilted her head back. She took another deep breath, then sat still. She did not move for a long time. She sat breathing very slowly, very rhythmically. Her hands opened. Her arms lifted, as if floating on their own—pulled by invisible strings or rising on currents of air. She began to sway gently from side to side, her hair flowing back and forth. Soon she began to hum. The humming took on a melody, and the melody produced words Modina did not understand.

Then Arista began to glow. The light grew brighter with each word. Her dress turned pure white, her skin luminous. It soon hurt Modina’s eyes to look at her, so she turned away.

The light went out.

“Did it work?” Modina asked. She turned back to face Arista and gasped.

When Arista opened the door, the guard stared at her, stunned. “Your Grace! I didn’t see you come in.”

“You should be more watchful, then,” Arista said, frightened by the sound of her own voice—so familiar and yet so different.

The guard bowed. “Yes, Your Grace. I will. Thank you, Your Grace.”

Arista hurried down the stairs, self-conscious and fearful as she clutched three strands of hair in her left hand and a chunk of chalk in her right. She felt exposed, walking openly in the hallways after hiding for so long. She did not feel any different. Only by looking at her hands and clothing could she see evidence that the spell had worked. She was wearing imperial robes and her hands were those of an old man, with thick gaudy rings. Each servant or guard she passed nodded respectfully, saying softly, “Good afternoon, Your Grace.”

Growing up with Saldur practically as her uncle had one advantage—she knew every line of his face, his mannerisms, and his voice. She was certain she could not perform a similar illusion with Modina, Amilia, or Nimbus, even if she had them in front of her for reference. This took more—she
knew
Saldur.

By the time she reached the first floor of the palace, she was gaining confidence. Only two concerns remained. What if she ran into the real Saldur, and how long would the spell last? Stumbling through what had to be an advanced magical technique, she had worked solely by intuition. She had known what she wanted and had a general idea how to go about it, but the result had been more serendipity than skill. So much of magic was guesswork and nuance. She was starting to understand that now and could not help being pleased with herself.

Unlike what she had managed in the past, this was completely
new, something she had not even known was possible. Casting an enchantment on herself was a frightening prospect. What if there were rules against such things? What if the source of the Art forbade it and imposed harm on those who tried? She never would have attempted it under different circumstances, but she was desperate. Still, having done so, and succeeded, she felt thrilled. She had invented it. Perhaps no wizard had ever managed such a thing!

“Your Grace!” Edith Mon was caught by surprise, coming around a corner where they nearly collided. She carried a stack of sheets in her arms and nearly lost them. “Forgive me, Your Grace! I—I—”

“Think nothing of it, my dear.” The
my dear
at the end of the sentence came out unconsciously—it just felt right. Hearing it sent a chill through her, which proved it was pitch-perfect. This might be fun if not for the mortal fear.

A thought popped into her head. “I’ve heard reports that you’ve been treating your staff poorly.”

“Your Grace?” Edith asked, looking nervous. “I—I don’t know what you mean.”

Arista leaned toward her with a smile that she knew from experience would appear all the more frightening for its friendly, disarming quality. “You aren’t going to lie to my face, are you, Edith?”

“Ah—no, sir.”

“I don’t like it, Edith. I don’t like it at all. It breeds discontent. If you don’t stop, I’ll need to find a means of correcting your behavior. Do you understand me?”

Edith’s eyes were wide. She nodded as if her head were hinged too tight.

“I’ll be watching you. I’ll be watching
very
closely.”

With that, Arista left Edith standing frozen in the middle of the corridor, clutching her bundle of sheets.

The guards at the front entrance bowed and opened the doors for her. Stepping outside, her senses were alert for any sign of trouble. She could smell the bread in the ovens of the bakehouse. To her left, a boy chopped wood, and ahead of her, two lads shoveled out the stable, placing manure in a cart, no doubt for use in the garden. The afternoon air was cold and the manure steamed. She could see her breath puffing in steamy clouds as she marched between the brick chicken coop and the remnants of the garden.

She reached the north tower, opened the door, and entered. A Seret Knight with a deadly-looking sword strapped to his belt stood at attention. He said nothing and she did the same while looking about.

The tower was cylindrical, with arched windows that allowed light to stream in and gleam off the polished stone floor. A tall arched frame formed the entrance to the spiral stair. Across from it, a small fireplace provided heat for the guard. Covered in cobwebs, a wooden bench stood beside a small empty four-legged table. The only unusual thing was the stone of the walls. The rough-hewn rock of the upper portion of the tower was lighter in color than the more neatly laid, darker stone beneath.

The knight appeared uncomfortable at her silence.

“Is everything all right here?” Arista asked, going for the most neutral thing she could think of.

“Yes, Your Grace!” he replied enthusiastically.

“Very good,” she said, and casually shuffled to the stairs and began to climb. She glanced behind her to see if the guard would follow, but he remained where he was without even looking in her direction.

She went up one flight and stopped at the first open cell. Just as Amilia had reported, it appeared to have been long abandoned. She checked to make certain the cell door would
not lock, and then carefully closed it. She got on her knees, quickly drawing the circle and the runes.

She placed the blond hairs on the floor, lining them up in rows. Picking up several pieces of straw, she twisted them tightly into a rope stalk. She repeated the phrase she had used for weeks and instantly the top of the straw caught fire, becoming a tiny torch. She recited the location spell and touched the flame to one of the hairs. It heated up like a red coil and turned to ash. Arista looked for the smoke, but there was none. She glanced around the room, confused. She looked at the smoke coming off the straw. It drifted straight up. There was no wind, no draft of any kind in the cell.

She tried again with the second hair, this time putting out the straw, thinking its smoke might be interfering. Instead, she cast the burn spell directly on the hair, followed by the location incantation. The hair turned to ash without a trace of the familiar light gray smoke.

Was something about the tower blocking her spell? Could it be like the prison where they had kept Esrahaddon? The Old Empire had placed complicated runes on the walls, blocking the use of magic. She looked around. The walls were bare.

No
, she thought,
I wouldn’t be able to cast the burn spell if that were the case. For that matter, my Saldur guise would have failed the moment I entered.

Looking down, she saw that there was only one hair left. She considered moving to a different room, and then the answer dawned on her. Reciting the spell once more, she picked up the last hair, held it between her fingers, and lit it.

There it is!

The smoke was pure white now and spilled straight down between her fingers like a trickle of water. It continued to fall until it met the floor, where it immediately disappeared.

She stood in the cell, trying to figure out what it meant. According to the smoke, Gaunt was very close and directly below her, but there was nothing down there. She considered that perhaps there might be a door in the fireplace, but concluded the opening was too small. There simply was nothing else below her except—the guard!

Arista gasped.

She checked her hands, reassured to see the wrinkled skin and ugly rings, and went back down the stairs to the base of the tower. The guard remained standing statue-like with his helm covering every trace of his features.

“Remove your helm,” she ordered.

The knight hesitated only briefly, then complied.

She knew exactly what Degan Gaunt looked like from his image in Avempartha. The moment he removed his helm, her hopes disappeared. This was not the man she had seen in the elven tower.

She forgot herself for a moment and sighed in a most un-Saldur-like way.

“Is there something wrong, Your Grace?”

“Ah—no, no,” she replied quickly, and started to leave.

“I assure you, sir, I told her nothing of the prisoner. I refused to speak a single word.”

Arista halted. She pivoted abruptly, causing her robes to sweep around her majestically. The dramatic motion had a visible impact on the guard and she finally understood why Saldur always did that.

“Are you certain?”

“Yes!” he declared, but doubt crossed his face. “Did she say differently? If she did, she’s lying.”

Arista said nothing but merely continued to stare at him. This was not an intentional act. She was simply trying to determine what to say next. She was not sure how to form her
statement to get the knight to talk without being obvious. As she stood there, formulating her next words, the knight broke under her stare.

“Okay, I did threaten to unsheathe my sword, but I didn’t. I was very careful about that. I only pulled it partway out. The tip never cleared the sheath, I swear. I just wanted to scare her off. She did not see anything. Watch.” The knight pulled his sword and gestured toward the floor. “See? Nothing.”