Sea of Death: Blade of the Flame - Book 3 (11 page)

Leontis continued looking at the fire as he spoke. Diran had long ago noted his friend often had trouble meeting others’ eyes when he was discussing what he thought were sensitive matters. “You are Purified, are you not? Strong drink can impair one’s judgment, causing one to lose control of one’s emotions. As you’ve taught us, becoming Purified—and staying so—requires the constant vigilance of both a strong mind and a strong heart.”

Tusya finished off the last of the wine before answering his young charge. “I’m not sure I’d call this vintage particularly strong, either in alcohol content
or
taste.” He smiled as he laid the empty skin on the ground next to him. “There are many lessons to be learned from the symbol of our faith, many truths and insights to be gained. For example, Leontis, what shape is our campfire?”

Leontis turned to Tusya and frowned. “What?”

“The shape, son. It’s a simple enough question. Square, round, triangular … which is it?”

Leontis scowled. “Forgive me for saying so, Teacher, but sometimes I wish you would just come out and say what you mean.” But the acolyte looked back to the fire and answered. “It has a general
shape, one that’s not like anything else except other fires. Our campfire is smaller than some, larger than others. Its specific size and dimensions vary with the amount of wood used to fuel it, and the flames themselves dance and move about.”

“So would you say that while the essential nature of the fire remains the same, its particular shape varies from one moment to the next?”

“Yes,” Leontis answered.

“And thus it is with Purification. The shape it takes varies from person to person, depending on their personalities”—Tusya glanced sideways at Diran—“and what demons drive them. Some men drink alcohol as if it were water, without experiencing any significant lasting effects. Others merely take a few sips of strong drink and become its lifelong slave. For these latter souls, resisting their need for alcohol is a struggle far greater than battling couatls or lycanthropes. You have little taste for wine, Leontis, so abstaining from it would be no hardship for you. I enjoy wine, so abstaining would be more difficult for me, but I could do so with minimal effort. So it would be no great feat for either of us to forgo strong drink. And the lesson in this, Diran, is …?”

Now it was Diran’s turn to smile. “Without struggle, there is no Purification, and what defines the struggle is different for each person.”

Tusya nodded, pleased. “And it also varies for individuals in different circumstances and at different times in their lives.”

Leontis frowned, as he so often did after one of Tusya’s lessons, but it was an expression of contemplation rather than consternation.

Diran noticed a moth dip precariously close to the fire. “What insight might that insect have to offer us, Teacher?”

Before Tusya could answer, the moth dove too close and ignited in a bright silvery flash. Its charred remains fell into the fire and were quickly consumed.

Tusya’s smile was grim this time. “I think that speaks for itself, don’t you, boy?”

“I suppose it does,” Diran said softly. He thought of the upcoming Victory Day, and the lycanthropic purge it commemorated, when the
followers of the Silver Flame had at last rid Khorvaire of the scourge of the evil shapeshifters. Some of the templars, believing that the ends justified the means, had used rather questionable methods to reach this holy goal. In the end, a few priests had become just as evil as any lycanthrope they had ever fought. They had flown too close the flame, and instead of being Purified, they’d been consumed by its heat.

“But as I said earlier, the symbol of our faith can reveal many truths,” Tusya said. “Forget the moth for a moment and consider instead the wood that feeds our campfire. Fire consumes wood for its fuel, and in so doing, the wood is transformed. It becomes one with the fire, fulfilling its true purpose. To serve the Flame well, we must willingly give ourselves over to its heat and light.”

For a time after that the three men sat quietly, listening to the crackle of the fire, the leaves of nearby trees rustling in the night breeze, and the gentle rushing waters of the Thrane River. It was peaceful and soothing, and soon Diran found himself becoming drowsy. He was about to say goodnight to his companions and crawl into his bedroll when a strange sensation began to come over him. The training he’d received at Emon Gorsedd’s academy of assassins had honed his senses to a razor-fine edge, and on more than one occasion those senses had saved his life on a mission. The feeling he had now was something like that, an awareness of danger, but there was more to it. He also felt a sense of
wrongness
.

Diran was instantly alert. “Teacher, I feel something …”

Tusya raised an eyebrow. “Is that so?”

Diran turned in the direction of the river. “That way … on the bank of the Thrane. But upstream a ways, I think.”

“What are you going on about, Diran?” Leontis asked. “I sense nothing.”

Tusya kept his gaze focused on Diran as he spoke to Leontis. “Our friend lived with a demonic spirit inside him for many years, lad. Thus he is more sensitive to evil’s presence than most people, even though he has yet to have any tutelage in the ways of dealing with such dark powers.”

Diran turned to look at Tusya. “Surely you were aware of this evil long before I was.”

Tusya shrugged. “Perhaps.”

“You have many fine qualities, Teacher,” Diran said. “But acting talent isn’t chief among them.”

Tusya grinned but said nothing.

Leontis sighed as he reached for his bow and quiver of arrows. He withdrew half a dozen shafts and began rolling their tips in the silvery ashes scattered around the burning wood.

“What are you doing?” Diran asked.

“Getting ready. Obviously Tusya wants us to investigate the source of this evil. Why else would he have insisted we camp here for the night? And why else would he have added silverburn to the fire unless he wished for us to make use of it?” Leontis finished coating the last of his arrowheads with ash and then returned the shafts to their quiver. He strung his bow, stood, and slung the quiver over his shoulder.

“Shall we?” Leontis asked.

Diran looked at his friend and fellow acolyte with newfound respect. Leontis might not have Diran’s life experience, but that didn’t make him stupid by any means.

Diran nodded to Leontis and stood. He turned to Tusya and asked, “Will you be joining us?”

During their travels through Thrane with Tusya, they’d had occasion to encounter evils both mundane and supernatural. But while the young acolytes had assisted their teacher in whatever capacity he required, Tusya had always been the one to take the lead when dealing with anything otherworldly.

The priest appeared to consider for a moment. “I’m a bit tired. I believe I’ll just stay here and warm my old bones by the fire.”

Diran and Leontis exchanged glances. Their teacher’s message was clear: he wished them to go alone this time.

“We’ll be back as soon as we can,” Diran said. He nodded to Leontis, and the two acolytes began walking away from the silvery flames of the campfire and into the dark of the night. When they were almost out of earshot, Diran heard Tusya speak in a voice close to a whisper.

“Go with the Flame, lads. But be careful not to fly too close.”

Baroness Calida took her time examining the letter of introduction from Baron Mahir. Not, Ghaji thought, because she had trouble understanding the missive’s meaning or doubted its authenticity. Rather, because she was uncertain how to respond to the words before her.

Ghaji, Diran, and Asenka stood quietly in front of Calida while she thought. Calida’s chamber was nothing like what Ghaji had expected. There was no throne on a raised dais to put the Baroness above her audience, no large open area for courtiers to gather, gossip, backstab, and generally attempt to curry favor with their ruler. The chamber resembled nothing so much as a private sitting room, with chairs and couches that looked almost
too
comfortable. Paintings of placid landscapes hung on the walls, and a woven rug of gentle sea-green covered the floor. As elsewhere in the palace, flowers and hanging plants were located throughout the chamber, their aromas mingling with the smells of the scented candles that lit the room, the combined odors keeping the air pleasantly perfumed.

Calida herself didn’t look particularly regal. In fact, if Ghaji had to pick a single word to describe her, it would have been
tired
. At first glance, he guessed Calida to be somewhere in her forties, but on closer inspection he realized she was likely ten years younger. The Baroness’s weariness added years to her appearance. Her eyes were red and sore, the flesh beneath them puffy and discolored. Her long flowing brunette hair was shot through with strands of gray, and she was so thin she looked as if she might be suffering from malnutrition. Calida’s simple yellow dress hung on her emaciated frame like a blanket someone had tossed carelessly over her to keep her warm.

She looked up from the letter and attempted to focus her gaze on them, though she seemed to have trouble doing so. She kept blinking as if to clear her eyes, and her head swayed from side to side slightly, as if she were having difficulty staying awake Ghaji wondered if Calida’s condition was entirely due to weariness, or if perhaps, living so close to the center of the Fury, she was forced to take narcotics simply to function. Perhaps both were true, he decided.

“Others have tried to remove the curse on the House of Kolbyr. What makes you think you can succeed where so many have failed before?” Calida’s voice was surprisingly strong, and Ghaji’s estimation of her went up a notch. It was the voice of a woman who was used to ruling, a woman whose inner reserves of strength, while depleted, were not yet exhausted.

Ghaji looked to Diran, expecting his friend to make their case to the Baroness. But to the half-orc’s surprise, it was Asenka who spoke first.

“I’m Perhaten, Baroness, and a faithful servant of Baron Mahir. As a Sea Scorpion, I have fought against your Coldhearts on numerous occasions, and I’ve slain more than my fair share. I think it safe to say that I hold little love in my heart for Kolbyr or its citizens.”

Ghaji grimaced. “I’m just an ignorant half-orc, Asenka, so feel free to correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t it generally a good idea for diplomats to speak
diplomatically?”

Calida held up her hand to silence Ghaji then nodded to Asenka. “Go on.”

Asenka bowed her head to the Baroness. “Forget for the moment that Mahir thought enough of these two men to write them a letter of introduction and send me, the captain of his Sea Scorpions, to accompany them. Forget for the moment that the citizens of Kolbyr have lived with the curse upon their city for the last hundred years. Forget that, should the curse be lifted, it may well lead to improved relations between our two cities, and perhaps a better life for all who inhabit the Gulf of Ingjald. All that matters is that within this generation, the curse has manifested itself in
your
firstborn child, Calida. Do you really want to hear assurances that Diran and Ghaji can help you? You already know you’re going to allow them to try. As a mother, you won’t pass up any chance, no matter how slim, to save your child?”

The Baroness regarded Asenka for a long moment, the expression on her weary face unreadable. Finally, she rose out of her overstuffed chair, picked up a scented candle mounted in a pewter holder off of the end table, and began shuffling toward the door.

“Come with me,” she said.

As the three companions followed the Baroness, Asenka gave Ghaji a grin as if to say,
Was that diplomatic enough for you?

Ghaji grinned. He was beginning to understand what Diran saw in this woman.

Ghaji expected Calida to lead them down into the bowels of the palace, where they’d find the cursed child sealed away in a subterranean cell, dwelling in darkness, forever denied the light of day. But instead the Baroness—along with the two guards—led them up a flight of stairs to the uppermost floor of the palace. At the end of a long featureless corridor lay a single door made entirely of metal, an iron crossbar set firmly in place to seal the room shut from the outside.