Stealing Sorcery (17 page)

Or maybe I’m fixating too much on taking immediate action.

“I’m going to go find an empty house and hide.”

Trace blinked. “What do you mean?”

“Given that the city is about to come under siege, they’ve probably evacuated some of the locations near the walls. Even if they haven’t formally evacuated anything, I can probably just find a place to hide somewhere. I’d regret having to fight civilians if I run into any, but I could probably scare them off. I’d hide until the bombardment starts, and then once the battle is going in earnest, I’ll go for the prince. If the infiltration squad already saved him, great. If not, I’ll do it myself.”

“Okay. How long would you wait after the bombardment starts before heading to the palace?”

“Only a few minutes. There’s the possibility that they might try to move or execute Adellan once the battle begins, especially since they know we sent in spies. It’s possible he’s already dead. If I find evidence of that, I’ll try to take one of the Xixian royals as my own prisoner and extract him or her from the city.”

“Huh. I, well, wouldn’t have considered that. I’ll go tell the judges.” Trace ran off to the judge’s table, leaning down and exchanging more hushed conversation with them. He returned to Taelien after several minutes.

“You’ve given us enough to begin evaluating your test results.”

Taelien blinked. “Really? That’s it?”

Trace laughed. “Usually it’s over a lot faster than that, actually. But you didn’t hear that from me. And remember, no talking to any of the candidates about this until you’re all done.”

“So…did I pass?”

Trace shrugged. “No idea. The judges will need time to make a decision. But either way, you gave us a pretty impressive show.”

Velthryn’s winding streets were somewhat easier to navigate in the dawnfire’s light, but only slightly. The city had grown rapidly from its founding until a mere fifty years ago, when Edrick Theas had laid the city’s famous boundary wards – a series of protection rituals that made the walls nearly impervious to harm. The wards were broadly believed to have other functions, such as preventing teleportation into the city from outside, but Jonan didn’t know the details.

He did, however, notice one of the consequences. When the wards were built, the city could no longer be built outward, otherwise the wards would lose their function. From that point on, the citizens had been forced to build in other directions – upward and down.

Selyr had its share of tall towers and majestic keeps, but they were few and reserved for the wealthy. Nearly every structure in Velthryn, however, was several floors tall. Individual houses were practically nonexistent outside of the wealthiest areas. Those wealthy areas were easy to discern visually, but the city didn’t seem to follow the same structure of clear districts that Selyr and Orlyn did, at least so far as Jonan could tell.

Tall housing complexes sat directly adjacent to warehouses, restaurants, and shops. The civilians seemed to know their way around instinctively, but the servant of Vaelien often found himself frowning at his map, pondering what sort of madness could have led to a city so lacking in organization.

It was midday before he found Orison Park, one of the few spots of green in a city of cobblestones and grey masonry. He paused to take a breath of the air nearer to the trees, hoping that the scent would remind him of the familiar forest air of home, but that effort ended in failure. The wood here had a sweet scent that struck him as unnatural, far unlike the sharpness of pine that he had grown accustomed to.

He found the twisting trails within the park easier to navigate – these, at least, appeared to lead specifically to or past points of interest. He passed a large statue of Lorain Valere, one of the city’s founders, and smiled at the children that were attempting to climb up the base. Past that, the trail led him to a pond. A group of young men were running circles around it, while a couple took turns tossing something – food, perhaps? – near a group of birds in the water.

Passing these people by, Jonan trekked onward, finally finding his destination – a lone bench, a familiar figure sitting atop it, a book pressed close against her face.

Jonan paused for a moment, uncertain what to say in spite of the hours he had spent aware of his destination.

Lydia spoke first, without even looking up from the pages. “Good morning, Jonan. Join me?”

He silently took a seat by her side, and she set the book down on her lap a moment later. Instinctively, his eyes shifted to the cover of the tome as she moved.

“Reading more of Tarren’s work? Don’t you ever get tired of it?” Jonan had read several of Tarren’s works – they were practically a mandatory part of any sorcerer’s education – but he found the scholar’s style too informal and whimsical for his tastes.

“He’s the expert on something I’ve been needing to study. But we’ll get to that.”

He nodded, glancing around. “Beautiful morning.”

“Is it?” Lydia followed his gaze, and then shook her head. “I hadn’t noticed.”

Truthfully, he hadn’t really, either – but someone else had mentioned it to him earlier, and he had long ago learned to mimic platitudes to mask his own awkwardness.

“So, uh, it’s been a while.”

“It certainly has. Thank you for coming on such short notice. I wouldn’t have asked if there wasn’t a good reason.”

A good reason? I suppose just wanting to see me wasn’t good enough.

“I suspected as much,” he replied.
And I was already in Velthryn, but she can’t know that.
“What do you need my help with?”

She tilted her head to the side, allowing a free strand of red to fall in front of her eyes. “A couple things, actually. First, I was hoping you’d be willing to share the results of your studies of Donovan’s sorcerous experiments.”

Several months earlier, Jonan and Lydia had worked together to investigate Donovan Tailor, a former Priest of Sytira who had set himself up as a “god” in the city of Orlyn. They had found evidence that Donovan had discovered a new way of applying ancient sorcerous techniques, which the sorcerer had used to fake his divine status.

Their work had resulted in Donovan’s arrest, and Jonan had managed to hold on to Donovan’s cryptic research notes when they had left the city. Throughout the intervening time period, studying those notes had occupied the vast majority of Jonan’s time. He had sent Lydia several messages about his progress – via a dominion bonded hand mirror that shared images with her own matching mirror – but he had kept the notes deliberately vague, just in case Lydia had somehow lost her mirror.

“I suppose I could, but I’m not sure this is really the right place.” He looked around again, not seeing any civilians in the immediate vicinity, but knowing that he had seen people no more than a few minutes away.

“I thought of that, and there isn’t really a much better location. I can’t exactly bring you to the paladin headquarters, and I sincerely doubt that wherever you’re staying is secure.”

That’s an understatement.

“All right, fair enough. But I’ll keep it in broad terms. I don’t want anyone overhearing us and piecing together secrets of world-shaking scale.”

Lydia gave a scoffing chuckle. “There’s no need to be so dramatic. No one is going to be able to do anything with that information without the sufficient context to know what we’re talking about.”

“You’re more right than you realize.” He took a breath. “We had only scratched the surface of understanding Donovan’s research when we confronted him.”

She reached upward with a slender hand, pushing her glasses further up her nose. “Go on.”

“Well, you remember those strange words that Edon was using for his spells? I think each word – possibly each syllable, really – corresponds to some sort of function. I don’t want to go so far as to say the sounds have intrinsic meaning, although they might, but something is capable of interpreting them and producing results.”

This explanation wasn’t completely new – they had speculated the possibility when they had confronted Donovan, even though it sounded completely contrary to typical sorcerous theory.

“Right, but we’ve both tried using the same words he did. Repeatedly, in my case.” Her lips contorted in frustration. “They don’t do anything on their own.”

“That’s where I’ve made a bit of progress. Do you still have the ring he was wearing, and that gemstone?”

The question was a probe for information, but it was only fair – what she was asking him about was even more valuable.

The knowledge sorceress nodded. “Yes, and I’ve spent some time studying them. Initially, I thought the ring was the power source for those unusual flame spells both he and Veruden were capable of using, but the phrase he used doesn’t activate the ring like I expected it would.”

“That,” Jonan smirked, “Is because he was changing the function of the ring.”

Lydia raised an eyebrow. “Go on.”

“So, remember when we talked about the marks on artifacts potentially corresponding to different words or concepts? Edon realized that if he could connect with an artifact, he could add additional words to change or activate a specific function.”

“Like adding keys to a dominion sorcery spell...” Lydia nodded, a thoughtful expression on her face.

“That’s the point of all those dominion marks he was putting on Veruden – and, presumably, on himself. When one of them activated a dominion mark, it would send a command to an artifact the mark was linked to. Their words would determine the exact function. It’s possible the marks even sent some sort of default message if they were silent - the notes in the journal were not that specific.”

Lydia turned her eyes skyward. “So, if we wanted to create the same effects, we’d need to be able to create identical bonds to the ones he did – meaning we’d need access to the same artifacts, and to know exactly how the marks were constructed – and then use the exact same words. That sounds somewhat challenging.”

He was tempted to tell her about the freshly-burned mark on his right bicep, currently concealed beneath his nondescript brown tunic, but he decided against it. She had probably been bright enough to guess that he had stolen the Heartlance after their confrontation with Donovan, but she didn’t need to know that he was able to tap into its abilities. She already knew far more of his secrets than he was comfortable with.

“Yes,” he said after a moment of hesitation. “But not impossible. I believe I have sufficient notes to attempt making a mark corresponding to the ring you have, but I do not have the resources.”

“Dominion essence corresponding to the dominion of the artifact, I assume?” Lydia asked in a rhetorical tone. “I could probably arrange for that. Provided you’re putting the mark on me, of course.”

He nodded affirmatively. “That would be acceptable. I think we could gain some valuable information from testing the interactions between a mark and that ring. Donovan’s notes were impressive, but not exhaustive. And, as you suspected when we last discussed this, I believe he was expanding his vocabulary of terms that the artifacts recognized with each one that he studied. If you could convince Taelien to let us study the Sae’kes—”

Lydia folded her arms, tilting her head downward with a frustrated expression.

Jonan raised his hands defensively. “Hey, I had to ask. You Sytirans do love knowledge, so I thought...”

“Studying a sacred artifact amongst our own is one thing. I like you, Jonan, but you are literally a spy for a foreign government.”

He rolled his eyes. “Well, when you put it that way...”

“If I asked you to loan me Vaelien’s personal weapon for some research, how would you react?”

Jonan scratched at his chin. “With amusement, really. I mean, do you really think I’d have any access to that? It’s not really a comparable scenario.”

“Fine, fine. But it does sound ridiculous, right?”

“Well, if I did have access to it, I would try to at least entertain the idea.”

Lydia sighed. “Ultimately, it’s up to Salaris, but I’d advise him against it.”

Jonan furrowed his brow. “Salaris? I’ve never heard you call Taelien that before.”

“I’ve had to get into the habit. Calling himself Taelien was one thing in Orlyn, but here, it’s more than a little presumptuous.”

Their mutual friend had always referred to himself as Taelien, as long as Jonan could remember – it was the title of the sacred weapon he carried. Taking a title as a personal name wasn’t exactly uncommon, but since the sword was a key element of the Tae’os religion, using the name in a Tae’os worshipping city was essentially telling people he was a messenger of the gods.

Which, given the swordsman’s capabilities, Jonan suspected might actually be the case. He had watched bouts between some of the most skilled fighters in Selyr, and less than a handful of them came close to Taelien’s raw speed or strength. And that wasn’t even accounting for his ability to manipulate metal, which was so useful in a sword fight it seemed almost unfair.

He had only heard the name “Salaris” – which was apparently Taelien’s actual birth name – thrown around once or twice. The swordsman didn’t seem particularly fond of it.

“I guess I’ll keep that in mind if I run into him. Is he going to be in on whatever you called me here for? I’m sure you didn’t ask me to come out to Velthryn just to discuss Donovan’s notes, as interesting as they might be.”

“You’re right, I did have another reason for talking to you. A more immediate concern than the notes, although I don’t think you should underestimate my interest in them. An entirely new method of casting spells could have the potential to reshape our society.”

Jonan waved his hand dismissively. He was well aware of the vast potential behind this Donovan’s discovery – a concept he was calling ‘artifact sorcery’ in his mind – and that potential was exactly why he didn’t intend to share the full extent of what he knew with anyone, even Lydia.

More dreadfully, he also knew that Donovan’s research partner – a sorceress named Morella – most likely understood the concepts even more intimately than he did, and that she was more than likely currently plotting her revenge against everyone who had been involved in Donovan’s downfall. Taelien, Lydia, and Jonan were probably among the top entries in that list.

“Yes, yes, sorcery is important. What’s this more immediate concern?”

“Well,” her lips twisted into a frown, “A young man was murdered.”

Murders happen all the time. Normal people should look disturbed at a revelation like this, however.

Jonan gave his best simulation of a sympathetic frown.

“Go on.”

“About a week ago, a young woman came to the Paladins of Tae’os asking for a healer. She said her brother was bleeding from several places, and she suspected a sorcerous cause. My partner, Aladir Ta’thyriel, was the first to make it to the scene. I can say without exaggeration that Aladir is the most powerful life sorcerer I have ever encountered. His ministrations – up to and including multiple Spark of Life spells - had no effect.”