Summa Elvetica: A Casuistry of the Elvish Controversy and Other Stories (16 page)

“I don’t think that counts until after you take vows.”

“I’ll take them just to get away from you if you won’t shut up.” He glanced back at Lodi, who was still sitting there in silence, seemingly unaware that anyone else was nearby. “But what makes you think he feels the way you do? He’s a dwarf, not a man.”

“Ask him, I suppose. You know, it’s a good thing we saw him shaved in Amorr, back before that bird’s nest of a beard grew back. Otherwise, for all he talks lately, you’d never know he had a mouth.”

• • •

Marcus did ask Lodi if he wanted to be freed. That very night.

As it turned out, Lodi had no burning desire for freedom. Like Marcipor, he was more concerned about the problems that freedom would present him at the moment than its future promises. The elven wood of Shadowald was not a place where a lone dwarf could expect to survive long. Lodi might bear the king of Merithaim’s gift-knife, but he was surely the very last individual in the party to be inclined to place any trust in the value of the elven king’s goodwill.

He also pointed out that as Marcus’s bodyguard, he was expected to save Marcus’s life from time to time. He had no desire to have one of Amorr’s most powerful magnates placing a bounty on his head for shirking what was, after all, nothing more than his duty.

“Your uncle told me to bring you back from Elebrion or he’d have my head. So, I’ll bring you back, one way or another. Alive, I hope. Once I get you back to your uncle, then we can talk about freedom.” Lodi stared into the flames. “It’s not the words that matter anyway. Call me free or call me slave, but either way, I’ll need enough gold to buy passage to Malkania. From there I can get back to the Volpiscenes.”

“Ask for it and it will be yours,” promised Marcus. Even if Magnus didn’t want to free the dwarf for his own incomprehensible reasons, he’d have to if he didn’t wish to cause his nephew to be foresworn. A Valerian’s word wasn’t merely binding on the Valerian, it bound all of House Valerius.

• • •

Four days later, they began the long approach to the High City of the elvish kingdom of Elberion. If the city was not truly one of the great wonders of the world, it deserved to be. The twisted forest pathways of the Shadowald slowly gave way to the foothills of the Montulae and finally to the climb that would lead them to the forbidding walls of the royal elven city. There was now a chill in the air, even at the height of summer, as they traversed the seven gorges that had swallowed entire armies during the War of the Three Peoples. After crossing Ol-Oropon, the sixth bridge, Bishop Claudo halted the train and, in his pinched voice, led the Michaelines in a ceremonial mass for the two thousand noble souls that had been lost here.

Marcus knew their splintered bones smouldered unburied somewhere in the cruel, unhallowed depths below. “I wonder if anyone has ever crawled down there?” he mused, as he and Marcipor peeked cautiously over the edge of the rocky chasm. The drop was tremendous, on the order of three thousand cubits.

The wily elves had allowed half the Amorran Legion to cross the bridge, then their sorcerers had destroyed its moorings while the latter half was still crossing. A surprise cavalry charge, its approach masked by illusion, had then swept those already across the bridge down into the gap, while Octavius Severus the Elfslayer helplessly gnashed his teeth on the other side. The Battle of the SixthBridge was one of the great disasters of Amorran history.

It was the elves’ lethal use of battle magic in this engagement, taken in company with the rout of the three legions at Aldus Wald, that had been one of the chief spurs in encouraging a dubious Sanctiff to allow the Michaelines to pursue their potent anti-magic skills as a much-needed countermeasure.

“You’d probably find some useful things down there if you did,” replied Marcipor thoughfully. He shrugged off Marcus’s dismayed expression. “It’s not doing them any good now, is it?”

Each waystation they came to was a sort of small community in its own right. The elvic guards, four at each bridge and twenty at each waystation, were civil, but markedly less friendly than their forest brethren had been. Judging by the flicker of curiosity in their pale eyes as the Amorrans rode slowly past, Marcus judged that very few men ever dared pay court to High King Mael. The path was paved at this point, and despite the incline, it was a broad and easy way.

“How come it’s never been taken?” asked Marcipor on the tenth day of their climb. “Even if you couldn’t get past the bridges, I haven’t seen any farms or livestock since we crossed the first one. Couldn’t you simply lay siege and starve them out in a season or two?”

Marcus shook his head. “No, there’s an underground river that links Elebrion to the sea, somewhere near Kir Donas. I’ve read that they even have a fish market.”

“Brrrr.” Marcipor shivered. “Swimming to safety in an underground mountain river? That would be a horribly long row—in the dark, no less. It must be two hundred leagues to Kir Donas!”

“It’s not dark,” Lodi said unexpectedly. “It’s lit by lights enspelled five hundred years ago and still shining. No magic older than elvish lore.”

Marcus and Marcipor looked at each other. “Have you been there?” Marcipor asked. “Have you seen the river?”

“No, but I been plenty of other places underground. I’ve seen elf-lights. They never stop glowing, so there’s no night down below. Some say they been put there by their diableristes, burning souls caught by their filthy soul-drinker swords. Lights of the damned, some say.”

Lodi scratched at his thickening stubble, which was now almost long enough to qualify as a beard by human standards, if well short of the dwarven. “Dwarves don’t hold with such. Pyromantic lanterns don’t work so well or last so long, but at least they’re not witchen filth.”

One of the Michaelines glanced back at them.

Marcus shushed the dwarf. “Lodi, don’t talk about such things, at least not like you know something of them.”

“Me? I don’t know more than any other dwarf. We’re not afraid of magics, but we don’t hold with it.”

“That’s good.” A dwarven slave might be permitted some license that a human slave was not, but no one except those expressly granted permission by the Sanctiff could practice magic in Amorr—under pain of death by fire and water. Even the unknowing possession of an ensorcelled object might suffice to land one in speedy exile, or worse. A slave—especially a breed slave—caught practicing any form of magic would be immediately put to death.

“Except, of course, for the smiths,” Lodi said. “They’re powerful great magicians. If that priest of yours thinks much of his elvenblade, he should see a dwarf-worked sword!”

“Lodi!”

Fortunately, the Michaeline had lost interest in their conversation. Marcus breathed a sigh of relief and shook his head. He wasn’t entirely sure, but he didn’t find it hard to imagine that being put on trial for suspicion of sorcery would be detrimental to any future career in the Church.

Cum in omnibus creaturis sit aliqualis Dei similitudo, in sola creatura rationali invenitur similitudo Dei per modum imaginis, in aliis autem creaturis per modum vestigii. Id autem in quo creatura rationalis excedit alias creaturas, est intellectus sive mens. Unde relinquitur quod nec in ipsa rationali creatura invenitur Dei imago, nisi secundum mentem. Gregorius, in homilia Epiphaniae, nominat aelvum rationale animal, ergo aelvi similius hominum angelorumque quam animalium irrationalium.

THE MASSIVE WALLS of the great elvish city were in sight when they reached the seventh and final waystation. Drenched in the crimson light of the setting sun, the walls looked invincible. Far above the Amorrans’ heads, two giant eagles circled aimlessly, and the sun glinted off the polished armor of their riders, who were surely armed with longbows, Marcus thought. The sight of the high patrol soaring over their heads made him very glad that there were two elves wearing unmistakable silver helms riding at the front of their train.

They entered the city in the afternoon. The great gates parted as they approached, and they rode in to the haunting fanfare of the strange elvic pipes called caslai. The pipes were long and white, carved from bone, with three separate tubes joined in irregular fashion. They produced sweet, high-pitched tones that echoed eerily off the surrounding mountains like an eagle’s cry in the thin air.

An honor guard awaited them inside the gates. The elves of Elebrion were taller and even paler than those of Merithaim. Their hair bore closer resemblance to the white of their snow-capped mountains than to the yellow flower-colored hair of their brethren in the lowlands. They also dressed more formally than their woodland cousins. All were wearing cloaks dyed in rich hues of royal blue, sumptuous purple, and blood red.

There was an ethereal quality to them—they showed little emotion in welcoming their guests, and their silver armor was so elaborate that it bore more resemblance to lace than to steel—and to their city as well. Together, Elebrion and its inhabitants left Marcus with the impression of a tomb guarded by beautiful, barely animate statues. It was a city of dead angels.

From what he’d seen in approaching it from below, Elebrion was perhaps only two-thirds the size of the city-state of Amorr. But now he saw that the elvish city was not nearly so crowded, which gave it the impression of being rather larger. It was spacious and regular, laid out in quadrants and wholly devoid of the serpentine vici streets that wound through Amorr like woodworms boring through a rotten log. There was a feeling of emptiness about the great marble-floored squares through which they rode. The citizenry seemed outnumbered by ornate fountains and intricately carved statues of past elven heroes and strange geometric shapes.

They passed a large building that seemed more alive than most. It seemed almost to have a golden aura emanating from its arches. It was marked above the entrance with what Marcus recognized immediately as the elven symbol for truth. The building drew him, as if it were a mighty lodestone and he nothing but the merest flake of iron.

He stopped, staring slack-jawed at what simply had to be the great library of Elebrion. It was one of the greatest storehouses of earthly knowledge in all the world, second only to the notorious Collegium Occludum itself.

How Marcus yearned to enter, to read those precious histories spanning times now lost to man, to learn the truth of all those centuries preceding the Black Age of the Witchkings. To Marcus, the worst of the Witchkings’ horrific sins—which were beyond number—had always been their wanton destruction of every script, scroll, and chiseled tablet that preceded their dark rule.

The doors of the library were remarkably plain. It might have been the entrance to a supply store. What spell-warded treasures there must be hidden away behind those deceptively nondescript doors! What ancient tales and histories lay there, patiently waiting, unseen by human eyes for four hundred years or more!

A horse bumped into Barat from behind, breaking the spell that held him transfixed.

“Get on, Marcus,” barked Jorim, the Michaeline who’d been following him. “There’s time enough for gawking later.”

Marcus apologized, but when he looked toward the front of the train, he could see that he was not the only one for whom the great trove of elven lore held a powerful, if perhaps illicit, allure. Bishop Claudo too was staring back toward the library with a wistful expression that was most strange when seen on that pinched face. Marcus grinned. Knowing that the bishop had a weakness not unlike his own made the old scarecrow seem almost likeable for a moment.

The elvic guard finally stopped in front of an enormous building that thrust high into the sky, with five delicate tines arching upward rather like a hand stretched forth into the heavens.

It was symbolic, of that Marcus was sure, but of what he did not know. It couldn’t be the five aspects of truth as taught by the Pannonian philosphers, unless perhaps the half-elves had inherited that concept as part of their subhuman paternity. Was it possible that the elves worshipped a secret god, a quintine one? Or perhaps they revered five distinct divinities—false gods, of course—although Marcus had no idea if that was the case since he’d never read anything that described the tenets of any elvic religion.

Scholastic inquiry into false faiths was not banned, precisely, but neither was it encouraged. And there was very little source material available to a young scholar regarding human heresies, let alone subhuman ones.

Of course, it was entirely possible that the geometric arrangement was simply ornamentation in the mode of the abstract sculptures he’d seen in the squares. It was impossible to say, but he made a mental note to ask an elf about it if the opportunity presented itself.

A jangling of metal drew his attention down from the skies, and he realized that he was the only one still seated on his horse. Marcipor was tugging at his left stirrup. Feeling vaguely embarrassed, Marcus quickly dismounted and joined the others.

The elven guards were relieving the Michaelines of their ornate blue scabbards, stacking them neatly near the white marble steps, oblivious to the begrudging acquiescence of the warrior-priests. Marcus quickly unbelted his own sword and smiled as he offered it to a silver-armored elf. But except for taking the weapon, the guard paid him no notice. Pale inhuman eyes flickered over his face and past him as if he was of no more interest than his horse.

He saw that the Michaelines were taking their brilliant blue-and-gold cloaks out of their packs and using them to cover their stained riding leathers. Glancing down at his own filthy clothes, he wanted to kick himself for not realizing that they might be given an immediate audience with the High King. He had a cloak somewhere in his pack, but he couldn’t remember if it was in any better shape than the tunic and trousers he was wearing now. He wished he was wearing the somber black of the bishop and his men—at least that way the dirt wouldn’t be so obvious.

Noticing that Marcipor was more than a little reluctant about giving up his ludicrously encrusted parade sword, Marcus couldn’t resist taking out some of his annoyance at himself by adding salt to Marpo’s wounds. “I shouldn’t be surprised if the bishop set that aside for a host gift. Don’t you think it’s pretty enough for the High King?”