The Awakened Mage (60 page)

He shook his head. “No. This is an important prisoner. He’d best be seen by the king’s own man. Go to the palace and fetch Nix here. But
slowly”
he added as Bunder made a dash for the door. “After the hullabaloo last night the townsfolk don’t need to see you careering through the streets like a scalded cat. Walk there and walk back again. Like you’re out for a stroll. With a friend.”

“Walk back?” said Bunder, confused. “But doesn’t the pother have a carriage?”

“A very nice one, I believe, with royal bits and pieces painted all over it,” Orrick said. “Humor me, Ox. Walk. This City’s been in a ferment for far too long. It’s our job now to set a calm example.”

“Yes, sir,” said Bunder, still confused but trained to the teeth. “I’ll be back with the pother directly.”

But not too directly, Orrick hoped, as the sound of Bunder’s retreating footsteps diminished. Well. He’d bought himself some time. Now to spend it wisely…

Matt was breathing more easily now, slumped on his side, his face almost human again. “You shouldn’t have stopped me, Captain,” he croaked, looking up through slitted eyes. “I’m going to die anyway.”

Orrick glared. Dragged the fool upright and leaned him against the wall. As a precaution he picked up the dagger and stuck it through his belt. “Well done. You’ve almost ruined everything. Sit there and do
nothing.
I won’t be long.”

Turning his back on Matt’s bewilderment he hurried to the rear of the guardhouse and opened the door. Beckoned to Darran, once more hiding in the shadows.

“Hurry! One of my lads could return any moment!”

Darran stared in alarm. “Where’s Matt?”

“Inside. The damned fool tried to hang himself and besides, there’s his escape to be covered! Come in!”

Wittering, Darran came. Matt’s swollen jaw dropped when he saw the prince’s secretary.

“Darran?
Are you another Circle member? Is Orrick?”

“I haven’t the faintest idea,” said Darran, kneeling beside him and speaking quickly. “Now hush up and listen. I’m getting you out of here. Prince Gar’s orders. The kingdom’s in danger and we need your help to save it.”

“I don’t understand,” said Matt, rubbing at his bruised, chafed throat. “If you aren’t part of the Circle why—”

Orrick kicked him, just hard enough to get his attention. “Can you take them to Asher?”

Matt’s face stilled. “Asher’s dead.”

“He’s not and we all know it. Do you know where to find him?”

“Please, Matt,” Darran urged him as the stable meister continued silent. “This isn’t a trick, I promise. We’re trying to save you. Trust us, we’re your only hope. The kingdom’s only hope. His Highness is
counting
on you.”

A riot of uncertainty in the injured man’s face. An agony of indecision. They were running out of time …

Orrick snatched the dagger from his belt. Hauled Matt up and onto his feet then shoved the weapon into his hand

“Stab me.”

“What?”

“No one will believe this unless I’m wounded! Stab me, you fool, and be quick about it! Do you want the king to find us? Could be he’s on his way!”

Matt lifted the dagger in front of his face, looking at it as though he’d never seen one before. “Say I do it. Say I stab you. Then what?”

“Then we run, Matt! To Asher!” said Darran, on his feet again. “His Highness is outside hidden in a donkey cart. We have to go now, man, before it’s discovered we’re missing from the Tower!”

But Matt just shook his head, still dazed. “I can’t—I don’t know—”

Orrick looked at Darran. “This won’t work, he’s addled with shock. You’ve got to get out of here, back to the Tower. Think of another way to—”

“There is no other way!” said Darran. His face was flushed, his eyes alight with desperation. “Oh sweet Barl, forgive me!” he gasped. Snatched the dagger from Matt’s unresisting fingers and struck.

Orrick choked as the blade sank deep into his shoulder. Magically tempered steel sliced muscle. Scraped bone. The pain was immediate. Shocking. Hot bright lights danced before his eyes and the small cell spun, sparkling like glimfire. Without his permission his knees buckled and he sagged to the floor.

Darran’s hands were pressed to his face. “Oh dear … oh dear…”

Oh dear was right. There was sweat on his face, icy as melted snow. His shoulder was on fire. Damn. Who’d have thought such a stringy old man would have such strength in him? “Go,” he croaked. His right hand hovered over the jutting dagger hilt. If he pulled the damn thing out would he bleed to death right here on the floor? “Now. Flog that damned donkey till it drops in the road and don’t look back. Nix is on his way, I’ll be all right. Tell His Highness, good luck. Tell Asher, I’m sorry.”

“Yes—yes—” said Darran, shaking, and took hold of Matt’s arm to drag him from the cell.

Matt pulled free. “Wait.” His dazed confusion had cleared. Beneath the bruises and bloodstains he looked himself again, the calm and competent man who’d run a prince’s stables. “We’ll never get out of the City unrecognized.”

“We might do!” cried Darran. “We must risk it!”

“No,” said Matt, and turned to Darran. Spread his hands wide and pressed them to the old man’s face. “Stand still. This won’t take a moment… I hope.”

Pounded with pain, Orrick watched as Matt’s battered face contorted and he lost his last color. Beneath his pressing hands Darran cried out, protesting.

“What are you doing? Stop it! Stop it!”

Matt lowered his hands. Staggered a little, and would have fallen if not for his shoulder pressed hard to the cell wall. “Did it work?” he muttered. “I’ve never done it before. Just had it done to me, once.”

Shocked speechless, Orrick looked into Darran’s changed features. A moment earlier they had been thin. Straight-nosed and sharp-chinned. Familiar. Now Darran wore the face of a stranger ten years younger, placid and pouchy, with a bulbous nose and a spider-working of veins across his cheeks. He found his voice and whispered, disbelieving, “It worked. You’re disguised, Darran. With magic.”

Darran gasped. “Barl have mercy! Not you too, Matt!”

Still leaning on the cell wall Matt pressed his hands to his own face. Groaned aloud, a sound of extreme distress, and nearly slid to the floor, retching. When his hands fell away they revealed a second stranger.

“It’s called a blurring,” he said hoarsely. His new face was gray and sweating. “But we’ll have to hurry. It won’t last long.”

“Then go,” said Orrick fiercely. “Now!”

They bolted. Alone and bleeding he sprawled face-up on the prison-cell floor. Before he could wonder if he’d done the right thing, the world around him turned scarlet, then black. His last clear thought, as consciousness left him, was something like a prayer.

Sweet Blessed Barl… don’t let me be wrong.

Morg woke late in his unattended house, and for some little while indulged himself in the luxury of silence. Silence was an antidote to the memory of Holze’s insistent yammering…

“Conroyd, you must show yourself the WeatherWorker in public. Conroyd, you must move into the palace. Conroyd, you must recall the lords and ladies now dallying in the country. Appoint a Privy Council… soothe the worried populace… decide upon an heir… name a Master Magician. Conroyd… Conroyd… Conroyd…”

He intended to feed the cleric to his demons
personally
when at last the Wall came down.

His regrettably unavoidable meeting with the man had lasted hours. Through it all he’d nodded and smiled and indicated approval, agreement, whatever was required to bring the audience to an end. But it seemed Holze had been storing up an inexhaustible supply of opinions… and he couldn’t risk taking action. A swift and surreptitious examination of the prosing cleric’s mind showed him a

man peculiarly proofed against easy tampering. More of Barl’s interference? He couldn’t tell. Didn’t care; in the end it would make no difference. With gritted teeth he’d survived the lecturing and so had Holze, barely, what he needed now was to bend his will towards the only thing that mattered: the next step in his undermining of Barl’s infernal Wall. That exquisite task completed, he would examine the stable meister taken by Orrick’s men after the execution and— The execution.

Beneath his cosseting blankets Morg stretched with delight like a cat.

Interfering, unexpected Asher was dead.

Gar had wept; recollection of the mewling cripple’s grief bathed him in more pleasure, leaving him languorous and replete. He was aware, too, of Conroyd’s pleasure in that brutal death. Conroyd had hated the Olken with a passion nearly matching his own. Not that his docile prisoner said as much. Subdued at last, run out of words and curses, Conroyd sat silent in his cage now; but his feelings were as loud as any shout.

The glow of sunlight behind the bedchamber’s drawn curtains reminded him the day was aging rapidly. He rose, bathed, dressed, summoned food from his cook-less kitchen and then rode Asher’s cowed stallion back to the Weather Chamber.

Holze had been right about one thing, damn him: to allay suspicion he must show the people of Lur their expected weather. So he made it rain, but with the magic corrupted, the spell altered, so that every drop of water falling from the sky pulled free a thread of the tapestry binding together the bitch whore’s ancient barrier.

Ancient… but not inunortal.

Overhead, the golden Wall trembled. Shuddered. Staring through the Weather Chamber’s clear glass ceihng Morg laughed and laughed to see it. Rode away light-hearted towards the City Guardhouse where waited the prisoner Matt, ripe for plucking.

But instead of the cripple’s former stable meister he found chaos.

“It’s a nasty wound, Your Majesty,” Pother Nix informed him on the threshold of Orrick’s office. “The captain has lost considerable blood. He’ll mend, but—Your Majesty, he’s not ready for—Your Majesty, I must protest! My patient—”

Thrusting the fool aside, ignoring his irrelevant gabble, Morg confronted Orrick on his makeshift sickbed. “Well? What happened? And why was I not informed immediately?”

Stripped to the waist and swathed in scarlet-stained bandages, Orrick regarded him weakly. His skin had turned sickly and his eyes were rimmed with red. “Your Majesty … forgive me…” His voice was a whispering trickle. “I failed you.”

One of the guardsmen, a hulking brute, stepped forward from the background huddle of uniforms and bowed. “Your Majesty, the prisoner tried to hang himself. Captain Orrick sent me to fetch him a pother and while I was gone the prisoner stabbed him near to death. He’s escaped.”

For one blinding moment his rage was absolute, so that he nearly wiped them from existence with a word: Orrick, Nix, the brutish guardsman.

“Your Majesty …” Orrick again, barely audible. “I’d hoped to find him quickly. Avoid the need to trouble you. I’ve many men out searching. He’ll be recaptured, I swear it.”

Rage subsided. So the stable meister was missing. But did it really matter? Attempted suicide suggested secrets worth hiding, true … but equally it could have been fear. Asher was dead and WeatherWorking had died with him. The Wall even now was crumbling. What matter the fate of one Olken, destined soon for fire wherever he’d run to?

Not that he’d say so. Keeping all eyes focused on recent events would mean less attention paid to him. He smiled, magnanimously forgiving. “Very well, Captain. I accept your apology. Continue your hunt for the miscreant. I trust implicitly your diligence shall find him in the end. Meanwhile, your men can enforce the Olken curfew and the other restrictions arising from this new and criminal action. My man Willer shall advise you of the details.”

He left behind him uneasy silence and a horrified exchanging of glances. Inwardly he smiled.

Downstairs in the guardhouse reception area he was accosted by ubiquitous Willer, damp from the still-falling rain and puffing from his minimal exertions. “Your Majesty! Your Majesty! Oh, at last I’ve found you!”

“For what purpose?” he asked coldly. The little toad had pretensions, and required regular squashing.

Willer stepped improperly close. “I have an urgent message, sir.”

He had no interest in messages. Frowning at the repellent creature he said, “Did you do as I bid, Willer, and see to Asher’s remains?”

Willer stepped back. “I supervised their disposal first thing this morning, Your Majesty, exactly as requested. The dead dogs are burned now, and then ashes scattered. The traitor is no more.”

“Excellent. And your message?”

“Your Majesty,” Willer’s voice was lowered to a sibilant hiss. “Lords Sorvold and Daltrie request an urgent audience.”

Of course they did. Puling lickspittles, desperate for advancement. “Inform them I am unavailable for audience.”

Willer swallowed, convulsively. “Yes, Your Majesty. Your Majesty, they seemed quite … determined. They’ll ask me to ask you again. What shall I tell them?”

‘Tell them a king does not account himself to his subordinates. Subordinates account themselves to their king.”

Willer looked less than convinced. “Yes, Your Majesty. Er, Your Majesty?”

In the midst of leaving he stopped and turned. Let his displeasure fully reveal itself and waited for Willer to cease his cringing.
“Yes?”

Faltering, stooped as though avoiding a blow, Willer crept close again. “There is just one more thing, sir. The palace provisioner was wondering when you thought to—”

“For all I care, Willer, the palace provisioner can drop dead of an ague!” he snapped. “Delay me no further! I am fatigued with WeatherWorking and must recover my strength. The damage wrought by the traitor Asher is greater than even I imagined. Would you have me weak and incapable of fulfilling my sacred duties? Of saving this kingdom from his black and ugly business?”

Willer blanched. “No, sir! Oh no!”

“Then desist your childish blatherings! And tell those who would tax me with trifles to quickly follow suit! I return now to my townhouse. If you’re wise you’ll see I’m not disturbed.”

“Your Majesty,” said Willer, his obeisance folding him in half.