The Elements of Sorcery (12 page)

Alvar Brauch: technically the Conte's younger half-brother, a fact made obvious by the fact that he possessed neither an expansive waistline, nor the complexion of soggy dough. The pure-blood aristocracy in the Old Kingdoms suffered as a result of five centuries' worth of careful selective breeding by a cabal of wily sorceresses that had somehow managed to put themselves in charge of managing the bloodlines of five of the seven realms.

They had not been breeding for intelligence.

By contrast, Alvar's breeding had produced a dangerously whip-like man with a hawk nose and a fierce chin. The Valisian aristocracy had reluctantly accepted the need for exogamous blood, in which the duly married wife of someone in the royal bloodline would be commanded to bring in an outsider and produce a second child by them. Thus, the pure-blooded would inherit the realm—in most cases—but more cousins, bearing stronger blood, would be available for marriage down the line.

The Conte's mother had clearly chosen well for her required second-child-to-be, probably from somewhere in the southeast, near the Sea of Swords. Alvar was dangerously intelligent, and a halfway competent sorcerer, on top of being second in line to the Grand Countship of Alewynn.

"Expecting someone else, were you?" Alvar sneered.

"Honestly, yes," I answered with a shrug. Though I tried to project an air of nonchalance, my heart pounded in my ears. Surely, if the Brauch family wanted me dead, Alvar wouldn't be wasting time questioning me on my associations…?

"Who?" he asked.

"Does it matter?" I countered.

He narrowed his eyes, and one corner of his mouth twitched. Alvar had long found me amusing sport, particularly when I was feeding him mostly useless information about Trulia's operations. "I suppose not."

We regarded one another warily for a moment, and then he went on: "I admit that I became concerned when you did not arrive at the estate two days ago as I requested. My men have been searching the city for you for days; I feared the worst."

That was almost definite confirmation that the Brauch family had not been behind my assassination. I felt mildly relieved, but then I realized that the other options were actually significantly worse. Alvar Brauch was dangerous, but he couldn't hold a candle to the wily bitchiness contained within the persona known as Trulia of the Thorn.

"Someone tried to kill me," I said with as much honesty as I could muster. "I've been hiding out since."

"I suspected as much," he said with a sage nod. "The House of Brauch is more than willing to extend you protection until such time as your death is no longer required by your enemies."

"I'd prefer to keep the fact that I'm alive as quiet as possible, Alvar," I said. "Why else do you think I'd be spending time in these slums?"

His mouth quirked again, and this time the smile neared sincerity. "Well, we can certainly hide you away until all of this blows over. Besides, you promised to help me with the completion of my project. Surely you wouldn't tread back upon your honorable word now?"

I gritted my teeth; he was technically correct, I had promised him help, despite the fact that I had no idea what it was that he was planning. Of course, at the time, I'd been trying to get him to divulge more secrets that I could continue placating Trulia with, and had no intention of helping him at all.

Now it seemed I was stuck for it. "I have an… acquaintance who's expecting me to be there on his return," I said, by way of mild protest. "I can't just leave…"

"Surely you will be safer with us than exposed out on the streets," Alvar said reasonably, his hand fluttering to indicate his armored bruisers. They'd been born of aristocratic blood; their engorged faces and drooping jowls gave it away in an instant. "I am certain that your… acquaintance… will be able to catch up with you."

He spoke in a friendly tone, but his eyes flashed ice at me. In that moment I realized that Alvar was no longer asking.

"All right, then," I said, holding up my hands in a
what-would-you-have-of-me
gesture. My next words were spoken just a touch louder. "I accept the hospitality of House Brauch."

He froze for a moment, and then a slow, wolfish smile overtook his face. My statement had been deliberately phrased so as to invoke the aristocrat's code of honor. Though it was mainly treated as a dying, quaint tradition in the back circles of the ruling class, they still strived to maintain it outwardly.

If the Brauch family offered me hospitality and something untoward happened to me before an official revocation by the Conte himself, it would be a permanent black mark on their honor. Such a breach would put them on the receiving end of years of saddened, condescending cluckery at the Valisian court—something which no sane man could possibly endure.

"Very clever, Master Moncrief," he murmured.

"Did you expect anything less?" I inquired innocently.

"Of course not." The smile turned slightly more genuine. "Please, come with us. The hospitality of House Brauch is yours. We shall dine with the Conte tonight, and on the morrow, I will reveal to you my genius."

As the scion of the Brauch family and his armed guards led me away, I was certain that I saw the reflection of light off a bald pate around the corner of a nearby building. Had Mendoz and Vellierz been only moments too late?

No matter now. I fixed a smile on my face and marched straight ahead.

"So," the corpulent Grand Conte Magrad XIV murmured to me over a veritable banquet a few hours later. "Alvar tells me that someone attempted to prematurely terminate our acquaintance, Master Moncrief."

"So they did," I agreed, taking a sip of dark red wine from a crystal goblet.

Beneath his drooping, wrinkled eyelids, the Conte's rheumy eyes flashed with anger. In that moment, I could see the faint resemblance he shared with his younger brother. "We should have regretted that immensely."

The Conte's mansion existed in the space between mansion and fortress. The architecture of the middle kingdoms – Valisia, Ethres and Kalemvor—favored a style which incorporated the high turrets and walls traditionally part of the most stalwart fortifications into a much warmer and open façade built from a deep russet stone. It was really quite an attractive place from the outside, standing tall at the very center of Selvaria, and even more inviting within.

"I am pleased and honored to be in Your Honor's such high regard," I said carefully. Despite their rotund and jolly appearance, every member of the blooded aristocracy had a keen nose for political intrigue; a web both easy to fall into and almost impossible to extract oneself from.

"Indeed you are, and for good reason," Alvar put in from the Conte's right hand. "For without your assistance, we should never have accomplished so much."

"It was my pleasure." My neutral tone was practiced; Alvar had been talking like this for weeks now, and I still had no idea what I'd contributed to his grand plan.

The Conte's fleshy hand contracted into a fist beside a generous portion of smoked venison. "Before long we will rid the streets of the damned bitch, and not a moment too soon. Already her agents are encroaching on my control."

The damned bitch
referred to no one other than Trulia of the Thorn, the one who ostensibly still held me on a short leash. Neither Alvar nor the Conte had any reason to suspect differently, and I intended to keep it that way. "Her sorcerers control most of the wharf's trade these days," I agreed, still keeping my tone neutral. "She's exceptionally dangerous."

"Three of my spies were found out yesterday," the Conte grumped. "Good men, too."

I nearly choked on my wine, but managed to cover it with a rather polite cough. Likely enough the intelligence I'd fed back to Trulia had led to the deaths of those men. "I'm sorry to hear that, Your Honor."

He didn't answer, instead picking up his knife and plunging it into the meat before him. A drop of sweat escaped my forehead at this display, and I turned to Alvar. "Tell me, my lord—just what is this grand plan of yours to rid Selvaria of its largest and most malignant wart?"

Alvar flashed me a smile at this description. "There's no need to worry about that tonight, Edar. For now, just enjoy the meal. Tomorrow everything will become clear."

The strange look of glee in his eyes robbed me of what remained of my appetite, but I continued to sip at the red wine, out of politeness at first, but with growing interest. The grapes had been aged to perfection. The wine had a complex flavor, with a hint of vanilla and… lavender, perhaps? "What vintage is this?" I inquired appreciatively.

"It's a nine-year-old red from the Kolvar Valley in Ethres," Alvar said. He looked at me with an unreadable, neutral expression, but his voice was light.

My vision blurred, and everything felt muted. I hadn't had that much wine, had I? My thoughts were growing fuzzy, and I hadn't even noticed.

"But I'm sure," Alvar went on, "What you're tasting is the special ingredient."

"Special?" I murmured, swaying slightly in my seat. My eyes fixed on the full crystal goblets at the hands of both the Conte and his brother. They hadn't been touched.

"They say that the nurem root adds a delightful sweetness to compliment the wine's acidity," he said. His pleasant tone never changed, but his eyes suddenly seemed very distant and cold.

Nurem root. I knew that one. I'd used it, on occasion.

"Endlesh
night
, I'm such an id—" I slurred as the lights went out.

When my consciousness returned, there were voices nearby, and a pair of hands was rustling through my robes. I jumped in surprise, but as I realized what was going on, I forced myself to go limp again, hoping that perhaps they would pass it off as an unconscious twitch.

"—really necessary to drug him?" I heard the Conte say.

"He's hiding something from us," Alvar snarled, his words coming from only inches away. "He's been keeping an enchantment on him since the moment I found him in the slums."

"You never did get him to explain what he was doing there," the obese oligarch murmured.

Carefully keeping my eyes closed, I tried to move my arms, and found that they were tied behind me. I was sitting on something hard, probably the same chair I'd occupied at the dinner table.

When my sorcerer's instincts finally came back to me, I realized that all of my enchantments had dissipated.

Frantically, I extended my awareness outward, searching for them. Nothing. Somehow, Alvar had unraveled my spells.

Which meant that the moment I opened my eyes and revealed the lambent gaze of an Arbiter, all hell was going to break loose. Alvar knew that I worked for Trulia, but the azure glow that belonged to the ancient Arbiters would send him into a blind panic that would end only in my death.

Alvar's hands had completed the inventory of my sleeves, and moved toward my legs.
The heartblade
, I thought viciously.
They cannot find it
.

"How did he get free of Trulia's enchantment?" Alvar demanded. "The cuff he was wearing was just an illusion!"

"No one has ever broken free of that imprisonment while they still lived," the Conte agreed. "However, our friend Moncrief is a very resourceful man. It is possible that he found a way and simply had not yet shared it with us."

If Alvar had figured out enough sorcery to learn how to undo my work, it meant he would be aware the instant I tried to reestablish any of my masking spells. Testing the edges of my awareness, I could feel the remaining tenderness where he'd unceremoniously ripped the fabrics of manna from my mind; no careful removal, then, just a raw tearing away at the pieces of my psyche that maintained the connection. Crude, but effective. Just like swinging a tree.

Still, if he'd used a crude dispelling, he might not detect my concealment efforts.

I had only two choices at this juncture. Option the first: call on every ounce of apocalyptic power at my command and start making threats. They still thought I was unconscious; if I came out of it with my hands ablaze in flame—and my irises shining like an Arbiter's—I would likely win the confrontation in the confusion and kill them both. Getting out of the Conte's mansion alive would be difficult, though. Worse yet, it would completely blow any remaining hope I had to conceal my newfound state of existence, and it would be in violation of the very hospitality agreement I'd invoked.

"What's this?" I heard him snarl, and his hand pulled out my bag of tricks. There came a rustling sound of leather, and I tried to hide a wince as Alvar undid the buckle.

No sound came from the bag, but the younger Brauch let out a strangled cry as the flawed topaz I'd laid at the top flared into a yellow light, one that would have been enough to blind a man for an hour if it was caught straight on. By the way Alvar snarled and sputtered, but did not exclaim about a total lack of vision, I guessed it had caught him a glancing blow.

He emptied the bag of its contents; I heard the small silver knife—barely larger than the span of my hand—and the second gem inside as they clattered to the floor.

"Oh dear," murmured the Conte. "Whatever would I do against such a weapon?"

I could almost
hear
Alvar rolling his eyes. "This only proves that this wasn't the weapon he was carrying to assassinate you with."

He thought
I
was trying to kill
them
? Oh, that was rich.

Alvar's hands returned to searching me, and my mind frantically whirled again. My second option was to resume the masking enchantment with only the bare minimum necessary, and hope that Alvar's goal wasn't actually to kill me, but to make sure that I spoke the truth… and of course, I could not let them find the heartblade.

After only a moment's reflection, I realized that I had only one good option. Just as Alvar's hands were about to reach the leather pouch concealed around my ankle, I coughed loudly, wracking my chest with deep spasms and jerking my legs a bit, even as I subvocalized the Tellarian syllables that re-enabled just the masking spell on my eyes. I required only a tiny trickle of manna, and I could only hope that Alvar's senses were not finely-tuned enough to detect it. The younger Brauch jerked away from me as I "awakened," and his search never found the heartblade's velvet-lined case.

There are only two modes to sorcery: deliberate, tinkering research and apocalyptic bloodbath… unless it's in the hands of a master. When I felt the manna coalesce around my eyes in a gentle, almost imperceptible hum, I felt like a master.

"He's waking up," the Conte said. "What are you going to do with him?"

Alvar paused for a long moment, and when my coughing subsided, I found that I was holding my breath.
Yes, Alvar… are you going to kill me now?

"Nothing," the younger man huffed at last, his voice retreating as he stood up and took a few steps back. "He will understand my caution."

Drugging me with nurem root, you mean?
Thankfully, that particular knock-out drug had few residual side-effects. I'd studied it extensively as part of my exploration into the local flora, upon arriving in Selvaria, and it only very rarely resulted in the person's sudden death by vomiting out his insides.

Though my eyes were still closed, I felt it when Alvar crouched down in front of the chair that I was sitting in. Slowly, I let my eyelids flutter open, praying that I'd remembered the spell correctly.

He didn't react.

Nailed it.

"I'm very sorry about that, Edar," Alvar said, and he did truly sound apologetic. "You must understand my precaution. There are many people who would wish my brother and I dead. Sending you in with an enchantment waiting to detonate at an assassin's command is a cowardly tactic, and one which Trulia has attempted to employ against us before."

"No harm done," I choked. Dizziness lingered in my head, and black lights danced at the edges of my vision. Whether that was a residual effect from the nurem root or a side-effect of my rapidly-reconfigured masking spell, I couldn't be sure.

"Why don't you take a walk in the garden, clear your head," Alvar said, exchanging a brief glance with the Conte, who nodded. "The night air will do good things for you. It's finally stopped raining."

"That sounds lovely." Somehow, I managed a smile. "Which way?"

Alvar stepped back and removed the bonds on my wrists, allowing me to rise; which I did, albeit with a bit of shake in my legs. He proffered an arm to help stabilize me, but I waved him off. The dizziness slowly faded; much more rapidly than I would have expected, in fact.

Dealing with the nobility of the Old Kingdoms is sort of like charming pit vipers who are possessed of a particularly strong sense of honor. Alvar had merely been doing what any prudent noble would do: completely roll over the proles to make sure that no harm would come to him or his kin. Much like I wouldn't blame a pit viper for flooding my veins with venom when wronged, I couldn't blame Alvar for doing what came naturally to him.

They knew well that I was working for both sides. So did Trulia, really. Politics is all just a bunch of polite fictions. Alvar and the Conte pretended that I wasn't feeding information to Trulia, just like the Circle of Thorns politely pretended that I wasn't scheming with the nobles on the other side. Each of them just hoped to get the maximum advantage out of me before I outlived my usefulness and ended up dead.

Politics is a strange, squirrely beast; a dangerous sea filled with hidden rocks, reefs and icebergs, and it was one that I'd taken to like a fish. Unfortunately, it meant getting roughed up from time to time. It wasn't a great system, but it was better than gambling. With politics, my brilliant mind actually helped move the odds in my favor, rather than just calculating how many ways there were to lose.

"Just go down these stairs and take a left at the bottom," he said. "The courtyard is just outside the door, straight ahead from there."

With a deaths-head grin on my face, I nodded and headed for the stairs. By the time I reached them, I'd mostly regained my right mind again, and navigated the descent without breaking my neck.

Every time my foot touched a step, I inwardly cursed myself again.
Never, ever
ever
let your guard down
, I chanted silently as I thumped down the stairs.

When I reached the landing below, a rush of cool air hit me, and I immediately felt better. The door to the courtyard was straight ahead of me, as Alvar had said, and I pushed it aside and stepped out into the night air. The rain and fog had abated, leaving behind only a midnight blanket of sky above, studded with glimmering stars, and a crisp breeze that seemed to sweep away the residual effects of the drug. The current winter was nearly two years old and had shown no sign of slackening, but I was certain that I could feel the promise of spring on the wind.

As I gazed up at the stars, a soft sound alerted me. It was like the rasp of metal on stone, a strange sound to hear in a peaceful courtyard. I looked around, trying to determine the source, but there was nothing moving.

Then it came again. Was it louder this time, or was I just listening more carefully?

Slowly, I crept toward what seemed to be the source of the strange noise. An uncomfortable sensation that reminded me of a sleeping limb prickled at the edges of my fingertips and along the outside of my arms, a strange sensation that reminded me of my time in Warsil. When I reached the spot that seemed to be as close as I could get, I looked down, and discovered a metal grate set into the grass of the courtyard.

Far below me, cast in deep shadows by flickering torchlight, there was something moving. The shape was almost impossible to make out. With careful trepidation, I crouched down beside the grate to get a better look.

My foot knocked a small stone into the slats. It struck the metal with a clang, and then dropped into the abyss below.

The thing startled, and a bellowing snarl echoed up from the pit.

One crimson eye locked on me.

Then ten more opened around it, swiveled, and
stared
.