The woman studied Tal’s face. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, sir.”
Tal laughed. “You know exactly what I’m talking about. I know I’m different from what you remember: I’m down to skin and bone, look like hell, smell like a week-dead cat, and I’ve lost an arm, but you spent too many nights in my bed not to recognize me, Lela.”
Her eyes widened, and she said, “Talon?”
With tears threatening to well up and run down his face, Tal said, “It’s good to see an old friend, my love.
Please, I need you to get word to Sorcerer’s Isle as quickly as you can, then if you don’t mind, I would love a mug of ale.”
She stared at him, then put her hand on his. “I’ll take care of both.”
She left him alone for only a few moments, then came back with a large pewter jack of ale. He drank it half _______________
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empty in one gulp, then put it down. “Last I saw of you was waiting tables at the Admiral Trask in Krondor, when Caleb and I came through.”
“They move us around,” said the girl Tal had known as Lela. “It doesn’t do to have people become too familiar with a face. Here I’m called Maryanna, Talon.”
“And I’m known as Tal. I saw Alysandra in Opardum,”
said Tal.
“It’s better if I don’t know about that.”
Tal sighed. “I know. What you don’t know, you can’t betray.”
He finished his drink and suddenly felt the hair on his arms and neck stand up.
Magic.
He turned and from the back room a familiar figure emerged. A skinny man with a shoulder bag at his side entered the room.
Nakor looked at Tal and said, “Got yourself in some kind of mess, I hear. What do you need?”
Tal smiled. “Gold, lots of it.”
“Gold I can get. What else?”
“Weapons, horses, whatever else I need to build an army.”
“Sounds interesting.” He turned to Maryanna. “Give me an ale and get him another.” He motioned for Tal to sit, and they occupied a table. “What else?”
“Clothing and supplies I can buy locally, but if you can, I’d like you to find a man up in Latagore named John Creed, and see if he can recruit for me and bring mercenaries south.”
“So, what are you going to do with this army when you have it?”
“I plan on sacking Opardum.”
Nakor grinned and took a swig of ale. “That sounds like fun. Others have tried it, but you might get lucky.”
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“I will if you and your friends will help.”
“What do you need from us, besides the gold, of course?”
“I need someone to keep Leso Varen out of the way.”
Nakor shrugged. “I’ll have to talk to the others about that.”
Tal told Nakor everything that had happened to him since his last visit from Magnus. He detailed his murder of Princess Svetlana and his failed attempt on Duke Rodoski.
He told him of Amafi’s betrayal and Kaspar’s decision to sacrifice Tal.
Nakor shook his head. “One thing I don’t understand.”
“What?”
“Kaspar is nobody’s fool, yet many of these things you’ve talked about are . . . mad. He’s alienated every potential ally, and he’s ensured that he will probably never get another opportunity to get at any member of Roldem’s royal family. Even though no one can prove anything, they know. Even if he’s there on a state visit and everyone’s standing around with those painful smiles”—
Nakor grimaced with his teeth clenched to demonstrate—“they’re going to watch him every minute. No one will trust him ever again. What is he up to?”
“I have no idea,” said Tal. “I just thought it was a mater of Kaspar’s vanity.”
“Kaspar’s arrogant,” said Nakor, “but he’s not vain.
He’s earned his reputation as dangerous.” He was silent for a minute. “Whatever we think he’s doing, we can almost be certain he’s doing something else. If you’re cheating a man at cards, you draw his attention to the one place you don’t mind him watching carefully, so you can do what you wish where you wish to do it.”
“That almost makes sense.”
Nakor grinned. “Kaspar is blundering about trying to _______________
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kill people because that’s what he wants us to watch. So, where does he not want us to look?”
Tal shook his head. “He’s got agents running around everywhere, Nakor. He’s got them trying to kill people.
He looks as if he doesn’t care if he starts a war. The only place I’ve seen where he doesn’t want anyone looking around is that part of the citadel where Leso Varen resides.”
Nakor nodded. “Then that’s where we will have to look, my friend.”
“Well, you’ll have to do something about the wizard.
I’ve been in his quarters twice, and neither time left me confident that I can walk in there and engage in him in polite conversation, let alone a duel. I suspect he’d reduce me to smoking ash or turn me into a toad or something else before I got within a sword’s thrust of him.”
“You’d be surprised,” said Nakor. “He’s a very powerful magician, but sometimes such men are vulnerable to very simple things. I will have to see what we can do about him.”
Tal knew he would have to discuss it with Pug, Miranda, and the other senior members of the Conclave. “I understand. But I think Kaspar may be involved in some very black arts.”
“Oh, we know he is. That message you sent was extremely useful. It confirmed some things we already suspected.” Nakor sat back. “Leso Varen is a very bad man, and he’s trying some particularly evil magic these days.
Pug will tell you about him if you live long enough to see him again. But they have crossed paths before, and Varen opposes everything Pug and the Conclave stand for.”
“Am I working for you again?”
“In a manner of speaking, you always were. But yes, you are, especially if we start giving you gold, my friend.”
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Tal nodded. “Understood, but I mean to have Kaspar’s head on a pike, Nakor.”
Nakor stood. “I’d better get back. Anything else?”
With a wry smile, Tal held out his right arm, showing the stump. “Can you fix this?”
Nakor shook his head. “No.” Then he smiled. “But I know someone who can.” He walked back to the door to the kitchen and said, “Be here tomorrow at the same time.
I’ll have your gold and some answers for you.”
He left Tal alone again with Maryanna. She came over with a pitcher of ale and refilled his jack. “You look like you could use a bath.” Then she wrinkled her nose. “Or a couple of them.”
“Do you have any old clothing?” Tal asked.
“Maybe,” she said. “Wait here, and I’ll have Mayami heat some water, and you can bathe in my room.” She moved toward the kitchen. “You stay here and I’ll send her to get you when the bath is hot. Want something to eat?”
“Whatever you have.”
She returned in a few minutes with a plate of fruit, cheese, and some bread. Tal had eaten most of it by the time the girl returned to lead him to the tub.
As he settled back in the hot water, the door opened and Maryanna entered. She held out a small jar.
“Thought you might like this.” She poured a bit of the liquid on her hand and started rubbing his back. He caught the scent of lilacs.
There came a knock at the door and Mayami entered, saying, “There’s a man here, sir. He said to tell you your men are bedding down at the Green Wagon Wheel.”
Tal thanked her and she closed the door. Maryanna said, “You’re all skin and bones. What happened to you?”
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“A bit more than three years in prison, where Duke Kaspar had them cut off my right arm, and a couple of months hiking overland from Olasko to here. Other than that, not much.”
She laughed. “You still have that sense of humor, don’t you?”
“What sense of humor?” He looked over his shoulder.
“I don’t remember being particularly funny when we were at Kendrick’s.”
“Oh, you were funny,” said the girl once known as Lela. “You just weren’t intentionally funny.”
He turned and grabbed her, pulling her into the small tub with him. She shrieked and laughed as he got her dress soaked. “Talon!”
“It’s Tal,” he said, then kissed her passionately.
She returned the kiss, then pushed away a little.
“Three years in prison?”
“Yes,” he said.
“Oh, you poor dear,” she cooed as she started to unfasten her blouse.
__
Tal wanted to scratch his right arm in the worst way. True to his word, a few days after first meeting with Tal, Nakor had taken him to see a priest on an island somewhere. All Tal knew was that one moment he was standing with him in the Anvil and Tong, and the next they were on a beach in front of an ancient temple at the dead of night. Nakor spoke to the priest waiting there in a language Tal had never heard before and the priest had nodded, then examined Tal’s wounded arm.
Tal got the gist of it even though he didn’t understand a word. This priest owed Nakor a favor, and Nakor sweet-
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ened the deal with a pouch of gold. Tal was made to lie on a table surrounded by candles in a room hung with tapestries bearing arcane designs. Tal had no idea which god or goddess this temple venerated, because there was not a single familiar icon or image anywhere.
The priest rubbed something on the stump of his arm and intoned several different prayers, then had Tal drink a noxious-tasting beverage. Then suddenly they were back at the Anvil and Tong.
Days went by with no apparent change in the arm. Tal busied himself with training his recruits and building his army. The gold secured them an abandoned farmhouse half an hour’s ride out of the city that they’d use as a base.
He bought horses, weapons, supplies, and clothing.
Within a week it was clear which of the freed slaves would make soldiers and which were useless as soldiers.
Four of the girls and two of the boys were given menial tasks around the property, while the remaining twenty-four continued to train with weapons.
Tal had cautioned Masterson about leaving the girls alone, unless they invited his attention, and sent him to the city a couple of days a week to get drunk and spend time with the whores. Since arriving at the farm, Tal had established his chain of command. Quint was his deputy, while Baron Visniya was his intelligence officer. Within a few days, Visniya had messages on their way to contacts of his in Opardum. These were people he trusted, he told Tal, and he kept the language of the message circumspect enough that if Kaspar’s agents intercepted them, they would discover nothing useful. They would wait for replies before attempting to develop any intelligence about Opardum. Stolinko turned out to be an adept quar-termaster and a natural-born trader, so he often went to town to buy supplies.
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One morning Tal stood out on the porch of the farmhouse, watching Visniya teach the former slaves how to ride a horse. He absently started scratching at his stump, then pulled his hand away. It was tender.
He went inside and sat down at the table they used for meetings and started unwinding the bandage from around the stump. When he got it clear he looked at his severed arm and saw that a lot of the skin was flaking off. He picked at it a little and then noticed little bumps at the point of the stump. He examined it closely, wondering if Nakor’s priest friend had somehow given him something that was making it fester. He got as close as he could without crossing his eyes and saw that there were five distinct protuberances coming up.
He studied it for a long minute, then gave up and washed the stump. The soothing bath seemed to help the itching, but did nothing to alleviate the return of the sensations he had experienced for a long time after his arm had been severed, the impression of having fingers and a hand, and the feeling of “connection” that he should somehow be able to use those digits. He shrugged and returned to his work.
Within a few weeks he would start actively recruiting mercenaries. He had inquired about the difficulties he faced in building a private army and had been told that he could do pretty much anything outside the city as long as local officials were bribed. The power in the region was divided equally between the Lord Mayor of the city and his ruling council and the local Baron, Lord Reslaz. An independent navy, funded by everyone along the coast with an interest in keeping their own ships afloat, was _______________
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based out of Traitor’s Cove. When it came time to secure transport for his army, Tal would have to talk to them; they had an office and a representative in Karesh’kaar.
Tal had introduced himself to the Lord Mayor and offered him a sizable gift. He had done the same with Lord Reslaz. By the time he had left the Baron’s castle, they had consumed a great deal of wine and Reslaz had let Tal know that if he was looking for allies in some great undertaking, Tal could count on his support, for a reason-able split of any booty.
__
Tal was sitting at the table pondering the situation when Quint entered and said, “You look lost.”
“I was just thinking. We’ve landed in a nation of pirates.”
Quint pulled up a chair and sat down. “There are moments when Kaspar’s desire to bring order to the region looks attractive.”
“It’s how he wishes to bring order I object to,” said Tal. “He regards people as disposable.”
“He wasn’t always like that, you know,” said Quint.
“I’m not trying to make excuses for him. He was always a hard man, even when he was little more than a boy; he could be beaten bloody by older boys in a game of ball and want to get right back in to give as good as he got. But he was never murderous.” Quint reached over for a pear from the nearby counter and took a bite. “I mean, if he had an enemy, he could be ruthless, but that was only with enemies. Now he just doesn’t care who gets hurt.” Quint shrugged. “I think it’s Varen. I think he’s the cause of Kaspar’s change.”
“Whatever, he’s got to be stopped.”
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“You’ll need more than that bunch of babies out in the pasture learning to ride.”
Tal laughed. “I know. I’m keeping them around mostly because I don’t know what else to do with them. I can’t get them back home, and I won’t sell them, and I would like to have at least a dozen or so men with swords walking around when I start to recruit.”
“When will that be?”
“A couple more weeks. I’m waiting for a message from up north.”
“From whom?”
“An old comrade in arms. Man by the name of John Creed. He helped me in that business with Raven. He’s smart, tough, and knows mercenaries; he’ll get us men who won’t run at the first sign of trouble.”
“I don’t know, Tal,” said Quint. “You’re going to need more than just a few mercenary companies. You’re going to need a real army, and I mean support, food, weapons, chirurgeons, porters, boys for the luggage, commissaries, engineers. You’re going to need horse, siege machines, and that doesn’t even start to touch on what to do about that evil bastard Leso Varen.”
Tal said, “You’re wrong. I’m only going to need a crack company of maybe three hundred mercenaries, handpicked and ready to ride at my command. The others, the engineers, the su
pport, all that, will be provided by others.”
“Who?”
Tal shrugged. “Roldem and the Isles.” He shrugged again. “Maybe Kesh, Miskalon, Roskalon, some others might want to get involved to.” He hiked his left thumb over his shoulder, in the general direction of Lord Reslaz’s castle. “And we have no shortage of volunteers to help sack Olasko right around here.”
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“Finding people to take booty is one thing; finding those will fight before there’s booty to take, that’s another.
Remember, I built up Kaspar’s army for the past eleven years. It’s the best force in the region.”
“I know, and I’m counting on you to help me take it apart.”
“That won’t be easy, either in the doing or for me: a lot of those lads are friends, and others I’ve trained.”
“How many of those men would die for Kaspar?”
Quint shrugged. “I know a lot who would stand with me until the end.”
Tal nodded. “But how many would willingly stand against you? For Kaspar? Look, if facing men you’ve trained and served with is too difficult, you know that at any time you’re free to leave, Quint.”
The old soldier shrugged. “Got nothing better to do for the time being, so I might as well stay.”
“Good,” said Tal, standing up. “I’m going to head into the city and visit a friend.”
Quint grinned. “A lady friend?”
“Just so,” said Tal as he departed. Over his shoulder he said, “Don’t bother waiting up for me.”
__
Weeks passed, and Tal saw the very best of the freed slaves turn into soldiers before his eyes. Twelve of them, seven women and five men, had turned into decent riders, adept with the sword and bow and able to take orders. The only thing he didn’t know was how they would react when blood started flowing. Two gave up on trying to serve and arranged passage to the east on caravans, hoping to return safely home. The others were put to work in support capacities.
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Tal noticed that several of the girls were establishing alliances with particular men and hoped he didn’t regret including women in his army. Jealousy could tear apart his little force before it ever became a coherent company. Still, what else could he do? Turn them over to a brothel-keeper?
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