Kareen twisted around trying to see what was happening. She looked back to Thelena and was relieved to see her whispering to the man. A chill went through her when she saw him shaking his head. What did that mean? Suddenly, Thelena and the man were looking past her. She turned her head and froze. The man who had first caught her was standing there in the entrance to the tent. Some of his comrades were with him. The man was talking and pointing.
He was pointing right at her.
What was going on? Did he want her back? But she had been given to the leader! To her horror, the leader nodded his head and the man came forward to claim her. Kareen screamed as much as her gag would allow and thrashed about with every bit of strength she had. No! Thelena!
Thelena put her hand on the man’s arm and said something to him. He put up his hand and the other man stopped. There was more talking and then he bent forward and took the gag out of her mouth.
“Thelena! Thelena!” she gasped. The woman slowly turned her head to look her in the eyes.
“Yes, Kareen?”
“Thelena! Help me! Please!”
“Help you? How?” A chill went through Kareen. There was no sympathy at all in Thelena’s voice.
“Don’t let them take me!”
“My father does not want you as his slave. He has promised you to these men.”
“No! Thelena! Please help me! I helped you! Years ago I helped you! Please!” Panic was rising in her. What was wrong with Thelena? The man, her father, talked to her briefly and then to the man who wanted her.
“You did help me, Kareen,” said Thelena. “You did save me from death. So now I shall save you.”
“Thank you!” said Kareen in relief. “Oh, thank you, Thelena!”
“Do not be so quick, Kareen. I shall save you. I shall save you exactly as I was saved.”
“What...what do you mean?”
“You saved me from death by buying me as your slave — after the Varags had used me for two days. So it shall be with you. These men shall use you as they please for two days. Then they shall return you to me and you shall be my slave.”
“Thelena!” shrieked Kareen. This couldn’t be true! How could she do this to her? “Please! Thelena!”
“You do not think this is just?” asked Thelena. She spoke out to all in the tent for a few moments and everyone there nodded their heads. “They all think it is just.”
“It’s not! It’s not!” sobbed Kareen. “I was kind to you!”
“By the measure of your people, I suppose you were. And by the measure of my people, I am being kind to you. Be satisfied with your lot, slave.”
“Thelena! No! Thelena!”
She said something and the man scooped her up. She screamed and struggled, but it was no use. The man turned to carry her out. Kareen was staring right at Thelena.
“Thelena! Please! I’m a virgin, Thelena!”
The Kaifeng woman looked at her coldly.
“So was I,” she said.
Her last plea rebuffed, all the strength flowed out of her. Kareen slumped limply against the bac of the man and wept as she was carried away into the night.
Chapter Five
The smoke told them the tale long before they could see the fort. The pre-dawn glow in the east had been marred by a dozen black fingers twisting lazily up the sky. They merged into a single dark mass that was tugged away by the winds at the higher altitudes. Matt had spotted it the moment he woke, and he groaned when he realized what it meant.
They were too late.
They had pushed themselves to the limits of their endurance the day before. The single cannon shot they had heard spurred them to trot and jog and scramble over the rocks and hills in a desperate race to reach the fort. But they were still far short of their goal when a much greater noise had reached them. A dozen or more cannon shots followed by several huge roars that shook the ground and echoed off the hills. They had feared they knew what it all meant. But they had kept going as long as they could, until darkness and exhaustion forced them to halt again. They had seen a red glow reflected off the clouds before they fell asleep.
Now all their fears were realized. They had reached a hill that overlooked Fort Pollentia, and they could see what had happened with their own eyes. The fort had fallen. The four corner bastions had been reduced to rubble, and several of the buildings had been gutted by fires. There were more fires still burning in the town. The Kaifeng were everywhere. Horsemen rode in and out of the fort at will. There was a large encampment in the valley below them. Matt fumbled out his small telescope and swept it over the fort.
“Gods!” he hissed.
“Bad as it looks?” muttered Sergeant Chenik.
“Yes. Worse. There are bodies all over the parade ground, and the bastards are just stripping them and throwing them in a pile. Hundreds of them.”
“They did the same thing here as they did to us, sir. Those firefly things. Blew up the magazines, they did. Took out all the guns and the muskets, and the bastards just rode in.”
“That must have been what happened,” breathed Matt. The enormity of the disaster was only sinking in. They had been fearing the worst, without really thinking about what the worst entailed. There had been three hundred dragoons, seven hundred musketeers, two hundred gunners, and a gaggle of Varags there! Surely they weren’t all... He shifted the telescope and looked down at the Kaifeng camp. “They didn’t kill everyone! There are a lot of prisoners in a big pen down there. A couple of hundred, at least.”
“Poor bastards,” muttered Chenik. “Better off dead.”
“They are all men in the pen. I wonder where all the...?” His voice cracked when he realized what he was asking. Kareen! “Oh gods,” he groaned.
“They’re better off dead, too,” said Chenik. “But you can bet they ain’t.” Matt put down the telescope and bowed his head. After a moment, Chenik took his arm.
“There’s nothing we can do for her, lad. Nothing at all. Not for any of them.”
“We have to do something!” snarled Matt.
“Keep your voice down. They’re sure to have scouts out. The only thing we can do, Lieutenant, is to stay alive and free, and try to get word back to the Berssians about what’s happened. Maybe we can figure out how to handle those fireflies—and then pay these bastards back.”
“It’s a long way to anywhere from here,” said Matt.
“That it is, sir,” said Chenik. “But it would be a whole lot shorter if we had some horses.”
* * * * *
Jarren Carrabello picked up his valise and his cello case and awkwardly walked up the gangplank from the canal barge to the dock. He stopped and took a deep breath as he looked around. Zamerdan! At last! The great merchant city on the Northern Sea sprawled around him in all its glory. The banks of the Madine River were lined with barges and small boats. They were unloading cargoes of goods from the south in exchange for loads of other goods from the north and across the seas. Books and fine glasswork were exchanged for furs and silver. Spices and tapestries for lumber and tin. Sculptures and muskets for gold and whale oil. A thousand products from a hundred lands flowed from where they were made to where they were wanted. And countless people helped it all move. The bargemen dickered with merchants for their cargoes, both, in turn, argued with the longshoremen to move the loads. Teamsters whipped their horses to haul the goods to warehouses or out to the hundreds of ships that lined the quays and filled the harbor. Jarren had thought the waterfront of Sirenza was busy, but he now realized he did not know what busy was.
“Hey! Mister! Carry your bag! Only five coppers.” Jarren looked down and saw a small boy, he could not have been more than nine or ten, standing in front of him. He hardly looked bigger than his valise. Jarren hesitated. All his notes were in the bag — and he was trying to save money.
“I don’t think so. Thank you anyway.” He phrased it carefully in the local dialect. He doubted the boy could understand Tatni. He wasn’t the least bit dissuaded.
; “Four, then! I’ll carry it for four!”
“Thank you, but no.”
“Three, then! I’ll—ow!” Without warning, a bigger boy plowed into the lad and knocked him down.
“You never learn, do you, Gez? I’ve told you before that this is my territory! Now get out before I break your leg!” The bigger boy kicked the smaller. Then he turned to Jarren. “Carry your bag, master? Only five coppers.”
Jarren frowned. He’d been bullied often enough as a boy and the memories still hurt. “I’m afraid not,” he said icily. “I’ve already hired Master Gez to carry my bag — for five coppers.” The larger boy looked outraged.
“But...but, you can’t do that!”
“Can’t I? It is my bag and my money. Or should we ask the constable to decide?” Jarren wasn’t even sure there were anything like constables around here, but the boy turned red. He shook his fist at the younger lad who was standing there with a broad grin.
“I’ll get you, Gez! Don’t think that I won’t!” Then he stalked off. Gez skipped over and picked up Jarren’s valise.
“Not too heavy for you, is it?” asked Jarren.
“Nah! I’m strong.” The boy did seem strong for his size, but he still struggled with the weight of the bag. Jarren felt that was a good thing — the imp couldn’t run off with it. “Where we goin’?”
“I am going to the university. Do you know where that is?”
“Gods! That’s clear the other side of the city! All uphill, too! I’m gonna need another copper for that!”
“And I think that five coppers is twice what you normally get, and it will serve you very nicely.”
“Well, yeah, I guess it will.”
“I do hope the other boy won’t carry out his threat.”
“Vak? Oh, he’ll beat me up for sure. But I’ll have the money hid by then, so it won’t matter.”
“I think you are smarter than Vak. Shall we go?”
“Sure, I know the way.”
Unfortunately, the lad did know the way. And since he was carrying a heavy bag, he made sure they took the shortest route possible. It was not a route Jarren would have taken by choice. Instead of following the grand boulevards through the city and seeing the palaces of the princes, they wound their way through alleys and among the stalls of small merchants — which looked little different from the ones back in Sirenza. Some of the people in those alleys and among the stalls eyed him suspiciously. Jarren was glad he was in his rather shabby traveling clothes. He kept a very tight grip on his purse.
Jarren was a bit disappointed at not seeing the things he had read about, but he supposed he would have the chance later. After all, he had only been on his journey for a few weeks. If he was careful, he had the funds for a year or more of travel and study. He had decided to come to Zamerdan directly rather than make a lot of stops along the way. Some of the clues he had learned in Sirenza and Duma had indicated that the great northern port would be a good place to start his search. So he had traveled to Ertria’s western coast and taken ship across the narrow Sea of Doran, to the rocky shores of Vallyria. A bouncing, jolting carriage had carried him up the winding roads and through the mountain passes until he reached a village near the headwaters of the Madine. The amazing engineering feat of the Madine Canal had allowed him to travel in far greater comfort all the rest of the way to Zamerdan. He had marveled at the ingenious lock system that gently lowered — and raised! — the barges and allowed them to bypass the falls and rapids of the upper river. There were many villages and towns along the river, and Jarren had made short stops in some of them, but the canal ride was so delightful he took it all the way to the river’s mouth. The evenings he had spent on the roof of the barge, playing his cello with the countryside slipping past, had been among the most pleasant he had ever had.
He and the boy finally left the rather squalid workers’ quarter, and Gez led him over a splendid bridge into a much richer part of the city. There was a watchman at the other end who eyed them both closely.
“You have business here...sir?” he asked.
“Ah, yes, I am traveling to the university,” said Jarren, very aware of his less than perfect command of the local tongue. “I have an invitation from Master Weibelan.” The watchman looked him over and frowned, but waved him past.
“Just make sure that urchin of yours gets back across the bridge before night,” he called after them.
“Why must you be across the bridge before night?” he asked Gez.
“Ah, don’t pay attention to the old fart, Mister. The lords ‘n ladies don’t want the likes of me in their part of town. But they won’t do nothin’.”
“I see.”
“Where you’re going is up the hill, there,” panted Gez. Jarren looked and saw a cluster of regal buildings on a slight rise. It was no hill at all compared to what he was used to in Sirenza, but the rest of the low-lying city of Zamerdan was as flat as a table top, so he supposed it must seem a hill to the locals. The boy was sweating and dragging his valise along the ground now, so Jarren took a turn carrying it. A short while later, they reached the gates of the university. There was a guard at the gate who would not let him in until he showed him the letter he had received from Master Weibelan. He would not let Gez in at all. Jarren paid the boy and thanked him, then watched him run off.
The guard gave him directions to find Weibelan, and Jarren hoisted his valise and started off. The university was larger than it had looked from the outside. Jarren was under no particular schedule, so he took his time and admired the gardens and statuary. There was a beautiful fountain, and Jarren wondered how the water pressure was maintained with no high ground to locate the cisterns on. He was also rather surprised to see a small barracks with soldiers, dressed like the one at the gate, lounging outside it. Did the university really need such a formidable defense? Eventually he reached his destination, a large, four-story building constructed in the northern fashion: exposed wood beams and very steeply pitched roofs. In winter, the city would get heavy snowfalls, and Jarren supposed the roof was designed so it would slide off. It never snowed in Sirenza. He had seen snow up in the mountains, but never up close. He would have to make sure he was still in the north come winter so he could experience the phenomenon.
He went inside the building but was disappointed to learn that Master Weibelan was gone for the day. Fortunately, the university had its own guest quarters, and he was directed there. They were quite comfortable and far larger than the small cabin he had on the barge. Jarren unpacked his modest belongings and then spent the rest of the day in the library.
During the night, he was awakened by the sounds of gunfire in the city. He looked out the window but could see nothing. It soon stopped and he went back to sleep.
He woke up the next morning when someone knocked loudly on his door. He sleepily opened it and was surprised to see an elderly man in scholar’s robes come bustling into his room.
“Master Carabello!” he boomed. “I just learned you had arrived! Forgive me for not meeting you yesterday, but I had no idea when to expect you!” The man was a head shorter than Jarren and twice as wide, with a full gray beard.
“Master Weibelan?” asked Jarren.
“Yes, yes! Oto Weibelan, at your service!” He seized Jarren’s hand and pumped it vigorously. “Welcome to Zamerdan!”
“Thank you, sir. I look forward to my visit.”
“Excellent! I have read several of your papers, and they were first rate, absolutely first rate! So when old Beredane wrote me that you were coming, I was thrilled! Have you had breakfast yet? No, of course you haven’t! Come along and we’ll get some!”
“Er, well, I really should get dressed first, sir.”
“What? Oh yes, I suppose you should. I’m an early riser myself, but carry on, sir, carry on!”
Jarren dressed himself while Weibelan babbled on and on. It appeared that the old man was half-deaf, and as a result, spoke in a virtual shout at all times. But he was friendly and enthusiastic,
and Jarren decided that he liked him. His liking grew when Weilbelan noticed his cello and began talking about music. The old man told him about the local orchestras while Jarren laced up his shoes. As soon as he was dressed, they went out onto the campus. As they headed for the refectory, they passed a squad of the guards Jarren had noticed yesterday.
“Oh, don’t mind them!” said Weibelan. “The princes are at it again. Fighting for control of a block here or a square there. Nothing new in that, of course. And it’s just a skirmish compared to Prince Evard’s War back in ‘32, but they’ve been hiring soldiers who are no better than thugs, and they won’t stay where they belong! We’ve had to hire these guards just to maintain the university’s independence. Blasted waste of money, but I suppose we have no choice. The undergraduates refuse to drill like we did in the old days, so we have to use hirelings. Not like the old days, I can tell you! Ah, here we are!”
The refectory served a good breakfast, although Jarren never dreamed you could do such things with eggs and herring. Weibelan chatted away between mouthfuls the whole while.
“So! I have a good idea why you are here, young Jarren, but I’m not sure how much help I can be to you. I’m an historian, after all, not a physical scientist. Still, it’s damn refreshing to see someone taking a new look at magic. Long overdue. Long overdue!”
“You’ve been helpful already, sir. I was in the library yesterday afternoon reading some of your ‘Downfall of the Wizards’. I wasn’t able to get a copy back home, and I learned a great deal from just the first few chapters.”
“Good to know that someone’s read it! I think I have a few copies left lying about and I’d be glad to give you one.”
Fires of Memory Page 12
