He broke off, his eyes widening, to thrust an accusing finger at Tinoan. ‘What are you doing to me? How dare you?’
Despin hurled elemental fire at the old priest. Jilseth threw up a cold wall of emerald mist to consume the vicious wizardry.
Her distraction gave Despin his chance. With a swiftness that swept books and papers from table and shelves alike, the bearded mage disappeared.
Jilseth would have followed him. Where else would he be heading but Hadrumal? But as she reached for her affinity, she felt the first tremor of weariness run through her wizardry.
‘You have done a great deal today,’ Brother Tinoan observed.
Jilseth spun around. ‘What did you do to him?’
The old priest shrugged. ‘I merely encouraged him to speak so that you would know what you were facing.’
‘What was he doing?’
This time Jilseth was asking herself but Brother Tinoan answered.
‘You heard what he said. More than that, he seeks advancement and acclaim for being the first mage to unravel the mysteries of these magical treasures. He is by no means alone,’ the old priest reflected. ‘If you thought that the renegade mage’s destruction would see an end to Archmage Planir’s troubles, think again. The echoes of such violent upheavals haven’t even begun to die away.’
‘Brother?’ Resnada opened Kerrit’s bedroom door. ‘I think he’s fading.’
Jilseth smoothed her skirts. Carrying herself back to Mellitha’s house would be less demanding than returning to Hadrumal. She could bespeak Planir, to inform him of Despin’s appalling behaviour and ask what he wished her to do.
Tinoan looked at Jilseth, his gaze penetrating with disapproval. ‘Can you not spare the time to sit with us as we see Kerrit to Saedrin’s threshold? To honour the price he has paid for Hadrumal’s sake?’
‘Of course, forgive me.’ Jilseth was ashamed to think that she could have even thought of being so callous. Kerrit deserved far better than that.
Nevertheless, as she followed the old man back to the blameless mage’s deathbed, she found herself beset by growing fears as well as distress at Kerrit’s undeserved fate.
Whether or not through means of his Artifice, Brother Tinoan had been right. Jilseth had assumed that the Mandarkin’s death would see Hadrumal’s customary serenity restored. There would be no more disputes over Planir’s authority in the Council Chamber, especially now that even the most contentious mages had the puzzle of these ensorcelled artefacts to fascinate them.
Beyond the wizard isle, there would be no more challenges to Hadrumal’s hegemony prompted by Corrain of Halferan’s infuriating obstinacy and his unshakable resolve to find magic to save his people from the corsairs, never imagining what unforeseen disasters would follow.
So she had blithely assumed. Jilseth was no longer so certain. None of them, not her, Velindre or Mellitha had foreseen the murderous attack which was now proving the death of poor Kerrit. What further unanticipated consequences might yet unfold?
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Merchants’ Exchange, Duryea, Caladhria
Winter Solstice Festival, 3rd Evening
WAS THERE ANY chance of achieving what he had come here to do before this parliament ended? How soon before someone called for a recess tonight? Whoever it might be, Corrain couldn’t blame him. He would have emptied his own purse for a breath of fresh air. The atmosphere in this room was somewhere between stale and stifling at the end of this tedious day.
Four hundred and more Caladhrian barons had journeyed to Duryea, fulfilling their sworn duty to attend at least one quarterly parliament a year. They sat on benches at long tables on either side of the aisle running from the lectern beneath the great chamber’s north-facing window to the double door in the southern wall. Twenty tables, each one set with flagons and fine goblets for twenty lords and at the moment, at least twice that number were trying to talk, every one intent on having his say without listening to anyone else’s opinion.
This vast chamber easily accommodated them. Duryea’s merchants’ exchange was larger than any other in the realm. This most northerly of Caladhria’s market towns prospered whatever the season or the weather’s vagaries, thanks to the east-west high road carrying trade between the independent fiefdoms and towns of Ensaimin and the wealthy princes ruling the great houses of Tormalin. Lesser roads brought goods from Dalasor, and still more northerly Gidesta. Duryea had separate market places for linen and dyestuffs, for raw wool and leather, for livestock still on the hoof and for the wheat, oats and barley harvested from these Caladhrian barons’ fertile fields.
And none of these wealthy lords had been willing to spare a copper cut-piece to defend the coastal baronies from the corsairs.
Corrain took care to hide his abiding resentment as he sat on a chair an arm’s length from one of the middle tables claimed by a coterie of barons who held lands around Trebin. The local lords had needed to send lackeys to fetch extra seating on the festival’s first morning. The number of barons attending this midwinter parliament was unprecedented.
Corrain and his allies had worked hard to make sure of that, drawing on Lord Saldiray and Lord Taine’s detailed knowledge of the barons’ countless factions, some united by location and common interests and others divided by personal dislikes and enduring rivalries.
‘My lords! It is clear that no one will prevail this evening!’ Standing at the lectern by right of his local pre-eminence, Baron Gyrice shouted, hoarse and exasperated.
The assembled Caladhrian nobles were so startled that silence swept through the room. Those barons still intent on arguing were hastily hushed by their neighbours. Those who had been dozing belatedly stirred, trying to pretend that they had merely closed their eyes in contemplation.
Corrain would send such dullards to keep a night watch with their own barony’s guard troop. They could learn the skills of staying alert and unwearied from first chime to last. Then they might appreciate the discipline required of the men who defended their homes and families, always ready to make obedient haste and fulfil any liege lord’s request.
‘Thank you, my lords.’ Baron Gyrice took a sip of water from a goblet on the shelf of his lectern. ‘Let us adjourn to observe Souls’ Ease Night’s rites. A show of hands?’
Corrain was on his feet. He ignored the outraged faces, more than one lord ready to rebuke him for resuming this endless wrangling.
Other lords looked bemused. He knew they considered a jumped-up guardsman had no right to be heard, even if some disgraceful contrivance had annulled Baron Licanin’s rightful guardianship of the Widow Halferan, sister to his own wife.
Corrain spoke quickly to forestall any interruption. ‘My lords, we are debating this proposal to enshrine in Caladhrian law a complete and eternal prohibition on the use of wizardry in warfare by any baron using force of arms on behalf of the Caladhrian populace against enemies from beyond our borders...’
He spoke slowly and clearly, for the benefit of Lord Matase who was proving his worth as a scribe, though the noble baron could not have imagined this undertaking when he had volunteered on the parliament’s first morning. Customarily the official archive only needed summary notes of those attending and of the show of hands should a vote be called.
But today the noble lords of Saldiray, Myrist, Taine and Blancass had proposed this ban on wizardry throughout Caladhria. For the past two days, Duryea’s taverns had heard terrifying tales of wild magic from those guardsmen of Licanin, Tallat and Antathele who had returned home from the Archipelago.
They had expected Hadrumal’s spells would merely carry them to the corsairs’ anchorage so they could put the villains to the sword. They had agreed to help the Archmage because Planir had told them that the corsairs had amassed a collection of ensorcelled items which they would use to renew their attacks on the mainland. Since Hadrumal’s ancient edicts forbade the use of wizardry in warfare, the Archmage had a duty to stop such abuses of magic.
What the Caladhria
n warriors had experienced was destruction beyond imagining.
Now Corrain would play his part, as agreed in ciphered letters exchanged long before he arrived in Duryea.
‘...I propose one further amendment to our new law. We must recognise that dire circumstances can drive any man to truly desperate measures. We must all admit, in our heart of hearts, that even the most honest among us would steal before seeing his children starve.’
He looked around, uncompromising.
‘My own true lord, the former Baron Halferan, was driven to seek wizardly aid for lack of any other hope for his people. I followed his example because I had no other recourse. Even after the Archmage’s wizardry swept away the ground beneath my feet, as the southern seas swept over my head—’
Cold recollection slid down Corrain’s spine to shrivel his manhood. He steeled himself not to shiver
‘—I would follow that same path again, if so vile and murderous a foe threatened Halferan. If I still lacked any other ally.’
He noted the eyes drawn to his wrist now bare of that slave manacle. He knew the taverns would be rife with speculation as to why he had cut his hair. Reven and young Linset and Halferan’s other troopers were ready with answers for Duryea’s taprooms.
Archipelagan corsairs denied their galley slaves any blade, not merely to stop them taking their own lives or some captor’s. Matted hairiness marked out such slaves on any shore, even when they were released from their chains to undertake some task.
Corrain had maintained his unbarbered state, since making his unprecedented escape, in memory of those Halferan men captured with him. Those whose bones now lay unburied and unburned on some Aldabreshin isle, to leave their innocent shades trapped between death and Saedrin’s threshold, tormented by Poldrion’s demons alongside the vilest, unrepentant evildoers.
Reven and Linset’s explanation would be carried back to these noble lords by their own loyal retainers. If Corrain no longer believed in the gods, he assuredly believed in guilt. Let every baron remember their cowardice in successive parliaments as the former Lord Halferan had begged for their men and swords to drive the corsairs from his own and his neighbours’ shores.
But now, so Reven and Linset would confide over their ale, Corrain had given up any hope of rescuing any surviving Halferans after the utter destruction of the corsairs’ isle. Now these noble lordships could consider the terrifying rumours of Hadrumal’s cataclysmic power whenever his raggedly shorn head caught their attention.
They didn’t need to know that the Archmage’s sole concern had been destroying the renegade Mandarkin mage whom Corrain had so foolishly offered the pick of the raiders’ plunder, only for that thrice-cursed villain to turn traitor and threaten Caladhria with still more lethal malice as he discovered unsuspected mageborn and still more unexpected magic among the corsairs’ treasures.
The barons didn’t need to know that Corrain had wept bitter tears in Halferan’s silent muniment room as he had worked through those lonely nights to free himself from that manacle. He would never forgive himself for failing those lost men. All he could do to honour their memory was ensure that no Caladhrian barony was ever left so shamefully undefended again, their honest troopers abandoned to fight such hopeless battles alone.
He swept the room with a searching gaze. ‘Let us agree on a duty in law, to be laid on our heirs in perpetuity. If a barony is attacked, we must join forces in that lord’s defence, whether that attack comes from beyond Caladhria’s borders or from malevolence within. Then no barony need ever seek wizardly aid to drive off their foes.’
He took care not to catch Lord Saldiray’s eye. The noble lord had assured Corrain that he would remind selected barons of Baron Karpis’s humiliation at the lady wizard Jilseth’s hands.
The story of a mild-faced maiden reducing the Karpis troops’ armour and weapons to rust and warped scraps of leather had passed through the previous year’s parliaments quicker than counterfeit coin. That had been a fine joke but an Archipelagan island being so comprehensively ravaged that not a rock remained above water wasn’t nearly so amusing.
However tempting these noble lords might find the prospect of calling on wizardly assistance, to inflict Baron Karpis’s mortification on some rival of their own, let them imagine their fiefdom facing a hostile mage capable of wreaking such utter destruction.
As soon as he had recovered from his ordeal in the Archipelago, Corrain had begun writing to the barons of Saldiray, Myrist, Taine and Blancass, erstwhile allies of the true Baron Halferan. Reading his chilling testimony they had agreed with him that such magic must never be loosed on Caladhrian soil.
‘An interesting proposal, though it comes very late in the day.’ Baron Gyrice made the mistake of taking another sip of water.
A baron from the Tresia region sprang to his feet. ‘If Caladhria is to forswear wizardry, we must urge those dominions which border our lands to follow our example.’
‘For our safety as much as their own. Only a fool discards a weapon to leave it where some enemy can pick it up.’ One of his neighbours stood to support him.
Baron Myrist had played his part well in preparing them. Corrain resumed his seat, hiding his satisfaction.
‘Assuming this proposal is passed, we must write first and foremost to Tadriol the Provident, Emperor of Tormalin—’
‘We owe Tormalin no fealty!’ Some backwoods baron was so outraged at the notion he shouted out unbidden.
‘We owe the Imperial throne due respect,’ Baron Gyrice retorted from the lectern.
‘Caladhria has been independent of Tormalin since the first decade of the Chaos, for twenty and more generations!’ A lean nobleman didn’t wait for Lord Gyrice to call on him to stand. ‘Our independence is our most cherished freedom, won by our forefathers driving their Tormalin conquerors back over the river Rel—’
‘Thank you, Lord Torlef, I don’t need a lesson in history from you.’ Baron Gyrice slammed his goblet down on the lectern’s shelf, spilling water over his hand.
Baron Myrist took advantage of his distraction. ‘If his Imperial Majesty proposes a similar law to the Convocation of Princes, explicitly forbidding the use of wizardry in warfare, we can surely hope that the lawmakers of Lescar and Ensaimin will follow Tormalin’s example.’
Corrain made sure not to catch Baron Taine or Baron Saldiray’s eye. Those noble lords had already written to their friends among the sieurs and esquires of Tormalin’s princely Houses to endorse just such a law.
A hand shot up from a knot of barons huddled around a central table. Baron Tulbec rose to his feet at Gyrice’s nod. ‘I propose that we write to the Relshazri Magistracy to apprise them of our new law.’
‘This law hasn’t yet been put the vote,’ Baron Saunor snapped.
‘Anyone voting against it is an arrant fool,’ Baron Tulbec said tightly.
Corrain noted nods of support from every noble with lands within two or three days’ wagon travel of the River Rel. Their wealth in timber and grain customarily filled the barges floating down to Relshaz, where it was turned into good gold coin.
‘Has your trade with the Relshazri been truly so undermined by their new shunning of wizardry?’ A baron with no such concerns thanks to his fiefdom’s border with Ensaimin was openly sceptical.
Baron Tulbec’s tone sharpened. ‘Do not underestimate the Archipelagan’s loathing of magecraft, my lord of Estoel. Since the eruption of wizardry in their islands, for which they blame Caladhria—’
Corrain parried Baron Tulbec’s condemning glare with an expressionless face.
‘—the Aldabreshi have scorned all our goods or wares. They refuse to do business with any Relshazri merchants trading with Caladhria. They look instead to Ensaimin, Dalasor or Gidesta—’
‘Those realms cannot supply our wheat and barley and flax—’
Baron Tulbec rounded on the complacent Baron of Ferl. ‘The Lescari are eager to steal that trade now they have peace to plough their fields.’
&n
bsp; Lord Dalthran lurched to his feet. From his high colour on plump cheeks, he’d been paying more attention to a wine flagon than to the debate. ‘This so-called Conclave in Lescar is merely a rabble of rebels! They encompassed the deaths of the Dukes of Parnilesse, Carluse and Sharlac.’ His voice thickened with outrage. ‘Their Graces of Marlier, Draximal and Triolle escaped with their lives through merest chance. If we acknowledge such malcontents and murderers as Lescar’s rightful rulers, what does that tell our own dissenters?’
Corrain narrowed his eyes at the belligerent lord. This was what he and the lords conspiring with him had feared. All too often Caladhria’s parliaments’ debates descended into irrelevant and inconclusive wrangling.
‘Forgive me, my lord of Dalthran.’ Baron Saldiray didn’t sound in the least apologetic as he stood up and waved a pale parchment, its broken wax seal stark as a clot of blood.
‘The whereabouts of Duke Iruvain formerly of Triolle and Duke Ferdain formerly of Marlier are currently unknown, much to the distress of their creditors in Abray, Adrulle and Relshaz,’ he observed drily. ‘Duke Secaris formerly of Draximal remains in Savorgan in northern Tormalin, still forswearing any desire to return to his former dominion.’
‘My lords, Lescar’s affairs are none of our concern and the evening draws on!’ Baron Gyrice gestured curtly towards the candlesticks on the tables. His servants had brought tapers to light each handful of flames as soon as dusk had drawn its veil across the room’s tall windows. Now the candles were visibly shorter.
‘This of all nights in the year requires reverence rather than argument,’ he continued crossly. ‘It is long past time we adjourned. May I have your assent?’
Hands rose at every table and some were already rising to their feet, taking the vote as given and eager to eat their festival dinner.
Defiant Peaks (The Hadrumal Crisis) Page 9
