Wrath of the Fury Blade

by Geoff Habiger

  Yasmin nodded sagely.

  “I’m sure there’s a connection,” continued Reva. “Aescel doesn’t think so, but there’s something odd about their order pins…Order pins. Right.” Reva recalled that she needed to be somewhere. “Well, I gotta run,” she said to Yasmin. “Thank you again. You’re a lifesaver.”

  “Anytime, Inspector,” Yasmin said as Reva headed out the door.

  † † †

  Inquisitor Renäe Owlswynn walked out of the bakery, taking a bite of the warm honey bread. His trip to the bakery was the only high point of the otherwise mundane tasks he was performing. Once a month he made the rounds through this part of the grove, checking his contacts for the latest news and gossip. It was not very different from what the Constables did, he supposed, but Renäe was more concerned with threats to the King and the Kingdom than he was with petty crime.

  All the shopkeepers expressed delight at his visits. Renäe knew that it was all feigned. Nobody liked getting a visit from the Sucra and his mere presence was often enough to keep customers away. Renäe didn’t care; it made his job easier, as the shopkeepers were more willing to give him useful information in order to get him out of their shops faster.

  Renäe took another bite of the honey bread and noticed that an RTC Inspector had entered the apothecary shop across the street. He had planned to visit the cobbler’s shop next, but decided to change his plans. The Inspector was from Acer Division and it was always beneficial to keep tabs on what the Constables were doing.

  Renäe slipped into the alley between the baker’s and cobbler’s shops, stepping into the shadows cast by one of the buildings and pulling his green cloak about him. He could see into the apothecary shop, though not well enough to get a better look at the Inspector. He could see her talking with Yasmin, the proprietor, and then wander about the shop as Yasmin went to the back. A couple of minutes later Yasmin returned and handed the Inspector something. The Inspector opened whatever it was and brought a hand to her nose.

  Interesting, thought Renäe. He recognized the gesture. He’d used Wake himself on a few occasions when spending a night on the town; it helped keep him going through a big night of revelry. It wasn’t a crime to use Wake, but knowing that an Inspector of the RTC was a user would be of use to somebody in the Sucra, he was sure.

  After a couple more minutes, the Inspector left the shop and headed up the street. Renäe memorized her features: light brown skin, silvery-red hair, about seventeen hands tall. Renäe thought that he recognized her but couldn’t put a name to her face.

  He counted to twenty slowly to make sure that the Inspector was far enough away so that she wouldn’t see him. He then walked across the street. Yasmin would give him some good information today, he was sure. In a few seconds, the bell above the door gave a cheerful jingle as Renäe walked in.

  Fifteen

  Two hours later Ansee ran his hand through his hair. Ugh. How many damn black swords are there in Tenyl? he thought. We’ve got a damn fetish with the things.

  Ansee stacked the last pedigree from the current group and stretched. He was only through the fourth stack that Locera was willing to parse out. Each stack had about sixty pedigrees to it, so Ansee wasn’t even halfway through. So far he’d come across thirty-seven pedigrees for black swords. For each one, he’d recorded the details and traced the lineage of the weapon, sometimes back for two thousand years.

  Some of the pedigrees were not as descriptive as he’d hoped, so even though he knew many details about the killer’s weapon from Cedres’s description, Ansee realized he couldn’t rule out any sword that might be a possible lead.

  Other pedigrees he ruled out either because the sword was known to be in someone’s possession outside of Tenyl, because there was a good description that didn’t match the killer’s weapon, or the sword was documented as having been destroyed. A couple he had marked as being promising, but nothing completely matched the description of the killer’s sword. That’s why he recorded them all, so he’d have a complete list to present to Inspector Lunaria.

  Ansee stood up, careful to close the ink vial and stack the pedigrees. Locera had chastised him for carelessness after Ansee had finished the first stack. As he walked across the archives, Ansee tried to study the books and objects he passed. He considered himself to be an amateur family historian—many elves were interested in their family histories, he knew—but he took a special pride in tracing much of his own family tree back ten generations. For him it was a personal search to find out where his arcane ability came from, to know why he was the way he was.

  Magic was certainly not rare on Ados, and the elves in Tenyl and elsewhere around the globe had a particular talent for molding and weaving it to their will. Whether they called themselves mages or wizards, magi, warlocks or witches, clerics, priests, or druids, elves seemed to have a special affinity for the magical energies that pulsed through Ados. But Ansee belonged to a rare group even among the elves; he was a sorcerer.

  All other practitioners of magic studied their craft in laborious detail. Whether through ancient tomes or divine faith and prayer, they harnessed the magic through long years of study in order to tap into it. For Ansee the magic flowed through his very veins. He felt it coursing through him like raw energy. Even among elves this was very rare. Like so many things that were not fully grasped by others, Ansee was snubbed by “real” wizards who considered the handful of sorcerers to be freaks and aberrations, not worthy of being included among the true magic users.

  For this reason, Ansee worked hard to hide his natural ability. He still required incantations and gestures to channel and focus the magic to his will, but they were things he made up—often on the fly—and not the standard, intricate motions taught to wizards. He had bought the RTC standard issue spellbook prior to joining the Constabulary. He kept it displayed at his desk and made a show of ‘studying’ it daily even though he didn’t have to prepare his spells by studying a spellbook. When pressed by other Seekers about his magic, he explained that he’d studied at a small wizarding school in the far north. Most considered that to be odd—why not study at the best school in the Kingdom, Auros Academy—but they usually didn’t pry further than that. Among non-spellcasters Ansee’s motions looked real enough, and people expected that he was a wizard, since that’s what they were used to. The only reason he got any respect or support from true wizards, especially among the Seekers at the RTC and those at Auros Academy, was because he worked hard to keep up an elaborate lie about his natural ability.

  Maybe it was this prejudice that allowed Ansee to see halpbloeden differently than most elves, to see them as regular people who are no different than anybody else.

  Despite his own research into his ancestry, Ansee had never learned from where his magical talent had come. But here, in these archives, Ansee thought, I might be able to do that. There were many wild theories about how sorcerers got their magic. Most of them were grossly inaccurate, since they were spread by wizards to show how inferior sorcerers were.

  Most clerics and priests believed that sorcerous magic came from a demon or devil taking the form of a beautiful woman and mating with an unsuspecting wizard. A few wizards favored the theory that they were the spawn of a necromancer who mated with a virgin on the night of a blood moon. Ansee’s favorite, the one propagated the most by wizards and non-spellcasters alike, was that sorcerers were the offspring of dragons who took elven form and mated with pretty much anybody.

  Ansee was sure that all the theories, especially the popular ones involving demons, dragons, and necromancy, were just plain wrong. They were too fanciful and they played upon people’s fears of these creatures. Besides, Ansee couldn’t understand why they all had to do with having sex. He thought that was more a sign that wizards needed to get out of their dusty libraries and have a little fun rather than bearing any truth in reality.

  The one theory that Ansee did believe was told to him
by his grandmother, who had also been a sorcerer. He had seen her rarely growing up—she’d been one of those adventurers that Inspector Lunaria seemed to despise so much—but when she visited the family on holy days she would tell Ansee stories.

  Nana had said that sorcerers were the true spellcasters of Ados because they had been given the blessing of Querna. Querna, the God of Magic, had bestowed the gift of magic to Ados and had imbued its power and energy into the elves when the world had been new. All elves at that time had been sorcerers, able to tap into this magic. These elves, in turn, had taught magic to the other races, sharing Querna’s gift and teaching them how to harness the magic. Over time, fewer and fewer elves had the ability to naturally tap into the magic, while more and more relied on the complex teachings of wizards. But the pure magic, the magic that had been blessed upon the elves by Querna, still remained in a few gifted people—sorcerers.

  Ansee didn’t know if Nana’s theory was any more or less true than the others, but he liked the idea of being blessed by a god better than being some demon or dragon spawn. It felt nobler to think that he was part of a lineage that could go back to the first elves. If he could walk down the aisles here in the archives, maybe he could trace his family lineage all the way back to the beginning and learn the truth.

  He walked out of the archives and across the stone forest. “Roya,” he called, “I’ve finished with the latest batch of pedigrees.”

  Ansee entered the Archivist’s office, but Locera was not there. Maybe he’s upstairs, Ansee thought. Heading out of the office, Ansee heard voices coming from the stairs.

  “What about Roya?” asked a voice that Ansee thought he recognized, but couldn’t place right away.

  “He’s having afternoon tea,” said a second voice. “He won’t be a problem.”

  Some sort of Constable’s sixth sense immediately alerted Ansee that it would not be a good idea to be seen here. Instinct kicked in and he stepped out of the doorway, back into the office, and out of view from the forest. Footsteps echoed across the floor.

  “I still don’t know why you insist upon seeing it,” the second voice said. “I assured Agera personally that it was there yesterday.”

  “Since there’s been a second murder, I want to verify for myself that it is still here, as does the Grand Inquisitor.”

  Now Ansee recognized the voice. He risked a quick glance around the door frame to confirm it and saw the form of Senior Inquisitor Malvaceä walking across the room with another elf. What in the hells is he doing here? Verify what? A second murder—does he mean Lady Ochroma?

  The two elves walked up to the storage room door. “The sword is still here in my possession, Inquisitor,” said the second elf as he opened the door. “I’m afraid you are wasting your time. And mine.” He put a slight emphasis on the last word.

  “That may be,” said Malvaceä. “But I like to see things with my own eyes. Call it—”

  The last words were cut off as the storage room door closed. Damn! Ansee thought. His mind was racing. Could they be talking about the killer’s sword?

  Ansee quickly moved from his hiding place across the stone forest to the storage room door. He held his ear to the door and heard muffled voices. He strained to hear more and thought about casting a spell to enhance his hearing when the voices stopped. What happened? Ansee placed his hand on the door handle and hesitated. What if they know I was listening? Are they waiting to catch me spying on them?

  Ansee’s heart was racing and his palms were sweating. He felt out of his depth; this was so much more complicated than patrolling Nul Pfeta and hoping to not get a rock thrown at him. He took a deep breath and slowly opened the door. The room was empty.

  Where the hell did they go? he asked himself. Ansee walked into the storage room. It was filled with shelves and bookcases. He saw blank parchment and even real paper, ink vials, and quills. Calfskin and pieces of frames were stacked in a corner along with some brooms. There were small, unlabeled boxes filled with rags and sponges.

  Ansee turned a full circle, taking everything in. There had to be some kind of secret door hidden in the room. What is this, an adventure play? he thought. Where is it? What’s the mechanism to open it?

  He started rummaging through the shelves, pushing things around, but nothing happened. Ansee’s hand fell onto the box of rags, when a voice spoke from behind him.

  “Can I help you with something, Seeker?” asked Locera.

  Ansee glanced over his shoulder at the Archivist standing in the doorway. He had a perplexed look of concern on his face.

  Ansee couldn’t hide his embarrassment. It was as if his mom had caught him stealing from the cookie jar. He felt his face flush. “I, uh….” His hand closed on the rags. He pulled out a couple and held them up. “I was looking for some rags. I, uh…I spilled my inkwell.”

  “Oh, you damn, clumsy fool!” exclaimed Locera. He turned and hurried toward the archives.

  Ansee ran to catch up, trying to get ahead of Locera. “I’m terribly sorry. Nothing was damaged, I can assure you. It’s just not been a couple of good days for me. See, just yesterday I spilled tea on my new Inspector’s table, ruining a bunch of papers.”

  Locera glowered at Ansee but said nothing. He quickened his pace.

  “I really am sorry,” Ansee said, hurrying to get ahead. As they approached the table where he’d been working, Ansee reached out and gave a magical flick at the inkwell, spilling the contents. He was careful to push it so that it spilled away from the stacked pedigrees.

  Ansee reached the table and picked up the inkwell, blotting the spilled ink with the rags. Roya snatched up the pedigrees like a protective parent and locked them up.

  “I think we’re done for the day,” he said.

  “I’m really sorry,” Ansee pleaded. Great, now I won’t be able to finish the one job that I was sent here to do. “It was an accident and nothing was damaged. I still have so many pedigrees to go through. And I’d hate for such a small thing to prevent you from helping us in our case. I don’t know what the First Constable will think when I tell him.”

  It was a thin threat, Ansee knew, but it seemed to have the desired effect. “Very well,” Roya relented. “But I think I will work the rest of the afternoon in here with you.”

  Ansee sighed. It was a victory of sorts, but it meant that finding out what Malvaceä was doing would have to wait.

  Sixteen

  Reva hurried along Ahern Path, feeling refreshed, as if she’d had the best night’s rest of her life. Everything was clear, the cobwebs gone from her head. She loved the way that Wake cleared her head. This case was taking on many new dimensions and she needed the extra energy to be able to get ahead of the killer.

  The path crossed Swan Creek, which wasn’t much more than a ditch filled with fetid water. Reva had never heard of anybody seeing any bird in the creek, let alone a swan. Ahern Path eventually met up with Ferry Road, the street that led up from the ferry landing along the river. Reva turned left onto the road and followed it for about a quarter league, then she turned off to the right and entered the heart of the port.

  The port, and Port Grove, was a warren of unnamed streets and paths that seemed to meander through the grove with no order or planning. Homes and shops were crowded in with larger warehouses and exchange houses, and it seemed to Reva that there was a bar or tavern every thirty paces. The area was permeated with a stench of the sea—salt water and fish—mixed with the odor of stale piss, shit, and unwashed bodies.

  Reva walked purposefully, her hand resting on the hilt of her sword. Port Grove was a haven for thieves and rogues who trolled for sailors and unwary travelers. Most thieves wouldn’t dare attempt anything with a Constable, but there was always one or two who were brazen, or foolish enough, to try.

  It took ten minutes to navigate the twisting streets to reach her destination. A weathered sign hanging over the door
read “Lombard” and had four brass-colored acorns hanging beneath it. Reva entered the narrow door beneath the sign into the pawn shop. Inside she was greeted by an old, musty odor, like the smell from a long-closed attic. The small shop was filled with a large variety of goods, from books and scrolls, cups, goblets, and silver platters to boots, frock coats, straw hats, weapons, and armor. The place was a combination junk and antique shop, and there was no order to how stuff was stored. Everything was haphazardly stacked, piled, squeezed, and perched in every available space.

  At the front of the shop, in the only clear space, sat a small square table and a chair. The table held a small collection of jewels—rings and necklaces, mostly, along with a couple of bracelets and cloak pins. Occupying the chair was a portly elf with long, loose, mahogany-colored hair. He wore a bright green and blue vest stretched tight over a crisp white shirt. A jeweler’s loupe was fitted to his left eye and he held a ring in his long, feminine fingers.

  “Ah,” he gave a wary smile. “Constable Inspector Lunaria. A pleasure to see you.” He removed the loupe, revealing smoky green eyes.

  Reva glanced at the pile of jewelry and picked up a ring. “New merchandise, Rhoanlan?” She rotated the ring, seeing a crest engraved in the gold next to the cabochon garnet setting.

  “Merely an appraisal,” Rhoanlan said.

  “Mmmhmm,” Reva murmured. “And you wouldn’t happen to know about a reported theft of jewels from a merchant’s house over in West Gate Grove? A merchant by the name of Loerwhold was robbed a few weeks ago.”

  “I have no idea what you are talking about,” he said with spread hands. “This is just an appraisal, like I said.”

  “Of course,” Reva said, not bothering to hide her disbelief. She set the ring with Loerwhold’s crest on it back down onto the table. She’d seen the report of the robbery last week.