A thought occurred to him.
D’Jenn had been passing letters with Vera for years. The Warlocks maintained a mail office in the Conclave Proper, a drop where classmates could leave communications with one another. Vera and D’Jenn, though, had established their own drop site after their first year in training, and had continued to use it in the years since.
D’Jenn rose and walked down the hall. He found one of the narrow stairways that Initiates and servants used to move about the tower, and slipped into the darkened passageway. A few twists and turns took him to the ground level, and he rushed out through a side passage and out onto the Green.
The Conclave had a large campus, and there places tucked away into the corners of the grounds that people rarely traveled. Such places were perfect for a pair of amorous youths looking for a bit of privacy to paw away at one another. D’Jenn and Vera had set up their letter-drop near the place where they had spent so much exploratory time together.
He would have run across the damp grass, but attracting attention went against his instincts. Even if Vera was dead, he felt that this little secret between them should be preserved. There were many people strolling through the Conclave grounds, and D’Jenn didn’t want to deal with their interested gazes.
He followed a stone path to the southeastern corner of the campus. There, in a little-used park, was a bronze fountain that hadn’t spewed water in years. A patio surrounded the fountain, with a small and weathered shrine to Neesa, the goddess of love and music. The little stone statue had a space hollowed beneath it—one that D’Jenn and Vera had created. They had written a ward into the base of the shrine that would allow no one but the two of them to open it. Even as he approached the fountain, he could feel the magic resonating from the statue.
He reached out with his Kai and unlocked the magical ward. The statue of the goddess felt gritty beneath his hands, and the stone was cold. Lifting the statue from its base, he looked into the space beneath it. There, tucked into the leather folder they had used, sat a single letter, folded and sealed with a dollop of wax. D’Jenn stared at the thing.
Part of him wanted to rip it open and devour the words contained within like a dying man eating his last meal. Still, another part wished to preserve it, to hold on to the missive until his last dying day. They were, after all, Vera’s last words to him.
The letter felt like a terrible weight as he pulled it out.
The wax was sealed with a blank stamp, yellow and gummy from the moisture in the air. D’Jenn held it for a moment, unable to open it, and unable to put it away. It lingered in his grasp like a prophecy. Should he read it, and know the secret of Vera’s last message? If he did, he knew that he would crouch over the thing every night for weeks, trying to derive meaning from every single word, every turn of phrase. He would agonize over those words. If he didn’t read it, though, the letter would weigh in his pocket like a lodestone, a constant reminder that she was gone.
Grimacing, D’Jenn tucked the letter away.
He sat staring at the fountain for a long time, the message weighing his pocket to the spot. Finally he rose, but turned away from the Conclave Proper. The campus was large, after all, and a walk would clear his thoughts.
He resolved never to visit the fountain again.
***
“The only possible explanation is Mind Flight,” said Victus Tiranan, Deacon of the Warlocks.
Victus was a large man, and built more like a blacksmith than a wizard. He had a wild mass of pitch-black hair, and a beard that was just as unruly as the hair on his head. He was swathed in a heavy, dark blue robe—which Dormael was sure concealed a knife or two—and his meaty hands tapped out a nervous rhythm on the table’s surface. His single golden ring of office, two sinuous bands woven together, practically shone against the skin of his sun-browned hands. Dormael had always thought he seemed out of place at the Conclave, like some beastly nomad dressed in a robe and taught pleasantries he barely understood.
Despite his wild appearance, though, Victus had a conniving, astute, and analytical mind. The man was one of the smartest people that Dormael had ever known, and was widely regarded as the next in line for the office of Mekai. Unlike most of his colleagues—the deacons of the other disciplines in the Conclave—Victus had an almost military bearing, and a deep dedication to his mission. Dormael held an unshakable respect for the man, who had overseen not only his training, but the training of all the Warlocks.
Victus was loved by the Warlocks, and hated by the other deacons.
“Mind Flight is not the only possible explanation,” a woman said from down the table. “We have to consider the possibility that young Dormael’s mind was in an advanced state of sleep, and the entire episode was created by his Kai.”
Lacelle—the Deacon of Philosophers—was among the other deacons that hated Victus.
She was everything that Victus was not—willowy, graceful, and light. Lacelle had the sort of icy beauty that one might find on a statue of an ancient queen. Her hair was straight, and a color of blond so light that it was almost silver. Her eyes were the color of a wintry sky, and her skin pale. She stared at Victus with undisguised disdain, and tapped her own ring of office against the table to illustrate her points.
“Physical manifestations of magic are a known phenomenon, Victus, as are descents into madness,” she clipped. “Why must you complicate this—something that could endanger the people around your Warlock—with talk of Mind-Flight? Where did Dormael’s consciousness go, then, Victus? Into the Void? Maybe to the place where the faeries live.”
“Don’t mock me, woman,” Victus grumbled. “Just once I’d like to have a discussion with you in which you were acting like a deacon instead of a petulant child.”
“Child?” Lacelle sneered, a laugh bubbling from the edges of the word. “Let’s talk about who’s being childish here. You have a mistaken urge to protect your Warlocks—like a child with his favorite toy, unable to admit when one of them is broken.”
Dormael winced. Lacelle could indeed be right, but her comment made him feel somehow guilty, as if he was lying about what he’d seen, or that he had misunderstood. He had a sudden urge to speak up and counter her arguments, but he disciplined himself to silence.
What’s the gods-damned point?
The argument had been going on for almost an hour.
The large room—lovingly referred to as the War Room by Warlocks—was paneled in white plaster, and hung with multiple tapestries that depicted victories by Warlocks of the past. Dormael looked up and saw a larger and more detailed version of Gimmael Facing Down Morvlund the Mad than the one that hung in his room. He spent a few moments following the lines of the artwork. Though the argument between the two deacons concerned him, they were already to the point of the conversation where they were repeating themselves, and hurling insults.
“I know my Warlocks, Lacelle,” Victus said, slapping the table for emphasis, “and Dormael’s head is as fine as it ever was. You tested his lucidity yourself. The simple fact that he woke up discounts the theory that his mind was broken, or that his magic was wild. There were no occurrences of wild magic reported either by him, or his companions on the road here. It must be something else, and I just don’t see why his testimony is considered suspect.”
“His companions are not reliable witnesses. One of them is his cousin, the other his brother, and another his concubine,” Lacelle replied, the disdain clear in her voice. “Do you really wish to posit those three as examples of objectivity?”
“Shawna is not my concubine,” Dormael said, breaking his silence, but Victus was already speaking over him.
“What exactly is your problem, Lacelle?” Victus snarled, leaning forward in his seat as if he meant to take a bite out of the woman. “The Baroness Llewan is not his concubine, and even if she was, that’s no business of anyone else in this room.”
Dormael wondered why in the Six Hells the Mekai had invited Lacelle to this meeting in the first place. If th
e woman was going to be hostile to him, and on such a personal level, he didn’t see what value she would add to the conversation. Philosophers didn’t understand the world outside the Conclave in the way the Warlocks did. They knew the natural world, sciences, and such things, but people were beyond them. Dormael suppressed another urge to rise to his feet and defend himself.
Part of him thought that this wasn’t about him at all. It was rumored that Victus and Lacelle had once been lovers, and only became enemies after having a vicious row. It was true that Lacelle went out of her way to make things difficult for Victus, but Dormael had to admit that he’d noticed times where the opposite was just as true.
“My problem,” Lacelle continued, “is that you Warlocks always watch out for your own. If it were a Philosopher that suddenly came down with a case of temporary insanity, he would be doubted, and rigorously scrutinized. But, since Dormael is one of your Warlocks, he must be telling the truth. This is nothing but favoritism. He should be submitted for testing.”
“I’m simply looking at the problem from an objective point of view, instead of dismissing it because I don’t like where it’s coming from,” Victus said. “He’s been tested—you tested him, woman!”
“I did a quick delving to see if anything was amiss,” she said. “That’s not the same thing as a round of rigorous inquiry. He needs to be observed over time, questioned, and tested for a thousand other things. Those things take time, Victus. He should removed from duty until I clear him for release. Until then, he’s a danger.”
Dormael quailed at the thought, and D’Jenn shot him a stealthy, astonished look.
“The day I let you determine the readiness of my Warlocks is the day the gods fucking return. Look at Dormael’s chest! Did his Kai cause the bruising? Did he hallucinate that?” Victus shot back, shoving a meaty hand in Dormael’s direction.
“It is possible, my dear Victus. There have been documented cases of magic causing physical harm to those who’ve wielded it with negligence, or of strange manifestations of power where mental instability was a concern. I could show you the records sometime if you’d like to come over to the Philosopher’s Tower—you’d have to learn to read first, of course,” Lacelle said, her tone dripping acid.
“If you were a man,” Victus snarled, “I would have hit you ten times over.”
“If you were a man,” she spat back, “you might have tried it, and been taught a lesson. Perhaps you’d like to try your hand in a duel?”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Victus snickered.
“Why is that ridiculous?”
“Because you’re not even trained to fight with your magic,” Victus said. “But I’m trained to kill with mine. Try it if you wish, woman, but we both know you’ll hide in your tower and keep…reading.”
“One day, Victus Tiranan, perhaps we shall find out,” she hissed.
“Silence,” said a voice from the doorway, bringing the room to immediate stillness.
An older man stood in the opening. He appeared to be somewhere in his seventies, with hunched shoulders and lines of wisdom etched over his features. He had flowing white hair, and a beard that rivaled it in both length and color. Intricate silver wire was wound around his beard, and cradled it like an eastern lady’s headpiece. He was dressed in a simple white robe with black trim, and wore a large amulet shaped like the Eye of Eindor woven around a tower—the symbol of the office of the Mekai.
His magic filled the room like mist, its presence more alive than anything Dormael had ever felt. Every wizard’s power grew over the years—not only in strength, but clarity. Arian Hilrath had served as Mekai for longer than Dormael had been alive, and his Kai was formidable.
The Mekai waved a hand as everyone made to rise from their seats, dismissing the custom as he entered the room. Two secretaries entered behind him, and his magic shut the door in their wake with a casual flick. He moved around to the head of the table and sat, acting as if he hadn’t noticed the argument which had probably been echoing down the hall.
“First, let us dispense with greetings,” the Mekai said. He always spoke softly, but his words carried the weight of mountains. If he chose to ignore something, then everyone else did their best to act like it didn’t exist. He turned to Dormael and D’Jenn. “It is good to have you two home again. I’ll want to hear first hand of your travels so far. You’ll take supper with me?”
“Of course, Honored Mekai,” Dormael replied, inclining his head in respect. The Mekai smiled at this, and Victus looked to lose some of his anger. Lacelle, however, looked at him as if her sky-blue eyes could stab him through the chest. He did his best to ignore her furious glare.
“Very good, very good, indeed,” the Mekai said. “Let us discuss this armlet. Everything else, no matter how emotional we might feel about it, is secondary to this problem. We can discuss other matters at another time, when it is more appropriate. For now I am willing to trust Deacon Victus, and his assessment of Dormael’s capabilities.”
“Honored One—,” Lacelle started, but the Mekai raised a single finger, cutting her off.
“If something odd happens again, we shall revisit your tests,” he said. “For now, let us move on.”
“Yes, Honored Mekai,” she said, nodding her head in respect.
“Good. Now, Victus has already filled me in on most of the specifics of your tale, boys. Finding the Baroness Llewan, recovering her artifact, and the flight from these Galanians. That should be the first topic of our discussion here—the Galanian Empire.”
“The men we fought were led by a man named Grant,” D’Jenn said.
“Rengard Grant?” Victus asked.
“I’m not sure if we ever learned his first name,” Dormael said. “Shawna put a sword in his skull. His soul has gone to the Void.”
“Rengard Grant was the commander of the Red Swords—the emperor’s elite squad of knights. According to my agents, he’s been absent from the field for the entire season. No one has seen him in Old Galan, or any of the conquered cities under the Imperial flag,” Victus said, nodding his head as if running through facts in his mind. “Now I know where he’s been the past winter.”
“These Red Swords—to what capacity do they operate within the empire?” the Mekai asked.
“They serve as his elite guard, and he also sends them on special missions, where the fighting is toughest on the field,” Victus said. “Emperor Dargorin established the order after winning his war of succession, and it’s been a point of honor for Galanian warriors ever since. Serving in the Red Swords earns a man a knighthood, and anyone who completes the training can join their ranks.”
“The emperor’s personal involvement in this is troubling,” the Mekai said. “How would he have found out about this armlet in the first place? He’d have to have advisers of a magical nature to even care about such a thing. This necromancer you encountered in the Runemian Mountains—and Victus, we’ll have to speak about how one of them was moving around within spitting distance of our city—he could be the one behind it.”
“I will see to that, Honored One, you have my word,” Victus growled. “As for the shade in the fire—it’s possible. It’s also possible, though, that Dargorin himself is Blessed and we just do not know. Though, I would think that my agents might have reported anything strange about him. Whomever it was that this Jureus spoke to in the flames—and whatever his position within the empire—he’s a threat we need to deal with. If Jureus was the apprentice, then the master would be much more dangerous.”
Everyone went quiet at the mention of the necromancer.
Necromancers were followers of Saarnok, the god of the underworld. They were wizards who, for one reason or another, turned from the common use of magic, and chose instead to commune with the dead. Little was known about necromancers, but it was widely accepted that the Lord of Bones granted powers to them in exchange for blood rites.
Some necromancers only dabbled in the art, as Dormael suspected Jureus had, without steeping t
o the deeper levels of corruption. The worst of them could do terrible things with their powers. Thankfully they were few and far between, and there had only been a handful in the past few hundred years. Their names were memorized and recited at the Conclave, so their atrocities stayed burned into its memory.
Victor the Unfeeling, who had butchered an entire nomadic tribe in Dannon and used his powers to enslave their dead bodies, was one such name. Stragen Child-Eater, whose favorite activity had earned him his title, and Saarn of the Thorn, who’d used his powers to subvert the king of Shera, also came to mind. Warlocks had hunted them all down.
Vilthinum.
That was the word for the worst of them—those that were said to eat human flesh, those that could enslave corpses, and those that summoned monstrosities from the underworld. In Old Vendon, it translated roughly into ‘those who eat the dead’. The very word brought a chill to Dormael’s blood.
“Even more troubling,” the Mekai said, “is this connection between the Galanians and the vilth. If the Galanian Empire is keeping a necromancer in its pocket, it’s certainly something we should deal with.”
“That line of thought brings up a new set of questions,” Lacelle said, leaning back in her chair. “If this vilth is indeed powerful enough to have gained apprentices of his own, such as Jureus, then why have we not discovered him? I would think we’d have heard something.”
“Perhaps he has been staying quiet, out of sight,” D’Jenn said. “Eldath is vast. He could have stayed hidden for years, if he didn’t let things get out of control. All the vilthinum we study here are the ones whom we’ve destroyed. They were dumb enough to try and eat entire villages, or take over kingdoms. Maybe this one has played the game a bit smarter, and has stayed out of sight.”
“But if he is connected to the emperor—and logic does seem to suggest that—then he’s moving within the corridors of power,” Lacelle said. “Perhaps the most powerful corridors in all of Eldath, in point of fact. Why would someone with power like this vilth serve the ruler of a nation that makes magic a hanging offense? Dargorin must have some sort of leverage over him.”
The Seven Signs: Three Book Collection Page 61
