The Sword of the South - eARC

by David Weber

  The room beyond filled half the top of the keep. Racked scrolls and books covered three walls, and work tables bore half-unrolled scrolls or sheaves of notes in her strong, graceful hand. One corner held an alchemist’s workshop of beakers and bottled fluids, and a large pentagram—traced in silver and umber powder—filled the center of the floor. Each angle held a man-high candle of blue-black wax thicker than her own thigh and somehow subtly deformed. A desk stood under a window slit, covered in something too pale for leather and worked with strange symbols in blood-rust red. A wide-bladed knife lay on a golden salver, its blade mottled with dried stains that whispered of horror, and a black tripod in the center of the desk held a single crystal, large as a man’s head and clear as quartz, but rough shaped and unpolished.

  Wulfra sank into a chair and considered possibilities. Her options ranged from the distasteful to the dangerous, and her brain ticked them off one by one as she sought to avoid the worst of them.

  But there was no escape, and finally she drew a deep breath and stood, pressing her hands to the slick crystal. Her brows drew together as she spoke another word, and the chamber became very still. An indefinable chill blew past her, but she ignored it.

  Lights swirled within the crystal like doomed fireflies. They hovered, then burst apart, speeding away from one another in streamers of flame. They shattered on the boundaries of the stone, spangling the room with brilliance that burst and died, and she peered past the brightness into the gramerhain as tiny scenes flickered by. They moved almost too quickly to be grasped, but Wulfra was well used to scrying and she sought a single target, clinging stubbornly to her purpose as scene after scene dissolved in flickering sprays of light.

  The light froze suddenly, and Wulfra gazed at tiny images of men and horses amid dripping trees. The men spoke soundlessly in the stony depths, and water dripped into their fire in puffs of steam. The horses’ heads hung miserably, and the men wore black leather, but there were only eight of them.

  Wulfra’s lips tightened as she studied their faces intently. She identified Rosper, but there was no sign of Chernion. Had disaster overtaken the hunters? Or had they split into groups for some reason?

  She frowned and muttered Chernion’s name to key the pattern she’d set upon the assassin weeks before. This time the play of light was briefer as the crystal arrowed down the link, and Wulfra smiled as images formed once more. Would Chernion guess? Not that it mattered; the link could kill, as well as spy.

  The image studied above an inn on an imperial high road. Five weary horses stood in the stable, and Wulfra smiled again as her viewpoint dodged into a darkened room. Chernion slept lightly, bushy brows frowning. So her hired killers had simply split to cover more than one trail. Good. Very good.

  Chernion stirred uneasily, and Wulfra snapped the link and sat caressing the pale human skin covering her desk while she thought. She longed to scry for Wencit, but that would be both futile and dangerous. The wild wizard was on guard; hammering against his glamour would avail her little and might tell him entirely too much about her own thoughts. She’d been badly shaken when Wencit wrested the madwind from Thardon and turned it against him, and she had no desire to experience the same thing with a spell linked to her own mind!

  She shook her head. She’d learned all she could on her own, but it was too little to discover what had awakened her, and she’d run out of excuses.

  Yet it was dangerous to contact her ally. Each effort left her drained, and the time approached when she couldn’t afford that weakness. Worse than the drain, though, was the fear she couldn’t master, however hard she sought to hide it. She hated admitting that even to herself, yet there was no point pretending otherwise, and she shook herself, banishing her fear-spawned rationalizations by sheer force of will. She was no Harlich to be ruled by temerity!

  She touched the chill, lumpy stone once more and closed her eyes while her lips formed the soundless words of an intricate incantation. Power welled, encasing her in a nimbus that burned ever brighter while the silent words sang in her brain. The nimbus gathered and flashed down her arms to her hands, and her long, gem-encrusted fingers vanished in a burst of bitter brilliance like the heart of the sun. It flashed from her windows, and those who saw it guessed their sorcerous mistress practiced her art once more and trembled.

  Savage light engulfed the stone for long seconds before the clear depths drank the energy, sucking twin balls of flame into their glassy heart. A flurry of sparks spiraled to the bottom, and two eyes formed—yellow eyes, pupilled like a cat’s. They vanished briefly to the blink of unseen lids, then burned anew.

  “Yes, Wulfra?” The cold words echoed in her brain like icicles.

  “Something’s happened.” She held her thought level despite the sweat on her brow, yet his power beat at her from the stone, frightening her.

  “What?” His question was like northern sea ice.

  “I can’t be certain. Something woke me—a surge in the art. I don’t know what it was, but my mind was attuned to Wencit when I woke. I fear…I fear he’s discovered some new power.”

  “It’s not possible for him to increase his power.” The mental whisper was cold. “He peaked long ago; now he declines. I haven’t been powerful enough to challenge him in the past, but that will change soon. I’ve studied his strengths and weaknesses with care; whatever you detected, it wasn’t more power awakening in his mind. He’s too old for that.”

  “It must have been! I tell you, my mind sought him even in sleep!”

  “Silence!” The voice burned in her mind, and she recoiled. “Must I teach you which of us is the master and which the student? Can’t you even understand the implications of what occurred three days ago? The old fool spent himself like a drunkard to save Bahzell’s half-breed bitch—it will be days before he dares to channel the wild magic again!”

  The cat eyes impaled her lingeringly, and Wulfra’s veins clogged with ice.

  “You were wise to report. Don’t waste that credit by reporting nonsense. It may have been his new companion, the one we haven’t identified, but it was not Wencit.”

  “It must be as you say,” Wulfra said tightly, “but—”

  “Enough.” The cold voice became calmer. “Perhaps I seemed hasty to you, but I’ve given Wencit a great deal of thought. Let’s turn to another matter. You didn’t tell me you’d employed assassins, Wulfra.”

  “I didn’t think it was necessary.”

  “It would only matter if they might succeed.” The voice was amused. “They won’t; any more than they’ve ever succeeded against Bahzell or Wencit. Still, I had to learn that for myself, and I doubt you’ll prove any more costly to the dog brothers than I. And they may keep him off balance if he believes they’re the best you can send against him. Don’t let me stand in the path of your initiative, my dear.”

  Wulfra stared into his yellow eyes, well aware of the amused malice in his agreement. Then she flinched as his thoughts came again.

  “Very well. Do you have anything further to report?”

  “Not at this time,” she replied, hiding a nervous qualm as best she could.

  “Good. Guard the sword well, Wulfra! It wouldn’t be disastrous if he regained it, but it would be…unfortunate. No one will ever wield its full power again, but it could inconvenience me even as a weapon. See that he doesn’t gain it. Farewell.”

  The eyes spun into one another, coalescing into a brilliant pinprick that lingered for an instant and then blinked suddenly out of existence.

  Wulfra leaned forward, arms braced against the desktop in exhaustion. Her hair was heavy with sweat, and her face glistened, but at least he’d been in a fairly good mood. The opposite was too often true when she disturbed him.

  She shook herself back under control, slowing her heart and drawing a deep breath. When one reached for power, one must deal with daunting allies, she told herself. She must remember that she was using the cat-eyed wizard as surely as he used her—and it was she who had a foothold on
this continent, not he.

  She straightened and walked to the door, pausing to glance back at the reassuring array of equipment and the scrolls of painfully amassed knowledge. Somehow the reassurance was less tonight than usual.

  She waved out the lights and the massive door closed silently behind her. She stood on the darkened landing, staring into blackness, wrapped in an inner quandary. Did the cat-eyed wizard truly believe that what she’d felt was unimportant? Or—she shivered—was he so confident only because it wasn’t he must face Wencit’s wrath?

  The rest of her night, she knew, would not be restful.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Strategies and Ambushes

  Rosper of the assassins cursed imaginatively as night settled once again on the dripping forest. He cursed the rain, the mud, the fog, the darkness, the trees, and—last and most imaginatively of all—Bahzell Bloody Hand. Rosper was a skilled tracker, but it scarcely mattered, for Bahzell was making no effort to hide his passage. He seemed prepared to rely slowly on speed, and his pace shamed the assassins’ best efforts. It was unbelievable that their prey could be so far ahead! Yet they were, and Rosper didn’t plan to admit to Chernion that he’d been unable even to stay on Bahzell’s heels.

  His seven men sat their steaming horses silently while he vented his spleen. It was clear darkness demanded a halt, yet none of them cared to press the point. Instead, they contrived to find other places to cast their eyes.

  “Get down!” he snarled finally, chopping with his arms. “Don’t sit there like a pack of Sharnā-damned fools! We’ll camp here.”

  “They can’t be far ahead, Rosper,” one of them ventured. “They only have four horses, and we have three apiece. We’ll run them down soon.”

  “Idiot!” Rosper’s voice was made savage by his own thoughts on that very subject. “The Bloody Hand’s a hradani—a Horse Stealer hradani—and any hradani can run the sun right out of the sky. Worse, the wizard’s riding a Sothōii courser, and Sharnā only knows what that cursed redhead is riding! They’re not horses—they’re devils, fit to leave any four of ours belly-up! Which is just what they’re doing!”

  “But—”

  “Be silent! We’ll rest until dawn, then follow those three from here to Kontovar if we have to!” He surveyed his men grimly. “Pick your best horses tomorrow; from now on, we ride them till they drop.”

  He turned to glower down the dark and muddy trail, his heart pounding with rage at the chase his targets had led him. A few of his men exchanged mutters, but he chose not to hear. He didn’t need them to tell him riding so hard would soon leave them afoot, but couldn’t they see that if they failed to catch the targets soon they’d lose them entirely? This trail sped south more rapidly than Rosper had believed possible. If Bahzell stayed so far ahead of them, he might reach Sindor even before Chernion!

  One or two exchanges were hard to ignore, but he kept his back turned doggedly. They’d ride better in the morning if he let them grumble now.

  Rosper knew his impatience was a failing in an assassin, yet even Chernion admitted that it was what made him in comparable in pursuit. If he had to ride every horse to death, then so be it. And their riders, too, if he had to! He would overtake Bahzell, and a slow smile twisted his mouth as he touched his hilt and turned to his men, his anger blunted by anticipation.

  “All right. Make camp and set a watch. And sharpen your swords.”

  He smiled grimly and stalked a short way down the trail, as if moving that small distance towards his prey relieved some of his tension. By dawn he’d be calm and cold, he told himself, ready to begin afresh. And when he caught the Bloody Hand, someone would pay for this wallowing journey.

  Master of his trade though he was, Rosper had forgotten his promise to his Guildmaster. He no longer tracked; he rode for the kill.

  * * *

  Chernion’s sleep was restless. Neither guilt nor compassion troubled the assassin’s mind, for ambition and pragmatism were Chernion’s constant companions…that and dread that someone might discover the secret.

  The Guildmaster woke once, with the uncomfortable feeling of being watched, but the room was empty and the assassin drifted back into sleep. Yet even in sleep, that restless mind turned to Rosper. Chernion was half convinced Rosper should have been sent on to Sindor while the Guildmaster undertook his task. In fairness, Rosper was a marginally better tracker, but his hastiness had often made the Guild uneasy, and the thought of where that hastiness might lead on this mission made Chernion far more uneasy than usual.

  It wasn’t that the dog brothers would miss Rosper (though they would), nor even that Rosper had proven entirely reliable over Chernion’s vexatious secret. No, the problem was that between them Chernion and he led half the strength of the Korun chapter, and whatever happened to Rosper would probably happen to those he commanded. If impatience mastered him, he and the hradani between them would leave a yawning hole in the Guild’s strength, which was bad. But there was worse, for no one escaped the assassins.

  Chernion knew that wasn’t literally true—indeed, this wasn’t the first time the Guild had stalked both Wencit and Bahzell, singly or together, and both of them were rather obviously still alive. But failures were few enough to make it appear true, and that was one secret of the Guild’s success. Unfortunately, Chernion could hardly hide the loss of half the Korun chapter, if it came to that, and the loss of so many men would demand Guild vengeance…even against Wencit of Rūm and Bahzell Bloody Hand. No, if Rosper died, the Guild ─ or the current Guild Council, at any rate ─ would feel forced to avenge him rather than simply quietly returning Wulfra of Torfo’s down payment.

  That was why Chernion had argued against ever accepting this commission. Unlike Rosper, the Guildmaster had studied the dog brothers’ own history, including the record of its failures—and the cost of its attempts—against the two targets Wulfra had hired them to eliminate. It wasn’t that Chernion feared the hradani or Wencit, champion of Tomanāk and wizard though they might be. It was simply that the Guildmaster recognized that there were targets…and then again, there were targets, and a competent and pragmatic merchant of death did well to recognize the difference between them.

  There were very few merchants of death more pragmatic than Chernion of the Assassins Guild. Death was a commodity, one Chernion provided without hatred, heat, or passion to those who sought it. Some dog brothers—more than Chernion would have preferred, upon occasion—were drawn to the Guild by bloodlust, the opportunity to slake their thirst for killing and cruelty. The Guildmaster recognized that, had learned to use those sorts of dog brothers for the tasks best suited to them, but that had never been Chernion’s own way. Even those outside the Guild, who knew Chernion only as a name of terror, also knew that the Guildmaster never threatened, never descended into petty cruelty, or employed torture. There was no need for the assassin named Chernion to do any of those things. Merciless death handed out for betrayal and failure, yes; that was precisely the reason for Fradenhelm’s fate in Korun. Yet over the years, more than a few, both inside and outside the Guild, had survived failing Chernion, for simple terror was a chancy tool. It might inspire obedience, yet men too consumed by fear were men who would forge ahead blindly—stupidly—rather than pause to think, and thought was what kept an assassin alive long enough to become master of the Guild.

  Chernion understood that that was what made those who failed—and survived—so useful, as long, at least, as there was no fault, no blame for disobedience or willful, avoidable clumsiness. Rosper was prepared to argue even with the master of his Guild precisely because Chernion permitted it. Encouraged it, at least within reason, specifically so that other dog brothers might be willing to exercise their own intelligence and modify their instructions when the mission required it rather than obey the letter of their orders slavishly lest they be punished for failing to do so. But then, Chernion was atypical in many ways. The Guildmaster was ruthlessly practical and as implacable as an East Walls winter, but ne
ver cruel for cruelty’s sake, and even the Guild’s most bitter foes recognized that Chernion was just as willing to take a target face-to-face as to strike down victims from the shadows. That was one of the things which made the Guildmaster so effective, one of the reasons the Guild’s ruling council normally sought—and took—Chernion’s advice.

  But this time the Council had acted against that advice, leaving Chernion no choice but to accept the commission which would have been so much better left alone. The Guildmaster’s distrust of wizards was well known, but emotion, the Council had ruled, must not be allowed to cloud clear judgment. As for the Guild’s previous record against Wencit and the Bloody Hand, past failures didn’t preclude future successes, and if the Guild succeeded against two targets such as they—or even against only one of them—the dog brothers’ reputation would soar to new heights.

  Besides, one or two of the Council’s members had murmured to one another, if the whispers coming out of the Church of Sharnā were true, the long-delayed moment of decision between Dark and Light might be upon them sooner than any had expected, and the Guild could not afford a victory for the Light. The majority of the dog brothers might have little taste for the wanton cruelty of the Dark Gods, but they had no friends among the Gods of Light, either. In a world ruled by the Dark, there would always be employment for assassins; in one ruled by the Light, the Guild would be hunted, hounded, and probably doomed. Which meant that the dog brothers had an interest of their own in killing Wencit of Rūm and Tomanāk’s foremost champion, and it was unlikely the Guild would ever have another opportunity like this—ever have another ally like its present employer—if it let this one slip. And so the Council had ruled against its own Guildmaster and accepted the commission.

  But Chernion knew success was far from certain, and that thought—and the thought of the potential consequences of not succeeding—was disturbing to a prudent broker of mortality.

  It was to be hoped that Rosper appreciated the investment potential he represented.