Princesses of the Ironbound Boxset: Books 1 - 3 (Barbarian Outcast, Barbarian Assassin, Barbarian Alchemist)

by Aaron Crash

  A map showed him the coast and the Scatter Islands in the Blue Sea. There was a university called Verra Nassa on a bigger island, in a port city called Williminaville. He flipped through pages so worn that some of the handwriting blurred.

  So many words, verbose and redundant. Why didn’t the author get to the point?

  The clan contracts with the Summertown merchants had to be complex, and each word could mean the loss of revenue or war. By their nature, they simply couldn’t be concise. This, however, was only a history book. The writer must have loved his sentences too dearly to cut even a single one.

  Finally, Ymir found what he was looking for. Everything that Jenny had done made sense now, except she’d made a few vital mistakes. Because she liked him. Because part of her wanted him for herself. That had undone her schemes to a certain extent. Like Gatha’s hate, Jenny’s desire was amusing.

  “What kind of witch’s web have you found yourself in, clansman?” he asked himself with a sigh.

  He closed the book. He might as well put it back himself. He went to the lightning lever and tried to pull it down. It wouldn’t move, not an inch. “Caelum inanis,” he said. Still nothing. He obviously didn’t have the magic.

  Down he went, and he set the book down on Gatha’s table. The orc librarian wasn’t around. Classes had ended, and scholars wandered through the citadel, chatting.

  Lillee was among them, and she stepped quickly to him. She pulled him down to a table near the side of the citadel.

  He sank down into a chair as she placed the parchment on the tabletop. “I’ve studied it as best I could, but there are some words I simply do not know.”

  “Why is there a sketch of only the one ring?” he asked. “Jenny mentioned several.”

  At the swamp woman’s name, Lillee frowned, her brow furrowed. That was going to be a longer conversation, especially after what Ymir had learned.

  “Eight rings total,” Lillee said. “Four are based on the schools of magic, and four others, which are lost to riddles. Or it might be my poor understanding of archaic Homme. If Jenny can help us, we might consider going to her.”

  “She invited both of us to her apartment for dinner tonight. She lives at the top of the Flow.”

  Lillee raised an eyebrow. “And how would you know?”

  “Jealous?”

  Lillee shrugged. “Not especially. Curious is more accurate.”

  “Cleaning. That fucking work has some benefits. I overheard Gurla saying some of the richer students hired cleaning staff to take care of their personal apartments. Not cells, mind you—apartments. Jenny is a princess of Josentown. She can afford it. Actually, she has the best apartment in the Flow, and that is saying something.” He tapped the parchment. “What else did you learn?”

  Lillee caressed his hand before pointing to the edge of the parchment. “It’s not been ripped from a book, that is clear, and the ink is rather fresh. This was copied from a longer work, I believe, since it mentions other pages. Do you have any idea who might have left it in your cell?”

  He shook his head. “I could make out a phrase. It might have said something about getting rid of magic. Is that the case?”

  Lillee rubbed at the tattoo on her temple. “To banish, to be rid of, something along those lines. It does seem to have something to do with your dusza. But it’s written in rhymes and riddles, as if it was trying to hide the truth of it.” She paused. “You know, the Ohlyrra are very adept at dealing with magical power. That is how they can wipe out a person’s sexual desires and make them a kenarra. I get the sense this is something similar.”

  He spoke his thoughts out loud. “Perhaps Issa Leel gave me the parchment. She is an elf, and she has no love for me.”

  “But it’s written in Homme,” Lillee said.

  “Then we should meet with Jenny tonight. I kissed her in the tower.” He gauged Lillee’s reaction. “I grew weary of our flirting and wanted to test her.”

  The elf thought for several long moments. Then she smiled. “If I took off my essess, I might’ve kissed her myself. I told you that I’ve thought about her in that way. The Swamp Coast women are wild, and without so many men, they find release among their own sex.”

  “Have you done that?” he asked.

  Lillee’s eyes went distant. “The Cult of Chaos and Desire was a celebration, and we’d already broken the laws of our people. What was one more? So, yes, I’ve been with women. And I liked it.” She didn’t blush, and she didn’t squirm in her chair. She said it all very logically, and Ymir knew why. The piece of jewelry on her forearm kept her shame at bay.

  “So if I were to celebrate life with Jenny, you’d be okay. Are you looking to dance with any of the men at Old Ironbound?” he asked.

  The question clearly confused her. “Why? I have you. After last night, you’ve proven that you can take care of my needs when I take off my essess. And I plan on taking it off most nights. Why wouldn’t I?”

  He laughed. “Why wouldn’t you? I agree.”

  A smile played across her lips. “You don’t want me to be with other men. I thought the barbarians of the North were wild and carefree. Yet, you’ve told me of marriages and monogamy. Perhaps you aren’t so free.”

  “We are,” he protested. “We ask the three questions. Some men tolerate their wives straying, and others don’t. I don’t.”

  “But it’s not fair. You are a hypocrite.” That grin never left her face. She was teasing him with her needling logic.

  “I am a hypocrite.” He wasn’t going to pummel this subject to death. “So, concerning the Swamp Coast queendoms and Jennybelle Josen, I know all about them and all about her. And what I learned might make going to her apartment tonight dangerous. What kind of spells can you cast if we have to fight?”

  “I only know rudimentary Flow magic, which is why I’m here. I do, however, have the power of my sexuality.” She said the joke with a completely straight face.

  He burst out laughing. “If need be, I’ll aim your oheesy at her.”

  Lillee considered that option and agreed. “But only if you take off my essess first.”

  “Of course.” He had to stop off at his cell before he went into the witch’s lair. He had a quick task to take care of.

  Chapter Twenty

  THE PRINCEPT DELLA Pennez sat at her desk on the Librarium’s mezzanine level. She liked her little space where she met with people to keep things running smoothly. The scholars below gave her a peace that always surprised her. Studious heads were bent over books. Women chatted with each other in groups, deciding whether they wanted to go to the feasting hall or use shecks at the Sea Stair Market. And then, the more adventurous might hire a boat at the hidden docks and go into StormCry to eat. The sea was relatively peaceful that evening. A rainy mist might dampen them, but that was half the fun.

  Della knew from personal experience. She had so many happy memories during her time at Old Ironbound. Leaving had been so very difficult, and going home had been wretched. Teaching in Four Roads had seemed like a monumental waste of time.

  She could let those bad memories go. She was the Princept of the Majestrial, and she would be until she died. As long as the Alumni Consortium deemed her worthy, and why wouldn’t they? During her reign, graduating scholars had gotten the best jobs in the guilds and even outpaced the university in Four Roads for the best government jobs in Farmington, the Sorrow Coast Kingdom, and the Holy Theranus Republic—which was a grand name for a dusty kingdom without any real power. Even the new leader’s name, the Grand Vempor Acadius, was trying too hard to seem important.

  The guilds ruled in Four Roads. The government was merely the puppet for those with more money and power.

  The Swamp Coast and the Scatter were a different story. Outsiders weren’t much tolerated unless they were men, and even then the males couldn’t be envied. Men had a strange way of disappearing in places like Josentown and Cujantown on the mainland, or in Williminaville down in the Scatter Islands.

  No
, the Consortium would back Della and her decisions. Old Ironbound’s ruling body was made up of only the richest and most powerful alumni, a sitting group of seven. Seven meant you only needed a simple majority to make any decisions, four votes to three. They met yearly at the Majestrial. Quarterly, they discussed issues via sand letters.

  The Princept heard footsteps clatter up the stairs leading to her perch. Issa Leel sat, frowning at her. The professor spoke in Ohlyrran. “Your barbarian was late to my class today. He wrote nothing down. He seemed to be listening, though it’s hard to tell, since half the time he’s drooling over the women in the class. I will say, when he fixes his gaze on me, I feel listened to, pierced even.”

  Issa didn’t mean it sexually at all. She was five hundred years old; she’d had her appropriate two children and then left them with her husband and his harem so she could teach at Old Ironbound. That had been over two hundred years ago, at least. She went home to the Ohlyrran Forests during the summers, but only during the summers since it was an arduous journey by either land or sea. Both had their own dangers. The ways of merfolk were hard to understand. And then there was growing trouble in the Blood Steppes with a rogue Gruul named Gulnash.

  “Ymir is not my barbarian,” Della said quietly. “He passed the Open Exam. He needed a spot in a college, and Siteev Ckins and I both thought to strengthen him by starting where he would be the weakest.”

  “Siteev and her coral golem,” Issa Leel sniffed. “I don’t like that thing, wandering around. Its crabs are disconcerting.”

  Della suppressed a sigh. “Why are you here, Professor?”

  The elven woman wasn’t about to come to her point. “I spoke with Denalia Fisherking. Ymir skipped his Courtly Manners and Arts course, which is what he needs, desperately. He does not fit in. The other scholars know it, which is why they have been tormenting him. I had to cast a spell in my own classroom, Princept. My own classroom. It is too much...far too much for me to take.”

  Della waited to see if Issa had anything more to say.

  When she didn’t, Della laid out her plan. “I had Gharam Ssornap talk to Ymir. They are similar, after all. We’ve had other high-spirited scholars attend our fine school. If a Gruul warrior can learn the rules of the Majestrial, surely a clansman can.”

  “The Gruul have a dusza, from birth, but not this Ymir. I’ve peered into the Flow, and he is new to the magic, and such power he has. I don’t trust it, Princept. I don’t trust him. I came here to ask you to move him to Sunfire. He and Professor Ssornap are made of the same stuff.”

  Della needed to soothe Issa, and that was going to be difficult. The elven professor was never going to trust Della fully, not with the Princept’s past and lineage. “Siteev and I spoke at length about this, Professor Leel.”

  The silver-haired elf half closed her eyes. “Siteev and I do not see eye to eye on most things. To think, you have taken her in as a confidant. That does not please me. If the Moons professor has an interest in the barbarian, then let her have him.”

  Della stated the obvious. “You’d still deal with him eventually. If not this year, then the next.”

  “Unless he fails the First Exam,” Issa replied. “If he passes, if he remains, I will not suffer such an animal in my classroom. Is that clear?”

  The Princept didn’t like her tone of voice. “Professor Leel, if you have a concern, you can take it to the Consortium. But I myself have talked with them about Ymir, and they are interested, very interested, in seeing his progress. The peoples of the Frozen Land have eschewed magic for millennia, and their dusza was lost to them. Now? To have Ymir here? It is as promising as it is troubling.”

  “Troubling indeed,” Issa said. “Only Theran magic has kept the clans from crossing the Frozen Sea and spreading across our continent. There have been clan leaders in the past that had definite ideas about empire.”

  “Not for thousands of years,” Della said. Though, in the current Age of Isolation, the races were mostly separated, and they might be easy pickings if magic-wielding barbarians decided to come south. The Gruul were in no position to repulse them, not when they had to worry about rogue orcs, this Gulnash in particular.

  Della knocked on her desk. “Regardless, I believe you are up to the challenge to help transition Ymir from barbarian to scholar.”

  “You mean break him. He is a barbarian. He will not be tamed. And so, I will have to suffer him it seems.” The beautiful elven woman sat, lost in thought. “I will consider my options.”

  Did the professor have some kind of plan? Della wondered.

  Issa seemed to speak carefully. “Another option? We help him remove his dusza. If he has no magic, he would return to the Frozen Land. That’s all he really cares about.”

  Of course, Della had the same idea. There were ancient texts in the Illuminates that discussed such matters. It seemed Professor Leel had already investigated the matter.

  “That is another option,” Della said noncommittedly. She let that line of thought drop. It was safer. She knew she had to ask Professor Leel about the Midnight Guild, since Issa spent a great deal of time scrying. “Professor, what do you think of the rumors about the Midnight Guild.”

  Issa straightened. “I’m sure it is gossip. I have seen nothing, and I, for one, am very comfortable in the Age of Isolation. The Ohlyrra enjoy our forests without outsiders trying to trifle or corrupt us. The Homme and the Gruul will forever be snarling at each other and themselves because that is the nature of such short-lived races. The Morbuskor rarely leave their mountains now, and those that do leave are impure. No, no one wants another Akkridorian Empire. If there is a Midnight Guild, it is impotent. We are safe. Things will remain as they have been for centuries.”

  As Della listened, she found it ironic that the elf was a master of the Flow. Then again, ice was a part of the flow, static, frozen in place. Della had always much preferred water, for it could fill cracks, and take so many shapes.

  However, her job as Princept was to embrace the ice—to make sure things were peaceful and stable.

  Della lifted a scroll and unrolled it. “If there is nothing else, Professor, then I think we are done. I trust that you have a process in dealing with difficult scholars. Think of Ymir as an unruly Gruul sent here as punishment. You’ve had that before. You remember Unggur the Unclean.”

  “Yes, I remember. But he had the pressure of his family to become clean. Ymir is alone.” Professor Leel stood. “I will keep you updated on Ymir’s progress. I will not go to the Consortium unless I feel you are mishandling the situation.”

  “I do appreciate that.” Della loved how honest the Ohlyrra were. It was refreshing. Perhaps without sex, lies weren’t as necessary. Was there a correlation? It was an interesting idea.

  The elven professor retreated down the steps, leaving the Princept alone.

  Many times, teachers at the Majestrial needed to vent, especially when dealing with new scholars. The beginning of the year was always such a stressful time.

  Ymir was troubling. Skipping classes. Punching students. Not wearing his robe. What did she expect?

  Della would not risk her career at the Majestrial over some clansman, however special. No, she had several contingency plans in place. Issa Leel was correct: If Ymir didn’t pass his First Exam, he wouldn’t be an issue anymore.

  And he was an issue.

  Siteev clearly liked the clansman, and there was heat in her eyes when she talked about him. Siteev Ckins, herself, was somewhat of a mystery. She said she was the daughter of merchants, yet several of those women were hanged as pirates. The coral golem was a concern, but the people of Kreenn had a special relationship with the sea. It was an interesting quirk. Another mystery? Siteev had come from the Sorrow Coast Kingdom, but she had focused on Moons and not Flow. Another? She’d lied about teaching at the Melancholia University in her hometown. She’d gone there and taught there, but not as long as she’d claimed.

  Siteev had said she loved subterfuge and secrets. She had
spies working for her. The Princept wasn’t sure who it was, but she hoped Siteev didn’t send those eyes to peer at the Princept or send ears to listen to her.

  Della’s thoughts returned to Ymir. It could be that the barbarian was simply too dangerous to remain at Old Ironbound—not for his minor infractions, or his silly rebelliousness, but for other reasons, reasons that might destroy Thera as they knew it.

  The Princept rose, sighing. During the day, she worried about the implications of a barbarian who could cast magic. At night, she fantasized about him. She knew her fear played into the illicit thrill of her fantasies.

  The barbarian had Della distracted, and she hated herself for her lack of focus. She hated him more for being so arrogant and difficult.

  Perhaps Issa Leel was right. Perhaps Ymir didn’t belong at the Majestrial.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  YMIR SAT ON THE SIMPLE wooden chair in his cell. He’d taken apart the seams of his Flow robe and stitched a strip of deer skin down the back. He’d have to tackle the shoulders and the sleeves at some point, but this would at least give him some room to breathe. He’d already added six inches of leather to the cuffs, so they reached to his hands.

  The waves crashed against the side of his cell. He was getting used to the noise. Never did he think he’d live permanently by the sea. Summers on the coast, where the sun ruled the sky most of the day, were one thing, but spending four years in the same place? The thought was hard to take.

  In fact, the sewing was putting him a bad mood. He’d never really understood a Pidgin word—homesickness. How could one be sick for home? For the Black Wolf Clan, they carried their homes on their backs or lashed to the broad backs of their otelkir. Home was where they camped, their fire, the laughter of the men, the chattering of the women, the happy squeals of children.