"Some might find gratification in admiration from others," she finally replied. "But when something starts as a matter of survival and evolves into a matter of course, one hardly looks for accolades, Lord Prichard."
Norbert frowned, peering nearsightedly at Destiny. He took a half step forward before catching himself and turning with a frown to Prichard.
"I spoke in all earnestness, Lord Prichard, and you jest at my expense?" he spluttered, his voice reedy.
"I do no such thing, Wizard Norbert," Prichard countered. "Wizard Destiny authored the ward, and much else besides."
Norbert shook his head violently, and Prichard saw Destiny's eyes narrow dangerously, though the Bakaana wizard didn't notice.
"I sense no magic in this room, active or passive, yet you suggest another wizard inhabits its confines."
"Wizard Norbert," Emily spoke up quickly, surprising not only Prichard―who knew her aversion to drawing attention to herself―and Norbert―who seemed to only now recognise the librarian as the recent companion to the King―but Destiny as well. Emily pushed on, either oblivious to the scrutiny of all or just hopeful to make her point quickly. "If you examine the bindings on Destiny's wrists, I believe you'll better understand your folly."
"I beg your pardon?" Norbert spluttered again, nearly apoplectic in indignation. Destiny grinned, raising her arms with a little shake and drawing the other wizard's attention even as he drew in another breath of complaint. Instead, Prichard watched the man's focus suddenly narrow as he took in Destiny's chains. Norbert's habitual squint widened and he forgot his affront, hastening forward to drop to one knee beside Destiny. He reached forward as though to grab at her bindings, but hesitated before he could touch them or her. Destiny flinched, then held still, allowing Norbert to examine the bracelets.
"Remarkable," Norbert breathed, his hands caressing the air above the bindings. Prichard watched Emily's intent stare, fascinated to see her reaction to whatever Norbert did. If he had harboured any doubts about the young woman's ability to see magic before, the way her eyes tracked what he himself couldn't see laid that doubt to rest. "I have read of this level of sophistication, but never had the occasion to see such cell bindings in person before." He glanced up over his shoulder at Prichard. "They truly hold her magic at bay?"
"See for yourself," Emily said, and before Prichard could do more than take a hasty step forward to stop her, she reached past Norbert and released Destiny's restraints. "Perhaps you would care to check over your ward, Wizard Destiny."
Destiny sat frozen, as still as Norbert, whose only reaction showed in his suddenly wide eyes as he stared from a bare span away at what he now could obviously sense as Destiny spread her awareness outward.
"Hellfire," Norbert sighed out before Emily closed the bindings again.
Destiny sighed as well, a sound more of frustration than satisfaction.
"I wish you wouldn't do that," she grumped to Emily. To Prichard's surprise, Emily just smiled lightly and sat back.
"It seemed easier and swifter than waiting for the otherwise inevitable objections and denials of a woman's abilities."
Destiny snorted while Norbert frowned, glancing between the two. Prichard just shook his head before moving to the nearest unoccupied chair and dropping down into it.
"You crossed my ward multiple times yesterday morning," Destiny said with an amused glance to Norbert. "Likely trying to determine its extent and origin."
"Satisfied?" Prichard asked Norbert as the smaller man slowly blinked, as though assimilating this new information. To his credit, the Bakaana wizard didn't scoff or try to ignore what Emily had just shown him. He slowly leaned back on his heels, then rose to his feet, regarding the women in turn once more as he found his own seat near the fire.
"Intrigued, if nothing else," the little man finally admitted, settling himself into the comfort of crimson cushions. "It seems our information in certain areas is woefully out of date."
His gaze sharpened as he turned to regard Prichard, but the spy noticed that the wizard no longer excluded the women from the conversation.
"Tell me what has happened since you left us, and how you think I can help."
***
More delays, more time wasted, more opportunity for his patience to wear so thin that it began to fade into obscurity. But Nathan had to admit that Tyrandel had a point. After seven years, one would think Nathan might have learned how to temper his expectations, gather his resources into an instrument more likely to succeed, rather then fling himself into action now that his goal stood within reach. If he simply stormed across the border in a blaze of power in his eagerness to deal with Girl and retrieve Marcus, he ran the risk of having to contend with more than the potential of magical opposition. These Dalashamites might mistake a blatant display of his prowess as a precursor to an invasion and feel obliged to try and stop him, wasting even more valuable time. So Tyrandel had advised on a more subtle course of action, a 'rescue' backed by force of arms.
"Petition for their release into your custody yourself," his rotund companion had counselled when Nathan had wanted to move upon losing his connection with Marcus.
"Marcus already tried that," Nathan had objected, lips curled into a sneer as he paused outside the room he had taken at the border inn.
"He's but one man," Tyrandel had countered with a single shake of his head. "Meet these Dalashamites on their own turf, but with more to back you up than just our strength."
Nathan remembered frowning at his friend, his fierce expression demanding a more detailed explanation.
"They know nothing of magic," Tyrandel said, his pudgy hands rubbing together slowly as they did when he plotted something cunning. "But they've had to endure whatever Girl perpetrated upon them, which will make them leery and mistrustful of wizards. Even so, two men with a handful of guards will hardly give them pause, except to strengthen their defences and put them on their guard for unknown compulsions.
"Facing a much larger troop of soldiers, however, will turn their suspicion and efforts to the military might they have experience deflecting, not to the two wizards in the midst of a small army. Give them a distraction with our presence so that they don't even consider how we might seek to turn their gaze from our more simplistic plan. While we have a soldier bluster our demands, keeping their attention focused elsewhere, we slip past all defences, snatching both Girl and Marcus from beneath their very noses while they try to come up with a solution to the might of arms."
The delay chafed, oh yes, but Nathan had admitted Tyrandel's plan had merit. So now he waited, determined to give his guard captain another handful of days to recruit a suitably sized force before taking back what belonged to him. From where the man would recruit soldiers, Nathan didn't care.
"Hire mercenaries, take farmers from their fields, conscript thieves and murderers, it doesn't matter, so long as they can carry a weapon and march," he had told his captain. The captain knew how to deal with adding numbers to create a sizable force―eager or recalcitrant, it didn't matter to the master who could magically tamper with a mind long enough to ensure compliance for a given task―and Nathan could deal with any cost incurred later.
"Five more days," he growled now to Tyrandel, curbing his impatience after already waiting for two evenings. "Then we move, and if an army follows in our wake instead of marching beside us, so be it."
Tyrandel grinned before swinging away from his companion to search out a certain battered red-head with whom to pass the time. Locating the girl's current hiding place just added to the fat man's amusement. Nathan didn't know whether the serving wench had failed to realise that she dealt with a wizard who could cast a locate spell as easily as breathing, or if she merely took the only form of protest available to her. The town only had so many hiding places, and Tyrandel could ferret them all out. The innkeeper had ceased any complaints regarding their actions two days ago when Tyrandel first convinced Nathan to wait, and if his vacant, mindless need to obey the two wizards b
othered anyone, those others simply took their patronage elsewhere.
Nathan left Tyrandel to toy with his victim, knowing that by the time they finally left and crossed into Dalasham by week's end, the wench would find herself as mindless as the innkeeper. Assuming his friend left anything of her whole. Perhaps Girl would also soon find herself in a similar position, a mindless husk, prey to the whimsy and lusts of those who owned her. After all, hadn't Father described that very use for her? To take whatever power she harboured and make it his own, slaking any thirst he desired.
Abomination, a tiny voice screamed in the back of his head. You mustn't.
Nathan ruthlessly shoved that aside and stood. He forced a smile, then turned to find something to take his mind off this deplorable wait. Surely something in this little town could divert his attention for awhile.
Chapter 12
One more thing to occupy my time, Stefan thought with a hint of irritability. Not enough that he still found himself unravelling some of Prince Whillim's machinations, that he had a hostile wizard locked in a special cell after threatening to turn Dalasham over to an equally unscrupulous man, or that he must justify the relative freedom of another wizard who had spread contention among his people―though Destiny had acted against Dalasham, she did not stand as a citizen of his realm and so could not, legitimately, receive punishment without possible reprisals, a fact his Council chose to ignore in their thirst to blame others. Nor could he reveal Destiny's claim that many under his rule possessed some form of the very aspect that so frightened his people. His Councillors might riot if they learned that many of their neighbours, if not themselves, might have a trace of Lesser Magic in their blood, so trying to explain why he needed Destiny to help research the origin of said Magics―and under the supervision of mere librarians (who also carried Lesser Magics)―rather than keeping her imprisoned or worse became counterproductive. Those concerns on top of the usual ruling of his kingdom threatened to give Stefan a headache on the best of days.
Today didn't sit as one of his better days. A messenger from the north had arrived to inform him that he had less than a week to prepare for the arrival of his bride-to-be, a time-frame his Councillors reaffirmed, finding themselves chagrined to learn that, yet again, they had misremembered Willi's edicts as Stefan's own. The betrothal didn't come as a surprise―Stefan had set things in motion there long before Willi had tried to usurp his position―but he hadn't expected Bash to move so quickly once the two kingdoms had reached a mutually beneficial agreement, suggesting either Willi had failed to negotiate well for Dalasham, or that Bash had ulterior motives for such haste. As Willi hadn't bothered to fully disclose to the Council the details of his clandestine meeting with Representative Tolnar, uncle to Princess Mantinou of Bash and a keen diplomat, Stefan suspected the former. With Willi on his way to Cranshaw, soon to find himself under guard from the very mercenaries he himself had hired―themselves under the strict eye of Stefan's lead general until Milos fully recovered and could remove his Company from Stefan's lands―only one person in Dalasmar Castle knew the full details of a union that should have taken more rounds of negotiation to achieve. That same Lady Destiny, whose presence caused such discontent even as he hoped it might lead to a discovery that would save his land from the influence of people like Nathan. And herself.
"You're sure you should go to her, Sire?" Fred asked as he walked through the halls beside Stefan. "I can have her brought somewhere secure―"
"The less anyone sees of her, the easier to fool themselves into forgetting her presence," interrupted Stefan. "And this way, we also learn what Darien has discovered, if anything. Better one trip for me than traipsing to so many meetings that others might feel inclined to invite themselves to."
"Easier if you just explained this possibility of Lesser Magics."
"Easier, but fraught with dangers, Fred. Besides, what if Destiny's wrong? These Lesser Magics might simply constitute an unusual phenomenon in Dalasham. Or she might see something that doesn't exist and has no other way to describe it."
Fred scowled and clumped along in silence for three whole strides.
"You don't believe that, any more than I do," he accused in a low tone, not that any of the other three King's Guard accompanying them would overhear. "Darien and Emily both believe her too."
Stefan suppressed a sigh.
"I know," he admitted. "But they have no proof that the Council would understand. Until I see a solution to this problem that no one else has known to exploit before, I see no reason to further frighten my advisors. They're skittish enough with the notion of outside magic finding its way into our kingdom, let alone learning that natives likely use it everyday without realisation. If Nathan or someone of his ilk shows up to challenge us, then I need to know how to answer his threat. Leaving the librarians and wizard to find part or all of that answer is the only course I see, and the faster they do so without constant interruption, the better. So we go to them."
Fred inclined his head in acknowledgement, though his dark eyes remained hooded with concern.
As they entered the sitting room he had instructed Prichard to set aside for the use of those librarians and wizard to gather and do research, Fred leading the way and signalling his men within to warn of the arrival of royalty, Stefan heard raised voices engaged in fierce debate.
"Impossible!" a wiry man with wavy chestnut hair brushed back from his olive toned face exclaimed from his seat near the fire, dark eyes so intent on the two women sitting in matching red-brown chairs across from him that he didn't notice the King's entrance. Recognising the Administrator from the Frontier School, Stefan recalled Prichard's intent to seek further assistance from the western Schools of Magic. Though Prich had indicated such help had arrived, he hadn't mentioned in what form. Stefan remembered Norbert as a man dedicated to his records in the archives, as well as in his devotion to Wizard Castillo, head of the school. He certainly hadn't expected to see that same administrator in Dalasmar Castle now.
Neither Emily nor Destiny paid Stefan's entrance any attention either, the former scowling in a way he recalled when she believed her audience misguided, the latter sitting forward, hands clasped tightly as she frowned fiercely, both intent on the foreign wizard. Ambrose leaned next to the mantel, arms crossed as he watched over Emily while Bartok hovered closer to the door Stefan had just entered. Prichard sat back in his own chair, keen eyes taking in everything. Norbert, meanwhile, continued his objection.
"No such wizards graced Dalasmar's halls in any capacity of authority. We have no records―"
"And do your records include Henri as a wizard?" Emily interrupted. "They may have listed him as Heinrich, but I assure you, by whatever name, Henri knew the arts of wizardry, as did Constance and Alfred and all these others she's named."
"And that's part of the problem," Destiny added. "You have no record of them because they altered the nature of reality."
Norbert shook his head, lips pursed in a firm line as though to keep his impatience from leaking out.
"Our records do not come from without; they are kept from within. To suggest any could tamper with them―"
"Would admit that a Great Magic might have occurred without your knowledge," Destiny snarled. "Come, Wizard Norbert, at least admit such could come to pass, no matter how improbable."
Norbert spluttered, but he didn't answer either way. Perhaps sensing the other wizard wouldn't commit to something he'd had no time to research, Destiny waved a chained hand in a cutting gesture, pushing this argument aside for the moment.
"It doesn't matter whether or not you agree that Constance had any power, let alone used her abilities for the benefit of Dalasham. It doesn't even matter at the moment whether you believe a woman capable of wielding complex magic. We need to address the issue of Lesser Magics, however they became so prevalent in this land. Emily―hellfire, everyone in Dalasham with a hint of Lesser Magic in their veins, could we but identify them―must learn how to shield themselves from power-
mad wizards such as those likely to come seeking to learn the fate of Marcus."
"The likelihood of so many able to claim a Lesser Magic in one place is too far-fetched a notion―"
"Test it," Destiny challenged, again cutting off Norbert's words. His face darkened further as irritation exploded into a growl. Fred shifted at Stefan's side, and the King turned his head to see the Chief Librarian come into the room on silent feet, a small pile of books in his arms. He took in the scene before him, coming to stand on the far side of Fred.
"Seems I've missed something," Darien murmured.
"Or you're just in time for more fun and games," Fred grunted, though careful not to draw the attention of the three arguing by the fire, none of whom seemed to have noticed their audience.
"I've already told you," Norbert spoke from between clenched teeth as he tried to keep his tone even, "I sense no magic users here."
"And that's the only defence they currently have," nodded Destiny. "You cannot sense their Lesser Magics, but you can see them at work, and from there, you can feel them as they influence you. The more you know where to look, and for what, the more you begin to recognise their prevalence. I'm hoping, from there, we can learn why we don't sense them, and how to keep any initial attention away from them."
Stefan watched Norbert's jaw unlock, curiosity beginning to chase away frustration, though disbelief still lurked in his eyes. If she can't convince another wizard of the existence of these Lesser Magics, Stefan pondered, how should I broach the subject to those less versed in arcane matters? How would I keep panic at bay among the Council when learned scholars dare not stretch their understanding?
"You ask me to take their Lesser Magic on faith?" Norbert's voice softened with consideration. "To trust to a sensation that you've now put in my mind, so that I won't know whether I feel an outside influence at work or an imaginary touch conjured by your supposition?"
The Forgotten Magic Page 12
