The Arcanist

by Greg Curtis

  He'd found the power behind the attacks on Theria. And he'd found the enemy within the city who'd guided these terrible creatures to do such terrible damage.

  But knowing that wasn't enough when his blood was pouring down his front in rivers. When his arms barely had the strength to hold the sword in them. And it was even less when he felt the wooden spear strike him in the back again and watched as a good foot of it emerged from his stomach.

  The king’s sword clattered to the ground as he was no longer able to hold it. He was no longer able to even to stand up. And when the spear was ripped out of him for the second time he collapsed, landing ironically enough on the black priest. The master of the sprigs.

  The priest wasn't happy with that and he'd regained enough strength to roll him off him, and then get to his own feet with a growl. Then he returned the favour he'd been given and kicked Byron in the head.

  It should have hurt, and maybe it did. But not as much as it should have. Not enough to take the king's thoughts from him either. And so as the king lay there dying, he was still able to watch the door. Able to watch as Simon strode back into the room, his blade covered in blood. His guards it seemed had been defeated. He was annoyed by that. The traitor should have been killed. It would at least have allowed him to die knowing some sense of victory. He hadn't realised that Simon was so capable with a blade.

  But it didn't really matter. Not when the light was slowly leaving his eyes and he knew it would not return. But even as things went dark he could still hear. He could listen as Simon grew angry and yelled at the priest for killing the King. Apparently he needed to be alive to sign the writ. That made Byron happy. Apparently he had achieved something after all. But then he heard the priest's final words.

  If he couldn't sign the writ while he was alive he'd just have to sign it when he was dead.

  The words that followed though, were more terrible still, and he was lucky not to hear them. Lucky not to know that as he lay there dying Simon and his dark priest were off to kill his family.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Banging on the front door once more brought Edouard out of his well earned rest, and he was angered by it. He was tired from the battle and from keeping watch. After such a long night visitors were the last thing he needed. He'd only just gone to bed. Could three bells have rung yet?

  “There's no hope I'm ever going to sleep again is there?” Edouard asked himself. There was no one else to ask it of. But why he was asking even Edouard didn't know. All he knew was that once more it was the middle of the night or actually the wee hours of the morning and the door was being pummelled by someone.

  Why hadn't he locked the front gate? This night of all nights? He cursed himself for his stupidity. After the sprigs had been defeated he should have. But instead he and his guests had simply gone to bed after watching the surroundings for at least five long hours from the tower. It was beginning to look like the only way he was going to keep people from trying to break his front door down was to shut the gate every night. The Seven only knew what his guests must think. First the sprigs and now this, whatever this was. This clearly wasn't a night for sleeping.

  Edouard threw aside the covers, got up and pulled on his robe once more, thinking to give whoever was annoying him a piece of his mind. Thinking that the others would too. All save Marcus of course, who he could hear still snoring away in the far room. First the man had slept through the afternoon, then the attack by the sprigs, and now it seemed he was going to sleep through this as well. What sort of tonic had the physician given him? Was there no limit to his ability to sleep?

  Still, that was a question for another night. For the moment he simply had to answer the door, and so once more he made the trek along the upstairs hallway to the landing, then down the stairs and across the marble tiled floor to the front door. Finally, still half asleep, he lifted the bar and pulled it open.

  “Hello? Captain?”

  In the dark Edouard wasn't completely certain who it was on his front porch. It appeared to be a couple of soldiers in the uniform of the king's royal guard with dark gauze covering their lower faces like veils for some reason. But why? Why were they at his door? And why were they veiled?

  “Lord Edouard Severin of House Barris?”

  The question was asked for some reason but of course it couldn't really be a question. Everyone knew who he was. Besides, they were on the doorstep of his house. Who else did they expect to answer it? They surely knew who they were speaking to.

  “Yes.” He resisted the impulse to answer him in the manner his foolish question truly demanded he did. The man was just a soldier carrying out his duty after all.

  “The king commands your immediate presence in the throne room.”

  “What? Now?” That sounded damned odd to Edouard. King Byron didn't normally have such an early start. Not unless something was wrong. And he had the sudden thought that something must be.

  “Yes.”

  “Have the mammoths attacked again?”

  “No.” The guard with the veiled face didn't seem to want to give a lot away with his one word answers and Edouard guessed he wasn't going to get a lot more from him. Or he wouldn't but Marcus might. The man was dressed in the livery of the royal guard after all and so his captain might have more luck. If he could wake him.

  “Stay here. I'll get dressed and bring my brother Marcus downstairs and you can explain what's happening to him.”

  “No. The king was very clear. Only you are to come, and you are to leave your contraptions behind. You will not need your weapons either.”

  “No weapons?” That sounded very wrong to Edouard. In fact it sounded as though he was being asked to step into some sort of a trap. As if he wasn't trusted. “Your face is veiled. How do I know you are who you say you are or that you speak for the king?”

  Immediately the guard handed him a writ with the royal seal on it, and the instructions he'd just given him were written out clearly for him to read. Clearly he'd expected the question. And the damnable thing about it all was that reading it Edouard knew he had no choice. He was a noble of Therion. To refuse to obey the king's orders was tantamount to treason. He couldn't do that. He could not disgrace the House of Barris so.

  “Fine. I'll get dressed and come with you.” But even as he made the journey back up the stairs to his bed chamber Edouard knew in his bones that something was wrong. Something was very wrong. He had the worrying thought that he was about to be accused of some sort of crime. Why else would the guards come to a man's door in the middle of the night save to arrest someone? And why would they demand he return unarmed? But what possible crime could he be accused of?

  Still, there was nothing he could do about it. He was a noble and he had been given an instruction by the king. He had to obey. And he was innocent of any wrong doing. There was nothing to do except go with the royal guards and hope that he could defend himself against whatever he was being accused of.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Ah brother, you've finally arrived. I'll be with you shortly.”

  “Simon?”

  Edouard was confused when he was finally escorted into the throne room by the guards, only to be greeted by his brother. Confused enough that he even forgot about the pain in his backside and thighs from having been forced to gallop all the way to the city. For a start, why was the entire court in session at such a late hour? Or rather, such an early one? Five bells had rung as they'd approached the city. Dawn could not be far off. And where was the king? After all the annoyance and humiliation as he'd been dragged out of his home in the middle of the night by the royal guard on the king's express orders, he'd at least expected to see him and maybe even get an explanation. The veiled soldiers had been short on conversation on the ride to the city. But King Byron wasn't there.

  Instead, and in a blatant offence against custom, Simon was sitting on the throne. He was even signing papers while he sat there. As if he had the right. Again it made no sense.

  Simon
wasn't the king. He wasn't part of the Aldison family. He wasn't even in line to the throne and neither was he part of the court. For him to be sitting on the throne was at the least a transgression of both custom and honour. But was it more than that? Was his brother actually in some way claiming the throne? It didn't seem likely. Not when he had no claim and everyone knew it. And not when Simon had never expressed any desire for the throne either. He didn't want to rule the kingdom. He wanted to own it. Besides, everyone knew that he had no claim. He had no connection at all to the royal family.

  Something was different about him too. Wrong. His usual larcenous grin and confident swagger were gone, and behind his eyes there lurked something else. Something Edouard couldn't quite make out, but which still managed to send a chill down his spine.

  But by his side there stood another figure who worried him more. A man – though other than for his size and shape there was little to prove that – clothed in dark black pilgrim robes that covered him from head to foot. The hood covered his entire head and extended so far forward that its shadow hid his face, while the sleeves hung down so far that even his hands were hidden. But Edouard had the disturbing thought that underneath his hood his face like that of the royal guards was also veiled.

  That struck him as odd. But the feeling he got from him when he set eyes on the dark robed figure was far worse. There was definitely something wrong with him.

  The man made his skin crawl, and he couldn't even see him. Worse he had magic. A lot of magic. He wasn't a mere spark like Edouard, and at a guess he might not even be a flame. His strength was far more than that. Dark magic, strong and powerful, insidious too, swam through his veins. Or maybe not his veins exactly. Was he truly a flame? Or was he a priest? Was the magic his or his master's? Or was he something else? Because his magic was strange. It was too well organised. Too neat. It was not the sort of wild, exuberant magic that came from the life force of a wizard. If anything it was almost mechanical. Cold and dead.

  Others sensed something of the wrongness in the priest as well, and the lords and ladies of the court had given him and Simon a wide berth, almost as though they feared what he might do. Edouard did too. Pulled out of his bed in the middle of the night, dragged to the throne room by the royal guard and seeing his brother on the throne looking distinctly odd did not bode well. Having the black robed sinister figure standing beside him boded even worse for what was coming.

  Neither did the court itself fill him with confidence. It wasn't normal. Neither for the hour nor the feeling. They were the lords and ladies of the kingdom, exactly as they always should be. But this was no normal gathering. Even allowing for the fact that it was not yet quite dawn, they seemed somehow subdued. Worried. As if they knew something bad was about to happen. Something perhaps to do with the papers Simon was signing.

  “Edouard.”

  Edouard turned as he heard a voice he knew rather well coming from his right, and instantly recognised Janus standing there, his pot belly and long bushy beard unmistakeable. It seemed that he too had been dragged to the court in the middle of the night. Immediately Edouard had to ask why. Why was he there?

  Janus was a good sort, the apothecary for the city, and one of the few other sparks in the land. His gift was for healing and not the elements like Edouard's, and he was highly valued because of it. Valued so highly that people forgave him his normal gruff manner. Even the king did so even though every so often he threatened to put him on an enforced diet. He said it was amiss that the city's apothecary should huff and puff when he walked up too many stairs. Of course King Byron did the same. The two were close. And Janus was also a friend of Edouard's. But he wasn't a member of the court. He wasn't of the nobility. Why then had he also been called to the court at this hour?

  “Janus?” Edouard greeted his friend with a nod but thought better of going over to him to talk. This did not seem the time or the place for casual conversation.

  Beyond Janus Edouard suddenly made out Fergis, another spark. He, like Edouard had fire in his blood and spent his days with the guards, adding heat to the smith's fires so that the weapons they forged were of the best quality. He also enchanted his own weapons and sold them, earning himself a healthy income. More than healthy according to many. A decent flame edged blade was worth a lot of gold and his weapons were of the finest quality. Like Janus he too was a commoner but well respected as an artisan. But he still shouldn't there.

  Edouard and Fergis had never really got on. Fergis was a short tempered sort, and he regarded Edouard as someone who wasted his gift. For him his gift was everything and he used it to make the coin he needed to live. Edouard had no need of coin and as someone of noble birth the idea of engaging in the commonplace of work was unacceptable. He could not perform manual labour and Fergis knew that. He despised him for it, and he had regularly told him as much in his typically blunt way. But seeing Fergis standing there, also surrounded by guards and looking worried, Edouard knew a moment of concern for him as well. For them all.

  Having three of the six sparks in the realm in the same room could not be coincidence. In fact it underlined the very strangeness of what was happening here.

  There was also something very wrong with the number of royal guards in the chamber. There were around fifty of them, all for some reason veiled, and lining the walls. They all for some reason had their hands near the hilts of their swords. It was almost as if they were there to keep the nobles in line. But that wasn't right. Nobles didn't need to be kept in line, and the idea that they should have to be watched by the guards was an insult to the entire Court.

  “Little brother.” His papers signed, Simon abruptly focused his attention on Edouard, bringing the court to order. There was no doubt that he was somehow in charge of matters. All eyes were on him and the silence deepened. “So good of you to come.”

  Mocking sarcasm. That was normal enough for Simon. But usually there was an element of humour as well as disdain in his words. Not this time. Instead they were cold and dark, almost threatening. Edouard ignored him as best he could.

  “Why are you sitting on the throne? Where's King Byron?” Edouard didn't bother with politeness or formality as he cut straight to the important questions.

  He still didn't understand. How could Simon sit on the throne with the Court before him as if he were king? Why had the Court even been called at this hour? Why were they surrounded by guards? And who was the dark robed man standing beside him?

  “You haven't heard then little brother. The king is no more.” Simon managed a mocking bow as he said it, as if it was somehow amusing.

  It was anything but, and Edouard almost fell to the floor in disbelief. It was shocking. Unthinkable. The king was dead? Simon was really saying that King Byron was dead? How? Why? When? There were so many questions and he didn't know how to ask them all. Simon must have seen that on his face.

  “The city was attacked again. Funny tree like creatures that tore through the guard as if they were unarmed. They tore through the king and the royal family as well.”

  “Sprigs?” Edouard mentally kicked himself. Why was he asking? He knew what they were. He knew that they had attacked him barely seven or eight hours before as well. He hadn't heard that they'd attacked the city. But then he hadn't been to the city in the hours since.

  “Ah, you know them then.” It was an accusation of some sort. But what was he accusing him of? Sending the sprigs to attack the city? He couldn't do that. He didn't have that sort of power, and Simon knew it.

  “My home was attacked by them earlier this night.”

  That stirred a response in his elder brother, but not one that Edouard understood. Simon turned his head a little and stared at the black robed priest as if asking him something. But not a word was spoken between them, and a second or two later he was once more staring at him.

  “Really? And you survived?” Simon mocked him, making it seem as if he was a liar of some sort. Why? And why was he sitting on the throne? That still made no se
nse.

  “They came from the wildlands and tried to climb the walls. A score of them. We blew them apart with the guns.”

  “And yet the guards' weapons were useless.” Did Simon truly doubt him? Or was this just some sort of sham trial? It felt like a trial.

  “My weapons aren't.” Edouard really didn't like the accusatory tone of his brother's words. It was almost as if he was being charged with something. Perhaps he was. The guards had come and all but dragged him here in the wee hours of the morning after all. “They're far more powerful. You can check the lands outside my walls this day if you like. There are dead sprigs everywhere.”

  “My lord.”

  The dark robed figure spoke up suddenly and every fibre of Edouard's being tried to recoil from him. His voice, whatever it was, wasn't right. It wasn't normal. It wasn't even human. In fact it conjured up images of damned souls screaming in the dark of the seven hells. Everyone else there appeared to feel the same. It was almost like a wave as the entire court seemed to flinch when the black priest opened his mouth.