Savage Empire se-1

by Jean Lorrah

  In the great hall, Aradia was receiving petitions. She was dressed more splendidly than Lenardo had ever seen her. Over a rose-colored dress similar in design to the one she had worn at the funeral, she wore a surcoat of rich blue velvet, with panels of gold embroidery. For the first time, too, she was wearing jewelry: gold pendant earrings, and two bracelets of gold on her left wrist.

  Before Aradia knelt a man in tan trousers and a homespun tunic. Lenardo half-Read, half-recognized that this was the owner of the house that had exploded in Nerius’ unconscious attack.

  “Rren,” Aradia was saying, “you are kind enough to allow me to make reparation without petition. You and your family were fortunate to escape from your burning home unharmed. You lost everything, however, through my fault.”

  “Nay, m’lady, you couldn’t know-”

  “I knew my father’s seizures. He never before reached outside the castle, though, and never struck a living being. He never will again-I guarantee it.”

  “Aye, m’lady. No one doubts that.”

  “But you must have your home restored. I have ordered the carpenter to rebuild for you.”

  “Aye-he has already started.”

  “Good,” she said. “But once you have your house again, you will want furnishings, and you will wish to repay your friends who are putting up your family. There-” she took one of the gold bracelets from her left arm, “-that should cover the value of anything you might require.”

  “Oh, my lady, this is of far greater value-”

  “You must not refuse me, Rren.”

  “Uh��� no, m’lady. Thank you, m’lady.”

  Still staring at the bracelet in his hands, he continued to mutter thanks as he made his bow and left.

  “Now,” said Aradia, “bring in the prisoner.”

  Lenardo remained on the steps, wondering if Aradia had sent for him to Read her prisoner. A Reader’s testimony was not admissible in empire courts, but it could be used to discover concrete evidence. When Aradia did not call him forward, he sat down on the steps to watch the proceedings.

  Two of Aradia’s guards brought in a third man, shackled hand and foot. Although his outward attitude was defiant, Lenardo could not shut out the fear that radiated from him. Whatever he had done, he did not feel guilty, but he was in an agony of terror at being brought before Aradia.

  Fighting to restrain his curiosity, Lenardo did not Read the man until Aradia demanded, “You are one of Drakonius’ watchers?”

  The man did not answer, but Lenardo Read that it was true. And that set him free to Read, to probe deeply for Drakonius’ whereabouts-for Galen’s!

  What Lenardo Read was that this man was looking for him. The description was too good-it could only have come from Galen. The one thing the watcher didn’t know, however, was that the man he sought was a Reader.

  Aradia, meanwhile, was questioning the frightened prisoner and getting no response. “Were you coming into my lands or leaving them when you were captured?” she asked.

  “Coming in,” he replied sullenly-a half-truth. He had indeed just come in, discovered that Aradia’s watchers were also searching for Lenardo, and started back across the border lands to report what he had learned when he was captured. He had not managed to make his report. Lenardo was confused by the fact that the man seemed to think he could have made his report without crossing back into Drakonius’ lands or meeting anyone. Try as he might, he could not Read how the watcher thought to do so. The man’s mind was darting like a wild bird in a cage, battering against the bars.

  Aradia did not know how to question the man to bring to the surface of his mind the information she wanted. Lenardo considered going down to offer help, but she didn’t want her men to know he was a Reader. The fact that Drakonius had not let his watchers know was further evidence that he was indeed in danger if so exposed.

  “You will tell me what you were doing in my lands,” Aradia was saying, the dangerous-wolf look in her eyes.

  The watcher panicked. Hideous images flickered through his mind-pain, dismemberment, flame; an Adept could keep a tortured prisoner alive and in agony indefinitely. He had seen Drakonius do so!

  Lenardo had no idea what Aradia intended to do to the man, but whatever the threat, it was the wrong move. As the watcher cowered before her, his psychic presence suddenly went blank-as blank to Reading as an Adept’s! He realized that this was one of those men with some minor Adept-power-like the young soldier he had met in Zendi -and that he had been driven by terror of Aradia to use it��� on himself.

  As the man collapsed before her, Aradia knelt at once beside him. His heart had stopped, but Lenardo Read it forced to start again when Aradia concentrated. But it didn’t take hold. In the bare moments it took for Lenardo’s long legs to carry from across the room, he realized that an Adept always had the means of suicide at hand by stopping his heart-but that it was ineffective before a stronger Adept, who could reverse the process. He Read, though, that this man was irretrievably dead. His power was not to move things-it was to create fire. And he had done so, to his own brain. It was cooked through.

  The smell of burnt flesh was rising as Lenardo reached,. Aradia’s side. She rose, staring in honest horror at what had happened. Although her thoughts were as unReadable as always, her nausea matched his own. She closed her eyes and turned away, saying, “How could he be so desperate? I had to know, but I wouldn’t have hurt him-”

  She squared her shoulders, becoming the calm leader again. “Remove the body,” she instructed the soldiers. When they had gone, she turned to Lenardo. “Drakonius has watchers in my lands.”

  “They are looking for me,” he replied. “You Read him?”

  “That is all I could Read-except that he did not report to Drakonius before he was captured.”

  “Then why didn’t he tell me that? There was no need for him to die.”

  “Aradia��� do you treat your prisoners as Drakonius treats his?”

  Her lips thinned. “I should have known. Father would not have made that mistake. He would simply have implanted the desire to speak truth before the man was brought before him. But, Lenardo, if you were Reading him, why didn’t you warn me?”

  “I didn’t know what he was going to do. And if I had known, and shouted it across the great hall��� Wulfston has warned me that your people would kill me if I gave myself away.”

  “Wulfston has told me a great deal about you, too,” Aradia said. “You frustrate him.”

  “Frustrate?”

  “He knows what great value you could be to us, and how dangerous you would be working against us. He wants to trust you��� as I do, Lenardo.”

  “Don’t,” he said, not ready to discuss even a truce until he had had time to think over the scene he had just witnessed.

  “There-you see? That is frustrating. You appear to be a man whose word we could take-if you would give it.”

  “What do you want from me, Aradia?”

  “Your loyalty. If you were my sworn man, you might use your powers openly. No one would dare question your motives.”

  “Why should I give you my loyalty?”

  “Because we have the same ideals. Wulfston told me why you were exiled. I can protect you from what you fear.”

  “What I fear?”

  “Lenardo-do you not fear pursuit? Leaving here and running northward while you were still so weak-that was not the act of a rational man. Do you expect retaliation? Would the Readers send someone after you, to kill you lest you join with us?”

  At this rate, how long before she figures out I am in pursuit of Galen? “Why should they? They know the savages will kill anyone who shows the ability to Read.”

  “But I did not kill you, did I? And Drakonius did not kill the Reader he used to attack Adigia, although he may have been killed since. I wonder.” She took off the remaining gold bracelet and tossed it into a chest by the wall. When she lifted the lid, Lenardo caught a flash of brilliant metal.

 
Gold, silver, jewels, coins-an immense treasure! And I thought there were no ornaments worn here. Aradia still wore the small gold pendant earrings, but nothing more except the rich embroidery of her surcoat, a far cry from the many rings, bracelets, and necklaces a wealthy woman of the empire might wear.

  Aradia clapped her hands sharply, and a man entered from the inner hallway. “Pepyi, have the treasure chest shut away.”

  “Yes, m’lady.”

  Aradia started up the stairs. “Are you going to leave the chest there, unguarded?” asked Lenardo.

  “The lock can be opened only by an Adept. Would you care to try to lift the chest, Lenardo? It will take six strong men to put it away-and I do not believe six of my men at one time would conspire against me.”

  “The value of the items in that chest might make them consider it.”

  “Why? They want for nothing. Also, the punishment for theft would make them think twice.”

  “And what is the punishment for theft?” The memory of the tortures he had seen in the watcher’s mind made his skin crawl.

  “Years ago, my father found an excellent solution for nonviolent crimes. The criminal is simply struck dumb.”

  “What?”

  “He cannot speak. That does not prevent him from making reparation. It is, of course, a handicap, a great embarrassment, because everyone knows why he cannot speak. Since it is difficult to communicate with others, he must commune with himself-and by the time the command is lifted, and they can speak again, most such people have reformed their ways.”

  “That’s a terrible thing to do!” Was there no limit to the ways these Adepts manipulated people?

  “It is painless. It does not separate the criminal from his family or make him incapable of honest work. He cannot run away, for he carries his punishment with him. Furthermore, only once, since my father instituted this method of punishment, has someone who suffered it repeated his crime.”

  “And what about the poor creature who is born dumb? He will be taken for a criminal under punishment.”

  Aradia stared at Lenardo in shock. “To be without Adepts-how horrible! You actually allow a child to grow up with such handicaps, deaf, dumb, blind-?”

  “You can cure all of those?”

  “Almost always in an infant. You saw Pepyi below? He was born blind, but my father cured him when he was just a baby-as soon as his parents discovered he couldn’t see. It took over a year, but he sees.”

  “I have a friend who is blind,” said Lenardo. “The optic nerves-the nerves from the eye to the brain-did not develop normally. Could you���?”

  “Is he a grown man?”

  “He’s seventeen.”

  “No, I don’t think anything could be done now. When a baby is developing and growing, it is relatively easy to correct such defects. I am sorry for your friend.”

  “Torio would laugh at your pity. Fortunately, he is a Reader-one of the best I’ve ever known. One day he will be far better than I am.”

  “And how good are you, Lenardo?” They had stopped at the top of the stairs. “What do you mean?” asked Lenardo.

  “There are degrees of ability among Readers just as there are among Adepts, Wulfston tells me. What is the level of your skills?”

  As he hesitated, not wanting to tell her he had just been admitted to the highest rank, she said, “No-your ratings would be meaningless to me. Come into my study.”

  She led him through her bedroom, where she paused to remove her earrings and exchange the velvet surcoat for a worn and ink-stained robe, and into a smaller room with large, many-paned windows of clear glass. The walls were lined with books and scroll-cases-as many, it appeared, as in the academy library! So here was one savage who could read and write.

  “You are a scholar?” he asked.

  “One cannot go everywhere and experience everything. Books bring knowledge one could never gather in a single lifetime. But of all these books, Lenardo, many of them from the Aventine empire, not one explains the techniques of Reading.”

  “It cannot be taught by books,” he explained. “One learns to Read by demonstration and experience.”

  “Very well. I want a demonstration.”

  “If you have not the talent-”

  She smiled. “No, I did not mean you could teach me to Read. I want to find out how well you can do it.” There was a table by the window, stacked with books and papers in uneven piles, a wax-encrusted candlestick holding down one stack. There were a tablet and stylus, quills, ink-all the supplies of a scholar, in deplorable disorder.

  Aradia picked up the wax tablet and, holding it so Lenardo could not see, said ‘Tell me what I am writing.”

  “I, Aradia, daughter of Nerius, heir to-”

  She stopped, turned the stylus, and rubbed out the words as she said, “I suppose that’s an easy trick.”

  “Yes, but it’s not the easiest. The first sign of Reading ability is to pick up another person’s thoughts. I cannot touch yours, so I had to do a visual Reading of what you wrote.”

  “Let’s try something a bit harder. You see the large red-bound volume in the middle of the top shelf?”

  As there was only one book bound in red, he said, “Yes.”

  “Look at the first page-I mean, Read the first page to me.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Oh,” she said disappointedly.

  “It’s not that I can’t Read it,” explained Lenardo, “it’s that I can’t read it. Although I speak your language, I have never learned your alphabet.”

  “Here,” she said urgently, thrusting the wax tablet into his hands, “copy it down! It doesn’t matter if you don’t know what it means!”

  The tablet’s surface did not show the rub-marks of the stylus; it was as smooth as if the wax had been remelted. Concentrating, he began to copy the characters in the book, letters made up all of straight lines, intended to be carved, not written.

  Aradia watched avidly, until he had copied three lines. “That’s enough,” she said and went to the bookcase, stretching up on tiptoe for the book. Just as Lenardo was about to go reach it for her, it conveniently tilted forward and fell into her hands.

  Eagerly, she opened it to the first page and compared what was written there with Lenardo’s version. “You write with the precision of a scribe,” she said. “It’s perfect.”

  She looked up at him, her face flushed. “Lenardo, if we could only work together���”

  “We can,” he said, pressing his advantage. “Aradia, Drakonius is looking for me. I assume that that means danger to you if he finds out where I am. I know it means danger to me.”

  “How did he find out about you?” she asked suspiciously.

  “His Reader knows me.”

  “Have you been in contact?”

  “No. I’ve been too ill to search for him��� and I do not know whether Galen is working freely for Drakonius or is being forced to do so.”

  “Of course,” she said. “How stupid of me. You came here seeking this other Reader, Galen.” She tilted her head, studying him. “To join him? Or to remove him from your enemy’s arsenal of weapons?”

  “Whatever my original motivation,” he replied, “I now see that he cannot be left in Drakonius’ power, even if he is there willingly. And that means I need your help, Aradia. I will Read Drakonius for you if you will help me remove Galen from his power.”

  “You realize that I am trying to extricate my people and myself from Drakonius’ power?”

  “I had surmised as much.”

  She searched his face, and he could feel empathically how her longing to trust him deepened. Then she said, “I am powerless to move against Drakonius. He knows that. I dare not leave my father for more than a day at a time. I cannot lead my army, even in defense��� unless you will help me.”

  ‘To do what?”

  “To cure my father!”

  “Aradia, there’s no way-”

  “You can Read the exact location of his tumor,
and I can remove it!”

  “No, Aradia. My surgical skills are good enough for emergency measures, but even the finest surgeon dare not cut into the human brain. It would kill your father at once.”

  “Cut into-? What are you talking about?”

  “Removing the tumor.”

  “By cutting? No, Lenardo! I am an Adept. I shall just-remove it! You must draw it for me, or make a model in wax. It must be exact-even more precise than these letters -but you can do it, can’t you?”

  “I��� don’t know,” he replied, caught up in the idea. “I said I would help you with healing-but this. If you were off by a hair’s breadth, you would kill him. The shock might kill him anyway.”

  “He is dying, Lenardo! If we do nothing, he will be dead within the fortnight.” She lowered her eyes. “For three days I have been strengthening his body again, hoping you could do��� what you have proved today. You are fully recovered, are you not?”

  “No. You don’t understand the precision required. I would have to fast and meditate-”

  “How long?”

  “At least two days.”

  “Then start now!” Her eyes were glittering with tears. Lenardo saw his chance of gaining Aradia-and Wulfston-as allies.

  It was not mere selfishness, though, he realized; he wanted to use his abilities in this strange new way to save a life, but he wondered what Aradia would do to him if he failed. She looked so frail and delicate, and she commanded such power. He could circumvent any command she planted in his mind, but he could do nothing against physical attack. He remembered Wulfston saying, “The best thing I could do would be to stop your heart right now.”

  Dared he risk his life now that he knew where Galen was?

  Then Aradia said, “Lenardo, if you save my father’s life, I will grant you your freedom. I will form an alliance with you, to our mutual advantage, to remove Galen from Drakonius’ power.”

  It was everything he could have asked-unless he failed. But he could not consider the possibility of failure.

  “Very well,” said Lenardo, “I will do it. You understand that while removing the tumor may allow Nerius to live, I cannot predict whether he will recover his faculties.”