Cold Iron (Masters & Mages)

by Miles Cameron

‘I suppose that technically I could arrest you,’ the man said with an easy smile.

  ‘Centark Equus,’ Aranthur said, smiling. ‘May I introduce Prince Ansu?’

  ‘We’ve met,’ Equus said smoothly.

  ‘Ahh. For a delinquent deserter, you are very well dressed. And you know everyone!’ The Centark pulled up a chair and sat with them. ‘Drako mentioned you again and stressed that you’d taken a wound in the service. I take it you’re well enough to travel?’

  Aranthur couldn’t resist. He hiked his shirt out of his hose and showed the spiderweb of scar tissue and the slight hole in his abdomen.

  Equus whistled. ‘Nice. Girls like that sort of thing. Boys too, I imagine.’

  He flicked his moustache with his hand and winked at Prince Ansu.

  Softly he said, ‘The General has marched. I can arrange for you to catch her until as late as Draxday. Then she’ll be out of our reach.’ He smiled at Ansu. ‘And I’ll be with her.’

  ‘I need the permission of the Masters of the Academy,’ Aranthur said.

  Equus nodded. ‘First actual military campaign of my lifetime. If you fancy being a soldier, this will be the moment—’

  ‘Unless he dies,’ Ansu said.

  Equus sat back.

  Ansu shrugged. ‘I come from a warrior people. War kills.’

  Equus smiled his crooked smile. ‘Of course it does. Why talk about it?’

  The Arnaut waiter poured wine for Aranthur and for Ansu, and Equus waved him off.

  ‘No, no,’ he said. ‘I can scarcely walk, and there’s a young person who seems to appreciate my sense of humour.’ He winked, and bowed. He handed Aranthur a brown leather wallet. ‘Here are your new orders – you’ll sail with me, day after tomorrow.’

  Aranthur bowed. ‘Thank you, syr!’

  ‘Think nothing of it. Drako and I … see some things the same way, what? Birds of a feather, eh? And he does get things done …’

  Equus stepped back and looked around.

  Aranthur turned to speak to Ansu, and he found …

  Iralia. She smiled. Her enhancement was gone. Most of the make-up was gone, and she wore a shorter gown in violet and gold, but nothing as revealing as what she’d had on half an hour before – the sort of kirtle any active woman might wear to a good inn. She was no longer breathtaking, but merely brilliant, which seemed her natural state.

  Nonetheless, Centark Equus made a very deep bow before looking for his young person.

  ‘I asked my … friend to go on without me,’ Iralia said.

  Ansu raised his wine cup. ‘To you, my lady. Two thousand years of Zhouian poetry cannot do you justice.’

  Iralia made a face. ‘Haven’t you done enough of that?’

  The prince took one of her hands and kissed it until she tore it away.

  ‘Really,’ she said.

  Ansu shrugged and drank more wine. ‘You are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen. I want to make love to you.’

  Iralia leant back, tossed her head, and the Arnaut waiter appeared as if by magic and handed her a glass of red wine. She flashed her eyes at him and he flushed, and she dropped a gold sequin on his tray.

  She looked back. ‘Am I the only woman in the palace you haven’t bedded?’

  Ansu smiled and his black teeth showed. ‘Not quite.’ His smile widened. ‘Close, though.’

  ‘Don’t you think it is more than a little impertinent to proposition a courtesan contracted to the Emperor who is your guest-friend?’ she asked, archly, as if she was someone’s grandmother.

  Ansu folded, as he would with someone’s grandmother.

  ‘I mean only to praise you. To be …’

  Iralia looked at him steadily. ‘You seem to be a very intelligent man. Do you fail to see that the Emperor is not only such in name, but must not be challenged, because he can never compete?’

  Ansu bristled. ‘No one is above—’

  Iralia had a fan, and she snapped it shut.

  ‘My dear man, I am telling you. Are you listening to me?’

  Ansu frowned. ‘Yes. But he is not my Emperor.’

  ‘Bah, it turns out you are just another young man with a high opinion of himself.’

  She shrugged, dismissing him. She turned to Aranthur.

  ‘And Myr Tarkas?’ Iralia’s eyes were on Aranthur. ‘She has taken a new lover, I think?’

  ‘Ouch,’ Ansu said.

  Iralia shrugged. ‘Courtesans take love affairs as seriously as soldiers take wounds.’

  Ansu almost spat out his wine.

  ‘Are you recovering?’ Iralia asked Aranthur.

  He smiled, trying not to be entranced. ‘Yes. I feel better. I’ve had all sorts of …’ He paused. ‘You know all about it. You were there.’ Then he smiled. ‘Are we speaking of wounds? Or love?’

  She smiled. ‘Not bad. You are learning.’ She glanced at Ansu to indicate that he was now included in the conversation. ‘I was speaking of mere bodily wounds. And I was there. If Kurvenos had allowed me, I’d have pulled down the Servant.’

  ‘Allowed?’ Aranthur asked.

  Ansu leant forward.

  Iralia rose. ‘I feel like a walk, Syr Timos. Would you be kind enough to escort me?’

  ‘Lucky devil,’ Ansu said quietly.

  ‘We’re old friends,’ Aranthur said.

  Ansu shook his head. ‘I need more old friends.’

  It proved that Iralia had changed at the family palazzo; her Eastern pashmina scarf was draped over a banister in the piano nobile. Both Kallinikos Primo and his wife came to wish her a good evening when the two of them crossed the canal to retrieve it. It was obvious to Aranthur that she’d left it on purpose, to have a chance to speak to the grieving parents in private.

  Hangela, Kallinikos’ mother, had been crying, but her voice was even.

  ‘It was so kind of you to come, to stay, to tell me such a beautiful thing about my son. The Duke of Volta is so wrong about you.’

  Kallinikos Primo glanced at his wife, as if concerned with what she’d said. Then he put a hand out.

  ‘Iralia,’ he said.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘You always know everything.’

  He was a courtier, but grief had made his face naked; his sadness and his anger were right there.

  Very quietly, he said, ‘Did Uthmanos really kill my son with sorcery?’

  Iralia took his hand in hers. Gone was all sign of seduction or enticement. Her voice held nothing but sorrow and regret.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘And he will be caught, and questioned, and punished.’

  ‘Not if my House catches him first,’ Kallinikos said.

  Iralia looked into his face as if reading him. ‘That is, right now, one of the worst outcomes the Emperor can imagine. I beg you to help us find him, and to ensure that he goes to trial.’

  Kallinikos stepped back, and Iralia released his hand.

  ‘I don’t think I could do that,’ Kallinikos Primo said.

  Iralia managed a smile. ‘I wish you would.’ She smiled up into his eyes, all her art, all her warmth focused on him. ‘And the Emperor wishes it.’

  Kallinikos nodded. ‘But there is a matter of honour, my dear.’

  Hangela looked at her husband, a look that burned. ‘What honour? My boy is dead. Iralia, why do you want this man alive?’

  ‘Because he is the key to all of it. The bone plague, the thuryx trade, the murders, the attacks on the Academy, and the death of your son. He will be put to the question, and then he will …’

  Iralia smiled, and Aranthur might have shivered. But he was too busy watching Kallinikos Primo, while Iralia spoke to Hangela. The man’s face grew hard; his eyes were haggard.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘This is not for the Emperor’s justice, but for our own.’

  Hangela looked at him with anger, almost rage, unspoken grief and worry. Aranthur was glad not to be receiving it.

  Iralia caught his hand and tugged.

  A minute later they were walking alon
g the canal. In this neighbourhood, the canal had a full width street running along it, and there was a greensward and cherry trees.

  They walked in silence for a little while.

  ‘Potnia fuck!’ Iralia said fiercely, invoking the Armean Lady of Animals. She stopped, leant against the railing that ran along the canal, and stripped off her magnificent sandals, which were embossed, gilded, and high heeled.

  She lobbed them into the canal.

  ‘Littering. A four obol fine,’ she said. ‘I intend to lead a life of crime.’

  Aranthur had no idea what to make of the change that had come over her.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.

  ‘Please tell me they will at least sink.’ She turned around. ‘His son is dead and he wants fucking revenge.’ Iralia shrugged. ‘Is it because I make love for my living that I have a distaste for the ease with which people use violence?’ She looked out over the canal. ‘Is Kallinikos Primo so rich that he doesn’t care about consequences? I was there when the Emperor, in person, told them that the House war was a set-up to cover other activities. If that jackass kills Uthmanos Primo …’

  She looked at Aranthur. ‘Do you know what I’m talking about?’

  Aranthur felt that three cups of heavy red wine might have been too many.

  ‘Yes,’ he said.

  ‘And?’ she asked, as if she was testing him.

  ‘Cold?’ he asked.

  ‘Iron,’ she said. ‘Cold fucking iron, Aranthur Timos. Drako thinks it’s time to move on, to penetrate the court of Atti and fight the Pure there. He is excited to support the General in her war.’ She glared at Aranthur. ‘I think we have to find the Servant and put him on trial, so everyone knows …’

  She looked at him. It wasn’t as dark as it might have been; many of the palazzi were illuminated for the evening funeral and dinner, and another house was having a dance.

  ‘Tirase believed that everyone should know everything,’ Aranthur heard himself say.

  Iralia’s eyes were deep and dark, and in the evening light, might have been brown.

  ‘He was correct, and so are you,’ she said. ‘Drako is a spy, with a spy’s sense of secrecy. This is a conspiracy that cannot live in the light. We need to expose it.’

  Aranthur nodded.

  ‘The Emperor needs to put this man on trial.’ Iralia was speaking less imperiously now. ‘The balance of powers is delicate – far more delicate than I imagined before …’ She smiled. ‘Before I started sleeping with the government.’ She turned. They were side by side at the marble railing.

  ‘Why did Myr Tarkas leave you?’ she asked.

  ‘I …’ Aranthur sighed. ‘I treated her badly. And she was only …’

  Iralia smiled. ‘Only watching over you? Tell me another one. I watch bodies; I watch the way men posture and women manipulate. Dahlia is a very honest young woman and she wanted you.’

  Aranthur felt he might choke. ‘Well, I didn’t talk to her for a few weeks,’ he admitted.

  Iralia began to laugh. ‘Aphres!. You are something, Aranthur Timos. You just … forgot you had a lover?’

  ‘I was so busy …’ he began. ‘By the Hero, that sounds weak.’ He shook his head. ‘And foolish. But when I concentrate on something …’

  ‘You do it to the exclusion of all the other things. I know. I’ve been inside your busy, busy head.’ She smiled. ‘Let’s go somewhere and drink, Aranthur. We’re not so different. I, too, push things too far. It’s not a bad fault, in a magiker. And I understand you walked down a sword blade.’

  Aranthur could still feel it grating along his spine.

  ‘Yes,’ he said.

  ‘That’s insane. And somehow, beautiful. You wanted to die?’

  She had started walking. She was barefoot, but the streets here were smooth marble, the cheaper, heavily veined kind. And very clean.

  ‘I thought it was the only option.’ Aranthur shrugged.

  ‘Beautiful. A little over-focused, but that’s who you are.’ She shrugged. ‘Where can I get a drink?’

  ‘Was Mikal Kallinikos really working for the Servant?’ he asked suddenly. ‘Since you seem to know everything.’

  He hadn’t realised that he was bitter until that moment. Or perhaps he had …

  Iralia turned. ‘Aphres! Who told you that?’

  Aranthur felt a chill.

  ‘Drako?’ Iralia asked.

  ‘No,’ Aranthur said.

  Iralia breathed for a moment. ‘Maybe if we showed those papers to his father …’ she began.

  Aranthur shook his head and caught her arm, in the middle of a marble bridge, just below the Golden Angel that gave the neighbourhood its name.

  She turned.

  ‘His father is involved,’ Aranthur said. ‘I can’t prove it, but I watched them. Hangela was … beyond rage. I saw it on her face when she realised that her husband is trying to find Uthmanos and kill him. I think he killed his son to cover something up. Listen – Mikal told me his father would kill him. I thought it was a phrase. And she said …’ He put his hands to his temples. ‘She said that you were better than Volta claimed … Something like that.’

  Iralia turned away rapidly. ‘Yes,’ she said quietly. ‘I caught that.’

  ‘And I saw Siran and Djinar at Kallinikos’ rooms. Kallinikos knew all about the Duke of Volta’s plans … Damn.’ He shrugged. ‘He was a Lion.’

  ‘Ah,’ she said. ‘Of course he was.’

  ‘No. No. Djinar. I just realised that I saw him – two days ago.’

  ‘Tell me,’ she said.

  His breath was caught in his throat as he tried to organise what he thought that he knew.

  ‘Djinar is a Byzas aristo. A friend of Kallinikos. But he was part of the rising that Volta led—’

  ‘That we’re not supposed to discuss,’ Iralia said.

  Aranthur shrugged. ‘Everyone in the West Country knows it happened. Djinar has a tie to Kallinikos and to Volta, and the day before yesterday I saw him …’

  He was visualising it: the masked man standing on the step of Rachman’s jewellery shop.

  Myr Ghazala had said the jeweller received stolen goods and Manacher had said he sold ghat.

  ‘What?’ Iralia asked him.

  Aranthur shrugged. ‘I want to look at a shop. I will see you tomorrow.’

  Iralia laughed. ‘See, Prince Ansu would never, ever leave me standing alone in the moonlight to run off and look at a shop,’ she said. ‘I’m coming with you.’

  Aranthur nodded. ‘It may be dangerous.’

  She looked at him for a moment. ‘The implication that I cannot deal with something dangerous is a little patronising,’ she snapped.

  ‘That’s unfair. You dislike violence,’ Aranthur said.

  ‘I know more about violence than most men. I dislike how easily the ignorant use violence. But I’m quite fond of it, myself.’ She smiled an ugly, tight smile. ‘I try to use it for good causes. Where are we going?’

  Aranthur took a deep breath. ‘I’m sure I’m wrong. But it seems that I know a jeweller whom local people thinks deals in ghat and thuryx. Who my friends said was deeply in trouble with soldiers a few months ago, and then had no further troubles. And Djinar was on his step two days ago.’

  ‘Aphres!’ Iralia said. ‘I see it.’

  ‘I see it too, but I am doubtless merely imagining it. We’ll have a quick look.’ He was already walking rapidly. ‘Iralia, what does Kallinikos do? In the government?’

  ‘He has, from time to time, been one of the Emperor’s ministers. At the moment he is the commander of the City Watch.’

  Iralia, it turned out, could walk as fast as Aranthur.

  He led Iralia across the bridge and then through the east bank of the Angel, and along the base of the Aqueduct Ridge, out of the richest neighbourhoods, past where Master Sparthos lived and taught, and then yet further east, where the warehouses lined the waterfront and the better shops crowded at the canal crossings.

  He slowed
, walking along the Street of Lanterns and passing though the Square of the Mulberry Trees along the wrong side. There was a man leaning against a tree and everything about him was wrong.

  Arnathur slipped an arm around Iralia’s waist.

  She smiled up into his face and kissed him.

  It was a wonderful kiss. Aranthur found it very hard to maintain any kind of awareness of the world around him.

  They walked past the man, who turned away with the embarrassment of a man watching lovers. But then he turned back, with a leer. He opened his mouth …

  Squint.

  It was Squint, the bandit.

  Even in the poor magelight of the square, Aranthur knew the man as soon as he began to turn.

  Squint reached for his sword. The recognition had been mutual.

  Iralia seemed to burst into golden flames.

  Aranthur reached with his left hand, as Master Sparthos taught. Iralia’s compulsion bought him a heartbeat. He stepped as far as he dared with his left foot as his left hand locked down on Squint’s sword hand, pinning it against his sword, still in its scabbard.

  Aranthur slammed his forehead into Squint’s nose. This was not the method taught by Master Sparthos, who’d probably never been in a farm boy brawl.

  Squint had a dagger on his right hip and Aranthur knew he could go for it. Instead, he reached with his right hand, caught the back of Squint’s leg, dropped him on the ground and then knelt on his sword hand, while his own hands went to the other man’s throat.

  Iralia stepped up behind him and uttered one word:

  ‘Philiax.’

  Squint was gone. His eyes rolled back and he was asleep, or worse.

  Aranthur looked up and down the street.

  ‘They will have another watcher,’ he said.

  Iralia cast, and then cast again. Her power rolled out of her like one of the Magi of the Academy, but even faster. Aranthur was almost unable to tear his mind away from the display of her puissance as shields unrolled like awnings in springtime.

  Aranthur stepped back from the downed man, rising but trying to keep the fringe of mulberry trees between himself and the other side of the street. He touched his kuria and raised the small red shield that he’d learned from the Safian grimoire.

  He ran through the second Safian working, the one that allowed him to see the colours of magik, and then he cast it. He wrote it in fiery calligraphy, an effect he enjoyed even under stress, and Iralia made a sound of approval.