“I’m not a jailer,” Gormer said, letting his eyes turn white as he entered Rupert’s mind again.
This time he didn’t look for thoughts and motivations. He didn’t poke around to see if this man could be trusted, or at least counted on not to raise an army against Astrid. This time he looked for everything.
As Rupert paced around in his cage lamenting his situation, cursing Gormer, and making desperate, impossible threats against Astrid, Gormer dove deep. It was as if he and Rupert were the same person. He stayed inside that mind until he nearly forgot who he was.
Crack! A sharp sound finally brought Gormer out. His eyes turned back to normal and he found Darnell there, picking up his broom.
“Sorry, magic man,” the wobbly drunk said. “I saw you standing there looking all crazy-like and dropped my broom.”
“It’s OK,” Gormer replied with a satisfied smile, locking eyes with Rupert. “I got exactly what I came for.”
He’d need that direct experience to successfully impersonate Rupert when he went to visit the Wilfred estate.
“That makes one of us,” Rupert mumbled under his breath a little too loudly.
Gormer heard it clearly. He normally wouldn’t have, but coming out of a mental journey that deep always made his non-magical senses more acute for a while.
“What did you say?” Gormer asked suspiciously.
“I didn’t say nothin’,” Darnell slurred as he propped his broom against a wall.
The wheels of a meal cart coming down the hallway got their attention. Gormer stepped away from the heavy iron door.
“I’ll take that,” Darnell said to the attendant. He pushed the food slot open, then reached for the tray.
“Hey!” Gormer exclaimed. He hadn’t pulled the lever on the door that extended two arms that would hold the tray on the inside of the cell. Instead of resting on a little shelf, the tray tipped and spilled its contents all over the cell.
“You clumsy fool!” Rupert whined. “Today is soup day, and now it’s all over my cell!”
Darnell put his face up to the bars and apologized profusely. “I’ll get you an extra portion,” he promised. “In my day we didn’t get but a quarter of what they’re giving you in here. I’m glad they’re treating prisoners better now.”
“You should be in here, not me!” Rupert exclaimed.
“I don’t disagree with you,” Darnell replied.
The shift supervisor, alerted by the commotion, hurried down the hallway. He spoke gently to Darnell, as everyone did. The muzzy old man act wasn’t working on Gormer this time. He knew Darnell was up to something now.
“I’m sorry, boss,” Darnell pleaded. “Let me make it up to him. I’ll clean his cell out extra good.”
“You’d better!” Rupert demanded. “Human beings should not be treated this way!”
Gormer raised an eyebrow at the warm blankets, artwork, writing tools, writing table, and all the other creature comforts Rupert had. It was more like a room at an inn than a cell.
“We’ll have to transfer you, Mr. Danut,” the supervisor said, removing handcuffs from his belt.
“The indignity!’ Rupert lamented.
They went through their unlocking ritual with Rupert facing the opposite wall. The shift supervisor cuffed Rupert and led him away.
That was when it hit Gormer. Darnell had done this on purpose; he’d wanted this to happen.
He had to think fast for a good line to give Darnell just the right impression.
The mental mage looked at Darnell and curled his lip. “Guess I was wrong about you. There really is nothing to read in that moldy head of yours.”
He walked away, but he glanced into every cell to take note of what each prisoner was doing. Most were asleep, and the others were busy minding their own business, as prisoners are wont to do.
Around the corner, Gormer slipped off his moccasin boots. As quiet as they were, he was stealthier in his bare feet. He waited for Darnell to come back with his mop and bucket. He heard the old man enter the cell. When he peeked around the corner, the mop and bucket were still there.
A minute went by and the cleaning tools remained in the hallway. That’s when he knew with absolute certainty that Darnell wanted something in that cell.
Gormer slipped down the stone hallway on the balls of his feet. He reached Rupert’s cell and hunkered down below the sight lines of the other cells’ doors. He was even careful not to cast a shadow on the other doors or into Rupert’s cell.
He heard a soft grunt from inside. “Come on,” Darnell urged. “Where are you?” The sounds of shuffling audible from the hallway. “Damn it,” Darnell cursed a bit too loudly.
Gormer risked a peek into the cell and found the old man’s lower half sticking out from beneath the cot. Gormer had to suppress a chuckle. Whatever the top half was doing, it made Darnell’s legs flop around with the effort.
Still Gormer could not read the old man. There was nothing; just a blank space like a missing window pane covered in black wood.
The sound of stone scraping stone brought a jubilant response. Darnell pushed himself back out and stood with his back to Gormer, who sprang into action.
“I knew it!” the former con man exclaimed. “Are you trying to help him escape?”
Startled, Darnell whirled around. In his hands was a hangman’s rope, complete with noose. “Get out of here!” he hissed.
Now Gormer could read something from him—raw anger and a wave of sadness.
“This ain’t for you to see! You made me break the promise! Get the fuck out of here! Get out, get out!” Darnell trembled and shouted as tears ran down his cheeks in fat streams. “He told me to never let anyone see this. You made me fail him, you bastard!”
Gormer was floored by the emotion coming at him in alternating hot and icy waves. He had to blink several times and calm his breathing so the feelings wouldn’t blind him.
“I’m sorry,” Gormer said, and he meant it. “I thought you were up to something bad.”
“It’s all bad. Always,” Darnell replied. He hugged the coiled rope to his chest as if it were the dead body of his dearest friend. In a way, that was what it was. “This is all that’s left of him.”
“The executioner?” Gormer asked, confused.
“He wasn’t that,” Darnell sobbed.
“What, then?” Gormer asked. He wanted to know. He needed to know. “Tell me why you’re crying over a rope.”
“I’ll show you, but you need to promise me. I beg you. Maybe I can fix what I broke if you can keep the promise.”
Gormer nodded solemnly.
Darnell uncoiled the rope and dropped the noose on the floor, then stepped on the line with both feet. He bent down and grabbed the noose with both hands, then stood up sharply and pulled with all his strength.
The noose made a zipping sound and slid against the line. Gormer wasn’t sure what he was seeing at first. He stared at the rope, which was now just an ordinary rope. The noose was gone.
“This was his chamber before he killed himself,” Darnell said. The sadness poured from him like sweat. “These weren’t cells back then. Nobody cared about the bodies after a person went to the gallows. That was how he figured it out. He was always the one who picked up the bodies. Nobody else.”
“It’s a trick noose,” Gormer gasped. “He spared them.”
“Most of them,” Darnell said. “Occasionally the bosses wanted to check the rope and he couldn’t change it out in time and other times the fake knot wouldn’t work…and sometimes the person taking that walk deserved to die.”
Gormer sat down heavily on the plain wooden chair while Darnell coiled up the rope again, then a thought occurred to him. “But why did he make your rope break?”
Darnell sat down on Rupert’s cot. “I asked him that so many times,” he said. “He never told me. I think it’ was because he needed a friend. He was always so kind to me, a worthless drunk. I was the only person he ever spoke to. Also, I helped him get the
people he saved out of the Protectorates. We had a method. We got whole families out to keep the secret. Nobody wanted to stay here after their loved ones were killed. I was good at it. Nobody ever saw them. Nobody ever figured it out.”
“Everyone was too scared to be his friend, but not me. I knew what he had done when I ended up under that gallows looking up at a frayed rope with my pants wet with piss. Fall broke my leg, not my neck. He even paid for the healer.”
“He was a hero. Why did he kill himself?”
“Because he took all the blame for the ones he couldn’t save. He was a Mover once; one of the best. That fucking animal Lungu broke him, just like he broke me and so many people. Just like he broke the whole damn land.”
Something tickled Gormer’s face and he realized his cheeks were wet. “Come on,” he said with a husky throat. “Let’s get you and the rope out of here before someone sees it.”
Finally Darnell smiled. He pulled a blanket off the bed and wrapped the rope in it. “You won’t tell?”
Gormer thought about it for a moment. He would have liked Astrid to know, but it wasn’t his place to even suggest it. Nobody had been intended to see this. Some terrible secrets could only be redeemed by keeping them.
“You don’t have to ask, Darnell,” Gormer said.
“I need to come back and clean this up,” Darnell said as they made tracks through the soup.
“Fuck that,” Gormer said. “Let someone else get it.”
“But that’s my job.”
“Yeah, but not right now. I’m taking you out for a drink.”
“Oh, gods bless you. They don’t give me the good stuff in here.”
“Not that kind of drink,” Gormer said. “I’m taking you to a friend of mine. Someone who helped me. The drinks she makes are very special.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
The War Room
Astrid did not understand why Gormer came to the war room with Darnell, insisting that Moxy mix him up the same healing elixir that had gotten Gormer off opium. It was the right thing to do, but not the right time to do it.
There was also no time to argue about it. Letting Moxy take precious time away from planning seemed better than denying Gormer’s request and letting that denial fester. In the end, she decided that if it was that important to Gormer, it had to be important overall.
The secrecy bothered her, but not for lack of trust. “I can’t tell you why,” Gormer said when Astrid pressed him. “I made a promise. This is just what needs to happen.”
She dropped it and let Moxy do her thing.
“Are we ready to handle the other business now?” Astrid asked. She knew she was feeling frayed by the barbed look she gave Gormer. She usually did not let annoyance affect her that way.
“Back on the path, boss,” Gormer said. He disarmed her with that smile of his.
“Good,” Astrid announced to the room. “We have one day to plan a decisive enough attack to end a war before it starts. If we do our jobs right, we avoid war. If we don’t, we are looking at a very long, very bloody struggle.”
“The plan hinges on Gormer’s infiltration of the Wilfred estate. That is the first thing we need to figure out. To that end, Tomas has discovered some very interesting information.” She turned to the young boy and told him to proceed.
The boy froze for a moment. He looked around the room with wide eyes and found Brol, who gave him a warm smile and nodded slowly.
Tomas cleared his throat and began with confidence. “As you know, I’ve been working as a clerk for Treasurer Brol. I was reconciling the spring commerce tax receipts when I kept seeing entries for the sales of capital goods.” He paused at their quizzical looks. “That means things like tools and machines—things that are used to produce other things.” Brol nodded his head again and folded his arms across his chest. The smile on his face spoke of pride. “Anyway, you need to know why that’s important. I started asking around and found out from the other house servants that many of the merchants and wealthy craftspeople are selling off all things metal. When I saw the reports in the war room about how the enemy is building all these weapons, I realized they were getting the metal from people here.”
“Traitors,” Tarkon growled. “Let’s round them all up.”
“Not so fast,” Astrid replied. “We only have a couple traitors. Most of the people selling off their goods have no idea where the metal is going. Tomas identified two brokers who have been moving metal to our enemies. They’ve managed to hide their activities.”
“So you’ve locked them up,” Tarkon smiled.
“Not quite,” Astrid replied. “We need them active. If we take them out of play now the enemy might figure out something is wrong. We want them to think they are succeeding until we make them fail.”
Gormer caught on quickly. “I’ll need to know where they are. I’ll find out everything they know.”
“Make that happen,” Astrid directed. “But make it quick. Tomas has an address for you.”
Gormer left the war room with Tomas in tow. “Shouldn’t take more than a few hours,” Gormer called back.
“I hate to do this,” Astrid continued, “but we need to go forward assuming that Gormer’s plan will work.”
“And if it doesn’t?” Tarkon asked, always the practical skeptic.
“Then we rely on numbers. I’ve called in all the Dregs as well as all the regular troops and fighters are streaming in from all over. The woods people are literally coming out of the woods to join the fight. Woody, George, and Merg are organizing the deployment from Keep 39 and Pleth is keeping track of everything.”
“Turned out to be an excellent move, getting Pleth to Argan,” Brol added.
Astrid smiled in return. “Let’s hope things continue to work out that way.” She pointed at Vinnie to continue.
“My students,” Vinnie began proudly, “have sent word from Argan that the manufacture of shields is well underway. They report that their devices can stop about a hundred hits from these magitech rifles before failing.”
Tarkon continued from there. “Unfortunately we have no magical weapons to counter the attack we are facing, but with the shields we can create a moving defensive barrier and use Vinnie’s rapid-fire crossbows to rain bolts on them from a distance. Once we get close, we can go hand-to-hand and their rifles won’t mean much.”
“How many crossbows do we have?” Astrid asked. “We’ll need a lot of ammunition.”
Vinnie spoke up. “The caves have been producing crossbows steadily since I came up with the quick-fire design. They’ve even improved on the first design.”
“Great,” Astrid replied a bit testily. “How many?”
“We’re guessing about a thousand,” Vinnie replied with another of his trademark Cheshire-Cat grins.
“Ammo?” Astrid asked.
“Countless,” Tarkon answered. “Every blacksmith in the Eastern District has been making bolts for these weapons.”
“Thanks to the trade with the Petrans,” Brol interjected, “the Treasury has enough to buy every bolt they’ve made and commission them to produce more.”
“Make that happen,” Astrid said, jabbing her finger at Brol. The treasurer nodded and left the room to implement that order.
Mika and Hanif had been silent since the meeting started. They’d listened carefully until now, and Mika inserted herself into the pause.
“As of right now, the lieutenants loyal to you have lost their estates. This is the worst outcome for us. Our troops are spread out between the keeps north of this line and the fortress wards.” On the map, she pointed to the string of keeps to the southwest that bisected the territory.
“I am aware of the predicament,” Astrid replied tightly. “And I am grateful for your continued support.”
Mika took a deep breath. “We left standing orders for our estates to surrender without resistance if they were challenged. Believe me, it took a lot for the others to agree to this.”
“I don’t understand.�
�� Astrid shook her head. “Why would you do this? We need to make it as difficult as possible for them.”
“It’s risky, yes, but think about it… They attacked the keeps first, not the estates. They need the resources. They’re trying to preserve the land so they can divide it among themselves.”
“But why make it easy for them?” Astrid asked.
“It won’t be easy,” Hanif replied. “It’s a huge management problem. It will consume their attention significantly.”
“ That will give them access to weapons, food, and supplies,” Astrid replied, still not understanding.
“And they will feel supremely self-confident,” Hanif added. “In the meantime, your man Gormer will be on the inside. It’s a perfect setup for…something. All of this is why we sent word to our estates to surrender now before they are challenged.”
“Won’t the turncoats…” Astrid paused. “I guess that’s what we’re calling them now. Won’t they kill our allies?”
Mika shook her head. “Most of the lieutenants loyal to you are here at the fortress with at least half their estate troops. My former friends and associates are brutal, but they are not idiots. Killing other first lieutenants is the surest way to turn the estates hostile. No, they’ll want to negotiate cooperation. Remember, they need the bodies. They need working keeps and estates. They won’t destroy what they can use.”
“And we can use that against them,” Vinnie replied. “I think it’s brilliant. Risky, but brilliant.”
The meeting went on for four hours until Gormer came back. Astrid was about to send for him when he walked through the door with a big smile on his face.
“Looks like someone has good news,” Astrid quipped.
“Indeed I do,” Gormer declared. “They have no idea Rupert is in jail. They think he’s in hiding.”
“Who is the ‘they’ we’re talking about here?” Tarkon asked.
“Two greedy fuckers,” Gormer replied. “My favorite kind of mark. They’re two second-rate merchants who discovered they could get rich buying low and selling high. If I come to them as Rupert with a wagon load full of metal I can get anything I want from them.”
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