The Spellmonger Series: Book 03 - Magelord

by Terry Mancour

  “That’s essentially what I told them, but they think they can hold out. Worse, they feel they can encourage the Farisi to rebel, too. Not that Rard can’t put it down, but it would be expensive.”

  “That’s the last thing we need!” I spat. “Every sword we send to put down rebellion is one less to fight the Dead God!”

  “Hey, I wrote that song you’re singing,” she reminded me. “So I had a unique solution in mind . . .” she said. Then she closed her eyes for a moment, and I could feel a spell drop on us. “There, now no one can hear us.” Then she told me her plan, and I had to admit it was pretty bloody brilliant.

  “There are going to be an awful lot of lords unhappy with that arrangement,” I said, when she was done.

  “They’ll be more unhappy if the Dead God is in charge. Honestly, Min, can you think of any other way to get the manpower we need for this war?”

  “No,” I agreed. “And that solves plenty of other problems. And raises yet more. Have you considered writing up a charter? That sort of thing would have to be a Royal Decree,” I foretold. “Anything less would lead to widespread rebellion.”

  “I thought you might say that,” she smirked, and reached under the table to retrieve a big sheaf of parchment. “Which is why I took the liberty of having it pre-written for His Grace’s – sorry, His Majesty’s seal. We can sneak it in with the charters for all of the other orders we’re chartering.”

  “I can’t imagine he’d object. Really, it’s as much for his benefit as it is for ours.”

  “I’m so glad you see it that way, Min,” she smiled, sweetly. “Because you’re the one who has to convince him of that.”

  * * *

  It was a good working lunch, but I was painfully aware that neither of us brought up the subject of Isily’s child. Who was likely mine. That Penny knew about, but about whom I was supposed to be ignorant. I almost brought it up myself a half-a-dozen times, but in the end I always thought better of it.

  There was just too much going on, and that kind of thing had the potential to make everything else we were doing a lot more complicated. Call me a coward if you wish, but I prefer to choose the time, place, and disposition of my battles before I fight them. I’m not a coward, but I’m lazy as anyone. I just didn’t have the emotional capacity to contend with the subject.

  The next couple of days were filled with meetings and discussions as we prepared for the Council. New High Magi were wandering in all the time, and I had to stop and chat with them repeatedly, thank them for their attendance, and in some cases receive reports.

  The second day Penny’s estate at Fairoaks saw the arrival of twenty mounted knights magi, directly from the front in Gilmora. They were led by Terleman, and after we warmly embraced and went inside he started chewing me out almost at once.

  “Duin strike me if I exaggerate, but we’re getting routed out there,” he admitted. “We’re doing plenty of damage . . . anywhere I send a mage, they make a big difference. But we aren’t stopping them at all. Hells, we’re barely slowing them down. Every time we destroy a band or a raiding party, there seems to be two more. And finding men willing to stand and fight is getting harder. The Day of the Dragons was brutal,” he confessed. “We’ve had a devil of a time getting troops since dragons got involved in the war.”

  I assured him the best I could that help was on the way – and it was – but that we had to get through this first. Surprisingly, he didn’t argue.

  “I could use a few days away from the front, and I’d be happy to swear my fealty to a king, instead of a duke.”

  “I really don’t see much difference,” I observed.

  “There’s not, on the surface. But I think it gives the men a psychological edge to be under a king, not just a high noble.”

  “They’ll die the same way whichever one is in charge.”

  Terleman brought more than complaints from the battlefield, though. He presented me with four more witchstones captured from goblin shamans, ready to be cleansed and distributed to worthy magi

  As Fairoaks began to fill up in earnest, I made a point to be seen frequently in my new silly looking hat, staff in hand, congratulating and encouraging all the magi who now looked to me for leadership. Some looked battle-scarred and others found their new roles as magelords or knights magi to suit them. One of my fellows, the nominal Court Wizard of Alshar, brought some intriguing news: Master Dunselen would be arriving late. Because he was at war.

  “Honestly, I didn’t think the old bird had it in him,” Master Thinradel told me at supper that evening. “You remember that old estate he prattled on about? Well, once he returned and claimed it, his neighbors took offense. He used his stone to level their castles and took their lands in conquest. He’s running three domains, now, and about to finish conquering a fourth.”

  “Master Dunselen? That old . . . ?” I didn’t know exactly how to finish that sentence, so I didn’t.

  “The very one. He even goes into battle, so to speak. He rides in a carriage behind his lances, and when there’s an engagement he rains down spellfire on them, or puts sentries to sleep, or some such, just like a warmage. He was always quite powerful, even before he had irionite. But I had always considered him harmless.”

  “Power does strange things to some people,” I observed. Thinradel nodded sagely.

  One of the only other interesting things that happened in the days leading up to the Arcane Orders departing Fairoaks for the capital was meeting up with Master Cormaran, the enchanter who built my mageblade and hundreds of others. I’d seen him at Robinwing Castle, of course, but we hadn’t much time for discussion. He insisted on seeing me the moment he got to Fairoaks, however, and I owed the man so much I stepped out of a meeting to speak with him.

  He asked that we find a quiet place, and I led him to Penny’s study. There we sat with a table between us where he poured out a bag of familiar white pebbles.

  “That ‘snowstone’ you . . . created? I’ve been testing it. A lot of people have been testing it, actually. But your initial assessment, while helpful, was wrong.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Snowstone doesn’t increase a particular mage’s powers. It works the other way, reducing his body’s resistance to magic. It has essentially the same effect.”

  I nodded. The way I understood Talent, you had a specific amount and type, usually fixed at a particular level. “That agrees with the tests I’ve made as well,” I agreed.

  “Oh, it gets better,” he grinned. “Everyone and every thing has some resistance to magical forces. One pebble of this, and that resistance almost evaporates. Honestly, I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve used it while enchanting mageblades, and the results have been impressive.” That was high praise from Cormaran. “If you’re sitting on a mountain of this stuff, you’re a rich man, Master Minalan. I’d like to get as much as I can to fortify my castle. Lanse of Bune raved about it, and there are enchanters everywhere who would prize it almost as much as they would irionite. ”

  “Wait, you have a castle?”

  “In the Magelands,” he explained. “Just outside the Penumbra. A big one, too – a baronial castle. It used to be called Meadowmont, but I’ve renamed it Forgemont. I never thought I’d go in for the life of a magelord, but I have to admit, being free to do experiments with irionite and steel and spells without having to worry about the Censorate makes all the petty administrative issues almost worthwhile.”

  “Just wait,” I sighed, realizing that for all the impressive improvement I’d affected in Sevendor, I had done virtually no magical research myself. I was just too damned busy. “Someday someone will come along and make you important, and you won’t have any fun any more.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  The Coronet Council

  Castabriel is as pretty as Tudry is ugly.

  Penny filled me in on the history of the city as we took the long carriage ride (there was just too much barge traffic to get there in time by river) to the
Council. I knew some from my own education, but Penny has a knack of finding the important stuff and putting it in perspective.

  Castabriel had been the capital of Castal before there was officially a Castal. It had been settled as the inland armed outpost of the Empire. It was built on the ruins of an ancient Tree Folk city, back when they built cities and didn’t just live in magical treehouses.

  I have no idea what that long-ago glory looked like, but present-day Castabriel certainly is one of the prettier cities around, thanks largely to the gorgeous stonework there. Somewhere nearby there had to have been a massive quarry, because just about every building in city was made of white granite. Not as white as snowstone, I realized, but gleaming nonetheless.

  In addition, the Castabrieli had a civic reputation as the “City of Ten Thousand Lights” and every household from the grandest burgher to the most modest hovel sported a candle or lamp every night, surrounded with as much sparkly glittery stuff as they could find. The combined effect made the whole place seem bright and elegant, even when you were stepping in offal in the street.

  The city was divided into three districts and sat on a pair of hills that ran northeast to southwest. The northern hill bore the mighty palace and Ducal castle, the huge gleaming Spire of Donrard towering twenty stories above the ground, looking slender in spite of its mass. You could have put all of Sevendor Castle on one of the four supporting shoulder turrets and rattled it. The spire was designed to impress, and it didn’t disappoint. It was usually the first thing you saw as you approached it.

  The other hill had been the site of the original Tree Folk city, and had been taken over by an army of priests and priestesses. The Temple Hill boasted hundreds of temples, shrines, and holy sites from various traditions and religions. Even the Sea Folk had a shrine there to their damp deities.

  Most of them vied to build the highest spire to challenge the might of Donrard’s, on the opposite hill, but none had succeeded in taking the prize. The tallest three were especially close, but at only fourteen stories the Temple of Orvatas the Sky God was a weak contender at best. The twelve-story Temple of Luin and the eleven-story Temple of Trygg looked like half-grown stalks by comparison.

  Between the hills in the saddle of the valley was the town, proper; that is, that’s where all the artisans and servants lived and where business actually was conducted. From the distance it looked more brown than green, and covered in the pall of cook fire smoke that hovers over every town. I’ve been by Castabriel three times over the years, and while it isn’t really my kind of city, it is as stately and beautiful city as I’ve seen in the westlands.

  Of course, last time I was there I was an itinerant warmage and a commoner. This time I was arriving by gilded coach in full regalia, with plenty of guards, going to lay eyes on the first King around for four hundred years. A difference in station can alter your perspective.

  The day was hot, but we didn’t feel it – Rondal kept a bubble of cool air around us and the horses the whole way, and someone cast a semi-opaque sunshield over our entourage. Everyone else was sweating as they went about their daily lives.

  I watched, fascinated, as the bustling nature of a truly large city unfolded around us. There were nearly 300,000 people in Castabriel. Of course, not everyone lived in gleaming spires or ornate palaces. From the outlying village of Narias, the last before the Great Gate, the traffic looked just like any other busy rural settlement, although with more travelers than usual. As we got closer to the city proper, however, the dress and class of the passers-by rose dramatically. I could tell by the change in expression of those who saw our retinue.

  There were two carriages in front of us, each bearing various High Magi. The leadership of the Hesian Order led the procession, and the smaller orders of scholarly and medical magi went in one long carriage pulled by a team of six. Then came us, in the grandest, most ostentatious coach I’ve ever laid eyes on, requiring a team of eight to drag it through the city. Then three more coaches bearing other VIPs, including Penny’s father and a strong delegation from Remere.

  And lastly the mounted might of the Horkan Order rode in the rear. They eschewed coaches for their chargers and destriers, and bore ceremonial lances with a green pennant with the badge of their order flying from every tip. They were resplendent in matching green tabards, the black Ilnarthi death-rune they’d adopted as their sigil embroidered on the breast.

  Azar led them, the tall warmage riding in black armor, with a huge, two-handed mageblade strapped across his back. He bore a sinister-looking warstaff in a holster on his saddle instead of a lance. Almost three dozen Knights Magi rode behind him. Behind them rode the professional warmagi who had joined the order, but had not been elevated with irionite yet.

  And behind them came those High Magi who hadn’t merited a carriage ride, and who rode their own horses or even came by foot. Considering how slow we moved through Castabriel’s crowded streets, they didn’t need to struggle to keep up.

  Penny had ensured a certain degree of uniformity in our presentation. While she had agreed that the tabards of the two martial orders were appropriate for the occasion, she felt that the rest of the magi were just not impressive enough on their own. It had been the subject of much debate in the days leading up to the council.

  “We can’t just show up and expect our pointy hats to impress anyone,” she insisted at our own little council meeting the night before. “We need to be there in force. Hence the staves. The wizard’s staff has always been an important symbol of our power, and having every mage there bear one will be a way of establishing our presence in the new order. And our strength,” she added.

  “But the staves don’t actually do anything!” Terleman had objected. “They just . . . look pretty!”

  And they did. Penny had commissioned a couple of Remeran resident adept enchanters to churn out about a hundred and fifty six-foot long cedar wood staves, polished to a high sheen. At the head of each one was a simple silver fitting in which a piece of thaumaturgical glass had been set. At a command the glass would glow with a soft light. And . . . that was all. They were pretty sticks.

  “That’s right, they do look pretty,” she agreed, sternly. “They light up and attract attention. Any idiot can carry one. But every idiot who does is going to be assumed to be a great and powerful wizard, no matter what kind of hat they wear or tabard they have on. People see livery all the time, but unless it’s something they’re familiar with, they forget it pretty quickly. Seeing a dignified mage walk by with a pointy hat and a glowing staff, that they will remember as a symbol of power.”

  There was more argument and debate, but as this was a political matter, I deferred to Penny’s judgment. I had brought my own staff, which wasn’t much better enchanted than the pretty cedar ones, but Penny had thought of that, too. She had given me a much grander stick, one with an elaborate metal head well-gilded and sparkling with crystal facets. The light inside the thing pulsated with the beat of my heart when I grasped it. It looked vaguely familiar . . .

  “Wasn’t that part of a lamp at your family’s estate?” I asked her, after examining my new prop.

  “Yes,” she snickered. “It was my Great Aunt Farrandra’s. Brilliant mage. Lousy sense of style. That thing has bugged me since I was a kid, since it’s about as gaudy as a dockside whore. So I had Planus steal it and incorporate it into your staff. I think the old bat would get a kick out of it, and it really does look better as a staff head than a lamp.”

  I couldn’t argue with that. It had been a very ugly lamp.

  We did not go directly to the Palace, which surprised me. Instead we went in the opposite direction, turning left when we hit the main thoroughfare, not a right. Our massive party was directed to a spacious temple on the southwestern hill, some god (Penny later explained it was Avital, the unpopular old Imperial god of engineering and, coincidentally enough, magic) whose worshippers hadn’t been able to pay their tribute or lost a bet or something and who had lost their temple to the
Duke, or more properly his Coinfather. Penny rented it as temporary quarters for us while we were in the city.

  It was a grand structure, in its way, and it would have dominated just about any other city’s skyline in Castal. Rising almost eleven stories from the ground to spire, the former temple was impressive . . . until you looked around at the other magnificent temples in the neighborhood that rivaled it.

  It had a central cylindrical tower structure that served as the temple, proper (long emptied and dusty), then a curved east wing that provided residential rooms for the priesthood and novices, as well as a few class rooms. The western wing held the kitchens, servants’ quarters, pantries, butteries, and other necessities. The southern wing, a paltry two story addition, was where the stables and carriage house was, as well as storage.

  “It’s our headquarters in the city,” she explained. “Fairoaks is fine for a place to retreat and study, but when the Order has to do business in the city, I’d think it wise if we had a more permanent base. I like this place, and if it suits our need, I thought we might buy it.”

  “ ‘We’?” I asked. “You’re the filthy rich one, remember?”

  “ ‘We’, as in ‘we, the Arcane Orders.’ Which are far more filthy rich now than my modest family.”

  “Huh?” I asked, eloquently. I’d been far too busy with everything else to worry about finances except in the vaguest ways. Penny looked exasperated.

  “Do you never listen to what I say?” she scolded. “We have been charging a premium for every witchstone, an initiation fee to the Arcane Orders of High Magic. We’ve waived it in some cases, but even so our treasury stands at just under half a million ounces of gold,” she said, matter-of-factly.

  “Half . . . a million?” I asked, stupefied.

  “Easily. With more coming in every day as pledges are redeemed. I’ve been busy,” she reminded me. “So yes, if this temple suits our needs, well, we will need a presence in the Capital, and I’d rather be on this hill than that one. Being too close to the Court is always a bad idea, no matter what my father might say,” she said, hinting at a squabble I really didn’t want to know about. “The temple is de-consecrated. It has a lot of library space, even space for labs, residence quarters, a meeting hall, kitchens, everything. And there are other reasons I chose it,” she said in that mysterious manner that told me she wasn’t going to tell me those reasons just yet.