The Last King's Amulet pof-1

by Chris Northern

  79

  The army was on the move.

  I was out on the balcony. I'd got in the habit of going out there and the guards had gotten used to it. They still rushed out but not with the same air of expectation. It irritated them. It hurt but I didn't care anymore. They always waited till I went in, and I guess they went back to their other duties as soon as I was out of sight. Maybe just waiting for me to trigger the alarm, who knew? Who cared?

  The sweat was evaporating in a cool breeze, chilling me. I was in hell. I needed a drink and there was none.

  It had taken a while before I noticed the army. The guards were entertaining me well enough for a minute or so. Then I looked up to take in the view, and there they were, silent from this distance, slowly drifting away from me, thirty thousand or more men passing before the town. I looked to the right, found the head of the march after a moment. They were heading south, heading off to another battle. Heading for the Kingdom of Wherrel and whoever was coming north to meet them. I wondered what had happened to Orthand. Was he still alive? Was his army still in the field or had it been crushed already? Were his mages in captivity here? Or were they elsewhere? Or still fighting? I shrugged. It didn't matter to me right now and there was no sense speculating. I looked left.

  For a second I didn't know what I was seeing, then I did. Another army was coming up behind them, easily as many men again. The north had risen. Who knew how far the unrest spread? There were more tribes to the east, and the kingdom of Rancik to the west. That kingdom had been free of our influence for the last century or so but we were on good terms as these things are measured. We had an ambassador there and they had one in the city. There was trading, peaceful borders. Our roads ran through their country and onward to others in the north west. There were no problems, but I wondered if the Necromancers' ambitions of subversion ran so far that they had Turned the king, or his barons to ferment civil war. Who knew what they were capable of?

  Sapphire had killed Alendi spies in our army. He knew of the Necromancers, or had rumors of their doings; I now believed that they had been Necromancer spies, Alendi under the influence of Kukran Epthel or his kind. And how many where there? I'd said nothing exists in a vacuum but still had no clue how many Necromancers there were. I guessed not so many. If you dilute your knowledge amongst too many there is bound to be dissent. They ruled by fear and intimidation. They did not need to be many. I shrugged it off; I doubted Kukran would tell me, even if I had the opportunity to ask. But the more I thought about it the more it made sense. Sometime I would have to cross the mountains and take a look about Battling Plain and track them down to the last man. If I could get out of here alive.

  It was too cold to stay on the balcony. I was shivering, though I knew not all of that was due to the cold. I needed a drink like I had never needed anything in my life. I went back inside and paced the room.

  I had taken to going outside several times a day and the guards hated me. Which was good.

  I paced around the room, giving them enough time to relax, then went back through the ward. The pain was good. I liked it. It took my mind off the rest of it for a moment or two. I watched the guards stroll casually outside, less of them, and look up at me. I grinned. Shrugged. Looked at the view. Watched the army leave. At least we wouldn't have an army on our doorstep any more, leaving maybe only a thousand or two to worry about. Much better. I began to shiver uncontrollably. It would be impossible for me to express how desperately I wanted a drink. I would have killed for one.

  I staggered back into the room and climbed in to the bed clumsily, wrapping myself in the eiderdown and shivering, suddenly drenched in sweat though I was freezing cold. I was going to crack, I knew it. Any time now. The next person who offered me a drink could have my soul. Everything had become disjointed. Time had stopped meaning anything to me. I knew that the shivers would stop, the sweat dry, the nausea would pass, I'd feel a little better, but it didn't matter, the moment stretched into an eternity of need.

  It would never go away until I had a drink.

  80

  I must have fallen asleep because I was suddenly back in the mist. It didn't happen every time, not by a wide margin, and I had begun to lose the ability to tell the difference between sleeping and waking. Unless I was here, in the mist that cleared to show me Jocasta, and my thoughts became more lucid.

  “Where are we?”

  “Empty warehouse,” she said succinctly. “There are plenty of them. You are going to be moved soon. The order came to prepare to move out.”

  “Where to?”

  “Meran hasn't been told, just to prepare. They will leave a small garrison here and move on but we don't know where yet. The army is already on the move. It could be any time.”

  “Where are the others?”

  “They are over there but you won't be able to see them. I'm not really here. I'm over there in the corner, lying on a cot. It's dusty and smelly and I don't like it very much, but there you are. We are working on your idea but there are problems. Illusory spell forms, that was clever. It took me a while to understand but then I got it when I understood why you had mentioned spirits. You can make a form and then change it and they can tell you what it will do.”

  “That's it exactly! I think that what they do is just magic by another name. After all, what is magic?”

  “It's a good question. One with many answers, depending on who you read or talk to. But I think you are right. There are problems, though.”

  “Tell me.”

  “Spirits are difficult to understand.” Her brow was wrinkled in thought.

  “So Dubaku explained to me.”

  “They are cooperating. Dubaku has good relationships with his ancestors. They all have a specialty they have developed to help him but I can't learn what they know, they have no way of showing me.”

  “But you are making progress?”

  “Yes, yes. It's just hard, and slow. I can't understand their explanations so I'm guessing all the time and they just say no, or yes, but yes isn't always right because if I check by asking the question a different way it's no. Then they explain and I don't understand. It's frustrating. It's not that I don't understand what they are saying but they mean something else and it's obvious that they do mean something else.”

  I thought for a while and she let me. I was worried. I wondered if it wouldn't be better if she took this knowledge far away from here. If Kukran got hold of this idea he would abuse it ruthlessly. I already knew what he would do to a spirit to achieve his objective. If he started working on this he would make better progress. I said as much and she started to pace.

  “You're right. It's dangerous. I don't think I could hold out under torture but he would have to ask me about it and he doesn't know what to ask. It's almost the same problem with the spirits. They don't understand why I don't understand. It's as though they have forgotten what it is like to be alive, forgotten our perceptions.” She laughed. “It would probably all be so simple to understand if I were dead.”

  “Please don't say that.”

  “Sorry. I'll try and stay alive. And free. I promise.”

  I smiled for her. “And I will try and get free. I might need help though.”

  “We are working on it. If they move you we will follow, at a distance.”

  “Be careful.”

  “And you. I mean…”

  “I know what you mean, it's all right. That's a lie. Sorry. It's not all right. I'll be an addict for life even if I do get free. Sure you want to live with that? And the stone,” I touched my forehead. “I keep forgetting the stone. They'll find me.”

  “Not if we kill them.”

  I nodded, not thinking that I was endorsing a plan. “I need something to teach them. If I crack, I mean. When I crack.”

  “I… here.” She hesitated for only a moment before a spell form appeared in the air between us. “An illusory spell form. Brilliant. Why didn't anyone think of it before?”

  “Why did anyone not th
ink of anything before?” I said as I studied the shape and movement of it.

  “Why not cast the spell several times to teach it? It's what we always did. It works. I only thought of it because, well because I wanted to be sure a spirit would be able to see it. I was just looking at things differently.”

  The mists suddenly swirled round me and I was gone, back to dreams that didn't enchant me with their beauty.

  81

  “Did you catch him?”

  I couldn't muster much enthusiasm for the question. I didn't have much enthusiasm for anything. I recognized that I was depressed. Knowing what it was and why didn't help much. Just as I was sometimes restless, agitated, anxious, or suffered from insomnia; I knew why and that a shot or two of booze would fix it. That was the problem. Sometimes the sweating and tremors would make me think I was ill, sometimes I believed it, but I wasn't ill, I was in withdrawal, so I knew it wasn't true. Rationally I knew that they had somehow enhanced the effects; there was no way I had been drinking for long enough to cause this acute a reaction to the absence of alcohol. Enhancing something that's real already, one way or another, is the easiest kind of magic. I guessed they had enhanced the alcohol they had fed me to hasten the changes in my brain, making the withdrawal that much harder.

  Larner didn't answer, he never did. But his silence was instructive, the dissatisfaction in it told me they had not. That must burn. I imagined Sapphire appearing from nowhere, killing one or two of them and fading back into the woodwork. He clearly had no intention of going anywhere, if that was the case. I tried to guess at the body count, at how close he had come to any serious targets. I also wondered at how he managed to do it, what his training was and where he came from. The basic question there was; who was Sapphire? Who was he that he could wander around killing people at will and never get caught?

  “Ready for a drink?”

  I shook my head reflexively. It didn't mean no. It meant I don't care, I was too despairing and dispirited to answer.

  He walked over to the bed where I was huddled in my misery. Popping the cap of the small flask he held it out. Whiskey. The smell flooded my senses. I wanted it. There was no way I could survive without it. It would make all the bad things go away. I didn't reach for it but didn't resist when he touched it to my lip. He didn't say anything. If he had I might have been able to resist. But I had something to teach. One thing. And suddenly I had a plan. The plan is what tipped me over. I snatched the flask out of his hand and gulped.

  82

  I would have to cast the spell. I had no idea what it did. But that didn't matter. If it was good, I would take advantage of it. If bad I would just change the spell form randomly on the second casting and see what happened.

  I didn't say it was a great plan. Anything could happen with an untried spell form. It is what makes research such a dangerous and solitary practice. All habitual spell researchers kill themselves. It's just a matter of time. Sometimes they learn something useful first. Sometimes they remember to teach someone else what it is that they have learned.

  “Feeling better?”

  I was. I had drank a couple of beers for breakfast. I'd even eaten something, though it was a chore and my stomach felt like a lead balloon afterward.

  “Good,” Larner oozed, “Glad to hear it. This afternoon, you will begin teaching. I'll come and fetch you.”

  I nodded acceptance. I had a plan. Everything would be fine. Or not. But it would be something other than this, and anything that wasn't this was good.

  “You will see that the master is fair and just, Sumto. You won't regret serving him.”

  I nodded easily and sipped my beer. The snuffling and growling of the dogs had faded slightly. “I don't.”

  He nodded happily, headed for the door and opened it. On an impulse I asked him who I would be teaching.

  He turned back, holding the door open. “Kukran Epthel, of course. There is no one else here who needs to learn.”

  “But there are others?”

  “Do you think he would be alone? Do you think his wisdom would have gone unnoticed? Of course there are others. He is one of many. Though few have attained immortality. That learning is a rare privilege, rarely earned. There are a handful of others. He is not the oldest, but he is the best. Not the greatest, but the wisest. Anything else? Should I stay?” His voice had become animated, his eyes bright.

  I shook my head. No, I don't want you to stay. Go away Larner. Just go away.

  He did and I spent a few brief moments thinking over what he had said. One of many. Not the oldest, not the strongest. And there were more, not all like him, not walking corpses, but more Necromancers. Many more, by implication.

  I turned away from the door just in time to see Sapphire drop to the balcony with a muffled thump, tuck into a roll and come to his feet inside the room, eyes alert, body taut and ready to move. He looked better than the last time I had seen him. No blood, no bleeding. The bruising on his face had subsided somewhat. His eyes were more widely opened, I noticed as the cold blue of them focused on me.

  “Dammit you made me jump,” I hissed.

  He smiled. “Sorry. Are you here?”

  “Of course I'm here, are you blind?”

  “Yes,” Dubaku said from just behind me.

  I spun like a top. “What the hell… will you stop doing that both of you? Is there anyone else here?”

  Sapphire snorted as he came by me. “Do you have it?”

  “Yes.” Dubaku held out a shortsword, sheathed.

  “Good.” Sapphire took it and tucked it into his belt. “This'll help.”

  “What are you both doing here? And how did you get in?”

  Dubaku shrugged his thin shoulders. “My ancestors helped me. And so did you; I couldn't get through the door the first three times but this time he stood and talked for a while. It helped. This is for you.”

  I took the silver ring he held out to me. “What is it?”

  “Put it on.”

  I hesitated, pointed at the shortsword. “And what was that?”

  “Mine,” Sapphire said succinctly.

  I let it go. Doubtless Dubaku had stolen it, or reacquired it more accurately.

  “How did you know Dubaku would be here?”

  “Jocasta sends vivid dreams. We fixed the time last night. If that works you are leaving now. I'll make a diversion.”

  “How have you managed to stay free so long? How many have you killed?”

  “Twenty-three,” he grinned. “And I am way way better than them at this. Better training. More practice. They're just barbarians. Nothing. You slip behind them and they think you have disappeared. Superstitious fools. If I am not under their noses it's like I don't exist.”

  It was the longest speech I'd ever heard him make. “Could you teach me?”

  “Are you five years old?”

  “No.”

  “Training starts at five. No exceptions,” he grinned.

  “You are enjoying this,” I accused him even as I admired him.

  “Absolutely. Try the ring. Time to go.”

  “No.”

  He shrugged. “Ruins the plan to get you out if you don't leave.”

  “They are taking me to Kukran Epthel this afternoon. I'm going to kill him.”

  “I like your plan better. How?”

  “I have a knife for that, for the rest I'm making it up as I go.”

  His snort of humor was tinged with approval. “Spontaneity. Confound the opposition with unexpected actions. Good. But we are allies. Tell us what you have in mind.”

  “They want me to teach him. I'll try for as large a stone as I can get. I am planning to start with the spell Jocasta showed me, it may be enough, if not I will generate a random spell form and see what happens.”

  He shrugged, glanced at Dubaku. “Do you know what he means?”

  Dubaku nodded. “I've been learning about spell forms. A random form can have any effect, just as you might expect. Any effect at all. It is very dangero
us thing to do.”

  “Hmm. Risky. But if we all move at once it might work.” He shrugged. “Or not.”

  “Keep Jocasta out of it.”

  “Why?”

  “I mean it. Look, if this goes sour then I don't want her in his hands. She has too much knowledge and too much stone to risk him controlling her.” It was a blatant rationalization and I suspected they both knew it. Sapphire's next words confirmed it.

  “If necessary I'll kill her to keep those weapons out of his hands,” he said, far too casually.

  “No!”

  “I was joking. But listen, we would have a better chance with her. Think about it. I'll be around.” He nodded to Dubaku and headed back out the window. He gripped the balcony, pulled himself over and disappeared from sight. I listened for a moment, heard a shout, and then others as he was spotted and the chase was on again. I shook my head in wonder. Twenty-three. Not for the first time I wondered where my father had found him, and where he was from. Training begins at five, he had said, training to be an assassin? Where did they train assassins from age five? And what did they begin to teach them at that age?

  “This is rash,” Dubaku said.

  “Yes, but I am going to do it anyway.”

  “A knife won't kill him.”

  “I know. It was a joke. For Sapphire. I have another idea for that. I plan to set him on fire. I figure he is dry and will burn pretty good.”

  “He will be guarded.”

  “I know. I'll assess it when I see him.”

  “We are not idle, Sumto. Things are happening. Sapphire is not alone in addressing the numbers of the enemy.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “Raising the populous. The army is gone. There is only a small garrison here. It might be wiser to wait.”

  I shook my head. “I won't wait. I know my own limits. If I obey him it will get to be a habit. I think that is what happens to all of them, regardless of how he makes them obey him the first time. I've been thinking about it. Pretending to be him. Working out what he thinks, how he thinks, what it would be like to be dead and yet alive, how he would 'feel' and what would amuse him. I think all the torture and trickery just amuses him and the secret is that he has a spell that reinforces obedience. He will order me to show him a spell today, not ask me. I know it.”