A Traitor in Skyhold: Mage Errant Book 3

by John Bierce

  He’d been expecting a tall, regal looking older version of Sabae, honestly. Probably dressed in fine robes and jewelry.

  Instead, a short, stooped, irritable, and wrinkled old woman stepped up to the railing, a large battered travel chest floating in the air beside her. Her dress was frayed and stained, her hair messy, and her only jewelry was a rather ugly looking necklace with chunky coral beads. Her muttering seemed to be entirely curses and complaints about the competence of the ship’s crew.

  So far as Hugh could tell, the only thing about her that resembled a legendary archmage was her cane, which appeared to be clouds trapped in glass and covered in spellforms.

  She did look like Sabae, at least.

  Hugh checked on Sabae again. She looked more nervous than ever.

  Ilinia Kaen Das floated up off the ship, then gently sank down to the docks.

  Sabae stepped forwards to greet her grandmother, visibly nervous. Hugh couldn’t help but feel nervous himself as the old woman approached.

  Sabae opened her mouth to say something, but her grandmother beat her to the punch.

  “Quit looking so nervous, girl, I’m not going to eat you,” Ilinia snapped. “Let me take a look at you.”

  The old woman reached up and grabbed Sabae by the ear, pulling her down towards her. She ignored Sabae’s yelp and spent several seconds inspecting her, making thoughtful noises.

  “You got taller,” Ilinia complained. “I’m going to sprain my neck looking up at you.”

  “Sorry, ma’am,” Sabae said.

  “Don’t apologize for what you can’t control,” Ilinia said, “it makes you look weak. And don’t call me ma’am. I’m your granny, not some foreign ambassador.”

  “Sorry, m… Grandmother,” Sabae said.

  Ilinia sighed, then let go of Sabae’s ear. “So formal.”

  Her eyes fixed on Hugh and the others, and a smile spread across her face. It was not a particularly comforting smile.

  She stepped around Sabae and towards them, pulling out a flask from her sleeve. She sipped it as she stalked towards them, and Hugh winced— it smelled like cheap, nasty grain alcohol.

  Somewhat to his surprise, he realized that Ilinia was actually shorter than him. Sabae was taller than a lot of men, and towered over Hugh’s modest height, so he’d expected Ilinia to tower over him as well.

  His musings were abruptly interrupted by Ilinia grabbing his ear. “You must be Hugh,” she said, turning his head about to inspect him carefully.

  “Ow,” Hugh managed.

  His spellbook yanked on its strap around Hugh’s shoulder, nervously edging its way behind his back.

  “I hear they’re calling you the Stormward,” Ilinia said. “My mother was the last one to bear that title, you know. It’s her notebook I sent Sabae a copy of for you. I’m glad to see someone’s putting my mother’s wards to good use. No one in the family right now has the natural fussiness necessary to be a decent wardcrafter.”

  “Ow,” Hugh replied.

  “I quite enjoyed watching you work in Theras Tel,” Ilinia said.

  Watching him work? Ras Andis was as far away from Theras Tel as Theras Tel was from Skyhold. How could Ilinia have watched him build the stormward from hundreds of leagues away? Even Alustin’s farseeing attunement didn’t reach that far.

  “Ow?” Hugh asked.

  “Of course Kanderon had to go and make sure to claim you for herself, didn’t she?” Ilinia said with a grim smile. “Pity. If you ever change your mind about working for her, you’re always welcome in Ras Andis.”

  “Ow,” Hugh said.

  Ilinia released Hugh’s ear and stepped over to Godrick, who edged back nervously. Before he could say anything, Ilinia levitated up into the air and snagged Godrick’s ear.

  “You’re entirely too tall, young man. It’s rude.”

  “Ow, I mean, sorry, ma’am,” Godrick managed. “Ow.”

  Hugh was a little amazed Godrick was actually managing to get words out— Ilinia pinched hard.

  “You’re Godrick, I assume,” Ilinia said, dragging Godrick’s head around to different angles to get a better view. “Sabae had plenty to say about you in her letters as well. She mentioned that you were tall, but not that you were this unnecessarily tall. You must eat your family out of house and home.”

  Hugh noticed that Ilinia was slowly drifting back towards the ground, forcing Godrick to bend down. He heard a chuckle from behind the councilors, where Artur was standing.

  Ilinia finally released Godrick and strode over to Talia.

  “I will bite you,” Talia said before Ilinia could grab her.

  Hugh could feel the crowd tense up behind him.

  Ilinia gave Talia a flat look, then cackled. “I like this one,” she said.

  Talia just folded her arms and glared.

  One of the council members— Hugh couldn’t recall his name— strode up to greet Ilinia, evidently wanting to get a jump on the others, who Hugh could see glaring.

  “I’d like to formally welcome you to Skyhold,” the councilor said.

  “Take this to my room, would you?” Ilinia interrupted, levitating her travel chest into the councilor’s arms.

  Before the shocked councilor could say anything, Ilinia had grabbed Sabae and gone marching through the crowds.

  “We have a lot of catching up to do, dearie,” Ilinia told Sabae. “And I’m quite eager to see if your education is worth the fortune I’m spending on it.”

  Sabae, still clutching her package, just shot Hugh a helpless look.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Setting the Stage

  Avah arrived on the Moonless Owl two days after Ilinia’s arrival. Hugh, Talia, and Godrick met it at the docks, which were thankfully back to their usual packed, overwhelming bustle, rather than the gargantuan crowd that had greeted That Old Pile of Junk.

  They hadn’t seen Sabae outside of class since Ilinia had arrived, and she’d missed over half of that, caught up in the wild swirl of politics and high level negotiations surrounding her grandmother.

  Hugh couldn’t help but notice that a meeting between Ilinia and Kanderon had still conspicuously not taken place yet. When he’d asked Kanderon about that, the massive sphinx had just stared at him cryptically until he changed the subject.

  There were two major differences to the Owl this time. First, the ship was in bad shape— the decks and hull were battered and splintered, and half the sails were torn.

  When Hugh asked Avah about it, she sheepishly admitted that they’d been maintaining the ward Hugh had crafted to help them through the sandstorm last summer, using it to pass through storms and cut time off their routes. This most recent trip, however, something had gone wrong, and the ward had barely made it through the storm.

  Hugh promptly dragged everyone back on the ship to inspect the ward.

  Lecturing Captain Solon, and, more terrifyingly, Deila, was a novel experience for Hugh. Having them listen to him, and not only looking abashed, but actually apologizing to him, was… well, eye-opening. Hugh really wasn’t used to thinking of himself as someone worth listening to even for other teenagers, let alone adults.

  Hugh had Avah and one of the other Radhan sand mages haul sand on the deck for him, and he began pattern-linking the quartz in the sand into a new ward. He actually embedded the new crystal ward into the deck. A few Radhan wood mages followed behind him, doing something to the deck behind him— the deck apparently flexed a bit when the ship traveled, so they were doing something to limit damage to the ward.

  The other difference was the absence of Irrick. They’d already known he wouldn’t be there— his arranged marriage was this summer, and he’d transferred to his betrothed’s ship a few weeks ago.

  He’d left a letter for Godrick, though, which the big stone mage tucked away carefully for later reading.

  To Hugh’s great relief, Alustin had lowered their workload as Midsummer drew nearer. Hugh could spend time with Avah and his friends with considerably
less guilt and avoiding homework than before, which was a pleasant relief.

  It was, unfortunately, one of the only things going well at the moment.

  Alustin— and nearly all of the other Librarians Errant— had vanished again on another mission for Kanderon, this time with only an hour’s notice. Artur was distracted with preparations for the labyrinth final— helping with them was one of his major duties each year at Skyhold, at least when he wasn’t being hired as a mercenary mage.

  Kanderon had less time for Hugh than ever, and what lessons they did have were kept focused and to the point.

  The worst part, though, was the fact that the investigation seemed to have stalled entirely. There were no further clues rearing up their heads, and nobody seemed to be available to talk to them about the investigation.

  Ironically, the adult most closely associated with the investigation that had time for them was Anders Vel Siraf, who was still teaching them battle tactics regularly. Avah started sitting in on the sessions— she seemed endlessly entertained with watching Anders wipe the floor with the four of them again and again. Or at least the three of them, half the time— Sabae was still missing tons of classes.

  The investigation was being further hindered by the fact that Avah wasn’t using her own guest room, and so they could only safely discuss it when she was off doing something else on her own.

  It was, to everyone but Talia’s distress, looking like they were going to have to make a decision soon— either enter the labyrinth again, or be forced out of Skyhold.

  Hugh was fairly sure that Talia’s confidence about the labyrinth was mostly bluster, at that. Even though she was easily the most dangerous and combat-ready of the four of them, Bakori was a threat far out of her league. Talia couldn’t stand looking vulnerable or weak, however, even in front of her friends.

  If it wasn’t for Avah distracting him, Hugh was pretty sure he’d be a wreck. Even with her there, though, he felt like he was teetering on the edge most of the time.

  Hugh’s own birthday, two weeks before midsummer, barely managed to distract him. Ironically, all his friends had, without consulting one another, bought him books.

  He ended up with several new volumes from Sabae and Godrick on wardcrafting to add to his rapidly growing collection, a volume from Avah containing biographies of a few of the more famous crystal mages, and a hilariously inaccurate book from Talia filled with rambling conspiracy theories about how Emblin secretly ruled the world.

  Apparently, the reason there was no magic in Emblin was because Emblin had a massive enchantment using all the available aether there that erased the memory of anyone who stumbled across their secret rule. Which sort of begged the question of how the author had managed to write about said conspiracy.

  Even when the five of them were laughing about Emblin’s secret invisible armies and mind control cheese, the threat of Midsummer still loomed in the back of Hugh’s mind.

  “You’re not paying attention,” Kanderon said, lightly tapping Hugh with her paw.

  Well, relatively light— Kanderon’s paw was considerably larger than Hugh, and even a light tap was enough to send him rolling across the sand.

  “Sorry,” Hugh said, after he spat sand out of his mouth. “Midsummer’s less than a week away, and we still haven’t…”

  Kanderon shot him a glare, and Hugh stopped himself before he could blurt out anything. It was important to be extra careful around Kanderon— unless they were in an adequately warded location, odds were she was being scried on by someone. Great powers like Kanderon, Ilinia, Chelys Mot, or Indris were watched carefully most of the time. Which made sense to Hugh— any of the great powers were about as dangerous as an army, and far more mobile. Not the sort of thing you’d want to be lax about keeping your eyes on.

  It made sense in retrospect, at least— Hugh hadn’t ever thought about it until Alustin started training Hugh and the others as prospective Librarians Errant. To his irritation, however, he’d been the only one surprised by that revelation.

  Hugh whistled, and the sand a few feet away started churning, and a patch of green poked out. “Could you do the thing?” Hugh asked his spellbook, trying to send it the mental image of what it had done to block Alustin’s scrying attempt.

  The book shot a few nervous looks at Kanderon— it was still skittish around her after she’d manhandled it. It finally seemed to decide she wasn’t going to shove her claw in its extraspatial cavities, and the labyrinth stone’s pattern began spreading across the cover of the book. Hugh could feel that odd feeling of tightness spread through the aether around him again.

  “It’s safe to talk now,” Hugh said.

  Kanderon eyed Hugh and his spellbook intently, then finally nodded.

  “We still haven’t caught the traitor,” Hugh continued. “I don’t suppose any of your agents have had any luck?”

  “I’m afraid not,” Kanderon said.

  “So what then? We just go into the labyrinth and hope Bakori is feeling merciful?” Hugh said. He couldn’t help but feel embarrassed at how whiny his voice sounded.

  Kanderon opened her mouth, as if to say something, then closed it, an odd look on her face.

  “Do you trust me, Hugh?” she finally asked.

  “Of course,” Hugh replied, without hesitation.

  The odd look on Kanderon’s face deepened, and the silence dragged on for quite some time.

  “Then, when Midsummer arrives, Hugh, you and the others need to go into the labyrinth again.”

  Without another word, Kanderon turned and launched herself into the air.

  The most terrifying part to Hugh was the fact that he couldn’t remember another occasion where Kanderon had ever cut a lesson short.

  If Hugh hadn’t been so distracted, he might have been able to avoid Rhodes. He’d barely even managed to pay attention in Emmenson’s class, though, and Emmenson had a way of holding your attention. Given that it had been the last spellform construction lecture before Midsummer, though, Hugh had hardly been the only distracted student.

  After class, Hugh had just wandered off, down one of the usually empty hallways that he preferred to take back to the library. He’d been so lost in his head that he didn’t see or hear Rhodes approach, and he’d left his spellbook back in his room, so it wasn’t there to warn him.

  Rhodes didn’t say anything this time, he just walked up while Hugh was staring off into space and grabbed him by the shoulders.

  “I need to…” Rhodes started.

  Before he could get farther than that, Hugh grabbed Rhodes’ arm in a hold Artur had been drilling them in. “Yeh don’t want ta be helpless if yeh run out a’ mana in a fight,” Artur had said. “And sometimes yeh jus’ don’t have time ta cast a spell.”

  Time seemed to slow down for Hugh as he sent Rhodes crashing into the wall, and turned to flee. He’d only made it a few steps, however, when Rhodes called out again.

  “Please!”

  Almost against his will, Hugh came to a stop, and made himself turn to look at Rhodes. Rhodes had sounded… desperate, almost.

  He didn’t say anything, just stared at his former bully. Rhodes… didn’t look great, honestly. His usually impeccably groomed appearance had gone far downhill. His hair was a mess— and not a carefully cultivated one. His expensive clothes looked disheveled and wrinkled, as though the noble had slept in it. Rhodes looked like he’d lost weight, and he even had deep bags under his eyes.

  The silence stretched on for an eternity before Rhodes finally spoke. “I’m not a coward,” he blurted out.

  “What?” Hugh said.

  “I’m not a coward,” Rhodes repeated, but he didn’t seem sure of it. “I… I’ve never run before.”

  “What?” Hugh said. Rhodes couldn’t possibly be talking about their encounter in the labyrinth, could he?

  “In the labyrinth,” Rhodes said. “I didn’t… I’m…”

  The noble wrapped his arms around himself, and slid down the wall. “I shouldn’t
have run,” Rhodes said. “I shouldn’t have left you and your friends in the labyrinth.”

  He was much bigger than Hugh, but he looked broken and small sitting there on the floor.

  Hugh felt a surge of joy rise up in him at the sight. Part of him felt viciously happy at seeing someone who had caused him so much misery and suffering looking so unhappy. He wanted to laugh, to crow, to mock Rhodes, to let the noble know that he was indeed a coward.

  And then Hugh remembered sitting against a wall of Skyhold in an almost identical position, crying.

  He sighed, crossed the hallway, and sat down facing Rhodes.

  Neither of them said anything for several minutes. Rhodes looked to be trying to regain his composure, while Hugh struggled with his own thoughts.

  “I was the golden child,” Rhodes finally said. “I could do no wrong. My parents thought they couldn’t have children, and when I showed up they and my uncle doted on me. There was nothing that didn’t come easily to me. Arithmetic, letters, archery, falconry— it was all easy for me. Everyone expected great things of me even before my magic showed up. Then it arrives, and I have five affinities. My family was talking about me becoming the next great power of Highvale before I even left for Skyhold. They even arranged for Aedan to return to Skyhold from his travels to take me on as an apprentice.”

  Hugh raised an eyebrow at that, but didn’t say anything.

  “Everything went my way here, too. Magic came easily to me, and people flocked to me just as they had in Highvale.”

  “If everything was going so well for you,” Hugh interrupted, “then why did you feel the need to make my life hell?”

  “Because it was funny,” Rhodes said. “Some peasant brat who couldn’t do magic and shouldn’t even be able to afford Skyhold? Even if you hadn’t just folded over to the slightest pressure it would have been easy, but you were guaranteed entertainment.”

  Hugh just stared at him, his mind racing in circles.

  “Then you just seemed to vanish off the face of the planet,” Rhodes said. “Some of us legitimately thought you’d finally given up and left Skyhold, until someone saw you get chosen by some nobody library mage— who, I suppose, turned out not to be a nobody after all.”