The Warrior's Bond

by Juliet McKenna

  “That D’Olbriot’s going to be hip deep in horseshit tomorrow? You know what this town is like, Rysh.” Mistal shrugged. “Some clerk, some advocate’s runner will reckon that’s too ripe a morsel to keep to himself.”

  “Dast’s teeth,” I cursed. “I owe you for this, Mist, and so does the Sieur. Will I see you round the courts tomorrow?”

  He hesitated. “I can be seen with my brother but only if you’re alone. Whoever’s behind this won’t waste a breath before accusing me of bad faith if I’m seen talking to anyone representing D’Olbriot without good reason.”

  I nodded. “Then you can walk back to safer streets with me. I can’t leave you here in your nice clean robes for any passing footpad to club.”

  “Just remember who’s the oldest here,” Mistal warned me.

  “Just remember what Mother said the last time she found a cure for the scald in with your dirty linen. I’m not leaving you near all these brothels.”

  We bickered amiably enough all the way back to the lower end of the Graceway, where Mistal turned off to head back to the warren of crumbling stone and worm-ridden wood that makes up the Imperial Courts of Law. I hailed a hireling gig and told the driver to get me back to D’Olbriot’s residence as fast as his whip could manage.

  The Library, D’Olbriot Residence,

  Summer Solstice Festival, Second Day, Noon

  And we may find something of interest here, Esquire.” An eager young man deposited yet another stack of dusty parchments in front of Temar.

  “Thank you, Master Kuse.” Temar managed to sound grateful.

  “Call me Dolsan,” said the saturnine youth as he leafed intently through the pile.

  “Then you must call me Temar,” he said with feeling. “Esquire D’Alsennin is over formal.”

  “The Sieur likes formality.” The clerk brushed a cobweb from the front of his jerkin. “Come to that, shouldn’t you be the Sieur D’Alsennin by now?”

  Temar sat back in his round-armed chair. “Should I?”

  Dolsan continued sorting documents. “You’re the elder male of the Name, so you’re entitled to propose yourself in the absence of any others.”

  Temar managed a shaky laugh. “As far as I’m concerned my grandsire will always be the Sieur.”

  “But what about everyone else’s concerns?” Dolsan asked, head on one side.

  “What has it to do with everyone else?” demanded Temar.

  Dolsan raised hands to deflect the irritation in Temar’s words. “It’s such an unusual occurrence, a Name reduced to one man. We’ve been trying to find precedent in the archives.”

  “We?” Temar queried.

  “The Sieur and myself,” Dolsan explained. “And clerks from other Houses have commented in passing. We meet at the law courts, at archives and so on, sometimes share a few bottles of wine after a long day.”

  Conversation over those cups must be mind-numbingly boring, thought Temar. But then again, perhaps not. “Have you friends in other Houses who might help us trace these people on my list?”

  “Almost certainly,” Dolsan nodded. “But it’ll be easier if we can pinpoint the era and Name we’re interested in.”

  “Of course.” Temar bent over the creased and dingy parchment he’d been studying and Dolsan turned over tattered leaves he’d fetched from a dusty chest. Their soft fall was the only sound to disturb the graceful room. The walls were shelved from floor to ceiling, with only lavishly embroidered curtains hung at long windows to soften the all-encompassing severity of the thick leather tomes. A carpet richly patterned in gold and green carried a wide table polished to a glorious sheen surrounded by stylish chairs with cushions in D’Olbriot colours and several lamp stands stood ready to shed illumination if needed. A black marble fireplace with a gold-framed mirror over the mantel claimed the only expanse of wall not given over to books, fresh summer flowers bright instead of flames in the grate. The only incongruous note in all this sophistication was the stack of dark, dusty record chests inconveniencing anyone wanting to move around.

  “We may have something here,” Temar said after a while. “This inventory of the Maitresse Odalie’s jewels mentions a silver brooch set with malachite. It came to her as part of an inheritance from a Tor Priminale aunt who died childless. We are missing a brooch like that and the woman it belonged to was from a family owing duty to Den Fellaemion.”

  “Who were subsumed into Tor Priminale during the Chaos,” agreed Dolsan. “The fact you can read archaic script makes this so much easier, you know.” He reached for a vast sheet of parchment covered in fine writing. “Here we are, marriages under Kanselin the Droll. Odalie had four daughters, two of whom married within the Name, one married into D’Istrac, and the youngest married into Den Breval.”

  Temar glanced up. “Do you know anyone serving either Name?”

  Dolsan leaned on his elbows, cupping his face in his hands.

  “I know a couple of clerks working for D’Istrac, but Den Breval’s a northern House; their archive’s in Ast. I know Den Breval had to defend in an argument over grazing rights a few years back. They’d have hired Toremal help for that and I might find someone who knows something, at least where any copies of Den Breval records might be lodged. Remote Names often leave things in the Toremal archives of allied Houses.”

  “Ryshad was right when he said you were the man for this job.” Temar shook his head. Would he ever get all these Names and their relations straight? It was doubtless all very well if you imbibed such things with mother’s milk but this flood of information all at once threatened to choke him. “But I admit I expected a sober old man with a long grey beard.”

  Dolsan smiled as he returned to his ancient records. “That sounds like my grandsire.”

  “He was a clerk? You followed his trade?” Temar nodded; of course that would be the way of it.

  Dolsan looked up. “Oh, no, he just had the beard. He was a cobbler, and my father after him. But we’re D’Olbriot tenants and that means the chance of better schooling than most. My teachers said I had a talent for words and recommended me to the Sieur’s Archivist.”

  “Do you enjoy your work?” asked Temar curiously.

  “Very much,” laughed Dolsan. “And anything’s better than spending the days pricking my thumbs with a leather needle.”

  “You must meet the scholars we have in Kel Ar’Ayen.” They shared this bizarre, intense determination to tease the truth of history from faded records and partial accounts, Temar recalled.

  “Perhaps, one day,” Dolsan said politely.

  A tap on the door made them both turn their heads. “Enter,” called Dolsan when it was clear Temar wasn’t about to respond.

  “Good day to you, Esquire, Master Clerk.” Allin slid into the room, closing the door behind her. “ I was looking for Demoiselle Tor Arrial?”

  “Avila?” Temar shook his head. “She has gone out with Lady Channis.”

  “Oh.” Allin looked uncertain. “Oh dear.”

  “Why did you want her?” Temar seized this welcome distraction from the documents stacked before him.

  “It wasn’t anything important,” said Allin in unconvincing tones. “Don’t let me disturb you.”

  The gatehouse struck the five chimes of noon and Dolsan let slip a sigh of relief. “My lady, I think we’ve earned a break, so you’re not interrupting us.” He got to his feet. “If you’ll excuse me, Esquire, I’ll go and eat. How soon would you like me back here?”

  “Take your time, have a decent meal and some fresh air.” Temar turned to Allin. “May I escort you to the upper hall?”

  “Oh, no, thank you but it’s not really—” stammered Allin.

  Temar looked at her pink cheeks. “Dolse, would you do us a small service?”

  The clerk turned on the threshold. “Esquire?”

  “Could you send word to the kitchens. We’ll eat in here, nothing too elaborate.” Temar turned to Allin with a faint smile. “I am hardly in the mood for formality either.”r />
  Dolsan hesitated. “You won’t get food or drink near any documents?”

  “Of course not.” The door closed behind the clerk and Temar began folding parchments along their dusty creases. “Please, do be seated. So, why did you want Demoiselle Tor Arrial?”

  Allin took a chair, reached for a skein of faded ribbon and began tying documents into neat bundles. “Oh, nothing important.” She blushed when she saw Temar’s raised brows. “Well, Velindre said it wasn’t.”

  “May I be the judge of that?” Temar didn’t see why Allin should always have other people telling her what to do and what not to do, even he must.

  Allin fumbled in the pocket of her skirt. “Velindre’s come to the Festival to find out what the Tormalins think of magic these days.” She unfolded coarse paper. “So we’ve been picking up handbills, to see if any wizards are earning money from magical displays.”

  Temar read the blocky letters aloud. “ ‘Saedrin locks the door to the Otherworld to mortals but a few favoured ones may listen at the keyhole. Poldrion charges mortals the ferry fee he judges his due but brings visions back across the river of death without charge. Many questions may be answered by those with the sight to see them. Seek your answers from Mistress Maedura at the Fetterlock Inn, from sunset on every day of Festival. Suitable payment for services rendered must be made in Tormalin coin.’ The style falls off a little at the end, I think?” He looked at Allin. “You suspect this is some magical charade?”

  Allin shifted uncomfortably in her chair. “Velindre thinks it’s just some confidence play to trick gullible Lescaris out of their coin.”

  “Why Lescaris?” Temar was puzzled.

  Allin sighed. “Trying to see something of the Otherworld, it’s rather a Lescari obsession. Everyone’s lost so many friends, families get split up, sons go off to fight and never return. People use all manner of divinations to try and find out what happened to loved ones; rune-telling, Soluran prediction, Aldabreshin omens.”

  “I am confused.” Temar rubbed a hand over his hair. “What has this to do with Demoiselle Tor Arrial?”

  “I wondered if it might be aetheric enchantment if it wasn’t elemental magic.” The plump girl set her jaw, giving an unexpected strength to her round face. “I wondered if the Demoiselle might come with me?” Allin raised hopeful eyes to Temar.

  He didn’t think it fair to tell her the scathing response she’d probably get. “Will Velindre not accompany you?”

  “She has a dinner engagement,” said Allin regretfully. “Tormalin mages gather for Festival like everyone else and there are wizards she wants to ask about the status of magic hereabouts.”

  Temar was diverted by sudden curiosity. “What do wizards do in Tormalin?”

  Allin looked at him with faint surprise. “They earn a living, same as everywhere else. Those with fire affinity help metalworkers and foundries, those linked to water find work with shipbuilders or something like that. But there’s still a lingering suspicion of wizards in Tormalin, so they’re only ever given short-term work, for a specific project usually.”

  “The mages in Kel Ar’Ayen are none too ready to lend magical aid to such mundane tasks. They always make it out to be some great favour.” Temar shook his head. “But why are mages so suspect on this side of the ocean?”

  “After the Chaos?” Allin looked puzzled. “Hasn’t anyone told you this?”

  Temar smiled appealingly at her. “We are generally too busy with the day-to-day business of living in Kel Ar’Ayen for idle chatter.”

  “Oh.” Allin looked round the room for a moment before visibly making a decision. “I don’t suppose it reflects very well on wizardry, so that’s probably why no one’s mentioned it. Some warfare in the Chaos was backed with elemental magic. Fire and flood, lightning, they were all used on battlefields. Other magic was wrought against encampments, armies found themselves mired in bogs where they’d been riding through pasture, that kind of thing.”

  “So Houses backed by wizards had a significant advantage,” nodded Temar with interest.

  Allin grimaced. “Magic’s a powerful ally in the short term, but in the longer term it’s not that crucial. You can drive an army off a battlefield with waves of flame but magic won’t help you hold the land you win. A single spellcaster soon exhausts himself; Cloud-Master Otrick makes sure every apprentice mage learns that. In any case, there were never that many wizards willing to turn their talents to warfare and once other Houses started banishing any mage-born — or doing worse—there were even fewer. But prejudice against magic in Tormalin persists.”

  “But Artifice held the Empire together.” Temar frowned. “Adepts in aetheric magic were highly respected. Everyone acknowledged that their work served the greater good.”

  “And the magic went away and everything fell into Chaos?” Allin raised her eyebrows. “Who do you suppose they blamed?”

  “If what Guinalle says is true, they were right to do so.” Temar bit his lip. “It seems the struggles of the Kel Ar’Ayen Adepts against the ancient Elietimm somehow undermined the whole aetheric balance underpinning Artifice.”

  “I heard some scholars visiting Hadrumal from Vanam arguing about that,” Allin nodded. “Wizardry did some truly dreadful things, before Trydek brought the mage-born under his rule, and the tales are still told, doubtless exaggerated with each repeating. It’s small wonder all most people believe is magic is magic and it’s suspect, whatever its hue or origin. There are precious few people outside Hadrumal who even know about aetheric magic and its role in the Old Empire. The world has moved on, more than you know.”

  “More than I am allowed to know, it would seem,” said Temar lightly, but anger sparked a gleam in his eye.

  Allin looked at her hands. “Perhaps I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  “I will not tell anyone you did.” Temar looked thoughtfully at Allin. “The wizards I know mostly want to live in Hadrumal pursuing their scholarship. You are not much like them.”

  Allin hesitated. “Scholarship’s important. Velindre spends her life trying to understand the work of the winds, what happens to air when it is warmed by fire or cooled over water. The more she understands, the more precise her magic can be, the more exact her control over the element of her affinity. It takes little more than instinct to raise a gale if you’re mage-born, but to use air to cool a sick child’s fever, to carry a word across a thousand leagues, that takes a depth of understanding that only study can give. That’s the whole reason for Hadrumal’s existence.”

  “But such study is not for you?” guessed Temar.

  Allin blushed. “I want to learn enough to make my magic useful, but I’m no scholar.”

  “Then what will you do with your useful magecraft?” asked Temar, teasing a little.

  “I’d like to go home but magic’s even more suspect in Lescar than anywhere else.” A hint of tears shone faintly in Allin’s eyes. “Each Duke’s afraid someone else will enlist a wizard to fight on their side.”

  “Which might at least bring all that sorry warfare to an end,” said Temar curtly. He waited a moment for the girl to regain her composure. “Forgive me. So, if you can not go home, what would you do?”

  “There are Lescari in exile all over what you knew as the Empire, mostly in Caladhria or Tormalin.” Allin looked at the paper lying on the table. “Some do very well for themselves, settle and grow rich, but others struggle. There must be some way to use magecraft to earn a living from the wealthy and to help the weak better themselves.”

  Temar studied the handbill himself, the silence in the room like a held breath.

  “But Velindre dislikes you associating with other Lescari?” He set his jaw.

  “Oh, no,” said Allin, flustered. “She just doesn’t think this is worth pursuing, and in any case she has other calls on her time.”

  Temar looked at the handbill again and clicked his tongue absently against his teeth. “This could be Artifice, used to read minds, tell people what they want
to hear. There would be a value in determining that.”

  “Whoever’s doing this might have some way to find people, maybe even people sleeping in an enchanted artefact,” suggested Allin tentatively.

  Temar looked searchingly at the girl. “Are there not people you wish to find?”

  Allin knotted her hands on the table before her. “I’m luckier than most,” she said determinedly. “I know where my parents are, my brothers and sisters. When the fighting finally rolled our way at least we managed to stay together. But I had uncles, aunts, cousins in and around Carluse. They were scattered to the four winds when our new Duke decided it was his turn to claim the Lescari throne and his Grace of Sharlac slapped him down.” She cleared her throat but said nothing further.

  Temar felt a pang at the thought of his own family, long lost to him beyond Saedrin’s door. “What if this person can really contact the dead?” he wondered aloud. “What if I could speak to Vahil? To Elsire?” What if he could speak to his mother, his grandsire, ask their advice once again?

  “Vahil was the Sieur Den Rannion that came back from the colony?” Allin leaned forward.

  Temar laid his long-fingered hands flat to stop them trembling. “What if I could ask him where the artefacts were sent, who got the pieces we are missing? It will take an army of clerks a full round of seasons to worm such secrets out of these archives. What if Vahil could save us all that work?”

  “So you’ll speak to the Demoiselle?” Allin laid an unthinking hand on Temar’s.

  “We do not need her.” Temar gave Allin’s fingers an encouraging squeeze. “You said you were no scholar. Well, neither am I, but I have learned enough of Artifice to know if someone is working it in the same room. I will come with you. If we learn something to our advantage then we can share the pleasure of telling Velindre she was wrong. If it turns out we are looking for wool in a goat shed, then no one need ever know.” He hesitated. “Except Ryshad, he had best come with us. Meet me at the gatehouse at sunset and we can all go together.”

  As Allin nodded, the door opened. A curious lackey moved to one side to let two maids carry trays into the room. Allin blushed scarlet and pulled her hands free of Temar’s.