The Tally Master

by J. M. Ney-Grimm

  It explained the flood he had summoned and the deadly whirl of the bladestorm, feats too great for the clean magery of the unafflicted – energea. But not too great for troll magery. What would Nathiar do when the madness came upon him – which it would – given what he had done already?

  Gael swallowed down nausea at the memory of the blood and gore exploding under the awakened sword shards and spearheads.

  How was it that Erastys could refrain from banishing his magus? How could he dare the risk he courted?

  Gael’s patch of ground was more puddle than mud, and Nathiar’s footsteps splashed as he drew near. The water stilled when he stopped to look coldly down upon Gael. Nathiar’s lips pursed, as though he would speak. Gael could not speak, could not find the breath to utter a word, could not find even the strength to be afraid, though he should be. Nathiar could kill him as he lay.

  But Nathiar merely shook his head and turned away, hurrying to catch up with his king.

  Erastys reached his brother first, ahead of his honor guard, but Heiroc’s blade was out also, and he was ready, receiving the cut of Erastys’ sword on the flat of his own, angling it aside and thrusting Erastys back with his shoulder.

  Then Heiroc’s back was to the trunk of the lone tree.

  But, Cayim! Seven to one?

  Gael tried to get his good leg under him and rise. As though that would do any good – seven to two, and one of those two with a broken leg.

  He fell back on his butt as the first of Erastys’ honor guard closed with Heiroc.

  Heiroc did something – he was a notable swordsman – and the warrior leaped away, tangling Erastys’ sword arm as he went.

  Gael gathered his pain-scattered wits as the next warrior charged in to the detriment of all three. Energea! It was energea he must call on in this last moment. In energea lay his only chance.

  It was hard to withdraw his attention from the outer world when his king fought for his life.

  The ring of sword on sword, the stamp of lunging feet, and the abrupt thunk of blade on tree sounded as he drew breath and followed the curling silver tracery of his arcs, as they emerged in the inner sight along with his brightening nodes. There was power here, his to use. But what should he do with it?

  The crow on Nathiar’s shoulder cawed again, and Gael let his sight go double.

  Gaelan’s tears!

  Nathiar stood some paces away from the knot of warriors besieging Heiroc at the tree, but his hands were moving in the passes he used for magery. Troll magery.

  If Gael failed to act now –

  He acted.

  The silvery blue of his energea streaked like spears toward each one of his seven enemies, encircled their ankles, and dove down.

  With a ghastly sucking noise, the hungry mud simply swallowed the five honor guard warriors, hauling their feet into its deeps and burying them to their heads. Cayim’s blood! Could they breathe?

  Gael couldn’t think about that now. His king needed him. Two of their seven foes – Erastys and Nathiar – were yet free, the magus gesturing further magery.

  Why had Nathiar left Gael free? But he couldn’t think about that either.

  Gael pulled harder on the energea noosing Nathiar’s ankles. Down! He must go down!

  Gael’s blue energea flashed green edged with gold, on the verge of troll magery from his effort.

  Nathiar drew both arms low behind his hips to throw –

  – and Gael yanked his energea with all his might. Gold-edged green flashed to black-edged gold, searing in its intensity. Gael felt something rip within him – instant, scorching fire from crown to root.

  And the earth swallowed again, sucking Nathiar elbow deep, just sufficient to trap his arms.

  Nathiar’s roar of rage in his ears, Gael blacked out.

  The incongruous scent of almonds perfumed the darkness. A woman laughed. Who? Silk hushed against silk. The notes of a lute sounded. Was this forgotten memory? Or dream? Then sounds and scents together whirled away in dizziness to unadulterated darkness.

  Slowly, Gael’s awareness climbed out of its sink, returning to the battlefield.

  The stink of the mud flooded his nostrils. The moan of someone wounded sounded in his ears. He blinked his eyes open.

  Blood dripping down one temple, Erastys wilted against the tree, his brother’s sword at his throat.

  “Do you yield?” growled Heiroc, his sword arm tense.

  Erastys paled, but shook his head. “No,” he whispered.

  Heiroc’s sword arm tightened, and they hung there an instant: the dark brother pinned to the tree, garbed in silver and red, wet with blood; the light brother clothed in bronze and aqua, drenched in river water.

  Gael’s vision pulsed in and out as he lay stunned, watching.

  Heiroc’s voice an edged hiss, the king commanded, “You shall yield!”

  Erastys grew more pale yet, but his eyes narrowed.

  “You must yield!” Was Heiroc begging?

  Gael suspected his hearing was as injured as his sight and the rest of him. What had happened, there at the end, when something ripped inside him? He feared the answer.

  Heiroc cast his sword to the ground, where it clattered against the tree’s roots. “I cannot kill you.”

  Swift triumph gleamed in Erastys’ eyes, and Gael would have cried out, had he been able. My king! My king! No!

  As Heiroc turned away, Erastys shed his drooping stance – suddenly powerful – and seized his brother by the neck, thrusting him against the bloody bark where, a moment ago, Erastys had languished.

  Erastys lifted his sword.

  “Do you yield? Brother?” he exulted.

  “No,” breathed Heiroc.

  “You shall,” gloated Erastys.

  “Never.”

  “But, yes, my brother. Oh, yes!” Erastys’ teeth gleamed.

  “You trade upon my mercy,” snarled Heiroc.

  Erastys’ nostrils flared. “I had not surrendered.”

  “No. You had not. Nonetheless.” Heiroc’s spurt of temper calmed.

  “I shall not be so weak as you. I can kill,” Erastys said.

  “I do not doubt it. Brother. Nonetheless. You trade upon my strength, not my weakness.” Heiroc’s tone was stern, and yet something lay under that sternness. What was it, thusly concealed?

  “Does that mean you trade upon my weakness, since I trade upon your strength?” mocked Erastys.

  Heiroc laughed. Gaelan’s tears!

  Erastys tensed his sword arm; and then cast his sword after his brother’s – to the ground – and fell upon Heiroc’s neck in a weeping embrace. Heiroc’s arms went hesitantly around his brother’s shoulders and then snugged him in tight.

  It had been love, Gael realized, love beneath Heiroc’s sternness. Even after a year of war, a year of bloodshed, a year of battle after battle. Dastard’s hells!

  Awe scudded through Gael’s disorientation, rendering him breathless. When else had he witnessed such compassion? Such forgiveness? Such . . . a bloody waste. Heiroc might cherish tenderness beneath his anger; Gael was not so saintly beneath his awe.

  How many warriors had died in the senseless quarrel between brother and brother? How much blood had been shed? How many men now eked out crippled lives, missing arms or legs or both? How many mothers, wives, and daughters lacked sons, husbands, and brothers? How many fields – such as this one – lay trampled by battling armies and fated to yield no harvest come fall?

  Gael could not blame his king for defending his kingdom. But if the brothers were going to reconcile their differences in the end – and well they should – why in Cayim’s hells couldn’t they do it at the first, instead of the last? Why in hells hadn’t they done it before that dreadful rip tore through something essential at Gael’s core?

  He fell back into a pulsing haze of pain and nausea. The world strobed in and out. The mud under him went hot, went cold, went hot. The cawing crows faded out, faded in. The wheeling sky turned white, turned black.
/>   Gael shuddered. What had happened to him?

  Uneasily, he pried open his inner sight. His arcs shivered, their silver edged with gold. His nodes shone the wrong colors: the root red instead of silver, the belly amber instead of white. No! And worst of all – worst – each node floated free of its mooring, no longer properly anchored. He was afflicted.

  The brother kings’ open sobs of reconciliation had been cleansing.

  Gael’s repressed sob was bitter.

  Death or maiming in service to his sovereign was a sacrifice to glory in. This . . . was not.

  The truldemagar had claimed him.

  * * *

  With effort, Gael wrenched his thoughts from the old, painful memories.

  Where he stood right now – in a dusty and cluttered storeroom full of wooden practice weapons, cutting butts, pillars, and mats – was a direct result of the events in those memories, but his attention needed to be on the present. Not the past.

  One of the page boys in the cluster behind him murmured.

  Gael’s gaze fell to the bronze gong resting on the stone floor between the two warriors. Its metal gleamed in the dim light, beckoning, inviting Gael’s scrutiny as his regenen had requested.

  Lord Carbraes awaited Gael’s response, his stance relaxed within his aura of command, and his eyes steady. “Secretarius?”

  Gael sighed. “Surely the magus is better qualified, Regenen. I renounced my magery when I entered your service. As you requested. As you request of all who dwell under your command.”

  “You did.” Carbraes’ face did not change – composed. Waiting.

  Almost did Gael submit. He valued his place here in Belzetarn. It was his home. He valued the reason and firm control Carbraes exerted over Belzetarn’s denizens. This refuge existed only because of Carbraes’ power and sanity. Gael had always been content – or almost always so – to give whatever Carbraes required of him.

  But not now. Not this. Of all the trolls gathered in Belzetarn – who renounced magery at Carbraes’ command – there was one who still performed it. Also at Carbraes’ command.

  “The magus would resent my usurpation of his prerogative,” Gael suggested.

  A slight warmth entered Carbraes’ ice blue eyes. “No. He will resent my insistence that another share his privilege.” That was true. “Which is my privilege.”

  Also true. But the magus of Belzetarn would add yet another grudge to those he already held against Gael, for the two were old acquaintances. Enemies? Maybe even enemies. At this juncture.

  For the magus of Belzetarn had been the magus of Pirbrant, serving Erastys seven years ago.

  Nathiar would yield no forbearance to Gael even when it was commanded by their mutual lord. Although . . . it was not Nathiar’s animosity that concerned Gael.

  Many of the trolls seeking refuge under Carbraes renounced their magery reluctantly. Its power and convenience were seductive. Why hone one’s sword with whetstone and oil and labor, when magery would do it faster and better? Why fight with that sword on the battlefield, when magery could deliver far more devastating attacks?

  But every troll in Belzetarn – or anywhere else – suffered the truldemagar because of magery gone wrong. They’d wielded magery too ambitious, too extreme, or too powerful for unafflicted arcs and nodes to withstand it and yet keep their healthy anchoring. And each time a troll pulled energea through his drifting nodes, those nodes drifted a little farther from true, farther from health, closer to deformity and madness.

  Gael had renounced his magery willingly.

  This artifact of Olluvarde threatened a return to his relinquished power. Why would Carbraes have Gael examine the sinister metal unless Carbraes intended Gael to meddle further with the gong? And Gael suspected that such meddling would require . . . magery. Not trivial magery either, but skilled and potent magery. The kind of magery that turned safe blue energea to lethal gold. There was a reason that Nathiar’s straight, shoulder-length hair shone silver now, while Gael’s black locks remained merely threaded with gray.

  Abstinence from magery possessed great benefits, and Gael was not anxious to forego them.

  “My skills are rusty,” he persisted. “The results will be more certain, if the more practiced magus – if Nathiar investigates this cursed thing and disposes of it.”

  “Nathiar believes me wrong to eschew troll magery,” said Carbraes. “Would you believe me wise to tempt him to it, beyond strict necessity?”

  Gael widened his stance and stood taller.

  He would be blunt. Carbraes never faulted a man for stating his position, even when that position differed from his own. Just as Nathiar could be quite frank about his preference that Carbraes use more magery in his operations, so Gael would now be frank about his own distaste for it. “No, you would not be wise to give Nathiar more cause to do magery than he already possesses. But just as Nathiar craves magery, so do I detest it. And just as you request that I take responsibility for this gong, so do I request that you give it to someone else.”

  He jerked his chin in an abrupt nod.

  One corner of Carbraes’ mouth quirked up, and he relaxed his stance further, which surprised Gael. He’d expected the regenen to match his own tension with a ramping up of power, not a diminution of it. But the regenen often departed from one’s expectations. That was a good part of why he remained regenen over the aggressive and prone-to-rage trolls who obeyed him.

  Carbraes gestured to the pages – standing very quietly, no doubt shocked – behind Gael. “Leave us,” he said. “Await me at the west stair.”

  The pages shuffled off, and then Carbraes turned to the warriors standing guard over the gong. “I would speak with the secretarius alone. Restrain the pages from too much horseplay and return to me when I call.”

  Both bowed and departed.

  Carbraes stepped closer to Gael, placed an arm over his shoulders, and drew him away from the gong to a front corner of the storeroom. “There is another matter in question, Gael,” he murmured. “I trust you. But I have reason to doubt your old friend.”

  Gael sometimes wondered at Carbraes’ ability to hold the loyalty of his troll followers. It was true that their lack of welcome elsewhere might compel them to remain true. But the very problem that drew them close – their disease – made them quarrelsome, unruly, and drawn to violence. Yet Carbraes mastered them.

  Gael wouldn’t have expected a traitor amongst the most privileged, however. “Wherein lies your lack of trust?” he inquired.

  “Nathiar remains in Belzetarn purely for his own advantage. And I can use him so. But only if I do not give him too much.” Carbraes gripped Gael’s shoulder. “Surely you see this? You were never a fool.”

  “Mm.” Gael conceded the point reluctantly.

  “But I think it is different with you,” continued Carbraes. “You are here, because . . . where else should you be? But you would not betray me for mere gain, even substantial gain. Is it not so?”

  How in Cayim’s hell did one answer a question like that? Yes, I would betray you for substantial gain? Although he wouldn’t. Carbraes was right about that. No, I would never betray you? Gael couldn’t be sure of that.

  “I am loyal, Regenen,” he said, his tone even, hiding his irritation.

  Carbraes touched his shoulder again. “I know it. I think you might betray me to preserve your own life, but not for less cause, and maybe not even then. Is it not so?”

  “Should your warriors rise against you, I suspect I would be better served defending you than seeking to save my own skin by joining them,” he answered dryly. “I doubt I should like such a regime as rebel trolls would create.”

  Carbraes chuckled. “I press you unreasonably. But, Gael” – he straightened – “I trust you. And I must not trust Nathiar. Help me with this foul artifact of Olluvarde. It bears an evil taint, and you were a skilled magus before you came here.”

  Gael stifled another sigh. He’d known it would come to this in the end. Command, guile, per
suasion. Carbraes had them all and knew when to use each.

  Gael glared at the gong – so like a shield, but not one – glimmering in the dimness.

  “Bid the warriors carry it up to my chambers. I want the hellish thing behind double locks.”

  * * *

  Chapter 2

  Gael let the warriors lugging the artifact precede him, although he followed close.

  It was a long, hot climb from the tower’s main gate to his chambers over the tally room. The stones of the walls and steps held their chill, welcome in summer, but the air flowing in through the arrowslits was too warm.

  Gael pushed past the burn in his tiring leg muscles, ignoring the fierce click in his ankle, thinking. Was he as loyal as he’d assured the regenen?

  Carbraes was right that Gael didn’t covet more power than he currently possessed. His position of secretarius was an exalted one, no question. But with more power would only come increased obligation to use it. The more powerful castellanum – Theron – governed all of Belzetarn: the kitchens and the cooks, the artisans and their yard, the messengers, the provisioners, the hunters, and more. It must be a tedious business, overseeing every last detail and all the disciplinary proceedings that were surely required to get the work done.

  Theron seemed to enjoy it, and he certainly ranked above Gael in the hierarchy, but Gael shuddered at any possibility of stepping into his shoes.

  Belzetarn’s march, Dreas, possessed power close to that of the regenen’s, commanding the regenen’s legions. But Dreas and Carbraes were like the fingers on one hand. They went back, way back, comrades before ever they came to Belzetarn, and comrades under the regenen who’d held the citadel before Carbraes.

  The march would never betray Carbraes. Nor did Gael covet his job. It came too close to the realities of the troll stronghold that troubled Gael.

  He was grateful to have this safe haven, grateful for Carbraes’ protection, grateful to have come to rest in peaceful waters after the turbulence of war under Heiroc, and then exile in a denuded wilderness when the truldemagar claimed him.

  But although his tally room was peaceful, Belzetarn as a whole was not.

  The citadel harbored warriors – troll warriors – and all the paraphernalia of war. It gave birth to war, standing opposed to near the entire North. As Carbraes once said: unless we carry the war to them, they will bring it to us. And what they bring will be defeat. Utter defeat. Annihilation.