The Far Far Better Thing

by Auston Habershaw

  Sahand!

  Myreon almost collapsed to the ground again, but Androlli held her up. “We won’t let him get away with it, Myreon. I promise you that.” The Mage Defender looked around at the ruined street and the human skeletons scattered as far as the eye could see. “This is the final straw. The Archmagi are in agreement and the Keeper has spoken—Saldor marches to war.”

  She opened her mouth to say something, though what, she couldn’t tell—a confession? A cry of anguish? It never came. The sky seemed to spin and then she was on her back and then darkness.

  Myreon woke up. It must have been dawn, judging from the soft light piercing the white canvas panels of the white-and-purple pavilion. She was in casterlocks and had iron shackles clamped around her ankles. She was lying on a flat straw mattress. She tried to get a sense of place and time, but there were no points of reference. All she remembered was the desolate streets of Ayventry and then Androlli being there and then . . . this.

  White and purple were Saldor’s heraldic colors. Outside she could hear the gentle stirrings of a large camp in the early morning—men talking in low voices, the sound of horses shifting against their tethers. Somewhere a teapot was rattling.

  She got up gingerly. She felt wrung out, weak. Her body trembled with the effort of sitting up unaided. Her stomach was so empty it felt plastered to her spine. With shuffling steps, she went to the tent flap and put one eye to the crack. Outside stood two Defenders in their mirrored mageglass armor, firepikes at their shoulders.

  She stepped back, trying to put her scattered thoughts in order. What had happened to the Creeping Dark? Had she put it back in the box? No—that was impossible. The box had been destroyed. She had lost total control and everyone died. Everyone.

  Then why was she in a tent instead of in Keeper’s Court, awaiting trial? Why was she even still alive?

  Sahand.

  Her last conversation with Androlli came back to her. She shuddered—they thought he had released the Creeping Dark on Ayventry. They thought he had committed that atrocity. And why not? It was the kind of thing Banric Sahand might do rather than lose a battle.

  It was the kind of thing Banric Sahand might do . . .

  Myreon fell to her knees, retching. There was nothing in her stomach to come out, though—only a thick string of yellow bile which she spat into the grass.

  The flap swung open—it was Androlli. “Good—you’re awake.”

  “Wh . . . where . . .” Myreon stammered as Androlli grabbed her under one arm and hoisted her to her feet.

  “Outside Bridgeburg. You’ve been unconscious for three days.” Androlli pushed back the tent flap and guided her through it.

  The full light of morning blinded her as she shuffled beside him. When her eyes adjusted, she could see the orderly rows of purple-and-white tents, the firepikes steepled in tripods here and there, the men dusting off mirrored helms after a day’s march—an army, then. She was too addled and too confused to possibly estimate the size, but even in their short walk across the camp, Myreon knew there were more Defenders of the Balance here, in one place, than she had ever seen before.

  Androlli seemed to follow her train of thought. “The collected resources of Galaspin and Eretheria tower plus the garrisons of every town and city in the north of Saldor’s Domain. Impressive, eh? An army not seen since Conrad Varner’s days, they’re saying.”

  Ahead of them was a black tent with a banner in front Myreon had seen before but could not place: a portcullis framed by tangled vines. There were two Defenders here on guard, too. They came to attention as Androlli approached. He held up the flap for her and motioned for her to enter. “After you.”

  Inside were four ebony chairs arranged around a glowing circle of runes scratched into the bare earth. Sitting in one of these chairs was Trevard, Lord Defender of the Balance—a thin man, but full of sharp corners and spiky looks, like a kind of animated splinter of wood. Next to him, resplendent in black and violet, his golden hair perfectly coiffed, was Xahlven Reldamar, the Archmage of the Ether.

  Myreon now knew where she had seen the heraldic device before—at Glamourvine. It was the Reldamar family crest. How strange she should have spent so much time with the Reldamars and had hardly ever seen their coat of arms.

  Xahlven smiled at her and motioned to one of the empty chairs. “Please, Myreon—sit.”

  Trevard gave her a look that could curdle milk. “I can’t see why we should let the prisoner recline in our presence, Xahlven.”

  “The woman is clearly exhausted to the point of death, Trevard,” Xahlven said, his face open with apparently genuine concern. “We hardly want her collapsing during her interview, do we?”

  Trevard’s sharp chin shook with anger. “I want a good deal more than that for this one. A good deal more indeed.”

  Myreon collapsed in the chair. Xahlven held out a goblet. “Drink. You need it.”

  She leaned forward to sip and, as she did, he gently held back her hair. As if he really cared about her. As if any of this were true. She wanted to laugh, but she lacked the energy. The goblet was full of some kind of enchanted wine of the type Tyvian had hated—he had claimed it did the exact opposite of what wine should do and tasted terrible to boot. Despite the sour flavor, she felt almost immediately refreshed.

  Androlli saluted Trevard and provided him with a ring of record, which the Lord Defender slipped onto his pinky finger. Trevard then closed his eyes for a moment. She knew he was reviewing Androlli’s arrest of her in Ayventry through Androlli’s own eyes, though at a more brisk pace. Androlli remained at attention, awaiting his superior’s word.

  They had a moment before the “interview” was to begin. She knew asking Xahlven questions was like dipping one’s toe in a bear pit, but she needed to know and this was her only chance. “What happens in Eretheria? Please, I need to know.”

  Xahlven assumed a look of suitable regret. “War, I’m afraid. Ousienne of Hadda has declared her support of the missing Prince and called all loyal followers to her banner. She promises an end to the spring campaigns and a reordering of the noble families, among many other promises. Camis and Vora have aligned themselves against her, citing Ousienne’s naked ambition.”

  Myreon couldn’t help but laugh. “She didn’t declare until after we were through. Now she acts the patriot. What fool would believe her?”

  “Most of them, as it turns out. They sing her praises in the capital, where food is scarce and riots are growing more common. The rumor is that the King of Akral is backing the Counts of Camis and Vora. Sahand, it seems, supports Hadda and pursues a marriage with the captive Michelle Orly. And ugly business brews.”

  “I’m sure you had nothing to do with that,” Myreon said.

  Xahlven cocked his head, evidently concerned. “And why would I?”

  Before she could answer, Trevard opened his eyes. “Very well. I’ve seen enough.” He slapped the ring back in Androlli’s palm and turned to Myreon. “Explain what happened, girl, so we can get this over with and see you petrified.”

  Myreon met Trevard’s gaze, but couldn’t hold it. For so long she wanted to glare at him—this old man who had let her be framed right under his nose, who may have even been complicit in her framing—but she couldn’t do it. She kept seeing the sack of Ayventry and the piles of bones. She heard the screams of those she’d killed. Her, not Sahand.

  But here was the question: should she tell the truth? Reveal Xahlven as the Chairman? Say, Yes, Magus, I stole a forbidden artifact from Xahlven’s mother’s house and used it to kill tens of thousands of innocent people.

  “Well?” Trevard barked, slamming his fist on the armrest of his chair. “Don’t make me Compel you, girl.”

  Xahlven put up a hand. “Give her a moment to collect herself, Trevard—the woman is clearly traumatized.”

  But what purpose would the truth serve, here? Myreon closed her eyes, trying to gather herself. What evidence did she have of Xahlven’s collusion? None. Nothing. If she t
old Trevard the truth, it would be her word against Xahlven’s, and there was little doubt which way that contest would turn. No, she would never have Tyvian’s infernal brother at her mercy—he was too well prepared, too cautious. She knew it was no accident that he was here now, sitting in this tent, observing her interview.

  Androlli was whispering in her ear. “Myreon, just tell them. There’s nothing left to hide here. You have nothing else.”

  But Androlli was wrong. There was one thing she could do—one thing she had. It was clear that Xahlven had anticipated this—that he knew either by scrying or by that same infuriating Reldamar ability to manipulate others that she would be sitting here, in this chair, faced with this choice. Either way, her life was over—that was certain—and since she had dedicated her life to doing good, here at the end there was only one good deed left to her. One thing that could serve the cause of justice.

  She opened her eyes and cleared her throat. “I believe Banric Sahand has access to the Seeking Dark, and that he acquired it through his connections with the Sorcerous League, and that he’ll use it again if he isn’t stopped, once and for all.”

  Trevard’s face was grim, his hawk-like nose pale as parchment. “You will need to tell us everything.”

  Myreon looked at Xahlven. “Of course, I would hope my cooperation would serve to lessen the severity of my sentence.”

  Xahlven smiled. “I think that can be arranged.”

  Chapter 29

  A Study in Misdirection

  By ancient tradition, armies fielded by the Arcanostrum on behalf of the Domain of Saldor were led by the Lord Defender of the Balance and advised by a sitting archmage. This was a historically rare occurrence—even now, over fifteen hundred years after the death of the last Warlock King, armies led by mighty sorcerers were something of a taboo—and therefore there was not a great deal of infrastructure in place to service an archmage in the field. Sorcerers of great power needed access to a great many materials to power their rituals, they required precisely balanced leys to achieve the correct effects, and they also tended to dislike getting muddy. Therefore, the first great ritual enacted by Xahlven and Trevard was to make for themselves an enormous floating palanquin.

  It was constructed of mageglass and large enough to accommodate both archmagi and a squadron of Defenders tasked with their defense. It coasted a few feet above the ground on a cushion of faintly glowing Dweomeric force, and its surface held three pavilions—Xahlven’s, Trevard’s, and a larger one in the center for receiving reports and holding audiences. The front of the large platform had two thrones built into it—a black one for the Archmage of the Ether, and a silver-gray one for the Lord Defender. From its many flagpoles and the spires of its tents the purple and white of Saldor flapped merrily in the breeze. It was an audacious thing—a brazen affront to centuries of Arcanostrum tradition.

  But Xahlven had insisted, and Xahlven was very persuasive.

  Myreon knew Trevard disliked the palanquin. Over eighty years old and set in his ways, he could not quite accept that in his lifetime the world had changed so much as to permit this thing to exist. Accordingly, he spent as often as he could anywhere else—inspecting the troops or taking meetings with his officers in their tents—only returning to the sorcerous construct in the evening, where he would glower at the serving specters pouring him wine and stomp off to his tent as soon as dinner was finished. Myreon half wondered if he would dispel it all in a fit of rage and they’d all go tumbling into the mud. He never did, though.

  Myreon was still in casterlocks, though the Defenders had the decency to let her out of them for meals. She never tried to escape—it would be idiotic to try, there in the company of two of the most powerful sorcerers in the world. Besides, there was nowhere else she had to go, nothing else she had to do. It wasn’t even clear to her why she was kept around.

  She spent her days shackled to a post near the front of the palanquin—a kind of cautionary tale for rogue sorcerers, she supposed, or maybe a mascot of some sort. Besides the Defenders, who refused to talk to her on principle, her only company was Xahlven.

  “A regrettable thing to see, isn’t it?” he remarked one day from his throne, looking across the columns of soldiers winding their way across the open grasslands that dominated the northern reaches of Galaspin and the southern reaches of Dellor—a trackless place known only as the “Wild Territories.”

  Myreon didn’t answer. She wasn’t sure whether he was referring to the monotonous landscape or the fact that six thousand Defenders of the Balance were marching to war, their purple-and-white banners and mirrored armor clearly visible against the gray landscape.

  “To think,” Xahlven went on. “If my mother had only listened to Conrad Varner and permitted him to harry Sahand all the way back to Dellor, we might have ended this thirty years ago instead of doing it now. Ayventry was such a lovely city. Such a shame.”

  Shame? Hadn’t he been the one to place the Creeping Dark in her hands? Hadn’t he been the one daring her to use it? His hypocrisy made Myreon want to claw off her own ears. She shifted restlessly against her bonds, trying to scoot farther away from him.

  What the hell was his game here? If he had spoken the truth in the Black Hall—if he really wanted to see an end to the Arcanostrum—she didn’t understand how this would accomplish it. The sorcerous might on display here was astounding. Six thousand firepikes? No conventional army could stand against that. She had spotted at least a score of men wearing colossus amulets, and there had to be thirty or forty Mage Defenders here, each of them trained in practical battle sorcery—lode bolts and fireballs, sunblasts and death bolts, blade and bow wards, sorcerous guards, and a hundred other enchantments and invocations that would spell certain doom to any Delloran force that faced them. How could one destroy the Arcanostrum by obliterating their most stalwart enemy?

  It would have been one thing if this army had been mustered without provocation—the other nations of the West were extremely suspicious of Saldor fielding armies of men equipped with invincible magecraft—but, as far as anyone knew, Sahand has just destroyed an entire city of people with forbidden sorcery. They were simply fulfilling their mandate, now—protecting the balance of power that had kept the West functional for centuries.

  Myreon knew Xahlven was running some kind of plot, here—he was a Reldamar, so of course he was—but what the hell could it be? She needed to find out, but needed to do so without letting on that she knew Xahlven was also the Chairman of the Sorcerous League.

  At last, she decided on a line of questioning. “Why am I still here?”

  “You were a military commander who fought against Sahand—successfully—for several months. We have decided your input could be worthwhile,” Xahlven said.

  “I’m also a rogue sorcerer wanted for a host of crimes. I should stand trial.”

  Xahlven nodded, conceding the point. “Your trial will proceed in good time. I am given to understand that Mage Defender Androlli is compiling the evidence against you as we speak. In the meantime, you remain at my disposal should I have any questions that need answering.”

  Myreon turned to look at him. Xahlven was grinning his dimpled grin, one leg crossed over the other. He looked relaxed as a frog in a pond. “Do you?”

  “I am interested to hear what you can tell me about the Sorcerous League.”

  Myreon’s eyes narrowed. Did he know? Was this some kind of test? “Almost nothing. Mostly just rumors.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Xahlven said. “I know you didn’t learn necromancy in the Gray Tower. Come now—Trevard isn’t here and I’ve made certain he won’t hear this conversation. You can tell me without offending the old man’s sense of propriety.”

  Well, I know that you’re in charge of the whole thing. But Myreon didn’t say that. Instead, she shrugged. “They’re just a bunch of pathetic hedge wizards and frustrated apprentices dabbling in arts they can scarcely handle. Other than their connections with Sahand, I wouldn’t concern
yourself with them.”

  “You’re seeking to deflect suspicion by complimenting my inherent belief in my superiority. Nice attempt—my congratulations. But that ritual in the sewers of Eretheria was not the work of a frustrated amateur or studious dabbler. That was an inspired bit of magecraft. Your work?”

  Myreon blinked. “You knew about . . . you’re the one who dispelled it?”

  “Just tying up loose ends for the Arcanostrum in Eretheria. As pretty a job as it was, I couldn’t allow it to continue, Myreon. You understand, I’m sure.”

  Myreon kept her face as passive as possible, but inside her a riot of wild theories was building. He knew about the ritual and where to find it? Impossible, unless the necromancer had told him about it. This was possible—Xahlven was the Chairman, after all. So Xahlven discovers the ritual and then waits to dispel it right at the moment she needed the White Guard most, drawing her army into a bitter street-by-street fight, which of course drives them to sack the city, which drove her to . . .

  “Are you all right?” Xahlven asked. “Do you need a drink of water?”

  Myreon, her stomach boiling, came back to herself. She felt like she had just run a race. “Fine. I’m fine. It’s just . . . it’s hard to lose like I did. Like we did.”

  “If their sacrifice leads to the destruction of Banric Sahand, it will not have been in vain. The world will be a safer place without him.” Xahlven’s voice was soft—he sounded so damned sincere. He always sounded sincere.

  And yet here was a man who arranged for Myreon to be pushed to use a terrible super-weapon, killing thousands of innocent people, all to get an army to march on Sahand, and thereby kill even more people. If the world was to be made safer, Sahand wasn’t the only one who needed to be destroyed.

  Myreon tugged on her casterlocks, suddenly frustrated at how powerless she felt. If she didn’t have anything to look forward to before, she did now. It wasn’t enough to be there to see Banric Sahand brought to justice.