Darkening Skies (The Hadrumal Crisis)

by McKenna Juliet E.

  He cleared his throat. ‘Where can I hire a ride to the city? I am Baron Halferan,’ he added for good measure.

  He half expected the lad to challenge him. The words still tasted like a lie in his mouth. The boy might even remember the true Baron Halferan’s arrival, when his dead lord had come to appeal to the Archmage’s better nature.

  Dull resentment burned deep in Corrain’s chest. Planir’s refusal to help had been the beginning of all Halferan’s misfortunes. But he couldn’t dwell on what was past. He needed the wizard’s help and he could afford no more delay.

  The young sailor looked up from coiling his rope. ‘The halls send a carriage for folk they’re expecting. Else they walk—my lord.’

  His belated courtesy didn’t hide his complete lack of interest in some mainland noble’s affairs.

  ‘Very well.’ Corrain hitched the strap of his leather travelling bag over one shoulder and followed the well-trodden path to the broad road.

  Thankfully he travelled light as befitted a guardsman, and he was wearing the best boots he’d ever owned, thanks to the Archmage’s gold filling Halferan’s coffers. He fell into a comfortable stride.

  What should he make of this though? He was expected, after all. He had told Zurenne to use her pendant to tell the Archmage he was on his way. After she had told Planir about Anskal’s unexpected visit and his incomprehensible threats.

  Planir had promised that his wizards would keep watch on the manor. That someone would be there to challenge Anskal if he appeared again. Corrain could only trust that Hadrumal’s mages were quick enough to appear in the blink of an eye. He’d seen how swift the Mandarkin’s malice could be.

  As long as that bastard didn’t realise where he was heading. Corrain was tormented by thoughts of the vengeance which Anskal might visit on Zurenne and her daughters for appealing to the Archmage.

  He’d barely gone ten more paces when a round-bodied gig came hurrying up behind him.

  The driver pulled up, a rough-coated bay colt tossing its head in ill-temper. ‘Baron Halferan?’

  The young man’s well-born Caladhrian accents prompted unexpected recollection. ‘Master Nolyen of Pardal Barony.’

  Corrain could remember precious little else beyond the young wizard’s name from that dreadful day when he had stumbled back into Halferan Manor to find so many of those he had believed were dead.

  ‘Of Hadrumal, eight years since,’ the mild-faced wizard said cheerfully. ‘The Archmage’s compliments, my lord baron.’

  ‘And mine to you both.’ Corrain slung his travelling bag into the space beneath the seat and climbed up.

  Nolyen whistled up the bay colt and they started towards the city.

  Corrain was still tense. Planir had said he was keeping watch for Anskal. What of other threats? Were courier doves carrying word across the length and breadth of Caladhria; that the Widow Zurenne and her daughters were once more unprotected? Corrain ground his teeth. He had gone to the southerly port instead of to Claithe in hopes of taking ship here unnoticed. But someone might have recognised him on his travels.

  Corrain stole a sideways glance at the Caladhrian born wizard. Could this Nolyen tell him anything useful? Or would asking questions risk Corrain revealing more than he wished to? He decided silence was the most prudent course.

  Besides, the mage did have his hands full with reins and rebuke. The spirited colt took the open road as an invitation to break into a gallop. Corrain was relieved to see that Nolyen was no less a Caladhrian when it came to horsemanship.

  The colt slowed obediently as they approached the city. Hadrumal had no walls to divide outlying artisans’ lodgings from its older heart. In that it reminded Corrain of Caladhria. All across the baronies, the market towns would proudly boast that no marching armies had troubled the parliament’s peace for twenty generations.

  Ensaimin visitors sneered that was because Caladhria had nothing which anyone might want to take. The truth of that hadn’t troubled Corrain until the corsairs had come to prove those Ensaimin wrong.

  And now they faced Anskal’s malice backed by those same cursed raiders and Corrain didn’t have any notion what the Mandarkin wanted from them. But he’d wager that the Archmage did. So he was here to find out. Planir couldn’t hide behind the infuriating evasions which Zurenne had repeated if Corrain met him face to face.

  The gig advanced slowly up the gentle rise of the high road. As far as Corrain could see, no two neighbouring buildings had been built by the same mason. Some had tall narrow windows defying any attempt to see what lay within while their arched, studded gates stayed stubbornly closed. Others extended a welcome with broad windows and wide archways opening into courtyard gardens, their invitation framed with carved birds and animals, leaves and flowers carved on their pillars and mullions.

  Delicate stone tracery framed stained glass panels on one building. Boldly painted shutters were bolted back from deep sills on the next. The frontage beyond was a mathematical paragon of precisely measured windows and doors making subtle geometric patterns.

  Only one thing was constant, as true of the substantial wizards’ halls as of the prosaic shops and tradesmen’s dwellings tucked in amongst them. All were built of the same fine-grained stone, softly golden in the sunlight.

  Men and women, young and old, dressed in every mainland fashion, hurried up towards the heart of the city or down towards the harbour road, hampering each other and the few carts and gigs patiently threading a path through the throng.

  Corrain had never imagined there could be so many wizards. That explained why this city on a remote island, exposed to attack from any quarter, felt no need for walls. If Madam Jilseth could defend Halferan Manor so doughtily, what couldn’t this multitude do?

  ‘Here we are.’ Nolyen turned the horse through a square entry into a stone paved quadrangle.

  An ostler appeared from a porter’s cubbyhole to take charge of the colt while the mage jumped down. Gathering up his courage along with his travelling bag, Corrain descended more slowly. He had come this far. There was no retreating now.

  Behind him and to either side, ranges of accommodation faced onto the quadrangle. Ahead a great hall filled the fourth side of the square, far older, with high windows and a single door at one end reached by a tall flight of steps.

  To Corrain’s eye, it looked built for defence, wizardry notwithstanding. A solid square tower rose at the opposite end to the door, with tall pinnacles at each corner and parapets built to shield sentries keeping watch aloft. It reminded him of the very oldest halls he had seen across Caladhria’s baronies. Though the lines of the lattice carving on the pillars supporting the pointed arch of the doorway were as sharp as if the stone mason shaping them had only then laid down his chisel.

  Nolyen was quite at his ease, striding across the flagstones. ‘This is Trydek’s Hall, founded by our first Archmage.’

  ‘Indeed.’ Corrain’s tongue felt like old leather, his mouth was so dry.

  Nolyen led the way up the steps, lifting the latch to shove the heavy door open. It revealed a whitewashed passage with double doors leading into the main hall on Corrain’s sword hand and a second way in or out at the far end.

  He turned resolutely away from that illusion of a last-minute escape as Nolyen ushered him into the hall. The young wizard followed and closed the doors behind him.

  ‘Good day, Baron Halferan.’

  ‘Good day to you, Archmage.’ Corrain bowed. He had silently sworn not to be subservient but this was neither the time nor the place for arrogance.

  Plain tables were framed with benches, running down the length of the hall. At the far end, the hall had the customary dais, though this one was raised much higher than Halferan’s. A long table set crossways was backed by tall carved chairs. The Archmage sat in the centre, his seat no more ornate than the rest.

  Corrain strode resolute down the length of the hall and he looked up at the wizard.

  When they had met before, he could have take
n the Archmage for some prosperous market town’s reeve; neatly dressed in black broadcloth doublet and breeches, free of unseemly ostentation.

  In this hall of wizardry, the lean-faced man wore a broad-shouldered black velvet mantle over an old fashioned tunic, buttoned high to the throat. Most of the portraits lining the whitewashed walls were dressed in the same style.

  Planir leaned forward, elbows resting on the table, his chin on his interlaced fingers. ‘Have you finally come to ask for wizardly aid in rebuilding your manor?’

  ‘I—’ Corrain hadn’t expected this genial query. ‘No. We wish to rebuild Halferan through our own efforts, my lord.’

  Planir raised his brows, dark with no hint of the silver which shaded his temples and beard. ‘Why?’

  Corrain answered with swift certainty. ‘To give every man, woman and child a stake in the barony’s future. To teach them all that their surest defence is their neighbour.’

  ‘Spoken like a true guardsman,’ Planir observed. ‘Then what do you want with me, and why,’ he continued before Corrain could answer, ‘have you spent the time, trouble and coin to come here in person rather than use my gifts to Lady Zurenne and Lady Ilysh to communicate your concerns?’

  ‘You know that the Mandarkin mage Anskal believes that we are concealing further magic from him.’ Corrain knew his voice betrayed his desperation. He didn’t care. ‘He says that I must hand this magic over or he will come north with a fleet of raiders. That he’ll leave Halferan ruined. I saw what he did to the corsairs and I know that we cannot stand against him. But I have no notion what he wants—’

  Corrain couldn’t continue. The appalling recollection of the blind corsair’s trireme burning and his pavilion’s destruction was bad enough. The thought of such violence crushing Halferan’s recovery was too much to bear.

  Planir studied him for an interminable moment before speaking.

  ‘I know what the Mandarkin seeks. He has discovered some stash of ensorcelled artefacts among the corsairs’ loot. He believes that more such treasures remain on the mainland. Unfortunately my gifts to Halferan’s ladies have convinced him that you possess some.’

  ‘I know nothing of magical trinkets beyond chimney corner stories for children,’ Corrain protested helplessly.

  ‘Quite so,’ Planir agreed drily. ‘But I doubt that you’ll convince him, especially now that he has discovered there are mageborn among the Aldabreshi, when you swore to him the islanders had no wizards.’

  Corrain couldn’t make any sense of that. ‘But the Archipelagans abominate magic.’

  ‘Indeed. Well now, the last time we met,’ the Archmage continued more briskly, ‘you offered me a bargain, you and Lady Zurenne. Provided we helped you drive away those corsairs, you wouldn’t disgrace Hadrumal. If we refused, then you would tell the world that Master Minelas was a wizard as well as a thieving murderer.

  ‘Are you offering those same terms?’ he enquired conversationally, ‘for our help in rescuing you from the consequences of your own folly? You went seeking alliance with this wizard, Anskal. You brought him south.’

  ‘I did.’ The admission left Corrain feeling sick to his stomach. ‘I will submit to whatever punishment which you think fit. Throw me from the top of your tallest tower if you must. As long as you keep Lady Zurenne and Lady Ilysh safe—’ He broke off. ‘Are they safe? I had to leave them to come here. But if I had stayed, I cannot fight this mage—’

  ‘They are safe and sound,’ the Archmage assured him, ‘though the demesne folk are baffled, my lord baron, to see you abandon rebuilding your manor to go off on some jaunt without so much as your household guard troop.’

  Planir leaned back in his chair, folding his arms. ‘Please, continue with your demands. I see you have more to ask of me, even though you claim you’re not offering me terms.’

  ‘I ask nothing for myself,’ Corrain insisted. ‘But there was a lad taken captive with me and he’s still a slave on that corsair island. I swear by all that’s holy I would have brought him away with me if I could. I thought he must surely be dead but now Anskal says he’ll return him to us if we surrender what he seeks. So we know that he’s alive. But we have no magic to give him,’ he protested. ‘Since he doesn’t believe us, he will surely kill the lad and he is innocent of all my follies, my lord.’

  ‘So you wish me to save the boy, though you’re making no demands?’ Planir’s eyes flicked past Corrain towards the back of the hall. ‘Nolyen? You have a question?’

  ‘When the Mandarkin mage, this Anskal, came to threaten Lady Zurenne, did he say anything to suggest what he might intend, once he has gathered these ensorcelled trinkets together?’

  Corrain turned to look at the Caladhrian wizard, hearing frustration and apprehension equal to his own.

  ‘No.’ He shook his head, so desperately wishing he could say something else.

  ‘It is for us to discover what the Mandarkin intends.’ Planir laid his hands flat on the table. ‘It is for you to make amends for your arrogance and your defiance,’ he told Corrain ominously, ‘and to lessen the burdens which Hadrumal now has to bear as a consequence of your follies.’

  Corrain braced himself. ‘Tell me what I must do.’

  The Archmage leaned forward, folding his hands together. His ring snagged the edge of a sunbeam, throwing out a flash of light to dazzle Corrain. ‘You must go to Solura.’

  ‘What?’ That made Corrain blink a second time. Whatever he had expected, of all the possibilities which he had debated with himself on the road and onboard ship, he had never envisaged this.

  ‘You will go to Solura,’ Planir repeated. ‘You will find your erstwhile ally, the Forest born lad, who escaped from the corsairs with you. Kusint, wasn’t that his name?’

  ‘Yes, but my lord—’ Corrain protested. ‘He and I parted as enemies. He told me not to strike a deal with the Mandarkin.’ Regret strangled that admission.

  ‘Then you will find him and humbly beg his pardon and tell him that he was right,’ Planir said relentlessly. ‘Then you will go and find those mages of the Order of Fornet whom you also so grievously offended and you will admit your guilt to them. You will submit to whatever punishment they decree for you. That may well cost you a flogging but as long as you tell them you’re under my protection, it won’t cost you your head.’

  ‘I—’ Corrain stared at the Archmage. ‘Why—?’

  ‘Kusint can bear witness that you did all this alone, without my knowledge or agreement. The wizards of Solura have friends among those adept with aetheric magic, who use it in the Soluran king’s service. Artifice will prove the truth of whatever you tell them. I recommend you do not lie,’ Planir advised, his tone cutting. ‘You have significant amends to make for the strife which your foolishness has caused between ourselves and the wizards of Solura.

  ‘Once you have convinced the Elders of Fornet that you alone are responsible for bringing this Mandarkin wizard southwards,’ the Archmage continued, implacable, ‘you will present my compliments to them and ask on my behalf, for whatever lore they or the Elders of other Soluran Orders might care to share about the ensorcelling of artefacts. I am particularly interested to learn if they know why this mage Anskal might find such things so intriguing. We will be indebted to them for any spells they may have for drawing the sting from such things. Do I make myself clear? Do you have any questions?’

  ‘My lord,’ Corrain protested. ‘It took me the whole of For-Summer to reach Solura. I have no notion where to find Kusint. Who knows how long it could take me to track him down—’

  Planir burst out laughing. Corrain reddened with furious humiliation as he realised an instant too late what the Archmage would say.

  ‘I can send you there between one breath and the next,’ Planir assured him, ‘and we can help you find Kusint. We were following your journey this summer with keen interest, weren’t we, Nolyen?’ He glanced over Corrain’s head again.

  ‘You followed us?’ Corrain looked around at the young wiz
ard, disbelieving. Then he recalled Planir’s earlier words. ‘You say that you know what the Mandarkin has found among the corsair loot? You’re watching him by means of some spell? Along with my lady Zurenne and her daughters?’

  ‘Holding true to our edicts means that we do not intervene in mainland warfare,’ the Archmage said, steely-eyed. ‘That does not mean we do not observe and make ready to act in case our own interests demand it. Let us hope that we can deal with this Mandarkin before he causes too much commotion amongst the Archipelagans. Let us hope that you can secure the Solurans’ forgiveness, so they will share the lore that will help us to safeguard Lady Zurenne and Lady Ilysh.’

  Standing beneath the Archmage’s withering gaze, Corrain felt a chill run down his spine. He raised his chin to answer the Archmage.

  ‘I will go to Solura. I will admit my folly. I will take whatever punishment comes my way. I will do my utmost to return with the lore that you seek.’ But he wasn’t ready to surrender completely. Not yet. ‘If you’re keeping watch on Anskal, surely you can rescue Hosh? I can tell you what he looks like. I can tell you which galley we were chained in, which oar.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ For the first time, Planir’s expression softened. ‘There would be no surer way of letting Anskal know that we are watching him, for us to pluck your friend from his grasp.’

  Corrain wanted to argue but he could see that there was no point. Worse, he couldn’t argue with the Archmage’s reasoning. Antagonise Anskal and the consequences for Halferan could be deadly.

  ‘We can warn the Mandarkin off any more visits to Caladhria without making our interest so obvious,’ the Archmage offered. ‘Allow us to help rebuild Halferan Manor. That will explain a mage’s presence and whatever Anskal has planned, he won’t draw attention to himself by challenging one of our own directly. Not yet.’

  Once again, the Archmage glanced over his head. Corrain had no doubt that Planir knew far more than he was telling. So how much did the Caladhrian wizard Nolyen know and was there any way to get anything useful out of him?