A Handful of Men: The Complete Series

by Dave Duncan

  “I should like an explanation, if you have one, before you tender advice.”

  “There have been rumors for some time that all was not well with the Protocol. Rumors of dragons? I understand that no one has heard from the wardens since the affair on Nefer Moor.”

  “Warlock Raspnex attended the Senate when it proffered the usual address of welcome,” Shandie said. “His speech was brief. Curt, even.”

  “And devoid of content, as I recall the popular reports. The preflecting pool is excessively intriguing. It reminds me of a magic casement I once consulted—with disastrous results, I must say. May I ask how you learned of it?”

  The imperor frowned, as if reluctant to answer the question. Then he shrugged. “An old woman appeared to me that evening, in a tavern. She knew who I was, and my companions did not detect her presence. Her cloak appeared to be dry, on an exceedingly rainy night.”

  Ylo glanced in astonishment at Lord Umpily, then at Acopulo, but obviously they were both as surprised as he.

  The old scholar had stiffened, pale eyes bright, head tipped with avian alertness. “Describe her, Sire.”

  “I have never seen her like. She must have been of mixed race. What little I could see of her face under her hood was quite unfamiliar to me, and I have traveled the length and breadth of the Impire. Her eyes were large and slanted, like an elf’s, but of a pale hue, not opalescent. Sort of yellow, I thought. Her skin was a brownish shade.”

  The big jotunn jaw dropped and then clicked shut. Sagorn paled. “A broadish nose, like a faun’s?”

  “Yes!”

  “By the Powers!” the scholar muttered.

  Evidently the old jotunn’s reputation for wisdom was not without foundation. Ylo caught Acopulo’s eye and saw both appreciation and annoyance there.

  The imperor smiled faintly. “You will have to be more specific than that, Doctor.”

  “Some friends of mine once met a group of young men fitting that description, four of them. I was told that they looked like a cross between imps, fauns, and elves.”

  “And who were these people?” Shandie asked, his tone sharpening.

  “They were pixies, Sire.”

  Acopulo stumbled against the table, knocking over two candles. Ylo went for them and caught one just before it rolled to the floor.

  “No one has seen a pixie in a thousand years!” the political advisor bleated.

  Sagorn did not look at him. “I just proved you a liar. But that was in Thume, where a pixie might be understood, if not expected. This was on Hub’s doorstep. You comprehend, your Majesty, that the incident could have been an occult hoax? Any two-toed sorcerer could project visions on a body of water by moonlight.”

  “But the visions led us here, to you. And to Master Jalon. I understand he also resides at this address.”

  “And to Krasnegar,” Sagorn murmured, nodding.

  “And to Krasnegar. You remember the faun sorcerer who —“

  “I am well acquainted with Master Rap, or King Rap as he is now. We traveled widely together. One of my more satisfactory pupils.”

  The audience exchanged pleased glances. Acopulo bared his teeth in a reluctant smile. Umpily rubbed plump hands together.

  “Then we seem to be getting somewhere!” Shandie exclaimed. “It all comes together! All roads lead to Rap. He befriended me when he was here, in Hub. My grandfather considered him the most powerful sorcerer in the world.”

  “I believe that,” the jotunn said wryly. “And probably the only honest one.” He did not venture to explain.

  “Then you believe that he will agree to help me once more?”

  The sage pouted. “I can commit neither kings nor sorcerers, your Majesty, but I do communicate with the faun now and then. I am confident that an appeal from me would carry weight with him. I am sanguine that he would remember certain moral obligations he owes me and would respond favorably, under those circumstances.”

  “Countess Eigaze has offered to intercede also on our behalf. She is a distant relative of Queen Inosolan and will be joining us here shortly.”

  Sagorn pulled a face, but restrained his acerbic tongue.

  “I propose to send my wife and child to some safe location,” Shandie said, “and Lady Eigaze has agreed to escort them.” He did not look at Eshiala, whose face was shadowed and unreadable.

  Ylo wondered how she felt about the day’s shattering turn of events. Exile from the formal life of the court would seem an escape to her, in a way Shandie would not comprehend.

  The bells grew louder and voices spoke down by the front door.

  “That is probably the proconsul now,” Umpily said.

  “The invitation would have to be carefully worded,” Sagorn mused, still working on the problem. “As a ruling monarch, King Rap has overriding responsibilities toward his own realm, of course.”

  The door of the room flew open, and Hardgraa marched right in. Ylo stiffened at once, recognizing an untoward glint in that normally obscure countenance.

  “But he also has a conscience,” the old scholar muttered, not looking up, “unlike most sorcerers.”

  “His Honor, Proconsul Ionfeu!” Hardgraa proclaimed, “and Countess Eigaze. And his Majesty, King Rap of Krasnegar.”

  Sagorn sighed. “And he has always had a flair for dramatic entrances.”

  3

  Shandie had sprung to his feet, staring at the big man who stepped forward. For a moment no one spoke.

  Ylo had seen fauns often enough around stables, but never one this size. He was taller than anyone else present, except the jotunn, and the bulk of his heavy cloak made him seem clumsy. No one would ever call his face handsome. A purebred faun would have said it was too aggressive and a jotunn that it indicated far too much pure stubbornness. It impressed Ylo with the thought that its owner might be a very difficult opponent, were he on the wrong side. And he was a sorcerer—uncanny foreboding battled with relieved feeling that help had arrived.

  “Rap!” the imperor whispered, still staring disbelievingly. “Really Rap?”

  A small, wry smile twitched the corners of the faun’s wide mouth, changing his appearance dramatically. “My, Shandie, but you’ve grown! I’ll bet you can’t wriggle through that transom into the Imperial Library anymore.”

  “Ah, Rap!” The imperor strode forward; monarch impacted monarch in a mutual embrace.

  Lady Eigaze was beaming happily at her husband. Sagorn hauled himself stiffly to his feet. Shandie led the faun over to the chair to meet his wife and sleeping daughter.

  Sorcerer? Ylo discovered that he had instinctively eased back against the cracked and peeling plaster of the wall. So had everyone else. The room was crowded now, with eleven people in it, for Hardgraa had remained to watch, but the onlookers were all giving the sorcerer a wide berth.

  As he shook hands with Sagorn they eyed each other with what seemed to be mutual respect, but no obvious warmth. Then he moved on to the portly Umpily, waiting for Shandie to make the introductions.

  The imperor frowned. “Your Majesty… Our Royal Cousin of Krasnegar…”

  “Ugh! Why not just ‘Rap’?”

  Shandie nodded brusquely. “Why not? But now that you are here, we can move back to more… to the palace?”

  The big man was shaking his head gravely. “This is an excellent place for a confidential meeting. The building is shielded against sorcery. It is one of the most private locales in the city, and I vouch for Doctor Sagorn’s discretion. No, let us discuss the problem here before we go anywhere else.”

  Shandie was not accustomed to being overruled. Pique flickered over him like summer lightning, but even imperors did not argue with sorcerers. “Very well. However, we may not need quite so large an audience.”

  Ylo almost laughed as he watched Umpily’s flabby face collapse in dismay. The snoopy chief of protocol would die of chagrin if he was banished from this epochal conference.

  The king seemed to sense that, because his wry little smile twitched
into view again. He thrust out a hand. “My name’s Rap,” he said, unnecessarily.

  Bristling, Shandie made the introduction, then presented the others also. When Ylo’s turn came, he found the experience unnerving. He had never shaken hands with a ruling monarch before, or a sorcerer, and he felt as if the big gray eyes were drilling into his thoughts. Again he decided that he would not want to have this man as an enemy. Then he remembered that sorcerers could read minds… couldn’t they? He hoped no one was going to ask him about the preflecting pool.

  Do not think about the preflecting pool!

  The sorcerer shot him a curious glance before moving on to shake hands with Acopulo.

  But the courtesies could not last forever, and when the faun had been all the way around the group, the time for business had clearly arrived. Without deferring to the imperor’s superior status, he brashly directed Eigaze to the second armchair—the impress, still holding her sleeping child, had not risen. Then he said offhandedly, “You want to sit there, Shandie?” indicating the high-back seat by the table.

  “Perhaps not,” the imperor replied testily.

  “Then Doctor Sagorn can rest his old bones on it.” Leaning back against the fireplace. King Rap looked over the company with an expression of unbelievable innocence.

  Shandie smiled grimly. “Please do sit, Doctor. I’ll be fine here.” He perched on the arm beside his wife. Everyone else found a patch of wall, again leaving the sorcerer isolated. The room was unpleasantly stuffy already, the smell of wet clothes now more noticeable than dust or mildew.

  It was a very strange setting for an historic conference. Ylo wondered if he would be listed in the history books; if there were to be any more history books. He recalled that he’d had much the same thought on Nefer Moor, just before the dragons came.

  “I bring no good tidings,” the sorcerer said, suddenly grave. “The only cheerful news I can give you is that I detect no magic on any of you—no loyalty spells or occult glamors or any abominations like that. I can’t be quite certain, because a better sorcerer could deceive me.”

  “You are modest, your Majesty,” Sagorn said acidly.

  King Rap looked down at him thoughtfully. “No, Doctor. I admit that I had great powers once, but not now. I’m not going to try to explain that at the moment. Perhaps never.” He turned back to the imperor. “I shall do what little I can, Shandie, but magically it will be very small. If you are expecting me to solve things, then you will be disappointed.”

  “I see.” The imperor’s eyes glittered icily, but when Shandie deliberately tried to be inscrutable he could baffle even Ylo, who had studied him meticulously for the last two years.

  The sorcerer shrugged. “I do not even know the name or nature of the enemy. Does anyone?”

  No one seemed willing to speak. Finally Shandie said, “Sir Acopulo? You are our advisor in such matters.”

  The little man pouted. “The problem obviously resides with the wardens. Speculation upon insufficient data is invariably hazardous. As a working hypothesis… suppose that a serious split developed among the Four, between North and West on one hand, and South and East on the other. The dwarf and the troll support your Majesty’s accession. The elf and the imp oppose it, for reasons unknown.” He cast a wary glance at Sagorn.

  “Continue!” the imperor said, nodding.

  “Two being sufficient for confirmation of your accession, Grunth and Raspnex preempted the others by calling on you to perform today’s…” Acopulo dried up, apparently discomfited by the jotunn, who had developed a sneer of fearsome proportions, deepening into bottomless chasms the clefts that always flanked his upper lip.

  “And the thrones?” Shandie demanded.

  “Lith’rian and Olybino’s retaliation, Sire? Or a counterstroke that came too late? Had the four thrones been destroyed sooner, then the ceremony would have been impossible.” He hesitated, then blurted, “It fits the facts!”

  “It does. Doctor Sagorn?”

  The jotunn shook his head pityingly. “It fits a judicious selection of the facts, Sire. As a student, Acopulo was always selective in his use of evidence, and I see he has not changed. The last news we had of the wardens, Lith’rian was hurling his dragons at Olybino’s legions. They were at each other’s throats! Now we are to regard them as allies?”

  Ylo noticed that the sorcerer draped against the mantel was obviously amused. In happier circumstances he also would enjoy watching this battle of brains, this scholarly free-for-all, with its air of sharpened quills, gutters running with ink, massacred hypotheses.

  Already Acopulo had lost much of his usual clerical calm. His face was crimson and his white hair stuck up almost as wildly as the faun’s did. “That is your only objection?”

  “It is the least of them. Granted that the Four often squabble, you have failed to explain why this disagreement is so much more virulent than all others in three thousand years—so dire that it required desecration of the Rotunda. You did not explain the dwarf’s prophecies and warnings. You did not explain why King Rap has come from Krasnegar. And you have most certainly failed to explain why, after a thousand years of extinction, a pixie should reappear now, and to his Majesty.” Sagorn leered in satisfaction.

  The faun spasmed upright. “Pixie?” He looked to Shandie.

  The imperor began to explain about the woman who had told him of the preflecting pool and went on to describe the whole incident.

  Evil take that pimping puddle! Ylo’s dukedom had receded into the mists now. He should have grabbed it when he had the chance, instead of letting himself be seduced by erotic promises. Eshiala was intent upon her child, who stirred in her sleep. The glow of candlelight on the woman’s face would drive a man to distraction. Gorgeous though she was, a few minutes’ physical excitement on a lawn was hardly worth a dukedom. She was impress now, but perhaps only in name. Who could say what other changes would come before the daffodils?

  Eigaze, in turn, was watching Eshiala. Had the old dear ever managed to stay silent for so long in her life before?

  The others were listening to the imperor. Umpily must be in raptures at all the secrets unfolding. Acopulo was probably being driven frantic by his lack of clear understanding. Hardgraa must be fretting about the danger to Shandie. The elderly, stooped Count Ionfeu was… was watching Ylo. Ylo looked away quickly.

  The story had ended. “So I think I saw your son,” the imperor concluded. “I feel that I should apologize, somehow, but of course it was by no choice of mine.”

  “You did see Gath.” The faun glowered. “And he saw you! It may even have been the same night, but it doesn’t matter if it was or not. He had a brief vision of a soldier, we didn’t realize it was you until about a month ago, or I might have come sooner. I fear I should have come a year ago, for I was warned then that the end of the millennium was brewing trouble.”

  “Warned by whom?” Sagorn demanded.

  “A God,” the faun said, with a sudden twinkle of amusement. “I’m not sure which God They were. One doesn’t think to shoot questions when Gods appear. I thought that the end of the millennium was awhile off, but I seem to have interpreted the date too literally. A year or two either way… When did the War of the Five Warlocks begin?”

  “Around 2000.” Acopulo frowned, uncertain.

  “The Festival of Healing, 2003, was when Ulien’quith fled the capital,” Sagorn said snidely. “You are right, your Majesty. A year or two either way does not matter.”

  “But the millennium itself does!” the faun said. “The pixies disappeared in the War of the Five Warlocks. Now his Majesty has seen a pixie. That seems to fit, somehow, doesn’t it? Every sorcerer from the wardens on down seems to have disappeared—I detect almost no occult power in use anywhere. I sense a terrible evil overhanging the world. Warlock Raspnex’s warnings of chaos and the fall of the Protocol—those may fit, also, although I am far from ready to trust the dwarf. Any dwarf.”

  Sagorn and Acopulo frowned, glanced at each other
, and then frowned even harder, in reluctant agreement.

  “It was the dwarf who arranged his Majesty’s formal accession,” the jotunn growled.

  Acopulo nodded. “Surely if we were to select the warden most likely to be trusted —“

  “No!” Rap barked. “Raspnex is the last one we should trust. On my way here I could feel…” His voice trailed off into silence. He was staring fixedly at Ylo’s feet.

  The others waited, then began sharing puzzled, frightened glances. Ylo glanced down at his own sandals and could see nothing wrong. They matched. He looked back at the faun, and now his gaze was slowly tracking across the floor.

  Had he gone mad? He was pale, tense…

  Gods preserve us! He was seeing something through the floor!

  Then he spoke, very softly. “Stand back from the doorway, Centurion. Don’t go for your sword. It will do no good.”

  Hardgraa reached for his sword automatically, then reluctantly took his hand away again. He stepped a pace sideways.

  “Cousin!” Shandie said, rising from the chair arm. “Rap? What’s wrong?”

  “We are about to have a visitor,” the sorcerer said hoarsely. “I am not the only one who indulges in dramatic entrances, Sagorn.”

  There had been no sound from the stair.

  The jotunn rose from his chair, tall and silver-haired and grim-faced. “Who?”

  “Warlock Raspnex.”

  The door creaked open.

  4

  The warlock halted in the doorway and glared across the room at the imperor. Even at that distance, he had to tilt his oversize head to do so. He was about half as tall as Sagorn, but twice as wide; Hardgraa would have nothing on him in chest and shoulders. His hair and beard were grizzled. His face had the gray roughness of weathered rock, so that the wrinkles resembled cracks. He was gray and clothed in gray.

  “You’re a fool, imp!” he growled. Dwarves’ voices always sounded like grindstones at work.

  Shandie bowed impassively. “You honor us with your presence, your Omnipotence.”