“Vicar Kissane, so good to see you again,” said the wordsmith sharing the same dark skin as her. The man stepped forward and gently shook Eylene’s offered hand. She tried not to wince as she clasped Andrew Noble’s right hand. It was missing the index, ring and pinkie fingers. By the smirk on his face, she knew it pleased him to make people uncomfortable, and a grin split her face.
“Still making impressions, eh Andy?” she asked.
“Please, you know I prefer Andrew. Shall I start calling you Leeny, again? Hum?”
“Okay, truce!” She laughed and stepped closer to him and clasped his deformed hand with both of hers. “I’m sorry, I don’t have much time. Those idiots back in the church will wander off a cliff if I don’t hold their hands every minute of the day. Please tell me you have results?”
Andrew looked sad and looked down at the ground. Eylene felt her hope vanishing like smoke. Andrew lifted his head and then laughed. “Got you!”
Eylene threw down Andrew’s hand with a laugh and slapped Andrew on the upper arm. “Such cheek! Andy! Don’t play around with this. It is far too important!”
“Ha-ha! Sorry, couldn’t be helped. I’m still smarting from all the pranks you played on me as a child. Come follow me.” He held out his hand to the other two wordsmiths. “This is John and Peter, if you remember?”
Eylene smiled at the other wordsmiths and followed Andrew through another door and down a small set of steps. The wordsmiths followed in behind. She remembered very clearly who they were and suppressed a smile. They had followed her around like little puppies back in Shape. They were always looking to catch her attention like all the little boys and men did.
They emerged into a long and wide stone chamber, their footsteps sounding hollow and with a slight echo off the floor. There was an unpleasant scent in the air and Eylene scrunched up her nose in distaste. Her eyes were drawn to a table set near the entrance with an array of strange devices laid out on it. Eylene was surprised to see an archery target was set up about twenty feet away. Andrew moved to the table and beckoned Eylene to join him.
“See here, we have the results you wanted. We kept this from Healy at your request. It wasn’t easy. But the secret of the black powder is ours, I’m proud to say.” Andrew opened a large clay jar and picked up a small measuring cup. He used the cup to scoop out a small measure of a black, glistening powder. He poured a little of the contents into a wide metal bowl. Eylene leaned forward to look inside, but Andrew held her back. Smiling he grabbed a strange device and held it over the bowl and squeezed the metal handle. The device made a scratching sound and a series of sparks rained down into the bowl. With a flash of light and an eruption of smoke the powder ignited and burned away in a moment. Eylene gasped and stepped back quickly. Andrew chuckled. “Relax, Leeny. when it’s loose like this it merely burns in a flash. I wanted you to see just how volatile it is. It’s dangerous stuff.
“Now, here on the table is the true brilliance of the Word. We have manufactured weapons that will change warfare. I’m certain of that. I’ll have one of my assistants demonstrate. John, if you would?”
The wordsmith John stepped forward and picked up a weapon from the table. It was made of wood and metal and he placed the wooden end into his hand. Eylene could see it was shaped to fit a grip. John pointed the metal end which resembled a short, hollow rod away from him toward the archery target. He continued to point the device and then with a finger on the grip he depressed a small catch. Something on top of the weapon descended with a click and a spark was made. The spark lit a small amount of black powder. There was a flash of flame and smoke and suddenly the weapon made an extremely loud sound like thunder. Eylene cried out and saw the weapon emit a flash of flame from the metal rod. The archery target jerked and Eylene saw a large hole formed on the surface. John set the weapon down and Andrew fanned the smoke with his hands.
“You see, we can propel a lead ball some distance with force and accuracy. Each weapon can fire one ball. It’s a brilliant design. John here was the genius who thought of it. It took some work. Accuracy is confirmed up to forty feet. After that the balls tend to veer off target. We don’t know why. Still, impressive, is it not?”
Eylene walked over to the target and poked a finger into the hole. It was wider than her thumb. She turned to Andrew. “Forty feet? Archers can fire with accuracy well over a hundred yards. Farther even. It’s impressive, I’ll admit, but the range is rather poor.”
Andrew grinned. “I knew you would say that. Think on this: I can teach a hundred men to fire one of these in a day. It would take five years to train a hundred men to fire a bow with any accuracy. And the power of the ball is enormous. One hit will kill a man, even dressed in plate armour, and a glancing blow will stun him for quite some time. But watch this. Come back over here.”
Eylene raised an eyebrow but complied. As soon as she came around the table, the other wordsmith picked up a short bow and lifted a strange arrow off the table. The head of the arrow was a small wooden cylinder rather than an arrow head. Eylene could see a small piece of rope extended from it. The man notched the arrow to the bow and then touched the piece of rope to a small brazier on the table. The rope sparked and smoked. The man quickly lifted the bow, drew it and released the arrow. It plunged into the target and smoked.
Eylene blinked. “What is that…
She was interrupted when the arrow exploded in the target. Smoke filled the air. And they all coughed. Andrew said something to John, and the man went over to a device Eylene hadn’t noticed by the door. The man rotated a handle and suddenly Eylene could see the smoke being pulled to a small vent in the ceiling of the room. In a minute the smoke cleared. They moved over to the target and Eylene gasped. The centre of the target had a large chunk torn away. A crater the size of a soup bowl marred the surface.
“That’s incredible!” she said.
“Thought you would say that, too,” replied Andrew. “Now imagine the damage a hundred archers could do to an army with those.”
Eylene smiled. “Oh yes. I can imagine that with no difficulty. They wouldn’t even need to hit their targets. Well done, Andrew.”
“Thank you, Eylene. I’m very proud of our work here. This is historic.”
Eylene looked back at the table and the other explosive arrows and the strange weapons. “What do you call the weapons? The ones you hold?”
“We borrowed from the Navy, I’m afraid to admit. It’s a gun that you hold with your hand, so we called them handguns. Not very imaginative.”
“I like it. I want as many as you can make. I want them issued to the Church Guard at once with training. I want this power openly displayed.”
“I’m afraid we can only make perhaps two dozen in a month, Leeny. The precision required for the barrels will not let us proceed faster than that. We’ve only found one blacksmith with the skill. The lead balls require a tight fit to work. But not too tight, you see. It’s very precise work.”
Eylene whirled on Andrew. “How many do you have now?”
Andrew lowered his head and pinched his nose, knowing what was coming next. “Only three at the moment.”
“I need more! Two dozen by the end of the month. See to it.”
Andrew sighed. “As you wish. We will do our best.”
“See that you do, Andrew. Speed is important,” Eylene eyed the other two wordsmiths then beckoned to Andrew with her head. “Walk with me.”
Eylene led Andrew out and up the stairs. Outside the fresh air was sweet compared to the stench of the chamber. Eylene turned to Andrew. “How many know the secret?”
“Only six. I trust them. All of them. With my life. You know most of them from our childhood days.”
Eylene studied Andrew for a moment. “Very well. Pray it stays a secret.”
Andrew smiled and bowed his head a little. “Of course.”
Eylene smiled and moved closer to Andrew and kissed him on the mouth. “Excellent. Come around tonight. Lana will join us again. She pr
omises to do that thing again with her powers.”
Andrew smiled. “I wouldn’t miss it.”
Edward Hitchens, heir to the throne of Belkin, slammed shut another tome detailing medical case files and cursed in what he imagined was a very non-royal way. He had been rummaging through the old case files for hours. He had first tried to find the case files for the King, but the Chirurgeon’s Guild archivists told him they no longer held them. When pressed for an explanation they hadn’t seemed to find that odd. Frustrated, he gave up and instead opted to look at other case files and see if he could spot anything that supported what Martin had said.
My world is in turmoil. Hallucinations of my dead father and draoi and other peculiarities plague my life. It is enough to drive someone trained in the Word conniptions. Edward sat back and rubbed at his tired eyes. I would do anything to go back to being a simple chirurgeon. I think I will stop this pointless search. Nothing I read gives a hint of the king being poisoned.
Edward was forced to attend all manner of studies intended to prepare him for assuming the throne. Brent demanded it. He attended long tedious lectures by Robert Ghent and Robert Hargrave on the Councils and the Royal Laws. He was lectured on the history of the realm and the long line of succession to the throne. He was forced to remember the baronies, the lords and their roles in the land. It was beyond Edward’s ability to even fake interest. The worst of all the lectures were from the Church of the New Order. He was expected to lead the Church and profess his faith and belief in this god they proclaimed existed.
And not one shred of proof to back that claim up, thought Edward and snorted.
He pushed back from the desk. And then rested his hands on his knees and stretched his back. I’ve read every case file from the era. I’m done.
He rose and felt his knees crack. He grimaced and gathered up the tomes. One by one he returned the tomes to their shelves. He loved the act of returning things to their proper place. Seeing the neat rows and organised tomes, soothed him. Finally he finished and wiped the dust from his hands and headed for the exit.
Poor Martin, he won’t be pleased if I found nothing to support him. But what did he honestly expect? If what he says is true—that Hietower had been poisoned—they would have covered it up. Destroyed the evidence. And that would explain why the records are gone. Which certainly lends credence to Martin’s accusation, no? But there's nothing on Hietower here at all.
Edward paused at the exit as a stray thought occurred to him. What if…?
Edward turned around and went to a different section of the archives. He weaved his way past desks and bookshelves to the back corner. He glanced at the dozens of rows of bookcases that rose from floor to ceiling and started to read the labels on the ends which detailed the contents of the shelves. His fingers skimmed the words, and he moved from bookcase to bookcase. Finally he found what he was looking for.
“Here we are: Orders and Shipping, 860 to 880 A.C.”
He moved down the bookcase and searched the boxes for the right dates.
“A-ha! Here we go. Spring, 878 A.C.”
Edward pulled down a box and grunted at the weight. He carried it over to his desk and sat it down on the floor and opened it. He looked down at order receipts placed by the Chirurgeon’s Guild; all tied up in loose bundles sorted by date and by which chirurgeon had placed the order.
“If I can find an order for the right materials, it could lead somewhere… he murmured to himself. Part of him cheered. This was the work he cherished. Facts and figures spoke to him. The mystery drew him in and excited him.
Edward rummaged through the bundles until he found one that bore the mark for the Munsten Castle chirurgeon. He pulled out the stack of receipts and laid them on the desk and read them one by one. They may have destroyed the chirurgeons reports on Hietower, but the evidence may remain in material orders. Not everyone would consider looking here. He felt a glimmer of hope.
The next day Edward found what he was looking for. He held the receipt in his hand and stared at it. It was a simple order, made a few years before the Great Debate, and it was a large one, but Edward recognised all the ingredients. One was the most telling, it was an order for a large quantity of quicksilver. He admired the liquid. It was like a metal. It shone brightly and as a child he had often played with it. As a chirurgeon he knew better. The skin absorbed quicksilver, and it did things to people with prolonged exposure. No one knew why it harmed people, but the Chirurgeon's Guild had seen the association and banned quicksilver from practice.
All the ingredients in the order, he knew, could be combined to make a quicksilver pill. It would be exactly how Martin described it: blue-grey, but deadly. The pill had been thought to cure certain sicknesses of the sexual kind. Edward could see the date on the order was a couple of years before Hietower started to become openly unstable. But the Chirurgeon’s Guild had already banned quicksilver at that point. They knew the danger of it and yet ordered material to make the pills. Had they known its intended use?
Unlikely, he thought.
He looked at the receipt again. It was ordered by the Chirurgeon’s Guild, but the recipient of the material was the Church of the New Order. Edward’s thoughts spun. Nothing of this makes sense.
By the end of the next day, Edward had a stack of similar orders spanning the years of Hietower’s reign. They ended suspiciously when Hietower passed away. All the orders were for quicksilver and all for the Church.
The decline of King Hietower was well documented. It had started subtly years before the Great Debate. He became more and more unstable over the years and the end of the Great Debate tipped him over the edge. Edward could see how exposure to quicksilver over time would lead to Hietower’s mental decline. There would have been other symptoms, he knew. Tremors, insomnia, weakness, and headaches. No one mentioned those about Hietower. Just his emotional breakdown. The Church was crucial to Hietower. He was a devout follower. By all accounts the Church loved him.
Edward thought of what he knew about the Church at the time. Archbishop Greigsen had been friendly with the King. All accounts were that the traitor Bill Redgrave had been the one to conspire with John Healy to replace the King. Greigsen had been against it at first, but Healy had convinced him. It made no sense for Greigsen to have ordered something that would knowingly kill the head of the Church and someone he admired.
So, if the head of the Church, closest to the King, had no knowledge of the quicksilver pills then who in the Church did? This speaks of conspiracy.
Edward laid down the stack of orders and stared sightlessly straight ahead. Martin was right, but he doesn’t know the full truth of it. No one does.
What is certain is someone in the Church poisoned Hietower.
Will walked the woods alone, well outside Rigby Farm. His walk was a daily occurrence. He needed to feel nature and get away from people—even his own draoi. From miles away, he could sense the draoi probing him and he could feel their worry. Oddly, their worry hardly concerned him. Rather, he felt at peace for the first time in a long time. The worries he had carried for so long were gone. Will walked to the edge of a clearing and paused to admire the view. Sunlight poured down from the high sun to brighten the clearing in stark contrast to the shadowed woods. Insects gleamed and darted through the air and the buzz of grasshoppers was a constant drone. Wild flowers grew everywhere and scented the air. Will noticed the blueberry bushes surrounding the area and how they were bursting with ripe fruit. The clearing was nothing more than a rocky outcrop where plants fought to find a footing.
Will entered the clearing and sat on the flat rock in the centre. His tunic and pants were soaked with sweat and Will relished the feel of the breeze pulling the heat from his body. Will had long ago stopped using his powers to deal with such things as sweat. He was certain a continued use of powers would numb him to the human condition. Nadine agreed with him.
The thought of Nadine stirred a longing inside him and a panic, but as quickly as the feelings appe
ared they washed away, and he wondered what he had been thinking about. It suddenly occurred to him he had been having more and more incidents of not remembering. He frowned and then the feeling washed away.
Will smiled up at the bright sunlight. He loved summer. He felt the plants around him reaching tall for the warmth and energy of the sun. Around him stirred the animals and insects of the forest. They sensed him and wanted to be with him, and they approached. With them he sensed the approach of many midges. He frowned and sent them away with a pulse of power. Nothing likes the midges, he chuckled.
Long ago the stark focus of nature on him had been an unnerving experience. Now, as Freamhaigh, and sure of his powers, he welcomed the attention of nature. He closed his eyes and opened his arms wide and threw back his head.
“Come to me!” he said.
Over the next hour, the surrounding wildlife emerged from the shadows of the trees. Rabbits, squirrels, mice, rats, deer, and all manner of other creatures came forward and gathered around him. From the ground and under stones every insect and arachnid imaginable erupted. The air buzzed with flying insects and then birds and bats swooped overhead in broad arcs, crying their joy. Life approached him without fear and basked in his attention.
“I welcome you,” he said and felt a tremor of joy pass through the nearby life. He lowered his head and opened his eyes. All around him was every living thing that had been in the surrounding mile. “I asked you here to talk to you.”
Will felt the gathering still in anticipation. When he spoke the words and sent their meaning across the bond, it was to the Simon motes that inhabited the world around him that he truly spoke. Will wasn’t certain if when he spoke to the motes that the creatures heard and understood the words, too. He had questioned Nadine on this many, many nights ago.
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