by William King
“You seem to be in good spirits,” said Rik.
“As do you,” said Sardec although it wasn’t quite true. Rick still looked thin and very unhealthy. There were shadows beneath his eyes and his face looked bony. There was an intensity in his gaze that was unsettling. He should have looked happier, Sardec thought. After all, he had been accepted into one of the greatest Houses in all of the realm. His patron was powerful enough to ensure that now. No one cast aspersions on his birth any more.
“When do you leave?” Tamara asked.
“Tomorrow,” Sardec said. “I join the Seventh. Under Lord Azaar again. We’re off to put down more of the walking dead and help free Kharadrea once more.”
He couldn’t quite keep the irony from his voice. He wondered if they would be any more welcome this time than they had been the last time. He hoped so. Rumour had it that Prince Khaldarus was gone, killed by the walking dead.
“I wish you luck of your new command,” said Asea. Sardec thanked her. He was sincere about it. He had tried to find a way to express his gratitude to her for closing the Gate and had never succeeded in doing it to his own satisfaction. It appeared that her sorcery was what had saved him that night at the ruined farm. Somehow she had disrupted the spell that kept the undead under control and granted them a limited intelligence. After she had closed the Gate they had become mindless and hostile even to each other.
He wanted to believe that that was the only reason he was here but he knew he would be deceiving himself if he thought that. He was a career officer now and she was the most powerful woman in the realm after the Queen. He had a connection to her and reminding her of that was his real purpose in coming here. He knew that Asea appreciated that when she presented him with an Elder Sign as a parting gift.
As he placed it around his neck he knew he was announcing that he was a partisan of her party and he did not mind that. If someone had to be in power in the realm, and someone always did, he was glad it was her. As he strode out of the Palace, he smiled. Rena was waiting for him and that thought made him happy.
From the balcony of Asea’s tower, Rik looked down on the night time city. He had a fine view of the river and the Pit. It seemed like a lifetime ago that he had met Rena there and become involved in Weasel’s plot to sell the ancient grimoire they had found in Achenar back to the Prophet Zarahel. He had not even known Asea in those days although he was soon to make her acquaintance.
In those days he had been a private soldier, unaware of his deadly heritage, unsuspecting of the part he would play in the future of the realm. As the voices whispered in his skull, it all seemed like a much more innocent time to him. He had succeeded beyond his wildest dreams in achieving his ambitions from those days. He was rich. He was a sorcerer of power, familiar with magic that not even Lady Asea had mastered. He had climbed out of the gutter and touched the stars he had reached for and he still was not entirely happy. He wondered if it was even possible now for him to be so.
There were times when he wished that he had never learned those secrets and had never become familiar with the practice of magic. There were times when he wished that he could be anonymous again. High Inquisitor Joran sometimes visited. Although he was affable he gave Rik strange looks, as if he suspected Rik indulged in forbidden practices. For the moment, Asea was too powerful for the Inquisitor to do anything about those suspicions but things had a way of changing. If he had learned anything, it was that there was nothing certain in Terrarch politics.
He supposed he should be grateful that he was still alive. There had been times during the long trip back from Askander when he had doubted that he would survive. The ship had carried them all the way to Harven and there had been a nerve-wracking period when it had taken all of Tamara and his skills to get them out of the seaport city. It had taken a great deal more effort to get them across the undead haunted lands and back to where the Talorean army waited. Since then he had lived very quietly. He had studied magic under the tutelage of both Asea and Tamara and he had learned a great deal.
He knew that sometime soon he was going to be called upon to use those spells and skills that he had learned. Things were changing in Terrarch realms. The humans were restless. The Terrarchs were uncertain. Rumours of what Xephan and his clique had planned circulated and many of the more progressive Terrarchs had been appalled.
Even those who secretly approved of that mad scheme claimed to be. It was unsafe to do anything else with Asea in the ascendancy.
If she called upon him to assassinate her enemies he would do it and not just because he owed her a great debt. He would do it because he agreed with her and he felt that those enemies were worth removing. He had finally reached a place from which he could change the world. The path that had led him there was a long one and a strange one. There were times when he wondered whether the Shadow had touched him after all when he thought so casually of murder. It was always possible. The Shadow worked in subtle ways; he had experience of that.
All he could do was his best. He could try and make the world a better place for humans because he was on their side and because they were the majority and deserved better than they had got so far. If that was the work of the Shadow then so be it. He smiled.
He lived in interesting times.
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