Heretic Spellblade

by K D Robertson

  The two men watched the hundred soldiers unload their wagons. Armor, weapons, food, barrels of booze, spare uniforms. Typical stuff.

  The other wagons were of more interest to Nathan.

  “I understand that. But the clerks?” he asked.

  Kuda smiled and said nothing.

  Two of the wagons had carried people, rather than goods. Unlike soldiers, civilians aren’t used to marching all day long. While Nathan had expected some administrative staff to help Kuda, there were far too many clerks here.

  A couple dozen paper pushers bumbled around the wagons, doing a terrible job of unloading their supplies. One wandered over to the outer gatehouse, looking thoughtful. The rest seemed awed by the fortress they found themselves in.

  Nathan had been busy these past two weeks. One item he had knocked off his to-do list was finishing the fortress. The keep stood tall, casting a shadow over everybody in the courtyard. But it now stood on top of a hill, giving it a height advantage, and a thick wall ringed the entire courtyard. Nathan hadn’t wasted much effort making the wall too high. Ten meters was plenty. Champions could still hop over the wall, but it was enough to deter a normal army.

  Especially as two layers of defenses sat outside the wall. One was a simple ditch. It was empty, but any attackers had to first run uphill, then traverse a three-meter-deep ditch. When the attacker got past the first ditch, he’d find himself facing another ditch.

  Except this one was filled with barbed stakes.

  It wasn’t the strongest fortification that Nathan had built, but he felt it would cause a lot more trouble to a conventional army than they likely bargained for. The limestone in the wall was reinforced by the binding stone, so siege weapons would be less effective than normal. With another week or two, Nathan would have the power to add a magical barrier to the fortress, preventing a sorcerer or Champion from easily destroying the wall or ditches.

  Given the fortress had been a pile of rubble two weeks ago, he forgave the clerks for being a little shocked.

  “The clerks?” Nathan asked again.

  “This is the border with the Amica Federation. It is also the fortress of the Bastion responsible for keeping the peace of the county,” Kuda explained. “Lady von Clair plans to re-institute the tariffs she is lawfully allowed to collect on goods entering and leaving the Empire. Furthermore, I suspect you will need some clerks to help you. You seem to be by yourself here. When merchants and others come to take advantage of the security of your fort, you’ll need a hand.”

  Nathan grimaced. Kuda was right.

  Almost every fortress a Bastion set up attracted its own populace. Bastions were popular, which meant a certain type of people wanted to live near them. A Bastion’s fort was also one of the safest places to live, as they had Champions and soldiers present in large numbers at all times.

  And Gharrick Pass was a thoroughfare for trade. Nathan had noted that traders passed through almost every day, sometimes in large convoys. He had chatted with a few when they stopped to rest or request water. One had even stayed the night, trading some intelligence about the Federation’s growing military near the border in exchange for a night’s accommodation.

  “Why haven’t you collected tariffs in the past? Surely that would have solved a lot of financial issues and allowed Anna to lower taxes to attract more peasants,” Nathan asked.

  “In case you haven’t noticed, we have something of a bandit problem,” Kuda said drily.

  “They’re attacking the traders?”

  “Enough that if we charged a tariff or toll, they’d almost all go the long way, through Forselle Valley to the north.”

  “That’s a long trip. Easily another week or more for your average merchant,” Nathan mused.

  “Compared to the cost of paying for guards, paying an eighth of your best product in tariffs, and then risking bandit attack anyway? Only the larger convoys dared to come through when we did have a tariff. For the most part, that’s what we see. The bandit attacks ceased when we stopped trying to collect tariffs a couple of years ago.”

  Nathan stared at Kuda. “And that’s not suspicious to you?”

  Kuda laughed. “Goddess, no. Even Bastion Leopold felt that the Federation was funding the bandits. A lot of the wealthier families in the Federation use this route to trade with the Empire, and it’s big money for them.”

  “And he still did nothing?” Nathan pressed. Bastion Leopold was Nathan’s direct superior, and the Bastion who had appointed him, according to his implanted memories. Although Nathan knew of the man from his own timeline.

  “The Empire’s focus is to the north, on Trafaumh. Bastion Leopold’s hands were tied, I understand. We tried taking other steps, but they never went anywhere. Politics, you see.” Kuda sighed. “Eventually, we applied for and got you. Despite my concerns, you seem a cut above the average Bastion.”

  “You don’t think much of Bastions, do you?” Nathan asked.

  “Experienced ones? I think very highly of them. Bastions deserve their legends. But newer ones are like conscript soldiers. Until they’ve been blooded, they’re useless.” The beastkin gave Nathan a measured look. “Typically.”

  Nathan wasn’t sure what to make of Kuda. He looked young, younger than Nathan, and had an oddly handsome appearance to him. At the same time, he was deceptively knowledgeable, and seemed aware that Nathan knew too much for a new Bastion.

  The new arrivals to the keep added a much-needed atmosphere. Meals became more than Nathan eating in his office, with Fei in an empty dining hall, or a quick snack while patrolling and investigating the leylines and bandit activity. Nathan made the time to join at least one meal a day in the dining hall. Kuda had brought a few cooks, and at least one of them knew what he was doing.

  Technically, Nathan could make food using the binding stone. But it was awful stuff. Filling, but unsatisfying. Like eating raw dough in the shape of actual food. It had the nutrition of actual food, but nobody would call it food.

  It was during breakfast that Nathan found himself being asked about the fortress. Fei sat next to Nathan, her tail rubbing against him every couple of seconds as it beat back and forth. Kuda sat opposite him, cutting into an omelet.

  “What you’ve done is impressive, but how do you plan to expand?” Kuda asked. “You could build a separate partition for the fortress, closer to the pass, but you’ll lose the height advantage and have to dig up the ditches. Binding stone or not, that’s a lot of wasted energy.”

  Nathan waved off his concerns. “I can shift the wall and ditches out as I expand the hill. No wasted energy involved.”

  “Shift?” Kuda froze, a piece of omelet hanging in front of his mouth.

  “Displace? Move without changing? I’m saying that I don’t need to dig up the ditches or rebuild the wall,” Nathan said. He dug into his own omelet while waiting. It was beautifully golden and brimming with chunks of ham.

  Kuda slowly lowered his knife and fork. They clinked against his plate. Then he steepled his hands and eyed Nathan closely.

  “You’re saying that you can make the hill larger. And move the wall and ditches along the hill. After building this place in a couple of weeks,” Kuda said, his voice low.

  Nathan shrugged. Internally, he realized he might have made a mistake.

  Spatial displacement of physical objects wasn’t something he learned from his homeland. Narime had taught him the principles, when he had recruited her while trying to save the Amica Federation from destruction at the hand of Messengers. He didn’t know if other Bastions knew much about the method.

  Surely if Nathan had picked the technique up from a mystic fox sorceress, then other Bastions knew the technique. Kuda likely hadn’t encountered it, because most Bastions didn’t explain to others about their methods of using the binding stone.

  “I believe there’s someone you are overdue in meeting,” Kuda suddenly said. “Lady Nair.”

  “I’d hoped to have more information on the leylines before I wasted he
r time,” Nathan admitted. “But I’m not having much luck tracing the source of the disruption.”

  “All the more reason to see her now. I feel she would be very interested in you,” Kuda said. He resumed his meal.

  “Guess I’ll make a day trip of it,” Nathan said. “Fei, get your things ready once you’re done. We’re heading out.”

  “Eh?” Fei blurted out, spraying bits of food onto the table.

  Nathan looked at the mass of food on Fei’s plate. White sausages, huge slices of smoked ham, whole hard-boiled eggs. Protein, protein, and more protein, stacked as tall as Nathan’s fist. Fei easily had enough food on her plate to feed ten men.

  Half of her plate was a scene of destruction, as it was almost every morning. Fei ate enough to require her own personal cook, and she had to show up at specific times to get her food. She was never late, naturally.

  “I said, we’re heading out after breakfast.” Nathan took a bite of his omelet, which he felt was plenty for a normal person to eat of a morning. “So finish demolishing your buffet and get ready.”

  Fei pouted. “It’s not a buffet. All of you just eat too little. Especially you, Kuda. How do you even function with so little food?”

  “Very efficiently,” Kuda said.

  Chapter 11

  “Why do sorcerers always live in tall towers?” Fei asked as she and Nathan rode up to Nair’s tower. “Is there some reason behind it?”

  Nathan gave her a sideways look. Fei’s smile looked innocent, and her ears and tail remained still. Although that might have been because she was riding an automaton horse. A few weeks of lessons during patrols helped, but she was still uncomfortable on horseback by herself.

  “What sort of reason are you thinking of?” Nathan asked.

  Fei’s smile twitched. That was all Nathan needed to see to know she was faking innocence.

  He sighed.

  “You realize Nair is a woman, don’t you?” Nathan said.

  “Maybe she wants what she can’t have?” Fei broke out into a fit of giggles. “I mean, why else live in a gigantic penis.” Her giggles strengthened.

  Her joke was an old one. So old that Nathan remembered reading it when he was little. Everybody made the joke. Sorcerers lived in towers that resembled phalluses. Were they compensating for something? Lusting for something? Were the towers symbolic of the true nature of sorcerers?

  No doubt somewhere there existed a group of people who believed that the phallic nature of sorcerer towers was some sort of plot or conspiracy.

  “Towers are easy to defend, given their height and the ease of protecting one with magical wards and barriers,” Nathan explained. “A handful of defenders can hold the entrance, and you can hurl all the spells you like from up on high. It even applies when the tower is breached.”

  “So they climb the—” Whatever Fei was going to say dissolved into a mess of giggling.

  Nathan decided not to bother trying to explain any further. Fei’s mind was lost to her lewd jokes.

  Nair’s tower was uninspired by sorcerer standards, if taller than Nathan expected. Perhaps because it was old. The dark granite exterior was overgrown with vines and moss, and the stone looked aged.

  A low wall of limestone surrounded the tower in a perfect circle, with a gatehouse located at each of the cardinal directions. Fairly normal stuff for a sorcerer. Their type loved this sort of symmetry. The plain outside the wall was empty save for paved roads leading to the gatehouses from the nearby highway. Not a shred of vegetation could be seen within half a mile of the wall.

  Two suits of armor stood guard at the gate that Nathan and Fei rode up to. He eyed them warily. The magic within them was simple to detect.

  They were summons. Good ones, too.

  Although Bastions were renowned for their summoning talents, nothing stopped an ordinary sorcerer from creating their own summons. Nothing except the vast amount of power necessary to create and run the things. A binding stone was an all-in-one magical generator and battery that eclipsed anything created by humans or any other race. For a sorcerer to try to match one was folly.

  But that didn’t mean a sorcerer couldn’t create a handful of good summons. What made Nair strange was that she had summons outside of her tower. Most sorcerers that Nathan met only used a handful of summons—sometimes as few as one—and kept them close. A summon was an indefatigable defender. They didn’t sleep, didn’t eat, were unaffected by darkness or deception, and were far more powerful than any non-magical warrior. Assassins didn’t have a chance against one.

  But a summon couldn’t defend you if it was a hundred meters away.

  Nathan tried to open the gate. It didn’t move. Looking around, he couldn’t see any obvious method to contact Nair or any occupants.

  With no other options, Nathan banged on the wooden gate. The loud thuds echoed across the empty clearing.

  After close to thirty seconds—long enough for Nathan to want to leave and Fei to become bored—a voice spoke from the air.

  “I’m assuming from your uniform that you’re the new Bastion?” the voice asked. It was too distorted for Nathan to know who or what the speaker might be.

  “I am. Bastion Nathan—”

  “Nathan Straub,” the voice interrupted. “Yes, I know. Anna sent a message letting me know that you were here, among other things. Let us talk in person.”

  The voice vanished. A moment later, the gate creaked open. Somebody needed to oil the hinges.

  Nathan and Fei approached the tower. He was all but certain the speaker had been Nair herself, given she spoke of receiving a message from Anna. Regardless, he needed to keep his guard up.

  For all he knew, the Federation had already replaced Nair with an imposter and this was a trap.

  By the time Nathan and his Champion reached the base of the tower, the double doors at the front of it were open. A beautiful young woman stood outside, waiting to greet them. Vera Nair herself, Nathan assumed.

  She wasn’t wearing a uniform, which meant she wasn’t part of the military. Instead, Nair wore a blue robe cut to reveal plenty of thigh and cleavage. Definitely not military issue. Atop her robe was a combined jacket and cloak that almost glowed white in the morning sun. Her flowing red locks contrasted against her cloak, as did the golden adornments on her jacket and her many pieces of jewelry, such as her rings.

  Nathan noted the two badges on her cloak, connected to one another by brass chains. One badge identified her as a member of the Imperial Sorcerer’s Lodge, which was the only recognized authority for sorcerers in the Anfang Empire. The other was a badge of knighthood from the archduke of the region.

  So, Nair was an actual lady—a noble serving the Empire. Nathan had assumed others referred to her as Lady Nair out of respect for her position as a sorceress, but she was the real deal.

  He didn’t know what to make of this revelation. If anything, it was further proof of her allegiance to the Empire. A knighthood was hereditary in the Empire, unlike in many other nations, and granted many noble rights to the holder.

  “Lady Nair,” Nathan greeted, dismounting from his automaton horse. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

  “I imagine the pleasure is all yours,” Nair said. “And call me Vera. We’re equals, are we not? You’re a Bastion, I hold a knighthood and am a sorceress.”

  Fei didn’t even try to hold in her displeasure and shot Vera a scowl. But Nathan patted the beastkin on the shoulder and gave her a look before she said anything.

  While the sorceress was clearly being disrespectful, Nathan had nothing to gain by biting back. And she was technically correct.

  In terms of nobility, a Bastion was one of the lowest ranks. Equal to a knight, but above an untitled and unlanded noble. All nobles who had been granted land as part of their titles—known as landed nobles—were superior to a Bastion in rank. Baronets, barons, counts—it didn’t matter. Holding land made a noble superior to a Bastion.

  “She’s so rude,” Fei muttered as Vera led th
e two of them into the tower.

  “The purpose of a Bastion is to serve and defend,” Nathan explained. “She won’t be the first noble to try to remind us of that.”

  “But we’re the ones doing the fighting,” Fei protested, her voice raising slightly. Vera didn’t respond, but Nathan knew she heard Fei.

  “So is the army. The nobles rule the land, and we help them keep the peace.” Nathan raised his voice to make sure Vera could hear him. “Bastions hold the same rank as knights for a reason. We’re all protectors of the Empire.”

  Vera paused in her step. Would she turn around?

  She didn’t.

  The three of them ascended through several levels of Vera’s tower. The tower was a simple construction, with a single open atrium rising all the way to the top. Each level had a staircase at the opposite end and required them to walk around the circumference of the tower to get to the other side. The rooms of the tower were locked off behind windowless rooms and closed doors on each floor.

  Nathan glanced down and saw that it was a long drop.

  He could probably survive the fall. The natural enhancement from the binding stone made him physically sturdy. Crossbow bolts snapped on his chest, and even long falls weren’t as lethal as they otherwise should be. This tower hadn’t been built to be defended against a Bastion or his Champions.

  “Is that what I think it is?” Nathan asked when he spotted an archway placed against a solid wall. They were close to the top of the tower.

  “And what do you think it is?” Vera replied.

  “A gateway to another mage tower.”

  “It is. Well, almost. I can turn it into a gateway.” Vera grimaced. “My predecessors have used it, so it is active on this end. But the sheer expense in organizing a connection to somewhere else prevents me from using it.”

  Nathan nodded. A gateway was convenient, but somebody needed to be constantly feed it with magical energy and catalysts to keep it active. Even as a powerful Bastion, Nathan had been sparing in his use of gateways.