A Magic Broken (7 page)

But long before the sun had even begun to approach its zenith, they heard the steady beat of horse hooves on the hard Amorran road over which they’d been travelling.

Lodi gesticulated, and the young dwaves fell silent. The beat of the hooves continued to grow louder, and it soon became clear they were coming from the north. Another gesture, and the rest of his small party followed him off the road and concealed themselves in the brush of the nearby tree line. They did not have to wait long before the horsemen came within sight.

There were three of them. The apparent leader was a tall, dark-haired Man astride a black horse. He was armed with a longsword of the sort favored by the warriors to the north, and that, combined with his pale skin, marked him for a Savonder. His two companions looked like guards of some kind, as neither were wearing any weapon at their belts except for the usual dagger. They sported the same crest on their tunic as did the Man they followed.

Lodi was sure the three Men would ride right past, as the flattened stone of the road betrayed no sign that five dwarves and an elf recently had left it. But the tall Man had no sooner ridden by than he pulled up his horse abruptly and began peering into the forest on either side of the road, looking for all the world like a fox that had just lost the scent of the prey it had been stalking. As his two companions halted their mounts, the leader withdrew a dagger from the folds of his cloak and moved it from side to side like a lodestone.

To Lodi’s horror, the tip of the blade continued to move left, until it was pointing almost directly at him. Magic! The Man was a wizard! He glanced at Gulfin’s bandaged arm and guessed how the wizard had been tracking them. He desperately wished he had thought to buy a crossbow, but it was too late for that now.

Panic gripped his bowels, but Lodi forced himself to remain motionless. If the Deep Dark was going to claim him now, then it would claim him, although the thought of it happening under the bright of the sky was bitter iron indeed.

There was no point in trying to steal away. Even if the wizard didn’t hear them, he’d only follow, and they couldn’t hope to outrun his longer legs, much less the horses.

Then it occurred to him that if the magicked dagger was like a lodestone, it gave away their direction only, not their distance. All he had to do was wait in silence, then surely the wizard would approach close enough for Lodi to bury an axe in his skull before he even realized Lodi was there. Once more, Lodi found himself lamenting the absence of his battleaxe. It would have given him another three fores of range.

He drew the hand axe from his belt as quietly as he could. As the wizard dismounted and took a step toward the trees in which they were hidden, Lodi glanced left and right and made an old mining gesture with his free hand. The young dwarves didn’t so much as nod to acknowledge him. They were bright lads, and even if they hadn’t worked long in the mines, they understood. Danger. Don’t move.

But the wizard confounded him by refusing to approach any closer. Instead, the Man slid his dagger back into its sheath and spread his hands.

“Come forth, if you please, good dwarves. I mean you no harm.”

Lodi didn’t answer. This was unexpected. He waited patiently to see what the Man would do next.

“I am only here for the elf. And I swear by the mountain’s heart and the Deep Dark I will do her no harm either.”

Lodi looked over at the elfess. She shook her head in bewilderment. It appeared she didn’t recognize the Man either.

The wizard waited long enough that his two guards began to fidget and sigh. Finally, he surprised Lodi by laughing out loud.

“Look, my dwarven friends, you must understand that I know you’re there. The blood on this blade tells me you’re hiding in these trees standing in front of me. And I would much prefer for you to come out and listen to what I have to say without forcing me to set you all on fire. I don’t wish to harm anyone, least of all your elven companion, but you will leave me with little choice if you will not speak.”

Lodi came to a decision. The wizard clearly wasn’t going anywhere, so Lodi would have to go to him. But not the others. Stay, he gestured to them. Then, warily, he rose to his feet and trudged toward the Man.

The wizard nodded to him, and to Lodi’s relief, showed no sign of intending to set anything on fire. Those who delved deep under the ground used fire as a matter of course, but few knew its risks better or feared it more.

“What do a Man want with an elf?”

“The Lady Everbright is of particular interest to me. I have been seeking her for months.

“You’re a wizard. But you wear the whorelord’s badge.”

“A necessary subterfuge. Savondese mages are unwelcome in Malkan. Rest assured, dwarf, no brothel owner can afford to keep a mage on staff.”

“I don’t know nothing about that,” Lodi said. “Answer me. What you want with the elf?”

The tall wizard smiled. “Knowledge, my friend. Only knowledge. She possesses it, and I require it. You need not fear for her. She will be received as honored guest of the King of Savondir and will be provided every comfort and courtesy due her status.”

Her status? The mage called out something in Elvish that Lodi didn’t understand. But before the elfess even had a chance to respond, the sound of rapid hoofbeats coming from the north could be heard.

“I don’t suppose that’s likely to be travelers passing by,” Lodi heard the wizard muse aloud. “Goram, Osgilder, stay on that side and take my horse. The dwarf and I shall take the other side.

He winked at Lodi and stepped toward him. Lodi growled and had the momentary urge to bury his hand axe in the wizard’s chest, but he resisted it. If there were as many horses as it sounded, having what appeared to be a competent spellmaster on his side might prove extraordinarily useful. He could always kill him later.

The hoofbeats grew louder, and it was not long before the first horseman rounded the gentle curve of the Amorran road and came in sight. It was a city guardsman wearing light chain mail. But it wasn’t the guard or any of the five other guards following him that drew Lodi’s attention—it was the rider accompanying them in the red robes of a Malkanian city mage.

“You!” the city mage shouted, his face nearly as crimson as his robes. Lodi wasn’t always able to tell with Men, but he was beardless and therefore appeared to be youthful. “Savonder! Raise your hands above your head!”

Lodi saw the tall wizard smile as he half-complied. The Man raised his hands and exposed his empty palms, although he raised them only to the level of his ears.

“Disarm Aetias’s guards,” the city mage instructed his men. “Dwarf, name yourself. Are you with him?”

“Me Blombur son of Blowen,” Lodi lied, purposefully thickening his accent. “Me never see this Man afore,” he added truthfully.

“Then you are not with him?”

“No, Man lord. He stop me on road. Me no know why.”

“Is that true?” the city mage asked Aetias’s guards as his men took their weapons from them. When the two guards confirmed Lodi’s words, he turned back toward the wizard with his hands upraised.

“Know that I can kill you where you stand, Savonder. Do not be deceived by my years. I am a magus of the Red.”

“Are you really?” Lodi heard the tall wizard drawl. “I cannot tell you how impressed I am.”

The magus of the Red didn’t rise to the bait. “I suspect you are perfectly well aware that the penalty for unauthorized entry into Malkan is death for any magic user. But I will make you an offer. Surrender to me, tell us how you kept your power hidden from us, and your life will be spared. It is even possible that you may be granted residence in the city, if you wish it.”

“Your offer is a generous one, boy. I appreciate it. I only wish I could offer you a similar one. But my lord is not so kind.”

“Your lord?”

“His Majesty Louis-Charles, the thirteenth of his Name.”

The red mage’s eyes widened momentarily with surprise, but even so, his reactions were lightning swift. His left hand whirled around in a circle while a gesture from his right hand sent a burst of crimson hellfire directly at the Man standing next to Lodi.

Lodi shouted in alarm and dove to his right. He did not attempt to get up, instead he desperately continued rolling as fast as he could until he was off the road and into the grass, scuttling on all fours for the relative safety of the trees. But when he looked back, he was astonished at what he saw.

Instead of lying dead and smoking, as Lodi assumed, the tall Savonder was still upright, sending one blue flash of lightning after another crashing into the golden aura with which the younger mage was desperately protecting himself. All seven guards were lying in crumpled positions on the ground, although Lodi couldn’t tell if they were dead or merely unconscious.

The crackling thunder was deafening, and the acrid stink of sulfur and ozone reminded Lodi of one particularly horrific underground battle during the second year of the siege, when he’d been escorting a pair of dwarven spellmasters and they’d run into a group of orcs accompanying three blood shamen. He watched with awe as the Savonder used his free hand to draw the same dagger he’d been using when Lodi had first spotted him, then shifted his grip and waved it at the struggling Malkanian.

“Do you know, boy, in the early days of my training, I used to complain about the way we were forced to waste time learning the use of conventional weapons. After all, we were to be the masters of fire, water, earth and air. Such a simple thing, this hammered bit of earth. Even a child could use it.”

The red mage’s face was slick with sweat, and his eyes were filled with terror. “Battlemage!” he hissed.

“Even so. An interesting choice of deaths, is it not? I wonder, will it be earth—” he lifted the dagger— “or fire?” The wizard threw two more bolts of lightning at the red-robe, shrugged as they were blocked by the latter’s shield, and then his wrist snapped forward. A moment later, the golden aura disappeared, and the young mage collapsed to the ground, both his hands clutching at the hilt of the dagger protruding from under his chin.

“Earth it is. A wise choice, boy. Quicker and with a little less in the way of pain.

Lodi froze as the tall wizard turned from the dying mage and regarded him without expression. Lodi still held his axe in his right hand, but he had the dreadful feeling that even if he could throw it faster than the wizard could hurl his deadly lightnings, it would probably just bounce off of some sort of magical shield or demon-cursed robe.

“There is no need to fear me, dwarf.” The wizard shook his head. “When I said I intended you no harm, I meant it.”

Lodi silently lowered his axe, less because he trusted the wizard’s words than because he suspected the weapon was useless to him.

“They dead?” he asked, pointing to the seven guards lying on the ground.

“Unfortunately, yes. Had that young fool there only kept his mouth shut, I would have spared them. But my king would not have Malkan know that we are capable of passing their wards as easily as dwarves pass their walls.”

Lodi took the hint. “Dwarves got no interest in Man wars,” he hastened to assure the wizard.

“I ventured to assume as much. As it seems we now share each other’s secrets, please convey the good wishes of His Majesty to the King of Iron Mountain. Savondir has always held the lords of the underdeep in the utmost regard, and he seeks no conflict with them. Now, would you be so kind as to do me the honor of presenting me to the Lady Everbright?”

The mage’s words were gentle enough, but Lodi recognized the steel underneath them. He shrugged. If the Savonders wanted to sneak a thousand mages inside the walls of Malkan, it was no concern of the dwarves.

“Come out, all of you,” he called. “There is no danger.”

Although he knew it would not do the elfess the least bit of good if the wizard were lying, he was pleased to see the four young dwarves step forward in front of her, acting as a shield of sorts. And he was even more pleased to see the tall wizard nod gravely to them, acknowledging their courage. He suspected the Man knew how unlikely it was that dwarves would lift a finger for an elf, let alone defend one, in normal circumstances.

“This Man is a warmage from Savonder, Dashella,” Lodi told the elfess. “He say he been looking for you for a long time. Man, she call herself Dashella.”

“An honor, Lady Everbright,” the wizard said as he smoothly dropped to one knee and kissed her hand. To Lodi’s surprise, the Man said something in Elvish, something that produced a look of surprise, followed by the barest hint of a smile on the elfess’s long, narrow face. She gave him a reply in the same tongue.

“Alas, my lady Elf, that very nearly approaches the sum total of my knowledge of your tongue. I do beg your pardon. I ask only that you allow me the privilege of escorting you first to Suessa, from whence we will take ship to Oeile. After my colleagues in the art, who are very interested in consulting with you, are able to meet you in Lutèce, you will be provided with an honor guard to the court of your cousin.”

Lodi blinked. The elfess was of the blood royal?

“I know what you want, magic man,” the elfess said in the Man tongue. “But I am no use to you, as you already know. My powers, they are gone.”

The wizard shook his head. “Forgive me, lady, but that is not true. The power may be gone, but you are still of considerable interest to me. Your memory remains. I am sorry for your loss, but the L’Academie has no need of power, not even royal elven power. What we lack is a certain bit of lore that I know is in your possession.”

“Lore?”

“Words. Knowledge. That is all. Nothing more.”

“Which words would that be, precisely?”

The Man smiled and replied in Elvish.

The elfess looked pensive and was quiet for a moment.

“I know the spell of which you speak. It will be of little use to you. Our steeds of the sky cannot be tamed. They are too old and proud to serve Men.”

“I assure you, His Majesty does not covet your sky steeds. No, let me restate that. He harbors no designs on your warhawks, nor does he imagine any will consent to serve him. The spell is needed for another matter entirely.”