Authors: Mercedes Lackey
Tags: #Fiction, #Fantasy, #General, #historical, #dark fantasy
Dragon's Teeth (9 page)
Aurens permitted him, and the envoys of the other foreign powers, into his office, commandeered from the former governor. The aides remained behind. “My people will see to us, and to them,” Aurens said, with quiet authority. A look about the room, at the men in a rainbow of robes, with hands on knife-hilts, dissuaded arguments.
The door closed.
Kirkbride did not join with the others, drinking coffee and making sly comments about their guardians. He had the feeling, garnered from glances shared between dark faces, and the occasional tightening of a hand on a hilt, that all of these “barbarians” knew English quite well. Instead, he kept to himself, and simply watched and waited.
The hour of prayer came, and the call went up. All the men but one guarding them fell to praying; Kirkbride drew nearer to that one, a Circassian as blond as Aurens himself.
“You do not pray?” he asked, expecting that the man would understand.
And so he did. He shrugged. “I am Christian, for now.” He cast his glance towards the closed door, and his eyes grew bright and thoughtful. “But—perhaps I shall convert.”
Kirkbride blinked in surprise; not the least of the surprises of this day. “What was it that the caller added to the end of the chant?” he asked, for he had noted an extra sentence, called in a tone deeper than the rest.
The man’s gaze returned to Kirkbride’s face. “He said, ‘God alone is good, God alone is great, and He is very good to us this day, Oh people of Damascus.’ ”
At that moment, the door opened, and a much subdued delegation filed out of the door. Allenby turned, as Aurens followed a little into the antechamber, and stopped. His white robes seemed to glow in the growing dusk, and Kirkbride was astonished to see a hint of a smile on the thin, ascetic lips.
“You can’t keep this going, you know,” Allenby said, more weary than angry. “This isn’t natural. It’s going to fall apart.”
“Not while I live, I think,” Aurens said, in his crisp, precise English.
“Well, when you die, then,” Allenby retorted savagely. “And the moment you’re dead, we’ll be waiting—just like the vultures you called us in there.”
If anything, the smile only grew a trifle. “Perhaps. Perhaps not. There is wealth here, and wealth can purchase educations. In a few years, there will be men of the tribes who can play the politicians’ game with the best of them. Years more, and there will be men of the tribes who look farther than the next spring, into the next century. We need not change, you know—we need only adopt the tools and weapons, and turn them to our own use. I would not look to cut up the East too soon, if I were you.” Now he chuckled, something that surprised Kirkbride so much that his jaw dropped. “And in any event,” Aurens concluded carelessly, “I intend to live a very long time.”
Allenby swore under his breath, and turned on his heel. The rest, all but Kirkbride, followed.
He could not, for Aurens had turned that luminous blue gaze upon him again.
“Oxford, I think,” the rich voice said.
He nodded, unable to speak.
The gaze released him, and turned to look out one of the windows; after a moment, Kirkbride recognized the direction. East.
Baghdad.
“I shall have need of Oxford men, to train my people in the English way of deception,” the voice said, carelessly. “And the French way of double-dealing, and the German way of ruthlessness. To train them so that they understand, but do not become these things.”
Kirkbride found his voice. “You aren’t trying to claim that ‘your people’ aren’t double-dealing, deceitful, and ruthless, I hope?” he said, letting sarcasm color his words. “I think that would be a little much, even from you.”
The eyes turned back to recapture his, and somewhere, behind the blue fire, there was a hint of humor.
“Oh, no,” Aurens said, with gentle warmth. “But those are
Arab
deceptions, double-dealings, and ruthlessness. Clever, but predictable to another Arab; these things are understood all around. They have not yet learned the ways of men who call themselves civilized. I should like to see them well-armored, before Allah calls me again.”
Kirkbride raised an eyebrow at that. “You haven’t done anything any clever man couldn’t replicate,” he replied, half in accusation. “Without the help of Allah.”
“Have I ever said differently?” Aurens traded him look for ironic look.
“I heard what happened before the battle.” Aurens, they said, had ridden his snow-white stallion before them all. “In whose name do you ride?” he had called. “Like a trumpet,” Kirkbride’s informant had told him, as awed as if he had spoken of the Archangel Gabriel.
And the answer, every man joined in one roar of response.
“In the name
of
Allah, and of Aurens.”
Aurens only looked amused. “Ride with me to Baghdad.” This had less the sound of a request than a command. “Ride with me to Yemen. Help me shape the world.” Again, the touch of humor, softening it all. “Or at least, so much of it as we can.
Inshallah.
I have Stirling, I have some others, I should like you.”
Kirkbride weighed the possibilities, the gains, the losses. Then weighed them against the intangible; the fire in the eyes, the look of eagles.
Then, once again, he looked Aurens full in the eyes; was caught in the blue fire of them, and felt that fire catch hold in his soul, outweighing any other thoughts or considerations.
Slowly, knowing that he wagered all on a single cast of the dice, he drew himself up to attention. Then he saluted; slowly, gravely, to the approval of every one of the robed men in that room.
“To Baghdad, and Yemen, Aurens
,”
he said.
“Inshallah.”
This story first appeared in
Fantasy
Book
magazine; it was later combined with the following story, “Dragon’s Teeth,” and stories by Marion Zimmer Bradley and Jennifer Roberson for a volume originally called
Bardic
Voices,
later published by DAW as
Spell
Singers.
Martis is very close to being a soul-sister to Tarma and Kethry
.
Balance
Mercedes Lackey
“You’re
my bodyguard?”
The swordsman standing in the door to Martis’ cluttered quarters blinked in startled surprise. He’d been warned that the sorceress was not easy to work with, but he hadn’t expected her to be quite so rude. He tried not to stare at the tall, disheveled mage who stood, hands on hips, amid the wreckage she’d made of her own quarters. The woman’s square features, made harsher by nervous tension, reflected her impatience as the mercenary groped for the proper response to make.
Martis was a little embarrassed by her own ill manners, but really, this—child—must surely be aware that his appearance was hardly likely to invoke any confidence in his fighting ability!
For one thing, he was slim and undersized; he didn’t even boast the inches Martis had. For another, the way he dressed was absurd; almost as if he were a dancer got up as a swordsman for some theatrical production. He was too clean, too fastidious; that costume wasn’t even the least worn-looking—and silk, for Kevreth’s sake! Blue-green silk at that! He carried two swords, and whoever had heard of anyone able to use two swords at once outside of a legend? His light brown hair was worn longer than any other fighter Martis had ever seen—too long, Martis thought with disapproval, and likely to get in the way despite the headband he wore to keep it out of his eyes. He even moved more like a dancer than a fighter.
This was supposed to guard her back? It looked more like she’d be guarding
him.
It was difficult to imagine anything that looked less like a warrior.
“The Guard-serjant did send this one for that purpose, Mage-lady, but since this one does not please, he shall return that another may be assigned.”
Before Martis could say anything to stop him, he had whirled about and vanished from the doorway without a sound. Martis sighed in exasperation and turned back to her packing. At this moment in time she was not about to start worrying about the tender feelings of a hire-sword!
She hadn’t gotten much farther along when she was interrupted again—this time by a bestial roar from the bottom of the stair.
“MARTIS!” the walls shook with each step as Trebenth, Guard-serjant to the Mage Guild, climbed the staircase to Martis’ rooms. Most floors and stairs in the Guild-hold shook when Trebenth was about. He was anything but fat—but compared to the lean mages he worked for, he was just so—massive. Outside of the Guards’ quarters, most of the Guild-hold wasn’t designed to cope with his bulk. Martis could hear him rumbling under his breath as he ascended; the far-off mutterings of a volcano soon to erupt. She flinched and steeled herself for the inevitable outburst.
He practically filled the doorframe; as he glared at Martis, she half-expected steam to shoot from his nostrils. It didn’t help that he
looked
like a volcano, dressed in Mage-hireling red, from his tunic to his boots; it matched the red of his hair and beard, and the angry flush suffusing his features. “Martis, what in the name of the Seven is your
problem?”
“My
problem,
as you call it, is the fact that I need a bodyguard, not a temple dancer!” Martis matched him, glare for glare, her flat gray eyes mirroring his impatience. “What are you trying to push on me, Ben? Zaila’s toenails, if it weren’t for the fact that Guild law prevents a mage from carrying weapons, I’d take sword myself rather than trust my safety to
that
toy!”
“Dammit, Martis, you’ve complained about every guard I’ve ever assigned to you!
This
one was too sullen,
that
one was too talkative,
t’other
one
snored
at night—” he snorted contemptuously. “Mother of the Gods, Martis, snored?”
“You ought to know by now that a mage needs undisturbed sleep more than food—besides, anyone stalking us would have been able to locate our campsite by ear alone!” she replied, pushing a lock of blond hair—just beginning to show signs of gray—out of her eyes. The gesture showed both her annoyance and her impatience; and pulling her robe a bit straighter could not conceal the fact that her hands trembled a little.
He lost a portion of his exasperation; after all, he and Martis were old friends, and she
did
have a point. “Look, when have I ever sent you a guard that couldn’t do the job? I think this time I’ve really found the perfect match for you—he’s quiet, half the time you don’t even know he’s there, in fact—and Mart, the lad’s
good.”
“Him?
Ben, have you lost what little mind you ever had? Who told you he was good?”
“Nobody,” he replied, affronted. “I don’t take anyone’s word on the guards I hire. I tested him myself. The boy moves so fast he doesn’t
need
armor, and as for those two toy swords of his, well—he’s good. He came within a hair of taking
me
down.”
Martis raised an eyebrow in surprise. To her certain knowledge, it had been years since anyone could boast of taking Trebenth down—or even coming close.
“Why’s he dress himself up like a friggin’ faggot, then?”
“I don’t know, Mart. Ask him yourself. I don’t care if my guards wear battleplate or paint themselves green, so long as they can do the job. Mart, what’s bothering you? You’re not usually so damn picky. You generally save your complaining till the job’s over.”
Martis collapsed tiredly into a chair, shoving aside a box of tagged herbs and a pile of wrinkled clothing. Trebenth saw with sudden concern the lines of worry crossing her forehead and her puffy, bruised-looking eyelids.
“It’s the job. Guild business—internal problems.”
“Somebody need disciplining?”
“Worse. Gone renegade—and he’s raising power with blood-magic. He was very good before he started this; I’ve no doubt he’s gotten better. If we can’t do something about him now, we’ll have another Sable Mage-King on our hands.”
Trebenth whistled through his teeth. “A black adept in the making, eh? No wonder they’re sending you.”
Martis sighed. “Just when I’d begun to think the Guild would never set me to anything but teaching again. But that’s not what’s troubling me, old friend. I knew him—a long and close association. He was one of my best students.”
Trebenth winced. To set Martis out after one of her old students was a cruel thing to do. The powers manipulated by mages gifted them with much that lesser folk could envy—but those powers took as well as gave. Use of magic for any length of time rendered the user sterile. In many ways Martis’ students took the place of the children she’d never have.
They often took the place of friends, too. She’d served the Guild since she’d attained Masterclass, and her barely past what for the unTalented would have been marriageable age. There were few sorcerers among her contemporaries, male or female, that didn’t secretly fear and envy the Masterclass mages. There were no mages of her own rank interested in taking a lover whose powers equaled their own. They preferred their women pliant, pretty, and not too bright. Martis’s relations with her own kind were cordial, but barren.
Trebenth himself had been one of the few lovers she’d had—and she hadn’t taken another since he’d toppled like a felled tree for his little Margwynwy, and she’d severed that side of their relationship herself. It was times like this one, with her loneliness standing bare in her eyes, that he pitied her with all his heart.
Martis caught his glance, and smiled thinly. “The Council did their level best to spare me this, I’ll give them that much. The fact is, we don’t know for certain how deeply he’s gotten himself in yet; we know he’s been sacrificing animals, but so far rumors of
human
deaths are just that—rumors. They want to give him every chance to get himself out of the hole he’s digging for himself. Frankly, he’s got too much Talent to waste. One of the factors in deciding to send me is that they hope he’ll give me a chance to reason with him. If reason doesn’t work, well, I’m one of the few sorcerers around with a chance of defeating him. After all, I taught him. I know all his strengths and weaknesses.”
“Knew,”
Trebenth reminded her. “Can I assign Lyran to your service, now that I’ve vouched for his ability, or are you still wanting someone else?”
“Who? Oh—the boy. All right, Ben, you know what you’re doing. You’ve been hiring guards as long as I’ve been training mages. Tell him to get the horses ready, I want to make a start before noon.”
When Martis had finished ransacking her room for what she wanted, she slung her packed saddlebags over her shoulder and slammed the door on the entire mess. By the time she returned—
if
she returned—the Guild servants would have put everything back in order again. That was one of the few benefits of being a Masterclass sorceress. The Guild provided comfortable, safe quarters and reliable servants who never complained—at least not to her. Those benefits were paid for, though; a Masterclass mage lived and died in service to the Guild. No one with that rating was ever permitted to take service independently.
Martis had a liking for heights and a peculiar phobia about having people living above her, so her room was at the top of the staircase that linked all four floors of the Masters’ quarters. As she descended the stairs, she found that a certain reluctant curiosity was beginning to emerge concerning this unlikely swordsman, Lyran. The order she’d given Trebenth, to have the lad ready the horses, was in itself a test. Martis’ personal saddlebeast was an irascible bay gelding of indeterminant age and vile temper, the possessor of a number of bad habits. He’d been the cause of several grooms ending in the Healer’s hands before this. Martis kept him for two reasons—the first was that his gait was as sweet as his temper was foul; the second that he could be trusted to carry a babe safely through Hell once it was securely in the saddle. To Martis, as to any other mage, these traits far outweighed any other considerations. If this Lyran could handle old Tosspot, there was definitely hope for him.
It was Martis’ turn to blink in surprise when she emerged into the dusty, sunlit courtyard. Waiting for her was the swordsman, the reins of his own beast in one hand and those of Tosspot in the other. Tosspot was not trying to bite, kick, or otherwise mutilate either the young man or his horse. His saddle was in place, and Martis could tell by his disgruntled expression that he hadn’t managed to get away with his usual trick of “blowing” so that his saddle girth would be loose. More amazing still, the swordsman didn’t appear to be damaged in any way, didn’t even seem out of breath.
“Did he give you any trouble?” she asked, fastening her saddlebags to Tosspot’s harness, and adroitly avoiding his attempt to step on her foot.
“He is troublesome, yes, Mage-lady, but this one has dealt with a troublesome beast before,” Lyran replied seriously. At just that moment the swordsman’s dust-brown mare lashed out with a wicked hoof, which the young man dodged with reflexive agility. He reached up and seized one of the mare’s ears and twisted it once, hard. The mare immediately resumed her good behavior. “Sometimes it would seem that the best animals are also the vilest of temper,” he continued as though he hadn’t been interrupted. “It then is of regrettable necessity to prove, that though they are stronger, this one has more knowledge.”
Martis mounted Tosspot, and nodded with satisfaction when his girth proved to be as tight as it looked. “I don’t think this old boy will be giving you any more trouble. From the sour look he’s wearing, I’d say he learned his lesson quite thoroughly.”
The swordsman seemed to glide into his saddle and gracefully inclined his head in thanks for the compliment. “Truly he must have more intelligence than Jesalis,” he replied, reining in his mare so that the sorceress could take the lead, “for this one must prove the truth of the lesson to her at least once a day.”