Finding Destiny (13 page)

“Diplomacy involves things like keeping an open mind toward offers and counteroffers, gauging the sincerity in offers of cooperation, an ability to weigh benefits and disadvantages, and being willing to compromise and meet the other side up to halfway. King Tethek made me the lead envoy because I have experience in these matters,” he told her.

The Consul-in-Chief started cleaning more of the grease from her fingers, using a clean scrap of the rag she had pulled from her sleeve, but he could tell she was listening. So was Catrine. Sort of.

“
Fine
. What do you, in your
vast
experience, say about giving them the very means to shield their evil machines against our spells?” Catrine asked, hands shifting to her hips.

“I say, first of all, their machines are not evil. They are simply tools, just like our swords and our lances. It is the
people
who wield them that determine whether they are used for good or for evil.” Zeilas could see that same half smile lurking on Marta’s face, but the other woman, Gabria, watched them with the sort of blank fascination of someone understanding nothing more than vocal tones and body language. “Second, even I, a non-mage, know that for every defensive spell invented, a counterspell
will
be developed sooner or later.

“Third, we
will
extend a reasonable amount of trust, and we
will
be honorable in acknowledging these
Guildarans’
efforts to offer their half of a diplomatic compromise. We learn about their machines, and they learn about our magics—you will notice that
they
offered first, with a show of trust on their part. The diplomatic thing to do is acknowledge that show of trust, and respond with some of our own. You reward good behavior with
more
good behavior, after all,” he reminded her. “Particularly when it’s finally being displayed.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the other side of Marta’s mouth twitch briefly upward. Facing the Consul-in-Chief, he switched back to Mekhanan. Or more properly, Guildaran, now that they were a new kingdom.

“Forgive us, Milady Chief,” he apologized, giving her a short bow. “Sir Catrine’s reluctance is typical of too many years of antagonism between your predecessor kingdom and our homeland. But King Tethek made his wishes clear. We are here to seek out and establish peaceful relations with Guildara. That you are willing to risk the secrets of your kingdom’s defenses shows more than mere words how much your side is interested in establishing those peaceful relations with Arbra. We, in turn, shall do our best to meet and match your sincerity.

“Sir Catrine, please assist the, ah ... sub-Consul, is it?” he asked, not entirely sure of her title. He knew a Consul was the head of a guild, but the rank and meaning of a sub-Consul eluded him.

“Sub-Consul Gabria of the ... Mage’s Guild,” the woman still kneeling on the ground confirmed, again with that same hesitation their long-departed escort had used. “Advisory staff to the Consul-in-Chief.”

“Not to mention, my good friend,” Marta added, both sides of her mouth curving up in a warm smile.

Zeilas blinked, surprised at how feminine the full-mouth smile made the Consul-in-Chief look, feminine and pretty. Her face was rather square compared to Arbran features, with plain, gray blue eyes and wisps of ash brown hair showing beneath the edge of her soft-felted cap. The knitted bulk of her tunic hid most of her figure, which she carried in a straight-backed, no-nonsense stance when facing off against Sir Catrine. But that smile made her beautiful.

It returned to its previous halfway state when she looked back at him. Tearing his gaze away from her, Zeilas gave Catrine a firm look. “Assist and instruct sub-Consul Gabria, Sir Catrine—in the interest of earning enough trust on both sides hopefully to build a solid foundation for peace.”

She rolled her eyes, but the Knight-mage started to lower herself to the leather mat on which the woman Gabria knelt. Zeilas switched back to Arbran, this time couching his words somewhat for subtlety.

“And do make sure to treat this machine as if
you
were going to be its very next operator. It will only do what we create and enspell it to do. It is not evil, in and of itself,” he reminded her. “Evil only exists when someone acts in an evil manner.”

The dark look she shot his way let him know his message had struck home.
Good. Now she’ll think twice about sabotaging the machine or offering poor spell choices that could cause harm to its operators.

“Sir Zeilas, while your fellow envoy cooperates with my advisor,” Marta offered in Guildaran, “would you like a tour of the Palace Precinct’s motorbarn? It may be the first time an Arbran has had the chance to view an intact war engine from up close with no fear for their personal safety. Hopefully, it won’t be the last time.”

He gave her a half bow. “I am honored by your offer and would be delighted to be given a tour.”

TWO

“This way, then.” Gesturing at the other machine-horses, she walked beside him, pacing down the row. “These are what we call motorhorses. They can run on smooth, level roads as fast as a cantering horse, but without needing to slow down and rest every so often, as a flesh-and-blood horse needs.

“Nor do they need to graze, though they do ‘eat’ a special liquid every hundred miles—the distance a man can walk in three days. It’s refined from common grains and grasses, empowering their movement, though it isn’t magic. We understand you occasionally use magic on your own carriages and wagons in Arbra to move goods and people from place to place, yes?”

“Yes. Horseless wagons with special locomotion spells. They’re expensive, but reliable when needed, such as when going up hills with heavy loads,” he admitted. “Horses are cheaper, particularly in the flatter sections of Arbra, but in the northern mountains, the miners and loggers prefer to use enspelled carts despite the cost. I understand these were used as a sort of counterpoint to our Knights on the battlefield, back in the Mekhanan days.”

“More for scouting than for jousting, but yes, they could be used for that. They do require both hands on the controlling rods, though, so we tend to team up in pairs for motorhorse battle. These are our small mobile
cannons
, and beyond them are the large siege cannons,” she added, nodding at the next group of machines they approached, the ones with the long tubes on wheels. “They’re used for firing explosive
charges
, sort of like exploding magical Artifacts. We’d rather not use them for two reasons. One, some of the minerals used to make the explosives are culled from farmlands, and Guildara is more mountainous than the northern lands, so our agricultural resources are geared far more toward feeding ourselves than in procuring the components we need.”

“And the other reason?” Zeilas asked.

Her gaze, fastened on the tube things, looked haunted for a moment. “They gouge holes in the land. Ruin crops, divot meadows ... destroy lives. We have stationary cannons at all the Precinct forts, of course, for defensive purposes, but we’d rather not see them on the move, trampling the land. These will be retrofitted for permanent posts of their own. Once they’ve been repaired, of course. The others that used to fill that back bay, there, were sent out before the start of winter to the two villages who wanted asylum from Warlord Durn. They’ve had their wheels removed and their axles filled with molten lead, so they cannot be easily returned to mobility, nor turned back against us.”

“A sensible precaution,” Zeilas murmured. Among the cannons, which were being repaired, over half of the men and women working on them slanted him wary looks as he passed. Deciding bluntness was the best tactic, he added, “Forgive me if I’m mistaken, but somehow I don’t think everyone in Guildara is happy to see an Arbran wandering around inside this place.”

“So long as you behave yourself, they’ll behave themselves. At least, in my presence,” she allowed. “I’m riding a tide of popularity based on a strong platform of favorable reforms, and the blessing of our Goddess Manifesting during the election process.”

“Yes, the election process. You have an ... unusual method of selecting your kings and queens,” he observed under his breath. “No offense is meant, but it is unusual.”

“We’d never have gotten everyone behind a single candidate for leadership, otherwise. Guildara survived the chaos of having Mekhana crumble and dissolve because the guilds have a very strong presence here in the southern mountains. Not even the priesthood could penetrate the full depths of our secrets—that’s how people like Gabria survived,” Marta revealed. “We figured out how to hide them and their abilities. But as I was saying, the guilds would never have agreed to a single representative, unless the Gods Themselves decreed it. Which, when I pointed
that
out, made undeniable sense to everyone.

“So we agreed each guild would put forth a candidate, who would then petition our chosen Goddess, and let Guildra decide who is the most fit to lead us. And, to make things fair, the petitions would happen once every five years, the same as the term of service for each guildmaster,” Marta told him. “It was just building further on a system that was already there, and thus everyone could grasp how it would all work. Bad leaders could be ousted at the end of their term, and good leaders could be retained.”

“So your guild put you forward as a candidate, and Guildra selected you?” Zeilas surmised.

The corner of her mouth quirked up. “Hardly. I was just the idiot child who figured out
how
we should pick our leader, rather than waste years bickering uselessly from inter-guild politics. I ended up being the event organizer for the great Convocation of Leadership, to prevent
that
from being turned into another round of endless committee meetings.”

“Sir Orana pointed out during the Knights’ Convocation just a month ago that most kingdoms cannot be successfully run by a committee,” Zeilas admitted. “She said the only land she knew of that
could
be run by a committee was both isolated and well protected against invasion, which gave
them
the leisure to argue matters to death. Most other lands don’t have the luxury of time for endless debate.”

“Sounds like she was secretly listening in on our inter-guild meetings—I met her once,” Marta added, lifting her hand and examining the pad of her thumb. She tilted it toward Zeilas. “I even signed her petition book with my own blood. Most guilds, we circulated our own books, once our ancestors realized she truly meant to help us. We saved them up for when she’d sneak back in for another visit. It was ten or so years ago that she last came through Durasburg, where I grew up, but I signed it. When she left, I didn’t hold any hope that we’d see the False God removed from power in my lifetime ... but we did. She’s one Arbran Knight
everyone
in Guildara will trust, for that reason alone. People like Sir Catrine ... well, there’s reason for caution and wariness on both sides.”

“She’s new to politics. After hearing Envoy Jellis explain why your people wanted instruction in spellcrafting, King Tethek sent her straight from one of our top Mage Academies. She
is
good at explaining the basics. She’s just ... not trained as an envoy,” Zeilas hedged. “Every Knight undergoes
some
instruction in things like negotiation and foreign etiquette, but not everyone has an aptitude for diplomacy.”

“No, they don’t,” Marta agreed. Since they had reached the next set of machines, the platforms balanced on tall, jointed pillars, she gestured at them. “These are the hexaleg troop transports. I understand ‘hex’ means something different in Arbran, something to do with magic, but in Guildaran, it’s just an old word for ‘six.’ Being machines, they weren’t built with spellcasting abilities, obviously. Six legs give them a great deal of stability over a variety of terrain, much more than four. They only have trouble going over swampy or muddy ground, or loose gravel and sand.”

“I wouldn’t mind seeing them in action one day—in a peaceful demonstration, of course,” Zeilas demurred. For a moment, both sides of her mouth quirked up, then settled back into that one-sided smile. “Anyway, you were telling me how you were chosen to lead?”

“Yes, well, as I said, I ended up organizing the whole thing. I wasn’t even paying any attention when She Manifested—instead, I was busy encouraging everyone else present to focus on the thought of Guildra, and on the qualities She should consider when selecting our best leader.” Marta shrugged, flicking a hand expressively. “All the candidates were up at the front of the amphitheater, with the expectation She’d Manifest there, select one of them to be the leader, and that would be that. The various guilds would grumble but deal with it, and we’d happily become a kingdom.

“I was on the upper tiers, encouraging people to concentrate. The next thing I knew, someone tapped me on the shoulder, I turned around, and there She was. She looked at me, said, ‘If you can put
this
into motion, and make
them
all agree, you can pull this nation together, and make it strong. Now go do it,’ and then She vanished.” Marta shrugged, spreading her mostly clean hands. “If Her reasons hadn’t been heard by everyone else, if I hadn’t had the crown Manifest on my head the moment She spoke, there might have been trouble. But there it was. Everyone had agreed to the system, they didn’t disagree at Her choice, and so here I am. Consul-in-Chief.”