Spellbound (19 page)
Authors: Blake Charlton
“Even though you didn't attack him, the demon's going to figure out what we're up to and flee. It would take us another decade to discover where he'll resurface. We don't have that kind of time. The academy is too close to a schism.”
“Let me guess, you think we should use the contingency plan.”
His tone became insistent. “Think about it. We could go to the colaboris station, send a message to our allies in Kara, and this whole thing will be over by tomorrow night, no chance for the demon to slip away.”
“We can't waste a chance to catch Nicodemus, the half dragon, and the demon all in one go. Besides ⦠it's too clumsy.”
“It is not,” Lotannu said coldly. He had been the architect of the contingency plan.
“I didn't mean that it's clumsily conceived. But however well executed the plan is, it might leave half this city's population dead.”
“What if the demon calls all of his wind mages down on us tonight? Your tidy little mission won't be so tidy then.”
“Don't sulk.”
“I feel the need to sulk.”
“My old friend, have I ever told you how much I love you?”
“Every time you pretend not to have heard what I just said.”
“I'm sorry,” she said before loudly asking, “What did you say?”
Cyrus followed Francesca through the labyrinthine alleys until they left the houses to stand in ten yards of muddy ground that separated the buildings from a district wall. Boards had been laid down to help people reach two sets of ladders propped against the wall.
Cyrus had never used such ladders; he had always lofted himself over any wall. But he couldn't spare the text in his robes to lift them both. So he climbed up after Francesca, nodded to the city watchmen at the wall's top, and then climbed down the other side into the Cypress District.
As they walked down a cobbled street, Cyrus admired the district's courtyards, gardens, and the cypresses that gave it its name. Twice they passed watchmen swaggering in their green and white cloaks.
Abruptly, the rain stopped and the black clouds rolled away, leaving first white puffs and then only thin wisps.
Moments before, the storm had darkened the day almost into night. Now they walked through bright streets, the puddles reflecting a pale evening sky. Cyrus had seen this rainy-season darkness-to-day phenomenon all across Western Spires, but the speed with which the clouds tumbled over Avel made it even more dramatic.
Francesca turned off the cobbled road and led them again through alleyways. The buildings became less grand until there were few taller than one story. They reached another wall and had to climb over it via the ladders.
They had reached the North Gate District. The rickety wooden buildings here were all single story, the doorways covered by ragged leather curtains. Muddy children and stray dogs roamed streets devoid of watchmen.
Each district had to mount a militia to supplement the city watch. The wealthier districts paid to arm their young men and hired mercenaries to train and support them. The walls around North Gate were less well defended, their streets unpatrolled, subjecting the district not only to crime but also to more frequent lycanthrope incursions.
North Gate was populated almost entirely by the Canic people. They
were a small cultural group, having significant numbers only in Avel, Dar, and the few fortified villages between. Their ancestors had been the first to settle the wild savannas of Southwestern Spires.
were a small cultural group, having significant numbers only in Avel, Dar, and the few fortified villages between. Their ancestors had been the first to settle the wild savannas of Southwestern Spires.
When the Neosolar Empire had united the continent, the Canics had held themselves apart. They had worshiped an ancient tree goddess, who resided in a redwood nearly a mile in height. After the empire's fall, the Polytheistic Realm of Spiresâthen an alliance of new kings and local deitiesâhad spread across the West. The Canics had tried to establish an independent realm, but the Spirish slaughtered the Canic armies, killed their goddess, and burned their sacred tree. Crushed and godless, the Canic tribes splintered and their numbers dwindled.
With the western frontier quiet, the young Realm of Spires had devoted all of its efforts to surviving the forays of Verdantine and Lornish armies up and down their eastern coast. The Canics became a marginal people.
This historyâin particular the loss of their goddessâhad produced the Canic's cynical philosophy that life was inherently wretched and that poverty and pain were unavoidable. The best any Canic could hope for was survival.
A more concrete manifestation of the Canic's history was the shabbily dressed children playing unsupervised in the mud. They were frail and feral things, boys and girls indistinguishable. Both had their tangled hair cut short and wore their people's traditional loose gray trousers and shirts.
Among the children romped dogs of the peculiar breed that the Canics bred and trained to attack lycanthropes. The canines stood taller than three feet, were covered with thick fur, and possessed unsettlingly intelligent eyes. When Francesca and Cyrus walked near a pack of shouting children, the dogs seemed to study them.
There were more ravens here too, cawing and fighting with each other. Stray cats, thin and mangy, prowled the rooftops.
The place's poverty didn't seem to bother Francesca. As she navigated the streets, she received an occasional wave from a child. In return, she gave each a warm smile and a dignified nod.
“Patients?” Cyrus asked.
“I'm one of the few clerics who comes to North Gate.”
They entered an alley and passedâin a small square of open groundâa young savanna oak, the branches of which were covered with prayer flags. “Where are we going?” he asked.
“To someone who owes me a favor,” Francesca said as she stepped around a puddle. “If Nicodemus is or was here, Old Man Luro will know it. Story goes that when he was a young caravan guard he saved his whole company from the Savanna Walker with some fast thinking. Until today, I
always assumed it was nonsense. In any case, Luro came back to Avel a hero. He was something of the public champion of the North Gate for years. However, last time I saw him, he said he was done worrying about other people's problems. But that doesn't mean he won't know about those problems.”
always assumed it was nonsense. In any case, Luro came back to Avel a hero. He was something of the public champion of the North Gate for years. However, last time I saw him, he said he was done worrying about other people's problems. But that doesn't mean he won't know about those problems.”
Cyrus made a low, thoughtful sound.
Francesca continued. “Luro's a typical old Canic: doesn't trust strangers farther than his twice-broken nose. We'll have to be ⦠persuasive.”
Just then a pair of yelling children and a large dog ran past them. Cyrus frowned at the mud they splattered on his robes and asked, “Why do the Canics always seem to have a flood of squeakers and a scattering of geezers without any folk between?”
At a fork in the alley, Francesca started off in one direction. “Most of the young people, men and women, leave to work in caravans: ox drivers, cooks, wagonwrights, guards, that sort of thing. Out there they're attacked by lycanthropes, grass fires, thirst. Add to that the young men who stay have to serve in the district's militia and the district is the most likely to be attacked by lycanthropes, and you can see why many of them die young and the rest are so cynical.”
Cyrus grimaced. “Makes you realize how easy we have it.”
“That's the God-of-gods damned truth,” Francesca said while stopping before a building that looked sturdier than its neighbors. “But don't express any pity for the Canics; Luro will find it patronizing. In fact, don't express anything at all. He's bound to dislike you. He dislikes everyone.”
Cyrus nodded and waited for Francesca to knock on the doorframe.
“OLD MAN LURO!” Francesca belted out with enough force that Cyrus jumped.
“Blood and fire, Fran!”
“OLD MAN LURO!”
Something thumped inside the house and then the leather curtain moved a few inches to reveal a vertical glimpse of a bearded face. A single brown eye looked Francesca up and down. Then the curtain parted to reveal a short man, bent forward. Though his face was crosshatched with wrinkles, he still possessed a shock of white hair. Less fortunately, a profusion of pale bristles grew from his ears and nose. “It's you,” the ancient figure grumbled. “Come in. Come in. Daria!”
Francesca stepped through the curtain. Cyrus followed and discovered a warm, dark room furnished with a table and a few chairs. A small fire crackled in a hearth on the far wall. An old woman crouched near it.
“Daria, see who's here for you.”
After Cyrus's vision adjusted to the dark, he could make out four massive dogs lying around the fire. Three children were among the animals; two slept on dogs' bellies as if they were pillows, the third sat up and stroked one beast's muzzle. As he watched, the one patting the dog rose and looked at Francesca.
The child's expression seemed stern beyond her years, as if she had just been confronted by a profound moral dilemma. Francesca crouched. “Who's that?” she playfully half-whispered.
The child's expression broke into a smile and she ran to Francesca, who caught her and twirled her around. The both of them laughed freely and began to chatter.
Cyrus folded his arms and considered Francesca. Her words, pitched in childish exaggeration, bore no hint of skepticism or wit. And her smile, lit by the watery red glow of the fire, seemed easy and unguarded.
“Hierophant,” a gruff voice said. Cyrus turned and saw Luro looking him up and down.
Cyrus nodded. “Master Luro.”
The old man stepped closer. “Windbag, what are you doing here?”
Cyrus met his gaze and then looked at the child in Francesca's arms. “That your daughter?”
“Great-granddaughter.”
Then Francesca was standing between the two men, pressing the giggling child to her hip. “How did you get to be so silly?” she asked and touched the child's nose.
The child giggled but then noticed Cyrus. Her expression became stern again, and she pressed her face into Francesca's shoulder.
“She's been fine, just fine,” the old man said to Francesca. “Eating regular and running around with the others. Just fell asleep when they had to come in during the rain.”
Francesca bounced the girl on her hip. “I'm glad to hear it.” Then she looked at Luro. “I didn't come to see Daria, lovely as she is.”
The old man squinted. “No?”
“It's time to pay back that favor you owe me. I need your help. So do your people.”
The old man hacked out a laugh. “Grandest damned way I've ever been asked to pay up. Told to take enough coin to make treating her worth your while. If you don't let Canics payâ”
“I need some information,” Francesca interrupted.
“What kind of information?”
“The first part's easy. I need you to tell me everything you know about
the Savanna Walker. I've heard stories you became a hero when you encountered the beast.”
the Savanna Walker. I've heard stories you became a hero when you encountered the beast.”
The old man chuckled. “Oh, a grand hero I was, a regular legend,” he said dryly. “Grander than any damned canonist.”
The child in Francesca's arms murmured. Everyone paused while Francesca put her ear close to the girl. “All right, honey,” Francesca said and put the child down. Once on the floor, the girl went back to the dogs. Francesca turned back to Luro. “You saw the Savanna Walker?”
“Hardly. Our caravan was circled up for the night and one of the outer lycanthrope tribes was harrying us. Stalking around it, darting in and out of the savanna grass, testing the barricades between the wagons. Nothing a caravan couldn't handle. Mostly it gave our archers empty hopes of putting an arrow through their hides. But then the wolves went mad. Writhing on the ground and screaming. Some attacked each other, some attacked an unseen creature in the grass. From atop a caravan wagon, you can see over the grass. And there was the usual waving stalks that lycanthropes make and this other bigger thing. Bigger than a katabeast. When it moved the ground shook.”
Francesca made a low noise. “The Savanna Walker?”
He shrugged. “What else? We had some candles from Dar in the cargo, so I jammed some wax in my ears and convinced most other guards to do so. The men who didn't went mad. They jumped off the wagons. The lycanthropes got to them or the Walker did. No one knows. An hour later they were all gone. Come morning, we found nothing but bones and bits of lycanthrope fur on the road.”
“So it was candle wax that made you Champion of North Gate?”
He sniffed. “Champion, my hairy backside. People like to complain to me. That's all. When I was younger, I was fool enough to listen.”
“So the Savanna Walker was an enemy to the lycanthropes?”
He scowled. “How in all the burning hells should I know? The different lycanthrope tribes fight each other year round. Some say the Walker is a massive lycanthrope. Some say it's the lycanthropes' deity. Some say strange things about the Walker's being a ghost of human souls that died of thirst. No one knows. And I don't care.”
He squinted first at her and then at Cyrus. “You two came out here to hear the glory stories of my youth?”
Francesca nodded. “In part, and we thank you for that. But there's another matter we need to ask about.”
“Spit it out.”
“At the end of last year's rainy season there was violence in North Gate.
Some of your people were hiding a man named Nicodemus Weal. The hierophants discovered him and things got bloody. I need your help finding out what happened to him.”
The old man lowered his eyebrows. “What happened to who? Nicolo? What are you talking about?”
“Don't play slow with me, Luro.”
He shook his head. “Don't know anything about bloodshed in this district.”
“That's more bollocks than I'd get from castrating a bull.”
The old man scowled. “I can't help you if I don't know what you're talking about.”
Francesca only folded her arms.
Cyrus cleared his throat. “Nicodemus is a rogueâ” He stopped. Francesca had held up a hand. “Luro knows. If he didn't, he'd be telling us how stupid we are for poking around his district.”
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