The Assassin's Tale (Isle of Dreams) (29 page)

‘Is there
nothing
we can do?’  Phantom asked helplessly.

‘Us? 
No.  But Master Sphinx can.’

‘Then why
hasn’t he?’  Mistral demanded in a confused voice.

‘Timing
Mistral.  This is all about timing.’  Phantasm replied
knowingly.  ‘Master Sphinx will act, but only at the very last minute when
we truly believe all is lost.’

Phantom shook
his head disgustedly, yet there was a hint of admiration in his expression too,
‘He’ll manipulate us into feeling guilt, desperation and then gratitude. 
It’s a classic technique to gain control over someone.’

Phantasm
nodded grimly, ‘We would be in his debt … emotionally,’ he added quickly as
Mistral opened her mouth to argue that point again.  ‘And obligated to
answer his every beck and call.  With our skills he could both know the
thoughts of any person he wished and bend their will to his own.  He could
control a room full of people like puppets; Council Officials, the Magnate even
Mage Grapple!’ 

‘Why on earth
would anyone want to do that?’  Mistral demanded sulkily.

‘Why
indeed?’  Phantasm mused then looked seriously at Mistral.  ‘It is my
firm belief that Master Sphinx seeks to be the next Divinus and ultimately
challenge the Council for rule of the Isle.’

Mistral
clenched her teeth and struggled to restrain her rising temper, ‘I really think
that you’re going just a bit over the top here!  It’s a bit of a leap from
Leo sending us on an admittedly tough Contract to him assuming the power of the
Divinus and ruling the Isle!’

‘Really?’ 
Phantasm demanded in a suddenly angry voice.  ‘Let’s just assume, in your
fantasy world where we can actually carry out this accursed Contract, that we
manage to have a “chat”, as you so endearingly call it, with Mage Grapple and
he doesn’t see things our way and jumps on his warship with his army and sets
sail.  What do we do then?’ 

Mistral
fidgeted agitatedly with her reins while she thought.  Phantasm had a
point.  How would they get to The Desert Lands? 

‘We’d just
have to charter a boat from Blackneath,’ she shrugged
defiantly.   

Phantasm
looked at her coldly, ‘And how much money do we have Mistral?’

‘Well, surely
we could sort something out –’ her voice tailed off.  They had no money at
all to pay for the sea crossing. 

‘Perhaps we
could simply ask them to send the bill to the Ri?’  Phantasm’s tone was
cutting.

Mistral
shrugged and stared moodily at the reins bunched in her hand while the twins
fell into a brooding silence.  

‘So how do you
see it working out then?’  she eventually asked, breaking the heavy
silence.   

‘We follow the
requirements of the Contract,’ Phantasm said calmly.  ‘Travel to Nevelte
to ascertain whether Mage Grapple has passed by.  Either way, we carry
on.  We can’t hang around at Nevelte and wait for him to turn up; it’s too
much of a long shot that he will go there at all.  So we head north west,
around
The Velvet Forests ,’ he paused to fix her with a stern look, ‘and make haste
down to the ford at the Amber River.  We establish whether or not he’s
been through the ford; an army on the move will leave considerable evidence,
and either wait if there are no signs of them passing through or move on to
Blackneath if they have been through before us. 

‘Basically,
it’s a wild goose chase until we actually catch up with Mage Grapple, or he
catches up with us.  Then we try and present our case to him, which my
brother and I will work out in due course.  Should that fail then I’m
afraid we’ll have played right into Master Sphinx’s hands.  We ride as
fast as we can back to the Valley and admit our abject failure to him.  He
will of course leap onto a ship from the Ri’s western port and arrive in a
blaze of glory to save the very same warriors we came within a gnat’s whisker
from having obliterated by a warlock army.’

‘Can’t you
give the Ri some credit for being able to fight?’  Mistral asked in an
affronted tone.  ‘I mean, this is what they do after all!  I know the
apprentices will be a bit out of their depth a bit, but there were plenty of
well-seasoned warriors going too, you saw them in The Cloak and Dagger!’

‘Have you ever
even seen a warlock?’  Phantasm asked sharply.

Mistral pouted
and looked stubborn, ‘No,’ she finally admitted.

‘They’re
nothing like normal sorcerers.  For a start warlocks are born, not just
trained, so think of them as an almost entirely separate species.  They’re
gifted with limitless strength and stamina; have almost no concept of pain and
definitely none of mercy and, as if that weren’t enough they also have the
Craft!’

Mistral’s
temper flared at being so openly patronised, ‘If they’re so powerful then why
isn’t the Isle ruled by them?’ 

Phantasm
clenched his reins tightly and drew in a deep breath; Mistral could tell that
he was closer to losing his temper than she had ever seen him.

‘Because,
Mistral, they’re not particularly intelligent.  They exist solely to
protect and serve the Head of the Council.’ 

‘Which will be
Master Sphinx’s if he gets his own way,’ added Phantom.

Mistral had to
bite her tongue to prevent herself from making a sharp retort.  Suddenly she
didn’t want to argue with the twins anymore; they were just going to end up
going round in circles.  Admittedly, not everything was clear cut with the
Contract, but she refused to believe things were as bleak as Phantasm was
making out.  She wondered distractedly what had made the twins so bitter
and suspicious.  They were always seeing some dark, hidden agenda when
sometimes there just wasn’t one. 

 Mistral
sighed and decided to give up, ‘I think your plan will make a good starting
point Phantasm,’ she conceded in a resigned tone.  ‘And should the
situation change then we’ll just have to think on our feet.’

‘So we still
get to go to Nevelte and meet your family?’  Phantom asked, looking up
quickly with a wicked gleam in his eye.

‘They’re not
family! 
Just an old couple who gave me a bed for a few years!’  Mistral
snarled, her temper fraying again. 

Phantom
grinned, ‘Fine by me, whatever they are, they’re still going to have some great
stories to tell!’

Determined not
be drawn into any more arguments, Mistral took a deep breath and made a
concerted effort to shake off her grumpy mood.  Racking her brains for a
change of subject that didn’t involve Nevelte or the Contract she remembered
something that Phantasm had mentioned the night before.

‘Tell me about
the tale of the two tribes,’ she demanded abruptly.

Phantasm
looked quizzically at her, ‘Mistral, are you changing the subject?’

‘Well, it’s
either that or I kill your brother, which would you prefer?’  Mistral
asked sharply then quickly altered her voice to be more conciliatory. 
’Please, Phantasm, you tell stories so beautifully,’ she added in a shameless
attempt at flattery. 

Phantasm’s
face immediately broke into an angelic smile, ‘Since you asked so very nicely,
I shall gladly oblige.  It will be a relief to talk about something else
actually.

‘As you know,
there are no kings or queens in sorcering society but the closest thing they
have are the two families of Rochforte and Noble.  The Craft is extremely
powerful in both bloodlines and as a result, they’re held in the highest
esteem. 

‘According to
Mage history, Alexandre Rochforte first appeared in France in the early
eleventh century.  The family of Rochforte integrated themselves into the
highest echelons of society in every country they chose to live in; becoming
advisors to royalty and aligning themselves with the most powerful political
names of the day.  Of course, their gift of the Craft allowed the
Rochfortes to remain unscathed through every political and civil uprising that
occurred, surfacing under another guise with just the right words to persuade
the new person in power that they, the Rochfortes, were essential to the
continued success of the new regime.’

‘Why didn’t
the Rochfortes just assume power themselves?’  Mistral asked.

‘Oh they were
too clever for that,’ explained Phantasm.  ‘Being in direct power would
bring too much exposure; they wouldn’t have been able to hide what they really
were.  But by always staying just in the shadows, the Rochfortes enjoyed
all the trappings of wealth and power with none of the risk.  It was a
simple but brilliant survival plan that served them well for centuries.

‘The second
family in our story arrived on the pages of sorcering history books around a
hundred years after the Rochfortes.  Thaddeus Noble was a high ranking
church official in England.  His family have successfully secured
themselves positions of power within the church for centuries.  By happily
passing the odd sorcering discrepancy off as a minor miracle they’ve enjoyed
flourishing careers.  Their family history is littered with saints,
cardinals and even the odd pope.  The Noble’s happily switched allegiances
between denominations, depending on which was more powerful at the time, to
ensure they were always in a position of strength and influence.

‘It was
inevitable that the two families would clash; their fates being so inextricably
woven to the fabric of the societies they had chosen to hide within.  As
the Church and royalty argued and fought throughout history, so did the
Rochfortes and the Nobles – creating a sorcering civil war that literally went
on for centuries. 

‘But times
changed.  By the thirteen hundreds the situation for the sorcering world
was becoming dire.  Humans naturally fear that which they do not
understand, and who can understand the Craft?  They thought it was the
devil’s work.  The paranoia soon spread and gave rise to overzealous witch
hunts.  It was no longer safe for Mage families to stay within human
society.  They looked to their two revered families for leadership. 
A shaky truce was born and a search began to find a sanctuary away from the
persecution of mankind.  The Isle was discovered and quickly inhabited by
fleeing sorcerers from all over the world.

‘The Isle we
live on now was originally called The Grey Isle.  At first the two tribes
of Rochforte and Noble agreed to rule jointly.  From the outset it was a
disaster.  Both were too used to autonomy and their loathing for each
other too deeply ingrained to be changed overnight.  Civil war erupted and
the Isle fell into chaos; a state in which it remained until Mage Grapple rose
to power and effectively united the two families by sheer brute force.
 However, the Rochfortes took umbrage at Mage Grapple being elected to
rule the Council and left the Isle; vowing never to return and severing all
ties with the Mage Council.  To this day they refuse to acknowledge any of
the laws that Mage Grapple brings into force to govern the tribes and sorcerers
on the Isle.  It causes Mage Grapple no end of headaches, they’re always
trying to set up trade lines in banned goods or export some demented new
species to the Isle.

Now,’ said
Phantasm, pausing to fix Mistral with a challenging look.  ‘We come to the
interesting bit.  Specifically, who is descended from which line?  The
names may have changed over the years, but deep down, all sorcerers are either
a Rochforte or a Noble.  Can you guess what our friends Mage De Winter and
Count Putreo Darke are?’

Mistral pursed
her lips thoughtfully, ‘Well,’ she began slowly.  ‘They both
sound
French which would put them on the Rochforte side, but you said that they were
from different families, so no, I have no idea,’ she said, giving up with a
shrug.

‘Mage De
Winter is a descendant from Noble on his father’s side, although his mother had
some Rochforte blood too.  Count Putreo Darke is a Rochforte; pure
actually.  He was one of the few that stayed on the Isle when the rest
left but he changed his name to avoid some of the stigma attached to being a
Rochforte.’

‘So it’s
literally in their blood to hate each other,’ said Mistral thoughtfully.

Phantasm
nodded, ‘It makes Mage Grapple’s life difficult to say the least; managing an
Isle full of virtually ungovernable Arcanes creatures and a Council made up of
descendants from a blood feud that has bubbled away, with the odd violent
eruption, for the last seven hundred years.’

‘I wouldn’t
want his job,’ said Mistral fervently.

Phantasm
smiled, ‘He does it well.’

‘Have you met
him?’

‘Once or
twice, although I’m sure he wouldn’t recognise us as the small twin boys
playing in the corner of the Council chamber during some of their long
meetings.’

Mistral
listened to the note of bitterness in Phantasm’s voice with curiosity. 
She knew little about their upbringing aside from what they’d told her – that
they were raised in the Mage Council’s stronghold in the north of the Isle
until they left to train with the Ri.  

‘Which family
is Mage Grapple descended from?’  Mistral asked curiously.

‘Noble,’
replied Phantom promptly.  ‘But it takes a lot of work to trace his family
tree back to a full-blooded Noble.  I know, I’ve done it.’

Phantasm
inclined his head towards his brother with a weary expression on his face,
‘Phantom is fascinated by sorcering family trees,’ he explained.

‘You can tell
a lot about a person by where they came from,’ said Phantom with a lofty look
on his face.

Mistral kept
quiet.  She had no idea where she came from.  What did that say about
her?

Phantom was
warming to his subject, ‘Take Mage De Winter for instance.  He’s a Noble
and should be enjoying the prestige and privilege along with all the other
Council bigwigs, but he refuses to have anything to do with Council life.’

Mistral was
intrigued, ‘Why?’ 

Phantom
shrugged evasively, ‘I don’t know the details.  I heard there was some
family upset.  Anyway, Mage De Winter is a bit of a dark horse to say the
least.  He holds a place on the Council due to his family name but we only
ever saw him at one or two meetings; usually only when Mage Grapple had
personally insisted on his attendance.’