Defiant Peaks (The Hadrumal Crisis) (49 page)

‘Good day to you, Hosh.’ Jilseth was startled into a smile. ‘My compliments, Mentor Garewin. I see you still have a long way to go but this progress is most encouraging.’

Hosh’s hand flew to his damaged cheek. ‘Progress?’

Jilseth looked quizzically at him. ‘Don’t you use a mirror for shaving?’

‘I’m pleased that you see the improvement, Madam Mage.’ Mentor Garewin smiled. ‘Each day’s changes are very subtle and the boy guards his hopes so fiercely against any hint of wishful thinking.’

‘Captain?’ Hosh looked desperately at Corrain.

‘I did wonder,’ he admitted haltingly. ‘I didn’t want to say until I was certain—’

‘Mentor Undil, sealed to the School of Apothecaries.’ The woman offered Jilseth the briefest of bows. ‘You said you had grave news of Micaran?’

‘The gravest, alas.’ Jilseth wove a brief cantrip from water magic to dry her clammy palms. ‘He has been killed by some aetheric means—’

‘—by the Soluran adept you saw that first day in The Goose Hounds.’ Corrain couldn’t restrain his anger. ‘Who is he, Master Garewin? Where can we find his lodging?’

‘If he’s guilty of such an unconscionable crime, he’s surely fled,’ one of the other men objected.

‘Not as long as I truly managed to kill him,’ Corrain countered with bitter satisfaction.

Mentor Garewin raised a hand. ‘Please, tell us all that’s happened. And forgive my ill-manners. May I make known to you Mentor Parovil and Mentor Lusken.’

Both men were in their middle years, robed and beringed as befitted mentors sealed to Col’s university. If Jilseth had not known, she would never have guessed that they were aetheric adepts.

‘Masters,’ Corrain acknowledged them grimly. ‘You should know that I am responsible for this tragedy. I asked for Micaran’s help in searching this Jagai
zamorin
’s thoughts.’

Jilseth listened with half an ear as the Caladhrian told his wretched tale a second time. She looked around the room for anything which she might use to cast a bespeaking to Hadrumal, though she would need to go outside to do that. The Prefecture’s librarians would consider a mage-kindled flame a breach of her own sworn oath to equal anything struck with flint and steel. Where might she find sufficient privacy close by to work her spell?

She realised that Corrain had fallen silent. Hosh gazed at him with more sympathy and understanding than Jilseth might have expected in such a young man’s eyes.

‘You all know this Soluran?’ Mentor Garewin demanded of his fellow adepts, his face taut with grief and outrage.

‘I do.’ The woman, Mentor Undil, nodded and the other two men did the same.

‘Remec Estinesh of Trudenar,’ Mentor Parovil growled.

Jilseth frowned as she recalled the map of Solura. What business did a House of Sanctuary from a central and southerly province have killing Col’s scholars? Why was this adept helping to turn Col’s residents and Archipelagans alike against the wizard isle? As she wondered, suspicion stirred in the back of her mind. But suspicion was no use without proof.

‘Let us find him, whether he is living or dead.’ Garewin sat and reached out to the adepts on either side.

Hosh shoved his stool back, getting out of the way as the four linked hands to form a circle.

‘Aderumai ar sesfital dar orida nal Estinesh.’

The four mentors sat motionless, their eyes closed, intoning their incomprehensible enchantment.

‘Aderumai ar sesfital. Aderumai ar sesfital.’

The woman and the older of the two men began repeating the first phrase while Mentor Garewin and the other continued with the full chant.

‘Aderumai ar sesfital dar orida nal Estinesh.’

Mentor Undil’s voice rose to harmonise with the baritones on either side while Garewin’s resonant bass underpinned the whole.

Jilseth’s fists clenched with frustration. When a wizard worked a scrying, the results were there for all to see. What was this Artifice showing the mentors? Were they searching the city with their mind’s eye or were they sharing some vision of the Soluran, trying to see some clue to tell them where he cowered or lay dead?

At some unspoken signal, the four adepts released their hold on each other’s hands and opened their eyes.

Mentor Undil spoke first. ‘He’s in an accommodation house, a respectable one, in Blackpits Lane.’

‘With a green-painted door—’

‘—and cream awnings over its windows.’ The other mentors said in swift succession.

‘Where is that?’ Hosh asked meekly.

‘Close by,’ Corrain assured him before Jilseth could reveal her own knowledge of the city.

‘He is dead.’ Mentor Garewin’s vicious satisfaction sat oddly on the mentor’s well-groomed face.

Jilseth breathed a little more easily.

Corrain grunted. ‘We’d best not delay. We don’t want anyone else finding the body and raising a hue and cry to summon the Elected’s men. Not before we’ve searched his room and his effects for some clue as to his partners in this crime.’

‘We should inform the authorities of such malice at work in our city.’ The older mentor looked affronted.

‘Naturally, and now that we know where to find him, you can do that,’ Jilseth said quickly. ‘I’m sure we can learn what we need before the Elected’s men arrive.’

Corrain scowled. ‘We can deal with the carrion, Masters and Mistress, but we must ask more of your Artifice. We still have no idea who this man from Wrede might be. After today, I don’t believe he’s an enemy but I would hesitate to call him a friend. Regardless, we need to know who he is.’

Jilseth nodded. ‘Mentor Micaran was searching for this stranger with a questing enchantment which he’d learned from Guinalle Tor Priminale in Suthyfer—’

She was encouraged to see the adepts keenly interested in this revelation.

‘—but now that he is dead, his endeavours will be lost—’

Mentor Lusken, the younger man, raised an assertive finger. ‘Not necessarily, if we can pick up the thread of that enchantment swiftly enough.’

‘We need to know the specifics of this Artifice.’ Undil looked around the table. ‘Do any of us know Lady Tor Priminale sufficiently well to reach her thoughts over such a distance?’

‘I believe that I may.’ Mentor Parovil’s confidence encouraged Jilseth.

Garewin looked apologetically at Hosh. ‘I fear this would be the end of our work with you today.’

‘This is more important.’ Hosh was already on his feet. ‘I can help my captain and the lady mage.’

Though he looked at Jilseth with a wariness which surprised her. Regardless, she spoke up before Corrain could offer some objection or send the lad back to kick his heels in their tavern room.

‘We’ll be glad of your assistance.’ Whether or not Hosh could help was of little actual concern. After what had befallen Mentor Micaran, Jilseth wasn’t letting anyone with detailed knowledge of Archmage Planir’s concerns out of her sight. She could only hope that the Soluran had died before he could tell anyone what he had learned with his insidious Artifice.

Corrain’s nod of accord suggested that he knew precisely what she was thinking. He bowed to the assembled mentors. ‘We’ll bid you good day, Masters, Mistress.’

Garewin held up a hand to stop him leaving. ‘Where and when shall we meet to share what we have learned? We can hardly gather at Master Olved’s home, now that it’s a house of mourning.’

‘We will meet at the Prefecture,’ Mentor Parovil declared with absolute authority. ‘We will share what we learn and then the Prefects and the Elected must be informed, before day’s end. A mentor of this university lies dead.’

Jilseth could see this was not negotiable. She would have to find time before they met later to bespeak Planir and let him know what had happened as well as asking what he wanted her to do next.

‘Very well, provided you have Artifice to foil any attempt to eavesdrop on our conversation through aetheric magic?’ She looked around the adepts. ‘I can baffle mundane eyes and ears with elemental wards against sight and sound.’

Mentor Lusken nodded. ‘We can do the rest.’

‘Then we will leave you to your magic.’ Corrain jerked his head towards the door in unmistakable command.

Jilseth was torn between the need for haste and her disinclination to let him think that she was his to instruct. She compromised by having the final word, letting both Caladhrians precede her out of the room.

‘Let’s meet at the Prefecture at the last chime of the day. That should give us sufficient time to learn what we can.’

With a final bow, she hurried after Hosh and Corrain who were already halfway down the stairs to the floor below. She had barely caught up with them before they were making their excuses to the liveried door ward.

‘You won’t be admitted without a mentor or the lady mage,’ the black-liveried man warned them as he opened the outer door.

‘Of course.’ Jilseth smiled at him as she followed them out onto the steps.

‘Halferan!’ she called sharply to halt Corrain’s swift descent. ‘A moment!’

‘Why?’ He stood ready to challenge her.

Jilseth chose her words carefully. ‘Now that I know the Soluran is dead, there is some particular wizardry which I can work to learn exactly who he had dealings with before he came to Col. That will be the quickest and most certain route to knowing who’s behind this plot against Hadrumal. But I must have certain things if I am to work this spell. I need oil and a vessel sturdy enough to hold it when it’s heated.’

She expected the Caladhrian to demand some explanation and braced herself for his revulsion at the notion of necromancy.

Instead he unbuckled his sword belt and handed the weapon to Hosh. ‘Go to Blackpits Lane and start knocking on doors if there’s more than one house matching the mentors’ description. You go—’

‘I know where it is,’ Jilseth assured him.

Corrain nodded. ‘Then I’ll see you there as quickly as I can.’

‘Yes, Captain.’ Hosh quickly secured the blade at his own hip.

‘Baron.’ Jilseth wasn’t finished with Corrain yet. ‘I must have oil pressed from nuts or seeds or olives, nothing that’s come from an animal. I cannot use dripping or lard.’

‘Very well.’ Corrain nodded impatiently and strode away.

Jilseth watched him go, still surprised that he hadn’t insisted on knowing why this might be essential for her wizardry.

‘This way.’ She turned to Hosh and led him westwards across the square. As they rounded the corner, she offered him a friendly smile. ‘You are looking well, truly.’

‘Thank you, Madam Mage,’ he said guardedly.

She waited for him to say something further, to ask some question. When neither was forthcoming, she concentrated on finding the lane they were seeking by the most efficient path which she could recall through Col’s byways.

It should hardly come as a surprise, Jilseth reflected, that Hosh would be chary around mages. Like Corrain, he had seen the corsair island destroyed at first hand, caught between Hadrumal’s vengeance and the Mandarkin’s savagery. The lad hadn’t been anywhere near a wizard since he’d returned to Halferan and handed that arm-ring to Velindre. Since coming to Col, he’d only met Master Olved and he was hardly the warmest of mages.

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY-
S
IX