Sourcethief (Book 3) (47 page)

The rope was still anchored in Tomas's room, running
from his window and around the corner. Pulled taut it stretched horizontally.
"Hold tight," Soria warned. "The first part will be the
hardest."

Soria stepped off the window ledge, and the two
women swung like a pendulum, Soria scrambling for her feet to keep up. She
managed to stop herself at the corner, and was nearly pulled around the corner
by Abbiley's weight yanking her by the neck. Abbiley shrieked again.

"Ow! Stop that. You're right in my ear,"
Soria scolded.

"Abbiley!" Tomas cried out from below.

"Oh, Tomas!" she called back to him.

Soria felt Abbiley's legs squirming against her own,
trying to hook around them.

"Stop that, too. I need those to get us
down!" Soria yelled. She took a step around the corner, as much to free
herself from Abbiley's panicked grasping as to advance their descent. She put
both feet to the side with Tomas's window and swung again, more gently that
time. After that, it was all Soria could do to release the rope to slide them
down a step at a time. Her arms were nearly spent. They would happily lock in
place for her, but they protested every motion.

Soria felt Abbiley sliding.

"Just hold on," Soria encouraged her. She
tried to lend a hand to help Abbiley refresh her grip, but knew as soon as she
tried to loosen her hold on the rope that they would both fall—one arm was not
nearly enough.

Slick with sweat born from fear, Abbiley's wrists
slipped apart. Soria turned and tried to grab her with a silent telekinetic
spell. Abbiley's Source—happy, healthy, stupid thing that it was—shrugged her
off like it was greased, instead of allowing the magic to save her.

Soria turned her head and squeezed her eyes shut.
Twin screams of terror rose from the throats of Tomas and Abbiley, but only
Tomas's persisted. Soria turned to look, and saw Abbiley sprawled motionless in
the grass.

* * * * * * *
*

"Who are you?" Brannis replied, shouting
across the dining hall. "What have you done with Tomas Harwick and Abbiley
Tillman?"

"My name is Lady Lurna Skaal, and I imagine you
have puzzled out the rest. I had not expected you to storm my keep with such
effective force, I admit. Your ploy got me to send my best men out to ride you
down. However ..." Lady Skaal snapped her fingers.

From the balconies on the upper floors, musketeers
appeared in numbers Soria had underestimated. There had to have been at least
thirty of them.

"... I still have quite a number left
here," Lady Skaal finished.

"What then? You laid this trap out for me, and
invited me to fall into it. What sort of fool do you think I am?" Brannis
asked.

"You are here, are you not?" said Lady
Skaal. "Even if half my men miss their mark, you will be slaughtered. You
are in the trap even now. Your friends ... I care not. They may flee if they
like. You are the only one that matters."

"What is the bargain? There has to be a bargain
to be had here," Brannis insisted. "I'm no value to you in this
world, we both know that."

"This is not a conversation to be shouted
across a room." Lady Skaal said. "Come, leave your sword and join me
for dinner." She waved a hand to the seat across from her. "The hour
is late, but I can have the kitchen staff roused."

"Not a chance," Brannis replied. "If
you want to talk, then talk. But there's no way I leave myself unarmed. You
made a mistake in thinking you can take the upper hand so easily."

"You pretend you are the great Kyrus
Hinterdale, fearsome sorcerer. I know better. There is no shielding spell that
will save you from those muskets that point at you, no fiery conflagration to
consume us. You are just an ordinary Kadrin knight, a long way from home, Sir
Brannis," said Lady Skaal. She laced her fingers together and held them beneath
her chin. Brannis watched her smile slide wide, never revealing teeth.

"Who else are you?" Brannis demanded. He
asked in Kadrin, not quite ready to trust his words in front of even doomed
men, and he was not sure just how many of the men above fit that description.

"I am Princess Shiann, heir to the throne of
Ghelk. I will have your aid in ending the war, in return for your life,"
Lady Skaal said. "You may accomplish such a thing however you like, but
you will be remaining in Khesh under my ... protection, to ensure the peace
continues."

"I see. Princes Shiann ... you are already
dead," Brannis countered. "Rashan Solaran killed a Ghelkan princess,
and I believe there was only one. You bargain from a position of ignorance. I
could promise you anything, and you would have to find someone else to tell you
truth or lie. The war might be over or Ghelk a scorched ruin, for all you know.
However it is neither, at the moment. Your friend Captain Zayne has set you on
this course to stop Rashan through me, but he has taken matters in hand himself
in Veydrus. You think to bargain with me while your own ally slaughters cities.
I could not buy my own life at the cost of allowing Jinzan Fehr a free hand to
finish what Loramar could not. You think to use me but I am a sword with a
blade for a hilt. You invite your doom."

Lady Skaal leapt to her feet, knocking over her
chair. She seethed through bared teeth. She barked an order in Kheshi, but
Brannis understood it well enough. He dodged aside, and heard a crackling
thunder of uncounted muskets firing; the shots pelted him like hailstones.

“
Kanethio mandraxae
,” Lady Skaal shouted,
words Brannis understood all too well. From Lady Skaal's crossed palms, a bolt
of aether lanced out, strong enough to take Brannis from his feet.

Brannis scrambled across the floor, gouging crevices
with Avalanche in his careless haste. As he fled into the corridor, he held the
blade to his side, allowing it to drag through the great chamber's wall. Down
the halls he ran, trailing rock wall the whole way. The keep shook. Brannis was
no architect, but he could only surmise that those walls were integral to the
keep's integrity. Soria's map floated in his thoughts: the kitchens, the
servants' quarters, the rearmost towers—anything but those.

He heard crashes behind him as sections of the upper
floors shifted and gave way. He rounded a corner, taking another side of the
grand chamber to ruin. The floor beneath his feet rocked, some great portion of
the keep having fallen, causing the whole of it to shudder. Brannis took
Avalanche from the wall. It was no use leveling the keep while he was still
within.

He had come around to the rear of the building.
There was an exit there. It was time to discover if he had bought Soria and
Rakashi enough time for their missions.

* * * * * * *
*

Soria felt the keep shake in earnest, and knew that
Brannis was done with parlay. With only her own safety to worry about, she
hopped away from the wall and released the rope. Soria hit the ground with the
force of a lighting sparrow, a pace or two from Abbiley's body. Tomas was
already rushing over.

"Abbiley! Abbiley!" he shouted, heedless
of the accepted decorum of diversion-based escapes, his own safety, and the bit
of magic that had just been worked in front of his oblivious eyes.

Abbiley moaned.
She lives
! Soria was shocked.
She pushed Tomas back as he arrived. The well-meaning ministrations of an
overzealous lover were more likely to further harm the girl than help her.
Soria knelt over the peasant girl and felt at the back of her neck for broken
bones, then felt around her head for blood. All she noticed though was a thin,
wispy line of smoke trailing up from the jade dragon pendant she wore. The poor
little dear was scorched, its fire burnt out, the one magic it held expended.

"What happened?" Soria asked, turning to
Tomas.

"There was a flash of green all around, just
before she hit the ground," Tomas said.

"You must have imagined—"

"No, it was magic," Tomas insisted.
"My father told me about it, showed me a bit himself. He must have given
Abbiley that pendant for this sort of emergency."

Soria knew better. She also now knew that Abbiley
had never told Tomas who had really given her the pendant.

The ground shook once more. Soria took a look back
to the keep; its years of patient service to Khesh—and whatever land came
before it—seemed at an end. She saw Rakashi emerge from around a corner, his
half-blade sheathed at his back and a large bundle slung over one shoulder.

"What happened?" Rakashi shouted as he
approached.

"Where's Brannis?" Soria yelled back.

"Still inside. Can you not hear him?"
Rakashi lowered his voice as he drew near. "Now what happened to the
girl?"

Abbiley stirred. "She fell. Couldn't hold on
while I carried her," Soria said. She backed away and took the bundle from
Rakashi. The Takalish warrior scholar was far more knowledgeable about anatomy
and medicine. Beyond telling that the girl had not broken her neck or split her
skull, Soria was unsure of the extent of her injuries.

Rakashi bent low to examine Abbiley. He put two
fingers to the side of her throat, and held them there a moment. With his
thumb, he pushed her right eyelid back, looking into her eye. Then he took a
shoulder and turned her just a bit. He reached beneath her and felt along the
backs of her ribs. He repeated the process for the other side, and then checked
her arms and legs for breaks.

"Hey!" Brannis's voice shouted. He was
running from the direction Rakashi had come. "We're all out. Get
clear."

Rakashi nodded to Soria then turned to Tomas.
"Help me carry her. Be gentle." The two men hoisted Abbiley and
carried her away from the keep. Soria brought the bundle and followed.

She watched as Brannis approached the corner of one
tower. He steadied himself as for a footrace, blade held to the side. At a run,
he slid the sword along the walls of the keep at shoulder height. He traced the
entire length of one side, slicing the building like a sack, rock spilling out
in place of grain. He sprinted out of the way as the keep collapsed, walls
caving in, and towers toppling.

"None of the survivors should be too interested
in pursuing us now, after seeing that," Brannis remarked. As the wind
carried off the dust from the devastation, less than half the keep remained
standing. It was a sudden ruin, desolate under the pale moonlight.

"Let's get out of here," Soria said.

Brannis took Abbiley, cradled in his arms. He had
not asked about her injuries, simply accepting that she needed to be carried.
When he looked down at her, Soria knew he could not help but notice the
pendant. But of all the looks she saw there on his face, she never saw the look
he saved for her.

For Soria, that made the whole of their expedition
worth the effort.

The music was raucous. Fiddlers hacked away at their
instruments like woodsmen, pipers warbled out melodies in counterpoint, and a
lone drummer sought little more than to be heard over the whole of it. The
dancers were the wealthy children of the Kadrin nobles, brought in by horse,
ship, and airship from across the empire, with a mix of beautiful—but less
high-bred—companions of both sexes.

Kyrus picked his way along the outskirts of the
debauchery past servants carrying trays of sweets and wine goblets, past casual
trysts, and past older men ogling and envying. It was a study in hedonism, and
it was perhaps the only thing that kept Emperor Sommick sufficiently amused to
ignore the men and woman who were the clockwork behind the face of the empire.

Kyrus smirked to himself at that last realization.
There was no clockwork anywhere on Veydrus, so far as he had seen. In his idle
moments, once the war ran itself out of breath, he meant to remedy that—and so
many more things. He would become an inventor, he decided. There were feats of
metallurgy that the empire could certainly do well by, as well as oil lamps for
the peasantry, modern ship hulls for the aerial fleet, and a civilized form of
cooking, using proper spices. There were books to be rewritten. There were
houses to be built that kept out wind and rain—with glass windows and all. He
could put to rest the squinting of old men like Fenris with proper spectacles.
He could do it all from things that he knew, and that Brannis could ask and
read about.

He could picture it all: he would fashion a flying
house for himself and Juliana—a workshop of wonders. They would travel the
world together, spreading the wonders of Tellurak and his magical hybrid
creations. Juliana would have her adventures, and he would have a lifetime of
study to fill his brain, even if that lifetime lasted two hundred summers.

The pleasant thoughts blanketed Kyrus's mind and
insulated him from the moral horrors he navigated. He needed little attention
to his path; he was known well enough, even by drunkards, to clear a pocket
ahead of him in any direction he cared to move.

"Ah, Sir Brannis, welcome," Emperor
Sommick sang, clearly deep within his cups. His breath stank of wine—excellent
wine, Kyrus had little doubt—and his eyes had a glassy sheen over their blue.

"You wished to see me, Your Highness?"
Kyrus bowed his head. He did nothing to hide his ennui, trusting in the wine to
hide it for him.

"Brannis, Brannis, my good friend and loyal
caretaker of my empire, what do we do to you all day to vex you so? Do you
carry a mountain upon those stooped shoulders? Has some cruel vixen driven a
spigot into your loins and drained your vitality?" Sommick asked, waving
his hands in Kyrus's direction as he spoke. His voice carried across half the
chamber, despite the music.

"I assure you, I am well, Emperor Sommick,"
Kyrus replied.

"Nonsense, nonsense," Sommick replied,
brushing away Kyrus's assurance with his non-drinking hand. "Brave face is
all that is. I command you, sip wine and join in the merriment. I shall not
have two grim sentinels circling about my reign, and the other defies me."

"I really had best not drink, Your Highness. It
is not safe," said Kyrus. He gave a small smile, meant to reassure. It
elicited a frown instead.

"None of that, now. I have two of the Inner
Circle out there among the revelers," Emperor Sommick claimed. Kyrus
looked about and confirmed that there were sorcerers among the courtiers, but
not any that were actually Inner Circle. Kyrus chose not to contradict the
emperor on that point.

"Your Highness, if
they
get roaring
drunk there is no chance of them reducing the whole palace to molten
rock," Kyrus pointed out.

"Full on yourself, are you? That's the
objection you choose?" Sommick asked.

"It should suffice, I think," Kyrus
replied.

"Good!" Sommick replied, screwing one of
his inimitable self-satisfied grins onto his drunken face. "Pick any lady
out there that you like. You need not drink with us, but you shall dance."

Kyrus glared at Emperor Sommick, worrying that he
would envision him aflame, and see it happen. He could be gone in an instant.
One tiny moment's loss of control, Kyrus realized, was all that separated the
empire from once again being without an emperor.

"Of course, Your Highness," Kyrus
responded. He turned and made his way toward the center of the dance floor, all
the while able to watch Sommick in his aether vision. As he watched, the
emperor yawned. It was the elaborate yawn of a man whose every shift in mood
was announced by proclamation. One of the attentive servants scooped the goblet
from Sommick's drooping hand.

Kyrus caught lewd, inviting glances from many who
had heard his exchange with the emperor. Others were more coy, but no more
welcome. Kyrus kept his course, shutting out his vision of the light as he
pointedly ignored all attention. He waited until he was sure that Sommick had
drifted off to sleep in his throne, then continued walking straight out the
doors.

The last thing Sommick saw before his magically
induced nap was Sir Brannis Solaran, dutifully obeying his command.

* * * * * * *
*

The Chess Room was a quiet place to think, even
while in the midst of a game, even while an opponent sat across the board from
you. Kyrus looked at his pieces, and at Rashan's. Since his revelation that
Rashan was playing an Acardian style of chess, Kyrus felt much more secure in
his assessment of the positions he took against the demon. Still, he weighed
carefully each move he made.

"You know, if this game is not decided before
word comes of Jinzan Fehr's attack, I will be the one to go," Rashan said,
breaking a silence which had been long enough for Kyrus to have eaten a
meal—which he had.

Kyrus looked up, then back at the board.

The demon's presence focused his thoughts, made his
musings less an abstract thing. Rashan was so simple to dismiss as a monster—a
demon, in the storybook sense—when he was not around. In the flesh, he was
personable, witty, challenging, and a wellspring of information when he chose
to share it.

A twitch from one of his knights drew Kyrus's
attention. The little carved marble piece turned its head to look up at him,
blinking baleful eyes. The edge of one of his pawns rose and fell in rhythm,
while the rest of the base lay flat on the board. Was it tapping its foot?

"You know I can see you doing that," Kyrus
scolded his opponent. Kyrus relented, and moved his bishop. It was a move he
had decided on some time ago. It was also a move that was subtly flawed. It was
meant to provoke an exchange of attacks, rather than attack and defense, but
that was not the flaw; the flaw was that it would fall one move short of
victory, if Rashan countered properly. Kyrus had carefully assured himself that
he was choosing a play that was consistent with his style, but not the best
move he could find.

"Something is on your mind besides this
game?" Rashan noted. "Is it that spat you had with Sommick this
afternoon?"

"I suppose I ought not to ask how you knew
about that. It just vexes me to think that we are subject to the whims of that
fop. I had to remove myself from his presence before I killed him. Do you
realize how close we came to needing to scrounge the dung pits for another
heir?" Kyrus asked. "It dawned on me how easy it would be, without
even meaning to; just a moment's loss of poise, and
poof!
" Kyrus
closed his hand and sprang it open, pantomiming an explosion.

"And thus did the young sorcerer know the pains
of a crazy old demon, eh?" Rashan replied. The warlock scoffed. "I
get that feeling constantly. There are so few competent ... well competent
anythings
around here. I am vexed on all sides by ignorance, stupidity, and duplicity.
Thank the winds that rarely does the latter come without an ample serving of
the former two. You worry about Sommick; for me, nearly everyone dangles over a
pit of knives."

"Should I worry?" Kyrus asked. He tried to
keep the question lighthearted.

"You?" Rashan shook his head. "I
spend much of my free time alone with my thoughts. I seek you out because you
try my patience with less vigor than most, and occasionally provide some
insight I lacked. I also weigh the thought that you would be more than a
trifling fancy to kill." The warlock reached across the table, and gave
Kyrus a swift, backhanded slap to the shoulder. Kyrus's shielding spell
shrugged the blow off.

Rashan moved his rook out of the path Kyrus had just
threatened with his bishop. The game was slipping down the path to Rashan's
victory, and another day of avoiding the "honor" of confronting
Jinzan Fehr.

* * * * * * *
*

"I just want to hear it again once. Is that so
much to ask?" Juliana shouted. She had spent the day in the captain's
harness, and was in no mood for willfulness. They sat in the sparse galley of
the
Starlit Marauder
, floating above the clouds, sharing a late meal.

"I gave my word once, it shall suffice,"
Tiiba replied, an uncustomary anger in his tone. "I am not some
street-corner piper to be bluffed and bullied into changing his story. My honor
and my blade, they are the only claims I have to this world, or the
other."

"You just keep getting this look in your good
eye, whenever I see you looking at him," Juliana pressed.

"You see that look because you imagine it
there," Tiiba replied. "I am holding to my part of the bargain. You
should listen to the screaming inside your heart. It is the call of your
conscience, should you let my people fall once more under the blade and spells
of that ... creature. You have to convince him to confront Rashan. By every
account I hear, he is the embodiment of destruction when he chooses to be. Let
him choose a noble cause."

"It's hard to argue that every day he spends
preparing makes him a bit more likely to prevail. The worst thing that can
happen is that he fails," Juliana argued.

"The worst thing?" Tiiba asked. "For
you, perhaps. For Safschan, I think, not trying at all is worse."

"Brannis ... thinks he might be able to tame
Rashan. He thinks he might just need to have someone who can tell him 'no' when
he oversteps reason," Juliana said, her voice fading. "He's starting
to worry that he might slide down the same dark path that took Rashan, or
Tallax, or who knows how many other sorcerers who stood mightiest in their
day."

"So that is your true worry," Tiiba said.
"You worry both that he might lose, and that he might win."

"Goodnight, Tiiba," Juliana said. She left
the remains of her dinner cold, and retired to her cabin.