The Conqueror's Shadow (38 page)

/My word, but she's helpful, isn't she?/

“What, you're the only one permitted to be sarcastic?” Corvis asked.

/It's just that most of you aren't very good at it./

“Oh, gods!”

Everyone jumped, then stared at the ogre. One of Davro's hands rested idly atop a heavy barrel, the forefinger and thumb of the other clasped tightly on the bridge of his nose. His single eye squeezed shut.

“Davro?” Seilloah asked, concerned. “Are you all right?”

“That depends,” the ogre said with a disgusted sigh. “If you mean physically, yes, I'm just fine. I am, however, an idiot.”

/I—/

“Shut up, Khanda.”

/Wow. Quick reflexes there, friend./

“Davro,” Corvis said carefully, “what is it?”

“I think someone else knows, Corvis. I'm sorry I didn't think to mention it before, but it didn't seem all that important at the time. And it was so long ago, there was so much else going on, I didn't—”

“Davro,” the warlord said again, a bit louder.
“What
happened so long ago?
What
didn't seem important?”

“It was right after you left Denathere,” the ogre said. “We were pulling out, a fighting withdrawal as it were. Anyway, some of my tribe and I were holed up in one of the buildings across from the Hall of Meeting, keeping an eye on things, watching for an opportunity to get the hell out. We were there when Duke Lorum and his entourage arrived, Corvis. When they got there, they were wary, but relatively upbeat. You'd disappeared, the army was falling apart, and there was no real cohesive resistance. At least, that's how they all looked when they got into the Hall. Maybe half an hour later, though, one of them storms back out into the street, and she's sure as sunset irked about something. All kinds of rants and curses and words that, no offense intended, I really didn't think humans had the wherewithal to use. So she keeps this up for a good five minutes, blows up a few nearby piles of what's already pretty much rubble, and stalks back inside. I didn't think much of it at the time—maybe she got some bad news, or found a friend among the dead—but now I'm not so sure.”

Losalis raised a hand. “I'm sorry to interrupt, but did you say she ‘blew up' a few piles of rubble?”

But there was no confusion at all in Corvis's expression. He knew of whom the ogre spoke; had known, in fact, since his first use of the word
she
. He wondered briefly if the past seventeen years were anything but a brief intermission in some stage play he performed for the amusement of uncaring gods, and if he was destined to continue every little thing left uncompleted so long ago.

“I hadn't heard that she had all that much of a temper,” Corvis mused, speaking to no one in particular. “For something to anger her that badly, it must have been pretty important.”

“My lord,” Losalis interjected again with just a bit less patience, “I don't mean to be rude, but might I impose on you to tell me who in the gods' names we're talking about?”

“I'm sorry, Losalis. We're talking about Rheah Vhoune, of course. Personal adviser to the regent, His Grace, the Duke Lorum of Taberness. And also, incidentally, one of the greatest sorcerers alive. Back when we were acquainted, she'd mastered the Seventh Circle at an age when most mages are struggling with the Fifth. She's probably achieved the Eighth by now.”

“Oh,” Losalis said simply. “Is this really the sort of person that we want getting mixed up in this mess? I think we've got enough wizards and witches and sorcerers involved already.”

Corvis actually laughed. “I couldn't agree more, Losalis. Unfortunately, our large friend got me thinking with his useful, if somewhat belated, revelations, and I'm afraid that I don't have any choice anymore.”

“You think she knew about the book?” Seilloah asked.

“It certainly appears that way, doesn't it? I'm starting to think that I should have just messengered an itinerary of my entire campaign to anyone who expressed an interest. Obviously, we weren't doing a great job of keeping it a secret.”

/Or,/
Khanda suggested,
/she didn't have the slightest clue what you were looking for until after you'd left, and just threw her little tantrum when she found the room and figured out what she'd missed./

“You know,” Corvis admitted reluctantly, “you may just have a point.”

/Oh! Oh, he acknowledges my humble contribution! My heart palpitates with glee!/

“You don't
have
a heart, Khanda.”

/No? Then what's palpitating?/

“Khanda suggests,” the warlord announced to the others, “that Rheah may not have learned of the book until after I'd left. She may have initially only realized that something important slipped through her fingers.” Corvis frowned darkly. “Not that it really matters
when
she found out. If anyone in this whole bloody kingdom could dig up that key,” he acknowledged, “it'd be her.”

Losalis's eyes narrowed. “Do we have any reason to believe that Audriss can't figure this out?”

“I don't think so,” Corvis replied. “We've been assuming that Audriss has access to the same information we do, if not more. I see no reason he couldn't come to the same conclusions.”

“Then we know where he's going, don't we, my lord? It seems to me that the question now is, what do we do about it?”

Unfortunately, as much as he might wish otherwise, Corvis knew
exactly
what to do about it.

Rheah Vhoune strode through the broken streets of Denathere, but her eyes scarcely saw the damage, her ears barely registered the moans of the injured or the cries of mourning and despair. The smoke in the air swirled around her, but her magics held it at bay. The dirt of the alleys wafted over her boots and rained back down to earth, unable to find enough purchase to stick.

For a time, as ash-stained brick loomed overhead and the occasional sound of lingering skirmishes echoed from afar, her attentions remained focused on the conversation she and Nathaniel Espa had just held with the young regent. Some level of despair was expected, understandable even, given the wound inflicted upon Imphallion's second greatest city and the frustrating escape of the Terror who'd inflicted it. Still, they'd need to keep a vigilant eye on Lorum, make sure that he had sufficient time to recover before he did something foolish. And she wasn't going to have unlimited time, either. When the Guilds regrouped, recovered their authority from the regent, and set out to rebuild, that would be the time to make her own move, to see her own dreams bear fruit. If she was too preoccupied with Lorum, her best opportunity would pass her by like a wild horse, leaving her in the dust.

But soon, thoughts of the Society she sought to construct turned to matters of politics and government and war. Again, as so often in the past hours, she wondered what it was that Corvis Rebaine had thought he was doing, why the Terror of the East had allowed himself to be cornered in this city, scarcely halfway to his goal. And Rheah Vhoune found herself—without the slightest surprise, though she'd no memory of choosing a destination—standing before Denathere's monolithic Hall of Meeting.

With scarcely a glance of acknowledgment, she brushed her way past royal soldiers and Guild mercenaries who, hours after Rebaine's forces had all but disintegrated and Denathere been retaken, still combed the corridors and rooms of the Hall, looking for bodies or survivors. Her soft-booted feet trod along stained carpets, down stone-walled halls, and across bloodstained thresholds. A stair that she'd long known existed but had never had cause to traverse led her ever down, to the deepest cellars of the Hall. And there even Rheah's granite demeanor cracked, for the hole in the floor was still half choked with bodies, the floor around it coated in drying blood. She felt a chill run across her arms, down her back, and sensed the presence of a dozen lingering souls.

A score of workers stood amid the bodies, their steps uneven, their faces pale, arms and torsos drenched in gore. They'd already dug from the tomb of flesh several living survivors, including the infant Braetlyn heir, and the odds of finding others grew more feeble by the moment. Nonetheless, Rheah took a few moments to aid them, directing phantom hands to lift the heaviest corpses and phantom ears to listen for the faintest breath or beating heart. Only when she was certain there were no more lives to be saved did she direct her magics on with greater force, clearing herself a path to walk the scorched passages that had been Rebaine's ultimate goal.

With the aid of a veritable swarm of spells, seeking this way and that, sniffing for any trace of lingering magics, it took her mere moments to find the iron door, peeled back and flush
against the wall like a flattened blossom. It took many minutes more—minutes spent sitting cross-legged in meditative concentration on the cold stone floor—for those spells to tell Rheah what had once lain upon the web-shrouded table within.

And many minutes more for Rheah's sobs of frustration to subside. All this time, so close, had she only known …

Rebaine had found it, he'd taken it—but he hadn't
used
it. Why? Could he simply be waiting, studying the incantations? It was possible, certainly, but somehow Rheah didn't think so. He'd left his army no path of retreat—surely he'd planned to use the book to make good his victory. That he'd escaped alone, allowing his campaign to crumble, suggested that something had gone wrong.

Rheah Vhoune rose slowly to her feet and stalked back toward the light above, still cursing with every step. First, the regent must be informed, for though her instincts screamed at her to keep her discovery a secret from all, she would obey her sworn duty.

But then … then she would learn
why
, what had stopped Rebaine within sight of his victory. And damn him, no matter what it took, she would be ready when he appeared again.

ONE WOULD NEVER KNOW
it to look at him, but Rollie Micallec was an easygoing man, softhearted and soft-spoken. At six-foot-six and nearly three hundred pounds, he was dragged into brawls and even duels with unfortunate regularity. His hands, large but dexterous, had been forced to do harm far too frequently.

When such violence could be avoided, he labored on behalf of others, as his mother had before him, and her father before her. Rollie Micallec, though one of the strongest men in the household of Edmund, Duke of Lutrinthus, was known throughout his master's province not as a warrior, but as one of the most skilled physicians ever to walk beneath the eyes of the gods.

He listened to his patients' complaints with understanding and sympathy,
rather than the abrupt veneer many physicians mistake for efficiency. Those powerful hands could set a broken bone, stitch a ragged wound, or merely offer a comforting touch, all with equal facility. As the duke's household physician, Rollie rarely treated the common folk, but his reputation, and those of his pupils, had nonetheless spread far and wide.

Today the famous healer was not in high spirits. He shoved through the crowded hallways of Duke Edmund's estate, pushing through soldiers dressed both in the white-and-silver livery of Lutrinthus and in various other hues as well, not the least prevalent of which was the deep blue and red of Braetlyn.

Rollie didn't like soldiers. He liked even less the fact that his own lord's men were currently outnumbered within the walls of the man's own manor. Intellectually, Rollie knew the warriors were allies, the soldiers of lords and nobles gathered against a common enemy, but emotionally he felt he was playing the part of a lamed lamb amid a gargantuan pack of wolves.

But even worse was the reason the soldiers were present.

Duke Edmund's estate sat just about a mile outside the city of Orthessis, a city currently in the throes of chaotic evacuation. Though much of the populace steadfastly refused to leave, a greater number streamed west, a winding worm of human misery advancing on Pelapheron. Valuables were hastily wrapped and packed into rickety carts, lumbering wagons, or dangling saddlebags. Animals were herded into some semblance of order and driven from their pens onto the dusty road. Friends and family were separated by the slow but steady tide of humanity, valuables were lost or shattered, and fights erupted with appalling regularity. And still the people coming up behind were willing to brave the horrors of this mass exodus, because staying behind was even worse.

The Serpent was coming.

Duke Edmund's scouts had come thundering into town a week before, horses lathered and sweating. Audriss's armies had paused for a day or so, camped just outside Vorringar. But they'd quickly been on the move again, and they'd reached Taiheason's Cross in less than a
day. There they had turned, the scouts reported breathlessly to Sir Tyler, current commander of Duke Edmund's forces, down the northwest fork.