Thief’s Magic (4 page)

Tyen smiled at the thought of all that had changed in the world since she had last “lived”. What would she make of the progress men had made, especially in the last century? She would be impressed, he was certain. A feeling rather like pride swelled within him, and suddenly he had another reason to delay handing her over to Kilraker and the Academy.

She needed to know how the world had changed. She needed her store of knowledge updated. He would have to teach her before he handed her over. After all, if she still believed in superstitions then they might not just declare her an inaccurate source, but a dangerous one.

A familiar, unsettling feeling in his stomach told him that the aircart was beginning to descend and he looked up. Palga was much closer now. Closing the book, he slipped her into his satchel, which he’d kept slung across his chest since escaping the Mailanders, and let his flame die, but Vella was foremost in his thoughts as they slowly dropped towards the small town.

I suppose there is no way she could be an accurate source of knowledge, having missed the last six hundred years of progress and knowing nothing more than what the people who held her did. Yet that makes her a fascinating insight into the past. In return for what she teaches me it seems fair that I give her the knowledge she was designed to absorb. The Academy will only be interested in what they can take from her, so I must do it before I hand her over.

Palga’s landing field was, as with most towns, on the outskirts in a field next to the main road. Two more aircarts lay on the grass, their cooling capsules carefully pegged down next to their chassis. As Kilraker’s descended Tyen moved to the front to take the looped nose rope, while Drem ducked under the railing in preparation to leap to the ground. Neel had taken the tail rope and Miko was at the rear.

“That’s Gowel’s cart, isn’t it?” Miko said as they floated past the landed carts.

“It certainly is.” Kilraker chuckled. “Let’s hope he’s recently arrived, or there’ll be no good dusky left at the Anchor Inn. Ready?”

Drem and Miko barked an affirmation.

“Jump!” the professor ordered.

As the pair leapt to the ground the aircart’s descent slowed abruptly and, with less weight bearing it down, it began to rise again. Kilraker looked up at the capsule. Flaps lifted, allowing hot air to spill out. The ascent slowed, then the cart began to sink again.

“Ropes!”

Tyen tossed the nose rope down to Drem, who caught it and drew up the slack. They were a well-coordinated team now, having landed the cart several times on this expedition. As the chassis settled on the ground, Tyen tossed a ring peg down and used magic to ram it into the earth. Drem fed the rope through the ring while Tyen hurried to the back to repeat the process with Miko.

With the cart secured, Kilraker, Neel and Tyen could step off the chassis. The professor strode away to arrange transport to the Academy Hotel, while Drem set to untying their luggage.

“Put what’s to be locked inside the chassis on the right and what you’re taking to the hotel on the left,” he told them as he lifted the first item.

“Left,” Miko said. Then, as the servant sorted through the luggage: “Hurry up, Drem. Gowel’s been away for a year. He’ll have some tales to tell.”

“I’m going as fast as I can, young Miko,” Drem replied. “And there’s plenty of hours left until the ridiculous time of the night Gowel will keep us all up to.”

“I’m sure the professor will let you go to bed long before then,” Tyen said. “One of us has to be lucid enough to get this thing off the ground tomorrow morning.”

“Tomorrow afternoon, most likely,” Drem grumbled.

By the time they had the deck clear, the capsule had cooled enough that it could be tied down beside the chassis. A hire cart had rolled up and Kilraker had haggled down the fee to a reasonable rate. Tyen helped Drem to pack luggage into the aircart chassis and the servant locked the hatch, then they all grabbed their bags and hastened to the hire cart.

Kilraker was smiling as they piled on board.
Looking forward to catching up with his friend and competitor
, Tyen thought.
I wonder …
perhaps he should slip Vella down his shirt again. She might learn something from the stories the two archaeologist adventurers would tell that night.

T
he Academy maintained a hotel in every city and town in the Empire worth visiting. Though Palga was too small to be called a city, Tyen wasn’t surprised that the town had one. Favourable winds made it a favourite stopover for air and sea travellers, of which many were Academy graduates of some sort.

He had been amazed at the size of the hotel, however. It seemed disproportionately large for the town, and most of the locals were employed in servicing or supplying it. Yet though everything was of exemplary quality, Kilraker assured them that it was to the Anchor Inn, the establishment on the other side of the road, that the younger graduates flocked to share a “bite” of dusky and boast of their journeys to the far reaches of the Empire and beyond. Adventurer men, and the occasional woman, of the non-academic and foreign kind also frequented the inn, and were often willing to share a tale or two.

As Tyen followed Kilraker and the other students into the inn’s public room, noise and warmth surrounded him. At the same time he was conscious of the book tucked into his shirt, its shape hidden under his waistcoat. Drem had insisted they all change into their usual city clothes: shirt, waistcoat, trousers, jacket and cap – not worn since they’d passed through Palga on the way to Mailand, after which they’d donned practical dust-coloured mar-cloth trousers and shirts along with warm airmen’s jackets, hoods, scarves and gloves.

As he entered the drinking room, Kilraker set his hat on one of a row of nails along the nearest wall. The students set their caps in a line below it and followed the professor towards a cluster of four men sitting at one of the inn’s trestle tables. One of the four looked up, his teeth flashing in a well-tanned face as he saw them.

“Vals!” he bellowed. “I thought you weren’t due back for another week or two.”

“I wasn’t,” the professor replied, moving around the table so he could slap the other man’s shoulders in greeting. “We had a bit of trouble with the natives. Nothing I couldn’t have dealt with by myself, but I didn’t want to risk harm coming to the boys.” He turned to Tyen, Miko and Neel. “I think you have met Tyen Ironsmelter and Neel Long before, but not young Miko Greenbar. Boys, this is Tangor Gowel, the famous adventurer.”

“Famous?” Gowel waved a hand dismissively. “Only among our kind, where fame has less value than friendship.” He gestured to the other men. “Kargen Watchkeep, Mins Speer and Dayn Zo, my travel companions. Friends, this is Vals Kilraker, professor of history and archaeology at the Academy. Now sit and tell me where you’ve been.” He waved at a passing server. “Four more glasses here!”

“Tell me where
you’ve
been first,” Kilraker retorted. “I heard you’d crossed the Lower Latitudinal Mountains and reached the Far South.”

Gowel grinned, his moustache broadening. “You heard right.”

“In that little aircart we tied up next to in the landing field?”

“Indeed.”

“Did the air get a little thin during the crossing?”

All four men nodded. “But we found a pass of sorts. A passage through the peaks.”

“And what lay on the other side?”

The server arrived with the glasses, and Gowel poured a generous measure of rich, dark dusky into them and those of his friends. “The Far South is as Discoverer Lumber described,” he answered, handing them each a glass. “Strange animals and stranger people. The atmosphere is strong in magic and what they do with it…” His eyes brightened with the memory. “We saw the legendary Tyeszal – which Lumber translated as Spirecastle. A city carved into a great pinnacle of rock as tall as a mountain. Suspended platforms haul people and produce up and down its hollow centre, and children fly around the outside carrying messages and small items.”

Kilraker took a good swig of dusky, his eyes never leaving Gowel’s face. “So not an exaggeration after all.” It seemed to Tyen that some muscle twitched or tightened in the professor’s face, and gave a fleeting impression of envy. “What are the natives like?”

“Civilised. Their king is friendly to foreigners and open to trade. Their sorcerers are well learned and they have a small school. Though far behind us in technological invention they have developed some methods and applications I had not seen before.” He shrugged. “Though I could be mistaken. Magic is not my area of expertise, as you know. My mission was not for the Academy but for Tor and Brown Associates, who directed me to find untapped resources and new trade, as well as an aircart route through the mountains.”

Kilraker finished his drink. “Did you find any resources and new trade?”

Gowel nodded and drew a large, leather-bound book out of his jacket. He flicked through the pages, giving them glimpses of neat writing and sketches. The adventurer stopped at a page to describe the plants and animals, both domestic and wild, that he’d found. He opened the book at a map, where he pointed out the location of the different peoples he and his companions had encountered. Tyen noted a line threading through an arch of mountains bordering the top of the map. Was this the route the adventurers had taken?

When Gowel had finished, Kilraker looked from the book to his friend and smiled.

“Surely that’s not
all
you brought back with you?”

“Oh, the usual samples of flora and fauna, minerals and textiles.”

“No treasures to sell to the Academy?”

Gowel shook his head. “Nothing that would have weighed down the aircarts.”

The professor grunted in reluctant agreement. “Gold and silver are cursedly heavy.”

“Knowledge is of greater value than gold and silver,” Gowel told him. “I make more money from my books and lectures than from treasure these days, even if the Academy calls me a liar. Perhaps because they do.” His gaze shifted from Miko to Neel and then Tyen. “Don’t let the venerable institution narrow your minds, boys. Get out there and decide for yourself what is folklore and what is truth.”

“It’s all very well for wealthy men like you, Gowel,” Kilraker said. “But most of us can’t afford to come home empty-handed. We need to justify the Academy financing our expeditions by adding to the venerable institution’s wisdom or wealth. Preferably wealth.”

“And we don’t want to get ourselves thrown out of the Academy, as you were,” Neel added, giving the older man the sort of challenging stare that only those from his class would dare. Kilraker chuckled.

Gowel stared back at the boy. “Contrary to what the gossip papers say, I wasn’t thrown out: I resigned from my position.”

Neel frowned. “Why would you do a thing like that?”

The adventurer’s smile was grim. “I once found a marvel – an object of little monetary value but great magical potential that might have benefited thousands – and they locked it away where nobody but they could see and use it.”

Tyen felt his heart skip a beat.
Is that what they will do to Vella? Lock her away where nobody would touch her? She would hate that.
But surely, once the Academy realised how useful she could be, she would be held and read all the time. By men with greater knowledge and intelligence than his. How could he deny her that when it was what she’d been made for?

“I should have kept it.” Gowel scowled, and Tyen was surprised to see Kilraker nodding. “From what Vals tells me, it’s sitting unused and forgotten in the vault. The Academy is greedy and selfish. Knowledge and the wonders of the world should be available to all, so that anybody can improve themselves if they wish to,” Gowel continued. “My dream is to build a great library in Belton that people may come to free of charge, to learn of the world and its wonders.”

It was an admirable dream, and Tyen felt a stab of guilt at his wish to keep Vella. To do so would be selfish. Others should benefit from her, too. But if the Academy treated her the same as the object Gowel had found, would anyone benefit from her? And while Kilraker’s words about justifying their expeditions had reminded him of the other reason he should hand her over to the Academy, wouldn’t doing so simply to gain higher grading be just as selfish?

Whatever he did, he ought to update the information she contained first. And work out if she did always tell the truth. It would increase the likelihood of the Academy seeing her as a valuable object worth using, and it was what she would want, since her purpose was to gather knowledge. It would also give him time to decide what to do.

The longer he kept her the worse it would look when he finally did, so he’d have to work quickly, taking every opportunity to teach her. It was clear telling her that she was wrong about something wasn’t enough to change the information she held. She had resisted when he’d tried to correct her on the relationship between creativity and magic. He needed proof to convince her of her error. And by the time he handed her over to the Academy he must be able to demonstrate that her knowledge could be corrected.

He looked around, wishing he could start now. It would draw premature attention to Vella if he took her out and started reading in the inn, but if he went back to the hotel it would be hours before the others returned. Miko and Neel would be amazed he was willing to miss out on Gowel’s tales – not to mention free dusky – but it had been a long, exciting day and he’d spent a large part of it driving the cart, so they’d believe him if he said he was tired. He drained his glass, set it down and yawned.

“Forgive me,” he said. “But I’m going to turn in for the night.”

The other students were staring at him in surprise, but Kilraker nodded sympathetically. “It has been a long day. Perhaps you all should—”

“I’m fine,” Neel declared. “Not tired at all.” Miko straightened and nodded in agreement. The pair looked at him sidelong.

Tyen hesitated as if nearly persuaded by their mockery, then shook his head. “I’m bound to get the first driving shift tomorrow,” he retorted quietly. He rose and nodded politely to Gowel and his companions, then Kilraker, then strode over to retrieve his cap before climbing the stairs to the main doors.