A Young Man Without Magic (44 page)

“You think she will tolerate this?”

“I think she has no choice. I am a sorcerer, Master Murau. Witches are not the only ones who can cast love spells and other compulsive bindings.”

“You have enchanted her?”

“I have enslaved her.”

Anrel shuddered. “But she is a free woman, not a bond servant,” he said.

“She is a woman who attempted to place me under her control. Whatever the law may say, I make no apology for imposing upon her much the same fate she intended for me.”

Anrel glanced at Reva. “Then you have dealt with the true villain; can you not show mercy to the witch? Flog her, perhaps, but allow her to live?”

“The law specifies that witches are to hang.”

“But you are the landgrave of Aulix! Can you not set aside the statute?”

“We are not
in
Aulix. What's more, she has seen and heard things that I cannot allow her to describe.”

“Are there no spells that would suppress her memories of those secrets?”

“There are, but really, sir, why should I trouble myself with them? She will hang, and that will be the end of it.”

Reva whimpered; Anrel glanced at her again, then turned back to Lord Allutar. “You asked what more I wanted, in addition to my freedom, and I am telling you, I want the witch's life.”

“You can't have it. I said before a house ful of guests that she would hang, so she must hang.”

That was the true reason for the landgrave's intransigence, Anrel realized. He was not willing to lose face.

But he did not want to antagonize Lady Saria, either. Which did he want less?

“And if I refuse to accept a bargain that does not include her?” Anrel asked.

“Why, then you shall hang with her. Master Murau, forgive my bluntness, but you are at my mercy here; we bargain on my terms or not at all.”

That did not sound like a bluff. Anrel did not look at Reva again; he did not want to see her face when he gave in. “Very well, then. If I cannot have the witch, then I want three things from you in exchange for forswearing all further involvement in politics and doing my best to stay out of your way.”

“Three?” Allutar frowned. “Name them.”

“My life.”

“Done.”

“My freedom.”

“Of course. And the third?”

“An apology for the murder of Lord Valin, who had committed no crime deserving death.”

“An apology? An
apology
?”

“Yes.”

Lord Allutar leaned back in his chair. “You amaze me. You are bargaining for your
life
, yet you still concern yourself with an apology that will change nothing?”

“Yes.” Anrel made no attempt to explain. He was not sure he
could
explain why an apology was important; he merely knew that it was.

“And if I refuse to apologize, what will you do? You would not die for the sake of this woman; will you die for an apology?”

“Will it harm you to make one, my lord?”

“Harm is not the issue. Do you think you can make demands of me because I intend to wed your cousin? I have offered you your life after you threw it away for the sake of your friend's memory, and you are not satisfied? I have offered you your freedom after you invaded my private study to rescue a condemned felon, and you want more? Do you feel no gratitude at all that I am allowing you to go unharmed? Father and Mother, man, but your insolence astonishes me!”

“And your arrogance appalls me, my lord. You have taken an innocent man's life, you have by your own admission enslaved a woman the law does not consider deserving of such treatment, yet you cannot bring yourself to make a simple expression of regret?”

“Oh, I have my regrets, sir!” Allutar exclaimed. “I regret I did not kill
both
of you!”

“You can, of course, remedy that omission, if you are willing to forgo my cousin's embrace.”

“You forget yourself, sir! And you forget who and what I am. I could enchant Lady Saria, as this witch would have enchanted me, and wipe all memory of your existence from her mind—have you forgotten that? I do not do so because I am an honorable man and would prefer my
marriage to be built upon genuine affection, but you provoke me—do not think it beyond me.”

“Oh, I am sure it is not, my lord. A man who would rather hang a helpless young woman than be seen to change his mind, a man who would rather commit a second murder than apologize for his first—what could be beyond you? But you know as well as I do that memory spells are difficult and unreliable, and that Lady Saria is an accomplished sorceress herself. Ensorceling her effectively would not be an easy task. Better to tolerate my insolence, and allow yourself a pretense of benevolence.”

Lord Allutar stuttered with rage, and leapt to his feet, knocking his chair over backward. “You
dare
? You, a mere commoner, speak to
me
like that?”

Anrel rose, as well. “I speak as I choose, my lord. I am a free man, commoner or not. Your wards could not keep me out, and your words cannot intimidate me.”

“Get out!” Allutar bellowed, pointing at the door. “Get out, before I forget my own best intentions and rip your heart out!”

Anrel hesitated for a fraction of a second, tempted to stay and argue—but Lord Allutar could indeed rip his heart out with a spell, and was even now raising his hands as if preparing to cast one. If Anrel fled now he might still find a way to free Reva; if he died, or stayed under Lord Allutar's eye, the witch was doomed.

And he had not yet sworn to any part of Lord Allutar's bargain, a fact that the landgrave might recall at any instant. Nor had he revealed how he passed the wards, a bit of information that might well alter Lord Allutar's attitude toward him.

Anrel turned and ran.

Anrel made no attempt at stealth or discretion as he fled; he ran up the stairs at full tilt, and charged through the house and out the front door, past a footman and the homunculus, without pausing.

His first impulse was to direct his path toward the city gate and head for Lume, but what could he possibly hope to accomplish there? Half the morning was gone, and he had only the vaguest notion of how he might locate members of the Grand Council in the capital's sprawling labyrinth of streets, courts, and alleys. There simply wasn't
time
to arrange a pardon, and after what he had just heard he was not at all certain Lord Allutar would respect one if by some miracle it were issued. Wasting the one day Reva had on such a hopeless effort would be foolish. He needed to find some other way to rescue her.

A pardon was not to be had, nor would Lord Allutar show mercy. A direct attempt to free her had failed, and Anrel could see no way another attempt would fare better—she was held fast by chains and spells, and Lord Allutar was aware that efforts were under way to save her, so she would almost certainly be guarded even more thoroughly now.

If he could not convince Lord Allutar to free her, and could not free her himself, what other possibilities remained?

He could not immediately think of any, but nonetheless, he no longer saw any point in going to Lume. Instead, once he had stumbled down the sweeping stair from Lord Allutar's front door to the street, he turned
his steps toward the bridge, not because he had any great need to cross the Galdin, but simply because it gave him a direction.

The sun was bright, and overnight the air had turned unseasonably warm; the snow underfoot was melting, turning to slush and puddles as he hurried down the slope. Several townspeople were taking advantage of this thaw to go about business they had put off over the past few days, and the streets were busy.

The sight of all those other people finally brought the obvious answer to his question to Anrel's mind. If he could not free her, and Allutar would not free her, then he must find someone else who could and would—or several someones.

None of Reva's family could do anything. The best any of them could devise was Garras's plan to trade Anrel's life for Reva's.

Lady Saria—Anrel did not know for certain where she was, whether she was in Beynos or Alzur or somewhere else entirely, and he not only doubted that she could persuade Lord Allutar; he doubted that
he
could persuade
her
to intervene. Her affection for Anrel would probably not extend to making demands on her own future husband on behalf of Anrel's possible future sister-in-law.

The person Lord Allutar seemed to most trust in all the world was that servant of his, Hollem tel-Guriel, but Anrel could think of no way to sway Hollem to aid Reva, and trusted or not, Hollem was still Lord Allutar's servant, not his master.

There was, in fact, no one Anrel could see how to usefully recruit—as Anrel Murau.

But Alvos of Naith, on the other hand . . .

He paused at the foot of the bridge and looked at the dozens of townspeople around him, wrapped in coats of fur and wool and leather, going about their business. These were the ordinary people of the empire, not sorcerers and witches, but workmen and merchants and housewives. These were the common people that Valin had spoken about, the people he had said should be running the empire, should be in charge of their own destinies.

These same workmen and merchants and housewives hired witches to treat their ills and tell their fortunes, to place their wells and bless
their livestock—and a good many of them would probably come tomorrow morning to watch one of those witches hang.

Perhaps these ordinary people should be given a chance to assert the authority Valin had claimed for them. Perhaps Alvos could advise them to do so, if he had the opportunity to speak at the hanging.

Anrel frowned. Where was the hanging to be? Hangings were traditionally public spectacles, allowing everyone to see justice being done. In Lume there was a permanent gallows in a place called Executioner's Court, perhaps a hundred yards downwind from the emperor's palace in the direction of the Pensioners' Quarter, near the headquarters of the Emperor's Watch; it was surrounded on all sides by arcades surmounted by watchmen's walks, to allow for control of unruly crowds. Anrel had seen no evidence of such a place in Beynos.

Alzur did not hold hangings; had any criminal ever been captured there he would have been sent to face the magistrates in Naith. Anrel had never seen a hanging in Naith, but they did occur, and he had the impression that they took place in a yard behind the courthouse.

Did Beynos operate on the same model as Alzur? Would Reva be sent to the Executioner's Court in Lume? That seemed unlikely—but if it
was
the case it opened new possibilities, as her escort to the capital might be waylaid on the road.

But it really
did
seem unlikely; Anrel could not imagine the bureaucrats of Lume allowing outsiders to hang someone in the Executioner's Court without days of negotiation and paperwork. No, Beynos presumably had a gallows somewhere, or a place where one could be improvised. He would need to learn more.

He also needed to plan out exactly what he intended to say and do.

The inns—the Sunrise House and the Flying Duck and whatever others there might be—were presumably open for business now, as they had not been late last night; he could get something to eat and drink and talk to a few people, find out where Reva was to die, and perhaps get a feel for the mood of the populace, and an idea what words might best sway them. He turned back toward the square.

He did not think Lord Allutar intended to pursue him; the landgrave
wanted Anrel to live, or at least he did not want to be responsible for Anrel's death. Anrel did not think Allutar would send either his own men or the burgrave's watchmen to canvass the inns and taverns, looking for the fugitive. He should be safe enough.

Anrel took a final glance upstream toward Lume. Was he doing the right thing? Was his trust in his own ability in oratory misplaced? Might it be better to rush to Lume and try to find Derhin, to try to arrange a stay of execution, pending a pardon?

But he doubted he could find and sway Derhin in time. A fiery speech asking the townspeople to intervene might not save Reva, but it seemed to Anrel the best of the available options.

Now he had to devise one.

The Sunrise House was open for business, and his presence in the saloon there was accepted without question. A few pence got him a breakfast of bland hash and scrambled eggs that were not as fresh as one might have hoped, washed down with a mug of small beer. A smile and a few wry remarks got him the ear of two of the locals, who filled his appetite for information as well as the hash and eggs had filled his belly.

Hangings, he learned, were conducted on the famous bridge itself. A structure that Anrel had taken for mere decorative elaboration that extended out over the water on the downstream side was, he was informed, a hoist that also served as a gallows. The remains of the condemned would dangle over open water, simplifying the eventual cleanup. If no friends or relatives claimed the body and paid the appropriate fees within the customary three days the rope would be cut, dropping the corpse into the river to be carried away by the current; there would be no need to put any effort into disposal of the remains.

This did not strike Anrel as a particularly healthy idea for anyone downstream, as everyone knew the dead carried harmful influences if not properly placated and buried, but he did not suppose the people of Beynos greatly concerned themselves with such details.

Word that a witch was to be hanged on the morrow had indeed spread through town. Not everyone at the inn had been aware of it, but one of Anrel's breakfast companions knew the entire tale of how some
poor foolish woman had been caught trying to enchant Lord Allutar at the landgrave's own reception, and had been flung into a dungeon, where she was now awaiting her doom.

Some details in his version were not quite what Anrel knew to be the truth; they had altered in the telling, as such things are wont to do. The witch was now reported to have been in the pay of Quandish agents who had hoped to force Lord Allutar to spy for them. Anrel supposed this theory came from Reva's improvised code phrase.