Master Mage (7 page)

“Tuck, are you around?” Thad asked,
sending his thoughts through the magical ring on his
finger.

“Thad, so nice to hear from you again
so soon,” Eloen’s voice said clearly in his mind. “I hope the news
is for me, but if you really need the elfin boy, I think he is
entertaining my husband and son.”

“Son,” Thad said, nearly
choking.

“Yes, the bad thing about being a queen
in Abla is they expect you to marry the king and sire an heir. For
a male, he’s not bad—kind, smart, handsome—but he’s a little too
flamboyant for my tastes.”

“The message is for you, but unless you
dearly need him, I will need Tuck back shortly,” Thad replied,
recovering from his shock. “Queen Maria has agreed to your terms
and even more should you find it in your power to send us
troops.”

“Maria,” Eloen said. This time, her
voice was one of astonishment. “Even if I wanted to, Thad, I don’t
think there is much we could do as far as soldiers. Farlan as a
whole is not looked too kindly upon around here, and I don’t need
any more complications to my already-tenuous hold. I might know
where you can find some soldiers … that is, if you’re willing to
pay good gold for them.”

“What do you mean?” Thad asked,
intrigued.

“Have you ever heard of the
Katanga?”

The word sounded familiar to Thad, but
he couldn’t remember where he had heard it. “I can’t say that I
have,” Thad replied, his mind still searching for the meaning of
the word.

“They are a race of mercenaries. They
travel a great deal, but they have a base in the desert northeast
of Abla. They were of big use to me during the previous war. If you
are willing to tell me how much gold you could afford to hire them,
I could try and see if they would be willing to help.”

“Give me one moment,” Thad said,
turning around and heading back to the throne room.

Thad barged into the room, paying
little heed that the queen was meeting with someone else. “What in
the blazes are you doing, Thad?” Maria asked, her face burning
red.

“Maria, how much gold could you make
available to hire mercenaries?” Thad asked, ignoring her
complaints.

“Mercenaries?” Maria asked, her face
bewildered. “I don’t know, Thad. I think I might be able to push
for ten to fifteen thousand gold coins considering the current
excess in the coffers … why?”

“I will have to explain later,” Thad
said before leaving the room as quickly as he had entered. “Eloen,
I can offer fifteen thousand in gold coins. Will that be enough?”
Thad asked, his mind whirling with possibilities.

“Fifteen thousand gold coins … that
would pay my whole army for nearly three years. I will talk with
Darryl and see what we can arrange. Given the amount you’re
offering, I am sure you can expect the Katanga to be knocking on
your door even if they have to walk over the mountains during a
snowstorm.”

As soon as Thad was back in his room,
he went straight for his desk. If he was lucky, more than five
hundred mercenaries would heed his call. If he was extremely lucky,
more than a thousand, and that still wouldn’t put a dent in the
force they needed to stand against Rane.

Currently, their reports put their
entire western force at just over eighteen hundred. The elves and
mercenaries would bolster that force, but he still needed at least
three times that number before they even stood a chance. Even if he
could get ten times his current force, it would be a long, hard,
and bloody battle.

Thad had still not heard from Crusher,
but that didn’t surprise him. If the dwarves were near where he had
left the caves, there would be little chance he would hear anything
before late winter or early spring. Thad was sure at least some of
them would come to their call, but he couldn’t make plans without
knowing for sure what forces would be available to him.

The first thing he needed to do was to
find a way to thin the charging ranks. Traps would work well, but
he was sure Rane had people watching their movements. If they made
what they were doing too obvious, it would all work out to
nothing.

Leaning back in his chair, Thad let out
a loud groan. What he needed was advice, but who in Farlan had
fought in a real war? Every battle for the past few hundred years
had taken place at Southpass from a highly defensible position.
This war was going to be completely different.

Almost all of the major kingdoms had
been at relative peace for the past few hundred years. There hadn’t
been an invasion of this size since the Succession Wars. As soon as
the thought popped into his head, Thad grabbed his cloak and dashed
for the door.

CHAPTER VI

As Thad rushed outside the palace and
into the city proper, the sun was still well in the air. Within
moments, he reached the royal school, which nobles all around Kurt
had been known to attend. Now, though, most of them had pulled back
for the winter and were not expected to return.

It had been years since Thad’s last
visit, but his mind keenly remembered where the large library had
been. If he couldn’t find an experienced person in the present,
then he would just look to those of the past.

As the heavy library doors loudly swung
open, the few people inside turned to look at him. “Can I help you,
sir?” an older woman in her late fifties with light brown hair
streaked with small bits of gray asked, her tone harsh and
reproaching.

“I need everything you have on battles
fought during the Fae War and the Succession Wars. In fact, I’ll
take anything you have that has to do with wars. I don’t care if it
is just about small border disputes,” Thad replied
frantically.

“One moment, sir,” the woman said, her
tone still cold and unforgiving. The woman called three younger
students over and briefly explained what Thad wanted. “Might as
well have a seat, sir,” she said, motioning for him to sit in an
uncomfortable-looking chair in front of a large oaken desk. “While
we wait, we can discuss your complete lack of manners while in an
institution of learning.”

Thad let out a heavy sigh and took his
seat. As the students continued to bring armloads of books to the
desk, Thad was regaled with a long lecture of proper manners.
Whenever the older woman thought his attention might be waning, she
rapped his knuckles with a long wooden stick a little over an inch
thick. The first time she had done so, Thad had moved his hands to
his lap, and the next blow struck him soundly on the top of his
head.

Why are you even allowing
her to hit you in the first place?
Thuraman
asked after Thad returned his hands to the table after being struck
in the head.

“I need the books,” Thad replied
honestly. “Not to mention she has a point. There is seldom a need
for rudeness. It’s not like the few seconds I saved running in here
like a madman really helped to save the country.”

It’s not as if being hit
with a piece of wood will help you remember to act more rationally
in the future either.

Smack
. “I think you might be wrong there,” Thad replied as he
rubbed his bright red knuckles.

The pile of books continued to grow as
Thad waited. Soon, the stack was so high that the mounting task of
reading them started to overwhelm him. “Miss,” Thad said,
interrupting the older woman as she explained the proper manners
for when one was in the presence of royalty from southern
Radan.

“Yes, young sir?” she asked, her voice
polite, but her eyes cold and icy.

“While I consider myself well-read, the
sheer amount of effort to scour these books for the information I
require will take far longer than I have available to me. Do you
think there are any students that have a passion for such
things?”

The woman called over another one of
the students and spoke to him briefly. They young man left in a
fast walk, returning quickly with three other students. “These are
a few of the better scribes present within the school. Alicia and
Natasha are Farlan-born, while Fredrick is from the island nations.
I am sure, given the present circumstance, they would be more than
willing to offer their aid to Her Majesty.”

“That would be a great help,” Thad
replied.

It was nearly sundown before Thad along
with the three scribes and a host of other students carrying the
load of books returned to the palace. At first, Thad had thought to
simply have the books taken to his chambers, but given the sheer
volume of them, he decided that one of the less-used lower dining
halls would be better suited to the task.

“Master Thad, if we had a better
example for what you are looking for and why you are looking for
it, then our time will be much more productive,” Fredrick said as
the books were being piled on one end of a large table. “All we
know at present is that it has to do with the upcoming war. That is
scant information to go on.”

“Honestly, I don’t know what I am
looking for,” Thad replied as he picked up one of the thick books.
“Soon, a large battle will be upon us, and my troops will be
greatly outnumbered. The fighting grounds are relatively flat, and
the officers we have are completely bereft of the experience in
fighting under conditions such as those we will face.”

“So it would be safe to say that you
are looking for tactical data of wars where smaller forces fought
against larger odds in similar conditions?” Alicia asked, her voice
dry and unassuming.

“That would be a great help. If you see
anything that you think might help me, I will listen,” Thad said as
he sat down and began reading. “Shall we get started?”

The first book Thad grabbed gave
details about the Fae War, but mostly from the side of the empire.
It was lacking in any real detail of the battles and spoke of them
only in passing, focusing more on the overall outcome and
aftermath.

Setting the book aside, Thad picked up
the next and continued his search. Thad had spent many hours in
study before, and history and war strategies had been one of his
best subjects back at the slave academy, but the flipping through
dusty pages trying to garner any small nugget of useful information
quickly began to wear on him.

It wasn’t until shortly after the
evening meal that Alicia tapped on his shoulder, holding a small
leather-bound journal. “I found the journal of a man belonging to
the southern army of Goriel during the thirty-year invasion by the
much-larger Talan kingdom. It goes into great detail about how they
were able to hide their forces and attack unnoticed all across
their kingdom.”

Thad took the small journal from the
young scribe’s hand and began to read.

It has been a long day, and
me and my men are once again safe within the confines of our
tunnels. The Talan soldiers had thought this would be an easy
fight, but they are quickly learning otherwise. For years, we have
had to fear invasion from our larger neighbors and have always been
prepared.

The Talan armies march into
our cities and find them empty. They scour the forest for our
people but find only leaves and rock. They never think to look
closer, and that is their folly. Now we live under the earth in
large tunnels that snake their way below our beloved Goriel. At
night, we strike, killing their soldiers and taking their supplies,
though it seems endless. For every soldier we kill, another seems
to take his place, but we will not relent.

As Thad continued to read, ideas began
surfacing within the recesses of his mind. “This is perfect,
Alicia,” Thad said excitedly. “I will be away for some time. Please
continue to search through the tomes and mark anything that you
might find of use. If it is urgent that you find me, find the
queen. She will know where to find me.”

“You expect us to just politely ask the
queen of your whereabouts should we need you?” Fredrick asked, his
brow furrowed.

“Yes,” Thad said, nearly laughing.
“Don’t worry, she doesn’t bite … hard.”

Thad wanted to go straight to Mage’s
Roost, but he knew that by time he reached the small settlement,
everyone would have already retired for the night. Instead, he
headed for his chambers, where he began writing out the details of
the plan that was forming in his mind. They would have to work fast
and hard, but if they could manage it, then they might have a
chance to hold off the Rane armies long enough for some of the
other forces to arrive.

As soon as the sun peaked above the
horizon, Thad had Lady saddled and was headed for Mage’s Roost. The
ride wasn’t long, but it did give him plenty of time to think about
what he was going to say to the elders should they make an
appearance, though if everything went smoothly, he would only be
dealing with Horus.

When Thad reached Mage’s Roost, the sun
was almost fully in the sky. Thad rode straight to Horus’s house
that was situated near the center of the small village.
Dismounting, Thad knocked loudly on the thick wooden door, hoping
that his friend was home.

After Thad’s third knock, the door
swung open, a red-eyed and tired Horus on the other side. “Thad,
what brings you out at such an early hour?” Horus asked between
yawns.