Michael A. Stackpole (7 page)

“Right. Are we creatures of free will, or is our future determined for us and we just become players in a production for which we don’t have a script?”

I closed my eyes and rubbed at them for a moment. “1 opt for free will, but aren’t there prophecies and the like that predict the future?”

“Sure there are, but take a good look at them. Oracles that make such pronouncements always do so in vague terms. Your father, it was said, was destined to kill the Chademon Kothvir, but no method was specified. If your father had run him through or served him bad oysters, either method would have fulfilled the prophecy. Lots of room for free will there.”

“Fascinating.”

“Free will versus determinism is one of those discussions that can make long rides much shorter.” Roarke clapped me on the shoulder. “So, what did she say to you?”

“She wanted to know who I was and why I’d invaded her dreams. She saw me fighting in Chaos.” 1 shrugged. “Sounds like she saw my father, but she didn’t like that suggestion. She marched off in a huff.”

“Wild talents are like that. They don’t have the control over their ability. With Clairvoyants it’s especially hard because they can never be sure what they are thinking. For all you know she’ll see her meeting with you as a vision and never be able to sort truth from dreams.” Roarke smiled. “She’s a cute one, though. Having her dream of you can’t be all bad.”

“Not my type.”

“You grew up on a farm with your two brothers and your grandfather. When did you have time to determine you have a type?”

I started to explain about all the Bear’s Eve celebrations I’d attended, but I stopped. “No matter what I say, you’re going to make me feel foolish, right?”

“Gotta get back at you somehow for beating me so often in chess, don’t I?”

Riding ahead of the caravan through a snow-dusted meadow on the last day, 1 caught up with Roarke. “The night we met you said you knew stories of my father.”

Roarke’s lean body swayed with the motion of his horse’s walk. “1 did, didn’t 1?”

“How did my father die in Chaos?”

“1 don’t know what happened to your father.” Roarke exhaled a plume of steam. “I
heard
he went on an expedition and never came back, but then again I heard he’s buried with your mother back in Stone Rapids. When Chaos is linked to a legend you can never tell truth from fiction.”

I felt my mouth go dry. “Was my father a good Chaos Rider?”

Roarke smiled easily. “That he was. Whereas other men would just use muscle against the Chademons, Cardew foxed them. He said, I’m told, fighting in Chaos was like a big chess game. He had mapped out many of the areas where time flows differently, figured out what the difference was, and was able to use that map to his advantage.”

My face brightened. “How did he determine what the time-rate difference was?”

The Chaos Rider arched his back and rotated his shoulders to loosen them. “Cardew was a thinker, he was. He took two twelve-foot-long planks and lashed hourglasses between them at the far ends of the boards. When he found a boundary he would insert one hourglass beyond it, then invert the whole contraption. By looking at how much sand was left in one when the other ran out, he was able to calculate the difference.”

“That
was
smart!” 1 smiled proudly. “He could use fast zones to speed healing for lightly wounded people and slow zones to secure his flanks.”

“Like father, like son.” Roarke winked his right eye at me. “That is very much the sort of thing he did. One time he had a man who had been mortally wounded. He placed him in a very slow zone, then sent riders all the way back to Port Chaos to fetch a magicker who could spell the man back to health.”

“But you don’t know what happened to him—my father, 1 mean?”

Roarke shook his head. “I don’t know. Cardew and the leader of the Black Shadows, Kothvir, had quite a rivalry. Kothvir even forged a sword with a likeness of your father etched into the blade. Mark of being a dangerous man, that is, to have a
vindictxvara
made to deal with you. And Kothvir stopped being a force among the
Bfiarasfiadi
at the same time your father disappeared, so perhaps Cardew got him after all.”

I had heard a similar thing in the past, but it felt good to have a Chaos Rider say it instead of a bard. “You said there were pockets of Chaos in which time moved very slowly, correct?”

“Yes.”

“So it is possible that my father and my uncle are still alive and trapped in one of those zones, or that they have been wounded and exiled themselves to one of them?”

The hopeful note in my voice seemed to make Roarke wince. “It is possible, Locke, but not entirely likely. I would rather bet that the sun and moons will collide than on your kin still being alive, I’m sorry to say.”

“But it could be true.” My eyes narrowed. “You said it yourself, ‘things like that happen in Chaos.’”

“So I did, Locke, but I didn’t say they happened all that often.” Roarke shook his head. “Anyone expecting to find a miracle in Chaos better be damned lucky, or prepared for a big disappointment.”

Cresting the hill on Herakopolis’s western edge, I saw a city that exceeded even Roarke’s glowing descriptions of it. Some of the larger estates in the outlying district had seriously impressed me, and I had embarrassed myself by refusing to believe that one or more of them were
not
the Emperor’s property. That individuals would have amassed enough money to own one building that itself was larger than my grandfather’s homestead quickly redefined my concept of personal wealth.

The capital started me redefining my concept of reality. Stretched out in a vast demilune around Herak Bay, the city consisted, for the most part, of whitewashed buildings with red tile roofs. Gaudily colored clothes flapped in the sea breeze from lines strung between many of the buildings, setting whole portions of the city in motion. A seawall and breakwater split the azure bay from the deeper ocean, while huge walls rimmed the city itself to protect from landward assaults.

The Imperial Palace dominated the top of the highest hillock in the city. A monstrously large building, each of the eight wings had been built by artisans from the different provinces. They worked with native materials from their homelands and created in the palace a simulacrum of the Empire as a whole. Appropriate provincial flags flew from the towers that capped each wing, while the white triskele flag of the Empire flew above the heart of the palace itself.

Northeast of it I saw a strange collection of buildings, each with a different architectural style, yet all arrayed around a central green “Is that the Imperial University?”

“You see, the book you read about the capital was not all that antiquated.” Roarke glanced back along the road at the distant line of the caravan, then looked at the city again. “And there, to the north, is the Imperial Theatre. It is the stepped circular building with all those pillars. The one in white marble.”

“I see it. And that must be the Street of the Gods.” 1 pointed to a double rank of tall buildings with towers topped by stars and moons and animals. “And, obviously, that’s the waterfront.”

“Correct.” Roarke again looked back at the caravan, then frowned. “Listen, Locke, I have to ride back to the caravan and get the papers we have to present at the gate. You should ride ahead to your grandmother’s house. Do you know how to find it?”

“If the streets have not been changed in the last forty years.” I laughed. “I ride past the Church of the Sunbird for two streets. I go east and then north along Butcher’s Row. She lives in the fourth house on the right as you go up the hill.”

Roarke nodded with pride. “Spoken like you’ve lived in the capital for ages.”

“Thank you for your friendship on this trip. Will you, if you have time, come see me?” I asked quietly. “Will you bring Cruach?”

“The hound will probably hunt you out on his own, the way you feed him.” Roarke gave me a reassuring smile. “After Bear’s Eve, i will find you. Unless they decide to sail you back to Stone Rapids, I think Haskell will have work for you with his first caravan heading west again.”

“If you don’t, I’ll hunt you down at the Umbra.” 1 grinned as he looked a bit surprised at my naming a tavern that catered to Chaos Riders. “See, I remembered everything you told me about Herakopolis.”

“Sharp lad, but 1 don’t recall mentioning the Umbra.”

“You must have; I know I didn’t read about it.” I shrugged. “Bye, Roarke. Say good-bye to Eirene for me. Have a happy Bear’s Eve.”

“And you, lad. Try not to step on any princess’s toes when you’re dancing in polite company.”

“I won’t, promise.” I tugged gently on Stall’s reins and started toward the capital of the Empire. 1 joined the trickle of other folks entering the city, and the guardsman leaning against the wall barely gave me notice. By keeping an eye on the Sunbird Church’s tallest spire, I managed to negotiate the narrow, cobblestone streets of the city’s oldest section. The Street of the Gods proved to be a wide boulevard that I crossed easily.

I turned where 1 had been told to turn and located Butcher’s Row by seeing a bloody stream washing down the gutter. Heading up the hill, I counted houses once, then frowned and counted them again.
Grandfather told me it was the fourth house, but it can’t be. That one is
so … so
big!

Audin had always spoken of my father’s mother in decidedly neutral terms, though he regularly expressed his disbelief at a woman of Garik finding happiness in Herakopolis. I knew very well the story of this girl from Stone Rapids marrying a merchant from the Imperial capital, but 1 had always assumed, from the way Grandfather told the story, that Evadne’s husband, before he died, owned a bazaar stall and sold copper pots.

Somewhat stunned by the size of the three-story building, I dismounted and just let Stail’s reins drop to the ground. Clearly this house belonged to someone more important than a bazaar barker’s widow. The wall around it hid the ground floor from sight, but trees and ivy vines overhanging it from the inside told me the house had a nice garden. I heard the tinkling of water landing in a pool, so that meant they had a fountain as well. The windows themselves were fitted with glass—much akin to the home of Stone Rapids’s Lord Mayor—but the blue and gold brocade drapes I saw in them were a lot finer than the Mayor had managed.

Even the stories Aunt Ethelin had told of this house had underestimated its grandeur. 1 turned around and counted one final time. It was the fourth house, but I couldn’t get rid of a sense of dread as I reached out and pulled the clapper cord for the bell beside the gate. It rang loud and strong, like an alarm bell, and I almost ran away because I just knew I had to be in the wrong place.

I probably would have run, but seconds after the bell’s echoes died, I heard a door open and close. I saw an old man accompanied by two hounds a bit smaller than Cruach come trudging up the crushed-stone carriageway toward the wrought-iron gate. I smiled at the man, but nothing short of a hive’s worth of honey could have sweetened the sour look on his face.

The man grabbed two of the gate’s iron bars. “And who would you be?”

“I am Lachlan. 1 have traveled from Stone Rapids to see my grandmother, Evadne, and accompany her to the Emperor’s Ball.” I stood up straight and wished I’d brushed the trail dust from my boots. “She sent for me.”

“Did she now?” The man scratched at a scraggly beard. “And who was it who sent you?”

I frowned. “My grandfather, Audin, Bladesmaster of Stone Rapids. He arranged a contest to choose from among my brothers and me for the honor of answering her request.”

The badges the man wore sewn to his sleeve marked him as a native of Herak and Evadne’s gardener. “So you’re claiming to be one of Cardew’s sons, or are you Driscoll’s whelp?”

“Cardew, sir.” I answered him fairly, only realizing at the last that he was baiting me.

“Fifth one this week. Just because she has a good heart, every orphan claims to be Cardew or Driscoll’s bastard.” The man backed away from the gate and waved me off. “Begone with you, or I’ll set the dogs on you. Bear’s Eve is still a week off, so you’ll not be bedeviling my mistress for seasonal beggings today.” He turned and wandered back toward the house.

Angry and embarrassed, I yanked the clapper cord once, hard, and the sound stopped the man cold. “Herakman, I will remain here and pull this cord once every ten heartbeats if you do not tell your mistress I am here. I am Lachlan, and I am here at her request.”

“Away, beggar, away! I’ll not be bothering her over the likes of you.” He turned his back on me and muttered to his hounds as he headed back to the house.

Mad enough to spit fire, I turned and whistled for Stail. The gelding trotted up to me, and I pulled myself into the saddle. Turning the horse around to take one last look at the house before 1 rode out to rejoin the caravan, I saw the man hurrying back toward the gate. The dogs both had run to the gate before him, and I took no joy in their eyeing me with their tails wagging.

1 assumed he was running to get his dogs, but he held up his hands. “Wait, wait, young Master.”

I hardly felt the desire, but I kept my voice seasonably cordial. “What is it, Goodman?”

“I’d know that whistle anywhere, I would, and the hounds did, too. That’s from Audin to your father to you.” The old man squinted at me. “Sure as the sun rises in the east, you’re Cardew’s son.”

He unlatched the gate and swung it wide open. “Welcome to Herakopolis, Master Lachlan. I trust you will enjoy your stay.”