The Sword of the South - eARC (38 page)

He managed to get the last sentence out with what sounded like genuine confidence in the dog brothers’ ability, and Ashwan nodded.

“I agree,” he said. “I didn’t say we should let them go; I only said it would be good if we could. But since we can’t, I have a suggestion.”

“Which is?”

“Wencit’s headed into Angthyr. If there’s a chance Wulfra’s betrayed us, don’t you think it might be wise to let Wencit do whatever he came to do? Wulfra may succeed in killing him, in which case there’s no need for us to lose more brothers against him. And if the Baroness doesn’t kill him, we won’t have to worry about anything
she
did to harm the Guild, because Wencit will see to it that she’s dead.”

“I think I agree.” It was Umaro’s turn to nod. “At least it’s a thought, and we’ve had precious few of those of late. If I get the chance, I’ll pass it to Elrytha for relay to Chernion.”

The Craftmaster heaved back into his saddle. Like so much else about him, his patently poor horsemanship was misleading. He scrambled up like a mountain climber and sat the saddle like a lumpy sack, yet he could stay there for days on end if he must. Now he reined his horse around to his waiting men. The dripping assassins huddled under what cover there was, soaked to the skin. They’d spent a miserable night in the open while the wizard and his companions used the cave, and there were raw tempers amid the dripping scrub that morning.

“Come on, lads,” Umaro growled. “We’ll stop long enough to dry our skins a little and make some breakfast, then be on our way again.” A few faces tightened, but there was no protest. “I’m sorry, Brothers, but we have no choice. You know as well as I do we have to avenge our losses to clear our reputation.”

There was a rumble of agreement. They understood the importance of that; without the terror of their reputation, their victims might remember that assassins, too, were mortal.

Umaro waited with Ashwan as his men’s horses scrambled up the hill.

“There goes the best reason of all for letting that bitch Wulfra kill her own game,” the Craftmaster muttered then, his face bleak as the rain. “How many more brothers can we lose on one assignment?”

* * *

The object of Umaro’s bitterness was at that moment thinking of the dog brothers. Wulfra hadn’t been watching Chernion when the assassin had actually summoned Umaro, but she was certain the Guildmaster had called for reinforcements. Unfortunately, Chernion was the only surviving assassin Wulfra was able to locate, so she had no idea who those reinforcements might be or where they might be found.

But now that her defensive spells were complete, Wulfra’s mind turned more often to the killer. Little though she cared to admit it to herself, she did feel a slight sense of unease about the trap link. Each time she used it, she increased the chance Chernion might sense it, and sorceress or not, only a fool
wouldn’t
feel uneasy at the thought of turning the entire Assassins Guild into her mortal enemy. Despite that, the baroness longed to know what the assassin was doing about Wencit. The wild wizard’s steady approach to Angthyr was enough to guarantee that!

She chewed delicately on a knuckle as she considered the problem. Caution pulled one way, curiosity the other—and, as wasn’t uncommon with wizards, curiosity won in the end.

She bent over her gramerhain and muttered the incantation. Power rippled through the crystal, flickering for a second…then for several seconds…then over a minute. Wulfra frowned in consternation and tapped the crystal gently. Nothing happened, and her frown deepened as she considered blanking the stone.

She was about to do just that when the gramerhain suddenly cleared, but it took her some moments to recognize the image. Then she gasped in astonishment. She wasn’t looking down on Chernion—she was looking out of the assassin’s own eyes!

She bent low, almost pressing her nose to the stone, and pouring rain seemed to flick into her own face. The slim, gloved hands on the reins could only be Chernion’s, and Wulfra trembled as she realized what had happened. She’d read about this effect, but she’d never actually experienced it. Her simple scrying spell had connected her directly to Chernion, and that happened only in certain special cases—such as when the trap link’s object was inside another wizard’s glamour. And only one wizard would be simultaneously maintaining a glamour and attracting Chernion’s attention.

Wulfra held her breath, torn between exultation and disbelief as she watched for confirmation of her wild hope. If only she could have controlled the assassin’s gaze! Unfortunately, she couldn’t, but—

Chernion’s head turned, and wildfire eyes glowed in the crystal.

Wulfra gasped in triumph, and then Chernion’s head turned the other way and Bahzell’s face filled the crystal. Not only had Wulfra found Chernion, but the audacious assassin had actually infiltrated Wencit’s ranks!

Wulfra blazed with triumph, and blood pounded exuberantly in her temples. Why, she could fix Wencit’s exact location whenever she wished!

She gloated over her unexpected achievement like a miser. She could attack at any time she chose! And even if her attacks failed, she could chart his exact progress! Let him maintain his glamour—what did that matter while she commanded that precious set of eyes within his camp?!

She threw back her head and laughed, blanking the crystal with a wave. She had to consult her patron. The opportunity to attack was too good to pass up, but first she must clear it with the cat-eyed wizard and ask for aid.

Her urgent request for contact was ignored, briefly. But eventually, the cold cat-eyes blinked lazily in the depths of her stone.

“Greetings, Wulfra,” his mental voice purred. “You have news?”

“I do,” she replied, fighting to restrain the triumph in her response.

“Then by all means amaze me with it, my dear.”

“Very well. As you know, all of my attempts to pierce Wencit’s glamour have failed,” she said flatly, and paused, half-daring him to explain his refusal to aid her efforts.

“Agreed,” was all the cat-eyed wizard said.

“Well, I can do it now.” She abandoned the effort to hide her soaring sense of triumph. “One of my hirelings has managed to join him, and I have a trap link to her. I can establish his exact position!”

“A sterling achievement. But what do you wish to do about it?”

“I have to attack! Attack at once—before he has an opportunity to realize what’s happened! And for that, I need your help. No spell of mine could succeed at such a long-range, but the opportunity’s there. It must be taken!”

She seemed astounded by his lack of enthusiasm, and rightly so, he thought…from her perspective.

“Allow me a moment of thought.”

His eyes vanished as he withdrew to consider, meshing the new information with knowledge he’d withheld from his minion.

Wulfra’s success puzzled them, though he wouldn’t admit it, for she must be encouraged to think him virtually omnipotent. But he could err. The attack on
Wave Mistress
, for instance, had been a mistake. He’d helped plan it, even given her of his strength for it, yet its only lasting effect had been to show Wencit he was watched.

The result had been predictable…or should have been, if he’d taken the time to consider things properly. Wencit was no fool, and he was already suspicious of Wulfra’s apparently increased ability, so he’d strengthened his glamour. Indeed, he’d virtually doubled its effectiveness. It cost him something in concentration, but the burden was far from crippling, and the consequences were far worse than any mere inconvenience.

Decades of carefully cherished advantage had been whittled away in an afternoon. Over the years, highly-trained teams of Carnadosans had managed to insert delicate probes through Wencit’s glamours largely because he’d seen no need to raise first-class protection against second-class opposition like Wulfra. It had been a difficult but relatively straightforward task to spy on the wild wizard under those circumstances.

No more. It was still possible to pierce his shields, but also far riskier. What had been like slipping a needle through a soap bubble without bursting it required far more force, and adding force added risk. It was no longer possible to maintain an hour-to-hour watch on him or even on his comrades when he was near. One simply couldn’t manipulate the energy required to breach his new glamour without creating a detectable eddy.

That had resulted from a single miscalculation, and it had gone even further. The morning he left Sindor, his glamour had been so strong not even the cat-eyed wizard had been able to crack it.

The Council had panicked. Wencit’s glamour had been so powerful Wulfra couldn’t have pierced it even with a trap link inside it; that “proved” he knew about
them
—and he still commanded the spells which had strafed Kontovar.

The panic had eased as Wencit allowed his protection to coast back down to the new level established after the madwind, however, and the cat-eyed wizard had personally relocated him within six hours. His accomplishment had soothed his fellows’ near terror and restored their ability to track the old wizard, although not even he dared probe too closely or too often.

But even though they’d relocated the wild wizard, and even though it was once again possible to slip at least occasional probes through his glamour, they dared not pass information to Wulfra. Not as long as that glamour stayed too strong for her to have broken it on her own. That iron rule couldn’t be violated, so he’d shut down the flow of information, rendering the wild wizard safe from sorcerous attack until he reached Torfo itself.

But now…

He grimaced in deep thought. All wizards were subtle, and Wencit the most subtle of all. The wild wizard lacked critical information, so his position was ultimately flawed, but another serious error by the Carnadosans might warn him enough to cancel much of the cat-eyed wizard’s advantage. Further, it was clear now that Wencit was engaged upon some deep, carefully planned move of his own, one which seemed to be based on information not available to the cat-eyed wizard. That added to the risks, for one side’s ignorance might tend to balance the other’s. But then, he thought sardonically, if the game was simple, everyone would play.

Yet one thing was certain: Wencit knew about the trap link. He’d have to be senile to miss it. But if he knew, why had he allowed Wulfra to establish it? To misdirect her somehow? Possibly…but then why cut off the link as he left Sindor, if he
wanted
her to be able to spy on him?

Ahhhh! The cat-eyed wizard smiled as he suddenly found the answer he sought. The object of this ploy wasn’t Wulfra; it was
Chernion
.

Data clicked into place in his orderly brain. Wencit had taken the measure of Wulfra’s power and discounted her as a threat at such long-range. He’d judged (correctly, as it happened) that nothing she’d produced to date was a serious danger, and so relegated her threat to a secondary status and turned his attention to his merely mortal enemies.

That made sense of the strong glamour at Sindor’s gates. He couldn’t be certain how many
other
assassins Wulfra might have snared in trap links like the one on Chernion, so he’d raised a protection strong enough to keep her from directing anyone to him. Then something—some deliberate probe of Chernion, perhaps—had convinced him that Wulfra’s only link was to the Guildmaster, and Chernion was under his own watchful eye, thus neatly beheading the Assassins Guild.

The crafty old devil was priming the assassin to turn on Wulfra!

The cat-eyed wizard chuckled in admiration. It was a small thing, but it showed Wencit hadn’t lost his touch. It would be easy for him to “let slip” sufficient information to alert Chernion to the trap link. After that, Chernion’s plans for the baroness became a foregone conclusion. But the important point was that he’d decided to risk Wulfra’s attack as the price of neutralizing her hired killers. It followed, then, that it was feasible to let Wulfra try. Wencit obviously expected her to, and it would never do to disappoint him.

This was a chance to redeem the madwind fiasco, if it was done properly. The attack had to be one Wencit couldn’t defeat without using the wild magic, but it must also be one Wulfra was theoretically capable of launching on her own. Something she could do herself if she had the nerve. Hmmm…

There was such an attack. Wulfra would never try it on her own, but she might be induced to with the promise of assistance. And whether it worked or not, it would give him immense pleasure to see it tried.

He threw his eyes back into Wulfra’s crystal and studied her taut face, savoring the fear which kept her impatience in seemly check. Dear Wulfra! It would be such a pity when she died.

“Forgive the delay, my dear,” he purred. “It was necessary to evolve the proper strategy, you know, but you’re quite correct. We
must
attack, and a delightful plan’s occurred to me. Here’s what I propose we do…

* * *

Evening found Bahzell leading them into the lower East Walls. The road wound between steep shoulders, climbing ever upward at a sharp angle. The air was noticeably colder, and Kenhodan shivered under his rain-heavy poncho.

“You wouldn’t have another cave handy, Elrytha?” he asked hopefully.

“No.” Chernion’s teeth chattered, and even her jaunty feather looked miserable. “The nearest shelter I know’s a hostel, still some leagues away.”

“It’s afraid of that I was,” Bahzell said sourly, sniffing the air. “We’ve little option but to be finding some shelter, Wencit. I’m thinking there’s snow in this air.”

“Snow?” Kenhodan was startled. “This late in the spring?”

“The Bloody Hand’s right,” Chernion said. “The year’s still young, and even in summer it takes little to turn rain into snow in the East Walls.”

“Aye, snow treacherous as a dog brother’s heart,” Bahzell muttered. He craned his neck to examine the slopes. “We’ve no very promising campsite here, either.”

“No,” Chernion agreed, looking about her, then pointed with a dripping arm. “What about those trees? We might shelter under them.”

“That’s after being a nasty slope,” Bahzell said.