The Telastrian Song (7 page)

S
oren and Alessandra
knew nobody there, and while she seemed at ease, he felt awkward and out of place, despite being confident that his clothes at least were appropriate. They each took a glass of wine from a passing waiter and Alessandra started to discuss aspects of the first part of the play. She mentioned several scenes that Soren had not noticed, but he nodded and agreed, doing his best to appear interested by occasionally drawing parallels to Shandahar as he remembered it. The only enjoyment he derived from the experience was seeing how happy it made her.

Subdued music from a quartet set the atmosphere for the event. The style was a little different to Ostian music, but it was pleasant and it created a nice ambience. As he absorbed his first few sips of wine he started to relax. Cultural events were completely lost on him, but he did his best for Alessandra’s sake. They stood to the side of the room, Soren ignoring the fact they were the only couple he could see that weren’t part of a larger group. After being the stranger in so many new places over the past couple of years, it didn’t bother him in the least, and he was content for them to keep to themselves.

As they chatted, Soren noticed a dark haired man from the other side of the room watching him. He stood in a group of fair skinned Ventish men and women who were talking but he paid no attention to them, his focus entirely on Soren and Alessandra. Soren grew uncomfortable, and he started thinking through different scenarios as he tried to appear normal to Alessandra and take in what she was saying. His worries grew with each new possibility that he considered, but he tried to dismiss them. It was more likely that the man’s gaze was directed at Alessandra in any event, striking as she was. She had drawn envious glances all evening, from the hotel to their box.

Soren watched the man out of the corner of his eye. He was slender with thick eyebrows and a shadow of stubble along his jaw. At first Soren wondered if he knew him, but he was able to dismiss the possibility quickly. Soren accidentally caught his eye, and the man nodded before leaving the group he was with and making his way across the foyer.

‘Ostian? Yes?’ he said.

‘Yes, we are,’ Soren said. There was no point in lying about that, it was too obvious. There would be plenty of lies to come, and the best lies were always built on a foundation of truth. ‘Banneret Massari at your service. My wife, Vittoria.’

Alessandra looked at him and cocked an eyebrow, while her mouth curved at the corner in the sarcastic smile she so often gave him and that he so loved. Her posing as his wife was a dangerous subject, and he knew from her reaction that it would get further discussion before the evening was out.

‘Very pleased to meet you. I am Pierfranco dal Lupard, Ambassador of Ostia to the Ventish Court.’

Soren’s blood ran cold at the man’s admission he was an officer of the new Ostian regime, and all thoughts of politeness and sociability left him. There was no reason to believe that he had recognised them as anything other than new Ostian faces, but the sooner their conversation ended the happier Soren would be.

He cast a quick glance at the man’s waist but there was no sword there, nor was there any other indication that this man was a banneret. Aristocrat or not, as a banneret, Soren did not have to shake the hand of a man that had not earned the right to a banner so he didn’t offer his hand, which caused a moment of awkward silence.

‘I’m surprised a member of the Count of Moreno’s court moves about Venter so freely, what with all the exiles here.’

Dal Lupard smiled. ‘I’m sure there are many things about me that would surprise you, Banneret. The performance, though. It was quite magnificent, don’t you think?’

‘Yes. Excellent,’ Soren said. ‘I was particularly impressed by the…’ he floundered for something insightful to say, ‘costumes.’

Alessandra snorted as she tried to supress a laugh. Soren could feel his face flush.

‘But you, Madam,’ dal Lupard said, turning his attention to Alessandra. ‘Have we met before? You seem familiar.’

Alessandra smiled and shook her head. ‘No, I don’t think so.’

‘But I’m certain of it. I never forget a face,’ dal Lupard said. ‘Ah, I have it now. Bev… Beverel…’

Soren could feel Alessandra’s grip on his arm tighten and the blood visibly drained from her face. He knew as well as she did what was coming—the name ‘Bevrielle’, the one Alessandra had used when Amero set her up as a courtesan in Ostenheim—and he felt his anger rise. Dal Lupard’s tone was teasing. It was obvious now that he knew who she was before he crossed the room, and had been toying with them. It was small consolation that he had clearly not seen through Soren’s false identity. If dal Lupard had been wearing a sword, Soren would have called him out there and then. As it was, for a banneret to kill an ordinary civilian over a matter of honour would be little better than murder.

‘I’m afraid we don’t have time to spend chatting with Amero’s lackey scum,’ she said, cutting dal Lupard off before he had a chance to utter the name that he clearly knew, but was simply taunting them with.

She nudged Soren with her elbow so he started moving toward the door. They had gone a few paces when dal Lupard, who stood watching them, spoke again.

‘Do please let me know if you take to whoring again. I should very much like to enjoy your hospitality. You were said to be one of the best in Ostenheim, as I recall.’

He said it loud enough for a number of people nearby to hear, and all conversation in that area stopped. It was not unusual for a man to take a courtesan to the theatre; it was not even frowned upon, at least not in Ostenheim, and Soren assumed it to be the case in Voorn also, if the age difference between some of the couples present was anything to go by. What was frowned upon was to intentionally draw attention to the fact. Aristocrat he might be, but gentleman dal Lupard was not.

It was not a slight that Soren was willing to allow pass, particularly not from a man on Amero’s payroll. He slipped his arm from Alessandra’s and could feel her attempt to restrain him as he turned and walked purposefully back toward dal Lupard.

Dal Lupard was unmoved, and stood still, unblinking, his eyes a striking shade of green. He had a smug, confident smile on his face. ‘What are you going to do, Banneret? Kill me? I am unarmed, as I’m sure you have noticed. It would be a cowardly act to strike down an unarmed man.’

‘It’s a brave thing to go about insulting your betters,’ Soren said, ‘when you know the rules of honour prevent them from drawing steel on you. Not that I’d waste the effort on a sack of shit like you.’ He raised his voice. ‘In any event, it’s well known that any man in the service of dal Moreno is a bigger whore than the basest courtesan. Pray we never meet again. I might not be so inclined to abide by the diktats of honour then.’

Dal Lupard said nothing, his face smug and indignant but betraying a hint of surprise. Soren smiled, and dal Lupard returned the expression, giving a slight nod of his head. Someone began to applaud from across the room, and was quickly joined by several others. Soren puffed out his chest as he turned and went back to Alessandra, before leading her from the theatre with as showy a display of pride as he could muster. He wished that they had gone straight home after the performance. She managed to hold her tears back until they were outside and away from prying eyes.

G
iura crumpled
the note from the Grey Tower’s physician and threw it at a bin, missing. The note let him know that the first two Intelligenciers hit by the mage had died several hours after the arrest attempt. The thought made Giura feel sick. He’d thought Nerli’s power was limited to causing nosebleeds, which was alarming. Being powerful enough to incapacitate three strong men was very concerning. To kill two of them was truly terrifying. Giura knew there was no way the man could have happened upon that level of skill and knowledge by chance. The notebooks confirmed that, but raised far more questions than they answered.

The books would be destroyed in the fullness of time, and Giura had no interest in the contents other than ensuring that no one else was able to learn from them. He wouldn’t destroy them until he had learned everything he could about where they had come from, though. That was a daunting task.

The full notebook was worn and well used, but it was not ancient. Someone had filled it with forbidden information within living memory and that meant there was a skilled mage, a man with the power of the mages of old. To Giura’s knowledge, there shouldn’t be anyone alive able to do that. There were stories of mages in the far east, but the consensus at the Grey Tower was that they were not especially powerful, and kept under strict control.

Giura’s mind raced with more questions that verged on paranoid fantasy. Who had written the notebook? How many other people had seen it? How many more men could do what Nerli had done? How had he reached this level without drawing attention to himself before now? An endless stream of questions filled his head every time he applied his mind to the matter, but there were no answers.

There was a coffee house near to the Grey Tower that Giura frequented when he needed to get a different perspective.

He savoured that brief escape for as long as he could, as he always did. The bustle and noise of the coffee house, pleasantly distracting as it was, disappeared and he felt alone in the world. He felt like he could be anyone, with no responsibilities and no worries.

He tried to put all of the pieces of information he had together in a way that would allow him plan his next step. There was an explanation floating around in the back of his mind that he couldn’t quite bring himself to accept; there were too many reasons for it to be rubbish, too many reasons for it to be impossible. And yet he had seen a man use magic to kill another man. That was also supposed to be impossible.

That level of power should take generations to discover. What Nerli possessed was something that had to be learned, something that had to be taught. That distilled Giura’s quandary down to one dominant question. Who was the teacher?

He was relieved to be able to put things so simply, even for an instant, but as soon as he asked the question he realised how many more it raised. Was this person still in the city? What kind of threat did they pose? Was it a man or a woman? Where would he start looking? Giura groaned and feared a headache was coming on. He stopped himself. One question, one answer; there would be time for the others after.

He recalled a report written by some colleagues a few years before, relating to the rise to power of a cabal of shamans among the barbarian peoples in the Silver Hills. The rise was sudden and unexpected, and managed to unite the disparate hill tribes in short order. No one could explain how it had cropped up so suddenly. Almost in the blink of an eye, the shamans went from parlour tricks to very serious magic. It was stamped out quickly enough, and hadn’t cropped up again, but it would be worth looking into further. As he stood and walked out of the coffee house, a fleeting and ridiculous idea passed through his head. Could Amero have anything to do with it?

E
ven a brief spell
in Amero’s presence made Byarsham feel sullied. Amero’s attitude revolted him. He was grasping and ambitious. He wanted everything now and that disgusted Byarsham. Anything worth having was worth waiting for. The best plans took decades to bring to fruition. Amero might want his petty little magic wielders in less than a year, but the Twelve were happy to wait for more than a decade to produce a crop that would be far more useful. Individuals that would have the potential to join the ranks of the Twelve one day, although at that point the plan was for the Twelve to be far more than that: the Hundred, the Thousand. There would be nothing to stand in their way: no person, no Fount-Blooded royal family with a high resistance to magic, no code of laws.

Byarsham made his way through the city toward the nursery. It had been an orphanage before Byarsham arrived in Ostenheim; now the Twelve owned it. The process of identifying adults with some potential for crafting magic, even at their advanced age, had not taken long—far less time than Byarsham had indicated to Amero. That extra time was used to screen the children at the orphanage. This project was secret, and Byarsham’s true reason for being in the city. The irritating Duke’s needs conveniently facilitated this purpose.

Most children could be trained to a useful level with time and appropriate guidance. Some were more receptive than others though, and Byarsham had no interest in those who could only be useful. The Twelve needed soldiers who could stand against a Fount-Blood, a member of the eastern royal family: their rulers, their oppressors. Useful was a waste of resources. After disposing of those that he felt would not reach the required standard, Byarsham was content that in ten, perhaps fifteen years, the first of those children could take their place beside the Twelve. Of course Amero would be long gone by then, and the city would be filled with nurseries.