The Wizard King (7 page)

Drianna stood paralyzed, gaping at him stupidly and unable to contain her shock at his callous treatment.

“Now!” he scolded, as if she were a novice kitchen maid too slow at serving his dinner. His tone did not invite argument.

Drianna scurried to the enameled desk, her vision swimming from the tears burning in her eyes, while the Sage began spewing out plans for the army of wizards that Couric and his other servants were hiring for him in western Caithe. Names of men, names of cities—most of which she could not spell—numbers, magic spells, and a host of other disjointed information. Unfortunately, Drianna’s talents did not include that of scribe, and the Sage did nothing to make her job easier; his thoughts were forever tumbling over themselves, and his sentences came out in bits and pieces, leaving her to divine his meaning.

Drianna sniffled miserably. He remembered all these infernal names and places well enough… how could he have forgotten
her
?

Distracted by both her injured heart and her urgency to write down everything he bade her, it took a moment for her to realize that Brandegarth had stopped talking. She glanced up warily to see him staring out of the window, listening to the sea wash upon the shore as if it murmured poetry to him.

Then he turned back to her, his gaze piercing clear through her soul. “I have touched God, Drianna.” His voice was hushed, as if he imparted the greatest of secrets. “He has spoken to me… through His angels.”

Drianna put down her quill. Was this true, or was it only some remnant bit of madness; a side effect of the spell? “W-what did they say?” She wasn’t sure whether the Sage was delusional or not, but she thought it best to humor him regardless.

Brand’s expression darkened. “They warned me not to encroach upon His secrets.” Then, as soon as it had come, the darkness on his face dispersed like woodsmoke in the wind and his eyes glinted with enchantment. “Ah, but perhaps there is one secret that He has imparted to me for my valor, eh, Drianna?”

He favored her with a wickedly sly grin. “You thought I had forgotten, didn’t you?” he said, pointing a finger at her in mock accusation. “How could I? It was the chance of obtaining this particular power that drove me to be sealed in the first place.”

Drianna’s heart fluttered wildly, but to her surprise, she felt a powerful urge to flee his presence. Ever since they had become lovers when she was a mere girl of sixteen, Brand had promised her that if she were to become a wizard, then he would marry her—as Sage, he explained, he could not marry anyone unblessed by God. They waited for the
mekahn
to manifest in her, but they waited in vain. At twenty-four, it was still possible that she carried the potential for magic, but inwardly, Drianna knew that the chance was growing more remote with every passing day. And after eight years of waiting, Drianna realized she would gladly wait another eight years to avoid hearing the wrong thing.

“Are you going to do it now?” she asked, half-expectant, half-terrified.

Brand chuckled lightly. “Let us not get ahead of ourselves. I want to be sure that I have the power first, and then, once I know what to look for, I will test you.” He touched a finger to her chin, lifting it up an inch. “I shall not risk error with you, my love.”

Then he clasped her face between his palms and kissed her hard; four months of waiting was contained in that single urgent encounter, and it left Drianna dizzy and bruised and breathless with rapture.

With an explosion of energy, Brandegarth strode to the door in three long strides and flung it open, sending it crashing back against the wall. “Come!” he shouted over his shoulder. He dashed off at a gallop and was halfway down the corridor before Drianna could rouse herself to follow.

Hiking up her skirts, she scrambled after him in haste, almost missing a step at the bottom of the great stair leading to the courtyard. He was traversing the yard like a man eager to pass the news of his newborn son, hurrying past the armory and bastle-house, buttery and brewhouse, sending a half-dozen hens, two milkmaids, and a cat scurrying out of his path as he finally disappeared into the palace stables. By the time Drianna caught up with him, wheezing at the effort, he had emerged again and sought a new destination. A stableboy poked his head out of the doorway after him, shaking it in bewilderment.

Drianna trailed the Sage into the kitchens, catching up again just as he lurched across the threshold like a stallion bursting free of his stall. Cooks and scullery maids busily wiped flour and grease from their faces in an attempt to look respectable for their lord, and one young girl hastily swept her worktable clean of onion skins. While everyone in the palace knew by now that the Sage was free of the sealing spell, they had no more expected to see him up and about—much less darting about the castle like a madman—than they would have thought to see a new mother hop on a horse and take a ride around the island within an hour of giving birth.

“Where are the youngest?” he asked them, scanning the puzzled faces before him. “Those less than nineteen. Don’t be shy—I won’t bite them. Bring them forward!”

One by one, the youngest girls were prodded forward by the older women and placed in a disorderly line, like a squadron of soldiers about to undergo inspection. The girls fidgeted anxiously, rubbing at spots of grime on their aprons or twirling locks of hair around their fingers. Then, one by one, the Sage reached out and brushed against their minds; he placed his hands on their temples and breathed deep, scrying their souls for the sign. If he did not find what he sought after several minutes, he sent them off with a mumbled word of dismissal.

After he had tested seven of the assembled twelve and found nothing, Drianna sensed that his temper was growing thin. He was so desperate to possess the ability, Drianna feared that if he did not, he would seal himself for an even longer time and surely kill himself in his quest for power.

But as he cupped the head of the eighth girl, a sallow-faced drudge smelling of onions, he finally found what he sought. His eyes snapped open, and his face glowed as if he had just been gifted with a visitation by an angel. “Ah! Blessed child!” he cried, kissing the grubby creature full upon the lips. “You carry God’s mark! What is your name? How old are you?”

“P-peg, your Grace,” she stammered, still reeling from his unprecedented show of affection. “An’ I’m almost fifteen.” Openmouthed, Peg stared at her lord with a curious mix of delight and terror, but if the girl thought him mad, Drianna mused, she knew better than to say so.

The Sage embraced her warmly, as if she was his long-lost heir. “The seed is within you, Peg. You are one of God’s chosen people. In a matter of years, you will come into your magic and will rise up in this world.”

Peg’s eyes grew round as the onions she had been chopping for the evening’s stew. “How do you know?”

The Sage smiled down on her with the benevolence of a saint. “God has given His secrets to me as reward for my devotion,” he said. “If you prove yourself worthy one day, Peg, then perhaps He will do the same for you.”

He abruptly dismissed the remaining four girls. They crept back to their tasks, some visibly glad for the reprieve and others disappointed that their future would not be told that day. The Sage bestowed a bow of respect upon Peg as he backed dazedly out of the kitchens; the moment he was gone, Drianna saw the other girls cluster around Peg as if she were a new bride, chattering congratulations on her auspicious future.

“I have it,” the Sage murmured, as he staggered drunkenly across the courtyard. “I have the power. It is so simple! A shining seed in the darkness… one only needs the power to see it and then it is so clear… like a pearl on black velvet, or a lantern in the night. Lord of my people, I thank you,” he went on, lowering himself to one knee on the graveled walk. “I thank you for allowing me to share your knowledge of who has Your favor and who does not.”

He struggled back to his feet, still intoxicated by the grace he had been granted. “Athaya will suffer for this… for keeping this power all to herself. When the Caithan people find out—”

“She thought it was wrong to use it,” Drianna explained from behind him, though why she felt obliged to do so vexed her. “She couldn’t possibly test everyone in the kingdom, so leaving things alone seemed the fairest thing to do. Especially in Caithe, where telling someone they’re a wizard is the same as passing a death sentence on them.”

“Then more the fool she.” But rather than enter into another debate over Athaya Trelane’s views on the ethics of magic, Brand motioned Drianna to follow him back to the tower. “Come, Tullis will have brought Ranulf to my chamber by now. After I have dealt with him, we will see what waits in your future.”

“Brand, are you sure it’s a good idea to see him?” she asked as they reached the foot of the great stair. Her mouth went dry as she spoke; Brand hated it when she questioned him—especially when it had anything do with magic—but if Brand still bore some lingering trace of his ordeal, then Ranulf would be quick to take advantage of it. He was one of Athaya’s staunchest allies and knew the threat the Sage posed to her work. “You should be resting, not overexerting yourself so soon after—”

“Bah! I am strong enough for anything.” He raised tight fists over his head, flexing the muscles on his bare arms and back. “By God, Drianna, I could Challenge one of God’s own angels and win right now!”

Drianna’s hand flew to her mouth, expecting lightning to strike him dead that instant.
“Brand!”

But his blasphemy was forgotten as they returned to the Sage’s bedchamber, where Tullis and two guardsmen kept silent watch over Ranulf Osgood. The prisoner was thinner and paler now—and somewhat damp, Drianna realized—but still a powerful man for his forty-odd years. Drianna suspected he could have wrestled almost anyone in the palace to the ground, with possible exception of Brand himself. Ranulf had been kept in reasonably honorable confinement—he was the enemy, but as a wizard, he deserved a certain amount of deference—and had suffered from little more than boredom these past few months.

“Please pardon his appearance, your Grace,” Tullis said, turning a critical eye to Sage’s captive. “He has not elected to bathe for months and… well, I had to insist that he do so before seeing you.”

Brand laughed merrily at the sight of Ranulf’s sopping red hair sticking out in all directions; he looked like a wet cat and surely bore the same temperament. “Ah, Ranulf. It is good to see you again.”

The mercenary made a hawking sound in the back of his throat. “Sorry I can’t say the same.”

Drianna could see the hatred in the man’s eyes, burning them hollow from within. But Ranulf was not a stupid man, and she saw caution simmering there as well. Ranulf was born and bred on Sare, trained as a soldier in the same mercenary company as Brand, but while Brand had remained on the island, Ranulf had sold his services to the civil war in Caithe. When his magic came upon him soon thereafter, he had ended up in Reyka instead of Sare, and was therefore never properly educated to revere the Sage or his island cult. But he knew of it and knew enough to tread carefully within its leader’s abode.

“Him I can understand,” Ranulf said to Drianna, flatly ignoring the Sage’s presence for the moment. “He always had a cesspool for a soul, even back in the corps. But you! Athaya was kind to you, even though you drove her to distraction with all of yer babbling and fawning. And this is how you repaid her.”

Drianna felt her cheeks tingle with heat. Although she had omitted the fact from her report to Brand, she had actually come to like the Caithan princess and enjoyed acting the part of lady’s maid to her.

“She did only as I asked her to,” Brandegarth pointed out in her defense. “And you must realize that my plans for Caithe were preordained. Little that Drianna told me could have changed them.”

The Sage dismissed the two guardsmen with a flick of his wrist, but bade Tullis to remain. Then he paused, silently appraising his captive. “Don’t you even want to know why I’ve sent for you?”

Ranulf sniffled crudely. “You’ll get to it. Far be it from me to rush you, your Grace.”

“No need to be so suspicious, my friend,” Brand replied, overlooking the mercenary’s mildly baiting tone. “I sent for you to tell you that you are free to go.”

Ranulf studied the Sage without blinking. “Just like that?”

“Almost. You may leave on the condition that you perform one simple task for me.”

Ranulf ran stubby fingers through his fresh growth of red beard and snorted. “You lock me up for four months and expect me to do ye a favor? That’s rich.”

“It is a small thing. When you leave here, I imagine that you will go directly to Athaya Trelane and tell her everything that has transpired here. All I ask is that you add one more thing to your report.”

Drianna detected the mercenary’s muscles relax slightly; when he had been imprisoned, he knew only that Nicolas was about to be bound by a spell of compulsion. He was clearly relieved to know that the spell had not been crafted to induce the prince to murder his sister, Athaya. But what it
had
induced him to do, he as yet had no idea.

“What did you do to Nicolas?”

Brandegarth waved his hand negligently. “Old news, my friend. Athaya will tell you about it when you see her, I’m sure.” He made a clicking sound with his tongue. “A most unfortunate turn of events, I’m sorry to say.”

For a man of his bulk, Ranulf was deceptively quick. Rage flared anew in his eyes, burning away all his former caution, and he lunged at the Sage with a growl of untempered fury. “Tell me, damn you!” Shunning weapons of magic, Ranulf was content to tear the flesh from his enemy’s body with his bare hands.

With ineffable calm, Brandegarth held up his right hand, palm facing his attacker.
“Salvum fac sub aspide!”

Drianna had seen the Sage cast a shielding spell many times before, but never to such spectacular effect. She expected a shower of blue sparks to deal a stiff but harmless shock to the prisoner, but this time, the instant Ranulf’s flesh touched the invisible shield, the room blazed with sparkling white brilliance like sunlight on the sea, temporarily blinding her. Her ears rang to the point of pain from the loud
pop
that followed.