Blue Diamonds (Book One of The Blue Diamonds Saga) (31 page)

“Well,” Fenwick finally submitted. “Please inform the Archbishop that I will need the ring back, immediately.” Fenwick then manufactured a smile, as he reluctantly handed over the frosty container.

“I will be sure to let him know,” Shomnath smiled in return and tucked the box under his arm.

“Thank you, your highness,” Fenwick said, bowing low once again, and once again Shomnath decided not to tell him that the royal advisers weren't expected to bow.

“No, thank you Fenwick," said Shomnath. "My father will be very pleased.”

Shomnath then turned for the door once again, pausing only to take a deep breathe before walking back into the liquid shadow. Fenwick watched the prince disappear as the black liquid enveloped him. At first he was a little disappointed in giving up his new toy, but he smiled as Shomnath’s last words echoed in his mind.

“Anything to please the king,” smiled the proud Fenwick.

“That’s him.”

“Ye sure this time?”

“That’s him.”

“Ye said that already. I asked if ye were sure.”

“I’m sure.”

“Are ye sure?”

“I’m going to hit you.”

“We followed the last feller nearly a mile before finding out he was just a dang cook.”

“Well, he was acting suspicious. This time I’m sure.”

Kala and Pall had been watching the guarded doorway at the base of the castle's southern tower for the better of two days, waiting for their friend to make his inevitable exit. For as long as they’d known him, Shomnath always slipped out this way, through a passage built for servants to bring goods in and out. There was always good wagon traffic going on here, and it made slipping in and out here ideal.

Today, the only sentry assigned was a tubby man well past his soldiering prime. He sported a potbelly that jutted out from beneath his tunic, and he seemed to have an endless supply of whatever he was drinking. He seemed more focused on the massive festival carrying on than his work. The way that he was cat calling to every woman that unfortunately crossed his path, you would not have guessed that he was on duty at all.

The hooded figure Kala was looking at toted a stuffed sack over his shoulder, and confidently glided past the guard without so much as looking up from the ground. Although it was the same type of sack that was constantly going in and out of the castle all day long, he was far healthier built than the average linen worker. That was the first giveaway, but this laundryman was also too clean looking to have been laboring away all morning.

Slumped under a tent that was pitched against a wall, Kala stared from below her hood. She was disguised as one of the various merchants that routinely set up shop around the castle perimeter. Atop a small rickety table she'd lined an assortment of mangoes, papayas, and bananas, although she made sure that they were all weeks past fresh.

The swarm of flies and stench of rotten fruit easily repelled any customers, but for Pall, these were the lesser of evils. He was less than thrilled at the costume Kala had put together for him, although the yellow, wide brimmed summer hat and matching dress did hide his identity perfectly. At a glance he was just a young girl helping her mother with her fruit stand.

Happy to take her word on it, he made a move to toss the hat from his head.

“Not yet,” she hissed as loud as she dared.

“Ye said it was him.”

“It is," Kala scolded. "But we'll follow him and make sure he isn't being followed by anyone else.”

“Yer just paranoid,” he said, but held his tongue and followed her.

After examining the direction that the prince was trailing off to, they both waited and watched for any other suspicious characters who might be exiting the gate. When they were confident that Shomnath had escaped cleanly, they jumped up to chase after him. Suddenly, the man with the laundry turned into a lane that was packed with merchants selling drinks and food for the party.

“We have to hurry, or we'll loose him in the party” said Kala. She then picked up the pace and grabbed Pall's hand to keep him close.

"Yes mother," laughed Pall.

The crowd was shoulder-to-shoulder, roaring with talk of diamonds, dragons, wizards and dwarves, yet Kala kept her focus locked on the bobbing sack making its way toward the center of the festival. Then, the sack took a sharp right, cutting away from the crowd and into a quiet alleyway.

When Kala and Pall reached the alley they were practically spit into it from the party, which raged on the same without them. Bordered by tall stucco walls, a dead end lane without windows or doors greeted them.

“Did we lose him?” said Pall, who felt it was as good a time as any to strip off his costume.

“Could Shomnath own one of these homes?” said Kala, looking at the windows high up on the walls to both sides of the alley. The windows looked like they belonged to homes, but they were all shut, and much too high for Shomnath to have climbed into any of them. "It would be a good place for a safe house."

“Would ye be surprised if he did?” said Pall, and the dwarf had only walked halfway down the lane before he stopped in his tracks, signaling for Kala to look at the end of the lane. Sure enough, there was another way out at the end of the alley on the left. It was covered by a hanging cloth, colored over by years of dirt buildup that eventually made the cloth match the color of the walls around it. Kala nodded and then motioned to continue on.

“Catch!” called a voice, and the large white sack that they'd followed shot out from behind the curtain and pummeled into Palls chest, startling and nearly knocking the dwarf down.

“Shomnath!” they cheered.

“Who else?” Shomnath said, and he appeared from behind the curtain with his hood still hiding his face, but not enough to hide a smile that stretched from cheek to cheek.

“What were ye thinking? Yer lucky I didn’t have me axe ready,” Pall said, and he threw the sack back into the prince's chest.

“Sorry for the scare," he chuckled. "I owe Kala like twenty of those.”

“Bah," huffed Pall. "Ye didn’t have me scared fer one bit.”

“Or me,” laughed Kala, but from ten feet behind Pall. It was where she landed after jumping from the attacking laundry bag. Shomnath and Pall both looked at her incredulously, before all three of them broke out into laughter. They were so thrilled to see each other that what ensued in the forest already seemed far behind them. The euphoria was short lived though, as Shomnath locked eyes with Pall.

“Once again, I’m sorry for your loss,” said Shomnath.

“And again,” Pall said, matching Shomnath’s solemn gaze. “It still aint time fer mourning. The ghosts of me kin is also having a party. A party fer the sweet revenge we got on Baylor. It’d be a shame to ruin the party with tears. Fer now, we need to get ye out of here before ye lose yer minute of freedom.”

“You're being sworn to the throne tonight, right after the inauguration of the new Archmage,” warned Kala.

“That’s what the crowd's celebrating, yah big hero,” snickered Pall.

The backdrop noise of the crowd felt louder than ever to the prince, only now he realized that the bulk of the cheering was his own name.

“Well, they're going to have to do it without me,” he said. "Let's get out of here."

The path behind the dirty curtain led to one forgotten path after the next, twisting through the more poverty stricken sections of the city, before eventually opening up to Somerlund’s quiet north side residential blocks. Until they reached this section of the city they moved at a feverous pace, running from alley to alley, avoiding stops, but once the houses started to get nicer Kala and Pall both understood where they were headed. They were going to Baymar’s school.

********************

Things have changed a lot since my day.

“You wouldn’t believe.”

Baymar jabbed three candles into the ground, which was more ash than soil now. He took care to ensure that they roughly formed a triangle around where he sat.

When the moonlight struck the shards of obsidian above, they glistened like black-green emeralds. Baymar felt he could lie and stare up at the formation all evening. He loved how the glass twisted gracefully and fluid in some areas while it was dangerously sharp and jutting out in others. During the bright of day you could see completely through the shards in some areas. These areas created an amazing kaleidoscope of clouds so beautiful that he almost forgot that they were Aga’s remains.

King Shomnor only lingered around long enough to see his troops tunnel into the heart of the obsidian. He said that he wanted to see Baylor's body, or rather whatever was left of the wizard-dwarf. It was to 'ensure that the diamond was destroyed', but Baymar had a feeling that Shomnor wanted more than that.

Unfortunately for the king the ground that Baylor was standing on was a large slab of granite. When Aga landed on him the result resembled a bug being caught between two clapping bricks. Baylor was instantly reduced to a smear, while the diamond was crushed to powder.

Miraculously his magic ring, Frostbern, survived the crash by slipping snuggly into a crack in the granite floor. The ring alone was very valuable, and the king was pleased to not leave totally empty handed.

I cannot believe the nerve of your king,
said Ambrosia.
It's hard to fathom that he’s a descendant of Shomrill.

Baymar paused at the mention of the ancient king, before continuing to mark the ground between the candles with the runes of spirit sight. It must have been ages since he’d heard that name. He let the white powder slip through the bottom of his powder horn slowly, forming the rune’s inner lines first, before finishing a larger circle around himself and the candles. The process was easier this time.

“He wasn’t always like that," said Baymar. "When I fought by his side he was so full of hope, so sincere in life. It’s like he’s a different person altogether now.”

Then you haven’t spoken to him in a while?

“Not for years. I’ve heard him speak plenty of times, but you can’t count his speeches because none of that is real. I think it’s been years since he’s spoken his own thoughts in public. Politics have killed the man.”

How can that be? There must be times when you bump into the king in the castle. I can remember that even the lowest mages would cross the king’s path at least once in a while. Has the guild moved from the castle?

“The guild hasn’t moved," said Baymar. "I’m not in it.”

You’re an… independent?
Ambrosia gasped.

Baymar cringed at the way she said the word. Apparently the wizards of her day also looked down at practitioners who chose to study outside of their
esteemed
hierarchy.

“I have my own school, as a matter of fact. I only teach healing magic.”

Well, it wasn’t healing magic that got me trapped in here.

“Well, I only
teach
healing magic. In my spare time I try to keep up with the arts, in case one day…” Baymar capped his powder horn and tossed it into his satchel, and then also threw in his spell book. It was the book he used in the Evernight, the night that he caught Ambrosia's soul. This time he wouldn’t need any of the words to chant. He wasn’t going to do any spirit catching this time. Today he just wanted to look.

One day?
said Ambrosia.

“One day, maybe, I might fix the disaster the guild has become.”

If that’s the case then you’re taking rejection very well.

“What rejection?”

Archmage. After what happened you should be the only one eligible for the position, not this Fenwick character.

“I don't want to be the Archmage," laughed Baymar. "I haven’t for many years.”

Then why was the king so happy to throw the name of his new lackey in your face? said Ambrosia.

This was true enough. After Frostbern was retrieved from the glass rubble Shomnor openly, and loudly mentioned that his new Archmage would be very pleased to recover the enchanted ring. He seemed to say it just loud enough for Baymar to hear. Only those who knew the king well would recognize the crooked smirk that came along with the words.

“That's just the way Shomnor is. It was probably a test, to see where I stand on the subject today,” Baymar decided.

You must not have parted ways on good terms,
said Ambrosia.

“You can take it, and leave it, at that.”

Ambrosia went silent, yet although she stopped speaking Baymar could still feel her inside of him, as if her thoughts were hidden somewhere under the beating of his pulse. He'd felt the same sensation the previous day, but he shrugged it off. Now that he had time to think on it, it was too strong to be denied. Somehow he knew that with every passing hour she was becoming more and more a part of him. How much of a part he couldn’t begin to guess.

Either way, the darkest hour had come and he was determined to finish the task at hand. There was a reason for shunning the comforts of his school for the cold forest. He and Ambrosia both had to find closure. They needed to know for sure that Baylor’s diamond was destroyed.

Baymar sat in the center of his rune, leaned forward, and then gently blew onto the tips of the candles.

Purple spark and smoke erupted from the magic candles as they did before, and his surrounding environment immediately shifted into a bright, lavender hue. Once again, Baymar’s eyes were opened to the surrounding souls that lingered. The landscape was littered with the bobbing red lanterns.

The first thing they feel is the shock,
Ambrosia said, once again giving him the impression that she was becoming more in tune with his feelings, and possibly even his thoughts.

Most of them aren’t even aware that they’re dead yet. Until they get over that obstacle, they won’t be able to enter the light. Not even if they wanted to.

“The light?” asked Baymar.

The doorway of light. It’s the only way I can explain it, but I couldn’t tell you what’s on the other side. That’s a door no one has come out of. I’ve been inches from making the plunge myself.