Enchanter (Book 7) (33 page)

“Aren’t these pretty?” she cooed, as she bent to study them. The half-dozen lumps of dirty white clay had been transformed by the Everfire; all six were smaller, brighter, and vibrating with arcane energy.  “Look at that one – the knot coral one.”  She waved her hand and the incandescent nodule floated in the air.  ‘That took almost no effort – none.  A mildly-Talented human could do it.”

“Telekinetic hypersensitivity,” I nodded, making a mental note.  “That is intriguing.  And useful.  I wonder if it will be stable at lower temperatures.”

“And this one . . . “ she said, replacing the first sample and examining the second, holding her bright red curls out of the way as she bent, as if she were a maid sniffing flowers in the garden.  “Oh!  This one is now psionically sensitive – that’s the zeolite matrix, I believe,” she said, sniffing the nodule.  “That one at the top is Prehnite, mostly, also psionically sensitive, but different.”

I was examining them all with the baculus, shifting through various detection spells and taking arcane measurements with the sophisticated enchantments.  The enneagram within the rod was curious, and it did most of the work for me.  It was the baculus’ intuition that drew my attention to the measurements of Specimen 5, the one that had nothing but ground snow quartz dust in it.  Insight was dragging my attention to a particular reading like a dog pointing toward a duck.

“Oh, my,” I breathed, as I realized what it meant.  “Isn’t
that
interesting?”

Chapter Fifteen

The Wall Of Gold

It was, as predicted, a long, cold, wet winter.  Snow, which was once pleasantly uncommon in the Bontal, seemed to arrive weekly to foul up travel, block roads, and generally encourage people to stay inside where it was warm.  Since I’d adopted the snowflake as my heraldic device, I got more than my share of blame for the weather.

I tried explaining to the complainers that it wasn’t my doing, that the Umbra – the region of magical shadow that was growing around Boval Vale in the Mindens – was having an effect on the weather patterns, and as a result we got more precipitation now than we used to . . . but after seeing enough blank stares, I realized it was wiser to just take the blame and mumble something about hoping it doesn’t get worse. 

When you say it just right, people leave you alone about it after a while out of fear of pissing you off.

The weather certainly aided our enchantment efforts in Sevendor, but it also slowed down my negotiation efforts with the six hill domains in Sashtalia who were interested in taking up the Snowflake, swearing fealty to me, and sitting out the coming war with Sendaria this spring.  I employed Sir Festaran almost exclusively as my agent in this, as he was trustworthy, known as a fellow Riverlord to the men, and he was becoming adept at such missions. 

But Festaran was running into a problem, as he scurried from one domain to the other, avoiding notice by Sashtalia’s agents.  The lords had all agreed, individually, to a tentative agreement, but there was a lot of resistance to being the first among them consummating the transfer, due to the anxiety of recriminations from their neighbors.  Changing allegiances was serious business, and could lead to bitter war if it went poorly.  The money I was offering was nice – a little more than five thousand ounces of gold, between all six fiefs – but it wouldn’t buy their lives if their jilted liege came calling with an avenging army.

That was particularly important for these folk.  Like Sevendor, they were mostly poor lords of small mountain estates who were often at the whims of their larger neighbors.  For a decade or more Sashtalia had relied upon the strength of its greatest eastern domains – Avanal, Pirine, Lavanth, and especially Rolone – to bully the hill lords into their service . . . and punish them bitterly if they did not comply. 

So I was quietly arranging a secret conference among them, which was difficult and treacherous to do under road conditions that poor.  Luckily (for me, not her) a revered abbess of the Temple of Trygg passed on to her reward one cold winter night, and the funeral provided an outstanding opportunity to get them all together without arousing suspicion in Sashtalia.

The temple was on an ecclesiastic estate that just happened to abut my one tiny domain in Sashtalia, a wooded parcel with a single village called Amel Wood that had been a gift from the King upon my investiture as baron.  The fact that it also abutted Rolone and Avanal, two of Sashtalia’s richer domains, had not escaped my notice at the time, but the death of the abbess gave me every legitimate reason to attend.  A figure of some note in the Bontal for over sixty years, the old bird’s position demanded a strong showing of piety from the neighboring lords.  As she had delivered most of them into this world, it only seemed honorable to pay their respects.

It also gave Alya and I an opportunity to get out of the castle.  And me the opportunity to renew our acquaintance, and perhaps our intimacy, as Briga had suggested.  As fascinating as my work had been, lately, Alya had been getting a bad case of castle fever with all of the snow and rain.  When word came of the funeral, a few days after the Feast of Briga (a grand blow-out for the official dedication of the new temple; to celebrate I paid for my dad to distribute free pastries to all, which made me very popular with both him and the people) it seemed an outstanding time to leave the children with the servants and get out of Sevendor.

Festaran arranged for my new carriage to be made ready.  I’d ordered it after returning from Kasar, having walked far more than I’d ever intended to in this life.  It was as grand and elaborate as the carriager’s art could make it, then further enhanced with enchantment to make it even more comfortable and convenient.  Outside, it looked like any other ostentatious baron’s coach.  But the Spellmonger’s wain must have proper amenities.

In addition to Joppo the Root, the coachman, and two footmen, we also included a second coach for Sister Bemia and her acolytes, which they shared with a few of the castle ladies who wanted to pay their respects.  A third open wain was used for baggage, and two packhorses provided for the six men-at-arms we were taking as a bare escort.  Sir Festaran himself was coming, ostensibly on behalf of his father, but mostly to act as my diplomatic agent.  He had met and spoken with each of the principals, and had at least a modicum of their trust. 

I also included Dara with the party.  As both my apprentice and the only native Sevendori noble, I thought it was important for her to be seen at the occasion.  She was growing into a striking young woman, and her reputation spanned the kingdom.  But as I wanted to keep a low profile, I made her ride a horse, not a hawk.  She didn’t seem to mind – she rode knee-to-knee with Festaran the entire way, Frightful on a specially-made block in front of her on the saddle. 

It was a cold morning as the horses struggled over Caolan’s pass, and even in the magically-heated confines of the carriage you could still see your breath a little.  The pass itself was a lot easier for the horses to make than it had been four years ago, when we had first come to Sevendor.  After the Warbird’s siege we had been steadily working to improve the tiny pass as an access point to the vale, making it both more defensible and easier to manage. 

The pass had been widened considerably, with large chunks of rock removed by magic and rendered into usable building stone.  The Karshak laid foundations of snowstone for the new defensive work, but the rest of the labor was being done by Master Nandol, the mason from town.  That meant that the work went more slowly, but it also went a lot more inexpensively for me.  Nandol’s entire crew of fifty was cheaper than a dozen Karshak doing the same work. 

Not that Nandol had been without clients – Sevendor’s building boom had made him a comparatively wealthy man – but there was some resentment lingering about employing Master Guri’s lodge to build the new castle. 

Master Nandol, for all of his skill as a human mason, just did not have the capacity or the resources to accomplish even a tithe of the construction within his lifetime.  The resentment had turned into a good-natured rivalry, with even Master Nandol himself acknowledging the debt he owed to the Karshak for teaching his men their techniques.  They were content to practice them on the pass fortification, and eager to rival their nonhuman competitors even if that was fairly unlikely. 

Work slowed somewhat in the winter, but by employing a hired enchanter using Bricking wands and other construction spells, the wall that would guard the gap was nearly ten feet high, now.  Eventually it would be twenty, and ten feet thick at the base.  Once completed it would be crenelated with machiolations – an extravagance for a normal castle, much less a frontier fortification, but I could pay for it.  Four turrets would allow a second tier of archers to defend the pass above the wall.  The foundations of the tower that would one day overlook the pass and provide a third tier of archers were already laid, but priority had been given to completing the wall, with possibility of war looming in the Bontal. 

We made a mandatory stop at the station that the Westwoodmen ran at the pass.  It was a temporary hall, until the tower complex was completed, but they had whitewashed it and laid out a receiving area for travelers, including a small shrine to Herus to welcome them to Sevendor . . . and a stark stone cell to detain them, if necessary.

The snowflake banner, white on green, flew from a half-dozen places, and the white hawk on Sevendor green was featured at least twice.  That was Dara’s device, forced on her by her own people out of their pride for her.  She tried to ignore it, when we stopped to use the privy and greet the captain of the guard . . . but that was hard to do when a line of Westwoodmen rangers and every other attendant to the station suddenly stopped what they were doing and bowed to Dara . . . and me and Alya.

But it was Dara they were really honoring, it was clear, when I helped Alya out of the carriage. 

“My Lady Lenodara, welcome to the pass,” said the captain of the guard – who I finally recognized as her eldest brother, Kyre.  He had grown a beard since the last time I saw him, and it added years to his appearance.  So did the armor he wore.

“Captain,” Dara nodded, from horseback, blushing furiously at the sudden display.

“Would you like to review the guard, my lady?” he asked, smirking. 

“I can see them from here,” she dismissed, embarrassed.  “Really, Kyre, do you have to be such an ass?”

“They are merely paying legitimate respect to a beloved leader,” Alya called to her.  “You’ll get used to it.”

“I’m his godsdamned
little sister!”
she fumed.  “I’m not his—”

“Liege lord?” I finished.  “Perhaps not technically, yet, but one day that may be true – best you both get used to the idea.”

“Me?” she asked, in disbelief.  “But I’m a
mage!”

“Mage
lord
,” I corrected.  “Regardless of your training status, that is still true.  Who do you think I can depend upon to protect the snowstone reserves in the Westwood?  That is where most of it lies.  The Master of the Wood already has a great responsibility for running the estate.  It would be unfair to saddle him with the additional burden of stewardship over that great resource.  That is the proper responsibility of a noble . . . and a mage.  Who better than Lady Lenodara the Hawkmaiden?”

“Hawk
lady
,” corrected Alya, “or she will be soon.  Have you given no thought to marriage, Dara?” she said, half-teasing.

“I’m an
apprentice!”
she protested.  “I don’t have time for romance, I
work
for a living!”  Frightful was glaring at us both.

“You won’t be an apprentice forever,” I reminded her.  “Tyndal and Rondal passed their exams, and in truth you are nearly ready to, yourself—”

“The
hells
I am!” she sputtered.  “By the Flame!  Master, you over-estimate my abilities and my knowledge!  Sure, I can fly, and wave a wand, run the Knife, and run errands, and if you want to know which hoof is bothering your horse, I’m your
girl
. . . but I am a
long
way from being ready for my exams!  I barely understand thaumaturgy, all this enchantment crap is confusing as six hells, and by the Flame if I
ever
will be able to tell the difference between Old High Perwyneese and Middle Perwyneese, I’ll count it as a legitimate miracle from Briga, herself!”

“Don’t think I couldn’t arrange that,” I warned, half-jokingly.  “My point, dear girl, is that you won’t be a dear girl forever, and your country has need of you.  Yes, you will serve more of your apprenticeship, but know that you cannot be a child forever.  Or even a maiden.  Adult responsibilities loom,” I said, in an exaggerated voice.

Screwing with your apprentices’ heads is half of the fun of having them.  The free work is the other half.

“And you are not without admirers,” Alya said, her eyes glancing toward Festaran, “and perhaps even suitors.  If not yet, then soon.  What then, Lady Lenodara of Westwood?  A short excursion into the countryside next to a handsome gentleman has been known to kindle a spark in the heart of a maiden . . . plenty of opportunities to be alone with someone . . .”

“I . . . I . . . I’m going to go
pee,”
Dara said, her mood crashing down dangerously.  “And while so employed, if
any
considerations of my future happen to occur to me, know that I will deal with them in the appropriate manner . . . in the
privy!”
she said, nastily.  As she stomped off she glared at poor Sir Festaran angrily.