Enchanter (Book 7) (7 page)

I glanced up at the white mountain looming to the south.  “Believe me, I know,” I sighed.  “And with all the irionite suddenly around . . . well, let’s say that it has made enchantment in particular an increasing interest of mine. As I’m certain you’ve guessed, Sevendor is starting to influence how other domains function, now.  Say, what position do you hold at the moment?” I asked, suddenly having an idea.

“I am currently between assignments, Magelord,” he said, as if it didn’t bother him. 

“Then if it doesn’t inconvenience you,” I decided, “please make arrangements to stay as my guest after the fair; it would be a shame to have all of this enchantment talent in my domain at one time and not make use of it.  See my Court Wizard, Dranus – he’s the Remearan with the shaved head in the corner with the Wenshari lady – and tell him I said to find you accommodations.  But I’d like the benefit of your counsel on some matters, for a few days – among other magi who have come.”

“Any way that I can be of service, Magelord,” he nodded.  I could tell he was relieved and gratified at the notice.  I found out later that Ulin had sold nearly everything he owned and quit his job as a court wizard for a prosperous knight in Wenshar to journey all the way to Sevendor for the fair.  Expressly, it turned out, to get my attention, since I seemed to be the mage who was doing the moving and shaking in the profession at the moment. 

I continued to work the room after the seminar, enjoying a few good discussions and avoiding a few bad ones.  I did my best to keep Dunselen on the opposite side of the room from me, but sometimes the gods just don’t listen.

“Ah, Baron Minalan, what did you think of the seminar?” Dunselen asked, another mage in tow. 

“Just the sort of thing I envisioned when I began the Magic Fair,” I said, truthfully.  “Getting some good discussions going outside of the hidebound halls of the academic world is just the sort of thing our profession needs.”

I could tell that took him aback.  He was, after all, head of the academic order I had started.  The hidebound halls of academia were precisely what Dunselen wanted to advance.

“Yet one cannot deny the importance of solid academic study,” he countered, diplomatically.  “These brief seminars provide a useful overview, but the true glory goes to those who toil in the dusty leaves of our libraries.”

“And just what wonders have you unearthed from there, Master Dunselen?” Terleman asked, joining us with a goblet in his hand.  My old wartime friend looked far more like a prosperous merchant than one of the best warmagi in the world at the moment – I’d heard he’d spent the last several months getting the estates he’d been given as a reward for service into proper order. 

He also had low opinion of academic magi.

“You’d be surprised,” Dunselen said, startled by the intrusion.

“I imagine I would,” Terleman chuckled.  “So tell me.”

“I, uh, that is . . . well, Mistress Robian of Alar Academy has determined that Ablard’s Constant varies with the time of day—”

“That was established before the Conquest!” sneered Terleman.

“Not to ten digits of variability,” the mage behind Dunselen sniffed.  He looked like an academic mage, if you can believe it.  Squint-eyed, stooped shouldered, inkstained hands from reading.  “That gives the thaumaturge unprecedented control over calculating the necessary energy consumption over a given period of time!”

“It’s a shadow of a fart in terms of usefulness,” Terleman shot back.  “Come off it, Dun – there hasn’t been a significant discovery or advancement out of the academies in generations!  A waste of time and resources, if you ask me. Who the hell cares about Ablard’s Constant?  Who casts spells that need that kind of control?  If it’s going to be a long-term spell, you just charge the hell out of it and calculate the daily average.  If it isn’t, who cares what the constant is to ten digits?  With a witchstone, such trivia becomes immaterial.”

“Yet few academics have access to such potent resources,” the other mage said, aggressively.  “They are wasted on the military.”

Terleman sipped his wine in silence for a moment.  “Goodman, I do not believe we have been introduced.”

Dunselen caught the cue, after a moment.  “Yes, this is Master Belemo, a fellow at Alar Academy.  An advanced student of thaumaturgy and enchantment theory.  Master Belemo, this is Magelord Terleman, Lord Commander of the Royal Magical Corps.”

The monkish little academic was not impressed by Terl’s title.  In fact, he seemed emboldened at the opportunity to confront an example of what he saw as wasted resources.  He launched into a diatribe about the folly of granting such power to a magical warrior class when it was clearly the study of magic that demanded the use of irionite.  He castigated the warmagi as thuggish brutes who were using forces they did not understand, and equated them dangerously to the less-flattering characteristics of the hated Censorate. 

I could tell by the way Dunselen watched his performance that the old coot had been, if not the author, then certainly an enthusiastic supporter of Master Belemo’s position.

“So you’re saying that Min should hand out witchstones on the basis of . . . what, publishing credits?” he snorted, derisively. 

“Witchstones!” Belemo snorted in return.  “A droll name for one of the most potent and mysterious of wonders.  And yes, irionite should be reserved for those best able to study it.  For those who have devoted their lives to studying thaumaturgy,” he said, passionately – almost pleadingly.  “The Academies already have the structure in place to handle the proper distribution of materials.  It’s criminal that they were not dealt with so when they were discovered.”

“I think ‘criminal’ might be overstating it,” I said, trying to avoid an argument.  “There was a war on.  There still is, if you’re paying attention,” I reminded him.  “Irionite was apportioned as a matter of necessity, to those best able to defend humanity.  Including the academics of Alar and Inarion.”

“But the war is over, now,” Dunselen said, dismissively. “Even if it is merely temporarily abated, then what better time to re-issue irionite to academics who can unlock its secrets?”

“You want to take away glass from wizards like me and give them to wizards like him?” Terleman asked, incredulously.

“As if you need them, now,” Belemo sneered.  “When I think of all the vital research that languishes for the lack of irionite, and I see all of the wretchedly decadent use of such great power for such incidental things, it angers me!  Why do you need a stone?  You already know how to kill things!”

Terleman eyed the man evenly.  “I got really good at it, too,” he said quietly.  “I can do it in all sorts of painful and creative ways.  And I’ve dug holes bigger than you for fun,” he added.

“You’re trying to intimidate me?” Belemo asked, contemptuously.  “I’ve had six of my monographs read in front of the Council of Masters and published in the Annals!  Your capacity for mindless violence doesn’t impress me!”

“Perhaps I can change that opinion,” Terleman said in such a casual, lighthearted way that I knew he was contemplating violence. 

“Gentlemen,” I said, warningly, “I remind you that you both took the Fairgoers’ Oath, forbidding brawling and violence.”

“Brawling?” Belemo asked, worriedly, as he suddenly realized what Terleman had been contemplating.  Fistfights do, indeed, break out in academic circles when discussions get heated, but it’s rare and the results are usually confined to bloody noses or a brief magical attack.  Terleman was a High warmage.  It didn’t take much, once you knew how, to use that power to roast a man alive.  I’d seen it done.

“I can wait until after the fair,” shrugged Terl, finishing his cup.  “I haven’t had good duel in years!”

“Duel?” Belemo asked, alarmed.  He wouldn’t have lasted two minutes in a peasant’s brawl, much less a duel with an adept.

“I hardly think that was the intent,” Dunselen interjected, quickly.  “This was merely an academic discussion, a spirited debate among colleagues over the issues of the day—”

“That’s a lot for a mere ‘thuggish brute’ to consider,” Terl said, setting down his winecup.  “Maybe you had better explain it to me using short words.”

“Gentlemen!  There are larger issues at hand!  This is not the time to—”

That’s when I noticed that everyone in the room stopped talking – and when a group of academics does that at a conference, you know something is afoot.  I turned in the direction of the turned heads I saw to see what had caused the sudden silence.

Four men were coming through the grand double doors of the chapterhouse hall.  They were wizards, everyone knew at once, and even more, they were warmagi.  You could tell at a glance.

All four were wearing long cloaks of red and white checks.

I couldn’t believe I was saying it.  “Baron Dunselen is correct.  There are larger issues at hand.”

Chapter Four

The Arcane Knights Of Nablus

BODEMENT

“An enchanter’s bodement, written within the very first leaves of the pantography of his enchantment, summarizes not just the expected result of his labor and craft, but also a personal statement of purpose; in committing to the bodement an enchanter commits himself to a course of action that cannot be lightly abandoned.”

Ratel’s Paraenesis

That
was a fun afternoon.

If you want to freeze the blood in a mage, show them a checkered . . .
anything
.  For four centuries the specter of the black-and-white cloaks of the Censorate of Magic was a symbol of dread and heartless regulation to the arcane profession.  When you saw them in the doorway, your likelihood of imprisonment, hanging, having the capacity to do magic burned out of your brain, or at the minimum receive a fine near the frontiers of extortion for the privilege of keeping your certification.

The fact that the squares were red and not black did little for their stylishness in Sevendor.  Everyone had heard about the Censorate’s reformation in Merwyn.  Under the Duke of Merwyn’s patronage, the remnants of the order had re-constituted themselves at the former commandary at Nablus, under new leadership with a new mandate. 

They had somehow bargained to be the exclusive bearers of the duchy’s irionite, as well as keeping their responsibility for overseeing the administration of magi in Merwyn.  Anyone who wanted to hold a witchstone in Merwyn had to join in order to legally do so.

Same unpleasant fanatical warmagi. Now with an iron-hard grudge, political patronage and the superlative power of irionite.

I felt Terleman and most of the other warmagi in the room tense for a fight.  The newcomers glared, but bore no weapons and cast no spells.  For a very long tense moment I dreaded the real prospect of an all-out magical battle erupting. 

But then a shorter figure pushed through the menacing cloaks.  Banamor poked his head into the room and cleared his throat.

“Spellmonger?  A word?”

I didn’t dare glance around the room.  “Pardon me, gentlefolk.”

Terleman fell in behind me without me asking.  Dunselen did too, for no good reason that I could see.  But I didn’t stop him.  Perhaps I wanted him to get caught in the crossfire.

As we approached the warmagi I thought I recognized a few faces above the cloaks.  I ignored them as I pushed through to speak to my spellwarden in the yard.  The former Censorate warmagi followed.

“Do you mind explaining this, Banamor?” I asked, quietly. 

“Magelord,” he said, which he calls me only when he’s being “official”, “they presented themselves at the gate.  They paid their fee.  They took the oath.  I had no reason to bar them entry!”

“No reason?” Terleman gasped.  He was still primed for a fight.

“I concur!” Dunselen said, angrily.  “This is unacceptable, Minalan!  The Censorate is banned from Castalshar!”

“We are not members of the Censorate,” one of the checkered cloaks said, quietly.  I recalled his name, now, Commander Dareen.  It had been he who had led the ambush on me at the Chepstan Spring Fair a few years ago. 

“Your attire suggests otherwise,” Terleman said.  “I find it offensive.”

“It is the livery of our order,” one of the other men insisted.  “The Arcane Order of Nablus.  The Censorate is no more.”