The Way Into Chaos (17 page)

“Of course.” Ranlin jolted in his seat. “Fire take me, Tejohn. I have not asked after your wife and children.”

“It’s okay, my friend. It’s been years, hasn’t it? I don’t think you’ve even met them. They’re safe. They were visiting family in East Ford during the Festival.”

The commander clapped Tejohn’s shoulder happily, shouted for his steward, then gave her a list of names to summon.
 

Ranlin’s meal only half finished, the two friends unfolded a patterfall cloth and began setting up the pieces. Reglis was the first to arrive, and he accepted his assignment with grim satisfaction; he also had recommendations for his replacement as captain and for a woman skilled with bow and spear who could serve as scout. She knew the Sweeps well, he explained, and had excellent vision. Tejohn accepted his recommendation gratefully.

Then Doctor Warpoole arrived with Doctor Eelhook in tow. Cazia Freewell entered with them, looking confused by the summons and uncomfortable with the company. She stood some distance from the two scholars while Tejohn spoke with them.
 

“Doctor Eelhook.” He stood and stared at her with a grim expression. “You can not cast a healing spell, can you? Can you at least create a sleepstone?”

The scholar shook her head nervously.

Doctor Warpoole spoke up, her tone bland. “Many of the storm houses at the edge of the empire have been built with sleepstones, so there should be some available if the need—”

Tejohn waved a hand at her and she fell silent with a look of irritation. “Doctor Eelhook,” he continued, “can you cast a fire spell? Can you purify water?”
 

“Yes,” she answered meekly. “I cast those every day as part of my duties.”
 

“What about creating and crumbling stones?”

Doctor Eelhook looked uncertain about these. “I’ve cast them in the past. It has been a while, but I’m sure I could refamiliarize myself.”

“Do so. Tonight. What about creating a translation stone?”
 

“No,” she said simply. Doctor Warpoole looked at the floor.
 

“I can do that,” Cazia Freewell said. “I was learning to imbue inanimate objects with Gifts, like lightstones and fountain stones.”

“How many can you make?” Tejohn asked her.
 

“Not many. It’s a difficult spell and easy to overdo. Also, the stones themselves can be dangerous.”

“One will be enough, then. I’ll need one by sunrise.”

“I’ll start right away,” she said, and started toward the door.

“Don’t go yet,” Tejohn told her. He turned to Doctors Eelhook and Warpoole. “You understand why I’m asking these questions, don’t you?”

“Because you and the king are leaving,” Doctor Warpoole said. “And you want a scholar with you.”
 

Tejohn nodded, meeting the administrator’s gaze evenly. “If I had a choice, I would bring this young woman here.” He pointed at Cazia. “She seems to be more scholar than either of you.”

“I can read and write!” Doctor Eelhook blurted out, as though Tejohn was supposed to be impressed.

“We have always had a great many duties to perform back in the tower,” Doctor Warpoole said smoothly. “This young woman has nothing to fill her time but loitering in the practice rooms.” She glanced over at Cazia. “And eating.”

Cazia Freewell’s eyes went wide and she bared her teeth, but Tejohn held up his hand. She held back whatever remark she was about to make. Tejohn kept his voice low and steady. “She’s also a child of fifteen. Doctor Warpoole, do you have any polished silver in your chambers?”

“No,” she answered, her voice just as steady. “The prince forbade it.”

“The king,” Tejohn corrected her. “Remember that. After we leave, I’ll need you to contact any scholars in the empire you can reach with the commander’s mirror. Talk to them about the...the grunts. Confer. The king will want to hear a report from you.”

“I am happy to serve.”

“But you are never to use the mirror alone, under pain of death.”

Doctor Warpoole’s smile was bitter. “The king does not trust me, then?”

“
I
do not trust you. I would prefer that you prove me wrong.”
 

The woman did not answer, only nodded briefly. Doctor Eelhook cleared her throat. “Excuse me,” she said, “but I am not the best person... I would much rather remain here in the fort.”
 

“So would I,” Tejohn answered. “Go down into the courtyard and practice creating and breaking rock. Work as though your life depended on it. I will send Miss Freewell to you in time so you can practice together with darts. Doctor Warpoole, please accompany her in case she needs tutoring.”

Doctor Eelhook looked miserable as she headed for the door; Doctor Warpoole followed her out, her eyes hooded. Cazia Freewell lingered, her arms folded across her chest and her lips crooked in an insolent frown.

Tejohn softened his tone when he spoke next. “You know why you can not go with us, don’t you?”
Hostage.

“Yes.”
 

“Will you make a translation stone for me right now?”

She sighed, then removed the net of blue stones from her hair. She’d worn it at the Festival, he remembered. She cut one of the little stones with a knife from her pocket and set it on the table. Then she took a deep breath and focused.
 

Tejohn had seen spells cast before, of course. Even before he became a soldier, he’d seen itinerant scholars cast spells on crops and wells; he’d seen them lay foundations of temples and imperial counting houses--they were a fact of life.
 

But the Twelfth Gift was rare. Doctor Twofin had once explained that it operated at the edge of the Evening People’s craft--they could manipulate the physical world in profound ways, but their magic could not affect the mind. This was as abstract as the Gifts could get, and that made it very challenging.
 

Still, during their trip, they would have to land the cart at sunset every day, and not everyone in the empire could speak Peradaini.
 

The entire spell took some time, and when it was finished, the stone looked no different than it had before. Cazia Freewell, however, was pale and sweaty, her eyes distant and her jaw slack. She looked almost comatose as she stood by the table, a line of drool hanging from her lip.
 

Ranlin gave Tejohn a nervous look, then he moved close to her. “Child?” He laid a hand on her shoulder and turned her toward him. She looked up at him vacantly--there were no tears on her face. Tejohn was never going to get past the habit of checking scholars for tears.
 

Ranlin glanced at Tejohn. “We should carry her to the sleepstones.”

“Hold,” Tejohn said. With the back of Ranlin’s spoon, he mashed a bit of beet and carefully ladled a bit onto her tongue. Her lips closed over it and she swallowed hungrily. Tejohn gave her a bit more, then a bit more. Eventually, she roused herself enough that she clutched at his soup bowl and drained the remainder in one long slurp, then tore into the remains of his mutton and rice.
 

“I should have eaten first,” she finally said, after she had nearly cleared the platter. “Stupid. Doctor Twofin said to eat first.”

“It was successful, then?” Ranlin picked up the little gem.

“
Kolga honchar idangiday, bissep,
” Tejohn said.
 

The unscarred side of Ranlin’s face flushed. “Great Way, Tejohn. There’s a young girl present.”
 

Cazia stepped away from them. “A young girl who couldn’t understand a word of that, and who doesn’t want to know.”

Ranlin set the stone down, and Tejohn picked it up. “How long can I hold it safely?”
 

The girl shrugged. “Doctor Twofin said no more than an hour a day before you start talking gibberish.”

Tejohn slipped it into his pocket. “Thank you, but you’re not done yet. First, I need you to go to the armory for darts and quivers. One for Doctor Eelhook, and one for yourself.”

“There’s no point,” she said. “Eelhook is useless.”

“Lar Italga’s life may depend on her. I don’t expect miracles, but do what you can. Tomorrow, Commander Gerrit will assign some bodyguards to you so you can go outside the fort and search for your brother’s body.”

The girl gasped, then lunged forward and hugged Tejohn with surprising strength. When she stepped back, she rubbed the spot on her temple where she’d bumped his cuirass. “Ow.”

“Thank Lar Italga,” Tejohn said. “It is the king’s order that his body be recovered and given a hero’s funeral. I am entrusting this task to you.”

“I’ll see to it.” She looked up at him, eyes brimming as she forced herself to smile.
 

“Girl,” Tejohn said calmly. “Scholars can not shed tears in public. You must control yourself or lose your hands.”

That ruined her happy mood, as he expected. She still left the chamber with her head high.
 

Ranlin stepped over to the patterfall cloth and moved his spider to the center square. Tejohn studied the positions and tipped over his throne, conceding the game.
Lar needs a shield bearer with a better head for strategy.
 

He found Wimnel Farrabell sitting alone in the great hall, a half-empty bowl of wet rice and a jar of wine before him. One of the village women was playing a summery tune on a flute for the benefit of the whole hall, but Wimnel didn’t seem to hear it. Tejohn ordered the man to his bed. If he couldn’t sleep through the night, Tejohn promised to choke him into unconsciousness. The driver looked up at him with haggard red eyes and wearily stood from his chair, then shuffled out of the hall.
 

After that, Tejohn went to the armory for a stout spear and a second dagger. By the time he returned to the yard, the steward was loading food and other supplies into the cart. The grunt’s corpse had been left on a wagon behind the temple to hide the smell.
 

He took a heavy carpet from his room and rolled the beast in it, then ordered the stewards to put it in the rear of the cart. Camping on the ground every night with a smell like that would draw bears and hill lions from all around, especially after several more days, but no matter. This was the king’s will.

Tejohn then went to the commander’s tower and let himself into the command room. The communication mirror at Fort Samsit was small, an oval of polished silver barely larger than his palm, but it was enough.
 

He laid his hand on it and spoke Moorlin Stillwater’s name.
 

The tyr of East Ford came to the mirror quickly, almost as though he’d been anxiously waiting for news. Tejohn disappointed him by saying he had none. He only wished to speak with his wife and children.
 

To his credit, Tyr Stillwater had moved Tejohn’s family into the holdfast as soon as he heard of the attack. It took little time at all for Laoni and the little ones to be brought into view.
 

“You look tired,” his wife said by way of greeting. She wasn’t much for sentiment and never had been. Great Way, she looked so young, especially with the little ones climbing on her. And of course, he knew what she would say next before the words came out of her mouth. “Have you been eating?”
 

Leave it to a baker to worry about his meals. “I have,” he said, “by royal command. How are you? How are the skirmishers?”
 

“Noisy. I miss you,” Laoni answered, absent-mindedly touching the long, dark hair that hid her scarred right ear. “Are you coming to East Ford? The rumor in the holdfast is that Lar and his betrothed are going to take refuge in the Indregai peninsula.”
 

“I wish that were true,” he said, but before he could say more, Insel and Alina pushed into view. The twins competed more than any siblings he’d ever seen; this time, they each sang a song about rivers and cakes, then demanded that Tejohn choose a favorite. He refused, as they expected, and they pretended to be heartbroken. Then Teberr climbed into view. He had learned to clap his hands together in rhythm, and father and child kept a beat for too short a time.
 

Eventually, one of Laoni’s cousins ushered the children from the room, so they could talk. “As you can see,” his wife said, “the skirmishers still baffle and distract enemy forces.”
 

“Tomorrow, I leave on a mission for the king,” Tejohn said. “It shouldn’t be a long one, but things are unpredictable right now.”

Laoni’s dark eyes never wavered. “Will it be dangerous?” She tried to make it sound casual.
 

“Everything is dangerous. Listen, there’s something I want you to do. You still have cousins in Beargrunt, don’t you?” Beargrunt was the Indregai city on the eastern side of the Straim. It was polite to call it a sister city, but in truth, it was little more than a village.
 

“A few,” Laoni said. “Most came west when the bridges reopened for trade.”

Tejohn nodded. “Take what supplies you’ll need to do some baking, and go stay with them. Make it a long visit.”

“What’s wrong? Are things really that bad?”

Her eyes were shining as though she was holding back tears. If she could be strong, he would be, too. “They aren’t good. I expect that, in the next few days, the bridges across the Straim are going to be destroyed.” There was a gasp from Laoni’s side of the mirror. As he expected, someone was listening to them. “I want you to already have accommodations when the refugees begin to cross.”

“There’s a problem,” Laoni said. Her gaze was steady, almost as if she was afraid to look at anyone else in the room with her. “I’ve already been questioned, more than once—”

“What?”

“Not officially,” she said, her tone suggesting official questioning might happen soon. “I haven’t been brought into the courts, but people are suspicious of us. They think you sent your family away from Peradain because you knew an attack was coming.”
 

“Are you...” He stopped himself. Of course she wasn’t joking. It hadn’t even occurred to Tejohn that someone might think this, but it should have. “No one could have known about this attack.”