To Be Grand Maestro (Book 5) (34 page)

Daniel remembered the officer who had been training spheroid slingers at the recently destroyed fort. Chas shook his head as if in wonderment. “Runyen Lymin is a survivor, always has been. I’m not surprised he managed to find a way to live,” the Sentinel Commander stated, and then added, “I will have some words with him before he is transferred to General Fisher’s facility,” to which Daniel had no objections.

Simon nodded and continued with his report, adding a slight smile as his eyes met Daniel’s. “The ISIG Conductor also recognized the male of the couple you captured as being a former associate of Serin Gell who was with the evil Accomplished at the encounter when Samuel lost his hand. Through further questioning he discovered the female to be the one who killed his horse and burnt his appendage to a crisp. Had you not restored his hand, he might have been tempted to repay her in kind. He was still upset over the death of Salsa and so was a little harder on the couple than he was on the rest. He did them no harm but the threats he made should guarantee their good behavior for the foreseeable future.”

Daniel nodded acknowledgment of the information while being inwardly pleased about Sam not given in to temptation. The talk of prisoners sparked a thought. He glanced at Leah. “Have you decided where the new facility is to be located?”

Leah nodded and he was not surprised that she had already come to a decision. “It will be two spans beneath the waves of the newly-formed Lake Shantear. The prisoners will not know they are under the water and the only way in or out of the facility will be to convey. The Accomplisheds are still asleep and will remain so most of the time, and when awakened for food and exercise, no more than three at a time will be permitted contact with each other. If we ever allow enough of them in one place to form a traveling circle, they will escape, and the facility will thereafter be vulnerable to those escapees returning in force.”

Daniel well understood the difficulty of detaining Aakacarns and knew he had two options and was astonished the experienced former Senior Soarer had not thought of them. Perhaps she was feeling ill. “I approve of the location and want to be taken there in the near future,” he began and peered into her eyes. “We will further reduce the risk of escape by either Silencing them or leaving their potentials’ shielded off. The fate of each spell-caster will be decided on a case by case basis. For example, the pair of One-bolts I captured cannot summon sufficient potential to create harmonic waves powerful enough to go beyond a one span radius. Good behavior means they will continue as they are with the ability to summon but not focus energy beyond their bodies, bad behavior means they will be Silenced and made to forget every Melody in their repertoires.”

Leah smiled, dimpling her cheeks. “Simon and I knew you would make that decision. Twenty of the Accomplisheds taken captive are One-bolts, nine are Two-bolts, and four of the detainees do not possess enough potential to rate a lightning bolt.”

Daniel leaned back in his chair and glanced at a bucket of rocks on the floor near his feet. He passed their little test of his decisiveness and all seemed to be as it should be. While he felt the test to be uncalled for, he felt better knowing they did not need to be told how to best detain Aakacarn captives. While every member of the guild seemed to respect him as a leader, many of them still saw him as being relatively inexperienced. These types of test did not bother him. It was the unasked questions and unspoken opinions bubbling beneath the surface that could potentially cause trouble. He could tell by the way a number of members faces’ blanked whenever he mentioned his wife that many of the former Accomplisheds of Aakadon did not approve of the marriage. They would never rebel or desert him, but he wondered if the drastic changes he continued to make caused the little tests.
Well,
he decided,
a new day lay ahead and it was time to get on with it.
“The Sentinels here are at full strength, the question of what to do with the prisoners has been answered, and I am ready to hear what chores my Chief Aid has for me to do.”

Simon leaned forward in his chair. “You make it sound like I am the delegator of tasks. It is not my fault so many people want a piece of your time,” he gave the disclaimer and then continued. “In a quarter of mark you will spar with Commander Herling while Accomplished Tell briefs you on the results of her surveillance. After that, Accomplished Glader will arrive and, as you added to the agenda, will convey you on a little outing where you will be leisurely observing aquatic creatures in their natural environment while the rest of us go about our regularly scheduled tasks.”

“Alright, alright, you can come, but it is going to get a little tight with you, Carlos, and Sero crowding into the sphere.” Daniel could tell by the tone of voice that his friend did not want to pass up an opportunity to learn something new about the complexities of the natural world.

A slight smile crept onto the face of the Chief Aid. “A sphere is as large as the spell-caster wills it to be, and you know it, so I won’t be stepping on your toes, and there will be no bumping into each other,” he replied, and his eyes seemed to brighten. “I look forward to seeing the world beneath the ocean.”

Carlos planted an elbow on the arm of the chair and rested his chin on his fist as if posed for thought. “Maestro, I admit to being curious as to why it was a good idea to use the spell, Sleep Time, on the Cenkataaran legions and not on the Pentrosans.”

Many people could and probably would argue with the reasoning behind his decisions, Daniel knew. He was the one with the responsibility to take action and placed in the position of deciding such things, while others had the luxury of sitting back and criticizing his choices. “King Gabriel KaTaar is not an ally of Tarin Conn and though his two legions did violate the sovereignty of Ducaun, they did not attack until our guild forces entered their camps. It was and is still possible to convince our neighbor to the east that we are not his enemy and it is my hope that by not killing his men, when it is obvious I could have easily done so, His Royal Majesty will change his mind. The same cannot be said for Xavier of Pentrosa. He is a willing ally of Tarin Conn, Accomplisheds of the Serpent Guild ride with the legions, and so every foot soldier and horsemen knows by now on which side of the War of the Champions they stand. We have and will continue to use lethal force on the servants of Tarin Conn and will accept the surrender of those who put down their weapons.”

Carlos leaned back in his chair and gave a slight nod of the head to show the question had been answered to his satisfaction, not so Simon who leaned forward. “You did not finish giving the reasons for the change in what had developed into the practice of taking no prisoners.” The sandy-haired Aakacarn could be just as determined as Samuel when it came to seeking answers.

Daniel opened his mouth to explain, but it was Leah who spoke first, no doubt to spare him the burden of speaking for himself. “I convinced him to make the change. Up until recently we had nowhere to safely keep any captives and could not afford to spare our limited personnel to watch them. We were and are so greatly outnumbered by our enemies that nearly every encounter has been a desperate fight to the death and any combatant left behind is one who most certainly will attack us in the future.”

“But most of that is still true,” Simon raised a good point.

“Yes,” Daniel agreed, “and you are correct. We have an uphill struggle against Tarin Conn and his allies, but that does not mean we should fail to give those who are less committed to his cause the opportunity to give up. Aside from the fact that I prefer not to kill people, Leah has given me several other reasons for making an effort to take captives.”

The first Accomplished held up her hand and raised one finger. “Living people answer questions.” Her second finger came up. “If the people sent against us believe their only hope of survival is victory, they will not stop short of death or incapacitation.” Her third finger came up. “The Atlantan Guild has grown to the point where we can hold captives. We have more Aakacarns and Sentinels now than we had before the taking of Shantear, although they are currently Talenteds and raw recruits, even so securing prisoners is not as risky as it once was.” She closed her fist. “Let’s hit the Serpents with all of our might, but extend an open hand to the countless people caught up in the struggle only because their selfish and power hungry leaders have sold out to the Dark Maestro.”

“I have family in Pentrosa who would be appalled at the idea of serving Tarin Conn and his ilk,” Chas added his reasons for agreeing with the change. “I am sure there are many people in the other northern kingdoms who are horrified at what their leaders are doing and would rather not mix in a fight where spells are being cast about.”

“Commander Herling is correct,” Sero, the Demfilian-born Accomplished stated firmly. “It has been more than five decades since I was taken from home, but I remember decent folks striving to make an honest living, and people like that should not be confused with those who willingly serve Tarin Conn.”

Simon glanced at everyone in the room. “Hey, I’m not arguing for us to go back to the old policy, I simply wanted to know the reason for the change.”

Chas focused his gaze upon the Chief Aid. “Well, now you know,” he said and then turned away from him. “Sir Daniel, I believe it is time for us to have a match.”

“I have a meeting with Conductor Lassiter and the First Lady,” Leah announced. “Perhaps I will have the opportunity to visit the ocean bottom some other time, but for now there are chores to be done, as our Maestro would phrase it.”

Daniel nodded and the First Accomplished vanished in a flash-bang, which caused him to ponder the need to establish some rules of etiquette with regard to the use of Conveyance. “Let’s go to the gym.”

They went to the underground athletics and training gymnasium Chas had requested be created to keep the Sentinels in top fighting condition. The huge facility was three levels below the assembly area which was beneath Center Court. As Daniel stepped through the door he quickly eyed the occupants. Half the room was full of men and women, some climbing poles and ropes, others swinging from one bar to the next in a long series of bars, while another group lifted weights. A squad was running through the obstacle course, and over to the left three men and eight women were running across narrow beams. The other half of the room was set up to improve fighting skills. Twelve men were shooting darts out of the miniature crossbows rather than blasting the targets with streaming pebbles of flame, while several squads of Sentinels practiced against members of the Benhannon Guard with swords, knives, and in some cases barehanded.

There was a time when all activity would stop and every eye would be focused on Daniel whenever he arrived to spar, but the frequency of his visits had become so a part of the normal routine few people stopped their practice to look at him. That is not to say folks in the sparing area failed to avail themselves of the opportunity to see a master-of-the-blade in action.  

He removed his cloak while Chas chose the practice swords, all of which had been modeled after the two owned by the deceased traitor, Cale Tomei, and were identical in weight and balance. They stepped into one of eighteen sparing circles and people who had stopped to catch their breaths between bouts came over to watch. The Sentinel Commander began with the sword form, Serpent Uncoiling and Daniel met the attack with Ferret Coming In, and quickly stepped into Triplets in the Carriage, his three rapid jabs were each met and parried by Spider in the Web.

Chas had improved to the point where Daniel could no longer face multiple sparring partners at once if the former Major of Pentrosa’s Sutton Guard was one of the opponents.

Simon escorted Bonny Tell to the edge of the circle while Carlos and Sero stood watching the bout. “Maestro, I requested this audience because I knew Cory, my bat, would soon be reaching what the Serpents refer to as the sacred cave in Mount Kelgotha.”

“I cannot ask for a more timely report than that,” Daniel replied while moving into Harvesting the Wheat, to counter Chas’s Plowing the Furrow. In a real fight there would be numerous distractions so he did not mind receiving reports in the middle of a bout.

“I will start by saying there are thousands of Accomplisheds on and in the mountain, so much so it can only be described as a major base of operations. Cory is deep inside and flying down a smooth tunnel. It is completely dark but his senses are showing me a vault with a smashed lid, a slab,” she paused and her eyes widened, “and Maestro, Tarin Conn is gone!”

Chas faltered, spinning prematurely out of Dry Leaves Stirring, and barely recovered when Daniel came at him with Cross Stitch. The man retreated and Daniel allowed him to take a moment before launching into Crack of the Whip. “This confirms what we suspected and frankly is something I knew would happen eventually,” he tried to assure them and everyone in hearing distance. The calm manner in which he took the news would go a long way in keeping people from panicking. “I can sense that the Shield spell I cast on the Dark Maestro is still holding. He has been deprived of the ability to draw nourishment into his body from the surrounding environment and so must eat and drink like the rest of us. For him it was a matter of seeking food and water or dying.”

“That’s good to know,” Chas said while countering the form used against him with the double thrust of Parting Kiss. He sprang forward with Pruning the Hedges.

Daniel smoothly moved into Raking the Leaves and added, “Yes, but it does not tell where he is. My foe could be occupying a chamber in Kelgotha or might be the caster of the High Power spell performed at Mount Filia.”