“He won’t stay fourteen for long,” Shandie said harshly. “The Impire takes the big ones at sixteen. I’ve sent beardless boys into battle often enough and watched them become heroes, at least in their own eyes.”
“And seen them die?”
“Die like men, kill like men. Physically, Rap, there’s very little you can do that that son of yours can’t. Judgment and experience, yes, you’re his master there and always will be. In some things he’s yours already.”
Fauns were notoriously stubborn. This one was no longer the bantering humorist who had played jokes with magic wine bottles. He looked implacable and dangerous. “You stay away from my son!”
Shandie tried again. “This is Gath’s world we’re fighting for. Wars eat young men and die of starvation when they’ve eaten up all the young men. Gods save me, Rap, I didn’t choose your son! I didn’t choose this war! I didn’t even choose you. Now, do I have your consent to go to Krasnegar and talk with him?”
“Talk? What in the Name of Evil would the two of you have to talk about?”
“What else would I do? Do you think I can take him by force? Will Inos sell him to me? I can’t imagine why he is important—”
“Perhaps he isn’t!” Acopulo said. “Never jump to unwarranted conclusions! The pool showed me Doctor Sagorn but the result was that we met King Rap and the warlock. Sagorn was a sort of signpost. The boy may just be another.”
Mm! Sometimes the old relic came up with intriguing ideas. Ylo’s improbable vision of Eshiala might have also been a diversion—except that the only real change it had produced in his life was to keep him away from Rivermead. Surely nothing that might have occurred there could be worse than what he had landed in now.
The imperor had never taken his eyes off Rap. “I promise that I will not lie to him, nor to your wife. What else can I swear? That I will abide by her wishes, not his? I can guess what a fourteen-year-old’s will be.”
The king sat up straight, as if about to launch a physical attack. His face held all the menace of a naked blade. “You will not go to Krasnegar! Don’t you see the risk? I told Tiffy my name. Zinixo must know by now that I was in Hub that night. Warlock—does he know my power is not what it was when I thrashed him?”
Raspnex uttered a low, rumbling laugh. “He didn’t before, or he’d have settled with you long since, I think. He may know now, but he won’t ever rely on it. He sees tricks in blue sky. I’m sure he died a million times from sheer terror when he found you’d emerged from your lair at last, and on the very night he made his move.”
“So the Covin must be hunting me just as hard as it’s hunting Shandie? ”
“Likely.”
“And if Zinixo ever gets a hint of my whereabouts, he’ll blast me with everything he’s got, just to be on the safe side?” The king scowled all around, to see if anyone disagreed with the logic. “And he will have set a watch on Krasnegar!”
Remembering the legends of the Dark Times and the Dragon Wars, Ylo realized the cause of the faun’s anger—he dared not go home now, lest the whole town be blasted to cinders, as had happened to cities in those days. At Lutant the harbor had boiled.
“Surely the watchers will be looking for yourself, not his Majesty?” Acopulo muttered with none of his usual smug confidence.
“How do you know he hasn’t smashed Krasnegar already?” Sagorn inquired waspishly. “Spite would be in character.”
“I don’t, of course,” Rap said.
“Naw.” Raspnex scratched his wiry beard audibly. “He wouldn’t take the risk just in case Rap’s still a demigod, just in case it’s a trap. He’ll make sure of Rap first. Then he’ll go after his family.”
“Then I should go and warn them of their danger,” Shandie said quietly.
The king opened his mouth, but the warlock spoke first. “Say, that’s a good idea! And you going to Krasnegar is so evilishly improbable that it could well foul up whatever sorcery my nephew’s setting up.”
Now it was the dwarf’s turn to endure the faun’s deadly glare. Eventually the king climbed to his feet. “Let’s eat,” he said.
6
All through the meal, Sagorn and Acopulo discussed elvish philosophy. Possibly they were being tactful. Perhaps they were baiting the dwarf. More likely they were just showing off, unwinding logic as snarled as kittens in a string bag.
Ylo did not listen to a word of it. Instead, he thought about Krasnegar. From the look of the place in Jalon’s painting, it would never be worth the trouble to visit it. The journey would be hard and dangerous. It would take months—time that could be much better spent in other pursuits. If Shandie dragged his signifer off on such a fruitless expedition, he was going to finish it alone. Ylo would double back to Yewdark.
He might, he decided, go along as far as Rivermead, just out of curiosity. There could be no harm in that. He had not seen the ancestral home since he was a child, but after one quick look he would desert and head back to Eshiala. And then . . . rich widow?
The chicken dumplings were superb. So was the blueberry pie that followed, and the wine flagon dispensed an exquisite elvish liqueur to wind up the meal. The deckhouse rolled remorselessly from side to side, yet his meal stayed where it was supposed to. Marvelous stuff, sorcery.
Warm, sleepy, and replete, Ylo returned to his comfortable chair to watch the council of war resume.
The Krasnegar Question, Round Two: Fauns and dwarves were the two most stubborn races in Pandemia. Which would yield?
It was Acopulo who set the discussion going again. “Does your son possess any occult powers, sire?”
The king of Krasnegar shot him a glance as deadly as a poisoned arrow. ”He is slightly prescient at times.”
“Ah!” The little man smirked.
The faun’s expression implied that strangling would be too good for him, but evidently he had accepted the inevitable. He sighed.
“You can get to Krasnegar in winter, Shandie. There is a back door, a magic portal. Any sorcery is a risk now, as you know, but devices such as portals are not easily detected if they are in good repair, and I can vouch for the workmanship in this one.” He forced a grim smile. “You may find Zinixo waiting for you on the other side, of course.”
“Where is this magic portal? Close to us?”
“No. It’s at Kinvale, a ducal estate in northwest Julgistro. The duchess is a distant relative of Inos’. If I give you a letter, I think she will at least inform Inos, even if she will not reveal the portal itself to you.”
“I know Aquiala,” Shandie said quietly.
“You do?”
The imperor smiled at Rap’s evident astonishment. “Two years ago I toured the Pondague front. I always call on the senior nobility when I visit a new district. She’s a very impressive person.”
“She never told us you’d been to Kinvale.”
“I should hope not!”
Ylo grinned to himself. The duchess owed her allegiance to her imperor, not to any foreign friends.
Acopulo rubbed his wizened hands. “His Majesty’s devotion to duty has frequently paid handsome dividends. The Gods reward diligence.”
For a moment the faun seemed to contemplate the prospect of immersing him in boiling oil. “Then the matter should be simple. Except that the journey took me six weeks.”
“And we can’t use the horse posts,” Shandie agreed. “The enemy will watch them. This is no brief campaign we are facing.”
The faun began talking about writing a letter to his wife . . . Rivermead was somewhere in the middle of Julgistro. It should just be possible to ride there and back before daffodil time. Ylo stifled a yawn—this had been a long day.
The king was addressing the warlock.
“The imperor goes to Krasnegar, then. I have a horrible feeling I get nominated to hunt down Grunth in the Mosweeps and do lunch for the anthropophagi in the Nogids. How about you?”
The dwarf shook his big head. “Jarga and I have some matters to attend to. Never mind us.”
The others frowned, but dwarves gave away nothing, ever, not even information.
“You’ll put us ashore somewhere?” King Rap asked.
“I think it would be safer to drop you off on fishing boats as we did with your fat friend.”
Shandie nodded, and then stretched. “Ylo goes with me. Have we a mission for Sir Acopulo?”
“Azak.”
Ylo started, wondering if he had heard correctly. Evidently so, for most of the others looked as surprised as he was. Old Sagorn was smirking. Acopulo wore an expression of horror. “The caliph?” he said. “Zark?”