Dave Duncan – The Living God – A Handful of Men. Book 4

“Obviously.” The dwarf pushed his bowl away and dragged a sleeve across his mouth. He fixed a stony glare on the imperor. “Sorcerous warfare is different! Reinforcements can move instantaneously. When armies are overpowered they’re not destroyed, they turn on their friends. Once battle is joined, there can be no withdrawal, no retreat, no regrouping! That’s only some of it. It’s not the kind of fighting you know. For one thing, it’s much faster. If you sound the charge and rush into Hub, you may find no one there. You are only a mundane, and a mundane can’t fight this sort of war.”

Shandie made a point of never losing his temper. Sometimes that was not easy. ”Can Rap, though?”

“We’re going to find out, aren’t we? He’s our leader. Who else could be? Olybino should have been, but he ducked and now he’s dead. Besides, the other races never trust imps. Grunth is a troll—for all her snarling and big teeth, she’s a rabbit at heart. Are you suggesting that elf?” Raspnex raised a fist like a stonemason’s hammer.

Dwarves and elves went together like water and quicklime. Raspnex and Lith’rian might both accept Rap, but neither would ever accept the other.

Shandie said, “No.”

“Good. Rap invented the new protocol. Rap beat Zinixo once before. Rap refused a warden’s throne—three times he refused. Rap is the only sorcerer other sorcerers will ever trust! In fact . . .” The warlock glanced thoughtfully at Inos. “There are rumors that he could have been a God and he turned that down, too.”

The queen glanced up and met his stony glare. “Are there really?” she said coldly.

The dwarf chuckled, as if he had just confirmed a suspicion. ”Rap is our leader. Any more bright ideas, imp?”

“None whatsoever,” Shandie said grimly. There had been no word from Rap in months. Was he even alive? He could well be dead, even if the Covin were not aware of it. Raspnex leered. “Good. It’s what Olybino said and no one argued. There’s no one else for the job.”

“So we are waiting for him to sound the attack?” Inos asked, squinting again at her paper.

“Yes.”

“But how long do we wait?’ Shandie asked.

“Dunno. Long as he wants. But don’t make any plans for Longday. Or after,” he added glumly.

“I dunno, either,” Inos said. “Have you ever seen anyone like this?”

She passed the paper across to Shandie. It was not a letter, it was a sketch.

“I didn’t know you were an artist!” he exclaimed. And a good one—he turned the sheet to the light. The queen of Krasnegar was a woman of infinite surprises. She had drawn four youthful male faces, one frowning, the others smiling. Yet there was something about the smiles that smacked of nightmare and raised his dander.

“Elves?”

“No.”

No. The noses were wrong. The ears were certainly wrong. “Then who?”

“I asked if you had ever seen anyone tike them.” ”Pixies? These are the pixies you met in Thume?”

“As well as I can recall. It was twenty years ago, remember.” She shivered. “But I still meet them in dreams.” Shandie nodded excitedly. ”It could be! The old woman who told me about the preflecting pool? Rap and Doctor Sagorn both suggested she might have been a pixie.”

“Well?” Inos asked patiently. “Was she?”

“I didn’t get a very good look, but—yes! Yes, I think so. The nose is right. The eyes are certainly right. They were not elvish eyes.”

Inos smirked, pleased at his reaction. “Does that answer your original question, Sire?”

Raspnex glared up at her. “Are you suggesting what I think you’re suggesting?”

“Yes,” she said sweetly. “We’ll meet up with the others at Randport. If the war hasn’t broken out by then, well, it would only take us a day or two to sail across and take a peek.”

The dwarf was looking more astonished than Shandie could ever recall seeing him. “Go to Thume? Woman, you are out of your mind!”

“Indeed?” Inos cocked an eyebrow. “Why? Tell me why?” The warlock just stared, speechless.

At that moment the post horn sounded:

“Time to go,” Shandie said, hiding his amusement. “Let’s think about it and talk it over this evening.”

A good-looking young couple in their very early twenties, possibly accompanied by a female child aged about two.

The description had not done them justice. In fifty years of service, Mother Iffini had seen no lovers to match them. The girl had the fragile, innocent purity of fine porcelain, the boy a winsome sparkle of devilry, but it was their physical beauty that impressed her most and the way they glowed when they looked at each other.

“Shorter than most and thinner than few” was how Mother Iffini liked to describe herself. She knew of no reason why an elderly cleric need be athletic, whereas a comfy maternal portliness was often an advantage in putting people at ease. With her baby-pink face and soft white hair, she felt that she represented the exact ideal of a wise, tolerant, venerable counsellor. Her appearance certainly deserved the honorific of “Mother,” and she tried to make her behavior equally worthy.

Her little chapel stood in the fruit country east of Gaaze, at a crossroads amid the orchards. It had a name on the maps, but no one ever referred to it as anything but the White Temple. At some times of the year the countryside swarmed with migrant workers, and she would fill the place four or five times over on every feast day. Between harvests, the countryside dozed off to sleep again, and even the most popular God would not merit a congregation of more than a dozen. As the bishop admitted, the area could not have supported a permanent temple at all without the inheritance Mother Iffini had received from her grandparents.

The fig season had not begun yet. Orchards stretched out sleepily under the summer haze with the Qoble Mountains a spectral backdrop to the north. At this time of year her duties were light. When callers came, she preferred to meet with them outdoors, although she was always careful to ask if they minded. She would show them the little courtyard behind her house and explain how completely private it was, even better than the house really because sometimes servants overheard without meaning do, and she would sit them down in the shade of the vine trellis, next to the bougainvillea, so magnificently purple. There was an ancient stone table there, well embroidered with lichens, and some comfortable wicker chairs. When there were children, as now, she would provide a bag of crumbs and point out the gleam of golden scales gliding under the water lily pads.

Thus Mother Iffini put her unexpected visitors at ease this breathless summer afternoon. She told her groom to attend to their horse, had cool lemonade brought for them, showed the little girl how to feed the carp. She moved the parrot’s cage to a safe height so there would be no nipped fingers, and finally got down to business, setting out inkwell and quill and parchment certificate on the table. Next to a naming ceremony, she enjoyed weddings more than anything.

Good-looking young couple in their very early twenties, indeed! The girl was an enchantress, unforgettable, the sort of stunning beauty one saw only once or twice in a lifetime. But then the boy was, too, although one normally did not use the same words for men. She could not recall a more romantic couple, nor a couple more obviously besotted. When they looked at each other the sun dimmed.

“Oh, do stop talking nonsense, you feather-headed bird,” said the parrot.

Mother Iffini decided that she had a problem.

Never in her born days had she doubted her own loyalty to the imperor, Gods bless him. Gaaze was not so far off that she had no contact with the legion there, the XIIth, probably the best in the army. Many a local boy had gone off to join the XIIth and come back all shining and proud in his bronze to brighten her little temple. She had married legionaries, named legionaries-future legionaries, of course-and buried legionaries. She was a loyal subject of his Majesty and a strong supporter of the army.

But before anything, she was a sworn servant of the Gods. The two duties had never come into conflict for her before. Perhaps they were not in conflict now, but she would have to make sure of that. After all, the legionary who had come calling yesterday had not shown her any formal warrant, as happened once in a while when there was a criminal loose. He had named no crime. He had merely read out a memorandum. That was not quite the same, was it, as showing her a document with the lictor’s seal on it? It was certainly no reason why she should not perform a marriage if her conscience said she should, whether or not she reported her visitors afterward.