Thieves World 4 – Storm Season by Asprin, Robert

why sorcerers allow men gods.

Equally reticent was Tempus when Ka-dakithis, wringing his lacquer-nailed hands,

told him of the First Hazard’s unique demise, and wondered with dismal sarcasm

if the adepts would again try to blame the fall of one of their number on

Tempus’ alleged sister (here he glanced sidelong up at Tempus from under his

pale Imperial curls), the escaped mage-killer who, he was beginning to think,

was a figment of sorcerers’ nightmares: When they had had this “person” in the

pits, awaiting trial and sentence, no two witnesses could agree on the

description of the woman they saw; when she had escaped, no one saw her go. It

might be that the adepts were purging their Order again, and didn’t want anyone

to know, didn’t Tempus agree? In the face of Kadakithis’ carefully thought-out

policy statement, meant to protect the prince from involvement and the soldier

from implication, Tempus refrained from comment.

The First Hazard’s death was a welcome surprise to Tempus, who indulged in an

active, if surreptitious, bloodfeud with the Mageguild. Sortilege of any nature

he could not abide. He had explored and discarded it all: philosophy, systems of

personal discipline such as Niko employed, magic, religion, the sort of eternal

side-taking purveyed by the warrior-mages who wore the Blue Star. The man who in

his youth had proclaimed that those things which could be touched and perceived

were those which he preferred had not been changed by time, only hardened.

Adepts and sorcery disgusted him. He had faced wizards of true power in his