“Assurances?” said Erik.
“It’s a long story. One I need to tell Prince Patrick, or at the least Owen Greylock.”
“You’re in luck,” said Erik. “I’m heading back 52893_~1.QXD 8/30/2002 10:02 AM Page 146
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toward Ravensburg, where Owen has his forward command. The Prince is still in Darkmoor, but the roads are ours between here and there, almost as peaceful as before the war. You can reach the Prince in less than a week.”
Jimmy said, “Good. I have grown very tired of the road and would love nothing more than a hot meal, a bath, and a soft bed.”
Erik nodded and said to Akee, “Have your scouts move west for another day and report back.”
Jimmy said, “There’s no need. General Duko is recalling all his patrols. The only thing you need fear are bandits and some bored mercenaries camped under the walls. You can move your entire command to the outlying estates and build your camps there, less than a day’s ride from the city.”
Erik looked curious, but he only said, “I think I had better ride back with you, Jimmy.”
“Where’s your camp?”
“A few miles ahead.” Erik waved good-bye to Akee, and turned his horse around as Jimmy urged his back to a walk. Erik moved his hand in a half-cir-cle and said, “We have control of all the woods for miles on each side of the highway.”
“You haven’t had a lot of problems in the last few weeks, have you?”
“No, actually. A few bandits, some deserters, and a couple of run-ins with some mercenaries from our neighbors to the south, but we’ve seen little of Fadawah’s forces for a while.”
“Duko’s looking to cut a deal with Patrick.”
“He’s willing to turn coat?” asked Erik. Erik had served two tours across the sea and was familiar with the Novindus mercenaries’ tradition of serving the 52893_~1.QXD 8/30/2002 10:02 AM Page 147
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highest bidder. The dependence on such forces was one of the reasons, Erik was convinced, that no one had successfully built an empire down there, until the Emerald Queen had started her conquests.
“Not exactly,” said Jimmy, filling in Erik on Duko’s proposal.
Erik whistled. “I don’t think Patrick is going to be pleased with this one. From what Greylock’s told me and what I saw before I left Darkmoor, the Prince is spoiling for a fight, Kesh, invaders, he doesn’t care who.”
Jimmy said, “I’ll leave it to my father and Owen to convince him. It’s too good a turn of the cards for him to not agree. He saves thousands of lives and accelerates the retaking of the Western Realm by a year if he agrees.”
Erik said nothing, but considering what he had seen of the hot-tempered young Prince, he was not convinced Patrick would see it that way.
Dash regarded the boots, trousers, and jacket that had been secured for him by the Mockers. They were serviceable, but nothing remotely as good as the ones taken from him by his captors.
Lysle Riggers, the Upright Man, looked at him as he rose to leave. “Not yet, boy.” The old man waved away Trina and the others of his company in the room, leaving Dash alone with his great-uncle.
When the door was shut behind Trina, the old man said, “You must understand something. I don’t think you’re going to get your amnesty for us, so this conversation may have no meaning. If you do not, shortly I will die. Healing priests can only do so much, and I am an old man, anyway. Another will come 52893_~1.QXD 8/30/2002 10:02 AM Page 148
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forward to take the office I hold. Who he will be I cannot know, though I have a couple of guesses.
John Tuppin might take the office—he’s strong and shrewd and many are afraid of him. Trina might, if she’s smart and silent, which she is, and can keep behind the scenes. But whoever it is, the agreements you and I reach will not be binding upon him. As I said, if you can’t get the Prince to agree to giving us pardon for past crimes, it doesn’t matter.
“But if you return with promises, they had best be kept, for if you are forsworn to the Mockers, no matter how high you rise, where you live, or what great office comes to you, eventually one of our brotherhood will find you in the night and your life will end.
Do you understand?”
Dash said, “I understand.”
“Know this as well, Dashel Jamison: once you step through that door you have taken blood oath not, by word or deed, to betray what you have seen here, nor may you bear witness against any who you’ve met. It is an oath made by silence, for you may not live to leave Mother’s without such oath.”
Dash didn’t like being threatened, but he had heard enough stories about the Mockers from his grandfather to have no doubt that what Lysle was saying was not an idle threat. Dash said, “I know the rules as well as anyone born here.”
“No doubt you do. My younger brother struck me as being a man with little modesty. I suspect you know as much about the workings of the Mockers as my own men.” The Upright Man waved a bony scarred hand at Dash. “Before he came to my little shop, years ago, to tell me how the land lay and how I would be required to conduct the business of the 52893_~1.QXD 8/30/2002 10:02 AM Page 149
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Mockers, I would have wagered our ways and secrets were inviolate. In moments I learned that Jimmy the Hand had been watching us as we had been watching him, more, he had others watch us while he was not about. In the end, he was a far better Duke than I was leader of the Mockers.”
Dash shrugged. “If Patrick does as I request, it all ends, anyway.”
The old man laughed. “Think you that a pardon will take this ragged brotherhood of ours and set our feet upon the straight and narrow path? Within minutes of such pardon some of our more reckless youth will be cutting purses in the market square or breaking into warehouse cellars, young Dash. The dodgy path is as much a part of who we are as it is a choice in life.
“Some, like your grandfather, find an escape, a way to better themselves, but most are confined to Mother’s and the sewers of the city, the rooftops—the Thieves’ Highway—and a short life ending with a hangman’s rope. It is as much a prison as the one in the basement of the palace, this life, for there is little chance of escape.”
Dash shrugged. “At least everyone, you, Trina, the rest, will have a choice. Most men can’t ask more than that.”
The old man laughed his dry laugh. “You’re wise beyond your years, Dash, if you really understand that and are not merely mouthing words heard at the knee of another. Now go.”
Outside Dash found his three companions from the work gang waiting. Gustaf and Talwin were together, while Reese stood next to some Mockers.
“You coming with me?” asked Dash.
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Reese shook his head. “Not me. I was a Mocker before they caught me, and these are my people. This is my home.”
Dash nodded. Looking at the other two, he said,
“You?”
Gustaf said, “I’m a swordsman without a sword.
I need a job. You hiring?”
Dash smiled. “Yes, I’ll hire you.”
Talwin said, “I just want to get out of the city.”
“Then it’s the three of us.”
Trina came and stood before Dash. “Well, Puppy, I’ll show you back to the safest way out. Wait until nightfall, then get out of the outer camps. Rumors are starting to circulate that the Prince’s army is getting close and men are sleeping close to their swords.
There aren’t many friends to be found in a place like that.”
Dash nodded and asked, “Weapons?”
“We have some for you,” said the heavyset man who had been his first captor, the man Dash knew as John Tuppin. “We’ll give them to you just before you leave.”
Dash nodded. “T
hen let’s be off.”
He glanced over his shoulder at the closed door, behind which sat the old man who claimed one of the most mysterious names in the history of Krondor, the Upright Man. Dash wondered if he’d ever see the old man again.
They set off in the gloom.
Pug sat quietly considering the choices that were rapidly approaching. Miranda watched him.
After a few moments, he turned his attention from whatever image hung in the air outside his win-
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dow and said, “What?”
She laughed. “You were millions of miles away, weren’t you?”
He smiled at her. “Not really. Just a few hundred.
But I was years away.”
“What were you thinking of?”
“My past, and my future.”
“Our future, you mean.”
He shook his head. “There are still some choices left to me alone.”
She rose up from her seat next to the fireplace. A small fire, more for comfort than warmth, which had been allowed to burn down to coals, smoked there.
She glanced at it, and came to stand before her husband. She settled easily into his lap and said, “Tell me.”
“Gathis’s choice. The Gods’ choice, really.”
“Have you decided what you must do?”
He nodded. “I think for me there is only one choice.”
After a moment of silence, she said, “Care to share it with me?”
He laughed, kissing her on the neck. She squealed appreciatively, then playfully pushed herself away. “You’ll not divert me that easily. What are you thinking?”
Pug smiled. “When I lay in Death’s Hall, I was given the choice to become your father’s heir.”
At mention of Macros the Black, Miranda frowned. She had never had a close relationship with her father, and the primary reason for that had been his association with great powers. His role as human surrogate for Sarig, the lost God of Magic, had reduced his role in her life to a scant decade out of 52893_~1.QXD 8/30/2002 10:02 AM Page 152
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nearly two hundred years she had lived so far.
Pug continued. “I can’t be Sarig’s agent on Midkemia. That’s not my role.”
“From what you told me, your other choices weren’t that appealing.”
Pug looked worried. “I didn’t die, so that narrows my choice down to one: I must live and watch destruction and death and lose that which is most dear to me.”
She returned to his lap, and said, “That has already been fulfilled. Your daughter and son were taken from you, weren’t they?”
Pug nodded, and she could see the echoes of pain still not dulled within his eyes. “But I fear there is more to lose.”
She settled into his arms, resting her head on his shoulder. “There is always the potential for loss, my love. Until we are at last dead, we can lose. That is the irony of life. Nothing is forever.”
Pug said, “I am almost a hundred years old, yet I feel like such a child.”
Miranda laughed and held him close. “We are children, my love, and I’m twice your age.
Compared to the Gods we are infants, just learning our first steps.”
“But infants have teachers.”
“You had teachers,” she said. “So did I.”
“I could use one now, I think.”
Miranda said, “I shall teach you.”
Pug looked at her. “You will?”
She kissed him. “And you shall teach me. And we shall teach your students on my father’s island, and they shall teach us. We have books yet to be read and understood, and we have the Hall of Worlds, through 52893_~1.QXD 8/30/2002 10:02 AM Page 153
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which we can reach out to wisdom undreamed of on this tiny orb. And we have ages to do it.”
Pug sighed. “You make me feel as if there’s hope.”
Miranda said, “There is always hope.”
There came a knock at the door and Miranda stood, allowing Pug to rise to answer the door.
Outside stood a royal page, and he said, “My lord, the Prince requests your presence at once.”
Pug glanced at Miranda, who shrugged in curiosity but said nothing. He nodded to her, and followed the page.
He wended his way through Castle Darkmoor, until he came to the old Baron’s quarters, being used presently by Prince Patrick. The page opened the door and stepped aside, allowing Pug to enter.
Patrick looked up from old Baron Otto’s desk and said, “Magician, we have a problem I hope you can deal with.”
“What may that be, Your Highness?”
Patrick held up a rolled-up parchment. “A report in from the North. The Saaur have decided to put in an appearance.”
“From the North?” Pug looked puzzled. When he had persuaded the Saaur to quit the field in the final battle for Darkmoor, their leader, the Sha-shahan, had vowed a blood price would be extracted for the wrongs done the Saaur. But to the North lay the armies of Fadawah, the most likely object of that vengeance. How could the Saaur have returned to their old allies after withdrawing? Pug said, “Where in the North, Highness?”
“The northeast! They’ve wintered north of us, between the mountains and the woodlands of the 52893_~1.QXD 8/30/2002 10:02 AM Page 154
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Dimwood. They’ve occupied the southern end of the Thunderhell Steppes, and now they’ve struck southward.”
“Southward!” Pug echoed, alarm in his voice.
“They’ve attacked us?”
Patrick threw down the parchment. “Read about it. They overran a detachment held in reserve in the foothills, to reinforce whichever gap Fadawah might attempt to breach along Nightmare Ridge. They slaughtered every man in the company.”
“Are they continuing to move?”
“No,” said Patrick. “That’s the good news in this.
They seem content to butcher three hundred of my soldiers, then withdraw. They left us a warning, though.”
“What is that?”
“They left three hundred stakes in the ground.
Atop each was a man’s head. It’s a clear challenge.”
“No, Highness,” corrected Pug. “It’s not a challenge. It’s a warning.”
“A warning to whom?” Patrick said, his anger barely held in check.
“To anyone. To us, to Fadawah, to the Brotherhood of the Dark Path, any creature of intelligence who is near enough to see the skulls. Jatuk is telling us that the Saaur are claiming the Thunderhell Steppes for themselves and for us to stay out.”
Patrick considered it and said, “Save nomads, weapons runners, and outlaws, no one lives there I would care to name Citizen of the Kingdom, but it’s still our Realm. I will be damned to the lower hells before I allow an army of aliens to overrun my troops and declare themselves an independent nation within our borders.”
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“What would you have of me, Highness?”
“In the morning I’m sending a detachment of soldiers northward. I would appreciate it if you’d accompany them. You were the one to get the Saaur out of the war. If this Jatuk wants to turn his anger against Fadawah, I’ll withdraw my soldiers along the northern ridge and even give him supplies to go assault Fadawah in Yabon. But I can’t have this bloody business go unchallenged.”
“What would you have me tell them?”
“Tell them they must cease this hostility against us, and withdraw from our lands.”
“To where, Highness?”
Patrick said, “I don’t care where. They can have safe conduct to the coast, and they can swim home for all I care, but I won’t have them telling me to stay out of any part of my own Principality! There’s been to
o damn much of that lately!” Patrick’s voice was rising and Pug could tell anger was getting the best of him.
“I will be pleased to go, Highness.”
“Good,” said Patrick, his tone leveling off. “I’ve sent word to Captain Subai, who’s in charge of the northern elements of our forces along the ridge, that someone would be coming. I want you to have him accompany you and I want this matter resolved. I’ve got enough to worry about with this business down in Stardock, Kesh acting foolish, and Fadawah living in my Principality to have the Saaur act up.
“If they’ll listen to reason, I’ll listen to reason.
Have them tell me what we must do to get them out of our Kingdom and I will do it. But if they refuse, there’s only one thing you can do.”
“What is that, Highness?”
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Patrick looked at Pug as if he were missing the obvious. He said, “Why, you must destroy them, magician. You must obliterate them from the face of the world.”
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Seven
Opportunity
JIMMY GRIMACED.
He had one good night’s sleep, in Owen Greylock’s camp, then had spent the next five days in the saddle, tiring out a string of relay horses. He and the Knight-Marshal of Krondor rode as quickly as possible to Darkmoor, where Prince Patrick’s court was established.
Now he stood outside Patrick’s quarters, having ridden in just before dawn. He waited along with other courtiers, while the Prince was dressing for the day’s court, and thanked all the gods he could think of that at least here an ample supply of Keshian coffee was still to be found. Tsurani chocha was a reasonable substitute, but nothing kept him going like a hot mug of coffee, cut with a tiny bit of honey.
“James!” said a familiar feminine voice from behind, and Jimmy was suddenly wide awake. He turned to see a young woman approaching.
“Francie?” he asked in astonishment.
In a serious breach of court protocol, the girl threw her arms around Jimmy’s neck, and said, “It’s been years!”