Recluce - Colors Of Chaos Part 82

"Not enough to trouble us," Fydel said. "A mere handful, and against our force ...".

Cerryl frowned. Had he heard the sound of boots on the hard-packed mud and gravel?

Anya smiled, broadly and falsely. "Cerryl, I know you have so many important things to consider, but the High Wizard will need your sage advice when he returns."

Cerryl wanted to wince at the sickly-sweet tone and cover the redhead with chaos. She seemed to be acting more and more as if she were the High Wizard.

"Now ... when we get ready to head out, Fydel, remember it's not too far until we reach that homestead. Don't fire it. The High Wizard wants to study it first-the one with the brush barricade around it and the charred cottage in front."

Cerryl nodded at the reference to the smith's place, although his screeing had shown it appeared to be empty and the smith was at the s.h.i.+pwright's-or he had been earlier.

"That is your precious smith's place, is it not?" asked Jeslek, returning to the tent, chaos swirling around him.

"This Dorrin is not my smith," Cerryl replied evenly. "He's left there for the s.h.i.+pwright's."

"It matters not. He can't escape our s.h.i.+ps." Jeslek dismissed the smith with an offhand gesture.

Cerryl frowned, s.h.i.+fting his weight from one foot to the other. He could sense a change around him-a concentration of something-order? He turned to the side of the tent where the silk billowed ever so slightly. The air wavered. "Look! Over there!" As he spoke, he lifted his s.h.i.+elds, wondering what good they would do against an order master even as he did.

"Concealment!" blurted Anya.

Fydel's mouth merely dropped at the appearance of the red-haired smith almost right before them, carrying something that looked like a short and heavy crossbow without the bow. The device was pointed at Jeslek.

The High Wizard gestured at the smith, and chaos swirled, beginning to build.

WHHHsssttt! The firebolt flared past the smith and burned through the tent silk.

Crack... thump ... whummmmmmPPPPTTTTTTT... Another kind of order- cased flame flashed from the smith's device toward the High Wizard.

Simultaneously Jeslek hurled a wall of chaos toward the slight figure who had invaded the tent. EEEEEEEEIIIIIIIIiiii...

As the order-forged flame of the smith and the High Wizard's chaos met, incandescence seared through the tent, rending the silk walls. Despite his s.h.i.+elds, Cerryl felt himself being hurled backward through a vortex of order and chaos that s.h.i.+vered the air and ground.

Darkness blanketed him.

He found himself lying on charred silk looking upward at a sky that seemed far darker and more cloud-filled than when he had entered the tent. Slowly, wondering how long he had lain there unconscious, he staggered upright in the cold rain that pelted down around him. He fingered his whites-definitely wet, and that meant he'd been down for a time, at least.

Thurrrrrummmmmmmmmm ... thuruummmmm ... Winds buffeted the few sections of the tent still in place, and thunderclaps shook air and ground alike, but both seemed to be lessening.

"Jeslek! Jeslek!" Anya's voice was shrill, perhaps the first time Cerryl had heard it so.

Heavy droplets of rain continued to lash from the near-instant clouds, so heavily that Cerryl had to blink as he lurched toward the center of what remained of the High Wizard's tent. Then ice pellets rattled down in a quick flurry before vanis.h.i.+ng.

Cerryl took a deep breath and sent forth his senses, trying to see if any traces of the smith and his dark order remained. Nothing... What did he do, that he could strike so quickly and be gone? The light cloak was similar to what Cerryl had used himself, but had he failed to recognize it because it felt different when used by an order wielder? Does it matter now?

He stopped, looking over where Jeslek had been. Jeslek was gone.

Jeslek gone? The greatest... or most powerful White mage... perhaps ever?

Gone?

Cerryl took a step, then another, still searching for the High Wizard.

Anya stood by the shattered remnants of the small table, binding her arm. Fydel rose from one knee behind her.

Cerryl tried his order-chaos senses again, but there was no trace that Jeslek had ever been there, except for the gold amulet that lay amid the disintegrating pieces of a white tunic. Nor was there any sense of the order that bespoke the Black smith. The only body was that of a White guard. Cerryl shook his head. Jeslek dead ... like that? He glanced at Fydel.

"He's dead ... gone," Fydel affirmed.

Cerryl rubbed his forehead, and his fingers came away slightly streaked with blood.

"It happens." Anya stooped and lifted the gold amulet from the pile of dust and clothes on the trampled and burned gra.s.s. Stepping around the dead guard's body without even looking down, she dangled it toward the bearded White wizard with the gash across his forehead "Would you like it, Fydel?"

"Darkness, no! Give it to Sterol."

She turned to Cerryl. "Would you-"

Cerryl stepped back, almost involuntarily. "It's past time for games, Anya. Sterol should have the amulet returned to him. Especially now." How can she just ignore Jeslek's death? Did he mean that little? Is she that cold?

"Don't tell me that you two brave and strong White brethren are afraid of a poor Black smith and healer who must stoop to stealth and murder?"

Fydel looked away.

Cerryl did not, instead meeting Anya's eyes. "He was rather effective, wouldn't you say?" His arm gestured at the pile of dust that had been Jeslek, the two bodies, and the missing side of the tent ringed with charred patches. "There were three of them-just three, according to Jeslek. Between them, they've destroyed more than half our forces, a half-dozen of the White brethren, and the High Wizard. Just what would happen if they had decided to have sent a few more- perhaps older and more experienced order masters and Black warriors?" Cerryl's smile was crooked. "For such reasons, I would prefer to defer to one of great experience, such as Sterol."

"Do we wait for him ... to finish this rabble?" snapped Anya. "No! Cerryl, you need to lead the pursuit of the smith. Now!"

"No. I think not. I think we can proceed-but slowly." Jeslek... gone? Like that?

Cerryl felt his thoughts were running in circles.

"You are always so cautious, Cerryl," Anya said brightly, her voice tight. "Do you think that the Council-or even Sterol-would let the blues get away with this? The High Wizard has been killed, and you wish to proceed slowly. Oh, so slowly."

"When one cannot rely on sheer force of chaos, dear lady," Cerryl forced out the deliberate words, "one must needs be cautious."

"Bah ... let's get the troops moving." Fydel blotted the blood from his forehead and stepped through the s.p.a.ce where the tent wall had been. Then he paused and pointed toward the remaining two bodies on the ground-those of the guards who had stood outside the tent. Fire flared, and only ashes remained. With another snort, Fydel marched toward the hut where the march captains waited, not even looking back at the other two mages.

Anya and Cerryl raised their eyebrows simultaneously, even as Cerryl turned toward Anya.

"Well, Cerryl?" asked the redhead. "Are you with us, or will you remain here and be cautious?"

"I'll be ready to lead the vanguard shortly. As the High Wizard's most trusted and valued a.s.sistant, you should draft the scroll to the Council-and Sterol-and then direct Fydel, as you have already been doing. Perhaps you should also inform the armsmen that Jeslek is dead. It might be a good idea, you know?"

Cerryl turned and walked heavily across the damp and matted gra.s.s toward the tie-lines where Hiser and Ferek and his lancers waited.

Beyond the first tie-line, Fydel had mounted and was talking to the march captains.

Is this wise? Cerryl glanced back toward the ruined tent, then up at the dark clouds that had already begun to disperse. He kept walking.

"Ser? What happened?" asked Hiser as Cerryl neared his detachment.

"The Black wizard killed the High Wizard. He got away in the storm and the chaos."

"Killed the High Wizard?"

"He killed the High Wizard ..."

"... High Wizard's dead."

"... can't believe that..."

"... light help us now."

"Enough!" snapped Cerryl. "It wasn't his order powers. He used an order-based crossbow or something. Then he ran away and hid in the storm." Cerryl stepped up to the gelding and fumbled for the gla.s.s packed in his saddlebags. You're not about to go charging off after that smith until you know what he's doing, Anya or not.

He found his hands shaking ever so slightly as the impact of Jeslek's death began to settle on him. Jeslek dead? What had the smith done- and how? How could they just march into Diev? Then, how could they not-if the Guild were to be respected? The Guild had to be bigger than the High Wizard.

Cerryl pulled out the gla.s.s and set it on the clay, concentrating and ignoring the headache he hadn't even realized that he had.

When the silver mists cleared, Cerryl took in the scene-an uncounted horse circling in the water behind the strange craft that was the smith's, the fighting on the deck of the smith's s.h.i.+p, and the smith dropping a blue armsman with a staff, then dropping another before taking a slash and staggering. As the White mage watched, the last figure in blue pitched forward, and the smith sagged onto the deck Sails furled, impossibly propelled by something churning the water beneath the stern, the s.h.i.+p edged out the channel toward the breakwater.

"What the darkness is it?" demanded Ferek.

"A dark creation."

"Cerryl?" called a voice from a mounted figure riding toward him.

Recognizing Anya's voice, Cerryl released the image. "I was check-ing where the smith was. He's on his s.h.i.+p, leaving the harbor at Diev."

"No matter," snapped the redhead. "The blockade s.h.i.+ps will take care of him and his s.h.i.+p."

I wonder. A faint smile creased Cerryl's mouth, an expression that faded as he recalled the dead Spidlarian armsmen on the s.h.i.+p. The smith is far more ruthless than even Jeslek-or Anya. "We can't. Not now that he's at sea."

"Then get on with it."

Cerryl nodded, packed the gla.s.s, and then swung clumsily into the saddle. His head throbbed. "Hiser, Ferek ..."

"Yes, ser."

Cerryl ignored their doubtful tones, his headache, and Anya's eyes upon his back as he rode to the head of the column. Jeslek... dead? He forced his concentration on the task ahead.

Cx.x.xVI.

The three mages stood on the edge of the quay, looking out into the empty harbor of Diev. The cool breeze off the water cooled them but carried the odor of dead fish and other decay-possibly bodies washed under the piers.

"We need supplies," said Anya. "Cerryl, send out a force to gather what we need."

"We can't pillage everything," the younger mage noted.

"Why not?" Fydel asked. "They killed half our men. They don't deserve any better."

Cerryl refrained from noting that earlier Fydel hadn't much worried about how many levies had died in taking Spidlar. "If we keep taking things, we'll never govern this place. We wouldn't keep seizing things from the farmers around Fairhaven."

"This isn't Fairhaven," said Fydel. "Never will be."

"Maybe we'd better think about making it so," answered Cerryl quietly. "The other way hasn't been working all that well lately."

"That will be the n.o.ble Sterol's decision, as you keep reminding me, dear Cerryl," answered Anya in an overly sweet voice. "I do not care how you obtain provisions, but provisions we must have. You seem best fitted for it, and Fydel must organize patrols to keep order."

"I'll take care of it." All Fydel knows about peacekeeping is how to kill peacebreakers.

"I am so sure you will, Cerryl. You always do." Anya flashed her bright smile.

"You always do."

"Just do it," added Fydel.

"We'll need some of the golds we took from the traders in Spidlar."

"You wouldn't if you just took them," pointed out Fydel.

"Where would we get provisions next eight-day?" asked Cerryl. "Or the one after that?"

"You can have some golds," conceded the redhead.

"Thank you, Anya." Cerryl nodded, then walked back along the quay toward the spot where Ferek and Hiser and their lancers waited. His eyes drifted to the harbor, where but a day before a s.h.i.+p had moved to the sea without sail, under the power of some device, some engine, developed by the smith.

Cerryl offered himself an ironic smile. If the smith but knew what change he had already wrought. That may be but the beginning. The smile faded into a frown as he neared the two subofficers.

"You don't look too happy, ser," observed Hiser.

"We get to find provisions-without pillaging and disrupting things," Cerryl answered as he mounted. "So I suppose we'd better see if there are any traders left around."

"Traders?"

"I'd rather have a local do the hard work. Besides, they probably know better where to find things-especially since we'll be able to pay a little."

"Where do we start?" asked Ferek.

"At that warehouse there." Cerryl pointed toward a timbered building several hundred cubits to the west of the end of the quay.

When they rode up, Cerryl could tell the warehouse had been stripped. The door hung open, and the shutters had not even been closed. "We'll try another."

They tried almost a dozen. Of all the buildings that had held factors or traders, only the chandlery remained occupied, and a thin trail of smoke wound upward from the chimney.

Ferek gestured, and a lancer dismounted and pounded on the door. After a moment, the door, recently reinforced on the outside with heavy planks, opened a crack.

"Open for the mages of Fairhaven," snapped Ferek.