Dirge of the Dormant, page 17
part #5 of The Mindstream Chronicles Series
With the ally disguised as Commander Nystrok, they returned to the street and walked boldly down the pier toward the ship. Adriel looked about nervously.
“Act naturally,” Jora whispered.
“Act naturally,” Sonnis said.
Adriel laughed, and Jora followed her lead in a high-pitched giggle that she imagined a teenaged Mangendan girl might use.
They started up the wide gangplank that led up to the ship. It was quite steep, and she was grateful for the little wooden slats nailed every foot or so that kept her feet from sliding backward. Though it was a good three feet wide, she would have appreciated a hand rail. Watching the dark water grow more distant below her gave her an odd sense of dizziness and the near certainty that she was about to fall. She stopped halfway up and looked at the boat in front of her. Keep going. Don’t look down. Though she glanced down at the gangplank from time to time—she couldn’t help herself—keeping her eyes directed ahead of her made the walk much easier.
She gripped the ship’s railing when she reached it and stepped over the side and onto the deck. The moment she was safely aboard, she let loose a shudder that rippled down to her toes and pricked her skin to gooseflesh. At least the wind was calm. She might not have made it otherwise.
Adriel climbed down onto the deck behind her, and Jora watched Sonnis walk easily up the last few feet and step down as if it were the most natural walk in the world.
“That was a bit nerve-wracking,” Adriel said.
“A bit,” Jora agreed.
The workers on the boat had stopped what they were doing to stare at the trio of newcomers.
“Don’t mind us,” Jora whispered. “Carry on.”
“Don’t mind us,” Sonnis said. “Carry on.”
“This way, I think,” Adriel said, motioning with her eyes toward a door in the rear of the ship. “There are a lot of echoes here. It’s hard to tell one from another.”
“Sonnis, lead us through that door,” Jora said. In a whisper, she said, “This way, ladies.”
“This way, ladies,” Sonnis said as he went to the door and opened it.
Out of sight of the Mangendan workers, Adriel led the way, comparing the scene she’d Observed involving the false Gerad to the scene involving the real king. “They kept him in the officer’s quarters? I’m surprised.”
“At least they’re treating him well,” Jora said, following her through the narrow corridor and down a ladder.
Outside a suite of rooms, Adriel closed her eyes and raised her hands, palms outward and fingers spread, as if she were touching an invisible wall. “This is it. Give me a minute.”
Jora leaned against the door frame while her friend waved her hands around and exhaled time and time again in various parts of the room. Each time, her brow knitted and she gave a small shake of her head. After a while, Adriel exhaled hard and let her shoulders slump.
“Whatever inscribing happened in this room is gone.”
“What about the room where you saw that other fellow?”
Adriel brightened. “Or the room where Ibsa slept. If we could figure out which that is, she may have drawn the inscriptions there.”
“I wonder,” Jora mused. “Retar, how can I more easily find Observable moments in a person’s life where they aren’t protected by a barring cuff or barring hood?”
Sonnis’s eyes, brown like the mimicked Mangendan officer’s, gleamed with an extraordinary brilliance. “Hello, Jora. Hello, Adriel. Such a thing isn’t possible for the preter-bent, sorry. You would have to search for such moments the way you currently do, by Observing your own past to locate the threads of others as they appear. On the other hand, a scribe who has the talent for witnessing can inscribe a bridge that links one Observable moment to the next.” He winked at Adriel.
Adriel smiled back at him. “Could you teach me how?”
Retar half-crossed his arms and tapped one finger against his chin. “I can give you a page number, how’s that? One hundred eighty-one.”
“Thank you, Retar,” Adriel said.
“You’re welcome.” He looked at Jora and pressed his lips together. “Try not to be angry when you encounter him. He isn’t here by choice.”
“Of course he isn’t,” Jora said. “He was abducted.”
Retar shook his head slowly, and the light left Sonnis’s eyes.
“That was odd,” Adriel said. “Why would he think you’d blame King Gerad for his own abduction? You don’t, do you? Blame him?”
“No, of course not. He was trying to help.”
But she did. King Gerad had ducked away from his guards to run into a war zone carrying the most valuable item in the entire world. What on Aerta had possessed the man to do something so foolish? She understood that he hadn’t had much time to absorb the fact that he was Serocia’s king. He hadn’t even told his wife yet. This incident had better wake him up and make him think next time the urge struck him to go off on his own while the city swarmed with enemies. Next time, he might find himself tied to a bloody chair or statued into stone. That would keep his bony ass—
“Jora?” Adriel said gently. “Your eyes are shining again.”
She took a deep breath and let it out in a gust. “Sorry. I let myself get riled. Give me a second to find the page.” Jora Observed herself and moved backward along her own thread, going back to the day she’d flipped all the pages in Elder Kassyl’s book of tones. When she saw herself turn to page one hundred eighty-one, she paused the stream and began to read.
At first, she’d had to look up every note to determine which holes on the flute to cover up to make it. Only when she imagined the sound it made did it start making sense to her. She’d learned the musical language of dolphins before she learned to read and write the notation. Now, she could read the printed notes and hear in her mind the sounds her flute would make.
Every note was spaced equally distant from the next on the page, which sometimes made it a challenge to figure out whether it was part of the note sequence before it or after it. Words in Azarian were comprised of one or more notes, sometimes as many as fourteen, and her command of the language was still in its infancy. As she read the notes on the page, she recognized the pattern of one word, through, and used that as a starting point for differentiating the rest. It took a minute or so to read the notes and consult her own diary, but she figured it out.
She listed for Adriel the words that made up the inscription she was looking for.
“I don’t know how to draw some of those sigils. Could you summon Zivenna, please? She can teach me.”
Jora did as her friend requested and tried to follow while the tall golden ally instructed Adriel.
“All right,” Adriel said. “I’ll try it.” She sat on the bench, closed her eyes, and began to draw in the air.
Curious, Jora Observed her while she worked. Colorful, sparkling trails followed the scribe’s hands, varying between the brightest silver, the pink of burnished copper, brilliant gold, and aged brass. When one of her hand movements didn’t result in a trail of color, Jora knew she’d messed up. Adriel knew it too, for she started over from the beginning. She completed the inscription without a mistake on the third try, and her face lit up.
“Got it,” Adriel said.
“That was beautiful,” Jora said. “If everyone saw what I did while Observing you, inscription would become a performance art, like dance.”
Adriel giggled. “I’d get myself tied up in knots. All right, Ibsa Bervoets. Let’s see what you’ve been inscribing.”
Jora Observed Adriel again, hoping to ride her stream and see what her friend saw, but apparently the bridge didn’t allow passengers. She didn’t see anything different on Adriel’s thread.
“Whoa,” Adriel said. “She drew three identical mimicry inscriptions on strips of cloth, each of which made its wearer look like Gerad. But then she made another that made its wearer look like one of the soldiers.”
“So they want us to follow three fake Gerads while they whisk the real one elsewhere.” Jora chuckled. “Imagine their surprise when we show up unexpectedly where the real Gerad went.” She glanced at Adriel. “Where did he go, anyway? Can you hear the inscription they used?”
Adriel held up one finger to call for silence. “It’s hard to hear. There are so many barring inscriptions to sort through.”
“You could use the spatial filter,” Sonnis said, his eyes sparkling.
Jora smiled. “Imagine that. Retar’s helping us against our enemy.”
“I’m merely assisting a young scribe in learning to harness her own abilities,” Retar answered with a wink. And with that, the brilliance in Sonnis’s eyes vanished.
“Spatial filter,” Adriel repeated thoughtfully, her brow wrinkled. “I don’t know—oh! Yes, I do.”
“What’s a spatial filter?” Jora asked.
“It enables the scribe to focus sound,” Retar said, returning to Sonnis’s body, “much like glass helps the eye to focus light.” At Jora’s blank look, he said, “Spectacles? They help people see better? Never mind.” He looked at Adriel. “You can combine the spatial filter with your ability to Observe the past.”
“Wait,” Jora said. “She can draw an inscription now that affects what’s already happened? That’s not fair.”
“No, she can draw an inscription now that enables her to better hear what’s already happened.” Retar smiled.
Adriel screwed her lips in thought. “Won’t I still hear all the vibrations at once?”
“Sometimes what you don’t hear is as important as what you do. The ship is a fairly small area to search.” Once again, Retar departed the ally’s body and left the women to decipher his meaning.
Adriel closed her eyes and relaxed, then began to draw the glyphs in the air in front of her. When she got one wrong or drew them in the wrong order, Zivenna gently corrected her.
Jora heard the sound of footsteps approaching. She sent Sonnis into the corridor to find out who it was and what they wanted. It was merely an aproned woman with a bucket of water, scrub brush, and rags coming to clean the rooms. Through Jora’s whispered commands, he instructed her to start in another room. She ducked a curtsey and complied.
By the time Jora returned her attention to Adriel, the scribe’s eyebrows were raised, and her mouth formed an O. “What is it?” Jora asked. “What’d you find?”
Adriel opened her eyes and smiled. “That’ll teach me never to doubt the god. He knows what he’s talking about.”
“Indeed,” Sonnis said with a wink, his eyes glinting momentarily before fading to their usual dullness.
“Do you know where they took the king?” Jora asked.
Adriel grinned. “I do. They took him to the last place we’d think to look—the capitol itself.”
Chapter 11
Ibsa paced in her room gnashing her teeth while she waited for the grand duke to see her. She couldn’t sit, couldn’t eat, couldn’t do anything while worry and anger gnawed at her gut. Ithek was undoubtedly whispering in the grand duke’s ear that very moment, filling his head with lies. Her handmaiden, Milandra, repeatedly suggested she do something productive to keep her mind from tumbling, but she’d already surrendered her books and the glodule. She had nothing. What was she supposed to do, needlework? Or perhaps knit herself a pair of mittens for the coming winter. Ibsa scoffed, a dry and bitter sound in her throat, and waved dismissively in the girl’s general direction. There had to be a way to earn back the grand duke’s trust and goodwill.
Perhaps there was something in Zivenna’s room that would give her some ideas for how to pass the time, if not charm the grand duke.
“Where is Ziv—” She caught herself with a gasp. “I mean the former prime maga’s room? I would like to see it.”
“It has been cleaned out in preparation for the new prime maga or magus, my good lady,” Milandra said. She’d been going around the room with a dusting-cloth, wiping the furniture and curios, and was on her second pass.
“What’s been done with her belongings?”
“Personal effects were returned to her eldest daughter. The rest were given to the grand duke.”
“He’s sorting through her things himself?”
Milandra giggled. “Apologies, Maga. No, he merely keeps them until the next prime maga or magus is named. He’ll grant that person the former prime maga’s notes, books, and so forth, as the former prime maga received from her predecessor.”
“I see.” Ibsa resumed her pacing. It had been hours since she’d sent her request for an audience. What could possibly be taking him so long to summon her? Had his guards captured Zyrac in the midst of his crime? Was the man being whipped at that very moment? Would he implicate Ibsa in his plot?
Her feet were starting to ache as deeply as the muscles in her shoulders, and she sat down, though her hands felt too empty.
“Might I suggest a book?” Milandra asked. “The former prime maga’s office is still largely intact, the library untouched.”
Ibsa spun on her heel. “What? Why didn’t you mention this before? Take me there at once.”
“Yes, of course.” Milandra set down the duster and went to the door. “You asked about her apartment. Forgive me. I should have understood you meant her office.”
Ibsa caught up with her and kept pace through the corridors. They descended one flight of stairs, passed through a pair of guarded doors, and down another corridor. The office door was closed and dark when they arrived.
Ibsa drew a light ball and pushed it into the room a head of her.
Milandra followed. “A candle, if you prefer. There are several oil lamps around the room.”
Ibsa took the candle from her and held its wick close to the light ball. When she exploded the light ball, its power turned to flame and lit the candle. There was an art to it, and if she’d had both hands free, she could have done it without extinguishing the light ball at all. She used the candle to light a half-dozen lamps in the room, brightening it considerably.
Walking around this room was like walking in a dream. Three walls were covered in bookshelves, each one filled with books. She went to the one on the right and scanned their titles. The Misfortune of Utopia, Ruin of the Gods, Taming the Void Creatures: A Guide for the Gatekeeper, The Ashes of Labrygg.
“What a marvel this is. Are all these books on magic?” she asked.
“I couldn’t say, Maga,” Milandra said. “I’ll summon you when the grand duke is ready to see you.”
“Yes,” Ibsa said absently, stroking the spines of the books as she strolled past. “Please do.”
The handmaiden curtsied and left, quietly shutting the door behind her.
Ibsa was so excited, she hardly knew where to begin. She walked past each of the book cases, letting her gaze caress all the wonderful spines, admiring the vastness of the collection as an artist would a masterpiece. She pulled a book from its shelf, intrigued by its title, Advanced Inscription Techniques for the Well-Versed Scribe. It was one she’d never heard of, perhaps published in Mangend and never smuggled out of the country. Judging from the worn cover and the hand-printed lettering, it was quite old and possibly the only remaining copy. She lay it on the desk and took a seat, then carefully opened it. Indeed, the interior had been copied by hand on pages that felt rougher than any books she’d ever owned. Eagerly, she turned to the beginning and began to read.
Some hours later, a knock came at the door. Milandra entered with a smile. “He’ll see you now, Maga.”
“Excellent,” Ibsa said under her breath as she rose. Part of her would have been glad for another lengthy delay, but she was also eager to rectify her situation. “Is my hair all right?”
“Your hair is lovely. Did you find any worthwhile reading?”
“Oh, yes, indeed,” Ibsa said with a broad smile. “This room is an absolute trove.”
Milandra smiled. “Glad to hear it. This way.”
She followed the handmaiden through the hallways, some narrow and others quite wide. They climbed a staircase and wove their way through more hallways. The capitol wasn’t laid out simply like the palace in Serocia. It seemed to be designed to confound visitors. Perhaps that would help the grand duke survive an invasion. All the decor was the same, which made every room and hallway look like every other. Who could find him in such a maze?
Ibsa went over what she’d planned to say to the grand duke. She would begin with an apology, courteously humble but not meek or submissive, and then state how wrong she’d been to entreat his indulgence. It had demeaned the both of them and so on. Then she would ask if perhaps revealing one of Serocia’s most guarded state secrets would earn back his good graces. That would get him curious. He would want to know what secret, and she would tease him a little—not enough to aggravate him further, but to simply cast out a morsel that would make him hungry for more. She would then take that opportunity to insist, gently and respectfully of course, that she be named as interim prime maga once again and given the chance to prove her worth as a scribe. If he hesitated, she would guarantee that he would find the information most illuminating and useful.
She would have to appear modest, of course. A man like the grand duke liked to have his swollen pride stroked and be made to feel like he was better than everyone else. It chafed Ibsa to speak to another person that way, to pour on false praise and humiliate herself in the process, but weaklings like him were intimidated by strength such as hers. That she would need to spend the rest of her life tiptoeing around his sense of self-importance nettled her, but what choice did she have aside from walking to Quandaria? Which was under Mangendan rule, she reminded herself. No, she had to make this life work however she could. If lavishing pretty words onto a vain, pretentious cad was the price for the power and prestige she’d chased all the way to Hazred, she would pay it.
They reached another pair of double doors, and two armswomen standing guard pulled open both sides at once on Ibsa’s approach. It was both maddening and gratifying. She’d always longed to be treated like royalty without the responsibility of ruling, and yet, the practical side of her thought it terribly wasteful. No doubt they did this every time someone entered or exited, but it was horridly ostentatious. Surely these two women had better things to do than open and close doors all day.
