Fires That Forge, page 9
part #1 of Lords of Order and Chaos Series
His appearance had remained rather youthful, given the fact that he would be turning twenty-six years old this year. He didn’t think that was it, though. No, Silas thought it was the knowledge he displayed to some, or the position he seemed to hold for others. The wise men all seemed to have white hair and flesh that hung loose on their bones, seemingly ravaged by lines of worry. The powerful all shared a trait of hard eyes and a tight mouth. Silas was cursed with none of those features. In fact, until very recently, he had been the epitome of boyish charm and inquisitiveness.
However, the past seventy-two hours had worn on him more than he had expected. He was determined, and his will was often underestimated, to persevere. He would continue to do what he must.
Sanctum Lacra was located near Noble’s Rest and Pauper’s Garden and had seen a number of changes since becoming his place of study. The location was formerly a warehouse and the close presence of the graveyards was not conducive to commerce. However, the availability of burial plots provided an excellent place for the disposal of waste from the hospital. Pauper’s Garden, the name made him want to laugh; or scream. Perhaps both.
Real paupers, until Silas began paying silver to examine them, were oft tossed into a convenient channel once bereft of Father Time’s breath. The River Olithyn had seen to the disposal of many of Moras’s downtrodden and unfortunate. And most sailors, of course, preferred that to a hole in the ground.
Pauper’s Garden was home to the graves of those who, mostly for religious reasons of some sort, felt the need, and could pay the coin, to be interred ‘properly.’ Silas didn’t understand why someone would pay to have themselves buried in the ground, but he had surrendered that battle of trying to understand the common mind years prior.
Sanctum Lacra now shined compared to its former self. The outer wood had always been coated with whale oil and tar to keep out moisture and protect the wooden frame. However, since becoming his hospital, he had seen to it that the new coats of oil were mixed with an ochre, a clay substance of white pigment. What was once a dark stain on the edge of Moras near the graveyards now shone white in the sun, when the sun shined.
Furthermore, he had seen to it that the inside of the structure was painted, and that a wooden floor, a great improvement over the packed dirt, was installed. He had used ships’ sails as curtains to create different chambers within the hospital. This provided his patients with a modicum of privacy and limited the exposure of diseases that he suspected could travel through the air. He had converted the ledger master’s office into an examination room complete with all of the tools and articles formerly packed on his wagon. There was a small closet within where he secured the herbs he had gathered and tonics he’d prepared.
Dunewell had been here two days prior, the day of the murders, and inspected the examination room, the closet of herbs, mystical and mundane, and his prepared tonics. Dunewell had, or so Silas had been told by Rethia, carefully inspected the inventory and compared it to the stocks on hand. Dunewell had questioned Rethia, a kindly woman of generous nature possessed of an easy smile, about her initials on the inventory. She had explained that Silas took great care in keeping track of exactly what was on hand and maintaining a two-person verification system. It seemed that system, Silas’s system, had allayed Dunewell’s suspicions… at least a bit.
Careful measurements were taken, in Silas’s absence of course, and everything had been accounted for. It was not Silas’s practice to keep any sort of poison on hand, however, he understood the need to check. After all, medicine is a poison if administered by a fool or a sadist.
So much of life was like that, he supposed. A sip of brandy could calm the nerves and warm the blood; bottles of it could induce vomiting and result in death. It seemed that all life was a balance of sorts. Too much or too little and everything could become calamity. Silas smiled at that idea. The balance of things; the scales of the gods. Order on one end of the spectrum and chaos on the other. Always checking one another, always fluctuating, and always in motion; like the easy sway of a ship at sea.
He had no time now to wax philosophical. He had patients to see and the Steward of House Jocayn to prepare for.
There were, at present, seventeen children and three adults under the roof and care of Sanctum Lacra. Of the adults, two would not recover for they suffered from a disease for which Silas had yet to devise a cure. He had treated them, studied them, and tried to make them more comfortable. The third was a man, suffering from the most interesting boils, who Silas had insisted on keeping in the Sanctum for further study. The pain-relieving salves Silas provided to the fellow had convinced him to stay.
The children were another matter. The churches of the area were the chief depository for orphaned or unwanted youths. However, they had a reputation for treating those with an ailment or deformity with barbaric rituals that only served to frighten and torture the child. Thus, Sanctum Lacra had become known among those urchins of the streets as a place where they would be safe from the priests and clerics and on some occasions healed of life-threatening impediments.
Certainly, the streets were where most of that unfortunate lot made their living and their home. There was no shortage of pickpockets and sneak thieves who had managed to escape the clutches of their sanctified oppressors. But many of them had come to the Sanctum for a reprieve. Some for a reprieve from the priests, some for treatment of a disease or ailment, and some simply for a warm meal and place to sleep for a night.
None were long term residents; staying no more than six or seven weeks at the most. In that time they would be cured, or learn that there was no cure, or devise a means of caring for themselves on the streets and channels of Moras. Some even, although a sad few, had been adopted by one couple or another. It was not unusual for a farmer to take in children and feed and board them in exchange for their labor in the fields.
Silas had learned a great deal in treating the children. He had learned volumes about birth defects and diseases specific to the young. He had also learned about himself. Something he never expected.
He was finishing with a young girl, no more than seven or eight years of age, with the most amazing blue eyes and loosely curling blonde hair. She suffered from the Vile Twitch, as he had, but her case had been quite severe. Her arm was scarred horrifically from an incident in which she fell into a fire during one of her fits. The arm had healed now, and she had learned how to identify the root needed for the cure and find it in the wild. She was now learning how to prepare the tea she would need to manage her condition but had yet to master the recipe. Once that was done her future would be her own. As Fate would have it, that would never come to pass.
As Silas left her curtained room, her name was also Helena and Silas found that coincidence amazing, Steward Whillyd was entering the large double doors of the Sanctum. He walked along the corridor created by the hanging sheets with a scowl on his face that made it clear he wanted to cover his mouth and nose with one of his fancy silk handkerchiefs.
“Is there somewhere we might speak privately?” Whillyd asked, looking over at the blonde curls and burn scars of the young girl behind Silas.
Silas saw the look of disgust Whillyd openly displayed. He also saw the cutmen wearing the colors of House Jocayn who were gathered just outside Sanctum Lacra.
“Of course,” Silas said, gesturing toward his examination room in the back.
Silas walked in front of Whillyd exposing his back, confident in his safety. After all, if House Jocayn wanted him dead, they would have only sent the cutmen. No, Whillyd hoped to take advantage of Silas’s perceived poor business sense and make some sort of monetary gain here.
Silas held the door open for Whillyd who walked past him without a look and took his ease in Silas’s chair. Silas entered, closed and locked the door, and took a seat on the stool hundreds of patients had sat in. Hundreds of patients who waited for news of their life or death.
“You and Inquisitor Dunewell are understandably close,” Whillyd began. He moved to remove his lambskin gloves, looked the room over, and changed his mind. “However, it is my belief that, if he suspects your involvement in this tragedy, he will jail and hang you just as swiftly as he would any drunken sailor or wine-soaked miner or stone mason.”
Whillyd was watching Silas carefully while delivering what he clearly believed to be a revelation. If he was watching for a sign of guilt or fear, he was disappointed.
“Of course,” Silas said as innocently as possible. “He is an Inquisitor of Moras. It’s his sworn duty.”
Whillyd’s lips parted, briefly, in his surprise at this. He caught himself and closed his mouth promptly.
“He has a witness that says there was black smoke coming from House Morosse on the tragic night,” Whillyd said.
Silas truly wished Whillyd had been educated, or loquacious, enough to come up with more than one adjective to describe the murder of his parents. ‘Tragedy’ and ‘tragic’ were eroding his patience rapidly.
“I see,” Silas said. “That indicates…”
“It indicates that someone within House Morosse was destroying evidence,” Whillyd said a bit impatiently. “It indicates your possible involvement, likely your consent, in the murders.”
“How so?” Silas managed to ask innocently.
Whillyd was growing angry now. He had expected Silas to cower immediately and begin to beg. He had been disappointed.
“Someone was destroying evidence in your home,” Whillyd continued, as if talking to an irritating child. “Your home. No one was seen coming or going. A superstitious person might even be compelled to believe some sort of dark enchantment had been in use.”
“You think a wizard broke into my home to kill my parents?”
“No!”
“I’m sorry,” Silas said. “I guess I just don’t understand. Father always said my grasp of politics and business was lacking.”
“Then I will say this plainly,” Whillyd said. “I expect some specific recompence for alleviating you of this witness.”
“But shouldn’t I want this witness to come forward with whatever he knows so the killer can be caught?” Despite the situation, or rather because of it, Silas found he was enjoying himself.
Whillyd’s face screwed itself up into the beginning of an oft used snarl, again only briefly.
“This witness’ statement means someone in your House killed your parents. That means you had something to do with it. Even if you didn’t hold the knife yourself you allowed it to happen. The black smoke is either some sort of dark magic or someone burning an oiled tarp or treated cloth. It points to you no matter what. Is that clear, you absolute imbecile?”
Silas couldn’t refrain. He cocked his head to the side and gave Whillyd an inquisitive look. The same look he had seen many dogs make when encountering what passed for a conundrum in their world. It did trouble him how close Whillyd had accidentally gotten to something of substance.
“So, you want me to pay you to kill this person?” Silas asked. “A person I don’t even know?”
“You will pay me!” Whillyd realized how his voice must have carried to the many witnesses outside and cast a furtive glance at the thin plank walls of the room. “You will pay me,” now much quieter. “You will pay me for killing this witness. You will pay me for not providing more witnesses. Witnesses that would have overheard you threaten to kill your father and mother. Witnesses that would have seen you purchase a blade in the low market. Witnesses that would have seen you drunk on the evening of their death.”
“But they would be lying,” Silas said.
“Lying and adding a knot to your hangman’s noose with every word,” Whillyd said. “I want in on the elven crafts you seem to acquire from thin air.”
This last struck Silas, although he worked hard to hide it. Elven crafts? That must be the subject of the coded ledgers, but he had yet had the time needed to decipher them. He regained his ground quickly.
“Perhaps we’ll ask Dunewell about your proposal,” Silas said as he stood up and approached the closet. “I spoke to him about our meeting and we agreed that he would hide in my herb closet here to listen in on what you had to say.”
The blood drained from Whillyd’s already pale face. He leapt to his feet and his eyes darted from the dagger on his belt to the door leading back to the world he knew and understood.
Silas began to laugh.
“I’m kidding,” Silas said. “Please relax. I was only kidding. I didn’t mean to upset you so. I’m not sure what elven crafts you speak of, but I’m sure we can come to some arrangement. Please understand, though. I wouldn’t want any witness harmed or threatened. I’d hate for you to do that.”
Whillyd nodded, still visibly shaken.
“I’ll have one of my housemen come around for a transfer order for you to sign,” Whillyd said. “You sign it and seal it and our business on this matter will be concluded.”
“Good,” Silas said with a pleasant smile on his face and a lighthearted tone.
Silas rose and turned his back to Whillyd again. Whillyd decided that if he needed to kill this fool, at least it would be easy. Silas opened the examination room door and walked with Whillyd to the large double doors on the north side of the building.
“My houseman will call on you at House Morosse this evening,” Whillyd said in a convincingly ominous tone.
“I’ll look forward to it,” Silas said with a smile, as if the implied threat had gone completely over his head. “Ta ta.”
Silas turned from Whillyd and his cutmen and strode easily down the corridor to his office. He smelled electricity in the air and felt the density of the examination room change. Silenstui must have arrived.
Silas opened the door to find the young mage adorned in his customary red robes; he had graduated beyond the blue robes of apprenticeship but was not yet a master. If he had been a master, he would not have needed Silas’s help.
“Were you able to find the ingredients you needed?” Silenstui asked.
His dark brown eyes, practiced in the look of disdain that all wizards carried, were now almost pleading.
“Of course,” Silas said. “The real trick is in the preparation. One must add the powdered mixture just before the water comes to a boil. Not a moment after. It’s really a matter of controlling the heat source; keeping it consistent. One must, of course, use exactly the same amount of water each time so that one can accurately predict the instant it will boil. I found that very interesting; water boiling at exactly the same time every time as long as all other conditions are…”
“May I have it?” Silenstui asked, cutting Silas short. “The pain,” he gestured toward his groin, “it’s terrible.”
“Certainly, certainly,” Silas said as he retrieved a glass vial from his herb closet.
Silas handed the vial to Silenstui who drank it immediately and handed the empty back to him. Then Silas stepped just outside the door and called for Rethia. He made a note on the ledger, the same one so closely inspected by Dunewell earlier, and initialed it. He then handed the ledger to his nurse who, after examining the empty vial, also added her initials.
He was careful to keep the door to his office pulled almost closed to protect the identity of his patient. Silenstui would face ridicule at best and expulsion from the Archives of the Arcana at worst if it was discovered he was seeking treatment outside of their ranks. However, Silenstui was hesitant to approach one of his masters. Requesting a tonic for relief of an affliction associated with unwashed tavern girls would not have improved his standing among his colleagues in the tower of Untold Truths.
“I do not like outstanding debts,” Silenstui said when the nurse had left, and Silas entered the examination room once more. “Please allow me to pay you.”
“You know what I want,” Silas said.
“Yes, yes,” Silenstui said. “You want a book. I’d be happy to get you a book, even though it would mean my beheading if it was discovered. The trouble is, you must tell me which book.”
“I don’t know yet,” Silas said. “Recent events may require it soon, however. I’ll mark our stone on the wall opposite your tower when I am ready.”
“Make it soon,” Silenstui said with an edge coming into his voice.
“If you fear your masters so, then why not pursue your studies at the Blue Tower to the west?” Silas asked with a bit of a smile.
Of course, he knew exactly why Silenstui remained at the Archives. The Blue Tower, a fabled keep of powerful and dangerous sorcerers on a large island far to the west, was a location shrouded in mystery and legend. Many tales and rumors drifted about Moras of the horrors that were perpetrated in the Blue Tower and the twisted creatures that roamed the island, creatures the results of experiments that could only be conceived by the mad. The crown, and all the churches for that matter, simply ignored the evils of the site, and, in return, the mages of the Blue Tower returned the apathy by not involving themselves in the matters that troubled the rest of the world.
Some had traveled to the Blue Tower to study magic unimpeded by the morals or edicts of the churches or of the Archives of the Arcana. None had been heard from since. Some believed that to mean they were living peacefully, happy in their pursuit of knowledge. Others believed the island inhabited by hideous monsters that consumed all who traveled there.
“Given your interests, I would think it would be the sort of place you would find appealing,” Silenstui retorted. “Assuming you weren’t eaten.”
“I promise it will be soon,” Silas said, smiling. “I have something in mind and will need a book soon.”
“Very well,” Silenstui said.
Silenstui rose, wrapped his robe around himself tightly and whispered, ‘sectlartha,’ into the air. The ether around him gathered, condensed, became charged with some kind of electricity Silas could feel but not see, and then he was gone. Silas never tired of seeing that trick. It was one he thought he might learn some day.
Two more hours of updating his notes on his patients’ various stages of progress, most detailed in regard to the behavior of the relevant injury or disease, and Silas was finally prepared to return home. He would be dining with Dunewell tonight and should therefore be rested and clear of mind.
