a surfeit of wizards 16

 

Chapter 16

 

I was plainly developing as a wizard, as I noticed that I was starting to notice what Chessina calls the jaggy colours about people and magical things.  Shareen saw it naturally, and in greater detail, but I was having hints, which was quite exciting, and useful, obviating the need to cast a spell to determine of something was magical.

And yes, the canopies of their majesties’ thrones were enchanted to enhance voices – though with two different enchantments, I also suspected one to suppress voices as a privacy feature.

I was also amused at the number of enchantments on the gaudy jewellery of the Ambassador of Agarak, who insisted on keeping his national costume of short white linen kilt, sandals, and jewellery, his shaved head covered by a linen headdress. His entourage had to make do with fur cloaks into which they huddled miserably.

“Quick, Castamir; cast a warming charm on that down-trodden looking one; I think he’s a secretary. He will then owe you a favour,” hissed Chessina.

I did as I was bid, murmuring ‘permit me,’ in my somewhat improved Agarakian.

The look of pleasure and gratitude which swept over him was reward enough for so simple an act, but I knew Chessina had plans for him.

Agarak is not, of course, the power it was in Djehuti’s time. What was once a vast, powerful empire has diminished to a fraction of its size and influence. It is now surrounded by small countries, some little more than tribally based, which were once part of Agarak, and now seethe and change constantly. Agarak’s main efforts are aimed at keeping a lid on the ambitions of the petty kinglets around them, and prevent them from nibbling away further at the borders. Someone apparently had a purge on wizards and wizardry after the demise of Djehuti, possibly as a result of the interference of Sekhemef, and without Imperial war wizards able to hold the wards of the borders, the whole thing collapsed, and would you believe, this was all a plot of the wizards who had been killed and whose deaths permitted the wards to fall.

Sometimes rulers can be abysmally stupid.

Naturally, after a generation or two without mage support, the concept that mages caused trouble was dropped, but by then, large portions of the empire were lost, and the whole infrastructure damaged, and it has never fully recovered.

“I’m going to have to lecture you all,” I said.

We had brought the apprentices to court for an educational trip and to allow Harmana to sneak off with her mother for a little time together.

“I could probably give it,” said Harmana.

“Probably better than I could,” I said, ruefully. She gave me a beaming smile.

“I might know more facts and figures, master, but your snide asides about the other countries will help make them more memorable,” she said.

“Tasayne calls him ‘his snideness,’” said Chessina.

My apprentices beamed at me.

“I shall endeavour to live up to my reputation,” I said. “Well, you know about Sigeralv, the Dwarven ambassador and a friend of mine; Ambassadors Cadyll and Eryr are the half-elves selected to represent Queen Ariannaith, now that the nation of the Elves has decided to behave like people old enough to mix with adult company.”

Harmana giggled. 

The Queen joined us at that moment and we all made our obeisances. Harmana and Shareen were learning Chessina’s little gesture, which was at least partly to hide Harmana’s careful and beautiful curtseys.

“Oh, Towermaster, will you introduce your apprentices?” asked the queen, her eyes devouring her youngest child, taking in how healthy and happy she looked.

“Certainly, majesty,” I said. “Harmana, my most senior apprentice at the moment; Ches, who is a cousin of mine, and also distantly related to my wife, through Sir Tasseder’s family; and Shareen, an orphan.”

The queen looked at Shareen.

“You’re the daughter of Lord Tabrel and his lady, Tanariane,” she said. “I wondered what had become of you; your uncle, Lord Morak said you were ungovernable and had to be put in a school. You don’t look ungovernable to me.”

Shareen buried herself against me.

“She’s a seer, your majesty,” said Ches, bluntly. “And they don’t like what she saw in their auras. They packed her off to the Royal Academy of Magic, and I think they hoped she’d be bullied to death there; she was being bullied badly, but Cousin Castamir rescued her.”

“I hope something is being done about institutionalised bullying, Towermaster?” asked the queen, frigidly.

“Frigermar is doing a sterling job sorting out the many rotten practices in the school, which is why we stole him,” I said, grimly. “But it seemed better to remove her entirely from the environment… she is our adoptive daughter now,” I added, lifting my chin in a gesture to dare her to insist on sending her back to her aunt and uncle.

“I’ll have it ratified by the court heralds,” said the queen, meekly. “I don’t like Lord Moruk and Lady Jolinn, and have reflected often that it is as well that they are childless. He is a nephew of Lord Ogier of the Western Marches, and his heir, unless Ogier’s daughter gives my son a second son.”

“He must not inherit!” said Shareen, and then buried herself in me again.

“What Shareen sees, she cannot always express, but I have only seen her become so agitated when demons are involved,” I said, grimly.

“Then look into it, Towermaster,” said the queen. “In the meantime, I know how fast children grow; perhaps you will lend me your senior apprentice to sort out some clothes my children have grown out of for your rather sudden family.  I recently l… lost a child, and I think her clothes would fit Shareen, and I have other clothes for boys and girls.”

“I would be grateful, your majesty,” I said.

It was a very clever excuse to draw Harmana away, and I would not turn down clothes for them as well. Harmana’s own clothes when she came to us were mostly sensible wear for children, so the royal children were only dolled up for display.

And Ches was going up like a weed.

Not that we were doing badly; Chessina had firmly taken over my finances and I had meekly turned over the chest of monies which Harmon kept for expenses and to place the cost of such small potions and magic items in, to defray expenses.

Chessina had discovered whole new worlds of magical items, and had negotiated with Garrzlan the Smith to place runes of ever-sharpness on tools, to sell in Stonebridge, or send to other settlements, and produced whole batches of stomach-soothers, cold-relievers, constipation curers and so on. And she had been quietly investing the proceeds, as I found out when I bemoaned not having enough money for a visit to court. She looked surprised, and said, “What do you mean? I’ve been preparing for this,” and took me to show me six chests full of largely silver, but some gold.  Apparently, she had invested heavily in the new infrastructure of the port at Braidfleet, and in the flax industry there. Apparently we owned half a ship as well. I asked “fore, aft, port, or starboard?” for which I was well poked.

After the consequences of that, Chessina explained that we had bought into a ship owned by someone who was in financial difficulties owing to circumstances beyond his control, and had invested in half a cargo as well. She informed me that we were doing very well.

But I am used to being frugal, and there is no harm in that if it does not become miserly.

I introduced my apprentices to Sigeralv and to the two half-elves, and then a footman asked me to join the queen.

Harmana was a little damp around the eyes, as was her mother, and her royal sisters, Maravelle and Trullara. There was a pile of clothes.

“I asked m… her majesty to send the clothes to Dragovar’s tower as we are living in obscurity,” said Harmana. “It’s a funny name for a house, master.”

Her eyes danced.

“Pest,” I said, fondly. “But yes, it is no longer a secret if people know where it is. It will come out one day, but let us defer that as long as possible.”

“I’m feeling a little odd, as there was a state funeral for me,” said Harmana.

“Ondomarion had a pauper child brought to fill the coffin,” said the queen, naming the royal chamberlain. “I asked if it was common for there to be dead street children and the pompous popinjay just shrugged. I have set up a royal commission to investigate child poverty; I find it almost unbearable to think of children dying of hunger in a rich city.” She looked at me. “Towermaster, I would like you to be a trustee for the commission and the charity I will be setting up to do what can be done. And I would like you to take any children with magic as your apprentices, because although there are commons in the Academy, these street children….”

“They will need extra care,” I said. “The beautiful thing about the Tower is that it seems capable of expanding to fit as many people as are needed.”

“How amazing!” said the queen.

“I love magic! And Arcana,” I said.

The Tower had its own ideas about things, and had grown extra rooms for the children – a bedroom each, and a playroom in the merchant’s house, which was apparently now an expansion of the Tower since I put the gate in. Harmana had got around to telling me about it after I had housed them in one room with a curtain for Ches to have privacy. She seemed happy to have conversations with the Tower. Well, that made it clear who would be Towermistress one day.

I wasn’t complaining about the expansion.

We left the queen summoning footmen to take clothing to Dragovar’s tower, and I returned to an exposition on the various ambastard… ambassadors.

“Starting in the north,” I said, “There’s a couple of Archduchies which are not exactly client states of Ezustry, but tied quite closely. Osternlondes, and Shirhersh. The fellow with the near shaven head and the aggressive moustache is the ambassador of Osternlondes, and he has a stick so far up…”

“Castamir!” Chessina interrupted.

The children giggled.

“Er, yes, well,” I said, and cleared my throat. “The ambassador of Shirhersh is the little guy with sad moustaches and a tuft for a beard. North of these lands, and on a promontory is Norroland, which is ruled by Kirgar the half-arsed.  He’s half dwarven; his mother was the sole heir to her father, and there was some argy-bargy over whether anyone would overthrow her, so she married a dwarven warrior, and he discouraged some of her other would be suitors or detractors by nine inches or so.”

“The length of a head?” asked Ches.

“Exactly,” I said. “Queen Solvega had no more trouble, and retired in favour of her son when he was thirty. Kirgar is reputed to be the strongest man in the world. I wouldn’t dispute that, and he’s shrewd as well.  His ships trade to the far east where there are lands across the ocean and bring back wonderful things which trade all over the place. His ambassador is his brother, there, another half-dwarf, but Surgar is a craftsman more than a warrior.”

I exchanged a nod with Surgar, whom I knew slightly as Sigeralv got on well with him.

“And to the south?” asked Ches.

“Our immediate neighbour is Bergiers,” I said. “The country’s wealth is on its sheep, and if you look over there, the ambassador and his wife are dressed, as their royal court dresses, in what they fondly believe to be the costumes of shepherds and shepherdesses. I’ve yet to see either clad in velvets and silks, of course, and the merchants of the country dress in sober gowns of dark rich dye made of wool. But nobody ever said that nobles were ever endowed with many brains. I think the ambassador is named Hemeri, which I can recall because he looks as if he has haemorrhoids; and his wife is Nosette, which is also easy as she looks as if she is smelling a bad smell all the time.”

“He’s the Baron de Boccage,” supplied Harmana.

“Thank you,” I said. “South of Bergiers are two countries; Vallony, which is on a plateau, and the settlements are in valleys between mountain ridges rising above the plateau. Harmon told me it was shaped a bit like a horse’s tooth, a raised peglike shape with ridges in wavy lines along it. The ambassador to Vallony is the tough looking fellow who has the look of an ork about him, Valdar Storche. They just want to be left alone. South of that and occupying the whole southern peninsular is Tierverano, and the colourful fellow is their ambassador. Jovano Aperitif is his name, I think.”

“I believe they pronounce it, ‘Apartieve’,” said Harmana.

“More than likely,” I said. “As to the trade in the East, it’s all very new, and is controlled mostly by Kirgar or out of Agarak, for exotic spices, velvets, and so on.”

“Thank you, Master; I have a better idea now of who is who,” said Harmana.  “I knew you would make it more interesting. I’ve never seen shepherds or shepherdesses dressed like that, either, but I suppose it’s something that they want to honour their national industry.”

“What are we mostly known for?” asked Chez.

“We have a mixed economy, a bit of everything,” I said. “It means we don’t need to import much and can supply others with surplus grain.”

“Useful,” said Harmana.

“And it’s why Ezustry is of interest to demons,” I said. “They wouldn’t have to worry about being rebuffed by other kingdoms, which if they planned to keep us all as slaves would make sense. You have to feed your slaves. Because that is what we would be.”

It was a sombre thought, but a very real fear; and we had to deal with Nosy to make sure it did not happen.