“Yes, and it makes sense, too,” Brandark muttered. The Bloody Sword’s dagger glittered as he carved patterns in the tabletop, and his ears were half-flattened. “Gods! No wonder the poor bastard’s scared to death. Black wizards less than a league away, and he can’t even tell the authorities because one of them is the authorities!”
Tothas nodded, wasted face shocked, for despite all that had happened since he first set out for Axe Hollow with Zarantha, the possibility that wizards had infiltrated the Empire had been only a suspicion before.
“Aye, well, I was listening hard to all he said,” Bahzell said, “and I’m thinking Baron Dunsahnta himself’s not so powerful a wizard as all that.”
“But the landlord claims he’s their leader!” Tothas objected.
“So he does, but think. The baron’s magistrate and landlord in one. That’s making him king frog in a tiny pond; if you were after being one of the tadpoles in his puddle, wouldn’t you think he had to be the one in charge?”
The Spearman nodded after a moment, and Bahzell shrugged.
“Well, then, think on this. It’s death to dabble in black sorcery and blood magic, so if you were after being a black wizard and you were wishful to move into an area, who would you look to recruit first of all?”
“The most powerful noble in it,” Tothas said flatly. “Aye, they’d almost have to bring him in on their side-or kill him and put one of their own in his place.”
“So they would. And I’m wondering about something else, as well. If magi can sense black wizards, can a wizard sense a mage?”
Tothas screwed his forehead up in thought, then shook his head.
“No. Oh, they can sense the mage talent , if it’s strong enough, but only if it’s used, and-”
“And she was probably using it,” Brandark said grimly. Tothas frowned at him, and the Bloody Sword’s ears twitched. “Think, man. You say she can ‘confuse the eye’ into not noticing her, and she was pretending to be Rekah’s maid. Don’t you think she’d have been reinforcing that any way she could?”
Tothas drew a deep breath and nodded unwillingly.
“That was in my own mind,” Bahzell murmured. He drummed on the table for a long, silent moment while Brandark carved a fresh design, then glanced sideways at Tothas. “You were saying something this morning-something about their taking her ‘home’ to kill.” Tothas nodded, and Bahzell frowned. “How sure would you be of that? And why would they do it?”
“I can’t be positive, but if they know who she is, not just what, it’s what they’ll do. Oh, they’ll kill her out of hand sooner than let her go, but if they can get her home and kill her on her own ground, they will.”
“Why?” Bahzell repeated.
“Because she’s heir to Jashân,” the armsman said, as if that explained everything.
“And?” Brandark asked, and sighed at Tothas’ look of disbelief. “Tothas, what our people remember about wizards is how to kill them, not how they do whatever they do, and we didn’t spend years in Axe Hallow learning about them.”
“Oh.” The Spearman digested that for a moment, then shrugged. “Well, it has to do with the nature of blood magic. Mind you, My Lady knows far more about it than I do, but from what I’ve been told, no wizard produces his own power. Mage talent draws on the power of the mage’s own mind, but a wizard uses the energy that-well, that holds everything together , if you see what I mean.”
Both hradani looked blank, and he sighed.
“The magi say there’s power in everything, even a rock, but especially in living things. The white wizards-when there were any-were sworn never to use the energy of living things, especially people, unless someone chose to let them, and even then they were bound never to kill or injure the . . . the donor. Are you with me so far?”
“Yessssss,” Brandark said slowly. “Or I think I am, anyway.”
“All right, then. The trouble is, very few wizards can use the energy of un living things without years of study. It’s harder to work with for some reason. But life energy, now, that’s easy to work with, especially at the moment of death. When a living thing dies, its energy-its life force-flows back out to merge with all the energy about it, and if a wizard seizes it when it does, he can use it however he wants. That’s why blood wizards seem so powerful. They may actually be weak-compared to other wizards, anyway-but they have a stronger energy source to work with, you see.”
Both hradani nodded this time, and Tothas leaned over the table.
“Remember I got all this in bits and pieces, so I may have some of it wrong, but from what I understand, the more intelligent a creature, the greater its energy. That’s why the most powerful blood rituals use people, not animals. And, by the same token, a younger person has more energy than someone who’s old and closer to death . . . and a mage has more than almost anyone else.”
Bahzell’s mouth tightened, and Tothas nodded.
“But that’s not all,” he said more harshly, no longer discussing theory but returning to the mistress he loved. “Some people, well, they ‘resonate’ with the life force around them.”
“ ‘Resonate’?” Brandark repeated carefully, and Tothas nodded again.
“That’s the word Master Kreska used the one time he discussed it with me. You see, when someone follows another person, then a tiny bit of his energy is tied up with that person’s. It’s . . . well, it’s like a burning glass. Whenever you give allegiance to someone, that person is a focus for you, almost a part of you, and if you give allegiance willingly-because you trust or love them, not just because you must-the bond is stronger. D’you follow?”
Brandark and Bahzell nodded dubiously, and Tothas sighed.
“Well, when you’re a ruler-or a ruler’s heir-you’re the focus of a great many people’s energy. And when you’re a ruler like Duke Jashân-or Lady Zarantha-most of those people love and trust you. So if they can get her back onto Jashân land, back into range of all that energy, and then kill her-”
He broke off, biting his lip, and Bahzell squeezed his shoulder.
“All right,” the Horse Stealer said quietly. “From what you’ve said, I’m thinking you’re right. She’s alive so far, and they’ll be looking for a way to get her home, and that means we’ve still time to find her first.”
“Where do we start?” Brandark asked.
“Well, as to that, I’m minded to pay a little call on the baron,” Bahzell rumbled. “I’ve fair pumped that landlord dry, and from all he’s said, Dunsahnta can’t have above two score armsmen, and his ‘keep’s’ scarce more than a fortified manor house. Now wouldn’t it be a strange thing if such as we couldn’t get into a place like that if it so happened we’d a mind to?”
Neither of his companions seemed to find anything to object to in that statement, and he smiled.
“Now, it may be we’ll find Lady Zarantha clapped up in there somewhere, but, truth to tell, I’m thinking they’ll have started her off to the South Weald as soon as ever they could. They’ve no way to know what we’ll do, so they’ll try to get her home quick enough to outrun anything we might do.”
Tothas nodded unhappily, but Bahzell squeezed his shoulder again.
“Buck up, man. Unless they’ve some magical beastie to use for it, they’ve no choice but to move her by horse, wagon, or afoot. Just let me sniff out the way they’ve gone, and I’ll run them to ground before they make it.” Brandark nodded sharply, endorsing the Horse Stealer’s promise, and Bahzell’s eyes gleamed at Zarantha’s armsman.
“And, d’you know, Tothas, if I can but have a word with this Baron Dunsahnta-aye, or with one or two of his guardsmen-I’ll know exactly where to look for her.”
Chapter Twenty-three