Chapter 30: Submission
"What would you recommend as a course of action, Brother Mage?" Grimm asked. "We seem at a considerable disadvantage. I doubt even a pair of Questors could thwart an army of fifteen hundred men and five mind-mages."
Xylox stood with his back to the wall; Grimm guessed the older mage felt as embarrassed as he by the brief, open-backed robe he wore.
"Divide and conquer, Questor Grimm," Xylox said. "They should be our watchwords. If we can ensorcel small groups of men without arousing suspicion, we may gain an armed force to aid our escape."
Grimm, who felt no more comfortable with his revealing attire than his fellow Questor, demurred.
"The mere sight of us," he said, "dressed in this fashion, will be enough to cause the alarm to be raised. We could be cut down in an instant."
Xylox's hand flew to his neck, and his eyes widened in near-panic. "My prized magic gem; it is gone!"
The young mage suspected Xylox had borne his amulet of Missile Reversal for so long that he felt almost helpless without it. The mage's only automatic defence against the Technological projectile weapons of Quelgrum's army had been snatched away.
"There is another problem, Questor Xylox," he said, shaking his head. "Questor spells powerful enough to bend a man's will to one's own purpose, and to maintain such control for a long period, carry a high cost in thaumaturgic energy. Each of us might be able to cast four or five such spells, and to hold them for thirty minutes or so.
"For a dedicated Specialist, such as Perfuco, such spells come at a trifling cost. We would be overwhelmed long before we could assemble a force strong enough to procure our escape."
Grimm had hit upon the major disadvantage a Questor faced when confronting another Guild Specialist: a Questor's spells were limited in scope only by his imagination, but forged by the marshalling of tremendous energies. A Specialist's rote-learned, runic spells were more limited in scope, but they were invariable and practiced endlessly until perfect.
The very patterning of a spell cost a Questor dear, whilst a Specialist's patterning was ready-made, by means of a standard chant providing the spell's structure within its carefully-crafted, well-researched, standardised syllables. Although the result of a brief one-on-one battle between a Questor and any other kind of Guild Mage was a foregone conclusion, a Seventh Rank Mentalist aided by four mage companions and fifteen hundred armed Seculars could surely defeat a pair of Questors with ease, if at considerable cost in life.
Tordun lounged on his bed, seemingly unbothered by his scanty attire; his pale body was muscular and impressive, as if sculpted from the finest alabaster, and he did not appear ashamed to display it.
"You are not alone, mage," the swordsman growled. "I am worth ten of those skinny louts, whether I am using a weapon or bare-handed."
"Excellent," Xylox said, his tone sour. "With the ten men we might ensorcel, we might account for… one-and-one third of a percent of the General's troops. That leaves the vast majority of his army intact.
"What of Master Crest? He has neither a whip nor a dagger, and I would guess that hand-to-hand combat is not his forte.
"And the female urchin; what of her?"
"I have a name: Drexelica," the girl muttered in a sullen tone, but Xylox ignored her. She slumped onto one of the beds, her eyes blazing.
It seemed to cost the senior mage considerable effort, but he turned back to face his junior. "Questor Grimm; do you have any constructive advice to offer?"
"We could replace the fluid in these bottles with water, get back on these beds and reinsert the needles," the younger mage suggested. "We could then feign continued intoxication and convince Armitage that we are duly Pacified servants of the General. During the initial assault on High Lodge, we raise the alarm, assuming that our deception has not been detected… of course, we would need to keep our bedazzled friend, Perfuco, and his fellow mages, well away from us; they would surely detect such a sham in an instant."
Xylox crossed his arms across his chest. "Your suggestion lacks appeal," he drawled. "Do you have any other suggestions?"
Grimm shrugged. "We could pool our resources and forge a spell of Translocation to send one of us back to Arnor House or to High Lodge, to give advance warning of the attack. This would, of course, leave the other members of the expedition at the tender mercies of Quelgrum, Armitage and Perfuco. I also imagine that neither of us has a very firm concept of the bearing of either High Lodge or Arnor House from this location."
"Neither of these options sounds very enticing, good mages," the wiry Crest said. "I can see an awful lot of 'ifs' and 'buts' in both plans."
"There is a third alternative," Grimm said in a soft voice, as new inspiration came to him. "We negotiate. Somehow, we convince the General that his cause is hopeless, and we persuade him to give it up. We Questors are dangerous, and I do not think General Quelgrum would relish a blood-bath."
Tordun guffawed, his laughter so loud that Grimm had to slash his hand through the air to remind the swordsman there might be guards outside the room.
In a more subdued voice, the albino said "Oh, I can just see that, Questor Grimm. We waltz up to Quelgrum and tell him that he's surrounded. I'm sure he'll just fold up and surrender immediately!"
"I haven't finished, Tordun!" Grimm snapped, his tone harsher than he intended. For once, Xylox did not reproach him for his breach of protocol in slipping out of the starchy, formal Mage Speech.
"I beg your pardon, Lord Mage," the albino replied in an acidic tone. "Pray continue."
"We convince him that High Lodge is already prepared for such an attack," Grimm said, clamping down on his fulminating emotions, "and that victory will only come through the payment of a very, very heavy butcher's bill. Quelgrum may be misguided, but he does not seem insane."
"Perfuco may know High Lodge as well as, or better than, either of us," Xylox said, rolling his eyes in ridicule. "Seculars move in and out all the time, and the mages of High Lodge are soft and weak, through years of self-indulgence and easy living. Perfuco will know that."
Grimm clasped his hands behind his head and stretched. His frequent reaction to worry was to yawn, and he found himself doing so now. He was aware that such a gesture might make him appear blase and cocksure, but he thought it might not be a bad impression to give.
"We do not have to expect the General to take our word for it," he said. "I understand that you have mastered the sleight of Telepathy, and that you could contact Lord Thorn by such means."
"I would already have done so, were I able!" the older mage replied, growing red in the face. "At our present distance from the House, the energy requirements would be beyond even our combined resources. The idea is risible!"
"We will tell Quelgrum how we communicated with the Lodge while we were imprisoned at Haven," was Grimm's smooth response. "Do you not remember, Brother Mage? After all, why would we have dared to approach this complex with such confidence, unless we felt sure of backup?"
Xylox snorted. "Quelgrum will not believe us. To send such a message from within that metal rabbit-warren would have been impossible. No telepathic signal could have passed in or out of there."
"We know that," Grimm said, his tone deepening as confidence in his idea began to grow, "but I doubt the General does. He was brought up as a farm hand, and I cannot believe his understanding of Technology is much better than ours, if at all. He uses it with aplomb, but I cannot imagine he is a master of the art."
"Armitage will know," the older Questor said. "Perfuco may understand it almost as well; he was conditioned at Haven for some time, and he may have attempted to send a Telepathic plea for help when he was first immured there."