TWENTY
1 Tarsakh, the Year of the Ageless One
The creaking of a wagon’s wheels and the clip-clop of a horse’s hooves on cobblestones brought Geran back to a painful consciousness. He was lying in damp straw in a dark, swaying wagon, bound hand and foot. His calf burned where the bolt had struck him, his forehead felt hot and sticky and throbbed in agony, and the whole right side of his jaw ached abominably. Gingerly he ran his tongue over his teeth and found one of his molars was deeply split; loose bits of tooth were adrift in his mouth. He spat blood and debris out on the straw of the wagon and groaned despite himself.
“Good, you ain’t dead,” a deep, gravelly voice said from somewhere behind him. “I wouldn’t thrash ’round too much if I were you. ’Twon’t do you no good, it’ll hurt like blazes, and I’ll beat you senseless again if you’re makin’ me to.”
“Where am I?” Geran rasped. It hurt to talk. “On your way t’ that tawdry ten-silver festhall they call Council Hall. We’ll be there soon enough. I understand your accommodations are waitin’ for you.” The speaker laughed dryly.
Geran rolled slowly to one side and glanced up at his captor. The fellow was a black-bearded dwarf in heavy armor. He sat on a bench in the back of the wagon, watching Geran. He had a clay pipe clenched in his mouth and held a short-handled cudgel capped with an ugly lead shot in his lap. “Who are you?” the swordmage asked.
“Kendurkkel Ironthane, master o’ the Icehammer Company. Pleased t’ make your acquaintance, m’lord-’specially since you’ve earned me a very fine bonus this morning.” The dwarf’s pipe bobbed as he grinned under his thick beard, but his eyes remained neutral and wary. “I heard y’know a thing or two about magic, so don’t be givin’ me reason t’ think you might be trying t’ cast a spell, or I’ll have t’ put you t’ sleep with me little persuader, here. Besides, you’re in mage shackles, so there ain’t no point in even trying.”
Geran didn’t know if he would’ve been inclined to try a spell with Kendurkkel sitting over him with the ugly little mace in his hand, but the mage shackles settled it. He decided he’d test them later to be sure, but if the dwarf wasn’t lying, then he wouldn’t get far. Mage shackles were enchanted with negation spells that simply absorbed any magic a captive tried to summon before it could be shaped into even the simplest spell. “What happened to my friend?” he asked.
“The halfling? Well, nobody offered me a bounty on him, so I left ’im in the street. He fought like a wildcat till me wizard struck him senseless with that purple ray he used to knock the sand out o’ you.” The dwarf shrugged. “I suppose I should’ve brought him along just on speculation, if you will, but frankly I don’t like the smell o’ this whole business, and I figured I’d be wiser t’ stick t’ the contract I was certain of.”
The wagon hit a sharp bump, and Geran winced as his head pounded in protest. He felt nauseated, and his limbs felt as weak as thin straws… likely the aftereffects of the blow to the head that had knocked him down. “I don’t suppose I can offer you a better deal than your bounty to let me go, can I?”
“No, that’d be unprofessional. I’ve got me reputation to think of.”
“What if I told you that the council mercenaries intend to hold me for murder because I killed a man in a fair duel? Or that they’re angry with me because I’m interfering with their plans to intimidate and extort half the folk in town? Would that make a difference?”
The dwarf chewed on the stem of his pipe and thought for a moment. “No, can’t say that it would,” he said. “I’ve found it don’t pay t’ worry too much about what folks say when they’re in your sort o’ predicament. Most o’ the time they’re lying, but if they did be tellin’ the truth, well, then, I’d feel just awful ’bout collectin’ the gold what’s on their heads. Better t’ assume they’re all lying. I sleep better that way. Well, look, here we are.”
Geran caught a glimpse of heavy wooden beams carved in fantastic shapes high overhead through the small, barred window in the wagon’s door. Then Kendurkkel knelt down beside him and pulled a heavy leather hood over his head and face. “Mind your manners a little bit longer, and I’ll make sure I take off the hood when we get t’ your cell,” the dwarf said.
The inside of the hood was lightless, dank, and hard to breathe through. Geran heard the wagon door swing open, and then several hands seized him by the arms and hauled him out. He tried to get his feet under him as best he could, but his knees were still quite weak, and his legs didn’t work as well as they should have; he was half-carried along by the unseen men around him. They took him down a flight of steps, through several doors, down another flight of steps, and finally through another door. Geran tried to think of some way to escape, but even if he hadn’t been sick and dizzy from the beating, he doubted that he could have managed much with magic-impeding shackles on his hands and a heavy leather hood to blind him. Several men seized him closely then, and his shackles were removed briefly, readjusted, and then snapped back into place. Only after that did the hood come off his face.
The dwarf stepped back, rolling the hood in his hands. “He’s all yours,” he rasped. “The Icehammers be done with this.”
“A fine piece of work, Captain Kendurkkel.” Sergen Hulmaster stood outside Geran’s cell, dressed in a resplendent, pleated coat of deep blue embroidered with gold thread. He wore a large gold medallion around his neck-a symbol of office, or so Geran guessed. Several of the Council Watch stood nearby in their browned cuirasses. “Thanks to your diligence, this murderer will soon face justice for his crimes.”
The dwarf glanced at Geran. “That’s your business,” he said. “You know where t’ find me if you’re needing the Ice-hammers for anything else, Lord Sergen. I go.” He withdrew, his heavy tread scuffing the stone floor.
The swordmage looked down at his shackles; they’d been moved around in front of his body and tethered to an iron ring set in the floor of the cell, so he could move around a little bit. There was a plain pallet of straw in one corner of the cell, a chamber pot in the other, and a flickering lantern in the hallway outside. “Your Merchant Council has a dungeon, Sergen?” he asked.
“The Council Watch, actually,” his stepcousin replied. “It’s less than three years old and seems to me to be a much better place than you deserve. If I had my way, you’d be thrown into the darkest, foulest oubliette I could find.”
“Your generosity overwhelms me.”
“Sarcasm ill becomes you, Geran. If it helps you at all, you can take comfort in the fact that you’ll be given a speedy trial before a special commission of the Merchant Council. I expect they’ll quickly condemn you to hang, so the quality of your accommodations won’t trouble you for long.”
Geran took a deep breath and silently promised himself that he would not give Sergen the satisfaction of angering him… or frightening him, for that matter. In truth, he felt too miserable to muster much of a retort. “You’ve given yourself the power to try people who displease you and to order executions? Uncle Grigor’s a patient man, but I think he might object, Sergen.”
“The laws of concession, Geran. Members of foreign legations are protected from crimes of person or property. You killed Anfel Urdinger in the sight of dozens of people, so House Veruna’s entitled to demand your arrest and trial under Mulman law.”
“I doubt the harmach will see it that way.”
Sergen snorted. “Well, as you are currently in council custody, it doesn’t really matter how he sees things, does it?” He sketched a mocking half-bow and straightened with an evil smile on his face. “Now, I’m a very busy man, and I have much to do. I’m sure that your case will be disposed of in good order. Until later, dear cousin.”
Geran tried to think of a stinging reply but failed. He watched Sergen strut off, and then he allowed his knees to fail him and slumped to the dismal little pallet. After a time he drifted off into darkness again, even though he knew he shouldn’t let himself fall asleep after a sharp blow to the skull. He felt as though he were plummeting down and down every time he closed his eyes, and yet he was so weary that he could not keep them open any longer.