Encouraged, Dennis went on.
“In this evening of marvelous gift-giving, I, a poor wizard, have little to offer. But to Baron Kremer I now offer the essence of… fire!”
He struck two of the little sticks together. At once the two ends erupted into flame.
The crowd moaned and pulled back in awe. They were rather crude matches, smoking and stinking of sulfur and nitrates, but that only made the display more impressive.
Dennis had seen the firemakers they used here. They were efficient but used that ancient principle of a rotating friction stick. Nothing in Coylia could do what he had just done.
“And now,” he added dramatically, waving the matches for effect, “the flavor of fire!”
He brought one of the matches down to the goblet.
A flickering blue flame popped audibly into place to meet it. The onlookers sighed. There was a long, stunned silence.
“The essence of fire… captured in a drink?” Dennis turned and saw that Hoss’k was goggle-eyed.
“A marvelous feat,” Kremer agreed, quite calmly. “It is akin, perhaps, to the fashion in which the wizard’s people enslave those tiny creatures within his little boxes. They have found a way to trap fire as well, it would seem. Wonderful.”
“But…but…” Hoss’k spluttered. “Fire is one of the life essences! Even the followers of the Old Belief agree with that. It is reserved for the gods who make and practice men! We may release the essence of fire from that which once lived… but we cannot trap it!”
Dennis couldn’t help it. He laughed. Hoss’k was nervously licking his tips, and seeing the deacon squirm gave Dennis a moment’s satisfaction. Here, at last, was some repayment for what the fellow had done to him.
“Did I not say it?” Kremer’s laughter boomed. “Dennis Nuel knows how to trap anything within a tool! What wonders might we expect if he is but given our full support?”
The crowd applauded dutifully, but Dennis could tell they were cowed. Their faces were touched with superstition and uncertainty.
Dennis glanced to his left, still grinning over giving Hoss’k the shock of his life. Then he saw Linnora, her face a mask of concern and fear.
The Princess favored Dennis with a withering glance, then swept about in a flourish to leave the hall, followed by her maid.
Now he recalled what Hoss’k had said about “the Old Belief” Apparently his little demonstration had reawakened her fear of those who abused life essences. Dennis cursed softly. Was there anything he could do here that wouldn’t be misinterpreted by her?
It had been the Baron who declaimed on what Dennis had done, he realized, at last. Kremer had put his actions in a light that boxed him in a corner, insuring that Linnora would misunderstand.
He was outclassed by the man. He could not oppose that kind of manipulative skill. How could there be any choice but to go along?
He only hoped that someday Linnora, too, would, understand.
6
A bit foggyheaded from the party, Arth and Dennis were late reporting to the still the next morning. When they arrived, they found that the crew had had a celebration of their own and left the still a shambles in the process.
The prisoners groveled, terrified of the wizard’s wrath.
Dennis just sighed, “Aw hell,” and set the men to work fixing the damage. Keeping busy helped him not think about his overall situation.
He had made progress in his plan to win influence over the warlord, Kremer. He still thought it the most logical plan— best for himself, for his friends, for Linnora, and even for the people of this land.
Yet the episode last night left him with a sour feeling. He worked hard, and tried to drive the memory away.
A little after noon, a bugle cried out from the front gate. The call was answered by trumpets on the castle tower. Troops in the yard hurried to fell into formation along a corridor from gate to castle.
Dennis looked at Arth, who shrugged. The little thief-cum-moonshiner had no idea what was happening.
Down a ramp from the keep came Baron Kremer and his entourage, their bright, centuries-old robes almost painful to look at in the sunshine. The tall plumed helm of Kremer’s cousin, Lord Hern, stood out in the crowd of courtiers.
They halted at a dais overlooking the massed companies and watched as the outer gate swung back.
In rode a small procession on horseback.
“It’s th’ embassy from th’ L’Toff!” Arth breathed.
They had been told such a party was coming. The L’Toff were searching for their missing Princess and no doubt suspected she was being kept here.
The rumors must have spread far and wide since the jailbreak, and especially since Zuslik’s aristocracy were let in on it, Kremer was publicly feigning innocence until it suited his purposes to do otherwise. But apparently he was no longer worried about suspicions.
For all of his apparent good favor with the warlord, Dennis had not been invited to attend the meeting of the welcoming committee. It was another sign of Kremer’s masterful insight into people. He clearly knew the foreign wizard was not trustworthy on the subject of the L’Toff Princess.
Dennis looked up at the third-level parapet, where he had often seen Linnora walk. She wasn’t in sight, of course. Her guards would keep her well secluded during the brief visit by her kinfolk.
He walked over to the low fence enclosing his work area and put a foot up on one of the rough wooden rails. He and Arth watched the embassy pass the arrayed soldiers to approach Baron Kremer’s platform.
There were five riders, all wearing soft cloaks in muted colors. They looked normal enough to Dennis’s eyes, though all five wore beards, unfashionable among Coylians. They seemed a trifle more slender than the people of Zuslik, or Kremer’s northmen. The five rode looking straight ahead, ignoring the xenophobic stares of the troops, until they came within a dozen yards of the dais where Kremer waited.
Two L’Toff held reins for the others as they dismounted and saluted the Baron.
Dennis could see Kremer’s face better than he could the emissaries’. He couldn’t hear what was said, but Kremer’s answer was obvious. The warlord smiled with unctuous sympathy. He raised his hands and shook his head.
“Next he’ll say he’s had scouts out scourin’ the countryside far an’ wide for their Princess,” Arth said.
Sure enough, Kremer waved an arm at his troops and at a squad of mounted horsemen. Then he pointed to the gliders circling patiently in the updraft over the castle.
“The two L’Toff on the right aren’t buyin’ it,” Arth commented. “They’d like to take th’ castle apart, startin’ with th’ Baron hisself.”
The gray-bearded leader of the embassy tried to stifle one of his companions, a brown-haired youth in dark-brown body armor, who shrugged off restraint and shouted hotly at the Baron. Kremer’s guards muttered angrily and shifted weight, poised for a nodded command from their Lord.
The young L’Toff looked contemptuously at the tense guards and spat on the ground.
Arth chewed on a grass stem speculatively. “I’ve heard it used to be the L’Toff were pacifists. But they’ve had to become fighters the past two hunnerd years or so, in spite of the protection o’ th’ King and the old Duke. Some of ’em are said to be about as good as th’ King’s own scouts.”
Arth pointed to the tall, angry young L’Toff. “That one may make it hard for the ambassador to get outta here without a fight.”
Arth sounded like he was handicapping horses. From what Dennis had heard, one of the major spectator sports here in Coylia seemed to be watching men hack each other to bits and betting on the outcome.