"Excuse me, Lord Wotheng," Folweel purred. "It was Yotha who—"
"Bull's piss! I saw it myself!" Wotheng smacked an impatient hand on the littered table. "Don't call me ignorant, Sir Priest; that fire was fueled with nothing but distilled spirits of wine. My good wife can make it in her still-room, and I've seen it before. 'Twas you priests who set and lit that fire, sir—on my land and in the sigil of my family's god—and I wish to know why."
Folweel barely blinked at the revelation. He only smiled, shrugged, and spread apologetic hands. "Ah, I see you understand our little secret. Yes, the knowledge of fire elixir is a, hmm, trade secret among the priests of Yotha, most commonly used to feed the god's altar fire—and sometimes to send messages."
"Messages! What manner of missive was that, pray tell?"
"Understand, m'lord." Folweel was not to be hurried. Neither, in this dark castle, was he intimidated. "Our priesthood is to perceive and interpret the will of the god. Thought, alas, is not readily visible to the common folk; therefore we use the little trick of the fire to make visible the god's word to men. One might say, we provide the ink for the quill of the god's writing."
"I do not appreciate script which scorches my grazing land, sir. Had you a message for me, a simple letter would have done."
"This is well known, sir, but last night's message was not for you."
"Oh? For whom, then?" Wotheng asked, guessing well what the answer was.
"Why, for the rest of our guests, here." Folweel nodded politely toward Sulun's huddled quartet. "Having no other contact with the House of Deese, and no time to create any, we sent the message by the swiftest and most visible means. My regrets concerning the brief stretch of grass that was scorched, but the missive was urgent and could not wait."
"What message?" Sulun asked. As if I couldn't guess.
"Why, simply this." Folweel spread his hands again. "'Tis written in ancient tomes that the Sukkti wizards were often . . . careless . . . with their art—"
"Careless!" Zeren snorted. Sulun restrained him with a quick touch on the arm.
"In this case," Folweel said, flicking an eye toward Eloti, then away, "you folk have been most profligate with your knowledge. You have given out spells, and knowledge thereof, to any who asked—taking little care for these folks' magical ability or moral condition. Who knows to what ill uses such unfettered knowledge might be put? We received from the god the message that the Lord of Storms was displeased by such carelessness—most particularly your, hmm, stealing his thunder, as it were, in your new magical device—and that his displeasure might soon be made manifest. That is the warning we tried to send."
Folweel bowed politely, and waited.
The reaction was not long in coming. "'Stealing thunder?'" Sulun yelped.
"The spells we've sold are damned harmless, even beneficial!" Zeren growled.
"Do you claim my folk are unfit to learn common figures and letters, sir?" barked Wotheng. Eloti said nothing, only rubbed her shoe thoughtfully at the edge of the nearest carpet.
"Peace, peace," the high priest intoned, raising his hand as if in blessing. "I but report what the god revealed. Surely you know that Yotha has some divine agreement with Vona; elsewise, why do so many fires start from lightning strikes, despite the presence of rain?"
"Clever," Zeren snorted.
"We received the god's warning that Vona was displeased with the carelessness of Deese House, and we sent on the warning as clearly as we could. Had we but sent a letter by common -messenger . . ." Folweel paused to smile blandly at each of Sulun's people in turn, "would you have believed it?"
"No," Doshi admitted, then plucked up his courage to add, "for that matter, why should we believe it now?"
"Why, then, that is your privilege." The high priest rolled his eyes heavenward. "We but reveal the word of the god. Men, in their willfulness, may refuse to believe, but we have done our part."
"At the expense of my grazing land," growled Wotheng.
"A narrow strip, no wider than your hand, easily regrown: hardly damage worth complaint, Lord Wotheng."
"And the fires that danced along the hills, when first you folk came here?" Wotheng's eyes narrowed. "You claimed you were following the god's trail."
"And so we were." Folweel remained bland as ever. "The god did point out his track to us, and where he wished his temple built. We lit the track to show people where he had passed and where he alighted. Again, we but illustrated the god's work."
"And what of the folk who were moved out of the old manse where you wanted the temple built?"
"Not we, Lord Wotheng, but Yotha himself. Had he not sported there long before ever we came here?" The high priest shrugged eloquently. "As for the folk living there, we did offer to take them into Yotha's household. Many chose to do so, as you recall. Others did not, which was entirely their will."
"And not to be wondered at, considering the famed capriciousness of your god, Sir Priest."
"The god does as he wills; we can only interpret his will."
"Yet you cannot deny," said Wotheng, slamming his fist down on the table, "that it was your fire that burned Poddil's cottage!"
Why just that one case? Sulun wondered. No witnesses to the others?
"But I can, Lord Wotheng." Folweel clasped his hands calmly. "We knew from the god that Poddil's cottage would burn. We sent him warning, several times byword of mouth, and finally by the running fire. The first warnings he ignored, the latter came too late; his chimney had already caught fire when the running fire reached him."
"Chimney?" Wotheng bristled his moustache. "My wife saw your fire run to Poddil's cottage, climb right up his wall and into the thatch of his roof. Are you calling my wife a liar, sir?"
Aha, reliable witness. Sulun thought, drawing no comfort from it.
Certainly not," Folweel smiled politely. "I only say, that, when a warning flame runs up a wall to point to a chimney, and the chimney is also, on fire and throws sparks down into the thatch, 'tis very easy to be mistaken concerning exactly which fire set the house alight. You must recall, Lord Wotheng, that witnesses saw sparks shooting out of that chimney and also saw afterward that it had fallen and was burned. The man should never have built his chimney of mere clay-daubed wattle, no matter how thick the clay. Had he not been warned of that before?"
"Poddil's chimney did indeed catch fire once before," Wotheng said slowly, "but without burning the whole house."
"Yet it could have done so, then." The high priest shook his head. "That, too, was warning. Poddil simply would not heed warnings."
"Do you attempt to tell me that Poddil's cottage simply happened to catch fire at the moment that your . . . warning . . . reached him?"
"Not at all." Folweel shook his head sadly. "In truth, his chimney caught fire a little before our warning reached him. We came too late, for which we pray forgiveness; we are but mortal."
"Unbelievable," Zeren muttered.
Don't provoke him! Sulun winced. We want to get out of here alive!
"And the fire you loosed at Deese House last night?" Wotheng rumbled. "Was that a 'late' warning, too?"
"How should it be?" Folweel raised his eyebrows, looking most honestly surprised. "Vona has not yet expressed his displeasure at Deese house, has he? Therefore, I trust our warning has reached its goal well before time."
"By all the gods!" Doshi burst out. "Do you try to tell us that you haven't heard about the poisoning of our workmen yesterday?"