“Master Mandes has not shown himself,” said the emperor, shifting in his wide canvas chair. His face was flushed, his eyes rimmed with red. “Will he cry craven, do you think?”
Valdid, standing at Ackal IV’s left hand, did not think so. “He’s waiting to make an entrance, Your Majesty,” was the old chamberlain’s opinion.
So it proved. Only moments later, a peal of thunder rumbled across the sky, though no lightning had been seen. All looked up. Over the distant forest of city rooftops was a streak of cloud. White against the mixed gray of the unsettled sky, the wisp expanded and came boiling directly toward the Field of Corij.
“Here he comes,” muttered Valdid.
A thrill of concern raced through Tol. By rights this duel should be his-he had been gravely wronged by Mandes many times and should have dealt with him long ago. Did Elicarno realize what danger he was facing?
When eight legs appeared below the surging column of cloud, Tol wondered if any of them truly knew what Mandes was capable of. The legs churned as though galloping through the air. Strangely, the front pairs did not match the rear ones. The four legs in the front line were feathered in white and bore great talons. The rear four were covered in tawny fur.
Wings appeared, beating in unison, and two amazing beasts dropped from the clouds: griffins, harnessed to a white, egg-shaped coach.
The Ergothians gaped. Griffins were exceedingly rare, and this fine, fierce pair bore the markings of royal Silvanesti heritage. Only the Speaker of the Stars owned griffins with snow-white eagle plumage forward and golden lion hide behind.
The coach they drew had no wheels, only a pair of long skids on its underside. The fantastical conveyance swept overhead, turned, and came back, landing gently as an autumn leaf before the imperial pavilion.
Shaken by the spectacle, the guards were slow to muster on the plain between the aerial coach and their emperor. By the time they had, Mandes was emerging.
He looked as dazzling as his transport. Dressed entirely in cloth-of-gold, he wore a skullcap carved from a single piece of lapis lazuli. His gloves were of woven gold thread, and in his right hand he gripped a tall, black oaken staff, inlaid along its entire length with esoteric symbols in silver.
Walking through the flustered guards, Mandes spread his arms wide and halted before the emperor. He bowed his head.
“Your Majesty, your humble servant is here,” he said in a manner neither humble nor servile.
“There’s no mistake about that,” Ackal IV replied dryly.
Valaran exclaimed, “Where in the world did you find a pair of matched griffins?”
“In Silvanost, Highness-a gift from the Speaker of the Stars.”
“For services rendered?” Tol said bluntly.
“Just so, my lord,” was the sorcerer’s cool reply. “I performed a bit of rare art for the Speaker, and in gratitude he presented me with Lightning and Thunderbolt.”
Valaran began to ask about the care and feeding of griffins, but her father cut her off. Valdid urged the emperor to commence the contest.
A runner was dispatched to bring Elicarno. The engineer soon arrived, flanked by Egrin and Miya. Kiya limped behind the trio, a dour expression on her face.
Elicarno had washed and donned clean clothes that morning, but his work assembling the ballista had left him grease-stained once more. The tousled engineer looked the very antithesis of Mandes’s gilded splendor.
When everyone was arrayed before him, Ackal IV charged the combatants.
“You are here to try your purposes against one another-Mandes’s magic against Elicarno’s machinery. As you are both valued vassals of the empire, I will tolerate no harm directed by either of you against the other. This is a contest of power, not a duel to the death. Is that clear?”
Each man assured the emperor of his understanding. Ackal gestured to Valdid.
The chamberlain directed everyone’s attention to two sturdy posts being raised on the field by gangs of soldiers. Each post was a freshly cut elm tree trunk, four steps tall and two handspans thick.
“Those are your targets,” Valdid declared loudly. “The first man to destroy his will be the winner. The deed must he accomplished from a distance-the greater the distance, the greater the merit earned.”
He paused dramatically, then cried, “Commence!”
Elicarno sprinted to his waiting men. “Jacks and levers! Move the beast around and bear on the target!”
His apprentices jammed long levers under the frame of the catapult and began heaving it around. The engine could swing on a pivot in any direction, but the lay of the land prevented Elicarno from using his loading device effectively unless he turned the machine.
While the engineers grunted and shouted, Mandes walked quietly away from the imperial pavilion, golden robe rippling out behind him. Softly, he intoned the words of a spell. A dark cloud began to form over his head.
The engineers had the catapult in position. Elicarno called for a quadrant and plumb line, to make sure the frame of the device was level and true. When he was satisfied, he chose a straight, sturdy dart from a pile of similar missiles and laid it in the launching tray. An assistant banged on the thick end of a wedge jammed under the ballista’s arm. With each blow, the plumb line swung more and more to the perpendicular.
“There!” Elicarno set the trigger mechanism. “Draw the weapon!”
Eighteen strong young men hauled back on the loading levers. With a loud clack, the hooks dropped over the bowstring, and the device began to ratchet back.
Meanwhile, Mandes stood alone in the trampled grass. The sorcerer’s hands were over his head, gloved fingers flexing ever so slightly. The steady drone of his voice carried to the pavilion. The black cloud that had formed over his head was now hovering above his target, growing larger and larger.
“Steady!” Elicarno shouted. His men quickly cleared away from the ballista, now poised and cocked. The power captive in the skeins could take off a man’s head if he got in the way of the bowstring.
The trigger line was a simple length of cord, surprisingly light to trip so large a device. Elicarno wrapped the line around his hand. After a heartbeat’s pause, he pulled the trigger.
Cords shrieked, timbers thrashed, and the bowstring sprang forward. Everyone in the pavilion felt the shock of the machine through the soles of their feet. The dart, two paces of turned hardwood with a solid bronze head, whistled through the air. It sailed over the target post.
“Down, three taps!”
Elicarno’s man pushed the elevation wedge out with three distinct blows of the mallet. The ballista was reloaded, a second missile thrown. This one landed half a step in front of the post, burying itself in the rain-softened soil up to its fletching.
“Up, one!”
A column of light, brighter than a sun, lanced down from the cloud Mandes had conjured. It struck the target post and exploded. The resulting thunderclap rocked the entire assembly, collapsing half the emperor’s pavilion and setting the tethered horses rearing and neighing in terror. Tol felt a glare of heat on the left side of his face. His skin crawled, and the muscles beneath surged of their own accord. Blinded, he flailed one hand and felt Kiya’s strong arm.
The flash faded and vision returned. A veil of smoke drifted across the Field of Corij. Mandes’s target was now only a charred, smoldering stump.
Looking a trifle singed, the sorcerer presented himself to the emperor. Valdid and assorted palace lackeys were struggling to erect the collapsed portion of tent, while Valaran brushed ash and bits of blasted turf from the emperor’s shoulders.
Mandes bowed, straightened, then declaimed, “My target is gone, Your Majesty. I have won!”
Ackal IV held up a hand. “Master Elicarno, can you continue?”
“Yes, Your Majesty!” the engineer shouted, even as he rubbed the dazzle from his eyes.