Knights of the Sword

Chapter 3

The green-walled chamber in Istar’s Tower of High Sorcery lay so far below ground level that it could hardly be said to be in the tower at all. It would have surprised no one, wizard, cleric, or common citizen of Istar the Mighty, to know that it was shown on no plan of the tower.

It might have surprised some wizards to know that there were indeed plans of the five great Towers of High Sorcery, and that these plans were often seen by common folk. However, it would not have taken a long explanation to end their surprise or ease their concern.

Tarothin the Wizard remembered giving one of those explanations himself some years ago, to a bemused apprentice.

“In the first place, the rulers of those cities and lands where the towers lie do not much care for our being more mysterious than we need to be. So any little gesture of trust in the right place may be a potent force for goodwill. Remember the Thirty-first Principle.”

The apprentice had been bright and eager even while bemused. He recited the principle briskly, from memory.

“A small spell at the right time has the power of a mighty one an hour late. A small spell in the right place has the power of a mighty one a thousand paces away.’ ”

“Exactly. Consider these plans of the towers a small spell for peaceful relations with those who wield power over our destiny without knowing much about us and often disliking the little they know.

“Also, there are times when one does not wish to use spells to unplug a drain or regild a ceiling in parts of the towers where nothing arcane or secret happens. Thus we bring in common workers, whose goodwill we earn by paying them for their labor, and who, when they see us as folk much like themselves, may lose a bit of their fear of us.”

Tarothin had laughed harshly. Once his laugh had been full-bellied; one woman had even called it jolly. But there had been rather less to be jolly about these past ten years than before.

“Of course, anyone entering a Tower of High Sorcery with hostile intent will find the plans more menace than aid. An army using them would be lucky to find anything important, luckier still to find its way out again. And every tower is guarded by wizards whose skills are devoted to making sure that the invaders have no luck.

“So you can be sure that the existence of plans of the towers is no mystery, nor any great danger to us.”

Mollified, the apprentice had returned to his studies.

* * * * *

I wonder what became of the lad, Tarothin mused, wiping his eyes discreetly as they watered from the smoke of the braziers. He had wits and a vocation, but seemed very firmly inclined to the White Robes. Too firmly for one his age.

It was unlikely that Tarothin would ever know. The full wizards of the White, Red, and Black Robes were not a multitude; the seats of a fair-sized games arena would hold most of them. But they were widely scattered, and it had become wiser with the years not to tell one another too much about their comings and goings, to say nothing of their secret refuges.

This meeting showed that problem as vividly as the freshly retouched gold inscriptions on the green marble wall behind the speaker’s chair. The chamber held seventy wizards, and apart from those of Istar, Tarothin did not know the homes of more than one in five. He knew their faces and their skills, but he could not readily have said where they came from.

There were exceptions, of course, and one of them was standing beside a bas-relief carving supposed to represent Huma’s minotaur companion Kaz. Rubina was a Black Robe who made no secret of being from Karthay, the great trading city near the mouth of the Bay of Istar and Istar’s leading trading rival. She also made no secret of being as concerned for the fate of her city as she was for the fate of the towers and all their wizards, apprentices, and servants, which was not proper in a full wizard.

However, it was hard to work oneself up to a serious argument with Rubina. She was too gracious, too witty, and many times over too beautiful.

At the moment, Rubina’s exquisite face was set in a mask of boredom, and her huge, heavy-lidded brown eyes were closed in a gesture not meant to be sensuous-at least Tarothin thought not. But then, the black robes weren’t meant to be alluring, either-but it was hard to look at Rubina in them without thinking of what she might look like without them.

The speaker was now repeating himself for at least the fourth time (Tarothin had given up counting) on the iniquity of the title of “kingpriest” for the principal cleric of Istar. Tarothin thought that if there was any point to be made on this subject, it had already been made, and the speaker was continuing because he did not know how to stop and nobody had the wits or courage to tell him to be silent.

The matter of the title was of some moment, to be sure. It had always been one title of the principal cleric of Istar, since Istar had been a village and all its clerics could be gathered in a single tavern, which was probably where many of them spent most of their time. A century ago, it had become the sole title, but the old titles did not vanish from usage and the new one was seldom taken seriously except on the most formal ritual occasions. The merchants and artisans of Istar were a hardheaded lot, or at least had been. They liked the idea of being the seat of the world’s virtue, but were not going to have themselves laughed at when there was work to be done.

Now, to be sure, people were actually fined or even imprisoned for failing to say “kingpriest.” But one could put all the fines so far collected in a purse that a strong man could carry, and the sentences of imprisonment were less than those meted out to drunkards who fought with the watch.

To keep his muscles from freezing him like a statue, Tarothin took a step sideways and looked about the chamber. Within a staff’s length he saw, wearing full robes, two kender, a full elf (Qualinesti, of course; the Silvanesti seldom lived outside their homeland, let alone entered any human order of priests, wizards, or warriors), two with the look of half-elves, and one who was short enough to be a dwarf, though he probably was not.

There lay what frightened Tarothin-the spreading notion that only humans, Istarian or otherwise, had virtue in the sight of the True Gods. This not only went against everything Tarothin had ever been taught, but it also went against everything he had seen or heard during a life now past its fortieth winter.

When the Istarians started enforcing that madness with fines and imprisonment-of humans or nonhumans, it did not matter-dire times indeed would be at hand. If the speaker had spoken so much as six words about that, Tarothin would have been content.

At last the speaker ran out of wind as thoroughly as he had long since run out of wits. Tarothin made polite noises as the man came down; he was, after all, a fellow Red Robe, and one needed harmony within one’s own order even more than with the others.

A buzz of voices made Tarothin turn, to see Rubina mounting the speaker’s stair and taking her seat. It could not be entirely his imagination that as she sat down she made her robes swirl a trifle more than nature allowed, revealing a well-shaped arm and truly exquisite ankles, as well as strong feet in sandals of leather with ebony clasps-and wine-colored toenails.

After this display, Rubina could have talked about the best formula for glue and still held at least the male portion of her audience. Instead, she bowed her head and said, solemnly:

“May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be pleasing to all gods, and to this honorable company.”

She then launched into a summary of a situation arising in the north that closely concerned her home city of Karthay.

“It will concern all here, and all magic-workers everywhere, before long. For how can we do our work in peace when there is no peace?”

That certainly won Rubina undivided attention. She continued, explaining that the outlaws and pirates of the north coast seemed to be growing in strength under the leadership-or so the tales ran-of a minotaur. They raided ever farther afield, and while moderate in their conduct, had everyone within several days’ ride of the shore looking over his shoulder. They had not taken seriously to piracy on the open sea as yet, but that could well change.

Even before that happened, Istar would surely assemble a fleet and an army to scourge the outlaws. This might seem innocent, even useful, but fleet and army would sit squarely across the mouth of the Bay of Istar from Karthay. No Karthayan ship could move without Istar’s permission, and it would be the easiest thing in the world to blockade Karthay over any slight dispute between the two cities.

“Istar has long been jealous of our prosperous merchants, and seeks to render them less prosperous. The scourge of the outlaws is real enough, but Istar will use it as a pretext for tyranny. And if we of Karthay resist, then the Knights of Solamnia will be bound to march, and the utter ruin of our city must follow.”

From the looks and mutterings Tarothin noticed, not all of those present found the idea of Karthay’s suppression as unpalatable as they ought to. He also hoped Rubina would not notice any of this. Her temper was legendary; unleashing it now would render her cause stillborn.

Tarothin cleared his throat. “If I might take a moment to add my thoughts to the Lady Rubina’s …” He waited a decent interval, then continued.

“Even if the Knights of Solamnia do not find cause to take part in this quarrel, Istar will have to increase its fleet and army. This means higher taxes, empty bellies, and people seeking to blame someone else for that fate. I will not judge either city, but I do call to your minds what has happened in other lands in other times.

“Istar has one great virtue-much of its empire it gained peacefully. What we can do to keep the city on that course in years to come, we should do.”

The response to that bit of common sense was gratifying-a flurry of suggestions, some more practical than others. The arguments were long and loud enough to fill the chamber with echoes, adding to the headache Tarothin had already acquired from the brazier smoke. They ended with an agreement to appoint two people from each of the orders to sit in council on the suggestions, weigh their merits, and propose acting on the best.

Tarothin would have liked more, but he doubted that he was the only one here whose head was splitting and whose stomach was rumbling ominously. For the sake of secrecy, the whole conclave and its chamber had been bound with spells that required fasting, and Tarothin at least had eaten nothing since a dried apple tart just before he went to bed last night.

The conclave had been declared closed, and the wizards were drifting toward one of the four low doors that led out into the underworld of the tower, when Tarothin felt a hand on his arm. He turned to meet Rubina, with a face so lowering and thunderous that for a moment he actually forgot her beauty.

Then awareness of the lustrous black hair and the high cheekbones and full lips returned. So did knowledge that his gesture of support for her had interrupted her speech, perhaps even ended it before she had wished. If she resented that-well, he could plead good intentions, but with either woman or gods, that plea was apt to be rejected.

“My good lady, if anything important was left unsaid because of my eager tongue-”

The thunderclouds blew away, and the huge, dark eyes stared into Tarothin’s with a warmth that, by a strange paradox, sent a chill creeping up his spine. Then Rubina laughed.

“Nothing I could have said was as important as having the conclave take the matter seriously. If it had not been for you, this might never have happened.”

“I am sure someone else would have had the sense to do the same,” Tarothin replied. “Our brothers and sisters sometimes seem witlings, but few of them actually are.”

“Nonetheless, I am grateful. Indeed, my gratitude could extend to dinner in my chambers tonight.”

Tarothin’s mind told his body to cease baying like a hound on the scent, which it seemed about to do. The invitation might have many meanings, most of them innocent, and several outcomes, likewise.

Still, when one looked at Rubina and thought of her chamber, the picture that came to one’s mind was a room largely filled by a gigantic bed, with every comfort ready at hand so that anyone in the bed need not leave it for quite a while.…

Tarothin lifted Rubina’s hands and bowed until he could brush them lightly with his lips. He nearly chipped a tooth on one of her rings-three or four to each hand, he judged-but he was rewarded with a silvery laugh.

“I have nothing to do that could reasonably vie with the pleasure of accepting your invitation,” Tarothin said, trying to assume the accent of a comic actor. This time Rubina’s laugh made him suspect that the gods had not made him for acting.

“I rejoice,” Rubina said, putting an arm briefly around Tarothin’s waist and standing close so that honey breath tickled his ear and played over his cheek and neck. “But now I must leave you, to make my chamber ready for hospitality instead of merely work.”

She seemed to vanish between one breath and the next, and it was a moment before Tarothin realized that while-they talked she had maneuvered him close to one of the doors. She had simply stepped through it the moment her last breath flowed past him-though it was not entirely Tarothin’s imagination that he could still smell her perfume in the air, and under the perfume the essential scent of woman.

What might come of this, Tarothin did not know; he was not even going to waste time guessing. However, there was one stop he would make on his way to Rubina’s chambers.

Jemar the Fair was in port, with three ships, one of them Sea Leopard, whose Mate of the Deck was another old comrade of the quest into Crater Gulf, Grimsoar One-Eye. Grimsoar One-Eye was once comrade in night work with Sir Pirvan the Wayward.

What mortal men could know of matters along the north coast of Istar, Jemar and his men might know-or at least know who did. With Grimsoar helping, Tarothin might even be able to draw on Pirvan’s wits-although as an oath-bound Solamnic Knight, the man could hardly offer more than advice without the permission of his superiors.

Tarothin told himself that he was not seeking all this to raise his standing in Rubina’s eyes and advance himself toward a more agreeable conclusion to the dinner. He was seeking knowledge that might altogether prevent a needless war, or at least turn a large war into a small one. And those who said all wars were evil had never talked to those who lived because someone kept a war small.

For centuries, the world had accepted the reign of Istar because it had brought peace and a fair degree of justice. If this was about to change, by the folly of kingpriests or anyone else, it was not something to endure idly.