The Unwelcome Warlock

Chapter Twenty-Two

Sterren stepped into Warlock House and found half a dozen strangers sitting in the parlor in their nightclothes. They seemed to be deep in discussion, so he decided not to interrupt them, and instead turned right, into the grand dining room. It was empty, but he could hear noise from the kitchen, so he made his way there and found the little redhead – Rudhira, that was it – shelling peas.

“Hello,” he said.

She nodded a silent acknowledgment as she popped open the next pod.

“Who are those people in the parlor?”

She looked up. “Warlocks,” she said. “Or former warlocks, anyway.”

“Why are they here?”

She cocked her head. “You’re asking why warlocks would come to Warlock House?”

Sterren felt momentarily foolish. “Well – yes,” he said.

She set down the bowl of peas and turned to face him. “Because they have nowhere else to go. Most of them were Called on the Night of Madness, and have no homes or families left after thirty-four years. Some were Called later, but still have no homes. So they came here.”

“You let them all in?”

“Hanner did. It’s his house. He told them they could stay until they find places.”

“Stay?”

“He doesn’t want them to have to go to the Hundred-Foot Field.”

Sterren pursed his lips, then asked, “What does the Great Vond think of this?”

“He isn’t back yet.”

“I doubt he’ll approve.”

“You would know better than I.”

“What do you think of it?”

She turned up a palm. “I am here because I had nowhere else to go, and Hanner took me in. How can I object when he offers others the same?”

“Well, you… Aren’t you a friend of his, while they’re strangers?”

“We knew each other for a few days, more than thirty years ago. I have no special claim on his affections.”

Sterren’s eyes narrowed. “I had thought there was rather more than that between you.”

“No,” she said flatly.

Sterren did not argue, but something about her attitude had him wondering whether perhaps she would have preferred there to be more.

“Where is Hanner?” he asked.

“He’s out looking for a wizard he knew seventeen years ago, to find something he left in the wizard’s shop.”

“To find what, exactly?”

“He did not see fit to tell me that.”

“Did you ask?”

She shook her head.

“Why not?”

She glared at him. “I told you,” she said. “I am here on Lord Hanner’s sufferance. I am not in a position to make any demands, for information or anything else.”

Sterren noticed the glare, and the title. “He brought you here, didn’t he? Did you beg him to save you, or did he volunteer?”

“That doesn’t matter,” she said. “I am still a guest.”

There was clearly something going on here between Rudhira and Hanner that Sterren didn’t entirely understand, but it wasn’t any of his business – at least, not unless it upset Vond. Sterren did not pry further.

This did complicate his own plans, though. He had just spent an hour talking to Emmis of Shiphaven, the overlord’s customs inspector responsible for overseeing all traffic between the Vondish Empire and Ethshar of the Spices. It was Emmis’ specific charge to ensure that no forbidden magic was transported from Ethshar to the empire, and most particularly that no warlocks took passage for any of the empire’s eight ports. Sterren had informed Emmis, among other things, that several former warlocks were on their way, and that any who had no family or other accommodations should be sent to Warlock House. Convincing Vond to accept them should not be unreasonably difficult, Sterren had thought, since Vond was the one who had taken them to the empire in the first place.

But that was before Sterren had discovered that Warlock House already had several guests he hadn’t known about. “How many of them are there?” he asked. “I saw five or six in the parlor just now.”

“Oh, it’s more than that,” Rudhira told him. “Twenty or thirty, I think, and I’d wager more are coming.”

“Twenty or thirty? Is there room for so many?”

“When I lived here before, we managed about forty,” she replied. “But that was crowded.”

This was the first Sterren had heard that Rudhira had ever lived here before, but he ignored that for the moment. “There may be others on the way,” he said. “The Great Vond brought some with him to the empire when he came back from Aldagmor, and I believe several of them are on their way here, to rejoin the emperor.”

“It will be crowded,” Rudhira said, reaching for the bowl of peas.

“If it’s too crowded, Vond may decide to do something about it.”

“I suppose he might.” She sighed. “The thing Hanner’s trying to retrieve from that wizard? I don’t know what it is, but it’s supposed to help accommodate some of these homeless warlocks somehow.”

It was reassuring to hear that Hanner was aware of a potential problem and trying to address it, but Sterren would have been happier if he had some idea just what Hanner had in mind. “Those people in the parlor – they seemed pretty intent on something. Do you know what they’re talking about?”

“Last I heard, they were making plans to find a tailor and get some clothes, if they could figure out a way to either pay him or arrange credit.”

Sterren looked at Rudhira’s own attire; she was wearing an embroidered white tunic and a good green skirt, but both had clearly seen better days. “What about you? Do you have any other clothes?”

“None of us do, Sterren,” she said, picking up a pea-pod. “We were Called, and I have never heard of a Called warlock taking the time to pack.” She snapped the pod open, and flicked the peas into the bowl. “I was living here when I was Called, and I’ve already looked – there’s nothing of mine in the closets. I doubt anyone remembers what happened to my clothes after more than thirty years, and I doubt they’d be fit to wear in any case, and really, I wouldn’t want to wear them.”

There was definitely some history here he was missing, Sterren thought.

She tugged at her white silk tunic. “This isn’t really mine,” she said. “Hanner’s uncle kept clothes here for his women, and I borrowed these. All those clothes are gone, too, or hidden away somewhere; except for Zallin’s, the closets and wardrobes are empty. I used money from the Council’s treasury to buy this food, so we would all have something to eat tonight, but I didn’t take any for myself, for clothes or anything else. That’s a matter for another day.”

“I see,” Sterren said. “You’re sure you have no family to help you?”

“I had no family before the Night of Madness. I doubt one magically appeared in my thirty-year absence.”

“Oh.”

Some of these former warlocks probably did have family or friends who would help, and just hadn’t found them yet, but Rudhira was surely not the only one who was genuinely alone in this new World. The magic Hanner had gone to recover might be something that would locate missing relatives, but that wouldn’t take care of everyone.

Vond wasn’t going to like this; Sterren was fairly certain of that. What he would do about it remained to be seen. He had declared himself Chairman of the Council of Warlocks, so he might feel responsible for helping these people – or he might just dump them all in the Hundred-Foot Field.

Or in the harbor.

“Is there any word from Vond or Zallin?” he asked.

Rudhira shook her head.

Sterren wasn’t sure what to make of that. Vond had wanted to look at the city, and see what had or hadn’t changed in his absence, but Sterren had expected him to get bored quickly and come back. That clearly hadn’t happened. He must have found something interesting.

He could be out there somewhere in the midst of a magical duel with witches or wizards, or tearing apart his old neighborhood looking for mementos of his childhood, or plundering the shops on Extravagance Street.

In fact, he could be anywhere – not just anywhere in the city, but anywhere in the World. He might have decided that Zallin made a better aide than Sterren, and flown back to Semma. He might have headed for Tazmor intent on rebuilding the Northern Empire, or out to the edge of the World to take another look at the poisonous yellow mists that lay beyond. Vond could be whimsical, and had the power to do anything he pleased.

This, Sterren thought, might be a good time to disappear into the streets of Ethshar – except that he didn’t know where his own family was. Emmis hadn’t heard anything from them yet. Lar Samber’s son had sent a very brief message, saying he was on his way and would meet with Emmis as soon as he reached the city, but that was the only word Emmis had received from the empire since Vond’s return.

Still, Sterren could find himself a place of his own, rather than staying here with these former warlocks. He could keep in touch with Emmis until Shirrin and the children arrived. Vond didn’t know anything about Emmis, so he couldn’t use that connection to track Sterren down.

In fact, Sterren was beginning to wonder why he had come back here at all. Things were going to get ugly here, one way or another, he was sure. Vond might massacre all these former warlocks, or he might pick a fight with the Wizards’ Guild, or with the city guard. If Vond didn’t start any trouble, the Guild might, or some other magicians – and then there was the Cult of Demerchan. Sterren strongly suspected that Demerchan would try to assassinate the emperor; he had told Emmis as much, and instructed him to cooperate with Demerchan should the opportunity arise. It wasn’t that Sterren especially wanted Vond dead, but he was certain that sooner or later, Vond was either going to kill people or get killed, and Sterren thought it would be better if Vond died without taking anyone else with him. The legends said that Demerchan hardly ever killed or injured anyone other than the intended targets.

“I think I might go out for another walk,” he said.

Rudhira glanced at him, but did not bother to reply before returning to shelling peas. She was almost done.

“If his Majesty asks, I’m not sure when I’ll be back.”

“I doubt the emperor will deign to speak to me,” Rudhira said. “If he does, I’ll tell him that.”

“Thank you,” Sterren said. Then he turned and headed upstairs to get his baggage – or some of it, anyway; he couldn’t carry the trunk by himself, but he could get the rest.

If anyone asked, he told himself, he could say he was going to take a room at an inn to make more space for warlocks. He hoped no one would ask.

At least none of these people would have magic to tell lies from truth; that was a talent found among witches, not warlocks – though wizards and theurgists also had slower, less direct methods of detecting falsehoods.

He remembered that Hanner had said Ithinia didn’t want any more warlocks around, and wondered if she had talked to any witches about it. There were stories about witches being able to partially suppress warlock magic, and even muffle the Calling. In the fifteen years since Vond’s departure Sterren had done quite a bit of quiet research into the nature of warlockry, more for his own sake than because he had ever expected Vond to return, and had heard several accounts of witches interfering with warlockry. Some warlocks had reportedly gone as far as hiring witches to block the Calling, but it had never worked for more than a few days; it was exhausting for the witch, and grew steadily harder over time, so that sooner or later the spell would slip and the warlock would be gone.

Sterren had never had to worry about the Calling; he simply wasn’t that powerful a warlock. He was barely a warlock at all. He had toyed with the idea of hiring witches to see if they could suppress his own ability completely, perhaps reverse what Vond had done to him, but he had never followed through; there were too many risks.

He knew that no witch had ever managed to undo the transformation that made someone a warlock in the first place. Every so often an apprentice warlock would have second thoughts, especially if his master began having the nightmares that were the first real sign of the Call, and want to back out of becoming a warlock, but it couldn’t be done – warlocks couldn’t undo the change without killing the apprentice, witches couldn’t reverse it, wizards’ restorative spells couldn’t touch it. Theurgists said the gods couldn’t even see warlocks, so they couldn’t help.

That was all moot now that there were no more warlocks – or it would be, if not for Vond and his second source.

But witches’ limited ability to suppress warlockry might be useful somehow in dealing with Vond. Ithinia had probably thought of that.

It wasn’t his problem, Sterren reminded himself. He had himself and his family to worry about, and other people could deal with warlocks and witches and empires for now. He slung one bundle on his left shoulder and carried the other in his right hand as he hurried down the stairs and out of Warlock House.

The temperature was dropping, and the sky was gray and threatening; Sterren thought it might rain, or even snow, in another hour or so. He turned west on High Street, heading back toward Emmis’ office in Spicetown, but not before taking a quick glance around. He pretended not to notice the gargoyle perched on the house across the street, a gargoyle that had never been there before. He ignored the spriggan that clung to the iron fence and stared at him. He paid no attention to the shimmer in the air above Warlock House, and in fact, he wasn’t sure just what sort of magic that might be – sorcery, perhaps?

And he genuinely didn’t see the woman who was loitering by the gate. Where it was Sterren’s idea to ignore the other signs of magical attention, it was the woman’s decision not to be seen. She wasn’t actually invisible; rather, she simply made sure that Sterren never quite looked at her. It wasn’t a talent witches bragged about, but it was a useful one, and Teneria of Fishertown was good at it.

If Sterren had seen her, though, he would have been relieved to know that a witch was there, taking an interest. The more other people concerned themselves, the less responsible he felt he needed to be, and he really did not want the responsibility of dealing with Vond.