The Unwilling Warlord

CHAPTER 24

Sterren was uneasy even before he led his victorious little squad into the throne room. They had been kept waiting in the antechamber considerably longer than he had expected. Most of the party had taken it well, after all, the Semmans were used to their king’s foibles, and the others had not known what to expect, but Vond seemed noticeably impatient.

Sterren found that he really did not tike the idea of being around someone as powerful as Vond when he got impatient.

He marched into the throne room neither meekly nor belligerently, but with the best approximation of calm assurance that he could manage, and found Vond on his right hand, sweeping forward a few inches off the floor, while the others straggled along behind rather haphazardly.

As he marched in, while he kept his face turned straight forward toward the king, as protocol demanded, his eyes were flickering back and forth, taking in as much as he could of the people gathered there.

The soldiers who stood in ragged lines on either side mostly looked either bewildered or bored; Sterren suspected that not a one of them really knew what was going on. Behind them, he could see a significant percentage of the castle’s noble population and he tried to read their expressions without letting his own interest show.

He saw a wide variety of emotions, puzzlement, delight, anger, but the dominant reaction to the arrival of Semma’s warlord and his party appeared to be poorly suppressed fear.

That did not bode well.

Remembering the violence of the warlock’s storm, however, Sterren could not say it was an unreasonable reaction.

He spotted the king’s children huddled to the left of the throne; the faces of Lura and Dereth were alight with excitement. Nissitha’s mouth was drawn up in her usual expression of polite distaste.

Shirrin’s expression was unmistakably wide-eyed adoration.

Sterren stopped at the appropriate distance from the throne and bowed.

Vond stopped beside him and condescended to dip his head slightly. Sterren saw this from the corner of his eye and was relieved; it was not a bow, but at least it was something. He had worried that Vond would go out of his way to antagonize Phenvel, with Sterren caught in the middle. Given how frightened most of the Semmans looked, and how easily fear might turn to anger, he very much wanted to avoid any open antagonism.

“So you’re finally back!” the king said, and Sterren’s hope for peace and amity faded.

“We returned as quickly as we could, your Majesty,” he said, his tone as ingratiating as he could manage — which was quite ingratiating indeed — as he had acquired years of practice with creditors and innkeepers. “The wind was not in our favor.” “You had magicians with you, didn’t you?” King Phenvel demanded.

“Only on the way back, your Majesty, and none of them could... could turn the wind,” Sterren explained.

The king stared at him, then snapped, “Are you trying to tell me that little breeze we had today was natural?”

Sterren blinked. “Oh, no, your Majesty,” he said, “That was the... the work of Vond the Warlock.” Sterren gestured at the warlock. “However, it’s a spell he... it’s new, a spell he had not... um, not learned yet during our journey.” He wished he knew Semmat better.

Even what he did know was somewhat rusty, since he had mostly been using Ethsharitic for the last few six-nights, talking far more to the magicians than to Lady Kalira and the three soldiers.

Furthermore, the obvious hostility was making him nervous, so that he was forgetting some of what he did know.

Vond recognized his name and bowed slightly in acknowledgment.

“Ah,” the king said, “so he found some way to study the arcane arts while hiding from the invaders, rather than fighting?”

Sterren was shocked at this snide question, with its implications of cowardice and incompetence. “Your Majesty,” he replied, “Vond defeated the armies of Ophkar and Ksinallion, almost by himself.”

“And took his own sweet time doing it, too! I suppose he thinks he’ll be getting more money out of me by making it look hard, but he won’t, and neither will any of these other sorry specimens you’ve dragged back here. One storm and the enemy ran! The gold and gems I gave you are too generous for such a sorry performance!”

Sterren could think of no reply to this. He did, however, find himself sympathizing with the rulers of Ophkar and Ksinallion who had ordered the invasion.

“Besides,” the king continued, “the war is hardly over merely because we won a battle. I’ll need to send ambassadors to arrange a peace and settle terms, won’t I? If you’d gotten a surrender, instead of a rout, I could have given terms to the warlords and saved some time.”

This hardly struck Sterren as a major problem, but he managed to avoid saying anything disrespectful by saying nothing.

“And furthermore,” the king said, “what about the mess you people left? Half the village is ruined, there’s mud everywhere, and all that wind blew tiles-off half the roofs and took the banners right off the flagpoles. I went up to the tower and looked, and it looks awful! And I don’t suppose any of your magicians would dirty their hands with cleaning it up! No, don’t say anything, warlord, I won’t ask them to; I’ll have my people see to it. You can pay your magicians and send them home now; we won’t be needing them around here any more.”

He waved a dismissal, but Sterren found, to his own astonishment, that he was not willing to be dismissed yet. “Your Majesty,” he said, trying hard not to clench his teeth disrespectfully, “I did not start this stupid war. I ended it, as quickly as I could. I had... had hoped that you would... would show more...” His Semmat failed him completely.

“Gratitude?” Phenvel practically sneered. “Gratitude, for doing the job you were born to? Warlord, if you had fought the enemy properly, with sword and shield, I might be more respectful, but to bring in wizards and witches is hardly a courageous act. It’s the doing of a merchant, not a warlord, and what I expect from someone three-quarters Ethsharitic, not a true Semman at all!”

“Not for me!” Sterren said, outraged, “I don’t want anything for me! For them, the magicians! They left home to come here and fight for you!”

“I didn’t ask for them,” King Phenvel retorted. “And they’ve been paid. And who the hell are they all, anyway? A ragged-looking bunch, I must say!”

Sterren stared at the king’s slippered feet and forced himself to calm down. When he was once again in control of himself, he said, “If I might present them, your Majesty?”

“Go ahead,” the king said, with a nonchalant wave. Sterren gestured to his right. “Vond the Warlock, late of Ethshar of the Spices.” He switched to Ethsharitic and said, “Vond, this is his Majesty, Phenvel, Third of that Name, King of Semma.”

Vond bowed, mockingly.

Sterren ignored the mockery and turned.

“Annara of Crookwall, journeyman wizard,” he said.

Annara curtseyed deeply. The king nodded politely.

“Shenna of Chatna, witch.”

Shenna, too, curtseyed, moving more briskly than gracefully. Her skirt was so thoroughly soaked that this sent a spatter of mud onto courtiers at one side of the hall.

“Chatna,” said the king, “Where is that?”

“In the Small Kingdoms, my lord,” Shenna said, in slurred Semmat, “Just inland of Morria, near the Gulf of the East.”

Sterren was startled, both by this information and by Shenna’s use of Semmat. He had assumed Chatna to be an Ethsharitic village somewhere and he had not realized that Shenna had bothered to pick up any of the local language during her stay in Semma.

Not that she knew it well, since she had used entirely the wrong title.

He gathered his wits quickly and continued with the introductions, hoping that Phenvel would not criticize the error in protocol.

“Ederd of Eastwark, witch. Emner of Lamum, wizard. Hamder Hamder’s son, witch.”

Each bowed in turn.

“Lamum?” Phenvel asked.

“A kingdom on the Eastern Highway, your Majesty,” Sterren replied, before Emner could react, “just across the border from the Hegemony of the Three Ethshars.” He was pleased that he had remembered that bit of trivia.

“Sterren,” Vond said, during the momentary lull while the king absorbed the introductions, “what the hell is going on?”

Sterren ignored him long enough to ask, “Your Majesty, may I translate your words to the magicians? Most of them speak no Semmat.”

Phenvel waved a hand. “Go ahead,” he said.

Sterren turned to Vond and said quickly, “He’s been making an ass of himself, complaining that we took too long to get back here and too long to break the siege and that the storm damaged the castle and he’ll have to have his people clean up the mess it left. I don’t know why he’s in such a foul mood; he’s been gratuitously insulting to all of us, particularly you and me. I think it might be because he’s scared to death of you.”

He noticed that Annara and Emner were listening closely, and added, “He’s probably scared of all of you. Magic is scarce around here.”

“I suppose that means no more pay and no big celebration,” Emner said.

“I’m afraid not,” Sterren agreed.

“Ah,” Vond said, “I’m not really surprised. That’s rather what it sounded like. Has he said what he expects us to do now?”

“He expects you to take your pay and go home. I haven’t yet mentioned that you may not want to.”

The warlock shrugged. “You don’t need to tell him; he’ll see for himself soon enough. Do you think you could arrange us some rooms for the night, though? It’s getting late.”

“I was planning on it; dinner, too.”

“Good.” The wizards nodded agreement, and Sterren turned back to the throne.

“Your Majesty,” he said, “I ask a favor of you. These six magicians have fought for you. Please, give them food and shelter here for a few days, to rest after their efforts. We ask no more than that.”

Relief flashed quickly across the king’s face, then vanished. “Granted,” he said. “We have dined, but I’m sure the kitchens can provide for you, and my chamberlain will find accommodations. You may go.”

Sterren bowed and started to back out. “Wait a minute,” the king said, holding up a hand, “Lady Kalira, didn’t you take six soldiers with you?”

“Yes, your Majesty,” Lady Kalira replied.

“I see only three now and I had asked to see your full party; what happened to the others? Wounded? Killed?”

“Deserted, your Majesty, while we were in Ethshar.”

“Deserted?” King Phenvel said, aghast.

Lady Kalira nodded. Sterren, hearing the king’s tone, wished she had lied a little.

“Warlord, I am not pleased at all. Three desertions!” Actually, he sounded as if he were quite pleased. Sterren guessed that he was happy to have something with which to rebuke his warlord, should the occasion arise.

Sterren started to phrase a reply, then thought better of it. Pointing out that desertion spoke worse of Semma in general than of his performance as warlord would only make trouble. “Yes, your Majesty,” he said. He looked up and met Phenvel’s eyes. He was not ashamed of any part of what he had done. After all, he had won the war, or at least the battle, whatever Phenvel might say.

The king met his gaze for a moment, then turned angrily away. “All right, then, you may go!” Sterren bowed, and he and the magicians went, bound for the kitchens and dinner.

CHAPTER 25

The long climb to his chamber, after the long and bewildering day, was exhausting, and Sterren fell into his bed and lay staring at the canopy for only a moment before falling asleep.

During that moment he thought about the conversation in the kitchens, held as the magicians ate the best meal they had eaten in sixnights.

The kitchens, and for that matter the corridors and halls, were full of peasants who had taken shelter in the castle during the siege, but the magicians had no difficulty in establishing their right to privacy. A wave of Vond’s hand had sent the refugees scurrying, leaving the new arrivals alone.

They had discussed the division of their pay. Everyone conceded that Vond deserved the lion’s share, but the other magicians felt that they, too, had contributed something and that their demoralization of the enemy had made the warlock’s triumph easier.

Vond had said almost nothing during this, but had nodded calm acceptance when Sterren proposed that each of the other five be paid one full gold piece, and that Vond receive the other five and all the gems.

Sterren had gone on to apologize for the poor reception the king had given them, and all six had been wonderfully understanding. Shenna had made a few bitter remarks, but had carefully not directed them at Sterren.

Vond had said nothing, then.

The conversation had shifted to whether or not they should all head directly back to Ethshar. The wizards and witches discussed various ideas without reaching any conclusions.

Vond had stated simply, “I’m staying here,” and said nothing more.

The party had broken up not long after that, and servants had escorted the magicians to rooms in the south wing. Sterren had wearily ascended to his own room in the tower. His last sight of the warlock was not reassuring; Vond was clearly very much awake, unlike the rest of the party, and was looking about intently as he followed the footman down the crowded passage.

Vond’s entire manner worried Sterren, but he was too tired to really think about it. He closed his eyes and slept.

It seemed just a moment later that a distant rumble awoke him. He blinked, and saw sunlight pouring into his chamber, and realized it was midmorning.

The rumble sounded again, and he felt the bed shift slightly beneath him. He realized that bright, unobstructed sunlight was pouring in. The rumble was not thunder.

He sat up, startled.

The rumble sounded again, and despite the trembling of the bed he thought it came from the outside. He slid from the bed and crossed to the window.

The view had changed since last he saw it. The castle roofs were spattered with broken tiles and shards of stone, wood, and tile. The outer houses of the village were gone. The rolling countryside was no longer a neat patchwork of farm and field, sprinkled with houses and barns, but a great expanse of mud and wreckage, strewn with all manner of debris.

And directly before him, a half mile or so away, a black-robed figure was hanging in mid-air, arms spread wide, cloak flapping like wings, and below him the earth itself was splitting open. The sandy mud had washed back to either side, forming a deep pit easily a hundred yards across, and not just the mud, but the clay beneath, down to the hard bedrock.

Then the rumble came again, and as Sterren watched an immense block of that bedrock rose up into the air toward the hovering warlock.

The block was rectangular, and by comparing it to Vond, for the flying man could hardly be anybody else, Sterren judged it to be about ten feet high, fifteen feet long, and five feet thick, give or take a foot or three in any dimension.

The block hovered for a moment, then slid sideways through the air, and dropped to the ground.

The rumble sounded again, and again, and again, and another block lifted into the air, slid sideways, and landed on top of the first. The cutting and lifting went more quickly this time.

A third and a fourth were added to the stack, and the cutting was just beginning on a fifth when someone pounded loudly on the door.

“Lord Sterren?”

Sterren started for the wardrobe, but then realized he had never undressed the night before. He still wore the same tattered and mud-stained garments he had worn through the storm and the audience with the king.

This was not the time to worry about neatness, he decided. He changed direction and crossed to the door.

“Yes?” he called.

“My lord, the king wishes to see you immediately.”

Sterren was not surprised. He opened the door and found himself facing a very worried-looking messenger boy. “I’m here,” he said. “Come on.”

A few minutes later he found himself facing a very worried Phenvel III in the royal family’s private sitting room, the king’s expression an odd contrast to the warm sunlight and bright, cheerful furnishings. The only other people present were the messenger boy and a worried valet. Another rumble ran through the castle as Sterren made his formal bow.

“Warlord,” the king demanded, “what the hell is your magician doing out there?”

“I don’t know, your Majesty.” Sterren would have been far more expressive in Ethsharitic; in Semmat he had to stick to the simple statement of fact.

“Is this something to do with the war?” the king demanded peevishly. “Do you expect another attack? I thought you said the enemy was beaten!”

“I don’t know, your Majesty,” Sterren repeated.

“Why not? He’s your damn wizard!”

“He’s a warlock, your Majesty, not a wizard,” Sterren explained wearily. “I hired him for a job. I don’t own him. He does as he pleases.”

“What in hell is a warlock?”

“He is, your Majesty, a kind of magician unknown here in Semma. Until now.”

“All right, he’s a warlock,” the king said. “What’s he doing?”

“I don’t know, your Majesty,” Sterren admitted. “Well, damn it, go find out!” The note of fear in King Phenvel’s voice was obvious.

Sterren bowed. “As your Majesty wishes,” he said. He departed quickly, before the king could change his mind or impose stupid conditions. He was curious himself.

He did not bother with any sort of preparations or cleaning up; he marched directly from the royal apartments out of the castle, ignoring the peasants huddled asleep on the corridor floor, pausing only to ask the man at the gate, “Did the black-robed magician come through here?”

“No, my lord,” came the reply. “He flew over the north wall.”

Sterren nodded and marched on.

The outside air was cool, but wonderfully fresh and clean. The ruined market at the castle gate, however, was not clean at all.

Traveling by air, he quickly concluded, was a major advantage. As he picked his way through the wreckage of the village he wondered how he and his party had ever gotten to the castle gate without so much as tripping over a broken beam.

Then he realized that Vond had been with them, more or less leading the way. He had undoubtedly cleared a path. Sterren had been following an old road, but now he stopped and looked around.

Sure enough, a path had been cut directly through the village, straighter than any street there had ever been, from the gate out toward the farm where he and Vond had climbed the rooftop to spy on the Ksinallionese trebuchet. He clambered across a smashed pottery shop to reach it, then followed it easily out into the open fields beyond.

Once clear of the ruins of the village, he turned north and headed toward Vond, who was still hanging in the sky, stacking up immense blocks of stone.

A bird sang cheerily somewhere nearby, and a gentle breeze rumpled Sterren’s hair as he walked.

He was perhaps halfway to the edge of Vond’s pit when the warlock stopped cutting slabs and turned to a low rise nearby, not that there were any real hills, other than the one covered by Semma Castle; this little bump in the ground was one of the higher elevations in the area. It also had the distinction of somehow having avoided being churned into mud by armies and storms; the top of it still bore a large patch of brown grass.

With a deeper, louder rumble than any that had come before, the top of the hillock lifted up and flattened out. The rumble continued for several minutes, and the ground shook wildly; Sterren stumbled and fell to all fours. The birdsong stopped abruptly.

He watched and realized that Vond was filling in underneath the patch of grass, pulling soil and rock from all sides, and building himself a rectangular mound of earth with the grassy area on top.

It took several minutes; then, abruptly, the rumbling and shaking stopped. The rectangular mound stood like a giant block.

Vond eyed the mound critically and then made a few adjustments, hauling tons upon tons of rock and sand to prop this corner or that edge up a little farther.

That done, he then leveled out the area around his raised rectangle until it was as smooth as a well-laid floor for at least fifty feet on all sides.

Sterren watched this without moving.

When the warlock was satisfied, the slabs of stone that he had quarried earlier began lifting from their piles and drifting over to the mound, settling in on all sides, walling it in with solid stone.

Sterren stood and marched on as this proceeded. He got within shouting distance within another few minutes, but merely stopped and watched at first.

The stone slabs were being set upright against the sides of the mound, then pressed in at the base until they stood exactly vertical. When one was in place, the next would fly over to join it. Sterren could not be sure, he was still a couple of hundred feet away, but it appeared that the seams between stones were somehow being welded shut, so that the rectangular mound was soon surrounded by what amounted to a single solid piece of rock.

When that casing was done, more slabs were laid horizontally around the outside, their inner edges butted up flush against the base of the retaining wall.

The operation was thunderously loud, of course; anything that slapped tons of stone about like building blocks had to be. During a lull, however, when the next slab was just beginning its flight toward the construction site, Sterren called, “Hai! Vond! Hello!”

Vond glanced over, saw him, and waved.

Sterren waved back.

Vond held up a hand, signaling Sterren to wait. The slab continued along its path, fell in neatly next to its predecessor with a resounding crash, and then with much grinding and hissing was pushed tightly into place against the wall.

That done, the warlock dropped from the sky until he hung a foot or so off the ground, five feet in front of Sterren.

“Good morning,” Sterren said.

Vond nodded a polite greeting.

“Pardon me for asking so bluntly,” Sterren said, “but what are you doing?”

“I’m building a palace,” Vond replied.

Sterren looked at the stone construction. “A palace?” he asked.

Vond turned and followed his gaze.

“Well,” he admitted, “it doesn’t look like much yet, but I’ve just started. I want it on a hilltop, but there aren’t any around here, so I’m going to build my own. It seemed stupid to build a hill, and then dig half of it back out for the crypts, so I’m building the crypts now and then I’ll put the hill up around them.”

“Oh,” Sterren said, “Oh, I see; that piece in the middle, the rectangle with the grass on top, that’ll be a courtyard, right?”

“Yes, exactly!” Vond smiled broadly.

“And you’ll have cellars on all four sides, and then the palace on top of the cellars, and then you’ll pile up the dirt and put a hill around the whole thing?”

“Yes, exactly!” Vond repeated. “What do you think?”

“Seems like a lot of work,” Sterren said.

“Oh, no,” Vond protested, “it’s fun! After all, I’m a warlock; the more magic I use, the better I feel. It’s not like other magics that tire people out, or like ordinary work; it’s invigorating! And I’m pretty much all-powerful now, you know.”

Sterren nodded. “Ah... I don’t know if it’s any of my business,” he said after a moment’s hesitation, “but I don’t know how well this is going to go over with the local people around here. After all, you’re tearing up several small farms here, and I don’t suppose that the peasants who lived here are gone for good. Most of them probably just ran to the castle, or to some relative’s house, and will be back as soon as they hear that the war’s over; and they’re likely to be pretty upset about this.”

Vond shrugged. “Too bad,” he said. “What can they do about it?”

Sterren blinked at this callousness and said, “You’re still mortal, aren’t you? Somebody might put a knife in your back.”

“Ha!” Vond said derisively. “Let them try! Don’t worry about me, Sterren. It’ll take more than any of these barbarians can do to kill me.”

“You’re sure of that?” Sterren asked, genuinely curious.

“Oh, yes,” the warlock replied confidently.

Sterren looked over the beginnings of Vond’s palace and remarked, “I don’t suppose old King Phenvel is going to like this much, either.”

“I don’t expect him to,” Vond retorted. “That’s why I’m doing it, well, one reason, anyway.”

“What’s another?”

Vond grinned. “For one thing, it’s fun! Haven’t you always wanted to live in a palace and have everything at your beck and call? I have, and now I can! Warlockry’s just about limitless, you know; nobody’s ever found anything it can’t do. It’s just that we’ve all always been so scared to use it, because of the nightmares and the whispering and the Calling. Well, here, I don’t have to worry about those! I have the power without the limits! Old King Phenvel can go bugger a goat, for all I care. I can do anything I want to here, and there isn’t a damn thing he can do about it.”

“For your sake, I hope you’re right,” Sterren said. “I’d feel awful if you got killed because I brought you here and you misjudged the situation.”

“I haven’t misjudged anything! It’s that old fool of a king who misjudged, telling me to take my lousy jewelry and go home. You know why I want a hill, Sterren? So it’ll be higher than his. I could have taken his castle away from him, and I might do it yet, if he goes on bothering me, but I thought it would be more fun to just outshine him completely, build a palace bigger and higher and more beautiful than his castle ever was. After all, his is something of a dump, really, sloppy and crowded and not much to look at.”

Sterren nodded. “I can understand being annoyed at him,” he agreed. “But don’t you think you’re overreacting?”

Vond considered this for a few seconds, then said, “No. I mean, if it weren’t going to be fun, that would be different. It’s not as if I have anything better to do, or anywhere else to go. I’m stuck here and I might as well make the best of it. Getting back at Phenvel for being such a fool is just a little extra, not the real reason.”

“I can see that,” Sterren admitted. He hesitated, then asked, “What do you plan to do when the palace is finished?”

“Live in it, of course.”

“I mean, do you have any long-range plans?”

Vond shrugged. “I hadn’t decided. I expect to collect a few concubines, spend some time decorating the palace, collecting treasures to go in it, that sort of thing.”

“I see,” Sterren said. He hesitated, and then plunged on. “So, at least so far, you weren’t planning to conquer Semma, or anything like that?” He hoped fervently that he hadn’t just presented Vond with an appealing idea.

No, he decided, he was certain that anyone in Vond’s position would have thought of it already.

Vond laughed. “Don’t be silly,” he said. “I’ve already conquered Semma. They just don’t know it yet!”

CHAPTER 26

Sterren stayed and chatted with Vond for several more minutes, but he could see that the warlock was eager to get back to his palace-building and he knew that the king would be growing ever more impatient.

He was not looking forward to facing King Phenvel, but he knew he would have to, sooner or later, and he decided he might as well get it over with. He told Vond farewell and started back toward the castle.

He had gone scarcely a dozen steps when he paused and considered.

Did he really have to go back to the castle at all? Couldn’t he just turn and head overland to Akalla, back home to Ethshar? After all, if Vond had conquered Semma, then presumably he was no longer the hereditary warlord, and King Phenvel no longer had any authority over him, or anybody else, for that matter.

It occurred to him for the very first time that royal power and authority were simply a matter of belief, of common consent to an arrangement. There was nothing inherent in Phenvel of Semma that gave him the power of life and death over his subjects; that power existed only because the people of Semma believed it existed. His castle guards and his courtiers obeyed him because they believed he was the rightful ruler of the land, and others obeyed because those guards and courtiers enforced his wishes.

If the guards ever decided that Phenvel was just a crazy old man, then he would be just a crazy old man.

Vond’s power, on the other hand, was quite real. He might not have any hereditary title or special cachet of authority, but he could easily make anyone obey him by using his warlockry. He needed no guards or courtiers. When he said that he had already conquered Semma, Sterren could accept that, who could defy him?

And wasn’t that the true definition of power? Vond could do anything he pleased, and no one could prevent it. Phenvel could do what he pleased only so long as people believed in his authority as king.

Vond’s power seemed much more substantial.

This, Sterren guessed, would soon make the warlock’s conquest an accepted fact. Phenvel had offended Vond, and now Vond was making plain just who really held power in Semma. Surely, Phenvel’s power would collapse quickly once it became obvious that he could do nothing against Vond. His authority would be destroyed, and the whole elaborate structure of hereditary nobility would undoubtedly collapse with it.

Sterren would no longer be warlord.

He could just turn, now, and go home.

But on the other hand, it was a long trip, and he was in no particular hurry. The situation in Semma had gotten very interesting, and he was curious about how it would turn out.

He was interested, also, in what might befall some of the people in the area.

He walked on, toward the castle.

The gatekeeper let him in without discussion, and he headed directly for the royal apartments.

He was admitted immediately. Queen Ashassa and the two younger princesses had joined the king; Princess Lura grinned at him, and even Princess Shirrin managed a tentative smile.

The instant Sterren had completed his formal bow King Phenvel demanded, “Well? What’s he doing out there?”

“He says he’s making a castle, your Majesty,” Sterren replied. He did not know the Semmat for “palace,” and was unsure what other verb might be most suitable for “building.”

“Making a castle?” Queen Ashassa asked, puzzled. “Yes, your Majesty,” Sterren said.

“What do you mean, making a castle?” the king demanded.

“I mean, your Majesty, that he is taking stones, very large stones, and putting them together into a... a castle. I don’t know the right words to make it clearer.”

“A real castle, or just an image of some kind, a model?”

“A real castle, your Majesty. He says he will live in it.”

“That’s ridiculous. This is Semma Castle, and I am king! No one else may build a castle in my realm!” Sterren did not waste time answering that. “Go tell him to stop!” the king demanded.

Sterren hesitated. “I can tell him,” he said. “But he won’t stop.”

“Well, make him stop! This is all your fault, after all; you’re the one who brought all these infernal magicians here! We’ve never needed a lot of fancy magicians in Semma, and we got along just fine until you brought this whatever-it-is who’s not a wizard here!”

“Your Majesty, your army was... the enemy had at least three men to each one of yours. Magic was...”

“Oh, stop arguing! You go tell him to stop what he’s doing and put everything back the way it was!”

“Your Majesty-”

“Go! Do it!”

Sterren went.

He nodded politely to the man at the gate and followed the clear path through the ruined village once again.

Vond saw him coming.

“Oh, hello,” he said, “I didn’t expect you back so soon.”

Sterren shrugged as he looked over the half-built crypts. “The king sent me,” he said. He strolled out onto one of the stone slabs.

“Oh?” Vond said.

“Yes. He wants you to stop what you’re doing and put everything back the way it was.”

“I daresay he does.”

“He ordered me to come tell you to stop.”

Vond nodded. “Go ahead, then.”

“In the name of Phenvel, King of Semma, stop building your palace and put everything back the way it was!”

“No. You can go back and give him that answer. Was there anything else?”

“Not from him. I was wondering, though, don’t you think it might get rather lonely, out here in this palace?” He waved at the cellars, which now covered a wide area around the “courtyard” and had a partially completed outer wall around most of two sides.

Vond looked down at his elaborate stone box.

“Maybe at first,” he admitted. “A little. But I expect other warlocks will come along, once word gets out about the new source of power here.”

“You expect word to get out?”

Vond looked momentarily disconcerted for the first time since he drove off the invading armies.

“Of course,” he said, “but if it doesn’t, I’ll send messengers back to Ethshar. You know, I hadn’t thought about that, we’re really way out here in the middle of nowhere, aren’t we?”

Sterren nodded. “If you go up about a hundred feet and look over that way,” he said, pointing south, “you ought to be able to see the edge of the World.”

Vond sighed. “I’ve always lived in Ethshar, back in the middle of things, where you can’t keep a secret if you try. I hadn’t thought about how the news would spread; I just took it for granted.”

“I don’t think you can, here.”

“Well, I’ll send messengers. I expect people will notice when I start building an empire, in any case.”

“Oh,” Sterren asked, “are you planning to build an empire?”

“Oh, I think so,” Vond said. “Isn’t it sort of traditional, for conquerors? Besides, Semma is so tiny! If I want to put together a decent harem I need more to choose from, for one thing!”

“What did you have in mind?” Sterren asked cautiously.

“Well, to start,” Vond said, “I was planning to conquer Ophkar and Ksinallion; that should be easy enough, since I’ve already routed their armies. After that, I thought I’d see how far I could go before I start to hear that whisper out of Aldagmor again. I’m not stupid, Sterren; I won’t be sailing off to Ethshar where the nightmares will get me. Even so, I ought to be able to put together half a dozen of these silly little kingdoms, don’t you think?”

Sterren had to concede that the warlock probably could, indeed, rule everything in the area. After all, he had lost contact with Aldagmor and started getting his headaches back in Akalla, which meant that Akalla, Skaia, Ophkar, and Semma would almost certainly be well within his grasp, and probably Ksinallion and several other kingdoms as well.

Not that any of those kingdoms amounted to much of anything.

“And you don’t think you’ll get lonely, or bored?” he asked.

“Why should I?” Vond snapped. “I can have as many people around as I want, just by ordering it! And beautiful women, there must be some, even here. Men in power always attract beautiful women.”

“But they’ll all be scared of you. You won’t have anyone you can talk to just casually, as an equal, or even near-equal. And what will you do with this empire?”

“I’ll just sit back and enjoy it, or course! I’ll live the good life. And other warlocks will hear about it and will come to live here; I’ll have my own court, and all the nobles will be warlocks, and we’ll rule because we deserve to, not because we were born lucky.”

“What if one of these other warlocks gets ambitious and decides to take over, though?”

Vond shook his head. “It can’t happen; I thought of that. But I got here first, so I’ll always be the most powerful, as long as I keep using magic. Look I was almost as powerful as a warlock could ever get, back in Ethshar. I had the nightmares pretty badly. If I’d done one or two more big magics, I’d have heard the Calling and gone north. So nobody is going to arrive here any more powerful than I was when I got here. And nobody will have any special way to overtake me, because warlockry doesn’t work that way. You get more power by using power, and you can only use it so fast. As long as I keep working magic, I’ll always be more powerful than anyone who comes after me. You see?”

Sterren did see and said so.

Vond nodded. “So,” he said, “My empire will be a haven for warlocks, when they start worrying about the Calling, they’ll pack up and come here, where they can safely use all the magic they want.”

Sterren could see how this might, in fact, happen. He could see how it would be very pleasant indeed for warlocks.

He could also see how it might be very unpleasant for everybody else. Magicians elsewhere always kept each other in check, or were kept in check by natural limits on their magic. Witches and seers and sorcerers and a variety of other magicians generally had only very limited abilities. Demonology was risky, and ever more risky as it got more powerful, since demons couldn’t be trusted. Theurgy was limited by the gods’ unwillingness to interfere with the World beyond a certain level. Wizardry, well, Sterren didn’t really know what kept wizards from getting out of hand, unless it was rivalry with other wizards, or something about the seemingly chaotic way wizardry worked, or maybe just the difficulty of acquiring the bizarre ingredients they needed for their spells.

Warlockry had always been kept in check by the Calling. Now Vond had found a way around that, or at least he thought he had.

Sterren suspected that Vond was being overly optimistic about that, but in light of his announced plans to build an empire, mentioning this seemed to be a mistake.

He wondered what the other sorts of magicians might think about all this. Might the rumored-to-exist Wizards’ Guild resent the presumption of a warlock establishing an empire?

They very well might, Sterren thought, and he almost said as much to Vond, but then he caught himself.

Why should he do Vond any favors? The man was about to enslave an entire section of the Small Kingdoms to avenge a slight from a foolish old man, and for the fun of it. It was true that he and Sterren had been comrades in arms, as it were, but that hardly took precedence over a common decency.

But on the other hand, would Vond be any worse than Phenvel? He might turn out to be a perfectly adequate ruler.

Sterren had no way of knowing. He decided to wait and see. Meanwhile, he would keep any possible threats to Vond’s usurped authority to himself, in case he needed them later. That included both the Wizards’ Guild and what Sterren thought was a basic flaw in Vond’s logic about his safety from the Calling. For one thing, he could not be completely certain that either threat really existed.

“Hai, Sterren!” Vond called. “Did you fall asleep or something?”

Sterren realized that he had been standing motionless, absorbed in thought, for several seconds. “No,” he called. “Just thinking.”

“About what?”

“Oh,” he said evasively, “what an empire of warlocks would be like.”

“Well,” Vond replied, “I hope you’ll stay around and find out! I owe you a favor, Sterren, for bringing me here. You treated me well and fairly, and it was your suggestion that helped me tap into the new source. Oh, I think I might have latched onto it eventually by myself, but you made it easier. You know, you’ve got a tiny bit of warlockry yourself; you could be one of the rulers of the empire!”

Sterren shook his head. “I don’t have any warlockry. Not here, anyway.”

“It’s there, Sterren, it’s just attuned to the Aldagmor Source, not the new one. I can fix that. I can let you hear the new one, at least as well as you ever heard the Aldagmor one.”

“I doubt that. I’ve got no aptitude for it.”

“Don’t be silly; you lived off it for years, didn’t you?”

“I never affected anything but dice and I didn’t even know I was doing that! Some magic!”

“But it should be different here; after all, I think we’re only ten leagues from the source itself.”

That caught Sterren’s interest. “Ten leagues?”

“I think so; I can feel it, you know, and sort of measure... there aren’t words for it in Ethsharitic. We warlocks haven’t worked them out yet. But yes, I’m pretty certain the source is ten leagues that way.” He pointed to the northwest; Sterren noted the exact direction as carefully as he could, for future reference.

“Ten leagues or a hundred,” he said, “I don’t think I’ll ever be much of a warlock.”

“Don’t argue with me!” Vond snapped. He gestured at Sterren, and Sterren blinked.

Something had happened; he could feel it in the back of his head.

“There!” Vond said, “I’ve adjusted your brain a little; now you can hear the new source!”

“I don’t hear anything,” Sterren said.

“I don’t mean hear, with your ears! I mean you’re a warlock. You can draw power from it. Here, catch this without touching it!”

Vond pulled a clear, shiny object object from the air in front of him and tossed it at Sterren.

Sterren threw up his hands to ward it off, and at the same time, in the back of his mind, thought to himself that maybe he was a warlock, maybe he could catch it, control it as if it were the dice he had guided back in Ethshar. He tried to think of it that way, to imagine what it would feel like to move something without touching it.

Then the little sphere shattered on the stone at his feet.

He looked down, bent over, and picked up a sliver. It was ice; it melted away in his hand.

“I tried,” he said.

Vond was glaring at him in disgust. “I know you did. I felt it. And I guess you were right; you’re no warlock!”

“Where did you get the ice?” Sterren asked, looking at the water on his fingers.

“I pulled it out of the air; it’s easy, for a real warlock.”

“Oh,” Sterren said, oddly impressed. He had seen Vond cutting out huge slabs of bedrock without tools, but somehow pulling ice out of the air seemed even more unnatural. “Can you do it again?”

“Of course I can!” Vond said, clearly affronted.

“I only meant-” Sterren began.

“Oh, go away!” Vond snapped. “I’m tired of all your questions and I’ve got a palace to build. Go tell those people in that castle that I’m in charge now and when finish the palace I’ll tell them what I want from them.”

Sterren started to say something and thought better of it.

CHAPTER 27

“I wouldn’t worry too much,” Sterren said. Princess Shirrin blinked at him. She and her father were the only two Semmans present; the queen and Princess Lura had gone elsewhere, and at the moment the servants all happened to be out of the room.

“Oh, you wouldn’t, would you?” said King Phenvel. “No, I wouldn’t,” Sterren repeated. “You can’t do anything about him. You’re just going to have to live with it. He’s not... not...” Sterren groped unsuccessfully for a Semmat word approximating “malicious,” and gave up. “If you don’t anger him,” he said, “he won’t hurt anybody.”

“But he’s a usurper, a traitor!” the king shouted.

Sterren shrugged. He didn’t consider it treason, since Vond was Ethsharitic, but he had to admit that the term “usurper” was accurate enough.

“All right, warlord,” King Phenvel said. “If you were king of Semma, how would you deal with him?”

“I’d surrender,” Sterren said immediately. He didn’t know the word for “abdicate.”

Shirrin let out a little squeak of dismay, which the two men ignored.

Sterren didn’t point out that if he were king of Semma, he would abdicate in any case, regardless of whether or not an all-powerful warlock were causing trouble. Being king did not look like an enjoyable occupation.

“Oh, go away,” Phenvel growled.

Sterren bowed and retreated.

With his duty fulfilled for the moment, he headed directly for the kitchens; he had not yet broken his fast, and his stomach was beginning to cramp with hunger.

He was not particularly surprised to find the two wizards and three witches already there, seated along the benches around two sides of a low table. The presence of Princess Lura, perched atop a high stool, was somewhat less expected, but not a great shock.

He greeted them all politely and then asked one of the cooks’ helpers to find him something. “A stale bun, a lightly chewed bone, whatever comes to hand.”

She laughed. “Don’t worry, my lord, we can always see what the dogs wouldn’t finish!”

“Oh, excellent! Do that, please!”

The servant hurried off, and Sterren settled onto a chair near a large chopping block that could serve him as a table, facing the others.

“Hello, Lord Sterren,” Princess Lura said. “What’s your crazy magician doing?”

“Oh, I don’t think he’s crazy,” Sterren replied.

“What is he doing?” Shenna asked, in Ethsharitic. “I woke early this morning, but he was already up and gone. I’m not sure he slept at all.”

“I’ve heard warlocks don’t need much sleep,” Emner remarked.

“Speak Semmat!” Lura demanded, in Semmat.

“I’ll translate anything important,” Shenna promised, in lightly accented Semmat better than Sterren’s own. “And if I don’t, then Hamder or Ederd or Sterren will. But Annara and Emner here don’t know any Semmat.”

“Well, I don’t know any Ethsharitic, and this is my daddy’s castle!”

“But we’re not talking to your daddy; we’re talking to each other,” Shenna pointed out. “I promise, Lura, I’ll translate.”

“That’s your Highness Princess Lura, to you,” Lura corrected grumpily.

Sterren looked at Lura for a moment, trying to decide whether he should say anything, and decided he shouldn’t.

“Well?” Emner asked, using the Ethsharitic word.

“He’s building a palace,” Sterren said in his native tongue. “He’s appointed himself dictator of Semma and plans to build an empire run by warlocks.”

Shenna hesitated, then translated this to Lura as, “The crazy magician is building a palace so he can be a king, too.”

“Why would he want to do that?” the princess demanded.

Sterren answered in Semmat, “He thinks your father wasn’t very nice to him.”

Princess Lura looked baffled. “But Daddy is rotten to everybody.” “I know that,” Sterren said, “but Vond isn’t used to it. His feelings were hurt.”

“That’s pretty silly,” Lura declared.

Sterren shrugged. “I guess so,” he said.

“What was that about?” Annara asked, in Ethsharitic.

Sterren sighed. He saw the kitchen maid approaching with a well-stocked platter, despite the threats, it was heavily loaded with dried fruit, slices of mutton left from breakfast, and assorted breads, and decided he didn’t want to deal with explanations just then. “Look,” he said in Ethsharitic, “I want to eat something, but I get confused dealing with two different languages. Could you people wait a while?” He switched to Semmat and said, “I want to eat now. Your Highness, could I come to your family quarters later and answer your questions then?”

The little princess looked at Sterren, then around at the magicians. “Oh, all right,” she said. She slid from her perch and stalked off.

Sterren and the five magicians managed not to laugh at her retreating figure. The warlord made it a little easier for himself by stuffing a pastry in his mouth; he found it hard to laugh with a mouthful of flaky crust.

When Princess Lura was safely out of earshot and the edge had been taken off his hunger, Sterren leaned back in his chair and began talking, answering the magicians’ questions.

With a little prompting, he explained about warlockry; of the five, only Ederd knew anything about it at all. He described what was known of the Aldagmor Source, and the Calling, and Vond’s discovery of a secondary source ten leagues to the northwest of Semma, and he reported what Vond had said of his intentions. When he had finished, the five looked at one another.

“I think I’ll go home,” Shenna said. “It doesn’t look that safe around here.” Hamder nodded in agreement.

“I must admit that if warlocks are going to be running things around here, they won’t have much use for witches,” Ederd agreed. “But I think I’d like to stay for a little while and see what develops.”

Sterren nodded approvingly. His own attitude was very similar.

“Suit yourself,” Hamder said. “I’m going home.”

“Me, too,” said Shenna.

Emner and Annara were obviously uncertain of their plans. They were eyeing each other doubtfully.

“One of us should stay to keep an eye on things, I think,” Emner said at last. “And the other should go contact a Guildmaster.”

Annara nodded. “You better go,” she said. “I don’t know any Guildmasters.”

“I’m not sure I do, any more,” Emner said.

“Well, you go, anyway,” Annara insisted.

Emner nodded.

“What’s this about Guildmasters?” Sterren asked. Annara and Emner exchanged quick glances.

Emner cleared his throat. “I suppose you’ve heard of the Wizards’ Guild,” he said.

Sterren nodded.

“Well,” Emner explained, “Guildmasters are the officers of the Wizards’ Guild. This is all more or less secret, you understand, but it’s not one of the big secrets; we won’t be punished for telling you.”

“You think your Guild will want to do something about this?” Sterren asked. He hoped for some facts to back up his earlier theorizing.

Emner spread his palms. “Who knows? They might, though, and if we didn’t tell them about it, and they found out later, it wouldn’t do our standing any good, that’s certain.”

“They probably won’t do anything,” Annara said. “They generally don’t like to interfere with nonwizards. But they like to know what’s going on. And sometimes they do intervene, eventually. Usually they wait a minimum of ten years, to see what’s going to happen. The Guild has been around a long, long time and it’s a pretty patient organization.”

“How do you know all this?” Hamder asked.

“We’re members of the Guild, of course,” Emner said. “You can’t be a wizard if you don’t join. They kill anyone who tries, usually in some spectacularly horrible way.”

“How do you join?” Hamder persisted.

“When you sign on as apprentice, you’re initiated into the Guild before you’re taught your first spell,” Annara explained. “All through your apprenticeship, you’ll get lessons about the Guild, as well as about wizardry itself. Not that they really tell you much. How the Guild actually works is all secret. There are Guildmasters, and there are rumors of an Inner Circle within the Guildmasters, but we don’t... well, at least I don’t know whether there’s really an Inner Circle, or who gets chosen to be a Guildmaster, or anything else about how the Guild operates. I just know that if you break a Guild rule, you die, and I know what the Guild rules are, and what I can and can’t tell outsiders.”

Emner nodded. “It was the same for me,” he said. “Even though my master’s old master was a Guildmaster himself, until he died.”

“So you intend to inform the Wizards’ Guild of Vond’s plans,” Sterren said. “Then what?”

Emner and Annara exchanged glances. “Then I go home,” Emner said, “if the Guild will let me. And I’ll buy a dream-spell or a messenger-spell and let Annara know what the Guild wants her to do, if anything, if they haven’t sent a message already.”

“And what will the Guild do?”

“I have no idea,” Emner said.

“Most likely,” Annara said, “they’ll argue for several months, maybe years, and give the problem time to either go away by itself or develop into something serious. My master always said that was how they worked.”

Emner nodded. “My master never said, but it sounds right.”

Sterren turned to Ederd. “Is there a Witches’ Guild?” The three witches exchanged glances. “Not really,” Shenna said. “There are two rather loose organizations, the Brotherhood and the Sisterhood, but they’re nothing like what Annara described. At least, the Sisterhood isn’t. I never joined either one, but I was invited by the Sisterhood once. I turned it down; I didn’t like the rules. They swap spells and recipes, and talk shop a lot, and they have an emergency fund for when a member’s in trouble; but they’ve got a lot of regulations about not competing with each other and not keeping secrets from the group and a whole bunch of other stuff that I didn’t want to put up with.”

“The Brotherhood’s even looser,” Ederd said. “I was a member for a year, but I got tired of paying dues for nothing and I quit.”

“I never even heard of it,” Hamder said.

Ederd looked at him curiously. “Your master never mentioned it?”

“No, she didn’t,” Hamder said, glaring back.

“Is there a Warlocks’ Guild?” Shenna asked. “You seem to know a lot about them, Sterren.”

“I failed an apprenticeship,” he said. “If there is a guild, I didn’t get far enough to find out about it. I don’t think there is, though; warlocks tend to be pretty antisocial. And they don’t have the history wizards and witches do; they haven’t even lasted twenty years yet.”

“I wonder about the sorcerers?” Hamder said.

“And the theurgists?” Annara added.

“You could ask Agor about them,” Sterren said.

“He’s a theurgist here in Semma, though he isn’t a very good one.”

“I’ll do that,” Annara said. “Where do I find him? I think I’d like to talk to him about all this and see what he thinks we ought to do about Vond out there.”

Ederd nodded agreement. “Good idea.”

Sterren shrugged. “I can show you his room, but there’s no hurry.”

“Speak for yourself,” Hamder retorted. “I intend to get out of here today, in case somebody gets Vond mad and he decides to squash this whole castle.”

“Me, too,” Shenna said.

“I don’t think he’ll do anything like that,” Sterren said.

“All the same,” Emner said, getting to his feet, “the three of us who are going probably ought to go, without wasting any more time. If you don’t mind, Sterren, I’m going to go pack my things.” He turned to Annara. “I have that spell you wanted written out; I’ll trade it for the Explosive Seal any time it’s ready.”

“I don’t know how to put all of it in writing; I’d better come show you,” Annara said. She rose, and together the two wizards departed.

“Excuse me, my lord,” Hamder said as he, too, stood up, “but I think the wizard’s right. I’ll go pack.”

Shenna just nodded without saying anything, as she and Hamder left.

That left just Sterren and Ederd.

“Well,” Ederd said, “I suppose I’ll go look around the castle, see if I can find a window with a good view of the warlock’s palace, and let you eat in peace.” He rose.

Sterren nodded. “If you like climbing stairs, my chamber in the tower has a great view. Tell the guards I said you could go in.”

Ederd bowed and left.

Sterren ate.

CHAPTER 28

“Ten leagues to the northwest, you say?” Sterren nodded. Queen Ashassa looked thoughtful. “That would be Lumeth of the Towers,” she said. “Perhaps near the Towers themselves.”

“Maybe it is the Towers!” Princess Lura said. The queen nodded. “Maybe it is,” she agreed. “Certainly, nobody knows what they’re for, and generating this magic you describe seems as likely an explanation as any.”

Sterren glanced at Nissitha and Shirrin, but as usual, they said nothing. Nissitha stared at him disdainfully, and Shirrin, whenever she saw him look in her direction, looked quickly away. The adoration he had seen so often in her face seemed to be gone, now, replaced by a ferocious disappointment.

Prince Dereth, age eleven, watched carefully, but said little beyond occasional expressions of wonder.

Nobody replied to the queen’s comment, and when the silence began to lengthen uncomfortably, Sterren asked, “Is there anything else, your Majesty?”

“Just this, Lord Sterren. You know this man Vond and you know something of his magic. What would you advise us to do?”

Sterren frowned slightly. He could only give one answer, but he knew it was not one that the queen would like.

“Nothing,” he said. He would have liked to have said more, explaining his reasons, but the effort of making himself understood in Semmat was too much. He had been talking all morning, save when he was walking back and forth between the castle and Vond’s building site, and he was tired of it. He left his answer a single word.

“You think he could defeat our entire army, if you marched against him?”

“Yes, your Majesty, easily.” Sterren did not bother to point out that the warlock had already defeated the much larger armies of Ophkar and Ksinallion; the queen knew that.

Ashassa eyed him for a moment, then nodded slightly.

“All right, Lord Sterren,” she said, “you may go.”

“Thank you, your Majesty.” He rose, bowed, and backed out of the room.

Once in the corridor he paused, unsure where to go. The three departing magicians might well have already left, and he had no idea where to find Annara or Ederd, unless Annara had tracked down Agor, in which case she might not appreciate any interruptions. The climb back to his own room was too much to face immediately.

Well, there were always his duties as warlord; he had not seen anything of his troops since returning from Ethshar save vague shapes moving on distant battlements, or guards at various doors. He headed for the barracks.

As he walked, he reviewed his own thoughts about Vond and the unexpected turn of recent events. He had not had a chance to sit down and think about it, but in the course of the morning’s several discussions, he had reached several conclusions.

The warlock’s plans had several good points to them, in truth. Uniting several of the Small Kingdoms and putting an end to their stupid little wars would hardly hurt anyone or anything except the egos of the conquered rulers. Most of the people affected would be peasants, who would acquire a new ruler and who would no longer have to worry about having their farms looted and burned and their wives and daughters assaulted by invading soldiers.

That assumed, of course, that Vond actually could build and hold his empire as easily as he believed he could, but Sterren thought it was a very reasonable assumption. As Vond had pointed out, warlockry without the Calling was virtually limitless, and right now, at least, he was free of the Calling. Magic was scarce and feared in this region. Who could effectively oppose him?

The local nobility would find themselves deprived of their traditional powers and perquisites, but Sterren found himself untroubled by that prospect. Life was inherently uncertain, always a gamble; why should kings and nobles be exempt from that uncertainty? The lot of them could go elsewhere and find ways to survive, he was sure, or could presumably find places for themselves under Vond’s rule; even a warlock could not do everything himself and would surely need experienced administrators to handle the details of governing.

The question was, what else would Vond do, beyond uniting the kingdoms and dispossessing the nobility?

That, of course, Sterren did not know. Vond had spoken of concubines, that might mean abduction and rape, or it might just mean accepting offers. He was setting himself up as an absolute ruler, but did that mean only that he would expect his orders to be obeyed, or that he would treat everyone else as mere slaves, to be beaten or killed at whim?

Benevolent despot or brutal tyrant, the difference would lie in Vond’s personality, and Sterren simply did not know the man well enough to guess which he would become.

If he became a tyrant, then what? If he turned out benevolent, then Sterren would leave well enough alone, but what if he became a tyrant?

Walking out and heading back to Ethshar was a possibility, but somehow it did not seem like a very appealing one. After all, Sterren had to admit that he had brought Vond here.

He had not had any way of knowing what would happen, of course. Nobody could have known about the new power source in Lumeth. Still, intention was not always as important as results. He had never intended to lose when he played dice, but that hadn’t put food in his mouth when he did lose. One had to live with the results of one’s actions, whether those results were planned or not.

If Vond were a tyrant, what then?

There was the Wizards’ Guild, of course, lurking somewhere in the background, but what Annara and Emner had told him of the Guild was hardly very inspiring. Slow, cautious, not eager to interfere, that did not describe an organization that would efficiently remove a tyrant.

There was assassination. Sterren had discussed the possible assassination of the kings of Ophkar and Ksinallion with Lar Samber’s son, his inherited spy, and thought he had a good idea of what would be involved. Semma had no history of assassination, no one trained in assassination; he could send his soldiers or Lar’s spies, but they would probably fail and either die or be captured in the attempt. They might also be traced back to him, their warlord. Against a mere king, Lar judged the odds on a first attempt no better than one in five, getting steadily worse with each attempt as the target took even stronger countermeasures.

Lar had hinted at knowledge of an organization of professional assassins, but Sterren had the clear impression that this group, if it actually existed, did not operate anywhere near Semma. Furthermore, if he had understood Lar’s hints, they were very expensive, very secretive, and generally not easy to deal with. They were not so much a gang or a guild as a cult; the name Demerchan had been mentioned once.

That might be worth pursuing if all else failed, but it did not look promising.

He could try to reason with Vond, of course; Vond considered him a friend and ally. Perhaps he could sway the warlock, keep him from becoming a tyrant in the first place.

He would have to try that.

There was one other possibility, one that he had seen almost immediately as the inevitable solution. He considered it as he opened the barracks door. It was a solution that would take care of itself, eventually, but which he could either hurry or hinder.

Vond thought he was free of the Calling, but if Sterren understood the situation correctly, Vond was missing a vital point.

He shoved the whole question to the back of his mind as someone shouted, “It’s the warlord! Three cheers for Sterren, Ninth Warlord!”

A ragged cheer broke out, and Sterren froze in the doorway.

He looked over his men, astonished by this display of enthusiasm. He had been so concerned with Vond that he had forgotten that it was only a day ago that the invading armies were sent fleeing. These soldiers didn’t care about any warlocks; they were happy to have the siege broken, the catapults and battering ram destroyed, their constant duties on the walls at an end, and the methods used did not worry them at all. They were spontaneously applauding him, Sterren of Ethshar, who had brought them this easy victory.

He smiled and raised his hands in triumph for a moment. The cheering died down, and as men sank onto their bunks he spotted the three hunched backs in the corner.

The gamblers had not let a mere warlord interrupt their dice game.

“Thank you for your... your welcome,” Sterren stammered. “I’m happy to be back! You did well!” He hesitated, looking at the listening faces and unsure what more to say.

He shrugged and said, “What’s the game back there? Can I play?”

Startled laughter broke out, then applause; someone grabbed his arms, and a moment later he was in the corner, the dice in his hand.

“It’s three-count, bet on the low roll,” someone said.

Sterren nodded. He knew the game.

“Your turn, my lord,” someone else said, as coins rattled onto the stone.

He shook the dice and tossed them. To keep the dice and win the coins on a first roll, he needed to roll three ones. If anything else came up, he had to pass the dice and the coins stayed. Three-count, the primitive ancestor of Sterren’s favorite three-bone, was usually a long, slow game, with a good many small bets changing hands rather than a few large ones; it was something played by bored people eager to waste time, rather than serious gamblers, and Sterren had never played much.

He watched as the dice bounced from the wall and rolled across the floor. The first landed showing a single pip; the second bumped it, but did not tip it over, and it, too, showed just one pip when it came to rest.

The third bumped the toe of a soldier’s boot and stopped, showing one pip.

Laughter and applause sounded again, as Sterren picked up his winnings.

Nobody was laughing half an hour later, when Sterren had won some sixty copper bits in one of the shortest games of three-count ever seen.

The soldiers scattered, leaving him standing there with a full purse in one hand, the dice in the other. He stared at the bits of polished bone. His talent was back. Vond’s attuning had worked, and he was drawing luck from the Lumeth source. He wondered whether he should be pleased.

CHAPTER 29

The peasants were being evicted from the castle, and Sterren stood atop the wall and watched as they went unwillingly out the gate into the wreckage that had been their village.

These were the people who had run for the shelter of the castle walls when the banners of the invaders first appeared on the horizon; the gates had been shut and barred well before the enemy armies came within bowshot, leaving the stragglers to flee in all directions. The people who had reached the castle were not the bravest, and were in no hurry to venture back out into the World.

King Phenvel, however, had put up with enough of the crowding and inconvenience and at dinner the previous night had announced that all peasants were to be outside the gates before noon. He had ordered Sterren and Lord Algarven, the royal steward, to see to it.

Although he did not really think that Phenvel’s authority still amounted to much, Sterren had shrugged and obeyed. Vond had only begun building his palace the previous morning, and despite Sterren’s warnings, the new situation had not yet sunk in. Phenvel still thought of himself as ruler of Semma, and the other Semmans still had the habit of obeying him. The castle was still his.

So now Sterren stood on the ramparts, watching his soldiers herd the peasants out the gate.

Each one, whether man, woman, or child, did the same thing upon passing the gate. Each one looked north, at the warlock’s building site.

Vond’s project was progressing well. He had completed his crypts, or at least the shell, in that first day, and had built his hill up around them overnight. Now he was erecting white marble walls on that base. The ground shook each time a new section dropped into place, and the roar of stone grinding against stone was almost constant.

Vond’s first quarry, now closed, had yielded granite, so the marble, gleaming in the morning sun, was a surprise, and combined with the horrendous racket it was very hard to ignore.

The entertainment, for Sterren, was not that each face turned toward the palace, but in seeing what each one did next.

Some stopped and stood staring, open-mouthed, until proddings from behind forced them to move on. Others took a single glance and marched on, stolidly accepting this miraculous construction as just another event that was none of their business. A few looked, then looked away, clearly frightened, as if just looking at the palace might somehow get them in trouble. Some of the children laughed and applauded as huge stones fell into position, or pointed wonderingly at the tiny black-robed figure hanging unsupported above the high white walls.

The next thing that each peasant did, after looking at Vond’s latest handiwork, was to look at the ruined village, and the reactions to that were far more consistent. Sterren could see despair plainly in the expressions and slumped shoulders of virtually all the evictees.

He had already decided, by the time the first peasant passed the threshold into the mud-soaked, debris-strewn village market, that he would order his soldiers to help with the clean-up and rebuilding. They were supposed to be men of war, and it was the war that had made this mess, so cleaning it up fell within their duties as Sterren saw them.

The last peasant was stepping unwillingly out into the mud when the roar from the north stopped.

It took a moment for the echoes to die away and silence to descend, and by then everyone had noticed the change, and every face had turned toward the new palace. The little black shape no longer flew above the marble walls; instead, it was soaring gracefully toward them. Sterren heard a few whispers from the crowd below, but then silence fell again as they all stared at the approaching warlock.

Sterren, too, stared, wondering why Vond had stopped work at this particular moment. He hadn’t finished the wall he was working on. If he was coming to force King Phenvel to surrender, it struck Sterren as rather peculiar timing.

Then he realized that from his position high above the palace, Vond would have seen the people emerging from the castle. He might even have seen Sterren, on the battlements above, and recognized him.

And Sterren, after all, was warlord of Semma. The warlock might think that an attack was being organized, or a formal surrender, or some other operation involving him.

“Hai!” he called, waving an arm. “Vond! Over here!” He did not want the warlock to believe for even a moment that anything suspicious was going on. He could probably kill every peasant there, and Sterren, too, as easily as Sterren would stamp on an ant.

Vond waved and a moment later he settled down onto the wall beside Sterren. The peasants below stared up at the two of them. “Hello, Sterren,” he said, “What’s happening? I saw the crowd from over there.” He waved toward his palace, and Sterren saw a proud smile flash across his face. “Coming along nicely, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it is,” Sterren agreed. Privately, he thought that the place looked somewhat forbidding; Vond had not bothered with much architectural detailing, but had used huge blank slabs of stone for most of his construction. He had not yet cut windows in them, either. The result, despite the white marble, looked more like a fortress than a palace.

Vond himself looked as human and ordinary as ever, just a smiling middle-aged man in black robes, and it was a bit hard to comprehend that he had singlehandedly erected most of that fortress in a day and a half.

“What’s this?” the warlock asked, waving at the market square. It was obvious to anyone that the ragged crowd milling below was no army readying for an attack.

“The king’s evicting them,” Sterren explained. “They took shelter in the castle during the siege and, now that the siege is over, they’re leaving.”

“Where are they going?” Vond asked, interested.

“Here,” Sterren said, waving. “They’re mostly from the village here. They’ll have to clean it up and rebuild, of course; I’ll be sending my men out to help. I suppose some of them come from the farms, too.” He couldn’t resist adding, “I don’t know if any of them are from the farms you’ve torn up for your palace.”

Vond glanced at him, startled, and then looked back down at the peasants.

“Oh,” he said, “but this can’t be all the people from all those farms and the entire village, too! What happened to the rest? Did the invaders kill them?”

Sterren shrugged. “Some of them, probably, but a lot must have fled every which way. You remember meeting some of those. These are just the ones who got to the castle before the gate was closed; nobody’s gone out to bring in the others yet.”

Vond stared down at the people for a moment longer, and a good many of them stared back at him.

“Hai,” he called suddenly, “I am the Great Vond, the new lord of Semma! You see my palace over there!”

Sterren started to protest, to grab the warlock’s sleeve, and then thought better of it. After all, the warlock was speaking Ethsharitic, which none of the peasants understood, a fact that Vond had clearly forgotten.

“I am going to want servants. Any of you who would be interested in working for me, you need only walk over to my palace and wait there! You need not decide immediately; come when you choose, and I will find places for you!” A mutter of puzzlement ran through the crowd. Nobody moved.

“I will show you, now, why I am the true ruler of Semma, and not the oaf who calls himself your king!”

Vond raised his arms, and the mud of the marketplace rippled. Stones and broken beams were thrown up, to hang in mid-air for an instant, and then fling themselves away, out of the village and into the distance. The mud itself separated into water and soil, and the water, too, was flung away.

In a moment, the marketplace was clean and dry, the dirt hard-packed beneath the peasants’ bare feet, pressed down almost into pavement by Vond’s warlockry.

Sterren, watching in fascination, thought that even the dirt from the peasants’ clothes and faces had gone into that smooth surface, leaving the crowd noticeably cleaner.

With a rush of wind, debris rolled up from one blocked street into a ball that hung in the air and then sailed away.

Then another street was cleared, and another, in similar fashion.

In twenty minutes, Vond had cleared out all the wreckage, leaving untouched the houses that still stood, and removing all trace of those that had been knocked down.

Unfortunately, that left only half a village, and most of that half was missing windows, doors, roofs, or even chunks of wall.

Vond eyed the results critically, then shrugged. “It’s a start,” he said. He raised a hand again.

Something, perhaps a motion in the corner of his eye, made Sterren turn and look at the castle. Faces were crowded in every window, watching this spectacle.

He turned back toward the village.

The wreckage that had been sent off over the rooftops was coming back now, as one huge, irregular mass that hung in the air like a cloud. It was shifting its shape like a cloud, too, though far faster than any natural formation. Wood, stone, and thatch were separating out into distinct portions; everything else was being dropped into a refuse heap in a handy field.

It occurred to Sterren for the first time that there were no natural clouds anywhere in sight, which, in light of what he had been told, hardly seemed normal for winter in Semma. He wondered if the warlock was controlling the weather, keeping the sky clear to make his working environment more pleasant.

When the different materials were sorted, Vond chose a house and studied it critically.

The thatch roof and most of the shutters were gone, but it was otherwise intact. Vond waved, and masses of thatch came flying down from the cloud and piled themselves into place.

“What about the shutters?” Sterren asked.

Vond glanced at him, then back at the house. “To Hell with the shutters,” he said, “I can’t do everything! How am I supposed to find the right ones out of all that?”

Sterren shrugged. “Just asking,” he said.

The repair work continued, as Sterren and the peasants watched.

As the day dragged on, most of the peasants settled to the ground, sitting or lying on the hard earth and chatting amongst themselves. A few leaned up against the castle walls. None dared venture out of the market.

The faces in the castle windows changed, as people tired of watching and were replaced by others. Still, Vond had a steady audience for his performance. Sterren thought he saw Princess Shirrin there almost the entire time.

Some time after noon Sterren spotted one of his soldiers and ordered that food and drink be brought out for the peasants and himself. He asked Vond if he cared for anything.

The warlock declined the offer and continued with his work.

Sterren realized he hadn’t seen Vond eat anything in days, and that there was surely no food in his unfinished palace. Was he living on magic alone?

Perhaps he was. Sterren thought better of inquiring and didn’t worry about it. He watched as his soldiers distributed bread, water, cheese, and dried fruit to the peasants, then ate his own meal, which was similar save that he drank wine.

The restoration of the village took a long time; in fact, Vond still had three houses unfinished when the sun sank out of sight and the sky began to darken.

Vond took care of that easily enough by summoning an orange glow in the sky that gave him enough light to work by.

When he had completed repairs to every house that had still stood, he lowered his arms and said, “There!”

Sterren nodded. “Very impressive,” he said.

Vond leaned over a merlon and called, “You can go home, now! If your house is gone, stay with a neighbor, and I’ll take care of you later!”

The crowd below stirred; some of the peasants, particularly the children, had gone to sleep and were awakened. Nobody left, however. Nobody made any move to leave the market. They just stared up at the warlock and the warlord.

“Why are you just sitting there?” Vond shouted.

Sterren reached out and put a hand on his arm. “They don’t understand Ethsharitic,” he said.

Vond whirled and stared at Sterren for a moment. Then he turned back to the market below, realization dawning.

“Oh,” he said. “Oh, damn!”

“You might want to learn Semmat,” Sterren suggested mildly.

“I’d rather they learned Ethsharitic,” Vond snapped. “And if I’m going to build an empire, I don’t want to have to learn half a dozen different tongues, damn it!”

Sterren shrugged. “Well, in time I’m sure you can make Ethsharitic the common language for your court, but right now, none of these people knows a word of it.”

“How the hell did all these stupid little languages happen, anyway? This was all part of Old Ethshar once, you know!”

“I have no idea,” Sterren said. “But they did. Maybe it was demons, or a trick by the ruling class to keep people where they belonged.”

Vond glared down at the village, lit a weird shade of orange by his unnatural illumination. “I suppose I’ll need interpreters,” he said.

“At least for now,” Sterren agreed.

For a moment, nobody spoke. Then Vond said, “You tell them, Sterren. Tell them they can go home. Tell them that if any of them want to work as my servants, they should come to my palace in the morning. I’m going home.” He rose into the air.

Sterren waved a farewell as the warlock began drifting away, then leaned over the ramparts and called, “The Great Vond has finished his work! Go home now! The Great Vond wants servants! If you want to be a servant to the Great Vond, go to his castle...” He remembered the word for “palace” from earlier conversation and rephrased that. “Go to his palace in the morning! If your house is not fixed, stay with a friend!”

The peasants stared up at him, and he heard someone say, “Who in the World is that?” He didn’t know if the man meant him or Vond; after all, since he had gone off to Ethshar before the invasion, he had not been seen much in his role as warlord.

Then, as his message sank in, the people began scattering to their rebuilt homes and shops.

The orange glow was fading rapidly as Vond moved off toward his fortress, but both moons were in the sky to allay the darkness. Sterren took one final look at the palace, its marble walls gleaming an eerie yellow against the black sky and plain in the strange mixed light, and then climbed back down from the wall and went inside.

So far, he could hardly accuse Vond of tyranny. Even so, he knew that the empire was doomed from the start.

CHAPTER 30

Nine days after the rout the Ksinallionese army marched back into Semma.

The exterior of Vond’s palace was almost complete; only the top of the huge northwestern tower remained open to the sky, although none of the roofs had yet been tiled.

The warlock scarcely needed to worry about leaky roofs, of course, since he could keep the rain away easily enough, as he in fact had so far. Besides, Sterren thought, a leaky roof wouldn’t do any harm, since there was nothing inside the palace as yet but bare stone walls and floors. He and Ederd had spent much of the previous day strolling through its empty halls and chambers, admiring the vast expanses of bare marble, as Vond explained what would eventually go where.

The warlock’s half-dozen servants had watched silently from their impromptu camp in what would in time be the kitchens. They had little to do, as yet, beyond seeing to their own most basic needs. Nothing needed cleaning yet, and Vond could not be bothered to eat real meals, but simply conjured up food from somewhere whenever he got hungry. He had no wardrobe to worry about; he still wore the same black warlock’s robe.

The stairways were not yet built, so the only way into the upper floors was by levitation. Some rooms had no windows as yet.

Even so, it was a very impressive job for a mere eight days’ work. All the more so, because Vond had spent a day or so cleaning and rebuilding the village around the old castle.

Looking out from his tower room in the old castle, and seeing the army on the horizon beyond the new palace, Sterren wondered what they thought of this great brooding edifice that had not been there when they left, just nine days before.

For that matter, he wondered what the people of Semma thought of it.

He sighed. He should, he thought, have realized that the lords of Ksinallion and Ophkar would not give up so easily as all that. A single battle was not a war.

Well, it wasn’t his problem, now that Vond had conquered Semma.

He watched as Vond appeared, rising out of the unfinished tower, his cloak spreading like wings on either side. He waited for the Ksinallionese army to be swept away.

It wasn’t. Instead, Vond dropped to the ground facing it, out of sight behind the palace.

Puzzled, Sterren waited a moment for him to reappear, then turned and headed for the stairs. He wanted to see what was happening.

By the time he had saddled a horse and ridden out the gate and past the palace, it was all over. He found Vond standing atop a newly erected stone dais in the middle of a field, and the entire Ksinallionese army spread out before him, bowing in obeisance.

Three fresh corpses lay at the foot of the dais, sprawled awkwardly, swords fallen from their hands. Another corpse lay in the dirt amid the bowing Ksinallionese, this one burned black.

“Hello, Sterren,” Vond said as he rode up.

“What happened?” Sterren asked.

“Well, these men marched up, as you see, and I stopped them. I didn’t hurt them, just stopped them. Most of them couldn’t understand a word I said, but a few spoke Ethsharitic, and one of them said they wanted to parley. I think my citadel had impressed them. Anyway, that one there,” he said, pointing to one of the bodies that wore an officer’s uniform, “claimed to be the Ksinallionese warlord. That fellow over there,” he went on, indicating a bowing survivor, “served as his interpreter. They said that they had no quarrel with me — they called me a wizard, but I let that slide, since they didn’t know any better. Anyway, they said they were at war with Semma, not with me.”

Sterren nodded.

“Well, I explained that I had conquered Semma and intended to conquer Ksinallion, too, but that I hadn’t gotten around to it yet; and I offered them a chance to surrender. The warlord got all red in the face and swore he’d never surrender to a damned wizard, or something like that, and I told him that in that case, he might as well try and kill me, and we’d see what happened. So he tried, and I let him take a few stabs at me with his sword, and then I exploded his heart.”

Sterren found the calm way in which Vond described this murder to be extremely upsetting, but he hid that reaction and asked, “What about the others?”

“Well, after that, there was a lot of discussion in whatever language these people use amongst themselves — Ksinallionese, I suppose it is. Then this one,” he said, indicating another corpse, “tried to distract me, while that one,” pointing to the final unburned body, “came up behind me and tried to stab me. I stopped both their hearts. And while I was doing that, that one over there,” he pointed to the burned remains, “fired an arrow at me. He was too far away to be sure of getting his heart properly the first try, so I fried him, instead. After that, I told the interpreter that I would now accept the surrender of anyone who cared to surrender and bow to me. And then you rode up, and here we are.” He waved a hand. “I think a few at the back ran, instead, but I won’t worry about it.” He looked over the hundreds of groveling figures. “I think I’ve just acquired a palace guard,” he said, smiling.

“What are you going to do about Ksinallion, then?” Sterren asked.

“Oh, I guess I’ll fly there this afternoon, stage a few demonstrations, and let them surrender. I wasn’t planning to start empire-building until I had my citadel finished, but I can’t just leave them there after this.”

Sterren nodded.

That afternoon, Corinal II, King of Ksinallion, capitulated. He abdicated in favor of the Great Vond, and the Kingdom of Ksinallion became the second province of the Empire of Vond.

At least, Vond considered it the second. Sterren, who had ridden along to watch, pointed out that Phenvel had not actually surrendered yet.

Vond shrugged that off. “I’ll worry about that after I finish my palace.”

Two days later Vond intercepted a party of Ophkarite soldiers spying on his palace and took a break from construction to force another capitulation. He had to kill King Neran IV before Neran’s heir, the newly elevated King Elken III, would surrender and add Ophkar to the Empire of Vond.

Vond got home in time to finish tiling the roof. That night, during dinner at the high table in Semma Castle, Phenvel finally confronted Sterren directly and demanded, “Whose side are you on, the warlock’s or mine?”

“I am on the side of what’s best for Semma, your Majesty,” Sterren replied quietly, putting down his fork.

“What does that mean?”

“Your Majesty, I mean what I said.”

What he actually meant was that he was in favor of whatever caused the least trouble and did the least damage to lives and property. He was not particularly concerned with any other criteria in choosing “best.”

“And who do you see as best for Semma, me or the warlock?” Phenvel demanded.

“At the moment, your Majesty,” Sterren said, “I see only that to argue with the warlock is to die.”

“To defy me can get you killed, too, warlord!” Sterren tensed at this threat, but forced his voice to remain calm. “Your Majesty,” he said, “I don’t think you want to do that. The warlock thinks me his friend and would not like it if you killed me.” He hesitated, considering whether he dared say anything, and if so how much, then added, “Besides, I can promise you that he will not rule for long.” “Oh?” Phenvel eyed Sterren intently. “Why not?”

“I’m sorry, your Majesty, but I can’t tell you that.” He gestured at the crowded tables. “If someone here were to hear and word get back to Vond, I fear what would happen.” In a moment of inspiration, he suggested, “Perhaps you could ask the wizard Annara.”

Phenvel looked without thinking, then realized that Annara, as a mere commoner, was not at the high table; as a rule, she and Ederd ate their meals in the kitchen with the servants.

He snorted and turned back to his fried potatoes. Sterren was able to finish his meal in peace and then slip out of the castle unnoticed.

He strolled through the village, with its odd empty spaces where houses had been destroyed, and down the hill, where he paused and looked at Vond’s palace.

The greater moon was high in the sky, the lesser low in the east, and the white marble seemed to almost glow in the moonlight. The five towers, one at each corner, and a much larger one over the gate in the center of the northwestern wall, stood out starkly against the starry sky. Lights shone from a few windows, but he knew that most of the structure was still empty.

He watched it unhappily.

Vond was accomplishing some impressive feats. The palace was beautiful, at least on the outside, although a bit ominous in its appearance, with its high, blank walls. The village at Semma Castle was cleaner and sounder than ever before, at least, what there was of it. Ophkar, Ksinallion, and Semma were united for the first time in three hundred years, and at the cost of only seven lives in all, counting from the day after Vond’s sudden acquisition of access to the Lumeth power source.

But it all made Sterren very uneasy. He knew that it could not possibly last, and even while it did last, he did not trust Vond to remain as harmless as he had been so far.

He had more or less decided on a course of action already, but he was not happy with it. He liked Vond; the warlock was like a child with a new toy, or really, an entire new playroom. Still, Sterren intended to do all he could to remove Vond from power in Semma, not on behalf of any foolish king, but because Vond was clearly very dangerous indeed.

What would happen if the Wizards’ Guild did decide to remove Vond? A magical battle on the scale Vond operated on might lay waste to the entire area.

What if other warlocks did come along and take part in ruling the empire? No matter how benevolent Vond might be, a question that was still in doubt, sooner or later, a warlock would come along who was not.

And Vond would not always be there to stop such a warlock.

Better, Sterren thought, if Vond were to go quickly, before any other warlocks arrived.

He sighed and decided to go sleep at the Citadel, as Vond’s palace was now known, rather than Semma Castle. The warlock had said he was always welcome there, though he had not yet been given a room specifically for his own use or moved in any of his belongings. Phenvel, on the other hand, was no longer making Sterren feel welcome at all.

He said nothing to the warlock of what had happened.

It was only coincidence that the next day Vond came to Semma Castle, smashed every door that was closed against him to splinters, and demanded Phenvel’s formal surrender of authority.

Phenvel, Third of that Name, King of Semma, agreed immediately, and the Kingdom of Semma ceased to exist, becoming instead the Capital Province of the Empire of Vond.

CHAPTER 31

By the first of Greengrowth in the year 5221 Vond’s palace was complete, furnished inside and out. The streets of his capital were laid out and paved. His new courtiers, recruited from his three provinces, could all hold a simple conversation in Ethsharitic and were teaching the tongue to others.

Sterren of Semma, once Sterren of Ethshar, was now Lord Chancellor of the Empire of Vond.

His reaction to Vond’s announcement of this honor had been, “What’s a chancellor?”

Vond had shrugged. “Whatever you like. I don’t need a warlord, since I do my own fighting, and that Ophkarite warlord is in charge of my guards, but I wanted to keep you around the palace, so you needed a title. That was the vaguest high title I could think of. Make of it what you will.”

Sterren had kept it vague. His primary duty, he knew, was to provide someone Vond could speak to freely. Beyond that, he set himself no definite duties, but managed to imply that he was Vond’s second in command, an implication the warlock supported.

Despite his new title, he still maintained his quarters in the tower of Semma Castle, as well as in the new citadel, and had managed to retain command of what had been the Semman army. His men, or at any rate those who had not gone over to the citadel to sign up with the Palace Guard, were now the Chancellor’s Guard.

All three of his officers had resigned, at different times and giving different reasons. Captain Arl had submitted his resignation two days after Vond’s storm had routed the invading armies; that had been the earliest he had been able to speak to Sterren. He had done so on the grounds that his men had been inadequately prepared for battle, which meant he had failed in his duties.

Sterren suspected that Arl had expected to be asked to stay on, but he had accepted the resignation. Arl had failed in his duties. Besides, Sterren preferred not to have his great-uncle’s officers around.

Captain Shemder had resigned when King Phenvel surrendered, refusing to serve a foreign sovereign.

Lord Anduron had finally resigned when Sterren accepted the title of chancellor, saying he no longer understood what his position was supposed to be.

Sterren had named Dogal and Alder as his aides and lieutenants, but did not replace his captains.

His soldiers seemed to accept the new order, and Sterren’s place in it, readily enough. The Semman nobility were another matter. When Sterren encountered any of them in the corridors of the castle he was usually snubbed, or presented with a ferocious glare. Phenvel’s son Dereth, no longer a prince, spat on Sterren’s best tunic. Shirrin, upon seeing him, invariably broke into tears and ran, she obviously felt her hero had betrayed her. Nissitha sneered, but then, she always had. Even Lura seemed subdued and told him, “I’m not supposed to like you any more, but I don’t really see why.”

Sterren caught whispers in the hallways, whispers he thought he was meant to overhear, whispers containing words like “traitor,” “barbarian,” and “coward.” Mutters about his unfortunate ancestry, three-fourths Ethsharitic, were common. “Money-grubbing merchant’s brat!” was one epithet he encountered often. “Blood will tell” was another favorite.

Sterren did not let any of this bother him. He had chosen his path and he was committed to it. The only things that bothered him were Shirrin’s tears, and he thought that if he could manage a moment alone with her, he would explain to her why he was doing what he was doing. She was a very pretty girl, after all, and just turned fourteen, not that much younger than he was himself.

But no opportunity to explain himself to her ever came along.

Every so often Sterren wondered why he didn’t just leave and go home to Ethshar, but he always arrived at the same answer. He had brought Vond here, so he was partly responsible for him. He was the only one in Semma except Vond himself who knew anything about warlockry, which meant that he was the only one who could see and understand everything that was happening.

And he also thought he was a restraining influence on Vond. The warlock had no other friends or confidants at all. Besides, now that he was no longer the warlord, there was no great hurry about getting out of Semma, and there were clearly historical events happening that were interesting to observe.

Actually, life in Semma and even in Semma Castle had not really changed that much at all. Most of the nobles still lived in the castle, undisturbed; a few had slipped away, but the majority remained, still more or less acknowledging Phenvel’s authority. Admittedly, about a fourth of the servants had deserted them to work at the palace, but that did little more than reduce the crowding somewhat. For most of the castle’s inhabitants, life coasted on, and they tried very hard to ignore the warlock and his palace.

Sterren noticed that peasants no longer came to the castle much. No taxes were paid to King Phenvel any more, and the castle’s stores were being consumed but not replaced, taxes were now going to the warlock’s citadel. This did not affect Sterren directly, since he was welcome at Vond’s table, but it did not bode well for the other nobles.

Those few of the bolder aristocrats who departed had accepted that their old way of life was doomed and had gone looking for greener pastures, “visiting” relatives in other kingdoms, or simply seeking their fortunes, like so many failed apprentices.

The nobles who lingered all seemed to think that matters would somehow right themselves, and everything would go back to what it had been before, with Phenvel once more uncontested ruler of Semma, but none of them seemed to have any idea how this would come about, and none of them, so far as Sterren could see, were doing anything to help it along.

He was helping it along, at least slightly, but he did not dare explain that; instead he put up with being labeled a traitor. He was not entirely sure that in a sense, he might not be betraying Semma by working toward Vond’s downfall. After all, for the peasants, all the changes were for the better. Vond controlled the weather and regulated the climate to an unheard-of evenness of temperament. Rain came when needed, usually at night, and never more than needed. When days threatened to grow uncomfortably cool the clouds would be forcibly scattered, and when the sun was hot clouds would gather. As a result, the spring planting was begun earlier than usual, and the fields were already turning green.

Vond had promised that roads and houses would be built once the palace was no longer occupying his time and energy. The peasants Sterren had spoken to all agreed that this would be wonderful, but he thought they didn’t really believe it would ever happen. They were accustomed to empty promises from their rulers.

Somehow, this bothered Sterren far more than the hatred of the dispossessed nobles. He knew that Vond sincerely intended to carry through on his promises — not so much out of altruism as to enhance his own position. The ruler of a rich land accrues more power and glory than the ruler of a poor one, and the warlock knew that well.

But Sterren also knew that Vond might not have time to make his promises good.

He sat in the tower room the warlock had given him, staring out the window at the palace sprawling below him, and wondered what he should do.

He had encouraged Vond to build his citadel as lavishly as possible, big and elaborate throughout, and created entirely with magic. Not a single stone had been lifted into place by human muscle; even the carpets and tapestries, although woven by hand, had been delivered and laid or hung by warlockry. Sterren had steadily urged Vond to use as much power as possible, not that he had needed much urging. Warlockry was like a drug; the more Vond used, the more he could use, and the more he wanted to use.

And somehow, he did not see what the inevitable outcome of this would be.

Sterren thought that he, ignorant as he was of warlockry, knew what was going to happen to Vond better than Vond did himself. The warlock was having too much fun with his magic to see that in time, the Calling would find him even in Semma.

Sterren stared down at the citadel and wondered whether he should warn him. Now that the palace was complete, Vond might not throw his power around so freely.

That brought up the question, of course, of what he would do.

Well, Sterren told himself, he could hardly learn anything about Vond’s plans sitting in his room. He headed for the door. He had intended to go all the way down to the warlock’s audience chamber, but halfway down the first flight of stairs Sterren changed his mind and at the next landing he turned down the corridor and knocked on the first door.

It opened, and Annara of Crookwall thrust her head around the edge.

“Hello,” she said.

“Hello,” Sterren replied. “May I come in?”

Annara hesitated, glancing back into the room, then swung the door wide and admitted him.

Sterren was not surprised to see Agor, the Imperial Theurgist, sitting on Annara’s bed. They exchanged polite greetings.

At Annara’s direction Sterren found a seat by the window. He settled onto the cushion and then fumbled about, trying to figure out how to ask what he wanted to ask.

Annara offered him a plate of honeyed cashews, and he nibbled on those without speaking, while Agor chatted in his newly acquired and horribly accented Ethsharitic about the delightful weather that Vond had ensured.

Sterren glanced around the room, looking for something that might serve to divert the conversation along the lines he wanted. He noticed a sparkle on a high shelf.

Something shiny was moving up there, he realized.

He squinted.

A coin, a silver bit, was spinning on edge, but he had not seen anyone spin it, and it showed no signs of slowing down as he watched.

“What’s that?” he asked, pointing.

The two magicians followed his finger. Annara said, “It’s a spinning coin.”

“How long has it been spinning?”

“Oh, three or four months,” Annara replied.

“But you haven’t lived here that long!” Sterren said, startled.

“I brought it with me from the castle,” Annara said.

“How could you do that?”

“It’s on a little card that folds up into a box for traveling,” she explained.

“What’s it for? What keeps it spinning?”

“It’s magic,” Agor said.

“I could have guessed that for myself,” Sterren said sarcastically. “I mean, what’s it for?”

“It’s a very simple little spell,” Annara said. “It’s called the Spell of the Spinning Coin.”

“And it just makes a coin spin on forever? That seems pretty pointless.”

“It does do a little more than that,” the wizard admitted. “Emner spun that one, I taught him the spell, as it wasn’t one he knew. It will keep spinning as long as he’s alive. If he’s seriously ill, or badly injured, the spinning will slow down, and it may even wobble a little if it’s very bad. If he dies, it will stop.”

“Oh, I see,” Sterren said. “So you would know if, say, he had been killed by bandits on the way to Akalla.”

Annara and Agor exchanged glances. “It wasn’t the bandits I was worried about,” Annara said.

Sterren nodded. “I suppose not.” He hesitated, then pushed on. He could hardly have realistically hoped for a better opening. “I see it’s still spinning, and he’s been gone for all these months. He must have contacted the Wizards’ Guild by now.”

“Yes,” Annara said, flatly.

“And they haven’t done anything? Have they communicated with you?”

She hesitated, then said, “My lord Sterren, why do you ask?”

Sterren blinked. “I’m curious,” he said.

“You’ll pardon me, my Lord Chancellor, but I’m not sure I care to satisfy your curiosity.”

He had half expected this reaction. “Annara,” he said slowly, “I can understand your caution, but believe me, I’m not going to cause you any trouble.”

“You will forgive me, my Lord Chancellor, if I...”

“Stop calling me that!” Sterren snapped. “I didn’t ask for the stupid title! People keep hanging these silly titles on me, when I was perfectly happy just being Sterren of Ethshar. Look, Annara, I know you’re worried that I’m Vond’s spy, but I’m not his spy, not unless he can read my mind without my knowing it. If he wanted to know something, I suppose he could force it out of you easily enough by torture; you aren’t enough of a wizard to defend yourself against him. Or if you are, you’re also one hell of an actress, because you’ve had me fooled! I can’t force anything out of you, though.” He paused for breath, then continued more calmly, “If you’re worried about which side I’m on, right now I’m not really on any side. I think I know how to either destroy the warlock, or to keep him in power for at least a while longer, and I honestly haven’t decided which I want to do, or whether I should just leave well enough alone. I came here hoping for more information to help me decide. I can’t force it out of you; Vond can. You can tell me now, and if I’m telling the truth it won’t do you any harm, and if I’m lying, Vond can come up here and convince you.”

He stopped, suddenly unsure what he was saying and whether he should be saying it.

Annara threw a look at Agor, then turned back to Sterren and said, “All right, Sterren. I don’t suppose it will do any harm to tell you. I’ve had dreams, dreams where wizards tell me things. Some of them may be ordinary dreams, but I think at least some must have been sent. I don’t always remember them when I wake up; there are tricks to remembering your dreams, and I’m not very good at it. All the same, I think I have an idea what the Guild is doing.”

“Ah,” Sterren said. “What are they doing?”

“Nothing. At least, nothing yet. They’re watching the situation, using scrying spells and prophecies, and that’s all. Oh, and it seems that reports of the events here are somehow not spreading very well, particularly not to warlocks, and those warlocks who do hear about the new power source are being discouraged or diverted in various subtle ways.”

Sterren nodded. “You know, I had begun to wonder why not a single other warlock had turned up.”

“Remember, Vond’s invitations have all emphasized his own supremacy, and warlocks are not prone to play the sycophant. Even without my guildmates interfering, I suspect he would be attracting few converts.”

“True enough,” Sterren acknowledged. He sat for a moment, munching cashews and considering this news.

“So,” he said at last, “is the Guild contemplating any more drastic action?”

“No,” Annara said, after a moment’s hesitation. “At least, not that they’ve told me about. The general noninterference policy seems to be holding good.”

Sterren nodded, and as he did a thought occurred to him. He asked Agor, “What do the gods think about all this?”

The theurgist shrugged. “Like the wizards, they don’t interfere,” he said. “Not since the Great War.”

Sterren accepted that. “One more question,” he said, “and I’ll go.” He looked at the two magicians closely. “For yourselves,” he asked, “do you want Vond removed?”

Annara and Agor looked at each other.

Agor shrugged.

“I don’t know,” Annara said, “I really don’t.”

CHAPTER 32

Five minutes after he left Annara’s room Sterren peered around a drapery into Vond’s audience chamber. The warlock spotted him immediately.

“Ah, Chancellor Sterren!” he called, “Come in! Come in!”

Sterren obeyed, looking curiously about as he did. He had seen the audience chamber before, of course, the rich red draperies down either side, the ornately patterned marble floor, the luxurious red carpet down the center. Twenty-foot-high windows behind the dais let sunlight pour in from the palace’s central courtyard; stained-glass medallions set in the windows painted colors on the floor, and the cut-glass bevels that edged the medallions ringed the colors with sprays of rainbows. Golden banners hung from the vaulted white marble ceiling; most were plain and unadorned, but three bore battle flags sewn onto them, representing Semma, Ophkar, and Ksinallion.

Three broad steps, alternating black and white marble, led up to the black marble dais, and above its center Vond floated comfortably in mid-air; he had not yet bothered with a throne.

That much was familiar. What was new to Sterren was the group of young women who stood at the foot of the dais.

He counted twelve of them, all young and all uncommonly attractive. Their garb varied from simple peasant homespun to the rich velvets and silks of the conquered nobility; their expressions varied from uncertainty to bold defiance. None of them were so much as whispering; the only sound was the rustle of their clothing.

“What’s going on?” Sterren asked, breaking the silence.

“I’m choosing a harem,” Vond replied.

Startled, Sterren took another look at the women. “I’ve had my eye out for the last sixnight or so,” the warlock explained, “and I’d noticed these young ladies as promising prospects, so when I had a moment, I brought them here to look over.” He smiled wolfishly.

“Do they know what’s going on?” Sterren asked, seeing confusion and fear on several faces.

Vond shrugged. “I told them, but I don’t know if they understood.”

“May I speak with them?” Sterren asked.

“Be my guest,” Vond said with a wave.

“Ladies,” Sterren said, in Semmat, “I am Sterren, Ninth Warlord of Semma.” He did not know a Semmat equivalent for “chancellor,” if one existed at all, and he was not yet comfortable with the title in any case. “Do you know why you are here?”

His reply was a babble of voices; he raised his hands for silence.

It took a moment, but the women quieted. Sterren pointed to one. “You; who are you?”

The chosen one looked back at him blankly. “Ksinal-Uoni,” she said, with an odd accent.

Sterren picked another. “Do you speak Semmat?”

This one nodded.

“Who are you?” Sterren asked.

“Kyrina the Fair,” she replied, “Daughter to Kardig Trak’s son and Rulura of the Green Eyes.”

Sterren could easily understand how she got her epithet. She wore a simple green tunic and a brown peasant’s skirt, but even so, she was easily more beautiful than the most elaborately attired noblewoman Sterren had ever seen in Semma.

“You live near here?” he asked. “In the village,” she said, gesturing vaguely in the general direction of Semma Castle.

“Do you know why you are here?”

She shook her head, which sent a ripple through her long, gleaming black hair and wafted perfume in Sterren’s direction. “No, my lord.”

“How did you come here?”

She glanced at Vond and at the other women, clearly not eager to act as spokeswoman. Nobody volunteered to take her place, and after an instant’s further hesitation she explained, “Perhaps an hour ago, something like a great wind, yet not a wind, snatched me up and brought me here. I found myself in a great hall, where I could move freely, but where all the doors but one were closed and barred, and the one open door was guarded by men who would not let me leave. Another woman was there, as well, and then these others were swept in, as I was, one by one; and when we were all there, the guards led us here, using their spears to keep us together.”

Sterren nodded his understanding.

“This is the Great Vond,” he said, gesturing toward the warlock. “You all probably guessed that.”

Several women nodded.

“You all know he now rules this land?”

Seven women, by Sterren’s count, nodded. He guessed the other five spoke no Semmat.

“You know he is a warlock, a magician?”

More nods.

“He is also a man. He has brought you twelve here to choose women to...” Sterren paused, wishing he knew more Semmat; he could think of a hundred delicate ways to phrase this in Ethsharitic. “To warm his bed,” he said at last.

That elicited not nods, but startlement, anger, fear, and at least one crimson blush.

Vond was watching all this, and, Sterren saw worriedly, looking bored.

“Sterren,” he said, “I take it you’ve just explained why I brought them here.”

Sterren nodded.

“Tell them,” Vond said, “that any who wish to leave are free to go, but that those who stay, and who please me, will be richly rewarded.”

Hesitantly, Sterren translated this speech into Semmat as best he could.

The seven who understood looked at one another, clearly considering the offer. Kyrina looked at the warlock carefully for a long moment, then turned and strode for the exit.

Vond waved a hand, and the great double doors swung wide to let her pass.

Another woman, a noblewoman this time, hesitantly followed her.

One of the five who did not understand Semmat seemed to catch on, and literally ran out the door.

Others followed, each after her own fashion, until five remained, three of whom spoke Semmat. The five eyed each other warily.

Sterren watched them, puzzled. Why had these five stayed? None of them was starving; in fact, two of the five were dressed very well indeed. They should not be so desperate as to choose slavery; and surely concubinage, in this case, was a form of slavery.

Perhaps, he thought, they didn’t trust Vond to keep his word and feared he would take revenge upon them if they left. Certainly, all five looked somewhat nervous.

Or perhaps they didn’t see it the way he did. They might see sharing Vond’s bed as a route to power and wealth. If that was it, Sterren was sure they were wrong.

Or perhaps it was just curiosity or a sexual interest in the warlock. Sterren hadn’t really given the matter much thought, but he supposed Vond was attractive enough, and there were always stories about magicians. For himself, Sterren could see no reason a knowledge of arcane skills should imply a knowledge of erotic skills, but there were always stories.

Most likely, he thought, it was a combination of all of these that kept the five of them in the audience chamber. He found that unappealing and decided he did not care to watch any further. He started to turn away.

“Sterren,” Vond said, “I need you to translate!”

He had forgotten that. He turned back, reluctantly. “Couldn’t one of your servants do that?”

“You’re here; they aren’t. Besides, you speak Ethsharitic better than any of them.”

Sterren had to admit that this was true.

“Let’s start with their names,” the warlock said, waving a hand at the women.

Sterren did the best he could, given that only three of the women spoke Semmat; a fourth spoke Ophkaritic, the fifth Ksinallionese. One of the Semman women knew a few words of Ksinallionese, and the Ksinallionese spoke Ophkaritic, so that nobody was totally cut off.

And of course, gestures and facial expressions conveyed plenty of information as well.

After half an hour or so, Vond chose the Ksinallionese to take a stroll with him and become better acquainted, and Sterren escaped with a sigh of relief, while one of the palace servants, summoned by Vond’s magic, escorted the other four to the apartments they were henceforth to share.

Sterren made his way out the citadel’s main gate and looked down Vond’s artificial hill at the surrounding countryside. The land had turned green with spring, and the peasants were out in the fields, tending their crops. The sky was a radiant crystal blue, with a handful of soft white clouds sailing like white-robed wizards across it.

A party of a dozen or so men was marching up the road toward the gate. Four of them were Vond’s red-tunicked palace guards, and the rest were in rags.

Sterren saw to his horror that the ragged ones were in chains. Most of them looked resigned, but two or three looked terrified.

“Hai,” he called, “What going on?”

The foremost guard saw him, acknowledged his presence with a bow, and called back one word.

Sterren did not catch it; the guard’s accent distorted his Ethsharitic beyond easy comprehension.

“What?” Sterren called back.

“Slaves!” the soldiers repeated. “We bring slaves!”

“What for?” Sterren asked, as he and the guard approached each other.

The guard spread his hands in the Ksinallionese equivalent of a shrug. “The Great Vond ordered,” he said.

“Where did these people come from?” Sterren persisted.

The guard hesitated; clearly, his Ethsharitic was not very good. “We go to Akalla, buy them, bring them back,” he explained slowly.

Sterren stopped and stepped aside as the party marched up past him. He watched them go without interfering.

At least they had been slaves already, and not innocent peasants Vond had had enslaved.

In fact, he supposed that it was perfectly reasonable for Vond to keep slaves, but Sterren found it a little hard to accept. For most of his life he had been far more likely to deal with slavers as merchandise than as a customer. He had never quite been reduced to sleeping on the city streets, which would have made him fair game for the slavers, and he had never been caught stealing, which could also put cuffs on a person, but those had always been closer than the sort of wealth that would include buying anyone.

He had known a few slaves, either before or after their enslavement. He had never exchanged more than a few polite words with a slave-owner, except Vond. Or, he suddenly realized, perhaps King Phenvel; some of his castle servants might well be owned, rather than hired. He watched the slaves march into the palace. Vond was buying slaves and acquiring a harem. Was this necessarily tyranny? After all, he bought his slaves on the market, and his chosen concubines were there voluntarily.

No, Sterren decided, it wasn’t tyranny, but it wasn’t a good sign, either.

CHAPTER 33

Vond conquered Thanoria on the sixteenth of Green-growth, 5221. He took a sixnight or so to consolidate his conquest this time, taking care of details he had been rather haphazard about in dealing with Semma, Ksinallion, and Ophkar. He arranged for taxes to be paid into his imperial treasury, appointed provincial officials from the former royal government, selected candidates for his harem, and so forth.

That done, he conquered Skaia on the twenty-fourth.

Enmurinon went next, on the third of Longdays, followed by Akalla of the Diamond on the fourteenth. He took special care there, due to the presence of the port, and inquired after recent arrivals, hoping for word of immigrating warlocks.

He was disappointed by the replies he received, and on the nineteenth he returned to his palace in a foul temper.

He concentrated on other affairs for several days after that, building roads, tenements, and market halls, getting acquainted with his new concubines, and dealing with his subjects.

Rather to his surprise, he found that he did not enjoy actually ruling his empire. Settling disputes, administering justice, appointing officials, and the other traditional duties of royalty were dull and time-consuming, and provided no opportunity for him to display his magic.

Sterren had been expecting this realization. He had long ago concluded that kings were no happier than anybody else. Furthermore, he had noticed that for some time now, Vond had only seemed really comfortable and alert when using huge amounts of magic, as if warlockry were an addictive drug. When the warlock finally confessed his disappointment, late one night in a quiet torchlit arcade overlooking the palace courtyard, Sterren simply nodded and agreed, without comment. “You don’t seem surprised,” Vond said, irritably.

“I’m not,” Sterren said. “I never thought ruling looked like much fun.”

The warlock settled more deeply into the sling chair he sat upon. “It isn’t,” he growled, “but it should be.”

“Why?” Sterren asked.

“Because I want it to be,” Vond snapped.

Sterren made no reply.

After a moment of disgruntled silence, Vond said, “I just won’t do it any more.”

“Won’t do what?”

“I won’t deal with all these petty details, who owns what, how to punish this thief or reward that soldier, where to put the roads, how to collect the taxes, how much coin to mint, I won’t do it.”

“Someone has to,” Sterren pointed out, “or your empire will fall apart.”

“I don’t have to. You do. You’re my chancellor, aren’t you? I just decided what that means, it’s your job to take care of anything I don’t want to be bothered with.” Vond smiled an unusually unpleasant smile. “I’ll announce it in the morning; you’ll be in charge of the administration of the empire. I’ll take care of what I’m good at, building and conquest.”

Sterren had hoped and feared this might happen. After all, he was the only person Vond trusted. To all the native inhabitants of his empire, the warlock was something of a monster, alien and inhumanly powerful, conquering entire kingdoms in a single day; none of them could speak to him without fear, and he dealt with them, in general, with contempt. Besides, very few were really fluent in Ethsharitic, and Vond had not yet bothered to learn any other tongues. Warlockry, unlike witchcraft, did nothing at all to enhance his linguistic abilities. Warlockry was a purely physical sort of magic; it could not teach.

The other magicians were less contemptible than the ordinary citizens, but still did not provide very good company for the new emperor. From the start, both Annara and Ederd had held back visibly, refusing to speak openly with Vond, and he had noticed this reticence. Agor’s Ethsharitic was an impediment, and his eccentric behavior, cultivated since childhood to add to an aura of mystery, was another.

That left Sterren as Vond’s only friend, the only person he could talk with as one human to another, and despite Vond’s denials, Sterren was quite sure that the warlock was miserably lonely.

He had expected other warlocks to come and join him, and was growing ever more confused and dismayed at their failure to materialize. This drove him, more and more, to talk away long hours with Sterren.

Sterren was no warlock; he was unnaturally lucky with dice, but otherwise could barely stir a cat’s whisker with his magic. Still, he had known Vond when Vond was powerless, he knew something about how warlockry functioned, and he was not cowed by the imperial might. That made him an invaluable companion.

And Sterren had guessed that it might in time make him Vond’s partner in empire, as well.

Now that that guess had come true, he was ready. This was an opportunity far too good to miss. He could do far more to prevent tyranny if he were himself involved in governing.

He had seen, over the last few months, that Vond’s decisions, as emperor, tended to be quick and careless. He did not concern himself with right or wrong, with what would be best for those involved, but only with what was most expedient, what would settle matters most quickly, rather than most equitably.

Now he could change that.

He had no illusions about his own governing ability, however. He knew himself well enough to suspect that he, too, would opt for expediency after a few boring days.

“I’ll accent that on one condition,” he said.

Vond looked at him sharply. “Who are you, to be setting conditions?” he demanded.

“I’m your Lord Chancellor, your Imperial Majesty,” Sterren replied mildly.

Vond could hardly deny that, but he was not so easily soothed. “What condition?” he demanded.

“That I may delegate my authority as I please,” Sterren said, “Because as I said, I never thought ruling looked like fun, and I don’t want to be saddled with the job either. I don’t mind doing a share, certainly, but I don’t want to spend my days divvying up strayed cattle any more than you do.”

Vond considered this. “Fair enough,” he said. The next morning Vond set out to conquer Hluroth, and Sterren set out to establish the Imperial Council.

CHAPTER 34

The Chancellor’s Guard came in handy on occasion; it had saved Sterren a good deal of trouble to simply tell Alder, “Take as many men as you need, but I want Lady Kalira of Semma here in an hour.”

Then all he had to do was sit in his chosen room, a small study on the second floor of Semma Castle, and wait; an hour later, Lady Kalira glared at him across the table.

“I’m here,” she said without preamble. “What do you want?”

Sterren noted, with hope and admiration, that she did not call him a traitor or otherwise insult him. “Your help,” he said.

Her angry glare softened to curiosity. “What sort of help?” she demanded warily. “In running the empire.”

“Empire!” She snorted.

Sterren shrugged, using both the Ethsharitic shoulder bob and the Semman gesture of spread fingers and a downturned palm. “Call it what you like,” he said. “Like it or not, the warlock has united several kingdoms now, I can’t say how many since he’s in the process of adding at least one more even as we speak, and I think I can call it an empire.” He had had plenty of time to improve his Semmat in recent months, and spoke it easily now. “I didn’t come here to argue about names,” he concluded.

“Maybe I did, though,” Lady Kalira retorted.

“I hope not,” Sterren said.

For a moment neither spoke. Then Lady Kalira said, “All right, what’s your offer?”

“You know Vond named me chancellor,” Sterren said.

“Whatever that means,” she answered, nodding.

“He’s just decided that it means I’m to take care of all the administrative details that he doesn’t want to bother with,” Sterren explained.

Lady Kalira considered this, then smiled. “And I suppose,” she said, “that you intend to palm the job off on me.”

“Not exactly,” Sterren said. “But I admit you’re close. I want you to tell me who I should pass it on to.”

“Should?”

“Yes, should. Who could do the best job of it, and who would do the best job of it. I know I’d botch it.”

“You do?” She eyed him carefully.

He nodded.

“I think you’ll need to tell me a little more of what you had in mind,” she said.

“What I had in mind,” Sterren told her, “is an Imperial Council, a group of the best administrators we can find, who would actually run the empire. Vond isn’t particularly interested in doing that, and neither am I. Besides, Vond isn’t going to be around for all that long, and I don’t suppose I’ll be very welcome once he’s gone. A group of well-respected natives would be able to keep things going smoothly, regardless of what Vond and I do.”

“Why isn’t he going to be around very long?” Lady Kalira asked, staring at him.

“I can’t tell you that,” Sterren replied uncomfortably.

“You said the same thing months ago, and he’s still here,” she pointed out.

Sterren shrugged again. “So far, yes,” he said.

“And you still say he won’t be for long?”

“He can’t be,” Sterren insisted.

“Why not?”

“I can’t tell you that,” Sterren said again.

Lady Kalira considered this, then asked, “Can you tell me how long he’ll be around?”

“No. Maybe a month, maybe a year or two. I don’t think he can possibly last five years.”

“Did you hire an assassin, or something?” she asked curiously. “The cult of Demerchan, perhaps?”

“No,” Sterren said. “Why would I do something stupid like that? He isn’t doing me any harm. In fact, he isn’t doing much of anybody else any harm, either. Look at the peasants out there, they’re doing just fine! Nobody’s complaining except the deposed nobles, and even you aren’t really suffering much! And here I am, on top of it all, offering you a chance to get back into running the government!”

Lady Kalira studied him closely and then shook her head. “I don’t understand you, Sterren,” she said, “I don’t understand you at all.”

“I don’t care if you understand me or not; I just want your help in putting together this council. I thought seven members would be about right, no ties in the voting that way. And I don’t want it to be hereditary, exactly, since we can’t afford to have any infants or incompetents on it; but perhaps members could have the right to appoint their heirs. I don’t want any of the deposed kings on it, either, it wouldn’t look right unless we included all of them, and I hope that you, as a Semman, will see why I don’t want that.”

Lady Kalira smiled involuntarily at this reference to her former sovereign. Sterren took this as encouragement.

“I suppose princes or princesses might be all right, but I’ll leave that up to you,” he continued. “I don’t know much about any of the people around here; I never really got to know most of them. I’d like you to choose the people you think I really need to have, to start. You’re welcome to take a seat on the Council yourself, if you like, and I thought maybe the steward, Algarven, would be a good choice, but I’ll defer to your judgment.” He hesitated, then said, “I think we probably don’t want all seven to be Semman. In fact, I think a good mix of nationalities would be wise, but on the other hand, Semma is the capital province, so at least one or two... What do you think?”

“I think,” Lady Kalira said slowly, “that I need to know more about the duties of this proposed council.”

Sterren smiled and said, “What would you suggest? Vond has claimed building and conquest for himself and left everything else to me. I prefer to leave it to a council. What would you recommend?”

“You’re really serious about this?”

“Oh, yes.”

She sighed.

By the time Vond returned from the successful subjugation of Hluroth, they had selected four of the seven councillors and were discussing meeting schedules.

CHAPTER 35

It was the ninth of Harvest, in the Year of Human Speech 5221. The Empire of Vond extended from the deserts in the east to the ocean in the west and from the edge of the World in the south to the borders of Lumeth of the Towers in the north.

Vond had turned back before attacking Lumeth and had returned to his citadel trembling.

“I heard the whisper there, even over the power I draw on,” he told Sterren. “I’d forgotten what it was like. Foul, dark muttering in my mind, awful!” He took a deep breath, then released it slowly.

“I almost think I can still hear it,” he said, “but I know it’s just my mind playing tricks on me.”

Sterren hesitated, then said nothing.

“Well,” Vond went on, “I know where my limits are now, at any rate. I don’t dare ever venture past the borders of Lumeth or Kalithon or Shassalla, but here on the south of them, I’m all-powerful.”

Sterren did not argue with Vond’s claim. “It’s too bad,” he remarked instead. “I was curious about what would happen if you got really close to the towers themselves. Aren’t they the source of your power?”

Vond nodded. “I was curious, too, but I won’t risk finding out. It’s too bad; I’d have preferred to have control over the towers.”

That had been sixnights before, early in the month of Longdays, and that unexpected defeat had been followed by more than half a dozen quick victories over the tiny port nations of the South Coast west of Akalla, victories that had extended Vond’s empire as far as it could safely go. Now, on the ninth of Harvest, Sterren stood on a balcony and looked out across the countryside.

The land was a rich green from horizon to horizon, punctuated only by roads and buildings and the bright colors of flowers; thanks to Vond’s control of the weather and reworking of the soil there were no barren spots, nowhere that the earth failed to yield generously.

Straight, smooth roads paved with stone stretched out from the plaza below the citadel, leading directly to each of the towns and castles of the empire.

The village that surrounded Semma Castle still stood, but was equalled in size and far outdone in splendor by the town growing up around Vond’s palace, a town built of white and gold marble, roofed in red tile. Small fountains babbled in each corner of the plaza and at several intersections, providing drinking water for anyone who wanted it, and a much larger ornamental fountain sprayed upward at the center of the plaza. Smoke and intriguing odors rose from a dozen forges and ovens.

The two villages were growing toward each other across the intervening valley, and it seemed likely that in time they would merge into a single entity. In time, Sterren thought, this might become a real city.

Semma Castle itself still stood, but its population had dropped drastically. Over the months, as the royal treasury and the castle stores gave out, the nobility had drifted away, fleeing the empire or, in a few cases, finding honest work. The royal family itself was still sticking it out, but most of the others had left.

The same thing, Sterren knew, had happened in all the former capitals, the castles and strongholds that had once ruled Ophkar, Ksinallion, Skaia, Thanoria, Hluroth, Akalla of the Diamond, Zhulura, Ghelua, Ansuon, Furnara, Kalshar, Quonshar, Dherimin, Karminora, Alboa,and Hend.

So far, Vond had definitely been good for the Small Kingdoms. He had dispossessed a few hundred nobles, but he had enriched thousands of peasants. He had killed a few dozen people in his conquests, but he had probably saved at least as many from starvation.

And he was doomed.

Sterren still found it hard to believe that Vond did not realize he was doomed. It was really fairly obvious. After all, all warlocks were doomed. Just finding a new power source would not change that. Sterren thought Vond had been given enough hints when he established the northern borders of his empire, but still the warlock did not see it.

It was not just that he was unwilling to admit it, either. If that were it, he would have cut back on his use of magic, but he hadn’t. He continued to lay roads, erect buildings, manipulate the weather, and at times to light the night sky in sheer celebration of his might.

Sterren had refrained from commenting, but after all these months, he was finally convinced that Vond deserved better. He deserved a warning, at the very least, a warning only Sterren could provide.

And, Sterren promised himself, he would deliver that warning.

The only catch was to figure out how to convince Vond that he, Sterren, had only recognized the danger now. If Vond knew that Sterren had withheld his certainty for so long he was likely to be very annoyed indeed.

Sterren did not care to have Vond annoyed with him. He was puzzling out an approach when someone behind him cleared a throat.

He turned and found a palace servant, a man named Ildirin who had once been a butcher’s assistant in Ksinallion, standing in the balcony door.

“Your pardon, my Lord Chancellor,” he said apologetically, “but the Emperor is meeting with the Council and desires your presence.”

“Now?”

“Yes, my lord,” Ildirin replied.

Sterren knew better than to argue or hesitate; Vond hated to be kept waiting. “Where?” he asked.

“In the council chamber.”

Sterren nodded, stepped past Ildirin into the palace, and headed towards the marble stairs.

Ildirin followed at a respectful distance. The council chamber had not been designed as such; after all, when Vond built his palace he had no idea that an Imperial Council would ever exist. He had intended the room to be an informal audience chamber, where he could meet with his cronies without the full pomp of the main audience hall, but still on a business basis rather than in his personal apartments.

Save for Sterren, however, who was usually welcome even in Vond’s private quarters, the warlock had no cronies. He had a council, instead, and so the informal audience chamber had become the council chamber.

The councillors could hardly he considered cronies; none of the seven liked Vond or particularly wanted to see him remain in power. All seven, however, were willing to recognize that the Empire of Vond was a reality and that it needed governing; and all seven were very good at governing.

Ordinarily, the Council went about its business, and Vond went about his business, and the two had as little to do with each other as possible, communicating with each other only through Sterren. For Vond to meet with the entire Council was unheard of.

Sterren hurried down the stairs, the wide sleeves of his velvet tunic flapping at his sides, and marched across the broad hallway at the bottom. The great red doors at the inner end of the hallway led into the audience chamber; the black doors at the outer end led out to the plaza. He ignored them both and headed directly for the small rosewood door that nestled unobtrusively in one corner.

His hand on the latch, he hesitated. He rapped lightly, then opened the door and walked in.

The seven councillors were seated at the table where they carried out most of their deliberations, three to a side. Their chairwoman, Lady Kalira, usually sat at the head of the table; today she was at the foot, and the Great Vond floated cross-legged at the head. He was only slightly higher than if he had been using a chair; his knees were below the polished wood of the table top.

“Ah, there you are!” Vond said when he saw Sterren step into the room.

“Here I am,” Sterren agreed. “What’s happening?” He looked about for somewhere to sit, or even somewhere better to stand, and spotted an unused chair. He turned it to face the warlock emperor, and asked, “May I sit?”

Vond waved permission. As he did, he caught sight of Ildirin peering in the doorway.

“I see you found him,” the warlock said. “Now go see if you can find us something appropriate to drink; I expect we’ll be doing a lot of talking, and talking is thirsty work.”

Ildirin bowed and vanished, closing the door behind him.

“Now,” Vond said, “I suppose you all want to know why we’re here, so I’ll get right to the point, which is that am I not at all sure I like this ’Imperial Council’ of yours.”

Sterren did not like the sound of that and decided that perhaps Vond was not in a mood to hear bad news today. He wondered whether he could somehow convey an anonymous message to the warlock.

The councillors glanced at one another, and some at Sterren, but after a second or two all eyes came to rest on Lady Kalira. She accepted her silent appointment as spokeswoman and rose. “Your Imperial Majesty,” she said in her accented Ethsharitic, “we serve at your pleasure. If you wish us to stop, we will stop, we will be glad to stop.”

Two or three heads bobbed in agreement; nobody indicated by even the slightest gesture or sound that he might think otherwise.

“Don’t be so quick to resign, either,” Vond snapped. “I know I need somebody to run things; I’m just not sure I want you. I’m not sure you’ve been running things the way I want them run.”

“We serve at your Imperial Majesty’s pleasure,” Lady Kalira repeated, bowing her head.

Her Ethsharitic had improved greatly over the past several months, Sterren noticed. Recognizing that it was the new language of government had driven her to study it far more seriously than mere curiosity had before. “That’s what you say here,” Vond said, “but I hear otherwise elsewhere. I hear whispers that you’re plotting to overthrow me, to restore the old monarchies. After all, you’re all aristocrats yourselves; why should you accept a commoner like me as your emperor?”

Lady Kalira started to say something, but Vond held up his hand to stop her.

Sterren wondered suddenly just what sort of whispers Vond had actually been hearing. Was it whispered rumors that had upset him, or was there another sort of whisper entirely that was getting on his nerves?

Then he forgot about that, as Vond turned and addressed him directly. “So, my lord chancellor, why is it you chose only the old nobility for your council?”

The question itself was easy to answer, so easy that Sterren wondered what Vond was really after.

“Because, Your Majesty,” Sterren said, “no one else in your empire has had any training or experience in governing.”

“And you did not see fit to train them?”

“No, Your Majesty, I didn’t; I was trying to set up something to handle governing now, not at some indefinite future time. Besides, I don’t know any more about governing or training peasants to govern than you do.”

“It wouldn’t have to be peasants; couldn’t you find merchants or tradesmen? Running a country can’t be that different from running a business.”

Sterren had some serious doubts about Vond’s statement, but he ignored it and answered the question. “I didn’t try to find tradesmen, because I didn’t see anything wrong with using nobles who already know the job. Besides, there aren’t that many tradesmen around here; it’s not exactly Ethshar. I mean, in Semma, they had a Lord Trader, how much of a merchant class could there be, in a case like that?”

“You didn’t see anything wrong with using the nobles I threw out of power?”

“No, I didn’t!” Sterren answered. “What are they going to do? You’d kill anyone who got out of line, and they know it.” He gestured at the councillors, reminding Vond that they were listening.

“They could stir up discontent,” the warlock suggested.

“Why should they? Listen, Vond, I don’t think you appreciate what these people have done here. I picked the most competent people I could, without worrying about where they came from. Each of them agreed to help run the empire because they could see that it was here to stay; and each one of them was labeled a traitor by his friends and family because of that! They put up with that because they want to see their people, nobles, peasants, merchants, everybody, ruled fairly and well. If your empire ever did fall, and the old kingdoms were restored, they’d probably all be hanged for treason for having helped you!”

“You think so?” Vond said, his expression unreadable.

“Yes, I think so!” Sterren snapped.

At that point Ildirin entered quietly, bearing a tray that held a full decanter and a dozen wineglasses. He proceeded around the edge of the room to the emperor, who court etiquette required be served first.

“And I don’t suppose,” Vond said, “that you might be trying to put the nobility back in power, leaving me just a figurehead!”

“Why would I want to do that?” Sterren asked, genuinely puzzled.

Vond accepted a glass of wine. “Because you’re a noble yourself, of course, Sterren, Ninth Warlord!” He drank.

Sterren’s mouth fell open in astonishment. One of the councillors giggled, then quickly suppressed it. Ildirin silently poured wine.

“Me?” Sterren said at last. “I’m an Ethsharitic merchant’s brat! I’m no noble; my grandmother ran away from home, and I don’t give a damn who her father and brother were. I’m no more a part of the old nobility here than you are!”

Vond’s expression stopped him, and he corrected himself, “Well, not much more. I didn’t know I had any noble blood.” He glanced at the councillors and said, “Besides if I were trying to restore the old nobility, wouldn’t I have put kings and princes on the council, instead of these people?”

“Kings would be a little obvious,” Vond pointed out, “and you did put a few princes in here, didn’t you?”

“I did?” Sterren looked at the councillors again and recognized Prince Ferral of Enmurinon.

“Oh,” he said. Defensively, he added, “Only one. Out of seven.”

“So far,” Vond said.

Ildirin had served all the councillors, now, and approached Sterren with a filled glass. He waved it away; it appeared he needed his head clear if he was going to keep it.

“So far,” Sterren said, “and forever, I don’t choose new councillors; I don’t know who can handle the job and who can’t. I let each councillor choose his own successor.”

Ildirin, still holding the glass he had intended for Sterren, looked around the room and noticed that the emperor’s glass was empty. He stepped back and started gliding silently along the wall, back toward Vond’s place at the head of the table.

“Oh, I see!” the warlock said, sneering, “You won’t put any kings on the council, but if these seven name kings as their heirs, then retire, there’s nothing you can do to stop it!”

“Don’t be silly,” Sterren said, and he heard someone gasp quietly at his audacity in addressing the warlock emperor thus. “The Imperial Council serves at my pleasure, as well as yours, your Majesty. I can dismiss any councillor any time I please. So can you, just as you can dismiss me as your chancellor. And I assure you, I’d dismiss any king or queen, and probably whatever fool named him as heir.”

“Ah, you would? Why?”

“Because we don’t want the old royalty back in power. We don’t want one councillor, by virtue of his former station, to perhaps sway the rest of the council unduly. We don’t want to confuse the peasants by restoring a king to any semblance of authority.”

“That’s right,” Vond said, accepting the full wineglass from Ildirin. “We don’t want any of that. I’m sure the peasants resent me, consider me a usurper...”

Algarven, once royal steward of Semma, coughed suddenly, choking on a sip of wine. Vond turned to glare at him between sips from his own fresh glass.

“Excuse me, your Majesty,” Algarven said, as soon as he could breathe and talk again, “but the peasants... why would you think the peasants resent you?”

A flicker of uncertainty crossed Vond’s face.

“I’ve overthrown their kings,” he said.

“Forgive me, your Majesty,” said Berakon Gerath’s son, once royal treasurer of Akalla of the Diamond, “but so what? What did the old kings ever do for the peasantry? You’ve built roads and houses, put an end to wars, and even done what seemed impossible and regulated the weather. With all this, your taxes are no higher than the old. Believe me, your Majesty, the peasants don’t mind at all that you’ve replaced the old kings, though they do worry a bit about the inevitable price for this bounty.”

Vond handed his empty glass to Ildirin, who struggled a moment to balance everything on the tray before he could accept it. Vond threw him an annoyed glance.

“All right,” Vond said. “Forget the peasants. You say nobody here wants the old kings restored, but you have a prince on the council; what happens when his father dies?”

“Your Majesty,” Prince Ferral said quietly, “my father has been dead for five years now. You deposed my elder brother, not my father.”

“All right, then,” Vond said, as Ildirin fumbled with the decanter, “what happens when your brother dies?”

“Nothing much, your Majesty. He has children and other brothers older than myself. I am eighth in the line of succession.”

Vond glared and reached for a glass of wine just as Ildirin started to hand him one. Their arms collided, and the wine spilled down the emperor’s chest, staining the golden embroidery on his black robe an ugly shade of red.

The warlock stared down at the spill for an instant, then shrieked, “You idiot!” He waved an arm, and Ildirin was flung hard against the marble wall. The crack as his spine broke was clearly audible to everyone in the room. Vond waved again, and the servant’s head was crushed, the bones shattered, leaving the skin a limp sack. Blood gushed from his nose and mouth as he died. The corpse fell heavily to the floor and lay in a pool of gore.

Sterren and the councillors stared in shocked silence.

The tray that held the decanter still stood on the table. Vond smoothed his robe, but did not seem overly disturbed.

Sterren knew, as he stared at the corpse, that he would not be warning Vond of anything.

CHAPTER 36

Little was accomplished in the remainder of the meeting. The presence of Ildirin’s body cast a pall over the conversation, and Vond seemed to have spent his anger. In the end, he agreed to let the Imperial Council continue as it had been, with the understanding that it existed entirely by his sufferance, and that he had the right to dismiss any member at any time and to overrule any decision.

None of this had ever been in any question, as far as Sterren and the councillors were concerned, but nobody was foolish enough to point this out.

Afterward, Sterren took a long walk.

It was obvious that Vond was losing control. The magnificent buildings, the prosperous empire, the thriving crops had all served to hide this; Ildirin’s gruesome death had dragged it out into plain sight. Not only was any thought of a warning gone, Sterren was now convinced that he had to do all he could to destroy Vond quickly.

That night Vond ate dinner in the Great Hall, with Sterren at his right hand. As often as not he ate in his private apartments, if he bothered to eat meals at all, but on this particular occasion he held a formal dinner, with himself, Sterren, and the Imperial Council at the high table and the rest of the imperial household arrayed along three lower tables.

“You know, your Majesty,” Sterren remarked as he chewed a bite of apple, “you haven’t done any real spectacular magic lately.”

Vond looked at him. “Oh?”

“I mean, early on, you conjured up that storm to rout the armies of Ophkar and Ksinallion, and you quarried and assembled the stone for this palace in a few days, and so forth; but lately you haven’t done anything much more impressive than laying pavement stones. Oh, that’s certainly useful, and so is regulating the weather, and all the rest, but you haven’t done anything really showy in months.”

“You don’t consider lighting the night sky showy?”

Sterren pretended to consider that. “Well, I suppose,” he admitted. “But it’s not new. Everybody’s used to it now.”

“And why should I want to be showy?” Vond asked.

“To impress people, to remind everybody what their emperor is capable of. If you got the awe you’re due, you wouldn’t need to worry about disloyalty, and we could avoid unpleasantness like that meeting this morning.”

Vond nodded.

“Besides,” Sterren added, “I thought you liked using your magic as much as you could.”

“I do,” he said. “In fact, I’ve been getting irritable lately, and nervous. I wonder if it might be because I haven’t been doing enough. The power’s there to be used, after all. It’s always there in the back of my head, and I feel it so very clearly now...” His voice trailed off. Sterren nodded encouragingly.

“What would you suggest?” Vond asked.

“Oh, I don’t know, move a mountain, maybe?”

Vond snorted. “I’d need to build one, first; there are no mountains in the empire. Besides, where would I put it?”

Sterren waved that away. “Not a mountain, then. Well, the edge of the World lies a few leagues to the south of here; could you do something with that?”

“Like what?”

“Oh, peel it back and see what’s underneath, maybe. I’ve heard theorists argue about what holds the World up and keeps it from falling into the Nethervoid. Or maybe just go see what lies beyond the edge and bring back a piece.”

“There isn’t anything beyond the edge, is there?” Vond asked.

Sterren shrugged. “Nobody knows,” he said.

Vond considered that, clearly intrigued.

Nothing more came of it that night, but the following morning, the tenth of Harvest, Sterren awoke not in his own bed, but hanging in mid-air, just outside the open window of his room.

“Good morning!” Vond called from above him. “I thought you’d like to come along to the edge of the World and see what it’s like!”

Sterren looked up nervously. This was not really what he’d had in mind. “Good morning!” he called in reply. “I hope you slept well!”

Vond frowned.

“Actually,” he said, “I didn’t. I dreamt... well, I don’t know exactly what I dreamt, but it wasn’t pleasant, whatever it was.” The frown faded. “Never mind that, though,” he said. “We’re off to the edge!”

Sterren concealed his lack of enthusiasm for the venture, and rolled over in midair so that he could see where he was flying.

They sailed quickly past Semma Castle and across the few leagues of farmland beyond, into the empty southern desert.

Sterren would have watched the scenery, but there wasn’t any below; and to either side he could see nothing but mile after mile of sand spattered with tough, patchy grass.

Behind him he could see the towers of Semma Castle and the Imperial Palace gradually shrinking.

And ahead he could see nothing. The edge of the World was wrapped in yellow haze.

Sterren had seen that haze from the tower, but had assumed it was just windblown sand, or glare from sunlight reflecting off the edge itself. To his surprise, he could now see that it was neither, but a sort of very thin golden mist. It would have been almost invisible in any imaginable confined area, but here it seemed to go on forever. He could look through the golden mist, but all he saw beyond it was more golden mist, and still more golden mist, until eventually it added up to opacity. If there were anything beyond the mist, he could not see it.

And of course, nobody had ever suggested that anything existed beyond the edge of the World, except perhaps Heaven, where the gods lived, and that was more usually thought to lie somewhere above the sky.

He had nothing to provide him with any scale, but Sterren thought he must be seeing literally hundreds of miles of nothing but that yellow haze.

Vond called down to him, “What is that stuff?”

“How should I know?” Sterren called back. “Do you think we can get above it?”

“I have no idea!”

“I’m going to try.” With that, Vond began to rise, pulling Sterren up with him.

They ascended for what seemed like hours, and eventually the golden mist thinned still further, but so did the air about them. The blue sky above turned darker and darker, and grew steadily colder, until Sterren was shivering so badly that he could scarcely shout his protests to the warlock.

They did, indeed, come to the top of the yellow fog, but they were unable to see over it or through it; all they saw was a seemingly infinite expanse of golden haze, stretching on before them forever, while behind them all the Small Kingdoms were laid out, the central mountain chain curving down between the rich-green coastal plain and the paler, drier eastern lands. The ocean appeared on the western horizon, the burning sands of the great deserts on the eastern, and still they saw nothing to the south but golden haze.

When they could see the haze on the eastern horizon, beyond the desert, wrapping around the southeastern corner of the World, even Vond gave up.

Sterren had been ready to give up long before; unlike Vond, he had no supernatural power source to warm him or gather in air. Frost had formed on his face and hands, and he was having serious trouble breathing by the time Vond finally began descending.

When they had once again reached the warm, thick air of the everyday world, the warlock remarked, “I’d never gone that high before. It’s quite something, isn’t it?”

Sterren’s frozen muscles had not yet thawed; he could not answer.

They landed, and Vond stepped forward to the edge while Sterren waited atop a small dune.

The edge looked like an ordinary cliff; it was not particularly straight or even, but just a place where the dunes ended in a drop-off.

What made it unique was that it extended as far as Sterren could see in both directions, and that he could see nothing at all on the other side except that infinite golden mist.

Vond stood atop that cliff, looking down. “I can’t see anything,” he called back, disappointed. “Just that damned haze.”

Sterren stepped cautiously forward and peered over, still several feet back.

Like Vond, he could see nothing but the yellow mist. “Wait here,” the warlock said. He rose into the air and drifted forward.

Almost immediately, he stopped and flew back to hang in the air near Sterren and said, amazed, “There’s no air! I couldn’t breathe. And that yellow stuff smells horrible and it burns your throat. And I still couldn’t see any bottom. The mist just goes on forever!”

Sterren looked up and down.

“What holds it back, though? Why does the mist stay on that side, and the air on this side?”

Vond looked up and down, as Sterren had, and then shrugged. “It must be magic,” he said. “Wizardry, maybe.”

Sterren shrugged. “I never saw magic do anything this big.”

“The gods must have done it,” Vond said, in sudden enlightenment. “The tales say they brought the World out of chaos, don’t they? That yellow stuff must be chaos!”

That did not sound right to Sterren. The story he had heard was that the World had been a bit that was left over, unnoticed, when the universe split into Heaven and Hell. The gods had found it later, and helped shape it, but they hadn’t created it out of chaos.

Besides, why would chaos be yellow? Why would it be any color at all?

He didn’t think that there were any explanations for the golden mist; it was just there, and they would have to accept it.

“Now what?” he asked.

Vond looked about, considering. “I don’t think I want to fool around with that stuff,” he said. “If it is chaos, it’s dangerous.”

Sterren was not about to argue with that; he said nothing.

“What if I were to fold back the edge, here? That might even be useful; if the magic that holds that stuff back ever fails, a wall here would be a good second line of defense.”

Again, Sterren was not inclined to argue, although he thought Vond was talking nonsense. He could not help balking at the immensity of the idea, however.

“Fold it back,” he said, his voice cracking.

“Why not?” Vond said. “I’ll need to see how thick it is,though.”

“How thick what is?”

“The World, of course!” He bent over, peering down between his dangling feet, and Sterren watched as a narrow hole appeared in the sand before him.

Sand slithered steadily up into a ring around the hole, and did not slide back down to fill it in again. Instead the surrounding ring grew and spread.

Vond stared down into this unnatural opening for several minutes, and Sterren settled down to sit on a dune and watch. From where he sat he could not see into the hole at all, but he found he did not much care.

At last, Vond straightened up. “I can’t find the bottom,” he said. “I went down well over a mile, I’m sure.” He shrugged. “Well, I’ll just peel back the top layer, then, and fold that up.” He looked about, calculating, and his gaze fell on Sterren.

“Oh,” he said, “I’d better get you out of here. This may be messy.”

“All right,” Sterren said, greatly relieved but trying not to show it. He stood up.

In an instant, he had been swept up by that now-familiar magic and was airborne again, flying at a fantastic speed back toward Semma, moving so fast that once again, as he had at high altitude, he had trouble breathing.

Breathless moments later, he landed, stumbling, on a village street, in the shadow of the walls of Semma Castle.

CHAPTER 37

Carried over the intervening distance, low rumblings occasionally reached the village. From his perch in the castle tower Sterren could see huge chunks of sand and rock shifting in the distance, but he could make out no details.

After dark the noise continued, and an eerie orange glow lit the southern skies. The glow seemed to wax and wane erratically, and occasional sparkles of red or pale blue light rippled across it. Sterren was very glad he hadn’t used another of his ideas and suggested that Vond go fetch the lesser moon out of the sky; folding back the edge of the World was quite terrifying enough.

By noon on the eleventh of Harvest the job was complete; where once the edge of the World had been marked by a distant line of gold, now it was marked by a distant line of black that Sterren assumed to be stone, and a tiny black dot was approaching that could only be Vond, returning.

Sterren decided that the tower of Semma Castle was not where he wanted Vond to find him; he headed for the stairs.

He passed Shirrin in the sixth-floor hallway and almost stopped to talk to her. She stared at him for a moment while he hesitated, then turned and ran, and he continued down the stairs.

When he got back to the Imperial Palace Vond was already there, sitting on air in the audience chamber with the great red doors opened wide.

Sterren paused in the entryway, unsure whether to speak to the warlock, or to slip upstairs unnoticed. Vond settled the matter by calling, “Oh, there you are, Sterren!”

Sterren strolled into the audience chamber, trying to look casual. “How did it go?” he asked.

“Oh, well enough,” Vond said, smiling. “The sand wouldn’t hold together, of course, so I pulled up a sheet of bedrock. It’s about fifty feet thick and fifty yards high, and only the gods know how long.” He stretched and added, “It felt wonderful, using all that power!”

Sterren smiled back, hoping the warlock would not see how false the smile was. “I could see the difference from the tower,” he said.

Vond nodded. “It doesn’t look like much from this distance, though.”

“True enough, but it can be seen, and when people realize what it is, think how impressed they’ll be. Their emperor has turned up the edge of the World itself! The concept is more powerful than the appearance on this one.”

Vond nodded. “But I’ll want to do something flashy next time, something everybody will see. You think about what it might be, Sterren; I like your ideas.” He paused and frowned. “Right now, though, I think I might take a nap. I didn’t sleep at all last night, while I was working, and my head is buzzing, as if the walls themselves were talking to me.” He waved an arm about vaguely.

Sterren nodded and watched silently as Vond drifted off toward his private chamber.

Vond still did not realize what was happening, Sterren thought. He wondered how long it would take and when Vond would catch on.

He strolled aimlessly out of the audience chamber into the entrance hall, where the rosewood door of the council chamber caught his eye. He crossed to it, hesitated, and then opened the door and peered in.

The chamber was empty. All sign of Ildirin’s sudden demise had been scrubbed away.

Sterren wondered how the other servants had received word of Ildirin’s death. Who had told them, and what had they been told? How many had decided to leave?

He closed the door and thought for a moment.

The weather was beautiful, of course, as it always was in Vond’s empire, but that might not last. He decided to enjoy it while he could. The courtyard held a magnificent flower garden.

He was sitting on an iron bench, feeling the sunlight warm on his face, and letting the scent of roses fill his nostrils, when Vond screamed.

The scream came not just from the warlock’s throat, but from the air around him, from the palace walls, and from the stone of the earth itself; everything vibrated in rhythm. The stones groaned, so deeply that the sound was more felt than heard, while the air shrieked and even the leaves of the garden whistled piercingly.

The scream had no words; it was shapeless terror given voice.

The echoes were still fading, the air still humming, when the window of Vond’s bedchamber exploded outward into the garden, spraying shattered glass in every direction; Sterren ducked and covered his head with his arms as shards rattled down on all sides.

When the last tinkling fragment had settled, he looked up and saw Vond hanging in the air above him. The warlock wore only a white tunic, and his face was almost equally white. His eyes were wide and staring, his hands trembling.

“Sterren!” he called. “Sterren!”

Sterren said quietly, “I’m here.”

Vond heard him and looked down. He plummeted from the sky and landed roughly on the graveled path, falling to his knees and only catching himself from falling flat on his face with one outstretched hand.

He looked up at Sterren and said, “The nightmares, Sterren, they’re back!”

Sterren nodded. “I thought so,” he said.

Vond’s expression changed suddenly. Sterren’s calm cut through his fear and released anger and uncertainty. “You thought so?” the warlock demanded.

Sterren blinked and said nothing.

Vond rose to his feet, using warlockry rather than hands and legs. “Just what did you think? I had a nightmare, how would you know anything about that?”

Sterren hesitated, trying to phrase an answer, and Vond continued, “It was just a nightmare! It wasn’t... wasn’t that. It couldn’t have been. It was just a nightmare, my mind playing tricks on me.”

“No,” Sterren said, shaking his head and marveling that even now, Vond could not accept what was happening.

“It was an ordinary nightmare,” Vond insisted. “It must have been! That thing in Aldagmor is still out of range. It has to be! I haven’t been using it! I’ve been getting power from Lumeth!”

“No,” Sterren repeated. He was horribly aware that Vond was on the verge of complete panic and could lash out wildly at any time and strike him dead instantly. “No, it almost certainly does come from Aldagmor.”

“It can’t,” Vond insisted.

“Of course it can!” Sterren answered, annoyed at Vond’s stubborn refusal to understand.

“But how?” Vond insisted, “I’m out of range here!”

Sterren shook his head. “Nowhere is really out of range; you know that. When you first came here, before you learned to use the Lumeth Source, you could still draw on Aldagmor. Not much, but a little. Don’t you remember? You couldn’t fly, but you could stop a man’s heart.”

“But that’s apprentice work! Apprentices don’t get the nightmares!”

“You’re no apprentice any more. Don’t you see? You’ve been drawing so much power from Lumeth, you’ve become so powerful, so receptive to warlockry, that the Aldagmor Source can reach you. Receptivity isn’t that selective. After all, your receptivity to Aldagmor was what let you use Lumeth in the first place. They’re the same thing; the more sensitive you are to one, the more sensitive you are to both. The Lumeth Source is closer, so you can draw far more power from it, but you still hear the Aldagmor Source, too.”

“But I cant!”

“You do. You told me so yourself. You couldn’t enter Lumeth of the Towers and you’ve been complaining for days about whisperings and buzzings in your head; didn’t you realize what they were?”

Vond paused, his expression shocked.

“No,” he said at last, “I didn’t. But they... you’re right, I was hearing Aldagmor. I wasn’t listening, since I had Lumeth, but I was hearing it. Why listen for a whisper when you can use a shout?” He focused on Sterren again.

“You knew“ he said accusingly. ”You knew this was coming!"

Sterren did not dare to reply.

“Why didn’t you warn me? I...” Realization dawned. “Gods, you encouraged me!” Vond exclaimed. “You, it was your idea to fold up the edge of the World!” Fury seethed in Vond’s eyes, and Sterren expected to die then.

He didn’t.

“Why didn’t you warn me?” Vond screamed.

“I was going to,” Sterren answered, truthfully. “Really, I was. But then you killed Ildirin and hardly even noticed, and I... I thought you were becoming too dangerous. Besides-” He took a deep breath, and continued, “besides, would you have believed me?”

Vond’s face, though still pale, was calm as he forced himself to consider this question. He sat down on the bench beside Sterren.

“No,” he admitted at last. “No, I wouldn’t have.”

“Besides,” Sterren said, “I had no idea how much longer you had, how much power you would have to use before... before this.”

Vond nodded. “No other warlock ever came close to the power I had,” he said wistfully. Sterren noted his use of the past tense. He had already resigned himself to the situation.

“So,” Vond said, “I’m back where I was when you found me in Shiphaven Market, back in Ethshar, I’ve had my first nightmare, passed the brink. I need to either get farther from Aldagmor, or to stop using my magic and live with the nightmares, or else I’ll hear the Calling and... and do whatever the Calling makes one do.”

Sterren nodded.

“I can’t get any farther away, can I?”

“We’re not at the edge of the World,” Sterren pointed out. “Not quite.”

“But from here to the corner there’s nothing but sand and grass and desert. It’s not worth it. I can’t even build anything to live in; it would use too much power.”

“You could use your hands,” Sterren suggested.

Vond snorted derisively. “I don’t know how,” he said. “You could just stay here, go on as you have, and go out in a blaze of glory. After all, the Calling isn’t death, is it? It might not be so bad.”

“No,” Vond said flatly. “I don’t know what it is, but anything that sends those nightmares... No. I escaped it once, and that just makes it worse now.” He shook himself, and said with sudden resolution, “I’ll give up magic. I don’t need it now; I’m an emperor. I can live as I please without it!”

Sterren nodded. “Of course,” he said.

But he knew Vond could never do it. After using warlockry in such prodigious amounts for months, using it for his whims for years, could Vond really give it up?

Sterren did not believe it for a minute.

CHAPTER 38

Vond walked into the audience chamber, climbed the dais, and settled uneasily onto the borrowed throne. He looked down at Sterren.

“How do I look?” he asked.

“Fine,” Sterren said reassuringly.

“It’s not very comfortable,” the warlock said, shifting slightly and looking down at the throne. “And it doesn’t really go with this room.”

“Phenvel’s bigger than you are and he leaned back more,” Sterren pointed out. “As for the looks, maybe we can drape something over it later.”

Vond nodded. “What did the servants say when you told them to fetch it?”

“I used some of the slaves you bought from Akalla, and they didn’t say anything. It’s not their place to question direct orders.”

The warlock nodded again. “That’s good,” he said, in a distracted way.

After a moment of uncomfortable silence, during which Vond tried to find a more comfortable position and Sterren simply stood and waited, Vond asked, “What do you think they thought at the castle? Did anybody object?”

Sterren shook his head. “I sent half a dozen of my guards along. Nobody objected. They may be wondering about it, but they can’t do anything. You’re the warlock emperor, remember, you’re all-powerful. Nobody knows anything’s changed except the two of us.”

Vond smiled, a twisted and bitter expression. “They know. Half of Semma must have heard my scream.”

“They don’t know,” Sterren insisted. “They don’t know why you screamed. They don’t know anything about warlockry. Nobody in the entire empire knows anything about warlockry except you, me, and maybe a few traders and expatriates from the north.”

“They’ll guess, when they see me sitting in this thing.”

“They won’t.”

Vond shook his head, but stopped arguing. “Should I open the doors, now?” Sterren asked. Vond waved a hand unhappily. “Go ahead,” he said. Sterren marched down the length of the audience hall to the great red doors and rapped once on an enamelled panel.

The doors swung in, propelled by two palace servants apiece, another reminder of Vond’s unhappy condition, since he had always moved them magically before.

In the hallway beyond waited a dozen or so petitioners. These were the ones who had been sent on by the Imperial Council or various servants and officials as being outside the council’s purview, with valid reasons to see the Great Vond himself.

There was no bailiff, usher, or doorkeeper to manage the presentations; Vond had always taken care of that himself, using his magically enhanced voice to direct people. As Sterren looked over the uneasy little knot of people he thought to himself that a great many things would have to change if the empire was to run smoothly.

“All right,” he said, “how many groups do we have here? Please, divide yourselves up, spread out, so I can see what the situation is.” The petitioners milled about in confusion; clearly, several had not understood his Ethsharitic. He repeated the instructions as best he could in Semmat and waited while the group sorted itself out into smaller groups.

There were five petitions, it appeared, one group of four, a group of three, two pairs, and a single. “Who speaks Ethsharitic?” Sterren asked.

One hand went up in each group; the single, unfortunately, just looked blank. Sterren asked him in Semmat, “Do you speak Semmat?”

He nodded. “Yes, sir,” he said.

That, Sterren thought, would have to do.

He decided to start with the largest group and work down; it seemed fairest to keep the fewest possible waiting.

“All right,” he said, pointing, “You four, come on in.”

The Ethsharitic-speaking spokesman for the foursome led his party into the audience chamber, down the rich red carpet as the doors swung shut behind them, to stand before the dais. Sterren watched them closely, to see if they seemed aware that anything was out of the ordinary.

They did not. Apparently, either nobody had told them that the Great Vond had no throne and always conducted business floating in the air, or they had dismissed such tales as exaggerations.

They went down on their knees before the emperor and bowed deeply.

“Rise,” Vond said.

His unenhanced voice seemed horribly weak to Sterren, a thin little sound that was almost lost in the great stone chamber.

The petitioners did not seem to notice anything odd. They rose.

Their spokesman took a cautious step forward and waited.

“Speak,” Vond said.

“Your Imperial Majesty,” the petitioner said, “we have come here as representatives for many, many of your subjects who grow peaches. This year, thanks to the fine weather you have given us, we have a very large, very fine crop, and it is all ripening at once, so fast that we do not have time to harvest it. We...” He hesitated, glanced at Sterren, who looked encouraging, and then continued, “We have seen you light the sky at night. Could you do this again? If you could light the sky above our trees, we could harvest by night, as well as by day, and we would not leave fruit to ripen and rot on the tree before we can get to it. I... we understand that you have other concerns, but-”

“No,” Vond said flatly, interrupting the petitioner.

The spokesman blinked. “No?” he said. “But your Majesty-”

“No, I said!”

“May I ask why-”

“No!” Vond bellowed, rising from the throne, not by magic, but standing naturally upon his own feet. His voice echoed from the walls.

A breeze stirred the warlock’s robes, in a closed room where no natural breeze could reach. Vond felt it and looked down at the swaying fabric of his sleeve in horror.

He turned to Sterren and said, “Get them out of here.”

Then he turned and ran from the room.

The petitioners stared after him in astonishment. Sterren stepped forward and told them, “The Great Vond is ill. He had hoped that he would be able to hear petitions regardless, but it appears that the gods would have it otherwise.” He hesitated, then continued, “And I’m afraid that’s why he refused your petition; while his illness persists, his magic is somewhat limited, and to light the sky as you ask would be too great a strain upon his health.”

The petitioners looked at him uncertainly as he spoke, and he saw fear appear on the spokesman’s face. Sterren thought he understood that; after all, when the king is sick, the kingdom is in danger. That old proverb would hold true all the more for an emperor, and a young emperor of a young and still-unsteady empire at that. Worst of all, Vond was an emperor without an heir. “Don’t worry,” Sterren said soothingly. “It’s not that serious.” He hoped the lie would not be obvious.

“What can we do?” the spokesman asked.

“Go home, harvest your peaches as best you can, and don’t worry unduly. If you know the names of any gods, you might pray to them on the emperor’s behalf, and I’m sure healing charms won’t hurt.” He took the spokesman’s arm and led the party back down the hall to the door.

Once again, a single rap opened the doors, and Sterren escorted the little party out into the hall. There he raised his voice and called, “The Great Vond is ill, and all audiences for today are canceled!” He repeated it in Semmat. “If you wish to, you may stay in the area and check with the guards daily, and present your petitions when the Great Vond has recovered; or you may put them in writing and give them to any guard or servant with instructions that they be delivered to Chancellor Sterren, who will see that they are read by the Great Vond as soon as his health permits. If you cannot write, there are scribes for hire in the village.”

The little crowd milled about again, muttering uneasily.

“That is all!” Sterren announced firmly. He turned to the four servants at the doors and dismissed them.

That done, he turned and headed for the stairs. He kept his pace slow and dignified until he knew he was out of sight of the petitioners, then broke into a trot, heading directly for Vond’s bedchamber.

As he had expected, he found Vond there, sitting in a chair and staring at the gaping hole, edged with bits of glass and leading, that had once been the window overlooking the courtyard gardens.

“I can’t even fix the window,” Vond said without preamble as Sterren entered.

“I’ll have the servants take care of it immediately,” Sterren said.

“Sterren,” Vond wailed, “I can’t even fix the damned window! I can’t do anything. I can’t afford to lose my temper; I was struggling as hard as I could to shut out the magic down there, but you heard my voice, you felt the wind. How can I live without magic?”

“I didn’t feel any wind,” Sterren said truthfully. “I saw your clothes move, so I knew what happened, but it didn’t reach me. You had it almost under control. It will take practice, that’s all. Most people live their whole lives without magic. You ask how you can live without it; ask how long you can live with it.”

Vond turned and glared at him. “You did this to me,” he said bitterly.

“You did it to yourself,” Sterren retorted. “And whoever did it, it’s done now, isn’t it?”

“Oh, gods!” Vond burst out, throwing himself from the chair to the bed. “And the nightmares have already begun!”

“You’ve only had one so far,” Sterren pointed out, “and that was right after working the mightiest magic any warlock has ever performed. Perhaps, if you use no more magic, you won’t have any more nightmares.” “Oh, get out of here!” Vond shouted. Sterren retreated to the door. “I’ll send the servants to fix the window,” he said as he left.

CHAPTER 39

There were no nightmares that night, or the next, and Vond grew more optimistic. He stayed sequestered in his apartments, but spoke of venturing forth again and taking up his role as emperor, when he had adjusted to using no magic.

Even the rain on the second day did not seriously dampen his spirits. If anything, this sign that he was no longer controlling the weather seemed to cheer the warlock.

On the third night his screams woke the entire palace. Sterren took the stairs three steps at a time on his way to Vond’s chamber.

Two guards and Vond’s valet were already there, staring in shocked silence as Vond, hanging a foot off the floor, beat on the north wall of the room with his fists.

“Your Majesty,” Sterren called. “Remember, use your feet!”

Vond looked at him unseeingly and then seemed to emerge from a daze. He looked down, then dropped to the floor, and fell to his knees.

He knelt there, shaking. Sterren crossed to him and put an arm around his shoulder.

“You,” he said, pointing to one guard, “go get brandy. And you, go get an herbalist.” They hurried away.

The valet asked, “Is there anything...”

“Go find the theurgist, Agor,” Sterren said.

The valet vanished, leaving Sterren alone with the terrified warlock. He looked up at the wall, where a small smear of red showed that Vond had scraped his hand on the rough edge of a stone.

“Why were you hitting the wall?” Sterren asked.

“I don’t know,” Vond replied. “Was I?” He looked up, saw the streak of blood, then looked down at his injured hand, puzzled.

“Was it the nightmares?” Sterren asked.

Vond almost growled. “Of course it was, idiot!” He looked up at the blood again and asked, “Was I flying?”

“Yes,” Sterren said.

“I used magic, then. No matter how careful I am, the nightmares can make me use magic. It’s not fair!”

“No,” Sterren agreed. “It’s not fair.”

The guard returned with the brandy, and Sterren helped steady the glass as Vond drank. When the warlock had caught his breath again, he asked, “Did I say anything?”

“No,” Sterren told him, “I don’t think so.” The guard cleared his throat.

Sterren glanced at him. “Was there something before I got here?” he asked.

“He was crying, my lord,” the soldier said, “and saying something about needing to go somewhere. I couldn’t make out all of it.”

Then the herbalist arrived.

Half an hour later Vond was in bed again, feeling the effects of a sleeping potion the herbalist had brewed, and the little crowd of concerned subjects was breaking up, drifting out of the imperial bedchamber one by one.

Sterren departed and headed back up for his own room.

The incident had shaken his nerves. It had been easy enough to say that Vond had to go, but to watch him slowly being destroyed by the Calling was not easy at all.

Sterren was not sure he could take it.

Perhaps, he thought, it was time to go home to Ethshar. Vond could not follow him. The old Semman nobility was scattered and powerless, save for Kalira and Algarven, and they would have no particular reason to want him back. But no, he told himself, that was cowardice. Not that he was particularly brave, but it was worse than ordinary cowardice. He had created the whole situation; to run away and leave it for others to clean up the mess was despicable. It went beyond cowardice, into treachery.

It would be cheating, and he was an honest gambler. He did not cheat. He did not welsh.

He would stay and watch what he had wrought.

He almost reconsidered two nights later, when another nightmare sent Vond blazing into the sky like a comet. He awoke and fell to earth a mile north of the palace; Sterren and a dozen guards marched out to fetch him back.

CHAPTER 40

On the twenty-fourth of Leaf color, 5221, Sterren awoke suddenly and was startled to see sunlight pouring in his bedroom window. It had been two sixnights since he had slept the night through, without being awakened by another of Vond’s Calling nightmares.

He sat up and realized that he was not alone in the room, that he had been awakened. He blinked, then recognized the man who had awakened him as Vond’s valet.

“What’s happened?” he asked.

“He’s gone,” the valet said.

Sterren wasted no time with further questions; he rose and followed the servant at a trot through the palace passages, back to the warlock’s bedchamber.

The bed was empty and not particularly disturbed; the coverlet was thrown back on one side, as if Vond had gotten up for a moment, perhaps to use the chamberpot, and had not yet returned.

The often-repaired window to the courtyard was open.

Vond was gone.

It was over; whatever it was that lurked in the hills of Aldagmor had taken another warlock.

Sterren almost wanted to laugh with relief, but instead he found himself weeping.

When he had regained control of himself, he asked the valet, “What time is it?”

“I don’t know, my lord; I awoke an hour or so after dawn, I think, and came in and found it like this. I went straight to fetch you.”

Sterren nodded. “All right,” he said. “You go find whoever takes care of such matters and see to it that the Imperial Council is in the council chamber an hour from now. I need to speak to them.”

The valet hesitated. “What do I do here?” he asked.

“Nothing,” Sterren said. “Leave it just the way it is. The Great Vond might come back.”

With a shiver, Sterren realized that might even be true. Nobody knew what happened to warlocks who gave in to the Calling. None had ever returned.

But Vond had been more powerful than any other warlock who ever lived, and warlocks had only existed, and therefore had only been vanishing, for twenty years. Nobody really knew whether Vond might come back.

But quite frankly, Sterren doubted it.

Back in his room, he had someone fetch him a tray of breakfast pastry, which he ate while bathing. When he was washed, fed, and dry, he took his time in dressing in his best tunic and breeches, combing his hair, brushing out his freshly grown mustache, he was almost, he thought as he looked at the mirror, ready to grow a proper beard. When he was thoroughly satisfied with his appearance, he headed for the council chamber.

All seven councillors were there waiting for him; Lady Kalira, anticipating his arrival, was at the foot of the table, leaving room for him at the head. He marched in and took his place.

“The Great Vond,” he announced, “has moved on to a higher plane of existence.”

“You mean he’s dead?” Prince Ferral asked. “No,” Sterren said. “Or at least, I don’t think so.”

“You’ll have to explain that,” Algarven remarked. Sterren did, not concerning himself with the truth. Warlocks, he explained, did not die the way ordinary people did. They vanished, transmogrified into pure magic. The nightmares and other ills that the Great Vond had been suffering were his mortal body’s attempts to prevent this ascension.

“He’s gone, though?” Prince Ferral demanded.

“He’s gone,” Sterren admitted. “But we don’t know if it’s permanent. It’s only twenty years since warlockry was first discovered, and the Great Vond was the most powerful warlock the World has yet seen. We really don’t know whether he might return or not.”

The councillors watched Sterren carefully, and he looked them over in return, trying to judge how many of them believed him. He couldn’t tell. After all, these were all expert politicians. They could hide their opinions quite effectively.

Then Lady Kalira asked the really important question, the one that Sterren had called this meeting to answer.

“What now?” she said.

“I don’t know,” Sterren admitted.

“Well, what do you think?” Algarven asked.

“I’m not sure,” Sterren said. “We could just go on the way we have been. After all, nobody outside the palace has seen Vond in almost two months now. Nobody has to know that anything has changed.”

“I don’t know about that,” Algarven said. “I don’t think we can keep it secret forever. The servants will know, and they’ll talk.”

The others nodded in agreement.

“We could take Lord Sterren’s approach,” Lady Kalira suggested, “and say that he’s gone, but he’ll be back.”

“Do we want to go on as we have?” asked Lady Arris of Ksinallion. “We could put everything back the way it was, couldn’t we?”

“Could we?” Algarven said. “What would we do with this palace?”

Everyone began talking, and Sterren lost track of who was saying what.

“Why should we go back to stupid little border wars?”

“Why break up the strongest nation in the Small Kingdoms?”

“What if the peasants don’t want to switch back?”

“What about all the roads he built?”

“We could be beheaded for treason!”

“How would we divide up the imperial treasury?”

It was Lady Kalira who settled the matter by asking, “Do you really want someone like King Phenvel back on the throne?”

That settled it; the Empire of Vond would continue.

“What about a new emperor?” Prince Ferral asked.

“Who?” Algarven asked in reply.

“If we pick one of the deposed kings, we’ll have rebellions in the other provinces,” Lady Kalira pointed out.

“What about Lord Sterren?” Lady Arris asked. Sterren thought he sensed a current of approval and he blocked it quickly. He had thought this all through once before, when Vond had appointed him to handle the details of government.

“No,” he said, “I’m not interested. I didn’t want to be warlord of Semma, I didn’t want to be Vond’s chancellor, and I certainly don’t want to be your emperor!” Lady Kalira started to speak, and Sterren cut her off. “You don’t need an emperor,” he said. “The Hegemony hasn’t got an emperor. Sardiron hasn’t got an emperor. They get along just fine.”

“What do they have?” Prince Ferral asked. “The Hegemony has a triumvirate, three overlords who form a sort of council. And Sardiron has a council of barons. We have a council here; we don’t need an emperor.”

“You’re suggesting, then, that the Imperial Council be the highest authority?” Algarven asked.

Sterren nodded. “Exactly,” he said.

“And what of our chancellor?” Lady Kalira asked. “What will you do?”

“Retire, if you’ll let me,” Sterren said. “I’d like to settle down quietly, find some sort of honest work — though I certainly wouldn’t mind if you want to vote me a pension, or maybe even an appointment of some sort.”

Lady Kalira rose and glanced at the other councillors. “I think,” she said, “that we need to discuss this by ourselves.”

Sterren bowed. “As you wish, my lady,” he said. “If you need me, I expect to be at Semma Castle.” She bowed in return, and Sterren left the room. As he strolled down the hill on one of Vond’s fine paved roads, he whistled quietly to himself.

It was over. He had discharged his responsibilities. He had cleaned up the mess he had created. He had won Semma’s war, but in the process of winning it he had unleashed Vond and destroyed Semma. Now he had removed Vond, but had kept his good works, his empire, intact. He could not be warlord of Semma, since Semma was gone, and now he was no longer chancellor of Vond.

He was free, he could go home to Ethshar if he wanted, or he could stay where he was. He was crossing the market before the castle gate when a soldier spotted him and waved. He waved back.

“Lord Sterren,” the man called in Semmat. “What about a game of three-bone?” Sterren looked over, thinking of the feel of the dice in his fingers. At that thought, somewhere in the back of his mind, he thought he heard a faint silent buzz, or perhaps even a whisper.

He shuddered.

“No, thanks,” he called. He turned his gaze away, up toward the castle.

He saw Princess Shirrin standing on the battlements, watching him approach. He waved. She smiled, and waved back. Startled, he stumbled and almost fell, then caught himself and walked on.

She must finally have forgiven him for allowing her father to be deposed, he realized. She could not possibly know yet that Vond was gone.

He could explain it all to her now, explain how he had known Vond was doomed and that to resist him would only lead to disaster. She would welcome this explanation, he was sure. She would welcome him. He thought he just might stay in Semma after all.