Thraxas and the Oracle

Chapter Sixteen

The next day, rumours sweep through the army. Deeziz the Unseen’s name is suddenly on everyone’s lips. Everyone seems to know that the most powerful Orcish sorcerer is here, right in the middle of our army, undetected. The mood among the soldiers changes from optimism to apprehension. The storm which delayed us, previously seen as an unfortunate natural phenomenon, is now taken as proof of Deeziz’s power. It’s a severe blow to morale. Even though our rendezvous with the Niojans has been delayed, the army was in good spirits. Not any more. The shocking rumours have a devastating effect. Everywhere you look there are soldiers eying their neighbours suspiciously, wondering if they might be an Orcish spy or an Orcish sorcerer. Confidence in Lisutaris as War Leader has plummeted.

I’m sitting morosely in the back of my wagon when Droo clambers in with a half-full bottle of wine in her hand. It’s an inferior vintage but that can’t be helped. If it wasn’t for Droo’s excellent talent for sniffing out spare supplies of alcohol, I’d have been in a much worse state.

“Deeziz is a cunning Orc,” I mutter, after a hefty swig from the wine bottle. “She’s spreading rumours about her own presence. Now the troops are worried and Lisutaris looks bad.”

It could get worse. If Deeziz decides to transmit some anonymous messages to the Niojans about Lisutaris visiting the oracle, it might end our alliance.

Rinderan appears. The young sorcerer is carrying a list of names. “Sorcerer Irith and his companions have checked every name on this list,” he informs me. “They’ve come up with nothing.”

“Did they really look?”

“So Irith says. They’ve used all available sorcery and examined everyone close to our War Leader. Every Commander, every one of her personal staff, anyone who’s been in contact with her. They’ve also checked everyone in the army who has any sorcerous power - the front line combat sorcerers, the message senders, the medical sorcerers, even the weather unit. No one shows any sign of actually being an Orcish imposter.”

I grunt with exasperation. According to Irith, his sorcerous detection unit had developed some new tools of magical investigation which he regarded as foolproof. Obviously they weren’t. I take the list and dismiss Rinderan, rather wearily. The whole affair is starting to seem hopeless. The list contains details of every possible suspect, anyone close enough to Lisutaris to know details of her plans. It’s a depressingly long. There’s her war council - General Hemistos, Lord Kalith-ar-Yil, and Bishop-General Ritari. Her aide-de-camp Julius. My own security staff. Makri. Irith Victorious and his fellow Abelasian sorcerers. Captain Hanama and her staff, including the mysterious Megleth, Elvish assassin. Then there’s Tirini, and her nursemaid Saabril Eclipse. The two Kamaran sorcerers they arrived with. Coranius the Grinder. There are the trusted guards who are always in place around her command tent. They’re not senior officers but they’re in close enough proximity to Lisutaris that they’d probably be able to learn a lot of information if they wanted. Senior Storm Class Sorcerer Habintenat and his weather unit. The officers in the level below the command council, General Mexes and Admiral Arith. All of these people have already been examined, both by my own unit and Irith’s sorcerers. I stare at the list, vaguely hoping that some inspiration might strike. A half hour later, I’m still staring, when Makri climbs into the wagon. Her hair is pulled back tightly and tied in a long pony-tail, perhaps as part of an effort to look more disciplined. I ask her if she’s hiding from See-ath.

“No. He hasn’t been around. Lisutaris asked me to leave for a while.”

“Another top-secret commanders' meeting?”

Makri frowns. “She says she’s meeting Legate Apiroi. I don’t like it.”

“Why would she meet him?”

“I don’t know. Yesterday she wanted him kept out the way and today they’re having a private conference. It can’t mean anything good. Legate Apiroi is only interested in one thing, increasing his influence. I think he’s trying to usurp Bishop-General Ritari. Wouldn’t surprise me if he’s got ambitions to be War Leader.” Makri takes the bottle of wine from me and drinks. “I don’t like it. Lisutaris should just get rid of him.”

“She has to be tactful. Relations with Nioj are always tricky.”

Makri notices the scroll in my hand. “What are you reading?”

“My list of every possible suspect.”

“Is it helping?”

“No, it’s useless. There must be forty or fifty people who’ve had enough contact with Lisutaris to be doing this damage. My unit has run background checks on all of them. Irith Victorious has checked them with sorcery. No results. If Deeziz is so clever maybe it doesn’t matter what sort of checks we make. Perhaps she can just fake anything. Maybe she can plant false memories in people.”

“Is that possible?”

“I don’t know. I’m beginning to wonder if there’s anything this Orc can’t do. She must have done a lot of studying on that mountain top. Maybe Lisutaris did go to too many parties.”

I take another sip from the wine bottle. “I always knew our degenerate aristocracy would ruin Turai. Lisutaris and Tirini spend their whole time dancing and gossiping at Palace soirees while Deeziz does what a sorcerer is meant to do - learn more sorcery. And now look what’s happened. Tirini’s half-dead, Lisutaris has gone mad, and an honest man like myself has his name dragged through the mud by malicious prophesies from a corrupt High Priestess. I tell you Makri, the situation is bad. We can’t even find the Orcish army. So much for Hanama and her Intelligence Unit. We’ve got a Sorcerous Weather Unit that can’t stop storms, and a Sorcerous investigation Unit that couldn’t find an Orc if she walked up and introduced herself.”

“In other words, everyone else is to blame?” says Makri.

“Exactly. Useless, degenerate incompetents, all of them.”

“How much wine have you drunk?”

“Not enough. I can’t believe Lisutaris said I was as much use as a one-legged gladiator. That’s not the sort of crude expression you expect to hear from your War Leader.”

“I didn’t like being blamed for Ibella’s death. But Lisutaris is under a lot of pressure. She’s worried she’s not going to be able to hold the army together.”

“All the more reason to value her trusted companions. I rescued that woman from Turai!”

“Are you ever going to stop bragging about that?” Makri drinks from the bottle.

“I blame the oracle.”

“The oracle?”

“We’ve been cursed since we visited that place. I hate oracles. They’re always useless. Some mumbo-jumbo that no one can understand. You never find an oracle saying anything worthwhile like 'Tomorrow someone will buy you a flagon of ale and a mutton pie.' That would be an oracle worth having.”

“It’s interesting how powerful a grip oracles still have on people’s imaginations,” says Makri. “People are fools. Oracles are nonsense.”

Makri shrugs. “I know. Though it’s odd how accurate some of the High Priestess’s predictions were. Ibella died of poison right after she was warned to fear only poison.”

“That’s only one prophesy. Anyone can get lucky. I still think her words to Hanama were ridiculous. Much Death. Hanama’s an assassin, it didn’t take tremendous insight to come up with that.”

“Did the High Priestess know she was an assassin?”

“Probably. It wouldn’t surprise me if her followers sneaked her some hints about the people who visit her. Charlatans, all of them. As for Gurd, and Much Life - ” I pause. “Now I think about it, Gurd told me Tanrose wants to have a baby. I suppose that might qualify as much life.”

Makri is amused. “Maybe the High Priestess knew what she was talking about.”

I refuse to rise to the bait. I know Makri has no more belief in oracles than me.

“Why did Gurd tell you Tanrose wanted to have a baby?”

“Because he knows I’m one of the few sensible men left in the West, and he wanted advice.”

“What did you tell him?”

“Mainly that I didn’t want to talk about babies.”

“He’d be a good father,” says Makri.

“He would be. But he’s worried he won’t be alive long enough to see the child. That’s a sensible worry. If this campaign continues to go downhill none of us will be around for long.”

We’re still trundling slowly over the low hills on the approach to the border between Simnia and Nioj. We’ll be meeting up with the Niojan army any time now. I wonder what sort of reports Legate Apiroi and Bishop-General Ritari have been sending them.

“I found out something odd about Tirini Snake Smiter,” I tell Makri, lowering my voice so that Anumaris won’t overhear. “She doesn’t come from the respectable family she claims. I don’t think she came from Turai’s upper class at all. Her father was a sewer inspector. If he’s the man I used to know, he was about as low class as me, which is very low, in Turanian terms.”

“Why would Tirini lie about that?”

“You lived in Turai long enough to know what it’s like. Class makes a lot of difference. The upper classes are obsessed with status and they don’t like sharing their privileges.”

Makri, as a foreign female gladiator with Orcish blood, had the lowest status it was possible to have in Turai, so she knows what I’m talking about. Even so, she’s puzzled about Tirini.

“Sorcerers don’t have to come from the aristocracy, do they?”

“Most sorcerers are the sons and daughters of respectable families. Not the highest aristocracy, but respectable. There are a few from the lower classes but they don’t get far in the Sorcerers Guild. Not promoted to the best posts. I suppose Tirini didn’t want to admit her background, particularly as she was so obsessed with being Turai’s most glamorous woman. I can understand that. But I’m puzzled.”

“Why?”

“I wouldn’t have thought it was easy for her to hide her background from other sorcerers. Not when she started out, anyway. When she first went to the Sorcerers College, she couldn’t have had that much power. The professors there should have seen through any attempt at deception. They do look into their students' background as part of the induction process.”

Makri takes a small bag from a pocket inside her armoured tunic.

“Lisutaris gave me this.”

“So she hasn’t stopped using it?”

“She’s cut down a lot. Quite a lot. Well, she doesn’t smoke as much as she used to.” Makri rolls up the thazis into a stick and lights it. She inhales then passes it to me. We smoke it peacefully together for a few minutes.

“What’s wrong with being a sewer inspector anyway?” asks Makri.

“Pardon?”

“You said Tirini was ashamed of her father being a sewer inspector. I don’t see why anyone would be ashamed of working on the sewers. Haven’t you used them during your investigations?”

“Once or twice.”

“And we escaped from the city via the sewers. You might say they saved Lisutaris’s life. Anyway, they’re a good piece of architecture.”

“They are?”

“Of course. Turai’s sewerage system is one of the best there is, in any city. It was all designed by the Master Architect Janavius.”

“How do you know that?”

“I learned in college. If it wasn’t for the innovations made by Janavius, Turai would be the festering mess it deserves to be. He built eight new tunnels under the city, incorporating three ancient streams into the system, and he was responsible for - ”

I hold up my hand. “Makri, does it ever worry you that you seem able to deliver a lecture on any conceivable subject?”

“No.”

“It worries me.”

“I think you just resent that women can get a good education at the Guild College.”

“I only resent it when they’re lecturing me about it.” I inhale from the thazis stick and pass it back to Makri. “I’ll take your word that our sewers are a marvel of architecture. It might take a while to convince the rest of the population. I can see why Tirini tried to keep it quiet.”

“I suppose so. Though Janavius really deserves more credit for his work. Did you know he was responsible for adding volcanic ash to concrete, which means it can set underwater? He discovered this by - ”

I sigh, and try to block of Makri’s lecture on Turai’s marvel of underground architecture. Once she gets going on this sort of thing, she can be hard to stop. It’s almost a relief when Anumaris Thunderbolt pokes her head through the canvas flap with an angry expression on her face.

“I thought I smelled thazis! You shouldn’t be smoking that.”

“Why not?”

“You shouldn’t be intoxicated when you’re on duty.”

“We’re off duty.”

“No you are not. What if some crisis happens?”

“Then you can deal with it.”

I pass the thazis stick back to Makri. “I thought you were bad, lecturing me about drinking all the time. Anumaris here is ten times worse.”

“I’m just doing my duty!” protests the young sorcerer. “We’re on our way to war. We should be alert at all times. Something could happen.”

“Just drive the wagon, Anumaris. Nothing is going to happen.”

At that moment, Lisutaris, War Leader, Commander of the western armies, appears at the rear of the wagon. She climbs in, quite nimbly.

“I told you something might happen,” says Anumaris.