A tiny smile on her face, she kissed Van and Gerin, fiercely hugged the Fox, and whispered, ' This will be hard. Hurry back, please!' She followed Namarra out. When the door closed behind her, Gerin felt the sunshine had left the day.
Valdabrun seemed oblivious to the byplay between the two women. That proved again to the baron that he was more used to the field than to the imperial court's intrigues. After his niece and mistress were gone, he said bluntly, 'Fox, if half what you've said is true, your arse is in a sling.'
'I'd be lying if I said I liked the odds,' Gerin agreed.
'Advice from me would be nothing but damned impertinence right now, so I'll give you none. But I will say this: if any man is slippery enough to slide through this net, you may be that man. Yet you seem to have kept your honor too. I'm glad of it, for my niece'show strange that seems!-sake.' He shifted his attention to Van. 'Could I by any chance persuade you to join the Imperial Guard?' His smile showed he knew the question foolish before he asked it.
Van shook his head; the plume of his helm swayed gently. 'You're not like most of the popinjays here, Valdabrun. You seem a fighting man. So you tell me: where will I find better fighting than with the Fox?'
'There you have me,' Valdabrun said. 'Gentlemen, I would like nothing more than talking the day away over a few stoups of wine, but I must get back to the palace. The Eshref clan out of Shanda have forced a pass in the Skleros Mountains, and their brigands are plundering northern Sithonia. His imperial majesty thinks paying tribute will get them to leave. I have to persuade him otherwise.'
'The Eshref?' Van said. 'Is Gaykhatu still their chief?'
'I believe that was the name, yes. Why?'
'Send troops,' the outlander said decisively. 'He'll run. I knew him out on the plains, and he always did.'
'You knew him on the plains…' Valdabrun shook his head. 'I won't ask how or when, but I do give thanks for the rede-and when I talk with his imperial majesty, I'll term it 'expert testimony' or some such tripe. Dyaus, what drivel I've had to learn in the past year or so!'
As Van and Gerin drove away from Valdabrun's home, the baron was heavy-hearted over parting from Elise, necessary though he knew it was. Van, on the other hand, was full of lickerish praise for Namarra and lewd speculation on the means Valdabrun, who was certainly no beauty, used to keep her at his side. His sallies grew so unlikely and so comical that Gerin finally had to laugh with him.
'Where now?' Van asked as the Alley's turmoil surrounded them once more.
'The Sorcerers' Collegium. It's in the southwestern part of the city, near the apothecaries' district. I should know when to turn.'
But he did not. He never learned whether the building he sought as a marker was torn down or if he had simply forgotten its looks in the eight years since he'd seen it last. Whichever, before long he knew he had gone too far west along the Alley. He turned to passersby for directions.
At first he got no responses save shrugs and a few vaguely pointing fingers. Realizing his mistake, he tossed a copper to the first halfway intelligent-looking fellow he spied. The man's instructions were so artfully phrased, accompanied by such eloquent gestures, that Gerin listened as if spellbound. He had all he could do to keep from applauding. Instead, he gave his benefactor another coin.
The man's thanks would have drawn an aurochs into a temple.
Unfortunately, the Sorcerers' Collegium was nowhere near where he claimed. Gerin expended more coppers and most of his patience before he finally found it.
There was nothing outwardly marvelous about the building that housed it, a gray brick 'island' not much different from scores of others in the capital. But it was discreetly segregated from its neighbors by a broad smooth expanse of lawn. None of the nearby buildings had a window that faced the Collegium. They only gave it blank walls of stucco, timber, or brick, perhaps fearing the sorceries emanating from it.
Though the Collegium accepted students only from within the Empire, folk of various races called on it for services. Many odd vehicles and beasts were tied in front of it; to his horses' alarm, Gerin hitched the wagon next to a camel some Urfa had ridden up from the desert.
No sooner had he done so than three muscular individuals appeared and asked if the gentlemen in the wagon would pay them to watch it. ' I'll see you in the hottest firepit in the five hells first,' Gerin said genially. 'You know as well as I, the Collegium has spells to keep thieves away from its clients.'
The largest of the bravos, a fellow who would have been a giant beside anyone but Van, shrugged and grinned. 'Sorry, boss,' he said, ' but the two of you looked such rubes, it was worth the chance.'
'Now you know better, so be off with you.' After exchanging a final good-natured insult with the baron, the ruffians ambled away, looking for less worldly folk to bilk. Gerin shook his head. 'When I was a student the same sort of rascals were about, preying on strangers.'
Inside the Collegium the ground floor was lit, mundanely enough, by torches. Some of them flared crimson, green, or blue, but that was the simplest of tricks, scarcely sorcery at all, merely involving the use of certain powdered earths. A greater magic kept the chamber free of smoke but let the nose detect the pinches of delicate incense burning in tiny braziers set along the walls and mounted on the sturdy granite columns that supported the Collegium's upper stories.
The procedures on the ground floor of the Collegium reminded Gerin of nothing so much as those of the Imperial Bank. Orderly lines of clients snaked their way toward young mages seated at tables along the north wall. Once there, they explained their problems in low voices. Most were helped on the spot, but from time to time a wizard would send one elsewhere, presumably to deal with someone more experienced.
Van bore queueing up with poor grace: 'I don't fancy all this standing about.'
'Patience,' Van said. 'It's a trick to overawe people. The longer you have to wait, the more important you think whoever you're waiting for is.'
'Bah.' Van made as if to spit on the floor, but changed his mind. It was too beautiful to soil: an abstract mosaic of tiny glass tesserae of silver, lilac, and sea-green, glittering in the torchlight.
The man in front of them finally reached a wizard and poured out his tale of woe like a spilled jug of wine, glug, glug, glug. At last the wizard exclaimed, 'Enough! Enough! Follow this'-a blob of pink foxfire appeared in front of the startled fellow's nose-'and it will lead you to someone who can help you.' He turned to Gerin and Van, said courteously, 'And what my I do for you gentlemen? You may call me Avelmir; my true name, of course, is hidden.'
Avelmir was younger than Gerin, his round, smoothly shaved face smiling and open. His familiar, a fat gray lizard about a foot long, rested on the table in front of him. Its yellow eyes gave back Gerin's stare unwinkingly. When Avelmir stroked its scaly skin, it arched its back in pleasure.
Gerin told his story. When he was done, Avelmir's smile had quite gone. 'You pose a difficult problem, sir baron, and one in which I am not sure we can render timely assistance. Let me consult here…' He glanced down at a scrap of parchment. 'We are badly understaffed, as you must be aware, and I fear we shall be unable to send anyone truly competent north of the Kirs before, hmm, seventy-five to eighty days.'
'What!' Gerin's bellow of outrage whipped heads around. 'In that time I'll be dead, with my keep and most of the northland aflame for my pyre!'
Avelmir's manner grew chillier yet. 'We find ourselves under heavy obligations in the near future, the nature of which I do not propose to discuss with you. If you do not care to wait for our services against your barbarous warlock, hire some northern bungler, and may you have joy of him. Good day, sir.'
'You-' Outrage choked the Fox.
The battle-gleam kindled in Van's eyes. 'Shall I break the place apart a bit, captain?'
'I would not try that,' Avelmir said quietly.
'And why not?' Van tugged at his sword. It came halfway free, then struck. He roared a curse. Avelmir's hands writhed through passes. When Gerin tried to stop him, the reptilian familiar puffed itself up to twice its size and jumped at him. He drew back, not sure if it was venomous.
Sweat started forth on Van's forehead, and an instant later on Avelmir's. The outlander gained an inch, lost it again. Then more and more blade began to show. At last it jerked clear. With a howl of triumph, Van raised his sword arm.
