Emmis’s plate was empty. Then the younger man straightened in his chair and said, “I think his name is Hagai, but I’m not sure.”
Lar looked up from spearing his last lump of carrot. “Is he watching us?”
Emmis glanced in the right general direction, then back at Lar.
“I think so. I’m not certain. He’s being casual.”
“But he’s still there.”
“Oh, yes.”
“You think they’re worried that I’m going to bring a new warlock back to Vond? That we’re going to use more magic to start conquering our neighbors again?”
“If I had to guess what they’re worried about from what they told me, yes, that’s what I would guess.”
“That’s almost funny, really.”
Emmis blinked. “It is? Why?”
“Because of my real mission.” He glanced toward the door, and toward the table in the window where the Lumethan was sipping at an empty beer mug. Then he turned back to Emmis, looking tired and thoughtful. After a pause, he said, “I’m going to trust you, Emmis. If they’re following me and watching me, I’m not going to be able to keep all my secrets anyway, so I’m going to tell you a few things. If the Regent doesn’t like it, he should have sent more people or used some magic to make my job easier.”
“All right,” Emmis said. “What is it?”
Lar leaned forward. “My mission is to make sure that more warlocks don’t come to Vond,” he whispered. “Vond the Warlock was a monster, a killer, and we don’t want another one. I’m here to convince the Council of Warlocks to forbid their people to set foot in the Empire, or if I can’t do that, I’m to hire other magicians to keep warlocks out.”
Emmis considered that for a moment, then leaned forward himself and whispered, “Why is that a secret?”
Lar snorted. “Because if warlocks who are worried about the Calling find out that we’re trying to keep them out, what do you think they’ll do?”
“I don’t know; what?”
“Well, some of them will try to get into the empire before we can stop them. Remember, Vond is a long, long way from Aldagmor.”
“But the Calling got Vond himself, didn’t it?”
“The Calling got Vond, yes, but only after he built an empire single-handed. He was using more power than any warlock I ever heard of, probably more than anyone since the Night of Madness. If a warlock settled in Vond and didn’t assume he was safe, if he was careful, if he didn’t go carving palaces out of bedrock and throwing entire armies around, he might live there for years before he was Called — and we don’t want that.”
“Why not?”
Lar looked at Emmis as if reconsidering his earlier remark about Emmis’s cleverness. “Because,” he said, “when he does hear the Calling, what’s he going to do?”
“Fly off to Aldagmor.”
“Yes, but before that — when he’s hearing the Call, but hasn’t yet given in to it.”
“I don’t know,” Emmis said, annoyed. “I’ve never met any warlocks like that.”
“They go crazy, Emmis. They do magic in their sleep. They lose their tempers and smash things without meaning to — including people, or maybe entire villages.”
Emmis had, in fact, heard stories about warlocks gradually going mad as the Calling overwhelmed them, but there was a flaw in this theory.
“If Called warlocks are so dangerous, why haven’t they smashed Ethshar?” he asked. “We have plenty of warlocks here.”
“Maybe because something keeps them in check,” Lar said. “Such as other magicians. Which we don’t have in Vond, really.” He hesitated. “And there’s more to it, but that part really is secret. Just believe me when I say we don’t want any warlocks in the empire, ever again.”
“Well, why don’t you just tell the Lumethans that?” He gestured in the general direction of their uninvited companion.
“Because we don’t want any warlocks to find out, remember? The Lumethans might not believe us, and even if they did they might just decide it would be amusing to see what happens if they send a dozen warlocks across the border. They don’t like us and they don’t trust us, and I don’t blame them.”
“How are you going to convince the Council of Warlocks to forbid their members to go to Vond when you can’t tell them why?”
Lar threw up his hands. “I don’t know!” he snapped. “I’m just doing what Lord Sterren told me to do as best I can, and no, it isn’t as simple as I’d like.”
Emmis was still struggling to make sense of the situation. “There have been warlocks around for more than twenty years, though, so this can’t be a new problem,” he said. “How many have gone from Ethshar to the Empire of Vond?”
Lar looked uncomfortable.
“Well... two,” he said. “That I know of.”
“Two? Two?” Emmis sat back. “That’s not exactly an overwhelming number, you know. If you’re so far from Aldagmor, why haven’t there been hundreds?”
“I don’t know that, either,” Lar said. “That’s another thing I’m supposed to find out when I talk to the Council of Warlocks.” He glanced at Hagai, then blinked. He stole another look at the Lumethan.
“How loud have we been speaking?” the ambassador asked quietly.
“Not very loud,” Emmis said.
“So he couldn’t have heard us?”
“Not unless he’s a witch.”
“Oh, for... witches could hear us?”
“Well, of course. Their magic enhances all their senses — they can even hear unspoken thoughts, sometimes, if conditions are right. And while he isn’t one, because we’d see him doing it, a wizard somewhere could be watching and listening with a scrying spell and we’d never know it.”
“Zag i mar!” Lar swore. “Magic!”
“You think he might be a witch? Or they might have hired a wizard?”
“Why not? Mar i zag!”
Emmis tried to be reasonable, tried to keep Lar from becoming too obviously upset. “But you don’t know,” he said. “Yes, if he’s a witch he could hear us, but we don’t even know whether he understands Ethsharitic! He claims not to, after all, and why would he lie about that?”
“To make himself appear harmless!”
“But, sir, really, if they wanted to, they could hire a wizard to find out what instructions the Regent gave you in the first place. I mean, unless you had protective magic preventing it. You can’t keep secrets for long once magicians are involved, not if there’s someone with money who’s determined to find them out.”
“I doubt there’s a wizard anywhere in the Small Kingdoms who could scry that well,” Lar said, in tones of disgust. “Wizards who are any good at what they do can do better than living in a kingdom a few miles across, where the only people with any money to spend on magic are the ones who call themselves kings, and where they can’t get half the ingredients they want for their spells. Witches, though — we do have witches. They like little villages and scruffy peasants.”
“They could hire a wizard here,” Emmis pointed out, amused that Lar knew the Ethsharitic word for “scruffy.” “They wouldn’t need to have one back in Lumeth. It probably wouldn’t even need to be a wizard. I’d guess that a theurgist could find out about your mission, too. Maybe even a sorcerer, or a scientist.”
“That’s probably true.” Lar sighed. “You know, I retired a couple of years ago; I had a little money put aside, and I was going to just live quietly, minding my own business. Then Lord Sterren got worried about other warlocks, and he didn’t trust anyone else to deal with it, so here I am. I’d much rather be back home tending my garden.”
Emmis had no useful comment to make about that; he thought gardening sounded horribly boring, but he
