The council of blades, p.11
The Council of Blades, page 11
Ilégo pursued him, and the young man could only meet attack after attack. The blades stabbed home time and time again, clashing against one another in a splash of sparks. Hissing evilly, Ilégo rammed his opponent far aside, sending the dazed youth staggering back across the grass.
Fighting for breath and whipping sweat back from his eyes, Ilégo’s opponent drove himself lurching back into the fight. He stabbed low, skipped forward, stabbed and lunged again. With a cry of hate he stamped his foot, then tried to disengage and lunge, his blade moving clumsily aside. Ilégo let the young man run clean onto his outstretched blade, ramming it unerringly through his opponent’s heart. He whipped free his steel and turned aside to wipe his blade clean on a silken handkerchief, not even deigning to watch the body fall.
Seconds ran forward to the young man’s corpse. Ilégo walked casually away across the dead, dry grass, made a sardonic salute of his swordbreaker toward the old man in the shadows, and strolled to rejoin his guest. The Sumbrian sheathed his sword without a trace of triumph or satisfaction.
“The Riturba family is such a bore. I foreclose on their loan, and what do they do but cry me up as a cheat?”
The nobleman favored Svarézi with a smile.
“I do find honor to be a fascinating thing. If I had killed him with a dagger in the back, I should surely have hung. Instead, I run him through before two dozen witnesses, and am reckoned to be a gentleman.” Ilégo adjusted the set of one glove. “With luck, his brothers will raise challenge, and I can clean out the whole gutless brood within the week.”
Ugo Svarézi laid a hand upon his hippogriff’s feathery mane.
“Unless they stumble on to your treachery, Sumbrian.”
“Stumble on it? Quite unlikely.” Ilégo gave a smile. “The poison, of course, was merely a soporific, something to slow his reactions and allow a killing blow. I do find it quite untraceable.” The noble retrieved his jacket from its tree limb, still not even bothering to spare his dead opponent a glance. “Naturally enough, the venom was impregnated into the tails of my shirt.”
There followed a pause—a time where both men gazed at each other in the shadows of the killing ground. A cool night wind came to stir Gilberto Ilégo’s hair.
“You have desires, colleague. Desires thwarted and choked by rules.” Framed against the graveyard, Ilégo fixed Svarézi with a snake’s black, calculating eye. “I can show you how to fashion the rules into your tool, colleague. Our tool.”
Ilégo drew forth a parchment—the torn lower half of the same letter Svarézi carried against his heart. The torn pieces were a perfect match.
“You have asked, colleague, why you are here. The answer is simple. I have asked you to come in the interest of our mutual advancement. It is high time that we men of potential moved our sights beyond the bounds of a single city’s walls.”
In the darkness beside them, the black hippogriff gave a sharp hiss of desire. Behind her, the moon rose across the killing grounds and stained the dry grass with lifeless gray.
“Tekorii-kii-kii!
“Tekorii-kii-kii!”
Miliana looked up from her books and charts, smiling as she saw the great long neck dangling down from the hole in the bathroom ceiling. Tekoriikii’s giddy, crested head announced itself with pride.
“Tekorii-kii-kii!”
“Well, hello!” Miliana closed her books and leaned upon her elbow to regard the bird. “Where have you been?”
“Glub glub!”
The bird jumped down through the broken ceiling in a swirl of feathers and landed on the blue-tiled floor. Thus far Miliana had kept the portal secret by ruthlessly chasing all maids and servants away from her room; a ruse that would only work until Lady Ulia freed herself from the distractions offered by the Festival of Blades.
Tekoriikii warbled happily and marched himself into Miliana’s study room. The bird walked with a rolling seaman’s gait, trailing a vast mass of gorgeous orange tail behind it. Silly plumes above his head bobbed and nodded as he walked, waggling like a gaudy helmet comb as he ducked his head about in avian curiosity. He sidled over to Miliana, cocked an eye at her books, and offered her a delighted smile.
Miliana unwrapped a rock-hard salted ship’s biscuit, peering warmly at her guest.
“Did you eat? Here’s something for dinner, if you want it. Just as a warning—don’t eat any of the palace rats. They smell like cherries, but they’re behaving very, very strangely.…”
The bird extended a genteel foot and fastened it about the biscuit. Tekoriikii gnawed the tidbit with an air of concentration, keeping one golden yellow eye on Miliana’s face.
Miliana ruffled her scrolls and settled the toadskin sheets back into order.
“You’ve been very quiet up there. Were you asleep, or did you go off for a flight?”
Aaaaah! Tekoriikii instantly launched into an attempt to relate his evening’s adventures. The bird danced high, the bird danced low—he gaped his beak and wobbled his backside up and down as though it came equipped with springs. A slap on his chest and a proud puff of feathers ended his announcement, and the firebird clucked his tongue and let smug self-satisfaction shine like fire in his eyes.
Miliana adjusted her spectacles across her freckled nose.
“No … I didn’t quite catch that. Actually, languages don’t really seem to be my strong point.” The girl scowled in concentration. “I will keep trying, though. See here? I think I’ve managed to assign sounds to the first three ideographs on page seventeen.…”
The princess had been hard at work over her puzzling collection of toadskin scrolls. Tekoriikii helpfully came over to inspect the results of her day’s labor, darting his head erratically this way and that as he examined the pages with their absurd calligraphy and diagrams. Miliana spread the pages open for him, pleased to at last have someone with whom to discuss her ideas.
“It’s not orcish, and it’s not elven. It looks like a southern language—sort of an early dialect of Akalan, maybe—but it isn’t.” The girl paused, then waved a finger over the cryptic texts. “I’m trying to turn them all into something I can understand. Some of them are magic chants, but others are mental images I have to frame in my mind if I’m going to cast the spell … maybe spell ingredients, or possibly phases of the moon …” Miliana flipped a clammy page of her collection and gave a frustrated sigh. “I just can’t find the key! I have to stare and stare at a page for hours and hours. Sometimes I seem to understand, and sometimes I just can’t.”
“Glub glub?” The bird flipped a toadskin over with his beak, scanning the page beneath. “Onk honk?”
“No, I thought of that. If I hired someone to cast a spell which would allow me to understand the scrolls, he’d tell my father. There’s nothing for it but to break the code myself.”
Tekoriikii coiled his head back on his neck to look the girl in the face with his astonishing golden eyes.
“Krrrrrrrk?” Wings wagged, and a foot spread its toes into a complex little sign. “Grook awk?”
“Well, yes—if they find out I’m doing it, it’s all over. They’ll burn the books and toss me out to some finishing school somewhere; no more Miliana.” The girl hissed a sharp sigh for the injustices of her world. She then brightened up, pulled out her pointiest of hats, and held it open to the bird.
“Aaaah—but see? Even in finishing school, I’d still bring my pointy hat! So what I’m doing is copying the scrolls in miniature and hiding them inside the hat lining. You see? Always anticipate disaster, birdie my friend. That’s what makes a great thinker a great thinker!”
It had been a long, frustrating evening of close-written work. Miliana reached fingers under the frames of her spectacles and wearily rubbed her eyes. Stifling a yawn, she leaned back in her chair and absently scratched the warm, soft feathers of the giant bird.
“Ooooort ooor! Ooooort ooor!”
Proud, pleased, and pampered, Tekoriikii began a song—a melody that started like the nighttime murmur of priceless, winsome hummingbirds, then changed into something reminiscent of a live narwhal being fed backward through a sausage machine. The awful row set bats starting up out of the eaves, caused nearby flowers to wilt, and set guard dogs howling for miles around. Feeling her hair loosen at the roots, Miliana gave a squawk of panic and frantically clamped the bird’s beak shut with her hands. Tekoriikii’s throat pouch bulged, and his eyes almost burst out of his head.
“Miliaaaa-naaaaaa! Miliana, what’s that noise?”
The imperious summons cut through solid stone to stick right into Miliana’s heart. Tekoriikii flattened himself against a wall, his chest panting and his eyes mad with fear—the usual reaction to one’s first encounter with Lady Ulia’s voice. Miliana sped to the door and frantically ran her eyes across the room.
The door pounded to a hammering fist.
“Miliana! Miliana! Open up this door and speak to me at once!”
Tekoriikii began to flap madly about the room, rebounding off the ceiling, cupboards, walls and floors in panic as Ulia’s voice pealed through the air. Miliana stuffed her toadskin scrolls inside her pointy hat; then helplessly tried to latch her hands onto the bird.
“Tekorii-kii-kii! Tekorii-kii-kii!”
“Miliana! Miliana, what’s that sound?”
The princess managed to grab Tekoriikii’s yellow feet and anchor him to the floor. Her clothing whipped backward in the breeze of frantic wings.
“It’s—it’s just me looking for clothes!”
“Clothes? What do you mean clothes?”
“I can’t open the door!” Miliana hurtled her arms around Tekoriikii and wrestled his writhing bulk to the ground. “I—I’m unsuitably dressed!”
“Not dressed? Sooth, girl! I am your stepmother, not your sweetheart!” Ulia’s fist pounded at the door until the tower foundations began to quake. “Now open this door!”
Miliana stuffed the firebird under the covers of her bed and pathetically tried to smooth the blankets down. It was a little like hiding a landshark in a china teacup. Backing frantically toward the door, the girl tried to motion Tekoriikii to stay hidden, then whirled about and ripped open the door locks.
“Ulia! Stepmother, what a surprise to find you up at this late hour.”
“And when can I be expected to sleep?” Ulia sniffed in indignation. “The palace has over thirty guests. Thirty!” Pulling up her hems to reveal ankles like oak trunks, Lady Ulia Mannicci stepped across the threshold. “This festival shall be the death of me yet. Now, what was all this chaos and cacophony I heard from the corridor just now?”
Miliana twittered her fingers in the air with a devil-may-care wave.
“A sneeze … it was just a sneeze.”
“A sneeze?” Ulia swelled like a mushroom after a summer rain. “What made you sneeze?”
“Um …” Not dust! Dust would make Ulia send for the cleaners. Miliana desperately tried to wrench inspiration out of thin air. “It was … feathers!”
Eyes narrowing in sharp suspicion, Ulia swept about the room. Miliana tried to guard the way into her bathroom, feeling a sweat of fear break out all along her spine.
Disorder attracted Lady Ulia like honey drew flies. She spied Miliana’s disheveled bed, and before the girl could even squeak, her stepmother had whipped away the covers. There, sitting on the mattress for all the world to see, was a giant peacock/rooster/phoenix creature with giddy golden eyes.
Tekoriikii had frozen in pure fright, rooted to the spot by his first face-to-face encounter with Sumbria’s most notorious secret weapon. Lady Ulia turned her back, waved an imperious hand over the paralyzed bird, and glared her stepdaughter straight in the eye.
“Well? I trust there is an explanation for the presence of this … this … thing?”
Tekoriikii went from mere paralysis into a boneless state of limp, abject terror. Miliana picked up his neck and felt it hang like boiled spaghetti in her hands.
Her thoughts came very, very slowly—dragged through a thick curtain of dismay.
“It’s … a … costume.”
Lady Ulia slowly raised an eyebrow.
“Yes?”
“For the ball tomorrow night.” Miliana’s lie finally found its feet. She shook out the comatose Tekoriikii like an old blanket across her bed. “I thought I’d wear it for the masque.”
“But my dear, I though you’d wear your little fairy costume. I did so like the wings.” Lady Ulia picked up Tekoriikii’s head. “What an amazingly stupid face! You operate it as a sort of puppet, I suppose?” Miliana’s stepmother hoisted up Tekoriikii’s tail. “Do you put your hand up here?”
“No!” Miliana lunged forward in alarm. “No … it’s … the glue’s still drying.”
“Oh, of course. Please don’t mind me, child. The evening has me so very, very tired.” Ulia rolled her eyes and sighed. “Thirty guests. Did I tell you? We have thirty guests!”
“Have we really?”
“Yes—now what did I come in here for?” Lady Ulia bustled herself out into the palace corridors. “Now do get some sleep, child. The ball is tomorrow night. There’s the Sun Gem to receive, elven ambassadors to welcome, and I still have no idea where I shall show this silly painting from Lomatra.…”
The great lady cruised off into the darkness in a confused babble of her own woes, and Miliana gratefully slammed the door shut behind her. Miliana wearily wiped sweat back from her eyes and prayed that Ulia had been mollified for yet another day.
From beneath Miliana’s pillow, a muffled voice nervously explored the air.
“Glub glub?”
“Yes, she’s gone.” Miliana peeled herself away from the wall. “You can come out now.”
Tekoriikii had hidden himself by the simple ruse of stuffing his head under the eiderdown. Inch by inch the creature cautiously emerged; his beak now looked a distinctly ashen shade of gray.
He had been lucky; a close encounter with Ulia could age some creatures by twenty years.
A light tap came at the sealed shutters of Miliana’s window. The girl ignored the noise and made her way over to the bed, where she tried to prop up the bird and bring the life back into his limbs.
“Well it’s your own fault, you know. All princesses are guarded by monsters. This one’s just a bit louder and more powerful than most.” Miliana removed her spell scrolls from inside her hat, which now had a pungent smell of sun-dried toads. “Come on—cheer up, eat your biscuits, and we’ll go and have some fun.”
A sharper rap came at Miliana’s window. She briefly scowled, removed her spectacles, and polished the lenses on Tekoriikii’s tail.
There it came again! Sharp and brief, like a night bird smacking into the shutters, or a branch flicking at the walls. Miliana heard the sound for a fourth time, rose, and opened her shutters to scowl out into the night.
A stone smacked her right on the brow. With a curse that would have made a drill sergeant blush, the girl fell back from the window half blinded in pain. Like the well-brought-up young lady that she was, Miliana furiously snatched the rock and pitched it straight back down into the dark. A rich, meaty thump followed by a piteous wail of pain rose from the courtyard below.
Lorenzo staggered out into the lamplight, looking up at Miliana with accusing, wounded eyes.
“What did you do that for?”
The girl leaned from her balcony, wondering if she should let down her hair; Lorenzo could then climb into reach so she could strangle him. Miliana rubbed ill-humoredly at her smarting forehead and glared down at the young man.
“Did you throw rocks at my damned window?”
“I wanted to quietly attract your attention.” Lorenzo drew stares from three passing gardeners, a night watchman and a maid. “I want you to come out with me, in secret!”
Miliana glared at the staring servants through spectacles that shone blank as ice.
“He’s the jester for tomorrow night. He’s just practicing his routines.” A maid looked at a gardener, seeming timid and unsure. Miliana sent them scuttling for cover with a roar. “Haven’t you people got work to do? Or does Lady Ulia have to come on another inspection tour?”
The courtyard cleared with unbelievable speed and Lorenzo was left alone amidst a cloud of dust left by fleeing servants. He looked about himself in awe, then stared happily up at Miliana’s face.
“I’m planning a fact-finding tour of the city. Will you come? We could take our feathery friend …”
“Shut up!” Miliana pegged her shutters open one by one. “Just climb up the jasmine creepers before somebody sees you!”
Shouldering an untidy parcel—his sketch pads, books and pens—Lorenzo made a creditable show of swarming up into the princess’s balcony. He sprang into Miliana’s rooms without the slightest hint of terror or embarrassment.
“Isn’t it the most incredible night? The moon looks utterly entrancing. I’ve been doing that anatomy work I discussed with you, and so I suddenly just had to see you.” Lorenzo tipped his cap to the girl and lit the room with an innocent, boyish smile. “Hello old bird! How do you do?”
Tekoriikii warbled, lowered his lashes, and fluffed up his plumes, obviously feeling his old self once more. Lorenzo unshipped one of his books and spread it out across Miliana’s tabletop.
“I’ve found him, by the way, in Groonpeck’s Field Guide to Terrifying Denizens of the Air, with special appendices for Acheron, the Elemental Planes, and the Abyss.” Lorenzo swept open the volume and proudly pointed to the page. “He’s a firebird!”
Miliana, Lorenzo, and the bird all craned to stare at the book; it contained a picture of a handsome orange bird with a great overabundance of tail plumes. Even Miliana couldn’t fault the likeness. She polished her spectacles, leaned over the book, then lowered her frames down her nose to regard the bird across the wire rims.
“Is that what you are? A firebird?”
