Krispos stared at him. "Somebody out where?" he asked owlishly.
The Haloga stared back. "Out there," he said after a long pause. Krispos realized the guardsman was even drunker than he was.
"I'll come," Krispos said. He had almost got to the door when his sodden brain realized he was in no condition to fight off a toddler, let alone an assassin. He was about to turn around when the Haloga grabbed him by the arm and propelled him down the stairs—not, apparently, with malicious intent, but because the northerner needed help standing up himself.
"Krispos!" someone called from the darkness.
"Mavros!" He got free of the Haloga and stumbled toward his foster brother. "What are you doing here? I thought you were on the other side of the Cattle-Crossing with Petronas and the ret of his restinue—rest of his retinue," he corrected himself carefully.
"I was, and I will be again soon—I can't afford to be missed. I've got a little rowboat tied up at a quay not far from here. I had to come back across to warn you: Petronas has hired a mage. I came into his tent to ask him which horse he'd want tomorrow, and he and the wizard were talking about quietly getting rid of someone. They named no names while I was there, but I think it's you!"
XI
Certainty washed through Krispos like the tide. "You're right. You have to be." Even drunk—perhaps more clearly because he was drunk—he could see that this was just how Petronas would deal with someone who had become inconvenient to him. It was neat and clean, with the Sevastokrator far away from any embarrassing questions, assuming they were ever asked. "What are you going to do?" Mavros said.
The question snapped Krispos out of his rapt admiration for Petronas' cleverness. He tried to flog his slow wits forward. "Find a wizard of my own, I suppose," he said at last.
"That sounds well enough," Mavros agreed. "Whatever you do, do it quickly—I don't think Petronas will wait long, and the mage he was talking with seemed a proper ready-for-aught. Now I have to get back before I'm missed. The Lord with the great and good mind be with you." He stepped up, embraced Krispos, then hurried away.
Krispos watched him disappear into darkness and listened to his footfalls fade till they were gone. He thought how fortunate he was to have such a reliable friend in the Sevastokrator's household. Then he remembered what he had to do. "Wizard," he said aloud, as if to remind himself. Staggering slightly, he started out of the palace quarter.
He was almost to the plaza of Palamas before he consciously wondered where he was going. He only knew one sorcerer at all well though. He was glad he hadn't been the one who'd antagonized Trokoundos. Otherwise, he thought, Anthimos' former tutor in magecraft would have been more likely to join Petronas' wizard than to help fend him off.
Trokoundos lived on a fashionable street not far from the palace quarter. Krispos pounded on his door, not caring that it was well past midnight. He kept pounding until Trokoundos opened it a crack. The mage held a lamp in one hand and a most unmystical short sword in the other. He lowered it when he recognized Krispos. "By Phos, esteemed and eminent sir, have you gone mad?"
"No," Krispos said. Trokoundos drew back from the wine fumes he exuded. He went on, "I'm in peril of my life. I need a wizard. I thought of you."
Trokoundos laughed. "Are you in such peril that it won't wait till morning?"
"Yes," Krispos said.
Trokoundos held the lamp high and peered at him. "You'd better come in," he said. As Krispos walked inside, the wizard turned his head and called, "I'm sorry, Phostina, but I'm afraid I have business." A woman's voice said something querulous. "Yes, I'll be as quiet as I can," Trokoundus promised. To Krispos, he explained, "My wife. Sit here, if you care to, and tell me of this peril of yours."
Krispos did. By the time he finished, Trokoundos was nodding and rubbing his chin in calculation. "You've made a powerful enemy, esteemed and eminent sir. Presumably he will have in his employment a powerful and dangerous mage. You know no more than you are to be assailed?"
"No," Krispos said, "and I'm lucky to know that."
"So you are, so you are, but it will make my task more difficult, for I will be unable to ward against any specific spells, but will have to try to protect you from all magics. Such a stretching will naturally weaken my own efforts, but I will do what I may. Honor will not let me do less, not after your gracious warning of his Majesty's wrath. Come along to my study, if you please."
The chamber where Trokoundos worked his magics was one part library, one part jeweler's stall, one part herbarium, and one part zoo. It smelled close and moist and rather fetid; Krispos' stomach flipflopped. Holding down his gorge with grim determination, he sat across from Trokoundos while the wizard consulted his books.
Trokoundos slammed a codex shut, rolled up a scroll, tied it with a ribbon, and put it back in its pigeonhole. "Since I do not know what form the attack upon you will take, I will use all three kingdoms—animal, vegetable, and mineral—in your defense." He went over to a large covered bowl and lifted the lid. "Here is a snail fed on oregano, a sovereign against poisonings and other noxiousnesses of all sorts. Eat it, if you would."
Krispos gulped. "I'd sooner have it broiled, with butter and garlic."
"No doubt, but prepared thus its virtue aims only at the tongue. Do as I say now: crack the shell and peel it, as if it were a hard-cooked egg, then swallow the creature down."
Trying not to think about what he was doing, Krispos obeyed. The snail was cold and wet on his tongue. He gulped convulsively before he could notice what it tasted like. Gagging, he wondered whether it would still protect him if he threw it up again.
"Very good," Trokoundos said, ignoring his distress. "Now then, the juice of the narcissus or asphodel will also aid you. Here is some, mixed with honey to make it palatable." Krispos got it down. After the snail, it was palatable. Trokoundos went on, "I will also wrap a dried asphodel in clean linen and give it to you. Carry it next to your skin; it will repel demons and other evil spirits."
"May the good god grant it be so," Krispos said. When Trokoundos gave him the plant, he tucked it under his tunic.
"Mineral, mineral, mineral," Trokoundos muttered. He snapped his fingers. "The very thing!" He rummaged among the stones on a table by his desk, held up a dark-brown one.
"Here I have chalcedony, which, if pierced by an emery stone and hung round the neck, is proof against all fantastical illusions and protects the body against one's adversaries and their evil machinations. This is known as the counsel of chalcedony. Now where did that emery go?" He rummaged some more, until he finally found the hard stone he sought.
He clamped the chalcedony to the table and began to bore through it with the pointed end of the emery stone. As he worked, he chanted a wordless little song. "The power we seek lies within the chalcedony itself," the mage explained. "My chant is but to hasten the process that would otherwise be boring in two senses of the word. Ahh, here we are!" He worked a bit longer to enlarge the hole he had made, then held out the chalcedony to Krispos. "Have you a chain on which to wear it?"
"Yes." Krispos drew the chain on which he kept the goldpiece Omurtag had given him up over his head.
Trokoundos stared at the coin as it gleamed in the lamplight. "My, my," he said slowly. "What company my little stone will keep." He seemed about to ask Krispos about the goldpiece, then shook his head. "No time for my curiosity now. May the stone, the plant, and the snail keep you safe, that's all."