Kheda found he couldn’t keep looking out over the unsuspecting anchorage and turned to stare at the empty seas to the south. Behind him, Dev spoke in some hurried incomprehensible tongue, his forceful scorn needing no translation.
‘She says she hasn’t found anything yet.’ Risala came to stand by Kheda, her back to the sea, all her attention on the mirror that Dev was holding. ‘She’s talking about searching in some library.’
‘We have libraries,’ Kheda muttered.
‘She’s been looking for some journals,’ Risala said slowly. ‘She hasn’t found them.’
From the tone of the barbarian’s brusque interruption, Kheda concluded that Dev wasn’t impressed by that news.
‘She’s asking him about the dragon,’ Risala continued in an undertone. ‘She wants to know if he’s seen it again and what it’s been doing. She wants to know all about it.’
‘What is he telling her?’ Kheda asked, curious. ‘Has he said anything about the gems? What has he said about his own magic going awry?’
No, he’s saying nothing about that,’ Risala said thoughtfully. ‘He just wants to know about her researches.’
Dev’s voice was harsh as he demanded answers. The unseen woman sounded to be giving as good as she got. Kheda could just hear her scathing replies, faint and tinny, like someone whispering paradoxically loudly into a copper goblet.
‘She’s saying he’s welcome to try for himself if he thinks he can do better,’ Risala commented with amusement
Kheda slid Risala a sideways grin. ‘I’m glad you’re here to keep him honest.’
She didn’t see his smile, intent on Dev’s rapid exchanges with the distant wizard woman. ‘They’re disputing who might have these journals and who she should ask next.’ Risala shook her head slowly, eyes still fixed on the mirror, her voice running low beneath the arguing mages. ‘She’s insisting she knows what she’s looking for. She’s sure these journals will hold all the lore we need. It’s just finding out who has them. I don’t think Dev’s convinced.’
Kheda could hear that for himself, along with the rising note of defiant argument in the woman’s words. Now she’s talking about having to go on some journey to find out what we need to know,’ Risala continued hurriedly. ‘She says that’s the best way to be certain, something about going to the source. I
think there’s a joke there but I don’t follow. Dev’s not amused. He seems to think there are people who’ll know what we need closer to hand. He doesn’t see why she can’t do whatever it takes to win them over.’ She broke off, frowning as the conversation flowing back and forth through the enchanted mirror threatened to degenerate into a shouting match.
‘Dev.’ Kheda yielded to his frustration and turned around.
‘What?’ snapped the wizard before silencing the distant woman with a curt word.
‘Is she truly on the scent of some lore that can help us? Do you believe that much?’ Kheda demanded. ‘Do you trust her?’
‘She wants this lore worse than you do.’ Dev laughed unpleasantly. ‘It’s just a question of the quickest way to find it. I’d stick to searching the archives at hand if it was me but she wants to make a trip—’
‘Whatever she chooses to do, how soon does she think she might have some lore we can use against the dragon?’ Kheda interrupted. ‘Honestly? We need to know how long we have to hold the beast off for.’
‘And what’s the longest it might take her,’ added Risala. ‘If things don’t go as well as she seems to expect,’ Kheda agreed.
‘Hope for the best but plan for the worst.’ Risala quoted one of Kheda’s precepts back at him with a grin. Dev posed the question in his rapid barbarian tongue. Kheda listened with frustration to the uncanny, unintel—
ligible conversation between the mages. The mirror burned with a red-gold radiance vivid even in the bright sunlight. The magewoman was a distant image, featureless as she gesticulated.
Hope for the best but plan for the worst. You cannot wait till you have all possible information before making plans. You will never have all the facts. Make your best plan based on knowledge, experience and instinct, and act upon it. Believe you are right. If it turns out you were wrong, deal with the consequences as and when they arise, and never admit to self-doubt. You did not make an error, because that was the best plan of action at the time. You cannot change the past, only the future, so make a new plan, the best you can in the here and now.
That’s what your father told you and that’s what you taught Sirket. It sounds so simple to be a warlord. But won’t relying on some accursed wizard’s best guess inevitably lead me into error?
What else can I do? Isn’t this woman’s guess better than nothing? I have to base my actions on something. The people of Chazen must believe I have a plan or we’ll lose them to their fears. Lose your people and you’ve lost your domain. First and last, that’s the ultimate reality of being a warlord. The wizard woman’s distant reply had been going on for far too long to be a simple answer. Tension crawled between Kheda’s shoulder blades along with sweat prompted by the punishing sun. Dev responded with some lengthy, forceful protest, his tone ugly.
‘What is she saying?’ Kheda asked with growing concern.
‘That she won’t just tell Dev what she learns regardless,’ Risala answered, her voice tense with anger. ‘She’s saying she wants to come here, to see the dragon for herself. Then she’ll share what she finds out. Unless we agree, she won’t tell us a thing.’
‘How does she propose to do that?’ Kheda saw that Dev was crushing the end of the taper in his hand, knuckles white around the beeswax. His scorn sprayed the mirror with spittle that vanished as soon as it touched the radiant metal.
The distant wizard woman’s face filled the magical void burning in the surface of the mirror. The contrast with Dev was startling. This wizard woman was all barbarian with blonde hair drawn back off a curiously ageless face, though she was plainly no longer in the first flush of youth. There was no softness in those angular bones, no yielding in the thin-lipped mouth speaking with clipped precision. Her eyes were a surprise,—brown where Kheda would have expected blue, though paler than any he’d ever seen on an Archipelagan. They were also wholly resolute.
‘She isn’t going to back down over this,’ he said quietly to Risala.
‘She certainly looks determined,’ the girl agreed. Kheda spoke up. ‘How does she propose to come here?’ he asked Dev. ‘I thought you said a wizard couldn’t go somewhere they’d never been.’ Dev ignored him, still arguing furiously with the woman. Her replies by contrast were icily calm.
‘She can’t ever have travelled in the Archipelago,’ commented Risala. ‘She’d have been enslaved before she got further than the northernmost reaches looking like that, never mind getting skinned for being a wizard.’
‘She knows she’s got the whip hand over us all, though,’ Kheda said with reluctant resignation.
‘She knows she needs an escort. She just said so.’ Risala rubbed a hand through her black hair, frowning. ‘She wants a ship sent to Relshaz to fetch her.’
‘That’s madness.’ Kheda stared at her. ‘There’s the entire length of the Archipelago between us. We haven’t that time to waste.’
‘She’s adamant.’ Risala looked at him. ‘She’s not going to give way on it.’
‘How soon?’ Kheda took a step forward and shook Dev’s shoulder roughly. ‘How soon can she get to Relshaz with this dragon lore? If she can bring us what we need to be rid of the beast, I will send a ship. If she can’t guarantee to help us, tell her I won’t waste any more time on this and I certainly won’t send her men or a vessel we need in Chazen.’
The woman abandoned her dispute with Dev, her eyes shifting to look straight at Kheda. He stifled a shudder of revulsion.
Scrying is one thing. The intimacy of this communication is quite another.