The second question-“Could all the might of the Mirror Lancers here in Cyad, or all the might of the Iron Legions in Hamor, prevail against the will of those who live in such lands?”-suggests an equally simplistic answer. That answer is obviously no, and the answer is so obvious Lorn wonders why his father asked such a question. “Are those who direct power or chaos the source of either?” The answer to the third question is yet an equally obvious negative.
Yet Kien’elth is far from a stupid or obvious father and magus. So why has he posed such questions to Lorn? What does he wish Lorn to see beyond the questions? And the last unwritten question is so general the answer could be anything. How can the world be simpler and yet more complex than possibly imagined? The complexity is easy enough to see-in people like Maran and Flutak and even his father. The simplicity is something he has his doubts about.
Lorn still has no answers with which he is comfortable when he finishes eating. He washes out both pot and platter in the bucket of soapy water Daelya has left, then rinses them with the clean water in the pitcher and sets them in the rack on the table to dry. He walks slowly from the breakfast room where he has eaten alone, back to the study, where he looks down at the glass, concentrating once more.
Once the silvery mists clear, Lorn can see that the assassin now meets with two other men in a dim room. Lorn watches but for a moment, not wishing to spend energy on the glass when it will tell him little for the moment. As the image fades, he picks up the crude map he has drawn out, of the road and the best way to reach Flutak’s villa. He hopes that Flutak remains alone, for the overcaptain knows he cannot afford to lurk and wait, or to dally.
Lorn also hopes that Flutak’s assassins arrive relatively early in the night so that he can complete his own tasks before daybreak. He has few doubts that Flutak will act quickly, before Lorn can discover how much of the payroll is being diverted-and tell anyone else.
Lorn shakes his head as he considers what faces him. If he does not act against Flutak and the assassins quickly, then he will spend all too much time merely avoiding getting killed, and likely fail in his assigned duties, which will require all his efforts, so deplorable is the state of the post at Biehl. Yet if anyone can prove Lorn has acted to stop his own assassination, he will be considered inept if he fails and ruthless if he succeeds-and coldblooded, either way.
His laugh is bitter. Why is it that people feel that revenge is justified, and acceptable, and that one is hot-blooded and human to undertake it, yet that to quietly prevent it is cold-blooded and ruthless-even if, in the end, far fewer souls suffer? Just from studying the payroll records, from looking at Flutak’s villa, and from seeing the man immediately hiring an assassin, Lorn can tell the depth of corruption. But most would want greater proof. Greater proof will likely be Lorn’s death, and he is unwilling to allow that. So he must act.
While he is uneasy about the decision, he cannot see any other option that will allow both his survival and his success at Biehl.
So…while he waits for the assassins he knows will come, he sits down in the twilight to consider again his sire’s first question-the essence of what allows Cyad to exist. All cities exist because the people wish to live there, and can do so better than elsewhere. Why? Or how? Trade? But trade requires that people produce more of a good than they require, and they must have enough food and shelter to survive.
Finally, he nods, and dims the lamp in the study, then walks to his bedchamber, where he dims and then shuts off that light. Like most Magi’i, his night senses are excellent. Except for detail work such as writing or reading, he needs no illumination.
In the darkness, he studies again the firelance he has removed from the armory earlier in the afternoon, more fully charged now than then, and sets it against the molding of the double doors to the bedchamber.
Then he returns to the study, where he concentrates on the image of the man he had seen in the afternoon, and followed in the glass through the early evening. Three shadowy figures ride down a narrow lane, past what Lorn believes to be the clayworks to the south of the compound.
Lorn watches in the glass, then lets the image fade, nodding. He steps back to the breakfast room and eases the window open partway, enough to hear any sounds in the courtyard, should there be any. Then he waits, sitting in the chair where he had eaten.
When he believes yet enough time has passed, he slips back to the study and checks the glass again. The last of three figures is sliding down a rope from a brick wall-the compound wall. Lorn returns to the breakfast room, bringing the firelance with him, and sets it in the corner by the archway between kitchen and breakfast room. He unfastens the sabre scabbard and lays it on the table, after drawing the Brystan blade. Then he stands in the darkness that is like early twilight to him, waiting.
How long he waits, he is not certain, but he can sense the three men padding up the back service steps to his quarters, and the slight click of a brass key in a lock is confirmation enough for Lorn.
The three ease into the kitchen, and, without a word, two slip through the side archway into the main room and across it to the closed double doors of the large bedchamber. A shorter figure remains in the kitchen by the door.
In the darkness, Lorn slides into the kitchen. The sentry peers forward, clearly expecting the return of his compatriots. Lorn moves, bringing the chaos-enhanced Brystan sabre across the other’s throat, and knocking the heavy truncheon aside.
The gurgle is barely noticeable, but the dull thud of the man’s body falling and the clunk of his weapon seem to echo through the kitchen.
Lorn ignores the sounds and retrieves the firelance in three steps, moving to the door between breakfast room and the main chamber.
“He’s not there!” hisses a voice.
“The study!”
Lorn raises the firelance, using his chaos-senses to focus the firebeam tightly. Hssst! Hsst!
“Aeei!” One brief scream is the only sound that may leave Lorn’s quarters.
He takes a deep breath, and moves to the two bodies, each sprawled with most of its skull burned away. Lorn swallows back the bile that has risen into his throat, standing there for a brief moment. Although the three had come to kill him, he dislikes becoming an assassin himself, save that he has little choice. He could not have captured them, and even had he, they would have said little, and he would have looked foolish trying to charge Flutak with hiring assassins. Then, he would have to kill the next set of assassins, if he could, and avoid other dangers-from possible poisoning to anything else Flutak could devise-each time with fewer advantages than the time before.
He finally bends down and searches the figures, but none bears anything that might prove useful, except for the gold and silver coins in their wallets, two daggers, a truncheon, and a short straight sword with a double edge. Lorn repeats the process with the dead sentry in the kitchen.
Then he drags all three figures out to the front, tiled foyer. There he lifts the firelance again, playing the chaos carefully across the bodies, trying not to burn the paneled walls or the woodwork. In a short time, nothing remains, except for a few metal items.
The worn broom from the kitchen is sufficient to sweep the ashes out onto the landing outside the door, and a rag removes most of the blackness from the tiles. It is also sufficient to wipe away the blood in the kitchen.