The murmur of voices fell quiet at the far end. Into the hall strode the bald priest who had first questioned him, Bishop Hansu. His lips, framed by his long, neatly groomed, dark brown beard, were pulled down in a frown. So were his matching gray-salted brows.
Archbishop Elcarei lifted his own brows. “You have news, Bishop Hansu?”
“Yes, archbishop.” He paused at the midway point and bowed. “The Patriarch and over half the priesthoods have voted against our guest’s proposal.” A slight, ironic dip of his head was aimed at Torven, then he continued. “But six of the nearest ten temples have agreed to it. Provided our guest can prove his method works, and works safely . . . then they will be with us.
“On another, somewhat related topic . . . from the state of chaos in many of the cities out there, it was strongly urged by our counterparts in the other temples that we get this city under control. Given what the talker-boxes picked up and the fact that it is now sunset,” Hansu continued, “I strongly suggest you select someone to go to the Consulate, Holiness.”
“Yes, we should remind them that we are the highest-ranked Guild in the land, and thus have a very strong say in the governing of it,” Elcarei agreed. He narrowed his eyes thoughtfully. “You said the other towns are rioting?”
Hansu nodded. “Not every temple has reported in via scrying mirror. It is presumed that, by now, they have been overrun by the local peasants—many of those are the ones that did not release their prisoners. Most of those temples which followed our guest’s advice have been spared. Not all, but most.”
“Thankfully, Captain Torhammer is a stickler for the law. This will work in our favor.” At a gesture from the archbishop, Hansu took the remaining empty seat and began dining on the food left around his plate. “I shall go myself in a moment, with a bishop and two priests. Koler, you have served well in our dealings with the Consulate; you shall come with us. Brother Grell and Brother Tanik, you will join us as well.”
The three selected priests bowed their heads. Elcarei looked to his right, meeting Torven’s mildly bored gaze. “Under Bishop Hansu’s supervision, you shall direct the novices to clear the power room of rubble and set it up for a series of test summonings. You will start with one minor demon, demonstrating that you can summon, control, and banish it, then progress to more powerful kinds.
“You may have the assistance of up to three priests and six novices but no more . . . and the first thing you shall do once the room is readied is teach everyone here the proper banishment spells, before actually summoning anything.”
Torven dipped his head. “I was going to suggest something similar myself, Your Holiness. I am pleased we are so well matched in our thinking.”
His flattery was even true, save that Torven had no intention of remaining subservient for long. Banishing a demon was not a problem; even if an enemy banished one, unless that enemy were a higher-ranked priest, the demon could always be resummoned. No, binding the demon was where all the true power lay, and he intended to bind the demons summoned to himself as their ultimate master.
“Save dessert for us,” Elcarei stated, rising from his seat. “We may be back late.”
Everyone else rose as well out of courtesy, giving the archbishop a bow of reverence. Even Torven, though his was not quite as deep. He would not upset this chance at securing a vast power for himself, but neither would he play the bootlicking toad to get it. They will acknowledge me as an equal, or they will find out the hard way that I am their better.
• • •
Thankfully, the Consulate was warm. Not only had the message for the meeting gone out in plenty of time to stoke the fires, taking the chill out of the air, Heiastowne itself was large enough that there was a permanent Consulate staff. It wasn’t the biggest city in Mekhana, but it was in the top ten easily, with many strong guilds and a handful of actual Guild Masters in the Precinct, not just grandmasters or mere masters.
At Alonnen’s urging, Rexei had brought all thirty of her Guild tokens, all strung on her silver chain. The other Gearmen of the Consulate had duly examined those thirty, including her trio of larger journeyman-rank medallions, the fourth one that represented her Gearman status—always left uncounted when tallying ranks—and permitted her a seat on the guild bench. Off to one side, of course; she was from out of town as far as they knew, which meant she had the right to speak only for those guilds not represented here in Heias Precinct, or at least not at this meeting.
The discussion hall was packed. All three fireplaces were roaring with the crisp, competing scents of coal, applewood, and oakwood. Even without the fires, she probably would have been warm enough to remove her Vortex-borrowed coat, though she was glad that her current project, a fine, silvery gray wool suitable for summer weight, was now big enough to cover her thighs. She wasn’t the only one, male or female, with a bag or basket of skeins and some sort of needlework in their lap. Looms were taxed for whatever they produced; knitting and crocheting were not.
Sharing the guild bench—which in a Consulate of this size was a long, curved table set with several high-backed chairs—were the Grandmaster Gearman of the Heiastowne Consulate, his three master Gearmen scattered at the quarter points, and Rexei at the far left end. Next to the grandmaster sat the Captain of Heias Precinct. Chairs had been brought in and crowded around the table until one could scarcely move to get up, even by pushing a chair straight back from the table a body length. Rexei herself sat on a footstool dragged in from somewhere else, and she had only been accorded room because she could speak for those outside the immediate region.
The rest of those seats were filled with the Guild Masters of several guilds: Masons, Coalminers, Lumber, Ironworks, Steelworks, Hydraulics, Brassworks, Clockworks, Engines, Modellers, Munitions, Plumbers, Wheelwrights, and Luthiers, specifically those woodworkers and metalsmiths who specialized in making musical instruments. And, of course, Alonnen, representing the one Guild no one wanted to actually name. The grandmasters of the many other guilds were given preferential seating in the first three rows of pews facing the long, curved table, and the masters of those guilds with no one of higher rank in the area were right behind them.
Everyone else crowding the place was a nonrepresenting master, a journeyman, or a few rare apprentices of the various guilds—mostly from the Servers and the Hospitallers, distributing warmed drinks and small sweet biscuits. Such offerings were not uncommon; each time a Consulate gathering was held, a trio of Guilds was taxed to pay for refreshments.
A fresh cluster of people arrived. Two women detached themselves from the rest and were greeted by Grandmaster Toric. Rexei couldn’t quite hear their titles over the general hubbub of the three or four hundred people crammed into the pews lining the rest of the hall, but she thought she heard the words Actors and Lacemakers.
Alonnen—who had donned a pair of blue-tinted viewing lenses once he had arrived—rose and hurried over to the side of the plumper of the two women, who was clad in a colorful knitted overdress patterned in shades of cream, beige, and russet from wool raised in the northernmost flocks. Nestled on her ample cleavage was the large oval gold-cast medallion of a Guild Master. From the masques engraved on it for its guild symbol, the woman had to be the head of all the Actors Guilds across Mekhana.