“I saw nothing that would indicate anything was wrong at the garrison when I looked out the Kingsgate watchtowers earlier, Your Majesty,” Chadde said. “Though I suppose with the spell of illusion that doesn’t mean anything.”
“I suppose also, Peacekeeper,” Jusson said. “And I further suppose that the only way to find out what’s going on is to actually go there.”
“Uhm,” began one of the town officials, his own brows crooking.
A faint smile crossed Jusson’s face. “Yes, I know. A circular argument. However, before we rush off to the rescue, I reckon we need to know at least two things. We’ve just been told the first—what happened to my Lord Commander. The second we’ve yet to find out: What was going on with Master Rodolfo’s body?”
“Demons,” Ranulf began.
I closed my eyes, exasperated, while Jusson gave a deep sigh.
“You were there during Laurel’s examination, Bainswyr,” the king said. “You heard the Faena. Rodolfo had the misfortune to get his throat cut. He was not killed in any ritual using dark magic—”
“Ranulf Leofric’son is right,” Wyln said. “It is a demon.”
A bird trilled and I looked out the study windows to see the eastern sky begin to lighten. Sunrise was finally coming. Beside me, Dyfrig stirred. After the revelation of church doctrine on the fae and fantastic, he, like Arlis, had been communing with the floor. Now, though, he lifted his head to stare at Wyln, a faint crease appearing between his brows as he brought his Staff of Office closer. And I could see that not only had the tremors stopped, but there was actually a little color in the doyen’s face.
“A demon?” Thadro asked, his voice careful. “You mean like the one you said caused the Jaban Waste?”
“The Waste was caused by a demon?” an aristo put in, his eyes wide as a murmur ran through the room, several blessing themselves. The crease between Dyfrig’s brows deepened.
“According to Lord Wyln,” Jusson said as he stared at the enchanter. “Is that what you and Master Laurel were arguing about earlier? That a demon is—involved?”
Laurel had moved to confer with Cais at a tea cart, and he now poured familiar tea leaves from a small sack into a pot full of steaming water. “That’s just it, honored king,” he said. “You heard Wyln’s tale. Five experienced adepts working in sync still lost control of it. And it took twice that number to contain and banish it again. Regardless of the changes your people have gone through, you don’t have anybody in the talent experienced enough to even get a whiff of a Damned One, let alone summon it.”
“There are ways other than coercion, Faena,” Wyln said.
“Old stories,” Laurel said, his beads clicking together as he shook his head. “Muddled by time. They could not be really true…” He faltered, staring at the rune on his middle pad, his cat pupils rapidly expanding until his amber irises were just thin rings as he stretched his paw out.
“No?” Wyln asked, his face somber.
Jusson thumped his desk. “What?”
“There is a demon, Your Majesty,” I whispered. “Laurel’s truth rune just confirmed it.”
“Not confirmed, Two Trees’son,” Wyln said. “It just let him know that what he’d declared impossible is not. And to be fair to the honored Faena, he is right in that there aren’t any talent workers here strong enough to summon and then contain a demon—”
“Including yourself, elf?” Beollan asked.
“Baiting me will not change the outcome and consequences of your war, Beollan Wulfgar’son,” Wyln said. He looked back at Jusson. “There are other ways to catch a demon. It can be—invited.”
Jusson was silent a moment. “You mean like possession?”
Another murmur, this one of distress, swept the room, and Dyfrig’s blue eyes started to burn.
“In a way,” Wyln said. “But in a true possession the demon is limited to the person it has taken residence in. No matter how powerful, it cannot give someone the ability to go beyond his or her own strength. Or, it can but it’s like a load on a wall. Too much and eventually the wall will crumble.”
“But if the—the inviter is powerful in and of themselves,” Thadro began.
“Oh, we don’t want someone like Two Trees’son to succumb to hell’s seduction,” Wyln said.
“Or yourself, Lord Elf,” Jusson said.
“Or myself, or Laurel, or Elder Dyfrig, or even you, Jusson Iver’son. Any would be a catastrophe. That is not the case here.”
“And it never will be,” I muttered, also blessing myself.
“Whoever invited this Damned One is not strong,” Wyln continued. “He had to kill the head jailer in dauthiwaesp, using water. But the fact that the dead was animated indicates the skill of an earth master, while at the same time Two Trees’son’s air aspect is blocked, also indicating someone with a mastery over air.”
“Blocked?” Jusson asked.
“Rabbit was hit by a quarrel,” Wyln said. “And now air avoids him.”
Jusson’s gaze went to the sphere hanging over Dyfrig’s shoulder.
“Perhaps this person has all the aspects too,” Thadro said. “Or at least those three.”
“If he were that powerful, he wouldn’t have needed the ritual of the dauthiwaesp to get the Damned One’s attention in the first place, Eorl Commander.”
“But, according to you, the demon would then be limited in what it can do,” Jusson said.
“Yes, normally,” Wyln said. The flames were bright in his eyes. “But there are stories from the Age of Legends. Of how the dread lords of old would kill, taking each death into themselves and thereby having two, or ten, or a hundred souls for the demon to feed on. Suddenly the limitations don’t apply, as you are legion, with all their strengths and abilities—and as soon as one soul crumbles, you replace it with another. Or several others. Whole cities were said to have been consumed.”
“Dear God,” Dyfrig whispered.
“Myths,” Laurel softly yowled, then stretched out his paw again, his face wrinkling in pain.
“But the master player wasn’t killed in death magic,” Ranulf said.
“It wasn’t necessary,” Wyln said. “The Damned One was already here. All the vessel needed to do was be present as the player’s soul fled his murdered body.”
“So how are these ‘dread lords’ defeated?” an aristo asked.
“I don’t know,” Wyln said. “The stories don’t say.”
In the silence that followed I could hear the birds ratchet up to full chorus as dawn arrived. Then Jusson began to laugh.
When I was a new recruit in His Majesty’s Royal Army, my troop unit rounded a mountain path during a patrol and unexpectedly met an exceptionally large group of well-armed and mounted bandits, all facing us with intent expressions. Some of the older soldiers in the troop had laughed then just as Jusson was laughing now, even as they lowered their helm visors and reached for their weapons. I, though, had felt very little amusement, instead understanding for the first time how someone could be scared spitless and still ride towards potential death and dismemberment.
Jusson caught his breath, his laughter devolving into his sharp-edged smile. “And I was certain that my stay here would be uneventful, and perhaps even a little dull.”
Chapter Thirty
The threat of demons and sorceries notwithstanding, Jusson would not be swayed from going to the garrison. The king had Cais produce a map of Freston and spread it out over the king’s desk while we crowded around—including Dyfrig. He stared down at the detailed map as Thadro questioned everyone about the attack, the doyen’s fingers tracing the route we took from Jusson’s residence and pausing at the ambush site. With the long night my mind had begun to drift and I’d been idly thinking that Dyfrig’s brows didn’t seem as bushy as before. Then I blinked as Dyfrig suddenly looked up, his eyes fierce as they fastened on the town elders standing across the desk. Most of them either looked away, or if they did manage to meet the doyen’s stare, it was with a very troubled expression. The only one who returned Dyfrig’s gaze easily was Peacekeeper Chadde, and it was the doyen’s eyes that dropped.