“It’s a waste of time.”
“It’s enriching,” says Makri.
I find this very annoying.
“If you were enriched you wouldn’t have to wear that ridiculous chainmail bikini.”
“Samanatius says that women who are obliged to exhibit themselves to make a living are not degraded by the experience,” says Makri stiffly. “The audience are.”
“Samanatius is an idiot. Bring me a beer.”
“Get your own beer,” says Makri, which is hardly the way for any barmaid to talk to a customer. She should learn some manners.
I get my own beer and return to the fire to think gloomy thoughts. I know most of the Sorcerers in Turai and plenty others from around the world. It’s no secret that I failed my apprenticeship all those years ago, but I don’t like my nose being rubbed in it. I still advertise myself as a sorcerous Investigator to bring in business, though the spells I can work are pathetic, child’s play compared to their powers.
“If any Sorcerer laughs at me, I’m going to punch him right in the face.”
I finger my necklace. It’s a spell protection charm, and a good one. I might need it if things get rough.
Gurd had the excellent sense to provide the tavern with a plentiful supply of logs for the winter, and the Avenging Axe is warm enough to comfort the coldest guest. It’s warm enough to allow Makri to wear the tiny chainmail bikini. I shouldn’t have mocked her for it. It’s not like she’s crazy about it herself. She relies on it to earn tips, a stratagem which has proved successful over the past year, which is not really surprising, given Makri’s figure. Mercenaries who’ve been all round the world and seen everything there is to see can still be struck dumb when she appears. Tanrose says that Makri’s beauty will one day get her married to a Senator or a prince, but given that Makri has Orc blood, pointed ears and plenty of attitude, I reckon she’s more likely to end up dead in a gutter, probably not long after me. I never figure she’s that beautiful anyway, but I gave up thinking about women a long time ago, so I’m a poor judge.
I finish my beer. Makri ignores my request for another. I swear at her. She swears back at me. Other drinkers laugh. Her moods are really getting me down. I retreat upstairs.
My magic warm cloak is on the bed. I’ll have to charge it up again before I go out tonight. I’ve a small piece of business to attend to—checking up on a woman for a jealous husband—but after that my diary is empty. Cicerius was right, I do need the work.
Makri strides into my room.
“Thraxas, can I—”
“Will you stop marching into my room uninvited?”
A tear trickles from Makri’s eye. I’ve never seen Makri cry before, at least not in misery. A few tears of joy after massacring some opponents, maybe. She hurries from the room. It’s strange behaviour.
Outside it’s snowing again. I wish I didn’t have to go out. I’ve been watching the activities of the wife of a wealthy merchant for two weeks now. He’s suspicious of her and is paying me for reports of her movements. Normally I’d be glad of the work—no danger and not too strenuous—but it’s been tough in the cold weather. So far I haven’t found the wife doing anything particularly odd. The only visitors that ever call are representatives from high-class clothing concerns, make-up artists, hairdressers and the like. There’s one beautician who looks in every day, but this is standard behaviour for any rich Turanian woman. The merchant has no objections to his wife beautifying herself. He now thinks he may have misjudged her.
I wrap myself in the warm cloak, fit on my sword and depart before Makri can bother me again with her moody behaviour. As expected, the assignment turns out to be a waste of time. If the merchant’s wife has any thoughts of being unfaithful, she’s probably waiting till the summer months, when her husband is away trading in foreign lands, which would be the smart thing to do.
I’m relieved when midnight rolls around. It’s another foul night and my magic warm cloak is starting to lose potency. I hurry off through the snow to the house of Astrath Triple Moon. Astrath is an old friend. He’s a powerful Sorcerer and might have expected to be a candidate for head of the Guild himself had it not been for some irregularities in the chariot races when he was employed as resident Sorcerer at the Stadium Superbius. The Stadium pays a Sorcerer to ensure that no magic is used to interfere with the races. When a rumour spread that Astrath Triple Moon had been taking bribes to look the other way while a certain powerful Senator hired a Sorcerer to help his chariots romp home easy winners, there was a lot of bad feeling in the city and Astrath faced a lengthy period in prison.
Fortunately for him, I managed to gather—and when I say gather, I mean fake—enough evidence in his favour to make prosecution impossible. Astrath was allowed to resign quietly provided he never showed his face in the stadium again. Thanks to me, he also escaped expulsion from the Sorcerers Guild, so he’s entitled to attend the convention, although whether he’s planning to, I don’t know. It might be a touchy subject. Astrath isn’t welcome in polite circles these days and I’m not certain how he stands with the other Sorcerers.
Astrath’s house is reasonably comfortable but not really the sort of place a powerful Sorcerer would expect to live in. Up in Thamlin, Harmon Half Elf has a villa with grounds so large he holds a horse race every year for all the Sorcerer’s apprentices, but here in more modest Pashish you’d be hard pushed to fit a horse into Astrath’s back yard.
He greets me warmly, as always. It’s a relief to him to see a friendly face from the old days.
“Thraxas, I’ve been expecting you. Some wine?”
“Beer would be better. And let me get myself in front of your fire, my warm cloak is starting to cool off.”
Astrath makes a living casting horoscopes, selling healing potions and such like, but there’s not much money around in Pashish. There’s not much money anywhere south of the river in Turai, unless you count the Brotherhood, who control the local criminal activity. They always do well, but you couldn’t say anyone else was prospering. Astrath only has one servant and she’s finished for the day, so he leads me inside himself, and takes my cloak.
“I’ll charge it up for you before you leave. What are you doing out on the streets in this weather?”
I tell him about my fruitless tailing of the merchant’s wife.
“The woman is completely blameless as far as I can see. Obsessed with beauty treatments, but having met the husband I can understand why she’d want a hobby.”
We sit and chat about this and that. I let Astrath get some wine inside him before raising the subject of the Assemblage.
“Are you planning on attending?”
The Sorcerer strokes his beard. Most Sorcerers in Turai are bearded, and they wear rainbow cloaks, the badge of their Guild.
“I’m not certain. I’m still a member, but—”
He shrugs. I tell him he should go.
“Be a shame to miss seeing your old friends.”
“There’s a lot of old friends not too keen to see me these days, Thraxas.”
“People in the Palace maybe. And round the race track. But your fellow Sorcerers? Do they care about a little trouble with the law? It’s not like you broke the Guild rules or anything. Hell, if the Assemblage banned every Sorcerer who’d had a run-in with their city authorities, the place would be empty. I’m forever getting Gorsius Starfinder out of trouble.”
Astrath smiles. Gorsius Starfinder, who holds a respectable post at the Palace these days, does have an unfortunate tendency to get drunk in brothels and cause a scene.
“Maybe you’re right. It’s a long time since they’ve held the Assemblage here, be a shame to miss it.”
Astrath knows that the Turanians are nominating Lisutaris for head of the Guild. He doesn’t give much for her chances.
“I still hear all the gossip, and Sunstorm Ramius from Simnia is the favourite. He’s sharp as an Elf’s ear and he has a lot of friends. And if he doesn’t win it, there’s a few others not far behind. Rokim the Bright from Samsarina, for instance. The Samsarinans control a lot of votes. Or Darius Cloud Walker. He impressed a lot of people when he brought down that stray war dragon right in the middle of the Abelasian Sorcerers’ drinking contest. Just pointed his finger, down it came, and he carried on drinking and won the contest. A man like that carries a lot of weight with Sorcerers.”