Chapter 9

"What do you mean she isn't dead?" demanded young Lord Tornadin, leaping up from behind the table and almost knocking over the ornate bottle of wine and the silver goblet beside it as his knees struck the underside. "Damn you Kurchal, I paid you double for that one!"

Kurchal, a skinny man, almost all bone and sinew, cringed back, but touched the hilt of his dagger as he did so. He may be cowed, but he would defend himself. Tornadin had seen the little man in a fight and he was not at all sure he could best the assassin. Kurchal was fast, very fast, even if he was not strong. "Milord did not inform me that she was a wizard," he protested, giving the taller, heavier built man an accusing look. "Somehow she saved herself, even stabbed in the heart. I felt the pulse through the blade. I pierced her heart, yet she did not die."

"Impossible!" screamed Tornadin, hurling the wine goblet over Kurchal's head, where it clanged and splattered deep maroon wine over a fine tapestry.

Placatingly, Kurchal held out his hands, fingers spread. "Milord, who knows what devilish things wizards might know how to do?" he asked. "You, yourself, said she was in league with the Dark One, maybe even the consort of a Templar."

"So she probably is, the devious whore," growled Tornadin, thinking furiously. "Were you fool enough to speak my name?"

"As you requested," said Kurchal, the accusing look returning to his gaunt features. "Your orders were quite explicit."

"Then she'll come for me, now," said the young nobleman, throwing himself back into his chair. It was a gaudy thing, ornately carved with serpents and gilded beyond good taste or reason.

The assassin's voice always struck Tornadin as reedy, but now it was positively gaspy with air. "I will stand beside milord, of course."

"You should be damn certain of that, you useless wretch!" shouted the young man, glaring again. "If I'm to die, it will be after seeing your scorched corpse first." He breathed hard, visibly calming himself. "There is one other option, though. It may not quite come to that." He dug into the pocket of the silken, embroidered smoking vest he wore, and pulled out a vial. "It may be that you can make her into something other than a wizard, for a short time."

"That, milord, would help immensely," said the man who appeared to be all bony joints and gangly limbs. "It might be that milord would wish to tarry a while with a helpless wizard, then?"

Lord Tornadin thought for a moment. "You could manage that?" he asked.

"If she is just a normal woman for a time, I can manage many things." The gleam in the scrawny assassin's eyes was decidedly unhealthy. "Including taking her somewhere where milord can - entertain himself for a while."

The smile that crossed Tornadin's face was more than confirmation enough. He flicked the vial toward Kurchal with a snap of his wrist. The assassin snatched it out of the air with that deceptive grace and speed and the vial disappeared amid the multiple pockets and folds of his tatty looking cloak. "If you bring her to me alive and helpless, I'll double again your rate."

Amazing how quickly he had gone from being in terror to gloating over his soon-to-be victim, observed Kurchal. He bowed low and backed out the door of the small, but ornately appointed, sitting room.

The round face of Terkel, Tornadin's personal manservant, poked around the corner. In his stilted Crystern, he said, "Master Urdran is waiting to see you now, milord."

"Send him in," said Tornadin, now in a nearly jovial mood, he beamed at the fat scribe entered the room, noting the spreading stain of wine on the floor.

"An accident that will soon be cleared," said Tornadin, dismissively and rising from behind the table to come around. As the man bowed, he clucked his tongue. "No need for that, good master. I invited you because I seek a favor, and you are one of the few men who can help me."

Urdran worked in the archives, as an scribe. Tornadin wished to know more about this Siska. It bothered him to not know his enemy. And she was an enemy, make no doubt, now. She knew he was out to kill her, and, sure as rain, she would be trying to kill him now.

The challenge of this newest of his goals rather thrilled him. He had eliminated many enemies, but no wizards. The vaunted powers of that caste rather frightened him, but that fear just hardened his resolve to prove himself the better.

"You did as my man asked?" asked Tornadin, picking up an additional cup and filling it from the bottle of wine. He held the silver goblet out to the fat scribe, who rubbed at his lower lip, round like a plump sausage, before answering.

"Yes, yes, milord, I did," he said. "But there are only three Siskas in Tressen, by any surname. It is not a common given name in the Crystern Isles. I believe it is Eastron, actually..."

"I see," said Tornadin, interrupting the flow of trivialities. "Well, which is the young pretty girl I saw in the market?"

That was the story he had given this functionary. He had seen a girl and become smitten with her and wished to know who she was. He had heard her name, but only her given name and did not know the surname.

Urdran fingered that plump lip again, humming to himself. "Well, of the three, two are young, one eighteen and one seventeen," he said.

Tornadin raised an eyebrow and retook his seat. He propped his elbows on the table and steepled his fingers, resting his chin on his thumbs.

It took the scribe a moment to move on, he sipped the wine. "That's very good, milord, tasty wine..." he said.

"Yes, it is," said Tornadin, impatience tinging his tone. "But I am in a rush, Master Urdran," he said.

"Yes, milord," said the functionary, stammering. "Well, the elder of those two has no surname, she was a slave until a week ago," he said. "Siska was purchased for three thousand marks."

"Three thousands?" asked Tornadin, disbelieving. "She must have been a beauty, indeed."

The scribe shrugged. "The records don't go into that, milord."

"This girl did not act like a slave, though." Tornadin narrowed his eyes, trying to remember the face of the tall blond girl who had stiffened her spine and stared him down. "No, she was no slave."

"The other, milord," said Urdran, "is a serving girl at the Gilded Cage." He gave the young nobleman a long look. "I understand that the Gilded Cage is a rather unseemly establishment, milord."

"I'm familiar with it, Master Urdran," said Tornadin, sitting back. "Perhaps the slave deserves more of my thought," he said. "Did it say anything of her looks?"

"The records give only the banal statistics, milord, for identifying purposes," said Urdran, setting the cup down and pulling out a strip of parchment. "She was tall, for a girl, just over seventeen hands and weighed six stone with blond hair and blue eyes."

Tornadin's eyes widened. "That's her," he said, definitively. "She was tall, and slim, with golden hair with eyes so blue they were violet."

The blank expression on the clerk's face told the noble that the man was simply humoring him in listening. Reaching into his belt pouch, Tornadin pulled out a small handful of gold coins. "I want you to find out all you can about her, her family, her buyer, everything," he said, leaning forward in the ornate chair.

Urdran took the coins tentatively in his chubby hand and quickly stuffed the gold coins into his own belt pouch. "Yes, milord," he said hastily, suddenly very nervous. If this young nobleman was willing to throw about gold, he rather feared where this all might lead him.

With an impatient roll of his eyes, the young man said, "Don't worry, Mater Urdran, I will not bandy about that you assisted me."

"Thank you milord," said the bureaucrat. "If you need nothing else..."

"Yes, yes, you can go," said Tornadin, dismissively, waving his hand at the scribe. The little plump man shuffled out of the room, bowing no fewer than two times.

Tornadin leaned back in the chair again, chuckling. "A slave, were you?" he asked the room, then broke into hearty belly laughter.

Keeley and Mist stood in her room, both eyeing her ornate bed with open approval. Siska was sitting on the bed in her shift, blushing at them and smiling. "I'm glad you came over to check on me," she said.

"I didn't hear about you getting hurt until Garel told me he heard you had been attacked on the street," said Keeley. Mist nodded beside her in agreement. Most of Mist's attention, however, was upon the silken canopy of the bed, dyed deep green and made of silk so sheer that it was virtually transparent. Keeley nudged her in the ribs.

"We ran over just as soon as he shut up about it," said Mist in a flurry of words, though her eyes quickly drifted to one of the massive posts, carved in the form of a stylized woman, holding the heavy frame overhead.

Siska smiled. "I've never had such a nice bed before, either Mist," she said, touching her friend's arm. Little Siska was climbing the blankets and moved to sit beside Siska on the bed. Mist blushed but smiled. "It's so beautiful," she said.

Keeley seemed determined to not speak of the bed and Siska well understood. "Well, tell your brother that I am thankful for him bringing you the news," said Siska. "I was terribly bored yesterday and cannot rise until tomorrow, according to Sherlynn."

Phillip entered the room, carrying a pewter platter with cups and a covered dish on it. "Here you ladies go," he said, giving them a slightly mocking bow as Keeley took the tray with a bemused expression. He bowed again as he backed from the room, grinning slightly.

Mist giggled. "Served by a wizard, now that's posh," she said.

"I think I'd best not get used to it," said Siska, grinning at the look still on Keeley's face. A mix of surprise and something else. "Mentor Phillip is a good man. Yet, he is my mentor. I should be waiting on his board."

"May I see the scar?" asked Keeley, her eyes aglitter with morbid curiosity. She sat the tray down on Siska's night stand and turned back with an eager expression.

Siska stood and turned her back to the other two, pulling her gown up to her shoulders as she did so. She felt soft touches on the puckered skin around the wound. It was barely sensitive now, something Siska took for being close to fully recovered.

The two girls ooh'ed and aah'ed over it for a long moment, prodding it and the skin around it. Mist's eyes widened as she saw the door was open and quickly pulled it shut with a slam.

"Your door was open, Siska," she said, blushing and looking at Siska's bared backside.

Siska blinked at her a moment then said, "Mentor Phillip has seen me unclad before, Mist."

Both of the young women looked scandalized, their mouths hanging open and eyes the size of full mark coins. Keeley managed to speak first. "He's seen you fully nude?" she asked, her tone spoke of incredulity.

"Many times," said Siska, suddenly growing worried at the level of shock on her friends' faces.

"But you said you were a, well, you know," said Keeley, blushing to her ears.

"I am," said Siska, again rather taken aback. "It's hardly the same thing." Her tone had shifted to one of defensiveness. Mist was conspicuously silent as this exchange passed before her.

"Well, one usually leads to the other, you know," said Keeley, rather floundering now.

"It didn't in this case," said Siska, her tone suggesting she was on the very edge of being offended in truth. "If you must know, he told me no."

"You offered?" asked Mist, suddenly finding her voice.

"More than once. He is such a gentleman he passed it by every time," said Siska, lifting her chin in pride in her mentor.

Keeley murmured something under her breath and gave the door a sidelong look.

"Did you just say he would not refuse you?" asked Siska, her eyes now the ones gone wide.

"What?" asked Keeley, blinking and seeming to be coming awake from a nap. "No, no." Her protest seemed to lack intensity, though.

Mist's expression was a studied blank as she attempted to avoid the topic in its entirety.

"Very well," said Siska, leaning back onto the thick down-filled pillows at the head of her bed. She smiled at Keeley softly then looked toward Mist, who was still being very quiet, seeming to fade back a bit from the conversation.

There was a soft thud as little Siska tumbled off the bed near the foot, tiny squeaking sounds, which seemed rather off color, erupted from below the footboard.

Mist lifted the little round cover off the platter and saw a pile of fat, steaming muffins beneath, the blue of berries peeking out of the fluffy dough.

Distracted by pastries, the three of them fell to drinking the thinned wine and eating the pile of muffins. "And he can cook?" asked Keeley, holding up the remains of a nearly finished piece of the cake.

"You seek to pursue my mentor?" asked Siska, lifting an eyebrow.

Keeley almost choked on her last bite of muffin. "Me?" she stammered, gasping for air after she had stopped coughing. "One, no," she said. "He's too old - isn't he?" That last had sounded oddly urgent to Siska's ears and she forced herself not to grin at Keeley.

"He has some years on you, yes," said Siska, trying to sound grave, and deciding to not pick on her friend. One cannot chose who one develops an interest in, no matter how casual, after all.

Mannis turned the corner in the dimly lit corridor. He barely had time to raise his practice sword before the blow landed against the bamboo rods with a loud clack.

The man who was attacking him wore black. Mannis raised his sword out of pure instinct, long drilled into his mind and body by the swordmasters who taught him for the last six years.

He stepped aside in a fluid motion, already bringing his practice blade around for a killing blow. The black clad man leaped back, a tricky underhanded swing coming at Mannis from below on the man's backswing

Mannis responded again by rote, his arms knew their job, and the slender strips of bamboo made another loud crack as his sword deflected the curving arc of the other man's sword away from his body.

This opponent made six. He had bested the first five quickly, on the counterstroke to their attack. This man was better, though, and pressed him back with a flurry of quick strikes with his own bamboo sword.

As Mannis retreated backward, the man shuffled his feet forward in many tiny steps. Niliwander style, thought Mannis as he backed another few steps. Except for the shouted kais that Niliwanders seemed so fond of, this man was fighting in the style the Niliwanders called Sheylo.

The rapid foot movements and the quick, almost blurred attacks from the blade forced Mannis to retreat before their ferocity, parrying and dodging in fluid motions. The odds of facing off against a Niliwander for a Defender was almost none, but the masters that ran the Defender Academy were adamant that their trainees know how to fight all forms of attacker, even the very unlikely.

The practice area for this final test was a maze of stone corridors and rooms within a large structure called simply the testing hall. Movable wooden baffles and walls would allow the maze and rooms to be changed at need for various sorts of training sessions. He had tested her many times already, passing each.

As his back hit the stone wall behind him he wondered if he would pass this last examination. He was out of room to retreat. He was required to finish this contest without the opponents scoring a killing blow by breaking one of the several clay disks that were attached to his light padded suit. He head the clay of the disk grind against the stone wall behind and he lightened how hard he pressed against it.

The man was clad all in black, and even his face was covered in black swaddling, including the eyes, which seemed to be peering out through a single layer of thin black cloth. The withering rain of blows kept falling on him and he parried frantically. He was beginning to tire. When his sword, clumsily, struck the wall from one of the opponent's parries, Mannis knew he was about to be beaten.

The man pinned his sword to the wall and Mannis glimpsed victory, he threw his weight forward and down, yanking back on his blade, freeing it from behind the other man's sword just before his shoulder pressed the blade to the wall. It would not hold the man long.

Mannis swung his sword around, switching grips as he had practiced thousands of times, the sword swinging upward in a tight arc. The man's sword came free and the opponent started to stab for Mannis' chest. There was a loud crack as his sword struck the man's abdomen and he felt the clay under the man's outer layer of black cloth snap. He had held it long enough.

His opponent stopped, lowering his blade and bowing to Mannis. He seemed to be panting under the cloth. This was only reasonable, considering the sweating and panting that Mannis, himself was doing.

"Well done, Defender Mannis," said the deep voice of Serayan, one of the instructors, from beneath all that black swaddling. "You finally remembered that the blade is not your only weapon. Remember that forever and you will do well."

He bowed in return to the black-clad instructor smiled. "Thank you, Master Serayan," he intoned, trying to sound sober and mature. "Yet, you are better than that in a fight, I've seen it."

"My boy," said the old instructor, pulling the black wrapping off of his head as he spoke. "I was testing you, not trying to prove myself better." He managed to pull the last of the wrapping cloths off his head and looked at Mannis with piercing brown eyes. "You were testing to prove you were worthy to be a novice Defender, not to prove you were better than me. You are worthy to wear the uniform and walk among the Defenders. That most certainly does not make you the best."

The serious and hard look in the instructor's eyes shamed Mannis and he lowered his head. He had been firmly rebuked for his assumptions. The instructor put a hand on his shoulder and smiled broadly. "It just makes you better than most," said Serayan and he grinned broadly. "It is an honor to be the first to call you Defender, son."

They walked down the twisting corridors, the old instructor guiding Mannis with a gentle arm over the taller youth's shoulder. When they came to a door, it rather surprised Mannis that he had gone through so much of the maze without realizing how far he had moved. Time seemed to move differently as he fought past his opponents.

The bright light outside made him blink as he walked out behind old Serayan. The instructor was tugging on his shirt as Mannis looked toward him and several chunks of broken clay and some dust floated down out of it.

The cheer from the dozen young men in the courtyard stunned him a moment. The others, the ones who had completed their test were there, all smiling and running toward him to clap him and break his clay targets. It was tradition for the targets to be broken with punches if the person passed his final tests. He bore the painful blows with smiles and a few tears. Varan delivered a particularly powerful blow to his chest, breaking the disk that covered his breastbone.

He looked at the young men there. Mannis had been last to test. He did a hasty count of heads. Of the twelve that he had trained with for this last test, only nine were in the group now. He immediately missed the three that were not there.

Cheerful Panral Gurria, who had always been everyone's friend, making no enemies in the training class and being a favorite guest when they went home for days of leisure.

Tobias Gerdlan, the strongest man in the group. He had been able to lift Mannis' weight with one arm. Many a time, Mannis had won coin betting on him in arm wrestling competitions.

Virgel Ogalian, who had been Mannis' best friend for the first two years of training. He had been convinced, every test, that he would fail. He finally had.

None of them were dead, he knew, they had left the Defender training with more than enough skill and knoweldge to make a good living as merchant guards of the highest caliber or mercenaries of a superior grade, or even enlist in many other nations' militaries as junior officers. But they were dead to the Defenders, and his squad mates would mourn them this night.

They had failed and were already gone. Such was the training and such was the difficulty of becoming a Defender. When they had started their training, at age fourteen, there had been thirty-six of them. Now there were nine. With the addition of a leader, they would become the newest squad of the Defenders.

A defender squad was a unit for life. If men died, they were gone forever from the squad and no more were added. Several of the oldest squads had only one or two members now, after the days when Tressen had been attacked regularly by the Theocracy, the Coghlanders, or the Rojando.

He looked about himself at the men he would fight beside for the remainder of his days with the Defenders. He knew them well already, he had grown up with them from the first of his days as a young man.

There were other classes, some a few weeks behind Mannis' and there had been one that graduated a few weeks before. The schedule of training had new squads completing training every month.

Tonight, as they mourned the passing of Panral, Tobias, and Vergal, they would be doing so with the eldest squad of defenders, the one that they would be replacing. The older defenders would be retiring. A ceremony would be held, and the banner bearer of the outgoing squad would present the new squad with the banner and crest.

They were to become the Fist of the Shattered Crown. So named for their part in protecting the lives of the last monarchs of Tressen, a century before. They had fought, holding the main door to the throne room to the last man able to stand. It bought the royal family time to flee the palace and try to reach safety.

The royal family, King Boris Vanakski and Queen Ivana Vanakski, and their daughter Yuliana Vanakski, had fled, only to be cut down on the streets by the mobs raging through the burning city. King Boris had reigned only five years when the greater houses turned on them in a fit of betrayal that became known as the Night of Flames.

Since their first days in the academy, they knew which squad they would be replacing, it was no secret and the men of that squad, only three of whom were still alive, spent many an hour in special tutoring of the lads, taking a personal interest in the fate of the good name.

When a squad was wiped out, it was never reconstituted. However, one of the members had survived that night a century before. He had been knocked unconscious before the fateful fight before the throneroom doors and left for dead. It was said that he wept for a month upon finding out that his squadmates all paid the ultimate price that night and he had not been there.

It was with somber reflectiveness that the nine walked from the courtyard back into the barracks of the trainees. Underclassmen cheered them as they passed with stony expressions and went to their rooms for a day of fasting and contemplation before their graduation ceremony. Somehow, to Mannis' eyes, the underclassmen suddenly looked like children. He knew some were actually older than him, but still, they were not yet Defenders and not all of them would ever become one.

One of the underclassmen ran up, quivering with excitement. A lad of about sixteen, with large, jughandle ears. "Your lady friend is alive, Defender Mannis!" he exclaimed. "I spoke with her mentor when he was out buying food."

It took Mannis a moment to truly digest what the young trainee said. "You spoke to the wizard, himself?" he asked, his voice rising with hopeful tones.

"Yes, sir, Defender," said the young man.

"Come on, Mannis," said Varan, pulling him toward their dormitory. "Too much good news in one day is likely to make you light headed."

Mannis turned to point at the young trainee. "Come to our room in thirty minutes, I have a task for you." he said.

The trainee nodded before being swallowed up by the milling mass of other trainees, wanting to slap the shoulders of the new graduates. Technically, they were not to fraternize with the trainees, now that they were elevated, but this evening, few would say anything about the matter.

"What are you doing?" asked Varan as he pushed the door of their room shut on the furor outside. Four men shared this room, himself, Mannis, Geordino, and Cherofski. Both of the others were already in the room, sitting on their beds and playing a game of chess between them.

"I'm going to ask her to the ceremony," said Mannis flatly. "You're asking Keeley, aren't you?"

"Well, yes," said Varan, shrugging. "I asked her two weeks ago."

"I hardly had the chance to ask Siska that long ago, now did I?" said Mannis, raising an eyebrow and his voice so that Cherofski looked up from the chess board and regarded Mannis with his black eyes.

Varan nodded. "I see your point," he said, his face going thoughtful.

"You think she will accept?" asked Mannis, a small amount of worry entering his voice.

There was a short space of silence, then Varan grinned. "Of course she will," he said.

Mannis pulled his writing desk from beneath his cot and twisted the cap off his ink bottle so hastily that he coated his fingertips with the black ink. He wiped them clean on a handkerchief and pulled paper from the inside.

"Slow down, friend," said Varan. "You'll even look overeager in your writing if you're not careful."

The tall, slender redhead stopped a moment, schooling himself to calmness. "You're right," he said, sighing deeply. "She's a wizard, after all, I have to word things right."

"Good point," said Varan, sitting on his own bunk and pulling off his boots. "You're dealing with a woman of substance here."

Geordino turned from the chessboard. "That girl in the blue robe was really a wizard?" he asked. "The gel you met in the park? I thought she was just wearing a blue dress."

"Wrong, as usual, Geordi," said Mannis, chuckling. "She's a Blue Sister."

"Damn my eyes," said the dark-skinned man, turning back to the chess board. "Next time, I'll be sure to follow you two when you go chasing after a pack of gels."

"There were two others, you know," said Varan, laying back on his cot and lacing his fingers behind his head. "Leetha and Mist. Neither of whom were exactly homely."

"Well, I've never had much luck with the girls," said Cherofski, moving his rook to threaten Geordino's queen. "I've seen that one you're courting, Keeley, up close, and she's definitely easy on my eyes."

"Bastard," muttered Geordino, taking the rook and promptly losing his queen to one of Cherofski's wizards.

Varan sighed and smiled to himself, his eyes focusing into the distance. "Yes, yes, she is," he said.

The frantic scratching of Mannis' quill stopped and he growled before crumpling a sheet of parchment and tossing it at Cherofski. "Hush about how pretty gels are," he hissed. "You're distracting me."

The tall, whip thin Varan chuckled at that. "Siska, the Blue Sister, is a beauty, for certain," he said in an idle tone. Waving his feet toward the door as he cradled his head with his hands.

"You just keep your eyes off Siska," accused Mannis, pointing the nib of his quill at Varan.

"Fear not, Brother Mannis," said the reclining young man, twisting his broad lips into a smile. "I'll not let my eye stray from Keeley for long. I'm a simple man, and quite happy with just beautiful."

Mannis began writing again, his head low over his writing desk. The scratching was the only sound for long moments, as the young men let him write, as he said, free of distractions.

He shook corn starch over the ink and looked at his handiwork. Varan sat up and snatched the parchment. "Dearest Siska," he said. "Good start. A very friendly opening without commitment."

"Give me that," said Mannis, making a grab for the parchment.

Varan rolled over his cot and stood against the wall opposite, smiling. "I would be honored if you would accompany me for my graduation ceremony, where I will be elevated to a Defender."

Mannis sat down on his bunk and simply rolled his eyes. "Right, read my heart's ourpouring to the world, why don't you?" he said.

"The event, if you choose to grant me this one heart's desire - oh, very nice, that - is to be held at the Palace of Tressen in seven days," read Varan, still grinning as if he were trying to display all his teeth for examination. "Respond please by way of the trainee who bears this missive - missive? I didn't know you knew that word, you cretin."

Mannis snatched the letter from Varan, glowering at him with mock fury. "Your own Defender, Mannis," said Varan, already having read the ending, his grin, if it were to be believed, widening further as he delivered this last line.

The blush that rose into Mannis' features set Varan to laughter which was joined by the sniggering of the other two Defenders in the chamber. "Damn, my boy, you do have a romantic's heart in there, don't you?" asked Varan between fits of laughter.