“I’ll kill you the first chance I have,” Acair promised.
“And find yourself swinging from the nearest tree before you managed it?” Mansourah asked with a yawn. “Wouldn’t risk it, were I you.”
Léirsinn heard Acair take a deep breath, then let it out gustily. Perhaps thoughts of murder were being shelved for the moment. She looked at him briefly, had a raised eyebrow in return, then took her own steadying breath. She would leave her companions to their business and concentrate on her own task of watching for shadows on the ground that she found herself particularly adept at seeing.
She could do no more. Their quest was begun with little more than their wits, a bad-tempered horse, and the company of a handsome, noble prince who she suspected would slip a knife between Acair’s ribs if given half a chance.
She supposed others had trotted off into the fray with less.
She just wasn’t sure she wanted to know where that lack had left them.
Two
There was much to be said for the quiet, unassuming life of a black mage.
Acair of Ceangail walked along the cobblestone streets of a city he hadn’t planned on visiting ever again without a very dire reason indeed and took the opportunity to indulge in a leisurely mental recounting of the pleasures of that normally quiet life.
He interrupted himself long enough to give a frisky lad a shove away from his companion and situate her more fully between himself and that empty-headed archer from Neroche, then he turned his mind back to his much-needed distraction.
He was never without an invitation to dinner. He nodded over that truth, then reviewed a small list of the elegant tables at which he’d enjoyed a prime seat, the stunning women for whom he’d poured wine, and the noble husbands and fathers with whom he’d engaged in battles fought with the tools associated with his class.
He had also enjoyed a wide variety of entertainments. Frolics on the stage, the occasional duel at dawn he thought worth getting up early for, and long, pleasant evenings spent listening to musicians who played in tune only began the lengthy list of pleasures he had enjoyed.
There were other things he relished, things that were perhaps a bit less gentlemanlike but absolutely to his taste. There were murders to boast of—and not a soul with the courage to ask him about the particulars—mischief to be about, and mayhem to inflict. His terrible reputation preceded him like a cleansing wind and trailed after him like so many neophytes wishing they had earned even a single word of the gossip that attended him. When he entered a gilded chamber, women swooned, men clutched the keys to their coffers, and mages scampered out the nearest exit.
And why not? He was the youngest natural son of the worst black mage in recent memory, and his mother was a witch. He had the wit, the courage, and the cheek to succeed at all sorts of ventures that might give a lesser man pause. Was there in truth any who possessed an existence such as his own?
“All right, bastard, where to now?”
He took a careful breath and reminded himself that killing anyone directly after breakfast might get the day off to a bad start. He clasped his hands behind his back where they wouldn’t do something he might regret later, then revisited why he still had a use for that wee rustic from Neroche standing closer to Léirsinn of Sàraichte than he was happy about.
He was trapped in the middle of the city of Eòlas, a place he continued to wish he weren’t visiting, preparing to mount an assault on the library attached to the city’s university in order to retrieve something he’d hidden there previously. He couldn’t use his magic, which left him relying on lesser souls to take care of any of that sort of business on his behalf. Not the most ideal of circumstances, but his life was not his own at the moment.
Mansourah of Neroche had been told all that already. If he had been left in the dark about a few things of note, that simply couldn’t be helped. There were few whom Acair trusted with the complete particulars of any given plan, and that lad from Neroche, whilst surely a pleasant fellow, hadn’t yet earned a place on that list.
Besides, what was there to tell? He needed a book that currently found itself in the university’s library. If he wanted to see what sort of trouble his presence in the city might stir up as he went about liberating that tome from its spot, that was his business. If his business also included a visit to his tailor when time permitted, so much the better.
And last but certainly not least, if his companions slept deeply enough during the coming night that he could slip out the window and do a bit of snooping in the local ruler’s private chambers, who could blame him? There was something in Eòlas that didn’t smell quite right and that wasn’t simply the trio of drunken, vomit-covered students sprawled on the sidewalk in front of him.
Exam time at the university, obviously.
He stepped over a moaning lad sporting ink-stained fingers and gave thought to the mystery that stank of something unpleasant.
Simeon of Diarmailt had been willing a pair of years earlier to trade his most treasured book of spells for a decent amount of the world’s magic. The king had sworn on his signet ring that it was the only copy of said book in existence, a claim no doubt made to enhance its desirability. Acair had doubted that the oath carried its usual weight considering that Simeon had left his crown behind—unwillingly, or so rumor had it—at the gaming table of one of his northern neighbors, but quibbling over the details had seemed a bit gauche at the time. He had accepted the king’s assurance about the exclusive nature of his book and hoped for the best.
He had wondered, of course, why the king wanted power badly enough to pay that sort of price, though the answer hadn’t been long in coming. The simple fact was, Simeon had lost his throne and therefore a solid border between his own sweet self and Wychweald. Given that the man was one of the most unpleasant knaves spawned in the past century, charm alone was obviously not going to win him a return of crown and country. Power it would have to be.
“Acair?”
He pulled himself reluctantly away from thoughts of poking his nose into royal affairs that weren’t his and brought his attention back to the matter at hand. The library was currently rising up before them in all its austere glory and getting inside without being discovered was going to be a challenge. He paused with his companions in the shadow of that imposing structure, then looked at the hapless middle—or thereabouts—prince of the house of Neroche.
“Where to?” he repeated slowly. “The library, which you already knew. I would like to pay said visit whilst shielded by as much anonymity as possible, which you also already knew.”