A Wizard in Mind

CHAPTER 1

Old Antonio pointed ahead and shouted. Young Gianni Braccalese looked up, saw the plume of black smoke ahead, and felt his heart sink.

Only minutes before, Gianni had run a finger around the collar of his doublet, wishing he could take off the cumbersome, padded, hot garment. The sun had heated the fields to baking by midday, and now, in mid-afternoon, the breeze had died down, so the only thing moving was the sweat from Gianni’s brow. If only they hadn’t been so close to Accera! It wasn’t much of a town, of course, but its two merchants were important sources of the grain and cotton that would fetch so high a price at home in Pirogia, and of the orzans that would make so beautiful a necklace for any lady who caught Gianni’s eye—so he knew he must not shame his father by appearing bare-chested, no matter how hot it might be. He scolded himself for not having thought to take off his doublet in midmorning, when the day began to grow hot—but it was the first time he had led a goods train in summer, and only the fourth time he had led a goods train at all. He had turned twenty after All Saints’ Day, so it was only a matter of months since his father had promoted him from his duties as a clerk, to actual trading. He was very anxious to make a good showing—but now this!

He stared at the black plume, feeling his stomach hollow with dread. Only one thing could explain so large a fire—a burning town. “Speed!” he called to Antonio. “We may be in time to save a life!”

Old Antonio gave him a sour look, but dutifully shouted to the drivers to whip up their mules. Gianni felt a burst of gratitude toward the older man—he knew, almost as well as though he had been told, that his father had bidden old Antonio to watch over him and teach him trading. The drivers and the guards were all very polite about it, but there was no question as to who was really managing the train—though with every trip, Gianni had needed to ask fewer questions, had been more sure in his directions and in his bargaining. He had even acquitted himself well in two minor skirmishes with bandits.

This, though—this was something of an entirely different order. Bandits who could attack a goods train were one thing—bandits who could sack a whole town were another! Admittedly, Accera was not much of a town, so far from the coast and with only a small river to water it, but it had had a wall, and its men had known how to handle their crossbows as well as most!

Why was he thinking of them as though they were gone?

He cantered along on his horse, with anxious looks back at the mules who bore his father’s wealth. The drivers had whipped up the beasts with gentle calls, not wanting to make any more noise than they had to, and Gianni went cold inside as he realized the reason. Whatever bandits had lit that fire might still be nearby—might even be in Accera itself! Gianni loosened his rapier in its scabbard as he rode, then swung the crossbow from its hook on his saddle. He might be a novice at trading and leading, but he was an expert with weapons. Every merchant was, in a land in which the distinction between trader and soldier was less a matter of vocation than of emphasis and of the way in which he had made his fortune.

The wall of Accera grew from a line across the fields to a solid structure—and there was the breach! It looked as though a giant had taken a bite out of the wall—a giant with no taste for flesh, for dead men lay all around that hole and some lay half in, half out of it, their pikes still resting against nerveless fingers. Gianni slowed, holding up a hand to caution his men, and the entire train slowed with him. This was no work of starving peasants gone to banditry to find food—this had been done professionally. The condotierri had struck.

Mules began to bray protest, scenting blood and trying to turn away, but the drivers coaxed them onward with the skill of experts. They rode through the breach with great care, Gianni glancing down at the bodies of the men of Accera, then looking quickly away, feeling his gorge rise. He had seen dead men only once before, when Pirogia had fought a skirmish with the nearby city of Lubella, over their count’s fancy that his daughter had been seduced by one of the merchants’ sons. They had fought only long enough to satisfy the requirements of the count’s honor—and to leave half a dozen men dead, all to provide a high-bred wanton with an excuse for her pregnancy. Gianni still wondered whom she had been shielding.

Now that they had slowed, the traders went cautiously down the main street of the town, between rows of cream-colored, mud-brick buildings with red tile roofs, glancing everywhere about them, crossbows at the ready. The sound of weeping came from one of the shadowed windows, and Gianni felt the protector’s urge to seek and comfort, but knew he dared not—not when enemy soldiers might be hiding anywhere. Then he saw the dead woman with her skirt thrown up about her waist and her bodice ripped open, saw the blood above and below, and lost all desire to try to comfort—he knew he could never know what to say.

On they rode, jumping at every shadow. Gianni saw broken doors and shutters, but no sign of fire. He began to suspect where he would find it, and felt dread rise within him.

Something stirred in the shadows, and half a dozen crossbows swiveled toward it—but it was only an old man who hobbled out into the sunlight, an old man with a crutch and a face filled with contempt, saying, “You need not fear, merchants. The rough bad men have left.”

Gianni frowned, stifling the urge to snap at the old man. The blood running from his brow showed that he had suffered enough, and the huge bruise on the left side of his face showed that, crippled or not, he had fought bravely to defend his family—as long as he could.

Old Antonio asked, “Condotierri?”

The old man nodded. “The Stiletto Company, by their insignia.” He pointed farther down the road. “There are the ones with whom you have come to trade—if they have anything left to trade.”

Antonio nodded, turning his face toward the plume of smoke. “I thank you, valiant vieillard. We shall come back to help where we can.”

“I will thank you—then,” the old man said with irony. “In the meantime, I know—you must see to your own.”

Gianni frowned, biting back the urge to say that Signor Ludovico and his old clerk Anselmo were only business associates, not relatives—but he knew what the old man meant. Accera was a farming town—they had brought trade goods to exchange for produce, after all—and to the farmers, the merchants were a tribe apart.

They turned a corner from the single broad street to see the stream flowing in under the water gate to their left, and the burning ruin of the warehouse to their right.

“The western end still stands!” Gianni shouted. “Quickly! They may yet live!” He dashed forward, all caution banished by the old man’s assurance that the condotierri had ridden away. Antonio, more experienced, barked to the drivers, and crossbows lifted as men scanned their surroundings.

To say the western end of the warehouse still stood was a considerable exaggeration—the roof had fallen in, and the main beam had taken the top half of the wall with it. But the fire had not yet reached the shattered doorway where a body lay, nor the corner where another body slouched, half-sitting against the remains of the wall. Even as he dismounted and ran up to them, Gianni was seized with the ridiculous realization that neither wore a doublet or robe, but only loose linen shirts and hose—shirts that were very bloody now. He knelt by the man in the door, saw the dripping gash in his neck and the pool of blood, then turned away toward the other body to cover his struggle to hold down his rebellious stomach. He stepped over to the corner, none too steadily, and knelt by the man who lay there, knelt staring at the rip in his shirt, at the huge bloodstain over his chest—and saw that chest rise ever so slightly. He looked up and saw the gray lips twitch, trying to move, trying to form words …

“It is Ludovico.” Antonio knelt by him, holding a flask of brandy to the man’s lips. He poured, only a little, and the man coughed and spluttered, then opened his eyes, staring from one to the other wildly …

“It is Antonio,” the older man said, quickly and firmly. “Signor Ludovico, I am Antonio—you know me, you have traded with me often!”

Ludovico stared up at Antonio, his lips twitching more and more until they formed an almost—silent word: “An—Anton …?”

“Yes, Antonio. Good signor, what happened here?” Why was the old fool asking, when they already knew? Then Gianni realized it was only a way of calming Signor Ludovico, of reassuring him.”

“C—condotierri!” Ludovico gasped. “Sti—Stilettos! Too … too many to fight off … but … ”

“But fight you did.” Antonio nodded, understanding. “They drove away your workmen, and … beat you.”

“Workmen … fled!” Ludovico gasped. “Clerks … home!”

“Ran home to try to defend their wives and children?” Antonio nodded, frowning. “Yes, of course. After all, the goods in this warehouse were not theirs.”

“Fought!” Ludovico protested. “Crossbows … there …” He gestured at the wreckage of a crossbow, broken in both stock and bow, and Gianni shuddered at the thought of the savagery with which the condotierri had punished the older man for daring to fight them.

“Thought me … dead!” Ludovico wheezed. “Heard … talk …”

“Enough, enough,” Antonio soothed. “You must lie down, lie still and rest.” He gave Gianni a meaningful glance, and the younger man, understanding, whipped off his cloak and bundled it up for a pillow.

“Not … rest!” Ludovico protested, lifting a feeble hand. “Tell! Conte! They … spoke of … a lord’s pay …”

“Yes, yes, I understand,” Antonio assured him. “You heard the condotierri talk about being in the pay of a nobleman. Now rest we can reason out the remainder of it well enough. Water, Gianni!”

Gianni had the flash ready and unstoppered. Antonio poured a small amount between Ludovico’s lips. The merchant coughed as he tried to speak a few more words, then gave over the effort and drank. The taste of clear water seemed to take all the starch out of him; he sagged against Antonio’s arm.

“The wound?” Gianni asked.

“It must be cleaned,” Antonio said regretfully. “Pull the cloth away as gently as you can, Gianni.”

This, at least, Gianni understood from experience. Delicately, he lifted the cloth away from the wound; it pulled at the dried blood, but Ludovico didn’t seem to notice. Gianni probed with a finger, very gently, managing to keep his stomach under control—here, at least, there was a chance something could be done. “It’s wide, but low.”

“A sword, and the soldier twisted it.” Antonio nodded. “It pierced the lung, but not the heart. He may yet live. Still, it must be cleaned. Dribble a little brandy on it, Gianni.” Then, to Ludovico: “Brace yourself, for there will be pain—there must be.”

Gianni waited a few seconds to be sure the man had heard, but not long enough for him to protest, then tilted the brandy bottle as Antonio had said. Ludovico cried out, once, sharply, then clamped his jaw shut. When he saw Gianni stopper the bottle again, he sagged with relief.

“Clean the space around him,” Antonio told Gianni. “It would be best if we do not move him.” Gianni frowned. “The bandits …?”

“They have been and gone. They would need sharp sentries indeed, to learn that new goods have come into the town—and why should they post watchers where they have already been? We are as safe here as behind a stockade, Gianni. Set the men to putting out the fire, as much as they can; these walls will still afford us some shelter.”

Gianni did more—he set the men to clearing a wide swath of everything burnable. When night closed in, the fire was contained and burning itself out. Tent canvas shaded poor old Ludovico, and the mules were picketed inside what remained of the walls, chewing grain; their packs lay nearby, and the men sat around a campfire, cooking dinner.

Antonio came out from beneath the canvas to join Gianni by the fire.

“Does he sleep?”

Antonio nodded. “It will be the Great Sleep before long, I fear. The wound by itself will not kill him, but he has bled too freely—and much of the blood is in his lungs. He breathes with difficulty.”

“At least he still breathes.” Gianni turned back to the steaming kettle and gave it a stir. “Do you really think a nobleman sent the Stilettos to do this work?”

“No,” Antonio said. “I think he heard the soldiers discussing their next battle, and whose pay they would take.”

Gianni nodded. “The Stiletto Company last fought for the Raginaldi—but they’ve come a long way from Tumanola.”

Antonio shrugged. “When there’s no work for them, mercenary soldiers turn to looting whoever has any kind of wealth at all. They needed food, so they came and took it from Ludovico’s granary, and while they were at it, they took the wool and cotton from his warehouse—and, of course, the orzans.”

“Must we bargain with them for it?” Gianni asked indignantly.

“You don’t bargain with condotierri unless you have a high, thick city wall between their spears and your hide,” Antonio reminded him. “Talk to them now, and they will take all your father’s goods—as well as our lives, if the whim takes them.” He turned and spat into the darkness. “I could wish the Raginaldi had not made a truce with the Botezzi. Then their hired dogs would still be camped outside the walls of Renova, not here reiving honest men.”

“It’s an uneasy truce, from all I hear,” Gianni reminded him, “and wearing thin, if the soldiers see new employment coming.”

“A fate to be wished,” Antonio agreed. “Soldiers in the field are bad enough, but at least a man can find out where they’re battling, and stay away.”

“Renova and Tumanola are the strongest powers in this eastern edge of Talipon,” Gianni said. “Their battlefield could be anywhere.”

“True, but at least their troops would stay there, putting up a show of fighting and taking their pay, not going about robbing poor peasants and honest merchants,” Antonio replied. “Idle soldiers make the whole of the island a devil’s playground.”

He did not quite say the soldiers were devils, but Gianni took his meaning. “Is it possible that some noblemen sent them to loot Accera as a punishment for some imagined insult?”

Antonio shrugged. “Who can tell with noblemen? They’re apt to take offense at anything and order their men to any action.”

“And who can say, with mercenary soldiers?” Gianni returned. “When they’re being paid, they’re an army; when they aren’t, they’re condotierri, worse than any mere rabble of bandits.”

“Far worse,” Antonio agreed. “I only wonder that it has not yet occurred to them to steal a whole city.” Gianni shuddered, taking Antonio’s meaning. If the Stiletto Company ever did decide to conquer a city to rule for themselves, it could not be one ruled by a noble family, for if they did, all the noblemen of Talipon would descend on them en masse, with every free lance they could hire to fight for them. No, the mercenaries would seek easier game, some city of merchants who ruled themselves—Gianni’s home, Pirogia.

“These condotierri may be working for themselves, or for one of the noble houses—it’s impossible to tell,” Antonio summarized. “But Accera lies within the lands claimed by Pirogia, before our grandfathers overthrew the conte and chased his family out. The attack may be only that of a hungry army needing practice, but it’s not a good sign.”

“Rumor says that the merchants of Tumanola grow restive, seeing how well we govern Pirogia,” Gianni said, “and that they have begun to petition their prince for some voice in the conduct of the affairs of the city.”

“The same is said of Renova.” Antonio scowled, shaking his head. “Me, I can only wonder how long it will be till both great houses march against our Pirogia, to put an end to the upstarts who’re giving their merchants such troublesome ideas.”

One of the drivers cried out from his station by the remains of the wall. “Who goes there?”

“A friend,” answered a deep voice, “or one who would be.”

Antonio was on his feet almost as quickly as Gianni. Both turned toward the voice—and saw the giant step out of the shadows.

The stranger towered over the sentry. He looked to be seven feet tall and was broad-shouldered in proportion and, though his loose shirt and leather jerkin hid his arms and chest, his hose revealed legs that fairly bulged with muscle. Gianni could have sworn the rapier at his hip was as long as the guard was tall.

Rapier, leather doublet, high riding boots—there was no doubt about his calling. The man was a mercenary. A giant, and a mercenary.

He was black-haired and black-browed, with dark deep-set eyes, a straight nose, a wide mouth, and a lantern jaw. His nose was no beak, but there was something of the hawk about him—perhaps the keenness with which he scanned the merchants—though no cruelty; rather, he seemed quietly amused. “I greet you, merchants.”

He spoke with a strong accent, one Gianni did not recognize. So, then—a giant, a mercenary, and a foreigner! Not surprising, of course—most of the mercenaries were foreigners from the mainland. He did not ask how the giant knew they were merchants—with their mules and packs, it was obvious. “Have you been watching us all afternoon?” he asked.

“Only since I found the town at sunset. I had a scuffle with some bandits back there”—the giant nodded at the hills outside the town—“three of them. They won’t fight for a long while. No, no, they still live—but my horse does not. I saw you, and thought you might have an extra horse to sell.”

They did have spare mounts, but Gianni said anyway, “It was not one of our men who died.”

“I had thought not—your men talked too much while they dug the grave.”

“These bandits who beset you—did they wear dagger—badges on their jerkins?” Antonio asked, stepping up beside Gianni.

The stranger nodded. “Long, slender daggers—stilettos, I think you call them.”

Antonio turned to Gianni. “He isn’t one of them.”

“If he tells the truth.” But Gianni could not think of a single reason why the Stiletto Company would send a man to spy them out, instead of falling upon them in a body—and he might need a professional fighting man before he saw Pirogia again. He held up a hand, palm open. “I’m Gianni Braccalese.”

“Well met, Gianni.” The giant, too, held up an open palm, the sign of friendship—or, at least, that they weren’t enemies. “I am Gar.”

Yes, the accent was very heavy—he made Gianni’s name sound like “Jonny,” missing the first i completely. “No family name?”

Gar shrugged. “I come from a poor country, too poor for second names. May I share your fire?”

“We will be honored to have you as a guest.” Gianni bowed him toward the campfire. Gar came and sat near the flames, opening the pouch that hung from a strap over his shoulder, across his chest, and down to his hip. He took out a waxed ball. “I have a cheese to share.”

“It’s welcome.” Gianni took a loaf from their journey bag and cut a slice with his dagger, then handed it to Gar. “The stew has yet a while to simmer.”

“I thank you.” Gar laid a slice of cheese on the bread, cut it down the middle, and gave half to Gianni. Antonio was content to sit near, watching the two young men perform the simple ceremony with approval.

“You’re a mercenary soldier, then?” Gianni asked before he took a bite of bread.

Gar swallowed and nodded. “A free lance, no member of a company. These bandits I fought were?”

“The Stiletto Company, yes—unemployed, for the moment. There’s no work for you there.”

Gar grinned. “I wouldn’t hire out to those who have attacked me.”

Gianni felt the thrill of bargaining begun. “But you are for hire?”

The giant nodded, chewing.

“Have you letters of reference?” Antonio asked. He knew the man probably did not, most likely could not write, but it was a good ploy for lowering his price.

The giant surprised them both, though; he swallowed and nodded. “Here.” He took two folded parchments from his pouch and gave them to Gianni.

The young merchant opened them; Antonio came to read over his shoulder, keenly interested in discovering a mercenary who had actual letters. The first was in a foreign language, but Gianni had learned the tongue of Airebi, for his father’s captains dealt with them frequently. It was from a merchant captain, who testified that he had hired Gar in Donelac, a land far to the north, and that the giant had done excellent service both as a sailor and a fighter. The other was in Taliponese, stating that Gar had been excellently loyal in transporting cargo from Venoga to Renova, and was very effective in fighting off bandits. That was especially interesting because Venoga was Pirogia’s main commercial rival, only a little behind them in volume of trade, but considerably behind in wealth; Gianni suspected that was because the merchants there had not yet succeeded in ousting their conte, who took entirely too much of their profits, thereby limiting their ability to reinvest, and capped it by strictly limiting the luxuries they could buy or possess. He had not quite signed his own death warrant yet, Gianni reflected grimly, but the blank parchment was before the nobleman, just waiting for him to write.

The merchant ended with regrets that he could not employ Gar any longer, but would have no new trading ventures for several months. He recommended the mercenary to any merchant who had need of his services—and even to those who did not, just in case. Gianni nodded and refolded the letters, handing them back. “Those are good, very good.” It occurred to him to wonder if there had been employers who had been dissatisfied and had therefore not given letters, but he dismissed the notion as unworthy. “Will you take our ducat to guard us against the Stiletto Company?”

“Or anyone else who might attack us on the way home,” Antonio added quickly.

“Gladly,” Gar said gravely.

With a feeling of triumph, Gianni took a ducat from his purse and held it out to Gar. The giant took it, saying, “I charge one of these for every seven nights I fight for you.”

“That will be enough,” Gianni assured him. “We have to go back to Pirogia—and go back empty-handed, since the Stilettos have stolen the grain, cotton, wool, and orzans we came to trade for.”

The mercenary frowned. “What are orzans?” Gianni stared, then remembered that Gar seemed to be fairly new to Talipon. “An orzan is a flame-colored gem—not very rare, in fact only semiprecious, but lovely to behold.” He gestured at the burned-out shell about them. “Signor Ludovico wrote that he had gathered a bag of them to trade with us, but it’s gone now—of course. Semiprecious or not, a whole sack of them would be worth a good sum.”

“So.” Gar smiled as he slipped the coin into his pouch. “We both have reasons to wish the Stilettos ill. Tell me of this Pirogia of yours. Is it true the merchants rule the town?”

Gianni nodded, and Antonio said, “We would sooner say ‘govern’ than ‘rule.’ ”

“It is the fact that matters, not the word,” the mercenary replied. “How did you manage to gain such power?”

Gianni smiled; he had learned an excellent way to fend off nosy questions. To the very first question, give a far longer answer than anybody could want but with as little information as possible. He launched into a brief history of Pirogia.