Colors of Chaos

CXV

CERRYL SLIPPED INTO the high room that overlooked the river walls, the building that Fydel had declared as his headquarters as soon as Cerryl’s crafters had reinforced and repaired the frame timbers and replaced the shutters and the glass in shattered windows. Cerryl had to admit that the room and the two wide windows did provide a useful view of both the river walls and the southern gate. The middle trading gate was too far north to see.

The younger mage studied the river walls where the work crew still toiled in the late-afternoon shadows. Small as the crews were, they might be struggling with the stones as the weather permitted until close to spring. Although the past eight-day had been warmer, enough to melt away some of the snow in the midpart of the day, Cerryl could scarcely count on the semithaw lasting much longer.

“You asked for me to join you.” Cerryl turned toward Fydel, who had remained seated behind a table that had clearly come from some other dwelling, ornate and trimmed with brass as it was.

The square-bearded wizard studied the unfolded parchment on the table. Beside it lay fragments of blue wax from the seal that had closed it. Beyond him the smoke-smudged stones that might once have been white framed a large hearth in which burned a pile of ample logs. “The Spidlarian Traders’ Council sent a message.”

Cerryl nodded, waiting, feeling the draft around his trousers, a draft that showed how much his apprentice crafters did not know. Whistling outside the window, the wind still did not drown out the clink of masons’ trowels and stones. The candles in the three-branched candelabra flickered with the gusts that found their way around the ill-fitting window.

Fydel stood and walked to the cloudy glass of the window. Below, the conscripted village troublemakers and the lancer disciplinary cases toiled with the stones of the walls, slowly dragging them back into position for the masons. Dark clouds overhead promised more snow or possibly freezing rain, but neither yet fell.

Finally, Cerryl, hunched in a heavy white wool cloak that Hiser had presented him from somewhere, spoke. “What are they offering?”

“Just about everything to save their necks,” laughed Fydel. “They’ll turn over any of the ‘unfaithful’; effectively disband the guards by reducing them to a handful of squads; open the roads to our traders.”

“Why aren’t you taking their offer?” asked Cerryl.

“You assume too much.”

Cerryl laughed softly. “I’m assuming nothing. You won’t take the Spidlarian Council’s offer. I’d just like to know why.”

“Isn’t it obvious? Why hand it to Jeslek? He’s back in Fairhaven, enjoying fires, good food, and a few other pleasures.” A wide grin revealed large white teeth. “Who knows? We might get a better offer before spring.”

“We won’t. What you’re hoping is that Jeslek will have to face some mighty Black. Like this Brede? Or that the smith Dorrin will turn out to be greater than Jeslek thinks.” Or that I’ll make more mistakes. “That won’t happen.”

“It could. The smith has produced some nasty weapons.”

“You don’t believe that.”

“No.” Fydel smiled. “But there’s no reason to make it easy for Jeslek, is there? No real reason to hand him an easy victory after he’s muddled through a year of doing nothing, is there?”

“What about the levies? Why kill them off unnecessarily?”

“You’re too soft, Cerryl. What are a few hundred peasants one way or the other? Especially peasants from Hydlen and Gallos.”

Cerryl shook his head but said nothing.

“Here. Read it. Tell me if I’m wrong.” Fydel reached down and picked up the scroll and handed it to the more slender White mage. After Cerryl took it and began to read, Fydel reseated himself at the table with his right side to the hearth.

The sunlight dimmed, and the room seemed to cool immediately as the first of the gray and white clouds from the north passed before the sun.

Fydel looked up only when Cerryl set the scroll back on the table before the older mage. “Is it not as I said?”

“It is.” Cerryl frowned.

“You seem disturbed.”

“Concerned. Concerned.” Cerryl stepped closer to the hearth, but not to Fydel. “The traders do not sound like men who have fought off another land for a year. They do not write as men who have mages and war leaders from Recluce fighting for them.”

“Perhaps the Black Isle has abandoned them. Recluce has done that before.”

“The smith remains in Diev, and he forges strange things out of black iron. I’ve seen that in the glass.” Cerryl turned. “Have you not told me that your patrols are still attacked, if by small numbers of blue lancers?”

“We’ve lost but a half-score since the turn of the year. Nothing.”

The younger mage shrugged. “Nothing, but the tactics remain as they were, and that would suggest that their Black warleader remains here in Spidlar.”

“What are you saying, Cerryl?”

“Nothing.” Cerryl shook his head. “Perhaps you should take their terms. Or make a counteroffer.”

“And let Jeslek…? No.”

“Then send him the terms. Ask for his advice.”

“Why should I do that?”

“So that you don’t give him another excuse to get angry at you.”

Fydel pursed his lips, then fingered his beard. “Perhaps I should, although it may take some time for their message to reach the High Wizard. The Easthorns are closed, except for the Great White Highway through Gallos, and it will take eight-days for a messenger to reach there.”

“As you see fit.” Cerryl nodded. “Might I be of other service?”

“Only if you can get the walls completely repaired, so that we don’t need so many patrols and sentries.”

“We’re working on that.”

“Good.”

“I will talk to you later.” Cerryl stepped away from the hearth and nodded to Fydel before departing. As he walked down the stairs and out into the chill where the gelding was tied, the wind whistled and the sound of stonework echoed through the window. Behind him, in the high room above, the candles flickered in the late afternoon.