Two Reasons
“For two reasons, I don’t think so.”
“Two whole reasons?”
“Defeat was certain back then, yes, but all anyone had to do was retreat. They weren’t desperate. We didn’t have the spare strength to chase down people who were already running, either. Better to put both legs to honest use than go to the trouble of destroying your own memories.”
“That… is fair.”
“Next. If she were the demon’s collaborator, the monsters would have been her comrades, not her enemies. But she took them for enemies from the very start. Which means she was never on the demon’s side.”
“What about suggestion magic? She could have been a spy.”
“No. I would have felt it.”
“I suppose you would.”
Just as Artila could sense danger, Ilesin had been born able to sense magic. Abilities so rare, granted at birth, were called an Innate Gift. During the conquest of the labyrinth his gift had proved invaluable: no matter how precise or cunning a magical trap, he found it at once and had it dismantled.
“Then we can throw out all these unpleasant hypotheses.”
“The best one left is that she drifted in by chance, had the misfortune to meet the demon, and destroyed her own memories while she fled. If she did it to hide who she was, that also explains why she discarded her belongings on the way.”
One question remained, and it still had no answer: why a talent of that caliber was here at all. He could not even begin to guess.
“I’m in favor of teaching her magic, or of having her recover what she knew. We’re desperate enough that even one more pair of hands for pulling weeds would matter. If you need anything, say so. But don’t use this as an excuse to order books and magical tools you want for yourself. If I catch you later, I’ll bill you on the spot. Understood?”
Hisnil bristled, trembling as he protested.
“You used to buy them for me without a fuss. Why are you like this lately?”
“Back then you fooled me. Not anymore. I won’t be raising your purchasing limit for a while.”
“Ugh. Yes. I understand.”
“Good. Then get moving at once. If Artila truly is a mage, this castle will have two of them, and that will be very useful for what comes next. Even if I take one mage with me when I leave, there will still be another left to hold the place.”
“Are you planning to go somewhere?”
“Yes. I am.”
“Where could you possibly be going that you’d need a mage along?”
“To the gathering of the Findrak clan.”
Hisnil stared, startled.
“You don’t even have the right to sit in on that council, Captain.”
“I’m still of Findrak. I wasn’t banished or cast out, so I have the right to speak.”
“You don’t have a vote.”
“I’ll ask my mother. She holds two votes all by herself.”
“Lady Turvena is hardly the sort to grant her son whatever he asks.”
“I know. I’ll have to persuade her.”
“Persuade her by saying what?”
“By asking for help.”
Hisnil’s face twisted.
“Help with what, exactly? What are you going to tell her?”
“The truth. If we fall, Findrak will be in danger, and Andriol and Targal with it—no, the whole of the north. If Artila is a proper mage, you and Nazares will hold the castle, and I’ll take her to Findrak as my attendant.”
“Isn’t that far too soon? There’s still a little over two months until this gathering.”
“The situation is what it is. I could leave without a mage. But if we have one, better to take her along.”
“Captain, think. You don’t even know who Miss Artila is, and you’re going to drag her into that closed-off north, where they half believe every outsider arrives with a horn on their head? I want to object. You’d be better off going alone.”
“Leave that to me. You just cultivate Artila’s abilities.”
Hisnil sighed.
“Now that I think of it, I should have noticed sooner that Artila knew something of magic.”
“What happened?”
“She recognized the magical tools we brought out of the labyrinth at a glance. I should have caught it then. If I’d realized even ten days earlier, I’d have had that many more days to teach her.”
“Did you tell her everything about us?”
“Yes. And about that bastard, too.”
“That bastard?”
“Fillion of Anhar.”
Ilesin frowned.
“What did Artila say?”
“That he’s a rotten bastard.”
A short laugh escaped Ilesin.
“She’s not wrong. Say it to his face, though, and there’d be a scene.”
“I’ll be going, then. Better to start even a day sooner. Mind you—she may not be a formal disciple, but she is learning from me, so from now on I get a say in anything concerning Miss Artila.”
“Who decided that?”
“It became so the moment you told me to teach her.”
“Hey, that’s not—”
Before Ilesin could get another word out, Hisnil was gone like a gust of wind. The no he had meant to finish never quite left his mouth.
“That brat.”
Ilesin leaned back in his chair and looked out the window.
If Moravik came again under the present circumstances, this time they might truly lose. He did not know how many more times they would come, or from where, and above all he did not know why they came at all.
It was an age when despair came easily, and hope was a useless thing. To give up would be comfortable; to fight, somehow, to win was pain. Resentment was easy. Even so, he could not simply sit limp and wait for ruin.
There had been a time when the future held nothing but hope and expectation. Days when today blazed, and tomorrow seemed certain to blaze brighter still.
Maze Conqueror. Hero of humankind. A victor wreathed in light. A young noble of the Galt who had lived as a mercenary achieved, all at once, a feat beyond measure. The emperor, suggesting he add just one more laurel to that fame, urged him into the swordsmanship tournament. With nothing better to do, he entered. The prize was enormous, and the whole span of the tournament was little different from a festival; he could let the men of his company enjoy themselves.
The moment it became known that Ilesin would compete, the gambling halls went up like wildfire. Money staked on the bets climbed to staggering heights. Spectators poured in from every corner of the realm just to see him, and the capital overflowed. Pleased, the emperor held a banquet on the eve of the matches. An emperor who never missed an excuse for merrymaking gave no thought to contestants who ought to have been resting, and opened the feast first.
Lavish food and wine in excess filled bellies and melted minds. Already looking ahead to the ball that would follow, people sized one another up in search of partners.
Ilesin, dragged there against his will, was among them. For the sake of this heretic noble of the north, the emperor had assigned him an attendant—one who had memorized, down to the last name, the pedigrees of every person of consequence in the hall.
Forever hunting a chance to display his learning, the attendant needed only a glance from Ilesin to launch into who someone’s grandmother and grandfather had been, and then the ancestors of that grandmother and the ancestors of that grandfather, in one unbroken recitation. Catch even a man whose forebears had been vigorous in the getting of descendants, and the ordeal was agony. Each time a new face appeared, Ilesin found himself hoping, fervently, that the fellow had been an only child for generations.
“The one seated over there is Lady Elin, heir to Her Highness Nivella, Grand Duchess of Arandia and mistress of Moravik. She shares a very deep connection with the opponent against whom Your Lordship will test his skill…”
Fortunately it was a house where children had been precious for generations, and the lecture ended quickly. The previous grand duke had had a younger sibling, but Grand Duchess Nivella had been an only daughter, and she herself had borne only Lady Elin. Set beside other families, the tree was sparse.
The grand ducal house of Arandia claimed as ancestor Elfsride, one of the heroes of the conquest of the Labyrinth of Origin. That Elfsride was a son of the Fairy King—a demigod. Fairy blood bestowed beauty and extraordinary gifts, but it also made children exceedingly rare. The long-lived fairy folk bore only one or two in a lifetime, and the house of Arandia, which carried their blood, had for generations produced a single heir, or two at most. Should even a third be born, they kept festival for three days and nights. Within the ducal house a third child was called the most blessed of all, and raised with doting care. Bastards, too, were often entered formally in the register, provided the conditions were met.
Lady Elin wore not a gown but a splendid tunic. Had one not known better, one would have taken her for an exceptionally handsome young lord rather than a lady. She was speaking with the companion who had come with her—a tall, slender woman. The clothes were plain, but the jewels at hair and throat were of great worth, and sleeve and skirt were embroidered with the radiant tree, emblem of the Duchy of Arandia. Wrapped in the symbol of the house, she was surely a woman of some standing within the grand ducal family.
Then the woman looked at Ilesin. When their eyes met, hers brightened, and she leaned at once to whisper to her liege, Elin. He recognized at a glance the curiosity and mischief in her gaze.
“…Lord Ilesin’s opponent in the final…”
The attendant raised his voice.
“Your opponent, Fillion of Anhar, and Lady Elin over there share the same father!”
He was loud enough that several heads turned. As if she had heard, Elin’s cold gaze drove straight into the attendant’s brow. Ilesin waited until that chill stir had settled, then asked,
“Did the Duke of Anhar remarry?”
“…N-no, that isn’t it. Grand Duchess Nivella remarried. The Duke of Anhar did not.”
A bastard born before the marriage, then. In a world already swarming with bastards conceived during wedlock, one conceived before it was hardly a problem at all. Nivella would have let it pass. She herself, after all, had remarried.