“Do you know who I am?” I interrupted. He shook his head. “I am Halar. I took that city from Rethven. I gave it to my followers from the undermountains. I
created
Keria. Now, we’re going to start again.
“Bring me my sword.”
“I cannot—”
“Did Firebrand give you the message I gave it?” I interrupted again.
“Yes, but—”
“Are you going to obey the King of Vathula and Lord of the Eastrange?”
“As I said, I cannot—”
“Tell Keria, when she wakes up,” I interrupted, for the last time, “that if I don’t get Firebrand in my hand, intact and perfect in every way, I will punish her for her insolence.”
Bronze turned and we walked away. He called out to me as we started, and Bronze paused. I looked back over my shoulder.
“Make it good,” I told him. “Make it very good, because I will
smite
this city and everyone in it.”
He swallowed a sip of wine, which was a mistake if he intended to show his calm. His hand shook. Instead of remaining seated, he rose, circled the table, and gestured everyone to kneel. He joined them.
“Great lord, forgive me; I have failed to make clear that which I have been instructed to tell. My life is forfeit for that failure, and I can only beg for mercy. May I say what I have been instructed to say?”
Bronze turned in place and I drew my sword. I wanted him to know I wasn’t pleased. He seemed to get the message.
“Say it as economically as possible,” I advised.
“Keria claims rulership over your realm,” he said. His use of language changed. He treated me as the ruler and Keria as an usurper in the way he spoke. Diplomatic of him, at least. “She claimed it by right of blood, as the Princess of Shadows. Yet, the King of Shadows is before me, and walks even in the day, acknowledged by the Dragonsword.
“If it is your will, Dread Lord, I will bear your message to the so-called Black Queen, the Empress of the Undermountains. Yet, I tell you the truth, my King: She will not listen.”
It’s moments like these that really annoy me. It’s daytime, so I can’t just look at his soul and see if he’s sincere, scared, or just a turncoat weasel. I see only a few possibilities for his sudden change of heart. He could be a diplomatic liar, saying whatever he has to say, however he has to say it. He could be a weasel, who takes me seriously when I say I’m going to smite Vathula, and he doesn’t want to be one of the people smote. Or, he could acknowledge my technical right of rulership over Vathula and really believe that I’m the proper king of the place, while Keria is an upstart with no real authority beyond her ability to browbeat anyone in reach.
“All right. Then tell everyone
else
this: anyone who remains in Vathula is my enemy. Say just that, and nothing more.”
Bronze turned away and we walked down the pass. Behind me, I heard the diplomat breathe a “Yes, Dread Lord,” and that was all.
We took our time on the run south to Mochara. There was no hurry, so I let Bronze pick her own pace. I got the feeling she was still a little tired from her flat-out run, so we didn’t get to Mochara until about lunchtime. I apologized to Tianna for my tardiness and did my best to make up for it by demonstrating the fine art of acoustics. I got a metal dinner plate to reproduce a number of songs from my memory. She seemed especially partial to the theme song to
Doctor Who
, and to the
Star Wars
Imperial March. That may be because I haven’t translated any of the ones with lyrics into Rethven-ese… There’s a project for Tyma and Minaren!
Amber was too busy to be bothered, so Tianna and I had lunch together in a little al fresco establishment while Bronze put her nose into a big bucket of charcoal.
“She’s hungry?” Tianna asked, spooning up a bowl of fish stew.
“She is. We had to run up to the pass this morning.”
“You—she—wow! She’s
really
fast! It takes at least a week to get to the pass!”
“I was looking at the walls of Vathula earlier this morning,” I assured her. “We took our time getting back, though; Bronze really hurried to get there. She’s tired.”
“Oh.” Tianna put down her spoon and went over to Bronze while I bought another bowl for myself. When I got back to our little outdoor table, Tianna had both hands over her head, laid flat on Bronze’s chest. Bronze was fairly radiating heat, but her eyes were the only part actually glowing.
Tianna took her hands down and breathed heavily for a minute.
“Tianna?” I asked. She grinned at me and came back to sit down. Bronze made ticking and pinging sounds as she cooled.
“Bronze is better,” Tianna said, and went back to eating.
I didn’t ask. I deserve the Steely Self-Control Award for that.
Instead, Tianna and I went for a ride around town. Bronze was, indeed, feeling immensely better after Tianna’s treatment. She fairly pranced along. We found a bunch of kids playing with sticks and Tianna decided she wanted to play, so I helped her down. That went well, all things considered. Tianna kept pausing to fix scrapes and bruises; the older boys kept asking me (very respectfully) if I would teach them something about swords. I think it was a good afternoon; Tianna had fun, and that’s the important thing.
I stayed for a while longer to give Tianna another math lesson. Her multiplication isn’t too bad, but her division is atrocious. Apparently, un-multiplying is a challenge.
I wonder… can I teach Tianna to have an inner headspace? A mental study would be useful. If we could share a little headspace, I could try giving her concepts directly. Once she understood division, then we could go over the actual rules of it, and that would be much simpler.
Is that what I did with Malana and Malena? Here is everything there is to know about swordsmanship—now go practice it? Is this a shortcut through the most tedious part of teaching, the transfer of raw information? It’s a sort of telepathy, granted…
If Tianna can learn to have a mental study, can she learn to be a wizard? Has there ever been a wizard fire-witch?
Amber interrupted our lesson with the declaration that it was dinnertime. I was invited without any detectable reluctance. She actually seemed pleased to have me there. Naturally, I was pleased to be there.
As a note, oysters, or clams, or whatever they were, are considered delicacies around here. Maybe it’s the water, or the variety, or the way they were cooked, or something, but I
despise
the things. The flavor was disgusting and the smell was… pungent. But this was dinner with my daughter and granddaughter, so I plastered Perfectly Believable Smile #6 on my face and pretended I liked it. Amber and Tianna, for their part, sucked the stuff up like it was ambrosia.
I’ve done harder things. They escape me, just at present, but I’m sure I have.
After dinner, Amber sent Tianna off to her prayers—after the tacklehug and the kiss on Granddad’s cheek—and beckoned me to follow her. We went outside and across Sparky’s central worship zone to a nondescript building on the far side. It housed a number of people, all with some sort of infirmity. Obviously, this was where the sick, injured, and otherwise unhealthy waited for the attention of the priestess.
“You can restore lost limbs and eyes?” Amber asked. I looked around. Yes, that did seem to be the predominant complaint. No missing feet, but doubtless those people were lagging behind.
“Yeah,” I admitted, sighing. “It’s a slow process, but yeah, I can.”
“Here you go.”
“Is… ah, will there be any complaints from…?” I nodded back toward the statue.
“I’ve consulted Her on this matter. She has, once again, expressed a lack of interest in it.”
“Okay. Do you want to help?” I asked. Amber looked surprised.
“How can I? It is wizardry, is it not?”
“Yes, but it puts a lot of stress on the person doing the growing.” I explained the process, briefly. “So, the body is just healing naturally, but with a spell to tell it what to fix and how. They still need to eat and drink and recover, just as if it was a smaller wound.”
“I see.” She frowned. “I’d like to watch, if I may.”
“Of course. Who would you like me to work on first?”
We worked on half a dozen people before I had to take a break; sunset was coming and I wanted to be somewhere private for that. After my break, I cleaned up with a spell and resumed work. Amber helped quite a lot, actually; the subject of the spell does most of the work over the course of the regeneration. I can tie the spell directly into the person’s vitality, so that they maintain the energy of the spell themselves, as well. Amber can dump a lot of vitality either into the person or
through
the person and into the spell.
“The real trick,” I cautioned every patient, “is to not grow it back too quickly. Your body can’t spare all the flesh and bone to make a whole new hand or arm or jaw; you have to let it grow gradually.”
They didn’t seem to mind that they were growing back about a pound of flesh and bone every week. Growing it at all was the issue. Admittedly, a whole arm can take a while, but a finger was only a matter of days.
The very first thing, though, before I even started, was a brief conversation with a rather wealthy-looking fellow. He tried to give me a chest of gold in exchange for giving him back his whole left arm. I refused the money.
“You have no idea how much it means to me to have two good arms again! I’m prepared to pay.”
“I’m pleased to be of help,” I told him, “but you can’t
buy
my help. If you were a citizen of Karvalen, I’d just assume you were worth my time, but you’re not.” I nodded at Amber. “See the pretty lady with the red hair? That’s the Princess of Mochara. She decided you were worth helping. I trust her judgment. Gold never entered into this.”
This was a stunner for everyone. He doesn’t take gold? He’ll do it for free if you’re one of his subjects?
As gratifying as that was, I think the best part of the evening was the way Amber reacted to four words: “I trust her judgment.”
I think I’ve made her happy. I hope so.
I settled Tianna into bed that night and told her the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears. She didn’t seem to like it much.
“Why did she eat their porridge? And why did she sleep in their beds? She doesn’t seem like a very smart girl,” she complained.
“I suppose you’re right. I think that story is really for much younger children, to teach them not to take advantage of strangers’ houses when no one is home.”
“Oh.” She looked troubled.
“Something wrong?”
“Where do they have talking bears? And why do bears live in houses?”
“It’s in another world,” I assured her. “You have to go through magic gates to get there. I wouldn’t, though. The place isn’t really very sensible.”
“It sounds very silly,” she assured me. “I don’t think I’d like it.”
“Fair enough. Now, you go to sleep.”
“Will you be gone in the morning?”
“Probably. It’s not easy, being a king.”
“I guess not.”
I kissed her forehead and she hugged my neck.
“G’night, Grandpa.”
“Goodnight, Tianna.”
I went downstairs and met Amber again.
“Is she settled in?”
“Yup.”
“Good. Thank you for your help with the infirmary.”
“Always happy to help,” I assured her.
“Is it true? That they couldn’t buy your help?”
“Not with a wagonload of diamonds.”
“Why not?”
“I’d have to want to help them, and money just doesn’t do it. I don’t much care about money.”
“Just blood?”
I looked at her and raised an eyebrow. She flushed slightly.
“I’m sorry. I don’t know why I said that.”
“It’s the fangs, isn’t it?” I joked. “Yes, blood is important to me, kind of like oyster stew is to you. If you didn’t want to do something, would you change your mind for a bowl of stew?”
“No.”
“There you are.”
“But you’ll do this for any of your subjects?” she pressed.
“I prefer to think of them as citizens, not subjects. But, yes.”
“That brings me back to the immigration policy. I wanted to talk to you about that.”
“I recall someone mentioning it in the middle of a very busy day. It guess it fell off my desk; I’m sorry. By all means, go ahead. What’s on your mind?”
She gestured to benches and we sat down.
“There are a lot of people—I mean, a
lot
—coming in on ships and now overland to Mochara. They aren’t really a problem; some of them are moving on to Karvalen, others are filling up the space made by those who already left. But they are
going
to be a problem if this keeps up. Mochara isn’t full, but it’s starting to get crowded, and I don’t know if they count as subj—citizens or not.”
“Hmm. You raise a very good point. What do you think? How does someone become a citizen? How
should
someone become a citizen? Do they buy their way in? Do they recite an oath? How should we handle this?”
“I’m hardly the person to ask.”
“You’re the Princess of Mochara,” I countered. “I’m asking your opinion.”
That made her pause and think. I have to give her credit for staying on as the ruler of Mochara, despite her misgivings. She was at least taking the job seriously and doing her due diligence.
“I suppose that, in its most basic form, it would depend on actually living here, rather than just… I don’t know… showing up to have something cured?”
“Good point. Where you live is important to who you are, isn’t it?”
I’m afraid I kept her up past her bedtime. We had a political discussion of immense boredom and terrible intensity. Well, the fate of the kingdom was in our hands, wasn’t it? Isn’t that worth a boring political argument or two?
The worst part of it was that Amber kept thinking like a priestess. Citizenship kept coming back to accepting the worship of the Mother of Flame, rather than anything civic. I kept bringing it back to purely civic matters, reminding her again and again that she was the Princess, not the Priestess. It was an exercise in patience on my part, and, judging by how much of a strain on my patience it actually was, I think I’m safe in saying that I am just not cut out to be a father.