Rebel Elements (Seals of the Duelists) (6 page)

“Good morrow, Surveyor,” he said. “Have you need of the duelists’ services this day?”

Philo stepped down beside him. “No, son. We’ve come to take your young trainee up to the Academy along with Bayan here.”

The boy’s dark eyes widened, and he looked more closely at Bayan, who stared back. The boy turned his attention back to Philo. “The boy you’re looking for isn’t from Renallen, Surveyor. He’s come from the Firedust Guild up north.”

Bayan heard a faint judgment in the boy’s voice, though he didn’t know whether the boy disapproved of the northern area or the guild.

“Well, come along, Bayan,” Philo said. “You’ll want to see the den, since you’ll be working in one eventually.”

I don’t
want
to work in a duel den,
Bayan thought, leaving the carriage. He felt the darkness rise up his throat and swallowed it back as he followed Philo and the boy.

They entered a broad tunnel. At its far end, Bayan saw an expanse of what looked like pale sand, with a narrow band of tiered seating on the far side. The boy turned down a side tunnel and into a large common room illuminated by sun through grated skylights. Several men and women sat in relaxed poses and chatted or played at games. An older man with gray hair rolled to his feet from a cushioned bench and padded over. Bayan was struck by how the man seemed to flow like water.

“Head Duelist Cavan,” the boy greeted him, “this surveyor is traveling to the Academy. He’s come for the fireduster.”

Cavan showed no reaction, but merely said, “This way.” He flowed past them without another glance.

Bayan looked at Philo, but the man sported his public face, which showed little more emotion than Cavan’s. Bayan turned to follow the men, but the young boy caught his sleeve.

“How does it feel to have dry feet?” he asked curiously.

Bayan stared, baffled. “Do you keep water in your shoes?”

“Of course not, but—”

“Then you know as well as I do what it feels like to have dry feet. You imperials are a strange lot.” He headed after Philo, leaving the boy behind.

He caught up with Cavan and Philo at the doorway to a spacious sleeping room. A pale, light-haired boy about Bayan’s age sat on a high, imperial-style bed. As Cavan explained Philo’s errand, the boy studied the floor. His right cheek bore a pink, raised swirl of scar tissue that resembled a broad tongue of flame.

While the boy packed a few things into a bag, Cavan returned to the doorway. “His name is Calder Micarron. He’s afraid of fire, even a simple candle. I’ve spent some time teaching him to distance himself from his fears, so his magic doesn’t escape his control, but he’ll need extensive retraining at the Academy. Otherwise, he’ll wash out and get potioneered quicker’n you can spit.”

Bayan listened with increasing worry. Cavan’s sudden flood of words made sense, of a sort, but the tone in which he delivered them was perfectly emotionless. He might have been discussing rice bushels at market, though Bayan’s father expressed more interest in those than Cavan did in Calder.

The boy approached Cavan. “I’m ready,” he said, slurring his ‘r’. Bayan’s eyes fell to the stiff, pink scarring on Calder’s cheek. He shivered, wondering whether the scar’s flame pattern was mere chance, or if Calder’s elemental magic had indeed marked him as its own.

Cavan stepped aside without a word, allowing Calder into Philo’s custody. Calder did not say goodbye or give a backward glance as the group returned to the carriage.

As Philo handed Calder’s bag up to Nic to secure on the roof, Bayan muttered, “Cavan wasn’t very interested in you, was he?”

Calder shrugged. “He helped me not be so afraid at first. I only slipped once, when I made a wall sprout leaves, and I’ve been here for six days.” The lilting rhythm of Calder’s accent was different from everyone in Philo’s traveling party, and Bayan enjoyed its light crispness.

“But he wasn’t happy, sad, anything. He just stood there and talked, like he was asleep.” Bayan climbed into the carriage and sat by Kipri, while Calder sat next to Philo. “I hope that’s not normal.”

“You want him to be off squint, throwing all his magic around and hurting people?” Calder asked, while shooting furtive looks at Philo’s wig.

“No, I mean I don’t want to end up that way, not caring about anything but doing a job.”

“I should think that doing one’s job might give sufficient pleasure to someone who truly embraced their position,” Philo said mildly.

Bayan looked down as Nic clucked to the horses and pulled the garish carriage out from under the duel den’s awning. It’s not fair. Why should we leave our entire lives behind and go fight for someone we don’t know? Especially someone who just took over my homeland! And now I have to do what he says, or he’ll… he’ll… I don’t even know what he’ll do. Probably kill me.

Philo reached out of the carriage window, knocked on its roof to get Nic’s attention, and gave orders to find a certain restaurant where they could all dine. Bayan crossed his arms and looked out the window as the carriage wound through the city. He wasn’t hungry. At least not for empire food, which was sour and salty and…brown.

He’d nursed the idea of escape since he’d first climbed into the purple carriage, but with seven guards, he had zero opportunity to slip away. Even if he had managed to slip off unnoticed, he’d be one lost young man against a vast empire. Between the strange food and the prospect of forced employment for what seemed to be a cruel tyrant, Bayan felt like a man condemned to a lifetime of imprisonment at the hands of his enemies. The weight of his helplessness pressed him into his seat, and once again he promised himself that when the right opportunity came to escape, he’d jump at it.

~~~

Calder snuggled under the warm blue blanket on his narrow inn bed and pretended to sleep while Bayan entered and sat on his own bed across the room. The ropes under the feather mattress creaked as the Bantayan reached over and picked up a small potted plant.

Calder reached down to scratch his leg where the spine of a feather had poked him through the mattress fabric. His mind played over the events of the last score of days, at the sudden turn his fortunes had taken. He had yet to decide whether he was happy or disappointed with the change.

On the positive side, he was free from the rest of his service to the Fireduster guild, and his mother’s debts had been paid when the emperor bought the remainder of his indenturement from the guild. He was also going to get to learn real magic, which was far more prestigious than simply making firedust explode.

On the negative side, the redemption price of his indenturement wouldn’t save his sisters from their own debts. They were older; they’d already chosen their paths by the time his mother indentured him, hoping to assure him a different fate. Calder had actually enjoyed learning how to make firedust before burning himself in a sudden explosion he hadn’t been able to control. He spent three days in drugged agony—one of which was spent detouring around a known vagary lair—as the guildmaster carted him to the closest chanter. The delay in healing meant that his cheek was scarred for life. Since then, any open flame made his heart race and his palms sweat. He had even shielded his eyes from the common room hearth fire downstairs earlier in the evening.

Even now, he feigned sleep so he wouldn’t have to talk to someone he barely knew. But that Balang was taking forever to lie down. When Calder cracked an eyelid open to see what the delay was, he nearly jumped out of his skin. Bayan had just jabbed his finger with a dagger, and he squeezed drops of blood onto—no,
into
—the potted plant he cradled between his knees.

Calder sat up in alarm. “What in the name of all the sints are you doing?” As he spoke, he felt his new scar tug at the corner of his mouth, slurring his words.

“So you are awake.”

Calder froze for a moment, then relaxed.
Stupid idea anyway, playing at sleep.
“Aye. What are you doing to that plant?”

“Feeding it. Four drops today.”

“Your blood-guzzling plant has a feeding schedule? Sints preserve me. What sort of barbarian are you?”

“The kind with trained blood-guzzling plants, of course,” Bayan replied. “Would it change your opinion of either me or the plant if I told you it was a seerwine pitcher?”

Calder thought for a moment. “Of the plant, aye. Pretty certain you’re still off your nut.”

“Fantastic.” Bayan put the pitcher’s pot back on the bedside table and lay down. “Then I’m a relieved barbarian.”

Calder shifted uncomfortably. “About the ‘barbarian’, I dinna mean your people. I meant mine. My ancestors, the Tuathi. Pale raging horse lords, that’s us. Or so the wisps think.”

“Pale barbarians? What sort of barbarians stay in their tents all day and get no sun? Or do they keep the tents on the backs of their horses, like giant snails?”

Calder barked a delighted laugh. “Snail lords! I’m afraid I’m going to like you, Balang.”

Bayan’s ropes creaked again as he turned toward Calder’s bed. “Can I ask you about the Academy?”

“I’ve heard all the usual stories, but I don’t know anything more about it than that.”

“No, I mean to say I don’t even know what a duelist does.”

Calder blinked. “How far away do you live?”

“Pangusay. It’s by the ocean at the south end of Balanganam. It took Surveyor Philo seven years to get down there.”

“Really? You speak Waarden well.”

“My teacher got there faster than Philo did.”

“Well then: duelists. They’re servants of the empire, same as the lords and politicians and the like, only they’re more duty-bound. They’re duelists for life. If they serve a score of years, they can get a different title, work outside the duel dens. But many of them canna manage to serve that long… intact.”

“Intact?”

“It’s a dangerous business, magic. Flinging fire and rocks and ice at each other all day, every day. Injuries are bound to happen, and not even a den chanter can save everyone from everything.”

“That’s madness! Why do we have to serve for life if it’s so dangerous? Why us?”

“Because of the magic. During wars—and the empire’s had more than its share—the duelists are the empire’s main defense. But during times of peace, the emperor has to do something with all that magic, lest we who are gifted decide to claim some chunk of the empire for ourselves. So he puts us to work keeping that peace.”

“And how are we supposed to do that?”

“Duels. Our job will be to settle disputes. We keep in fighting shape in case of war, and we duel each other to determine which claimant wins.”

“Like a legal court, but with magic and death, then?”

“Exactly!” Calder beamed.

“Ay, Bhattara.”

“That’s how duelists become famous: by winning lots of duels. The best become celebrities, with entourages, nicknames, all the trimmings.”

“Can they go wherever they want?”

“Aye, sure.”

Bayan’s face brightened. “Tell me more.”

Calder frowned. “Well, most of the really good stories involve the Tuathi invasions, and some of the most famous duelists in history who returned to be teachers, especially right after the Academy was sacked—”

“The Academy was sacked?”

“Twice. In both the First and Second Tuathi Wars. Back when the original three Waarden kingdoms were finally becoming best mates, my ancestors lived a nomadic, raiding life up behind the Maam Ardcath. You know, the hills to the northwest? When the Waarden got fat and happy down here in the valleys, the Tuathi decided they wanted a share of that easy life. And they got it. They settled down across Marghebellen and Gallenglaas, and the Tuathi who still held to the old nomadic ways shunned them as Dunfarroghan—horse killers—for giving up their way of life and taking on the traits of their weak, soft enemies. A few hundred years later, the Tuathi forgot how much they despised their Dunfarroghan cousins, and they invaded again, greedy for fat cows and fertile soil. They took back Marghebellen and Gallenglaas, and even Helderaard fell to their spears.”

“The capital fell to invaders? What happened to the emperor? Did they kill him?”

“Nae. His court fled to Kemada, where the Shawnash’kote gave them asylum and the promise of an alliance to assist them in getting back their lands.”

“So that was where the Shawnash and the Waarden first allied? When the Tuathi stole Helderaard?”

“Aye. And the Shawnash never make big decisions lightly, so they saw something worthy in the Waarden. Hundreds of years have passed since the Tuathi last invaded, and in all that time, through good times and bad, the Shawnash and the Waarden have never parted ways. In fact, you’ll notice once we start seeing more nobles—and we will if we become duelists—most of them have a skin tone all their own: halfway between the Waarden, who are pale as milk, and the coppery cream of the Shawnash. I’ve heard the combination called ‘the noble tan.’”

 
Bayan raised his eyebrows and smiled. “Sounds pretty.”

Calder grinned. “Aye, it is. But only on the girls. Now, there are more imperial holidays on the calendar than you can strap onto a night caravan’s wagons. One city or another would hire my guild—my former guild—to make firedust flowers. Whenever I went, I hung in the background of the show and picked up a lot from a pack of history fanatics who loved to talk. Since I wasna allowed to fire off anything—” Calder paused to suppress a shudder, “I had time to stand around and listen to them. Some of the stories stuck.”