Lawrence Watt-Evans - The Vondish Ambassador

Emmis grimaced. "That enchantment you put on me – it's a very powerful one, right? I never stood a chance."

"Oh, absolutely, my poor child. You couldn't possibly have resisted." Ithinia got to her feet. "Why didn't the Empire just outlaw warlocks, then? Oh, because that wouldn't look right when Vond, their founder, had been a warlock. It would just serve to notify Lumeth and Ashthasa that something was up."

"Guildmaster? Why do you keep secret what the Towers really are?"

"Oh, it's not exactly secret," Ithinia said. "We just don't advertise it. We don't want people prying at them. Yes, I see the similarity – if you don't want to draw attention to something, you don't make it a forbidden mystery, you just don't mention it. All the same, I think I'll want to have a word with the chairman of the Council of Warlocks, whoever it is at the moment, and remind him that the southern Small Kingdoms are a bad place for warlocks, and anyone fleeing the Calling should look to the west instead."

"That would be… I think the ambassador would appreciate that."

"I'm sure he would. I'll tell him about it. Right now, though, I think you should go back to your place in Allston and pack a few things."

"Pack… what?" Emmis blinked. "Oh, I think Lar will give me time to find a new place back in Shiphaven."

"Shiphaven? We aren't going to Shiphaven."

"What? Then… 'we?' Where are we going? Who is 'we'?"

"You, and Lord Ildirin as the representative of the Hegemony of the Three Ethshars, and His Excellency representing the Empire of Vond, and me, representing the Wizards' Guild, and I think we'll need to track down those spies you met, Annis the Merchant and the three Lumethans, and bring them along."

"Along where?"

"To Lumeth of the Towers, of course." She smiled at him, and touched the ancient dagger she wore on her belt. "And maybe to Ashthasa and Semma, as well."

"But – why? I don't understand."

"It's simple enough," she said. "The Wizards' Guild guards the Towers, and the enmity between Vond and Lumeth threatens them. Therefore, the Guild will put an end to that enmity, even if it means wiping out every living soul on both sides."

Emmis's mouth fell open.

"Come downstairs now. We have an ultimatum to deliver." She opened the door and stood waiting for him.

The preparations took longer than Ithinia's words had led Emmis to expect – and probably longer than Ithinia herself had expected.

The afternoon's meetings with Lar and Ildirin went smoothly, so far as Emmis could tell; he was sent off while they were taking place, and did as Ithinia had suggested, packing a bag for a few days' trip to the Small Kingdoms.

Or rather, what he thought might be appropriate. He had never been to the Small Kingdoms. He had never wanted to visit the Small Kingdoms. Ithinia, however, did not offer him a choice. "You started this," she said. "You're coming."

When Lar returned to the house on Through Street that evening, accompanied by four guardsmen, Emmis met him at the door. "What happened?" he asked.

"We're going to Lumeth," Lar replied, bemused. "Ithinia insists. She says that if Lord Ildirin wants the assassination attempts to stop, they must be stopped at the source. She's planning to leave in a day or two."

"That's… interesting," Emmis said. "Do you think she knows anything about…" He glanced at the guards. "…about who's behind the assassins?"

"We'll talk upstairs," Lar said.

A few minutes later, after posting the guards at the doors, they did exactly that, taking seats in the ambassador's study.

"Did you ask the Guildmaster about the source of the hum?" Emmis asked.

Lar shook his head. "No," he said. "I don't think I want her to know anything about it; she frightens me. She isn't anyone's hireling; she has her own goals, and they may not match ours. But Lord Ildirin has brought her in to stop the assassination attempts and keep peace between Vond and Lumeth, and I think she can help with that."

"I see," Emmis said, hiding his unhappiness. He had hoped that the ambassador had brought Ithinia into his confidence; it would have simplified matters.

"Lord Ildirin had that man Kelder questioned this morning, by a magistrate and two witches," Lar continued. "He'll hang tomorrow, but in exchange for his cooperation Lord Ildirin let a warlock heal his arm, and the witches calmed him. He'll be burned on a proper pyre, not left to rot."

Emmis shuddered.

"He named his partner, Tithi Salman's son," Lar added. "Ildirin has magicians and soldiers tracking him down now, as well as those three Lumethans and the Ashthasan merchant."

"That's good," Emmis said. "Isn't it?"

"I think so," Lar said. "But Lumeth and Ashthasa are going to be our neighbors for a long time; we need to be careful how they see us."

Emmis nodded.

After a moment, Lar asked, "That theurgist you visited – the one who told you about Fendel's Assassin. Did he tell you where the hum came from?"

Emmis hesitated. "Not exactly," he said. "He said the Towers are gigantic sorcerous talismans, so it might be from those, but he didn't say definitely."

"The Towers." Lar nodded. "I thought so. Sorcery, is it? That might be it. Interesting."

Emmis waited for Lar to ask the next question, to give him a chance to say more, to explain about the Towers and why he had spoken to Ithinia, but the ambassador said nothing more.

And then the moment had passed, and Emmis couldn't bring himself to say anything more about it. The rest of the evening was uncomfortable; Emmis had to watch everything he said, lest he reveal some part of his conversation with Ithinia best left unspoken. He went to bed early, claiming to still be tired from the previous night's adventures.

And in the morning there was Zhol's funeral, which Emmis and Lar attended as Lord Ildirin's guests. Because Zhol had served honorably in Lord Ildirin's escort the ceremony was held not in Camptown, as most city guard funerals were, but on a terrace overlooking the Grand Canal, between the Palace and the Old City. The pyre was built right on the edge, where the flames reflected in the murky water of the canal, and the event was well attended – not only were dozens of guards present, and a score of Zhol's kin, but much of the city's ruling elite; Lord Ildirin had seen to that. The overlord himself, Azrad VII, plunged the torch into the waiting kindling to light the blaze that would free the dead man's soul to ascend to Heaven.

Emmis did not dare approach Azrad, but he did take a good look at him. The overlord was a heavily-built man in late middle age, his hair gray and thinning, but his face still relatively smooth, his stance still strong and upright. Although he must have weighed fifty pounds more than the slender Ildirin, the family resemblance was plain.

"I didn't expect to see him here," Emmis whispered to Lar, as they watched the flames spread across the pyre. "Even if Zhol was chosen for Lord Ildirin's escort, he was still just a guardsman, after all."

Lord Ildirin, on Lar's other side, heard; he leaned over and replied, "The man served honorably, and died performing that service. His family deserves to see that my family respects him for it. My nephew understands that."

Chastised, Emmis said nothing more.

And that afternoon there was the hanging. Emmis talked his way out of attending that, but Lar and Ildirin did not. That left Emmis sitting alone in the makeshift embassy on Through Street, and he busied himself cleaning and straightening – though he wasn't entirely sure why he was bothering. He was fairly sure that after this planned trip to Lumeth, if it happened, he would no longer be Lar's aide and guide. The truth would come out, that he had given Ithinia the hints she needed to guess Lar's secrets.