David Farland - The Sum of All Men

He caught her, laid her in the grass beside the stream. He took off his dirty cloak, wrapped it around her for what little warmth it could give, then began making his way through the streets.

It was an odd sensation, walking that street. Binnesman's garden was afire, the flames shooting now eighty feet into the air. The castle was alive with people shouting, running to and fro, afraid the fire would spread.

On the street leading to the stables, dozens of people raced past Gaborn, many of them carrying buckets to the stream so that they could douse the thatch roofs of cottages, protecting them from falling cinders.

Yet of all the people who passed Gaborn, none asked his name or sought to learn why he carried an unconscious woman. Is Earth protecting me, he wondered, or is this such a common sight this night that no one notices?

Gaborn found the spice cellars from Rowan's description. It was a fair-sized building, something of a warehouse whose back was dug into the hill. A loading dock by the wide front doors was just the height of a wagon.

Gaborn cautiously opened the front door into an antechamber. The scents of spices assailed him—drying garlic and onions, parsley and basil, lemon balm and mint, geranium, witch hazel, and a hundred others. The cook's son was supposed to be sleeping here. A pallet lay in a corner with a blanket over it, but Gaborn saw no sign of the boy. On a night like tonight, with soldiers in town and a huge fire burning, the boy was probably out watching the sights with friends.

A wall of stone and mortar stood on the far side of the antechamber. Gaborn carried Rowan to it, opened it wide. A huge chamber was behind the door. A lantern hung by the wall, burning low, next to a flask of oil and a couple of spare lanterns. Gaborn poured oil into a lantern and lit the wick so that it burned brightly, then gaped.

Gaborn had known that the King dealt in spices, but hadn't guessed how much. The chamber was filled to the brim with crates and sacks. Off to the left were common culinary spices in huge bins, enough to supply the city through the year. Ahead were smaller casks of Binnesman's medicinal herbs and oils, ready for shipment. To the far right lay thousands of bottles of wine, along with casks of ale, whiskey, and rum. The chamber must have reached back a hundred feet into the side of the hill.

The place held a miasma of scents—spices rotting, spices fresh, dust and mold. Gaborn knew he'd found safety. Here beneath the earth, in the far chambers under the hill, no hunter would be able to track him.

He closed the great door, made his way with the lantern to a corner of the cellar, stacked some crates to form a little hiding place, then laid Rowan behind them.

He lay down with her, warmed her with his body, and for a time he slept, curled against her back.

When he woke, Rowan had turned, was gazing into his eyes. He felt a pressure on his lips, realized that she'd just kissed him awake. She breathed softly.

Rowan had dark skin, with thick, lustrous black hair and a gentle, caring face. She was not beautiful, he decided, merely pretty. Not like Iome, or even Myrrima. Both of those women were blessed with endowments that made them more than human. Both of them had faces that could make a man forget his name or haunt him for years after a mere glimpse of them.

She kissed him again, softly, and whispered, “Thank you.”

“For what?” Gaborn asked.

“For keeping me warm. For bringing me with you.” She cuddled closer, spread his robe over them both. “I've never felt so...alive...as I do right now.” She took his hand, placed it on her cheek, wanting him to stroke her.

Gaborn dared not do it. He knew what she wanted. She'd just reawakened to the world of sensation. She craved his caress—the warmth of his body, his touch.

“I...don't think I should do this,” Gaborn said, and he rolled away, put his back to her. He felt her stiffen, hurt and embarrassed.

He lay for a moment, ignoring her, then reached into the pocket of his tunic, pulled out the book that King Sylvarresta had given him earlier in the day. The Chronicles of Owatt, Emir of Tuulistan.

The lambskin cover on it was soft and new. The ink smelled fresh. Gaborn opened it, fearing he wouldn't be able to read the language. But the Emir had already translated it.

On the cover leaf, in a broad, strong hand, he'd written,

To my Beloved Brother in Righteousness, King jas Laren Sylvarresta, greetings: It has been eighteen years now since we dined together at the oasis near Binya, yet I think fondly on you often. They have been hard years, full of trouble. I give you one last gift: this book.

I beg of you, show it only to those you trust.

Gaborn wondered at the warning. After running out of space at the bottom of the page, the Emir had not bothered to sign his name.

Gaborn calmed himself, prepared to memorize everything in the hook. With two endowments of wit, it was a daunting task, but not impossible.

He read swiftly. The first ten chapters told of the Emir's life—his youth, his marriage and family connections, details of laws he had authored, deeds he had done. The next ten told of ten battles fought by Raj Ahten, campaigns against entire royal families.

The Wolf Lord began destroying the smaller families of Indhopal first, those most despised. He worked not to take a castle or to bankrupt a city, but to decimate entire family lines. In the South, the code of honor made it obligatory to avenge one's relatives.

Among the horsemen of Deyazz, he'd attack a palace in one city, then slay Dedicate horses of those who might come to the city's aid, while also taking children for ransom on another front. With multiprong attacks, he overwhelmed his foes.

Gaborn quickly saw that Raj Ahten was a master of illusion. Always one could see the knife flashing in his right hand, while his left kept busy elsewhere. A small army might lay siege to a king's palace in one land while five others quietly ripped at the underbelly of some lord two kingdoms away.

Gaborn studied the patterns of the assaults. He grew terrified.

Raj Ahten had taken Castle Sylvarresta with nothing more than his glamour and fewer than seven thousand knights and men-at-arms. True, he brought Invincibles, the heart of his army. But it left many questions unanswered. Raj Ahten had millions of men who could march at his command.

Where were they?

Gaborn wondered as he read. The tales of Raj Ahten's battles contained no hidden knowledge. The Emir had laid bare Raj Ahten's tactics, but a good spy could have gleaned as much information.

Gaborn skimmed the Emir's poetry, found it dull, mere doggerel, each line ending in a full rhyme, each line perfectly metered.

Some poems were sonnets that enjoined the reader to seek for some virtue, in the way of poems given to young children who are learning to read. Yet in the sonnets, the Emir did not always rhyme flawlessly. Sometimes he ended in near rhyme, and on a swift reading, Gaborn found that the near rhymes leapt out at him.

It was not until reading ten pages that Gaborn stumbled on the first of these near rhymes, in an odd poem, a form called a sonnet menor.

Now Gaborn focused on that poem, for it held Sylvarresta's name in the title.

A Sonnet for Sylvarresta

When the wind strokes the desert in the night, so that veils of sand obscure the starlight, we lie on pillows by the fire to read In books of puissant philosophy.

Ah, how they clear the mind, focus the eye, Of mortal men who linger, love and die!

Gaborn rearranged words in each line, seeing if he could form sentences that might convey some hidden meaning. He found nothing.

He wondered at the words, longed for the days when men from the North could have traveled openly in Indhopal. He'd recently heard a trader bemoan those times by saying, “Once there were many good men in Indhopal. Now it seems they are all dead—or perhaps just frightened into evil.”