Michael Stackpole: When Dragons Rage

Crow’s right eye sparkled. Was that a tear forming in the corner? “Just worry about the world, Highness. The world you can save. Nothing else matters.”

Will awoke muzzy-headed. It wasn’t that he’d drunk too much the night before but that he’d stayed up much too late, and Resolute’s dawn rising had left him perilously short of sleep. While he had managed to burrow back into the blankets and tried to use them to shut out the light, his efforts failed. He dozed and awoke a half-dozen times before surrendering, slipping from bed and getting dressed.

Despite being half-asleep, he did pull on his mask, tying it into place before he left the room. Prior to the previous night, he’d seen that mask as silly. As a thief he’d always known the value of wearing a mask, but that was to preserve anonymity. An Oriosan mask did just the opposite, proclaiming all manner of details about the person behind it. It struck him as not a little ironic that the customary tool of a thief here allowed him to scout out potential targets by interpreting mask decorations that indicated prosperity or nobility.

And while he’d worn his mask since Yslin, he’d been wearing it to humor those backing the army. But the previous night in the common room, he’d watched how common folk were treating him. They were reading the mask and believing what it proclaimed. They knew it had been given to him by the king, and that he was the Norrington . To them, it didn’t matter that he’d been a thief. The simple fact was that he had been given a mask that elevated him, and it made all the difference.

Part of him wanted to dismiss the mask as nonsense, but he didn’t. First—and it pained him to admit it—was the fact that the people really were looking to him as their hope against Chytrine. Their faith surprised him, for in the den of thieves where he grew up, having faith in someone was the first step to being betrayed. Had he wanted to wring money from those who believed in him, he could have had whatever they possessed in a heartbeat.

He didn’t want their money, however. He wanted their good wishes and hopes. He had a mission—saving Crow—and his mask told those in Tolsin that he was to be trusted. It gave him a legitimacy he never would have had otherwise, and he was determined to use that power to save his friend.

And while it surprised him that he was employing so valuable a tool for someone else’s benefit, he also acknowledged that the world was no longer as it had been just six months earlier.

Will wandered down the stairs and through the inn’s common room. He nodded in response to the innkeeper’s greeting, then headed out into the town. The coming winter had left a chill in the air, but the sun’s caress warmed him. The sun had long since climbed above the Bokagul Mountains to the south, and somewhere between that and Tolsin lay the city of Valsina, the home of the Norrington family. His father’s wife controlled the estates, holding it for her children—allegedly his half brothers. Bosleigh Norrington had acknowledged the two boys as his, but dark rumors suggested he had not sired them.

Tolsin itself wasn’t very impressive, though it was large enough to support two inns and a third tavern, as well as a smith and several carpenters and woodwrights. It had a market square in the heart of town, with farmers and traveling merchants selling their wares.

As Will wandered, eyeing the Thistledown Tavern for any signs of easy ingress, he recognized some folks from the inn’s common room the night before. He exchanged a kind word or a wave, and noticed they warmed to his attention. Six months previous he would have been calculating how much he could take them for, but now he found himself thinking about how his failure would mean doom for them all.

“Good morning, my lord.” The voice remained soft, despite a certain keenness of tone. Sephi slipped her hand through the crook of his right arm and smiled at him. “I need to speak to you.”

Will kept his expression impassive as he looked at her. She’d pulled her black hair back into a thick braid, and her hazel eyes shone from within the depths of a dark brown mask. It had an orphan’s notch cut at the bottom of the left eyehole, indicating her father was dead. Will wondered for a moment if Distalus, the man she had been traveling with in Alcida, had been her father. No question that he’s dead .

Sephi pressed her lips into a flat line when he failed to greet her immediately. “Please, Lord Norrington. I know you think I have done you a grievous wrong.”

You betrayed Crow ! He wanted to shove her away. He might have done just that, save for two things. The first was that, since she had been a spy in the employ of the Oriosan government, she might be of use. To save Crow I will use anyone and anything at hand, and not regret a moment of it .

The other was that hint of pleading in her voice. She wanted him to understand why she had done what she did, and that meant she could give him information—trading it for forgiveness. Information he desperately wanted, so he answered her with a nod.

“Yes, Sephi, if that is your name, what you did hurt me.” He drew in a deep breath, then slowly exhaled. His voice remained even, but his tone was cold. “Crow saved your life and you turned him over to enemies who will kill him.”

Her shoulders slumped. “That is how it seems, I know. And, yes, I am Sephi. Please, my lord, I would have you know why I acted as I did.”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“But it matters to me. You are the Norrington, and I’ve hurt you.”

Will stopped and turned to face her, placing his left hand over hers. He let a little warmth filter into his voice, promising a healing of the rift. “I’m sure you did what you did because you thought it was right.”

“Yes, that’s it exactly.” She nodded solemnly, then lowered her voice. “I feel I can confide in you, my lord, because we have seen each other naked.”

A small jolt ripped through Will. Back during the summer Crow, Resolute, and he had run into Sephi in Alcida. They’d rescued her from a band of gibberkin. Her companions had been slain and she had been hurt. While they had traveled together for a number of days, he’d never seen the tall, slender girl naked. Will was certain he’d have remembered that.

Then it struck him. When we met, she had no mask ! For her to be without a mask was to be as vulnerable as he might have felt without clothes. And Crow had his mask stripped from him ! Will couldn’t even begin to imagine how much that must have hurt his friend.

He nodded slowly to the girl and began his manipulation. “Yes, Sephi, you can trust me. Since being made aware of who I am, well, considerations wear on me, but I know how important trust is. And, I will admit, I did feel betrayed by you.”

“But, Will, I mean, Lord Norrington, I didn’t… that wasn’t my intent.” She sighed heavily. “My lord, you have to understand, I grew up here in Oriosa. I grew up with tales of the Traitor, and Oriosans felt his betrayal more keenly than others. The Norrington Prophecy, the one that predicted your coming, had previously been taken to refer to your grandfather, and then to your father. When Lord Norrington went out to fight Chytrine, there was much rejoicing, and when he failed and went over to serve the Aurolani Empress, we knew despair. Worse yet, he had been betrayed by Hawkins, the coward. And then, to expunge the evil of your grandfather murdering Queen Lanivette, your father headed north to do what that proud band of heroes failed to do.

“You know well what happened. Your father, brave though he was, fell prey to the blandishments of Chytrine.” She lowered her voice again and led him down into an alley between the town’s main stable and carpentry shop. “Distalus said that your father had tried to get Chytrine to free those who had become her sullanciri . She tricked him, and his father talked him into joining her.”