L. Modesitt - Ordermaster

He’d enlisted the armorer to cut him minute scraps of copper, iron, bronze, and tin, and he’d also taken his own wood samples from the workroom of the Great House’s carpenter. No one had asked him what he wanted the materials for, almost as if no one even wanted to hazard a guess as to what a mage had in mind.

Kharl smiled wryly. He was definitely learning, and he’d discovered things that weren’t in The Basis of Order … or rather, tricks that were barely hinted at in the order manual. Although the book’s lack of clear directions for technique had bothered him in the beginning, he was beginning to understand why whoever had written it had avoided describing techniques except for a few relatively basic points.

Wood was easier to work with, but the chaos-energy released wasn′t that much greater for most pieces of wood than for a leaf the same size, except for a tiny fragment of lorken, and that had almost been as hard to handle as iron, although the “feel” had been different. On the other hand, the chaos released from a small fragment of an iron nail had blown off a quarter of one of the granite parapet stones and cracked the remainder of the stone. Kharl was just glad that he had had the presence of mind to use very small bits of metal and crouch behind one of the granite parapet braces several cubits away. Even so, he’d suffered several small cuts from flying stone fragments.

Even with all the work and experimentation he had done, Kharl had been unable to release the order bonds from much farther than a rod away for the heavier substances, such as metals, and perhaps twice that for woods. Exactly how what he had discovered would help Hagen, he was unsure, but perhaps the lord-chancellor might have an idea or two.

Kharl found himself shivering as the wind picked up. The spring day had started out cold, but the morning breeze had died away, and the cloudless sky and sun had joined to turn the afternoon almost as hot as early summer. Nearing sunset, the wind had risen and shifted, blowing out of the north and cooling the top of the tower.

“Will it work?” came a voice from the west side of the north tower.

The other’s figure was blurred to Kharl’s sight, but he recognized Hagen’s voice. “Will what work?”

“Whatever you’ve been doing up here all day that has everyone in the Great House afraid to get near the tower, or even beneath it.” Hagen laughed. “I told them that the only time to worry would be if you fled the tower.”

As Hagen moved nearer, and Kharl’s vision cleared, the mage could make out the dark circles under the lord-chancellor’s eyes. “You’re tired. And worried.”

“Wouldn’t you be? Hensolas has moved his forces to Kiford. That’s less than five kays from the southern end of the harbor causeway.”

“Why was it built? Does it go anywhere?”

“It’s a direct road south. They say that Lord Esthaven built it so that he could move armsmen from the southern barracks directly to the harbor.” Hagen laughed. “The barracks were never used after Esthaven, and Lord Estloch tore them down and reused the stones for rebuilding the barracks in the city. They were wood before.”

“How soon will Hensolas attack?”

“Tomorrow, I’d wager.”

“You didn’t tell me until now?” said Kharl.

“Why? You’re doing the best you can, and I just would have wasted your time and mine. You understand what’s happening.”

“I may have wasted it anyway. I’ve been trying to work out how to release chaos from objects.”

Hagen frowned. “Is that something black mages can do?”

Kharl understood the question Hagen hadn’t asked, the one he hadn’t wished to ask, and replied, “There is one way that is acceptable for a black mage. That is not to handle the chaos directly, but to remove the order bonds from an object and leave the chaos.” Kharl offered a crooked smile. “It’s not recommended. According to the … to what I’ve heard and learned, trying to do that could kill a mage.”

“You’ve been doing it.”

“I couldn’t think of anything else that might be helpful,” Kharl admitted. “I don’t know how useful it will be.”

“You blew pieces of granite off the tower. Stone shards were falling in the courtyard.”

Kharl nodded. “I have to be close, somewhere within twenty or thirty cubits.”

Hagen fingered his clean-shaven chin, tilting his head to one side. “We still might be able to figure out something. Let’s go get something to eat, and we’ll see what we can work out.”

“I am hungry,” Kharl admitted. He was ready to listen. Besides, he was too tired to try anything else.

“Good. You look like you could use a good meal.” Hagen turned.

Kharl followed the lord-chancellor down the stone steps from the tower.

In the darkness before dawn, Kharl used his order-senses check the causeway to the east of the flat-bottomed boat. Using them was necessary, because the boat had been covered with reeds and grass, from which jutted straggly cattails that remained from the fall before. In the mist that covered the marshes bordering the causeway, the concealed boat looked like another marshy hump, one of a number, if the only one in the immediate area. Under the canvas covered with grass and clumps of plants, the fetid mixed odors of marsh and harbor backwaters were almost unbearable.

Kharl swallowed.

“How much longer, ser mage?” asked Dorfal, the young armsman and former crabber, his voice low.

“They’re still a good kay or more south of us,” Kharl whispered back. As he waited with the clammy fog all around him, Kharl wondered, once more, how he’d managed to get himself where he was-sitting in a flat-bottomed boat less than thirty cubits off the causeway, essentially alone. There was a squad of armsmen waiting well to the west of the marsh, but they were out of sight, and too far away to be of much immediate assistance. They were there to protect Kharl once he returned-and to escort him back to the Great House.

How had he gotten into this mess? By the way he had dealt with Guillam, everything else had followed. While it might not have been his fault, not totally, it was certainly his responsibility. More important, if he didn’t support Ghrant, he’d have nothing, and he didn’t want to go back to that.Hiding, not having enough to eat, watching every corner, listening to every sound-no, he’d had enough of that, even if it had only been for a season.

He could only hope the plan he and Hagen had developed would work out.

The plan itself was simple. Kharl and Dorfal waited in the concealed boat, a craft built like a scow, but far smaller, with two hastily mounted winches fore and aft. Cables were attached to the winches. One was anchored-underwater-to a massive boulder at the edge of the causeway. The other, more than ten rods to the west and also underwater, was tied to a huge and ancient stump that barely protruded from the water. Beyond the stump was a low hillock, behind which the armsmen waited. Between the small scow and the trunk was one of the few stretches where the murky swamp water was a good three or four rods in depth. Kharl would make sure that no order or chaos could be sensed by the Hamorian white wizard-or wizards. He and Dorfal would wait until the bulk of the rebel forces passed. Then Dorfal would winch the craft to the causeway, and Kharl would begin to release order from the nails and other small scraps of metal in the pouch at his belt-after he’d thrown or otherwise placed them in the right spots among and behind the rebels. With the winch and cables, the scow would stay where it was supposed to, and could be moved more quietly.

The idea was to push the rebels forward, toward the harbor front, which appeared largely undefended. It was, in fact, scarcely defended at all-except for the dozen or so old cannon that Hagen had taken from the armories. But those cannon were set to rake the end of the causeway with grapeshot. Hagen had also managed to dig out cold-iron powder canisters, the kind that could be closed after each load was measured and set. While there were still risks involved, from what Kharl and seen and sensed, the Hamorian mages weren’t likely to be able to set much of the powder off at any one time. But he’d told Hagen that it was most likely that some of the powder would still be fired by chaos.