Eric Flint - This Rough Magic

Manfred had never really thought of the old man as a having once been a mere rank-and-file knight, but always as a prosy and disapproving important old man. "So, Milord of Brunswick," he said, in as serious a manner as he had ever donned. "What should I do? Lecture them on diplomacy?"

"Break a few heads," said Erik, looking up from his platter. "You are too young and too popular."

Eberhard shook his head. "That might work for you, Erik. You will lead troops. You already do that well. But Manfred is such a babe-in-arms, he still needs them to teach him. He will lead armies, not troops. And what he needs to learn is that you cannot lead armies on your own. You need to delegate."

Manfred stared at him in astonishment. That was a solution that didn't sound like a good idea. On the other hand, Eberhard… had experience. "Delegate to whom? I mean, wouldn't they just think I was trying to avoid responsibility?"

Eberhard gave his wintry smile. "This is statecraft, which your uncle wished me to instruct you in. I thought it was a waste of time but if you can see that there is a problem, well-perhaps you might learn something after all." He cleared his throat. "It is often a good idea to pick on the worst sources of your troubles-and make them responsible. If they fail, then you must display very clearly that you have not abrogated your responsibilities, by taking action against them, personally. But I don't suppose you'll have either the intelligence or maturity to take my advice."

Despite himself, Manfred knew that his face showed what he'd have been likely to do if the old man were not nearly seventy. Instead he clenched his fists and walked off.

"Francesca, he's going to drive me mad," said Manfred later in their chamber. "He treats me as if I were stupid and ten years old."

Francesca traced his deltoid with a delicate finger. "He's a very bad old man, to tease you so. But I think he wants to make sure he's got your attention."

"You think he's doing it on purpose?" demanded Manfred incredulously.

Francesca smiled catlike. "He is one of the leading diplomats and statesmen of the age, Manfred, dear. He's playing you like a lute."

Manfred did not like the idea of being manipulated by anyone, much less Eberhard. "The old bastard!"

Francesca shook her head in admonition. "I'm sure he's only doing it to oblige Charles Fredrik."

Manfred snorted. "Two can play his game. I won't rise to his bait. Tomorrow morning I'm going to call Falkenberg and Von Gherens. Make those two carry the can. Falkenberg can do the damned accounting. That'll stop him eating and drinking for a few minutes, which should save us a few pennies anyway."

"Good. Then maybe we can get moving a little faster. I had letters while I was in Mainz from Katerina. I said I would do my best to be there for her wedding, even if I cannot accede to her request to be a maid of honor." Francesca smiled wryly. "But I wouldn't mind being a trifle early to help with the organization."

"Von Gherens will have to make them trot," said Manfred languorously, leaning toward the caressing fingers.

The woman didn't stop screaming. She'd gone beyond the edge of fear and into raw hysteria.

None of the three people in the room appeared to even notice, any more than slaughterhouse workers might notice a bellowing steer. Jagiellon simply continued to whet the cleaver.

Caesare Aldanto stood like a blond puppet that someone had propped against a wall. The position his arms were in was not quite natural and would have caused any normal man to alter it before more than a moment had passed. Aldanto stood as still as a log. His empty blue eyes stared unblinking at the altar. The shaman simply continued to rub the drum-skin, and walk in a widdershins circle, producing a low murmur of sound that seemed to slice through the screaming.

The cut, when it came, did not stop the screaming. That brutal chop was not intended to. This rite derived much of its power from the suffering of the victim. The quodba drum now was a fluttering, weakening, fast heartbeat, perfectly matching that of the woman. In the old face, the shaman's eyes burned with a fierce intensity. Sweat dripped from his forehead although the room was cold. Jagiellon showed no such signs of strain.

Neither did Caesare, who had come forward now to kneel, holding the stone-cut bowl into which the woman's femoral artery pumped.

Jagiellon scryed for his foes in a dark magic built on blood, pain, and defilement.

There was a price, a terrible price for this clear vision, and not just from the victim. But the Black Brain did not care. That part of Jagiellon was long dead anyway. And this was no new ritual being enacted for the first time.

In the blood that now pumped feebly into the bowl, Jagiellon saw Eneko Lopez, and a band of companions. Saw the canals of Venice, and a canal boat with what could only be a bridal couple. Abruptly that opaqued. Only a Leonine winged shadow remained.

The blood bowl cleared, showing a new vision. Eneko Lopez again, face uplifted, at peace, standing on the place which is called Golgotha.

There was a high, thin, sound that pierced the brain like a white-hot needle.

The bowl shattered. Blood erupted out of it, as if something had exploded within the depths of the bowl, splattering everything and everyone within the magic circle.

The woman's screams, which had grown weaker and weaker, were stilled. Cut off abruptly.

Silence, heavy and chill, hung over the scene for a moment. No one moved.

And then the shaman coughed, breaking the stasis.

Neither Caesare nor Jagiellon appeared concerned about being showered in fresh blood, but something had plainly affected them. There were sweat beads on both foreheads, mingling with the splattered blood. Caesare's eyes were wild and mad, not dead as they had been moments before.

"Very powerful place. Very powerful man," grunted the shaman, fastidiously cleaning his drum.

"I know where he is going," growled Jagiellon. "The forces of light marshal against us. A pilgrimage. And he intends to go via Venice. Somehow this ties with the wedding of the other one. Marco Valdosta. That joining must be stopped. Or at least I must stop Lopez reaching the marshes where the Lion holds sway."

The shaman nodded and rubbed his shoulder, wincing as he did so, as if the shoulder was deeply bruised. "Lion is very strong. Even if the young one is still unskilled, he is strong."

"I do not like failure. You will keep watch around the Lion's borderland." Jagiellon cleaned the cleaver on the victim's hair. "We will consult with Count Mindaug. He has been studying the magics of the West. He thinks I am unaware of this. Maybe he will know of some trap we can set."

The shaman nodded, and the Count was sent for, as servants cleared the mess away, moving with swift and fearful silence. As well they might: Any one of them might be next, if they drew attention to themselves. Until today, the dead woman had been a chambermaid.

The Count did indeed have an answer. A stray fact plucked out of a grimoire from the Ravenna region, from the southern margin of the sequence of lagoons and floodlands that had once stretched all the way from there to Grado in the north. Just off the southern margin of the ancient marshlands lay a grove of oak trees. The local people would go nowhere near the place. Local legend said a terrible rite had raised something there, something so evil that everyone for miles around found a reason to avoid the spot. It was a lonely and not very fertile area anyway, full of mosquitoes and malarial fevers. It lay not far from the causeway that led to Ravenna, and then onwards along the coast toward Venice.

"I will open the way," said Jagiellon. "Take a form to travel on land. See what, if anything, lies in this place."