Lisa Shearin - Magic Lost, Trouble Found

Piaras hurried to comply. I decided to lie there and breathe. Not that I had any choice. My body still had a mind of its own, and I wasn’t entirely convinced it belonged to me. Garadin’s injury was worse, so Piaras treated him first. He applied the salve to Garadin’s burn and bandaged it with a strip of linen. Then he did the same to my hand.

My godfather drew a ragged breath, and blew it out. “I don’t think it likes me.”

“I don’t like it either, so we’re all even.”

Once I could sit up on my own, I held the amulet so Garadin could study it. He wasn’t going to try to touch it, and I certainly wasn’t about to take it off again. Piaras may not have heard the previous part of our conversation, but he saw the results. When the amulet burned him, Garadin had dropped the shield blocking our voices. Pain can make you do that. He didn’t bother putting the shield up again, and I didn’t bother reminding him. It’d be like shutting the stable door after the horses were gone. A little too much, a little too late.

The silver disk glittered in the firelight. To me, it looked like it was proud of itself. I swear I felt it vibrate, almost like it was purring. Glad one of us was happy. I leaned back against the side of the chair. The floor seemed relatively stable. I thought I’d stay there for a while.

“What do you think it is?” I asked Garadin.

“I don’t know,” he admitted without the least embarrassment. “I’d say it’s quite old, and judging from the style and quality of workmanship, it is of elven make.”

“Maybe that’s why it likes me so much.”

“Unlikely.”

“One could hope.”

“Objects like this don’t usually ally themselves along racial lines. From its reactions to you, and the identities of those who want it, I think we can assume that it is a magical talisman of some sort.”

“You think?”

“Sarcasm won’t help.”

“It won’t hurt. And it’s about all I can muster right now. I can’t take it off, I don’t want to keep it, but I can hardly hand it over to anybody who’d take my life to have it. And who only knows what it’s doing to me.”

“Do you feel different?”

“A little.”

“How?”

“Twitchy, for one thing. And when Quentin was ambushed, I didn’t know who had set him up, just that it was magic and it was trouble. That’s a new talent for me.”

“Interesting.”

Everyone was entirely too fond of using that word to describe my predicament. “No, it’s not interesting,” I told him. “But then I’m the one the thing has grafted itself to. I just want to know what it does, and why the Khrynsani and Guardians want to get their hands on it.”

“Conclave Guardians? Here?” Piaras asked, looking entirely too eager for my taste.

Great.

“Sorry. I didn’t hear that,” Piaras said quickly. “I didn’t hear a thing.” He tried getting to his feet, his long legs tangling in the process. “I’ll just go stand in the corner. Better yet, I’ll step outside.”

“Sit,” Garadin and I said in unison.

Piaras sat.

Garadin sighed. “If you hear anything you consider fascinating, just forget it immediately.”

“Yes, sir.”

Exhausted, I slouched back against the chair leg. “Garadin, you were once a Conclave mage. You must have some idea what that Guardian”—I shot a glance at Piaras—“who shall remain nameless, meant by ‘that box and its contents are our only concern.’”

Garadin leaned back against the other side of the chair. “The Conclave has many interests, and it’s been a while since I was on Mid. I still have contacts there, some I can trust. Let me ask around. In the meantime, you need to keep that trinket out of sight, and you need to be careful.”

“I’m always careful.”

Garadin gave me the look. You know the one.

“Whenever I can,” I added.

“You’re going to have to do better than that. Have you talked to your best client?”

I knew he meant Markus. No need to share that name with Piaras either.

“I sent him a note a few hours ago asking if I could use one of his safehouses as a base for the next couple of days. And after what you told me about Tarsilia’s visitors, I think it’s an even better idea.”

Garadin shook his head. “You may want to consider arranging for more protection than that. I don’t like you wandering around the city alone.”

“I don’t ‘wander’ anywhere,” I told him. “I know the under-belly of this city better than anyone, and you know how I feel about someone playing shadow. I work alone.”

“As long as you’re wearing that, you won’t be lacking for company.”

“No one can sense it when I’m wearing it.” I paused uncomfortably, remembering Mychael Eiliesor—and feeling his presence all too clearly in the past hour. I didn’t doubt for a moment that it was his seductive lullaby Garadin and Piaras’s arrival had interrupted. If he had managed to put me to sleep, then traced me here, who knows where I’d have woken up. “With the exception of my Guardian acquaintance.”

I remembered another reason why I wanted to talk to Garadin. I didn’t want to ask in front of Piaras, but I had no choice. “How much do you know about Gates?”

My godfather was silent before answering. “I have knowledge, but not firsthand experience, though I know some who have both.” His distaste for the subject was apparent. “I don’t count any of them as friends.”

“I think that’s how the Khrynsani got into Nigel’s house tonight,” I told him.

Garadin didn’t say anything, but I could see his jaw tighten. Piaras had gone a shade paler, if that was possible. I didn’t know how much he knew about Gates, but I was pretty sure it wasn’t as much as Garadin or I knew, and I wasn’t going to be the one to expand his education. This was one topic I would tiptoe around. I’m sure Garadin would agree with me.

A Gate is a tear in the fabric of reality. It’s not naturally occurring. Nothing about a Gate is natural—or legal or moral. Stepping through a Gate is like stepping through a doorway, except that doorway can cover miles instead of inches. In theory, I guess any distance is possible. Gates are a convenient way to get around, if you don’t mind what it takes to make one. Magic of the blackest kind, fueled by terror, torture, despair, and death—the more the merrier. It takes a twisted sorcerer to open a Gate. Luckily I hadn’t had the pleasure of meeting anyone quite that sick—at least not until tonight. It sounded like something that’d be right up Sarad Nukpana’s dark alley.

“I had a tracking stone on Quentin, so I saw everything he did. There were no goblins in that house before he opened that box. Quentin swears they just stepped out of thin air. I didn’t want to scare him with my opinion of how that happened. He’s had a bad enough night.”

“Your average goblin shaman wouldn’t get within a mile of an open Gate,” Garadin said, “let alone create and open one.”

I snorted. “I wouldn’t call any of the goblins running around Nigel’s place tonight average. Sarad Nukpana’s certainly qualified to create and open a Gate, and considering the other goblins who took on his temple guards in Nigel’s garden, Nukpana probably felt the need to be onsite to protect his investment.”

Garadin raised an eyebrow. “Other goblins?”

“Expensively armored other goblins. I’m thinking they were all at Nigel’s for the same reason, and I’m wearing it around my neck.”

“Any theories on who they were?”

I shrugged. “Sarad Nukpana works for the new king. The new king has a brother—a brother he just recently exiled. Rumor has it little brother isn’t happy with his new living arrangements and is looking to make as much trouble for big brother as possible. The prince could certainly afford to outfit his allies that well. As to why they all want what I have, I have no idea. Sibling rivalry? Revenge? Who knows?”