Элейн Каннингем - The Wizardwar

"Not a bad idea," she admitted, "but the pink palace is a far cry from my usual venue. Nothing I've played in street corners and taverns hits the right note."

Zalathorm took her hand and raised it to his lips, a gesture reserved for great ladies. "Then create a new role. Face the crowd as one who knows in her heart she is daughter to a queen and a princess of Halruaa."

For a long moment Tzigone stared at the king, dumbfounded. Then she began to laugh-rich, unrestrained, bawdy laughter that shook through her like a storm. Finally her mirth faded, and regal hauteur swept over her face. She beckoned to Matteo.

"Come, jordain," she intoned. "We have much to prepare before I give audience."

She swept out like a starship in full sail. The two men watched her theatrical progress from the room.

"It is said that a king need never apologize," Zalathorm said, his eyes twinkling. "But judging from the look on your face, Matteo, I suspect I've just stretched that proverb to the breaking point."

That afternoon the pink-marble audience hall was filled to capacity with Halarahh's wizards. From his position behind the king's seat, Matteo searched the small crowd waiting before the dais and found Tzigone among those who waited to give evidence. Their eyes caught, and he gave her a slight, encouraging nod.

When the crumhorns sounded the resumption of council, Zalathorm glanced at the parchment before him and called upon Tzigone as first to give testament.

She climbed the dais and executed the proper bows to the king and the assembled dignitaries. "Before I speak in Lord Basel's behalf, I wish to advise this council of an emerging magical gift, one that has helped me find the evidence I will present. I have recently discovered a talent for reverse divination. I can see into the past with greater detail than is yielded by a legend lore spell."

A murmur of astonishment rippled through the crowd.

In Halruaa, magical skills were slowly and assiduously acquired. Sorcery was frowned upon, and "recent discoveries" of inborn talents were rare in their ordered society.

Matteo stepped forward. "I will attest to this. I have seen her go deep into memory and in doing so accidentally produce a memory that belonged to someone long dead."

A wizard of the Belajoon clan rose, a supercilious smile on his face. "Begging the jordain's pardon, but wasn't this girl a common street performer? How do you know this 'ancient memory' that so impressed you wasn't just another tavern tale?"

"This memory was powerful enough to conjure a visible illusion," Matteo said coolly.

"Lord Basel, her mentor, is a conjurer. No doubt she learned this trick during her apprenticeship."

"This occurred before Tzigone's training began," Matteo countered, "before her magical feats in Akhlaur's Swamp, before she had any notion of herself as a potential wizard. The image she conjured was a rare species of griffin, extinct for over three centuries. Few lore books contain any reference to such a beast. It is unlikely that a child of the streets would have access to such books. I was there at the time, and no one, no matter how skilled a performer, could have feigned Tzigone's astonishment. Her talent for reverse divination is a natural gift, and it is very real."

Tzigone faced down the wizard, who looked ready to argue with Matteo's assessment. "Give me something to hold, and I'll tell you its history."

"Here!" A woman rose in the balcony and tossed down a shining bauble. Tzigone deftly caught it and held it up for general inspection. It appeared to be an exceptionally fine opal necklace, with large, glowing white stones set in silvery filigree.

Zalathorm looked to the donor. "Lady Queirri Venless," he said, naming the wizard. "To the best of your knowledge, does this girl have reason to know the history of this necklace?"

"No. This I swear, by wizard-word oath," Queirri replied.

Tzigone turned her face toward the wizard, and her eyes took on a distant, unfocused expression. "You were twelve years old, wandering the forest near your home. There were hunters-poachers-setting up traps and lures. Curious, you hid and watched as they ran a baby unicorn into their traps and slaughtered it for spell components. You fled home with the tale. Your mother, outraged, had the poachers hunted down and killed. Their deaths have always weighed heavily upon you, and you still dream of the unicorn. You kept the horn and had it fashioned into this necklace. You wear it as a reminder that sometimes the price of magic is too high."

A long moment of silence filled the hall. "A fanciful tale from a two-copper performer," the nay-saying wizard sneered.

"Nevertheless, it happens to be true," Queirri said quietly. "No single living person knew the whole of this tale but me."

Zalathorm nodded. "I am convinced. Lord Basel's apprentice may speak for him, and her words will be afforded the same weight given to any diviner."

Procopio Septus rose abruptly from his place on the Elder's dais, his hawklike face blazing with indignation. "Respectfully, I must protest. Giving this... apprentice the same regard as a master diviner diminishes us all!"

A subtle murmur of agreement, barely audible, blew through the hall, cooling Tzigone's listeners as surely as an ocean breeze.

"One wizard's magic enriches all of Halruaa," Matteo said, repeating a common proverb. "No man is truly diminished by another's skill."

Procopio ignored this digression. "As lord mayor of Halarahh, I have a responsibility to uphold Halruaan law. By this law, no person who is under sentence of death can bear witness for or against another. It has come to my attention that Tzigone is the illegitimate daughter of the renegade wizard Keturah. By law, she was born under sentence of death."

Tzigone's chin came up. "I'm no bastard. My mother and father were wed."

Procopio snapped his fingers, and a sheaf of parchment appeared in his hand. "Here are papers of divorcement between Keturah and her husband, Dhamari Exchelsor. This girl was begotten by an unknown father well after his divorce."

"My mother married a second time."

"Did she? Whom?"

"A young man she met in the forest. He fell off a griffin, and she tended him."

"Does this hapless rider have a name?"

Her gaze faltered for just a moment. "I don't know his name."

The wizard's white brows rose. "An honest answer," he said with exaggerated surprised. "The fact is that there is no record of another marriage. A wizard's bastard, a magic-wielder of uncertain parentage-and especially one who 'discovers' unusual and unpredictable gifts-is a threat to Halruaa. By law, this threat should have been eliminated over twenty years ago!"

Basel Indoulur rose abruptly. "Keturah and I were friends from childhood, and remained friends after she was falsely accused and fled the city."

"Falsely accused?" Procopio broke in. "Not submitting to magical testing is as good as an admission of guilt!"

"Who was the Inquisitor of Halarahh at that time?" Matteo asked calmly. "Who would have examined Keturah?"

The lord mayor sent him a venomous glare. "How should I know? That was five and twenty years past"

"Six and twenty," Matteo corrected, "and the magehound in the city at that time was Kiva, an elf woman since convicted of treason. I can present documents from the Jordaini Council exonerating several jordaini whom Kiva had falsely condemned over the years."

"You're arguing that Keturah would have had reason to fear similar treatment? On what basis?"

"Kiva was an apprentice in Keturah's tower," the jordain said calmly. "Keturah dismissed her for reckless magic. Even if she knew or suspected nothing of Kiva's larger designs at that time, she had reason to know the elf woman's character and to believe her capable of taking vengeance."