Martin Scott - Thraxas and the Elvish Isles

“What do you do if three Elves all want to take you somewhere?” she asks, quite seriously. “Do I have to pick a favourite right away?”

“I wouldn’t have thought so. We’re going to be on Avula for a while yet. You can play the field.”

Makri considers this. “Is that good advice? Do you know about these things?”

I shake my head. “Not really. I never had a relationship where the woman didn’t leave in disgust. Several of them actually tried to kill me. My wife swore she’d hire an Assassin. Fortunately she was exaggerating, though she did did smash eighteen bottles of my finest ale before she departed.”

Makri sees that I am a poor person to ask for this sort of counsel, and wonders about talking to Lady Yestar.

“Except I think Yestar might not be too pleased with me. I forgot that Isuas would have to attend the funeral and I bloodied her nose and blacked her eyes and I don’t think there was enough time for the healer to fix things properly.”

We crane our necks to see over the crowd, but the Elves are tall and we can see little except for a sea of green cloaks and tunics and a lot of long blond hair. Light cloud has blown in from the sea and the day is dull and slightly chilly. The crowd is quiet, as befits the sad occasion.

“Do you think I’d look good with blonde hair?” asks Makri.

“I’ve no idea.”

“It looks good on the Elves.”

“Maybe. But only whores have blonde hair in Turai.”

“That’s not true,” objects Makri. “Senator Lodius’s daughter has bright golden hair, I saw her at the chariot races.”

“True. Blonde hair is sometimes affected by our aristocratic females. But no one is going to mistake you for an aristocrat with your red skin and pointy ears.”

“You think I should buy a dress when we get home?”

“Makri, what is this? I don’t know anything about hair and dresses. I have enough trouble remembering to button up my tunic in the morning. Weren’t you going to take notes about the funeral for your Guild College?”

“I am. Mental notes. I just wondered if maybe I should get a dress. You notice how Lady Yestar has that blue eye make-up and she kind of fades it into grey at the edges? How does she do that?”

“How the hell would I know? Is this all connected to those young Elves? They seemed to like you fine the way you are.”

“Do you think so? I thought they might be laughing at me. I noticed when I was talking about rhetoric their eyes were sort of glazing over. I think I might have been boring them. And when I said I was champion gladiator I wondered if they might think I was boasting. It probably put them right off.”

I glower at Makri.

“Excuse me, I’m going to go and investigate something.”

“What?”

“Anything.”

“But I need some advice.”

“Pick a favourite and club him over the head.”

I walk off, keen to make an escape. Any observer might reasonably have assumed that Makri was a confident woman. Why a bit of Elvish attention should reduce her to a babbling idiot is beyond me, but I can’t take any more of it. I drift around the edges of the crowd, not paying much attention to the funeral oration or the Elvish singing. I notice Gorith-ar-Del. Like me, he seems to be skulking round the fringes of the crowd.

Someone snags me as I pass. It’s Harmon Half-Elf. He bends over to whisper in my ear, trying and failing to look inconspicuous. “I did the testing spell,” he whispers. “A difficult procedure, without letting anyone notice.”

“And?”

“The Tree Priest’s body was full of dwa,” he says.

Lanius Suncatcher is right behind Harmon. The pair of them look pleased with themselves. For all their protestations, I’d say they enjoyed the opportunity to act surreptitiously. Sorcerers generally like a bit of intrigue.

It’s always gratifying when a hunch pays off. Elith said that Gulas abused her cruelly for using dwa. Yet there he was, enjoying it himself.

“How much dwa had he taken?”

“Difficult to judge. Enough to put him to sleep, I’d say.”

Strange. He wasn’t sleeping when Elith stuck a knife in him. And somehow I doubt he’d be able to ingest much dwa after that. It would be good to know if my number one suspect, Gorith-ar-Del, has been in recent contact with dwa. Now that Harmon has used his spell he won’t be able to do it again till he relearns it, so I ask Lanius if he also loaded in a suitable spell. He tells me he did. I discreetly point out Gorith.

“Could you use it to find out if that Elf has been in contact?”

“My spell is for using on a corpse. You never said you wanted a live person tested.”

“Can’t you improvise?”

As an Investigating Sorcerer at the Abode of Justice, Lanius often encounters dwa, and must have had to adapt his spells before. He agrees to give it a try, and sidles off. Gorith-ar-Del pays him no heed as he walks up behind him. The spell might lower the temperature around them slightly, but on a cold day like today Gorith might not notice. Lanius concentrates for a second or two, then heads back towards us.

“Been in contact,” he says. “Definitely.”

It’s a damning piece of evidence against Gorith. I’m delighted to finally have confirmation that he’s been involved in this business.

After the funeral I wait around, wondering what to do. I should go and report to Vas-ar-Methet, but I can’t face telling him that his daughter really is a murderer. I’m standing aimlessly in the clearing when Makri appears.

“I’m in trouble,” she says. “Lord Kalith was as angry as a Troll with a toothache about his daughter appearing at the funeral looking like she’d just fallen out of a tree. Which, fortunately, is what she had the presence of mind to tell him had happened. She’s been banished to her room and forbidden to leave the Palace.”

“At least you won’t have to spend the rest of the day teaching Isuas to fight.”

Makri shakes her head. “She’s still coming. She sent me a message saying she’ll meet me at the clearing in thirty minutes.”

“Is she going to exit via a window and shin down a tree?”

“Something like that.”

I congratulate Makri on improving the child’s spirit in such a short time.

“Possibly the first ever Elf child imbued with the—what was the word for insane Orc warrior?”

“Gaxeen. Yes, she’s learning all right. Too much Gaxeen in fact. Now I have to show her the Way of the Sarazu.”

“Sarazu?”

“The Way of the Contemplative Warrior. It’s a kind of meditative trance for fighting. Very peaceful. You must be at one with the earth, the sky, the water and your opponent.”

“And then you kill him?”

“Sort of,” says Makri. “Although in the Way of the Sarazu, time doesn’t exactly flow in a straight line.”

I shake my head. It doesn’t take much of this sort of thing to confuse me.

“I liked the Way of the Gaxeen better. Good luck with the kid.”

Makri isn’t listening. She’s staring intently at the Hesuni Tree. This goes on for quite a long time. Finally she shakes her head and looks puzzled.

“You know, I could swear the tree was communicating with me.”

“What did it say? Anything interesting?”

“I’m not sure. I’m only partially Elf. But I thought it was saying you should stay around here for a while.”

“It was a message for me?”

I’m not too surprised. On an Elvish island it was bound to happen sooner or later. Makri departs. I take her advice and stick around, slinking into the shadows, where I can watch unseen. At least it will delay having to see Vas. I have a feeling that something is about to happen, though whether that’s my investigation or Makri’s suggestion I’m not sure.