The King's Thief

Chapter 8

The thief finally recovered enough of himself to speak. “My name is…”
 “We know your name, human,” the Sylva facing him said. His voice was mellow, a light tenor, and he spoke in a slightly ponderous fashion, giving weight to each utterance. “You are known to us, and we have been seeking you since news of your failed induction into your human army reached us.”
“Well, now that you’ve found me, what do you intend to do with me?”
“You are one of our enemy, but we would have it be otherwise. The erg-man, Malketh, had planned to use you to sabotage our war effort, but we bear you no malice. You are compelled by forces you can have no reckoning of, and we are aware of the special considerations regarding you.”
Kaliss lapsed into silence. Special considerations? The Sylva continued.
“My name is Faergaldan. I am the kinroc of this fighting unit, a rank equivalent to a captain. You are Kaliss Talason, raised by the monks of the order of Tala, professional thief and, until recently, prisoner at your King’s pleasure. We have… liberated you to prevent your use as a weapon against us. It is not my choice what happens to you now as I have been instructed to take you to one of our principal cities, Sylvanasher. There you will be tried by our Council of Thirteen. The outcome will either be death or freedom.”
Kaliss suddenly found it hard to swallow. “No pressure, then. How long will it take us to get there?”
Turning those strange wooden eyes aside to look at one of the uppermost pieces of paper, Faergaldan sighed and said “The better part of a month’s travel is ahead of us. We leave with the dawn, tomorrow. Please make yourself comfortable in the south-east corner of the warehouse until then.” He moved off, then, almost casually, he turned back and said “Oh, and do not leave the warehouse. You are currently phased half a second away from your normal time, and will continue to be until we resync tomorrow.” His gaze hardened.  “Your attempts to exit without the proper ergnul would lead to your disintegration. It matters not to me, for I do not relish the journey ahead, but you might wish to be aware.”
Kaliss watched as Faergaldan turned and moved off. “Thanks, I guess,” he muttered at the receding back. He looked around, but all of his ‘honour guard’ seemed to have dissipated into the crowd of people working at the desks, so he slowly picked his way towards the corner of the warehouse where he found a simple mattress laid out for him. A pair of boots lay on the mattress and, gratefully, he slipped them on. Tying the laces, he suddenly became aware of one of the black-robes standing in front him. As he finished fastening the boots, he stood up, then took an involuntary step backwards; the tall black-robe was holding a knife pointed straight at him.
“This is yours.”
The voice was male, a light voice which seemed at the same time confident yet delicate Kaliss looked closer at the knife. It was simple, a wooden handle with a short metal blade, both sides sharp. It bore no resemblance to the finely-balanced knife he had lost while under arrest, with its pearl-inlaid handle and whisper-sharp blade, though weighing it in his hand he found it to have a pleasant feel, a little heavy at the front, but not at all unpleasant. He took the weapon and stowed it away at the back of his belt, finding that it fit the small leather sheath. The figure pulled back his hood, revealing a soft-featured face framing those strange brown eyes and, surmounting all, shoulder-length blond hair, almost hiding the subtle points of his ears.
“My name is Ryndaele Tipperanae, and you are the thief Kaliss. I have been assigned to be your guardian on our journey, as well as to ensure that you remain with us.”
“Well in that case, Ryndaele Tipperanae, perhaps you can tell me what the hell is going on here? I had a nice comfy jail cell, and now I’m a wanted man all over again!” Kaliss’s eyes narrowed as he considered the slender man.
His eyes containing mirth, Ryndaele said “Would you rather we took you back? I am sure that the guard will be pleased to see you.”
Kaliss had had enough. Lurching forwards, he grabbed the front of the black robe that the Sylva was wearing; noses almost touching, he ground out “Tell me what is going on!”
Seeming completely unfazed by the sudden violence, Ryndaele stared back into the human’s eyes. “I think you want to let go of me now, Kaliss,” he murmured.
A slight thread of danger through the quiet words made Kaliss let go.
“Better. Now, Ryn is a suitable way of addressing me, although you will not find the same informality in others of our group. Our leader, for example, will always be Kinroc Faergaldan to you. And it was wise that you let go of me, for others among us would have slain you for that alone.”
“Now, about your predicament. Tell me, thief, what do you want in life?”
Taken completely off kilter by the sudden change in conversational topics, Kaliss answered, his words dripping with sarcasm. “Enough money to buy myself a title at the Court of Ryar, a diamond the size of my head, let’s see, a pet dragon, a river of gold… hell, while we’re wishing for things, maybe to find out what’s going on?”
Ryn began to move through the warehouse, leaving Kaliss to trail after him. “We could get you those things, Kaliss. Perhaps not the diamond or the river of gold. But certainly money, if that is what drives you. Women? We could provide those too, of such beauty as you have never seen.”
Kaliss’ mind turned to Sayela, his thoughts like an open wound, and found that he suddenly could not speak. Suddenly, he felt alone, surrounded as he was by a score of people, and he was able to do nothing more than draw in a ragged sigh.
“Ah yes, we know about her. She was here with you.” At the thief’s sudden glare, Ryn laughed. “Oh, yes, we knew you were here. How surprised you looked when you burst in here, to find nothing.”
Their pace quickened and the Sylva seemed to become more animated as he talked. “You possess an ability, Kaliss, one which we have never seen. Malketh, the head of the venomous snake you call Theria, seeks to use you in some way, and perhaps he has threatened or hurt you, but we seek to be fairer.”
Kaliss raised an eyebrow. Evidently the Sylva were not as up-to-date as they hoped; they didn’t know about the explosive strapped to his wrist, nor what task Malketh had set him to. He had an inkling that he would not still be breathing were they aware of that piece of information.
“We Sylva are fighting a war on the front lines, and we are winning. We know that you are a potential threat to us, so the Council of Thirteen have sent us to offer you anything you want, within reason, to stay away from us.”
Understanding dawned on Kaliss. “A bribe. You mean to bribe me to stay away.”
Ryn winced a little at the blunt language, but nodded his agreement. “Yes, if you wish to couch it in those terms. Call it an advance reward, if you want, for a mission well done; that mission being to simply live your life away from Sylvanasher and out of the war.”
The wheels in Kaliss’s mind began to spin; if these Sylva meant to simply take him to the place where the Radiant Emera was sure to be stored, why not go with them? Malketh had ensured that Kaliss could not double-cross him, at least not without bloody reprisal, and travelling with a group of trained warriors was sure to be safer than alone…
He came to a decision. Sticking out his hand, the thief grinned at the Sylva.
“One thing though,” the thief said, as they shook hands. “I said I wanted a pet dragon. You didn’t say I could have that.”
“I didn’t say you couldn’t, either,” replied Ryn, before turning away from the Thief’s widening eyes.

Shaking his head in disbelief, Kaliss turned his stare onto the rest of the warehouse. They had arrived at the northern edge of the warehouse. It was comprised of one single shared space divided up into thirds, pretty much as Kaliss had seen it. The impossible inside field lay to his right, the desks in the centre and the two sparring warriors continued their bout. The sticks they were using blurred as they were swung impossibly fast, yet there was very little sound, as if each strike didn’t quite make contact.
“You have questions. Ask them.”
It was difficult to sort through the many questions that he did indeed have, but finally he asked “The field, how does it work? What is it?”
Ryn turned his head towards the gently waving crops. “That is a crop of what you humans would call corn; we have modified it and given it the ability to grow inside. It provides us with sustenance, for a handful of corn to us is the equivalent of one course of a meal for you. We also use it to make flour which we use to bake nommas-bread.”
Kaliss tried to assimilate all the new words and ideas as Ryn explained further. It seemed that the Sylva were either decades ahead of humans in areas such as farming and cross-pollenation, or alternatively they were gifted magicians with a bent towards nature-magic, or ergnul as they called it.
“The field will be harvested tomorrow morning for our journey. All this that you see around you will be gone by dawn tomorrow, ready for our departure.”
“Why are we not leaving until tomorrow? You’re apparently able to move around the city under the noses of the King’s Army, why not just walk out now, or for that matter, attack the palace?”
Ryn fixed those eyes onto Kaliss. “That is not our way. You will discover this in the coming weeks. For now, be content to know that we are finishing several research projects that could only be achieved here, in Theria.”
Kaliss began to feel uncomfortable staring at Ryn’s eyes. Hastening to change the subject, he gestured to the workers at the desks. “Their robes, they’re all identical. How do you tell who is who? I can only see the Kinroc because his head is uncovered…”
Ryn gestured to the two warriors, who were stripped to the waist. “Normally speaking, we dress as they do, a simple kilt, although we have armour for our upper body. You will see that as we travel, too.”
The fight appeared to be reaching a crescendo, and now there was audible the sound of wood striking wood, each man seeking an opening in the other’s defence. The wood became a blur as it was swung around in arcs too fast for the human eye to track, a sort of swinging dance that involved both warriors rotating around each other and on the spot. Suddenly the fight was over, one wooden training sword lying across a neck, the other set against a groin. For a heartbeat, both Sylvan men were still, then they separated, holding their swords up to their faces in some kind of salute. They walked to the edge of the fighting area and picked up two of the black robes, calmly put them on and blended in with the workers seamlessly.
Moving to the nearest desk, Kaliss took in the strange sight, a man apparently working inside the back of a man’s head, but a man only three feet tall. On closer examination it was some sort of mechanical construct, cleverly designed to look humanoid and covered with a pinkish type of leather.
“What about this, what am I seeing?”
Ryn gestured to the mannequin. “This is not of our creation; it is a small ergling we found wandering in the sewers, something powered by the will of an erg-man.”
“You keep mentioning this erg- word as if you expect me to know what it means.”
“You would call it magic, human. The twisted energies of nature, bound to serve you. Your grasp on the powers of this world is a cruel one.”
“But you yourselves use magic; this whole place is shielded, yes? When we came in, something was done to us that made us visible to you and invisible to everyone else, right?”
Ryn nodded soberly. “Indeed. We are currently half a second away from the human city, slightly out of sync and thus invisible, as they will never quite catch us up.”
“But then, you have the ability to move in time? Why not just stop the war, make it so you won?”
“Time has laws, inflexible and unbreakable. We can change the course of the river from our current position, affecting the land downstream, but we cannot return upriver, for that would destroy all that we hold dear.”
“What about that desk over there, then, what’s happening there?”
“That is a communication stone for visual contact. We use them for…”

Ryn’s patience was apparently endless, and Kaliss continued to ask questions until the sun had set. Finally, the figures in the warehouse, apparently working on unspoken signals, all set their tools aside and began to retreat towards the walls where simple hammocks were strung up. Ryn directed the thief back to the corner where his mattress lay.
“You will sleep now, as will we all. We will leave in about nine of your hours, and the journey will be long. Use this time wisely.”
Sleep suddenly crashed down on Kaliss like a club swung at the back of his neck and in complete exhaustion, he lay down and fell instantly asleep. His boots twitched every so often as he dreamed, strange dreams of a woman with a mirror for a face, a beach and a tall shadowy person.


*    *    *

Wheeling a gurney through the silent halls in the Royal Barracks, Private Beck was inwardly fuming. His confrontation with Malketh earlier that morning had crowded out all other concerns, and for the first time he had told his superior that he was ill, giving him the day to himself. Indeed he was sick, with a fury that absorbed him completely. Just over a year ago he had had wealth and status, but now, through the single command of a powerful man, he was nothing. Malketh’s position as Principal Magician gave him unparalleled power over the King’s armed forces, but he almost never used it; the military forces of Theria were more used to getting their commands from the OverGeneral; that man theoretically reported to Malketh but the King took personal charge, much to the magician’s relief. Kaliss, though, Kaliss…
Beck’s career had been nothing but success until his fateful meeting with Kaliss. As a raw recruit nine years before, he had dazzled his superiors with the quality of his decisions and his ability to take the initiative. In particular when, on a training exercise, his unit had been attacked by a large swamp-wyvern, he had stepped into the command position when their sergeant had been wounded. When the unit had returned with the head of the wyvern, it was only natural for Beck to be recognised and decorated. From there, it had been almost too easy; each member of the King’s Army had to spend a portion of their time working on developing new uses for magic, as well as training their current skills, and a breakthrough in the field of medical research magic had seen him promoted again; finally he had been sent to the front and, unlike most, had returned with all his limbs and his mind intact, even managing to capture a mid-level Sylvan Roerhin, equivalent to a Lieutenant. But Kaliss; the man’s name echoed in Beck’s thoughts, the sight of his face on every attacking Sylvan barbarian in his memories, on Malketh’s face, on his comrades’ faces, everywhere he turned, there was the thief.

Now, he was wheeling a burned husk of a body to his private quarters. What he was about to attempt would, he hoped, find him solace from the ever-increasing echos in his mind. Somehow in the flurry of demotions he had managed to hang on to the two rooms he had earned as a Captain. The tapestry, the ornate painting by famed artist d’Nellacio, all of Beck’s fine objects had gone, the room laying bare; wheeling the gurney, its contents covered by a green sheet, into the middle of the room, Beck sat for a moment on the edge of his bed. His mind was beyond the whirl of emotions that might be expected of someone who fell so far, so fast; just the single image of a thief, laughing, laughing at him, at Beck. Closing his eyes, the man saw again the scene as Malketh, somehow sporting a darker-haired and squarer face, told him he was useless, that he was lucky to be just a Private, that his efforts were wasted and his skills were dust.
“Kalisssss…”
Beck looked up in shock; it was as if the voice had come from the very air around him. He glanced at the object he had just wheeled in; perhaps it had come from that.
The gurney lay in the middle of a circle delicately inscribed circle designed to focus magical energy. Getting up, Beck crossed to the gurney and, in a single dramatic motion, snatched the sheet off to reveal what lay underneath. The body of a naked woman was revealed. Dirty feet lead to legs with a week’s growth on them, lithe thighs with only one or two lesions on them, a small pubic mound with a few wisps of ginger hair, a flat stomach leading to pert breasts and, finally, the face, a charred husk with the skull visible at several points. Black and grey lumps of flesh dangled tenuously from the cheekbones, the lips, nose and ears were totally missing and only the mass of ginger hair, somewhat singed, remained to show that this was the body of Sayela.
The chest was moving up and down slowly, breath rasping in the vocal chords; the small wax seal, affixed over the body’s heart with the symbol for air stamped into it, was the only outward sign of the magic that was keeping her heart pumping, blood circulating to the brain and oxygen filling the lungs.

Stepping over to the small table under the shuttered window, Beck lifted the only object there, a fist-sized piece of silver. This had cost him most of the money he had available, and he had no intention of wasting it. Laying the orb on the chest of the naked Sayela, Beck stepped out of the focus circle and gently willed a little energy into it. Although he had been stripped of rank, there was no known way to take a magician’s powers, and he was still in possession of all of his puissance. There was a faint scent of ozone as the circle snapped into life. Beck sat, cross-legged, closed his eyes and sent his will into the magic inside him. Half an hour later the single candle burned down, leaving the two bodies silent in the room. The only movement in the room was the slow rise and fall of their chests as they breathed.