The Floodgate - Elaine Cunningham [45]
"Who was this 'they' you speak of?"
She responded with a shrug and a vague, milling gesture of her hands. "You know. Them."
"Tzigone." His voice was uncharacteristically stern.
"Kiva, the elf magehound."
"Ah." Basel exhaled the word on a sigh. "Well, that follows. What else did this Kiva tell you?"
"Not a thing. Unless tossing fireballs counts as conversation, we didn't exactly chat."
"I see. So from whom did you hear this name?"
The wizard's persistence puzzled her. "Andris, the jordain who has lived through the laraken's magic drain."
"Ah, yes. That tale created quite a stir." Basel propped his elbows on the table and laced his plump fingers together. "Fascinating story. A jordain shows no sign of latent magical talent, yet magic-echoes of some distant elf ancestorlies dormant within. The Jordaini Council debated whether Andris possessed magic or not, was a false jordain or true. Nor are they alone. A wizard cannot leave his own privy without encountering a philosophical debate on the nature of magic and life. The Azuthans won't solve that puzzle, but I'm eager to read their reports concerning this Andris.
"Back to the subject at hand," Basel concluded. "If I may ask, what is your interest in Keturah?"
Tzigone gestured to the portraits that ringed the room, an ever-present circle of Indoulur ancestors. "You come from a long line of conjurers. I have no family.
No one can say, 'Don't worry, your sister had a hard time with that spell, too.'
You've said yourself that my magical talents are puzzling. Maybe talking to someone who's even a little bit like me will help."
Basel leaned back and gazed at some distant point, as if he were studying one of the portraits on the far wall and measuring the worth of kith and lineage.
"A reasonable argument," he said at last, "but wouldn't it make more sense to seek out your own family, rather than a wizard with a similar talent?"
"Of course it would," she answered quickly, understanding that a disclaimer would be too blatant and obvious a lie. "Don't think I haven't tried. I even tended behir hatchlings for a while so I could learn how to read genealogy records. With all the tinkering breeders do, the records are almost as complex as the wizardgift charts."
"Very ingenious," he murmured, "but unless your forebears were eightlegged crocodilians, such efforts will only get you so far."
Tzigone hesitated, considering how much more she could safely tell even her kindly master. "I tried to get at the Queen's Registry."
The wizard stiffened. "What did you learn there?" he asked, a bit too casually.
His reaction put her into swift retreat. "Before I could find much of anything, Cassia, the king's jordain, interrupted and tossed me into a locked room."
"To which the door mysteriously opened, I suppose."
"Life is full of mystery," Tzigone agreed.
"And Cassia was murdered before she could chase you down," he added.
That was not something she liked to contemplate. Kiva used Cassia to lure Tzigone to Akhlaur’s Swamp. Tzigone lived with this as best she could. Was there more to this? Did Cassia know some secret that prompted Kiva to kill her?
Basel shook off his introspection first. "Keturah simply disappeared one day.
No one learned with certainty what became of her. Since no Halruaan likes to speak of his failures, your quest will be considered an enormous breach of protocol, and a challenge to those wizards who tried and failed. You must understand that any question you ask will be answered with a hundred more.
Forgive me, child, but can your past bear such scrutiny?"
This was no casual question in a land where traveling entertainers were viewed as frauds and pickpockets, and thievery was punished by dismemberment. "So there's nothing I can do," she said in a dull tone.
Basel studied her for a moment. "If you are determined to pursue this, perhaps Dhamari Exchelsor can help you. He was married