The Vacant Throne - Ed Greenwood [31]
"Worse tyrants than the king," Daragus said promptly, "hence unattractive as allies-but if their power grows apace, perhaps deadly to retain as foes, or defy for too long."
"Well, your words certainly cheer me immensely," Phelodiir of Sirlptar said sarcastically. "I grant that you've identified the players facing us quite well-but I heard no indication of a shining road to victory in what you've said. Surely you have a plan in mind."
"No, Factor, I do not," Daragus said flatly. "Half-considered dreamers' schemes for Aglirta are in part what has given us far too many years of warring barons, and let wizards become the tyrants of whim we know them as. I see no clear leader for the Vale, and no one likely to win, save perhaps the Serpent-priests-only as lurkers who survive to pick up the shards after we've torn each other apart, and not victors on battlefields or in the hearts of Aglirtans."
"So we've talked and talked," Carthel of Sirlptar said heavily, "and stand now just where we did when we first crossed the threshold of our good Lord of Sart: troubled by the state of the Vale, resolved to strike down the grasping reach of the king-and with not a step along that road agreed upon among us. So, my Lords, we're still just where we've all spent tens of years: watching the Vale torn apart by one dispute after another, while we dream of what might be, and watch our own coin and power slip away…"
"I have no great scheme," Daragus told the others. "I came here hoping the Lord of Sart had one. I find myself too unsure of the real power of the king-and wanting to see what befalls when a baron defies him. Then, perhaps, we'll know if a lion rules us, or an empty voice, or someone who can call down lightnings out of the legends that spawned him."
"Too early to declare ourselves, yes," Phelodiir agreed, "but far from too early to make preparations… We should agree on something, Lords, or all our time and daring is wasted."
"Well, then," the Tersept of Sart said, leaning forward. "Let it be thus: we agree, here and now, on another meeting-and between that day and this, we craft such schemes as seem to us to have merit, to share with each other at that moot. In the meantime, any royal herald, envoy, or messenger who comes to Sart with a hand-count or less of bodyguards will, I fear, vanish; the turmoil created by the king's own decrees and lack of law-swords has made road-brigands so bad of late. I can hardly credit that the rest of the Vale-Gilth, for example, and even Sirlptar-might be much safer. So many folk of Aglirta, after all, fear the fingers of a king they barely know…"
The three Sirl men chuckled as one. "Silken words as sharp as a sword," Telabras murmured, "and as sweet as good minstrelry. Where shall we meet, then?"
"Sirlptar," Daragus of Gilth said promptly. "Gathering there evokes the least suspicions-and I'm sure three of us at this table have power to spare, to make the meeting-place secure against royal prying. That leaves 'when.' "
Phelodiir of Sirlptar looked at their host with his brows raised in silent query, collected a silent nod from the Tersept of Sart, and said, "Well, then, let it be a month hence, the night before the Feast of Dragonfall, on the upper floor-I'll see that rooms are held-of the Windmark Wyrm inn, on Semble Street. That's just below the Tower of Lanterns, on the seaward side, nigh Orthil's Spoon."
"I know it," the Factor of Gilth said, setting down his goblet. "We're agreed, then?"
Their host nodded, and said formally, "Let us part. Be welcome again in this house."
"You truly mean that?" Factor Carthel murmured, as they rose in unison.
The Tersept of Sart regarded him for a moment, unsmiling, and then said calmly, "No. No, I don't."
"No." The wizard lifted a face adrip with sweat and murmured, "No, they left no magic behind, Lord."
The Tersept of Sart nodded and snapped, "Leave us."
After the scrape of the old mage's crutch had been replaced by the deep thud of the entry door closing, the tersept went