The Morality of A Necromancer Read online

  Book 2

  Chronicles of the Martlet

  The Morality of a Necromancer

  Written by

  Elizabeth Guizzetti

  Copyright © 2018 by Elizabeth Guizzetti

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form without the prior written permission of the publisher, except brief excerpts for reviews and noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  For permission requests, email the publisher, with the subject line “Permissions” to [email protected]

  Edited by Joe Dacy II

  Cover and Interior Illustrations by Elizabeth Guizzetti

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. (Also weird. I mean really this book is about a group of elves.)

  Printed in the United States of America

  ISBN-13

  Paperback: 978-0999559833

  Ebook: 978-0-9995598-6-4

  Dedicated to Ramona

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ALSO BY ELIZABETH GUIZZETTI

  Seven Populated Realms protected by the Guild

  Cannik (Can nik)

  Watery Realm of the vodnik

  Daouail (Da o wail)

  Realm of the Daosith

  Dynion ( Di nee on)

  Realm of the humans

  Fatidel (Fat i del)

  Realm of the Fates

  Fairhdel (Fair del)

  Realm of the Fairsinge

  Larcia (Lar see a)

  Realm of the dwarves

  Si Na (See Na)

  Realm of the telchine

  *Uttalassus (Ut ta lass us)

  Technically within the Realm of Si Na.

  Land of the gnomes

  Realms not within the Guild

  Risford (Rise Ford)

  Realm of the Giants

  Widae (Wed ae)

  Realm of Dragons

  Thousands of Uncharted Realms

  Chapter 1

  A cottage in a wood, somewhere in the Realm of Daouail

  Kian only needed a mouthful of wine. Just the dregs at the bottom of a carafe would stop the pounding in his head. The thick red liquid in the bottle was too salty to be wine, but the pressure on his lips echoed the memory of it.

  Poison. Kian had tasted this blood and chemical mixture before: Master Candlewick’s healing potion. His brain screamed at the betrayal, but his mouth could not form the words. He wanted to drink. If he couldn’t have wine, poison would do. Anything to stop the burning memories.

  Above him, three faces blurred. He was back where he started in the unending nightmare of slavery. This place was a trap. The witch, her handsome nephew and the man who claimed to be his lost brother would sell him again. He would rather die than live as a slave. He wouldn’t let the witch sell him. He would kill her if he could.

  The poison burned his throat and pooled into his gut. Heat rose from the center of his being and raced through his veins. Night wind whistled through the cracks in the cottage’s stone walls, sweeping a deathly chill across his skin, but Kian was on fire.

  He screamed until his voice grew raspy.

  A cooling hand rested on Kian’s brow. He observed it was small, mostly ivory with ruddy and wrinkled knuckles.

  Larger hands gently smoothed blankets over him and bound him to the mattress with layers of rope across his chest. Eohan, if you really are Han, don’t sell me, Kian wanted to cry, but darkness took him utterly. His last sensible thought was that he would like to bite his brother and taste his blood. Maybe then he would know if Eohan was real or not.

  *

  Watching Kian’s head loll back onto the mattress, Eohan worked to ensure his younger brother’s comfort. He slipped his fingers between the thick wool blanket and the ropes. The binding wasn’t tight. It would allow Kian to easily roll over but would stop him if he tried to rise.

  Eohan tucked the blanket over Kian’s pronounced clavicle both for warmth, and so he didn’t have to witness the birdlike fragility. Kian’s scrawny chest was thinner than Eohan’s thigh. Of course, Eohan was seven years older, but had he been this small at eleven? He couldn’t remember. The brothers’ late-mother’s hazel eyes and scarred backs were the only resemblances. Eohan received his raven hair, considerable frame, and darker skin from his biological father. Though Kian was still growing, he barely brushed his brother’s massive shoulder. Kian always looked like their Pa, a lanky man with strawberry-blond hair and fair complexion. Now Kian looked half-starved, in some way stunted.

  Alana forced open the boy’s mouth. The coating of white disappeared, and the flesh became pink. Kian’s flaking lips healed. His pallor went from a sallow sickly gray to the blush of health before their eyes.

  The thick creases on the lady’s face relaxed into wrinkles; tears sparkled in her blue eyes as she wiped the sweat from Kian’s brow.

  Eohan’s heart swelled with gratitude for her compassion. He couldn’t have asked for a better master and friend. After the strange string of events that brought them together, Alana had taught and protected him. She treated him as she treated Roark, her own nobleborn nephew. She had searched the Realms -- and found -- his little brother who had been sold multiple times. She fed, clothed him and even gave the last of her healing potion. Eohan wanted to thank her for the sacrifices she made, but the words in his head sounded stupid, trite, and unworthy of the noblewoman. He was still figuring out what to say when Roark said, “We have a problem.”

  At the window, a gull squawked; a Guild mission scroll tied to its leg.

  “Hopefully, it’s a small one.” Alana wiped her eyes on the edge of her nightdress’s sleeve and went to retrieve the scroll.

  “What do we do, my lady?” Eohan asked, feeling an ache in the back of his throat. “I can’t leave him again.”

  As was the War Ender’s habit, she did not look up from the parchment. “I wouldn’t expect you too. Corwin wants a favor from me.”

  “But we did everything legally,” Roark said, tossing a crust of bread to the messenger-gull. “Who is Corwin to ask for favors?”

  “He’s the Guild House Master of Olentir and will be for many years yet,” Alana replied in her “don’t be a cumberworld” voice which she saved for the rare moments when she was irritated with one of them.

  Eohan winced, but Roark remained beside his aunt and studied the scroll.

  “Why in the lowest Realm would Corwin care about this?” Roark asked.

  “I doubt he does. I’ll learn what he cares about on the job. Keep the other two safe.” Alana wrote a short message on a piece of parchment, tucked it into the gull’s scroll tube. The bird squawked and side-eyed the bread. Roark tossed it another morsel. The gull flipped its head toward the ceiling and swallowed, bobbed its head and flew out the window.

  “Yes, Auntie, I will, but you aren’t waiting till morning?”

  Eohan hid the roll of his eyes. He hated when Roark called the great lady by a s
illy endearment -- though he only ever said it in private.

  “I should leave immediately.” Alana put an overtunic over her nightdress and gathered her saddlebags. “There’s enough food in the safehouse for a week, but keep your snares set to extend it. Once Kian wakes, he’ll need meat … I craved meat and blood after I took the potion.”

  “Yes, my lady,” Eohan said with a painful lump in his throat.

  She stretched woolen socks over her feet and laced up her boots. “I’ll return as soon as I’m able, but don’t wait for me. If you aren’t here, I’ll meet you in Eyredeir. If Kian could travel, I’d send you now.”

  Alana grasped her nephew by his elbow and whispered something else. She kissed his cheek and passed him a small bag of coin. By the roundness of the bag, Eohan did a quick mental calculation -- easily enough for travel and lodgings to Eyredeir.

  “Be well, Eohan, and keep your brother under a watchful eye.” She hurried out to the stables.

  Roark leaned against the door frame. Eohan came beside him and watched their master lead her horse into the darkness. The moonlight caught a flash of Alana’s silvery braid before she disappeared into the wood.

  “If I could kill him, I would,” Roark said.

  “What did Corwin ask?”

  “You won’t believe. She needs to rescue some slaves from her list and bring them to Sildeir instead of Eyredeir.”

  “Why?” Remembering how Corwin looked down upon him, Eohan felt a sour taste in his mouth. “Corwin doesn’t care about commoners much less slaves.”

  Roark shrugged. “Maybe for House Silba, but I don’t know. He’s up to something.”

  “Why does Corwin hate her?”

  “He doesn’t. He hates she chose to stay on the job when House Eyreid was under attack.” Roark’s eyes shut and shook his head as if he were trying to dislodge the memory. “And he hates that if he had been in Alana’s shoes, he would have made the same decision. I wish I hadn’t read his mind. It was easier to loath him before.”

  Eohan thought it was still pretty easy to dislike the House Master but didn’t say anything. “Did Lady Alana tell you anything more?”

  “She just said, ‘Only the potion is dangerous. Kian might struggle with the bloodlust. He’s still so pale.’”

  “I hoped she whispered the answer to our problems.”

  Roark shrugged. “Well, she told us to ensure Kian eats meat. I’ll check the snares in the morning. Maybe we caught a rabbit or something.”

  *

  Chapter 2

  The Muirchlaimhte

  Alana led Talia slowly eastward through the darkness of the forest. Daouail’s two moons cast dimmed beams, but the moss-covered ground was uneven with hidden rocks and roots. They were both a little too long in the tooth to survive a stumble.

  She hoped the older boys would be able to handle Kian’s needs for a few weeks, but mostly her mind was on Corwin’s request: “Who knows what Corwin wants? What if our shared grief finally reached him and he softened in his old age?”

  Talia neighed in response as she often did when Alana spoke to her in a conversational way.

  “I did not think so either,” Alana said.

  For five decades, she wandered for the good of her people and glory of her House, transfixed upon the Martlet vow. Her work as a Guild War Ender had always been secondary. She had killed and wounded uncounted to save immeasurable others. During the long years, through the many Realms, Alana wandered, her time of strength had grown thin. Her body had grown bony and tired. Her heart had become so indulgent she had rescued two common slave boys without worry of the various debts she was incurring. She feared her mind grow soft before she could repay them. Perhaps Corwin’s worried about that, too.

  “It’s unlikely Corwin wishes to train any of the children who were lost.”

  This time the mare’s neigh seemed like she was laughing at the thought.

  Corwin openly detested the Guild’s open and equal, skill-based tradition. He wanted only the nobleborn Martlets as the elfkin representatives within the Guild and did not approve of Eohan for the War Ender ranks. What if Corwin has a plan for them?

  “Maybe, I should’ve had the boys ride tonight,” she said.

  Fighting the terror she had made a mistake and should turn back to the safehouse, Alana picked her way through the boulders and moss until she came to a dirt road. She mounted her horse.

  The well-traveled road was clear on an icy night such as this. Talia cantered all the way to Gornisce, the closest city with a long InterRealm dock. She slowed to a trot in the outer village.

  Alana was briefly stopped at the city gate, but instead of announcing herself, she gave the Guild sign with the hope she would not be questioned. She wasn’t. Near the gates, the streets were mostly empty, except for beggars and urchins huddled under the eaves of buildings.

  Closer to the docks, the public houses kept their oil lamps burning, but it was late enough that their patrons had gone home or back to their ships. Alana stopped to scan the notices pinned to the wall under a low hanging eave. It was there. She wasn’t surprised but regretted leaving the boys instead of planning their escape.

  Regicide!

  Reward for the capture of two runaway Fairsinge slaves who may have information of the Empress and her consort’s death.

  Male Arena Fighter of twenty-five, name of Roson

  Black colored hair, 18 hands high and 9 hands across the shoulders.

  Male of eleven, name of Kian

  Straw colored hair, hazel eyes

  Two Daosith women wandered past in conversation, perhaps in negotiations. They did not look up at her, but Alana moved as if she were reading another notice.

  Once the two turned the corner, Alana ripped the notice off the wall, slipped it into her pouch, and set to the marina. At the end of the dock was a large wooden Expanse-faring ship, emblazoned with the word Muirchlaimhte in gold leaf on the port side. The forecastle, ending in a large bowsprit, was covered with gun boxes. Its rounded-off iron-clad, wooden hull held three decks leading to the aftcastle where the folded glass hull was battened down to allow the fresh briny air to permeate all the decks.

  She stopped at the gangplank and asked the sailor. “Alana Guild War Ender asks permission to come aboard.”

  He rang two bells and, moments later, the captain’s sixteen-year-old daughter, Nalla, hurried down the gangplank to help with Talia. Her long black braids flew in the icy darkness of pre-dawn. Nalla already had her mother’s fine brown skin and ebony hair, and, in a few years, she would have her mother’s elegance and composure. However, on that day, Nalla showed her disappointment plainly on her face as she looked past Alana though they embraced in greeting.

  “Kian came to us quite ill, but I’m sure you will see Eohan soon.”

  Nalla turned to Talia and petted her nose and nuzzled her as was the girl’s habit. “I’m glad you found Eohan’s brother and sorry he is ill.”

  “I’ll tell Eohan you asked after him; it will lighten his days. He oft thinks of you.”

  Nalla’s bright smile returned. “Thank you, Lady Alana.”

  She clicked her tongue at Talia and led her up the lower gangplank to the stables in the ship’s second deck.

  A sailor carried her bags. At the top of the gangplank, Captain Nyauail waited.

  The women embraced and kissed each other’s cheeks.

  “Corwin wastes no time,” Nyauail whispered. “But as far as I know, he doesn’t know or care I helped you with the boys.”

  “Good. I must send a message to Roark.”

  Nyauail sighed. “And you’ll tell Eohan that Nalla asked about him.”

  “You don’t approve of their infatuation?”

  “I want her to be a deck boss before I’m a grandmother.”

  “Eohan does not entertain any other, but I keep all my apprentices equipped, less I’m wandering the Realms with a moppet in tow.”

  “Nalla is equipped as well, but only the lowest Realm knows if t
hey’ll use it when the moment strikes.” Nyauail sighed deeply. “Still, if it comes to that, you need not worry; my grandchild would stay with me.” Nyauail’s white teeth flashed as the steward. Lillia, an elderly, peg-legged Daosith woman approached.

  “Nalla has a good head on her shoulders, Cap,” Lillia said. “Though, Lady, I don’t know about that boy.” The venerable woman pointed at Alana’s brow. “Ever spread your gifts around?”

  “I’ve foreseen Eohan’s future, but only in regard to Roark. As for his future with Nalla, I cannot say.” Alana asked Nyauail. “You want to know Nalla’s future?”

  “No. Nor would I believe it if you told me. The Expanse is too unpredictable. Next, you’ll be telling stories of ghost ships, unicorns dancing in sea foam, and giant white whales. Your tales are worse than any sailor’s.”

  Nyauail invited Alana for tea during the voyage and returned to work by yelling at a sailor who was trying to carry a load meant for two. Another sailor appeared in seconds.

  Lillia escorted Alana down a small flight of sternward stairs into the large Guild cabin where Bryonia, the fifty-second Martlet of House Silba, reclined on one of the built-in benches attached to the stern. At twenty-three, the woman’s gentle alabaster face had matured with smooth high cheekbones which looked as if they had been sculpted by the Goddess herself.

  Alana felt her scalp prickle. She wished she hadn’t wasted the last of the blood potion on Kian. If Byronia was half-decent with the saber on her belt, Alana could not stand against her.

  The young woman rose and inclined her blond head. “Lady Alana, your reputation has come to Sildeir as our citizens return to us as refugees. Doyenne Orla sends her regards and thanks. We weren’t sure you’d come, but my Lord Uncle said never to doubt you.”