The Vondish Ambassador

"No one," Lar replied cheerfully. "I just like to know what's possible."

"I don't work for people who hire assassins."

"I'm pleased to hear that."

Emmis glared at his employer. Lar finished his tea.

"I'll order furniture," Emmis said.

Lar shook his head. "Visit the i

"Would they still be there in the Small Kingdoms?"

"They might be, they might not. It would depend on the i

"I can do that," Emmis acknowledged. He started to rise.

"And while you're doing that, I can go back to the Wizards' Quarter and try to find a good theurgist."

"About the door shrine?"

"That, too."

"About your mysterious hum."

"Yes."

"Someday I'd like to know what that's about."

"So would I – but I know what you mean. Eventually I may tell you."

"But not today? Not now?"

Lar studied him thoughtfully for a moment, then said, "All right."

Emmis sat down again. "You will?"

"I will. It may help you know what to ask at the i

"I'm listening."

"You understand that if you tell anyone, I will have you killed? And I won't waste time with street thugs; I'll hire a demonologist."

Emmis hesitated. "You will?"

"Yes. If a warlock, any warlock, finds out what the Empire is worried about, there will be deaths, and yours will be one of them."

Emmis considered that.

It wasn't fair, really – making it clear just how important and dangerous this was made it irresistible. His curiosity was going to drive him mad if he didn't ask.

He would just need to be very, very good about keeping his own mouth shut.

"Go on," he said.

Lar sighed, and began.

"Four years ago," he said, "Sterren, Ninth Warlord of Semma, came to Ethshar and hired some magicians to help defend Semma against her neighbors, Ophkar and Ksinallion. King Phenvel of Semma was an idiot, and had managed to antagonize both his bigger, more powerful neighbors at a time when Semma's own army was in terrible shape, and Sterren thought the only way he could survive the coming war was by breaking the tradition against using magic."

"All right," Emmis said. So far this didn't sound like any great secret.

"Well, as you might guess, most of Ethshar's magicians weren't interested in going to fight a war at the far end of the Small Kingdoms, but he found a few, and one of them was a warlock named Vond, who had started to hear the Calling and was desperate to get farther away from Aldagmor."

Emmis nodded.

"Semma was so far from Aldagmor that at first Vond wasn't much use. In fact, he was stricken with headaches. He said they were caused by a buzz, or hum, that he heard constantly, that never went away."

That seemed mildly odd, but not like any great dangerous secret. "So you want to find out why he had headaches?"

"No, no, no!" Lar waved that absurd notion aside. "You know something about warlocks, yes?"

"A little."

"You know that their power comes from a sort of voice they hear in their heads?"

Emmis frowned. "Well, not exactly a voice…"

"No, not exactly a voice. Vond called it a whisper, and said that the Calling began when you started to understand what it was saying."

"Really? I hadn't heard it that way."

"That's what Lord Sterren told me," Lar said, turning up a palm. "That there was this sort of whispering, muttering voice, or collection of voices, that warlocks drew their power from, and when they drew too much power, the whisper began to gain power over them."

"It could be," Emmis admitted. "But it isn't really a voice. There are images, aren't there?"

"I'm no warlock, but I think so, yes. Still, it's like a voice, sort of."

"Magic," Emmis said, with a wave. "It doesn't have to make sense. So it's a whispering voice that makes images, and that they draw power from. All right."

"And in Semma, Vond got headaches because of a horrible buzzing in his head that never stopped. Can't you guess what happened?"

"No." Emmis had an uneasy suspicion where this was going, but he wanted it spelled out.

"Vond discovered he could draw power from the hum, instead of from the whisper. And he thought he could use all the power he wanted without worrying about the Calling, because the buzz didn't have any words or images in it, it was just this constant flow of energy he could tap into."

A second source of magic that warlocks could use – that was a secret worth worrying about, Emmis had to admit. But it still didn't seem all that terrible. "But he got Called eventually, didn't he?"

Lar nodded. "Yes. Eventually he used so much magic, and grew so powerful, that the whisper could get at him right through the buzz. But the buzz, or hum, or whatever it is, never tried to affect him."

That would make it more appealing for a warlock, certainly. "Was this hum coming from Aldagmor, too?"

Lar shook his head. "No," he said. "We think it comes from Lumeth of the Towers."

This was begi

"Gods and demons, no!" Lar said. "Didn't you hear me tell you that we don't want any warlocks in the Empire? We don't want to control this second Source.

"We want to destroy it."

Chapter Fourteen

Emmis ambled along High Street, mulling over what Lar had told him.

It all made sense, really. Vond the Great Warlock had been as much a menace to his own people as to anyone else, and the Imperial Council really didn't want anyone taking his place. They liked being in power, with no emperor to answer to – apparently Lord Sterren, the Regent, was an easy master to deal with.

So they didn't want any warlocks in the Empire, and most particularly they didn't want any warlocks who might be able to hear the Lumeth Source, as well as the Aldagmor one. That explained why Lar had gone to see Ishta, why he had asked what kept warlocks out of Vond.

They wanted to know exactly what and where the second Source was, so they could destroy it. And they didn't want any warlocks to know anything about it, because they assumed, with reason, that warlocks would want access to this second source.

The Source in Aldagmor was obviously more immediately dangerous; everyone near it had simply vanished on the Night of Madness. Apparently they had all heard the Calling, man, woman, and child. A little farther away there had been survivors initially, but they had all become warlocks, and were either murdered by frightened neighbors, or Called not long after. Even now, anyone venturing too deeply into that area would be Called, even if he or she had not been a warlock. The southeastern half of Aldagmor was now uninhabited, as a result.

Lumeth wasn't depopulated. There were no warlocks there. There were no areas where people vanished, or where people acquired magical powers. It wasn't obvious exactly where the second Source was, or how Vond had been able to "hear" it when no one else had.

So Lar had asked Kolar where Vond's "hum" originated – and Kolar hadn't been able to tell him.

Lar was interested in where one might hire thugs and murderers because the Empire might want to hire a few and send them into Lumeth to smash that mysterious source, wherever and whatever it actually was.

He was also worried that the Lumethans might have found out that they had an immensely powerful source of magic in their country, and might be looking for ways to use it against the Empire. The Empire was just as worried that Lumeth might invade them as the Lumethans were worried that the Empire might invade them. That the Empire had at least a dozen times the population really wouldn't matter if the Lumethans learned how to use that magical power.