Aonarach looked at him without a trace of emotion on his face. “I imagine you’ll discover everything you need to know about them without my aid, more particularly the ones created by that mage watching the front gates. I don’t think you have a bloody clue who you’re dealing with or what he truly wants.”
“Am I to assume that you do?”
“Must I say it?”
“I think you would feel better about it if you did.”
There, more friendly words instead of unfriendly fingers wrapped around the throat. Good deed accomplished.
Aonarach reached out and clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Sometimes, friend, we are far less important in the grander scheme of things than we believe. And I believe that is my cue to, as you would say, make an elegant exit stage left.”
Acair was torn between feeling flattered that his words had made such an impression on the lad and being overcome with frustration that he hadn’t beaten out of that self-same lad the details he’d needed. He leaned back against the stone because it seemed wiser to do that than stagger artistically into the nearest leather chair. He watched his recent tormentor leave the library, pulling the main door shut behind him, then considered what he’d just heard.
Less important than he believed?
That was offensive. There was a very long line of people who wanted him dead, beginning with that wee fiend’s grandfather. Of course he knew he wasn’t always topping everyone’s list of mages to slay before luncheon, but that could have definitely gone without being said.
He walked over to a sideboard placed just close enough to the fire for the distance between a fine glass of whisky and a comfortable place to settle in to be not unmanageable, poured himself something from the decanter there, then tossed it back without bothering to sit. It hardly began to properly address the insults to his pride, but as tempting as another few fingers of what he suspected was Gairnish brew might have been, he would do better to be in possession of most of his wits. For all he knew, he might run across someone who didn’t want him dead—apparently there were more of those lads making lists than he suspected—and he would want to scold them for their lack of good taste whilst having a full complement of slurs at his disposal.
He accompanied himself to a chair with a few bitter curses and retrieved the pair of books he’d brought with him from under the seat cushion there. He’d been fighting a gnawing feeling that his grandmother’s map held secrets he would want to know sooner rather than later, but he forced himself to set it aside for when the whisky had taken full effect.
The second book was the one the king had foisted off onto him, that poorly chosen collection of lesser mages going about decidedly lesser deeds. If only the king had dog-eared a page or two that had intrigued him, the evening’s task would have been more easily accomplished. But things were as they were, which left him doing all the dirty work, as usual.
There was unfortunately no bookmark loitering between any of those mediocre pages, never mind any hint that he could see of anything magical having been left behind. Unsurprised but determined, he began from the beginning, giving it the proper study he hadn’t been at liberty to previously. He recognized many of the names, of course, but…
He held onto the page he had almost turned and wondered why it was that at the very moment one found something one hadn’t been expecting, the world seemed to pause and hold its breath. Usually that came about thanks to some piece of mischief he was preparing to perpetrate, which left him thinking that the book he held in his hands might just be of more worth than he’d suspected.
One can hardly fully explore the underbelly of the fouler pieces of magick-making in the Nine Kingdoms without a brief examination of those who slither in and out of tales with astonishing cleverness and an undeniably theatrical flair.
Well, that made his non-appearance on the roster even more painful, but he made a note of the author’s name to pass along to his mother just the same. Perhaps he would find himself sitting across the table from that man at some future supper where he could offer a gentle rebuke about omissions that had surely been nothing more than simple oversights.
Included on our list of mages who paired arrogance with foul deeds like another might pair a fine red wine with perfectly cooked beef is a man named Sladaiche—
“Is there anything you require, my lord Acair?”
Acair caught the book he had thrown upwards in surprise, rather thankful it had been a book and not one of the king’s very fine crystal whisky glasses. Damnation, he had had enough of slinking about like a mere mortal. Things in his life had to change.
He looked at the trembling bard standing just inside the library door. “Nay, Master Eachdraidh,” he said, wishing he sounded less hoarse and more annoyed. “I am well. Very kind of you to ask.”
Master Eachdraidh bobbed his head and retreated, looking positively thrilled to be escaping. Acair found his place again in the king’s book and had another look at the words that seemed to be glowing with a bit of their own importance.
Naturally, there was little patience for the petitions of Sladaiche, but such was the nature of the king of—
Acair blinked, then swore. Why, that was a damned smudge right there in the bloody book, just where it didn’t need to be! He scanned the pages on either side of that salacious tidbit and found that there wasn’t a single reference to the country in which that worker of perilous magic had been found. If he hadn’t known better, he would have suspected that the whole bloody world was marshaling its forces for the sole purpose of causing him grief.
He reread the pages before and after the one with the smudge—put there, no doubt, by Uachdaran himself—but still found nothing of substance. As usual, he would have to poke his nose into places it shouldn’t go and find out what he needed without help. He indulged in a hearty curse or two, then forced himself to turn another page.
Rumor has it he mistreated his horses, which earned him no affection from the stablemaster.
Horses. Of course. He should have known it would wind round to them in the end.
He considered things he hadn’t had time for earlier. First, it wasn’t possible that Uachdaran didn’t realize what he’d ordered delivered. Acair suspected there wasn’t a damned sliver of the worst quality quartz lingering in the most distant wall in his worst mine that Uachdaran didn’t hear calling his name and asking permission to be carried off in some dwarvish pouch or other.
Nay, the king knew. Why he’d thought Acair needed to have it was perhaps a much more interesting question.
Second was the strange coincidence, something he rarely believed in, that he should be keeping company with a horse miss when the apparent maker of substantial mischief had run afoul of those noble beasts…