Lesson of the Fire Read Online Free Page B

Gematsud raised you, not me.”
    She closed her mouth. Her eyes glistening
with tears, she teleported away.
    Sven marched toward the citadel, Einar at his
heels.
    “Old lover?”
    Sven opened his mouth to
answer but changed his mind. If he knows
who she is and who she serves, he may yet turn against
me.
    “I am in no mood, Weard Schwert.”
    Sven knew he should be horrified by the day’s
activities, sick to his stomach for his behavior on the square. Two
men dead by his hands, but he felt nothing.
    It was the only way to win three consecutive
duels. My display of superhuman power today will keep other wizards
from challenging me each year. My enemies will have to find other
ways of fighting me, ways that don’t force me to give away my
weaknesses.
    Sven removed the gloves from his utility vest
and returned them to the pouch at his side. He had killed men who
had done nothing wrong before, as he protected innocent people from
the wrath of a magocrat. Horik and Solvi had deserved their
fates.
    For Marrishland, I must beat those who would
be her enemies. I must learn their strengths and weaknesses and use
that knowledge against them. Now I am the most powerful wizard in
Marrishland. I must use this position to my advantage.
    Slaves and mundanes of the Citadel stepped
forward until they surrounded him, asking his command. Sven
flinched slightly at this servility in fellow Mar.
    This, too, will I change.
    He gave them instructions patiently, asking
for food and a room. Sitting at a table before a narrow opening, he
ate the soup they brought. It was delicious and thick with meat. He
ate it in silence, noting with some sadness that it was the best he
had ever tasted.
    While many mundanes risk their lives daily
in the swamps to feed themselves, the most powerful weards do not
even have to boil their own soup.
    He vowed he would not allow such meals to
become a habit. Wild rice and laurita soup with a little meat had
sustained him all his life. There was no reason he should eat
better food than that.
    If I did, I would be no better than
Vigfus.
    When he had finished his meal, he withdrew to
his quarters to rest. He stayed awake just long enough to offer a
prayer of thanksgiving to his patrons for his success in battle
that day, and for the gifts they had given him.
     
     
     

Chapter 4
    “ The oldest Mar stories are more symbolic
than literal. Oral tradition loses details of fact in just a few
generations, replacing them with details that reinforce existing
values. When these stories are written down, it preserves them, but
traps the tales in time. As the centuries pass, the symbolic
details lose their strength as metaphors and come to be regarded as
literal facts.”
    — Weard Eira Helderza,
    Unavoidable Problems in Literature
    Sven Takraf’s dramatic victories over three
contenders for the Chair on his first day effectively ended all
formal resistance to his ascent, and he faced no further challenges
the next day. Existing political pressures, clever planning and
turns of good fortune often attributed to divine intervention
allowed him to lay the foundation for his rule after only one
forty-five day month as Mardux.
    Sven chose an ideal year to seek the Chair —
the same Duxfest when more than a dozen reds conspired with Dux
Feiglin to topple Mardux Rorik Beurtlin. Five reds died at Rorik’s
hands in two days before he fell to Ozur Betrun. Rorik’s old friend
and master duelist Weard Einar Schwert arrived from the frontier to
issue a challenge of his own.
    Volund’s allies were still implementing a
revised plan to take the Chair when Sven Takraf arrived in Domus
Palus. By the end of Sven’s first day of duels, nearly a third of
all the reds in Marrishland lay dead in the year’s battle for the
Chair. If he had not spared Weard Schwert, though, he may still
have faced more challengers. However, while the remaining reds
could not know with certainty that Weard Schwert would issue a
fresh challenge against anyone who