The Telastrian Song Read Online Free Page A

something of an unknown. He seemed ordinary at first glance, but Giura was not sure of what powers the man might have. Enhanced eyesight? Night vision? The ability to sense when someone was near? Watching?
    Nerli wasn’t doing anything of note—boiling eggs from the look of it—but he was an interesting man. Giura had been hunting practitioners of magic for the better part of his adult life, and he had never seen one like this before. Back-alley conjurers, healers and conmen were Giura’s stock in trade. Small-timers, but Giura had seen tiny streams swell, flood, and wipe out all before them. One never knew which of these dabblers would make a breakthrough, find something that had been forgotten for hundreds of years. Something that would make them more of a threat to the order of things. Giura believed he was watching one such man now, a belief that filled him with fascination and fear.
    He had been on the wall for some time and it hadn’t been comfortable to begin with. Parts of his body were starting to go numb and he knew he would have to put an end to his surveillance soon.
    In the hours that he had been watching since nightfall, the man had done nothing of interest. Giura wasn’t sure if he was disappointed or relieved. His attention was drifting to his discomfort rather than his task, and he was starting to wonder if he was wasting his time. He refocused and committed himself to a few more minutes.
    The man was indeed boiling some eggs. Nothing remarkable about that. Giura was about to give up when something caught his attention. The man was not standing over a stove or a hot plate to boil his eggs. He was standing by an ordinary wooden bench, with nothing beneath it that could be responsible for generating heat.
    This was nothing especially noteworthy in itself. Giura had seen people boil water before with only the power of their mind, or their magical powers, or whatever it was they used; the boasts varied. Those people charged a silver penny for the chance to watch, but the display had always taken all of their concentration and left them exhausted. Giura usually left those ones alone. It was as much as they were capable of. This man was doing it as casually as he might pull on a pair of boots; reading from a book and only occasionally glancing at the pan of boiling water.
    Giura felt giddy at the thought. Since becoming an Intelligencier of the mage hunting variety—a mage taker, as they were popularly called—he had wondered what it would be like to face a proper mage, wishing at times for the excitement it would bring. It would be the pinnacle of his career. It could also be the abrupt end of it. Stories of what the ancient Imperial Mages could do were sparse and mingled with as much fiction as fact, but if only parts of the stories were true their powers were beyond belief.
    Faced with the possibility of realising this dream it was difficult not to feel afraid, but the fear was tinged with curiosity and excitement. He had never seen true magic before—of course he had seen the mage lamps that lined the main streets, the product of a level of skill long dead—and to see a true adept was mesmerising.
    Giura had already seen more than enough to have the man arrested and brought to the Grey Tower in chains, but there was more he could learn by observing, so he decided to delay that act. All thoughts of numbness and discomfort faded as he continued his vigil. Torture had its uses, but watching a man while he did not know there were eyes on him was a far more effective method.
    He continued to lie on the wall-top watching the man eat his eggs, and then move to a desk where he spent the next hour. Giura strained to see what he was doing, unsuccessfully. The opportunity to rummage through the man’s desk wasn’t far off, so Giura’s patience wouldn’t be tested.
    A woman and a young boy walking down the street diverted Giura’s attention—they looked like mother and child. The Cathedral’s campanile had