Read Online Mage Quest - Wizard of Yurt 3 by C. Dale Brittain - Free Book Online Page B

at least you don’t make me kiss your ring,” said Arnulf with a laugh. “Does that wait until you’re made bishop?” Joachim neither laughed nor answered the comment. “It’s good to see you,” he said instead and turned to introduce his brother to the rest of us.
    “Claudia’s eager to see you, too,” said Arnulf, “and of course the children can’t wait to meet their Uncle Joachim.” Joachim took a deep breath. “And I them.”
    We were shown to the guest rooms and told that lunch would be served in half an hour. The rooms seemed sybaritic after our weeks on the road, feather beds covered with clean white sheets, long windows curtained in blue, and plenty of hot water. An efficient serving maid unpacked our bags and took our clothes away to the laundry.
    We had been given five rooms in the guest wing, al next to each other, while the chaplain was taken off to the family wing of the house. I took the opportunity to shave my cheeks more thoroughly than I had been able to do with cold water that morning. The soap was delicately scented with lily of the valey.
    I stood by the window to dry my face, enjoying the light breeze coming through the open casements and the sight of birds hopping purposefuly across the lawn. I was distracted from a pleasant reverie by the sound of voices.
    Joachim and his brother were stroling along the outside of the house. Arnulf spoke as they came under my window. “It’s as though they’d disappeared into thin air. And nothing left—except the sign.” They continued out of my earshot without speaking again. I looked soberly after them. Sir Hugo’s party had also disappeared into thin air.
    There came a sharp knock, making me jump. “Come in!” I caled and Ascelin entered, ducking his head as he came through the doorway.
    He closed the door behind him and motioned me away from the window. “What’s going on here?” he asked in a low voice. “Is everyone here under a spel?” Startled, I probed at once for magic and found none. As my mind slid lightly along the surface of magic’s four dimensions, I could sense the presence inside the house of al our party except Joachim, as wel as many minds I did not know, but none of them was a wizard. I found Joachim and his brother down by the front door, the house guards in the courtyard and, in the stables, minds I assumed belonged to the stable boys, but that was al. I came back to myself and looked up into the prince’s worried eyes. “No one’s under a spel here. Why did you think so?” He shook his head “It must be hunter’s instincts. This whole house feels as though something has just happened or is about to happen and I don’t know what it is.” I had felt nothing of the sort, but then I was no hunter. Ascelin, I knew, had many years of experience in guessing or sensing where animals were hiding and when they would break into the open. I shook my shoulders to dispel a sudden chil that could have been prescience and could have been my imagination.
    “We should al stay close together,” said Ascelin, “and leave here as soon as we can.”
    “But we just got here,” I protested, “and Joachim hasn’t seen his family in years!” Al of us had been in high good humor this entire trip. An onset of unprecedented caution, just when we reached such a comfortable house, seemed entirely uncaled for.
    “And why did his brother want him to visit now?” demanded Ascelin.
    I was suddenly reminded of the bandits who had thought that there was something specific hidden in the silk caravan and that we, too, were looking for it. Arnulf, I knew, was involved in some way in the luxury trade with the East. Could there be, here in this house, something valuable enough to make a castelan turn outlaw?
    “I don’t know if you overheard,” said Ascelin, “the other day when we were at that inn, but several of the merchants were talking about very strange rumors coming out of the East, and I thought I heard one of them say that they