“I knew Handor was a bastard, but I never thought he’d kill Lightlings like that.” Burt shook his head, waving off clouds of blue cigarette smoke.
“Ain’t much evidence Handor knew,” said Gorm. “Seems like it was Johan’s idea from the start. It’s all there, plain as day in the documents. And now we have the bastard king by the throat!”
“Probably,” said Jynn.
“Ye think he can deny it?” demanded Gorm.
Gaist pointed to the Tandosian documents for emphasis.
“I’m aware of the evidence,” the archmage told the weaponsmaster. “But only a fool would underestimate the king.”
“We have proof!” Kaitha said.
“He has the kingdom,” Jynn countered. “The people love him. The temples see him as one of their own. The Wall is having its best run in years. They will be reluctant to give up their prosperity and security for something as insignificant as the facts.”
Gorm shook his head. “That ain’t how it works.”
“It is. I’ve lived it,” said Jynn. “For all my father’s evils, he did not kidnap Princess Marja. Yet people still tell each other the story of how Johan saved her. The public would rather have a hero for a king than a royal assassin, and contrary to what the Agekeepers say, it is public preference that writes history.”
“And the people won’t prefer his story once they hear it was him that’s been torchin’ their towns and blamin’ an imaginary dragon!” said Gorm.
“And what if the dragon is imaginary?” asked Jynn. “How many billions of giltin are invested in the Dragon of Wynspar’s hoard? What do you think happens to that gold if there is no dragon and no mountain of treasure for it to sleep on? Will the banks and their investors accept that their fortunes are invested in a lie?”
“Some things are hard for people to believe, especially if they’re true,” Heraldin added.
“But… we have proof!” Gorm protested, though the fuel had been pulled from his fire. “Every town crier would leap at the chance to holler about a scandal like this.”
“Not if the executives at the Town Crier Network are concerned about their stocks,” countered Heraldin.
“That’s madness!”
“Yes, but it’s also the norm.” Jynn retrieved the Wyrmwood Staff from a corner of his office. “We’re not saying we shouldn’t share the information you gathered, but we need to proceed cautiously.”
“Johan could claim that we are trying to frame him, to bring down the kingdom.” Heraldin steepled his fingers and stared at Jynn’s desk as though it were a thrones board. “So long as he maintains the dragon is real and we’re interlopers, the evidence won’t matter to people whose fortunes are on the line.”
The wizard ignored the commentary and began twisting reality around his fingers. “No, we cannot rush to the first town crier we find with the evidence.” The space in front of Jynn pinched into an onyx surface haloed by a faint blue corona. “We can store the evidence in this pocket dimension while we plan. Until we’ve carefully considered how to deploy this information, we must keep the evidence safe.”
“We’ll have to act soon,” said Heraldin. “If Johan knows what you took, if he has some inkling of the evidence we hold, he’ll be forced to make a move soon.”
“You think he’ll have us arrested?” asked Kaitha.
Heraldin shook his head and pursed his lips. “No. Moving against us publicly would only give us a platform, a stage to make our case. And if he felt he could risk discreetly assassinating us, he’d have attempted it long ago.”
Gaist shrugged his shoulders, then lifted his hands up in the manner of a smith offering a fine sword.
“He’s right!” gasped Heraldin.
The others looked uncertain. “He is?” asked Gorm.
“Johan doesn’t have to discredit our evidence; he needs to make sure nobody pays it any mind.” The bard grinned triumphantly. “That’s his move. He won’t waste words denying our story; he’ll just give the city a bigger one!”
Gorm shook his head. “That can’t be right. The bloody King of Andarun has been stagin’ attacks on his own people and killed one of the mages’ dignitaries for investigatin’ him. What could be bigger than that?”
“I shall lead the Golden Dawn to slay the Dragon of Wynspar!” trumpeted Johan the Mighty.
A shockwave of gasps and whispers rolled through the throne room, radiating away from the dais where Johan and his party posed. Wearing enchanted armor and triumphant grins, the Golden Dawn stood with fists to their hips and feet set apart, as if preparing for an aerobic workout. The king’s chosen heroes looked for all the world like the heroes of antiquity come to life.
Weaver Ortson was a hero of a more recent age, one where men and women of valor were better versed in stagecraft and public relations. The guild’s arch-choreographers had instructed the Golden Dawn carefully on the most inspiring poses. Staff beauticians and illusionists had applied makeup and magical glamours to each member of the party. The guild’s top illuminancers wove enchanted mists and glowing orbs around the room to ensure that the king and his fellows were put in the best possible light. Under Ortson’s direction, the guild’s combined efforts ensured they looked like legends striding in from the mists of history and tracking glory all over the present’s carpeting.
Now the guildmaster sat in the shadows behind the throne’s dais, nursing a glass of Elven white and watching the theatrics with a critical eye.
“Never before has our kingdom faced a peril like the Dragon of Wynspar.” Johan spoke with all the ostentatious solemnity of a bejeweled sarcophagus. “But never before have we had a warrior king, a slayer of necromancers and liches, a hero for the ages upon the throne! Ha haaa!”
The throne room burst into cheers. Weaver Ortson sipped his wine; he had made it something of a private game to drink whenever the king told a falsehood at these functions. In Handor’s days, the guildmaster would take a swig of whiskey or down a cocktail for each lie, but even Ortson’s battle-hardened liver couldn’t withstand the combined might of hard liquor and Johan’s mendacity. He’d even watered down the wine for this particular spectacle, and he was already well pickled halfway through the production. The king droned on, and Ortson dutifully drank.
“And though the dangers are great—”
Sip.
“I must put your safety ahead of my own—”
Sip.
“For my only ambition has ever been to serve the land and people I love!”
That whopper was worth downing the rest of the chalice. Ortson was halfway through it when a high-pitched squeal startled him into spilling the remainder. He glared at the queen through the wine dribbling down his brow.
