The Story of Samo-Chapter Two, Part Five
Once in the office, Samo wasted no time in asking his question. He said, “How old are you?”
Naram smirked. He set his hand on the head of a marble bust and said, “No that is an impertinent question. Fortunately, I expect no less from you.”
“Please just answer me,” Samo said.
“May I ask why?”
Samo stepped toward him and looked up—he seemed to be always looking up at people—as he squared his feet and set his hands on his hips. He said, “I don’t have to stay at this school. You’ve said yourself that I’m better than most of the teachers. You’re no idiot, and you know why I’m asking.”
“Well,” Naram said. “I can see that you have the potential to be a very dangerous man in a few years, if you are not already. I’m eighty-seven years old.”
“Then how did you meet the Inventor?” He did not move as he interrogated the man with the real power at the Academy. If this gambit of his failed, then he would be tossed out just as Lasci had been. He prayed that it would not fail. He needed this information. “Kiara has read your biography. It said you grew up in the north of Parsha. Sarenti Dacule died in the south, over a thousand miles away, and you were only seven.”
Chancellor Naram began laughing. He took his hand from the head of the bust and held his head as his laughter rose to a full bellow. Between baritone guffaws, he said, “Samo, Samo. I expected more from you. Kiara’s a bright girl, but if she has one fault, it’s that she believes everything she reads.” He moved to a bookshelf—one of the many that lined the walls of the room—and removed a small decanter of a thick brown fluid and a glass. He said, “I’d offer you some of this, but I don’t want to damage your young liver.”
“That’s all right, sir,” Samo said. “I don’t drink alcohol anyway. I stick to coffee.”
“Good for you. It’s better that you don’t-” Before he could finish his sentence, Samo interrupted him.
He said, “When did Sarenti Dacule die? Where was he? Why did the historians lie?”
Naram took a sip of the distilled liquor and puckered at the strength of it. Samo never understood why people would drink something that made them do that. Of course, he did that sometimes with coffee that was a touch to strong, so perhaps he did understand. After a second sip shortly following the first, Naram answered, “Oh, the historians did not lie. They were told lies.”
“Are you saying the Inventor faked his own death?” If this knowledge was known, things would be changed. Even if the Inventor had died at an old age that a man should die, and not gutted on a pike or blasted to pieces by the shrapnel from a cannon or rifled gun, then people would be furious. Even if Dacule hadn’t started the war, he had been a major player in it. If he had faked his death halfway through, he could have very well guided his followers to the point of affecting the outcome in ways unimaginable had he been alive. The Inventors Order would be at great risk. Many still distrusted the technology that came with it, thinking it was the work of sorcerers. People would want blood. “Sir? How old were you when you met him?”
Chancellor Naram smiled. He said, “I was a little older than you.”
“What?” Samo grabbed the edge of the desk to steady himself. Over a decade after he was supposedly killed in battle, Sarenti Dacule, one of the most hated dead men in this region, had been alive and well enough to travel. He said, “Do you know what will happen when people find out he faked his death? There are enough rumors that the Inventors are trying to secretly control the world.”
“Yes,” Naram said as he stepped forward. He cradled the glass of liquor in one hand and held the decanter by the neck in the other. He said, “Which is why it was incredibly foolish of you to admit your allegiance to their teachings earlier, while at the same time trying to attain the exact illegal writings of Dacule himself. Now, I won’t bring any repercussions on you for it, since I admire the man myself. I’m warning you, though.. Watch your step. Your master is already dead, and I doubt that you wish to join him.”
Samo said, “Do you think that his death had anything to do with the Inventors Order?”
“Tell me,” Naram asked. He took a sip and said, “Who was it that taught you about Sarenti Dacule? Who was it that taught you about the laws of physics and about the new science and the blue flame? It was Gianan. Sarenti Dacule did not invent the blue flame, or the phosphorescence of metals. He simply discovered it. For this he was thought a sorcerer, tapping into the power of hell itself. Sorcerers tend to go mad, not the kind of madness that you or I might have when we’re obsessed with our own work. It’s not even the type of madness that you are accused of having. It’s madness that shows the Fallen have taken a hold of them. Dacule did not have that madness. Even his enemies knew it, and were puzzled by it.” He stopped to drain his glass. As he filled it again, he said, “Gianan taught you about both Sarenti Dacule and the High King of Heaven. If he did not die because he was a member of the Inventors Order, it was because he was a worshiper of the High King. You are both of those things, I understand.”
Samo nodded, and remained silent.
Naram pointed his forefinger at Samo and said, “Either way, your master’s murderer will see you as a threat, and he will see Sarenti Dacule as a threat as well. War is coming.” He emptied his glass down his gullet and said, “I’m certain you came for what you wanted. You may want to have some food brought into the library if your friends haven’t done so already.”
Samo turned to the door and set his hand on the knob. He looked back at the chancellor, who was pouring himself a third glass of the viscous alcohol, and frowned. Even if he had not received the information he had come for, he would get no more out of the man. He wondered if it was his third glassful, or his fourth or fifth. Sighing, he opened the door and stepped out into the unadorned hall.
Tales of the Inventor's War 