Scholar of Magic (Art of the Adept #3) - Michael G. Manning Page 0,92

have been the military? Lognion has obviously been preparing for this. Blake told me he had ordered a lot of weapons with silver inlay.”

“The professor said that the military maintains a separate supply since they use alchemical fire for some of their standard operations. This was bought by a private merchant in the city just a couple of weeks ago.”

“Before we knew anything about this,” muttered Will. An image flashed in his mind for a second, the vial of alchemical fire that had been thrown at the Nerrow home. It hadn’t occurred to him at the time, but the glass vial was much like the ones he had bought from Wurthaven. They were produced by a local glass blower. The alchemical fire had been made in Cerria.

Tracing the maker down through sales of vials probably wouldn’t be practical, but finding the merchant who bought the rare and dangerous white phosphorous was a sure lead. He started to say something, but Janice spoke first. “I have the merchant’s name here.” She pushed a piece of paper across the table. On it was written a name, “Factor Jorn Slidden.” It was followed by an address close to the central market in the city. “He’s a trader,” explained Janice. “He keeps a warehouse by the river docks too and does a lot of business in a variety of commodities, though he specializes in wool. White phosphorous isn’t part of what I think would be his usual business.”

Will nodded. “So he probably served as a buyer for whoever the alchemist was that produced the alchemical fire. Did Karlovic say how much he bought?”

“Something close to two hundred pounds, all that they had,” she informed him.

“That’s enough for thousands of vials,” said Will.

Blake chimed in, “When I was doing special service, we used it quite often. You can wreck a city’s hierarchy and control structure with a few judiciously placed fires. Burn out the right homes or businesses and you can sow chaos and throw the government into disarray. Use more and you can start fires so big the whole city will burn. We usually preferred not to cause massive casualties like that, since they could be politically counterproductive, but you don’t know what the enemy’s objective is here.”

“I’m starting to feel alarmed,” said Will in a dry tone.

Tiny jumped in. “You’re just now feeling alarmed? I started the other night when that thing tried to rip my face off!”

Will smiled. “I was being sarcastic.” He turned to Janice. “You found out a lot about the trader pretty quickly.”

“I skipped class. Rob was a big help too,” she answered.

“Rob?”

“Who would you ask if you want to know about the latest gossip? Plus, he knows a lot of people. He ferreted out most of the information about Jorn within the first hour of me asking. I think he feels bad about jumping down your throat the other day,” said Janice.

“Did you tell him about the vampires?” asked Will.

She shook her head. “No, but he knows something crazy is going on.”

“How?”

“Because you’re involved, and I wouldn’t answer his questions. He took everything very seriously, even though I know he must have been annoyed.”

Will felt even guiltier regarding his friend. “If you see him later, tell him I’m sorry, and next time he should come with you. I’ll explain everything to him.”

“So I should tell him about the vampires?” she asked.

He nodded, yawning. Glancing over, he could see Tiny struggling to keep his eyes open. “We should get some rest.”

Tiny got to his feet. They were both still clad in their armor. “I’ll see to our gear. You should bathe first this time.”

Will smiled. “Why don’t we all take a bath together?” Most of them frowned at that remark, but Janice’s eyes were glued to his palm, where a complex spell was slowly coming together. As he got close to completion, the structure trembled slightly on the verge of falling apart, but it stabilized again, and Will invested the turyn necessary to make it work. Seconds later, the magic expanded, taking in the room and his friends.

He was rewarded