Cloak & Dagger: Book II of The Dragon Mage Trilogy (6 page)

“Yes,” said Fildamir. “Almost everyone who was at our latest gathering is suffering from this illness, including me. Someone has managed to poison our food, and the clerics are helplessly trying to find a cure. We tried to isolate which foods it was that caused this outbreak, but without success.” Fildamir coughed again. “You’re fortunate that you didn’t show up, Kazin.”

“Is this illness inevitably fatal?” asked Kazin with obvious concern.

Fildamir nodded. “Everyone who was affected continues to weaken, and some have even lost consciousness. No one has reported an improvement in their health. This illness is deadly, and time grows short to find a cure.”

“Cure,” murmured Kazin. “You say the clerics are working to find a cure?”

“Yes,” said Fildamir. “But their efforts haven’t paid off yet. I’ve even contacted Arch Mage Valdez in the north in the hopes that the clerics and druids up there can help.”

North of the Old Dwarven Mountains was a land of humans and barbarians. This land was physically cut off from the rest of the human lands by the mountains. The mountains were impassable unless one could fly, and only a few magical portals connected the two realms. Kazin was the only human who was able to activate the portals, and work was being done to try to find other ways to bridge that gap. Arch Mage Valdez was an advisor to the queen of that region, and had accompanied Kazin on his previous quest in order to get to this new land. Now he was trapped there, by his own choosing. As for the queen herself, she was a druid, who had also helped Kazin on the previous quest. With magic new to the realm, the new queen, called Milena, had put in place a number of academies which determined whether any of the northern residents could cast spells related to white or grey magic. White magic was healing and defensive in nature, while grey magic was a combination of black and white magic, with black magic being offensive in nature. Grey magic was more versatile, but was considerably weaker than either white or black magic by themselves. Having skill with the different and more powerful magic of druids, the queen had also attempted to find anyone who could cast the magic of druids, but that was unsuccessful. After a decade of work, she had succeeded in finding a sizeable number of individuals who could cast white or grey magic. Most of them had the ability to cast the magic of grey mages, but amazingly, some of those people could even do some of the rudimentary druid spells as well, with limited strength, which was common to grey magic. So the training began in earnest, and Milena had made sure to have them trained in the druid magic whenever possible.

“What do you want me to do?” asked Kazin.

“You and Valdez are the only remaining arch mages that are not affected by this poison,” said Fildamir. “That means that you and he must continue to run the mage guild if we fail to survive. I want you close should it come to that. However, we’re not dead yet, so in the meantime I want you to go to the Tower of Hope to assist the clerics there in finding a cure. Keep in close contact with Valdez in case he comes up with anything. But whatever you do, stay away from the Tower of Sorcery. I don’t want you getting sick too. As far as we know, the illness isn’t contagious, but I’m not taking chances.”

“I understand,” said Kazin.

“I’ll send word to my king to send some of our healers to the Tower of Sorcery,” offered Della. “They use different herbs and techniques than your clerics do. They may be able to help.”

Fildamir nodded. “We would appreciate any help we can get. Thank you.”

“Then we’d better get moving,” said Kazin. “Time is of the essence.”

“Good luck and Godspeed,” said Fildamir. “Lives hang in the balance.”

Chapter 5

G
raf chuckled as he made his way to his favourite place - his study. Some nearby lizardmen eyed the lizardmage warily but dared not interrupt the lizardmage’s thoughts. Graf was their leader, his magical prowess a symbol of his rank. The stronger the magic, the higher the rank. Graf was the strongest of the lizardmages, so he made the rules. Few openly dared to challenge Graf’s decisions unless they had the knowledge or magical skill to back up their comments. With knowledge, they could make their point without recrimination. With magical skill, they were a force to be reckoned with if their idea was unacceptable - so they wouldn’t be rebuked to any great degree.

Ever since his brother’s death some ten years ago at the hands of the minotaurs, Graf had plotted his revenge. Not so much on the minotaurs, who were indirectly responsible for Farg’s death, but rather on the meddling humans, who had created an uprising that had resulted in the minotaurs changing sides and joining them against the lizardmen. Had that not happened, the humans would have been crushed. The human dragon mage was the one determining factor in all of that, and Graf would never forget or forgive that human for foiling his plans. Humans were the only thing standing in the way of lizardmage supremacy. If they were defeated, lizardmages could take their rightful place as the dominant species in the world. No one could stand against the superior magic of the lizardmen. The elves might resist, but without allies, their numbers were not substantial enough to face the lizardmen on their own.

Many years prior to the last war, a disgruntled human, who had failed to become a black mage due to his penchant for practising necromancy, had wandered into the mountains and stumbled upon the dark magic of the lizardmages, along with a cracked dragon orb. He had taken the orb and several manuscripts on necromancy, and escaped the mountains to come out in a realm where the humans were not familiar with magic. With the orb’s help, reasoned Graf, the human had been able to read and study the magic in those evil tomes he had stolen. Combining that with the black magic he already knew, the human had become a powerful necromancer with the ability to raise legions of undead. Those legions he had led against the Tower of Sorcery.

Finding a way to contact the lizardmages, the human had formed a tentative alliance, bringing them in on his devilish scheme. The lizardmen were to cause a distraction while he led his minions against the Tower of Sorcery. The lizardmen agreed to this, having no love for the humans and their magic either.

What the lizardmen hadn’t counted on was the delay by the undead troops to attack the Tower of Sorcery. Everything had fallen apart because of that delay, and the rest - well, that’s another story.

Graf shook his head. He shouldn’t have trusted a human, even if he had the same objective. He had lost his brother because of it. From now on, he would do things his way.

The lizardmage loosened his long ebony robe as he rounded a final bend where the entrance to his quarters lay. He produced a key, entered his home, and cast a spell, lighting all the torches on the wall simultaneously. He didn’t stop walking as he did so, heading directly for his study.

When he arrived at the study door, he removed the cowl of his dark robe, revealing his pointed green head and black, sunken beady eyes. His mouth opened slightly, displaying his white, pointed teeth. He half raised a hand to remove the protective ward on the door when he let out a short gasp. The ward was gone! Someone had broken into his study!

A low, guttural growl emerged from his throat, and he clenched his teeth in anger. Whoever had broken into his study was going to pay dearly! With vengeance, he barged into the study, a spell ready on the tip of his split tongue.

At first, he could see no one, but a slight movement at the corner of the room indicated someone was present. Without hesitating, Graf let loose with a fireball, flinging it in the direction of the intruder.

Several shrieks of different tones sounded at the same instant. Graf spun on his victim as soon as the fireball was cast, ready to do battle with the spell caster who had broken into his home.

In the next few moments a multitude of things happened. First, the fireball streaked toward its still-shrieking victim, making the intruder perfectly visible to Graf. On impact, the fireball, instead of doing damage, simply fizzled out and vanished in a puff of smoke. The intruder almost screamed at this point, one voice saying, “Nooo!”, while another voice cried, “Don’t hurt us!”

The momentary glimpse of the intruder, along with the many voices crying out at once, confused Graf enough that the next spell he was already chanting didn’t come out right. At the conclusion of his chant, the intruder stopped shrieking, and a sudden silence descended upon them - along with thousands of large, white feathers.

Graf swore and chanted two quick spells, one to stop the feathers from falling, and the other to cause the wall torches to shine even more brilliantly. His eyes narrowed as he stared at the intruder, who whimpered and cowered in the corner. Each of the heads tried to hide behind the other.

“What - who are you?” hissed Graf angrily.

“Please don’t hurt us!” wailed Frag’s voice from the middle head. “We didn’t mean to break in - I mean enter - er - it was Garf’s fault!” She spun to look at the third head.

“Shut up!” snapped Garf. “It was your idea, Frag!”

“And it was your magic that got us in here!” argued Frag.

“And you touched the dragon orb when you shouldn’t have!” growled Garf.

“So did you!” snapped Frag.

“Enough!” shouted Graf suddenly. He glanced at the table with the empty box on it and back at the hydra, who cowered in silence. “So! You came in here to snoop around and play with things that don’t concern you, eh? Magic is a complex power that novices like yourselves should treat with great caution.” He glared at the hydra. “By the way, who broke the ward on the study door?”

“Garf did,” said Frag quickly.

“Garf”s head recoiled nervously in anticipation of Graf’s wrath.

Surprisingly, Graf grinned. “Interesting! Not many magic wielders could manage that spell properly. I’ll have to change the complexity of my warding spells in the future.”

Garf breathed a sigh of relief.

Graf wandered over to his table, kicking aside feathers in the process. He examined the empty box, which had housed the damaged orb. “So, you went and touched the orb. How did it happen?”

The three heads began talking at once and Graf had to hold up a hand and command them to stop. Then he pointed at Gif’s head. “You! I take it you’re Gif?”

The head nodded. “Yes, uncle Graf,” whimpered Gif.

Graf nodded and grinned. Gif was usually hanging around his siblings. It was not unusual that the others had dragged him into this situation. Of the three, Gif was the least likely to embellish the account of what had happened. He was the honest one. “Gif, tell me what happened.”

Gif anxiously gave an account of their encounter with the orb and the transformation that had followed. “But I told them not to touch it!” concluded Gif, who regarded the others fearfully and drew as far away from them as his neck allowed.

Graf grinned as the other heads hissed at their counterpart but said nothing. He aimlessly handled the empty wooden box while thinking.

After a long, uncomfortable silence, Frag spoke up. “Are you going to change us back again, uncle Graf?”

Graf didn’t look away from his box. It was a few moments before the hydra heard the hissing indicative of laughter as far as lizardmen were concerned. Graf was laughing.

Finally the lizardmage sat down and caught his breath. He turned to the hydra. “You really don’t know what you’ve gotten yourselves into, do you?”

“What do you mean?” asked Frag.

“Can’t you change us back?” asked Gif with a trembling voice.

“No,” stated Graf coldly. “My magic cannot help you.”

“Oh, no!” wailed Frag despairingly.

Gif whimpered.

“Can you still cast spells?” asked Graf, looking at Garf’s head.

Garf shook his head sadly. “No. I tried. I haven’t even got any hands to assist my spell casting.”

“No matter,” said Graf calmly. “It probably isn’t necessary.”

“Necessary for what?” asked Frag.

“It isn’t necessary for my plan to work,” said Graf cryptically.

“What plan?” asked Garf.

Graf stood up. “You’ll see.” He turned for the door and paused on his way out. “Stay put until I return.”

“I’m hungry!” blurted Gif.

“I’ll bring back some food,” said Graf. “In the meantime, you can try to clean up all the feathers. Just don’t touch anything! I shouldn’t be too long.” He left the study and locked the door behind him. Then he exited his quarters and headed at a brisk pace for the council hall, quietly hissing in laughter.

There was a fair bit of noise in the lizardmen’s council hall as the lizardmen debated amongst themselves about recent issues and events. To the untrained ear, the sound was not much different from a snake pit full of rabid vipers.

The hall was a gigantic semicircle with elevated alcoves at the sides and end where Graf and other superior lizardmages sat or stood. Graf had the highest alcove, positioned in the middle of the others. Each of the alcoves was situated so that all of the other alcoves were visible. The only difference was that the lower-ranking lizardmen had to look up at their senior counterparts. The more common lizardmen stood in the middle of the hall, and had to turn to see each speaker above them in one of the alcoves.

Graf waited for most of the major players to arrive before rising and waving a hand for silence. A few minutes later the debating ceased and all turned their attention to Graf, waiting expectantly for him to speak.

Graf licked his lips and began. “The Tower of Sorcery has been successfully poisoned.”

There were hisses of astonishment from many in the hall. Graf grinned when he saw the number of disbelievers who had once again underestimated him.

“How did you manage that?” asked a lizardmage to Graf’s right, above the hiss of the crowd.

Graf lifted a scaly hand for silence and continued. “As I told you before, my magical power is superior to that of the humans. The slow-acting poison has been planted inside the tower, and it is only a matter of time before it takes effect, if it has not already done so.”

“How do you know they will not detect your poison?” asked another lizardman, this time to Graf’s left.