Blood Of The Wizard (Book 1) (38 page)

Chapter 81

“Popes and paupers, all of us.”

—Halfling philosophy

__________

Friar Basil limped to the high turret atop of Covenloft Tower, visibly out of breath.  As he leaned between the stone merlons, his tattered green raiment looked all the world like an errant piece of spinach in a massive lower jaw. 

He cupped his hands to his mouth.  “Verily, liege, he burnt my feet.  I know not where he went after.”

“Oh, my.  That is your answer to me?  Monk, I’ve gathered two thousand men of the cruelest demeanor with me.  They have not slept for a week, and I dare say no one among us is in the mood for any foolery.  Now, please, if you will, tell me where he was going.”

High overhead, some blubbering faded into indiscernible prayers.  His hands were folded, looking down at the crowd of Dellish soldiers.

“My dearest liege, you know well enough of me.  My heart does not hold well in such conditions.  Could I lie to you without fainting?”

Jorigaer knew this was true.  And he was already certain the monk was telling the truth; a thorough search of the monastery had produced nothing.  He smiled sufferably, then looked up.

“Monk, if you wish for your head and your arse to be attached to the same body, you will get the both of them down here. 
Now
.”

Soon, but not soon enough, the door at the tower’s base groaned open.  The monk limped out.  Two of Jorigaer’s guards looked at their king, noticing the monk’s feet wrapped in blood-drenched bandages.

Jorigaer merely glanced down at the pavingstones as the monk was pushed to the ground.  While they kept him pinned, a third guard unwound the dressings on his feet.

“They
are
burned, my lord.”

Jorigaer looked down at the scalded, open burns.  The king adjusted his fox pelt over his tartan and grabbed the monk by a wrist.  He stood him up with a yank.  Then he walked with him, halting near a gathering throng of locals.

“Who among you can claim any real love for this man?”

There was a silence as thick as the town.

“I see,” the king groused.

As Friar Basil quivered, more and more of the villagers were gathering around him.

They closed in a bit tighter, morbidly interested in the blood-sport that was surely about to happen, the monk mumbling fast and breathy prayers.  His swollen eyes watered.  Between sudden, yelping bursts of tears, he began pleading, “My God, man!  Have mercy!  Do not leave me to these savages!”

King Jorigaer smiled slowly.  Then he tsked.  He put his hands to his lips and drew Urth, a sword supposedly forged from Tiamark’s great claws.

The monk shook, straining to remain silent as the guards once again placed him on his belly.

The king looked at him sideways and stared with a sort of bemused admiration.  He felt no pity for the monk, but there was something he liked about him.  Something he could not place.  The childish honesty of his fear, perhaps.  The way he shook like a woman.  But in the end, he shrugged, and brought the blade around his head.  He chopped downward, ripping a clean new seam down the back of the monk’s garments.

Basil squalled.  He struggled to gather the shreds around him as men to either side pulled them away, laughing. 

They looked at their king.

King Jorigaer approached and, closer, grabbed him by his thinning orange hair.  He pulled his face up.  Placed on his belly as he was, his face reddened with the mere strain of looking up.  Otherwise, the monk did not offer protest now, prostrate and nude atop the cold cobblestones.

“I beg of you.  Please be quick, my liege.”

“The silver I gave you. 
Where?
”

“In the tower.  Every reel, I swear it.”

The king let go of the hair.  He was standing over the monk, thinking for a moment.  Silence began swelling around them until there was only the sound of small birds in the distance and Friar Basil’s breathing.

Then the king lowered the blade between the monk’s buttocks.

“Every reel?”

“I swear it!”

The king laughed, goading him with the slightest penetration of the steel before he turned to the crowd.

“Behold the pink, dimpled arse of your man of God.  See how it quakes!”

Dellishmen and Arwegians laughed wildly.  Savagely.

“
Riiip
him!” someone shouted.

“Cleave his arse!”

Then there was great commotion, a torrent of wicked demands before the king held up his hand for silence.

When the quiet returned, the tip of the sword withdrew from between his rump.  He raised the sword slowly.  A dollop of blood fell from the tip and landed in the small of the monk’s back.  The king wiped it clean across the monk’s bared flesh, then put the tip into the back of his neck.  The monk, still forcing himself into stillness, began to breathe in sobs.  At Jorigaer’s nod, a couple of troops tied ropes around the monk’s waist.  They brought the same lengths around his wrists.  The other ends of the rope were tied to a large trough at a store front.  They stuffed odd bits of cut rope into his mouth, slapping him, laughing.

And the monk began squalling again.  His eyes bulged.  More of the Arwegians joined now.  Next his ankles were secured.  His quaking flesh was reddening now across the legs and back.

When the guards where done, the monk could not move if he tried.

Then, stepping away from the monk, Jorigaer told them, “A chest of silver to the man with the largest fistful of the monk’s hair.”

Then he and The Dwarf in the Black Thistle Helm walked away, the monk begging after them.

And the town closed in around him.

__________

Turning back, they watched them begin to pour over him like rats on a heap of chicken fat.  Their lashing and pulling was tentative at first.  It brought only whimpers, then muted screams.  Then came more brazen yanking followed, and suddenly the ripping and clawing grew in chorus with his death-screams.

The Dwarf in the Black Thistle Helm winced, laughing.  “If he knew where the wizard was...”

“He would have said long since,” Jorigaer conceded.

The Dwarf in the Black Thistle Helm nodded.  He turned to one of his Thistle Knights.  “Give the idiots a bit more fun, then bring him to me.  I want to know everything he can tell me about this … Cullfor Stonebreaker of Gintypool.”

Chapter 82

__________

The peach line of dawn was radiant and soft to their right as Bunn poured the last of her oats into the pan.  She added some water and fried them into crisp little cakes before carefully inching them out of the pan with her smart fingers and handing them to him.

Cullfor bowed slightly, accepting each them as if they were worth a king’s ransom. 

A moment later, eating them like cookies, he suddenly felt so dangerously good that he almost forgot to split them with her.

When he did, she kissed him lightly on the lips.  It was just a peck, but it washed through him. 

Later, when they got moving, there was little conversation, just Cullfor’s boyish silence, and again he sponged up her nearly majestic ability to maintain it. At a westbound inroad to God-knows-where they turned northward.  The only sound was the thin, crystalline patina of spring snow, crisp under his boots.

.  __________

At noon, they went carefully down a treed section of road, which meandered down a long, easy hill.  At the bottom, the trees fell away, and he found they were approaching a placid sheet of water.  It was exploding with early-afternoon rays, splitting with each wave to send a cataract of sparkles ripping across it. 

And there was something else here.  A feeling.  As they walked toward the water, the feeling grew.  They approached the thin road at its edge.

There was something here.

He looked at the water, at the green stone shore.  They were on the cool wet mud of the road now.  He did not care for the look of the hill that rose to their right.  The top was too far up.  It was steep and long, and further down, it formed a mile or so of cliffs, which would be ideal for an ambush.

Abruptly, Bunn left his side and approached the water.  She bent on both knees and quickly lapped a delicate drink then sauntered back quickly.

Did she sense something too?

They looked another moment.  Her eyes moved back and forth across the water.  He let the sun play on his face, but the feeling would not go away.

As they got moving, she stayed unusually close to his side.

Toward the middle of the road, they heard something.  They turned and watched a school of fish scatter and jump.

Bunn stopped.  She shielded her eyes from the sun and stared while a sharp roil and fizz erupted from the water.  Black humps of thick rubbery skin rose, and they turned to see the humps were gliding toward them.  For a second, there was just shock.  Then, before he realized it, he was running, struggling to keep up with Bunn.

He heard a wet slapping noise.  It grows louder behind him.  Then there were more, a great watery herd splashing closer and closer until it was nearly alongside them.  He ran, breathy and tense.  He could not glance back, nor at the water.  Then Bunn fell.  He went sideways jumping over her.  When he landed, he ran between her and an oncoming horror.

He was staring at something mustachioed, almost limbless.

“Run!” he squalled.

He fell.  He grunted and rolled.  He was scampering to his feet, but he was never upright before the beast latched onto his ankle.  Thirteen feet long, the beast could have been the mating of a dragon and a whale.  It was too late to block its coming with his magic, and even with his ankle in its mouth, it was honking like some perversion of a goose.  The eyes glowed dusky ginger against the sun.

And it waddled back toward the lake with him, Bunn screaming.

“Run, woman!

He heaved and got his foot free.  He succeeded in tumbling back onto the road.  But more of the beasts were undulating toward him.  One snaked upward in a great leap and he managed to freeze it in the air before it dropped harmlessly back in.  He did the same to another, a but a third beast, one he did not see, bit him, dragging him in.  The others circled back lunged into the water alongside him.  Cullfor grabbed a large stone, but it pulled him free of it and sent him careening into the water.  He splashed down and spun.  Waist deep, he righted himself and began splashing ashore.  Then he gathered his wits and turned.  He raised his palm just in time to halt the largest of the creatures, its thrashing form flailed wildly before him.

Then, Bunn’s huge white eyes pleading to him from the shore, he raced toward her.  Too slowly.  The other beasts, free now, lunged through the water behind him.  Still he sloshed toward the rocks.  The creatures began encircling him.  He roared and held out an invisible wall to the great tightening wallow of slithering forms but the bottom fell sharply below his feet.  Everything submerged into the seething muddy water. 

Cullfor reached for the rocky ledge.  Missed. 
Damn.
 

Reached again. 

He was fighting for air already, but at last he gained his feet again.  He pulled himself atop the wet rocks, his knees grinded against the stone.

He froze.  He needed out of their element.  But one of the beasts lunged.  Shaking, he managed to pull his dirk from his boot.  It felt too late to stab, but he ripped the knife into its neck, sending it roaring back into water, blood gargling from the open and fatty slit across its throat.  The second knocked him sideways and sent him sprawling into a third.  Falling, he stabbed and missed.  But he bought himself a moment to stand, then ripped a gouge down its chest.

He turned, growling now.

The others fell back, swarming over the others’ bleeding carcass.

Cullfor climbed, panting wildly.  He ran, sloshing up onto the road.  Bunn grabbed his hand and together they limped up the cliffs.  He was bruised and exhausted.  His gaze darted toward the shore.  The creatures had already dragged the two wounded creatures under.

She put an arm around his waist, struggling with him further up the cliffs.  Here, he helped him to a flat spot.

“Lake dragons.  Nestlings.  They’re gone, my sweetness.”

“Boiling hell!” he snorted.

He put his hands on his knees and sat.  Then he flopped on his back.  There was a moment.  It was just a glance but there was an instance of utter care.  It warmed his cold feeling.  Once he had enough air, he blew a large breath.

“Gone,” he said.

“I know,” she said.  She was stroking his arm.

Together they stood and began surveying the aftermath of the insane encounter.  Everything felt dull and flat, as if in the suddenness of it all they had somehow been robbed of its meaning.

Cullfor wiped the mud off himself until he was dusting away the drying bits of frayed cloak.  He grinned, looking out at the water again.  It was choppy with a new breeze.  There no trace of the muddy disturbance the struggle had left.

“Damn,” he said.

And they began walking back down to the stony little road.

Once the long rise was behind them, they eased away from the water.  Cullfor paused once more.  He thumbed the heart-shaped gem and stood staring back down the road.

It was a long path.  But it seemed shorter from this angle.  The hill’s shadows had begun to stretch into the water.  There was no sign of the things.

He pulled out the gem and gave it a quick glance, wondering.

__________

Lady Dhal followed the Dwarf-King as he strode up into the bowels of the castle, the expertly-hewn stone trails still feeling like the boat as she struggled to keep up.  She felt ill indeed, and she wondered if this was some manner of
land sickness
. 

In time, though, the feeling eased.  She settled her mind.  As they walked, she looked at the other dwarves’ eyes.  They were fearful but calm, and in this way she tried to gain some sense of what kind of leader he was.  He seemed to induce both though, she noticed, which made it hard to judge.  That, or this dwarf was something more than royalty.

Perhaps he was the dark cruithne lord he claimed to be.

As they moved upward through the castle’s cavernous underbelly, more regular, straight walls began engulfing them.  They were traveling through parting crowds now, and he silenced their conversations like parting waves.  She tried to think of Fie again.  She wanted images of him in her mind, perhaps, if nothing else, to ground her.  The thoughts were vague, though, more like flashes of personality.  The way he never seemed to want anything, but went after so much.  The way people adored him, though he was a hermit by nature.  The way, at times, he tended to speak to others in words that were so frank they were almost mean.  But
tongue in cheek
was probably more accurate.  Without question, he had an old dog’s charm.

As they made their way into the castle proper, Bhiers was ahead of her by some distance.

He halted at the second row of doors, not turning.  But she felt him watching.

“You must be half-starved,” he said, and turned

Before she could respond, he held out a loaf of bread.  It was steaming, and smelled wonderful, but she tried to seem unsurprised by his little trick, nor overly pleased.  But it was impossible.  Shock surged under her sternum, vaporizing down into her abdomen.

She raised her eyes to him, knowing she appeared nothing less than absolutely shocked and grateful.  And Bhiers did not appear disappointed with the look.  He smiled, pulling two torches from the wall, and as he handed her one, he allowed her time with her little meal.

She grabbed it, softly, and chewed with as much self-control as she could muster.  Which was nearly impossible.  There was sausage and cheese inside.  It was delightful, almost instantly filling.  Keeping the bites in her mouth, she followed him into the warm anteroom, where he began taking off his long tunic.

Despite his dwarven size, there was something enormous about him  His rounded shoulders were visible even under the thick mail armor.  He folded the tunic and placed it on a rack.  Then he pulled down a long woolen blanket, asking her if she was cold.

She was trembling, she realized, despite the warmth.  Stepping toward the blanket, she became keenly aware of his neck and hands now.  In the torchlight, they seemed more battered, ripped with the long gouges of battle.  The skin seemed translucent, and the muscle was active underneath.

He nodded to his tunic.

“I was no wizard before I earned that.”

She wrapped herself in the blanket.

“So you
are
one now?”

He laughed.  “
Och!
  I do have my… 
qualities
.  Did the others not bring your handmaiden?”

“They did... She did not survive the journey.”

“A pity, my lady... Talent!  Come, girl!”

Footsteps pattered on the roof overhead.  There were giggles.  Soon after, a fat blonde human woman emerged from a series of stairs.

For a moment, she seemed shocked at the sight of Dhal.  Then she nodded, and bowed.

“My lady,” he said to Dhal.  “You will find your new maiden kindly and handy enough.  A good cook, she is.  And she speaks a passable Dwarvish.  She will see you to some warm water and some worthy clothes.”

Dhal looked to the door, realizing it was open.  But leaving, though permitted, was impossible.  Her stomach, among other things, would not permit it. 

“I was raised by dwarves, maiden, but my husband was from Delmark too.  You may use your own tongue.”  

Bhiers smiled the slow affable grin of a sorcerer, waving his hand slowly before her.  And even as he told her had to travel south on business, it was like a blanket was wrapping around her soul.

It was like home.

__________

Talent was, as promised, not unkind.  Nor again was she some eager girl.  Once they were upstairs, beyond sight of Bhiers, she became like a handmaiden of elder days, holding Dhal’ hand, doting over her a bit, helping her with her sea legs up the stairs.  She held the torch for her as she led her down a short hall, where she seemed to look at her with a measure of something that seemed meant to cheer her up.  A smile, almost.  There was an honest understanding there, she sensed.  Some acknowledgment of her loss, and the need to soak it in.

They passed a room, which was longer than the hall itself.  Several women looked up from a variety of chores, smiling.

Talent motioned for one of them, barking at her to do something or other downstairs.

She led Dhal past them without a proper introduction.  Before she could even acknowledge them, they were each filing in behind the first, tracing downstairs.

Dhal cocked an eye at Talent.

“Yus.  Those gurlz hof to be toad every lost ting, ya?”

Dhal smiled as they continued.

At the end of the hall was a small room.  In its center was green copper floor.  It dipped in the middle, to a circular bench.  As they entered, Dhal noticed more blankets.  Pitchers and cups.  And a gutter, which also copper.  It wound from the ceiling to a pipe with a large lever.  Talent opened it, sending a taut stream of water spilling down a second gutter, which spilled into the copper basin at the center of the room.