Legends of the Dragonrealm, Vol. III

by Richard A. Knaak

  Plool was already acting.

  Cabe started toward him, hand out. “Wait!”

  The familiar hilly and, thankfully, clear terrain of western Esedi manifested before him. Despite his not having described it to the Vraad, Plool had known where to go. He could have only done so by seizing the image from Cabe’s mind.

  His relief at escaping the fog made the invasion of his thoughts almost secondary, at least for the time being. Cabe exhaled in relief and started to look for the other mage.

  He heard a gasp of pain from a voice that could only be Plool’s, then the world around him began to spin. He struggled to maintain balance, but the force tugging at him was too strong.

  Cabe was torn from the earth. Everything around him shimmered in an all too familiar way. There was a brief instant when he was surrounded by nothing. Pure nothing. The nothing was followed by a body-rending shock as the startled warlock was flattened against a rocky surface.

  It was not enough to severely injure him, but it did leave him stunned and aching for several minutes. Eventually, he tried to see where he was, but his surroundings seemed but a blur no matter how many times he blinked.

  No. Not a blur. As his head cleared, Cabe saw that it was not his vision that was at fault.

  He was back in Legar. Back on the hill near where the sorcerer from Nimth had shown him the crystalline sphere.

  What had happened to Plool? Cabe recalled the brief, agonized sound. He scanned the region, but his search was limited to a few yards at most in any one direction.

  “Gngh!” A terrible force dragged him upward. His frantic thought was that the teleportation spell was still in effect, but then he ceased moving. Cabe simply hung where he was, his arms and legs mysteriously bereft of movement. There was an uncomfortable pressure around his chest that made it difficult to draw a breath.

  “Bedlam, I do not like pain! Betray my faith, my goodwill! I have punished for less; much less have I punished for, Bedlam!”

  “Ploo-ool?” Cabe managed to choke out.

  The Vraad floated before him on a throne formed from the very mist. His round torso was tipped back so far that Plool had to practically peer over it. He was breathing hard and one hand shook. The maddening eyes were narrow in dark thought.

  “Wh-what have I done?”

  “The pain!” Plool roared. “The pain, the pain, and the pain! My very body twisted and boiled! Were I not Plool the Great, I would be dead, torn apart!” Somehow, Plool managed to lean forward. “As you shall be for my sport and vengeance!”

  “I did nothing!”

  “Lies and lies and lies and lies!”

  It was growing nearly impossible to breathe, much less speak in his own defense. “You’ve freely invaded my mind, haven’t you? Do it again, but this time seek out the truth about me! Try to prove that I betrayed you!”

  He hoped his plan, born of the second, would succeed. Otherwise, Plool would use him as he desired. A Vraad’s desire. The very notion turned his stomach. He knew the legends.

  Plool’s long, hodgepodge face leaned even closer. Was it Cabe’s imagination or was the upper eye slightly more to the other side? That was preposterous, of course, the product of his predicament. It was a moot point, anyway. What mattered was what the furious Vraad drew from his mind.

  One breath.

  Two breaths.

  Three and four, all harsh.

  The pressure on his chest eased. Slowly, both he and Plool sank toward the ground. Plool ceased descending when he was roughly a man’s length from the rocky surface of the hill. He still used the chair of mist to support his massive form. Cabe, on the other hand, was unceremoniously dumped. The gasping warlock managed to keep his balance.

  From the Vraad there was no apology, but a careful study of Plool’s insane countenance revealed to Cabe enough to satisfy him. Plool had read his mind and found what the desperate mage had wanted him to find.

  Nothing more. Cabe was certain of it now. There were things his mind held, thoughts concerning the Dragonrealm and his fears of Plool, that the searching Vraad would have surely noticed and acted upon. That he had not noticed meant that like Darkhorse, Plool had limits as to how deep he could plunder another’s mind. It was good to know. Cabe had feared that he would not have the power to direct his menacing companion’s mental search toward specific thoughts only. His mind was his after all.

  “I was in great and terrible pain, Bedlam,” the floating spellcaster hissed. His tone bespoke his condition; Cabe grew more and more interested in what had happened to him. “Terrible and great pain.”

  “I feel your pain,” Cabe returned, all politeness. “But I am not the one responsible, as you now know.”

  “Then who? Who, then, Bedlam, hmmm?”

  The Crystal Dragon? It was unlikely. Not at all like the Dragon King, if the warlock’s opinion was correct. The lord of Legar was generally satisfied with his enemies fleeing from his kingdom. He would have been more likely to take both of them and fling them farther from the peninsula, say all the way to the Dagora Forest. Still, nothing was predictable anymore. It might very well be the Crystal Dragon.

  The Aramites certainly would not have left Cabe alone, so it could not be them. He also doubted it could have been some trick of Lanith’s mages. They were not that organized.

  Could it have simply been something about Esedi itself? Or Plool even?

  Plool . . . yes, it was a possibility. He tried not to change his expression as he covertly studied the misshapen body of the Vraad. What had he thought earlier? Only in Nimth could someone like Plool be possible?

  Only in Nimth and not beyond the borders of its foul mists.

  “I don’t know,” the warlock finally responded. He despised lying, but in this case he was not certain the truth was any better. Plool might choose to believe him or he might not. Besides, there might still come a time when Cabe would need that bit of knowledge to save himself; the Vraad had already proven his instability.

  His reverie was interrupted by a look of sudden inspiration on the horrid visage. Plool’s eyes widened, then narrowed. “But I think I know who it must be . . .”

  Gods, no! If he blames Darkhorse, then the two of them could come to blows without any chance of explanation!

  It was not Darkhorse. “They will boil in their suits of black armor. Their heads I shall use for a stairway in a citadel built from their bones; from their bones a citadel will be built. Even then, I shall not let them die, death being too good for them for having caused me such pain . . .”

  Black armor. Plool had chosen the wolf raiders as his scapegoats.

  The maddened Vraad was looking directly at him again. “And you, Bedlam, will aid me; aid me you will, Bedlam.”

  It had been Cabe’s early hope that if the Aramites had truly landed on the shores of Legar, as he now knew they had, he would find some means, some allies, that would force the raiders from the Dragonrealm forever. What he had not been searching for was someone like Plool. Definitely not like Plool. To join the Vraad on his campaign of vengeance would be folly of the greatest kind.

  The Vraad was quiet for a time, but his anger by no means diminished. He was thinking, contemplating. Cabe used the time to try to clear his own thoughts. How could he steer Plool from the direction the other sorcerer was heading to one in which the Vraad chose to return to Nimth?

  The sphere! The doorway! In some ways, Plool was like a child. Cabe suspected that once turned toward the puzzle of how to open the doorway again, Plool would forget his insane vengeance on the wolf raiders. At the very least, it was worth the attempt. Plool was likely to cause more chaos than good by attacking the Aramite encampment.

  Where was the sphere? The warlock looked around. It should have been in sight. Plool had embedded it in the rock, but from Cabe’s angle it still should have been visible.

  “What do you search for?”

  “The sphere. Your doorway home. It’s vanished.”

  Plool hardly seemed put out by that
fact. “Then, I will be staying.”

  “You don’t understand . . .” Neither, in fact, did Cabe. He did, however, have a very bad feeling that his assumptions had gone astray, that he had left out something.

  He was even more certain when his feet began to sink into the hillside.

  The spell that he cast in an attempt to free himself did nothing. Cabe was not even certain that it had completed, for there was no sign of any reaction, no twinge in the magical forces that held the Dragonrealm together. The warlock looked down; the earth had already swallowed him up to his shins and it was evident that the rate of sinking was increasing.

  “Plool!” What was the Vraad doing? Watching him? Did he find this all entertaining?

  When he looked up, Cabe saw that the truth was anything but. Plool was not standing over him, merrily watching his predicament. Plool might possibly not even be standing there, although it was hard to say, for in his place there was now a vast, opaque sphere, a glimmering monstrosity taller than a man. In some ways, it resembled the sphere that Cabe had investigated, but whereas that had been a doorway, a gate, this one was more likely a prison. A prison for a dangerous and unpredictable sorcerer like Plool.

  The sphere, too, began to sink, but the struggling mage hardly cared now. He was more concerned with his own freedom, for without that he could hardly help the Vraad. His legs were now completely enveloped. At the rate he was being dragged under, he had only a minute, maybe two, to act.

  Somewhere, Cabe found the strength. Tensing, he threw himself into the spell, stretched out a hand, and pointed at an outcropping. A single magical tendril shot forth and pierced the rock. The warlock attached it to himself, creating a lifeline.

  His rate of sinking slowed, but that was not enough. Pleased with his success at casting a spell despite the malevolent mist, Cabe anchored himself in a similar manner to another outcropping. Now, his downward progress was nearly negligible. The strain on his body, however, was growing stronger by the moment. It felt as if a giant had taken him by the feet and head and was trying to tear him slowly apart like a piece of fruit. If he delayed too long, whoever sought to capture him might finally do so, but they would have to settle for half his body.

  The third tendril was easier to create and cast than the previous two and while he wondered about that, there was no time to consider the reasons. This third he bonded to a formation before him, but not in the same manner as the ones on each side of it. This one Cabe kept bonded to his hands, so that it seemed as if he were holding on to a magical rope.

  His concentration fixed upon the stream of power running from his hands to the rock, the warlock caused it to shorten ever so slightly. It did and to his joy he found that he rose a little. The strain was still incredible, but it was no worse than before. Still, he wished he could trust his abilities enough to do something else. He wished he had the time to think of something else. Yet Cabe was also aware that more complicated or stronger spells might not function as well here. More subtle spells, because they did not stir the forces as much as the greater ones, were less likely to go awry under present circumstances. His own attempt at teleportation was a fine example.

  Becoming more daring, he shortened the strand by nearly half a foot. The warlock rose by a similar height. He allowed himself a quick smile, which promptly faded as his concentration slipped and he started to sink again. Another attempt brought him back up, but the effort was beginning to take its toll. His sides ached terribly and his breath was becoming a little ragged. Cabe dared not turn his attention to Plool’s dilemma, assuming that Plool was indeed a prisoner of the sphere. He did not even know if the sphere was still visible or whether it had already sunk unchecked into the hill.

  His next attempt faltered and instead of the foot that he hoped to rise, he barely gained more than an inch. Still, Cabe persevered. As long as he continued to rise, he would eventually triumph, he told himself.

  On his next attempt, however, he felt a new force combating him. It was not magical, but physical.

  Something had clamped on to his ankles and was pulling him under with renewed vigor.

  One of the two lines linked to his body simply faded. Cabe sank to his waist almost instantly. He tried to strengthen the other one, but between his need to monitor the magical bond pulling him free and the strain on both his mind and body, the tiring spellcaster could add little. Cabe watched in frustration as whatever force had eliminated the first also caused the second to dissipate.

  The ground was already creeping up to his chest. Cabe put his entire will into the one bond that remained to him. His sinking slowed, then stopped again. He even succeeded in winning back an inch or two of freedom.

  Then, the ground behind him shook, something shot by the left side of his head . . . and Cabe Bedlam had a momentary glimpse of a massive, taloned paw just before it covered his face and, with the aid of others like it, finally pulled him underground.

  XI

  There is something different about this place.

  Sometimes, it was hard to recall that more than twenty years had passed since his last visit to Zuu. It had been before the crisis centering around Cabe Bedlam and his emergence from hiding.

  I live too long a life, the Gryphon thought not for the first time. Even the sorcerers he knew gradually aged and, if allowed, died peacefully. He, on the other hand, went on and on, fighting wars and trying to find his place in the world. Even when he had learned his own origins, learned that once his body had been that of one of the Faceless Ones of the other continent, he had not felt as if he knew who he was. There had only been two places where he had ever felt comfortable with himself. Safe. One was Penacles, which had embraced him as its leader despite his monstrous appearance.

  The other place was wherever his family happened to be. With Troia and Demion, he had known true peace of mind, even during the worst years of the war.

  Now Demion was dead and Troia, still chafing about being left behind, would someday also die.

  When would he?

  The Faceless Ones were virtually immortal; he was not so certain that he wanted to be. Yet neither was he the suicidal type.

  Reshaped to pass for human, the Gryphon walked among the inhabitants of Zuu. Things were different. There was more order, more attention. Lanith, who he recalled vaguely as a young, obstinate child, must be more ambitious than his father. The Gryphon hoped that that ambition in no way mirrored that of King Melicard. The Dragonrealm looked to be in enough chaos without two human monarchs seeking to take on the mantle of conquest the Dragon Kings had given up.

  He fingered the medallion given to him by the guards at the gate. More familiar with its like than Cabe was, the lionbird understood its true purpose. The talisman was crude, however, and so it had only taken a simple spell to adjust it so that anyone attuned to it would not notice the sudden presence of a master mage.

  Two hours of wandering Zuu’s market area had already told him most of what he wanted to know. Again, as with the talisman, he was more familiar with how the rumor and gossip system of cities worked. Cabe, for all his skills, had not lived in the lower reaches of civilization for as long as the Gryphon had. True, the human had grown up around the taverns, but there were other levels of information. He had not had to survive as the lionbird had had to do in the early days. Few, if anyone, had the sum total experience that the Gryphon had.

  And how I envy you that, Cabe.

  He saw no purpose in remaining any longer. The sun was already down and each minute he delayed added to the off-chance that one of the king’s new spellcasters might, just might, detect him. The Gryphon, like Cabe, did not want to cause an incident. He already knew of the mysterious goings-on in the city and suspected that the warlock and the demon steed had nearly been discovered. While it was possible the Gryphon would be able to call upon his role as monarch of Penacles to protect himself, it would be embarrassing to his former kingdom and good Toos to try to explain why he was skulking about in another’s domain.


  One item he had learned interested him most of all. There was some news about Legar. A dank fog had risen and those who had dared traverse the regions near the border had told of a mist so thick it was impossible to see anything. Curiously, this mist ended almost exactly at the inner edge of the peninsula, less than a few yards from where Esedi began. No one doubted it was magic, but having lived near the domain of the Crystal Dragon for so many generations, the people of Zuu were inclined to believe it was simply a step by the lord of Legar to further isolate himself from the world. After all, the fog did end before Esedi, not after. Not even the least tendril extended into those lands claimed by Lanith’s kingdom.

  It is amazing, the peace of mind some can have. The Gryphon was not so confident. To him the foul haze meant that the wolf raiders must be there, as the Bedlams had feared. That meant that Cabe might be in more danger than he was prepared for, even with the aid of Darkhorse. From experience, the lionbird knew of some of the Aramites’ deadly tricks. He knew them better than anyone and knew also that D’Farany would be plotting others.

  Abandoning his listening position at one of the danker establishments, which he still found of higher quality than many he had visited during his long life, the Gryphon sought out one of the more secluded alleys. It was time to begin following Cabe’s trail and for that he needed to perform a little magic. It would be subtle enough to escape the attention of the third-rate sorcerers who had created the talismans, but still powerful enough to accomplish its mission.

  In the darkness of the narrow street, he removed a single object from the folds of his weathered cloak. The object had been carefully wrapped in a piece of cloth so as to be affected as little as possible by his own presence. Both the cloth and what it enshrouded had come from the personal effects of Cabe Bedlam.

  He quickly unfolded the cloth and removed his prize. It was a short blade of the type used for shaving. One of the warlock’s foibles concerned shaving without the use of sorcery. Cabe’s detestation of any sort of magical alteration to his physical being amused the Gryphon at times, but in this instance it had come in handy. Metal objects were always best for this sort of spell. They had a better affinity for their user, especially mages. There were reasons why this was so, but they were of no concern to the lionbird at the moment. Finding Cabe’s trail was.