Vows And Honor Book 1: The Oathbound

by The Oathbound [lit]

  asked, a horrible thought occurring to her. "I mean,

  if he's really a woman now . .."

  "Bright Lady, what an awful paradox we'd have!"

  Kethry laughed, easing Tarma's mind considerably.

  "We punish him for what he's done to women by

  turning him into a woman—but as a woman, we'd

  now be honor-bound to protect him! No, don't worry.

  Under the illusion—and it's a very complete illu-

  sion, by the way, it extends to all senses—he's still

  quite male."

  She gave the horse's rump a whack, breaking the

  light enchantment that had held it quiet, and it

  bucked a little, scrabbling off into the barren hills.

  "The last of the band went that way," she said,

  pointing after the beast, "And the horse he's on

  will follow their scent back to where they've made

  their camp. Of course, none of his former followers

  will have any notion that he's anything other than

  what he appears to be."

  A wicked smile crept across Tarma's face. It

  matched the one already curving Kethry's lips.

  "I wish I could be there when he arrives," Tarma

  said with a note of viciousness in her harsh voice.

  "It's bound to be interesting."

  "He'll certainly get exactly what he deserves."

  Kethry watched the horse vanish over the crest of

  the hill. "I wonder how he'll like being on the

  receiving end?"

  "I know somebody who will like this—and I can't

  wait to see his face when you tell him."

  "Grumio?"

  "Mm-hmm."

  "You know," Kethry replied thoughtfully, "this

  was almost worth doing for free."

  "She'enedra!" Tarma exclaimed in mock horror.

  "Your misplaced honor will have us starving yet!

  We're supposed to be mercenaries!"

  "I said almost." Kethry joined in her partner's

  gravelly laughter. "Come on. We've got pay to col-

  lect. You know—this just might end up as some

  bard's song."

  "It might at that," Tarma chuckled "And what

  will you bet me that he gets the tale all wrong?"

  "Not only that—but given bards, I can almost

  guarantee that it will only get worse with age."

  Nine

  The aged, half-blind mage blinked confused,

  rheumy eyes at his visitor. The man—or was it

  woman?—looked as awful as the mage felt. Blood-

  shot and dark-circled eyes glared at him from un-

  der the concealing shelter of a moth-eaten hood and

  several scarves. A straggle of hair that looked first

  to be dirty mouse-brown, then silver-blond, then

  brown again, strayed into those staring eyes. Nor

  did the eyes stay the same from one moment to the

  next; they turned blue, then hazel, then back to

  amethyst-blue. Try as he would, the mage could

  not make his own eyes focus properly, and light

  from a lanthorn held high in one of the visitor's

  hands was doing nothing to alleviate his befuddle-

  ment. The mage had never seen a human that pre-

  sented such a contradictory appearance. She (he?)

  was a shapeless bundle of filthy, lice-ridden rags;

  what flesh there was to be seen displayed the yellow-

  green of healing bruises. Yet he had clearly seen

  gold pass to the hands of his landlord when that

  particular piece of human offal had unlocked the

  mage's door. Gold didn't come often to this part of

  town—and it came far less often borne by a hand

  clothed in rags.

  He (she?) had forced his (her?) way into the

  verminous garret hole that was all the mage could

  call home now without so much as a by-your-leave,

  shouldering the landlord aside and closing the door

  firmly afterward. So this stranger was far more

  interested in privacy than in having the landlord

  there as a possible backup in case the senile wizard

  proved recalcitrant. That was quite enough to be-

  wilder the mage, but the way his visitor kept shift-

  ing from male to female and back again was bidding

  fair to dizzy what few wits still remained to him

  and was nearly leaving him too muddled to speak.

  Besides that, the shapeshifting was giving him

  one gods-awful headache.

  "Go 'way—" he groaned feelingly, shadowing his

  eyes both from the unsettling sight and from the

  too-bright glare of the lanthorn his visitor still held

  aloft. "—leave an old man alone! I haven't got a

  thing left to steal—"

  He was all too aware of his pitiful state; his robe

  stained and frayed, his long gray beard snarled and

  unkempt, his eyes so bloodshot and yellowed that

  no one could tell their color anymore. He was housed

  in an equally pitiful manner; this garret room had

  been rejected by everyone, no matter how poor,

  except himself; it was scarcely better than sleeping

  in the street. It leaked when it rained, turned into

  an oven in summer and a meat-locker in winter,

  and the wind whistled through cracks in the walls

  big enough to stick a finger in. His only furnishings

  were a pile of rags that served as a bed, and a

  rickety stool. Beneath him he could feel the ram-

  shackle building swaying in the wind, and the move-

  ment was contributing to his headache. The boards

  of the walls creaked and complained, each in a

  different key. He knew he should have been used to

  it by now, but he wasn't; the crying wood rasped

  his nerves raw and added mightily to his disorien-

  tation. The multiple drafts made the lanthorn flame

  flicker, even inside its glass chimney. The resulting

  dancing shadows didn't help his befuddlement.

  "I'm not here to steal, old fraud."

  Even the voice of the visitor was a confusing

  amalgam of male and female.

  "I've brought you something."

  The other hand emerged from the rags, bearing

  an unmistakable emerald-green bottle. The hand

  jiggled the bottle a little, and the contents sloshed

  enticingly. The rags slipped, and a trifle more of

  his visitor's face was revealed.

  But the mage was only interested now in the

  bottle. Lethe! He forgot his perplexity, his befogged

  mind, and his headache as he hunched forward on

  his pallet of decaying rags, reaching eagerly for the

  bottle of drug-wine that had been his downfall.

  Every cell ached for the blessed/damned touch of

  it—

  "Oh, no." The visitor backed out of reach, and

  the mage felt the shame of weak tears spilling down

  his cheeks. "First you give me what I want, then I

  give you this."

  The mage sagged back into bis pile of rags. "I

  have nothing."

  "It's not what you have, old fraud, it's what you

  were."

  "What... I.. .was...."

  "You were a mage, and a good one—or so they

  claim. That was before you let this stuff rob you of

  your wits until they cast you out of the Guild to

  rot. But there damn well ought to be enough left of

  you for my purpos
es."

  By steadfastly looking, not at the visitor, but at

  the bottle, the mage was managing to collect his

  scattering thoughts. "What purpose?"

  The visitor all but screamed bis answer. "To take

  off this curse, old fool! Are your wits so far gone you

  can't even see what's in front of you?"

  A curse—of course! No wonder his visitor kept

  shifting and changing! It wasn't the person that

  was shifting, but his own sight, switching errati-

  cally between normal vision and mage-sight. Nor-

  mal vision showed him the woman; when the rags

  slipped a little more, she seemed to be a battered,

  but still lovely little toy of a creature—amethyst-

  eyed and platinum-haired—

  Mage-sight showed him an equally abused but far

  from lovely man; sallow and thin, battered, but by

  no means beaten—a man wearing the kind of smol-

  dering scowl that showed he was holding in rage by

  the thinnest of bonds.

  So the "curse" could only be illusion, but a very

  powerful and carefully cast illusion. There was some-

  thing magic-smelling about the man-woman, too;

  the illusion was linked to and being fueled by that

  magic. The mage furrowed his brow, then tested

  the weave of the magic that formed the illusion. It

  was a more than competent piece of work; and it

  was complete to all senses. It was far superior to

  anything the mage had produced even in his best

  days. In his present condition—to duplicate it so

  that he could lay new illusion over old would be

  impossible; to turn it or transfer it beyond even his

  former level of skill. He never even considered trying

  to take it off. To break it was beyond the best mage

  in Oberdorn, much less the broken-down wreck he

  had become.

  Eyeing the bottle with passionate longing and

  despair, he said as much.

  To his surprise the man accepted the bad news

  with a nod. "That's what they told me," he said.

  "But they told me something else. What a human

  mage couldn't break, a demon might."

  "A ... demon?" The mage licked his lips; the

  bottle of Lethe was again within his grasp. "I used

  to be able to summon demons. I still could, I think.

  But it wouldn't be easy." That was untrue; the

  summoning of demons had been one of his lesser

  skills. It was still easily within his capabilities. But

  it required specialized tools and ingredients he no

  longer had the means to procure. And it was pro-

  scribed by the Guild....

  He'd tried to raise a minor impling to steal him

  Lethe-wine when his money had run out; that was

  when the Guild had discovered what he'd fallen

  prey to. That was the main reason they'd cast him

  out, destroying his tools and books; a mage brought

  so low as to use his skills for personal theft was no

  longer trustworthy. Especially not one that could

  summon demons. Demons were clever and had the

  minds of sharp lawyers when it came to wriggling

  out of the bonds that had been set on them; that

  was why raising them was proscribed for any single

  mage of the Guild, and doubly proscribed for one

  who might have doubts as to his own mental com-

  petence at the time of the conjuration.

  Of course, he was no longer bound by Guild laws

  since he was outcaste. And if this stranger could

  provide the wherewithal, the tools and the sup-

  plies, it could be easily done.

  "Just tell me what you need, old man—I'll get it

  for you." The haggard, grimy face was avid, eager.

  "You bring me a demon to break this curse, and the

  bottle's yours."

  Two days later, they stood in the cellar of the

  old, rotten mansion whose garret the mage called

  home. The cellar was in no better repair than the

  rest of the house; it was moldy and stank, and

  water-marks on the walls showed why no one cared

  to live there. Not only did the place flood every

  time it rained, but moisture was constantly seeping

  through the walls, and water trickled down from

  the roof-cisterns to drip from the beams overhead.

  Bright sparks of light glinted just beyond the circle

  of illumination cast by the lanthorn, the gleaming

  eyes of starveling rats and mice, perched curiously

  on the decaying shelves that clung to the walls.

  The scratching of their claws seemed to echo the

  scratching of the mage's chalks on the cracked slate

  floor.

  The man-woman sat impatiently on the remains

  of a cask off to one side, careful not to disturb the

  work at hand. It had already cost him dearly—in

  gold and blood. Some of the things the mage had

  demanded had been bought, but most had been

  stolen. The former owners were often no longer in

  a condition to object to the disposition of their

  property.

  From time to time the mage would glance search-

  ingly up at him, make a tiny motion with his hand,

  frown with concentration, then return to his drawing.

  After the fourth time this had happened, the

  stranger wet his lips with a nervous tongue, and

  asked, "Why do you keep doing that? Looking at

  me, I mean."

  The mage blinked and stood up slowly, his back

  aching from the strain of staying bent over for so

  long. His red-rimmed, teary eyes focused to one

  side of the man, for he still found it difficult to look

  directly at him.

  "It's the spell that's on you," he replied after a

  moment to collect his thoughts. "I don't know of a

  demon strong enough to break a spell that well

  made."

  The man jumped to his feet, reaching for a sword

  he had left back in the mage's room because the old

  man had warned him against bearing cold steel into

  a demon's presence. "You old bastard!" he snarled.

  "You told me—"

  "I told you I could call one—and I can. I just

  don't know one. Your best chance is if I can call a

  demon with a specific grudge against the maker of

  the spell—"

  "What if there isn't one?"

  "There will be," the mage shrugged. "Anyone

  who goes about laying curses like yours and leaving

  justice-glyphs behind to seal them is bound to have

  angered either a demon or someone who commands

  one. At any rate, since you want to know, I've been

  testing the edges of your curse to make the mage-

  rune appear. I'm working that into the summoning.

  Since I don't know which demon to call, the sum-

  moning' will take longer than usual to bear fruit,

  but the results will be the same. The demon will

  appear, one with a reason to help you, and you'll

  bargain with it for the breaking of your curse."

  "Me?" The stranger was briefly taken aback. "Why

  me? Why not you?"

  "Because it isn't my curse. I don't give a damn

  whether it's broken or not. I told you I'd summon a

  demon—I didn't say I'
d bind him. That takes more

  skill—and certainly more will—than I possess any-

  more. My bargain with you was simple—one de-

  mon, one bottle of Lethe. Once it's here, you can do

  your own haggling."

  The man smiled; it was far more of a grimace

  than an expression of pleasure. "All right, old fraud.

  Work your spell. I'd sooner trust my wits than yours

  anyway."

  The mage returned to his scribbling, filling the

  entire area lit by the lanthorn suspended overhead

  with odd little drawings and scrawls that first

  pulled, then repelled the eyes. Finally he seemed

  satisfied, gathered his stained, ragged robes about

  him with care, and picked a dainty path through

  the maze of chalk. He stood up straight just on the

  border of the inscriptions, raised his arms high,

  and intoned a peculiarly resonant chant.

  At that moment, he bordered on the impressive—

  though the effect was somewhat spoiled by the

  water dripping off the beams of the ceiling, falling

  onto his balding head and running off the end of

  his long nose.

  The last syllable echoed from the dank walls.

  The man-woman waited in anticipation.

  Nothing happened.

  "Well?" the stranger said with slipping patience,

  "Is that all there is to it?"

  "I told you it would take time—perhaps as much

  as an hour. Don't fret yourself, you'll have your

  demon."

  The mage cast longing glances at the shadow-

  shrouded bottle on the floor beside his visitor as he

  mopped his head with one begrimed, stained sleeve.

  The woman-man noted the direction his atten-