Murder in Halruaa

by Richard Meyers

  “Yes?” said Pryce immediately, snapping out of his shock.

  “What are you going to do?”

  “Carry on,” Covington snapped. “With style.” He acted as if absolutely nothing was wrong. “All right, my dear Wotfirr, do you have any idea what Geerling Ambersong had in mind for Darlington Bl—I mean, for me?”

  Wotfirr tried to speak but found he wasn’t up to the challenge. He shook his head vigorously.

  “Do you have any idea where this Geerling Ambersong is?”

  Gheevy shook his head again, then suddenly stopped and looked hopeful. “But I can show you where I delivered the ale and grog,” he offered. “He might be close by.”

  Covington wasn’t impressed. “Let me guess,” he said aridly. “The Mark of the Question?”

  Gheevy’s mouth dropped open. “That’s incredible!” he burbled. “How did you know that?”

  “Rudimentary, my dear Gheevy,” Covington said airily, waving away the question with mock refinement. Then he abruptly leaned toward the halfling. “Where do you think I found this cloak?” he asked, then murmured, “Among other things …”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  Instead of answering, Pryce fell miserably to his knees. Unable to remain oblivious any longer, he let despair wash over him, driving him to his elbows, his face in his hands. For a time, the only sounds in the grotto were Covington’s groans. Finally, cupping the side of his head, he looked over at the halfling. “I wonder … can I trust you?”

  The halfling straightened to his full height, his chin rising. “Never trust a person by his words,” he intoned. “Only by his actions. You will note that I have not, and will not, turn you in. I will not have your death on my conscience for what I believe was an entirely innocent act.” He nodded with certainty. “I believe your remorse and confusion to be genuine.” Then he smiled kindly, with a small twinkle in his eye. “As is my pity for you, poor man.”

  Pryce rose to his knees. “Thank you. I try. Now, would you mind doing me a small favor?”

  “What have you gotten me into?” Gheevy Wotfirr complained into the night upon seeing the two corpses.

  “Nothing!” Pryce insisted, motioning for the halfling to keep his voice down. “I just need your advice.”

  “Well, then, my advice is not to have involved me in the first place!” the halfling retorted. “Oh dear, oh, dear. This is just awful!”

  They had left Lallor under the cover of moonlight and the shadow of ale barrels. “Good friends” Gheevy Wotfirr and Darlington Blade had passed below the eye at the gate, carrying refreshments for their mutual friend and Blade’s teacher, Geerling Ambersong.

  “But what if Inquisitrix Lymwich tries to follow us?” Gheevy had worried. “Or tries to get a wizard to track our steps?”

  “I’m counting on Blade’s … I mean, my reputation to make her think that any attempt would be futile. If Lallor is truly Halruaa’s exclusive retreat, most of the wizards will be staying at vacation castles. I hope they’re not interested in being bothered. Besides, they would hardly dare to show up the city’s primary mage.”

  His reasoning had seemed logical enough, and all went well until they reached the tree. Then the halfling became a trifle unreasonable.

  “Do you know who that is?” Wotfirr wheezed, pointing excitedly at the second man.

  “Don’t tell me,” Pryce replied sarcastically. “I’m keen to guess.”

  “It’s Darlington Blade!”

  “Shush!” Covington pleaded, then tried to distract the excitable halfling by pointing at the first man. “Do you know who that is?”

  To Pryce’s surprise, Wotfirr said matter-of-factly, “Oh, that’s just Gamor Turkal. But what are we going to do about—”

  “Just Gamor Turkal?” Pryce interrupted. “What’s so unimportant about Gamor Turkal?”

  “Well, if you must know,” Wotfirr began hesitantly, “Turkal wasn’t exactly well liked around here. No one, myself included, could understand why Mage Ambersong insisted that he be treated with such deference and respect. Turkal certainly didn’t treat anyone else that way.”

  Covington nodded with recognition. Given the situation, he could well imagine Gamor acting arrogant. “But he was my partner,” Pryce said somberly. “And when your partner is killed, you’re supposed to do something about it.”

  Wotfirr let that sink in for a moment, then replied helplessly, “Okay. What?” It was the halfling’s turn to drop to his haunches and put his head in his hands. “I promised not to turn you in,” he said miserably, “and I can’t, I won’t, have your punishment on my conscience … but, oh, if only the Council of Elders weren’t so intractable in their laws!”

  Pryce felt sorry for the little man, so he tried to find a way out for both of them. “Gheevy, I brought you here because I have to know what is possible and what isn’t. Gamor was hanging by his neck from this branch.” He pointed at the bent branch of the tree. “And Darlington Blade was sitting right there, leaning against the trunk.”

  “Where?” Gheevy asked.

  “Here,” Covington replied, showing him. “Do you think it’s possible that somehow Gamor accidentally killed Darlington Blade and hanged himself in remorse?”

  “What?”

  “Well, it sort of fits,” Pryce said defensively. “Gamor does some incredibly stupid thing that gets Blade killed, and rather than face the wrath of Geerling Ambersong, he hangs himself.”

  “But how does that explain the mage’s disappearance?”

  Pryce looked at him blankly for a few seconds, then continued. “All right, how about this? Geerling takes one look at the scene and realizes that Gamor has caused Darlington’s death and has killed himself. The mage is so devastated by the death of his student that he wanders away, overcome with grief. And remember, it was Ambersong himself who insisted that Gamor be treated with respect, so the mage would also feel remorse at his own complicity in the death of his favorite disciple. It would be enough to drive anyone over the edge.”

  For a moment, Wotfirr stared with disbelief into Pryce’s hopeful face, and then his expression turned sour. “The Council of Elders and the inquisitrixes would never believe that Gamor Turkal could do such a thing.” The halfling shook his head sadly. “Handsome? Yes. Smooth-talking? Yes. But intelligent enough to kill Blade on purpose or stupid enough to kill Blade by accident …?” The halfling looked helplessly up at Pryce. “Besides, where’s your proof? Was there a suicide note? They’re not going to simply accept our word for it, you know.”

  Pryce recognized the truth of the halfling’s words. “I could try to find Geerling Ambersong,” he mused. “He couldn’t have gone far.…”

  “But what if you’re wrong?” Gheevy pointed out “What if you find him and that’s not what occurred? What happens to you then?”

  Covington thought about it and didn’t like the conclusions he reached. As before, the odds were just too great. “Good point,” he said, sitting down disconsolately next to the halfling. He considered his situation for a short time, hardly enjoying the cool, clean night air. “There’re only four things I can do,” he concluded. “One, run and take my chances.”

  “You wouldn’t stand a chance,” said Wotfirr ruefully.

  “True,” said Pryce. “There’re only three things I can do. One, find Geerling Ambersong and beg for mercy.”

  “Not much hope of that,” said Wotfirr. “On either count, I’m afraid.”

  “Also true. So there’re only two things I can do. One, stay and continue the impersonation, hoping nobody finds me out”

  “And Geerling Ambersong never returns,” Wotfirr reminded him.

  “And Ambersong never returns.”

  “Unlikely,” the halfling commented. “Besides, from what you told me, you nearly were caught twice in the tavern.”

  “True again.” Covington sighed. “So there really is only one thing I can do.”

  “And what is that?” Wotfirr asked curiously.

  “Find some
proof,” Pryce said flatly, leaning back against the tree’s tangled network of aboveground roots. Suddenly he froze in place as he spotted something close to the tree trunk. “What’s this?”

  “What’s what?” Gheevy inquired, leaning back.

  “Look here, Gheevy, in the space between these roots.” Pryce turned over on his hands and knees and gripped a loop of a root that rose from the loose dirt.

  “What is it, Blade?” Wotfirr inquired, straining to see what had so interested Covington.

  Pryce looked up at the night sky and then down again. “This afternoon’s storm probably washed away any other evidence we might have found, but these roots form what amounts to a tiny protected cave. And look here, in the mud.”

  Wotfirr used his halfling sight to good effect, peering among the roots as closely as he could. “It’s a footprint of some kind.” Pryce’s mood lifted. “No,” Gheevy corrected himself, “a paw print of some kind.” Pryce’s mood sank.

  “Wait a minute,” Covington said, inspired. “What kind of paw print?”

  “I—I can’t quite make it out. I don’t recognize it.”

  “Let me see,” Pryce insisted, maneuvering to get a better angle. He held onto the upturned roots like handlebars and stuck his head, upside down, between the roots.

  “It’s a footprint and a paw print,” the halfling marveled in Pryce’s ear.

  “By all the electrum in Maeru,” the bogus Blade said. “It’s a jackalwere print!”

  “What is a jackalwere doing this far south?” Pryce wondered aloud as they made their way northeast from the city.

  “How would I know?” Wotfirr complained. “I only said I’d never seen a footprint like that before. I didn’t say I knew anything about the blasted creature’s migratory habits!”

  The halfling was worried, and not just because he was carrying Gamor Turkal’s body across his shoulders. The weight was no problem—Wotfirr was used to hauling heavy kegs of ale—but they were moving farther and farther away from the safety of Lallor’s walls. “If we must search for this jackalwere lair, must we also carry around this—” he paused and cringed at the term he couldn’t avoid using “—this dead weight?”

  “I told you,” Covington admonished him, carrying the other body on his own back. “We can’t take the chance of anyone else coming upon this living proof of my true identity!” He grimaced at his extremely poor choice of words. “Well,” he corrected himself, “not living proof, I suppose. Anyway, if we are to discover the truth of the matter, we can’t afford to wait until tomorrow to find the jackalwere. I’ve had some experience with those beasts. They’re constantly on the move, preying on unsuspecting travelers.”

  “Oh, good,” Wotfirr moaned. “That certainly puts my mind at ease!”

  “We’re not in any danger,” Pryce said. “We’re suspecting travelers. Like all ambush artists, jackalweres prefer finding unprepared victims rather than prepared adversaries.”

  “Even so,” Wotfirr complained, “we must be mad to do this!”

  “I’m sorry, Gheevy, but we have to find a place to hide these bodies, and we have to discover if this jackalwere knows anything about their deaths. Desperate times call for desperate measures.”

  “But why—”

  “Shhhh,” Pryce suddenly instructed, slowing down as the road approached a forest of dead trees. The landscape around them was a series of small valleys interspersed among low hills. Trees were plentiful, but their bare, empty branches looked like the fingers of starving men clawing at the sky. There was no way a gang of marauding brigands could hide behind them, or in the coarse, briar-lined bushes that covered the hills. But the foliage would be perfect for smaller creatures.

  The two heard a low moan coming from around a curve in the road just ahead of them. Pryce leaned over to whisper. “It sounds like a traveler in distress.”

  Wotfirr peered into the murk. “I don’t see anyone,” he said, stepping forward.

  Pryce hastily held him back with a single outstretched palm. Then he placed a forefinger to his lips. Silence did not reign long.

  “I say,” came a clipped, civilized voice from the gloom ahead. “I say, is someone there? I seem to have fallen and twisted my ankle. Can you help me?”

  Concerned, Gheevy hopped to Pryce’s side. “Let me see if I can help this fellow,” he said. “He sounds harmless enough, and he’s obviously in great pain.”

  “You will do nothing of the sort,” Covington said quietly.

  “But my family knows of certain healing ways,” the halfling retorted. “Let me put my burden down and supply some aid—”

  “The only thing you will supply is this evening’s repast,” Pryce snapped. “And that burden, as you call it, is probably the only thing keeping you from being set upon immediately.”

  Gheevy opened his mouth to reply, but quickly shut it tight.

  “I say,” the voice continued. “I’ve twisted or broken my ankle or some such. Dash the luck. Can anyone give me a hand?”

  “What a shame,” Pryce called ahead. “Sadly, our hands are full at the moment”

  “Really?” came the smooth reply from the darkness. “How awfully inconvenient for us both. Well, let’s see if I can—” there was some painful grunting and authentic-sounding moaning—“manage to regain my feet.… Ah, there we are.”

  The two reluctant body snatchers heard an ominous shuffling coming toward them.

  “I say, I do hope you won’t mind my accompanying you for a short way. Perhaps I could be so bold as to request some guidance? Perhaps you might even deign to allow me to lean on one of you fine examples of humanity for some slight support?”

  The person who appeared to them out of the night was the most benign-looking gentleman imaginable. He had a long, sympathetic, somber face, the kind you might find on an understanding uncle who would always offer you his shoulder to cry upon. His wardrobe had at one time been elegant, but now it was a bit frayed, like that of a traveler slightly down on his luck.

  “Greetings,” he said bravely, favoring his right leg. “Please allow me to introduce myself. The name is Cunningham, and I am but a humble vagabond who wants nothing more than to be on my way and of no bother to the likes of you gentlemen.”

  “Greetings,” Pryce replied. “You may call me Darling, and I’m told I’m delicious in a Halarahh wine sauce.”

  The old gentleman stiffened, his dark eyes suddenly piercing as he turned his gaze on Gheevy. “What is your associate talking about?” he said intently.

  “I’ll be cursed if I—” the halfling started to say, looking up.

  “Don’t look him in the eye!” Pryce cried, but it was too late to warn him of the creature’s magical gaze now. Wotfirr’s vision grew cloudy, his eyelids slammed shut, and his small, squat form crumbled to the ground beneath Gamor Turkal’s cadaver.

  The change that came over the self-styled Cunningham raised the hair on the back of Pryce’s neck. Then the entire scene changed enough to raise the hair all over Covington’s body.

  The wounded man’s leg strengthened and straightened. He smiled … and when his lips arrived at the point where a human’s lips should stop, they kept right on going. They stretched wider and wider and never seemed to come to the end of this character’s teeth.

  Soon the smile was satanically wide, but still the lips kept stretching and curling, and the teeth multiplied like reinforcements joining a battle line. The bottom of the creature’s face distended with a wet, audible cracking sound. His nose sniffed and his nostrils flared, but instead of returning to their natural position, they remained open, growing even wider and darker.

  Cunningham had given the impression of being unshaven—the better to match his disguise as an itinerant wanderer—but now his five o’clock shadow had become a midnight thicket of coarse orange-red fur. His dark eyes had become yellow, but no less piercing. Rising from his thickening hair were two quivering cones of fur-covered flesh. His hands, too, had become much larger, and his fingernail
s now looked like steel knives.

  He snapped his head forward and back, and his appearance became completely feral. Frighteningly, his face still held the obvious intelligence of an educated human—a malevolent, dangerous, violent human, but an educated one nonetheless. Even so, he emitted a sound that was part whistle and part death rattle.

  Covington knew from experience what was coming, and he heard them before he saw them. Cunningham had called his children … full-blooded jackals, although born of a jackal mother and jackalwere father, with no human consciousness whatsoever.

  The little beasts appeared from all around Pryce, forcing their emaciated, starving bodies from the prickly brush, their skin torn from the briars. If they weren’t so dangerous, they’d be pitiful.

  There were a half a dozen in all, snarling, coiled, and ready to strike. Pryce’s eyes darted this way and that, carefully noting their positions and making sure none started to nip at Gheevy. Pryce could practically smell their hunger and resentment.

  From the moment he and Wotfirr had walked away from the Question Tree with the bodies, Pryce had been preparing himself for this eventuality, but now had to wonder whether he had the courage to get rid of these fresh corpses and elicit information from a dangerous jackalwere at the same time. At this point, he hardly had a choice.

  He waited in the center of the circle of jackals, trying not to be paralyzed with fear. To keep his fear from taking over, he kept thinking over and over, “I am Darlington Blade, master mage and hero, and I know I am in complete command here!”

  “What is that you are carrying?” Cunningham suddenly hissed. The threat inherent in his question was unmistakable, and the interruption in his thought process made Pryce freeze in place.

  “You really don’t know, do you?” Covington snapped nervously. The jackalwere was taken aback by the man’s sharp retort, but Pryce didn’t leave it at that. “That must mean that these bodies appeared at the Question Tree after your visit there.” It had to be that way. If the jackals had found these carcasses earlier, they would surely have eaten them.