The Spell of the Black Dagger (2nd Edition)

by Lawrence Watt-Evans

  "Tikri?" Sarai was astonished and delighted; she hadn't seen Tikri since the day Tabaea first marched on the palace, when he had gone off to defend the overlord. She had feared he was dead, or at best driven into exile, yet here he was, apparently back at work.

  "Yes, my lady," Deran answered. "This way."

  Sarai and Karanissa followed him across the room, toward a stairway leading down. "Where are we?" Sarai asked.

  "Officers' training area, my lady," Deran answered. "Top floor of the North Barracks, in Grandgate."

  "So the city guard is back here? Everything's back to normal?"

  Deran kept walking, but hesitated before answering, "Not everything, my lady. The guard's back, all right—Lord Torrut saw to that as soon as he heard that Tabaea had given up her claim to be empress—but I wouldn't say everything's back to normal. The overlord is still aboard his ship down in Seagate— there's something wrong with the palace, something to do with the Wizards' Guild. Nobody goes in there without the Guild's permission. And Lord Kalthon…"He broke off.

  "What about my father?" Sarai demanded. "They say he's dying, my lady," Deran reluctantly admitted. "The sea journey was bad for him; they say he has a sixnight at most, even with that witch Theas tending him. But the overlord won't appoint a replacement, and we need a Minister of Justice right now, to sort out the mess. Lord Torrut's doing what he can, but… well, I wouldn't say everything's normal." He stopped in front of a door and knocked.

  The door opened, and Captain Tikri glared out angrily. When he saw Sarai, though, the anger evaporated; he smiled.

  "Lady Sarai!" he said. "You're back!" Belatedly, he added, "and you, Karanissa!"

  The two women smiled and made polite noises, but then Tikri held up a hand. "We don't have any time to waste," he said. "We need to get you to the palace immediately; the wizards have been very emphatic about that. We can talk on the way; just let me get my sword."

  A few minutes later, a party of four—Deran, Tikri, Sarai, and Karanissa—emerged from the barracks into the inner bailey of Grandgate, walking briskly; they passed through the immense inner gate into Grandgate Market, headed for the palace.

  And atop the south inner tower Tabaea leaned over the battlement, glaring furiously. She could not see faces clearly from that distance, could not be sure of the scents, but two women in aristocratic garb, accompanied by two soldiers—that had to be Sarai! She had missed them! After all this time spent searching through the absurd complexities of Grandgate's many towers, she had missed them!

  She ran for the stairs, berating herself for being overcautious. She had searched all six of the gate towers, and most of the South Barracks, but had left the North Barracks, with its hundreds of soldiers, for last.

  But of course it would be the North Barracks—that was where everything important was. She should have checked there first, despite the soldiers.

  Furious, she plunged down the stairs, in hot pursuit of the Black Dagger.

  CHAPTER 43

  Lady Sarai stared in shock and dismay through the stinking, unnatural white mist at the bubbling, steaming, swirling mass of greenish slime before her. It blocked the entire corridor, wall to wall and floor to ceiling, at an oblique angle.

  "It's slightly over a hundred feet in diameter now," Tobas told her. "It's down into the lower dungeons, and as you can see, it's consumed the rear half of the throne room, including the entire rear staircase and the corridor below. It's also eaten its way through into the passageway above, there, but hasn't reached the overlord's apartments yet."

  "And you expect the Black Dagger to stop that!" Sarai demanded, turning to face the party of magicians and soldiers jamming the corridor behind her, and holding up the knife so that everyone could see just how small and harmless the enchanted weapon looked when compared with that gigantic mass of corrosive, all-consuming wizardry.

  For a moment, no one answered; Sarai could see them judging, comparing, contrasting, considering.

  Then one of the warlocks giggled nervously.

  The giggle caught and spread, and in seconds several magicians—witches, warlocks, and even a wizard or two—were laughing hysterically. The soldiers were grinning, but not openly laughing.

  Angrily, Telurinon shushed them all; after a few moments, with the soldiers' assistance, order was restored. Then the Guildmaster turned angrily on Lady Sarai.

  "What do you know about wizardry?" he shouted. "Size is irrelevant! What matters is the strength and nature of the enchantment, nothing else!"

  "And you think a dagger enchanted by accident, by a girl who knew almost nothing of wizardry, is going to stop a spell you say can destroy the entire World, Guildmaster?" Sarai shouted back.

  "It might!" Telurinon answered, not as certainly as he would have liked.

  "I don't mink so," Sarai replied. "I think that stuff will dissolve the dagger, just as it dissolved Tobas' tapestry and everything else, magical or mundane, that it's touched."

  "And what would you suggest, then?" Telurinon sarcastically demanded. "Do you have some clever little counterspell that's somehow eluded the attention of the Wizards' Guild? We've tried everything we know; the warlocks, the witches, the sorcerers, they've all tried. The theurgists couldn't even find anything to try; the demonologists marched a score of demons and monsters in there, and it consumed them all. Nothing stops it."

  "And the Black Dagger won't, either," Sarai retorted. "Look at it!"

  "The dagger cuts all other wizardry," Telurinon insisted. "We've never found anything else that stops wizardry so completely."

  Startled, Sarai glanced at Tobas and Karanissa, then announced, "That's not true, Guildmaster, and you know it."

  Telurinon gaped. The rest of the party, soldiers and magicians alike, was suddenly absolutely silent, and Sarai could feel them all staring at her, giving her their full attention. Accusing a Guildmaster of lying, before such an audience as this…

  "I saw it myself," Sarai insisted. "There's a place in the Small Kingdoms somewhere where wizardry doesn't work; it brought down a flying castle, by the gods! That could stop the Seething Death!"

  Telurinon recovered quickly. "Oh, " he said. "Well, yes, there is such a place. We had hoped to transport the Seething Death there, in fact, but it turned out to be impossible."

  "It dissolved the Transporting Tapestry," Tobas confirmed.

  "It ate away the chunk of floor we tried to move," a warlock added.

  "It can't be moved," Vengar agreed.

  Sarai looked from face to face, trying to think. "You can't move the Seething Death," she said.

  Several voices muttered affirmation.

  "Can you move the dead area?" she asked. "As the saying has it, if the dragon won't come to the hunter, then the hunter must go to the dragon."

  For a moment, silence descended, broken only by the hissing of the Death, as everyone considered this.

  "I don't see how," Tobas said at last. "It's not a thing, it's a place. Certainly wizardry couldn't move it, since wizardry doesn't work there."

  "Witchcraft does," Sarai pointed out. Karanissa had demonstrated as much.

  "Yes, but Lady Sarai, it's a place," Tobas insisted. "Even if, say, moving that entire mountain would be enough to move it, how could you bring it eighty leagues to Ethshar? Witches couldn't do it, not unless you had thousands upon thousands of them, probably more witches than there are in the World. Warlocks could, perhaps—if they were all willing to accept the Calling. Sorcery, demons—I don't think so."

  "Not sorcery," Kelder of Tazmor agreed.

  "Nor demonology," Kallia confirmed.

  "Then can you create a new one?" Sarai demanded. "A new dead area, here in the palace?"

  Tobas hesitated and looked at Telurinon.

  "No," the Guildmaster said, quite emphatically.

  "The spell is lost," Tobas agreed.

  Intending to make a point, Sarai turned to look at the Seething Death and involuntarily found herself backing away—the wall of seething ooze had
drawn visibly nearer while she argued. Shaken, and after having moved several feet farther down the corridor, she turned back to Tobas and demanded, "You're sure of that?"

  He nodded. "The only Book of Spells that ever held it was burned, over four hundred years ago—in 4763,1 think it was." He added helpfully, "They hanged the wizard who used it."

  "But it was done by wizardry in the first place?" Sarai asked.

  Telurinon glared at Tobas.

  "Yes," Tobas said.

  "And the spell was written down?" Sarai asked.

  "By Ellran the Unfortunate, in 4680," Tobas said.' "That was when he discovered it." He smiled wryly. "By accident. Just the way Tabaea made the Black Dagger by accident. Ellran never used the spell again, but his apprentice did, and got hanged for it. And the book was burned."

  "You seem to know a lot about it," Sarai remarked.

  "It's a sort of specialty of mine, if you'll recall—I told you that," Tobas said. "It's why I was brought here in the first place. As you know, I have a personal interest—or at least, I used to."

  "If you know that much about this spell," Vengar asked, "can't you recover it somehow?"

  "If you know the true name of the apprentice, and when the spell was used," Mereth volunteered, "the Spell of Omniscient Vision ought to let me see the page it was written on. We never knew enough about the countercharm for the Seething Death, but this one…"

  "No! "shouted Telurinon. "Mereth, I forbid it! Stop and think what you're proposing! The overlord's palace, dead to wizardry? The Guild could no longer…"

  He stopped, abruptly, looking about wildly, as if realizing that he was about to say far too much in front of far too many people. Then he shouted, "No! We'll try the Black Dagger, and if that doesn't work we can evacuate the city…"

  Lady Sarai, moving as quickly as she could without her cat abilities—rabbits were quick, but not as fast in their reactions as cats—stepped up and, with her left hand, grabbed the front of Telurinon's robe. The Black Dagger, in her right hand, pressed against his chest.

  "Listen to me, Guildmaster," she said. "You and your stupid spells are destroying the overlord's palace—and maybe the rest of the city, maybe the rest of the World—and you're worrying about saving your Guild's secrets, your Guild's power? You're worried that maybe you won't be able to eavesdrop any more, won't be able to threaten the overlord with your spells and curses? That you might have to really give up meddling in politics? Well, I've got a real worry for you, Telurinon—this dagger. I don't intend to try it on the Seething Death, Telurinon—I intend to use it on you. It'll eat your soul, you know—it sucks the essence right out of you, doesn't even leave a ghost."

  She didn't know whether this was truth or lie—but right now, she didn't care. She pressed the point harder against the old wizard's chest, piercing the fabric of his robe.

  Telurinon gaped at her. "You can't do this!" he said. "The Guild…"

  "The Seething Death is going to kill us all anyway if we stay here," Sarai told him. "And besides, I don't think your Guild is on your side in this one. Has anyone tried to stop me?"

  Telurinon turned and looked.

  Tobas and Mereth and Heremon were standing there, unmoving; Heremon at least had the grace to look somewhat abashed, and Algarin had turned away rather than watch. Further back, the other magicians were watching, but showed no signs of helping the Guildmaster. The soldiers were obviously ready to cheer Lady Sarai on.

  "I don't know what spells you people are talking about," a soldier called, "but I've about had my fill of the Wizards' Guild here. If anyone harms Lady Sarai, he'll answer to me!"

  Several growls of agreement, not all from soldiers, were enough to convince Telurinon.

  "Very well," he said, "very well. We'll try the Spell of Omniscient Vision, as Mereth said, and if we can find Ellran's forbidden spell we'll try that. But if it doesn't work, Lady Sarai, then we'll try the Black Dagger!"

  "Agreed," Sarai said, stepping back and releasing the Guild-master's robe.

  "I need my scrying stone for the Spell of Omniscient Vision," Mereth said, "and I left the stone at home. Besides, I need a totally dark room, and I don't know of any in the palace."

  "Then go home and do it there," Sarai said. "I'll come with you," Tobas offered, "to write down Ellran's spell. Besides, I want to see this."

  Telurinon started to say something, but before he could speak, Sarai said, "And I think it would be best if Guildmaster Telurinon returned to the Guildhouse, wouldn't it, to see how things stand there?"

  He glared at her, then looked over the crowd of magicians and decided not to argue.

  Sarai knew she had made an enemy for life of Telurinon, but just now she really didn't care. As Mereth and Tobas headed down one corridor, circling around toward the northwest gate, while Telurinon and Heremon headed out toward the northeast and the others scattered in various directions, she just wanted to find somewhere to rest. She wondered whether her old room was safe; the Seething Death was nowhere near the southeast wing yet, where her family's apartments were, but it seemed to be spreading quickly.

  Someplace nearer a door would be better. She stopped into one of the little waiting rooms along the northeast corridor, where petitioners could prepare for their audience before the overlord.

  The place was a mess; she stared around in dismay, unable to decide whether someone had lived here during Tabaea's brief reign, or whether it had been used as a garbage dump.

  Karanissa appeared behind her. "What are you doing, Lady Sarai?" she asked.

  "I wanted to… oh, just look at this place, Karanissa!" She waved a hand at the disaster. The two little silk-upholstered benches had lost their legs and become crude beds; the pink silk itself was slashed and stained several places. The gilded tea table was on its side. Three rotting blankets were heaped on the floor, amid orange peels, eggshells, chicken bones, and other detritus.

  Karanissa looked and found nothing to say.

  Sarai picked up one of the blankets, holding it between two fingers, then used it to sweep a pile of trash out into the corridor.

  "You shouldn't bother with that, Sarai," Karanissa said. "For one thing, the Seething Death may eat this room before we stop it."

  "Before the wizards stop it," Sarai snapped, flinging the blanket aside. "Those idiots who started it in the first place! Wizards who showed Tabaea how to make the Black Dagger, wizards who started the Seething Death, wizards who wouldn't help my father…"

  "Wizards like my husband," Karanissa replied gently. "And your friend Mereth."

  "Oh, I know," Sarai said, peevishly. "Most of the wizards I've known have been good people, really. But sometimes they don't know what they're doing, and it can be so dangerous! And they talk about these stupid rules about not meddling in politics, and then that old fool Telurinon practically admitted they spy on the overlord…" She sat down abruptly, on the floor of the passage.

  Karanissa settled down beside her, and for a time the two women simply sat, side by side. In the distance Sarai could hear footsteps and voices—and the hissing of the Seething Death. She looked down at the Black Dagger, which was still in her hand, and noticed a tiny drop of Telurinon's blood on the point. She shuddered.

  "I think I really would have killed him," she said.

  "Probably," Karanissa said. "Something we all knew during the Great War was that anybody can kill, under the right circumstances. Anybody can be dangerous."

  "Even a harmless little nobody like Tabaea the Thief," Sarai said. "With this knife in her hand, she was empress of Ethshar." She shuddered. "Maybe I should have tried it on the Seething Death—at least then we'd be rid of it."

  "Why didn't you?" Karanissa asked.

  "Oh, I don't know," Sarai replied. "It just seemed like such a waste. You have no idea what it's like, Karanissa—being able to smell everything, to practically see with your nose. And seeing in the dark, like a cat, or hearing all those sounds we can't hear; being strong and fast…"

  "Are
you going to do it again, then? Kill more animals?"

  Sarai hesitated.

  "No," she said at last. "I don't need to, with Tabaea gone, and I don't like killing anything. I don't want to like killing."

  "Then what will you do with it?"

  "I don't know," Sarai replied slowly. "I'll have to think about it." She stared at the dagger for a moment longer, men looked up at Karanissa and asked, "What's it like, being a witch?"

  Karanissa tried to explain, without much success; from there, the conversation turned to what it was like to be married to a wizard, then what it was like to share a husband, and how she had come to marry Tobas, and how Alorria had come to marry him, as well. Some of this Sarai already knew, of course; me two women had talked during the long walk down the mountains, but only now did Sarai feel able to ask the questions that really interested her.

  At last, though, the conversation ran down. The daylight was starting to fade, and the hissing of the Seething Death seemed significantly closer.

  "I'm hungry, and you look tired," Karanissa said. "Would you like to come back to the inn with me for dinner and then borrow a bed?"

  "That would be wonderful," Sarai admitted gratefully. She got to her feet; the Black Dagger tumbled from her lap to the floor, and she picked it up.

  She did not sheathe it immediately, but carried it loose—not for any particular reason, but on a whim. The hilt felt curiously reassuring in her hand.

  Together, the two women strolled down the northeast corridor and out onto the plaza.

  CHAPTER 44

  Tabaea had been waiting. She had not caught up to Lady Sarai and her escort on Gate Street, Harbor Street had been crowded, and Quarter Street had soldiers patrolling it; Tabaea had not dared to jump Lady Sarai anywhere on the way. She had not dared to enter the palace, either, with all those guards and magicians about, not without the Black Dagger in her hand. Sooner or later, though, Lady Sarai would come out again; surely she wouldn't sleep in the palace with the Seething Death still there. She would go out to Serem's house, or to the barracks in Grandgate, or somewhere. Sooner or later she would be careless, would travel with a small enough escort that Tabaea would have her chance.