The Magehound

by Elaine Cunningham

  The elf had leave to take the Starsnake up whenever he chose, and the crew were instructed to follow his bidding and speak nothing of what they heard and whom they saw. It was among Zephyr’s tasks to gather information, and few Halruaans would not eagerly accept an invitation to fly on one of the wondrous ships. Once away from port, the visitors were quite literally captive audiences until whatever time Zephyr chose to put down. Over the years, he had coaxed amazing secrets from people who were too thrilled or unnerved by sky travel to guard their words. It was a fine arrangement, and one of the few occasions in which Zephyr felt truly in control.

  Today, however, the elf had few illusions about who commanded whom. He had taken to the skies at Kiva’s call.

  It occurred to him that the beautiful magehound had come a very long way from the bedraggled, terrified girl-child that Akhlaur’s men had dragged from the trees of the Mhair. She had been nearly insensible with shock and grief, for she had escaped the first attack upon their village only to witness the slaughter of her people. Like Zephyr, she had survived years of torture and degradation at the hands of the wizard Akhlaur. But unlike him, she had escaped Halruaa and made a life for herself. Many years later, she had returned to learn the famed magic of the land, determined to use it to right this terrible wrong. For what she had endured and all she had accomplished, Zephyr admired her.

  Recently, however, he had also begun to fear her. He wished he could explain why this was so. Wasn’t her life’s quest, grim though it was, the same as his own? Didn’t she bear the same grief and guilt over the creature that haunted Akhlaur’s swamp? Hadn’t they both sworn not to rest until the laraken was destroyed?

  The old elf squinted at the sky, cursing his fading vision as he tried to divine the nature of the small dark cloud. Yes, it was almost certainly the awaited signal. There was no lack of clouds over the lake, but most of them sailed briskly on the winds. This one sat and brooded, looking as if it wished for fingers so that it could drum them impatiently. More importantly, it lay just beyond the reach of the city’s magical wards, powerful spells that informed the city guards whenever a wizard of power approached the city. Kiva would know of these wards and keep just beyond them.

  Zephyr gave the order to the helmsman to change course and sail through the dark cloud. He went below to await his visitor.

  He felt her presence in the sudden cool mist of the cloud that enveloped the ship. He watched as the fine droplets condensed into a solid female form, a wild elf with jade-green curls and skin of deep burnished gold, an unusually pale hue for a forest elf from this clime.

  “Greetings, Kiva. You look chilled.”

  The magehound glared at him, then strode across the cabin and picked up a decanter of haerlu wine from the captain’s table. She poured a small measure of the pale golden liquid into a goblet and then tossed it back with a single swallow. She grimaced at the fiery taste, but Zephyr noticed that some of the coppery color crept back into the golden pallor of her face. Apparently there was cold comfort to be found in the arms of a storm cloud.

  She turned to the old elf. “Do you have the girl or not?”

  “I will have her,” Zephyr said stoutly. “She has been most bold of late. We have spotted her several times over the last few days. So far no one has been able to lay hands on her, but it is only a matter of time.”

  “Has Matteo been of help?”

  The elf grimaced. “Not as much as I had hoped. The lad has changed service. I haven’t seen him since he went to the court of Queen Beatrix.”

  Kiva turned sharply to stare at him. “You cannot be serious. Whose doing was this?”

  “Procopio let him go, but at Cassia’s urging.”

  The elf woman nodded grimly. “I should have surmised. Cassia has long been suspicious of the queen. I hadn’t suspected, however, that she knew so much.”

  “Most likely she doesn’t realize the full implications of her action. Matteo can be impulsive, and Cassia claims that she hopes to see him bring trouble or at least embarrassment to Beatrix’s door. Perhaps that accounts for Cassia’s first impulse, but I suspect she has other, more complex desires.”

  “Such as?”

  Zephyr told her the story of Matteo’s battle with the necromancer. “He killed Azgool Njammian, in combat, which, although impressive, fixes wary eyes upon him. All jordaini are taught to fight, but few of us actually kill. Matteo will be regarded as warily as a half-feral hunting hound. What is even more significant is that Azgool located Matteo through a spell of seeking. A difficult task, for as you know, few jordaini can be observed magically. If Matteo is one of these few, then Cassia might well have gained a window into the queen’s chambers.”

  “Cassia, that most honored of jordaini, using forbidden magic to observe a rival?” Kiva said with ironic surprise.

  The elf shrugged. “There is little that Cassia would not do. But don’t credit her with too much knowledge of Beatrix. I think her primary goal is to supplant the queen in Zalathorm’s affections.”

  “More fool she. Cassia will never be queen. Jordaini cannot marry.”

  “As she well knows. But Cassia already has the king’s ear; perhaps she aspires to his heart as well. At present, Beatrix still holds Zalathorm’s affections, but with each day that passes, the clamor for him to take a new queen and get himself an heir grows louder. I suspect that Cassia would be pleased to see Zalathorm put aside Beatrix and take a new queen. He is likely to resent whatever woman supplants Beatrix, and that would place Cassia foremost in his regard.”

  Kiva sniffed. “Cassia might be a fool, but she is an ambitious fool. We will have to watch her closely.”

  The elf inclined his head. “As you say. How do the plans for battle progress?”

  “Very well,” she said with great pleasure. “The first great test lies ahead. If we do battle successfully in Kilmaruu Swamp, we will bring tested weapons and methods into the Swamp of Akhlaur. I am confident that before the summer rains come, the source of the laraken’s power will be no more.”

  “This is not what we agreed!” Zephyr protested. “The laraken must be destroyed outright!”

  “Of course,” Kiva assured him in soothing tones. “The creature is tethered to the swamp by the spill of magic from the Elemental Plane of Water. Once that gate is closed, the laraken will be desperate to feed elsewhere. We will lure it away and see that it is appropriately dealt with.”

  “You swear it?” the elf persisted.

  The magehound’s face became deadly still. “By the graves of our people, by the trees of the Mhair, by the injustices visited upon us both, I swear that this evil will be set right.”

  Zephyr nodded, satisfied by the solemnity of her oath. “I regret that I have not yet been able to deliver the girl Tzigone to you, but I must admit that I am not sorry to see young Matteo move clear of the matter. The lad might become something rather special, given a chance.”

  “More likely one of Beatrix’s machines will grind him up to oil its gears,” she commented. “What a ridiculous risk to take! Warriors like Matteo should die in battle, not in some insane workshop.”

  “You are one to talk of risk. Do you still intend to enter the Swamp of Akhlaur, knowing that the laraken could strip the magic from you?”

  “I’m working on that. There is no need to concern yourself.”

  The elf shook his head. “There is need. There is a bond between us. We share a history, a homeland. We have both known great loss, and our secrets are mirror images.” He fell silent for a long moment, then added in a softer tone, “We share blood.”

  “Blood? Ichor, more likely!” she spat out. She took a moment to compose herself and then continued in more modulated tones. “We will be avenged, Zephyr. Never doubt that.”

  For a long moment the gaze of the two elves locked, bound by shared memories of long-ago wrongs.

  Kiva shared the passion for vengeance that shone in the old elf’s eyes, but she also harbored ambitions that went far beyond retribution.
The laraken would be destroyed sooner or later—the wizards of Halruaa were too resourceful to let its rampage continue forever—but for many moons to come, the evil that the wizard Akhlaur had created would be visited upon his descendants. That was right and fitting. But Kiva wanted more. She wanted the dark power that Akhlaur had amassed at such unspeakable cost And then, once she was strong enough, she would have Akhlaur himself.

  “You said that Matteo was well out of this matter,” she said, schooling her voice into a mild tone. “Does the girl Tzigone seem to share this opinion? Has she finished with him?”

  “They have not been seen together for several days. I’ve had him watched, so I’m quite sure of this.”

  “Perhaps she considers her debt paid,” Kiva mused. “But we cannot be too certain. She might present herself on the doorstep of Beatrix’s palace at any time, and that we must avoid. We need the girl and cannot risk letting the Cabal get hold of her. Not that there is much risk of that. For all anyone knows, they did away with the child years ago.”

  Zephyr was silent for a long moment. “Cassia has learned otherwise. She also knows that the girl is in the city and has told this news to my patron, Procopio Septus.”

  Kiva’s amber eyes narrowed to feline slits. “And you only now see fit to mention this? What else might Cassia know?”

  “That I cannot say.”

  The magehound poured herself another glass of wine and sipped it as she considered. “Perhaps there is a way to use this new development,” she said at last. “Let Cassia seek Keturah’s daughter. Nothing will lure the girl into our nets like the mystery of her past.

  “Yes,” Kiva said with more confidence, “we shall soon have Tzigone, and if we play the game well, Matteo as well.”

  “Do you really need the lad?” Zephyr said tentatively.

  Kiva’s smile was cold and hard, and in her eyes glittered something that went far beyond hatred. “You’ve seen the laraken. You know its power better than most. All your magic and centuries of your life were stolen in the making of that monster. You aged hundreds of years in a matter of hours as you watched it tear its way toward life. You know the scars that the birthing left behind, for you cared for me after I was tossed out to die.”

  “Kiva, no more,” he begged, appalled by the memories she evoked and the rising hysteria in her voice.

  But the elf woman would not be deterred. “You saw the monster that Akhlaur summoned to mingle with your magic and mine. You know what the laraken is, and you know how powerful it has become. And yet you tell me to leave Matteo out of this! He is a jordain, and I am a magehound, and his fate has been in my hands since before he was born. He is nothing.”

  “No soul is without worth, Kiva. Not even a human soul.”

  “I did not come to discuss philosophy with you. Matteo is a good fighter with nearly total resistance to magic. He is precisely the sort of weapon we seek. Knowing all you know, can you begrudge me a single blade that I could take into that swamp?”

  The elf bowed his head in defeat. “Do what you must,” he said softly. But at that moment he wasn’t certain what he feared more: the laraken or the magehound.

  Cassia stood on the parapet of the palace, watching the scene below her with disbelief. Queen Beatrix walked the promenade, her pale, gem-encrusted gown glittering in the faint light of late afternoon and her elaborate white-and-silver coif anticipating the moonlight. Beside her strolled her new counselor, pointing out sights in the city below and nodding in polite deference to the wizards who passed by.

  The jordain noted that every wizard the pair encountered stopped to speak with the queen, and that quite a few didn’t move on after the time required by the proper greetings had elapsed. Cassia remembered all too well the charm that Beatrix could use when it suited her to do so.

  Cassia spun on her heel. She strode quickly back into her chamber and began to pace. Apparently Matteo had managed to persuade Beatrix that there was a realm outside her workshop. He might even convince the queen, Mystra forbid, that she was still a human woman!

  That was not a thought that Cassia relished. Granted, it was hard to find a weakness or a misdeed in a woman as cold and brilliant and solitary and mysterious as the queen. Who knew what damning secrets might flow forth if Matteo could effect a thaw?

  On the other hand, Cassia’s position as high counselor would be compromised by Beatrix’s return to court. Cassia was at Zalathorm’s side more often that anyone else, and she wouldn’t readily relinquish this spot, not even to the queen.

  Perhaps especially not to the queen.

  Clearly she had erred when she sent the young jordain to Beatrix. She didn’t doubt her assessment of Matteo. The young man was impulsive and passionate, and such people tended to attract trouble. Wasn’t his apparent friendship with Keturah’s daughter proof of this? What Cassia had neglected to consider was that where there was great risk, there was also great potential.

  Fortunately she had other ways to bedevil the queen. Cassia glanced toward the cot, where a grotesque figure writhed and moaned as it struggled against its bonds, near death but taking its time.

  Her “guest” was the Cabal’s latest find, a misbegotten creature that was obviously intended to be a centaurlike warrior, half panther, half Crinti. The result was horrific: an elflike body supported by four twisted, feline limbs, and a dark, feral face that was neither elf nor panther, but a mirror into some nether world. The creature’s body was covered with a mottled mixture of dusky skin, patches of gray fur, and reptilian scales. It was, beyond doubt, a wizardly experiment gone wrong.

  The jordaini had a proverb about the danger of dancing to songs that gods had written. Never had Cassia seen such vivid proof as this wretched, dying cat-thing.

  But the greatest crime, in her opinion, was that the creature had been allowed to live this long. Halruaa was a land of powerful magic carefully constrained by rules and customs. This was necessary, or ambitious wizards would soon reduce the land to chaos.

  But such control had its costs. Magical experiments that went wrong, and often the wizards who erred, were quickly done away with. The “crintaur” should have been slain before it drew its first breath. Yet it had been found wandering in the queen’s forest. Cassia’s scouts had shot and mortally wounded it. Nor was it the first such creature her scouts had found.

  That led to an interesting question. Few people knew of the Cabal, a society of wizards who controlled magical use and dealt out penalties for misuse. Cassia had little doubt that Beatrix was somehow involved with this mysterious group. But did the queen work against the Cabal, or did she command it?

  There were possibilities either way. Most wizards feared the secret Cabal and wouldn’t take kindly to news that the queen controlled its activities. Of course, Zalathorm knew of the Cabal, but he kept himself apart from the darker realities of his realm. He was widely loved and revered. He had ruled well and led his people to victory in many battles. His people would forgive him much. But if it was proved and quietly revealed that Beatrix was connected with the Cabal, he might be forced to put her aside.

  But the fact that this creature had been caught in the queen’s forest was not sufficient proof of the queen’s complicity. The girl Tzigone, on the other hand, might be. She had escaped the Cabal. Perhaps she could be induced to remember who had questioned her and who had aided her escape. This would yield the first steps along a path that Cassia dearly hoped would end at the door of Queen Beatrix.

  There was much about Tzigone that interested Cassia. Her inquisitors hadn’t been able to detect a drop of magical ability, but simple observation indicated that the child possessed a volatile combination of wild talents, as well as an almost total resistance to magic.

  Magic resistance was a highly desirable trait, and the regard that Cassia and her fellow jordaini enjoyed was proof of this. But a wizard who possessed a jordain’s resistance provided new and unpredictable possibilities. No one knew how talents such as Tzigone’s might develop if trained,
and, even more ominous, how they might pass down to future generations. Magical gifts were to be strengthened through careful selection and guided marriages, but only along prescribed lines. Tzigone would not have been the first wild talent removed by the Cabal. Society demanded it, much as it safeguarded itself through the destruction of a rabid and unpredictable hound.

  Yet Tzigone lived. More interesting still, she seemed to have caught the interest of the magehound Kiva.

  The same magehound, Cassia noted, who had examined Beatrix before her marriage to a smitten Zalathorm.

  There was a connection there, but one that eluded Cassia.

  The jordain sat down at her desk and began to write, meticulously piecing together the information from a dozen scrolls. She traced the magehound’s path over the past several years and noted that Kiva’s travels intersected frequently with reports of trouble caused by someone who was variously described as a street urchin, a street performer, or a young girl. Tzigone, it seemed, had had a very busy life.

  A pity, thought Cassia, that she couldn’t trace Tzigone back to her origin. She would have given a great deal to know the name of the girl’s father. Perhaps then she might be able to find a damning connection between the girl, the magehound, and the queen.

  As it was, Cassia had information sufficient to create trouble. She quickly penned a letter to Sinestra Belajoon, a diviner who had been seen in Tzigone’s presence. Cassia commiserated with the wizard about her loss. Whether Tzigone had actually stolen anything from Sinestra, Cassia didn’t know or care. The very suggestion would have the wizard patting her pockets and coming up with a loss of some sort. She commented that Sinestra was not the only person of wit and talent to be taken in by this clever thief. Matteo, counselor to Queen Beatrix, was a friend of the girl.

  With great satisfaction, Cassia sealed the letter and sent a servant to deliver it. She turned back to the bits and pieces of Tzigone’s history, tracing the determined magehound’s efforts back five years, ten, nearly twenty.