by Ed Greenwood
"Mercy," the chained wizard hissed, his voice thin with warring fear and hatred, "I… I beg of you, wench!"
"Most charmingly begged, to be sure. Rest easy, Huldaerus. I'm not here to work you any personal harm, just to do away with any other little surprises you may have for us… there.”
The Master of Bats felt several tiny, icy jolts as other prepared magics were forced into wakefulness and then broken and drained away ere they could take effect-and then a curtain seemed to roll back in his mind, and he was left with a fair and sunlit view down the Vale from Flowfoam not long after dawn, as the last mists stole away like hastening wraiths above the mighty Silverflow on some day in the past. The tiny figures of women come down to the banks to do their washing could be seen at the first bend. He peered at them, trying to see their faces and hear the chatter amid their laughter, as a waterswift flew past overhead, and…
"I'll leave you this scene to brood upon," Embra's voice said to him, with a warmth and closeness whose affection shocked Arkle Huldaerus.
That and the shock of the blow of Craer's flung frying pan that had felled him hours before in the midst of his spells, with the Four all around him, had shaken the Master of Bats more than all the events of the year before this day. He shivered helplessly.
And then she was gone, and he was alone.
Truly alone, the last of his ready magic stripped from him and with no bats left whose eyes he could borrow. He plunged once more into that view of the Silverflow, with mists he could almost smell and merry converse he could almost hear-and then thrust it away again angrily. There would come a time when he would need its solace to keep away despair or even madness, but for now he had better things to think about.
The bitch had at least been true to her word. She'd refrained from blasting his mind and leaving him unable to work magic or know who he was. Ah, no. He knew all too well who he was.
He was a helpless, spell-drained wizard chained upside down in a dungeon cell under Flowfoam Palace. The beginnings of a dark storm of a headache were beginning to rage now, as the echoes of that frying pan blow were made monstrous by the blood pounding in his head. The Master of Bats clenched his teeth and spat a single furious obscenity into the surrounding darkness.
Rage and pain clawed at each other, doing battle inside him as he hung heavy in his chains, numb in some places and throbbing in others. Groaning from time to time, Arkle Huldaerus drifted in their stormy grip, letting himself be driven this way and that…
He slept, or thought he did. Yet it seemed that he'd not been alone with the darkness all that long when light arose around him again.
A cold, blue-white glow this time, with none of the warmth of firelight. It came from the wall of the cell across from him, hitherto hidden in the darkness, and it was moving. Moving?
Huldaerus stared at the glow. Was he asleep, and this a dream-fancy, or was that bitch Silvertree-or the other one, her slyskirt sidekick-at work with spells on his mind, trying to drive him into raving?
The glow had a shape now, as it stepped silently out of the solid wall-the shape of a skeleton, with two tiny stars of cold flame twinkling in its eye-sockets. Those eyes looked at him, and the chained wizard knew an old and fell intelligence lurked behind them, mirth that betokened good for no creature alive within them. A hand whose floating bones should all have clattered to the floor waved jauntily at him, the bony feet strolled across the cell, and the hand sketched another wave in his direction as the skeleton melted into the waiting stones, its glow dimming, and… was gone.
Arkle Huldaerus blinked at the darkness that reigned unbroken under his nose once more, shook his head, and sighed. This had not been a good day, nor did the morrow hold bright prospect.
He almost envied that skeleton its freedom to walk through walls.
The young man's bald head was slick with sweat despite the chill of the cavernous chamber. The snake fang-adorned bottom edge of his high-collared robe swirled above bare feet as risen magic played dancing white fires around them, shimmering across the mirror-smooth floor of the vast room. A pattern of intertwined serpents, jaws agape, encircled his wide sleeves, and scales were visible on the glistening flesh of his forearms and the backs of his hands.
The man took two measured steps forward, murmured an incantation, and flung up his hands as if to cradle a large globe of empty air. White sparks crawled tentatively from his fingertips to shape that sphere… and swirl about it… and then rise in tendrils around the Serpent-priest, building to silently raging brightness.
That growing light was reflected in the steady, watching eyes of two tiers of benches of expressionless priests along the chamber walls, well back from the spellweaving priest.
The cold radiance brightened as the incantation crafting it rose in volume-brightened and grew, becoming slowly writhing spirals of tentacles around the priest… and then coalescing into serpentine bodies shaped all of sparks. As those swaying serpent-forms grew snake-heads, they began to glide around and around the bald priest in an undulating, quickening dance.
The watching priests made not a sound, but some leaned forward eagerly. Not one looked away, even for an instant, as swiftly building spells erupted into bright bursts, one flaring atop another as the priest who stood alone at their heart cried phrase after phrase, his voice loud now with confidence, his fingers writhing like excited snakes in ever more rapid weavings.
White sparks sheaDied the spellweaver's body, drawing in about him in thick coils, until it seemed a forest of large and ever larger serpents was lovingly encircling their creator. Their twining force slowly lifted the priest off the floor until he stood upright on empty air almost his own height off the ground, hands still furiously shaping spells.
Each new magic reached up, straining toward the lofty ceiling of the chamber. The unfolding spells seemed to draw upon something up there, unseen in the darkness, that sent down spiderweb-thin lines of force-force that blossomed into cold, bright fire when it touched the silently raging serpents woven by the lone priest.
In the heart of the light his incantations gasped and stammered on. Sweat drenched him, and his racing fingers were trembling now, his body shuddering as if fighting to stand against the snatching gusts of a gale.
A spell burst into a sudden shower of sparks, and there came a sudden, brief murmur-part consternation, and part satisfaction-from the watching clergy as the bald priest convulsed, shrieked something despairing, and clawed at the air as if to ward off a pouncing monster.
Sparks fell, and there came another explosion, bright and then dark,
motes of fire raining down in all directions as the spellweaving priest sobbed bitterly. Burst after burst, in swift succession, tore the dancing serpents into a swirling cloud.
At its flickering heart the lone, sweat-soaked figure frantically waved fingers grown impossibly long, trying to shout words with a voice that had suddenly tightened into a loud hiss. A forked tongue darted from grimacing lips as the sparks raced aloft to shape many bright serpent heads-which then struck in unison, lashing down at the wildly gesturing man with terrible speed.
The bald priest screamed under those fangs of light, high and shrill. His suddenly long and rubbery arms flapped helplessly in the brightly boiling radiance-and then caught fire in a long gout of flame.
He screamed again, dancing grotesquely in the rushing conflagration, flesh melting and receding from bones with horrible swiftness. Smaller explosions bloomed and rolled all around that capering figure, and in the wake of each a freed spell fell away from the doomed priest and became a ghostly white serpent of flickering force, writhing and undulating in uncanny silence.
Within this ghostly circle of swaying heads and lashing coils, the dying priest danced on, his flesh melting. His screams became raw, faint and feeble… and he sank to the floor, still dancing-jerking back and forth, helplessly and horribly, like a stick puppet flailed about at a market fair for the amusement of small children.
Sprawled on the dark stone,
the priest melted swiftly down to near bones-and as he became more skeletal, the freed, slithering spells dancing around him moved in, coiling into and out of the writhing bones. Where they passed, bones parted, dissolving into streamers of smoke, and shifting… twisting…
The skeleton was soon little more than a flaming skull atop a whirlwind of tumbling bones-remains spun into the undulating shape of a serpent by the ghostly Serpent-spells.
The fading serpent-shape coiled, reared menacingly-and the skull atop it exploded in a puff of bone-dust. The bones below faded, and out of that writhing collapse rose the last glowing wisps of magic, drifting up to whatever it was that hung high overhead in the darkness.
There they shone for one whirling moment around a mottled, hand-sized stone floating alone in midair. Glowed, and then sank into the stone, to glow no longer.
As darkness returned to the ceiling, the watching priests looked down from where the wisps had gone, tightened lips grimly, and sighed-some with wistfulness, and many more with relief.
"This failure was not unexpected," one man said into the silence, his cold tones loud, firm, and flat. "Shall we resume?"
Another priest lifted a hand. "We shall- and with Ghuldart gone, and his boasts and claims with him, one thing is certain: None of us has the might to master the Thrael. The Great Serpent is come not back among us. Yet."
A third, younger priest asked, "Could some of us not cast a few spells of the Thrael each, and so weld together a ruling council from among our ranks? Need it be one man?"
The first priest rose to his feet and replied, "There I hear the voice not just of you, Lothoan, but of all your ilk: the young, eager, and restless amongst us, who thirst for power and see change as no concern at all if it wins us more power swiftly. Hear me, now, all of you younglings. Hear and learn"
Caronthom "Fangmaster" turned slowly to survey all the robed men on the benches. No women sat in the chamber; he and the knives of elder priests of like mind had seen to that. She-priests were vicious and treacherous, but alluring; there would be time enough to empower such when it came to open strife, and such qualities could serve the Brethren-and be the ready excuse for slaughtering the women as soon as it became needful.
"The Serpent who spawned us all was never a god. He was a mortal man, a great wizard-as were all his successors, Great Serpent after Great Serpent. None of us particularly loves serving a tyrant, but this is how it must be. Only one being can be master of the Thrael at a time. Once cast, the Thrael exists as a web of magic whose backlashes slay many linked to it if someone tries to wrest control of the Thrael from its creator, or craft a second Thrael that comes into contact with the first. When we pray to the Great Serpent, we send calls along the Thrael to him, calls he can hear. If he chooses to do so, he sends us back spells or healing energy or raw power, drawing on his own manifest power-which is that of all of us who are touched by the Thrael. Literally, our lives, and those of the sacrifices we slay in specific ways, empower the Thrael and the Great Serpent, and he returns power to us as he sees fit. Forgive this blunt speaking, but 'tis time and past time you heard it shorn of all the 'holy' nonsense we must always cloak it with, to conceal this central secret from lay believers."
Caronthom sighed, threw back his head, and continued, "So I say again: The Serpent was a man, not a god. Great elder magics create his recurring manifestation, and that of the Dragon who opposes him. Divine magics, if you prefer-magics we no longer understand or know how to control, augment, or destroy. From the Serpent we have his teachings, the secrets of the Thrael spells and of its working-and the sacred writings of what has gone before, which stand as lessons to us in what to do and not to do to win power."
He strode slowly along the benches, meeting the gazes of some priests thereon directly, and added, "Wherefore this council is met. As always, we must scheme and work and refine our plots, when seeking to win greater power in Aglirta-for no god aids us. We all saw Ghuldart try and fail to craft the Thrael, and witnessed his fate-and I feel no shame in admitting that, overambitious foolishness aside, Ghuldart was the most confident and powerful seeker amongst us who desired to master the Thrael. None of us is powerful enough to survive those castings."
The second priest rose. "Every word you utter is blunt truth, Caronthom. It should be clear to even the youngest and most restless amongst us that this council's most urgent business has now been determined."
He began his own slow walk along the benches. "You know me as Raunthur the Wise. Hear now my latest wisdom, and know it for no more than truth. We came here to discuss how to win power in the Vale, but could decide nothing until we saw if Ghuldart could ascend to the rank of Great Serpent over us. His failure means we must find and recruit a wizard powerful enough to become the new Great Serpent, so as to conquer Aglirta at last. Each of us-even as we work against the officers and authority of the boy king-must seek suitable men to become our leader. To borrow the words of the Old Viper who taught Caronthom and myself, 'The tyrant we must obey must be found.' "
One of the younger priests moved restlessly, and Caronthom pounced.
"Yes, Thuldran? Speak!"
The young priest flushed and looked down. Both elder priests moved to stand side by side and glare at him. After a long, unwilling time of glancing up into their hard gazes and shrinking away and then looking up again to find their stares still fixed on him, Thuldran said reluctantly, "I-I like this not. We're to invite an outsider to power over us? Risking possible betrayal, and a rule none of us may favor?"
"Well said," Raunthur replied. "Of course none of us welcomes this situation. 'Tis right not to want or trust an outsider as our Great Serpent. To avoid disaster, all of us elder priests know very well that we must choose the right outsider. Finding and guiding him into office over us will be neither swift nor easy."
"In the meantime," Caronthom added, "be aware that we shall be ruthless in purging all misdirected ambitions from the Brotherhood. We elders are mages of some accomplishment; those who were not were the ones who perished. We may cower before the Thrael, but until it has been raised anew by a Great Serpent, we shall rule the Brotherhood. Speak freely, dispute freely-but obey when we speak orders, or we shall strike you down. In this leaderless time, treachery and internal strife are weaknesses we can neither afford nor tolerate. Heed my words, or die."
There was a stillness along the benches now that sang with tension. Raunthur smiled softly into it. "That's not to say we desire any of you to sit in hiding and wait for a new Great Serpent to come calling. Far from it. As we sit gathered here, we're still the strongest, smartest force in Aglirta, and we shall not be idle. If blustering idiot barons can hold power in the Vale, so can we."
"And so," the Fangmaster added smoothly, "we desire every one of you to aid in our chief plot to bring down the boy king. Some few among you, I've no doubt, have already gained hints of what this is. More than one of you is guilty of excessive prying in this regard that I'll henceforth reward with death. To quell consuming curiosity, know that before departing this place you'll be furnished with a spell. Others will follow, brought by fellow Brothers of the Serpent along with strict instructions as to when to use them and when they are not to be employed."
For the first time, the old priest who'd taught so many of them allowed a smile onto his face. "The first spell infects drinkables with something akin to the venom of some rare sorts of snakes, but stronger. Most who imbibe succumb to 'the Malady of Madness' told of in ancient times, the Beast Plague that makes victims lash out at others ere they die. Spread among Aglirtans with the words of 'divine punishment for misrule' you shall whisper, this will serve to weaken the rule of Flowfoam. When the time is right, all of you shall be properly placed, up and down the Vale, to supplant the local authority of the boy king."
Raunthur spoke up. "So much is the plan-so let your various spyings cease. You shall all hear the unfolding details anyway. Salaundius?"
An old priest with a scarred face rose from the benches, nodded re
spectfully to Raunthur and Caronthom, cleared his throat, and said stiffly, "My tests have been a success. The spells I've worked with can now break the effects of the venom-spell, repeatedly and reliably. I-ah-there is no more to say." He sat down again.
The Fangmaster nodded. "Arthroon?"
A darkly handsome priest rose, smiled coldly, and announced, "Belgur Arthroon, from Fallingtree. The village is small, and accordingly I've been careful to enspell only a select few wine decanters and buckets of water. The results thus far are: success in every attempt. I'll soon be able to report fully on dosages and amounts of various sorts of drink to achieve specific results. As with all such castings, one must follow specific instructions or practice much to acquire a feel for the task."
The Fangmaster nodded, and Arthroon sat down again. "We've been absent from our holds and posts around the Vale long enough," Caronthom said firmly, "so let this council now entertain any other questions, concerns, or desires of the Brethren. Speak, Brothers, ere we break this assembly and confer upon each of you a scroll that holds the venom-spell."
No one rose, but an eager restlessness fell upon the benches. More than one priest leaned forward as if the promised scrolls could be snatched from empty air as a hawk takes a field rat. Caronthom watched, and smiled again. "Then let this council be at an end. Raunthur?"
The elder priest who was called the Wise strode to a door that glowed briefly as he placed his hand on it and then groaned slowly open by itself. "Scrolls, one to each," he said curtly. "No pushing."
Had any priest there dared to demonstrate so fatal a failing as a curious eye, he might have seen a younger priest clutching his precious scroll stride swiftly down a dark and little-used passage, duck through a lightless door and up a stair, and then pass through another door that glowed with guardian-spells every bit as powerful as those Raunthur had used to safeguard the scrolls. Once through it, the young priest extended an arm that reached a full three feet farther than his other arm-or the arm of any human-should have been able to, and pushed at one end of a particular block in the stone wall. It pivoted, swinging open to reveal a cavity behind, and into this he thrust the scroll-and after it, his Serpent-robes.