Tchazzar smiled. “That’s what I’ve been telling you.”
The wizard stared straight ahead. Tchazzar had the feeling that it wasn’t just to drink in the spectacle of the sunset. She was hesitant to meet his gaze. After a time she said, “I’ve also been thinking that I could find a … particular relief by staying here.”
“My lady, you’re welcome to whatever I can give you.”
“You’ve given me so much already. You probably see how unhappy I am and think me a terrible ingrate. But … by the stars, I hate talking about this! … but you know how I hate to be touched. But do you know I hate myself for hating it? That I’d give anything not to be so freakish? To share in the same simple comforts and pleasures that everyone else enjoys?”
“Yes,” said Tchazzar, “I do.” Since he had the insight of a deity, he must have realized it, mustn’t he?
“Well, it occurred to me … I mean, you’re different. You’re a god, not a man. And I have no trouble touching you when you’re in dragon form. So I thought …”
“That I could help you overcome your aversion?”
She still wouldn’t look at him. “Maybe. Or that even if I never learn to bear the touch of ordinary people, from time to time perhaps you would condescend …”
He had to hold in a grin that might otherwise have spooked her. For that was the way to bind her to him, as he’d captured the hearts of so many women in the past. And now that he understood it was possible, her severe, tawny beauty leaped out at him and made his mouth grow warm.
He just had to proceed gently and patiently. And, for the time being, not acknowledge in any way the consumation toward which they would travel together.
“My lady,” he said, “condescend is the wrong word. It will give me joy to help you.” He extended his hand. “Shall we begin?”
Jhesrhi flinched. “Right now?”
“Why not? The first course won’t arrive for a while. Just rest your hand on mine, as lightly as you like. I won’t even close my fingers around yours.”
She took a deep breath, then slowly did as he’d bidden her. Her fingertips were rough and calloused.
After a moment, her hand started to shake.
“You can stop whenever you like,” he said.
“No,” she said, her voice tight. “But talk to me. Give me something else to occupy my mind.”
“Of course, my lady. What shall we talk about?”
“Anything! Tell me why we had to fight in the north. Tell me about Alasklerbanbastos.”
By the time Jhesrhi reached her apartments, her guts were churning. But she couldn’t let it show quite yet. Life at court was still strange to her, but she had learned that everyone lived for gossip, and servants were prime conveyors of that commodity.
So she snarled for her maids to get out. And, knowing how their fussing, chatter, and mere presence often irritated her, they scurried away without questioning her command.
Just in time. Jhesrhi stumbled on into the lavatory and dropped to her knees in front of the commode. The fine supper Tchazzar had given her came up in a series of racking heaves.
It left a nasty acidic taste burning in her mouth. She spat some of it away, but for the time being would have to tolerate the rest. Because she had another vile sensation to deal with-or maybe just the memory of one. But whatever it was, it was even more repugnant.
She poured water from the pitcher into the basin, then focused her will on it. It steamed as it grew hot. Then she rubbed soap onto a brush meant for cleaning fingernails and scrubbed her hand till it was raw.
When it was finally enough, and her feeling of violation subsided, she took a bottle of wine from the cabinet and rattled off a cantrip. Magic popped the cork out of the neck. She used the first mouthful of something red and sweet to rinse her mouth, spat it in the spattered and stinking commode, then flopped down in a chair and took a long pull.
She wanted to drink until her memories of the evening grew dim and meaningless. It had disgusted her to play the weak, helpless, pleading damsel, especially since the lie was built around a core of truth. She was freakish and broken, even if it was beyond Tchazzar’s power to mend her.
He’d keep trying though, since she’d opened the door. He’d paw her whenever he could, and how was she supposed to bear it?
She couldn’t imagine. But the ploy had been the only one she could think of to lower the red dragon’s defenses and cozen him into telling her what she needed to hear.
As she’d promised she would when Aoth had asked her in his apartments the night before. Even though he’d asked in a diffident manner quite unlike the man she knew.
“I don’t know if it’s right,” he’d said. “I’ve always believed that ‘right’ is honoring your contracts. I don’t know if it’s prudent. I’ve always thought that prudence is not sticking your nose into things that are none of your business. I definitely don’t know if it’s right and prudent for you. You’re on your way to a splendid life in the country of your birth. All I can offer is more of the same mud, blood-”
Perhaps it was his guilt, and the affection that underlay it, that abruptly made all other loyalties seem inconsequential. At any rate, she’d lifted her hand to silence him. “Stop. Please stop. I’ll do it whatever it is, if only to stop you blathering.”
And since she had, and since it had worked, she supposed she mustn’t drink herself into a stupor after all. She needed to work on what Tchazzar had given her. She set the bottle on the floor and snapped her fingers. Her staff leaped from the corner into her hand.
Though Gaedynn had never admitted it, he occasionally found Aoth’s augmented vision annoying. Like now, for example. Gaedynn was supposed to be the master scout, but it was the war-mage-with plump, pretty Cera riding behind him-who sent his griffon swooping toward a particular barren crag. Presumably because he’d spotted the cave mouth they were seeking.
Eider followed Jet down, and then Gaedynn saw it too, not that there was much to see. Just a crack in the sloping granite. But at least it had a ledge in front of it big enough for griffons to set down on.
The riders dismounted, and Cera somewhat awkwardly adjusted the round shield on her arm. She was game and sharp, but no trained soldier, and Gaedynn wondered if Aoth had been wise to bring her.
Maybe not, but then again if any of them were truly wise, no one would have embarked on this secret expedition.
“Are you sure this is the place?” Gaedynn asked. He squatted to examine the ledge more closely. “I don’t see any claw marks or other signs that a dragon’s been here recently.”
“No,” Aoth admitted. “But Jhesrhi got Tchazzar talking, and he told her he hid Alasklerbanbastos’s phylactery where no one would ever find it. He also told her stories involving an old secret refuge he had in the Smoking Mountains. Afterward, she skimmed some of the histories archived in the War College and performed a divination, all in an effort to figure out where the place was. And this is the location, give or take.”
Gaedynn straightened up. “Well, we might as well go in and look around. And if we don’t find anything, we can probably count ourselves lucky.”
Cera peered at him. “But you won’t feel that way.”
He smiled. “No, sunlady, I confess I won’t.”
Aoth looked at Jet. “I don’t think you and Eider can squeeze through that narrow gap.”
“No,” the black griffon rasped.
The Thayan turned to Cera. “That makes it even more important that you stick close to me and do anything I tell you to.”
She grinned. “So you want a repeat of last night.” Aoth scowled. “All right, I understand!”
Gaedynn laid an arrow on his bow. “Perhaps you could kindle a light to help us on our way. And then, with this sour old codger’s permission, I’ll go first.”
Cera recited a prayer and swung her gilt mace through an arc that mimicked Amaunator’s daily transit across the sky. Gaedynn couldn’t see the results until they entered the cave. But then it be
came apparent that she’d cloaked herself in a warm golden glow that pushed back the dark for a stone’s throw in every direction.
Gradually the way widened until several people could walk abreast. The ceiling lifted away from their heads until Gaedynn would have needed to rise on tiptoe to touch it. He watched for movement at the point where Cera’s light failed, and for sign on the floor. He listened and sniffed the air. And detected nothing but stone and darkness.
Then Aoth rapped, “Stop!”
His nerves jangling, Gaedynn froze. “What is it?”
“If you take another step, the ceiling will fall on you. I can see the cracks running through the granite, along with a flicker of magical force.”
Gaedynn took a breath. “In its way, that’s helpful. It tells us this really is Tchazzar’s secret hiding place, and at least suggests he’s hiding something here now. Still, it would have been nice if those miraculous eyes of your had noticed the cracks a little sooner.”
“Sorry. They’re very tiny cracks, and it’s a very faint flicker. If it makes you feel any better, there’s a chance that if the ceiling comes down, it will crush Cera and me too.”
“That is comforting. But on the whole, I think I prefer that we all remain unsquashed. What should I do, back up?”
“No. It’s like you’re at the center of a spiderweb that sprang into being around you. You’ll break a strand whichever way you step.”
“That’s … inconvenient.”
“I can try to dissolve the enchantment,” Cera said, with only the slightest quaver in her voice.
“I know,” said Aoth. “But do you think you can channel enough power to outmatch Tchazzar?”
Cera frowned. “Perhaps not.”
“Then maybe we should try another way. When he set this trap, Tchazzar wrote runes on the ceiling with a wand or his fingertip. I can see those too, and I think they contain the phrase that allows safe passage.”
“You ‘think,’ ” Gaedynn said.
“Yes,” said Aoth, “and I think I can pronounce them correctly too, even though Aragrakh isn’t my best language.”
“Then take your shot,” Gaedynn said.
Aoth raised his spear over his head and held it parallel to the floor. The point glowed red, like it had just come from the forge. He hissed sibilant words that filled the air with a dry reptilian smell, as though a wyrm were lurking just a pace or two away.
The cracks in the ceiling became visible as they too flared with crimson light. Despite himself, Gaedynn tensed. But then the glow simply faded away.
“It’s safe now,” said Aoth.
Gaedynn grinned. “Of course it is. I never doubted you for an instant.”
They prowled onward. Until Aoth called for another halt.
“What is it this time?” Gaedynn asked. “Am I about to burst into flame?”
“No,” said Aoth. “Or at least I don’t think it’s another snare. But there’s something just ahead of you. Tchazzar dug into the floor, then fused the broken stone back together.”
Cera smiled. “And you can see that too.”
“I have to admit,” Gaedynn said, “the bastard’s clever. To those of us without truesight, there’s nothing to distinguish this bit of passage from the rest of the cave. No trap or guardian in the immediate vicinity. No widening out into a vault or anything like that. Even if a searcher knew something was in here somewhere, he’d likely walk right on by.”
“But we won’t.” Aoth stepped past Gaedynn, and then the head of his spear glowed blue as he charged it with force. He gripped the weapon in both hands and plunged it repeatedly into the floor. The resulting cracks and crunches echoed away down the tunnel.
Something scuttled into the light.
Big as a man, it looked like a scorpion carved from black rock and possessed of a pair of luminous crimson eyes. But it was charging faster than anything made of stone should have been able to move-and, intent on his digging, Aoth plainly didn’t see it rushing forward to seize him in its serrated pincers.
“Watch out!” Gaedynn said. He drew, released, nocked, drew, and released.
Both shafts pierced the creature’s body but failed to stop it or even slow it down. Nor was there time for a third shot. Gaedynn dropped his bow, snatched out his short swords, and lunged past Aoth, interposing himself between the war-mage and the beast.
When Gaedynn got close to the thing, he discovered its body was blistering hot-standing near it was like standing too close to a fire. It snatched for him, and he sidestepped and thrust. His primary sword chipped a dent in the scorpion’s claw, then popped out of the wound and skated along, leaving a scratch behind.
The scorpion reached for him with its other set of pincers. He stabbed again. The claws snapped shut on his blade and yanked it from his grasp.
At the same moment, the pincerlike parts on either side of its mouth spread apart. A glowing red drop of some viscous liquid oozed out, and Gaedynn’s instincts warned him the beast was about to spit. He poised himself to dodge.
Then, behind him, Aoth growled a word of command. A flare of silvery frost shot past Gaedynn and burst into steam when it splashed against his foe. Cera called out to Amaunator, and the light with which she’d surrounded them burned brighter.
The scorpion fell down thrashing. Its pincers clattered, and Gaedynn’s bent and twisted sword clanked on the floor. He lunged and drove his remaining blade into the creature’s left eye. It heaved in a final convulsion, then lay still.
It was still hot though. Stepping back from it, he panted, “Let me just point out that I said, ‘No guardian in the immediate vicinity.’ I never said there wasn’t one lurking around somewhere, listening for the sound of digging.”
Aoth grinned, lifted his spear, plunged it down, and broke away another chunk of floor. And that was sufficient to reveal what lay beneath.
It was a gem the size and shape of an egg. Or at least Gaedynn thought it was. At certain moments, it looked less like a solid object than a mere oval of shadow with tiny blue lightning bolts flickering inside it.
“Is that it?” he asked.
“That’s it,” Aoth answered. “Alasklerbanbastos’s spirit. His life.”
“I still say that if Tchazzar weren’t as crazy as a three-tailed dog, he would have destroyed the thing.”
Aoth shrugged, and his mail clinked. “Maybe he thought that would be letting his old enemy off easy. I mean, it would be hellish to be stuck inside a stone, alone and bodiless, for eternity, wouldn’t it? Or maybe he plans to haul out the Bone Wyrm by and by, and torture him for his amusement.”
“Except that we’re going to haul him out first,” Cera said. She drew a deep breath, opened the leather pouch on her belt, produced a gold box large enough to hold the phylactery, and dropped to one knee beside the hole. His pulse ticking in his neck, Gaedynn did his best to believe that the spellcasters knew what they were doing.
EPILOGUE
15 FLAMERULE THE YEAR OF THE AGELESS ONE (1479 DR)
Blind and deaf, aware of nothing but the alternating mumble and yammer of his own thoughts, Alasklerbanbastos floated in the void. Deliverance came as a sudden feeling of soaring.
For an instant, the mere fact of sensation filled him with such ecstasy that he could think of nothing else. Then he remembered that Tchazzar, Jaxanaedegor, and the rest of the traitors had destroyed his body and sent his ghost into his phylactery. So it was almost certainly the red dragon calling him forth, and not because the lunatic had decided to show him any mercy.
Well, so be it. Tchazzar would no doubt thrust him into some weak and possibly crippled form, but Alasklerbanbastos still had his spells. And with magic, many things were possible.
For a heartbeat, he felt heavy as lead, and then merely corporeal once more. But that didn’t entirely relieve him of the feeling of burdensome weight. Someone had buried the body he now occupied, a frame of rotting flesh as well as bone.
Which was strange. Tchazzar couldn’t possibly expect a me
re grave to hold him.
Puzzled, Alasklerbanbastos snarled an incantation and noticed how odd it felt to have an actual tongue curling and flapping in his mouth again. Then the earth above him rumbled and split, revealing a glimpse of the stars. He heaved himself up into the open air, and dirt streamed from his wings.
When he noticed the crooked talon on his right forefoot, he realized he’d entered the corpse of Calabastasingavor, a relatively young blue Tchazzar had killed at the start of his campaign. That explained all the charred, flaking patches on his hide, not that they or the provenance of his new body mattered at the moment.
What did was that much to his amazement, neither Tchazzar nor Jaxanaedegor was anywhere to be seen. Instead, it appeared that Aoth Fezim, Gaedynn Ulraes, and a woman with a mace and shield had taken it upon themselves to call Alasklerbanbastos back into the world.
The idiots apparently thought themselves safe because they had his phylactery. They had no idea how fast and to what lethal effect he could strike, even locked in a youthful dragon’s body. He drew breath to roar a word of power, and then conjured sunlight blazed around the woman.
Agony ripped through Alasklerbanbastos’s frame. Magic was suddenly impossible. So was moving, or even standing upright. His legs buckled beneath him, dumping him back down into the pit.
Fezim came to the edge and peered down at him. “I know liches aren’t as susceptible to sunlight as, say, vampires,” the Thayan said. “But none of you undead like it, do you?”
“How are you doing this?” Alasklerbanbastos growled.
“We tampered with your phylactery,” said Fezim. “You could say we poked a hole in it to let the light in. And my friend the sunlady can make a very bright light when it suits her. She’s going to hold on to the stone for now, to guarantee your cooperation.”
“What is it you want?”
“Answers. She and I were the disembodied souls who spied on you dragons palavering atop your mountain. What was the point of that council? Why are so many of your servants trying to turn everyone against Tymanther? When wyrms talk about Precepts, what does it mean?”
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