Liar's Blade

by Tim Pratt

  "I suggest you take that and leave, now," Obed said. "If you will not consent to be paid in gold, you will be paid in steel." He looked pointedly at Rodrick.

  After a moment, Rodrick blinked, and said, "Ah, yes, right." He drew Hrym, and the carter flinched back. "It would be paying you in ice, I suppose, not steel, but the sentiment is the same."

  The carter shifted uncomfortably, but didn't climb down. "It's a long trip to New Stetven, if I don't have a mount, and it's getting dark—"

  "Run quickly, and you might catch the guards," Zaqen said, rather kindly. "Perhaps you can ride pillion with one of them. But regardless—run, quickly."

  The carter scowled, but he moved, dropping down off the far side of the cart and racing off, surprisingly quick for a man his age, shouting, "Ho, wait!" at the guards.

  "Zaqen," Obed said. "Why have we purchased a cart?"

  "You'll like this bit," Rodrick said. "You'll be traveling in style." He tore away the tarp covering the back of the wagon and revealed a wooden tub, the largest they'd been able to find—the sort of tub the better class of inns provided when they had passing nobles in want of a hot bath.

  Obed clambered onto the back of the cart, looked at the tub, and—for the first time in Rodrick's experience—laughed aloud. "Ha. Very nice, Zaqen."

  "It was Rodrick's idea, actually."

  The priest glanced down at Rodrick, then nodded. "The people we pass on the road will think me mad," he said.

  Rodrick shrugged. "The sides of the wagon are built up fairly high. We can pile things at the back, too. Your presence won't be obvious. We can pull the tarp over you if you want to travel more discreetly. And anyway, so what if they think you're mad? You're a holy man. It's allowed."

  Obed removed his robe, set it aside in the bed of the cart, then lowered himself into the tub. Rodrick winced at the thought of bare flesh touching the cold smooth wood, but the gillman wasn't noticeably bothered. It must be cold as a corpse's guts in the sea, so he was surely used to it. "The pitcher," Obed said, and Zaqen passed up the artifact. Obed settled down into the tub, leaning against the curved back, and began pouring brine in from the pitcher. "Proceed east," he said, and closed his eyes.

  Cilian frowned. "East. Toward the cold mountains. The auguries have shown me this. Places of darkness, locked in ice, full of crawling foulness."

  "Lovely ice," Hrym said. "The other parts I could do without."

  "East, then. Not back to New Stetven? You don't want to peacefully recover in the inn of the Flaming Riders for a while? They do a lovely fish stew—no, all right, fine. In search of key number three."

  "Well?" Obed said. "Get the carthorse moving." He put the pitcher beside the tub and sank down, his face disappearing beneath the waterline.

  "Yes, Cilian, you should—" Rodrick began, but the huntsman was gone, melted off into the treeline somewhere as always. He looked at Zaqen, and she shrugged her asymmetrical shrug. "If I climb behind that horse it'll bolt and tear the cart apart, or break an axle at least. I'm making her skittish just standing this close. I'll ride in the back with my master."

  "Don't look at me," Hrym said from Rodrick's back. "I can't hold reins."

  "I was hired for my skills as a mercenary," Rodrick grumbled. "And also for my skills of persuasion. I don't recall agreeing to drive a cart."

  Obed's pool bubbled, and Rodrick sighed and climbed up to the front of the cart. He peered down the road, such as it was. Forest, endless forest on his left. The plains of Rostland rolling off on his right. Far off, the distant peaks of mountains. "Are there even any towns this way?"

  "Not as far as I know," Zaqen said from behind him. "None big enough to put on a map. Colliers' camps and logging camps, I'm sure."

  "Then where are we going? Is the third key a magical saw? A magical wedge? A magical brazier?"

  "My master hasn't told me. I know as much as you know. Which is: east."

  "East, into what?" Rodrick snapped the reins, which only seemed to irritate the cart horse, judging by the way it twitched its tail and shat. "And why?"

  "For your weight in gold," Hrym said. " Or equivalent gems. It's good to maintain your focus."

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The Howling Mountains

  The trip east was not pleasant. Rodrick's rear end began to hurt within an hour after they set off from the edge of the Gronzi Forest, and the cart wheels had a regular squeak that he found damnably irritating. He suspected he would be hearing that squeak in his dreams for years to come. Obed would rise occasionally from his bath and sit beside Rodrick, staring in all directions with his usual cold, impatient fury, but there was precious little to see: forest on one side, plains on the other. Rodrick tried to make small talk, mostly because attempts at conversation hastened Obed's sullen return to his tub.

  Hrym chattered amiably with him about their past conquests, and what they'd do with all the gold they had coming to them—sleeping on it was Hrym's main idea. The sword seemed to suffer from the misapprehension that they were nearly done now. They had only to pick up another artifact or two, open this mysterious vault, and—ahem—"get paid." At least Hrym had the good sense not to speculate aloud about how Obed would look when he realized he'd been robbed.

  From time to time Cilian would emerge from the forest, trot up to the cart, and hop up alongside to ride for a while, telling Rodrick about the various threats he'd dispatched, or bandits he'd frightened off by convincing animals to attack them, or how the shape of writhing wood grubs in the dirt reinforced his certainty that traveling with this bold band of heroes was his destiny, and so on. The huntsman was almost as bad as Obed, but unlike the priest, he was undeterred by either trivial conversation or cold silence, or even veiled insults. Fortunately Cilian always hopped down and ran off into the woods again after a short while.

  They found a colliers' camp just before full dark. Obed slumbered in the tub beneath a tarp while Zaqen and Rodrick joined the local workers around their fire. The soot-stained men were happy enough to greet travelers who might bring news of more civilized lands. Rodrick spun some expansive lies: the demons were being defeated in the Worldwound, Cheliax was throwing off the yoke of Hell, rumors of impending civil war in Brevoy were greatly exaggerated, and there had been sightings of Aroden reborn far to the west, near the hurricane-swept lands.

  Later, leaning against a log with a cadged bottle of local booze brewed from some foul vegetation, Rodrick looked up at the smoke-smeared stars while Zaqen leaned beside him. "Why did you tell them such ridiculous lies?" she said after a while.

  "They'll never know the difference," Rodrick said. "Whether the things I said were true or untrue, nothing's likely to change for them. They'll burn charcoal here until they die from breathing in too much black smoke, whether there are demons in the Worldwound or not. And tonight, they're happy, and think the world is a better place. Not every lie is a weapon. Some lies are kindnesses."

  "Hmph. I think you just like lying."

  "I like doing anything I'm good at," Rodrick said. "And that, remarkably, was the honest truth." Another long moment of companionable silence passed. "You really don't know where we're going?"

  "Ultimately, yes: to the bottom of a lake. Tomorrow? No idea. We're off to get the next key. My master hasn't told me anything more." She sighed. "He doesn't entirely trust me anymore. My loyalty, I mean. Which is ridiculous. Even if I were feeling disloyal, there is the geas, compelling me. But he knows there are ways to get around a geas—to fulfill the letter of the compulsion and avoid fulfilling the spirit. He told me, flat out, that he doesn't trust me anymore—or, at any rate, doesn't trust my discretion."

  "Whatever for? I've known hounds trained from puppyhood to be perfect companions who are less loyal than you. Not to compare you to a dog—"

  "I've been compared to worse. At least dogs are mammals. Obed ...I think he thinks I've become too friendly with you."

  Rodrick let no expression touch his features. "He doesn't think we're ...that is, that we'
re ..."

  She made a face. "I'm not sure he ever thinks about humans doing those things, Rodrick, any more than you spend your time imagining gorillas in the Mwangi Expanse making sweet jungle love." She looked at him sidelong. "You don't spend all your time imagining that, do you? Good. I'm reassured. No, but you were supposed to be expendable. A weapon to use until you broke, or needed to be paid off, either one. But when he was in the pond in the forest, Obed accused me of growing fond of you."

  "Have you?"

  "I think you're a terrible person, but you make me laugh." She shrugged. "I don't have much use for other humans, as a rule. I've never felt comfortable with my race, perhaps because it's not entirely my race. But if Hrym sees something in you ..."

  The sword, silent all night in order to avoid frightening the colliers, spoke up. "I don't see that much in him. Are you looking for a sword, Zaqen? I could be persuaded to switch my allegiance. I'm fickle."

  "Breaking up the two of you?" She clucked her tongue. "I'm no homewrecker, Hrym. The two of you are one of the great romances, in your own way."

  "You take that back." Hrym said. "This man means nothing to me. He's just a body to strap a scabbard to!"

  "I should have given you to the swordlord," Rodrick said. "I could have kept Magnos the Ash Lord. He knew how to keep his lack of a mouth shut."

  Zaqen chuckled. "Sleep well, boys. We have an early day tomorrow. I don't know where we're going, but I'm sure Obed will want to get there faster than is physically possible."

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  Two days later they crossed a minor river into wilder lands—now the forest loomed on both sides, though there was a little village there with a mill wheel, and farmers making the most of Brevoy's short growing season. The weather was already turning surprisingly cold, especially nights, and Rodrick couldn't imagine what it must be like here in the winter. The mountains were closer now, and it became increasingly apparent that some peak or ridge or pass must be Obed's destination. Maybe the next artifact was hidden under another rock. That would be nice.

  The road they were following gradually devolved into a mere track, but they hadn't passed into entirely uninhabited lands yet, and the cart rolled stolidly along. Obed wanted to travel nights too, but Rodrick convinced him that the near certainty of hitting a hole in the dark and breaking a wagon wheel—or a horse's leg—would cost them more time than his plan would gain.

  When they camped the next night, just stopping where they happened to be when darkness fell—which it did swiftly at this latitude—Rodrick saw lights flickering off to the east. "What's that?" he asked. "Is something on fire over there?" The thought of a wildfire tearing through the Gronzi Forest was terrifying, since they were literally surrounded on both sides by the wood.

  Cilian, who'd walked in from the trees to join them for a meal, looked at the light for a moment, then shook his head. "That does not seem to be fire. The lights are in the icy mountains. Mountains do not burn."

  Zaqen rose and stood with them, then made a hmmm sound. "The Valley of Fire is in that direction, though still some distance away. It's the site of a great battle—or a great massacre, anyway. The Aldori rebels pursued Choral the Conqueror into that valley, thinking they would corner him, but it was a trap. The Conqueror had an ambush prepared. Two red dragons. They simply filled the place with flames, reducing the main force of the army of Rostland to so much bone meal and ash. Apparently nothing grows on that battlefield anymore, and everything is still as charred and blackened as it was right after the dragons attacked."

  "All right, but it's still on fire?" Rodrick said.

  "There are stories that the ghosts of the dead army still linger there," Zaqen said. "Some say their shades still burn, eternally suffering the agony of a fiery death."

  "Ah." Rodrick turned his back on the distant flickers of light. "So it's just burning ghosts, then, is that all? Why has Obed brought us to this horrible place?"

  The priest spoke up, startling Rodrick, who hadn't noticed him emerge from his tub and approach their fire. "I go where my god demands, man. Just as you go where your employer demands. We are all tools for someone."

  "Are we bound for the Valley of Fire, master?" Zaqen said. Rodrick dearly hoped not. Hrym was a versatile weapon, but he lost most of his considerable advantages when it came to dealing with magical fire.

  "No. Tomorrow we will begin to turn north."

  "North? But there's nothing to the north but forest, and the Icerime Peaks—"

  "I can read a map," Obed said. "And I know where I'm going. You do not need to concern yourself with such things." He paused. "Oh. And Zaqen. Tomorrow—do not take your remedy."

  The sorcerer stumbled back a step. "But ...master ..."

  "Would you disobey me?" Obed's voice was mild, but it was the mildness of ...well, of a psychopath enjoying the lull before an explosion of violence.

  "I would not disobey, even if I could, but I want to make sure I understand—"

  "Your medicine," Obed said. "Your preventative. Do not take it tomorrow. Or the next day, of course. I know it takes a day or so for the effects of your remedy to wear off."

  "May I ask why?" she said, almost whispering.

  "We will soon have need of those qualities you choose to suppress," Obed said, shrugging. "That is all the reason you should require." He went back to the cart, climbing into his sloshing tub.

  "Are you all right?" Rodrick said. "I'm not sure what just happened, but—"

  "It's nothing." Zaqen drew her cloak around her tightly. "I ...will serve him in whatever way he sees fit."

  "But if you stop taking your medicine, whatever it is," Rodrick said, "will it ...make you sick? Will it hurt you?"

  She laughed in a strangely toneless way. "Will it hurt me? Not at all. It's much more likely to hurt others." Zaqen went to the far side of the fire, curled up on the ground, and rolled over, either falling asleep immediately or pretending to do so.

  Rodrick walked away from the fire, and a moment later, Cilian followed him.

  "What do you think?" Hrym said. "Is she a werewolf?"

  "Some sort of lycanthrope could be a possibility," Rodrick said. "Though the tainted blood she spoke of seemed different, and it would be odd if she were also a were ...whatever. That might explain why horses shy away from her, though."

  Cilian shook his head. "She is not a shapechanger. I believe I would know."

  "Oh?"

  The huntsman nodded. "I have fought werewolves, and wererats, and stranger things, and there is always a certain bestial quality, a whiff of musk, some sign of the beast within revealed by the way they move. Zaqen...I like the sorcerer, despite the twisted blood that flows through her, but she does not have the grace or power of someone who shares her soul with a beast. The herbs she uses for her medicinal tea each morning are not wolfsbane, either, and I know of no other preventative for lycanthropy."

  "What herbs are they, then?" Hrym said.

  "They are nothing I have ever seen, and my knowledge of plants is quite extensive. The leaves, before she crushes them, are red and spined ...they look unnatural. Like something that might grow on another plane, or from cursed and polluted soil."

  Rodrick sighed. "It would be almost too simple if she were a werewolf. I'm sure it's nothing that ordinary. I suppose we'll find out what secret she's hiding soon enough. I just hope she doesn't have to suffer too much in the process."

  "I'm more concerned about us," Hrym said. "She did say if she stopped taking her medicine, it would be others who got hurt."

  "What are you worried about?" Rodrick said. "You're a sword."

  "That's a good point," Hrym said. "Carry on, then."

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  The Sunken Land

  The Icerime Peaks," Rodrick said, yawning. They'd camped late the night before, and arisen early, setting off before dawn. The sun was only just now up over the trees, and though Rodrick had been awake for hours, he still felt thick with sleep. "How pleasant. They couldn't have ca
lled them something a little cheerier, like the Frozen Teeth of Death?"

  "You have to admit, it's descriptive." Zaqen was in the rear of the cart, but standing up, leaning against the back of the driver's seat. They both looked at the jagged peaks marching north and south on their right, dizzying spires of stone covered in white snow, with occasional patches of solid ice that flashed blue. On their left stood the ragged vastness of the Gronzi Forest, evergreen trees dusted with snow on their highest branches. The group was squeezed between stone and wild, following a path that might have been used by traders, once, but obviously hadn't been traveled much in decades, if not longer. The temperature seemed to drop with every mile they rolled, and Rodrick had never taken off the thick wool cloak he'd wrapped around himself to sleep in the night before.

  "They should have sent some of the red dragons up this way back during that war," Rodrick said. "And melted some of these mountains. I bet they're really just little hills, once you chip away all the ice and snow."

  "Don't talk about such things," Hrym said, leaning against the seat beside Rodrick's right leg. "Dragon's fire is one of the few things that might actually be able to melt me. You'll give me nightmares."

  "You don't sleep."

  "Don't remind me. Can you imagine having to listen to your snoring eternally?"

  Cilian trotted out of the treeline, easily running alongside the slow-rolling cart, then pulled himself up on the seat next to Rodrick. "The forest here is strangely empty," he said. "No sign of predators, but also no prey animals. I detect no hint of poison or corruption. Perhaps there is some magical taint ...?" He trailed off and looked at Zaqen.