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Five: Word in Elfyn-Land

 

1

Crunch!

Mm? Andor stirred, feeling the ache in his back.

Crunch! again? Where was he? Feet cold, back stiff as planks, lying on something very hard . . . Crunch! What was that infuriating noise?

He opened a reluctant eye and saw sky, pale blue, framed all around in impossibly green fronds. Sleeping outdoors? Wrapped in his cloak?

Crunch! He opened the other eye and turned his head.

The king of Krasnegar sat cross-legged beside him, eating an apple. Crunch! The oversized faun looked down with a mocking grin on his ugly, unshaven face and his big jaw moving in a rhythmic chewing. His clothes were laborers' castoffs, as usual. His hair resembled a neglected woodlot—as usual.

"Good morning, sleepy-head!" Rap said. "I needn't ask if you slept well. You certainly slept long enough."

Fornication! More than dawn dew chilled Andor. Every time he got involved with this accursed ex-stableboy, he landed in trouble, big trouble. Now he remembered: being transported by Evil-begotten sorcery in the middle of the night from that stinking, sinking hulk to . . . Oh, Gods! . . . to Ilrane, elf country. Big, big trouble!

He returned the smile cheerfully. "Good morning, your Majesty! I trust you also slept the sleep of the just?" He heaved himself into a sitting position.

"No, I just sleep. Don't stand up! You might be seen."

Whatever the troll-sized grass was, it was only waist-height, admittedly, but why should a sorcerer care? Andor yawned and stretched. "Can't you use your farsight?" The first time he had met this big rustic lout, years ago, had been beside a bonfire on an arctic beach. Farsight had been the issue then, he recalled, and he had wanted to scream at the kid not to reveal his talent. He had gone right ahead and done so, of course. There had been "duty" involved, and the faun had always been one of those idealistic idiots who rallied to Calls of Honor. That was a dangerous trait, one that had subsequently landed him in innumerable perils. He was no kid anymore—he was a lot older than Andor himself now—but he had never learned sense. Unfortunately he seemed to have a gift for dragging Andor's neck into the noose with his own.

Now he shrugged casually. "I haven't been outside the shielding yet. I chose this bivouac because it was shielded, remember?"

The faun had breakfast all spread out on the trampled herbage between them. Andor pulled a face and reached for the water bottle. He would prefer not to be reminded of the events of the night. He had an instinctive dislike of ships, especially sinking ships.

"Why would anyone put shielding in the middle of a hay field?"

"This ain't hay, City Slicker! Likely there was a house here once, a sorcerer's house. I think I was lying on some of the foundations, as a matter of fact." The king grinned as if he had not a care in the world. Good humor early in the morning was a revolting vice; good humor in the face of hazard was utter insanity. He would be more malleable if he did not know how Andor felt on the topic, though. So Andor smiled again.

"I had the fireplace! What's the program for today, Rap?"

The faun nodded in a direction behind Andor's back. "We head for that"

Andor turned his head to see. In spite of his grouchy, early-morning feelings, he felt the impact. The first rays of the sun had just caught the summit, blazing in crystal glory, a blur of rainbow high against the pale dawn blue. The sky tree was obviously very far off, the rest of its familiar pinecone shape still an indistinct shadow.

"Valdorian?"

"Valdorian," Rap agreed. He tossed his apple core away and reached for a pear.

See one sky tree and you've seen 'em all. Andor glanced over the choice of breakfast, realizing he was hungry. The last meal he'd eaten had been an excellent dinner at Casfrel Station. The fact that it had been three or four months ago was of no importance. What did matter was that he had been called back into existence last night and had built up an appetite in his sleep.

The menu was entirely vegetarian. "I suppose one of the trolls magicked up this for you?"

Rap raised a quizzical eyebrow. "You'd rather I'd asked an anthropophagus?"

"Er, no!" Andor chose a mango and reached for his dagger to peel it. Big, big, big trouble! He was not only an illegal intruder in Ilrane, he was supposed to accompany this faun maniac on a visit to a warden, an elvish warden, an elvish ex-warden, an elvish fugitive ex-warden. Crazy, crazy, crazy! Somehow, he must detach himself and head for safety. Even getting out of Ilrane might not be easy. The yellow-bellies were deeply secretive about their ancestral homeland; they hated strangers trekking around in it. Their ports and border crossings were infested with guards, who had loathsome habits of throwing nonelves in jail at the slightest provocation.

Call another of the Group? That seemed impractical under the circumstances. Darad and Jalon would probably collaborate with the faun. Sagorn certainly would—besides, the old fool was too frail to be exposed to hardship and danger. Andor couldn't call Sagorn or Darad at the moment, anyway.

That left Thinal. Funny, in any tight spot, Andor's first thought was always to call that no-good fast-fingered little vagrant. It must be some sort of throwback to their childhood, when Thinal had been his big brother, leader and protector, fearless hero. Changed days now! Thinal did have a rat's instinct for self-preservation, and he would share Andor's sentiments about this present idiocy, but he would have even less chance of escaping from elf country, because at least Andor could usually talk his way out of trouble. How had he ever fallen into this cesspool?

"Valdorian? That's Lith'rian's ancestral enclave?"

The faun nodded, gray eyes twinkling as if he could read Andor's thoughts. He could, of course, but he had some stupid scruples about reading thoughts. So he had always said and he was always moronically truthful.

Andor bit messily into the mango. "Isn't that an absurdly obvious place to look for him? Surely the Covin's been hunting him for months?"

Rap wiped his fingers on grass, apparently finished with breakfast. "I discussed this with Sagorn and he agreed. You must remember that."

Andor hid his annoyance in a laugh. "Rap! Recalling Sagorn's mental processes is like trying to recapture a nightmare. You explain to simple old me, huh?"

The faun frowned, puzzled. "I don't understand that, you know! If you share memories of events, why can't you remember what he was thinking?"

Why didn't he mind his own accursed business? "Because, old friend, I'm just plain dumb compared to him. He jumps to conclusions so fast that he doesn't even notice how he gets there. So he doesn't remember the steps—and then neither do I."

"I see. Well, it's not simple, I admit."

"We're talking elves. Rap. Nothing is ever simple around elves."

The faun laughed agreement. "Precisely! That's the point. When Lith'rian fled from Hub, everyone's first thought was that he would head back to Valdorian. Elvish instinct—go home to the tree. But Zinixo is hunting him with the Covin, so the obvious place is the last place he would be, right?"

"Right!"

"So that's exactly where he will be." Rap smirked, and began packing the rest of the food away.

Andor hastily chose two more mangoes and some grapes. "Surely that's too obvious?"

The smirk widened. "Therefore that makes it even more likely!" He turned serious. "It's a gamble, of course, but Zinixo is a dwarf, and you can't have two ways of thinking more different than elves' and dwarves'. I've had a taste of both sets of mental processes in my time, and I tried to apply them as well as I can. As I see it, to Lith'rian the only place he can possibly hide is his own sky tree, Valdorian. Honor and dignity require it! To Zinixo, anything as obvious as that can only be a trap. And there's two other reasons to start there."

"Tell me!" Andor could see that worse was coming, but he smiled as if he were enjoying this craziness.

Rap began buckling up the pack. "First, we don't have any other leads at all, and Ilrane is just too evilish big to search. The elves will never tell us where their beloved warlock is hiding, and he's a very powerful sorcerer—we can't hope to find him by ourselves in a thousand years. It's Valdorian or nothing. Second . . . how do you think Warlock Lith'rian is feeling now?"

"I haven't the foggiest," Andor said cheerfully, thinking that there was nothing in the world he could care less about. Then he guessed, and a moderate size iceberg settled in the pit of his stomach. "Oh! Defiant? Suicidal?"

The faun nodded somberly. "Glorious last stands are an elvish tradition. It fits the present situation, somehow. Lith'rian has been a warden for almost ninety years and probably expected to have another century or so. But now he's facing defeat by his old enemy, a detested dwarf. The millennium has come and brought total ruin to everything. My guess is that he will have rallied his votaries in Valdorian, planning to go down gloriously, with all flags flying." He shrugged. "It's not much, and if you've got a better idea, I'm certainly willing to listen."

Andor had a thousand better ideas, and Rap would never accept any of them. If the big mongrel wasn't a sorcerer, Andor would talk him out of this in minutes. And if there was anything worse than a warlock, or an ex-warlock, it must be a suicidal ex-warlock. God of Horrors!

"Sounds good to me," he said.

Rap smiled gratefully. "Sky trees are heavily guarded. You'll be a great help if you can just charm the elves into admitting us."

"No problem. Rap. Elves are about the easiest people I know." He was a sorcerer—let him do his own damned charming! "I can handle elves! Dwarves, now, or fauns . . . Ugh!"

Rap laughed aloud, completely unoffended. "We've had some grand adventures together, old friend, haven't we?"

"We sure have. Rap," Andor said. And none of them was ever my idea! "But this one beats them all." Gods get me out of here!

Rap chuckled and rose to his knees, then more cautiously to his feet, looking around him all the while. "All clear," he said.

Then came pulling on of boots and buckling of swords. Andor scowled at his cloak. It would be a dreary weight to lug around, and Ilrane near to midsummer was certain to be hot. The only use for a cloak was as bedding, and he did not intend to repeat this sleeping-out-of-doors nonsense. There was no need to argue that point now, though. Eventually he rose also. He hoisted the second pack, grunting at its weight, although it was substantially smaller than the one the faun had taken. He slung it on his back, and it made him stoop, putting his eyes about level with the king's collarbones. There was something obscene about a faun bigger than an imp. It was contrary to nature.

Waist-high all around them, the lurid green foliage rippled in the breeze. A line of tall hedgerow showed where the road ran close by. Southward, the sky tree of Valdorian was all ablaze now in the rays of the rising sun, a crystal artichoke two leagues high. Thin cloud streamed eastward from the summit.

"Isn't it magnificent?" the half-breed said in an awed voice.

"Fantastic!" It would take days to reach that monstrosity on foot. "Why didn't your sorcerous friends put us closer?"

"Oh, we were afraid there might be magical boobytraps set up around it."

Oh, great! Just wonderful'

"And we must give the others time to get things organized in Dragon Reach," Rap continued, wading off into the greenery. "Lith'rian," he said over his shoulder, "is going to explode in streaks of fiery fury when he hears what we're up to."

Even greater! A furious suicidal elvish ex-warlock!

Other plans were needed, and soon. If Andor's mastery was going to be used to charm him into elvish places, those places were not going to be any urinating sky trees, they were going to be bedrooms. Come to think of it, there was one bright spot in this mess, and that was girls. Since elves never showed their age, elvish women were all nubile. And lovely. And inventive. And extremely susceptible. They could often be talked into interesting group exercises. So the first fork in the road would see a faunless Andor heading for the nearest convenient port, but on the way there he would certainly refresh his memories of elvish hospitality and intimate—

"God of Fools!" the faun roared. He turned and grabbed Andor and spun him around and rushed him back the way they had come by sheer brute strength, until they reached the trampled patch where they had spent the night. There he stopped. "God of Misery!" he added.

Andor hurled himself to the ground to hide. Realizing that the faun was still standing, he peered up—and greatly disliked what he saw. He knew Rap was heavily cursed with the sort of unimaginative stupidity often referred to as "courage." He had very rarely seen Rap look frightened. He had never seen him look like he did now. But if such obvious danger threatened, why was he still on his feet, in full view of the whole world?

"What the Evil is wrong?" Andor bleated . . . demanded.

The king swung his pack off and dropped it. "The Covin!" he growled. He sat on the pack, put his elbows on his knees and his chin on his hands, and scowled homicidally at the distant sky tree.

"Rap—"

"Shut up and let me think!"

That remark shocked Andor more than he liked to contemplate. That remark had not represented Rap's usual stubborn insistence on ignoring trouble. That remark had sounded scared. Andor wondered if he ought to make a break for it while there was still time.

"Sorry," Rap muttered, still pulling faces. "I let it startle me."

"Let what startle you?"

"Eyes. Zinixo's eyes."

Andor clenched his teeth to keep them silent.

Rap paused a moment longer, then sighed. "I think I see. I'm not near as wise as I once was, you know, but I think I see what he's doing; how he's doing it. He's . . . well, just because I understand doesn't mean I can explain it." He straightened up and ran both hands through his thicket of hair. "The Covin's mounting a personal search for me. It started to home in on me as soon as we left the shielding."

"It didn't find you, did it?"

"Obviously not."

"Why obviously?"

"Oh—because we're still alive and at liberty. But it's like being hunted by hounds, I think. Every scenting or sighting will bring them closer."

"Just you?" Andor licked his lips, wondering how to suggest tactfully that he be allowed to leave—alone, of course. A week's start would be only fair.

"Just me. I saw Zinixo's eyes . . . Big as mountains, cold as stone." Rap shivered. "It's sort of like the sending he used on Shandie at the beginning. It's not the same as the hunt for magic he tried on us in the Mosweeps. This is personal!"

And obviously dangerous. "Why now?"

"I don't know!" the faun muttered, scowling. "Perhaps because of Olybino's performance. Perhaps the dwarf didn't realize I was involved in the Mosweeps thing. Perhaps he still feared I was a demigod, and didn't dare risk personal contact . . . He's a horrible coward, you know? Worse than, well, worse than anyone else I can think of. If I was," he growled, "was still a demigod, I mean, then I'd accept the connection and burn him to a crisp! Even if I had to fry half the Covin to get to him, I would!" He groaned and returned to his concentrated brooding.

Andor struggled to regain control over his teeth. "Rap?" he whimpered. "Rap, if any one of us five ever dies before he can call another, then the other four will be lost forever, won't they? That means effectively dead, doesn't it? The first death will kill all five of us!"

"I suppose so," the king murmured, seemingly still engrossed in other matters.

"Well, then?"

What Andor meant was that it wasn't fair to expect him to risk five lives all on his own. He had more to lose than other men, didn't he? How could he put that into words?

"Ha!" Rap grinned. "Got it! At least, I think I have."

"Oh, good."

"He's hunting for my, er, my magical signature, I suppose is the best way to describe it." He scowled, briefly. "Never mind the details. What matters is that he's looking for me as a sorcerer. If I cloak myself in a shielding, so I don't react with the ambience . . ."

For a moment he twisted his ugly features in a grimace. Then he jumped up, smirking. "There! Done it!"

Andor clambered warily to his feet, dusting himself. "Done what?"

"I just shielded myself." Rap chuckled and ran his hands through his awful hair again. "No sorcery in, no sorcery out! So as far as the Covin's concerned, I'm a mundane, and thus I won't show up to their search! So it's all up to you, now, friend Andor. Lead the way!"

Not a sorcerer?

Well, in that case . . .

A hurricane hit Andor at full force, slamming him into the ground, knocking all the wind out of him, rolling him over. Then the great ox was on his back, crushing his lungs, twisting his arm up until his shoulder was almost dislocated.

"Rap!" he gurgled, through a faceful of greenery. "What the Evil are you doing?"

"Thought you saw your chance, did you?" a gruff voice snarled in his ear. "Thought you'd settle a few old scores, did you?"

"Rap!. Never! What in the world are you talking about? We're old buddies, you and I! Ever since I gave you your first lesson in bookkeeping—"

"That won't work, either!" the jotunnish accent said. "This shielding will keep your occult charm out, too! I saw where your hand was heading."

Damnation! "I don't know what you're talking about!"

"Oh, yes, you do! So now I know I can't turn my back on you, Andor, old snake. Too bad, because you'd have been really helpful."

"You're making a horrible mistake," Andor told the vegetation under his nose. It was hard to breathe with that load on top of him. "I was just scratching a bite."

"You were just drawing your sword! And we both know who's the better swordsman. Going to finish our long-ago duel, were you? Well, I think we'll have Jalon in your place, thank you nicely. He can't help as you could have, but he does look sort of elvish at a distance. And I can trust him at my back."

"Rap—"

The pressure on Andor's arm increased mercilessly.

"Rap!!"

"Call Jalon!" the faun roared. He sounded more like a jotunn when he wasn't visible.

The bones in Andor's shoulder creaked and burst into flame. Oh, God of Vengeance! He swore a silent oath and called:

 

 

2

Jalon lifted his face out of the mush and said, "Ouch!" The pressure on his arm eased immediately. "This is not easy for a jotunn, you know!" he said. "If I lose my temper, I may start using really vulgar language."

With a hoarse chuckle, the weight vanished from his back. A moment later two big hands grabbed him under the arms and hoisted him bodily upright He spun around and was enveloped in the big fellow's hearty embrace. They thumped each other and laughed.

He backed off, wiping sap and leaves from his cheeks. "Good to see you again. Rap! Hope I can stay around a little longer this time, though."

"Hope so, too! It's good to have you back." Puffing slightly, the oversized faun grinned down happily at the undersized jotunn.

"And great to be in Ilrane!" Jalon said. Immature sugarcane rippled all around—oh, that green! He inspected his hand, which was bright with the same green. "You know, I've never found a stable pigment to capture this color? Not close, even! It's almost glauconite, but with less blue in it. Do you think you could magic up some for me some time?"

Inexplicably Rap bellowed with laughter. "If that's all I have to pay for your assistance, then I'll be more than happy to oblige."

"You will? Oh, thanks. Rap!" Jalon rubbed his shoulder. He must not get lost in thinking about painting, though, or singing. He must remember that they were here on very important business, and not go wool-gathering. Then he recalled the sky tree and swung around to take a proper look at it.

God of Beauty! Glorious! The nimbus of color on the sunward side, a spiky kaleidoscope of pale hues, contrasting with the low-value gentian blue of the shadowed face, and the cerulean sky beyond—he drank it in, memorizing the play of light.

"I said," Rap repeated, "that if your shoulder hurts, I can take off my shielding for a moment and fix it for you, while we're here."

"Mm? No, it's fine." Even the clouds took on pearly tints near the tree.

"You've seen a sky tree before, haven't you?"

"What? Oh, yes. Andor visited Valdostor years ago, and he called me to do some of the climbing for him." But Jalon had never really had a good chance to study a tree at a distance, in its proper setting. The land rose in irregular waves to it—the root hills, elves called them—and here they were blotched with orchards and vineyards in malachite and shamrock green, streaked with deeper cypress. Might even be real cypresses.

"What? Oh, thanks." He accepted his pack from the faun and let himself be led across the field toward the road. The air was honey and wine. Ilrane! At last! He had always wanted to visit Ilrane and had always let himself be diverted somehow. There would be songs to learn, too, because everybody knew that the elves had music they saved for homeland and sky trees.

"Aren't you going to put that pack on?" Rap asked as they scrambled through the hedge.

"On? Of course!" Jalon hauled the straps over his shoulders. They were set for Andor, and loose on him, but they would do for now. Meanwhile he was far more interested in—

"This road!" the faun said. "I didn't notice in the night—it's colored!"

"All roads are colored in Ilrane, Rap. Elves don't like bare gravel or rock. The pictures tell a story to speed your journey. Two stories, depending which direction you're going. Let's see, this one seems to be—"

"We have to go this way."

"Oh. Well, that's all right. This way it'll be better. The best tales lead to the trees, of course. Yes, this looks like the tale of Puil'arin. She was the daughter of Zand'arin, War Vicar of the Senior Sept, and she fell in love with . . ."

In a few paces, the ballad came flooding back. Wishing he had a lyre or a lute with him, Jalon raised his eyes to the road ahead and began to sing. Rap strode along at his side, listening contentedly.

 

There was something magical about the light in Ilrane. It made a man's heart tingle. It roasted every warm color and froze every cool one; a million tints of green vibrated all around. The most banal motifs were transformed into marvels—willows over brooks, cattle under trees, cottages drowning in billows of flowers. Jalon's head ached with the effort of storing up memories he would express in pigment when he returned to Hub. He would try watercolor first, he decided, then oils, but would he manage to capture that enchantment? Probably he would dash off a dozen or so landscapes in a few days, working in a frenzy until he was ready to drop. Thereafter they would lie around his studio until Thinal sold them off for a fortune to rich imps, or Andor gave them away to women. That was what usually happened. He didn't care; it was the act of creation that mattered.

Sometime on that first morning, he lost his pack. Rap was annoyed. He said he'd been watching, and it had still happened, and how the Evil could a grown man lose a backpack without even remembering taking it off? Jalon apologized and promised to pay better attention in future. Yes, he did know how important this mission was. But why did they need packs at all? The climate was much like a warm bed all the time, and the hedgerows alone were laden with enough berries to feed them, even without having to raid the orchards.

Rap didn't believe that, so Jalon marched over to the nearest hedge and began filling his hat with berries—some people just couldn't see what was in front of their eyes! He would have collected a dinner in minutes, except he got distracted by a spider spinning a web. He wanted to see how she would finish it, but Rap came and said it was time to move on.

 

That night they bedded down in a copse by a stream. Jalon insisted on choosing the spot, because he wanted a good view of the sky tree. It seemed bigger now, towering over the hills. It reflected in the foreground pool, glowing begonia pink against the cobalt and manganese twilight, and sometimes fish set it rippling in circles. It was so beautiful it hurt. Perhaps an underpainting of madder scarlet, overlain with glazes of burnt umber and ultramarine . . .

"Just like old times, isn't it?" Rap said wistfully. "Like you and me and Gathmor marching across Dragon Reach."

Yes, Jalon agreed, just like old times. They talked about that for a while. It didn't seem all that long ago to him, but Rap had certainly been much younger then, so perhaps it was. Gathmor had been a likable guy for a sailor; short-tempered, of course. Fortunately Rap was more understanding—Jalon was almost certain he had started out the morning with a sword, and now he didn't have one, and he felt guilty about that. Not that he was any use with a sword, but he might have to call Darad. He wondered if Rap had noticed its disappearance yet.

"I suppose it would be safe to have a dip in that pool?" Rap said suddenly.

"Why not? I expect at least a dozen girls will appear as soon as we get our clothes off."

"Will they? We haven't seen many so far."

"Then why did you keep pulling me into hedges?"

Rap hauled off his shirt. "Three times. Only three times all day have we seen people. No livestock, nobody in the fields! The farms all seem deserted." He pushed off his boots, and then stayed sitting, frowning. "Where is everybody?"

"Fled, I expect."

The faun scratched his head. "Or taken refuge in the sky tree?"

"No. We'd see lights up there if it was inhabited."

"Barnacles! Why didn't I think of that?" Rap stared at the great bulk of Valdorian, slate blue now against the emerging stars. The play of starlight on it was unforgettable, but not a lantern nor a torch flame showed.

"Because you're not an artist," Jalon said, feeling rather pleased at having been useful for once. "And you can't swim worth a spit."

"Oh, yes? Think you're better? Want to prove it?"

 

It was too bad there were no elves around. They might have been difficult with strangers, of course, but Jalon wanted very much to talk with real Ilrane elves. Later, when he and Rap had enjoyed their swim, had eaten, and were lying on heaps of ferns, bone weary from their long trek but not quite ready to sleep, they fell to talking about elves. And Jalon found himself telling a little of himself, and what it was like to be a mixture of such impossible opposites as elf and jotunn.

Apparently he had already told Rap once, long ago, that he had elf blood in him, although he did not recall doing so. Normally he never mentioned it. Apart from his size, he was so completely jotunn on the outside that no one would ever guess. Only the inside of his head was elvish.

"You must have had a difficult childhood," Rap said sleepily from the darkness.

Jalon stared up at the star dust above the branches and said yes, he'd had some troubles then. "As long as I stayed away from jotnar, it wasn't too bad, though. Imp boys didn't mess with me, on account of my looks."

"But elf boys would have nothing to do with you?"

"There weren't any elf boys in our part of town." He did not mention his mother, because he could remember so little of her. Whether she'd been raped by a jotunn or had acquiesced in his conception, he had never known. The fact that she had lived apart from the elf community in Malfin suggested that she'd been driven out. Certainly an elf woman who had gone into domestic service must have been in sore straits. He liked to assume that she'd died of a broken heart. "I lived with Darad's family. He was a younger brother to me, although he was always bigger. He used to defend me from the others—mostly so he could beat me up himself."

"Sounds like friend Darad," Rap murmured. "Did he have more wits in those days, before they got banged out of him?"

"Not that I recall. And I used to stay close to Thinal as much as I could."

"Thinal? The Thinal I know?"

"Yes. He was older than the rest of us. He took good care of us, too. We worshipped Thinal!"

Rap snorted but said nothing. It was certainly curious that the boyhood hero had turned out so despicable. Yet Thinal had always had his own standards. Inos's father had liked him, but that had been long before Rap was born.

"I suppose being a faun in Krasnegar wasn't exactly cream buns either?"

"Oh, I was jotunn enough to get by. Besides, no one sneers at mongrels there because most people are, especially the royal family."

"The present king, you mean, and Inos? What are your kids like?"

Rap sighed.

"Sorry!" Jalon said. "Shouldn't have asked."

"It's all right. I think of them every day, so why not talk about them? No fauns, thank the Gods. The twins are the oldest, Gath and Kadie. Kadie's pure imp, except she has Inos' green eyes. She's a little minx! No need to worry about Kadie. Gath and Eva are jotunn in looks. Holi's turning out a sort of blond imp—or he was when I last saw him. He may get picked on when he's older, I suppose."

Jalon prepared to change the subject, but Rap went on, speaking softly to the night breeze.

"Gath bothers me a little. He's a jotunn on the outside, like you, although he's going to be tall. Inside . . . I don't know! I can't figure Gath out at all. He's placid and unassertive and sort of dreamy. Not stubborn like a faun or aggressive like a jotunn. Not greedy and meddlesome like an imp."

"My sort of guy."

"Almost. But he shows no artistic vices, so I can't accuse Inos of having an affair with an elf."

"Will he be king after you?"

"If we win this war . . . Well, who knows?" Rap sighed again. "For all I know, Zinixo has leveled Krasnegar to the wave tops."

Jalon stumbled over hasty words of comfort. "You'd have felt that happen, wouldn't you? Grunth would, at least, or Tik Tok! Someone on Dreadnought would have told you if anything like that had happened."

"Probably. I just hope Inos had the sense to go into hiding with the kids. I told her she should."

"Where could anyone hide near Krasnegar?" Jalon demanded, thinking of the bleak tundra.

There was a long pause, then the king said, "She could have gone south. There's a way. Trouble is, the goblins were down in Pithmot, right? How did they get there?" His bedding rustled as he rolled over. "Well, Lith'rian will know. Think I'll catch me some shut-eye."

 

Guided by Grunth, who had once been there, the meld of sorcerers on Dreadnought had set the intruders down about two days' ride from Valdorian—or so they had thought. They had not anticipated that there would be no horses to be found. So Rap and Jalon were forced to walk, and a long trek it was. In the root hills the land was heaved into a maze of ridges and steep-walled canyons. Elvish roads never led directly anywhere, but always took the most scenic route possible.

Jalon lost count of the days, because he was enjoying himself so much. He rarely worried about time, anyway. Rap was fine company—humorous, soft-spoken, even-tempered. Despite his apparent clumsiness and his homely looks, the big fellow was as good for a chat as he was in a brawl. He was impatient to achieve his purpose, yet he never let his frustration show, except for an occasional obscure mutter about Longday.

The land was an artist's dream, prosperous yet beautiful, a blend of garden and apparently virgin nature that only elves could have achieved. It seemed uninhabited because elvish buildings, no matter how picturesque, were always tucked away out of sight. Rap said that the amount of agriculture in the district showed it must normally support a large population and he debated where all the people had gone, and why. Since the first day, the intruders had seen no one at all.

There were advantages to that, of course. Soon they began a little discreet looting—eggs from the farmyards, fish from the ponds, smoked hams from the larders. They took to sleeping in elvish beds. About the third night Jalon discovered a lute on a high shelf. It had been so coated with dust that he felt justified in taking it with him when he left the next morning, certain that its loss would not upset its owner. He would never steal a musician's favored instrument, but this one had obviously been superseded. After that he could play upon the road, and the leagues seemed even lighter.

As Rap pointedly pointed out, he did not lose the lute as he had lost the pack and the sword.

The land rose steadily. Far to the south, two more sky trees came into sight like ghostly pinecones and then vanished again behind the bulk of Valdorian. Valdorian itself grew ever more enormous, day by day, until it obscured the sky and overhung the world. Its summit was no longer visible, only the ribbed undersides of the great petals. At their fringes they shone bright as diamond, darkening inward to the trunk in rich translucent tones, like a glass mountain.

Then one day, just as Jalon finished the "Lament of the Lonely Sisters" and was adjusting the tuning on his E string, Rap said, "Hold it a moment."

Jalon said, "Mm?" and took stock of his surroundings. There was nothing especially interesting in sight, even the road itself, which had just reached the sad end of ill-starred Loah'rian and was doodling in arabesques and chinoiserie before starting another tale. The scenery was concealed by high grassy banks. A dull patch like this invariably hinted at something spectacular just around the next bend; it was designed to clear the palate.

"Let's take a brief break here. Come and sit down."

Uneasy, Jalon followed his companion to the verge and settled beside him on the grass. They traveled light now. Rap had retained only his boots and sword and long breeches, abandoning all baggage. Jalon wore cerise elvish shorts and mauve bootees, while his third layer of skin was coming in tanned. His slim build and fair hair might escape notice at a distance, but elves were golden, not red and peeling.

Oddly, Rap never wore short pants. Funny guy—you could tease him about his hair or his face, you could even address him as "Master Thume" because of the word tattooed on his arm, and he would smile tolerantly—but breathe one word about his furry faun legs and a dangerous jotunn glint would flare in his gray eyes. It was nice to know he was human enough to have tender spots.

A faun and a jotunn in elfland—add a sword and a lute, and you had the makings of a ballad; like "The Minstrel and the Knight," for instance. He hadn't sung that one since . . .

"If you don't mind?"

Jalon started. "Sorry, Rap. You said?"

Rap smiled fondly. "Is the sun bothering you, then?"

"No." Jalon looked upward. "Oh!" They sat in shadow. The noon sun was almost vertical and the underside of Valdorian's first petal completely overhung them, a pellucid roof whose depths gleamed in indigo and parrot green.

"We're almost there, Jalon."

"Yes . . . I didn't hear what you asked. Rap."

"I would like to consult Sagorn, if you don't mind."

"Of course I don't," Jalon said, with an outward smile and an inward sigh. He had been so much looking forward to another visit to a sky tree, hopefully a much longer visit than those few hours he had enjoyed in Valdostor, years ago. Now he must go, and the next time he was called he might be a thousand leagues from Ilrane. Still, this mission of Rap's was important, and he must settle for these few idyllic days he had been granted. Without argument he called:

 

 

3

Sagorn screwed up his eyes against the pink glare, wincing as the seams of his breeches exploded and his toes were crushed—why did that moronic artist never learn to think? Why did he never consider that he was the smallest of the five of them, except for Thinal? Sagorn never called Darad without loosening his clothes first—not that he ever called Darad unless he had to. All it took was a little foresight. Knowing he might be returned in daylight, he always closed his eyes if he had to call a replacement when he was in a dark place, like Dreadnoughts fo'c's'le.

He risked a peek through slitted lids and saw the prognathous smile of the king of Krasnegar. After a moment he blinked his eyes fully open and strained awkwardly to remove the boots.

Rap said, "Morning, Doctor! Or possibly good afternoon."

"Have you tried lifting your shielding at all?"

"No!"

Mm? That dangerous? "You did not explain the hazard very clearly to Jalon, or if you did he didn't listen."

With the unconscious suppleness of the young, the faun rolled back to lean his elbows on the grass. "It's quite simple. Zinixo had melded with the Covin, or some of them, and was hunting for me in the ambience—me personally. It's almost impossible for a sorcerer to hide there."

"But you don't know if he is persisting in his endeavors?"

"And I don't intend to investigate. One clear glimpse and he'd have me."

"He can utilize this technique to locate any sorcerer known to him?"

"Undoubtedly. At these distances it requires enormous power, but he has that."

"So Witch Grunth and the two warlocks are likewise in danger?"

The faun pulled a face, which made him look even more grotesque than usual. "Yes. I just hope they were as lucky as I was, being within easy reach of shielding when it happened. Making a shield is a very conspicuous use of power."

"But shielding is not common as crabgrass, surely? We must assume that most or all of the wardens have now been apprehended and perverted." The enemy continued to grow stronger.

Rap nodded in glum silence. Sprawled back with his shirt off, he looked like a common quarry worker, but he was more than mere brawn. He had worked out the evil tidings and chosen not to burden Jalon with them.

"So why hasn't the Almighty—"

"Please, Doctor!"

"All right," Sagorn said sourly, thinking that the name seemed more appropriate all the time. "So why hasn't Zinixo tried this before? No, never mind." There were at least four possible reasons, and the point was moot anyway. "This occult cloak of yours—it is substantially identical to the immurement you once imposed on him?"

"You do like big words, don't you? Yes, it's the same, except that mine I put on myself, so I can take it off. When I shut him up, years ago, I was mightier than he was, so he couldn't break out of the shielding."

"You explained that adequately back in Hub. But he must be out of it now, if you saw him in the ambience?"

The faun scowled. "I saw only his eyes, but yes, it was him. You're right, of course."

The deduction was satisfyingly obvious and yet Rap had apparently not realized the terrifying corollary that could be drawn from it. Sagorn decided to save that insight for later.

He glanced around at the hollow. There was nothing to see except scrubby grass—which was why the spot had been selected, of course, for privacy. The underside of the sky tree loomed overhead like a ceiling. He would not have believed that any mineral growth could support its own weight over such a span, but he noted how the ribs were cantilevered to channel and direct the stress. The great vaulting swept downward steeply and obviously must reach ground level just over the rise. The road would end there.

When the next question did not come, he glanced down to meet the intent gaze of the recumbent faun. "You called me to ask how to get in, I presume?"

Rap nodded morosely. "I'm not even a beetle-sized sorcerer now. Doctor. I'm more of a mundane than you have ever known me—more of a mundane even than you. I need your insight." He plucked a blade of grass and tucked it in his mouth, playing yokel. His flattery would be more effective if it was sincere.

"Well, I cannot assess the occult defenses. We may even be within shielding here."

The faun shook his head. "I don't dare take the risk of trying to find out. We'll have to chance the sorcery—occult alarms may ignore mundane intruders, you agree? But I can't guess how to avoid even mundane alarms, or guards. I assume there will be guards, and locks, and so on. Valdorian has a resident warlock to defend it, but most of the trees must rely on ordinary precautions, so I expect it has those, also."

Logical! The former stableboy had always possessed a clearer mind than his appearance led one to expect, and he had learned the value of ratiocination from associating with Sagorn himself.

"The guards may have fled with the civilian population," Sagorn remarked cautiously. He stretched and yawned, only too aware that he had been roused from a deep sleep just a few minutes ago, in his time. "The fact that you have been able to approach so near without being observed would suggest that the entire tree is abandoned. Getting in may be both elementary and pointless."

"If the population has fled!" Rap said. "Perhaps all the people have taken refuge within the sky tree itself; in which case it will be packed like a herring barrel and we have no hope of entering unobserved. I do not wish to be thrown into an elvish jail, comfortable though they may be. Or a herring barrel," he added solemnly.

"Oh, come! Women and children and old folk? That would be carrying Suicidal Last Stand to extremes, even for elves."

The faun had not worked that one out yet. "Why are you so sure?" he asked, frowning to concede the point.

"Oh, I'm not certain! But we do not prognosticate mundane armies laying siege, and I'm sure the elves don't, either. If the Imperial legions were coming, yes, they would take refuge. The trees can hold out indefinitely, for they have their own sources of food and drink. But in sorcerous wars they are notoriously vulnerable. Jalon displayed unusual tact in not singing you any of the ballads about Valdobyt Prime."

"What of it?"

"It was the greatest of them all. Is-an-Ok overthrew it in the Second Dragon War, spreading destruction for leagues. That's why the outlying population has fled, of course. They don't know which way Valdorian will fall."

"This is the sort of intelligence I need," Rap said humbly. "This is why I asked for you. How do I go about getting in?"

He seemed gratifyingly sincere, but he was talking utter rubbish. Was he up to something?

From what he had said earlier, the war was to all intents over. The Covin had won—Zinixo had won; he had earned his self-bestowed honorific of the Almighty. As the brains of the Group, Sagorn had a duty to his associates to set strategy, and the only sane strategy now was a speedy withdrawal from King Rap and his lost cause; the farther the better. There was no point in continuing a fight once it became impossible.

He glanced around again. There was no point in his lingering here, either. The altitude was already oppressive and the shadow of the tree made the air uncomfortably cool on his bare skin. If he stood up, the remnants of Jalon's garment would fall off him, and he was much too old to go parading around in the nude. He must call one of his associates in his stead and depart. First, though, he should unravel the faun's childish scheme, whatever it was; and a wise man tested his hypotheses against all available evidence.

"Zinixo was a very powerful sorcerer in his own right, was he not? Even before he became warlock?"

"Extremely. A once-in-a-century sorcerer." Rap stuck out his jaw. "But I bested him!" His fists clenched, apparently of their own volition.

"Only just, as I recall your admitting once." Sagorn smiled encouragingly to hide his perennial irritation that the finest scholar in the Impire should have to elicit magic lore by interrogating a semiliterate laborer. "But when you gained a fifth word and were a demigod, then you had no trouble dealing with him?"

Rap sat up and removed the grass stalk from his mouth. "None whatsoever. Why?" he asked suspiciously.

"Give me the facts, please."

"The facts are obvious." He grimaced. "And just because I'm shielded doesn't mean I don't hurt like hell when I talk about them! Every word brings a new level of power. A demigod is as much above a sorcerer as a sorcerer is above a mage . . . or an adept above . . . a genius . . . I rolled out Zinixo like a wad of pastry and . . . thumped him back again."

He wiped his forehead. He was chalky pale and streaming sweat, as if seized of a very serious disease. Stubbornness had its uses sometimes. Still, there was only one question left now.

"And when you wrapped him up in the shielding spell, did you put all your demigod power into it, or only a fraction?"

"I gave it every glimmer I had!" Rap shouted. "I tied that little turd in a bag that I thought the Gods Themselves would not have gotten—" He stopped abruptly, gagging.

So there it was: hypothesis confirmed.

"You all right?" Sagorn inquired, not much interested in the reply. The faun groaned in agony, clutching his head.

Indeed, there it was! The cause was lost, and the only question now was how best Sagorn could extract himself and his associates from it—also how far and how fast. He had been called by Jalon; last time he had called Andor. That meant he now had a choice of Darad or Thinal.

Darad's animal mind would not comprehend the change in allegiance, and would not care if it could. That human polar bear had long ago decided he approved of Rap. That meant he gave him the unquestioning devotion of a dog.

Thinal, on the other hand, was even more protective of his own skin than his brother Andor. Being still young, Thinal would have a chance of outrunning King Rap in a fair, mundane foot race starting right here, and that might well be necessary. Thinal, despite his limitations, was still the best of the five of them when knives began to glint in the shadows. He had resources all his own. He could be relied upon to move himself as far from Valdorian as possible, as soon as possible, and as safely as possible, in effect faking the other four with him.

Thinal it would have to be.

"Why?" Rap moaned.

"Why what?" Sagorn thought back to the conversation.

"Why was I asking those questions? Merely to confirm the obvious, as you surmised."

But if it was all so obvious, then why had the big faun consulted him, in turn? Why had he asked Jalon to call Sagorn here at all?

Just to confirm the obvious, also?

What was he up to?

"What obvious?" Rap asked, still breathing hard from his ordeal.

"The obvious fact that you—er, we, I mean—have lost! If Zinixo is now free of the shielding you put upon him, then the Covin must have released him. Therefore the Covin has finally enlisted enough sorcerers to be collectively stronger than you were as a demigod. Add to that strength Zinixo himself now, plus the three wardens, and it is obvious that there is no force in the world that can ever hope to withstand the Alm . . . the dwarf."

Rap snorted. "You are too ready to grant him the wardens! I admit Grunth may have been vulnerable, out there in Dragon Reach. He may have nabbed Grunth. But Warlock Raspnex is probably down a mine somewhere in the Isdruthuds, and I would bet that Lith'rian has spent the last half year under a shielded bed in some safe hidey-hole."

Sagorn shrugged. "A warden or two here or there hardly matters. The odds were never auspicious. Now they are infinitesimal. I was never sanguine; now I see the cause as hopeless."

"I do not intend to give up!"

"I fail to see what you can do, even where you can start."

Rap had recovered his composure and was glowering. He jerked a thumb at the overweening mass of the sky tree. "I start by getting into Valdorian and finding Warlock Lith'rian."

"How?"

"That was what I called you to inquire! Thinal is the finest burglar in all Pandemia. If anyone can get me in there, he can. But the question is, how do I motivate him?"

Sagorn shook his head in disbelief. "The last time he was called, on the ship, you damned near throttled him! You expect him to cooperate with you now?"

The faun ran fingers through his gorse-bush hair. "I'm truly sorry about that! I will apologize sincerely. I will kiss his toes, if that will make him forgive me."

It would certainly impress the mean-minded little guttersnipe. Few things would please him more than having a king grovel in the dirt for him. Sagorn felt a twinge of worry—could he absolutely trust Thinal to abscond, as he had presumed? Thinal had a sneaking admiration for the stableboy who had stolen both sorcery and a kingdom.

There was another problem, too. Almost a year ago, Thinal had begun organizing an elaborate conspiracy to filch certain priceless artworks from the Abnila Museum in Hub and replace them with forgeries. Appalled by the risks involved, the rest of the Group had cooperated to keep Thinal out of harm's way. Unfortunately their abilities in that regard were limited by the terms of the sequential spell, as amended once by Rap himself, which required Thinal to exist for about a third of the time, so that he might catch up in age with the others. By the night of Emshandar's death, when this madcap venture had started, the little thief had been seriously behind in his quota of real life. The others had been experiencing difficulty in calling one another, instead of him.

Then Rap and Shandie had appeared and dragged them away adventuring. Thinal had regained some ground, but lately he had fallen behind again. At his last appearance, on Dreadnought, he had managed to call a replacement only with a great effort, when Rap had threatened him. That must have been eight or nine days ago. Now he would probably find it impossible. When Thinal arrived, Thinal would have to remain. He would be unusually vulnerable without his customary escape hatch available.

"What I was thinking of," Rap said hopefully, "is professional status. I mean, who in all history can ever have managed to break into a sky tree? I'm sure a warlock's enclave is packed with valuables, too. It would be a fabulous heist! Do you think an appeal to his vanity would have any success?"

Sagorn resisted a need to smile. The chances of Thinal falling for that argument were significantly less than zero, absolutely inconceivable. His entire mindset was against it. In fact, Sagorn himself had explained that aspect of Thinal's psychology to Rap twenty years ago, in Faerie, on the occasion of their third meeting. If the stablehand had forgotten it, then that was his lookout.

But had he forgotten it? Or was he playing a double game? If he truly wanted Thinal, then why had he not asked Jalon to call him directly?

Why had he summoned Sagorn at all?

Just to ask such footlingly stupid questions?

Ah! Of course!

Rap did not want Thinal! He wanted Darad!

Obviously Rap believed that he would have to fight his way into the sky tree and needed the warrior to assist him. But Jalon could not have called Darad for him, because Jalon had called Darad the last time. Jalon could have called only Thinal or Sagorn. Believing that Thinal would bolt in short order, the faun had asked for Sagorn instead. Now that Sagorn had demonstrated reluctance to cooperate further in the fruitless struggle against the Almighty, the faun was pretending to want Thinal in the expectation that Sagorn would seek to balk him by calling Darad instead. The yokel was trying to double-cross him!

Nicely tried. Master Rap, your Majesty!

"I do believe your reasoning will impress Thinal," Sagorn said blandly. "So perhaps we have completed our discussion and I should now call him for you?"

"I would be grateful," Rap said, completely straight-faced. "May the Good go with you. Doctor."

"Very well, then. Until we meet again!" With a quiet snigger to himself, dearly wishing he could be present to see the faun's chagrin when Darad failed to appear, Sagorn called:

 

 

4

Thinal coughed, rubbed his throat, and pouted reproachfully up at Rap, who sat on the grass at his side.

Rap twisted his big mouth in a rueful smile and whispered, "Hi!"

Thinal made a choking, rasping sound.

Rap said, "I'm sorry I was rough with you. I was under a lot of stress, but that was no excuse for losing my temper. It isn't like me and I'm ashamed of myself. Will you forgive me?"

Thinal swallowed a couple of times, making it seem harder than it really was. He'd known much worse. "Truly sorry? Gonna show me like you said?"

The king nodded solemnly. "If that's what you want. Will one on each foot do, or all ten?"

Oh, temptation! Knowing him, the big lout probably meant it. If he didn't—if he was just testin' to hear the answer—then he might turn Thinal inside out instead. He warn't in Darad's class for sheer size, but with his shirt off he showed meat only a jotunn would argue with.

"All ten—but I'll take a rain check."

"One rain check!" Rap said cautiously.

"Awright, ten toes, one rain check."

"It's a deal." Rap held out a hand to shake. He didn't do the jotunn thing and crush, either. Thinal found himself grinning a bit, in answer to the big guy's smile. He was dumb, of course—rustic, honest, hardworking—yucch!—dull, courageous . . . trustworthy! In spite of all his faults, though, there was something likable about the faun. He'd sneaked his way from muckin' out stables to restin' his ass on a real Evil-take-it throne without changing his hat size. So what if he'd climbed the royal bed sheets to get there? Maybe queenie-doll had a thing about sailor arms, but there'd be lots of thick arms in a port like Krasnegar, and she'd gone for these arms. Small-time boy makes good! Up the workers!

Thinal reached down and pulled on his boots, Jalon's choice of boots. They were loose, but he could run in them if he had to. His breeches were a joke. The drawstring still held, but Sagorn had split all the seams. It was a pukey weird garment, but it wouldn't slow him, either, if he had to make a break. And then he remembered more of what the old man'd been thinkin'.

"You expectin' Darad?"

Rap looked blank and shook his head. "No, I asked for you."

"Sagorn thought you really wanted Darad."

Rap looked even blanker. "Don't have any bloodbaths planned for this afternoon, why'd I want Darad?" He scratched his head. "And if I'd wanted him why'd I've asked for you?"

"The old coot gets funny ideas sometimes."

The faun snorted. "His trouble, he's got more wits than he has brains to hold 'em. Never mind. Look, you know why I need you. The door into Valdorian is round that bend there. It may be guarded, in which case I'll just go up and tell the elves that the king of Krasnegar wishes to pay his respects to the warlock, all polite-like. It may be wide open and deserted. If it is, then I'll walk in and start climbing."

"Have a jolly time."

Rap chuckled, but his eyes were watching Thinal very carefully. "If it's locked and deserted, though, then I'm stumped. That's when I'll need your help."

Thinal shivered. "Weed a warlock's sky tree? Not Evilish likely! I learned my lesson there a long time ago. Rap! You know that!" He heard the shrillness in his voice and it scared him.

The faun nodded, looking puzzled. "You burgled a sorcerer's house. But that was a hundred years ago!"

"Hun'red thirty." Shriller.

"So? You needn't take anything, just open a door or two for me."

"No!" Thinal knew he was in a shaky sweat already.

Rap had seen that and was curious. He scratched his hair with both hands. "Sagorn told me once you still felt guilty about what happened that night, but it turned out well in the end, Thinal! The sequential spell wasn't a curse, it was a blessing. When I took it off you all wanted it back. You were the first to ask, too!"

"Old Sagorn doesn't know everything!"

"No? I thought you five shared memories?"

Pause.

"Well?" Rap prompted gently.

"Only of what happened after Orarinsagu put the spell on!" There! Now he'd dunnit. Pothead! Change the subject, talk about something else, anything else—

"Ah!" Rap studied Thinal for a moment and then shrugged. "None of my business."

"No, it ain't."

"A long time ago . . . ever talked about it with anyone?"

Thinal shivered and shook his head.

Rap lay back and rolled over to rest on his elbows. He poked a finger idly at the grass in front of him. "If you ever want to, any time . . . I mean, not necessarily now, but maybe some time. It can help to get things off one's chest, you know. What friends are for. I wouldn't repeat anything you told me. You know that."

"It doesn't matter," Thinal muttered. "Don't matter a spit if I told you or not, or if you told anyone."

The big faun just lay sprawled on the grass, not saying anything, not looking around. He pulled up a grass stalk and tucked it in his mouth.

"No reason why I shouldn't tell you," Thinal said uneasily. There was no reason why he should, either. "You wanna hear?"

"I'll listen if you wanna talk."

"Well, we was just a bunch of kids. I was the oldest, right? The leader." Sixteen. His teeth interrupted him, chattering wildly. He got them under control again. "Sagorn was the youngest. I put him in through a transom and he opened the door for the rest of us and we started lookin' around and then right away we saw that there were odd things in there and Andor said we oughta leave and I said awright and we headed for the door and then Orarinsagu appeared, all fire in the dark, and we couldn't move."

Green fire. He tucked his hands under his arms to stop them shaking. They were cold as a sexton's boots. He was hunched, his gut all knotted up. He'd never told anyone about this and the horrors that came after.

"Go on," Rap said to the grass. "You've started, so you'd better finish. You'll feel better when you get it over with."

Thinal sniffled. "You won't tell anyone?"

"Not a word, I promise."

"He said it was all my fault! He put the other four to sleep and . . . There was just me and him. And . . . And he played with me!" Gods! I was only sixteen. Gods! "I doan wanna talk about it. He broke me! Crawlin' on the floor . . . gibberin' and crawlin'. He played with me like a kid an'a beetle. I can't tell you what he did, what he made me do. I kept beggin' to die and . . . Gods' bollucks, I doan wanna talk about it!"

He hadn't been conscious of either of them moving, but Rap was sitting up and holding him, crushing him tight, hugging him like a baby, and he couldn't seem to stop talking, even while he was blubbering like a kid, weeping on Rap's shoulder, talking, talking, and sobbing, too.

"He said I was the criminal. He said the others were just my dupes. Said I owed him some fun, said I owed them, too, for leading them astray. Bugs an' bones an' things inside me. Toes 'stead of fingers. Things crawling inside me. I doan wanna talk about it!"

But he couldn't stop talking about it, not until he had detailed every agony and humiliation and terror of that night. Even things long forgotten came bubbling up and got spat out—everything. Only then did the pauses grow longer, the words scarcer, the weeping quieter. He fell silent. Rap maintained his rib-bending hug, and gradually the indignity of that position seeped through to Thinal.

"I wish you'd left the spell the way it was," he muttered hoarsely. "Living isn't what it's cracked up to be."

He tried to pull free, but was held as by hemp cables.

"Living is all there is!" the faun said softly in his ear. "Don't ever think about what follows. You listen to me now. Did you never wonder how Orarinsagu managed a matched set? You five are not just a random handful of men! Scholar, lover, warrior, artist, thief—did you never wonder how he was so lucky, to find one of each?"

Thinal pushed free. He blew his nose, wiped his fingers on the grass, and mumbled, "No."

"Sure?" Rap said. "Sure you never wondered? There was more to that sequential spell than I expected. Lots more. I only discovered it all when I took it apart. Orarinsagu robbed you, Thinal! Sagorn's brains, Andor's charm—all those great talents the others have—they come from you. Oh, the word of power helps, of course, but the basic talents are yours. The Spell strips them from you and gives them to the others, so they get a double dose. You sure you never knew that?"

Thinal grunted.

"Mm," Rap said suspiciously. "You must have been quite a youngster with all that ability. In time you'd have been a great man. A great criminal, maybe, but certainly great. The sorcerer divided you up to make the matched set. Darad's thuggery is his own, but basically the others are all just shadows of what you might have been. Without what they steal from you, they'd only be shadows of what they are now."

"Why'd you put the spell back then?" Thinal mumbled.

Rap thumped a big hand on his shoulder and squeezed. "Because you asked me to. You, not them. It was your idea! Oh, partly because I thought it was too late to undo the damage; it would have ruined them to lose the use of your talents, and I didn't think those talents would do you any good then. You'd been a guttersnipe so long, I didn't think you'd ever learn to be anything else. I've often wondered if I made the right decision. And if you tell me that you didn't know where the others get their skills, then I'm going to feel an Evil of a lot worse about it."

"I . . . I maybe guessed some," Thinal admitted. He'd known. He could remember the sorcerer's exact words: Your larceny I leave you, but all the rest is forfeit. It wasn't fair, though. The others had grown since that night, gone on to manhood and achievement, and he'd shrunk, gotten less. He'd been a leader before that night and since then he'd been nothing.

"So why'd you ask me to put the spell back?" Rap asked.

Thinal wiped his nose and eyes with the back of his arm. God of Sewage! Why'd he gone and spouted all that crap to the faun? What must he be thinking? "Doan wanna talk about it anymore."

"Then don't," the faun said cheerfully. "And I'm not surprised you don't want to help me break into the sky tree! I understand. I don't hold it against you."

Sniff! "Rap, it's hopeless! The dwarf's beaten you. He's won. Sagorn knows. Give up. Rap!"

The faun doubled over, putting his arms on his knees and his head on his arms. He looked all weary and beat, but when he spoke he didn't sound that way. "I can't, Thinal! You can quit, if you like. Everyone else can quit, but not me. He'll hunt me down somehow. He'll go after Inos and the children. The God told me I must lose one of my children, but They didn't say which one. And They didn't say it would be only one. I don't care how hopeless the cause is, I must soldier on."

Silence.

Crazy, stubborn faun!

Thinal snuffled, "Whatcha gonna do? Whatcha wan' me t'do?"

Rap looked up with a smile sad as death. "I'll go and take a look. If there's no one there, I'll come back. We'll talk some more. If I don't come back in a little while . . . You get your ass out of here, okay?"

Thinal nodded and sniffed again. "I'll wait."

Rap thumped him on the shoulder and stood up. "Thanks, old buddy! You must have been quite a kid."

He stepped back onto the road and walked away, not looking around.

 

The wind blew cold through the gloomy gully. Thinal sat and shivered, hugging himself. Bare grass and bare road, and that awful roof up above, threatening to fall on him all the time. He was being a fool. He ought to make tracks back down the road, real smartish. Lotsa empty houses—even Jalon had managed to break into those. In a few more days Thinal'd be able to call one of the others, probably Andor. Andor'd know which way the sea was, and he could head there and talk his way onto a boat.

The war was lost. The dwarf had won. That was no skin off Thinal—no skin off any of 'em. The five'd get by whether four wardens ruled or just one Almighty.

Waiting was hell, but he'd told Rap he'd wait. How long? What was the guy doing, all this time?

And if Rap did come back, and asked him, what was he going to do? Crib a warlock's shop?

He stood up and relieved himself—second time—and moved a few steps and sat down again. Right away he wanted to pee again.

Why'd he gone and blabbed all that stuff about Orarinsagu to Rap? What must Rap think of him, a grown man blubbering?

What was the guy doing?

Thinal wasn't going to go and see.

Rap must be dead. He wasn't going to come back.

Thinal was going away.

Now!

Well, very soon.

He sort-of tried to call Andor, and knew it wouldn't work. He wouldn't be able to call any of the others for days yet. Curse Rap and his meddling around with the spell! They'd never had this trouble before he changed it.

He was a city boy. All this grass-and-sky-tree crud was not his gruel. He'd never had much truck with elves—no elf in the Impire ever owned anything worth lifting.

Rap wasn't coming back. He would count up to a hundred and then go.

Behind him, someone coughed politely.

Thinal's heart flew away and the rest of him twisted around so hard he near broke his back. Half a dozen elves stood in a semicircle. They all wore silver chain mail and they all had drawn bows trained on him. If he made one false move, he'd be a human forest.

He called—Darad! Darad!

Nothing happened.

So Thinal did what he always did in moments of stress. He screamed in terror and peed in his pants.

 

 

5

The elves closed in on their prisoner, babbling in high-pitched voices with an accent he could barely decipher.

Two were men, four women. They were all about his size, yet they seemed like adolescents and he had seen enough of the underlife of cities for that illusion to frighten him even more. Their golden faces were contemptuous, with big opal eyes flickering in impossible shades. Their silver-link tunics were prettied by bright-hued belts and baldrics and lanyards; their half-boots and helmets were equally gaudy. Their legs and arms were bare, except for dainty greaves and vambraces. Even their weapons might have been chosen for appearance, but he did not doubt that they were real and deadly.

They twittered a few commands at him, ignoring his pleas and questions except to tell him to be silent. They tied his hands behind his back with a silken cord. They put a noose of the same cord around his neck. Then they formed up and began trotting along the road to the tree, cheerfully singing a fast-paced, complex round.

Thinal followed. He had no choice, for the tether ran easily through a silver ring and would choke him if he allowed it to tighten. They ran him on a very long leash, so he must trail far behind them. Somehow that position felt designed to humiliate, as if he were something unpleasant they did not want to be associated with. Trotting along with his soiled rags flapping against his thighs, he preferred not to think about that. If he tried to catch up, then he would step on the cord and strangle himself. He feared that they would just drag him if he fell down.

Guard and captive rounded the bend and the entrance to Valdorian was straight ahead. The trunk itself was still some distance away, a rugged cliff meeting the ground in an untidy, unelvish jumble of broken rock, stretching off on either hand until it disappeared in the far distance, and leaning outward, rising to meet the roof. The road ended at a freestanding spiral staircase of red and white polished stone. The guards continued on up the steps without pause, although they stopped their singing. There was no sign of Rap, or anyone else at all.

The stair soared in an impossible spiral to vanish into an aperture in the roof. Halfway up, Thinal was gasping for breath and shaking sweat out of his eyes. He had no time to look around, for he must concentrate on the curve of the snaky cord rising steadily ahead of him. He could tell that he was falling behind when the cord no longer touched the steps. Relentlessly it grew straighter, then darkness closed in as the stairs entered a shaft. He ran harder and harder, yet slower and slower, lungs bursting, legs sheer blades of fire. He could no longer see the tether, but he felt it tighten around his neck—at first with the gentle touch of a teasing lover, then sternly, urgently, murderously; briefly it took some of his weight to haul him up the steps, until he choked and fell, battering himself on the hard edges.

Voices warbled above him like furious birds. He could see nothing. The rope jerked repeatedly, tugging at him until he managed to scramble to his feet, his throat feeling as if it had been beaten with a hammer. He resisted the pull, holding himself to a walk. The noose yanked harder and he fell again, hurting himself in a whole new set of places. Again he rose and again he refused to run; with much angry chirping, his captors acquiesced to his slower pace.

He hoped they knew that he wasn't being stubborn, that they would not be angry with a poor weakling who could run no more. He was beyond speaking, even had they seemed inclined to listen. He plodded grimly upward around the spiral.

Gradually light filtered down the tunnel, and it emerged onto the first layer of the tree. He was vaguely aware of mossy greenery and shrubs, of dripping sounds and a scent of flowers. The ground rose gently from the cliff until blue sky showed over treetops far away. High above those the sloping underside of the next petal roofed the glade like a low cloud, but it was shiny crystal, not dark as the outside layer had been. Light reflected in a million spars of color on ribs and facets.

He had neither time nor desire to admire. His guards hurried him along a brief road, to yet another stair, this one narrower and carved into the side of the trunk. They began to climb again. How far were they going? Valdorian was two leagues high, higher by far than any mountain. He would freeze at the top of it—there would be no air to breathe!

And where was Rap?

The stair turned into the rock and again there was dark. Despite their mail, the elves moved in silence. He could not tell how far ahead of him they were except by the tightness of his noose. He fell only once on that stair, but he cracked his head hard enough to see a million stars.

Back into daylight they came again, into a dim ferny forest, and at last his captors took a break—Thinal just crumpled to the moss at the roadside. A small stream of water cascaded down the cliff, ending in a free-falling jet. One by one the elves stepped under it to drink and be soaked. They jabbered and laughed among themselves, ignoring their prisoner. When they had all finished, they called Thinal over. He heaved himself to his feet and lurched forward; he sank on his knees in the pool, lifted his face. The cold wetness ran over him and down his throat like pure bliss. It was the best thing he could ever remember.

His guards had been joined by another group—three male, three female. For a moment they all chattered together, apparently discussing a cluster of red birds singing in a nearby copse. Then the original six departed back the way they had come.

"Up!" cried a boyish voice.

Thinal leaned back until his groping fingers found the tether under him. He wrapped it in his bound hands as well as he could. When the jerk came it did not reach his neck, and the guards looked back in surprise and annoyance.

He heaved himself unsteadily to his feet, his legs wobbling with fatigue. He could not tell which of the six was the leader, so he spoke to all of them.

"Where are you taking me? Where is my friend?"

The smallest stepped forward, holding up a very shiny, very skinny, very slim dagger. Her eyes twinkled amber and pale green in the dimness, but there was no smile on her face.

"Let go that rope, imp!" she said in a piping treble.

Thinal had never known himself to defy anyone before—not since that night in Orarinsagu's house, anyway—and he knew it could not be courage that made him defiant now. It must just be sheer terror.

"Not until you answer my questions!" His voice was as shrill as the elf's.

The guards all burst into twittering laughter, like birds. "If you do not let go of that rope," the smallest one said, "we shall take it off your neck and put it around your ankles. Then we shall make better time."

Thinal released the rope.

 

He lost track of the layers. Staircases and ramps went by in an ordeal of mindless trudging. He knew only the cramps and stitches and the bruises he gained in his falls. When he was granted a rest he fell to the ground and usually passed out. He was aware of being given water, and even food, which he could not eat. He was offered liniment for his legs; he knew vaguely that someone massaged it in for him, and more than once; his feet were tended and clad in better shoes.

Higher and higher he went, step after step after step, every one a calculated agony.

He was passed from squad to squad up the tree. The soldiers were not consciously cruel, as goblins would have been. They were not malicious like imps, or even callous like jotnar. They sympathized with his suffering, in their alien way, although they could not help but regard an imp within a sky tree as a pollution. They pitied him after their fashion, but they had been given the task of conducting this prisoner up this tree and elves were fanatical about performing duties.

Somewhere his bonds were removed, but he was never unguarded and he had no hope of escape. He obeyed and endured in sick despair.

He lost track of the days, for after a few hours' rest he would be taken on again, in daylight or by the amber glow of lanterns. As the temperature fell, his escort provided him with warmer clothes, fine silks and light woolens. His lungs strained in the thinning air.

Mostly the way clung close to the central trunk and often followed shafts cut within it. At times, though, it veered away from the cliff, and then he traveled by spidery ladder and perilously narrow catwalks with the petal landscape spread out below him like a map: lakes and forests and fields, tiny picture-book cottages nestling among the meadows. His captors kept careful watch over him at those times, but they need not have worried. Thinal had no fear of heights. Heights were the only thing he did not fear.

Days came and went—weeks, perhaps—and the ordeal grew no easier.

He gathered from some chance remark that Rap was traveling ahead of him. Thinal had never been to Krasnegar, but the others all had, and he remembered the stairs. Rap would be managing better.

He became aware that the soldiers were the only inhabitants, that the tree had been evacuated, like the surrounding countryside.

Time and again he tried calling the others—Darad, Jalon, Andor, or even old Sagorn. The spell never worked for him. He had to put in more living, even if he wore out his heart in doing so. The elves were determined that there be one of two possible outcomes—either he would arrive at his destination or he would die. He could barely remember a time when he had not been climbing stairs.

 

 

6

He was in a big, bright hall, whose walls and pillars of intricately carved cedar were barely visible through clouds of scented steam. Someone had just told him to strip. He fumbled helplessly with buttons, then golden hands came to help him, moving swiftly, urgently—two elves undressing him. He did not know what sex they were and did not care. As his pants fell around his ankles, a gentle push sent him toppling backward into a pool of scalding hot water. When he surfaced, spluttering and choking, two soaked male elves were having hysterics on the brink, holding each other up in mutual convulsions of mirth.

After that they spared no more time for jollity. They jumped right in beside him, scrubbed him, shampooed him, ducked him, and then hauled him out to dry and clothe him. He could not stand unsupported, so they fetched a chair.

"Whasall the burnin' hurry?" he muttered, and one of them took that opportunity to shove a foamy toothbrush in his mouth and scour his teeth.

"The High War Chief awaits!" exclaimed the other, lathering Thinal's face for shaving.

He relaxed. He had been afraid it might be the warlock. He dozed off during the shave.

Clad in fine wool garments of silver and burgundy, he was hastened out to a chill morning. The low sun blinded him, blazing in over pine trees, reflecting also from a sky of carved diamond far above, glittering on the frosty grass beside the path and the film of ice on the lake. Steadied by hands on his arms, he stumbled along obediently. The air was much too thin to breathe. He was surrounded by elves, but none of them wore mail or helmets; sunlight flamed on the spun gold of their hair and the myriad colors of their garb.

Then he registered a stranger, a head that stood clear of all the others and was topped by riotous brown thatch. Rap! He was clad in white and gray, the same gray as his eyes, a whale among a school of goldfish—Thinal wondered whose idea that outfit had been. In a moment. Rap glanced around and saw him. His ugly faun face lit up like the sunlight.

What? Pleasure? Relief? In his fog of fatigue and hopelessness, Thinal wrestled with the amazing thought that the king of Krasnegar seemed glad to see him. Had even been worried, maybe? It was an incredible notion, a mind-crippling astonishment, a sensation so unfamiliar that his mind could not grasp it. He knew what the other four thought of him. He knew who his friends were back in Hub, and they were no more trustworthy than he was; any of them would sell him for a copper groat. Somebody cared?

No, that was ridiculous. It must have been a trick of the light.

He stumbled up the steps into the great wooden hall that stood on the lake shore, barely noticing the ornate carvings, the bronze-studded doors, the ankle-deep rugs within. Then his gaze was caught by a figurine on an onyx table. It was Kerithian workmanship, undoubtedly, but of a style he had never seen before—a horse rising on its hind legs, spreading butterfly wings. The porcelain was so fine that it was transparent and the colors richer than rubies. He had not known that the merfolk crafted for elvish tastes, but of course why shouldn't they? And the thought of the price that piece would fetch from the fences of Grunge Street made his head ache.

Then he had gone by that wonder and was being hurried past a portrait of some elvish beauty, unquestionably the work of the legendary Puin'lyn. No one else had ever mastered her technique of setting gemstones in crystal. With breathtaking artistry, the mosaic face smiled back at him mysteriously, as if challenging him to assess her worth. God of Greed! Of course he'd have to melt it down and job the gems by the cupful, but he'd still pocket enough to buy a palace.

More, and more! Everywhere his eyes turned they found wonders and treasure. The itch in his hands was driving him crazy. Jalon's head would explode if he ever saw this, and his own was like to. Thinal gave no spit for beauty; it was the value that stunned him. He had not known there was so much wealth in the world. This room would buy the Impire and leave enough change for a couple of Zarks.

The sky tree's leaves were narrow, up here near the summit. High and vast and airy, the hall was set on the very brink, its great windows overlooking a mauve sky. All of Pandemia lay below, curving away into a vague fog where the horizon should be. Thinal did not notice any of that. He stood in a fog of gold and riches.

The solitary chair on the dais before those windows had its back to the chamber. Thinal had been placed beside Rap, flanked by a small group of elves. Two were token soldiers, the rest civilians. Everyone was waiting respectfully for that chair to do something—everyone except Thinal. He was estimating tapestry by the square cubit. He was assessing the diamond and crystal chandeliers, the sculptures and paintings. He was wondering if he could sidle closer to some of the jewel-encrusted bric-a-brac on the side tables. It was torment.

The chair pivoted slowly to face the assembly. A youth in white velvet lounged upon the carmine satin of its cushions.

Even Thinal noticed the drama of that quiet move. A quiver of warning raced down his spine. He had seen that lad somewhere before. No, Jalon had. Jalon's recall of events was usually a blur, but his visual memories were acute as razors.

A waiter? No, a dishwasher.

How could that be? Why should even Jalon remember a juvenile dishwasher of no exceptional beauty, at least by elvish standards? Thinal's knees buckled. That long-ago flunky had turned out to be Warlock Lith'rian himself!

Fortunately everyone else was bowing, and he converted his involuntary curtsey into a bow more or less like theirs. When he straightened up, he pushed his knees hard together and tucked his sweating hands out of sight behind him.

Rap spoke first. Surprised, Thinal glanced up. He saw no smile to accompany the words, but there must be a smile intended, or they would be outrageous.

"I am Rap, son of Grossnuk. I come in peace. Your foes are mine."

Surely no elf in all history had ever heard that greeting spoken in his sky tree, but the warlock's expression did not change by an eyelash, for there was no expression on his face at all. If he made a signal, it was not mundane. Two young pages hurried forward, one from either side, each bearing a silver tray. Warlock and king were tendered goblets.

Lith'rian took his with graceful golden fingers and raised it in salutation. "Safe haven and good sport," he said softly. It was, of course, the correct response, but he did not drink. The opal eyes shimmered to new shades. "Chieftain Rap, you are welcome to our hearth and spring. We offer what we have, and may the Good be prospered by your coming. May your stay be joyful and your leaving long delayed."

Rap glanced down, met Thinal's worried stare, and flickered him a wink. Probably he was taking a moment to nudge his memory, but when he replied to the warlock he did not stumble: "May the Good grow within your house and the Evil diminish. May your men be strong and your women fertile, your children wax in beauty and your elders in wisdom. May your crops flourish, your herds increase, and all your arrows fly true."

The wink had produced a very odd sensation in Thinal's throat. It had said, of course, that Rap remembered who had taught him the faunish salutation, and where, in days that were gone. But it might have said more than that—he would have to consider . . . Why had the warlock not touched crystal to lip yet? He wasn't waiting on Thinal to do something, was he? Panic!

No—Rap seemed puzzled, also. "Your Omnipotence, I confess I am ignorant of the correct elvish greeting."

The youth sprawled in the chair made an inscrutable gesture with his free hand. "Strangers within sky trees are so rare that we have never developed one. In most places it is customary for the guest to drink first."

As the men drank, Thinal felt a strange rustling among the closepacked elves at his back, almost as if they were commenting on the score so far. Suddenly he realized that they might all be sorcerers, Lith'rian's votaries. He suppressed a wail, shivering all the way to his toes.

The pages were departing with the goblets.

"Your Omnipotence," Rap said, "may I have the honor—"

Opal eyes turned on Thinal in gleams of red and blue. "I don't care who he is. I can see what he is. Your choice of companion is insulting."

"You invited him, not I," Rap said softly. "He would depart gladly, by your leave, I am sure."

"With full pockets, no doubt."

The faun smiled faintly. "I would recommend a body search at the door, yes. He has involuntary reflexes in such matters."

The warlock showed no signs of appreciating the humor. "Minstrel Jalon would be a welcome alternative."

He was speaking to Thinal. Thinal opened his mouth and made a croaking noise, like a squeaky wagon wheel.

Rap glanced at him quizzically and then spoke for him. "My young friend is temporarily rendered speechless by the grandeur of your collection. I am sure he appreciates the incongruity of his presence as much as you do, but he is presently unable to call any of his associates in his stead."

A tiny crease between the elf's golden brows boded earthquake and cataclysm. "Very well, your Majesty," Lith'rian said icily. "He may remain for now. Tell us why you disguise yourself as a mundane. Do you seek to guard yourself against us?"

Rap bowed again in his usual clumsy fashion. "No, your Omnipotence. I seek to hide from the dwarf."

The elf curled his golden lip. "Then you came to the wrong place. This hall is shielded, of course, but the mole watches it day and night. He knows who enters and who departs." The voice was soft, but it filled the breathless hall.

Rap frowned, as if doubting. "Why, then, does he not act?"

"Surely you are not so enfeebled as that. Sorcerer? Can you not smell the blood upon Midsummer?"

"Our time is short, I agree."

"Short for what? You come to join us in our final stand against the self-styled Almighty?"

Rap folded his arms and paused a moment before replying, studying the warlock. "If you plan to resist him, yes. Then I am your man. If you merely plan to die in a romantic, historical catastrophe, I will have no part of such buffoonery."

The warlock frowned. The warden of the south was displeased. The world chilled. He was only a slim youth in white, with the usual opal eyes and golden hair, but there was terrible danger in his frown. None of the other elves had spoken a word yet. Thinal eased closer to Rap's comforting bulk.

"Indeed?" Lith'rian sneered. "Two weeks ago that unlamented idiot, my former Brother East, attempted to raise a banner of resistance. He named you his leader, in fact. He quoted a deal of drivel about reforming the protocol and domesticating sorcery—unprecedented populist idealistic claptrap, which he attributed to you. He uttered a pathetic rallying call and nobody rallied. He was struck down in the gutter, alone and unaided."

Muscles tensed under the faun's fresh-shaven cheeks. "The time was not auspicious. Had we risen then, the Covin in opposing us would have released the dragons. We could not risk such a disaster."

Lith'rian's eyes flamed. "And what makes you think the mole will not call out the dragons again?"

Rap drew an audible breath. "We have taken steps to see that this will not occur."

"What?" The monosyllable cracked through the hall like a whip. Everyone jumped. Thinal very nearly . . . but regained control in time.

"With respect, your Omnipotence," Rap said loudly, "when the Covin subverted the dragons from your legitimate control, we construed that to mean that you had abdicated your prerogative as warden of the south. Consequently, certain of my followers—"

"We?" the warlock roared. "Who is We?"

"Witch Grunth and—"

"Grunth has been coerced into the Covin! Her presence within the meld has been established beyond doubt."

Rap winced. "I am indeed sorry to hear that. Nevertheless, there were others whom Zinixo would not know. I am confident that they will have taken the necessary steps."

Lith'rian sprang up from his chair. His face had flushed to a deep bronze; he was shaking with fury.

"What steps?"

"To destroy the dragons if they rise again."

"Idiots!" The warlock blazed with fury. The sorcerer onlookers cried out and staggered back in unison. Thinal uttered a shriek of terror and instinctively called:

 

 

7

Darad whirled around before the sound of ripping cloth had ended. He snatched the sword from the closer soldier's scabbard and cut his throat with it on the way by. Scarlet blood shot out in a very satisfying spray. Everyone else was still frozen. He leaped past Rap, who was just starting to open his mouth, and swung the sword overhand, slamming it down on the other soldier's helmet. Good dwarvish steel, it split pretty-boy's head apart to the neck. A gorgeous fountain of gore and brains erupted over the onlookers. That took care of the professionals, pansies though they had undoubtedly been.

Furniture crashed over, clattering and tinkling. Screaming began.

The kid in the chair was the key—hold a blade at his throat and none of the little darlings would as much as raise a finger. Darad chose a girl at random and grabbed her by the throat to use as a shield. Holding her out at arm's length before him, he rushed for the warlock. She was a pretty little thing, except for the way her eyes bulged. Just on principle, he thrust the sword into her belly on the way and spilled her guts. Conscious of the few fluttering rags still trailing from his nudity, he thought what a waste of a nice rape that was. He leaped for the edge of the platform.

In midjump, he froze. His foot made contact, but his muscles turned to mush. The girl shot from his grasp with a scream and he toppled over on the kid in the red chair. By rights they should have all gone down in a heap, but somehow he seemed to slide off something invisible. He rolled helplessly, slithered off the platform, and ended lying on his back on the floor, completely limp.

Sorcery! Evil-begotten sorcery! "Rap!" he bellowed—or tried to. Not a sound emerged.

God of Slaughter! He strained mightily and could not move a finger. The hall was full of shouting. It should be full of screaming. Rap was a sorcerer—why didn't he do something? Rap! Still no sound. All he could see was a big candleholder hanging from the ceiling right above him, a clutter of glass. Then he discovered that his eyes would move.

Sorcery! The yellow-bellies had mended the first soldier. The kid was pale as tin, his helmet off and his too-pretty curls all awry, but he was standing and obviously alive, in spite of the blood all over him. The other one would not be put back together so easily. Not likely! Most of the rabble had gore on them, and they were all twittering at once.

He turned his eyes the other way, to see if the girl had been mended, also. She had. She was standing up, and the warlock kid had an arm around her. Fornication! Only one? He'd taken a blade to a herd of elves and gotten only one of them? That was disgusting! That was humiliating! Convulsed with fury and frustration, he tried again to break free of the sorcery, but again to no avail.

Rap appeared right above him, haggard with shock.

Darad tried to grin. Once Rap got this evilish spell off of him, he'd kill 'em all. He thought of the hall smeared with blood and littered with parts of elves, and it was a thrilling idea. But he could not speak to Rap.

"Oh, Thinal, Thinal!" Rap muttered. "Why did you have to do that?"

Darad flicked his eyes the other way. The kid in white was standing on the edge of the platform, glaring down at him.

"This is intolerable!" the elf squeaked. "One of my guards slain in my own hall? The man must die!"

Have a fit, maggot!

Rap sighed. "I cannot deny that he deserves to."

Rap! Rap, his old friend? He couldn't mean that!

"He is a mad beast," Rap continued. "But if you execute him, you kill his associates, also, by default. He cannot call them back if he is dead. If he calls another first, then he himself is beyond the reach of justice, even your justice."

Darad chortled silently. That's tellin 'em. Boss!

"You underestimate me!" the elf snarled. "That spell is an abomination! It bears your hand. You are equally to blame, faun!"

Aha! Now Rap would settle the pretties' hash.

Pale-faced, Rap ran a hand through his hair. "I am not guiltless, I admit. I did not invent the spell, though. It dates back more than a century. The five of them had aided me, I was in their debt. I released them, but then they asked me to replace the sorcery. I fear I was wrong to do so."

"You were certainly wrong to include this vermin. Without the ability to disappear at will, he would have been apprehended and destroyed years ago!"

Rap nodded sadly. "But I was in his debt, also. He had saved my life—how could I desert him? I hoped, I suppose, that the others might restrain him."

"They did not do so now!" the warlock snarled. "He will be thrown to the winds."

The gaggle of pretties all cheered, and Darad could not even grind his teeth at them. He strained uselessly.

"You had best do it soon. Omnipotence," shrilled one, "or I fear he will burst his heart with anger." The little yellow-asses all laughed. Only Rap stared down sorrowfully at Darad.

He would kill them all. He would cut their guts out and watch them die. He would rape the women and then slit them open.

"And the one who called him is equally to blame!"

"No!" Rap said sharply. "He did not plan this. You startled him, and he invoked the spell without thinking."

"He should have thought!"

The elves twittered loudly in agreement, but Rap held up a hand.

"When you dismantle that spell, your Omnipotence, observe carefully how it is constructed. See what it does to Thinal. When a man is startled, he reaches for the courage within him, correct?"

"So?" the warlock asked warily.

Rap nudged Darad with a foot "There is Thinal's courage."

The warlock shrugged. "I will look."

Rap! What sort of a shipmate are you? Get this triple-accursed spell off me and let me fight!

"You brought this evil upon us, faun!" the warlock said grimly.

Good! If Rap was threatened he would need Darad, and then he would do something. Rap was a sorcerer, too.

"Not I! Thinal was brought in by your orders."

"Ha! You told us he could not call a replacement"

"I'm sure he could not, not consciously. But you terrified him. A man should not be punished for an act of desperation. The fault, again, was yours."

The elf snarled. "Did I not fancy having Minstrel Jalon's art to enrich our vigil here, I would have this brute dealt with as he is, and let the others fall with him. But I can think of no reason to desire your presence, faun. You will go now—freely, or by force."

Rap set his big jotunn jaw. Here it came! Good old Rap!

But no—"I had hoped to remind you of past glories. Warlock. Pandemia has known no greater heroes than those of Ilrane. Zuik'stor and your own forefathers, Danna'rian and—"

The elf reddened. "Silence! We need no halfbreeds here to lecture us on honor."

"Indeed, I think you do!" Rap shouted. "Not two years ago, seven thousand elves prepared to lay down their lives on Nefer Moor to protest the Imperial invasion. And now you will just give in to a dwarf? A dwarf? I wonder the trees themselves do not fall down from shame!"

"The cause is hopeless!" The little elf could roar like a bull when he wanted. That had to be sorcery. "Your followers are a tiny, scattered rabble. The Covin outnumbers them manyfold. There is no power in all Pandemia can stop him now. Thus we shall—"

"There may be!" The faun's voice cut through the outburst like a razor.

The elf stopped. That had shaken him! Didn't want to show it, but it had.

"Where?" The hall fell silent.

Rap hauled up his sleeve to show his tattoo. "Thume. There is a spell of inattention upon the Accursed Land." Sounds of protest swelled and Rap raised his voice. "You know such an enchantment could not have prevailed unattended since the War of the Five Warlocks. What power maintains, it, your Omnipotence?"

"Rubbish! Utter nonsense! There is nothing in Thume!"

The onlookers twittered in agreement.

"There must be something in Thume!" Rap said stubbornly.

"No! I will not believe it!"

"I believe it."

"Then you may go and seek this chimera for yourself!" the warlock yelled. "Vice-armiger Fial'rian—remove this mongrel from our presence and evict him!"

Rap seemed to sway backward. "Wait!" he shouted, and straightened. "You said the Covin is watching this place. Do you throw your guests to their enemies? Is this what elves understand by hospitality. Omnipotence?"

Glaring, the elf teetered on the edge of his platform. "Very well. Armiger, convene enough power to evict our unwelcome guest unseen."

Again Rap shouted, "Wait! I may thus escape notice leaving, but I shall be observed arriving at wherever you send me."

The warlock laughed, high-pitched. "I fancy not! We shall send you like a parcel to the destination named on your label. If there is a conjuration upon the place as you claim, then all will be well with you. Begone!"

Rap spun around and marched away without a word.

Rap! Rap was leaving him alone? What sort of a shipmate deserted a comrade? Just because he'd swatted a lousy, yellow-assed elf? What did one puky elf matter? He'd killed hundreds of better men than that in his time.

The warlock scowled down at Darad. "Now," he said, "you."

 
Word in Elfyn-land:
But, Thomas, ye maun baud your tongue,
Whatever ye may hear or see;
For speak ye word in Elfyn-land,
Ye'll ne'er win back to your ain countrie.

Traditional: Thomas the Rhymer

 

 

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Framed