The (sort of) Dark Mage (Waldo Rabbit) (56 page)

“Then I will leave you to settle your affairs.” He stood up. “Your old quarters will be made ready for you, and anything else you may require will be provided.”

“You have my sincerest thanks baron. I wish upon you the blessings of unity, justice, and peace.”

“Yes, now if you will pardon me I have much to do.”

He wasted no time in withdrawing, and all but one of his retinue followed on his heels. Melissa soon found herself alone with a well-dressed man in a dark blue cloak.

“It is nice to see you again John Varlos.”

“It is also good to meet you again Melissa Cornwall.” He gave a slight, respectful nod.

“The audience was rather short.”

“The baron is a very busy man, the merchant houses and the guilds are always screaming for his attention.”

“When I was staying here before he avoided me as much as he could. I think I make him nervous.”

“I think you make all of us nervous.”

“Should I take that as a compliment?”

“You can if you like.”

They both kept a healthy distance as they eyed one another cautiously.

“We last met about, what, a year and a half ago in the capitol? What is King Leo’s spymaster doing here so far from Nodol?”

“Spymaster?” He placed a hand to his chest and both eyebrows rose. “Mistress Melissa you exalt me far beyond my rank. I am but a humble merchant.”

It was a wonderful performance. “A merchant who just happened to be here to greet me as soon as I arrived. You were the only one without noble blood attending the baron.”

“The baron honors me by seeking my advice on minor matters of trade and banking.”

Melissa nodded. “As does the king, you were a fixture at the royal court. Always standing in the background listening, ever present yet never noticed.”

“Well you certainly noticed me, but I would expect an archmage to have a keen eye.”

“I am just a servant to the Order and to The One We Follow.”

He frowned. “Is that how you refer to your ruler or to one of your gods?”

“So what are you doing here in Middleton?”

“I am doing what I always do, selling my goods, purchasing materials, and seeking promising business opportunities. A merchant needs to travel constantly.”

Melissa nodded. “As do spies.” She hesitated just a bit. “Have you any interesting news to share?”

“There is always gossip. Are you concerned with any particular subject?”

“Not really.”

“Then how could I guess what you mind find remarkable?”

“I am simply curious if you have heard any rumors that are especially unusual.”

“Nothing really comes to mind.”

“I see. Well it was just a thought.”

There was silence as they both stood there observing the other.

“You don’t trust me do you?” Melissa asked.

“Mistress Melissa, I can honestly say that I trust you as much as I trust any White Mage.”

“Which is to say not very much at all.”

He shrugged. “I am merely a merchant; my opinion does not count for much.”

“Your king seems to value it.”

“You give me far too much credit.”

“I don’t think so.”

“King Leo has many advisors, and my opinion is not unique.”

“I am not your enemy. The Order and the Alliance are not your enemies. Your enemy wears black.”

“My enemy, is whoever threatens my country and my king.”

She spread her hands. “Avalon is no threat to Lothas. All we want is…”

“Unity, justice, and peace; yes, I have heard that before, many times.”

“It is the truth, that is all we want for the world.”

“Even if I believed that you would still be a threat.”

“How so?”

“Because to achieve those noble ends you would sacrifice my homeland.”

She shook her head. “Avalon, and every member of the Alliance, would shed its blood for you.”

“That will be a huge comfort as the hordes of zombies overrun us. You are very far away, and Alteroth is on our southern border.”

“Yes, poor Lothas, so far from salvation and so near Alteroth.”

“I am sure from your point of view that is an inconvenient truth. Being a great power, Avalon can pick and choose its enemies. We do not have that luxury.”

“There can be no peace with those who embrace evil. If you put your trust in the Dark Mages instead of us, they will swallow you whole.”

“We would be idiots to trust the Dark Mages. At least for now though, they are not a threat, they do not seek to invade our lands. If you had your way you would provoke them into attacking us. That is the last thing the king wants.”

“They are evil and must be purged from the land. They are rotten and must be cut out. There is no other way. Soon or late there will be war.”

“If those are the only choices then King Leo chooses late.”

Melissa shook her head sadly. “Forgive me, but that is cowardly. Wickedness must be opposed, not tamely yielded to.”

“That is very easy to say when it is not your people who will be butchered or your lands that will burn.”

“King Doran of Dregal has a very different view of things. He understands the wisdom of accepting our protection and our beliefs.”

Doran was extremely close to his advisor Ramiel and seemed to be inching his way towards joining the Alliance. That made everyone at the royal court in Nodol very nervous. It was assumed that openly joining the Alliance would provoke an invasion by Alteroth. The ruling families of Lothas, Dregal, and Wylef were all connected by blood. King Leo would be honor bound to come to Doran’s aid, which would likely mean the end of Lothas.

“I cannot speak for King Doran, but I know that King Leo does not want to provoke our southern neighbors.”

“Then I will pray that he gains the wisdom to understand who his friends are. Know that should he ever truly see the light we will still extend to him our benevolent support.” She turned and headed to the door. “If you will excuse me, I have had a long journey and am going to rest.”

XXX

As he headed home Varlos was not happy.

Melissa’s arrival was a reminder that a day of reckoning was coming.

The sad thing was that in many ways he respected the order and what they stood for. If he were forced to choose he would choose them over the Dark Mages. The darks were genuine evil; he had no illusions about that. For Varlos, and for his king, the problem with the White Mages was that they were trying to force them to choose. They were zealots, and in their fanaticism were pushing for a confrontation that no one here wanted. That they and their Alliance would fight he did not doubt for a moment. But if Lothas were destroyed regardless of who won, what difference did it make?

When he returned he found a few new reports waiting for him on his desk.

One was from an agent he had in Stratford. It related a very interesting tale about a Dark Mage and a winged monster. The monster had been a beautiful barmaid named Alice.

Chapter 41

What A Guy Will Do Just To Get An Ogre

In one of the blank pages of his spellbook Waldo had written the following:

Recipe for Love Potion

Two servings of ground rose petals.

Three servings of ground mandrake.

Two pinches of sugar.

One pinch of cinnamon.

Two pinches of rosemary.

Two servings of ground lotus blossoms.

Another ingredient.

Mix together with one cup of water and bring to boil.

Add one succubus tear while reciting the following spell:

‘Est lothanos carcao, est navarro carcao, aris monk nula.’

Will produce one dose of love potion that will enrapture any heart for a single night.

That was what Waldo
thought
the recipe was. He had learned it along with many others back when he had been studying magic. The recipes for all the various potions had been written down in his spellbook, the one that was at the bottom of a river now. He had to go by memory and intuition.

Right beneath the first notation was a second one.

Recipe for Love Potion, Rabbit Variant

Two servings of ground dandelions.

Two
servings of ground mandrake.

One spoonful of honey
.

One pinch of cinnamon.

Two pinches of rosemary.

Two servings of ground lotus blossoms.

One serving of ground devil’s grass.

Mix together with one cup of water and bring to boil.

Add two succubus tears while reciting the following spell:

‘Est lothanos carcao, est navarro carcao, aris monk nula.’

Will produce something, I pray the Dark Powers, that will act like love potion for at least an hour or two.

Magical incantations and potions were a bit like cooking recipes. If you had the necessary abilities and followed the correct process you could expect to get the same result every time. The same was true of potions and wards.

But, as with cooking, you could make adjustments. Change a syllable here; alter an inflection there, even use a different word and you would get… something. The effect might be close to what you wanted, it could be worse or better, it could be nothing, and occasionally it could be something else entirely.

Walter had once drawn up a summoning circle meaning to call a samalander. He made a mistake with one of the runes and somehow wound up with a talking gerbil who said his name was Ernst.

Mages could create their own spells and potions through experimentation. The spellbooks of former masters were treasures worth killing for, largely because they often contained unique incantations found nowhere else. For the truly great ones (like his mother) it was almost expected.

Circumstances had forced Waldo to come up with an alternate recipe.

Alice hadn’t known of any places that sold roses and so had brought him some dandelions she had found growing in an alleyway. Mandrake and lotus blossoms had been among the ingredients he had stolen from Roger, but he’d only had enough mandrake to make two doses. Sugar was an expensive luxury and very hard to find, he had substituted the honey that the Innkeeper had brought just this morning. Cinnamon and rosemary he had, having acquired both while traveling through the forest.