The Wiz Biz (46 page)

“Interesting, but is it strong enough?”

“Well, I can make someone’s helm ring pretty good with it.”

“Try it on the pell,” Shamus invited.

At the far end of the drill field was a row of head-high posts set in the earth. Each was about six inches thick and the dirt around them was freshly dug.

Karl stepped up to the nearest post, assumed his position and struck, overhead and slanting down and into the post. The blade turned in his hand, so the first cut only skimmed the post, scraping along the surface and taking a shaving with it. The second cut drove the sword edge perhaps two inches into the pine.

“Surprisingly strong, My Lord,” Shamus commented as Karl stepped back, massaging his wrist from the shock. Then he stepped up, assumed his guard stance and sheared the post off cleanly with a single mighty swing.

“Such blows win battles,” he said, stepping back.

“How did you do that?”

“Years of practice,” Shamus said with a smile. “Of course there are one or two small tricks. But mostly an hour or two practice every day for, oh, six or seven years and you would be a creditable swordsman.” He laughed and clapped the younger man on the shoulder.

“I think I just made a raging fool of myself,” Karl muttered to Judith as he came off the field.

“I think it’s called hubris,” Judith told him. “How’s your head?”

Karl rubbed his wrist. “It’s my arm more, than any my head and it will heal quicker than my pride.” He looked back out at the practicing guardsmen. “You know what the worst of it is? I can’t use any of this stuff in our combat back home. Our rules are so unrealistic that the techniques that really work won’t work for us.”

###

“. . . so anyway, we’re working on a user interface. It’s going to be really neat when we get it done.”

June watched Danny and said nothing.

They sat side-by-side on the roof, looking out over the Capital to where the late afternoon sun turned puffy clouds into a symphony of pale golds and blush pinks.

They had met up on the roof nearly every day since their first encounter. Sometimes one or both of them brought food and they had an impromptu picnic. Sometimes they just sat and talked. Or rather Danny talked and June listened. June hadn’t said a dozen words since that first day, but now they sat together on the slates. Sometimes they held hands.

“You ought to come and see the place sometime. It’s really pretty interesting.”

June smiled and shook her head.

“Well, look, I gotta get down there or they’re gonna start asking questions. I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?”

Danny started to rise, but June took hold of his arm and pulled him close. She kissed him full on the mouth and before Danny could respond she skittered away over the roof ridge.

Danny sat there for a moment longer, tasting her on his lips and trying to understand what had happened. One thing he was sure of. He liked it.

###

Even by the standards of the City of Night, this place was strange. The windows about the tower gave good light, else he never would have dared to approach the eerie blue glow issuing through the open doorway.

At this level the tower was divided into two rooms. The one beyond the carved black portal must be by far the larger, but the one was substantial as well. Looking at the layout, Wiz had the odd feeling that this level was larger inside than it was on the outside.

This was obviously a wizard’s tower and judging by the effects a very powerful wizard at that. Through the inner door, Wiz could see forms writhing in the smoky red dark. It might just be fumes from the ever-burning braziers, but he had no intention of crossing the threshold to find out.

This room must have been an adjunct to the workroom. There were shelves along one wall which had obviously held scrolls. Pegs and hooks on another wall had perhaps held ceremonial robes and other magical apparatus.

But none of that was left. The small room had been thoroughly ransacked. Hangings had been pulled off the walls and lay rotting in a heap on the floor. The shelves were empty and broken. The floor was littered with broken glass, smashed crockery and bits of less savory items that might once have been in pots and jars. In one comer an armoire leaned crazily against the wall, its doors torn half off their hinges and showing the scars where someone had hastily chopped them open.

Wiz walked over to the cabinet and looked inside. The shelves were askew and the drawers were ripped apart. Like the room itself the armoire had been looted.

On an impulse, he stuck his hand into the cabinet. He struck the back much sooner than he expected and jammed his fingers painfully.

That wasn’t right, he thought as he flexed the aching digits. The back was closer than it should be. He put his hand back in the cabinet and reached around to feel the back from the outside. Yes, there was definitely a space there. There was a good eight-inch difference between the inside and outside back.

A careful examination of the inside back and the sides showed him nothing. The wood was plain and the grain straight and simple. He pressed and twisted, but the back remained in place.

Well,
he thought hefting his halberd,
there’s always the field engineering approach.

Three quick blows from the halberd splintered the thin wood of the back. On the third blow the armoire gave a despairing
sproing
and the remains of the back fell toward him. Eagerly Wiz reached inside.

At first he thought the compartment was empty. But when he thrust his hand into the dark recess, his fingers touched cloth. He lifted the garment off the peg on the side of the recess and brought it out into the light.

It wasn’t much, just a brown wool travelling cloak, frayed and slightly moth-eaten. The kind of thing a wizard might wear for a disguise, or because he was too engrossed in his magic to worry about appearances.
It doesn’t even look very warm,
Wiz thought as he fingered the thin cloth. For the hundredth time, Wiz thought of the fine gray and red cloak with the fur trim he had left in the village.

Well, anything was better than nothing and that’s what I’ve got now.
He threw the cloak over his shoulders and pulled it tightly about him. He was right, it wasn’t very warm. Still it was comforting to have something to wrap around himself.

###

“I saw Moira today, My Lord,” Arianne said as she and Bal-Simba finished the day’s business in his study. “She asked if there was any news of Wiz.”

“If there was news, she would be the first to know,” the giant wizard told his deputy. “No, so far our search has turned up nothing.” He frowned. “We know an accident did not befall him in the Wild Wood. If he started out on the Wizard’s Way and did not return to the Capital, we may assume some magical agency intervened.”

“Human?” Arianne asked.

“Perhaps. Although it appears that Sparrow has an unusual number of non-human enemies as well. Powerful ones.” He paused for a second and frowned. “And Lady . . .”

Arianne bent close at his gesture. “Yes, Lord?”

“Inquire—discreetly—into the activities of our own wizards over the last fourteen days. Especially any who have absented themselves from the Capital.”

Arianne looked shocked. “Do you think—”

“I think,” Bal-Simba said, cutting her off, “that we would be remiss if we did not explore every possibility to get our Sparrow back here as quickly as we can.”

Arianne turned away to execute his command. “Oh, and Lady . . .”

Arianne turned back. “Yes, Lord?”

“Find that ex-apprentice, Pryddian, and ask him what he knows about this.”

“Pryddian?”

“Just a thought. A direct attack on Wiz in the Capital would be difficult. It would be easier if he were outside our walls. Pryddian was the cause of our Sparrow’s journey.” He shrugged his mountainous shoulders. “Unlikely, but we have to start somewhere.”

###

Pryddian was sweating as he came over the last rise before his destination and not just from the noon sun. Before him the road curved to the left around the base of a hill, actually a large limestone outcropping. To the right, away from the road and along the outcropping, was a wild jumble of small trees, laurel bushes and boulders. The former apprentice started down the road, his feet kicking up powdery white dust fine as flour as he walked.

When he reached the place where the road curved away he paused for an instant and scanned the bushes on the roadside. The dusty weeds beside the road showed no sign of disturbance, but there was a path there, leading off the road and in among the undergrowth. Pryddian patted the breast of his tunic for reassurance and then stepped off the road and onto the little-used path.

He breasted his way through the bushes, dodged around trees and boulders and followed the meandering path deeper into the woodland. The thick brush and second-growth trees showed that once this place had been logged. But that had obviously been long ago. Getting felled trees out of such a place would be backbreaking and not worth it so close to the Fringe of the Wild Wood. It had been done once and men the wilderness had been allowed to reclaim this place.

Finally the trail took a sharp turn and a dip and Pryddian stumbled through into an opening. He was against the flank of the hill now, in a little hollow hard against sheer rock face. All around him like grotesque sentries stood boulders twice as high as he was. Directly in front of him was a single table-high stone in the midst of a patch of beaten earth. There were dark splotches on the stone, as if something had been spilled there and allowed to dry.

Pryddian walked hesitatingly into the place. Suddenly an arm like iron clamped across his windpipe and he felt cold steel against his neck.

Instinctively he twisted his head and out of the corner of his eye saw that his captor was clad in the close-fitting black of the Dark League’s dread Shadow Warriors. The Shadow Warrior pressed the edge to his throat and Pryddian ceased struggling.

“No move, no sound if you value your life,” a voice grated behind him.

Pryddian licked his lips and remained silent.

“Better,” the voice said at last. “Now, why are you here?”

“I am called Pryddian. I am . . . URK.” The Shadow Warrior’s grip tightened on his windpipe.

“I did not ask who you were, but why you had come,” his unseen questioner said sharply. “Answer only those questions I ask you, apprentice, or you will wish you had never been born.”

“I came seeking the Dark League,” Pryddian said when the pressure on his throat relaxed.

“And why should the Dark League be interested in the likes of you?”

“I have talent. I desire to become a wizard and I bring you something.” He reached toward his tunic, but the Shadow Warrior drew the blade perhaps a quarter of an inch along his skin. He felt the burning sting of the cut and then the warm wetness of blood trickling down his throat.

Pryddian froze, but the Shadow Warrior, reacting to an unseen signal, slackened his grip and moved the knife away from his throat. Slowly he extended his trembling hand and reached into his tunic. Equally slowly he withdrew his hand, holding a roll of parchment.

“I give you the Sparrow’s magic,” he said.

###

“Lord, Moira asked again today about Sparrow,” Arianne said.

Bal-Simba turned away from his window to face his deputy.

“Today as every day, eh?” He shook his head. “The answer is still the same. We can find no trace of him, in all the World.”

“Is he dead then?” Arianne asked.

Bal-Simba shook his head. “Moira does not think so. I trust her judgment in this.”

“Moira was away in his world when he left Aelric’s hold,” Arianne pointed out.

“Still, I think she would know if he had died.”

“Then where could he be?”

“There are many possibilities. He might be in a place where he is shielded by magic. He might have been sent beyond the World. He might be held in a state of undeath. One thing I think we can safely venture. He is not where he is voluntarily and wherever he is, he needs any aid we can give him.” He returned to his desk and sat down again. “On that subject, have you learned more in the matter you were pursuing?”

“You mean the actions of the Mighty? There is one thing new. Ebrion is missing for near three weeks.”

“Ebrion?”

Arianne nodded. “There is more. We cannot be sure, but it appears that he may well be dead.”

“Dead? How?”

Arianne shrugged. “We do not know. We are not even certain that he is dead.”

Bal-Simba sucked his lip against his sharpened teeth thoughtfully. “Ebrion, eh?”

He twisted in his chair to face her. “This should be explored. Investigate closely.”

“But discreetly,” Arianne agreed. “I am already doing so, Lord.”

###

Just like all the rest,
Wiz thought as he surveyed the room in the failing light. Nothing to eat, just more piles of junk. The wind whistled through the broken windows and he shivered as he pulled the worn brown cloak tighter around himself.

Outside the setting sun poked fitfully through the layer of lead-gray clouds. By now Wiz knew the signs of a storm moving in, perhaps with snow. It was going to be another cold, miserable night. Too cold for foraging.

Since his encounter with the flying wizard, Wiz had stayed out of the open, at least in daylight. Every day, unless the winds were too high, one or more wizards of the Dark League floated over the ruined city looking for a sign of him. Now he tried to move from building to building only at night.

Well, none of that this evening. Storms in the Southern Land were nothing to take lightly. He needed a place to hole up. And food, of course.

He made one more survey of the room. Broken furniture, bits of smashed crockery and junk, and piles of what had probably once been wall hangings or drapes. He poked at the largest pile, over against the far wall with his broken halberd. Nothing but cloth. Then he stopped in mid-poke. Maybe he could use this after all. There was a lot more of it here than normal and it was pretty dry. More than enough to make a nest for a human.

Wiz burrowed into the pile of cloth and rolled himself in the rags. He pulled up the hood of his cloak and drew another layer of cloth over him. The material was none too clean. It had been soaked repeatedly and Wiz was not the first creature to nest in it, but it kept out the chill and as his body heat warmed the cloth, Wiz stopped being cold for the first time since he had arrived. As the wind whistled and howled outside, his breathing steadied and he fell deeply asleep for the first time in days.