“What did you find?” Azzie asked.
Nemain cocked his head, then, in a small voice, replied, “I believe we’ve located the one you want.”
“Where is she?”
The other two ravens fluttered down. One perched on Azzie’s head, the other on Frike’s shoulder.
Macha, the eldest, said, “Yes, it’s definitely the woman you want. The scent is unmistakable.”
“I suppose she is dead?” Azzie asked.
“Of course she’s dead,” Macha said. “That’s the way you wanted her, isn’t it? If not, you could always have her killed.”
Azzie didn’t bother explaining that there were rules against that sort of thing. “Where will I find her?”
“Go a couple of leagues down this road and you’ll come to a town. She’ll be in the second building on your left.”
“Thanks, baleful bird,” Azzie replied.
Macha nodded, then rose into the air. The others followed. In a moment they were gone.
Azzie and Frike mounted and headed downroad, south. It was an old Roman road that crossed southern Europe, headed toward the great fortress city of Carcassonne, in better condition than many roads they had taken. They passed along it in silence, and after a time they came to a fair-sized village. Azzie sent Frike on ahead to locate accommodations while he tended to the matter of Miranda’s head.
He walked to the house the ravens had indicated. It was the largest in the lane, and dark, with an unpleasant look to its little slit windows and ill-thatched roof.
He knocked at the door. No answer. He tried the latch. It was not secured. He walked into the main room.
It was dark inside, with only a little light showing through cracks in the ceiling. There was a strong smell of wine.
His sense of danger kicked in, a moment too late. He plunged through a hole in the floor and fell into the room below, landing heavily. When he sat up, he found himself inside a bottle.
Chapter 2
It was a glass bottle with a wide neck, of a type not seen much in these days, large enough to hold a medium-sized demon like Azzie. The fall had made him dizzy for a moment, and he heard a noise above his head but didn’t know what it was until he looked up. Then he saw that the bottle had been stoppered with a wooden plug. Azzie recovered his senses quickly. What was he doing in a bottle, anyhow?
Peering through the green-tinged sides, Azzie saw that he was in a room illuminated by many candles. There were three rough-looking men standing around a little table, arguing.
Azzie tapped on the glass to get their attention.
They turned. One of them, the one with the ugliest features, came forward and spoke to him. Since the bottle was stoppered, no sound came through. Azzie indicated this by pointing to his own ear and shaking his head.
When the loutish fellow understood, he told the others. Once again their argument raged, this time more furiously. Finally, they came to a decision. The first man climbed up a ladder set alongside the bottle and loosened the wooden plug slightly.
“You can hear now,” he said, “but if you try anything, we’ll push the plug in tight and go away and leave you here forever.”
Azzie made no move. He figured he had a decent chance of driving it out before they could hammer it in securely. But he was interested in hearing what they had to say.
“You came for the witch, didn’t you?” the man said.
“It might be easier if I knew your names,” Azzie said.
“This is Ansel, here is Chor, and I am Hald. We are brothers, and the dead witch Miranda is our sister.”
“Indeed,” Azzie said. “Where is she?”
“We have her close by. We’ve preserved her with ice.”
“Bought at great expense,” his brother Ansel reminded him. “We must get back the cost of the ice. And that’s only the beginning.”
“You’re going too fast,” Azzie said. “What makes you think this sister of yours, whom you call a witch, is worth anything at all?”
“The doctor told us.”
“What doctor is that?” Azzie asked.
“Old Dr. Parvenu. He is also our local alchemist. After that crazy fellow killed Miranda and we brought her back, our first thought was to consult Dr. Parvenu, who is an expert on these matters. This was after we had killed Phillipe, of course.”