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 prettyboy’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.