grass. I practiced with the apple for a few moments until I could
hold it firmly without sinking my talons into its flesh. Then I went
back to the squealing field-mouse. I took him firmly in my talons,
shouldered the rock off his tail, and left for Vo Astur.
The trip wasn’t bad – for me – and after we were several hundred
feet up in the air, Killane stopped squealing. He did tremble a lot,
though.
It was mid-afternoon when we reached Vo Astur, and I noted as
we settled onto the battlements of the palace that the parapet was
largely deserted, a clear indication that discipline was lax. I
disapproved of that, even though it was definitely to our advantage.
Asturia was on a war footing, after all, and the lack of sentries
on the parapet was an indication of unforgivable slovenliness. Still
holding the trembling mouse in one claw, I hopped into a deserted
sentry-box at the southwest corner of the battlements and changed
Killane and myself back into our natural forms. He was staring at
me in absolute horror when his real form blurred into place, and
he continued that squeaking.
‘Stop that!’ I told him sharply. ‘You’re a man again. Talk. Don’t
squeak.’
‘Don’t you ever do that t’ me again!’ he gasped.
‘It was your idea, Killane.’
‘I never said no such thing.’
‘You told me that you were going to come along. All right, you
did come along. Now quit complaining.’
‘What a dreadful thing that was t’ do!’
‘So was threatening to burn my house down. Snap out of it,
Killane. We’ve got work to do.’
We kept watch from the tiny sentry-box until the soldiers who
were scattered along the parapet gathered over on the far side in
response to the inviting sound of a pair of rattling dice. Then, with
no ostentatious display of furtiveness, Killane and I went down a
flight of stairs into the upper floors of Nerasin’s palace. I still knew
my way around the ducal residence, and Killane and I slipped
unobtrusively into a dusty, neglected library. In all probability, it
was the safest place to hide, since study was not held in very high
regard in Vo Astur just then.
The sun went down and darkness settled over Vo Astur. The
noise from the throne-room seemed to suggest that the Asturians
were celebrating something. Nerasin had evidently done some
boasting, and his cohorts – his immediate family, for the most part
– appeared to be convinced that his clever ploy would improve
things in Vo Astur. I assumed that they were eating as well as
drinking. That’s the basic flaw in any attempt to starve a people
into submission. The ones you’re really after are the last ones to go~
hungry.
Killane kept watch at the door while I carefully reviewed the
details of a dissection my teacher Balten and I had performed back
on the Isle of the Winds. I wanted to make absolutely certain that
a fairly common ailment would convince Nerasin to be cooperative.
I think it was almost midnight when a group of rowdy Asturian
nobles came staggering up the stairs from the throne-room, turned
the semi-comatose Nerasin over to the guards at the door to the
royal apartment, and reeled off down the corridor singing a bawdy
drinking song.
Killane and I waited. ‘I’ll be after doin’ th’ killin’, Lady-O,’ my
friend whispered to me. ‘I’d not be wantin’ y’ t’ soil yer pretty hands
on th’ likes o’ no Asturian.’
‘We aren’t going to kill anybody, Killane,’ I told him firmly. ‘I’m
going to give Nerasin some instructions, that’s all.’
‘Surely Y’ don’t think he’ll be after followin’ them, do y’?’
‘He’ll follow them, Killane. Believe me, he’ll follow them.’
‘I’ll be absolutely fascinated t’ see how Y’ plan t’ manage that,
Lady-O.’ He picked up a heavy chair and very slowly twisted it
apart, making only a very small amount of noise. When it was all
in pieces, he selected one of the legs and swished it through the
air a couple of times. ‘Twill do nicely, don’t y’ know,’ he noted,
brandishing his makeshift club.
‘What did you do that for?’ I asked him.
‘I’ll be after needin’ something’ t’ put th’ guards t’ sleep.’
‘Why don’t you check with me before you dismantle any more
furniture?’ I suggested. ‘The guards won’t be any problem.’
‘I’ll not be after doubtin’ yer unspeakable gifts, Lady-O,’ he said,
‘but I think I’ll be after keepin’ me cudgel here – just in case.’ .
‘Whatever makes you comfortable, I suppose.’ I listened at the
door for a few moments. Silence was settling over the castle. Here
and there a door slammed, and the occasional bursts of laughter
and rowdy song were quite some distance off. I opened the door
slightly and looked at the two bored-looking guards at Nerasin’s
door. ‘Sleep,’ I murmured to them under my breath, and a moment
or so later they were sprawled, snoring, one on either side of the
door. ‘Let’s get on with this, then,’ I said to Killane, and the two of
us stepped out into the corridor.
The door was not locked, since it was supposed to be guarded,
so Killane and I were inside Nerasin’s apartment in no more than
a minute.
I cast my thought about the series of connected rooms and found
that nobody was awake, and then my friend and I went on into
the bedroom where Nerasin sprawled snoring and only partially
undressed across the canopied bed. I noticed that his bare feet were
very dirty.
Killane quietly closed the door. ‘Would y’ be after wantin’ me t’
wake him?’ he whispered.
‘Not yet,’ I murmured. ‘I’d better sober him up first. Then he’ll
wake up all by himself, I think.’ I rather carefully examined the man
who called himself ‘the Duke of Astur’. He was of a medium build,
he had a big, bulbous nose and small, deep-set eyes. He had a weak
chin and sparse, dark hair. He was none too clean, and his breath
was like the odor from a freshly reopened grave.
Leeching the residue of strong drink from a man’s body isn’t
particularly difficult, but I wanted something in place within
Nerasin’s body before I did that. I probed rather carefully with my
thought, located his stomach, and carefully etched away the lining
of the stomach wall near its bottom. Then I abraded the stomach
wall itself until there was an open sore there. Nerasin’s digestive
juices should do the rest. Then, being careful not to move too quickly,
I drained away what he’d drunk that evening. When I judged that
he was just on the verge of noticing the fire I’d just built in his belly,
I relaxed the muscles in his voice-box to the point that he wouldn’t
be able to scream – not audibly, at any rate.
The putative Duke of Asturia awoke rather suddenly.
Judging from the slightly disappointed look on his face, soundless
screaming isn’t very satisfying. His writhing was inspired, however.
‘Good evening, your Grace,’ I said pleasantly. ‘Isn’t the weather
mild for so early in the season?’
Nerasin scrunched himself up into a tight ball, clutching at his
stomach and trying with every ounce of his strength to push out at
least a small squeak.
‘Is something the matter, dear boy?’ I asked, feigning some slight
concern. ‘Something you ate or drank no doubt.’ I laid my hand on
his profusely sweating forehead. ‘No,’ I said, ‘it doesn’t seem to be
connected to any kind of food. Let me think for a moment.’
I drew a look of studious concentration over my face while my
patient’ thrashed about on his bed.
Then I snapped my fingers as if a thought had suddenly come to
me. ‘Of course!’ I exclaimed. ‘How did I miss it? It’s so obvious.
You’ve been a naughty boy, your Grace. You’ve done something
lately that you’re very ashamed of. There’s nothing really wrong
with your poor little tummy. You’ve got a guilty conscience, that’,s
all.’ Then I triggered a fresh flow of digestive juices into his stomach.
This time he was actually able to make a slight squeaking noise
– I think he did anyway. I couldn’t be completely sure because he’d
rolled off the bed and was crawling around under it. The squeaking
might have been the sound of his toe-nails scraping on the
floorboards.
‘Help his Grace back into bed, Killane,’ I suggested to my grinning
henchman. ‘I want to see what I can do to ease his suffering.’
Killane reached under the bed, caught Nerasin by one ankle, and
dragged him out into the open again. Then he bodily picked up the
squirming Asturian and casually dumped him back on the bed.
‘Allow me to introduce myself, your Grace. My name’s Polgara.
You may have heard of me.’
He even stopped wiggling. His eyes bulged out. ‘Polgara the
Sorceress?’ he whispered, looking slightly terrified.