To brighten and dim magical lights, you know. The demon is not doing what it is supposed to. I have been over and over the code and I can’t seem to find the problem. Do you suppose you…”
“I’d be happy to. I’ll be back at the castle in a couple of day-tenths. Could you bring it by then?”
“Thank you, My Lord. Two day-tenths it is. Enjoy the fair. Good day, My Lady.” With that he wandered off.
Moira looked after him, eyes sparkling with laughter. “He is a dear, isn’t he?”
“Yeah, but I wish he was a little more logical when it comes to programming.”
Moira shrugged. It was an old discussion. While anyone could use a spell written with Wiz’s magic compiler, creating them required the same knack for logical thinking and organization it takes to be a programmer in any language. Traditional magic did not build up spells a statement at a time and so relied on other qualities, notably memory, intuition and courage. It was hard to be good at both the old and new magics, and as one of the Mighty and a member of the Council of the North, Malus was very good at the traditional magic.
“He has an eye for chicanery though,” Moira said. “Perhaps I had better have a word with Mother Charisong before you or one of the other fair wardens has to take official notice.”
At least one journeyman wizard was always on duty among those overseeing the fair to guard against magical trickery. It was not required that the Mighty take a turn as fair wardens, still less that the members of the Council do so, but many of them did.
“Want me to come along?”
“It would be best if you escorted me there and then went off on another errand while Mother Charisong and I talked of old times.”
“Thus implying a threat without having to make it.”
Wiz nodded.
Moira’s green eyes grew wide and innocent. “Why no, My Lord. How can you think I would threaten a poor old woman? We will merely have a quiet gossip.”
Wiz put his arm around his wife’s waist. “Which will make the point without having to say a word Darling, did I ever tell you you are brilliant?”
Moira cocked a burnished copper eyebrow. “Only by comparison.”
“Hey, Danny,” Jerry called, “watch this.”
Two mouse clicks, two mouse squeaks, and the rabbit with the bass drum was back on Jerry’s desk It marched up and down, beating the drum and getting closer to the table’s edge with each pass.
As the rabbit reached the edge of the table, a green tentacle curled out of the “screen,” wrapped around the rabbit’s throat and jerked it back into the system, cutting the rabbit off in mid-beat.
“Crude,” Danny said, “but effective.”
Deep in the Wild Wood, the sun was also shining. The weak winter rays slanted through the multi-paned windows of the great hall at Heart’s Ease, throwing diamond-shaped patterns on the table. Two women stood beside it, studying a curiously carved casket. Both of them were tall and slender, but the younger one with raven-dark hair was slightly taller than the older woman with the prematurely white hair.
“Now watch closely,” Shiara the Silver said to her pupil. Working by touch, because she was blind, she selected a lock pick from the assortment that lay on the table. “You must keep the tension on the mechanism,” she said as she smoothly manipulated the lock. Two heads, one silver-white and the other black with russet highlights, bent over the chest “Past the first ward. Then past the second ward.”
Malkin, sometime thief on the Dragon Marches and now lady to Jerry Andrews of the Wizards’ Keep, nodded.
“And then the tumbler slips like so,” Shiara said. “Now you try it.”
Malkin bent to it with a will. In seconds the lock clicked and the dark-haired woman straightened up in triumph. Then her face froze, her eyes widened, her features contorted and she let out a thunderous sneeze.
“Had it been real, the blow tube would have been filled with something more lethal than pepper,” Shiara said mildly.
“You didn’t say anything about that,” Malkin protested, sneezing again.