"Scheming and meeting with folk and casting spells and manipulating events all over Aglirta and not involving me in the slightest, or telling me a single thing. We have agreement on this, remember? I am not a piece of furniture."
Ingryl Ambelter forebore to make the obvious reply linking baronial usefulness and immobile items of furniture. Instead, he came forward into the light of the window he'd tunneled out of the earth, glanced out at the pleasant vista of the Vale it afforded, and took the other chair. "You're most correct, Phelinndar. My apologies; this is but long habit and no deliberate attempt to belittle you or leave you ignorant or uninvolved. I assure you that I've done a lot of drinking and scrying, but made very few… ah, aggressive actions beyond the Bowdragon visits. You observed every moment of those, I trust?"
Phelinndar nodded. "I did. Your spells worked admirably. Yet here I sit, eating eggs and fryfish-I kept some warm for you under yon dome-whilst you scurry and mutter. Wizards aren't the only folk in the Vale with brains or imagination-or Dwaer-Stones, either."
"Point taken," the Spellmaster agreed gravely. "Well, then, here's what I've been thinking about-thinking, mind, more than doing. Thus far, I've met with failure in all attempts to sway the Bowdragons into action. Much of my present scurrying, as you put it, involves trying to discover how to move them into aiding us-or if the powers of these remaining elders are feeble enough that we can abandon attempts to bother. Can we wrest their spellbooks and enchanted items from them, and have done-or is that the swift way into another feud, and more peril?"
He waved a hand that bore many rings at the dark and yet somehow glowing crystal spheres that floated in a curious, unmoving cluster above a small circular table across the room. "You've made good use of the scrying-spheres since I linked them to you, I trust?"
The baron nodded. "Unrest is rife, up and down Aglirta-neighbor turning on neighbor in mad violence, folk becoming beasts and savaging everyone… it can't be natural. Either the gods have cursed the Vale, or there's dark magic at work. And dark magic either means crazed wizards- an army of them, to cause this much bloodletting-or the Serpents. Unless you believe all those bards' tales about the Faceless rising to slaughter us all."
Ambelter shook his head. "Oh, the Faceless exist, to be sure, but this is not their way. No, this is the work of the Servants of the Serpent."
Phelinndar shook his head. "Why? Why destroy? Many a baron executes and tortures and spreads terror, but to loose something that harms many folk-crafters who could make you rich, farmers who feed you, loyal retainers as well as those who'd smile to see you dead-where's the sense in that? Why do the Snake-lovers always lash out to do harm in all directions, like reckless boys on their first sword-raid?"
The Spellmaster shrugged. "Mad folk, obeying mad orders? Who knows?"
The baron leaned forward in his chair suddenly, and burst out, "Ah, but we must find out! How can we proceed if the Vale is full of reckless idiots who could be unleashed upon us at any moment? Or commanded to work some idiocy like burn all the crops or poison the Silverflow itself?"
Ambelter nodded. "There's truth in what you say. I must confess I've been trying to ignore the priests and work around them-judging that any sort of assault would be attracting a foe to myself who could prove endless and all-consuming of my time-but yes, we should try to learn just who's leading the Serpents, and judge for ourselves their aims and probable forth-coming orders."
"Precisely!" Phelinndar agreed, letting the Dwaer roll down his sleeve into his hand and hefting it. "After all, what are half a dozen outlander mages compared to an army of ruthless fanatics already spread the length of the Vale? If we can steer them…"
The Spellmaster winced. "Experience tells me they'd never be more than a treacherous weapon in our hands, at best. Yet knowing what they plan, that I do agree to. Now, given their reckless and active nature, numbers, and the magical knowledge senior priests among them undoubtedly possess, do we dare risk scrying to find out? They may well be waiting for us to use the Dwaer for such pryings, so they can trace it."
"They may also be kings of far lands, every one of them, with their armies arriving in Sirlptar right now to bring them their favorite fresh morning eggs, or eels, or tree-worms," Phelinndar snarled, "but I doubt it, and we can't sit here growing old worrying about what they might-"
A shimmering occurred then, in the air beside the Spellmaster's chair. Astonished, he snapped an incantation and raised his hands like claws to smite-never faltering when the rippling radiances resolved themselves into an unfamiliar, darkly beautiful young woman who stood facing them, her hands clasped together like a dutiful and abashed daughter being presented at court. Long, raven-dark hair fell in a smooth sweep down over a clinging black gown. Slender hips, great dark eyes-flashing now from one man to the other, above a mouth that opened uncertainly…
The baron gaped at this apparition, who stood unharmed and seemingly unangered in the midst of a lashing fury of spells hurled by Ambelter. Phelinndar even felt the Spellmaster plucking at the Dwaer-which rose and flickered in the baron's grasp-to power greater scourings.
The air around the wench caught fire, flames that raged and then fell to ice, leaving behind the sharp stink of burning. Tiny lightnings stabbed like tavern-brawl daggers… and then fell away, leaving the lass unmoved.
A sending, she must be.
Ambelter mastered his fear and astonishment, and addressed the stranger sharply. "I know not who you are, sending, but I am the Spellmaster of Aglirta, and I can destroy you-not merely this your seeming, but through it your true self. I intend to do this only after I've traced you and brought you here to us, to learn how it is that you found us, and all you know… and how you can be made to serve our pleasure. Prepare, rash one, to taste the first moments of your doom!"
The Dwaer tore free of Phelinndar's grasp and rose up before him, spinning and brightening. The baron let his hand fall, not daring to try to reclaim it.
"Lord Ambelter," their visitor said firmly, not moving, "these acts of rough-and all too traceable, by those who even now search for you and the Dwaerindim-magic won't be necessary." For a moment Phelinndar thought she was an immobile image, a portrait sent to hang before them, but then he noticed she was trembling-with excitement, by the sound of her voice, not fear.
"I'm called Maelra Bowdragon, and I believe you know my lineage. I witnessed your meetings with my uncles-and know who and what you are."
The Spellmaster's eyes narrowed. "And?"
"And I want you to know that not all Bowdragons are afraid of the Vale. I… I want to work with you."
Dark magic boiled up around them again. Hawkril winced, staggered, and dropped the bowman he was carrying. "Craer?"
"Keep at it," the procurer snapped. "Trust Embra to quell such, or we'll never be done here. I've not seen so many bowmen in one place since the Isles!" A splash announced the culmination of his latest guiding journey.
As the dark cloud faded, thinning rapidly, Craer came back dusting his hands together. "That's two dozen cortahars I've sent swimming. Possibly the first baths they've had this season. You're cutting all bowstrings?"
Hawkril nodded, and waved into the turret behind him. "A dozen or so are lying there yet-every time I bend to reach for a bow, one of these damned snakes tries to put its fangs in my face. Why couldn't Em stop them turning themselves into slitherers? I can't hack any of them without letting the rest fang me… which I suspect would be a very foolish tactic." With a grunt he heaved the limp cortahar onto a growing pile of senseless Storn warriors. To drop them into the moat now would be to slay helpless men-but the moment he saw one moving, he intended to pluck and toss.