"What's happened?” someone on the barge gasped.
"Magic," a barge guard said grimly, and spat disgustedly into the river. "The same blight that always afflicts Aglirta. Fell magic, from wizard or Serpent-priest. To rule it, they rush to destroy or maim it. Until Aglirtans rise up and rid themselves of such vermin, this is going to happen again and again. My father told me it raged in his time-and here we are forty-odd summers later, and how far has the Kingless Land come?"
"Well," Flaeros replied quietly, "they have a King now."
The guard looked at him. "Hah! And do they heed him? Do the Serpents bow, and the barons obey, and the people know peace?" He waved at the fires and screaming people on the shore, and added wearily, "Oh, for a true King! This land could be so great!"
"I think it is great," Flaeros said firmly, "to have survived at all. The Dwaer-Stones lost and lost again, Faerod Silvertree and his Dark Three, Bloodblade, the Rising of the Serpent, the death of King Snowsar… Aye, Aglirta has survived much."
The guard slowly surveyed the fires and the maddened folk busily slaying each other, and then grunted, "Survived? Well, aye, after a fashion, Lord Bard. After a fashion."
They exchanged grim nods as the barge slid on through the night of blood and madness. Here and there, bodies were bobbing in the waters now.
"Is that you, Tash?"
"It had better be," the Lady Talasorn told Craer, as she swung around a corner to embrace him, and unhooded a lantern. "We… we're a littie weary."
"Huh," the procurer muttered, "you're weary. Who's been swinging swords and jumping around like jesters while you three lounged around humming to yon Dwaer, I'd like to know?"
"Charming as always, Overduke Delnbone," Blackgult observed from across the chamber.
"One has one's reputation to maintain," the procurer replied, sketching an elegant bow.
"Evidently," the Golden Griffon replied in weary rebuke. "We felt the castings dwindle and end, so I presume the priests are all dead or fled, but I hope you sent Stornbridge to a fitting end?"
"One priest fled, aye," Hawkril replied, shouldering into the room, "and Craer did his usual dancing justice upon the unlamented tersept. But we've some grim news to report: The Serpents have unleashed something they call the Blood Plague, all over the Vale."
Embra nodded, looking pale and drawn. "It does seem widespread, yes. Fell and mighty, laying madness on folk who've never bent a knee to the Great Serpent as well as those who've come to his altars, so far as I could see. The altar fires…" She winced at the memory. "We had to leave off using the Dwaer, or be overwhelmed. So much magic, and so… twisted!
Craer nodded. "So, does anyone have anything trustworthy we can eat or drink?"
His fellow overdukes stared blankly at him, and then Blackgult- followed by Tshamarra, and then Hawkril-started to laugh.
"Well?" the procurer asked, folding his arms. "Are we now the masters of Stornbridge Castle? Should we find some chamber with food and drink that we can readily garrison, and get some sleep?"
"Now that is a very good suggestion, Craer," Embra muttered, and there were sounds of agreement among the mirth of the others. "Before someone expects me to stagger around this interminable castle, however, suppose we discuss where we might find such a place. If it helps, with what little I could tell through the Dwaer, all the guards, servants, and Serpent-priests seem gone from nearby."
Craer frowned. "Fear, or our hacking and spellhurling, or just freedom from dead masters-or did this plague touch them, too?"
"Some of them, yes," Embra replied. "Through the Dwaer, I saw one servant claw another, without warning, and the two of them fell to fighting like beasts."
"And I," Blackgult added, "saw an armsman in the castle start to stagger and hunch over-and by the time he reached his fellows, he was something lizardlike and slithering. They put spears and swords through him, of course, and then tossed the corpse into the moat."
"Might I suggest," Tshamarra said quietly, "that before we take on all the troubles of Aglirta, we see to ourselves? I'm… there's still something wrong with me, inside, and it could well be this plague, or something akin to it… and I know I'm not the only overduke in such a state. We should use the Dwaer to purge ourselves of its taint, if we can."
"Eat, drink, and sleep-sleep above all," Hawkril growled. "Some place you ladies can spell-seal."
"We need safe sleep more than anything else right now," Embra agreed. "But where? Those kitchens are quite a stroll back that way. And how do we know the food's untainted? And the water?"
"Sausages and pickles," Craer suggested. "Mad spellweaving Serpent-priests rarely take the time to stop and taint those."
"No more splitting up," Tshamarra said firmly. "Where we go, we go together."
Hawkril looked at his lady. "If you've strength left to blast down a door or two with the Stone, I propose we descend to the courtyard, walk along to the right tower to be close to the kitchens, and blast its door in. Take what we want, and then… Well, if we're far enough away from any fires or folk who could start new ones, another turret-top room might serve us as a refuge."
The Lady of Jewels smiled wearily. "Fine. Let's do that. Agreed, all?"
"Agreed," Blackgult said firmly, more or less drowning out the affirmative noises made by the others-so they went and did that.
Four guards met them in the passage outside the kitchens, grimly raising swords and striding forward. Hawkril and Blackgult strode to meet them, but were still a good three strides away from the foremost guard when the man suddenly screamed in terror, went to his knees, and started to sprout fur.
The overdukes backed away again-and so did the guards behind the stricken one. Both sides watched in wary silence as armor fell away from the hairy, increasingly wolflike body that quivered on all fours between them.
After a time it roared, shook itself, and prowled forward, snarling. Hawkril and Blackgult took up stances shoulder to shoulder, and waited, but the beast sprang right onto their waiting blades. A few moments of wrestling aside snapping jaws, and watching blood pump, and the beast went limp.
The overdukes traded glances, and then carefully stepped over the corpse. The guards beyond eyed them uncertainly-and then turned in unison and ran.
Craer grinned. "Ah, we've finally found the wiser ones. I was wondering where Stornbridge kept them hidden!"
"What I don't want to know," Tshamarra murmured from just behind his shoulder, "is what sort of monster the cooks have turned into."
The kitchen, however, proved to be deserted-abandoned in haste, by the looks of things: spilled condiments, burnt food on cooling spits above the dying coals of untended fires, and half-sliced onions upon a none-too-clean cutting block.
Embra sighed. "Go find your sausages and pickles."
"Hey, 'tis not that bad," Hawkril rumbled, looking around. "There's one end of a roast here not burnt-and sarrago stew, if my nose doesn't fail me."
"And it rarely does," Craer agreed, rummaging. "Tash, grab yon pot, hey? There's a wheel of cheese here, and roundloaves in plenty. We'll not go hungry, to be sure!"
"Couldn't we just garrison this room?" the Lady Talasorn asked. "Is there something especially scenic about a round room up six or seven flights of stairs?"
Blackgult sighed. "We need a strong-walled room that we can't be burnt or flooded out of, that gets air, preferably with only one or two entrances that can't easily be blocked from outside. Oh, and with a floor some of us can sleep on. There might be suitable pantries hereabouts, but I doubt it."
Hawkril shouldered a door open and peered in. "Hmm. I feel less and less enthusiastic about eating another feast in Stornbridge, no matter who's tersept and how far across Darsar we've scoured the Serpents out. Phaugh, as they say!"