Sword Play

Lady Polaris swept onto a low dais at the front of the room, white hair and dress glistening in the reflected crystalline light. To polite applause, she a

Without any sign of Sysquemalyn, her entertainment began.

There was neither curtain nor light bank, but somehow the room went dark. Then, about head-height on the dais, a window into nothing opened, dropped, and became a door. From the door stepped a handsome man, as naked as a baby. Sketching with his hands, the man described more circles, and each opened into another window. From one he drew cloth to wrap himself. From another, a shining sword. A third window opened onto a sylvan glade, complete with waterfall, and this window the man tugged open until the water of the pool spilled over the lip and gushed onto the dais, then the floor, only to disappear. At this trick, the company of archmages oohed like children watching fireworks.

In the glade, the man met a woman, equally naked. He retrieved for her a bolt of cloth and wrapped it about her slender form. Arm in arm, they crossed the stage and stepped into a su

At the rear, Candlemas found himself oohing and aahing along with the rest. Then he shook his head, wondering how Sysquemalyn had contrived these tricks. Typical entertainments were a blend of illusion, sleight-of-hand, distant events viewed magically, and performances by hired actors. Certainly all these elements mingled here, but there was much more magic involved, and he was piqued that he could identify little of it.

As he'd guessed it might, the story soon turned tragic. An archmage entered the story, took a fancy to the beautiful woman, and demanded her. The hero resisted, so the girl was spirited away. Journeying through ever-increasing settings-twisted tubes of stone, empty expanses like black glass, tangled forests where the trees attacked, and so on-the hero suffered fear and sorrow, then gained a boon companion only to lose him tragically. The girl, who spurned the archmage's advances, was brutally tortured, both physically and then spiritually, tricked into thinking she'd killed her lover when he entered her room by night. Soon the girl died and spiraled into a pit of hells, each more fearsome than the other. Despairing, the hero killed himself, then flickered through his own hells, drawing gasps and guffaws from the jaded audience. In the end, the lovers were united only to be incinerated in a pit. But the archmage, taking pity on the misguided and headstrong humans, resurrected them as two ash trees at opposite ends of the sylvan glade, yearning to interlink branches, but never quite achieving it.

Finally, the scenes were whisked away, and only Lady Polaris was left standing there to bask as the audience roared and cheered and applauded. They demanded she take a bow, which she did, smile gleaming. But Candlemas did not linger. Mopping his brow and yanking at his collar, he staggered past servants and spectators until he reached fresh air at a back door.

Of course, he told himself, the moral was clear: mere humans must never defy the whim of an archmage, lest they be racked in every hell imaginable. The audience of archmages had, naturally, loved it.

But where, Candlemas asked himself over and over, had Sysquemalyn gotten those magics? And how had she manipulated them?

And most importantly, could she really control them?

In the morning, which Sunbright was moderately surprised to see, the orcish commander took pains to paint a smeary red hand on a curl of birch bark, with his own mark, a tiny red spider, in the corner. This, he explained, would be a safe-conduct to get them past later patrols as they approached Ti

Barely had they passed the first few trees, though, before Sunbright flung the red-painted pass by the side of the road and sca

Greenwillow cut him off. "What are you doing? Are you mad?" She bent and retrieved the pass, blowing chaff off the wet paint.

"What?" Sunbright snapped back. "Me mad? You don't believe that chip of bark will protect us, do you?"

"Of course I do! That orc might be starry-eyed and dense as an oak tree, but he's honest enough. And he's empowered to issue passes, and now we've got one! So we don't need to skulk through the woods anymore, and so lose time. We can hie straight to Ti

"Listen to yourself!" Sunbright waved his hands in frustration. "An honest orc? Orcs can't be trusted, starry-eyed or not! Nor can most 'civilized' men, for that matter."

"Nor any men at all, say the elves. Think, frost-brain! We failed to slip past an orc patrol this far from Ti

"Save yourself the trouble!" Sunbright grabbed his hair, pulling on his topknot. "Just prop your sword in the road and put that against your breast! Better to fall on your own sword than go down to a dozen hacks from bloodthirsty orcs."

"I won't argue," And with that, Greenwillow spun about and tramped off down the road. Sunbright called after her, then yelled, then swore, and finally trotted to catch up.

He waved his hands at the ope

"Save your breath for walking, human."

Their new status as legal delegates to the One King was tested about noon. Climbing a steep road, they ran into a patrol of orcs coming down the ruts. Human and elf froze and waited nervously, Greenwillow's hand clearly showing the pass.

The five orcs pulled abreast of them, then shuffled around until Sunbright felt the hair on his neck and arms rise. He anticipated his last sensation would be the back of his skull caving in. But one of the orcs snatched up the chip of bark, studied the spider mark, then gruffly handed it back. Snarling at the others, they passed on without a word.

Sunbright let out a long breath.

"Now do you believe me?" Greenwillow glared with gray-green eyes.

"Yes. You were right and I was wrong. But glory to Garagos, being a diplomat is harder than being a fighter!"

And so they traveled for two more days. They slept two nights in the woods and, when closer to the city, spent one night at an i