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"This door is yours, my lord," the Storn servant told Overduke Delnbone with clear relief in his voice, as they reached another lamplit and cortahar-guarded door. He swung the door wide.
An oil lamp glimmered softly on a stone-topped table flanked by a tall, narrow chair carved into the likeness of an arch of leafy vines. A canopied bed of similar style stood to the right, and a matching wardrobe to the left. Screens in distant corners discreetly concealed a tall mirror and a "thunder-chair," respectively.
On a large table to Craer's left stood a ewer in a bath-bowl, and another ewer with a pair of goblets. Before them on the gleaming tabletop Craer's battered saddlebags and their contents had been arranged in a neat row. Nothing seemed to be missing.
The chamber had neither co
Craer smiled at those panels. They were relief-carved in splendid scenes that offered a hundred hiding places for spyholes-and had no doubt been liberally endowed with such features. Some might fire dart-traps to dissuade prying eyes or fingers, or even permit access to small storage drawers. A room like this was great entertainment to a procurer.
"May I be of assistance, Lord?" the chamber knave asked the ceiling carefully. Craer followed the servant's gaze upward, seeking traps, entrances, and additional evidence of spyholes. None were evident.
So Overduke Delnbone gave his most charming smile and said, "But of course. Tell me where the various secret passages, traps, spyholes, firing ports, and the like are hidden, around this room."
"I… uh… I…" The servant gaped at Craer as if he'd made an indecent personal suggestion involving horses and gamefowl and possibly the Tersept of Stornbridge himself, reddened, and shook. Craer watched with a quizzical smile, awaiting an answer.
The chamber knave regained his composure, gave the procurer a look of anger, and in utter silence wheeled around and marched out of the room.
"Have a pleasant evening," Craer called merrily after him, and then sighed and began his examination of the room for those features he'd just mentioned, muttering, "Which is more than I'll do, if my gut gets worse. Embra's magic can't catch everything, it seems. Something in the food." He shook his head, and then his fist. "If I die spewing and filling yon thunder-bowl, I'll haunt my slayer and send him the same fate-only worse. This I
swear"
He cocked his head and listened, gazing at the ceiling, but if the Three had heard his declaration, they gave no sign of it. As usual.
So here Craer Delnbone stood, in a den of foes who'd happily murder him and his four fellow overdukes-whilst some false overdukes were evidently traipsing around the Vale, working mischief… mischief they'd be free to go right on doing if the real overdukes quietly disappeared here in Stornbridge Castle. The Faceless might impersonate a person here or there, for a short time, but not five nobles riding around openly. The false overdukes were magically disguised Serpents, of course… and the road ahead was what it had always been, in all of these dark little dances for the throne of Aglirta: stay alive, and slay the Serpent-priests responsible.
With a sigh, the procurer examined his belongings. They held no delights unfamiliar to him, but 'twas something to do until darkness came-and all the slaying and similar fun began.
"I seem to have been crouching behind bushes and trees forever," Fang-brother Khavan complained in a whisper.
Scaled Master Arthroon gave him precisely the cold and withering sort of look he'd expected. "When the Great Serpent comes, those who've been unwilling to do what's needful will be those considered expendable. You'd do well to remember that, Fangbrother."
Khavan nodded and flexed his cramping, protesting legs by extending one in a slow, soundless parody of a dancer's deep kick, and then drawing it back and doing the same with the other. The pain lessened but little.
They were crouching in the deep gloom of a thornvine-filled thicket behind Bowshun, on the edge of a little clearing where Aranglar the Weaver and his wife Thaelae split and stacked their firewood, kept their privy, and tossed things that had rotted. The happy couple were in the clearing now, but decidedly not engaged in any of the activities they customarily used it for.
Instead, they were trying to kill each other.
Grunts and shrieks of effort, triumph, and pain mingled with the crashings of their bodies rolling in underbrush, dead leaves, and formerly tidy piles of kindling.
Kicking, punching, and gouging, Thaelae and Aranglar tore at each other's hair, tried to smother each other, attempted stranglings, butted each other like enraged bulls, and even tried to batter each other's limbs and heads against handy trees-while ignoring a handy ax buried in Aranglar's chopping block. Gasping and shuddering, they snarled and spat, wild-eyed, and literally raked and tore with their fingers at each other.
Fangbrother Khavan winced, more than a little sickened-and well aware that Arthroon was watching him. The weaver and his wife were streaming blood from dozens of places, now, and Thaelae had just gouged out one of Aranglar's eyes with hideous ease.
Khavan set his teeth, gorge rising, and risked a look at his superior. The Scaled Master was smiling, obviously amused at Khavan's discomfort.
"Come, Brother Softguts," he purred. "We've seen enough of this particular plague affliction. There's someone else I want a look at. Keep low and quiet unless you'd like to lose your eyes too."
Skulking around the fray, the two priests scuttled hurriedly back to Aranglar's cottage.
"Why the rush?" Khavan gasped. Arthroon's reply was to throw himself flat behind moss-covered rocks, catch hold of the Fangbrother's leg with cruel force, and drag his fellow priest down to join him.
"Three people live in yon hovel, not just the loving pair we've been watching," he murmured, ignoring Khavan's gasps of pain. "That gives us a good chance of seeing a different plague effect than mindlessly seeking to slay, taking hold of the third person. Right about… now."
The ramshackle back door facing them banged open, and an old man lurched out, his wrinkled and unshaven face twisted in pain. He retched, clutched at his ribs, bent over, and spewed what looked like a very large meal onto the ground, groaning like a woman astonished by the pains of her first hard labor. Then he stumbled off down the narrow track that led to the stream and the deeper forest beyond.
"Who-?" Khavan asked, more in an attempt to appear alert and interested than out of any true interest.
"Thaelae's aging father," Arthroon replied, rising like a hunter stalking a beast of which he must be wary-and yet get very close to, to make his kill. "Follow quietly. 'Twould be very unwise to let him see or hear us, if my suspicions are correct."
Like wary ghosts they drifted along the trail from tree to tree, keeping to dappled shadows well behind the old man-who was staggering along feebly, bent over like a man on the verge of collapse, but groaning with ever greater vigor.
Anon those groans become rougher and deeper, until they were almost growls. Khavan gave Arthroon a "what now?" look, but the Scaled Master merely smiled and continued his patiently stealthy pursuit.
The Fangbrother took care that his resulting sigh was silent. He was shaking his head and hastening to catch up with Arthroon-and yet do so silently-when the Scaled Master held up a hand to indicate that Khavan should halt.
The old man was still wandering along the forest track, growling like a beast, but now he was tearing at his clothing. As Khavan peered, he could see hair-reddish-brown, profuse hair, not sparse gray and white-cloaking the man's hands and neck. More of it could be seen wherever clothing had been torn away-and "torn" was exactly the right word: the old man's fingers seemed to be lengthening into claws! That stooped, frail body was growing taller, broadening to split its well-worn tunic…