Shadow Prowler

“Master Artsivus has informed me that your endeavors have been crowned with success,” said the king.

Artsivus frowned. He was obviously out of sorts. One of my friends used to have an expression like that when he was tormented by constipation. I just hoped that the archmagician had a different reason for his bad mood. He gave me a look that wasn’t exactly the friendliest, but he didn’t say anything.

“Yes, Your Majesty, I have completed all the preparations for our . . . er . . . little undertaking.”

“I have many questions. Would you be so kind as to tell us once again what has happened to you?”

The king’s wish is the law. I sighed and for the umpteenth time that week started telling the story of my adventures, only on this occasion I kept nothing back. Well, almost nothing. I didn’t say a word about Valder this time, either.

Halfway through my narrative, my throat finally dried up and I began talking more and more quietly. Noticing this, Stalkon clicked his fingers casually, and the attentive jester poured me some wine. I kept my eyes on him to make sure there was no laxative in the glass. Then I went on with my story.

Artsivus merely raised an eyebrow every now and then, usually when he heard something for the first time. Something I had kept secret from him during our ride in the carriage. The most interesting thing was that no one interrupted me and my listeners were not bored by my interminable story. But everything comes to an end sometime, and eventually I was able to sigh in relief and wet my throat once again with the remarkable wine from the king’s cellars.

“A fine kettle of fish,” said Kli-Kli, the first to break the silence.

“You put it too mildly, fool,” Alistan Markauz blurted out. This time he was dressed in an ordinary guards’ uniform. The famous armor that had become a legend among the warriors of Valiostr must have been taking a rest that day. “The kettle is boiling over, my dear jester, and we can only hope that we won’t get scalded. Forgive me, Your Majesty, but despite all our secrecy the forthcoming expedition has become known to our enemy.”

“Not only to our enemy,” Miralissa purred. “You are forgetting about the Master.” For a moment I wondered how such a sinister sentence could sound so pleasant. The race of elves were known to have good voices. Where had I heard that bit of wisdom?

“Have you heard of him before?” the king asked the elfess.

“No.”

“The archives will not be of any help to us, either,” the Rat added morosely. “The royal sandmen have searched for days and found nothing.”

“Not exactly nothing,” Stalkon objected. “They have found something.”

“Ah,” the captain of the royal guard said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “That’s nonsense.”

“What are you talking about?” asked Artsivus.

“You see, Your Magicship, as we were plowing through the old chronicles, we came across the interrogation of a certain Djok Imargo. The man whom everyone knows under the name of Djok the Winter-Bringer. He claimed that he had been deliberately framed for the murder of the Prince of the Black Rose, which was committed by the Master’s henchmen. Of course, no one could find any Master, nobody had ever even heard of him, and Djok was handed over to the elves.”

“Did he tell you anything about this, Lady Miralissa?” the archmagician inquired.

“I’m sorry, milords, but I don’t know that piece of history very well,” Miralissa said with a shake of her head. “And in addition, it was an internal matter of the House of the Black Rose, so the House of the Black Moon did not intervene. I will ask Ell. He is one of the elves accompanying me, from the House of the Black Rose.”

“Very well. Let us consider the Master to be perfectly real and just as dangerous as the Nameless One—if not more dangerous. After all, we still don’t understand what it is he wants,” said the king.

“A retarded ogre could understand what he wants,” Kli-Kli objected. “He doesn’t want the Horn to fall into our hands.”

“There are many who do not wish to see the Horn return to the world. Even the Order is among those who regard it as too dangerous, but unfortunately it is essential. Do you have the papers with you, Harold?” Artsivus asked.

I nodded reluctantly. It had cost me much effort to obtain them, and now I didn’t really feel like handing the plans of Hrad Spein over to the Order. Not even on a temporary basis.

“Would you please let me have a look at them?”

There was nothing I could do but reach into the bag and hand the papers to the archmagician. He began studying the maps, moving his lips occasionally when he came across lines that he found interesting.

The others began waiting patiently for the archmagician to condescend to share his observations. But just then the doors of the room swung open and the lieutenant of the palace guard whom I already knew came in.

“I beg your pardon, Your Majesty, but the gnomes are outside. . . .” The lieutenant looked a little crestfallen.

“And what is it that they want, Izmi?”

“They say that a goblin remarkably similar to your jester stole their, or rather, your ca

“How can that be?” Like everyone else, the king could not really understand how little Kli-Kli could have made off with the huge, heavy ca

“The gnomes say he used a spell and the ca

“Kli-Kli, is this true?”

“Well, not exactly,” the jester muttered, studying the toes of his boots.

“What does ‘not exactly’ mean?” the king roared.

“Well then, it’s true,” the jester muttered, acknowledging Lieutenant Izmi’s accusation. “I only wanted to try out one of the spells from Harold’s bag.”

“You tried it, and now I’ll have to pay for it! Who’s going to settle matters with the gnomes?”

The jester maintained a polite silence, pretending to be very, very ashamed. No one believed in Kli-Kli’s repentance, of course.

“Try to smooth this matter over.”

Having received this impracticable order, the poor lieutenant did not hesitate for an instant, but found the i

“Listen here,” Artsivus said, clearing his throat. The archmagician had not taken the slightest notice of the unpleasant incident that had just taken place. All of his attention had been focused on the old papers. “There’s something very interesting here. . . .”