Dragon's Tongue (The Demon Bound) (7 page)

“Ross-mhor? The Forest Wall Kingdoms?”

“Actually, it’s just one big kingdom, Alaric. It only has one king, and there are those who say he is descended from Haxons who went there, led by the Stone Folk, after the Great Cataclysm turned their own lands into a frozen waste. You should ask Etienne herself if you want more details. Her ancestors were a mixture of Haxons and the Woodfolk who dwelled in Ross-mhor before their coming. She can even read Haxon runes…”

Alaric glanced towards the place where she had gated away. Clearly, Etienne was an amazing woman. Perhaps he would ask her.

“Ah well, get dressed, Alaric,” Fenelon said, scrambling off the bed and tossing one of the pillows at Alaric in a playful manner. “We’ll go have that breakfast, and then I’ll give you the grand tour before I take you back to Dun Gealach. The Council meeting begins just after the midday meal, and Turlough will likely want to make a pompous ceremony out of telling everyone you’re now under my command.”

Alaric frowned, not sure he like the idea of being Fenelon’s to command.

“Oh, don’t go all gloomy-faced on me, Alaric,” Fenelon said. “It won’t be so bad. They could have assigned your mage training to someone worse…like Turlough himself.”

Alaric had to agree with that. With a sigh, he pushed back the covers. Fenelon moved towards the windows, giving Alaric enough privacy to tie on his breechclout and slip into his trews.

EIGHT

Scant moments later, Alaric was dressed and being stuffed with a rather fine fare before he was hauled around the opulent little keep that sat atop a tor. From its walls, he saw the road that snaked back and forth and disappeared into the treeline below. Impressive, he had to admit, and certainly brighter than Dun Gealach, and more pleasant to behold now that his head had cleared.

“I’ll likely bring you here for lessons,” Fenelon said. “We’ll have more privacy…”

“And be less likely to upset Turlough over what I’m being taught?” Alaric suggested with a suspicious sidelong glance at Fenelon.

“Well, that too,” Fenelon agreed with a smirk.

“And why is that?”

“Because my great uncle several times removed and I don’t always agree on the ways of magic.”

“Why am I not surprised to hear that?” Alaric said, trying to keep the bitterness out of his tone. “Would it also have anything to do with why you failed to mention you were the one who cloaked the gatespell that likely let the demon in?”

Fenelon smiled. “Well, yes. But I have my reasons.”

“Considering those reasons nearly got me sundered and publicly beheaded, would you mind sharing them?”

“You’ve already heard what Turlough said about me and fire magic,” Fenelon said wearily. “The old goat would jump on any excuse to ban me from Dun Gealach forever. I simply refuse to give him that opportunity.”

“You’ve been caught using the gate spell in forbidden parts of Dun Gealach before, haven’t you?”

Fenelon smiled. “You know, you’re very astute, Alaric. I like that.”

Alaric frowned to indicate his own displeasure.

“Yes, I have been caught more times than I can count on fingers and toes,” Fenelon said. “And there have been other incidents as well. Turlough has no imagination when it comes to the uses of magic. He thinks it should be straightforward and secretive. In the old days, we were respected for what we could do for mortal kind. Now folks blame a lot of the ills of this world on mageborn. There are some who make a religion out of that, and Turlough is angry at them because our present High King will not banish them. So Turlough takes his frustrations out on me, making threats of banishing and the like. Truth is, he fears me because I’m more powerful than he’ll ever be, and there are those who think I should be the one to replace him as High Mage when his time comes to retire.”

“He doesn’t consider you worthy?” Alaric said.

“He doesn’t think anyone is worthy of his post,” Fenelon said. “He was not first choice for the position, you see. One of my direct ancestors was, and what always infuriated Turlough was that my grandfather many times removed actually turned down the post, saying it was foolish for mageborn to have a hierarchy akin to kingship and be ruled by one of their own. Turlough does believe a mageborn should rule not just us, but mortal kind as well. He’d give anything if there was enough mage blood in the High King’s family to make him see things this way as well. Turlough has tried more than once to marry a mageborn into the Keltoran crown in hopes it would become fashionable. And Turlough uses his post as a mantle of protection for himself. He thinks it puts him above the laws of mortalborn.”

Alaric looked out at the trees that were dancing in the wind. Marda had often whispered Turlough had a dark, ambitious side to his nature, but Alaric assumed it was because she was not as powerful and felt the High Mage looked down on her for that. Now, he started to wonder if it were true. There was something overly pompous about the Lord Magister of Dun Gealach.

“And anyway,” Fenelon continued, “since I perfected my skills at using cloaking spells, the incidents have dropped to nothing. Turlough merely thinks his threats are holding weight…”

“They don’t?” Alaric asked, feigning surprise.

“No…except for one,” Fenelon said. “I may be more powerful, but Turlough could still easily banish me from Dun Gealach, and there would be nothing I could do to stop him.”

“Banish you? How? If you’re more powerful…”

“Even a powerful mageborn can be warded against in much the same way we keep demons out…” Fenelon said and frowned in thought. “Which reminds me. Can you think of how the demon could have gotten into your psaltery?”

“I’m afraid I know very little about demons and their ways,” Alaric said. “We don’t get many of them in Tamnagh. Your guess is as good as mine.”

“Did the psaltery ever leave your company?”

“No.”

“Do you recall anything strange about last night?”

Alaric sighed and glanced at his hands. “Well, there was that wench with the white scarf. She talked awfully well for a common tavern wench. She kissed me.”

Fenelon smirked. “Nothing strange about that. You are an attractive enough fellow to get unwanted attention from the ladies.”

“Well, actually, there was something strange about it,” Alaric said, his mind filtering through the muddle of his tavern adventures. “She had a scarf on…a fine white scarf of silk that seemed very expensive compared to the rest of her clothes. And when she kissed me, I recall that it fell into my lap and covered the psaltery…only…”

“Only what?” Fenelon looked keenly interested with this bit of information.

“She didn’t have it on when she walked away. And I looked down to see where it might have fallen to, but it wasn’t there. And later, when we were leaving, I remember thinking I felt something slide around inside the psaltery, and that it felt heavier.”

“That’s it, then,” Fenelon said and thumped Alaric’s shoulder. “And you have just learned one important aspect of demonkind, Alaric. They can shape-shift into almost anything, no matter what size.”

“They can?”

“Come on,” Fenelon said. “We should have enough time to go to the library and learn exactly what was taken before the Council meeting.

“And what will that tell us?”

“Well, it should give us a reason as to why someone would send a demon to steal a map,” Fenelon said and began the motions of a gate spell.

“Someone sent the demon?” Alaric said as he watched the magical rift appear and tried to memorize the words Fenelon was whispering to make it happen.

“Demons are always sent, Alaric,” Fenelon said and seized the younger mageborn’s arm. “They rarely have enough wherewithal to come into this world otherwise.”

Before Alaric could ask anything else, he was whisked through the whorl, back into the gloomy Keltoran weather.
He found himself standing on the very cobbles he had come across when he first entered the outer gates of Dun Gealach, looking at a pair of mageborn guards who were looking back. Fenelon spread his hands in a gesture of submission, and Alaric realized he was being scried by one of the two. They said nothing, merely stepped aside and allowed Fenelon and Alaric to move on towards the keep.

He was just about to enter the inner gate when a bit of black flitted past the corner of his eye. Alaric sensed the bitter tang that had burned his tongue last night. He gasped and turned, but it flitted away, and all he saw was what looked like a raven as it disappeared behind one of the towers.

“Something wrong?” Fenelon asked.

Alaric frowned. “Nothing…just a raven,” he said.

“The city is full of them,” Fenelon said. “You’ll get used to seeing them. Let’s get inside. We’ve little time as it is…”

He whisked Alaric on through the doors.

~

That was too close
, Vagner thought as he dove for the ground and waited. The young one was overly sensitive to demon essence. Vagner had barely managed to get himself below the level of the towers in time. He could only hope the other one had not sensed him too.

Vagner had taken raven form to hide among the many. Keltora was full of the scavengers. Whole flocks of them roosted about the King’s city, and Vagner figured one more would not be noticed.

Of course, he had discovered ravens had terrible singing voices. Rough as sandstone, they sounded. Still, the demon had not been able to resist qworking a few strains of
“The Merry Lad of the Lea”
as he flitted among the rooftops.

He had already circled Dun Gealach twice when he felt a familiar essence invoking a spell that was not hidden, and had been pleased to see his quarry was returning to the nest. But there was still the problem of getting to him, and it would do no good for the demon to be noticed now. The young one would likely become suspicious and avoid coming outside if he thought the demon was waiting for him.

But wait I must,
Vagner thought. Tane Doran would be displeased if the demon failed to return with his quarry. So he winged past the walls once more and settled himself atop one of the gatehouse towers when he felt it was safe enough to return. From here he would have a fine view, and be well away from the demon-sensitive wards.

His perch also overlooked the outermost bailey and the practice yard where a group of young guards were trading blows with swords and targe. Their movement seemed almost clumsy to the demon. But then, there were few men alive who had sufficient reflexes to battle a creature like himself. Vagner would have smiled at that thought, but raven beaks did not lend themselves to curving up at the corners.

With a sigh, he qworked a few strains of the melody to
“The Lass Who Loved the Heather Downs”
and waited for his victim to reappear.

~

Fenelon led Alaric into the musty gloom of the great library of Dun Gealach, and while Alaric could feel a number of wards, he sensed no real magic in this place. This puzzled him, for Marda had spoken of the number of items of power that were supposedly housed here. So where were those powerful items, those scrolls that gave off the scent of magic as much as parchment?

Fenelon stopped long enough to ask one of the mageborn at the entrance a question. Alaric noticed the fellow’s eyes slid briefly in his direction, and heard, “So he’s the one…” But whatever that conversation entailed, Fenelon apparently was not willing to listen to more gossip than necessary. He merely waved the mageborn librarian aside and motioned for Alaric to follow.

They slipped through a number of book-lined corridors before Fenelon stopped at a door where the words “Old Maps” had been carved into the wood in neat letters. He opened this door and peered inside before going on in.

“This is where the demon gated out from,” Fenelon said quietly. Alaric assumed it was because he sensed other mageborn in the area working with various tomes, but no one else was in this library. “According to Master Whitlow, as near as they can tell, the demon took a copy of a map that showed an unknown section of Ranges known as the Shadow Vale.”

“Unknown in what respect?” Alaric asked.

“Well, it was copied from an original, and that map came from a cache of things found in the possession of a bloodmage who died rather nastily back a few hundred years ago.”

“How nastily?” Alaric couldn’t resist asking.

“He lost a mage battle with one of my ancestors,” Fenelon said and grinned. “At any rate, the map showed the area known as Shadow Vale. Alas, no one knows where Shadow Vale is exactly, but there was something about the map that convinced the librarians to copy it and place the original in hiding. Now there should be another copy since our librarians know full well that having only one copy is foolish…”

Fenelon fumbled around a bit. Alaric fingered some parchments on the table as a distraction.

“Ah, here it is,” Fenelon said. He pulled forth a sheepskin that had been etched in inks and unrolled it on the nearest table. Alaric came over and glanced at the map. It was neatly drawn and lettered, showing a lengthy valley with a waterfall, a deep forest and several other unique features. And at the top of the map someone had drawn a stylized sword and written, “Shadow Vale, said to be the resting place of The Dragon’s Tongue.”