Garander stopped, and the shatra dropped out of a tree almost directly in front of him.
“Nothing’s wrong,” he said. “The wizard’s right behind me.”
He hoped that was true.
“Gods!” Ellador’s voice said, relieving Garander’s doubts. “It really is a shatra!”
Tesk jumped sideways, and suddenly one of his black rods was in his hand. His head jerked upward, then back down.
“I can smell you,” he said. “And I sense your body heat…”
“I’m right here,” Ellador said, suddenly appearing in a patch of moonlight between two trees. He was holding a large piece of dark cloth in one hand; he was hatless, and his hair was rumpled.
“He was using a spell to help him slip away,” Garander said.
“The Mantle of Stealth,” Ellador explained. “It’s a simple invisibility spell.”
“Ah,” Tesk said, lowering his wand—but only partway, Garander noticed.
“I’m Ellador of Morningside,” the wizard said. He started to hold out his hand, then thought better of it. “My friend Azlia asked me to help this young man out with a bit of magic, and I agreed.”
“I am Tezhiskar Deralt aya Shatra Ad’n Chitir Shess Chitir,” the shatra replied. “Your people call me Tesk.” He still did not put his weapon away.
“I take it you are not comfortable around wizards,” Ellador said, pointing at the black rod.
“I am not,” Tesk agreed.
“That could be awkward. To perform the spell Garander wanted, I’ll need to draw your blood with my own knife. Can you allow that?”
“How much blood?”
“Oh, just a few drops—a pinprick, really. Though if the spell works it will look like far more.”
“If the spell works?”
“Well, it’s probably never been attempted on a shatra before,” Ellador said cheerfully. “I certainly haven’t used it on one!”
“Does that matter?”
Ellador turned up the palm of the hand that was not holding the cloth. “Who can say? But the spell is meant for humans, and as I understand it, you are not fully human.”
“I am not,” Tesk acknowledged.
“Then we won’t know until we try it.”
Tesk considered that, and finally lowered his weapon the rest of the way, though he still did not return it to its place on his back.
“Ideally,” Ellador said, “I would draw blood from your throat. Anywhere will do, though, if you can’t bring yourself to let me get that close.”
“Why would the throat be better?” Garander asked, before Tesk could respond.
“You seemed worried that someone might want to make sure he’s dead by cutting off his head,” Ellador replied. “Well, wherever I cut him, it will appear the flesh in that spot has been cut open clear to the bone. If I nick his throat, just ever so slightly, it will look as if his neck’s been sliced clear to the spine; cutting his head off the rest of the way would be pointless.”
Tesk and Garander exchanged glances. “It will?” Garander asked.
“If the spell works at all, yes.”
“I like that idea,” Garander said.
“It is not your throat,” Tesk retorted. “But I see the wisdom in this.”
“Then shall we proceed?”
“It will last until morning?” Garander asked.
“It will last until at least sundown tomorrow, and will be gone without a trace by dawn of the day after.”
“I am not sure I can allow you to cut me,” Tesk said.
“If I meant you any harm, I wouldn’t be here, plain to see. I could have kept the Mantle of Stealth, after all.”
“It may be that you could not use other magic while it lasted.”
“Well, yes, in fact that’s true, but really, why would I be here, instead of using a spell that would kill you from afar?”
“Yes,” Tesk acknowledged. “Your words are convincing.”
“Then will you trust me to draw some blood from your neck?”
“I am not sure I can allow it.”
“But you just agreed…!”
“I am not sure I can allow it. The demon may object.”
Ellador looked startled. “There really is a demon inside you?”
“Yes,” Tesk replied flatly.
“You doubted it?” Garander asked.
“Well, I haven’t ever seen anything like it before! No one in Ethshar ever knew how to merge a man and a demon.”
Garander had nothing useful to say to that. Instead he suggested, “What if Tesk held your wrist while you make the cut?”
“That might help,” Tesk said.
“All right,” Ellador said. He drew the knife on his belt, and took a step toward the shatra.
Tesk’s hand came up so fast that Garander did not see it move; the black rod was just suddenly there, pointed at the wizard’s heart.
Ellador stopped. “I can’t work the spell without your blood,” he said.
“I know,” Tesk said. Slowly and carefully he returned his weapon to its place on his back; then he reached out and gripped Ellador’s wrist.
Ellador’s face went pale, the change visible even in the faint moonlight. “Do you need to hold it so tight?” he asked.
“I apologize,” Tesk said, and Garander thought he could see the struggle on the shatra’s face as he forced his fingers to loosen their hold.
“That’s better,” the wizard said, as Tesk’s grip relaxed. “Now, guide the blade to your neck.”
Tesk jerked the wizard’s hand closer, forcing Ellador to stumble forward, and then the tip of the shining dagger touched the shatra’s throat.
For a moment nothing more happened; both men stood motionless, staring at one another. Then Ellador jabbed, and Tesk’s fingers tightened; the wizard let out a gasp of pain. Garander started toward them, but before he could intervene Ellador had stepped back, and Tesk had released him.
“I am sorry,” the shatra said. “I warned you. Do you want to try again?”
Ellador began massaging his wrist with his other hand, but looked at Tesk, startled. “Why would I want to try again?” He held up the knife. “That’s enough blood right there.”
Garander could barely see the speck of dark red on the tip of the blade. “It is?” he asked. He looked at Tesk’s throat, and saw the tiniest of scratches, no bigger than a spider’s bite.
“I told you I didn’t need much,” Ellador said, and Garander thought he sounded a bit smug. “Now I need to mark you with it.” He dabbed the index finger of his other hand on the dagger, then reached out and drew a faint line across Tesk’s throat with the blood. The shatra did not resist.
“A few more marks might be useful, but that one will probably do,” the wizard said. Then he waved the dagger in a peculiar zigzag motion, and said something that did not sound like anything that should come from a human throat.
Garander was about to ask a question when the dagger began glowing faintly purple. He stared as the wizard continued his incantation.
Then Ellador finished his chant with a flourish, and lowered the dagger. Garander turned back to Tesk, to see what he thought.
Then he stopped, and swallowed to keep from vomiting.
Tesk’s throat had been laid open clear to the spine, and thick, dark blood was spilling out. The shatra’s face was ashen gray, with bluish blotches on the cheekbones; blood dribbled from his nostrils and the corners of his mouth. He was obviously dead—but still upright, still moving. “Gods!” Garander exclaimed.
“Oh, good,” Ellador said, smiling. “It worked.”
“It…” Garander said, but was unable to force more words out.
“I do not feel anything unusual,” Tesk said, and thick blackened blood ran from his mouth with every word. The effect was appalling.
“There’s no reason you should,” Ellador said. “But if you look in a mirror, you’ll see. And if you need more blood for some reason—say, you don’t think there’s enough on one
of your arms—just cough, and you should have plenty.”
Garander swallowed again.
Tesk looked at him. “I feel no different,” he said.
“Believe me, you look different,” Garander told him.
“I’ve done what I promised,” Ellador said. “I’ll be going back to camp now.”
“Yes, of course,” Garander said, still staring in horror at Tesk. “I’ll go with you, so you don’t get lost.”
“Thank you,” the wizard said. “I’d appreciate that.”
Tesk said, “My appearance is different?”
“Oh, yes,” Garander said. “All you have to do is lie still, and no one will doubt you’re dead.”
“You don’t have a heartbeat or a pulse,” Ellador added helpfully. “And no one can hear you breathe or see your chest move.”
“I do not feel different,” Tesk said again.
“We have to go,” Garander said. “You go fetch those supplies we talked about, and find someplace convenient where I can show you to people. Maybe cough some blood on the stuff. I’ll see you in the morning, and we can arrange the viewings.”
“Viewings?” Tesk snorted, spraying clotted blood from his nose. “You make it sound like an exhibition.”
“That’s what it is,” Garander said. “Now, go get your things!”
Looking slightly annoyed, Tesk turned and leapt up into a nearby tree, then vanished in the spring foliage.
Garander did not watch him go; he did not want to look at the ghastly illusion the spell created. Instead he took the Ethsharite wizard by the arm and said, “This way.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
“Velnira! Come with me, please!” Garander tried to sound genuinely desperate.
The baron’s chamberlain looked up from her breakfast, blinking in the bright morning sun. “Why?” she asked. “What is it?”
“It’s the shatra!”
Her eyes narrowed. “What about it?”
“He…it…it’s terrible!”
Velnira set her plate aside, and asked Burz, “What’s he talking about?”
“I don’t know,” Burz said. “He just said it was urgent, and I knew he was in on all the talking, so I let him past.”
She looked questioningly at Garander.
“Something terrible has happened!” he said. “I think he may be dead.”
Her eyes narrowed. “The shatra? Dead?”
“I…I think so.”
“What about his magic?” she asked warily.
“You mean why didn’t it protect him? I don’t know! His talismans are still there, so—come and see!”
Velnira frowned and got to her feet. She told Burz, “You’re coming with us.” She pointed to another soldier, a man Garander did not know, and said, “You, too.” She ordered a third, “Inform the baron, and see which magicians are available. Have the magicians ready, in case I send for them.” Then she turned to Garander. “Show us,” she said.
Garander turned and trotted eastward, glancing back over his shoulder to make sure the others were following. Burz took the lead, then Velnira, and the other soldier brought up the rear as the farm boy led them across the field and into the woods beyond.
“I was coming to see whether he wanted to talk to anyone this morning, and I found him,” Garander said as he pushed through the underbrush. “I came straight to you—I thought the baron ought to know.”
“You haven’t told anyone else?” Velnira asked, as she stumbled over a fallen log.
“No,” Garander said. “I’m a loyal subject of Lord Dakkar, so I came to you first.”
“Hmph.”
Then Garander brought them around the trunk of a big oak, and there was Tesk, lying on his back in a pool of blood, his head flung back across a fallen branch, his helmet half off, and his throat exposed—both the outside of his throat, and the inside. Raw red flesh and a glimpse of white bone lay open in a shaft of sunlight, and the bits of skin around the wound that weren’t covered in blackening blood were grayish-white.
Even though Garander knew it was an illusion, he shuddered at the sight. He heard Burz choke, and Velnira gasped and stepped back at her first glimpse of the downed shatra.
“I think one of the mizagars may have turned on him,” Garander said. “Or maybe his own demon, because he was talking to Ethsharites.”
“He looks like he’s been dead for days,” Burz said.
“We spoke to it last night,” Velnira said. “Maybe it’s decaying quickly because some preserving magic is gone, and it’s making up for all those years time was kept at bay.”
Garander was pleased that he did not need to make that suggestion himself; he did not want to appear to have all the answers, as that might arouse suspicion. He was just a farmer, after all, not a magician or scholar.
“Go fetch the magicians,” Velnira ordered the soldier behind her. “Tell Lord Dakkar that the shatra is dead, and we await his instructions.”
“Should he tell Lady Shasha?” Garander asked. “She ought to know, too, shouldn’t she?”
Velnira threw him a sharp glance, and then looked at Tesk’s body—and at his equipment, scattered on the ground around him. “Make sure none of the Ethsharites see you,” she told the soldier. “We want to keep this quiet for now. Don’t let anyone see you or the magicians when you bring them back—maybe one of them can work a spell to ensure that.”
“I’ll do my best,” the soldier said, with a bob of his head. Then he was gone, crashing through the underbrush.
“All his weapons are still here,” Burz remarked. “Whatever killed him didn’t rob him.”
“Maybe there’s a protective spell on them,” Garander suggested. “Or maybe it really was a mizagar—they wouldn’t have any use for all those tools and talismans.”
“Maybe,” Velnira said.
“What should we do?” Garander asked.
“We wait,” Velnira told him. She gestured at a mound of dead leaves. “Have a seat, if you want.”
“I know you don’t want to tell Lady Shasha,” Garander said, “but shouldn’t I tell my family?”
“No,” Velnira snapped. “Sit down.” She suited her own actions to her words, slumping back against the base of a tree.
Garander hesitated, then found a spot of his own, not on the dead leaves, but nearby. He glanced up at Burz, but the soldier seemed content to stand.
“Poor Tesk,” he said, looking at his friend’s body again.
It was hard to believe that the shatra was not really dead; he looked ghastly. In addition to the slashed throat, blood ran from his mouth and nose and stained his clothing from neck to navel. Blackish rivulets had run down his side and pooled on the ground beneath him.
“Hard to believe he’s dead,” Burz said.
Velnira turned her head to stare at him. “Are you mad? Look at him!”
“Oh, I know he is dead,” Burz acknowledged. “I just don’t understand how he could be. I saw him fight; by the gods, I fought him myself. He was faster and stronger than anything I had ever seen before. If he had wanted to kill me, he could have done it at any time. But here he is, dead as a stone. If this was a mizagar’s work, then those things are even more dangerous than I thought.”
“It might have caught him off guard,” Garander suggested. “After all, he thought they were on the same side.”
“That’s true,” Velnira said, “but it might have been one of those wizards from Ethshar.”
“Why would they kill him?” Garander asked. “They were trying to hire him!”
“Maybe he told them no,” Velnira said.
“Oh,” Garander said. “You think that’s it?” He tried to decide whether he wanted the Ethsharites blamed for this. He probably did not; it might serve as a pretext for conflict.
There was something ludicrous in the idea that the barons might start a war with Ethshar to avenge the killing of a left-over Northern monster, especially when Lord Dakkar had announced last night that he would have the shatra ki
lled if Tesk did not cooperate, but that did not mean it was impossible.
Velnira did not answer, and after a moment of awkward silence Garander asked, “Would a wizard leave his throat like that? I thought wizardry…well, that it either wouldn’t leave any marks at all, or that he’d be completely ripped to pieces.”
“I don’t know,” Velnira said, obviously nettled. “Ask the wizard when she gets here. Or he. Or they.”
Another uneasy silence settled over the threesome. Garander wished that they would get on with whatever they were going to do; he was worried that someone from Ethshar of the Sands would come looking for Tesk and stumble on the party.
He also feared that Tesk might shift position. He knew no ordinary man could stay so motionless for very long. Tesk, of course, was no ordinary man, but still, Garander could not help worrying.
It seemed like hours before the soldier returned with Sammel, Azlia, and a woman Garander did not recognize, but at last they came stomping through the forest, making what seemed to Garander like far more noise than necessary.
“There you are!” Velnira said. “What did Lord Dakkar said?”
“He won’t be coming himself,” the soldier replied. “He thought that would attract too much attention.”
“And of course, he’s worried that it might be a trap,” the unfamiliar woman said. Startled, Garander took a closer look at her.
She was short, and a bit plump, dressed in a red tunic embroidered in white, green, and gold over a respectable ankle-length green skirt. She was wearing boots—far more sensible for tramping around the forest than the shoes Velnira, Sammel, and Azlia had on. Given the soldier’s instructions and the fact that no one had remarked on her presence, Garander assumed she was a magician of some sort, but her clothes gave no indication of what kind of magician. Wizards traditionally liked hats and robes, while her head was bare and her clothes ordinary; although he had never met either one Garander had always heard that theurgists wore white and demonologists wore black. She might be another sorcerer, like Sammel or the man who had vanished after tampering with Tesk’s weapon, or she might be a witch, or something else entirely.
Whatever she was, Sammel glared at her and held two fingers to his lips in a shushing gesture. Then he lowered the fingers and looked at Tesk.
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