by A. L. Sirois
Oriabel stared at him for a few moments, then turned to her familiar. “Here we see the value of the seasoned tactical mind at work,” she said. “What say you, Rámon?”
The parrot clacked his beak a few times. “The idea has merit,” he said.
“Yet I am not certain that accosting one of the men in the tavern would necessarily be the best way to proceed,” she said. She seized a lock of her hair and stuck it in her mouth, sucking on it while she pondered. “I see no reason why I cannot simply walk right up to the cave, saying I have divined Vedastus’s need by means of runes or my cards, and have come to offer my services.”
Guilhem thought about it. “I suppose that could work. He cannot help but be impressed with your ability to find him, and probably will not have you slain before you can explain your presence. But how do we explain my being there?”
“That is a problem which I will contemplate. Let us get some rest. Tomorrow we will put your plan into effect.”
* * *
Once again Guilhem was roused out of a sound sleep by someone pounding on the door of his room. He groaned and buried his head in the bedclothes. “Go away!”
From the hallway outside Oriabel said: “A difficulty has presented itself.”
Guilhem groaned again, more softly. “What is it this time?”
“Even should I get into the cave, how am I to coerce Vedastus into speaking about these supposed ties of his to dark powers in Bohemia?”
“I don’t know,” Guilhem said, yawning. “You’re the one familiar with magic; can you not contrive a way, or mix some potion that would loosen his tongue?”
Silence from without. He had almost slipped back into slumber when she said, “That is possible, but nothing I can do will be efficacious during the short time in which I will be present in the cave to examine him. Always assuming they will allow me entry in the first place.”
“They will... One-Eye at least knows you, having seen you at the Black Ox, telling fortunes.”
“Perhaps. In any case, there may be an easy solution. Allow me entrance and I will tell you.”
Guilhem rose reluctantly from his bed and padded across the room in his bare feet. “Very well,” he said, opening the door. “What is it?”
A moment later he found himself on the floor, wriggling, as the room around him grew vast in all directions. No, he thought, I am shrinking! At the same time, he felt his body undergoing excruciating alterations: his arms and legs withdrew into his torso, becoming less than stumps; his head and neck merged likewise into his trunk, while his eyesight became complex as additional eyes surfaced out of his skin; and his muscles melted together into bands of supple flesh encircling his new worm-like form.
What have you done to me! he tried to shriek, but no sound came out of his mouth, which had become circular, and lined with teeth. At the same time his fundament lengthened while also becoming circular, leaving him with two suckers, one at either end.
Once more Oriabel, grown huge, loomed over him. “The thing of it is,” she said, picking him up, “as a leech you will be ideally positioned to overhear confidences that Vedastus and his men would not discuss, were I present.” She paused, biting her lip. “I apologize for changing you again, but these transformational spells... I find them relatively easy to do, and I have a knack for them. It is possible that I rely overmuch on them. But they do get the job done.”
A leech? This is worse than being a cockroach! Guilhem writhed with impotent rage between her fingers. She took him to her room and put him into a small glass jar with several other leeches.
She said, “I have gifted you with the ability to hear, which leeches commonly lack.”
Thank you for nothing! he raged silently at her.
With a yawn, she added, “Spellcasting robs me of energy, you know, so I am going to nap for a while.” She lay down on her pallet and closed her eyes, leaving Guilhem to acquaint himself with his new companions.
To his surprise, he soon learned that he did not find the other leeches repulsive, merely stupid and dull. The animals were extremely limited in their viewpoint, and barely communicated other than to express a desire for blood. Guilhem soon gave up trying to talk to them. He ignored the tiresome creatures as they crawled over him, concentrating instead on gaining mastery of his new form.
Lacking legs entirely, he had to learn how to move around. He found that when he pushed the front part of his body in a direction, the rear part would then slither after. With five pairs of eyes to control, the world inside the bottle looked chaotic indeed until he got used to the wider image field. He found it easier to manage if he kept most of his new eyes shut.
He also discovered that he had more sensitivity to temperature than he had had as a human being, and that his sense of smell was no longer located in his nose—he had none—but came in through his skin.
By the time he had learned how to move and see, he was conscious of a growing hunger. Resigned to what that meant he watched through the bottle as Oriabel donned her fortuneteller garb and prepared a pack containing other bottles, these filled with liquids he assumed were potions, a few roots, and small boxes of powder. He and the other leeches endured a moment of vertigo when she picked up the bottle and lifted it into the air prior to putting it away with the others. The lid of the pack closed. Guilhem and his slimy companions were plunged into darkness.
Guilhem heard nothing but could still sense movement. After an indeterminate period during which he fell asleep several times and was repeatedly wakened when one of the other leeches crawled over his body, light burst in on them from above as the pack containing his glass prison was opened. The bottle was lifted, transported through the air, and then set on a flat surface.
It took Guilhem a few moments to readjust his vision. The walls of the small flagon in which he was trapped were smeared with dried leech slime, and the light from outside less bright than he had at first thought, being provided only by four candles. At last he saw that the bottle was sitting on a tabletop. Beyond it was a pallet on which lay a very thin, pale man who seemed to be breathing with some effort. Further away were a few items of furniture and then walls of stone. The bandits’ cave, he realized. Now to see how well Oriabel plays her part.
Passably well, as he was soon forced to admit.
“I do not hold with witchery,” said the thin man, in a weak voice that nevertheless held contempt and malice. “Yet your skills are undeniable. Certain it is that this cave is well hidden, and my men are always careful that they are not followed when they come here.”
“It is as I told you, sir,” Oriabel said. “Whilst telling their fortunes I felt disturbances in the aether convincing me that an important colleague of theirs—you, of course, as I now see—was dreadfully ill. I am sworn to alleviate suffering when and where I can... hence my presence.”
Scoffing, Vedastus glowered at her from red-rimmed eyes. “Were it not that I cannot seem to shake this cursed sickness I would have you strangled, healer.”
Oriabel waved her hand. “I tell fortunes in a tavern because I need money on which to survive,” she said. “Your methods of procuring money differ from mine, but do I censure you? I do not. A small show of gratitude for the time and effort I spent locating you and offering to help might more properly be in order.”
Guilhem would have smiled had his leech body retained the capability of human facial expressions. Oriabel’s disguise retained some of her native truculence as well as an intimidating air of subtle menace. He doubted that the brigands—by and large, an ill-educated lot—would be willing to risk incurring the wrath of someone they believed to have magical powers. Not even Vedastus seemed inclined to provoke her overmuch.
Just as well for you, Guilhem thought with irony. You could end up in a bottle, like me.
Even so, Guilhem doubted her ability to handle the three men attending Vedastus all at the same time; she was no wizard, merely a simple country witch-woman.
Then again, there was her skill with a swo
rd—substantial, as Guilhem had reason to know. However, to further her disguise as a healer she had been obliged to leave the weapon at the inn. Guilhem was nonetheless certain that she was armed in some fashion; most probably her athame blade was hidden somewhere in her clothing. Ceremonial or not, the athame could of necessity be used in a fight.
“Gratitude will come in the shape of coins, if I am cured,” said Vedastus.
“That will be quite sufficient.”
“Then do you practice your craft,” Vedastus growled. “I grow weary of not being able to keep my food down, and of losing at both ends what little I am able to eat. I must mend and be about my business.”
Guilhem listened as Oriabel took information from the ailing bandit chief and his men. How long had he been ill? What were the symptoms? She listened carefully with grave mien, and then said, “You need to be bled, sir. I have brought leeches with me. With your leave, I will position them on your body. I will return on the morrow to remove them and judge your condition, which will be much improved.” She busied herself with other bottles taken from her satchel. “In the meantime, do you drink this elixir, which will calm your stomach and ease your rest.”
She took Guilhem and the other leeches out of their phial and placed them at various places on Vedastus’s body. The bandit chief scowled but made no protest.
Guilhem wanted to explore his surroundings but his body had other ideas. Overwhelmed by hunger, he could not help latching onto the expanse of warm, hairy flesh, fastening his front sucker to it. He felt a strange sense of satisfaction as his mouth parts exuded a liquid that would, he knew, prevent Vedastus’s blood from coagulating. Slicing into the man’s body with the three sharp, triangular teeth in his sucker, Guilhem began gulping at the blood that welled forth.
For a long time, he knew nothing else. At last, however, his body felt satiated and he loosened his hold. He became aware that the brigand was conversing with his men. Oriabel was nowhere to be seen, and Guilhem assumed that she had departed while he was in his feeding daze.
“If the healer’s work is as good as she says, then we will be able to resume our activities within a day or two,” Vedastus said. “I will leave this stinking cave, and we will rejoin the others and be on our way.”
“And if her potion does not relieve you?”
“Then she will pay with her life,” Vedastus said, scowling.
“It seems to me that you do not look much better, for all the leeches and the potions.”
“We might even find use for the powders and compounds in that bag of hers,” said the one-eyed robber.
“Perhaps. But if I do mend, we will play fair with her; we will pay her and allow her to depart unharmed. Then we can take up the task Mojmir has charged us with.”
Ah ha! thought Guilhem. It would seem that our gamble is paying off. This is the connection I have sought to help me get rid of the ifrit.
At the thought of the ifrit he had a pang of anxiety. How were his family and associates faring back in the Aquitaine? Oriabel has insisted her spell would keep the ifrit frozen in its tower until the spring—but what if she were wrong?
He wriggled in frustration, but forced himself to be still lest Vedastus take notice.
“It’s about time we got on with that chore,” said one of the other men, a hefty young blackguard with long brown hair and a gold earring. “Though how we are to get into that mosque you’ve told us about is not clear to me.”
“When I met with Mojmir he assured me that a confederate of his will provide disguises for us, Toussaine,” said Vedastus.
“I hope so.” One-eye scowled. “We do not look like Saracens. And Córdoba is far away; it would not be good were we to travel that distance for nothing.”
Córdoba? thought Guilhem, surprised and dismayed. That is in Spain, many leagues distant, indeed. That’s where the mosque is?
“I agree with you, Jehan. I don’t know why Mojmir wants that cursed ifrit back anyway,” said Toussaine. “Everything he has said about it leads one to conclude that it is a dangerous creature to have dealings with.”
“That is his business. He is paying us well to secure the volume,” said Vedastus.
“Pah! We should take it for ourselves,” said the one-eyed Jehan.
“Then you are a greater fool than you look to be,” growled Vedastus. “Mojmir warned us that the Saracen who wrote it laid heavy incantations on it. To merely open the volume is to invite death. Leave such things to the sorcerers. Eh? They defer matters of theft and the blade to us... it is the natural order of things. I am not the one wishing to face Mojmir and tell him we have tampered with the book. Unopened he wants it, and unopened he shall have it.”
“Pah,” said Jehan again; but he made further argument.
Toussaine, however, said: “But, Córdoba. T’will take all of six weeks to ride there, with no guarantee that our mission will meet with success.”
“Mojmir assures me we can win past the devil haunting the place and attain the book,” Vedastus said.
Once more Guilhem was surprised and dismayed. A monster guardian? I like this less and less.
Toussaine scoffed. “Well may he say that, who will not be making the attempt.”
“I like it not,” said Jehan. “I wish he had told more about what he saw there.”
“All he would say was, ‘You would think me mad,’” Vedastus said in a low voice.
“I like not the idea of facing something that cannot even be described in any detail.” Toussaine shook his head. “We are robbers, thieves; not the Knights of the Round Table.”
“The business smacks of sorcery,” Jehan muttered.
“Well, of course it does, you clot! It is nothing but sorcery.” Vedastus sat up a little, nearly dislodging Guilhem, who dug in a bit deeper with his teeth. “Ouch! I hate these leeches.” He reached down to pluck Guilhem off his abdomen.
“You’d best leave it be,” Toussaine said, wrinkling his nose. “Remember what the healer woman said.”
“Oh, to blazes with her. I still feel as weak as a babe. Yet I confess that my bowels have calmed down somewhat since I started drinking the swill she concocted for me. That much is a blessing, anyway.”
“For us as well as you,” Jehan said with a grin. “The place has not been fit to live in since you took sick.”
“Yet the scourge is passing, right enough,” Vedastus said. “Another day or two of rest and I will be back to my usual self once more.”
But as the hours went by, Guilhem began to suspect that Vedastus’s opinion of his health was erroneous. At one point, the man suffered a coughing spell that lasted several minutes, leaving him weak and shaking after its passing.
Guilhem, with his additional eyes, noticed Jehan and Toussaine exchanging worried glances.
Guilhem continued to suck Vedastus’s blood, but at a slower pace. He could not judge time well in the cave, where no daylight was visible, and grew increasingly impatient for Oriabel to return.
When at last she did, Vedastus had lost more strength. Guilhem took a good look at him as the witch plucked him and his fellow leeches from the brigand’s body and popped them into the little bottle, which she then put on the table by Vedastus’s pallet.
He longed to tell the witch what he had learned, but to his annoyance she did not depart from the cave at once, lingering instead by Vedastus’s bedside.
The brigand’s breath came now in labored gasps. He reached up with considerable effort, seizing her garments with a claw-like hand. “You promised me I would benefit from your treatments,” he said, almost panting.
She shook his hand loose. “And so you have. Your men tell me that you have stopped vomiting and evacuating your guts. Is that not improvement?”
“Of a sort, yes, but I feel very feeble. A child could best me in my current condition.”
“Healing from such a sickness as yours, which was caused as I believe by consuming partially spoiled food, can take a day or two. Weakness is often attendant upon such
maladies.”
Oriabel examined him while Jehan and Toussaine watched, glowering.
“Let me give you another dose of medicine,” Oriabel said after she finished looking him over. She poured some out into a glass and handed it to him. He drank it unwillingly, Guilhem thought, watching through the flagon’s wall.
Upon draining he glass Vedastus fell back on his filthy bed. He looked worse than ever. Suddenly Guilhem realized why: Oriabel’s concoction, far from healing him, was poisonous: she was killing him. His estimation of her cleverness increased several degrees.
“Come outside,” she said to the two menacing henchmen as she packed her satchel, including the leech bottle. “I must talk to you while he rests.”
The men followed her out. Guilhem, though trapped in the leech bottle, pressed up against the glass to catch their muffled words.
“Why does he grow weaker?” Jehan demanded.
“My question as well,” Toussaine said. “It is true that he is no longer expelling his food, but why does he not rally, and become stronger? I wonder what the contents of your medicinal elixir are.”
“Oh, did you catch me out on that?” Oriabel smiled at them. She drew a short length of yew from her bag. “You are more intelligent than you appear.”
“What? You dare!” Jehan drew his sword, but as he stepped forward Oriabel waved her wand and he froze in his tracks.
With an oath Toussaine went for his weapon but was likewise paralyzed.
“Now then,” she said, returning the yew stick to her bag. “What should I do with you two knaves? Should I simply leave you to regain the use of your limbs? By the time you do, you know, your master in there will be dead, and I will be long gone. However, I fear that you would in that case be all too likely to continue your piratical ways. I’ve no stomach for killing you; Vedastus has more brains and is overall a malign influence so we are well rid of him... but you two are not that bright. Oh, I know! You are as greedy and contentious as starlings, so starlings shall you be.” She muttered a long spell and gesticulated at the men with her fingers. Of a sudden they were gone, and in their place were two small black birds. The birds looked at each other, squawked, and flew away.
