Forward the Mage

by Eric Flint

  A loud knocking sounded from the floor below.

  "That'll be him," said Magrit. She headed toward the stairs, giving the wizard a sneer as she passed. "Some people use the front door."

  "Madame!" exclaimed Zulkeh. "This is preposterous! I have no time to fiddle away doing some 'job' for you—certainly not a task which involves such a mountebank as—"

  The witch paused at the head of the stairs. "Fuck you," she snarled. "You came here looking for my help. You can't pay anything, except in that dwarf gold I wouldn't touch in a minute. It's like they say: 'no freebies from Magrit.' If you want my help, you've got to do me a service—and the service I need will require Wolfgang. So! There it is—you want my help finding your enemies, stay and wait. You don't need my help, after all? No problem—get lost!"

  When Magrit reappeared, climbing the stairs, the wizard was still protesting volubly. His voice was stilled by the sight of the figure who followed, a gigantic man who was only able to negotiate the staircase in a stoop.

  "He's even bigger than I remembered," muttered Greyboar.

  "Disgusting, the way he drools like that," whispered Ignace.

  Once at the top of the landing, the giant straightened up slightly, rolling his eyes toward the ceiling.

  "I do wish you'd raise this ceiling a bit, dear," he said. "Last time I was here I couldn't ever stand up straight." A grotesque leer came upon his face. "Not that I spent much time in a vertical position." He reached out a huge hand and patted the witch's ample posterior. Magrit squawked with laughter and slapped the hand away.

  Still stooped, the giant turned to the wizard.

  "Zulkeh!" he boomed. "Have you led me a merry chase! Been following you ever since you left Goimr!"

  "Following me?" demanded the mage. "For what reason? And by what right?"

  The giant giggled. "By the right of lunatics to do anything that crosses their silly minds, of course! As for the reason, you're about to hear it."

  Wolfgang spread his hands, still giggling. "I now declare this council of war open!" Then, slapping his head. "Oh, but wait! I'm so forgetful! The others!"

  He leaned over the railing and emitted a piercing whistle. "Come on up, boys!"

  There came the tramp of heavy feet. Then, appearing in a row up the stairs, came six wide grins on six lumpy faces.

  PART XV

  In Which the Mage Agrees,

  Though With Profound Misgivings,

  to the Proposal of the Witch and Her

  Vile Accomplices, Producing Those Results

  Which Reverberate About the World To This Very Day,

  Not the Least of These Being the Earliest

  Manifestation of The Horror Henceforth

  Known, To Friend and Foe Alike,

  As The Rebel.

  CHAPTER XX.

  A Notorious Council Convenes. A Wizard's Objections. A Theft Proposed. A Wizard's Objections. Motives Revealed. A Wizard's Objections. Particulars Explained. A Wizard's Objections. A Plot Set Afoot!

  And so was convened the later-notorious First Magrite Council. The date: October 30, Year of the Jackal.

  Presiding over the Council was the witch Magrit herself. Also present were: Zulkeh and his apprentice Shelyid; Greyboar the strangler and his agent Ignace; Wolfgang Laebmauntsforscynneweëld, the lunatic; and six lowlifes, these latter a disreputable crew known to friend and foe alike as Les Six.

  The meeting began badly.

  "Insufferable!" stormed the wizard Zulkeh. "By what bizarre logic are these—these proletarian jackanapes!—present at this council?"

  Six wide grins split six lumpy faces.

  "The mage is affronted in his mind!" exclaimed the first.

  "Aghast, appalled and taken aback!" added the second.

  "And rightly so!" cried the third.

  " 'Tis a travesty to have present at such a learned gathering our lowly and loathsome like!" concurred the fourth.

  "For are we not uneducated, untutored, unlettered and ignorant?" demanded the fifth.

  "Rude, crude, lewd and uncouth, that's us!" boomed the sixth. This was apparently something in the way of a ruffianly toast, for the six scalawags raised their teacups in unison, pinkies politely extended like so many small logs, and slurped noisily.

  Zulkeh's expostulation, even now gathering like a storm, was cut short by Magrit.

  "Shut up, you old fart! And you! Yeah—you—Les Six! Quit baiting the wizard!" The six scoundrels looked aggrieved.

  Magrit glared around the room. "I'm running this meeting, d'you all understand that? None of your clowning around, any of you!"

  She settled her ample body back into her chair. Then spoke again:

  "All right, here's the deal. There's something that needs to be carried out. It's a task which is almost impossible. But with the people we've got here in this room, I think it can be done. And if it can, each of us stands to gain in some way. What is it? Simple—I want to steal a Rap Sheet."

  A collective gasp swept the room.

  "A Rap Sheet!" exclaimed Ignace.

  "But madame!" protested Zulkeh. "They're all in Ozar—all known ones, that is. Except, perhaps, for the two reputed to be in the possession, respectively, of the Kaysar of All The Kushrau and the King of the Sundjhab."

  Magrit allowed the hubbub to quiet down before continuing.

  "There are five Rap Sheets whose location is either known or surmised on good evidence, of the original six which Joe is supposed to have made for the cops at the beginning of time. As the wizard says, two of them are suspected to be in the hands of the Kushrau Kaysars and the Sundjhabi Kings. Although recent events cast some doubt on the latter," she mused. "Didn't seem to have done the King of the Sundjhab much good."

  Greyboar coughed. "Perhaps my guru left it behind on his recent sojourn to New Sfinctr," he opined.

  "His recent, abruptly-ended sojourn to New Sfinctr," stated Magrit, pointedly staring at the strangler. Greyboar coughed again.

  "Baloney!" snorted Ignace. "That old fr—uh, wise man—didn't leave nothing behind. Take it from me—I was there! Luxuries like a sybarite's dream, his suite at the hotel—and him squawking about philosophy the whole time!"

  Greyboar glared at his agent.

  "What's this?" demanded Zulkeh. "Has some unfortunate accident befallen the King of the Sundjhab? I certainly hope not! A most eminent sage, His Highness—the preeminent expositor in our modern times of ethical entropism. Mind you, I myself do not share the King's belief in the moral supremacy of the second law of thermodynamics, yet still there is no question—"

  "The King's dead," interrupted Magrit. "No accident either," she snorted, nodding at Greyboar, "unless you want to reckon him and his thumbs a genetic accident fallen on the unwitting human race."

  Greyboar flushed. It took a moment for her meaning to penetrate to the mage's mind. Then did the sorcerer gasp, shock writ plain upon his face.

  "What? Do I understand you to say that this—this assassin has throttled the King of Sundjhab?"

  "And his heir, the Prince," said Magrit.

  "That's why we're hiding out here in Prygg," complained Ignace. "It'd been okay if he'd just choked the King—the Prince hired us, and he'd have gotten the porkers off our back. But no!" he shrilled, "Mr. Philosophy Student here"—an accusing finger was leveled at Greyboar—"had to take exception to the Prince's—and I quote—'disrespect for philosophy' and go and squeeze his weasand for him, too! Not that the royal larva didn't deserve it, I'll admit, but still—talk about poor business practices!"

  "He hired me to strangle my own guru," growled the strangler. "Imagine! What else was I to do?"

  Zulkeh frowned. "Do I understand you to say, sirrah Greyboar, that you yourself are an acolyte of the—former—King of Sundjhab's teachings?"

  "I certainly am!" boomed the strangler. "A novice, I admit—I'm still working on my Languor."

  "Then why did you strangle him?" demanded the mage.

  Greyboar grimaced. "Well, actually I wasn't a foll
ower of my guru when I took on the job. The King—bless him—showed me the Way right at the last moment."

  "Greyboar had what you might call a deathbed conversion," chipped in Ignace. "The King's deathbed, that is." He looked innocently away from Greyboar's fierce gaze.

  "But still," protested Zulkeh, "the truth once known to you, why did you finish the choke?"

  Greyboar looked offended. "I'd already taken the money for the job. Professional ethics, you know."

  Zulkeh nodded his head. "Of course, of course. Professional ethics, of course. Yes, quite so!"

  "May we get on with our business?" asked Magrit. "Or would you two rather turn this into a leisurely chat on the nature of ethics, morality, and whatnot neither of you knows squat about?"

  Wizard and strangler glared at the witch, but fell silent.

  "Anyway," continued Magrit, "as I was saying, of the five Rap Sheets known to exist, the other three—this is a certainty—are in the possession of the Imperial Republic of Ozar. Have been for some time, in fact. Helps explain the historic success of the Ozarine—"

  "—in its rapacious gobbling up of the world," chimed in Les Six in unison.

  "But what's not widely known," said Magrit, ignoring the interruption, "is that one of Ozarae's Rap Sheets has been brought right here to Prygg. Only a few days ago."

  "The Ozarine have brought such a precious relic here to Grotum?" inquired the mage. "Whatever for?"

  "Is he really that stupid?" demanded the first.

  Before the usual round could begin—or the wizard do more than sputter—Magrit took command of the discussion again.

  "Keep personalities out of it!" she snapped. "And he's not actually stupid, he just lives in the clouds, on his head, thinking the earth is vapor above." She forestalled Zulkeh's indignation with a sharp gesture.

  "In answer to your question, Zulkeh, the Ozarine have brought it to Grotum to aid them in their commercial, industrial, financial and you-can-practically-name-it conquest of our sub-continent. And it will be a big help to them, too, let me tell you. The biggest problem the Ozarines have is suppressing the revolutionary movement of Grotum." She sneered. "That's not from lack of cooperation from the Groutch regimes, of course—in Prygg especially, which over the past two years has become an Ozarean satrapy in all but name. The upper classes in Pryggia today aren't but lackeys for their Ozarine masters."

  "Never were much good at their best," stated the second.

  "As sorry a lot of drones, churchmen and landlords as ever plagued a land," agreed the third.

  "As rapacious as your Sfinctrian aristocrats, as incompetent as your Goimric nobility," concurred the fourth.

  "Former worms, current tapeworms," added the fifth.

  "Here's to the downfall of parasites!" cried the sixth. This was apparently something in the way of a rabble toast, for the six malcontents raised their teacups in unison, pinkies politely extended like so much firewood, and slurped noisily.

  Magrit continued:

  "The Rap Sheet rests in the care of the Ozarean sub-secretary to the third consul for agricultural affairs, one Rupert Inkman. He's also the Groutch chief of station for the Ozarean Senate's Commission to Repel Unbridled Disruption."

  "A Crud!" exclaimed Greyboar.

  "That he is," agreed the first.

  "One of your greater Cruds, in fact," commented the second.

  "The Butcher of the Rellenos," added the third.

  "Reports direct to the Angel Jimmy Jesus himself," elaborated the fourth.

  "He's also a subsidiary of the Consortium," embroidered the fifth. "One of their most profitable concerns."

  Fortunately, the sixth's contribution—which should no doubt have led to another grotesque toast—was cut short by Zulkeh.

  "One moment, madame! I wish to return to the beginning of your exposition. I fear my mind has been so distracted by the news of the sad death of the King of the Sundjhab and the appearance in Grotum of a Rap Sheet that I have let fall aside the chief point. Do I understand you to say that you wish my assistance in the theft of this Rap Sheet from its rightful owner? If so, you may rest assured that I will have no part in such a criminal—"

  "Oh, shut up, you old fart! Since when is a Rap Sheet the rightful property of the Senate of Ozar? They stole all theirs from other empires, or took 'em by main force—you know that as well as I do! Cut plenty of throats in the process, too."

  Zulkeh stroked his beard thoughtfully. "Well, as to that, I admit there is much to what you say. Still, the Rap Sheets have been in the possession of the Ozarine for some time now, and 'tis a well-known jurisprudential principle—well-buttressed by numerous ontological axioms—that possession is ninety-nine point astronomically large number of nines following the decimal parts of the law."

  Now did a new party, hitherto silent, enter the discussion. Since his introduction, the lunatic Wolfgang had sat in a corner, in a special chair designed for his gargantuan frame. He had closely observed all of the participants, reserving, strange to say, the most careful scrutiny for the least significant member of the group—I speak, of course, of the dwarf Shelyid. This latter had squatted on the floor throughout the proceedings, sitting a pace back from the main circle, as was his proper place.

  Now Wolfgang spoke, in a tenor voice which contrasted oddly with his size, addressing himself—astonishing to relate—to the apprentice.

  "What do you think, lad?" he asked.

  Shelyid frowned, stammered, glanced to his master.

  "Well, it's not really my place to say. That's for the master to decide."

  "Yes, yes, no doubt," spoke the giant cheerfully, "but I didn't ask you what you decided—I asked you what you thought."

  Shelyid glanced again at his master. The wizard made a permissive gesture.

  "Well," Shelyid said, his brow knotted with thought, "the master always explained that the Rap Sheets were made back in the beginning of time, back when the legends say Joe was froze up by the Old Geister." His face cleared. "I remember now! There was a little poem the master had me memorize—goes like this:

  Joe made six Pink Slips for the bosses,

  to keep the bad in line.

  Then Joe made six Rap Sheets for the cops,

  to keep track of worse ones.

  Then Joe made six Switches for the priests,

  to make the worser wail.

  And finally Joe made one—"

  Shelyid stopped abruptly, looking guiltily at the mage.

  "I'm not supposed to say the last thing Joe made. But it's real awful! He made it for the Old Geister, and—well, I'm not supposed to say." The dwarf fell into a fearful silence.

  "Excellent!" boomed Wolfgang. The lunatic gazed benignly at the wizard. "I'm pleased to see that you haven't neglected the boy's education, Zulkeh. Most commendable, teaching him the old gypsy song. Not many sorcerers today even know it themselves." The wizard nodded graciously.

  "But what do you think, boy?" continued Wolfgang. "Now that you've recited the song—and, yes, we can skip the last part—not suitable in polite company, that's for sure!—what do you think? Who rightfully owns the Rap Sheets?"

  "Oh!" cried Shelyid. "That's easy. They belong to Joe, just like all his other inventions. He's the one gave them to those other people, you know, the ones he invented in the first place—the cops and the bosses and the priests and the Old Geister." The dwarf paused, pondered a moment. "Well, I'm not actually sure the Old Geister's a people, but anyway, Joe just made them so that things would work right. But the cops and the priests and the bosses and the Old Geister—they played him a dirty trick! They froze him right up, like they shouldn't have done! So the way I see it, the Rap Sheets and all really still belong to Joe. Anybody else who has them just has them, well, sort of on loan, I guess you could say." The dwarf pondered a moment more. "Well, sort of more like a mugging kind of loan."

  "Marvelous little chap!" exclaimed the first.

  "No lawyer long with pedigree could have put it better," agreed the s
econd.

  "Ridiculous!" cried the third.

  "No lawyer long with pedigree would have put it that way at all," snorted the fourth.

  "Your lawyer long with pedigree would have explicated the situation with much the greater circumlocution and the use of fourteen orders of magnitude more the words," stated the fifth.

  "And would have concluded, would your lawyer long with pedigree, that the items in dispute properly belonged with their present owners, what just coincidentally happen to be his meal ticket, and that this Joe fellow was no better than a criminal behind bars what's lost his rights," concluded the sixth.

  "Bah!" oathed Zulkeh. "Shelyid's opinion—which is, I will admit, deft in its dialectic though crude in its presentation—is beside the point. Joe doesn't exist, if he ever did, so wherein lies his right to property?"

  No doubt this latest addition to the brew would have produced yet a further unending round of disputation, save for the intervention of the witch Magrit, who, crude termagant though she was, did possess—it cannot be denied—a talent for focusing the debate.

  "Cut the crap!" she exclaimed. "Nobody but you, old fart, gives a screw about the Ozarine's so-called right to the Rap Sheet. The Senate of Ozar grabbed it by force and has used it ever since to suck the world's blood. And right now the leech is attached to Grotum itself. So we're going to take it for ourselves! You want my help in your problem, you pitch in—if you don't, there's the door! Get lost!" She stopped, breathing hoarsely, glaring at the mage.

  Zulkeh hemmed and hawed for a few minutes more, but eventually he agreed as to how certain epistemological unclarities regarding the ownership of the Rap Sheet did, in all conscience, allow him to proceed as a participant in the exercise.

  "But you have not yet explained, madame," he concluded, "why you want this Rap Sheet in the first place."

  "That's simple!" replied Magrit. "I want it because it'll improve my foety. Wolfgang wants it stolen because he thinks the whole idea's crazy and so naturally he can't resist. Les Six over there need to get it out of the hands of the Cruds, who are getting a wee bit too close to figuring out their hobby—"