The Dragon's Doom

12

A Surfeit of Plague

Fire leaped up in the night. Flaeros Delcamper stared at it-and then at another tongue of flame, shooting up to scorch the stars some distance away, probably at the next village. He frowned. "T'isn't festival time. What's going on?"

There were only three other paying passengers on the trade barge. One was asleep, but the other two were gawking at the flames just as he was. "What's going on?" he demanded again, but one of them-the trim-bearded Sirl merchant in green-just shook his head in silent bewilderment.

The barge crew had been rowing steadily against the steady flow of the river, keeping the barge to the most placid bankside shallows, but they'd seen the nightfires, too-and their response, without waiting for orders, was to stroke more swiftly.

For a moment the barge moved raggedly, and then settled into a new, faster rhythm. The breeze was quickening, too, and for the first time those afloat heard faint screams and shouts.

Flaeros strode toward the barge captain, sitting on his high perch and staring into the night ahead. Several of the hired Sirl guards moved to block his way, but the captain said a single quiet word and they drew back to allow the bard through.

Master Rold did not halt his ceaseless scanning of the way ahead as Flaeros approached. He'd caught up a double-ended metal spear from somewhere, and was holding it ready across his lap.

Even before the bard could open his mouth to repeat his queston, the master of the Silver Fin gave him a flat stare and said, "I don't know either, sir bard-but I'd much appreciate it if you'd stand quiet and just watch and listen, until I tell you different. Panic aboard makes our tasks no easier. So look sharp for archers or others on the banks who could menace us, and otherwise…"

"Keep my jaw shut?"

The barge captain nodded once, and resumed his steady scanning of the waters ahead and the banks around them.

Flaeros sighed, then said, "Very well. I agree if you'll tell me one thing- full truth, mind. I promise not to share your answer with…" He waved his hand to indicate the other passengers, now pacing nervously as new fires sprang up in the night-strange tall, narrow pillars of flame. The sleeping man had awakened, it seemed, and was going about asking very much the same thing Flaeros had been.

The barge captain watched those askings, sighed, and said flatly, "Ask your one thing, Lord Delcamper."

"Why are we on the water? Silverflow barges don't normally travel by night, and I remember us tying up and bedding down. When I came awake, there were one or two of these fires and we were under way again. Why?"

The breezes brought them more screaming; the folk doing it sounded terrified. "Is Aglirta at war?"

The barge captain shrugged. "As to war, the shouting and the fires, I know no more than you do. Something's going on, aye, but all I can tell you is that we cut our moorings in fair haste, and left Sabbar dock as fast as we could."

Flaeros cast a look back at the grimly rowing sailors, and saw sweat glistening on them in the reflected firelight. It was a clear night, but more warm than chill, even right on the water. "Why?" he asked again, when it became clear the barge captain was in no hurry to say more.

"Sir bard," the man asked reluctantly, "have you ever seen lions with two heads, that turned into great snakes halfway down their bodies, and slithered along with no rear paws? Or doings like walking spiders as big as mules, but with dozens of snake-heads sprouting from the tops of their bodies?"

"N-no," Flaeros replied. "The lion-things are known to heralds, though, and are called krimazror, or krimazrin in the singular. The desert backlands of Sarinda were once full of them, the tales say."

"Ah. Well. That's very nice. Remind me never to take it into my head to go faring into the deserts of Sarinda."

"Master Rold," Flaeros asked firmly, "are you telling me you've seen such beasts this night? Here, in Aglirta? Real beasts, and not some wizard-spun illusions to drive you off a dock he was keeping open for someone else, say?"

"I saw no wizards," the barge captain replied stolidly, "or at least, no men in robes who waved their arms as they sneered and declaimed, but I did see beasts of both these sorts. Real beasts, Lord Delcamper. They burst onto the docks and bit the heads off some of the crew-and sleeping passengers, too-of the Taratheena, out of Dranmaer. It was tied up next to us, and when a lion-thing looked our way, I yelled at the lads to cut loose and push off into the Silverflow."

They were rounding a great bend in the river, and there were more flames ahead. Flaeros shook his head. "I don't doubt your word, master-but I can scarce believe it."

"Huh. You're not alone in that," the barge captain replied. "Now, Lord Delcamper, I'd best devote my full attention to avoiding sandbars and swimming monsters, and suchlike, so if you'll…"

"Of course," Flaeros said, turning away from the raised bow under the watchful eyes of the guards.

As he did so, a weird hissing call arose, faraway down the Vale, and seemed to sweep closer, picked up and echoed by unseen folk-or beasts-nearer at hand. As if in response, the pillars of flame bent, wriggled, and took on the shapes of serpents, snake-heads questing this way and that. Flaeros could just make out the heads and arms of a ring of worshippers gathered around the base of the nearest bright serpent of fire.

It bent toward the bank, a forked tongue of fire licking forth, and Flaeros felt its heat on his face. Instinctively he shrank away, murmuring, "I might have known! Always, 'tis the Snake-lovers!"

A low moan of recognition and fear arose on the barge. Flaeros looked back downriver, and then forward, and shook his head. Much of the Vale seemed to have erupted in whatever mischief this was.

Abruptly, a hay-barn perched high on the bank they were passing burst into flame-a blaze set by whoever was crying out in triumph, not a serpent-shaped fire, at least not yet-and in its sudden bright light, Flaeros and everyone else on the Silver Fin saw people running. Vale folk were fleeing other Vale folk, some of them staggering strangely.

Staggering, and sinking down into things that grunted and snorted and ran now on all fours, reaching out with tentacles or crablike claws or spindly, barb-limbed talons.

People were screaming, people were falling and being eaten.

"Three take us all!" someone gasped, as a tall, elegant lady in a torn gown ran down the bank, hotly pursued by two youths. Almost at the water's edge they caught and clawed at her, raking her face and arms into bloody ruin. She bit them, snarling and pummeling, as the last shreds of her clothing fell away, and then flung herself atop one of them and held him down and drowning as she battled the other.

Flaeros and his fellow travelers on the barge stared in horror as hair was torn out and kicks and punches thrown recklessly. Everyone seemed enraged, one screaming man even turning with a roar to bite and claw the monster chasing him. Everywhere, folk were battling in barehanded, reckless savagery, like maddened animals.

"What's happened?” someone on the barge gasped.

"Magic," a barge guard said grimly, and spat disgustedly into the river. "The same blight that always afflicts Aglirta. Fell magic, from wizard or Serpent-priest. To rule it, they rush to destroy or maim it. Until Aglirtans rise up and rid themselves of such vermin, this is going to happen again and again. My father told me it raged in his time-and here we are forty-odd summers later, and how far has the Kingless Land come?"

"Well," Flaeros replied quietly, "they have a King now."

The guard looked at him. "Hah! And do they heed him? Do the Serpents bow, and the barons obey, and the people know peace?" He waved at the fires and screaming people on the shore, and added wearily, "Oh, for a true King! This land could be so great!"

"I think it is great," Flaeros said firmly, "to have survived at all. The Dwaer-Stones lost and lost again, Faerod Silvertree and his Dark Three, Bloodblade, the Rising of the Serpent, the death of King Snowsar… Aye, Aglirta has survived much."

The guard slowly surveyed the fires and the maddened folk busily slaying each other, and then grunted, "Survived? Well, aye, after a fashion, Lord Bard. After a fashion."

They exchanged grim nods as the barge slid on through the night of blood and madness. Here and there, bodies were bobbing in the waters now.

"Is that you, Tash?"

"It had better be," the Lady Talasorn told Craer, as she swung around a corner to embrace him, and unhooded a lantern. "We… we're a littie weary."

"Huh," the procurer muttered, "you're weary. Who's been swinging swords and jumping around like jesters while you three lounged around humming to yon Dwaer, I'd like to know?"

"Charming as always, Overduke Delnbone," Blackgult observed from across the chamber.

"One has one's reputation to maintain," the procurer replied, sketching an elegant bow.

"Evidently," the Golden Griffon replied in weary rebuke. "We felt the castings dwindle and end, so I presume the priests are all dead or fled, but I hope you sent Stornbridge to a fitting end?"

"One priest fled, aye," Hawkril replied, shouldering into the room, "and Craer did his usual dancing justice upon the unlamented tersept. But we've some grim news to report: The Serpents have unleashed something they call the Blood Plague, all over the Vale."

Embra nodded, looking pale and drawn. "It does seem widespread, yes. Fell and mighty, laying madness on folk who've never bent a knee to the Great Serpent as well as those who've come to his altars, so far as I could see. The altar fires…" She winced at the memory. "We had to leave off using the Dwaer, or be overwhelmed. So much magic, and so… twisted!

Craer nodded. "So, does anyone have anything trustworthy we can eat or drink?"

His fellow overdukes stared blankly at him, and then Blackgult- followed by Tshamarra, and then Hawkril-started to laugh.

"Well?" the procurer asked, folding his arms. "Are we now the masters of Stornbridge Castle? Should we find some chamber with food and drink that we can readily garrison, and get some sleep?"

"Now that is a very good suggestion, Craer," Embra muttered, and there were sounds of agreement among the mirth of the others. "Before someone expects me to stagger around this interminable castle, however, suppose we discuss where we might find such a place. If it helps, with what little I could tell through the Dwaer, all the guards, servants, and Serpent-priests seem gone from nearby."

Craer frowned. "Fear, or our hacking and spellhurling, or just freedom from dead masters-or did this plague touch them, too?"

"Some of them, yes," Embra replied. "Through the Dwaer, I saw one servant claw another, without warning, and the two of them fell to fighting like beasts."

"And I," Blackgult added, "saw an armsman in the castle start to stagger and hunch over-and by the time he reached his fellows, he was something lizardlike and slithering. They put spears and swords through him, of course, and then tossed the corpse into the moat."

"Might I suggest," Tshamarra said quietly, "that before we take on all the troubles of Aglirta, we see to ourselves? I'm… there's still something wrong with me, inside, and it could well be this plague, or something akin to it… and I know I'm not the only overduke in such a state. We should use the Dwaer to purge ourselves of its taint, if we can."

"Eat, drink, and sleep-sleep above all," Hawkril growled. "Some place you ladies can spell-seal."

"We need safe sleep more than anything else right now," Embra agreed. "But where? Those kitchens are quite a stroll back that way. And how do we know the food's untainted? And the water?"

"Sausages and pickles," Craer suggested. "Mad spellweaving Serpent-priests rarely take the time to stop and taint those."

"No more splitting up," Tshamarra said firmly. "Where we go, we go together."

Hawkril looked at his lady. "If you've strength left to blast down a door or two with the Stone, I propose we descend to the courtyard, walk along to the right tower to be close to the kitchens, and blast its door in. Take what we want, and then… Well, if we're far enough away from any fires or folk who could start new ones, another turret-top room might serve us as a refuge."

The Lady of Jewels smiled wearily. "Fine. Let's do that. Agreed, all?"

"Agreed," Blackgult said firmly, more or less drowning out the affirmative noises made by the others-so they went and did that.

Four guards met them in the passage outside the kitchens, grimly raising swords and striding forward. Hawkril and Blackgult strode to meet them, but were still a good three strides away from the foremost guard when the man suddenly screamed in terror, went to his knees, and started to sprout fur.

The overdukes backed away again-and so did the guards behind the stricken one. Both sides watched in wary silence as armor fell away from the hairy, increasingly wolflike body that quivered on all fours between them.

After a time it roared, shook itself, and prowled forward, snarling. Hawkril and Blackgult took up stances shoulder to shoulder, and waited, but the beast sprang right onto their waiting blades. A few moments of wrestling aside snapping jaws, and watching blood pump, and the beast went limp.

The overdukes traded glances, and then carefully stepped over the corpse. The guards beyond eyed them uncertainly-and then turned in unison and ran.

Craer grinned. "Ah, we've finally found the wiser ones. I was wondering where Stornbridge kept them hidden!"

"What I don't want to know," Tshamarra murmured from just behind his shoulder, "is what sort of monster the cooks have turned into."

The kitchen, however, proved to be deserted-abandoned in haste, by the looks of things: spilled condiments, burnt food on cooling spits above the dying coals of untended fires, and half-sliced onions upon a none-too-clean cutting block.

Embra sighed. "Go find your sausages and pickles."

"Hey, 'tis not that bad," Hawkril rumbled, looking around. "There's one end of a roast here not burnt-and sarrago stew, if my nose doesn't fail me."

"And it rarely does," Craer agreed, rummaging. "Tash, grab yon pot, hey? There's a wheel of cheese here, and roundloaves in plenty. We'll not go hungry, to be sure!"

"Couldn't we just garrison this room?" the Lady Talasorn asked. "Is there something especially scenic about a round room up six or seven flights of stairs?"

Blackgult sighed. "We need a strong-walled room that we can't be burnt or flooded out of, that gets air, preferably with only one or two entrances that can't easily be blocked from outside. Oh, and with a floor some of us can sleep on. There might be suitable pantries hereabouts, but I doubt it."

Hawkril shouldered a door open and peered in. "Hmm. I feel less and less enthusiastic about eating another feast in Stornbridge, no matter who's tersept and how far across Darsar we've scoured the Serpents out. Phaugh, as they say!"

"Agreed," Craer said, wrinkling his nose. "How about this next one?"

"Three preserve," Blackgult said grudgingly, after a moment, "but it seems ideal." He peered around again, and nodded. "Bear in mind, though, that anyone left in the castle will come here foraging, ere long. We have to be able to wedge this door against considerable force-and it has to be able to withstand a ram, and lots of arrows."

"Well, there's only one way to find that out, as they say," Craer commented brightly. "However, there's a harder test yet."

"Hey?"

"Embra has to say aye to it. Naught else matters, hmm?"

"I'm not," the Lady Silvertree said frowningly, "quite so much of a surly dragon as you make me out to be, Craer." She looked around the old stone room, reading what was painted on some of the jars. "Olaunt. Sar-fruit. Gaddorn. Yes, this will do."

There was a general murmur of approval-that lasted for as long as it took Craer to fetch two shallow tureens down from a kitchen shelf and present them to Tshamarra and Embra with the grand words, "Ladies-your chamberpots for the night. No, no, I'll accept no payment for this thoughtful service!"

"Tash," Embra said wearily, "kick him. Somewhere where it hurts."

"More!" Craer said grandly, dropping two bulging sacks beside Blackgult and trotting back through an archway again before his fellow overdukes could say a word.

Tshamarra sighed. "Been a day or two since he last had a chance to practice looting, would you say?"

Embra chuckled. "He's not done badly. I hope we can find a wagon in the stables to carry all he's gathered."

"Lass," Blackgult said reprovingly, "wheels of cheese and kegs of wine are wise booty to anyone. Be not so hard on the lad. We may even need yon chest of coins-if we need to buy a spare castle or two, for instance."

They stepped over more sprawled and gnawed corpses, and Embra shuddered. Stornbridge Castle had become one great charnelhouse, with bodies lying everywhere, fires smoldering unchecked, furniture and belongings broken and strewn, and transformed folk prowling the rooms and passages in their bewildering newfound lives as wild beasts.

By the cries of the suffering, unmilked cows, the town and the farms around were in much the same state. Anyone who'd survived the plague-fury had fled far away or was keeping well hidden.

"Let's hope some horses have been left uneaten," Hawkril muttered, advancing into the gloom of the stables cautiously, his drawn sword ready. Bright scratches on his armor bespoke the power behind the claws of the last beast he'd battled. It had pounced on him from above-and it had been a long time since the armaragor had been taken that much by surprise.

Some stalls had been torn open, and dead and half-devoured horses lay within most of them. Grimly Hawkril stalked on, seeking danger first, and beasts they could ride second. Two monstrous things of many claws and turtlelike body shells lay twisted together in death in one end stall, their jaws still locked in each other's throats, and an evil carrion smell wafted down from the loft above, but no foe remained alive to pounce or menace-only trembling, snorting horses who were more inclined to kick than to welcome being led out of their stalls into all the slaughter.

"Seven beasts worth looking at," Hawkril growled, returning from his survey. "No wagons, Lord Delnbone."

"No wagons? Then we take every horse and saddlebag. What we don't fill, we sling over top, tied down, and take empty-we'll find uses for them, never fear."

"Aye, I'll bet," Embra murmured. " 'Tis those in our path who own any-thing attractive or valuable who'll have to fear."

"By the Three!" Blackgult agreed with a smile, in quavering mockery of a doom-saying old man.

"Help me get reins and saddles on these horses, you jesters," Tshamarra said from her perch on the rail of a stall above them, where she stood eyeing a horse almost as uncertainly as it was eyeing her. "If'tis not too much trouble for you high-and-mighty folk, that is."

"Lady Talasorn," Embra said in mock-offended tones, "everything's too much trouble for we high-and-mighty folk. That's what's made Aglirta the glorious center of peace and prosperity that 'tis today!"

Tshamarra gave her a sour look. "Get in here and show me which end of the horse I put this on, hey?"

"Hey, indeed," Embra agreed. "Father?"

"Of course," Blackgult agreed, striding into the stall, striking aside its frightened occupant's deadly foreleg kick with one blow of a practiced hand, and ramming himself against the breast of the horse, crowding it back until he could get the bridle on. "Easy, see?"

Tshamarra and Embra looked at each other and rolled their eyes in heartfelt unison.

Fires were rising here and there in Stombridge town, and half-eaten bodies and the stains of pools of blood were everywhere. The horses snorted and danced, even under Dwaer-calming, and their disgusted riders glanced around warily in search of danger. No dogs barked… probably because they'd been eaten, perhaps by the dark shapes that slunk from bush to bush and tree to tree, following the five riders and their pack horses, but never coming near.

"So this is a Blood Plague," Tshamarra said slowly, looking around at the devastation. "If it was what tainted us, it can be visited on folk in food or wine… but what is it, really?"

"Aye," Hawkril growled. "Foul Serpent-work, to be sure, but how? What spell, and how to undo or stop it?"

Embra sighed. "And so we're back to the problem that always besets us: not knowing." She held up the Dwaer. "If I knew what I was doing with this, and how to make sure the other three Dwaerindim were lost forever, I could rule Darsar quite handily, were I subtle and cunning enough."

She smiled thinly at the looks she received. "Worry not, friends-not only have I no desire to rule Darsar, I'll never know this Stone properly. They fight you, you know, quietly-things you've done before with them become harder to remember how to evoke, not easier."

Blackgult nodded. "That's true. I've never voiced it before, but… yes. The Dwaer do fight their wielders."

Craer glanced at the molded Stone in Embra's hand with new respect. "Well, now," he began, "that makes dreams of snatching one of these baubles for my own-"

He was interrupted by a ragged shout from among the cottages to their left. A wild-eyed man charging at them, pitchfork in hand, with several boys running along in his wake. They clutched stones, and echoed the man's roar of challenge as he ran right at the horses, fork leveled.

"Hold!" Hawkril bellowed, drawing his sword, but the Storn folk didn't seem to hear him. Straight at the overdukes they ran.

Embra sighed, the Dwaer flared in her hand-and when the first stones came, they struck something unseen in the air and bounced away. The fork halted suddenly in midair, causing its wielder to emit a startled "Ooof!" as he folded up around it. The overdukes spurred their horses and rode away, up the road where they'd been greeted by arrows the day before.

Today, there were no woodcutters, or bowmen, though they all kept a sharp watch as they rode up through the trees, heading back to Osklodge.

"Whither now?" Craer asked quietly, as the trees gave way to fields around them. No carts, no beasts in the high meadows; this part of Aglirta seemed to have emptied.

"Glarondar," Embra said firmly. "We go right back the way we came."

"Well, that's a relief," the procurer said with a smile, cutting into a small wheel of cheese that seemed to have fallen out of his saddlebag into his hand a moment before. " 'Tis nice to have a clear destination for once. The barony of Glarond, where they've at least heard of decent wine, food, and hospitality."

Blackgult and Hawkril both cast looks at Embra, but said nothing. If she was choosing not to share her reason for heading to Glarond with them yet, that was all right. They had to search for missing Dwaer somewhere-and seemed to have found something more pressingly important that just might be everywhere in the Vale, so one direction was as good as any other.

Moreover, every last one of the Overdukes of Aglirta was weary of constant wrangling over deeds and destinations.

"We have the 'where,' now, but what shall we be doing there?" Tshamarra asked quietly, after they'd galloped along the road for some time, leaving Osklodge behind and losing all sight of Stornbridge.

Craer shrugged. "What we always do-draw our swords and chase them around the kingdom."

Tshamarra smiled and sighed. "Yes, but doing what?"

"Causing trouble, blundering along not knowing what to do next, and offering ourselves as targets for all foes of the crown."

"Craer!"

"Well," the procurer told her with an ingenuous grin, "it's worked so far."

Brother Landrun came up beside him, and Hanenhather sighed. "What do you think, Landrun?"

The tentacle that slapped across the Serpent-lord's mouth did not- quite-break his neck. A second tentacle was already ensnaring his wrists, crushing them ruthlessly even as it garnered them in, and a third wrapped around his waist and snatched him up into the air, to stare helplessly down at-at something that no longer looked much like Landrun at all.

For one thing, it had no face. Just smooth flesh where eyes, nose, and mouth should be… yet its voice was clear enough as it said coldly, "We Koglaur are feared and hated enough in the Vale without your shapeshifting mischief, Serpent-priest. Plague-monsters are one thing, but making doubles of tersepts and overdukes-or kings-is our province. The, overclever Lord of the Serpent."

The last thing Melvar Hanenhather saw, as tentacles slammed his head floorwards at breath-snatching speed, was a trickle of blood coming around the corner from the side passage. Landrun's, of course.

"Well, Brother Landrun?"

"Ah… isn't Overduke Anharu taller than that, Lord?"

The Lord of the Serpent peered at his most recent transformation. The armaragor did seem to loom a little less than the real Anharu did, in his remembrances, but…

"You may be right, Landrun," he said slowly. "Make it stand beside our Embra. I should have done Blackgult first, because he's about half a head taller than his daughter, and Anharu overtops him by about the same… or a little less, perhaps. Hmm."

Brother Landrun hastened to obey-so quickly that there was a stumbling thud as he hastened down the side passage.

He strode into view soon enough, looking none the worse for wear, and towed the shuffling Anharu over to where the false Embra stood. Neither of the transformations looked at the other, but stood shifting aimlessly from one foot to another. Landrun gazed at them for a moment, and then returned to the passage.

Lord of the Serpent Hanenhather peered narrowly at the two false overdukes. How much of the real Anharu's hulking size was his armor, bulking up those massive shoulders? Or did folk really look closely enough at him for it to matter? Casting the spell took but a moment, but getting the results right, now…

There was a guard at the Rowfoam docks that hadn't been there before- with ready strung bows, too, the customary spears relegated to the banner-display stands at the back of the docks. The dockloaders and pages were frightened and eager for news; barely had the Silver Fin tied up at the jetty than excited whispers arose in a hissing chorus, as every passenger and bargehand was queried.

Flaeros Delcamper bounded up the steps before any servant could ply him with questions of fires and slaughter and marauding monsters. His haste earned him a barrier of crossed spears at the first terrace, with an officer of the guard aiming a bowgun at him from behind them. "Hold hard! Your name and business?"

Flaeros frowned. "I am the bard Flaeros Delcamper, of Ragalar; here in Flowfoam at the personal invitation of my friend, the King."

"Your 'friend'?" a spear-wielding guard asked skeptically, but his older fellow guard had already lifted his spear and stepped back.

"He tells truth," the veteran told both the officer and his fellow spearman. "This is the man who faced down the nobles, and made them swear fealty to our new King. He practically ran this palace for a month or so, until things settled down."

The enlightened guards eyed Flaeros with new respect, and the officer clapped his hand to his shoulder in salute as the bard nodded and resumed his ascent to the palace. As he glanced up at Flowfoam, its ravages now entirely repaired or concealed, he was aware of cold and unfriendly scrutiny from several sides-but who was so regarding him, he could not see. He gave his unseen observers a smile and a shrug, and went on into the waiting bustle of the court.

The request to present himself to the king earned Flaeros a hard-eyed escort of suspicious guards, before and behind, and a thorough search of his person for weapons. Lighter by the weight of his dagger, his best quill-case, and the tiny trimming knife he used for cutting quills, Flaeros was taken through three guarded doors, so weighed down by the glares of guards that he found himself moving slowly.

Even when he reached Raulin-seated behind a small desk, head down and writing furiously, with piles of parchments on both sides of him-the blades of two bared swords separated them. "May fairer days come, Your Majesty," he said gently.

Raulin Castlecloaks looked up with a frown, trying to place the voice- and when he saw Flaeros, he smiled broadly, tossed down his pen, and strode around the desk to embrace his visitor, laughing in delight.

Even then, the guards kept their blades pointed at the bard's back. When he turned, hugging the king, they moved in haste to keep behind him-until Raulin shooed them away with sharp words and waving hands.

They took up positions about four strides distant, swords still drawn, as the king gleefully swept a pile of writs and proclamations onto the floor to free up a stool, and presented it to Flaeros with a flourish. Grinning, the bard took his seat.

"Wine, some of that Craulbec, and apples!" the king called, to a servant nervously hovering just beyond the ring of guards.

Flaeros raised an eyebrow. "Craulbec? Since when did you take a liking for cheese strong enough to outreek dead goat?"

"Since you left some behind in the larder when you went home. Three Above, but I'm glad to see you, Flaer! I… I've been going wizard-witted here, what with all"-Castlecloaks lowered his voice abruptly-"the troubles in these halls. Writs and treaties are bad enough as daily fare, without all this…"

"Yes," Flaeros murmured, leaning in close to the king despite the stiffening, advancing reaction of the guards. "Tell me: What troubles? What's been going on? Why all the menacing swords?"

"Snakes," Raulin murmured. "Slithering into my chambers at night.

Three guards have died from their venom, and more have been bitten. They must come by magic-and you know who that means-because it matters not where I sleep, and how carefully the walls are chinked and sealed. I've even ended up in bare chambers on rope-sling mattresses with nothing but blankets, and still they come. And folk here in Flowfoam are going mad! Without warning, time and again, a servant or courtier or guard who's been perfectly pleasant to me for months will draw a blade and start stabbing and hacking-at me, or whoever's nearest!"

As if the king's words had been a cue, an approaching platter of wine, cheese, and apples suddenly went flying, two terrified servants were flung aside, and a guard burst forward, waving his sword and howling.

Astonished, Flaeros stared as the man charged right at them, wild-eyed. Two guards stabbed him from either side, were dragged along, and then frantically wrestled with the roaring man, who staggered up to the desk, battering the heads of the men clinging to him with his sword, and thrust out at the king.

Flaeros swept up his stool and smashed the steel aside-and as Raulin reluctantly drew his own sword and the snarling man tried to claw his way along the desk toward it, Flaeros swung the stool again, as hard as he could, into the man's head.

There was a dull crack, and the guard crashed down face-first onto the heaps of proclamations, riding them bloodily to the floor and trailing the pair of grimly clinging fellow guards.

The bard and the king stared at each other and then down at the lifeless man at their feet. Then they lifted gazes to stare at each other again, helplessly.

"I wish the Four were back here with us," King Raulin whispered. "They'll know what to do."