Red Magic (6 page)

“I’ll be fine by tomorrow,” Galvin grunted. He considered himself in charge of this expedition, and he wasn’t about to take orders from a centaur. He watched Wynter place the charred hedgehog into the earth and build a small mound over it. Satisfied the creature was at rest, the druid returned to his soaked backpack and lay down beside it. He quickly fell into a deep, troubled sleep.

It was dark when Galvin awoke. The moon and stars shone overhead, and the druid cursed himself for sleeping most of the day away. He felt the ground around his hands; the grass was dry, the earth only slightly damp. He ran his hands over his clothes—they, too, were dry. He cursed himself again, realizing his first guess was wrong—he had slept for more than a day and a half. His shoulder felt sore, but not nearly as bad as before. The herb poultice had healed it considerably. He flexed his fingers and rotated his shoulder. The numbness was gone.

Reasonably healed, the druid knew he would be able to travel. He stretched on the ground and was debating taking Brenna back to Glarondar tonight when he heard her voice—and Wynter’s. He listened to pick up their conversation.

“It won’t help my political career any to go jaunting off into Thay as a spy,” he heard Brenna say. “My rivals will surely use it against me, claiming I have more interest in what goes on outside my country than in Aglarond.”

“But if we uncover some plot against Aglarond, you’ll be a hero,” Wynter commented.

“Perhaps, but I think the negatives will outweigh it. Do you have any interest in politics?”

“I don’t, and I don’t care to,” Wynter countered. “But I do know something about people. And—” there was a lengthy pause as Galvin strained to hear what came next— “you’re going to have to find some other way to gain fame. Galvin says you’re staying behind, and I trust his judgment. Thay’s a harsh place—no place for you. I know. I was born there.”

Galvin sat up to watch the pair. Brenna sat cross-legged on a straw mat outside her tent, her arms crossed defiantly. Wynter stood above her, looking amused.

“Can you keep up with us?” Galvin asked.

She looked through the centaur’s legs at the druid and nodded emphatically.

The druid glanced up at Wynter. “We leave at dawn.”

The centaur grinned broadly and joined Galvin. “I’m not sure about her motives, but she just might be an asset. At least she knows her way around cities.”

Galvin frowned, hoping desperately that he hadn’t made a mistake by allowing Brenna Graycloak to come along.

Three

Maligor reclined on a crimson-dyed leather divan in the center of his immense bath chamber, his head resting on a green silk pillow recently imported from Shou Lung. Although he was thin and stood only about five and a half feet tall, he looked large on the couch; he chose his furniture to make himself appear imposing. A half-dozen of his favorite pleasure slaves attended him. Two, who had been born on Maligor’s slave plantation and were hardly more than children, massaged his feet, applying expensive, musky oils. The scent was sweet and heavy and permeated the air. Another pair, blond twin sisters kidnapped by pirates from their sea captain father in Orlumbor, worked diligently to manicure and polish his hard yellow nails. The fifth, the eldest of the human slave women, a buxom twenty-year-old from Ravens Bluff, sat on a stack of pillows near his right shoulder. Slowly rubbing a damp cloth across his forehead with one hand, she used the other to gently run a sharp blade over his temples and across the top of his head, shaving the fine stubble growing there. She took extreme care not to cut him; her predecessor had died horribly in the laboratory several days ago for just such an offense.

The women wore sheer, colorful fabrics that left nothing to Maligor’s imagination. He dressed all of his female slaves thus to prevent them from hiding weapons that could be turned against him. The women’s hair extended to the middle of their backs, while the children’s hung about their shoulders. It was an indication they had been slaves for many years. However, the sixth slave, an elven woman in a short, rose-hued gauze tunic, had silvery-white hair that reached barely below the lobes of her pointed ears. Maligor had owned this prize only a few months. She sat apart from the group near a black iron cage filled with finches. Strumming an ebonwood lyre, she sang a mournful old elvish tune that Maligor could not understand. The Red Wizard usually enjoyed her music. Tonight, however, he found the tune annoying. It prevented him from concentrating.

The wizard owned more than eight hundred slaves, a considerable stable. Most were male laborers who worked at various tasks around his properties. Several dozen were warriors and sailors who had been captured in nearby countries. Fewer still were slave women who attended to his needs. He continually added to his stable, as the Red Wizard needed a steady supply of slaves to replace those who died of overwork, old age, or, more likely, because of his malicious magical experiments.

There were few Red Wizards who owned more slaves than Maligor. Slaves made up about two-thirds of the country’s population and were considered one of Thay’s major imports. Maligor prided himself on having some of the most exquisite slaves.

This evening, however, his pleasure slaves were doing little to please him. The Red Wizard’s mind was elsewhere, concentrating on another woman—the one he had seen before his darkenbeast died. Maligor still puzzled over her. He had sent the darkenbeast after an errant gnoll guard, yet through his telepathic link with the darkenbeast, he had picked up no trace of the gnoll—only the red-tressed beauty.

The woman was confounding. If she was in Thay, she might be a slave because of her long hair. But she was not one of Maligor’s. Perhaps she was the slave of another Red Wizard, the same one who had solicited the services of the missing gnoll. Perhaps she herself was a Red Wizard—but if she was, why had the darkenbeast attacked her? And what had happened to the gnoll?

Maligor pursed his lips, causing the slave shaving him to tremble. Continuing to puzzle over the matter will do little good, he thought. The gnoll, wherever he is, knows nothing of my real plans. But the woman… who is she? Where is she?

“Finished, my lord,” the buxom slave announced timidly, interrupting his thoughts. Looking frightened yet expectant, she wiped the damp cloth across the top of his head with a shaky hand and replaced the shaving blade in its case.

Maligor eyed her sternly and ran his hand over his head to inspect her handiwork. He watched her bottom lip quiver and her face grow pale in fear that her performance was less than satisfactory. For a moment, he was tempted to find fault with her, then decided to be uncommonly kind.

“It is barely adequate, but it will do for tonight. Tomorrow make sure you do better.”

Visibly relieved, she rose and joined the elven woman. The other slaves continued their tasks. Maligor stared past them to the blackness beyond the room’s small windows. It was late, and from his position all he could see was a small section of sky and a few tiny stars, the bottom claw of the Malar constellation. He pulled his thoughts away from the dead darkenbeast, pondering instead what was transpiring under the stars in Amruthar at this moment. At least he would know about that within a few hours, as he had informers stationed in several taverns and on select street corners to pick up gossip. Maligor enjoyed the ability to keep track of most of the city’s seedy activities without leaving the safety of his fortified tower.

Maligor felt comfortable and secure here. His tower stretched sixty feet above the rich Thayvian soil. It boasted a crenellated top, where seasoned fighters were always stationed within easy reach of massive mounted crossbows and jugs of oil that could quickly be set aflame. The outer walls were made of solid granite, eighteen inches thick in most places. All the windows in his keep were of the same size—eight inches wide by two feet high. This small size made for better defense. Each was barred or covered with protective spells to keep unwanted things from entering or the wrong eyes from looking inside. To complete his defenses, the wizard had magical guards and wards scattered throughout his premises and skilled guards and loyal slaves on every level.

“My Lord Maligor,” a soft voice came from just beyond the chamber. “You summoned me?”

“Yes, Asp,” Maligor replied thickly as he continued to stare at the sky. “You’re late.”

“I was drilling the gnolls.”

Maligor sneered, hating to be kept waiting. “Enter. We have much to discuss.”

The bath chamber was lit by dozens of thick red candles on curved iron stands that were placed around the walls and near Maligor’s divan. They kept away the shadows, except those in the darkened doorway where Asp now stood. She poked her head out from the gray entrance, glancing around the room and at the nervous slaves. Sliding her shoulders and arms out of the shadows, she maneuvered herself entirely into the chamber, revealing her serpentine body.

One of the twins gasped. Throwing both hands over her mouth, she dropped the manicure tools, sending them clinking in several directions across the polished white marble floor. She scooted away from the divan, unmindful of Maligor’s burning gaze. The other slaves also appeared startled, but they were wiser. They remained rooted to their posts.

Perturbed, Maligor silently marked the twin for stringent punishment, then turned back to Asp.

His lieutenant noiselessly slithered toward the divan, the candlelight playing over her glittering crimson and charcoal scales and causing the scales to reflect eerily on the marble. From the waist down, Asp resembled a colorful sand boa with a ridge of armored, triangular-shaped scales down her back and a tail that tapered to a black point. From the waist up, she was a lovely young woman, more beautiful than even the slaves in the room. She was a spirit naga, a member of a race of unhuman women, and Maligor knew she could shape-change into any human or demihuman form. He wondered whether this was her true appearance or merely a magical fabrication. It really didn’t matter, he reasoned. He was dishonest enough with his own body, cloaking his years with his potion bottles.

Her true appearance did not matter; he found her easy on his old eyes. Still, his other senses found her unsettling. Like all spirit nagas, or “snake women of the underground” as many men preferred to call them, Asp smelled of rotting flesh. And that scent, coupled with the musky oil on his feet, made Maligor wince.

Her tail undulated back and forth over the smooth floor, then acted as a brace as Asp rose like a spitting cobra to address him. From the tip of her tail to the top of her head, Asp measured almost twenty feet long.

“My Lord Maligor, may I speak freely here?” She glowered at the slaves and hissed at the elf for emphasis. Abruptly the music stopped.

“A moment,” he answered, his eyes reluctantly leaving the human part of Asp’s form and turning to his slaves. He clapped his wrinkled hands once, and guards stationed beyond the entrance moved in to escort the slave women to their chamber. With a bony finger, he indicated the twin who had shown improper behavior, and a guard nodded and smiled knowingly as the slaves were ushered from the room.

Asp was pleased to see the women’s alarmed expressions and felt amused that one would be whipped—or worse—because of her. She enjoyed terrifying Maligor’s female slaves and often went out of her way to do so. The snake-woman claimed she did it to put them in their place, while adding to her own sense of superiority over humans.

Maligor chose to believe she was jealous.

For nearly three summers, the naga had been the Red Wizard’s companion, initially studying under him as an apprentice, then gaining a trusted position as leader of his guard force and chief instructor of his army. They shared an unusual relationship that couldn’t quite be considered affection. Maligor believed himself incapable of love.

Still, the Red Wizard enjoyed her company and respected her abilities and cunning, using her to his best advantage. In turn, the keenly intelligent Asp used Maligor to help her gain stature in Thay and more wealth than she could have stolen from the drow and other races who dwelt in the underground. In those three years, the Red Wizard hadn’t noticed the snake-woman age one bit. Not one wrinkle had formed on her delicate face; not one silver hair shone on her head. He knew a naga’s life spanned many human generations, and in that respect, he considered her a fitting confidante. Maligor intended to live a very long time.

She glided to his side, wrapped her tail around the base of a stack of pastel satin pillows next to the divan, and eased herself onto them. She rarely used furniture, finding most of it awkward for her body, a human folly. But if she remained upright, she would tower above Maligor, something she knew the wizard would not tolerate.

“My army … ?” Maligor began.

“Their training is progressing satisfactorily,” she replied. “I drill the gnolls to the point of exhaustion.”

“Good,” he said simply, peering into her lidless eyes. “My beautiful general has a fist of iron.”

“My lord?”

Maligor reached up and gently brushed her cheek with the back of his hand.

She smiled coyly, then her face took on an intense expression. “My lord, I’m curious about the gnoll guard—the missing one you sent the darkenbeast after.”

The Red Wizard sighed and dropped his hand from her face. “Your concern is the army, Asp. That’s what I called you here for. I want a detailed report.”

“But my lord …” the naga began.

“The matter of the errant gnoll has been taken care of,” Maligor lied. “Now to other things. We have much work to do, my lovely.”

The wizard propped himself up on an elbow and gazed harshly at Asp while she detailed the army’s numbers, capabilities, and state of readiness. In the candlelight, the naga’s eyes appeared nearly luminescent. With those eyes, she could charm lesser men and often did, forcing them to do her bidding. That ability helped her to deal with Maligor’s soldiers.

“Then the army is ready,” the Red Wizard concluded. “It is time to take action, Asp. I have been content for too many years with my holdings and position as Zulkir of Alteration. None of the wizards in my school have the power to challenge me. But the other Red Wizards, the other zulkirs …” He paused, thinking primarily of Szass Tam, his arch rival. “It is time to show them I am an unstoppable force. It is time I became the most powerful Red Wizard in Thay.”