Madwand (Illustrated) (6 page)

“Indeed, Madwand, they do. You shall see for yourself soon.”

As they watched, the sparkling began again, faint at first, growing.

They reached the foot of Belken by evening and entered the bright city which had grown up there. The first archway through which they passed might have been made of branches strapped together, but it gave every appearance of gold-veined marble possessed of intricate carvings. Countless lights drifted through the air at several times the height of a man. Pol kept turning his head, assessing the wonders. Unlike any city with which he was familiar, this one seemed clean. The way beneath their feet was unnaturally bright. The buildings appeared almost fragile, with an eggshell translucence to them. Filigreed screens covered fancifully shaped windows in walls sporting designs of glowing gemstones. There were balconies and overhead walkways, arcades through which richly garbed men and women passed. Open-fronted shops displayed magical paraphernalia and exotic beasts were penned and tethered throughout the city—though a few wandered harmlessly, as if taking in the sights themselves. Thick clouds of red smoke rose from a brazier on a corner where a turbanned mage chanted, a demonic face and form taking shape within it high above the street. The sounds of flutes, stringed instruments and drums came from several directions. On an impulse, Pol jerked his guitar into existence, tuned it, slung it and began playing as they walked along. He felt his dragonmark throbbing invisibly, as if in response to the magical ambiance they were entering. Bright birds in cages of silver and gold trilled responses to his song. A few of the passing faces turned his way. High above, the face of the mountain was glowing softly, as if traversed by swarms of fireflies. And even higher, the stars had appeared in a clear sky. Cool breezes moved about him, bringing the odors of exotic incenses, perfumes, of sweet logs burning.

Mouseglove sniffed and listened, fingers twitching, eyes darting.

“It would be difficult to know what to steal, in a place where nothing is what it seems,” he remarked.

“Then you might look upon it as a vacation.”

“Hardly,” Mouseglove replied, eyeing a demon-face which seemed to regard him from behind a grating high in the wall to his left. “Perhaps as an experience in compulsory education . . . ”

Ibal, croaking orders to his servants at every turn, seemed to know the way to his quarters. They were, Pol later learned, the same apartments he had always occupied. Their appearance would be radically altered upon each occasion, one of the older servants informed him. Orientation here was a matter of familiarity with position rather than appearance.

The apartments to which they were conducted as Ibal’s guests seemed extensive and elegant, though the eye-swindling shimmer of glamourie lay upon everything and Pol noted that solid-appearing walls seemed to yield somewhat if he leaned upon them, smooth floors were sometimes uneven to the feet and chairs were never as comfortable as they looked.

Ibal had dismissed them, saying that he intended to rest and that he would introduce them to the initiation officials on the morrow. So, after bathing and changing their garments, Pol and Mouseglove went out to see more of the town.

The balls of white light illuminated the major thoroughfares. Globes of various colors drifted above the lesser ways. They passed knots of youths whose overheard conversations were like the ruminations of philosophers and groups of old men who called upon their powers to engage in practical jokes—such as the tiny cloud hovering just beneath an archway which suddenly rattled and drenched anyone who passed below it, to the accompaniment of uproarious laughter from the gnome-like masters lurking in the shadows.

Brushing away the moisture, Pol and Mouseglove continued on to a narrow stair leading down to a winding street less well-illuminated than those above—blue and red lights, smaller and dimmer than the others, moving slowly above it.

“That looks to be a possibly interesting way,” Mouseglove indicated, leaning on a railing above it.

“Let’s go down and have a look.”

It seemed a place of refreshment. Establishments serving food and beverage, both indoors and out, lined the way. They strolled slowly by all of them, then turned and started back again.

“I like the looks of that one,” said Mouseglove, gesturing to the right. “One of the empty tables under the canopy, perhaps, where we can watch the people pass.”

“Good idea,” said Pol, and they made their way over and sat down.

A small, dark, smiling man wearing a green Kaftan emerged from the establishment’s doorway almost immediately.

“And what will the gentlemen have?” he inquired.

“I’d like a glass of red wine,” said Pol.

“Make mine white and almost sour,” said Mouseglove.

The man turned away and immediately turned back. He held a tray bearing two glasses of wine, one light, one dark.

“Useful trick, that,” Mouseglove observed.

“Private spell,” the other replied.

The man grew almost apologetic then as he asked them to drop their payment through a small hoop into a basket.

“All the others are starting it, too,” he said. “Too many enchanted pebbles going around. You might even have some without knowing it.”

But their coins remained coins as they passed through the charmed circle.

“We just arrived,” Pol told him.

“Well, keep an eye out for stones.”

He moved off to take another order.

The wine was extremely good, though Pol suspected that a part of its taste was enchantment. Still, he reflected after a time, what difference should it make? Like the entire place about them—if it serves its purpose, appearance can be for more important than content.

“Hardly an original observation,” Mouseglove replied when he voiced it. “And it meant a lot to me every time I lifted a bogus jewel I thought was real.”

Pol chuckled.

“Then it served its purpose.”

Mouseglove laughed.

“All right. All right. But when death gets involved it is better to know which is the real dagger and which the real hand. After what happened that last night in your library, I would be very careful in a place like this.”

“By what means that I am not already employing?”

“Well, that magical shower we passed through earlier,” Mouseglove began. “I just noticed—”

He was interrupted by the approach of a blond, well-built young man with finely chiseled features and a flashing smile. He was extravagantly dressed and he moved with an extraordinary grace and poise.

“Madwand! And Mouseglove! Strange meeting you here! Waiter! Another of whatever they’re having for my friends! And a glass of your best for me!”

He drew up a chair and seated himself at their table.

“It looks as if they did a better than usual job this year,” he said, gesturing. “How do you like your accommodations?”

“Uh—fine,” Pol replied as the waiter arrived and produced their drinks.

The youth gestured and his hand was suddenly filled with coins. They leapt upward from it, arched through the hoop and into the basket with a small pyrotechnic display.

“Colorful,” Pol said. “Listen, I hate to seem rude since you’re buying, but I can’t seem to recall . . . ”

The youth laughed, his handsome features creasing with merriment.

“Of course not, of course not,” he said. “I am Ibal, and you are looking at the finest rejuvenation spell ever wrought.” He brushed a speck of dust from his bright sleeve. “Not to mention a few cosmetic workings,” he added softly.

“Really!”

“Amazing!”

“Yes. I am ready to meet once again with my beloved Vonnie, for two weeks of lovemaking, revelry, good food and drink. It is the only reason I still come to these things.”

“How—interesting.”

“Yes. We first met here nearly three hundred years ago, and our feelings have remained undiminished across the centuries.”

“Impressive,” Pol said. “But do you not see one another in between times?”

“Gods, no! If we had to live together on a day-to-day basis one of us would doubtless kill the other. Two weeks every four years is just right.” He stared into his drink a moment before raising it to his lips. “Besides,” he added, “we spend a lot of the intervening time recovering.”

He looked up again.

“Madwand, what have you done to yourself?”

“What do you mean?” Pol asked.

“That white streak in your hair. Why is it there?”

Pol ran a hand through his still-moist thatch.

“Little joke,” he said.

“Not in the best of taste,” said Ibal, shaking his head. “You’ll have people associating you with Det’s Disaster. Ahh!”

They followed a sudden movement of his gaze out along the street, past a halted fat man and a pair of strollers, to where a woman approached under a swaying blue light. She was of medium height, her hair long and dark and glossy, her form superbly molded beneath a light, clinging costume, her features delicate, lovely, smiling.

Following his sharp intake of breath, Ibal rose to his feet. Pol and Mouseglove did the same.

“Gentlemen, this is Vonnie,” he announced as she came up to the table. He embraced her, kept his arm about her. “My dear, you are lovelier than ever. These are my friends, Madwand and Mouseglove. Let us have a drink with them before we go our way.”

She nodded to them as he brought her a chair.

“It is good to meet you,” she said. “Have you come very far?” and Pol, captivated by the charm of her voice as well as the freshness of her person, felt a sudden and acute loneliness.

He forgot his reply as soon as he uttered it, and he spent the next several minutes admiring her.

As they rose to leave, Ibal leaned forward and whispered, “The hair—I’m serious. You’d best correct it soon, or the initiation officials may think you flippant. At any other time, of course, it would not matter. But in one seeking initiation—well, it is not a time for joking, if you catch my meaning.”

Pol nodded, wondering at the simplest way to deal with it.

“I’ll take care of it this evening.”

“Very good. I will see you some time tomorrow—not too early.”

“Enjoy yourselves.”

Ibal smiled.

“I’m sure.”

Pol watched them go, then returned his attention to his drink.

“Don’t look suddenly,” Mouseglove whispered through unmoving lips, “but there is a fat man who has been loitering across the way for some time now.”

“I’d sort of noticed.” Pol replied, sweeping his gaze over the bulky man’s person as he raised his glass. “What about him?”

“I know him,” Mouseglove said, “or knew him—professionally. His name is Ryle Merson.”

Pol shook his head.

“The name means nothing to me.”

“He is the sorcerer I once mentioned. It was over twenty years ago that he hired me to steal those seven statuettes from your father.”

Pol felt a strong urge to turn and stare at the large man in gold and gray. He restrained himself.

“ . . . And there was no hint from him as to what he wanted them for?” he asked.

“No.”

“I feel they’re very safe—in with my guitar,” Pol said.

When he did look again, Ryle Merson was talking with a tall man who wore a long-sleeved black tunic, red trousers and high black boots, a red bandana about his head. The man had his back to them, but a little later he turned and his eyes met Pol’s in passing, before the two of them moved on slowly up the street.

“What about that one?”

Mouseglove shook his head.

“For a moment I thought there was something familiar about him, but no—I don’t know his name and I can’t say where I might have seen him before, if indeed I did.”

“Is this a coincidence, I wonder?”

“Ryle is a sorcerer, and this is a sorcerers’ convention.”

“Why do you think he chose to stand there for so long?”

“It could be that he was simply waiting for his friend,” Mouseglove said, “though I found myself wondering whether he had recognized me.”

“It’s been a long time,” Pol said.

“Yes.”

“He could simply have come over and spoken with you if he wanted to be certain who you were.”

“True.”

Mouseglove raised his drink.

“Let’s finish up and get out of here,” he said.

“Okay.”

Later, the edge gone from the evening, they returned to their apartments. Not entirely because Mouseglove had suggested it, Pol wove an elaborate series of warning spells about the place and slept with a blade beside the bed.

IV.

Enough of philosophical rumination! I decided. It is all fruitless, for I am still uncertain as to everything concerning my existence. A philosopher is a dead poet and a dying theologian—I got that from Pol’s mind one night. I am not certain where Pol got it, but it bore the proper cast of contempt to match my feelings. I had grown tired of thinking about my situation. It was time that I did something.

I found the city at Belken’s foot to be unnerving, but stimulating as well. Rondoval was not without its share of magic—from utilitarian workings and misunderstood enchantments to forgotten spells waiting to go off and a lot of new stuff Pol had left lying about. But this place was a veritable warehouse of magic—spell overlying spell, many of them linked, a few in conflict, new ones being laid at every moment and old ones dismantled. The spells at Rondoval were old, familiar things which I knew well how to humor. Here the power hummed or shone all about me constantly—some of it most strange, some even threatening—and I never knew but that I might be about to collide with a deadly, unsuspected force. This served to heighten my alertness if not my awareness. Then, too, I seemed to draw more power into myself just by virtue of moving amid such large concentrations of it.