"I just saw Kierkan Rufo," Cadderly remarked.
"As did I," Danica said calmly.
"What happened to him?"
"He tried to put his hands where they did not belong," Danica said casually, turning to stare back at the stone block. "I stopped him."
None of it made any sense to Cadderly; Rufo had leered and stared, but had never been foolish enough to make a move toward Danica. "Rufo attacked you?" he asked.
Danica laughed hysterically, and that, too, unnerved the young priest. "He tried to touch me, I said."
Cadderly scratched his head and looked around the room for some further clues as to what had transpired. He still couldn't believe that Rufo would make an open advance toward Danica, but even more remarkable had been Danica's response. She was a controlled and disciplined warrior. Cadderly would never expect such overkill as the beating she had apparently given Rufo.
"You hurt him badly," Cadderly said, needing to hear Danica's explanation.
"He will recover," was all that the woman replied.
Cadderly grabbed her arm, meaning to turn her about to face him. Danica was too quick. Her arm flicked back and forth, breaking the hold, then she snapped her hand onto Cadderly's thumb and bent it backward, nearly driving him to his knees. Her ensuing glare alone would have backed Cadderly away, and he honestly believed that she would break his finger.
Then Danica's look softened, as if she suddenly recognized the man at her side. She released her grip on his thumb and grabbed around his head instead, pulling him close. "Oh Cadderly!" she cried between kisses. "Did I hurt you?"
Cadderly pushed her back to arm's length and stared at her for a long while. She appeared fine, except for Rufo's blood on her hands and a curious, urgent look in her eyes.
"Have you been drinking any wine?" Cadderly asked.
"Of course not," Danica replied, surprised by the question. "You know that I am allowed only one glass ..." Her voice trailed off as the hard glare returned.
"Are you doubting my loyalty to oath?" she asked sharply.
Cadderly's face crinkled in confusion.
"Let go of me."
Her tone was serious, and when the stunned Cadderly did not immediately respond, she accentuated her point. She and Cadderly were only standing about two feet apart, but the limber monk kicked with her foot, up between them, and waved it threateningly in Cadderly's face.
Cadderly released her and fell back. "What is wrong with you?" he demanded.
Danica's visage softened again.
"You beat Rufo badly," Cadderly said. "If he made inappropriate advances―"
"He interrupted me!" Danica cut him off. "He ..." she looked to the block of stone, then back to Cadderly, again glowering. "And now you are interrupting me."
Cadderly wisely backed away. "I will go," he promised, studying the block, "if you tell me what I am interrupting."
"I am a true disciple of Grandmaster Penpahg D'Ahn!" Danica cried as though that answered everything.
"Of course you are," said Cadderly.
His agreement calmed Danica. "The time has come for Gigel Nugel," she said, "Iron Skull, but I must not be interrupted in my concentration!"
Cadderly regarded the solid block for a moment―a block far larger than the one in the sketch of Penpahg D'Ahn―then eyed Danica's delicate face, trying unsuccessfully to digest the news. "You plan to smash that block with your head?"
"I am a true disciple," Danica reiterated.
Cadderly nearly swooned. "Do not," he begged, reaching for Danica.
Seeing her impending reaction, Cadderly pulled his arms back and qualified his statement. "Not yet," he pleaded. "This is a great event in the history of the library. Dean Thobicus should be informed. We could make it a public showing."
"This is a private matter," Danica replied. "It is not a curiosity show for the pleasures of unbelievers!"
"Unbelievers?" Cadderly whispered, and at this strange moment he knew that the label fit him, but for more reasons than his and Danica's differing faiths. He had to think quickly. "But," he improvised, "surely the event must be properly witnessed and recorded."
Danica looked at him curiously.
"For future disciples," Cadderly explained. "Who will come to study Grandmaster Penpahg D'Ahn in a hundred years? Would that disciple not also benefit from the practices and successes of Grandmistress Danica? You cannot be selfish with this achievement. Surely that would not be in accord with Penpahg D'Ahn's teachings."
Danica mulled over his words. "It would be selfish," she admitted.
Even her acquiescence reinforced Cadderly's fears that something was terribly wrong. Danica was sharp thinking and never before so easily manipulated.
"I will wait for you to make the arrangements," she agreed, "but not for long! The time has come for Iron Skull. This I know is true. I am a true disciple of Grandmaster Penpahg D'Ahn."
Cadderly did not know how to proceed. He sensed that if he left Danica, she would go right back to her attempt. He looked all around, his gaze finally settling on Danica's bed. "It would be well for you to rest," he offered.
Danica looked to the bed, then back to Cadderly, a sly look on her face. "I know something better than rest," she purred, moving much closer. The urgency of her unexpected kiss weakened Cadderly in the knees and promised him many wonderful things.
But not like this. He reminded himself that something was wrong with Danica, that something was apparently wrong with almost everything around him.
"I have to go," he said, pulling away. "To Dean Thobicus to make the arrangements. You rest now. Surely you will need your strength."
Danica reluctantly let him go, honestly torn between her perception of duty and the needs of love.
* * * * *
Cadderly stumbled back down to the first level. The hallways were unnervingly empty and quiet, and Cadderly wasn't certain of where he should turn. He had few close friends in the library―he wasn't about to go to Kierkan Rufo with this problem, and he wanted to keep far away from the living and working quarters of Dean Thobicus and the headmasters, fearing an encounter with Avery.
In the end, he went back to the kitchen and found Pikel and Ivan, nearly collapsed with exhaustion, still stubbornly arm wrestling at the table. Cadderly knew that the dwarves were headstrong, but more than an hour had passed since they had begun their match.
When Cadderly approached, shaking his head in disbelief, he saw just how headstrong the Bouldershoulder brothers could be. Purplish bruises from popped veins lined their arms and their entire bodies trembled violently under the continuing strain, but their visages were unyieldingly locked.
"I'll put ye down!" Ivan snarled.
Pikel growled back and strained harder at the pull.
"Stop it!" Cadderly demanded. Both dwarves looked up from the match, realizing only then that someone had entered the kitchen.
"I can take him," Ivan assured Cadderly.
"Why are you fighting?" Cadderly asked, guessing that the dwarves would not remember.
"Yerself was here," Ivan replied. "Ye saw he was the one what started it."
"Oh?" Pikel piped in sarcastically.
"What did he start?" Cadderly asked.
"The fight!" growled an exasperated Ivan.
"How?"
Ivan had run out of answers. He looked at Pikel, who only shrugged in reply.
"Then why are you fighting?" Cadderly asked again with no answer forthcoming.
Both dwarves stopped at the same time and sat looking across the table at each other.
"Me brother!" Ivan cried suddenly, springing over the table. Pikel caught him in midnight and their hugs and pats on the back were nearly as vicious as the arm wrestling had been.
Ivan turned happily on Cadderly. "He's me brother!" the dwarf announced.
Cadderly strained a smile and figured that it might be best to divert the dwarves as he had diverted Danica. "It is not so far from suppertime," was all he had to say.
"Supper?" Ivan bellowed.
"Oo oi!" added Pikel, and they were off, whirling like little bearded tornados, sweeping the kitchen into order in preparation of the evening meal. Cadderly waited just a few minutes, to make sure that the dwarves wouldn't get back to their fighting, then he slipped out and headed back to check on Danica.
He found her in her room, sleeping contentedly. He pulled her blankets up over her, then went to the stone to see if he could find some way to remove it.
"How did you ever get this up here?" he asked, staring at the heavy block. It would take at least two strong men to move it, and even then, or even with three men, the stairs would not be easily negotiated. For now, Cadderly figured that he could just drop the block down from the sawhorses, put it on the floor to stop Danica from making her Iron Skull attempt. He went back to the bed and took the heaviest blankets. He tied them together and wrapped them about the block, then threw both ends over a rafter in the low room.
Cadderly grabbed the dangling ends and hoisted himself right off the floor to tack at the block. The sawhorses leaned, then toppled and the rafter creaked in protest, but Cadderly's counterbalancing weight brought the blanketed block down slowly and quietly.
Using the sawhorse legs as levers, he managed to wiggle the blankets out from under the stone. Then he tucked Danica back in and headed away, his mind racing to find some logical reason for all the illogical events of the day.
* * * * *
It was a wondrous oak, a most excellent tree indeed, and Newander gently stroked each of its spreading branches as he made his way higher. The view from the uppermost branches was splendid, a scene that sent shivers of delight along the druid's spine.
When he turned about to regard the mountains to the south-west, though, Newander's smile disappeared.
There sat the Edificant Library, a barely seen square block far in the distance. Newander hadn't meant to be gone this long; for all the freedom and individuality their order offered, he knew that Arcite would not be pleased.
A bird flitted down and landed not far from the druid's head.
"I should be getting back," the druid said to it, though he wanted to remain out here in the wilderness, away from the temptations of civilization.
Newander started reluctantly down the tree. With the distant library removed from sight, he nearly headed off again in the opposite direction. He didn't, though. Chastising himself for his fears and weaknesses, he grudgingly started back toward the library, back to his duties.
* * * * *
Cadderly meant to lie down and rest for only a short while when he returned to his room. The afternoon was barely half over, but it already had been an exhausting day. Soon the young priest was snoring loudly.
But not contentedly. From the depths of his mist-filled dreams came the walking dead, skeletons and gruesome ghouls, reaching for him with sharp, bony hands and rotting fingers.
He sat up in pitch blackness. Cold trails of sweat lined his face, and his blankets were moist and clammy. He heard a noise to the side of the bed. He hadn't undressed when he lay down, and he fumbled about, finding his spindle-disks and then his light tube.
Something was close.
The end cap popped off and the light streamed out. Cadderly nearly flicked his spindle-disks out of sheer terror, but he managed to forego his attack when he recognized the white fur of a friend.
As startled as Cadderly, Percival rushed across the room, upsetting all sorts of things, and darted under the bed. The squirrel came up tentatively a moment later at Cadderly's feet and slowly moved up to nestle in the pit of the man's arm.
Cadderly was glad for the company. He recapped his light, but kept it in his hand, and soon was fast asleep.
The walking dead were waiting for him.
The Time to Act
Barjin is preparing to open the gate," Dorigen told Aballister. "My contacts on the lower planes sense the beginnings of the portal."
"How long?" the wizard asked grimly. Aballister was glad that Druzil soon would be close to Barjin, keeping an eye on the dangerous man, but he was not pleased that Barjin had so quickly advanced to this level of preparedness. If Barjin meant to open a gate, then his plans were probably in full swing.
Dorigen shrugged. "An hour or two," she replied. "I cannot know which methods of sorcery the priest will employ." She looked over to Druzil, sitting comfortably atop Aballister's desk, appearing impassive, though both wizards knew better than to think that. "Do you really believe it's necessary to send the imp?"
"Do you trust Barjin?" Aballister answered.
"Talona would not have allowed him to take the elixir if he was not loyal to our cause," Dorigen replied.
"Do not presume that the goddess is so directly interested in our cause," warned Aballister, rising from and walking nervously about his oaken chair. "The Time of Troubles has passed and much has changed. Talona's avatar was pleased to bring me into her dark fold, but I am not her only concern, and I do not presume to be her chief concern. She directed me to Druzil, and he provided the chaos curse. Its fate is in my... in our hands now."
"But if Barjin was not of Talona's clergy ..." Dorigen argued, shifting tentatively from foot to foot and letting her companion complete the warning for himself.
Aballister considered Dorigen for a long moment, surprised that she was as fearful as he about Barjin. She was a middle-aged wizard, thin and drawn, with darting eyes and a tangle of graying black hair that she never bothered to brush.
"Perhaps he is of Talona's clergy," Aballister replied. "I believe that he is." Aballister had played these possible scenarios through his thoughts a hundred times over the last few days. "Do not let that fact comfort you. If Barjin stuck a poisoned dagger into my heart, Talona would not be pleased, but neither would she seek vengeance on the priest. That is the price of serving a goddess such as ours."
Dorigen considered those words for a few moments, then nodded her agreement.
"We vie for power with the priests," Aballister went on. "It has been that way since the beginning of Castle Trinity, and that contest intensified with Barjin's arrival. He gained control of the elixir from me. I admit my own failure in not anticipating his cunning, but I have not conceded defeat, I promise you. Now, go back to your chambers and converse with your contacts. Inform me at once if there is any change in Barjin's gate."
Aballister looked over to his magical mirror and considered whether he should scry into Barjin's altar room to confirm what Dorigen had told him. He decided against it, though, knowing that Barjin would easily sense the scrying and recognize its source. Aballister did not want Barjin to know how concerned he was, did not want the priest to understand how great an advantage he was gaining in their competition.
The wizard looked over his shoulder and nodded to Druzil.
"The priest is a daring one," Druzil remarked, "to open a gate right below so many enemies of magical power. Bene tellemara. If the priests of the library discover the gate ..."
"It was not unexpected," Aballister retorted defensively. "We knew that Barjin was taking materials for sorcery."
"If he is opening the gate already," Druzil put in, "then perhaps the curse has begun!" The imp rubbed his pudgy, leathery hands eagerly at that prospect.
"Or perhaps Barjin's situation has become desperate," Aballister quickly replied.
Druzil wisely disguised his excitement.
"We must get the brazier prepared," Aballister said, "and quickly. We must be ready before Barjin begins his summoning." He moved over to his own burning brazier and picked up the closest bag, checking to ensure that the powder inside was blue.
"I will provide you with two powders," the wizard explained. "One to close Barjin's gate behind you as you pass through to join him, another to reopen it so that you may return to me."
"To ensure that I am his only catch?" Druzil asked, cocking his dog-faced head curiously.
"I am not as confident of Barjin's powers as he appears to be," Aballister replied. "I
f he summons too many denizens, even minor creatures, of the lower planes through to serve him, his control will be sorely taxed. No doubt he is bringing in undead to serve him as well. That type of an army could be beyond him when the priests of the Edificant Library strike back. I fear Barjin may be reaching too far. It all could crumble around him."
"Fear?" Druzil asked slyly. "Or hope?"
Aballister's hollowed eyes narrowed dangerously. "Examine the situation from another point of view, my dear Druzil," he purred. "From your own. Do you wish to find competitors from your filthy home at Barjin's side. Might not another imp, or a midge perhaps, know you and know that you have been in service to me?"
The wizard enjoyed the way the imp's features suddenly seemed to droop.
"Barjin would know you as my agent then," Aballister went on. "If you were fortunate, he would only banish you."
Druzil looked over to Aballister's brazier and nodded his agreement.
"Get through as soon as Barjin opens his gate," Aballister instructed, dumping the blue powder into the burning brazier. The flames roared and shifted through the colors of the spectrum. Druzil walked by the wizard, taking the two tiny bags and looping them over the foreclaws on his wing.
"Close Barjin's gate as you step out of the flames," Aballister continued. "He will not understand the sudden shift in his fire's hue. He will think it is the result of your passing."
Again Druzil nodded and then, eager to be away from Aballister, and even more eager to see exactly what was going on at the library, he jumped into the brazier and was gone.
"Aballister's plans serve everyone," Druzil muttered to himself a few minutes later, as he floated in the black void at the edge of the material plane, just waiting for Barjin's gate to open. The imp realized, too, that other things―jealousy and fear―guided the wizard's actions. Barjin had shown no signs of weakness throughout and Aballister knew as well as Druzil did that a gate to the lower planes would not seriously threaten the priest's successes. Still, Druzil was more than happy when he looked down at the magical powders Aballister had provided. The imp remained intrigued by Barjin's brashness and confidence. The priest's preliminary victories, both at Castle Trinity, against Aballister, and possibly in the dungeons of the library, could not easily be dismissed. While Aballister might fear for his own position, Druzil's only concern was the chaos curse, the recipe he had waited so very long to exploit.