“If the fight begins anew in the spring …” Shayleigh started to say.
“We will be back,” Danica assured her.
“Back where?” Ivan finally came up, shook from his yellow beard the twigs and leaves that had gotten caught up in it from his two rolls down the hill, and tucked it into his wide belt.
“Back to Shilmista,” Shayleigh explained. “If the fighting begins anew.”
“We going somewhere?” Ivan asked Danica.
“Uh-oh,” moaned Pikel, beginning to understand.
“Winter will be upon us soon,” Danica replied. “The passes through the Snowflakes will become impassable.”
“Uh-oh,” Pikel said again.
“Ye’re right,” Ivan said after thinking things over for a moment. “Things’re settling here—not much left to hit. Me and me brother’d get bored soon enough. And besides, them priests at the library probably ain’t had a good-cooked meal since we left!”
Shayleigh slapped Ivan on the side of the head. Ivan turned to stare incredulously into her wistful smile, and even the gruff dwarf could recognize the pain hidden beneath the fair maiden’s delicate features.
“You still owe me a fight,” Shayleigh explained.
Ivan snorted and cleared his throat, sneakily moving his shirt sleeve high enough to wipe the moisture from his eyes as he ran his sleeve across his nose. Danica was amazed by the obvious chink in the dwarf’s callous demeanor.
“Bah!” Ivan growled. “What fight? Ye’re just like the other one!” He waggled an accusing finger at Elbereth, whom he had battled to a draw in a similar challenge just a couple tendays before. “Ye’d dance all about and run in circles until we both fell down tired!”
“Do you think I would release you from the insult you gave my people?” Shayleigh snarled, hands on hips, and moved over to tower above the dwarf.
“Ye think I’d let ye?” Ivan retorted, poking a stubby finger into Shayleigh’s belly. “Bah!” Ivan snorted, and he turned and stormed away.
“Bah!” Shayleigh mimicked, her voice too melodic to properly copy the dwarf’s grating tone.
Ivan spun back and glowered at her then motioned for Pikel to follow him away. “Well, ye got yer forest back, elf,” Ivan said to Elbereth. “Ye’re welcome!”
“Farewell to you, too, Ivan Bouldershoulder,” Elbereth replied. “Our thanks to you and your splendid brother. Know that Shilmista will be open to either of you if you choose to pass this way again.”
Ivan smiled Pikel’s way. “As if that one could stop us anyhow!” he roared, and he slapped Shayleigh across the rump and darted away before she recovered enough to respond.
“I must go as well,” Danica said to Elbereth. “I have many preparations to make before dawn.”
Elbereth nodded but could not reply past the lump in his throat. As soon as Danica was gone, skipping down the slope to catch up with the dwarves, Shayleigh took a seat beside the silver-eyed elf king.
“You love her,” the elf maiden remarked after a few silent moments.
Elbereth sat quietly for a while then admitted, “With all my heart.”
“And she loves Cadderly,” said Shayleigh.
“With all her heart,” Elbereth replied.
Shayleigh managed a weak grin, trying to bolster her friend’s resolve.
“Never would I have believed that an elf king of Shilmista would fall in love with a human!” Shayleigh spouted, nudging Elbereth in the shoulder.
The elf turned his silver-eyed gaze upon her and smiled wryly. “Nor I that an elf maiden would be enchanted by a yellow-bearded dwarf,” he replied.
Shayleigh’s initial reaction came out as an incredulous burst of laughter. Certainly Shayleigh had come to know Ivan and Pikel as friends, and trusted allies, but to hint at anything more than that was simply ridiculous. Still, the maiden quieted considerably when she looked down the empty slope.
Empty indeed did it seem with the Bouldershoulder brothers gone from view.
FOUR
A LONG TIME TO DAWN
Bogo Rath knocked on the door of the small conference room. The knock was tentative, stuttering. He was never secure in his dealings with the dreaded Night Masks. A score of assassins had accompanied the two Night Mask leaders into Castle Trinity that morning, many more trained killers than Bogo had anticipated for such a seemingly simple murder.
Two sentries searched the young wizard before he was allowed entry. The pair was unremarkable enough, Bogo noted, probably new to the dark band. They wore the customary dress of Westgate’s assassins guild, nondescript yeoman’s clothes and silver-edged black eye masks. One sentry’s tusky grin told Bogo his heritage was likely more orc than human—common enough among the Night Masks—and that thought sent a shudder along the young wizard’s spine.
Even if the pair were human, Bogo would have been no less uncomfortable. He knew that while the assassins openly displayed no weapons, each of them carried many and were trained to kill with their bare hands as well.
The guards led the young wizard into the room then stepped back to the door, standing impassively on either side of the portal.
Bogo forgot about them as soon as they were behind him, for the young wizard found the two men inside the comfortable room much more interesting. Closest to him sat a puny man—if it was a man—effeminate and obviously weak, issuing a steady stream of phlegm-filled coughs. The man showed no beard at all, not even stubble. His face was too clean and soft-looking to be an adult’s. His heavy eyelids drooped lazily, and his lips, too thick and too full, seemed almost a childlike caricature.
Across the way sat the man’s opposite, a thick-muscled, robust specimen with a full, thick beard and shock of hair, both flaming red, and arms that could surely snap Bogo in half. Still, this powerful man seemed even more out of place, from what Bogo knew of the Night Masks, than did the weakling. He brandished a huge sword on his girdle and bore the scars of many battles. His dress, too, was far from that preferred by assassins. Wide, studded bracers, glittering with dozens of small jewels, adorned the man’s wrists, and his snow-white traveling cloak had been cut from the back of a northern bear, albeit a small one.
“You are Bogo Rath?” the large man asked in a smooth baritone, with an articulation that was sharper and more sophisticated than Bogo had expected.
The wizard nodded. “Well met, fellow Night Mask,” the young wizard replied with a low bow.
The red-haired man gave him a curious look. “I was not told you retained any connection to the guild,” he said. “I was informed that you left by mutual consent.”
Bogo shifted nervously from foot to foot. He had paid a huge sum to be allowed out of the Night Masks, three years earlier, and even with the bribe if it hadn’t been for the fact that his father was an influential merchant in Westgate—one with political associations and ties to the dark guild—Bogo would have been given the customary send-off for one who could not meet the Night Masks’ standards: death.
“It’s unusual to see a person who can claim that he once belonged to our beloved brotherhood,” the red-haired man teased, his cultured voice dripping with sarcasm.
Again Bogo shifted, and he had to remind himself that he was still in Castle Trinity, his home, and that Aballister and Dorigen, for all their taunts, would look out for him.
“It was an unusual circumstance,” the young wizard replied, revealing his nervousness with an uneasy flip of his stringy brown hair. “I had another calling, one that took me far from Westgate. As you can see, my departure has done us both some good. I have attained a level of power that you cannot comprehend, and you shall be paid well for doing me this one small task.”
The huge man grinned, seeming to mock Bogo’s claims of power, and looked at his puny companion, who seemed none too pleased.
“Do sit with us,” the large man bade Bogo. “I am Vander, the taskmaster for this small bit of business of which you speak. My associate is Ghost, a most unusual and talented man.”
Bogo took a seat between the two, alternating his gaze to try to determine how far he could trust the assassins.
“Is there a problem?” Vander asked after studying Bogo for a moment.
“No,” Bogo blurted. He forced himself to calm down. “I am just surprised that so many have been sent for so simple an execution.”
Vander laughed aloud, but stopped abruptly, a curious expression crossing his face. His glower fell over Ghost as his body went into a series of convulsions, and to Bogo’s amazement, Vander and his possessions began to grow.
The sword, huge to begin with, took on gigantic proportions, and the northern bear that comprised the fine cloak no longer seemed a cub. Because Vander was seated, Bogo couldn’t tell just exactly how large the man became—at least ten feet tall, he guessed.
“Firbolg?” he asked, recognizing the giant for what it was. Bogo was at a loss. A huge, red-haired man, so easily distinguishable, in the Night Masks was stunning enough, but a firbolg?
Vander’s angry glare did not relent. His dark eyes peered at Ghost from under his bushy brows. He regained his composure quickly, though, and rested back in his seat.
“Forgive me,” he said to Bogo. “I am indeed of the race of giant-kin, though I do not openly reveal my more-than-human stature.”
“Then why—?” Bogo began to ask.
“An indiscretion,” Vander quickly interrupted, the tone of his deep voice indicating that he did not wish to continue.
Bogo wasn’t about to argue with an eight-hundred-pound giant. He crossed his hands defensively over his lap and tried hard to appear relaxed.
“You question our number?” Vander asked, going back to the wizard’s original inquiry.
“I did not expect so many,” Bogo reiterated.
“The Night Masks take no chances,” Vander replied. “Often executions appearing so simple prove the most difficult. We do not make mistakes. That is why we are so well rewarded for our efforts.” He cocked his giant head to one side—a curiously ungiantlike action, Bogo thought—and looked to the pouch on Bogo’s rope belt.
Taking the cue, the young wizard pulled the bag of gold from his belt and handed it to Vander. “Half payment,” he explained, “as was agreed to by your superiors.”
“And by yours,” Vander was quick to remark, not willing to give Bogo the upper hand, “a wizard named Aballister, I believe.”
Bogo neither confirmed nor denied the claim.
“And you will accompany us, as a representative of Castle Trinity, in this matter?” Vander stated as much as asked. “Another unusual circumstance.”
“That, too, was agreed upon,” Bogo replied. The way he continually moved his fingers defeated the conviction in his tone. “By both parties,” he prudently added, “most likely because I was once a member of your guild and understand your ways.”
Vander stifled an obvious urge to deflate the pretentious young man’s swelling ego. The giant surely knew that Aballister had paid a considerable amount of extra gold to get Bogo included, and that the young wizard’s assignment had nothing to do with Bogo’s past employment with the guild.
“I will journey to Carradoon beside you,” Bogo continued, “to offer a full report to my sup—associates.”
Vander smiled widely, catching the slip. “Whatever role you might play in the death of Cadderly does not change the sum owed the Night Masks,” he said.
Bogo nodded. “My role will be as observer, nothing more. Unless, of course, you, as taskmaster, decide otherwise,” he agreed. “Might I enquire of your own role?” Bogo paused. He knew he might be overstepping his bounds, but he couldn’t let Vander have such an obvious advantage in their dealings. “It seems unlikely that a firbolg could parade through the streets of Carradoon. And what of the Ghost?”
“He is called Ghost, not ‘the Ghost,’ ” Vander snapped. “You would do well to remember that. My own role,” he continued, mellowing a bit, “is none of your concern.”
It struck Bogo as more than a little curious that Vander took more offense at his concerns for Ghost than for himself, particularly since Bogo had directly questioned the firbolg’s value.
“Ghost will lead the way in, gather information, and prepare the target,” Vander went on. “I have twenty skilled assassins at my disposal, so we will need to secure a base near, but not within, the walls of Carradoon.”
Bogo nodded at the simple logic.
“We will leave in the morning, then,” Vander continued. “Are you prepared?”
“Of course.”
“Then our meeting is concluded,” Vander stated, motioning to the door. The sentries moved to either side of Bogo to escort him from the room.
Bogo looked back at the door many times as he made his way slowly down the corridor. A firbolg and a weakling? It seemed unusual, but then Bogo had been in the Night Masks only a day more than a month before he had begged to leave, and he had to admit, at least to himself, that he knew very little about the band’s methods.
Bogo soon dismissed all thoughts of Vander and Ghost, concentrating instead on another meeting he had planned. At Aballister’s request, Bogo would meet with Druzil to learn all he could about Cadderly and his cohorts. The imp had dealt with Cadderly on two occasions—both disastrous for Castle Trinity—and knew as much about him as anyone.
Bogo desperately wanted that knowledge. He was a bit dismayed that so many Night Masks had been assigned to the task, not because he wanted Cadderly to have a chance to escape, but because he wanted to be in on the action. More than anything else, Bogo Rath wanted to play a vital role in the kill, wanted to gain the respect of Aballister, and particularly Dorigen.
He was tired of the taunts, of being referred to as “Boygo.” How would mighty Dorigen, who returned from Shilmista stripped of her valuable possessions and with her hands broken and swollen, feel when Bogo delivered the head of Aballister’s troublesome son? Cadderly, after all, had been the source of Dorigen’s humiliation.
Bogo dared to dream that he might ascend within Castle Trinity’s hierarchy to become Aballister’s second. Dorigen’s hands were slow to heal; the fortress’s clerics doubted that many of her fingers would ever straighten. Given that precise movements played a vital role in spell casting, who could guess the implications to Dorigen’s power?
Bogo rubbed his soft hands together eagerly and sped off for the meeting room, to where Druzil, his guide to a better life, waited.
“How dare you do that to me!” the firbolg growled at his companion as soon as Bogo had gone. A nod from him sent the two guards scrambling from the room. The giant leaped from his seat and advanced a step.
“I did not know that my … that your … body’s size would return to normal,” the little man protested, trying to sink deeper into the cushions of his soft chair. “I believed the enchantment would last longer, at least through the meeting.”
The firbolg grabbed the little man by the collar and hoisted him into the air.
“Ah, Vander,” the giant purred, his face suddenly calm, “dear Vander.”
Then the firbolg’s face contorted in rage again and he punched the little man in the face, destroying his nose. A backhand slap raised a welt on one cheek, and a second slap did likewise on the other. Then, with an evil grin, the firbolg grabbed the little man by one forearm and snapped his bone so severely that the man’s fingers brushed against his elbow.
The beating went on for some time, and finally the firbolg dropped the barely conscious man back into his seat.
“If you ever deceive me so again …” the red-haired giant warned. “If ever again you humiliate me in front of one such as Bogo Rath, I will beat you until you beg for death!”
The smaller man, the real Vander, curled up in a fetal position, cradling his shattered arm, feeling terribly vulnerable and afraid trapped inside the puny body of the weakling Ghost.
“I want my body back,” Ghost said suddenly, tugging uncomfortably at his firbolg trappings. “You are so hairy and itchy!”
<
br /> Vander sat up and nodded, eager to be back in his own form.
“Not now,” Ghost growled at him. “Not until the wounds heal. I would not accept my body back in less than perfect condition,” he said wryly. “As it was when I gave it to you.”
Vander slumped back. The game had grown old over the last few years, but what options lay before him? He couldn’t escape Ghost’s evil clutches, couldn’t resist the demands of Ghost’s magic. Vander wanted nothing more than to get back into his firbolg form and pound the little man, but he knew that Ghost would simply initiate a switch back, and Vander would feel the pain of his own attacks. Ghost would continue the beating, Vander knew, for the better part of a day sometimes, until poor Vander broke and wept, begging his master to stop.
The trapped firbolg put a hand to his broken human nose. Already it was on the mend. The pain had faded and the bleeding had stopped. The broken forearm had straightened again and Vander could feel a warm tingling as the bone knitted back together. Just a few more moments, he thought to comfort himself, and I will have my body back, my own strong body.
“I will be leaving presently,” Ghost said to him. He pointed a threatening finger Vander’s way. “Remember that you are my spirit-mate,” he warned. “I can come back for you, just for you, Vander, from any distance, at any time.”
Vander averted his eyes, unable to deny the threat. Once he had tried to flee the nightmare his life had become, had gotten all the way home to the Spine of the World, but Ghost, thousands of miles away, had found him and forced a body switch. Merely to show Vander the folly of his actions, Ghost had mercilessly slaughtered several of Vander’s fellow firbolgs, including his brother, on a little-used mountain trail east of Mirabar. Vander vividly remembered the terrible moment when Ghost had given him back his body, holding his oldest son’s left arm in his gigantic hand.