Her Majesty's Wizard

CHAPTER 7

The campsite lay quiet, silvered by a gibbous moon, warmed by the glowing coals of the fire. Stegoman lay curled up under the trees, neck curled around his body, his tail overlapping his head. Sir Guy, Matt, and the princess lay under their cloaks around the fire, sound asleep.

Matt snapped awake, suddenly and totally. He stared through a gap in the trees at the plain that swept to the horizon. What had awakened him?

Then it came again - along, drawn-out, despairing wail. A woman in trouble! Matt rolled to his feet and leaped around the fire to shake the Black Knight's shoulder. "Sir Guy, wake up! There's a damsel in distress!"

Sir Guy snored, then rolled over on the pine boughs. Matt shook him again, but the Black Knight didn't even snore back this time.

"Wake up!" Matt bellowed. "Fire! Earthquake! Ragnorak!"

There was no response.

"So much for chivalry!" Matt growled. He yanked a dagger from Sir Guy's possessions, wishing the knight weren't sleeping on his sword, and ran through the gap in the trees.

As he leaped out onto the plain, the scream came again -- raw, ragged, and much nearer. Matt swung toward the sound - and saw a girl running at an angle toward him, panting in terror.

Long, black hair streamed back from a finely chiseled ivory face. Full breasts stretched the fabric of her bodice taut, and her skirts whipped tightly about long, slender legs and the curve of her hips. Even in panic, there was something about her that promised impossible pleasure for the man lucky enough to possess her.

Matt kicked into a run.

She fled toward the horizon, angled his way, without even a backward glance, running for her life.

Hobbling and leaping over the plain on thick, stunted legs, giggling and drooling, came something eight feet tall and four wide. Four steel-cable tentacle arms flailed the air. Huge platters of eyes reflected the moonlight, and a foot-wide mouth revealed a set of shark-like teeth.

Troll, Matt's mind screamed at him. His body went into overdrive as he ran toward the girl. But he knew he wasn't fast enough.

The troll leaped, landing five feet behind her. She was hampered by her clothes - kirtle, bliaut, and cloak of rich fabric. A tentacle slashed out, snatching at the girl's cloak. She stumbled, her body slamming against the fabric, and it tore in a huge, jagged rent. She screamed, but staggered back into a run, the troll snickering behind her.

It slashed out again, catching her skirt. The kirtle tore. Two tentacles shot out, one catching the hem of her skirt, the other hooking into her collar. The girl spun about as the bliaut tore open in a long, jagged rent along its whole length. A third tentacle hooked the back of the neckline, and the bliaut snapped her arms up as it came away from her. For a moment, she stood poised, arms high in the moonlight, in only her shift.

Then a clawed tentacle slashed down at her, and she threw herself down backward to avoid it. The troll howled laughter and pounced, but she was too quick for him; she rolled to the side just in time and kept rolling.

She was free for a moment and was up and running. The troll howled and pounced. She threw herself to the side-straight against a thorn bush. She leaped away, but the shift caught in the thorns, ripping away in a jagged line just below her hips.

The troll caught her with a howl of glee, pinning her arms to her sides with tentacle loops, lifting her toward the gaping shark's mouth.

Then Matt reached the troll and leaped, striking home.

The dagger struck a tentacle and the troll howled, dropping the girl - and Matt suddenly realized what a fool he was to attack with only a dagger. He leaped away, chanting frantically,

The dagger surged in his hand like a living thing as the blade tripled its length. The edge glinted in the moonlight.

The troll was on him, with a howl like a steam whistle.

Its tentacles whipped out for him. Matt leaped to the side and slashed at its midriff. The blade struck a spark from its body and skidded. The beast was hard!

The troll twitched its tentacles out of the way and pushed its huge body toward him, giggling inanely. The huge trunk swung into the arc of the blade, and the sword clanged off its side in a shower of sparks. The jar shot pain up Matt's whole forearm. He leaped back, hanging onto the blade by sheer determination, while realization exploded in his mind. Trolls were made out of stone!

Steel was no use against stone. He needed something harder. Diamond!

He turned and ran, hearing the huge feet drumming the earth as the troll followed. Matt panted out a rhyme as he ran.

The sword twitched in his hand, now black and gleaming.

Matt whirled about, swinging the sword with both hands. The blade scored deep into the monster's body, and it leaped back, its scream soaring to a height that pierced Matt's ears. Ichor welled out of the gaping slit in its belly.

Matt jumped in again, but the monster had realized it was in trouble; it bent forward, and shark-like teeth scored Matt's chest, while tentacles ripped at his arm, chest, and belly. He leaped away and swung the diamond blade at the place between head and shoulders, where a neck should have been.

The tentacles lashed out, dancing toward his face. But their tips were moving erratically; they weren't under full control, and the troll was staggering.

Matt leaped to the side and swung down in a full overhand chop. He caught the troll in the same place, and the sword bit in deep, cutting halfway through its head. Its whole body jerked in one mighty spasm. It fell, twitching and heaving, scrabbling about in the dirt. But the thing was already dead, its spinal cord cut.

The spasms slowed and stopped. Matt stared down at the huge, dead thing. The corpse looked shrunken somehow, lying still in the moonlight; it was only an oddly shaped boulder in the middle of the plain.

"You have slain it!" The girl stood just a few feet away now, with the moonlight behind her showing the shadow of her body against the thin cloth of her shift. Here and there, a long gash in the fabric revealed a smooth, creamy curve.

"You have saved me! Oh, you are my true knight!" She stepped closer, her body less than a foot from his. Then she gasped and flinched away. "But you are wounded!"

The cuts were still bleeding and had begun to sting sharply. But he shook his head. "Aw, they're just scratches."

"But they must be tended." She caught up the ragged hem of her shift to wipe at the blood on his chest, exposing more curves. "You must come home with me, where I may care for them."

"Milady!" A score of armed men suddenly came running up, drawn swords in their hands. "Milady Sayeesa! Are you ...."

"Safe, little thanks to you." Her tone was severe. "But no matter. This brave knight has succored me. Now conduct us back to my home, that I may tend his wounds."

"Uh..." Matt shook his head, trying to dispel the haze to which he'd been since he first sighted the girl. "'Thanks, but I'd better not. I've got friends back there, and they'll be worried."

"Then they shall be told and invited to share what comforts I can offer. Captain, see to it!"

The captain moved away to tell off a party of six men to head back to the campsite. Swords snapped into scabbards, and the rest of the men formed up for a march.

Matt found himself alone for the moment, holding the bare sword in his hand, with no place to put it. He frowned, then recited,

A scabbard was suddenly at his hips, belted around his waist. The sword slipped easily into it, just as Sayeesa returned to his side. The captain's cape was about her shoulders now, but she seemed not to notice that it left an open strip down her front.

Her smile was compelling as she placed a hand on his arm. "Come, let us be off!"

With the girl at his side and her hip pressing against his, Matt forgot to notice in which direction they marched. Nor was he aware of how long the journey took.

Then the soldiers halted, and Matt jerked to a stop, staring.

Before him stood a palace. High walls glowed, and tall, slender towers glittered with fairy lights. The whole seemed to be made of jade. And from it came a procession of Sayeesa's servitors. There must have been a hundred of them, joyfully welcoming her. All were young and beautiful - except two. The pair of guards before the entrance were at least seven feet tall and half as broad, burly and ugly. Their skins were of a walnut shade.

"Does my home please you?" Sayeesa asked. At his enthralled nod, she waved her hand. "Then enter, that we may partake of its delights."

Inside, candles glowed everywhere. The air was filled with some heavy scent that seemed to go to Matt's head instantly. And the hallway was lined with statues, mostly of young men, though a few were of lovely girls. They seemed almost alive, each with a dazed but delighted expression.

"Marvelous!" Matt exclaimed. "What great sculptor shaped them?"

The girl hesitated, then admitted, "They are of my crafting."

"You? Lady, you're amazing!" He was standing very close to her, looking downward where the cape was open. "Almost unbelievable," he breathed.

She laughed and spun away with a coy glance at him.

"You regain your strength quickly, Sir Knight. But come hither, and I'll attend to your wounds."

'Hither' turned out to be a Roman bath, tiled in sapphire, with a huge sunken pool. There she turned him over to a pair of female servants, making some excuse about more suitable garb. They seated him on a bench. One removed his jacket while the other stripped off his shoes and socks.

But when one started unbuckling his belt, Matt called a halt. "I'll do that myself."

The girl's face registered astonishment and a trace of what might have been fear. "But sir, 'tis our custom!"

"Not mine." Matt caught an arm around each girl's waist and ushered them toward the door. "Out!"

They went, but before the door closed fully, he caught a snatch of conversation.

"Fear not. Remember, the priest was like that."

"Aye, 'tis what troubles me."

Matt slipped out of his clothes and waded into the pool. From the edge, it went down in a series of foot-high steps. He stepped down twice, then seated himself and leaned back against the warm tiles behind him with a blissful sigh. Here the heady perfume seemed stronger. The warm, murky aroma seemed to fill his head, inducing visions.

Then he heard a silken rustle behind him. Sayeesa had slipped into something that seemed almost transparently blue and silken, low at the throat.

"Rest, Sir Knight," she crooned. Her hands crept to his shoulders, kneading and massaging. "My bath has wondrous minerals in it to heal your wounds."

Matt started to protest, but Sayeesa was now stroking a cool, scented cream over his shoulders and biceps, crooning a soft, restful song in some strange language. The feel of her hands spreading the salve over his wounds and her crooning, combined with the silken sounds of her movements, drove all other thoughts from his mind.

There was a rough knock, and the door flew open, to show the captain standing there.

Suddenly Sayeesa's voice was harsh. "You know better than to disturb me! Out!"

The captain seemed to cringe, but his voice was insistent. "The man and woman have arrived."

"You know where they go!" Sayeesa snapped.

"But ... you have the keys!"

For a moment, Sayeesa stood irresolute. Then she nodded. "Very well. I'll come. Forgive me, Sir Knight. Matters of import call me. My servants will show you to your room."

She left; a moment later, the two serving girls were back. One held a supply of towels; the other laid a magnificent robe on the bench. They stared uncertainly, but left when he waved them away. By the time they returned, he was dried and attired in the robe.

They led him to two huge, gilded doors, which two other servants threw wide. Matt stepped into the bedroom of his less printable dreams. It was draped with tapestries, with a carpet which seemed to engulf his feet as he stepped on it. The bed was canopied, with curtains drawn back to show a gold-and-silver bedspread. It seemed that a squadron might sleep on its expanse.

"There is brandywine by the bedside and fruit in the bowl," one girl told him, while the other turned down the covers for him. "If you need aught else, you have but to call."

Matt stepped up to the bed, sat, and rolled onto his side. The pillow seemed to mold itself to his head, and his body was cushioned in total luxury. He yawned, and his eyes closed.

A touch on his shoulder brought him awake quickly, and he looked up to see Sayeesa in the sheerest of silken robes. She bent over him, and the robe parted. She slipped onto the bed and lifted the counterpane over her, stretching luxuriously. "You lack chivalry, Sir Knight," she purred, reaching out to caress his cheek. "Will you not show welcome to a lady?"

Matt was about to do so when a slow, seductive chant sounded, coming closer. Draperies across the room rippled and parted, and a blonde and a brunette stepped through. Each carried a sort of crystal vase with a thick-looking fluid in it.

Sayeesa sat up stiffly, and the look on her face made the two girls flinch back. The brunette gasped. "Milady, here are the oils. Do you not wish us to help..."

Their words wilted under her glare, they shrank away. Bowing low, they shuffled backward between the tapestries.

"How could I so lose control?" Sayeesa muttered to herself. "Is this one so much more that I cannot wait for each measure?"

"..Beg pardon?"

"Why, naught." She turned to face him, her face smoothing out into a lazy, inviting smile. "Or do you truly wish explanation, sir?"

"I hate explanations." Matt reached for her again. "I much prefer demonstrations."

He was about to begin when he felt her body stiffen. Her face turned dark with fury, and she sat up with an air of slow, building menace. "What do you here?"

One of the brawny, walnut-skinned guards stood there, his arms full of ironware. Matt made out something like handcuffs and a pair of what seemed to be whips.

"Milady commanded me to bring them," the creature grated.

"I did not!" It was almost a shriek. "Wherefore should I wish for such vile instruments? Get you gone, or 'twill be the axe for you!"

The guard seemed to quiver with terror. He bowed stiffly and shuffled backwards, with a sound like sandpaper sandals.

Sayeesa slowly settled back, still frowning. Matt reached for her, but with a measure of uncertainty this time.

His doubts were justified. A great gong sounded, and she sat up abruptly.

The captain strode though the door, making no effort to be silent.

"What now troubles us?" Sayeesa demanded. "You had best have good reason for this incursion, captain!"

"Madam," he said, bowing to her, "there is a dragon at the gate, attempting to destroy all this palace. And he is demanding-"

"I can guess his demands," she interrupted. "Man the defenses. I shall take measures below."

She was gone in a rush, with the captain trailing her.

Matt lay back, wondering what madness afflicted this place. A dragon? But why should a dragon assault the lady's palace? He puzzled over it briefly, but his thoughts were hazy, and he began to slip back into a sort of fantasy in which Sayeesa did not go running off.

Then words seemed to burn in his brain.

Lord Matthew, I summon you by Earth, Air, and Water. Aid me now, for my peril is great!

It was the voice of Alisande!

Matt sprang up, staring in bewilderment at the garish surroundings in which he found himself. What devilish spell had be been under?

No time to think about it. He barreled through the door and along the hall to a cross corridor. Which way now? A bedlam of screaming came from both sides.

The ones to the right were louder. Matt kicked out in a run, just as a roar like an overfed steam boiler blasted out, and the screaming went wild. He skidded to a halt at the end of the corridor, where it reached the main hall. A line of soldiers barred his way, their backs to him. He lowered his head and charged, and they bowled forward like tenpins. He snatched up a battle-axe, to find himself facing the dragon, reared back on its hind legs, with its neck stretched out and fire in its mouth. Searing flame blasted out.

Matt leaped aside, and the flame struck the row of soldiers behind him.

"Stegoman!" he shouted. The gigantic head swiveled toward him, weaving, an ugly glint in its eyes. Matt had seen that look before. "Stegoman! I'm Matthew - Lord Wizard - your friend."

"Lord Wizh ..." The dragon's eyes filled with confusion.

Matt leaped, bounced his foot off Stegoman's shoulder, and landed between two of the huge fins. "You came here seeking the princess, Sir Guy, and me-remember? Well, you've found me."

"Then let ush sheek out the otherzh!" Stegoman slammed down on all fours, searing a blowtorch arc across everything near him.

"You're wasting time, you loony lizard!" Matt had begun to put the clues he had together, now that his mind was clearing. "They must be in the dungeons - probably being tortured. We've got to find a way down..."

"Torture? I'll torch them! Vile hatchling hunterzh!" Stegoman reared back his head and blowtorched the floor. The marble cracked with a series of bursts and explosions. He let out another blast-furnace breath, and the floor gave way with a roar.

A huge shock jarred Matt's bones. He gasped and flung the battle-axe over his head, holding it broadside, like an umbrella. A few last shards of charred marble clanged off the improvised shield. Then things were relatively quiet.

Light from the huge hole overhead showed undressed stone walls and floor. They'd fallen at least thirty feet. "We're in the cellar," Matt said. "You all right?"

Before Stegoman could answer, a clamor of battle cries sounded from their right. Sayeesa's troops were probably gathering to protect the last stronghold.

Stegoman turned toward the noise, breathing torches. Fifty feet ahead, light gleamed off armor. The dragon jumped into a gallop, sending flame gouting twenty feet ahead. The lurid glow of his fire lighted tall, slender soldiers in golden armor. They shrieked, jamming into the second row behind them. In a moment, the hall was packed solid with struggling bodies.

Matt glanced at the ceiling, twenty feet overhead, and yelled, "Up and over, Steogman! Up and over!"

The dragon grunted and leaped. Matt pressed himself back against the fin, hearing howls of agony as the great claws tore at heads.

They burst into a huge room, lighted by a score of torches and a huge fire in a pit near the far wall. The place was cluttered with objects. Matt recognized a few: a tall coffin lined with spikes; the pallet and drum of a rack; and thumbscrews and whips lining the walls.

Alisande and Sir Guy were there, chained to the left wall, their arms manacled over their heads. Sir Guy was stripped to his shirt and hose, and Alisande to her shift. One of the huge guards was approaching with a six-foot branding iron, but they looked untouched, so far.

Sayeesa stood at the side, but she whirled as Matt and Stegoman burst in. Her eyes widened in terror, but she swung to seize the branding iron. "Now, Lady!" she screamed at Alisande. "Command them to stand fast, or you shall know the taste of hot iron!"

"I obey no foul minion of Evil," Alisande snapped.

The branding iron stabbed out. Matt bellowed, and Stegoman charged, roaring fire. Sayeesa dropped the iron and jumped as the flame seared the guards around her. Matt leaped down and ran toward the princess.

"Who movezh," Stegoman rumbled, "diezh!"

Sayeesa froze as Matt slid to a halt near Alisande, swinging his axe over his head.

"You come late, sir," the princess said. She moved her wrist along the wall, stretching out the six inches of chain.

Matt took a deep breath and chopped. The chain parted with a snap, and he circled to the opposite side. He chopped the second chain off. "Yeah, sorry I couldn't come sooner. I had a pressing engagement."

"And I know well what you were pressing," Alisande said between her teeth.

Sayeesa was screaming at her troops as Matt turned to free Sir Guy, and they were forming up again. Matt wasted no time in chopping through the chains that held the Black Knight.

"Late come - but well come," Sir Guy said. He turned to Sayeesa. "And now, what of the witch?"

"Witch?"

"Aye. What else could you think her?" Alisande had picked up the branding iron and was swinging it tentatively. "A foul lust-witch, who inflames men with desire - to their ruin. Already she has ended the lives of half a hundred, draining them of all energy." She glared at Sayeesa.

Sayeesa returned the glare with bitterness. Her voice rose. "Guards! Out upon them!"

The guards started forward, while Sir Guy snatched a poker from the fire. But Stegoman thundered, "Hold!" He scored the stone floor with fire in front of the ranks.

"Go! Upon them!" Sayeesa screamed. "Will you let them ruin all?"

Matt began chanting.

The irons twisted, growing and flattening into slender swords. Sir Guy grinned and cut at the air. Alisande threw a glance at Matt and turned to Sayeesa.

The witch shrank back. "Kill them now! Attack or I'll return you to nothingness!"

Despair washed over the faces of the soldiers, to be replaced by hopeless determination.

Stegoman let out a blast, sweeping the lines. But when his fire winked out as he paused for breath, they charged forward, pikes and swords slashing. Alisande and Sir Guy met them back to back, threshing death all about them.

But Sayeesa's threat to return the men to nothingness touched a response in Matt's memory. He chopped a guard aside and sprang to join the princess and the knight, laying about with the axe and crying, "They're only illusions. They seem solid, but they're made from nothing!"

"Then this illusion will have your head," a soldier howled. "Make me vanish, if you can!"

"Nothing easier," Matt shouted, blocking the blow.

Sayeesa gave a long-drawn-out wail of heartbreak, and other voices caught it up, keening in unison, as everything about them began to waver and ripple. Colors faded; shapes flowed and merged into the rippling. The rippling itself faded, until it was a cloud of mist that thinned and disappeared, leaving only a heat haze.

Even that faded and was gone.

Matt's axe fell from numbed fingers. He stood in an empty crater with a causeway thrust in from the edge. At the lip of the crater, a double line of youths and occasional girls stood shivering, looking about them uncertainly. A few still forms lay among them, very still. Around the crater stretched a blasted heath. And in the center, Sayeesa knelt in a plain tunic and cloak, doubled over with grief, sobbing her heart out.

Suddenly she screamed and yanked a knife from her robe. She swung it high, then slashed it down toward her heart.

Matt leaped and caught her wrist, just as the knife grazed her flesh. Sir Guy grabbed her from behind in a bear hug and pinioned her arms, and Matt twisted the knife free.

Sayeesa loosed one last ear-piercing scream and collapsed, slumped in Sir Guy's arms and sobbing. "Let me die! I am damned beyond saving. My sins are too terrible ever to be shriven. Let me die!"

"Nay. You still have a part to play." Alisande strode up grimly. "For your sins you must atone." She yanked Matt's sash loose. He gave a startled squawk, holding his robe shut.

"Oh, try me not with your mockery of modesty!" she snapped. "Bind her hands." Sir Guy held Sayeesa's arms, and Matt began pinning her wrists together behind her back. The princess cut a ragged strip from Sayeesa's homespun gown and bound the witch's feet. Sir Guy let the girl down gently upon the scorched earth.

Alisande was gazing at the muddle of young people near the causeway. Matt followed her gaze. "Where did they come from?"

"Her victims. Lured to her and bedazzled by pleasures untold. Tales are recounted of the vile degradations she heaped upon them, till they were drained and could no longer please her. Then she turned them to stone statues-monuments to what she no doubt thought of as her 'power of womanhood'." The princess's mouth was tight.

"And now they've come alive again - most of them." Matt frowned at the milling group. "It seems impossible that I could have broken so many spells with only one verse."

"Ah, but you broke the master-spell on her," Sir Guy explained.

"A spell on her?" Matt's eyebrows raised.

"Aye, or so rumor has it." Alisande stood glaring at the sobbing woman. "She was naught but a simple peasant wench once, though of much beauty and charm - and far too much sensuality."

Sir Guy nodded. "She was a lass for all men, though 'tis said she was goodhearted withal. She was a lass for all men, seeking always to give more, until she ceased to have self."

"You don't mean that promiscuity destroyed her identity, do you?" Matt asked. "Maybe that was her identity."

"The identity goatish men wished for her!" Alisande glared at him. "She tried to be what they wanted, thereby losing what she was. Her sinning gave Evil power over her, so that an ancient, depraved sorcerer could cast a spell to transform her into the lust-witch you met - for his own pleasure, no doubt. He died in flames shortly after, but she still had power over men, and the power to cast the glamours that arise out of desire."

"Then all these illusions and powers - her fairy palace and her servants - were only outgrowths of the sorcerer's spell?"

Sir Guy nodded.

"What about her door guards?"

"Mandrake plants," Alisande said, with a trace of contempt. "Did you not recognize them, Wizard?"

"No, never saw one before." Matt considered carefully. "Then she's no longer a lust-witch - just an ordinary girl again."

"Aye." Alisande speared him with another glare. "But beware, Wizard. She still has the power she was born with - which has proved sufficient to ruin the strongest of men."

Sayeesa lifted her head from the dirt. "Give me the knife, loose my hands, and let me die! For I am too foul to live!"

"You are not, if you still can think so." Alisande stared at the girl, her look almost sympathetic. Then her face hardened as she turned to Matt. "Thus have men done to her!"

"Well, it wasn't my spell that did it!" Matt didn't know what was bothering the princess, but he was getting tired of her attitude. "Control your tone, Lady!"

Sir Guy's eyes widened, and Alisande froze, paling. Then she spoke in a low tone, quivering with anger. "We will speak of that anon, sir, when your duties here are done."

"Duties? I didn't hear anyone blow assembly."

"Did you not?" Alisande's finger stabbed out, pointing to the naked, bewildered young folks. "There stand those poor victims, stripped to their skins in the cold night air. If you claim to any morality, Wizard, you must clothe them. I, too, am lacking, and Sir Guy is without armor."

"Nay. After they bound us in our ensorcelled sleep and brought us here, they took all from us." Sir Guy turned away. "But perchance I may find them here."

He strode off, while Matt stood with his eyes locked on Alisande's. Then he sighed. "All right, I'll try. But don't expect miracles, Lady. I'm beat."

He thought for a moment, but memory was no help. This would have to be something original, good or not.

There was a rustle, and the feeling of cloth against his skin. He looked down to see his clothes back on him under the robe. Alisande was again wearing the garments he'd first given her. And now Sir Guy was coming back, again clad in his black armor. He looked up, and the youths were all dressed.

'Reclothed,' eh? His spell hadn't just supplied the garments, it had dressed everyone with them instantly.

"Satisfied?" he demanded of Alisande.

She made no answer. Stepping forward to the edge of the crater, she held up her arms and called, "Hearken! Attend me!"

The youngsters quit "oohing" over their clothes and looked down at her, startled. They obviously hadn't realized she was there.

"I am Princess Alisande," she called out, proud and grave in the moonlight. She had the dignity and authority that could only come from being raised to it, from an impregnable sense of self. "I and my liegemen have saved you. We have broken the spell that chained you. You are clothed, and most of you live. Thank your God for that! Now stay not to marvel or doubt. Find a church to be shriven, to be granted new hope of salvation. Then return to your homes. Now depart!"

As he watched the youths begin to leave, bearing their dead with them, Matt felt a touch on his arm. He turned to see Sir Guy beside him, holding out his silver ballpoint pen. "I have never seen the like of this. Surely it must be yours. Perchance your magic wand?"

"My what?" Matt pocketed it automatically. "Uh - not exactly. Thanks, Sir Guy."

"And this?" Sir Guy held out the black sword in its scabbard. "A wondrous-seeming blade. Is it also yours?"

Matt nodded uncertainly. "Well, partly. I made it from your dagger. I suppose it's really yours."

"Nay, 'tis now yours." Sir Guy smiled. "Already I have two swords, mine own, and that which you magicked here for me."

Alisande had been watching the last of the youths depart, but now she came back, turning scornful eyes on Matt. "And now, Wizard, are you recovered from your night of revels?"

"What revels?" Matt demanded. "We'd hardly begun!"

"Begun the road to your death!" Alisande blazed. "But for your oath, you'd have been drained to a husk."

Matt stiffened... "Oath? What are you talking about?"

"The oath of fealty you swore when I created you Lord Wizard. Had it not been for that, I could not have broken the foul spell that bound you. Be assured, the words that you spoke gave me power over you."

"And me some power over you! I remember your saying a word or two."

"Aye, certes. My oath bound me to you, as did Sir Guy's to draw us into your danger. Or did you not realize, sirrah, that your lust led us all into peril?"

"Whoa! It didn't start with lust. There was a damsel in distress.. ."

"A comely damsel, no doubts and one not overly clad."

"Oh, well. But you can't think I went off fighting trolls because I was hot for her body."

"Say, rather, you fought an illusion of hers under her total control," Alisande corrected him. "She was in no danger."

"But I couldn't know that." Still, it must have been true. And if he'd had no sword to fight with, she'd probably have brought up her guards in time to rescue him, then been all sympathy as she took him to heal his wounds.

"If there had been no sin in your soul, she could not have seduced you to her," Alisande said, with scathing scorn. "When free from sin, the minions of Evil have no power over you!"

"So what am I supposed to be? A saint?" Matt cried, exasperated. "And as forgetting us into danger - why didn't you warn me that there was a lust-witch around?"

"Because, from the best we knew, her lair was a day's ride to the north," Sir Guy answered.

"It should not have mattered," Alisande declared. "And it would not, had you been a knight, not a slight country wizard!"

Matt bridled. "And just what could a knight have done that I didn't?"

"He could have known Evil when he saw it - and resisted it!"

Matt reared his head back, staring at her. "Sure, Lady! Knights never give in to temptation. Oh, never! I suppose Astaulf wasn't a knight before he usurped the throne!"

Alisande started to answer. Then she turned pale and snapped her jaw shut. She swung on her heel and stalked off into the night.

"What's the matter with her, anyway?" Matt asked Sir Guy. "Does she think I should be made out of marble?"

"She is, perchance, distressed to learn that you are not." Sir Guy pursed his lips, but there was a hint of amusement in his face. "If you can be tempted to sin by a woman's body, Lord Wizard, the princess's cause is imperiled."

Matt's brows drew down. "How do my lapses endanger the cause?"

"Because, Lord Wizard, you and I are her only true assets in the war for her throne; and of us two, you are the more vital."

"Seems to me wars really boil down to which side has the strongest fighters," Matt objected.

"Not so. For at root, this is a struggle between Good and Evil. And most potent for those forces are the wizards and sorcerers. Sorcerers must remain celibate - no human feelings must possess their attention. But even more must a wizard be virtuous, since the smallest sin weakens his power for the Good. Thus our Princess Alisande must have concern for your soul."

"Yes, I see," Matt admitted grudgingly. "But I also see that it is an invasion of privacy."

"Indeed. She most truly invaded your privacy when she summoned you by your oath, saving you from the witch." Sir Guy smiled in gentle mockery, then sobered. "Your oath was a bond, Sir Wizard, and protection against all but the most potent magics. No matter the charms the witch used on you, it would find a way to protect you against them - for a time, at least."

So that was why somebody had come bursting in on him and Sayeesa just when things started to get interesting. Then another thought occurred to him. "If I'm so important, could that have anything to do with Sayeesa's castle being suddenly so far south of where it's supposed to be? And could Malingo have anything to do with the sending of both witches against me?"

Sir Guy's brows knitted in thought. "'Tis not impossible. And that would mean more traps might be set for your soul. Were I you, Lord Wizard, I should spend much time in prayer! But come, the lady is ready to depart. Summon your friend Stegoman, and I will seek my good steed where he was left after bearing our bound bodies here."