King Pinch

19

The first thing the regulator noticed as he eased himself down the narrow staircase was the uncanny brightness of the place. Then he realized he hadn't brought candle or lantern with him. There was at least one advantage to having the lich's body, though it hardly compensated for the crime wrought upon him.

The next thing Pinch noticed was how much easier it was to track. He understood now how the quaggoth moved through the tunnels so easily. The dark passages had the appearance of an overcast day.

The question was, where had the beast gone? The creature had a considerable head start and could have chosen any number of paths. The rogue's only resource, the dust-laden floor, was a useless guide now. It was all churned and muddied by comings and goings till it was far beyond his ability to read anything in it.

In this the rogue's luck held, for the quaggoth was just in sight. The great white beast was ambling down the passage, not imagining it was being followed.

The second fortunate thing was that being dead had not robbed Pinch of all his skills. He still knew to creep and skulk about, though knowing was not the same as doing. It was one thing to know how to step lightly, but the rogue wasn't sure he could get the rotting hulk that was his prison to cooperate. There was only one way to know, and that was by trying. He set out as light-footed as he could, but in his desire for stealth every noise was agonizingly magnified. There was no time to gain a proper body sense of the lich, so every move was accompanied by a cluster of scrapes and bumps even the dullest novice could have avoided-and Pinch especially if he had been in his own flesh. His bone-bare feet went scritch-scritch over the hard stone. Little bits of his body splashed softly splashed into the puddles at the wet spots. They weren't loud noises, but they were loud enough to Pinch's ear and pride.

Nor did they pass unnoticed. Several times Ikrit stopped and eyed his back trail suspiciously, even at moments when Pinch swore he made no noise. The beast wrinkled his broad nose, and that's when Pinch realized he had another complication.

The corpse stank. It was "the corpse" and not himself-the rogue refused to accept Manferic's body as his new identity. He remembered that Manferic's body could foul the air of a perfumery. The body's nose was apparently immune to its own fetor, for he could not catch a whiff of it, but apparently the quaggoth was not immune. Now not only did he have to be stealthy, he apparently also had to remain upwind of his prey. If not, he'd be the first thief ever discovered by his stench. Not the epitaph he wanted on his grave, that was for certain!

The stalking game of cat and mouse continued, although it was never clear who was the cat and who the rodent. Ikrit stopped far too frequently to suit Pinch yet never seemed to tumble to the rogue's presence. It was almost as if the quaggoth were hearing something else that eluded Pinch's dulled ears. The result was a maddeningly slow pace for the thief. He was of the utter conviction that time counted for everything, that his body had to be regained by the coronation. After that, reaching Manferic/Janol/Cleedis-it was impossible to choose a single name for the lich-would be well-nigh impossible. The privileges of the palace would surround the creature, and between the guards and the lich's spells it would be impossible to get close to the dread lord. Pinch's mind had already plotted that the best hope lay in the sheltering confusion of the festival. The lich was most apt to be distracted now before its triumph was complete.

But what then? Assuming he found Manferic, how was Pinch supposed to get his body back? The rogue had no idea. Manferic certainly wasn't going to give it up easily, not after all the trouble he'd gone to just to collect it, and Pinch had no spells to force the issue. Damnation, he wasn't even sure what had happened to him! All he had was his faith in improvisation, the belief that if somehow he saw his way through, something would give him a chance.

There was only one problem with his determined optimism. Ikrit wasn't cooperating. With his improved eyesight and his past experience, Pinch knew enough to say the ape-thing wasn't bound for Manferic. It was avoiding all the tunnels Pinch remembered and plunging into areas the thief did not recognize. Admittedly, there was only so much he could remember about darkened stone, but the haze of dust clearly meant that no one had passed this way in recent time.

This was not good, but what could he do? Short of marching through the halls of the palace, Ikrit was his only lead. He had to follow where the beast led.

Thus he was trailing the creature, slipping into a crack in the catacomb wall when it paused for the hundredth time, that Pinch was caught unawares. As he was peering carefully from his shallow hiding place, the angry buzz of a hornet sang loudly in his sense-clogged ears. A shadow hurtled past and skipped onto the stone between him and the quaggoth with a rattling clatter.

As the thief was held prisoner by amazement, trying to fathom what had just happened, the silence was rent by cries of war. Ahead of him, doing all things at once, the quaggoth bellowed with bloody rage, dropped into half-doubled crouch, and charged, talons bared, straight down the corridor for him.

Gods pluck a rose, Pinch panicked, he's seen me! With his instinct to run in full alarm, the regulator spun about as quick as the rickety body would let him-

And came nigh-on face-to-face with two hundred-plus pounds of charging dwarven hate. The barrel-chested, black-bearded little man had cast aside a crossbow and was in the act of whirling an iron-studded mace over his head for a furious blow. "Death to the king!" Iron-Biter roared.

Pinch flopped his decrepit body back into the niche in which he'd sheltered. He was barely fast enough. Just in front of him, all forces collided in the narrow passage. Iron-Biter's mace hit the wall scant inches from the rogue's forehead. Stone ripped in sharp splinters and ricocheted around his head. The shards tore into Ikrit's outstretched arms as the quaggoth slammed into the stocky dwarf like a brawling stevedore. The impact flung the dwarf backward, and it was only his warblood, which even a surplice couldn't change, that gave him the determination to hold his footing. Ikrit slashed with his broken claws, ripping ragged gashes through the dwarf's armor. Blood leaked over the rent chain mail.

Pinch squeezed into the scant hollow as deep as he could. The battle raged too damn close for him to be safe. Ikrit's back-cocked elbow slammed him in the chest, spraying rot over his tattered cloak. If he'd been Pinch and not this festering thing, the blow would have punched the wind out of him like a noisy sack. Fortunately, at this moment, he didn't breath.

"Clubs!" Maeve's familiar voice shrilled from down the passage. It was a warning to her friends to stand clear, a slang the mage used just before she was about to cut loose with a spell large and nasty.

"Maeve, for the gods' sakes-NO!" Pinch yelled with the realization that he was almost certainly standing at the blast center of whatever it was. The scream, though, was absurd: far too shrill, far too unbelievable to be heeded. Abandoning the wisdom of eyes to the foe, Pinch threw his cloak up and huddled against the wall.

Almost immediately, the clang and squeal of battle was complemented by a thunderous crack. The rogue had heard the sound oft before, and every time it reminded him of the bang of smoke powder rockets from Shou. The air exploded in a tingling concussion of heat and static, punctuated by first one metallic howl of pain and then a second, more bestial, squeal. Jagged ribbons of blue fire embraced the huddled thief, rippled the scant hair, and sparked in front of his eyeballs. The maggots and worms fell in roasted flakes from his corpse, but the electric agony Pinch awaited never materialized.

Staggered by amazement, Pinch rose from his huddle to confront the battle once more, except that there was no battle left. The passage in front of him was a bloody smear of white fur and broiled flesh. What was left of Ikrit had been flung a good rod down the passage. The body was there, but the quaggoth's flattened broad head was all but gone, transformed into a smoldering, blood-strewn blot. Ikrit was dead, without even a convulsive hint at life.

Even as he absorbed the sight, the battle began again all too fast. "Die, you thing of evil!" a shaky voice commanded. Iron-Biter was staggering to his feet even as he held forth the seal of his order. The dwarf was calling upon the majesty of his god to undo the evil that bound this undead thing to the world. The only problem was that, being undead only in the flesh, Pinch just didn't fit the mold. The words and the display had no effect on him.

Nonetheless, the dwarf gave it his best, screwing up his blood-splattered face in a grotesque mask of concentration. He was bleeding from gashes over his shoulders and chest, his leather and iron helmet was twisted black from the bolt, blood flowed from a loose flap in his scalp to soak his bearded cheek, and his whole frame shook with exertion, but the dwarf intoned his orison with a will. Behind him, well back and awaiting the outcome, were the rest of the ragtag band: Sprite, Maeve, Therin-and Lissa in their tow.

Pinch almost wanted to laugh at the futility of it, but there was no time. Realizing this monster was not to be turned, Iron-Biter threw aside the effort and changed his chant. The words and gestures were a spell. Pinch didn't know what, but it couldn't be good for him. The dwarf had death and murder in his eyes. Pinch had to stop him now or not at all.

Besides, there was the matter of old scores to settle.

Even as the dwarf raised his voice in the final binding of the spell's power, Pinch lunged forward. He had no weapons, little hope of besting the bear-sized dwarf in a hand-to-hand battle, and no particular courage for straight-up fighting, but it was a long sight better than standing still to be blasted to shreds.

His lunge startled the priest, who expected to fight with magic and not his hands. Pinch got one hand on Iron-Biter's arm, wrenching awry the intricate patterns he'd been weaving in midair. To the rogue's amazement, the skin beneath his corrupt fingers instantly turned an icy blue, the lines of his chilling touch tracing their way up the dwarf's veins toward his heart. Seizing on that opening, Pinch got his other hand closed around the throat, squeezing to a gurgle what would have been a scream if the rogue weren't crushing the little priest's windpipe. The frozen blue pallor spread underneath the dwarf's beard and emerged on his cheekbones.

Iron-Biter was far from defenseless, though. With his free arm he swung his holy symbol, a weighty replica of the Cup. It cracked against hollow ribs with enough force that Pinch knew it had caused harm. His mind told him that, but his nerves remained dead to the blow. No pain, he thought, a lich must feel no pain.

He squeezed tighter, and that's when he made his next discovery. Along with the icy touch, Pinch had inherited the lich's strength. His bloodless fingers squeezed down. Flesh tore and bones snapped within his grasp. Iron-Biter's eyes bugged as he corded his neck muscles to hold off the pressure. It was a losing battle and the dwarf knew it. He dropped the mace and scrabbled for something at his belt.

No mercy, Pinch knew. Iron-Biter would show him none, and he couldn't afford to give any. He squeezed harder, starting to hear the clicking grind of cartilage giving way.

Over the dwarf's shoulder, five motes of light hurtled from Maeve's fingertips to strike Pinch cleanly. With each he rocked a little, like the impact of an arrow, and like the mace he knew these were hurting him though he felt nothing. This had to be ended quickly or his friends would kill him, all the time believing him to be Manferic.

The dwarf pulled something from his belt-a short stubby stick of intricate workmanship. It was some kind of magical rod, Pinch knew, especially since the end glowed with magical fire.

The dwarf never got a chance to use it. Discovering his strength, the rogue heaved the massive dwarf easily from the floor and slammed him against one wall and then the other. It was exhilarating, hurling his tormentor about like a helpless rat. With each crash his grip on the dwarf's windpipe tightened until at last there was a loud crack as the vile priest's neck snapped. Triumphant against his own odds, Pinch hurled the body to the floor.

"Should have killed me in the tower, you bastard!" the rogue snarled in victory.

"Clubs!"

It was Maeve again. The target clear, she was readying another of her massive spells, one that Pinch knew in his heart he would not survive.

He did the only thing he could thing of. He dropped to his knees and threw up his hands in complete submission.

"Maeve-don't! It's me, Pinch!" His voice was a dry screech, ignoble but to the point.

The woman's hands raised-

And then dropped. It had worked. At least Maeve hadn't blasted him to shreds. He could see the four of them in hasty conference.

Finally Therin sidled to the front. "Move and she'll finish her spell. Understood?"

"Of course, Therin," Pinch croaked back, his heart in his mouth-if he still had a heart.

"Who are you?" Therin shouted, not coming any closer.

"I told you-Pinch. Manferic switched bodies with me."

There was another huddled conference at the far end of the passage.

"Impossible. That's bull-"

"It happened."

"Prove it."

Prove it? How in the hells was Pinch supposed to do that? He thought for some secret that only he would know. "Sprite," he finally called out, "remember Elturel, in the Dwarf's Piss Pot last summer? What did you do with those emeralds you lifted off of Therin?"

There was a hushed silence at the other end. "Emeralds?" a voice, Sprite, finally squeaked. "What emeralds?"

"You remember, don't you Therin," Pinch rasped back, "those big ones that you lifted off that jeweler from Amn?"

"He stole them off me?"

"He's lying-I wouldn't nip you, Therin!" Sprite squeaked again.

"Well then how the hells did he know?"

"I'll bet that lich tortured it out of old Pinch," the halfling replied. It was hard to say how much of that was in good faith and how much was a lie to save his own hide from Therin's wrath.

Damnation, this wasn't working, Pinch thought. It was a bad choice of example. He needed something stronger.

"Maeve!" he bellowed as best this wretched husk allowed him. It was getting passing uncomfortable on his knees, even without the feeling of pain. He'd never been on his knees to anyone before and he didn't know as it was likely in the future. It was undignified and crass and that bothered him, but he was able to swallow it so long as it kept him alive. Pinch, master thief, was a practical man in no hurry to die. If saving his life meant being on his knees, then so be it. Dead men had a hard time getting revenge, some would say, although Pinch wasn't so sure in this case. Manferic had made a fine job of it.

"Maeve, probe my mind, if that's what it'll take to convince you."

A third quick conference took place. There was considerable debate on this one. Finally, Therin, clearly acting as the new regulator in his absence, shouted, "No trickery-we've got bows and we've got a priest!"

"No trickery."

Pinch closed his eyes, calmed his mind, and waited. Just because exposing his mind was his only hope of proving himself, it didn't mean he wanted her to know all his secrets. Without really knowing how, he tried to bar certain areas of his mind from her prying.

When she came, it was a tickle like what he'd felt under Manferic's gaze, although her scan did not carry with it the painful itch of the lich's hateful will. Pinch did his best to stay calm under the scan. He tried to think about the drinking bouts, the jobs they'd pulled, even Therin's hanging where she'd played an important part. Most of all he put it into his mind to increase her share of the take. Certainly a bribe wouldn't hurt in a time like this.

Like the devil in all things though, those thoughts that he'd never entertained more than once in a year of fortnights now all decided to make their appearance, or so it seemed. Things he'd never said and regretted, cheats he'd pulled on his own gang, even the squeals he'd made to get rid of his foes all chose to surface now. Maeve was reading a mindful, there was no doubt, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

At last the tickling stopped. She withdrew her mind and let him rest. Not that his dead muscles felt strained. What rest did a lich need or ever take? If it slept, the fierce will that kept it alive might waver and fade. If that happened there would be far fewer liches in the world.

All he could do was wait nervously for Maeve's decision.

And she damn well took her time. He knew he was Pinch and he knew she'd read enough of him to know that, but she was lingering on her pronouncement. No doubt, he raged to himself, she was enjoying having him on the spit. If he ever got out of this, he'd have to make sure she gained no profit from the venture.

"It's Pinch all right," Maeve said with a touch of awe. "I ain't sure what happened, but I know his fashion. It's him."

"That… thing is him?" Therin drawled, clearly filled with disbelief.

"He knows garbage what only Pinch would know, like how we fetched your body after the hanging in Elturel. More than that, too, like jobs we've pulled where there ain't nobody who knows them and all. I tell you, it's Pinch."

Therin looked back at the kneeling lich-thing. "Pinch, that really you?"

" 'Swounds, it's me, you big hay-headed Gur! I should've left you as that fortune-teller's stooge for all the good you're doing me."

Sprite and Maeve both looked at Therin with keen interest. It had always been a question between them just where the old master had found the big Gur.

"Well met, then, I guess," Therin hailed, face reddened at his secret. "Come over-but slowly, old man."

Lissa looked at the lot with a highly jaundiced eye, more than suspicious of their easy familiarity with this creature called Pinch. They talked all too freely of jobs and hangings to be anything like honest folk. She'd always had suspicions, but every time they arose, she'd convinced herself or let others convince her otherwise. Now, she finally realized, she'd been blind to it all this time.

"You're all a lot of thieves!"

"What did you imagine we were-lousy prophets?" Therin snapped.

"You lied to me!"

"We lie to everyone, miss," Sprite explained with glee. "It's our stock and our trade. Don't feel bad for being taken. We'd be pretty poor rascals if we couldn't fool anyone."

"Sprite's right, dearie," Maeve added to the chorus. "Consider yourself honored into our company. Pinch called upon you in particular for aid, so he must think highly of you-and it's Pinch now we've got to see to."

"Aye," Sprite echoed. He looked at the moldering form that shuffled closer. "What happened, Master Pinch?" There was still a hesitancy in his voice, lest this be some hideous creature approaching.

"Manferic," the corpse croaked. "He traded bodies with me-though I don't think that was his full intention."

"What happened?" Maeve demanded, magical business making her sharply attentive.

As quickly and clearly as he could, Pinch explained the course of his meeting with Manferic. He had no idea what clues were needed to restore his body and so, against his true nature, he spared nothing in the telling. When it was done, Pinch croaked, "Ladies, tell me. How do-"

"I'm not sure I should even help you, thief," Lissa cut in, still rankling at her discovery.

"Leave me and you leave Manferic. Would your conscience feel better by placing a lich on the throne, priestess? What would the Morninglord think of that?" Pinch snapped. He didn't have time for this. That he knew instinctively.

Lissa went white, then reddened, horrified at the prospect yet outraged as his tone. "Very well, in this… but in this only!"

With that settled, the two spellcasters looked thoughtful as they debated. Like plotters on the stage, they whispered dramatically to each other as they considered various possibilities.

"Pinch," Sprite asked while they waited, "if it can be done, what the plan?"

"Plan?

The halfling gave a wan smile. "Sure, a plan-you've always got a plan."

If he could have sighed in this musty body, he would have sighed. "You know, Sprite, all through this game I've had plans and schemes and thought I was in control. Now my life turns out to be one of Manferic's grand plans. Pinch the master planner-hah! Well, Sprite, this time I've got no plan. All my other plans have turned into traps as Manferic twisted my plots around. This time we're just going to improvise and let's see him plan for that."

"Great plan," Therin remarked gloomily.

The two spellcasters ended their conference and Maeve spoke for them both.

"About your body, Pinch. We don't know-"

"But there might a chance. If we can get you close enough to you-er, Manferic-I might be able to dispel the magic that holds you."

"And then?"

Lissa bit her lip. "I'm not really sure. You should switch bodies."

"Or?"

"Or both of you vanish into the void, like Manferic said."

"That's it? Just get this," Pinch gestured to the rot that was himself, "into the middle of a coronation and-"

"What was that?" Sprite hissed as he waved his hands for attention.

"What?"

"Quiet. Listen," the halfling commanded. He stood on his hairy tiptoes, his head cocked so that his pointed ears where tipped to catch the least chitter in the halls. "That-did you hear it?"

The others strained, hearing nothing.

"Ikri…"

There was a voice, faint and distant.

"Ikrit…"

From somewhere in the depths of the tunnels, a woman was calling.

"Ikrit!"

Pinch looked at the blasted white mass that choked the passage ahead. The quaggoth had been going somewhere, but not to Manferic. There was only one other choice. "The woman…"

"What? What woman, Pinch?" Sprite demanded.

"Lady Tulan, my mother," was the answer.

"By the Morninglord," Lissa gasped, "your mother's down here? I thought you were an orphan."

"It's a long tale to tell now." Pinch dismissed it with a wave of his rotted hand. His dead eyes suddenly glowed with cold light, a small spark of the willpower he'd inherited from his father. "We've got to find her. I know what revenge Manferic deserves."

"He's gone maundering. Wit's left him," Maeve whispered to Therin.

"Comes from being dead." The Gur tensed his muscular frame, just sensing the need if Pinch got violent.

"I'm not mad," their corpse-bodied leader growled, surprising them with the insight of his senses. "Just help me get back my proper body and I'll nip what Manferic and Vargo prize most. The first thing is to find my mother."

"Think she'll take a ghoul as a son?" The halfling, who had raised the question, didn't figure the query needed an answer. He was just reminding his captain of the realities of the situation.

"Gods' pizzle," he swore, "she can't see me like this! She'll think I'm Manferic." Pinch flapped the rags that hung on his body, waving his frustration.

"Leave her and we'll be out of here," Therin suggested.

"Mask curse you!" the regulator swore with a clear vehemence that was undimmed by his lipless elocution. "She's my mother."

"Yesterday she could've been a common stew for all you cared then!" Therin snapped back.

"Therin, he's got a plan," Sprite interceded, laying a hand on the bigger's arm. The small face looked up with ridiculously large eyes: Sprite's playing his looks for the sympathy of the crowd. "If we don't help him, then there ain't none of us like to get out of Ankhapur alive. It's you who should go find this Lady Whatever."

"Me?"

"You've a way with ladies. Besides, you think she'd heed me, only a halfling?"

"I'll go, too," Lissa volunteered, trying to do the noble thing.

"No-Maeve, go with Therin," Pinch ordered, treating the suggestion a done deal. "I'll need you, priestess, if we're going to be facing a lich."

"And what if I should say no?" Therin asked.

"Relish the rest of your life down here, do you?" Sprite added. When Therin frowned, the halfling added, "Then get going."

"How'm I supposed to find my way out?"

"She'll know the way," Pinch growled, flashing his yellow teeth through a cold smile of hunger. "Just be at the Rite of Choosing.

"He's right, Therin. Let's go." Maeve gathered up a lantern and waited for the Gur to come.

The regulator immediately dispensed with them and turned to Sprite-Heels and Lissa. "I'll need you two with me. Sprite, can you pace us out to someplace other than my rooms?"

The halfling nodded. "Couldn't get this lot back into your kip, so I had to find another way in. That's what kept us from…" Sprite let it trail off as he wasn't sure it was good business to raise his failures up right now, especially since Pinch hadn't fared too well.

"Then stop prattling and go. Late off the start's almost cost the race already."

There was a disconcerting way to Pinch's saying it that gave life to the blue-gray pallor of his skin. He was a cold thing with a hunger that was only going to be satiated with cold revenge.