Oathbound

Nine

The aged, half-blind mage blinked confused, rheumy eyes at his visitor. The man -- or was it woman? -- looked as awful as the mage felt. Bloodshot and dark-circled eyes glared at him from under the concealing shelter of a moth-eaten hood and several scarves. A straggle of hair that looked first to be dirty mouse-brown, then silver-blond, then brown again, strayed into those staring eyes. Nor did the eyes stay the same from one moment to the next; they turned blue, then hazel, then back to amethyst-blue. Try as he would, the mage could not make his own eyes focus properly, and light from a lanthorn held high in one of the visitor's hands was doing nothing to alleviate his befuddlement. The mage had never seen a human that presented such a contradictory appearance. She (he?) was a shapeless bundle of filthy, lice-ridden rags; what flesh there was to be seen displayed the yellowgreen of healing bruises. Yet he had clearly seen gold pass to the hands of his landlord when that particular piece of human offal had unlocked the mage's door. Gold didn't come often to this part of town -- and it came far less often borne by a hand clothed in rags.

He (she?) had forced his (her?) way into the verminous garret hole that was all the mage could call home now without so much as a by-your-leave, shouldering the landlord aside and closing the door firmly afterward. So this stranger was far more interested in privacy than in having the landlord there as a possible backup in case the senile wizard proved recalcitrant. That was quite enough to bewilder the mage, but the way his visitor kept shifting from male to female and back again was bidding fair to dizzy what few wits still remained to him and was nearly leaving him too muddled to speak.

Besides that, the shapeshifting was giving him one gods-awful headache.

"Go 'way -- " he groaned feelingly, shadowing his eyes both from the unsettling sight and from the too-bright glare of the lanthorn his visitor still held aloft. " -- leave an old man alone! I haven't got a thing left to steal -- "

He was all too aware of his pitiful state; his robe stained and frayed, his long gray beard snarled and unkempt, his eyes so bloodshot and yellowed that no one could tell their color anymore. He was housed in an equally pitiful manner; this garret room had been rejected by everyone, no matter how poor, except himself; it was scarcely better than sleeping in the street. It leaked when it rained, turned into an oven in summer and a meat-locker in winter, and the wind whistled through cracks in the walls big enough to stick a finger in. His only furnishings were a pile of rags that served as a bed, and a rickety stool. Beneath him he could feel the ramshackle building swaying in the wind, and the movement was contributing to his headache. The boards of the walls creaked and complained, each in a different key. He knew he should have been used to it by now, but he wasn't; the crying wood rasped his nerves raw and added mightily to his disorientation. The multiple drafts made the lanthorn flame flicker, even inside its glass chimney. The resulting dancing shadows didn't help his befuddlement.

"I'm not here to steal, old fraud."

Even the voice of the visitor was a confusing amalgam of male and female.

"I've brought you something."

The other hand emerged from the rags, bearing an unmistakable emerald-green bottle. The hand jiggled the bottle a little, and the contents sloshed enticingly. The rags slipped, and a trifle more of his visitor's face was revealed.

But the mage was only interested now in the bottle. Lethe! He forgot his perplexity, his befogged mind, and his headache as he hunched forward on his pallet of decaying rags, reaching eagerly for the bottle of drug-wine that had been his downfall. Every cell ached for the blessed/damned touch of it --

"Oh, no." The visitor backed out of reach, and the mage felt the shame of weak tears spilling down his cheeks. "First you give me what I want, then I give you this."

The mage sagged back into bis pile of rags. "I have nothing."

"It's not what you have, old fraud, it's what you were."

"What... I...was...."

"You were a mage, and a good one -- or so they claim. That was before you let this stuff rob you of your wits until they cast you out of the Guild to rot. But there damn well ought to be enough left of you for my purposes."

By steadfastly looking, not at the visitor, but at the bottle, the mage was managing to collect his scattering thoughts. "What purpose?"

The visitor all but screamed bis answer. "To take off this curse, old fool! Are your wits so far gone you can't even see what's in front of you?"

A curse -- of course! No wonder his visitor kept shifting and changing! It wasn't the person that was shifting, but his own sight, switching erratically between normal vision and mage-sight. Normal vision showed him the woman; when the rags slipped a little more, she seemed to be a battered, but still lovely little toy of a creature -- amethyst-eyed and platinum-haired --

Mage-sight showed him an equally abused but far from lovely man; sallow and thin, battered, but by no means beaten -- a man wearing the kind of smoldering scowl that showed he was holding in rage by the thinnest of bonds.

So the "curse" could only be illusion, but a very powerful and carefully cast illusion. There was something magic-smelling about the man-woman, too; the illusion was linked to and being fueled by that magic. The mage furrowed his brow, then tested the weave of the magic that formed the illusion. It was a more than competent piece of work; and it was complete to all senses. It was far superior to anything the mage had produced even in his best days. In his present condition -- to duplicate it so that he could lay new illusion over old would be impossible; to turn it or transfer it beyond even his former level of skill. He never even considered trying to take it off. To break it was beyond the best mage in Oberdorn, much less the broken-down wreck he had become.

Eyeing the bottle with passionate longing and despair, he said as much.

To his surprise the man accepted the bad news with a nod. "That's what they told me," he said. "But they told me something else. What a human mage couldn't break, a demon might."

"A... demon?" The mage licked his lips; the bottle of Lethe was again within his grasp. "I used to be able to summon demons. I still could, I think. But it wouldn't be easy." That was untrue; the summoning of demons had been one of his lesser skills. It was still easily within his capabilities. But it required specialized tools and ingredients he no longer had the means to procure. And it was proscribed by the Guild....

He'd tried to raise a minor impling to steal him Lethe-wine when his money had run out; that was when the Guild had discovered what he'd fallen prey to. That was the main reason they'd cast him out, destroying his tools and books; a mage brought so low as to use his skills for personal theft was no longer trustworthy. Especially not one that could summon demons. Demons were clever and had the minds of sharp lawyers when it came to wriggling out of the bonds that had been set on them; that was why raising them was proscribed for any single mage of the Guild, and doubly proscribed for one who might have doubts as to his own mental competence at the time of the conjuration.

Of course, he was no longer bound by Guild laws since he was outcaste. And if this stranger could provide the wherewithal, the tools and the supplies, it could be easily done.

"Just tell me what you need, old man -- I'll get it for you." The haggard, grimy face was avid, eager. "You bring me a demon to break this curse, and the bottle's yours."

Two days later, they stood in the cellar of the old, rotten mansion whose garret the mage called home. The cellar was in no better repair than the rest of the house; it was moldy and stank, and water-marks on the walls showed why no one cared to live there. Not only did the place flood every time it rained, but moisture was constantly seeping through the walls, and water trickled down from the roof-cisterns to drip from the beams overhead. Bright sparks of light glinted just beyond the circle of illumination cast by the lanthorn, the gleaming eyes of starveling rats and mice, perched curiously on the decaying shelves that clung to the walls. The scratching of their claws seemed to echo the scratching of the mage's chalks on the cracked slate floor.

The man-woman sat impatiently on the remains of a cask off to one side, careful not to disturb the work at hand. It had already cost him dearly -- in gold and blood. Some of the things the mage had demanded had been bought, but most had been stolen. The former owners were often no longer in a condition to object to the disposition of their property.

From time to time the mage would glance searchingly up at him, make a tiny motion with his hand, frown with concentration, then return to his drawing.

After the fourth time this had happened, the stranger wet his lips with a nervous tongue, and asked, "Why do you keep doing that? Looking at me, I mean."

The mage blinked and stood up slowly, his back aching from the strain of staying bent over for so long. His red-rimmed, teary eyes focused to one side of the man, for he still found it difficult to look directly at him.

"It's the spell that's on you," he replied after a moment to collect his thoughts. "I don't know of a demon strong enough to break a spell that well made."

The man jumped to his feet, reaching for a sword he had left back in the mage's room because the old man had warned him against bearing cold steel into a demon's presence. "You old bastard!" he snarled. "You told me -- "

"I told you I could call one -- and I can. I just don't know one. Your best chance is if I can call a demon with a specific grudge against the maker of the spell -- "

"What if there isn't one?"

"There will be," the mage shrugged. "Anyone who goes about laying curses like yours and leaving justice-glyphs behind to seal them is bound to have angered either a demon or someone who commands one. At any rate, since you want to know, I've been testing the edges of your curse to make the magerune appear. I'm working that into the summoning. Since I don't know which demon to call, the summoning' will take longer than usual to bear fruit, but the results will be the same. The demon will appear, one with a reason to help you, and you'll bargain with it for the breaking of your curse."

"Me?" The stranger was briefly taken aback. "Why me? Why not you?"

"Because it isn't my curse. I don't give a damn whether it's broken or not. I told you I'd summon a demon -- I didn't say I'd bind him. That takes more skill -- and certainly more will -- than I possess anymore. My bargain with you was simple -- one demon, one bottle of Lethe. Once it's here, you can do your own haggling."

The man smiled; it was far more of a grimace than an expression of pleasure. "All right, old fraud. Work your spell. I'd sooner trust my wits than yours anyway."

The mage returned to his scribbling, filling the entire area lit by the lanthorn suspended overhead with odd little drawings and scrawls that first pulled, then repelled the eyes. Finally he seemed satisfied, gathered his stained, ragged robes about him with care, and picked a dainty path through the maze of chalk. He stood up straight just on the border of the inscriptions, raised his arms high, and intoned a peculiarly resonant chant.

At that moment, he bordered on the impressive -- though the effect was somewhat spoiled by the water dripping off the beams of the ceiling, falling onto his balding head and running off the end of his long nose.

The last syllable echoed from the dank walls. The man-woman waited in anticipation.

Nothing happened.

"Well?" the stranger said with slipping patience, "Is that all there is to it?"

"I told you it would take time -- perhaps as much as an hour. Don't fret yourself, you'll have your demon."

The mage cast longing glances at the shadowshrouded bottle on the floor beside his visitor as he mopped his head with one begrimed, stained sleeve.

The woman-man noted the direction his attention was laid, thought for a moment, weighing the mage's efforts, and smiled mirthlessly. "All right, old fraud -- I guess you've earned it. Come and get it."

The mage didn't wait for a second invitation, or give the man-woman a chance to take the reluctant consent back. He scrambled forward, tripping over the tattered edges of his robes, and sagged to his knees as he snatched the bottle greedily.

He had it open in a trice, and began sucking at the neck like a calf at the udder, eyes closing and face slackening in mindless ecstasy. Within moments he was near-collapsing to the floor, half-empty bottle cradled in his arms, oblivion in his eyes.

His visitor walked over with a softly sinister tread and prodded him with a toe. "You'd better have worked this right, you old bastard," he muttered, "Or you won't be waking -- "

His last words were swallowed in the sudden roar, like the howl of a tornado, that rose without warning behind him. As he spun to face the area of inscriptions, that whole section of floor burst into sickening blood-red and hellish green flame; flame that scorched his face, though it did nothing to harm the beams of the ceiling. He jumped back, frightened in spite of his bold resolutions to fear nothing.

But before he touched the ground again, a monstrous, clawed hand formed itself out of the flame and slapped him back against the rear wall of the cellar. A second hand, the color of molten bronze, reached for the oblivious mage.

A face worse than anything from the realm of nightmare materialized from the flame between the two hands. A neck, arms, and torso followed. The hands brought the mage within the fire -- the visitor coughed on the stench of the old man's robes and beard scorching. There was no doubt that the fire was real, no matter that it left the ceiling intact. The mage woke from his drugged trance, screaming in mindless pain and terror. The smell of his flesh and garments burning was spreading through the cellar, and reached even to where the man-woman lay huddled against the dank wall; he choked and gagged at the horrible reek.

And the thing in the flames calmly bit the mage's head off, like a child with a gingerbread manikin.

It was too much for even the man-woman to endure. He rolled to one side and puked up the entire contents of his stomach. When he looked up again, eyes watering and the taste of bile in his mouth, the thing was staring at him, licking the blood off its hands.

He swallowed as his gorge rose again, and waited for the thing to take him for dessert.

"You smell of magic." The thing's voice was like a dozen bells ringing; bells just slightly out-of-tune with one another. It made the man-woman nauseous and disoriented, but he swallowed again and tried to, answer.

"I... have a curse."

"So I see. I assume that was why I was summoned here. Well, unless we enter into an agreement, I have no choice but to remain here or return to the Abyssal Planes. Talk to me, puny one; I do not desire the latter."

"How -- why did you -- the old man -- "

"I dislike being coerced, and your friend made the mistake of remaining within reach of the circle. But I have, as yet, no quarrel with you. I take it you wish to be rid of what you bear. Will you bargain to have your curse broken? What can you offer me?"

"Gold?"

The demon laughed, molten-gold eyes slitted. "I have more than that in mind."

"Sacrifice? Death?"

"I can have those intangibles readily enough on my own -- starting with yours. You are within my reach also."

The man-woman thought frantically. "The curse was cast by one you have reason to hate."

"This should make me love you?"

"It should make us allies, at least. I could offer revenge -- "

"Now you interest me." The demon's eyes slitted. "Come closer, little man."

The man-woman clutched his rags about himself and ventured nearer, step by cautious step.

"A quaint curse. Why?"

"To make me a victim. It succeeded. It was not intended that I survive the experience."

"I can imagine." A cruel smile parted the demon's lips. "A pretty thing you are; didn't care for being raped, hmm?"

The man-woman's face flamed. He felt the demon inside of his mind, picking over all of his memories of the past year, lingering painfully over several he'd rather have died than seen revealed. Anger and shame almost replaced his fear.

The demon's smile grew wider. "Or did you begin to care for it after all?"

"Get out of my mind, you bastard!" He stifled whatever else he had been about to scream, wondering if he'd just written his own death-glyph.

"I think I like you, little man. How can you give me revenge?"

He took a deep breath, and tried to clear his mind. "I know where they are, the sorceress and her partner. I know how to lure them here -- and I have a plan to take them when they come -- "

"I have many such plans -- but I did not know how to bring them within my grasp. Good." The demon nodded. "I think perhaps we have a bargain. I shall give you the form you need to make you powerful against them, and I shall let you bring them here. Come, and I will work the magic to change you, and free myself with the sealing of our bargain. I must touch you -- "

The man-woman approached the very edge of the flames, cautious and apprehensive in spite of the demon's assurance that he would bargain. He still did not entirely trust this creature -- and he more than certainly still feared its power. The demon reached out with one long, molten-bronze talon, and briefly caressed the side of his face.

The stranger screamed in agony, for it felt as if that single touch had set every nerve afire. He wrapped his arms over his head and face, folded slowly at the waist and knees, still crying out; and finally collapsed to the floor, huddled in his rags, quivering. Had there been anything left in his stomach, he would have lost it then.

The demon waited, as patient as a snake, drinking in the tingles of power and the heady aura of agony that the man was exuding. He bent over the shaking pile of rags in avid curiosity, waiting for the moment when the pain of transformation would pass. His expression was oddly human -- the same expression to be seen on the face of a cruel child watching the gyrations of a beetle from which it has pulled all the legs but one.

The huddled, trembling creature at the edge of his flames slowly regained control of itself. The quivering ceased; rags rose a little, then moved again with more purpose. Long, delicate arms appeared from the huddle, and pushed away from the floor. The rags fell away, and the rest of the stranger was revealed.

The visitor raised one hand to her face, then froze at the sight of that hand. She pushed herself into a more upright position, frowning and shaking her head; she examined the other hand and felt of her face as her expression changed to one of total disbelief. Frantic now, she tore away the rags that shrouded her chest and stared in horror at two lovely, lily-white -- and very female -breasts.

"No -- " she whispered, " -- it's not possible -- "

"Not for a human perhaps," the demon replied with faint irony, "But I am not subject to a human's limitations."

"What have you done to me?" she shrieked, even her voice having changed to a thin soprano.

"I told you, I would give you a form that would make you powerful against them. The sorceress' geas prevents her from allowing any harm to befall a woman -- so I merely made you woman in reality, to match the woman you were in illusion. They will be powerless against you now, your enemies and mine -- "

"But I am not a woman! I can't be a woman!" She looked around her for something to throw at the demon's laughing face, and finding nothing, hurled curses instead. "Make me a man again, damn you! Make me a man!"

"Perhaps. Later, perhaps. When you have earned a boon from me. You still retain your strength and your weapon's expertise. Only the swordswoman could be any danger to you now, and the sorceress will be bound to see that she cannot touch you. My bargain now, bandit." The demon smiled still wider. "Serve me, and it may well be I shall make you a man again. But your new body serves me far better than your old would have. And meanwhile -- "

He drew a swirl of flame about himself. When he emerged from it, he had assumed the shape of a handsome human man, quite naked; one whose beauty repulsed even as it attracted. He was still larger than a normal human in every regard, but he no longer filled a quarter of the cellar. He stepped confidently across the boundaries of the circle, reached forward and gathered the frozen woman to him. She struggled wildly; he delighted in her struggles.

"Oh, you make a charming wench, little toy; you play the part as if you had been born to it! A man would have sought to slay me, but you think only to flee. And I do not think a man would have guessed my intentions, but you have, haven't you, little one. I think I can teach you some of the pleasures of being a female, as well as the fears, hmm? Perhaps I can make you forget you ever were anything else -- "

His laughter echoed through the entire house -- but the rest of the inhabitants did no more than check the fastenings of their doors and return to the safety of their beds, hoping that whatever it was that was laughing would overlook them.

With another gesture, the demon transformed the bleak basement into a setting from a whore's nightmare; with his other hand he held his victim crushed against his chest while he reached into her mind with his.

She gasped in shock and dismay, feeling her will crumble before his, feeling him take over her senses, and feeling those senses rousing as he wished them to. He ran his hands over her body, stripping away the rags until she was as nude as he, and in the wake of his hands her skin burned with fever she could not repress.

As the last remains of her will fell to dust before his onslaught, her body, too, betrayed her; responding as the demon desired.

And at the end, she did, indeed, forget for that one moment what it had been like to be a man.

* * *

Kethry twined a lock of amber hair around her fingers, leaned over her cup and hid a smile. She found the side of herself that her swordswomanpartner was revealing disarming, and quite delightful -- but she doubted Tarma would appreciate her amusement.

The common room of their inn was far from being crowded, and the atmosphere was relaxed and convivial. This was really the best such place they'd stayed in for months; it was well-lit, the food was excellent, the beds comfortable and free of vermin, the prices not outrageously extortionate. And Tarma was certainly enjoying the company.

As she had been every night for the past three, Tarma was embroiled in a religious discussion -- a discussion, not an argument; although the two participants often waxed passionate, neither ever found offense or became angered during their disagreements.

Her fellow-scholar was a plump little priest of Anathei of the Purifying Flame. He was certainly a full priest, and might even (from his cultured accent) be a higher prelate, yet he wore only the same soft, dark brown, unornamented robes of the least of his order's acolytes. He was clean-shaven and quite bald, and his cheerful brown eyes seemed to regard everything and everyone with the openhearted joy of an unspoiled child. No straitlaced ascetic, he -- he and Tarma had been trading rounds of good wine; tonight reds, last night whites.

Tarma looked even more out of place seated across from him than she did with her sorceress-partner. She towered over him by a head, her every movement proclaiming she knew very well how to manage that sword slung on her back, her hawklike face and ice-blue eyes holding a controlled intensity that could easily have been frightening or intimidating to a stranger. With every article of her weaponry and earth-brown clothing so precisely arranged that what she wore might almost have been some kind of uniform, and her coarse black hair braided and coiled with militant neatness, she looked as much the priest or more than he -- half-barbarian priest of some warlike order, that is. She hardly looked as if she could have anything in common with the scholarly little priest.

She hardly looked literate. Certainly no one would expect erudite philosophy from her lips, not with the warlike accoutrements she bore; yet she had been quoting fully as many learned tomes as the priest -- to his evident delight and Kethry's mild surprise. It would appear that service as a Sworn One did not exclude knowledge as a possible arena of combat. Kethry had long known that Tarma was literate, and in more than one language, but she had never before guessed that her partner was so erudite.

Kethry herself was staying out of the conversation for the moment. This evening she and her partner had had an argument, the first serious disagreement of their association. She wanted to give Tarma a chance to cool down -- and to mull over what she'd said.

Because while it had been unpleasant, it was also, unfortunately, nothing less than the truth.

"You're not going out there alone, are you?" Tarma had asked doubtfully, when Kethry had voiced her intention to prowl the rather dubious quarter that housed the gypsy-mages. Kethry had heard that one of her old classmates had taken up with the wanderers, and was looking for news of him.

"Why not?" she asked, a little more sharply than she had intended.

"Because it's no place for a woman alone."

"Dammit, Tarma, I'm not just any woman! I'm perfectly capable of taking care of myself!"

"Look -- even I can get taken out by a gang of street toughs."

"In the name of the gods, Tarma, leave me alone for once! You're smothering me! I can't go anywhere or do anything without you rushing to wrap me in gauze, like a piece of china -- "

She'd stopped then, appalled by the stricken look on her partner's face.

Then, like lightning, the expression changed. "You're imagining things," Tarma replied flatly.

"All right -- have it your way." Kethry was too tired to fight with her. "You will anyway. Any time you hear something you don't like, you deny it and shut down on me -- just like you're doing now."

And she had turned on her heel and led the way into the inn's common room, ignoring the fact that Tarma looked as if the sorceress had just slapped her.

The voice of the little priest penetrated her musing.

"Nay," he said. "Nay, I cannot agree. Our teaching is that evil is not a thing of itself; it is simply good that has not been brought to see the truth. We hold that even a demon can be redeemed -- that even the most vile of such creatures could become a blessed spirit if someone with time and patience were to give him the proper redirection."

"Always supposing your proselytizer managed to keep from being devoured or ripped to shreds before he got a single word out," Tarma croaked wryly, draping herself more comfortably over the edge of the worn wooden table. "He'd better be either agile or one damned powerful mage! No, I can't agree with you, my friend. Aside from what Magister Tenavril has to say about them, I've dealt with a few demons up close and on a quite personal basis. I have to side with the Twin Suns school; the demonic beings must have been created purely of evil forces. It isn't just the Abyssal dwellers that are bad clear through, either; I've known a few humans who could pass for demons. Evil is real and a reality in and of itself. It likes being that way. It wouldn't choose to be anything else. And it has to be destroyed whenever a body gets the chance, or it'll spread. Evil is easier to follow than good, and we humans like the easy path."

"I cannot agree. Those who are evil simply don't know what good is."

"Oh, they know, all right; and they reject it to follow pure selfishness."

"I -- " the little priest blinked in the candlelight.

"Can you give me even one instance of great evil turned to good once good has been pointed out to it?"

"Uh -- " he thought hard for a moment, then smiled triumphantly. "The Great Demon-Wolf of Hastandell!"

"Oh, that's too easy. Warrl!"

A shadow in a corner of the hearth uncoiled itself, and proved to be no shadow at all, but the kyree, whose shoulder came nearly as high as Tarma's waist. Closer inspection would reveal that Warrl's body was more like that of one of the great huntingcats of the plains than a lupine, built for climbing and short bursts of high speed, not the endurance of a true wolf. But the fur and head and tail were sufficiently wolflike that this was how Tarma generally thought of him.

He padded over to the table and benches shared by the ill-assorted trio. The conversation of all the other occupants of the inn died for a moment as he moved, but soon picked back up again. After three days, the patrons of the inn were growing a little more accustomed to the monster beast in their midst. Tarma had helped that along by coaxing him to demean himself with a few tricks to entertain them the first night of their stay. Now, while the sight of him still unsettled a few of them, they had come to regard him as harmless. They had no notion of his true nature; Tarma and Kethry had tactfully refrained from revealing that he was just as intelligent as any of them -- and quite probably could beat any one of them at chess.

"Here's your Demon-Wolf -- one of his kin, rather." Tarma cocked her head to one side, her eyes far away as if she was listening. "Kyree is what they call themselves; they come from the Pelagir Hills. Warrl says to tell you that he knows that story -- that Ourra didn't know the sheep he'd been feeding on belonged to anyone; when he prowled the village at night he was just being curious. Warrl says Ourra had never seen humans before that lot moved in and settled; he thought they were just odd beasts and that the houses were some kind of dead growths -- believe me, I have seen some of what grows naturally in the Pelagirs -- it isn't stretching the imagination to think that huts could grow of themselves once you've seen some of the bushes and trees. Well, Warrl wants you to know that when the priestess went out and gave Ourra a royal tongue-lashing for eating the stock, Ourra was quite embarrassed. Without there being someone like me or Kethry, with the kind of mind that he could talk to, there wasn't much he could do by way of apology, but he did his best to make it up to the village.

His people have a very high sense of honor. Sorry, little man -- Qurra is disqualified."

"He talks to you?" the little priest said, momentarily diverted. "That creature truly talks? I thought him just a well-trained beast!"

"Oh, after all our conversation, I figured you to be open-minded enough to let in on the 'secret.' Kyree have a lot of talents -- they're as bright as you or me. Brighter, maybe -- I have no doubt he could give you a good battle at taroc, and that's one game I have no gift for. As for talking -- Warrior's Oath -- sometimes I wish I could get him to stop! Oh, yes, he talks to me all right -- gives me no few pieces of unsolicited advice and criticism, and usually with an 'I told you so' appended." She ruffled the great beast's fur affectionately as he grinned a toothy, tongue-lolling grin. Kethry tossed him one of the bones left from their dinner; he caught it neatly on the fly, and settled down beside her to enjoy it. Behind them, the hum of voices continued.

"Now I'll give you one -- evil that served only itself. Thalhkarsh. We had firsthand experience of that one. He had plenty of opportunity to see good -- it wasn't just the trollops he had stolen for his rites. Or are you not familiar with that tale?"

"Not the whole of it. Certainly not from one of the participants!"

"Right enough then -- this is a long and thirsty story. Oskar?" Tarma signaled the host, a plump, shortsighted man who hurried to answer her summons. "Another round -- no, make it a pitcher, this may take a while. Here -- " she tossed him a coin, as it was her turn to pay; the innkeeper trotted off and returned with a brimming ear then vessel. Kethry was amused to see that he did not return to his station behind the counter after placing it on the table between Tarma and the priest. Instead he hovered just within earshot, polishing the tables next to them with studious care. Well, she didn't blame him, this was a tale Tarma didn't tell often, and it wasn't likely anyone in Oberdorn had ever heard a firsthand account of it. Oskar would be attracting folk to his tables for months after they'd gone with repetitions of the story.

"From all we could put together afterward, Thalhkarsh was a demon that had been summoned purely by mistake. It was a mistake the mage who called him paid for -- well, that's usually the case when something like that happens. This time though, things were evidently a little different," she nodded at Kethry, who took up the thread of the story while Tarma took a sip of wine.

"Thalhkarsh had ambition. He didn't want to live in his own Abyssal Planes anymore, he wanted to escape them. More than that, he wanted far more power than he had already; he wanted to become a god, or a godling, at least. He knew that the quickest ways of gaining power are by worship, pain, and death. The second two he already had a taste of, and he craved more. The first -- well, he calculated that he knew ways of gaining that, too. He transformed himself into a very potently sexual and pleasing shape, built himself a temple with a human pawn as his High Priest, and set up a religion."

"It was a religion tailored to his peculiar tastes. From what I know most of the demonic types wouldn't think of copulating with a human anymore than you or I would with a dog; Thalhkarsh thought otherwise." Tarma grimaced. "Of course a part of that is simply because of the amount of pain he could cause while engaging in his recreations -- but it may be he also discovered that sex is another very potent way of raising power. Whatever the reason, that was what the whole religion was founded on. The rituals always culminated with Thalhkarsh taking a half-dozen women, torturing and killing them when he'd done with them, in the full view of his worshipers. There's a kind of mind that finds that stimulating; before too long, he had a full congregation and was well on his way to achieving his purpose. That was where we came in."

"You know our reputation for helping women?" Kethry put in.

"You have a geas?" ventured the little priest.

"Something like that. Well, since Thalhkarsh's chosen victims were almost exclusively female, we found ourselves involved. We slipped into the temple in disguise and went for the High Priest -- figuring if he was the one in charge, that might solve the problem. We didn't know he was a puppet, though I had guessed he might be, and then dismissed the idea." Kethry sighed. "Then we found our troubles had only begun. He had used this as a kind of impromptu test of the mettle of his servant; when the servant failed, he offered me the position. I was tempted with anything I might want; nearly unlimited power, beauty, wealth -- and him. He was incredibly seductive, I can't begin to tell you how much. To try and give you a notion of his power, every one of his victims ran to him willingly when he called her, even though they knew what their fate would be. Well, I guess I resisted him a little too long; he became impatient with me and knocked me into a wall -- unconscious, or so he thought."

"Then he made me the same offer," Tarma continued. "Only with me he demonstrated his power rather than just promising things. He totally transformed me -- when he was done kings would have paid money for the privilege of laying their crowns at my feet. He also came damned close to breaking my bond with the Star-Eyed; I swear to you, I was within inches of letting him seduce me -- except that the more he roused my body, the more he roused my anger. That was his mistake; I pretended to give in when I saw Kethry sneaking up behind him. Then I broke his focus just as she stabbed him; he lost control over his form and his worshipers' minds. When they saw what he really was, they deserted him -- that broke his power, and it was all over."

"She' enedra, you were in no danger of breaking; your will is too strong, he'd have needed either more time to work on you or power to equal the Warrior's."

"Maybe. It was a damn near thing; too near for my liking. Well he was absolute evil for the sake of it -- and I should well know, I had that evil crawling around in my mind. Besides that, there were other things that came out afterward. We know he took a few innocent girls who just had the bad luck to be in the wrong place; we think some clerics went in to try and exorcise him. It's hard to say for certain since they were hedge-priests; wanderers with no set temple. We do know they disappeared between one night and the next; that they did not leave town by the gates, and that they had been talking about dealing with Thalhkarsh before they vanished."

She trailed off, the set of her mouth grim, her eyes bleak. "We can only assume they went the way of all of his victims, since they were never seen or heard from again. So Thalhkarsh had plenty of opportunity to see good and the Light -- and he apparently saw it only as another thing to crush."

The little priest said nothing; there seemed nothing appropriate to say. Instead, he took a sip of his wine; from the distant look in his eyes he was evidently thinking hard.

"We of Anathei are not fools, Sworn One," he said finally, "Even though we may not deal with evil as if it were our deadly enemy. No, to throw one's life away in the foolish and prideful notion that one's own sanctity is enough to protect one from everything is something very like a sin. The arrow that strikes a friend in battle instead of a foe is no less deadly because it is misdirected. Let me tell you this; when dealing with the greater evils, we do nothing blindly. We study carefully, we take no chances; we know everything there is to be known about an opponent before we face him to show him the Light. And we take very great care that he is unable to do us harm in his misguided state."

Tarma's eyes glinted with amusement in the shifting light. "Then it may well be your folk have the right of it -- and in any case, you're going about your conversions in a practical manner, which is more than I can say for many. Once again we will have to agree to disagree."

"With that, lady, I rest content." He bowed to her a little, and the bench creaked under his moving weight. "But we still have not settled the point of contention. Even if I were willing to concede that you are right about Thalhkarsh -- which I am not -- he was still a demon. Not a man. And -- "

"Well if you want irredeemable evil in a human, we can give you that, too! Kethry, remember that bastard Lastel Longknife?"

"Lady Bright! Now there was an unredeemable soul if ever there was one!"

Kethry saw out of the corner of her eye that Oskar had not moved since the tale-telling had begun, and was in a fair way to polish a hole right through the table. She wondered, as she smothered a smile, if that was the secret behind the scrupulously clean furniture of his inn.

"Lastel Longknife?" the priest said curiously.

"I doubt you'd have heard of that one. He was a bandit that had set up a band out in the waste between here and -- "

"Wait -- I think I do know that story!" the priest exclaimed. "Isn't there a song about it? One that goes 'Deep into the stony hills, miles from keep or hold'?"

"Lady's Blade, is that nonsense going to follow us everywhere?" Tarma grimaced in distaste while Kethry gave up on trying to control her giggles. "Damned impudent rhymester! I should never have agreed to talk to him, never! And if I ever get my hands on Leslac again, I'll kill him twice! Bad enough he got the tale all backward, but that manure about Three things never anger or you will not live for long; a wolf with cubs, a man with power and a woman's sense of wrong' came damn close to ruining business for a while! We weren't geas-pressed that time, or being altruistic -- we were in it for the money, dammit! And -- " she turned to scowl at Kethry. "What are you laughing about?"

"Nothing -- " One look at Tarma's face set her off again.

"No respect; I don't get it from stupid minstrels, I don't get it from my partner, I don't even get it from you, Fur-face!"

Warrl put his head down on his paws and contrived to look innocent.

"Well, if my partner can contrive to control herself, this is what really happened. Longknife had managed to unite all the little bandit groups into one single band with the promise that they would be able-bunder his leadership -- to take even the most heavily guarded packtrains. He made good on his boast. Before a few months passed it wasn't possible for a mouse to travel the Trade Road unmolested."

"But surely they sent out decoy trains."

"Oh, they did; Longknife had an extra factor in his favor," Kethry had managed to get herself back into control again, and answered him. "He had a talent for mind-magic, like they practice in Valdemar. It wasn't terribly strong, but it was very specific. Anyone who saw Longknife thought that he was someone they had known for a long time but not someone anywhere within riding distance. That way he avoided the pitfall of having his 'double' show up. He looked to be a different person to everyone, but he always looked like someone they trusted, so he managed to get himself included as a guard on each and every genuine packtrain going out. When the time was right, he'd signal his men and they'd ambush the train. If it was too well guarded, he'd wait until it was his turn on night-watch and drive away the horses and packbeasts; there's no water in the waste, and the guards and traders would have to abandon their goods and make for home afoot."

"That's almost diabolically clever."

"You do well to use that word; he was diabolic, all right. One of the first trains he and his men took was also conveying a half-dozen or so young girls to fosterage -- daughters of the traders in town -- the idea being that they were more likely to find young men to their liking in a bigger city. Longknife and his men could have ransomed them unharmed; could even have sold them. He didn't. He took his pleasure of each of them in turn until he tired of them, then turned them over to his men to be gang-raped to death without a second thought."

The priest thought that if the minstrel Leslac could have seen the expression in Tarma's eyes at this moment, he'd have used stronger words in his song than he had.

"The uncle of one of the girls found out we were in a town nearby and sent for us," Kethry picked up when Tarma seemed lost in her own grim thoughts. "We agreed to take the job, and disguised ourselves to go out with the next train. That's where the song is worst wrong -- I was the lady, Tarma was the maidservant. When the bandits attacked, I broke the illusions; surprise gave us enough of an advantage that we managed to rout them."

"We didn't kill them all, really didn't even get most of them, just the important ones, the leaders." Tarma came back to herself and resumed the tale. "And we got Longknife; the key to the whole business."

"What -- what was the 'thorough vengeance'?" the priest asked. "I have been eaten up with curiosity ever since I heard the song, but I hardly know if I dare ask -- "

Tarma's harsh laugh rang as she tossed back her head. "We managed to keep one thing from that songster, anyway! All right, I'll let you in on the secret. Kethry put an all-senses illusion on him and bound it to his own mind-magic so that he couldn't be rid of it. She made him look like a very attractive, helpless woman. We made sure he was unconscious, then we tied him to his horse and sent him into the waste following the track of what was left of his band. I've no doubt he knew exactly what his victims had felt like before he finally died."

"Remind me never to anger you, Sworn One." The priest shook his head ruefully. "I'm not sure I care for your idea of justice."

"Turnabout is fair play -- and it's no worse that what he'd have gotten at the hands of the relatives of the girls he murdered," Kethry pointed out. "Tarma's Lady does not teach that evildoers should remain unpunished; nor does mine. And Longknife is another bit of scum who had ample opportunity to do good -- or at least no harm -- and chose instead to deliberately inflict the most harm he could. I think he got his just desserts, personally."

"If you, too, are going to enter the affray, I fear I am outnumbered." The priest smiled. "But I shall retire with dignity, allowing the justice of your assertions, but not conceding you the victory. Though it is rather strange that you should mention the demon Thalhkarsh just now."

Both Tarma and Kethry came instantly alert; they changed their positions not so much as a hair (Tarma leaning on both arms that rested on the table, Kethry lounging a little against the wall) but now they both had dropped the veneer of careless ease they had worn, and beneath that thin skin the wary vigilance of the predator and hunter showed plain.

"Why?" Tarma asked carefully.

"Because I have heard rumors in the beggar's quarter that some ill-directed soul is trying to reestablish the worship of Thalhkarsh in the old Temple of Duross there. More than that, we have had reports of the same from, a young woman who apparently dwells there."

"Have you?" Kethry pushed back the hood of her buff-colored robe. "Worshiping Thalhkarsh -- that's a bit injudicious, considering what happened at Delton, isn't it?"

"Injudicious to say the least," the priest replied, "Since they must know what will happen to them if they are discovered. The Prince is not minded to have light women slaughtered on altars instead of paying his venery taxes. I heard that after Thalhkarsh's depredations, his income from Delton was halved for the better part of three years. He took care to alter or tighten the laws concerning religious practice after that. Human sacrifice in any form is punishable by enslavement; if the perpetrator has murdered taxpayers, he goes to the Prince's mages for their experiments."

Kethry lifted an eyebrow; Tarma took a largish mouthful of wine. They'd both heard about how Prince Lothar's mages produced his monstrous mindless bodyguards. They'd also heard that the process from normal man to twelve-foot-tall brute was far from pleasant -- or painless. Lothar was sometimes called "the Looney" -- but never to his face.

The little priest met blue and green eyes in turn, and nodded. "Besides that," he continued, "There are several sects, mine included, who would wish to deal with the demon on other levels. We all want him bound, at the least. But so far it's all rumor. The temple has been empty every time anyone's checked."

"So you did check?"

"In all conscience, yes -- although the woman didn't seem terribly trustworthy or terribly bright. Pretty, yes -- rather remarkably pretty under the dirt, but she seemed to be in a half-daze all the time. Brother Thoser was the one who questioned her, not I, or I could tell you more. My guess would be that she was of breeding, but had taken to the street to supply an addiction of some sort."

Tarma nodded thoughtfully.

"Where is this temple?"" Kethry's husky alto almost made the little priest regret his vow of chastity; and when she had moved into the light, and he saw that the sweet face beneath the hood matched the voice, he sighed a little for days long lost.

"Do you know the beggar's quarter? Well then, it's on the river, just downwind of the slaughterhouse and the tannery. It's been deserted since the last acolyte died of old age -- oh, nearly fifteen years ago. It's beginning to fall apart a bit; the last time I looked at it, there didn't seem to be any signs that anyone had entered it in all that time."

"Is it kept locked up?"

"Oh, yes; not that there's anything to steal -- mostly it's to keep children from playing where they might be hurt by falling masonry. The beggars used it for a bit as one of their meeting halls, before the acolyte died, but," he chuckled, "One-Eye Tham told me it was 'too perishin' cold and damp' and they moved to more comfortable surroundings."

Tarma exchanged a look with her partner; We need to talk, she hand-signed.

Kethry nodded, ever so slightly. We could be in trouble, she signed back.

Tarma's grimace evidenced agreement.

"Well, if you will allow me," the little priest finished the last of his wine, and shoved the bench back with a scrape, "I fear I have morning devotions to attend to. As always, Sworn One, the conversation and company have been delightful, if argumentative -- '' Tarma managed a smile; it transformed her face, even if it didn't quite reach her eyes. "My friend, we have a saying -- it translates something like 'there is room in the universe for every Way.' You travel yours; should you need it, my sword will protect you as I travel mine."

"That is all anyone could reasonably ask of one who does not share his faith," he replied, "And so, good night."

The two mercenary women finished their own wine and headed for their room shortly after his departure. With Warrl padding after, Kethry took one of the candles from the little table standing by the entrance to the hall, lit it at the lantern above the table, and led the way down the corridor. The wooden walls were polished enough that their light was reflected; they'd been tended to recently and Tarma could still smell the ferris-oil that had been used. The sounds of snoring behind closed doors, the homelike scents of hot wax and ferris-oil, the buzz of conversation from the inn behind them -- all contrasted vividly with the horror that had been resurrected in both their minds at the mention of Thalhkarsh.

Their room held two narrow beds, a rag rug, and a table; all worn, but scrupulously clean. They had specified a room with a window, so Warrl could come and go as he pleased; no one in his right mind would break into the room with any of the three of them in it, and their valuables were in the stable, well-guarded by their well-named warsteeds, Hellsbane and Ironheart.

When the door was closed and bolted behind them, Kethry put the candle in its wall sconce and turned to face her partner with a swish of robes.

"If he's there, if it's really Thalhkarsh, he'll be after us."

Tarma paced the narrow confines of the room. "Seems obvious. If I were a demon, I'd want revenge. Well, we knew this might happen someday. I take it that your sword hasn't given you any indication that there's anything wrong?"

"No. At least, nothing more than what you'd expect in a city this size. I wish Need would be a little more discriminating." Kethry sighed, and one hand caressed the hilt of the blade she wore at her side over her sorceress' robes in an unconscious gesture of habit. "I absolutely refuse to go sticking my nose into every lover's-quarrel in this town! And -- "

"Warrior's Oath -- remember the first time you tried?" Tarma's grim face lightened into a grin with the recollection.

"Oh, laugh, go ahead! You were no help!"

"Here you thought the shrew was in danger of her life -- you went flying in the door and knocked her man out cold -- and you expected her to throw herself at your feet in gratitude -- " Tarma was taking full revenge for Kethry's earlier hilarity at her expense. "And what did she do? Began hurling crockery at you, shrieking you'd killed her beloved! Lady's Eyes, I thought I was going to die!"

"I wanted to take her over my knee and beat her with the flat of my blade."

"And to add insult to injury, Need wouldn't let you lay so much as a finger on her! I had to go in with a serving dish for a shield and rescue you before she tore you to shreds!"

"She could have done that with her tongue alone," Kethry grimaced. "Well, that's not solving our problem here...."

"True," Tarma conceded, sobering. She threw herself down on her bed, Warrl jumping up next to her and pushing his head under her hand. "Back to the subject. Let's assume that the rumor is true; we can't afford not to. If somebody has brought that particular demon back, we know he's going to want our hides."

"Or worse."

"Or worse. Now he can't have gotten too powerful, or everybody in town would know about him. Remember Delton."

Kethry shifted restlessly from foot to foot, finally going over to the window to open the shutters with a creak of hinges and stare out into the night. "I remember. And I remember that we'd better do something about him while he's in that state."

"This isn't a job for us, she'enedra. It's a job for priests. Powerful priests. I remember what he almost did to me. He came perilously close to breaking my bond with the Star-Eyed. And he boasted he could snap your tie to Need just as easily. I think we ought to ride up to the capital as fast as Hellsbane and Ironheart can carry us, and fetch us some priests."

"And come back to an empty town and a demon transformed to a godling?" Kethry turned away from the window to shake her head at her partner, her amber hair like a sunset cloud around her face, and a shadow of anger in her eyes. "What if we're wrong? We'll have some very powerful people very angry at us for wasting their time. And if we're right -- we have to act fast. We have to take him while he's still weak or we'll never send him back to the Abyssal Planes at all. He is no stupid imp -- he's learned from what we did to him, you can bet on it. If he's not taken down now, we'll never be able to take him at all."

"That's not our job!"

"Whose is it then?" Kethry dug her fingers into the wood of the windowframe behind her, as tense and worried as she'd ever been. "We'd better make it our job if we're going to survive! And I told you earlier -- I don't want you cosseting me! I know what I'm doing, and I can protect myself!"

Tarma sighed, and there was a shadow of guilt on her face as she rolled over to lie flat on her back, staring at the ceiling; her hands clasped under her head, one leg crossed over the other. "All right, then. I don't know a damn thing about magic, and all I care to know about demons outside of a book is that they scare me witless. I still would rather go for help, but if you don't think we'd have the time -- and if you are sure you're not getting into more than you can handle -- "

"I know we wouldn't have the time; he's not going to waste time building up a power base," Kethry replied, sitting down on the edge of Tarma's bed, making the frame creak.

"And he may not be there at all; it might just be a wild rumor."

"It might; I don't think I'd care to bet my life on waiting to see, though."

"So we need information; reliable information."

"The question is how to get it. Should I try scrying?"

"Absolutely not!" Tarma flipped back over onto her side, her hand chopping at the pillow for emphasis. Warrl winced away and looked at her reproachfully. "He caught that poor witch back in Delton that way, remember? That much even I know. If you scry, he'll have you on his ground. I promise I won't cosset you any more, but I will not allow you to put yourself in jeopardy when there are any other alternatives!"

"Well, how then?"

"Me." Tarma stabbed at her own chest with an emphatic thumb. "Granted, I'm not a thief -- but I am a skilled scout. I can slip into and out of that temple without anyone knowing I've been there, and if it's being used for anything, I'll be able to tell."

"No."

"Yes. No choice, she'enedra."

"All right, then -- but you won't be going without me. If he and any followers he may have gathered are there and they're using magic to mask their presence, you won't see anything, but I can invoke mage-sight and see through any illusions."

Tarma began to protest, but this time Kethry cut her short. "You haven't a choice either; you need my skill and I won't let you go in there without me. Dammit Tarma, I am your partner -- your full partner. If I have to, I'll follow you on my own."

"You would, wouldn't you?"

"You can bet on it." Kethry scowled, then smiled as Tarma's resigned expression told her she'd won the argument. Warrl nudged Tarma's hand again, and she began scratching absentmindedly behind his ears. A scowl creased her forehead, but her mouth, too, was quirked in an almost-smile.

"Warrior's Oath! I would tie myself to a headstrong, stubborn, foolish, reckless, crazed mage -- "

"Who loves her bond-sister and won't allow her to throw her life away."

" -- who is dearer to me than my own life."

Kethry reached out at almost the same moment as Tarma did. They touched hands briefly, crescent-scarred palm to crescent-scarred palm, and exchanged rueful smiles.

"Argument over?"

"It's over."

"All right then," Tarma said after poignant silence, "Let's get to it now, while we've still got the guts for it."