The Hag's Contract

Six

Parniel Bowspear returned to the Temple of Ela just after midnight. When he entered the front doors, he found an underpriest standing there, waiting for him. The man wore long black robes, with a black skullcap on his shaved head, and his features were gaunt and pinched, almost emaciated. His pale blue eyes missed nothing, though, as he studied Bowspear’s face.

“Is she here?” he asked.

“This way,” the underpriest said, turning toward the altar room. “Haltengabben is expecting you.”

Bowspear hesitated a moment before ducking through the doorway after him, but when he did, he found no trace of the bizarre ceremony he had witnessed earlier. The large brass braziers still smoked, but now they let off the scents of sweetly aromatic herbs, and the dancers, musicians, and giant serpent had vanished entirely.

The priest led him past the altar and through a maze of tiny corridors to Haltengabben’s overcrowded office. When he entered, she looked up from a manuscript, then quickly rolled it up and put it away.

“About this morning—” he began.

“It’s not important,” she said. “Sit.”

Meekly, he slid into one of the chairs before her desk. Somehow she managed to make him feel small whenever he was in her presence. He intensely disliked that feeling. But I need her, he told himself, far more than she needs me.

“You brought a wizard to Grabentod,” she stated flatly.

Of course her spies would have informed her about the wizard. Nothing happened in Grabentod that she didn’t know about. Doubtless she knew more about the cargo he’d captured last night than he did.

“Yes,” he said slowly. “He was on his way to Müden when I captured his ship—”

“He will lead only to trouble,” she said, interrupting. “But there is a chance for great profit.”

“Then you know about the expedition?” he asked. He wondered at her spy network. The expedition had been agreed upon only a few hours ago, and he had been the first to leave the feast.

“Of course … and I want you to represent my interests in it as well.”

He regarded her suspiciously. “How?” And what exactly did she mean by her interests?

Haltengabben stood and began to pace. “The wizard will doubtless provide charms that may prove useful against the Hag’s lesser creatures.”

“He did promise something of the sort,” Bowspear murmured.

“I can provide you with something better … an amulet that will render you invisible to her creatures.” She lifted an intricately carved wooden box from a shelf and drew out a long silver chain. A pendant set with what looked like a large ruby eye dangled from it. “Behold, the Eye of Vadakkar.”

Bowspear stood. Invisibility. With that amulet, he realized, he could follow Evann into the Hag’s Domain. With that amulet, he could make certain Evann’s mission failed.

“How does it work?”

“The wearer and anyone within twenty feet of the Eye is protected from scrying. The Hag will never know you’re in her territory.”

“And what is your price?”

“Half.”

He paled a little. “Half of what?” he asked.

She smiled. “Everything.”

Bowspear bit his lip. He could take Grabentod’s crown without her, but only if Evann failed. If the king returned … if the king found out all that Bowspear had been doing in his absence …

But half of Grabentod as the price!

Then he smiled. The people would never accept her as their queen. She would have to stay comfortably behind the scenes, much as she did now. Half … perhaps it wouldn’t be nearly as much as it sounded like now.

“How does it work?” he asked.

Dawn brought slate-gray skies and a cold, steady wind from the north. As Captain Terrill Evann mustered his squad of ten men in the castle’s courtyard, he felt two of his ribs ache with the promise of snow.

He’d broken those ribs in his first mission as a Grabentod Raider eighteen years before, when one of Müden’s royal marines had leapt inside his guard and punched him in the chest with the pommel of his sword. He’d been lucky to live through that battle. He wouldn’t have if King Graben hadn’t cut the marine down with one powerful blow from his sword. If he could repay that debt now, he would.

Scowling, he stared up at the sky as the first few snowflakes drifted lazily toward the ground. Not the most auspicious omen, he thought. Still, this early in the season, the mountain passes would be clear. He and his men were used to the snow. As long as they did not tarry, they should get back safely.

Assuming they found Orin Hawk.

Assuming the wizard’s charms worked.

Assuming the Hag didn’t kill them.

He stopped in front of Uwe Taggart, the youngest of his volunteers at seventeen. He’d had half a mind to refuse the lad’s request to join … but Uwe’d already fought, and fought well, in two sea battles. Uwe’s young, deep-blue eyes stared expressionlessly back at Evann. He’d been letting the soft downy yellow hair on his cheeks grow, and over the last month, it had lengthened into a sketchy beard. A man now, indeed, Evann realized; he couldn’t very well refuse him.

“Open your pack,” he said gruffly.

“Yes, sir.” Uwe squatted, unlaced the flaps on his backpack, and began laying out the contents on the flagstones. Bedroll, candles, rope, dried jerked meat, canteen—all the supplies he’d been ordered to bring. Evann nodded: he’d expected no less.

“It’ll do,” he said. “Shut it.”

Nodding as Uwe began reassembling his pack, Evann moved to the next man, Ivar Reddman, and did likewise. He knew they’d all have their full marching kits ready, though; this was an exercise to kill time.

With a glance at the east tower, he wondered how long the wizard planned to take. Candabraxis had left the feast, even though technically it was in his honor, to begin preparations to leave.

Parniel Bowspear dangled the Eye of Vadakkar before a candle, watching the play of red light and shadow as different facets of the ruby caught the flickering glow. Deep inside the stone, he thought he saw movement, a shape that flitted first one way, and then another.

Abruptly he blinked, pulled the chain over his head, and tucked the stone inside his tunic. Dawn had nearly come; he still had a lot to do before then.

Pulling a set of chain mail from a trunk by his bed, he began hooking it on. Despite Haltengabben’s promise of invisibility to the Hag’s scrying, he planned on taking no chances. That meant wearing the armor he’d taken from a prince of Massenmarch last year, wielding his good long sword, and bringing twelve of his best men.

They would find Hawk first, he vowed, and kill him. Or, if the opportunity presented itself, they would ambush Evann and his men. He had several old scores to settle with Captain Evann … he hadn’t forgotten the first year of his own captaincy, when Evann had time and again reminded King Graben of Bowspear’s youth and inexperience. As a result, Evann had taken more than his fair share of prize ships, leaving lesser targets for Bowspear.

Finished with his armor, he rose, opened the door, and glanced up and down the street. Dawn had just begun to touch the east with fingers of gray. His breath misted before him. It would snow today, he thought: so much the better. It would make tracking Evann easier.

He strode out to round up his men.

The last of the magic spells finally cast, Candabraxis sank back in the chair next to his worktable. He had carefully unpacked the ingredients he used in his more complex conjurations, and they covered the table now, a jumbled mass of jars, vials, boxes, packets, and other containers.

He pressed his eyes shut and gave a low groan. He ached from mind to body. There was simply no other way to put it. Magic always took a lot out of a wizard, but spell after spell, cast in rapid succession throughout the night, left him with a deep psychic hurt that his body now mirrored.

Forcing himself back to his feet, he took a deep swallow from the glass of water on the table, then looked appreciatively at the eleven talismans he had created. To the untrained eye, each one looked like a carved obsidian pin in the shape of a wolf. Unlike mere glass, however, each talisman carried deep within a magical charge potent enough to deflect a variety of spells. Not all spells, of course—no mere talisman could do that—but the magic he had imbued in each pin would certainly protect its wearer against some of the most common and potentially lethal castings, such as unnatural fears and petrifications.

He donned a heavy woolen cloak, gathered up the talismans, and began the long descent to ground level. Next time someone offered him a suite of rooms in a tower, he vowed, he’d ask for a lower floor.

When at last, panting a bit, he opened the tower door and stepped into the courtyard, he found a light snow just beginning to fall. Captain Evann and his squad of men stood across from him, going through a weapons check of some kind.

Captain Evann spotted him and jogged to his side. “Are they—?” he called.

“Done. Yes.” Candabraxis held out the small cloth sack he’d placed the talismans in. “Here.”

Evann drew one out and stared at it. “How do they work?” he asked.

“Pin it to your clothing—it doesn’t matter where. That’s all you need to do.”

He scowled at it. “It doesn’t seem like much….”

“It will protect you against all minor charms and spells … not against the Hag herself, certainly, but it should work against any magics used by her minions.”

He nodded. “It will be enough,” he said.

Evann returned to his men and began handing them out. The men, one by one, pinned the talismans to their cloaks.

The doors to the audience hall opened, and Harlmut strode out. Like Candabraxis, he wore a heavy woolen cloak with the hood pulled up. He quickly joined Captain Evann and talked in quiet tones with him. Evann nodded several times, called orders to his men, and marched them single file out through the huge castle gates. Outside they turned toward the Drachenaur Mountains. Candabraxis watched until the last one had vanished from sight behind the walls.

Harlmut joined him.

“What are their chances of finding Hawk?” Candabraxis asked. By the light of day, it seemed a mad, almost impossible plan.

“They will succeed,” Harlmut said firmly. “They have to.”

The door to Haltengabben’s office burst open, and a boy of perhaps ten or eleven rushed up to the desk. Young Jerroch. Haltengabben had assigned him to watch the castle. Something must have happened there, she realized, but that was no excuse for his behavior, not here in the Temple of Ela.

“Always knock, Jerroch,” she said sternly.

“But, Haltengabben—” he gasped.

“Do it again.”

Slowly, head down, he turned and went back out into the hall, pulling the door closed after him. A heartbeat later, he gave a timid rap.

“Come in!” Haltengabben called.

He opened the door, stepped in, and pulled it closed after him. Taking his place solemnly before her desk, head bowed, he waited for her to speak first. She nodded imperceptibly: much better. She kept an iron discipline inside the temple.

“Make your report,” she said.

“The soldiers left, Haltengabben.”

“How many?”

“Ten, Haltengabben.”

“And the wizard?”

“He stayed at the castle.”

Haltengabben leaned back in her seat, pursing her lips slightly. So … Candabraxis hadn’t gone along on the mission. She’d expected him to try to kill the Hag himself. Perhaps he didn’t want the strength of her bloodline. But what manner of magical weapons must he have given to the soldiers to safely battle her? And why risk passing the Hag’s bloodline along to one of them? It didn’t make sense. She had missed something somewhere, she decided.

“Thank you,” she said to the boy. She opened a small pouch on the desk, drew out a copper eagle, and tossed the coin to him. He tucked it into his belt in one swift movement. “That will be all,” she said.

“Yes, Haltengabben.” Bobbing his head once, he turned and quietly left her office, shutting the door carefully and almost silently behind him.

Candabraxis posed a threat, she decided. She couldn’t have him lingering in Alber. No telling what mischief he might discover.

After a second’s thought, she drew a small, square piece of parchment from a stack, dipped her quill pen in ink, and began to write a brief letter explaining the situation.

Her sister Temple of Ela in Grevesmühl had an assassin staying with them at the moment. The price would be steep, but she knew she could buy his services to kill the wizard and still make a tidy profit, thanks to the Hag. After all, a pound of gold went a long way in Grabentod.