"The sword," she began abruptly.
"What sword?" I asked.
"You know damned well" She stopped, swallowed, and began again. "The sword that was recovered at the Wall of Baritt's Tomb."
I admired the way she put that. "Was recovered." Whatever it was she wanted, it wasn't enough to make her admit … oh, skip it.
"What about it?" I said.
"I have it," she said.
"I know," I told her. "I didn't realize it at the time because I didn't know you. But I figured out who you were later. It's funny you should bring this up just now"
"If you please, Lord Taltos," she said, as if addressing me by title made her lips hurt.
"Yes?"
She looked at Loiosh, riding complacently on my shoulder, then looked away. I heard Loiosh chuckling within my mind.
I thought about baiting her some more, just because this conversation was so obviously distasteful to her, but I refrained, mostly because I was curious. "All right," I said. "What does this have to do with me?"
"I want you to act as intermediary for me with the Lady Aliera."
"You want me … wait a minute." I couldn't decide which question to ask first. I settled on, "Why me?"
"Aliera doesn't care for me much."
"Well, come to that, neither do I. So?"
"Negotiations should be handled by a third party."
"Then why not Morrolan? Or Sethra?"
"As for Sethra Lavode, I believe she is still sufficiently vexed with me that I cannot ask her for a favor. And Aliera's relationship with Morrolan is such that she will automatically react with hostility to anything he suggests."
That much was true. But"What makes you think I have any interest in doing you a service?"
She looked startled. "Oh, I'm not asking you for a service."
"You're not?"
"No, no. I intend to pay you."
I carefully controlled my reaction. "I see. Well, what is this negotiation about?"
"The sword, of course."
"Excuse me?"
"I want to offer her the sword we recovered from Fornia in exchange for Kieron's greatsword."
That threw me. I sat there for a minute, trying to figure out what it all meant, and then, to kill time as much as because I was curious, I said, "So far as I know, the sword we recovered from Fornia has nothing special about it. At least, insofar as any Morganti weapon has nothing special about it. Why do you think she'd be interested?"
"You know as well as I that there is more to the sword than that. If I don't know precisely what, that is because, well, that is because I have not yet taken the time to find out."
Because you aren't up to the job? I thought to myself. But that wasn't fair, of course. Several people, including Fornia, hadn't been up to the job. But it pleased me that, after snatching it, she hadn't been able to solve the problem either. I speculated that she'd been too proud to ask Sethra Lavode for help, but I had no way of knowing; maybe the Enchantress of Dzur Mountain had drawn a blank, too.
What I said was, "What would you do with Kieron's greatsword?"
I could see her trying to decide if I deserved an answer. At last she said, "Conquer the East. It would be a tremendous symbol for the leader of"
"Spare me," I said.
She cleared her throat. "Yes, certainly. But you must see, you are the perfect choice. She trusts you, and even has some bizarre affection for you. And you could put it in terms that would make her see the mutual advantages. I don't know what the going rates are for such a service, but I have sufficient means towhere are you going?"
"To drink seawater. It'll leave a better taste in my mouth than this conversation. Excuse me."
And that was what Sethra the Younger wanted to see me about. It is, you see, all part of the same picture. It is not a picture I'd care to have on my wall.
Which doesn't keep me from continuing to paint it.
7What Was the Question?
Loiosh said, "No one's noticed you, yet"
"Good."
I trotted to the top of the hill and took a good look around. The field on which my messmates were fighting was behind me, and farther behind me was the Wall; a long way off to my right was a match of cavalry against cavalry, and to my left was a company of bad guys marching at quicktime. They might be reinforcements coming to attack my own unit; I couldn't tell yet, and didn't want to wait around to find out. Ahead of me, about two hundred yards away, was a slightly higher hill, and on it was a body of soldiers, I guessed around twenty or thirty, standing alert and, I was fairly certain, protecting the sorcerers, in the center of whom would likely be what I was after.
"Okay, Loiosh. Forward at a march."
"You march, Boss. I'll just sort of hang around."
"Or you could fly overhead and let me know if you see Chi in that group."
"Whatever you say, Boss."
He left my shoulder. I headed toward the hill, wishing I had some sort of plan. But, after all, there were only twenty or thirty of them; what was there to worry about?
I'd covered about a hundred and fifty yards when Loiosh said, "They've noticed you, Boss."
"Great."
I kept moving, because stopping would have been worse, although I didn't enjoy it. I was, not to put too fine a point on it, terrified. My brain was working hard trying to come up with what to say, what to do that would not only leave me alive but let me finish what I set out to do, but each step took an effort, as if my feet had their own idea and wanted me to stop and reconsider the whole idea of forward motion.
I'd had the same reaction, now that I thought about it, to stepping through Morrolan's window; I hadn't wanted to go, but I did. And both times, in a way, I was driven by the same thing: the desire not to look craven in front of a Dragon. Why should I care? There's another mystery.
I knew, as I stepped through that window, that if I looked around there would be no window behind me, but I had to look anyway. No, there was no window; there was, instead, a breathtaking view of three mountain peaks, laid out as if they had been built just for how they looked from where I stood. Two of them were capped with snow, stretching out before me, too far away to pick out details. There was a purple sheen to them, and it took a moment to realize I was looking down on them. Then I noticed the sharpness of the air, and the fresh tang. I pulled my cloak closer around me.
"Let's go, Vlad."
"I'm admiring nature," I said, but I turned and followed him up the path.
I bent my head as we entered the caveI suppose from some odd instinct, because it was large enough for Morrolan to enter unbowed, which he did.
The light failed quickly; after ten paces I could no longer see. Morrolan and I stopped and he made a light spell that caused a radiance to shine out from his hand, not too strong to look at but very bright wherever he pointed. We continued. The cave became narrower and the ceiling lower. "Watch your head," he suggested.
"Notice anything odd, Boss?"
"No, Loiosh, it seems just like every other time I used a necromantic window to step through onto the top of a mountain and walk into a dark cave to meet someone of a half-legendary magical race. What are you talking about?"
"What do you smell?"
"Ah. Okay, point. I owe you a fish head."
What I smelled was brimstone. What it meant I couldn't say, but I doubted it was a natural smell in that cave, at least as strong as it was. I glanced at Morrolan, walking steadily and emitting light from his hand. I could read nothing from his expression.
About fifty paces in from the mouth, the cave abruptly ended in a natural-looking wall that could not have been natural. Morrolan stood there, frowning at it, and I said, "What now?"
"I am uncertain of the custom," he said. "Whether we should wait or"
There was a rattling sound, as of pebbles rolling on metal, followed by a low rumble, and a portion of the wall before us gave back, showing a narrow stone stairway heading downward.