“What about this fourth order he pulled out of nowhere? Are you sure this isn’t his practice.” Bess asked.
“No, it’s legitimate. He either had it around for some time, keeping it a secret, or he just got lucky. I think the latter. I’d almost have to say it’s a fresh catch. While extremely powerful, it isn’t using its abilities to their fullest potential. If so, we’d have had a hell of a lot more trouble from it. That would indicate that it’s either new, or it’s playing political games with Lenamare.”
“How often does one end up finding a newcomer that’s fourth order? Not that often. If it’s not using its abilities, I’d assume its master-demon politics and Lenamare just really doesn’t have a clue to what it should be able to do.” Ramses stated.
“Or doesn’t want to push things, by allowing it too much freedom. Lenamare is not stupid, I remind you,” added Bess. “He may know exactly what it can do, and just doesn’t want to chance giving it a free hand.”
“Either way, I am sure the demon is incidental. Lenamare hasn’t opened the book yet.” Exador insisted emphatically.
“So what’s the next step?” Ramses asked.
“Well, one of our bungling search parties located a fleeing caravan. They intercepted it and got trashed by the fourth order. This was probably Jehenna’s caravan. Lenamare may have been in it also, but he is already in Freehold, the caravan couldn’t have made it there yet.
“I’ve sent out demons to intercept the remains of the caravan and hopefully they can tell us where the book is or more precisely what Lenamare is up to. I am relatively sure, however, that Lenamare has the book with him in Freehold. He’d be a fool to let it out of his sight.” Exador explained.
“So we can confirm what we’re already pretty sure of. How do we recover the book?” Bess asked.
“We’ve got to get someone into Freehold to steal the book for us. If we get anyone from the caravan, I may be able to influence them, or trick them into stealing the book from Lenamare, once they’re reunited with him.”
“Any possibility of a more overt move?” asked Ramses.
“I don’t like relying on one of Lenamare’s people being subverted. What about one of our people going in directly?” Bess proposed.
“The council members are blind fools, wrapped up in their own petty concerns. If something went wrong with this, and we were exposed in doing something; it would complicate things enough to get them questioning the whole situation. We don’t want them to know about the book,” Exador stated.
“What about one of our people or us, shape changed to look like one of Lenamare’s people?” Ramses asked, pacing back and forth at his end of the table.
“Possible, but we’d need to know who to impersonate. It would have to be someone relatively high up in the school, and someone we’d have in our custody, dead or at least out of the way.”
“Jehenna?” asked Bess, licking her lips.
“If she is with the caravan then maybe we can. However, as if impersonating her wouldn’t be hard enough, if she’s not in the caravan then getting her out of the way in Freehold would certainly be difficult and noisy.” Exador stated, exasperated. Bess had a couple three bones to pick with Jehenna.
“We must come up with something, however.” Ramses insisted, trying to get the others to start coming together on a plan.
“We will,” stated Exador, “our lives depend upon it.”
Chapter 36
“Let go of me you stupid, lichen eating, moss bearing, demonic scumbags from hell!” Jenn shouted as she squirmed trying to make the demons let go of her. By any measure that she could think of, she should be scared out of her mind. Her anger seemed to be keeping fear at bay. For the moment at least; or maybe the close proximity of that stupid fourth order demon for a prolonged period had numbed her sense of self-preservation. Jenn didn’t know, but she did know she was upset.
The demons had grabbed her and pulled her through some sort of gateway before Tom could get to her. At first she’d been scared they’d take her to the Abyss and do vile unspeakable acts of violence upon her person. After the nerve-shattering transition however, she’d found herself and the demons in the middle of an army camp. An army camp that had lots of wounded. From the insignias on the soldiers’ uniforms she was pretty sure it was Exador’s army, but it was a lot smaller than before and she didn’t see Lenamare’s castle over the tents surrounding her and the demons. Surely Lenamare couldn’t have destroyed the entire castle as well as this many men. Exactly how powerful was that spell of his?
One of the demons held her tightly as the other explained to a guy in a uniform with lots of medals exactly what had happened. The officer, or so Jenn assumed he was, looked her over a couple times as the demon accurately described her kidnapping. Finally the demon finished and the officer stood lost in thought for a moment. At last he looked up to where the hovering demon was holding her and addressed Jenn directly. “So, you were wandering the countryside in the company of a greater demon? Amusing. You don’t look old enough or powerful enough to control such a being, but maybe you had some control device?
“In either case, I am sure Lord Exador will wish to speak with you upon his return.”
Aha, her guess was confirmed. She was in Exador’s camp. Where, though, was the rest of his army? What exactly was that device of his that got so many soldiers wounded? Finally, where was Exador if he wasn’t here now?
“Remove her robe, and make sure she has no spell components or magical items in her clothes underneath the robe. Then bind her hands and feet and put her in the prisoner tent.” The officer instructed the demons.
Working together, the two demons quickly had Jenn trussed as directed. Despite her best efforts to struggle, they were just too strong. When they took her robe, Jenn became concerned. The mysterious book was in it, and she really didn’t want them getting a hold of it. While she didn’t know what it was, she was pretty sure Lenamare would be upset if it fell into Exador’s hands. The loss of her spell components was also annoying, but expected. She could make do without them, assuming she ever got her hands free. Fortunately the weather was warm enough that her blouse and riding breeches would be warm enough without the robe.
The two demons hauled her over to a large center pole tent that had two human guards at the entrance. At the demons’ approach, one guard raised the tent flap and stepped aside so the demon holding her could toss her in.
She fell hard on her face. The demons had tied her hands behind her back and her ankles were also tied together. As she rolled to her side, the light in the tent darkened as the tent flap closed behind her. The tent was basically empty except for a rather worn rug on the floor, and one other human inhabitant. The other prisoner was tied similar to herself and was leaning against the center pole of the tent. He was dressed in clothes that resembled a hodgepodge of Lenamare’s soldier’s uniforms and silk clothes. He was young, maybe slightly older than Jenn and his golden hair was disheveled, his face was red with white spotches. It appeared that he’d been crying a bit recently.
While he looked familiar, it took Jenn a little while to recognize him. It was one of the wizard’s who’d ambushed her party. The one the demon had let run off. “You!” She accused.
Gastropé looked up at her. Until she’d shouted at him, Gastropé had only been vaguely aware that she was there. He’d paid just enough attention to be sure they weren’t coming to get him when the tent flap had opened, and then sunk back into his misery. When he looked up at the shout, he recognized the caravan wizard who’d entangled him in weeds. He was momentarily startled. “What,” Gastropé said flatly.