She really wanted a familiar, and now look what had happened. What could she do?
On the floor, Shank was making gurgly noises not too different from those of a beached fish. The paralysis made it hard for him to do more than slobber and sputter for rescue. The sound reminded Maeve of her victim, and a wicked look passed across her face. Suddenly Shank wished he could have been very, very still.
All at once clear-headed and firmly resolute, Maeve rose from her seat. "Fiddlenose," she announced with heartfelt relief, "I release you. Go home, brownie. I can't send you home the way you came, so it'll be an adventure or two getting back to your farm. Woodrock's a good week west of here, but if you follow the shore, you should make it all right. That's the best I can do."
The little wood sprite gaped in astonishment. "But what about you? I'm your familiar. Didn't you want one?"
Maeve shook her head, tossing her brown-gray hair. "You go. I'll find a solution to my problem. Go now, before I change my mind!"
The brownie was already making for the door. "Thank you, mistress," he said with heartfelt glee just before he ducked through the door.
With one gone, Maeve turned to the other. "Now, what should be done with you?" The question was pointless, and not just because Shank couldn't answer. The wizard already had plans.
"Perhaps, you don't know, but I'm the royal court wizard," Maeve continued, clearly relishing the look of panic in Shank's eyes. "That means my lord, King Pinch, could have you put away for a very, very long time. Or maybe just execute you as an example, dearie. Does that sound fair?"
The pupils grew wider.
"Or"-and for this she knelt down beside him-"you could be my familiar. Serve me, play the part, and you could have almost as much wine, cheese, and fine clothes as you'd like. Stick your tongue out if you think you'd like that instead."
Sweat matted Shank's hair, but he managed to poke his tongue through his parted teeth.
"Good." Maeve smiled, and then her face went hard. All the fine court manners she'd learned in a year dropped away as she spoke to him in her element. "Understand this, Will o' Horse-Shank. Change your mind, scupper out on me, or play me for the coney again, and I'll see to it that Pinch scrags your scrawny neck from the leafless tree and leaves your bones for the dogs. Hide from me, and every sorcerer in the kingdom'll be scrying for you, every foin and cutpurse will be out to collect the bounty on your hide. You know I can do it, and you know I will. Understand?"
The tongue poked out again.
Maeve smiled and waved a hand over the paralyzed brownie. Sensation and order began to flow back into his limbs. "Then we have an understanding."
She picked up the empty wineglass and raised it in a mock toast while Shank stumbled to his feet. "Here's to getting me a very special familiar!"
RED AMBITION
Szass Tarn eased himself into a massive chair behind an ornate table covered with curled sheets of vellum and crystal vials filled with dark liquid. A thick candle stood in the middle of the clutter, its flame dancing in the musty air and casting a soft light across his grotesque features.
His pale, parchment-thin skin stretched taut across his high cheekbones, and his wispy hair, the color of cobwebs, spread unevenly atop his age-spotted scalp. His lower lip hung loose, as if there were no muscles to control it, and the fleshy part of his nose was gone, revealing twin cavities. The scarlet robes he wore fell in folds about his skeletal frame and spread like a pool of blood on the floor about his chair.
He absently swirled his index finger in a puddle of wax gathering on the table, letting the warm, oily liquid collect on his skin. He rolled the cooling blob between his thumb and middle finger until it hardened into a ball. Then he released the wax and watched it roll across the rosewood finish and come to rest near a decades-old scroll. The piercing points of white light that served as Szass Tarn's eyes stared at the parchment. It contained the last enchantment needed to turn his cherished apprentice into a creature like himself-an undead sorcerer… a lich. Of course, his apprentice would have to die before the spell could be invoked. Killing her would be no great matter, he decided. Bony fingers grasped the parchment and brought it close to his still heart.
Szass Tarn's mortal life had ended centuries ago on a Thayan battlefield a hundred miles north of his comfortable keep. But the magic coursing through him prevented him from passing beyond the land of the living. It bound him to the human realms in a rotting body that pulsed with an arcane power few would dare challenge. The lich considered himself the most formidable Red Wizard in Thay. A zulkir, he controlled the country's school of necromancy. His apprentice, Frodyne, was also a Red Wizard, one of an august council of sorcerers who ruled Thay through schemes, threats, and careful manipulation. Szass Tarn smiled thinly. None were more treacherous than he.
He listened intently. The soft footfalls in the hall were Frodyne's. He placed the scroll in a deep pocket and waited. One day soon he would bless her with immortality.
"Master?" Easing open the door, Frodyne stepped inside. She padded forward, the shiny fabric of her dark red robe dragging across the polished marble floor behind her. "Am I disturbing you?"
Szass Tarn gestured to a seat opposite him. Instead, the young woman's course took her to stand beside him. She quickly knelt, placed her delicate hands on his leg, and looked up into his pinpoint eyes. Her clean-shaven head was decorated with red and blue tattoos, fashionable for Thay, and her wide, midnight-black eyes sparkled with a hint of mischief. The corner of her thin lips tugged upward into a sly grin.
Szass Tarn had taken her as an apprentice several years ago. An amazingly quick study, Frodyne never hid her hunger for spells and knowledge, and she dutifully hung on his every word. The lich thought her loyal, or as loyal as anyone in Thay could be. As she grew in power through the years, he shared horrible designs with her- how to crush lesser wizards under the heels of his skeletal army, how to raise men from the grave, hdw to steal the souls of the living. He recently confided in her that he was undead, showed her his true, rotting visage, and when she did not shrink from it, he shared with her his plans for dominating Thay. Frodyne had made it clear she wanted to be at his side-forever.
The lich stared at her unblemished, rosy face. Indeed, he thought, she is worthy of passing the centuries at my side. He reached a bony hand to her face and caressed her smooth cheek.
"What brings you here so late?" His deep voice echoed hauntingly in the room.
"I was at the market today, the slave pens," she began. "I was looking over the stock when I discovered a man asking about you and the goings-on in the keep."
The lich nodded for her to continue. "He was an unusual little man who wore only one tattoo: an odd-looking triangle filled with gray swirls."
"A worshiper of Leira," the lich mused.
"A priest of the goddess of deception and illusions, in fact," Frodyne added. "In any event, I followed him. When he was alone I cast a simple spell that put him under my control. I had to know why he was asking so many questions."
The lich's pinpoint eyes softened, and with his skeletal finger, he traced one of the tattoos on Frodyne's head. "And what did you learn?"
"Much, Master. Eventually. The priest had a strong will. But before he died he revealed he was worried about one of your armies, the one patrolling Delhumide. There is a ruin in that dead city that a few worshipers of Leira a~e particularly interested in. The priest believed that deep inside a crumbling temple rests a powerful relic. When your army passed nearby, he feared you had learned of the thing and had sent your army to retrieve it. But when your skeletons did not enter the temple, he was uncertain how much you knew. He came to the city asking about your plans and forces."