And he was, as he had been reminded, sworn to a mission.
As long as they were going to try it, there was no point in wasting time. The Scapula, being a rogue of the first order, was obviously proceeding with his own plans, and it had to be assumed he could have some counterstroke up his sleeve. But on the other hand there was no point in launching themselves unprepared at half-cock. It was more than just a question of procedures, there was an uncomfortable amount of unavoidable improvisation ahead. What was Pod Dall’s state of consciousness in the ring, for example? Did the ravening insanity that had gripped him in Roosing Oolvaya still wrap his mind? They had considered the tradeoff of waiting to move while seeking out additional expertise. After all, Max (having spent so much time probing the ring in the course of placing his traps) might know and Gashanatantra (having worked to establish the ring as a snare for Pod Dall in the first place) certainly must know how to release Pod Dall from his confinement, but even they didn’t necessarily know how to restore his sanity or stabilize his mood once he had been freed. So that tradeoff had been rejected. With further debate reduced to a minimum, there was now no excuse for delay.
Which was not to say there had not been some hierarchical jostling between the professionals on hand. “Are you familiar with the Kringlaffer hold?” Dortonn had asked Karlini.
“You can’t be serious,” had been Karlini’s retort. “No one in their right mind would still use Kringlaffer after the Dray Kopf counter.”
“I may be from the north but that doesn’t mean I’m out of touch,” croaked Dortonn. “If you anticipate the Dray Kopf you can build in this.”
“That’s not bad,” was Karlini’s grudging reply. “But what about...”
And so it had gone. “Why remain here we?” Haddo hissed at Wroclaw.
“We gave our word to Dr. Shaa,” said Wroclaw, watching the network of tuning parameters hanging in the air around Dortonn and Karlini. Svin was hanging back by the door, fingering his sword speculatively. He had earlier expressed the intention to slash vigorously if anything sorcerous happened to wander in his direction.
“Pfah!” snorted Haddo. “Owe I Shaa nothing.”
“That is debatable,” Wroclaw said severely. “But even if true, Karlini is still our employer, and Karlini is still here. Would you leave him alone with your old compatriot Dortonn? Even damaged, Dortonn is not empty of tricks.”
“Perhaps time it is to quit. The revolution help will I not if slave remain I to wages.”
A cloud of ethereal vapor pumped pinkly across the room; Karlini leaned into it and made tamping-down motions. “And what revolution would that be?” asked Wroclaw.
“Always is there revolution,” proclaimed Haddo.
“I see,” Wroclaw said. “That revolution.”
“Patronize not I,” Haddo warned.
“Farthest thing from my mind.”
“Haddo!” said Karlini, scarcely for the first time, half-enmeshed in the clinging folds of the marginally-controlled pink cloud. “You want to give us a hand over here or not?”
“Hear,” grumbled Haddo, “I, and obey.”
The Scapula stood over Fradi, gazing down. “So,” he said, “you may have been wondering why you have remained alive, and whether this state of affairs is likely to persist. You are a clever enough fellow, but you have lacked important facts. Unfortunately there is insufficient time to enlighten you. Perhaps you will appreciate the sound and fury, at any rate.” He tugged at a plain gold band on his finger; tugged harder. An expression of mild consternation appeared on his face. “Damn,” he murmured. “That was clever.”
“He has grown aware of us,” Dortonn said suddenly.
“The binding spell is in place?” asked Wroclaw. He had lost track of the progression of the spell-work while Karlini and Haddo were fighting the train of spell-packets back into line.
“Yes, he’s got the ring on his body, and the binding spell’s in place,” said Karlini, who had inherited that part of the job once they had agreed on the modifications to the Kringlaffer. “It may even last long enough, too.”
Even if the binding held, Wroclaw thought, there was an obvious countermove. But would Shaa’s brother, unprepared, avail himself of it?
“They will pay,” said the Scapula. It was those obnoxious friends of his brother, no doubt. His stroke against them was apparently not as preemptive as he had intended. Someone would hear about that; more than hear, to be exact - he didn’t employ the fools to be late, and it wasn’t likely they’d be able to wring from him a second chance. Well, at least his brother was still locked in his cell back at the house; he was going to need to take this out on somebody, and minions wouldn’t be nearly as satisfying. Arznaak went to his knees, deliberately clenched his teeth, spread his fingers wide on the floor, positioned his dagger grasped firmly in the other hand, and leaned into the stroke. The tip went cleanly through the bone. His own finger - still bound to the Pod Dall ring - came free and curled up in the sudden rush of blood.
“Well, he went for the Dray Kopf,” Karlini said. “Should we abort?”
“The proliferator should still bind to him,” croaked Dortonn. “The ring is still tied to his flesh - it will remain synchronized to his aura.”
And since he’s drawing his god-power from the ring, Karlini thought, casting it off would leave the vitality of his defenses collapsing - “I’m projecting the disorientation barrage... here goes the rest of the diversion package.”
“My master is being released,” Dortonn said suddenly.
“What? We’ve barely launched the matrix piercer - I thought you said nothing should be happening for another three minutes!”
“I did say that, and it should have. He has been released, but not at my hand.”
“There are troops in the trees and outside in the street,” Svin said suddenly.
The Scapula had shrugged off the rest of the attack, although the wall just behind him and an adjoining arc of floor were still glowing red and pooling into puddles. This demonstrated once again the value of superior planning, he reflected, and of moving fast enough to stay ahead of the opposition. If he had still been drawing on the energy of the ring he would now most likely be reeling and drained, ready for Pod Dall to materialize and devour his soul, or whatever it was about him that might have attracted Pod Dall’s interest. As it was instead, there was no need for him to be interested in Pod Dall any longer, not to say that such interest as had previously been relevant had been any wider than questions of power level and tap schemata; Pod Dall’s place in the balance of power would for various reasons be neither relevant nor important again. But of course, thanks to his maneuver at the conclave the ring and Pod Dall its contents had served their usefulness, and issues of power levels no longer had any significance at all. In a literal sense, the Scapula now had more power than he could productively wield, but not of course more than he knew what to do with.
Which didn’t mean the power was worth wasting; he did have a Knitting to elaborate, after all, and beyond that other plans. The impending ceremony of Knitting, however, was not the only valid reason to abandon this place. His adversaries might be feeble and cower in his dust, but they were ahead of the schedule he had anticipated. If they had been a few minutes earlier, in fact, he might have had a real fight on his hands.
Moreover the ring was still bound to his finger, even if the finger was no longer bound to the rest of his body. They might think they could still bridge the gap. If they were adept enough with voodoo-style similarity work, perhaps they actually could. The fact that the finger was currently in intimate contact with the flesh of another should deflect their aim, however, since contiguity usually trumped similarity, and in any case once Pod Dall began to materialize he would lock to whichever living incarnate was closest to hand.