Toria did not understand what was happening. She did not recognize Karver, so she thought that she and Egert had been tracked down by common thieves. She had no intention of waiting for them to demand their purses. She smiled scornfully and was about to say something scathing, but Karver forestalled her.
He recognized her, even in the muddy light of the swinging street lantern, and he could hardly keep his eyes in their sockets. “Lady! We are acquainted!” he drawled with an expression of sheer amazement. “For shame!”
Bonifor and Dirk leaned forward to see Toria a little better.
“Oh yes, Egert,” continued Karver. “You seem to have attained your goal. But what is the meaning of this, my lady?” He turned to Toria with a perfectly polite demeanor. “Have you so easily forgiven him for the base murder of your studious fiancé?”
“Who are you?” asked Toria in an icy tone. The iron undertones in her voice caused Dirk and Bonifor to wince slightly, but Karver was not the slightest bit put off.
“Allow me to introduce myself. I am Karver Ott, Lieutenant of the Guards of the city of Kavarren, sent here with a special commission: to bring the deserter Egert Soll back to the regiment. These are my fellow guardsmen, remarkably worthy young men. That, my lady, is who we are, definitely not the thieves of the night you seem to think us! And now allow me to ask you, just who do you think that man is, the one who is now hiding behind your back?”
Egert was not at all hiding behind Toria’s back, but he had instinctively retreated, horrified as a tenacious wave of his eternal companion, animal fear, arose in his chest. Karver’s words lashed him like a whip.
“This man,” responded Toria, undaunted, “is under the protection of the university and of my father, Dean Luayan. And Master Luayan is a mage, as you should have heard by now. And now, be so kind as to clear the way. We are leaving.”
“But, lady!” cried Karver in bewilderment, either real or feigned. “I cannot believe this. You are such a distinguished individual, how could you be involved with this, this…” The lieutenant’s lips involuntarily curled in a grimace of aversion when he glanced at Egert. “I repeat, he murdered your fiancé. I think that even then in the depths of his soul he was already the thing he became just a bit later. Do you know what he became!”
“Allow us to pass.” Toria stepped forward, and Karver slowly stepped to the side.
“Please. We have no desire to bring even the slightest shadow of insult to the beautiful daughter of the dean, the gentleman mage. But this man, lady … Wouldn’t you be interested to find out what Egert Soll really is?”
Egert was silent. Gradually, he began to understand that what was happening now was, if anything, more terrible than Fagirra’s poisoned stiletto. There was nothing he could do to stop this dreadful game from playing out; Egert would have to drink this cup to its dregs.
As if responding to his thought, Karver pulled his sword out of its sheath with a subtle movement. In the light of the lantern, Egert saw the silver ribbon of the blade and his knees began buckle.
“You’ll answer for this,” spat Toria.
Karver raised his eyebrows. “For what! Am I doing something improper to the lady? My lady may stay or she may go. In the second instance she will finally see the true face of her, hmm, friend.” The tip of the impossibly long Kavarrenian sword touched Egert under the chin.
Egert felt faint. Karver’s voice continued to reach him, but it was as if it came through the roaring of a waterfall; the sound of his own blood in his ears deafened him. Vainly trying to overcome his horror, he suddenly recalled the words Toria had once spoken. The curse will be broken if you fall into a hopeless situation and yet somehow overcome it. When the path has reached its bitter end: don’t you think the Wanderer was speaking of this?
“I feel pity for you, lady,” said Karver in the meantime. “Cruel fate brought you into contact with a man who is, to put it mildly, entirely unworthy. On your knees, Egert!”
Egert reeled, and Toria caught his gaze. The curse will be broken if you fall into a hopeless situation and yet somehow overcome it. Heaven, how could he be victorious over a rock, a landslide, an avalanche that was careening down a mountainside? Egert’s soul was wailing and thrashing about. The pitiful coward died a thousand deaths, and Egert knew that within a second the vile beast would completely subdue him.
“Did you hear me, Egert?” repeated Karver calmly. “On your knees.”
Toria is here. Toria will see, then she’ll really think …
Without following the thought to its conclusion, he sank down into the slimy muck below. His knees buckled against his will, and now Karver’s frayed belt and sleek riding breeches were right in front of his eyes.
“Do you see, lady?” Karver’s reproachful voice rang out above Egert’s head. “Demand something of him now; demand anything you like. He will answer.”
Egert could not see Toria, but he felt her next to him. He sensed her pain and her striving and her rage and her confusion, and her hope.
She hopes. She does not understand that it is impossible. Impossible to overcome the strength of the curse laid on me by the Wanderer. Never.
The sword jerked in Karver’s impatient hand. “Say ‘I am the nastiest wretch in creation.’”
“Egert,” sighed Toria, and his name seemed to echo from the distance, from the bright winter day when he stood with her by the eternally blooming tree on the tomb of the First Prophet.
“I am the nastiest wretch in creation,” he gasped through parched lips.
Karver chuckled contentedly. “Do you hear that! Repeat after me, ‘I am a lady’s cowardly lapdog.’”
“Egert,” repeated Toria under her breath.
“I am a lady’s cowardly lapdog,” his lips murmured of their own accord.
Dirk and Bonifor, who had been silent until now, burst out into merry laughter.
“Repeat, Egert, ‘I am a creeping piece of shit and a sodomite.’”
“Leave him alone!” shrieked Toria, beside herself.
Karver was amazed. “Why are you so bothered? Is it because he’s a lover of men? He is definitely a bugger, we found him with his boyfriend in some tavern. But you did not know, of course?”
Her silent entreaty reached Egert. Stop this, Egert. Stop it. Break the curse.
A door slammed open wildly. The morose cook walked to the storehouse, casting a glance, as oppressively indifferent as before, at the people by the fence.
Fiddling with his blade, Karver waited until she hobbled back and slammed the heavy door; then he spun his sword right in front of the face of his victim. “Answer, scum. Are you Egert Soll?”
“Yes,” wheezed Egert.
“Are you a deserter?”
“Yes.” And then he broke out into a sweat, but no longer from fear. All he had to do to break the curse was say yes five times.
“Did you, scoundrel, murder the fiancé of this beautiful lady?”
“Yes.”
Toria was shaking. She also understood. Through his slumped back, Egert felt her feverish, frustrated anticipation.
Karver smiled expansively. “You love this lady, don’t you, Egert?”
“Yes,” he screamed out for the fourth time, feeling how hard his maddened heart was beating.
It seemed to him that he could hear Toria breathing. Glorious Heaven, help me! But the chance would come only once, and that which was foremost in his soul must become last. Did that mean that he must cast off his fear?
He jerked up his head, awaiting the fifth question; meeting his eyes, Karver involuntarily flinched, as if seeing a phantom of the former, domineering Egert Soll. Falling back a step, he searchingly examined his victim. An enormous shiver struck Egert.