“Ackal’s Teeth! Theo, are you all right? Theo? Blast it all!”
He couldn’t see anything; there was too much of that thick, acrid smoke. Something had blown up. He looked to his left and checked on the painting. It was still there and unharmed. He got to his feet. “Theo?”
“Right here,” said a voice from the smoke. Theodenes, his face black with soot, emerged. “Vanderjack, I think that was a display of invoked pyrothaumaturgics.”
“A what?”
“A fireball. We’re under attack!”
Vanderjack grabbed Theodenes and ducked behind a low brick wall as a whistling sound heralded another explosion.
“Where’s it coming from?” asked Vanderjack.
The gnome poked his head around the corner of the wall then quickly drew it back. “It’s him. It’s Cazuvel.”
“Oh, fantastic. I thought I’d have a little time before he showed up.”
“Sellsword!” called the Black Robe’s voice above the sizzling sound of many small fires burning the rooftop tar. “I have the girl! Give me the painting! We’ll call it a fair trade.”
Vanderjack blinked and looked behind him. He clasped Theodenes on the shoulder and whispered, “He’s got Gredchen. Duck over there and get the painting before he sees it, Theo. I’ll … distract him.”
Theodenes looked from the sellsword to the painting, which was indeed out of sight, and nodded.
Vanderjack jumped out from behind the wall. “Over here!” he shouted. “Looking for me?” In his mind, he recalled Gredchen’s advice and tried to imagine what the Balladeer might prompt him with. The ghost was always suggesting one insult, taunt, or jibe after another. What were some of the best ones he’d used before?
He saw Cazuvel stalking across the tower roof, his black robes flapping in the wind. His cowl was pulled over his head so all the sellsword could see were those violet eyes and the peculiar grin. With a twinge, he also caught sight of what might have been the hilt of Lifecleaver, strapped to the mage’s belt, beneath the robes.
“So the highmaster left you behind, did she?” said Cazuvel, shaping a gesture with one hand while the other gripped the sword hilt. Vanderjack saw him look briefly to the side and say something under his breath then shake his head.
He was talking to the ghosts!
“She figured you and I should have a little parley!” Vanderjack said, holding up his hands. A memory of the Balladeer’s voice came to him, and he ran with it: “But I thought, why tease you with big words you don’t understand?”
The kender race produced the most accomplished insulters and taunters in all of Ansalon. Vanderjack was no kender. But his sarcasm seemed to have struck some nerve. The wizard completed whatever spell he was casting, and a streak of black lightning arced from his fingertips to a spot just to the left of the sellsword. Where it struck, chunks of rock exploded upward, catching Vanderjack across his side and along his upper arm.
“She sent you after me, did she? Madness! You haven’t a chance against my magic, sellsword. Give me the painting, or I will wipe you off the face of Krynn!”
Vanderjack took a quick look around. “Or I’ll give you the painting and then you’ll wipe me off the face of Krynn! See what I mean? All you’ve got is fakery and grandstanding and simple words of one or two syllables. It’s really kind of embarrassing.” In his mind the memory-voice of the Hunter was telling him to watch his flanks. Sure enough, the sellsword spotted two kapak draconians clinging to the battlements on either side of him, crouching, unmoving.
The sellsword hoped Theo had moved the painting or was at least making his way to the stairs. He couldn’t see him anywhere; the collateral damage from the mage’s destructive magic had stirred up so much dust and smoke.
“The painting, sellsword!” said Cazuvel, emerging from the nearest bank of smoke. Vanderjack had no weapon and still couldn’t see Gredchen. Had one of the kapaks grabbed her?
“Painting?” Vanderjack said. “Now where did I put that thing …?”
Cazuvel snarled and started to frame another spell. Vanderjack wondered what the Conjuror would say about that. Maybe …
Vanderjack dropped to his left, somersaulting out of the way just as a chilling blast of frost sprayed the spot he just left. When he came up, he knew he needed to take the initiative and just grab the wizard. With luck, he’d take the sword from him and it would all be over.
Vanderjack dived at Cazuvel, aiming for his midsection. The wizard brought his knee up, hoping to catch the sellsword under the chin, but was a fraction of a second too late. Vanderjack knocked the wizard backward into another low wall, one hand up to grab the wizard around the throat with the other reaching for his sword.
His fingers wrapped around the hilt, and in that instant Vanderjack spied the ghosts arrayed around them both-the Cavalier, the Hunter, the Apothecary, the Aristocrat, the Conjurer, the Philosopher, and the Balladeer. And there, in front of them all, stood the Cook.
“Etharion?” said Vanderjack.
“Get back!” they all shouted in unison.
Cazuvel brought the heel of his palm up against Vanderjack’s nose. The sellsword felt his nose break, the blinding pain lancing all the way to the back of his head. He let go of the sword, and the ghosts vanished from his sight. Then something even worse happened.
Cazuvel triggered a spell, obviously connected to the act of making physical contact with his opponent. A sudden wave of nausea and muscle cramps struck the sellsword only a heartbeat after his nose was broken. He slumped to the side. The wizard leaped to his feet, and Vanderjack felt a hard kick in the ribs from a hobnail boot.
“Aaaargh!” he screamed, clutching his injury.
Cazuvel looked off to the side. A smile crept across his face, and he looked back down again at Vanderjack. “I have what I came for!” he said, triumphant, and dashed away.
Vanderjack struggled to get up. Blood was streaming from his nose, and his chest felt as if a lance had pierced it. He looked around, desperate, unable to see Theodenes, the painting, Gredchen, or anything except flashes of color in his left eye and smoke everywhere.
Then, as if it could get any worse, there was a high-pitched screech as the kapaks leaped out of the darkness toward him. Vanderjack braced for their impact.
A deafening roar split the night, knocking the two kapaks out of the air with the force. The smoke was blown clear. Vanderjack rolled onto his belly and pushed himself up onto his elbows to see the welcome sight of Star rising up above the battlements, Theodenes straddling his back.
“The wizard!” Vanderjack coughed, pointing in the general direction of where Cazuvel had gone.
“Too late for that now,” said Theodenes. “He has the painting and Gredchen and he’s teleported both away from here.”
Vanderjack felt the world around him spin, and he had to steady himself against one of the crenellations. “Then we’ve lost. We’ve lost everything. Ackal’s Teeth, what do we do now?”
“A rescue mission, of course! We leave immediately for Wulfgar,” said Theodenes.
“How could you possibly know that’s where Cazuvel is going?”
“Because,” said Star, his resonant feline voice dispelling the fog in Vanderjack’s head. “Your ghosts are telling me.”
Vanderjack managed a smile. Now that was more like it.
Rivven Cairn instructed Cear to land in the courtyard behind the khan’s palace in Wulfgar.
“All of this traveling back and forth is distracting me from what I need to be doing, Cear,” she said, patting him on the snout as she dismounted. “Stick around, though. The chariot racing starts tomorrow. I know how much you like that.”
“I like it more at night,” said the dragon, his jaws dropping with thick, sulfurous spittle. “When everything’s on fire.”
Rivven smiled. “That’s only when you get carried away, Cear,” she said and walked away from him. Cear was as much in love with fire as she was, but then, he had an excuse. She was the perfect partner for one of the mighty, inflammatory reds.