"No," he said. "Telurinon intends to pour the drop directly on her head."
Mereth was a wizard and had been for all her adult life; she regularly worked with bits of corpses and various repulsive organic fluids. What was more, she had worked for the Minister of Justice and his daughter, the Minister of Investigation, studying and spying on all the various things that the citizens of Ethshar did to one another when sufficiently provoked. All the same, she winced slightly at the thought of pouring that stuff on someone's head.
"Ick," she said. Then, after a moment's thought, she asked, "How?"
"The warlocks," Tobas told her. "As soon as it's ready, the warlocks will transport it to the palace and pour it on Tabaea. Then, as soon as she's dead, they'll lift her corpse, so the stuff won't get on anything else, and send Tabaea and the Seething Death through the tapestry. It's all ready to go, rolled up by the front door."
"Couldn't they just send her through the tapestry alive? Then we wouldn't have to use the Seething Death at all!"
Tobas sighed again. "Maybe they could," he said, "but they don't think so. She's a warlock herself, while she's alive, and she can block them. I don't understand that part, I'm not a warlock any more than you are, but that's what they say."
"Have they tried!" Mereth demanded.
Tobas turned up an empty palm. "Whether they have or not," he said, pointing at Telurinon, "it's a little late to turn back now, isn't it?"
CHAPTER 35
Sarai winced, eyes closed, as she slit the dog's throat. The animal thrashed wildly, and hot blood sprayed on Sarai's hands, but she kept her hold.
And as it struggled, Sarai felt a surge of heat, of strength, all through her; without meaning to, she tightened her grip on the dying dog and felt the flesh yielding beneath her fingers. Her heart was pounding, her muscles were tense.
Then the dog went limp, sagging to the ground between her legs, and the world suddenly seemed to flood in on her; her ears rang with strange new sounds, and her vision seemed suddenly sharper and more intense, as if everything was outlined against the background of the Wall Street Field-though for a moment, the colors seemed to fade away, as if drowned out by the clarity of shape and movement.
Most of all, though, scents poured in. She could smell everything, all at once-the dog's blood, her own sweat, her sex, the dirt of the Field, the sun-warmed stone of the city wall, the smokes and stenches of every individual shop or home on Wall Street or the blocks beyond. She could tell at once which of the empty blankets and abandoned tents of the Field were mildewed or decayed and which were still clean and wholesome; she could smell the metal of the Black Dagger itself.
For a moment she stood over the dead dog, just breathing in the city, marveling at it all. She had known that dogs could smell better than mere humans, of course, everyone knew that, but she had never before realized how much better, and she had never imagined what it would be like.
Her attempts to find Lord Torrut had, so far, been unsuccessful; she had found no one in the barracks or the gatehouses. Now, though, she wondered if she could locate him by smell, track him down by following his scent. She had heard about dogs doing such things and had always dismissed the stories as exaggerations, but now, she had to reconsider. She could smell everything.
She was stronger now, too; she could feel it. The dog had not been particularly strong or healthy, just a half-starved stray scavenging in the almost-empty Field, but she had felt the power in her grip as she held it while it died.
Tabaea had killed a dozen men-Sarai tried to imagine just how strong that made her feel, and couldn't.
And Tabaea had killed several dogs, as well, Sarai remembered-she, too, had experienced this flood of scent and sound and image.
Scents-that explained some of Tabaea's mysterious abilities. It wasn't magic, not in the way Sarai and the others had assumed; she could smell people approaching; she could hear them, like a watchdog. People said dogs could smell fear, as well, could tell friend from foe by scent-could Tabaea?
Until now, Sarai had viewed Tabaea as a mysterious and powerful magician, her talents and abilities beyond any ordinary explanation, her mind beyond understanding; now, suddenly, she thought she understood the usurper. Sarai had assumed that Tabaea had created the Black Dagger deliberately, knowing what she was doing; that she had studied magic, had set out to conquer Ethshar. It was the Black Dagger that gave her her physical strength and immunity to harm, the wizards had told Sarai that, but now Sarai began to believe that all Tabaea's power came from the dagger.
Without it, did she have any magic?
Well, she presumably still had her warlockry, and maybe witchcraft-Teneria and Karanissa had said that Tabaea had the talent, as they called it, but didn't know how to use it properly.
And she had her canine sense of smell and her accumulated strength and stolen lives.
Sarai remembered the dead cats and the dead pigeon; could Tabaea have stolen the bird's ability to fly? What had she gotten from the cats?
Well, Sarai thought, holding up the bloody dagger, there was one way to find out, wasn't there?
The first cat came as a revelation; the addition to her strength was nothing, smell and hearing got no better, but the increase in her speed and the intense sensitivity to movement were as big a surprise as the dog's sense of smell. That was how Tabaea could react so quickly when she fought!
The pigeon was a waste of time; that explained why dead birds hadn't littered the city when Tabaea was building herself up.
The next step, Sarai decided, was an ox, for the raw strength it would provide; Tabaea had used people, but Sarai had no intention of committing murder.
Unfortunately, there were no stray oxen wandering in the Wall Street Field. Buying an ox was not difficult-if one had money. Sarai had no money to speak of, just a few borrowed coppers in the purse on her belt. The family treasure had gone to sea with her father and brother, while the family income was gone with Lord Tollern and the overlord.
Perhaps she could borrow more money somewhere, she thought. The obvious place to go would be the Guildhouse, since that was where the richest and most powerful of her nominal allies were, but she still did not care for the idea of walking in there with the Black Dagger on her belt. She thought she could trust Mereth, and Tobas seemed like a reasonable person, but Telurinon and Algarin and the rest…
Tobas was not living in the Guildhouse, though; he and his wives were staying at the Cap and Dagger. Lady Sarai sniffed the air, without consciously realizing she was doing it. She stretched, catlike, then flexed her shoulders in a way that would have fluffed a pigeon's feathers out nicely. Then she wiped the Black Dagger clean, sheathed it, and headed out of the Field, up onto Wall Street, and toward Grandgate.
From the market, she turned down Gate Street; the Cap and Dagger was six blocks down on the right.
As she walked, she soaked in the odors and sights of a city turned strange and rich by her augmented senses. She could, she found, tell what each person she passed had eaten for his or her last meal and how long ago that meal was; she could detect the slightest twitch of a hand or an eye. She spotted rats foraging in an alley and knew that she would never have seen them without the Black Dagger's spell.
She saw someone glance oddly at her and realized that she was moving strangely, her gaze darting back and forth, her nose lifted to catch the air. She forced herself to look straight ahead. Then she was at the inn; she stood in the door until the inn-Keeper came to ask what she wanted.
Sarai was sure she had not seen the man before and wondered where he had hidden himself when the wizards held their meeting in his establishment.
"I'm looking for a man named Tobas of Telven," she said. "Or if he's not here, one of his wives."