Wiz Zumwalt plopped down in the carved oak chair, poured a cup of wine from the carafe on the inlaid table and sighed deeply.
Bal-Simba looked up from the corner of the Wizards’ Day Room where he was studying a scroll. "I take it it did not go well?" the giant black wizard asked mildly.
"You might say that." Wiz took a pull on the cup. Then he snorted with laughter.
"May I ask what is so funny?"
Wiz shook his head. "I was just thinking. Two years ago today I was being chased through the Wild Wood by trolls, bandits, Dire Beasts and the sorcerers of the Dark League."
"I remember."
"Now here I am, safe in the Capital of the North, the Dark League is in ruins and," he gestured mock grandly, "I’m supposed to be the greatest magician in the whole World."
"Your point, Sparrow?" Bal-Simba rumbled.
Wiz sighed deeply. "Just that right about now trolls, bandits and evil sorcerers look awfully good."
"I am Seklos," the black-robed one said. "I speak for the Dark League."
"Where is your master?" the northern wizard demanded.
"He is—indisposed," Seklos said. "I serve as his deputy with full authority to act in this matter."
The first one nodded. Since the great battle between the Sparrow and the Dark League, the conclave of sorcerers had been reduced to a pitiful few remnants. Their City of Night on the southern continent lay ruined and deserted and the black-robed ones who had once threatened to engulf the entire North were fugitives everywhere. The leaders of the Dark League, including Toth Set Ra, their chief, had died in the battle and the new leader was much less powerful. There were also disturbing rumors about him. The northern wizard was not surprised he had sent a deputy.
He advanced a step and then stopped. Crouching watchfully next to the wizard was a Shadow Warrior in the tight-fitting black of his kind. A slashing sword hung down his back and his eyes were hard and merciless through the slits in his hood.
"Foolish to bring such to a wizard’s meeting," the blue-robed wizard said.
The other shrugged. "It seemed a simple enough precaution."
"We meet under a sign of truce. You need fear nothing from me so long as the sign glows."
Seklos regarded him with amused contempt. "I know the usage. But we did not come here to discuss custom. What is your proposal?"
"My proposal?"
"The sign changes color," the wizard pointed at the glowing character, which was now definitely orange. "Let us not waste time."
He hesitated, thrown off his carefully prepared approach. "Very well. It concerns the Sparrow, this Wiz."
"Ahhh," said Seklos in a way that made the other think that he had known very well what the subject would be.
"You mean you are not—what was that phrase you used?—’living happily ever after’?" Bal-Simba smiled gently. "Few people do, Sparrow."
"Yeah, I know, but I didn’t expect it would be anything like what it’s turned out to be. I thought I’d be able to finish my magic compiler and teach a few people how to use it. Then I could go on to more advanced magic programs."
Bal-Simba nodded. More than most of this world’s wizards, he understood that Wiz’s magical power came not from innate talent—Wiz had no talent for magic in the conventional sense. Rather, his abilities rested on his discovery that it was possible to write a magic "language," like the computer languages he had used back in Silicon Valley. Wiz might be spectacularly untalented as a magician, but where computers were concerned he was about as talented as they come.
Wiz shook his head. "1 never saw myself sitting in meetings or in a classroom, trying to pound programming into a bunch of apprentices."
"Power makes its own demands, Sparrow," Bal-Simba said gently, laying the scroll aside. "Your new magic makes you powerful indeed."
"You know this Sparrow," the northern wizard hissed. "You know his power. He broke you utterly in a single day."
"And you are cast down from your former high estate in the North," the black robe retorted. "Do you wish our aid in restoring you? A trifle chancy, I fear. As you say, we are not so great as we once were."
"I desire no such thing," the blue robe said with dignity.
"Oh, the presidency of the Council then? To replace Bal-Simba?"
"I desire what we of the north have always sought. Balance, the preservation of the World."
"I fear your Sparrow is proving as dangerous to your precious balance as ever he did to our League," Seklos said. "Well, what did you expect when you Summoned someone so powerful?"
"We did not agree to the Summoning," the other said testily. "That was Patrius’s idea and he did not share it with the Council. And as for danger, he went on fiercely, "he is a greater danger than you know. With his outlandish magic he upsets the very balance of the World. Mortals attract attention from those who have ignored us ere now. They are likely to act against us, Council and League both."
Seklos nodded, saying nothing.
"There is still time. He can be stopped before matters come to a head, but to do it I must have your magic behind me."
Seklos laughed. "You propose to become an initiate of the Dark League?"
The blue-robed one gestured angrily. "Do not mock me, wizard. And understand this. We are mortal enemies, you and I. Under other circumstances I would crush you as I would kill a poisonous serpent."
Seklos smiled unpleasantly and cocked his head, but he did not interrupt.
"But," the first man went on, "the Sparrow is a threat to every human magic user in the World. For this once and on this one matter I suggest that we have common cause and propose that we act in concert to rid ourselves of this menace."
"You put the matter succinctly," said the black robe. "Let us therefore consider the destruction of this Sparrow."
"No!"
The other cocked an eyebrow. "Does our new alliance flounder so soon?"
"The Sparrow is to be neutralized, not destroyed."
"Why not?"
"Two reasons. First, I forbid it." Seklos smiled again, but the blue robe ignored him. "Second, if you had a modicum of mother wit you would know his death is your destruction. Kill the Sparrow, harm one hair of him, and every wizard in the North will descend upon you. They will grub you out of your burrows and exterminate you all."
"And doubtless in the inquiry your part in the business would be discovered."
"Doubtless," the blue robe agreed, making a brushing motion as if to shoo off an annoying insect. "No, we cannot kill him. But if he were to disappear there would be many to mourn aloud him and few to lament his passing in private."
"And you suggest… ?"
"A Great Summoning to send the Sparrow back where he belongs. Him and his alien magics."
"Such a thing would not be easy to do."
"It would take a number of wizards, but it would not be impossible."
"Patrius did it alone."
"I am not as great a magician as Patrius," the northerner said with dignity. "Nor do I wish to end as he did." He remembered how the Dark League had cut the mighty wizard down as he performed unaided the Great Summoning which brought the Sparrow to this world. "This requires more than I can accomplish alone and the others on the Council who feel as I do will not act."
"And you think we will?"
The northerner shrugged. "You have more reason and less to lose. It cannot be pleasant to be reduced to lording it over field mice and birds."
Seklos’ eyes glittered and the other knew his shaft had gone home.