“Lord Dauntless”? Nay, not for him. Lords were arrogant, fat-bellied idiots with monocles, foolish notions, and casual rudenesses, who deserved all the contempt they were held in.
Sir Dauntless, now… a man had to earn a knighthood. He stared at the shield in his lap through the last of the thinning smoke. Its blazon was an unfinished chaos of chalk, because Dauntless wasn’t much of a limner and because he hadn’t quite settled on what he wanted-wings and a lion, yes, yet a lion with wings was a manticore: a stupid, evil, nuisance beast-but he could copy out ornamented characters with the best of them. His motto, framed by a flowing scroll, blazed forth from the shield proudly: “Bold to face the foe.”
Well, so he was. Someday, perhaps, Cormyr would say so.
Reluctantly stubbing out the butt before it burned his knuckles, Dauntless slid the shield safely back into its hiding place in the lid of his locker, between the real top and the false top he’d constructed so long ago, folded down the edge-flap over the slot between them, and carefully adjusted the pins that secured it, sprinkling a pinch of pepper over them to look like dust. If the wrong person found this, it would mean utter disaster.
The distant bell tolled, right on time. Sighing, Dauntless stood, put the cigar butt on the usual tray on its high shelf, jammed his helm onto his head, and strode out of his quarters, every inch a stern, erect, on-duty ornrion.
It was time for this particular gruff, cigar-smoking veteran of burly build, shrewd sense, and a huge mustache to flog Purple Dragons into shape once more.
And by Helm and Torm both, they took a lot of flogging.
“We-that is, all house wizards-are under orders to investigate any accidental death of any noble, knight, mage, or priest, Lady,” Treth Ohmalghar said. “Moreover, both your lord husband and myself find your orders to all Greenmantle servants to depart the hall for the day… interesting.”
Lady Greenmantle’s face was white with anger. “You dare-? ”
“Lady,” Ohmalghar said gently, “I do, and must. Please bear in mind that Lord Greenmantle and myself have taken care that I speak with you in private, to spare you even the slightest stain to your reputation. Just as you consulted with Bleys Delaeyn in private.”
“Very well,” the noblewoman said, still obviously furious. “Ask your questions.”
The Greenmantle house wizard inclined his head to her politely, spread his hands, and murmured an incantation too quiet for Lady Greenmantle to hear.
“Mage, what are you doing? ”
“To save us both much time and ill-feeling, I’m seeking answers in your mind,” Ohmalghar explained. “Innocent folk have nothing to fear from such a proced-” He stiffened, his eyes going sharp.
Lady Greenmantle gave a little cry, like a dismayed bird, one hand going to her mouth. Her eyes darted to the bell that would bring servants on the run, then to the two doors out of the room… and all her rage seemed to drain away from her, leaving only fear, when she realized the house wizard-who suddenly seemed an above-himself servant no longer, but something far more menacing-had deftly placed her so that he stood between her and both the bell and the doors.
There was a wand in his hand, and it was pointed at her.
“Lady Greenmantle,” he said, the snap of command in his voice, “sit down. In the chair just behind you. Now. ”
Amdranna Greenmantle sat.
Eyes never leaving hers, Ohmalghar cast another spell and spoke softly to the empty air. “Treth Ohmalghar for Ghoruld Applethorn. Urgent.”
The noblewoman sat staring at him, trembling, her white face gone almost yellow.
“Yes, Treth?” The voice spoke from nothingness.
“Greenmantle Hall, Twohelm Chamber. I’m with Lady Amdranna Greenmantle, and from her mind have just learned that she murdered Wizard of War Bleys Delaeyn. As her part in a plot to murder senior war wizards, unfolded to her by the Lady Jalassa Crownsilver, and also involving the noble ladies Muscalian and Yellander! We must inform Lord Vangerdahast at once!”
“Indeed. Knows she any other intended victims?”
“I… think not. I lack the spells to truly probe.”
“I’m coming through.”
Lady Greenmantle whimpered, the air between her and the house wizard shimmered, and then there was a tall, impressive-looking man in rich robes standing on her dapple-dyed ghost-rothe rug.
Wizard of War Ghoruld Applethorn’s hair was white at the temples and he had a face as handsome as it was commanding. There were rings on his hands-one of them adorned with a large, strikingly carved unicorn head finer than anything in her own coffers. He gave her a hard look, turned slowly on his heel to look all around the room, nodding to Ohmalghar, and ended up with his back to the house wizard. Amdranna Greenmantle saw him cup one hand against his chest as if holding an invisible bowl, murmur something into it, then turn. Smiling at the house wizard, he stepped forward-and slapped that hand against Ohmalghar’s face.
The house wizard staggered, gasping, and fell to the rug, tiny wisps of smoke streaming from his eyes.
“Dedication, Ohmalghar,” Applethorn said almost jovially, “gets you only one thing: killed. Who’d have known Delaeyn was such a devious traitor that he’d cast a backlash on Lady Greenmantle to mindblast anyone probing her, burning out his brain and leaving him forever a drooling idiot?”
Giving Amdranna Greenmantle a soft smile, Applethorn cast another spell.
The air shimmered again, and a creature that Lady Greenmantle had only seen depicted in one of her husband’s hidden books appeared beside the war wizard. It was a gray-skinned, gaunt echo of a man, with huge eyes set in a larger head, and had long, spidery talon-fingers but no nose, mouth, nor privates.
“Your time has come at last,” Applethorn told the doppelganger-and pointed at Lady Greenmantle.
“Much thanksss,” it hissed, with lips that swam into being and gained shape even as it spoke. It was looking straight at her… and becoming shapely and feminine, its eyes going emerald green, an ample bosom form Great Gods Above! ’Twas becoming her! Herself, the Lady Greenmantle she gazed at in her dressing-glass of mornings!
As Amdranna Greenmantle stared at it in horror, her own voice issued from its lips: “Applethorn, try not to destroy the garments this time. I’d rather not stalk naked around this house trying to find the right wardrobes and upsetting the maids.”
As the wizard nodded and started to murmur a spell, the-the thing wearing her shape started purposefully toward her.
Amdranna Greenmantle opened her mouth to scream, rising to flee she knew not where, dashing wildly across the room.
Calmly, Ghoruld Applethorn blasted her down.
Dauntless swung open the battered door of the ready room-and stiffened, frowning.
Lionar Almarr Toliphur was sitting in his chair. A lionar sitting in his chair!
“What’s this?” he barked.
Rather than leaping upright and stammering excuses and apologies, Toliphur favored his superior with an easy grin, and held out the duty scroll. “I have to sit here and growl at the stalwarts as if I were you, because you have to report in to the She-Dragon herself.”
Dauntless sighed, smote his forehead, and growled, “I clean forgot. These ‘Swords of Eveningstar,’ right?”
“Right,” the lionar confirmed happily.
Dauntless plucked the scroll from Toliphur’s grasp, turned on his heel, and marched out. The scroll rattled in his hand as it trailed behind him in the wind of his haste.
He rolled it up without slowing, striding hard and fast toward the She-Dragon’s lair.
The Lady Lord of Arabel knew very well what the watch called her, just as well as the folk of Arabel knew it.
And just as Arabellans chose to overlook the slight on their loyalty represented by the Crown making every officer of the watch a Purple Dragon of experience and standing, Myrmeen Lhal chose to ignore the fact that those men-and most of the city, echoing them-called her “the She-Dragon.”
She’d even been heard, when someone bellowed it at her in an unfriendly fashion across a busy street, to remark that it was a rather more catchy name than “King’s Lady Lord of Arabel.”
