Miranda had fought themost intense battle of minds with her mother and lost, but had notfelt defeated. She had battled her mother when she was dead tiredwith fatigue and her mother was fresh. Next time the outcome wouldbe different. Next time Miranda would win. The curious thing wasthat rather than her mother becoming overbearing and crowing abouther victory, she had not even mentioned it but had suggested thatAquitain might actually be able to lift the curse.
Miranda thought aboutthe curse. It had tormented her dreams countless times in the past.Now her mother had told her that something had gone wrong. It wasnot as her mother had intended. It was worse. Her mother couldn’tremove it, only her potential lover could. What sort of a man wouldbe prepared to run the gauntlet of death for her? She was scared -would Aquitain be prepared to try to lift it? Did he care enoughabout her? Did he feel like she felt? Would he change now that hewas a bear? Would he challenge her powerful mother? What were theother conditions he would need to fulfil? Could he succeed? Did helove her?
She rememberedsomething he had said only this morning. If the gods wanted to makechanges they would get people like her and himself to do it andtempt them with something they desired, and taunt them in theirdreams. She remembered the bear dream. She remembered that it wasAquitain she had seen in the bear’s eyes. He had been both happyand sad. Why was he sad? Was it that he knew he couldn’t lift thecurse? Was he sad because they could only remain friends andnothing more?
Was she his prize andhe her prize but they would remain forever separated by her curse?She cried again, deep heart wrenching sobs. Why was the Lady socruel?
Chapter 22 Trouble in TwinTowers
It was late afternoon,just before dark. Jaztrix sat dominated on a log in the jungle tothe west of the teleport marker near Twin Towers, wearing the BeastMask. She had been hiding invisible in the room when Aquitain hadunwrapped the mask to let it challenge Miranda. Unknown toAquitain, it could detect any life within ten paces. It haddetected Jaztrix and mentally attacked and dominated herimmediately after feigning its loss to Miranda, and implanted acommand in Jaztrix’s mind to follow Miranda and steal the mask atthe first opportunity. It couldn’t believe its luck, as neitherAquitain nor Miranda knew the gnome was present.
The gnome had followedMiranda to Twin Towers but was unable to get close enough to stealthe mask. Jaztrix was listening in as a rat when Miranda toldZephira the story, was overjoyed when she had said she would goback to Aquitain, and followed along. When the assassin had struckAquitain down and Miranda had left without the backpack, Jaztrixhad been able to steal the mask and replace it with a piece of woodof roughly the same size and shape, wrapped in the same cloth thatthe mask had been covered with to disguise its absence ,then leavefor Twin Towers.
When Miranda hadreturned with her friends and resurrected Aquitain she had brieflyfelt to see if the mask and club were there, and feeling both,hadn’t looked any closer. Jaztrix was already in Featherdown’stower writing her letter about quitting her apprenticeship. Themask had big plans for Jaztrix.
‘Ah. It’s so good to befree again,’ said Erastius. ‘I’ve been stuck in this damn maskwithout any excitement for too long. It’s time to have some funagain. Tonight we announce our presence, gnome. You and I are goingto get along well until I can find someone more powerful, thenmaybe I’ll let you go. Then again, maybe I won’t. Ha Ha.
‘It’s time to call somecats and maybe some wild boars. That’ll make them scratch theirheads. Two natural enemies working together to attack newmans. Itshould give rise to all sorts of crazy rumours. How delicious. Callthe boars first.’
Jaztrix activated themagic in the mask to call the creatures and waited.
Nine large boarsanswered the summons and, using the mask, Jaz dominated them,getting them to all lie down and wait. A half an hour after darkJaz called the cats, and over the next half hour five arrived.These were also dominated using the mask, and made to sit andwait.
About three hours afterdark when most of the town’s people would be sitting aroundchatting, and perhaps drinking a few ales, Erastius got Jaz intoaction. She first moved all the boars and then the cats to withinabout five hundred paces of the town limit, and had them crouch atboth sides of the road. Then she used a scroll to cast flight onherself and flew to where she knew the duty wizard would bestationed; and the Erastius dominated the young wizard.
The duty wizard hadaccess to the armoury and Erastius and the wizard raided it,getting three wands that were there for defending the gateway.Erastius had Jaz select a wand of fear and stored the other two inJaz’s backpack for later use. Erastius planned tonight as just thestart of his fun. The young duty wizard was commanded to break intoone of the customs stores and set it on fire. He was then to usehis own magic to fend off anyone trying to put out the fire.
Erastius had Jaz flyback to the Ugly Bear Inn and turn invisible. When the buildingcaught fire an alarm was sounded and the troops were turned out toput it out. The young wizard defended his post heroically, causingthe duty guards to pull back and call the officers and more guards,a good proportion of whom had been in the Ugly Bear or therestaurants around the fountain. Many of the Inn and restaurantcustomers went outside to watch the spectacle, but others eitherstayed inside or went back in after seeing all the troops runningto attend to the blaze, expecting it to be put out within a fewminutes.
At Erastius’ commandJaz sneaked inside the Inn and found about fifty people listeningand singing along with the Bard. He then got
