and you will learn.'
'Then why?'
The rotting face did its hideous smile. 'You were Manferic's insurance,' the lich explained, persistently talking about its own past as if it belonged to another. 'Insurance against his sons.'
'Insurance?' Wonders of all, Manferic apparently felt talkative, like the aging father passing his wisdom down to his son. The lich was sentimental in a cold and heartless way.
'If his sons rebelled and he was forced to kill them, he wanted you alive to continue the bloodline.'
'So he fathered me and kept it secret-'
'So you would not turn against him as he feared his sons would.'
The cold-blooded reasoning of it matched Manferic's mind perfectly. 'Why did he force me to leave? I don't believe a word about making me stronger.' Unconsciously, Pinch talked as if Manferic were someone else, too.
'Manferic realized he could create me. Why should he try to continue his dynasty through the blood of others when he could live forever? You became a danger to making me,' the lich answered.
From the way the lich talked about itself, Pinch could only decide it was mad. The spells, the will, and the decay had destroyed something in Manferic's mind. The lich might have the memories, the evil and the cunning, but it was no more Manferic than Pinch was. It was a transformation of souls, as the old king descended into something even viler and more grotesque than it had been in life. Pinch had seen fatherly love in all its forms-fathers who trained their sons in the highway law, fathers who sold their daughters to wealthy men, even those who turned in their own to the authorities for coin-but even these could not compare to the scale of reptilian cruelty that Manferic aspired to. An involuntary shudder seized him at the thought of such cruel manipulation.
'So Manferic tried to kill me and get rid of the problem,' Pinch said bitterly as he finished dressing. The heavy hand of the quaggoth forced him back into his seat. Meanwhile, the lich produced a gem from the folds of its robe and set it on the floor between them.
'No,' the undead thing sighed, 'it was not Manferic. It was your half-brother, Prince Vargo. Manferic simply withdrew his protection from you. He did not want you dead, only gone. A good scare to send you away. There was always a chance he might need your bloodline, that his plans might fail.'
'Who was my mother?' Pinch was still stalling for time, but he truly wanted the answer to this.
'As you were told, the Lady Tulan, lady-in-waiting to the queen.'
'What happened to her?'
'Manferic hid her in the catacombs until the baby was born,' the lich answered with icy detachment. 'Then he gave her to Ikrit.'
Pinch looked over his shoulder at the huge, hairy man-thing. 'You guard the lady?'
The creature bared a fang and grunted, no confirmation or denial. It was as much as the creature would say before its master.
The lich's burning gaze fixed on the dirty white creature. 'Interesting…' it whispered.
Pinch sensed that he'd spoken more than he should. If it had been only Ikrit, he would have irked the two to conflict, but there was another at stake here he did not want to sacrifice-the lady in the tunnels. If she was his mother, Pinch wanted to protect her from harm. He needed her to prove his claim, he rationalized, forgetting that his chances of escape were slim. 'So why drag me back?' he asked to quickly change the subject.
The lich's fiendish gaze shifted to Pinch. 'Does this look like success?' It snarled as it brushed its wormy cheek with a skeletal hand. 'All the books, all the scrolls never promised anything like this! I need a new body… and you will provide it. Ikrit, hold him!'
The quaggoth clamped its paws on Pinch's shoulders till the claws stabbed into the flesh. This was the last moment, he knew, so the rogue twisted and fought with all abandon. He kicked at Manferic, but the lich stayed well out of the way, and all his writhing only made the giant guardian press him down all the firmer. While he kicked and screamed, the lich coolly went about its preparations.
'Scream as you wish. No one will come.' Pinch gave it up, knowing the monster was right. No doubt Cleedis had ordered the guards to leave them undisturbed when he first came in. 'Hold him, but don't hurt him,' the creature warned. 'I want my new body undamaged.' The lich seemed positively cheerful. 'You see,' it explained as it arranged the gem between them, 'I don't intend to spend eternity looking like this. I want a strong body.'
'You could have had anyone. Just steal one off the streets,' Pinch protested between kicks.
'And walk through the halls wearing the husk of a street rat? The palace guards would never let me in.' The lich positioned itself opposite Pinch. 'I was going to use Cleedis, but he's so… old. The other princes are too well known. There was too much to learn to be one of them. Their friends would be suspicious. You are perfect. A place in the palace and no past to encumber me.'
'I have friends.'
'Ah, your three companions. I know about them. Cleedis informed me. He was quite thorough-right to the end.' Preparations finished, the lich sat at the edge of the bed. 'No one will mourn their deaths. Just sewer scum the city is best rid of.'
Pinch winced at that. He had worked hard to protect himself and the others from that fate, and now his efforts would be to no avail.
'This will be interesting,' the lich continued. 'A new experience. You see, I will replace you in your own body, while you will be trapped in this jewel.' It nodded to the stone between them. 'And then, I will have Ikrit crush the jewel and your essence will vanish into the void. An interesting experience for you, though rather shortlived.'
The lich drew itself up, ready to utter the words that would close the spell. Hands raised, it parted its teeth and-
'Your plan is flawed!' Pinch blurted, trying to sound more confident than he felt.
The lich sensed his desperation. 'It will work perfectly,' it sneered.
'Oh? What about Cleedis? How can you rule Ankhapur if your broker is dead? You needed him to be regent, and like a fool you killed him back there. No one in Ankhapur would tolerate me as their sovereign.' Pinch tried to sit himself up straight in support of his bluff.
The lich shook its moldering head. 'Is this my only spell? Why should I be one person when I can be three? It is a simple thing to change a face with a single spell. I will be Janol or Cleedis as I choose, but I will always be Manferic in my soul. When all the princes fail the test, they will be forced to name me regent.
'Enough of this-Ikrit, don't let him escape.'
Pinch lashed out wildly as the lich began the rite. He tried every foul move he could, aiming his elbow for the creature's lower regions and stamping to break the beast's foot. None of it worked. The lich droned through its litany, brittle voice rising in triumph as it reached the last syllables.
At the final phrase, the lich's body collapsed like the dead body it truly was. The legs folded uselessly, the raised arms flopped, and the head lolled in meaningless directions as the carcass fell to the floor. A scattering of lice and worms spilled from the sack-the scattered pollen of death.
It didn't work, Pinch exulted. The lich's spell and his plan had failed. With burst of joyous strength that caught the baffled quaggoth off guard, Pinch broke from the beast's corded grasp and dashed for the door. He would throw it open, the guards would come, and-
An invisible, intangible spike hammered right through Pinch's brow. It was a heated nail of hateful ambition that cracked his skull and burrowed into the heart of his brain. It ripped at the lines of his self, the ties that anchored his being to his body. With swift cuts, Pinch's body vanished from his psyche. He went blind first as something seized his eyes. The sounds of his crashing across the room vanished next, leaving only the rush of pain as his connection to the world. Pinch tried to fight this waylaying of his body, to concentrate on who he was, but his effort was crushed by a ferocious onslaught of hateful will. In a brief glimpse, he saw the form of it, the raw essence that had kept his father alive-even beyond death.
And then there was nothing.
Blind, mute, and disconnected from his nerves, Pinch was stripped of the weight of his flesh and cast into a void. There was no color, no darkness, not even the sense of seeing. There was no pain or absence of it, no stale smells of prison-trapped air. There was no body to breathe. All that remained of Pinch were the lessons life had given him, the bitter memories, the ambitions, and the uncertain belief that he still existed.
But just what was he? With ample time to consider, for time too was lost to him, Pinch arrayed the options that memory presented him. Manferic said he'd be trapped in the jewel, but also that he was going to crush it. So was he alive… or dead? He compared all the ends he'd ever heard described, but his bland, existenceless state was
