A Dragon's Ascension - Ed Greenwood [66]
Embra opened swimming eyes, and tried to stare at him. "Top of the dock stair-little door in the topmost torch lantern: a glowstone, for when there's wind or rain or overmuch snow…"
"Raulin!" Sarasper snapped, and the young bard launched himself up the steps like an arrow shot from a bow.
"Uh, Raulin-?" Craer asked, on the stair, as the young bard stormed past. "Hadn't you better wait for us, in case whichever wizard raised that barrier is lording it up there? And might be struck by the urge to turn you into a rotten gourd? Or, say, a pillar of ale, with no flask or handy tankard to hold you together?"
The hurrying youth paid him no heed, slowing not a step in his rush.
"Our 'whichever wizard' is going to be Ambelter, I'll be bound," Hawkril growled darkly, striding up the stairs three at a time with war-sword in hand.
Raulin came back down the stairs even more quickly. He bore the glowstone in his hand, but looked sick.
"What ails, lad?" Hawk snapped.
"B-bodies," the young bard called back. "Blood, and flies crawling on their eyes-"
He was suddenly, noisily sick just to one side of the stone steps, and ran on, almost sobbing, to where Sarasper waited in the boat, with Embra and Glarsimber slumped on either side of him.
"Spew some more right now if you can, lad," the old man told him with a sour smile. "I'm going to need your help pulling the sword out of our bold baron, here!"
Raulin stared at him, face white-and then, abruptly, did as Sarasper suggested. The healer threw a hand under the nearest Castlecloaks elbow and spun him around just in time to avoid being drenched.
"Such obedience is rare in the young," he commented, as Raulin's shoulders stopped shaking.
The bard hissed a bad word at him, then threw back his head, breathed deeply, and followed it with an apology. "There's been a battle up mere," he told the healer. "Bodies everywhere."
"Flowfoam court guards? Courtiers? Strangers?"
The bard shrugged. "I don't-all of them, I guess. Just blood, blood-"
Sarasper clapped a hand on Raulin's shoulder, and said, "The glow-stone? Thankee. Now into the boat-we've got a lady sorceress to get on her feet."
"But isn't Glarsimber-?"
"Yes, and I'd be seeing to him first save that we all might need Em's spells in a hurry; us for healing Brightpennant, here, or Hawkril and Craer if they run into the Spellmaster or some other crazed wizard, Aglirta's got plenty to spare-a step or two inside the palace! Now get down here! I need you to hold her still, in case she thrashes if there's pain and loses us this glowstone into the water, see?"
Raulin saw, and got down mere in as much haste as he could. He was only sick once more, and that was safely into the water.
"The lad was right," Hawkril muttered. "Looks like a hog-slaughtering!"
Craer nodded, but put a finger to his lips for quiet as he glided forward into the next chamber. Bodies were slumped everywhere, and all was dark and silent, as if not a man yet lived- There! Something had moved over there!
In a crouch, the procurer crept forward, darting along beside a grandly gilded lounge that half a dozen armaragors could hide behind. At its far end he halted, low to the floor, and peered around the corner, head swaying out like a snake's.
The man at the far end of the chamber was stumbling along blindly, blundering into walls and doorframes, and-yes, his face drooped sickeningly, eyes great pits and flesh hanging like melted wax. Another lurched into view, shuffling mindlessly through another doorway, a sword dangling from its hand. It did not even seem to see the first stumbling man-or the procurer peering at it.
Craer ducked back the way he'd come. "Melted! The place is full of Melted!" he hissed.
"So which wizard commands them now?" Hawkril growled. "The one we're going to find and slay, yes?"
Craer gave him a wry grin. "You