The Dragon's Doom - Ed Greenwood [92]
"What's happened?" someone on the barge gasped.
"Magic," a barge guard said grimly, and spat disgustedly into the river. "The same blight that always afflicts Aglirta. Fell magic, from wizard or Serpent-priest. To rule it, they rush to destroy or maim it. Until Aglirtans rise up and rid themselves of such vermin, this is going to happen again and again. My father told me it raged in his time-and here we are forty-odd summers later, and how far has the Kingless Land come?"
"Well," Flaeros replied quietly, "they have a King now."
The guard looked at him. "Hah! And do they heed him? Do the Serpents bow, and the barons obey, and the people know peace?" He waved at the fires and screaming people on the shore, and added wearily, "Oh, for a true King! This land could be so great!"
"I think it is great," Flaeros said firmly, "to have survived at all. The Dwaer-Stones lost and lost again, Faerod Silvertree and his Dark Three, Bloodblade, the Rising of the Serpent, the death of King Snowsar… Aye, Aglirta has survived much."
The guard slowly surveyed the fires and the maddened folk busily slaying each other, and then grunted, "Survived? Well, aye, after a fashion, Lord Bard. After a fashion."
They exchanged grim nods as the barge slid on through the night of blood and madness. Here and there, bodies were bobbing in the waters now.
"Is that you, Tash?"
"It had better be," the Lady Talasorn told Craer, as she swung around a corner to embrace him, and unhooded a lantern. "We… we're a littie weary."
"Huh," the procurer muttered, "you're weary. Who's been swinging swords and jumping around like jesters while you three lounged around humming to yon Dwaer, I'd like to know?"
"Charming as always, Overduke Delnbone," Blackgult observed from across the chamber.
"One has one's reputation to maintain," the procurer replied, sketching an elegant bow.
"Evidently," the Golden Griffon replied in weary rebuke. "We felt the castings dwindle and end, so I presume the priests are all dead or fled, but I hope you sent Stornbridge to a fitting end?"
"One priest fled, aye," Hawkril replied, shouldering into the room, "and Craer did his usual dancing justice upon the unlamented tersept. But we've some grim news to report: The Serpents have unleashed something they call the Blood Plague, all over the Vale."
Embra nodded, looking pale and drawn. "It does seem widespread, yes. Fell and mighty, laying madness on folk who've never bent a knee to the Great Serpent as well as those who've come to his altars, so far as I could see. The altar fires…" She winced at the memory. "We had to leave off using the Dwaer, or be overwhelmed. So much magic, and so… twisted!
Craer nodded. "So, does anyone have anything trustworthy we can eat or drink?"
His fellow overdukes stared blankly at him, and then Blackgult- followed by Tshamarra, and then Hawkril-started to laugh.
"Well?" the procurer asked, folding his arms. "Are we now the masters of Stornbridge Castle? Should we find some chamber with food and drink that we can readily garrison, and get some sleep?"
"Now that is a very good suggestion, Craer," Embra muttered, and there were sounds of agreement among the mirth of the others. "Before someone expects me to stagger around this interminable castle, however, suppose we discuss where we might find such a place. If it helps, with what little I could tell through the Dwaer, all the guards, servants, and Serpent-priests seem gone from nearby."
Craer frowned. "Fear, or our hacking and spellhurling, or just freedom from dead masters-or did this plague touch them, too?"
"Some of them, yes," Embra replied. "Through the Dwaer, I saw one servant claw another, without warning, and the two of them fell to fighting like beasts."
"And I," Blackgult added, "saw an armsman in the castle start to stagger and hunch