The Vacant Throne - Ed Greenwood [119]
Sarasper smiled thinly. "Lady, I do recall one. The way lies through yonder tomb." He nodded his head at one of the cottage-sized stone crypts that studded the overgrown hillside, and started forward. "We'd best make good time. Raulin's little rumor preceded us to that last tavern, and I'd like to be settled in again before whelmed warbands start dropping swords-first into our laps looking for Dwaer."
Embra nodded. True enough; their own trap was baited but not built.
Folk of the Vale, ever anxious for gossip a little darker and more local than the latest word of barons whelming armies and Serpent-priests holding sinister rituals in the mountains, had with Raulin's sly assistance (after Sarasper and Embra had told him what to say and not to say) wagged their tongues eagerly about the four adventurers who knew the king-and, some said, called him from slumber to rule the realm once more-who were even now in the depths of the Silent House, Doom of the Silvertrees, using a fabled Dwaer-Stone to find and summon to them the legendary Swords of the Lost-to make Aglirta invincible against all foes.
The Doom had already twisted the Lady Embra Silvertree into a horrible, slithering monster, that farmer in the last tavern had told his friend across the table-and half the taproom besides-in a hoarse whisper, and she'd eaten one of her three companions already, leaving the other two hiding from her in terror in the deepest dungeons of the House!
A peddler had turned from the bar then to insist that he'd heard-from a minstrel who'd dared to sleep in the ruins, and barely escaped with his life from ghosts that had risen straight up out of the ground like glowing pillars of death-that the Four had succeeded in summoning at least two of the Swords, which were now floating in the Silent House, slaying all who dared touch them (two of the Four, thus far). Their summoning had alerted no less a wizard than Bodemmon Sarr, who'd magically transported himself to the ruined mansion and there forced Embra Silvertree out of monster-shape so that he could mate with her, and had done, and that she was even now bearing a babe in her womb who'd hurl spells like none ever seen before in Darsar, and be able to turn into a monster at will, or to be man one night and a woman the next-a child who would seize Aglirta's throne not long after it tore itself free of her womb, or ate its way out, or from within her used its nascent mastery of magic to send the Swords of the Lost forth to slay wizards and barons and Risen Kings alike…
"Gods," Raulin had hissed, around the knuckle he was gnawing on to stifle his mirth, "but it gets steadily better!"
"That, lad," Hawkril had growled from beside him, "is how all bards' ballads and tales build… into something their own mothers wouldn't recognize."
As they took their first strides towards the overgrown ancestral home of the Silvertrees, a shimmering occurred in the air before them-and Hawkril snarled and flung wide his arms, knocking Raulin flat in the road and sending Sarasper staggering to one side.
The shimmering became a wash of Light that spat forth a staggering man stumbling amid the loose, clanging plates of splendid armor that was much too large for him. He took two unsteady strides and toppled, metal bouncing and rolling in the dirt all around.
"Craer!" the armaragor roared, racing forward too pluck the coughing procurer to his feet. "You're alive!"
His old friend looked down at his nakedness and the fresh weals made by the armor that had now fallen entirely away, rotting underpadding and all, and said a little wearily, "I suppose so. I've been killing barons and wizards. Thirsty work. I don't suppose anyone has-?"
"Here, sir," Raulin chirped eagerly, holding out a flask into which he'd poured some wine too fiery to finish at the last inn. Craer squinted hard at the lad.
"And who," he asked in somewhat amused tones, between quaffs,