Diseases! Derk thought. But he could not resist saying, “Isn’t there a case for the Dark Lord appearing to have a divine and sickly beauty?”
“Not,” said Mr. Chesney, “to any Pilgrim Party. Besides, this would interfere with our choice for this year’s novelty. This year I have decided that one of your gods must manifest at least once to every party.”
An anxious rustle ran around the entire table.
Mr. Chesney’s head came up, and his mouth clamped like a man-trap around someone’s leg. “Is there some problem with that?”
Querida was the only person brave enough to answer. “There certainly is, Mr. Chesney. Gods don’t appear just like that. And I don’t think any god has appeared to anyone for at least forty years.”
“I see no problem there,” Mr. Chesney told her. He turned to Derk. “You must have a word with High Priest Umru. Tell him I insist on his deity appearing.” He picked a sheaf of crisp blue papers out of his little case and flicked the pages over. “Failure to supply this year’s novelty is covered by Article Twenty-nine of our original contract. Yes, here it is. I quote. ‘In the event of such failure all monies otherwise accruing as payment for services rendered over the tour or tours will be withheld by Chesney Pilgrim Parties for that year and the individuals responsible will be fined in addition a sum not exceeding one hundred gold coins.’ This means that no one will get paid unless a god appears. Yes, I think there’s no problem here,” Mr. Chesney said. He put the papers away and sat back. “I shall now let Mr. Addis take over the meeting.”
In the silence that followed, the large man on Mr. Chesney’s right put his briefcase on the table and smiled jovially around at everyone. Mr. Chesney meanwhile refused wine from Mara and beer from Elda but accepted a cup of coffee from Blade, which he pushed to one side without tasting. He took a snack from the plate Lydda offered him, sniffed at it, and, with a look of slight distaste, laid it beside the coffee. The woman behind him refused everything. At least, Blade thought, the wizards were eating and drinking heartily enough. The beer barrel was empty when he tested it.
“Tell Callette to bring another one,” he whispered to Elda in the dreadful silence.
Ants needn’t sting people to spread the diseases, Derk thought. They could do it just by crawling between people’s toes.
The large Mr. Addis was fetching wads of different-colored pamphlets out of his case. Such was the silence that Blade could clearly hear the shiftings and creakings from the place where the stretched roof dipped down. He looked up anxiously. He saw a row of round snouts and interested little eyes peering over the bent gutter. So that was what the noise was! Blade nearly laughed. The pigs had discovered that the dip in the roof was beautifully warm and gave them an excellent view of the terrace. It looked as if the whole herd was up there. Some of the sounds were definitely those of a porker blissfully scratching its back against a loose tile. Blade longed to point the pigs out to Mara at least, but everyone was looking so shocked and solemn that he did not dare.
“Well, folks,” Mr. Addis said cheerfully, “this year we have one hundred and twenty-six Pilgrim Parties booked. They’ll be starting a fortnight from now and going off daily in threes, from three different locations, for the next two months. In view of the unusual numbers, we’re confining the tours just to this continent, but that still gives us plenty of scope. It means that some of you Wizard Guides are going to have to do double tours, but you should get around that easily by aiming to get your first party of Pilgrims through in a snappy six weeks or so. We’ll be starting from the three inns in Gna’ash, Bil’umra, and Slaz’in—”
“Where?” said Derk.
“—so apportion yourselves accordingly,” said Mr. Addis. “Pardon?”
“I’ve never heard of these places,” said Derk.
“They’re all marked down on our map,” said Mr. Addis. “Here.” He picked up the top one of his papers, a cream one, and handed it to Derk. Barnabas made a tired, practiced gesture on the other side of the table, and there was a map in front of everyone. There was even one for Blade, on top of the plate of snacks he was holding. He put the plate on the table and unfolded the map. To his slight alarm, it meant nothing to him.
“Oh, I see,” said Derk. “You mean Graynash, Billingham, and Sleane.”
“We like to rename our places, Mr. Dark Lord, to give the right exotic touch,” Mr. Addis explained kindly. “Now, as you’ll see, in order to get the Pilgrim Parties through all their scheduled adventures, we have to route them in a number of ways, color-coded on your map. Note that some of you will have your temple episode early, some in the middle, and some late and that the same applies to the exotic eastern adventure. We then split the tours into two for the enslavement episode. Half of you will go north to be captured by pirates, and half south to Costamaret to be taken as gladiators. Because of this division, we have selected ten cities for sacking this year. Mr. Dark Lord, please negotiate with your Dark Elves on this point and make sure they allow the Pilgrims to escape before the cities are burned. And after this, all Pilgrim Parties come together again for the regular weekly battle in Umru’s lands. Wizard Guides must take care here that each party is unaware of the presence of other parties. We like our customers to believe that their own tour is unique. You’ll find all the tour plans laid out in the pink schedule.”
He picked up a pink pamphlet. Barnabas made another gesture, and everyone had one of those, too. Blade unfolded page after page of lists and swallowed unhappily. “And here are your color-coded copies,” said Mr. Addis. This time Blade received a green paper that looked slightly simpler. The other wizards got blue or yellow or green lists.
In a fuzz of bewilderment, Blade heard Mr. Addis continue, “Please take note that this year’s tour is choreographed around the one weakness of the Dark Lord. Each party will pick up clues to the Dark Lord’s weak point as it goes around, ending in the retrieval of an object that contains this weakness—this is to be guarded by a dragon in the north—and then going on, after the battle, to kill the Dark Lord. Mr. Dark Lord, I’m sure I can count on you to lay one hundred and twenty-six clues at each spot marked with an asterisk on the map. And you will, of course, need the same number of objects for the dragon to guard.”
Derk thought vehemently of ants crawling between people’s toes to spread disease. Otherwise he thought he might cry. “What kind of objects have you in mind?” he asked.
“Any object, at your discretion”—Mr. Addis smiled—“though we tend to prefer something with a romantic bias, such as a goblet or an orb. But basically it should be capable of containing the weakness of your choice.”
“Athlete’s foot?” asked Derk, with his mind on ants.
“We prefer it to be a magical weakness or even a moral one,” Mr. Addis corrected him, with a kindly smile.
Derk stared at him, unable to concentrate. It was not just that he was thinking of ants while being deluged with instructions and colored papers. Mara was up to something. He could feel her working magic, and it worried him acutely. “Moral weakness?” he said. “You mean, sloth or something? Callette likes making objects. I suppose I could ask—”
And here was Callette herself, with her back talons grating the terrace as she heaved along another beer barrel. She set it down with an enormous thump, in the wrong place, between Mr. Chesney and the woman with the clipboard. Whump. The top was open. Bright red stuff splashed in all directions, smelling rather nasty.
Chairs scraped as everyone but Mr. Chesney got out of the way. The woman sprang up with a scream. “Oh, Mr. Chesney! It’s blood!”
Blood was running down one side of Mr. Chesney’s face and dripping on his suit. He turned and stared reprovingly at the barrel while he got out his handkerchief.
Derk wondered how Callette had come to be so stupid. Callette’s mind was always a mystery to him, but still! “Callette,” he said, “that’s not beer.”
Callette’s huge head pecked forward. She stared down into the rippling red liqui
d in the utmost surprise. Every innocent line of her said How is it not beer?
“It just isn’t,” Derk told her. “It’s one of the vats from my workroom, and I know it was sealed by a stasis spell. I can’t think why it’s open. I’m terribly sorry,” he said to the woman. She was still standing up, whimpering and dabbing at red spots on her tight pin-striped skirt with a paper hankie. “I’ll get it off for you—for both of you. It’s only pigs’ blood.”
The pigs on the roof heard him. At the words pig’s blood, there was an instant outcry, squeals, grunts, and yells of protest. Pink bodies surged about up there, and trotters clattered on tiles.
“Oh, shut up!” Derk yelled up at them. “It’s a pig from the village. Your ancestors came from the marshes.”
This did nothing to soothe the pigs. They continued to surge about, yelling their protest, until Ringlet, one of the larger sows, slipped, overbalanced, and toppled off the roof. As her heavy round body came plummeting down, squealing fearsomely, she looked certain to land splat in the middle of the table. Half the wizards prudently ducked underneath. Several vanished. Chairs fell over, and cups and mugs. Even Mr. Addis put his hands nervously over his head. But Ringlet, still squealing mightily, struggled about in the air and managed to right herself in time to spread her stubby little white wings. Violently flapping and squealing hysterically, she got control inches from the table and flew screaming down the length of it, just rising in time to miss Mr. Chesney and then rising again to swoop up to the roof. The whole herd took off from the tiles joyfully to meet her, flapping, grunting, and bawling like a disturbed pink rookery.
Shona dashed past Blade and fled in through the front door. He could see her there, and Elda with her, inside the hall, clutching one another and shaking with laughter. He marveled that Callette could sit there on her haunches looking so solemnly innocent. He took his hat off to her. He wanted badly to giggle himself, until he looked at Mr. Chesney. Mr. Chesney had not moved, except to wipe the blood off himself. He was just sitting there, waiting for the interruption to stop.
“Take it away, and get a proper barrel of beer,” Derk told Callette. She heaved the vat up and tramped away with it without a word. “I’m sorry,” Derk said as wizards began cautiously reappearing from under the table or out of thin air and setting chairs upright again.
“Accepted, but don’t let it occur again,” said Mr. Chesney. “Mr. Addis.”
“Right.” Mr. Addis switched on his friendly smile again. “I’m now going on to the update of our rules, which you will find in this black book.” He passed a heavy little volume to Barnabas.
Barnabas raised his hand. Then he paused, puffing a little from his recent dive under the table. “I think,” he said, “that as we have a new Dark Lord this year, I’d better appoint myself his Chief Minion, as the most experienced wizard here. Is that agreed?”
A sigh ran around the table as the wizards saw the favorite job go out of their reach, but most of them nodded. “It won’t be the usual cushy post this year, anyway,” someone murmured.
Barnabas smiled ruefully and gestured. Blade and Derk each found themselves holding a thick, shiny book labeled in gold “Wizard’s Bible.”
“Keep this by you and consult it at all times,” Mr. Addis said, “and please note that the rules are here to be kept. We had a few slipups last year, which have resulted in changes. This year we require all Wizard Guides to make sure that a healer stays within a day’s trek of them. Healers have been instructed about this. And Wizard Guides are now officially required to ensure that all Pilgrims marked ‘expendable’ on their list meet with a brave and honorable end and have that end properly witnessed by other Pilgrims. Last year we had someone return home alive. And in another case, lack of witnesses caused searching inquiries from the Missing Persons Bureau. Let’s do better this year, shall we? And now I hand you over to my financial colleague, Mr. Bennet.”
Callette came back and boomed another barrel down on the terrace. Everyone looked at it nervously, but when Blade opened the tap, it was beer.
Mr. Bennet cleared his throat and opened his briefcase.
It was hard to listen to Mr. Bennet. He had that boring kind of voice you shut your mind to. Derk sat leafing through the black book, wondering how he would ever learn all these rules. Ants that built real cities perhaps? Blade was busy handing out fresh beer and being surprised at how many wizards leaned forward and attended eagerly to Mr. Bennet. The word bonus seemed to interest them particularly. But all Blade gathered was that the Dark Lord was allowed a bonus if he thought up any interesting new evils, and Dad did not seem to be attending. After quite a long while Mr. Bennet was saying, “With the usual proviso that Chesney Pilgrim Parties will query extravagant claims, will you please use these calculators to record your expenses?”
Barnabas gestured, and Blade found a flat little case covered with buttons in his hand. He was examining it dubiously when Callette silently reappeared from the other end of the terrace and took hold of the case in two powerful talons.
“All right, as long as you give it back,” Blade said automatically. “And explain how it works,” he added as Callette took it away. Callette always understood gadgets. She nodded at him over one brown-barred wing as she padded off.
Then, for a moment, Blade was sure the meeting was over. Mr. Addis and Mr. Bennet stood up. The wizards relaxed. But Mr. Chesney passed his briefcase back to the woman without looking at her and said, “One more thing.”
Everyone stiffened, including Mr. Addis and Mr. Bennet.
“Wizard Derk,” said Mr. Chesney, “since you owe me for this suit, which your monster has ruined, I propose that instead of the usual fine we appoint your lady wife as this year’s Glamorous Enchantress. Without fee, of course.”
Derk spun in his chair and saw Mara standing there, glowing with a glamour and looking absolutely delighted. She doesn’t need the glamour, he thought. She’s still beautiful. So this was what she had been working on.
“You agree?” asked Mr. Chesney, and before Derk could say a word, he turned to Querida. “You will be standing down from the post this year.”
“Glad to,” Querida said dryly. But Derk kept his eye on her, and on Mara, and saw Querida was truly pleased. She and Mara were exchanging looks and all but hugging themselves.
What’s going on? Derk wondered angrily.
He was taken by surprise to find that Mr. Chesney and the others were actually leaving. They went clattering down the terrace steps, with Mr. Chesney in front again. This time the orchids cringed away as the four strode off down the driveway. Derk started after them, but not very fast. He was not sure if he should show them politely to the gate, as he would have done for normal people. He was only halfway down the drive when they reached the gate.
And Kit was suddenly there, several tons of him, parked in the gateway, sitting like a cat and blocking the way entirely. He towered over Mr. Chesney and his three helpers. From where Derk was, he could have sworn Kit was as tall as the house. Funny, he thought. I didn’t think even Kit was that big.
“Out of my way, creature,” Mr. Chesney said in his flat, colorless voice.
Kit’s answer was to spread his wings, which made him look even larger. As Kit was mainly black these days and his wing feathers were jetty, the effect was very menacing indeed. Even Mr. Chesney took half a step backward. As soon as he did, Kit bent forward and peered very intently into Mr. Chesney’s face.
Mr. Chesney stared at that wickedly large, sharp, buff-colored beak pointing between his eyes. “I said get out of my way, creature,” he said, his voice grating a little. “If you don’t, you’ll regret it.”
At this, Mr. Addis and Mr. Bennet each dropped their briefcases and reached under their coats in a way that looked meaningful. The girl threw down her board and fumbled at her waist. Derk broke into a run, with the starry cloak billowing behind and holding him back. “Kit!” he yelled. “Stop it, Kit!”
But as soon as Mr. Chesney’s followers mov
ed, Kit leaped into the air. His enormous wings clapped once, twice, causing a wind that made the four people stagger about, and then he was sailing above them, uttering squawks of sheer derision. He sailed low above Derk, almost burying Derk in the windblown cloak. “Kit!” Derk bawled angrily.
“Squa-squa-squiii-squa-squa!” Kit said, and sailed on, up into the dip in the roof, where the pigs erupted again in a frenzy of flapping and squealing, trying to get out of Kit’s way before he landed on them.
Most of them made it, Derk thought. He felt the thump of Kit’s landing even from beside the gate. “I do apologize,” he said to Mr. Chesney. “Kit’s only fifteen—”
“Consider yourself fined a hundred gold, Wizard,” Mr. Chesney said coldly, and marched away to his horseless carriage.
FOUR
AFTER THAT DERK BADLY wanted to be alone. He wanted to visit his animals, scratch backs and rub noses in peace. But he knew he must talk to Querida, much as he disliked her. “Would you like me to show you my animals?” he asked her, by way of doing both things at once.
Querida looked along the table. Most of the wizards were still there, eating and drinking and chatting cheerfully. She nodded and stood up. She barely came up to Derk’s elbow. “On the understanding that I don’t offer to embalm any of the creatures, I suppose,” she said. “Although I think I’d hesitate before I tried embalming a griffin.” She jerked her chin in the direction of the roof. All that could be seen there was a ruffled lump of black feathers where Kit was, after a fashion, lying low.
“I’ll talk to you when I come back!” Derk shouted up at the lump. “If I have to get on a ladder to do it!”