Ed Greenwood - The Wizard's Mask

The commander wasn't about to verbally retreat from the cold refusal he'd just given, but nodded curtly. The foregate opened.

Tantaerra and The Masked were ushered into sixty feet or so of cobbled passage between the foregate and the still-closed inner gate, the massive stones of the gate-keep all around and above them, complete with firing ports everywhere.

As the foregate started to creak closed, an armored Molthuni rode up out of the night, yelling, "Stop them! Stop them! That explosion? They did that! Stop them before-"

With a grim smile, Tantaerra pointed a finger of the Fearsome Gauntlet, and smashed the man into silence.

Then she whirled at the thunder of onrushing boots, to blast down the gate guards charging from the inner gate-but The Masked hissed, "Trust me" into her ear, put his hand on the gauntlet, and snarled, " Luraumadar! "

A racing wave of magic flashed out of the magical gage. It shook Tantaerra and her partner, numbing their very teeth-but the onrushing guards fell or stumbled dazedly along the walls, then dropped to the ground. Unseen weapons clattered behind walls, and an arm appeared through one of the firing ports overhead, dangling limply.

Eerie silence fell.

Beyond the unconscious guards, the inner gate stood ajar. Tantaerra and her partner peered through it.

More silence, and no one to be seen. Cautiously they ducked through it, into Braganza. They were met by cartwheels rumbling, some echoing footfalls, and the smaller sounds of a large city largely asleep.

A door stood open, near at hand. The Masked peered into the room beyond, then stepped into it. Frowning, Tantaerra followed.

It was a guardroom, empty of people. A lit storm-lantern on the table showed them a chair overturned, among several chairs arranged around a table strewn with cards and dice, oiled rags, and whetstones. Through another open doorway they could see light-and smell food.

Boar stew, steaming in bowls on a table where men sat slumped and silent, with tankards of what looked like small beer, and handloaves of hardbread. No one in the bunkroom moved, save for quiet snores.

Suddenly ravenous, Tantaerra and The Masked rushed to the table and ate, Tantaerra taking up a great jug of beer and pouring it slowly down her throat in delight.

The belch that tore out of her after her last swallow was thunderous, and her partner's flat stare set her to giggling. He shook his head. "The gauntlet didn't kill them, you know. We don't have long."

Tantaerra promptly snatched up a full bowl and spoon, and muttered, "So eat and walk, masked man. Eat and walk."

She headed for the door, and her partner swiftly drained a handy tankard and claimed his own bowl.

∗ ∗ ∗

Night-shrouded Braganza wasn't as asleep as they'd first thought. The distant explosion had roused many, and the Watchguards on duty were concerned and frowningly alert, but no hue and cry was raised for two figures striding purposefully along with no trace of furtiveness. And what sort of thief strides the streets eating stew?

Tantaerra was almost done when they arrived at the great door of the soaring stone mansion of Lord Krzonstal Telcanor. The house guards stirred at their approach, readying weapons.

"Yes?" the guard commander snapped coldly, as The Masked strode up.

"Lord Telcanor bade us speak to him the moment we returned to Braganza," Armistrade snapped right back.

"You can wait until morning, whoever you are," the commander said flatly, eyes flickering as he took in the bowls and spoons-and the halfling. "He's asleep, and I'm not waking him."

"I'll be needing your name, then," The Masked told him calmly. "So the General Lords know who to punish. Lord Telcanor may, of course, not wait for whatever Canorate may want to do to you. He may want to appease them by doing it to you first."

The commander frowned and stepped back, making a hand-signal. In response, a row of gleaming spears were leveled to menace them.

"Well," Tantaerra murmured, "you tried. Some things never change."

"Aid, here!" the commander barked sharply, as boots scraped the cobbles behind her.

A Watchguard patrol had come by.

She and The Masked both risked looks over their shoulders, and were treated to the sight of competent-looking Watchswords spreading out carefully to block their escape.

"Your names and lawful business," the Watchguard patrol leader demanded in almost bored tones, advancing on them from behind.

By way of reply, Tantaerra whirled and flung her empty bowl into his face. The Masked threw his-still laden with enough stew to make it stick to the man's face-at a hulking Watchsword right behind the patrol leader.

There was a general roar and charge.

" You down, but Gauntlet up," The Masked told her firmly in the midst of the din, going to the street and dragging her down with him.

The gauntlet flashed under his direction, his mask echoing that burst of light-and charging Molthuni fell on their faces in a great clattering of spears and clanging of armor.

Followed by …silence.

Tantaerra looked all around. House guards and Watchswords alike had fallen, slumped and silent.

"Was it something I said?" she joked, as Tarram hauled her to her feet and headed for the front door of the Telcanor mansion.

A lone night porter was standing between the two grand rows of show armor and looking bored when they stepped inside, but he was so astonished to see a female halfling in his entrance hall that he actually bent down to peer at her.

The uppercut Tantaerra delivered snapped him right back into The Masked's roundhouse punch. It knocked him cold, but he wavered on his feet just long enough for Tarram to catch him and slow his journey to the floor into something near silent.

"The Lord might be asleep, but I'm thinking he's far more likely to be two floors up," The Masked commented. "In that audience chamber of his."

Tantaerra smiled crookedly. "Front stairs, or back?"

"Back. Fewer people for us to fight, or who can raise the alarm before we can get to them. Oh, and we leave the gauntlet here."

"And you were made Imperial Governor when , exactly? No, seriously, Tarram, I agree about the back way, but why stash the gauntlet? And where's 'here,' exactly?"

"With this," The Masked told her, tapping his mask, "I can call on its powers without them seeing it on one of us-the one of us who'll immediately be the target for anything they can hurl. And 'here' is …here."

He tapped the closed helm of the nearest suit of armor.

Tantaerra looked up and down the two impressively gleaming rows, pivoted to scan the hall and make sure no second servant was peering at them from anywhere, and asked, "What if they're enchanted? The armor, I mean. Then they can go prancing off anywhere, the gauntlet with them, and we're beyond roasted."

Her partner pointed. "Animated? With that many bolts holding them to those frames to keep them upright? Hardly."

"I am convinced," she granted, and surrendered the Fearsome Gauntlet. In a trice The Masked put it inside the helm, lowered the visor again, and stepped away. No trace of it could be seen.

"Right," she sighed. "Off we go to what's almost certainly going to be a rather unpleasant meeting. He'll try to trick us."

"He'll try to kill us," The Masked replied. "No one's succeeded yet."

"It only takes one success," she muttered back. "Lead on, Masked Fool."

He grinned, and did so.

∗ ∗ ∗

Around them, the House of Telcanor was dark and silent. They tried to keep it that way.

They saw no servants along the route they took through the vast mansion, and although they weren't certain exactly where the upper passage they ended up in gave into the rear of the audience chamber, they needn't have worried. Long before they reached it, they could see light, and hear voices and the trudge and scrape of many booted feet moving about.