Jeff Grubb: Lord Toede

The young scholar jerked his empty hand back out of his vest as if he had discovered a venomous snake in there. "How did you…?"

"Groag is strapped for money to pay his mercenaries, and in any event is a cheap little cuss, so they will be placed in the position of the greatest potential loss of life. Dead meres don't draw paychecks. He then gives the less well-trained militia defensive posts they can cower behind, so they'll fight to protect their positions. Lastly, the elite guard is not intended to reinforce, but rather to protect the highmaster of Flotsam at all costs."

Besides, Toede finished to himself, Groag was there when I set up the bloody plan over two years ago.

Bunniswot's look changed to one of amazement. Shakily, he nodded. "That's right. It's all right." He started for the entrance. "If you want me, I think I'll bunk by the fire."

Toede walked to the entrance, watching the young scholar walk haltingly over to the campfire. Renders was telling yet one more Tale of the Lance to Charka and Taywin. Charka had apparently heard this one before, because he (no, she) was interjecting appropriate sound effects.

Bunniswot reached into his vest pocket and pulled out the papers detailing Groag's not-so-secret battle plans. He looked at them a moment, then tossed the plans on the fires. The flames glowed a brilliant green as they consumed the parchment, then dimmed.

Toede shook his head. He hadn't been all that hard on Bunniswot, but sometimes even scholars had to be taught that others knew things that they themselves did not. Still, Bunniswot was quite the nervous nelly, always swooning right and left. Better to get him out of the line of fire, before something bad happened to him, or more importantly, to those around him.

"He's a traitor, you know," said a small, delicate voice behind him.

He turned to a small, elfin figure hovering gently over the pages of Bunniswot's tome of Toede-advice. It was dressed in shades of blue and silver and white, with features so sharp they could cut glass.

Toede raised his eyebrows. "Doesn't anyone knock anymore?" He pulled his chair up to the open book so he was almost nose to torso with the small apparition. "You said Bunniswot was a…"

"Traitor," repeated the apparition in a high, melodic, singsong voice. "He works for Highmaster Groag. He means you harm."

"Uh-huh," said Toede. The small figure hovered there, its small feet barely grazing the pages of Toede's book.

"He seeks to catch you unaware and slay you, or failing that, to plant unsound ideas in your mind, hoping you will cause your own death," said the apparition, which looked like a cute pixie, a redundant statement most of the time, but applicable here.

"Uh-huh," said Toede, putting his hands on his knees.

"And you would be?"

"A spirit of wisdom," said the pixie. "A warning from the future. A voice of reason. The animated urge of learning."

'This is a multiple-choice test, I assume," said Toede.

"Mock not," said the spirit in blue and silver and white, "for he does mean you harm."

"So you say," said Toede. "Perhaps I should have Rogate take care of him."

"Trust not Rogate, either," said the spirit, "for he means you ill as well."

"He is a traitor too?" asked Toede.

"Only to himself," said the pixie. "For you scrambled his mind in your first meeting, in the tavern in Flotsam.

With every moment he spends with you, his mind clears, and soon he will realize that he was given the holy task to kill you."

"Hmmmm," murmured Toede, "then perhaps Charka and Renders can take care of them, but I suppose they are also…"

"Traitors," piped up the small creature. "They have been compromised by the necromancer, who also means you harm."

"That I never would have guessed," said Toede sarcastically.

The spirit pixie overlooked his attitude. "They have been promised dominion over Flotsam if they arrange for you to die in battle. Renders is to remain at your side, and slip a dagger between your ribs during the heat of combat."

Toede rubbed his chin again. "Then perhaps we should get the loyal kender rabble to throw these dastards into a makeshift brig, then execute the lot of them at dawn."

"Alas!" said the pixie.

"Let me guess…" said Toede. 'The kender mean me harm, too."

'The girl is loyal only to her father, who reserves a deep and abiding hatred for you." The pixie bowed its head remorsefully. "You are surrounded by treacherous servants."

"And to think that they don't realize they are all traitors," said Toede. "If only they were organized, they could have killed me days ago."

If the pixie was aware of sarcasm, it did not show on the being's delicate elfin features. "There is but one hope," it said, and Toede could almost hear inspirational music rising up around it.

"You must leave this place," the pixie said sternly. "Take the horse that Bunniswot brought, and ride to the south and east. You will find a small inn, with a single light in the window. Knock on the door and ask for shelter. They will take you in. With you absent, the attack will succeed, but the alliance will fall in upon itself, and the city will be wracked by civil war."

"You're saying I should flee like a coward," said Toede, leaning forward.

"It is the only way." The pixie nodded. "To save my own hide," said Toede, reaching up and curling his fingers around the edges of the book. "At the cost of my good name."

"You must leave now if you are to avoimmmmphl" The pixie's voice was stifled as Toede slammed the massive volume closed. He counted to ten, then opened the book. Only a small singed spot on the pages reassured him that it had not all been a dream.

"Surprisingly," he said aloud to the smoking scorch mark, "I've been thinking the same things myself. Why would these good and, yes, noble people throw in with one such as I? I have been assigning them all sorts of evil motivations and reasons, and my guts have been twisted trying to figure it out.

"But your appearance, dear little singe," said the smiling hobgoblin, "confirmed my hypothesis. Twice now I thought I had things locked up to retake my throne, and twice now something materialized to swat me away. This time, my common sense says flee, and it is bolstered by a supernatural apparition. I have reached a decision."

Toede closed the book again, softly now, and took it with him as he left the tent. He padded back to the fire. Renders was finishing some saga involving gnomes and boats and gold dragons. Charka and Taywin were listening intently, while Kronin and Rogate were sketching lines in the dirt to hone battle plans. Bunniswot, one of the many accused assassins present, was curled up on his side, snoring softly.

Toede kneeled by Taywin, and asked quietly if she had a perfume bottle. She looked at him oddly, then nodded. He sent her to fetch it, along with whatever passed for a priest of the True Gods among the kender. Then the former highmaster handed the massive tome to Renders. Toede returned to the fire and built it up with a few logs, "raising a shower of sparks.

"If s going to be a long night," said Toede. "For a lot of people here, it will be their last one. If we're not going to sleep, we might as well know what we're fighting for."

Renders nodded and picked up the tome, starting to read where Toede himself had recently left off. The old scholar's voice started shakily, but soon he caught the cadence of the writing, the words falling from his tongue like petals. Bunniswot awoke with a snort and wiped the sleep from his eyes. Rogate and Kronin stopped their dirt-scribbling, and gnolls and kender, themselves unable to sleep, began to filter back into the glow of the campfire. Taywin returned with the holy kender and a spray bottle of perfume, and Toede spoke with the priest briefly and softly, then sent him to carry out his appointed duties.