Vance Moore - Odyssey

”How terrible you say,” Laquatus drawled. ”The barbarian destroyed the wall of the vault.”

He had of course already received a full report from his spies. Kamahl's casual display hinted that another powerful champion had entered the contest. Perhaps new alliances were in order.

”I am terribly sorry, but I do see Caster Fulla over in the corner alone.” He interrupted the official who had continued to drone on like an inconsequential insect. ”I would be a poor host indeed if I did not look after all my guests. Why don't you join me in extending greetings?”

”No, no,” the official said hurriedly, rising and moving away quickly enough to leave a wake of disturbed water. ”I have things that must be done,” he tossed over his shoulder.

Laquatus was not surprised at the swift withdrawal. He transformed back to his legged form, his fins absorbed back into his body, and his tail splitting to form the limbs he must use away from the sea. Small fish swirled around his submerged limbs as scales and destroyed flesh temporarily fouled the water. He rose with initial care and waded across the pool.

Turg rose from concealment in response to a mental command and moved toward the ambassador's back. Dealing with dementia casters was often dangerous. Their grip on reality could become quite tenuous as they grew more powerful. Caster Fulla was very powerful indeed.

”Hello, my dear,” the ambassador exclaimed. ”I am so glad that you accepted my invitation.”

The caster turned, and he waited for her eyes to focus back on the present.

Caster Fulla ”Braids” appeared a weathered thirty years. Her dark skin and clothing seemed in perpetual shadow, and Laquatus felt a faint increase in tension as she looked on him fully. Her right arm brushed the short sword at her side before extending toward the ambassador. Kissing a woman's hand was a ridiculous piece of theatre most of the time, and it was particularly ridiculous now. Fulla's right arm was misshapen with scars and chunks of missing flesh. Leather and iron bracing showed conspicuously as he lowered his head to the misshapen claw that she must call a hand. He brushed his lips against the tainted flesh and slowly straightened. For her profession, Fulla was really quite comely.

Dementia casters, like many mages, called forth monsters to fight for them and serve their purposes, but even the dark magic of their Cabal brethren was twisted in bizarre ways. The trances that dementia casters fell into seemed to open the dark recesses of the mind, bringing forth hideous monsters. Many only existed in insane dreams before the power called them. Some used drugs to alter their thoughts and perceptions to bring forth ever greater horrors until they lost what remained of their sanity. Then instead of using drugs to free their minds, they engaged in a pharmacological war to retain some connection to reality. Laquatus hoped that such a fragile grip on existence would offer the handhold he needed to twist her into his service.

”It was something to do,” Fulla said in a dead tone. The beads woven into her hair clinked together softly as she moved. ”But it is only the same party. I've been here a hundred times before and since.” Boredom filled her voice, and her eyes were focusing back into her internal world to the ambassador's irritation.

”Surely something must interest you.” Laquatus hummed, a low thrum began to pick at his ears as the merman fed instructions to the magic plants and springs feeding the grotto.

The corals released bursts of drugs into the water. The ambassador felt a curious mixture of energy and languor even though he and his personal servants regularly dosed themselves with antidotes. The party seemed to grow quiet as the guests succumbed to the chemicals in the water.

”I think that we should work together.” The ambassador said, crowding closer. ”The bouts offer us a chance to realize tremendous profits if we could just cooperate.” The merman put his hand on her maimed arm, controlling his expression at the touch of the gnarled flesh.

”I hope we might become something more than partners.”

Laquatus breathed more heavily as he tried to suggest seduction. He had less than no interest in the women above the sea, but he had set this hook before. Fulla showed only irritation and broke his grip easily.

”You're boring,” she said flatly. ’’Everything is boring now. I am going back to the Casters' Quarter. At least it is never boring.”

Fulla started wading toward the steps leading into the pool. She moved surely and with purpose, showing no sign of being affected by the water. Laquatus realized that, as a dementia caster, she dealt with shifting reality often. The Casters' Quarter that she was headed for was notorious for the monsters and dark passions that gripped its inhabitants. Fulla's being was far too vicious a battlefield for the gentle persuasion of the grotto's waters. Turg, feeling his master's irritation, cut through the partygoers to grab Fulla's arm.

Braids swung around, curling inside the pit frog's arm and breaking his grip. Her sword was in her hand, and Laquatus felt a burst of pain as her blade slapped along the frog's side. The ambassador could feel the bestial rage of his champion surging to dramatic levels, and he tried to force the beast to calm.

Laquatus and the frog were tied together on many levels, feeding off of each other's emotions. The frog supplied a dramatic amount of muscle the ambassador used to cow his enemies, while the merman supplied the intelligence and drive to make Turg more than a savage animal. The pain and snub eroded his control and Turg acted to hold the caster.

”At last!” Fulla exalted. ’’Something interesting in this sewer.”

Laquatus paused in his attempts to restrain his champion. A sewer! He was sick of insults from these land-bound simpletons. Turg attacked as the ambassador's pique weakened his hold. The frog skin grew mottled as the amphibian forced more foulness into the water. Turg leaped to the side, plowing into a crowd and sending a spray across the pool.

The ambassador could feel the fresh chemical assault against his senses. Colors seemed to strobe as the mind-altering chemicals fought his will for control of his vision. Fulla's eyes seemed to gleam as she went into a trance. The screams of the other guests began to waver as well as Turg's indirect attack merged with the suggestive chemicals of the pool. Laquatus could see an escort flailing at hallucinations.

”Close the doors!” he screamed to the servants at the gate.

The guards slammed the decorative doors shut as one pit fighter ran for the exit. A huge minotaur, it lowered its head and charged. The expensive facade cracked over the armor beneath as the giant humanoid went down, blood flowing from its nose and ears. Other guests began to stumble out of the pool.

Turg erupted from the water beside Fulla. His skin was silvery, and he was almost impossible to see. Like the octopus and cuttlefish of the ocean, the frog could blend against many backgrounds. Fulla was a veteran of the pits, and her skewed mind edited out the madness surrounding her. The frog's attack met a summoned creature that threw the combatants apart as if a bomb had exploded.

The eel that wrapped itself around the frog showed bones and frayed flesh. Turg spun to throw it off, but its weeping skin seemed to glue the creature to the frog. The amphibian's wild gyrations threw gobs of rotting meat across the chamber, which rained down on the guests and struggling servants. The ambassador could see blackjacks plied freely by his mercenaries as they struggled to contain the growing riot. Only their fight with imaginary demons prevented a total bloodbath as pit fighters went down under the swinging sacks of lead shot. Laquatus felt Turg's pain as the eel struck again and again, pumping venom into the humanoid's frame. The frog tore off portions of its own hide but hurled the writhing eel away into a group of musicians the ambassador had hired for the evening.