Fred Saberhagen - Woundhealer's story

Only the gods and demons, thought Amintor-and my friend here-know what may be blocking the way into this canyon from above. He also found himself wondering, in the occasional pauses of the conversation, how fast the creature below him might be able to move if and when it decided there was a need for speed. He could not imagine anything that a great worm would feel the need to run away from, but it must require enough food for an army, and catching that might well require some quickness sometimes. And, how long had it taken to travel here, from whatever strange place it had been summoned?

"A most formidable guardian," he remarked at one point, indicating the limbless dragon with a gesture.

"I have lost," Burslem muttered, "some of my faith in demons." It was as if the wizard were speaking more to himself than anyone else.

The Baron was not sure that he saw any relevant connection between demons and dragons, but he did not choose to pursue the matter. The magician turned slightly in his chair to face him. "Let us speak plainly." "By all means."

"You invite me into a partnership. Between partners, there is always one senior to the other."

Amintor spread both hands, a gesture that caused the Swords at his sides, in their metal-bound sheaths, to chink faintly against rock. The wizard had totally ignored the priceless weapons so far, and continued to do so now.

The Baron said: "I would certainly not claim seniority over one who was the chief of security and intelligence for King Vilkata."

Burslem grunted. "If he had listened to me, he would be alive today. Not only alive. He would have won the war."

In those days Amintor himself, of course, had been at the right hand of the Silver Queen. But he made no claim now to having given advice that, if taken, would have altered the outcome of the war. Instead the Baron said only: "When one of these Swords finds itself in a ruler's hand, there is a tendency for it to dominate his thinking." Vilkata had held the Mindsword, then. "Or her thinking, as the case may be."

Burslem laughed. It was a hissing sound, unpleasant and somewhat labored, quite out of keeping with his ordinary appearance. Amintor found himself thinking he would not be surprised if a serpent stuck its head up out of the man's throat. The great worm had long since lowered its head again, become a silent wall that curved through deepening night. But the eyes of the other thing on the ledge above, whatever it might be, were still there watching.

"Well," the wizard said, "we may hope that the Sword of Love now dominates the thinking of Prince Mark. Maybe it will lead him into trying to do good unto his enemies."

"May it be so indeed," agreed the Baron heartily. "He has done a fair amount of troublesome things to me, though in the end I had what I wanted from him."

"Is it possible that you will want more from him in the future?"

"I should say it is quite possible. By the way, Burslem, I have here a small flask of wine of a certain rare vintage. Would you share a drink with me? A toast, to the future prosperity of both of us?" The Baron stopped short of proposing that they drink to a partnership that had not yet been finally agreed upon.

"Why not?" Burslem reached over with a well-kept, ordinary-looking hand to take the flask. At that moment Amintor was conscious of the faintest throb of power inside the length of Shieldbreaker as it lay along his thigh. Weapons of magic arrayed in opposition meant no more to the Sword of Force than did those of steel. None stands to Shieldbreaker. But the Sword's reaction was nothing serious as yet; a preliminary stirring, he supposed, a response to some magical precaution activated by his host when Burslem took the drink into his hand.

Now the wizard was holding up the small flask of wine in both hands and gazing at it, as if he were somehow able to study the fluid inside the leather skin. Amintor, expecting to be able to perceive something of testing at this moment, could just detect, with his mind more than with his senses, the passage of something in the air immediately over his own head. He looked up. He had a sense that it had been of considerably more than human size, but already it was gone. The small green eyes that he had seen, of something perched upon the higher ledge, were now gone too.

As soon as the airborne presence had passed, the wizard heaved a great and human-sounding sigh. Then he opened up the flask and drank, without any hesitation but with little evidence of enjoyment either. Even as the magician swallowed, the Baron felt a mild glow inside his own belly, as if it were there that the wine had landed.

Burslem passed back the flask and wiped his mouth. As the Baron drank in turn, the great worm again raised its head upon the column of its neckless body, just enough so it could turn its gaze at him. The huge eyes still glowed with the faint reflected light of the night sky. The Baron made a little gesture in the worm's direction with the flask, a kind of to-your-health, and sipped again. The Sword at his side was quiet; was the great worm a weapon? Probably not within the logic of Shieldbreaker's protective magic. The dragon could come and kill him and the Sword of Force would be a sword in his hand and nothing more, as useless against such an attacker as against an earthquake.

He understood that at the moment he might well be relatively vulnerable to the wizard's power; but he also thought that for the moment he had nothing to fear from that.

Burslem, as if his mind were running in the same track, suddenly remarked: "You realize that I could take those two Swords from you at any moment."

Amintor, who had dealt with Swords before, realized nothing of the kind. Except for the controlled presence of the dragon, he would have been tempted to laugh at the idea. Even for the dragon to reach him would take time, and he and Shieldbreaker would not be idle in that time.

But the Baron was not going to try to dispute the point just now. "Thereby depriving me," he answered calmly, "of the pleasure of putting them willingly at the service of my senior partner-or am I to take it that our agreement is not yet formally concluded?"

The other laughed again. "Yes, perhaps I do need your skills at negotiation, Amintor. Very well, the agreement is concluded. Keep both your Swords, for now. They are likely to be of the greatest use upon a battlefield, and you are much more likely to find yourself on such a field than I am."

The talk between the two men resumed, now in something of a new key. It soon turned to practical planning.

The magician said: "One of your first duties will be, of course, to raise an army, substantially larger than the mere guard force-about three hundred soldiers-I have at my disposal now. There are times when nothing but a real army will do, if one is to be taken seriously enough in the world."

"Indeed."

"Yes. The worm below us, for example, is capable of taking a city, or defeating an army in the field. But no matter how cleverly it is given orders, it cannot very well collect taxes, or guard an entire frontier."

"Certainly."

"We shall have to discuss the question of what exact size and composition of the force will be most practical. The recruitment, organization, and training will then be left almost entirely in your hands."

"If such matters are to be done properly, they inevitably take a great deal of time."

"Yes, time and patience. But until the army is ready, our greatest plans, as I see them, must be held in abeyance."

Amintor was silent.

"You disagree?" Burslem asked sharply.

"I only venture to suggest that there are some great plans that by their nature do not require an army."

Shortly after that remark was made, and before it could be amplified in discussion, the first conference between the partners was adjourned. There were matters, Burslem said, for which he had to prepare, and the preparations were of such a nature that they had to be accomplished without human company. So far he still had not taken up Amintor's hint about great plans.