The Viper's Fangs (Book 2) (7 page)

Angus frowned. “If is a treasure,” he asked, “why wouldn’t
they have left the crack alone? Wouldn’t it be better concealment for the
treasure to put it in a natural formation instead of carving out the entrance
like this?”

Giorge frowned. “Do you have another idea?”

“No,” Angus admitted.

“Fine,” Giorge said. “I need my tools. They’re in a brown velvet
pouch in my saddlebag. Would you mind getting them for me?”

Angus continued frowning as he reached into one of the
pockets in his tunic and brought out a short, thin piece of wire. “Will this
work?” he asked, tossing it down the tunnel.

Giorge picked it up, examined it closely, and then asked.
“Why are you carrying around a lock pick?”

Angus shrugged. “You never know when one might come in
handy,” he said. “I have two more, if you’d like to see them.”
Why am I
carrying them?
he wondered to himself.
Wizards don’t need to pick locks;
we have spells. If I wanted to open that thing, I could just melt the lock—and
whatever is inside it. I’d have to use the wand to make this tunnel larger to
get at it, first, and that would be a tremendous waste.

“Yes,” Giorge said. “I don’t think this one will work. It’s
a sturdy lock, and this pick might break.”

Angus reached into two other pockets and brought out two
more picks. They were of different sizes, and one was bent at odd angles, as if
it were the ridged edge of a key. He tossed them through the opening. He
almost
mentioned the key he had, but the likelihood that it would work in the lock was
so low that he dismissed the idea as soon as he thought about it.

Giorge studied them closely and shook his head. “I don’t
think they’ll work either, but I’ll try them while you go get mine. I have a
full set, and there are a couple of master keys with it.”

Angus hesitated. Is that what his key was? A master key? It
seemed unlikely…. But Giorge had a point. Or was he lying? Would his picks work?
Did Giorge just wanted him out of the way while he found out what was there? Hobart
said they always had to keep an eye on Giorge because he had itchy fingers; he
had even threatened to hire a Truthseer when Giorge’s grasp overreached his
share. He wasn’t supposed
to steal from the members of the Banner, but
that might not stop him from doing it. “Why don’t you try them to find out?
Then if they don’t work, I’ll go?”

Giorge shook his head. “We don’t have time for that,” he
said. “The fletchings will be coming back too soon.”

Angus sighed. Another good point. “All right,” he said.
“I’ll tell Hobart and Ortis what you’re doing while I’m up there.”

As Angus turned to leave, Giorge said, “You know, those
mushrooms are pretty nasty things. I
still
feel like something inside
this cave is watching me.” Then he moved away from the narrow tunnel’s opening
and Angus couldn’t see him any longer.

“Maybe you should wash that tunic,” Angus suggested. “The
smoke might still be lingering on it.” Then he turned and climbed gracefully
out of the top of cave, wondering if that was all it was. But he had seen
nothing, and when he had cast the Lamplight spell, there was no indication of a
disruption in the magical threads in the area. Not all spells caused
disruptions, but anything major almost certainly would have done so. Besides,
Giorge knew what he was doing, didn’t he?

He smiled and yelled, “Reel me up! Quickly!” and prepared
for the rapid climb to the top. Giorge
did
know what he was doing, but Angus
didn’t, and that worried him….

5

Fanzool woke warm and refreshed. That surprised him. He
hadn’t expected to wake up again. Being warm was a nice touch, but waking up
was enough.

It wasn’t snowing.

The wind wasn’t blowing.

He was walking.

How long had he been walking?

How was he walking
now
? He had been sleeping, almost
dead.

He tried to stop walking, but his legs didn’t obey him. He
thought harder, but they kept walking as if they belonged to someone else. But
they were
his
legs, weren’t they? They didn’t belong to anyone else.

Was he ensorcelled? He smiled; he always liked how that word
rolled off his tongue.
Ensorcelled.
He glanced at the magic within him
and about him, but there were no indication that he was ensorcelled. Was it
something else? What else could make his legs walk while he was sleeping? What
else—

Sardach?
Fanzool thought. It was a strange thought,
one full of despair and hope, fear and wonder. He hadn’t known Sardach could do
such a thing! “Sardach?” he asked softly. “Are you there?”

There was no response, but he didn’t expect one. Sardach
never spoke to him, and he often wondered if Sardach even listened to him.
Their whole trip across the plains was like that. Fanzool would prattle on
about all sorts of interesting bits of information. “Did you know there are
flowers in the north that only bloom in the dead of winter?” It was true, too;
they called them snowbirds because of the small, white hummingbird that
pollinated them. Their fruits were filled with mostly frozen flavored water. “Look
at that drift! The shadows playing across it look like a dragon’s wing! Not
that I’ve ever seen a dragon, mind you, but….” He had always played that sort
of game as a child. What do you see in that cloud? That hillside? That tree
branch? He had become an expert at it, but the other children thought it odd
when he didn’t outgrow it. But they couldn’t see the wondrous patterns of magic
that formed the images in the cloud, hillside, and tree branch the way that he
could…. “Don’t you get tired of the cobblestones clacking underfoot? It’s a
constant reminder of how far we have to go. One step, one clack. A thousand
clacks and it’s but a short step closer to Wyrmwood, a short step further away
from Tyrag. I should have worn soft-soled boots, but with the snow, metal
cleats seemed prudent.” On and on he had talked, and Sardach had said nothing.
Not one word.

“If you’re making me walk,” he said, watching his legs plodding
forward, “you can stop. I think I can walk by myself now.”

A moment later, his legs stopped walking and he tottered to
a stop. He almost fell before he realized he was in control of them again.
So,
it was Sardach
, he thought.
Why would he do that?
Then he decided it
didn’t matter; he would never understand Sardach and didn’t really care. He was
alive, and he would stay that way for a little while longer, maybe even a
longer while longer. But where was he?

There were mountains looming in front of him, and they were
much larger than he remembered from the previous—day? Two days? A week?

The sun was shining low on the horizon behind him. Dawn or
dusk? He looked back and saw the low hills and no mountains. It would have to
be dawn; he was heading west. Unless Sardach had taken him through the
mountains altogether, and that wouldn’t make any sense. Unless Angus had gone
through the mountains and into the Western Kingdoms. The divination had clearly
shown him to be west of Hellsbreath at the time of the casting, but he had not
been close enough for a clearer reading. Could he have gone that far?

He was near the top of a long, sloping hill. How far had he
gone? The last he remembered, he had collapsed in a blizzard with the stubble
of grain fields on either side of the road. He was still a week from Wyrmwood
at the time and had been caught between villages when the sleet began to fall.

He decided to keep walking. He could think while he walked,
and it would get him closer to Wyrmwood while he thought about how close he was
to that crossroads town. He was still wondering how close he was to it half an
hour later when he topped the hill and saw a large town sprawled about in front
of him. It covered the valley floor and stretched into the hills around it. It
was a small town compared to the capital of Tyrag, but it was a hundred times
the size of the villages he had passed since leaving that delightful city. It
also had walls. Three of them, in concentric circles. It had to be Wyrmwood.
The only other town of any size near the border was Hellsbreath, and there was
no way he could mistake this town for Hellsbreath. It wasn’t surrounded by
volcanoes.

He smiled. Sardach had brought him a long way. He hurried
forward, gleefully anticipating a warm meal, a hot bath, and a cozy room. Then
he remembered why he was there, and his pace slowed; he would have to make his
decision soon, and he was not looking forward to it.

Which way would he go from Wyrmwood? North to Voltari’s?
That was what Argyle had told him to do, but he dreaded the idea almost as much
as he feared Argyle’s wrath or whim. Had he sent Sardach with him to make sure
he went that way? Would Sardach allow him to take a different route? He had
already made him walk in his sleep….

But he was chasing after the wizard and thief. He needed to
know if Angus had made the coin or not. If he had, his quest would be ended
because the coins could not have come from Typhus. He would divine the truth
from him one way or another—
if
Sardach let him. Besides, he could always
talk to Voltari after he confronted the wizard, couldn’t he?

The gold coin was cold against his chest now, but it
wouldn’t be for long. The enchantment he’d cast on it would spring to life when
he reached Fenbrooke’s Inn. He had seen Angus there, and from there he would
follow after him. If the weather held.

At least winter would be over soon.

6

“Where’s Giorge?” Ortis yelled as Angus approached the top
of the cliff.

Angus shouted, “We found something!”

“What?”

Angus waved him off and focused on walking up the rest of
the cliff face. “I’ll tell you when I get up there!”

When he reached the top, Ortis reached out to steady him as
he righted himself. “Well?”

“He needs his tools,” Angus said as he moved toward the pile
of gear near their horses. “They’re in his saddlebag.”

“Why? What have you found?” Ortis asked, falling in beside
him.

“It looks like an adit,” Angus said.

“A mine?” Ortis asked. “In the cliff?”

“No,” Angus said. “It just looks like one. There is a short
tunnel at the back of the adit and another chamber on the other side. It’s a
small chamber with a keyhole in the floor.” He gestured with his hands, making
a small square as he added, “The tunnel is about that big.”

“Giorge went through it?” Ortis asked. “Is he stuck?”

“I don’t know if he’s stuck or not,” Angus said. “It was a
tight squeeze, but he made it through.” They had reached the pile of saddlebags
and other gear, and he paused to look through them for Giorge’s saddlebag. “At
least that’s what he said he found.” He paused and reached for a saddlebag.
“This one is Giorge’s, isn’t it?” he asked. “The one with the copper clasp?”

Ortis nodded. “You think he may have found something more
than he is telling you about?”

Angus shrugged. “You know Giorge better than I do. I left
him with my picks, but he said they probably wouldn’t work.”

Ortis frowned. “You don’t believe him, do you?”

Angus shrugged and took out a brown velvet pouch from
Giorge’s saddlebag. It was heavy for its size, but made absolutely no noise as
he shook it. “These are his tools, aren’t they?”

“Yes,” Ortis said.

“Good,” Angus said, rising and moving quickly toward the
cliff. “I should get back down there in case he’s found something else.”

“I’ll go with you,” Ortis said. “It will only take me a
minute to get into the harness.”

Angus shook his head and said, “No. Giorge will need it when
we come back up. Besides, you wouldn’t fit through the tunnel any more than I
could. It’s too small. Giorge barely got through it.”

“What if something happens to him?”

Angus shrugged and turned back toward the edge of the cliff.
“I have no idea,” he said.

Ortis frowned but didn’t press the issue. Instead, he picked
up Giorge’s harness and handed it to Angus. “Don’t let him talk you into
staying too long,” he said. “Dusk is approaching and so are the fletchings.”

Angus nodded and called out to Hobart, “A little less
tension this time. I need to go faster.” When Hobart was ready, he jumped over
the edge and slid down several feet before contacting the cliff face. The rope
slackened at once, and he began hopping against the cliff face to avoid tumbling
against it. “Too loose!” he shouted, and the rope suddenly went taut.

Ortis stuck his head out over the lip of the precipice and
called down to him. “Tell me when it’s what you want, and I’ll let him know.”

The rope slackened in increments, and he walked down with
it. He let it increase speed to a fast walk and then signaled to Ortis. He kept
up the hurried pace and moved sideways to the right at the same time. By the
time he reached the level of the adit, he was only a few yards away. He found a
handhold to stop his descent and edged toward it.

“Giorge?” he called as he approached the adit. But there was
no answer. When he reached it and looked inside, he saw Giorge sitting in front
of the back wall with a small, ornately carved, wooden box on his lap. It was
varnished with a deep chocolate brown and studded with silver inlays that
sparkled in the Lamplight’s glow. He rested his elbows on the lid and held an
ivory scroll tube between his fingertips, only a few inches from his face. He
turned it slowly, studying the patterns on its surface, and occasionally
running a fingertip along one of them.

“Giorge?” Angus asked, easing around the corner of the entry
and skirting the edge of the aerie. He stepped down and dropped Giorge’s
harness. “What is it?”

Giorge didn’t answer. He continued to study the scroll tube,
his eyes and fingertips tracing the lines etched into its surface.

Angus moved closer and leaned over for a better look at the
scroll tube. It was small for a scroll tube, barely six inches long, but very
well made. It had been carved from a single piece of ivory, and across its
surface were several symbols he recognized and others he didn’t. Most of the
symbols were related to the spheres of magic—flame, sky, earth, water, life,
death—but there were others he didn’t recognize. What they meant when combined
together in the way they were was beyond him. The symbols he didn’t recognize were
placed in what he thought were strategic places, but it was only an impression
and nothing more. He couldn’t even determine which basic knot they were derived
from—if, indeed, they were knots at all; they could be symbols of a language
instead of magical runes.

“I can’t figure out how to open it,” Giorge said, his voice
soft and his eyes fixed on the scroll tube.

Angus smiled and held out his hand. “Let me,” he said. “I’ve
dealt quite a bit with scroll tubes.”

Giorge glanced at him for a long moment, then grinned and
shrugged. But he didn’t hand Angus the scroll tube. “What do you think is in
it?” he asked. “A scroll?”

Angus chuckled. “What else could it be?” he asked.

Giorge’s grin broadened. “Lots of things,” he said. “Poison
gas, for instance. A map. Gems. Coins. Probably not coins, though; it isn’t
heavy enough for that. It could even be empty.”

Angus frowned; he hadn’t considered that it could be
something other than a scroll. After all, scroll tubes
were
for scrolls,
weren’t they? What if it was something else? What if it was poison gas? If he
opened it without safeguards, would it kill him? And even if it was a scroll, it
could be protected by traps. Magical traps. That’s what he would do if he were
trying to protect his scrolls. In fact, he should have done something like that
already. Why hadn’t he? They were his most valuable possessions, and he threw
them in his backpack as if they were a spare pair of socks. He frowned. He
really should have copied them into Teffles’ book; it at least needed a key and
could be carried in a pocket of his robe. But he had so many other things to do….

“Let me see it,” Angus said. “I should be able to tell if
it’s a scroll or not. At least if it’s a magical one; there is always a pattern
to them that is detectable. There is magic in the ink to keep it from fading.”
As he waited for Giorge to hand him the scroll tube, Angus concentrated and brought
the magic into focus.

Giorge reluctantly handed it to him as he asked, “Do you
know how to open it?”

Angus nodded, “I think so.” Then he saw something that he
didn’t think was possible, and a frown creased his lips and forehead. “This
isn’t possible,” he muttered. “
Everything
contains magic.” But not the
scroll. If it was a scroll. Whatever was inside the scroll tube had no magical
strands running through it at all. He peered more closely, sharpening his focus
and trying to find the smallest hint of magic, but there was none. The scroll
tube held magic, a very light shade of gray for the slow decay of the ivory mixed
in with the earthy, metallic tan clinging to the silver. His hands had magic in
them—the same kaleidoscope of colors that every person had—and so did
everything around him. But whatever was in the scroll tube had
nothing
.
There wasn’t a single thread that went
through
the scroll tube to touch
whatever was inside it.

“What is it?” Giorge asked, his voice rigid with
anticipation of something horrid—or horribly exciting.

“An impossibility,” Angus said. “There is no magic inside
this scroll tube.”

Giorge relaxed and grinned again. “That’s good, isn’t it?”

Could it be a scroll without magic? No, not without magic;
it’s an
absence
of magic. Nothing was ever completely without magic; it
pervaded everything. Angus shook his head and slowly rotated the scroll tube,
studying it from all angles. What could it be? He had never heard of anything
that didn’t have magic within it. It couldn’t be a scroll, could it? Scrolls
were always riddled with a spider web of magical threads; there was magic in
the ink that made them as permanent as they could be. It couldn’t be a
magical
scroll, then. But why didn’t he see
something
? Even air had magic
running through it—sky magic of all sorts—and a bare whisper of air would show
some sign of it. Was it empty?
Really
empty? Was there nothing in the
scroll tube at all? Not even air? It was possible, and that would explain the
absence of magic. After all, if there was nothing in it, there could be no
magic in it either. Or scroll. Or treasure. Unless there was some other reason
for the absence of magic. But what could
that
be?

“Angus?” Giorge prompted, reaching up to wrap his hand
around the scroll tube.

“Hmmm?” Angus looked at him and blinked. He let the magic
fade to his periphery but didn’t let it slip all the way into the background.
He had a feeling that he might need it, and if he did, it would be good to have
it at the ready. “I don’t understand it,” he said. “Either there is nothing
inside this scroll tube or something is keeping me from seeing its magic.” Is
that what it was? Could the scroll tube be made from something that shielded
whatever was in it from his sight? Voltari had mentioned creatures from elsewhere
that were untouched by magic; could this be what he meant? Was the scroll tube
made from one of their horns? No. The scroll tube had magic in it; if it was a
horn from a creature that was untouched by magic, the ivory would not have had
magic in it. Perhaps the scroll tube was lined with the skin of one of them?
That
was possible. It was also possible that it was something Angus did not
understand and could not know. There was only one way to find out: open the
scroll tube. Was it worth the risk?

“It’s all right, Giorge,” Angus said, kneeling down beside
him. “See? The two ends of the scroll tube will turn, but you have to press in
on these two points.” He pressed at the base of the caps and turned them
slightly. “To open them, you have to line up the right symbols. It may take a
few minutes to figure out which ones—”

“I’ll do it,” Giorge said, pulling the scroll tube from
Angus’s grasp. “I got a good look at it before you came back.” He pressed the
two ends and began turning them. “It didn’t look right to me, but I couldn’t
figure out why. Now I know. The patterns were misaligned.” He finished
adjusting the caps and there was a soft click.

Angus brought the magic into sharper focus and said, “One of
the ends ought to screw off now. Release the base and find out.”

Giorge nodded and a few moments later, the scroll tube cap flopped
open on its hinge. He looked into the end of scroll tube and exclaimed,
“Scrolls!” He tipped the scroll tube and letting them slide out onto his palm.
There were four of them, each about four inches long and tied with a thin cord
of braided thread. The threads were of different colors, one each of yellow-green,
a mixture of ice blue and white, a mixture of deep green and black, and the
last of pure black. The scrolls were tightly coiled, and the vellum looked
almost new.

Angus frowned. As the scrolls had slid out, they burst to
life. There
was
magic in them, and that meant something had obstructed
his view. And
that
was dangerous. Whoever had hidden the scrolls had
wanted them to stay hidden. Were they too dangerous? Too powerful? Both? The
magic in the scrolls corresponded to the braided cords wrapped around them. The
yellow-green was permeated by the life-giving energies of animals, and would
relate in some way to them. The ice blue and white was riddled with frost and
rime—would it cause a snowstorm? An avalanche? Something worse? The deep green
and black was plagued with death and dying, but it was not the most worrisome
one; it still had life clinging to it. But the last one, the one tied with
black, was densely packed with
consumptive
black, the kind of horrid
death that lingered and infected everything around it. It was the most powerful
form of death magic, the kind that would bring back the dead, call them forth,
sustain them, and
control
them. Voltari’s sentinels had such blackened
tendrils writhing about them, bringing them to life—not true life, only a
semblance of it, an incomplete shadow that never once drew breath again.

Giorge weighed the scrolls in his palm and looked from them
to the scroll tube and back again. After a few such glances, he moved his hands
so they were side by side and nodded sharply. He twisted the scroll tube so he
could look inside it and chirped, “Aha! A false bottom! Here, Angus,” he added,
thrusting the scrolls toward him.

Angus didn’t want the scrolls, not yet, but they were
rolling off Giorge’s palm and he instinctively reached out to catch them. When
nothing unusual happened, he shrugged and sat down. He set three of the scrolls
in the small crook where his leg bent into his hip and picked up the
yellow-green one. It would be the safest of them—he hoped—and started to untie
the cord. He did it gently, almost reverently, and with a great deal of
caution. But when nothing happened, he let his breath out slowly and unrolled
the scroll.

It was a tiny scroll, considering how much magic it held; it
barely spanned the length of his hand and wrist. He tentatively began reading
it, frowned, rotated it, and frowned some more. Most scrolls were instructions
for weaving a spell, but this one wasn’t. There were no symbols indicating the
kinds of knots to be tied, no directions for which threads were to be used, no
suggestion whatsoever that it was a spell. And yet, it was rich with magic.
Why? How? What would the magic do?