The guard jerked his chin at the man in the back of the cart. “What’s wrong with him? And why’s he sitting funny like that?”
“Hurt meself loading the cart,” the little one said. “Set off me lumbago, it did, and sitting any other way hurts.” The guard snorted and turned to help the third man open the gate. The cart creaked through and off into the night with Wiz still magically frozen under a load of turnips.
“Hurry up with that cement, will you? My arm’s getting tired.”
A fire provided light and kept off the chill. A couple of hundred feet away the horse, still hitched to the cart, munched grass placidly. Wiz was standing in a tub half-full of cement, gesturing to empty air. One of the thugs was holding a sword to his throat and the other two were bent over another tub stirring the contents with wooden hoes.
“You want another turn at it?”
“All this work. I think we’re underpaid, charging for this like a simple kidnapping. Between the hauling, the mixing and the rest I swear stone cutting’s an easier living.”
“Where is he anyways?” the third one put in. “I want to count me money and see the back of this job.”
“We’re supposed to meet him at Bottomless Gorge, and we’re still a good half mile from Bottomless Gorge.”
“And who was it who decided we’d stop and do it here, eh?”
“I didn’t decide. Here’s where the cart broke down.”
“I knew it would,” the third one said gloomily. “Overloaded it was, and as soon as we got off the main road . . .”
“It will ride lighter with nothing but him in it,” the tall one told them. “Just get that stuff mixed up good and we’ll have plenty of time to fix the cart while it sets hard. Meanwhile our client will just have to wait.”
“I dunno. Not good business practices to keep a client waiting. How’s that cement coming?”
“Still more like soup than cement.”
“You put too much water in,” the tall one said from where he held the sword on Wiz.
“I did not!” the shorter man retorted.
The third one stuck his hoe blade in the trough and watched the milky concoction run off the end. “This lot’s got chalk mixed in with it. Adulterated, that’s what it is.”
“Came right out the city warehouse, it did,” the short man said morosely. “Councilman Hanwassel’s best. You can’t trust no one nowadays. The decline in honesty in our society is shocking. Positively shocking. Me, I lay it all to the parents.”
“Me, I lay it all to you,” the tall one said acidly. “Last time I let you get the supplies for a job!”
“And who was it who was too busy nattering over his ale in the Blind Goat to go out and get the necessaries?”
“That was planning,” he answered loftily. “Something like this takes planning-and delegation. It’s up to the subordinates to fulfill the tasks delegated to them.”
“You can delegate all you want,” the short man answered sullenly. “But next time you steal the flipping cement.”
The other one started to reply, but the third man gestured them to silence.
“Hsst. Here he comes.”
Pieter strode into the firelight.
“Where have you been?” he demanded. “And what are you doing here?”
“Cart broke down,” the tall one told him. “We figured we’d set him up here and then take him the rest of the way.” But Pieter had quit listening as soon as he caught sight of Wiz.
He stood in front of Wiz, arms akimbo. “So Wizard, not so high and mighty now, are you?” He followed it up with a stinging slap to the face.
At least Pieter’s hand stung. It was like slapping a rock and the young man winced in pain.
“He can’t hear you,” one of the footpads said.
“Can’t feel what you do to him either,” another one added.
“Well, wake him up then. I want him to know the author of his fate.”
“Wake him up?” the shortest one quavered. “He’s a wizard.”
“And he’s tied so tight he can’t wiggle a finger and gagged so tight he can’t utter a word. Release him, I say!”
Hesitantly the one with the sword removed it from Wiz’s ribs.
Suddenly Wiz was there again, tied up, gagged, surrounded by three armed thugs and a grinning Pieter, and up to his knees in cement. Not for the first time it occurred to him that the protection spell’s definition of “mortal danger” left a lot to be desired.
The short, balding one, whom Wiz mentally tagged “Curly,” was edging away from the reanimated wizard. The one beside him was holding his sword warily, ready to thrust it between Wiz’s ribs at the first sign of movement. The tall one was looking back and forth between Wiz and Pieter.
“Throw me out of the house, will you?” Pieter snarled and drew back his hand to slap Wiz again.
The blow never landed. Wiz was gagged, but that didn’t matter. He could form the words in his throat and that was all it took.
The spell for “loose knots” worked in part by making things self-repulsive and in part by reducing the coefficient of friction of everything in the neighborhood to something less than teflon on plate glass lubricated by greased owl shit. Which is to say that any friction fastening in the vicinity stopped working instantly.
Which is to say that everyone’s pants fell down as their belts came untied. Actually it is to say more than that. Sewing can be loosely defined as a form of knotting, so the clothes not only fell off, they fell to pieces.
That left Wiz, Pieter and his three henchmen standing there stark naked. In this crisis the thugs reverted to their natural behavior: They turned to run like frightened rats. Pieter just stood with his hand stopped in mid-air and his mouth open. Wiz spoke another word and all four of them were frozen in place.
Wiz took a step forward and nearly tripped over the edge of the tub he was standing in.
light exe he commanded and a witchfire globe cast an even blue light over everything.
It made an interesting tableau. The tall man had lost his footing and fallen to his hands and knees. The balding one was trying to scramble over the tall one’s back, which left them poised as if playing a slightly obscene game of nude leapfrog. The middle-sized one was straightening up with arms pumping, like a sprinter coming out of the blocks.
Wiz shook the wet cement from his legs and considered his next move. A chill evening breeze reminded him that his first priority was finding something to wear if he didn’t want to catch cold. He looked at the piles of fabric littering the ground around them but none of them were large enough to cover much.
The cart had been outside the range of the spell, so the horse was still placidly cropping grass. Wiz pulled off the horse’s blanket and, ignoring its condition and its odor, draped it over his shoulders toga style.
Leaving Pieter frozen, he gestured to unfreeze his stooges. The three returned to awareness facing a wizard surrounded by glowing blue light and wearing a tattered horse blanket. Just then Wiz’s sartorial shortcomings meant less to them than his obvious power.
Their first act was to collapse in a heap as their momentum caught up with them. Curly covered his head with his hands and moaned.
“Stand where you are!” Wiz commanded in a stern and majestic manner-or as stern and majestic as you can be when the cold night air is nipping at your bare backside. “Go on, stand up, all of you.”
The three thugs pulled themselves erect and sorted themselves out facing Wiz. They were all about the color of the cement in the tub and Wiz didn’t think they were shivering because they were cold.
“I ought to turn you all into frogs,” he said sternly. The tall one blanched and the short one whimpered more loudly.
One of these days I’ve got to write a spell to do that, he thought.
However, just now the threat was enough.
He pointed at the trough. “What’s this stuff?”
“Cement, My Lord. It’s a little thin because . . .”
Wiz cut him off with a wave of his hand. “Okay, you’re going to take this cement and you’re going to paint a coat of it onto Pieter here. All over, so he’s thoroughly covered. Then, when it’s dry, you’re going to load him into the wagon, take him back to town and set him up in the square in front of the town hall. Got that?”
“The wagon’s broke,” Larry said sullenly.
“Then carry him,” Wiz said and turned away into the night. He took two steps and then turned back to them. “But if he’s not standing in the square by noon, you’re all going to be pigeon roosts by evening.”
He took two more steps and turned back again.
“Oh, and one more thing.”
The three quailed before him.
“Which way is it to town?”
God what an evening, Wiz thought as he trudged down the dusty road toward town. The moon gave enough light to keep him on the road and out of potholes, but not enough to see every rock and tree root. As a result he had stubbed his toes and bruised his heels a half dozen times before he had gone as much as a mile.
The only good thing is, it’s too late for anything else to happen to me tonight.
Just then a shadow passed over the moon. Wiz looked up to see a dragon settling down on a hillock beside the road. The moon was behind the creature so it loomed nightmarishly large and black before him.
“Starting a new fashion, Wizard?” Wurm’s “voice” rang in his head.
“Right now I’m trying to get back to town.”
“Still, this is opportune. I have been meaning to speak to you at a time and place which would not upset your, ah, clients.”
Wiz had a sudden premonition the night’s events so far had just been a warm-up. “What do you want?” he asked wearily.
“An opportunity to discuss your progress, and perhaps your future actions. I understand for example that you personally convinced one dragon to give up his prey. That in itself is a notable accomplishment.”
“Ah, to tell you the truth it wasn’t that difficult. Not with that particular dragon.”
Wurm nodded his enormous head. “Griswold is a moron. Even for a hatchling.”
“Well, at least my run-in with him helped get me in solid with the council.”
“Oh, you have accomplished more than that,” Wurm said, amused. “In two days there will be a dragonmote to decide what to do about you.”
“Dragonmote?”
“A meeting of dragons, or of all who choose to attend.” He cocked his enormous scaly head. “Quite an honor actually. The first dragonmote in several hundred years. Dragons dislike gatherings and prefer single combat to the constant clumping and bickering of humans. Besides, dragons seldom feel the need to take concerted action.”
Suddenly it got even colder under the horse blanket. “Concerted action?”
Wurm nodded again. “I believe the currently favored solution is incinerating the town and you with it.”
“Is this where I came in?” Then he thought furiously. “Look, can you get me in to that meeting? To speak to them I mean.”
Wurm cocked his enormous head. “I think it can be arranged.” The way he said it left Wiz no doubt that had been his plan all along.