Quag Keep Read Free

know why, but—” Fangtooth’s eyes no longer held those of the swordsman. Rather he was looking with an open expression of perplexity at their bracelets. “But,” he continued after a moment’s pause, “this is what I must do: join with you. And this”—he attempted to slip the bracelet from his thick wrist but could not move it—“is what commands me—after some fashion of its own.”
    â€œWe must be bespelled.” Milo returned frankness with frankness. Berserkers seldom sought out any but their own kind. Among their fellows, they had comradeships that lasted to the shores of death and beyond, for the survivor of a fatal encounter was then aware always of only one driving force, the need for revenge upon those who had slain his other self in battle-kinship.
    The berserker scowled. “Spells—they have a stink to ’em. And, yes, swordsman, I can pick up that stink a little. Afreeta”—the pseudo-dragon flickered its thread of tongue like a signal—“has already sniffed it. Yet it is not, I think, one sent by a dark-loving devil.” He had kept his voice low with a visible effort as if his natural tone was more of a full-throated roar.
    Milo noted that the eyes beneath those heavy brows werenever still, that Naile Fangtooth watched the company in the room with as keen an eye for trouble as he himself had earlier. Those who whispered together had not once made any move to suggest that the two were of interest to them. The shabby druid licked his spoon, then raised the bowl to his lips to sup down the last of the broth it contained. And two men wearing the shoulder badges of some merchant’s escort kept drinking steadily as if their one purpose in life was to see which first would get enough of a skinful to subside to the rush-strewn, ill-swept floor.
    â€œThey—none of them—wear these.” Milo indicated the bracelet on his own wrist. The dice were now quiet on their gimbals. In fact when he tried to swing one with his fingernail, it remained as fixed as if it could never move, yet it was the same one he had seen turn just before Naile had joined him.
    â€œNo.” The berserker blinked. “There is something—something that nibbles at my mind as a squirrel worries away at a nut. I should know, but I do not. And you, swordsman?” His scowl did not lighten as he looked directly at Milo. There was accusation in it, as if he believed the swordsman knew the secret of this strange meeting but was purposefully keeping it to himself.
    â€œIt is the same,” Milo admitted. “I feel I must remember something—yet it is as if I beat against a locked door in my mind and cannot win through that to the truth.”
    â€œI am Naile Fangtooth.” The berserker was not speaking to Milo now, but rather affirming his identity as if he needed such assurance. “I was with the Brethern when they took the Mirror of Loice and the Standard of King Everon. It was then that my shield brother, Engul Widehand, was cut down by the snake-skins.Also it was there later that I picked Afreeta from a cage so she joined with me.” He raised a big hand and gently stroked the back of the dragon at a spot between its continually fluttering wings. “These things I remember—yet—there was more. . . .”
    â€œThe Mirror of Loice . . .” Milo repeated. Where had he heard of that before? He raised both fists and pressed them against his forehead, pushing up the edge of the helmet he wore. The edges of the two thumb rings pressed against his skin, giving him a slight twinge of pain. But nothing answered in his memory.
    â€œYes.” There was pride now in his companion’s voice. “That was a mighty hosting. Orcs, even the Spectre of Loice herself, stood against us. But we had the luck of the throws with us for that night. The luck of the throws—!” Now it was Fangtooth’s turn to look