Murder in Cormyr (2 page)

I could not move, and, aside from my first shriek of horror when the cat had come to life in my hands, could not utter a sound. If the door at the far wall hadn’t opened, I think those

cats and I might still be there, growing old together.

But the door did open, and a blinding glare of light fell through it onto the cats and me. In the center of that light, his round body casting a great shadow on the floor and at least a dozen spitting cats, was the wizard, in the company of still more cats, one perched upon his shoulder, and one in his arms, too happy with the stroking it was receiving to take notice of me.

The wizard took notice, however. In a voice as rich and plummy as a pudding, he chuckled, then said, “Well, I see we have a visitor, my friends… a welcoming committee, mayhap?”

His furry feline friends eased up on the spitting and hissing. I thought I even heard a few purrs due to his presence, though I noticed in the brighter light that the cats’ claws remained dangerously unsheathed. The wizard went on.

“As you see, 0 stranger, I bear no weapon. Yet”—he gestured with his petting hand to the cats—”I have nearly a hundred at my beck and call. If you give me your word you shall neither fight nor flee, I shall ease their suspicious minds.”

It took me several tries to get out the words. “I… I swear.”

“That is quite decent of you,” said the wizard, and then he looked at the cats, just looked at them in a not particularly stern or demanding way, but it was as though I were suddenly one of the family. The growling ceased on the instant, and I was nearly knocked off my feet by a multitude of fuzzy backs and legs rubbing up against my ankles, one of which still oozed blood.

“They seem to be good judges of character,” the wizard said, still patting the cat in his arms, “despite their guardian proclivities. Once they are assured there is no danger to me,

they treat the interloper fairly. Were you truly an evil man, bent upon my destruction, they would still be on their guard, watching you every second. So, even though you have broken in here illegally, you strike them as an honest fellow. Quite a paradox. Honest but ill-advised, perhaps?”

I shrugged. I didn’t know what to say. Here I was, caught red-handed (literally, I thought, wiping blood from my fingers) burglarizing the abode of a retired War Wizard. I was nearly aghast at my own stupidity—and ill luck.

“Put a few logs on the fire, stranger,” the wizard said, sitting down in a chair large enough to hold his heavy frame. Immediately a score of cats sought the comfort of his capacious lap, and he chuckled again, accommodating as many as he could and gently shooing the rest to the floor.

“You’ll find a teapot on the hearth. There’s tea in the kitchen. Fetch it, put some water on the fire, and we’ll have a cup together.”

He didn’t caution me not to run away, but he didn’t have to. A dozen of his cats came along with me, and I had the feeling that if I had made any move to escape, we would have been joined by the others. By candlelight, I found the tea, returned to the wizard, and before too long was sitting across from him, sipping a very good cup of tea, if I say so myself.

Benelaius took a sip and nodded appreciatively. “So tell me, what prompted you to enter my house?”

There was no point in a lie, since I felt he would have quickly detected one. “A dare,” I said shamefacedly. “I was just supposed to come in, take something, and leave. But I picked up a cat by mistake.”

“Had I not entered when I did,” the wizard said, “they might have harmed you. Irreparably. Burglary is a crime, you know.”

“I know, sir.”

“I should by all rights turn you over to the authorities. You would undoubtedly serve a prison term. And then you would be released, hardened, made even stupider than you are, and probably become a professional thief, in and out of prison until one of your victims finally puts you out of your misery. Or…”

He cocked his head. ‘You could reform yourself, with my aid of course. You brew a decent cup of tea. What work do you do?”

“I’m slop boy at an inn in Ghars.”

“Slop boy,” he repeated thoughtfully, stroking a cat with one hand and his long gray beard with the other, while the cup and saucer trembled on his broad belly. ‘Then domestic service to a gentleman such as myself would be a step up. I need someone to run my errands to town and keep the cottage clean and running… and to look after the cats. I’ve hesitated because of the expense, but…”

He eyed me for a moment, and the intensity of his gaze belied his easy manner of speech. I felt as though he were peering into my brain, plucking out the thoughts and examining them. At last he spoke again.

“What’s your name?”

“Jasper,” I said.

“All right, Jasper, my name is Benelaius, and here is my proposition. I give you two options. Option one, I turn you over to the Purple Dragon contingent and tell them I caught you burglarizing my house, which, as we both know, is the truth. Option two, you agree to become my indentured servant for a period of, say, one year. You do whatever I tell you to do—go, fetch, clean, carry, cook—for which you will receive your room and board, and an education.”

“An… education? You mean I’d have to take lessons?”

“Yes. Tutoring. From me, in lieu of a salary.”

“So my options,” I said, “are either jail or slavery.”

He frowned. “The kingdom of Cormyr does not sanction slavery, as well you know.”

“Well, what do you call working for you for a year for free?” I was bolder than I should have been, but since there was no option concerning being shredded by cats, I felt a bit braver.

Benelaius frowned even more deeply. “Perhaps a very small salary, then, to assist you in learning the management of your own money. How much do you earn at the inn?”

“Five silver falcons a month,” I lied. I made only two a month.

‘You lie,” Benelaius said smoothly. ‘You make two at most, and I will pay you one. My tutelage will be worth many times that, and if you don’t find a way to make your knowledge pay, it will be your own fault—assuming, that is, that you will want to leave at the end of the agreed upon term of service.”

“Oh, I will all right, if I decide to do it in the first place.” I was feeling pretty cocky since cat teeth were out of the picture.

“If not, I hear Cormyrean prison food is delightful. All the fresh weevils and moldy bread you can eat—if the big boys don’t take it from you first. And frankly, crushing rocks with hammers eighteen hours a day would put some muscle on that spindly frame…”

I sighed and looked around at the cats who would be my roommates for the next year. “When do I start?” I asked.

I started the very next day. After signing the papers that Benelaius drew up, I went back to the Sheaf of Wheat to give my notice to Lukas Spoondrift and gather my belongings. Spoondrift, the owner of the Sheaf of Wheat, went into a mild rage when I told him I was leaving, and shouted at me unceasingly as I packed my few things.

But I made my escape without bloodshed—save for Spoondrift’s sore throat—and eventually found myself ensconced in the wizard’s household. And a fairly decent dwelling it was, if you disregard its proximity to a swamp where all sorts of monsters and, yes, ghosts trod the squishy terrain.

A small front hall led into the main room, where Benelaius’s cats had captured me. It was pleasant by daylight, with two wide, high windows in the front, and another at the side. In the back was the kitchen, and off the main room was a spacious study with doors that opened onto a back porch that Benelaius called a piazza. Rustic wooden

chairs were positioned so that the sitters could look out into the swamp, if such was their desire.

It certainly wasn’t mine. The Vast Swamp gave me the creeps, even though Benelaius told me that he had cast a protective spell around his property. When I asked how
was able to get inside so easily, he told me that it wasn’t worth the energy to cast a spell that kept out spindly servants. In fact, not doing so had caught him one, hadn’t it?p>

I had to agree. But working for Benelaius wasn’t all that bad. I slept in one of the three bedrooms upstairs. The large one was Benelaius’s, of course; the next largest was for any guests he might have (and he had a surprising number); and the third was mine. It was the smallest, but much nicer than my pallet in the Sheaf of Wheat’s buttery. A fourth room above stairs was used as a small library, stuffed so full of books that I feared the floor would collapse. The ceiling below did have a definite dip.

My duties were far from wearing. I cooked, cleaned, ran errands, bought groceries and whatever else was required around the house, emptied chamber pots, and took care of the cats. This last activity required less time than you would think.

The thought of cleaning up after nearly a hundred felines had initially made me shudder. But the cats were extremely deferential to my well-being, strolling off into the swamp when the call of nature arose. So the stench associated with multicat households was never the bane of ours. On the contrary, the cats were polite, even affectionate to me now that I was no longer a stranger, and I enjoyed their company, once the feeding and milk-drawing was finished.

True to his word, Benelaius tutored me for at least an hour each day, in the midmorning after I had finished washing the breakfast dishes and airing the beds. He was pleased

to find that I already knew how to read (my mother had taught me), and he covered many subjects, of which wizardry was never one. I asked him why, one evening as we sat together by the fire, drowning comfortably in our sea of cats.

“Best not to know those things,” he said. “Though the study of wizardry was my making, it also proved to be my downfall.”

“What?” I asked. “I thought you retired from the College of War Wizards. Were you really kicked out?”

He summoned up enough energy to scowl at me. “No, my leaving was my own choice. I had had enough of magic. The downfall I mention was due merely to my own… dissatisfaction with magic.”

“Dissatisfied? Why, I’d think it would be great to be a wizard. All you have to do is just wave your hand, say a few magic words, and presto, you get whatever you want!”

If you did not mark my naiveté in the preceding speech, be certain that Benelaius did. “That’s what you think, is it?” He gave a tsk-tsk and shook his craggy head. “Even the smallest spell, Jasper, takes great knowledge, greater preparation, and even greater energy. The power of magic saps you, drains you, and enchants you until you go to great magical lengths to do even the simplest things, tasks that would take you an iota of the strength to physically do yourself. I’ve seen it happen to others, and I found it happening to me.

“I decided that I would engage my mind in other interests—stop and smell the roses, if you will. And when I did, I found the natural world and its laws a delightful contrast to that of the supernatural. Over a period of months, I determined that I would give up magic unless its use was absolutely necessary, and live as others did—the natural life, studying and writing of such things until my knowledge

of them became as great as it is of wizardry.

“I told my fellow War Wizards of my decision to leave their noble company. Some thought I was a fool. But others, like Vangerdahast, Chairman Emeritus of the College of War Wizards, and Royal Mage to King Azoun himself, thought me wise to follow my will. So I searched for a quiet place far from Suzail, where the War Wizards congregate, and here I am.”

I still didn’t get it. “But doesn’t it get boring? I mean, I always thought that Ghars was the dullest spot in Cormyr, and after being a War Wizard and fighting battles and all, how can you stand living here?”

He rubbed Grimalkin’s ears until the cat purred. I was starting to be able to tell the cats apart now. “Not all War Wizards see battle. I mostly conducted research into how to make spells more efficacious, and often worked healing spells when wounded warriors were brought back from the front line. Personally, I detest violence…”

He did too. He seldom ate meat, and would do so only in order not to insult a guest who had brought along food and drink. We had a good many of those, mostly wizards come to see their old friend. Once even Vangerdahast paid a surprise visit. I laid as low as possible, fearful that the stern and powerful old man would turn me into a slug if I were to pour a drop of tea into his saucer instead of his cup.

Afterward Benelaius confided to me that Vangerdahast often paid surprise visits to retired wizards, War Wizards in particular, just to let them know that he still had his eye on them should they intend to use their wizardry for evil ends. But when the Royal Mage took his leave of Benelaius, I heard him say to my master, “I know I need not keep track of your doings, old friend, but were I not to plague you as well with a visit, all other wizards might think you my pet.

Besides, I’ve missed your company.”

So I could only assume that Vangerdahast had a soft spot for my master, for which I was glad. It’s not nice to have the most powerful mage in the realm eyeing you askance—or eying you in any way, for that matter.

But even with wizardly visits and my daily chores, I still had much time to myself. Since I had to be close at hand, I passed that time the only way I could, by reading the multitudinous volumes that filled the second-floor library, since the books in Benelaius’s study were off limits. Don’t think that they were forbidden volumes of necromancy and chiromancy and whatever other ‘mancys’ there might be. Most of them were terribly complex books dealing with the natural sciences, and I was forbidden them because if I were to get any out of the seemingly random order in which my master had them, his research, so he claimed, might be put back days or even weeks.

Sure, I thought, but I left them alone, and dusted carefully around their perimeters. I had plenty of other things to read.

And read I did, both nonfiction and fiction. Benelaius had no cheap romances on his shelves, however. Instead I immersed my mind in the literary masterpieces of Faerűn— Raster’s Archetymbal, the Proceedings of Magus Firewand, Kirkabey’s Mediations and Meditations, and Chelm Vandor’s Seasons in the Heartlands. Besides these acclaimed classics, there were others, books of philosophy, epic poems, tales of travel, and I devoured them all, liking some more than others.