Page 91 of The Dungeon Book

In truth, I don’t think Bait did resist. Oh, she certainly wanted to, but not at the cost of endangering the Denizens. Or at the cost of your health, for that matter. You impressed her, and no one since her first meeting with Nala had managed that feat. I certainly never did – apart from once.

No, if anyone is at fault, it was Orphir. He lacked the power to work the spell, or the time to refine it.

Time was always lacking for Orphir. Even while his RAS adventurers were off looting the Dungeon, there was war in Eskerlund, and Crowhaven was under siege, and armies marching down the roads towards the border keep. Every morning brought fresh messages of woe, which he would read over a breakfast he did not notice or taste. He’d give commands to his generals, then rush up to attend to the dying king. Then off to examine the latest acquisitions from the Dungeon, then more affairs of state, then off to his laboratory to experiment with reclaimed sorcery. He had been Master of the Dungeon, and traded it to be the secret master of the world, and it brought him no joy. He had no time to enjoy any of the wealth or influence his position had brought him – and he was painfully aware that his position was utterly dependent on the favour of the royal family. Wolves circled Orphir within and without, probing for weakness, waiting for the moment of vulnerability.

I did not help him much. That’s to my credit, I think, for whatever little it’s worth. I could have been his colleague again, we could have sought magic side by side once more, like we did in the old days. Orphir had brought me back because he needed a trustworthy servant. I suspect he feared he could no longer rely on Nala and the other young RAS scholars. No one in the castle knew what to make of me; from their perspective, I just suddenly appeared one day, without anyone seeing me arrive. My appearance (pink and utterly hairless) added to my reputation as a mysterious, unnatural sorcerer, which served Orphir very well.

Once or twice, before I retired to bed, Orphir invited me up to his rooms for a drink. He’d claimed the chambers formerly occupied by Sir Rudyard. We would talk about old times. Our time in the Dungeon was a succession of sore spots (between the fourth and fifth vertebrae, for example), and I shied away from discussing Bait, so it was mostly him talking about his rise through the court. His original plan, all those years ago, was to win the favour of King Arus by bringing you safely home, with one deed outdoing all the great knights and heroes of the realm. Then, ensconced in the palace, he planned to use his magic to secure control of the kingdom. He intended spells of charm and command, of turning his enemies into toads and blasting foes with lightning bolts. A storm of sorcery, like a wizard out of legend. He dreamed of an easy path to kingship, the way we’d dreamed of fortune and glory when we first started out on the road with a dream and a cartload of stolen alchemy.

But his magic faded the further he went from the Dungeon. Maybe he had found gold down the back of the couch of history, but he lacked a purse to carry it. By the time he was presented to the king, he had little more sorcery than Old Pentsable, whose magic could at best make rain on a cloudy day, or conjure shapes from woodsmoke. Fearing that he would climb no further than Royal Physician, he took every advantage of his new position. Poison, blackmail, fostering the king’s own hypochondrias, worming his way into secret councils. He gained access to the royal vaults, where certain ancient treasures were kept, and he learned to leach magic from them. Now he had a little power again, a handful of spells, and these he did not squander.

A rival lord falls from his horse, victim of a sudden catastrophic stroke. Another looks in the mirror, sees the yawning void between worlds, and goes mad. A third has his dreams ransacked for secrets. A little power goes a long way when applied judiciously. With a handful of spells, he rose yet higher – influential enough to create the Royal Antiquarian Society as a tool to gather yet more magic. The Underhalls were not the only dungeon his minions raided. This magic he leveraged into yet more influence.

He became the power behind the throne, the spider at the centre of the web.

But the spider never gets to rest from weaving, and the one behind the throne never gets to sit down and put their feet up.

On those nights, I’d retire to bed, and Orphir would stay up labouring and scribbling, trying to avert all his several dooms.

I did not help him. Nor, I admit, did I visit Bait.

The scales tip against me.

She had one visitor, though.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Neb was not that visitor.

He wanted to be. He tried to be.

But chance intervened.

Young Valourentius had gone to the royal court as commanded. Sir Rudyard’s guards brought him as far as Eskerlund. They were in awe of the lad, for they’d seen the devastation wrought by the dragon, and that terror transmuted into amazement in the presence of the young hero. At Crowhaven, royal guards in gleaming armour took charge of Valourentius. They hailed him in the name of the king. Heralds proclaimed the coming of Valourentius Dragon-slayer, the hero of the realm. On a white horse he rode to the capital. His head spun with adulation.

Now, a dragon-slayer was a marvellous novelty, especially as the dragon was undeniably real. Since the formation of the RAS, the capital had seen a procession of self-proclaimed slayers of demons, vampires, kraken and other fabulous monsters. On investigation, these often turned out to be no more than overgrown owls, rough sleepers in graveyards, aggressive squid and so forth. But he was the genuine article. He was questioned by Nala and other scholars. His sword was examined for supernatural properties. He was made to draw anatomical sketches of the dragon’s innards and sniff jars of various sulphurous compounds that might match the composition of the dragon’s foul breath. All these trials he endured with good grace, even if they hardly matched his youthful imaginings of what life as a hero might entail.

Next, he was presented to King Arus at court, and oh – that was more like his dreams. Nobles from every corner of the realm hailed him as hero. Maidens fair curtsied before him; great lords praised him as Sir Peledon come again; bards retold the tale of his victory. He feasted on pheasant and lark’s tongue and other delights. He had his surfeit of lampreys. The king was unwell, so he spoke little to the brave young dragon-slayer. The Chancellor was so busy with affairs of state he attended only one course out of twelve, and over a pea soup asked curious questions about the state of the Dungeon. It put Valourentius in mind of a trapper thrusting a spear into the earth, searching for a hidden burrow. He tried to avoid any mention of Bait in his answers, but by the time spoons rattled in empty bowls, the Chancellor smiled. He assured Valourentius that a suitable place would be found for him in the royal guard, and then left to deal with weighty matters. Nobles gossiped about matters Valourentius knew little about; depressing talk of the war beyond the walls was banished in favour of glorious stories about dragon-slaying.

Neb – he still thought of himself as Neb – scanned the assembled crowd of nobles for a particular face, and wondered if the Princess Aldebara would be attending that evening.

Had he paid more attention to the gossip of the nobles, he might have avoided the fate that befell him. The kingdom was at war with the rebel barons, not to mention the northern lands and their allies. A decade of Orphir’s advice had brought the kingdom to the brink of ruin and depleted its armies. The remaining troops were starved and desperate. Only the Royal Antiquarian Survey’s “assistants”, those cut-throats and brigands personally loyal to Orphir, had the supplies they needed. The king commanded – or, rather, the Chancellor commanded and the king moaned assent that even the royal guard, customarily reserved for ceremonial duties and the defence of the palace, might be sent into battle.

Thus it was that, no more than a week later, so quickly that he could still taste the lampreys at the back of his throat, poor Neb found himself on a desolate hill somewhere in western Eskerlund, at the head of a company of men all of whom were taller and older than he. Somewhere down in the grey valley were the forces of the rebel barons; Neb and his company were scouts, sent ahead of the main army to spy out the advancing foe.

Neb was uncomfortably aware that the royal guard helm on his head was gilded with gold, that the cloak gifted to him by the Chancellor was much warmer than the rags of the other soldiers, and the prize money given by the RAS jangled with every step he took.

“You’re the hero, lad,” said one of his men. “The big dragon-slayer and all. Why don’t we go down and you can defeat the rebels single-handed?”

“It’s what the Chancellor would want,” echoed a second.

“We’ll just watch,” said a third. “Moral support.”

The fourth said nothing, but sharpened a knife off a convenient rock.

“That doesn’t seem wise,” said Neb.

“A frontal assault would take ’em by surprise, sir.”