Still unimpressed, Ichabod gave Tristan a confident, arrogant glare. "Go ahead and try," he dared. "I'll tell them the cards belong to you. Who do you think they'll believe?"

Tristan only smiled. "Actually, I think they'll believe me," he said softly.

"And just why is that?"

"Because there is wax on the edges of these cards," Tristan answered casually, as he grabbed one up from the table and held it before the sailmaker's eyes. "The same as that on your mustache. And in case you haven't noticed, I'm clean-shaven. So tell me, sailmaker, now which of us is the insolent bastard?"

Ichabod's face went white. On trembling legs he searched absently behind himself, finally finding his chair. He sat down carefully.

"Four hundred, you say?" he asked, his voice breaking. His tone had suddenly become far more agreeable.

"Four hundred," Tristan nodded. "Far be it from me to swindle a card cheat. And no deposit. Rather, payment in full on delivery to my ships tomorrow at dawn. You'd best not cross me. I wouldn't take it well."

"Where are you anchored?" the sailmaker asked.

"On the eastern shore. In the rocky cove, just off the wooden docks. Do you know it?"

"Yes."

"Then I will see you there at dawn," Tristan replied. "With the sails."

Ichabod's eyes narrowed a bit. "Once you leave the Wing and Claw, how do you know I'll keep my end of the bargain?"

Reaching back, Tristan casually produced one of his throwing knives and held it to the chandelier. The soft light glinted off the dirk's razor-sharp edges.

"Because if you don't, I'll come to you tomorrow night," the prince said quietly. "Sanctuary is a small island, and I'll find you no matter where you try to hide. I'll find you, and I'll cut you." Looking back down into Ichabod's eyes, he smiled. "From groin to gizzard."

Ichabod swallowed hard. "Very well," he said in a much smaller voice. "It shall be as you say."

Remembering what Tyranny had taught him, Tristan spat into his right palm and held it out. After a moment, Ichabod followed suit, and they shook hands. The prince had been inordinately lucky. He also knew that he should leave quickly, before anything went awry.

But as he stood to go, someone else entered the Wing and Claw. Someone he knew. It was Scars.

As might be expected, the giant's frame filled the doorway, blocking out much of the afternoon sun. But as Tristan looked more carefully, he saw that something was very wrong. Scars' hands were tied behind his back, and his face was bruised. He was being prodded into the room by two leering pirates, their sabers held to his back. Tristan froze, trying to act as though he had never seen the colossus before. His mind began to race.

Scars and the pirates finally entered the tavern and slowly walked over to one side. Then, from the sunlight beyond the doors Tristan detected something standing there, its silhouette dark against the afternoon sun. It looked like a man. But it had too many arms and legs to be a man, and some of them weren't where they were supposed to be.

Then he saw the thing start to spin around, and Tyranny came flying through the air to crash into one of the nearby empty tables. It collapsed beneath her, and she went down hard. Dazed and hurt, at first she seemed unable to get up.

Tristan started to go to her, but somehow her eyes found him in the crowd. She gave him a short, decisive shake of her head, telling him to stay put. Understanding, he fought down the impulse to help her and forced himself back down into his chair.

He heard boot heels on the clapboard sidewalk, and a man walked arrogantly into the tavern. Striding over to Tyranny, he reached down and, viciously grabbing a handful of her short hair, wrenched her face up for everyone to see.

"I'm looking for the other man who came into town with this!" he shouted. "It has come to my attention that there is another rooster in my henhouse! Reveal yourself, whoever you are, and I'll let her live!"

Staring at the man with hatred, Tristan's endowed blood began to rise hotly in his veins.

His hand closed automatically around the handle of his knife.

CHAPTER

Forty-three

"T ell me, Wulfgar," Krassus asked. "Are you comfortable?"

The hard, white marble table pressing against his back, Wulfgar looked around the Scriptorium as best he could. He and the wizard were alone. He had been forced here by several of Krassus' demonslavers, and they had tied down his hands and feet, making it impossible for him to move.

He was naked save for a pair of emerald-green silk trousers. His long, sandy hair fell down over one edge of the table and stretched toward the floor. As he lay there, looking up into the smiling face of the wizard with the long white hair and the strange, two-colored robe, his heart beat wildly. Sweat born of fear poured maddeningly off his face and body.

Craning his neck to one side, he saw a partially unrolled scroll hovering in the air nearby. It was magnificent, and it glowed with the same strange blue color that he had seen come and go so often since being imprisoned here in the Citadel.

"What are you going to do to me?" he demanded, straining against his bindings for what seemed the hundredth time.

Krassus wiped the perspiration from his subject's brow. It was almost as if he were a healer, compassionately tending to a patient.

"I am nothing if not a man of my word," he said calmly. "I'm going to do exactly what I promised you that day in your quarters. I shall introduce you to something wonderful-something that will change your life forever. In the end you will thank me. And before we are finished, you will find yourself begging for more."

Summoning all of the saliva he could, Wulfgar arched his back and spat it directly into the wizard's face. Unperturbed, Krassus calmly wiped it away.

"I will fight you; you must know that," Wulfgar swore. "One day I will find Tristan and Shailiha, and join them. Together we will kill you-you and all of these monsters that serve you." Exhausted, he lay back down against the hard, almost welcoming coolness of the stone.

"Of course you will fight me," Krassus said. "Given the nature of your blood, I would be very disappointed if you did not. So will Serena, when her time comes. But by then you won't want to kill the demonslavers, Wulfgar. You will want to command them. I am simply an intermediary, doing my late master's bidding." Krassus turned to view the scroll.

"I believe prudence dictates that we begin with one of the simpler Forestallments," he said casually. "Although the process will not be pleasant, it will have nowhere near the impact of some of the more powerful ones that will eventually follow. But by then your unique blood will have adjusted. When I finally deem you ready, I will gift you with the one Forestallment that will change the world forever-the one my loyal consuls worked so hard to uncover in the scroll."

Narrowing his eyes, Krassus called on the craft, and a section of the beautifully elegant, glowing text lifted itself from the scroll and came to hover before his dark eyes. But just as it did, Krassus began to cough again.

Taking his rag from his robes, he covered his mouth. His hacking went on unabated for some time. It was becoming progressively worse, he realized. Finally the convulsions subsided, and he put the rag away. Now it was Wulfgar's turn to smile.

"Perhaps you will die before you can turn me, wizard," he said. "Did your supreme master consider that before he departed?"

"Of course," Krassus answered hoarsely. "But have no fear: I shall easily live long enough to turn you, perhaps even long enough to see you fulfill my master's plans. What a glorious day that shall be! Now then, shall we begin?"