I wouldn’t hunt you down amongst these wretched mundanes? Now you’ll die like a rat in a wall, as you richly deserve.”
“I’m not a well man,” said Lord Ermenwyr in a faint voice. “I’m afraid I’m not up to your challenge.”
“You’re afraid!” gloated Blichbiss. “And whether you’re well, sick, or dead, we’re going to duel in this room tonight. It’s not a customary combat location, but mundane cities are within the permitted areas.”
“Oh, you’re lying,” said Lord Ermenwyr, pulling at his beard in agitation.
“I most certainly am not. And if you were any kind of scholar, instead of the spoiled scion of a jumped-up Black Arts gladiator, you’d know that!”
“Are you going to let him talk about Daddy that way?” demanded Lord Eyrdway.
“I quote as precedent the Codex Smagdaranthine, fourth chapter, line 136: ‘And it came to pass that in the mundane city of Celissa, in the seventh year of Fuskus the Tyrant’s reign, Tloanix Hasherets was done grave insult by Prindo Goff, and therefore challenged him to wizardly battle, whereupon they dueled in the third hour after midnight in the central square of the city, and Hasherets smote Goff down with a bolt of balefire, and scattered his ashes in the fountain there,’” recited Blichbiss in a steely voice.
“But you haven’t got a second,” Lord Ermenwyr pointed out.
“I’ll be his second,” said Lord Eyrdway. “Smith can be yours.”
“You traitor!”
The bodyguards came shuffling into the room and stopped, staring at Blichbiss. A low growl issued from Cutt’s throat. All four of them began to drool. Lord Ermenwyr put his hands in his pockets, smirking.
“And then again, my gentlemen here just might tear you into little pieces,” he said.
“No, they won’t,” Lord Eyrdway assured Blichbiss. “They take orders from my family, and I’ve got precedence over my little brother. You can’t kill this man, boys, do you understand? That’s a direct order. He’s insulted Lord Ermenwyr, and so he’s Lord Ermenwyr’s kill alone.”
The bodyguards drew back, looking at one another in some confusion. There was a taut silence in the room as they worked out the semantics of their terms of bondage, and finally Cutt nodded and bowed deeply, as did the other three.
“We respectfully withdraw, Masters,” he said.
Smith shifted his grip on the bottle he was holding, just the slightest of movements, but Lord Eyrdway turned his head at once.
“Don’t try it, Smith, or I’ll kill you,” he said. “And I’d really be sorry, because I like you, but mortals shouldn’t get mixed up in these things.”
“Thank you for the thought, however, Smith,” said Lord Ermenwyr, with a hint of returning bravado. “Way-way, you are going to be in so much trouble with Mother.”
Lord Eyrdway blanched.
“I’m doing you a favor, you whiner,” he said plaintively. “You can’t always run from everything that scares you. Fight the man!”
“Yes,” said Blichbiss, who had been standing there with his arms folded, looking on in saturnine triumph. “Fight me.”
“Very well.” Lord Ermenwyr shot his cuffs and drew himself up. “I assume I get choice of weapons, as is customary?”
Blichbiss nodded, hard-eyed.
“Then, given the fact that we’re indoors and my second here has personal property at risk, I think we’ll just avoid incendiary spells, if you’ve no objection?”
“None.”
“So, under the circumstances, I think … I choose … Fatally Verbal Abuse!” cried Lord Ermenwyr.
Blichbiss’s eyes flashed. “Typical of you. And I accept!”
Smith racked his brains, trying to remember what he’d ever heard of mages and their preferred means of killing one another. He vaguely recalled that Fatally Verbal Abuse was considered a low-caliber weapon. It had none of the glamour or impact of, say, a Purple Dragon Invocation or a Spell of Gradual Unmaking. In fact, there was some dispute as to whether it constituted an actual magickal weapon at all, given the propensity of people to believe what they are told about themselves anyway, and their tendency to fulfill negative expectations. There were those on the fabled Black Council who held that only the process of accelerated impact qualified it as a valid means of score-settling between arcanes.
This was not to say that Fatally Verbal Abuse could not produce dramatic results, however, or that strategy was not required in its use.
Blichbiss cleared his throat. He stood straight. “The first assault is mine, under the ancient rules of combat. Prepare yourself.”
Lord Ermenwyr stiffened. Blichbiss drew a deep breath.
“You,” he said, “are a twisted, underdeveloped dwarf with a bad tailor!”
Lord Eyrdway chortled. Smith gaped as, before his eyes, Lord Ermenwyr began to warp and shrink, and his