amused the boy (amusement had been hard to come by in the Badlands, and he welcomed it), then tried again. This time he managed to get up.
"I see no bodies except for those of two fellows who look like they died even older than you," Mordred remarked, looking around in exaggerated fashion. "I certainly see no dead gunslingers, of either the long-leg or shor'-leg variety."
"You say true-and I say thankya, o'course I do-but I can explain that, sai, and quite easily-"
"Oh, but wait! Hold thy explanation, excellent though I'm sure it is! Let me guess, instead! Is it that the snakes have bound the gunslinger and his lady, long fat snakes, and you've had them removed into yonder castle for safekeeping?"
"My lord-"
"If so," Mordred continued, "there must have been an almighty lot of snakes in thy basket, for I still see many out here.
Some appear to be dining on what should have been my supper."
Although the severed, rotting limbs in the basket would still be his supper-part of it, anyway-Mordred gave the old fellow a reproachful look. "Have the gunslingers been put away, then?"
The old man's look of fright departed and was replaced by one of resignation. Mordred found this downright infuriating.
What he wanted to see in old sai Thoughtful's face was not fright, and certainly not resignation, but hope. Which Mordred would snatch away at his leisure. His shape wavered. For a moment the old man saw the unformed blackness which lurked beneath, and the many legs. Then it was gone and the boy was back. For the moment, at least.
May I not die screaming, the former Austin Cornwell thought.
At least grant me that much, you gods that be. May I not die screaming in the arms of yonder monstrosity.
"You know what's happened here, young sai. It's in my mind, and so it's in yours. Why not take the mess in that basket-the snakes, too, do ya like em-and leave an old man to what little life he has left? For your father's sake, if not your own.
I served him well, even at the end. I could have simply hunkered in the castle and let them go their course. But I didn't. I tried."
"You had no choice," Mordred replied from his end of the bridge. Not knowing if it was true or not. Nor caring. Dead flesh was only nourishment. Living flesh and blood still rich with the air of a man's last breath... ah, that was something else. That was fine dining!"Did he leave me a message?"
"Aye, you know he did."
"Tell me."
"Why don't you just pick it out of my mind?"
Again there came that fluttering, momentary change. For a moment it was neither a boy nor a boy-sized spider standing on the far end of the bridge but something that was both at the same time. Sai Thoughtful's mouth went dry even while the drool that had escaped during his nap still gleamed on his chin. Then the boy-version of Mordred solidified again inside his torn and rotting coat.
"Because it pleases me to hear it from your drooping old stew-hole," he told Thoughtful.
The old man licked his lips. "All right; may it do ya fine. He said that he's crafty while you're young and without so much as a sip of guile. He said that if you don't stay back where you belong, he'll have your head off your shoulders. He said he'd like to hold it up to your Red Father as he stands trapped upon his balcony."
This was quite a bit more than Roland actually said (as we should know, having been there), and more than enough for Mordred.
Yet not enough for Rando Thoughtful. Perhaps only ten days before it would have accomplished the old man's purpose, which was to goad the boy into killing him quickly. But Mordred had seasoned in a hurry, and now withstood his first impulse to simply bolt across the bridge into the castle courtyard, changing as he charged, and tearing Rando Thoughtful's head from his body with the swipe of one barbed leg.
Instead he peered up at the rooks-hundreds of them, now-and they peered back at him, as intent as pupils in a classroom.
The boy made a fluttering gesture with his arms, then pointed at the old man. The air was at once filled with the rising whir of wings. The King's Minister turned to flee, but before he'd gotten a single step, the rooks descended on him in an inky cloud. He threw his arms up to protect his