From alt.pub.dragons-inn Thu Jun 16 21:29:00 1994 Xref: netcom.com alt.pub.dragons-inn:7409 Path: netcom.com!netcomsv!decwrl!news.hal.COM!olivea!charnel.ecst.csuchico.edu!psgrain!nntp.cs.ubc.ca!alberta!cab006.cs.ualberta.ca!aaron From: aaron@amisk.cs.ualberta.ca (Aaron V. Humphrey) Newsgroups: alt.pub.dragons-inn Subject: [Ornigan] Enter Draxil Mandobar Date: 16 Jun 1994 02:32:17 GMT Organization: The Anna Amabiaca Fan Club Lines: 217 Message-ID: <2todjh$epn@scapa.cs.ualberta.ca> Reply-To: aaron@amisk.cs.ualberta.ca NNTP-Posting-Host: cab006.cs.ualberta.ca Originator: aaron@cab006.cs.ualberta.ca ADMIN: Well, this thread has been dormant for a while, and will probably continue to be intermittent, but at least I'll introduce the other characters in the thread, besides Ornigan, the title character. Draxil Mandobar and Dasha(not to be confused with Archmage Dasham)are my characters, although technically my brother's creations... Thorn and Fauteuil, while originally my creations(I _named_ them, at least...:-)are property of the Mage Guild folks as a whole. This post is Copyright 1994 by me, with permission granted for transmission over Usenet channels by regular means, and storage in an a.p.d-i archive. Thanks to Steve Hutchison for his comments. In the previous installment, the mage Ornigan received a missive from his brother, from which he learned that his father was on his deathbed and his sister missing. He resolved to return to his home, the County of Maybold, with all speed. The Archmage Thorn, who covets a fabled hoard of magical knowledge left in Maybold by Ornigan's ancestor and namesake, Ornigan IV, is monitoring and influencing his actions by means of an amulet Ornigan wears... "Outrageous!" Draxil Mandobar shouted, pacing up and down the blood-red carpet of the Mage Guild's guest suite, robes swirling. "Simply outrageous! I would have expected a guest lecturer to get better treatment than this! That Archmage Armchair--" "Fauteuil," Dasha corrected him. The mage wheeled on his swarthy apprentice. "Whatever his name is! Question and answer periods I can abide, but not--not browbeating! I would've thought that at a place like this, so close to so many dimensions, they would be a little more open-minded about their dimensional theory!" "It's not the first time a brilliant new advance has been stifled by hidebound old codgers," Dasha noted. Draxil sighed, calming slightly. "I guess you're right. I had just expected better." "Archmage Thorn did appear sufficiently apologetic for his colleague's behaviour." Draxil smiled. "Aye, he did. Such a charming fellow, that. I guess I was expecting the other Archmagi here to be like him. But that Fauteuil is no better than the fellows in the Heath. Of course, all anyone wants there is battle-magic. War, war, war. Nobody in the Heath can think of anything but war!" "Generica's history seems quite peaceful," Dasha said. "And well I can understand that, with people like Thorn keeping the wheels oiled. But I understand that recent years have brought more than a few disturbing events. Did you ever meet Supreme Archmage Delalle?" Dasha shook his head, and Draxil continued, "Salt of the earth, that fellow. I met him once before, when I was starting on my current research. He expressed interest, and asked me to come up when I'd made some progress. And so I did. But poor Delalle wasn't here to see it. I don't know if I like that Dasham woman, and I couldn't make head nor tail of her explanation of what had happened. Could you?" "Destroyed by some evil creature that was impersonating an archmage, or some such thing," Dasha said. "Hrm. Yes. Well...what do we do now? Do you think we're going to get any help in our research here, or will that Fauteuil fellow throw too much weight against us?" "Dasham may be too new yet to her position, and too unsure of her power, to risk angering one of her Archmagi now," Dasha said, fingering his earring thoughtfully. "I'd think it unlikely." Draxil sighed. "I'm afraid you may be right. Well, then. We'll have to try another dig and see if we can get some compelling evidence. Did you check on that ship leaving for Rameshan?" Dasha nodded. He'd spent most of the day on the docks. He'd been stifling in the Heath, and it was good to get back to the coast. There weren't many other sea gypsies there, but he'd had pleasant enough conversations with some of the Antilleans, and sailors in dockside inns. He itched to feel the sway of a ship beneath his feet again. "The Dawn Clipper leaves two days hence," he said. **** Thorn sat down behind the desk in his shielded office and sighed. "Do you think you could have been a bit less subtle?" "He's so close!" Fauteil said. "I thought the 'Sparlactican evidence' sounded harmless enough, but when he talked about having found six 'hidden' points of harmonic intersections of the Matrix..." "Remind me," Thorn said, suppressing his impatience. "This is your specialty, not mine." Fauteuil sighed. "Each point of harmonic intersection provides a place around which dimensional resonances can be rotated, somewhat like the four dimensions of space-time." "In this city, it's more like six or seven," Thorn noted dryly. "Go on." "So with the standard twenty-three, it's possible to access an infinite number of dimensions...but there are infinitely many more that _can't_ be accessed by using those points. I've been using twenty-nine in secret for years." "And we've both profited handsomely by it," Thorn reminded his fellow Archmage. "But now, if this Draxil Mandobar keeps up with this line of research, others will be able to access these planes as well. Which means that, potentially, they'll be able to access them in heretofore unknown ways, and--" "And you'll be in trouble," Thorn finished. "And _we'll_ be in trouble," Fauteil amended pointedly. Thorn raised an eyebrow. "Have you been recording our conversations? No? Then I'm afraid that they didn't occur. No offense, but I have taken precautions. I presumed that you would be similarly careful." Fauteuil sighed. Thorn was just so damnably slippery sometimes. He wouldn't put it past him to have figured out a way around the truth-spells they used. "So you can see why I'm so upset. We can't allow him to continue with his research." "Agreed," Thorn said softly. "I can think of several ways to accomplish that, with varying degrees of risk. And one of them is _not_ losing your temper and screaming at him like a lunatic in a colloquium to which _we_ invited him!" "_You_ invited him!" "Delalle had left me a memo that this fellow's research was of interest. I thought it might be good for relations with the Heath guilds to bring him here to find out." "Well, now you know," Fauteuil growled. Thorn raised an eyebrow. "Had you not paid any attention to this fellow's papers before?" "I gave them to Satoeun to read. I was busy with the Sukumarl affair at the time; would you rather I had left that to deteriorate any further? The summary he gave me said that he'd found archaeological evidence of Sparlactican dimensional magics. How was I to know that the Sparlacticans had known all this already?" "Never mind." Thorn steepled his fingers. "If we're going to keep this from blowing out of proportion, then we're going to have to make him look like a real crackpot. I imagine most of his colleagues at the Heath Guild will be only too glad to do their parts, for the proper inducements. His family will likely be relieved to have him out of the way--most of these Heath families consider mages a bit of an embarrassment if they're not directly helping the troops. "That only leaves the mage himself. Discrediting him won't necessarily keep him from pursuing his research. Perhaps we can make it look like his research was taking him into dangerous areas." Fauteuil's eyes lit up. "I can find something suitably nasty for him to meet his end. Something from Monchunonzh, perhaps." "You think it will discourage research if he gets killed by some creature never before seen? All that will mean is that those following his work will take greater precautions. No, we'll have to make it look like he merely happened upon a back-door to dimensions already found--and a dangerous one, at that. Do you think you can manage that?" Fauteuil grinned, his enthusiasm returned. "Shouldn't be too hard." Now he remembered why he worked with Thorn. It was because, if it were in his interests, he could extend some of his slipperiness to his allies. "When do you wish it?" "Given your reaction to him, I doubt he'll have great hopes for staying here. Find out when he plans to leave and do it then. Whatever you do, don't do it within the confines of the Guild itself." Fauteuil snorted. "I'm not _that_ stupid. I'll keep you posted." With that, he opened a gate and headed back to his own pocket-dimensional office. Alone at last, Thorn sighed. It was simultaneously a pain and a thrill to work with fools. The thrill of control, of manipulation, never wore off; but working too closely with them made it all to clear that they were nothing more than fools. Then he corrected himself; many of them were anything but fools, in their own specialties. Perhaps "pawn" was a more appropriate term. Easy to control, and usually little realizing the part they played in larger schemes. And mostly expendable. Except for that Arcania Dorval woman. She was mildly impressive. Her techniques were a little heavy-handed, but they probably worked for her. He'd toyed with the idea of attempting to pin Mandobar's attack on her, but decided in the end that might be unwise. He didn't quite know enough about her yet to pinpoint her reaction, although it would probably be easy enough with this other business going on...and leaving too many links between himself and Dorval at the moment would also be risky. It was time to check on Ornigan again, he decided. He'd not yet left the city, and Thorn was getting impatient. He gave him another gentle mental nudge. If he could get at Ornigan IV's laboratories, he might no longer need to work with pawns. At all. Though he probably would, just for the sport... -- --Alfvaen(Editor of Communique) Current Album--Prince:1999 Current Book--Roger Zelazny:Lord of Light "It's a one-time thing. It just happens a lot." --Suzanne Vega