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The Hound of the Bastard’s Villa

G. Scott Huggins

When I tell people I’m a veterinarian, they usually say, “A what?”

Actually, a lot of them spit at my feet. Sometimes, the politer nobles will say, “We honor your service.” In the Dread Empire, even for people, life is expensive and death is free. So the idea of getting paid to care for animals is a bit strange.

Once they understand, then they say, “Isn’t it difficult to avoid being disemboweled, poisoned or eaten by the horrible creatures you work with?”

And I say, “You shouldn’t talk about my patients’ owners that way.”

Of course, since becoming the Dark Lord’s Beastmaster, I don’t worry so much about some random orcish noble having me drawn and quartered. But there are some offenses that could still get me horribly vivisected. Such as declining dinner invitations from Baron “The Bastard” Vondeaugham, Vice-President of the Outer Council.

“Stop scowling at everyone,” murmured Harriet, from somewhere around my waist, as we approached the front door. “Relax and smile.”

“I’m smiling,” I said, between my teeth, “but I’m not relaxing.” While it might not be safe or profitable for Vondeaugham to allow his guests to be eaten by his various pets, you couldn’t count on the Baron to realize that.

“You look like you’re about ready to rip someone’s throat out, James,” she said.

“That’s pretty typical of Outer Council meetings,” I said.

“But it’s a party. Look pleasant,” said Harriet, putting on a stunning smile and looking up at me. “It’s called acting. I survived a couple of years bartending for orcs doing just that, and it won’t kill you for one night.”

There was a line at the door to the Bastard’s villa.

“I have just about had enough of this,” said a tall, pale figure immediately in front of us to his female companion. It was hard to tell them apart. They had identical neat, pageboy haircuts. The only difference I could see was that she wore a wreath of wilted black flowers in her hair, and a tiny fringe of black lace on her robe. Their eyes were all black, their lips red as blood. He snarled, “I did not come here to watch a pair of animals sniff at each other!”

“I know how you feel, Raddie,” I said, easily. “I could have just stayed at work.” The vampires’ faces twisted with disdain, and they turned their backs on us. Vampire lords, even minor ones, don’t like it when their food talks back to them. Fortunately, I didn’t care. “Oh, come, Radula,” I said, loudly. “The Underminister of Unhealth and Human Services should positively relish a chance to informally chat with the people he serves. How else will you know whether you’re doing the job right?”

Radula turned slowly, trying for maximum intimidation, but I was used to high-ranking vampires wanting to kill me. “I take issue with your familiarity,” he said. “And the word ‘serves.’ And ‘people.’”

“Why?” I said, affecting puzzlement. “They’re two syllables at most, you can’t have forgotten what they mean.” I looked over his shoulder. “But here comes a vocabulary refresher.”

A big, hairy face thrust itself between Radula and his companion, accompanied by a choking miasma of stale body odor, piss, and rotting meat. “Call me ‘animal’ again, you walking corpse, and I’ll hang you from your own entrails. If you have complaints, take them up with our host, who has not taught his verminous servants to make proper obeisances before nobility!” He shoved Radula, pointedly. “No slave gets the last sniff at Kaga Hlorcha!”

“Dung-eating gnoll!” hissed Radula, fangs bared. “I’ll…!”

A huge hand reached over me and clamped down on the furious vampire’s head. Another picked Hlorcha up by the scruff of his neck. A massive presence stepped past me and held them both inches off the ground.

You will remember your manners as befits a member of the Outer Council,” rumbled a voice so deep that the paving stones shook. “That was what you were about to say, weren’t you, Underminister Radula?”

Radula was spitting mad. But he managed to say “Yes,” in a flat voice. Even if it did come out a bit more like “Yeph” because of the hand.

“And you, Underminister Hlorcha, will remember the dignity that befits your office, will you not?” continued the voice.

“Iiiiiiigh,” growled the gnoll chief. The hand tightened. “I. Will,” he choked.

“Good. Enjoy the evening, gentlemen.” The ogre dropped both of them, and they stalked inside, pretending that their mutual and unbearable humiliation had never happened. Then he turned around and stared down at me.

It was unbelievable that anything so big could move so quickly and silently. But “Gentleman” Noj Enorcma wasn’t like most other ogres. Oh, he refused to wear pants, and otherwise wore skins and bones, over his gray-green, flaking skin, but they were neatly tailored into an outfit that was half armor and half courtier’s doublet. A donkey skull hung about his neck, for no reason I’d ever heard. “Dr. James DeGrande,” he rumbled, with a smile. “A word in private.”

Shit. One major part of my strategy for surviving tonight had been avoiding a private word with Enorcma. Because he was also the Dark Lord’s Underminister of Transportation. I looked around, but Harriet had vanished. Which meant that her survival instincts had kicked in and she was safer than I was. Good. “What can I do for you, Underminister?” As if I didn’t know.

“The Dark Lord wants his Heavy Assault Unicorn Brigade across the Metatarsals of the World by the end of the week.”

“You mean the rhinoceroses?” I said.

“Heavy. Assault. Unicorns,” said Enorcma. He really loved renaming things, and he hated when people didn’t use the names.

“Across that series of ridges? That certainly sounds like a challenge for you,” I said.

His hand blocked my feeble attempt to step around him. “I promised him air transport.”

“Well, that was a bit shortsighted of you,” I said, looking him in his dull red eyes. “What do you think can possibly carry them?”

“You squish-brained little human, I gave you the answer to that. The perfect answer! Use the brics!”

And he loved breeding animals. And like most idiots who tried to do so, he was intuitively bad at it. “Okay, I told you: your attempt to domesticate rocs was a failure. Four of your so-called “brics” died the first time they tried to carry a horse. The ones that lived are arthritic and wing strained because you overworked their undergrown flight muscles. I can’t tell you they’ll ever heal, but they sure won’t without time.”

He shrugged his huge shoulders. “Use magic. Where’d that little witch of yours go? I don’t care how you do it. Your job is to heal my animals, Beastmaster.”

“Yeah: my job. Not Harriet’s or any other wizard’s. If they could just “heal things with magic,” I wouldn’t be any good to anyone. If you try to make these deformed rocs—”

Brics!” interrupted Enorcma.

“Whatever—fly even themselves anywhere this month, they will imitate their namesakes, and the Dark Lord’s ‘heavy assault unicorns’ will suddenly become his fastest cavalry ever. Briefly.”

“Well”—Enorcma took a step forward and bent over me—“it doesn’t seem to me that you’re much good to anyone now.” He raised an enormous fist.

“The Dark Lord disagrees,” I said, trying to keep my voice from cracking. “He likes having me as his veterinarian.” The Dark Lord’s favor wasn’t a card I cared to play very often. But now seemed a good time.

The ogre hesitated. “Well, that’s just too bad. Because I made a promise. And I always keep my promises.” He bent closer. Enorcma was big. “For example,” he whispered, and it still made my bones vibrate, “I promise you, now, that if those brics can’t lift that regiment, your little quarterling kennel assistant will have an accident. That private practice you keep on the side, that seems to distract you from your duties to the empire? It’ll burn. And your little woman, wherever she is…” He sniffed the air and let his smile widen. “Well, I’ll leave that to your oh-so-active human imagination.”

I just stood there, shaking. “Gentleman” Noj was a bigger enemy than I could hope to fight. And he would keep his promise. And there wasn’t a damned thing I could do about it.

He swept past the man-sized, hairy shape that stood with an expression of sullen belligerence at the door. It had been stuffed into something that had probably been formal attire once. Its muzzle was bleeding. Its nostrils flared as Enorcma passed, and it winced.

“Is it gone?” asked Harriet. I pulled her to me, unsure of how she had reappeared, but very glad to see her.

“Are you all right?” My voice might have been a little higher pitched than usual.

“Yes, I just thought I’d let you boys discuss Council business in private.” Which was good instincts. Not knowing things was often safest, in the Dread Empire. “Are you all right? You’re trembling.”

“Fine,” I said. I wasn’t about to frighten Harriet with Enorcma’s threats. Well, not until we were alone and she could help me figure out what to do about them. “We should go in.”

“Is that a werewolf?” said Harriet, staring at the door-creature.

“Whatwolf,” I said.

That wolf!” she hissed.

“No, I’m saying that wolf is a whatwolf, if I’m any judge.”

“A what?”

“Yes, that’s what I said.”

Harriet punched me in the thigh. “Is that a werewolf or not?”

“No, I’m being serious,” I muttered back. “That’s a whatwolf. Probably less than a quarter human blood, and that’s as human as it can look. You need nearly half to be a werewolf. Used to be spelled wherewolf. Because when they’re in fully human form, you’re not sure where they are. It got shortened over centuries. Once they’re up to three-quarters human blood, it’s technically a whowolf, and they’re a lot smarter. Some can pass for hairy humans.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Not at all.”

“But why do they call it a whatwolf?”

I stepped forward. “Good evening, my lupine servitor,” I said, cheerfully. “Present our felicitations to your liege lord and admit us to his domicile!”

The creature’s brow wrinkled. “What?”

I looked at Harriet, who rolled her eyes. “Doctor and Underminister James DeGrande,” I said, passing over a card. “And wife.” I still enjoyed calling her that, even though it had been nearly four months. From the blush she gave, Harriet enjoyed hearing it, too.

But it meant I had more to lose than ever before. And Enorcma knew it.

The whatwolf looked at our invitation. It couldn’t read. But its nostrils informed it that we were human. It slavered, jaws widening. However, this creature I wasn’t afraid of. “Don’t try it, Fido,” I said, my hand dropping to the hilt of the blade at my waist. “I’ll charge your owner the emergency fee for neutering, but it won’t need to cover anesthetic. Underminister DeGrande. Beastmaster.”

The whatwolf slunk back. “Pass, lord,” it muttered.

We strode past it and into the large, gloomy foyer, where a spectrally thin dark-elf butler took our coats and gestured us without a word to join the company in the dining hall.

Kaga Hlorcha was there, his stench granting him an island of solitude. He had just appropriated an entire tray of appetizers from one of the waiters. Radula was nowhere to be seen. “And he’s a member of the Outer Council?” Harriet asked.

“Health and Inhuman Services. That’s why Radula hates him. They have to work with each other. Closely.”

“A gnoll in charge of health. Of course.” Gnolls don’t bathe. They consider it a sign of weakness. Why put one in charge of Health? Ever since he conquered the world, about forty years ago, the Dark Lord has considered that staffing his bureaucracy with malign incompetence is the best way to suppress rebellion. Gets people fighting among themselves. Gnolls also have a very efficient approach to health care. If it’s sick enough to be eaten, they have relatives who’ll eat it. Saves a lot of time and effort worrying about things. And it sure motivates people to stay healthy, or at least pretend to be.

“Hlorcha! Grundy has been waiting to see you,” a cheerful voice called. “I’ll make sure you two have a chance to run around outside!” The gnoll’s jaw gaped in rage at this. But the voice, unworried, continued: “James, my boy!”

Underminister of Involuntary Labor Baron Ballard “The Bastard” Vondeaugham was a large man, mostly gone to paunch. His neat beard hid his chins, and he looked like the kind of guy you’d pick for a rich uncle. Needless to say, he was a backstabbing son of a bitch. “We humans have to stick together,” he continued. “Glad you could make it, and your, ah, gnome is welcome too, of course.”

Son. Of. A. Bitch. I’ve said it before: humans who claw themselves into the nobility of the Dread Empire are as nasty and cutthroat as they come. Vondeaugham was no exception: he’d murdered his legitimate brothers for his title, and “Humans have to stick together” was his oily motto. It meant he hoped you’d look the other way while he measured you up for a slave collar and took the credit for your work and anything else he could lay hands on.

“Harriet is my wife,” I said, meeting his eyes. Gnome. Harriet stands something under four feet due to the extreme left curvature of her spine. And the hell of it was, I couldn’t even tell if Vondeaugham was being insulting or just ignorant.

“Oh?” he said. He pantomimed brushing her hand with his lips. “As long as you are here, James, perhaps you could take a look at my Grundy. GRUNDY!”

“What’s a Grundy?”

“Oh, thank you, dear boy!”

“I didn’t…”

The whatwolf galloped up. No wonder Hlorcha had been pissed off. It was fully transformed, or untransformed, really. It wore only its collar. It still came up to Harriet’s head height and growled at her. “Are you done with the gate?” the Bastard burbled, scratching its head and completely unaware of Harriet’s danger. “You did such a good job, boy, yes you did.”

“Vondeaugham!” I snapped, pushing Harriet behind me, “Hold him or I’ll make you wish you had!”

Vondeaugham purpled. “How dare you speak to me like that! I am your superior…!”

“Who isn’t getting free veterinary advice from me in exchange for dinner. Make an appointment if you want your dog seen later. Hold your dog now if you want to see him above ground tomorrow.” I put my hand to my blade.

Vondeaugham gripped the whatwolf’s collar, but drew himself up. “As vice-president of the Outer Council, I…”

“Should be seeing to the needs of the President of the Council, don’t you think?” interrupted a voice as cold as ice, smooth as glass. Vondeaugham’s face faded from mauve to white and he went still.

Behind him stood a woman who, while not as tall, still managed to look down on the Bastard. Her skin was black. Ink black. Her hair was the white of cobwebs, and her eyes pearlescent. She wore a gown that looked as though it had been woven of crystal and iron. Metallic lace fashioned in a pattern of silver-and-black flies crawled across it, realistic enough to be slightly nauseating. She gripped a gray-skinned, lank woman by her hair.

“President and Countess Anachryma,” the Bastard said, smoothly. “My apologies, I’d not dreamed you could feel neglected in my home. How may I serve you?”

The dark-elf lady sniffed. “Tend your animals in your own time, as the doctor has the sense to advise you. This idiot”—she yanked her victim up higher, eliciting a sharp cry—“had her serving-orc bring me a message. Dispose of the corpse and move her to the lowest place at the table. And then begin the meal. I have better things to do than be confined to your hovel all night.” She dropped the woman and left.

“As you command, Dark Lady,” said the Bastard with a bow. But as he rose, his face was a mask of fury. He snapped a command at Grundy, who ran off. Then he punched the half-dark elf woman in the face. “Govanna, I didn’t know anyone could be too dumb to be Underminister of Education,” he roared. “I’ll have you keeping the Council’s minutes in your own blood! Get to your seat and wait for us. And as for you,” the Bastard hissed at me, “you’ll regret not treating Grundy! You’re still slaves. Both of you.”

“Personally owned by the Dark Lord,” I said, keeping my voice level. “See him if you don’t like my conduct.” The Bastard stormed off. “It’s all right,” I lied to Harriet. Another powerful enemy made. Wonderful.

“All right?” she said. “It’s absolutely glorious.”

“What?” I said.

“Remember the Human Anti-Racism and Stereotyping Segregation law?”

“Yes.” After Harriet’s first year of studying witchcraft at college, HARASS had banned humans with visible deformities from attending academies of sorcery so that they would not “propagate harmful images of our human subjects.” Except that birth defects—like Harriet’s—are a major side effect of high magical potential in humans. So, humans were effectively expelled. Harriet had managed two more years of college by disguising herself as a dark elf before she was caught and expelled.

“Well, she’s the one who designed it,” said Harriet. “James, you said this party wouldn’t be fun.”

“It isn’t,” I groaned, as the butler escorted us to our places.

The plates were already set out as we approached, and I had to suppress a gag reflex: you’d think that, in spite of the company, dinner at the home of a noble of the Dread Empire would at least feature excellent food. You would, however, be wrong, because human nobles would never dream of shaming themselves by serving human food at their tables. Dark-elf food is the empire’s haute cuisine, and Vondeaugham was playing hotelier-than-thou with a vengeance: jellied spider eggs, tarantulas on the moult-shell, and nightcrawler ragout were the features. Accompanying it, wine pressed from snake venom. The best thing on the plate was the garnish: one cold, marinated mushroom.

That’s when Harriet discovered she was seated next to Govanna. I don’t know why she was surprised. Of course humans were going to be seated near the bottom of the table. Harriet exchanged scowls with the humiliated minister.

Across from us was Hlorcha, and next to me sat Radula. The stench of gnoll mingled with the odor of the huge chalices of blood before the vampires. Still, I spend my days smelling evacuated anal glands and month-old ear infections, so I only had to get past the taste.

Govanna sniffed. “Do I smell…human?” she asked, looking past us at Radula.

“Probably,” said Harriet. “You’re at least fifty percent human, by the looks of you, so the odds are pretty good.”

“Are you trying to get smart with me, slave?” Govanna shrilled.

“No, I’ve already succeeded in being smarter than you.” Harriet smiled.

“Well, I’m afraid that’s impossible,” said Govanna, sweetly. “The Department of Education has proven that dark-elf intelligence would have to be divided by one half for human intelligence to equal it.”

“Well, you’ve certainly put us in our place with facts and mathematics, there,” I said.

A rumbling belch from the head of the table rattled the silverware. “I’m so glad you seem to have enjoyed the meal,” said Baron Vondeaugham with a supercilious smile at “Gentleman” Noj.

“What I’ll enjoy is getting the Council’s work done,” rumbled the ogre. “You are going to have those thousand slaves ready to escort Our Lord’s expeditionary force?”

“Oh, that depends entirely on our good Radula.” Vondeaugham waved expansively down the table to the vampire, who raised his face from his chalice. “He has all the slaves I could spare from the Lord’s other projects. Take it up with him.”

“I told you I couldn’t do it,” said Radula. “If I slew them all today, I couldn’t even have decent zombies raised from what you left me in less than a month.”

Vondeaugham snorted. “So you’re wanting another reprimand from His Darkness? Dear me, that might cost you some privileges.” He glanced at Radula’s companion, who stiffened. “Or you could talk to Hlorcha and see if he has dwarves or orcs for you.”

Hlorcha glared up the table and spat. “It was you who ordered my reserves to the mines! There are no more!”

Enorcma leaned toward Vondeaugham. “I don’t really care how you do it, but you’d better have those slaves, little man.”

The Bastard turned jovially to him and leaned in himself. “I just told you I do have them. All designated for your use. It isn’t my fault if Radula’s department hasn’t prepared them. In any case, all the rest of my poor people are already committed.”

My stomach churned, and it wasn’t because of the food. His “poor people.” He didn’t give two shits whether Radula killed his slaves and raised their corpses. I shuddered to think what labor the ones who were still alive were being forced through.

Enorcma and Vondeaugham were still eyeing each other. Anachryma rose and placed her hands gently on both their shoulders. “Gentlemen, this is unseemly,” she said. “Stand down.”

“Of course, Madame President.” Vondeaugham gave her a smug little bow. “My documentation is fully in order. You just all need to learn to work as a team.” This was why Vondeaugham was one of His Darkness’s favorite managers.

So, Vondeaugham was setting Enorcma up to fail. Or was it Radula? Maybe both? And with a sinking feeling, I realized I was part of this too, because I was responsible for the brics Enorcma wanted. Was I one of Vondeaugham’s tools? Or another victim? It was like being enmeshed in a horrible enchantment. None of us wanted to be here. Our host was the most hated man in the room. But none of us could afford to break the spell called bureaucracy, because it was far too easy for all that frustrated hatred to be channeled right at anyone who was foolish enough to leave the only arena in which they could fight back.

The meal dragged on. The plates were cleared and replaced by desserts (honeypot ants in gelatinous cube bowls) to a conclusion with no further overt threats. Finally, Baron Vondeaugham rose. At least now I’d get a chance to plot my own survival…

A scream cut through the barred iron doors of the dining hall. A pale servant squeezed through them and fell to her knees, tears running down her face. “It weren’t my fault, sir, please. I just found him!” Two other servants appeared, and their faces fell as they saw they were not first with the news. “Grundy is dead!”

* * *

Baron Vondeaugham shot to his feet. He swayed so violently that I thought he would fall on top of his slave. For just a moment, he looked stricken. Human.

I’d seen that look too many times on the faces of clients to ever mistake it. He’d actually loved the thing. “Treachery. Poison,” he whispered. Then he kicked the woman in the face. “Who has dared?” he shrieked, trembling violently enough that I thought he might have a seizure right there.

Then, as fast as the rage had seized him, his voice grew cold. “Nobody leaves,” he said. “Lock the gates and the outer doors. I’ll not let a soul leave these grounds until I have justice for this outrage!”

Snarls and cries of protest greeted this pronouncement. When they had all died down, Enorcma growled, “Do you really think you and all the powers you command can keep me here against my will, you miserable human sack of shit?” The floor shuddered as he stepped toward Vondeaugham.

It took me a moment to realize that Enorcma had looked up in as much surprise as the rest of us at the blow. I’d thought it was him. The stamp was repeated. Again.

A metal shape that towered a head over even the ogre thrust aside the iron doors of the hall. It looked like a suit of armor fit for a small giant, but it wasn’t hollow. Within the helmet, polished granite eyes surveyed the room. In a voice like sliding rock, it said, “THE OUTER COUNCIL OF THE DREAD EMPIRE HAS BEEN ATTACKED. THE HEAD OF ITS SECURITY TEAM HAS BEEN SLAIN. THIS ONE IS CHARGED DIRECTLY BY THE LORD OF THE DARKNESS TO ASSIST IN THE DISCOVERY OF THE TRAITOR. ANY WHO FLEE WILL BE JUDGED GUILTY AND SUMMARILY EXECUTED.”

Facing Enorcma, Baron Vondeaugham gave the ogre a vindictive smile and said, “Why, yes. I do believe I can.”

For a moment, Enorcma looked like he was ready to test that statement. The construct wasn’t in the best of shape. There were rents in the massive armor, and crudely carved glyphs in its chest and the back of its head. It swiveled toward the ogre. “ANY ATTACK ON THIS ONE WILL CONSTITUTE COLLABORATION WITH TREASON AND RESULT IN SUMMARY EXECUTION.”

“Noj, stand down,” said Anachryma. “You can’t fight an Inexorable.”

I stopped breathing for a moment. An Inexorable? That’s what this thing was? Beside me, Harriet swayed on her feet. “I thought the Inexorables had all been destroyed,” I whispered.

“It looks like this one almost was,” Harriet hissed back. “Those carvings…I think the Dark Lord repurposed it.” I swallowed. The Inexorables had been created by the Council of the Wise during the War of the Dark. They weren’t alive. Their purpose was to fulfill their missions at whatever cost, to stiffen the spines of the wavering mortal nations. One of them had slaughtered the population of Kalmier when it had tried to surrender. They had killed whole legions before being shattered by the Dark Lord himself at the Last Battle. They couldn’t be bargained with, they possessed neither mercy nor forgiveness. They cared only for their missions. And they could hear truth. You couldn’t lie to one. Holy shit, how much worse could this get?

I had to give Anachryma this: she didn’t waste time. “Agent of the Great Lord. Do you recognize me or my position?”

“YOU ARE THE CURRENT PRESIDENT OF THE OUTER COUNCIL.”

“Good. What…?”

“YOU WILL DIRECT THE INVESTIGATION. THE INVESTIGATION SHALL TAKE NO MORE THAN SIX HOURS. IF AT THE END OF THAT TIME YOU HAVE NOT SUBMITTED REASONABLE PROOF OF THE ASSASSIN’S IDENTITY, YOU WILL BE DEEMED GUILTY OF INCOMPETENCE AMOUNTING TO CONSPIRACY, AND YOU AND YOUR INFERIORS WILL BE SUMMARILY EXECUTED.”

I choked. Everyone. Baron Vondeaugham’s mouth opened and shut. Even Anachryma’s ink-black skin turned dark gray.

“And who set that particular deadline?” she managed.

“THIS ONE’S PARAMETERS WERE SET BY THE LORD OF DARKNESS.”

Ah. That much worse.

“Of course they were,” muttered Anachryma.

* * *

“Oh, gods!” wailed Govanna. “Some rebel is plotting to kill us! First your pet and now the head of security! Who was it?” She just did not keep up.

“Perhaps, Govanna,” said Vondeaugham in tones of pompous dignity, “your time might be better spent helping us find this rebel assassin than in worrying about yourself.”

Anachryma looked at Baron Vondeaugham, and said, “Let us be perfectly clear: Am I to understand that the head of security for the entire Outer Council was your pet whatwolf?”

“You told me to make security arrangements,” Vondeaugham blustered. “Grundy was loyal, ferocious, dedicated…”

“And now just dead,” said Anachryma. “Where is the rest of the team?”

“Grundy…that is, I put him in charge of hiring…but he hadn’t…” Vondeaugham stammered.

“Whatwolves are barely capable of using language,” I said. “Much less hiring an entire security team!”

“Sounds perfectly qualified to be an Imperial official,” muttered Harriet. “Ow.” I had stepped on her foot.

Baron Vondeaugham fixed me with a look of sheer hatred. “Well, Grundy might still be alive if you’d examined him like I asked you to!

“What?” cried Harriet. But I just shrugged. It was among the crazier things I’d been accused of in my career, but it wasn’t near the top.

“If I’d wanted him dead,” I said, clearly, returning Vondeaugham’s glare, “I’d have been more than happy to examine him. I could have killed him right in front of you while telling you I was doing everything possible to save the poor animal. In fact, I never touched him. If you’d really noticed something was wrong an hour ago, you’d have told me what it was.”

Baron Vondeaugham purpled and then wheeled on Radula. “Then it was you who poisoned him!” he screamed. “My servants have been telling me for weeks that you’ve been throwing piles of trash over my walls!”

Radula bared his teeth. “The ‘trash’ is your own disgusting compost heaps that fall over into our property! And they’re our walls!”

“Or perhaps it was you!” Vondeaugham whirled on Hlorcha. “Your rotting zombie servants are always wandering into my estates.”

“Your stupid whatwolf drags them over!” Hlorcha growled. “I wish they were poison, he’d have been dead months ago!”

“Enough.” Anachryma’s voice cut through the recriminations. “This is Council—in fact, Imperial—business”—she glared at Vondeaugham—“and as the construct says, I am in charge. Beastmaster DeGrande.”

“Yes, Madame President.” I swept her a bow. Anachryma was more evil than Vondeaugham, but a lot smarter.

“It seems we are in need of your expertise. Go examine the body and report. I will consult with the Inexorable to determine its parameters for considering our investigation a success.”

Of course, the thing about impressive mansions is that while they are full of rooms filled with luxurious diversions, they are unaccountably short on examination rooms suitable for performing a necropsy. So, Harriet and I headed to the kitchen. The cook was thin, human, trembling and white. “All right, don’t panic, you’ve done nothing wrong,” I said. “Just get me your sharpest knife, preferably something about eight inches long.”

Well, what should I have done? I don’t carry my equipment to dinner. And people still want free service. “The Baron mentioned trash thrown over the wall. Get me a sample of anything you saw Grundy eating—or even eating near—in the last day. And what the hell am I supposed to use for shears?” I muttered to myself.

“Hey, your job’s easy,” said Harriet, assembling various cups and pots. “I have to set up an alchemist’s lab in here.” She strode off, calling for vinegar, soda and water.

“This is going to be messy,” I said to the cook. “Have a couple of your staff heave him onto whatever’s easiest to clean.” They laid him out on a stone counter. I really don’t have many patients that are man-sized. The small ones tend to be a lot smaller, and the big ones are much bigger. I opened Grundy with the chef’s knife. Blood oozed out as the skin and muscle parted, revealing the abdominal cavity. I became aware of a presence—and a smell—at my elbow.

“Please, sir,” whispered a groundskeeper. “It’s the offal y’wanted.”

“Very good,” I said. I looked it over. It was rotting meat, fruit. Certainly nothing a vampire would have owned. But they might have laced it with something. “Pet poisoning” is a common accusation leveled by neighbors who hate their neighbors. It’s rarely true. “Take it to Harriet, the short woman over there. Then come back.”

I filled a small bowl with blood, and then started on other things for Harriet.

The thing about poisons is that there are hundreds of them. If the poison was something visible, in the stomach or the guts, it would still be there tomorrow, so no rush. But who knew how long ago Grundy had really been poisoned? Oh, Vondeaugham was sure that someone right here was the culprit. But some poisons take days to work. And if it were one of those, I’d never find it myself.

Quickly, I snipped out bits of Grundy’s liver and kidneys, filled another cup with bile, and a third with urine straight out of the bulging bladder. Then I leaned in, crushed a vertebra, and snipped out part of the spinal cord. Then I scooped out one of his eyeballs. It was amazing where poisons ended up. I signaled the servant back to me and sent her off with it for Harriet to work her alchemy. Then it was time for me to get to my job. Which hopefully would return a diagnosis of death by natural causes.

There was nothing grossly wrong with Grundy’s guts. So I cut open his stomach. A wolf’s stomach makes the stench of the meal I’d just eaten smell like roses. Grundy was gorged. Recently. Gods knew where he’d gotten it all. Chunks of some kind of meat: Vondeaugham fed his whatwolf better than his guests. Something else, here: what looked like part of a giant prawn. There were shellfish toxins that were pretty deadly, but there were also people who ate large prawns, and that was a bit more common. Then I saw the berries.

Small berries. Dried. They might have passed for blueberries, or even peppercorns, but I’d seen them before. Never in the stomach of a carnivore, though. Deadly nightshade. Fuck. Of all the times for that idiot Vondeaugham to be right. Grundy had been poisoned. By one of the guests? Possibly. I turned to find Harriet.

And nearly tripped over her.

“James,” she muttered, “the cook is standing right behind you with a large cleaver and he’s watching you.”

“And that’s a problem because?” I said, an ugly chill crawling up my spine.

“He’s the poisoner.”

* * *

“And how do we know this?” I asked, impressed. I’d just discovered the poison, and she already knew about it and had figured out who’d done it?

Harriet pulled out a jar from under her arm with a faint green glow to it. “Because this isn’t sugar syrup, and it’s on his hands, too.”

“Good gods, how didn’t anyone notice that?”

Harriet sighed. “The poison is a clear liquid. The glow is my tracking spell. Alchemists call it ethglyc. It’s an extract from a certain moth caterpillar, and it tastes sweet.”

“Wait, what?” I said. “I’m sorry, but I think you meant to say, ‘it’s a solution containing deadly nightshade, from these berries right here.” I held one up.

“Wait, what?” said Harriet. “Two poisoners?”

I shook my head. More likely one poisoner trying to make double sure. “Odd choices to poison a carnivore with,” I said. But after all, dogs would eat almost anything. Whatwolves might, too. “Okay, we don’t have time for subtle, I want to survive the night.” I turned, and in one smooth motion drew the blade at my waist and laid it against the head chef’s throat. “Drop the kitchen hatchet,” I said.

My blade is a No. 75 dragon scalpel. It’s over two feet long, and about four inches wide until it narrows to a point. Sometimes I even use it on patients, but mostly I employ it in performing what Harriet refers to as a “problemectomy.”

The cook’s cleaver clattered to the floor. I moved my foot just in time and almost made it look smooth.

“Lord, how have I offended?” the man whimpered.

My stomach churned. Look, I lived as a slave and a human in the Dread Empire all my life. Technically, I’m still a slave. But now I’m also the Dark Lord’s Beastmaster. Effectively a noble. And my own people cower before me and spit behind my back when I pass. It made me cringe; I probably hadn’t even needed to draw on the guy. But you don’t take chances with anyone carrying that much edged steel.

“I’m afraid you have a confession to make,” I said. “Harriet?”

She stepped forward. “See your hands?” He did, and gasped in horror, trying to rub the glow off. “It means you put this in Grundy’s food.”

Please,” whispered the man. “You don’t know what it’s like here. The Baron doesn’t feed us. He expects us to live off his table scraps! And the werewolf gets most of those! And stealing food before he’s done means we get to be the next meal! The last one was the maid’s daughter!” Tears leaked from his eyes. “I know you have no reason to, but if there’s any part of you that remembers what it was like to be human…”

I slapped him. “I am a human,” I said. “And it doesn’t make you special. I’d personally just as soon say Grundy died of natural causes, but it wasn’t. It was poison, and I can’t lie about that.” I explained about the Inexorable. “I’m sorry, friend. But if I don’t tell on you, you die anyway, only you take us all with you.”

The man sagged. “All right. It was me. I bought the ethglyc and used it. I guess if I have to die, maybe at least everyone else will get a good meal out of it.”

“And then stuffed the deadly nightshade in his bowl just to make sure?”

“The what?”

I stared at him. “They won’t kill you any deader for admitting to the nightshade, too.”

“But…but I didn’t! Why would I lie about this? You have me, all you have to do is tell.”

“DeGrande!” Baron Vondeaugham burst into the kitchen. “The President wants to see you. Now!” The cook opened his mouth.

I elbowed him in the gut. “Silence!” Then I muttered, “Not yet.” I followed Vondeaugham out the door. Anachryma was waiting in the great hall.

“I’m very much hoping you have something, DeGrande,” she said.

“Madame, my assistant and I have just begun. It would be incredible if we had something already.” Technically, I wasn’t lying.

“The Inexorable will require your sworn testimony and your reasoning as to why the testimony is true. It will not necessarily require physical proof, but it is good at logic. At least, I wasn’t able to tie it up in conundrums.” For the first time since my elevation, I saw Anachryma flustered. “Find something, DeGrande. Find anything plausible.”

“I’m at least as motivated as you are,” I said. Again, true. “By your leave?”

Back in the kitchen, Harriet met me. “We’re not telling on Gordon. He has children.”

“Gordon?” The chef nodded. “Not unless it’s that or die. Besides, I’m not absolutely sure the Inexorable would accept your magic as proof, Harriet. I bought us some time. Here’s the plan: Harriet, can you do with the berries what you did with the, uh…with his poison? Find out who used it?”

“No. The liquid was once all a single thing. Berries are individual objects, and the spell doesn’t work like that.”

“Can you come up with one that does?”

“I doubt it.”

“Well, try. Gordon, if you could think of poisoning Grundy, so could another servant. Or they might have seen the person who did. Find out if anyone knows about these black berries turning up in Grundy’s food.”

“What if I find out it’s one of them?”

I sighed. “Then you’ll have to draw straws…or something.”

“What are you going to do, James?” asked Harriet.

“I’m going back out there and stir up our suspects.”

* * *

There aren’t many advantages to living in a society ruled by an immortal incarnation of Evil that everyone in power is trying to curry favor with. However, one of them is this: when the chips are down, everyone can be relied on to turn on everyone else.

“All right, everyone, I have an announcement,” I called, from the entrance of the dining hall. “In the stomach of our host’s whatwolf, we have found deadly nightshade. So if anyone happens to have seen their neighbor sneaking off to the kitchen where Grundy’s bowl is, we can get our friendly Inexorable here to execute the truly guilty party and then we can go home.”

The room became very—still. Then everyone began pointing and chattering at once:

“This carrion-eater was sniffing…”

“The vampire took offense at…”

“The ogre was threatening our host!”

Baron Vondeaugham shouted, “This is ridiculous. Why are we waiting for the guilty party to confess? This is no real mystery. Inexorable, isn’t it true that you cannot be lied to?”

“INDEED. I HEAR THE TRUTH OR FALSEHOOD IN THE WORDS OF MORTALS.”

“Then simply ask them and have done!” I groaned inwardly. Vondeaugham had to pick now to do something halfway intelligent?

“THIS IS ACCEPTABLE. BARON VONDUUM, DID YOU POISON THE HEAD OF SECURITY OF THE OUTER COUNCIL, AKA ‘GRUNDY’?”

“What? How dare you…?”

“ANSWER THE QUESTION. FURTHER EVASIONS WILL BE CONSIDERED PROOF OF GUILT.”

Vondeaugham’s veins throbbed in his purple face. “Of course not, you stupid infernal machine!

“YOU ARE TELLING THE TRUTH.” It clanked over to the next nearest noble. Anachryma. “COUNTESS ANACHRYMA, DID YOU POISON THE HEAD OF SECURITY OF THE OUTER COUNCIL, AKA ‘GRUNDY’?”

“Certainly not,” she said, in bored tones.

Well, shit. This might work or it might not, but if the poisoner wasn’t found among the guests, eventually he’d have his servants marched in here, and Gordon would end his life on an impaling pike. Besides, evading questions was an art form, and while the Inexorable might be able to tell truth from falsehood, the fact that it had needed Vondeaugham to tell it to interview the suspects didn’t suggest the greatest initiative or imagination.

Besides, I already had my primary suspects. When people do hurt animals, it’s usually in a fit of rage. Hlorcha, Radula, and his consort were staring at the Inexorable, and I knew they’d both resented Grundy’s inspection at the beginning of the evening. Radula’s consort looked frankly terrified.

No one was watching me. I casually walked toward Hlorcha,

There was an insistent tug at my arm. Harriet was there, with Gordon. “Not now! I’m just…are you all right?” I asked. “You look pale.”

“I’ve felt better,” Harriet said. “James, there’s another poisoner.” She held up a vial with pale blue liquid in it.

Another one?” My head spun. “How many people wanted this stupid wolf dead?”

“I don’t know, but it’s a nasty one. Black fae dust. Clots the blood in the veins.”

I shook my head. “We know Grundy didn’t die of that, his blood flow was as normal as I’ve ever seen when I cut him open.”

“Oh, for gods’ sakes, James!” snapped Harriet. “I’ve seen you double-talk the Dark Lord before! Do something!”

Well, that was true, but it wasn’t something to count on; I could have been killed every time. “Okay, we’ll try it. I suppose you didn’t manage another tracking spell?”

“No.”

I hesitated. “Okay, what’s in that vial? Anything dangerous?”

“No.”

“Great.” I held it up. The stress must be getting to me, too. I was sweating and had to concentrate to focus. I clapped my hands for attention.

“Noble colleagues,” I said, “it grieves me to report that our poisoner was quite thorough and used more than one agent to ensure that his treachery would succeed. However, I see none of us are wearing gloves. Black fae dust is very effective when sprinkled in the victim’s food, but there would still be some on the poisoner’s hands. What our poisoner could not have counted on was that Harriet would have compounded this solution!” Here, I poured a splash of Harriet’s liquid onto my handkerchief. “Completely harmless,” I said, wiping my hands with it. “But if you have touched black fae dust, and an alchemical reagent causes it to be absorbed through your skin, and, into the bloodstream, well…” I turned to Hlorcha. “Will you shake hands with me?”

The gnoll grinned. “Of course, Beastmaster.” His hand was hairy and sticky, but his handshake was firm.

“Countess Anachryma?” I offered my hand.

“Of course.” She allowed me to take hers.

No sooner had I turned toward Govanna than she bolted for the door. In three clanging strides, the Inexorable caught her. “LADY GOVANNA, DID YOU—”

“Yes. YES!” she screamed. “I used the black fae dust, and just to be sure, I slipped in some deathclover mold, too! I won’t stand for any more of your bullying and insults! I don’t know how it got into your stupid werewolf’s bowl, but at least I know you won’t live much longer than it did, Vondeaugham, you utter prick!”

Harriet and I stared at each other. “Wait, what?” we said, simultaneously. Vondeaugham was the target? But what about…?

“LADY GOVANNA, YOU ARE UNDER ARREST FOR ATTEMPTED MURDER.”

Vondeaugham screeched in rage. “What? This vile bitch poisoned me? Me?” He looked from my face, to Harriet’s, to Anachryma’s, and stopped. “Would you care to tell me,” he seethed at the countess, “exactly what you are laughing about?”

With a grim smile on her face, Anachryma gestured to me. I sighed. “Black fae dust is a deadly blood poison. So is deathclover mold. But it prevents the blood from clotting and makes you hemorrhage to death.” I looked at Govanna, whose face had gone pale. “She fed you two poisons that act as each other’s antidotes.”

Harriet said brightly, “I hope the new Underminister of Education addresses the shocking failure of our schools to teach real-world poisoning skills!” Then she howled with laughter.

The Inexorable opened its chest, revealing a small cage, and stuffed the raving Govanna inside. Her screams cut off as the armor clanged shut. “THESE POISONS CANNOT HAVE KILLED THE VICTIM. THE DEADLY NIGHTSHADE IS TO BLAME, AND THE POISONER REMAINS UNFOUND.” It stalked toward Hlorcha to resume its questioning.

“Great, we found a poisoner, and we can’t blame her because she’s a complete moron,” I muttered to Harriet, helping her up. “And we’re running out of time.” My heart was pounding. Harriet staggered into me. “I think I’m going to barf,” she groaned.

I wasn’t feeling too good myself. “Who wouldn’t feel like throwing up,” I grumbled, “after that lovely meal of spider eggs and legs, worm sauce and fermented mushrooms?”

“Mushrooms?” said Gordon. “What mushrooms? We didn’t prepare mushrooms.”

Oh. Shit.

Harriet looked up at me. “I missed a poison, didn’t I?”

“Oh, I’m afraid neither of us missed it. But there do seem to be an awful lot of them around tonight. Hold on. Govanna tried to poison Vondeaugham, but you found it in Grundy instead? How did Grundy…” I whirled on Gordon. “You said he was fed on leftovers! And that means that the ethglyc was in our food!” I grabbed him by the collar and whispered, “You begged for my help when you were poisoning us all?”

Gordon struggled in my grip. “No, Beastmaster. No!” he choked. “Only his food! I swear! He didn’t eat what the rest of you did!”

“I saw him!”

“No. His plate…we just put the tarantula legs around it for a garnish. He never eats them. Behind the garnish, he had roast prime rib, potatoes and prawns! The ethglyc went in his key-lime custard. His glass of venomwine was single-malt scotch. But no mushrooms!”

My grip loosened. Just when I’d thought I couldn’t possibly hate the bastard any more than I already did. But no mushrooms. I looked around. And suddenly, the light dawned.

I staggered over to Baron Vondeaugham. Yes, the dizziness was definitely getting worse.

“What is it?” he snapped.

“You want your poisoner?” I asked.

“Of course!”

“You got a hunting crossbow?”

“I am a gentleman,” he sniffed.

“Great. Let me borrow it for a minute, and I’ll solve your case.” I really hoped I was going to be able to solve mine and Harriet’s too, but at least our killer wouldn’t get away with it. Vondeaugham snapped at a servant, who ran off.

“Gordon,” I said, “clear out of here and hide. That thing is almost done questioning guests, and then it’ll start in on the staff. Let’s make sure it asks you last.” The chef nodded and bustled back to the kitchen while I filled in Harriet on what to do.

“BARON RADULA’S COMPANION, DID YOU POISON THE HEAD OF SECURITY…”

Well, it was consistent, anyway. It hadn’t even realized that it was asking the wrong question. Our suspect could answer honestly that he hadn’t poisoned Grundy. He’d poisoned the Baron. The servant handed me Vondeaugham’s crossbow. Even better than I expected, it was a weapon meant to impress as well as kill. Razor-sharp bolts gleamed in twin slots, and I cocked it with the pump of a lever. Then I handed it to Harriet and circled around until I was face-to-face with Hlorcha again. “Sorry, there’s one more thing.”

“What now, human?”

“Put up your hands, you stinking pile of shit,” said Harriet from behind him.

Hlorcha whirled, saw death staring at him behind a hair trigger. He raised his hands. “You dare…” And I saw exactly what I’d known I was going to see.

I plucked two of the fungal growths right out of Hlorcha’s armpit and danced back, avoiding his reflexive swipe. They glistened with oil and sweat. He’d cultivated them there.

I turned to the Baron. “Did you eat this?” I said.

“Yes,” he swayed on his feet, going green.

I pulled some of the shrunken nightshade berries out of my pocket. “Do you remember eating these?”

“I thought those were black capers!”

“Are you,” I said, “feeling as sick as I am, right now?”

“I feel fine.” He looked at the mushroom, sheened with gnoll sweat. “Until, um, just now.” He turned and vomited on the floor. Then yelled for the Inexorable. I closed my eyes. Dammit. Not again. It couldn’t be. Well, first things first.

Hlorcha snarled as the Inexorable reached him. “You just couldn’t pass up the opportunity, could you?” I asked him. “To get us as well as him?”

“Humansss,” he hissed. “Are a disease in the Council.”

I held up the mushrooms and berries to the Inexorable’s stone gaze. “These are poisonous,” I said. “He poisoned all the humans. And then they got to Grundy.”

The Inexorable locked Hlorcha in its iron grip. “THOSE BERRIES ARE DEADLY NIGHTSHADE?”

“Yes,” I said, “but…”

Whirling, the Inexorable strode across the room and grabbed Radula’s escort, who shrieked. “BARON RADULA’S CONSORT AND CHIEF HLORCHA. YOU ARE UNDER ARREST FOR ATTEMPTED MURDER.” It set her down, locked in its other hand. “THE BERRIES YOU WEAR IN YOUR HAIR ARE THE SOURCE OF THE DEADLY NIGHTSHADE.”

I stared at the struggling vampire. The wreath of flowers hanging askew in her hair…weren’t flowers. They were berries cut to resemble flowers at a glance. But that hadn’t fooled the Inexorable. More berries, still intact, nestled below her hairline. Well, there was nothing for it. I took the wreath and did some calculations.

“Six berries for you, ten for me,” I said, handing Harriet her share.

“You’re poisoning me?” Harriet cocked her head and nearly fell over. “Isn’t that redundant?”

“Not when deadly nightshade counteracts the muscarine in the fungus we ate,” I said.

“You mean…?”

“Yes, they did to each other what Govanna did to herself,” I said. “We’ll feel like shit for a few hours, but we’ll be okay.”

The Inexorable opened its chest again, and we got a brief glimpse of Govanna as she cried out, “There’s not enough roo…” before the new prisoners were thrown inside and the chest slammed shut. I rather thought I’d heard something squish.

“YOUR ACTIONS PROVE THESE POISONS CANNOT HAVE KILLED THE VICTIM. ANOTHER POISON MUST BE TO BLAME.”

Harriet’s hand tightened on my wrist. I returned the grip.

“I know, I know,” I whispered, “Gordon’s the poisoner. I’m out of ideas.”

“No, that’s just it: he can’t be the poisoner,” said Harriet. “Not if he poisoned Vondeaugham tonight. Ethglyc doesn’t work that fast.”

My mind raced. “Why didn’t you tell me that before?”

“I didn’t know, before! When I found it, we thought Grundy was the target, and for all I knew, he could have been poisoned last night.” She broke off.

Countess Anachryma was walking up to me. “There is another poisoner, Dr. DeGrande,” she said, in a voice of frozen bronze, “and I cannot help but notice that you are doing nothing as we inch closer to death.” She was the only one left in the hall besides Enorcma.

“I SHALL BEGIN QUESTIONING THE SERVANTS.”

“Wait!” I said, desperation accelerating my thoughts. “I think I know where the poisoner is.” The Inexorable stopped.

“I know it isn’t me, and it’s not Harriet. So the two remaining suspects are Countess Anachryma, and Gentleman Noj Enorcma.”

“We’ve already been cleared,” the ogre said, with a calm smile.

“No, you haven’t,” I said. “Both of you told the Inexorable that you didn’t poison Grundy. And that was true. The Baron poisoned Grundy.” Vondeaugham started to shriek a denial, but I went on: “By handing him a plate of leftovers. So enough games. Why don’t you both just strip and let us search you? We can see if you might have anything else that might have found its way onto our host’s plate.

Anachryma smiled. “Very well.” She began to shrug out of her dress.

Enorcma stiffened. “Human scum,” he said. He fixed me with a deadly glare.

Oh, shit.

Enorcma screamed and charged, his enormous horny fist raised to pound me into jelly.

Unlike stage duels that go on for hours while the principals hurl insults at one another, most real fights to the death are over very quickly. I’d had a moment of warning, and I knew what he was expecting. I’d run. Or dodge.

So I whipped out my dragon scalpel and knelt, slamming it over my head with all my strength.

Enorcma’s huge fist whipped just over my head and hit the diamond-edged steel as I brought it forward. A regular sword would have bounced off his thick hide, but my blade was meant for surgery on dragons. It shore through the horn and muscle, of Enorcma’s knuckles, parting the carpal bones and slicing between the ulna and radius for a foot before the ogre’s inertia whipped it out of my hands and it spun across the floor. His howl of agony shook the room.

I was already running after my sword. I’d been lucky and half-crippled him, but Enorcma could have still killed me even if I’d taken his whole arm off and he knew it. I heard his footsteps pounding behind me.

I hadn’t slowed him down enough.

I leaped for the handle of my weapon just as he swung at me. Goaded into swinging early by rage, he only brushed my leg with his fingers. It felt like a mule’s kick. I spun through the air, past my blade, feeling the awful shock of the blow. Then the nauseating pain. He hadn’t broken the bone, but I wouldn’t be running anymore. I was screwed.

I staggered to one knee. Just in time to see Enorcma’s foot slide out from under him and send him crashing to the floor.

I caught up the blade. Hobbled two steps.

Enorcma raised his head and fixed me with a glare of pure hatred.

Just as I brought the blade down on his head.

The ogre fell, skull split in two.

Harriet ran up to me. “James, how badly are you hurt?”

“I’ll be okay.” I spotted the thing she was holding. It was a napkin…folded into a squat shape. There were bristly hairs and skin flakes sticking out of the lumpy figure. “What is that?”

“Insurance,” said Harriet. “He didn’t seem terribly patient when you were talking to him outside. But he was rather focused on you. Easy enough to gather up a little hair and skin. I’d have made a better doll once we got home. But this was enough to trip him up. No one threatens my husband like that.” She bent down and rifled through the pouch at the ogre’s waist. Then she rose with a rapt smile. “Aconite, James.”

I took the dark green leaves—shredded, so as to resemble herbs—and held them up. “This is it,” I said to the Inexorable. “This is what killed Grundy.” Except even as I said it, I knew it was wrong. I turned and stared at Baron Vondeaugham. “Why aren’t you dead? You’ve eaten enough poison to kill you six times.”

Vondeaugham blinked. Pale, he said, “I thought you said they were all antidotes to each other. I, ah, knew all along, of course.”

“Right. So what didn’t Grundy know?” I glanced at Harriet. But Harriet was staring at Countess Anachryma, who was shrugging back into the top of her dress.

“That’s a lovely design,” she said. “All those silver-ebony flies. I’ve been admiring it all evening.” Anachryma nodded, the only indication that she had deigned to hear a compliment from one of the lower orders.

“Only one of them seems to be missing,” Harriet said. “That one at your left shoulder.” Anachryma froze. “It seems to have landed on your neck, Baron.”

“What?” said the Bastard. He slapped at the fly nestled just below his ear. “Ow! That…that’s not a fly!”

“No, don’t…” I said, but he yanked at it and it came away trailing a hair-thin needle glistening with an oily wetness. His face flushed and he turned on Anachryma.

“You bitch! You tried to kill me?”

She smiled. “And I’ve been waiting for ages. I was wondering what could possibly have gone wrong with my favorite shellfish toxin.”

“I’ll have you…I’ll have…” His breathing accelerated. He shuddered. His final seizure went on for a good three minutes before his heels drummed on the floor and he went still.

The Inexorable advanced. Anachryma held up a hand. “The poisoning is solved. Baron Vondeaugham killed Grundy by feeding him his own poisoned food.”

“YOU HAVE KILLED THE VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE OUTER COUNCIL.”

“I did not. He died upon removing the antidote that was saving his life. Baron Vondeaugham committed suicide.”

The Inexorable was silent a moment. “IT IS AS YOU SAY. MY DUTY IS DISCHARGED.” Slowly, it walked from the room.

Anachryma gave me and Harriet a cold smile. “Well done, Beastmaster. Our next council meeting should be so much more efficient.”

I gave her a bow. “Let’s go tell Gordon.” I limped into the kitchen on Harriet’s shoulder.

* * *

“I don’t know what to tell you, or offer you,” said the chef, blinking back tears. “You saved me. You saved us all.”

“I wish I could promise your next master won’t be worse,” I said.

“Whoever it is will probably feed us,” he said. “And at least we can eat tonight.”

“Well, make sure you throw that bowl away,” I said, pointing to the heap of half-eaten steaks and prawns dumped in Grundy’s bowl. “I’d hate to see someone else die of eating that.” Turning to Harriet, I said, “So after all that, the ethglyc in the dessert wouldn’t have even killed the whatwolf until tomorrow?’

“Honestly, I doubt he’d have even noticed.” She picked up the whatwolf’s water bowl. It was full of amber liquid. I looked at Gordon.

“Single-barrel malt,” the cook replied bitterly, opening the liquor cabinet above with a huge ring of keys. “Nothing but the best for Grundy.”

“So…?” I looked at Harriet. “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me.”

She shook her head. “Funny thing, but getting falling-down drunk is the antidote for ethglyc poisoning. They would have both been fine.”

I took the bottle. It was nearly full. I looked at Gordon. “I’d say you’ve earned it,” he said.

“Good. This is the kind of antidote I think I need, too.”

With the bottle in one hand, and Harriet on my other arm, we went home.


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Framed