Free Songs of the Dying Earth by George R.R. Martin, Gardner Dozois Page A

of the council’s shortsightedness, when I had been making such good progress in my work. I tried not to listen as the resident told the rest: how, while I slept, my assistants had fed my watcher a posset of drugged honey, then stolen into my chamber with knives.
    The dastardly attack came, coordinated and from three directions at once, catching me unawares in the midst of my sleep-wanderings. I awoke and defended myself, though without magic, I was in a poor situation. However, I had not become a wielder of three colors of magic without learning caution. The traitors were surprised to discover that I had long since created for myself an impregnable refuge in the fourth plane, to which I fled when the struggle went against me. Unfortunately, they had done such damage to my physical form that only my essence won through.
    “He left behind his physical attributes,” my former assistant was telling Grolion, “and these we sealed into a coffin of lead lined with antimony. Thus he cannot reach out to repair himself; instead, he projects himself from his hiding place, riding the sensoria of passing insects, seeking to spy on me.” He swallowed and continued, “Something is boring into my ankle. If you release me from the tree’s grasp, I swear to do you no harm.”
    Grolion tugged away the tuber that was feeding on the resident’s leg and batted away another that was seeking to insert itself into the prisoner’s ear. He pulled free the creepers that had been thickening around the resident’s torso, then yanked the man loose. The resident gasped in pain; scraps of bloody cloth and small pieces of flesh showed where barbed thorns had worked their way into his back and buttocks.
    Grolion tore the man’s robe into strips and bound his wrists and ankles. But he considerately hauled the bound man out of the tree’s reach before going to reinspect the workroom and the design. He reached for the Phandaal libram, but as his fingers almost touched its blue chamois, a blinding spark of white light leapt across the gap, accompanied by a sharp crack of sound. Grolion yelped and quickly withdrew his hand, shook it energetically, then put the tips of two fingers into his mouth and sucked them.
    He left the room, took himself out to a bench along one side of the garden, equidistant between the tree and the workroom. Here he sat, one leg crossed over another, his pointed chin in the grip of one hand’s forefinger and thumb, and gave himself over to thought. From time to time, he looked up at the barbthorn, or over to the workroom window, and occasionally he considered the tied-up resident.
    After a few minutes, he called over to the resident, “There were three of you. Where are the other two?”
    The resident’s upturned glance at the tree made for a mutely eloquent answer.
    “I see,” said Grolion. “And, ultimately, what would have happened to me?”
    The resident’s eyes looked at anything but the questioner.
    “I see,” Grolion said again, and returned to thought. After a while, he said, “The lead coffin?”
    “In the crypt,” said the resident, “below the garden. The steps are behind the fountain in the pool of singing fish. But if you open it, he will reanimate. I don’t doubt he would then feed us all to the tree. He used to care only for refulgent ombre; his murder, followed by several incarnations as various insects, most of which die horribly, may have developed in him an instinct for cruelty.”
    Grolion went to look. There was a wide stone flag, square in shape, inset with an iron ring at one side. He seized and pulled, and, with a grating of granite on granite, the trapdoor came up, assisted by unseen counterweights on pulleys beneath. A flight of steps led down.
    I did not follow. The glyphs and symbols cut into my coffin’s sides and top would pain me, as they were intended to do. I flew over to a crack in the wall above the resident, and, having established than nothing lurked therein, I settled down to