Emperor and Clown by Dave Duncan Page A

murdered-and the faun has escaped!”
    “I
am delighted to hear it,” she said calmly. “If you think I am hiding him, then
I grant you leave to search my quarters.”
    “My
men already did.” Kar spun on his heel and strode out, his spurs jingling. His
flunkies followed.
    Thinal
grinned and cocked a final snoot at his back. Rap frowned.
    “Well!”
Kadolan said, annoyed to find that her heart was beating faster than was
seemly. “I thank you, Master Rap. Your powers are a welcome reinforcement in
Arakkaran!”
    The
youth smiled faintly, but he was still keeping his true feelings masked.
    “Perhaps,”
she suggested, “we should now compare notes and make some plans?”
    He
nodded. “First I must escort Thinal down to the gates and see him safely on his
way. It would not be fair to keep Gathmor in suspense any longer.”
    “Gathmor?”
    “Another
friend. A good friend. A sailor. You saw him once.”
    “I
did?” The conversation was already slipping away from the path she had planned.
    “In
the magic casement. He was the third man present when Sagorn and I met the
dragon.”
    Gods!
“The prophecy was fulfilled?”
    “The
first one . . .” The faun frowned suddenly. Looking very uneasy, he added, “And
now I suspect that makes the other two inevitable.”
    A
duel with the infamous Kalkor? Torture in the goblin lodge? Horror-struck, she
said, “Surely not! Why?”
    “Because
obviously the casement was working correctly. Why did I not see that earlier?”
He shook his head, puzzled. “Some things are very clear to me now, things I
never knew before.”
    “The
words bring wisdom?” She took a shaky sip of coffee. “Then perhaps you can
explain something that is puzzling me, Master Rap. My word of power never
seemed to make much different to me, nor to my sisterin-law, when she was
alive. I assumed that it had very little strength, as it were ... that it had
been diluted in the remote past by too many sharings, or that it was wearing
out. Yet it’has produced extraordinary abilities in you. Surely you were not
capable of all this yesterday?”
    Again
he shook his head, his gray eyes unreadable. After a moment he said, “I do know
more about that! It ... it isn’t easy to explain.”
    “Oh,
we have lots of time.”
    “We
don’t, not at the moment. But it isn’t that. I mean, I feel a strong urge not
to talk about such things. The words are secretive by nature(“ He glanced at
Thinal’s ratty eyes. “This must be why nosy mundanes like Sagorn have so much
trouble finding out!”
    The
thief nodded and smirked.
    “I’ll
try, though.” Rap took a deep breath. “There seem to be three things involved,
ma’am. First, of course, is the mere number of words. One makes a genius, two
an adept. Then mage and sorcerer. All are different. Rarely a genius will have
occult power, as I did, but not often-and so on. The number of words is
important in itself. Everyone knows that.”
    “Like
the number of wheels on a coach.”
    “Yes(
A wheelbarrow, or a chaise, or . . .” He smiled his diffident little smile. “I
don’t know anything with three wheels( Or a wagon-all different. But the number
of words matters most. My farsight, for instance, is much stronger than it was,
but mainly I have skills now that I never had before. Mage skills. And then the
words themselves can be weakened by sharing. We knew that.”
    “I’m
not as good as I was,” Thinal muttered, looking resentful.
    “You’re
still the best!” Rap said quickly. He wiped his forehead, as if feeling a
strain. “That sort of comparison is all right when you compare one person’s
power before he tells a word, or after he gets more of the same word ... but it
doesn’t mean much when you compare one person with another. What’s more
important then is ... the third thing ... I never realized . . .” He paused.
    “What
third thing?” Thinal demanded.
    “It’s
a sort of native talent.” Rap stared unseeing for a moment, a young