Mallara and Burn: On the Road by Frank Tuttle Read Free Book Online

above Mallara's right shoulder."We've been
ten days on the road from Arbor. No inns, no beds, no baths.
Sorceress Mallara is about to lose her temper." The voice dropped
to a conspiratorial whisper."She does frogs when she's mad,
soldier. But she doesn't do them well. Something about the mouth --
she never gets it right, even if she turns you back. It isn't
pretty." The shimmering in the air darkened."Not pretty at
all."
    The soldier at the gate swallowed."Orders,"
he said."No one gets in Tillith after dark." The soldier's
too-large iron helm fell down over his eyes, and he pushed it
quickly back up."There's a Troll on the Square, ma'am," he said, to
Mallara."A Troll!"
    Mallara counted silently to ten."I came, as
an agent of the Crown, to see this Troll of yours." Mallara thumped
her iron-shod traveling staff on the road, and a long ribbon of
yellow fire climbed quickly up the shaft and coiled about the
head."It's late, and I'm tired. So you can either step aside or
start catching your supper with the end of your tongue."
    The shimmering in the air chuckled."That's if
you end up with a tongue, son," said the shimmer."And if it's in
your mouth."
    Mallara fixed the guard in a weary green-eyed
glare.
    A bullfrog croaked, out in the night.
    The soldier coughed and leaped aside, shoving
Tillith's wobbly gate-pole open as he moved."Welcome to Tillith,"
he said."Do try the sausages at the Dancing Hound."
    Mallara threw back her cloak and brushed past
the guard. Her traveling staff -- moody, as usual -- spat a tiny
hissing bolt of lightning at the guard as Mallara passed.
    "Really, Burn," Mallara said to the
shimmering air, when the guard was out of earshot."Frogs?"
    Burn bobbed closer."Just say 'frog' and you
instantly evoke every fairy tale these bumpkins ever heard," he
said."That makes 'em stop and think." Burn snickered."And then we
just walk on by, don't we?"
    Mallara rolled her eyes. I could have asked
for a cat, she thought. A nice quiet cat.
    "Go find me this Troll, Burn," she said
aloud."Hurry."
    Burn zipped away, down Tillith's wide, empty
main street. Mallara followed, walking slowly, reveling in the cool
evening air and the promise of a long hot bath at the Dancing
Hound.
    Tillith rose up about her, lit only by a
half-moon and a scattering of pitch-filled street-lights. Like
dozens of other towns along the ancient road, Tillith was laid out
in a straight line along both sides of the granite pavers that once
linked the Old Kingdom from sea to sea. Gone were the towers and
keeps; instead, neat stone and timber structures flanked the road
-- here a general store, here a tavern, a barrel-maker's, a stable
-- each structure itself flanked by narrow modern streets made of
smooth black cobble-stones.
    The night-time curfew left Tillith's streets
empty and her buildings quiet, though Mallara could see light
behind most window-shutters and hear laughter and the clink of
glasses from a nearby tavern.
    The air smelled of horses and wood-smoke;
Mallara's stomach began to grumble audibly at the scent of a
fresh-baked apple pie cooling on a nearby windowsill.
    "Trolls in Tillith," muttered Mallara aloud.
She smiled."Dragons and kraken, too, no doubt."
    Burn buzzed suddenly down out of the
night.
    "Mistress," squeaked the shimmer, "It's a
Troll. Not a bear or an ogre or a hairy man in a fur hat. A
Troll!"
    Mallara poked a finger into Burn's blurry
volume of air."A Troll," she said."Primus Sapiens. Here, tonight,
in Tillith."
    "Mistress," said Burn, "It's a Troll. Six
blocks ahead, on the town square. Standing right under the
courthouse clock-tower."
    Mallara halted."Burn," she said, "there
hasn't been a confirmed Troll encounter anywhere in the Kingdom for
five hundred years."
    "Then walk with me," said Burn."Confirm
one."
    "Burn--"
    "I'm serious, Mistress," said the shimmer."No
mistake. No joke. Just a Troll. On our watch. What rare good
fortune."
    "Indeed," said Mallara. She curled and
uncurled her toes inside her boots, stretched her