The Mage in the Iron Mask by Brian Thomsen Read Free Book Online Page B

were almost as uninhabited as the ground, with only the occasional bird of prey or vulture breaking up the grey monotony that reached upward as far as the eye could see.
    The master traveler seemed oblivious to the lifelessness around him, and contented himself with putting together new and different phrases to describe the barren landscape. Occasionally he would pass an abandoned farmhouse or inn, and would wonder what ill-fortuned farmer or hostler was foolhardy enough to try to ply his trade there. Further on in his journey, he began to pass larger abandoned structures that almost resembled Southroad Keep. From the research notes that he had prepared prior to setting out on his journey, he knew that they were monasteries and habitats for contemplative orders that had long fallen by the wayside.
    There must have been something about the austerity of the landscape itself that attracted the ascetic, introspective, hermit types that had the swelled the orders that had filled these citadels in years gone by. I guess they came looking for the meaning of life, didn't find it, and left, leaving their monastic dwellings behind, he thought.
    The great gazetteer smiled.
    Maybe I'll include something in the guide about these places being haunted to sort of make things more exciting. Local legends have to start somewhere, he surmised.
    As Volo and his steed approached what remained of a stone arch that had in some earlier era provided egress for some now long bygone structure, the great gazetteer heard a scurrying like the scrambling of rats on a cellar floor. The master traveler smiled, and reached into the inner pocket of his cloak, the tips of his fingers caressing one of the numerous blades he had secreted on various parts of his person.
    Company, he thought to himself.
    Guiding the horse closer to the arch rubble, Volo allowed himself to slump down in the saddle as if he had fallen asleep, while tightening his hold on the reins to keep control of his steed in as inconspicuous a manner as possible.
    Easy pickings, the master traveler thought to himself, usually leads to careless thieves.
    He heard the scurrying on his left and above, and readied himself for the attack.
    A last scratch of a scurry from above, followed by a grunt, clued Volo in on a moment's notice that the outlaw who was stalking him was leaping down on to his not unsuspecting prey from above.
    The master traveler quickly spurred his steed forward, upsetting the dim-witted brigand's planned interception, causing him instead to go crashing to the hard stone ground below.
    Once again at a moment's notice, Volo reined in his steed with one hand, this time quickly turning his mount around to face the inept assailant, while flinging a throwing blade with his freed hand. The blade met its mark, passing through the shoulder fabric of the black haired brigand's cloak, lodging its tip in the seam between the stones in the road, and staking him to the ground while barely scratching the less than deserving oaf.
    Dazed and bewildered, the thief looked up and began to quake in his threadbare boots, beads of sweat trickling down his face from razor cut locks of ebony as he waited for another blade to make its mortal mark.
    "What is your name, O inept felon?" Volo inquired.
    "James," the thief sputtered.
    "Well, felonious James, or perhaps James Felonious since you do seem to be rather backward," Volo blithely explained, "I'm afraid that business demands that I go this way, and since the authorities that I would have to turn you over to lie back from whence I came, I'm afraid that I will have to leave you behind."
    James the Felon tried to get up but was still held in place by the blade-staked cloak.
    "I can't get up!" the bewildered and dense brigand cried, unaware that it was his own cloak that was holding him down.
    "That's right," the master traveler replied. "I have cast a static cling spell that is causing the ground to grip you up against it."
    Volo spurred his steed again,