Witchmarked (World's First Wizard Book 1) by Aaron Schneider (my reading book .txt) 📕

“You brought entertainment. How grand!” Marid cooed, smiling broadly as all but the silvery fey stiffened. “I must learn who is responsible for this grand affair and reward them handsomely for it. So tell me, who do I have to thank?”

The chamber remained miraculously silent, not a single whisper to be heard.

“Come now, humility only gets you so far.”

“Bashlek Marid,” Lady Dazk began, trying to muster the fiery vitriol she’d had moments before, “the Nether Council was called—”

“The entire Nether Council is here?” Marid asked with grotesquely exaggerated excitement. “My dear Lady Dazk, you’ve truly outdone yourself. I’ll have to arrange something very...special to repay you for such a gracious return to my city.”

Milo didn’t bother to hide his smile as he watched the firebrand she-ghul return to her seat in a miserable, skulking cringe. Turning back to see the wickedly gleaming eyes of the ghul monarch, Milo could almost find it in himself to feel bad for the wretched aristocrat.

Almost.

“Well, as merry a meeting as this is, I’m afraid I must bid it disband,” Marid declared with a lazy sweep of his claws. “Your Bashlek understands and appreciates your adulation, but I’m afraid more pressing matters require my attention.”

Before the host of ghuls could skitter into the darkness, their proverbial tails between their legs, Marid pointed a claw at the fey and then Milo.

“If both sets of my esteemed guests would attend me, I believe there are a few things we must discuss.”

14

An Adjustment

After the excitement of the audience chamber, the private gardens of Bashlek Marid might have seemed tame to the point of dull if not for the alien flora that was tended there.

Luminescent fungal blooms the size of small trees sprouted from clusters of stone or clung in cultured patterns across free-standing walls. Flitting among them here and there were tiny creatures that resembled airborne squids or octopi. Their moist skin was nearly translucent, and Milo spied the hair-thin filaments of their internal structure glittering in ever-shifting shades as they sprang from one growth to another, sometimes snaking in floating motes with their outstretched tendrils.

Across the floor of the chamber, Milo was treading across the same woolly base that had covered the floor of the tunnel. His eyes now enhanced, it resembled coarse gray hair.

They followed the Bashlek to one corner of the garden, past a central mushroom as tall as any tree Milo had seen, to a place where the hairy carpet did not reach. In this bald patch, stone stools were arranged haphazardly around a little pool in whose center was a pile of stones. Shimmering and shifting shades of yellow, orange, crimson, and magenta glowed in the spring that rippled up within the pile of stones to spill down into the pool.

The Bashlek took the seat in the far corner of the garden wall, emitting a groan of relief as he settled against the mossy buds that coated the two walls.

“Please.” He sighed, gesturing to the stools. “Have a seat, and have no fear. We need only be ourselves here.”

To illustrate the point, the Bashlek leaned to one side and released a tremendous fart. The air filled with the smell of rotting flesh and something that might have been an abrasive chemical cleaner. Milo fought not to gag as his eyes watered. He glanced at the fey, who unfairly seemed immune to the stench or the grotesque display. Ambrose swore in a few different languages and stepped back a step.

“Go on and have a seat, Magus,” Ambrose grunted, eying the malodorous monarch warily. “I’m just going to enjoy the scenery, such as it is.”

The stools were low and sized for ghuls, a fact Milo was convinced was not lost on the ghul monarch as he squatted to perch uncomfortably. Looking to the side, he saw the moonlit fey who must have been Contessa Rihyani slide gracefully onto the seat. A strange impression, a ripple almost across his sense of the unseen, flitted by. Milo noticed he was staring, and she was staring back.

Milo coughed and cleared his throat, which made it more noticeable when he turned away. To his great discomfort, he found that Marid was also staring at him, his shriveled lips having slid up just enough to show his tangle of fangs.

“You’ve turned out to be a lot more work than I bargained for,” the ghul said after a lengthy foot-shuffling pause. “More helpful than you know, but even so, it seems that every time I turn around, someone is trying to kill you.”

Ambrose gave a not-so-subtle sniff that was as good as his “making friends” jibe.

Milo opened his mouth to apologize, then shut it. A lifetime of monsters, whatever their species, warned him that an apology was not in order.

“I was just thinking you should rename the audience chamber ‘the arena,’” Milo quipped, doing his best to seem at ease despite the precarious seating. “At least that way, guests have some idea of what they are getting into. You know, good sportsmanship.”

The Bashlek chuckled and conceded the point with a nod as the contessa offered a brief smile.

“You handled the situation better than most,” Rihyani said in a soft yet powerful voice. It was the kind of voice that didn’t need to be raised to get attention.

“I’m not sure we were in the same room then, Contessa,” Milo replied, battering down a sheepish grin. “I’m pretty sure I was seconds away from Lady Dazk picking out bits of me from between her teeth.”

Marid snorted a laugh at that, but the contessa just gave another cryptic smile as she tilted her head back.

“Perhaps,” she said, eying him with a gaze that was both aloof and flensing. “But you provided solid reasons, if not evidence, for your innocence. The Nether Council’s more moderate members will be shaken by the Bashlek’s display of power, and the more conservative members will have your words to swing them over to their side.”

Milo’s eyes wandered to the Bashlek, who’d closed his