Part 24 (1/2)

With a triumphant smile, El slid them into her boots and carefully repacked the chest, casting a longing look at the spell-book fastened into the lid. Nay; her task now was to begone from here, as fast as she could without raising an alarm.

Not so easily done. She could hardly hope to cast a spell right underneath a magelord-even a magelord in the throes of pa.s.sion-without being heard.

And then she heard him grunt, above her head, and say, ”Ahhh, yes, by all the G.o.ds! Now out, girl-out! I've work to do yet ere I sleep! Stay, mind-I'll be back out for you later!” The bolt was opened, and then the door, and then she heard both being put back again.

Elmara tensed under the bed. She had a few slaying spells- but a sphere of flames is little use if one wants to survive a fight in a small room... still less if one wants to do it without alerting a fortress full of armed men.

She also had something smaller; a fleshflame. Hmmm.

And then the curtains in front of her were jerked aside, and a kneeling man thrust his head in under the bed, seeking his riches.

He stared in amazement at Elmara, as her hands shot out and grasped his head by both ears, drawing her toward him.

”Greetings,” she purred, murmured the few words that called up the magic, and kissed him.

Flame spat from her parted lips into the incoherently struggling magelord. He stiffened, clutched at her convulsively, and then sagged to the carpet, teeth clicking as his chin hit the floor.

Smoke drifted from the dead wizard's mouth and ears as she dragged the chest over to him, opened it again, and left him kneeling with his head in it. When he was found, perhaps they'd think something inside it slew him.

Coolly, Elmara rose from under the bed. The door was closed and bolted. Good. She ducked back under the bed, and took out the spellbook. Flipping through it rapidly, she found the wizards' spell she wanted.

It was very similar to the prayer-spell that Braer had taught her. Kneeling with the book open before her, she prayed fervently to the Lady of Mysteries.

Brightness seemed to flare inside her-and abruptly she was standing just outside her ward in the meadow, the spellbook in her hands. ”Thanks be, Mystra,” she told the stars, and went in.

The spicy scent of turtle soup wafted through the cave. Intent on keeping it from burning, Elmara barely heard the faint voice from behind her.

”Who-who are you?”

She turned to see the sorceress truly awake for the first time. Large, hollow eyes stared into her own. The sorceress reached up a hand to brush matted hair aside, and that hand trembled. There must have been something on that crossbow quarrel. Even with the potions, the sorceress had been a long time recovering.

Elmara went on stirring the soup with a long bone-all that was left of a deer her spells had brought down days ago-and said, ”Elmara of Athalantar. I... wors.h.i.+p Mystra.” Those large eyes held her own as if clinging to a last crumbling handhold, and El added, ”And I will be a foe of the magelords of this realm until they are all dead, or I am.”

The woman let out a long, shuddering breath, and leaned back against the wall of the cave. ”Where-what place is this?”

”A cave in the north of Athalantar,” El told her. ”I brought ye here more than a tenday ago, after I rescued ye from armsmen in the Haunted Vale. How came ye to be there, in a ring of quarrels?”

The woman shrugged. ”I... was newly arrived in Athalantar, and met with a patrol of armsmen. They fled, gathered more of their fellows, and came to slay me. From some things they said, it seems they're under orders to slay any wizards they meet who aren't magelords. I was tired and careless . . . and was overwhelmed.”

She smiled and stretched out a hand to touch Elmara's own. ”My thanks,” she said softly, eyes very large and dark in her beautiful bone-white face. ”I am Myrjala Talithyn, of Elvedarr in Ardeep. They call me 'Darkeyes.'”

Elmara nodded. ”Soup?”

”Please,” Myrjala said, sitting back against the cave wall. ”I have been wandering,” she said slowly, ”in my dreams, and have ... seen much.”

Elmara waited, but the sorceress said no more, so she dipped a drinking-jack-all she had-into the soup, wiped its dripping flanks, and handed it to Myrjala. ”What brought ye all the way to Athalantar?” she asked.

”I was riding overland to visit elven holds up the Unicorn Run when I first met with the armsmen, and they slew my horse. After, I walked to where you found me,” Myrjala replied, and looked around. ”Where am I now?”

”Above the ruins of Heldon,” Elmara said simply, licking soup from her fingers.

Myrjala nodded, drank deep of the steaming soup, and shuddered at its heat. Then she raised her black, liquid eyes again to meet Elmara's gaze, and said, ”I owe you my life. What can I give you in return?”

Elmara looked down at her hands, and found them trembling with sudden excitement. She looked up, and blurted, ”Train me. I know some spells, but I'm a priestess, not a mage. I need to master sorcery in my own right, to hope to hurl spells well enough to destroy the magelords.”

Myrjala's dark brows arched upward at El's last words, but she said only, ”Tell me what you've mastered thus far.”

Elmara shrugged. ”I've learned to blast foes, and to use their anger against them....I can create and hurl fire, and jump from place to place, take shadow-shape, and rust or master steel. But I know nothing of wise spell-strategies against a clear-headed foe, or the details of just what most wizards' spells do, or how one can best use one spell with another, or ...”

Myrjala nodded. ”You've learned much ... most mages never even notice they lack such skills-and if someone dares point it out to them, they lash out in anger to slay the one who revealed it to them, rather than giving thanks.”

She took another sip of soup and added, ”Aye, I'll train you. Someone had better; there're wild wizards in plenty out roaming Faerun already. When you've come to trust me, you might tell me why you want to slay all the magelords in this land.”

Elmara's thoughts raced. ”Ah,” she began, ”I...”

Myrjala held up a restraining hand. ”Later,” she said with a smile. ”When you're ready.” She made a face, and added, ”And when you've learned just how much salt to put into soup.”

They laughed together then, for the first time.

Fourteen.

NO GREATER FOOL.

Know this, mageling, and know it well: there is no greater fool than a wizard. The greater the mage, the greater the fool, because we who work magic live in a world of dreams, and chase dreams . . . and in the end, dreams undo us.

Khelben ”Blackstaff” Arunsun

Words To Would-Be Apprentices

Year of the Sword and Stars Fire was born, swirling into furious life where the air had been empty moments before. Swiftly it grew in two places in the huge cavern, until Elmara's intent face was lit by two huge spheres of flame. A double-throated roar began, rising in tone and fury as the spinning spheres grew larger. El stared from one whirling conflagration to the other, sweat running down her face like water over rocks and dripping steadily from her chin. Across the chamber, Myrjala stood unmoving, watching expressionlessly. The twin fireb.a.l.l.s grew even larger, seeming to pluck flames from the air as they rolled over and over.

”Now!” El whispered, more to herself than to her teacher, and brought her trembling arms together.

Obediently the two huge spheres of flame moved, pinwheeling across the cavern toward each other. Elmara took one careful pace backward without looking away from the flames, and then another. It was as well to be far away when the two fiery spheres-touched!

There was a blinding flash of light, as tortured tongues of flame leapt wildly out in all directions; the cavern rocked with the force of the mighty blast. Heat rolled over Elmara, and the force of the explosion smashed into her, plucked her from her feet and hurled her spinning back into-nothing. The fury of the blast roared past her, and slowly died away. El found herself floating motionless in midair as the echoes of the explosion boomed and rolled around her and rocks and dust fell on her from the unseen ceiling far above.

”Myrjala?” she asked the darkness anxiously. ”Teacher?”

”I'm fine,” a calm voice replied from very near at hand, and El felt herself turning in the air to look into the dark, intent eyes of the older sorceress, who was floating upright in midair beside her. Myrjala's bare body was as dusty and sweat-dewed as her own; around them, the cavern was still uncomfortably hot.

Myrjala leaned forward and touched El's arm. They began to descend. ”To protect us both,” she explained, ”I had to spin my spell s.h.i.+eld around you, then make it pull me into it; my apologies if I startled you.”