Realms of Valor

King's Tear

The spirits of the three sages writhed in the flickering, poisonous green flames rising from the copper brazier. The necromancer Kelshara prowled catlike about them, here in the highest chamber of her tower that stood among the dark, jagged peaks of the southernmost Sunset Mountains.

"Please, sorceress, we do not know the answer you seek!" one of the spirits moaned.

"We beg you," pleaded another. "Release us from this torment.¹"

"Very well," Kelshara hissed. Her features were pale and flawless, her long hair as dark as polished onyx, yet she was anything but lovely. Rage was never beautiful. "And for your worthlessness, this is your reward."

She tossed a handful of dark powder onto the brazier. Brilliant sparks, red as rubies, crackled about the pale apparitions as they shrieked in agony. The magical flames flared to the ceiling, then died down in a puff of acrid smoke. The spirits were gone, the last echo of their wails ringing off the chill stone walls.

Kelshara smiled in cruel satisfaction for a moment, but the expression soon faded. She still had no solution to the mystery. From a golden box on a table she drew out two small objects. They were jewels, teardrop shaped and as clear as winter ice. King's Tears such stones were called. Legend held that they were the tears of ancient kings magically turned to stone. Legend also told that if you looked into the heart of a King's Tear, you would see an image of what the ancient lord had loved most in life. And the legends were true.

Even now she could see the visions flickering within the jewels: parchments scribed with strange glyphs and books bound with gem-encrusted covers. It was the library of King Everard Farseer she was glimpsing. Once he had ruled over a realm that stretched for leagues along the banks of the great River Chionthar. But his kingdom had crumbled to dust long centuries before folk from Cormyr crossed the Sunset Mountains and raised the shining Caravan Cities, strung like gems along the necklace of the river. But though Kelshara had gazed into the Tears for hours on end, she never saw what she sought, the book Everard had prized above all others: the Tome of Midnight. Within its covers lay the key to life eternal.

"Toz!" the necromancer shouted. "Toz!”

Kelshara heard the scrabbling of claws against stone behind her. "Mistress?" a voice croaked tremulously. She spun to see a small, malformed creature hobble into the chamber on two gnarled and twisted legs. It blinked its red, bulbous eyes, snuffling its warty, canine snout.

"Come, Toz," Kelshara said in her icy voice. "Speak the future for me. And do not dare lie, or I promise you'll lose more than just your tail this time."

"Yes, mistress." The kobold fawningly approached the table. Its features were caught up in a mask of mock-contrition, its bulging eyes cast down to the floor. A foul odor followed in its wake, and the ratty brown piece of sackcloth it wore like a tunic looked as if it was ready to rot off its scaly back.

Once the creature had been a man, a diviner of such skill that he had told the fortunes of emperors and queens. But Kelshara had wanted him for her own. She had arranged his murder. Then, with her dark powers, she wrought his reincarnation into this new, loathsome form, bound by magic to do her every bidding.

Clumsily, the kobold opened a small ivory box, drew out a deck of ornate cards wrapped in black silk, and shuffled them. "You must draw three," it instructed the necromancer in its croaking voice, and Kelshara quickly did so.

With a misshapen hand Toz turned over the first card. The Three of Gems. "This signifies the heart of your quest. It symbolizes great riches, but some of them are lost."

"Of course," Kelshara crooned, her violet, gold-flecked eyes glittering with understanding. "I have been a fool, Toz. The image of the Tome is not within the two Tears I possess, and there can only be one answer. The Three of Gems. There must be a third Tear. Go on."

The kobold turned the next card. The Priest, reversed. "This signifies the forces of your allies." Toz moved to the last card. "And this signifies the forces that will oppose you on your quest." He turned the card. The Warrior, also reversed.

"What do they mean?" Kelshara demanded.

Toz's pointed ears wriggled in confusion. "I am not certain, master. Somehow, a priest who is not a priest will help you gain the jewel. But a warrior who is not a warrior will stand against you."

'"A warrior who is not a warrior?'" Kelshara said mockingly. "That doesn't sound like one I need fear."

"But, mistress," the kobold protested, its snout wriggling in agitation, "these cards speak of powerful forces at work. You must-"

"Quiet!" Kelshara snapped, striking the kobold and knocking it to the hard floor. It yelped shrilly, but she paid the creature no heed. "All I have to do now is find where the third Tear is hidden," the necromancer whispered exultantly. "Then immortality will be mine."

Things were in a bit of an uproar at Everard Abbey, and Tyveris knew he was the cause.

He dashed up the spiral staircase, his sandals slapping hollowly against the worn stone steps. The abbess had sent for him, and one did not keep Melisende waiting. He hesitated for a few heartbeats before the paneled mahogany door that lead into her chamber, then knocked as softly on the dark wood as he could with his massive hand. The sound boomed like thunder. Tyveris winced.

"Come in," came the crisp reply from beyond.

With a deep breath Tyveris opened the door and stepped inside, though he was forced to turn sideways a bit to squeeze his broad shoulders through the portal. He was not a tall man, but his sheer size was astonishing. The thin brown homespun of his simple robe did little to conceal the thick, heavy muscles that were roped about his powerful frame, and his dusky brown skin marked him as a foreigner in these lands. Altogether, he was a rather remarkable individual for the backward Everard Abbey.

And that was a great part of the problem.

"Oh, do stop standing there filling up the doorway and come sit down," Mother Melisende said in her typically brisk tone. The abbess was a tiny woman, with bright, dark eyes and wispy white hair. She sat before a fireplace, clad in a simple but elegant robe of soft dove gray. Despite her diminutive stature, a mantle of authority seemed to rest comfortably upon her small shoulders.

"Yes, Mother Melisende." Though he made an effort to speak softly, Tyveris's deep voice rattled the glass in the windowpanes. He sat down. A cheery fire was blazing on the hearth to drive back the autumn chill. Melisende poured steaming tea into a pair of delicate porcelain cups and handed one to Tyveris. He stared at the fragile teacup worriedly, holding it with exaggerated care in his big hand. He swallowed hard.

Melisende sipped her tea, regarding Tyveris with a wise expression. "I won't keep this from you," she said after a moment's quiet. "Several of the loremasters have come to speak to me this past tenday. They have asked that I dismiss you from the abbey."

Tyveris's dark eyes widened behind his wire-rimmed spectacles. "Have I done something wrong, Mother Melisende?"

The abbess sighed. "No, Tyveris, it is nothing you have done." She smiled fleetingly. "In fact, I daresay we've never had a handyman about the abbey who was as useful as you. The chapel ceiling no longer leaks onto the pulpit, the new hinges on the gate open without a creak, and the drains in the kitchen are working properly for the first time in a century." Her smile faded, replaced by a scowl. "No, it's not what you've done that some of the loremasters don't care for. You wear a monk's robe now, but I'm afraid that doesn't change what you are in their eyes-a sell-sword, a man dedicated to violence, not knowledge."

"But they have nothing to fear from me, Mother Melisende," he boomed earnestly. "I can control myself. I swear it!"

There was a clear, delicate snap as the teacup shattered in Tyveris's hand. He stared down at the broken shards in horror. "I've ruined your cup," he said despairingly.

"Forget the teacup, Tyveris," Melisende said, taking the broken pieces from his hand and setting them aside. "It is simply a thing. Completely replaceable." She took his big hands into her tiny ones. He almost pulled away in surprise, but she gripped him tightly. "Look at these, Tyveris. What do you see?"

Unsure what she meant he looked down at his hands. They were huge, big-knuckled, the dark skin crisscrossed with even darker scars and welts. They were a fighter's hands. Hands that had taken more lives than he could count. He told her so.

"Really?" the abbess answered. "That's peculiar. For I see a pair of hands that are gentle even in their strength. I see hands that have embraced children, hands that have freely given alms to those in need, hands that have held a book for the first time as their owner learned to read in this very room. No, Tyveris, I don't believe these are a warrior's hands at all."

He pulled away from her. "But the other loremasters don't believe that, do they?"

"Some don't," Melisende answered solemnly. "A few. Loremaster Orven speaks loudest among them. I'm afraid they fear that one day you won't be able to control your temper, and that violence will result."

"Maybe they're right," Tyveris replied, his voice just slightly bitter. Why not? he thought. It had happened often enough in the past, when he had been both slave and soldier and the only thing that had mattered was to kill his foe, so that he wouldn't be killed himself.

Melisende's eyes flashed brightly with anger. "I don't expect to hear any more such nonsense from you. I don't let just anybody into my abbey, you know. You're here because I believed you belong here. That hasn't changed." She picked up her teacup again. "I'll speak with those who have been troubled by your presence. Perhaps I can allay their fears."

Tyveris's heart leapt in his chest. "You will?" he rumbled gratefully.

"Did I not say so?" Melisende snapped. The abbess didn't like having to repeat herself.

"But what about Loremaster Orven?" he asked tentatively.

"I will concern myself with him. You may go now. Attend to your work." Tyveris knew that one didn't hesitate when dismissed by the abbess. He hastily stood and bowed before hurrying from the chamber.

"And, Tyveris," Melisende called after him. "Do try to stay out of trouble."

Tyveris spent the rest of the day repairing cracks in the abbey's outer stone wall. After he had finished the day's work he made his way to the dim, dusty library to read for a time in the quiet chamber. Outside the window the day was fading to twilight as the deep tones of a bronze bell sounded Vespers. The shadowed plains rolled southward into the far purple distance, toward a single twinkling gem on the horizon-the Caravan City of Iriaebor.

Had Tyveris been looking, the city's lights might have been a reminder of his past, of the days when Iriaebor had been his home and the sword had been his way of life. But he was focused on something else, another, more comforting past. Tyveris flipped idly through the colorfully illuminated manuscript resting on the table before him, a historical treatise concerning the founding of the Church of Oghma. He could hardly imagine a time when he couldn't read, but in truth he had only learned a few short months before.

The library was not a terribly large room, but it was filled from floor to ceiling with books, so many that Tyveris suspected it would take a pair of lifetimes just to read them all. The abbey was devoted to the god Oghma, the Binder, who was the warden of all knowledge, and its library was its greatest pride. In fact, the abbey even took its name from Everard Farseer, a king of an ancient, forgotten land whom legend told gave his life to protect a library from marauders who sought to burn the books within.

Tyveris cringed at the memory of the countless buildings he himself had set ablaze in the days when he had been driven into battle with whips at his back. How many precious books had been consumed in the flames and lost forever?

To atone for that destruction, Tyveris had spent the last decade as part of a small band of adventurers based in Iriaebor, men and women who had done their best to work against tyranny in the Caravan Cities between Waterdeep to the far west and Cormyr to the east. But even then he'd simply been a well-trained swordarm. And when the group disbanded a year ago, Tyveris found he had no purpose.

There was no one to tell him who to fight, or where or when. Alone once more, he discovered that all his good deeds had done nothing to assuage his guilty conscience. Then, in the grips of a dark despair, he came to the abbey's gates on a rainy spring day….

A fierce look crossed Tyveris's face as he banished the memories. He wasn't going to let anyone force him to leave Everard Abbey. Not Loremaster Orven. Not anyone.

A place at the abbey was the one thing Tyveris knew he was still willing to fight for.

He bent his head over the tome once more, content to lose himself in its pages. Twilight dwindled outside the window, and night gathered its ebon mantle about the abbey, secure within its walls on the hill above the moonlit plains.

"Reading dusty old books hardly seems like a proper pastime for a warrior," a voice said, startling Tyveris. Yellow light flared up as a candle was touched to the wick of an oil lamp.

Tyveris spun around, dreading to see Loremaster Orven behind him. But instead he found himself gazing into the hard gray eyes of an acerbic-looking, harshly thin man. Patriarch Alamric.

Tyveris cleared his throat gruffly. "No one is a warrior within these walls, Patriarch Alamric," he rumbled.

"So the abbess is fond of saying," Alamric said in his sharp voice. "A pity."

Tyveris watched Alamric in wary confusion as the skeletal man sat at the table opposite him. He had not had many dealings with the old man since coming to the abbey. Alamric was a patriarch in the Church of Oghma, second at the abbey to only Melisende herself. Yet Tyveris had often had the disconcerting feeling that Alamric was watching him. It appeared that feeling had been justified, for the patriarch now gazed at him intently, interest sparking in his sharp gray eyes.

"Not all who worship Oghma tremble foolishly at the sight of a warrior, like our poor Loremaster Orven," Alamric went on. His voice had a hissing edge to it, like a knife drawn through silk. Tyveris looked at him dubiously.

"You doubt me, but it is true," Alamric said with a tight, thin-lipped expression that was more grimace than smile. "I am a powerful man, Tyveris. There are many in the church who obey my orders. But even so, I admire you. No, I envy you." His eyes glowed with a strange, fierce light. "From the time I was young I wanted more than anything to lead others, to let my wisdom and my will be their own. I dreamed of riding into glorious battles, raising my sword in the cause of righteousness." He paused and sighed deeply. "But I'm afraid the gods have mocked my pride by granting me this frail form. I've had to content myself with spiritual battles. You are lucky, Tyveris."

"No," Tyveris said, shaking his head. "No, don't envy me, Patriarch. I would give anything to change what I am." He reverently touched the open book before him. "This is something far greater than battles or swords."

Alamric snatched the book up in his bony hand and tossed it carelessly aside, a look of disdain on his severe visage. Tyveris stared at him in shock. "Knowledge is not the only thing sacred to Oghma! No, there is something even more holy, and that is Truth. Knowledge comes in tomes, but there's only one way to carry Truth to people, and that's by deed." A ruddy, unwholesome flush came to Alamric's cheeks. He didn't seem to be gazing at Tyveris anymore; instead his eyes were turned to the darkened window as if he saw a glorious vision there, invisible to mundane eyes.

"Unbelievers can cast books aside all too easily," Alamric went on, his voice chantlike. "But if we armed our priests, not with parchment scrolls, but with swords, nothing could stand before us in our quest to bring Truth to all the lands of Faerun!"

Tyveris felt a chill run up his spine. "What 'truth' do you mean, Patriarch?" he dared to ask.

Alamric's gaze bored hotly into Tyveris. "The Truth. Don't you see? People will no longer need to read books to learn what to think. We will think for them. We will tell them what they must know."

"There will be people who will resist you," Tyveris said carefully. "There always are."

Alamric waved a hand dismissively. "Not all souls can be saved, Tyveris. But that's the price we must pay for the benefit of all. Mother Melisende and those like her may not see far enough into the future to realize the great good in this, but there are those in the church who will. I shall be the one to carry the message to them." He clutched Tyveris's wrist. His fingers felt strangely warm. "But we will need holy warriors to become the bearers of the Truth. You could be one of the first."

Tyveris pulled his hand away, rubbing his wrist as if he'd been burned. "I'm sorry. I don't think I can be … what you want."

Alamric's exultant expression did not waver. "Very well, Tyveris. We'll let that stand as your answer-for now. But I have faith that you will soon see the light and join me. I have great faith."

After Patriarch Alamric left, Tyveris found he had no more heart for reading. He put away the book and made his way to the abbey's stable, where he kept a room in the loft. He lay in the darkness for a long time-even past midnight, by the stars outside the window-but he could not sleep. Alamric's strange words kept echoing in his head.

Finally he threw off his blanket and fumbled about in the dark until he found a stump of a candle. He lit it with a flint and a bit of tinder. A warm golden glow filled the loft.

He dug beneath his bed of hay until he reached the floorboards. One was loose, and he pulled it up to reveal a shadowed recess beneath. He drew out a long object and unwound the thick cloth that covered it. A sword gleamed in the candlelight, sharp and clean. For a time Tyveris stared at the blade, trying to see the faces of those he'd slain, to draw them forth like a magical shield against the patriarch's words. After an hour, he rewrapped the sword and put it away.

He drew another object from the hole-a small jade figurine. Once it had been meant to represent a bird, but its features had been rounded with the wear of his touch. Still, Tyveris remembered the beauty clearly. His sister Tali had carved it for him long ago.

Once he and Tali had been bold youths, always seeking trouble together. When the ships came across the sea to the jungles of Chult, he and his sister had ignored the pleading of their parents. Enticed by tales of riches and strange wonders, they signed on to become warriors in the distant lands to the north.

But they had been deceived.

The siblings had found themselves bound, not for glory, but for slavery. The ship had been a nightmare of foul darkness and disease. Tali had not survived the voyage, and Tyveris had lived only to have shackles clamped on his ankles and a sword thrust into his hand. The jade figurine was all he had left of his sister. Her bright eyes, her brave, sweet smile, were only memories now.

Not all souls can be saved…. Alamric's terrible words burned like poison in his mind. He gripped the figurine tightly in his hand. A single tear, clear as a diamond, touched his dark cheek.

"Must there always be more dying, Tali?" he whispered into the night. There was no answer but silence.

It was a dreary afternoon late in the waning days of autumn when the stranger came to the gates of Everard Abbey.

Tyveris was in the great hall at the time, repairing the crumbling mortar around a window to keep out the chill winds of the coming winter. He heard the crystalline chiming of harness bells and gazed outside. Through the glass he saw a figure clad in a heavy, midnight-blue traveling cloak ride into the courtyard astride a delicate black palfrey. Even as he watched, Mother Melisende and Patriarch Alamric stepped forward to greet the stranger. The mysterious rider lifted two gloved hands to push back the cowl of a heavy traveling cloak.

She was beautiful. Her hair, as dark and glossy as her steed, cascaded over the shoulders of her crimson riding gown. Her pale features were so perfect they seemed almost exotic. The woman must be a noble of some sort, Tyveris thought, and he wondered who she might be.

Rumors tended to be repeated as often as prayers in the abbey, and by Vespers Tyveris had heard numerous intriguing whispers about the strange lady. Her name was Kelshara, he learned, and she was a benefactor of the church. Some said she had been sending gold to the abbey for months and had now made the pilgrimage here.

Other rumors spoke of her desire to see the abbey's most holy relic, the Tear of Everard. The crystalline jewel, kept in a small chamber behind the chapel's nave, was in truth a tear shed by the abbey's namesake, magically turned to stone. Several centuries ago it had come into the possession of a priest of Oghma who founded the abbey to guard the Tear. Even now, pilgrims journeyed from lands afar to see the Tear and send a prayer to Oghma.

The evening chants still echoed among the candlelit vaults of the chapel when the order for a feast came down from the chamber of the abbess. In moments the abbey was bustling with activity, and Tyveris helped to ready the great hall. He and several of the brethren scattered the stone floor with fresh rushes and pulled out long trestle tables. All the while more and more of the sisters scurried in bearing candelabras pilfered from nearly every room of the abbey. Soon the hall was ablaze with light.

After this, Tyveris did his best to keep out of everyone's way. In the tenday since his conversation with Melisende, he had been making a concerted effort to do nothing that might alarm Loremaster Orven or any of the abbey's other residents. So far, it seemed, he'd been very successful.

By the time the folk of the abbey sat down in the great hall, the tables had been loaded with roasted geese, bubbling stews, platters of spiced fruit, and mountains of steaming bread. For a few fleeting moments Tyveris was in paradise-until the loremaster sitting to his left politely remarked that he was supposed to pass the food-laden platters rather than hoard them.

After all had filled their plates and a benediction had been spoken, Mother Melisende stood in her place at the head of the great hall. She introduced the stranger as Lady Kelshara and revealed that the abbey's mysterious benefactor had indeed come in pilgrimage to gaze upon Everard's Tear. Then Kelshara herself stood and spoke.

"You have given me a most gracious welcome," Kelshara said in a silk-smooth voice, "and I look forward to seeing the precious relic you so unfailingly guard." She raised her wine goblet with a smile and tilted her head forward. "May Oghma in his kindness grant us each the knowledge we seek." Tyveris stood with the others to raise his goblet in reply, but he suddenly found himself distracted. There was something strange about Kelshara's smile, something very private and inward.

In his years as a warrior, Tyveris had learned to read the smallest of expressions on the faces of his jailers and his enemies. He could tell when they were lying by the look in their eyes, or whether they were going to attack by the set of their jaw. He wasn't altogether certain what Kelshara's smile portended, but a sudden chill touched his spine.

He picked at his food absently for the remainder of the evening, watching Kelshara out of the corner of his eye. She was engaged in an animated conversation with Alamric. The patriarch's eyes were glowing hotly, and Tyveris had no doubt he was extemporizing upon his dream of transforming the Church of Oghma into a more militant order. Kelshara seemed to be paying close attention to his words, but Mother Melisende, sitting nearby, was regarding the two with a sour expression.

Tyveris noticed then that Kelshara's smile had changed slightly. There was a faintly triumphant note to it now. Yet every few minutes her attention wavered from Alamric's ravings, and her cool gaze flickered across the sea of faces filling the great hall.

She's found something she was after, but she's still looking for something else, Tyveris thought. He wasn't certain why, but he slumped down in his chair as much as his massive frame allowed. The less anybody noticed him, the better.

Finally, Mother Melisende rose to bid the abbey folk good night. She left the table quickly, but as she made her way from the hall she paused by Tyveris's seat.

"You've been working terribly hard not to be noticed these last days," she said matter-of-factly.

Tyveris grinned a bit foolishly. "I've been trying. It isn't all that easy, you know. A year ago I thought the word 'subtle' meant using a dagger instead of a battle-axe."

Mother Melisende winced slightly, then smiled, patting his broad shoulder. "Well, do keep trying. Loremaster Orven seems to have calmed a bit. In fact, I'm calling a meeting tomorrow to discuss making your position at the abbey permanent. I have reason to believe the loremasters will be agreeing with me." Her eyes snapped fire.

Tyveris's grin broadened. "Thank you, Mother Melisende."

'Thank me by not proving my judgment foolish," Melisende said smartly.

The abbess turned to leave, but Tyveris reached up and touched her arm. "You don't like her, do you?" he whispered.

Melisende hesitated for a moment, then shook her head. "No, I don't," she said softly. "But she seems to have found a friend in Alamric."

"He wants her to be the patron of his order, doesn't he? To use her gold to buy an army of warriors to spread his truth across the Heartlands."

Melisende's usually warm visage was suddenly as hard and cold as steel. "Stay away from Patriarch Alamric, Tyveris. He may need you for his schemes, but you most certainly do not need one such as him." With that, Melisende briskly departed.

Tyveris's gaze drifted to the head of the hall once again. Alamric was still babbling at Kelshara's side, but she wasn't looking at him. Instead her sharp violet gaze was directed across the vast room. The note of triumph about her smile had deepened. She was looking directly at Tyveris.

After the feast, Tyveris made his way to the stables for some much-needed rest. Yet when the moon finally rose over the distant horizon, its silvery light streamed through the open window of the loft to find him still awake.

"I know they'll decide to let me stay, Tali," he whispered. "I feel it. I belong here."

He set down the worn bird of jade on the overturned crate he used for a table. Then, pushing his wire-rimmed spectacles into place on his nose, he bent back over the tome he had been reading. It was an account of an ancient war in an empire that had long ago vanished beneath the sands of Anauroch, the great desert to the north. His brow wrinkled as he concentrated on the words.

It was late when he finished the tome, but still sleep would not claim him. Troubling visions of Patriarch Alamric's army of truth bearers, financed with Kelshara's gold, flickered through his mind. For a heartbeat he saw himself leading a crusade, carrying the symbol of Oghma on a battle standard, crying out triumphant praises to his god as the unbelievers were trampled, weeping, in the blood-soaked mud beneath the hooves of his thundering black charger. There was a dark appeal to the scene, a comforting sense of power. And if Alamric's cause proved a worthy one, Tyveris knew he could be a powerful force in such a holy war. But if Alamric spoke only from his own ambition…

"No," Tyveris whispered fiercely. "I will not be a pawn again. Never."

He headed quickly down the ladder. If he couldn't sleep, he might as well get another book from the library. Quietly he made his way across the moonlit courtyard and slipped inside the abbey, treading down the stone corridors as stealthily as he could manage. As he passed the doors to the chapel, he paused. A flicker of movement within had caught his eye. Curious, he peered through the archway.

Alamric was inside. The patriarch stood in the chapel's nave, no doubt sending some fervent plea to Oghma. Tyveris quickly hurried away from the chapel, his heart pounding in his chest. He had no desire to listen to any more of Alamric's diatribes. He walked quickly up a stone staircase and down the long hallway leading to the library.

He was halfway down the corridor when he noticed something odd. A peculiar orange glow spilled from the crack beneath the door to Alamric's chamber. At first Tyveris thought little of it and continued on; no doubt the patriarch had left a candle burning while he was out. Yet there was something strange about the ruddy light, the way it flickered and danced. It looked almost like the light of a…

"Fire," Tyveris whispered, his eyes widening. An image flashed before his mind-a candle burning too low on a table strewn with parchments, flames licking hungrily at the papers, catching, and leaping high to the ceiling. He considered running downstairs to retrieve Alamric, but it might be only a matter of moments before the fire spread out of control. Instead he burst through the door into Alamric's chamber.

He halted, dumbfounded.

Tyveris noted two things about the room. The first was that there was no fire. The flickering light emanated from an object resting on a marble table-a small glass jar filled with a strange light that washed over him in dizzying waves.

The second thing he noticed was that he was not alone. The stranger, Kelshara, sat nearby in a high-backed chair lined with crushed velvet the same purple hue as her eyes. Tyveris took a startled step backward, but she seemed not to notice him. She continued to stare straight ahead, her face pale and devoid of expression. He would have thought her dead if it weren't for the steady rise and fall of her breast beneath her crimson gown.

Tyveris felt a prickling on the back of his neck. Without thinking, he dropped his hand down to his hip, but there was no sword hilt for it to grasp.

"There's enchantment at work here, sure as the night is black," he grumbled. He'd never much cared for magic, or those who worked it. Mages were treacherous creatures, the whole lot of them.

But the weird scene in the room puzzled him. Was Alamric dabbling in magic himself? Perhaps there was nothing he would not do to achieve his bloody dreams of holy conquest. Perhaps he had ensorcelled Kelshara so that she would give him the gold he needed for his schemes. Tyveris shook his head in disbelief. He had to go find Mother Melisende.

As he turned to leave, his gaze was drawn once again to the light-filled jar. Dread fascination reeled him in, forcing him to peer into the jar's center. There was something inside.

A man-or, more precisely, the ghostly image of a man- battered at the glass prison. His eyes were wide with madness, his mouth open in a silent, endless scream. The tiny ghost scrabbled at the glass with hands clenched into claws. Worst of all, Tyveris recognized the man imprisoned within the vessel. It was Alamric.

"So, you've come after all," a hard, cruel voice said behind him. "I expected you to, of course. Toz lies at times, but the cards never do."

Tyveris spun on a heel, crouching into a defensive posture. He held his big hands out before him, ready. His nostrils flared with the scent of danger on the air.

He found himself facing Patriarch Alamric.

Yet, somehow, his battle-honed senses told him that all was not as it appeared. The body might be the patriarch's, but it was not Alamric who gazed out of those gray eyes at him. No, somehow the patriarch-or at least his soul-was locked inside the glowing prison. Someone else had possessed him, and the smug, triumphant smile that curled about the patriarch's lips gave the foe's identity away.

"Kelshara," he whispered. The woman's body still sat, unmoving, in the high-backed chair, but somehow she was in control of Alamric's form.

The smile broadened. "Perceptive," the necromancer crooned through the man's lips. "However, I think you will find yourself wishing you weren't so terribly clever. Fate decreed you would stand in my way, warrior. It is my decree that you will fall."

With a suddenness that surprised Tyveris, the false patriarch drew a long curved dagger from beneath his robes and lunged forward.

Reflexes worn into Tyveris's muscles by his years as a sell-sword sparked him into motion. He spun away from the blade as he kicked out his other foot. He felt the bones of the patriarch's arm buckle and snap beneath the blow. The dagger flew from Alamric's grip. With lightning speed Tyveris reached out and snatched the knife before it fell and brought it downward in a smooth, precise stroke.

It was over in a second.

"No," Tyveris whispered in horror, staring wild-eyed at what he had done. Alamric's body slumped against him, a bloodstain blossoming on his robes like a rose unfurling its petals. Tyveris tried to pull the dagger free, but the false patriarch grabbed his arm with uncanny strength, driving the dagger in deeper.

"And so victory is mine," Kelshara hissed triumphantly through Alamric's teeth.

A flood of orange fire burst from the glass jar, searing Tyveris's vision. When his sight cleared he saw that Alamric was gazing at him in mute amazement. And this time the patriarch himself looked out through his body's dimming eyes. With a gasp and a shudder, he died. Slowly, Tyveris let the corpse slide to the growing pool of blood on the cold stone floor.

"I am grateful to you," said a chill, mocking voice. Tyveris turned to see Kelshara rise from the chair, smoothing her silken gown. "I was finished with Alamric, and you have so kindly dealt with him for me." She picked up the now empty jar from the table and slipped it into a pocket of her gown. There was a scrabbling of claws, and Tyveris watched in shock as a small, misshapen creature hopped from the sill of the chamber's open window and hobbled to Kelshara's side. It was a kobold. The creature regarded him with its bulbous red eyes.

"Here they are, Toz, just as the cards foretold," Kelshara said. "The priest who is not a priest." She waved a hand, and an intricately drawn card appeared in her fingers. It depicted a holy man. The card was turned upside down. "His was a violent heart, and violently has he died." She crumpled the card in a fist. It burst into flame as she dropped it, turning to ash before it even hit the floor.

"And the warrior who is not a warrior," the kobold croaked.

"Yes," Kelshara said, her violet eyes gleaming speculatively, "but I think there is more warrior in this one's heart than he wishes to believe. He kills with practiced ease. But then, so do I."

Too late Tyveris realized his peril. Before he could leap forward another card appeared in Kelshara's hand, this depicting an armored knight. It was also upside down. With a swift motion, she tore the card in half.

Tyveris screamed.

He had never screamed before, not in all his years of battle. He'd taken wounds that would have killed other men, borne the torture of whip and hot iron without ever giving his tormentors the satisfaction of hearing him hiss in pain. But this time he screamed, the agony ripping the sound out of him like a claw reaching down his throat to tear out his heart.

Mercifully, a numbing coldness washed over him then. He fell to the floor, his limbs frozen motionless, his heart shuddering in his chest. Kelshara bent over Alamric's body and took something from his pocket. It was a small, clear gemstone. Everard's Tear.

"I have what I came for," Kelshara purred. "Farewell, warrior. Do not fear, though. You won't live long enough for your brothers to mete out justice to you for this unfortunate murder."

The dark-haired necromancer turned to the open window. She spread her arms wide and called out in a strange, guttural tongue. A huge creature swooped down from the night sky to hover before the window.

In life the thing might have been a griffin, a feral but noble beast with a lion's body and an eagle's head and wings. But Kelshara's mount was a creature of death. Rotting flesh hung in tatters from its bones, and its eyes glowed with a sick, unearthly light. It let out a shriek, but the sound was muffled by the dirt filling the thing's beak. Kelshara climbed onto the nightmarish steed, the kobold clambering up after her. There was a rush of dank, charnel-house air as the creature spread its wings. It soared triumphantly into the sky, leaving Tyveris alone and utterly defeated.

Some time later, Loremaster Orven came upon the former sell-sword lying beside Alamric's already stiffening body, still clutching the bloodstained dagger in his frozen hand.

Then came the ringing of bells, shattering the night.

It was a chill, gray morning. The wind smelled faintly of snow. Tyveris stood before the open gates of the abbey, alone. No one had come to bid him farewell, though that was hardly surprising since everyone believed him a murderer. And he supposed they were right, though not in the way they so smugly believed.

He gathered his travel-stained cloak about his broad shoulders. He had traded in his brown homespun robe for the worn leather jerkin and breeches he had worn before coming to the abbey. His swordbelt was slung low against his hip, the flat of the blade resting comfortably against his thigh. It felt almost as if he'd never taken the weapon off. He shouldn't have even bothered trying.

The council of loremasters had not believed his tale.

"I need no magic to explain these black deeds," Lore-master Orven had pronounced angrily. 'Treachery is reason enough. You plotted with Kelshara to steal the Tear and brutally killed Patriarch Alamric to avoid discovery. But once Kelshara gained the relic, she needed you no longer. You are a fool as well as a murderer, Tyveris, for she left you to suffer punishment while she herself escaped to freedom." The others had agreed. Tyveris would never be anything but a man of violence.

Only Mother Melisende's intervention saved him from a sentence of death. But the punishment finally handed down was almost as bad: he was to leave the abbey immediately.

Tyveris gazed toward the far-off horizon. The world beyond the abbey's walls seemed empty, as though it held nothing for him. But there was no use in lingering. He started through the open gateway.

The clip-clop of hooves behind him brought him up short. He turned around. What he saw made him smile, despite his dark mood.

"I thought you might prefer to ride rather than walk," Mother Melisende said in her brusque tone. Behind her followed the delicate palfrey that Kelshara had ridden into the abbey. "I daresay no one else will ride her, though it seems foolish. She's a good horse and hardly responsible for her mistress's ill manners." She patted the palfrey's glossy neck affectionately.

"Thank you," Tyveris said, taking the reins. He stood absolutely still for a time, at a loss for anything else to say.

The abbess regarded him wearily. "I know you told the truth." Her expression seemed tired, her bright eyes dull. "I'm sorry I couldn't have defended you more properly, Tyveris, but the others would have simply thought I was bewitched somehow." She sighed. "People can be so terribly blind sometimes-even seekers after truth and knowledge."

Tyveris shook his head in amazement. "I really don't think there is anyone alive who sees as well as you do, Mother Melisende."

She laughed aloud. "Why, I suppose not." Her round face grew serious then. "This is for you." She handed him a small bundle wrapped in dark cloth.

Tyveris took it gingerly. "What is it?"

"It is a holy relic, a very old one. Once it belonged to the monk who founded the abbey. It will protect you in the dark days to come. And it will guide you."

"Guide me?"

The abbess nodded gravely. "To Everard's Tear." She sighed wearily. "I have just come from Loremaster Antira's chamber, Tyveris. There she cast an augury for me, to see what the signs portend for the future." She paused ominously. "The abbey is in great peril. The Tear was the abbey's heart, and without it we have no means to ward ourselves from the forces of darkness. The evil creatures you described as Kelshara's servants would never have been able to come within these walls had she not possessed the Tear. And now that it is gone, the auguries speak clearly. Within the year, the abbey will be destroyed."

Tyveris stared at her in shock.

"Find the Tear of Everard. Prove to the others what I already know about you."

Tyveris sighed gravely. "But how can I defeat Kelshara? All my years as a warrior meant nothing against her magic."

A mysterious expression touched Melisende's face. "Yes, but you possess something else, Tyveris, something she does not."

"Aren't you going to tell me what it is?"

She considered him carefully for a moment. "I think that's something you must discover for yourself." She pressed his fingers closed on the holy relic. "Remember. This will protect you and guide the way."

Without another word she turned and walked swiftly across the courtyard, disappearing into the abbey. Once again Tyveris was alone, though not so completely as before. The cold wind tugged at the cloth in his hand, revealing the object concealed within. It was a feathered quill pen, yellowed with time and spotted with ancient ink.

Three days later Tyveris glimpsed the tower rising like a jagged stump of bone from the dark hills. As he studied the castle, the sun slipped into a pool of bloodred clouds and the first flakes of snow began to fall, as hard and stinging as tiny shards of glass. One last time he carefully took out the ancient quill pen Melisende had given him. As he had done a dozen times in the course of his journey, he fastened a bit of leather string about the quill's middle. Holding the other end of the string, he let the relic dangle in the air. Despite the howling wind, the quill spun evenly until its tip pointed toward the tower. Tyveris nodded grimly, then put away the relic. After only a moment's pause, he nudged his dark mount into a canter.

The face of the hill was steep and treacherous with loose rock. Tyveris left the palfrey in a sheltered hollow and continued on foot. He loosened his sword in its sheath, his muscles tensing with anticipation. Abruptly the cold wind stopped, and the air grew strangely still. It was as if Cyric, Lord of the Dead, were watching, holding his sepulchral breath, waiting to claim his due.

Finally he reached the twin gatehouses bordering the main entryway. The tower hulked above, silent and frosted in a thin layer of snow. He pushed against the iron-banded wooden door, and it swung in upon groaning hinges. Sprinting across the deserted courtyard, he came to the keep itself-a single, massive tower that seemed to scrape the clouds high in the twilight sky. An empty archway led inside.

The keep's interior was cloaked in darkness. Tyveris cursed his foolishness, for he had neither candle nor lantern. Then he noticed a faint glow. He looked about in the dimness for its source and was surprised to see it emanated from his own pocket. He pulled out the quill. The feather glimmered now with a pure, silvery light.

"Thank you, Mother Melisende," Tyveris whispered with a fierce grin. He tucked the feather into his belt. It seemed.

Oghma himself would light the way.

The first thing he saw when he stepped into the entrance hall were the skeletons. The stone floor was littered with scabrous bones and blankly staring skulls. The dank reek of decay he had smelled that night in Alamric's chamber was a dozen times stronger here. He could almost feel the stench seeping into his skin. Still, Tyveris had dealt in death for most of his life. He simply blocked his nose and crossed the hall to another door. Bones cracked and crumbled to dust beneath his boots. To either side of the archway, skulls were heaped in pyramids. Tyveris paid them no heed as he moved by.

That was a mistake. Two pinpricks of crimson light flickered to life in the empty orbits of a skull sitting atop one of the piles, and the thing began to shriek. In a flash Tyveris drew his sword and struck. Shards of bone flew in all directions, and the thing's shriek abruptly ended, but the damage had been done. Skull watchers, such things were called. The enchantment that gave them life had been created long, long ago by Prince Ketheryll of the Moonshaes. It was only a small part of the dark sorcery that had created Ketheryll's nightmarish Palace of Skulls, but if Kelshara could master it, she was more powerful than Tyveris had suspected.

And worse, thanks to the skeletal guardian, she would be expecting an intruder.

Beyond the archway, the light of the feather revealed a vast circular chamber, its ceiling lost in a shadowy vault. The chamber was bare except for a spiral staircase rising against the far wall. Warily Tyveris started across the room, his boots echoing off the cold stone. He was just halfway to the staircase when he heard the noise.

It started as a faint clicking sound but grew rapidly into a deafening whir. Tyveris felt something brush against his neck, sharp and stinging. Then a hot bead of blood trickled down his back. He drew his sword and looked up, his eyes widening in shock.

Bats filled the air, hundreds of them, flitting jerkily around the chamber. They were not living things. Cobwebs stretched between the thin, yellowed bones of their wings, and their hollow eyes glowed with the same sickly crimson light that had shone in the orbits of the skull watcher. They opened their maws in silent cries, their needle-sharp teeth glimmering in the quill's enchanted light. Tyveris swore, batting one as it came close. Another sunk its fangs into his forearm. With a grimace of disgust he shook the creature off. The tiny abominations meant to tear him apart one mouthful at a time.

He let out a bellow of rage and spun wildly, swinging his sword in a deadly arc. A dozen skeleton bats burst into puffs of thick bone-dust as the blade struck them. Yet the undead vermin continued to swoop and whirl about him. Blood snaked in fine rivulets down Tyveris's face, and countless pinprick bites covered his arms and neck. With every swing, more of the creatures burst apart in a spray of delicate, desiccated bones. The air was thick with dust, choking him, but there was no pause in the steady rhythm of his swings.

Finally the chamber was quiet, save for one last skeleton bat flopping weakly on the ground. Its bones were crushed to fine powder under Tyveris's boot as he made his way toward the stairs.

I'm coming for you, Kelshara, he was tempted to shout, but there was no need. The sorceress knew. He started up the broad stone steps, keeping his sword held ready in his hand. At the top of the stairwell a corridor stretched before him, ending at a door.

Ancient-looking stone sarcophagi stood upright to either side of the corridor, facing each other in pairs. Carved into the lids of the coffins were bas-relief death masks-likenesses of the corpses sealed within. Eyes inlaid with lapis lazuli and onyx stared menacingly at the warrior. Stone mouths carved into cruel, frozen smiles mocked him. He smirked back at them and started down the corridor.

As Tyveris passed the first pair of sarcophagi he felt a stone shift beneath his foot. A click echoed from the walls as some unseen mechanism was sprung.

Fortunately, he didn't waste a heartbeat considering his action. Even as he lunged forward, gleaming blades sprang from the mouths of the two death masks to either side of him. The blades met with a ringing sound just behind his head.

His momentum carried him forward, past the next pair of sarcophagi. Expecting another set of swords to spring from the mouths of the death masks, he hunched down. The motion nearly cost him his life, for this time the blades sprang from slots hidden at knee height; Tyveris barely managed to dive over them as they clanged together.

He charged down the corridor, blades hissing through the air all around him. The deadly barrage did little more than shred Tyveris's tunic, for he had trained long and hard to deal with such traps. But as the warrior leaped over the blades erupting from the penultimate set of stone coffins, he stumbled and skidded painfully to his knees.

The abbey's dulled my skills more than I'd suspected, Tyveris thought ruefully as he waited for the last trap to spring.

The grating squeal of metal against stone rang out in the corridor, but no blades erupted from the sarcophagi. The trap, it seemed, was stuck.

Tyveris glanced at the death masks, at the swordtips jutting halfway from them. If he moved, he might just set them off. Of course if he just sat there, Kelshara would most definitely stumble across him sooner or later.

Not daring to inhale, the warrior wriggled forward on his stomach until he was past the last pair of blades. As if in answer to his murmured prayers to Oghma, they remained locked in place.

Tyveris lay in front of the closed door, catching his breath and letting his heart slow, but only for a moment. Then he hauled himself to his feet. Beyond the door he found a narrow flight of steps. He gripped his sword firmly and headed up to the tower's uppermost chamber.

"You should be dead, you know."

Kelshara stood in the room's center, her hair shimmering in the moonlight that streamed through the chamber's open window. She smiled. It was a cruel, secret expression. "When I tore the card of fate in two, it should have ripped your heart apart. It's worked on other men."

"I don't care about your sorcery," Tyveris lied. "It has no effect on me." He watched her calculating eyes drift to his sword. Despite her cool demeanor, he could see a faint flicker of anxiety race across her features. "I am here for the Tear of Everard."

"So it appears," Kelshara replied acidly. "Toz! Bring my new treasure to me."

The kobold scurried out of a darkened alcove bearing a small box of finely wrought gold. Kelshara snatched the box from the creature's gnarled hands. "You are slow, as always, Toz," she snapped. Almost casually she pointed a finger at the kobold, and a spark of crimson fire leaped forth, striking the creature in the chest and flinging it into the chamber's wall. The kobold let out a shrill shriek and cowered against the cold stones, its eyes pulsing in pain.

Kelshara ignored her servant. She opened the box and took out a gem, clear and glittering. The Tear of Everard. "All men perish," she hissed. "But I have found the secret of eternal life." She clutched the stone tightly. "You will die this night, warrior. But I shall live forever."

Tyveris lunged forward, sword before him.

Kelshara gave a small cry of surprise, taking a startled step backward, but even as Tyveris lifted his sword for a killing blow she recovered her composure. She reached out a hand toward the warrior's heart as strange, guttural words rippled like dark water from her tongue.

An invisible hand clutched Tyveris, and he found that he couldn't breathe. His blood seemed to freeze in his veins, and his vision blurred. Slowly, shivering with cold, he sank to his knees. It was as if all warmth had been drained from him. He could even see it, like a trail of sparks on the air, flowing from his body into Kelshara's own.

The necromancer laughed, her cheeks blushed with color. She was draining the essence of his life and drinking it up, making it her own.

Tyveris tried to shout, but the sound was barely a whisper. He struggled to move, but his limbs seemed to be made of lead.

Suddenly a voice hissed, "That is the last time you will ever strike me-or anyone."

Kelshara turned to gaze at the kobold in surprise, but the magical stream still flowed toward her. Tyveris found it hard to concentrate, and the room started to tilt and spin before his eyes.

From amongst the rags of its filthy tunic the kobold drew a dark, jagged-edge knife. "Once I was strong and handsome-like him," Toz spat, his voice oozing malice. "And then you gave me this … this twisted form. And the pain. For too long I've suffered the pain of serving you." The kobold's eyes flared with countless years of spite now unleashed. "But I will suffer it no more, Kelshara. I will suffer you no more." The kobold lifted the knife and took a menacing step toward the necromancer.

"Halt!" Kelshara cried, lifting a hand.

Toz shuddered to a stop. He grunted, trying to bring the dagger down in a deadly arc, but his hand merely trembled, frozen.

The necromancer laughed cruelly. "Foolish Toz. Do you forget the magic that binds you to obey me? Then allow me to remind you." She made a slashing motion with her hand, and Toz gurgled in pain. As though he were some fantastical marionette, the kobold moved to mirror the necromancer's motion, plunging the knife into his own chest.

The kobold howled once in agony, then slumped motionless into a growing pool of black, foul-smelling blood. Kelshara gazed at her servant with fierce satisfaction. And in that moment of distraction her attack against Tyveris wavered.

The magical force draining the warrior's life flickered and vanished. Warmth flooded back into his limbs. He felt weak, strangely hollow, but he was alive. Kelshara turned to him, a startled look on her face, realizing her spell was broken. She lifted her arms to entrap him once again, but this time he did not give her the chance.

He sprang forward, slamming the sorceress into the wall, the point of his sword resting against the hollow of her throat. "Give me the Tear!"

Hatred glittered in her eyes like poison, but finally she lowered her gaze in defeat. "Very well," she hissed. He thrust out his hand. She opened her clenched fist over his upturned palm.

Tyveris swore as he felt a sharp sting on his thumb. He shook his hand, and a small black beetle, bright with yellow blotches, fell to the floor with a plop. It scuttled away before he could smash it with his heel. Tyveris felt fury blaze hot and crimson behind his eyes. He raised his sword threateningly. "Give me the Tear!" he bellowed.

"Never!" Kelshara spat. From the folds of her robe a dagger appeared, stained with venom. She brought it down in a slashing motion, but Tyveris easily countered the blow with his own blade. She nearly managed to twist out of the way, but not quite.

The sword cut a long, sinuous gash across her arm. At the same time Tyveris felt searing fire run down his own arm. In confusion he looked down, only to find a wound that was the mirror image of the one he had inflicted upon the necromancer.

Black words of magic began to tumble from Kelshara's lips, but Tyveris attacked again before she could complete her spell. This time his blade bit deep into her shoulder. She slumped against the wall, moaning.

Tyveris swore as his own shoulder burst into brilliant pain. Blood coursed down his chest. He leaned heavily against the table, his head swimming dizzily. Kelshara watched him, her face a grimace of agony … and yet that same triumphant smile twisted her lips.

"Yes, warrior," she whispered. "Each wound you inflict upon me strikes you as well. Our lives are linked by the sting of the deathmirror beetle. But I am stronger now than you. Go on. Strike me again. I will survive the blow. You will not"

Tyveris shook his head, fighting to stay upright. He knew she was right. Darkness swam dangerously at the edges of his vision. Her magic had weakened him, drained him of his strength. His muscles felt as if they'd been turned to water. He looked down at the sword in his hand, sharp and wicked, slicked with blood. For so long the blade had been his life, everything that he was. Now it had failed him. He had nothing left.

No, he told himself, that wasn't true. Remembered words echoed in his mind. You possess something else, Tyveris, something she does not. But what had Mother Melisende meant? Understanding washed over him, accompanied by a wellspring of fear that eddied darkly in his chest. He pushed that fear aside as best he could. He knew what he had to do.

The sword slipped from his fingers to clatter against the stone floor. He sank to his knees before Kelshara.

"The cards never lie," she purred. "You truly are no warrior." She picked up the sword in both hands. "You are nothing."

Tyveris did not look at her. Instead he clasped the ancient quill still tucked into his belt. He had heard the loremasters at the abbey calling upon the power of their god before. He knew that, sometimes, there was great magic in those prayers. Still, he was no priest. He could only hope that Oghma would hear his words anyway.

With a look of animalistic exultation, Kelshara lifted the sword. "All men die," she said coldly.

Tyveris gripped the holy relic. "I have faith that you will help me, Oghma. Grant me your protection."

As Kelshara raised the sword to strike, a blue nimbus sprang to life about the relic in Tyveris's hand. He felt a warmth touch his heart. The soft illumination enshrouded him like a cloak. It brightened, deepened. He rose to his feet, new vigor flowing through his veins. The necromancer stared at him, the fear finally clear in her violet eyes. He was stronger than she had ever imagined.

"I've won, Kelshara," he said solemnly. "Give me the Tear, and I-"

His words trailed off as the blue nimbus surrounding him flared. A thin, gossamer tendril uncoiled itself from the magical aura, reaching out for Kelshara.

"No!" the sorceress cried out, backing away, her voice trembling with revulsion. The sword dropped from her hands and clattered to the floor. 'The deathmirror beetle should only link us in pain!"

She shrank back from the divine aura, step by step, but the blue glow steadily followed her. Finally she backed up against the ledge of the chamber's arched window. The tendril of holy light coiled about her like a shroud. "It's burning me!" she screamed. "Help me! Someone please help me!"

"I will help you, mistress," a wet, bubbling voice croaked. Toz pulled himself slowly to his feet, the knife still lodged in his chest. He grinned, his jagged teeth stained dark with blood. "I am your servant, after all."

With a cry that might have been sorrow as easily as rage, the kobold lunged at the sorceress, grasping at her with gnarled hands. Entangled in a fatal embrace, the two tumbled backward over the window's ledge.

Kelshara shrieked. "But I am going to live forev…" Her cry ended abruptly.

The necromancer's life had ended. But her magic had not.

The tendril of azure light still linked her to Tyveris, reaching him from outside the chamber's window. Even as he watched, a darkness seemed to climb up the shimmering rope like a sinewy viper as black as midnight. It was the final culmination of her spell. Death had taken Kelshara. Now it was coming for him.

The darkness snaked toward him along the tendril, closer, no more than an arm's length away. One touch, and Tyveris knew that he would die. But how could he fight death itself?

It will protect you in the dark days to come.

There was no time to think about it. Gripping the quill tightly, Tyveris thrust his fist toward the thread of darkness.

"In the name of Oghma, be gone!" His voice boomed through the chamber.

Blue light flashed, and thunder shook the tower to its very foundation. The magic was shattered. Shards of azure and onyx flew in all directions. Then came silence. Tyveris blinked. Both the dark and light tendrils were gone. The ancient quill lay in his hand, looking dull and quite mundane.

Tyveris shook his head in wonderment. His body ached terribly, but he was alive. Carefully he tucked the relic back into his belt. He turned and walked slowly from the chamber, leaving his bloodstained sword where it lay on the floor. The weapon had failed him. His faith had not.

He made his way down the stairs and into the night. The storm had ended, and the moon was out, casting its silvery light over the new layer of snow that cloaked the ground, making everything seem somehow fresh and pure.

He found Kelshara and Toz among the rocks in the desolate courtyard, their twisted bodies covered in a burial shroud of windblown snow. The Tear of Everard lay in the necromancer's outstretched palm, unblemished and perfect.

Tyveris bent down and picked up the shining jewel from Kelshara's cold grip. Neither the sorceress's dark magic nor the fall from the tower had damaged the Tear. Just more proof of Oghma's divine presence in the world, Tyveris decided, and he headed off into the night.

When Tyveris finally reached the abbey on a bright winter's afternoon, he found the gates open wide. It looked as if all the loremasters had gathered in the courtyard to greet him. He swung down from the pretty black palfrey, grinning foolishly at them all. The news of his battle with Kelshara-and his recovery of the Tear-had obviously proceeded him.

"Welcome home, Loremaster Tyveris," Mother Melisende said, her eyes sparkling brightly. "Welcome home."

"There's a rider coming," the Shadowhawk hissed, his breath turning to steam in the chill midnight air. "You remember what I told you? You get 'alf of what we pinch from the bloke, right?"

"Yes," the young boy replied meekly. He picked at the loaf of stale bread jutting out of the small pack at his feet, then looked up at his father. With wide brown eyes, he pleaded to be released from the frightening task that loomed before him. In reply, the Shadowhawk frowned and pushed his son through the tangled hedgerow separating them from the road.

Artus Cimber tumbled through the thorny branches, recently laid bare by the first blustery days of winter. As he stood and brushed off his threadbare tunic and breeches, he looked into the darkness down the packed dirt trade road. In one direction the way ran empty and arrow-straight much farther than the boy could see, almost until it reached the peaceful hamlet of Irath. In the other, it made a gentle curve around a tree-lined hill before striking north toward Waymoot. There wasn't the slightest hint of a horseman from either direction.

How can Father tell someone's coming? Artus wondered. I can't even see as far as I can throw a stone.

The boy glanced up, only to find the moon hidden behind iron-tinged clouds, swollen with snow. To one side of the trade road, past the thorny hedgerow, trees hunched like sleeping giants on a hill. On the other, fallow fields stretched for miles. Lights shone in the windows of a farmhouse, nestled atop a faraway ridge, but they appeared as tiny, flickering pinpoints. Artus would have mistaken them for fireflies, had it been summer.

"Not enough light to see anything," he whispered and tugged at his mask. After adjusting the tattered strip of cloth around his eyes, he squinted into the darkness once more.

Curiosity quickly overcame the boy's fear as he tried to puzzle out just how his father had detected a rider. He cocked his head and listened for the telltale sounds of hoof-beats on the frozen ground. An owl hooted occasionally from a branch high on the hillside. At the farmhouse, a dog barked at some annoyance, yelping and whining in fits. But those were the only sounds on that lonely stretch of road- though the young boy's heart was pounding so hard he wondered childishly if someone might hear it, too, if they listened hard enough.

Artus pressed a hand to his chest, hoping to muffle the hammering. Of course it wouldn't stop. He softly cursed his fear, but choked on the words; if he spoiled the job by making too much noise, his father would beat him for certain. There was nothing the Shadowhawk cared about more than his work, and Artus was suddenly petrified at the prospect of failing him.

Scoril Cimber was the most famous highwayman in the kingdom of Cormyr, known as the notorious Shadowhawk. If Scoril himself were to be believed, that fame extended throughout the disparate countries and city-states that made up the Heartlands, but even at seven, Artus could tell when his father was stretching the truth. And though the Shadowhawk was an overly proficient liar, it could not be denied many in Cormyr respected him as a master of his craft. Dozens of men from the Thieves Guild in the capital city of Suzail petitioned him regularly for apprenticeships. Scoril would accept none of them; if his craft was to be passed down, it would be through one of his two sons.

This cold Uktar night, it was Artus's turn to take up the mantle. His elder brother, Oric, had proved himself much more adept at robbing people. He was agile and as strong as many men twice his ten years in age. Yet Oric had also demonstrated himself incurably stupid time and time again-forgetting to disarm his victims or blurting out his father's name during a robbery. Never a patient man, the Shadowhawk couldn't bear these mistakes. So it had fallen upon Artus to become an apprentice highwayman. And even though he loathed the idea, he did his best to make his father happy.

Tonight, as on most nights, he failed.

"You're as bad as Oric!" The words struck Artus at the same time as the blow landed in the small of his back. The boy fell onto his chest, his ears ringing, his heart fluttering like a trapped songbird.

The Shadowhawk snorted. "You're lucky there ain't no rider."

"No rider?" Artus repeated.

"Course not." The highwayman tossed a small pack at the boy. "It was a test and you failed. What did I tell you about standing too long in the road during a jaunt?"

"That it's dangerous," Artus replied. He sat up and slid his pack onto his shoulders, but kept his gaze carefully locked on the scuffed tips of his boots.

"And?" the Shadowhawk prompted, pulling the boy to his feet.

Artus buried one hand in his pocket. Drawing it out again, he opened his grimy fist to reveal a blue gem, which glowed softly with a magical radiance. "And always keep this tight in one hand."

"The stone'll protect you, keep you from being trampled. You remember that stiff I showed you in Suzail, the knuckler what got run over by the wagon?" The pained look on Artus's face, heightened by the weird radiance of the stone, was answer enough. The pickpocket's bloody corpse had taken up a vivid residence in his memory. "Well, you'd look just as bad if a warhorse galloped over you."

Scowling, the Shadowhawk brushed away the lone tear meandering down the boy's cheek. "Oh, you're not 'urt," he murmured. "Right?"

"No, Father," Artus said between sniffles.

"These jaunts are for your own good. There's always danger if you're going to be a scamp, and I've seen a lot of blokes get killed being careless." He reached down and tucked the boy's tunic into his belt. "But you've got something they didn't 'ave, right? You've got brains. That makes you better than the little brats what only earn their blunt as buzzmen, swiping 'andkerchiefs and 'ats from the swells in Suzail. You can be a scamp, like me. Maybe even a good one."

The boy nodded and looked up at his father. The hood of the Shadowhawk's black cloak hid his stern features. That massive, shapeless cape had become a trademark of sorts for the highwayman, for it concealed both his face and his form. In the steady light of the gem, though, Artus glimpsed his father's hooked nose and the strange, predatory glint in his green eyes.

He'd seen that look many times on jaunts, but the first had been two years ago, when his father had beaten a fellow scamp unconscious on the road outside Suzail. The Shadowhawk, his hood knocked back in the fight, had stood over the man in mute triumph, assured the brigand was completely in his power. Now the gaze revealed how confident the Shadowhawk was his son had no ambitions, no dreams other than those he had instilled in him.

So intent was he upon Artus that the Shadowhawk didn't hear the oddly muffled sounds from up the road until it was too late. There was no thunder of hoofbeats, no clink and clatter of tack to warn of the approaching warhorse; the mount's magical horseshoes did their best to mask these noises. The barely audible creak of leather as reins and harness and saddle strained on the galloping destrier-this was all that alerted the highwayman to the threat at his back. He looked up just in time to see the massive white horse bearing down on him. Its rider, oblivious to the obstacle, stared intently over his shoulder.

"Tyr's eyes!" the Shadowhawk cursed and threw himself on top of Artus. At the same instant, the glowing gem in the boy's fist flashed brightly. A sphere of light welled up from the stone to surround the unfortunate pair huddled directly in the destrier's path.

The shout and the burst of magic from the gem snared the rider's attention, but not soon enough for him to do anything to avoid the pair. He wrenched the reins, but the warhorse half-jumped, half-stumbled over the highwayman and his son, its hooves rapping a loud and threatening drum roll on the arcane shield. The force of the assault knocked the magical bubble a dozen yards down the road. It rolled like a crazed billiard ball with the two robbers tumbling inside.

As soon as the danger had passed, the gem drew in the force shield, and the battered duo assessed their situation. The Shadowhawk had gained a few bruises and a throbbing headache from the tumble, Artus not even a scratch. The highwayman shook his head, the severe frown telling the boy quite bluntly this trouble was his fault and he would pay for it. The Shadowhawk probably would have meted out that rough justice, too, if the destrier and its rider weren't sprawled, unmoving, at the edge of the road opposite the hedgerow.

"I'll check him," Artus said, adjusting his near-empty pack on his shoulders. If the jaunt went well, the sack would soon be full of coins and anything of value they might be able to fence in Suzail.

"Yeah, awright." The Shadowhawk rubbed the welt on his arm roughly. "Give 'im a topper if 'e's twitching too much."

Artus shuddered. Robbing people at knifepoint was one thing. Bashing them on the head was another. He knew his father dfdn't kill people-"doing the out-and-out" the thieves at the guildhall called it-but the Shadowhawk never shied away from roughing up a swell who resisted too much or a tax collector who threatened to bring the law after him.

The moon struggled from behind the clouds, casting its wan light over the road. Fortunately, the rider looked like he was in no shape to put up a struggle. He lay face down, his arms spread to his sides, his breath wheezing from him in bursts. He'd fallen clear of his mount, which was for the best; the horse had landed in a heap. Its neck was twisted grotesquely, and blood dribbled from its nostrils and mouth. Deep, ragged gouges marred the destrier's legs- wounds it couldn't have received in the fall-but the shattered bone jutting from its foreleg was clearly a result of the collision. The boy was glad the poor beast was dead. Its rider would have had to kill it anyway.

Artus knew his father was watching him, so he steeled himself and strode confidently toward the unconscious man. As he did, he exchanged the glowing gem in his hand for his dirk. That would please the Shadowhawk, he was certain. Besides, the feel of the dagger in his palm took his mind off the white, staring eyes of the dead horse and the uncomfortable prickle of his father's gaze.

The rider was wealthy, of that there could be little doubt. As Artus rolled him over, the moonlight danced over the silver links of an expensive chain-mail shirt. The man's cloak was new and fur lined at the collar to keep out the winter chill. His boots were tooled from the finest leather, as were his gloves and belt. Unlike the thieves, the young knight had bathed recently and his hair was neatly trimmed.

Roughly the boy pulled the man's scabbard from his belt and tossed it aside. Then he reached for the rider's tabard, crumpled by the fall. Wrought of expensive Shou silk, the cloth was emblazoned with the Purple Dragon. Symbol of King Rhigaerd II and House Obarskyr, the Purple Dragon was worn by all who served in Cormyr's military. But the soldiers in Rhigaerd's employ sported white tabards. This man's was gray. And his cloak was not military issue. Artus had seen enough soldiers around Suzail to know that.

"What's the delay, Art?" the Shadowhawk growled. "So 'e's a bloody soldier?" The highwayman eyed the man's warm clothes. "Be a good lad and give me 'is gloves. Me 'ands are frozen."

The boy peeled the gloves from the knight and tossed them to the Shadowhawk. "Father, I…”

"Quit stalling! You'll be sorry if 'e wakes up. I'll leave you to fight 'im, you know." The highwayman threw his own rat-nibbled gloves into the hedges and slid the new ones on. "Grab 'is jewelry, if 'e's got any, and whatever blunt 'e's got in that stuffed purse, then check 'is nag for supplies."

Quickly Artus pulled the gold ring from the man's left hand, a wedding band with delicate engraving inside. In the moonlight, the boy could read a name there: Filfaeril. The knight's lady love, it would seem. Without pause, he thrust the ring into his pocket. Once the engraving was smoothed out, it would fetch a good price in the city.

Next he cut the purse from the man's belt. It was heavy, and Artus couldn't help pausing to glance inside. Atop the mound of silver coins lay another ring-gold and encrusted with gems. It, too, bore the dragon of House Obarskyr.

Artus froze. A cold dread spread from the ring to his suddenly numb fingers, up his arms, and finally to his heart. Only one young man would carry such a signet ring. The boy looked at the knight's face. He was the right age, just a little older than the Shadowhawk. And it was said in the Thieves Guild he often rode out of the royal castle in Suzail, disguised as a wandering cavalier, a sell-sword meting out justice as part of a brave band known as the King's Men.

"Prince Azoun," Artus whispered.

The purse slipped out of his fingers, rebounding off his leg before hitting the ground. The coins jingled musically as they scattered over the road. 'The prince," Artus said, turning to his father. "We've got to-"

But something else had captured the Shadowhawk's attention. He fell to his hands and knees, head cocked curiously. "Something's coming," the highwayman said. Artus thought he heard an edge of fear in his father's voice. "It ain't on the road, though. More like … under it."

The road trembled beneath Artus. He tried to stand, but the packed earth under his feet shifted, sending him sprawling atop the unconscious prince. Frantically he reached for the gem in his pocket.

As Artus's fingers closed around the blue stone, something burst up from the dirt next to the dead horse. The boy caught a glimpse of it-shaggy hair and beard, all wild and unkempt and matted with soil. That mop seemed to be the entirety of its head and upper body, until it flexed its stubby arms and slashed the air with long black talons.

The creature plunged back into the ground then, just as another surfaced momentarily on the other side of the horse. Together the two creatures circled the unfortunate mount, a track of disturbed earth forming around the corpse. Before Artus could cry out his amazement, a hole swallowed up the entire warhorse.

"Run!" he heard his father shout, but the words seemed to come from very far away.

Brightly the gem in Artus's hand flared to life. The force wall flowing from it pushed his fingers apart, as it always did, and spread out to encircle both the boy and Prince Azoun. Artus felt the globe sink as the earth gave way, opening a wide maw for him. He looked with staring eyes at the still form of Azoun, past him to the translucent blue floor of the sphere. At any moment, the dirt beneath it would fall away and they would be swallowed up, just like the dead destrier.

Then the rumbling beneath Artus stopped. All was silent for an instant as the globe settled in the shallow sinkhole. Nearby, where the horse had been taken, clots of dirt shot from the burrow. They rained down on the road in a soft patter. On the other side of the road, the Shadowhawk crouched near the hedgerow, neither fleeing nor lifting a hand to help his son. Like Artus, he seemed frozen by fear.

"Whatever you do, boy," came a strained, quiet voice, "don't let go olthat gem."

Artus nearly did just that at the unexpected words from the prince, but Azoun reached out and gently steadied the boy's trembling hand.

"W-What are they?" Artus stammered.

Reaching up to gingerly prod the bloody wound on his forehead, Prince Azoun said, "Zhentarim assassins. Magically altered dwarves, I think. Voracious little beasts called groundlings. How-Ooch." He pulled his fingers away from the gash. "How long can you keep that force shield up? I think it's blocking the groundlings' tracking sense."

"It stays up by itself, but only as long as we're in danger and the gem's touching my skin. I mean, I can't control it other than that."

"One of the groundlings must be right below us," the prince observed. "Close, too, if it's triggering the shield." He reached for his sword, but found his belt empty. "Where's my blade?"

The boy gestured to the weapon, which lay in the road, well out of reach. Then he flinched, as if he were expecting a blow for his mistake.

"It's all right," Azoun said kindly. "Just give me your dagger."

The prince took the small, rather dull knife and rolled onto his knees. The movement caused the thing in the ground beneath the force globe to stir, and the sinkhole grew deeper as the groundling blindly expanded its burrow. The sphere of magical energy sank into the earth, far enough that Artus could barely spy his father as he huddled near the hedgerow.

The boy soon regretted even that limited vista.

From the wide burrow that had swallowed the prince's horse, a coarse laughter began to echo. The hacking was soon accompanied by the sickening crack of still-warm bones breaking. Limb by limb, rib by rib, the destrier's remains flew out of the burrow. The gory missiles landed in the grass, bounced off the force shield, even buffeted the Shadowhawk. The bones had been stripped of most of their flesh by the assassins, the tack and saddle chewed almost beyond recognition.

That was more than enough to panic the highwayman. With a single glance back at his son, the Shadowhawk sprang toward the hedgerow. He fixed his cold eyes on the hillside beyond. The trees, leafless in the Uktar wind, promised safety with their high branches. If only he could reach them….

As soon as the highwayman moved, three tracks of churning earth shot across the road-two from the horse's grave, another from beneath Artus and Azoun. The groundlings burrowed furiously after the Shadowhawk, like sharks in bloody waters. They converged on him just before he reached the row of thorny bushes at the road's edge. Clawed hands burst through the topsoil and closed around his ankles. Talons sharp as swords tore deep furrows in the highwayman's boots and painful scratches in the skin below.

The Shadowhawk screamed once before he disappeared into the burrow.

The force globe vanished when the groundlings went after the highwayman. Prince Azoun hit the bottom of the sinkhole with a grunt of pain, then reached out to stop the boy from running. Artus ducked the prince's awkward grab, leaped from the hole, and raced to save his father.

"They won't kill him!" Azoun shouted. "They're after me!"

Artus wasn't listening. When he reached the burrow where the Shadowhawk had vanished, he stuffed the blue gem into his pocket and grabbed a more suitable weapon- a fist-sized wedge of stone tapering to a point at one end. Kneeling before the hole, he whispered, "Father?"

His knees had barely touched the road before two squinting red eyes appeared in the blackness. Artus didn't wait to see what the groundling would do. Savagely he lashed out with the stone. The Shadowhawk had trained the boy in knife-fighting, but his years in the roughest alleys of Suzail had given him less orthodox fighting skills, too. In his hand, the stone might as well have been a warhammer, wielded by a young dwarven warrior from the halls of Earthfast.

The blow landed on the bridge of the assassin's snoutlike nose, shattering it noisily. The groundling howled and clutched at its face. Artus attacked again, this time planting the stone squarely atop the creature's shaggy head. The sound of a skull fracturing resounded in the burrow.

For an instant, Artus felt a surge of relief. Then the groundling burst from the burrow once more, crazed with pain and fury. When he saw the flash of the creature's teeth, the boy realized what a horrible mistake he'd made.

Certain of his doom, Artus braced for the attack. He didn't close his eyes or turn away; fright had locked his arms and legs. The sole thought running through his mind was how stupid he'd been for putting the magical gem in his pocket.

Like a diving falcon, a silver blade flashed out of the night and pierced the groundling's back, right between the shoulder blades. The assassin's dirty paws went limp on Artus's arms. The thing puffed out a last stinking breath and was still.

Artus stared in horrified amazement at the groundling. Short and stocky, it vaguely resembled the dwarves who sometimes passed through Suzail as itinerant sell-swords or miners or metalsmiths. Yet its features had been twisted by the Zhentarim's dark sorcery. Whatever stunted ears it had were buried in wild fur, its eyes reduced to nothing more than narrow slits. Artus had bloodied the long, fleshy snout, probably even broken it, from the awkward bend near its bridge. Even in death, though, the bristles on the snout's tip twitched spasmodically. The creature stank of rotten meat and fetid water. Sticks and decaying leaves, worms and crawling weevils, dotted its hairy flanks and the crown of its head.

"Get to the trees!" Prince Azoun shouted.

Artus, shocked out of his frightened stupor, looked up to find the prince bracing one dragonhide boot on the corpse. He was trying to wrench his sword free. The blade had gone right through the assassin, pinning it to the ground. Now it wouldn't budge.

A shriek reverberated eerily from the depths of the burrow. It was the animalistic cry of a groundling, and from the angry snarls that followed it, Artus was fairly certain the remaining pair of assassins had discovered their mistake in grabbing the Shadowhawk.

As the angry cacocophy in the burrow grew louder, the prince grasped the sword more tightly and pulled with all his strength-to no avail. He'd simply struck the beast too hard.

"Brute force causes as many difficulties as it solves," he said bitterly, repeating a maxim favored by Vangerdahast, his royal tutor. As with most of the wizard's sage advice, though, its true meaning had come to Azoun just a little too late.

When he saw Artus still standing at the edge of the burrow, staring mutely at the corpse, the prince released his grip on the trapped sword. Grabbing the boy by the arm, he bolted through the hedgerow and ran toward the hillside beyond. They stopped at the nearest tree with branches low enough and sturdy enough for them to climb.

"Go as high as you can," Azoun said as he boosted Artus onto a gnarled limb. "Then take out that gem again and hold it tight."

The boy moved tentatively into the lower branches. He wasn't afraid of heights; it was just that he'd never climbed a tree before. After all, he'd had few chances to do so in Suzail, since only noble estates and small, well-patrolled public parks held any greenery at all. And the Shadowhawk frowned upon hiding in trees during a jaunt, since a robber was just as likely to hurt himself by leaping on a victim.

"The only time a proper scamp's found in a tree is when 'e's dangling from it," was one of his favorite sayings.

To counter the fear welling inside him, Artus tried to picture himself climbing up to the second story of the ruined tavern where he had his secret library. By scaling a flight of rickety stairs and pushing through a hole in the upper floor, he would come to his treasure trove of books. He'd stolen most of them from scribes' stalls in the marketplace, but a few proclamations had come to him from the rubbish heaps outside the city walls. Scaling the tree wasn't so different from getting up to the loft, he decided, and the climb became less of a struggle.

When at last he reached a safe vantage, high in the tree, Artus looked down to find Azoun struggling along behind him. The prince's cloak snagged branches with each move he made, and his chain mail shirt hung heavily on his shoulders. Azoun settled on a thick limb below the boy. Only then did he begin to undo the elaborate clasp holding his cloak closed.

"That was a brave thing you did," the prince noted. He puffed out a breath of relief as he slid the cloak from his shoulders. "Put this around you. It'll get cold up here fast, once the fright lets go of you."

Artus took the cloak with a softly murmured thanks. "What about my fa-uh, the Shadowhawk?" he asked.

The prince paused. "The Shadowhawk, eh? At least I was waylaid by the best." Forcing a grim smile, he added, "Don't worry. The groundlings are professional assassins. They won't harm your father-the Shadowhawk, I mean. He's got my gloves, I suppose. That's why they went after him-they could pick up even that much of my scent on him as he moved. But, like I said, they won't hurt him. Their contract is for my death. To kill someone else would be against guild rules. Do you understand?"

The boy nodded, and the cloud of concern passed from his brown eyes. If the creatures were sentient enough to follow the rules of the Assassins Guild, perhaps his father could fast-talk his way free. "Will they let him go when they figure out he's not the one they want?"

"Not right away. At least not until they've got me. Right now, the groundlings-"

A scraping noise drew Azoun's attention back to the road. There, the assassin's corpse was slowly sliding into the burrow. The sword point jutting from its chest cut through the ground like a plow blade as the groundlings dragged their dead fellow deeper into the earth. Soon, the corpse and the sword were gone.

Azoun sighed. "Right now, the groundlings are building a warren, an underground camp. They must realize they have us trapped, since nothing is moving on the ground. They'll do all they can to bleed us out of weapons, food, and hope, then wait for us to come down." Scowling, he noted, "Especially food. They'll eat almost anything. I managed to escape them outside of Waymoot by dumping my rations onto the road-that and being lucky enough to have a very fast mount with enchanted horseshoes."

"I have some bread!" Artus offered brightly, gesturing to his pack. "I mean, if you can think of a way to use it against the groundlings …"

"Well, at least we won't starve," the prince said, trying not to be patronizing, but failing badly. "But since we don't have a horse or any way of escaping, tossing it to the assassins won't do us much good right now."

Clouds slid over the moon once more, blanketing the hillside in a more profound darkness. A cold breeze made the branches creak and sway. The boy was glad for the prince's cloak then, for his shabby clothes gave little protection from the wind. "I'm Artus," he began softly.

The words jolted Azoun out of some intense reverie. "Eh? Well, Artus, you can call me Balin."

The boy paused, then pulled the gem from his pocket. Its blue light cast strange shadows over Azoun's face. He stared at the young man for a moment, openly sizing him up. "But that's not your name," Artus said at last.

"Of course it is," Azoun began, but he saw the frown on Artus's lips, the look of distrust stealing over his eyes. He looked down at his hands, to the indentation on his finger left by his missing wedding band. His purse was gone, too. "Was it the princess's name on the wedding ring or the signet ring in my purse that gave me away?"

"Kinda both," Artus replied. He dug the gold band out of his pocket and returned it to the prince. "And the tabard, too. Not many sell-swords would wear the king's symbol like that."

Azoun looked down at the torn and grimy Purple Dragon. "My tutor always said this was rather silly, to wear the family crest on a disguise. Still, it fooled men a lot older than you."

"People don't look for the obvious. Do you want me to call you Your Holiness?"

"No," Azoun said, trying not to smile at the boy's blunt-ness. "We're fighting together now, and brothers-in-arms need not bow to courtly manners. Besides, you call clerics Your Holiness, not princes."

"Sorry. I never met a prince before."

"So how do you know so much about me?"

The boy fidgeted uncomfortably with the cloak's fur collar. "Well, I've read about King Rhigaerd and about you on the royal proclamations posted around Suzail. And I saw you on your wedding day, when your carriage went down the Promenade. Well, I was too far away to see you, but I saw your carriage. And then there's the stories they tell in the Thieves Guild about you-how you dress up in disguises and play like you're a knight They say-"

"All right," Azoun said, holding up a hand to stop the torrent. It was his turn to study his unwilling companion, to size up this worldly child-robber. Most children grew up quickly in Cormyr, especially poor children from the city. But this boy was more than world-wise. He was obviously clever. Moreover, he could read, a skill confined mostly to the nobility, the priesthood, and a few wealthy merchant families. "Your father taught you to read, did he?"

Artus laughed with surprising bitterness. "He doesn't like me to read. A priest of Oghma taught me on the sly, until Father found out, that is. It didn't matter, though. By the time he told me to stop I already knew how." He gripped the gem tightly, cutting off most of the light. Still, Azoun could see the angry look in the boy's eyes as he said, "I don't want to be a scamp like him."

The prince held his hand up to the boy. "If you don't want to be a highwayman, how about giving me your mask? I could use it right about now."

For a moment Artus thought the prince was going to try to fit the dirty strip over his face, but he began to tie it over his forehead. Then the boy noticed the gash on Azoun's head was leaking blood into his brown hair, staining it dark and masking the strands of gray already taking hold there. "So what's your ambition then-a priest, perhaps? Maybe a bard? You seem to remember stories pretty well."

A smile crept across Artus's features. "I like stories a lot. I-" He cast his eyes down at the glowing gem and paused. "I know some about you. The men at the guildhall told me about the King's Men. They say you won't be a good king, you know, that you'll be wandering off to rescue people and fight dragons."

"Indeed," Azoun said flatly. "Maybe they're right. We'll find out soon enough, though, won't we?"

Artus let the cryptic comment drop, for the cold tone in the man's voice frightened him just a little. His father sounded the same way whenever he talked about a failed jaunt or a rival in the Thieves Guild who had questioned his skill. "What will we do now?" he asked after a time.

"Wait, I suppose," the prince said mournfully. "They won't attack us once the sun comes up. It hurts their eyes too much. Besides, by dawn there'll be travelers on the road again. We can muster enough people to stand against the little monsters, if they haven't given up by then and gone back to Darkhold."

An uncomfortable silence fell over Artus and Azoun after that. Both were certain there should be some way to fight, but neither came up with a plan worth suggesting. Azoun took to whittling away bark with the boy's knife, while Artus slumped unhappily against the trunk.

Occasionally one of the groundlings would appear at the mouth of the nearest burrow. It would sniff the air, squint uselessly into the night, then call into the darkness, "Escape is not for you, Azoun." Their voices were frightful, high-pitched and screeching like hobnail boots sliding on a slate floor.

After a time, though, even this harassment stopped. Artus dared to hope that the assassins were giving up, that his father would soon crawl out of the ground a free man. But the sudden, violent collapse of a tree perilously close to their sanctuary crushed those hopes.

"They're not going to wait for us to come down," Azoun observed bitterly.

Horror-struck, they watched another tree drop into a sinkhole, then pitch forward. The night filled with groans and cracks as the oak smashed into a leafless maple and both crashed to the ground. All around the fallen trees, groundling burrow tracks cut through the earth. Every few feet, one of the assassins would breach and test the air.

Finding no trace of the prince amongst the wreckage, the groundlings set about toppling more trees. The din was terrible as the oaks and pines tumbled, tearing branches from other trees in the path of their fall, pounding the life out of anything caught beneath their impact. Birds and squirrels and other creatures took flight as their homes swayed and collapsed. Any creature larger than a rat that fled on the hillside found itself swallowed up by a groundling burrow. As the prince had noted, it seemed the voracious assassins would eat almost anything.

Finally a tree toppled close enough to swipe at Artus and Azoun with its barren limbs. The gnarled branches clutched at them like skeletal fingers, scratching a painful line across the prince's cheek and snagging the heavy cloak Artus wore. The boy felt himself falling backward. The gem in his hand threw its magical globe around him at that moment, shielding him from a branch that careened past him. Yet the globe didn't anchor Artus to his perch; neither, he knew, would it cushion his impact with the ground if he fell. Reluctantly the boy let the gem slip from his hands and tried one desperate grab for the trunk.

His cold-numbed fingers closed on air. Shouting for help, Artus plummeted.

He didn't fall far, though. Azoun, his legs wrapped tightly around a branch, grabbed for the boy as he went past. Fortunately, the prince stopped Artus's fall. Unfortunately, he did it by snagging the cloak, which fluttered behind the boy like a sparrow's broken wing.

Artus jerked to a stop. Choking, he tried to get a foothold or handhold on the tree. Any sizeable branches were well out of his reach, so all he managed to do was set himself swinging back and forth. The clasp cut into his throat, and the tree's smaller branches battered his face. When at last Artus got a firm grip on the cloak, he gasped in a ragged breath and looked down at the site of his almost-doom.

The tree had barely landed before the assassins were swarming around it. They nosed at the glowing blue gem, which lay nearby, but it held little interest for them. The groundlings were, after all, dwarves at heart. Though mutated, they shared that stout people's disdain of unfamiliar magic.

The Zhentarim agents wasted little time on the search. As soon as they were convinced the prince had not fallen with that particular oak, they set to work undermining the next. It wasn't long before shudders began to ripple up the tree holding Artus and the prince.

His face red, his arms quivering at the strain of holding his neck out of the fur-collared noose, the boy looked up at Azoun. "Let me go," he croaked.

Ignoring the plea, the prince began to reel in the cloak like a net. Artus writhed, trying to break free. "I can. . save us," the boy cried.

Azoun grimaced. "Don't be foolish," he snapped. "You can't-"

Another shudder wracked the oak as the groundlings cut away a major root. The prince braced himself, waiting for the trembling to pass. At the same time, Artus twisted sharply, jerking the cloak from Azoun's fingers.

The boy fell, spinning violently in the air. The momentum was enough to send him toward a heavy branch. He grabbed it just long enough to slow his fall, then dropped again, rebounding off limbs closer and closer to the ground. He hit the hillside on his feet and was running before the assassins could react.

As Artus dashed away from the tree, one of the groundlings broke off from the excavation and followed. It tried to keep up with the runner, but he leaped onto the trunks of fallen oaks and scurried into the thick branches of toppled firs. With footfalls muffled by the fresh blanket of needles, he was almost imperceptible to the hunter's keen senses of hearing and touch. Artus might have eluded the creature completely, had it not been for the cloak he wore. Even tearing through the frozen earth, the groundling could smell the prince's scent.

And that was just what Artus was counting on.

A deep groan warned the boy that the tree sheltering Azoun was ready to fall. He turned back just as it started to lean. But instead of avoiding the tree, the boy ran straight toward it.

The oak fell slowly at first, and Artus could see the prince scrambling for a vantage from which he could leap clear when he got close enough to the ground. The boy wanted to shout to him, tell him not to jump just yet, but he knew the prince wouldn't be able to hear him. Even if he did, he probably wouldn't listen, just like the Shadowhawk….

Those bitter thoughts kept Artus's mind off what he was doing, which was a blessing of sorts. The chance the plan would fail was great, the chance it would succeed terribly slim. Nevertheless, Artus ran right into the path of the falling oak, the assassin bearing down on him.

As the track of churning earth touched his boot heels, Artus shrugged the heavy cloak from his shoulders and dived forward. The groundling, certain its victim had fallen, burst up and grabbed the prince's cloak-just beneath the tree trunk as it hit the ground. Like a mallet wielded by a storm giant, the oak drove the unfortunate dwarf-thing back into the dirt, shattering its skull and most of its bones.

That part of the plan worked perfectly. The rest did not.

Artus rolled away from the tree's impact and landed next to the softly glowing magical gem. The boy dared for an instant to hope he'd won. Then a thick branch dropped onto his leg. Artus managed to heave the wood aside, but it left his knee throbbing. Teeth clenched in pain, he sprawled on the soft bed of pine needles and clutched the blue gem in trembling fingers.

The prince fared no better. As he leaped from the oak, he was battered by its limbs. The tree flung him toward the ground in an awkward tumble, and his mail shirt prevented him from righting himself. Azoun hit the hillside shoulder-first and slid into the furrow left in a groundling's wake. Though he landed only a horse's length from Artus, the prince might as well have been a hundred leagues away, for all the help he'd be against the last assassin.

Azoun pushed himself to his knees and dazedly looked around. The makeshift bandage had been torn from his head, and blood ran freely down his face. He spotted Artus and managed to crawl to the wounded boy. "Save yourself," he murmured, then spiraled down into unconsciousness.

Warily the remaining groundling surfaced a dozen yards from Artus and Azoun, squinting toward them with its slit-like red eyes. "Now you are done, princeling," it screeched and tunneled into the ground.

The assassin surfaced again, near the spot where it had scented Azoun. All it found was the blue glow of the force globe, since the magic masked the prince from detection. The groundling cried out in frustration and, for the first time, a little fear. The Zhentarim sorcerers who had dispatched the assassins from the bowels of Darkhold never brooked failure. Even if it survived this encounter with the prince and his able young protector, the groundling would find itself facing endless punishment in that foul keep's dungeons, tortures like the smiling screws or the gruesome kiss of the carrion worms.

To even the groundling's limited intellect, this proved incentive enough for an original thought to emerge.

"You cannot run," the assassin shrilled in sudden realization. "I've won!"

"We can hide in the globe," Artus said as bravely as he could, though pain and fright made his voice crack pitiably. "You've lost. Sooner or later, the royal wizards will come looking for the prince. Until then, we'll be safe in here."

The last was pure bluff, but it set the groundling digging around the magical globe. Dirt and stones rained down on the shell, the clatter underscored by the assassin's unearthly wailing. Then, all at once, the creature ceased its frightening tantrum and sidled up to the globe. It glared at the magical bubble, the pale light nearly blinding it, and said, "They'll find a corpse here just the same. I have the one who was with you, boy." The groundling paused and licked its snout with a long black tongue. "I'll leave his bare bones around you like a picket fence if you keep my prize from me."

"But the guild rules-"

"Mean nothing if I lose the prince," the groundling snapped. "So they take away my guild badge for killing the wrong man. So what?"

Artus's shoulders slumped. There was really no choice if the assassin threatened his father. Besides, what was Azoun to him?

"A trade, then," the boy called. "I'll hand over Prince Azoun, but you've got to bring the other man back here."

"What about the magic wall?" the groundling shrieked. "You'll take the other and hide him there with you and never give me the prince!"

"And you'll just kill me as soon as you have Azoun!" Artus snapped.

There was an uncomfortable pause as the boy and the dwarf-thing considered their rather limited options. It was Artus who finally suggested a plan. In it, there was just the slightest chance he and the Shadowhawk would survive this nightmarish ordeal-and maybe even rescue the prince, too.

"I'm a thief, so we're brothers in trade, right?" Artus began tentatively. In truth the groundling did rather remind Artus of his brother Oric. "So we should be able to make a fair bargain. If, uh, I promise to put the magic gem away and not use it until you have the prince, the trade should be easy. Is that all right with you? I mean, once you have Azoun, you've got no reason to harm us, so we can all get what we want out of this."

It took a few moments for the groundling to wrap its limited intellect around that complicated arrangement, but at last it agreed to the plan. In a flurry of gravel and dirt, the assassin disappeared into its burrow. As soon as the thing was gone, the globe vanished. Artus unslung his ragged pack and prepared Prince Azoun for the groundling's return.

The Shadowhawk was bound hand and foot when the assassin dragged him to the surface. His cloak hung in tatters on his back, and his hood lay in useless strips around his shoulders. Fear filled his wide, staring eyes. Dirt and grime clung to his hair, transformed into clinging mud by blood and sweat. A gag pulled his mouth into a frightful rictus grin.

In silence, Artus stood over the unconscious form of Prince Azoun, who now lay with his head propped up on the boy's pack. Stepping away from the nobleman, he walked slowly toward his father. He could see the surprise in the Shadowhawk's usually cold green eyes, but that didn't concern him as much as the look of reckless triumph twisting the groundling's already horrific features.

The assassin swam through the ground at the surface, paddling straight toward Azoun. It paused at the prince's side, then reached out with a single claw. Perhaps the groundling assumed Azoun would turn out to be a phantasm, despite what its keen senses reported. Whatever the reason, the assassin started when it touched the prince's warm flesh. This was even more than it had hoped for bringing Azoun back to Darkhold alive would quadruple the reward, perhaps even purchase a transformation back to its original dwarven form.

Carefully the creature encircled the prince's legs and started to pull him into the burrow. As Azoun slid, the bed of pine boughs and the small pack that was his pillow slid with him. The groundling didn't seem to notice the branches falling into the burrow, but it stopped dead when the sack's contents rolled onto him-a few sticks of greasepaint used for disguises, a small length of thin black cord, and the stale loaf of bread that was to have been Artus's sustenance on the long trek home. It was this last item that caught the attention of the groundling's twitching nose.

"Hey," Artus called halfheartedly, "that's mine!"

The assassin snorted and scooped the loaf into its maw. Chewing only enough to break the bread into chunks, it gulped the prize down. The groundling then turned its weak eyes back to Artus, a snide comment on the tip of its black tongue, but found the boy standing very close to the burrow's edge.

"Leave the prince alone," Artus said coldly. He planted his hands on his hips and puffed out his chest in what he assumed to be a heroic pose. "If you go now, I'll let you live."

The groundling snarled and tensed its legs to spring, but an odd feeling in its gut made it pause. It groaned and looked down at its suddenly burning stomach. Was the boy using magic? The glowing stone, perhaps? The assassin cursed itself for trusting the human child, especially since it intended to break its vow once the prince was bound securely for the trek back to Darkhold.

"Really," Artus said, "you'd be better off to give up right now. You're beaten."

That was enough for the groundling. It threw back its head and howled, then lunged at the boy.

Artus calmly curled one small hand into a fist and raised it to strike the charging monster. But the groundling never got close enough to harm the boy. The gem it had swallowed with the bread responded to the raised fist by throwing out its protective shell. The magical wall mindlessly and methodically expanded, trying to encase its new master.

The groundling clutched its swelling gut and fell face-first into the dirt. Artus limped another step closer to the creature. "I warned you," he said.

In reply, the assassin belched as defiantly as possible, then burst like an overripe melon dropped onto a cobblestone street.

The silence that followed was quickly filled by the mundane sounds of an Uktar night-hooting owls, the distant barking of dogs, and the chill wind rustling through the trees. Artus stood still for a time, reveling in that normalcy, then set to work untying his father. The Shadowhawk said nothing-no exclamations of pride, no cries of relief, no words of gratitude. He merely rubbed his sore limbs and watched his son without comment as he pulled the prince out of the burrow, bandaged his head again, and moved him out of the road to the safety of the hedgerow. Scoril Cimber could see there was something different about the boy now, but he couldn't quite figure out what.

When he finished with Azoun, Artus turned back to the Shadowhawk, who still sat amidst the piles of earth and gaping holes covering the trade road. "Father," he said flatly, "there's a rider coming."

If the highwayman was surprised his son had heard the faraway rumble of hooves before him, he never let on.

The rider turned out to be the vanguard of a large patrol, scouring the countryside for the lost prince. When the soldiers paused to search the destruction, Artus threw a few stones to draw their attention to the hedgerow and the unconscious royal. Even with his sprained knee it proved simple for the boy and his father to elude the mounted and heavily armored patrol on the wooded hill. The Shadow-hawk was a wanted man, after all, and capture by the king's Purple Dragons was something he had avoided many times before.

In the days that followed, Scoril Cimber cemented his place at the cynosure of the weblike Cormyrian underworld with wild tales of his role in the rescue of Prince Azoun. Artus did nothing to counter these yarns. In fact, the boy often lent quiet support to the Shadowhawk's claim that he'd killed all three Zhentarim thugs and single-handedly protected the heir to the throne of House Obarskyr. And since the palace never commented on assassination rumors, for such things tended to upset the commoners, the Shadowhawk rose unopposed to the height of scamp notoriety.

Such fame always proved fleeting in the back alleys of Suzail, though, and other topics soon supplanted the daring rescue and the molelike killers-foremost among them the oft-repeated rumor that the withering sickness would surely claim King Rhigaerd before the year was out Young Prince Azoun would soon be King Azoun IV. No one seemed pleased to hear this.

"Look," a grizzled thief said, just loudly enough to overwhelm the ten or so voices vying for dominance in the Thieves Guild common room. "Rhigaerd was a bully. No one's arguing with that. All I'm saying is we knew what to expect from him."

"Yeah," someone chimed in, "a quick hanging if we got caught on the road with five silver falcons we couldn't prove as our own."

The grizzled thief frowned. "But at least we knew where we stood. He was a strong king, sure, but that also meant prosperity for the nobles-and good pickings for scamps smart enough to follow guild rules and keep away from his patrols."

From his position in the center of the throng, the Shadow-hawk cleared his throat. The room quieted noticeably and all eyes turned to him. "Azoun don't want to be king, right? So maybe 'e'll spend 'is time daydreaming about fighting giants and leave us be." He put his boots up on the table right in front of Artus and paused smugly. "Yeah, I think 'e'll just leave us be. After all, the bloke owes 'is life to a scamp, right?"

"But what about Vangerdahast, that tutor of his?" another thief asked. "He's a scary one, real sly and real smart. That wizard'll be running things himself if Azoun isn't going to do it proper, and he has no love of the guild."

A pickpocket with three fingers missing on one hand nodded sagely. "Wizards ain't to be trusted," he said, wiggling his remaining digits meaningfully. "It may not matter, though. I hear said that when Azoun's son died last year he changed, started to think of things more like a prince. It took the wildness out of him. Not surprising, when a babe two winters old dies so sudden. Makes you wonder what he did to offend the gods, eh?"

Someone across the room raised a mug in mock reverence. "To Azoun," he said. "May he be half the king his father was-half as good at catching thieves!"

Silent the entire morning, Artus shook his head. "Azoun will be a great king. All the assassins and thieves in Cormyr will be sorry for it, too."

"You'd better 'ope not, Art," the Shadowhawk said, surprised by the comment. "After all, you'll be the scamp to end all scamps yourself one day."

The boy turned cold brown eyes to his father, and the Shadowhawk caught a glimpse of that strange expression he'd seen on Artus's face the night of the battle, just before he'd killed the last of the assassins. "But, Father," he announced in a voice loud enough for everyone to hear, "you said I don't have to be a scamp."

"What?" the Shadowhawk bellowed. "I never-"

"Right after the fight-right after you killed all three assassins-" Artus cut in quickly, "you said I fought so badly I would never be safe robbing people. I should be a scribe, you said, or a bard."

Everyone's attention was on Artus and the Shadowhawk, and those thieves prone to jealously and envy-which was, in fact, all of them-found their spirits buoyed by a sudden hope that Scoril Cimber's yarns might now be proved untrue. The room stood frozen for a moment as the highwayman searched in vain for some way out of his son's well-laid trap. The boy had let him tell his version of the rescue, let him take all the glory and reap the guild's rewards for such notoriety. Now, it seemed, he wanted his payment.

But when Scoril looked closely at Artus, he realized there was no escape. The predatory look in his son's eyes was a familiar one, a glint as hard as the stiletto hidden in his boot and as cold as the winter chill creeping through the guildhall's cheap floorboards.

"Yeah. You be a bard," the Shadowhawk murmured at last.

He turned away from Artus's triumphant smile and gulped his ale. Even if he ain't going to be my apprentice, the highwayman thought ruefully, the boy's learned more than I ever intended to teach him.

The druid stood before the weathered oak door of the tower. His wheat-colored hair lay plastered against his neck, and his dark green tunic clung slickly, like a second skin, to his muscular frame. His embroidered cloak stretched to the grass behind him and tugged annoyingly at his neck as he tipped his head back and glanced upward through the soft, steady rain.

The tower's slate-gray stones merged with the dreary early evening sky, making it difficult for the druid to see the crenelated battlements. Squinting, he peered into the gloom and glimpsed a flicker of light from a window on the highest floor.

The druid dropped his gaze until his chin rested on his chest "I haven't seen him in years," he said softly.

A rushed sequence of chitters and squeaks issued from his tunic in reply.

"Yes. It has been too long."

The druid gently tugged the lacings of his tunic, loosening the material about his neck. A moment later a weasel's shiny black nose poked out from the V-neck of the sodden garment. The creature chittered again.

"All right. I'll hurry," the druid answered, stepping forward and rapping on the tower door.

An interminable time later the door groaned inward, revealing a figure draped in a hooded cloak.

"Galvin, my friend!" The speaker brushed aside the cowl, revealing rheumy blue eyes and skin that was as pale and wrinkled as crumpled parchment. White stubble edged the man's jaw. "You must help me! She's gone missing in my tower, and I can't find her. I'm very worried."

"Can't find who?"

A weak smile played at the old man's ashen lips. "My granddaughter." The old man paused. "Please, come in. You'll catch your death in this weather." Reaching out a shaky, age-speckled hand, the man grasped the druid's sleeve and drew him into the tower. "Oh, Galvin, I was afraid Elias wouldn't find you. I wasn't sure where you were living. And this storm…"

"Is not so bad, Drollo," the druid offered, extracting the weasel from his tunic. "Elias here doesn't seem to like the rain much, though."

The old man gingerly took the dripping weasel from the druid and scratched the top of its head. Elias squeaked loudly and stretched so its ear could be rubbed. The weasel shot an angry glance at the druid and squealed shrilly.

Galvin nodded to the animal and closed the tower door, muffling the patter of the rain and shutting out the sweet scent of the wet earth. After the long trek in the open air, the tower smelled musty. The druid wrinkled his nose in distaste.

Little of the thick, chiseled stone that made up the structure was visible on the inside. Paintings of fancifully dressed men and women competed with meticulously embroidered tapestries depicting life along the banks of the nearby Dragon Reach. In some places the tapestries and paintings overlapped. Galvin found himself staring at a partially covered tapestry showing several men putting a large boat out into the Reach. A satyr stood at the boat's prow, one hoofed leg up on the stern, an overlarge jacket wrapped about his human torso. The druid couldn't see the entire boat. A tapestry filled with prancing unicorns draped over it.

Beneath the paintings and tapestries, piles of labeled and unlabeled crates stretched across the length of the wall and reached as high as Calvin's chest. Bundles of folded clothes, stacks of colorful clay dishes, mismatched boots, smoke-tinted jars filled with glass beads, mounds of books, carefully balanced pyramids of scroll cases, and many objects the druid couldn't identify peeked out between the crates.

Galvin continued to gape at the dust-covered collection until a hand on his shoulder brought his attention back to the old man.

"My granddaughter," Drollo began. "She's only five. I was categorizing a new shipment when she wandered off. I'm afraid I wasn't paying attention to her."

"Your grandchildren are older than I am," the druid noted. When Drollo didn't reply, Galvin found himself staring at the old man.

At one time Drollo had been tall, with square shoulders and a long stride, but the seasons had taken their toll on his frame. Now he stood stooped over, his upper back a hump and his shoulders rounded and turned toward his chest. The skin hung on his bones as if it belonged to someone larger, falling in folds like the worn, oversized robes he wore. His wispy gray hair matched the color of the spiderwebs that clung to nearly everything in the tower. Only his eyes showed a spark.

With considerable effort Drollo bent and carefully placed the weasel on one of the few sections of slate floor that was free of clutter. The creature wriggled furiously to shake the rain from its fur, then darted around the pool of water forming from Calvin's dripping clothes and slid behind a crate marked "Alguduire feathers." The old man huffed, then stretched out an arm to grasp a nearby crate. Using it for support, he righted himself.

Drollo rubbed his hands together nervously and looked about for something. At last, after gathering his thoughts, he met the druid's gaze.

"I used to play with your grandchildren," Galvin said a bit more loudly. "I used to run after them in the marketplace close to three decades ago. They're older than I by several winters."

"Did I say 'granddaughter? Er, she's the child of one of my grandchildren, or one of my grandchildren's children," the old man said, shaking his head. "The years have sped by so quickly that I can't recall. She calls me Grandfather. That's what's important."

"And you're certain she's here?"

Drollo nodded absently. "Somewhere. I call her, but she doesn't answer. Maybe she's playing a game on me. Maybe she's hurt."

"Her mother?"

"Isaura. She's a hundred miles away," Drollo replied. "The girl's spending a few months with me. Isaura thought it would do me good to have some company. But she'll have little to do with me anymore if she learns of this."

"So you sent Elias for me." Calvin's tone was sympathetic. He could tell the old man was frightened, and the druid never remembered him being concerned about anyone-_only about the junk he collected. "How long has she been missing?"

"Two days," the old man answered quickly. "Perhaps three. But not more than that, I don't think. Time runs together." Drollo stared into Calvin's emerald green eyes. "I sent Elias as soon as I noticed her gone."

"We'll find her," Galvin stated simply, hoping his tone would help lessen Drollo's worry.

The druid tugged his cloak loose and glanced about for a rack. There was a pole-shaped object behind a large crate, but it was well out of reach. Shrugging, he laid the dripping garment across a tall, narrow crate lettered "frangible." Next came the boots. They made a slurping sound as he pulled them loose and water spilled out. The puddle beneath him grew to cover half of the entryway, and the water began to seep between the crates. He pulled his tunic over his head and laid it unceremoniously on top of the cloak, leaving his wet chest glistening in the light from the oil lamp overhead.

Elias poked its head out and chittered a scolding to the druid.

"The floor will dry," the druid told him.

Barefoot and shivering in the dampness of the tower, Galvin padded past Drollo, with the weasel scampering at his heels.

The lagging, shuffling footsteps of the old man followed the druid, who started picking his way down a hallway lined with a jumble of crates. In places the boxes were piled six feet high, as tall as Galvin, and the writing on most of the labels had faded with age. Dust blanketed many of the crates, showing they had not been moved in a long time. However, some had been tampered with recently. The druid noted small, round holes where mice had chewed their way into them.

Emerging into what he remembered as the sitting room, Galvin saw more crates and clutter. Stuffing spilled out of the furniture in places, adding to the disorder on the floor. Nicks covered the wooden arms and legs of chairs that Galvin recalled from his youth as being polished and perfect. The cushions and tabletops were cluttered with papers, knickknacks, and other objects. Only one piece of furniture, a large black leather chair, stood devoid of odds and ends.

“The woman was crazy to leave a little girl here," Galvin muttered.

The shuffling behind him stopped. "Oh, it didn't look quite this bad when the girl arrived a few weeks ago," Drollo nervously defended himself. "I'd picked up a bit and, er, cast a spell to hide all the crates and cover the dust."

The druid groaned and dropped to his knees. He peered under the furniture. Amongst the filth were scraps of paper and an old, toeless slipper that was much too large for Drollo.

Elias sprinted past the druid and dove into a mass of webs. The weasel returned a few moments later, trailing a cloud of gray-white webbing that was dotted with the husks of unfortunate insects. Elias brushed up against a table leg, knocking most of the webs loose, then began squeaking at the druid.

"Yes, I know she's not under there," Galvin replied. The druid rose to discover his wet leggings were coated with grime. Futilely he tried to brush them off.

"Her name?" Galvin turned to Drollo.

The old man beamed. "Isabelle. Named after my second wife."

"And you're certain she's still inside?"

"Oh, yes. She's too small to reach the door latch or the windowsills."

"And she's been missing two days, maybe three?"

"Yes," the old man stated simply.

Galvin rubbed his chin. "When I was her age," he mused aloud, "I occupied myself for days rummaging about your tower. But after two days she should have come out for a bite to eat-if she could." At once he regretted saying that, knowing the old man would fear the worst.

"The kitchen," the druid offered quickly. "If she's all right, she has to be looking for food. We'll start searching in the kitchen."

Drollo frowned and shifted his weight back and forth on his slippered feet.

"What is it?" Galvin asked curtly.

"She might not be hungry," Drollo suggested. "I have bits of food stashed all over the tower. I'm getting old, you know, and sometimes it's hard to get around. I keep things to eat here and there, so when I get hungry I don't have to come all the way downstairs to the kitchen."

The druid sighed. "Is she prone to playing games? Is it like her to just disappear like this?"

"She likes to play," Drollo said. "Hide-and-find is her favorite game."

The druid scanned the clutter. There were dozens of hiding places for a little girl in this room alone, and there were eight floors to the tower and a deep basement that had more than two levels. "You used magic to hide this mess," Galvin began. "Did you use magic to look for her?"

A pained expression crossed Drollo's face. "Oh, Galvin, would that I had that kind of magic. I can mask things, make something look like something else, make sounds appear out of silence, or silence something noisy. My magic doesn't have any real substance to it. I'm sorry." He chewed his lower lip. "What about your magic?"

"I'm a druid," Galvin noted flatly. "I can't do that sort of magic either."

"But you talk to Elias. And I've seen you talk to plants and rocks," Drollo stammered.

"I don't see how those skills are going to help us here."

Drollo blanched. "Then what are we going to do?"

"We're going to find her the old-fashioned way, by searching for her," Galvin sighed. "You start looking over there." He indicated the section of the room blanketed in sheafs of parchment.

"I've looked there. I think I've looked everywhere," Drollo moaned. "This is my fault."

The druid pointed again, and the old man complied, shuffling toward the parchment mound. Drollo began shuting through the mass. "Isabelle!" he called. Unsurprisingly, no one answered.

An hour later the druid was certain every inch of the room had been searched. There was no sign of a little girl.

Frustrated and sneezing, Galvin strode from the room and nearly bumped into a pile of crates in the hallway. "What's in all of these?" he asked. The old man pursed his lips. "Oh, things I've collected through the years. I've forgotten what's in most of them. You'd have to look at the labels. What room shall we try next?"

The druid continued to stare, dumbfounded, at the mounds of boxes and piles of books. If he were outdoors looking for someone, he would track them like a hunter tracks an animal. Broken branches, muddy footprints, flattened grass, and other clues would point the way.

Perhaps, Galvin thought, I was wrong about my magic, especially if I treat this collection of junk like the wilderness.

The druid looked around, searching for disturbed patches of webbing. His eyes rested on the base of a large crate. There, nearly hidden by the shadows, a mouse was tugging a pale pink ribbon into a hole. Galvin knelt and began squeaking to the mouse, but the little rodent was determined in its task and ignored the druid. Reaching forward, Galvin snatched the ribbon and squeaked again.

The mouse shuddered with fear, wriggled its nose, and darted into the hole.

Galvin rubbed his thumb across the silk ribbon, still shiny and new. "Isabelle's?" he asked.

The old man looked at the ribbon, then nodded slowly.

"I'm tracking her," the druid said simply. "Let's try the next floor."

Only a pathway at the center of the stairs to the upper floors was clear of debris. An accumulation of junk rested against each banister. Galvin scanned the collection of chair legs and discarded oil lamps, pausing only when he spied a brass vase precariously poised on a step halfway up. He carefully picked his way through the hodgepodge and knelt by the vase. Elias darted under Calvin's arm and sniffed it, black, beady eyes reflecting warmly in the curved surface. The weasel chartered uneasily.

"Yes, it's unusual," the druid answered.

"What?" Drollo huffed as he climbed the stairs, a thick candle in his right hand. "You found something?"

Grasping the vase at the rim, the druid turned and sat on the step to face the old man. "This vase," Galvin began. "It's peculiar."

Drollo arched his eyebrows. "Look at my collection later, Galvin. My granddaughter is more important than a hunk of brass."

"Don't you see?" the druid continued. "It's out of place. It's clean. There's not a spot of dirt anywhere on it."

The old man shook his head. "It's not out of place. It's new. I got that a few days ago. It was in a shipment from Callidyrr." He paused for a moment, then spoke more rapidly. "A shipment I opened in my study! Galvin, I didn't put that vase here."

"Isabelle might have," the druid surmised. Placing the vase back on the step, he stood, pivoted, and sprinted to the landing above. Elias bounded after him, pausing only to glance back at the old man, who followed.

On the landing Galvin scrutinized the piles of odds and ends, which were beginning to resemble every other cache of junk in the tower. What would possess a man to hoard so much? the druid pondered. Drollo was like the most greedy of dragons, he decided. He collected anything remotely valuable, then let it sit and gather dust.

Well, in that much Drollo differed from the dragons Galvin had chanced upon in his journeys: the great wyrms tended to keep their wealth relatively clean. And it was easy to walk around in their caves-if you were an invited guest, of course.

The druid lay down on the landing and glanced around. The weasel clung to his shoulder and continued to squeak. Its small face turned from side to side as if it were imitating Galvin.

"I'm looking at things from a child's-eye-view," the druid told Elias, pushing the weasel out of the way.

"That's smart of you," Drollo gasped, nearly out of breath from the effort of climbing. "I hadn't thought of that."

Without a word, Galvin rose and padded toward a door off the landing. It was partially blocked by a stand filled with intricately carved staves inlaid with silver and gold, but there was just enough space in the doorway for a child to squeeze through. Galvin moved the staves, though he nearly dropped the entire stand when one staff began to twinkle and twitch.

As he'd suspected, the ever-present spiderwebs had recently been disturbed around the door. Keeping an eye on the magical staff, he reached for the latch. He stopped, spying small smudges on the knob-traces of Isabelle.

"I'm not such a bad detective after all," he noted reassuringly to Drollo, then turned the handle and went inside.

The druid had to shield his eyes, for the room beyond was as bright as a sunny day. The source of the light was a glowing yellow globe dangling low, just inside the doorway. The ceiling, as cracked as the earth in a dry riverbed, was painted a warm and inviting shade of rose. The color of the walls was a darker shade of rose, though much of it was hidden behind Drollo's myriad possessions.

"Isabelle," Galvin called. "I'm a friend. I'm here with your grandfather. Please come out."

He glided farther into the room and was overwhelmed by a smell that was at once acrid and fruity-no doubt the remains of a meal lost amidst the junk.

"Isabelle?" He spied movement near the windowsill. Striding forward, the druid brushed aside a thin curtain of webs. By the window sat a small oak table, in the center of which danced an ivory mermaid, no bigger than Calvin's hand. The exquisitely carved figurine rose and fell, spinning on a carved walnut wave. And all along the dusty outer edge of the tabletop ran a smudged path of handprints.

Elias skittered up Calvin's leg and leaped onto the table. The weasel chittered excitedly.

"Isabelle was here," Galvin replied. "She tried to reach for the mermaid."

"Isabelle?" Drollo called, padding into the room.

The druid gathered up Elias and faced the old man. "She was here. Perhaps she still is. The handprints are fresh enough that they're free of dust."

The old man's eyes sparkled. "Bless you, Galvin."

The druid's cautious stare told Drollo not to get too excited.

"I knew I did the right thing by sending Elias after you. I couldn't thuuVof anyone better for finding my Isabelle. You know, people around here consider you a hero, Galvin. And just think of the-"

"Quiet!" the druid hissed. He cocked his head from side to side.

"What's the matter?"

Galvin glared at the old man, then quickly softened his expression. "I heard something." He cocked his head again and called, "Isabelle?"

An odd scratching noise was the only reply.

Calvin's senses were more acute than most men's, but the unnatural clutter and congestion inside the tower hampered them. Out of his element, it took him more time and effort to pinpoint the source of the noise, but locate it he did. Putting Elias down, he moved warily toward a shadowy recess hidden partially by a large crate.

Skritch. Skritch. Skritch.

Galvin could tell it was the sound of metal upon stone, but as he neared the crate the noise stopped. Elias, hugging his ankles, bared its teeth and hissed.

It took all of the druid's strength to tug the crate forward, leaving just enough space for him to squeeze through and get to the recess behind. The weasel remained in front of the crate, rearing back on its hind legs and pawing at the air.

The shadows were thick behind the crate, despite the light from the magical globe. Webs tangling in his hair, Galvin wondered why a little girl would brave the mess to hide here. He never came to a conclusion; something stabbed him in the right ankle and disrupted his thoughts.

The druid cursed between gritted teeth as he tried to back away. Again pain lanced through his ankle, and Galvin discovered he couldn't budge-something was wrapped around his leg, something metallic and jagged and very strong. Bending forward as much as the small confines would allow, he groped about, trying to find his attacker.

A whiplike tendril wrapped itself painfully about the druid's left wrist. Galvin cursed again.

"Galvin?" Drollo called.

"Stay back!"

The whip tightened about Calvin's wrist. Reaching forward with his right hand, he locked his fingers about the tentacle and pulled as hard as he could. Galvin heard a snap, then fell backward, a sundered metal limb in his hand. The druid quickly righted himself and grasped the tentacle about his ankle and pried it loose.

He crawled out from behind the crate and bumped right into Drollo's slippered feet.

Scritch. Ka-thunk, ka-thunk.

The druid glanced back just in time to see the crate wobble and fall forward, toppled by a metal monstrosity. A glistening black sphere surrounded by a dozen limbs, the thing wasn't alive, yet its whiplike appendages writhed like an octopus's tentacles. Oil spurted from the spots where Galvin had yanked limbs loose. The thing still had at least a dozen more of the whiplike devices, and it twirled several maddeningly while using others to move itself along, climbing over the crate and advancing on the druid.

A loud clap sounded in the room, followed by a brilliant flash of blue-white light.

The druid shielded his eyes once more. He flailed his other arm in front of him in a sorry defense against the metal monster. But no attack came. When the glare subsided, he dropped his hand and stared at the thing.

The clockwork contraption lay unmoving, cracked nearly in two. Oil spilled out of its guts and onto the floor.

Puzzled, the druid glanced up at Drollo. The old man was leaning on a carved staff he had taken from the stand-the one that had sparked and twinkled when Galvin had first tried to move it.

"Just wanted to help," the old man offered proudly. "I remember now why I kept this room closed up. I've a few gnomish odds and ends stored in here-that vermin catcher you tussled with and some other clockwork things like it. A few of them might be dangerous." A look of panic washed over his face as he shuffled toward the broken mechanization: "My Isabelle," he gushed. "What if the vermin catcher got my Isabelle?"

Galvin slowly got to his feet and tested his sore ankle. Looking down, he saw that it was bleeding. He cautiously flexed his left hand and felt his wrist to make sure nothing was broken. "She's not back there."

"What if she's lying there dead?" Drollo asked frantically, trying to pick his way behind the fallen crate.

The druid grabbed the old man's shoulder. "I would have smelled her blood," he stated bluntly, then stalked from the room.

Galvin waited for Drollo on the landing, then closed the door to the room and replaced the stand filled with staves. Nervously, he paced back and forth, rubbing his sore wrist. Elias scampered between his bare feet, the weasel's claws slipping on the smooth stone with every other step.

He stared at the polished marble steps and the central pathway swept clean of dust by his feet and Drollo's-and Isabelle's.

"Drollo, I've been a fool. I should have done this the moment I came into the tower."

The druid sat unceremoniously on the step just below the landing, wedging himself between a pile of books and a collection of hourglasses. He closed his eyes, slowed his breathing, and rested his arms on the landing, his fingers feeling the cool smoothness of the stone at his side.

Galvin broke into a cold sweat, the sheen on his brow nearly matching the shine on the marble beneath his fingertips. His breathing became slower still. He was calling upon skills taught to him by powerful druids-the ability to speak with stones and the very earth itself.

He felt his fingers become as stiff and unmovable as the marble, his limbs rigid like the stairway. His tongue became dry and thick. Though his mouth moved slowly, no words escaped.

A little girl, Galvin said with only his mind.

Little? the stone stairway asked. The word was drawn out, sounding like rock grating upon rock.

A person. Like me, but smaller. Galvin felt his own thought processes moving sluggishly, the words he was forming in his mind becoming simpler as his thoughts merged with the marble's. A girl. Half my size.

Small, the stone repeated. The word sounded exotic and even soothing coming from the stairway. Tall to us. Always above us. The marble droned. Stone never hurried in telling its story. Always looking down on us. We always looking up.

Tall to you, then, Galvin continued. But not as tall as me. The druid was sweating profusely now, for conversing with stone was always taxing. Remember her?

The grinding noise became louder inside the druid's head. The stone was thinking, mumbling to itself. Remember many feet, the steps groaned finally. Feet of people smaller than you. Pebbles compared to rocks. A short while ago, many, many pebble feet.

Many? the druid gasped.

The stone rumbled and pulled a term from Calvin's mind. Children, the stone replied. Many children. Up and down. Up and down. Always running up and down us.

Many?

Many, the stone repeated. Feet quickly grew, became larger, like yours. Then all but two feet go away. The stone paused, then added, But soon more pebbles came. They got larger, too, and disappeared. Now left with only two feet again-and yours.

The druid was confused. All but two? All but Drollo's two feet?

No, Galvin growled. You're remembering Drollo's children and his grandchildren. That was a long time ago.

Short time, the stone corrected.

Galvin chided himself wordlessly. Stone existed for an interminable time. The life span of a human could seem like mere moments to it.

Think, Galvin coaxed. The last two pebble feet.

Always up and down us.

Yes.

Smooth like us, the stone continued. Always stopping to… to… look at things resting on us.

The junk, Galvin clarified, picturing the mounds of debris stacked high against each railing.

Junk, the stone groaned. Yes. Can't see through it. Want it to go away.

Galvin sighed. I'll see what I can do, he offered. But first, help me. Those pebble feet, where did they go?

Moments ago, the stone began, choosing words from Calvin's mind. Pebble feet went up, up, up. Near the top, but not the top. Did not come back down.

So she's still in the tower, Galvin concluded, perhaps hiding on the second or third floor from the top. He was grateful he wouldn't have to search all the levels below. With luck, it wouldn't be long now and the girl would be safely back with Drollo.

The druid thanked the stone and began to separate his mind from the steps, when the marble added, A moment later the. . thing… came down and went away.

Thing?

The stone growled, loud enough that Galvin was certain even Drollo heard it. In the end, the stairway explained in simple terms that it had no words for what descended shortly after the girl climbed to the upper floors.

Is the thing here now? the druid continued.

No. Gone like all the pebble feet. Come and go. Up and down. Up. .

"Galvin? Galvin? Are you all right?" The words belonged to Drollo, who bent next to the druid, shaking him.

Galvin slowly opened his eyes, reluctantly discovering his connection with the steps severed. This was the longest conversation he'd ever managed with stone, and the effort had apparently caused him to pass out. He lifted a heavy hand to his throbbing head. His arm felt stiff, and his pallor was tinged with gray.

"Galvin?"

"I'm all right, Drollo. Let's go upstairs. I think we'll find Isabella there."

The old man beamed and helped Galvin to his feet. The trek up the stairs seemed a lengthy one to the druid; he paused at each landing to rest a moment. Drollo and Elias had no trouble keeping up with Calvin's sluggish pace. However, the druid had trouble keeping up with the old man's questions.

"So my steps told you she's up here?"

"Something like that," the druid answered.

"They saw her?"

"They paid more attention to her feet."

"Galvin, this is wonderful. After I have my Isabelle back, could you teach me to talk to the steps?"

"I'll think about it," the druid said flatly. Then a smile tugged at the corner of his lips. "You'll have to clean them off before they'll talk to you, though."

"I can do that."

At the sixth landing Galvin looked out a thin window. It was dark outside, and the rain had stopped. The moon, high in the sky, was poking through the clouds. Gathering his energy, he climbed to the seventh landing and faced an opened door.

"Isabelle?" the druid called softly. "Isabelle?"

No answer.

Another search then, the druid decided. The weasel chit-tered animatedly, wrinkled its nose, then squeaked and began running about the jumble.

"Yes, you can help us look for her," Galvin sighed.

To the druid this room looked like the rest of Drollo's tower, packed with an assortment of oddities and lined with crates containing more unused things. It was as filthy as the other rooms, but Galvin could see patches where the dirt had been wiped free by small feet. He strode forward, Drollo shuffling behind him.

The dust on many of the small crates was dotted with tiny fingerprints. Packing material lay strewn about some of the crates, and the contents-a veritable treasure trove of useless objects-covered the floor. The druid noted that the crates were all labeled in flowing Elvish script. Intrigued, he began searching the room more carefully, paying attention this time to the words on each crate.

Behind him, Galvin heard Drollo rummaging around. Elias was searching, too. The weasel's plaintive squeaks nearly drowned out the old man's rustling.

At last Galvin's eyes settled on a particularly large crate set against a wall, one that had been pried open. There was little stuffing near it, so whatever had occupied the crate had likely taken up most of the space. He ran his fingers along the rough wood and read the Elvish label.

"Oh, no," the druid whispered.

"Isabelle!" Drollo continued to call.

"Drollo," the druid began. "Do you do any trading with the sea elves in the Dragon Reach?"

"No," came a muffled reply. The old man had his head stuck into a crate. "Well, at least not anymore."

"You did at one time?"

"Yes. Quite a few years ago. I don't go down to the shore much nowadays. The sea air makes my bones ache."

The druid scowled and reread the label. "Drollo, stop looking," he said quietly. "She's not here."

"We'll go on to the next room, then."

"No. She's not in the tower."

The old man's face turned ashen, and Galvin quickly added, "But I know where she went. Don't worry. I'll go get her."

"I'm-I'm coming with you," the old man stammered.

"Not where I'm going."

With that, Galvin bounded down the stairs. Elias was fast on his heels. When the druid reached the bottom of the stairs, he glanced back and saw Drollo just starting to descend.

"Stay here," he cautioned. "I'll be back with Isabelle."

Galvin hoped he sounded confident enough, because he wasn't sure he could locate the girl. Still, he didn't want the old man to follow him. Then he would have two people to worry about.

Throwing open the tower door, he ran out into the damp night.

"Your boots," he heard Drollo call.

But the druid continued to run. Boots were the last things he'd need where he was going.

Galvin angled his path away from the tower and toward the south. In the distance he heard waves washing up on the beach. Overhead, the clouds were thinning, pushed away by a freshening breeze. By the time the druid reached the beach the moon was fully visible, shedding light on the night-black waters of the Dragon Reach.

With shrinking confidence, Galvin ventured into the surf. The cool water swirled about his ankles, then his knees. A wave came in, splashing him thoroughly and plastering his leggings to him like a second skin. He waded out farther and began to concentrate.

The druid willed his face to become more angular. His nose and mouth extended outward, and his skin became blue-gray. He hurled himself headfirst into the water as the transformation continued. His arms shortened, became thinner, then took on the appearance of flippers. His shoulders flattened, joined with the fins, and pressed close to his changing torso. His legs grew together into a muscular tail; waving rhythmically, strongly, the tail propelled the dolphin that was Galvin farther into the Dragon Reach.

The dolphin covered miles, darting in and out of sea caves that stretched across the Reach. The seascape was rocky, with spires of stone twisting upward, cloaked by patches of reedlike plants. Beyond the caves the seabed flattened, the evenness disrupted here and there by large rocks and giant clams. Colorful seaweed extended toward the surface and moved with the current. Farther into the Reach the seabed dropped off sharply-"the Cliff," the sea elves called it. The cliff's wall was a large coral reef of brilliant hues that teemed with life.

Galvin swam back and forth across the reef, quizzing jellyfish, yellowtail damselfish, and patches of seaweed. He rose to the surface only for air. A queen angelfish, disturbed from its sleep, finally provided a few clues and sent Galvin past the Reach, into the deeper, cooler water of the Sea of Fallen Stars.

Here the terrain resembled a plain, with ripples in the sand marking shifts in the current. The plants were fewer and taller and not as colorful as the ones along the reef. Galvin swam deep, hugging the sandy bottom. He noted that the fish here were schooling, perhaps out of habit or because a large predator was nearby. He scanned the sand, looking for some unusual disturbance. However, all he saw were the fading reed-fine prints of lobsters and other shellfish; the current kept tracks from staying for more than a few minutes in the sand.

The druid continued his search, swimming miles out to sea. Finally he found a set of tracks that resembled cleft hoofprints; they were not made by any sea creatures familiar to the druid. Galvin followed the quickly dissipating tracks across the ocean floor. The druid knew he was scouting over the Death Knell, a shallow point in the Sea of Fallen Stars that was dangerous to deep-hulled ships.

Sparse patches of seaweed, some of it nearly torn free from the sea floor, provided still more information.

A monster that frightens all fish, said one clump.

A thing that tears us from the ground and leaves us to die, cried another.

The druid pieced together clues and continued on, many minutes later passing over a large, rectangular bed of kelp. He thrust with his tail and dove toward the bed. The kelp was planted in rows, and there were signs each plant was being carefully tended.

It was a garden, he decided, but whose? Sea elves, perhaps, though the elvish communities resided closer to the Reach. Besides, elves needed much larger gardens to sustain their tribes.

Galvin swam slowly, keeping about a foot above the bed. There was less chance the current would wipe away the tracks here, as the kelp helped to hold the pulse of the water at bay. At the far edge of the bed he found evidence of his quarry's passing; a section of kelp uprooted and strewn about. It looked as if a big dog had been digging in a row of carrots. Several pairs of deep hoofprints showed in the sand.

A half-hour more, and the object of the druid's search came into view. The thing, which seemed hard at work destroying a flowering sea-frond bed, resembled a cross between a bat and a wolf spider. Its bulbous body was nearly three feet across at the middle, and its round head was about a foot in diameter. Silvery pincers protruded from its bottom jaw and cut through the fronds with ease. Attached to what passed for shoulders were wings, scalloped like a bat's. The contraption sat atop two stubby goat-like legs that ended in hooves; the legs were alternately balancing the bulky body and uprooting plants.

The back of the contraption-for like Drollo's gnomish vermin catcher, this thing had never truly lived-was decorated with scrawls of red and blue. Various sized circles of green and yellow were clustered beneath its wings. The hooves were painted a bright red and edged with a light green trim. It was garish. And inside, visible through its rounded glass eyes, Galvin saw the grinning face of a little girl.

Like a manta ray, the device glided over the sea fronds, then stopped to uproot a row at the end. The bulbous spider's head turned from right to left, then stopped, spotting the dolphin.

Galvin swam behind a clump of seaweed as questions danced in his head. Is Isabelle controlling the thing, or is it running away with her? How am I going to bring it to land? How do I…

He paused and let the sea current wash the tumultuous thoughts away. I meet it head on, he decided. Determination showing in his black dolphin eyes, the druid shot out from behind the seaweed-then stopped short.

Galvin wasn't the only one to notice the garden-wrecker. Swimming rapidly toward the sea fronds and the spider-bat was a quartet of sahuagin, gill-men of the deep. Roughly humanoid and exceedingly muscular, they had scaly green bodies, long pointed ears, and webbed hands and feet. Each hefted a trident in one hand and a weighted net in the other.

The contraption and its passenger seemed oblivious to the threat and concentrated on dislodging more plants. Its bulbous spider head only turned toward the sahuagin when a hurled trident landed in the sand next to a cloven metal hoof.

Panicked, the druid propelled himself forward and willed another transformation to take place. His skin took on a darker shade of gray and expanded outward to accommodate his growing body. The dolphin fin atop his back enlarged and became more angular. His head grew thicker and flatter, his lungs swelled with water, and his once bottle-shaped mouth stretched and filled with a double row of sharp teeth.

The shark sped toward the sahuagin, who had already reached the spider-bat. The gill-men were circling the thing, three of them jabbing at it with their tridents while the fourth retrieved his weapon from the sand. Through the water Galvin heard their odd battle chant, a singsong drone. The chant rose in volume and culminated in a whoop when one of the sahuagin was victorious in thrusting his weapon through the spider-bat's wing, pinning the construct to the sea floor. The contraption began to circle madly, like a buzzing, wounded fly.

Galvin saw the frightened face of Isabelle through the spider-bat's bulbous glass eyes. He reached the nearest sahuagin just as it slammed the butt end of its trident against the contraption's head. Wincing inwardly, the druid watched a glass eye crack. This instant of delay gave the gill-man an opening.

The sahuagin whirled on the shark, leveling the barbed trident in Galvin's face. The druid found himself oddly transfixed by the sahuagin facing him, and the creature began moving its trident from side to side while mouthing something that was audible, yet foreign to Galvin's ears. It was a variation of a battle chant, perhaps. Whatever it was, the sound comforted Galvin's jangled nerves, and the druid felt himself growing sleepy. The sahuagin continued to drone, lulling his foe into a dreamlike state while the current nudged him away from Isabelle and the contraption.

The shark felt the water play all about its skin. It was so restful, so…

Kchink!

Through the water came the muffled sound of the tridents striking the metal of the construct. The noise roused the drifting shark. Forcing his tired eyes open, the druid watched the sahuagin hammer away at the spider-bat. A net had been placed over the thing's head to prevent the pincers from reaching out for them.

Kchink! Kchink! Kchink!

Galvin fought off the effects of the sahuagin's sleep spell. His mind began to clear, and he once again saw the gill-men as a threat to Isabelle. He swam forward, determined to rout the sahuagin from their grim task. As he raced through the water, the natural instincts of his adopted form took over.

This time when a gill-man began weaving his trident and droning, the shark focused his thoughts on the endangered little girl, shutting out the sounds that only moments before had seemed like a lullaby. Catching the chanting creature off guard, the shark darted under the trident and slammed his snout into the sahuagin's belly, pushing him backward into one of his fellows. The pair floated, stunned and unmoving, above the ocean floor.

The two remaining sahuagin turned their attention to the shark, which had veered away and was building up speed to come in for another attack.

Galvin felt a rush of pain as a trident jabbed deep into his side, just below a fin. Blood mingled with the seawater. He tried to ignore the pain, to press his attack; he was rewarded when he felt his teeth close about a gill-man's tough hide. Tearing like a savage animal, the shark shredded the sahuagin's armorlike scales and dug his teeth deeper into the torso. All the while he shook his head back and forth, turning the sea black with blood. The gill-man tried to extricate itself from the death grip, but it was no use.

Again pain shot through Galvin's flank, this time originating closer to his tail. Another trident jab, his mind screamed, feeling the barbs still embedded in his flesh. The shark opened his mouth, letting the dying sahuagin float to the ocean floor. In a pain-maddened frenzy, Galvin turned on the remaining gill-man, who was attempting to flee. He sped after the sahuagin, closing the distance with two swishes of his tail. Gleefully the druid rolled his eyes back, ready for another kill.

Stop! Galvin's mind screamed. The druid fought to regain control of himself, to quell the bloodlust overtaking his soul. Isabelle. Save Isabelle.

The shark slowed his pace and turned back toward the pinned contraption. Galvin continued to focus on Isabelle and the spider-bat, trying to avoid looking at the sahuagin corpses floating in his path. His thoughts were filled with self-recrimination. It wasn't uncommon for a druid to be overwhelmed by the animal instincts of a creature he imitated, but Galvin could never quite reconcile his love of Me with the strange, savage things he did when he transformed-even if such violence was integral to everyday life in the forest or the sea.

Sadly the druid clamped his jaws about the trident that pinned the spider-bat to the seabed. One yank and the weapon was free. Next he worked to get the trident free of his own hide. Then he quickly tugged the net loose from the spider-bat. Peering through the cracked glass eye, he saw the frightened little girl. Water was seeping into the construct; it sloshed all the way up to Isabelle's shoulders.

Galvin locked his jaws on the spider-bat's good wing and laboriously dragged it toward the surface. His wounds, though not serious, were painful, and he found himself thinking of the old man and Isabelle to keep himself moving. The druid's shark head broke the waves some time later, and he squinted in the face of the bright sunlight. The search for Isabelle had taken him well into the next day.

With the contraption in tow, the druid started the long swim back to shore.

Galvin resumed his human form in the shallows of the Dragon Reach, near Drollo's tower. He pulled the spider-bat a few feet up onto the sand, then lay back, ready to let exhaustion take him. His side ached from the trident wounds. Fortunately, they were more painful than life-threatening.

Just a brief rest, he thought, closing his eyes.

Clunk, clunk ka-thonk!

The sound roused Galvin and he watched the contraption's lid fall open. A blond-tressed head poked out. A sheepish, wide grin covered the girl's face.

"Hi!" Isabelle beamed between yawns. "Who're you?"

"A friend of your grandfather's," Galvin said softly, rising sluggishly to his feet and extending a hand to the soaked girl.

She grabbed it and scrambled out of the spider-bat.

"Will he be mad?" she asked quietly, pointing with a stubby finger at the contraption. "Will he be mad 'cause I broke one of his toys?"

Galvin shook his head. "No. He has plenty of others."

The walk up the beach to Drollo's tower seemed lengthy to the druid, who found himself inundated by the little girl's chatter along the way.

"Isabelle!" Drollo cried as he threw open the door. He ran out into the courtyard and lifted the girl into his arms.

"Oh, Grandfather," the girl squealed. "I've had such a wonderful time! There were water flowers and green men and a big shark! It was fun!"

Galvin frowned and pushed past the embracing pair into the entranceway, where he found his dry cloak. Throwing it on over his shoulders, he gathered up his tunic and boots and turned to see Drollo carrying the tired tot inside.

"Wherever did you find her?"

"Out beyond the Dragon Reach," the druid stated simply, pulling on his boots. He reached for his sword and strapped it about his waist.

"But, how did you know she'd be there?"

"You said you traded with the sea elves years ago," the druid began. "The Elvish writing on the big empty crate upstairs indicated it came from Mercea. That's a city a few dozen miles from here-underwater. As close as I could translate, the label described the contents as "one water spider." So I played a hunch that Isabelle, uh, borrowed your device. Knowing sea elf technology, I figured it would do its job whether she knew how to run it or not. And since Mercean water spiders are supposed to walk under the sea…"

“Thank Tymora your hunch was right!" Drollo chirped, setting Isabelle down on a clear section of floor and patting the top of her head. "Don't you get out of my sight, now," he instructed.

The little girl yawned and dutifully grabbed the hem of his robe.

"How can I ever repay you?" the old man asked. "I must do something. I must give you something."

The druid shook his head. He had no need for possessions, especially any of the junk cluttering up the tower. But as he turned to go, a thought occurred to the druid. Eyes twinkling, he spun around to face Drollo. "How about giving me some of your collection?"

"Yes! A splendid idea!" Drollo exclaimed. "As much as you can carry."

Galvin spent the next several hours toting an impossibly large sack up and down the tower stairs.

"What is this?" the druid asked on the top floor, pointing to a long cylindrical object aimed out the window.

"A star-watcher."

"Well, I don't need one of those. And this?" He gestured at a half-sphere covered with beads and bits of metal.

"I don't recall."

"Fine. I'll take it."

"What about this?" Galvin asked as they descended to the next floor.

"It's called a hudabit. Imported from Zhentil Keep. I'm not sure what it does."

"Good. I want it."

The druid pawed through a collection of gnomish devices and pointed at a small box covered with gears and dials. "What's this?"

The old man shrugged, and Galvin promptly put the box in his sack.

On and on the druid went, picking up anything the old man couldn't identify. By the time he was finished, Galvin was loaded down with satchels, pouches, sacks, and packs. He strained under the weight, and Drollo had to open the front door for him.

"Thank you, Galvin. For everything," Drollo said.

"Until swords part," the druid replied formally. "And fair days to you, Isabelle."

The little girl yawned and waved, but the weasel in her hands chittered in mock offense.

"Yes, I'll come back for a visit," Galvin told the weasel. "I'll not stay away so long again."

Like an overburdened peddler, Galvin staggered away, dragging his bundles for nearly a mile. At last, he found a shady copse of trees and dropped his gifts on the ground. The druid unstrapped his sword, stretched, and fell to all fours.

He willed another transformation. This one covered him with coarse gray fur and gave him long, sharp claws.

The badger started digging a hole at the base of a massive willow tree. Hours later, when the hole was deep enough for his purposes, Galvin returned to his human form. He deposited all the junk into the hole, covered it up, and stamped the earth flat.

He carefully loosened ferns and mosses from elsewhere in the copse and transplanted them over Drollo's buried possessions. Like a careful gardener, he arranged the plants and made it look as much as possible as if the ground had not been disturbed.

Satisfied that Drollo's toys would remain undiscovered, the druid strode south toward the Reach. He intended to have a chat with the sea elves of Mercea about selling water spiders to people who haven't the foggiest idea of how to use them.

From the look of things, times were hard for the Inn of the High Terrace. Although the supper hour had long since arrived, the veranda was deserted. In the center of each rough-hewn table sat an overturned bread basket and an old wine bottle filled with wilted poppies. The chairs were scattered haphazardly around the patio, as if the person who had last swept the floor had seen no purpose in returning them to their rightful positions.

"It appears you haven't had many patrons of late," Adon observed.

"Let's just say that tonight the best table in the house is yours," grumbled the innkeeper, leading the way across the patio. Myron Zenas, for that was his name, was a brawny man as hairy as a bear, with steady black eyes, a huge nose lined with red veins, and a beard that hung down to his chest.

"Does your trouble have anything to do with the curse on Tegea?" Adon asked.

Myron stopped. "It's not my fault," he snapped. "Who told you it was?"

"No one," said Corene.

Like Adon, the young woman belonged to the Church of Mystra, though she was a novice and he was a cleric of high standing. The black-handled flail hanging from her belt seemed curiously at odds with her golden-haired beauty, for she had brown doelike eyes, a button nose, and the gleaming smile of a goddess. "In fact, we've heard very little about the evil afflicting Tegea, save that you need help."

"It's best that you don't know more," the innkeeper said, an expression of relief crossing his face. He led the way to the far corner, where the veranda overlooked the entire village. "Tegea's problems aren't your concern."

"We've come a long way to offer help," Adon objected.

"Then you've wasted your journey," Myron replied. "Even if there was anything you could do-and there isn't-our village's grief is its own. The last thing we need is a pair of outsiders sticking their noses into our misery." With that, the innkeeper moved two chairs to the table and waved his guests to their seats. "I'll send your meal out."

As Myron returned to the kitchen, Corene whispered, "This is going to be harder than we thought."

"Not at all," Adon said, removing his mace from its sling so he could sit comfortably. "The people of Tegea will be happy for our help-once we've won their confidence."

"And how are you going to do that?" demanded the novice.

"I'll think of a way," Adon said. He looked out over the village he had come to rescue.

Located in the southern reaches of the Dragonjaw Mountains, Tegea seemed idyllic enough. The mountains surrounding it were covered with towering cypresses, as slender and pointed as spearheads. Closer to the village, the terraced slopes supported huge groves of strangely gnarled olive trees. The warped boughs were laden with silvery leaves that danced in the evening breeze and seemed to whisper the soft songs of pastoral life. In the town itself, the muffled clang of a goatbell occasionally echoed off a stone wall, but no other sound rose from the narrow lanes running through the labyrinth of whitewashed huts.

On the far side of the village, the local duke's dusky castle squatted upon the edge of a thousand-foot cliff. Its craggy towers were silhouetted against the distant waters of the Dragonmere Sea, where the sun was just sinking below the turquoise horizon.

Normally Adon would have been staying in the citadel instead of the local inn. As an important cleric in the Church of Mysteries, he could expect most nobles to extend their hospitality to him. However, the patriarch had been warned that the duke of Tegea disliked all priests, so he hadn't bothered to call at the castle.

Adon felt Corene's warm touch on his arm. "Here's dinner-at last," she said.

The cleric returned his attention to the veranda. A serving girl had just stepped out of the kitchen with a heavy tray in her hands. Her bountiful figure was accentuated by a tightly laced bodice and a billowing skirt just clingy enough to hint at the slender legs beneath. She had skin the color of ginger, with black hair that cascaded over her bare shoulders in silky waves. Her almond-shaped eyes were as brown as topaz and lined with kohl.

It was impossible to see the rest of her face. From her cheeks down to her collarbone, the maid's visage was hidden by an unsightly veil. Brushing against the skin of such a beautiful girl, the shroud seemed sorely out of place. It was made of coarse, black wool and suspended from a strand of rough twine.

The young woman rested the serving tray on the edge of their table. "I'm Sarafina, Myron's daughter," she said, placing a goblet of golden wine and a steaming bowl in front of Corene. "Tonight, we have plum wine and lamb stew. I hope you'll enjoy it."

As Sarafina turned to serve Adon, her eyes fell on the left side of his face and remained fixed there. Although the patriarch was a handsome man with a patrician nose and a cleft chin, he often elicited such stares. During the Time of Troubles, when the gods had walked Faerun in the bodies of mortal avatars, his good looks had been taken from him by a zealot. Now a red scar traced a crooked path from his left eye down to his jawline. Adon self-consciously turned his face away so the young woman would not have to look upon his blemish.

After placing the patriarch's wine and stew on the table, Sarafina asked, "Is there anything else you'd like?"

Adon continued to look away and shook his head without answering. He was not angry with the girl for staring, merely ashamed of his appearance.

"Please, Your Grace," said Sarafina. "I didn't mean to hurt your feelings. If you could see beneath this veil, you'd know that I'd be the last to mock another's scars."

Adon looked back, touched by the sincerity in her voice. "I thought it unusual for a woman to wear a veil in this part of the world," he said. "Perhaps you should let me have a look at your affliction. I may be able to heal it."

"I don't think so." Sarafina wiped sudden tears from her eyes. "Many priests have tried, and each time they've only made matters worse." "But I'm no ordinary cleric-"

"Please don't ask again," said Sarafina, still looking away. "Can I bring you anything else?"

"Some bread would be nice, if you have any," said Corene.

Sarafina nodded. "My mother has just taken a few loaves out of the oven. I'll bring you some as soon as it's cool enough to cut."

As the young woman returned to the kitchen, Adon shook his head in frustration. "Why are these people so reluctant to accept our help?"

"You can't blame the girl for being cautious," said Corene, pointing at the crooked blemish marring Adon's good looks. "Why should she think you can mend her face when you haven't bothered to heal your own?"

"Our travels together have made you too familiar," Adon snapped. "You'd do well to remember who's the novice and who's the patriarch."

The cleric's threat did not intimidate the young woman. "So why haven't you mended it?" she pressed.

"Don't you think I've tried?" Adon retorted. "I've been praying to Midnight-er, Mystra-since she became the Goddess of Magic."

"And she hasn't answered?"

"Not in this matter," Adon said, sipping the powerful wine Sarafina had placed in front of him.

"I can't believe Our Lady of Mysteries would deny such a thing to someone she once called friend, someone who fought beside her during the Time of Troubles."

"That was before she became a goddess," said Adon, then paused. "Now that she's an immortal, I suppose she must behave as one. She doesn't even like me to call her Midnight. That's the name of my avatar,' she says. The Midnight you knew exists only as a memory.' "

"She calls herself Mystra to honor the goddess of magic before her," Corene noted dogmatically.

"The reason she hasn't healed me is a bit more complicated than an occasional breach of divine etiquette," Adon murmured into his wine.

"Meaning?"

'That she's angry with me for more important things," Adon answered, looking away in embarrassment. "Her church has stopped growing in the last two years, while others continue to flourish."

"Because Mystra doesn't resort to buying worshipers with misleading dreams of wealth and power, as do the other gods," Corene objected. "You can't be blamed for that."

"Perhaps not, but that doesn't change facts," said the patriarch. "Before allowing the gods back into the planes, their overlord made it clear their status and power would depend upon the faith of the mortals who worship them.

Mystra's church is smaller than Cyric's. And that means I've allowed Our Lady's foulest enemy to outstrip her power."

"But you've always said that the Goddess of Magic is special-"

"I know what I've said, but the truth is that I'm failing," Adon replied. He turned his scar toward Corene and pointed a finger at it. "And this is the symbol of my inadequacy."

"If what you say is true, what are we doing in this forlorn place?" Corene asked. "We should be back in Arabel, converting the masses to Our Lady's cause."

Adon shook his head. "That isn't Mystra's will," he said. "In a dream, she made her wishes clear. I must lift the curse afflicting this village-whatever it is."

The novice shook her head. "The will of the gods is difficult to comprehend."

'True, but in this case I think I understand Our Lady's design," Adon said. "We cannot hope to contend with the priests of the other churches. Chauntea gives her worshipers bountiful crops. Helm protects his followers from harm. Lliira promises her devotees a lifetime of bliss. As clerics of Mystra, we have nothing to offer except a lengthy and difficult study of the mysteries of magic."

"But the rewards-"

"Are a long time in coming and difficult to grasp," Adon interrupted. "No-if I've learned one thing since becoming a patriarch in this church, it's that we won't earn worshipers for Mystra by competing with other religions. Instead, we must try something different-something like what Our Lady sent me here to do."

'To lift a curse?" Corene asked.

"That's only the beginning," Adon said. "What's most important is what happens later."

Corene looked puzzled. "Now I'm having as much trouble understanding you as I do the gods."

The cleric smiled. "That's because I haven't told you the most important part of Mystra's plan," he said. "After I remove the curse, we'll convert the villagers to the Church of Mysteries. I've selected you to administer the priory we'll build here-if we succeed."

Corene looked flattered for a moment, then an expression of understanding came over her face. "You mean stay behind?" she gasped. "We're over a hundred leagues from anything that could be called a city!"

"Relax," Adon said. "The assignment isn't permanent. I'll replace you in a few years-"

"Years!" the novice screeched. "You can't do this!"

"I've done it already," Adon said. "There's no use arguing. This is where Our Lady needs you, and this is where you'll stay."

Corene downed her wine in one swallow. "Are you doing this because I mentioned your scar?" she demanded, wiping her mouth with the sleeve of her robe.

"It has nothing to do with anything you've said during our journey, though you've certainly given me reason enough to chastise you," Adon replied. "I selected you for this task before we left Arabel. "

Corene narrowed her eyes. "Why didn't you tell me then?"

"Because I know how much you love the city," he said. "You would've complained for the whole journey, and maybe even tried to avoid it altogether."

"I might have," she agreed. "Throwing myself into the Starwater doesn't seem an unreasonable alternative."

"I'm sure there's no need to remind you of your vows," Adon said.

"I couldn't forget them if I wanted to-which, at the moment, I do," sighed Corene, though both knew she really didn't mean it.

Despite her disappointment, the novice remained as radiant as ever. His heart softened by her beauty, Adon tried to console her. "I know this assignment will be difficult for you," he said. "But it requires someone with an independent spirit. That's why I chose you."

Corene did not answer, keeping her eyes fixed on the far edge of the veranda. Adon turned to see what had captured her attention. There, standing just inside the cafe's entrance, was a handsome newcomer. The man had striking features, with high cheekbones, a dark brow, and a roguish mop of auburn hair that hung down to his collar. His figure was trim and solid, with broad shoulders covered by a fur-lined cape and a narrow waist entwined by a cummerbund of the finest purple silk. Ignoring Aden's presence, the fellow flashed a scoundrel's smile at Corene.

The newcomer moved toward the back of the veranda. At the same moment, Sarafina stepped out of the kitchen with a covered basket. As soon as her eyes fell on the stranger, the basket slipped from her hands, spilling slices of dark bread over the floor. She backed toward the door, yelling, "Father, come quickly!"

"What's wrong?" Adon asked, rising to his feet. "Do you need help?"

The stranger paused to sneer at him. "If you know what's good for you, traveler, you'll tend to your own business."

Myron came bustling out of the kitchen and placed his brawny form between his daughter and the stranger. "Tell your master no, Broka," said the innkeeper. "The answer was no yesterday, and tomorrow it'll still be no."

"I must hear that from your daughter's lips," said Broka. He bent down and began gathering up the bread Sarafina had dropped. "Why don't you take this to your guests? I'm aware that you've a shortage of customers these days, and it wouldn't do to let these go hungry."

"We've no complaints," said Adon. He moved toward the handsome stranger, intentionally leaving his mace behind. If it became necessary to intervene on behalf of Sarafina, there were more effective ways to do it than by resorting to weapons.

Myron raised his hand. "Stay out of this," he said. "I can protect my own daughter."

Broka returned to his feet and shoved the refilled basket toward Myron. "Protect her from whom?" he asked. "I've only come to ask a question of fair Sarafina."

"Then ask and be gone," Myron said. He slammed the basket onto the table next to him.

Broka smiled wickedly at Sarafina, "Are you ready to return the love of my master?"

"No!" she yelled. "I'll never be ready-even if he turns me into a harpy!"

"Are you sure?" Broka asked. He stepped past Myron, at the same time reaching into his pocket and withdrawing a small mirror. "Have a look at yourself, and remember that all the women of Tegea share your fate."

He reached for Sarafina's veil, but Myron shoved him away. As Broka fell to the floor, the mirror flew out of his hand and shattered against a chair.

"How dare you touch me!" Broka leaped to his feet, a dagger in his hand.

As Broka stepped toward Myron, Adon smiled. The lout was providing him with a perfect opportunity to prove his power. Calling upon the magic of his goddess, the patriarch cast a spell that would make the dagger too hot to hold.

Nothing happened.

Adon stared at his hand in dumbfounded shock. Something was terribly wrong.

Broka grabbed Myron and pressed the blade to the innkeeper's throat. "Perhaps you'd remember your place if you looked more like your daughter," he hissed.

"Do something!" whispered Corene, stepping to Adon's side. Following her patriarch's lead, she had left her weapon on the table. "He'll be killed!"

Desperate to save the innkeeper, Adon attempted another spell. This time, a ray of green radiance sizzled from his fingertip, leaving a streak of white vapor in its wake. When the beam hit the blade, a high-pitched chime rang across the veranda. The knife shattered into a dozen shards.

Broka cried out in surprise, then tossed his useless hilt aside and stepped out of Myron's reach.

"Before you leave, I suggest you apologize to Sarafina and her father," Adon said.

Broka whirled around to face the cleric. "Do you know who I am?" he demanded.

"A bullyboy who torments women and hides behind his dagger," said Corene. "And it's a real shame, too. Before you behaved so badly, I thought you rather handsome."

Broka ignored Corene's rebuke and pointed at the castle on the far side of the village. "I'm seneschal to the lord of that castle," he reported. "And at present, I'm conducting my master's business. I suggest you keep out of it-or you'll be answering to him."

With that, he turned back to Myron. "My instructions are to examine your daughter's face," the seneschal said, staring into the innkeeper's eyes. "If you deny me again, I'll have your whole family lashed."

"Let him, Father," said Sarafina, reaching up to undo her veil. "It will cause me no pain to have him look."

As Myron reluctantly stepped aside, Broka smirked at him. "If your daughter cared about the women of Tegea as much as she does her family, she would come with me to the castle," he said. "Then, perhaps, your customers would forgive you for Sarafina's stubbornness."

"She's done nothing wrong," said Adon. He grabbed the seneschal by the arm. "After you apologize, you'll return to your master and tell him to leave Sarafina alone."

"By whose order?" Broka scoffed.

"By the command of Adon of Mystra, patriarch of the Servants of Mystery," volunteered Corene.

This only made the seneschal laugh. "My master recognizes the authority of no churches here," he said, returning his attention to the innkeeper's daughter. "Now, let me see what my lord's curse has done to your beauty."

Adon jerked Broka back, and the seneschal came around swinging. No stranger to a fight, the cleric blocked the punch easily. He countered by driving a palm into his foe's chin, at the same time slipping a foot behind an ankle and sweeping Broka off his feet. The seneschal slammed into the floor with a resounding thump, his pained cry leaving no doubt that his impact had been a hard one.

Adon placed a knee on Broka's ribs. "Apologize."

The seneschal's only reply was to utter a colorful curse.

"Perhaps you'd be more sympathetic if you weren't so handsome," said Corene.

The novice uttered a spell and touched Broka's brow. Her magic worked perfectly.

The seneschal's face darkened to a deep shade of red, then it erupted into a rash of boils and festering sores. Screaming in alarm, he crawled away and grabbed a piece of the mirror he had dropped when Myron pushed him.

"My face!" Broka howled, staring at himself in the shard.

"You've nothing to complain about," said Corene. "It's better suited to your personality."

The seneschal rose and faced the novice. "Lord Gorgias shall hear of this!"

"That's all I ask," said Adon, moving forward. "Now go!"

The seneschal flung the shard of mirror at Adon, who ducked it easily. As Broka fled, the patriarch turned to face Myron and Sarafina.

"Why don't you tell me more about Lord Gorgias and what he's done to Sarafina and your village?" the cleric asked, certain that his display of courage had won the confidence of his hosts.

"You're a madman!" roared Myron. "I want you out of my inn-now!"

Adon scowled. "What's wrong?" he demanded. "Can't you see that Corene and I are here to help you?"

"You mean to get us killed!" snapped Myron. "You insulted the duke's man. I only hope Lord Gorgias will settle for your lives and leave my family alone."

"He won't murder anyone," said Adon.

"It's kind to offer your protection, but you can't stop the duke," said Sarafina. "In Tegea, at least, no cleric can challenge his magic."

"His spells can't be more powerful than Mystra's," said Corene. "No mortal's can."

"Mystra's not here," Myron growled, pushing Adon and his novice toward the exit. "And until you bring her back with you, you're not welcome, either." The innkeeper pushed them off the veranda, then took his daughter and went into the kitchen.

"What's going on here?" asked Corene, staring at the door through which Myron and Sarafina had disappeared.

"I don't know," said Adon, thinking more about his failed spell than Myron's ingratitude. "Did you notice that Mystra didn't respond when I asked for my first spell?"

Corene bit her lower lip and could not quite bring herself to meet Adon's gaze. "Maybe we're in an area of especially wild magic," she suggested. "Since the Time of Troubles, no one's really bothered to map out all the places where the gods' fall made spells unpredictable. Tegea could be-"

"The devoted of Mystra need not refrain from casting spells in areas known for wild magic," Adon said pedantically, then faced the young woman. "You know that as well as I do. Besides, we can both guess why my first spell didn't succeed."

The novice shook her head. "There must be another explanation."

"No. What happened is a sign of Mystra's disappointment in me," he said. "If I don't discover why she's displeased with me before we leave Tegea, I fear I never will."

When the sun rose the next morning, it found Adon standing in the center of Tegea. Behind him, a bubbling spring spilled out of the mountainside to fill a stone basin with cold, clear water. In front of him was a small plaza enclosed by the stone walls of several two-story houses. Dozens of women wearing white blouses and colorful skirts stood in the square, their heads swaddled in black shawls and veils. In their hands, they held the empty wooden buckets they filled each morning at the water basin.

"Mystra's magic will protect you from Lord Gorgias," said Adon, one hand casually resting on the head of his mace. "All I need from you is one who'll trust me to prove it."

When none of the women stepped forward to volunteer, Corene moved into the crowd and touched the veil of a thin woman. "Come now, do you wish to wear these masks for the rest of your lives?"

"What's done is done," said the woman. "Sarafina thought she was too beautiful to marry the duke, and now we must all live with the consequences."

"This is not Sarafina's doing!" boomed Adon. "Lord Gorgias cursed your village, and it's cowardice to blame Sarafina because she won't yield to his demands."

"That's easy enough for you to say," yelled a matronly woman. "You don't live in Tegea."

A chorus of agreement answered from the crowd, then another woman said, "Even if you can help us, what happens when you leave?"

"I'll tell you what happens," said the thin woman. "Lord Gorgias punishes us for defying him."

"No, he won't," said Corene, stepping to her patriarch's side. She gave Adon a dutiful glance, then added, "I'll be staying behind to make sure that doesn't happen."

"A lot of good she'll do us," said the matronly woman, glaring at Adon. "If your idea of bravery is to leave a little girl behind to fight the duke, I want nothing to do with you."

"Inside a week, she'll be scrubbing Lord Gorgias's floors and begging for gruel," called another.

"No!" cried Adon. "With the power of Our Lady, she's strong enough to prevail over any foe-even Lord Gorgias."

From the back of the plaza, a familiar voice called, "Then let her prove it." A narrow lane opened in the crowd, and Sarafina walked forward, a pair of empty water pails in her hands. When she reached the basin, she dropped the buckets at Corene's feet, then reached up to her veil. "If you are strong enough to protect us from Lord Gorgias, then make me beautiful again."

"No, Sarafina!" shouted the matron. "If you ask strangers for help, we'll all pay the price."

"At least we still have our hands to work with," cried another woman. "Don't make Lord Gorgias any angrier, or he'll take those away, too."

The thin woman stepped toward Sarafina. "Haven't you caused enough trouble already?"

"I'm suffering the same as you-probably more so, considering the hardship your anger has caused my family's inn," Sarafina replied. "But the duke is evil, and I'd rather die than marry him."

"There are tortures worse than death," said the thin woman. "And your stubbornness is visiting them upon us all."

"If you prize your appearance so highly, then you marry him," countered Sarafina, ripping off her veil. "As for me, I'll parade my ugliness past all the men of the village before I sell my virtue and yield to the duke."

Adon gasped at what the duke's curse had done to Sarafina's face. From the eyes downward, her appearance was that of a monster. She had shriveled green skin, stretched tight over a dozen bony lumps jutting out from her face. Her nose was hideously pointed and covered with carbuncles, while her lips were frozen into an ugly sneer that revealed a mouthful of jagged, yellow teeth. From her chin sprouted a short gray horn, which curled back toward her throat.

All of these deformities, however, could not hide Sarafina's inner beauty. She held her head high and met Aden's gaze without shame, her strength and determination showing in her unwavering brown eyes. In a steady voice, she asked the patriarch, "Now who's gaping?"

The cleric did not look away. "If I am staring, it's because I am captivated by your spirit," he said honestly, stepping toward her. "It's not because the duke's pitiful mask has engrossed me."

"All the same, the people of Tegea won't trust your novice until she proves her power," said Sarafina, facing Corene. "Give me back what Lord Gorgias has stolen."

Corene cast a nervous glance at her patriarch. Adon nodded at her. "Lift the curse," he said. “Trust in Mystra. You have more than enough power."

The novice's eyes ranged over Adon's scar, then she swallowed hard. "If you think so." She laid a hand on Sarafina's deformed face, then spoke her incantation.

A yellow radiance spread outward from the novice's hand and crept across Sarafina's visage. The young woman's skin returned to its normal swarthy color, and the lumpy protrusions covering her face began to subside. The carbuncles on her nose slowly healed, and her gray horn began to soften and shrink.

An astonished murmur rustled through the crowd.

"You see?" cried Adon, facing the women. "Armed with Mystra's magic, even a novice can undo Lord Gorgias's-"

An alarmed cry from Corene cut his statement short. When Adon looked back, he saw that a gray shadow was replacing the golden luminescence of Corene's magic. As it worked its way over Sarafina's face, the young woman's newly restored beauty was replaced with the hideous mask of Lord Gorgias's curse.

When the shadow touched Corene's fingers, she screamed and pulled away. The grayness followed her hand, quickly gliding up her arm. The terrified novice plunged her hand into the water and desperately tried to scrub the thing off, but her efforts were to no avail. The shadow slipped over her shoulder and onto her face. It lingered there for an instant, then faded away as rapidly as it had appeared.

For a moment, Corene remained where she was, staring into the basin's rippling waters. Then, all at once, a horrified howl escaped her lips and she threw herself at Adon. "Forgive me!" she screeched, wrapping her arms around his chest. "It was your scar. It made me doubt Our Lady!"

Adon pried Corene away and looked at her. From her cheeks downward, her skin had become leathery and shriveled. Her button nose had tripled in size and turned red, with gaping pink nostrils larger than those of a swine. Her lips were covered with black bristles and curled back, while a fringe of silky white wool hung from her jawline.

"I understand," Adon whispered. "Don't worry. I'll set things right."

"How?" demanded the matron. "By staying here yourself?"

The patriarch shook his head. "My duties in Arabel-"

"Then I suggest you return to Arabel right away. Just leave us to our troubles," said the thin woman, moving forward. "Now stand aside so I can fill my bucket."

Corene blocked her path. "You don't understand. This failure was mine, not Mystra's."

"Our Lady of Mysteries is the patroness of magic itself," Adon explained. "No mortal's spell can withstand her power."

A deep voice boomed across the plaza. "But your goddess is not here, and I am!"

A hulking, leather-clad figure lumbered out of the lane. Although he had a hunched back and a gnarled frame, he stood half again taller than any normal man. His legs were thin and so badly bowed that he seemed to scuttle rather than walk. One gaunt arm hung so low that his knuckles dragged on the cobblestones, while the other was twisted and held to his chest at an awkward angle.

The newcomer had a face as horrible as any Adon had ever seen. It was impossibly haggard and covered with cracked, black skin. The figure's brow jutted out so far that it cast an impenetrable shadow over his eyes. His nose was as narrow as a dagger blade, his cheekbones were grotesquely misshaped, and a pair of yellow tusks curled up from beneath his lower lip.

Behind the figure stood Broka, wearing his fur-trimmed cape and purple cummerbund. His face remained covered with boils, and his swollen nose and black eyes suggested that he had suffered a harsh beating after returning to Castle Gorgias last night.

As the women began to scurry for their homes, the seneschal yelled, "Stay! The duke wishes you to see what passes here."

The crowd stopped moving instantly, leaving a wide swath of open plaza between the gruesome figure and the patriarch. Adon stepped away from Sarafina. "Lord Gorgias?"

The duke tipped his head in acknowledgement and scuttled forward. "I've come to thank you for the change in my seneschal," he, said, waving his gangling arm at Broka's ulcerating face. "He's much more interesting to look upon."

"Perhaps to you," Adon allowed.

The duke stopped a dozen steps away. "And now that I have expressed my gratitude, you and your novice must go," he said. "Had you called at my castle when you arrived, you and I might have had an interesting debate regarding the Church of Mysteries-with a few hours on the rack to help you think clearly. As it is, however, I cannot allow you to spread your lies among my villagers."

Adon shook his head. "We won't leave while your curse remains on Tegea."

"Curse! Do you think I would curse the woman I love?" demanded the duke, gesturing in Sarafina's direction. "I'm broadening her sense of beauty, so that she'll appreciate the subtle elegance of my form."

"It's not your form that repulses me!" Sarafina snapped. "I loathe what you are inside."

"And what am I-inside?"

"A tyrant, as cruel as you are vain," said Sarafina. "I'd rather die alone than marry you!"

A forked tongue flickered between the duke's lips. "I wonder if the other women of Tegea share your feelings?"

"No!" screamed several of the women in the square.

"Go with him now, or you'll make widows of us all," ordered the matron, stepping toward Sarafina. Others moved to back her up, but Corene quickly drew her flail and blocked the women's path.

Adon pulled a pinch of yellow brimstone from the pocket of his cloak. He uttered a silent prayer to Mystra, begging her to look favorably on the spell he was preparing to cast, then said, "Lord Gorgias will kill no one."

"Perhaps not-if you're gone by dusk," said the duke, fixing his shadowed eyes on the cleric. "But if you're still here after highsun, every man in this village will die. Mark my words."

"If you threaten others, I've no choice but to strike you down in Mystra's name!"

As the patriarch raised his arms to cast the spell, the women screamed in alarm and fled the plaza. The duke merely smiled while a fiery breach opened in the sky above his head. A pillar of flame crackled down toward his face. He watched it come, laughing wildly.

When the first tongue of flame licked his bony brow, the fiery shaft stopped descending. The blaze fizzled away, and the crimson rift abruptly closed, leaving nothing but a column of gray fumes behind. Within moments, the smoke had disappeared in the breeze. No sign of Adon's spell remained in the sky.

"He worships Cyric!" Corene gasped. "Only someone under the Lord of Strife's protection could withstand Mystra's magic-and do this to a woman's face!" She touched her fingers to her deformed cheek.

"Don't be foolish," scoffed the duke, stepping toward her and Adon. "Your pitiful gods don't interest me. The only being worthy of my adulation is me."

Corene leaped forward, swinging her flail at the duke's ribs. "For the women of Tegea!"

Lord Gorgias allowed the blow to land. It glanced off his leathery hide. Then he grasped Corene by the wrist and uttered an incantation. A soft coat of downy fur immediately sprouted all over her body. Her arms and legs suddenly curled backward against the joints, becoming gnarled, pitiful things that could not even support her weight. She collapsed to the ground, screaming in agony.

Adon wasted no time making another attack, this time drawing his mace. Calling Mystra's name, he leaped forward and swung his weapon toward Lord Gorgias's face. As though transfixed, the duke watched the flanged head arc toward his nose and the patriarch dared to hope he would strike his enemy down with a single blow.

Moving so fast that Adon saw nothing but a blur, Lord Gorgias intercepted the mace and plucked it away. He tossed it aside, then clamped a powerful hand on the patriarch's throat, lifting him off his feet.

"Enough of your foolishness," hissed the duke.

Adon glimpsed Sarafina's lithe form approaching from the side. She was using both hands to swing Corene's flail at the duke's leg. The blow glanced harmlessly off the knee.

"You ally yourself with this stranger against your future husband?" he demanded, glaring down at Sarafina.

She raised the flail and struck again. The duke hardly seemed to notice. Gorgias looked back to Adon. "How did you make Sarafina love you?"

"What she feels for me isn't love," Adon gasped. "It's gratitude for trying to help her."

The duke looked down at the girl. "Is that true?"

She glared back up at his misshaped face. "What I feel for this man is not your concern."

Lord Gorgias turned his shadowy eyes on Adon. "I would kill you now, but I fear that would only make you dearer to Sarafina's heart," he said. "I give you until highsun to show yourself for the coward you are. If you have not left my village by then, Sarafina becomes my wife whether she wishes it or not-and I'll honor my promise to kill every man in this village."

"I'll throw myself into the sea!" Sarafina threatened.

"I think not," the duke replied, glaring down at her. "I will have a woman from your house as a wife. If not you, then your mother."

With that, Lord Gorgias threw Adon into the pool. By the time the cleric had struggled back to his feet, his foe had scuttled halfway across the plaza, Broka's fawning figure trailing a step behind. Sarafina helped the patriarch out of the pool, and they went to where Corene still lay in the street. With her limbs twisted backward and her pained eyes staring straight into the sky, the novice looked more like a fur-covered crab than a young woman. Adon kneeled at her side and once again prayed to Mystra.

"Corene has not failed you," he whispered. "If you are angry, be angry with your patriarch alone! Let me undo the damage I have caused this poor woman. Let me show this village that I am your true servant!"

Adon closed his eyes, laid a hand on Corene's trembling brow, and spoke his incantation.

The novice remained in monstrous form.

Looking skyward, Adon cried, "Why, Mystra? Why did you send me here if you intended to abandon me?"

"Your goddess hasn't abandoned you," Sarafina said, covering her face with her veil. "She can't hear you."

Adon frowned. "Of course she can," he said. "She's the patroness-"

"Of magic, I know," said Sarafina. "But she still can't hear you, not as long as you're in Tegea."

"What are you saying?"

"Will you leave us in peace if I tell you?" she asked. "Lord Gorgias is quite capable of carrying out his threats, and you can't stop him. No one can."

"Mystra wouldn't have sent me here if that were true."

"If it is, will you leave?"

"I came to save Tegea, not destroy it," said Adon. "If I cannot do that, I'll go. But if I think I can stop Lord Gorgias-despite what you reveal about his power-you must promise to help me in any way I ask."

"Done," said Sarafina. She gathered her water pails and began to fill them, at the same time telling Adon the story of Lord Gorgias. "The duke has not always been so ugly- on the inside or the outside. Once, he was quite a handsome young nobleman who cared a great deal for his people."

"What happened?" Adon asked, gathering Corene's twisted form in his arms. She lay silently in the patriarch's comforting embrace.

"It was during the Time of Troubles," Sarafina said. "For the first few days, we were spared much of the wild magic and unnatural beasts caused by the gods' fall. But one day, when we went into the groves to pick olives, we found that Tegea hadn't escaped completely." She shuddered. "The trees bled when we took their olives. Then they shrieked curses at us and tried to club us with their branches. Lord Gorgias came and cast a spell to calm them, but something went wrong. He cloaked the entire mountain with black fog so thick you couldn't see a pace ahead."

Sarafina started up a narrow lane toward her father's inn, motioning for Adon to follow along. "We didn't see Lord Gorgias again until the fog had lifted."

"And when was that?"

"A month after the gods ascended to the heavens again," said Sarafina. "He'd become the monster you see now. Somehow, though, he'd come to believe that he was more handsome than ever. He still believes that."

"This is all very interesting, but there's nothing in what you've said that convinces me Lady Mystra is powerless to help us," Adon said, already puffing from the exertion of carrying Corene up the steep slope.

"I haven't finished," Sarafina replied. Unlike the cleric, she showed no strain at carrying her heavy burden. "After the fog lifted, Gorgias cursed the gods for harming his people and for letting magic become unstable. He cast a spell over the village to hide us from the heavens. We were safe from the gods-but they could no longer hear our pleas. It was as if Tegea had died to them." She paused and turned sad eyes to Adon. "We had a church of Chauntea here, but the priests found they could no longer commune with the Great Mother. They lost their status in Tegea, so they left. When our crops didn't suffer for their leaving, Gorgias said it was only more proof that gods held nothing for us."

"And what did it prove for you?" Adon asked softly.

"That the clerics mustn't have been very holy." She sighed mournfully, making her veil flutter. "They were only interested in being important people in the village. A few other wandering priests have been through here, but they leave when they discover they're cut off from their gods."

"But Corene cast spells to protect the village. You saw her cover Broka's face with boils," Adon noted. "And I summoned that pillar of fire to strike down the duke."

"It's true," Sarafina admitted, "you and Corene are the only clerics who have been able to call upon your goddess for even the most minor magic, but…"

"Go on," Adon prompted kindly.

"Forgive me, Patriarch, but your flames did nothing to the duke." She looked down at the misshapen woman in Adon's arms. "And Lady Corene's magic couldn't save me-or save herself from a fate worse than mine."

Adon stopped walking. "You just might be right," he said softly. "The duke's spell may make it difficult for Mystra to answer our prayers, but I can't give up."

The patriarch laid Corene on the ground and tried again to dispel the magic that had turned her into such a hideous thing. This time, though, Adon prayed only for Corene to be healed, with no thoughts of his own part in bringing her to this sorry state.

The novice's body began to glow with a greenish aura and was quickly swaddled in swirling lights that obscured her from view. For several moments, Adon waited in silent anticipation. When the radiance finally died away, he saw that his spell had worked, more or less. Corene's body had returned to normal, but her face remained disfigured.

Corene returned to her feet, staring at her arms and legs as if seeing them for the first time. "You've saved me!"

"Not entirely," said Sarafina, pointing timidly to her face. "But it will make your journey easier."

"What journey?" Adon demanded. "We're staying. You've seen that I can undo the duke's magic."

"And what of her face?" countered Sarafina, reaching down to stroke the white fleece hanging off Corene's chin. "Her curse isn't so different from mine. You haven't rid her of that."

"If it's the only way I can prove to you I'm right and you should have faith in Mystra, I shall," Adon said.

A yellow glow spread from Adon's hand to engulf the novice's head. For a moment, her features seemed to soften and the hideous lumps began to recede. Then, just as Adon was certain of his victory, a gray shadow started to creep back over Corene's face.

As the lumps began to rise again, Corene backed away, breaking contact with Adon. "Stop, before it affects you too!"

Adon closed his hand and hung his head. "It won't work until Mystra can hear our prayers," he said. 'The duke's curse makes his magic stronger than any I can cast while cut off from Our Lady."

"The only true faith that exists in this village is that which Lord Gorgias places in himself, and it's clear that you're not powerful enough to overcome that on your own," Sarafina said. "You must honor your promise and leave."

Adon did not answer for several moments. Finally he said, "Perhaps you're the one who will have to honor her promise, Sarafina."

The innkeeper's daughter frowned. "What do you mean?"

Adon turned to Corene. "I assume you've studied the spell of true sight recently?"

"Of course, but-"

"Good," Adon said. He looked back to Sarafina and smiled. "I hope there's a mirror in your father's inn."

As it turned out, Sarafina had an ideal mirror. It was just large enough to cover Adon's forearm like a small buckler, yet small enough to support with one hand.

Holding it as though it were a shield, the patriarch stood before the oaken gates of Castle Gorgias, his mace held firmly before him. At his side stood Sarafina, her veil fluttering in the warm breeze. Behind them, waiting at the edge of the cobblestone street, were Corene and Myron. The innkeeper did not approve of Adon's plan, but, at his daughter's insistence, had reluctantly agreed to go along.

Broka's pocked face appeared in the window of the gatehouse. "You still have time to leave, cleric," be cried, peering at the blazing sun. "It's not quite highsun."

"I've come to challenge your ugly master for Sarafina's hand," Adon called. "If he's not too much of a coward, he might win himself a wife this day."

Broka raised a brow at Sarafina. "Is this so?"

"It is," she answered. "If Lord Gorgias wins this combat, my father will offer my hand to him."

She had barely finished speaking before the castle gates crashed open. Lord Gorgias scuttled into the street and glanced at the mirror on Aden's arm. "Do you really think that will protect you?" he snickered.

"You can't hit what you can't see," the cleric answered.

He angled the mirror so that it reflected the sun's brilliant rays into his opponent's eyes and rushed forward. Sarafina fled to her father's side.

"This will be a short combat," the duke promised, his fingers already working to cast a spell. He pointed at the patriarch, his deep voice growling his spell. When his gaze fell on the mirror's silvery surface, though, he stumbled over the syllables of his incantation.

Taking advantage of his enemy's blunder, Adon lashed out at Lord Gorgias. The blow struck him in the head, knocking him senseless. It also made the duke's spell misfire; a black beam shot into the wall of the gatehouse. Amid the clatter of broken stones and crumbling masonry, Broka's death scream rang out as the tower collapsed around him.

Adon thrust his shield toward Lord Gorgias's face. 'Take a good look, hideous duke," he said. "This is your true self-inside and out!"

The duke turned away. "That's not me!" he growled, lashing out. "It's an illusion!"

Adon ducked, then moved around to keep the mirror in front of Lord Gorgias. "You're the one who has been casting illusions, but you've fooled yourself and no one else!"

Lord Gorgias snapped a foot out, catching Adon in the ribs. The cleric stumbled several steps backward before finally falling to the ground. He clutched the mirror to his chest and struggled to draw a breath.

The duke pointed in Sarafina's direction. 'Tonight, you sleep in my bed!" he said, his tusks gnashing in fury.

Adon leaped to his feet and moved forward warily. "The only enchantment on this mirror is a spell of true sight," Adon said, thrusting the silvered glass toward Lord Gorgias's face. "Look!"

The duke peered into the mirror for barely an instant, then whipped his head around so that he would not have to see himself. Adon sprang forward, swinging his mace again and again. Lord Gorgias gasped in pain and a bloody welt rose each time the weapon struck, though any one blow would have killed most normal men.

The duke tried to strike back, flailing his arms and legs about blindly. He landed only glancing blows that bounced harmlessly off Adon's armor. Several times, Lord Gorgias tried to look at the patriarch, but he always glanced away when he saw his own image. Twice, he lashed out at the mirror itself, but the cleric was ready for this tactic and knocked the hand aside with a sharp blow of his mace.

Finally, Lord Gorgias dropped to his knees. "It's me!" he cried, covering his head. "I admit it. That's me."

Adon stood over the cowering duke. "It doesn't have to be," he said. His voice sounded thin and reedy, winded as he was from the fight. "You can change what you see here."

The duke raised his head and stared into the mirror. "Don't you think I've tried?" he demanded, grimacing at the image. "It's impossible!"

"No, it isn't." Adon kept the shield in front of Lord Gorgias. "You have to face this, like you're doing now. Then we can get help."

"Help?" Lord Gorgias asked. He used a filthy-clawed finger to scratch at the image in the glass. "Who can help me escape that?"

"Our Lady of Mysteries."

"No!"

The duke lashed out and plucked the mirror away, then swung his legs around and swept the cleric's feet from beneath him. 'The gods are the ones who did this to me!" Lord Gorgias yelled, throwing himself on Adon.

"Not Mystra," the cleric gasped. "She wasn't even a goddess then."

Lord Gorgias smashed his bony forehead into the cleric's nose. Adon heard cartilage snapping and his cheeks exploded into pain.

"Have a look at yourself!" snickered the duke, holding the mirror over Aden's blood-smeared face.

The patriarch had no choice but to do as Lord Gorgias commanded. His nose had been broken and lay spread across his face, and both eyes were already turning black.

But it was what he did not see that astonished him. The ugly scar on the left side of his face was gone. Yet, when he reached up to touch it, he felt the same cord of rough skin that had been there since the Time of Troubles. It simply was not visible in the mirror.

"Mystra?" the cleric gasped.

Lord Gorgias brought the mirror down. Adon barely managed to throw his arm across his eyes, then his entire face exploded into agony as the glass shattered against him.

A fiery streak shot from across the street, where Corene had been watching the battle with Myron and Sarafina. A magical arrow of flame buried itself into Lord Gorgias's ribs. The shaft continued to sputter for an instant after it struck, filling the air with the acrid stench of burning flesh. The duke cried out, but didn't even glance in the direction from which the attack had come. Instead, he closed his fingers around Adon's throat and began to squeeze.

A dark curtain began to descend inside Adon's mind. He thrust a hand up, sticking his fingers into the smoking hole that Corene's fire arrow had opened. Lord Gorgias tried to pull away, but Adon hung on tight, at the same time uttering an incantation. A wave of unimaginable cold ran down his arm and directly into the wound. With a sizzle, a cloud of red steam shot from the puncture, making the duke scream in agony. He threw himself off the cleric and rolled away, clutching his stomach.

Adon stood and, after wiping the blood from his eyes, retrieved the largest mirror fragment he could find. It was about the size of his hand and shaped like a squat triangle. He walked toward Lord Gorgias cautiously, at the same time enchanting the shard with one of his most powerful spells. The duke struggled to his knees and glared at the cleric.

"Your hatred has consumed you," Adon said, holding the blood-smeared shard toward the duke. "That's what made the monster you see here, not the gods."

"But they abandoned me-and my village! They did this to me! They refused to answer my prayers!"

Lord Gorgias sprang.

Adon tossed the mirror fragment at him, at the same time speaking the command word that triggered the spell it contained. The shard struck the duke's arm and sank deep into his flesh. A silver light flashed from the wound, and Lord Gorgias's anguished voice rang off the castle walls. In the next instant, he vanished.

The mirror triangle tumbled to the ground.

When Adon picked up the shard, it felt so cold that it stung his fingers. No longer was it possible to tell that it had once been part of a mirror, for its smooth surface had become as hard as polished stone. In place of the cleric's reflection was the image of Lord Gorgias, his shadowed eyes glaring out at the world, his tusks gnashing in anger.

The patriarch studied the shard for a long time. He felt a great sense of relief and hope, but also of loss and fear. Today, he had vanquished a monster, but he had also vanquished something even more terrible-something that he'd been afraid to face for many years.

Just before Lord Gorgias had smashed the mirror against his face, Adon had seen himself without his scar. It was then that he had realized why Mystra had sent him to Tegea. The power to remove the scar always lay inside him, just as the ability to defeat the duke had been his all along-if only he turned his gaze outside himself, focused his thoughts on something other than his own petty concerns. The clerics of Chauntea who'd abandoned the village had done so because their own selfish interests had stopped them from breaking the silence the duke had imposed upon their souls. And all the spells that had failed Adon in the last few days had done so because he'd cast them, not to help others, but to prove himself a worthy servant of Mystra.

By the time he realized where he was, Adon had walked back to the center of town. Myron, Corene, and Sarafina were trailing along behind him, keeping a respectful distance from the pensive young patriarch.

Finally Myron came forward. "I didn't believe anyone could banish the duke, but you have." He paused for a moment, then pointed at Castle Gorgias. "Corene and Sarafina are already talking about making a House of Mysteries out of that."

"You'll have plenty of help," Sarafina said from beside the crowded pool in the center of the square.

"Yes, when our husbands return from the fields this evening, they'll be so glad to see us without veils that they'll have it converted before morning," said another.

Dozens of women were filing into the street, all without veils, all smiling broadly. Some had big noses and some double chins, while others were missing teeth and had cheeks as leathery as saddles. Nevertheless, Adon would not have called any of them unattractive. Too him, they were all as beautiful as Corene.

"Well, Corene," Adon said, turning to the novice, "are you looking forward to seeing Arabel again?"

“I’ll be going back with you?" asked Corene, stepping to Adon's side.

"Not exactly," the cleric replied, looking down at her. Her button nose had returned to its normal size, and her pale cheeks had begun to shine with their old radiance. I’ll be staying here. I don't think the spell the duke cast to shield the village from the gods has been lifted entirely. It'll take someone of the right temperament to maintain contact with the Lady once the church is established here."

Corene kissed Adon's cheek. Then, wiping the blood from her lips, she said, "I don't know if it will work, but I could try to heal your nose and those cuts."

"Fine, but leave my scar alone," said Adon.

Sarafina, still hidden behind her veil, stepped up to Adon's side and slipped a slender arm around the patriarch's waist. "I've thought from the start that it gives your face character."

"Maybe you're right," the priest said, laughing. "But I'm not going to spend any more time worrying about it. My concern now is how to help Tegea."

Sarafina lowered her veil and smiled at him. It was the most beautiful thing Adon had ever seen.

Sunrise. Birth of a new day. An awakening of the surface world, filled with the hopes and dreams of a million hearts. Filled, too, I have come painfully to know, with the hopeless labors of so many others.

There is no such event as sunrise in the dark world of my dark elven heritage, nothing in all the lightless Underdark to match the beauty of the sun inching over the rim of the eastern horizon. No day, no night, no seasons.

Surely the spirit loses something in the constant warmth and constant darkness. Surely there, in the Underdark's eternal gloom, one cannot experience the soaring hopes, unreasonable though they might be, that seem so very attainable at that magical moment when the horizon glistens silver with the arrival of the morning sun. When darkness is forever, the somber mood of twilight is soon lost, the stirring mysteries of the surface night are replaced by the factual enemies and very real dangers of the Underdark.

Forever, too, is the Underdark season. On the surface, the winter heralds a time of reflection, a time for thoughts of mortality, of those who have gone before. Yet this is only a season on the surface, and the melancholy does not settle too deep. I have watched the animals come to life in the spring, have watched the bears awaken and the fish fight their way through swift currents to their spawning grounds. I have watched the birds at aerial play, the first run of a newborn colt___

Animals of the Underdark do not dance.

The cycles of the surface world are more volatile, I think. There seems no constant mood up here, neither gloomy nor exuberant. The emotional heights one can climb with the rising sun can be equally diminished as the fiery orb descends in the west. This is a better way. Let fears be given to the night, that the day be full of sun, full of hope. Let anger be calmed by the winter snows, then forgotten in the warmth of spring.

In the constant Underdark, anger broods until the taste for vengeance is sated.

This constancy also affects religion, which is so central to my dark elven kin. Priestesses rule the city of my birth, and all bow before the will of the cruel Spider Queen Lloth. The religion of the drow, though, is merely a way of practical gain, of power attained, and for all their ceremonies and rituals, my people are spiritually dead. For spirituality is a tumult of emotions, the contrast of night and day that drow elves will never know. It is a descent into despair and a climb to the highest pinnacle.

Greater the heights do seem when they follow the depths.

I could not have picked a better day to set out from Mithril Hall, where my dwarven friend, Bruenor Battlehammer, was king once more. For two centuries, the dwarven homeland had been in the hands of evil gray dwarves, the duergar, and their mighty leader, the shadow dragon Shimmergloom. Now the dragon was dead, killed by Bruenor himself, and the gray dwarves had been swept away.

The snow lay deep in the mountains about the dwarven stronghold, but the deepening blue of the predawn sky was clear, the last stubborn stars burning until the very end, until night gave up its hold on the land. My timing was fortunate, for I came upon an easterly facing seat, a flat rock, windblown clear of snow, only moments before the daily event that I pray I never miss.

I cannot describe the tingle in my chest, the soaring of my heart, at that last moment before the yellow rim of Faerun's sun crests the glowing line of the horizon. I have walked the surface world for nearly two decades, but never will I grow tired of the sunrise. To me, it has become the antithesis of my troubled time in the Underdark, the symbol of my escape from the lightless world and evil ways of my kin. Even when it is ended, when the sun is fully up and climbing fast the eastern sky, I feel its warmth penetrating my ebony skin, lending me vitality I never knew in the depths of the world.

So it was this winter's day, in the southernmost spur of the Spine of the World Mountains. I had been out of Mithril Hall for only a few hours, with a hundred miles before me on my journey to Silverymoon, which must be among the most marvelous of cities in all the world. It pained me to leave Bruenor and the others with so much work yet to do in the mines. We had taken the halls earlier that same winter, cleared them of duergar scum and all the other monsters that had wandered in during the two-century absence of Clan Battlehammer. Already the smoke of dwarven furnaces rose into the air above the mountains; already the dwarven hammers rang out in the relentless pursuit of the precious mithril.

Bruenor's work had just begun, especially with the engagement of his adopted human daughter, Catti-brie, to the barbarian lad, Wulfgar. Bruenor could not have been happier, but like so many people I have come to know, the dwarf could not hold fast to that happiness above his frenzy over the many preparations the wedding precipitated, above his unrealistic craving that the wedding be the finest ceremony the northland had ever seen.

I did not point this out to Bruenor. I didn't see the purpose, though the dwarf's incredible workload did temper my desire to leave the halls.

But invitations from Alustriel, the wondrous Lady of Silverymoon, are not easily ignored, especially by a renegade drow so determined to find acceptance among peoples who fear his kind.

My pace was easy that first day out. I wanted to make the River Surbrin and put the largest mountains behind me. It was along those very riverbanks, sometime around mid-afternoon, that I encountered the tracks. A mixed group, perhaps a score, had passed this way, and not too long before. The largest few sets of tracks belonged to ogres. What worried me the most, though, since such creatures are not uncommon and not unexpected in the region, were the smaller bootprints. By their size and shape, I had to believe that these markings had been made by humans, and some seemed to belong to a human child. Even more disturbing, some bootprints were partially covered by monster tracks, while others partially covered monster tracks. They were all made at approximately the same time. Who, then, was the captive, and who the captor?

The trail was not hard to follow. My fears only increased when I spotted some dots of bright red along the path. I took some comfort in the equipment that I carried, though. Catti-brie had loaned me Taulmaril, the Heartseeker, for this, my first journey to Silverymoon. With that powerfully enchanted bow in hand, I continued along, confident that I could handle whatever dangers presented themselves.

I stepped carefully, keeping to the shadows as much as possible and keeping the cowl of my forest-green cloak pulled tight about my face. Still, I knew that I was gaining rapidly, that the band, holding to the riverbank, could not be more than an hour ahead of me. It was time to call upon my most trusted ally.

I took the panther figurine, my link to Guenhwyvar, from my belt pouch and placed it on the ground. My call to the cat was not loud, but it did not have to be, for Guenhwyvar surely recognized my voice. Then came the telltale gray mist, a moment later to be replaced by the black panther, six hundred pounds of fighting perfection.

"We may have some prisoners to free," I said to the cat as I showed Guenhwyvar the trampled trail. As always, Guenhwyvar's growl of understanding reassured me, and together we set off, hoping to discover the enemy before the onset of night.

The first movement came unexpectedly from across the wide expanse of the Surbrin. I went down behind a boulder, Taulmaril pulled and ready. Guenhwyvar's reaction was similarly defensive, the panther crouching behind a stone closer to the river, back legs tamping the ground excitedly. I knew that Guenhwyvar could easily make the thirty foot jump to the other bank. It would take me longer to cross, though, and I feared I could not lend the cat much support from this bank.

Some scrambling across the way showed that we, too, had been spotted, a fact confirmed a moment later when an arrow cut the air above my head. I thought of responding in kind. The archer ducked behind a rock, but I knew that, with Taulmaril, I could probably put an arrow right through that meager stone cover.

I held the shot, though, and bade Guenhwyvar to stay in place. If this was the band I had been tracking, then why had no more arrows whistled out beside the first? Why hadn't the stupid goblin-kin started their typical war-whoops?

"I am no enemy!" I called out, since my position was no secret anyway.

The reply let me ease my pull on the bowstring.

"If you're no enemy, then who might you be?"

This left me in a predicament that only a dark elf on the surface can know. Of course, I was no enemy to these men-farmers, I presumed, who had come out in pursuit of the raiding monster band. We were unknowingly working toward the same goal, but what would these simple folk think when a drow rose up before them?

"I am Drizzt Do'Urden, a ranger and friend of King Bruenor Battlehammer of Mithril Hall!" I called. Off came my hood and out I stepped, wanting this typically tension-filled first meeting to be at an end.

"A stinking drow!" I heard one man exclaim, but another, an older man of about fifty years, told him and the others to hold their shots.

"We're hunting a band of ores and ogres," the older man-I later learned his name to be Tharman-explained.

"Then you are on the wrong side of the river," I called back. "The tracks are here, heading along the bank. I would guess they'll lead to a trail not so far from this point. Can you get across?"

Tharman conferred with his fellows for a moment-there were five of them in all-then signaled for me to wait where I was. I had passed a frozen section of the river, dotted with many large stones, just a short distance back, and it was only a few minutes before the farmers caught up with me. They were raggedly dressed and poorly armed, simple folk and probably no match for the merciless ores and ogres that had passed this way. Tharman was the only one of the group who had seen more than thirty winters. Two of the farmers looked as if they had not yet seen twenty, and one of these didn't even show the stubble common to the road-weary faces of the others.

"Ilmater's tears!" one of them cried in surprise as the group neared. If the sight of a dark elf was not enough to put them on their nerves, then the presence of Guenhwyvar certainly was.

The man's shouted oath startled Guenhwyvar. The panther must have thought the plea to the God of Suffering a threat of some kind, for she flattened her ears and showed her tremendous fangs.

The man nearly fainted, and a companion beside him tentatively reached for an arrow.

"Guenhwyvar is a friend," I explained. "As am I."

Tharman looked to a rugged man, half his age and carrying a hammer better suited to a smithy than a war party. The younger man promptly and savagely slapped the nervous archer's hand away from the bow. I could discern already that this brute was the leader of the group, probably the one who had bullied the others into coming into the woods in the first place.

Though my claim had apparently been accepted, the tension did not fly from the meeting, not at all. I could smell the fear, the apprehension, emanating from these men, Tharman included. I noticed the younger farmers gripping more tightly to their weapons. They would not move against me, I knew-that was one benefit of the savage reputation of my heritage. Few wanted to wage battle against dark elves. And even if I had not been an exotic drow, the farmers would not have attacked with the mighty panther crouched beside me. They knew that they were overmatched, and they knew, too, that they needed an ally, any ally, to help them in their pursuit.

Five men, farmers all, poorly armed and poorly armored. What in the Nine Hells did they expect to do against a band of twenty monsters, ogres included? Still, I had to admire their courage, and I could not discount them as foolish. I believed that the raiders had taken prisoners. If those unfortunates were these men's families, their children perhaps, then their desperation was certainly warranted, their actions admirable.

Tharman came forward, his soil-stained hand extended. I must admit that the greeting, nervous but sincerely warm, touched me. So often have I been met with taunts and bared weapons! "I have heard of you," he remarked.

'Then you have the advantage," I replied politely, grasping his wrist.

Behind him, the sturdy man narrowed his eyes angrily. I was surprised somewhat; my benign remark had apparently injured his pride. Did he think himself a renowned fighter?

Tharman introduced himself, and the tough leader immediately rushed forward to do likewise. "I am Rico," he declared, coming up to me boldly. "Rico Pengallen of the village Pengallen, fifteen miles to the south and east." The obvious pride in his voice caused Tharman to wince and set off silent alarms that this Rico might bring trouble when we had caught up with the monsters.

I had heard of Pengallen, though I had only marked it by its evening lights from a distance. According to Bruenor's maps, the village was no more than a handful of farmhouses. So much for the hopes that any organized militia would soon arrive.

"We were attacked early last night, just after sunset," Rico continued, roughly nudging the older man aside. "Ores and ogres, as we've said. They took some prisoners-"

"My wife and son," Tharman put in, his voice full of anxiety.

"My brother as well," said another.

I spent a long while considering that grim news, trying to find some consolation I could offer to the desperate men. I did not want their hopes to soar, though, not with ogres and ores holding their loved ones and with the odds apparently so heavily weighted against us.

"We are less than an hour behind," I explained. "I had hoped to spot the group before sunset. With Guenhwyvar beside me, though, I can find them night or day."

"We're ready for a fight," Rico declared. It must have been my expression-perhaps it was unintentionally condescending-that he did not like, for he slapped his hammer across his open palm and practically bared his teeth with his ensuing snarl.

"Let us hope it will not come to a fight," I said. "I have some experience with ogres and with ores. Neither are overly adept at setting guards."

"You mean to simply slip in and free our kin?"

Rico's barely tempered anger continued to surprise me, but when I turned to Tharman for some silent explanation, he only slipped his hands into the folds of his worn traveling cloak and looked away.

"We will do whatever we must to free the prisoners," I said.

"And to stop the monsters from returning to Pengallen," Rico added roughly.

"They can be dealt with later," I replied, trying to convince him to solve one problem at a time. A word to Bruenor would have sent scores of dwarves scouring the region, stubborn and battle-ready warriors who would not have stopped their hunting until the threat had been eliminated.

Rico turned to his four comrades, or, more accurately, he turned away from me. "Guess we're following a damned drow elf," he said.

I took no offense. Certainly I had suffered worse treatment than the blustery insults, and this desperate band, with the exception of Rico, seemed pleased enough to have found any ally, regardless of the color of my skin.

The enemy camp did not prove difficult to locate. We found it on our side of the river, as twilight settled on the land. Conveniently-or rather, stupidly-the monsters had set a blazing fire to ward off the winter night's cold.

The light of the bonfire also showed me the layout of the encampment. There were no tents, just the fire and a few scattered logs propped on stones for benches. The land was fairly flat, covered with a bed of river-polished stones and dotted by boulders and an occasional tree or bush. Pig-faced ore sentries were in place north and south of the fire, holding crude, but wicked, weapons in their dirty hands. I assumed that similar guards were posted to the west, away from the river. The prisoners, seeming not too badly injured, huddled together behind the blaze, their backs against a large stone. There were four, not three: the two boys and the farmer's wife joined by a surprisingly well-dressed goblin. At the time, I didn't question the presence of this unexpected addition. I was more concerned with simply finding a way in and a way out.

"The river," I whispered at length. "Guenhwyvar and I can get across it without being seen. We can scout the camp better from the other side."

Rico was thinking the same thing-after a fashion. "You come in from the east, across the river, and we'll hit them hard on this flank."

His scowl widened as I shook my head. This Rico just did not seem able to comprehend that I meant to get the prisoners without an all-out fight.

"I will get at them from across the river with Guenhwyvar beside me," I tried to explain. "But not until the fire has burned low."

"We should go at them while the light is bright," Rico argued. "We aren't like you, drow." He spat the word derisively. "We can't see in the dark."

"But I can," I retorted rather sharply, for Rico was beginning to bother me more than a little. "I can get in, free the prisoners, and strike at the sentries from behind, hopefully without alerting their fellows. If things go well, we will be far from here before the monsters even realize that their prisoners are gone."

Tharman and the other three men were nodding their agreement with the simple plan, but Rico remained stubborn.

"And if things do not go well?"

"Guenhwyvar and I should be able to keep the monsters confused enough so that you and your freed kin can get away. I do not believe that the monsters will even attempt to pursue you, not if they think that their prisoners were stolen by dark elves."

Again I saw Tharman and the others nodding eagerly, and when Rico tried to find a new argument, the older man put a hand firmly on his burly shoulder. Rico shrugged it away, but said nothing more. I did not find much comfort in his silence, not when I looked at the hatred deeply etched on his stubbly face.

Crossing the half-frozen river proved easy enough. Guenhwyvar simply leaped across its width. I followed, picking a careful path along the ice. I did not want to depend wholly upon such a fragile bridge, though, so I chose a course to the opposite bank that offered the most prominent stones.

My new perspective on the enemy camp from across the river revealed some potential problems-more precisely, the gigantic ogres, standing twice my height. Their skin shone dull and dark in the flickering firelight, prominent warts shining darker, and their long, matted hair shone bluish black. There were two at least, squatting amidst a tumble of boulders to the north of the prisoners. The prisoners themselves faced the river, faced me, their backs against the stone, and now I saw another guarding ore, sitting with its back flat against the north face of the same stone. A bared sword lay across its lap. Having often witnessed the brutal tactics of ores, I figured that this guard was under orders to slip around the stone and slaughter the prisoners if trouble came. That ore presented the most danger, I decided. Its throat would be the first I slit this night.

All that was left for preparation was to sit low and wait for the fire to dim, wait for the camp to grow sleepy with boredom.

Barely half an hour later, angry whispers began to drift to me from across the river-but not from the enemy camp. I could not believe what I was hearing; Rico and the others were arguing! Fortunately, the two ore guards nearest the men's hiding place did not react at once. I could only hope that their ears, not nearly as keen as my own, had not picked up on the slight sound.

Another few moments slipped by, and, thankfully, the voices went silent once more. I did not relax. My instincts warned me that something drastic would soon happen, and Guenhwyvar's low growl confirmed the feeling.

At that critical moment, I did not want to believe that Rico could be so incredibly foolish, but my instincts and warrior senses overruled what my mind refused to believe. I had Taulmaril off my shoulder, an arrow nocked, and searched out again the exact route that would get me quickly across the water.

The two ores of the southern watch began to shift nervously and converse with each other in their guttural language. I watched them closely, but more closely I kept my attention on the ore nearest the prisoners. I watched the ogres as well, by far the more dangerous foes. An eight-hundred-pound, ten-foot-tall ogre might not be easily or quickly felled by my scimitars, though a well-aimed strike by Taulmaril could bring one crashing down. Still, my whole plan was predicated on getting the prisoners out without the ogres ever knowing-a battle with those brutes could cost me more time than I, or the prisoners, had to spare.

Then my plan unraveled before my eyes.

One of the orcish sentries yelled something. The ore beside him put an arrow into the bushes shielding the farmers. Predictably, the sword-wielding guard was up in an instant, right beside the helpless prisoners. The ogres in the boulder tumble were stirring, but they seemed more curious than alarmed. I still held out some hope that the situation could be salvaged-until I heard Rico's cry for a charge.

There is a time in every battle when a warrior must let go of his conscious thoughts, must let his instincts guide his moves, must trust in those instincts fully and not waste precious time in questioning them. I had only one shot to stop the sword-wielding ore from killing the nearest prisoner, Tharman's wife. The creature's blade was up in the air when I let fly the arrow, its powerful enchantment trailing a silver streak as it flashed across the Surbrin.

I think I got him in the eye, but wherever the missile actually hit, the ore's head was virtually blown apart. The creature flew back into the darkness, and I started across the river, finding what steps I could without taking my attention from the opposite bank.

The ores nearest the farmers fired their bows again, then drew out weapons for close melee. And though I did not bother to look, I knew that Rico was leading a charge. The three ores to the north cried out and looked to the river, trying to figure out what had killed their companion. How vulnerable I felt out there, with only emptiness about me, moving slowly as I picked my careful way! Those fears proved valid, for the ores spotted me almost immediately. I saw their bows come up to fire.

Perhaps the guards could not see me clearly, or perhaps their aim was simply not as good as mine. Whatever the reason, their hasty first shots went wide. I paused in my frantic charge and returned two arrows of my own; one hit home, its tremendous force throwing the middle ore of the three back and to the ground. I heard an arrow whistle by my ear, just inches away. I think Guenhwyvar, leaping past me, took the next, for I never heard it and, by the luck of the gods, never felt it.

Guenhwyvar hit the bank ahead of me and completely shifted her momentum, sleek muscles pulling hard, bringing the panther about. I had seen Guenhwyvar execute maneuvers like this a hundred times, yet my breath, as always, was stolen away. The cat's flight was directly westward, but as soon as her paws touched down, without a single extra step forward, she cut an incredible pivot to the north and fell upon the archers before they had another arrow out of their quivers.

To my relief, I heard the sounds of battle joined to the south as Rico and the others clashed with the ores. They had stirred up this hornets' nest. At least they were going to share in the task of putting it right.

I saw the ogres get up then-four, not two-and I let loose another arrow. It got the leading brute in the chest, tearing through the dirty hides the giant wore and burying itself to its silver fletchings. To my amazement and horror the smelly creature continued on for a few steps. Then it fell to its knees, stunned, but not dead. As it slid to the ground, it looked about curiously, as though it had no idea what had stopped its charge.

I had time for one more shot before I reached the bank, and I wanted desperately to kill another ogre. But an ore appeared behind the prisoners, and its evil intentions were obvious as it lifted its cruel sword over the children's heads.

The ore was turned sideways to me. I shot it in the nearest shoulder, the arrow blasting right through to the opposite shoulder. The ore was still alive when it fell to the ground, flopping helplessly with no use of either arm.

It seems strange to me now, but I remember that when I at last made the opposite bank, dropping the bow and drawing my scimitars, I was truly concerned that I might lose Taulmaril. I even thought of the scolding Catti-brie would give to me when I returned to Mithril Hall without her precious weapon! The images were fleeting, though, a needed diversion until battle was rejoined.

Twinkle, the blade in my right hand, flared an angry blue, aptly reflecting the fires within me. My other scimitar flared bluish white light, a testament to the winter's chill, for the blade would only glow when the air about it was very cold.

The three remaining ogres came at me in no concerted way-whenever I battle such strong but stupid beasts I am reminded of how powerful they would surely be if they could find some order to overrule their natural chaos.

They had erred in their charge, for the lead ogre was too far ahead of its companions. I came in faster than the monster expected, charging low. Twinkle banged hard against one kneecap, and my other blade dug a gash into the opposite thigh as I passed between the huge legs and dived into a headlong roll. The ogre tried to stop abruptly-too abruptly-and it skidded to a jerking halt on the smooth, polished stones.

It fell to a seated position just as I came up to my feet behind it. One does not get many opportunities for so clear a strike at an ogre's head, and I took full advantage, slamming Twinkle hard against the beast's skull, cutting one ear almost exactly in half.

The blow didn't kill the hulking thing, but it was stunned. Before the ogre could recover, I leaped up, caught a foothold on its shoulder, and sprang off, soaring straight for the next brute's face. The move caught this second ogre by complete surprise. Its formidable club was postured for a low defense. It couldn't possibly get the heavy weapon up in time to block.

Twinkle slashed across the side of the ogre's thick neck as my other blade bit into its cheek, tearing away the skin so that the monster's black teeth gleamed in the starlight. Neither wound was mortal, though, and I feared that I was in serious trouble when the monster wrapped its free arm around my back, pulling me in tight against its massive chest. Fortunately, my right arm was angled so that I managed to pull back Twinkle and get the scimitar's point in line. I drove in with all my strength, knowing that I needed a quick kill, for my sake and for the sake of the helpless prisoners.

The magical blade slipped through the ogre flesh, nicking off a rib that must have been as thick as a fair-sized tree trunk, and then probed deeper. I actually felt the throbbing as Twinkle found the ogre's heart, the violent pumping nearly pulling the scimitar's hilt from my grasp.

I'd needed the quick kill, and I got it. The ogre gasped once, and we tumbled together to the ground. I was away in an instant, the dying ogre taking the club hit its remaining companion had intended for me.

The battle was far from won, though. This last standing ogre crouched low, poised and ready. Even worse, both the brute I had shot with the arrow and the one whose ear I had split were not dead. Stubbornly, they were trying to rise, to get themselves back into the battle.

I took some comfort when Guenhwyvar raced past me again, right between me and my newest opponent. I thought the cat was going to finish one of the wounded ogres, but Guenhwyvar went right past the struggling monsters and leaped over the terrified, huddled prisoners. I understood why when I heard the twang of bows; the ore guards from the west had arrived. There came a thunderous roar, followed, predictably, by terrified screams.

It would take more than a few orcish arrows to slow mighty Guenhwyvar.

I noticed, too, when I glanced to the side, that the goblin prisoner was up and running, fleeing into the night. I took little note of the creature, having no idea then of how profoundly this particular goblin would affect my life.

All thoughts of cowardly goblins disappeared as the unwounded ogre drew me back into the battle. It got in the first swing, the first two or three, actually. I kept on the defensive, picking my openings carefully. As I expected, the ogre's frustration mounted with every miss. Its attacks grew more wild, more open to counters. I had hit the brute four times, cutting painful, if not too serious, wounds in its hide, when I noticed the ogre with the split ear starting to rise.

My opponent swung again and again, forcing me to dodge. I rushed in for a quick and furious flurry of stinging strikes, pushing him back on the heels of his huge feet. Then I turned and rushed the groggy ogre. The beast lifted its great club pitifully, hardly having recovered the strength to line the weapon up at all. Its swing was slow and clumsy, and I easily stepped back out of danger. I followed the club in on its follow-through, slashing wildly with both scimitars. How many lines of blood I drew on that ogre's face, I do not know. In barely an instant, the monster's features all seemed lost in a gory mass.

I scanned the camp as the huge corpse fell away, and was heartened, for the ogre with the arrow in its chest had given up the fight, had given up everything. It lay facedown, so very still that I knew it was dead.

That left only the one behind me, slightly wounded. I knew I could beat any ogre in an even fight, knew that it would never get close to hitting me if I kept my concentration absolute. Always eager to battle such vile creatures, I admit an instant of regret when I turned around and found, that the ogre had run off into the night.

The tinge of regret disappeared when I remembered the prisoners. To my relief, the ores in the south had been defeated by the five farmers, with only one of the men, the youngest, showing any wounds at all. Rico wore a smug expression, one I dearly wanted to pound from the boastful man's face.

Guenhwyvar came trotting back into the camp a moment later at an easy gait, the western area secured. The panther showed a couple of small wounds from orcish arrows, but nothing serious. Thus the fight ended, three ogres and eight ores dead, another ogre and perhaps a half-dozen ores fleeing into the night. A complete victory, for not a single companion had been slain.

Still, I could not help but consider that this battle needn't have happened at all. Any thoughts I held of berating Rico did not remain for long, though, not with the ensuing greetings between Tharman and his family, between another of the farmers and his lost younger brother.

"Where is Nojheim?" Rico demanded. His callous tone surprised me. If he'd lost some kin, a child or a sibling, I would have expected sorrow. But I heard no sorrow behind the man's question, only a desperate anger, as though he had been insulted.

The farmers exchanged confused glances, with all gazes finally coming to rest on me.

"Who is Nojheim?" I asked.

"A goblin," Tharman explained.

"There was a goblin among the prisoners," I told them. "He slipped out during the fight, heading northwest."

"Then we go on," Rico said without the slightest hesitation, without the slightest regard for the beleaguered prisoners. I thought his request absurd; could a single goblin be worth the pains of this man, woman, and boy who had gone through such trials?

"The night grows long," I said to him, my tone far from congenial. "Bring the fire back up and tend to your wounded. I will go after the missing goblin."

"I want him back!" Rico growled. He must have understood my confused and fast-angering expression, for he calmed suddenly and tried to explain.

"Nojheim led a group of goblins that attacked Pengallen several weeks ago," he said and glanced around at the others. "The goblin is a leader, and will likely return with allies.

We were holding him for trial when the newest raiders came."

I had no reason not to take Rico's claims at face value- except that it seemed odd to me that farmers of the small village, so often besieged by the many monsters of the wild region would go to the trouble of holding a trial for the sake of a goblin. The hesitating (or was it fearful?) expressions of those other farmers, particularly of Tharman, also gave me pause, but I dismissed their apparent reservations as fear that Nojheim would return with a sizable force behind him and lay waste to their vulnerable village.

"I am in no hurry to get to Silverymoon," I assured them. "I will capture Nojheim and return him to Pengallen on the morrow." I started off, but Rico grabbed my shoulder and turned me about to face him.

"Alive," he snarled. I did not like the sound of it. I have never held any reservations about dealing harsh justice to goblins, but Rico's cruel tone seemed to tell of a thirst for vengeance. Still, I had no reason to doubt the burly farmer, no reason to argue against the accepted code of justice of Pengallen. Guenhwyvar and I were away in a moment, tracking to the northwest, easily finding the trail of the fleeing Nojheim.

The chase took longer than I'd expected. We found the tracks of some ore stragglers crossing those of Nojheim, and I decided it to be more important to prevent the ores from getting back to their lair, where they might find some reinforcements. We found them, just three, a short while later. Using the Heartseeker, so marvelous a bow, I finished the beasts from a distance in a matter of three quick shots.

Then Guenhwyvar and I had to backtrack, rejoin Nojheim's trail, and head off into the darkness once more. Nojheim proved to be an intelligent adversary, which was consistent with Rico's claim that he was a leader among his wretched race. The goblin doubled back constantly and climbed among the wide-spread branches of several trees, coming down far from his original trail and heading in an altered direction. Ultimately, he made for the river, the one barrier that might defeat pursuit.

It took all my training as a ranger and all the help of Guenhwyvar's feline senses to close ground before the goblin got across to safety. I admit in all honesty that if Nojheim had not been so weary from his ordeal at the hands of the merciless raiders, he might have eluded us altogether.

When we at last reached the riverbank, I used my innate ability-common to the Underdark races-to view objects by their emanating heat, not their reflected light. I soon spotted the warm glow of a form inching across a rock walkway, picking his strides carefully. Not trusting the obvious limitations of infravision, where shapes are indistinct and details revealed only as patterns of heat, I lifted Taulmaril and loosed a streaking arrow. It skipped off a stone and hit the water just a few feet ahead of the goblin, making him slip one leg hip-deep into the icy flow. The lightninglike flash of silver left no doubt as to the goblin's identity. I rushed for the stone crossing.

Guenhwyvar flew by me. I was halfway across the bridge, running as swiftly as I dared, when I heard the panther growl from the darkness beyond, heard the goblin cry out in distress. "Hold, Guenhwyvar!' I called out, not wanting the panther to tear the creature apart.

The slight, yellow-skinned Nojheim was on the ground, pinned by huge paws, when I caught up to them. I ordered Guenhwyvar back, and even as the panther moved away, Nojheim rolled about and grabbed for my boot with his long, spindly arms, his hands still showing the remnants of torn leather bindings.

I nearly slammed him with the butt of my scimitar, but before I could react, I found the pitiful Nojheim slobbering kisses all over my boots.

"Please, my good master," he whined in his annoying, high-pitched voice, so typical of goblins. "Please, oh, please! Nojheim not run. Nojheim scared, scared of big, ugly ogres with big clubs. Nojheim scared."

It took me a few moments to recover my wits. Then I hoisted the goblin to his feet and ordered him to be silent.

Standing there, looking down into Nojheim's ugly, flat face and sloping forehead, his gleaming yellow eyes and squashed nose, it took all of my control to hold back my weapons. I am a ranger, a protector of the goodly races from the many evil races of Faerun, and among those evil races, I name goblins as my most hated enemy.

"Please," he repeated pitifully.

I slid my weapons away, and Nojheim's wide mouth stretched with a strained smile, showing his many small but sharp teeth.

It was nearly dawn by this time and I wanted to be off right away for Pengallen, but Nojheim was half-frozen from his stumble into the river. I could see by his crooked stance that the goblin's drenched leg had little or no feeling in it.

As I have said, I hold no love for goblins and normally offer them no mercy. If Nojheim had precipitated a raid on my own community, I would have put a second arrow in the air before he had ever lifted his leg from the river, ending the whole affair. But I was bound now by my oath to the farmers, and so I set a blazing fire, allowing the goblin to warm up his numbed limb.

Nojheim's actions when I had first caught him continued to bother me, continued to raise quandaries in my mind. I questioned him early the next morning, after I had released Guenhwyvar back to rest on the Astral Plane. The goblin would say nothing. He just took on a resigned expression and looked away from me whenever I tried to address him. So be it, I told myself. It was not my concern.

Later that afternoon, we arrived in Pengallen, a cluster of about a dozen one-story wooden houses set in the middle of a flat field cleared of the common trees and surrounded by a high picket wall. The others had come in a few hours earlier, and Rico had apparently warned the two gate guards manning the village wall of my impending approach. They did not immediately allow me entry, though they were far from inhospitable, and so I waited. Rico was there in a few moments. Apparently he had left word that he should be summoned when I arrived.

The burly man's expression had changed much from the previous night. No longer was his square jaw set in a grimace, revealing Rico's happiness at the turn of events. Even his wide-set blue eyes seemed to smile as he regarded me and my prisoner, all the lines on his ruddy face tilting upward.

"You've been generous with your aid," he said to me, looping a rope about Nojheim's neck the way some in crowded villages leash their dogs. "I know that you have business in Silverymoon, so let me give you my assurance that all is well in Pengallen once more."

I had the distinct feeling that I had just been summarily dismissed.

"Please take a meal at our inn," Rico quickly added, motioning for me to go through the now-open gate. Had my confusion been that obvious? "A meal and a drink," he added cheerfully. 'Tell the barkeep, Aganis, that I will pay."

My intention had been to deliver the prisoner and head off at once, trying to get a good start on my way to Silvery-moon. I was anxious to see the wondrous city on the River Rauvin, to walk freely with the blessings of the ruling lady along the marvelous curving boulevards, to visit the many museums and the unparalleled library. My instincts told me to go in for that meal, though. Something about this whole scenario wasn't quite right.

Aganis, a barrel-shaped, thick-bearded, and oft-smiling man, was indeed surprised to see the likes of a dark elf enter his establishment, a larger two-story building set in the middle of the village's back wall. The place served as inn, trading post, and a variety of other public functions. As soon as he got over his initial reaction-I suppose that terror-stricken is the only word to properly describe his expression-he became quite anxious to please me, at least, judging from the large portions he set before me, portions far larger than those of a farmer sitting not so far down the end of the bar.

I let the obvious pandering go without comment. It had been a long night and I was hungry.

"So you're Drizzit Do'Urden?" the farmer at the end of the bar asked. He was an older man with thinning gray hair and a wizened face that had seen countless days under the sun.

Aganis blanched at the question. Did he think I would take offense and tear apart his place of business?

"Drizzt," I corrected, looking to the man.

"Jak Timberline," the man said. He extended his hand, then retracted it and wiped it on his shirt before putting it back out. "I've heard of you, Drizzt." He took extra care to pronounce the name correctly, and I'll admit, I was flattered. "They say you're a ranger."

I accepted the shake firmly, and my smile was wide, I am sure.

"I'll tell you right here, Drizzt-" again, the extra care with the name "-I don't care what color a fellow's skin might be. I heard of you, heard good things about what you and your friends've done up in Mithril Hall."

His compliment was a bit condescending, and poor Aganis blanched again. I took no offense, though, accepting Jak's clumsiness as inexperience. The greeting was actually quite tactful, weighed against so many others I have received since I came to the surface world-so many others that took place at the end of a drawn weapon.

"It is a good thing that the dwarves have reclaimed the halls," I agreed.

"And a good thing, too, that you happened by Rico's group," Jak added.

"Tharman was a happy soul this morning," put in the nervous barkeep.

It seemed so normal to me, and you have to understand that I was used to anything but normal in my dealings with the various surface races.

"Did you get Rico back his slave?" Jak asked bluntly.

My last bite of food suddenly refused to go down my throat.

"Nojheim," Jak explained. "The goblin."

I had seen slavery in all its brutality in Menzoberranzan, the city of my birth. Dark elves kept many slaves of many races, working them brutally until they were no longer useful, then torturing them, butchering them, breaking their bodies as they had broken their spirits. I had always felt slavery to be the most repulsive of acts, even when practiced against the so-called unredeemable races, such as goblins and ores.

I nodded in answer to Jak, but my sudden grimace put the man off. Aganis nervously cleaned the same plate several times, all the while staring at me and occasionally putting his towel up to wipe his sweaty brow.

I finished the meal without much more conversation, except to innocently discover which farmhouse belonged to Rico. I wanted no answers from these two. I wanted to see for myself what I had done.

I was outside Rico's fenced-in yard by dusk. The farmhouse was a simple structure of boards and logs, mud patted in against the cracks to keep the wind out and a roof angled to handle the winter snows. Nojheim was going about his chores-unshackled, I noticed-but no one else was in sight. I did see the curtains of the single window on this side of the farmhouse move a few times. Rico, or one of his family, was probably keeping an eye out for the goblin.

When he was done tending to a goat tied near the house, Nojheim considered the darkening sky and went into the small barn, barely more than a shed, a short distance from the house. Through the many cracks of this rough structure, I saw the light of a fire come up a moment later.

What was this all about? I could not reconcile any of it. If Nojheim had initially come to Pengallen at the head of a raiding force, then why was he allowed such freedom? He could have taken a brand from that fire he had burning in the barn and set the main house ablaze.

I decided not to get my answers from Rico-decided, since I knew in my heart what was going on, that I would get no honest answers from him.

Nojheim went into his pitiful slobbering as soon as I walked into the shadows of the dimly lit barn.

"Please, oh, please," he whined in his squeaky goblin voice, his fat tongue smacking against his lips.

I pushed him away, and my anger must have been obvious, for he suddenly sat quietly across the fire from me, staring into the orange and yellow flames.

"Why did you not tell me?"

He glanced up at me curiously, his expression a clear image of resignation.

"Did you lead a raid against Pengallen?" I pressed.

He looked back to the flames, his face twisted incredulously as though that question should not even be justified with an answer. And I believed him.

"Then why?" I demanded, shifting over to grab his shoulder and force him to look me in the eye. "Why did you not tell me Rico's reason for wanting you back?"

"Tell you?" he balked. His goblin accent had suddenly flown. "A goblin tell Drizzt Do'Urden of his plight? A goblin appeal to a ranger for compassion?"

"You know my name?" By the gods, he even pronounced it correctly.

"I have heard great tales of Drizzt Do'Urden, and of Bruenor Battlehammer and the fight to reclaim Mithril Hall," he replied, and again, his command of the proper inflections of the language was astounding. "It is common talk among the farmers of the lower valleys, all of them hoping that the new dwarven king will prove generous with his abundant wealth."

I sat back from him. He just continued to stare blankly at the flames, his eyes lowered. I do not know exactly how much time passed in silence. I do not even know what I was thinking.

Nojheim was perceptive, though. He knew.

"I accept my fate," he replied to my unspoken question, though there was little conviction in his voice.

"You are no ordinary goblin."

Nojheim spat on the fire. "I do not know that I'm a goblin at all," he answered. If I had been eating at the time, I surely would have choked once more.

"I am like no goblin I've ever met," he explained with a hopeless chuckle. Always resigned, I thought, so typical of his helpless predicament. "Even my mother … she murdered my father and my younger sister." He snapped his fingers to mock his next point, to accentuate the sarcasm in his voice. 'They deserved it, by goblin standards, for they hadn't properly shared their supper with her."

Nojheim went silent and shook his head. Physically, he was indeed a goblin, but I could tell already by the sincerity of his tone that he was far different in temperament from his wicked kin. The thought shook me more than a little. In my years as a ranger, I had never stopped to question my actions against goblins, never held back my scimitars long enough to determine if any of them might possibly be of a different demeanor than I had come to know as typical of the normally evil creatures.

"You should have told me that you were a slave," I said again.

"I'm not proud of that fact."

"Why do you sit in here?" I demanded, though I knew the answer immediately. I, too, had once been a slave, a captive of wicked mind flayers, among the most evil of the Under-dark's denizens. There is no condition so crippling, no torment so profound. In my homeland, I had seen a contingent of a hundred ores held under complete control by no more than six drow soldiers. If they had mustered a common courage, those ores could surely have destroyed their keepers. But while courage is not the first thing to be stripped from a slave, it is certainly among the most important.

"You do not deserve this fate," I said more softly.

"What do you know of it?" Nojheim demanded.

"I know that it is wrong," I said. "I know that something should be done."

"I know that I would be hung by my neck if I tried to break free," he said bluntly. "I have never done any harm to any person or any thing. Neither do I desire to harm anyone. But, this is my lot in life."

"We are not bound by our race," I told him, finding some conviction finally in remembering my own long trail from the dark ways of Menzoberranzan. "You said that you have heard tales of me. Are they what you might expect of a dark elf?"

"You are drow, not goblin," he said, as if that fact explained everything.

"By your own words, you are no more akin to goblins than I am to drow," I reminded him.

"Who can tell?" he replied with a shrug, a helpless gesture that pained me deeply. "Am I to tell Rico that I am not a goblin in heart and action, just a victim of merciless fate? Do you think that he would believe me? Do you think that sort of understanding is within the grasp of these simple farmer folk?"

"Are you afraid to try?" I asked him.

"Yes!" His intensity was surprising. "I'm not Rico's first slave," he said. "He's held goblins, ores, even a bugbear once. He enjoys forcing others to do his own work, you see. Yet, how many of these other slaves did you see when you came into Rico's compound, Drizzt Do'Urden?"

He knew that I had not seen any, and I was not surprised by his explanation. I was beginning to hate this Rico Pengallen more than a little.

"Rico finished with them," Nojheim went on. 'They lost their ability to survive. They lost their usefulness. Did you notice the high cross-pole beside the front gate?"

I shuddered when I pictured what use that cross-pole might have been put to.

"I'm alive, and I'll stay alive," Nojheim declared. Then, for the first time, the determined goblin allowed his guard to slip down, his sullen expression betraying his words.

"You wish that the raiding ogres would have killed you," I said to him, and he offered no argument.

For some time we sat in silence, silence that weighed heavily on both of us. I knew that I could not let this injustice stand, could not turn my back on one-even a goblin- who so obviously needed help. I considered the courses open to me and came to the conclusion that to truly remedy this injustice, I must use what influence I could. Like most of the farming villages in the region, Pengallen was not an independent community. The people here were within the general protection of, and therefore, under the overseeing law of the greater cities nearby. I could appeal to Alustriel, who ruled Silverymoon, and to Bruenor Battlehammer, the nearest king and my dearest friend.

"Perhaps some day I will find the strength to stand against Rico," Nojheim said unexpectedly, pulling me from my contemplations. I remember his next words vividly. "I am not a courageous goblin. I prefer to live, though oftentimes I wonder what my life is truly worth."

My father could have said those very words. My father, Zak'nafein, too, was a slave, though a slave of a different sort. Zak'nafein lived well in Menzoberranzan, but he detested the dark elves and their evil ways. He saw no escape, though, no way out of the drow city. For lack of courage, he lived his life as a drow warrior, survived by following those same codes that were so abhorrent to him.

I tried to remind Nojheim again that I had escaped a similar fate, that I had walked out of a desperate situation. I explained that I had traveled among peoples who surely hated me and feared me for the reputation of my heritage.

'You are drow, not any goblin," he replied again, and this time I began to understand the meaning behind his words. "They will never understand that I am not evil in heart, as are other goblins. I don't even understand it!"

"But you believe it," I said firmly.

"Am I to tell them that this goblin is not an evil sort?"

"Exactly that!" I argued. It seemed reasonable enough to me. I thought that I had found the opening I needed.

Nojheim promptly closed that door, promptly taught me something about myself and about the world that I had not previously considered.

"What is the difference between us?" I pressed, hoping he would see my understanding of the truth.

"You think yourself persecuted?" the goblin asked. His yellow eyes narrowed, and I knew that he thought he was being shrewd.

"I no longer accept that definition, just as I no longer accept the persecution," I declared. My pride had suddenly got in the way of understanding what this pitiful wretch was getting at. "People will draw their own judgments, but I will no longer accept their unfair conclusions."

"You will fight those that do you wrong?" Nojheim asked.

"I will deny them, ignore them, and know in my heart that I am right in my beliefs."

Nojheim's smile revealed both an honest happiness that I had found my way, and a deeper sorrow-for himself, I came to know.

"Our situations are not the same," he insisted. I started to protest, but he stopped me with an upraised hand. "You are drow, exotic, beyond the experiences of the vast majority of people you meet."

"Almost everyone of the surface has heard horrible tales of the drow," I tried to reason.

"But they have not dealt directly with drow elves!" Nojheim replied sharply. "You are an oddity to them, strangely beautiful, even by their own standards of beauty. Your features are fine, Drizzt Do'Urden, your eyes penetrating. Even your skin, so black and lustrous, must be considered beautiful by the people of the surface world. I am a goblin, an ugly goblin, in body if not in spirit."

"If you showed them the truth of that spirit…"

Nojheim's laughter mocked my concern. "Showed them the truth? A truth that would make them question what they had known all of their lives? Am I to be a dark mirror of their conscience? These people, Rico included, have killed many goblins-probably rightly so," he quickly added, and that clarification explained to me everything Nojheim had been trying to get through my blind eyes.

If these farmers, many of whom had often battled goblins, and others who had kept goblins as slaves, found just one creature who did not fit into their definitions of the evil race, just one goblin who showed conscience and compassion, intellect and a spirit akin to their own, it might throw their whole existence into chaos. I, myself, felt as though I had been slapped in the face when I'd learned of Nojheim's true demeanor. Only through my own experiences with my dark elven kin, the overwhelming majority of whom well deserved their evil reputation, was I able to work through that initial turmoil and guilt.

These farmers, though, might not so easily understand Nojheim. They would surely fear him, hate him all the more.

"I am not a courageous being," Nojheim said again, and though I disagreed, I held that thought private.

"You will leave with me," I told him. 'This night. We will go back to the west, to Mithril Hall."

"No!"

I looked at him, more hurt than confused.

"I'll not be hunted again," he explained, and I guessed from the faraway, pained look he gave me that he was remembering the first time Rico had chased him down.

I could not force Nojheim to comply, but I could not allow this injustice to stand. Was I to openly confront Rico? There were implications, potentially grave, to that course. I knew not what greater powers Pengallen held fealty to. If this village was sponsored by a city not known for tolerance, such as Nesme, to the south and west, then any action I took against its citizens could force trouble between that city and Mithril Hall, since I was, in effect, an emissary of Bruenor Battlehammer.

And so I left Nojheim. In the morning I secured the use of a fine horse and took the only route left open to me. I would go to Silverymoon first, I decided, since Alustriel was among the most respected rulers in all the land. Then, if need be, I would appeal to Bruenor's strong sense of justice.

I also decided then and there that if neither Alustriel nor Bruenor would act on Nojheim's behalf, I would take the matter unto myself-whatever the cost.

It took me three days of hard riding to get to Silvery-moon. The greeting at the Moorgate, on the city's western side, was uncommonly polite, the guards welcoming me with all the blessings of Lady Alustriel. It was Alustriel that I needed to see, I told them, and they replied that the Lady of Silverymoon was out of the city, on business with Sundabar, to the east. She would not return for a fortnight.

I could not wait, and so I bade the guards farewell, explaining that I would return within a tenday or two. Then I set off, back the way I had come. Bruenor would have to act.

The return ride was both exhilarating and tormenting to me. The greeting at Silverymoon, so different from what I had come to expect, had given me an almost giddy hope that the wrongs of the world could be defeated. At the same time, I felt as though I had abandoned Nojheim, felt as if my desire to follow proper etiquette was a cowardly course. I should have insisted that the goblin accompany me, should have taken Nojheim from his pain and then tried to mend the situation diplomatically.

I have made mistakes in my life, as I knew I had made one here. I veered back toward Pengallen instead of traveling straight to Bruenor's court at Mithril Hall.

I found Nojheim hanging from Rico's high cross-pole.

There are events forever frozen in my memory, feelings that exude a more complete aura, a memory vivid and lasting. I remember the wind at that horrible moment. The day, thick with low clouds, was unseasonably warm, but the wind, on those occasions it had to gust, carried a chilling bite, coming down from the high mountains and carrying the sting of deep snow with it. That wind was behind me, my thick and long white hair blowing around my face, my cloak pressing tightly against my back as I sat on my mount and stared helplessly at the high cross-pole.

The gusty breeze also kept Nojheim's stiff and bloated body turning slightly, the bolt holding the hemp rope creaking in mournful, helpless, protest.

I will see him that way forever.

I had not even moved to cut the poor goblin down when Rico and several of his rugged cohorts, all armed, came out of the house to meet me-to challenge me, I believed. Beside them came Tharman, carrying no weapon, his expression forlorn.

"Damned goblin tried to kill me," Rico explained, and for a fleeting moment, I believed him, feared that I had compelled Nojheim to make a fateful error. As Rico continued, though, claiming that the goblin had attacked him in broad daylight, before a dozen witnesses, I came to realize that it was all an elaborate lie. The witnesses were no more than partners in an unjust conspiracy.

"No reason to get upset," Rico went on, and his smug smile answered all my questions about the murder. "I've killed many goblins," he quickly added, his accent changing slightly, "probably rightly so, too."

Why had Rico hedged by using the word "probably"? Then I realized that I had heard those exact words spoken before, in exactly the same manner. I'd heard Nojheim say them, and, obviously, Rico had also heard! The fears the goblin had expressed that night in the barn suddenly rang ominously true.

I wanted to draw my scimitars and leap from the horse, cut Rico down and drive away any that would stand to help this murderer.

Tharman looked at me, looked right through my intentions, and shook his head, silently reminding me that there was nothing my weapons could do that would do anybody, Nojheim included, any good.

Rico went on talking, but I no longer listened. What recourse did I have? I could not expect Alustriel, or even Bruenor, to take any action against Rico. Nojheim, by all accounts, was simply a goblin, and even if I could somehow prove differently, could convince Alustriel or Bruenor that this goblin was a peaceful sort and unjustly persecuted, they would not be able to act. Intent is the determining factor of crime, and to Rico and the people of Pengallen, Nojheim, for all my claims, remained only a goblin. No court of justice in the region, where bloody battles with goblins are still commonplace, where almost everyone has lost at least one of his or her kin to such creatures, could find these men guilty for hanging Nojheim, for hanging a monster.

I had helped to perpetrate the incident. I had recaptured Nojheim and returned him to wicked Rico-even when I had sensed that something was amiss. And then I had forced myself into the goblin's life once more, had spoken dangerous thoughts to him.

Rico was still talking when I slid down from my borrowed mount, looped Taulmaril over my shoulder, and walked off for Mithril Hall.

Sunset. Another day surrenders to the night as I perch here on the side of a mountain, not so far from Mithril Hall.

The mystery of the night has begun, but does Nojheim know now the truth of a greater mystery? I often wonder of those who have gone before me, who have discovered what I cannot until the time of my own death. Is Nojheim better off now than he was as Rico's slave?

If the afterlife is one of justice, then surely he is.

I must believe this to be true, yet it still wounds me to know that I played a role in the unusual goblin's death, both in capturing him and in going to him later, going to him with hopes that he could not afford to hold. I cannot forget that I walked away from Nojheim, however well-intentioned I might have been. I rode for Silverymoon and left him vulnerable, left him in wrongful pain.

And so I learn from my mistake.

Forever after, I will not ignore such injustice. If I chance upon one of Nojheim's spirit and Nojheim's peril again, then let his wicked master be wary. Let the lawful powers of the region review my actions and exonerate me if that is what they perceive to be the correct course. If not,…

It does not matter. I will follow my heart.