The Nether Scroll

5

1 Eleint, the Year of the Banner (1368 DR) Parnast, Weathercote Wood

He can scream himself blue before I let him in, Rozt'a had sworn last night before Tiep left the rented room.

She'd been even more emphatic after midnight when he'd returned from a tryst with Manya.

No way, she'd growled as she'd usurped Dru's place at the threshold. No way beneath the sun or stars that I'm doing anything on a dog-faced goblin's say-so. I'll show him the flat of my sword first.

Tiep had been in absolute agreement. He'd gone to sleep confident that there was no chance whatsoever that he was going off on some early-morning hike into a forest that Manya swore was home to dire and magical creatures. So why was he trudging through dead leaves and treacherous roots behind Druhallen, Galimer, and the dog-faced goblin, with Rozt'a bringing up the rear?

Because Rozt'a had had a dream, that's why. The most reliable, least superstitious among his adults had had a dream in which she met a tall, pale-skinned woman with white-and-brown striped hair and the woman-Lady Mantis-had whispered: I'm waiting for you. Come quickly.

Rozt'a had awakened them all and shared her dream before it was cold in her memory. Then she announced, We're taking Sheemzher's offer. We're going into Weathercote Wood to meet with Lady Wyndyfarh.

Suddenly both the goblin and the wizard-lady had had real names again and Tiep hadn't needed lamplight to see the determined look on his foster-mother's face. Galimer was shrewd and Druhallen could be downright scary when he was casting a spell, but Rozt'a was the warrior among them, the brawler who backed up her words with her body. When she lowered her voice and her eyebrows, you knew you were in for a fight.

Rozt'a had pitched her voice so low that Tiep had known for certain that her eyes had disappeared.

He'd lain very still then, praying to Tymora, the notoriously fickle goddess of luck, that one of his foster-fathers would challenge Rozt'a's declaration. Tiep thought Tymora was on his side when Galimer demurred, saying he had merchants to meet and arrangements to make, if they were going to get out of Parnast without paying court to Amarandaris. Tiep thought that was reason enough to stay out of the woods, but Rozt'a disagreed.

One day. One day, that's all I'm asking. The rest of our time belongs to you When Galimer fell silent, Tiep had pinned his hopes on Druhallen. Rozt'a tended to back down from confrontations with Dru, but Dru said he'd take a walk in Weathercote Wood with Rozt'a, with or without the goblin, and regardless of the path or the light. What he'd said didn't make sense, but nobody argued with Druhallen and Rozt'a.

When dawn came and brought the goblin with it, Tiep had pretended that he wasn't awake. He'd hoped that Galimer would stay behind with him. It wasn't fair, but the desert trader would give gold-haired Galimer a better price for the carved boxes than he'd give a mongrel like Tiep. But his fantasies of profit had suffered total defeat when the goblin announced that he'd lead them all to his lady's glade or he'd lead none of them.

No problem, Galimer had said cheerfully. We'll go with you, Roz-as long as we're back tomorrow. We can be back by then, can't we? — Good. Give me a few moments at the charterhouse. I'll be back before you get the youngster woken up.

Tiep had clenched his fists beneath his pillow then and he clenched them behind his back now. When they'd given him a partner's share this spring they said his opinion mattered, not as much as theirs, but enough so he'd no longer feel like a child tagging along behind his parents. Tiep had never had the luxury of parents. He'd been making his own decisions as long as he could remember-including the one that took him to the Berdusk temple when he'd heard that a sick lady and her moon-eyed husband were mourning an unborn child and likely to adopt an orphan if an orphan presented himself.

Dru and Galimer were always talking about how Ansoain had died on the Vilhon Reach and Rozt'a described busting her captain's face as if nobody had ever stood up for themselves before. Well, Galimer had been full-grown when his mother died and busting someone's face wasn't worth mentioning unless that someone was twice as tall as you were and four times as heavy. None of Tiep's adults understood that he was older than all of them together. Lately, they'd been whispering about cutting him loose because his notion of risky was bolder than theirs. Maybe he should just leave before they got the chance to slam the door.

Maybe he should have left before they started hiking through Weathercote Wood.

It wouldn't have been so bad if they'd been riding. Tiep was used to being astride all day and each of their horses was a sensible creature that took care of itself and its rider on the roughest road. But, no-the dog-face said horses weren't allowed on the Weathercote paths and that was that. Horses had four legs, one at each corner. When a walking horse stumbled, it still had three feet left on the ground to keep it from going splat! in the leaves. People had two legs and when people got tripped up by roots lurking beneath the leaves, people went down.

Tiep had fallen twice already when he felt his toes catch beneath another root. Flailing like a tethered hawk, he managed to land on his rump instead of his face.

Rozt'a offered her hand. "It's your own fault. You insist on scuffling your feet. Pay attention and you'll stay upright."

Tiep accepted the boost, rejected the advice. "I am paying attention," he insisted, testing his abused ankle. It was sore but held his weight. "That's the whole problem. We're being watched. The trees are staring at us. I'm about ready to jump out of my skin. We should hie ourselves back to Parnast before it's too late."

She gave him a lethal look. "Don't start with me. You can spend tomorrow with Manya and tell her how brave you were in Weathercote, but until then, don't carp about shadows. Quit being a sulky brat and try to enjoy this. Look over there-have you ever seen a more beautiful tree?"

Tiep had never paid much attention to trees. They were all green in summer and a few stayed green in winter. They made shade when they were growing and fire when they weren't. What more did he need to know? But it was wiser to sight down Rozt'a's arm than to argue with her. His eyes came to rest on a tree that was shorter than its neighbors and speckled with sky-blue flowers, each about the size of his open hand. For a tree, he supposed that it was beautiful. Beyond doubt, he'd never seen another remotely similar and mentioned this to Rozt'a.

"There's magic here," his foster mother explained with exaggerated patience.

"That's not a good thing, Rozt'a, not for the likes of you and me. Last night, I told you what the Parnasters say about this place: folks go in but they don't come out, sometimes for years, sometimes never."

Rozt'a scowled. "I'm sure you didn't say that."

"You weren't listening," Tiep lied. "Tymora's tears! I never thought you'd be the one to cave in. You were going to smack the dog-face up if he showed up, remember?"

"I had a dream-more than a dream. I saw her… I didn't cave in, Tiep. I'm getting closer to something I never thought I'd find in this life."

Before Tiep could ask what that might be, they both became aware of the goblin hurrying toward them.

"Call out if you need to rest," Sheemzher said, as if it were perfectly normal for a goblin to give orders to humans.

Sheemzher had added a thrusting spear to his blue and green costume. The weapon was a bit longer than the goblin was tall and its gnarled shaft had been oiled so much that the wood was glistening black. Beads, tattered feathers, and strips of fur hung from the cording that lashed the flint point to the shaft. The ornaments rattled with the goblin's every move and effectively drew Tiep's attention from the point.

A single goblin, even one with a nasty spear, was a joke, but a horde of spear-toting goblins was a different matter. Tiep glanced at the trees. He did feel they were being watched. Goblins weren't tree-climbers; at least that's what he'd heard in the cities where he'd harvested most of his education. Before Parnast, he'd never seen a goblin that wasn't a pet or a slave. Such goblins wouldn't have dared to look at Tiep the way Sheemzher did, all impatience and calculation.

"I wasn't resting. I stopped to look at that tree over there," Tiep said before Rozt'a could say anything at all. "The one with the big blue flowers. It's some kind of magic tree, isn't it?"

Sheemzher fussed with the brim of his hat and cupped his hands around his eyes. Like elves and dwarves, goblins could see clearly through the darkest night, but unlike those races, goblins paid a price for their night vision. When the sun shone bright, they had to strain to see half of what humans saw.

"Sheemzher not remember. Good lady tell Sheemzher, but Sheemzher not remember. Ask good lady. Good lady Wyndyfarh never forget anything. Good lady remember name, magic."

Druhallen and Galimer joined them. "What's the problem?" they asked with one voice.

"Nothing. I was just going to pick one of those blue flowers so Lady Mantis could tell Rozt'a and me the tree's name."

Tiep hadn't taken two strides toward the blooming tree before Sheemzher was in front of him, flapping the spear. Rozt'a drew her sword-Tiep knew the sound. Dru prepared to cast a spell. There wasn't a sound, though Dru kindled most of his spells with a spoken word. Tiep simply knew when magic was immanent; it was a taste in his mouth, a scent at the back of his nose, a tingle that raced down his spine and up again.

In the beginning, Druhallen and Galimer had hoped his premonitions meant he had spellcasting talent; they hadn't. Tiep's talent was a minor jinx: some simple spells didn't affect him, others went awry in his presence. Dru was good enough at his craft that the jinx didn't matter; he'd fry the dog-face, hopefully before that spear penetrated Tiep's ribs. With Galimer it was different. Galimer's command over his magic was chancy at best and worse when Tiep was nearby, though Tiep privately suspected that his jinx got blamed more than it deserved.

Sheemzher was clever-for a dog-faced goblin. With his eyes on Dru, he lowered his spear and retreated.

"Stay on path," he said in a childish sing-song manner. "Stay safe. Tree there not on path. Tree there not safe. Tree there not belong good lady. Remember! Ask! Stay on path!"

Tiep hadn't cared about the tree, but he wasn't going to be bossed around by a goblin. "Tymora's tears," he complained, sidestepping the spear point. "Who's going to miss one lousy flower? The ground is crawling with dropped petals already."

Sheemzher matched Tiep's sidestep and shoved his spear forward. The sharpened flint pricked Tiep's skin through his shirt. He held his breath, waiting for Druhallen to do something magical.

"It's not the flower, Tiep," Dru said and the sense of immanent magic faded. "It's the path."

"What path?" he demanded.

"Path here! Sheemzher follow path. Follow Sheemzher!" the goblin snarled through his too-big, too-sharp teeth.

He prodded Tiep with the weapon and despite his mind's determination to stand firm, Tiep's body retreated.

"What path?" he repeated. "There's no path, no road. We're just slogging through leaves, trusting a goblin, which has to be the dumbest thing we've ever done." He glimpsed Rozt'a's darkening face and knew he'd said the wrong thing. "The dumbest thing I've ever done."

The attempt to mend his fences failed: Rozt'a turned her back to Tiep. Frustration boiled over and he seized the spear. They wrestled for control: a sinewy, dog-faced goblin against a larger, heavier, smarter human. Sheemzher kept his weapon, but only because Tiep flung them both toward the flowering tree.

He had to admire the goblin's consistency. When Sheemzher found himself closer to the flowering tree than to his precious, invisible path, he yelped and scrambled hand over foot to rejoin them. He collapsed an arm's length from Rozt'a, shaking and clinging to his spear with his shifty eyes squeezed shut.

The spear had shed a ratty, white feather. While everyone else's attention was on the panting goblin, Tiep surrendered to temptation and tiptoed across the leaves. Holding the feather by its tip, he called "Lose something, dog-face?"

Tiep's words and gestures might have been a spell for their effect on Sheemzher. The little goblin's eyes popped open, then he brought his weapon to the ready and would have charged-if Rozt'a hadn't seized his collar and lifted him off the ground. His booted feet churned in the air. Tiep began to laugh.

"Get yourself back here… now!" Druhallen shouted.

Dru had almost as much weight on Tiep as Tiep had on the goblin, so Tiep didn't waste time standing with a feather dangling from his fingers. "I was just trying to be helpful," he lied as he obeyed.

"You're headed for trouble," Rozt'a scolded.

She released the goblin who grabbed the feather and whimpered as he reattached it to the spear.

"Yeah? Well, I'm not alone, am I?"

Rozt'a replied with a flat slap of her sword against her palm.

"Both of you-and you, too, Sheemzher-settle down!" Galimer raised his voice so seldom that Tiep scarcely recognized it. "We're here now. We're committed to visiting this lady Wyndyfarh and returning to Parnast before dark. There's no time for nonsense. If the goblin wants us to stay on the path, then we stay on the path. Is that clear, Tiep?"

"What godsforsaken path?" Tiep fumed. He wouldn't win, but defeat had never kept him from fighting. "I don't see any godsforsaken path."

Galimer looked at Dru who shrugged. "Don't ask me. I've been following you and the goblin."

Sheemzher scurried between them. He'd dropped his spear and clawed at his neck. "Path! Safe-passage path. All watch."

The goblin freed a golden necklace from his striped shirt and displayed its nut-sized pendant for close inspection. The lumpy stone was polished, not cut, and about the same color as the goblin's red-orange skin.

"Good lady Wyndyfarh show path. All watch. All look."

The red-orange pendant glowed in the sunlight. When it was ember bright, similarly colored specks in trees they'd passed and in trees they approached became visible.

"See? See?" the goblin asked. "Safe-passage path. Good sir safe, good man, good lady, even that one-" Sheemzher pointed at Tiep then he pointed at the blue-flower tree where no ember glowed. "See no path, no safe passage. Tree there not safe. Tree there not belong good lady. Good lady say: 'Stay on my path, Sheemzher. Don't bother the others. Leave them alone. Don't start trouble.' Sheemzher listen. Sheemzher follow path. All follow Sheemzher, yes? No flowers. No petals. Not safe. Not belong good lady."

Druhallen asked if he could examine the pendant and, after a moment's thought, Sheemzher handed it over. As long as the goblin's knobby fingers touched the necklace, the pendant and the markers glowed brightly. The pendant went dark the moment Dru touched it. The markers faded, too, but not so much that Tiep couldn't still distinguish them.

"Interesting." Dru held the pendant to the sun. "Amber-it's warm to the touch-but this color is new to me, and it's remarkably clear."

Interesting was, well, interesting, but amber-clear amber-was rare and, therefore, valuable. Much too valuable to be hanging around a dog-faced goblin's neck. Tiep tried to catch Galimer's eye-to see if they were both thinking about profits-but Galimer's attention was on the pendant. Rozt'a's, too. With all of them distracted, Tiep considered popping a marker out of the nearest tree, but decided to resist temptation-for now. After they'd taken care of Rozt'a and her dream, he'd make the chance to fill his pockets with amber.

Tiep was imagining the expressions on his adults' faces as he told them what the Scornubel jewelers had paid for Weathercote amber when the markers brightened.

"Not belong good sir!" the dog-face protested, fairly climbing into Druhallen's arms to retrieve the pendant.

"Belong Sheemzher. Good lady give. Belong Sheemzher, not good sir."

"Not mine," Dru agreed and replaced the chain around the goblin's scrawny neck. The markers winked out like blown candles. "Interesting. Yesterday morning an old man warned me not to enter the Wood unless the light was right and I stayed on the path. I didn't know what he meant then, but I do now. Can you still see the path, Sheemzher?"

Tiep recognized Dru's patient-parent voice, but the goblin fell for it. He tapped his temple where a few wisps of ratty black hair escaped his hat. "Sheemzher knows way home. If Sheemzher forget, gift show path. Sheemzher never lost here. Good lady not alone here. Others different. Others not welcome Sheemzher, visitors. Stay on path. Safe passage. Always safe passage. Never lost. Stay on path."

"Good idea," Galimer agreed. "And let's get moving along the path ourselves. How much farther is Lady Wyndyfarh's glade anyway? One hour? Two? A half?"

"One hour," Sheemzher answered, returning to his place at the front of their line.

Sheemzher's hour was endless. They walked until the sun was high above the Wood. Tiep had taken Rozt'a's advice to heart. He walked lightly between the trees; the thrill of stirring up the leaves was long gone. There was shade aplenty in the forest, but the heat was oppressive and the only breeze came from the cloud of buzzing, stinging insects that accompanied them.

They'd filled their waterskins at the bridge. Tiep's was empty by mid-morning. His mouth was sour leather before the goblin lead them past a cool-water spring. No one said a word while they drenched themselves and refilled the skins. Rozt'a looked particularly grim and guilty.

Tiep's mind had gone numb. One foot after the other, he watched the ground and paid little attention to the forest. He hadn't noticed that there were fewer trees, more gray boulders until a noise that sounded like a man screaming jolted him out of a hazy, instantly forgotten daydream. His companions had heard the same thing. They were stopped and staring in the same northerly direction.

"What was that?" Tiep asked.

"Sounded like a big cat," Druhallen answered. He turned to Sheemzher. "Are there forest lions in here?"

When the goblin didn't immediately answer, Galimer offered his opinion: "That roar didn't come from any cat."

Rozt'a drew her sword. "What's dangerous around here?"

"No danger here," Sheemzher insisted. "Safe passage." He hunched his shoulder and made the tree markers glow. "Stay on path. No danger."

The goblin resumed walking. He hadn't taken two steps when the sound repeated itself, louder this time, maybe closer.

"Go to ground, Tiep," Rozt'a whispered.

That was his place when trouble blew in. Tiep was neither muscle nor magic and his adults didn't want to be worried about him when they had work to do. Sometimes he resented it; not this time, not after a third scream. The boulders promised some shelter, but the trees offered more.

"Path!" Sheemzher shouted as Tiep bolted for a tree whose branches were both reachable and sturdy. "Safe passage. Stay safe. Stay on path!"

"I'm not leaving your damned path!" Tiep shouted as he made a standing leap for the lowest branch. "This tree's got a marker on it."

Tiep didn't believe the dog-faced goblin's assurances about the path. His faith lay in the damage he'd seen Dru and Rozt'a create with their chosen weapons. They'd triumph over anything a forest could throw at them-and he'd pocket an amber marker on his way back to the ground.

A long silence reigned after the third scream. Rozt'a lowered her sword. When she sheathed it, Tiep was clear to rejoin them. He was calculating the best way to snag the amber when Galimer shouted "There!"

Branches blocked Tiep's view. He climbed higher and almost wished he'd stayed put. The screamer wasn't any familiar sort of animal. Long-legged and horse high at the shoulder, it had a short neck and forward-looking eyes. Its snout was short, too, and framed with overlapping tusks that showed pale against its nearly black fur. Tiep guessed it was some sort of overgrown pig, then it raised a front leg and he saw that it had paws, rather than hooves.

Tiep couldn't name any ordinary animal that had tusks and paws. Pigs didn't have paws. Lions and bears were built closer to the ground and didn't have tusks. With the education he'd gotten from Dru and Galimer, Tiep reckoned that some wizard somewhere or when had transformed this beast into being.

When great wizards conjured creatures, they didn't often pay attention to what lay inside their skulls. With mismatches between their minds and bodies, magical creatures tended to be cranky or crazy, and were often both. Hidden though he was, Tiep held his breath. He didn't dare a quick prayer to Tymora. You never knew what a magical creature might be sensitive to, or what might set it off. Smart folk concentrated on blending in with their surroundings. Tiep filled his thoughts with branches and leaves.

The beast reared and screamed. There was magic in the sound. Terror waves washed over Tiep and the trees. He wrapped his arms tighter around the branch and made himself breathe deeply, evenly. That helped against ambient magic, but not against gut-born fear when the beast set its front paws on the ground and shambled directly toward their supposedly safe path.

Rozt'a raised her sword; Druhallen, his arms. His lips moved and a globe of fire leapt off his fingertips. Dru didn't miss. Tiep clung to the branch but kept his eyes open. The tree shuddered when the fireball exploded.

Flame consumed the dead-leaf carpet and tasted the trees. Smoke billowed quickly and hid the yowling beast. Tiep allowed himself to believe that Druhallen had slain the creature with his first spell, until it charged out of the smoke. It had a clumsy, rocking-chair gait, but it moved quickly, too quickly for Dru who needed a few moments of recovery before he could kindle another spell. Galimer tried… and succeeded with a fiery streak that ringed the beast's neck without doing noticeable damage.

The wizards fell back at the last moment. Rozt'a took a swing at the creature's muscular neck as it charged past. Her sword bit deep; Tiep saw the blade disappear in flesh. She would have slain a horse or ox with that stroke, but the Weathercote beast shook her off without breaking stride. She landed on her back with the sword still firmly in her grasp. Tiep noted that the blade was clean-not a smear of blood anywhere along its length. Rozt'a noticed, too, and shouted a warning to Druhallen and Galimer "It's sorcerous!"

Their replies were lost in another roar.

The creature was more agile than Tiep would have expected; something-perhaps-to do with having paws, not hooves. Druhallen pelted it with a different sort of fire as it turned. It circled wide and away from Tiep's tree. (Thank you, Great, Kind, and Good Tymora!) But the beast was riled now and wouldn't be driven off. When it had shaken off Dru's second spell as it had shaken off the first and Rozt'a's sword, it squatted back on its haunches and leapt at Rozt'a like the lion Dru had guessed it was.

She danced a retreat, placing herself between Galimer and Dru, keeping herself the primary target while they readied more magic. That was according to plan-when they all in danger, she was pure muscle-a bodyguard and no one's wife. What wasn't according to plan was the dog-faced goblin with his bright-silk garments and stone-tipped spear darting between Rozt'a and the beast.

While Rozt'a cursed louder than the beast's roars, Sheemzher launched himself and his spear into harm's way. If the goblin had been aiming at the beast's nose, then his aim had been perfect; and if he'd had the sense Great Ao had given an ant, he'd have let go of his precious spear when the creature began tossing its pierced head. But Great Ao hadn't spared sense for goblins and so the fool hung on, even when the beast sat down like a dog and brought its forepaws into play.

Rozt'a ran at it with her sword slashing. She got what should have been a tendon-severing slice across the paw it used to swat at Sheemzher but, as with her first stroke, she scored no lasting damage. In his tree, Tiep recalled that there were some creatures-some men, too-who simply couldn't be harmed by ordinary weapons. Rozt'a's sword bore a small enchantment that maintained its temper and kept it free from the ravages of rust, but it bore nothing that could split the hide of this nameless beast.

Dru shouted for both Rozt'a and Sheemzher to back off and leave him a clear line. Rozt'a obeyed; the dog-faced goblin stayed glued to his spear. As Tiep saw things, Druhallen should have gone ahead and kindled another fireball. If it roasted the goblin and the beast together, so much the better. But Dru tended toward the high road. Galimer saw the situation Tiep's way, but his spell failed either in his mind or against the beast's magical armor.

Rozt'a moved in to thwack the beast for the third time and grab Sheemzher as she retreated. The damned goblin put up a fight. She couldn't get him to abandon the spear, but their combined weight was enough to wrench it free, giving Dru the clear line he'd wanted. He got off one of his better fireballs-a huge sphere of yellow flame with heat that reached all the way to Tiep's perch. Tiep started counting; he reached twenty before the fire died.

The beast had risen to its four feet, angrier than ever.

Ominous thoughts rained through Tiep's mind: though none of them was hurt, they were in serious trouble.

Druhallen couldn't cast an endless series of fireball spells. Depending on what he expected to be up against on any particular day, he could cast three, maybe four, before his concentration gave out. Not that his fire was denting the monster. Galimer's magic wasn't as potent as Dru's, and Rozt'a's sword might have been a feather for all the damage it had caused. So far, the only lasting damage had come from Sheemzher's spear: the beast's nose leaked a steady trickle of steaming, black fluid.

Death by nosebleed… unlikely.

If the beast didn't get bored it would pick them off. Tiep was in favor of sacrificing the goblin, then beating a fast retreat to Parnast, but he couldn't make his opinion heard and, even if he'd been on the ground among them, he knew his adults well enough to know they wouldn't listen. Already, Dru and Galimer had closed ranks with Rozt'a. She'd managed to pass them her fighting knives and they were ready to stand as one to their deaths. According to plan, when they closed ranks like that, Tiep was supposed to try to escape.

Little as he liked the idea of dying, or watching them die, Tiep wouldn't-couldn't-run away. He had a knife, a little knife better suited to carving fruit than monsters, and the will to use it.

After whispering another prayer to Tymora, Tiep dropped out of the tree. The first thing he noticed once he'd picked himself up was Sheemzher backing away from the fight. The damned dog-face could run away-no one expected honor from a goblin-but he wasn't taking that spear with him.

The goblin must have heard Tiep sneaking up on him and guessed why. He tossed the spear away and with his eyes still on the beast, fell to his knees. Tiep headed for the spear which had landed perilously close to one of the fires Dru's spells had kindled in the leaves. As he retrieved it, Tiep heard the goblin whimpering "Safe passage… Safe passage. Hear Sheemzher, good lady… great lady. Sheemzher on path! Help Sheemzher, help all, great lady, gracious lady."

Pathetic, Tiep thought. Detestable and Not worth killing raced through his mind also, then he felt a tingling at the base of his neck-Magic, immanent magic on a scale Tiep had never felt before, not even that ill-fated night in Scornubel when he'd tried to rob a disguised Zhentarim lord. He looked up and saw nothing but branches and clear, blue sky. He looked to his right, toward the beast and the battle, and watched in disbelief as Dru's unbound hair fanned out from his scalp. Tiep's hair began to rise a heartbeat later. For an instant the air smelled bitter, then everything became dreamlike.

In Tiep's dream there was dazzling light and noise so loud he heard it in his stomach rather than his ears. A great hand circled his waist, lifting him up and tossing him backward. The dream ended when his shoulders struck the ground. He lay still a moment, wondering if he were awake… or dead.

"Tiep! Say something! Can you move at all?"

Rozt'a. Tiep recognized his foster-mother kneeling beside him. She had a cut on her forehead and a big, black smear across her cheek, but her hands were strong as she helped him sit.

"What hap-?"

An important part of the answer was obvious before he finished asking the question. The beast was dead-burnt to a smoldering crisp in the middle of a charred circle some ten paces wide. Galimer and Dru were examining the corpse, gleaning it the way magicians did. All wizards were scavengers at heart. The more magical or unfamiliar an object, the more samples they collected. The dog-faced goblin didn't approve. He tugged at their sleeves as they worked.

Rozt'a interrupted Tiep's curiosity with a hug. "You fell out of your tree, that's what happened."

Tiep knew better. He remembered dropping out of the tree and going after the goblin's spear, which was back in the goblin's possession. He remembered, too, that he hadn't collected the amber marker. If it was all right for wizards to indulge their curiosity, Tiep didn't see why he shouldn't put his knife to good use His knife.

It had been in his hand before he'd sailed backward; now it was missing. There was another in his boot cuff, but the missing blade had been Tiep's favorite. Considering where the spear had wound up, he suspected the goblin and vowed a reckoning.

With a shrug he freed himself from Rozt'a's embrace. She looked uncomfortable with her arms wrapped around her own waist and Tiep felt a little guilty, though he'd never been one for hugs. When he'd been younger, he'd endured them but now that he was older and thinking about women himself, he loved his foster-mother best at arm's length.

"What else happened?" he asked, hoping to blunt the silence.

"The Lady Wyndyfarh saved our hides. Druhallen calls it a 'bolt from the blue'-a one-ended bolt of lightning. I call it a miracle. Can you stand? The goblin says we've got to move quickly. He says reavers are the hounds of Weathercote and we'll have a pack on our trail until we reach his lady's glade."

Tiep got to his feet. He was lightheaded, but the wooziness faded before he needed the arm Rozt'a offered. The idea that they owed their survival to a dog-faced goblin burnt his gut and the displeasure apparently showed on his face.

"Sheemzher saved us," Rozt'a chided him. "Maybe you couldn't see, but the three of us weren't getting the better of that reaver. When I put my sword into him, it was like slicing mud and about as effective. If Sheemzher hadn't invoked Lady Wyndyfarh, it would have had us all, maybe you, too. At best you'd be alone. You owe him."

Tiep shook his head which was honest, but foolish. Suddenly he needed Rozt'a's arm to stay upright.

"Try," Rozt'a advised. "I know your head hurts and you never wanted to come, but, please, try not to be so hateful-"

"I came with you, didn't I?" he grumbled. "I'm not turning around and going back alone, am I? I lost my knife when I fell out of the tree. I need to look for it before-"

"I'll help-"

"I can find it myself

Tiep didn't dare look at Rozt'a before he stalked toward the leaves where he last remembered standing. The knife wasn't there. Proof, as far as Tiep was concerned, that the goblin had lifted it. But Tiep wasn't really looking for his knife. He wanted amber and he could dig that out with his boot knife. If anyone asked what he was doing He looked over his shoulder. Galimer, Rozt'a, and Dru had their heads together, probably talking about him. They wouldn't notice, but the damn goblin was trotting his way.

"You want; Sheemzher has. Sheemzher give."

"I don't want anything from you. Go away," he shouted back.

He did want his knife, but he wanted to pound it out of the goblin's red-orange hide, not take it politely from his warty hands. In principle, Tiep didn't care if Sheemzher watched him pop the amber marker loose from the tree. The word of a human was always worth more than that of a goblin. Everyone knew that goblins lied and goblins couldn't be trusted, except this goblin had successfully invoked Lady Mantis.

Manya said the white lady was one of the powers of Weathercote Wood. As Lady Mantis, she had the power to heal the sick, but mostly she dealt justice to villainous men and visited the dying to collect their final breath. That was how she'd gotten her name-a tall, thin, and pale woman leaning over a dying man with her arms bent in prayer and an inscrutable expression on her face.

Tiep didn't want to meet her.

"Sheemzher call good lady. Sheemzher find knife after. Knife belong, yes?" The goblin held out a familiar knife. "Yours?" he added, the word was unusual for him and he pronounced it wrong.

"Mine," Tiep agreed sourly and took the knife without a hint of thanks. He made a point of wiping it before sliding it into its sheath. "Now, go away."

"Good lady not here. Good lady in glade. Go now. Go there," Sheemzher persisted. "Beyond path here. Beyond good lady. Reaver not belong good lady. Reaver not obey good lady. Retribution. Trees not belong good lady. Trees belong path."

Was that an assurance that Lady Mantis wouldn't mind if he helped himself to an amber keepsake? It wasn't a question Tiep could ask, but one he had to answer for himself. He pulled himself up to the branch where he'd hidden and the marker that was in reach above it.

There was a thumbnail-sized bug squatting on the amber. It didn't fly off when he waved his arm over it and brandished nasty claws when he tried to flick it away with his fingernails, so he smashed it with the flat of his second-best knife and wiped the blade on his breeches before using it to free the marker.

The goblin was grinning when Tiep's feet hit the ground again.

"Valuable, yes? Valuable outside?"

"Yes, and mine. Just like the knife. Don't go getting any dog-face stupid ideas."

"No stupid ideas," the goblin agreed, still grinning like the fool he was.

Sheemzher assured them, again, as they left the killing ground, that they were merely an hour from his lady's glade.

He was lying, of course, but closer to the truth than he'd been. They hadn't gone far before the forest thickened and cooled around them.

Dru announced that they'd successfully passed through someone's warding.

"Good lady dwells here. Good lady Wyndyfarh. Sheemzher belong here," the goblin replied proudly.

Tiep had never encountered green in such variety and intensity. The trees were clothed in green, but so was the ground. Moss grew everywhere-even the rocks and tree bark were cloaked in living velvet. Though birds flew overhead, the moist, heavy air hushed their songs. Tiep felt obligated to speak softly when he asked the wizards, "Is everything here magical?"

"Everything and nothing," Galimer replied, also whispering.

"What kind of answer is that?"

"The truth," Dru said, and ended the discussion.

They climbed a moss-covered stairway carved into the side of a small, steep hill. Rozt'a was in the front, right behind the goblin. She gasped when she reached the top. Tiep understood why when he stood beside her. The hill was the outer boundary of a water garden that was like no part of Faerun he'd imagined possible. The water in a pond at the base of the hill sparkled-truly sparkled-in the sunlight. The flowers glowed with subtle light and the countless butterflies were brighter than a queen's jewelry. There was a waterfall on the opposite side of the pond and a small, round building beside it. Tiep judged the building a temple, because it had no walls, just white-stone columns and a blue-green metal dome, and it looked like the sort of place where a god might rest his feet.

He'd barely begun to consider the implications of what he saw when a woman appeared in the temple-she must have emerged through the waterfall, though she wasn't dripping. She was tall and thin. Her face was pale and her hip-length hair was cross-striped with white and dusty brown. Even at this distance, her fingers appeared unnaturally long and when she pressed her palms together in front of her, Tiep had no trouble recognizing the Lady Mantis whom Manya had described.

"She's deadly," he heard himself whisper to Druhallen. "She could kill us as soon as look at us."

Dru nodded. "Deadly's not dangerous, if you keep your wits about you and your hands at your side. Is that clearly understood?"

Tiep grumbled that it was and with his thumbs hooked under his belt followed his elders and the dog-faced goblin toward the temple.