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or a slug, or creeping moss? Aye? Aye? AYE?"
He was pushing them both again, now, step by step to the door. Narm had begun
to chuckle uncertainly. Shandril was still white and open-mouthed. The door
opened behind them, and Elminster added in sudden calm, "Two guests again,
Lhaeo. They'll be needing clothes first."
"Aye," came the dry reply from within. "It is cold in the corners, herein. How
are they at peeling potatoes?"
Elminster's answering chuckle urged them in, and he closed the door with a
brief, "I'll follow, anon... some tasks remain." They were inside in the
flickering dimness with Lhaeo, already moving toward a certain closet.
SPELLFIRE
"We've gone through more clothes since you've come to Shadowdale," he said.
"You were a head shorter than I, were you not, Shandril?"
"Yes," Shandril agreed, and she began to laugh. After a moment, Narm joined
her. Lhaeo shook his head as he handed clothes backward without looking. Truly
they serve most who know when to laugh and when to listen.
The stew warm inside her, Shandril leaned back against the wall on her stool
happily. She looked over at Narm, clad in the silk robes of a grand mage of
Myth Drannor, and smiled at him, heart full. The hearth glowed, and Lhaeo
moved softly back and forth in front of it, stirring and tasting and adding
pinches of spice kept in a rack above his cutting board. Pheasant hung from
the rafters above the scribe, and a plump gorscraw lay upon the table, waiting
to be plucked and dressed. Narm sipped herbed tea and regarded Lhaeo's deft
movements over his stewpots. "Is there anything we can do to help?" he asked.
Lhaeo looked up at him with a quick smile. "Aye, but it is not cooking. Talk,
if you would. I have heard little enough speech that is not Elminster's. Tell
me how it is with you."
"It is wonderful, Lhaeo," Narm said. "I am as happy now as I have ever been in
my life. We are wed this day and henceforth. It is joyous indeed!"
"You, too?" the scribe asked Shandril. She nodded, eyes shining.
Lhaeo smiled. "Both of you/' he said, "remember how you feel now, when times
are darker, and turn not one upon the other, but stand together to face the
world's teeth. But enough. I will not lecture you. You must hear enough of
that from other lips, hereabouts."
They all laughed. Shandril stopped first and asked, "Those men at the wedding?
Who were they, do you know?"
"I was not at your wedding," Lhaeo said softly. "Forgive me. I abide here to
guard certain things. I did learn something from the Lord Florin of the men
who drew swords and would have attacked you, if that's whom you mean."
Narm nodded. "Those men, yes."
EDGBEENWOOD
The two men held each other's eyes for a moment, and then Lhaeo said, "There
were over forty, we believe. Thirty-seven perhaps more by now lie dead. One
talked before his life fled. They were all mercenaries hired, for ten pieces
of gold each and meals, to grab you both Shandril alone, if they could take
but one of you.
"They were hired in Selgaunt only a few days back and flown up in a ship that
sails the skies. Oh, yes, such things exist, though they be rare triumphs of
art. They were hired in a tavern by a large, balding, fat man with a wispy
beard, who gave his name as Karsagh. They were directed to take you to a hill
north of here to be picked up by the skyship.
"They would then be paid in full. Each had received only two pieces of gold.
Many died carrying it, still unspent. Who this Karsagh is and why he wants
you, we know not. Have you any favorite thoughts as to who he might be?"
Narm and Shandril both shook their heads. "Half the world seems to be looking
for us, with swords and spells," Shandril said bitterly. "Have they all
nothing better to do?"
"Evidently not," Lhaeo replied. "It is not all bad, that. Look who found you,
Shandril this mageling called Narm, and the knights who brought you here."
"Aye " she said very quietly, "and it is here we must leave-friends and
all because of this accursed spellfire." Fire leaped and spat in tiny,
crackling threads from one hand to another, as she stared down at her hands in
anger.
"Not within these walls, if you please, good lady," Lhaeo said, eyeing it.
"Things sleep herein that should not be so suddenly awakened." Shandril
sighed, shame-faced, and let the fires subside.
"Sorry I am, Lhaeo," she said sadly. "I have no wish to burn down your house."
The hearthfire let out a crack, then, that startled them all, as a tiny pocket
of pitch in a branch blew apart. Narm stared from it to Shandril, a little
fear on his face. At his look, Shandril nearly burst into tears.
"Nay, nay," said Lhaeo, turning to his cutting-board. "I know you do not, nor
do I fear it coming to pass. You must not hate your gift, Shandril, for the
gods gave it to you without such fury. And did not Tymora bless your union?"
The scribe indicated the holy symbol that Shandril had carefully
9S98*
SPEIUTHE
set upon a high table. As if in response to his words, it seemed to glow for a
moment as they looked at it.
"Aye," Narm said, getting up. "So we are helpless in the hands of the gods?"
He began to pace. Lhaeo looked up, sharp knife flashing as he cut up the
tripes of a sheep.
"No," he answered, "for where then would be your luck, which is the very
essence of holy Tymora? What 'luck' can there be, if the gods control your
every breath? And how dull for them, too! Would you take any interest at all
in the world beneath your powers, if you were a god and if the creatures in it
had no freedom to do anything you had not determined beforehand?
"No, you can be sure that gods do not fate men to act thus-and-so often, if at
all, despite the many tales even those by the great bards that would have it
otherwise." [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]