Crown of Fire

Three Swords Gathered in the Shadows

It was, as the minstrels say, a bright and beautiful morning in the forest. Birds sang and swooped in the branches as three Zhentilar warriors, whose faces and backs ran with sweat, bent to their work. Grunting under its weight, they lowered the stout frame of wooden poles into the pit where they stood. The end of each pole had been sharpened into a cruel point. “How’re we to know she’ll come this way? Aye?” “Not our worry, Guld.” The swordmaster’s voice came from above them at the lip of the pit. “We’re just swordarms. When the cover’s done, we just hide by it and wait with blades out—and that’s exactly how Lord Manshoon said it.”

The swordmaster had meant to awe them into silence with his last words, but the three sweating men—now climbing out of the pit and struggling to drag the dirt-and-brush-covered wooden lid properly onto the greased axle-pole—were young. They still owned tongues that wagged faster than the muzzle applied by prudence would allow.

“What makes high-an’-mighty Manshoon think we can do what he couldn’t? Him with a dragon and all his spells and wands, too!”

“He obviously knows your true worth better than I do, Alorth.” The swordmaster’s tone was biting.

Guld bent to slide the thin twigs into the sockets provided for them, taking care. The branches would hold the trap-cover up until this Shandril’s weight was on it. Giving the last one an extra tap, he looked up, wiping sweat and hair out of his eyes. “Seriously, Sir: what leads Lord Manshoon to send swords against this lass, where spells fail?”

Swordmaster Bluth bent his critical gaze on the finished pit trap, watching as Alorth spread a basketful of earth and leaves over its edges, kicking them into place with a practiced boot.

Then Bluth shrugged and looked up. “We’re only intended to wear this Shandril down so she’s tired and hurt and has used most of her spellfire before the magelings attack her. I’d like to surprise a few wizards, though, by capturing her ourselves.”

“Ourselves being those of us who’re still alive, you mean.” Alorth’s voice was hard. “Why attack her at all if we’re just going to our deaths? Why not leave her for the wizards—tell them she’s slipped past us somehow?”

The swordmaster walked all around the pit trap and nodded his acceptance; it was well-concealed. He stepped back to look at the trees around, searching for any signs they might have left of their presence, then replied, “Duty, lad. Duty to orders. It’s what we live for—and die for.”

“So lords can sit safe in their towers,” Alorth replied bitterly.

Bluth turned a cold eye on him. “Dangerous talk, Alorth. Taking the venomed dagger of your tongue to the plans and deeds of your betters is a sport that was old—and deadly—long before you were born.”

He looked around one last time, and then drew his sword and said to the other men briskly, “Best we get dressed again and ready. If the other lads do their work as well as we have, they’ll be here soon.”

“I’m done, Shan.” Narm shut his spellbook with a snap. “Mighty magic once more up my sleeves.”

“At least you’re not as overblown about it as most mages,” Delg said, looking up at him. “Though you’re not much better than most of ’em at walking, or cooking, or digging latrines … or anything else much useful ….”

“Delg!” Shandril and Narm protested together. The dwarf laughed and settled his bulging pack on his shoulders. As usual, he carried far more than his larger companions.

“We’d best be off before some more Zhents find us,” he said merrily. “North as before, then?”

Shandril shrugged. “You know better than I. Lead on.”

Without further words, the dwarf set off into the waiting woods.

“How do you feel today, love?” Narm’s voice was low.

Shandril gave him a smile. “Better than I have since we left Shadowdale. About time, too—it’s a long way to Silverymoon. From what Storm said, if we walk and have to avoid Zhents more than once or twice, winter could well find us before we’re halfway there.”

“See Faerûn,” Narm said, gesturing at the trees around them. “Know high adventure. Meet strange and fearsome beasts, the like few folk have ever seen—”

“And slay them.” Shandril’s voice was wry. She seemed to be looking at something far away. “I never dreamt, back at the Moon, that when I finally got my taste of adventure, it would mean I went around burning powerful wizards and veteran warriors to ash—and that the Cult of the Dragon, the Zhentarim, and just about everyone else I met would attack me.”

Narm hastened to head off her darkening mood. “Who else your age, though, has fought dragons—undead dragons, even—and lived?”

He caught his lady by the shoulders, eyes dancing, and went on jovially, “Has been rude to Elminster the Sage—and lived? Blasted Manshoon of Zhentil Keep and the dragon he rode out of the sky, and sent them fleeing for home? Blown up entire castles? Made friends with the Harpers, with Elminster, and with the Knights of Myth Drannor? Walked the ruined streets of Myth Drannor, that folk all over Faerûn talk of?”

Shandril smiled ruefully. “Yes, and hasn’t had a spare moment to draw breath, yet alone enjoy any of it.”

“You married me—and seemed to enjoy that,” Narm protested in mock hurt.

“She must have been deaf, then,” Delg put in, ahead of them. “The way you babble day and night through.”

Narm favored the dwarf with a certain rude sputtering noise made by small children throughout Faerûn.

“You’ll have to be a little closer to kiss me, lad,” the dwarf replied, eyes twinkling. Then his face grew more grave. “Shan—are you having thoughts against this journey?”

Shandril shook her head. “No—whatever I do, danger waits for me or comes looking. At least if I’m going somewhere, I have the feeling I’m doing something rather than just running from the latest attack.” She looked at them both and spread her hands. “If I wasn’t trying to get to Silverymoon—even if it doesn’t turn out to be a friendly haven—I’d be dead by now. I’d have surrendered, just to be free of always running and worrying and fighting. I’m so sick of it all—I could scream!”

Fire danced in Shandril’s eyes for a moment, and then died away, leaving her expression empty, her eyes like two dark, despairing pits. “I do scream,” she added, voice unsteady, “when I have to use spellfire—cursing the gods for playing this jest on me.”

Delg squinted up at her. “Others have cursed the humor of the gods, lass, even among the dwarves—but I’ve heard elders tell them the gods jest with us all, and we are measured by how we deal with what befalls. Of course you want to be free of all who harry you. Who in Faerûn wouldn’t?”

He shifted his heavy pack on his shoulders and added, “More than that: I’d be sad if one so young and inexperienced as you had already decided exactly what she’d do her entire life through … because she’d have to be a fool to be so certain about so little.”

“My thanks, Delg—I think,” Shandril told him a little stiffly.

And then she shrieked. Out of nowhere, something slim and dark tore through the air, leaping past her breast to crash into the leaves beyond.

Delg put his head down and charged bruisingly into Shandril. As they crashed into the damp, dead leaves together, the dwarf snarled, “Down!” in Narm’s direction.

With the hum of an angry hornet, another bolt tore through the air close overhead, and then another. Narm rolled amid dead leaves nearby, cursing.

Shandril fought for breath as Delg wriggled and grunted beside her, shucking his pack, tearing his shield free, and getting his arm into the straps. His axe flashed past her nose as he hefted it.

“The Zhents again!” the dwarf hissed, peering into the trees. “There!”

He pointed. Shandril rolled onto hands and knees and came up beside his hairy hand, looking along the pointing finger—and into the eyes of a Zhent who was loading a cocked crossbow.

From the leaves beside them, Narm muttered something. Two pulses of light leapt from his hand, streaking through the trees. The man grunted as they hit, staggering and dropping his bow.

Shandril saw others behind him, and rose to her feet, pointing. Spellfire roared down her arm, shaking her, and white flames shot out through the trees like the breath of a furious red dragon. Leaves blazed and then were gone. Halfway to the Zhents a tree was burned through by the roaring flames. It toppled slowly, and crashed ponderously among the dead leaves.

Shandril snarled and raised her other hand.

Delg caught her arm from behind. “No, Shan!” Then he cursed and shrank back from her, clutching at his hand. Shandril stared at him in shock. Smoke was rising in wisps from the dwarf’s fingers; he shook his hand, roared out his pain, and looked up at her, eyes bright with tears.

“Remind me not to do that again soon,” he growled, flexing his burned fingers. Then he nodded at where she’d aimed. “You daren’t do that in these heavy woods, lass—look.”

A burnt scar stretched away through the trees from where she stood, to where a tangle of trees had fallen. Shandril stared along her path of destruction, face bleak, and saw dark-armored figures moving amid the trees beyond it.

The dwarf hesitated, then reluctantly reached out and caught at her arm again. This time no ready spellfire burned him. Too many. We must run from them, lass—if you use your fire freely, all these woods’ll soon be ablaze around us.”

They could see Zhent warriors, blades drawn, in the trees to their right and ahead of them. The Zhents were advancing cautiously, moving in as a group so as to arrive together, their blades a deadly wall of steel.

Delg couldn’t see any foes to their left. He heaved his pack back onto his shoulders, hung his shield on it, commanded, “Come!” and broke into a lumbering run, heading to the left.

Narm and Shandril followed, hurrying through the trees. They heard shouts behind them and broke into a panting run. Narm skidded to a halt, waved his hands hurriedly, and then scrambled to catch up with his lady.

Close behind him—too close—Zhentilar soldiers cursed and struggled in the invisible spellweb the young mage had left for them to blunder into.

Shandril looked anxiously back every time her route through the thick-standing trees turned to one side or the other. Narm grinned at her between gasps for air as he closed the distance between them, sprinting and leaping as he’d done as a small boy—and never since, until now.

That invisible web Elminster had taught him had come in very handy. A few Zhents must have gotten around its ends, though—and soon it would melt away, freeing them all. By then, a certain trio of fools had better be long gone.

Narm reached Shandril’s side. They crashed wildly through leaves and tangles, leaping over rocks and fallen branches and slipping on mud and wet leaves underfoot while the dwarf huffed along ahead of them, completely hidden under his pack. The bulging rucksack looked like it was running away by itself, leaping and scuttling through the leaves.

With aching lungs and pounding hearts, Narm and Shandril followed, plunging down a slope of old leaves and soft mosses that gave way and slid under their feet. Soon they reached the bottom of a leaf-choked gully, and ran along it, gathering speed with the easier footing. Their route looked like an old, sunken road hidden below the overhanging trees, cutting through a ridge ahead and then dropping out of sight.

The pack that hid Delg bobbed and wiggled as it fairly flew along ahead of Narm and Shandril, but their longer legs were beginning to close the distance to the huffing dwarf. Now he was only thirty paces or so in front of them. Narm growled and put on a determined burst of speed.

Twenty paces ahead.

Ten.

There was a sharp cracking sound—and then another. The ground in front of Delg rose suddenly, like the drawbridge of a keep, and the two puffing humans saw the bulky pack slip back down its slope. Delg’s axe flashed for a moment as he waved it—and then the dwarf and his pack fell out of sight.

Narm and Shandril came to a shocked halt on the very edge of the pit Delg had fallen into, and they clutched at each other for balance. Delg lay helpless like an upended turtle atop a forest of wooden spikes that had pierced the pack he wore. Shandril looked over her shoulder to find a vine to drag Delg out, but just then, four Zhentarim soldiers with drawn swords rose from behind the trees, atop the banks of the gully.

“Surrender to us,” one said heavily, “or—”

Shandril didn’t want to hear the choice, it seemed. With a scream very like the angry shriek of a harpy, she hurled spellfire in a fury. White flames leapt forth, roaring; when they died away, the Zhents around saw that the warrior’s upper body had been blasted away.

The legs tottered for a moment and then fell. The two men beside the ash heap screamed in terror and ran.

Narm dropped to his belly beside the pit. Its lid was held open by Delg’s booted feet; the red-faced, furious dwarf lay below, just beyond his reach, spitting curses Narm was glad he couldn’t understand.

Shouts came from the trees behind them. The warriors they’d run from—who’d herded them here, Shandril realized—were following up their trail. Fast.

One man remained atop the other bank, sword drawn. He looked down at them uncertainly, his face gray with fear, his eyes wide.

“Drop your sword, or die!” Shandril told him. “Now!”

Alorth licked bloodless lips and looked across at what was left of the swordmaster. He threw his blade down, raising his hands to plead. “Please—”

“Get down here!” Shandril hurled spellfire back down the gully behind her without looking; a cry of despair, abruptly stilled, answered her. She glared at the Zhentilar. “Come down—or die!”

Almost weeping with terror, Alorth slithered down. Those burning eyes stared up at him from only a few feet away. They might belong to a young, frightened girl—but they held his death, and Alorth knew it. He trembled, sudden sweat running down his nose.

“Touch no weapons,” Shandril said, biting off her words. “Reach down and get him out of the pit. If he’s hurt, or if you leave the pack behind, you die.”

Alorth stared at her for a moment, and at the young mage who rose up from the dirt to glare at him. A crossbow bolt whistled past them.

“Move, or die!” Shandril hissed, eyes flaming. Spellfire lanced out. The Zhentilar cried out at the burning pain her gaze brought him, and fell heavily on his knees. Behind him, he heard screams and a roar like rolling thunder. He looked around—to find the forest lit by hungry flames, Zhentilar warriors shrieking and staggering in the conflagration. The young lass stood defiantly facing them, fire dancing in her hands.

Then something gleamed, very near, as it slid down into his view: the point of his own sword, not a finger’s length from his eyes, the angry face of the young mage behind it.

Sobbing in fear, Alorth turned and reached for the dwarf. Too far. He’d never reach that far, without—he frantically scrabbled at the edge of the pit, but harsh hands were suddenly at his ribs and belt, heaving and shoving.

With a cry of terror, Alorth Bloodshoulder toppled headlong toward the spikes, those cruel points leaping up at his face, and—there was a sudden pain in his knees as he came to a wrenching halt. Alorth groaned. Sweat fell past his eyes—and spattered on the sharpened wood only inches below. The mage must be sitting on his lower legs.

The dwarf, still snarling dwarven curses, swarmed up his arms, digging in fingers with cruel force. Then the weight and the pain were both gone, and Alorth was roughly hauled up onto the ground. Freed, he slumped into the dirt, moaning softly.

The noise like thunder came again. Alorth looked up with tear-blurred eyes, and saw a stream of white, roaring flames rolling down the already blackened gully away from him, the girl silhouetted against its brightness.

Crossbow bolts leapt from the trees to either side, caught fire as Shandril looked at them, and crashed down in smoke and ashes. The dwarf, axe in hand, glared at Alorth from a foot or so away, and the Zhentilar fearfully snatched the dagger from his belt.

Shandril heard his grunt of effort and spun around. Spellfire roared, and Alorth found himself staring at the bare bones of his arm. The smoking remnants of the dagger fell from them an instant before they collapsed, pattering to the ground in a grisly shower. Alorth found breath enough to whimper for a moment before the world spun, and he crashed down into darkness ….

“Are there any left?” Narm was peering back through the trees as they stood gasping for breath in a little hollow deeper in the forest. They had run from the gully of smoking Zhentilar corpses for what seemed like an hour. The pursuing shouts and crossbow bolts seemed to have stopped—and far behind them, they heard barking calls that probably meant wolves had discovered waiting cooked meals.

“There’re always more Zhents, lad,” Delg puffed. “They’re like stinging flies.” The dwarf was glumly looking at his torn and punctured pack. Shredded clothing protruded from the rents the spikes had made.

Narm pushed the cloth back through the holes. Between gulps for air, he said brightly, “That could’ve been … far worse … aye?”

Delg rolled a severe eye around to meet his. “Many men spend their lives trying to get out of one hole or another. Just take care, Narm, that yours doesn’t wind up being a pit with sharpened spikes at the bottom of it.”

Shandril managed a weak chuckle, and then got to her feet. “We’d best go on while we can,” she sighed. “Or they’ll be on us again—and those crossbows can’t miss forever.”

Narm was muttering something and passing a hand over Delg’s pack. Where he touched it, the worst rents and holes shrank and closed, the fabric smoothing out as if new. Narm, finished, probed at his work, and looked up at her. “How are you feeling, Shan?”

“Tired. When I said I was sick of endless battle,” Shandril told him grimly, “I meant it.”

The glow from the pool lit the face of the Zhentarim priest who stared into it, watching them from afar. He smiled a slow, cruel smile and said, “Oh, maid, if you’re sick of battle now, you’ll be at the doors of death over it, before long—I can promise that.” The warriors standing with him all laughed. It was not a pretty chorus.

As they struggled through the endless green depths of Hullack Forest, and the day wore on, Delg felt the constant weight of watching eyes on them. More than once, he called a halt to peer around suspiciously, looking at the dim legions of tree trunks on all sides. “We’re being watched,” he said. “I can feel it.”

“Magic?” Narm asked.

“Of course magic, stumblehead,” the dwarf replied grumpily. “If a beast—or even a Zhent sneak-thief—was stalking along behind us, I’d have seen it by now.”

“As you say, oh tall and mighty one,” Narm replied, eyes dancing.

Shandril flicked a warning look at her husband as the dwarf growled something under his breath, and Narm raised his hands. “Peace! Peace, oh giant among dwarves!”

“A bit less tongue, youngling,” Delg replied, “and we’d best be on our way again—unless Elminster taught you any clever spells that can ward off scrying magic.”

The mage frowned. “No, no … but I’m trying to remember something Storm said, back in Shadowdale, about the goddess Tymora.”

“Tymora?”

“Aye … Rathan gave us a luck medallion blessed by Tymora, and Gorstag gave us another. Storm said something about how such things can be used, but I can’t recall—”

The dwarf snorted. “Of course not. You’re a mage, and mages can’t even remember their own names or ages. Let me look at these medallions.”

Shandril obediently pulled on the chain around her neck, drawing her medallion out of the breast of her tunic. Narm brought his out of his robes. The dwarf squinted at them both and sighed.

“By the gods, you two innocents’ll be the death of me yet! With these, we can be cloaked from magic, twice—each use will burn away one medallion.”

“What?”

“Aye.” The dwarf fairly danced in impatience. “There’s a charm on these things.” He swung around to fix Narm with eager eyes. “You can cast an invisibility spell, can’t you, lad?”

Narm nodded. “Y-yes.”

“Well, if you cast it on one of these medallions, the spell will last until the next morn, so long as the medallion isn’t touched by a living being, or moved. The spell covers everyone within ten paces—or whatever, I forget exactly how far—and nothing can see, hear, or smell them from outside that space. Even sniffing beasts and wizard spells miss you. All the spells that detect things find all sorts of traces, aye—in the wrong places, and moving in the wrong directions.”

“You speak truth?” Narm’s astonishment overrode his manners.

“Nay, lad—I want to die under a dozen Zhentarim blades,” the dwarf snarled, “after all we’ve been through thus far. So I’m lying to you both so Manshoon can walk right up to us while you think us safe. Of course I speak truth! One of these saved my life, once, when our company was too badly wounded to go on; with it, we bought time for healing.”

“If that’s so,” Shandril said quietly, “I could use a rest from all this running—and time to practice a bit with my spellfire. I’m still burning things to ashes when I mean only to cook them gently, or send spellflame past them at something else. I’ve no wish to burn most of this forest down, or slay things I have no quarrel with.”

“Let’s go on until we find another clearing, then,” Narm said. “And some water to drink.”

“We’re past highsun,” Delg said. “We’d best be getting on.”

It had grown late, the sun sinking low amid the trees, before they found another clearing. “Here,” Shandril said, giving her medallion to Delg.

The dwarf set it on a stone near the center of the open, grassy space, and sat himself on an old stump nearby. “Your spell, lad,” he directed. Narm carefully worked his magic and touched the shining silver disc. It flashed and then briefly sparkled, but nothing else seemed to happen.

“Is it working?” Shandril asked. The young man and the dwarf traded looks and shrugged in unison.

“I don’t feel we’re being watched anymore,” Delg said. He turned to Narm. “Best study your spells, lad, while I get a meal ready.”

Shandril sighed, relaxing, and then walked a few paces away. She found some bushes and a comfortable moss-covered stone, and sank down thankfully. Yawning, she rubbed at her shoulders and aching feet. Then she stiffened. There was a tiny fluttering inside her; spellfire tingling faintly … building again.

She bent her will to calling the inner fire up, feeling it surge and roil about within her. When Shandril felt ready, she stood and hurled a tongue of flame between the two trunks of a forked duskwood tree. They smoked and creaked in the heat, but neither burst into flame.

Pleased, she threw spellfire again. This time her target was a small cluster of leaves: could she burn them off their branch without disturbing other leaves nearby? The cluster flared and was gone; a few flames flickered and then died in their wake. Shandril frowned; she’d burned more leaves than she’d meant to.

None of the three travelers saw the medallion begin to smolder. When the next burst of spellfire lashed out at a small patch of toadstools, the medallion pulsed with momentary fire. Drifting smoke showed that only a blackened patch remained where the toadstools had been; the medallion melted into a tiny remnant that crumbled and fell apart, unseen.

When next spellfire licked out—in a curving arc this time, reaching around behind a stout tree—malevolent eyes were watching, as before ….

“Watch well,” Gathlarue said softly, looking into the glowing crystal, “and remember—this is not a fire spell. The maid’s fire cleaves all spell barriers we know of and will scatter any wall of fire you or I might raise.”

Mairara lifted an eyebrow. “I find it hard to credit that wench with wits enough to stand up to any mage of skill.”

“She is said to have forced Lord Manshoon himself to flee,” Tespril whispered. Her eyes were large and very dark; Gathlarue was pleased to see that at least one of her apprentices was smart enough to be scared.

She stretched, then favored them both with a smile. “We shall watch and learn much more before we move against Shandril ourselves.”

She ran her fingers idly through a lock of Mairara’s long, glossy black hair, and as its owner smiled at her, sat back from the crystal and told Tespril, “Order our evenfeast brought to us, here. Tonight we’ll have rare entertainment to watch; the main troop of Zhentilar are to try their luck at capturing Shandril. The idiot sword-swingers are such crude fumblers they’ve been assigned one of Fzoul’s best priests in case they should kill Shandril by mischance.”

The apprentices laughed merrily, and Tespril bowed and hastened away to give the orders.

“Lady,” Mairara whispered, bending over her mistress, “is this spellfire really so much more powerful than the spells of, say, a pair of capable archmages?”

“Watch,” Gathlarue murmured at her senior apprentice. “Watch what befalls tonight, in my crystal … and govern your own mind in the matter.”

Mairara nodded, somber eyes on her, and then looked up swiftly as Tespril returned.

“The men are taking bets on how this night’s battle will turn out,” the younger apprentice said, chuckling. “They want to know who commands the Zhentilar.”

Gathlarue smiled. “Karkul Memrimmon leads,” she said. “A great beast of a man who fights with spiked gauntlets, and never stays out of the fray.”

“You’ve met him, Lady?” Tespril’s tone was teasing, her eyes bright.

“I kept well out of his reach,” Gathlarue told her. “He’s the sort who’d get thrown out of taverns I wouldn’t go into ….”

Spellfire crackled satisfyingly around the stump. Shandril watched a small thread of smoke curl up from the bark, and she nodded, satisfied. She could strike exactly the spot she aimed for—and high time, too, as Delg would say.

She sighed ruefully and looked at the dark, deep woods around her. A branch snapped somewhere off to her left, not far away. Shandril’s eyes narrowed, and she backed up to a tree, calling “Narm? Delg?” as loudly as she dared.

Her answer came swiftly—something large and hairy emerged from behind a nearby tree, lumbering along like a grotesque parody of a man. A cruel beak larger than Shandril’s head protruded from the dusty, matted feathers on its face. Hungry, red-rimmed eyes glittered at her, and it began a crashing charge through the leaves.

Shandril screamed and hurled spellfire at it in a frantic spray. Sputtering spellflames raced out of her and wreathed the huge monster—and it screamed. Shandril sent a bolt of fire right into its face and backed hastily away around the tree, as it roared and flailed blindly with its bearlike claws.

Her flames hit it again, and its cries grew weaker. There were other crashing sounds behind her, now, coming closer. Shandril looked up. Delg and Narm were bounding through the undergrowth. She sighed thankfully—and the wounded beast charged toward the sound. Anxiously Shandril hurled spellfire into that reaching beak—and the thing recoiled, roaring again.

There was a sudden flash of light in front of Shandril. It lit Narm’s stern face as he guided his conjured blade of force straight into one of the beast’s eyes.

Light flashed again inside that monstrous head, and with a rough, despairing cry, the thing crashed to the damp leaves at her feet. Smoke rose from its mouth and then drifted away. The beast thrashed about briefly and lay still, its eyes growing dull.

“An owlbear!” Delg’s voice was rough with worry. “You seem to run into the most interesting folk, wherever we go.”

Shandril looked down at the smoking thing at her feet, her eyes empty. She suddenly shuddered and turned away with a sob, starting to bolt. A moment later, she ran straight and bruisingly into something large and hard—Delg’s shield. The dwarf stepped out from behind it, letting it fall, and caught Shandril by the arm. “You can’t run from it, lass—sooner or later, you’ve got to face it. As long as other folk in Faerûn want what you’ve got, you must kill to live—so, these days, killing’s what you do.”

Shandril stared at him. “And what if it’s not what I want to do?” she asked very quietly.

The dwarf squinted up at her and then shrugged. “Then you’d best lie down and die the next time someone attacks. You’ll save a lot of trouble—for yourself, not for the rest of the Realms.”

Shandril looked back at the smoking corpse, and then fixed tired eyes on his. “I don’t like killing. I’ll never like killing.”

Delg nodded. “If that proves true, ’tis good, very good, for us all.”

Shandril frowned. “What do you mean, ‘proves true’?”

The dwarf leaned on his axe. “Slaying’s never easy, lass. When you’re young, it’s a shock—the smell, the blood and all ….”

Narm added quietly, “And when you’re old, you see your own death in each killing … a part of you dies each time.”

The dwarf looked at Narm in surprise. “Wise words for one so young; right you are, indeed.” He stared off into memory for a moment, and added softly, “Much too right, lad.”

“And between youth and old age?” Shandril asked quietly. “What then?”

Delg squinted at her. “Ah,” he rumbled, “that’s the time when one who must kill is most dangerous. They get good at the task—very good, some of them—and they also get so they just don’t care about the lives they take.”

Shandril looked at him. “And if that happens to me?”

Delg looked into her eyes and then turned away. “I’ll try to kill you. So will Elminster, and the Knights—and, of course, the Zhents and everyone else in Faerûn who’s been hunting you all this time.”

“Tell me,” Narm said to the dwarf, his voice like a quietly drawn sword, “what you’d say if I stood by Shandril then, even if—gods forfend—she did come to love killing … what then?”

Delg looked at him. “Before you died,” he said gruffly, hefting his axe meaningfully, “I’d be very proud of you.” Then he walked away over the edge of the ridge, axe in hand, looking very old and very alone.

Narm and Shandril peered at each other. “I hope I’m never that sad,” Narm said quietly as he put his arms around her.

“I hope I’m never that short,” Shandril said with a sudden smile. The mood broken, they laughed uneasily—and then heartily when they heard Delg snap the words, “I heard that!” from the other side of the ridge.

After their laughter was done, they walked back together and found the dwarf gloomily surveying a scorched stone in the center of the clearing where the medallion had been. Delg sighed, lifted his eyes to Shandril’s, and said gruffly, “Just keep your fires away from my axe, lass. Oh, aye—and the seat of my breeches.”

Narm chuckled to rob those words of their sting, but Shandril did not manage a smile.

Not far away, men in black armor crept through the forest, their drawn blades blackened with soot. Their progress was marked by muffled curses and stumbling noises from time to time as rocks and tree roots disputed passage with the soldiers.

A swordmaster near the rear muttered, “A little more care and quiet, there!” Silence answered him, and after a few cautious breaths the officer turned his head and added, “Keep a good watch out behind, Simron—or you’ll wind up owlbear-meat.”

“Aye, sir,” Simron replied, low-voiced, and laid a restraining hand on the shoulder of the man beside him. They knelt unmoving until they heard the swordmaster scramble away.

Simron turned and surveyed the night in all directions behind them. After being satisfied that they weren’t followed, he turned back to his companion and said, “I’m in no hurry to move on yet and get cooked like an ox on a feast night. Have ye heard the one about the six dancing girls and the glow-worm? No? Well, then …”

“Enough, lass. It’s too dark to keep hurling flames about, even down in this vale. Your fires’ll draw the eyes of beasts—and worse—all around in these woods.” Delg put a cautious hand on her elbow, which was about as high as he could reach.

Shandril let the smoldering spellfire in her hands die away and then stood trembling, drenched with sweat. Managing a weary smile, she said, “Thanks, Delg. I suppose I got carried away—I even forgot about evenfeast.”

“It’s waiting,” the dwarf said, leading her briskly back to where Narm lay against their packs, dozing. “If the flies haven’t had it all by now—”

Whatever else he’d been going to say was lost forever in the sudden crack of a whip, very near in the darkness. A startled, tired Shandril watched light blossom here and there among the trees as lanterns were unhooded. More than one lamp was sent streaking through the air, borne by hurled spears—and in the light they shed, the horrified dwarf saw dark, sinuous shapes leaping at them.

“War dogs!” Delg swore. “Narm, ’ware! Narm!” He was running as he bellowed, axe flashing out.

In eerie silence the dogs bounded toward him. Their tongues must have been cut out, Shandril thought in horror, as she raised weary arms and sent killing spellfire into the night.

Gods, but they were fast! Dogs dodged and leapt, bared fangs flashing as they came. She struck again, and blazing hounds writhed in soundless agony, rolling over and over, smoke rising from their flanks.

She saw Narm’s hands fall, a spell done—and a dozen or so dogs came to an abrupt, brutal stop, falling and thrashing about together in a confused mass. He must have conjured another spellweb. But many more dogs streamed around the fallen ones and toward them. Shandril hurled spellfire again, and in the midst of it, one dark form rose up, pawed the air for a moment, and then fell over on its back, dead. By the light of her spellflames she saw a score of leaping dogs still coming, snapping and snarling as they came.

Delg stood among them, axe rising and falling. The light grew stronger as torches were lit. Shandril saw the gleam of armor all around them in the trees as Narm, his dagger in hand, reached her—just in time to be bowled over by a leaping war dog.

Shandril screamed as fangs snapped at her throat. Frantic spellfire flared as she was struck by the beast, and the heavy, cooked dog bore her to the ground with the force of its leap. It left the stink of its charred, headless body all over her.

Shandril screamed again, rolling free, as a hurled spear hummed past her ear.

Amid the hissing torches, the Zhentilar Warcaptain watched her crawling as fast as she could for the cover of a tree. He grinned cruelly and said to one of his officers, “Now.”

The swordmaster whistled, and the air was suddenly alive with hissing crossbow bolts.