The Stories of Elaine Cunningham

A LITTLE KNOWLEDGE

The Counselors amp; Kings trilogy visits the land of Halruaa and introduces the jordaini, a class of magic-dead warrior scholars who serve as advisors to Halruaa's wizard lords. The jordaini are not only trained for this job, they're bred for it. And that, of course, is fraught with all the issues that arise when genetic engineering is discussed.

It took two hundred and thirty-seven tries to successfully clone a sheep. What on earth-or for that matter, what on Toril-should be done with the failed attempts at creating a particular kind of human?

This story deals with two deeply flawed humans; a "defective" jordaini who, by law, should have been destroyed at birth, and a sorcerer who is tormented by the ability to see all possible outcomes of any situation.

19 Marpenoth, the Year of Wild Magic (1372 DR)

Long rays of morning sun slanted through Halruaa's ancient trees, reaching out like tentative fingers to waken the rain-sodden village. But Ashtarahh was already long awake and bustling with activity.

The summer monsoon season was over. The village diviner decreed that yesterday's storm would be the last. Already the rice fields and briss-berry bogs were alive with harvesters, moving barelegged through ankle deep water as they sped their task with morning-glad songs.

Mist clung to the fields and swirled around the small buildings, pinned between land and sky by the hot, dense air and the swiftly climbing sun. No one wondered how the moisture-laden skies could absorb yesterday's rains; the answer was in the lush Halruaan landscape, and in particular the tall, thin trees lining the forest's edge, swaying dreamily to music only they could hear.

The vangi trees came with the first rains, sprouting up overnight like verdant mushrooms. They grew with incredible speed-two or three handspans a day. By the end of the monsoons, they were ready for harvest. Several children, agile as monkeys, shimmied up the segmented trunks to pluck the fist-sized purple fruit at the top. These they tossed into the canvas sheet held taut and ready by the four glum-faced, land-bound boys who'd drawn short straws. Several young men stood ready with machetes. Once the fruit was taken, the trees would be cut, dressed into lengths, and dragged to the road. The village streets were cobbled and the forest roads deeply sheltered, but the path leading through the fields was slow to harden after the rains. Each year fresh rows of vangi trees were pressed into the muck, forming a bumpy but mostly dry path for market traffic.

This path ended between two shops: the blacksmith and the wheelwright. Smoke rose in billows from the forge, and two apprentices busily rolled new wheels into waiting racks. A trip down the vangi corduroy road was a bone-rattling gauntlet, and more than one of the expected market carts would not survive it unscathed. But visiting merchants and artisans shrugged off splintered wheels, unshod oxen, and broken axles as the cost of doing business in Ashtarahh.

The late summer market was especially busy. Market stalls and tents rapidly took shape under the hands of carpenters and minor wizards. The owners of more permanent shops folded back the protective canvases, wielded brooms, and set out their wares. The clack of looms and the tart aroma of ripe cheeses filled the air. Bright glass vials of brissberry cordial stood in lines, looking like enormous ruby necklaces. Lengths of fine white linen gleamed in the morning sun, and skeins of brightly dyed yarn hung in arched windows in deliberate imitation of rainbows. But the most famous of Ashtarahh's crafts were its cunningly woven tapestries. These hung at every third stall, transforming the market into a veritable gallery.

Villagers who were not otherwise engaged strolled along the cobbles, admiring the woven art. Most of the tapestries depicted scenes from Halruaan history and legend. Skyships were commonly depicted, as were the magical creatures common to Halruaa: the brilliantly colored, many-legged crocodilians known as behirs, the winged starsnakes, even the dreaded laraken. Some of the tapestries depicted famous and infamous wizards. Small magical effects enlivened some of these scenes, sending bursts of light arcing between spell-battling foes. A large weaving of a quite-literally blazing phoenix-the new standard of King Zalathorm-drew admiring attention. The biggest crowd, however, was the group stealthily converging upon the southwest corner of the square, where Ursault the All-Seeing sat with his crooked, cast-off loom.

Ursault was a thin, unassuming man of indeterminate age. His long, rather stringy locks had gone gray, and his face was unmemorable but for his pale eyes-a hazel more gray than green, an oddity in a land of dark-eyed, black-haired people. The title "All-Seeing" held gentle mockery, though it was rumored that it had once been spoken with respect. Once, it was said, Ursault had been a powerful diviner, one who saw many possible paths with equal clarity. But the vast and various potential of the future was a burden too large to carry, and Ursault had retreated to this sleepy village, content to weave his confused visions into tapestries no one wanted, and only he could understand.

A band of boys wove through the stalls as they crept toward the wizard, their grins wide and white in small dirty faces. Several of them scooped mud from between the cobbles and readied the first wave of attack.

The wizard looked up and smiled in gentle welcome. No knowledge of the coming mischief was written in his pale eyes, but a small, ominous gray cloud appeared directly over the head of the band's leader, a stocky little urchin who answered to Dammet.

The unwitting boy hauled back for the throw. Instantly the cloud exploded into a tiny, belated monsoon, drenching the boy and sending his comrades skittering away, hooting with delighted laughter. Liquid mud dribbled between Dammet's fingers as his weapon dissipated.

A second boy darted back and hurled his mud ball with a deft, side-armed toss. Ursault moved one hand in a vague little gesture and the mud changed in midair to a crystalline white. He caught the snowball and tossed it back to the urchin. The boy yelped with surprise and tossed the ball from hand to hand, marveling at the unfamiliar sting of cold.

"Taste it," Ursault suggested.

Uncertainty flooded the small face, but the mixture of encouragement and taunting from his friends decided the matter. He took a tentative lick, and his eyes rounded with delight.

"Mazganut cream," the boy announced grandly.

He dodged several grasping hands and darted off, his prize clutched possessively. Two of the boys started to give chase, but abandoned the notion after their first few steps. There was a bigger game to be played, and their faces were smug with anticipation.

Dammet pushed a smaller boy forward-an ungainly lad with an intense but unfocused stare. Dammet flipped a lock of wet black hair off his face and draped an arm around the boy's tensely-hunched shoulders.

"Here's my man Tad," he announced. He leaned down to scoop up more mud, which he slapped into the boy's hand. "You might say he's skittish. If he kept his mind stuck to one idea for more'n a heartbeat, the shock of it would likely kill him. And he can't throw worth goat dung. There ain't no way you could know where this mud ball's gonna hit."

Indeed, the wizard's face furrowed as he contemplated the possibilities. An expression of near panic seeped into his pale eyes.

"Maybe not, but you can figure out where I'll hit sure enough," announced a rumbling voice. A short, stout man stepped out from behind the stall's tumble-down wall, brandishing a vangi switch. "Now git."

The boys got, scampering off with scant regard for their less agile champion. Tad stumbled after them, howling protests against his abandonment.

Ursault glanced at his rescuer. Though the wizard was seated upon a low stool, he was eye to eye with the newcomer, a man whose barrel-chested torso was supported by uncommonly short, bandy legs. He was about the height of a dwarf, but was most definitely not of that race. His face was as beardless as a boy's though he was well into adulthood. There was no hint of any other race about him to explain his stature-he lacked the small frame and hairy feet of Luiren's halflings, and the bulbous nose and blue eyes common to gnomes. Yet some wag had called him a Gnarfling-an unlikely combination of all three races-and the name had stuck.

Something that for lack of a better name could be called friendship had grown between the two village misfits. Gnarfling was the only person who regularly sought out Ursault's company, and who actually seemed to enjoy the old wizard's tales. He leaned in and regarded the tangle of thread on the wizard's loom.

"What do you make of this?"

"Melody Sibar's peacock chicks," Ursault said, pointing to a matted blob of gray thread. "They'll hatch today. Or perhaps tomorrow. At least, those that intend to hatch at all."

"That ought to cover it."

Gnarfling uncorked a flask, which they passed back and forth a couple of times. He belched companionably and settled down, preparing to enjoy the morning's storytelling. His look of contentment faded when he noted a stout woman bustling purposefully toward them.

"Landbound skyship a'coming under full sail," he muttered.

The description was not far off. Vilma was Dammet's mother, a cheery, chatty woman who frequently-and justifiably-looked a bit flustered and windblown. Wisps of black hair escaped her single braid and her round face was rosy-cheeked from her morning's work. Like her son, she was always busy, never still. But unlike many of the villagers, she made time to chat with Ursault now and again, mostly because he was one of the few people in Ashtarahh who tolerated Dammet's pranks.

With a grateful sigh, the woman shouldered off the straps that held a basket of newly-harvested brissberries. The fruit was heavy, covered with a thick rind and a nutlike shell, and extracting the juice was a long process. She unhooked a small cleaver from her belt-a needed tool for the task ahead-and began to smooth a whet stone over it.

"What's coming to this little corner of Zalathorm's realm, lord wizard?"

"A white dog," Ursault said mildly.

"Fearful doings," she said with a grin.

He nodded somberly. "That dog will be the death of more than half the people in a neighboring village."

A small brindle pup ambled by, not far from the wizard's stall. Vilma gave a good-natured chuckle. "That's Dammet's mongrel pup, and the closest thing we got to a white dog hereabouts. Not much of a threat there."

"Not for several seasons, no, but then the dog will wander far from the village and mate with a renegade wolfwere. Their offspring will have pure white fur and look more dog than wolf. In human form, she will be a comely maid."

Vilma responded with a thin smile. "My man Tomas will enjoy this tale, that's for sure and certain! His eye for a pretty girl will be the death of him." She shook her cleaver, an unconsciously lethal gesture.

"True enough, but his death will not come at your hands," Ursault replied.

The woman's smile faded, and fear crept into her eyes. When a wizard-even a mad wizard-spoke of death, it was time to start kindling the funeral pyres.

"Of course, if your boy Dammet remembers to tie the brindle dog when the harvest moon blooms full, the white maid will never be. A lot of trouble that will save." Ursault cocked his head, as if listening to unseen voices. "But on the other hand, a lot of trouble that will cause. This same wolfwere maid could bring doom to the floating city. A lot of trouble that will save. On the other hand-" He broke off with a grunt, momentarily silenced by a sharp, warning nudge from Gnarfling's elbow.

The woman's smile returned, edged with both relief and pity. "Floating cities now, is it? Here in Halruaa?"

Ursault shrugged. "Sometimes yes, and sometimes no."

"That ought to cover it," Gnarfling said meaningfully.

Vilma's gaze darted toward the short man and moved quickly away. Her tolerance did not quite embrace the odd little man. Everyone in Ashtarahh knew most everything about everyone else, and found comfort in this universal lack of privacy. But not even the most imaginative gossip among them could invent a story that could in satisfactory fashion explain Gnarfling, or define his purpose in coming to Ashtarahh. Vilma had a limited imagination and a healthy suspicion of anything than lay beyond its bounds. She gave Ursault a tentative smile, then hauled up her basket and took off at a brisk pace.

Gnarfling reached for his flask and gestured with it toward the loom. "What else you see in there?"

A forlorn expression touched the wizard's face. "Everything," he said softly, his voice sad and infinitely weary. "Everything."

The small man cleared his throat, uneasy with his friend's pain. "Well, how about you start a new weaving, and let's see where it goes."

Ursault obligingly drew a small knife and cut the tangle from his loom. He made a complicated arcane gesture, and a new set of vertical threads appeared on the crooked frame. For a long moment he studied the warp threads, as if examining and discarding many possibilities. Finally he took up a shuttle and began to layer in the weft.

His hands flashed with a wizard's exquisite dexterity, adding a thread here and a new color there. Before long a pattern began to emerge. Glowing, silvery threads connected in a fine web. The fabric between this web, however, remained a dark and indeterminate color, deep as moon-cast shadows. Gnarfling frowned in puzzlement as he noted that Ursault was threading in some mud-splattered crimson. Even this bright color disappeared into the shadowy gloom.

"What do you make of that?" he demanded.

"That's the Weave," Ursault replied, naming the web of magic that surrounded and sustained all of Halruaa and, for all Gnarfling knew, the rest of the world as well. "At least, it's Ashtarahh's place in the Weave."

Gnarfling leaned in and squinted. Sure enough, he could make out the faint outline of the village, as it might appear to a soaring hawk, carved out of the tightly packed web that represented the jungle. Fainter, thinner silver threads connected the fields and buildings, and tiny glowing dots seemed to mill about the open area-an uncanny representation of the market square and the people who readied it.

This was the first discernible picture Gnarfling had ever seen on Ursault's loom. For some reason that worried him. So did the intense expression on the wizard's face as he tossed colors haphazardly into the pattern, only to have them swallowed by the strange, shadowy void that separated and defined the silvery Weave.

In short order a small tapestry hung on the loom. Ursault studied the weaving intently, and Gnarfling studied Ursault.

"You see something, don't you?"

"Everything," the wizard responded again in wondering tones. "Everything."

The response was familiar, but there was a new note in his voice, something that sent tiny fingers of cold dancing down Gnarfling's spine.

After a moment, Ursault moved one hand in a flowing circular pattern. The unseen colors shifted, and a man's face took form in a gap between the glowing silver threads, a face depicted with precision and clarity that the best of Ashtarahh's weavers could not match.

The man was young and exceedingly lean. His high, sharp cheekbones leaned precariously over the deep hollows below, and the thin black mustache on his upper lip looked as tremulous and impermanent as a perching moth. His face was exceedingly pale for a Halruaan, and a sharp contrast to the feverish brightness of his black eyes.

"Trouble coming," muttered Gnarfling. He was well acquainted with trouble and plenty familiar with wizards-which, to his way of thinking, were two words for the same thing. "When?"

In response, Ursault merely shifted his gaze from the loom to the market square.

The square was filling rapidly. Visiting merchants strolled along the paths, eyeing the tapestries and sampling bits of cheese. The trundle of carts over the corduroy filled the air with a pleasant rumble. Already two of these carts had been hauled off the path to languish by the wheelwright's shop, listing heavily over shattered wheels. A young man stood by one of them, arguing with the apprentices and punctuating his complaints with overly dramatic gestures.

Gnarfling's eyes went straight to a thin young man, narrowing as they took in the too familiar theatrics. The newcomer didn't have the look of a merchant or artisan. He was tall and thin, not much past twenty summers, and obviously possessed more money than sense. He traveled alone in an expensive covered cart drawn by matched horses. His emaciated form was draped with fine robes of purple-trimmed black, and jewels flashed on his gesticulating hands. All of these things fairly screamed "wizard."

Even without the trappings, there was an intensity about the newcomer that suggested magic, yet Gnarfling could sense no hint of Mystra's Art about the young man. His nose for such things was as keen as any hound's, and, more to the point, as keen as any magehound's. These instincts, and the permanent disguise offered by his stunted form, had kept him alive for over thirty winters.

Why then, he wondered, was he so uneasy?

"He's looking for you," Ursault said, as mildly and as matter-of-factly as if his companion had spoken aloud, "that's why."

The small man shot to his feet as if he'd just sat on a hedgehog. The sudden movement seemed to draw the newcomer's eyes. Recognition flared in his strangely burning gaze, and for a moment Gnarfling stared into the youth's face like a hare mesmerized by a hawk.

Then, suddenly, the young man was standing directly in front of Ursault's stall.

Gnarfling blinked once in surprise, and a few times more to adjust his vision. He instinctively sniffed for the scent of magic, but all he smelled on the newcomer was the cumulative effect of several days on the road: the faint odor of wet cashmere, the musty stench of dirty clothes, and a perfume that smelled of dangerous herbs and pending lightning-a scent no doubt meant to mask the other, more mundane smells.

"I am Landish the Adept," the young man announced grandly.

Gnarfling collected himself and folded his stubby arms. "Good for you. Me, I got no business with the outlandish or the inept. You want I should ask around, and see if someone else might?"

Pure fury simmered in the man's intense gaze, a rage out of scale with the small insult. "Are you certain you have no business with me?" he said meaningfully. "Absolutely certain? Tell me, jordain, what am I?"

A small sizzle of panic raced through Gnarfling, quickly mastered. Surely this revelation was nothing new to Ursault the All-Seeing, and no one else was close enough to hear the damning secret.

"What are you?" he echoed scornfully. "The back end of an ox, so far as I can tell."

The man's eyes narrowed. " 'Outlandish and inept,'" he repeated. "A strange choice of words for someone who purports to be an itinerate field hand."

Gnarfling stared for a moment, then his shoulders rose and fell in a profound sigh.

"You're a magehound," he said in disgust. "Well, even a slow and stupid hound sometimes blunders into a vhoricock's nest."

"A jordaini proverb," Landish said smugly, clearly enjoying himself. "You should guard your words more carefully."

"Don't see what harm it could do at this point. A magehound," Gnarfling repeated in disgust.

"No," stated Ursault.

There was a conviction in that single word that dismissed all other possibilities. Gnarfling sent a puzzled look at the wizard, and was astonished at the simmering wrath in the old man's usually vague, mild eyes.

"Mirabella," Ursault said grimly.

The small man's heart seemed to leap in his chest like a breaching dolphin. Mirabella was the woman who'd saved an outcast jordaini babe, one whose stunted form was deemed unsuitable for the rigorous physical training given Halruaa's warrior-sages. But there was nothing wrong with his mind, and the soft-hearted midwife charged with his destruction knew enough of jordaini ways to give him a bit of the training, enough to keep him alert and alive-until now, at least.

Landish's gaze snapped to the wizard's face and for a moment he looked deeply troubled. His face cleared.

"Ah. A diviner, I suppose. You see the results of my work, if not the actual workings."

"Your work? What'd you do with Mirabella?" roared Gnarfling.

He threw himself into a charge, his stubby hands leaping like twin hounds for the man's skinny throat.

Then he stopped, stunned by the white, leprous growth that had appeared on his short digits. As he stared, the small finger on his left hand listed to one side, then broke off entirely and fell to the muddy ground.

"That," Landish said succinctly. "She won't be missed. Just as you won't be missed."

"Mirabella is not yet dead," Ursault said as he rose to his feet. "She may not die. The old speckled hen, the one destined for the soup pot, is going to lay her first egg since the last new moon. If she lays it in the hencoop, Mirabella will die. If the hen ventures into the gardens, a tamed hunting kestrel will see her and swoop. This will draw the eye of a passing hunting party. They will follow their hawk and find Mirabella. The hunter has a terrible fear of the plague. If he is the first to see the woman, he will flee in panic and the others will follow, never knowing what he saw. But if his horse throws a shoe-there is a loose nail and the shoe could be lost any time today or tomorrow-his greenmage daughter will be the first to find Mirabella. She can mix the herbs and pray the spells that will cure the woman. The herbs grow near Mirabella's cottage. She may find them, provided that-"

"Enough!" howled Landish, his dark eyes enormous in his too-pale face. "What madness is this?"

"He's mad, that's for sure and certain," Gnarlish said, jerking a leprous thumb toward Ursault, "but that don't stop him from being right. His way of telling the future is like throwing a really big fireball-the target can be found somewhere in the big, smoking black hole. If there's anyone left to look for it."

Ursault turned the loom around, revealing the weaving and the scenes depicted in it. Landish's face was still there, and so was a small, snug cottage, complete with speckled hens and an elderly woman sprawled, facedown and still, in the courtyard. A soft moan escaped Gnarfling.

"You named yourself an Adept," Ursault said to Landish, "and so you are. You are a Shadow Adept, though this is not known to your master, the necromancer Hsard Imulteer. You intend to ambush and destroy your master, but fear that your growing powers will give you away before you are strong enough to prevail. Desiring to test your shields, you prayed to dark Shar, the goddess of shadows and secrets, and she led you to a hidden jordain. You wished to see if a jordain could perceive your true nature, and you believed that my friend here presented a small risk. Obviously he is gifted at perceiving magic in others, or how would he evade the magehounds for these many years? If he had been able to perceive you for what you are, what harm could come of it? He could not accuse you without also giving himself away."

The young man's face paled to a papery gray. "This is not possible. No one could know these things!"

"They don't call him Ursault the All-Seeing for naught," Gnarfling pointed out.

Landish began to pace. "Yes, I have heard that name," he muttered in a distracted tone. "A wizard who sees so many possibilities he cannot discern the truth. Paralyzed, driven mad, finally fleeing into a hermit's life. Seeing all, knowing all-the possibilities are staggering!"

Gnarfling began to see where this was headed. He'd met wizards before who believed they were the exception to every rule, magical and otherwise.

The Shadow Adept stopped before Ursault and fixed his intense black gaze on the older wizard's face. "You can see all possible futures-including those influenced by practitioners of the Shadow Weave. This is a great gift, my friend!"

"Gift, or curse?" said Ursault softly. "It is difficult to say."

Landish shook his head vigorously. "Halruaa is famed for wizardry, but few know of the Shadow Weave. We who are blessed by Shar can move in secret."

"But as you gain power, your ability to perceive the workings of Mystra diminish," Ursault concluded. "You may be hidden from wizards, but their ways, in nearly equal measure, are hidden from you."

"You grasp the salient point," the young Adept said, nodding approvingly. "Clearly, you do not want this gift and-forgive me-you have not proven strong enough to handle it. It has become a burden, one I would gladly lift from you."

"A little knowledge," cautioned Ursault, "is a wonderful thing."

Landish let out a sardonic chuckle and dismissed this notion with a wave of one skinny hand. "Come, let us make a bargain. I will give you the herbs needed to cure your short friend and the old dame who raised him."

"No deal," said Gnarfling sternly. "Ursault already knows what herbs are needed. He can find them himself, no help from you."

"Of course he can find them, and of course he can cure you and the old woman-'if this, and if that,'" mocked the Adept. "And let us not forget 'unless this and the other.' Count your fingers-how many remain? Are you willing to trust your life and the woman's to a mad old wizard, and the whims of fate?"

"Same question, back at you." The small man folded his arms. "That mad old wizard could just kill you and have done with it."

"No," said Landish smugly, "he couldn't."

The wizard considered this claim for a moment, then agreed with a grim nod.

"You see? This discussion is a mere formality. I could simply take this man's powers from him. He knows this, and he knows how. It would be easier for me, and far more pleasant all around, if he yields them willingly."

"Mageduel," Ursault suggested. "Take the three of us to Mirabella's glen, and you and I will do battle for the title of All-Seeing."

"Done!" the Adept said gleefully.

He stepped behind the wizard's stall and conjured an oval portal, gleaming with dark, purple-black light. He made a mock-courtly gesture for the others to precede him.

Gnarfling charged through the portal and hit the ground running. He bolted toward his foster mother, dropped to his knees, and gently turned her over with hands that felt strangely numb. He recoiled in grief and horror at the ravaged mess the Adept's spell had made of her face. He lifted one hand to stroke the old woman's hair away from her eyes, and grimaced at the sight of his own hand. He didn't look much better off.

He looked to the center of the courtyard. The wizards faced each other, an expression of intense concentration on each face as they attuned themselves to each other and to their competing Weaves.

A sly smile crossed Gnarfling's face as he perceived the wizard's stratagem: an Adept of the Shadow Weave would have little power in a mageduel arena.

Indeed, a dazed expression crossed the Adept's face as he ventured into the older wizard's convoluted mind. His feverish eyes started to dart about, as if tracing the paths of a hundred startled ground squirrels.

Landish pulled himself together with visible effort and said, "As you yourself observed, I am apprentice to a powerful necromancer. There is still enough of Mystra's art remaining to me to vanquish you, old man. Surely you foresee this."

"It is a possibility," Ursault admitted, "but only one of many."

The younger man sniffed. "A cube, fifty paces on all sides. I could manage more, but the smaller the arena, the swifter my victory."

"As you wish." Ursault smiled faintly. "And in defiance of the rules, you may take your spellfilcher gem into the arena with you."

He did not point out that the man was intending to do precisely that, but the meaning was there all the same. Landish's face flushed at this gentle rebuke, but he spun around and began to stalk off his portion of the arena. Ursault did the same. A translucent, faintly glowing red cube began to take shape around them, growing on all sides as they moved farther apart.

"Just let him rob you and be done with it," muttered Gnarling. "That'll serve him right and fair."

Landish began to mumble the words of a spell. A brilliant golden flame erupted from the ground before him. Bright droplets turned into insects-deadly magical fire gnats whose touch could raise blisters and whose bite could set living flesh aflame.

A faint blue mist surrounded the older wizard as the glowing insects swarmed in. Each one met the aura with a faint, sharp sizzle and flared out of existence.

Tremors shook the ground as invisible fingers of necromantic magic reached deep into the soil. The clearing stirred, and small puffs of dirt and sod exploded upward as long-dead bones fought their way into the light. The older wizard countered with a quick gesture, then he clapped his hands sharply together. A thunderous rumble echoed through the clearing and the old bones shattered to dust.

On the battle raged, and each spell Landish cast was anticipated and countered. The young man's thin, wolfish face contorted with rage, and he hurled his remaining spells one after another, so quickly that spell and counter-spell seemed to follow each other as quickly as two sword masters' thrusts and parries.

So intent was Gnarfling on the battle that he did not at first notice the glowing gem on the Adept's hand. A large amethyst, brilliant purple, was taking on light and power with each of Ursault's counterspells.

"The spellfilcher gem," he muttered, cursing Landish as a cheat and coward.

The light intensified until it filled the arena and spilled out into the clearing. Finally Ursault collapsed, falling to one knee and drawing in long, ragged breaths. As Landish has promised, the process of taking his magic from him had not been easy or painless.

The Adept stood triumphant in the eerie light. The hand bearing the glowing gem was fisted and held high, and his eyes shone with the bright, multifaceted dream that was his future.

Gnarfling eased Mirabella from his arms and went over to haul the old wizard slowly, painfully to his feet.

"You shoulda thrown the fight," he grumbled.

"And willingly pass this curse to another, even such a man as this?" Ursault shook his head.

"You knew he was going to win, though."

"It was a possibility. One of many."

With Gnarfling's help, the wizard made his way over to Mirabella. After a moment he shook his head. "She needs more help than I can give her."

The short man sat back on his heels and considered the tangled tale Ursault had told earlier. "If that and if this," he mused.

He leaped to his feet, went to the hencoop and kicked it resoundingly. Half a dozen hens exploded from it, squawking in protest. One old biddy scurried into the field.

Landish's howl of protest cut through the clearing like a machete. Even before he looked up, Gnarfling knew what he would see.

The small form of a kestrel circled against the clouds. Within moments the hawk went into a diving stoop, tempted by the plump, slow-moving meal below.

The rumble of horses' hooves turned thunderous as the hunting party burst from the forest and onto the old corduroy path. Gnarfling blinked in surprise at the size of the entourage: at least six wizards, plus squires and a plain-faced young woman in simple tunic and trews. That would be the greenmage.

Her gaze fell upon the old woman, and she let out a small cry. A bolt of lightning sizzled toward her-and was stopped just short of a strike by an answering bolt flaring from one of the mounted wizards. The hunters spurred their horses toward Landish. They dismounted and began to circle the young adept.

"You didn't mention the other wizards," Gnarfling said.

Ursault smiled faintly. "Knowledge is not quite the same as wisdom. It is not necessary, or wise, to speak of everything you know."

But Landish had not yet acquired this wisdom. He advanced swiftly, his hand fisted and his spellfilcher ring held out to capture the first spell flung at him.

"The first of many," Ursault observed. He sighed in resignation.

"What's going to happen?" Gnarfling asked. He suddenly seemed to hear his own words, and grimaced. "Sorry. Old habit."

"The only thing that could happen," the wizard replied. "The ability to recognize several possible futures does not grant a corresponding ability to avoid them.

Gnarfling responded with a nod and an evil grin. When several powerful wizards were concerned, one possible future apiece seemed more than enough to ensure the Adept's thorough and messy demise.

The battle that followed was swift, but violent enough to meet Gnarfling's expectations. When all that remained of Landish the Adept was a smoking, greasy circle on the blasted clearing, the greenmage came up and took Gnarfling's hands between hers.

"The same blight," she murmured, her brows pulled down in a deep frown. "It is a necromantic spell, but not one I have seen before."

"Are you not Suzza Indoulur, niece to Lord Basel of Halar?" asked Ursault.

Her eyes widened, and she responded with a nod.

"Your name is spoken as a capable greenmage, but did I not also hear that you are studying for the priesthood of Azuth?"

"News travels swiftly through this forest," she said cautiously.

"The herbal potions and prayer spells of Constandia of Azuth against the leprous blight may prove efficacious," suggested Ursault. "Even a novice priestess might be granted such a spell. I believe I saw some wild priestcap flowers just off the path. Shall I gather some for you?"

She considered this, nodded, then set to work. In short order Mirabella was sitting comfortably, sipping a steaming herbal brew as the greenmage gently smoothed priestcap ointment over the old woman's face. Gnarfling was grinning like a gargoyle and flexing his ten pink fingers, which were longer and more dexterous than they'd been before Landish's spell and Suzza's healing ministrations.

"I can make more ointment for your legs, if you like," the greenmage offered. Her gaze fell on his stunned face, and she added hurriedly, "I mean no offense. I just thought you might like your legs to match the rest of you. Everything else seems just fine. That is, a man as handsome of face and form… What I meant to say was…" She trailed off a second time, her lips folded tightly together and her face blooming a vivid pink.

Her confusion suggested other possibilities, even more wondrous than the prospect of looking as other men. "Might not hurt to even things out a mite," he said casually. "Kind of you to offer."

The greenmage sent him a tentative smile and set to work with a wooden bowl and pestle. She scooped the ointment into a small pot and pointed to a curving mark carved into the pottery.

"This is my family sigil. Trace it with one finger and repeat the words I will give you, and it will bring you to our estates near Halar. I would like to see you again to make sure the cure is progressing."

"And if it doesn't?" asked Gnarfling, gesturing to his stubby limbs.

The greenmage's soft smile didn't falter. "Even then."

She spoke a short, strange word and had Gnarfling repeat it. When she was satisfied with his pronunciation, she rose in one swift, surprisingly graceful move and strode to the impatient band of wizards. Her father's squire handed her the kestrel, and she tied the little hawk's jesses to her saddle pommel. They rode off without a backward glance, their horses clattering over the rough corduroy path.

Gnarfling watched them go, and for the first time, his future seemed bright with possibilities. He turned to his wizard companion.

Force of habit prompted him to ask, "What now?" Ursault's smile held a world of contentment. "Isn't it wonderful? I have no idea." Originally published in Dragon #335, August 2005 Edited by Erik Mona