“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.”