No one moved or spoke. After a very long time, Naergoth said softly, “So be it. We are agreed. We put spellfire behind us and go on to work for the greater glory of the dead dragons in other ways.”
There were reluctant nods, but no one said anything. It is difficult to laugh at fear when one regularly dealt it often to others.
They rode west, steadily. Narm peered warily all about as they traveled, expecting another attack. But Shandril found this forest somehow friendlier than the Elven Court. Amid the thick tangle of trunks and gnarled limbs, one could see into the deep, hidden places. Vines hung in spidery tangles from high branches to trunks. Ferns grew thick upon the ground, broken only in places where limbs had fallen.
Shandril looked here and there, at moss upon rocks and trunks, and at great thick trees as large about as some cottages. But Narm saw only danger, possible ambushes, and concealing shadows. But as the day grew older and no attack came, he too began to enjoy the road to Deepingdale.
“It is beautiful,” he said, as they came to the crest of a gentle rise in the road and saw sunlight streaming down through the trees in a small clearing.
“Aye,” Shandril said in a small voice. “I’ve never seen these woods before, even though I lived just a day’s ride from here.” She peered about. “Sometimes I wish I’d never known this spellfire, and I could Just come home now with you, instead of fleeing a hundred or more half-mad mages.”
“Why not stay?” Narm replied. “You have the power to slay a hundred half-mad mages.”
Shandril sighed. “Aye, maybe. But I’d lose the dale and my friends and even you, I don’t doubt, in the process. Powerful mages always seem to destroy things about them. They work worse devastation than forest fires and brigands. Sometimes I think life would be much simpler without art.”
“I said that to Elminster,” Narm replied, “and he said not so. If I could see the strange worlds he’s walked, he said, I’d understand.”
“No, thank you,” Shandril replied. “I’ve troubles enough, it seems, in this world.” The road rose again through a leafy tunnel of old oaks, then gave way to an open area.
Narm and Shandril rode close and quiet, side by side, looking all about them for danger. Tiny, whip like branches that had fallen from the trees above lay amid the dead leaves and tangled grass and ferns like thin, dark faerie fingers, waiting to clutch or snap underfoot. They rode on, and still no attack came, nor did they meet travelers upon the road.
“This is eerie,” Shandril said. “Where is everyone?”
“Elsewhere, for once,” Narm said. “Be thankful, and ride while we have the chance! I would be free of the dales, where everyone knows us. Your spellfire cannot last-triumph-forever.”
“I have thought about that,” Shandril said in a small voice. “Thus far, we have been very lucky. More than that, we’ve fought many who did not know what they faced, even as 1 do not. Before long, mages will come against us with spells and devices of art prepared specifically to disable me or foil spellfire. And then how shall we fare?”
“Ah, Shan, you moan a lot,” Narm replied, exasperated. “I’m worried about you. You at least can strike back. Did you expect a life like in the ballads, all cheering and triumph and happy endings? No. Adventure, you wanted, adventure you have. Did you hear Lanseril’s definition of adventure, at that first feast in Shadowdale?”
Shandril wrinkled her brow. “I did overhear it, yes. Something about being cursedly uncomfortable and hurt or afraid, and then telling everyone later that it was nothing.”
“Aye, that was it.” They rode over another rise with still no sign of other travelers on the road. “It is a long way to Silverymoon,” Narm added thoughtfully. “Do you remember all the Harpers Storm named for us, along the way?”
“Yes. Do you?” his lady replied impishly, and Narm shook his head.
“I’ve forgotten half of them, I’m sure. I was not suited to be a world traveler?’ Narm replied ruefully. “Nor was the tutelage of Marimmar very useful in that respect.”
Shandril laughed. “I’ll bet.” She looked at the woods about them. “If the Realms hold places as beautiful as this, mind you, I won’t mind the trip ahead.”
“Even with a hundred or so evil priests and mages after our blood?”
Shandril wrinkled her nose. “Just don’t call me ‘Magekiller,’ or anything of the sort. Remember-they come after me. I have no quarrel with them.”
“I’ll remind the next dozen or so corpses of that,” Narm replied dryly. “If you leave enough for me to speak to, that is.”
Shandril looked away from him, then, and said very softly, “Please do not speak so of all the killing. I hate it. Never, never do I want to become so used to it that I grow careless of my power. Who knows when this spellfire might leave me? Then, Narm? I will have only your art to protect me. Think on that.”
They rode down into a dell where moss grew in knobs and clumps of lush green amid the dead leaves. Small pools of water glistened under dark and rugged old trees. Narm looked around warily, as always, and said soberly, “Aye. I think of it often.”
“It seems the fate of this Shandril to grow old unhindered-by us, at any rate” Naergoth said dryly to Salvarad, when they were alone at the long table. “Is there any other business?”
“Aye, indeed. The matter of your mage. Malark was destroyed in Shadowdale-how, I know not-but Malark perished at the hands of Shandril.”
“You are sure?”
“I watch closely, and others watch for me-and, all told, we miss little.”
Naergoth looked at him expressionlessly. “What then have you seen in the way of mages to take the Purple in the place of Malark?”
“Zannastar, certainly. You could even give him the Purple now. We have seven warriors and one mage.
“Well enough. Why Zannastar?”
“He is competent at art, but even more, he is biddable, something Malark was not.”
“Aye, then. Who else?”
“The young one, Thiszult. A wild one-quiet but very reckless. He could be dangerous to us, or brilliant. Why not, alone and in secret, send him after the spellfire with four or six men-at-arms? He’ll either bring it back or kill himself-or learn caution. WB cannot do ill by this.”
“Oh? What if he comes back with spellfire and uses it against us?”
“I know his truename,” Salvarad replied smugly, “though he doesn’t know that any have learned it.”
Naergoth nodded. “Send your wolf, then. Who knows? Perhaps he’ll succeed where all the others have failed-ours and those of Bane and Zhentil Keep. This gauntlet we’ve made the girl Shandril run will have its effect on her in the end, even if we’ve paid the price for it in blood thus far?’
Salvarad nodded. “Yes. She’s only one maid, and not a war-tike one at that. We’ll have her in the end, spellfire or no spellfire. I mean to have the spellfire, too… but if we take her alive, she’s mine, Naergoth.”
Naergoth raised an eyebrow. “You can have women much easier than that, Salvarad.”
“Nay, you mistake me, Bladelord,” Salvarad replied coldly. “The power she has handled… does things to people. I must learn certain things from her.”
Naergoth said, “Then why not go after her yourself?”
Salvarad smiled thinly. “I am intrigued, Bladelord. I am not suicidal.”
“Others have said that, you know.”
“I know that well, Naergoth. Some of them even meant it.”
Night came upon them while they were still in the woods. The night grew cold, and the couple drew their cloaks about them as they rode on. Mist rose among the trees. Narm watched it drift and roll and said in a low voice, “I don’t like this. An ambush would be all too easy in this mist.”
“Yes” Shandril replied, “but all the wishing in the world won’t make any difference. We’re not far, now-we can’t be, for travelers who left the inn mid-morning fully expected to make Tasseldale by nightfall. And there is no other road. We cannot have missed our way.” She looked into the soft silence of the trees. Tangled branches hung still and dark in the mist. Nothing stirred, and no attack came.