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My eyes were drawn from the wavering landscape to the sorcery rune I had, for whatever reason, drawn on the ground before me. I blinked and it didn’t go away. I licked my lips.

The rune was glowing. I hadn’t asked it to, but I guess I hadn’t asked it not to, either.

I brought my palms together in front of me, fingers pointing out, and in the air I drew another rune, this one the verb “to summon.” I considered what nouns I might hang from it, shuddered, and almost lost control of the spell. Loiosh pulled me back and I dropped my hands back to my lap.

The rhythm was still with me and the landscape still wavered and the rune on the ground still glowed.

I think the other sound was my teeth grinding.

I was unconscious for about twenty seconds, near as I can figure it. The side of my face still stung from slapping the floor, as did my right hand.

I awoke slowly, and swirls of black dissipated before me. I know better than to shake my head under such circumstances; my eyes cleared.

Loraan was leaning up against the far wall, staring past me, both his arms raised. I turned my head and saw Morrolan, who seemed to be fighting something invisible that was trying to entangle him. Sparks flashed in the air between them—that is, directly over my head.

I was being rescued. Oh, rapture.

I was about to try to convince my body to function—at least enough to get out from between the two of them—when Loraan gave a kind of cry, struck the wall behind him, bounced, and came careening at me. I would have put a knife into him then and there but he fell on top of me before I could go into action.

This is called “not being in top form.”

Loraan was quite agile, though, especially for a wizard. After landing on me he kept rolling until he ended up in the room with Morrolan, as well as the table, the sword, the staves, and all that stuff. He came smoothly to his feet and faced Morrolan.

There was a bit of confused action lasting maybe ten seconds, including smoke and sparks and fire and loud noises, and when it was over Morrolan had his back to me and Loraan was too far away for any of my goodies to be effective.

Loiosh, who had been so quiet I’d all but forgotten him, said, “Should we get the staff now?”

Oh, yeah. Right. The staff. What we came for.

I got to my feet, a little surprised that they worked, and moved toward the cube of orange light. I began studying the enchantment on it and muttering curses to myself. I didn’t know what it was or how it had been accomplished, but I could tell it wouldn’t be safe to put my hand in there; I could also tell that breaking it would be way over my head. I wondered if Morrolan would be open to taking a job. I turned back to the fight to ask him.

I was almost sixteen when I decided I was old enough to ignore my grandfather’s advice, and started carrying my rapier. It wasn’t a very good one, but it had a point, an edge, and a guard.

I’d been carrying it for less than a week before I learned that my grandfather was right. I was heading back to the restaurant from the market at the time. On reflection, an Easterner with a sword at his hip carrying a basket full of fish, meat, and vegetables must have looked a bit absurd, but at the time I didn’t think about that.

I heard laughter as I was near the door and saw two kids, roughly my age (taking different growth rates into account), dressed in the livery of the House of the Hawk. They were clearly laughing at me. I scowled at them.

One laughed harder and said, “Think you’re pretty dangerous, don’t you?” I noticed he was also wearing a blade.

I said, “Could be.”

He said, “Want to show me how dangerous?”

I set the basket down and walked into the alley, turned, and drew, my pulse racing. The pair of them walked up to me and the one with the weapon shook his head in mock sadness. He was quite a bit taller than I, and may have had good reason to be confident.

He took his sword in his right hand and a long fighting knife in his left. I noted that he probably wasn’t going to use sorcery, or his left-hand weapon would have been different. My grandfather’s words came back to me, and I put a little more mental emphasis on the word “probably.”

He faced me, full forward, both arms extended, right arm and right leg a bit more. I came into a guard position, presenting only my side, and a look of puzzlement came over his features.

I said, “Get on with it.”

He took a step toward me and began an attack. At that time, I had no idea of just how much of an advantage in speed and technique there was to the Eastern style of fencing. I actually wondered why he was taking such big actions, and wondering prevented me from stop-cutting his exposed forearm. However, I still had time to shift backward, which I did, and his cut missed.

He came at me again, in the same slow, stupid way, and this time I did put a cut on his arm before pulling back out of the way. He made a sound of some sort and dropped his knife out of line.

His heart was wide open, with absolutely no protection. How could I resist? I nailed him. He gave out a yell, dropped both of his weapons, fell over backward, and began rolling on the ground. Before he hit the ground I was pointing my weapon at his companion, who was staring at me, wide-eyed.

I approached the uninjured one then and, as he stood there, cleaned my blade on his garments, still staring him in the eye. Then I sheathed my rapier and walked out of the alley, picked up my basket, and continued home.

On the way, I decided that my grandfather had certainly known what he was talking about: Wearing a weapon is asking for trouble.

I continued to wear it.

Everyone should, at least once, have the chance to witness a fight between two wizards. I’d have preferred to watch this one from more of a distance, though. The air between them seemed to dance, and my eyes had trouble focusing. Loraan held a staff with his right hand, in front of him. The tip of it was glowing with a sort of gold, and images behind the glow were blurred and out of focus. His other hand continually made motions in the air, and sometimes my ears would pop—from what I’m not sure.

I could see that Morrolan was hard-pressed. He had lost whatever advantage he had gained, and was leaning against a wall. There was a black mist in front of him, pushing against something invisible that was trying to get through to him. From thirty feet away I could make out the sweat on his forehead.

Loraan took a step forward. Morrolan raised his hands. The black mist in front of him grew thicker. I recalled an old maxim: Never attack a wizard in his keep. The black mist dissipated completely, and Morrolan seemed to shrink against the wall. Loraan took another step forward and raised his hands. I recalled another old maxim, this one concerning wizards and knives. Loraan’s back was to me now, more or less.

My dagger caught him high on his back next to his backbone, though it didn’t quite hit his spine. He stumbled. Morrolan straightened and took a step forward. He turned to Loraan. Loraan promptly vanished; one of the fastest teleports I’ve ever seen. Morrolan gestured at him as he was going, and there was a flash of bright light, but I didn’t think it had accomplished anything. I entered the room and approached Morrolan.

He turned to me. “Thank you, Lord Taltos.”

I shrugged. “I can’t figure out how to get the staff out of whatever it is he’s got in in.”

“Okay. Let’s—”

Clang. The door burst open and Dragaerans started pouring through. About a zillion of them, give or take a few. Most of them had the sharp chins and high foreheads of the House of the Dragon, though I thought I saw a Dzur or two. They all wore the red and white of the Athyra. I looked at their broadswords and longswords as I drew my cute little rapier. I sighed.

“No, Vlad,” said Morrolan. “Get the staff. I’ll hold them.”