The scene blurred and faded, leaving them alone in the chamber.
"What was that?" asked Dantane.
"A memory," answered Meisha, "from soon after I came to the Delve. I was a Wraith—half-feral—in Keczulla, when Varan found me. He took me on as an apprentice because he sensed my talent. I remember when he brought me down here to converse with the fire elemental. I could feel it burning, just like I burned inside. It's part of every savant's training, to recognize how their spirit matches the element they've chosen. With proper training, eventually, the spirit melds with that force and becomes part of it," Meisha said, her voice oddly hushed.
"Is that what you aspire to?" Dantane asked, "to join with the fire and become as an elemental creature?"
She glanced at him. "It's what every savant wants."
"But do you?"
Without answering, Meisha stood up, her eyes scanning the floor where the phantom images had been. "There." She bent down, lifting a small piece of glittering crystal from the floor. "The source of the memories," she explained.
"Your master's work," Dantane said, impressed. "He has great power."
"Obviously, not enough," Meisha said, "or he failed to follow his own teachings."
Had Varan recorded all his past sessions with his apprentices? she wondered, and if so, how many crystals, how much Art would be required for such a task?
"Why do you despise him so much?" Dantane asked. "He awoke the power in you. Without it, you might have died a Wraith."
"I know," Meisha said. "He cared about me, as much as he was capable of such feelings. He offered me magic and a place in his world, but I couldn't accept it."
"Why not?"
"Because if I hadn't possessed that power and if Varan hadn't sensed it, he would have passed me by on that street without looking twice. It was the power that fascinated him most, not any of us. And yet, I still wanted to love him."
"Then why did you come back?" Dantane asked. "Why help him now?"
"Because he was right. He was the only one who understood me, and I still love him for that," Meisha said bleakly. "That bond—the one I see reflected in Kall's group—I've known nothing like it, not since the night Shaera left the candle in my room."
"Shaera?"
"It doesn't matter." Meisha waved the memories away. "She's gone now—they're all dead—and Varan is not the master I knew."
"What about the boy," Dantane persisted, "the one who followed you?"
"Talal," Meisha said, and something inside her constricted. She'd avoided thinking about the boy. "Talal is ... he has no scrap of magical power in him, and yet I find myself wanting to mentor him, in life, if not in the Art. It's strange. Then, in the next breath, I remember what I am and what I could do. When I remember, I want to put him as far from myself as I possibly can."
"It seems he would choose otherwise," Dantane observed.
Meisha shook her head grimly. "I pray that choice doesn't bring about his doom," she said, "if it has not already."
She touched the crystal, and the phantom Varan appeared again, drawing Meisha's attention back to the pedestals. This time the apprentice was not Meisha, but a young man with short blond hair cropped in a bowl shape.
"Prieces," Meisha said. "The earth savant. I've never seen this."
The young man appeared pale and drawn, even by the blurry magic illuminating the memory. His gestures were not as crisp as the child-Meisha's had been. His arms weighed heavily with fatigue, but he pressed on under Varan's encouraging gaze.
The earth elemental crawled up from the ground opposite Varan, but it was bigger—twice as broad as the creature Meisha had helped to summon. The force of its arrival shook the cavern, knocking Prieces from the pedestal. Varan reacted instantly, throwing out a spell to keep the apprentice from injuring himself. He didn't see the earth elemental smash the pedestal Prieces was standing on in half. Stone shards flew, striking Varan in the back. The wizard turned, intending to banish the creature, Meisha thought, but the thing rose up, crashing headfirst into the ceiling. Cracks fissured through the stone, and the chamber, unstable from all the tunnels carved in one place, began to come apart.
The elemental thrashed wildly, seeking release. It picked up the shattered pieces of the pedestals and threw them. The flat portion hit the wall and fell back, crushing Prieces beneath it.
Meisha cried out and ran forward. Dantane caught her arm. "It is an illusion. It isn't real," he hissed in her ear.
"But it did happen," Meisha whispered. She watched helplessly as Varan shouted an incantation that blew the stone aside, into the earth elemental. The force of the spell knocked the creature backward off its massive feet, giving Varan time to levitate Prieces to safety, but it was too late. The body of the unfortunate apprentice hung limply in the air, his neck broken.
Varan turned, chanting a spell that finally banished the elemental. The wizard collapsed to his knees next to Prieces. Stone continued to fall, but he erected a magical barrier that deflected the falling rock.
"Look there," said Dantane, pointing across the chamber.
The back wall of the cavern had completely caved in, revealing another set of passages that curved and split off in the darkness. Within them, a light burned, but Varan was oblivious to it.
"Is that another testing chamber?" asked Dantane.
Meisha shook her head. "There should be nothing behind that wall but solid rock."
They watched the strange light grow brighter, and as the rumbling gradually ceased, another sound filled the silence—the tap-tap of what sounded like rain on a campfire.
The light flickered and went out, but only because an object had passed in front of it, a swift, blurry movement not unlike the fire elemental.
Not rain, Meisha thought, as the thing coalesced, taking on shape and substance, but claws.
Dantane gasped when he saw what the walls had imprisoned. "Impossible," he said.
* * * * *
Laerin hauled Morgan to his feet. The rogue's boots skidded on a pile of bones. Morgan regained his footing and cursed a loud, long streak that echoed down the tunnel.
"See how you corrupt the children," Laerin tutted, shooting a wink at Talal.
Talal didn't share the humor. He was still on the ground, shards of broken bone digging into his knees.
"Where are we?" he asked. He dislodged an oblong skull from a pile. "What are all these?"
"Animal remains," Laerin surmised, taking the skull from him. "Wolves of great size. They all died here together."
"In pieces," Morgan said. His head perked up. "Quiet."
Talal listened and heard the echo of footsteps. Swiftly, Morgan picked up the remains of a battered rib cage and smashed it into the face of a Shadow Thief as he came around the corner.
The thief went down, and Morgan put his boot on the man's neck.
"Brittle pieces." Morgan sniffed. He cast away the shredded bone cage.
"Is he harmless?" Laerin asked. The squirming thief was trying to reach a dagger clipped in his boot.
Morgan pressed harder, until the man choked. "As kitten teats." he grinned.
"Let me talk to him." Laerin squatted next to the thief. "Where are the others?" he asked calmly.