Esme pursed her full lips. "Why the curiosity about a place none may enter?"
Lyim decided to speak boldly "I want to become our order's guardian there. Frankly, Esme, my life hasn't turned out as I'd planned. I haven't been able to cure my… deformity." He drew his leather-gloved hand back when her eyes inevitably strayed to it.
"I'd welcome the isolation," Lyim went on in an enthusiastic rush. "There, only two other people would be subjected to seeing my hand."
"I'm sorry, Lyim," she said softly.
He tore his gaze from the pity he'd expected, and now found, in her eyes. "I don't want your sympathy," he said sharply. "I want your help. You know what Bastion is like. You were among those who designed and built it. Tell me what you know," he rushed on, leaning toward her, "and it will give me an advantage over other candidates the next time the position becomes available."
Lyim reached out with his hand for one of Esme's, then noticed the thick, silver bracelet in the shape of a snake encircling her right bicep. He remembered well the electrical shock the protective armband delivered. Lyim's hand curled into a desperate fist. "Please, Esme. I've never wanted anything so much in my life."
The young woman visibly paled. "Don't you know?"
For once, Lyim didn't have to pretend ignorance. "Know what?"
"That Guerrand took the position less than a year ago," she supplied. "And unless something has happened to him-"
"Guerrand DiThon is the Red Robes' guardian?" gulped Lyim, uncharacteristically surprised.
Esme nodded, her brow furrowed. "I can't believe that you spoke to Justarius recently and he didn't mention it." t
"We didn't really discuss Bastion or Guerrand," muttered Lyim. That wasn't surprising, since he hadn't spoken to the Master of the Red Robes in years.
"I'm sorry to be the one to dash your hopes," Esme the OcdusA pUgue
said. "Frankly, I don't think I could have helped you very much anyway. Though I participated in the exterior design and construction of the stronghold, all but the Council of Three were dispatched from the site before the interior was complete and it was sent to the plane where it would block passage to the Lost Citadel."
"What plane is that?" Lyim asked.
Esme pondered the question. " 'Between earth and sky' was all Justarius would ever say about it."
"Bastion sounds like a wondrous place," sighed Lyim. "One I'm destined never to see."
Esme smiled distantly in fond memory. "It is a wondrous place, made of the most pure and perfect red granite mined from the Kharolis Mountains." She strode to a recessed shelf and took from a triangular pedestal a palm-sized red and creamy pink-veined ball from among the bric-a-brac there. "I pocketed this from among the scraps at the site as a souvenir. A local sculptor fashioned it to look like a miniature Lunitari."
Lyim laid his hand to the cold, polished stone. "It's flawless," he breathed in wonder. Abruptly, he set it back down and stood. "I'm sorry, Esme. It appears I've disturbed you for nothing."
"Oh, I wouldn't say that," Esme said generously. "I'd forgotten how… entertaining you could be, Lyim. Please stay long enough for me to offer you some repast."
Lyim hesitated, swallowing a pleased smile. "It was a long trip."
She headed for the door and placed her hand on the knob. "Just give me a few minutes to prepare something." Lyim nodded his consent, a smile still pulling up his lips as Esme slipped from the room.
The door clicked shut, and the mage nearly swooned with delight over his good fortune. He would get everything he'd come for and a meal with the beautiful
woman he'd always desired.
He had to move quickly, though. Lyim began muttering an incantation. Wisps of dark material emerged from the air around him, which he plucked and gathered into a ball. As long as he chanted, the wisps appeared, until he had collected a lump of sufficient size. His refrain then changed, becoming less rhythmic. The ball of material hovered in the air as Lyim's hand wove around it, shaping it without touching it. Wisps separated from the ball to curl around Esme's moon globe, then dart back to their starting places. The orb pulsated as if alive as it shifted and formed itself.
And then it was done. The red globe of granite dropped into Lyim's hand, pleasantly small but weighty. He compared the two; the match was perfect. Lyim placed his creation in the triangular holder on the shelf and concealed the original among the thick folds of his robe. The facsimile would not last forever, but it would certainly endure long enough to get Lyim away from Fangoth with the real globe of granite that would help him locate Bastion, and that was all he wanted. For now, anyway.
Guerrand rubbed his eyes, which were red from staring, and glanced at the time glass on the small table behind him: only half the sand had sifted from the top to the bottom beaker. The mage let out a small sigh. He had half a shift to serve yet in the scrying sphere. Why was the time passing so slowly today?
The muscles in Guerrand's shoulders were knotted into thick cords. His stomach growled unrelentingly. The high defender's temples throbbed from the strain of concentrating on the model of Bastion and its perimeter.
Usually a patient man, Guerrand could hardly wait until Dagamier came to replace him in the sphere. He knew exactly what he would do then: pour an entire flask of restorative rosemary oil into the warmed wading pool in the seascape room. While the hot water covered him to the waist, cool air would fan his chest soothingly. Then he would open a bottle of green Ergothian wine, his own brew aptly named for both its color and flavor. Nibbling sweet biscuits, Guerrand would drink just enough wine to ease the stress from his back.
Imagining it erased one furrow from Guerrand's brow. He blinked; his sight wavered briefly before settling again upon the model on the table beneath him. It really was a marvel, this magically imbued diorama of Bastion. It resembled an architect's rendering of a city. Guerrand had seen such a diagram back in Thonvil, a rotting and dusty wood-and-stone model made by Castle DiThon's original architect.
The similarity ended there, however. Bastion's diorama was aglow with minerals and magic. In the middle of a curved table covered by clear glass, the stronghold's three wings were represented in the model by resonating crystal that continuously hummed softly. The wings were surrounded by the courtyard, whose topiaries and statues were carved of emerald. Beyond the small fence that enclosed the model's courtyard was a ring of crystalline sulfur attuned to the area patrolled by the hell hounds. Encircling the sulfur was a wide band of quicksilver, a literal representation of the vast mercury moat that was the final border of this demiplane of shadow. The outermost edges of the diorama were shrouded in ever-roiling gray mists that represented the Ethereal Plane, which abutted Bastion's demiplane.
Though the defender who watched the diorama was unable to see into the Ethereal, any disturbances in this demiplane of shadow would be evidenced on the model in the scrying room. Trouble in the courtyard would make the emerald topiaries wink light and dark; disturbances among the hell hounds would illuminate the yellow sulfur. Guerrand, Dagamier, and Ezius watched in neverending rotation for such an event.
Though time in the usual sense had no meaning at Bastion, a defender's turn in the scrying sphere was kept to a short period predetermined by a sand-filled glass. The defender sat on a hard, wooden chair, intentionally uncomfortable to discourage dozing in the column's silence. The only source of light was the diorama itself, which naturally drew the occupant's attention in the otherwise dark sphere.