Without thinking, he tried to straighten up. Cursing suddenly, Argaen thought of his pain. Everything he had gained was a half-measure. By rights, the emerald sphere should have granted him sufficient power and control to heal himself. Yet he still couldn’t even stand straight without tremendous agony…
He put his hands in his robe pockets and turned to once more face the emerald sphere and that other who floated vaguely above it. Briefly the fingertips of his right hands touched what he sought. Argaen did not smile, though he felt the urge to. Instead, he spoke to his “partner” of circumstance.
“Let us begin afresh…,”
The dark elf stepped toward the gleaming artifact, his eyes never leaving the specter.
So caught up was he in his new machinations that Argaen Ravenshadow failed to take notice of a small form watching from the alcoves.
Delbin, like Sardal, had gotten within the boundaries of the barrier spell at nearly the last moment. The kender had only become aware of what was happening when he turned around and saw a hapless human, one of the enemy, trapped in the essence of the barrier itself, frozen like a statue. While the idea of such a spell tickled his imagination, Delbin knew that it could only mean trouble for Kaz and the others. The kender had immediately picked up his pace.
Getting inside had turned out to be remarkably easy. Delbin was very proud of himself. As far as he knew, during his search through the upper floors of the main building, he had done none of the things that, for some reason, irked his minotaur companion. His only problem now was not knowing where to look next. Kaz was in this place somewhere, and Delbin had the feeling that something was going to happen very soon, and there might be no one to prevent it except him.
Looking down at the dark elf and the indistinct phantasm that Argaen insisted on addressing as Galan Dracos, a name Delbin knew from Kaz, the kender felt an odd, unfamiliar emotion stir within him. A member of any other race would have recognized it immediately, but not a kender. It was a rarity among his own kind, but Delbin had spent enough time among the other races so that he was finally able to put a name to it.
Fear.
Sardal had wanted to say more, and Kaz had certainly wanted to hear more, but such was not to be, for something chose that moment to come prowling through the corridors.
This was no dreadwolf. They had no inkling exactly what it was, save that it was a guardian, a watchdog of sorts. A watchdog on two feet, which was how they first became aware of it. Kaz heard the footfalls.
Whatever it was breathed heavily, so that they could hear it at all times. Sardal, with a shake of his head, indicated that it had not yet picked up their presence. That was a hopeful sign. A dreadwolf would have been hot on their trail by now. Nonetheless, it was heading in their direction.
With the unknown danger wandering toward them, Kaz and the elf had no choice but to retreat down the hall. Speed was of the essence, but so was stealth.
For Sardal, moving silently was no problem. For a being of Kaz’s stature, built for strength and not for subtlety, it was next to impossible. His feet seemed to find every uneven portion of the floor, causing him to stumble several times. Naturally the battle-axe bounced against the wall more than once because of this. Each time, he expected creatures to come boiling out of the stone walls.
Their unseen pursuer moved ever closer, but it didn’t seem as if it had taken real notice of them. Kaz began to wonder if the thing was deaf. Even he would have known by now there were some intruders.
Sardal paused at one point, looking back in the direction they had come from. The footfalls of the creature behind them had finally faded to nothing. Kaz thought the elf looked rather pale.
“What’s wrong?” the minotaur asked.
“I scarcely can believe it, but I think I have been leading us in circles.”
A shriek caught them both by surprise. Something huge, furry, and two-legged threw itself on Sardal, who went down with a muffled cry. Kaz readied a strike at the rampaging attacker, but there was too much risk of hitting the elf instead. Abandoning his battle-axe, the minotaur took hold of the creature from the back and tried to pull it off the elf.
They struggled at a stalemate for several seconds. Then the head of the creature slowly bent back as Kaz pulled at it. He slipped one arm around its neck, further strengthening his hold. The head swiveled to look at him, and the minotaur caught a glimpse of the only face he had ever seen that would make an ogre or a goblin look handsome by comparison-not to mention the face of the biggest vermin he could possibly imagine.
The ratman released its hold on Sardal and twisted around, trying to get its sharp teeth and claws on the minotaur’s bare skin. Kaz would have none of that, however. Strong though it was, the monstrosity was at a disadvantageous angle, and Kaz slowly tightened his grip on his adversary’s larynx. Jaws snapped a few inches from his face and claws scratched his chest and arms. He refused to budge.
With a gurgle, the creature suddenly convulsed in his arms and went limp. Kaz saw blood running down its back. Sardal had stabbed it from behind.
“I would recommend haste, minotaur. I sincerely doubt that this poor misfit is alone.”
Kaz found himself scanning each dark corner thoroughly, as if ratmen were about to come leaping out of every corner now. “Agreed. I just have to retrieve my-”
After a moment of waiting for Kaz to finish his sentence, Sardal finally asked, “Your what?”
The minotaur did not reply at first, instead gazing around the hallway. In frustration, he kicked the dead ratman.
Sardal watched him impatiently. “Is there something amiss?”
“Honor’s Face! I can’t find the battle-axe you gave me!”
“Perhaps it was thrown during battle…”
“I put it down here.” Kaz pointed at a spot no more than a couple yards from the site of the struggle. “I was afraid I might chop your head off instead of his.”
“Then it is lost, minotaur, and we had best depart before those who took it return. They might be some of his brethren.” The elf indicated the corpse and shivered slightly. There was something disgusting about such a creature. He doubted whether the beast had been born like that. More likely, it was something that Argaen had stolen from some Black Robe. Sardal hoped it had never been human.
“Let me try something first.” Kaz, now smiling, closed his eyes. Whoever had stolen his battle-axe was in for a surprise. How could they know that he could summon it back to him? He pictured the weapon, the mirrorlike axe head gleaming, and called it to him as he had done before.
“What is it you are doing?” Sardal asked, his tone hinting of annoyance.
Kaz opened his eyes and stared at his hands-an empty pair of hands. “It’s not here!”
The elf looked at him worriedly.
“The axe! It comes to me when I call it, when we’re separated!”
“It does?”
Leaning toward the elf, Kaz looked into his eyes. “You didn’t know that?”
“No… but it might explain things a bit. I always thought there was some secret about that axe. The dwarf would never explain. Said I should just keep it ready. He wanted it kept away from those who would misuse it, but he saw that someone would eventually have need of it. I think he was almost as confused as I am now. It is quite possible that Reorx worked through him. I often wondered about that. The battle-axe sounds like a product of his mischievous mind. Anyone who would forge a thing like the Graystone of Gargath…”
Kaz was completely ignoring the elf. He stared grimly at his empty hands. With the battle-axe, he had stood some chance, however little, against Argaen and Dracos. He had even come to believe that the twibil was the key to destroying the emerald sphere-didn’t Magius’s wizard’s staff shatter it the last time?
“We have to move on,” Sardal was concluding, “with or without your axe.”
The minotaur nodded. “We must be on guard for traps.”
‘Those are aptly timed words, minotaur! They will mak
e an appropriate epitaph for you!”
Argaen Ravenshadow was suddenly there before them, his left hand stretched back as he prepared to hurl something at the two stunned figures.
Only moments before, Delbin had watched wide-eyed as the dark elf, face alight with obsession, seemed about to achieve what he had failed to do before. Ravenshadow had one arm raised high and the other pointed toward the emerald sphere. His outstretched hand barely skimmed the surface of the artifact. The elf’s body trembled.
Above the sphere, the misty form of Galan Dracos seemed to intensify. Delbin got the odd impression that the wraith was waiting for something, something that had as yet not manifested itself. The form shifted and twitched in what the kender guessed was growing impatience.
Suddenly the phantom straightened, solidifying to the point where its features became truly distinct. The almost reptilian visage twisted into a look of savage madness. Dead eyes stared off into space, and a soundless cry issued from the specter’s lips. At the same time, Argaen Ravenshadow fell back from the crystalline sphere with a scream of both pain and astonishment.
“Freel The minotaur free! And Sardal here as well!” the dark elf snarled at the air. His words made only partial sense to the eavesdropping kender. Ravenshadow locked eyes with the ghostly Dracos. “Show me where they are!”
The wraith faded, turning almost nonexistent. Some silent communication passed between mage and elf. Ravenshadow nodded, then suddenly vanished. One second he was there, reaching into his robe pockets, and the next second he had disappeared. There was no puff of smoke, like the magic of illusionists. Ravenshadow simply ceased to be there.
The kender marveled at this for quite some time before realizing that this was his chance to do something-but what? Galan Dracos no longer floated half-seen above the emerald sphere, either having decided to follow the elf or to return to some otherworldly domain. Either way, it meant that Delbin was completely alone. His only excuse for not attempting something was his own bewilderment. Perhaps if he climbed down and got a better view of the place, he might be able to think of something.
Delbin waited three or four dozen breaths before he decided it was safe to climb out of his hiding place. No human could have fit into the space he had watched from. With ease, he stretched out, got a hold on the wall beneath him, and scurried down like a spider, jumping the last three feet. Where a human would have made noise, he landed as silently as an autumn leaf falling from a tree. Delbin turned around. There were all sorts of neat things that he would have been eager to look over if the situation had been different, but concern for Kaz was paramount.
His eyes focused on the scarred surface of the sphere. Were there eyes there looking back at him? Delbin waited, but no figment of Galan Dracos rose to crush him. It was only a trick of his own mind. During their months together, Kaz had more than once chided the kender for letting his overactive imagination get the best of him. Delbin had never been able to make him understand that an overactive imagination was a normal kender trait.
His eyes trailed back to the emerald sphere. It was the cause of everything, he decided suddenly. Argaen had used it to drive the knights mad-or had the emerald sphere used the elf? Delbin shook his head. That didn’t matter. He knew only that Argaen was planning to use it again, and that Kaz thought a lot more people would get hurt if that happened.
It was what Delbin had to deal with. If he could destroy it-the sphere was too large to fit into his pouch, so he couldn’t just wander off with it-then everything would be wonderful again. People would be happy once more, which was the proper way to be.
How to shatter it, though, was the question. Delbin looked around the room. There were lots of shelves and tables with all sorts of interesting stuff on them. He looked at the spellbooks that Ravenshadow had shoved aside on one table, massive tomes, possibly centuries old. They looked pretty heavy. Maybe one of them would do the trick. There was also the hourglass.
While the kender pondered what would work best, a mist slowly rose from the emerald sphere.
“Why… not… try… the… battle-axe?” a voice like a drawn-out breath whispered mockingly in his ear.
The battle-axe-Kaz’s battle-axe, he realized-was suddenly there next to the table. Delbin caught only a glimpse of the weapon, for he was already turning toward the origin of the voice.
The wraith that was Galan Dracos looked down at him with eyes that made the kender shiver and turn away.
“There is… nowhere… to go… and I have need … of you!”
An invisible hand took hold of Delbin and began to drag him back toward the emerald sphere. He struggled in vain.
“No,” continued Dracos. “I think… I need… you… a little more… pliable.”
A great shock surged through every inch of Delbin’s body and he slumped, but his body was moved by a force other than its own ever nearer to the sphere and its creator.
“Soon… I will be… alive again,” the wraith said to the limp form, “and my mistress… my forgiving… mistress… will at last… rule Krynn!”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Several dozen tiny black objects went flying toward Kaz and Sardal.
Even as Kaz realized that he was going to take the brunt of the magic thief’s attack, the projectiles faded harmlessly less than two feet from his face.
“You have become what you always thought of our race, Argaen! Much too predictable. Is that the only spell you can perform consistently? Creating those little baubles is a toddler’s trick!”
As Sardal spoke, Kaz noticed a smile creeping onto Ravenshadow’s visage.
The ceiling above the minotaur and his companion collapsed.
Sardal raised his hands in defense, but he was too slow to effectively protect them both. To Kaz’s horror, the elf’s hurried spell stabilized the ceiling above the minotaur, but not above Sardal himself. Great chunks of cut stone rained down upon the elf. Kaz could see that some of the stones were glancing off harmlessly, but enough were still hitting his companion, who had saved his life at least twice now.
All the while, Argaen Ravenshadow laughed insanely. Sardal had underestimated the dark elf. He had always been a magic thief, with little power to call his own. That had changed now, and it looked as if his old friend had become Argaen’s first victim.
Snarling in anger, Kaz turned his gaze on Ravenshadow and charged him. He never made it. Argaen stopped laughing and stared down at the floor before the minotaur’s feet. A gap began to spread across the floor. Kaz leaped over the treacherous chasm, fully intending to land on his adversary.
Stone claws sprouting from both walls caught both his legs and one arm. The sudden stop nearly wrenched one leg out of its socket. Kaz bit back a bitter, painful scream.
Argaen Ravenshadow had decoyed him.
Like a child with a new toy, the dark elf was experimenting with his newfound powers. He twirled one hand before Kaz, remaining just out of reach of the minotaur. Tiny winged serpents fluttered out of the circle he sketched in the air, flitting around Kaz’s face. With his free hand, Kaz tried to swat them away. He was bitten several times in the process and succeeded only in crushing one. They were astonishingly quick, like hummingbirds.
After a minute or two, Ravenshadow tired of this and waved his hand. The winged serpents faded away.
“Once I would have only been able to dream of doing something so extraordinary. My masters said I lacked the aptitude. What they inferred was that there was weakness in my bloodline, that perhaps one of my progenitors had been a human.”
Kaz, who understood what elves could be like, knew what sort of life Argaen must have had. Pure bloodlines were more important to them than to even the Knights of Solamnia.
“Being part human doesn’t necessarily weaken the blood. I’ve met many powerful human sorcerers.”
That produced a smile-a chilling one, but a smile nonetheless. “That is what I believed as well. The rumor was never confirmed, but I chose to study humans anyway and discovered
within them a vitality that the elven race lacks.”
“You chose to admire… the wrong aspects of humanity, Argaen,” a familiar voice called out from behind Kaz.
“You still live, Sardal?” the magic thief commented blandly. He took a step closer to Kaz, but his eyes were on the elf behind the minotaur. Kaz eyed the distance separating him from the dark elf. Another two steps and Ravenshadow would be within his reach.
“You still live, Sardal,” Argaen repeated in that same bland tone, “but not for long.”
“More true than… you think, friend.”
Argaen started to take a step forward, but froze in midstep and looked the minotaur square in the eye. Kaz found himself suddenly swung toward one of the walls, one leg temporarily loose. He was slapped against the wall with bone-jarring force. While the minotaur fought to stabilize himself, Ravenshadow walked past him toward the other elf.
“You are dying, aren’t you?” he said at last, his tone odd. Kaz thought he almost detected a slight trace of guilt in the magic thief’s voice.
Ravenshadow stood over Sardal, who lay pinned under several large portions of the ceiling. A gaping hole above indicated just how much stone-more than enough to crush him to pulp-had actually fallen on the elf. Only quick thinking on Sardal’s part had prevented that, but one especially large chunk of stone had slammed into Sardal’s rib cage. It was a wonder he could speak, let alone breathe.
“Argaen… it is still… not too late! No one is… safe around… the forces that Dracos… sought to tap! Even the Dragonqueen… was hesitant!”
“You think that I cannot control such power?” All guilt was gone from the renegade’s voice. He spat down on the dying figure at his feet. “Even you Elderly fools! I know more about the workings of magic than all of them combined, including you! While they have been content to play with their powers, I have studied and learned-and now I have access to more power than any of you can imagine!”
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