The Floodgate

Then she raised the sword point to her chest and with both hands drove it into her own heart.

With her last strength she threw herself backward, as if determined not to fall prostrate at his feet. She landed hard and her arms flew out wide. Her bloody hands spasmed into clenched fists, slowly opened, and fell slack.

For a long, shocked moment Matteo stared at the dead warrior.

"It is their custom," Andris said softly. "A Crinti who feels herself disgraced will chose death over shame. They are a brutal people, but proud."

Matteo slowly turned to his friend. "How did you come by this knowledge?"

Andris swept one hand in a wide circle that encompassed the high, wild country. "This is the Nath. If you wish to survive, you must learn of its dangers."

"That does not mean you must join them!" Matteo protested. "Gods above, Andris, what are you doing?"

The jordain's ghostly jaw firmed. "What I think is right. Go your way, and leave me to it."

"You know that I ca

Even as he spoke, he knew his words to be false. The shuttered expression on Andris's ghostly face forced Matteo to admit the full and painful truth.

"You fight with Kiva again," he marveled, "and with the accursed Crinti! Andris, what could possibly justify such an alliance?"

"Halruaa," Andris said shortly. "My vows as a jordain. The wrongs done to my elf forebears."

"Kiva is a traitor to Halruaa. How is it possible to serve the land by following one who betrayed it?"

"Do not judge me, Matteo," Andris warned. "For both our sakes, do not hinder me."

For a moment Matteo stood, torn by his own conflicting loyalties and by the plea in Andris's eyes. Slowly he threw away the Crinti's sword. A smile that was both relieved and sad touched Andris's face, only to die when Matteo drew his jordaini daggers.

"Return with me, Andris," he said quietly.

In response, the ghostly jordain drew a dagger of his own and dropped into a defensive crouch.

Matteo tried one last time. "I don't want to fight you, my friend!"

"Small wonder. You usually lose."

Andris's hand flashed forward. His dagger stopped well short of Matteo's lighting-quick parry, but the jordaini blade was not Andris's true weapon. With his free hand he hurled a fistful of sparkling powder into Matteo's face.

The powder struck him in an explosion of unimaginable pain. It burned him, blinded him. Matteo dropped his daggers and reeled back, both hands clasped to the white-hot agony in his eyes.

With a strange sense of detachment, Matteo registered the sharp blow just below his ribs. The pain was a whisper compared to his screaming eyes, but his body responded by folding over at the waist. Two sharp, precisely placed blows to the back of his neck brought the ground racing up to seize him.

As if from a great distance, Matteo heard Andris's voice speaking with what sounded like regret. "The powder's effect wears off swiftly. Until then, try not to rub your eyes too much. But don't follow me, Matteo. I might not be able to let you go next time."

From a rocky perch high above the clearing, Kiva watched the battle between Andris and Matteo. Her lips curved in a smile as the troublesome jordain fell. As she suspected, Andris was hers. Like the Crinti, he put such value in his elf heritage that all other considerations paled. For Andris to turn against a fellow jordain, his best friend, made that abundantly clear.

This meant more to Kiva than she wished to admit She had chosen Andris before she knew of his heritage and because he was not Matteo. Matteo's heritage she had known for a long time. The fact that Andris and Matteo were friends disturbed her, as did Matteo's incomprehensible friendship with Tzigone. Kiva's nighttime reverie had been haunted more than once by the fear that the three humans were bound by a destiny none of them fully understood.

The elf woman made her way down to the Crinti camp and sought out Shanair. She described Matteo to the chieftain, instructing the elfblood to take a group of warriors and lure him and any companions into the haunted hills. The men were to be kept alive, she stressed, until Shanair received word otherwise.

Once the Crinti chieftain gave grudging assent to these constraints, Kiva took her scrying globe and went off in search of a quiet place and a conversation with a certain wizard. She had not contacted him in years, and finding him among the silver threads of magic's Weave would be no easy task.

Mastering the spell of attunement took Kiva most of the morning. Even then, the wizard took his time in answering. The elf woman's lips curled in disdain when at last the man's face appeared before her. The years had not dealt kindly with the human. He was thin and balding, and the furtive expression on his face made him look disturbingly like a hairless ferret.

"Damn it, Kiva! After all this time, you had to pick this precise moment?" he hissed.

"Trouble, my love?" she said mockingly. "I would have thought you incapable of spawning anything quite so interesting."

"Where have you been? What's going on?"

"No doubt you heard of my capture in Akhlaur's Swamp."

"Yes, and your excommunication from the Fellowship of Azuth. I'm sure that broke your heart."

Kiva laughed scornfully. "Yes, but my faith in the humans' so-called Lord of Magic will sustain me through these trying times. Enough prattle. The battle nears, and we need to unleash all our weapons or fail utterly! You will have to cast the summoning we prepared."

The wizard shook his head. "You know I ca

The elf lifted one jade-colored brow. "I can live with that."

"Obviously, I ca

Kiva's golden eyes lit up. "You have the girl?"

"In the palm of my hand," Dhamari Exchelsor said smugly. In a few words he described the events of the past few days and his new relationship with Tzigone. "We're heading north even now. Keturah's bastard has not yet learned the spell we require, but she will master it by the time we arrive in the Nath."

"You have done well," Kiva said. "Surprisingly so! This Tzigone is a ca

"As a novelty, I tried telling the truth as often as possible. The accusations against Keturah are a matter of public record, so that was easy for her to confirm, but it took some clever magic to convince her and the jordain Matteo of my sterling character and good intentions."

"Now I know you're lying," Kiva said scathingly. "First, you're not terribly clever. Second, you have no character of any kind, and third, your intentions are never good. More to the point, neither Matteo nor Tzigone can be convinced of anything by magical means."

"Ah, but the spell was not on them, but me! That talisman of Keturah's? The one that protected the possessor against me and my agents? I had it reproduced. I gave the copy to Matteo to pass along to Tzigone, and I carry Keturah’s original for my own protection."

The scorn melted from the elf woman's face. "It protects you from yourself!"

"Just so," Dhamari said smugly. "Since the jordain and the girl are currently the greatest threats to my success, the talisman protects me by ensuring that I do nothing to reveal my true thoughts and purposes." The wizard's smile held great satisfaction. "If you wish to retract your insults, I will listen graciously."

"Just get the girl to the Nath with all haste. See she learns the spell of summoning on the way!"