The Magehound

Tzigone most emphatically did not want to see the source of this danger. She dragged herself back up through the darkness more brutally than Matteo had done. Panting for air, she opened her eyes and willed the memory-the memory, not her memory-back to whatever place forgotten nightmares fled.

But the image remained, as visible to her eyes as it had been in her memory trance. The forest and the guardian beast were suspended in the center of the room like a ghostly vision. The color was almost as vivid as Tzigone had seen in her mind, but it was rapidly fading, and the image was growing more and more translucent. She could see through the memory, like looking through the arch of a low-lying rainbow, but it was no less fearsome for its seeming delicacy.

Tzigone scrambled away from the terrible vision, crab-walking frantically until she bumped into the far wall. Matteo also retreated, but he circled the vision and studied the ghostly bird thoughtfully.

Suddenly a vast clawed hand flashed in from nowhere. It slashed toward the avian guardian, a force too fast to evade and too powerful to stop. The bird exploded into a flurry of feathers and gore.

And then the image was suddenly, mercifully gone.

"What foul sorcery was that?" Matteo said softly, looking at Tzigone with the same horror that she had felt upon beholding the dream. Apparently he could bear the magic far more easily than he could stomach the magician.

"It wasn't mine," she said desperately. "Not my magic, not even my memory."

"It couldn't have been your memory. That much is true. That species of griffon has been extinct for nearly three hundred years. You couldn't remember what you have never seen.

"Or could you?" he said, his tone bleak but thoughtful. "A diviner can glimpse the future. I have never heard of a wizard who could look into the past, much less recall it in so vivid a fashion, but perhaps it could be done. But you are a wizard, Tzigone, no matter what tales you choose to tell."

For once Tzigone had no rejoinder. Too shaken to care about such fine distinctions, she bolted for the window. Before Matteo could say a word, she disappeared out into the night.

Chapter Fifteen

Dawn was nothing but a fond hope when the small band of warriors waded into the Kilmaruu Swamp. Andris went first, wading through the knee-deep water and carefully testing a path for the men who moved silently behind him. There were forty of them, some jordaini, some commoners, some of foreign blood. According to the magehound, none of them knew Mystra's touch.

Each man carried a pack on his back fashioned from sharkskin, and another, smaller bag hung on each side of his belt. These were filled with rations, for Andris did not trust any food or water they might find in Kilmaruu. The bags also carried an odd assortment of weapons. No magic could be used in the swamp, but Andris knew of natural substances that in certain combinations produced nearly magical effects. Each man carried several small bottles, each firmly stoppered with cork and sealed with a thin film of wax.

As he shifted his weight carefully to his next step, Andris tried not to think too much about the source of this relatively firm footing. Many years ago a terrible war had raged in this place. Hundreds had died fighting in a battle that lasted through the three days and nights of the full moon. It was said that entire villages had been emptied by the battles. Two villages had been all but swallowed by the swamp, and their ruins provided a haven for the undead creatures that haunted the land. Even Kilmaruu's quiet dead were very much in evidence. The bones of long-dead warriors provided a frame that held the silt and sand and kept Andris and his fighters from sinking into the muck.

Mist rose from the water, swirling through the already thick fog. Andris watched closely for patterns. Many of their foes were creatures that could hide in the mist, blending in like dryads in a grove of trees. Ahead and to his left, a particularly thick land-bound cloud brooded over a sleeping heron. The jordain noticed that it didn't touch either the bird or the water.

Andris nodded to one of the forward scouts-Quon Lee, a small, slight man with hair the color of polished ebony and almond-shaped black eyes so sharp that they could perceive shadows almost before they were cast. Quon Lee was a conscript, stolen from his homeland by pirates. Kiva had paid his slave price so that he could join this endeavor.

That was something else Andris tried not to ponder. True, the man stayed willingly enough, for he was eager to win his freedom. Kiva had promised that her magic could remove the ugly scar of the slave brand from Quon Lee's forehead once the battle was over. Andris would have preferred to lead into battle men who chose to fight, not men who fought because they had no other choice.

He watched as the scout broke away from the group and slipped down into the water, half swimming and half crawling toward the cloud, keeping his movements slow and fluid and doing his best to stay submerged.

Andris nodded in silent approval. He wouldn't have thought of this precaution, but he saw the wisdom of it at once. Quon Lee had been born and raised in haunted jungles far to the east. If a spirit guardian lurked within that cloud, it would be roused by the heat of a living body moving through the still morning air. But the water was as hot as blood, and it was full of darting creatures and unpredictable currents. The warm, restless water would mask the scout's approach.

The call of the heron, sudden and shrill, startled them all. Some of the men jumped, but all were too well trained to make any noise. The long-legged bird burst into awkward flight. It rose into the strange mist and immediately faltered, its wings locked into place as if frozen. Like a child's wooden toy, the bird traced an awkward nose dive and crashed into the water. The impact seemed to revive it somewhat, and it began to flail about in a wild panic.

Almost at once, the waters around the heron started to churn. In a heartbeat, a pool of deep red surrounded the bird. Frantic flashes of silver leaped and glittered in the bloody water.

Andris abruptly motioned his men to a stop. The swamp teemed with schools of silvery, delicate fish, not much bigger than a man's hand, that could strip the flesh from an ox more efficiently than a butcher. Andris didn't have to remind the men to keep perfectly still until the frenzy abated and the fish swam off in search of other prey.

One of the men lifted a hand to his heart to trace a sign of warding, a silent petition to some foreign god. Although Andris had been raised to believe that none but Mystra or Azuth were true deities worthy of veneration, he didn't begrudge the man his devotions. Jordain were taught to respect the gods of magic, but from a distance. Still, Andris suspected that all the men were calling upon every god whose name they knew. A trip into Kilmaruu, Andris noted wryly, might even make a devout man of Matteo.

He quickly thrust aside the thought of his friend and the pain that came from knowing he would likely never see Matteo again. In the eyes of his brothers, Andris was dead. Unless he kept his focus, that fiction might soon become truth. This was no time to think about what might come after Kilmaruu.

Quon Lee glided smoothly back toward the group. He rose from the water, caught Andris's eye, and gave him a single grim nod. The man's lips were blue, and under the brown of his face lay a sickly pallor. Even in the water, even without touching the cloud itself, he had been chilled by the ghostly presence.

Andris motioned the men away from the lurking mist. They moved cautiously through a narrow strip between two seas of reeds, into a lagoon shaded by leaning trees draped with moss and vines.