Hand of Fire

Paraster Montheir swallowed, nodded hastily, and was still nodding with a sickly grin coming and going on his face when Mirt barked, "Asper! To me! Hasten, no need to crawl!" The lithe, leather-clad lass raced into view through the archway and came to a halt with hands at her sides, as alert and straight-backed-rigid as any Palace guard standing to attention.

"Conduct our valued friend Master Montheir to the gates with all courtesy," Mirt commanded her.

"At once, my Lord!" she breathed and made her turn toward the Athkatlan merchant almost a leap of eagerness. "This way, honored merchant," she urged, indicating the door with a flourish as if he'd never seen it before, bowing low, then leaping to open it for him.

Swallowing again, Paraster Montheir nodded hastily to Mirt, turned, and waved at Asper to precede him.

She bowed to him again and did so, slowing to offer him her arm on the broad rough-slab stairs that descended into the forehall past rows of figureheads and bowsprit filigrees salvaged from wrecks in the dangerous coastal seas just north of Waterdeep.

At about the sixth step down, Asper murmured, "If you’ll allow me to say this, Master Montheir, you are a very brave man."

The Athkatlan looked at her sharply, seeking any hint of sarcasm or perhaps pleading or admiration, but her eyes were downcast and her face unreadable.

Paraster made no immediate reply, but when they reached the bottom of the stair and a sharp singing in the air around him a

"Oh, yes," Asper replied, slowing and turning to look at him with eyes that were large and grave. "In fact, Khelben insists on it."

"The Blackstaff? He does?"

"Oh, yes," Asper told him, not loosening the clasp of their linked arms as they walked on. "Laws are laws, and a bond is a bond. Let me show you something."

Laden servants were hastening back and forth across the forehall between the pantry and a shuttered larder where wagons left deliveries. Asper reached out her free hand to a passing maidservant. "Maerilee-show this honored merchant your back."

Maerilee nodded, undid a bodice-lacing atop one of her shoulders, turned away, and let her garment fall to her waist. Across shoulder blades and a deep-corded back, Montheir found himself gazing upon a webwork of deep white and purple scars.

The servant looked at Asper, who nodded, and Maerilee bowed her head and went on her way. "She displeased my lord," Asper told the Athkatlan softly, "over a debt."

Paraster Montheir said nothing and remained silent as she conducted him out through the great entry doors of the mansion, but he nodded to her as he would to an equal as they parted on the broad top step of the outside stairs.

He looked back once as he joined his guards and shuddered as he saw the wench in leathers wave casually to the two gargoyles-if that's what they were; great stone beasts with wings and claws and tusks-perched atop the doorposts, receiving their solemn salutes in return.

Asper seemed to speak to someone else as she turned to go in, someone ghostly, whose feminine head and shoulders seemed solid enough but who trailed away to nothingness well above the ground. The doors of Mirt's Mansion closed softly, and Paraster Montheir found himself listening to a high wail of pain coming from somewhere within that old, ramshackle, fortresslike house.

Asper smiled and shook her head as she shot the last bolt and turned back toward the stairs. The problem with watchghosts like Ieiridauna was that they loved dramatics. That cry of pain sounded more like a large and enthusiastic wildcat in heat than a woman in pain.

On the other hand, perhaps 'twas overly harsh to criticize another's acting. Laeral had been so overblown as to be about as convincing as a slap-puppet play-though it had worked, hadn't it?-and if things had gone on much longer, a certain lass who rejoiced in the name of Asper couldn't have avoided bursting into wild, helpless laughter. Shaking her head, she retraced her steps to Mirt's office.

This was an occasion when a little untruth served everyone well. There was no need for Paraster Montheir of Athkatla to learn that Maerilee Goodfellow had received her spectacular scars in pirate slavery in the Nelanther or how much Mirt had paid for her freedom when she'd caught his eye. There was no need for a lot of merchants in bustling Waterdeep to learn a lot of things. When bound by carefully guided ignorance, they led-in Asper's opinion, at least, and she'd seen much of both ignorant and wise merchants and the few traders whose forebearers had done so well at making coins that they'd become the city's nobles-better lives. The truly wise were rare gems, but a few scraps of wisdom tended to make men dangerous.

Wherefore Waterdeep was a groaning, overladen cart heaped high with danger. As Asper smiled ruefully to herself and strolled back into the office, Mirt was growling, "Just what sort of attack could lay low one of ye Seven? Not something I'd want to be in the same kingdom as I'm thinking…"

Laeral nodded to Asper over the rim of a huge goblet that sparkled with deep blue Sossal snow wine. The Lady Mage was sitting with her booted feet up on Mirt's desk enjoying a good reward for her playacting whilst the Old Wolf prowled the room, barking questions at her.

"My sister is not hiding from foes she fears or nursing wounds," she replied calmly. "She's doing what we so often must: reacting to being hit on the nose with a new ball she's never seen before. She had no idea she needed to be juggling it among all the others we must keep in the air constantly, so she's letting some lesser balls bounce by themselves for a day or two, while she learns what she must about the new one, to know best how to handle it."

"High Lady Alustriel will be delayed arriving in Waterdeep, I take it?" Asper asked swiftly, helping herself to the decanter of snow wine.

"I'm afraid so. On the other hand, it will be days yet before Shandril reaches Waterdeep, even if her caravan has a clear run, and we know the maid from Highmoon has power enough to defend herself for a few days longer."

"More than enough, I'm thinking," Mirt growled. "Tis in my mind, Laeral m'gel, that spellfire in the hands of a youngling untutored in magic or by Mystra may become like a wind-driven forest fire: stronger as it goes on and soon out of control and needing mages working on all sides to prevent it overwhelming everyone. Each time Shan used it when I was with her, her confidence and power seemed to grow. Can her will and backbone keep pace with its flaring? I hate to say this, but I doubt it."

Laeral nodded grimly. "As do I, Old Wolf." She took a long sip from her goblet and added, "I'm afraid you know too much about how magic works to be wrong in this hunch."

"Knowing my Lord," Asper said fondly, as she put an arm around Mirt from behind, "I'm sure he's hurled queries at you like a busy slinger hurling stones in battle and heard this from you already-but if 'tis not a deep, close secret, Laeral: what attack?"

"While trying to enter some of the vaults of great magic deep beneath her palace in Silverymoon," the Lady Mage replied, "Alustriel was beset by a storm of spells launched by lurking mages-a cabal of unfamiliar and strangely empowered wizards."

"She survived, so much I know. Did they gain access to the vaults?"

"No, but they seemed able to take refuge in the Weave itself when she struck back at them."

"And reading the Weave, she learned what about them?"

Amusement rose and danced in Laeral's eyes. "You know all that you need to know-and more-about the Art, too, it seems. Well, then, my sister's attackers seemed to be incorporeal, half-insane wizards who'd passed beyond life into unlife in some new and hitherto unknown way. 'Mere memories of mages,' she called them."