Hand of Fire

"Arrsarundae!" he snapped.

Obediently the air shimmered and burst into brightness as a magical field collapsed, flooding the chamber with the harsh white light of its slow dying.

A figure stood revealed beyond it, man-shaped and robed- and hidden again in an instant, as Drauthtar and Eirhaun both furiously snarled out incantations and moved their hands in lightning-swift gestures, hurling deadly magics at the intruder.

Scores of tiny fireballs whirled to assail that mysterious target, dozens of lightning bolts leaping past them or stabbing through them in an unleashing of fury that would have been fool-work indeed to loose in even the stoutest of castles, had Eirhaun's dozen shieldings not been there to shape and contain their destruction.

As it was, the room shook, dust showering down, and an entire row of flagstones heaved and rippled as if some giant mole were racing along beneath them. Ears were smitten with the shrieks of shieldings torn asunder, gargoyles were hurled away like leaves flung along in a gale to be shattered and broken on far walls, the very air crackled and scorched the skins of the two wizards… and when the smoke and stones had fallen away, the mysterious intruder stood unscathed.

Unscathed, and stepping slowly forward, smiling.

"Hesperian!" Drauthtar spat, rage still his master.

"The same," replied the feeble old man with that amused look that Drauthtar knew so well. He was clad in the dusty maroon robes he always wore-perhaps the only clothes he had-and the same long, pointed, ridiculous shoes. They seemed relics of another age, just as the Old Man of the Zhentarim was. Our Old Mage. Not for the first-time, Drauthtar wondered if Hesperdan and Elminster were cousins, brothers, or even one and the same man…

That thought always made him shiver, and he shivered now. Hesperdan strolled unconcernedly between Drauthtar and Eirhaun, giving them both the same patronizing smile, and the Maimed Wizard said heavily, "You heard all the words that passed between us." Again, his words were not a question.

"Of course."

"W-what will you tell Manshoon?" Drauthtar dared to ask.

"Nothing. I, too, enjoy a good spellstorm."

A little silence followed his reply, until Eirhaun asked almost reluctantly, as if fearing the answer he'd receive: "How did you pass and hide from my shieldings?"

"Ah, yes. A fair question. When you can answer it for yourself, you'll finally be competent to perform the scouring-the-Brotherhood duties you've taken upon yourself, Eirhaun Sooundaeril. I hope that competence comes soon, Eirhaun. More than that, I hope it comes in time."

Drauthtar told himself to remember Eirhaun's family name, which the Maimed Wizard never used and he'd never known. Hesperdan took another step and was abruptly not there, gone as if he'd never been present.

Drauthtar stared at the empty air that had held him, then at the scorched walls and sprawled dead gargoyles. He said feelingly, "I hate that man."

"No," the Maimed Wizard said slowly, "you don't, and neither do I. No one in the Brotherhood quite dares to hate Hesperdan, I think. We all fear him too much for that."

The dark cloud whirling above them suddenly sharpened and grew still darker. Shandril could see that it was now a forest of dark swordblades, all pointing straight down at the ground, and all whirling in swift spirals, like a hundred corkscrews.

Nay, swiftly descending spirals! Like a patiently settling mist, the cloud started to descend, draining itself away into all those swords. In a rising, discordant singing, they loomed larger and longer and darker, whirling nearer…

Men were shouting or crying out in frantic fear or cursing-Shandril could hear Orthil Voldovan, and Arauntar, and Beldimarr all gasping out floods of words that were cruel, colorful treasures of invective-and Narm was desperately muttering an incantation, trying to weave a counterspell when there was no time left to cast anything.

Shandril summoned up a last surge of spellfire to cleave this death that was reaching for them. As the flames started to flow, an old and coldly amused voice arose out of them, saying quite distinctly, "I hope that competence comes soon, Eirhaun. More than that, I hope it comes in time."

Mystra's doing? Who was speaking, and who was Eirhaun?

Shandril shook her head. There was no time left to wonder, no time to do anything more than nod at the aptness of the mysterious words, and gather her paltry remaining spellfire, and wait for just the right moment as the dark blades came whirling down.

Fighting for Life in Haelhollow

Fight, little fools! Mount your wars and raise your towers and make your chases. I like to taste well-marbled meat when I'm crunching your bones.

Hamairathgauraundon, High Wyrm of the Crags.

Words Spent On Little Fools: Instructing Humans

Year of the Watching Helm

The cloud resolved itself into a dark, glittering forest of swordblades, spi

"No!" Korthauvar Hammantle shouted. "Don't slay her, you fool!"

"Who-?" Hlael snapped, leaning forward to see, but Korthauvar gave him no answer. The taller Zhentarim was too busy leaping to his feet and casting the strongest shielding spell he knew, as fast as his fingers could fly and his lips gasp out the incantation.

"No!" Hlael said, face paling, as he realized what Korthauvar was going to do. "You can't…"

Korthauvar could, and did. He hurled his spell into the depths of the crystal, even as Hlael threw himself and his chair over backward, scrambling to get clear before The crystal exploded in a bright roar of force and tinkling of razor-sharp crystal shards that peppered the walls like hard-driven hail before raining down all over the chamber.

Korthauvar lowered both his hands, seeming not to see that they were streaming blood and bright with glistening shards in a score of places. He'd shielded his face and throat, and that was all that mattered. "Hlael," he muttered, "get up. It's your turn to weave a farscrying. We've got to see what happened. I saw her face-she knew she hadn't enough spellfire left to disrupt that spell."

"She had enough to defend herself, surely," Hlael protested, clambering up from behind his chair.

"Yes, but she has her husband to think of and the two guards she healed earlier. She dotes on folk so easily, remember."

Hlael sighed. "She's young."

"Aye, and she'll die that way, right soon, if we don't cast just the right spells," Korthauvar declared, striding over to his scattered heap of spellbooks. "Now spin me that farscrying! I have to see what happened-now!"

Hlael nodded hastily, shook himself, and started to stammer out the spell. Korthauvar growled out wordless frustration and started flipping pages of the oldest, most powerful spell-tome he owned. Unless he was mistaken, Haelhollow was boiling with a storm of spells right now that would make a mistake at a MageFair look like a mere trifle!

The sky low over Haelhollow erupted in a sudden bright conflagration. Boiling brightness tore apart the dark cloud of descending blades like bright lantern beams slicing through nightgloom. Lightning bolts sprang out of that roiling, spraying here and there among the wagons. Men screamed as they stiffened in death, outlined in blue fire with every hair on their bodies standing out like bristles. Corpses toppled, trailing plumes of smoke, unregarded in the shout-filled confusion of tiny, dying lightnings crackling across the ground like restless claws, spiraling swords fraying away into drifting plumes of smoke, and spheres of snarling flame bouncing and tumbling out of the sky.

The brightness overhead died away swiftly, lashing out in a few parting surges. Floods of ruby and blood-pink radiance washed over trees and wagons and ru