Hand of Fire

Thoadrin threw his arm around his best warrior-by the Dead Dragons, his only warrior, now!-and held the man, helpless to do more, until at last the coughing ended. Laranthan went to his knees, spat out a lot of blood onto the fire-scorched rocks, drew in a few long, gasping breaths, and asked, "Could we… get away from this place?"

"Come," Thoadrin said quietly, lifting him to his feet. "'Tis the Blackrocks for us, north and west as fast as we can go." Laranthan looked at his lord. "North and-Waterdeep?" Thoadrin nodded. "Seeking spellfire is a fools' game, but those well above us in the Followers may not believe that, from where they sit safe and distant. So to Waterdeep to hide until the time's right to seek our masters and admit our failure."

Laranthan nodded, looked back at the drifting smoke where a long ridge of ancient and weather-scoured rocks had been, shivered, and started walking northwest.

The flying lass and her storm of all-consuming flames dwindled down behind the smoking, melted rocks along one side of the hollow. Orthil Voldovan shook his head in awe and then bellowed, "Arauntar! Beldimarr! All swords-to me!"

Was anyone left to answer his rallying?

Ah, Arauntar, lumbering forward, and someone else, past yonder wagons… Voldovan stared around in mounting horror at the smoldering ruins of his caravan, muttering all the curses he could remember. A dozen wagons, at least, and probably more than twice that many clients…

All the work of some brigands and one girl.

Distant trees crackled as spellfire roared on. Voldovan looked in that direction and growled, "Gods above, how am I going to slay her? And if I don't, how soon before that devours all the Realms?"

In the gathering dusk, Sharantyr of Shadowdale saw the flash and glow of mighty flame in the distance ahead a moment or two before the ground shook beneath her boots.

"Shan, Shan," she muttered, climbing onto Flamewind's saddle and urging the weary horse into a trot, "couldn't you have waited until I got there?"

Somewhere nearby in the Blackrocks, a wolf howled.

Her mount faltered under her, saddle leather creaking with the break in stride. Sharantyr kicked her feet out of the stirrups and murmured, "Slow, then, Flamewind. Go as slow as you want to."

The horse faltered again under her and fell.

Sharantyr sprang free, cursing softly, and watched the ground rush up to meet her like a hard-driven fist.

Her bright spellflames first began to falter just as Narm was starting to stagger from weariness, every breath burning his lungs. He'd run a long way up and down loose rocks and over tangled thorn-vines and half-fallen, leaning trees. He had lost count of the number of small, snarling things that had scurried away from beneath his pounding boots.

He felt as if he'd run halfway to Waterdeep, but when he'd slipped, caught hold of a tree to keep from falling down a dark cleft between rocks, and ended up wrenching himself back the way he'd come from ere he could halt, he could still see the fitful glows and rising sparks of the burning wagons in Haelhollow, not all that far off.

Shandril was flying lower now, struggling in the air as if wrestling with some invisible wraith, and the jets and bursts of flame were becoming fitful as her spellfire ran out or she won her battle for mastery over it. It had been some time since she'd burned a clear trail through the Blackrocks brush. Only the occasional gout of flame set anything below her to smoldering now.

Narm caught hold of another tree, clung to it while he threw back his head and drank in deep, shuddering breaths of cool twilit air, then ran on again. She wasn't far ahead now. One last sprint just might…

Shan suddenly put her hands down at her sides-balled and shaking fists, at once achingly beautiful and pitiful- and soared straight up into the sky. Windmilling his arms wildly to slow down, Narm ran right underneath her, managed to get himself stopped with the aid of a particularly thorny wintanberry bush, and wrenched himself around to face her.

"Shan!" he shouted. "Shan, I'm down here!"

The bright thing of fire wriggled in the swiftly darkening sky above him, writhing strangely against the brightening stars like a sandsnake he'd once seen burrowing into river mud, and made a horrible sound. A soft and yet harsh sound that went on and on.

Narm gaped up at his lady for a long, fearful time, wondering if the spellfire was turning Shan into some sort of monster, before he realized he was hearing bitter, mirthless laughter. She was choking out the last of her spellfire. He saw it billow from her nose and mouth like horse-breath on a cold day. Slowly she sank back to earth again, shuddering amid the last crackling, spitting eruptions of flame.

"Believe it or not," she gasped, turning to face him with eyes that blazed with spellfire, "I'd noticed you crashing along, down below. Oh, gods, Narm, I love you!"

Narm reached up his hands for her. "And I love you, Shan!"

"Do you?" She shuddered, hunching over in midair and spitting forth flames as if vomiting up a sickening meal. "Still?"

"Yes, my lady," Narm cried, catching hold of one of her feet despite a surge of power that burned, then numbed him. "Oh, yes!"

"Then end this," she whispered. "Please."

Narm dragged her down to the ground and embraced her, bending forward to kiss her, then recoiling helplessly before her skin-searing breath.

"W-what d'you mean?" he cried, as he staggered back, wreathed in flame, and saw his lady fall to her hands and knees, arching and convulsing. "Shan, I'll not harm you!"

The look she gave him up through her tangled hair was hat of an angry, hungry beast, but her voice was all weariness when she said, "Then knock me cold. Give me sleep-swiftly, with your fist-before I lose this battle raging inside me."

He ran to her. "Shan? What… what's happening to you?"

"I'm dying," she whispered. "Or will"-her voice rose into an angry snarl-"if I give in to this fire. It feels so warm, so soothing… and gives me such power. I want it. I want it so much!"

She quivered, head down, and he flinched back from her, inches away from putting soothing fingers to her shoulders.

"If I give in," she growled, "if I stop fighting, I'll become a flying flame, scouring everything I see like some sort of mad, leaping star come down to the ground… until I'm burnt out and gone." She sobbed harshly, then added in a hoarse, hissing whisper, "Gone to ashes, like all the folk I've slain!"

Her head jerked up, then, and her face was aflame and twisted. She looked like a fiend out of the Nine Hells as she stared at him and growled, "Do it, Narm! Do it, my love!"

Narm stared at her, clenched his hand slowly into a fist, and held it out to her questioningly. She nodded, lowering her face again, and snarled, "Damn you, do it!"

A roar built in her throat, and her body shook again. In sudden fear Narm drew back his arm and drove it forward, punching his lady's jaw as hard as he'd ever struck anyone in his life.

The force of his blow brought sharp pain to his fingers, then numbness. He shook them, absently, as he watched his lady's head snap back, the fires go out in her eyes, and her body start to crumple.

He grabbed for her too late, as her senseless body fell forward into a boneless roll that brought her to a stop against him, limp and heavy.

"Gods above," he cursed-or prayed-and started to cry. "Oh, Shan, Shan… what am I going to do?"

Only the first few peeping insects of nightfall gave him answer, and Narm cradled his wife's body in his arms, stroking her matted and sweat-soaked hair, wondering what was going to become of them both.

If only he had the spells of an archmage or spellfire to match her own-or neither of them had ever heard of Mystra's terrible gift, and no one was chasing them across half Faerun seeking to enslave Shan or somehow wrest her power out of her. No doubt the Zhentarim and a score of other fell, cruel wizards had spells that would slay her in slow torment as crawling magic tore spellfire out of her and into their hands. Even if they didn't, they'd lock her up until they could find or craft such spells-or slay her, just to keep spellfire from falling into the hands of their foes.