He didn’t like the thought of that. “Isn’t there another way out?” he whispered.
Eralynn shook her head.
“Right,” he said, untying his mace. “That’s it, then. We fight our way out.” If he managed to strike the dragon on the head and shout the word that activated the magic in his mace at just the right moment, they just might live to see another delve. He pointed at the entrance where the dragon waited, likely thinking its prey hadn’t noticed it yet. “You on one side, and me on the other,” Torrin whispered. He handed her his cup. “When we’re in position, throw this. When the dragon hears the noise, and sticks her head in, I’ll stun her. Then you can finish her with your sword.”
She shoved the cup back into his hand. “Stay where you are,” she said. “This is my fight.”
“I won’t let you take on a dragon alone.”
Her look grew cold. “You won’t ‘let’ me?”
He stared back at her and quoted from the Delver’s Tome. “ ‘Unless it is the only way to complete the delve, no Delver shall abandon his partner, or allow him to face danger alone,’ ” he whispered.
“This isn’t a delve,” she retorted, her face growing red. “Nor are you my ‘partner.’ You’re just a sadly deluded-”
A bellowing roar cut off the rest of her insult. A gout of flame billowed into the cavern-the dragon’s fiery breath. A blast of heat washed over them, searing the bare skin on Torrin’s forehead and arms. The smell of singed mustache filled his nostrils. “Down!” he shouted. No need for silence any longer. The red had heard them arguing and knew they were there.
Eralynn didn’t need to be told. She was already springing off the slab of rock. Together, they threw themselves prone in the lee of it, just as a second blast of flame flared across the cavern, even hotter than the first. Melted candle wax dribbled down onto Torrin’s bracer and ran down to his elbow, burning through his heavy shirt and searing his right arm. He cursed and slapped at his sleeve.
“What now?” he gasped. “If we try to get any closer, we’ll be cooked meat.”
Eralynn coughed. The air was thick with smoke. “If we wait here, we’ll suffocate,” she said.
Torrin touched the silver hammers braided into his beard as another roaring gout of fire filled the cavern. The air grew still more stifling. His entire body was bathed in sweat, his singed beard limp, and his hair plastered against his scalp. Eralynn didn’t look much better. Hot, sooty air rasped down Torrin’s throat like a sawblade as he tried to draw breath.
“Torrin,” Eralynn said. “I’m sorry.”
Torrin forced a grin. “Everyone has to die, sometime.”
“Not that,” she said with a cough. “About what I said.”
He waved a hand. “You can apologize later.” He coughed again. “In the next life, when we meet again.”
“Small chance of that,” she gasped. “We won’t even recognize each other.”
Torrin hung his head closer to the ground, trying to find cooler air. With all the smoke in the air, it was getting difficult to see. Eralynn struggled to rise, her sword in her hand, but another blast of flame forced her back to her knees.
Then Torrin noticed something-a blue glow. Lines of magical energy were flowing toward the spot where he and Eralynn were crouched, converging on them as though they were the hub of a spoked wheel.
“What’s happening?” he asked.
“Something’s activated the earth node,” Eralynn said. “It’s channeling spellfire.” She lifted her hands and squinted at them through the smoke. The glowing veins of blue were no brighter than usual. “But it’s not me. Something other than my spellscar must be drawing it.”
Torrin saw, to his surprise, that the beams of crackling blue energy were converging on the spot where he crouched. “It’s focusing on me!” he gasped back. “But I’m not spellscarred. Why would it-”
Wracked with coughing, he couldn’t continue.
“Your runestone!” Eralynn cried.
Of course! Why hadn’t he made the connection before? The words on his runestone were “earth magic,” and they were at the heart of an earth node: one of the places where the invisible lines of elemental energy that ran the length and breadth of Faerun converged. And perhaps-just perhaps-it would be their salvation. Mages used earth nodes like stepping stones, teleporting from one to the next with a mere thought. Perhaps the runestone would allow even someone without knowledge of magical rituals to do the same. And not just from one earth node to the other, but to-as Kendril had said-“anywhere you want to go.”
Torrin ripped off his pack and fumbled with the runestone. Immediately, the sparkling lines centered on it. A ball of blue light formed around the runestone, sending tingling shivers up Torrin’s arms.
“What should I do now?” he shouted.
“I have no idea!” Eralynn rasped out between coughs. “Try concentrating on somewhere else.” Yet another wave of heat and smoke boiled over them as the dragon exhaled again. “Anywhere else!” She cupped her hands around Torrin’s, and the blue glow intensified. Crackling veins sprang into bright relief on the backs of her hands.
“Hold on!” Torrin shouted. He squeezed his eyes shut, one hand on his pack and the other holding the runestone. Out of here, he thought fiercely. Get us out of here. Take us-
Fire curled over the slab as the dragon exhaled its most powerful breath yet, the flames licking down over the lip of the stone. As they seared Torrin’s scalp and smouldered his hair, he screamed in pain. “Home!”
He felt a sudden wrench.
A twisting sensation followed-a long spinning slide along lines of blue fire. Then a sudden thud, blessed coolness, and the press of wooden boards against his cheek.
He lifted his head and saw Eralynn lying unconscious-but, praise Moradin, still breathing-beside him on the floor of his parents’ shop in Hammergate.
“We made it,” he gasped.
Then he collapsed.
Chapter Six
“Even the just may sin with an open chest of gold before them.”
Torrin hissed in pain as something cold touched his forehead. He reared up, wincing at the sting, and a wet cloth fell from his forehead, into his lap. He glanced around stiffly, and saw that he was in the attic loft above his parents’ shop in Hammergate.
“Welcome home, Daffyd,” a voice beside him said. Torrin glanced to the side and saw his mother. She picked the cloth up from the bed, dipped it into a basin of ice water, and wrung it out. “We’ve seen you, what-twice? — these past ten years, and suddenly you decide to barge in on us out of thin air.” She shook her head and feigned a laugh. “Decided to test the shop’s protective wards, did you?”
“You’ve added wards?” Torrin asked. “Business must be good.”
“As it turns out, no,” his mother replied, suddenly serious. “The dwarves have sealed the gate to Eartheart. None of them are venturing out to Hammergate any more. They’re all trembling, right to the tips of their beards, about this new disease. The stoneplague, they call it. Thank goodness it doesn’t seem to affect… us.”
Torrin’s mother had aged since he’d seen her last. The hair that was pulled up in a neat bun was a solid gray, and the lines beside her mouth had deepened. She was also heavier than Torrin remembered-the stool she sat on creaked as she leaned forward. But although her tone was as chiding as ever, her touch was gentle as she laid the cold cloth on Torrin’s scorched arm.
“Where’s Eralynn?” he asked. “Is she all right?”
“That dwarf woman you teleported in here with?” his mother replied. “The one with the strange hands?” Her lips turned down in a barely suppressed frown. “She’s spellscarred, you know.”
