warmed with invitation and promise. Larson knew he should thank Oghma for his good fortune, but his gaze kept straying to the table where Quintish sat. The older bard listened to the dance music with a mixture of puzzlement and longing on his ravaged face.
When the dancers stopped, happy and exhausted, they settled down to drink and listen to the singing of ballads. Two tales were sung, then someone called for Ellamir. Murmurs of approval and anticipation rippled through the crowd as she picked up a small harp and made her way to the center of the circle.
She put her slender hands to the strings. A sad silver melody flowed from her fingers, and then another, and then the two entwined in a complex, compelling dance. Larson had never acquired more than the bare rudiments of the instrument, but he considered himself a fair judge of harpers. Seldom had he heard Ellamir's equal. Despite her youth, she was a harper of uncanny skill.
Then, when Larson was convinced that never had music been so exquisite, Ellamir began to sing. Her silvery soprano floated through the room like the chime of fairy bells. He listened entranced, forgetting for the moment even his concern for Master Quintish.
Then the words of Ellamir's song caught Larson's attention. It was a woman's lament for a lost love, a bard who had scorned her. She died, but her obsession did not. From her shattered dreams rose the Lhiannan shee —
'Silence!'
The indignant baritone command shattered the silvery web of Ellamir's song. The village meistersinger leapt to his feet, his blond mustache quivering with rage. Many of the bards in the circle shifted uncomfortably. Some made signs of warding. Ellamir's hands dropped to her lap, and two bright spots of color flamed on her pale face.
Larson cleared his throat to break the uneasy silence. 'I am a stranger here,' he said slowly,' but I don't see how Ellamir has done wrong! The song was lovely and her voice superb, even by the high standards of Kartakass.'
'It is not her bardcraft that we fault,' the meistersinger said severely,' but her judgment.'
'But what is a. . lanan she, that you fear it so? '
'Enough! That is something of which a bard should never speak. In this land we have a saying: Be careful what you call, for you might receive an answer!'
'Wise advice,' Larson said gravely, but he caught Ellamir's eye and winked. A small, grateful smile touched her lips.
Hoping to change the mood of the crowd, Larson rose to his feet and lifted high a mug of meekulbrau. He then drained the bitter brew without coming up for air.
'Feeshka!' he shouted, and tossed the empty mug to a burly, sandy-whiskered balalaika player. The man caught the mug, accepting the challenge with a grin. In the language of Kartakass, 'feeshka' meant 'little lies', and these tall tales were a passion in this land of long winters and dreaded nights.
As the evening wore on, many mugs were drained and tossed as the bards strove to outdo each other in absurd storytelling. Larson was delighting the crowd with a ribald story of elves and satyrs when he saw Quintish rise abruptly. With quick, fevered movements the older man made his way toward the back door, and then out into the night.
Larson improvised a quick ending to this tale, then he slipped away to follow the bard. The courtyard was brightly lit, but Quintish was not to be seen. The only sign that the bard had passed through was the sharp staccato of boots on cobblestone. The sound was fading away quickly.
For a moment Larson paused, uncertain what to do. Calling for help would be effort wasted, for few Kartakans would venture outside during the night. Yet he could not let the bard wander alone. Taking a deep breath, Larson sprinted off in pursuit.
The city walls shrouded the streets in shadow. A scant half-moon had crested the mountains, but it cast little light. Larson ran as fast as he dared through the dark streets. Once, he stumbled over something he sincerely hoped was a night-prowling cat. Then the sound of Quintish's footsteps stopped, and the city was eerily silent. Larson was beginning to despair when he heard the shriek of wood against wood. He raced down an alley toward the sound.
There was Quintish, heaving at a thick board barring a door in the city wall. Before Larson could reach the bard, the door gave way and Quintish was off. He hurried through the field, as unerring and unwitting of his surroundings as a sleepwalker.
A distant howl sliced through the night, and again Larson hesitated. He remembered the Vistana camp that lay nearby. For some reason, wolves seemed to avoid gypsies. Armed with that scant assurance, Larson followed the older bard through the field and into the forest.
Quintish came to rest in a clearing, a place of quiet and unearthly beauty. Faint moonlight played on the ripples of a small stream, and moss formed an inviting, velvety cushion along the banks. Larson crouched behind a copse of trees some hundred paces away, waiting to see what had lifted the master bard from his strange lethargy.
A dark-haired woman stepped lightly into the clearing. She was a compelling beauty with an oddly familiar face. Recognition hit Larson like a fist, and he sucked in a quick, startled breath. It was the woman in the locket, the long-dead Vistana whom Quintish mourned!
Larson watched, barely breathing, as Quintish buried his hands in the rippling mass of the woman's hair and drew her close. She pulled playfully free of the bard's embrace and leapt onto a rock in the middle of the stream. There she seated herself, arranging her skirts seductively as she spoke words that Larson could not hear.
Quintish began to sing, and his celebrated bass voice lifted in a wrenching declaration of love that seemed torn from the fabric of his soul. Larson listened with awe and longing. Only once before had he heard such a fevered, passionate song. It ended far too soon. The raven-haired beauty leaned toward her bard, offering a kiss in reward for the tribute.
A cloud passed over the moon, casting the clearing into darkness and granting the lovers a moment's privacy. When the cloud passed, the woman was gone.
Quintish lay face down in the stream.
Larson leapt up and ran into the clearing. He dragged the bard onto the mossy bank and turned him onto his back. A silver chain caught the moonlight as it slid from the master bard's limp fingers. Larson picked up the locket and absently thrust it into his own pocket. He bent down and put his ear to Quintish's chest. The bard's breathing was shallow, his heartbeat weak and slow. Larson shouldered the older man and half-ran, half-staggered back toward Skald. Urgency quickened his steps: he had come too far to lose Quintish now!
It took all Larson's eloquence to persuade the owner of the Fireside Feeshka to open the door for them. Once they were inside, the village meistersinger took over. He had Quintish carried to his room, and the inn's herbalist roused from slumber. Many suspicious glances were sent Larson's way, but he answered questions with a frank, open manner. He told them that he'd been distressed by the bard's confused state of mind and unwilling to let him wander alone in the night. He described the gypsy woman, but out of respect for Quintish he omitted the tale of a long-lost love. When all the questioners were satisfied, Larson hurried upstairs and took up a vigil outside the master bard's door.
It was there that Ellamir found him. She had listened to Larson's story with a growing sense of dread. Quintish had once shown her a picture of his long-dead wife, and the Vistana woman Larson described sounded far too much like Natalia for Ellamir's peace of mind. The words of her own song haunted her, and she felt as guilty as if she had summoned —
'A Lhiannan shee,' she breathed.
Ellamir shook her head in self-recrimination. Why had she not seen it sooner? It would explain the strange malady that had stolen Quintish's songs and drained him of life. Sometimes called the Ghost of Obsession, a Lhiannan shee was an undead vampiric spirit that feasted upon living bards. The creature could appear in any form that might appeal to its chosen victim, usually that of a beautiful woman or half-elf. Once enspelled, a bard could think of nothing but his nightly meetings with his love. An enthralled bard willingly, eagerly gave up his essence to the seductive creature, one kiss at a time.
A door creaked, and the herbalist stalked into the hall. Larson rushed forward and demanded news of the bard.
'Dead,' the herbalist muttered as he brushed past Larson. 'Poisoned.'
