Shandril's feet slid again in slithering coins. She caught her balance with a painful wrench and leaped onto rocks. The silent winking of the beljurils grew ahead of her as she neared a wall. Behind her there was another flash and the metallic clinking sound of running feet on the heaped coins.
But the feet did not sound as if they were following her.
Shandril gasped for breath as she climbed rocks with bruising speed. Light sprang into being again, and she dove forward into a cleft between two boulders. The dracolich roared again.
And I haven't even a blade! Shandril thought, rolling to her feet, banging knees and elbows in the process. She peered back across the cavern at the battle.
Symgharyl Maruel stood upon a high rock, hands moving-but she was not spellcasting. Rather, she was slapping at something very small. Insects!
The slim and beautiful newcomer in robes was casting a spell, facing the dracolich across the grotto. Knee- deep in coins at the dracolich's feet stood the man in armor, chopping and slicing at the skeletal form that towered over him. Another warrior was racing down the slope to join him. An elf! This one, too, bore a glowing blade. The blade's radiance was briefly overwhelmed by a roaring blast of flames from the dracolich's bony maw.
Rauglothgor turned his head toward Shandril as he rose up from a gout of flames he'd launched at the warriors. Shandril turned in panic and scrambled up the cavern wall, praying that the dracolich would not overwhelm her.
'Lady!' came that voice again. The young man was still pursuing her, but she dared not stop. She clambered up over rocks and loose rubble. The dracolich, Symgharyl Maruel, and these powerful newcomers all stood between her and escape, she decided, and she doubted if the gods cared enough about Shandril Shessair to save her. Better to flee while they were busy slaying each other!
The flickering glow of another burst of flame reflected off the rocks before her. Shandril heard a man roar in pain as the fire died away. Behind her, much closer than she expected, she could hear the young man chanting rapidly. Was he trying to trap her with a spell, too? She scrambled away.
Suddenly, she slipped and fell hard, knocking the wind from her lungs. The favored of Tymora, as usual, she thought, gasping for air.
Shandril looked up in time to see the young man who'd been pursuing her land softly at her side. She jumped to her feet to run away, raising an arm to fend off attack.
Narm grabbed her hand and pulled her back down. 'Lady!' he panted. 'Keep down. The sorceress…'
Abruptly, there was a flash and a deep, rolling explosion, and small stones clattered and fell about them.
'She is free of the insects!' the young man gasped, looking around them frantically. 'Oh, gods!' he cursed.
Shandril followed his gaze up the purple-robed form of Symgharyl Maruel, who appeared before them with a triumphant smile.
But the smile was knocked from her face as a slim, dark figure leaped at the sorceress, somersaulting in the air. The figure's feet struck The Shadowsil with bruising force in the shoulder and flank. The two figures hurtled clean out of view behind rocks.
'Well met, witch!' a merry voice said from behind the rocks. 'I am Torm, and these are my feet!'
Back down below, however, Rauglothgor hissed and roared, and Shandril saw its great bony form twisting and rearing. Next to her, the handsome young man chanted, 'By grasshopper leg and will gathered deep. Let my art make this one'-he touched Shandril's knee-'leap!' He thrust something small into her hand. 'Lady,' he hissed, 'break this, turn, and leap up there. The sorceress!'
Shandril, goaded into fearful scrambling, fumbled with the wisp, broke it, and jumped. The art took her high and far in one mighty bound. She landed on a ledge in the heights of the cavern. Behind her she heard The Shadowsil chant high and shrill, and then there was a flash. Shandril landed lightly on tumbled rocks. Whatever art the sorceress had hurled had missed her.
Shandril glanced down-and met Symgharyl Maruel's glittering, angry eyes. She was casting yet another spell, arms moving in fluid motions. Again the acrobatic figure in dusty gray sprang at her from the side. But The Shadowsil crouched at the last second, turned with a laugh of triumph, and hurled the spell meant for Shandril at the somersaulting Torm. But from his hands flashed two daggers, blades spinning end over end through the air.
Shandril turned and ran on without waiting to see who would die. A dull, rolling boom sounded from far behind her, and stones shook beneath her feet. The floor of the cavern, rising still, was scattered with riches. The faces of long-dead kings carved from cold white ivory stared at her as she pushed past, shuddering at the thought of how large the beasts who yielded those tusks must have been.
Shandril was feeling her way past a curtain of strung amber, the toothed ceiling of the cavern low overhead, when there was yet another mighty blast behind her. Dust swirled as small pieces of rock rained down around her. Shandril heard the hasty, sliding steps of someone running across loose rocks and coins behind her. She hurried on, stumbling for the hundredth time, hands outstretched to break her fall. The steps behind grew closer.
'Damnation!' she cursed aloud. 'I can't keep running anymore. When will this nightmare end?'
And the gods heard. There was an ear-splitting crash from the cavern behind her. Shandril was flung violently forward amid a helter-skelter of rocks, coins, gems, gold chains, and choking dust. Over the din, the thief of Deepingdale heard the dracolich Rauglothgor give an anguished, bellowing roar that rose and fell, then died away in hollow echoes.
Then came three short, sharp explosions. Shandril screamed and held her ears. The deep rolling did not die away, but seemed to be coming from all sides. Small rocks struck her like stinging rain. Then loud booms sounded again, and larger slabs and pillars of rock broke free and fell. Refusing to be entombed alive, Shandril crawled desperately on into the darkness. She heard faint, despairing shouts far behind in the dark, but the words dissolved in the never-ending echoes.
When chaos finally died into stillness, Shandril was alone in the drifting dust. Her ragged breathing was deafening in the sudden silence. She lay still, aching from bruises and scrapes, covered by sweat and dust and small stones.
Suddenly, she noticed a pale glow from the rubble below. Shandril stared at it as her eyes slowly adjusted to the gloom. The glow came from a sphere of crystal. Its curves were glossy-smooth, and it was a little larger than a man's head. The steady white radiance came from within it, and by its light Shandril could see that it lay among a pile of treasures.
She picked her way to the sphere. When she nudged it cautiously with a toe, the glow did not flicker. She watched it for a time, waiting for any change, peering closely to see if anything might be hidden beneath it. Finally, she reached down and touched it. She ran her hand lightly over the cold smooth surface, then stepped hastily back, eyeing the sphere narrowly. But nothing flickered, nothing changed. Shandril crouched down and gently lifted the sphere. It was light, and yet somehow unbalanced, as though something were moving inside. But she couldn't feel, hear, or see anything inside.
Holding the sphere up like a lamp, Shandril looked around. The jagged ceiling of the cavern hung close overhead, stretching away perhaps twenty paces, to meet the broken and rubble-strewn stone floor. She swung around slowly, gold coins and other treasures winking as the radiance met them. She was at a dead end. The roof of the cavern had fallen in, and she was trapped, far underground!
Panicking, Shandril scrambled forward. There must be a way out! The whole wide cavern can't have been blocked, just like that' 'Oh, please, Tymora, whatever has gone before, smile upon me now!'
And then the light she bore fell upon an outflung arm.
The young man who had been chasing her across the cavern earlier lay face-down, silent and unmoving. A pile of stones half-buried his legs. Shandril stared down at him for a moment and then knelt carefully amid the rubble and gently brushed the hair from his face.
His eyes were closed, his mouth slack. She knew him now. He was the man whose eyes she'd met across the taproom of The Rising Moon, the same man who'd defiantly hurled magic at Symgharyl Maruel before the gate in Myth Drannor.
He was handsome, this man. And he had tried more than once to help her. Abruptly, he moved slightly. Before she knew it, she had set the globe down and was carefully lifting and cradling his head.
He stirred and worked his jaw. Pain and concern lined his face, and he spoke suddenly. 'More devils! Is
