of death. The work of the ruthless foe, a shapeshifter who could drink in and use the powers of his victims. A shapeshifter who was beginning to seem unstoppable. There were days of work, here, just to-
With a sharp clack, a stone struck the tiles behind her and rolled away. Storm whirled around, looked up, and had a brief glimpse of a smiling mouth and a cluster of three watching eyes, all on their own tentacles. The mouth spat fire.
Storm dodged aside and pulled back her blade to save it from being destroyed. She called up silver fire to cloak her. The stones by her boots melted away, smoking, as the gout of flames struck them. Dragonfire! Where by the names of all the gods had he found a red dragon to subsume? This was starting to seem a proper nightmare!
The groaning behind and above warned her. Storm launched herself into a frantic headlong dive. She bounced and skidded painfully on stony rubble before rolling up and launching herself into another desperate dive. With ponderous, deadly momentum, the entire wall behind her broke loose and fell, crashing down in a mighty, ground- shaking river of shattered stone.
Cold laughter rolled around her as Storm struck the floor again and slid to collide with the staring corpse of a Purple Dragon. There was dust on his eyeballs, and his hands were frozen into claws, reaching vainly for his sword. Storm snatched it up. With steel in both hands, she looked up at the foe, a snarl curling her lips.
A row of bobbing mouths laughed at her in chorus. 'Such defiance, little kitten!' one of them boomed cheerfully. The one next to it added with cold spite, 'Do you know any other games, little trollop? I've seen running rabbits that were more amusing!'
Storm thought she recognized the voice of Pheirauze Summerstar in that last remark. She glanced quickly behind her and then all around to be sure no sneak attack was snaking up to lash at her while the mouths taunted.
The next moment, the smiling face of Maxer appeared at the edge of the room above, across from the mouths. It looked down at her. As hard as she could, she threw her newfound blade up at the face-just as the attack it had come to watch bore fruit.
The air shattered into four rushing balls of flame that snarled into bright existence on all sides of her. Storm closed her eyes.
A moment later, the world went up with a roar.
Standing hunched, Storm felt the tatters she wore seared away from her, and whipped around her body in the blast of ravening fire. Her sword melted away and her hair lashed her face in a wild tangle as it sizzled and stank. A soothing coolness flowed through her. The powers laid on her long ago sucked the fiery assault into her and twisted it into beneficial energy. As it surged, she was healed and renewed. All weariness and discomfort washed away. Every dazed corner of her mind was relit. Still the energy came on.
She let it swirl around the forearm of her empty hand, and gathered the divine fire of Mystra. She called up that silver fire from within her and from around the keep, into something that snarled and thrummed in her with a fury all its own.
The fire raging around her abruptly faded away. Storm knew the foe would be looking down to see what his meteor swarm had wrought, unaware that it was one of the spells that could not harm her. She did not waste time looking up or pointing her arm grandly, but simply hurled the bolt of silver fire up where the false face of Maxer had been.
A tortured chorus of agonized screams was her reward. The row of mouths pitched and trembled in pain. Something black and shriveled trailed smoke as it staggered away. The silver fire had bored through it, the ceiling beyond, and the two floors above that one, to where the faint rosy fingers of approaching morning touched the sky.
Storm smiled tightly and ran from the scorched spot where she stood to a stairway that was still standing.
She was only just in time. Another burst of flame shattered the ceilings above where she'd been, hurling a ton of stone down onto the scorched floor-and through it. The floors collapsed into the cellars below and shook the stair she was racing up.
Glass shattered somewhere nearby. There were other, lesser crashes as shaken furniture pitched through holes in walls or floors, and tumbled down to crashing destruction.
As the echoes died away, Storm reached the next floor and raced through a scene of devastation. There were gaping holes and tumbled walls everywhere around her. She was seeking the tentacles that led to those mouths, hoping to get to them before they could wriggle away or be retracted. . and to get to the foe at their far ends.
'Maxer?' she called in loud challenge, eyes flashing as she sought those tentacles. 'Afraid to face me?'
Her answer came from a jagged hole in the ceiling. Jaws appeared, and then dragonfire. The stream went on and on, fanning across stone and fallen timbers as it sought her life.
Red ravening flames struck her. Storm staggered under their weight, planted her feet, and called on the silver fire again. Its shining stream split the roaring red flames asunder. With a savage smile, she turned her own fire up at the ceiling, seeking to strike through it at the unseen body of the foe above.
Stone, plaster, and wood collapsed amid the roiling flames and crashed heavily to the floor. Tiles buckled, spilling the debris down through it to the level below.
The dragonfire suddenly ceased. The jaws that had spouted it were gone.
Storm frowned, held back her outpouring of silver fire, and broke into a run, getting away from where she'd stood before the foe could trigger another ceiling collapse. She'd taken a bare dozen running steps when the floor heaved so hard it threw her to her knees. A deafening crash set her ears ringing. She was plucked up and flung on by tumbling timbers.
From the corner of her eye, she glimpsed the ponderous plunge of an entire turret, arched windows and all, down from above, through the floor where she'd been-and on, on down through all the levels below.
Storm struck a pillar, ribs shattering like dry twigs. She spun around it with the force of her tumbling flight, and fell to a now-tilting floor, roaring out her pain like any dismayed warrior. She was still skidding to a dusty stop when a sudden thought made her chuckle.
'Apt name-Firefall Keep.'
As the thunder of rolling stone died away, the tatter-clad bard lay still and turned the energy inside her to healing. One bloody end of a rib was protruding from her flank; Storm frowned down at it and then grasped it, set her teeth, and pulled it forth. Warm blood drenched her fingers and she shuddered, let silver fire burn both gore and bone fragment away to nothing, and held her hand to her side.
'About now,' she muttered, 'he'll see the morning sun and remember there's a kingdom out there he could be despoiling-and it'll be 'rend the annoying barrier' time again.'
She laid her sword across her knees, made herself as comfortable as she could, and closed her eyes, letting the web of silver fire tell her where things were. The morning sun fell through the shattered ruins of the keep and laid bright fingers of sunlight across her cheek. The warmth made Storm almost purr with pleasure-an instant before the stabbing spells and mind-thrusts at her barrier began. Then her gasps became loud and quick and urgent. She rolled around on the stones, clutching her half-healed gut and wondering if she could hold him back this time.
'Mother Mystra,' she hissed, 'be with me now!'
There was no answer. . Slowly, very slowly, the floor beneath her started to tremble.
The sun on his cheek was bright and warm. Broglan Sarmyn, war wizard of Cormyr, blinked at it. He slowly became aware that he was lying on sharp stones, in stillness. The only sounds he could hear were some tentative bird calls, though he dimly recalled the rubble beneath him shaking as sounds like thunder rolled and crashed all around, not long ago … or perhaps it had been a dream.
His last clear memory was a blinding flash from the floating black eye, as it shuddered and blinked at him almost beseechingly. That had come soon after the scepter-and where had it come from, anyway? — had disappeared. Now the eye was gone, probably consumed in that flash of energy, and he was lying in the rubble alone. Ah, well, even among wizards, the gods rarely grant the sight and wits to know what's going on.
Speaking of stumbling… Cautiously he got up, testing his aching body. Bruises everywhere, some very painful, but it seemed that Broglan Sarmyn was whole and could walk unhampered. It seemed he would have another chance to walk straight into his own waiting grave.
