ye stood so much pain and stuck to thy task.'
He chuckled. 'I also find it hard to be displeased that thy task was to make me whole.'
The Magister laughed then, a little unsteadily, and said, 'I don't know if I'm strong enough, after this, to go chasing Manshoon.'
Elminster shook his head. 'Don't waste thy Art. Ye are so much better at healing and aiding, Noumea. Healers and helpers of power are so much rarer, in this and other worlds, than those who can rage and slay and lay waste with little effort. Manshoon will spend time now fending off rivals in his own Brotherhood who'll see his weakness as a chance to destroy or supplant him. Yet if ye go into Zhentil Keep after him, they'll all strike at thee for the glory and the power they'd hope to win. The Realms have only one of thee, but they seems to have an endless supply of evil, power-hungry magelings. Don't throw all away fighting them, for ye'd surely go down in the end.'
Noumea bowed her head. 'You're right, I suppose. I have little love for war, and less skill at it.' Sharantyr saw the movement; sight was coming slowly back to her.
'So I've noticed, a time or two,' Elminster said dryly.
Noumea looked up at him quickly through wildly disarranged hair, anguish in her eyes. 'Have I made many mistakes, Old Mage? Should I know better how to deal with this wild magic? Am I worthy to serve Our Lady at all?'
'Ye have done well-better than almost all of thy predecessors I have known. The Art needs thy caring, not brilliance of invention at spellcraft, or a lot of cold-hearted scheming and vain, spectacular spellcasting,' Elminster replied gravely. 'Ye continue to surprise and please us, Lady Magister. Ye cannot help who ye are, and ye have dealt well with what ye now are. Don't try to change thyself. It never works, and will make thee as unhappy as those ye mistreat in the trying.'
Noumea beamed at him, damp-eyed but radiant. Then she sighed and said, 'I must go, Elminster. There is so much to do. Art everywhere is awry. Without Mystra, all is in chaos. Hurry and give her power back to her, Old Mage.'
'There is still a Mystra? Ye have spoken with her, then? Why has she not taken it, if she wants it?' Elminster asked sharply.
The Magister looked at him, her gentle face suddenly terrible in its fear. 'I fear she cannot. She dare not speak to thee, for fear something will reach through her to snatch at the power you hold.' She walked across the chamber, searching for something, and seemed to find it.
Stopping, she looked up at him through her long hair and said urgently, 'Be very careful, Old Mage. Our Lady depends on you, and I cannot stay to guard you.'
Elminster chuckled. 'So ladies always seem to say to me, just when I'm hoping they'll stay for a time. Go with my good wishes, Lady Magister.'
Noumea gave him an unsteady smile, stepped onto a stone that held a deep-graven rune, and vanished.
Elminster stared at where she'd been for a long time. Then he turned, looking old again, and walked across the floor to where Saharel had stood. He bent down in the darkness, and when he straightened again there was a pitiful, crumbling, charred skull in his hand.
The Old Mage looked at it, shook his head slightly, kissed it, and tucked it into his robe. Then he came back to Sharantyr. As he extended a hand to help her up, he managed a smile, but it faded quickly, leaving a face haunted by old memories and weariness.
'Old Mage?' she asked. 'What now?'
'I know not,' Elminster told her. 'Where to run that other mages cannot follow? And who knows where the fallen gods may lurk in the Realms? If I meet with one, I cannot hope to survive any disagreement that may befall, and risk losing Mystra's power to the grasp of another. That, in turn, must not occur if the Realms as we know them are to weather this great storm.'
He spread weary, empty hands, then suddenly brightened and hurried over to the rune Noumea had found.
'Hah!' he said happily, and Sharantyr's heart leapt. He was confident again, and she felt safe once more.
'We can use this,' Elminster said in satisfaction. 'Rouse the two snoring beauties, will ye?'
Sharantyr chuckled, shook her head, and went over to the still forms of the Harpers.
Storm drew in a deep breath, let it out slowly, and smiled.
'Well?' Jhessail and Lhaeo asked together, across the table. 'What happened?'
The bard closed her eyes, still smiling, and said, 'Manshoon died. Elminster lives.'
'Manshoon destroyed? Elminster's work?'
Storm shook her head. 'He died, but he has worked at dark Art hidden since Netheril fell, and has other bodies to flee to. The Old Mage was there, but the magic that slew Manshoon was not his.'
The bard trembled with weariness, and Jhessail laid a warning hand on Lhaeo's shoulder. They exchanged glances, saw Storm hide a yawn, and fell silent.
In the kitchen of that farmhouse in Shadowdale, time passed in slow silence. Storm's eyes fluttered and then closed, and her head sank lower. Careful, quiet hands moved her mug out of harm's way. The bard did not notice.
Jhessail and Lhaeo put their arms around each other and sat in companionable silence. Slowly, before their eyes, it happened. Still smiling, Storm Silverhand laid her head on her hands and slept.
'Draw thy daggers,' Elminster said gruffly. 'Ye seem to feel better when ye have some piece of sharp steel in hand. And my first thoughts, as always,' he added, irony heavy in his tone, 'are for thy comfort, ye three.'
The Old Mage watched steel flash out in answer, then nodded, turned, and said, 'Follow.'
He stepped onto the rune and was gone.
Sharantyr sighed, hefted the knife-what good would this little fang do? — in her hand, and followed.
Abruptly she was elsewhere. Behind her, she heard Itharr exclaim in surprise.
All around them was darkness-a deep, chiming void of blackness lit only by faintly glowing purple mists and by drifting, winking lights. The mist curled lazily about, and there was no horizon or boundary or anything solid to be seen, only endless darkness. They stood on nothing, hanging in emptiness.
'Old Mage,' Sharantyr asked fearfully, 'what is this place?'
A little way distant stood Elminster. He had grown somehow taller and stood outlined with a blue-white aura.
He turned and smiled at them reassuringly. 'This is called by some the Flame Void. It is a strange place, not quite out of the Realms yet not in Faerun-at least, not in the Faerun that most folk can see and reach. Take a good look about at all this nothing. 'Tis probably the only time ye'll ever see it.' He looked past her at the two Harpers, nodded reassurance to them, and said to them all, 'Come.'
Then he turned and walked confidently away, treading on nothing.
'Where are we going?' the lady ranger said, hurrying to catch up with the Old Mage. Though she still felt nothing under her boots, and a sharp, falling feeling seemed alive in her stomach, she could move merely by thinking of moving in a direction.
'To a place I know,' Elminster said, 'where Lady Mystra often leaves messages, or things, for me. It is my hope that she can feel my arrival and respond.'
'Oh,' Sharantyr replied, not much enlightened and showing it in her tone. Elminster said no more, and she fell into step beside him. The two Harpers caught up to flank them, and all four went on together.
They walked for a long time, and Sharantyr began to notice things around them that had escaped her before. Flitting shadows swirled half-seen in the mists, like living things-they probably were alive, she realized with a faint, crawling fear-and weird lights danced and glimmered in the distance.
She exchanged glances with the two young men who strode with them, and saw in their eyes the same fear and wonder that she knew shone in her own.
'Elminster,' Belkram asked after a while, 'is your magic back?'
The Old Mage simply looked at him in reply.
Belkram frowned. 'Then how is it you brought us all here?'
