Shadow Prowler

“Marvelous,” I responded with no great enthusiasm.

Stay well away from those who work magic—that’s always been one of my many mottoes.

“We have to harmonize it with you. Everything is ready. Here, hold it.” Miralissa handed the artifact to me again, ignoring my sour grimace.

With or without my consent the elves intended to indulge in a little shamanism, and there was no point in getting uppity, or they might get some word confused and I’d be left wearing horns on my head for the rest of my life, or something even worse.

“Sit down on the bed.” Egrassa lit another candle, but he stood it in the headboard of the bed instead of on the table. “Milord Alistan, if you would be so kind, please leave us while the ritual is taking place.”

The count left the room without the slightest objection, closing the door firmly behind him.

“What are you waiting for, Harold? Sit on the bed!” said the elfess, taking some bundles of dried herbs out of her traveling bag. I was on the bed, sitting before I could think. There was real iron in that voice.

A sweetish scent of bog flowers and late autumn drifted through the room. I sat down and Miralissa came up to me with a cup in her hand. She dipped one finger in it and then drew some signs on my forehead and cheeks. At her touch, a light current went through my body starting at my face and quickly sparking down to my toes. It was a madly pleasant sensation. Ell was already standing over one of the candles, whispering and tossing dust up into the air. It looked to me like some kind of powdered herb.

Somehow the dust seemed to fall very slowly, touching the flame of the candle, giving off a thin streamer of white smoke and disappearing. So this was the shamanism of the dark elves. Long whisperings, dances, signs, and all sorts of rubbish like dried bat dung. Yes, sometimes this art could do things that wizardry could never manage. The ancient magic, correctly performed, is far more powerful, but its cost . . .

A single mistake, a single mispronounced word, the absence of the most unnecessary-seeming ingredient— and nothing will happen. And the most important thing is the time required for working the shamanic magic. Time is invaluable, and the need for it puts the magic of the dark elves at a disadvantage compared with human wizardry.

Some elves understood this and became the light elves, but others, like the orcs, goblins, and ogres, do not wish to abandon their ancient knowledge and stubbornly continue to use this ineffective anachronism, as the magicians of the Order call it. But then, I’m certain that wizardry also has another, weak side to it, which the Order of Magicians, in its polite fashion, simply forgets to mention.

Meanwhile, Miralissa began singing. Her low, resonant voice began twining itself into the air, swirling through it in a taut spiral of words. Her singing was spellbinding. For all its native coarseness, the orcish language, or rather its elfish dialect (the elves thought of themselves as too proud to use the language of the orcs) was like a mountain stream. Its gurgling was very pleasant to listen to.

The elfess sang as she approached me, and I felt as if she and I were alone in the room with her voice. Egrassa and Ell had moved back and away, become just one of the many shadows hemming me in on all sides.

The voice, the shadows . . . And the eyes. Miralissa’s golden eyes, with tongues of amber flame flickering in them. They drew me in, leading me away to distant places and times. They filled the entire room. The signs she drew on my face began burning, and the key clenched in my fist was also getting warmer and warmer.

The walls of the room flared up in bright fire, trembled, collapsed outward, then began falling in blazing banners into endless darkness. I cried out, my feet searching hopelessly for support that was not there; I flung my arms out in a futile attempt to fly. The darkness burst into flame and the furious flames born in the darkness came rushing toward me from all sides, scorching my neck, my back, my shoulders. The unbearable heat licking at my body set my hair ablaze. The pain ran through me like a blunt knife. I don’t remember, I think I screamed, but then an ink-black shadow that had appeared out of nowhere in this hell of amber fire touched my back and pushed me forward. Into the yellow eyes, into that roaring heat.

A single instant.

Flight. Blindness. Silence.

Night.

21 THE KEY

I swear on the peak of Zam-da-Mort, may its snows never melt! Are you sure that on the way here, honorable sir, you didn’t fall into the old quarries? It’s dangerous around there now; the gnomes’ wits have completely deserted them and they throw the exhausted rock straight down on your head. You have to be careful not to get hit.”

The dark elf whom the old dwarf was addressing restrained himself with an effort. Probably only those well acquainted with this race could understand just how much of an effort this restraint required. Neither the dark nor the light elves, may a dragon’s flame devour them, were known for the mildness of their tempers, and they responded to any insult, real or imagined, by reaching for their weapons. But this representative of the forest folk remained calm. Who better to persuade a dwarf master craftsman to carry out a special commission than the eldest son of the House of the Black Flame?

Elodssa was not only a fine warrior (even his enemies, the orcs, accepted that he was), but also an excellent diplomat. And in addition, his knowledge of shamanism improved his chances of getting what the elves wanted from the dwarves, and the short people would never even suspect that they had been given a gentle nudge. But Elodssa was in no hurry to employ his secret knowledge. That was his last resort. For the time being he could restrict himself to normal negotiations.

“No, honorable Frahel, nothing fell on my head.”

“Oh really?” The old master craftsman seemed rather perturbed by this circumstance. “But then your race is a bit touched in the head without any help from stones.”

“Every race has its shortcomings.” The elf bared his fangs in an attempt to smile, although he really wanted to do something quite different: take the obstinate dwarf by the scruff of the neck and smack his head against the wall several times.