The other Jehan turned to the young mage and scowled, that serious scowl that Jehan used when listening to his master. 'Now that this is all taken care of, you'd best get home. I'll see to the disposal of the powder.'
The original Jehan shook his head. His voice cracked as he spoke: 'There is another one here, a giff. He has a pistol, as well.'
'That is true,' said Ladislau, standing by the barrel of smoke powder. The giff's face and topcoat were slick with black blood, and he had lost an eye to the bronzework deva. He aimed the gun at Jehan's duplicate.
'You saw what happened to your ally,' said the other Jehan. 'Do you think you can hurt me with mere bullets?'
The giff gave a bloody-mouthed smile and said, 'No, not with bullets.' He aimed the gun at the barrel of purified smoke powder. 'Not with bullets,' he repeated. 'But a single shot will blow us all to our respective afterlives.'
The other Jehan took a step forward and snapped his fingers. A single flame appeared and danced at the tip of his index finger. 'Run, boy,' he said to the battered, original version.
Jehan ran, making long, limping strides. As he cleared the door, he heard the giff shout, 'I'm not bluffing.'
The other Jehan replied coolly, 'Neither am I.'
Jehan made it ten, maybe eleven steps past the door when a huge hand grabbed him and pressed him flat against the ground. Then the thunder, this time like a thousand arquebuses firing at once, swept over him and pressed him farther against the cobblestones. Then the heat washed over him in a single blast, pushing past in its rush to escape the alley.
Jehan rose slowly and saw that the warehouse was in flames, the fire already licking up through the broken skylight and setting the roof ablaze. The single entrance was an inferno, and while the walls seemed to have resisted the blast, nothing could live within it.
The other Jehan stepped out through the doorway, unblemished by the explosion, and unsinged by the flames. He looked around, spotting the unsteady youth, and walked toward him. —
As he walked, the duplicate's features changed. He became taller, almost gangly, and his hair changed from Jehan's dark ponytail to an icy blond tint, worn short. Gerald, Anton's friend.
Then he changed again, the blond darkening to a night-black shade, worn free over the shoulders, the face aging and gaining a full beard, black with a white stripe in its center. The shoulders widened, and the wizard's stride became long and measured. Khelben Arunsun, the Black-staff of Waterdeep. The Old Spider.
'Are you all right, child?' asked the elder mage.
Jehan, propped against a wall, managed a weak nod. He noticed that no mind-killing lights danced at the older man's fingertips.
'Good,' said the wizard. 'Maskar takes a dim view when I get his apprentices damaged, and doubly so when they are his relatives. Of course, he's dismissed apprentices for much less serious crimes than this.'
Jehan's mouth finally found purchase. 'What…?' he said. 'What happened?'
Khelben's mouth formed a thin line. 'For what it's worth, you can tell your master that my original plan did not involve you. I had found this little bit of smoke powder, and put the sand in it, hoping to turn up the conspirators. Then as Gerald, I would hang out at the better taverns loudly declaring my anti-elder, pro-powder thoughts, waiting for someone to contact me to solve the little problem I had given them. I did not count on another young whelp making a better case than myself on the use of smoke powder. I did not even know you had been contacted until an abjuration I had placed here warned me that the powder had been purified. At that point, it seemed to make more sense to imitate your appearance, and throw the conspirators off-balance, should they have killed you. My 'Gerald' identity failed to impress them earlier, and I would set them to immediate flight in my natural form, the one you so aptly titled 'skunk-maned.''
The elder mage paused in his lecture, as if just remembering Jehan was still there, leaking his blood into the wall. He looked at his battered companion and added, 'So, child, you still think everyone in Waterdeep should have smoke powder?'
Jehan looked at the flaming wreckage of the warehouse. Already the locals had responded and were forming bucket brigades from nearby cisterns. Everyone was ignoring the two mages-more magic of the Old Spider, no doubt.
'I think,' Jehan started, too tired and battered to be properly respectful or afraid, 'I think you just can't blow up the future and hide in the past. Somewhere, someone is going to get past you, and you need to be ready for the day. You can't stop progress.'
That was when Khelben surprised the young mage. He laughed-a sharp, staccato chuckle. 'Ah, so at least we agree on something. You are right: we can't stop progress. Smoke powder, the printed word, new forms of magic- it's all coming. But we can slow it down from a run to a walk, so at least we can be ready for it. So we can be its master, instead of it being ours.'
Jehan groaned. 'You think the Old Rel… Maskar will dismiss me for this?'
Khelben nodded at the wreckage. 'Well, he no longer changes apprentices into newts for forgetting the lemon in his morning tea… but yes, this is pretty serious. I could put a good word in for you. Or perhaps…'
Jehan looked at Khelben, but his eyes refused to focus properly. 'Perhaps?' was the best the youth could manage.
'I could use another youth to scrub the pots, sweep the conjuring floor, and learn what snippets of magic I deign to teach. And an adventurous youth would be suitable, since I think my Gerald persona should leave town for a while.' The Old Spider chuckled again. 'And Maskar would be relieved of having to face your parents with your latest escapade.'
Jehan tried to smile, but the effort broke his last bit of willpower. He fell into soft, warm darkness.
The young mage awoke at home, the healer speaking to his parents in the next room in quiet, relaxed tones- the tones of one confident the patient will recover without further interference. Jehan's shoulder and leg were still sore, but it was the soreness of strained muscles and bruises as opposed to ripped and bloodied flesh.
His parents wavered between anger at him risking his life in some damned-fool adventure and pride in the impression he had apparently made on the great Black-staff, who had brought him home and spoken of his heroism. Even now, they said, Khelben was talking with Uncle Maskar about taking Jehan under his wing. Imagine, one of the Wands family learning from the Old Spider himself. But of course, regardless of the outcome, he should not have taken up with that sinister merchant in the first place.
His parents were still trying to determine if they were angry at Jehan or proud of him as he drifted back to sleep.
He awoke much later, having slept through the entire day. Beyond his open window, Waterdeep lay spread out before him with a thousand flickering lights, marching southward toward the sea.
Suddenly there was a series of bright flashes, down by the wharves. A moment passed, then another, then at last the staccato of small explosions reached his ears. Khelben probably had found the rest of the smoke powder stashes, Jehan thought. The ripple of thunder sounded like Khel-ben's chuckle.
Jehan sat there for a long time, looking out over the darkened city, but the effect did not repeat itself. The young mage wondered, Is Khelben rewarding me by making me his apprentice, or punishing me?
Or is he up to something else entirely?
Jehan was still trying to figure this out, the first of many puzzles Blackstaff would pose to him, when sleep finally reclaimed him.
THE MAGIC THIEF
I am penning this story as a warning, so that it will not happen to another as it happened to me. My first mistake upon meeting the thief was that I pitied him. But then I have always pitied his kind: those who have longed all their lives to become wizards but-by some cruel trick of birth or accident-are incapable of touching or shaping the ethereal substance of magic. How easy it was for me, so comfortable in my wizard's mantle of power, to feel pity
