Sandstorm

He could use this mirror-he had used it-to spy out the secrets of the most powerful beings in Faerun. Now he breathed magic onto the scratched silver surface of the mirror and whispered syllables of power. “Where are you, Corvus?” he asked.

“Right here, Your Grace,” said the kenku from behind him.

The WeavePasha did not turn around. Instead, he found a pen, dipped it in a pool of gelid ink spreading from an overturned pot, and made a note to himself on the closest scroll. Self, dead apprentice, granddaughter, and kenku, he wrote. Aloud, he said, “Do you know, Corvus, that I believe you’re a sort of lodestone for hubris in the mighty? Where intemperate pride is at its greatest, well, there you are. Or rather, here you are.”

“An interesting theory, WeavePasha, but I have never been to Waterdeep.”

There was an unusual strained tone in the kenku’s mellifluous voice, and the WeavePasha turned, asking, “How about Calimport?”

He saw that Corvus bled freely down one leg, leaning on the grim-faced halfling adept, Shan. The spymaster said, “No need, Your Grace. Calimport has come to me.”

Cynda gave the kitchener’s apprentice a disapproving look and swung a sloshing pail back up onto the cart, using one knee to buck the heavy container over the sideboard.

“Please, mistress,” the disheartened boy said. “That is very valuable wine, a vintage of your own kin in the Purple Hills. The cost of what you spilled there would pay my wages for a year.”

Tobin reassured the apprentice. “It would have all been gone if we took it to Trill, now wouldn’t it? The WeavePasha is too generous. This brace of sheep is more than enough, and more like the simple fare she is used to. Though we are grateful for it all, to be sure.”

The boy still looked doubtful. “The mutton is no simple fare, sir. The spices and herbs the chef used in their preparation are very fine. Their flavors guided my choice of wine. Are you sure the dragon would not like just two or three of these casks?”

Cynda gave him a firm shake of her head. She spelled out a word in the sisters’ fingertalk.

“Nonthal?” said Tobin aloud. “That is a town-”

“In Turmish, yes!” the apprentice said. “They have a wonderful varietal of ruby that would go very nicely with the mutton. Is that the problem? I have plenty of it laid in.”

But Tobin recalled why Cynda had thought of the town. “Young fellow,” he said, “I am sure you are right about the wines. But you are wrong about Trill. She is a wyvern, not a dragon. And should you ever find yourself in Nonthal, there are many there who can explain why wyverns should never be given wine.”

With that, Cynda completed her culling of Trill’s midday meal and indicated that Tobin should shoulder the pair of dressed and roasted whole sheep.

Tobin could never have found his way back to the straw-filled fountain where Mattias waited with the impatient Trill, but Cynda did not hesitate as they walked the branching paths of the artificial woodland. He told this to Cynda, and she smiled, acknowledging his compliment, but also tapped her ears and pointed to his.

Tobin said, “Well, yes, I suppose that I would not have been lost forever. She does make quite a racket when she’s waiting for her food, doesn’t she? And, of course, if I took too long, she would have come to find me.”

A voice said, “You’ll not be easily found where you’re going, goliath.” Another voice sounded at the same time, muttering words beneath the first.

Tobin was counted fast among goliaths, but Cynda was counted fast among the swiftest fighters of the South. By the time he dropped the sheep and brought up his huge fists, she had launched four silvered darts and leaped into a tumbling charge after them.

The darts struck a transparent barrier, which flashed red long enough for Tobin to see its domed shape and realize that he and Cynda were trapped. Cynda stopped her headlong spring just short of the invisible wall, crouching low, next to where her darts lay in the gravel. A smell of sulfur filled the air, paired with a thin line of smoke trailing from the spot where the four darts had struck.

“That wasn’t supposed to happen,” said the firesouled Akanulan Flamburnt, who stood beside his fellow Firestormer. “There must be something unusual about those darts. No matter, they did not get through.” He paused and glared up at Lavacre, who stared at the wisp of smoke and absently rubbed his throat. When Flamburnt struck him in the side, he remembered himself and hastily muttered in the language of fire.

Cynda ignored both men. She took up a handful of gravel and tossed one stone at a time against the barrier, working her way around Tobin. She held her short sword drawn in one hand.

“Testing the strength of my spell, halfling?” Flamburnt asked. “Finding the limits of your cell? Don’t worry, you won’t be in there much longer.”

Tobin asked, “What are you doing, Flamburnt? We are guests of the same host. We have not raised our hands against you.”

Cynda suddenly leaped back against Tobin’s legs, holding her sword before her. She kicked up more gravel, and Tobin saw that it now fell much closer to them than it had just a moment before. Already, Cynda’s darts lay outside the shrinking barrier.

“It looks as though the magic Shahrokh gifted me will not last long, clown,” said Flamburnt. “If your friends are wise, they will forget you. But since you have all bound yourself to Ariella, then they are all certainly fools. They will seek to rescue you. This, as the djinn say, is known.

“And since there is the barest possibility that you will see the windsouled bitch again before you die, I bid you tell her this. We may be among the lowest ranked at the Motherhouse of the Firestorm Cabal in Akanul. But we are ranked among the highest at the Sacred Hunter’s Lodge in Memnon.”

Tobin began to reply but found he could not draw breath to speak. There was no more air in the shrinking dome, as the interior whirled with black and red waves of fiery magic. He crouched, bent over Cynda, and pulled her close.

And then he knew no more.

The WeavePasha used tongs to pull out the filthy rags the kenku had stuffed into the wound on his thigh, laying them in a tray to one side. The tray had held a collection of glowing rings a moment before, but the wizard had casually spilled them onto the floor when he cleared the table where Corvus lay.

The old man sniffed. “Is that … orvas? Gods above, Corvus, you have to stop reading old books. I have forbidden even the ingredients of this vile concoction from the city, so I know it came from your blade, not this trash you used for bandages.”

Corvus hissed in pain when the WeavePasha plucked a bloodstained feather from his leg. “It affects only mammals, Your Grace,” he said. “The more common blade oils are less finely formulated. And I would lie here poisoned by my own sword but for my old books and their secrets.”

The WeavePasha took a clay vial from a rack, removed its cork stopper, and peered at the contents. A doubtful expression crossed his features before he shrugged and turned the vial upside down over Corvus’s leg. Yellow steam boiled from the wound, and Corvus would have fallen from the table as he convulsed had Shan not rushed to hold him.

“Whatever poison was borne in the mud and garbage of the alley has sickened you well enough. That tincture will boil it out of your blood, though.”

Corvus snapped his beak open and closed several times. “The choice was between possible infection and certain blood loss. I judged that Shan would find her way over the wall in time to deal with the first, but not the second. And as I was blinded by the djinni’s spells, I could not see what I was using to staunch the flow.”

The WeavePasha frowned. “Yes, that’s the most troubling aspect of this business. He spoke the truth about only being present by semblance. If a magician of his power had appeared in Almraiven, I would not have been the only one to sense it. As I should have sensed his spellwork this close to the palace. The djinni is digging deep in his stores of knowledge and making use of ancient items of power. He has to be. The question is why. If they’ve discovered my plans for Cephas, there was no need for such a display.”

Shan passed her dancing fingers before Corvus’s eyes. “Your Grace,” he said, “Shan asks about the vizar’s threat concerning a goliath and a halfling.”

The WeavePasha waved dismissively. “I would know if any dislocative sorceries were attempted against my defenses. Be at ease, adept. My wards are not so easily defeated coming in as you found them to be going