«Where are the Elfstones?» she asked, moving the dagger blade tighter against the Elf’s throat.
Abruptly the tower bell sounded — once, twice; three times, then a fourth. Wisp let out a frightened moan and thrashed violently against Wil’s grip. The Valeman shook him angrily.
«What’s happening, Wisp? What is it?»
Wisp slumped down helplessly. «Morag comes,” he whimpered.
«Morag?» Wil felt a sudden sense of desperation. What brought Morag to her sister’s keep? He glanced quickly at the others, but the confusion in his eyes was mirrored in theirs.
«Wisp serves the Lady,” Wisp muttered and began to cry.
Wil looked about hurriedly. «We need something to bind his hands.»
Eretria loosened the long sash about her waist and used it to tie Wisp’s hands behind his back. Wil picked up the loose ends and wrapped them about one hand.
«Listen to me, Wisp.» He jerked the moaning Elf’s chin upright until their eyes met. «Listen to me!» Wisp listened. «I want you to take us to where the Lady Keeps the Elfstones. If you try to run or if you try to give any warning, you know what will happen to you, don’t you?»
He waited patiently until Wisp nodded. «Then do not be foolish enough to try. Just take us to the Elfstones.»
Wisp started to say something, but Eretria brought the dagger up at once. Meekly, the little fellow nodded one time more.
«Good for you, Wisp.» Wil released his chin. «Now let’s go.»
In a line, they started up the stairway, Wisp leading, Wil just a step behind, holding firmly onto the sash that bound Wisp’s arms, Eretria and Amberle trailing. Into the blackness they went, eyes peering blindly, hands groping to find the stone walls of the passage. For several moments they were in total blackness. Then a new light glimmered ahead, and the faint outline of the stairs reappeared from the dark. A globe similar to the one that had illuminated their cell came into view, and they passed beneath it. Ahead, others flickered through the gloom.
The climb wore on, the stairway spiraling a ward through the tower. From time to time they passed lack, empty passageways tunneling through the stone and isolated doors, closed and latched, but Wisp did not slow. The bells had gone still after the first sounding; the entire tower lay wrapped in silence. The musky smell of incense burned more strongly as they climbed, filling the stairwell with its pungent odor. It made the Valeman and the women groggy, and they tried not to breathe it. Wil began to grow suspicious as the minutes slipped away. Perhaps Wisp was smarter than he appeared.
But then they reached a landing and Wisp stopped. He pointed down a dimly lighted corridor that ran a short distance into the tower and ended at a massive, ironbound door. From beyond the door came the sound of voices.
Wil bent down hurriedly. «What is it, Wisp?»
The wizened face was furtive and beaded with sweat. «Morag,” Wisp whispered, then shook his head quickly. «Very bad. Very bad.»
Wil straightened. «Morag is not our concern. Where are the Elfstones?»
Wisp again pointed to the door. Wil hesitated, staring at him uncertainly. Was Wisp telling him the truth? Then Eretria knelt down next to the little fellow, her voice gentle this time, the dagger no longer in view.
«Wisp, are you certain?»
Wisp nodded. «Not lie, pretty one. Don’t hurt Wisp.»
«I do not want to hurt you,” she assured him, her eyes holding his. «But you serve the Lady, not us. Are we to believe what you say?»
«Wisp serves the Lady,” Wisp agreed rather weakly, then shook his head. «Wisp does not lie. Pretty stones there, across great hall, in small room at top of stairs, in box with pretty flowers; red and gold.»
Eretria stared at him a moment longer, then glanced at Wil and nodded. She believed him, she was saying. Wil nodded back.
«Is there any other way to get to the box?» Wil pressed the little Elf.
Wisp shook his head. «One door.» He pointed down the corridor.
Wil looked at him silently for a moment, then motioned for the others to follow. Quietly, he crept down the short passageway until he stood before the door. Beyond, voices rose, shrill and angry. Whatever was taking place in there, Wil wanted no part of it. He took a deep breath, then slowly, carefully released the latch that held the door before him and pulled. The door slipped open just a crack. The Valeman peered through.
Beyond was the hall where Mallenroh had seized them, massive and shadowed, illuminated faintly by a handful of the strange, smokeless lights that hung like spiders from an invisible ceiling. Immediately past the door, a landing swept downward m a series of half–circle steps to the floor of the hall. There hundreds of the stick men jammed tightly together, encircling two willowy black figures that faced each other at less than a dozen paces and shrieked as if they were cats at bay.
Wil Ohmsford stared. The Witch Sisters, Morag and Mallenroh, last of their Coven, bitter enemies through a centuries–old conflict forgotten by everyone but themselves, were identical twins. Black robes flung back from their tall figures, woven gray hair trailing nightshade, flawless white skin, ghostlike in the dark — they were mirror images. Both were exquisitely formed, both lithe and delicate. But at this moment their beauty was marred by the hatred that contorted their features and hardened their violet eyes. Their words reached out to the Valeman, softer now as the shrieking subsided, yet harsh and biting.
«My power is as strong as your own, Sister, and I fear nothing that you might do. You cannot even keep me from this dreary refuge of yours. We are as rock to stone, and neither one nor the other may prevail.» The speaker shook her head mockingly. «But you would change all that, Sister. You would seek to arm yourself with magic that does not belong to you. In so doing, you would bring an end to our shared dominion over these Hollows. Foolish, Sister. You can have no secrets from me. I know as soon as you what it is that you intend.» She paused. «And I know of the Elfstones.»
«You know nothing,” shrieked the other, whom Wil now saw to be Mallenroh. «Go from my home, Sister. Go while still you may or I will find a way to make you wish that you had.»
Morag laughed. «Be still, foolish one. You cannot frighten me. I will leave when I have what I came to get.»
«The Elfstones are mine!» Mallenroh snapped. «I have them and will hold onto them. The gift was meant for me.»
«Sister, no gift shall be yours if I do not wish it. Such power as the Elfstones offer must belong to her who is best suited to wield it. That one is me. It has always been me.»
«You have never been better suited to anything, Sister.» Mallenroh spat. «I have permitted you to share this valley with me because you were the last of my sisters, and I felt some pity for one as ugly and purposeless as yourself. Think on it, Sister. I have always had my share of pretty things; but you, you have had nothing but the company of your voiceless stick men.» Her voice became a hiss. «Remember the human you tried to take from me, the beautiful one that was mine, the one you wanted so badly? Remember, Sister? Why even that pretty one was lost to you, wasn’t he? So careless you were that you let him be destroyed.»
Morag stiffened. «It was you who destroyed him, Sister.»
«I?» Mallenroh laughed. «One touch from you and he withered with horror.»
Morag’s face was frozen with rage. «Give me the Elfstones.»
«I will give you nothing!»
Crouched motionless behind the massive wooden door, Wil Ohmsford felt a hand on his shoulder and he jumped in surprise. Eretria peered past him through the crack. «What is happening?»
«Stay back,” he whispered, and his own eyes returned at once to the confrontation taking place within the hall.
Morag had come forward and now stood directly in front of Mallenroh.
«Give me the Elfstones. You must give them to me.»
«Go back to the hole out of which you crawled, lizard.» Mallenroh sneered. «Go back to your empty nest.»
«Snake! You would feed on your, own kind!»
Mallenroh screamed. «Ugly thing! Leave now!»
Morag’s hand whipped from beneath her robe and struck Mallenroh a stinging blow across the face. The
