[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

She was certain that she would explode like one of her globes if she didn't speak
out. Soon. Tonight!
But she waited until all the dancing lights were spent. They left the roof and
took shelter for the night in the crowded upper room of a dockside inn. The child
always felt safest in such places. Nocturnal "adventures" seemed to occur more
frequently when they took solitary refuge. She felt reassured by the sonorous
snores coming from the trio of ale merchants who shared a bed by the shuttered
window, and took comfort in the sword that lay, bright and ready, beside the
earnest young man her mother had described as a questing paladin.
She waited while her mother emptied the common washbasin into the back
street and refilled it with fresh water from the pitcher. She sat stoically while her
mother wet a square of linen and scrubbed off some of the dirt that the child
seemed to attract, much as spellcasting drew cats. She waited until her mother
took out their greatest treasure, a small brush with a silver handle engraved with
climbing roses, and began to ease it through her daughter's tousled dark hair.
Usually she loved this nightly ritual, often she wished she could purr
throughout the brushing like a petted cat Tonight, though, she would have
answers or she would burst.
"Who is following us?" she demanded.
The brush paused in mid-stroke. "Great Lady Mystra!" her mother exclaimed
in a low, choked voice. "You know?"
She gave an impatient little shrug, not sure how to answer this. "Who?" she
repeated.
Her mother was silent for a long moment. "Many are the tools, but the hand
that wields them is that of my husband."
The little girl picked up an oddly discordant note in the music of her mother's
voice. It occurred to her, for no reason that she could yet understand, that Mother
did not name their shadowy pursuer as her child's father. Perhaps this was
because in Halruaa the two were ever the same. Children were born within
marriage. Marriages were arranged by the local matchmaker, who was always a
minor mage of the divination school. She had yet to live out her fifth summer, but
she knew that much. Even so, the same puzzling instinct that sensed her
mother's hesitation prompted her to leave the obvious question unasked.
She settled for another. "Is your husband a great wizard?"
"He is a wizard."
"Like you?"
The brush resumed its rhythmic stroking, but the effect was no longer
soothing. The girl absorbed with each stroke her mother's emotions: tension,
grief, longing, fear. The temptation to pull away was dizzying, but she fiercely
pushed aside the impulse. She wanted answers. Perhaps this pain was part of
the knowing.
"Once he was my apprentice," her mother said at last. "There is a proverb
that warns masters to beware ambition in their students. Words of nonsense can
be repeated as often as sage wisdom, but this one held true."
The little girl shrugged off the lesson, her mind on the recent miscast spells,
the wandering magic. "You are the master still," she said stoutly, as if she could
deny what was becoming clearer with every day.
Her mother's smile was sad and knowing. "How long has it been since you
asked me to summon Sprite? It is a difficult casting. Surely you know that."
The girl's eyes dropped and her lower lip jutted. "He teases me. That's all."
"Really. That has never bothered you before."
"I've tired of it," she said, implacably stubborn. "And I'm tired of talking about
that silly Sprite. Sing another song, one that will summon something fierce and
strong. A starsnake!"
"They do not fly at night, child."
She folded her arms. "Then the name is stupid."
Her mother laughed a little. "Perhaps you are right. What fierce creature do
you desire? A night-flying roc? A jungle cat, perhaps?"
There was a playful tone in her mother's voice. The girl understood that she
was being humored, and she liked it not at all. "A behir," she said darkly, picturing
a many-legged creature with the sinuous body of a snake, a fearsome crocodilian
head, and a wide mouth full of wicked, translucent teeth. "It can follow us and lie
in wait behind us. When your husband comes by, it will spring out and bite off his-
"
"Foot," her mother supplied quickly, suspecting, quite rightly, that the little girl
had placed her ambitions for the behir somewhat higher.
"Foot," agreed the child quickly, for she had lost interest in her imagined
revenge. Her mother's eyes had gone wary, and her hand went to the small
amulet that nestled in the hollow of her throat.
Carefully her mother eased her hand away from her amulet. "Your hair is so
smooth and shiny! You look too fine for sleep. What if we run across the rooftops
until we find a tavern still open? We could have cakes and sugared wine, and if
there is a bard in the house, I will sing. And, yes, I will summon a fierce creature
for you. A behir, a dragon-anything you like."
She wasn't fooled by the brittle gaiety of her mother's tones, or by the bribe
of a rooftop romp. Though neither of them had even spoken the words aloud, the
child understood that the hidden ways were safer than the streets. Quickly she
tightened the laces on her soft leather shoes. It would not do to trip and fall into
the grasp of her mother's husband.
"I'm ready," she announced.
Her mother eased open a shutter and lifted her onto the ledge beyond. The
child leaned her small body against the wall and began to edge around the
building, as confident and surefooted as a lemur.
Something caught her eye several streets to the east A tendril of magic, so
powerful that her eyes perceived it as a glowing green light, twisted through the
streets toward them.
Lightning jolted through her, nearly knocking her from the ledge.
Tzigone frowned, puzzled. This had not happened to the child she had been,
nor had it ever been part of her dream. A second jolt struck, and suddenly the
ledge was gone and she was falling.
Tzigone awoke suddenly, gasping and flailing about for something to hold. A
startled, almost panicked moment passed before she remembered where she
was.
She'd picked the most secure resting place in Khaerbaal. She had followed
the flight of a winged starsnake to this tree, an enormous bilboa that shaded and
dominated the public garden. She'd climbed until she'd found this perch, and
then bedded down on the broad limb. The snake was sleeping still, its gossamer
wings folded and the blue and white scales of its long, coiled body glittering like
moonstone.
Tzigone pushed herself up into a sitting position and shoved a hand through
her short, sweat-soaked hair. The rope that lashed her to the tree had pulled tight
around her waist, giving testimony to a restless sleep. She'd probably touched
the snake while she was thrashing about.
Had she been almost anyone else, she would now be swinging from her
rope, smoking like an overcooked haunch of rothe-not that she had much
knowledge of these savory, shaggy beasts, overcooked or otherwise. Starsnakes
she knew better.
The slumber of these winged reptiles was guarded by powerful magical
defenses. A wandering sage had once informed her that creatures changed over
the centuries in response to their surroundings and to thwart their enemies. In
Halruaa, wizards were the most dangerous beings, potential enemies of anything [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]