Elminster in hell - Ed Greenwood [87]
Before he finished speaking, the owner of the high- '! prowed gown and helm-high hairdo had whisked herself into the pink silk cushions of a gilded high-back lounge. It had been a rotting mushroom in the forest out by Harper's Hill only that morning. She swept sandwiches onto a silver self-platter faster than raindrops fly to earth. A dainty decanter of cordial floated gently off a shelf to fill a fluted glass at the Great Lady Calabrista's elbow, causing her to emit a surprised little titter.
Four young and silken-gowned beauties drifted into the room, making hand-courtesies as they came. They ranged themselves before the four empty chairs farthest '] from their tutor. Their beauty was as gilded as fine court furniture, but at least two of their smiles held a touch too much superior sneer. All of them affected slight boredom and languid ease. All of them would soon catch cold in the gowns they had chosen to impress. Watching pearls glisten, slippers glide, and pendulous gem-cluster earrings sway and dangle, Elminster was beginning to be reminded of Tharsult too.
"Come along, come closer, girls! DON'T be shy; great men have no time for shy little girls! Sirrah Elminster, these sandwiches are QUITE the most EXQUISITE morsels that have passed these my lips in weeks! Why, whatever are they made of?"
"Snail, Great Lady," Elminster said with the sweetest of smiles. "Laced with a green paste made from only the largest tree-slugs of the forest around us, garnished with pepper and lemon-squeezings, of course."
"Of course," the Great Lady Calabrista echoed, faintly and haltingly.
Elminster put a firm hand over his teacup to muffle its snort of mirth.
Four gracefully extended hands stopped, quivered, and withdrew, leaving platters untouched.
The Old Mage raised his brows. "Oh, but they're GOOD! Nobles in Waterdeep prize nothing else more highly! And if the gods smile upon thee, and grant their brightest luck-" He leaned forward eagerly, peering at the sandwiches upon the platter before him, until his hand stabbed suddenly down, to peel back bread and reveal a hurrying slug undulating out of the heart of a sandwich-for just a moment, before he slapped the bread back into place, snatched the sandwich to his mouth, and bit down, hard-"ye find a live one! Ah, there's nothing like it!”
As he spoke, the green head of the slug poked out of the corner of his mouth, twisted this way and that ques-tioningly, and then vanished within again. Elminster chewed heartily, beaming at his guests. The little illusions get 'em, every time.
"I-I think it would be best," the Great Lady Calabrista quavered, "if we proceeded with the burden of our visit. Men of great influence in Sembia-not to put too fine a point on it, men of great WEALTH-have enrolled their daughters at my school for some years now, seeking to find those who are GIFTED BY THE GODS with an aptitude for magic… an aptitude that I flatter myself I can draw out without recourse to dark altars and midnight fires and sacrifices of, er, snails… THAT IS TO SAY, I am confident that these, my BEST students, will not disappoint any competent practitioner of the ART! I was REQUESTED to bring them before you by VERY highly placed individuals, for your examination and-ah, approval."
"Ye have done well and wisely," Elminster said with a smile. "I approve of all of them."
"You DO? Without eve-that is to say, their fitness at magic shines forth so BRIGHTLY?"
"Indeed, Great Lady," Elminster said with a gracious smile, gently slapping his teacup (which had begun to emit small sounds that resembled hiccups), "it doth. Indubitably. Had ye not had so GREAT a hand in the shaping of their glories, their power would blind EVEN YE! Let me tender my apologies, ladies four, for discussing thee as one does cattle, or fine gowns, or the luster of china… What concerns me most is not thy grasp of spells but thy thinking, and characters,