Elminster in Myth Drannor - Ed Greenwood [51]
"Oh," she gasped, putting a hand to her mouth in chagrin. "Here." she reached out with two fingertips, touched the side of his head, and murmured something.
And like cool water lapping down his neck, the pain washed away.
El gasped his thanks, and slid down the coins until he was sitting on the floor again. "So ye set to work on my mind once I was stunned, and-"
Remembering, he whirled and rose to bend anxiously over her. "Lady, there was smoke coming from ye! Were ye hurt?"
"Mystra was waiting for me, just as she waited for the Coronal," the Srinshee told him with the ghost of a smile on her lips. "She cares for you, young man. She thrust me right out of your mind, and told me she'd placed a spell in your mind that could blast me to dust."
El stared at her, and then let his mind sink down to where, for so long, no spells had lain ready. He was going to have to do something about that. Without even a single spell to hurl, and no gem to call on, he was defenseless in the midst of all these proud elves.
Aye, there it was. A deadly magic he'd never known before-so mighty, and so simple. One touch, and elven blood would boil in the body he'd chosen, melting it to dust in a few breaths regardless of armor and defensive magics, and…
He shivered. That was a slaying spell.
When his senses returned to the here and now, cool fingers as small as a child's were tugging at his wrist, towing his hand to rest on smooth, cool flesh. Flesh that felt like-
He stared down. The Srinshee had bared her breast and placed his hand firmly upon it.
"Lady," he asked, staring into the sad blue flames of her eyes, "what-?"
"Use the spell," she told him. "I deserve no less."
El gently shook his hand free, and lifted what was left of her gown back into place. "And what would the Coronal do to me then?" he asked her, in mock despair. That's the trouble with ye tragic types-no thought for what happens next!"
He smiled, and saw her struggling to give him one in return. After a moment, he saw that she was crying, silent tears welling from her old eyes.
Impulsively he bent and kissed her cheek. "Ye did the unforgiveable, aye," he growled in her ear. "Ye promised me nightglade tea-and I'm still waiting!"
She tried to laugh, and burst into sobs. El dragged her up into his arms to comfort her, and found that it was like cradling a crying child. She weighed nothing.
She was still sobbing, arms around his neck, when two steaming cups of nightglade tea appeared in the air in front of his nose.
* * * * *
Elminster had long since lost count of the things that he thought most clever. There was a crown that let its wearers appear as they had done when younger, and a glove that could resculpt the skin of battered or marred faces with its fingertips. The Srinshee had set these, and other things he most fancied, aside in a chest in the domed central chamber, but he'd seen less than a twentieth of the treasures held here, and the Srinshee's eyes were growing sad again.
"El," she said, as he tossed aside a flute that had belonged to the elven hero Erglareo of the Long Arrow, "your time grows short."
"I know," he said shortly. "What is this?" "A cloak that banishes blight from trees whose trunks it is wrapped around, or plants it is draped over, left to us by the elven mage Raeranthur of…"
He was already trudging away from her, toward the chest for things he fancied. The Lady Estelda fell silent and sadly watched him walk away from her. She dared not aid him even by shifting coins, for fear one of the court mages, eager for this human intruder's death, was scrying her from afar.
Elminster returned, looking weary about the eyes. "How much longer?" he asked.
"Perhaps ten breaths," she said softly, "perhaps twenty. It depends on how eager they are."
"For my death," El growled, leaning past her. Was it an accident that she'd rested her hand on this crystal sphere thrice in the last little while? "What's this?" he asked, scooping it up. "A crystal through which one can see the course of waterflows