Hand of Fire - Ed Greenwood [115]
Her scalp prickled. Sweat was all over her in a sheen … she was getting hot, all over. Her fingertips ached.
"Shan!" Narm whispered. "Are you all right?" She nodded vigorously and waved at him to keep quiet, but he held up his own hand in a "heed me here" signal, fumbled in her things, and came up with her hand mirror, which he held up so that she could see herself.
Flames were licking out of her mouth and eyes! No wonder he was concerned.
She nodded, smiled, and waved to let him know she was fine and went back to sucking fire.
In the brief time she'd lifted her head to look at Narm, a tiny ring of dancing flames had risen beneath her throat and breast. If this worked as before, only her bared flesh could take in flame – at least until roaring fire had engulfed her, and she hoped whoever was waiting outside to capture or slay them would have grown impatient by then.
Rather than spend time disrobing, Shandril wriggled backward along the floor a trifle to take in these new flames. Smoke curled up thickly around her, and for the first time she coughed.
Hastily she crawled forward again to suck flames, hoping that the floor wouldn't give way before the firesetter's patience did. There was always the chance that someone had just set fire to the wagon and gone away in hopes that they'd be asleep and dead of smoke before waking, but somehow that didn't sit with how she saw these spellfire-seekers.
Kill, and so destroy what you prized? No, he'd be out there waiting – if, of course, it was a "he." Were there any other women along on the caravan? Oh, yes, one of the merchants had a wife, as fat and ugly as himself… of course, it could be neither he nor she, but "it." Shandril quelled such thoughts, resisting an impulse to laugh at a sudden vision of a gigantic dragon curled up like a cat before a hearth, breathing flame at her in a long, slow, steady stream.
She was starting to feel bloated now, like the day so long ago when she'd bet Gorstag she could consume an entire great blandreth of soup and had, then had wished she hadn't. There was pain now, too, in her joints and fingertips and toes, an ache that grew steadily greater.
"Shan," Narm said quietly, "you're starting to glow."
"Why thank you, kind sir," she replied tartly, making light of his words. "Every lady should glow when at her best." She would have said more, but a sudden shudder set her to coughing, and this time, as she'd feared, she couldn't stop.
Every hacking explosion gouted forth flame, and she had to turn her head hastily to avoid scorching gear.
There was too much cargo for sudden rushes anywhere, or she'd have run out the door regardless of arrows or waiting spells and spewed fire into the night, but…
Outside, someone snarled, "At last! I thought they'd never – "
A man's voice she'd heard before on the run. Well, no great surprise there.
Shandril threw back her head, teeth clenched. Her knees, elbows, and breasts were starting to ache now. If she didn't rid herself of the fire she'd swallowed soon, someone was going to get a great surprise. She hoped it wouldn't be Narm, deafened by a mighty blast and suddenly wearing a wetness that had been his Shandril a moment earlier.
No, she dare not stay in here a moment longer.
Trusting to spellfire to keep her safe, she crawled unsteadily to the front of the wagon, flames crackling from her hands as she went. She hoped Narm would have sense enough to get out fast, whatever happened next. This wagon would probably go up with a roar, very soon.
Calling on spellfire, she flew, bursting out through the doorway on her side and arrowing up sharply into the sky.. "Hah!"
Mhegras of the Zhentarim was standing below, a look of triumph on his face and his fingers already weaving a spell. Shandril vomited fire at him and out of the heart of its spectacular flood blasted him with spellfire, an angry white shaft of force that ate into the ground in an instant, leaving nothing in its wake but a pair of