Realms of Magic - Brian Thomsen King [144]
"Blood, ale. Whatever. It matters only that Toth has escaped to where only our daughters' daughters might find him!"
"Oh, I don't think so," said the drow in a satisfied tone. She held out her palm. Lying in it was a stone coin, whole except for a small wedge.
Wonder lit Vasha's eyes. "That is the time-coin! But how?"
"Typical devious drow tactics. I stole it from Toth, using a simple spell. Sometimes magic is the most direct method, after all."
The piles of splintered wood and wounded patrons argued powerfully for LiriePs point. Vasha conceded with a nod. "Magic has triumphed, strength has failed," she admitted humbly. "But where then is Toth, if he cannot travel through time?"
"A wizard powerful enough to construct a time portal could be almost anywhere," Liriel said. "My guess, though, is that he's somewhere in Skullport. It's exceedingly dangerous to travel to a place never before seen. Also, once he realizes he's missing that coin, he won't go far."
This reasoning brought glowing hope to Vasha's face. "Then we can still hunt him down!"
Liriel lunged at the departing barbarian and seized the edge of her bearskin cloak. "Enough! I've another idea, but you must agree to the use of magic."
The swordwoman subsided, bowing her head in resignation. "How can I not? Vasha the Red has failed. I yield to the wisdom of the drow."
Liriel held up the runecaster's book. "This tells how to use the coin. We'll step back in time, to the point just before Toth came into the tavern. And this time, we'll be ready for him."
Vasha agreed. She stood guard while Liriel studied and cast the intricate spell, and she managed to hold on to her temper and her sanity when she found herself once again seated across the table from Liriel in an undamaged tavern. But the sight of a small coin fragment at the bottom of the bowl of water made her swallow hard.
"We have failed! Toth still holds his half of the coin; he can flee!"
"Why should he?" Liriel retorted. She pulled a knife from her boot and used it to fish the stone from the rapidly heating water. "He's coming here looking for us, remember? He doesn't know that I'll lift his half of the coin."
As she spoke, the drow fingered a tiny pocket just inside her sleeve, where she had hidden the nearly whole coin that had traveled back in time with her. She did not understand how this had happened, or have any idea how the coin could exist simultaneously in its past and present forms. But she saw no reason to speak of this, or any harm in keeping silent. As long as Vasha got her runecaster and brought him back to stand trial before the ancient Rus, all would be well.
Vasha still looked puzzled, but she allowed the drow to position her near the tavern door, in plain sight of any who might enter. Liriel took her place nearer the entrance. Toth will be looking for you, so I've got a better chance at getting in the first blow," the drow explained. "If I miss, feel free to step in."
The barbarian shook her head. "I do not doubt your success. What shall you do-imprison the runecaster in some mysterious dark-elven spell?"
"Something like that," Liriel said absently. She retreated into herself, seeking the innate magic that flowed through the fey dark elves. Summoning her natural power of levitation, she drifted up to hover high above the doorway's lintel.
This act was easy enough for Liriel, something that all drow of the Underdark could do. But this was not the Underdark, and such powers usually faded away long before a dark elf came so close to the lands of light. The spectacle of a floating drow, therefore, was unusual enough to draw every eye in the tavern. Even Vasha stared, bug-eyed and gaping.
Thus it was that Toth, when he entered the tavern, noted the general bemusement and instinctively followed the line of the patrons' collective gaze. When he looked up, Liriel was ready-not with some spell, for she could