Spellfire - Ed Greenwood [100]
Shandril nodded, suddenly exhausted. "Thank you, lord," she said-Elminster winced at the title-"I must sleep soon, or fall down where I stand."
"Thanks, Elminster" Narm said with sudden boldness. "Good fortune this night and hereafter.
After I get our clothes back from the knights, we shall go and think on your lords for a breath or maybe two before falling asleep."
They chuckled together, and then the young couple went down the hill, the guards closing in around them. Florin and Merith flew watchfully above, leaving the sage behind with Jhessail and Illistyl.
"Satisfied?" the sorceress of Shadowdale asked her sometime master.
Elminster looked at the scorched marks on the rock at his feet. "I thought so," he said softly. "The power to unleash spellfire. Her mother had it." Both lady knights looked at him, startled, but Elminster merely smiled that distant smile that warned he would gI’ve no answer, and asked, "So what did ye hear of interest, Illistyl? Ye may edit such things as ye feel mine aged ears should not hear, out of consideration for my vulnerable heart."
"Well, then" Illistyl said, with an impish grin, "there is precious little to tell."
The mist was still streaming through the trees when Korvan from The Rising Moon, arrI’ved at the butcher's shop. "Morning;1 said a stooped man the cook had never seen before. The stranger leaned upon the yard fence by the door, the mud of much travel on his boots and breeches.
"Morning," Korvan replied sourly. He had come for meat, not a lot of talk. Since that little brat Shandril had run off, he'd had to get his meat earlier, at a time of the day when he'd rather be abed yawning and dozing.
"Buying lamb? I’ve thirty good tails in the pen there, just down from Battledale." The sheepherder jerked his head at the muddy yards behind him.
"Lamb? Well, I'll look… if I can find two good hand-counts among them, I might do business with you," Korvan said grudgingly. The herder stared at him.
"Two hand-counts? Have you a large family?"
"No, no," Korvan said sourly as they went in. "I buy for the inn, The Rising Moon, down the road."
"Do you? Why, there's a tale I have for you, then!" the herder said, with sudden interest. "It's about that young girl who worked at the inn and left."
"Oh?" Korvan said, turning his head sharply in sudden interest. "Shandril, her name was."
"Oh… pretty, that," the herder replied, nodding. "I saw her in the mountains only a few nights back. I was chasing two lost sheep."
"The Thunder Peaks?" Korvan asked, nodding at the wall where, beyond, they knew the gray and purple mountains could be seen above the trees.
"Aye, near the Sember. I came upon a great crowd of folk, with weapons and all. They were all standing about, asking this girl of yours if she was all right, after she'd unleashed 'spellfire,' they called it…"
"Spellfire?" Korvan said, astonished.
"Aye. I hid-there were gold coins all over the place, and they had swords out. I wasn't sure that a guest who came uninvited would be left alive to walk away again, if you take my meaning-"
Korvan nodded. "Aye… but who were these people?"
"Shadowdale folk, they were. That old sage, and the ranger who rides about the Dales with their messages- Falconhand, is it?-and the elf-warrior who lives there, and a priest, I think. They were all excited over the girl… seems she burned up a dragon or suchlike with this spellfire. There was something about someone called Shadowsil, too. They walked about so that I couldn't rightly hear it.