Spellfire - Ed Greenwood [26]
Abruptly he heard a dry female voice close by. "He lives, Lanseril. If your bolt had been a couple of hands closer, mind…"
"Your turn, remember?" a light male voice replied, pointedly. Then both voices chuckled.
Narm blinked his dazzled eyes desperately. "Help," he managed to say, almost crying. "I cant see!"
"Can't think either, if you planned on storming Myth Drannor armed with nothing but a sapling," the female voice said to him and then hissed a word.
Narm had the impression that something brightened, suddenly, to his left, and raced off in a spray of separate moving lights. But he could see nothing more-everything looked like a white fog. A hand fell on his arm. He stiffened and swung his staff up.
"No, no," the male voice said in his ear. "If you hit me, I'll just leave you again, and the devils'll have you after all. How many companions had you?"
"J-just one," Narm replied, letting his arm fall.
"Marimmar, the-the Mage Most Magnificent."
Suddenly Narm burst into tears.
"I take it that he is no more," the female voice said gently. A hand took his sleeve, and then Narm was being led rapidly over the uneven leaves of the forest floor.
"Aye," the man said by Narm’s shoulder. "I've seen pieces of him. Mixed up with two horses. Can you ride, man?" Insistently he shook the sobbing Narm, who managed a violent nod, and then added, "Good.
Up you go." Narm felt a stirrup, and then he was thrust up onto the back of a snorting, shifting horse.
Narm clutched the horse's neck thankfully, and from one side heard the female hiss a word that he had heard earlier.
The male voice spoke again. "Tymora spit upon us, they're persistent! There's another flying at us now!
Ride! Illistyl, lead him, will you?" Narm heard a sudden flutter of wings. He struck out at it wildly, blindly, with his staff.
"Mystra's strength!" the woman said, and Narm was jerked roughly to one side. "Strike down Lanseril?
Idiot!" A small, strong hand clouted him under the jaw and then jerked the staff from his grasp. Narm heard it clatter against something off to his right.
"I beg pardon!" he said, clutching the horse's neck as it gathered speed. "I meant no harm-devils flying, he said!" "Aye, they are, and we're not-as they say in Cormyr-out of the woods yet, either. It might help if you held the reins and let the horse breathe and turn its head by loosening your hold on its neck," she suggested flippantly. "I am Illistyl Elventree.
Lanseril Snowmantle flies above us. He may forgI’ve you by the time we reach Shadowdale."
"S-Shadowdale?" Narm asked, trying to remember what Marimmar had told him of the dales. He could see dark things moving… no, he was moving past them. Trees… his sight was coming back!
"What-how did you save me? I was-was-"
"Trapped, yes. Lanseril nearly caught you in the lightning he called-it wouldn't have been the first time. Can you see yet?"
Narm shook his head, trying to clear the white mist before his eyes. "Trees, yes, and the horse before me-" he turned his head toward her voice-"but I fear I cannot see you, yet." His voice shook a little, and then steadied. "How came you to find me?…
And-and-"
"We are Knights of Myth Drannor. Those who venture here for treasure often meet with us. The unlucky visitors such as yourself and this mage-your master, I take it-encounter the devils first."
"We… we met an elf first, good lady. Strongbow, he gave as his name, and he stood with a lady mage.
They warned us back. My master was very angry. He was determined to find the magic that remains and so went around by another way. He is-was-proud and willful, I fear."
"He stands in large company both in life and death, then. You were apprentice to him?"
"Aye. I am but new come to the art, lady. My spells and cantrips are not yet of any great matter. They may never be, now." Narm sighed.
"What is your name, wise apprentice?" the woman asked.
"Narm, good lady."
"Nay, that I'm not. A lady, yes, when I remember, but I fear