The Temptation of Elminster - Ed Greenwood [54]
"I'm not!" Beldrune replied, almost bowling the older mage over in his rush for the door. "Adventure…at last!"
Tabarast blinked at his fast-receding colleague and said, "Droon? Are you mad? This is exciting, yes, but our road's just beginning…it'll be a hard fall for you soon, if you're dancing this high in glee right now."
The Dark Gods take your gloom, Baerast…we're going adventuring? Beldrune shouted back up the stairway.
Tabarast winced and started descending steps, a sour expression settling onto his face. "You've never been on an adventure before, have you?"
Years of travel had made the hard-packed mud lane between Aerhiot's Field and Salopar's Field sink down into its own ditch, until now the tangled hedges almost met overhead, as disturbed birds and squirrels fretted and darted along in the perpetual gloom whenever anyone ventured along the lane.
The oxen were used to it, and so was Nuglar. He trudged along half asleep with his goad-stick in the crook of his arm, not expecting to have to use it, while the three massive beasts ambled along ahead of him, also half-asleep, hardly bothering to switch their tails against the biting buzzflies.
Something chimed nearby. Nuglar lifted one heavy eyelid and turned his head to see what could be making the sound… a wandering lamb, perhaps, collared with one of those tiny toy bells the priests of the Mother hung down their aspergilla? Several younglings?
He could see nothing but a sort of white, sparkling mist in the air, whirling tongues of it that trailed the chiming. It was all around him now, loud and somehow cruel, settling around him like a cold shawl… and around the oxen. One of them sobbed in sudden alarm as the chiming mist became a howling, tightening whirlwind encircling it.
Nuglar shouted, or thought he did, and stretched out a hand to that ox's rump…only to feel a deathly, searing chill, numbing in an instant like icy winter water. He drew back his arm.
It was a stump, blood streaming from where his hand should have been. He opened his mouth to scream, and a wisp of that deadly whirlwind spun out of nowhere to plunge down his throat.
Less than a breath later, Nuglar's jawbone dropped away from a wavering, wind-scoured skull…an instant before his skeleton collapsed into whirling dust, whipped together into crumbling oblivion with the three oxen.
With a loud, triumphant chorus of chiming, like many exultant bells being rung together, a larger, brighter whirlwind rose out of the lane and poured itself across Aerhiot's Field, leaving the muddy lane empty of all but a stout, well-worn goad-stick. It danced in the air in the whirling wake of the chiming mist for an eerie moment, then fell to the mud for other frightened farmers to find later.
A long time passed in the gloomy lane before squirrels meekly scampered and the birds dared to sing again.
The Riven Stone must be a place, or more likely a landmark…a rock cloven by a spring or winter ice. A feature he'd never heard of, but then there was a lot of Faerun he knew nothing about, yet.
Was Mystra going to make him walk over every stride of it?
Almost reeling in exhaustion, Elminster trudged up a grassy slope, trying to keep in sight of the road that had brought him to the Tower… and was now taking him on away from it. Leaving the tower had been a matter of flat urgency, aye, but the Lady…or Azuth, speaking for her… knew he'd have to search for the Riven Stone. Well, then, he couldn't be expected to find it immediately.
That was good, because he could barely find the strength to put one foot in front of another any longer.
El took another two clumsy steps, found himself sliding back down the slope to the roadside, stumbled, and a short rushing while later, fetched up hard against a duskwood tree.
It felt good to lean against the comforting bulk of the tree, when he was so gods-forsaken weary… bark burned against his cheek, and El caught himself halfway along a sliding fall. Sprawling a-snore in the road wouldn't be