The Vacant Throne - Ed Greenwood [25]
Fingers like iron drove into his cheeks, forcing his jaws wide as her mouth descended-and from out of its warm depths glided a small green serpent, its eyes glittering at him in a tiny triumph of its own, fangs parting…
In Loushoond's last, gurgling moments, he was dimly aware that he was choking on the thing as it wriggled right down his gullet, and that a warm body was pressing against his, and that there wasn't anything he could do to avoid joining Ornentar…
6
Paved with Stones Enchanted
They'd stumbled away from Indraevyn for hours before finding a green hill in the endless forest, a huge clearing in woods furnished with very few open spaces. Embra had declared it ideal, but her three companions had squinted and sniffed their ways around it suspiciously, as if they expected cave mouths to yawn open in it without warning, or the entire hill rear up and be revealed as the armored back of a wakened dragon. The lady sorceress had stood watching them with her arms folded and a sympathetic smile on her face as they searched, never uttering an impatient word as the time passed, and the three men shook their heads and growled and announced in their various ways that they could find nothing wrong with it-but that it certainly didn't feel right!
Yet time passed without alarm or attack, and Craer circled the clearing well out in the trees and found nothing of menace, and at last they gathered by Embra's tree and admitted with varying degrees of gruffness that there seemed to be nothing amiss with the place. Nothing but a feeling of being… watched.
"We're in the Loaurimm, gentlesirs," the Lady Silvertree reminded them gently. "It's alive, crawling with more creatures than ever carried sword for my father, or marched in Blackgult's army. There must be dozens of little eyes on us right now. Yet I see a shortage of bowmen and wizards, and am content. Let this be the place, and let the time be now."
She spread her arms in a gesture that urged them back into the trees, and stepped forward alone onto the mossy flanks of the hill, asking over her shoulder as she went, "Are we clear on this? Sarasper covered all?"
"Aye," Craer and Hawkril admitted reluctantly, more or less in unison.
"We know what to do," Craer added, and they saw her nod as she reached the crown of the hill, just before she closed her eyes and turned to face west, towards Aglirta.
The procurer leaned close to Sarasper and murmured, "I am clear on what we're to do, but I'd like to know this: just how much magic-besides healing; I mean spells, like Embra's castings-do you know, anyway?"
The old healer thrust his head close, so they stared at each other with noses almost touching. "Enough to know I shouldn't be meddling with such," he muttered darkly. "I wish a few more young and eager wizards would achieve the same knowledge." Then he stalked away around the edge of the clearing, waving at Craer to take up his own position.
From across the open space Hawkril cast the moving men a glance. His sword was in his hand, and his eyes seldom strayed from the trees around the hill. He seemed as tense as a hound straining on a leash, aching to explode into battle, as the three men of the Four took up positions equidistant around the clearing.
No foe came. Embra knelt, chanting something, set the Dwaer-Stone between her feet, and rose slowly, hands moving in intricate, air-weaving gestures. Then she spread her arms, fingers down, with the air of a contented crafter finishing a long task.
Silent white fire sped out from each fingertip, to strike the ground and cling, sputtering without scorching. Embra closed her eyes again and seemed to shudder, tilting her head slowly back until her face was upturned to the sky. Pulses of brighter fire traveled down the lines of light to the ground and back up again, washes of radiance that seemed to wink back off the trees around and set up a gentle rustling of leaves.
Sarasper watched, eyes narrowing, and waved one hand until he caught Hawkril's attention. He frowned