White-lipped, Tarth Hornwood stood alone in the circle for an even longer time. Then he stepped forward and softly spoke the charm that began the ritual all over again. Reaching for the knife, he never saw Elminster reappear on the bank behind him.
The Old Mage smiled and nodded approvingly.
The staff rose again. This time Tarth's tears flowed so freely that he could scarcely see the staff through them. He was filled with an aching sense of loss and a wrenching, weak feeling that grew worse in waves, in time with the pulsing of the staff.
It climbed above the stone. The singing was loud in Tarth's ears. Suddenly it flared into blinding brilliance. Tarth cried out, breaking off the chant. He fell helplessly to his knees amid the singing, and slid sideways to the turf, and beyond….
[Growl] how much longer, wizard? How much fire-lashed longer?
Cool air whispered past his brow. There were gentle hands on him… two, three-had the old sage grown more hands?
Tarth blinked and found himself looking at a clear blue sky and dancing leaves overhead. He was lying on his back on uneven ground. The aroma of warm tea came from somewhere very near at hand.
"With us again, lad?" Elminster's familiar voice rolled out. Tarth turned to look at the Old Mage, opening his mouth to reply. It stayed open for some time in utter astonishment.
The Old Mage was sitting on a stone, tea in hand. He wore a worn and patched cotton under robe above his battered old boots. Sitting with him was a slim, gray-eyed lady regarding Tarth with interest. She held two jacks of steaming tea in her hands and was clad only in Elminster's flowing outer robe.
"Well met," she said, in a low, gentle voice.
Elminster grinned. "Tarth Thunderstaff," he said with gallant grandeur, indicating the lady, "meet thy staff. The Lady Nimra. Known in her day as Nimra Ninehands, after a spell she favors."
His grin broadened. "Ye've been draining her strength to work thy Art these long years, so I had ye give much of thine back to her, ere ye destroyed her entirely. Now, I've wasted time enough. Evenfeast awaits ye both at my tower, when ye find the way thither. I imagine ye'll have much to say to one another."
He chuckled at Tarth's stunned expression. "Now, lad," he reproved, " 'tis not every day a wizard has a chance to speak so freely to his staff. Use that glib tongue of thine." With that, Elminster waved a hand, and was gone.
Wordlessly the lady held a jack out to Tarth.
He took it gingerly, managing not to spill any on himself, and cleared his throat. "Ah… well met!" he began uncertainly. A wavering smile spread itself hesitantly across his face…
Gah! Loving again? You humans!
Much later that night, Tarth sat again with the Old Mage amid the dusty stacks of parchment. "How long have you known about her?" the young wizard asked curiously, gesturing upwards. The Lady Nimra slept in Elminster's bedchamber above them.
"Nimra was imprisoned in the form of a staff over seven hundred winters ago, by a rival in Myth Drannor," Elminster said slowly. "We never freed her, for her imprisonment let loose a number of fell creatures that had been in her power. They searched everywhere for her and would have found and destroyed her in the end, if she'd walked the Realms in her own form. Her imprisonment was the best disguise she could have found."
"What happened to these creatures that search for her?"
"Destroyed in their turas, down the years," the Old Mage replied. "Nerndel slew more than one of them."
"Master Nerndel? How did he come to have the staff?" Tarth asked in astonishment.
Elminster grinned. "He was Nimra's rival. It was his trap that imprisoned her. He hoped one day to free her and woo her-but I laid spells on the staff, so that I could find it where'er it might be hid and so that its making could not be undone while Nimra's enemies yet lived. I also took from Nerndel the spells he used to entrap her- so ye are stuck with her, young Master Mage."
"Stuck with her?" Tarth echoed, not understanding.
"Aye. She owed Nerndel six services, and the first he set her to do was to train him. The second was to undertake a certain ritual. It trapped her in the form of a staff, while her first task lay incomplete. She is not free of the web of spells he laid until she completes the training-of ye, since ye are Nerndel's heir."
"Me?" Tarth asked, dumbfounded. "But what then?"
Elminster shrugged. "That is between the two of ye. She has served ye these past few years, willingly, even if ye knew it not, and I think likes ye. Thy ways may well am together a long time yet."
"Together," Tarth said wonderingly, looking up at the ceiling. "But how should I treat her? What do I say to her? Should I try to make her do me the services that remain? If I try, what will she think of me? Need I fear her-ah, attacking me?"
Elminster smiled slowly and spread his hands. "In this, ye must be your own guide. Ye have already shown that ye can take the proper course, alone."
Tarth stared at him. Then his eyes narrowed suddenly. "You did agree to teach me until the passing of the next moon. Tell me, then, what I want to know!"
Elminster nodded. "I agreed, aye. Yet I fear I can help thee little, Tarth. I know not the answers to any of thy questions."
"You are said to be the wisest of living sages, in most fields!" Tarth protested. "One who knows all the answers!"
They heard a light step upon the stair. Tarth turned and stared at the Lady Nimra, who smiled at him. Tarth looked deep into her clear blue eyes and was lost.
"Only fools know all the answers," Elminster told him quietly. He silently vanished, the dust swirling up around him.
"And so, Master Tarth," Nimra said softly, as she sat where the Old Mage had been, "your questions are your own to answer, and your choices your own to make, and you must live out the results. That is what being a mage is, after all."
Tarth nodded, and cleared his throat. "Ah, uh-well met!" he began brightly.
She started to laugh….
That's your "powerful magic"? You claw mo hard at my patience, little wizard!
How does it feel when i do the same to your chain? And make it take fire at the same time! Hey? Eh?
[screaming, raw and wild and in vain, dying away]
Oh, no! Nor that easily! A uttle healing and a jolt awake, and you're ready to taste torment again.'
[roaring diabolic laughter, screams rising]
Chapter Sixteen
Tentacles reached angrily toward the dirty, naked chained heap that was a man… then, reluctantly, drew back again.
I remain somewhat bewildered as to why some of the memories you've shown me are of lasting interest to mystra-or to you. Why is this in your mind, elminster? Does mystra place there only what she wants you to see, or also some things you desire to see?
Out of love and grace, the Lady I serve gives to me memories of things I could not witness but desire to. The doings of Mirt, for example-I felt the need to understand the character of this man, as a fellow Harper.
Ah. Just as i watched you from afar, you watch others. [Growl] I'll not try to hide from you, manung, that rage rises in me as I scour your mind and search out memory after memory, as if I'm seeking one stone in all the rock that is avernus, and find nothing of the memories of magic I seek. Memories I need.
Yet you must have them, or you could not be what you are.. Perhaps mystra is the key. I do not think she reached out to change you, in her brief visitation here….i would have felt that. So your memories must survive-and finding the ones she gave to you must he where the treasure lies.