Maresa smiled thinly and answered, "No, I am not in any danger. I found the assassin who murdered my mother and killed him. And I found out who had hired him, and killed his employer as well. I went back to Waterdeep after I saw to that."
Araevin was not sure if one should congratulate a young human-well, half-human-woman on having successfully killed the murderers of a parent.
"I see," he managed, and decided to change the subject. "How did you receive my summons?"
Maresa reached into her tunic and drew out a small pendant in a star-shaped design.
"This little keepsake of my mother's," she said. "I wear it to remember her by."
Araevin nodded. He had given the tokens to his companions when they parted in order to serve as conduits for his call, if he should ever need them again.
"So what business did you think you had with my mother?" the genasi asked.
"I have just returned to Faerun after a long time in Evermeet," Araevin answered, "and I find that I have need of some trustworthy comrades to assist me in the recovery of some relics of my people. Theleda was an expert at traps and locks and such things, and I had hoped I might persuade her to travel with us again. But it seems we will have to do without her."
"I might be able to help you. Mother taught me everything she knew."
"It might be dangerous, and there may be little reward in it," Araevin said.
"I have reasons to leave Waterdeep anyway, and as long as I get an equal share of the profits-or am reasonably compensated for my time, if there are none-I might be interested."
"Maresa, I don't think you understand," Grayth said. "You may not have much regard for whether you yourself are in danger, but we may have to trust our companions with our lives. You are young, and we don't know you."
"I told you that I dealt with my mother's murderers myself," Maresa said flatly.
"Which we only have your word on," Grayth replied.
"Fine. Allow me to demonstrate," Maresa snapped. She stood up quickly and rested one hand conspicuously on the hilt of a rapier at her belt, a graceful weapon with a guard of gleaming silver. A slender wand of dark wood rested in a small holster next to the blade. "Who's the best swordsman among the four of you?"
Grayth folded his thick arms across his chest and said, "I don't know if that would-"
"Afraid to try your luck, priest?"
The Lathanderite stopped in mid-sentence, his face expressionless. He leaned back in his seat.
"She's her mother's daughter, all right," said the priest.
"If my eyes were closed, I would swear that was Theleda speaking. And the gods know Theleda never had a good eye for picking a fight."
Maresa bridled, but Ilsevele set a hand on her arm and said, "In all seriousness, you know something about traps, and glyphs, and such things?"
"I already said so!"
"All right, then. Open this."
Ilsevele reached into her pack for her spellbook. As a spellarcher, she studied wizardry in order to enchant her arrows. She had nothing like Araevin's skill in the Art, but she was no novice either, and as many wizards did, she had protected her spellbook with abjurations designed to prevent anyone from pilfering her spells. It was a small, slender volume bound between thin sheets of laspar wood, with clasps of silver.
"There's nothing deadly here," Ilsevele explained, "but you definitely won't like it if you open the book without passing my signs safely."
Maresa bristled.
"An audition? Fine!" she muttered under her breath.
She sat down again, peering at Ilsevele's spellbook without touching it.
Araevin sat up straight and looked to Ilsevele. He knew what sort of protections Ilsevele had on her spellbook, and they were formidable even if they weren't deadly.
He said in Elvish, "Ilsevele, do you think this is wise? If she fails, she will be shamed, and if she succeeds, she is likely to insist on going."
Ilsevele shook her copper hair, met his eyes with her sharp gaze, and answered in Elvish, "She came in her mother's place. I have a feeling about her, Araevin. I am willing to give the girl a chance, if you are."
Araevin acceded. He returned his attention to Maresa, who had finished looking over the book. The genasi whispered the words of a seeing spell, and the spellbook began to glow with a soft azure radiance. She carefully studied the book again for a few moments, examining the spells that lay over it.
"All right, then," Maresa said as she reached into a vest pocket in her doublet and retrieved a small leather folio, opening it on the table by the book. "Your glyph will be damaged."
"We will see," said Ilsevele. "Do what you need to, as long as you don't damage the book itself." "It's your book," Maresa replied.
She found a small paper packet in the leather case and opened it, shaking out a purple-colored powder over the spellbook. Then she laid a thin piece of parchment over the powdered book. With a stick of charcoal she carefully colored the parchment, making a rubbing or etching of the spellbook's cover.
On the parchment, a string of mystic symbols appeared in her rubbing. No such symbols had been visible on the book's cover beforehand. Maresa left the parchment in place and fished a strange styluslike instrument from her case. Muttering the words of a counter charm, she picked out the symbols on her charcoal rubbing one by one and pressed each out with the stylus, changing it to a different symbol by erasing one stroke. Carefully she negated or altered each symbol in the arcane phrase, then straightened up and shook her flowing white hair. Araevin noticed that she still had not broken a sweat. With a smug smile, she removed the parchment, picked up the book and shook off her powder, and promptly opened it.
"Satisfied?" she asked.
"Damn. That was nicely done," Grayth said. "All right, so you're better than I thought."
"You can come," said Ilsevele. She took her spellbook back from Maresa with a rueful look. "I suppose I need better runes to protect my book."
Araevin set down his mug and looked up at Maresa.
"There is a little more to this than striking out spell traps," he said. "It's not wise to seek out dangerous places in the company of people you don't trust implicitly, and to put it plainly, you don't know us very well, nor do we know you."
"You knew my mother, didn't you?" Maresa riposted.
"She carried your pendant until the day she died, elf. She would have answered your call, so I am here in her place."
Neither Araevin nor Grayth replied. "I thought so," Maresa said. "In that case, where are we going, and when do we leave?"
Gaerradh knelt easily in a well-disguised tree stand overlooking the village of Rheitheillaethor. The moon was hidden behind the overcast, leaving little more than a silver patch in the darkness overhead, but an elf's eyes needed little light. She could clearly make out the simple shelters and fieldstone storehouses on the ground below, with the gleaming patches of white snow lingering around the boles of the broad weirwoods and shadowtops sheltering the village.
Rheitheillaethor was home to nearly five hundred of the wood elves, but few of them lived in the buildings and shelters on the ground. Instead their homes were hidden high in the branches above the forest floor, a cunning arrangement of disguised platforms and narrow catwalks that was nearly invisible to anyone below. Even knowing they were there, Gaerradh had a hard time picking out other stands and platforms at any distance, but here and there she caught glimpses of resolute wood elf warriors crouching in stands like hers, waiting for the enemy to appear.
She shifted her position, craning her head for a better look. Her platform was near the center of the village, away from the pickets where she would have liked to be, and she was impatient to get a look at her foes. Three days before she had brought news of the breaking of Nar Kerymhoarth to the elders of Rheitheillaethor. The next day news had followed of orc bands on the move in the forest, accompanied by winged elves, cruel and proud, armed for war. Gaerradh had no idea who the elfkin might be, but the fact that they marched in the company of orcs spoke for their intentions. Wood elf scouts had shadowed the invaders since sunrise. There could be no doubt that they were coming to Rheitheillaethor.