The ettin roared in pain, hopping awkwardly sideways-through a tree-and trying to turn and see what had hurt it so much.
Islif kept rolling with Pennae in her arms, whooping and fighting for breath, trying to get them both away behind too many trees for the two-headed giant to smash aside.
"Jhess!" Semoot said up on the ledge, shaking the shoulder he had hold of and trying to ignore the wildly lolling head atop it. "Wake up! Wake up! We need you to blast something!"
Florin reached the end of the gravel and slid into a thornbush. The ertin was headed away from him now, hitting out viciously behind itself with both morningstars. The ranger fought his way free and to his feet, snatching out his dagger and thinking just how useless it would be against this foe even as he did so. His sword was lost somewhere up on the scree yonder, with no moonlight to make it glint, andRight in front of him, not the reach of an arm from the point of his dagger, a vivid blue flash of light split the night-gloom.
Laspeera lowered her arms, looked over her shoulder at Lorbryn Deltalon, and nodded.
He returned her nod and began casring the same spell. Dalonder Ree stood like a calm statue until the blue flash claimed him, leaving the diamond on the floor empty and just the two war wizards in the chamber.
They looked at each other down the length of the room. By the faint glow of the shieldings Laspeera had raised around them when they'd first brought Dauntless and Dalonder into the spellcasting chamber, each could see that the other wasn't smiling.
"Well, that's done," Laspeera said. "Up to the scrying spheres to watch them."
Deltalon shook his head. "You watch. I'm going after them."
The second-most-powetful Wizard of War in all the land stared at him expressionlessly. Then, slowly and carefully, she drew a wand from her belt.
Deltalon took a step back, going tense. If she used it on him, there was little he dared do to try to counter the magic, standing here in the grip of her shielding.
Laspeera walked down the room toward him, face still expressionless.
Deltalon retreated anorher step, then stood his ground.
When she was close enough to touch him, Laspeera stopped, reversed the wand, and handed it to him, butt first. "Force spheres," she almost whispered. "To confine a foe or englobe and protect a friend. Nine of them. Come back alive, if you can."
She opened her arms to him.
Deltalon hugged her fiercely, overcome with gtatitude and relief, the wand solid and comforting in his hand.
"And if I do not," he whispered into her ear as they rocked together in their shared embrace, "beware a possible Wizard of War traitor. The man I've seen binding the mindworm-touched nobles under his personal controclass="underline" Vangerdahast, the Royal Magician of Cormyr."
Laspeera sighed against his neck, then whispered, "Thank you, Lorbryn. All good gods watch over you."
She kissed his neck, then drew smoothly back and away, leaving his skin tingling.
Deltalon swallowed, saluted her with the wand, thrusr it through his belt, then carefully teleported himself away.
Laspeera stood gazing at the spot where he'd been standing for a long time, pondering things. Then she lifted her head and out of habit gazed all around the empty chamber.
It was indeed empty, looking precisely as it should. Biting her lip gently to keep a wry smile from climbing onto her face at what she knew she was about to discover, she lifted her hands and made the simple gesture that would banish her shielding spell. The new shielding was of her own devising, subtly different from the one Vangerdahast had taught her to use.
The shielding crackled and collapsed rather than fading-telling her that it had been under assault from a spell probe.
The smile found its way onto her face after all, though it was just as crooked as she'd thought it would be. It was his, of course.
So the second-most-powerful Wizard of War in the Forest Kingdom lifted her head and said softly to the empty air, "Fair evening, Lord Vangerdahasr. Master."
Then she wenr to the door to throw its bolts and begin her ascent to the room of scrying spheres.
She knew she'd find a certain Royal Magician waiting there.
"What are they fighting?"
Klarn was, it seemed, one of those men who cannot abide not having his curiosity assuaged.
"We'll soon see," Boarblade said in tones intended as a clear and emphatic "Silence, dolt!" warning.
Klarn, it also seemed, was a man deaf to tonal warnings. "It sounds gods-murdering big! How in all these trees did they find it?" "It found them." "Huh?"
He left Klarn's astonished grunt unanswered and stalked ahead, crouching low and moving as quietly as possible.
Klarn came after him, thudding heavily through the forest like the oaf he was. Thorm and Darratur followed him like silent shadows. Boarblade couldn't see Glays bringing up the rear, but he had every confidence that the man was there, moving through the night as softly as a ghost.
Not that it seemed necessary any longer. Trees were being shattered, their rendings loud and violent, and the ettin was screaming. Nothing else could scream with two mouths like that, except a much larger two-headed giant, and Boarblade had seen nothing looming taller than the trees.
There was a lot of crashing and thrashing going on and men and women shouting. He skulked nearer, smiling openly now.
The smile went away in an instant when he saw the blue flash.
A man stood in front of him. He hadn't been there a moment ago. A man he knew. A man in armor who was snatching out his sword and throwing out his gauntleted hand to dash aside Florin's dagger.
The ranger stepped smoothly back, seeing the ettin peering their way and blinking. It wasn't too badly hurt to turn in a flash when it needed to, and both of its heads were thrust fotward, low and menacing, in the direction of the now-vanished flash.
"Dauntless," Florin said, "look out behind you. We've got larger problems than each other."
"I'm a friend, not a foe!" the ornrion said, then risked a fleeting look back over his shoulder.
Dauntless, Florin, and the ettin were all in time to see the second flash.
Drathar frowned. Some sort of showy teleport spell. Bringing an individual here, not whisking anyone away. But who'd wotked it?
Not that little flamehaired Knight, that was for sure and certain, unless Mystra or Azuth had arrived personally to work the spell for her.
Then came the second flash-and by its light the Zhent wizard saw something that took him far beyond frowning.
Telgarth Boarblade was coming toward him. He'd know that fluid, gliding walk anywhere, though his fellow Zhent-fellow rival, though just one of many-was using some sott of magic to disguise himself. There was at least one man with Boarblade, and likely more.
Drathat stepped hastily behind a tree, turned until his shoulders were against it, then worked a swift invisibility spell.
Thus hidden-as much as anyone could be hidden in a night full of flashing magic and roaring, tree-smashing ettins-he sat down against the tree trunk to keep quiet and watch what unfolded.
With the Knights of Myth Drannor, the ettin, Boarblade and his blades, and rhe Watching Gods alone knew who'd magically arrived all converging here, what unfolded promised to be good.
Or at least entertaining.
"Sorry," Islif panted, boosting Pennae to her feet.
The thief grinned. "Well, I'd rather be in your arms than embracing an ettin. Still have your blade?"
Islif waved it. Neither of them could see it in the dark, but they both heard the dull ring of its encounter with a sapling.
Pennae's grin widened. "I kept hold of mine, too. Let's both of us be after its hamstrings again. It's going for Florin, see?"