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Horses' Move, 4


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#1 Guest_Ananke_*

Posted 11 May 2007 - 06:33 PM

(4)

9 Mirtul, evening, Adratha’s cottage, swamp near Trademeet (ctd)
…and this, in short, is it. I would never have pegged him for the type to tell bedtime stories, but if he’s right…
Here’s hoping he’s not right. Even he says he doesn’t have to be. So, maybe there’s no reason to mope.
Except that now I’m tired.
Well, sitting here writing won’t make the sleep go. And half the night has already passed, I think. So, time for bed.
Sheesh, when I think of the people who slept in it today…



She found the man on the stone bridge which joined Adratha’s cottage to the swamp, standing there motionlessly, looking at the stream running below: a solitary, cloaked figure with folded arms, dark, oily eyes and a mask instead of a face.

“Forgive my outburst,” he said calmly when the girl approached, without taking his eyes off the water. “I sometimes forget that I am far too old to behave like a reckless cub. You have, possibly, come here to comfort me. If so, I thank you for the sentiment; the words are not required.”

“Are you sure?” Imoen asked cautiously.

Cernd looked at her and smiled. “Yes. The water soothed my mind, as it is wont to… For a moment there, I forgot that nature knows subtle paths; that I need not rush in like the gale, seeking to open closed doors. I should, instead,” he said, looking back at the stream, “move like the gentle breeze, and get in through the gaps around. The henge is nigh close. We will take some sleep; and then, hidden like the wind, steal into the camp before the night is over. You two will take your horses; I will take my son. With nature’s favour, we shall leave as unseen as we enter.”

A certain part of Imoen’s mind could not help but admire the idea. This was the quintessential thief’s plan: move in, steal the target, and move out, without alerting anyone in the process.

This was not the part which asked, quite coldly, “You do know that the woman will simply pick another child?”

A muscle twitched on the man’s face; but when he replied, his voice was steady. “Yes, I do.”

“You have thought the matter over, I see,” Imoen said, looking at the water glittering in the moonlight and trying to keep cool; she still seemed cold to herself, instead.

“You are not a mother,” Cernd replied vehemently; and then, as if disturbed himself by the suddenness of his reaction, added, in a much quieter voice, “If you are asking me if I can live with the consequences of my decision… then yes, I can.”

And it was clear from his tone that he had, indeed, considered all the implications of his choice; which was why Imoen did not press the issue, but instead asked calmly, “Why can’t we just kill her?”

She was not at all surprised by how easily the question came to her; they had killed monsters with Irene.

Cernd’s mouth moved, as if he had just bitten something bitter. “Because she has bonded herself with the grove. This means,” he said, casting a quick, furtive look at the girl, “that whatever harms her harms also the land; and that, as long as the land is healthy, she will take from its powers to strengthen herself. She should not, but—” He shrugged desperately.

Imoen winced. “You mean she’s invincible?”

“As long as the land is healthy, and barring challenges for leadership, yes,” Cernd replied flatly.

“And you won’t harm the land,” Imoen nodded. The water under the bridge was laughing, silvery and pearly in the moonlight, at her. “And the challenge?”

“A fight,” the man said, suddenly and bitterly. “A fight which I cannot win.”

Imoen frowned. “Faldorn won the fight against Gragus.”

“Gragus never bonded himself to the land the way she has. He… thought it too intrusive. He was bound to the land, yes; but only because he served it, and the land repaid his service. He was an old man—a bit younger than Pauden, perhaps,” Cernd said; and Imoen, not for the first time that day, wondered how old the man himself was, “and he was wise in the winter of his life. Many could have won a fight against him, but chose not to.”

“Including you,” Imoen challenged.

“Including me,” Cernd agreed.

“But this ritual challenge is the only way to get at Faldorn,” Imoen said, folding her own arms. It was really getting cold, and her own cloak was back in the hut.

“Yes,” Cernd said reluctantly. “Ultimately, the bond is not with the person, but with the—” He shrugged. “Rank, for lack of a better word. Challenged for supremacy, Faldorn is vulnerable; still strong, but vulnerable. The new leader would fill the void left by her death, and could then slowly dissociate the bond, if he or she so wished.”

Absently, he took off his cloak and offered it to the girl; she wrapped herself in it—like all Cernd, it smelled of herbs—and tried to think. “So, in short, outside of a challenge, Faldorn can’t be killed. You don’t think you can win this fight, which is why we are taking your son and leaving. Is that right?” she said, looking into the druid’s face for confirmation.

There was no intent in her words beyond establishing the facts; which was why Cernd’s reaction to them startled her so. The man tensed and recoiled, almost as if physically hit. “You must think that I’m a spineless coward,” he said, without meeting her eyes.

Imoen frowned. What did it matter what she was thinking? a part of her wanted to ask; for, after all, they had known Cernd all of one day; but then, it had been a very busy day, and the man clearly needed some sympathy in what could not be the easiest decision for him. And he would not get it anywhere else. “No,” she said; and then, suddenly, laughed. “No. That would be what Sarevok would think of you. Me, I think that you are just a nice, normal guy we happened to.” She winced; the last part hadn’t been exactly planned.

Cernd looked at her oddly; the way he had looked at her when she had first learnt that he was a werewolf. “You happened to?” he asked incredulously.

Imoen, suddenly finding that she could not look the man in the face anymore, said, “Yes. We tend to do this to people. Sow chaos in their lives.” She winced again: put this way, it sounded almost like some sort of a mildly embarrassing disease, instead of the fact of it: that people tended to die around her, in gruesome ways.

There was a moment of silence; at the end of which, a calm, sensible male voice said, “Well. No one is perfect.”

Imoen, frowning in disbelief, looked at the druid; who, on his part, immediately looked away, saying, now much less reasonably and much more turbulently, “As I should best know.”

Suddenly, he crouched at the edge of the bridge, and stretched out his hand; as if the sight of the water was no longer enough to calm him, and he needed also to feel its cool touch.

Above him and behind him, Imoen sighed and shook her head. “Cernd,” she said sadly. “I really think that Adratha would understand it if you took Ashdale and left. And that so would Pauden. Me, you’re right, I’m not a mother, but if someone threatened my child, I would probably do the same thing as you said—if I really couldn’t do anything about Faldorn. Because, somehow, I don’t think you would be half as bothered by this whole affair as you are if you really couldn’t do anything about it. So… why don’t we cut this conversation short? Let’s strike a deal. Go and fight Faldorn tomorrow. In return for that… win. Just win. If you must fight her, then don’t hesitate. Kill her. Your son will need his father.”

“I’m not exactly the best material for a godmother,” she finished with a terrible, self-derisive smile, looking at the almost full moon reflected in the water; and feeling cold; so cold.

A bird’s death cry echoed through the swamps.

-----


“Pauden,” Cernd said as he accepted the cloak Imoen returned to him as soon as they entered Adratha’s hut, “I will need you.”

“What?” was all the cantankerous old man managed to utter as he was gently led out of Adratha’s bed and into her kitchen; wherein Cernd told Sarevok, sitting there by the almost put-out fire, “We’ll spend the night outside.”

The younger man nodded. “When will you return?” he asked.

“An hour after dawn at most. If not, Imoen knows what to do,” Cernd said, smiling at the girl; who smiled in return. “Good luck,” she said.

“With nature’s favour, it will be,” Cernd replied peacefully; and, together with Pauden, left the cottage to the siblings.

A silence fell then. Imoen went to her things to put on her own cloak; Sarevok rose and added to the dying fire. “And so, the wer found the motivation to release the wolf,” he said thoughtfully.

Something glittered on his neck in the light of the fire; a necklace, previously hidden by the high collar of his clothes, now escaped as he had loosened the laces of the shirt. This was all of him that was not dark to Imoen as she replied, “You are crude today, brother.”

“Yes,” the man said; and laughed. “Yes, I am. But the interpretation was all yours, sister.”

He stood up from the fire; poured something into two of the clay cups on the table and pushed one over to Imoen. “But let’s not fight, now, sister; there are things you must know.”

“What’s this?” Imoen asked, surprised and suspicious.

In the darkness, her brother shrugged. “Adratha’s finest fruit wine. The old goat showed me where she stocked it.” Suddenly, he laughed again. “It’s not poison, sister. Adratha was, by all accounts, an expert distiller. Drink. You are cold. And I really think you will want to know what the druid told me.”

“You spoke with the druid, then,” Imoen replied casually, sitting by the table. “I’m surprised he would tell anything to a city rat.” The wine tasted slightly sweet and slightly sour; in other words, as wine should.

Her brother seated himself on the other chair, turned half towards her and half to the fire. “Apparently I smell right to him,” he said lightly.

“This does not surprise me. After all, you have put on the skin of a druid, brother,” Imoen remarked amiably, eyeing the man. Here, in the darkness, smelling sweetly and sourly of wine, and dressed in the dark clothes of the man he had killed, he looked like something very different from his urbane persona; and the one impression was that, indeed, this Sarevok was much cruder, though definitely not less cruel, than the other one.

Perhaps it was his true self, she could not remember; and, in any case, soon, he replied flawlessly, “As you have put on the skin of a huntress, sister. I think,” he added, taking a drink of his own wine, “that this is the point where our friend would add some thought on the idea of mimicry.”

“Friend?” Imoen asked, concentrating on the word which felt the most, plainly speaking, wrong.

“I like him,” her brother replied. “He is half a man and half a beast, and it is hard not to commiserate with that. Although he has learnt to control his beast a bit too well, perhaps,” he added after a moment. “There is a yearning somewhere in him, teeming right under his skin… Haven’t you felt it, sister?” he asked, shooting a curious look at Imoen.

Imoen, looking at the burning eyes before her, thought of the druid’s own—dark and oily; and of what Cernd and Pauden were now doing out in the forest—and said, “You will stay away from him, brother.”

Sarevok laughed. “You are being territorial, sister.”

Imoen poured herself more wine. “And you, brother, are again being crude,” she said calmly. “What did Pauden say?”

“That Faldorn’s partner, Dalok, is the one who has our horses. He took them while his shift were returning from Trademeet— A moment, sister,” he said as Imoen was about to ask just what was happening in Trademeet. “We need some order. Dalok is an elf, blond with green eyes. It would be best if you killed him.” For a moment, his voice was hanging expectantly.

Imoen considered. “They know Cernd and Pauden; you will be yourself and will look like one of them. They will think that I’m the weakest link. There must be no weakest link. Is that correct, brother?” She took another sip of the wine.

The man was looking at her curiously. “I must confess, sister, that I did not expect such insight from you,” he admitted, looking away from her and back to the fire. “Then you raise no objections?”

Imoen shrugged. “Cernd will have enough trouble as a leader as it is,” she said. “He isn’t exactly you. He’s far too nice, and not half ruthless enough.”

Her brother looked at her askew. “I will take your words as a compliment, I think,” he said. “But you are right. It is odd to see a father who cares for his son. Still—” He frowned. “First, he will have to survive the fight. The old man mentioned that there may be some trouble?”

Imoen took another sip of wine, and relayed what she had learnt from Cernd about Faldorn, her bond with the grove and the druid ritual of ascendance; at the end of which, her brother, pouring himself the rest of the wine-bottle’s contents, said carefully, “We might tip the balance of the fight in his favour. There is enough poison in this hut—”

“We might,” Imoen interrupted, “but we won’t. You will bring no plague of yours here, brother.” The wine, the fire and the cloak were working: she was feeling much warmer now.

Sarevok shrugged. “Plague? What an odd word to use… Do you know what Faldorn is doing in Trademeet, sister? For the past three days, the whole city has been strangled by vines, watched by wolves, spiders and panthers; and beset by insects. Ants and grasshoppers, devouring everything they encounter; flies and mosquitoes, fouling water and spreading disease; bees and asps, stinging all who dare leave their houses— Ingenious, in a way,” he said, with no small dose of admiration. “I give them another day or two, most. I would like to have met that woman in different circumstances.”

Imoen remembered the insect swarm which had attacked them earlier that day; and shuddered.

“Even if they managed to send out a courier for help through magical means,” Sarevok, meanwhile, mused, “there is nothing they can do to save the city. They may try to break out through the siege army; but, without druids or advanced magic, nigh impossible to work out in the limited time, the city is lost. Of course, the Council of Six will not suffer this insult easily. Trademeet is a chief trade node; and if they let Faldorn take it unpunished, she will press on.”

“There will be retaliation,” Imoen groaned, suddenly understanding. “Here. And the army will not hesitate to destroy the grove to get at Faldorn.” She looked at the man. “An imminent pestilence there, and a pending bloodbath here. And us, squarely in the middle of the future battleground. You must be having fun, brother,” she said; and then, as a sudden thought hit her, a suspicious glare entered her face.

The man returned the look calmly. “I am glad that you have thought of the possibility on your own, sister,” he said. “But I neither have done nor will do anything which would put Cernd’s enterprise in jeopardy. I think,” he laughed, “that I will enjoy seeing Logan Coprith’s face as he ponders whether to hang me or invite me to his house too much for that.”

“He’s the High Merchant of Trademeet, sister,” he said, seeing Imoen’s momentarily confused face. “A reasonable man. Cernd will, I believe, find him amenable to peace overtures,” he added.

“If he wins,” Imoen said, and finished her wine.

“Well,” her brother said, rising to his feet and approaching the fire again. “This rather depends on what you have done to him, sister.”

“What I have done to him?!” behind him, his sister protested.

The man shrugged. “Well, not I. As, I hope, we have already made clear.”

“I haven’t done anything to him,” Imoen said, scowling at the broad back which cut off the light and warmth from the rest of the kitchen. “I like him.”

“And he is attracted to you.”

“If he is, then it’s none of your business,” Imoen said, set her cup on the table with a decisive thud and rose to her feet. “Good night, brother.”

As she was circling the table to get to the bedroom, Sarevok closed his eyes and started to rub them with the palm of his left hand. “A man returns home after a long travel,” he started to speak slowly, almost hesitantly; and Imoen, surprised by the sudden change of tone, looked at him across the table.

“On his way,” her brother was saying, “he encounters two strangers lost in a forest during a storm. He helps them. He guides them. He hunts with them, and shares his food with them. Then—”

“But it wasn’t like this!” Imoen protested. Cernd did share his food with them, on that morning which seemed so far ago now, but—

“Then,” her brother continued mercilessly, “they finally reach his people; and when they do, the man finds his home in disarray, his friends changed or dead, and his own child in danger. He also learns that the strangers are—”

“But it’s us!” Imoen yelled out. “We’re us! Not strange people from some fairy tale!”

It was as if Sarevok hadn’t heard her at all. “The strangers,” he repeated thoughtfully. “They will repay the man’s kindness in kind, of course. This is how the story ends. They are human; and they will fight for him; and, perhaps,” he laughed mirthlessly, “they would even if their own matters were not taking them his way. But they are not only human, sister.”

“Well, we’re not gods, either!” Imoen shouted out; and then, having found a rational argument and thus able to calm herself down, added, “Whatever your megalomania tells you, brother, we’re simply too weak to… give out divine favours. Or however you wish to put it.”

For a moment, she hovered, uncertain and expectant, on the far end of the table; before setting, once again, for the bed and the bedroom.

“The strangers,” the singsong voice resumed, halting her in her tracks. “The brother— No; of him, we shall speak not; he plays no part in the story, save, possibly, to his own grief, that of the oracle powerless to counteract the doom he foretells. It is the sister who acts; let us, then, speak of the sister. She is all the man worships in the land he reveres: is firm; is cruel; is kind; is protective; is compassionate; is demanding. She likes the man; like the old woman his respected friend, she is a huntress who knows well the value of life; she understands implicitly the man’s own creeds; she requires that he fight for her and heal her; she is, lastly, a striking young woman. The man is a widower—”

“Now, you don’t know that!” Imoen said indignantly. “You’re drunk, brother,” she added, disgusted, as she finally realised the simple truth.

Between her and the fire, Sarevok laughed lightly. “Drunk? Yes, I am drunk. Or, possibly, prophetic. The forest affects me, too; but it is of the man that we now speak— The man. The man is a mystic. He thinks in metaphors and speaks in similes; he lives his life amongst rituals, mental exercises and brews designed both to curb his own second nature and to make his mind more open; more pliable—more… receptive to certain forces. He, in short, is not an ungodly man. As the sister-stranger is not an ungodly woman. But; and this is, I believe, the point of these drunken ramblings… She is a huntress and, in half, a goddess, but she is not Mielikki’s daughter.”

Imoen sat—not on the chair; for the chair was still standing between her and her brother—but straight on the table; and said, “So, what you’re saying, brother, is that I somehow… changed Cernd, without either me or him knowing, because he—” She searched for words for a moment; and, finally, unable to find proper ones for what she wanted to express, finished, “let me? Let himself open to me?”

The man’s head dropped, as if all tension had suddenly left his neck muscles; he turned around, opened his eyes, and said, “Yes. The question, sister,” he added, now coolly amused, as he picked up his chair, turned it round, and, putting his hands behind his head, spread rather than merely sat on it, “is what you did to him when he did.”

Imoen narrowed her eyes. “Nothing worse than you ever did, brother, I’m sure. Am I to bring back the topic of Mae’Var’s thieves?”

Her brother shrugged. “Do, if you wish. I convinced them to follow me—”

“How very noble of you,” Imoen interrupted acerbically from the advantage of the table’s height.

“—If anyone can be called an ungodly creature, sister, it’s Aran’s thieves. I could not influence their instincts if I wanted; much less inspire them to murder. Or to let themselves be murdered,” the man sitting on the chair below her finished calmly; and, suddenly, Imoen understood what, in an uncharacteristically roundabout way, her brother had been trying to tell her.

She wished she had had more wine before it had ended.

-----


They were watching each other in the suffocating silence, the girl sitting on the table and the man on the chair in the corner by the smothering fire.

In the end, the girl spoke out first. “Didn’t it occur to you to tell me all this a bit earlier?”

The reply was simple. “I am not your keeper, little sister.”

“You said you like him,” the girl replied desperately.

The man scowled; but then, suddenly, relaxed. “I didn’t know it could happen,” he said lightly; almost flippantly.

The girl blinked. “You didn’t know it could happen.”

The man shrugged. “It never happened to me.”

“Then how—”

A small smile crossed the man’s face. “You asked me about the thieves… You should have asked me about my acolytes, sister. They did take their power from me, and it strengthened them both internally and corporally. But they did so knowingly, and after months of preparations.”

“You mean you are guessing?! We’ve wasted all this time on your guesses?!”

“Don’t glare at me like this, sister… When you two returned from your little heart-to-heart, he was changed. That, of and in itself, does not mean much; after all, he did just take a significant decision. But you… you were cold. Frigid. Do you know how cold your other self is, sister?”

A silence.

“What will happen now, brother?”

“I don’t know.”

“Then what do you think will happen?”

“What favour you grant may have but one consequence, sister. A murder. And you know whose death tomorrow will breed more death in turn.”

“But he has his own gods to defend him! And I’m, well—”

“Young.” A laugh. “It’s all half conjecture and three quarters prophecy. Nothing of it must come to pass. But—”

“But I am a cruel goddess, and may kill him for the fun of it. Is that what you were about to say?”

“I meant, sister, that… I don’t remember if I ever managed to shape the raw energy I lent into some specific form. Then, of course,” another small laugh, “I don’t think I ever tried. And certainly not into the one kill which would prevent further kills. But it must be possible.” A massive yawn. “Try to control yourself, can you, sister? You managed not to kill me, after all. The toad who wants to eat the swan’s flesh—”

Imoen looked at the tall figure in the dark clothes sitting by the dying fire; and said sensibly, “Take the bed, brother. You almost haven’t slept yesternight. I’ll wake you up in several hours.”

-----


Left to herself, she added to the fire; poured herself the rest of Cernd’s invigorating brew, now long cold and completely without taste; cleaned her armour and her sword; skimmed through her spell-book; went for a brief walk around the hut; returned to the kitchen, took out her diary and started to write in it in a completely failed attempt to order impressions and thoughts.

Half the night passed; the diary was closed and hidden in the bags; and an unforeseen problem posed itself.

It felt strange to see her brother curled up on his side in the bed which was far too small for him, sleeping with his face twisted into a feral scowl, the muscles of his left hand, thrown over the deerskin cover, tense, taut and playing right down to the tightly clenched fist, a necklace glittering on his neck in the moonlight, and a trickle of blood running from his nose to stain the white linen of Adratha’s pillow; and not only because she knew that, if touched to awaken, this man might possibly swap her like a fly and break her neck without even realising it.

Suddenly, the breathing rhythm changed; and, shortly, she heard an amused voice speak out, without the man ever moving, “Well, sister? What is your decision tonight?” They were thinking the same thing, of course: they were siblings.

She refused to be baited, nevertheless; and, putting her sword and her dagger on top of the large wooden chest standing by the bed, said, “Everything is calm, brother;” and then, as the bed was promptly being vacated, added, “I’m all prepared, so you don’t have to wake me early.”

He was leaving the bedroom to her, soon and without further word. “There is blood on the pillow!” she yelled after him.

He did not close his eyes; and so, in their treacherous light, she could see the whole procession of feelings on his face: first, a bemused frown; then, an irritated scowl; finally, a distinctly familiar cruel twist around the mouth: amusement. “Then turn the pillow over,” he said; and was gone.

Imoen, with a scowl of her own, did; then, slid into the warm, almost hot, bed; and dreamt.

-----


Irene was sitting on the familiar bridge, a bridge of human femurs cast over a river of blood; and also, the bridge in front of Adratha’s cottage. She was dangling her legs over the ledge, and demurely dropping little stones which were not stones but human bones into the river below.

“Hello, Irene,” Imoen said, approaching her dwarven sister and sitting next to her.

“You know,” she said when she received no reply. “This place. It’s no longer scary. I mean, it is, but it isn’t. It’s… familiar.”

A dagger appeared in her hand. She let it drop into the river.

“Good,” she heard suddenly. Irene still wasn’t looking at her; but she added, “After all, it’s you.” A femur appeared in her hand; she exerted and threw it far, far away in a high arc.

“No,” the dreaming girl disagreed. “I mean. I know this bridge. It’s just outside the cottage in the true world. In Amn,” she added as it occurred to her that she did not know if this place was not, by chance, also true and real.

“Sure it is, silly,” the dwarf said, and smiled her eyeless, lipless smile. “You know every place here. Even if you haven’t seen it yet. Unless,” she added after a moment, “you don’t survive to see them, of course.”

Imoen considered this for a moment. “Tell me, Irene,” she said at length. “Do you have to look like this?”

The dwarf finally looked at her. “Of course not,” she said; and became her living self, with her merry eyes, her chestnut beard and her honest smile.

“I did this,” she added, pulling her legs under her chin, “to make you see that I am not really me. All I am is a memory of me in you, and a shadow of myself here in Father’s realm. Would you like to see Edwin, by the way?” she asked suddenly. “He’s in his laboratory, picking up things after Father’s visit.”

Imoen considered again. “No,” she said. “I don’t think so. Not yet, at least.” She felt something in her hand; she dropped it into the river absently, without looking at it.

Irene shrugged; and, undeterred, continued, “You, of course, are quickly turning to be his puppet in life… Did you have the time to consider his question?”

Imoen stretched her memory. “Yes,” she replied. “I think I did. I was killing Sarevok because that was what I wanted. It wasn’t because he deserved it, or because he escaped justice, or for you, or because… anything. I just wanted it. More than anything. There was nothing I wanted more. That’s it. Did you ever feel that way?” she asked curiously.

“Yes, of course,” Irene replied, turning to Imoen, crossing her legs, and putting her hands under her chin; and smiling. “I wanted to kill you because you were you. So bloody chirpy all the time, running around being so bloody merry when I was waking up after another very bloody dream. And the elves for being so… elvish. And Jaheira for being Jaheira, and Khalid for never telling her to shut up. And I wanted to kill them all just… because. You know.”

“I remember,” Imoen said, pulling her left leg under her as she turned to her sister, “how you touched that ogre and killed it.”

“Yes,” Irene replied.

“You said that it made you feel bad.”

“Well, now you know how it felt. Good.”

“Perfect,” Imoen agreed. “How do I stop it?”

The dwarf considered. “No,” she said reluctantly in the end. “I can’t tell you that. Father doesn’t want me to. You have to find out yourself.”

“Irene,” Imoen pled. “I must know. There’s this guy, you see—”

The dwarf’s eyes twinkled merrily. “There is?”

“Irene!” Imoen laughed, punching the dwarf lightly in the shoulder. “I’ve known him all of one day! And we haven’t even talked that much. And he has his own problems. And he’s ten years older than me, at least. And he has a son—”

“—and you, apparently, know a lot about him,” the dwarf finished, also laughing.

The dreaming girl shook her head in disbelief. “Honestly. Between you and Sarevok—”

The dwarf suddenly stopped laughing. “Then you speak with my killer,” she said, clearly disappointed; and Imoen felt disappointed in herself, too.

A sudden thought entered her mind, though; but, as she started to frame it into words and speak it out, “Irene—,” she felt a sudden tug; and was torn back into Amn, with only the vague aftertaste remaining that she lost something; something extraordinarily important.

-----


“Imoen!” the irritated voice was saying; and, for a moment, Imoen couldn’t quite pinpoint the caller; until, that is, the selfsame, though much more amused, voice said, “Little sister, I would know how, with a sleep like that, all my assassins failed to dispatch of you;” for then, the world was returned to normal.

She opened her eyes, blinked to chase away sleep, and said coolly, “That’s what elves are for, brother.”

Sarevok looked at her curiously; and said, “Cernd is back, sister.”




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