Ed Greenwood: Cloak of Shadows

The three companions at the table sighed-in Itharr's case, it was almost a groan-as the Old Mage shuffled unconcernedly forward. His pipe appeared out of thin air behind him with a pop and floated along in his wake as he came to the table, lowering himself with a grunt onto the bench beside Belkram.

The taller and more ruggedly handsome of the two young Harpers looked into the mage's old, bearded face with something approaching fond amusement. "How long have you been here listening?"

Belkram's tankard rose stealthily from the table and darted toward Elminster's waiting hand as the wizard of Shadowdale said mildly, "Long enough to tell this lass here-"

He gestured with a glance, and Belkram's eyes, following the wizard's gaze across the table to where Sharantyr sat with a dangerous look growing on her face, saw his tankard flying past. He made a grab for it, missed as it impudently shot straight upward, and overbalanced heavily onto the table.

Sharantyr's wine danced, and Itharr chuckled as she made her own-successful-grab for drinkables. As the lady Knight swept her goblet away from disaster, Elminster continued unconcernedly, "-that Flambarra was found by Elion of Talltrees, and by the grace of Tymora lives again."

Sharantyr stared at him for a moment in astonished silence. Then tears of joy rained from her, and she erupted across the table, crushing the stolen tankard against Elminster's cheek as she embraced the Old Mage. Around her tearful thanks he said gruffly, "Agh! Urgghh! I-The deed was not mine, lass, but if ye're bent on thanking me, well, my mouth is over here, and-"

Obedient lips found his enthusiastically, and his words trailed away in a confusion of frantic murmurs. One of the Old Mage's hands waved vainly above the lady ranger's smooth shoulders, gesturing frantically but not too frantically.

Itharr took in the sight with one bright eye. Turning deliberately to his Harper colleague, he remarked casually, "All in Faerun is not dark these days, indeed. Why, I could not help but notice, as we came here to partake of this excellent beer tonight, that the price of potatoes has fallen a full two coppers the wagonload, heralding a goodly harvest without doubt."

Belkram nodded his head and replied heartily, 'This is true, good Itharr, and yet surpassed by even more heartening news! Our internal ablutions cannot help but be aided by a similar drop in the price of ale, a drop that by the all-surpassing favor of the gods bids fair to coincide with a rise in the quality of the brew. Richer, nuttier, and more warming in the chest, by my halidom, and-"

"You can belt up now," Sharantyr told them both in dry tones. "I had to release him, to draw breath."

"And yet," Elminster put in merrily, in perfect mimicry of Itharr's conversational tone, "I find the surpassing memory of her kiss is a fiery balm upon the hitherto-cooling flames of my old heart! I could not help but notice, moreover, that her tears taste like the finest salt wine of Tashluta, and her eyes are like two dark and welcoming stars in th-"

Sharantyr plucked the gently smoking pipe deftly from where it floated in the air by the Old Mage's shoulder and thrust it into his mouth. "Glup," he added intelligently, ere smoke began to leak from his ears and nose.

The two young Harpers shouted their laughter at Elminster's slightly disbelieving expression… and then at the dangerous calm with which he spat the pipe out, watched it scud away trailing smoke across the room, and turned to regard Sharantyr.

The Lady of Shadowdale shrank back a little and brushed her long hair out of her face with one impatient hand as if preparing for battle, but met Elminster's gaze with a bold, silent calmness of her own.

Elminster's eyes blazed at her for a long, tense moment. Then the Old Mage turned his head and said lightly, as if nothing had occurred, "I observed the newborn pricing of potatoes too, and wondered in passing if it meant other goodly harvests, and a general time of plenty across the Dragonreach!"

"Well," Belkram said in a voice as dry as the bottom of the empty tankard he had retrieved, "if magic everywhere continues to fail and go wild, farmers'll certainly have less interference in taking their crops in, and we'll see fewer armies on the march to devour it all."

Itharr sighed. "You would have to drag things back to that."

Belkram spread his hands. "And is this chaos of magic not the true driving force of the times? And do we not share a victory, born of this very matter? A victory that bears celebration?"

"I'll ring for more beer," Itharr replied, pulling on the stout cord that hung by the wall near his corner seat.

"The simple solution to ill tidings," Elminster informed the ceiling. "Have more to drink."

Belkram shrugged. "With thirsty wizards at the table, I'm in little danger of getting more to drink, wouldn't you agree?"

Elminster's reply was a snort that seemed as eloquent as several speeches. They were still chuckling when there was a rap on the door. "Ale," came the voice of a server from outside.

"Ride in!" Itharr called in reply as Sharantyr took another sip of her wine and Belkram made an innocent grab for the floating pipe.

The door swung wide, and they had a momentary glimpse of a young boy's face, set in concentration over a tray laden with tankards, before he hurled tray and all at them.

Blue-white fire roared out of the heart of the tumbling pitchers and steins, thrusting into the face of the Old Mage like a bright, unstoppable lance.

Blue radiance flashed around the calm wizard, and the roaring shaft of devouring fire rebounded from him, snarling back at its source while the surprised and shouting Harpers and lady ranger were still hurling themselves back from the table and snatching at their sword hilts.

One tardy tankard melted away in the path of the fiery bolt and was hurled aside in the form of hissing droplets of molten metal. Beyond them there was a thin scream as the white light found its source and winked out.

Sharantyr and the Harpers were leaping forward by then, blades drawn, as the staggering, hunched thing that had been a serving boy a moment before sprouted long, snakelike tentacles in all directions. Coiling like a forest of serpents, the tentacles lengthened with terrifying speed, growing sharp edges and points like blades. Without pause they slashed and stabbed at the charging Harpers, slithering and looping around them.

Amid this sudden chaos, Elminster calmly pulled the bell rope for beer again, even as a single tentacle leapt past the shoulders of his three embattled companions, growing to an impossible stretch over the entire length of the table as it raced toward him. Its skin seemed to split and shrivel away as it came, revealing a needlelike, flashing sword. Elminster calmly murmured an incantation as the slim steel stabbed at him.

As he completed the spell, the Old Mage heard the tentacled creature grunt in pain as someone's blade struck home. Sharantyr gasped as a tentacle tightened around her, and then the sword that sought Elminster's life passed through his arm as if it were made of smoke and plunged deep into him!

He felt nothing as the blade plunged, probed, slashed, and was driven home again, cleaving the air freely as if he weren't standing there. El looked at his three friends, hacking at growing forests of tentacles around them, saw Belkram look back apprehensively, and snapped, "Drive your blades deep, all of you!"

An instant later his spell took effect. Blue lightning crackled from Itharr's blade to Sharantyr's, then from hers to Belkram's steel as the three swords quivered amid rubbery, shapeshifting flesh and hot, rushing blood. The creature they fought shuddered as smoke rose from it. Then it collapsed suddenly away from around their blades like the contents of a fresh-broken egg, flowing to the floor in an untidy heap.