R. Salvatore: Realms of Magic

Jehan panicked. The statue offered only minimal protection for an immobile target wedged between it and the wall. Jehan's legs stiffened to push him back into the wall itself.

The wall did not move. The statue did. It tipped forward on its loose mounting.

Jehan's panic that he would be shot was suddenly replaced with a similar concern that he would fall from his perch. With a shout, he leapt forward to grab the statue behind the wings and rode it down as it tipped forward.

The giff had time to look up at the plummeting statue, open his huge maw in a shout, and raise his gun. The pistol detonated as the great bronze deva, Jehan on its back, slammed into him.

On impact, Jehan rolled free and felt something give in his right leg. He rose slowly to survey the damage. The giff had been pinned beneath the heavy statue, a large pond of blackish blood pooling beneath him. The creature was still struggling, and as Jehan watched, he started to shift the heavy statue off himself. Of the gun there was no sign, and Jehan had no time to search for it.

Jehan looked up at the skylight, now as unapproachable as the moon beyond it. The only way out would be past the merchant, who likely had the other gun.

Jehan dodged over three rows of crates before heading for the door, hoping Khanos would search out his companion at the sound of his cry. Indeed, Azuth and Mystra were smiling on him, for the area in front of the great oak door was clear. Jehan tugged on it with his good arm, then realized it was still locked. He reached over and, grunting, unlocked the door.

"Stand away from the door, would you, boy?" said a voice behind him, raising the last word in an odd inflection.

Jehan cursed softly and turned slowly to face Khanos. He wished he had some lightning bolt or other spell to slay the merchant on the spot, but he was a novice mage, and the wind-sweep cantrip had emptied his mind.

Khanos was there, and had the other arquebus in his hand. There was no sign of the giff. The merchant had a lopsided smile on his face.

"I really wish we could let you live?" he said, emphasizing the last word. "But it just wouldn't do, would it? I mean, your magical brothers might want to hunt you down when they themselves start dropping from assassin's bullets? Oh yes, the powder isn't leaving the city, not when it can be put to much better use here? A few well-placed shots against the more powerful mages, and the rest will retreat into their towers? Wizards are cowards like that, aren't they? And by the time they emerge, we'll have a ready supply of powder from Ladislau's friends? So unwittingly, you helped bring a new thing to Waterdeep- and greater independence from mages?"

Jehan was not thinking of the advancements to Water-deep, but rather the distance between the two of them. Four steps. More than enough distance for the merchant to get off a shot before Jehan could get the gun. And from the easy way he held the weapon, Khanos seemed a better marksman than the giff had been. Still, it was move and die, or stay and perish just as surely.

Jehan started to move forward when the door behind him rolled aside on its squeaking runners. A fresh breeze blew aside the dust still hanging in the air. Khanos pointed his gun at the doorway as a new figure entered the warehouse.

Jehan gasped. The new arrival was himself, or rather an unwounded, unbloodied Jehan, dressed as he had been when he left the tavern, unblemished and unarmed. No, this Jehan was a little taller, perhaps a little fiercer, but otherwise it was he.

"Another wizard?" spat Khanos. "You'll come no closer?"

"I don't think so," said the other Jehan, using Jehan's voice and mannerisms. "I think it's time to wrap this little play up, eh?"

"I'll shoot?" said the merchant.

"Be my guest," said the other Jehan, striding forward and in front of the young wounded mage. Jehan saw that magical energy was already dancing at the ends of his duplicate's fingertips.

The other Jehan took two steps forward, and Khanos fired, the thunder of the gun echoing through the warehouse. The other Jehan did not flinch or fall. The bullet struck him with a metallic splang, then rebounded in the darkness.

The other Jehan took another two steps and reached up, grasping the merchant by the forehead. Yellow lances of energy raced across Khanos's face, and the foreign merchant screamed, his skull shuddering under the other Jehan's grip. After a few moments, the merchant toppled forward, his ears and mouth streaming with thin wisps of white smoke.

The other Jehan turned to the young mage and scowled, that serious scowl that Jehan used when listening to his master. "Now that this is all taken care of, you'd best get home. I'll see to the disposal of the powder."

The original Jehan shook his head. His voice cracked as he spoke: "There is another one here, a giff. He has a pistol, as well."

"That is true," said Ladislau, standing by the barrel of smoke powder. The giff's face and topcoat were slick with black blood, and he had lost an eye to the bronzework deva. He aimed the gun at Jehan's duplicate.

"You saw what happened to your ally," said the other Jehan. "Do you think you can hurt me with mere bullets?"

The giff gave a bloody-mouthed smile and said, "No, not with bullets." He aimed the gun at the barrel of purified smoke powder. "Not with bullets," he repeated. "But a single shot will blow us all to our respective afterlives."

The other Jehan took a step forward and snapped his fingers. A single flame appeared and danced at the tip of his index finger. "Run, boy," he said to the battered, original version.

Jehan ran, making long, limping strides. As he cleared the door, he heard the giff shout, "I'm not bluffing."

The other Jehan replied coolly, "Neither am I."

Jehan made it ten, maybe eleven steps past the door when a huge hand grabbed him and pressed him flat against the ground. Then the thunder, this time like a thousand arquebuses firing at once, swept over him and pressed him farther against the cobblestones. Then the heat washed over him in a single blast, pushing past in its rush to escape the alley.

Jehan rose slowly and saw that the warehouse was in flames, the fire already licking up through the broken skylight and setting the roof ablaze. The single entrance was an inferno, and while the walls seemed to have resisted the blast, nothing could live within it.

The other Jehan stepped out through the doorway, unblemished by the explosion, and unsinged by the flames. He looked around, spotting the unsteady youth, and walked toward him. —

As he walked, the duplicate's features changed. He became taller, almost gangly, and his hair changed from Jehan's dark ponytail to an icy blond tint, worn short. Gerald, Anton's friend.

Then he changed again, the blond darkening to a night-black shade, worn free over the shoulders, the face aging and gaining a full beard, black with a white stripe in its center. The shoulders widened, and the wizard's stride became long and measured. Khelben Arunsun, the Black-staff of Waterdeep. The Old Spider.

"Are you all right, child?" asked the elder mage.

Jehan, propped against a wall, managed a weak nod. He noticed that no mind-killing lights danced at the older man's fingertips.

"Good," said the wizard. "Maskar takes a dim view when I get his apprentices damaged, and doubly so when they are his relatives. Of course, he's dismissed apprentices for much less serious crimes than this."

Jehan's mouth finally found purchase. "What…?" he said. "What happened?"

Khelben's mouth formed a thin line. "For what it's worth, you can tell your master that my original plan did not involve you. I had found this little bit of smoke powder, and put the sand in it, hoping to turn up the conspirators. Then as Gerald, I would hang out at the better taverns loudly declaring my anti-elder, pro-powder thoughts, waiting for someone to contact me to solve the little problem I had given them. I did not count on another young whelp making a better case than myself on the use of smoke powder. I did not even know you had been contacted until an abjuration I had placed here warned me that the powder had been purified. At that point, it seemed to make more sense to imitate your appearance, and throw the conspirators off-balance, should they have killed you. My 'Gerald' identity failed to impress them earlier, and I would set them to immediate flight in my natural form, the one you so aptly titled 'skunk-maned.'"