Irlar roared, clutching at his eyes.
She felt his dagger swing around, missing her in the darkness as she Hung herself back and away, rolling along the edge of her bed. As always, casting the cantrip left her weak and trembling. She found her feet and fled unsteadily across her dark bedchamber, hampered by her skirts, trying to keep ahead of his reaching blade.
Cursing, Irlar came after her. He slashed wildly with the dagger, still blind but heading straight for the passage door. She'd have no time to throw the bolt and escape from her rooms. She whirled around her unseen guest table, bending her will again to the harping, bringing it louder and nearer.
Irlar followed. His cursing sounded scared now, more than angry.
Alustriel breathed a prayer to Tyche as she bumped her shins into her little side table, stumbled, and caught herself on it with both hands. She swept it up desperately, spilling a mint-water decanter and two drinking horns to the floor. She held it like a shield.
Irlar charged toward the noise, slashing wildly. He slipped on one of the horns and flung his arms up to hold his balance.
Alustriel stepped forward to bring all her weight to bear, as she'd seen her uncle's axe men do, and brought the little table down as hard as she could on the hand that held the dagger.
Irlar screamed on the heels of the sickening crack. The dagger rang off the glass decanter somewhere underfoot.
He lunged upon her, grabbing at the table with his good hand. She held to it, but he jerked impatiently, tore it from her grasp, and flung it away. It crashed against the far wall.
Alustriel dodged away again, desperate now.
"Bitch!" Irlar hissed at her savagely. "I'll kill you for that!"
She knew his words for simple truth. His thoughts of abduction on horseback to a temple of Bane were gone. Nothing less than her blood would satisfy him now. He crashed into another table, toppling statuettes and jars, but did not upset it and stopped, holding to it to steady himself. Alustriel heard a jar roll across it with almost lazy slowness-before it toppled over the edge to the floor.
Then she was pulling at die bolt of her chamber door with all her strength. It squealed, and he roared at the sound. Some instinct made Alustriel duck away. An instant later a perfume bottle crashed into shards against the wall just above her head, showering her with glass and a stinging mist. Then came another and another. In her hampering skirts, she scuttled sideways seeking a weapon... or a refuge against his murderous fury... and knowing she would find neither.
A rushing, whistling sound in the darkness told with cold certainty that Irlar had found her riding whip.
She had to get out of these long skirts! With shaking fingers, she unlaced and tore at the garment, crouching low and biting her lip.
Irlar panted and thrashed the darkness furiously with the whip, seeking her.
Nearer he came, and nearer. Alustriel rolled out of her skirts at last. He heard her and charged with an exultant roar. She twisted on the floor and brought the cloth up before her in both hands, as a shield. The whip cut into them with a sharp crack, and one of her arms burned with sudden, stinging fire.
The whip came down again-and again and again, in a rain of blows too wild and rage-driven to be precise. Alustriel rolled and crawled and writhed on her luxuriant rugs, but could not elude him. When she got the edge of a table between her and the whip, Irlar kicked her savagely in the face and breast until she was out from under the table's shelter-and pressed on with his whipping, grunting with the effort of his stroke.
Alustriel sobbed as she made for the table. This time the whip missed her. She crouched motionless in the dark, gathered her tattered will, and bent it to her task.
In the darkness above, Irlar sneezed. Alustriel gave a little crow of triumphant laughter. Again she felt the surge- and again he sneezed, the whip swinging wildly. She rose swiftly under die table, catching it on her shoulders and driving it into him. Irlar stumbled back into furnishings and went down, losing the whip. Alustriel danced away from his flailing limbs. She headed for the door, her only chance.
She pulled on the bolt with sudden, rising hope-but the brass jammed in her haste and wouldn't budge. Looking back, she saw Irlar silhouetted against the dim torchlight of the window, leaning on the stone table and reaching for the bell-hood of her tiny oil lamp. She could not let him lift it, or she was lost! With light enough, he could stalk her at leisure....
His eyes must have recovered. As his hand settled on the hood, Alustriel ran at him with frantic haste, heart pounding. She crashed into him just as he saw her in the blossoming lamplight. He struck her on the brow with the hood. Alustriel reeled... but her hands were on the hot metal, and she swept the lamp up and out the window, heedless of the spilling oil-and the room was safely in darkness again.
She was too close to the window. Irlar could see her outlines in the faint torchlight. He shoved her away so he could land a blow with his good hand: a solid punch that sent her reeling, eyes stinging and wits dazed. Her jaw felt as if it was broken... gods, the pain! He was after her triumphantly, reaching out to throttle her.
Alustriel fled from him-had she been dodging him in the darkness forever? In sudden determination she turned and fled no more but ducked in under his arm, ramming her head into his belly as hard as she could, charging forward.
Irlar was in pain, and unsteady. She carried him before her rush, back, back to the window. He kicked out wildly as his back hit the low sill. He lost his balance. Alustriel punched his groin, grabbed his foot, twisted, shoved- and suddenly she was alone in the room.
There was a sickening crack from the courtyard below. Lord Irlar struck the stones and bounced, once. A moment later, Alustriel heard the sudden shout of a guard. Torches began to flicker and move.
She leaned on the sill for a moment to catch her breath, watching them, and then turned deliberately for the door. The harp's song began as a few happy notes and swelled around her. She walked, uncaring of her appearance, down the long dark passage, through the heavy doors, and around the turn to her uncle's door. As she approached, it was thrown open.
Thamator came out into the night gloom, his sword drawn.
"Who be ye?" he challenged roughly, blinking into the darkness. The music of the harp swirled around him.
"I still want to be a Harper," Alustriel told him, surprised at how calm her voice sounded.
"Ye, girl? Must ye wake me with such tricks at this time of night? Hast aught else to do?" her uncle demanded thickly. She knew from his tone that her music reminded him of someone else, from long ago. The sword in his hands began to glow palely. In the growing radiance she saw his jaw drop.
His gaze was on her bloody state of undress, and roved to take in the red whip weal’s crisscrossing her body. He took a step forward, peering at her in disbelief. "What, in the name of all the gods, bef-"
Then there was a clatter of hurrying boots, and a waving torch came around the corner, its light gleaming on helms and spear points... and anxious faces. "My lord!" snapped one of the guards, his voice high with tension. "The Lord Irlar! He's dead! In the courtyard, belike he's fallen from a window!"
"Aye," Alustriel said into the astonished silence, "he did." Ignoring the startled looks from the men crowding around her, she added, "After he was pushed."
Meeting her uncle's eyes steadily, she added, "1 was disinclined to become a bride of Bane-and before my wedding night, too."
She turned her back on them all with newfound dignity and left then. Her uncle's astonished curses faded behind her as she sought her room again. His voice sounded, she thought, amazed and... and a little pleased.
Now to ask Gaerd how to become a Harper. Alustriel looked down at herself, shrugged at her state of dress, and turned her aching, whip-scarred legs down a different passage. Why not now? Why should her uncle be the only one roused this night?
When she knocked on the wizard's door, it opened, and Gaerd was smiling at her-sleepily, but smiling nonetheless.
There was a crystal sphere in his hand, and in it she saw, with a little shock, the open window of her room as seen from within... captured as a tiny scene within the.'j globe. The mage waved her to a chair, beaming at her proudly. On the table beyond the seat, a harp of silver hue was playing softly, by itself... and with a smile, she recognized her tune.
Chapter Thirteen
NERGAL SURPRISED
Adrift in a dream of pain, Elminster gradually came awake to the realization that it was real. He was floating, or falling, through a cloud of red and black smoky foulness shot through with crackling fires. Bolts of bright fury lanced out of it from time to time to transfix him. He was falling through Nergal's mind.
Awake, little worm? Wasted my time again, thank you kindly.
[mind bolt jabs repeatedly until the human writhes and curls in shuddering pain, and then jabs still more]
What did i think of it? Charming. [sneer] Defeat a man by luck, and take your reward from the goddess.
[gasp] Well, mind-slave, i've lost patience. Again. Prepare to he taken apart. I'm through dancing to your little games. I'm going to find and take the useful memories from you and be done. Die, mighty wizard!
[bright arc of mind bolts, raining down like fire and splashing back up to overwhelm all, searing the tumbling, howling, fading form of the human host]
Give me, fool! Give me what i seek!
[bright ring of fire, tightening into a noose around the falling, dwindling, limbless essence of Elminster]