Elminster frowned angrily. "Ye seek to trick me with clever words, Lady!"

"Nay," came the soft reply. "I seek to make you think before you offer your own clever words and quick, sure judgments. I ask again: is a sword evil?"

"Nay," Elminster said, "for a sword cannot think."

The lady nodded. "Is a plow evil?"

"Nay," Elminster replied, raising an eyebrow. "What mean ye?"

"If a blade is not evil, but may be used for evil, is not this scepter the same?"

Elminster frowned and shook his head slightly, but did not reply.

Those eyes of light held his steadily. "What if I offered this scepter to a wizard, an innocent apprentice in some other land, not a magelord? What would you say to that?"

Elminster felt anger rising in him. Was everyone who worked sorcery given to fencing with clever words? Why did they always toy with him, as if he were a child, or a beast to be slain or transformed with but a pa.s.sing thought? "I would say against it, Lady. No one should use such a thing without knowing first how to use it-and knowing its work well enough to realize what changes it will work in Faerun."

"Sober words for one so young. Most youths, and most mages, are so full of whim and pride that they'll dare anything."

Her words calmed him a little. At least she listened and did not dismiss him out of hand. Who was she? Did Mystra bind wizards to guard every one of her temples?

Elminster shook his head again. "I am a thief, Lady, in a city ruled by cruel wizards. Whim and pride are luxuries only rich fools can afford. If I want to indulge in them, I must needs do it by night, in bedchambers or on rooftops." He smiled thinly. "Thieves-and indeed farmers, beggars, and folk who own only a small shop or hand-trade, methinks-must keep themselves under rather more control by day, or soon perish."

"What would you do," the sorceress asked curiously, eyes very bright, "if you could work magic and became a wizard as strong as those who dwell here?"

"I'd use my spells to drive all the wizards out of Athalantar so folk could be free. I'd set a few other things right, too, and then renounce magic forever."

"For you hate magic," the lady said softly. "What if you did not and someone gave you the power, and told you that it must be used, that you must be a wizard? What then?"

"I'd try to be a good one," Elminster replied, shrugging again. Did temple wizards just talk to every intruder all the night through? Still, it felt good to speak openly at last to someone who listened and seemed to understand but not judge.

"Would you make yourself king?"

Elminster shook his head. "I'd not be a good one," he said. "I have not the patience." He smiled suddenly and added, "Yet if I found a man or a maid who'd wear the crown well, I'd stand behind him or her. That, I think, is the true work of a wizard-to make life in the lands he dwells in good for all who dwell there."

Her smile, then, was dazzling. Elminster felt sudden power in the air around him. His hair crackled, and his skin tingled. "Will you kneel to me?" the sorceress asked, striding nearer.

Elminster swallowed, mouth suddenly dry. She was very beautiful, and yet somehow terrifying, her eyes and hair alight with power like flame waiting to burst forth. Trembling, Elminster held his ground and asked, "L-Lady, what is thy name? Who are ye?"

"I am Mystra," came a voice that crashed around him like a mighty wave smashing on rocks. Its echoes rolled around the chamber. "I am the Lady of Might and the Mistress of Magic! I am Power Incarnate! Wherever magic is worked, there am I- from the cold poles of Toril to its hottest jungles, whatever the hand or claw or will that works the sorcery! Behold me and fear me! Yet behold me and love me-as all who deal with me in honesty do. This world is my domain. I am magic, mightiest among all those men worship. I am the One True Spell at the heart of all spells. There is no other."

Echoes rolled away. Elminster felt the very pillars of the temple shaking around him. He wavered in awe, like a man struggling in a high wind, but kept his feet. Silence fell, and their eyes met.

Golden flames burned in her gaze. Elminster felt as if he were burning inside; hot fire raced along his veins, pain rising in him like an angry red wave.

"Man," the G.o.ddess said, in an awful whisper, "do you defy me?"

Elminster shook his head. "I came here to curse thee or desecrate thy holy place or demand aid from thee, but now-no. I wish ye hadn't let the magelords slay my parents and ruin my realm, and I would ... know why. But I have no wish to defy ye."

"What do you feel, instead?"

Elminster sighed. Somehow he'd felt he had to speak the truth since her first words to him, and it was still so. "I fear ye, and ..." He was silent for a time, and then what might have been a smile touched his lips, and he went on. "... I think I could learn to love ye."

Mystra was very close to him now, and her eyes were dark pools of mystery. She smiled, and suddenly Elminster felt cool and refreshed, at ease.

"I let mages use spells freely so that all beings who use magic may escape tyranny. But from that freedom come such as the magelords in this land," she said. "If you would overthrow them, why not become a mage yourself? It is but a tool in your hand... and it seems to fit your hand better than many I have seen grasping at it."

Elminster took a pace back, lifting his hands in an unconscious warding gesture.

Mystra halted, eyes suddenly stern. "I ask again: will you kneel to me?"

Eyes locked on hers, he knelt slowly. "Lady, I confess I am awed," he said slowly, "but if I serve thee ... I'd rather do it with my eyes open."

Mystra laughed, eyes sparkling. "Ah, but it is long since I've met such a one as you!"

Then her face was again solemn, and her voice low. "Extend your hand, freely and in trust, or go unharmed; choose."

Elminster extended his hand without hesitation. Mystra smiled and touched it. Fire consumed him, spun him down helplessly into nothing and beyond, and whirled him away into golden depths ... as a thousand lightning bolts struck through his heart and roared back out of him as consuming flame....

Elminster screamed, or tried to, as he was flung away into many-hued madness, a place of blinding light and blazing pain.

He roared, and when darkness rushed up to meet him, he plunged headlong into it, striking it as if it were a stone wall. Dashed against it, he was ... gone....

It was the cold, again, that awakened him. Elminster sat up, half expecting to see the burial-ground slumbering around him, and found instead the temple, still and dark. Power yet flowed in it, though, in a silent, invisible web of stirrings all around him, from the bare altar to the armsmen and the magelord who stood motionless all around the circular chancel.

Now he could feel magic as well as see it!

Awed, Elminster looked all around. He was naked; everything had been burned away to lie in ashes around him except for the Lion Sword, which lay beside him, unchanged from its ruined state. Taking it up with a smile-the Mistress of Magic knew his duty, too, it seemed-he got to his feet. The blue glow of magic was everywhere in this vast chamber, but brightest of all behind him. He turned and beheld the altar.

Mystra was gone, and her scepter with her, but as he looked, words flamed out brightly on the altar. He hurried forward to read them. "Teach thyself magic, and see the Realms. You will know when to come back to Athalantar. Worship me always with that keen mind and that lack of pride, and you will please me well. Serve me first by touching my altar."

As he finished reading, the words faded. When the altar was bare and dark again, he reached forward tentatively-paused in sudden, trembling fear-and then laid a hand firmly on the cold stone.

He thought he heard a faint chuckle, somewhere nearby .. . and then darkness claimed him again.

Eight.

TO SERVE MYSTRA.

Did I ever tell thee how I first came to serve Mystra? No? Ye won't believe a word of it naetheless. The way of the Lady seems strange to most men-but then, most men are sane. Well, more or less.

Sundral Morthyn

The Way of a Wizard

Year of Singing Shards The world was drifting white mists. Elminster shook his head to be free of them and heard a bird calling. A bird? In the depths of the dark, empty temple? He shook his head again, and realized with a start that his bare feet stood on moss and earth, not cold stone. Where was he?

El found himself struggling now to break free of the mists ... clouds in his mind, not the world around. Shaking his head, he heard bird calls again, and a soft rustling, a sound he remembered from long-ago Heldon: breezes blowing through leaves.

He was in a forest somewhere. As the last of the mists fell away, El looked around and caught his breath. He stood in the heart of a deep wood, with duskwoods and shadowtops and blueleaf trees standing all crowded together around him, the ground beneath them a dim and mushroom-studded place stretching off into gloomy, rolling distances.

He stood in sunlight on a little knoll where several old giants of the forest had toppled, leaving a clearing into which the sun could reach. It was a small patch of sunlit moss where a large flat stone lay, and beyond it, a tiny, crystal-clear pool. The Lion Sword lay on the stone. Mystra's magic must have brought it here with him.

Elminster bent forward to take it up. There was an unfamiliar swaying sensation at his chest as he knelt. Frowning, he looked down and saw the b.r.e.a.s.t.s and the smooth curves of a maid. Elminster stared down at himself in astonishment, and ran a wondering hand over his body. It was solid and real... he looked wildly around, but he was alone. Mystra had turned him into a woman!

Clutching the rea.s.suring, familiar hilt of the Lion Sword, El crawled forward across the rock until he could stare down into the placid waters of the pool. He studied his reflection there, seeing his own sharp nose and black hair, but a rather softer face, with a pert mouth-now frowning in consternation-a long neck and below it, a slim-hipped, rather bony woman. He was Elminster no more.

As he stared down, something seemed to grow in the depths of the pool... something blue-white and leaping-a flame.

El sat back. A flame was burning under the water, a flame with nothing to feed on! A flame that was rising, and becoming golden ... Mystra!

He reached out an eager hand to touch the flame as it broke the surface, never thinking that it might destroy him until it was too late and his slim fingers were already feeling-coolness! A voice seemed to speak in his head. "Elminster becomes Elmara to see the world through the eyes of a woman. Learn how magic is a part of all things and a living force in itself, and pray to me by kindling flame. You will find a teacher in this forest." The flame faded and Elminster shivered. He knew that voice.

He looked down again in wonder. Now he was .. . "Elmara," she said aloud, and repeated it, her voice more musical than before.

She shook her head, suddenly recalling a night in Hastarl bought with stolen coins at Farl's urging. She remembered hot kisses and smooth, cool shoulders sliding soft and curved under his fingers, which wandered with tentative awe.

If he went into such a room now, he'd-she'd-be on the other end of the lovemaking. Hmmm.

So this was Mystra's first trick. Elmara twisted her lips wryly, shivered again, and then drew a deep breath. Elminster, the upstart prince whose failed battles had made him known to at least two magelords, was gone ... at least for now, perhaps forever. His cause, she vowed, would never die, but end fulfilled. That might take years, though, and for now- Elmara murmured, "So now what?" A breeze rustled the leaves again in answer.

Shrugging, she rose and walked all over the little knoll-noting that her stride was subtly different, shorter and swaying from side to side more-but there was nothing else to be found except moss and dead leaves. She was alone, and nude, the occasional twig sharp under her bare feet. What to do?

There was no food here, and no shelter. The sun already felt hot on her head and shoulders ... she'd best get into the shade.

Mystra's voice had said she'd find a tutor in the forest, but she was reluctant to leave the pool, perhaps her only link to the G.o.ddess . . . but no. Mystra had said that El should pray to her by kindling flame, and there was not enough wood or leaves on this knoll to do that. Mystra had also said she'd find a tutor, and that implied she'd have to look for one.

Elmara sighed, juggled the Lion Sword thoughtfully, and squinted up at the sun. This forest looked like the High Forest above Heldon. If this was the High Forest, going south would bring her to its edge, and perhaps to food, if she couldn't find anything to eat among the trees, and to some idea of where exactly she was. The ground under the trees was dark and rolling, with sharp slopes and little gullies everywhere. If she left this knoll, she doubted she could ever find it again. That thought made her remember the pool, and she knelt and drank deeply, not knowing when next she'd see water.

Right, then. Time waited on no man-or woman, she reminded herself wryly, wondering how long it would take to get used to this. As she set off down into the trees, she did not look back, and so didn't see the pair of floating eyes that appeared above the pool, watched her go, and seemed to nod approvingly.

She'd walked all day, and her feet were cut to ribbons. She winced as she went and left a b.l.o.o.d.y trail. She'd have to get into a tree before dark, or some prowling forest cat or wolf would follow her trail. If it bit her throat, she'd be dead before she could wake.

Elmara looked around uneasily. The endless forest seemed dark and menacing now as the small glimpses of sunlight turned amber with sunset, and twilight came creeping . . . should she light a fire? It might attract beasts that could eat her, but yes. Only a little one, and let it die out before she slept. A flame to pray to Mystra. She'd do this every night, she vowed, beginning now.

She bent and gathered a dry tangle of twigs from under a large leaf and spread them on a nearby rock. Then she stopped in confusion. How could she make them burn? With a flint, aye, but she had no flint, nor steel.

A moment later, she smote her forehead and made a disgusted sound. Of course she did: the Lion Sword! She raised it, shaking her head at her slow wits, and rang it off the rock.

A spark jumped. Yes! This was the way. She set about belaboring the edge of the rock with the stoutest part of the blade, the unsharpened length just below the hilt, and pushed kindling in around where she struck, to catch any spark. The ringing sounds she made echoed a long way under the trees ... and sparks jumped and winked where she didn't want them, disdaining her dry kindling.

Frustration and then anger rose in her... could she do nothing right? "I'm trying, Mystra," she snarled, "but-"

She broke off as the white glow arose at the back of her mind. Use her mind to call up fire? She'd never done more than nudge things a trifle, or slow falls a bit, or staunch bleeding ... could she?

Well, why not try? She bent her gaze on the sword and summoned up the white fire within, building it with her anger until it blazed up and filled her mind. Then she brought the sword crashing down on the rock. A spark leapt up-and seemed to grow, expanding into a little ball of light before it arced back down and faded away.

El's eyes widened. She stared down where the spark had been, then shrugged and began the slow process of building the fire in her mind again. This time, the spark glowed white, expanded-and Elmara set her teeth and willed it to drift sideways and keep blazing... and it settled down into the kindling.

A curl of smoke drifted up. El watched and grinned in sudden exultation. She blew ever so gently at the kindling, and then shifted some twigs and a leaf so that they'd catch, if only the G.o.ds smiled-yes! A tiny flame rose, a tongue of faint amber that licked at the leaf and spread brown over it as it fed, growing higher.

El trembled, suddenly aware that a painful throbbing was beginning in her head, licked her lips, and said over the flame, "My thanks, great Mystra. I shall try to learn, and serve thee well."

The flame soared suddenly, almost burning her nose, and then winked out, gone as if it had never been. Elmara stared at where it wasn't, then sat back, holding her suddenly splitting head. No normal flame would behave that way; Mystra must have heard her.

She knelt there for a few breaths, hoping for some sign or word from the G.o.ddess, but there was nothing but darkness under the trees, and a faint whiff of woodsmoke. But then, why should she expect anything more? She'd never seen Mystra in all her life before last night. . . and there were other folk and other doings in Faerun besides Elminster of Athalantar.

Elmara, she corrected herself absently. What did G.o.ds spend their days at, anyway?

And then a booted foot came down softly on the ground she was staring at, treading firmly on the Lion Sword. She gasped and looked up. Proud eyes-elven eyes-stared down at her, and their gaze was not friendly. A hand was extended toward her, and there was a sudden glow of light from its palm. The bright radiance grew, stretching out straight down at her, until the tip of a sword of light was in front of her chin.

"Tell me," a light, high voice said calmly, "why I should let you live."

Delsaran sniffed suddenly and raised his head. "Fire!" The tree he'd been shaping fell back limply under his hands as his magic faltered. Quick anger turned the tips of his ears red. "Here, in the very heart of the old trees!"

"Yes," Baerithryn agreed, but laid a restraining hand on his friend's arm. "But a small one; tarry." He raised his other hand, sketched a circle in the air with two fingers, and spoke a soft word.

A moment later, an intent face appeared in the air between them, the face of a human woman. Delsaran hissed but said no more as they heard the woman speak: "My thanks, great Mystra. I shall try to learn, and serve thee well."

The flame soared then, and their spell-vision exploded into a tiny twinkling of blue sparks. Delsaran's jaw dropped. "The G.o.ddess heard her," he said in grudging disbelief.

Baerithryn nodded. "This must be the one the Lady said would come." He rose, a silent shadow in the gathering night-gloom, and said, "I shall guide her, as I promised. Leave us be ... as you promised."

Delsaran nodded slowly. "The Lady grant us success"-his lips twisted wryly-"all three." Baerithryn laid a silent hand on his shoulder, then was gone.

Delsaran stared unseeing at the tree he'd been shaping, and then shook his head. Humans had slain his parents and their axes had felled the trees he'd first played in ... why did the Lady have to send a human? Didn't she want the People to be guided in learning her service and true mastery of magic?

"I guess she thinks elves are wise enough to guide themselves," he said aloud, smiled almost wistfully, and got to his feet. Mystra had never spoken to him. He shrugged, set his hand rea.s.suringly on the tree for a moment, and then slipped away into the night.

Elmara stared up at the sword. "There is no special reason," she said at last. "Mystra brought me here, and"-she gestured down at herself, and a sudden blush stole across her face- "changed me, thus. I mean no harm to you or to this place."