But when Xandra met the captive's eyes-which were as green and hard as the finest malachite-the sneer melted from her lips. What she saw in those eyes stunned her: intelligence far beyond her expectations, pride, cunning, rage, and implacable hatred.

Hardly daring to hope, Xandra glanced at the man's hands. Yes, the wrists were crossed and bound together, the hands swathed in a thick coc.o.o.n of silken bandages. No doubt some of the fingers had been broken as well-such precautions were only prudent when dealing with captive spellcasters. No matter. The powerful clerics of House Shobalar could heal such injuries soon enough.

"A wizard," she stated, keeping her voice carefully neutral.

"A powerful wizard," the merchant emphasized.

"We shall see," Xandra murmured. "Unbind him-I would test his skills."

Hadrogh, to his credit, did not try to dissuade the female. The merchant quickly unbound the human's hands. He even lit a pair of small candles, providing enough dim light so that the man could see.

The red-robed man flexed his fingers painfully. Xandra noted that the human's hands seemed stiff, but unharmed. She tossed an inquiring glare at the merchant.

"An amulet of containment," Hadrogh explained, pointing to the collar of gold that tightly encircled the man's neck. "It is a magical shield that keeps the wizard from casting any of the spells he has learned and committed to memory.

He can, however, learn and cast new spells. His mind is intact, as are his remembered spells. As are his hands, for that matter. Admittedly, this is a costly method of transporting magically-gifted slaves, but my reputation demands that I deliveiij undamaged merchandise."

A rare smile broke across Xandra's face. She had

never heard of such anarrangement, but it was idealljl suited to her purposes.

Cunning, quickness of mind, and magical apt.i.tude) were the qualities she needed. If the human pa.s.sed! these tests, she could teach him what he needed toi know. That his mind could be searched at some latex

time, and its store of magical knowledge plundered foi

her own use, was a bonus.

The drow quickly removed three small items from! the bag at her waist and showed them to the watchful human. Slowly, she moved through the gestures andjj spoke the words of a simple spell. In response to heil casting, a small globe of darkness settled over one o

the candles, completely blotting out its light.

Xandra handed an identical set of spell components) to the human. "Now you,"

she commanded.

The red-clad wizard obviously understood what wasj expected of him. Pride and anger darkened his face, butj only for a moment-the lure of an unlearned spelj proved too strong for him to resist. Slowly, withl painstaking care, he mirrored Xandra's gestures and? mimicked her words. The second candle flickered, then) dimmed. Its flame was still faintly visible through the] gray fog that had suddenly surrounded it. I "The human shows promise," the Shobalar wizard admitted. It was unusual for any wizard to reproduce a] spell-even imperfectly-without having seen and]

studied the magical symbols. "His p.r.o.nunciation is

deplorable, though, and will continue to hamper hi^ progress. You wouldn't by chance have a wizard in stock who can speak Drowish? Or even Undercommonlj Such would be easier to train." 3 Hadrogh bowed deeply and hurried out of sight. A moment later he returned, alone, but with one hand! held palm-up and outstretched so that Xandra could see he had another solution to suggest. The faint light of the fog-shrouded candle glimmered on the two tiny silver earrings in his hand, each in the form of a half-circle.

"To translate speech," the merchant explained. "One pierces the ear, so that he might understand, the other his mouth, so that he might be understood. May I demonstrate?"

When Xandra nodded, the merchant lifted his empty hand and snapped his fingers twice.

Two half-ore guards hastened to his side. They seized the human wizard and held him fast while Hadrogh pressed the rings' tiny metal spikes through the man's earlobe and the left side of his upper lip. Immediately the human gave off a string of Drowish curses, predications so colorful and virulent that an astonished Hadrogh fell back a step.

Xandra laughed delightedly.

"How much?" she demanded.

The merchant named an enormous price, hastening to a.s.sure Xandra that the figure named included the magical collar and rings. The drow wizard rapidly estimated the cost of these items, added the potential worth of the spells she would steal from this human, and threw in the death of Liriel Baenre.

"A bargain," Xandra said with dark satisfaction.

Chapter Two.

Shades of Crimson.

Tresk Mulander paced the floor of his cell, his trailing scarlet robes whispering behind him. It had not been easy, persuading the Mistress to provide him with the bright silk garments, but he was a Red Wizard and so he would remain, however far he might be from his native Thay.

Nearly two years had pa.s.sed since Mulander had first encountered Xandra Shobalar and begun his strange apprenticeship. Although he had not once left this room-a large chamber carved from solid rock and vented only by tiny openings in the ceiling, well above his reach-he had not been badly treated.

He had food and wine in plenty, whatever comforts he required, and, most importantly, an intense and thorough education in the magic of the Underdark.

It was an opportunity that many of his peers would have seized without aqualm, and in truth, Mulander did not entirely regret his fate.

The Red Wizard was a necromancer, a powerful member of the Researcher faction-that group of wizards who were content to leave Thay's boundaries as they were and who instead sought ever stronger and more fearsome magics.

Utterly devoted to the principles of the Researchers, Mulander was still somewhat of an oddity among his peers, for he was one of a very few high-ranking wizards whose blood was not solely that of the ruling Mulan race.

His father's father had been Rashemi, and his inheritance from his grandsire was a thick, muscled body and a luxuriant crop of facial hair. From his wizard mother had come his talent and ambition, as well as the height and the sallow complexion that were considered marks of n.o.bility in Thay.

Mulander's cold, gemlike green eyes and narrow scimitar nose lent him a terrifying aspect, and although he conformed to custom and affected baldness, he was rather vain of the thick, long gray beard that set him apart from the nearly hairless Mulan. In all, he was an imposing man, who carried his sixty winters with ease upon his broad, proud shoulders. He was strong of body and mind and magic; the pa.s.sing years had only served to thin his graying hair, which he regretted not at all, for it made the daily task of shaving his pate less onerous.

Mistress Shobalar had indulged him in this, as well, providing him with incredibly keen-edged shaving gear and a halfling servant to do the honors.

Indeed, the drow female seemed fascinated by the tattoos that covered Mulander's head. As well she should be: each mark was a magical rune that, when activated with the appropriate spell, could transform bits of dead matter into fearsome magical servants. Provide him with a corpse, and he would produce an army. Or could, were he able to access his necromantic magic!

Mulander grimaced and slipped a finger under the gold collar that encircled his neck-and imprisoned his Art.

"In time, you will be permitted to remove that," said a cool voice behind him.

The Red Wizard jolted, then turned to face Xandra Shobalar. Even after two years, her sudden arrivals unnerved him-as they were no doubt intended to do.

But today the implied promise in the drow's words banished his usual resentment.

"When?"

"In time," Xandra repeated. She strolled over to a deep chair and, in a leisurely fashion, seated herself. Two years was not a long time in the life of a drow, but she was well aware of the human's impatience, and she intended to enjoy it.

Enjoyable, too, was the murderous rage, barely contained, in the Red Wizard's eyes.

Xandra entertained herself with fantasies of seeing that wrath unleashed upon her Baenre fosterling.

At last, the long-antic.i.p.ated day was nearly at hand.

"You have learned well," the Mistress began. "Soon you will have a chance to test your newfound skills. Succeed, and the reward will be great."

The drow plucked a tiny golden key from her bodice and held it high. She c.o.c.ked her head to one side and sent the Red Wizard a cold, taunting smile.

Mulander's eyes widened with realization, then gleamed with an emotion that went far beyond greed. His intense, hungry gaze followed the key as Xandra slowly lowered it and tucked it back into its intimate hiding place.

"I see that you understand what this is. Would you like to know what you must do to earn it?" she asked coyly.

A shudder of revulsion shimmered down the Red Wizard's spine. He fervently hoped that his flowing robes hid his instinctive-and potentially fatal- response. He knew immediately that it had not; Xandra's smile widened and grew mocking.

"Not this time, dear Mulander," she purred. "I have another sort of adventure in mind for you."

The Mistress quickly described the rite of the Blooding, the ritual hunt that each young elf was required to undergo before being accounted a true drow.Mulander listened with growing dismay.

"And I am to be this prey," he said in a dazed tone.

Anger flashed in Xandra's eyes like crimson fire. "Do not be a fool! You must prevail! Would I have gone to such trouble and expense otherwise?"

"A spell battle," he muttered, beginning to understand. "You have been preparing me for a spell battle! And the spells you have taught me?"

"They represent all the offensive spells your young opponent knows, as well as the appropriate counter-spells." Xandra leaned forward, and her face was deadly serious. "You will not see me again. You will have a new tutor for perhaps thirty cycles of Narbondel. A battle wizard. He will work with you daily and instruct you in the tactics of drow warfare. Learn all he has to teach during the course of this session."

"For he will not live to give another lesson," Mulander reasoned.

Xandra smiled. "How astute. For a human, you possess a most promising streak of duplicity! But you are among drow, and you have much to learn about subtlety and treachery."

The wizard bristled. "We in Thay are no strangers to treachery! No wizard could survive to my age, much less reach my position, without such skills!"

"Really?" The drow's voiced dripped with sarcasm. "If that is the case, then how did you come to be here?"

Mulander responded only with a sullen glare, but the Mistress of Magic did not seem to require an answer. "You possess a great deal of very interesting magic," she said, complimenting him. "More than I would have guessed a human capable of wielding, and judging from your pride, more than most of your peers have achieved. How, then, could you have been overcome and sold into slavery, but by treachery?"

Not waiting for a response, Xandra rose from her chair. "These are the terms I offer you," she said, her manner suddenly all business. "At the proper time, you will be taken into the wild tunnels surrounding this city-as part of your preparations, you will be given a map of the area to commit to memory. There you will confront a fledgling wizard, a drow female marked by her golden eyes.

She will carry the key that will release you from that collar. You must defeat her in spell battle-do whatever you must to ensure that she does not survive.

"You may then take the key from her body, and go wheresoever you will. The girl will be alone, and you will not be pursued. It may be that you can find your way to the Lands of Light-if indeed there is still a place for you there.

If not, with the spells I have taught you, as well as the return of your own death magic, you should be able to live and thrive Below."

Mulander listened stoically, carefully masking the sudden bright surge of hope that the drow's words awoke in his heart. For all he knew, this could be an elaborate trap, and he refused to display his elation for this wretched female's amus.e.m.e.nt.

Or did she perhaps expect him to show fear?

If that was the case, she would also be disappointed. He knew none. The Red Wizard did not for one moment doubt the outcome of this contest, for he knew the full measure of his powers, even if Xandra Shobalar did not.

He was more than capable of defeating an elven girl in spell battle-he would kill the little wench and set himself up in some hidden cavern of this underground world, a place surrounded by magics of warding and misdirection that would keep even the powerful dark elves from his door.

This he would do, for the Shobalar wizard was right about one thing-there was no welcome awaiting Mulander in Thay, and no welcome for Red Wizards in any land other than Thay. Another of Xandra's thrusts had found its mark, as well: he had indeed been undone through treachery. Mulander had been betrayed by his young apprentice, as he himself had betrayed his own master. It occurred to him, suddenly, to wonder what treachery Xandra's young prodigy might have in store for her mistress!

"You are smiling," the drow observed. "My terms are to your liking?"

"Very much so," Mulander said, thinking it prudent to keep his fantasies to himself."Then let me add to your enjoyment," Xandra said softly. She advanced upon the man and reached up to place one slim black hand against his jaw. His instinctive flinch, and his effort to disguise the response, seemed to amuse her. She swayed closer, her slim body just barely brushing against his robes.

Her crimson eyes burned up into his, and Mulander felt a tendril of compelling magic creep into his mind.

"Tell me truly, Mulander," she said-and her words were mocking, for they both knew that the spell she cast upon him would allow him to speak nothing but truth. "Do you hate me so very much?"

Mulander held her gaze. "With all my soul!" he vowed, with more pa.s.sion than he had ever before displayed-more than he knew he possessed.

"Good," Xandra breathed. She raised both arms high and clasped her hands behind his neck; then she floated upward until her eyes were on a level with the much taller man. "Then remember my face as you hunt the girl, and remember this."

The drow pressed her lips to Mulander's in a macabre parody of a kiss. Her pa.s.sion was like his: it was all hatred and pride.

Her kiss, like many that he himself had forced upon the youths and maidens apprenticed to him, was a claim of total ownership, a gesture of cruelty and utter contempt that was more painful to the proud man than a dagger's thrust.

Even so, he winced when the drow's teeth sank deep into his lower lip.

Xandra abruptly released him and floated away, suspended in the air like a dark wraith and smiling coldly as she wiped a drop of his blood from her mouth.

"Remember," she admonished him, and then she vanished as suddenly as she had come.

Left alone in his cell, Tresk Mulander nodded grimly. He would long remember Xandra Shobalar, and for as long as he lived he would pray to every dark G.o.d whose name he knew that her death would be slow and painful and ignominious.

In the meanwhile, he would vent some of his seething hatred upon the other drow wench who presumed to look upon him-him, a Red Wizard and a master of necromancy!-as prey.

"Let the hunt begin," Mulander said, and his bloodied lips curved in a grim smile as he savored the secret he had h.o.a.rded from Xandra Shobalar, and that he would soon unleash upon her young student.

Chapter Three.

A Grand Adventure.

The door of Bythnara Shobalar's bedchamber thudded solidly against the wall, flung open with an exuberance that could herald only one person. Bythnara did not look up from the book she was reading, did not so much as flinch. By now she was too accustomed to the irrepressible Baenre brat to show much of a reaction.

But it was impossible to ignore Liriel for long. The elfmaid spun into their shared bedchamber, her arms out wide and her wild mane of white hair flying as she whirled and leapt in an ecstatic little dance.

The older girl eyed her resignedly. "Who cast a dervish spell on you?" she inquired in a sour tone.

Liriel abruptly halted her dance and flung her arms around her chambermate.

"Oh, Bythnara! I am to undergo the Blooding ritual at last! Mistress just said!"

The Shobalar female disentangled herself as inconspicuously as possible as she rose from her chair, and she looked around for some pretense that would excuse her for wriggling out of the younger girl's impulsive embrace. On the far side of the room, a pair of woolen trews lay crumpled on the floor; Liriel tended to treat her clothes with the same blithe disregard that a snake shows its outgrown and abandoned skin. Bythnara was forever picking up after the untidy little wench. Doing so now allowed her to put as much s.p.a.ce as possible between herself and the unwanted affection lavished upon her by her young rival."And high time it is," the Shobalar wizard-in-training said bluntly as she smoothed and folded the discarded garment. "You will soon be eighteen, and you are already well into your Ascharlexten Decade. I've often wondered why my Mistress Mother has waited so long!"

"As have I," Liriel said frankly. "But Xandra explained it to me. She said that she could not initiate the rite until she had found exactly the right quarry, one that would truly test my skills. Think of it! A grand and gallant hunt-an adventure in the wild tunnels of the Dark Dominion!" she exulted, flinging herself down on her cot with a gusty sigh of satisfaction.

"Mistress Xandra," Bythnara coldly corrected her. She knew, as did everyone in House Shobalar, that Liriel Baenre was to be treated with utmost respect, but even the archmage's daughter was required to observe certain protocols.

"Mistress Xandra," the girl echoed obligingly. She rolled over onto her stomach and propped up her chin in both hands. "I wonder what I shall hunt,"

she said in a dreamy tone. "There are so many wondrous and fearsome beasts roaming the Lands of Light! I have been reading about them," she confided with a grin. "Maybe a great wild cat with a black-and-gold striped pelt, or a huge brown bear-which is rather like a four-legged quaggoth. Or even a fire-belching dragon!" she concluded, giggling a bit at her own absurdity.

"We can only hope," Bythnara muttered.