Juhg suddenly felt certain he would rather be upstairs alongside the dwarves fighting Dread Riders and Grymmlings while carrying his weight in books than to be in the lowest recesses of the Library with the cantankerous old wizard and the Grandmagister. Juhg did not want to feel guilty about the choice he had made. Living in the Library and serving the secrets it held was the Grandmagister's dream, not his.

Craugh continued leading the way. Juhg glanced at the doors to the rooms he had visited on occasion while serving as First Level Librarian. Now that he looked at those doors, remembering the shelves and shelves of books in each of the rooms, he wished that he'd had more time to find out what was among the stacks.

Perhaps, he told himself with a little hope, those days and those opportunities are yet to be. Not all of the Library can possibly be destroyed.

Only a little farther on, Juhg saw what it was that Craugh had traveled to the bottom of the Library to find. In the fourth large chamber they came to, a pulsating web of deep purple magical power permeated the entire room, contracting and expanding in a seemingly endless flow across the ceiling, walls, and floor.

16.

Web of Spells Juhg stayed behind Craugh, fearing that the darkness ahead was filled with Dread Riders and Grymmlings. Instead, nothing moved but the shadows as the web of magic shifted and flickered, pulsing like a heartbeat. The throb of the magical spell sounded like a heartbeat as well, but one that thundered rapidly. Echoes rolled around Juhg.

"What is it?" Grandmagister Lamplighter asked.

"The root of the magic." Craugh pointed his staff at the pulsing web. Purple sparks shot from the shifting design to bite and flash at the magical light atop the wizard's staff. "This is the force that holds open the doors all through the levels above us."

Another spark spat from the web, jumping like an arrow in flight straight at the wizard.

Craugh blocked the spark with his staff. The spark broke into a thousand gleaming pieces and disappeared. "If I can destroy this, all the magical doors to the upper floors will close."

"What about the creatures that have made it through the doors?" the Grandmagister asked.

"Some might yet remain. That fact depends on how possessive the spell is. If I destroy the spell and the magic behind it is possessive, the spell may very well draw those creatures back to the world they came from. I will try to encourage that." Craugh settled his pointed hat more firmly atop his head and stepped into the room. "Those that remain we will have to track down and kill. But I don't know yet how many more can be sent through the doors."

"Why aren't any of the creatures here?" Juhg whispered, hoping he didn't jinx them by mentioning the lack of enemies bent to spill their blood.

"No door was made here." Craugh pointed at the web of power. "This is the root. The spell took hold of the Library here, leeched into the magic protecting this place, and bent those old magics to its use as well. The root could not allow itself to be disturbed by doors or anything else that might disrupt its pattern." The wizard faced the spell grimly. "That is the spell's strength and it is its weakness." He stepped closer. "And I must find a way to disrupt it."

Winds suddenly whipped up in the chamber, biting cold breezes that ripped at Craugh's robe and beard until he spoke harsh, guttural words. Then the wind seemed to blow right through him because it never touched him again.

But the wind touched Juhg, bringing a near-freezing intensity that chafed his exposed skin and turned his fingers into brittle sticks. He'd never seen anything freeze so quickly. He squinted his eyes against the gale, blinked near-frozen tears down his cheeks, and watched Craugh approach the magical web stuck tight to the sides of the chamber.

Craugh shouted words of power. The wind changed and became filled with the blazing heat of the desert. Juhg sweltered, opening his robe and breathing harshly to try to pull more air into his lungs.

A ball of whirling green light formed in Craugh's free hand. He raised the ball to look at it, as if weighing it or checking its shape, like he was picking out a melon in the marketplace. Then he hurled the ball against the web.

An explosion rocked the Library, even in the bedrock of the Knucklebones Mountains.

Juhg felt the floor shift beneath him, looking on in stunned amazement as cracks shot across the floor and huge sections of stone lifted and bashed against each other like ice floes colliding. The crunching impacts filled the chamber with noise. Juhg fell and pushed himself up again, only to struggle to keep himself from falling back as the section of floor he stood on reared into the air and almost turned perpendicular to the position it had previously enjoyed.

Glancing to his right, Juhg saw that the Grandmagister was experiencing similar problems keeping his footing. The chunk he stood on suddenly upended and tossed him into the air. Out of control, he fell toward a crack in the floor that was already starting to push back together. If he got caught in that, Juhg knew the Grandmagister would be crushed. The purple and green lights from the conflicting magics showed the fear on his face.

Without thinking, Juhg threw himself at the Grandmagister. Despite his modesty and self-confirmed lack of bravery, the Grandmagister had saved Juhg's life on a number of occasions, often putting his young protege's survival ahead of his own. Juhg could not sit by and watch the Grandmagister fall to his doom.

Throwing out his arms, Juhg slammed against the Grandmagister and carried them both clear of the gaping crack just as it closed again with a deafening crunch. They rolled and came up against the wall to the right of the door.

The Grandmagister said something, but Juhg could not hear him over the horrendous roar of the shattering rock. Out of breath from the collision, his heart beating frantically at how he had just risked his life, Juhg stood on shaking knees.

The floor beneath Craugh shattered so hard that plumes of stone dust spat up like a whale pod breaching and blowing. A section of stone only an arm's breadth across twisted like a bucking horse. The wizard nearly toppled from the stone.

Pointing to the stone with his free hand, Craugh snarled more harsh and guttural words. The stone section took on a silvery sheen, then rose up from the floor and leveled off, despite all the turmoil that took place in the space it had vacated.

Power filled the room. Juhg felt the arcane force. The hair on his arms and his head and the back of his neck stood up in response.

Craugh threw both hands forward, chanting the whole time. The wind picked up intensity, whirling and whistling around the great room. For a moment, the purple web swayed, then it pushed back. The waves of invisible power slammed into Craugh and nearly took him from his feet.

Still, the wizard remained unbowed and unbroken. He grinned into the fury of the forces warring against him. He threw his hands forward again, and this time Juhg saw the green power lash out against the purple web. Whole sections of stone broke where the lines of the web touched the walls, floor, and ceiling, spreading cracks across those surfaces. The entire room shook and clouds of stone dust poured down.

Juhg knelt, hiding from the wind as best as he could. The wind picked up small pebbles and stone shards and hurled them like missiles. A few of them struck Juhg with ringing pain and slashed at his face and hands. He wrapped his left arm over his lower face and breathed through the material of his robe to filter out the dust. His eyes teared from the dust and the grit. He barely managed to stand on the heaving surface of the floor. Grim certainty that the Library was about to come plunging down onto them dug into him with fishhooks.

Then the green fury Craugh unleashed tore chunks and strings from the web of purple power. The strands ripped away, stretching and popping and curling in on themselves until they disappeared. In the space of a drawn breath, only the fractures across the floor, the walls, and the ceiling remained to mark the web's existence. A few faint tremors shook the Library-and perhaps the Knucklebones Mountains themselves-then they faded away.

The Grandmagister dusted himself off. His face bled in a dozen different places and one eye was swollen nearly shut.

"Craugh," the Grandmagister called.

His voice sounded strange in Juhg's ears, now that the roaring wind was absent.

Stepping gingerly from the floating chunk of rock, which dropped with a crash to the broken floor as soon as the wizard's foot left it, Craugh stared up at the ceiling. He held his staff tightly and caused the light at the end of it to blaze to life again.

"Craugh," the Grandmagister called again.

"What?" The wizard's voice held irritation.

"Is it done, then?" the Grandmagister asked.

"The spell is banished." Craugh walked around hesitantly, his eyes never leaving the center of the ceiling where the cracks stemmed. "But whether that is the end of it..." He shook his head. "The spell was a true one, Wick. Woven strong. It dug deeply into the magic that was placed into the Library. I don't know what the removal of the spell has done to the Library."

"But how would anyone know how to tie that spell in with the magic that is part of the Library?" Juhg asked. Despite his dazed state, his ever-inquisitive mind sought answers. "The magic that helped create the Library is so old that not many remember how to work it."

Craugh glanced away from his survey of the ceiling and smiled grimly at the Grandmagister. "Well, Wick, people will certainly be asking that question over the next few days."

The Grandmagister evaded his friend's penetrating gaze.

Juhg knew that something important was passing between the two, but he couldn't fathom what it was. Evidently the Grandmagister knew more about the attack than was immediately apparent. Although Juhg had known both of them for years, he found he wasn't surprised that they could hide secrets from him.

"You knew," Craugh accused bluntly, "you knew that this might someday happen. You knew the risks."

"I did," the Grandmagister replied. "I did know the risks. But they were acceptable."

Craugh waved an impatient arm at the destruction around them. "And are they acceptable now?"

The Grandmagister straightened himself with dignity. "What we've lost remains to be seen."

Even though the Grandmagister said those words, Juhg heard no hope in his mentor's voice. The disconsolate sadness in the Grandmagister's words hurt Juhg and made him feel helpless.

"Or perhaps," Craugh ventured, "what you've lost will never be seen again."

The Grandmagister started for the doorway. Chunks of rock lay in the way. Cracks turned the carved arch into a ragged tear through the rock.

"They were after the books," Craugh said. "Not to keep them, Wick, but to destroy them. They started fires in the rooms we were in to destroy the books. Any Librarians they chanced to meet along the way were just bonuses. They came to destroy the Library."

"I know that," the Grandmagister replied heavily.

"You know who did this."

"I don't."

Craugh stamped his staff furiously. Green sparks spurted from the end of the staff and belled in the air before dying out on their way to the floor. "By the Old Ones but you can be stubborn when you've a mind to. You've known about them for years, Wick. The time is well past that something should have been done about them."

The Grandmagister peered over his shoulder, eyes catching first Juhg, then the wizard. "Craugh, please."

The tone was a warning. The Grandmagister giving a wizard a warning! Juhg's mind spun wildly at the very thought.

"Faugh!" Craugh clomped about angrily in his boots. "That's your dweller's instinct talking, Wick. You can't just stick your head in the sand and hope that this goes away."

"I couldn't stick my head in the sand here," the Grandmagister said in a weary voice. He kicked a loose stone. "All we have here is rubble."

"They won't give up after this."

"I can't talk about this now."

"You have to."

The Grandmagister halted and turned around quickly. Anger and pain warred across his face.

Instinctively, Juhg took a step forward, certain that he would have to intercede on the Grandmagister's behalf before the wizard turned him into a toad. And what will that do? Ensure that I get turned into a toad before the Grandmagister? So there will be a pair of toads that go hopping out of this room?

"They don't know where we are," the Grandmagister said.

"They do now."

"Do they?"

Craugh glowered, evidently set back by the Grandmagister's question. "You have to assume that they do."

"No." Grandmagister Lamplighter looked at the wreckage in the center of the room.

With the shadows draping the room, the damage didn't look nearly as bad as Juhg was certain it would in the light of day. Or even under torchlight.

"The Dread Riders and Grymmlings got here by that spell," the Grandmagister said. "That doesn't mean that they know about this place. Or even about this island."

"Wick, please. You're making a mistake." Craugh sounded almost as if he were pleading.

Juhg remained silent and still, but he was only a step away from placing himself between the wizard and the Grandmagister-if it came to that.

"No," the Grandmagister said. "I can't allow myself to think like that. That way lies..."

A rumble started distant and high in the Knucklebones Mountains. Juhg turned his head automatically, tracking the sound as his heart slammed into full speed again.

The rumble grew in intensity and came closer, faster and faster. Stone dust shot through the cracks of the ceiling, spewing out in long, thin clouds that smashed against the broken floor and spread like warm autumn fog.

Juhg tried to yell out in warning, but his voice became lost in the discordant clatter and crash of breaking rock. Grandmagister Lamplighter grabbed the sleeve of Juhg's robe and yanked him into motion. Juhg followed the Grandmagister, stumbling over a broken slab of rock. He stayed upright only because the Grandmagister supported him. Together, they raced for the broken archway. Craugh was but a half-pace behind them.

The rumbled deepened, growing faster and coming closer, till it reached a crescendo and filled the rooms on either side of the doorway, where Juhg stood grim and fearful.

The center of the room's ceiling, where the web had stood, exploded, shattering into a million pieces and pouring into the room, becoming a waterfall of tumbling stone shards, bookshelves, and books. Juhg went deaf with the sound of it. Several stones skidded across the floor and slammed into his feet, shins, and knees with bruising force. He fell, but the Grandmagister and Craugh grabbed his robe and hauled him to his feet again before the growing pile of rock could cover him. He covered his mouth with the sleeve of his robe but still felt certain he was going to suffocate in the swirling sea of dust.

Then, so quick it was unbelievable, the carnage that racked the Library stopped.

Wheezing for his breath, eyes filled with dust and tearing as they tried to clear the debris, Juhg stared at the incredible mass of broken rock that filled the room. So much of the wreckage piled from floors above that the jumble had choked the hole that had opened in the ceiling. Only the fact that the falling stone had gotten bogged down by its own volume saved them.

The Grandmagister was the first of them to move. Slowly, walking as though stunned, the Grandmagister limped forward.

"Grandmagister," Juhg managed with what little breath remained in his lungs.

"Wick," Craugh called out. "Come back from there. It might not be safe. If that pile of stone shifts, you could be buried in a fresh avalanche."

Obviously unable to stop himself, the Grandmagister kept going forward. "It can't have come to this, Craugh. Not this. We simply can't have lost the Library."

A huge hole gaped in the ceiling. In the darkness, Juhg was barely able to see how large it was, but Craugh caused his magical flame to grow larger and chased the shadows away.

"Perhaps it's not as bad as it looks," Craugh suggested.

Juhg knew that was a poor attempt on the wizard's part to allay the Grandmagister's fears. There was no mistaking the damage that the Vault of All Known Knowledge had suffered.

A few stones slid free of the pile, tumbling down with harsh clack-clacking clatter. Other stones shifted, offering immutable evidence that the pile of broken stones wasn't in any way stable.

"Wick." Craugh started forward, but one of his legs slid out from under him, obviously injured, and he sat down heavily. In the glare of his magic flame, his face went white with pain. He shifted his attention to Juhg. "Go get him away from there before we lose him, too. We've lost enough today, and we can ill afford to lose him."

Warily, feeling the pain in his legs, Juhg limped forward. "Grandmagister," he called. "Grandmagister Lamplighter."

More stones slid free and tumbled down the pile. Juhg felt the vibrations through his feet, feeling the certainty of an impending shifting that would spill the stones loose again.

How far up did the damage go? A stone bounding across his foot painfully interrupted Juhg's reverie.

"Get him," Craugh growled, trying in vain to lever himself to his feet with his staff.

Weakness showed in the wizard's every move, and Juhg knew that Craugh was all but done in. He ignored the shifting stones, clamped down hard on his own fear that he should run for his life, and approached Grandmagister Lamplighter.

"Grandmagister," Juhg whispered. This close to the stones, at the very edge of them, he feared that even the vibration of his voice might be enough to set them loose. "Grandmagister."

Tears ran down the Grandmagister's face.