Steel and Stone Read Free

him.
    One of the generals, the self-important one, spoke up. “We must be certain,” he said ponderously, narrowing his eyes and rubbing his chin. “It is better if she has fled. If Dreena ten Valdane were to be killed in combat, it could arouse the Meiri peasants to our disadvantage.”
    The second general chimed in. “The Meiri peasants were fond of the Meir, but they adore his wife. We’d best be sure the captain is correct.” His stare indicated that he, at least, didn’t think Kitiara was reliable. “I suggest we wait,” he concluded.
    Kitiara ignored the two and spoke to the Valdane. “I am as sure that Dreena has left the Meir’s castle as I am that I stand before you now.” Her gaze never wavered.
    The leader nodded to Janusz. “Mount the attack.”
    Janusz bowed and left, and the generals scattered. Kitiara waited at the Valdane’s tent until the mage, his thin white hair fluttering above the collar of his black robe, disappeared into his own tent before she followed. When she reached the mage’s tent, she stationed herself by the tent flap, eased it open a finger’s width, and watched. Knowledge was power, her mercenary father had often reminded her. It wouldn’t hurt to know more about the mysterious mage.
    Janusz looked neither right nor left as he moved directly to his cot and pulled out a trunk that lay beneath it. He released a pinch of gray dust into the air and whispered,
“Rrachelan,”
releasing a magical lock. Then he slung up the heavy lid, reached inside, and drew out a sandalwood box carved with silhouettes of minotaurs and seal-like creatures with huge tusks.
    He repeated the incantation, with a slight differencein intonation, then opened the box. A look of relief spread across his face. “The power of ten lifetimes for the man who unlocks it,” he whispered. Kitiara felt the hair rise on the back of her neck.
    Janusz’s fingers disappeared into the box and emerged with two—two what? “Gems” was the obvious word, but the stones were more than gems. They glowed with unearthly light. Once, traveling south of the Khurman Sea, two hundred miles to the south, Kitiara had seen a necklace of amethysts that had gleamed violet in lamplight but, outside, had deepened to the purple-blue of the darkest ocean. Those Khurman stones, however, were mere pebbles compared to these. These radiated the heat of light and the cold of winter.
    Ice, Kitiara thought; they looked like glowing, purple ovals of ice, the size of robins’ eggs. She’d never seen anything so beautiful. Her breath quickened.
    The mage had said they held power. Kitiara knew he spoke the truth.
    “Mage!” The Valdane was shouting from his own tent. The spell-caster looked up and caught Kitiara spying on him at the opening of his tent. He hurriedly slipped the two stones into a pocket of his robe, and the weird purple light went out as completely as if the gems had never existed. Shaking with anger, Janusz could barely speak. “Return to your post, Captain,” he choked out. “And forget what you’ve seen here, lest you suddenly find yourself with the head of an eel.”
    Kitiara made a show of moving away from the tent flap, but seconds later, she peered back in. The mage was taking the deep breath that Kitiara had seen her brother, Raistlin, use to cleanse his thoughts and focus his attention on spell-casting. Then Janusz turnedand swept from the tent, scant seconds after Kitiara had dodged around the corner of the mage’s lodging.
    The mage moved to a clearing in the trees downhill from the tents. He was in clear view of the castle. His hands twitched. It was as if Janusz’s fingers had lives of their own as they danced through the complex movements that accompanied the spell.
    “Ecanaba ladston, zhurack!”
the mage intoned.
    Kitiara felt her face tingle, and she looked away. She heard Janusz continue his chanting. Was he turning her into an eel after all? She looked around, seeking something shiny, a mirror or pool