She returned to Gamalon's side and found his lone eye open and looking at her.

"Where is Mynda? Where is my wife?"

His voice was raspy, and he was in obvious pain. He tried to move to a sitting position, but his strength failed him and he fell unconscious again with a faltering groan.

Tsarra looked at the count and tears welled in her eyes. While Gamalon looked no older than his early fifties, his head wounds and body damage left him in no shape to cast spells or even move easily.

Tsarra cast a spell she often used to bear the fruits of her hunts home, interlacing her fingers together into a cup to materialize a russet-tinged floating disk beneath the stunned mage. She willed the disk to move slowly out onto the lawn, pushing it a slight distance ahead of her.

The familiar flew a loop around her and its snarls and purrs told her a little more. "Firemarkedoldmage and house got hit by skylanceburningbright, like you and darkmage and sunnybrighteyesgone.

We fight shiftshapemanysmelling thing, yes?"

Tsarra was glad the familiar was all right, but she shook her head. "No, we won't. You stay with him, and keep him safe. Let me know if anything other than his guards try to get near him."

"Wantfight, protect mistressfriend. Not afraid."

The tressym's loud yowls surprised the nearby men almost as much as when Tsarra meowed her response:

"Staysafehere until weknowfoeweakness." With that, she settled the disc and the count onto the grass, the tressym landing nearby with an angry rustle of his wings. Tsarra picked up her bow and turned to see where she could help Khelben.

The sharn howled, "Thievess! Sssscentssss mark you… Take what is oursssss!" and threw an axe and a long sword in Tsarra's direction.

"No!" Khelben yelled and leaped in front of the weapons, his arms glowing as if armored by magic.

The long sword glanced harmlessly off his left forearm and fell to the side. The axe, however, hit his right hand with a wet smack, and the Blackstaff grunted in pain.

"So messy. He'll never cast that crushing grasp now, will he?" a woman's voice sneered from empty air across the inn from Tsarra.

"Needs both hands, given the way you humans cast it."

"No, my dear, he can't. Imagine-us lending a hand to the Blackstaff. Such a strange day," a man's voice erupted from the same area over by the fireplace, and a form took shape as the man's arms waved in intricate spellcasting, dispelling his invisibility.

The lightly bearded man stood taller than Khelben by perhaps a handspan with long black hair pulled into a pony-tail trailing halfway down his back. His face was tanned, but that was the only healthy thing about him. His form was scrawny rather than lean. Rings glittered at least two per hand, and a heavy gold pendant hung on his chest atop his amber-colored tunic, richly embroidered but fraying at the cuffs and sleeves. His leather breeches were well made but looked as if they'd been worn overlong.

With great speed, the sharn launched a chunk of ruined table at the man, but other arcane words filled the air. A blast of flames engulfed the wooden implement and the arms that held it. The trailing end of the fires led to the recently visible hands of an elf woman.

She stood about Tsarra's height and wore traveling clothes of dark blue and gray leathers and linens-not protective so much as practical.

Her snow-blond hair, bound in multiple places by silver ties, nearly reached the floor and seemed white or gold, depending on how the light hit it.

Tsarra's surprise at the arrival of two other wizards ended when Khelben shouted at her, "Stand away, girl!"

He turned around and spoke to the other two wizards, and the three of them created a triangle around the sharn. The man's casting finally ended, and a hazy shimmer settled around the sharn, slowing down its movement to closer to normal speeds for a creature its size.

Khelben said, "Petrylloc's Gambit, now!" and started casting.

The other two, after a moment, took to casting similar spells-or at least they sounded similar to Tsarra's ears. She kept her bow ready but began a spell, happy she knew how to cast without movement. In her mind, she summoned magic and the sounds of a hummingbird's wing and the twang of a bow. Four glowing green energy pulses leaped from her hands into four open mouths on the sharn. When the sharn howled, its speech slowed so it sounded like a wounded bear with a human voice.

Tsarra and the assembled guards had their bows drawn, and the wizards were all occupied with their collective spellcasting. The sharn sprayed all of them with magical bolts. While the spell didn't disrupt the wizards' castings, Tsarra and eight others let arrows fly. Six of them hit the sharn, but only Tsarra's ensorcelled arrow appeared to do any damage. Despite that, the volley kept the creature suitably occupied.

Tsarra saw twinkles of white and gray collect first into a wall of ice and followed by two walls of stone. All three perched precariously on the remnants of the upper floor just above the sharn. Their weight immediately crumpled the floor on which they rested, and all three fell atop the sharn. The creature's speed still belied its bulk, and it managed to dodge the first wall, but the second wall pinned it in place. The third wall dropped on it, the ice broke into three large pieces, and the sharn died beneath it with a lowing cry and the sound of something heavy slapping onto thick mud.

"Honestly, Blackstaff. Couldn't you be more direct in battle instead of spouting obscure references?" The man kept his eyes on Khelben but extended his hand to his lady, who placed her hand on his as they moved toward Khelben.

The Blackstaff replied, "If you hadn't known it, I'd have been even more disappointed in you and your teachers than I have been in times past."

Khelben kept his attentions focused at all times on the man and woman, though he grimaced while he pulled the axe free from his hand.

His hands returned to his sides, and he left the wound alone. Tsarra flinched but stared with fascination as Khelben's hand bled a bit, leaving a puddle of blood at his feet. Within moments, the wound closed, flickers of silver flame bubbling and burning at its edges.

Tsarra left Gamalon and her familiar behind her on the ground as she moved to Khelben's side. She slung her bow over her shoulder and placed her other hand pointedly on the pommel of her scimitar.

Silently, Khelben sent to Tsarra a request to keep an eye on them a moment, please.

The wizard turned his back on the wizardly pair and approached the guard captain. "Captain Grellig, we shall have to track and capture those responsible for this on the morrow. Tonight, I'm afraid there's naught left for you and your men to do but prepare graves for the unfortunates. Major Jharna, I shall need your assistance."

The major approached and muttered, "I don't like the smell of this, Lord Arunsun. It's the curse for certain."

Khelben said, "Healthy skepticism is good, Major, but superstitions carry their own powers whether we like it or not. Pray, do not speak of curses until your lord is safe. Your troops can return to the city with Grellig's Guard contingent in two days, but I need you to act more quickly for me." Khelben pulled a ring from his belt pouch. "Use this, and it will take you and Count Idogyr directly to my tower, where he can get help. Tell Laeral to prepare Nine Silvers for the Legacy's rise. Give her that ring, repair to his excellency's rented villa, and refrain speaking of this to anyone outside my tower, please." "Right away, sir." Major Jharna walked over to the nine Tethyrian guards and servants who surrounded their count. He put the ring on his right hand, grasped Gamalon's left hand, and twisted the ring's gem to teleport away. Khelben returned to Tsarra's side and faced their impromptu allies. It bothered Tsarra that she didn't know who she faced. Something about the elf woman reminded her of a vague half-memory from her youth in Ardeep. Perhaps Tsarra had gazed too intently at her, because the elf woman stared back. There was haughtiness and regal bearing in her face, followed by some amusement and flickers of shock and disappointment. "You give kiira to half-breeds, Blackstaff? Either you like risking their sanity or you simply wish to insult tel'quessir. To add further insult, she's not even a true wizard!" Khelben spread his right arm in Tsarra's path as she surged forward, his palm still bearing a smoldering, angry wound.