The shadow of someone carefully moving down a side corridor in his direction made Kaz flatten against the wall. There was nowhere to hide save his former cell, and he had no intention of retreating into it.

With little other choice, he raised the battle-axe high. One adversary or more, his best bet would be to charge the moment the owner of the shadow came into sight. Surprise was on his side.

There was still only one shadow. A lone guard who had heard the noise? Why not summon help, then?

A hand and boot slipped around the corridor. Kaz stiffened in anticipation. A head peeked out.

“Sardal!”

Kaz almost let the battle-axe drop to the floor as he exhaled sharply in relief. The elf looked up at the minotaur in surprise, saw the massive blades, and blanched.

Kaz was the first to recover. “How did you find me? Where did you come from?”

“Lower your voice or speak not at all, friendl Branchala be praised that we have found one another! I pray that together we may find some way to turn that monstrous evil back before it is too late!”

“Too late?” Kaz eyed the elf fiercely. “What’s happened, Sardal? I’ve been chained up until a moment ago. What’s happened?”

“You do not know?” Sardal seemed stunned. It took a few seconds for the elf to collect himself. “No, you would not know, trapped as you were in the lower chambers of this keep.”

“Something’s happened to the others? Delbin? The humans?”

Sardal looked as grim as an elf could, which was very grim indeed. “Only a barrier surrounding this keep, one of incredible magnitude, hardly the work of one such as Argaen. I was barely within its boundaries when it was cast. A second or two more and I would have been trapped in it.”

“And the others?”

“The Knights of Solamnia and those of my people who aid them are the better force, but the Dragonqueen’s former servants hold the more advantageous positions. Even if there was no barrier, your companions and the knights would not be able to reach the keep’s outer walls before darkness, and in the night we are at a further disadvantage.”

“Why?”

“Nuitari rules among the moons now, my friend. Tonight the black moon will devour all but a trace of Solinari. I fear the sorcerers without will not be able to break the spell of the shield, which leaves it up to you and me, minotaur. And since I am hampered by the same difficulties as my brethren, I fear that my aid will be somewhat limited.”

“Which leaves most of it up to me,” Kaz muttered.

There were times, he reflected, when it would have been better to have been born a simplistic gully dwarf. At least no one expected them to save the world-or die trying.

Argaen Ravenshadow raged at the object of his desire, the gleaming emerald sphere wrought by Galan Dracos.

“No more tricks! I know your power! I know what you can do! The minotaur did not lie, did he? Why else have I come up short each time I sought to bind the sphere to my bidding? Is it because it still follows the dictates of another master?”

Above the crystalline artifact, an indistinct form wavered almost haughtily. At the moment, it little resembled any human form. It was a mere misty outline, a gauzy shroud. There had been times when it had worn a more definite form, when Ravenshadow had found himself staring into the unsettling eyes of the renegade mage Galan Dracos. Argaen found he was more than happy to deal with the wraith in this less disturbing form.

There was no response. Sometimes there was; sometimes there was not. The magic thief could never be certain when he was going to receive an answer, and sometimes he even wondered if he had imagined the others, for when Dracos spoke, his voice was little more than a drawn-out breath.

When it became apparent that this time he was wasting his energy, the elf finally whirled away from the silent specter and turned his concerns to other matters. It had seemed as if everything was going his way for a change. The mostly human raiding bands in the south had answered his call with surprising speed, almost as if they had expected his summons. To the north, the ogre tribes were amassing again after lying low for most of the past five years. The elf had promised them a tool of great power in their seemingly hopeless struggle, for without the dragons of darkness the servants of Takhisis had no edge. Now they had Argaen Ravenshadow.

Through a stroke of astonishing luck, he had secured the artifact he needed to make him first and foremost among the Dark Queen’s servants, only to discover that there was more to the emerald sphere than even he had surmised.

Ravenshadow stalked to a window and stared out at the eerie tableau before him, the shimmering that represented the barrier keeping both his enemies and his allies from him.

There was a question he had asked himself more than once in the past day, even before the minotaur had made his unnerving remarks. The dreadwolves were further testimony that Dracos did need him-but for what? The wraith had more power than it would admit to, but it still needed him. Why? And how could the dark elf turn that need to his advantage?

A bitter smile briefly played over his lips as he watched the tiny figures in the distance waver like unstable puffs of smoke. Ravenshadow, at present, was only able to command the least of the object’s abilities, yet that had already given him a taste of incredible power. If he could only bind himself to the core, truly control the flow of magical power that the sphere only acted as a conduit for, he would be like a god…

Or dead. A pawn of the creator of this amazing tool.

He needed to know more. He needed to know what his place was in the schemes of the vague figure floating above that which rightfully belonged to the elf. Then- then Ravenshadow would deal with the fool. Dead was dead, and Galan Dracos had had his chance. The future now belonged to Argaen Ravenshadow.

Turning from the window, Argaen glanced at the hourglass on one of the tables he used for his studies. The books and manuscripts he had stolen over the years were forgotten now and were piled to one side, for the timepiece now held precedence. It held roughly three hours’ worth of sand, approximately half of which had already fallen to the bottom. Three hours of safety. That was the barrier’s limit. It would cease to exist then. The sand in the hourglass fell too readily, he thought. By nightfall, his protection would be gone. Before then, he had to master the sphere. He had no more shadow boxes; the one he had used to carry the sphere had been nearly burned out by the time they had arrived here.

Without thinking, he tried to straighten up. Cursing suddenly, Argaen thought of his pain. Everything he had gained was a half-measure. By rights, the emerald sphere should have granted him sufficient power and control to heal himself. Yet he still couldn’t even stand straight without tremendous agony…

He put his hands in his robe pockets and turned to once more face the emerald sphere and that other who floated vaguely above it. Briefly the fingertips of his right hands touched what he sought. Argaen did not smile, though he felt the urge to. Instead, he spoke to his “partner” of circumstance.

“Let us begin afresh…,”

The dark elf stepped toward the gleaming artifact, his eyes never leaving the specter.

So caught up was he in his new machinations that Argaen Ravenshadow failed to take notice of a small form watching from the alcoves.

Delbin, like Sardal, had gotten within the boundaries of the barrier spell at nearly the last moment. The kender had only become aware of what was happening when he turned around and saw a hapless human, one of the enemy, trapped in the essence of the barrier itself, frozen like a statue. While the idea of such a spell tickled his imagination, Delbin knew that it could only mean trouble for Kaz and the others. The kender had immediately picked up his pace.