"There's got to be something here that we can use," Damon cried, frantically searching the room.

"Maybe there's something in Master Wane's hardwood chest," replied Annarais.

As Damon approached the chest, a flicker caught his eye. Sitting on one of the writing stands was the flat, mirrored disk that Master Wane had used to create phantasms-horrible but insubstantial images of frightening creatures.

Damon remembered sitting with Sabra and Master Wane on the rocky beach, waves gently lapping in the background. The master had reached into his stained gray cloak and produced the disk, laying it gently on the pebbles before them. The disk reflected the sun and blue sky. "The blind see only the truth," he said.

Wane had tucked his age-spotted hands into his cloak and closed his eyes. Sabra reached out for the disk. She pulled it close to her face and peered into it. With a forefinger she pushed at a pimple on her chin. Suddenly her eyes widened, and she dropped the disk on the rocks. Damon looked up and saw behind Sabra a naked, hairless, humanlike form with long, clawed fingers and toes. Its wings made it seem bigger than it really was, but it was the claws, not its size, that looked deadly. It rested on the rocks behind Sabra, and, as she began scooting backward toward Master Wane, it followed her with short hops.

Learning to ignore these horrific visions had been an early lesson for each apprentice, a lesson in distinguishing that which the eye sees from that which the mind knows. "Our magic is the magic of the impossible," Master Wane would often say, "of the impossible made true."

Damon picked the disk up. "Maybe we can use this to distract the assassin," he muttered, and he tucked it into a wide pocket hidden in his shift beneath his frock.

Together, he and Annarais tugged at the chest's cover, but it was sealed tight. They heard crashing noises from downstairs. Damon swore and kicked the chest. Then, abruptly, he grabbed Annarais by the forearm.

"When have we ever seen Master Wane open anything with his hands?" He straightened up and took a deep breath. His eyes closed.

He opened them a moment later when Annarais whispered, "Done."

The chest was open, the cover gone. Probably never was one, Damon thought sourly. He glanced at Annarais. "Go see if you can open that door." She nodded.

Inside the chest was a jumble of items and scrolls. Some Damon recognized from training exercises, most he had never seen before. He pulled out a sextant covered with spikes. What could that be used for? He dropped it back in the chest. Spotting the hilt of a sheathed blade, he extracted it carefully and slipped it into his inside pocket. It clinked against the disk.

He was tossing scrolls and sheaves of paper from the chest, searching for more weapons, when he heard a pounding in the training room. His heart skipped a beat, and he looked up, but it was Annarais beating repeatedly on the door to Master Wane's personal quarters. Damon picked up his staff and hurried to her side.

"If we could get through-" she said, tears of frustration forming in her eyes. "I tried the litany. We'd be safe, but we're not safe, we're going to die. It won't open. Nothing will open. I can't do it."

Damon dropped his staff, grasped her shoulders, and pulled her back against his chest. She shook in his hands as she cried, then Annarais wiped her eyes with her wrist and sniffed loudly. Damon felt a tremendous sympathy well up inside him, an overpowering desire to protect Annarais.

He felt a sudden confidence, an assurance, an acceptance of his own learning. Without a word to Annarais, he stepped forward and placed his hand on the handle of Master Wane's door. He pulled, not with great force but with great confidence.

The door held. Damon's confidence crashed.

The door at the bottom of the stairs shattered. Damon turned and held his staff defensively in front of him. The polished, plodding golem reached the top of the stairs, and its head swiveled to consider the apprentices. Behind it the stairwell stretched like a long, narrow pit in the floor, and Damon could just barely see the assassin lurking there at the bottom of the stairs.

"Take another step and I'll disintegrate you both," said Annarais.

Damon peered at her in astonishment. She was holding a squarish blue stone in her hand. It glowed as if alive. The assassin murmured a word to the golem and ducked back into the stairwell.

Annarais raised the stone and pointed it at the machine. "Don't come any closer."

The golem's feet scraped over the stone floor as it turned toward Annarais and began to walk toward her.

Damon grasped Annarais's arm and raised it. "What is this thing? Can you really do that?"

Annarais answered breathlessly, "Remember, we found it on the beach just after Jervis came. Sabra was left holding it when Master Wane found out." She looked at the golem as it continued its march toward them. She said in a rush, "The master dropped it on the beach and walked away, but Sabra kept it. She learned how to make it work."

The golem was now managing a lurching jog, its arm raised for a blow. Annarais held out the device toward the creature and gave it a quick turn, as if it were a doorknob. A flash like lightning threw Annarais back against the wall, made Damon's hair rise, and enveloped the metal creature. The flash was gone. The golem was coming toward them as if nothing had happened.

Damon sidestepped the machine and ducked its swinging arm. He backpedaled toward the writing stands, and the golem followed. Damon raised his disk and gave it a mental command. Between him and the machine, something took shape. It was a hairless, humanlike creature with long claws, the image that had terrified Sabra. It flapped its wings and hissed as it hopped from foot to foot. The golem brought its spiked ball down through the illusion with a spin of its whole upper body, and then, with the sound of gears grinding, resumed its stance, ready to strike.

Untouched, the illusion continued to caper. The golem struck again, exactly as before. Exactly as before it resumed its ready position. Damon watched as it repeated its attack without variance three times. He remembered what Master Wane had said about machines that mimic life: they're still machines. Unconscious of its own actions, the golem responded as it had been built to respond. In the face of an unchanging foe, its response never changed. It was stuck.

Damon slowly crawled through the discarded scrolls behind a writing stand, trying not to attract the golem's attention. He looked for Annarais. Behind the golem, near the far wall, she was shaking sense back into her head. He waved and started to crawl toward her, still clutching his staff.

Suddenly the assassin vaulted out of the stairwell and crouched on the floor, blade in one hand. She saw Annarais near her then spotted Damon behind the writing stands.

"Very good," she said. Her laugh was surprisingly pleasant and reminiscent of chimes. "Very smart, little fish. I was sure that thing would finish off the two of you. The fact that you both are still alive raises my opinion of you. The first two were easy kills." She tilted her head back and raised her voice. "Wane! Traitor! I hope that somewhere, somehow, you're using your magic to see this. If I can't get you, I want you to see what happens to your precious students."

The assassin took her curved blade in both hands and walked purposefully toward Annarais, who was now holding her staff at the ready. Terrified, she had both her hands near one end, holding the other end out to try to keep danger at bay.

Willing his disk to work again, Damon rose and charged the assassin. Before him, another winged creature took form. The assassin shot Damon a sideways glance and moved in on Annarais faster than she could retreat. With a swift, curving motion, the woman ducked past the end of the staff, grabbed the weapon's center with one hand, and slipped the blade underneath, where it disappeared into Annarais's frock.