"I see nothing wrong with becoming rich and famous, Chane Feldstone," the wizard said in a voice as thin and as cold as winter wind. "It is a proper approach to some worthwhile goals."

The dwarf frowned at him, backing off a step. "Have you been listening to my thoughts? If you have, you know it wasn't me who said that, it was some kender."

"There'd be no need to read the thoughts of one who speaks them to himself while he is working, Chane Feldstone."

"How do you know who I am? I didn't tell myself my name."

"Oh, I know of you, Chane Feldstone," the wizard said. "I might even know more of who you are than you do."

"Who are you, that you know about me?"

The man sighed, bowing his head, and whiskers of sleet gray bobbed as he nodded. "I have been called many things, young dwarf. Some call me

Glenshadow the Wanderer. If you want a name for me, that will do." He stepped doser to the still-glowing forge and spread his hands as though to warm himself. He glanced at the new hammer. "Have you set a crest or a device upon that? Have you named it or made it yours?"

Again the dwarf edged away, but he took the hammer from his belt and turned it in the light. "I've only initialed it. See for yourself. What device would I use?"

The wizard squinted at the hammer. "Ah, yes. I see. C. F. Chane

Feldstone. It is truly your hammer, then."

"What do you want of me?"

"Why, I am going with you. I thought you would know that."

"Why would I have known any such thing?"

"You're right, of course," the man admitted. "Well, first we must go see the Irda."

"The who?"

"The Irda."

"Why?"

"We will know more about that when we get there. Come along, now."

"Come along nothing!" Chane's whiskers twitched with exasperation. "I have a sword to make."

The wizard looked at the ancient, rusted metal bar.

"That isn't the stuff of your sword, Chane Feldstone. There's better along the way. Come on, now. This valley is not a happy place for me, and

I don't want to spend more time here than I have to."

Chane shook his head violently, clenching his teeth in frustration. "I don't know what you're talking about, and I don't want to go!"

"I think you had better," the wizard said quietly.

"Why?"

"Because of them." The wizard tilted his head to one side, gesturing."

Chane looked where the man indicated, then sucked in a whistling breath, grabbed his pack, and ran, barely aware that the robed man was pacing him alongside. Behind them came a leaping, bounding, slinking flood of huge black cats. The wizard was half again as tall as Chane, and when he lifted his hems and sprinted, he left the dwarf in his wake. "This way!" he called. "The road curves back, just ahead!"

Chane ran for all he was worth, but with each step the cats were closer behind him, their deep, rumbling purrs mounting like the roll of charging drums. When he felt their breath warming his back he clasped his hammer in one hand, his cat-tooth dagger in the other, skidded to a stop, and spun around. The dwarf crouched and roared a battle cry. As he faced them, the cats hesitated. Other cats coming up behind collided with the leaders. In an instant the glade was atumble with clawing, spitting cats, swatting at one another, sidling and rearing, grappling and rolling. Chane raised his hammer and started forward, set to wade in among them, but a hand caught him by the nape, turned him, and shoved.

"Run!" the wizard snapped. "This is no time for games!"

The logic of that statement was inescapable. Chane ran. Beyond the glade was forest, and beyond the forest the blackstone path. They arrived there with cats pounding at their heels, and the dwarf strode back and forth along the edge of safety, growling as ferociously as the frustrated predators that strained toward him. Finally Chane got his temper under control, slung his hammer at his belt, and turned to the wizard. "How do you suppose those cats got across the road? They were supposed to all be on the other side."

The man shrugged disinterestedly. "An ancient question, that. Why does a cat cross the road?"

"Rust and corruption!" Chane glared at him. "That's chickens, not cats!

And don't change the subject. What I asked was how they got across."

"Oh, that. You left your log skid back there. Someone simply moved the gravel again."

"But who would -" the dwarf's face went dark with fury. "You! You did that! Why?"

"Would you have come along with me otherwise?"

Chane tried to say something, could think of nothing appropriate, and merely sputtered.

"No need to apologize," the wizard said. "Any dwarf worth his salt would rather cook iron than travel. It's your nature. You might have dawdled there for weeks, when you should be seeking the Irda. You do want answers to your questions, don't you?"

"I don't have any questions!"

"Of course you do." The wizard drew himself up to his full height, and the gray eyes above his gray beard seemed to focus on something far away.

"Everyone has questions." At first, Chane had thought the man looked old.

Now he realized it was not old he looked, but… ageless. 'You can learn to be what you've always been," the wizard said, "if you've the gift of knowing. But you can't learn from whence you came 'til you learn where you're going."

Chane felt a chill creep up his spine. "Are you working a spell, wizard?"

"Oh, mercy, no," the man said, turning away. "Didn't your little friend tell you? Spells are dangerous and unreliable here. This is the Valley of

Waykeep."

For days Jilian Firestoke had watched the ways of the Daewar city, going often to the market centers at the tenth and thirteenth roads and finding excuses even to visit the bustling ware-room district near the eleventh road gate, where goods from other clan cities in Thorbardin were gathered and traded. She had ridden a cabletrain to the east warrens, where Chane

Feldstone worked the fields sometimes when neither Barak Chiselcut nor

Rogar Goldbuckle had employment for him.

Wherever she went, she had asked about Chane, but no one had seen him lately. Maybe, some suggested, he had gone to carry dispatches for Rogar

Goldbuckle to his commodity camp west of Thorbardin in the Kharolis

Mountains. But, no, one of Goldbuckle's guardsmen had said that he was sure there had been no dispatches lately, and since Goldbuckle was preparing for a pack-trip to Barter, he would carry any such messages himself.

She had become more worried by the day. It was not like Chane to just disappear without telling her where he was going, Yet, since the day she had taken him to see her father – she had been sure her father would help him, but he had flatly refused – Chane had been absent. Someone said they thought Chane might have gone back again, alone, to talk with Slag

Firestoke. But her father said he hadn't seen the whelp again and, furthermore, didn't want to.

Jilian had only recently – as they said in the polite sectors – "come of age," and had no shortage of admirers among the young male dwarves of

Thorbardin. A petite and sturdy four feet three, with the wide, subtly chiseled face of a dwarven angel and a curvaceous shape that even the most modest of clothing could not hide, it was natural that she should have suitors. And she did. They came by the dozens, and Slag Firestoke busied himself investigating the family lineage and financial means of each one.

But he was wasting his time. Jilian had already decided. Even when young males of the noble-blooded Hylar clans stared after her in the market, with open mouths and enchanted eyes, she was no more than amused. In Chane

Feldstone she saw something that no one else seemed to see, but that didn't matter. She saw it, and had no intention of letting him get away.