“They’re still three women.”

Gresh hesitated, then admitted, “They’re all my sisters.” He looked forward, past Tobas, and saw the towers of Eastgate approaching with frightening speed.

“What, all four of them?”

“All five of them. My assistant Twilfa is the baby of the family.” They were passing over the broad hexagon of New Eastgate Market; the merchants and shoppers were looking up in surprise as the carpet’s shadow swept over them. The wind of their passage whipped at Gresh’s hair, and just as Alorria had warned, an insect of some sort bounced off his cheek.

“The wizard, too?” Tobas asked.

“Dina’s the oldest.” They were past the market and soaring along far enough above East Road that it no longer mattered whether they actually stayed above the street-they would clear most of the rooftops in any case. Gresh had to shout to be heard over the rush of wind. He realized they were passing over the intersection with Wizard Street, and he pointed to the north. “Her shop’s over there.”

When he turned his gaze forward again, Gresh saw that the towers ahead were… well, they were straight ahead, and the carpet was rushing directly at them.

Then they zoomed over Old Eastgate Market, and between the two towers of the gates, clearing the city wall by four or five feet, and they were outside Ethshar of the Rocks and flying east at a phenomenal speed, on their way to Ethshar of the Sands.

The Spriggan Mirror

A Legend of Ethshar

“My home village of Telven is somewhere over that way, on the coast,” Tobas shouted over his shoulder, waving his right arm vaguely.

Gresh glanced to the south, then frowned. “Isn’t that still the Pirate Towns?” he asked.

“That’s right,” Tobas said. “The Free Lands of the Coasts, they call themselves. I grew up there. My father was a pirate, Dabran the Pirate, captain of Retribution. A demonologist out of Ethshar of the Spices sent the whole ship to the bottom, with all hands, when I was fifteen.”

Gresh nodded but did not reply. He was unsure whether Tobas was serious or not, and besides, conversation was difficult over the constant roar of the wind as the carpet sped through the air.

They were about four hours out of Ethshar of the Rocks, and Gresh had discovered that while riding the carpet didn’t seem particularly dangerous, Alorria had been right that it wasn’t exactly fun. There were frequently bugs splattering against their chests and faces, at least at lower altitudes; the luggage piled around Tobas was speckled with their remains. Birds hadn’t been a problem, but the unrelenting wind of their passage was tiring and annoying and made it impossible to talk comfortably. Gresh also now understood why Alorria wore a coronet and why Karanissa had gone to the trouble to braid her waist-length locks. His own hair was long enough to whip about uncomfortably, flicking across his eyes at inopportune moments. He was sure he looked positively dreadful, with his hair awry and dead gnats smeared everywhere.

The worst part of flying was that it was boring. A day earlier Gresh would not have believed that soaring through the air at fantastic speeds on a magic carpet could become tedious so quickly, but it had. They had passed over a hundred miles of farms and fields and forests. After the first hour or so they all looked very much the same.

If he had been able to talk freely with his companions it might not have been bad, but the wind prevented that-the wind, and his uncertainty as to how much he could believe of what Tobas and Alorria told him. Alorria had said that Tobas slew a dragon to win her hand and that he had served for a time as the court wizard to her father, Derneth II, king of Dwomor. However, Tobas had already been married to Karanissa at the time and had been spending most of his time in another world, so it had been complicated. Tobas claimed to have inherited Derithon the Mage’s book of spells, rather than compiling his own, which was undoubtedly a violation of custom and probably of Wizards’ Guild rules but which explained why his training was so uneven. Tobas had served only a partial apprenticeship under a senile and dying master, but the old book allowed him to teach himself much more.

Now Tobas claimed to be a pirate captain’s son. How would a pirate’s son have wound up apprenticed to a wizard at all? Gresh was beginning to think he wouldn’t have believed any of this if Kaligir hadn’t shown up with those other wizards to provide him with magic. Pirates and princesses, dragons and castles and centuries-old witches and all, sounded like far too much adventure to have jammed into Tobas’s one short lifetime. Good honest magic Gresh understood, and spells gone wrong, so the flying carpet and the spriggan mirror were easy to accept, but the rest of it…

But four-hundred-year-old Karanissa was there behind him on the carpet, and Tira had said she spoke the truth. Alorria, princess of Dwomor, was there, as well, and no one back in the city had expressed any reservations about her claimed heritage. Kaligir had believed enough of Tobas’s story to agree to pay Gresh’s fee, and to provide him with all those lovely vials and jars, safely tucked away in Gresh’s bag.

Gresh hoped he had chosen those prepared spells wisely. He had equipped himself with powders that were good for a dozen castings each of Lirrim’s Rectification, Javan’s Restorative, Javan’s Geas, the Spell of Reversal, and as the result of a fit of originality, the Spell of the Revealed Power, as well as seven doses apiece of potions that would provide Varrin’s Protective Bubble or the Spell of Retarded Time. The five magical powders had all turned out different colors, which several wizards had assured him was normal. They were all carefully tucked away in clearly labeled glass jars in a well-padded wooden box, along with labeled vials of the two crystal-clear potions.

Those spells were all the help Kaligir’s little committee would provide, so Gresh hoped that his heavy emphasis on counter-spells would prove appropriate. He had decided against any levitations; the flying carpet should serve well enough. He had also considered and dismissed a variety of communication spells, illusions, invisibilities, and other simple magic on the assumption that even Tobas ought to be able to provide those. Having those other spells as potions might have been faster, but he hadn’t had that many wizards available to produce them and had preferred to use his limited resources for the most difficult or important spells. His options had not been unlimited; he had had to choose preparations that six wizards could produce in less than three days. It had taken some argument even to get a second potion, since that had required one wizard to perform the spell for Tracel’s Adaptable Potion twice in quick succession.

With his sisters’ help, he had equipped himself with a few of his usual devices, as well as Kaligir’s contributions; the Spell of the Spinning Coin would keep Twilfa informed of his general state of health, the amulet strapped to his left wrist held a rune that would protect him from most hostile magic, he had a bloodstone tucked away that could be used for the Spell of Sustenance if food ran short, and Dina and Chira had provided half a dozen other talismans of various sorts. He felt reasonably well prepared.

The one thing he regretted was that he hadn’t managed to include any decent divinations in his supplies-but since the Guild had already tried every known divination in previous attempts to locate the mirror, he had reluctantly chosen to skip those, even though they might have been useful in less direct applications.

Right now he thought a divination to tell him whether Tobas was embellishing his personal history might have been welcome, but he didn’t have one available.