"Was it worth it?" Cale asked. "Oghma's gift?"

Had Mask granted Cale a "gift" of the sort that Oghma had bestowed on Sephris, Cale would have hated him for it.

Sephris nodded. He took Cale's meaning.

"That is a fundamentally flawed question, Erevis. Do you know why?"

Cale shook his head.

"Because it implies a choice."

Mentally, Cale rejected Sephris's statement. He insisted on believing that at some point choice entered into the equation.

Cale said, "I'm not a determinist, Sephris."

Sephris smiled softly. "Then let me answer you this way. Serving a god brings many rewards, but it also demands a price, always a price. The price I paid—" he sighed, a sound both contented and fatigued—"is simply more apparent to you than the price you have paid ... and will pay."

To that, Cale could think of nothing to say. He found that his hand was in his pocket, clutching his mask. He released it as if it was white hot.

Sephris leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, and said nothing further. Cale took that as an invitation to leave.

"Thank you for your help, loremaster. If we get the other half of the sphere ..."

Sephris smiled, though he still kept his eyes closed, and said, "Then we will speak again."

Cale turned to go. The library didn't appear as disorganized before.

When he laid his hand on the door handle, Sephris called to him, "One last piece of advice, Erevis. Listen carefully, for here is the key to understanding Fate." He paused before he said, "Two and two are four."

Cale gave a smile. If only it was that simple.

"I don't believe in Fate, loremaster."

Sephris opened his eyes then and said, "That is only because you cannot yet do the math."

Outside, Jak didn't ask Cale what transpired between he and Sephris. Instead, the halfling and Cale filled Riven in on events. The assassin took it in without a word.

Afterward, he said, "So the sphere tells the time that something will occur. But we don't know what the something is and we don't know where it will happen."

Cale nodded. Almost involuntarily, all three glanced skyward, though no stars were visible in the daytime sky.

Jak took out his pipe and tamped it.

"But we can be sure it's not good," the halfling said.

At that, Riven scoffed. Cale suspected that the assassin didn't care if what Vraggen sought from the sphere was good or otherwise. He only wanted to kill the wizard whose spell had made him afraid. Cale would just have to use that.

Jak struck a tindertwig and puffed on his pipe. The pipeweed's aroma filled the overgrown yard.

"Cale," Jak said, "we can't give them the sphere."

"Still thinking like a Harper, Fleet?" Riven asked with a sneer. "What do we care what this sphere signals? Worried about the innocent?"

Jak blew smoke in Riven's direction. He started to frame a reply, but Cale's hand on his shoulder cut him off.

"Little man, he's just goading you," Cale said. "It's his way. Just leave it alone."

Cale shot Riven a contemptuous glance.

"We can't turn over the sphere," Jak repeated. "They aren't human, at least some of them aren't, and we don't know what they plan to do." He shot a heated glare at Riven and added, "And burn him if he won't think about innocents. Wearing a pin didn't make me what I was, Drasek Riven, and resigning from the Network doesn't change what you are."

Riven only sneered.

Cale found that he too was concerned about innocent lives, and that realization pleased him. But there were more selfish reasons at work. He wanted to stop Azriim and Vraggen—kill them—for personal reasons. They had invaded Stormweather Towers, murdered guards, kidnapped Ren, and tried to incinerate he and Riven at the Stag. They had earned his wrath. For that, they would all die.

Cale patted Jak's shoulder and said, "We're not giving them the sphere, little man, or at least we're not letting them keep it. We get Ren back safely and kill them all, under the leaves of the Elm. That solve your problem?"

"Solves mine," Riven said, and he winked at Fleet.

Jak blew smoke rings at him and said, "You couldn't solve two and two with an abacus, Zhent."

Jak's choice of words gave Cale gooseflesh.

"We've got a day," Cale said. "Let's get ready."

CHAPTER 10

THE TWISTED ELM

Cale sat in the chair in their room at the Lizard, preparing for communion with his god. Jak and Riven were already asleep in their cots. Cale was to wake Riven before dawn, but doubted he would. He knew he would not be able to sleep that night.

No candle lit the room but Selune's light through the shutter slats cast silver lines on the floor. Cale waited. Though Selgaunt's churches stopped tolling after the tenth hour, Cale knew intuitively when the midnight hour began. A benefit of serving the Lord of Shadows, he supposed.

He calmed himself, and cleared his mind. Time passed. When midnight arrived, a cloud passed before Selune and cast the room in utter darkness. A sign from Mask.

The darkness mirrored Cale's mood. Dark thoughts filled in his mind, violent, bloody thoughts. He reached out his consciousness to his god and requested spells that would harm his enemies. Mask answered. Cale's mind filled with power, the power granted him by the Lord of Shadows.

At that moment, Riven began to toss in his sleep, muttering in the strange tongue Cale had heard him speak previously. For a fleeting instant, Cale thought he understood the words—an ancient tongue once used by worshipers of the Lord of Shadows in the deep of night—but the meaning danced just out of reach of his understanding before dispersing like smoke.

Jak's voice, jarring in the dark, gave Cale a start.

"You all right, Cale?"

Riven's muttering must have awakened the halfling. Jak was sitting up in his cot, looking at Riven.

"I'm fine, Jak," Cale replied. "Go back to sleep."

The halfling nodded at Riven and said through a yawn, "What in the Nine Hells is he dreaming about?"

Cale didn't answer.

"Probably don't want to know anyway," Jak said, chuckled, and lay back down to sleep.

Cale didn't bother to wake Riven for his watch. Instead, he spent the night murdering the last of the butler in his soul. From then on, he wanted nothing in him but the killer.

A steady rain fell, soaking Cale's cloak. The gray clouds turned the dusk of evening into the darkness of night. The surface of the Elzimmer churned in the downpour. Before them rose the High Bridge. Wide enough to accommodate three wagons abreast, the great span had stood for hundreds of years, withstanding countless battles and mage duels. The thick oak footings of the span rose from the river's waters like the legs of giants. It looked as immovable as a mountain, but Cale knew better. The Uskevren had fought a battle there months before against the summoned horrors of Marance Talendar. The magic released during that combat had set the bridge to shaking and nearly brought it down.

Guard sheds stood at each end of the bridge, and a larger barracks complex sat in the center. Pitch torches sizzled in the wind and rain, the flames dancing as though to avoid the downpour. Just outside the near shed stood four Scepters, each armed with poleaxes and dressed in the green weathercloaks of the Scepters. They eyed Cale, Riven, and Jak suspiciously as the three approached. Cale knew the High Bridge guards to be notoriously difficult to bribe. He didn't bother to try. Instead, he presented his Uskevren house badge and announced the three to be on Uskevren business. The bedraggled bridge guards let them pass without further inquiry.

The rain thumped a drumbeat on the wood beams. Probably due to the weather, Cale, Riven, and Jak were the only traffic on the bridge. The river flowed under their feet.