Green fire erupted in her free hand and she reached in, grasping the sorcerer's robe. Despite the wind, the magic fire caught and ignited in the ash-gray robes, and he fell back screaming. But his cries twisted into an incantation, and the wind gusted, blowing Amira back and extinguishing the flames. Gyaidun, his broken wrist throbbing with pain, pushed himself to his feet and lurched forward. His toe struck something hard. His knife! He reached down, grabbed it, and charged.

He knew he was most likely done in and nothing he could do could stop the sorcerer, but if he could add his effort to the fight, perhaps Amira could conjure something strong enough to strike him down-or at the very least buy her time to escape. The sorcerer stood, blackened holes in his robes and cowl still smoldering, and as his charge brought him close Gyaidun could hear him snarling. Amira began her incantation, "Keljan-" "Hey!" Gyaidun roared, raising his knife to swipe at the sorcerer's face. The sorcerer turned his attention away from Amira to Gyaidun, and as he did so the wind caught in his tattered and burned cowl, ripping it off his head. Gyaidun saw the sorcerer's face for the first time. Older it was, and gaunt like a man long deprived of food, but there was no mistaking the face and the cant of his eyes. His mother's eyes. It was Erun. His son. "-saule!"

Amira finished, and from behind him Gyaidun felt the air ignite. "No!"

Gyaidun threw himself between them.

The Endless Wastes The wind died near dawn, but the snow kept falling as if Auril meant to bury the world. From the shelter of their camp-at the bottom of a washed-out gully where straggly bushes and long grass sagged over a lip of earth, offering a sort of half roof-Amira watched it come down. Under different circumstances she might have found it beautiful, but now she knew it would be waist deep by midmorning. Jalan was still asleep, wrapped in thick blankets beside her. She resisted touching him, fearing she might wake him. The belkagen had done all he could to heal him. Jalan's body would have to do the rest. Looking down at him, Amira's heart slowed but seem to beat with twice its usual strength.

She had her son back. His cheeks were sunken, dark circles ringed his eyes, his skin had a gray pallor she didn't like, and his breathing was strained, but he was alive and he was here. Right now, that was all that mattered. Amira heard footsteps wading through the snow, and then the belkagen ducked under the overhanging foliage and stepped around the small fire. "How is he?" she asked. "Gyaidun?" "Yes."

"He'll live." The belkagen sat. His skin looked brittle as parchment and his shoulders sagged under his cloak. "Healing the damage from your staff took most of my strength and wisdom. I'll have to rest before I see to his wrist and other injuries." Amira opened her mouth then shut it again. She was torn between guilt and anger. Battered as Gyaidun had been in the fight, it had been her strike aimed at the sorcerer that had done the most damage. After it had struck Gyaidun in the back, the sorcerer had fled, fading into the deeper darkness of the storm. Gyaidun had lain unmoving in the snow, his torn shirt smoking and the flesh underneath steaming. She'd run to him, finding him breathing but little else. Part of her had wanted to pursue her foe, to finish this once for all, but there was no sign of him.

Looking down at Gyaidun, Amira had known he would die without help-and might well die with it. So she'd used her spell to take them both back to the belkagen. Even after the old elf's first attempt to heal him, Gyaidun had been almost insensate, tears streaming down his cheeks, raving and screaming. Amira had seen wounded men, some on the verge of death, trying to hold in their life's blood as they watched it pouring between their fingers, and she'd understood Gyaidun's cries were from no physical pain. She'd known others like him in the war. He could've swallowed hot iron with a smile. No, this had been something deeper, the cry of anguish, of a broken heart. The belkagen had poured a syrupy concoction down Gyaidun's throat. A shudder had run through him, followed by a violent bout of coughing. Gyaidun had looked up at her, and his eyes seemed haunted. He told the old elf what he'd seen.

Amira had been standing nearby, and she heard it all. "Erun!" he said.

"It was Erun. My son! My son, my son…" "Erun?" said the belkagen.

"That thing had Erun?" "No!" Gyaidun grabbed the belkagen's shoulders.

"It was Erun. That thing was my son. My son!" That had shocked Amira as much as anyone-and filled her with a cold dread. So much of the past several tendays- Jalan's abduction, that damned sorcerer's dogged pursuit of him, the vision in Hro'nyewachu-was beginning to come together in her mind. Now, with Gyaidun off somewhere else, she voiced her concerns to the belkagen. "Gyaidun's son…" "Erun," said the belkagen, his voice thick. "Erun is-was his name." "Erun. He was taken, just like Jalan?" "Fifteen years ago." "Out there…" said Amira. She stopped, gathering her thoughts. "In the darkness, in the storm, Gyaidun was… beyond hurt. I've seen the carnage of battle, and I've seen few men take a beating like that and still remain on their feet. But Gyaidun was still fighting. He must have been running on will alone. Is it possible that… that-" "That he imagined the whole thing?" "Yes," she said, her hope gathering strength. "His search for his son has consumed him for so long. It's been the one thing that kept him going. Finding Jalan… I knew from the beginning, since that night by the lake when we first spoke, that Gyaidun was after Erun, not Jalan. Is it possible he wanted to find his son so much-maybe too much-that his mind saw what it wanted to see?" The belkagen sat in silence for a long while. When he spoke, his voice was cold and hard. "You think Gyaidun wanted to see his son warped and twisted into that… thing? That horror?" "No," said Amira.

"But if the heart wants something strong enough…" "You told me what you saw in Hro'nyewachu. The road of years you walked. You saw the fate of Khasoreth and his apprentices. Jalan's forefathers. Did your heart… imagine that?" "No. Mystra help me, no. If anything, I would want to believe it was all some twisted dream. But I know it wasn't." The belkagen gave a deep sigh and nodded. "I know it also. I never walked that road, but I have walked many others. Long roads through doubt, darkness, and worse. I believe what you saw in Hro'nyewachu was truth. I do not doubt it. But my question is: Why?"

Amira scowled. "Why?" "You went seeking aid for your son, not… what you would call 'a history lesson.' " "The staff-" "Was given to aid your fight. But it was not the help you sought. Hro'nyewachu told me the staff would 'sharpen the bite' you gave your enemies, but that it was for another to save Jalan." "Sharpen the bite?" Amira's mouth opened and closed twice before more words would come to her.

"Hro'nyewachu… told you? She told you? What else did she tell you?"

The belkagen looked up, and again Amira felt herself caught in a hunter's gaze. "Many things, sacred things for her and me alone. But she told me that for you. The staff is meant to aid your fight, not win it. That task is for another." "Another?" she said. "Gyaidun? You mean Gyaidun?" "I mean no one," he said. "They are the words of Hro'nyewachu, not the words of the belkagen. Is the other Gyaidun?"

The belkagen shrugged. "Perhaps. Perhaps not. Who can tell?" "Then what damned good is it?" Amira said. "If we can't understand any of it, what does it mean?" "It means this fight is not over." "What?"

Amira could not look away from the belkagen's wolf stare. He'd run last night while she stood and fought, yet here she sat feeling like a snowblind hare caught in the open. "You are thinking about taking Jalan back to Cormyr," he said. "Back to the safety of your knights, wizards, and castles." "And if I am?" "Your knights, wizards, and castles could not protect him before." "They cau-!" "And they will not protect him now!" said the belkagen. "Nor you. You did an amazing thing last night, Amira Hiloar. You hurt… the sorcerer. You did something that no one has done in many ages, I think-not even your own precious knights and wizards. But now he knows it. And he knows you.