The Spy

Chapter 3: City of Thieves

Chapter 4: Worlds of Wonder

          Parawn's gray eyes light up as his favorite subject is brought up. "Actually, we did in fact see that. It was a most impressive display of power by the ", he chuckles, "..priests. It is just another example of how the orcs have access to an entirely different approach to magic than we have. Now some would say it's better and some would say it's worse than our own. I for one say it's neither. It is something to be studied. After all this religious nonsense is just another cover to hide how they perform that magic. We must somehow find a common ground so that we can exchange ideas and see what the orcs mind set is so that we can see what kind of approach they take. For all we know it may be the same one we take only they hide it under all this pomp and circumstance. Maybe they have discovered that hiding the runes under this new cover and teaching them as rote and scripture has enabled them to pass on the rune learning to many who would by our standards completely unable to learn them. Because even the dullest of students will get something simple as a shadow-fire flow to create ice, if you repeat it to them a thousand times."

          He pauses for a breath and continues, "It's too bad the wall blocks scrying techniques as well otherwise, I'd be watching them all the time. I tell you it's amazing how we never really knew how advanced their studies of the magical arts truly were. Of course now we know they hid it under this ridiculous pretension of religion. Oh, when I discover the secrets, Magi throughout the valley will come to me for a few grains of wisdom. I will have debunked once and for all this stupid charade of priests and show that everything is simply and application of the runic arts with variations to account for the different effects. Now take that attack for example." He turns and begins pacing around the room, "It was simple a sound attack, undoubtedly they used shadow or illusion flows to amplify the sound of their voices to great effect. I'm quite impressed actually. But I think that if I had the time and didn't have to go to all these ridiculous meetings, perhaps I could figure it out. Of course first I have to get past that barrier." He begins walking out of the room, you can almost see the ideas churning inside of his head. "Yes.. I must find a way to pierce the barrier then I can get close enough to study them and figure out their style... " His voice fades as he shambles down the hall lost in thought.

          Torana appears in the door looking at the retreating figure of Parawn. He snorts, "If he had half as much common sense as he did brains the man might be only slightly dangerous." He turns to his apprentice and smiles, "As it is, if we guide him right, he is perfectly harmless. If we let him go out on his own, however, we are all in trouble. But he is right about one thing, that display was impressive. I hadn't really wanted to think about what would happen if we got the other gods involved in this mess. I figured the really powerful priests would take a while before they reached here. Luckily the barrier held. By the way we thought we heard Tacho bellowing about down here? More demands I suppose?"

***************

          Magnus looks at Torana and replies, "Why yes he was here just before the attempt. I wrote down his complaints and even had him sign it just to get rid of him."

          Torana looks at the parchment and snorts, "Yes...yes...yes..nothing important I see." He drops the parchment back on Magnus desk. He leans back against a wall and idly stares at the ceiling.

          Magnus shakes his head, "I pity the orcs when that man gets to vent his weeks of frustration out on them." The apprentice stands up and walks over to the window, "Speaking of which. How is progress with the wall coming? It has given us the time we needed to catch a breath, though I fear we are giving the orcs the same opportunity."

          Torana leans against the wall and stares at the roof, "Can't be helped. I suppose this falls under the category of 'be careful what you ask for you might just get it.'" The right side of his mouth curls in a half-smile.

          Magnus says, "The barrier stops physical and magical entry, we can't be attacked, spied on or enspelled, but we cannot do the same." Torana nods his head, "Now it seems to me that the orcs have been using brute force to try and take the barrier, and this will work eventually, but they haven't been able to muster enough force at one time. I am surprised that they haven't tried a little more finesse, though that doesn't mean we cannot."

          "Perhaps they have, we may not ever find out until it's too late", Torana says lazily, still contemplating the ceiling. "Only the gods know how long that barrier will last."

          Magnus pauses to gather his thoughts, "Now take two of the more advanced spells that I know, the one you recently taught me to appear in more places than one and the other that causes my form to blur making me harder to hit, these spells rely on shadow and illusion to fool the eye, what if we could combine the negative and positive flows to fool the senses as well? If a spell can be devised that will phase the target one step out of tune with the rest of the physical world, then the target should be able to cross over to the other side of the barrier and reappear once they are through." The young mage looks out for a moment and then shakes his head. "But that still wouldn't work cause the spell would be negated as the phased person hit the barrier since it dispels magic. However if a spell can actually put the recipient within another dimensional space outside of this one and then allow them to reappear past the barrier's physical limits, then they would never actually have gone through the wall and it should work...what do you think?"

          Torana stares at the roof for a moment, the curve of his lips rising even more sharply into a smirk. "And they say apprentices can't think for themselves..." He chuckles for a moment then says, "That would require entering another dimension entirely separate from this one, but similar in terrain." He pauses for a moment and says, "Quite possible but also quite dangerous. It can't be a dimensional space attached to this plane as it would never get near the barrier. We can not use a portal, as we have often done, because that would require dimensional warping on this plane of the two points to allow us to...well step from one point to another. But the barrier is still between the two points. Actually we've been looking along those lines, but the closest plane has also been blocked by the barrier and the others are fairly hostile. A small group would be able to do it, but never an army of any size. We have yet to find a plane that is compatible. Today we found one plane where the terrain is so different from here that our scrying found that this same location in the other plane ended up in the middle of a mountain. We've tried teleporting...the results were shall we say, liberating to ones lunch. Charon has been trying to find a way to nullify the barrier in a single location temporarily. He was the first to discover that the orcs are damaging it, but the thing is actually repairing itself. Hopefully it will be a while before the orcs figure out that a magical attack of the magnitude we've seen recently over three successive days will erode the barrier in one spot. Luckily they only test it once every few days."

          Torana rolls his head so that he is looking at Magnus and winks, "But don't tell Parawn that, he prefers the orc's direct method. Nahabedian thinks this is all a distraction and that they have already passed though the barrier. He spends most of his time scrying along the barrier looking for orcs."

***************

          Magnus looks at the barrier through the window and asks Torana, "By the way where did you find the spell for the barrier, and shouldn't it be easier to counteract the effects of the spell, by studying the runes of the spell?"

          Torana sighs and says, "That would be true, if I knew what the runes were. I meant it when I said 'be careful for what you ask for.' When it became obvious there was going to be all out war, I spent quite a bit of time trying to find a way to stop an army from getting too far into our territory. It became obvious that while such a barrier could have been constructed, it would require dozens of powerful magi and we would have had to have started over a year ago to cover the area necessary."

          "Several years ago back before Lorana was born and we were free to do as we wanted, my brother and I spent a lot of time exploring. During the course of our adventures we did favors for many then great powers. One of them was a quest for the goddess Gaea. The artifact didn't seem like much to us, and I was unable to determine its powers. But the high priest, I think they called them Elders...the Elder claimed that she was very grateful and gave us a ring with two obscured runes upon it. The Elder told us that if we wanted something very badly and there was nothing we could do to obtain it, then place the ring on a finger and make a wish. There was one for me and one for him. I held off making a wish because I wanted to study the runes on the ring, but as yet I have been unable to get through whatever is obscuring the rune. When I began hearing rumors of the orcs supposedly superior skill with runes and the inevitability of the upcoming war, it seemed a good idea at the time to ask for a barrier that would stop the invading forces from passing a single foot closer into our territory than the line I drew outside my tower. At first I thought nothing had happened then when you and Charon returned. I was showing him around and I noticed that we were under attack and that some sort of barrier was protecting us. It seems I got my wish. Now if I could just figure out what that rune was..."

          After a few moments of silence Magnus asks, "Have you managed to figure out how to take the runes that we use and change them into the orcish runes?"

          "Oddly enough, every time I think I've gotten it, I'll try it on a new rune and another theory goes up in flames. No surprise that the negative flows seem to be different for each spell. However if your rune consists of purely elemental flows, you place the focus points where the dominant rune overlays the supporting rune, not the opposite order or a mix otherwise the spell will backfire with spectacular results."

          He looks down at his robe and starts patting it all over looking for something. "Ah, take this rune for instance", as he slips his hand into a pocket that appears just long enough for him to pull out a thin leather bound book. He flips a few pages before pointing out a rune.

          "See here, this is a normal rune it consists of a major fire flow and a minor air flow. The focus points would then be applied in these spots." Torana points to where the one flow dominates the other. "But you would not put a focal point here or here." After some back tracing Magnus realizes those locations are where the minor flow temporarily dominates the major one. "This has the effect of locking the energy of the rune to the level of the mage who originally scribed the first rune. There are still a few things I don't quite understand about the locking mechanism. For instance how does it make it possible for the mind of less experienced magi to bend the more powerful source flow than they could otherwise do." Torana falls silent considering the rune for several moments before shaking his head.

          "Can you show me how", Magnus asks, "to cast the runes without the physical writing?"

          Torana nods absently and says, "It's really not all that difficult, it just requires concentration and practice. Unfortunately it has a downside. If your concentration is less than absolute its pretty much as if someone had interrupted your studying." He chuckles, "During one of my earlier trials....well you'll see."

          "We shall start with a simple rune." He flips through several more pages and comes a familiar rune. "First of all stare at the rune, but don't look to closely, don't try and study it just look at it as a whole." Magnus takes the book and looks at the rune. After a few moment he shakes his head as he feels himself beginning to fall into the rune. After several more tries he finally manages his stare at the entire page, seeing the rune but only in an abstract sense. "Now move your eyes until you reach just above the top of the page." Torana instructs, "Again don't focus on anything. Try to keep the entire rune within your field of vision. If you can't do that then try moving your eyes until it is just to the right of the rune."

          Holding the rune at arms length Magnus adjusts the location of the book several times. "Now with your free hand try and trace the rune in the air. Don't try and focus on anything. Don't worry about mistakes, don't worry about not knowing what the rune is." Magnus shifts his hands and holding one hand in the air, the other holding the book at arms length. The empty hand begins to trace in the air and the other hand begins to waver as his arm begins to ache. He hesitates and momentarily forgets his instructions and focuses on the book, instantly losing his place in the rune and breaking what little concentration he had.

          Torana nods and says, "You've got the basic idea now you just need the practice. You might also want to prop the a rune up on something, so that your arm doesn't get tired." He takes the book and places it back in that mysterious pocket and heads out the door. Just before leaving he says, "Oh by the way, there was a bit of an accident in the North room on the 5th floor. Do be a good lad and clean it up. I'm afraid the couch will be a complete loss, check and see if there is anyone in town with any skills to make another or check with any caravans to see about making another."

          As he leaves Magnus gets a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. With a sense of curious dread he sets his things aside and make the climb to the 5th floor. He opens the door to the North room, named such because its single wide window is facing due north. And at first he can see nothing wrong. The shadows cloak part of the room in darkness and the rest seems to be in order. After a few second he thinks, "Wait a minute there was supposed to be a couch right there. And shouldn't that half of the room be a bit lighter considering there are still hours of daylight left." Expecting some kind of trick the young apprentice checks out the darkness only to discover that it is not the shadows making the entire side of the room dark...it is soot. The entire side of the room looks as if there was a huge fire that burned pictures, the couch, the table next to the couch, even the stone seems badly scorched. Oddly enough there seem to be various pockmarks in the stone as if something hit it hard.

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Chapter 3: City of Thieves

          Magnus looks at the mess in the North room and shakes his head in dismay. "Damn..." he mutters. "Well learning to practice in the apprenticeship to the world's oldest and most powerful child, isn't easy." The young mage quickly measures the space where the old couch used to be. Then he begins examining the rest of the room to see if he can rearrange the room for maximum comfort and use. After a few minutes he is done designing in his minds eye, he gathers up his gear and heads out into the tent city.

          After a few discreet inquires he there are few if any merchants that have anything resembling furniture and even then it is extremely crude, poorly made chairs to fit the soldiers poor pockets. That and the occasional straw pillow seem to be all the merchants seem able to sale, though a peek inside the wagons of more than one merchant reveals much more comfortable furnishings.

          However inquiries into a reliable messenger are happily received and shortly thereafter Magnus meets with a man who says, "Master Delio is out at the moment but should you return with a message I'm sure he will be happy to send Kamdek upon horseback to locate this Jassal for the mere low price 10 silver plus expenses. Master Delio should be back by nightfall."

          Finally reduced to searching for a skilled artisan, several promising leads die out as they each turn out to be purveyors of junk and little real talent. Eventually one of the lieutenants points Magnus in the direction of yet another would-be-artisan. This one is actually another lieutenant named Beris. Outside the nondescript tent, Magnus hails the occupant, but is bid to leave. After explaining his purpose, Magnus is allowed to enter the tent.

          Much to his surprise the inside is far different from the outside. A quick glance around reveals the tent has a hardwood floor made of highly polished planks. The tent poles are also polished and carved with designs on them. On the right side there is a hole in the planking about two feet in diameter and a long cot carved out of the trunk of a tree lies along the left side of the tent.

          The sole occupant is busy doing touch up work on the cot. He glances up and notices Magnus looking around. "Yea, I know. What happens when the wall is down and the orcs attack, what am I going to do with all of this then? Well frankly....nothing. We're dead meat, but I'm not planning on spending my last few days living like a poor pathetic soldier boy. I want some comforts of home."

          He puts his tools down and turns around sitting in the cot. "So what minor decoration could possibly bring one of the mighty magi out of their tower?"

          Magnus looks at the soldier and smiles, "Ah, the artists' temperament I see, well surely one must expect the lack of social graces from one who spends more time honing his woodcraft." The mage laughs and extends his hand, " Magnus Kane at your service, Lieutenant Beris I presume."

          The occupant hrrumphs and says, "Yea, that's me!"

          Magnus says, "I wouldn't be so sure on dying at orc feet just yet, the wall is giving our side the time it needs to prepare for their offensive. The orcs may be in for a rude surprise. Anyway, let us talk about more pleasant business." Beris shrugs as Magnus continues, "I am in need of a new couch for one of the tower's rooms. Your skills are obviously up to the task and you would be paid well for your time, do you agree?"

          Beris stares at Magnus for a long time as if try to read him. Finally he makes his decision and shrugs and while going back to working on the cot he says, "I would think that with all that magical power I keep hearing about you could conjure one up in the blink of an eye. My price will be depend upon the type of couch you want and what decorations you want on it and the materials. I can only work after my duty shifts. I'm going to need to see the room it's going in. What kind of couch are we talking about here?" He looks up sharply, "and none of that magical fools gold I keep hearing about!"

          Magnus nods and looks around at the carvings upon the tent pole, "If it is at all possible I would also like to watch you work. I do some wood working as a hobby mainly in decorating this staff here, perhaps I could learn some refinement from observing a master's hand."

          With a bit of pride, Beris says, "I don't consider myself to be a master...yet. You can watch as long as you don't ask me a lot of silly questions and let me work. But if you really want to get good then you practice." He waves his hand grandly, "You've got plenty of wood out there to practice on. Nature has provided the materials and the design, you must find a way to bring the shape out of the wood. I have other things to do today, come back tomorrow just before noon. The orcs shouldn't be trying anything then and I have a late duty shift that day."

          Magnus asks, "I'm looking for a good carving chisel, perhaps you know where I can find one?"

          "I got mine from a man named Coros but I doubt if you'll find him here. He was heading south last time I saw him and that was months ago. I'm sure the merchants around here should be able to sell you one, though you might want to be careful and check them out first. I use a good heavy one for the general outline and most of the design and a smaller lighter one for the touch up work. Be careful they don't try and sell you a hollow one or maybe one that looks fancy, they are a complete waste of money if you actually plan on using them."

          Magnus bids Lt. Beris good day and heads back to the caravans this time inquiring about a hammer and chisel. It doesn't take long for the mage to find someone willing to sell him a hammer with a good set of chisels. After some serious haggling and 4 silver pieces later, Magnus walks away with the set of chisels for wood and stone in a leather pouch.

          After few moments after walking away from the merchant, Magnus feels a slight tug. He turns around quickly to see a thin wiry fellow, slightly smaller than the mage, and much younger, in a half crouch with his arm extended looking up at him. Following his outstretched arm Magnus sees his purse in the fellows hand. Looking back at his face. The fellow smiles for a bare second and says, "Ta TA, gotta go now!" and turns and begins running back down the crushed grass pathway that has been passing for a street.

***************

          Magnus begins to sprint after the thief. The mage yells out, "Stop that thief he stole my purse!" The passersby almost all have the same reaction...to stop and watch the chase.

          One calls back, "Which one?" The crowd laughs.

          Another calls out, "How much will you pay me?" The rest do not care at all. The thief darts between some tents and Magnus follows. He reaches an intersection and looks all around only to see people milling about. Following an open path in the crowd he spots the thief rounding another corner down the street. Mentally recalling the layout as seen from his tower window Magnus darts between the tents and begins snaking through a back way.

          After a few moments he comes out onto the street to practically bump into the thief strolling calmly down the street. The man takes one look at the mage and bolts back in the other direction. Magnus grips his staff. Icy blue light trails away from his hands and down the staff making a exquisitely intricate pattern. The pattern explodes violently in a light blue flash. Just as suddenly the light collapses upon itself shaping itself into four arrows of pure bluish light. One of the arrows steaks off leaving a light blue trail and like a guided missile follows its the dodging thief unerringly. With a violent flash the arrow slams into the thief's side. The impact knocks the thief several feet though the air to land in a heap. Immediately he begins screaming, "My arm, my arm! I can't feel my arm! Help me!" His eyes widen in surprise as he sees a patch of ice welding his arm to his side.

          Passersby look at him with some amusement, but all amusement vanishes as they glimpse the visage of the angry mage walking slowly up to the disabled thief.

          The thief begins chipping at the ice with a dagger from his free hand. He stops as a shadow passes over him. When he looks up to see the angry mage. He begins scooting back, trying and failing to gain his feet while holding the knife up defensively. "Get away from me! I got no problem with you just leave me alone." He quickly back up to a tent side and stops. As the angry mage stops and stares down on top of him, with staff with black mystical markings and four eerily blue specters floating idly just next to his shoulder, the thief's hand with the dagger wavers, shaking violently. "D.d..d..dont hurt me p-please s..s.sir, I meant no harm!"

          The mage stares down at the pitiful thief in silence for several seconds before saying, "Now tell me why I shouldn't send the rest of these right down your throat boy?"

          The thief gulps hard and shivers..."Ummm...."

          The mage extends his hand, "Hand over my purse now, As well as any others you stole today."

          The thief drops the dagger and begins digging into his shirt, pulling out small sacks and purses. When he is done there are three small nearly empty sacks, one fat bulging purse and the mage's own purse.

          The street is all but deserted as the mage smiles to himself. His eyes glitter with the promise of something rather unpleasant and the thief gives an involuntary shudder, "Help..."

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Chapter 4: Worlds of Wonder

Magnus puts the purses into his own shirt. The young mage also picks up the thief's blade and slides it into his belt. As Magnus picks up the items the thief begins slowly trying to slide to one side. Looking down at the thief who freezes, Magnus asks, "What's your name boy?"

"M..mm..my f..friends...c..c..call me W...Wo...Wolfe", he replies as he begins

to shiver. "C..c..could...I g...go...now....t..t..this...t...thing is c...c.old."

"On your feet, Wolfe. I see no reason why someone as healthy as you is stealing for a living instead of earning your wages through honest work. It appears as if I am going to have to teach the value of a hard earned coin." Wolfe pales slightly and his eyes shift from left to right looking for an opening as he attempts to rise. On his third try he is successful, but another heavy purse falls out of his shirt. Calmly Magnus picks the purse up and puts it with the others. "We are going to the tower. You lead, and if you think of trying to run, go ahead."

Wolfe looks at the mage in surprise and for a bare second it looks like he might just run, but he pauses as Magnus continues, "I would hate to not have a use for my remaining missiles." Wolfe pales considerably glancing over at the coldly glowing arrows floating above the staff. Slowly Wolfe moves in the direction of the tower. As he walks the ice weighs down one side and he falls over the ice hitting the ground and as it digs into his side he lets out a whimper.

As he picks himself up he mutters, "What did I do to deserve this mess?" Wolfe tries to compensate for the heavy ice by leaning in the other direction. After a few moments he falls in that direction. With a loud thump he hits the ground and groans loudly and for several moments he lays there cursing his luck. He eventually gets back up and manages to walk leaning first one way then another but not falling.

As they walk, pedestrians take one look at the thief, gawk at the ice patch on his arm and then spot the mage walking behind him and quickly avert their gaze. Nearly everyone begins looking busy at the side of the street, few willing to stare for more than a few seconds, but almost all are whispering to each other.

Magnus asks, "How old are you Wolfe?"

"Twenty-two", Wolfe replies tiredly.

"Where are you from?"

"Telor."

"Why are you here?"

"I didn't have much of a choice" He replies bitterly, "They picked me up off the street and asked why I hadn't joined the army. I told them I didn't want to fight. They said either I go to jail or joined the armed forces and protect our people. Since the city guard was full that would have meant a fighting army, so I choose jail. They knocked me out. I woke up in a cell with a few other guys. After a day or two I was released and told that I had just joined the army. I was free to do as I wanted but I was told that I would be okay as long as I reported for duty. I looked around and here I was. I've never been out of the city before so I knew I wouldn't last a minute outside of this city. I have no choice but to stay. A real nasty concept here. A prison without walls and the inmates are forced to protect the city just to save their own hides!" As he goes on the strain on Wolfe begins to tell in his voice.

"Do you remember who you stole the purses from?"

"No..Not really I just watch for marks and snatch what I can. I don't exactly get to k..know the victims." His words are slow and measured and even though he is beginning to shiver quite a bit.

Magnus allows the thief to enter the tower. At the entrance the thief stops and looks up the side of the tower, an act that almost causes him to fall backward. He quickly recovers, takes a deep breath and enters the tower. The door closes behind them with a boom and Wolfe jumps and bites off a whimper. He constantly begins looking left and right jumping at shadows while brandishing a dagger that is no longer there to protect himself. Magnus takes him upstairs and a short time later he sits eating dinner while the thief stands by the fire. The mage known Nahabedian is curled up in one corner of the room like a large cat curled up on itself for warmth. But in this case the mage is curled up while reading a book. Wolfe sits so close to the fire that quite often the fire spits back at him as water drips down into it. Wolfe recoils and pulls himself away each time but soon is edging back closer into the fire. His shivering is noticeably less as his eyes nervously track back and forth between Magnus and Nahabedian. His stomach growls as he watches Magnus eat. After a few moments Magnus gives the thief something to eat and Wolfe devours its trying desperately not to make a sound at every slurp and crunch he pauses to stare at the curled up mage.

When the ice has finally melted and the thief has some feeling back in his arm.

Magnus says picks up a few pieces of firewood and says, "Follow me." The voice sounds loud in the silence and Wolfe nearly jumps out of his skin as he leaps to his feet staring at Nahabedian then at Magnus as if he is about to be attacked.

Magnus turns and Wolfe quickly follows him out of the room. After showing him where the rags are kept. Wolfe carries the bucket and rags down to a well where they fill up the bucket and trudge up to the North Room.

The sun rides lower in the sky and most of the room is cloaked in shadows. After lighting a few candles Magnus says, "This room will be spotless when you are done, Wolfe. When the job is done satisfactorily, you will be paid for your work." This causes both his eyebrows to raise up then narrow dangerously. He looks around the room quickly as if expecting a trap.

Magnus continues, "Though I may have some more work for you to do later. Get going we don't have all day."

Wolfe looks almost defiantly at the mage for a moment before picking up the bucket and rags and walking slowly around the room. After a moment he stops at the back wall and stares at the craters in the walls. He runs a finger along one side and looks at the soot covered mess that comes off. He shudders and spares one quick glance at Magnus before setting down the bucket and beginning to work.

Magnus sits down on the opposite side of the room and begins chipping at a piece of wood with his staff next to him, the eerily silent ghostly arrows floating around it.

By the time the room is cleaned the sun has set and Magnus' block of wood looks like...well nothing in particular. Just a piece of wood with a lot of grooves on it.

Wolfe rubs his sore arms and says, "Can I go now. You have your money back. I've cleaned your room up for you. You said I could go..." He stops and cocks his ears before looking up at the roof. "What's that?"

All is silent for a few moments before Magnus just barely hears the sound of voices chanting above.

***************

Magnus motions for Wolfe to be silent and listens for a while before determining that the voices are attempted to look at or bringing something to them from far away...

Magnus thinks for a moment and realizes that the only place large enough for the magi to do any casting would be the top of the tower. The other rooms would require massive amounts of furniture moving and they haven't had him dragging anything around just yet.

Taking a look out the North window he sees the numerous campfires of the orc army. It's hard to tell in the darkness, but nothing seems out of the ordinary there. He also realizes that he cannot hear the chanting anymore.

He turns away from the window to find Wolfe almost to the door. The thief freezes knowing he's been caught. Magnus walks toward the door motioning toward Wolfe as he picks up his staff and says quietly, "We are going to go and see what the chanting is about."

"What do you mean we?"

"Lets see how good of a sneak thief you are", Magnus says, by seeing how quietly you can move with me. Lets go."

Wolfe looks for a moment as if he is going to bolt, then his eyes flicker to the floating arrows. Anyone can see him calculating his odds for a moment then not liking what he finds, he sighs and cocks his ear first one way then the next and begins heading toward the stairs. The chanting begins getting louder as the pair creep up the stairs, the only sound is the soft padding of the magi feet and the occasional tap of his staff against the stone. In the soft glow from the arrows Wolfe can been seen wincing at each tap of the staff.

As they climb the last two flights of stairs, Wolfe stops just before going on to the roof and begins heading toward the one of the few rooms in the tower Magnus hasn't been in. It is then the apprentice notices another one of the additions to Torana's Tower. Just off the stairwell is an open doorway that should be all means lead to the outside, but instead leads to the a small empty room. At the far end of the room is another open archway through there they can see several figures standing. Magnus motions for Wolfe to move closer and Wolfe looks at him as if he is crazy. Slowly Wolfe moves forward silent as a ghost. The chanting even drowns out Magnus footfalls.

The pair near the doorway to the second room and see six magi standing in a circle. All seem to be concentrating on the center of the circle, each standing in various stances as if concentrating. A rune has been drawn on the floor and glows brightly as all the colors of the rainbow seem to run through it in rhythm with the chanting. Above the rune there is a giant sphere floating above the ground and in the sphere is a vision of fire and molten rock moving swiftly. The chanting reaches a fever pitch and the rainbow travels through the rune again and the vision changes to something resembling the night sky, except it is all around and the stars are much brighter and much more numerous. The vision of stars begin to twirl as the chanting returns to normal levels.

Magnus can't quite follow the rune, but he is quite sure it's the same one as before just being repeated. After a time the chanting reaches a fever pitch and again the vision changes. This time showing the top of a forest of trees. but it only takes a moment to notice several things are wrong. The first thing is that it is daytime in the vision. The second is that the sun is orange and the sky is green. The third is that the plants are a rather strange shade of blue. A giant flying creature enters the view heading straight for the vision. The creature is bluish and large, its wings seem to be some sort of scaly material but it actually seems to fly rather than glide. It has a long tail almost as long as it is. It looks like a child's clay statue of a dragon would look. As it nears it seems to slow down and hover in the air. The eyes are set far apart on either side of its head and as it turns its head Magnus sees one white eye with a gray pupil staring at outward almost as if it can see through the sphere.

For the next several moments the creature hovers almost as if it can see into the room its eye looks all around seeming to focus on each of the magi then their surroudings.

Then the chanting reaches a fever pitch and the rune flashes again and the vision changes. As it changes Magnus is almost sure he could hear a cry of consternation from the creature. The new vision is that of a grassy plain stretching all the way to the horizon. The night is illuminated by thousands of stars and a pair of brilliantly white moons. Suddenly a dozen humanoid creatures enter the view running.

At some signal they spread out wide and run quickly in different directions. Suddenly one vanishes in a brilliant ball of light. A few moments later they spot creatures looking very much like praying mantis astride a giant jelly-like creature that seems to flow quickly across the plains. The sound of clicks and scraping fills the air as the eyes of one of the mantis creatures glows brightly for a moment and another humanoid bursts into a brilliant ball of light. Within moments all is silent as everyone vanishes into the distance.

The next few visions show alternately infinite blackness, another place of fire this one inhabited with creatures screaming and writhing while others are laughing and playing, and ocean creatures swimming in yellow tinted water. Finally the rune flares out and dies. The magi all heave a sigh and stare at the dead rune in utter silence.

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