NAGARATH crashed heedlessly through the underbrush of the wood, his black cloak of power marking a wide swath in the snow. There was no need for secrecy. The light had only just begun to sneak its way into the morning skies, a lighter grey upon the dark. There would be nobody about at this hour, not in this bitter cold.

Besides, he had bespelled himself from prying eyes. The charm repaired the damage he left in his wake and dampened the sound of his passage. For though he hated using his power for such things, the urgency that drove him out into the woods of Limska Draga on this early morning was greater than his reluctance to employ the spellwork.

The squirrel he chased simply moved too fast for any other option.

While he felt a pang of conscience for having purposefully left without telling Liara, Nagarath tried to argue it away. Telling the girl would have necessitated any number of problematic explanations, for one thing. And disclosing the contents of Phenlick's letter, with its rumors of unrest stemming from Liara's exile, was not something he wanted to do just yet—if ever.

Then there were the creatures of the forest, the mage's eyes and ears. The varying reports of armed men in the woods had so far been discreet enough so as not to draw Liara's attention, squirrels and birds having come to him mostly to complain. Nagarath was certain Liara would not take kindly to the revelation that he had magicked the animals. They made regular patrols of the forest, and had done so, in fact, for many years.

Satisfied that he was in the right, Nagarath continued trailing his informant through the trees. The gray squirrel slowed, scratching and skittering along through the underbrush. Gently, so as not to disturb the flighty animal, Nagarath crouched and peered about the small clearing. Informant for the mage or no, squirrels were always both easily frightened and angered.

At his feet, the last of the year's ground cover bent under the weight of the previous week's early snowfall. But beyond that, partially open to the gray swirling skies through the trees, the little clearing was trampled flat. Booted feet had cut into the snow. A broken branch lay here and there. Whoever had been there had been of sufficient number that they had not bothered to cover their tracks.

With a heavy sigh, Nagarath reached into a pocket of his robes and drew forth a nondescript pebble. Dropping it, he murmured quick words of magick and rose to his feet. He looked inquisitively to the squirrel and again they were off, crashing through the crusty snows and brittle foliage of early winter.

They visited five such sites before the skies had brightened to a polished gray-white. And at each, Nagarath repeated his ritual of words and pebble. Satisfied, he thanked the squirrel and bid the little creature farewell.

Alone in the wood, Nagarath turned a slow circle, closing his eyes in readiness for his spell, gripping his staff tightly as the hair at the nape of his neck prickled and stood to attention. Spellwork made him vulnerable, and he could feel other eyes upon him. Could I possibly bring myself to attack Dvigrad's soldiers?

If it proved necessary. The thought came unbidden as he sought to settle his mind for the magick. Yes. Yes he could. The truth of the revelation sparked a shudder that went beyond the cold of the winter air.

Resolve strengthened, he muttered a few of the sharp words of the Green Language. In his mind, five points of green light flickered to life. He could feel that he stood over the fifth, the pebble at his feet glowing the brightest to his magickal senses. Widening the gaze of his mind's eye, Nagarath sought the two blue-white points that marked Dvigrad and Parentino on his mental map. He thought he ought to have located them by now . . .

There. Parentino, glowing steadily in his mind. He hadn't realized that he'd traveled so far afield. He loosed the breath he'd held, feeling the sudden squeezing sensation in his chest ease.

Even so, the flicker of fear remained. His eyes snapped back open. He couldn't 'see' Dvigrad. Luckily, the squirrel's zigzag path through the forest had not disoriented him so much that he couldn't get his bearings based on his position relative to Parentino's. Pausing a moment on the path, he gently raised his staff in a protective gesture.

Surely there was nothing amiss in Dvigrad? It was only last week that Piotr had come to see them, only days since the town guard had made their various camps that so disturbed the squirrel. Not entirely reassured by his logic, he set out once more, favoring speed over silence until he could finally make out Dvigrad's familiar, reassuring form through the winter-thinned trees.

In the short walk, Nagarath had decided that, early or not, unwelcome or no, it was high time he talked face to face with the priest about the goings on in Limska Draga. If there wasn't a need to be in the woods, then the guard should be back within Dvigrad's walls by sundown, not camping in the forest like vagabonds. On the other hand, if they were patrolling against some unknown trouble, then it was Nagarath's right to know so that he could prepare his own defenses accordingly. And perhaps provide some of my own to Dvigrad.

Almost immediately, he retracted this last thought with a shiver. He, of all people, was not the one to offer a good defense against trouble. Breathing heavily, for the cold and the fear had both been growing on him as he traveled, Nagarath walked round Dvigrad from the backside.

He was doubly thankful for the charm that had rendered him invisible throughout his investigations. If there was real trouble afoot in Limska Draga, the soldiers he sought might well still be scattered amongst the trees, even further than he'd looked. Even so, the time for stealth was over. It would not do to approach the wall and catch the guard unaware by means of magick.

"Her'ah." The spell of revealing came out as an exhalation, Nagarath pressing forward into the path in the space of a breath. Shading his eyes from the brightness of gray stone against gray skies, he looked upward to the battlements.

"Good day," Nagarath shouted. The wall gave nothing save a stern-faced silence. "Good day?"

When his second call aroused no further activity from the empty walls, he gave the gates a push. They yielded only as far as the bar on the inside allowed.

So, we're playing this game now, are we? Nagarath stood back from the wall, again craning his neck upward, looking for any signs that his greetings had been noted. Early or not, someone must be up. The days simply passed too swiftly at this time of year. Annoyance turning to ire, Nagarath turned back toward the town gates, his staff raised anew to draw, most carefully, the required opening rune upon the impenetrable gate. Though he much preferred his wand for such purposes, it would not do to come charging through the city's entrance, weapon drawn.

With a quick and quiet spark, Nagarath's magick forced the barrier's locks and bars to give way and the mage entered, fearful of what he might find.

~*~

Out in the garden, Liara fitfully overturned clumps of dirt, looking for signs that any of the root vegetables had survived the early snow. While winter storms and cold snaps were not uncommon—Liara could remember half a dozen such winters in her own short lifetime—a thick blanket of snow this early had come as a surprise.

Nagarath had, of course, shrugged off her insistence that they hurry out and harvest what they could. Which was why she had decided to do exactly that. If the mage was going to wander off without so much as a word, then he couldn't complain about what happened in his absence. Besides, she'd worked too hard on the kitchen garden to have the fruits of her labor ruined by lazy stubbornness.

Stretching her arms in an attempt to free herself of the crick in her back, Liara paused. Limbs akimbo, she stared, frozen, up into the bleak winter sky, listening intently as bird twitters silenced and the air became unnaturally still. Rising to her feet in alarm, she darted a glance at the gate, confirming that it was indeed locked. But the building pressure in the air told her that it would not help.

Whatever was coming was not coming through the gate . . .

Liara ran for the safety of the castle, fleeing into the cellar. Covering her ears, she tried to fight the mounting pressure in the air, like a giant fist squeezing her lungs. She could almost hear the walls screaming. The air positively danced with magick. Panic rising, she ran back up the stairs, debating whether to try her bedroom or the library. She chose the library.

Pushing aside the tapestry that hid the door, Liara ruled out the possibility of a misfired spell or experiment. Whatever was in the air felt purposeful. Menacing. Forbidding. Like it wanted to crush the life out of her.

With a quick, guilty glance over her shoulder—where are you, Nagarath?—Liara slammed shut the library door and, running over to a nearby shelf, grabbed a recently catalogued book of wards.

"Please work," she mumbled, not quite sure whom she addressed, frantically turning pages as the room swam into focus around her. A trembling breath, and the spell was cast.

Liara swayed and sat down hard. A long, breathless moment passed before she rose slowly, shaking, to her feet. Feeling a trickle of wetness above her upper lip, Liara wiped blood from her nose, wincing as her heart skipped a few beats. Still, the room had ceased to ripple, the air becoming breathable and quiet. A soft, bright sensation settled in her mind as she realized that her casting might actually have worked.

Liara, magus of Parentino, she crowed inwardly. She barely had time to register the thought before a whoosh of wind stirred the pages of the book in her hands to life and, with a loud bang, Nagarath appeared in the center of the room.

Startled, Liara watched unmoving as the mage stumbled towards her, his face gaunt and pale. And then she was in his arms, Nagarath murmuring into her hair, "Oh, thank you. Thank you, gods."

Caught in the impromptu bear hug, Liara's spine stiffened as she caught the smell of death upon the man, death and the fiery scent of burned-up magicks. Remembering himself, Nagarath let go of his ward and walked in a daze to the wall, slumping down against it, as if exhausted, spent. His staff clattered to the ground beside him, momentarily forgotten.

Liara still hadn't moved, had not said a word, stunned as she was by his abrupt entrance and even stranger display of affection.

He looked up at her, his eyes haunted. "They're all dead. All of them, Liara."

She shifted uncomfortably. He was near tears. To her dismay, her mind dislodged from his words, traveling back to Nagarath's impulsive embrace, stuck on the confusing and embarrassing clutter of feelings it sparked. She wanted to relive the moment again and again. She wanted to wipe it from her memory. It was awful. And distracting. Unsure how to react to Nagarath's pain, she opted for the safe route, gently claiming a spot on the floor beside him, forcing herself back to the present and searching his face for answers. What in the world had just happened? Why did he look like, smell like . . . death?

"Who's dead?"

"The town. Dvigrad." A weak hand gestured to the outside world.

The room tilted and swiftly righted itself, leaving Liara gasping for breath. Dead. Everyone is dead.

"How did—?" Her voice cracked, betraying emotions she could not yet comprehend. Her brain told her it wasn't possible, that Nagarath was mistaken or exaggerating. But her heart, frozen with shock to the point of barely beating, told her the truth of it. She could feel Dvigrad's absence even here in Parentino, could see it in his face. Suddenly, Liara missed the numb sensation of a moment before, finding she did not like the new, terrible fear that had taken its place. "Was it—?"

Fire, her mind wanted to say, wanted to supply a reason for it all to add up. But a daughter of the woods, she knew better. Nagarath had smelled not of ash and heat, but of spent magicks. Her heart squeezed again at the thought. Too much magick used. Nagarath, why? Perhaps it had been the abrupt manner in which he had returned? In all her time with the mage, she had never seen him use his Art in so dramatic a fashion. She hadn't even known he could.

Thinking of Nagarath's display of power, mentally dissecting his scent, called back into sharp focus the memory of him holding her close, however briefly. She could almost feel the comforting warmth of his arms, the desperation of his embrace and the emotions riding high underneath the intimate gesture. Her own tumble of emotions swelled with the recollection. Liara turned away, overwhelmed.

"Plague." The word, barely a whisper, drew Liara out of her spiraling thoughts. "It took the whole town. Save for the soldiers, I believe."

"Soldiers," Liara repeated dully, as if by so doing she might bring some sense of order to her reeling mind. The smell of burnt magick wafted again to her nose, her heart skipping an anxious beat. "Wait, did you . . . did you fight them?"

Nagarath stirred, his eyes gaining back some of their steely focus. "No. They were just gone. I'd been looking into it. They've been patrolling further and further from Dvigrad, of late."

Liara tried to think of why else Nagarath would have used so much magick at once. He looked about done in. It was terrifying, seeing his face so ashen. What if he died on her? What would she do then?

As if sensing her unspoken worries, Nagarath smiled and reached for her hand, his voice rough with emotion. "Someone needed to honor the bodies before scavengers defiled them. Not that animals would have taken much interest in a place with the smell of sickness so thick in the air. I used a good deal of magick to make sure that each was properly mourned."

Liara turned away, shrinking from the mental picture of her friend building the large funeral pyre. "I'm sorry," she said simply, not knowing what else to say.

Nagarath squeezed her hand. "They were your people, Liara."

Reluctantly, she nodded her assent, unsure of how she felt about it. True, she'd been closer to some than others, but . . .

"Liara, there's blood on your nose." Nagarath's voice came sharp, interrupting all thought.

"Oh. That." Liara moved to wipe the blood with her sleeve, but stopped. Father Phenlick had taught her better than that. Blanching at the thought of the old priest, she hid her face under her handkerchief. "It's nothing. I . . . I got scared. There was something in the air. Squeezing me. I ran inside. Here. And did the first thing I could think of."

Nagarath's eyes shot to the cover of the book that Liara now held up, his face a mix of incredulity and anger. Liara would have rejoiced to see the mage show so much spark had he not looked so forbidding. "Did you . . . did you attempt a warding spell?"

Liara nodded. "I thought something was attacking Parentino."

Nagarath blinked in surprise, his look changing from one of danger back to one of keen alertness. "How so?"

"Something just felt . . . scary . . . all of a sudden. Like the air was all crackly. And the pressure? Oh, I thought my heart would burst from it. So I ran inside, thinking I'd at least try to stop whatever-it-was from getting in here with me and the books and things." She shrugged. "I just sort of reacted."

Nagarath sat back against the wall, stunned. "You 'just sort of' performed complex magick."

Liara blushed. "I . . . was worried I'd locked you out."

"Me?" This seemed to amuse him. "I don't think you could. Not out of my own castle."

Liara pouted at the immediate dismissal of the first high-level magicks she'd performed.

He waved aside her reaction. "No, no. You see. . . I've got so many spells at work within these stones. I felt the defensive wards trigger all the way from Dvigrad. You saw me rush back. I was afraid . . ." He shook his head, as if clearing a thought.

"So, you're saying it was our defensive spells that tried to crush me?" Liara recoiled.

"That tried to cr– what? No! That's preposterous. You must have done something to trip them."

"I was gardening." Liara's response came flat, her annoyance hanging as thickly in the air as the adverse magick she'd suffered through.

"You were out in the gardens?"

Liara nodded.

"Yes, well." Nagarath tugged at his nose. "Outside the walls, the spells defending the castle had no way of really knowing if you were an enemy or a guest. They're rather good enchantments, if a mish-mash."

"Like everything else you do?" Liara interrupted blackly.

"Yes, but over time, they have become quite effective, clearly."

"I could have been squished!"

"Goodness, no." Nagarath shook his head against the cool stone wall. "Ended up with one whopping headache, perhaps. But nothing worse than that, once the spells saw into your head and heart, saw that you were allied with me. I'm sorry for the fright, little magpie. You did well."

Together they sat in the silence of the library, neither eager to return from their brief sparring match to the bleakness of reality. Liara's mind was abuzz, unable to settle in the tumult of magick and questions pummeling her. Dvigrad dead. Her blood, singing with the power of her first advanced spellwork—for, oh yes, it would be the first of many. Phenlick, Piotr, Babić . . . Krešimir, all gone.

Her eyes prickled, sour tears that refused to do more than stab at the backs of her eyes. But why? How? And was Parentino safe under Nagarath's hodge-podge illusions and wards? Something had to have triggered them. She'd been outside countless times over the past eight months with not so much as a twinge from the wizard's patchwork enchantments. No, something else had tripped Parentino's protections. But what? And had it anything to do with what had happened in the town?

With that, Liara's mind returned to Dvigrad, starting the circuit of fretting and fearing anew.

"You say that you were gardening?"

Nagarath's statement came at her again, with that same dreamy distance he tended to put between emotion and academia. Liara fought the urge to snap her response. "Yes."

"And not with magick?"

Liara noted the slip of Nagarath's gaze back to the book of wards, still in her hand. Annoyed that he'd question the matter—again—especially considering the fright that his spells had given her, she opted for tightlipped silence.

"Liara, if we have to discuss anew the dangers of you performing illicit magicks . . ." Nagarath gently reached over to take the spell book from her.

"I didn't do it, all right? They attacked me." Liara snatched the book to her chest, then relaxed her hold, feeling stupid. It was Nagarath's book. And the mage look positively wounded by her words. "Or something did."

The inherent question in the admission died unanswered between them, as Nagarath turned to stare at the tile beneath his feet, seemingly spent, his mouth set in a hard line. Liara sat through the silence, waiting for acknowledgement of her last statement, her hinted fears.

Nothing from the mage. He continued his moody stare at the floor.

She prodded, unable to let the matter drop, "I draw water, I use the privy. It's not the first time I've been outside the keep. And before you ask, no, I wasn't outside Parentino's outer wall."

"I don't have spells beyond our perimeter. You know that." His eyes darted to her briefly, the fierce anger in them kindling Liara's own. "Listen, the only way the inert spells that protect the courtyard would activate is by them sensing an adverse force—either a trespasser harboring ill-intent or a magick other than my own."

"I didn't touch your horrid old spells. I told you what happened."

"Even now. After everything that happened today." Anger turned to hollow bleakness and Nagarath's accusation came hoarse, sorrowful. "Liara, when are you going to stop lying?"

"When are you going to believe me?"

Liara was angry. She was hurt. Today should have been a banner day. She had cast a serious spell, unaided. A hero. She'd been frightened out of her wits, more than she could ever remember from her own ordeal in the garden. The fears she'd known as a child had been visible threats, easy to identify and anticipate. But magick? It was terrifying, exhilarating. And she'd mastered it, only to have old sins thrown back in her face, instead of congratulations and thanks for saving the castle.

'After everything that happened today.' The tang of spent magicks was fading from the air, carrying with it the sting of Nagarath's thoughtless accusation. Oh, the things that her mage had been through today. The memory of his first words, whispered into her hair as he held her, returned full force. She was still mad at him, to be certain—him and his stupid patchwork spells. But she owed it to her friend to swallow her pride, bite back the retort that old habits had formed on her tongue. Because, in spite of his hurtful words, he cared. Cared so much that he'd burned through incredible amounts of power to return and assure himself of her safety. So much so that she could see the tense alertness under the exhaustion, and she knew that, even now, he was actively sustaining his "horrid old spells."

"Do you have to work hard to maintain them?" She looked again to Nagarath's hooded eyes, the gray pallor of his skin. Her fears sharpened, crowding out her anger. What if he had caught the plague? What if it wasn't just a drain on his magick that was hurting him? Or worse, what if he ran out of magick? Liara knew from her studies in magickal theory that large amounts of casting or long-term maintenance of a network of spells could very well drain all magick from the caster—if it didn't kill them first. A wizard who became incantate lost their magickal signature forever, their ongoing spells often ending as well.

Nagarath saw her worried frown, followed her unspoken thoughts. "I am far from incantate, my dear. Just . . . tired. Believe me, I'm nowhere near dropping, but I will say it would take a great deal of peril before I'd attempt any more casting at present. Granted, I shouldn't have left you defenseless—near defenseless"—Nagarath corrected himself at Liara's quick glance—"with only the castle spells to protect you in the event of disaster. But I couldn't very well leave all those poor souls in Dvigrad like that."

Liara knew she should feel guilty over having bothered him about the spells. He'd had to deal with so much in those last few hours. But, the awfulness of that moment in the garden hung around her like an unwelcome fog. His questioning of her account made sense, in light of past actions and today's stunning demonstration of power. What if she had unconsciously done something to his wards? And what if they hadn't, in the end, functioned as the wizard promised, reading her heart or whatever it was he'd said?

She glanced at Nagarath, laboring under the maintenance of the spells, and an even darker fear snaked its way into her spine: what if her warding of the castle had saved her from a real threat? Cobbled together defenses or not, what had happened in the garden hadn't felt like Nagarath's magick. Liara shuddered, wishing he'd say something else.

Dvigrad, dead. The thought returned to her, unwelcome and pressing.

His face darkening, Nagarath eased himself up off the ground. Leaning heavily on his staff as he limped towards the doorway, he called back over his shoulder, "Liara, you'll find that all parts of the castle are now open to you. However, I would ask that you refrain from going out of doors until I can sort out what happened to the enchantments at work outside Parentino. And please, try not to do anything stupid while I am in my workroom looking for a way to better separate my personal magick from the direct maintenance of our defensive spells."

Liara obeyed. In fact, she did not move at all, in spite of Parentino with all its exciting nooks and crannies fully opened to her at last. Instead, she looked in on herself and frowned.

Dvigrad, buried and gone.

Why could she feel nothing? Not even shed one tear?