The barely sealed cut bled freely. Three drops of crimson fell upon the hair.

A greenish smoke arose wherever the blood touched the follicles.

The necromancer began chanting. He uttered the name of Gregus Mazi, once, twice, and then a third time. Before him, the unsettling smoke swelled, and as it did, it took on a vaguely humanoid shape.

"I summon thee, Gregus Mazi!" Zayl called in the common tongue. "I conjure thee! Knowledge is needed, knowledge only you can supply! Come to me, Gregus Mazi! Let your shade walk the mortal plane a time more! Let it return to this place of your past! By that which was once a very part of your being, I summon you forth!"

Now the smoke stood nearly as tall as a man, and in it thereappeared what might have been a figure clad in robes. Zayl returned to chanting words of the Forgotten Language, the words that only spellcasters knew in this day and age.

But just as success seemed near, just as the figure began to solidify, everything went awry. The billowing smoke abruptly dwindled, shrinking and shrinking before the necromancer's startled eyes. All semblance of a humanoid form vanished. The hairs curled, burning away as if tossed into hungry flames.

"No!" Zayl breathed. He stretched a hand toward his two prizes, but before he could touch them, they shriveled, leaving only ash in their wake.

For several seconds, he knelt there, unable to do anything but stare at his failure. Only when Humbart finally spoke did the necromancer stir and rise.

"So… what happened there, lad?"

Still eyeing the pattern and the dust that had once been hair, Zayl shook his head. "I don't—"

He stopped, suddenly looking off into the darkness.

"Zayl?"

"I do know why it failed now, Humbart," the necromancer responded, still staring at nothing. "It never had a chance to succeed. From the first, it was doomed, and I never realized it!"

"Would you mind speaking in less mystifying statements, lad?" the skull asked somewhat petulantly. "And explain for us mere former mortals?"

Zayl turned, eyes wide with understanding. "It is very simple, Humbart. There is one and one reason alone that would make this and any other summoning of Gregus Mazi a futile gesture: he still lives!"

TEN

If anything, Quov Tsin had grown more unsettling, more unnerving, by the time Captain Dumon next visited him. An empty mug and a small bowl of half—eaten food sat to the side of where he feverishly scribbled notes. His withered features had become more pronounced, as happened only in the dead as the flesh dried away, and he looked even more pale than the necromancer. Now the Vizjerei did not just mumble to himself; he spoke out in a loud, demanding tone.

"Of course, the sign of Broka would be inherently necessary there! Any cretin could see that! Ha!"

Before entering, Kentril questioned Gorst, who leaned against the wall just outside the library. "What sort of state is he in?"

The giant had always been untouched by Tsin's acerbic personality, but now Gorst wore a rare look of concern and uncertainty. "He's bad, Kentril. He drank a little, ate even less. He don't even sleep, I think."

The captain grimaced. Not the mood he had been hoping for, although from the beginning it had been unlikely that the Vizjerei would be any more reasonable than before. Still, Kentril had no choice; he had to try to speak with Tsin now.

"Keep an eye out, all right?"

"You know I will, Kentril."

Straightening, Captain Dumon walked up to the stooped—over sorcerer. Quov Tsin did not look his way, did not even acknowledge that anyone had entered. Taking aquick glance at the spellcaster's efforts, Kentril saw that Tsin had filled more than a dozen large parchment sheets with incomprehensible notes and patterns.

"You're a bigger fool than I thought, Dumon," the Vizjerei abruptly announced in an even more poisonous voice than previously. He still had not looked up at the fighter. "I went against my better judgment last time in forgiving your interruptions—"

"Easy, Tsin," Kentril interrupted. "This concerns you greatly."

"Nothing concerns me more than this!"

The mercenary officer nodded sagely. "And that's exactly what I mean. You don't realize just what you might lose."

At last, the diminutive figure looked at him. Bloodshot eyes swept over the captain, Quov Tsin clearly pondering what value the words of the other man might contain. "Explain."

"Knowing you as I do, Tsin, you've got two reasons for doing this. The first is to prove that you actually can. The Vizjerei sorcerers are well known for their reputations as masters of their art, and your reputation exceeds most of your brethren."

"Seek not to mollify me with empty flattery."

Ignoring the dangerous expression on the bearded face, Kentril continued. "The second reason I can appreciate more. We came to Ureh for glory and riches, Tsin. My men and I want gold and jewels—"

"Paltry notions!"

"Aye, but you came for riches of a different sort, didn't you? You came for the accumulated magical knowledge gathered in this kingdom over the many centuries, rare knowledge lost when true Ureh vanished from the mortal plane."

Tsin began tapping on the table with one hand. His gaze briefly shifted to the magical staff, then back to the mercenary, as if measuring options.

Kentril defiantly met the baleful gaze of the Vizjerei. "Lord Khan has offered you all that you can carry off if you succeed, hasn't he? That would mean books and scrolls worth a kingdom each, I imagine."

"More than you can imagine, actually, cretin. If you could understand one iota of what I've discovered here so far, it would leave you astounded!"

"A shame, then, that so much else will be lost again."

The spellcaster blinked. "What's that?"

Resting his knuckles on the table, Captain Dumon leaned forward and in conspiratorial tones whispered, "What could you accomplish if given a year, even two, to further study this collection?"

Avarice gleamed bright in the sorcerer's bloodshot eyes. "I could become the most powerful, most adept, of my kind."

"Juris Khan intends to open the way to Heaven again."

"He lacks the assistance he had the first time," Tsin commented, "but I must admit from listening to him that I think he has some notion of how to get around that. I'd not bet against him that once he is free, he will succeed with his holy dream in short order."

"And with him goes this entire library."

Kentril saw then that he had Quov Tsin. More than the mercenaries, the Vizjerei had known that the riches of the fabled realm would only return when the city once more breathed life. Tsin had not even attempted to inspect the library before the coming of the shadow because he had known that there would be nothing. The Vizjerei had pinned all his hopes on the legend, and now that same legend threatened to take from him much of that for which he had worked so hard.

"So much lost again," the wrinkled spellcaster muttered. "So much lost and for no good reason…"

"Of course, you could fail to find a solution to Khan's own curse, but then he might eventually suspect and send you away. If you tried to steal all this—"

Tsin snorted. "Don't even blather on in that direction, Dumon. Even if I would stoop so low, there are wards in this library that only our good host can unravel, or else why do you think I stay in here save when I must heed personal needs?"

"So there's no hope, then."

The robed figure stood straight. "Quite obviously, you do have a suggestion, my good captain. Kindly tell me what it is right now."

"A clever mage like yourself could find excellent reasons why it would be to Lord Khan's benefit to make Ureh a permanent part of the real world."