"Well," said Ivy, still determined to be optimistic, "perhaps this leads straight outside."

"Did you suspect such a possibility?" Sanval asked Mumchance.

"I suspect everything, but that never finds the key to a shifting passage. Only a truly lucky or miserably unlucky accident does that," the dwarf complained and stamped ahead of them through the opening.

"And which kind of accident is this, my dear?" speculated Kid with a soft laugh at the dwarf's grumbling.

"Won't know until we get there," said Mumchance over his shoulder. "Come on, Wiggles, hurry up." The little dog was lagging behind and seemed reluctant to enter the room. The dwarf whistled. Wiggles tucked her tail firmly between her legs and slunk into the passage behind him.

In the darkness far ahead of the Siegebreakers, the magelord hissed and stopped. He had felt something, like a cold draft across his spell-laden shoulders. The charms attached to his robe murmured to him, giving him advance warning of a new danger. Magic… Somebody or something had woken up an old magic in these tunnels.

"Fools." He peered back into the blackness outside the yellow light cast by the torches. Fottergrim had set trackers on his trail. He had known that the big orc would do that. Who knew what those idiots had stirred up? If only that foolish orc had done what he had told him to and stayed outside the walls of Tsurlagol, letting him explore these tunnels in peace. No, no, the big stupid oaf had to smash his way into the city and start a war!

The bugbears surrounding him shuffled their broad feet and voiced their complaints. They had been growing more obnoxious in their objections since they had had to abandon that one female bugbear. As if such a creature mattered to him! A quick snap of the fingers, and a quicker flash of fire lit up the tunnel, turning the bugbears' complaints to sullen but subdued snarls.

"We are being followed," he informed them. After all, it was the bugbears' job to guard him while he went about his business. He had already paid them a half-horse worth of nearly fresh meat that morning. And promised them more in the evening. "Be alert!"

But he decided not to rely on the bugbears alone-they were stupid creatures whose big muscles gave them their only worth in his estimation. Something else slithered through the ruins of buried Tsurlagol, something large and scaled and hungry.

With a few muttered words, and at the cost of only one charm, the magelord called the creature to him. At his feet was the big hole that they had just climbed out of. It was another dead end for his treasure hunt, but a perfect trap for anyone foolish enough to follow him.

The new tunnel led the Siegebreakers into another broad room, wider than the first. Like the ossuary, it contained bones-only these were strewn across the floor as well as piled into niches. At the sight and smell of the bones, Wiggles's ears went up. The little dog tentatively wagged her tail. Mumchance snatched at her collar to keep her from grabbing the nearest bone. While hauling Wiggles away, the dwarf noticed that there was one peculiarity about all the skeletons scattered across the floor.

"There are no heads," Mumchance said. "Where have all the skulls gone?"

"Burial rite?" guessed Ivy.

Kid advanced into the center of the room. He glanced at Ivy, waiting for her to tell him not to touch. When she said nothing, he stretched out one little hoof and stirred the bones. An odd grin of amusement spread across his face. "Perhaps someone took away the skulls for a collection, my dears, or to roll them through the ruins for their pleasure."

"There's something evil here," said Gunderal with a shiver at the little thief's suggestions. "I can feel it." She passed Kid, going into the center of the room and looking right and left. "There's something hiding here. I know it."

Gunderal peered into the shadowy niches lining the walls, with Zuzzara following directly behind her.

"Let's just get out of here," suggested Ivy.

"No," Gunderal almost snapped at her. "We have to find it first. If we try to pass before we find it, we'll end up like those skeletons."

"How can you be certain?"

"Because I am a wizard," said Gunderal with more force than normal. "Evil was done here."

"Come on, Gunderal," said her sister. "You are just nervous. It has been a bad day."

The wizard heaved a sigh. "Don't tell me what I'm feeling. This is what I am good at, sensing magic, just as you are good at hitting things." Gunderal moved back to the center of the room. Rather than skipping lightly around the bones on the floor, as she would normally do, she kicked her way through a rib cage, sending bits rolling off to one side. "Show yourself. I know you are there," she said.

Everyone looked at Gunderal, then looked around the room, not asking to whom she spoke. She was a wizard, and they respected that. Still, they had never seen her talk to a pile of bones before. When a thin, strange voice answered her, they all became motionless. Ivy liked to think that standing frozen like a statue in the marketplace was a sign of alertness on her part, never fear. She glanced at Sanval. As always when faced with danger, his face was as frozen as the farm pond in midwinter. But he did give the tiniest shrug of inquiry. Ivy raised her eyebrows and shook her head when he started to move forward. She trusted Gunderal's instincts. The little genasi had gotten them out of more than one magical trap. Besides, from the way that Kid's ears were swiveling back and forth in nervous agitation, she was sure that he felt something peculiar in the room too.

A voice said, "The wizard is clever. Very clever. But is the wizard clever enough to best me?"

In an unnoticed niche, a soft green glow began to brighten. As it floated out into the room, they saw the light was a human skull surrounded by a jagged green flame that ringed it much like a lion's head is ringed by its mane. Its eyes glittered, points of green fire. The light increased and reflected off the walls, turning the room into a flickering green grotto.

"All heads belong to me," said the flameskull, apparently untroubled by its lack of a body. The thing had no lips, no flesh at all, just clean jawbones clacking away. Unfortunately, it did have a few teeth-brown and half-rotted-that wobbled in a disgusting manner when it spoke. "They told me that when they left me here."

"And who would they be?" Gunderal sounded as if she were making pleasant conversation in her own parlor, but she waved her uninjured hand frantically behind her back, gesturing to the others to gather closer to her.

"My two friends, my two fond friends, my two cherished dead friends," said the flameskull, floating effortlessly in front of Gunderal. "We had heard that Tsurlagol had fallen and all its treasures were buried in its ruins. So we came to dig them out again. We were wizards too-not insignificant spellcasters or mountebanks, but masters of magnificent magic. We came looking for the glittering gems and the great diamond buried with them."

"Any luck?" Ivy could not resist asking even as Gunderal made shushing motions.

For a creature with no face, it was amazingly clear that the flameskull had settled into a sulk. Ivy guessed it had something to do with how the flames writhed in the eyesockets and the tone of voice issuing from its mouth. "They left me behind," it said with a distinct snarl. "They left me behind and told me to take the skulls of any who followed us. But I cursed them both even as they chopped off my head and arms and hid my body in the ruins."

"There's nothing worse than an argument among thieves, my dear," said Kid in a tone laden with bitter experience. "Especially when they are magical thieves."