"I came with you, didn't I?" he grumbled. "I'm not turning around and going back alone, am I? I lost my knife when I fell out of the tree. I need to look for it before—"

"I'll help—"

"I can find it myself

Tiep didn't dare look at Rozt'a before he stalked toward the leaves where he last remembered standing. The knife wasn't there. Proof, as far as Tiep was concerned, that the goblin had lifted it. But Tiep wasn't really looking for his knife. He wanted amber and he could dig that out with his boot knife. If anyone asked what he was doing—

He looked over his shoulder. Galimer, Rozt'a, and Dru had their heads together, probably talking about him. They wouldn't notice, but the damn goblin was trotting his way.

"You want; Sheemzher has. Sheemzher give."

"I don't want anything from you. Go away," he shouted back.

He did want his knife, but he wanted to pound it out of the goblin's red-orange hide, not take it politely from his warty hands. In principle, Tiep didn't care if Sheemzher watched him pop the amber marker loose from the tree. The word of a human was always worth more than that of a goblin. Everyone knew that goblins lied and goblins couldn't be trusted, except this goblin had successfully invoked Lady Mantis.

Manya said the white lady was one of the powers of Weathercote Wood. As Lady Mantis, she had the power to heal the sick, but mostly she dealt justice to villainous men and visited the dying to collect their final breath. That was how she'd gotten her name—a tall, thin, and pale woman leaning over a dying man with her arms bent in prayer and an inscrutable expression on her face.

Tiep didn't want to meet her.

"Sheemzher call good lady. Sheemzher find knife after. Knife belong, yes?" The goblin held out a familiar knife. "Yours?" he added, the word was unusual for him and he pronounced it wrong.

"Mine," Tiep agreed sourly and took the knife without a hint of thanks. He made a point of wiping it before sliding it into its sheath. "Now, go away."

"Good lady not here. Good lady in glade. Go now. Go there," Sheemzher persisted. "Beyond path here. Beyond good lady. Reaver not belong good lady. Reaver not obey good lady. Retribution. Trees not belong good lady. Trees belong path."

Was that an assurance that Lady Mantis wouldn't mind if he helped himself to an amber keepsake? It wasn't a question Tiep could ask, but one he had to answer for himself. He pulled himself up to the branch where he'd hidden and the marker that was in reach above it.

There was a thumbnail-sized bug squatting on the amber. It didn't fly off when he waved his arm over it and brandished nasty claws when he tried to flick it away with his fingernails, so he smashed it with the flat of his second-best knife and wiped the blade on his breeches before using it to free the marker.

The goblin was grinning when Tiep's feet hit the ground again.

"Valuable, yes? Valuable outside?"

"Yes, and mine. Just like the knife. Don't go getting any dog-face stupid ideas."

"No stupid ideas," the goblin agreed, still grinning like the fool he was.

Sheemzher assured them, again, as they left the killing ground, that they were merely an hour from his lady's glade.

He was lying, of course, but closer to the truth than he'd been. They hadn't gone far before the forest thickened and cooled around them.

Dru announced that they'd successfully passed through someone's warding.

"Good lady dwells here. Good lady Wyndyfarh. Sheemzher belong here," the goblin replied proudly.

Tiep had never encountered green in such variety and intensity. The trees were clothed in green, but so was the ground. Moss grew everywhere—even the rocks and tree bark were cloaked in living velvet. Though birds flew overhead, the moist, heavy air hushed their songs. Tiep felt obligated to speak softly when he asked the wizards, "Is everything here magical?"

"Everything and nothing," Galimer replied, also whispering.

"What kind of answer is that?"

"The truth," Dru said, and ended the discussion.

They climbed a moss-covered stairway carved into the side of a small, steep hill. Rozt'a was in the front, right behind the goblin. She gasped when she reached the top. Tiep understood why when he stood beside her. The hill was the outer boundary of a water garden that was like no part of Faerun he'd imagined possible. The water in a pond at the base of the hill sparkled—truly sparkled—in the sunlight. The flowers glowed with subtle light and the countless butterflies were brighter than a queen's jewelry. There was a waterfall on the opposite side of the pond and a small, round building beside it. Tiep judged the building a temple, because it had no walls, just white-stone columns and a blue-green metal dome, and it looked like the sort of place where a god might rest his feet.

He'd barely begun to consider the implications of what he saw when a woman appeared in the temple—she must have emerged through the waterfall, though she wasn't dripping. She was tall and thin. Her face was pale and her hip-length hair was cross-striped with white and dusty brown. Even at this distance, her fingers appeared unnaturally long and when she pressed her palms together in front of her, Tiep had no trouble recognizing the Lady Mantis whom Manya had described.

"She's deadly," he heard himself whisper to Druhallen. "She could kill us as soon as look at us."

Dru nodded. "Deadly's not dangerous, if you keep your wits about you and your hands at your side. Is that clearly understood?"

Tiep grumbled that it was and with his thumbs hooked under his belt followed his elders and the dog-faced goblin toward the temple.

6

1 Eleint, the Year of the Banner (1368 DR)

Weathercote Wood

Druhallen took his own advice as they descended into Lady Wyndyfarh's grove. The rocks and water were natural enough, but everything else—the trees, the thick moss carpet, and especially the unseasonable array of flowers—bespoke a wizard with time and spells to spare. The air itself was magically charged, and Dru felt vitalized as he had not been since his visit to Candlekeep years ago. Now, as then, a wise inner voice warned him that casting spells in such a place would be the ultimate foolishness.

Dru dearly wanted to cast an inquiry or two. He had a hunch that some of these plants had sprouted in other forests far removed from the Greypeak Mountains, far removed, perhaps, from Faerun and Toril itself. He would have given much to know where Lady Wyndyfarh had been born. The cabinetmaker's son was by nature a prudent man, a man who lived by his conscience and accepted the disappointments of wisdom. As Sheemzher led them around the waterfall-fed pool and across a flat-stone ford, he was content with what his eyes could see.

When Lady Wyndyfarh had first emerged from her sanctuary and Dru had studied her appearance from the hilltop, he'd judged her an elf. As they came closer to the circular marble building where she waited for them, he had second thoughts. True, the lady was of elf height and slenderness, but elves were, overall, a lean, angular race who frequently seemed in need of a few hearty meals. Lady Wyndyfarh had a softer silhouette in the dappled light and her coloring, though very pale, was distinctly unelvish. In Dru's experience, pale elves were moon elves with ash-blue, wintry complexions. Lady Wyndyfarh's pallor had a warmer, faintly russet tone.

The lady's hair, which descended unbound below her hips, was dead straight and wispy in the gentle breeze. It perfectly matched her skin, except where it was striped in a crosswise pattern with darker russet shades. She wore an unadorned, high-necked gown with sleeves that flowed past her fingers. Dru was no expert where it came to cloth, but he'd overheard enough to guess that the fabric was the finest silk and masterfully dyed to blend with the lady's face and hair. Then again, maybe Wyndyfarh's gown hadn't been woven or dyed at all. At a five-pace distance, Dru couldn't say exactly where the gown stopped and the lady began.