Chronicles of Den'dra - Spencer Johnson Page 0,160

it to an illusion without bothering to ask.

“No, no, I didn’t destroy it.” Igarlin opened his first palm and revealed nothing. That was, until the ring ripple into existence. The trick of bending light around something to make it disappear was only a day old. Unfortunately, it only worked on something smaller than a fist. Now he held both the illusionary ring and the real one. One was indistinguishable from the other unless she tried touching the illusion.

“That is impressive… Can you do anything else with it?” Igarlin smiled as if he had been waiting for her to ask. She watched the illusionary ring that he held in his left hand as tendrils of Igarlin’s energy wreathed it for a moment. When the light faded, he dropped them both into her hand. Surprisingly, the illusion had weight. She could feel the cool metal against her skin. In wonder Em’risi picked them both up and examined them. There was no longer the illusion of two rings, but both were identical in every way. They weighed the same when she hefted them. Each of the tiny emeralds glittered with the same brilliance. Even the fingerprints from when she had handed the ring over in the first place had no discernable difference. This realization caused her to furrow her brow.

“Which one is the real one?” Igarlin’s excited smile vanished. Worry took its place. He took the rings back and examined them again, but from his growing scowl, he wasn’t able to tell them apart either. First one glowed, then the other. Illusions appeared then disappeared.

“I don’t know. They… they are the same.” There was a catch in his voice and a blanched pale to his cheek as he looked up. Em’risi allayed his fears with a smile. No real damage had been done. At best, she now had a spare of her favorite signet ring. At worst, the jeweler that had cast it would be irked to know a superb forgery existed. Tapping into her enhanced senses, Em’risi examined the rings. One was emanating an exceedingly faint essence similar to some of the hues in Landin’s colors. The other hummed faintly with Igarlin’s energy. Taking the second ring, she rapped it sharply against the tabletop. At first nothing happened but a moment later and it dissolved into a fine dust that evaporated in a twist of the breeze.

“Tell me about it. I can’t quite see how you are doing it beyond a glow at first.” Igarlin seemed to shake himself out of his apprehension as Em’risi slipped the real ring safely back on her finger.

“If I concentrate on something, I can see it in my head. Every detail of it is in focus. I can even see if there are any defects under the surface. In the ring, there is a softer seam where the metal flowed together in the mold. I once watched a goldsmith make a ring. As long as I am holding on to the original, I can make the illusion without any difficulty. I can even form it easily.”

“As long as you are holding it?” Em’risi absently asked as she thought about the illusions that the glimmer had been able to conjure. Most appeared real enough, if one didn’t look very close.

“I can still do it without working too hard if I am holding it again.”

“Can you make another ring?” Em’risi frowned slightly as the idea occurred to her of a dozen signet rings running about.

“Yes… but it won’t be the same.” Igarlin called forth another illusionary ring between his thumb and forefinger. It looked the same yet once it had been formed, Em’risi could see that it was a poor replica. The smooth metal was rippled and the emeralds cloudy. Only a light tap was required on the tabletop to dispel it.

“Iggy, I wonder… Alvin, can I borrow one of your arrows?” In response, Em’risi’s bodyguard flicked a wrist and a shaft rose from his quiver. A moment later it was deposited on the table before her. “Iggy, do you think you could make a copy of this?”

“Sure, Princess, it takes more to make metal than it does to make wood. Lighter metals are easier. I could make three iron rings for every gold one like yours. Wood is ten times easier than metal.” Like the ring, Igarlin held the arrow and furrowed his brow. The diminutive beams of light danced across the arrow like the reflection cast on the wall by a shattered mirror. A few seconds