written in old script. The hand was very fine. There was something familiar about it. Even though he was certain he’d never actually seen this writing before, there was something about it that reminded him of someone.
He turned to the opening page of the volume where he saw a famous mark. It was one that he recognised from the inscriptions on Sunfang, the rune that identified the sword’s maker. This was a volume written in the hand of the Archmage Caledor. It contained spells that he had personally inscribed.
Excitement filled Teclis. This was a treasure he had never hoped to find. He felt sure somehow that no one except himself had ever seen this particular book. He was the one who was meant to find it, even though he was not sure why.
He continued to leaf through the volume, until his eyes came to rest on one particular spell. He could not say why exactly he was compelled to look at it. He was sure that it was not magic that made him do so. He would have felt that. He would have been able to resist the compulsion to read it as well. It was as if this particular spell was somehow intended to appeal directly to him. It was written in slann runes and yet he somehow understood them.
Something about the words embedded them in his mind immediately and set his lips forming them and his hands moving through the gestures of casting before he could even stop himself.
Even as he did so, he felt his eyes grow heavier and his voice grow throatier. His words became slurred and he started to mumble in a way that he had never done when casting a spell before.
Fear filled him. This whole episode was too strange. He felt as if he was caught in some vast intricate trap. This was not supposed to happen. It should not be able to happen. The Tower of Hoeth was supposed to be a safe haven for wizards.
Had he stumbled onto something strange and deadly? Had this happened before to other wizards? Would he simply be the last in a long line of people who had disappeared and were not remembered? He supposed it was possible. After all, the magic of the tower warped the minds of all who came into contact with it.
Even as these thoughts occurred to him, a wave of dizziness overcame him and he slumped forward over the books.
Teclis opened his eyes and wondered where he was.
The chamber was not like anything he had ever seen before. It looked as if it had been furnished by elves, but not any of the sort of elves he knew. The workmanship was crude, although still beautiful and still the product of a fine sensibility. Everything looked hastily made, as if the craftspeople had not taken the time to give it the requisite level of polish.
Scroll racks and bookcases covered the walls of the chamber. On a table in front of him was a game board inscribed with slann runes similar to the one back in the library, but this was the most fantastically complicated game board he had ever seen. Pieces that looked like elves and daemons, and dragons and monsters were strewn across it. One of the pieces even looked like him.
In the centre of the chamber stood a tall, stooped elf. He was almost skeletally thin, with receding hair and an oddly-shaped head. A woven carpet covered in a pattern that looked strangely familiar lay on the floor beneath his feet. He turned to face Teclis and there was nothing in his eyes except flaming light.
‘You should not be here,’ said the figure. Its voice was gentle and soft and very sad. ‘I should not be here either.’
‘And yet we are,’ Teclis said. ‘A strange meeting.’
The stranger’s flesh seemed almost translucent. Tendons and sinews moved visibly beneath it. His face was a mask of strain and his expression was that of someone constantly in pain. Teclis recognised that expression only too well. He had often seen it in the mirror.
‘Stranger than you think and later than you think,’ said the elf. He limped over to the table and slumped down in a chair. He contemplated the game as if he was about to make a move, then he tipped his head to one side and studied Teclis for a moment. ‘You look like him, you know.’
‘Like who?’
‘Aenarion. You are one of his blood, aren’t you?’
Teclis nodded. ‘How can you tell?’
‘Your