Stalking Darkness

chilly attic storeroom to their own door.
    The cluttered sitting room was still warm from the evening fire. Tossing his wet cloak over the mermaid statue by the door, Alec shucked off soaked clothing as he crossed to his bed in the corner by the hearth.
    Seregil watched with a faint smile. The boy’s considerable and, to his way of thinking, unnatural degree of modesty had lessened somewhat over the months of their acquaintance, but Alec still turned away as he stripped off his leather breeches and pulled on a long shirt. At sixteen he was very like Seregil in build: slim, lean, and fair-skinned. Seregil quickly busied himself sorting a pile of correspondence on the table as the boy turned around again.
    “We don’t have anything in particular planned for tomorrow,do we?” Alec asked, taking a bite from one of the meat pies they’d purloined.
    “Nothing pressing,” said Seregil, yawning hugely as he went to his chamber door. “And I don’t intend to be up before noon. Good night.”
    With the aid of a lightstone, he navigated past the stacks of books and boxes and other oddments to the broad, velvet-hung bed that dominated the back of the tiny room. Peeling off his wet garments, he slipped between the immaculate sheets with a groan of contentment. Ruetha appeared from some cluttered corner and leapt up with a throaty trill, demanding to be let under the covers.
    It had been a busy year overall, he thought, stroking the cat absently. Especially the past few months. Just realizing how long it had been since he’d visited the Street of Lights underscored the general disruption of his life.
    Oh well. Winter’s here. There’ll always be work enough to keep us occupied, but plenty of leisure too for the pleasures of the town. All in all, I’d say we’ve earned a bit of a respite
.
    Imagining quiet, snowy months stretching out before them, Seregil drifted contentedly off to sleep—
    —only to lurch up sometime soon after from a nightmare of plummeting into darkness, Alec’s terrified cry ringing in his ears as they fell down, down, past the walls of Kassarie’s keep into the gorge below.
    Opening his eyes with a gasp, Seregil was at once relieved and annoyed to find himself slumped naked in one of Nysander’s sitting-room armchairs.
    There was no need to ask how he’d gotten there; the green nausea of a translocation spell cramped his belly. Pushing his long, dark hair back from his face, he scowled wretchedly up at the wizard.
    “Forgive me for bringing you here so abruptly, dear boy,” said Nysander, handing him a robe and a steaming mug of tea.
    “I assume there’s a good reason for this,” Seregil muttered, knowing very well that there must be for Nysander to subject him to magic so soon after the shape-changing incident.
    “But of course. I tried to bring you earlier, but you two were busy burgling someone.” Pouring himself a mug of tea, Nysander settled into his usual chair on the other side of the hearth. “I just looked in for a moment. Were you successful?”
    “More or less.” Nysander appeared in no hurry to elucidate, butit was obvious he’d been working on something. His short grey beard was smudged with ink near his mouth, and he wore one of the threadbare old robes he favored for his frequent all-night work sessions. Surrounded by the room’s magnificent collection of books and oddities, he looked like some down-at-the-heels scholar who’d wandered in by mistake.
    “Alec is looking better, I noticed,” Nysander remarked.
    “He’s healing. It’s his hair I’m concerned about. I’ve got to get him presentable in time for the Festival of Sakor.”
    “Be thankful he came away no worse off then he did. From what Klia and Micum told me, he’s lucky to be alive at all. Ah, and before I forget, I have something for the two of you from Klia and the Queen.” He handed Seregil two velvet pouches. “A public acknowledgment is impossible, of course, but they wished to express their gratitude nonetheless. That green one there is yours.”
    Seregil had received such rewards before. Expecting another trinket or bit of jewelry, he opened the little bag. What he found inside reduced him to stunned silence.
    It was a ring, a very familiar ring. The great, smooth ruby glowed like wine in its heavy setting of Aurënfaie silver when he held it closer to the fire.
    “Illior’s Light, Nysander, this is one of the rings I took from Corruth í Glamien’s corpse,” he gasped, finding his