“Very well, then.” Salamander made her a bob of a bow. “My lips are sealed with the wax of circumspection and the signet of prudence.”

As he walked over to Laz’s camp, Salamander called up from his memory what he knew about Alastyr, whom he’d seen in the flesh only briefly, when he was a very young child and Alastyr, a young lad who went by the nickname of Tirro. Salamander had been gone from the camp when a fully-grown Alastyr had helped Loddlaen murder Valandario’s lover, but he’d of course heard the tale. Many years later he’d helped Nevyn track down an utterly corrupt Alastyr, who preyed upon young children of both sexes not merely for pleasure but also to drain their life force for his evil dweomer workings. Although Salamander had never actually seen the dark dweomermaster Tirro had become, Nevyn had told him the tale in some detail. A thoroughly loathsome soul, that Alastyr, Salamander thought.

And yet, when he sat down with Laz to discuss the black crystal, Salamander found him no fiend. Berwynna had told him how Laz had risked his own life to save the caravan. Laz seemed concerned about her, asking Salamander how she and her uncle fared, expressing sincere sorrow over the death of her betrothed and the deaths of the other men as well.

“But in the end,” Laz said at last, “death takes us all, and life on the caravan road is generally short.”

“True enough, and alas,” Salamander said.

They shared a brief silence in the memory of the slain. Salamander took the chance to study Laz’s aura, a strangely mottled swirl of purple and green. Laz, he supposed, was doing the same to his.

“I see you’ve brought that black crystal with you.” Laz said eventually. “Do you know somewhat about it? Dalla mentioned that I’d owned it in a former life.”

Salamander had sudden thoughts of doing Dallandra bodily harm. How was he supposed to gain Laz’s trust by telling him the truth but never mention Alastyr? Fortunately Laz misread his silence.

“I take it you don’t know,” Laz said.

“Well,” Salamander found a dodge just true enough to pass muster. “Dallandra doesn’t like to tell tales of other people’s past incarnations unless they’ve told her she may.”

“Very honorable of her.”

“I do know a bit about the crystal, though. Whenever I look into it, I see the same vision, of Evandar standing on the pier at Haen Marn.”

Laz mugged shock. “Evandar again? Very strange!”

“Even stranger,” Salamander went on, “is this. I’ve never been to Haen Marn, and yet in the crystal, I’m apparently scrying it out. What have you seen in it?”

“Only the location of the white crystal, which is, unfortunately, now at the bottom of Haen Marn’s lake. They’re linked in some way, but I have no idea of how.”

“Have you ever thought of using it to scry for the dragon book?”

“I haven’t, but that’s a good idea.”