Homeland by R. A. Salvatore Read Free Book Online

and left arm trailed wisps of smoke, and the most exquisite expression of terror and pain that Masoj had ever seen was etched on the DeVir noble’s face.
    Alton stumbled to the floor and kicked into a roll, desperate to put some ground between himself and the murderous master. He made it down and around the descending arc of the room’s floor and through the door that led into the next lower chamber just as the Faceless One made his appearance at the sundered door.
    The master stopped to spit a curse at his misfire, and to consider the best way to replace his door. “Clean it up!” he snapped at Masoj, who was again leaning casually with his hands atop his broomstick and his chin atop his hands.
    Masoj obediently dropped his head and started sweeping the stone splinters. He looked up as the Faceless One stalked past, however, and cautiously started after the master.
    Alton couldn’t possibly escape, and this show would be too good to miss.

    The third room, the Faceless One’s private library, was the brightest of the four in the spire, with dozens of candles burning on each wall.
    “Damn this light!” Alton spat, stumbling his way down through the dizzying blur to the door that led to the Faceless One’s entry hall, the lowest room of the master’s quarters. If he could get down from this spire and outside of the tower to the courtyard of the Academy, he might be able to turn the momentum against the master.
    Alton’s world remained the darkness of Menzoberranzan, but the Faceless One, who had spent so many decades in the candlelight of Sorcere, had grown accustomed to using his eyes to see shades of light, not heat.
    The entry hall was cluttered with chairs and chests, but only one candle burned there, and Alton could see clearly enough to dodge or leap any obstacles. He rushed to the door and grabbed the heavy latch. It turned easily enough, but when Alton tried to shoulder through, the door did not budge and a burst of sparkling blue energy threw him back to the floor.
    “Curse this place,” Alton spat. The portal was magically held. He knew a spell to open such enchanted doors but doubted whether his magic would be strong enough to dispel the castings of a master. In his haste and fear, the words of the dweomer floated through Alton’s thoughts in an indecipherable jumble.
    “Do not run, DeVir,” came the Faceless One’s call from the previous chamber. “You only lengthen your torment!”
    “A curse upon you, too,” Alton replied under his breath. Alton forgot about the stupid spell; it would never come to him in time. He glanced around the room for an option.
    His eyes found something unusual halfway up the side wall, in an opening between two large cabinets. Alton scrambled back a few steps to get a better angle but found himself caught within the range of the candlelight, within the deceptive field where his eyes registered both heat and light.
    He could only discern that this section of the wall showed a uniform glow in the heat spectrum and that its hue was subtly different from the stone of the walls. Another doorway? Alton could only hope his guess to be right. He rushed back to the center of the room, stood directly across from the object, and forced his eyes away from the infrared spectrum, fully back into the world of light.
    As his eyes adjusted, what came into view both startled and confused the young DeVir. He saw no doorway, nor any opening with another chamber behind it. What he looked upon was a reflection of himself, and a portion of the room he now stood in. Alton had never, in his fifty-five years of life, witnessed such a spectacle, but he had heard the masters of Sorcere speak of these devices. It was a mirror.
    A movement in the upper doorway of the chamber reminded Alton that the Faceless One was almost upon him. He couldn’t hesitate to ponder his options. He put his head down and charged the mirror.
    Perhaps it was a teleportation door to another section of the city, perhaps a