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In the Caverns of Mist, an apprentice sorceress and an apprentice wizard watched the tragic scene in their crystal globe.

“Poor Tressalara,” Niniane said sorrowfully, touching the princess’s image in the glass.

She turned her head away to hide a tear, and her white draperies swirled like moonbeams. “And poor King Varro.”

Her companion hunched his skinny shoulders, and his spangled cloak shivered with dark light. “It’s all your fault,” Illusius accused. “If you hadn’t mixed that eye of newt with the bladderwort syrup…”

“I?” Niniane exclaimed with icy hauteur. “ I am not the one who broke the flask of Yann and loosed the spell that bound up Myrriden.”

“Yes, but if there hadn’t been newt and bladderwort lying about everywhere, it wouldn’t have exploded the way it did and—“

The two glanced uneasily at the rear of the cavern, where the great wizard Myrriden was encased in a sheet of glittering Spell-Ice as clear as glass.

Although Myrriden was supposed to be in a deep sleep from the spell gone awry, his gray eyes were wide open.

They seemed to stare at his erstwhile students in either fury or resignation, depending upon the light.

At the moment a bubble of ice glimmered like a tear on the old man’s cheek.

Niniane turned hastily away, tugging at one of her silvery curls.

“Oh, hush! We won’t get anywhere if we don’t stop arguing about it.

If only we could discover the spell that would release us from these caverns, I would find a way to save the princess.

” She sighed. “But we can’t. So you must continue to assist me in going through these endless mounds of spellbooks until we find a way to unfreeze Myrriden.

Then he can use his mighty powers to enable Tressalara to save her people. ”

“We’ve been at it for ten human years now.

” The apprentice’s dark brows drew together in a scowl as he scanned the stacks and stacks of cobwebbed tomes stretching up into the darkness of the cavern’s mile-high roof.

At their current rate of reading, it should only take, oh, about another human century.

Or two. “I need time to study for the apprentice examination. Why should I even have to get involved? She’s not my human. ”

“Hah! You’re so lazy and selfish you’ll never make senior wizard! No wonder you don’t have a human of your own to guard.”

Illusius frowned. “Do so! His name is Cador. He’s off fighting in the mountain kingdoms. He’s a highlander and a mighty warrior. The fiercest in the entire world. Why, he could save this puny little kingdom without even missing his supper.”

Niniane smiled sweetly. “Then why don’t you ‘call’ him? Surely so great a warrior would be up to the challenge.”

“I doubt if he could spare the time…even if he wanted to help Tressalara.”

The sorceress laughed. “I shall see to it that he does.”

She picked up her book titled Love Spells and Potions, Volume XVIII, and turned confidently to a page marked with a wide silver ribbon. “You’re not the only one who has been cramming for the test.”

“The bastard! May he rot in hell!” Tressalara looked magnificent in her topaz-studded gown of cloth of gold, her eyes blazing with fury.

As she paced the floor of her tower bedchamber, the gown’s stiff train whispered angrily over the stones.

Two days since the coup and her father’s murder, and she had had no time to mourn him.

Lector had not allowed it. And today she would be forced to wed him.

“If only I could have escaped through the tunnel before his men returned and found me!” At least she had bloodied one and sent another to his maker. She whipped around to face Elani. “And you! You should have stayed hidden until it was safe to come out.”

Elani wrung her hands. “How could I, highness, when I knew you were the villain’s prisoner?”

They heard the sound of the door being unbarred, and Lector entered, resplendent in black and silver, with a massive collar of ruby-studded white gold about his neck. As his men fanned out to block the doorway, Tressalara stepped protectively in front of Elani.

“Your ignorance shows, Lector,” she sneered. “It is bad luck to see the bride before the wedding.”

He smiled, grasping her arm in a painful grip. “I make my own luck. And I would brave more than the threat of ill fortune for you, my sweet.”

Stepping forward, he took her chin in his hand and lifted her face to his.

She could not help but notice the unusual ring he wore: a gargoyle with one eye carved from an emerald.

The other eye was missing. Tressalara realized that the lost emerald was the one she found in the chapel after her father was slain.

So it was Lector himself who had struck her father down.

Her hate chilled to a stern and icy rage.

He ran his finger along the sweet curve of her lower lip. “I shall teach you to love me,” he said. “I am highly skilled in the sensual arts.”

She jerked her head away. “I will never love the traitor who murdered my father, the rightful king, in cold blood!”

He saw the revulsion in her eyes and laughed softly. “There is nothing I like better than a challenge.”

Pulling Tressalara into his arms, he pressed a hot kiss against her closed lips and mocked her resistance.

“I look forward to this evening and many others. In time you will come to appreciate the, ah…benefits, shall we say, of being my wife. With your beauty and my will, we shall forge a formidable union. I will know how to pleasure you until you beg for my favors.”

She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. “I would rather wed a pig!”

His breath hissed out in anger, and she tried to free herself from his hold. He jerked her face back and laughed, aroused to have her completely in his power. “It will be a pleasure to break you to bridle.”

His grip tightened. He was hurting her purposely, his fingers digging into her flesh, but she bore the pain stoically. She lifted her head defiantly, although her lips had gone white with pain.

Elani could stand no more. She leapt to her mistress’s aid. Before the soldiers could even draw their swords, Lector’s hand whipped out and struck the girl. Elani fell to the floor, dazed and weeping. He moved toward the door, then stopped and issued a challenge over his shoulder:

“Heed me well, Tressalara. Do not cross me! Even a princess is expendable.” With a laugh of truimph he swaggered out of the room, followed by his soldiers.

Tressalara helped Elani to her feet. The imprint of Lector’s fingers stained the girl’s face like a bloody hand. “How can a man with so handsome a face have a soul so filled with canker? It pains me to think he was once the object of my girlish admiration.”

Her maid-in-waiting wiped her tears. “He is a cruel man. You know what tales they tell of him in the villages now. He will do what he can to break your spirit. I shudder to think of what may be in store for you this night, highness!”

“Do not fear for me. I have a plan.” Tressalara lifted her gown’s train away from her back and slid out her jeweled dagger.

“Oh! How did you get it past Lector’s men?”

“I hid it in my garter. Not even they dared to search my person.” The princess’s face was cold as marble. “If I cannot save my people, at least I will rid them of this villain Lector! I will have his life’s blood before he has my maidenhead.”

“You cannot mean it. You will be tortured and put to death!”

Tressalara’s violet eyes darkened to black. She twisted the bracelet on her delicate wrist, a circle of gold and ame-thyst that matched her coronet, even down to the dragon emblem of Amelonia carved into the central stone. “What kills once can kill twice. They will not take me alive.”

Her intensity frightened Elani even more. “You must not go through with this mad scheme. Only think, you are the living symbol of Amelonia. Only you, highness, can command the powers of the Andun Stone.” Her face brightened. “Can you not use the crystal’s magic to overcome Lector?”

“Alas, even if I were free to discover where my father hid it, I doubt I could harness the Andun’s energy.” A look of savage pain flitted across Tressalara’s mobile features. She should have disobeyed her father and studied the sacred scroll without his knowledge.

“When I should have been studying the Dragonmaster’s teachings, I was out running through the woods like a wild creature. Now the kingdom will reap the harvest of my selfish folly. I must carry out my plan.”

But Elani would not be persuaded. “I have a better one. They did not discover the secret passage behind your bed. You could conceal yourself there, highness, and I would put on your gown and veiled headpiece and go to the chapel in your stead. Once the guards were gone, you could flee in disguise. Lector would not discover the ruse until the vows were exchanged and the veil lifted. You would have ample time to make your escape.”

“Yes, and let them kill you when they discover I’ve fled?” Tressalara took her lady-in-waiting’s icy hands in hers and smiled. “You are a brave and true friend to me, dear Elani. You will do both myself and the kingdom more good if you are alive.”

There was a great flapping of wings at the window, and they turned to see a large white bird fly in and settle down on the sill: Rossmine, the wild hawk that Tressalara had found wounded and nursed back to health.

She had been training it as a surprise for her father.

The creature was so tame now that it would feed daintily from the princess’s own hand.

Tressalara went to the casement and held out her arm, and Rossmine flew to it.

The hawk settled on her wrist, curving its sharp talons so delicately that they didn’t leave a scratch.

She smoothed the bird’s feathers with a light touch.

“Rossmine, my fair companion in adventure, I give you your freedom. Fly free. Soar high!”