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.The devils flew wide to take him from two sides.Shandril swallowed and looked away.From the reactions of the party, the warrior must have been the leader.As the devils tore his body apart, his fellow adventurers ran in all directions, crying and cursing.The devils circled, teeth gleaming, and Shandril decided to flee before the battle was over and she risked being seen.She crawled into the trees, hoping she was heading out of the city.Judging by the sun, she was probably heading south, but she had no idea whether she was near the edge of the city or not.Twenty minutes of clambering and skulking later, she decided she definitely was not near the city's edge.Tumbled stones and gaping, empty buildings were everywhere.Gnarled trees had broken through marble and anything else that got in their way as they grew, rending once-beautiful spires and high, curving bridges.Most of the bridges had cracked and fallen; a few were intact, though choked with creepers, trailing vines, and old nests.Shandril stayed low and tried to avoid open spaces, for here and there in the ruins she saw devils—some black and glistening, some blood-red, barbed and scaled, and some mauve or yellowish green.They perched on crumbling spires or battlements, or sprawled at ease on bridges or atop heaps of tilted stone.A few, mainly the winged devil-women, but some horned, spine-tailed, and scaly horrors, too, flew in lazy circles around the ruins.If this was Myth Drannor, it was a wonder any of the dales still existed.What was bringing them here—and what was preventing them from flying in all directions, murdering and wrecking havoc?It did not matter now.Shandril wanted only to know how to escape.She lay huddled under the edge of a slab of stone carved with a very beautiful scene of mermaids and hippocampi, now forever shattered.Her large boots were rubbing her calves raw as they flapped at her every step, and her borrowed blade was too heavy for her to lift quickly in a fight Against these devils, she dared not try to fight.Not even the whim of Tymora could save her against even one amused devil, and one devil could call, given time, on all she had seen here.She shuddered at the thought, and it was a long time before she dared leave the shelter of the stone slab.The sun cast long shadows as the day gave way to dusk.Grimly, Shandril knew she had to act soon, or be trapped in the ruins after dark.She set off past more cracked and tumbled buildings, dreadfully afraid she might be moving aimlessly in circles, merely postponing the inevitable.The ruined city seemed endless, though she saw more trees among the stones than she had earlier.Perhaps I am nearer the edge of the ruin, Shandril thought hopefully.She sighed and looked all around cautiously for perhaps the thousandth time.It was then she saw them.In a place of tilted piles of stone, where all the buildings had toppled and fallen, there stood two figures confronting each other across a wasteland of rubble.A sharp-eyed man in wine-red robes stood on the cracked base of a long-fallen pillar, facing a tall, slim, cruel looking woman in purple standing on what was left of a wall."Die, then, Shadowsil," the man said coldly, and his hands moved like coiling snakes.Shandril crouched low and kept very still.The woman's hands were also moving.Shandril wondered briefly if everyone in all Faerûn would arrive in Myth Drannor before she could get out of it.From the man's hand burst sparkling frost, a white cone that spread, roaring as it closed on the beautiful woman.She stiffened, arms shining with frost, but already from her hands four whirling balls of fire had burst forth, flashingthrough the fading cone of frost, trailing winking sparks.Shandril scrambled on hands and knees around the pile of rubble and behind the corner of a building that wasn't there anymore.It was well she did so, for an instant later there was a flash of flame and a roar, and a wave of intense heat passed over her face.When she peered cautiously around the rubble again later, the man was gone.There was a large, blackened area on the rocks, and the woman in purple was walking triumphantly across mountains of jagged stone to where her foe had stood.The cracked stone creaked as it cooled; the woman turned on her heel to stare levelly all around.She saw Shandril's head immediately and stared.Shandril scrambled hastily back to the corner again and fled down a ruined street.At its end she ducked around a corner, blood hammering her brain in fear.Biting her lips to silence her panting, she dared not believe she had escaped so easily.Suddenly, the air before her shimmered and the lady in purple stood before her."Who are you, then, little one?" she asked softly; Shandril shivered.The lady was very beautiful."I am Symgharyl Maruel, called The Shadowsil"Shandril held her blade up in silent answer.The lady mage laughed, and her hands moved deftly.Shandril rushed at her, but knew before she started that the woman was just too far away.She was staring in fear and anger at the mage, still yards distant, when her limbs locked in mid-stride and she froze helplessly.The purple robes swished nearer.The lady undid a rope from around her waist as she approached.Tymora, aid me, Shandril thought desperately as the mage placed the rope gently around the wrist of the hand in which the immobile, straining thief held the sword.She looped it also about Shandril's neck, drawing it tight across her throat, and said, " Ulthae—entangle." The would-be thief's scalp prickled in horror as she felt the rope slithering of its own accord across her skin, tightening about her arms and neck and knees, pinning her securely.When it was done, Shandril was bound tightly about, truly helpless, and a short length of rope led from a great knot at her waist to the languid hand of the lady in purple
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