The two senior wizards spent the next half hour looking over the remaining weapons. An assorted collection of white painted tubes, spheres and pipes with strange metal projections, flaps, loops and levers all over them. Most of them had incomprehensible numbers and letters painted on every flat surface that made no sense even when read with a translation spell. When Elmias had finished showing them to him, though, there were still a few strange items of equipment left over, and Tragius now turned his attention to them. “What are these?” he asked. “I take it they’re not weapons.”

     “Indeed not,” replied Elmias. “While I was waiting to meet the arms dealers I took a stroll through one of their cities and came across a few items I thought might be useful.” He gently picked up a fragile looking wooden contraption in the shape of a cross with a pair of wheels on struts underneath and a small fan on the front. “This flies through the air, propelled by the fan which spins at great speed. You control its motion with this.” He put down the wooden thing and picked up a small black box with two small levers on it and a long length of wire pointing out from the back.

     “I see,” said Tragius doubtfully. “What good is it?”

     “On its own, nothing. It’s just a toy. But when used in conjunction with this...” He indicated the last two items in his collection. One of them looked like a rectangular mirror but the glass front was a dull grey that held only a very poor reflection. There were small buttons down one side and some strange holes in the back. A length of rope ran away from its back end, ending in a strange white block with three copper pegs emerging from it to which Elmias had tied a perspex rod with a length of string.

     Elmias ignored the ‘mirror’ for the time being, though, and picked up the other object, a black lumpy thing that fitted neatly into his hand and had a shiny glass lens on the front. “This is great!” said the wizard enthusiastically. "This thing has an eye that looks at whatever it’s pointed at and remembers what it sees.” He pointed it at Tragius, pressed a button on its side. A faint whirring sound came from it. He then pressed another button to stop the sound, and connected a rubber rope to a socket in the side, the other end of which he connected to the mirror with the window.

     "Everything it sees can be sent to this mirror through this rope," he explained. He bent down to touch the perspex rod, spoke a few magic words, and it began to glow softly as the wizard snatched back his hand. “Whatever you do, don’t touch that rod while the spell’s working on it,” he warned. “It’s a modified version of a lightning bolt spell, and just as dangerous.”

     “That box needs lightning to work?” asked Tragius curiously.

     “Yes,” replied Elmias. “It’s what they use instead of magic.” He pressed more buttons and the mirror came to life, displaying an image of Tragius’s face that lasted for a few seconds before being replaced by a couple of words in a strange language.

     “Great, eh?” said Elmias, eager to see Tragius’s reaction.

     The other wizard wasn’t impressed, though. A single spell could have achieved the same effect with much less fuss. “Get to the point,” he said impatiently.

     Elmias wilted with disappointment. “Well, what I was thinking was that we could shrink the eye until it’s small enough to be carried by the wooden bird. Then we can send it flying through enemy territory. It remembers everything it sees, and when it comes back you can see everything it’s seen on the box. Troop positions, movements, everything!”

     “Just like you can with a crystal ball, you mean?” said Tragius sarcastically. Why is he wasting my time like this? he wondered. He’s a powerful wizard in his own right, he knows you can do all this with ordinary scrying spells.

     “Aha!” said Elmias triumphantly, coming to his grand conclusion. “But crystal balls can’t see inside the Shadow, can they? No scrying spells can penetrate that place, but none of these devices is magical...”

     “So they’ll work inside the Shadow!” exclaimed Tragius as it suddenly hit him. “We’ll be able to spy out the very homeland of the enemy, even Arnor itself, which has so far defied our every effort to investigate! Elmias, you are truly a genius!" The other wizard beamed with pleasure. "You are a true wizard and worthy of a place among the best of us.”

     Elmias’s smile faded, to be replaced by a look of faint annoyance that this had ever been in doubt. Tragius didn't notice, though, being swept away by jubilation and relief. This means I don’t need Malefactos any more, he thought. I can go back down to the repository, get his ark and find a way to smash it to pieces, put an end to him before my part in his transformation is discovered. Tragius felt that a great weight had been taken from his shoulders, a worry that had been preying mercilessly on him ever since he’d first become involved with the rak. The threat of discovery and ruin, almost certainly resulting in the end of his career as a wizard, was all but gone, and he felt as light headed as though he were drunk.

     “Does it have the range to reach all the way to Arnor from the edge of the Shadow?” he asked.

     “Not as it is, no,” replied Elmias, his mood lightening again in response to the other wizard's evident pleasure and the knowledge that he had caused it, “but it’d be a simple matter to magically extend its range. I don’t see any insurmountable problems.”

     “Good, good, I’ll make plans for us to go to the Shadow right away. We’ll find a spot somewhere around the perimeter where we won’t have to worry about running into any Shads. Can your assistants handle all the rest of this stuff?” He indicated the collection of assorted military hardware.

     “Yeah, no problem. They know as much about it as I do.” Elmias noticed that one of his assistants was looking rather uncomfortable, was clearly unhappy about something, and beckoned him over. “What is it, Bergen? Is something troubling you?”

     Bergen Atherwood was a wizard in his own right who’d graduated from the University ten years before. He was one of the small number who returned for further education after several years of practical experience in the big wide world and was now receiving personal and individual tutelage from Elmias himself in return for serving as his assistant. Every senior wizard in the University had two or three such assistants, who benefited immeasurably from the experience as they learned the real tricks of the trade; the things that made University wizards so much better than their externum counterparts. It was this mentor-assistant system that was largely responsible for the University’s continuity down through the centuries as each generation passed on to the next its dedication to excellence and the University’s self proclaimed goal of raising the global level of magical competence.

     It had its drawbacks, though, as any of the University’s senior wizards would have admitted. Once a wizard had taken on a younger wizard to be his personal assistant, everything that assistant did, even after he’d left his mentor’s service, was reflected on the mentor, so that if he went out and made a complete ass of himself, the senior wizard whose assistant he’d been had to take his or her share of the shame.

     The reverse was true as well, of course, and many a senior wizard had basked in insufferably conspicuous pride when a former assistant did something particularly brilliant. That’s why they were so critical and discerning when pondering a young wizard’s request to be taken on as a personal assistant, at least when there were enough candidates that they could afford to be choosy.

     Unfortunately, though, only a minority of University graduates ever returned and it was sometimes the case that the demand for assistants was greater than the supply, especially when there was some major project underway, such as had been the case during the relocation of the University several centuries before. During such times the boot was on the other foot and the students could shop around looking for the best teacher. The senior wizards frequently gave thanks to the Gods that such times were few and far between.

     Bergen Atherwood was the best assistant Elmias had ever had, and was well tipped to be offered the post of head of extra-planar studies when his mentor eventually retired, joining the long and distinguished line that went all the way back to Arden Planewalker, the founder and first head of the department. He was normally a quiet and studious fellow who kept to himself, speaking only when spoken to, but now he was shifting awkwardly from one foot to the other as if wanting to say something but not quite having the nerve to break in on a conversation between his superiors. He brightened visibly when Elmias offered him the opportunity to speak, but it still took him another few moments and a clearing of the throat before he could actually say anything.

     “Er, well, that is,” he began awkwardly, “I mean, that is, have either of you ever heard of the Godswrath?”

     Tragius gave a short of annoyance “Elmias, what kind of nonsense have you been teaching your assistants?”

     “Begging your pardon, Sir, but it’s more than just a legend,” replied Bergen, growing bolder. “I spent several years among the trogs of Ka-Zora, and I heard several stories of trog alchemists suddenly dropping dead for no apparent reason. Perfectly healthy trogs, many of whom had been expected to live for up to a century longer. Every casualty had one thing in common. They’d been pursuing forbidden lines of research. Lines of research which have, according to the legend, been forbidden by the Gods themselves.”

     “What does that have to do with us?” asked Elmias. “We’re wizards, not alchemists.”

     “Yes, master, but one of the forbidden lines of research has to do with a legendary black powder that explodes violently when burned, and I was reminded of it when you were talking about the flying pipes and the metal projectiles.”

     Elmias smiled comfortingly. “You need have no worries on that score, my boy. I was curious about what made them work and spelled one open. They contain no black powder. The active ingredient appears to be a pale yellow rubbery substance, about as far from a black powder as it’s possible to get.”

     “But it has the same properties as the black powder,” persisted the assistant. “It can be made to explode under the right circumstances, and exploding is a very unnatural thing for a natural substance to do. Only magic can make things explode, and you say that these weapons contain no magic. Could it be that the divine interdiction applies to the whole class of exploding natural substances, not just the black powder itself, in which case we could all be in very great danger?”

     “There is no divine interdiction,” explained Tragius with forced patience. “I was once the close friend of a priest of Samnos, still am as a matter of fact, although I’ve hardly had a glimpse of him for years. He told me that he was permitted to use any weapon at all in the fight against evil, even this fabled black powder, if it exists. Samnos certainly doesn’t forbid its use, and if any of the Gods did, you’d think that the War Gods would be among them.”

     “Well someone certainly forbids it, or else why would so many trog alchemists, all engaged in the same lines of research...”

     “Young man,” said Tragius, his patience wearing thin, “you are overlooking a very simple and obvious explanation, which is that some of the substances used by the alchemists are mildly poisonous. Harmless if handled briefly and casually, but fatal if used and handled for many years. The poison gradually builds up in the bloodstream until a critical point is reached, whereupon he suddenly keels over. Now, isn’t that a much more plausible explanation than the wrath of some unidentified, renegade God?”

     “Yes, sir,” agreed Bergen, but he didn’t sound convinced.

     “Right, well now that we’ve sorted that out, do you think we can get on?”

     Bergen made no further protest and so, under the direction of the two senior wizards, he and Elmias’s other assistant picked up crates of flying pipes and began carrying them towards the door.

     Bergen froze in surprise, though, as a strange halo of blue light appeared around the crate in his hands. It looked a little like St’ Elmo’s fire but had a strange quality to it that unnerved him so much that he dropped the crate and backed away from it fearfully. He glanced at Elmias and Tragius to see if they were responsible, but they were as surprised as he was, and looking around he saw that all the other weapons and items of equipment had the same glow around them, as did the crate held by Elmias’s other assistant. He was made of sterner stuff than Bergen, though, and continued holding onto his crate for a few moments longer, only dropping it when the pain became too much to bear. “Hot!” he gasped, smoke rising in curls from the sleeves of his robes. “It’s hot!”

     “Hot?” said Elmias in sudden fear. “Get out of here, quick! Everybody out!”

     The two assistants ran from the room and Elmias turned to follow, but Tragius grabbed his elbow to stop him. “What’s going on?” he demanded. “What is this?”

     “Do you want to hang about to find out?” replied Elmias in near terror. “Look!” He pointed at the mysterious glowing aura, which was now incandescently bright and producing so much heat that they could feel it on their foreheads. “Come on, let’s get out of here!”

     Tragius let go of him, and the two wizards sprinted for the exit, running down the corridor and just managing to get around the corner before a massive explosion rocked the building to its foundations. A three foot thick stone wall protected them from the worst of the blast, but it was still blown outwards, showering the corridor with massive blocks of rubble that bounced off the shield spell Tragius had just had time to cast. The impact of the flying rubble against his shield spell knocked him backwards, crushing him against the far wall of the corridor, but it also carried him out of danger from the falling ceiling as the two foot thickness of solid granite collapsed in front of him, along with smashed and burning items of furniture from the floor above, most of which disappeared through the massive hole in the floor into the basement.

     Frightened shouts and screams came from the rooms around him, the source hidden by drifting clouds of dust. Tragius tried to stand, but a lance of pain shot through his chest as though someone had stabbed him. Broken ribs, he thought fearfully. I need to take it easy until I can get healed or I might puncture a lung.

     He gazed in wonder at the devastation around him. Hard to believe that those harmless looking tubes and pipes could contain so much destructive power, and all without the aid of magic! He suddenly realised that Elmias was nowhere to be seen and he felt a sudden fear for his friend. Ignoring the pain in his chest, therefore, and a sickening dampness all down his left side that he refused to look at, he struggled to his feet and made his way through the heaped rubble, taking care not to fall down the gaping hole to his left. “Elmias!” he called fearfully, searching for any sign of movement in the wreckage and dreading to find a lifeless hand or a puddle of blood seeping out from beneath a great lump of stone. “Elmias, can you hear me?”

     “Here I am,” said a voice from behind him, and he turned to see the transparent, ghostlike figure of the director of extra-planar studies stepping through an undamaged section of wall as though either it or he were only an illusion. “I just had time to make myself ephemeral,” he said as he regained his solidity. “I reckon at least five tons of rock just passed through my body at high speed. What happened?”

     “The Godswrath!” replied Bergen as he and Elmias’s other assistant came running back. The four of them joined in the effort to clear the rubble and help the victims in neighbouring rooms, most of whom had escaped with injuries which, though serious in some cases, were all quickly healed by the clerics who arrived soon afterwards. Miraculously, no-one had been killed, most of the force of the explosion having been contained by the thickness of the walls surrounding them, but the basement room directly beneath the site of the explosion was sometimes used as a spare lecture room. If it had been occupied when the ceiling came down, the loss of life could have been tragic.

     “But that’s not the way you said it worked!” protested Kalda, Elmias’s other assistant. “You said that alchemists pursuing forbidden lines of research simply dropped dead.”

     “Yes,” agreed Bergen, “but in this case the creators of these weapons live in another universe, out of reach of the Gods of this universe. Perhaps this is how they respond to extra-dimensional weapons being brought to this world.”

     “Can’t be,” replied Elmias. “I’ve brought loads of extra-dimensional weapons back to this world, for my good friend Resalintas who collects such things. He’s never had any trouble from them.”

     “But he only hangs them on the wall and looks at them,” pointed out Bergen. “He doesn’t actually use them. There’s a difference.”

     “Rot!” exclaimed Tragius as he made a huge boulder weightless and floated it away. “I’ll tell you what happened; planar incompatibility. The natural laws of this universe are slightly different from those in the universe you got those weapons from, and they became unstable when brought here. I’ve seen it happen dozens of times.”

     “Not as many times as I’ve seen it happen,” replied Elmias, now looking thoughtful. “I know more about planar incompatibility than you do, and that didn’t look like anything I’ve ever seen before.”

     “Do you think it might actually have been the Godswrath, then?” asked Kalda.

     “No, there was nothing divine about it,” replied Elmias. “That’s not the way the Gods operate, not even the evil ones. They work in this world only through their priests and clerics, and no priest or cleric could have gotten in through our defences without our knowing about it. I thought at first that it might have been the Shadowwizards, but it couldn’t have been them either, for the same reason. No, this is something else, and I’ve got no idea what. Whatever it is, though, it is our enemy, since it seems to have taken the side of the Shadowhosts against us.”

     “How is it possible for no-one to know anything about it?’ demanded Bergen. “Wizards have been walking the planes for thousands of years. Surely we’re not the first to think of bringing other worldly weapons back. Why haven’t we heard of other wizards either carving out vast empires with powerful extra-dimensional weapons or being killed in massive explosions?”

     “It may have happened several times in the past,” said Elmias. “You know how vast the University archives are. Full documentation of the incidents, whether they’re caused by planar incompatibility or Godswrath, could be buried in there and never seen again. Bergen, for the next few days I want you to spend all your spare time in the archives. Get a couple of third or fourth year apprentices to help you. Don’t stay in one particular era of the University’s history. Dip in here and there, from the early days right up to the present. Look for any evidence of wizards dying from Godswrath, unexplained explosions or any other strange cause, or any wizards suddenly demonstrating powers and abilities that should have been far beyond their reach.” The assistant nodded in acknowledgement.

     “Kalda, I want you to do the same thing, but in the library. Tell Karen you're to be allowed into the fourth room alcove containing the secret histories, but stay away from the shelves marked ‘Deep mysteries of the Art.’ I’ll let you know when you’re ready for them.” The second assistant also nodded.

     They continued to work in silence, the task getting easier as more wizards and clerics arrived on the scene, using their various powers to drag one victim after another out of the rubble. Tragius’s mind wasn’t really on the job, though. He was thinking of the wooden bird and the mechanical eye, both of which had been destroyed in the explosion, taking with them the opportunity to spy on Arnor from a distance.

     Looks like we still need Malefactos after all, he thought, and the great burden he thought he’d shed, the terrible fear of discovery and disgrace, came settling back down on him like a ton of feathers. I wonder what he’s doing now, he wondered bleakly.