They were large and contained deep gray pupils hinting at a vast and profound wisdom.

They mage suddenly slammed his hands together, roaring in laughter as he saw Baldarr snap out of his daze.

"No time for daydreaming," the man said, once again shrouding his face in his cowl.

"I?I was?," the young man stammered, his heart suddenly racing. He didn't realize how nervous he would be at the hüag.

"You were daydreaming. Now, let's get this thing over with. Let me see, where is that dratted book?" The mage plunged his hands into his cloak, feeling around for the object. Apparently finding it, the mage's face brightened and he said, "Aha!" The old man pulled the thing out from the depths of his cloak. It was a massive book, leather-bound, and spine and cover alike covered with strange inscriptions which Baldarr thought held a striking resemblance to the characters on the temple's pillars.

Baldarr waited anxiously for the mage to start the ritual, the mage himself having seemingly forgotten his subject as he slowly flipped through page after page of illuminations and fancy writing. Under his breath, the mage was muttering something like, "?dratted spell?physicians and their hüag?" He said the last word with an especial tinge of contempt, and violently flipped the page. Coincidently, he seemed to have found the spell, for the old man looked up at Baldarr and said, "Let us begin." There was no verbose introduction like the young man had expected. Just a short, and rather sloppily-said stanza.

The mage cleared his throat, spending a few seconds perusing the page on which the hüag was written. From his vantage point less than a foot away, Baldarr could clearly make out the diagrams accompanying the spell?positions of the spell-caster's fingers, the intonation of the words, and other such things the young man found quite trivial. His patience up, he made an angry sigh.

"Will you start?!" he said, at once regretting it as he was ensnared in the boring gaze of those deep gray eyes.

"Very well young man!" spat the mage, slamming his book shut. He immediately began a series of chants, his arms and hands and fingers moving so quickly that they at once became a blur. Baldarr's heart boomed as his stood there, the incomprehensible words whispering past his ears so fast and so silently that he felt, for the first time in his life, utterly terrified.

And now the mage had silenced, but the young man had barely noticed this when an onslaught of pain ripped through his muscles and he fell to the floor. Thus the hüag had begun.

Baldarr's eyes shifted back into focus as he once again studied that familiar, yet completely alien face in the mirror. As he peered into the glass, the young man spotted a tiny scratch along his cheek. He leaned closer to examine the think when suddenly it seemed to pulsate. The man gasped, unbelieving as the scratch raced along his cheek and down his neck. He flew back in shock and ripped off his shirt, clawing at his chest as the scar turned into warts and gruesome leprous boils.

"What sorcery is this, mage!" the young man yelled in anger, his nails ripping at his arms as the virus spread into his hands. Without warning his feet caught on some object and with only a short wail of shock, Baldarr feel face-first onto the floor.

His breath was knocked out as his chest met the cold marble. He lay there dazed, trying to regain his breath. How long he lay there, the man knew not. To him it seemed as if forever, and then, only for a brief moment. Images of the hüag resurfaced in his mind, and one that had been buried deep within the sea of his subconscious floated back into his memory. Right before the mage left Baldarr at the onset of the hüag, the young man caught a glance at the mage's face from beneath the cowl. As the memory, like a great river released from an ancient dam, came pouring forth and emptied itself into Baldarr's mind, he jumped up off the floor and looked at his bare chest. And screamed.