by Ed Greenwood
“Too many, and the Dragons are almost upon us,” Storm told him grimly. “I don’t see any highknights or bowguns, but—”
“They charged to the fore, of course,” El replied, “and so are now pelting along that passage halfway across the palace. Well, now …”
He produced a wand. “Paralyzes,” he announced. “I still have the thought-prying pendant, too, but that’s about all. The retreat ye suggest might indeed be prudent, if I can recall what lies on the other side of the Low Kitchens. Quite a warren of ramps and stairs, in that direction, and—”
“Elminster!” Storm snapped warningly as a Purple Dragon loomed up over them. Elminster calmly called up the wand’s powers, and the warrior stiffened in midlunge and toppled forward, crashing down at them.
Only to fetch up against the heavy table, his frozen, helpless body forming a shield.
“Right, lass, let’s be off,” the Sage of Shadowdale said gruffly. “We—”
Startled cries erupted beyond the paralyzed Dragon, as bright light burst into being and washed over the room. At its height the cries ended in midblurt, leaving only eerie silence as the radiance faded again.
Storm flung herself sideways into a roll that brought her out beyond the table and two toppled stools to where she could look down the former passage at the distant glow of the Dalestride.
She was in time to see Wizard of War Rorskryn Mreldrake standing in a hitherto-closed doorway in another back corner of the Room of the Watchful Sentinel. He held a still-flickering scepter in his hand and was staring around at the guardians in front of him with an uneasy smile on his face.
Those men—every last Purple Dragon and wizard of them—had fallen on their faces and were lying still and silent.
Mreldrake took a swift and uncertain couple of steps into the room, craning and peering to make sure none of them were moving, then spun around and hastened back out the door he’d come through, closing it behind him.
“It seems we have an unexpected ally,” Storm whispered. “Or the wizards of war are harboring a traitor who just decided the time was right for a little treason.”
Elminster shoved the paralyzed Dragon aside with a grunt of effort and crawled quickly to the next nearest warrior. “Senseless—not dead,” he muttered. “They’ll be gone for most of a day, unless someone casts spells to revive them.”
He shot Storm a look. “I’ll take care of our traitor, if I can catch up to him. Ye get to Alassra before the inevitable horde of guards arrives to see who’s been blasting down walls in the palace.”
Storm nodded, raced to Elminster, and swept an arm around him to give him a brief, fierce kiss, then snatched up the fallen Dragon’s sword and sprinted for the glowing portal.
Halfway there she bent over a fallen wizard and tugged hard, rolling the body over. She came up with his cloak, and two strides farther on scooped up a fallen wand. It was a short run from there to where she could pluck a second wand from another outstretched hand.
Casting a brief look back over her shoulder at Elminster—he was on his feet and gave her a cheery wave—she raced for the glowing portal and plunged through its silent white fires without hesitation.
The palace was suddenly gone, and she was running on soft, sinking nothing, in the heart of a bright blue void that stretched endlessly and silently away in all directions, a void that just as abruptly vanished in a flash of bright light that became the low, bright sunlight of late afternoon lancing through trees.
A certain freshness in the air and a cool breeze coming down from the north told her she was east of the Thunder Peaks. Mistledale should be just ahead, with the broad straight wagonway of the Moonsea Ride just out of sight behind and below yon trees, and there’d undoubtedly be a sentinel of some sort keeping watch over this side of the Dalestride, being as it connected with the heart of the royal palace of Suzail, and—
Storm looked around wildly and swerved toward the nearest trees as she did so. Guards of realms with wild borders often have bows or spells to hurl, and lone women running with drawn swords in their hands could hardly fail to evoke a certain apprehension in even the laziest of sleepy sentinels …
“Hold!” an annoyed male voice snapped from somewhere behind her, right on cue. Storm ran even faster, turning sharply to meet the trees even sooner, and tore open her jerkin with her free hand as she went, ducking low.
“Halt, I said!” the guardian shouted, sounding angrier. “Are you deaf, woman?”
Storm found a tree and caught hold of it, spending all the haste of her run in a swing around it that brought her back facing the glade she’d just fled.
A young, stern-looking wizard of war flanked by two Purple Dragons with longbows in their hands was striding toward her, and he was frowning. Behind them, this side of the portal cast no glows at all; instead, it looked like endlessly rippling empty air.
“No,” she panted, giving all three men a good look at her bared and bobbing front. “I’m just—a certain none-too-noble lord seeks my virtue! Lord Wizard, I dare not tarry!”
“But—but this way is guarded at the palace end! How did you get through?”
“Please, Lord, the guardians of the Dalestride let me through! Lord Warder Vainrence ordered them to and said he’d take care of—of the one chasing me! Please, Lord, I must be away from here!”
The Dragons were staring only at what she was displaying, but the wizard was reddening and looking away. “How do I know you speak truth?” he asked, sounding exasperated.
“Vainrence’ll sure tell you, I’m thinking,” one of the Dragons muttered, “when he takes your report.”
At that, the wizard went very red and waved wildly at Storm. “Get you gone!” he commanded. “Just get—go!”
“T-thank you, kind lords!” Storm babbled, swinging around the tree again and sprinting headlong into the woods. There was a stream nearby, she remembered, and a little wade up it would cover her tracks, if anyone changed his mind about permitting her departure.
As she went, she rolled her eyes. As the centuries passed, her acting seemed to be getting more than a little rusty, but men weren’t changing much.
CHAPTER
TWENTY
WHEN VENGEFUL GHOSTS WALK
You’re armed for real trouble? Good, good.”
Marlin was gleeful.
In fact, the young lordling was actually rubbing his hands.
Manshoon rolled his eyes. Not even Fzoul at his gloating worst had been that unsubtle.
The lordling’s two bodyguards stood awaiting further orders. Ormantor said nothing, as usual. That tall, broad-shoulded mountain of muscle seldom said much of anything at all. Gaskur, however—nondescript, forgettable-looking Gaskur, Marlin’s fetcher and carrier and trade agent and nigh everything else, whose service had enabled the younger Lord Stormserpent to accomplish everything he’d managed thus far—was clearly worried.
“Where are we bound, Lord?” he murmured.
Marlin grinned like one of his nieces’ well-fed cats. “No, no, Gask, better you not know. Safer, that way.”
Manshoon managed not to roll his eyes again. Stupider, rather—you obviously don’t know, lordling.
Gaskur obviously thought so, too, though he knew better than to say so. A flicker of Ormantor’s eyes betrayed his similar judgment.
“Come!” Marlin said eagerly. “Glory awaits!”
Unheard in his cavern, Manshoon smiled mirthlessly. It was time to have some fun, flex a few tentacles, and slay the guards set to watch over the secret passage—so foolish young Lord Stormserpent could reach the Dragonskull Chamber and test his secret weapons. If they held the blueflame ghosts and young Marlin could control them, they would be formidable weapons indeed.
And if he could not control them, young Lord Stormserpent’s ambitions would come to a swift and painful end.
“Glory, lordling,” Manshoon murmured into the glow, “awaits.”
Elminster came to a certain place in the passage and stopped. An old war
d should be waiting right in front of him, and as he was—admit it—less than what he’d once been, what he did next should be done cautiously.
He stretched forth a hand gingerly into the empty air.
Which remained empty, though a whispering awakened all around him and raced away along the dark stones into the distance.
He took a cautious step forward, and—nothing else happened.
Good.
He took another. Still nothing. Six more strides brought him to the stone he knew, which moved under his hand and let him step into the wall and avoid awakening the spell-trap that awaited another few steps along the passage.
It had been long centuries since the royal crypt had been guarded by bored Purple Dragons, but it was still protected by other things, and bore alarm magics that might alert someone in the palace above, if anyone up there still had the wits to be alerted by anything.
He was beginning to doubt that.
The air in Dragonskull Chamber wasn’t as stale as it should have been, and the darkness wasn’t as dark. Even the stillness wasn’t still; it pulsed and swirled and flowed in an endless, soundless tumult that could be clearly felt.
The twisted wards were alive and restless, and although they made him feel rather sick, Marlin Stormserpent was glad of that. It meant the war wizards—even the Mage Royal, Ganrahast—couldn’t see him from afar or know he was there or what he was doing.
Which was good indeed, considering that what he was doing would undoubtedly be seen as high treason.
“I’m experimenting freely,” he murmured. No, that excuse sounded lame even to his ears; he couldn’t imagine even the youngest Crownsworn mage or courtier believing it.
Wherefore he’d best be doing what he’d come to do swiftly, and get back to his bodyguards before they drank the deepest winecellar of the Old Dwarf dry. Even shunned rooms of the palace must have patrols stalk by their doors from time to time.
Marlin drew in a deep, excited breath, brought forth the chalice with one hand and his handful of parchment notes with the other, and awakened one of his rings to give him light enough to read.
That reminded him that he was wearing the Flying Blade and would perhaps be wiser to set it aside and try to deal with one ghost at a time.
The room around him was as empty as ever, most of its walls lost in the evershifting darkness—but it was clearly bare of furniture. So he laid his sword belt on the floor a few paces away, the scabbarded sword atop it, and stood so he could face it while he worked on the chalice.
His notes were few the casting or ritual, or whatever it was properly called was short and simple.
Which meant he couldn’t delay any longer. Sudden fear uncoiling in his throat, Marlin held up the chalice, peered at his notes again, then said firmly, “Arruthro.”
The word seemed to roll away across vast distances, though it seemed no louder than it should have been—and at a stroke, the room was darker, the air singing with sudden tension. He looked around in case something was slithering or creeping out of the darkness to come up behind him, but saw nothing.
“Tar lammitruh arondur halamoata,” he added, loudly and slowly. He had no idea what language—if it was a language—he was speaking, but it sounded old and grand and menacing. Very menacing.
The room went colder still.
“Tan thom tanlartar,” he read out—and flinched as the chalice in his hand erupted in weird blue fire. Raging flames that raced down his arm to the elbow and then wreathed it and the chalice in an endless, soundless conflagration. That held no heat at all and caused him no pain, only a disturbing, bone-deep tingling.
“Larasse larasse thulea,” he added.
And shivered in the sudden icy chill—as the blue flames sprang from the chalice in a flood, like a gigantic snake or eel pouring forth from the goblet to the floor and then rebounding up again, growing larger and taller … man-high. With a darkness at their heart that slowly became a man. A man standing facing him and smiling, clad in a dark and nondescript leather war-harness. Boots, sword, and dagger. Dark eyes with those blue flames dancing in their depths—and a ceaselessly burning shroud of blue flames around the man’s body that ignited nothing, charred nothing, and seemed to cause the man no pain at all.
As he shifted his stance, one hand falling to his sword hilt and the other coming to rest on his belt, and smilingly faced Marlin Stormserpent.
Who asked carefully, “You obey me, y-yes?”
The man nodded curtly. “I do. And will.”
The lordling let out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding and asked, “And you are?”
“Treth Halonter. The best warrior of the Nine, or was … before Myrkul.”
“Before Myrkul?” A dead god, something to do with the dead. Old Lord Bones, that was what the ballads called him. “Before you died?”
“Before Myrkul did this to us and bent us to his love of death.” The ghost’s smile never wavered.
Marlin peered hastily at his notes. “Is there—what must I avoid doing to prevent you turning on me?”
“Nothing. We know and obey the one who summons us forth.”
“And you’ll, uh, go back into the chalice when I say the right words?”
“Or just command me to. Myrkul was not interested in allowing me to deceive, betray, or turn on you. This is no fireside faerie tale, man. I am your slave.”
Marlin glanced at his sword, still lying where he had left it.
“How many of the Nine can I command at once?”
Halonter shrugged. “I know not. Are you given to fits of madness?”
In the depths of young Lord Stormserpent’s mind, Manshoon smiled.
This was going to be fun.
Marlin discovered he wasn’t just drenched in sweat; he was shaking with exhaustion. The two cold smiles facing him felt crushingly heavy, as if he was staggering under the weight of two suits of armor at once.
Those unwavering smiles belonged to the two who stood facing him wreathed in glowing blue flames that burned nothing—but drank energies from living beings they touched, if they willed it so. Or so they claimed.
Two blueflame ghosts who could stride through stone walls at will, but nothing living. If he commanded them to, they could literally walk right through the walls of the palace—leaving them whole and unmarred—and out into Suzail. Again, so they said.
Not that he had any way of proving wrong anything they said, except by watching as they tried to follow his orders. He would order them to walk through the wards and the walls beyond them, in a breath or two, and see.
He’d already commanded them both back into the sword and the cup he’d brought them forth from, and had brought them out again. They assured him they could sense where those items were, no matter how far he took them, and would return to them, but “go into them” only if he was present to command them. Unless or until his command over them was broken by someone else.
How that could be done, or by whom, they did not know—or, again, said they did not. Marlin knew he had no way of catching them in falsehoods until it was too late … and he was beginning to fervently wish they’d stop smiling.
Relve Langral had been the rogue among the Nine and was far more talkative than Halonter. According to him, the dark god Myrkul had corrupted them; they were now ruthless and uncaring, gleefully enjoying killing and any chance to do harm. “We are insane and beyond death,” Relve had announced calmly. Smiling that terrible smile all the while.
They had been awakened from their imprisonments before, and had then heard themselves termed “blueflame ghosts,” but said they were nothing like the real ghosts they’d met and fought when the Nine were adventuring.
They’d said more, too. “We cannot and will not destroy each other, nor will we attempt to. It’s one of the few commandments you can give us that we must ignore.”
“And the others are?”
“Still unknown to us—and, I gather, to you, too,” Relve had replied promptly—and, of course, smil
ingly.
Marlin drew in another breath and wiped his dripping forehead with the back of his hand. “Then hear my first command to you. Somewhere in this city around you—we stand in the palace in Suzail, Cormyr—there is a man by the name of Seszgar Huntcrown. The one I seek is nobly born and the heir of House Huntcrown, in the unlikely event you find someone else by that name. You are to go forth from here—through the walls—to find him without delay, slay him, and return to me. I will not then be here but in my home, not far from here in this same city. Go. Go now.”
In smiling silence, the two flaming men—or ghosts, or whatever they were—drew their swords, slashed the air around them a time or two as if working stiffness from their limbs, and started toward him.
Marlin watched them come, mouth dry, and it was only when they were a mere stride away that he retreated, clutching at his belt dagger and trying in terror to remember what in all the odd powers of the various rings he wore might save him against two ruthless slayers who could suck the life out of him with a mere touch.
He was still stumbling back, trying to think of something to stammer to keep them at bay, when they strode past him with their fierce smiles, cold contempt for him in their eyes, and … through the nearest wall, as softly as any maiden’s whisper.
And the blue flames were gone from the Dragonskull Chamber, leaving Marlin Stormserpent whimpering and shaking.
Farruking Tempus forfend! So he could control them … or were they merely humoring him?
Stlarn. He swallowed hard, his mouth as dry as he imagined any howling desert to be, and tried to quell his shaking.
He had to get out of there, notes and chalice and all, and back home before some sneering fool of a war wizard found him.
Home, to await a horrible doom—was there anything in the family vaults he could protect himself with? Anything?—or to learn that this little test had become a success, and he was rid of a longtime foe.