Swords of Eveningstar

by Greenwood, Ed

  “Lord Vangerdahast!” The war wizard’s swift hail was high and shrill in excitement. “Someone has just approached them, and—”

  The royal magician held up a quelling hand. “So I hear and see for myself.”

  He shrugged, the glow of his scrying crystal dancing across his face. “Let every jack and lass at loose ends in the upcountry join them, and ride hearty. It’ll take most—mayhap all—of their lives, just to poke their noses into the Haunted Halls.”

  The Swords were still staring at the two women when two men wearing empty scabbards, easy grins, and the looks of muscled warriors came to the other end of their table.

  “We’d also like to ride with you, if you’ll have us,” said the taller and more handsome of the two: a blond charmer who outshone Florin in looks. “Agannor am I, and this is my friend Bey. We swing swords … fairly well.”

  The Swords found themselves staring at the two newcomers, then back at the two women, then at the grinning men again.

  The Lady Narantha raised her eyes to the rafters and asked disbelievingly, “What is this place? A branch of the Society of Stalwart Adventurers?”

  “Nay, Lady,” the tavernmaster told her proudly, arriving with a platter crowded with goblets and flasks on his shoulder. “Better than that: this is The Moon and Stars, finest tavern between Teflamm and splendrous Waterdeep!”

  The tall trader nursing a tankard not far from the Swords’ table glanced their way with casual indifference at the tavernmaster’s merry boast—then stiffened in anger and surprise as his gaze fell upon a tall woman in forest green, who’d risen from where she’d been sitting alone, at a table against the wall, and was striding toward the Esparran adventurers.

  Thinking silent curses, Horaundoon turned back to his tankard, taking care not to do so too swiftly. Dove Silverhand might be the most feeble in Art of the Seven—but just how feeble that might be, he did not care to learn.

  No sane wizard challenges the goddess of magic, and expects to win.

  Someone else was coming to their table. Florin glanced up.

  And froze, heart pounding, as he met her dark blue eyes—and fell into them, plunging into endless wise depths …

  He swallowed and shook himself like a wet dog, tearing himself out of whatever reverie—had he been caught in some sort of spell?

  Was this a fell sorceress?

  She had long brown hair, that swirled unbound about her shoulders—shoulders as broad as his own, and outstripping Islif in bulging build. She was as tall as him, too, and clad in the vest, tunic, breeches, and high boots of a man. A stylish man able to afford the best weaves and leathers, and have even his boots dyed forest green.

  She was all in green, this woman, and strode up to them with casual grace, as one deft and strong who knows her power but assumes no airs of rank or mincing affectation. Narantha might have a title, but this lady was truly noble.

  The very sight of her stirred and unsettled him; Florin looked down, certain he was blushing. Her image remained bright before his eyes even as he stared into his tankard. He had to know her, to speak with her—yet he felt none of the swift, strong lust that lush feminine beauty or flirtation was wont to stir in him. She was … she was … gods, was this what minstrels sang of, “love at first glance”?

  He was lost …

  “Well met, adventurers,” she said, voice low-pitched and husky. “I happen to be an officer of the Crown, and perceive a possible need. If you desire to amend your charter—to add to your ranks, say—I can ply the pen properly, so the nearest Purple Dragon, Wizard of War, royal magician, or even the king himself will pronounce it proper.”

  “Uh—ah—t-that’s very kind of you, Lady … ah?” Florin flushed crimson. Gods, he was gabbling like an awestruck village idiot! He was deathly afraid Semoor would erupt in a acidic comment about “lovestruck Florin” or some such, and yet … and yet he cared not.

  “I am known here as the Lady in Green,” she said warmly, and her eyes seemed to flare silver, just for a moment. None of the Swords saw war wizards and Purple Dragons all over the room stiffen and stare vacantly at nothing for a moment, silver flames dancing in their eyes—then return to their tankards and mutterings, all notice of a lone woman in green gone. “You can trust me.”

  Leaning close to Florin—who fought furiously with himself to keep his gaze from plunging into her bodice, and just barely won—she murmured, “As Azoun told you: ‘Tathen.’ ”

  Hearing her, and looking again at the four other visitors to their table, the Swords traded arrow-swift, excited glances, looking at last to Narantha. Who smiled at them in wry amazement, shook her head, and said, “Truly the gods do smile upon you, friends!”

  Take command, Florin reminded himself. “Are we all agreed to accept four new companions? I know ’tis swift, and they’re strangers, but the king …”

  “The gods!” Semoor said firmly. “The hands of the gods have provided them!”

  Islif spread her hands. “We need the strength. I’m for them all.”

  “I, too,” Jhessail put in. Semoor, Narantha, and Florin found themselves nodding at each other.

  “Done, then,” Florin said, shuddering in relief, and clawed at the buckles of the breastplate he wore. Azoun had given it to him, and he hadn’t wanted to leave it in his room, in case …

  “Pray excuse this disrobing,” he muttered, swinging the breastplate open and plucking the precious charter from between the inside of the plate and its inner lining. He held it out to the Lady in Green.

  Who smiled at him and shook her head. “You’d best find another place for it. Your sweat will rot it away in a month or so if you keep it there; believe me, for betimes I wear steel in battle; I know.”

  Out of the inside of her vest she produced a plumeless, tapering quill and a vial of ink that sparkled through its confining glass. “I’m going to need four names,” she said calmly, “with their proper spellings …”

  Horaundoon brooded, the hargaunt shifting restlessly as it felt his fury. Not six places from him, she was, and the Weave fairly crackling around her. Sark her!

  She was more than a creature of Mystra—though by all the eye tyrants Manshoon could name, wasn’t that enough? She was a Harper, and this room could well be crawling with them …

  Nay, almost certainly was crawling with them. Which in turn meant sarking Vangerdahast was probably scrying this place, right now, with half a dozen of his most senior Wizards of War.

  Which meant Horaundoon of the Zhentarim dared do nothing. Nothing at all.

  If any of the war wizards and out-of-uniform Purple Dragons in the taproom had happened to notice the tall trader, all they would have seen then was his eyes narrow, and his expression grow thoughtful.

  And what trader doesn’t get that look, a time or six each day?

  The mindworm would have a new target. One of the four new Swords: Pennae, Martess, Agannor, or Bey. Which one, though? Who would be best to subvert?

  Well, the answer to that would take more watching and waiting.

  Praise Bane, watching and waiting were tasks Horaundoon excelled at, and was even beginning to enjoy.

  “Agannor Wildsilver. Alura ‘Pennae’ Durshavin. Bey Freemantle. Martess Ilmra,” Florin read aloud. “Welcome to the Swords of Eveningstar!”

  The cheer that went up then rocked the taproom of The Moon and Stars, echoed as it was from many tables.

  In the moment of silence that followed in its tankard-clinking, ale-swilling wake, before the chatter could resume, Doust Sulwood burst into the room, and hurried toward his fellow Swords.

  “Did I miss anything?”

  Chapter 11

  AN EVENING STAR IN HAUNTED DREAMS

  To see a steadfast star in your dreams is to behold a sign of favor from the gods. The trick, as usual in life, is to determine just which god, and what the sign means. Before, of course, ’tis too late.

  Aundrammas Hulzondurr

  Collected Sages’ Sayings

  pu
blished in the Year of the Fist

  Something moved in the moonlit cottage. Something dark and serpentine. Malevolent, Jhessail knew a moment later, as it reared up, faceless and flowing, and somehow looked at her.

  Somehow the wall was gone, between her room and her parents’ bedchamber, and she was seeing their moonlit bed, holding the two of them asleep together, peacefully entangled.

  Jhessail screamed, but nothing came out of her mouth. Nothing at all.

  Faceless yet somehow sneering at her, the thing, wraithlike and dark, turned to rear over her parents.

  Jhessail screamed again, screamed and tried to leap from her bed to wake her mother and father before it … before it …

  Fell on them like a great endless wave, as black as deepest night and as cold as all winter, to slide into their sleeping mouths and noses, in at their ears, escaping into them like smoke as Jhessail burst free of whatever was holding her, sprang down from her bed atop the wardrobe, and raced to snatch up lantern and fire-poker and run to—stand above her parents, terrified and shivering, not knowing what to do.

  Craegh and Lhanna Silvertree lay in the moonlight, murmuring in their slumber as they finished flinging aside the quilt and covers, their faces troubled and pale as the moonlight itself …

  Then, as Jhessail stood over them helplessly, their faces went calm again, and they froze into peaceful stillness.

  Leaving her with nothing to do, after long and fearful gazing, but trudge back to her wardrobe, feeling a dark and mocking gaze between her bare shoulderblades, and soundless laughter rolling uproariously around her …

  She started to shiver and couldn’t stop, ending up doubled over with her teeth chattering violently, trying to keep clawing her way up the wardrobe to her bed in her shudderings, deathly afraid whatever it was would reach out its flowing darkness for her …

  Abruptly Jhessail became aware that the room around her was not her own, and held no moonlight nor parents. Instead there was someone in bed beside her whose shiverings were every bit as violent as her own, and whose breathing was sharp with fear. Jhessail rolled away, against the wall, and stared up into the darkness. Ah, yes: this was a room at The Old Man inn in Waymoot, and the woman wrapped in a close-bundled sheet beside her was—

  Martess. Martess Ilmra, who called herself “Lowspell.” Who was whimpering now, and—

  Thrusting bolt upright in bed, gasping. “Where—”

  “Martess?” Jhessail asked, trying to sound calm and gentle. “It’s me, Jhessail. One of the Swords of Eveningstar you joined, earlier this even. I’m right here beside you. Rough dreams?”

  “Y-yes,” Martess whispered. “Gods, I was so frightened! Something dark and shapeless, that I could never quite see clearly. It moved by flowing, Jhess—oh, I’m sure I sound like a silly little lass!—and I watched it pounce on—on some sleeping folk, and flow into them, somehow, leaving them asleep as before. It was so … vivid; I—I can’t quite believe ’twasn’t really happening!”

  Jhessail reached out her hand in the darkness, and Martess started and gave a gasp that was almost a cry at that touch. Jhessail stroked her side soothingly, through the sheet, and whispered, “You don’t sound silly to me. I had the very same dream. I was sleeping at home and woke up, and saw the wraith-thing go into my parents. It laughed at me.”

  “Yes!” The answering whisper was fierce. “Exactly!”

  There was a little silence, then Martess whispered, “The same dream—and if meddling mortal magic played no part in this, then shared dreams are sent by the gods. Who sent ours, and why?” She drew in a deep, shuddering breath and asked, “And what does it mean?”

  “We’re both dedicated to Mystra, above all others,” Jhessail whispered back. “Even if this was not her sending, it is to her we should look for guidance.”

  “Yes,” Martess agreed, and rose from the bed. The room was small, but she shrugged the sheet from around her and knelt on it, to give Jhessail room to slide out of the bed with the quilt, and do the same thing.

  Side by side, able to hear more than see each other, they knelt together in the dark and prayed to Mystra, the simple Plea for Guidance that is taught to anyone who cares to learn it, and is muttered by many to the nearest candle flame or visible star when confronted with magic.

  Their whisperings ended in perfect unison, and they were both drawing breath to speak to each other about what to do next when a sudden sound made them both freeze.

  Just outside their door, in this upper-floor passage of The Old Man inn, whose aging timbers creaked betimes but was in the main quiet (the noises of persons striding briskly would have been clearly heard), they had both heard the ever-so-faint scrape of a boot on the floorboards.

  Jhessail put her hand out to Martess and felt her way to the woman’s ear. Putting her mouth against it, she whispered as quietly as possible, “I’ve a magic missile. What shall we do?”

  She turned her head aside, to let Martess find her ear, and say into it: “Oh. A battlestrike, you mean?”

  Jhessail patted her fellow mage’s hand to signify “yes.”

  “Then get you to the wall by the door, ready to hurl it, and I’ll use my ‘servant unseen’ to open the door and unhood our night-lantern. Forget not to shield your eyes.”

  Jhessail put up her hand, found and shaped the chin of her fellow mage, and murmured, “I’ll go pour water from ewer to bowl and back, to cloak your incanting. Tap me with your spell, to let me know when to cease.”

  Martess whispered agreement, and they did those things.

  Jhessail set down bowl and ewer the moment she felt the spell-touch, and scampered for the wall by the door, bruising the fingertips of the hand she flung out before her to keep from crashing into its boards.

  There was a faint squeal from the floor beside her as the servant-spell tugged out the door-wedge. Then it snatched the door open.

  As the battered old planking swung into the dark room, Jhessail clapped her hand over her eyes—and Martess magically lofted the lantern across the room at the passage, unhooding it as it went. Its swift flight made it flare up into roaring brightness.

  The man outside blinked then squinted, raising a hand to shield his eyes that held a holy symbol of Tymora. The blank coin of a novice, on a chain that Jhessail recognized.

  The lantern halted right in front of the novice’s nose, close enough to keep him from seeing anything beyond it—and to be thrust full-searing into his face if he tried anything sudden or menacing.

  What they could see of that face was grim, and belonged to Doust Sulwood.

  “Jhess? Martess? Are you both well?” His voice was the quietest of murmurs, and was grave. “I’ve had a most disturbing dream …”

  Maglor checked the two slow-coal braziers. Overnight heating was essential for these concoctions, but he didn’t want to find them charred waste come morning—or half his workshop gone to ashes, either. Even if he hadn’t served the Zhentarim, every village apothecary had ingredients and concoctions difficult to replace, and secrets his fellow villagers had best never see, even as smoking remnants.

  His windows were already firmly shuttered against hopefully sleeping Eveningstar, for it would go ill indeed for him if anyone witnessed the moot he was here to attend.

  Under orders, of course.

  Why Old Ghost felt the need to meet every seventh night.… Unless, of course, it really was just to enjoy terrifying him.

  Maglor’s thin, cruel mouth tightened, and he shook his head. Some day he’d be mighty enough to destroy Old Ghost … somehow …

  He felt a sudden tingling, as if every hair of his body was standing up on end. Well, they probably were, because the faint, dead-white glow that followed, tinged just for an instant with green, meant only one thing: out of empty air, by fell magic, the eerie, flowing wraithlike thing known as “Old Ghost” was joining him in his workshop.

  From where, he knew not, nor could he do more than speculate as to how; the word “magic” was an explanation s
o broad as to be meaningless. He wasn’t even certain what Old Ghost was. A fell intelligence that could speak, yes, and probably once a solid, mortal human wizard.

  Probably.

  Now, Old Ghost was Maglor’s all-too-familiar Zhentarim superior, and Maglor wasn’t sure if he hated it more than he was terrified of it—or whether his terror outstripped his hatred. The latter, he supposed, as he’d never dared try to—

  “Maglor,” Old Ghost said, in that hoarse whisper of a voice that never began with any greeting, “I have a task for you.”

  Maglor bowed his head. “I willingly serve.”

  The glowing, drifting presence made a sound that might have been a snort. “You remain a poor liar. Save your breath, and heed well. You are to deal with the upstart Swords of Eveningstar before they endanger our profits.”

  “Who or what are the Swords of—”

  “Adventurers, who just personally received a charter from King Azoun—along with his order to undertake an exploration of the Haunted Halls. They will be here soon, and are bidden to report to Winter. Their very presence may disrupt our caravan traffic, for even if they haven’t been ordered to report anyone they see in the Stonelands, some war wizards will have been ordered to spy on them, and so will be where we don’t want them to be.”

  “ ‘Deal with’?”

  “Eliminate them. Without attracting Purple Dragon attention to our smuggling activities in Eveningstar.”

  “I’ll see to it at once.”

  “You will indeed. Or else.”

  And Old Ghost faded away, making this the shortest moot Maglor had ever “enjoyed” with it. The Zhentarim upper ranks must be busy.

  Nonetheless, as he snuffed the last of the candle-lamps and headed for the stairs up to his cold and lonely bed, Maglor was trembling.

  The sickening chill of Old Ghost’s nearness—a bone-deep cold that stole his strength and left him retching on the weak brink of unconsciousness, on the rare occasions when Old Ghost swept through Maglor—always left him trembling.