by Ed Greenwood
Oh dear Mystra, preserve me! That thought made him see a rushing wave of chaos—ghostly and imperfect, mind-echoes of what he recalled from the gem now torn from him, but plunging at him all the same. He tried to turn and run, but no matter how hard he struggled, everywhere he ran was toward the rushing wave of memories. It was almost upon him—it broke over him!
“That babbling—that’s human talk! He must be up there somewhere!” The words were elvish; deep, booming echoes that seemed to come from all around him.
In the shrieking, blinding chaos that followed those deafening words Elminster Aumar spat blood from nose and mouth and eyes and ears, and went down, drifting, into dark oblivion …
TWELVE
THE STAG AT BAY
The most dangerous moment in the hunt is when the stag turns, at bay, to trade his life for as many hunters as he can. Elven magic customarily turns such moments into mere glimpses of magnificent futility. But what would such moments be, I wonder, if the stag had strong magic, too?
SHALHEIRA TALANDREN, HIGH ELVEN BARD OF SUMMER-STAR
FROM SILVER BLADES AND SUMMER NIGHTS:
AN INFORMAL BUT TRUE HISTORY OF CORMANTHOR
PUBLISHED IN THE YEAR OF THE HARP
It’s coming for me! Blast it!”
The voice was elven and terrified; it drew Elminster up out of floating darkness soaked in sweat, to find himself still lying in the little room with the elven bones.
There was a roar of flame off to his right, and a stabbing tongue of fire licked the collapsed ceiling above his nose for one scorching moment. El narrowed his eyes to slits, trying to see; one side of his face felt blistered.
When he trusted his sight again, he looked in that direction. The fire was gone. Three soft globes of radiance were drifting beyond the crevice, high in the air of the room where he’d been studying. By their light he could see the elf who’d cried out. He was standing on empty air, sword in hand, near his crevice. Levitating, not flying freely. Swooping around him, just out of reach of his vainly slashing and stabbing blade, was one of the Dlardrageth ghosts; the fire spell hurled from below had failed to destroy it.
If common or easily crafted spells could fell the ghostly remnants of House Dlardrageth, of course, they’d have all been destroyed long ago, and some ambitious fledgling House would be dwelling in this castle now. There was little chance any of the young elves here today had the power to destroy a Dlardrageth ghost.
On the other hand, the swooping, flitting ghost could probably do little more than frighten living elves—and one of those elves was within easy distance of hurling a deadly spell at Elminster, even if the opening between them was too small to allow any elf to enter.
El reached out and cautiously, quietly picked up his spellbook. He’d just have to drag the tangle of cord attached to it around with him for now, as he crept as far along this room as he could, away from the crevice.
Though he felt like he’d been torn apart and been put back together again, piece by agonizing piece, Mystra had come to his aid. She’d dragged him through a thousand tangled Alastrarran half-memories to what his mage’s mind had remembered clearly, at the very depths of his recall: the spells the lore-gem had held.
There’d been one he’d dared not use; its price was too high. Empowering it would strip three of the most powerful spells from his memory and drain something from the scepter as well … but now it was needful he do so.
With a sigh, Elminster did what had to be done, shuddering silently as sparks seemed to wash and flow through his mind, stripping spells away. Thankfully, he did not have to awaken the scepter again to drain power from it. When the new spell shone bright and ready within him, El found the deepest niche he could, in a far corner of the collapsed room, and wedged his precious spellbook into it. Taking the cord he’d stripped from his tome, he checked that its other end was still secure about the splintered stub of the ceiling beam, tossed its coils down the cascade of stones into the tower room, and slipped down it as quietly as he could.
Inevitably stones rolled and bounced, but the levitating elf was snarling so much in his battle with the ghost that no one heard the little clatterings. El reached the bottom, rolled up cord until he had a substantial bundle, tied it to itself to keep the mass together, and threw the thing back up the fallen rocks as high and far as he could, hoping it’d not be seen.
Well, not without someone flying, or a very bright light, he judged, studying it. Drawing a deep breath, he started his first casting: a simple shielding, like he’d used against Delmuth. It was time to face Ivran’s merry band of blood hunters.
His casting warned the elves that magic was being unleashed, of course, and there was an immediate, excited roar from the room they’d been searching. They’d be coming along the narrow passage soon; it was time to greet them.
Elminster showed himself at the mouth of that passage just long enough to make sure of one thing: the levitating elf wasn’t trying to find any ceiling route anywhere, but was descending as fast as he could. Good. El gave the foremost elf a merry wave, and waited.
“He waved at me!” that elf said anxiously, and stopped.
The one behind him—Tlannatar Wrathtree, as it happened—gave him a nudge with the flat of his sword, and snarled, “Go on!”
The elf hesitated. El gave him a grin that must have showed every tooth he possessed, and made an almost amorous beckoning gesture.
The elf stopped, and started to scramble back. “He—”
“I don’t care!” Ivran barked, from the room behind. “I don’t care if he’s grown dwarven-dunged gossamer wings! Move!”
“Go on!” Tlannatar added, giving another shove with his sword. He did not use the flat this time.
The less-than-brave elf shrieked and stumbled hastily ahead. El took one last glance down that passage—it was so tempting to hurl a lightning bolt now, but one of them was sure to have a mantle that would reflect such things—and backed away. He went across the tower room to its other passage, to stand within its opening. Almost none of these noble Cormanthans seemed to have bows; they left that weapon to their common warriors, thank Mystra. Or Corellon. Or Solonor Thelandira, the hunting god. Or whomever.
Still, he’d have to time this perfectly; he’d committed himself now, and would only get one chance. He waited, smiling grimly, for Tlannatar as well as the fearful elf in the lead to scramble out into the tower room and see him before he turned and sprinted down the linking passages, hurrying for the shattered chamber through which the hunters had first entered the castle.
“If this doesn’t work, Mystra,” he remarked pleasantly, as he ran, “you’ll have to send someone else into Cormanthor to be your Chosen. If you want to be gentle on whoever that is, select an elf, hmm?”
Mystra gave no sign that she’d heard, but by then El was out into the shattered chamber, and heading for a rock pile at its center. The elves, running fast, weren’t far behind.
El found his spot and spun to face them, assuming an anxious expression and raising his hands as if uncertain which spell to hurl. The blood hunters came racing into the chamber, waving their blades, and howled their way to a halt.
The elf who’d been first in the narrow passage said uncertainly, “This doesn’t look right—he wasn’t so fearful before. This must be a tr—”
“Silence!” Ivran Selorn snarled, shoving the speaker aside. The fearful elf slipped on fallen stones and almost fell, but Ivran paid no attention. It was his moment of glory; he was swaggering toward Elminster with leisurely grace, almost dancing on the tips of his toes as he came. “So, human rat,” he sneered, “cornered at last, are you?”
“You are,” Elminster agreed with a smile. The fearful elf raised a fresh cry of alarm, but Ivran hissed, “Be still!” at him, and then turned back to favor Elminster with a mirthless smile.
“You hairy barbarians think yourselves clever,” he remarked, eyes glittering, “and you are—too clever. Unfortunately, in the half-witted, cleverness breeds in
solence. You’ve certainly shown us ample supplies of that, being insolent enough to think you can slaughter the heirs of no less than ten Houses of Cormanthor—eleven, if we count Alastrarra, whose lore-gem you wore when you came trotting into our midst; who’s to say you didn’t murder Iymbryl to get it?—and pay no price. Some who hold the rank of armathor serve Cormanthor diligently all their lives and slay fewer foes than you have already.”
With exaggerated apparent surprise, Ivran Selorn looked around at his companions, and then back to Elminster. “See? There are many more, here. What a splendid opportunity to add to your score! Why do you not attack? Are you scared, perhaps?”
Elminster lifted his lips in a half-smile. “Violence has never been Mystra’s way.”
“Oh, so?” Ivran said, his voice high and incredulous. “What then was that blast by the pool? A natural occurrence, perhaps?”
With a tight, wolfish smile, he motioned the other elves to encircle Elminster; keeping a safe distance, they did so, silently and smiling. Then the leader of these blood hunters turned back to his quarry and said, “Let me tell you the heirs you’ve slain, oh most mighty of armathors: Waelvor, and a bloody harvest by the pool: Yeschant, Amarthen, Ibryiil, Gwaelon, Tassarion, Ortauré, Bellas, and, I hear from our mages, Echorn and Auglamyr, too!”
Ivran advanced again, slowly, tossing his long, slim blade into the air and catching it in a fluid, restless juggling that El knew meant he’d throw it soon. “Just one of those heirs—to say nothing of the dozen or so servants and house blades you’ve felled, along the way—would be more than enough to buy your death, human. Just one! So now we have you at last, and face the difficult problem of how to fittingly slay you ten times over … or should it be eleven?”
Ivran came still closer. “Two of the gallants you slew were close friends of mine. And all of us here are saddened by the loss of the Lady Symrustar, whose promise has warmed us all for three seasons now. You took these from us, human worm. Have you anything futile to say on your own behalf? Something to entertain us as we hack you down?!”
As he screamed these last words, Ivran charged, hurling his blade in a silvery blur. It was meant to slash El’s hand and ruin any spellcasting, before the other elves—leaping in from all sides now—reached him.
Smiling grimly, Elminster worked the spell, and became a rising, roiling column of white sparks. Charging elves crashed through him and into each other, blades biting deep. Elves arched in agony, and screamed, or coughed around the hilts of deeply driven blades, and poured out their blood upon the stones.
The whirling column of sparks began to drift away, heading for the passage El had entered by. Snarling and panting, with two blades that were not his standing out of his body, Ivran cried, “Slay the human! Use the swordpoint spell!”
His last word was choked off by blood bubbling forth, and an elf who streamed blood from a slash on his forehead—the one who’d been so fearful, earlier—hastened to the staggering Ivran, his hands glowing with healing magic.
Tlannatar Wrathtree followed his leader’s bidding, shouting, “I have the spell! Throw your blades up!”
Obediently those elves who still could hurled swords and daggers into the air above their heads. The spell, which was making blue-white stars of force flare and twinkle around Tlannatar’s hands, snared those hurled blades and sent them across the chamber in a deadly stream, point-first.
The whirling white column of sparks and light paused at the entrance to the passage, and the hurled blades swerved in their flight to go around it, picking up speed, and then spray out back across the room like a deadly hail of darts, flung in random directions. Tlannatar cried out as one took him in the ear, and toppled over with his mouth still open; it would gape, now, forever. Ivran, held up by his healer, took one in the throat and spat blood at the ceiling in a last, dying stream, and another elf fell, far across the room, with a sword right through him. He took two staggering steps toward the rock pile he’d been seeking as cover, then collapsed across it, and did not move again. When the column that had been the human armathor whirled away down the passage and silence fell over the room, the fearful elf looked around. Of them all, only he still stood, though someone was moaning and moving feebly by one wall.
Dazed by grief, he stumbled in that direction, hoping the one healing spell he had left would be enough. By the time he got there, the body was still and silent. He shook it and whispered its name, but life had fled.
“How many of us,” he asked the empty room in a trembling voice, “does it take to buy the life of one human? Father Corellon! How many?”
Raw power was surging through Elminster—more than he’d ever known outside Mystra’s embrace—and he was feeling stronger, warmer, and mightier by the second. As he spun, the purple-hued glamer spun by the mages was being sucked down into him, giving him its energy … wild, unleashed, and wonderful!
Laughing uncontrollably, El felt himself growing taller and brighter, as he rose from the shattered base of the fallen tower.
He was conscious of the four mages scrambling up and shouting in fear. He spun in their direction, drunk with power, hungry to slay, and destroy, and—
The mages were casting something in unison. El leaned toward them, trying to get there before they could flee, or do whatever else they were trying to do, but his spinning form couldn’t hurry. He tried to bend over, to sweep at them, but couldn’t hold the shape, as his spinning whirled him upright again. He was closing on them now, he was—
Too late. The four elves swept their hands down by their sides—hands that trailed fire—and stood watching him expectantly. They were not fleeing or even looking alarmed.
An instant later, Faerûn exploded, and El felt himself being wrenched apart and hurled in all directions, like dry grass spun away by a gale wind. “Mystra!” he cried, or tried to, but there was nothing but the roaring and the light, and he was falling … many of him were falling, onto many treetops …
“And then what happened?” High Court Mage Earynspieir’s voice was thin with anger and exasperation. Why, oh Corellon tell me why, did the younger bloods of the realm have to be such bloodthirsty fools?
The trembling elven mage facing him started to cry, and went to his knees, pleading for his life.
“Oh, get up,” Lord Earynspieir said disgustedly. “It’s done, now. You’re sure the human is dead?”
“We blasted him to nothing, L-lord,” one of the other mages blurted out. “I’ve been scrying for magic use and invisible creatures since then, and have seen no evidence of either.”
Earynspieir nodded almost absently. “Who survived, out of the whole band that went in there?”
“Rotheloe Tyrneladhelu, Lord. He—he bears no wound, but hasn’t stopped crying yet. He may not be well in his wits.”
“So we have eight dead and a ninth suffering,” the High Court Mage said coldly, “and you four unhurt and triumphant.” He looked at the ruined castle. “And no body of the foe, to be sure he is dead. Truly, a great victory.”
“Well, it was!” the fourth mage shouted, erupting in sudden fury. “I didn’t see you here, standing boot-to-boot with us, hurling spells at the Heirslayer! He came boiling up out of that castle like some sort of god, a deadly column of fire and sparks a hundred feet high and more, spitting off spells in all directions! Most would’ve fled, I swear—but we four stood and kept our calm and took him down! And”—he looked around at all of the silent, somber faces around him, court mages and sorceresses and guards, these last all heroes of earlier wars, their aged faces expressionless, and finished lamely—“and I’m proud of what we did.”
“I gathered that,” Earynspieir said dryly. “Sylmae? Holone? Truth-scry these four … and Tyrneladhelu, to see how much of a wreck his mind is. We need to know the truth, not how windy their boasting can be.” He turned away as the sorceresses nodded.
As the sorceresses advanced, one of the mages raised his hands. Red rings of fire encircled them, and he said warningly, “Ke
ep back, wenches.”
Sylmae’s mouth crooked. “You’ll look rather less handsome wearing those flame hoops on your backside, puppy. Dispense with this nonsense, or in the next three paces or so Holone and I’ll grow weary of it.”
“You dare to truth-scry me? The heir of a House?”
Sylmae shrugged. “Of course. In this, we act with the Coronal’s authority.”
“What authority?” the mage sneered as he retreated a step, the flamehoops still blazing about his hands. “The whole realm knows that the Coronal’s gone mad!”
The High Court Mage turned around slowly, a slim but menacing figure in his black robe, and said gravely, “After your behind eats those flame hoops you’re so fond of, Selgauth Cathdeiryn, and you’ve been thoroughly truth-scryed, you will be conducted under guard to the Coronal. You will then be free to make that observation to our Revered Lord himself. If you’re feeling a trifle more prudent than at present, you may be wise enough to do so politely.”
Galan Goadulphyn looked at the surface of the pool one last time, and sighed. Had he been less proud, there might have been tears, but he was a warrior of Cormanthor, not one of these weak-knees, the prancing and overperfumed lispers whom the high noble Houses of the realm were pleased to call heirs. He was like stone, or old treeroot. He would endure without complaint and rise again. Someday.
The picture the pool displayed was not inspiring. His face was a mask of old, dried blood, the fine line of his jaw marred where a flap of torn skin had bonded in its dangling state, making his chin square as a human’s. The tip of one ear was missing, and his hair was as matted as a dead spider’s legs, much of it stuck in the dark scabs that covered the raw furrows the rocks had gouged out of his head.
Galan looked back at the pool. His lips curved in an unlovely smile as he—stiffly—made a formal bow in its direction. Then he turned and booted a stone into its tranquil heart, shattering the smooth surface with muddy ripples.