by Ed Greenwood
“ Yes,” Andolphyn said shortly. “Must be using a hired wizard to keep ’em under the whip. Hope no one casts any mischief.”
Something that seemed to be drawn by dragons came into view, and Andolphyn shook his head in fresh disbelief. “Oxen cloaked by illusions, must be. Those can’t be real.”
Blacksilver chuckled uneasily as their coach slowed, nearing the cluster in front of the gates. “If I know anything about war wizards, their fury soon will be, though.”
In this, he was correct. Two coaches rounded the curve of the Promenade in the far distance, escorted by shining-armored outriders whose mounts, long banner lances, and splendid armor outshone those of the best Purple Dragon honor guards. A rather large number of outriders.
“Someone’s brought along his own army,” a gruff old lord in a nearby open carriage commented-as wizards of war stormed past, hastening on foot from the palace toward the still-distant outriders. Onlookers in windows and shop doorways were murmuring, having caught sight of the unauthorized military might on display.
Andolphyn and Blacksilver saw the hurrying Crown mages stop just long enough to work spells then hasten sternly on. A tense breath or two later the outriders were all trotting briskly past, on down the line of coaches and right past the palace. Trotting at the exact same pace, despite some spur-kicking and hauling on reins by their surprised-looking riders.
One outrider even fell off, and his empty-saddled mount continued right on. He ran after it, caught hold of the reins, and pulled hard; it dragged him, slowing not in the least.
On the riders went, up the Promenade to the Eastgate and out through it, some of them yelling for help or cursing.
Andolphyn laughed. “Willing to wager Dragons are waiting outside the gates with a camp set up to gather those dolts in?”
Blacksilver shook his head. “I’ll not take that wager. I’m sure they are.”
He looked again at the lions. “I hope they’ve enough war wizards to quell battles, or…”
“Yes,” Andolphyn agreed. “ ‘Or,’ indeed.”
The name of Lord Arclath Delcastle held no weight at the gates; the Dragons there looked her up and down and shook their heads.
Amarune looked past them, hoping-in vain-to see Arclath.
“I’m expected!” she said almost pleadingly. “Lord Delcastle will be escorting me on from here!”
The guards merely laughed, shook their heads, and said firmly, “Not today, lass.”
Whereupon Storm Silverhand took her hand and led her around the Dragons toward the watchful line of war wizards, telling the guards smoothly, “The lady is expected, saers.”
As they stared at her in surprise, she added, “Please come with me, Lady Amarune. Lord Delcastle is being kept busy by some of his more, ah, demanding fellow lords, and sent me to bring you to him.”
She swept a startled Amarune into the palace, mouthing the words “Ganrahast tells me the falcon is dark” to the nearest war wizard.
Startled at being given the passphrase by someone he didn’t recognize, he blinked and yielded way, murmuring, “Who are you?”
Storm gave him a smile so warm he blushed, and with little stars of promise shining in her eyes, replied, “Someone in disguise.”
“No doubt,” came a cold and familiar voice from just inside the palace door. “Wherefore you can turn right around, both of you, and depart this place. Go far. We’re much too busy today to entertain mask dancers and thieves.”
“Why, Glathra, dear,” Storm replied mockingly, “doesn’t Foril need you at his side right now, far more than we do?”
“Speak the king’s name with more respect, if you dare utter it at all!” Glathra spat, waving at the guards beside her to move Storm and Rune away. “Get them gone,” she ordered. “Now.”
Faces hardening, the Dragons advanced. “You heard her,” the foremost snapped. “Go-or be taken!”
“If they resist, there’s no need to be gentle,” Glathra added, turning away to give some arriving nobles a glare.
Storm took Amarune’s hand again and strode off down the street too quickly for the guards to bother to follow far.
“Now what?” Rune murmured. “Are we giving up?”
“Of course not. There are scores of ways into the palace,” Storm whispered back. “Right here, for instance.”
She ducked into an exclusive-looking shop, gave the proprietress a wave that incorporated some sort of subtle signal, then ducked through a side door in the shop showroom and down a dark and narrow flight of stairs… only to come to a halt in front of a spearpoint that had a hard-faced Purple Dragon behind it. Beyond him was a lantern, and beyond that more guards and a war wizard.
“The palace,” the half-seen mage intoned flatly, “is closed. Return tomorrow.”
Without a word Storm went back up the stair and out into the street, with Rune hurrying to catch up.
“They’ll have every way guarded,” the dancer sighed.
And it soon seemed that they had. The stable gates were closed and manned by a row of alert Dragons with spears. The next two secret shop-tunnels Storm tried were also guarded. And the door of the high house behind the stables was answered not by the usual beautiful chatelaine, but by a sour-looking wizard of war who said firmly, “No bedwarmer-lasses are wanted in the palace this day or night, thank you,” and closed the door in their faces.
“The royal gardens are full of guards, too,” Rune commented, looking past Storm’s shoulder. “Was that the last way in?”
“No,” Storm replied, “but I was hoping to avoid the slow and unpleasant ones. Or we may reach the Council chamber too late to be of any use.” Putting a finger to her lips for silence, she strolled along the ivy-cloaked wall of the high house they’d just been shut out of, turned the corner to continue along the side wall, and let herself through a narrow swinging gate into the house garden.
She was just reaching for a particular section of the ivy-drenched wall ahead when the hidden door she was seeking in it opened. The same wizard glared out at her, wand in hand, and said, “You’re far more persistent than a mere coinlass would be. I think we’ll just-”
The pot that struck the back of his head then made a solid thlangg sound, and the mage’s eyes rolled up in his head before he collapsed in a heavy, untidy heap on the doorsill.
A bewhiskered old face grinned out at Storm and Rune over the hairy hand that held the pot.
“Well met, lasses! Storm, ye got me into the palace, an’ the food an’ drink I’ve been scrounging since have been splendid, so ’tis my turn to do ye a favor! Let me drag this lard-sack out of the way, then come in and be welcome!”
“Mirt!” Storm greeted him happily, “I could kiss you!”
He took her up on her offer, promptly and enthusiastically, and she responded so warmly that Amarune, squeezing past them, murmured in her ear, “You sure you haven’t spent time mask dancing?”
Storm chuckled and broke free of Mirt’s lips.
“Later, old lecher,” she told him fondly. “We’re in some haste right now. We’ve got a kingdom to save.”
“What, another one? Which one is it this time?”
Hiding watchfully behind the darting eyes of the young and excited Lord Jassur Dragonwood, Manshoon listened hard to comments from all around as noble lords jostled and glared, laughed and waved… and shuffled through one of the doorways into the Hall of Justice. From what he was hearing, no goading would be necessary; these lords were spoiling for a chance to rebuke the king.
He’d prejudged matters rightly, which is why he was well away from the minds of Crownrood and Loroun and had left all memories of him heavily cloaked from them. Freed from his influence, they could better be themselves-and as they were as expendable as every other titled lord and lady of the Forest Kingdom, any recklessnesses they indulged in were just fine with him.
So long as someone dragged out a sword and disrupted this Council, or Foril was forced to turn tyrant to keep order, causing most of th
e nobles to end up seething at him, the future Emperor of Cormyr and Beyond would be well content.
Now, had the palace dolts been foolish enough to try to dictate seating? No, it seemed not, aside from a small royal area.
Ah, well, that sort of blunder would have made things too easy.
In the crowd of nobles outside another door into the Hall of Justice, Arclath glanced back down the long, crimson-carpeted palace passage he’d just traversed, wondering if he’d ever see its splendors so unbesmirched, and its guards standing quite so peacefully again. To do so, he had to peer past the shoulder of Lord Braelbane-year in and year out, still a tiresome old wind-horn-and was startled to see a superbly gowned Amarune Whitewave halfway down that passage, walking toward him.
Dodging past Braelbane without a word, he strode to meet her. “You got in? How?”
A nearby guard turned his head sharply to give Amarune a hard look, and she laughed, replying, “Why, Arclath, what better chance to see the palace and try to decide if I’d like it here, without a lot of questions being asked by bored guards and courtiers and war wizards and highnoses… ah, other highnoses?”
“Nobles,” he corrected her.
“Nobles,” she echoed.
Arclath drew her close, giving the guard a “none of your affair” frown, and murmured, “But… but how’d you get in, Rune? Past the guards and all?”
“Mirt let us in,” Amarune replied. “Storm and me, that is-”
She turned to indicate Storm and found she was gesturing at empty air. Storm Silverhand was nowhere to be seen.
Above and around them, thunderously, the third fanfare sounded.
The anteroom off the crimson-carpeted passage was small, dusty, luxuriously furnished, and occupied only by a silver-haired woman talking to herself.
Or rather, arguing with a swirling cloud of ashes.
I must get into that Council. So either we conquer some poor, unfortunate, high-ranking courtier or a much-less-poor noble, or I go back into your boots and you march right in there. At least get me to the open doorway, so I can drift away to find a suitable victim, while you distract the guards.
Storm sighed. “No, El. It won’t work. Not with all the wizards, Highknights, and Dragons they’ve gathered around that room.”
Show them your bitebolds, Stormy One. That usually works.
Storm shook her head. “I don’t mind in the slightest trying that, but I just don’t think it’ll work. Not this day. There are handfuls of war wizards at every door, all with wands in their hands, orders to use them without hesitation, and worry and excitement all over their faces. They’ll blast you.”
I’m already dead or bodiless; what can they do to me?
“That’s just it,” Storm hissed. “We don’t know! They could destroy you! And it’ll all end right here-Mystra’s dreams, your promises, and all-over a bunch of nobles fighting over the Dragon Throne, something that’s been going on ever since there first was a Dragon Throne. El, use your head!”
Haven’t got one any more, came the inevitable reply.
“Then use mine, and see sense!”
Nay, nay, lass, I’ve got ye to do that for me. When I behave like a madwits, that’s when things go best, remember?
“My memory, Old Mage, is rather less selective than yours!”
Amarune and Arclath turned together to the nearest doors that opened into the Hall of Justice, but at its doors many stern war wizards and Purple Dragons denied Amarune passage.
“Now, listen here!” Arclath began sternly. “I’m Lord Delcastle, and I-”
“No bodyguards or companions of any sort,” the oldest wizard told him sternly. “We’ll not bend this clear royal decree, so if you want to avoid unpleasantness, lord, you’ll be best advised to-”
“Do not presume to give me advice, man,” Arclath began but broke off as Amarune dug steel-like fingers into his thigh.
“Lord Delcastle, you have a duty to your family and to the realm,” she hissed in his ear. “Get to your seat. You can tell me how it all unfolded afterward!”
And before he could reply she turned away, leaving him staring into the wizard’s face and watching the man do a masterful demonstration of smirking at a noble lord without quite smirking.
Chin high, Arclath strode past and into the Hall of Justice.
Storm was gone, and of course Elminster with her. They were up to something, and Amarune’s own part in it-for now-was done.
So, in small and modest ways, mask dancers can help save kingdoms after all.
Marching back down the crimson-carpeted hall, Amarune Whitewave did not see the oldest wizard of war direct three others to follow her.
At the third fanfare of warhorns, servants were dismissed from the chamber, and most of the war wizards and Dragons moved to stand guard outside its doors. As Arclath hastened up to the nearest vacant seat in the great oval tiers of nobles, the only non-nobility he could still see in the room were a pair of armored bodyguards and two scribes around the king. Probably everyone present knew or guessed they were really Highknights and war wizards.
The older scribe rose, his abrupt movement lessening the din of chatter, and struck a little bell. Silence fell. The Council of Dragons had begun.
King Foril rose to address the nobles, looking more calm than impassioned. Was there a hint of sadness about him?
Arclath devoted himself to listening hard and gazing all over the chamber, watching the expressions riding the faces of his fellow nobles. Most, like Harkuldragon yonder, held open contempt.
Foril wanted all the peers to swear binding “blood oaths” before the attending wizards. Meaning those mages would formally take vials of their blood, upon which to work magics if the sworn nobles were disloyal in the future. These would further be oaths of loyalty to Crown Prince Irvel-who sat impassively to the left of the king: vows to serve him and keep his person safe to ascend the Dragon Throne, and then rule as rightful king of Cormyr.
In return, King Foril expressed his willingness to restore “some” rights and privileges trammeled by the Writ-if the assembled nobles could convince him that doing so wouldn’t harm the lives of Cormyreans not born with titles.
“I have heard your anger, directly and by report of what you have said aloud but not to my face. Remember that I must rule justly over all Cormyreans, high and low. I am prepared to dispense with evasions, long speeches, and insults, and deal plainly, here and now. So, what rights and privileges are you, good lords of the realm all, most concerned with?”
The king spread his hands in query and resumed his seat. Which, Arclath noticed, was no throne but identical to all other chairs in the chamber.
After a short, uncertain silence, it began. Old Kreskur Mountwyrm was bold enough to rise first. Noble after noble followed suit, each rising to speak of what he wanted restored.
Which, when those who liked to flap their tongues-Arclath not among them-were done, was everything.
Few of them were unreasonable or wanted all that much, but put together, all their demands would not just gut the Writ, it would grant them more power than ever before, leaving the king of Cormyr little more than a figurehead.
In other words, just about what Arclath had expected.
Now the real fun would begin.
And if everyone in this room was more fortunate than they probably deserved to be, they might-just might — still have a kingdom come next morning.
CHAPTER TEN
I FORESAW ALL THIS
A slight sound behind her-the scuff of a swift striding boot on carpet-made Amarune glance back.
Far down the passage were three men in robes. War wizards. They were heading after her, their forbidding eyes locked on her.
They were coming for her.
Rune quickened her pace and looked back again. The mages, wearing tight smiles, were gaining on her.
Sighing in mingled fear and anger, she came to a right-angled bend, strode around that corner-and discovered she was trapped.
The passage ahead was long, straight, and ended in closed double doors that were visibly locked and barred. There were other, lesser doors along the passage but all were closed and probably locked, too. She tried the nearest one.
Yes. Locked.
Rune set off down the passage, moving very briskly as the three wizards turned the corner behind her.
A sudden, unseen force shoved and clawed at her knees and ankles, and she stumbled and fell. Magic.
Scrambling up again, she found the Crown mages almost upon her.
“Surrender, woman,” one commanded, “in the name of the king! You’re suspected of treason against the Crown, and-”
“What do you want with me?” she snapped.
In her fine garb, she was weaponless and stood still, panting from her fall and from rising fear as they surrounded her.
“Your obedience,” another mage replied grimly, “which every loyal citizen owes the Crown, I remind you! If you’re innocent, you’ve nothing to fear. A few swift spells will tell us what’s in your mind, and-”
“And I’ll go mad!” Amarune snarled. “A barking, drooling madwoman I’ll be, and-”
“Ah,” the third war wizard said soothingly, “but you’ll be a loyal one, and-”
A door behind them opened, and a storm of ashes swirled out of it, spinning up to the height of their heads.
Amarune ducked down hastily as the wizards shouted in alarm and started casting spells. Through watering eyes she saw them staggering around as someone else came through that door.
Could she flee?
No, this new arrival seemed to know just where she was, and was striding toward her, reaching out…
It was Storm!
A spell worked by a war wizard took effect, lashing Storm with lightning. She staggered but caught Amarune by the arm and started towing her toward the still-open door.
Another spell struck, and as Storm moaned in pain, Rune felt a flare of searing heat in her shoulder and down her back. She ducked low and flung herself into the room beyond the door, leaving Storm reeling behind her.
Ashes were still whirling around the cursing mages’ heads. Looking back through swimming eyes, Rune saw Storm, her gown aflame, collapse into the arms of the nearest wizard.