by Ed Greenwood
The doorguard raised his eyebrows. "That makes me even more determined not to let you pass. News of that sort should not be-"
"Yes, Melarvyn? What's the trouble here?"
The steward of Haelithtorntowers was a brusque and efficient man. He was not disposed to look kindly on any wastage of his time, trivial matters, or unnecessary distractions. The doorguard knew this well and stepped back with a tight smile as he indicated the dusty man standing on the threshold.
"This-ruffian-is demanding an audience with the Lady Ambrur. He won't go away, even when threatened with the Watch, and insists that his business is urgent and that he has a personal relationship of some sort with the Lady. I believe him not, but in fairness-"
"Fairness? Melarvyn, since when did fairness play any part in life, beyond nursery tales? Since when have I allowed any hint of 'fairness' into the daily governance of Haelithtorntowers?"
Without waiting for a reply, the steward looked coldly down his nose at the aforementioned ruffian on the threshold and began, "As for you, sir-"
The dusty man peeled off his mustache and said quietly, "Enough foolery, Elward. Take me to Joysil now or I'll inform the Watch of the fate of Iliskar Northwind. And the matter of the missing Selgauntan crab shipment last month. To say nothing of your part in the disagreement between the Seven Traders and the port tax-takers here two months before that. Or the new Marsemban trade-agent of the slaver Ooaurtann of Westgate who goes by the name 'Varsoond.' But then, Elward Varsoond Emmellero Daunthi-deir would know nothing about a buyer of slaves, would he not?"
The steward had gone the hue of old cracked ivory during the stranger's soft little speech, and he'd begun to swallow repeatedly, his left eye twitching as if there was something in it.
The doorguard had slowly stepped back from Steward Elward Daunthideir as his own face had slid from annoyance to rage to astonishment to dumbfoundedness. His facial expression was now veering toward something akin to amazement.
"Uh, wha … whuh .. . ahem," the Steward began then suddenly smiled, stepped forward to offer the stranger his hand and asked brightly, "Why, Lord sir! Whyever didn't you mention all of this before? Of course the Lady Ambrur will be happy to see you-immediately, I might add, and it would give me the greatest pleasure, it would indeed, to escort you to see her myself!"
He ushered the dusty stranger across the threshold and in through the thick outer wall of Haelithtorntowers with swift, florid gestures, almost sweeping him along the short, curving path to the nearest grand door of the mansion. The doorguard stared after them with an amazed whistle on his lips and wonderment in his mind.
He broke off whistling to remark, "I'll bet it would, I do indeed- and I'll bet yon stranger had best look sharp, or he'll never reach the Lady alive." His face darkened. "Whereupon my hide will be next, as old Elward knows I heard all of that, too. Wherefore I'd best confide in the Lady myself, and soon, too. Hmmm . . . what if she knows about all of these matters? What if he fronts for her in them? Oh, gods . . ."
The Lady Joysil Ambrur was in her retiring-room, reclining in a vast couch strewn with a waterfall of pillows. Her gown was of a rose-pink silk, her feet bare, and her hair unbound to spill and swirl across the pillows.
Tomes were piled all around her, some of them larger than the tops of her small, ornate side-tables. It was a wonder how her slender, languid limbs could lift them-but perhaps servants assisted with the larger ones. Some of them looked magical and dangerous.
One such was spread open on her lap as she looked up, more surprise than annoyance in her gaze. The servants knew she was not to be disturbed when . . .
Her steward bowed lower than she'd ever seen him do before and raised pleading eyes to her. "Ah, Lady, a very special guest has come to us in some urgency, with a private message for your ears alone! He says you know him well."
A shapely eyebrow arched, long fingers closed the book and set it aside, and a hand extended in a beckoning gesture.
"So bring him to us."
The steward bowed again, his manner fawning rather than its usual careful, slightly disdainful dignity, and turned to the door he'd entered by behind the hanging tapestry at the foot of the great couch.
Roldro Tattershar strode in wearing a grave expression. At the first sight of him the Lady Joysil said sharply, "Elward, you may withdraw. To the south pond, where the rainbow-fins are in need of feeding."
The steward nodded stiffly, face frozen impassively, and departed. The bard in dusty leathers waited, his hand raised to signal silence, and after a few breaths went quietly back to the door, opened it, and peered out. Elward was gone.
He returned, nodding in satisfaction, and the Lady Joysil rose to embrace him fondly and murmured, "What is it, Roldro? No good news, I can tell."
"Ammaratha, I've just come from Suzail, where I overheard two War Wizards talking about the retired Lord Vangerdahast's current work."
"Yes, he's crafting new spells at his sanctum-difficult magics, it would seem. Powerful ones, without a doubt. Binding spells to establish new guardians for Cormyr to replace the Lords Who Sleep, who were all destroyed. Some of his early ones had to do with finding and calming the guardians he intended to hunt for, I believe."
The Harper nodded. "Indeed. So much We Who Harp also believe. However, I doubt you've discovered just whom he intends to bind."
"I'll pay you what I did last time, Roldro, to learn this," the Lady Ambrur said calmly.
"That much coin will be quite acceptable."
The noblewoman looked at him sidelong. "Why are you backing away from me?"
"To give you room," the bard replied calmly.
Her eyes narrowed. "What do you mean?"
"Ammaratha, hear this: For his new guardians of the realm, Vangerdahast intends to bind-dragons."
"What?" The air shuddered with a furiously rising thunder, and Roldro Tattershar winced then scrambled back to the foot of the couch.
Silver blue scales flashed and shone, mighty wings spread and flapped heedless of the cracking, groaning ceiling, and the glare of those piercing turquoise eyes froze the cowering Harper where he crouched.
The great tail lashed, long legs sprang-and the ceiling was crashing and falling in huge chunks of plaster, riven wood, dust and tumbling stone all around Roldro. The room rocked, and its pretty oval skylight vanished forever into tinkling shards. A much larger window was left behind in its place: The entire top of the chamber gaped open to the misty Marsemban sky.
The song dragon was soaring up into the blueness above the city-stink and heading northward, flying fast and furiously.
Roldro stopped holding his breath, gasped for air-and promptly started coughing furiously. He was covered in thick dust and could hear faint shouts from below as guards and servants wondered aloud of the gods what had happened.
Ammaratha Cyndusk was already no more than a tiny, dwindling dot. Roldro struggled across the room, scooped up one of her jewel-coffers as the first installment of his payment, and started searching for the way into the secret passage he knew departed this room from the westernmost closet. Crooked stewards he could handle-but crooked stewards commanding a dozen or more furious and well-armed guards might well be another matter.
"May you find fair fortune, Ammaratha," he whispered, between coughs. "If I could turn into a dragon, I'd not go roaring openly down on Vangerdahast unless I was seeking my own swift death."
There was a decanter of wine on a shelf in the closet, and the last of the Tattershars decided to take it with him and banish his coughing the enjoyable way. The panel gave him some trouble, for the wall above it was buckled and sagging . . . but he got it closed behind him a good two hearty swigs before the furious pounding on the retiring-room door began.
"How dare he!" the song dragon roared into the wind of her own furious flight. "How dare he!"
She ducked one shoulder and turned a little westward without slowing, cleaving the air so fast that breathing was hard and her wings hummed and hissed in their
battle with the air.
"Such an insult to all dragonkind! Such colossal arrogance! Even if some wyrms submit willingly to ages-long slumber and eventual perilous service, the wizard's plan endangers us all! Once Vangerdahast has developed binding spells that work on dragons, anyone who steals them or acquires them after his passing can use them against any dragon!"
Her voice was ear-splitting, but the heedless skies made no reply. With a snarl of seething fury she ducked her head and beat her wings in earnest, darting furiously on toward the green vast-ness of the King's Forest.
On to the sanctum where the villain Vangerdahast was lurking.
Nineteen
DRAGONRAGE AND DECEPTION
Deceit and falsehood wound me more deeply than mere daggers- poisoned or not. Thy tolerance may, of course, differ.
Selemvarr of Pyarados, "The Old Red Wizard" My Century of Might and Folly: A Career In Robes of Red Year of the Gauntlet
Outside the kitchen there was a mighty crash, and someone screamed. The ground shook, setting the lanterns to swinging, and Myrmeen started for the window in a wary crouch, blade drawn.
Vangerdahast did not look up from his spell. "Not now" he snapped. "How am I ever goin-"
"Vangerdahast" the Lady Lord of Arabel snapped, "get over
here! There's a dragon digging out your sanctum like a dog hunting for bones!"
"Eh? A wyrm? Excellent! I can try my-"
"I doubt either of the two War Wizards it's just flung away over the trees would agree with that 'excellent' of yours," Myrmeen interrupted crisply. "And I doubt this sword of mine will do much more than amuse our unexpected guest! I've never seen this sort of dragon-silver blue, but with the shape of a copper wyrm. . . ."
Vangerdahast made a small sound of exasperated annoyance, abandoned his spell with a dismissive wave of his hands, and strode to the window.
"A song dragon! Well, now!" He rubbed his hands together. "I wonder how her human form strikes the eye?"
Myrmeen gave him a strange look at about the same time as the massive tail outside swung toward the window in a suddenly looming slap. The windows crashed in, riven spells bursting into crawling fingers of lightning that wrestled with the glass, splinters of frame, and dislodged stone blocks-then stabbed out in all directions. The Lady Lord shrieked as one bolt found her armor and writhed briefly up and down her, and Vangerdahast grunted as another made one of his rings burst apart without triggering its magics, almost casually flinging him across the room as it did so. The north end of the kitchen groaned as unseen pantries beyond it collapsed, the chambers beyond them dug open and flung apart.
"Wizard!" a great, roaring voice hammered at them. "Where are you, wizard?"
Vangerdahast's answer was three carefully enunciated words that called up the defenses of the sanctum.
The shields all around him flared 'white and flowed forward, in a gathering charge that flung the song dragon back across the glade. Helmed horrors came racing through the shattered trees like arrows, converging on the thrashing wyrm. A pale green radiance began to gather around Vangerdahast, leaking out of the empty air like so many humming sparks to settle around him, cloaking him in rising power.
"Lass," he growled, in obvious discomfort, "see yon stone? The one with the rune on it?"
Myrmeen looked up at him from where she lay sprawled and gasping on the floor, face white and hair scorched . . . then turned her head to look where he was pointing.
"Pluck it up, and drink all you need of the healing potions beneath," the former Royal Magician of Cormyr grunted, striding past her with green radiance surging and building around him. "For once have a little sense and crawl away somewhere to lie quiet and keep out of the way. In all that battle-steel, you're nothing but dragonbait: Yon wyrm breathes lightning-gas!"
The Lady Lord of Arabel stared after him . . . and with trembling hands, as she lay on the floor, tried to unbuckle and shake off her armor. Vangerdahast cast a glance back at her, shook his head in disgust, and flexed his hands.
Green radiances flashed, and all over the sanctum wands, rods, rings, and odd diadems and orbs flashed, quivered, and grew green haloes of their own.
Outside, the helmed horrors were hacking and stabbing at the rolling, tail-lashing dragon, unaffected by the cloud of gas that gouted from its jaws. Scaled claws snatched and flung them often, and from time to time tore one apart in a flare of white radiances, the pieces of armor tumbling separately to earth.
Vangerdahast calmly watched the song dragon writhe and roll its way through the forest, toppling trees in all directions. If it started working magic, he'd smite it with the whelmed power of the sanctum, but until then, as long as his horrors held out . . .
These guardians didn't last very long, anyway. The flight enchantments he gave them gnawed endlessly at the magics that animated and bound them together, so they were a loss he could bear. The imprisoned criminals who'd elected to be put into dreamsleep so their sentiences could be used for these horrors would have sudden awakenings and probably an unpleasant burst of nightmares, scaring their jailers and adding to the meal preparation burden in the few remote keeps of the realm that had been turned into jails . . . but they'd be there again when new horrors were needed.
The horrors were swarming like angry hornets around the coiling and rolling wyrm, smashed away in their dozens when it slashed out with wings or tail, only to dart right back in and jab, jab, and hack again. There came a brief shimmering in the heart of that fray, and Vangerdahast lifted a hand, eyes narrowing.
In the next instant, the dragon collapsed, that great sleek scaled body in the heart of the darting, armored cloud suddenly falling away to being . . . not there.
And a staggering, panting woman clad in a few tatters of rose-pink gown suddenly stood before the shattered windows, calling, "Vangerdahast? Wizard? Where are you? We must have words together!"
"I am here," Vangerdahast replied calmly, the green radiance rising up in front of him like a wall. "Had I known you were coming, I might have been more welcoming. As it is, I'd prefer that your next words to me be your name and your business. Unless, of course, you'd like them to be your last words."
The woman put a hand on the shattered window-frame and ducked gracefully to climb down into the kitchen. Her state of dress made her lack of weapons plain to any eye, but Myrmeen, still sprawled on the floor, laid down the potion vial she'd just emptied and reached for her blade again.
"My name, Lord Vangerdahast, is Ammaratha Cyndusk," the woman replied, stepping down onto the counter between two plate-racks in a catlike crouch. She was tall, well-built, and wise-eyed. "In human shape I dwell in Marsember, and folk there know me as Lady Joysil Ambrur."
'Ah, the lass who likes to know all secrets," the wizard replied, nodding. "And must now have learned this one of mine. Who told you, may I ask?"
"A Harper whose name you'll not learn from me-who told me a War Wizard spoke of it to another War Wizard. Before I throw my life away trying to end yours, I'd like to make sure I understand correctly: You're developing spells to hunt, lure, and control dragons, intending to accumulate a collection of dragons whom you'll bind-with other spells you're also working on-as sleeping defenders of Cormyr, in much the same way as the Lords Who Sleep formerly guarded the realm?"
"That is correct, yes."
"And you'll not be swayed from this scheme? Into using, say, willing War Wizards or Purple Dragons or other humans of Cormyr?"
"Human participation is likely, but I firmly intend to use dragons for most of the realm's defenders. Are you interested?"
The woman suddenly vanished from the countertop-and reappeared with her legs scissored around Vangerdahast's head. She twisted them sideways in an attempt to break his neck as her body arched over backwards down his front, and slapped both her arms out behind her to strike down his own and ruin any castings he might try.
"In your death, wizard!" she gasped as they crashed together, her back slamming into his ankles.
&n
bsp; Vangerdahast still stood upright, his neck unmoved, so she threw herself from side to side, whipping her legs back and forth-but she seemed to be pivoting on something rigid, immobile, and as hard as stone. Something shrouded in more brightly pulsing green radiance.
"Interesting view," the wizard managed to say, in the moments before Myrmeen Lhal crashed into Joysil, tore her free from Vangerdahast, and bore her to the kitchen floor.
They skidded along together as Vangerdahast frowned down at them both. "Lass, I can fight my own battles, thank you. See this field around me, this green glow? It both protects my neck and keeps this song dragon from regaining its real shape and crushing the both of us against the walls and floor. It should also prevent her from teleporting again, now that she's this close. Get clear, now. I want to talk to her."
Myrmeen gave him an 'are you sure?' look, and he nodded. She rose off Joysil, springing clear to keep from being tripped or having any of her daggers stripped from her, and Vangerdahast laid a hand on her arm and said gruffly, "Oh, and lass, thank you."
Myrmeen gave him another strange look and backed away to the sink.
"You might as well kill me," Joysil panted, from where she lay bruised and winded on the floor. "Unless you renounce this plan of yours-and I can somehow believe you-I'll just keep trying to slay you. No dragon in all Faerun is safe once those spells of yours work and are written down."
Vangerdahast nodded, and green radiance flowed from his fingers. In a room far away across the sanctum, two wands flickered and flashed. "I fear you'll now discover that you can't move, Lady Cyndusk-or Ambrur, if you prefer. I'd rather not be slain, thank you very much . . . and yet there's truth in what you say. These spells shall be my legacy to Cormyr. Others must be able to cast them after I am gone to augment the ranks of defenders or replace those fallen in battle. Some wizards may well use them less . . . judiciously than I shall. So, yes, I am a danger to dragonkind."