bald human with a long black beard and mustache. This visage was what Bane allowed his worshipers to see when the god felt the need for direct contact with creatures on the Prime Material Plane.
'Well?' the god-voice boomed.
The deity's glare was too much for even the diamondlike surface of the elemental. The creature burst into a billion shards. The fragments that hurled toward the god were pulverized into harmless soot. The rocky projectiles hitting the fiend ripped its flesh to shreds and sent the creature to the floor, writhing in pain, despite the protective energies that still wrapped around it.
'That's much better, my dear drooling son. I do so much like communicating with you directly. Let me tell you what has happened with my plan so far.' The face softened. The pit fiend was instantly drawn in awe and adoration to the god's every word.
'All the cities of the Moonsea that I wished for my own, except yours, have been collected. They were ripped from the earth and are now in the plane of Limbo. While a few cities are still trying to resist me, their pools of darkness are transforming the human souls into my minions. In a few months, I will be able to put these cities back in their places around the Moonsea and my worshipers will fill the land to overflowing, thus increasing my power in Faerun.
'Listen!' shrieked the god. With that, the many layers of magical defenses around the fiend vanished, all except the blue spheres of protection.
'You poor excuse for an imp!' Bane's voice was ear-splitting. Now the blue spheres burst with a stone- shattering boom. Not only was the tower rocked, but the land around the massive structure reeled with the anger of the god.
'Do you want to tell me why Phlan isn't where it should be?' Each word of the god blasted the fiend harder and harder into the floor. The very stones under and around the creature sank and molded themselves to the monster's body. Its massive frame started to melt from the energy it was absorbing.
'Master! Please! Mute your righteous wrath before I perish and am unable to do your will!
The god smiled and reduced his power to a fraction of what it had been. The fiend still squirmed.
Bane's light was completely blinding. Crusty layers of flesh peeled off the arms of the fiend. It wrapped its body in its wings, which blocked the searing heat temporarily, although soon the wings would be burned husks embracing a skeletal frame.
'Aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh!' The voice of the pit fiend finally convinced Bane to convert the burning light to a cool radiance. The forces blasting the creature to the floor changed, picked the fiend up, and healed it completely. Huge chunks of black rock fell from the flesh of the fiend and crashed with loud echoes to the floor. The fiend gasped as it spit out its explanation.
'I purposely shifted Phlan to a huge cavern below this tower, using the power of the pool of darkness to transport it. It will now be easier, for you in all your greatness, to shift it back again when all the souls have been pulled from Phlan. All this was done only for you, noble master. All was done to make you more powerful here in Faerun. I know what great effort you expended to pull the other cities away. Was I wrong, most noble of gods?
'No, my loyal toadling. I don't know yet what you intend, but the souls of Phlan must be mine at the precise moment when I gather those from all the other cities. So hurry up with your plans. Summon me again when our work is accomplished, Tanetal.'
With that, the light vanished and the god was gone. The fiend groaned in relief with the disappearance of the intense pressure on its body and mind. Whatever happened, Phlan would have to surrender its human souls to the pool of darkness, or bits of the fiend would certainly be scattered over this chamber, like bits of the elemental it had summoned.
The fiend wasn't the only creature present in the mage's tower. In other parts of the fortress, equally evil activities were underway.
'Fiends,' the Red Wizard said imperiously, 'arise. I have a mission for you.'
Three abishai, one black, one green, and one red, flapped down from their golden alcoves in Marcus's throne room and shuffled over to the wizard. If it were possible to read the expressions on the faces of the ghastly creatures, it would be obvious they didn't like taking orders from a mere human.
Of the many types of fiends, abishai were among the lowliest. Their distant cousin, the pit fiend, was the most powerful of their kin. The abishai's bodies showed disgusting similarities to their more powerful relatives.
Like pit fiends, abishai looked much like hideous gargoyles. Thin and reptilian, they possessed long, prehensile tails and great bat wings. Standing seven feet tall, their true heights were deceptive due to their crouching, bobbing gaits. These monsters were powerful, much stronger than goblinkin, and about as intelligent as an average human. And each abishai was more than a match for even the most powerful of wizards. A man wiser than the Red Wizard might have had the sense to be fearful.
'My pit fiend has given you three to me to use as I wish. You will guard my tower night and day. Fly out from the tower three hundred miles and circle the entire area. Kill anyone or anything that might cause me trouble.'
The three fiends grumbled in irritation.
'None of this!' the wizard shouted, waving his ringed hand. 'I, Marcus, have power over you. Now go!'
The abishai flew across the room and out of the chamber. As they went, each vowed silently to serve the pit fiend Tanetal for a thousand years, but only if they were allowed to dismember the wizard and rip out his organs one by one, keeping the insolent spellcaster alive during the fun.
No, the red abishai thought, I must offer to serve Tanetal for five thousand years. It was the most intelligent and powerful of the three, and it knew that such a plan might successfully exclude its lesser brethren from the delight of torturing the Red Wizard.
Unaware of the hidden feelings of the abishai, Marcus gloated as he sat on his throne. Invisible among the Red Wizards of Thay, he'd been of their lowest rank and was paid no attention by other wizards in the sect. Marcus's only claim to fame was a smidgeon of power granted to him after he became a follower of Bane. From that day on, his star had been on the rise. And a dark star it was.
A high priest of Bane had given Marcus the means to summon the pit fiend to Toril's plane of existence, as well as the name of Tanetal. This evil priest had also told Marcus of Bane's plan to take over the cities of the Moonsea and fill them with possessed humans who would worship Bane and make the deity the most powerful god in Faerun.
When Marcus summoned Tanetal, he was startled but overjoyed by the massive power of the pit fiend. The creature's mere touch had given the wizard awesome mystical abilities. And in a snap the fiend had summoned the lesser fiends, the abishai, to serve Marcus in any way the Red Wizard desired.
'Oh, that was a glorious day when Tanetal became my servant. We raised this tower and later we stole the entire city of Phlan. All I must do now is conquer the city with the mystical minions I command, and all will be pleasing to Bane. I will be granted powers beyond those of mere mortals. What more could one wizard ask?' Marcus hissed and seethed in distorted ecstasy.
Over the next hour, Marcus gave instructions to clerics of Bane and then to the commanders of the mercenary armies. Phlan would fall-of that he had no doubt-and all would be perfect. True, the city had resisted the first attack of Marcus's army. The residents were surprisingly well prepared for battle, and powerful wizards lurked within the city, including one female who cast the most damnable violet lightning bolts. But they would fall; they would be defeated.
Marcus smiled as he thought of the day that the people of Phlan would be submerged into the pool of darkness under the red tower. The evil wizard and his pit fiend would absorb a fair share of the power from those souls, and Bane would never notice the energy missing from his pool. The fiend had been explicit and had carefully described this part of the plan. Bane would get eight out of ten souls, and the rest would be enough to make Marcus a demigod. The very thought of this made the Red Wizard quiver.
Now the mage cleared his throne room. All the orders had been given, and his war plans would proceed perfectly. Marcus's gray, stormy eyes scanned his golden domain. He had worked hard to tastefully decorate the walls, floors, and ceilings of his rooms in red gold. He didn't realize that he was the only creature who found them
