exploded out of the pyre, trailing flames down into the inner courtyards: the wand.
The guards exchanged fearful looks, licked dry lips, and started to back away in fear. They had managed two strides before the stones beneath their feet rippled like waves on a beach and started to slump and fall.
They fell into oblivion with the gathering roar of Glymril Gard collapsing ringing in their ears.
As the moon saw that great fortress crash back down into the tumbled ruin it had been before Glymril's spells had rebuilt it, a bright and triumphant mist danced over the rising dust and fading screams, its chimes mixed with cold, echoing laughter.
The court mage looked at the guard captain's grim face and sighed. 'Who was it this time?'
'Anlavas Jhoavryn, Lord Elminster: a merchant from somewhere south across the sea. Brass work, sundries, nothing important, but a lot of it. Many coins here over many seasons. His throat was cut.'
Elminster sighed. 'Maethor or one of the new barons?'
'L-lord, I know not, and hardly dare s…'
'Your
The guard captain glanced nervously from side to side, El smiled crookedly and leaned over to put his ear right to the man's lips. 'Limmator,' the officer breathed hoarsely, El nodded and stepped back. No particular surprise if Rhoagalow was right, Limmator was the only baron…or lordling…in Galadorna busier in dark corners with bribe, threat, and ready knife than Maethor of the Many Whispers.
'Go and dine now,' he told the exhausted guard officer. 'We'll talk later.'
Rhoagalow and his three armsmen hurried out, El took care not to sigh until the antechamber was quite empty.
He murmured something and moved two fingers a trifle. There was a faint thump behind one wall, as the spy there abruptly went to sleep. El gave the section of wall a mirthless smile and used the secret door he wanted to keep secret a little longer, taking the lightless passage beyond to one of the disused and dusty hidden rooms in the House of the Unicorn. A little time alone to think is a rare treasure some folk never seize for themselves … and others, the truly deprived in life, cannot.
Three barons had died so far this year, one of them with a dagger in his throat not two steps from entering the throne chamber, and six…no, seven…lesser lords. Galadorna had become a nest of vipers, striking at each other with their fangs bared whenever the whim took them, and the court mage was not a happy man. He had no friends, anyone he befriended soon ended up staring sightlessly at a ceiling of a morning. There were whisperings behind every door in the palace and never any true smiles when those doors opened. El was even getting used to the sight of dark ribbons of blood wandering out from behind closed doors, perhaps he should Issue a decree commanding all doors in Nethrar be taken down and burned.
Hah to that. He was becoming what he knew they called him behind his back: 'the Flapping Mouth That Spews Decrees.' The barons and lordlings constantly tried to undercut royal authority, or even steal openly from the court, and his Lady Master was no help at all, using her spells too seldom to engender any fear that might in turn breed obedience.
There came a faint scratching sound from off to his left. Elminster pulled on the right knob and a panel slid open. Two young guardsmen peered into the dimness. 'You sent for us, Lord Elminster?'
'Ye found the scrolls, Delver, and…?'
'Burned, and the ashes in the moat, lord, as you ordered, mixed with the dust you gave me. I used all of it'
Elminster nodded and reached out a hand to touch a forehead. 'Forget all, loyal warrior,' he said, 'and so escape the doom we all fear.'
The guard he'd touched shivered, eyes blank, then turned and hurried back into the darkness, unlacing his breeches as he went. He'd been heading for his quarters when the sudden, urgent need to use a garderobe had come upon him, and led him into the disused wing of the palace.
'Ingrath?' the court mage asked calmly.
'I found the Q…ah, Aerwork in the Redshield Chamber and mixed in the white powder until I could see it no more. Then I said the words and got out,'
El nodded and reached out his hand. 'Ye arid Delver are earning such handsome rewards….' he murmured.
The guardsman chuckled. 'Not the need to go to the jakes, please, lord. Let it be wandering trying to recall my youthful dalliances down here, eh?'
El smiled. 'As ye wish,' he said, as his fingers touched flesh. Ingrath's eyes flickered, and the forgetful warrior stepped around the still and silent mage, walked in a thoughtful circle around the room, found the panel, and trotted away again, his part in slowing Dasumia's evil forgotten once more. Which might just keep him alive another month or two.
Twould be safer if the two weren't friends and knew nothing of each other…but it had happened that the best warriors El could trust, after subtle but thorough mind-scrying, were fast friends. That should be no surprise, he supposed.
El paced the gloomy room, his mood dark enough to match it. Mystra's command to serve had been clear, but 'serve in his own way' had always been Elminster's failing, if it was a flaw that was to doom him now, then let it be so. Some things a man must cling to, to remain a man.
Or a woman cleave to, to be herself… and there was certainly one lady in Galadorna doing just as she pleased. Queen Dasumia always seemed to be laughing at him these days and certainly cared nothing for the duties of being queen, she was seldom to be found on the throne or even in the royal castle, leaving El to issue decrees in her stead. Galadorna could sink into war and thievery without her noticing … and daily, as more slavers and unscrupulous merchants rushed in, knowing they'd be left more or less unrestricted in their dealings, the Lords of Laothkund were casting covetous eyes on the increasingly wealthy kingdom. One thing lawlessness among merchants does bring is full tax coffers.
El sighed again. The important thing was to make sure that with all this gold, lawlessness did not spread to the crown. Sweet Mystra forfend. Whatever would it be like to live in a land ruled by merchants?
Everyone ignored the splintering and crashing sounds of a table collapsing under two cursing men slugging each other and the shivering and tinkling sounds of breaking glass that followed as various nearby drinkers hurled bottles at the combatants, seeking to alter the odds of wagers just placed. Someone screamed from another room…a death cry that ended in a horrible, wet gurgle, and was answered by drunken applause. It was late, after all, and this was the Goblet of Shadows.
Nethrar had known wilder taverns in its time, but the days of golem dancers who ate their fees to enrich Ilgrist were gone, and the dens they'd done more than dance in were gone with them. The Goblet, however, was very much here…and those too afraid to brave its pleasures alone could always hire a trio of surly-looking warriors to guard them and make them…at least in their own eyes…seem a veteran member of a band of adventurers on dangerous business bent.
And there were the ladies. One such, a vision in blue silk and mock armor whose loops of chain and curves of leather did more to display than conceal, had just perched on the edge of a table not far from where Beldrune and Tabarast were nursing glasses of ruby-hued but raw heartsfire and grumbling, 'Well aged? Six days, belike!' to each other.
Over their glasses, Beldrune and Tabarast watched the saucy beauty in the silks bending low over two young men at the table she'd chosen, giving them a view of the sort that older, more sober men have fallen headlong into before now. The two wizards cleared their throats in unison.
' 'Tis getting a might hot in here,' Tabarast observed weakly, tugging at his collar.
'Over that side of the table, too?' Beldrune grunted, his eyes locked on the lady in blue. He flicked a finger, and through the din of chatter and laughter, singing and breaking glass, the two mages could suddenly hear a voice purring, as if it was speaking right in their ears: 'Delver? Ingrath? Those names are … exciting. The names of daring men … of heroes. You
The two young warriors chuckled and said something more or less in unison, and the saucy beauty in blue whispered, 'How daring are you both feeling this night? And … how heroic?'
The two men laughed again, rather warily, and the beauty murmured, 'Heroic enough to do a service for your queen? A…
They saw her reach into her bodice and draw forth a long, heavy chain of linked gold coins that caught and
