The Temptation of Elminster

He sighed and stood up as the last of the screams died away, watching the bobbing heads of those who'd lived to flee grow smaller as they ran across the fields. He'd best be running, too, before some bloodthirsty idiot rallied them or the folk here who were only stunned and twitching recovered enough to seek revenge.

The smell of cooked flesh was strong, bodies were heaped on all sides. Tenthar gagged, then broke into a trot. He never even saw the pike hurled at him from the balcony, it fell well short and struck, quivering, in the dirt.

A blackened body rose from among the dead and tugged it free. 'The thing I hate most about these little games,' it remarked to the empty air, 'is the cost. How many lives will be snuffed out before it's over, this time?'

Another blackened thing rose, shrugged, touched the pike, and said sadly, 'There's always a price … all our power, and we can't change that.'

There were two shimmerings in the air…and the two blackened bodies were gone. The pike winked out of sight an instant later.

'Are there archmages under every stone out yonder? Or just what bloody dancing gods were those? the guard who'd thrown the pike barked, more fear than anger in his tones.

'Mystra and Azuth,' the priest beside him whispered. The guards turned to look at Kadeln…and gasped in amazement. The missing pike had just appeared in the priest's shuddering hands. He stared at them, eyes full of wonder, and moaned, 'Mystra and Azuth, they were. Standing right there, with the symbols they've granted us to know them by glowing above their heads…right there?

He tried to point out into the litter of bodies, but decided to faint instead. He did it very well, eyes rolling up and body folding down. One of the guards caught him out of force of habit, and the other snatched hold of the pike.

If gods were going to come calling, he didn't want to be standing there unarmed.

'Mystra is dead!' the Darklady declared exultantly. 'Her priests find their spells to be but flickering things, and mages study and find no power behind their words. Magic is now ours alone to command…ours to control!'

The purple flames that raged in the brazier before her cast strange lights on her face as she raised eyes that were very large and dark to gaze at them all. Around the flames sat her eager audience: the six priests of the Dark Lady who'd agreed to work as wizards, harnessing for their spells the power of what had already become known in the temple as the Secret in the Sphere. With them she could make the House of Holy Night the mightiest temple of Shar in all Faerun…and the faith of the Nightbringer the most powerful in all Toril. It might not even take long.

'Most loyal Dreadspells,' the high priestess told them, 'you have a great opportunity to win the favor of Shar, and power for yourselves. Go forth into Faerun and seek out the most capable mages and the largest holds of magic. Slay at will, and seize all you can. Bring back tomes, rare things, and anything that bears the tiniest glow of magic. You must slay any of those servants of Mystra called the Chosen if you meet with them. We here shall work most diligently with our spells to try to find them for you.'

'Your Darkness?' one of the wizards asked hesitantly.

'Yes, Dread Brother Elryn?' Darklady Avroana's voice was silken, a clear warning to all that anyone who dared to interrupt her had better have a very good reason for doing so…or she'd soon give them one.

'My work involves farscrying our agents in Westgate,' Elryn said quickly, 'and rumor now abroad in that city speaks of many recent sightings of a Chosen in the vicinity of Starmantle … something about going into a 'Dead Place'…'

“I, too, have heard such tidings,' the Darklady agreed eagerly. 'My thanks for giving us a location, Elryn. All of you shall go there immediately…and there begin your holy task. Thrust your hands into the flames…oh, and most loyal Dreadspells, bear in mind that we can see and hear you always.'

Six faces paled…and six hands were reluctantly extended into the flames. Darklady Avroana laughed delightedly at their fear and let them burn for a few moments ere she said the words that teleported them all elsewhere.

It was very peaceful in the woods around the shrine…and, since the killings had begun and fear had driven folks away, very quiet.

Most days Uldus Blackram was alone on his knees before the stone block, halfheartedly lashing himself a few times…gently, so as not to make much noise…and whispering prayers to the Nightsinger.

The shrine had been founded so nicely, consecrated with blood and a wild ritual that still made Uldus blush to remember it. Now there were no black-robed ladies to dance and whirl barefoot around the horned block and no one to lead him in the half-remembered prayers … so he did a lot of just thanking Shar for keeping him alive on his stealthy visits to the woods. He hoped she'd forgive him for not coming at night anymore.

'May your darkness keep me safe from the Slayer,' Uldus breathed, his lips almost touching the dark stone. 'May you guide me to power and exultation over mine enemies, and make of me a strong sword to cut where you need things cut, and slash where it is your will to slash. Oh, most holy Mistress of the Night, hear my prayer, the beseeching of your most loyal servant, Uldus Blackram. Shar, hear my prayer. Shar, answer my prayer. Shar, heed m…'

'Done, Uldus,' said a voice from above him, crisply.

Uldus Blackram managed to strike his head on the altar, somersault over backward to get a good four paces away, and get to his feet all in one blurred flurry of movement.

When he froze, half turned to flee and panting hard, he was looking back at six bald-headed men in black and purple robes, standing in a semicircle around the altar facing him, with faint amusement on their faces.

'Lords of the Lady?' Uldus gasped. 'Have my prayers been answered at last?'

'Uldus,' the oldest of them said pleasantly, stepping forward, 'they have. At last. Moreover, a fitting reward has been chosen for you. You're going to guide us into the Dead Place!'

'P-praise Shar!' Uldus replied, rolling his eyes wildly upward as he toppled to the turf in a dead faint.

'Revive him,' Elryn commanded, not bothering to keep the contempt from his face or voice. 'To think that such as this worship the Most Holy Lady of Loss.'

'Well,' one of the other wizards commented, bending over the fallen Uldus, 'we all have to start somewhere.'

The glowing spellsphere orbited the throne at an almost lazy pace. Saeraede gave it only casual attention, absorbed as she was in sending images of her peering self out into the trees to lure this bold Elminster back to her castle.

Aye, let us gently tease this fittingly powerful and somewhat attractive mage hence.

Yet the news was clear enough, from all the mages she covertly farscried. Word of the death of Mystra was spreading like wildfire, spells were going wild all over Faerun, mages were shutting themselves up in towers before grudge-holding commoners could get to them… or tarrying too long, and getting caught on the ends of pitchforks in a dozen realms, and on and on.

It was time to move at last and make Saeraede Lyonora once more a name to be feared!

Abruptly something tore through one of her images. Saeraede sat up with a frown, and peered, trying to find out what it had been. The spellsphere abruptly lost its scene of city spires and flapping griffon wings beneath armored riders and acquired the dappled gloom of the forest above her. A forest that held a crouching Elminster, several of her floating faces, and…

Arrows snarled through her conjured visage and the dead leaves beyond, to thud into the forest loam and send Elminster scrambling around the other side of a tree.

Arrows?

'Damned adventurers!' she roared, her cry ringing back to her off the cavern roof, and sprang up from the throne. The spellsphere winked out as it fell, the radiance around the stone seat faded…but she was already whirling up the shaft, her eyes spitting flames of mage-fire. Were a bunch of blundering sword swingers going to shatter her long-nursed plans now?

The fittingly powerful and somewhat attractive Elminster boldly dodged another arrow, hurling himself on his face in wet moss and dead leaves as another dark shaft whined past his ear like an angry hornet and fetched up in the trunk of a nearby hiexel with a very solid thunk.

El scrambled up, drawing breath for a curse, and flung himself right back down on his face again. A second