[pain]
Tears running down the sky from the dark, watchful eyes of the Lady of Mysteries, on a night before her powers failed, and she could only behold what befell as magic failed, all across Faerun….
The day was warm and bright-but all was decidedly not well in the Realms.
In Chessenta, the Sceptanar screamed in rage as three of his high wizards battled to control the wild transformations their Art had brought to certain ladies of the court. It was the Sceptanar's wont to have noble consorts altered by magic, to tint their skins with exotic hues, enhance their height and features, and give them something different- scales, or serpentine tails, claws, or even gossamer wings. This morn, the spells had gone horribly wrong. They brought on changes, yes-changes that continued, faster and faster, altering the ladies into monstrous things that screamed, bellowed, or burbled at the pain and stress of their shifting. The Sceptanar's most powerful high wizards scurried and cast spells and puzzled, hurling all they could find. No magic could stop these fell transformations.
Moreover, rumors of the gods walking the Realms grew ever more detailed with the passing days. The Sceptanar was beginning to grow very afraid indeed.
'Lady?' Taern's voice was rough with concern, and he half-rose from his stool under the lamp.
In the pool where Alustriel bathed, amid the spell glows and scented oils applied by deft servants, she had stiffened and gasped. She sat bolt upright, ripples racing away across the waters. She clutched at her head as if something had caught fire within.
'Lady Taern almost shouted. 'Are you well?' Alustriel raised a hand to stay his cry, and then asked, 'Taern, did any memories come into your mind just now? Of the two of us, perhaps, on the night when the Art seemed to fail?'
Taern shook his head, his eyes large and dark. 'The night I felt Mystra's power within you?' he whispered, heedless of the listening servants and the little murmur of wordless excitement that spread from them. I’ll never forget that night, Lady. Yet I tell you truth: It comes to me now, as you speak of it, but nothing until then. I was thinking of nothing but the ledgers and coins we'd been discussing.'
'Nothing of Azuth, or the Magister, or far Chessenta?' Taern shook his head. 'No, Lady,' he said in a low, wondering voice. “Why would I?'
'Aye,' the lady wizard echoed, sinking back into the pool until the rippling waters lapped at her magnificent throat. 'Why would I?'
***
[images spinning on, in the blood-red gloom of Hell]
In Aglarond, the Simbul forbade the use of magic against Thayan raiders, telling her men to trust instead in their swords. When the Red Wizards leading the strike against Aglarond tried to hurl lightning against the Simbul's men, their spells instead brought forth falls of flowers, crystal spheres, and mud. In the end, a Red Wizard sought escape by giving the raiders' stolen boat the power of flight, but his Art instead turned it to old and crumbling cheese, and it fell apart beneath them. They sank into the cold waters of the Sea of Dhurg. Only a handful emerged to the embrace of the Simbul's spell chains.
In Silverymoon, a simple spell to light the recesses of a dark cellar brought down the tower above it. The astonished caster was High Lady Alustriel, herself.
In Waterdeep, an apprentice's prank involving a dog charmed to fetch and carry pretty passing girls in to meet the lonely caster went wrong. Everyone the dog touched was transformed into another creature-serpent or rooster or centipede, When one became a hissing wyvern, the dog fled in terror. Nearby mages, alerted to the clanger, cast spells to slay the monster. The enchantments instead brought down a rain of fire from the sky, turned gray stone buildings pink and translucent (mightily pleasing the owner of one, for it was a high-class brothel), and caused the street to be riddled with holes. The wyvern escaped, flying to the top of Mount Waterdeep. There, Khelben Blackstaffs spells restored it to its former shape: that of a terrified noble lady. Even his Art, though, twisted awry. Instead of clothes, the hysterical lady was covered with feathers of a vivid blue.
In Calimport, two female slaves with barbed whips dueled to the death for the amusement of their cruel sultan owners-and to settle a bet. Both weakened, panting and staggering, sweat beading their oiled bodies like clusters of gems. A watching wizard decided to aid his master's slave with a secretive spell. His furtive Art, designed to make her a shade faster, instead transformed her into a raging red dragon. In a trice, she devoured or smashed flat the sultans, the unfortunate wizard, and many of their servants. She then beckoned the other slave onto her back, and they flew away, northeast, toward the Marching Mountains.
All across the Realms, magic was going wild. Even in the High Dale, amid the chaos of weakening magic, fateful changes came. Perhaps the gods willed it, perhaps it was the deliberate work of Mystra… or perhaps it was mere chance. Heladar Longspear never had time to find out.
[pain; gasping, helpless, twisting servant to the pain]
A dark head, glaring…
A dark, floating sphere amid racing shadows…
Shadows falling away before torchlight, and old stone vaulting, and a room that had need of neither…
Khelben sighed and sat back from the crystal ball. It was three times the size of his head, glossy-smooth, and as dark and lifeless as death. There came an answering, feminine sigh.
Around them, the dome of the spell chamber winked and sparkled with stars-as it always did, no matter what the time of day or weather outside Blackstaff Tower.
He shook his head slowly, staring again at the empty crystal ball. 'Nothing.'
Laeral laid a comforting hand on his shoulder. 'Easy, my lord. The fault is not yours. Magic seems to have gone rogue everywhere in the Realms.'
Khelben Arunsun rose to pace the chamber. 'It's not that, love. My Art held, I believe. I reached Lhaeo, the Old Mage's scribe, but Lhaeo knows not where Elminster may be.'
Khelben shrugged. 'He suspects-hopes-that a lady: ranger of the Knights of Myth Drannor accompanies the Old Mage: one Sharantyr. Her I cannot reach, and in truth I barely remember her. We've met only a time or two, and always with many others in her company, whom I know much better.'
Laeral glided up behind him and stroked his shoulders. 'I expected no better result than this, and I'll be very surprised if you tell me in truth that you did. We can only keep trying and hope.'
She gravely studied the man who was her lord, love, and master. 'You are troubled more deeply, Lord-there is something more. I would know it, if you will.'
Khelben turned and took her in his arms, unsmiling. Behind him, a star fell across the dark, unending void of the chamber. 'I have tried to reach Azuth and the Lady, both. I have felt them. They are here, in the Realms, with us. Azuth's power bums but dimly, a mere glow where once there was a fire, and I cannot reach him. His Art has waned as he uses it; he is helping lesser beings as he always has-and will do so, I fear, until he is but a whisper and a memory.'
Laeral turned her dark, beautiful eyes up to his. 'Yet that is not what really troubles you. Is it the Lady?'
