hard into the wall.
The umber hulk reached for him again, roaring-and Whisper plucked something dark and tiny from his belt and threw it down the monster’s open mouth, throwing himself to one side.
The umber hulk exploded, spraying the reeling chuul with razor-sharp shards of brown body plates that tore it open in a dozen places, and snatching the ettin off its feet with the force of the explosion.
The ettin slammed into the floor, slid along stone twisting and roaring in pain, and when it skidded to a stop, staggered to its feet again and lurched forward.
By then the Swords were past it, trotting up the stairs with their weapons ready.
Whisper was on his feet, leaning on the wall and glaring at them.
Islif ran right at him, Pennae and a pale-faced Florin not far behind. The Zhentarim raised a bleeding hand to work a spell.
Snarling, Islif flung herself at him, waving her sword wildly, hoping to ruin his casting.
She landed just out of sword-reach, and threw herself forward again, her blade slashing viciously. Whisper’s body flickered, vanished-and even as she cursed and hacked the empty air where he’d been, reappeared just a stride away.
He saw her and started to scream. Her first slash was at his mouth, to spoil any spell.
Then Pennae arrived, driving home a dagger hilt-deep under the mage’s ribs, and following it with another into his throat.
Jhessail joined in the butchering, and the wizard reeled and slumped, fountaining blood in many places, to bounce once and lie still, his blood a pool of swift-spreading crimson around him.
Islif promptly sprang back across it to greet the ettin, Doust and Semoor whirling around with curses and ready maces to stand with her.
Frantic in their fear, the Swords swarmed the foul-smelling beast, thrusting, hacking, and clubbing it from all sides. It soon toppled like a felled tree, crashing down atop Whisper.
Who, forever staring, moved not a finger.
In Maglor’s dusty back room, far away in Eveningstar, a gasping, bleeding man staggered to a bench, clung to it long enough to catch his breath, snatched a dusty cloth off Maglor’s scrying orb, and passed his hand over it.
It awakened with a soft and silent glow, warming his face even as a scene from afar spun into sharp coherence in its depths.
Still breathing raggedly, Whisper the mage watched Maglor reel as blades struck ruthlessly home. He saw the screaming apothecary die in his place-and whispered fervent thanks to Bane and Mystra both for the long-prepared spell that switched his body with that of Maglor, and the even older spell that gave Maglor the face and appearance of Whisper.
As the Swords killed the ettin in the depths of the orb, Whisper turned his back on it and stumbled away, feeling sick and afraid. It was the first time he’d been truly frightened in… yes, years.
Pale, eerie radiance flared, banishing the gloom of the cold, dark tomb, as Old Ghost reared up, his eyes blazing in fury.
“ Now you go too far,” it whispered to the silence. “Maglor was a worm, yes, but he was my worm, his life mine to spend at a time and place of my choosing. Whisper, your life is forfeit.”
The wraith stormed out of the tomb, chill fire moving with swift purpose.
The war wizard finished casting, let his hands fall to his sides, and sighed.
With a much softer sigh, a glowing doorway appeared in the empty air before him.
“That’s where they went,” he said. “Now I really must get back to the lady lord’s side. By now, she could be halfway across-”
“Hold!” Dauntless was every whit as furious as he looked. His words snapped as fiercely as crossbow. “Is it safe to pass through?”
The mage shrugged. “Anything could await on t’other side-a dozen blades ready to stab, for instance. Yet unless the one who crafted yon portal commands magic so strong that the portal-enchantments can subvert my probing spells-unlikely, but by no means impossible-the portal itself is safe to traverse, yes.”
Dauntless snapped names and orders over his shoulder, mustering particular Dragons by name to step through the waiting door, and ended rather ungraciously, “And Swordcaptain Draeth, I suppose.”
Draeth swallowed. “Uh… hadn’t we best clear this with Lady Lord Myrmeen Lhal?”
Dauntless spun around, his roar almost blasting the swordcaptain off his boots as he said “ Hang Myrmeen, and her orders, too!”
“Ho, now! I think not, Lionar Dahauntul,” a crisp voice said out of the darkness along the warehouse wall.
Dauntless peered, not seeing who’d spoken. “Who speaks? And I’m an ornrion, not a lionar.”
“Disobeying superior officers, and speaking of bringing about their deaths, are offenses that may yet earn you more than a simple demotion, Lionar Dahauntul,” the voice replied coldly.
Its owner strode forward into the lanternlight, and there were hoarse gasps and muttered oaths as the gathered Dragons recognized the king’s cousin, Baron Thomdor, Warden of the Eastern Marches.
All of the watch went to their knees, Dauntless among them, sputtering, “Pray pardon, Lord! I must confess I-”
“Save it,” Thomdor told him, “and tell me this: who went through that, and why d’you want to follow them?”
“Adventurers,” Dauntless explained. “Chartered, but well on the way to becoming wildsword nuisances. Some here are saying they set this warehouse afire-but ’tis certain they fled through this magical way, to some unknown Zhent stronghold, in the company of known Zhentarim agents who’ve murdered more than a few Dragons this night. I’ll be aft-that is, I want to pursue them with all the force I can muster, war wizards and all, and scour out the Zhents on the far end of yon portal, once and for all.”
“No,” Baron Thomdor said. “We’ll let these Swords of Eveningstar handle things. That’s what Crown adventurers’ charters are for. ”
“If he were trying to trick us,” Pennae replied, “d’you think he’d try to do it with potions he’d so cleverly hidden away?”
“Keen thought,” Doust said, taking one of the vials she was passing out.
Jhessail peered at hers. “What’s this shining-sun mark?”
“A symbol for healing,” the thief replied, watching Florin flick away the cork she’d loosened for him, and proceed to swallow the contents of his vial.
“It’s working,” he husked, holding out his hand for another.
Pennae grinned and slapped another vial into the forester’s palm. “Good. Drink deep. Whisper seems to have stored his spellbooks and suchlike somewhere else-and the prospect of stumbling through his vile traps trying to find all of his other hidden magic is not one that leaves me especially eager.”
Florin swallowed, sighed gustily, and leaned back against the wall, looking much better as pain drained from his face. He held up his no-longer-broken arm, wiggling his fingers gingerly.
The Swords were cautiously plundering Whisper’s lair of what scant riches they could find and magic they dared touch. A room away, two glowing portals waited.
Not knowing where either led had touched off a halting debate regarding what they should do next.
Penny grinned. “I walked around rather more streets in Arabel than the rest of you-”
“Yes,” Semoor interrupted, “and bedchambers, shop stockrooms, and back pantries, too, I daresay!”
There was a ripple of laughter, in which Pennae joined, ere she gave him a rude gesture and continued, “-and saw the same royal proclamation posted in five places: a screed promising the title of ‘Baron of the Stonelands,’ with a fortune and an army to go with it, to anyone who builds a castle in the Stonelands and holds it for two straight years, cleansing it of a certain count of brigands and beasts-the beasts’ heads to be proofs of this.”
Islif snorted. “Godhood, too?”
Everyone laughed.
“ Next month, hey?” Semoor commented. “After we’re whole and hearty again, and the priests back at the House of the Morning have granted me my god-name and told me what a great champion of the faith I am.”
Giving Semoor a hard look, Pennae waved at the single small coffer of Whisper’s coins they’d found. “And just how much coin out of this are you going to have to give them to get them to do that?”
