into the room, stepped aside, and handed in an unfamiliar woman as if she outranked him. She was tall and muscular, her hair a long fall of silver-not silver as old folk go silver, but the shining silver of polished metal-and she wore green leathers, with the crescent moon badge of the Harpers at belt buckle and throat.
Baron Thomdor gave Dauntless a smile. “Well met this day, Ornrion Dahauntul. Be also well met with Dove Silverhand, of the Harpers.”
Dove inclined her head in greeting. “Myrmeen, Dauntless: you share no failure. The fugitives you’ve been chasing have just been knighted by Queen Filfaeril, and are riding in triumph into Suzail right now.”
Two jaws dropped in unison. Almost tenderly, Dove added, “When they pass through Arabel again, in a tenday or so, ’twould be best if they were made welcome, not hounded or imprisoned.”
Stunned disbelief was clear on the newly restored ornrion’s face. “And-and how can you know this?” he sputtered. “Forgive me, Lady, but words are easily said-yet more slowly trusted. Why, I’ve never even seen you before!”
“Ah, but you have, gallant Dauntless. That night at the Leaping Hart, when you danced on the tables, remember? And loudly admired the behind of a certain lass?” Dove turned and struck a pose. “Have your fingers forgotten this backside so swiftly?”
Dauntless reddened as words failed him again, and Myrmeen and Thomdor exploded into laughter.
Dove grinned and patted the ornrion’s arm. “Ne’er mind. ‘Bold to face the foe,’ remember?”
The Horngate loomed high and impressive overhead. “Lady Queen,” Florin murmured over his shoulder, “you should ride at the fore, and we behind you. ’Tis not right that-”
“Ride on,” Filfaeril commanded, in a voice of sudden iron that sounded muffled. “Just as we are.”
Florin turned his head and discovered that the Dragon Queen had cast a mantle over her head, and ducked low in her saddle.
He exchanged looks with Islif, they both shrugged-and an ornrion was stepping into their path, his hand raised imperiously.
“Hold hard, there!” he said sternly. “So large a company, and under arms? Who are you, who seek to ride right into Suzail?”
“We are knights of Cormyr, and chartered adventurers besides, and so are doubly allowed to bear war-steel into this fair city,” Florin replied, as they reined in their mounts.
“Knights and chartered adventurers? On mounts bearing the royal crest on their harness?” The officer’s voice was hard and incredulous. “Down from your saddle, sir, and furnish me with your charter-if you have one.”
Purple Dragons behind him, in the arch of the Horngate, had already taken up cocked and loaded crossbows and were aiming them, their faces suspicious.
“I think not, ” Queen Filfaeril’s voice rang out. “Stand aside, loyal Dragons!” She urged her horse past Florin, mantle thrown back, and raised her hand in a wave that set folk to astonished chatter-and sent the gate guards to their knees, their bows hurriedly pointed elsewhere.
“Diligently done, ornrion. Thy vigilance has our royal favor,” the Dragon Queen said crisply as she spurred past the officer, leading the knights forward onto the Promenade.
Word seemed to spread like fire racing in a gale, and folk streamed out of shops and sidestreets to gawk at the passing riders.
“I wonder how many enemies she’s making us?” Pennae whispered uneasily, as ragged cheers arose, the queen waved, and folk-so many folk-stared, faces upon hundreds of faces. “I mislike being seen so prominently in public.”
“Get used to it,” Alaphondar murmured. “And keep smiling. Every hamlet and realm, and all the folk in it, need their goats and heroes.”
“Ah,” Semoor asked wryly, as the tall iron gates of the Royal Court opened before them, “and which are we, I wonder?”
Alaphondar’s smile was thin. “Learning how to find a way out of goatskins is the true mark of a hero.”
As they rode across the broad and muddy courtyard, bright horns began to sound.
Epilogue
There was only one way to defend Cormyr.
Only one way to restore the honor of House Crownsilver.
Every god there is, give me strength to do this.
To do what must be done.
Rethendarr was the war wizard who’d been most angry in questioning her-the youngest, most eager and restless. To Rethendarr she would go.
After she made one necessary stop.
“I am the Lady Narantha Crownsilver,” she told the startled Purple Dragon at the guardroom. “And I have need of-ah. This one will do.”
Her sliced thumb told her the slender long sword was very sharp. Carrying it like a walking stick, she marched off before the guard could think of a pretext to stop her.
“Two things,” she murmured to herself, “all the realm knows. The Wizards of War stand ever-ready to defend the realm-not the king or Obarskyrs or palaces, but Cormyr itself-and right now every last spellhurler among them has one peril uppermost in mind: the Arcrown, that can easily slay any mage from afar. They search for it day and night.”
She stood before the door to Rethendarr’s study for a long time, trembling, before she mustered courage enough to open it and step inside.
There had been a chair… and that high marble-topped table.
There still were. The table was too heavy for anyone to shift alone-good-but the chair Narantha dragged to where she needed it-and wedged the sword hilt in its back cushions, the blade angled up over the table.
Ah, he had a glowstone. Even better. She put it on the marble, just beside the sword with its jutting point.
Now, where did the wizard keep his wine?
Ah.
She chose the best, and his largest goblet, and it was good. She had a second goblet.
Yet found herself still trembling.
“Lorneth,” she whispered, “guide me.”
And she flung the goblet with all the force in her arm, at the closed door Rethendarr must be on the other side of.
He was, by the startled curse she heard through it.
In a moment he’d wrench it open, and she must be ready. Standing up straight and proud, she tossed her head, trembling so hard that she thought she’d fall over, and cried in as triumphant a voice as she could manage, “Ha! Face me if you dare, Rethendarr, for I wear the Arcrown-and I want to see your face as I slay you! You, and all who stand between me and the Dragon Throne!”
There was a moment of silence, then a swift incantation.
The glowstone on the table winked out-and several other things around the room changed, too.
“My, antimagic fields are wonderful things,” she commented aloud, talking to keep her courage up.
The door crashed open-and Narantha hurled herself onto the sword.
Rethendarr’s face was furious, his hands raised, but the jaunty greeting she’d meant to give him was lost in the sob of pain that burst from her.
The steel was so cold. So cold…
She slid down it, gasping. Blood was running from her lips like a waterfall, it was through her and must be thrust out through her back by now, dark and wet…
So this is what it’s like, to die.
In a room far away in Arabel, Dove Silverhand’s head came up sharply.
“What is it?” Myrmeen Lhal snapped.
