the nearest war captains, their faces wet with tears, too. They knew what was about to befall here on this hill.
Silvery threads of whispering air were curling about Vangerdahast’s shoulders-the magic he used when he wanted to speak aloud to someone distant but to have their words and his face cloaked from those standing nearby. Suspicion was spreading across the faces of some war captains as they watched those dancing threads gather. Alusair caught their eyes and reached out deliberately and laid a hand on the wizard’s neck to ensure she’d be privy to the farspoken conversation. Vangerdahast’s response was to move a little closer to her, to ease her reach.
“Filfaeril,” the royal magician said gravely, without preamble, “your Azoun hangs near death, and I cannot comfort you with the expectation of a recovery. The magics on him keep him asleep and make it dangerous for us to approach, but in his last wakefulness Azoun spoke to me of how precious your love has been to him, and to give you his last salute. He also commanded me to learn, and tell him, of Tanalasta’s fate, and that of the child she bears. What news?”
“Good Vangerdahast,” came a clear, cold voice out of the empty air, for all the world as if the Dragon Queen stood in front of the wizard, “my eldest daughter is dead-she died true and fearless, destroying Boldovar to save us all here-but her babe lives. It is a boy, another Azoun for Cormyr. I pray you, if your wisdom makes these our words private, that you not burden the heart of my lord and love Azoun with word of Tanalasta’s passing, in his own last moments. Just… just…” Filfaeril’s voice wavered on the edge of a sob, just for a moment, then steadied again into cold resolve. “Tell him, Vangey, just how much I love him. Farewell, my Azoun. Our love will endure when our bodies cannot.”
Her voice broke entirely, and was a pleading agony as she whispered, “If you love me, old wizard, can you not bring me to him?”
Alusair felt a tremor pass through Vangerdahast then that marked his own sob bursting forth-a tremor that was promptly and with iron determination mastered, head bowed, as the royal magician murmured, “Oh, Lady Queen, I dare not try, lest I doom us all, your other daughter most of all. If this magic goes wild…
“I understand,” Filfaeril whispered. “Oh, gods, Vangey, keep Alusair safe and… and ease my Azoun’s passing. If you have any magic, later, to show me what you saw and thought of his dying, I command you show me. I must see.”
“Lady, you shall,” Vangerdahast said gently. “Fare you well.” He ended the spell with a weary wave of his hand, and turned to Alusair. “For the safety of the crown, I dared not bring her here,” he said, sounding ashamed. “I want you to kn-“
Alusair whirled away, tearing free of his grasp, but not with the snarl of anger he’d feared and not to spurn him. Instead, she was crouching with drawn steel, like all the other war captains on that hilltop, awaiting fresh menace. The wizard peered around her.
The Steel Princess was facing a whirling chaos of growing radiance in the air a little way down one slope of the hill-the glow of manifesting magic.
“Translocational arrivals,” Vangerdahast said loudly, to identify the magic for any who might not yet have recognized it. “Launch no attack until I bid y-“
“Be still, wizard!” one of the war captains snapped, eyes intent on the brightening glows. His voice sank to a mutter, Vangerdahast forgotten as he studied the flaring magic, and he added, “For once…”
Several heads snapped around to see how Vangerdahast would react to that outburst, but the royal magician’s face was expressionless as he took a step sideways to place himself squarely between this burgeoning magic and the fallen king. Vangerdahast squinted into the flares of brilliance as they reached their heights, then sighed and stepped back, a sour expression flickering across his face so swiftly that Alusair, watching him, could not be quite sure she’d seen it there.
Some of the veteran war captains of Cormyr were not so discreet. Disgust and disdain were written large on their faces as Cormyrean high priests of various faiths appeared out of the roiling sparks and glows of their collective teleport. Loremaster Thaun Khelbor of Deneir, his face set with fear, glanced this way and that at the wrack of battle, and was promptly shouldered aside by the High Huntmaster of Vaunted Malar, who in turn found himself in the striding wake of Aldeth Ironsar, Faithful Hammer of Tyr. Evidently the war wizards who’d sent them hence had lacked magic enough to send the upperpriests of each church who customarily accompanied their superiors everywhere. Every arriving priest ruled the Cormyrean churches of his faith.
“Trust the vultures to come now,” someone among the watching war captains said loudly, as many blades- but by no means all of the swords held ready on the hill-were sheathed.
“Aye,” someone else said bitterly, “now that the bloody work’s done.”
The Lord High Priest Most Favored of the Luck Goddess turned his head and snapped, “Who said that?”
For a long, cold moment there came no reply, then the air grew more frosty still when more than a dozen of the blood-drenched men in armor said in flat, insolent unison, “I did.”
Manarech Eskwuin blanched and quickly looked away, striding on, like all of his fellows, up the hill to where the king lay. As if the magic that had brought him was rolling along before him, fresh flames and radiance burst into being around Azoun’s body, and he roared and twisted in pain, spasming on the bed of shields. The taint of the dragon’s blood had returned.
“Make way!” commanded the high priest of Malar. “We are come in Cormyr’s hour of need to heal the king.”
“This is not a matter for straightforward healing,” Vangerdahast said warningly, standing his ground. Behind him, something that hissed and coiled arose from Azoun’s mouth, and small puffs of flame curled up from his drumming heels. Fell magic was raging and gnawing within him.
“I fear there is nothing you can do here, holy men,” the royal magician said politely, “save to let King Azoun die with the dignity he has so valiantly earned.”
Some of the war captains there drew in to stand beside the wizard, barring the high priests from reaching the king, but others cast suspicious glances at Vangerdahast, and murmurs were heard of, “Refuse the king healing? What treachery’s this?”
Augrathar Buruin, High Huntmaster of Vaunted Malar, raised an imperious hand. It was swathed in a furry gauntlet whose fingers were tipped with the claws of great cats, and whose outer side was studded with the bone barbs of beasts. He pointed at the royal magician, then swept his arm to one side, still pointing. There was a sneer on his face, and his eyes glittered with contempt through his obvious excitement. “Back, Vangerdahast!” he snarled.
The old man in the torn and dirty robe neither moved nor spoke.
The huntmaster snapped, “In this, wizard, you’re but an ignorant, meddling courtier. Stand back, and take your puny spells with you. The divine might of Malar shall prevail, as it always has-and always will.”
A swelling of light occurred in the air behind the priests then, and several of them whirled around in swiftness born of fear, faces tightening. The light outlined a figure, then swiftly faded into streaming sparks. Out of their heart trudged a man in hacked and blood-drenched armor. He was bareheaded, his face wore the weathered calm of a veteran warrior, and the bare-bladed miniature sword floating upright a foot in front of his breastplate marked him for all eyes as a battlelord, a senior priest of Tempus, come late to the feast. On this battlefield, first rank should be his, yet the huntmaster of Malar gave no sign of noticing the warpriest’s arrival, but merely gestured imperiously to Vangerdahast once more to stand back.
Something that might have been the faint echo of a smile passed across the old wizard’s face, and without turning away, he retreated three slow steps.
The huntmaster drew himself up in triumph and cried, “Oh, Malar, Great Lord of Blood and master of all who hunt, as this brave king has done, look down upon thy true servant in this hour of a kingdom’s need, and grant thy special favor upon this endeavor! Let the strength of the lion, the suppleness of the panther, and the stamina of the ice bear flow through me now, to touch this fair monarch in his time of need!”
The healing spell needed neither the invocation nor the grand gestures that followed, but no one moved or spoke as the huntmaster almost leisurely completed what must surely have been the most spectacular casting of his holy career, stretching forth both hands to Azoun with white purifying fire dancing between them.
The fire leaped forth to the bed of shields and plunged into the body of the king. Azoun convulsed, hands curling into claws as the surge of magic lifted him, back arched, amid sudden snarls of lightning and rolling, fist- sized balls of flame. Fire fell to the turf, and smoked, shields buckled with a shrill shriek, and out of the fading white fire a crackling arm of lightning reached, with an almost insolent lack of haste, to wash over the huntmaster.
