Before her horrified gaze, as the beat of her own heart pounded in her ears and the clangor of battle died away all around them, the marilith tore Maxer's head from his shoulders. The head leapt through the air, tongue lolling, and trailed a plume of dark blood down into the fray. Beyond it, the marilith grinned exultantly and shook the headless, convulsing body in celebration.
Storm's vain rush carried her closer. She wept in helpless rage and grief as the marilith's grin shifted to her and became gloating laughter. The whirling sparks and mists of the spell that would whisk it away were already rising in the air around it.
Storm raised her blade too late, knowing cambions were leaping after her, hungry for her own death.
Something rolled by her feet, across the bloody flagstones of the temple: Maxer's head. His mouth was open in a final cry that had been choked off forever. His eyes were wide and staring.
And then, as it always did, despite her moan, the grisly thing leapt into her lap, hissing wetly, 'I love you!' Still trailing blood, it sprang at her face, lips pursed to kiss her-
Storm Silverhand awoke screaming, cradling nothing in front of her mouth. Her silver hair stood out arrow- straight from her skull, and her bare body was drenched with sweat.
'No! Oh, gods, no!' she sobbed, sliding down the far wall of the room where she somehow always ended up. Her trembling body was as wet as if she'd been for a swim, and as always, her skin had shed blood as well as sweat. Sylune was hovering anxiously over the empty bed, surveying sheets and blankets that had been slashed as if by frantic swings of a sword.
As she always did, Sylune watched silently as Storm panted her way back to coherence, rolling over onto her knees and sobbing. 'Why did he have to die?' she cried out. 'Why?'
Wisely, her sister kept silent, even when Storm raised her tearstained face. 'I was so close! So close! And I could not save him!'
Fresh tears choked her for a time, and she crawled blindly back toward the bed, crying, 'I should never have left his side! I should have been there! I-ohhh, Mystra, aid me!'
That last, despairing wail took all the energy she had left with it; the Bard of Shadowdale fell on her face on the floor and wept her way into slow oblivion.
When she awakened once more, Sylune's hair was softly brushing her bare shoulder. 'Storm,' the gentle voice came from above her, 'a warm bath awaits you, and the sun is coming up. Rise, and put Maxer behind you once more.'
'My thanks,' Storm whispered, not moving, her cheek against the cold stone. She shivered, suddenly, and added, 'Sylune? Stay with me just now… please?'
'It was a bad one,' her sister said soothingly. 'They seem to be the worst when they herald doom.'
Storm sat up, her face pale but calm. 'Oh, yes,' she said wearily. 'Somewhere, and soon, there will come another death that will matter greatly-another that I cannot stop.' She gained and sighed. 'A murder, of course. One more Harper will die.'
ONE
'Look!'
The cry burst forth from one of the Purple Dragons as the honor guard stood back from the pyre. Heads jerked up, wearing the annoyed expressions of folk embarrassed by an unseemly outburst. Frowns melted away in awe.
Athlan's sister even broke off her sobbing to give a cry of near-delight. In the dusky sky over the distant Stonelands, a solitary light was plunging to earth: a falling star.
'Praise be,' one guard muttered, 'a good sign.'
The Harvestmaster of Chauntea drew breath to thunderously acclaim this mark of divine favor. The old priest raised his voice in a tremulous declamation.
The gods-some god, at least-saw good or at least important times ahead for the noble. House of Summerstar, here on the very edge of Cormyr. The assembled family members looked suitably gratified.
A moment later, the crackling flames rose with a sudden roar, hiding from them all the shrouded form that had been Athlan Summerstar.
The seneschal's gaze went from the racing flames to the icily beautiful face of the dowager lady. Even before he could have tactfully suggested such a thing, the matriarch of the Summerstars-Dowager Lady Pheirauze Summerstar-had ordered her grandson burned by holy handfire to banish any harmful magic. She now stood watching-calmly, even haughtily. But then, she did everything haughtily, carrying herself with the smooth sophistication that sixty winters of high station and great beauty had brought.
She stood at the center of the gathered family, tall and slender, and the firelight that found her danced on a face that showed more annoyance than sorrow. Athlan had failed her, tearing asunder her schemes of greatness for the Summerstars. She'd probably not live to see another male Summerstar heir ready to ride to Suzail and impress whichever king sat the Dragon Throne then. Worse than that, he'd failed her in a way that left her unable to get even with him. . and Pheirauze Summerstar always got even.
Athlan's younger sister, Shayna, was suddenly the family heir now. Her stunning beauty had built to a peak, and her willfulness was making her dalliances with every second or third young and handsome Purple Dragon armsman in the vale increasingly difficult to hide.
Impossible to hide, more like, thought the seneschal. He'd soon have to call in war wizards to nose about in every corner and cranny of the keep. Murders of nobility might be hushed up, but never the sudden deaths of heirs or of any noble in a border hold. These days, Sembia was looking westward with ever-hungrier eyes. Renglar sighed.
No, the folk that the Purple Dragons privately called 'the Happy Dancing Mages' would come. This was murder, all right. No young noble heir goes alone into a so-called haunted tower of a castle and gets his tongue slashed to prevent any screams, a sword thrust through him from behind-and some spell or other that burns him to a shell-by accident!
Later, he said as much. Most of the ashes had been placed on the traditional saddle bowl and the dead lord's horse had been whipped into a gallop to strew them wide and far over the vale. The Summerstars retired to their quarters-no doubt to yell at each other over the details of Lord Athlan's will. They hadn't even bothered to accompany the priest of Chauntea on the solemn march down to the family crypt to inter the traditional lone handful of still-smoking ashes in Athlan's upturned helm. The seneschal and his guest, however, both did.
When it was all over-after the crypt doors had boomed shut and been sealed with a final benediction and the priest had scuttled away with the traditional gold goblet full of gold lions as payment-Renglar sighed once more and turned to his tall, solid, sharp-eyed guest. 'Care for some wine? We need to talk.'
'Yes, and we do,' the tall man agreed simply. They went up the stairs together. 'He meant a lot to you?'
The seneschal shrugged. 'He was a good lad. Lots of dreams-and the dreams of young men light the fires that brighten Cormyr in years to come. I liked him, aye, and I put a lot of hours of sword-work in on him; all wasted now.'
'Would he have grown into another Pyramus?'
Renglar shrugged again, and stopped to unlock a seldom-used door. 'It was too early to say. He had a touch of the let's-use-magic-because-it's-quick-and-easy streak, and was drifting into poking into small magics because of that. Another Pyramus? I don't think so.'
They went through the door. With a heavy clang and a rattle of chain, it swung to behind them. The seneschal of Firefall Keep took a torch from a wall-bracket ahead, and led the way. His guest followed, eaglelike eyes moving this way and that, missing nothing. … Then again, it might be his task to besiege this place some day.
