Elminster Must Die

“When we get caught,” Dawntard corrected grimly.

Still panting, they paused together to catch their breath in the passage outside the door of old Lord Murandrake’s expensive rented rooms-and hesitated, exchanging wild-eyed glances.

The wizard and the noble came to a spot where the dark, narrow passage ended in a meeting with a passage running left and right.

“This way, lad!” Elminster boomed cheerfully from inside his borrowed helm, turning left.

“Very well,” Arclath agreed, following, “but where are we going, if I may ask?”

“Ye may,” El replied brightly, “and if ye’re very good, I might even tell thee. Before we get there, that is. Life is, after all, a journey rather than a-”

“Destination.” Arclath sighed. “I know the hoary old sayings, too, saer. What I don’t know is why I’m following you at all, when I came here to find the lady war wizard named Glathra, and … ah …”

“Tell her all about me? That I’m after the Nine, is that it? Amarune told thee?”

“She told me a lot of things,” Lord Delcastle replied. “That she’s your kinswoman and that you want her to help you steal certain enchanted things from the palace-which frankly puzzles me. Are you lazy, or horribly busy, or just trying to keep your hands clean? If you’re as mighty an archmage as the tales all say, why not steal them yourself? Or just seize them, brushing aside our wizards of war-fallen far since the days of the legendary Vangerdahast, who was a mere pupil to you, if I’ve remembered rightly-as if they were so many ineffectual children?”

“My, her tongue has been busy,” Elminster observed. “She must trust ye. Hmm; are ye lovers, perchance?”

“I’m her patron and friend, old man,” Arclath replied, a trifle sharply. “It would be improper of me to take advant-”

Elminster turned and made a very rude sound in Arclath’s direction. “Ye’re a noble of Cormyr, lad! ‘Improper’ is what ye were raised to do, and haughtily! An utter dolt ye must think me, to take me for someone who’ll swallow ‘my morals shine’ pretenses out of thy mouth! After all, a simple ‘aye’ or ‘nay’ would suffice for a man who had naught to hide.”

Arclath knew he should be whipping out his sword, afire with anger, but found himself feeling far too sheepish for any such nonsense. He settled for saying simply, “We talked last night; she’s very scared; she does trust me, and I touched her not. Truth, I swear.”

Elminster dragged off the helm, revealing a face glistening with sweat, for just long enough to meet the young noble’s eyes with his wise and twinkling old blue-gray ones, and reply, “I believe ye, lad.”

Then the helm came down again, and from within it, the old man added, “So, aye, I’m her great-grandsire, and I want her to take my place in the harness, saving the Realms. She’ll be needing help, mind; that’s why I’m admitting anything at all to ye, lad, rather than just snuffing out the pride of House Delcastle, here and now. Oh, and aye, I do need to get my hands on any items that house the ghosts of any of the Nine; ’tis vitally important.”

“And if, say, the Crown of Cormyr believes differently?” Arclath asked calmly as they started to move along the passage again. “And prefers these, ah, haunted magic items be retained here, in royal or war wizard hands, to defend the realm?”

“Lad, lad,” came the hollow voice from within the helm, “ ’tis the way of all rulers, and even more so of their lackeys and toadies, to latch onto anything that just might be of value or hold power-whether they understand its consequences or know how to wield it or not-and keep it safe forever, or until their realm falls, which always happens first. Trust these words, from one who’s ruled more realms than ye or any Obarskyr ever will, and saved this particular one we’re standing in a time or two, as well: I can make better use of them than Foril or Ganrahast or all the nobles of the realm put together. Trust me.”

“My dear long-departed grandfather,” Arclath replied carefully, “once told me that trusting any wizard is even more foolish than trusting any noble. I have found that to be wise advice.”

“Ye were well raised,” Elminster agreed cheerfully. “Yet how much can any of us trust anyone, really? We’ll have to talk more on this, ye and I.”

He stopped at a right-angled bend in the passage, slid open another panel in the wall, and waved Arclath through it, indicating that the Lord Delcastle should precede him.

Arclath bowed and obeyed, stepping into a new and better-lit passage-where he found himself face to face with an out-of-breath War Wizard Glathra, who had just come hastening along it.

“You’ve been looking for me, I hear; you have news?” she snapped.

“I do,” Arclath replied. “This is the wizard El-”

He turned, but the passage behind him was empty of a man in old, ill-fitting armor. He took a swift step to where the once-again-closed panel was, slid it open with only a moment’s difficulty, peered up and down the passage he’d just come from, finding it-of course-empty … and turned back to Glathra rather helplessly.

“Well, Elminster was with me, and-”

“I believe you,” Glathra said crisply. “If it really was Elminster and not some poser just claiming that infamous name, I’d not have wanted to trade spells with him nose to nose, anyhail. Report!”

Arclath nodded. “Well, he confirmed everything Amarune has told me: He’s her great-grandsire; he was waiting for her in her lodgings yestereve to tell her so; and he wants her to save the Realms as he’s been doing for centuries. Beginning with stealing some magic items that are apparently here in Suzail, and hold the ghosts of the Nine-you know about the Nine?”

“We do.”

“Ah, of course. Well, as it happens, that wasn’t all that I came here to tell you.”

Glathra leaned forward, for all the world like a hunting dog straining at the leash to be released to pounce. “Yes?”

“I’m … I’m not half as capable a spy as I thought I was. I am loyal to the Crown, mind, just not … guarding the realm is not half as easy as I thought it would be. Not to mention even less fun.”

Glathra’s stare was hard and level. “Others before you, Lord Delcastle, have discovered as much. A few of them have even admitted it.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

HUNTING ELMINSTERS

Watching Gods Above, was that the time?

An exhausted Wizard of War Glathra stumbled out her usual rear door of the palace, intent only on getting home to eat something-cold roast fowl from three nights back would have to do; she was too tired to get busy at her hearth-and soak her aching feet before falling-and this night, it would be falling-into bed.

Almost immediately she stopped dead, because someone was standing in her way. Swordcaptain Dralkin.

“Now what?” she snarled, by way of greeting.

Rather stiffly, he replied, “War Wizard Glathra, I’ve news that might well concern the safety of the realm. I thought you’d want to know.”

She closed her eyes wearily, but when she opened them again he was still standing there. “And it is?”

“Three of our younger noble lords-Windstag, Dawntard, and Sornstern-seem to be turning much of Suzail upside down right now, looking for magical hand axes. They’re offering large coin in the taverns frequented by nobles’ servants-the Rose and Dragon, the Servant Exalted, and the Hrelto-for any hand axe brought to them that’s magical when they test it, and came from any noble House. They have this chant about where they want folk to look: ‘up on a wall or hidden in a bedchamber or back hall.’ ”

Glathra sighed heavily. “There’s more, isn’t there?”