'And the Conclave of Wizards refused her,' Calcidon mused. 'Even those mages allied with good.'
'The White Robes were somewhat willing,' Tarscen shy;ian said. 'The neutral Red Robes were unsure, and the Black Robes of evil were absolutely set against any action.'
Strands of mist coalesced and whirled around Tarscen-ian and the others as though the fog expressed some of their agitation.
'What interest could the Black Robes have in sup shy;porting a man who would gladly see them all burned?' Calcidon asked. 'They are mages, after all. Like us, they favor the Old Gods.'
The mage Benthis spoke next. 'Refugees have been arriving from the far north with tales of strange armies, mercenaries, and nefarious creatures,' he said. 'Mino-taurs. Hobgoblins, goblins, and worse. There's no logic to the rumors, unless a source of unheard-of evil is behind such a military undertaking.' Benthis looked Calcidon straight in the eyes. 'An evil on the scale of a deity.'
The elf frowned. 'You are suggesting …'
'Takhisis herself.'
'The Dark Queen!' Calcidon laughed. 'Oh, surely one of the Old Gods would not intercede on Krynn..' The elf halted, taken aback by the intent looks of the other mages. The last time the Old Gods had interceded on Krynn, the resulting debacle practically destroyed the world. Three centuries earlier, the Cataclysm had drained seas, created oceans and deserts where none had been before, and killed hundreds of thousands of humans, elves, dwarves, kender, and other beings. All because a human, the kingpriest of a faraway city, had aspired to godhood.
Calcidon, wearing a mask of elven calm, turned to Tarscenian. 'The Conclave has refused to help you, but two score white-robed mages hear your tale now. What do you seek of us?'
'Hederick is slaughtering scores of mages,' Tarscen shy;ian replied. 'All of you have lost someone dear to Hed-erick's Inquisition.'
Indeed, it was true, the mages agreed, nodding to each other. In the past three months, Hederick had leveled dozens of vallenwoods. The Solace trees were sacred to the followers of the Old Gods but merely another source of firewood to the Seekers. Hederick was employing goblins and hobgoblins as spies and assassins. The gob shy;lins in turn had enlisted other evil creatures to assist them.
On the land cleared of vallenwoods, just north of Solace on the shores of Crystalmir Lake, Hederick had built an opulent temple. The High Theocrat called the temple Erolydon, which meant 'scourge of heresy' in Old Abanasinian. There Hederick had set up the head shy;quarters of his Inquisition. Anyone caught using magic was deemed a heretic, according to the Seeker faith, and thus was subject to execution, which came both swiftly and mercilessly.
Benthis, surveying the assembled White Robes, noted the melancholy expression on the face of the elven mage. 'Even you, Calcidon?' he murmured. 'I thought you and yours never ventured forth from your cozy elven nest in Qualinost. Who have you lost to Heder-ick's Inquisition?'
'A cousin,' came the tight-lipped answer. 'And you, Benthis?'
The hawklike visage softened. 'My sister.'
Other mages chimed in. 'Hederick executed my brother.' 'My friend of twenty years.' 'My partner.'
'What do you want of us, Tarscenian?' Calcidon repeated.
'Ancilla gave me instructions before she addressed the Conclave,' Tarscenian said. 'She feared she would fail-once more-to persuade them. And she worried she would be too frail afterward to summon you her shy;self.'
Tarscenian chose his next words carefully. 'Ancilla discovered a way to collect the powers of willing mages, and channel them through her own willpower. She thought that with such unusual strength at her disposal, she could at last wrest the Diamond Dragon away from Hederick. In turn, she planned to use the artifact to defeat him.'
'Take our powers?' Benthis cried. 'That's unaccept shy;able. Where would that leave us? Devoid of magic at a time when Hederick is sending spies and kidnappers all over Krynn to capture spellcasters! You'd leave us unprotected against this tyrant?'
'Ancilla found a means to shelter you,' Tarscenian explained. 'If you will transfer your powers to her, the vallenwoods will shelter your bodies and nurture you until the Diamond Dragon releases you.'
A flurry of protest, led by Benthis, rippled through the gathering. But as Calcidon and the rest of the wiz shy;ards intoned the names of the loved ones lost to the Inquisition, one by one the opponents backed down.
Benthis tried one last argument. 'If Ancilla fails, what happens to us? What if she dies despite our combined powers?'
'I cannot say for certain,' Tarscenian said. 'You will be part of the vallenwoods, but whether you will die or stay in the trees for years-or forever-Ancilla could not foretell.'
Benthis gazed around the circle. His look met only obdurate stares. 'And we all must be part of this?' he asked.
'All who are present now,' Tarscenian replied. 'Or the spell will not work.'
Benthis closed his eyes. At last he opened them and attempted a weak smile. 'If it comes down to dying at Hederick's command or perishing inside a vallenwood, I suppose it ultimately makes no difference,' he con shy;ceded. He wiped the damp from his forehead with his sleeve. 'I loved my sister. I'm with you.'
For the rest of the day, Tarscenian led them through the steps Ancilla had forced him to commit to memory. When all had learned the spells and movements, he spread his cloak on the ground in the middle of the circle and laid Ancilla upon it. Then, because Tarscenian was but a minor spellcaster, he backed out of the circle, leav shy;ing the wizards to do their work.
Calcidon led the spell. 'Shiriff intoann ejjitt,' he intoned.
'Borumtalcon,' the mages replied.
They raised their hands and lowered them in the pre shy;scribed movements. Each wizard inscribed upon the fog a different portion of the magical traceries. The gestures of their fingers left blue, green, and red lines on the mist. Ancilla had stressed that each segment of the total was crucial, but to Tarscenian, each mage's work appeared to be nothing but errant scribbling.
The fog began to glow. The white robes gleamed like burnished silver.
'Bilum merit ayhannti,' Calcidon sang in his elven tenor.
'Achet shiral pescumi. Relaquay,' came the chanted reply of the group. The men's voices rumbled. The women's tones floated like feathers.
Suddenly the forty robes glittered like diamonds. They scattered light until tears streamed from the mages' eyes. Ancilla had been adamant: the mages' eyes must remain open, whatever their inclination to close them against the brilliance.
'Ayhannti, shiral liwix xhalot.' Calcidon sang on. 'Polopeque.'
The shine that had transformed the robes now leaped out of the cloth as though it had life of its own. The glitter shone silver and white. Ice blue appeared in the swirling fog. The lines that the mages had traced formed into figures-a tree, a dragon, a lance, a crown.
Then they muted to nothingness.
The mist evaporated around the ring of mages and intensified above Ancilla's still form. The air filled with the clattering and chiming of bells.
'Shiral liwix trassdiv dhellil' Calcidon shrieked the words. Yet the other mages could barely hear him over the noise from the twisting tendrils of fog.
'Reveese rou ripow nad borrah rou carpeh,' the mages shouted in unison. 'Reveese rou ripow nad borrah rou carpeh!'
The fog enveloped all the mages. The light from a thousand stars exploded within the circle. Wooden bells, silver chimes, steel cymbals could be heard. Some of the mages began to bleed from the ears. Others cried out with pain and made as if to clap their hands over their eyes.
Then all disappeared. The fog vanished with them, revealing a late-afternoon mountaintop without tree or living beast.
All was silent.
At that moment, Ancilla shivered and awakened. Her green eyes stared blankly at Tarscenian for a moment. 'I am alive?' she finally whispered. 'They agreed to help us?' At Tarscenian's nod, the old woman accepted his hand and stood. She wobbled at first, then sup shy;ported herself without aid. Ancilla waved away Tarscenian's
