Prologue
11 Hammer-16 Ches, the Year of Blue Fire (1385 DR)
Sometimes even archmages have to wait, and so it was for Szass Tam, standing on the wide, flat roof of the castle's highest tower. He passed the time gazing out at the chain of volcanic peaks his people called the Thaymount, at other fortresses perched on lofty crags, mining camps clustered around yawning pits and the black mouths of tunnels, and, here and there, leaping flame and trickling lava. The cold winter air smelled of ash.
Beyond the peaks lay farms and parklands, cloaked in snow. Except for the leaden overcast sky, which once would have seemed an aberration in a realm where sorcery managed the weather, the view was much as it had always been throughout Szass Tam's extended existence.
He smiled appreciatively at the geography, as one smiles at a favored pet. During the first two years of the war, his troops had fought savagely to dislodge his enemies from their estates on the plateau, and in the wake of his army's success, High Thay had
become his secure redoubt. His foes were evidently sensible enough to deem it unassailable, for they'd never sought to clamber up the towering cliffs of the Second Escarpment to challenge him. Rather, they fought him on the tablelands beneath, and on the lowlands between the First Escarpment and the sea.
Footsteps roused him from his musings. He turned toward the doorway and four blue-bearded frost giants shambled forth from the shadows beyond. The grayish tinge of their ivory skins, the slack-jawed imbecility of their expressions, and the smell of rot surrounding them identified them as zombies.
They carried a platform of oak affixed to two long poles. Atop the square surface was a transparent, nine-sided pyramid composed of crystallized mystical energy. Within it rested Thakorsil's Seat, a high stone chair with arms carved in the shapes of dragons. Seated thereon was Yaphyll, a woman of youthful appearance, small for a member of the long-limbed Mulan aristocracy, with an impish face.
As the zombie giants set her down, Yaphyll shifted and adjusted her robe. "As litter bearers," she said, "your servants lack a certain delicacy of touch. Especially when carrying their passenger up flight after flight of stairs."
"I apologize," Szass Tam replied, "but I hoped you'd enjoy a change of scenery. Aren't fresh air and this magnificent vista worth a bit of bouncing around?"
"If you had only freed me from the pyramid," she said, "I would have been happy to walk up under my own power. After so much sitting, I would have enjoyed the exercise."
"I'm sure you would," he replied, "just as I'm sure that you would have found some way to turn the situation to your advantage. That's why I took the trouble to confine you in a prison built to hold an infernal prince."
"I appreciate the compliment. Someday I hope to show you how much."
"No doubt. Meanwhile, consider the view." He waved his hand at the mountains and the shadowed gorges between. "This is the highest point in all Thay. Legend has it that a person can gaze out from here and observe everything transpiring across the land. That's nonsense, of course, or at least it is for most of us. But I wonder what the eyes of the realm's greatest oracle can see."
"Burnt villages and plundered towns," Yaphyll said. "Fields returning to wilderness. Famine. Plague. Armies preparing for another season of ruinous war."
"I had hoped you'd grace me with a genuine exhibition of your skills, not a banal recitation of common knowledge."
"As you wish." She sketched a sign on the air. Her fingertip left a shimmering green trail. "Some of your troops are besieging a castle east of Sekelmur. A company of our raiders has attacked a caravan of supply wagons on the Sur Road. Neither action looks important, but then, they never are decisive, are they? Thus the game drags on and on and on."
"Perhaps if we work together, we can change that."
"I'm willing to try. That was why I forsook the other zulkirs and joined you. Anything to shift the balance of power, break the stalemate, and bring the war to an end before it cripples the realm beyond recovery."
"I had no idea your motives were so patriotic. I thought you simply decided I was going to prevail and preferred to be on the winning side."
Yaphyll grinned. "Perhaps there was a bit of that as well."
"Yet eventually you elected to turn your cloak again, and nearly succeeded in slipping away. Because you found my strategy and resources less impressive than expected?"
"Not exactly. But the stalemate endured, and in time I realized I'd rather stand with the living than the dead. With lords who, whatever their excesses, refrain from massacring their own subjects to turn them into ghoul and zombie soldiers."
Szass Tam shrugged. "It was scarcely indiscriminate slaughter. I only did it when necessary."
"If you say so. At any rate, now that you've made me your prisoner, such details no longer concern me. I need to look after myself. So please free me, and I promise to serve you loyally."
"And how could I possibly doubt your pledge, paragon of honesty and loyalty that you are?"
Yaphyll took a deep breath. "All right. If you feel that way about it, bind me into your service."
"I'm afraid the usual ritual wouldn't take, at least not permanently. It's one thing to shackle a common Red Wizard, but another to trammel the mind of the zulkir of the Order of Divination."
"Then turn me into a lich or one of your vampires, something your necromancy can control. Better that than to stay in this box!"
"I've considered that, but the passage from life into undeath alters the mind, sometimes subtly, sometimes significantly. I won't risk compromising the clarity of your vision. Not yet. We have a war to win."
"If you won't release me from the chair, I won't help you."
"Please, don't be childish. Of course you will."
He held out his hand and the Death Moon Orb appeared in his palm. Coils of black and purple swam on the surface of the sphere. The orb changed size from time to time. Currently, it was as big as a man's head, which made it seem an awkward burden in such a frail-looking hand. But despite their withered, mummified appearance—the only visible sign of his undead condition—Szass Tam's fingers were deft and strong, and he managed the sphere easily.
He lifted the orb to the level of Yaphyll's eyes. "Look at it," he said.
She did. The power of the orb had compelled her into Thakorsil's Seat, and she found it as irresistible as before.
"You will tell me," he said, "when and where to meet the legions of the other zulkirs in battle to win that decisive victory which has thus far eluded us all. I command you to cast the most powerful divination known to your order, no matter the peril to your body, mind, or soul."
"Curse you!" Yaphyll gasped.
"I'm sure you will if you ever get the chance. But for now, does the spell require arcane ingredients? I daresay my own stock contains whatever you may require."
"Eanacolo." Yaphyll spat. "Haunspeir. Dreammist. Redflower leaves. The eyes of an eagle, a beholder, and a medusa. A mortar and pestle, and a goblet of clear water."
That combination of narcotics and poisons would kill any living woman under normal circumstances. Szass Tam wondered if it would kill her, too, or if her mastery of her art would enable her to survive. It would be interesting to see.
He sent a pair of apprentices to fetch the spell ingredients, then opened the pyramid long enough to hand them to her. Her features twisted with reluctance, she then proceeded with the ritual.
Gray fumes of dreammist twisted through the air. Yaphyll chanted as she pulped and powdered the other items one by one, then stirred them into her cup. When she'd mixed everything, she shouted a final rhyme, raised the cup, and drank the narcotic concoction.
She convulsed so violently that only the magic of Thakorsil's Seat kept her upright, thrashing against that invisible restraint. Her dainty fist clenched and the pewter goblet crumpled. Then her fingers relaxed and the ruined cup slipped from her grip to clank on the oak platform. Her body slumped and her head lolled to the side.
"Are you still conscious?" asked Szass Tam. "If so, tell me what you see."
Yaphyll blinked and sat up straighter. "I see ..." "What? I explained what I need."
She shuddered, bumping her head against the high back of the chair, and then the shaking subsided. "Come spring, send word to Hezass Nymar that you mean to march the legions of High Thay to lay siege to the Keep of Sorrows. Summon him and his legions to rendezvous with you there."
Szass Tam frowned. Hezass Nymar, the tharchion of the province of Lapendrar, had switched sides five times since the war for control of Thay had begun, which branded him as faithless and unreliable even by the shabby standards of this chaotic conflict. "Such an assault would put my strongest army deep in enemy territory, drawn up in front of a formidable fortress, with the River Lapendrar and the First Escarpment limiting our mobility. On first inspection, I don't see that idea's merit."
Yaphyll grinned, a flicker of her usual impudence shining through the daze induced by magic, drugs, and poison. "You're right to be skeptical, for Hezass Nymar is about to change sides again. He'll betray your intentions to the Council of Zulkirs, and if he opts to march his army to the battle, it will be to fight on their side."
Szass Tam nodded. "I doubt I would have blundered into this trap in the first place, but I appreciate the warning. Still, it isn't the answer to my question. When and where can I bring your peers to battle to tip the balance in my favor for good and all?"
Yaphyll's back arched, and she raised her trembling hands before her face as if she meant to claw at it. "You have your answer. The other zulkirs will leap at the chance to catch you. They'll field every soldier who can reach the Keep of Sorrows in time. But, knowing the situation is a snare, you can plan accordingly. You can turn it around against your enemies, and when you defeat such a large number, you'll cripple them."
"Interesting." It seemed a mad scheme altogether, and yet
Szass Tam knew that where augury was concerned, she was a better wizard than he was. He was also confident that, compelled by the Death Moon Orb, she couldn't lie. What if—
Yaphyll's laughter jarred him. Or perhaps she was sobbing.
"The white queen is troubled," she said, "but can't say why."
"What queen is that?" Szass Tam asked, without any sense of urgency. Since Thay didn't have kings or queens, the remark was cryptic, seemingly without relevance to his question. Now that Yaphyll had obeyed his command, he suspected her mystical sight had drifted to some unrelated matter.
"The black queen hates the white," Yaphyll continued, "and gives the assassin a black cloak. The assassin steals up on the white queen. She can't see him gliding through the shadows."
"Who are these people?" asked Szass Tam.
"The sword screams," Yaphyll continued. "The white queen falls. Her city falls. Stones fall in the cavern to crush the soothsayer."
"It sounds like a bad day all around."
"The tree burns," Yaphyll said, "and thrashes in agony. Branches break. Branches twist and grow togeth—"
Tendrils of blue flame erupted down the length of her body, from her hairless scalp to the tips of her toes. She screamed and thrashed.
Szass Tam took a step back. Had her spell escaped her control? He'd save her from the consequences if he could, in the hope she'd prove useful again. He spoke the word that dissolved the crystal pyramid into a fading shimmer, then prepared to conjure a splash of water.
The flames went out of their own accord, leaving behind spots where flesh, silk, and velvet had melted and flowed like wax. Indifferent to the bizarre injuries, Yaphyll giggled and rose from Thakorsil's Seat.
Szass Tam was astonished, but didn't delay. He thrust the Death Moon Orb at her. "Sit down."
"Thank you," she said, "but I'd rather stand. You bade me split myself in two, and send one half into tomorrow. Your silly globe can't touch that half."
She waved her hand and a gout of acid flew at him and splashed across his chest. But fortunately, he was never without his defenses, and although much of his robe sizzled and steamed away, he felt only a little stinging.
Which didn't mean he was inclined to let her try again. He lunged at her and grabbed her by the wrist.
When he willed it, his grip could paralyze, and she stiffened as he expected. But then, to his chagrin, he sensed the life vanish from her body like a blown-out candle flame. After the poison she'd already taken, the malignancy of a lich's touch had proved an unendurable strain. Such a waste.
He dropped her and turned to the zombie giants. "Return Thakorsil's Seat to its chamber," he said, "then take this corpse to Xingax."
For his part, Yaphyll had left him with a mystery to ponder— and, he supposed, a campaign to plan.
"It knows we're coming," Brightwing said.
As he often did when they flew by night, Aoth Fezim had married his senses to the griffon's. Even so, he couldn't tell how she knew, but he didn't doubt her.
"Is it in the air, too?" he asked, adjusting his grip on the spear that served him as both warrior's weapon and wizard's staff.
"I can't tell yet," Brightwing said, then hissed when the base of her right wing gave her a twinge.
With their minds coupled, Aoth felt it too. "Are you all right?" he asked.
"Fine."
"Are you sure?" He'd almost lost her last autumn, when one of Szass Tam's undead champions drove its sword deep into her body, and he didn't want to take her into battle if she hadn't fully recovered.
"Yes! Now stop fretting like a senile old granny and tell your friends what I told you."
She was right—he needed to relay the information. His familiar spoke Mulhorandi, but with a beak and throat poorly shaped for human speech, and for the most part, only her master could understand her.
Flying on his own griffon, Bareris Anskuld acknowledged the warning with a curt nod. As the bard's fair complexion and lanky frame attested, he was of Mulan stock, but he sported a tangled mane of blond hair that shone bone white in the moonlight. He'd abandoned the habit of shaving his head during his travels abroad and had never taken it up again.
A dimly luminous shadow, Mirror floated on the other side of Bareris, far enough away to keep his presence from spooking the singer's mount. As it might well have done, for Mirror was a ghost. Because he lacked all memory of his mortal existence he tended to take on the appearance of anyone who happened to be near. Although sometimes he showed a murky, wavering semblance of what had been his own living face, a lean visage notable for a big, hooked nose and a drooping mustache. Occasionally, he even spoke.
Mounted on his flying horse, Malark Springhill acknowledged Brightwing's warning with a grin and a finger-flick of a salute. Compact of build, with pale green eyes and a wine red birthmark on his chin, Malark was an outlander, but he sported the usual Thayan hairless pate and collection of tattoos.
To some, they would appear an ominous trio. Bareris's bleak, obsessive nature revealed itself in his cold stare, gaunt face, somber dress, and indifference to personal hygiene. Mirror was
one of the living dead. Malark's unfailing good cheer in the face of every hardship and horror the war could unleash sometimes verged on the demented. Yet Aoth felt a bond with them all. They'd all but been to the Hells and back together.
Aoth, Bareris, and even Mirror, in his inscrutable fashion, served as soldiers in the service of Nymia Focar, tharchion of Surthay. But Malark was spymaster to Dmitra Flass, governor of Eltabbar and zulkir of the Order of Illusion since Szass Tam slew her predecessor. Thus it was rare for all four of them to gather in the same place at the same time with the leisure to devote to any sort of reunion.
But it had happened a few days earlier, after some secret business brought Malark to Nymia's palace. When word came that the enemy in the north had sent another menace to stalk the countryside, Aoth had suggested that, in lieu of the usual patrol of griffon riders or horse archers, the foursome fly out and hunt down the threat themselves.
He'd hoped the diversion would lift him out of the brooding glumness that had afflicted him of late. But it seemed to have the opposite effect.
"Shake it off," Brightwing growled. She'd sensed the tenor of his thoughts. "This isn't the time to mope. A cluster of houses lies up ahead. The thing—or things—we're hunting could well be down there."
"I suspect you're right." He pointed his spear at the ground, signaling his companions to descend.
They made a wary, swooping pass over the village. "I smell fresh blood," Brightwing said, "but I don't see anything moving."
"We'll have to land to determine what's what," Aoth said.
"You could just throw spells and burn the whole place from the air." The griffon snorted. "But you won't. Not when there could be survivors."
"And not when there might be something to learn. Set down
in front of the biggest house. The one with the carvings on the corners of the eaves."
She did as he'd bade her, touching down lightly in the snow. His companions followed, although Malark's dappled mare was reluctant, whickering and tossing her head. After dismounting, he murmured to her, and she wasted no time galloping back up into the air.
"That's a bit reckless," said Aoth.
The spymaster shrugged. "If I kept her on the ground, she'd become more and more nervous, and less tractable. She'll come if I whistle. Now, how about a light?"
"Why not?" Aoth replied. "Since Brightwing says the enemy already knows we're here, I don't see much point in trying to sneak around." He exerted his will, and the head of his spear flared yellow. The radiance was as bright as sunlight, anathema to most undead, although it never troubled Mirror. He could move around even in real daylight without harm.
The glow revealed doors smashed open, and a confusion of marks and footprints in the snow.
Bareris squatted to examine the signs. "Skeleton tracks."
"Well, then." Malark unsheathed the oak batons he wore strapped to each thigh. A blue gleaming flowed down the lengths of polished hardwood, a sign of the enchantments within. "I was hoping for something more interesting, some new creation from your old friend Xingax, but we'll have to make do."
The mention of Xingax gave Bareris a spasm of hatred and self-loathing, for it was the aborred demigod who'd transformed his beloved Tammith into a vampire. Not long after, he'd come face to face with the hideous fetal creature but had
botched the job of killing him. But then, he'd always failed when it mattered most.
"It might be more than skeletons," said Aoth. His coat of mail clinked as he stooped to examine the ground. Most wizards found their spellcasting hindered by armor, but war mages like the swarthy, stocky Aoth, who looked like a humble Rashemi despite his claim to have come from Mulan stock, trained to overcome the limitation. "Look here. Some of the farmers ran out of their houses. They made it this far, then the tracks end in a great muddle, as if something magical sprang up and destroyed them."
"Or something big dived down on them from the air," Bareris said. "It's curious there are no corpses, just the occasional spatter of blood. It's likely the enemy carried its victims away, possibly for reanimation."
"I agree," Malark said. "Here's a spot where it looks as if a pair of skeletons hauled away a body."
"We don't know that it was a dead body," Aoth said. "They may be taking prisoners, and we may be in time to save them. Come on." Glowing spear at the ready, he stalked forward, following the trail Malark had indicated. His companions prowled after him. Brightwing and Vengeance, Bareris's griffon, padded out to guard the flanks of the procession. For a time, Mirror appeared as a wavering, murky parody of Malark, with a cudgel sketched in shadow in both fists, but then the weapons melted into a sword and targe.
The trail led to the hamlet's little cemetery. So did other sets of tracks. Nothing was moving there, but something had torn open all the graves, leaving black, ragged wounds in the frozen earth, toppling markers, and scattering bones.
"I guess," Malark said, "we need to look in the graves. Unless the skeletons and others have moved on, I don't know where else they could be."
They crept forward. Bareris realized his mouth had gone dry, and he swallowed hard to moisten it.
Several paces inside the desecrated space, slumped at the edge of an open grave, he discovered a mass of torn, bloody flesh clad in peasant clothing. At first glance, it looked like a farmer, but something was wrong with its mangled shape. Bareris lifted one of its arms, saw it flop and sag, and then he knew. Something had pulled out all its bones.
That might explain why so many bones were lying around, more than the open graves could have contained. But no, actually even the mutilation of all the locals couldn't account for it—bones lay everywhere. It had simply been difficult to mark their true plenitude amid the heaps of dislodged earth and snow.
Bareris frowned. He didn't understand what he was looking at, and that frequently meant he'd blundered into serious trouble. He drew breath, about to suggest that he and his companions withdraw, and then several skeletons scrambled up from the concealment afforded by the open graves.
Bareris shouted, and his thunderous bellow, charged with bard's magic, blasted one of the skeletons to scraps and splinters.
Aoth hurled a fan-shaped blast of fire from the head of his spear and burned an opponent to ash.
A skeleton swung a warhammer at Mirror, and the weapon passed harmlessly through his insubstantial form. Mirror struck back with his sword. His blade passed through the undead warrior's fleshless body without cleaving any bones, but the foxfire sheen in the creature's eye sockets guttered out, and its legs collapsed beneath it.
Malark positioned himself in front of a skeleton, inviting an attack. The creature swung its axe at his neck. He slipped out of the way, shifted in, and rapped the skeleton's skull with one of
his batons. The yellowed cranium, naked except for a few lank strands of hair, shattered.
Beating their wings, the griffons pounced, each bearing a skeleton down beneath a snapping beak and slashing talons.
Clattering sounds reverberated across the cemetery. The loose bones leaped up from the ground and tangled themselves together into something not unlike a wicker sculpture. In a heartbeat, they became a colossal serpent, its tail looping around the perimeter of the graveyard as if to cage its prey.
It reared its head high, then struck down at Bareris.
He hurled himself to the side. His foot slid in a patch of snow and he fell. The serpent's fangs—blunt knobs of bone that would not pierce but would surely crush—clashed shut on empty air.
It swiveled its misshapen head and opened its jaws to bite again. Bareris scrambled to regain his feet, too slowly.
With an earsplitting screech, Vengeance plunged out of the air to land on the serpent's head. Pinions flapping, he hooked his talons into the spaces between the bones and caught a mass of them in his beak. His neck muscles bunched beneath his feathers as he strained to bite through.
The serpent tossed its head, shaking the griffon loose from his perch, and caught him in its jaws. The pressure burst Vengeance's body open as if he were a ripe piece of fruit. With a ghastly sucking sound, the bones slid out of his body, rattled dowiv the serpent's gullet, and snapped into spaces along its body, adding to its mass.
Bareris's lips drew back in a snarl, for Vengeance had been a good mount, steady and loyal. The bard rose, readied his mace, and started singing.
The slithering, clattering wall that was the serpent's body slid past Malark, and he considered how best to attack it. He despised the undead for the abominations they were and fought them at every opportunity, always hopeful that this time, his foe might kill him. Death was a gift—one he had long ago spurned by armoring himself against the ravages of age and becoming an abomination in his own right. Since that time, he sought to atone for his folly by honoring the greatest of all powers. One day, perhaps, the multiverse would deem his service sufficient. Then, despite the formidable combat arts he had learned from the Monks of the Long Death, a blade or arrow would slip past his defense, and he could pass into the darkness.
Striking with one hand, then the other, swinging his batons like a demented drummer, he battered the creature's flank. Bones cracked and snapped with every stroke, but he couldn't see if the creature was weakened. Sorcery might be the only thing that could destroy the snake. If so, the best tactic might be to hold the serpent's attention, buying Aoth and Bareris the chance to cast their spells without interference.
He scanned the wall of bone, found his bearings, and sprinted toward the creature's head, bounding over open graves on his way. Armed with a scythe, a surviving skeleton rushed in on his flank. Malark broke stride, leaped high into the air, and kicked to the side, driving his heel into the creature's neck. The attack shattered the skeleton's spine and its head tumbled free. Then the spindly figure fell to pieces, and its bones flew through the air to integrate into the snake. Malark ran on.
As he neared its head, he heard Bareris singing. The tune was mournful, dirgelike, but it sent a thrill of fresh vitality through Malark's limbs.
Bareris had managed to lay an enchantment on himself, and he flickered in and out of view. Malark knew his friend was solid one moment, but not the next. With luck, he'd be safely
intangible if the snake's fangs slammed shut on him. But that was not a certainty, so he dodged when his colossal adversary struck at him, and pounded back with his mace.
Mirror was intermittently visible as well. Taking advantage of his lack of a solid foe, he was trying to attack the interior of the serpent's body, and was alternately inside and out as the creatures mass writhed back and forth.
Aoth chanted the words of an incantation, spun his glowing spear through mystic passes, and the snake's head swiveled toward him. Plainly it was intelligent, but then, Malark had already guessed that, because it had laid a trap for them. It, had lured its foes into striking distance before manifesting, and had choosen ground where the yawning graves might keep them from maneuvering to their best advantage.
Aoth leaped backward, evading the attack and carefully preserving the precise cadence his chant required. A sphere of bright white light shot from the luminous head of his spear. It struck the snake on the snout and exploded into twisting, crackling arcs of lightning.
The attack charred the serpent's head, but caused no noticeable injuries. It reared for another strike.
Completing his dash, Malark interposed himself between the creature and Aoth. "Get up in the air," he called out. "Bareris, stay away from it. Mirror and I will keep it occupied."
Aoth shouted Brightwing's name, and the griffon, who'd already taken to the air and had been wheeling overhead, maneuvering to make an attack, furled her pinions and dived toward her master. Bareris scrambled backward, his head twisting as he sought to keep his eyes on his foe without falling into one of the graves.
Malark lost track of his allies after that, because the snake spread its jaws wide and lunged at him. He had to hold his attention on his adversary. It was his only hope of survival.
He forced himself to delay his dodge, lest the serpent adjust its aim. He waited until the last instant, then spun to the right. The creature's jaws smashed shut beside him.
Malark bellowed a war cry, slammed the serpent as hard as he could with a baton, and bashed a substantial breach in the weave of bones beneath the jagged-edged eye socket. Apparently, Aoth's lightning had weakened the tangled lattice, allowing the baton to inflict significant harm.
The serpent finally reacted almost like a living creature, jerking its head away as though the strike had caused actual pain.
"That's right!" Malark called. "I'm the one who can hurt you the worst! Fight me!"
The snake obliged him with a few more attacks, which gave Bareris time to sing a spell unhindered. A shuddering ran down the length of the snake, breaking certain bones and shaking others loose from the central mass.
The serpent's body twisted around as it oriented on Bareris. Malark had to move quickly to keep the bony coils from knocking him down and grinding him beneath them. The movement left him yards away from the creature's head, with little hope of diverting it from the bard.
Then Mirror flew up from the ground to hover right in front of the serpent's face. His ghostly sword sliced back and forth.
The snake tried to catch him in its teeth, while Bareris sent shudders and convulsions tearing through it, and Malark battered it with his cudgels. At first, Mirror either dodged the creature's bite or oozed free unharmed. But then the colossal jaws clamped down again, and the malignancy of the snake's own supernatural nature finally overcame the protection afforded by the ghost's phantasmal condition. Mirror fell from the gnashing teeth tattered, fading, dwindling, and incapable of continuing the fight. Bareris cried out in dismay.
Overhead, Aoth chanted words of power. For the first time,
Malark felt truly confident that he and his companions would prevail. War magic won battles more often than not, provided the war mage positioned himself out of reach of the foe and conjured unimpeded.
With a great clatter, the serpent arched itself and hurtled up into the air. Malark had forgotten their earlier guess that their quarry might be capable of flight.
Aoth and Brightwing had evidentally lost sight of the possibility as well, for they were flying low, and the griffon took a heartbeat too long to start swooping out of the way. It looked to Malark as if the serpent would snag her in its jaws.
Bareris gave a thunderous shout. The noise jolted the snake, and its strike missed.
Aoth bellowed the final words of his incantation. An orb of mystical force, glowing a dull blue, flew from his outstretched hand. It struck the serpent like a stone from a trebuchet, and with a prodigious crack, broke it entirely in two. The sections collapsed, and Malark raised a hand to shield his head from the rain of bone.
He watched to see if the serpent would reassemble, but couldn't detect even a slight twitch. The thing looked utterly destroyed.
Aoth and Brightwing glided back to earth. The rents in Mirror's substance began to mend, and his vague form took on definition. He was going to be all right.
"What's the proper term for that thing?" Malark asked. "A living bone yard?"
"I don't know," said Aoth. "I've never heard of such a beast before. The necromancers' creations grow stranger every year."
"Well, the important thing is that we won."
Aoth's mouth twisted. "Did we? The peasants are dead. Will anyone else come and work this isolated, poorly protected patch of land and feed us in the coming year?"
"They'll dare it if someone in authority orders them to. What
ails you, friend? I thought Bareris was the gloomy one." Malark gave the bard a wink, which he didn't bother to acknowledge.
"I just...." Aoth shook his head. "Mirror isn't the only one. We're all ghosts. Ghosts of the men and lives that ought to have been."
"How do you mean that?"
"I don't know," said Aoth, "but sometimes I feel it."
chapter o^e
26-29 Ches, the Year of Blue Fire
H ezass Nymar, tharchion of Lapendrar and Eternal Flame of the temple of Kossuth in Escalant, drew breath to conjure, then hesitated. What, he thought, if the lich or his spies are watching me at this very moment? Or what if the lords of the south disbelieved his statements, or chose to kill him on sight, without even granting him a hearing?
He scowled and gave his head a shake, trying to dislodge his misgivings. Yes, it was dangerous to act, but it might well prove even more perilous not to. He wouldn't let fear delay him now.
He recited the incantation, the ruby ring on his left hand glowed like a hot coal, and the dancing flames in the massive marble fireplace roared up like a bonfire, completely filling their rectangular enclosure. Hezass walked into the blaze.
Without bothering to look back, he knew that the four archer golems would follow. Carved of brown Thayan oak with longbows permanently affixed in their left hands, the automatons
were Hezass's favorite bodyguards, in part because they were incapable of tattling about his business no matter what persuasions were applied.
Beyond the gate he'd opened lay an entire world of flame. The air was full of cinders, the sky, nothing but swirling crimson smoke. Fires of every color hissed and crackled everywhere, some as tiny as blades of grass, some the size of shrubs or trees, and some as huge as castles or even mountains, without the need for fuel to feed them. The yellow ground was an endless glowing furnace with streams of magma running through it. Birds or something like them flew overhead, a herd of four-legged beasts stood on a rise in the distance, and even they were made of fire.
The extreme heat would have seared flesh and ignited oak instantly, except that Hezass's power protected him and the golems. Indeed, he found this realm exhilarating, and had to take care lest that excitement swell into a delirious joy that could make him forget his purpose.
He walked until the prompting of his spell pointed him toward a patch of blue-white fire the size of a cottage. He led the golems into it and out the other side.
As he'd expected, the other side was one of the scores of ceremonial fires burning behind the altars of the Flaming Brazier, the grandest temple of Kossuth in all Faerun. Eyes glowing, shrouded in nimbuses of incendiary power, images of the god glared from the walls and the high vaulted ceiling.
Despite the lateness of the night, it didn't take long for a Disciple of the Salamander, a warrior monk performing sentry duty, to discover Hezass while making his rounds. In other circumstances, the exchange that followed might have been comical, for the poor fellow plainly didn't know whether to react with hostility or deference. Hezass was a supposed enemy of the Council of Zulkirs and all who gave it their allegiance, but he
was also a hierophant of the church, decked out in all the pomp of his formal regalia.
Fortunately, it was easy for the disciple to resolve his dilemma. He only had to do as Hezass requested and fetch Iphegor Nath.
The High Flamelord arrived with a handful of monks in tow. He was a tall man with craggy, commanding features. His muscular physique, the uncanny glow of his orange eyes, and the tiny flames that crawled on his shaved scalp and shoulders all combined to make him resemble the traditional depiction of the deity he served. His simple attire stood in marked contrast to Hezass's gemmed and layered vestments, for, most likely roused from his bed, he'd only taken the time to pull on breeches, sandals, and a shirt.
Hezass dropped to his knees and lowered his eyes. Iphegor let him remain that way for a long time.'
Finally, the High Flamelord broke the silence. "You realize, I'm going to drown you."
Inwardly, Hezass winced. "Drowning is the traditional punishment for an apostate, Your Omniscience, and thus inappropriate for me. I walked through the god's domain to come here. How could I do that if I'd renounced my priesthood?"
"You renounced the church," Iphegor growled. "You renounced me."
"With all respect, Your Omniscience, that is incorrect. I freely acknowledge your supreme authority ... in matters of theology. The matter of who should govern Thay is a political question."
"And your answer is—the creature whose treachery slew scores of the Firelord's priests."
"I confess, I made an error. I've come here to rectify it."
"By sneaking an armed force into the temple."
"What, these?" Hezass waved his hand at the golems standing like statues behind him. "They have their uses, but it's laughable to think that four of them could prevail against all
the magic and armed might protecting the Flaming Brazier. I simply wanted to present myself with the dignity an escort affords. Now, do you truly intend to keep me on my knees for the entire parley, and to conduct it in the hearing of these good monks? I'm sure they're pious and loyal, but even so, it would be indiscreet."
"Get up," Iphegor said. "We can talk in the chapel over there. Leave your puppet bowmen outside, and I'll do the same with the monks."
A statue of Kossuth bestowing the gift of fire on humanity dominated the shrine. The golden light of votive fires gleamed on the crimson marble. In the mosaic on the wall, the god presided over a court of red dragons, efreet, and other creatures whose natures partook of elemental flame.
"So," Iphegor said, seating himself on a bench, "how do you propose to atone for your sins?"
Since the High Flamelord hadn't given him leave to sit, Hezass remained standing as he explained his proposal.
When he finished, Iphegor stared at him for several heartbeats, until Hezass, who'd just negotiated the Plane of Fire without discomfort, felt sweat starting to ooze under his arms. Finally, the big man said, "You string words together as glibly as ever. But after all the lies you've told over the past ten years, how can you possibly expect anyone to believe you?"
"I've already explained that my link with our god remains intact. How could I not desire reconciliation with the head of my faith?"
Iphegor snorted. "How many times have I offered my forgiveness, only to have you wipe your arse on it by slinking back to Szass Tam? I've lost count."
"I confess. I've maneuvered for power and wealth. I've put my own welfare ahead of every other concern, doing whatever seemed necessary to survive amid a war of wizards. Which makes
me no worse than many other nobles and officials in Thay. But I know that's not the man I want to be. I want to be steadfast and honorable and worthy of the god we serve."
"That would be inspiring if I thought you meant it."
Hezass sighed. "If you can't believe I've had a change of heart, perhaps you'll credit this. The Council currently occupies a goodly portion of eastern Lapendrar. I'd like those lands back, and in reasonable condition."
"And you doubt Szass Tam's ability to recover them?"
"He may succeed, or he may not. Even if he does, I don't approve of the way he's conducting the war. I understand the strategic points of causing flood and drought, slaughtering peasants, and poisoning the soil, rain, and streams. Since his legions are largely undead, the resulting scarcity of food hurts his enemies more than it injures him. But what will be left of the realm after he wins? I don't want to live out my days as the pauper governor of a ruined province. I want the old Thay back!"
Iphegor grimaced. "As do I. So I'll tell you what I'll do. I still don't trust you, but I will ask the Council to listen to your blandishments. They can make up their own minds about you."
Aoth steeled himself for an ordeal. When convening for a council of war, the zulkirs sometimes commanded the attendance of their tharchions, whisking them to the site of the meeting by magical means. The military governors, in turn, made it a habit to bring a trusted lieutenant or two, which meant Nymia Focar occasionally dragged Aoth along.
He supposed he should be used to it, but after all these years, he never felt fully at ease in the presence of the notoriously cruel and capricious wizard lords. It didn't help that, of everyone in the hall, with its long red wooden table and jeweled crimson banners
hanging from the rafters, he was the only person who didn't look like a proper Mulan.
Still, the zulkirs probably deserved commendation for possessing the prudence to seek advice, especially considering that the council was less than it once had been. Not that there was any real shortage of intelligence. The bloated Samas Kul, shrewish Lallara, clerkish Lauzoril, glowering Nevron with the brimstone stink emanating from his person, and the comely Dmitra Flass were as shrewd as anyone could wish. But Kumed Hahpret, who'd succeeded the murdered Aznar Thrul as zulkir of Evocation, and Zola Sethrakt, representing what little remained of the necromancers after Szass Tam suborned most of the order to fight on his behalf, had proved to be less impressive intellects than their predecessors. And the chair once occupied by the traitorous Yaphyll sat empty. The Order of Divination hadn't yet elected a leader to replace her.
Aoth stiffened when Iphegor Nath ushered Hezass Nymar into the chamber. The fire priest's faithlessness had, on more than one occasion, cost the Griffon Legion good men and mounts. But Aoth couldn't vent his anger in such an assembly, at least not yet. He had to sit quietly while Hezass spoke his piece.
When the whoreson finished, the zulkirs sent him out of the room under guard. "Well," said Dmitra, who often acted as presiding officer, to the extent that the other haughty zulkirs would tolerate, "what do you think?"
"Question him under torture until he dies of it," Lallara said. Powerful as her magic was, the zulkir of Abjuration could easily have erased the outward signs of advancing age, but had instead allowed time to cut lines and crow's feet and loosen the flesh beneath her chin. It made her bitter manner all the more intimidating.
Dmitra smiled. "That's my first impulse, also, but I wouldn't
want to waste a genuine opportunity. Your Omniscience, what's your opinion? What game is Nymar playing this time?"
Iphegor frowned. "Your Omnipotence, I wish I knew. Much as it irks me to admit it, he hasn't lost his connection to the Lord of Flames. He's still a priest, and it's possible he wishes to mend his quarrel with me, just as he asserts. In addition, I find his claim that he only ever served Szass Tam to achieve a life of opulent wealth, and that he fears that such an existence is slipping forever beyond his reach, to be plausible. Still, there's no disputing the man's a treacherous worm. Who knows where his allegiance really lies, or where it will reside tomorrow?"
"Not I," said Samas Kul. If Hezass was in fact motivated by avarice, he ought to sympathize, for, taking full advantage of his position as Master of the Guild of Foreign Trade, he'd made himself the richest man in Thay even before his ascension to leadership of the transmuters. His red robes reflected the fact, for they glittered with more gems and precious metal than any of the other costly attire on display in the chamber. Unfortunately, even the finest raiment couldn't make his obese, sweaty, ruddy-faced form attractive.
Lauzoril pursed his lips and pressed the fingertips of his hands together to make a pyramid. "The important question," the zulkir of Enchantment said in his dry tenor, "isn't whether Hezass is a scoundrel, but whether his information is accurate. If so, then as Dmitra Flass observed, we may have a chance to win a meaningful victory at last."
"I concur," Nevron said, scowling so fiercely that anyone who hadn't heard his words might have assumed he disagreed. A number of his tattoos took the forms of hideous faces, the countenances of the demons and devils that, as a master conjurer, it was his particular art to command. "Szass Tam descends from the heights to lay siege to the Keep of Sorrows. We swing an army in behind him. They'll be the hammer, and the castle and the
edge of the cliffs, the anvil. We'll pound the necromancers, and they won't be able to retreat."
"You can't count on Nymar to bring the troops he pledges," Samas said. "He'll keep them in their garrisons to protect the lands he still holds, and afterward, claim sickness in the ranks prevented them from marching. Or else, that his scouts reported Aglarondan troops maneuvering on the western border, and he had to leave his men in place to protect against a possible invasion. He's done it before."
"I remember," Dmitra said. "He doesn't much care to ride heroically into battle, does he? But if we can prevail on him to bring his army as far as the western bank of the River Lapendrar, to make certain Szass Tam can't maneuver in that direction, that in itself would be a help."
"Right," Nevron said. "We can do the real work ourselves, if we commit enough of our own strength."
Samas responded, as well as Lallara, in much the same vein. Before long, it became clear to Aoth that, without bothering to say so overtly, the zulkirs had decided on a strategy. Now they were discussing how best to implement it.
Aoth gnawed his lower lip. In theory, he and the zulkirs' other subordinates were present to provide their opinions, and he would have preferred to hold his tongue until someone specifically asked for his perspective. But it didn't seem that any of the mage lords meant to do so.
Wishing he were somewhere else, he cleared his throat. "Masters?"
The zulkirs all turned to regard him, some more coldly than others, but none with extraordinary warmth. "Yes, Captain?" Dmitra said.
"I think," said Aoth, "we should evaluate Hezass Nymar's claims carefully, and not just because he's a known traitor and liar. I realize that many of you have magic to determine
whether a man is speaking the truth as he understands it, and I imagine you've applied those tests in this instance. But on the face of it, the scheme he's attributing to Szass Tam makes little sense."
"Why?" Nevron asked. "The Keep of Sorrows is an important fortress. If he takes it, it will be far easier for him to strike into Tyraturos, and if he's successful there, it opens the High Road for incursions into Priador."
"Yes, Your Omnipotence," said Aoth, "//"he's successful. But the keep is generally considered impregnable, or nearly so. Until now, Szass Tam has only undertaken major battles and sieges under conditions advantageous to himself. Most of the time, he picks away at us, raiding, burning crops and granaries, killing a few folk here and there to raise as zombies and swell the ranks of his legions. He's been slowly tipping the balance in his favor, as if-—as Hezass Nymar suggested—he doesn't care how long it takes to win, or what condition the realm is in when he does. Why, then, would he suddenly change tactics and commit his troops to such a reckless venture?"
"Because he's grown impatient," Lallara said, "and made a mistake. The wretch isn't infallible, whatever you and fools like you may imagine."
Aoth glanced at Nymia Focar in the forlorn hope that his superior would support him. She was an able warrior and capable of seeing the sense in what he was saying. But, as he expected, she gave him a tiny shake of her head, warning him to desist. The motion made the silver stud in her left nostril flash with a gleam of lamplight and the rings in her ears clink faintly.
He wished Malark were present. Dmitra often heeded his opinion, but hadn't seen fit to bring him. Perhaps he was busy with some other task.
Milsantos Daramos might also have spoken on Aoth's behalf, for the former tharchion of Thazalhar had been both
the canniest and the bravest Thayan general in recent memory. Unfortunately, he'd succumbed to old age three years back.
In the absence of such men and the counsel they might have offered, Aoth stumbled on alone. "I understand that the lich is capable of miscalculating. Everybody is. But I still worry that there's something about this situation we don't understand."
Samas grunted. It made him seem even more swinish, if that was possible. "You realize, Captain, that if the lich marches on the Keep of Sorrows, we have no choice but to defend it. Unless' you advocate simply opening the gates and surrendering."
Aoth clamped down hard to keep resentment from showing in his face or tone. "Of course not, Master. But the keep should be able to resist a siege for a considerable time. We needn't be in a hurry to commit the bulk of our forces to defend it, and we needn't look to Nymar for anything. We can proceed cautiously."
"And perhaps lose the castle as a result," Lallara rapped. "Perhaps even forfeit the opportunity to win the war."
"Which is something," Dmitra said, "we cannot afford. You said it yourself, Captain, more or less. Time is on Szass Tam's side. We must defeat him while we're still strong."
Aoth inclined his head. "Yes, Your Omnipotence. I understand."
Tammith Iltazyarra winged her way through the night sky as a flock of bats, the lights of Escalant shining below. The sea reflected Selune's crescent smile, and the haze of glittering tears that followed her, like an obsidian mirror. Tammith's inhuman senses registered the sea in somewhat the same way that a living person might discern the presence of a wall or cliff face looming close. She didn't merely see it, but felt it as a confining
pressure. It exerted a force upon her, because no vampire could cross open water.
Once upon a time, her transformation into a swarm of leathery-winged beasts would have significantly altered her consciousness. The human—or quasi-human—Tammith was prey to shame and regret, and the bats were not. But it had been a long while since such feelings troubled her in any of her various guises. She supposed that meant she truly was dead now, and she was glad of it. Existence was easier this way.
Their shrill cries echoing from roofs and walls to guide them, the bats flew into an alley, checked a final time to make sure no one was watching, then swirled together. In a moment, they merged to become a petite, dark-haired woman in a plain cloak and gown. In other circumstances, she would have worn a sword and mail, but she didn't feel vulnerable without them. Her most formidable weapons were always with her. Xingax, curse him, had seen to that.
She walked onward, through streets that were busy even after dark, because Escalant was a thriving port. Though under Thayan governance, it was a colony, geographically removed from the realm proper, and as a result, the zulkirs' war had yet to blight it. In fact, the contented faces, well fed and unafraid, the music and laughter sounding from the taverns, and the scarcity of soldiers reminded her of Bezantur as it had been when she was alive. Something stirred inside her, some vague approximation of melancholy or nostalgia.
Then the temple of Kossuth came into view, and she quashed the feeling, whatever it was, to focus on the task at hand.
Like all the Firelord's houses of worship, this one was a zig-gurat, built of blocks of cooled lava. Fires burned on either side of the door, on the terraces leading upward, and at the apex of the pyramid.
Tammith again felt a pressure, because the flames were the
sacred symbols of Kossuth, and although no priest was trying to use their power to repel her, there were plenty of them, and more holy force, concentrated inside the temple.
Still, since the ziggurat was a public place, it should be possible for her to enter. It would simply take spiritual strength and resolve.
As she advanced, Tammith fought the urge to lean forward as if she were struggling against a strong wind. Her skin grew hotter and hotter.
She stumbled as she climbed the steps to the entrance. Fortunately, the two warrior monks standing guard at the top didn't take any notice. Perhaps they were used to the sick and the lame hobbling up to pray to the god for healing.
Grimacing with effort, she forced herself across the threshold, and then the pressure and heat abated. Wherever she looked, more fires burned, altars stood piled with offerings, and images of Kossuth glowered at her, so the aversive sensations didn't vanish entirely. But it seemed that by coming this far and asserting her supremacy, she'd heightened her resistance. She should be able to bear the unpleasantness for a time.
She reached out with her mind, and the results were disappointing. The priests and monks evidently did a good job of waging war against rats, or perhaps the rodents simply found the pyramid with its hard stone walls and scores of open fires uncongenial. But every large structure provided a home for at least a few such vermin, and she summoned them to rendezvous with her as she prowled onward, doing her best to look like a worshiper heading for her favorite shrine or chapel.
The ruse lost its utility when she reached the staircase leading up. The higher reaches of the temple were closed to everyone but clerics and monks. Before continuing onward, another vampire might have become a bat or rodent to make himself less conspicuous. But Tammith could only transform into a
cloud of bats or a scurrying carpet of rats. Those guises were more likely to attract attention than a single human figure, and the same was true of a hulking wolf, or billows of mist flowing along in the absence of a breeze. Best, then, simply to slink on two feet.
The rats she'd collected on the first story scurried behind her. The eyes of a few more gleamed from the shadows on the level above. Somewhere in the ziggurat, a choir commenced a hymn, the sound of the nocturnal ceremony echoing through the stone chambers.
Fortunately, most of the temple's occupants were asleep. That fact and her talent for stealth allowed Tammith to reach the highest level and the antechamber of Hezass Nymar's personal apartments undetected. Shelves stuffed with ledgers and documents lined the walls. During the day, clerks would be hunched over writing desks, quills scratching. Petitioners and underlings would lounge on the benches, awaiting the high priest's pleasure. But at this time of night, no one was around.
But no. She was mistaken. Perhaps no person was here, but something was. She couldn't see it, but she suddenly sensed its scrutiny, its watchful expectation.
Perhaps it was a guardian creature, or some sort of unliving but sentient ward. Since it hadn't attacked or raised an alarm immediately, it might be giving her a chance to prove she belonged there. By speaking a password, or something similar.
"Praise be to Kossuth," she said. The odds were slim that she'd guessed correctly, but she couldn't see that she had anything to lose by trying.
Heat exploded through the chamber. Something hissed and a wavering yellow brightness splashed the walls. Tammith pivoted and saw the creature that had emerged from nothingness to destroy her.
It was a spider as big as a pony, with a body made of glowing
magma, with flame dripping from its gnashing mandibles. Its eight round eyes gave her a lidless, inscrutable stare.
This was bad. She'd spent the past decade battling every devil and elemental Nevron that the Order of Conjuration could raise, and had learned early on why it was difficult to fight entities like the spider. If she closed to striking distance, the heat emanating from its body would burn her to ashes.
Better to subdue the spider without fighting if she could. She stared into its row of eyes and willed it to cower before her.
Instead, it sprang. She leaped out of the way, snatched up one of the benches, and threw it. Tavern-style combat would make too much noise, but that couldn't be helped.
The bench smashed into the spider and clattered to the floor in burning pieces. One of the arachnid's legs dragged, twisted and useless. The injury didn't impair the creature's quick, scuttling agility, but it was a start.
Tammith scurried to grab another bench, keeping an eye on the spider lest it jump at her again. Instead, it reared onto its hind legs, exposing the underside of its body. Burning matter sprayed from an orifice in its abdomen.
The discharge spewed in a wide arc and expanded in flight to become a kind of net. Caught by surprise, Tammith tried to dodge, but was too slow. The heavy mesh fell over her and dragged her to her knees. Its blazing touch brought instant agony.
With burning, blackening hands, she struggled to rip the adhesive web away from her body. Another weight, far heavier than the mesh, slammed down on her and crushed her to the floor. Liquid fire dripping from its fangs, the spider lowered its head to bite.
She wasted a precious instant in desperate, agonized squirming, then realized what she needed to do. Focusing past the distractions of pain and fear, she asserted her mastery of her own mutable form.
Tammith dissolved into vapor. Even the lack of a solid body failed to quell the ache of her wounds, but the spider could no longer bite her, and its bulk and web couldn't hold her any longer. She billowed up around it and streamed to the other side of the room.
Given the choice, she might well have kept flowing right out the door. But although she was a captain in the legions of the north, she was also a slave, magically constrained to obey Xingax and Szass Tam. The latter had ordered her to accomplish her mission at any cost.
That would require slaying the spider, and she couldn't do it as a cloud of fog. She had to become tangible once again.
As she did so, she glanced at her charred hands and her arms where the sleeves had burned away. New skin was already growing, but not quickly enough. If the arachnid seized her again, it would likely hurt her so severely as to render her helpless.
She spun and scaled one of the bookcases, then released the shelves to cling to the ceiling. Intent on climbing up after her, her adversary raced across the floor.
She grabbed the bookcase and strained to heave it away from the wall. She could use only one hand and had no leverage, and for a moment, she feared that even her vampiric strength would prove insufficient. Then she felt the case's center of gravity shift, and it toppled.
It crashed down on top of the spider. She dropped after it, then jumped up and down to smash the arachnid's body. Layers of paper and wood insulated her from flames and the worst of the heat. At first, the wreckage rocked back and forth as the spider tried to drag itself out, but after several impacts, its struggles subsided.
Tammith grinned, and then something hit her like a giant's hammer. Her guts churned and her skin burned anew, glowing, on the brink of catching fire. She reeled back and Hezass
Nymar stepped from his apartments into the antechamber. She could barely make him out, for the man assailing her with the power of his priesthood stood shrouded from head to toe in Kossuth's fire.
Tammith ordinarily had a strong resistance to the divine abilities that most priests wielded against the undead. But Nymar was a high priest standing in his place of power, and she was already badly hurt. His righteous loathing ground at her flesh and mind.
She silently called to the rats, crouching in the shadows. She hadn't sought to use them against the spider. They would have burned to death in a heartbeat, most likely without the beast even noticing their presence. But maybe they could help her now.
The rodents charged Nymar and clambered up his bare feet and ankles, biting and clawing. He yelped, danced, and flailed, trying to dislodge them. It broke his concentration, and his nimbus of flame, along with Tammith's sickness and paralysis, vanished altogether.
Tammith rushed Nymar, grabbed him, and slammed him down on his back. The rats scurried away. She bashed the priest's head back and forth, pinned him, and showed him her fangs. She needed willpower to refrain from tearing her captive's throat out and guzzling him dry. She was still in pain, and such a meal would speed her healing.
"Please," he gasped, "this is a mistake. I'm on Szass Tam's side."
"No," she said. "You slipped away to betray him to the council. As he knew you would. As he intended." "I... I don't understand."
"Since you were sincere, you were able to win a measure of their trust despite your history of treachery. But now that your task is accomplished, it's time to cement your allegiance where it belongs."
"I swear by the holy fire, from now on, I truly will be loyal." "I know you will."
"You made too much noise! The monks are surely coming even now!"
"I know that, too. I can hear them. But by the time they arrive, I'll be gone, and you'll explain how an assassin tried to murder you, but you burned the dastard to ash. They'll have no reason to doubt you, as long as you hide the marks on your neck."
chapter two
16-29 Tarsakh, the Year of Blue Fire
The griffon rider came running to tell Bareris that some of the legionnaires were violating the patrol's standing orders. The soldier found his immediate superior in consultation with Aoth.
When the two comrades investigated, they discovered a griffon crouching outside the hut in question. No doubt its master had stationed it there to keep anyone from interfering with the mischief inside. Aoth brandished his spear at the beast and it screeched, lowered its white-feathered aquiline head, and slunk to the side.
Bareris tried the door. It was latched, so he booted it open.
The round dwelling was all one room, with a stove in the center, a loom to one side, and a bed on the far end. Their faces pulped and bloody, a man and a woman sprawled on the rush-strewn earthen floor. Two of the soldiers responsible were holding a sobbing, thrashing girl—Bareris put her age at twelve
or thirteen—spread-eagled atop a table. The third was tearing off her clothes.
The door banged against the wall and all three jerked around. Aorh could have simply snapped orders at the men, but he was too angry to settle for mere words. He lunged at one and struck with the butt of his spear. The ash haft cracked against bone and the man fell, tatters of skirt in his hand. The other two released the child and scrambled out of reach.
Aoth took a deep breath. "You know the rules. No looting except for what an officer gives you permission to confiscate, no beatings, and no rape."
"But that's provided the rustics are friendly," said the soldier on the left. "Provided they cooperate. These didn't."
"What do you mean?" asked Aoth.
The warrior picked up a clay bowl from the table. Somehow, it remained unspilled and unbroken. The legionnaire overturned it, and a watery brown liquid spattered out.
"The villagers are supposed to give their best hospitality to the zulkirs' troops," he said. "Yet this is what they serve us. This slop! Isn't it plain they're holding the good food back?"
Aoth sighed. "No, idiot, it isn't. Last year's harvest was bad, the winter was long and harsh, and they've barely had time to begin the spring planting. They'll go hungry tomorrow for want of the gruel they offered you tonight."
The griffon rider blinked. "Well... I couldn't know, could I? And anyway, I'm almost certain I heard one of them insult the First Princess."
"Did you now?"
"Besides," the soldier continued, "they're just peasants. Just Rashe—" It dawned on him that he might not be taking a wise tactic in light of his commander's suspect ancestry, and the words caught in his throat.
"The two of you," said Aoth, "pick up your fellow imbecile
and get out of here. I'll deal with you shortly." They did as instructed, and then Aoth turned to Bareris. "I trust you know songs to calm this girl, and to ease her parents' hurts."
"Yes," Bareris said. He applied the remedies as best he could, even though charms of solace and healing no longer came to him as naturally as they once had.
With the parents back on their feet and the girl huddling in her mother's arms, Aoth offered his apologies and a handful of silver. The father seemed to think the coins were some sort of trap, for he proved reluctant to accept them. Aoth left the money on the table on his way out.
"What's the punishment?" Bareris asked. As the miscreants' immediate superior, he was the one responsible for administering discipline.
"Hang the bastards," Aoth replied.
"You don't mean that."
"They deserve it. But you're right. Nymia would string me up if I executed two of her griffon riders just for mistreating a family of farmers, especially on the eve of a major battle. So five lashes each, but not yet. Let them sweat while you and I have a talk."
"As you wish." They'd already been talking when the soldier came to fetch them, but Bareris inferred that Aoth had something more private in mind. Sure enough, the war mage led him all the way through the cluster of huts and cottages. The men-at-arms watched as their officers tramped by.
Beyond the farmhouses were fields and pastures, which gave way to rolling grasslands that made up the greater part of Tyraturos. Bareris scrurinized the landscape stretched out beneath the evening sky, still banded with gold where the sun had made its farewell, and charcoal gray high above.
Earlier that day, they'd ascertained that the bulk of Szass Tam's army was marching well to the northwest, and it was
unlikely that even the lich's scouts and outriders had strayed this far from the main column. Still, it paid to be cautious.
Aoth led his friend to a pen made of split rails. It held no animals, only a scattering of leprous-looking toadstools. The war mage heaved himself up to sit on the fence, and Bareris climbed up beside him.
"Well," said Aoth. "Ten years since I discovered you and Mirror hiking out of the Sunrise Mountains."
Responding to his name, Mirror wavered into view. Maybe he'd been with them all along. For a moment, the phantom resembled the bard, then Aoth, and then settled into a blurred gray shadow that scarcely possessed a face at all. His presence chilled the air.
Aoth acknowledged the ghost with a nod. "Ten years since we started fighting Szass Tam." "Yes," Bareris said.
"Have you ever thought it might be time to stop?"
Bareris cocked his head. A strand of hair spilled across his eye and he pushed it up, noticing in passing just how matted and greasy it was. "I don't know what you mean."
"A griffon rider could be out of Thay before anyone even realized he'd decided to leave, and then, well, Faerun's a big place, with plenty of opportunities for a fellow who knows how to cast spells or swing a sword."
"This is just blather. You'd never abandon your men."
"We'll invite them to come along. Think how much a foreign prince will pay to employ an entire company of griffon riders."
"You must be tired if that unpleasantness back in the hut upset you as much as this."
"It wasn't that. At most, that was the last little weight that finally tipped the scale. Do you ever ask yourself why we're fighting?"
"To destroy Szass Tam, or at least to keep him from making himself overlord."
"And why is that important, when he has as much right to rule Thay as anyone ? When the lords who oppose him are just as untrustworthy and indifferent to anything but their own interests?"
"Because they aren't. Not quite, anyway. Don't you remember? We made up our minds on the subject back in that grove, when the necromancer came to speak with us."
"Yes, but over the course of a decade, a man can change his opinion. Consider this. Samas Kul cast his lot with the lich for a season or two. Yaphyll's allied with him now. Half the tharchions jump back and forth like frogs. By the Abyss, I doubt that even Nymia would stay loyal if she thought she'd fare better on the other side, and then where would you and I be with our preferences and principles?"
"It's more sensible," Bareris said, "to consider where you actually are. Our mistress and the zulkirs have treated you well. They've given you command of the Griffon Legion and purses full of gold."
"Things I never wanted. I was happy as I was. If they want to reward me, I wish it could be with their respect. Respect for my judgment and experience." Aoth shifted slightly atop the fence.
"Now I see. They offended you by rejecting your advice. But I'll be honest with you. It isn't plain to me that you were right and they were wrong."
"It isn't plain to me, either, but I feel it, just as I've sensed such things once or twice before. We believe we've out-thought the enemy, but we haven't. Something nasty is going to happen at the Keep of Sorrows, and I'd rather be far away when it does."
"You say that, but I know you're not a coward," Bareris said.
"You're right. I have my share of courage, or at least I hope I do. What I lack is a cause worth risking my life over. For a long while, I thought I was fighting to save the green, bountiful Thay of my boyhood, but look around you. That realm's already dead,
trampled by armies and poisoned by battle sorcery. I'm not a necromancer, and I don't want to waste the rest of my days trying to animate the rotting husk that remains."
"And neither should you," Aoth continued. "I understand why you fight—to avenge Tammith. But from all you've told me, she'd weep to see what your compulsion has made of you—a bard who never sings except to kill. I think she'd want you to lay down your grief and hatred and start life anew."
He's made up his mind, Bareris realized. He's going to saddle Brightwing and disappear into the sky, even if I refuse to go with him.
And that would be a disaster. Aoth had matured into one of the most formidable champions in the south. The cause could ill afford to lose him, and it certainly couldn't manage without all the griffon riders, who might well follow where their captain led.
Bareris would have to stop him.
"You know me too well," he said, infusing his speech with enchantment. "It is hate that drives me, and I won't pretend otherwise. But your judgment is too pessimistic where our homeland is concerned. What sorcery has broken, it can mend. Given a chance, the old Thay will rise again, blue skies, thriving plantations, mile-long merchant caravans, and all."
Aoth's eyelids fluttered. He gave his head a shake as if it felt muddled and he needed to clear it. "Well, it's possible, I suppose. But for it to flower again in our lifetime—"
"We need to win the war quickly," Bareris said, "before it further fouls the earth, water, and air, and further depopulates the countryside. I agree, the zulkirs agree, and that's why they intend to strike hard at the opening Szass Tam is giving them. You see the sense in it, don't you?"
"Yes," Aoth admitted, his speech ever so slightly slurred. "I do understand, just as I understand that they're cunning, and mine
is only one dissenting voice. It's just..." He seemed unable to complete his thought.
"If you understand, then help! Keep your oath. Stand with me and the rest of your friends. If we win, you'll share in the glory and all the good things that will follow. If we lose, at least you won't live out your life wracked with a betrayer's guilt, wondering whether your prowess might have meant the difference."
"Fastrin the Delver went mad," Mirror said in his hollow moan. Bareris jerked around, and Aoth did too, despite his light trance. Over the years, they'd grown used to the ghost hovering around, but he spoke so rarely that his utterances still tended to startle.
"He wanted to kill everyone," Mirror continued. "Some folk fought, some ran, and either way, it didn't matter. He got everyone in the end. But I'm glad I'm one who fought."
Bareris's mouth tightened in exasperation. The terse story agreed with the history Quickstrike the gravecrawler had once related, and almost certainly represented one of Mirror's rare glimmers of authentic memory, but that wasn't the point. Though the ghost appeared to be recommending courage, his story also implied that those who dared to cross archwizards like Szass Tam could anticipate only destruction. That moral seemed likely to bolster Aoth's doubts and so disrupt the influence Bareris was weaving.
But Aoth sighed and said, "I suppose I'd feel the same way. Death gets us all eventually, doesn't it? If not in the form of an ambitious lich or crazy warlock, then in some other guise. So you might as well stick by your comrades and follow the banner you've chosen no matter how ragged and faded it becomes."
Bareris's shoulders slumped with relief. Beneath that emotion was the hint of another—a vague, uncomfortable squirming that might have been shame—but it subsided quickly. "Now that's the Aoth I've known for all these years."
Aoth snorted. "Yes, Aoth the fool." His mail clinking, he slid off the fence. "Let's go back and get the flogging over with."
Perched on a mound at the edge of the sheer drop that was the First Escarpment, girt with a double ring of walls, the Keep of Sorrows had never fallen, and wise men opined it never could. Still, as Nular Zurn, the castellan of the granite fortress, stood on the battlements and studied the advancing host through his spyglass, he felt tense anyway.
It wasn't just the size of the besieging force, though it was huge, darkening the plain like a vast stain and flying the standards of every tharch and order of Wizardry, since Szass Tam claimed dominion over them all. Nor was it the knowledge that the lich himself was down there somewhere. What troubled him was the nature of the troops under his command.
Throughout its history, Thay had employed undead troops, the Zombie Legion, dread warriors, and the like. During his thirty-five years of soldiering, Nular had, of necessity, grown accustomed to such creatures. But he'd never seen so many gathered together, rank upon rank of withered and sometimes eyeless faces, and enclosed wagons shrouded in pockets of unnatural gloom carrying entities that could only move around between sunset and dawn. Although the host was still some distance away, the wind already carried its carrion stink, and he wondered how the lich's companies of living warriors could stand marching in the thick of it.
Nular glanced up and down the walkway. Lacking spyglasses, his own soldiers couldn't see the advancing army as well as he could, but they could discern enough to discomfit them. He could read it in their faces.
"Where's our hospitality?" he said, raising his voice sufficiently
to carry along the battlements. "Why do you stand mute when guests have come to call? Say hello!"
Its gray hide creased with scars and spittle flying from its mouth, a blood ore sergeant screamed an ear-splitting battle cry. In moments, all the ores joined in and the human warriors too, although the latter couldn't compete with their pig-faced comrades. Their shouts were all but lost in the din.
As the noise subsided, the company looked steadier. The sergeant turned to Nular. "Lord! The closest ones are in catapult range."
"I believe so," said Nular, "but wait." The zulkirs promised a swift resolution to the siege, but in case they were mistaken, he intended to use catapult stones, ballista bolts, and all other resources with care.
"Look!" someone shouted.
Nular peered outward again. Riding in from the west, a dozen horsemen galloped into the open space between Szass Tam's army and the keep. From their course, it was plain they rode for their lives, hoping to reach the latter.
Szass Tam's archers reacted within a moment or two, and arrows arced through the air. Nular expected to see men and horses fall, but instead, they simply popped like soap bubbles until only a pair of riders remained. The others, Nular realized, had been illusions intended to draw the enemy's attack.
More shafts flew at the real horsemen and their mounts, but glanced harmlessly away. The riders had a second defensive enchantment in place. Nular realized the fools might actually reach the keep. "Open a sally port!" he shouted.
Voices bellowed, relaying his command. Then a huge shadow soared up from a patch of darkness in the midst of the enemy host and flew toward the riders.
Nular had difficulty making out its shape, but it resembled a giant bat. "Shoot the thing!" he shouted. "Where are our spellcasters?"
Bows creaked, crossbows snapped, and arrows droned through the air. Several found their mark, but failed to penetrate the bat-thing's hide. It raced ahead of the horsemen and whirled around to face them. Mystical energy, visible as ripplings in the air, streamed down at them from its head.
Nular winced in anticipation of the horsemen's destruction, but they had another trick to play. Riders and mounts vanished and reappeared several yards closer to the castle. The leap whisked them out of the way of the creature's blast, which covered the piece of ground they'd just vacated in ice.
The shadow bat wheeled, seeking its quarries once again. Twisting in the saddle, one of the riders pointed a wand. Fire streamed from the tip of the weapon and splashed against the creature's wing. It convulsed and began to fall.
Then the beast spread its wings, arrested its plummet, and swooped toward the riders again. But by that time, the men were pounding through the sally port. Nular heard the small gate slam shut after them.
The bat flew high enough to peer over the outer wall of the keep. But if it thought to continue the chase, the sight of so many soldiers standying ready and the wizards and priests scurrying to aid them, must have discouraged it, for it wheeled and retreated toward the rest of Szass Tam's army. Legionnaires cheered and howled derision after it.
Nular descended the stairs to the courtyard. By the time he arrived, the newcomers had already dismounted, thrown back their cloaks to reveal the crimson robes beneath, and started drinking the cups of wine the grooms had brought them. They set the-goblets aside to greet Nular.
One rider was exceptionally pudgy for a Mulan, and a wand dangled from his belt. The other had sharp, haughty features and was missing the fingers on his right hand. Both were panting and sweat-soaked, with a gray cast to their skin.
"Masters," Nular said, "are you all right?"
"We will be," said the Red Wizard with the maimed hand. "The nightwing—the creature that chased us—moves in a kind of poison cloud, but now that it's flown away, the sickness will pass. My companion is So-Kehur, and I'm Muthoth. We're messengers from Hezass Nymar."
"He sent two," So-Kehur wheezed, "in the hope that at least one of us would make it past the enemy."
"What is your message?" Nular asked.
"The tharchion and his army have crossed the Lapendrar safely," Muthoth said, "less than a day's march to the north, and without the necromancers knowing about it. The governor will move in and strike when the time is right, in concert with the forces closing in from the north and east."
"I'm pleased to hear it," Nular said. In fact, he was astonished that the infamously unreliable Nymar had actually decided to commit his troops and person to battle. "And also honored to have you as my guests. Unless you're minded to try to slip past Szass Tam's army a second time."
"Thank you, no," Muthoth said. "We'll stay here where it's safe."
Dmitra Flass knew she wasn't the most powerful illusionist in Thay. She had her skill at politics and intrigue and her primary role in the opposition to Szass Tam to thank for her election as zulkir in the wake of Mythrellan's demise. Or perhaps, knowing that whomever succeeded Mythrellan would likewise receive the lich's homicidal attentions, no one else with any brains had wanted the job.
In any case, Dmitra was zulkir whether her arcane capabilities justified it or not, and only the zulkir, by virtue of the rituals that
had consecrated her ascension, could perform the task required of her now. Accordingly, she sat chanting in the dark, stuffy confines of the enormous rocking, creaking carriage—essentially a conjuration chamber on wheels—for bell after sleepless bell. A circle of her underlings recited with her, sending flickers of light, whispers and chiming, surges of heat and cold, baseless sensations and manifestations of unreality, dancing through the air. But those wizards were able to work in shifts. As the essential hub of a vast and intricate mechanism, Dmitra had to perform her function continuously.
That mechanism consisted of far more than the occupants of a single carriage. Other such coaches rolled among the marching legions of Eltabbar. Their positions would define a magical sigil if any flying creature gazing down from above had the knowledge and wit to connect them with imaginary lines. The entire fleet of wagons had its counterparts amid the armies of Tyraturos and Pyarados, all working as one to keep Szass Tam's scouts and soothsayers from discerning the foes advancing on their flank and rear.
Dmitra reached the conclusion of one lengthy incantation and drew breath to start another. Then someone touched her on the shoulder. She turned and saw Malark. For a moment, a stray wisp of illusion painted iridescent scales across his brow.
Careful not to unbalance the forces at play, she uncoupled her power from the structure she'd created. It could manage without her, but only for a little while. "Is it midday?" she asked, her throat raw and dry.
"Yes," Malark said, "just as you ordered." He offered her a goblet of water.
It was cold, a pleasant surprise given the army's current circumstances. Malark must have persuaded a wizard to chill it with conjured frost. She gulped it greedily.
"I also have food," the spymaster said. "Raisins, dried apricots, bread and honey—"
"I'll start with that." He proffered a silver tray. "Do we know," she continued after her initial bite, "whether all this effort is actually accomplishing anything?"
He shrugged. "My agents can't see any indication that Szass Tam knows we're creeping up on him, and the diviners say they can't, either. Since I don't practice their mysteries, I've little choice but to defer to their expertise. I imagine their opinion is reliable. After all, we have the entire Order of Illusion working in concert to do what you do best."
"You're right," she said, "that should suffice, but you don't know Szass Tam like I do. He's a genius, and a master of every school of wizardry. So can we really hide whole armies from him, or was that Rashemi griffon rider correct? Is this a feckless plan?"
Malark smiled. "Captain Fezim would be gratified that you recall his opinion, though chagrined to hear you call him Rashemi. But in response to your question, I can only say that in war, nothing is certain, especially when facing an enemy like Szass Tam. But brilliant though he is, you've always proven his equal in guile whenever it truly counted. So I trust your judgment, and think you ought to trust it, too."
"Thank you," she said, and felt a swell of affection. Collecting and evaluating intelligence was a demanding task, especially in the midst of an army on the march. She hadn't required that Malark attend to it and also ride alongside her coach to guard her while she was vulnerable, fetch her food and drink, and soothe her frazzled nerves. He'd volunteered for the latter duties, as he always did his utmost to assist her, and without wheedling for lands and lucrative sinecures like so many courtiers.
"Once we destroy Szass Tam," she said, "I'll make you a tharchion, or whatever else you want."
"Some people might object to that, considering I'm not Mulan, nor even a Thayan."
"Then they'll just have to choke on it, because I mean it—whatever you want."
He inclined his head. "You honor me, but let's discuss it after the war is over. Right now, all I truly want is to kill a great many of your enemies."
Aoth glanced around, making sure he knew where everyone was, as his command winged its way across a sky that was clear and blue for once. Bareris gave him a nod. Aoth felt a fleeting pang of hostility, and then wondered why.
"Because your eyes water every time he comes near," Brightwing said.
Aoth snorted. "You've been known to stink yourself."
"That's different. I'm an animal. I'm allowed. Do you resent him for persuading you not to desert?"
"No." A new thought struck him. "Do you? If I left, you'd enjoy a safer, more luxurious life, too. You could gorge on horseflesh every day."
The griffon laughed her screeching laugh. "Now you tell me! But no. You raised me to fight, and I wouldn't want to miss a battle like this. Look at them down there."
They were soaring high enough that Aoth had called upon the magic in one of his tattoos to ward off the chill. High enough that he could gaze down on them all—the legions of Pyarados, Eltabbar, and Tyraturos converging on the foe. They were visible to him because the same spell of concealment that cloaked them enshrouded him.
When he contemplated them, he reflected on how difficult it could be for even two companies to coordinate once separated by any distance. It seemed little short of miraculous that, marching through spring rain and mud, all the diverse elements of this
great host had managed to assemble in the right place at the right time to close the trap on Szass Tam. And on top of that, there was still no indication the lich knew they were coming.
As anticipated, the shield of illusion failed at the end. Aoth knew it when horns started blowing and living men and ores began shouting amid the necromancers' army. That force had arranged itself to threaten the Keep of Sorrows, and now companies scrambled to defend against the enemies who'd suddenly appeared in the opposite direction.
The southerners meant to hit them before they had the chance to form ranks. Their own bugles blew, their blood ores bellowed, and clouds of arrows blackened the air. Aoth brandished a spear, and the Griffon Legion hurtled forward.
A flat, leechlike undead known as a skin kite flew up at Aoth. Brightwing caught it in her talons and shredded it. Aoth rained lightning and flame on the massed foes on the ground, while Bareris sang noxious clouds of vapor and hypnotic patterns of light down into their midst. Their fellow riders shot arrows from the saddle.
"Beware!" Brightwing lifted one wing and dipped the other, turning, and then Aoth saw the danger—several yellowed, rattling horrors, reanimated skeletons of giant raptors, seeking to climb above them.
There were too many for the griffon to handle alone. Aoth pointed his spear at the closest and flung darts of emerald light from the point.
The knight was undead, its face a rotting skull inside its open helm. Its flying steed, with its night black coat, blazing eyes and breath, and hooves shrouded in flame looked demonic, but nonetheless alive.
If so, Bareris thought, it should be susceptible to enchantments that couldn't affect its master. Murder, his new griffon, maneuvered to keep away from it while he sought to sing it blind.
When the horse balked, jolting the corpse-knight in the saddle, he knew he'd succeeded. He sent Murder streaking at it.
The undead knight spurred its mount and hauled on the reins, but couldn't induce the sightless, panicked creature to move in any way useful for defense. Abandoning the effort, it braced its lance in both gauntleted hands and aimed to impale Murder as he closed.
Bareris leaned forward, swung his spear, and knocked his adversary's weapon out of line. Murder's talons stabbed deep into the black horse's body, and for a moment, they all fell down the sky together. Then the griffon pulled his claws free, lashed his wings, and flew clear. The knight and his destrier smashed into the ground.
Bareris cast about to locate the next threat. He couldn't find one. For the moment, the patch of air in which he and Murder had been fighting was clear of foes.
Good. He and Murder needed a chance to catch their breath. While they did so, perhaps he could figure out how the battle was progressing.
When he surveyed the battlefield, he decided it was going well. Hammered by flights of arrows and quarrels, by the devils and elementals of the conjurors and the firestorms and hailstones of the evokers, by sword and mace and spear, Szass Tam's battle lines were buckling, and his warriors had nowhere to retreat. Yielding to the pressure only moved them closer to the walls of the Keep of Sorrows, where the defenders maintained their own barrages of missiles and spells.
Ten years we've been fighting, Bareris thought, and by dusk it could all be over.
It should have been cause for rejoicing, but he felt empty. He Scowled and looked around for something else to kill.
To So-Kehur's relief, the keep's temple, with its altars to Kossuth, Bane, and an assortment of other deities, was empty of priests. No doubt they were all outside tending the wounded and casting maledictions on the undead.
Of course, even had the clerics been in attendance, it was unlikely they would have objected to So-Kehur visiting the shrine. When the defenders of the keep learned that a siege was imminent, they'd surely started watching for spies and scrying. But by entering the castle despite the northern army's supposed efforts to stop them, and then delivering good news, he and Muthoth had diverted all suspicion from themselves. As the castellan had promised, they were honored guests.
Still, some busybody might have found it odd if one of the newcomers showed an interest in the crypts. So-Kehur appropriated a votive candle and hurried down the stone steps, getting himself out of sight before anyone wandered in.
The wavering yellow candlelight revealed massive sarcophagi, the lids sculpted into the likenesses of those who rested inside. Slabs of marble graven with names, titles, and dates, with mottos, coats-of-arms, and the sentiments of the bereaved were mortared into the surrounding walls. Apparently no aristocrat had died in a while, for dust lay thick and cobwebs choked the walkways. The air smelled of dampness and decay. So-Kehur extracted the scroll Szass Tam had given him, unrolled it, and hesitated.
He wasn't afraid of the act he was about to perform for its own sake. He sometimes thought that his necromancy and the entities it summoned were the only things that didn't frighten him. But
once he cast the spells, everyone in the fortress would know him for the enemy he truly was. Everyone would do his or her utmost to slaughter him on sight.
But it didn't matter that he was afraid. He was mind-bound, and had no choice. The enchantment might not poison a man if he made an honest effort to carry out Szass Tam's orders and then gave up when the task proved impossible. The magic was subtler than that. But it would smite So-Kehur if he didn't even try.
He read the first trigger phrase on the vellum, releasing the spell contained therein. Stone grated and crashed as coffin lids slid open and marker stones fell away from the vaults behind them. So-Kehur winced at the racket, but doubted anyone would actually hear it. The battle raging outside the castle was even noisier.
He recited the second trigger. A cold breeze gusted, nearly blowing out his candle. The smell of decay thickened, and the spiders skittered in their webs.
A dead man sat up in his coffin. Another stuck his head out of a newly opened hole in the wall.
Some of the dead, more recently deceased or artfully embalmed, retained a goodly portion of their flesh. Others had deteriorated to mere rickety-looking skeletons, but it didn't matter. Infused with the power of necromancy, they could all fight, and many already carried swords and axes. As befitted knights and warriors, they'd been laid to rest with their weapons and armor.
Milky eyes fixed on So-Kehur. Empty, mold-encrusted orbits turned in his direction. The dead awaited his command.
"Range through the castle," he said, "and kill everyone you find, except for me and a man with the fingers missing on his right hand." The way Muthoth liked to insult and bully him, it would serve him right if the dead went after him as well. But
however obnoxious, the other necromancer had been So-Kehur's partner in desperate endeavors for a long time, and he was the only ally who could stand with him now.
Or at least the only one who thought and spoke and breathed.
Muthoth sat cross-legged on the floor of the bedchamber. He breathed slowly and deeply, from the belly. He sank deeper and deeper into his trance, deeper and deeper into himself, until he reached the cell or psychic cyst that caged the thing within.
So-Kehur had smuggled death into the Keep of Sorrows on a roll of parchment. Recognizing Muthoth as a more powerful necromancer and a stronger will, Szass Tam had chosen him to bring an even more terrible weapon to bear, and to carry it entombed in his own mind. At times the oppressive weight and the whisper of alien thought had nearly driven him mad, and he was eager to put an end to the torment.
Which didn't mean he could afford to rush. The entity was inimical to all life, but since it hadn't enjoyed being imprisoned any more than he'd enjoyed containing it, it now hated him more than anything else in the world. Accordingly, he recited the incantation of release, or rather, of transfer from one form of binding to another, with the utmost care.
The caller in darkness, as such abominations were known, howled up around him in that realm of concept and image they both occupied. The entity was a vortex of dark mist with anguished faces forming and dissolving inside it. Their shrieks pounded at him. They'd blast his mind apart if he let them, then tear the pieces out to add to the collective agony that was their source.
Steeling himself against the onslaught, Muthoth repeated the words of command he'd just recited. The caller recoiled from him, then vanished.
For an instant, Muthoth was confused, then he realized it had transferred itself to the physical plane. It hoped the surface of his mind would prove vulnerable to assault while his awareness was focused deep inside.
He hastily roused himself, suffered a fleeting illusion of extreme heaviness as his psyche fully meshed with his corporeal form. The demented ghost—or amalgam of ghosts—raved around him. It looked just as it had inside its quasi-imaginary dungeon, but its howls were silent now, albeit as palpable and hurtful as before.
He recited the spell a third time, and the caller flinched from him. Its power stopped beating at him, although the psychic howling didn't abate.
"Go forth," he panted, "and kill every living person you meet, unless I tell you otherwise." He intended to trail along behind the caller, where he'd be safe. He hoped that if the entity encountered So-Kehur, he'd spot his fellow necromancer in time to keep the thing from attacking. If not, well, the fat fool wouldn't be much of a loss.
Still, So-Kehur had a role to play. As the dead men he'd already roused proceeded with the work of slaughtering the garrison, he'd make new zombies of the fallen, just as Muthoth intended to reanimate the caller's victims. As the defenders' numbers dwindled, the ranks of their enemies would swell.
Xingax liked to ride on the shoulders of a hill-giant zombie. It made folk assume that a being who resembled an oversized, leprous, and grossly deformed fetus couldn't get around by
himself, and he liked being underestimated in that way. It gave him an edge when ill wishers sought to kill him.
Or rather, it had worked that way in the past, but he'd discovered that in the midst of a battle like this, his mount was a liability. Even at the center of the northern host, sticking up higher than the heads of the people around him increased the likelihood of being pierced by arrows or fried by flares of arcane energy. So now he simply floated in the air beside Szass Tam.
Xingax disliked the roaring, dangerous chaos that was warfare, and privately felt that he shouldn't have to endure it. He was an inventor, sage, and artist, not a brute. Thus, it galled him to recognize that he himself was responsible for his presence at the battle. After Bareris Anskuld had mutilated him, he'd repaired the damage with a hand and eye harvested from the body of the fallen nighthaunt Ysval, then learned to wield the abilities the grafts conferred. As a result, Szass Tam had incorporated him into his battle strategy.
The lich had created half a dozen hovering eyes, then sent them soaring up into the sky. Periodically he opened his mind to the sights the disembodied orbs beheld. It allowed him to oversee the progress of the battle as a whole. He signaled the end of such an interlude by pivoting toward Xingax.
"Is it time?" Xingax asked.
The lich smiled. "It is, indeed. Our enemies smell victory. They're pushing in hard, and that means they won't be able to disentangle themselves from us later on. So remember what I taught you, and use your power."
Xingax closed his natural, myopic eye so only Ysval's round white orb could see. He raised the nighthaunt's oversized, shadow black hand to the heavens, clenched the clawed fingers into a fist, and strained with all the considerable force of his will.
Responding to his summons, darkness streamed across the
sky. For the Keep of Sorrows, night fell early, and across the length and breadth of Szass Tam's army, wraiths and other fearsome entities exploded from the wagons, tents, and pools of shadow used to shield them from the light of day.
Tammith looked around. The horses stood ready, but she couldn't see any clear path along which she and her command might ride to engage the enemy.
Fortunately, the vampires of the Silent Company, made up largely of progeny Tammith had created over the years, had other ways of reaching the foe.
"We fly!" she called, then dissolved into bats. Her warriors each transformed into a single such creature. None of them had inherited her trick of breaking apart into an entire swarm.
She led her spawn over clusters and lines of combatants to a company of mounted knights. By the looks of it, they'd just finished butchering a band of ghouls.
The Silent Company dived at the southerners. Midway through her plummet, Tammith yanked her bats back into a single human body. It was a difficult trick and it hurt, but it was necessary, because her target wore plate armor and had his visor down. The bats wouldn't be able to hurt him.
She crashed into the knight, swept him from the saddle, and hurled him to the ground beneath her. The impact probably killed or at least crippled him, but she ripped the visor off his helm and drove her stiffened, mail-clad fingers deep into his head to be sure.
She sprang to her feet, found another target, and stared at his face. Addled by her hypnotic power, he faltered, giving her time to draw her sword. As she leaped up at him, his wits returned, and he swung his shield to fend her off. He was too slow, though,
and the point of her sword punched through his breastplate into his vitals.
Meanwhile, the other vampires attacked like lethal shadows, until all the riders were dead. Tammith looked around for new foes and saw the griffon riders wheeling and swooping overhead.
Since the Silent Company could fly, it could engage the zulkirs' aerial warriors—but no. By all accounts, Bareris was still alive, and had joined the Griffon Legion.
Of course, she didn't love him anymore. The predator she'd become was incapable of loving anyone. Sometimes she even hated him for failing her as he had.
But still: no. Now that the battlefield was dark, Szass Tam had other warriors capable of fighting in the air, and the Silent Company could find plenty of work to do on the ground.
Malark considered himself as able a combatant as any in Thay. He had, after all, had centuries of life to perfect his disciplines. But he couldn't use them to best effect standing in a shield wall or charging in a line. The philosopher-assassins of the Monks of the Long Death hadn't modeled themselves with those sorts of group endeavors in mind.
Thus he preferred to fight on the fringes of the battle, and found plenty of enemies to occupy him—skirmishers, warriors separated from their companies, and undead horrors so savage and erratic that even the necromancers mistrusted their ability to control them. Accordingly, they didn't even try, just shooed them off in the general direction of the zulkirs' army to rampage as they would.
He kicked an ore in the chest and burst its heart, then used his batons to shatter the skull of a yellow-eyed dread warrior. He
dispatched foe after foe, all the while exulting in the slaughter. Until the ground began to shake.
The first jolt knocked some warriors to the ground. Malark took a quick step to keep his balance, then glanced around to see what was happening.
On the plain to the north, entities huge as dragons heaved up out of the earth. Dirt showered away to reveal forms akin to those of octopi, but shrouded in moldy cerements. Vast black eyes glaring, tentacles clutching and churning the soil, they dragged themselves toward the rear of the legions of Eltabbar.
As he stared dry-mouthed at the colossi, Malark wondered if Szass Tam and Xingax had created them or unearthed them from some forgotten menagerie of horrors, and wondered too how the enemy had managed to bury them in the field beforehand without anyone in the Keep of Sorrows noticing. Well, caverns riddled the earth hereabouts, and from the first days of the war, the necromancers had employed zombies with a supernatural ability to dig. So perhaps they'd tunneled up from underneath.
Not that it mattered. What did was that the squid-things were about to smash and crush their way into Dmitra's soldiery like boulders rolling over ants, and that meant Malark's place was at her side. He sprinted toward the spot where the standards of Eltabbar and the Order of Illusion, both infused with magical phosphorescence, glowed against the murky sky.
Since the day he'd first sat on griffon-back, Aoth had loved to fly, but now, for an instant, he hated it and the perspective it afforded. He wished he didn't have such a perfect view of victory twisting into ruin.
Gigantic tentacles lashed and pounded, smashing the infantry and horsemen of Eltabbar to pulp. Those few warriors who
survived the first touch of the kraken-things' arms collapsed moments later, flesh rotting and sloughing from their bones. Meanwhile, strengthened by the creatures that had emerged with the premature night, the army assembled before the Keep of Sorrows counterattacked ferociously and started to drive the southerners back.
By rights, the castle's defenders should have fought to hinder that. They should have kept up a barrage of arrows and magic from the battlements, or attempted a sortie beyond the walls. But they'd stopped doing anything. Plainly, the necromancers had found a way to kill or incapacitate them.
Aoth felt a sudden surge of hope when the legions of Lapendrar appeared in the northwest. Maybe, driving in on the kraken-things' flanks, Hezass Nymar's men would have better luck fighting the behemoths than the soldiers they were pounding flat by the moment.
But it soon became clear from their maneuvering that they weren't inclined to try. Rather, in a betrayal that seemed the crowning achievement of his life of opportunism and disloyalty, Nymar meant to attack the southern host.
The object of the zulkirs' strategy had been to surround and trap Szass Tam. Now, with the lich's soldiers on one side, the squid-things on another, and the legions of Lapendrar on a third, their army was the one boxed in.
"And I could have gorged on horseflesh every day," Brightwing said.
Aoth managed a laugh, though it felt like something was grinding in his chest. "It sounds pretty good right now, doesn't it?"
"The other riders are looking to you," the griffon said. "They need orders."
Why? Aoth thought. The day is lost whatever we do. Still, they had a duty to fight until Nymia Focar or one of the zulkirs gave them leave to retreat.
"We attack Nymar," he said. "If we hit hard before his men can form up properly, maybe it will do some good." He brandished his spear, waving his men in the proper direction, and they hurtled across the sky.
Szass Tam knew he'd won the battle, and that meant he'd as good as won Thay, but it was no reason to let up. Any zulkirs who escaped might cause trouble later, delaying the start of his real work, to which all this fighting and conquering was merely the necessary prelude.
Of course, if they realized their cause was lost, it was possible they'd all whisked themselves to safety already. They certainly wouldn't tarry out of any misguided devotion to the doomed followers who lacked the same ability to make a magical retreat.
Still, he had nothing to lose by dropping his line in the water. He sent his magical eyes flying this way and that, swooping over the enemy army to locate his rivals.
And there was Dmitra, looking sweaty, pale, and exhausted. She'd wearied herself maintaining the shield of illusion that, she imagined, kept him from discerning the southern army's approach, and had cast many more enchantments during the battle. Nor was she done yet. Reciting hoarsely and whirling a staff, she meant to hurl fire at the undead kraken crawling in her direction.
SzassJTam summoned the Death Moon Orb inro his hand. The jet and magenta sphere was the size of an apple this time, as small as it ever shrank, but fortunately, its potency didn't vary with its size. He focused his will to wake its magic, then hesitated.
Because, at the end, the Death Moon Orb hadn't worked on Yaphyll. And these days, Dmitra, too, was a zulkir.
He snorted his misgivings away. He still didn't understand everything that had passed between Yaphyll and himself, but he didn't regard her resistance to the orb as part of the mystery. No charm of domination succeeded every time. Still, in its way, the artifact was the most powerful weapon in all his arsenal, and he had nothing to lose by trying it. If Dmitra proved impervious to its magic, he'd simply change tactics.
With a gesture and a spell, he placed an image of himself, complete with the orb, before her. A lesser wizard couldn't have used the sphere at such a distance, but Szass Tam believed he could, and while doing so, he'd be less vulnerable than if he'd moved his physical hody into the center of an enemy army, beleaguered and on the brink of rout though it was.
When she glimpsed his shadow from the corner of her eye, Dmitra pivoted to face him and continued her incantation. He, or his image, would be the target of the fire spell if he chose to let her complete it. He didn't. He held out the Death Moon Orb, and she staggered. Her staff slipped from her spastic fingers.
"It's all right," he said. "I should punish you for your betrayal, but I always liked you, and you were always useful. I'll make you a lich and then you can join the new circle of zulkirs I'm assembling to serve me. How does that sound?"
Her eyes rolled. Shuddering, she fumbled at her scarlet robe, seeking one of the hidden pockets and whatever talisman it contained. But she lacked the coordination to reach it.
Szass Tam concentrated, bearing down to crush what little capacity for defiance remained. "For now, you can help my leviathans slaughter your soldiers. Don't worry, the brutes won't strike at you if I don't want them to."
At that moment, squirming and shoving his way though the mass of panicky legionnaires, Malark Springhill lunged into view. Capitulating to Szass Tam's orders, Dmitra oriented on the spymaster and started chanting. Realizing she meant him harm,
Malark dropped into a fighting stance. He obviously hoped he'd be able to dodge whatever magic she was about to conjure.
Then, despite her skill and the coercive power of the orb, she faltered, botching the spell. Szass Tam didn't blame her. He, too, had frozen, as true wizards all across Faerun undoubtedly had. They sensed what had happened, if not how or why. Mystra, goddess of magic, had just perished, and with her death, the Weave, the universal structure of arcane forces, convulsed.
Corrupted by sudden chaos, the Death Moon Orb exploded in Szass Tam's grasp.
Aoth felt a shock so profound that for an instant it obliterated thought. He assumed, when he was once again capable of assuming anything, that some hostile priest or wizard had cast a spell on him. Yet he seemed unharmed. "Are you all right?" he asked his mount.
"Yes," Brightwing said. "Why wouldn't I be?"
"I don't know." But the whole world abruptly tasted wrong. He supposed it was because the combatants had unleashed too much magic that day, enough to scrape and chip at the fundamental underpinnings of matter, force, time, and space. Reality was sick with it, and a magic-user like himself could feel irs distress.
But reality and he would have to cope. The battle wasn't over.
The ground rumbled, heaving up and down like the surface of the sea. Some powerful spellcaster had apparently decided to conjure an earthquake, and as far as Aoth was concerned, it was a good idea. The tremors knocked down many of Hezass Nymar's warriors and threw their ranks into disarray. In flight, the griffon riders were unaffected.
"Kill them!" Aoth bellowed. Brightwing dived at Nymar. Aoth had been trying to get at the whoreson ever since their
two forces engaged, and now he saw his chance. His comrades plunged at other targets.
As Brightwing plummeted, talons outstretched, and Nymar scrambled to his feet and lifted his shield, Aoth noticed the scarf wrapped around the tharchion's throat. Suddenly he had a hunch why Nymar had switched sides again. It cooled his hatred, but didn't shake his resolve. The fire priest was still an enemy commander and still needed to die.
"Break off!" Bareris shouted, his voice magically amplified so everyone could hear. "Fly higher! High as you can!"
Brightwing flapped her wings and started to climb. Aoth turned this way and that, trying to determine what had alarmed his friend, then gasped.
A wall of azure fire, or something that resembled flame even though it burned without fuel, heat, or smoke, was sweeping across the ground, and across the army of Lapendrar, from the south. Aoth saw that it killed everyone it touched, but no two victims in the same way. Bones and organs erupted from a legionnaire's mouth as he turned inside out. One of Kossuth's monks dissolved in a puff of sparkling dust. A knight and his horse melted into a single screaming tangle of flesh. Nymar froze into a statue of cloudy crystal.
The blue flames towered high enough to engulf many of the griffon riders. They shredded one man and his mount and plucked the heads and limbs from another pair. Then, despite Brightwing's desperate attempt to rise above it, the fire took her and Aoth as well. Pain stabbed into his eyes and he screamed.
By sheer good luck, Xingax had wandered behind his hill-giant zombie when the blast flared and roared at the center of the northern army, and his hulking servant shielded him. It
collapsed, a flayed and blackened ruin, and when he looked over the top of what remained of it, he wondered for a moment if the explosion had destroyed Szass Tam as well.
But obviously not, for the lich clambered up from the ground. He was surely hurt, though. Previously, despite his withered fingers and the occasional whiff of decay emanating from him, he could have passed for a living man. Now, with all the flesh seared and scoured from his face and hands, his eyes melted in their sockets, his undead nature was plain for all to see. The hem of his tattered robe was on fire, but he didn't seem to notice.
"Master," Xingax said, "what happened?"
Szass Tam oriented on him without difficulty. A lich didn't need eyes to see. "Can you still transport both of us through space?" he croaked.
Xingax didn't see why not. Such instantaneous travel was a natural ability for him. "Yes."
"Then take us inside the Keep of Sorrows. If So-Kehur and Muthoth accomplished their task, we should be as safe there as anywhere, and I don't want to risk jumping any farther."
"As you command," Xingax said. "But what in the name of the Abyss is happening?"
"We don't have time for an explanation," the necromancer replied. "Suffice it to say, we need to employ your talents, because I can't trust mine anymore. Not for the moment, anyway."
Szass Tam vanished, seemingly vaporized by some sort of explosion, although Malark assumed the archmage hadn't really perished as easily as that. Dmitra had fainted, which was better than if she'd remained under the lich's spell and kept trying to murder her own officer. The kraken-things had slowed their
irresistible advance and weren't smashing at the soldiers of Eltabbar as relentlessly as before. A few colossi were even pounding at one another.
It all looked like good news, but Malark couldn't rejoice because he didn't understand any of it. Nor would he, so long as he was stuck amid the clamorous, milling confusion that was Dmitra's army. He needed to oversee the situation from the air.
But he couldn't leave his liege lady stretched insensible on the ground. He picked her up, draped her over his shoulder, and trotted toward the place where he'd left his horse tied.
Another tremor shook the earth. He staggered, caught his balance, and scurried on.
The agony in Aoth's face abated, and he felt the steady bunching and releasing of Brightwing's muscles beneath him. Somehow both he and the griffon had survived the power that had killed so many others.
He realized that in response to the pain, he'd reflexively shut his eyes. He opened them, then cried out in dismay.
"What's wrong?" Brightwing asked. When he was slow to answer, she joined her mind to his to determine for herself. Then she hastily broke the link again. She had to if she was to see where she was going, because her master had gone blind.
But it wasn't ordinary blindness. He could still see something. In fact, he had the muddled impression he could see a great deal. But he couldn't make sense of it, and the effort was painful, like looking at the sun. His head throbbed, and, straining to hold in a whimper, he shut his eyes once more.
"I'll carry you to a healer," Brightwing said.
"Wait! The legion. Look around. Did anyone else survive?"
"Some."
"Bareris?"
"Yes."
"Then I need to put him in charge before—" Brightwing's pinions cracked like whips and her body rolled. Aoth realized she was maneuvering to contend with an adversary or dodging an actual attack. An instant later, the air turned deathly cold, as if a blast of frost were streaking by. "What is it?" asked Aoth.
"One of those big shadow-bats," the griffon said. "I'll see if I can tear up its wing bad enough that it can't fly." She hurtled forward, jolting Aoth back against the high cantle of his saddle.
If their assailant was a nightwing, she had no hope of defeating it by herself. Aoth had to help. But how could he, when he couldn't see?
By borrowing her senses, of course, just as he had many times. He should have thought of it immediately, but the inexplicable onslaught of the blue flame and his sudden blindness had robbed him of his wits.
By the time he tapped into Brightwing's consciousness, she'd nearly closed on her opponent. At the last possible instant, the bat-thing whirled itself away from her talons and struck with its fangs. The griffon dodged in her turn, but only by plunging lower, ceding the nightwing the advantage of height. Brightwing streaked through the air at top speed to get away from it.
"Turn around as soon as you can," Aoth said. "I can't target it unless you're looking at it."
"You won't be able to target it if it bites your head off," Brightwing growled, but she wheeled just heartbeats later.
He saw the nightwing was close, and swooping closer. He aimed his spear at it and rattled off an incantation. As he did, he could tell that something else was wrong.
When he cast a spell, he could sense the elements meshing like machinery in a mill, and feel the power leap from their interaction. But though he'd recited the words of command with the necessary precision, the magic's structure was out of balance. The components were tangling, jamming, and producing nothing but a useless stink and shimmer. Meanwhile, the bat-thing had nearly closed the distance. Brightwing waited as long as she dared, then swooped in an attempt to pass safely beneath it.
Aoth had emptied his spear's reservoir of stored spells over the course of the day's fighting. But he could still charge the weapon with destructive force. Or he hoped he could. For all he knew, even that simple operation had become impossible.
He spoke the proper word, and to his relief, he felt power flow and collect in the point of the spear. Then Brightwing hurtled under the shadow creature, and he couldn't see it anymore. He thrust blindly, and the spear bit into its target. The magic discharged in a crackle.
"Did I kill it?" he asked.
Before Brightwing could answer, agony ripped through her body, beginning in her chest. Linked to her mind, Aoth endured a measure of it as well. His muscles clenched and his mouth stretched into a snarl. Brightwing floundered in flight, and for a moment, Aoth feared she was about to die. Then the pain abated as her extraordinary hardiness shook off the effect of the supernatural attack.
"Does that answer your question?" she rasped.
She turned, and he could see the nightwing for himself. The thing wasn't flying as fast or as deftly as before. But it was still pursuing.
For want of a better plan, he tried another spell, and felt it taking something like the proper form. But he was straining against a resistance, as if he were forcing together puzzle pieces that weren't truly mates.
It worked, though. A cloud of vapor sprang into existence directly in front of the bat-thing, so close that the creature couldn't avoid it. It hurtled in and the corrosive mist burned its murky substance ragged, in some places searing holes completely through.
The creature fell, then flapped its tattered wings and climbed at Aoth and Brightwing.
But then Bareris and Mirror dived in on the entity's flank. The bard ripped the nightwing's head with a thunderous shout. The ghost closed and slashed with his phosphorescent blade. The bat-thing plummeted once more, and this time unraveled into wisps of darkness.
Bareris and Mirror ascended to reach Aoth, who tried to look at them with his own eyes. Maybe his blindness had been temporary. Maybe it was gone.
Then he clamped his eyes shut again as though flinching from overwhelming glare. Although, beneath the unnaturally darkened sky, glare couldn't possibly be the problem.
Bareris's face had become a lean, hard mask over the years, betraying little except a hunger to kill his enemies. Yet now he gaped in surprise.
"What?" Aoth asked. "What did you see?"
"The blue flame," Bareris answered. "It's in your eyes."
Terrified and disoriented, Dmitra thrashed. A steely arm wrapped around her chest and immobilized her.
"Easy," Malark said. "You're safe now, but you don't want to flail around and fall."
When she looked around, she saw that he was right. She was sitting in front of him on his flying horse, high in the air. His other arm encircled her waist to hold her in the saddle.
"I apologize if this seems unduly familiar," Malark said, "but I had no other way of carrying you out of the thick of battle. Do you remember what happened?"
The question brought memory flooding back. She gasped.
"Szass Tam disappeared in a blaze of fire," Malark said. "He isn't controlling you anymore."
"That's not it," she said. "His influence was . . . unpleasant, but it's over. I'm unsettled because the Lady of Mysteries is dead."
"Do you mean the goddess of magic?" he asked, sounding more intrigued than alarmed. But then, he wasn't a magic-user, and didn't understand the implications.
"Yes. And for the moment, her destruction taints the well from which all mages draw their power."
"Your enchantments made this horse," Malark said. "It isn't going to dissolve out from underneath us, is it?"
She smiled, appreciating his unruffled practicality. It steadied her in moments of stress, not that she would ever admit such a thing. "It seems to be all right."
"I'm glad. If we're not in imminent danger of falling, may I suggest you take advantage of our elevation to look at what the goddess's death has done to our battle?"
It was a sound suggestion. But the charm that enabled her to see like an owl, cast when Szass Tam shrouded the field in darkness, had run its course. She murmured the incantation once again.
It was a petty spell for an illusionist of her abilities, and she was accustomed to casting it with unthinking ease, the way a master carpenter would hammer a nail. But she felt the forces twisting out of her control. She had to concentrate to bind them into the proper pattern.
When her vision sharpened, a secret, timid part of her wished it hadn't, for now she could see how Mystra's death had
infected the world. Dislodged by recurring earth tremors, avalanches thundered down the sheer cliffs on the First Escarpment. In the distance, curtains of blue fire swept across the landscape, sometimes cutting crevasses, sometimes lifting and sculpting the plain into hills and ridges.
The upheaval was vast and bizarre enough to transfix any observer with terror and awe, but Dmitra could afford neither. She had an army to salvage, if she could. With effort, she narrowed her focus from the widespread devastation to the chaos directly below.
Before Mystra's death and the mayhem that followed, Szass Tam had been on the verge of victory. Now Dmitra doubted that any living creature on either side even cared about winning. Combatants of all kinds were simply struggling to survive, for the wounding of magic had smashed a conflict in which thau-maturgy had played a dominant role into deadly confusion.
Some of Szass Tam's undead warriors remained under the control of the necromancers, and, with their living comrades, were attempting to withdraw into the Keep of Sorrows. But others had slipped their leashes. Mindless zombies and skeletons stood motionless. Gibbering and baying to one another, a pack of hunchbacked ghouls loped away into the darkness. Gigantic hounds, composed of corpses fused together and three times as tall as a man, lunged and snapped at the wizards who chanted desperately to reestablish dominance. Each bite tore a mage to shreds, and when swallowed, a wizard's mangled substance was added to his slayer's body.
Meanwhile, the southerners faced the same sort of chaos. Demonic archers—gaunt, hairless, and gray, possessed of four arms and drawing two bows each—abruptly turned and shot their shafts into three of Nevron's conjurors. An entity with scarlet skin and black-feathered wings swung its greatsword thrice and killed an ore with every stroke.
Half the kraken-things sprawled motionless. The others dragged themselves erratically around, striking at southerner and northerner, at the living, the undead, and devils, indiscriminately.
"We have to try to disengage at least some of our troops from this mess," Dmitra said. And for such a withdrawal to have any chance of success, she would have to command it. She was reasonably certain her fellow zulkirs had already fled.
"We'll try to find Dimon and Nymia Focar," Malark said. Responding to his unspoken will, his horse galloped toward the ground as if running down an invisible ramp.
chapter three
30 Tarsakb-8 Mirtul, the Year of Blue Fire
The door squeaked open, and Szass Tam turned in his chair. Azhir Kren and Homen Odesseiron faltered, their eyes widening. Their consternation was silly, really. As tharchions, they were accustomed to eyeless skull faces and skeletal extremities. They commanded entire legions of soldiers of that sort. But their master had always presented himself in the semblance of a living man, and though they knew better, perhaps they'd preferred to think of him that way. If so, it was their misfortune, because the truth of his condition was suddenly unavoidable.
"It's nothing," Szass Tam said. "I'll reconstitute the flesh when it's convenient." And when he was sure he could perform the delicate process without the magic slipping out of his control. "Don't bother kneeling. Sit by the fire, and help yourselves to the wine."
"Thank you, Your Omnipotence," Azhir said. Skinny and sharp-featured, the governor of Gauros had doffed her plate armor, but still wore the sweat-stained quilted under-padding.
"We're crowded," Homen said, "but all the troops have a place to sleep." An eccentric fellow with a perpetually glum and skeptical expression, trained as both soldier and mage, he wore the broadsword appropriate for a tharchion of Surthay, and also a wand sheathed on the opposite hip. "The healers are tending to the wounded, and we can feed everyone for a while. Nular Zurn stocked sufficient food for the living, and the ghouls can scavenge corpses off the battlefield."
"Good," Szass Tam said.
Homen took a breath. "Master, if I may ask, what happened? We were winning, and then . . ." He waved his hand as if he didn't know how to describe the immolation that had overtaken them.
Szass Tam wasn't sure he could, either. He disliked admitting that all sorcery, including his own, was crippled. But Azhir and Homen were two of his ablest generals, and they needed to comprehend in order to give good advice and make sound decisions.
But because it would do no good and might shake their faith in him, he didn't admit that he should have known what was coming—that Yaphyll's prophecy had revealed the event, if only he'd had the wit to interpret it. The white queen had been Mystra, the black one, Shar, goddess of the night, and the assassin, Cyric, god of murder. The fall of the city, the collapse of the cavern, and the agonies of the tree referred to the ordered structures of magic crumbling into chaos.
Now that he'd had a chance to reflect, he thought he might even understand how Yaphyll's initial prediction of victory had so resoundingly failed to come true. It would have, if the world to which it pertained had endured. But Mystra's demise was a discontinuity, the birth of a new reality, where the rules were different and certainties were warped.
In touch with that terrible tomorrow, Yaphyll had seized some of the blue fire—enough to break the hold of Thakorsil's
Seat and negate the power of the Death Moon Orb. Szass Tam supposed he was lucky it hadn't empowered her to do worse.
By the time he finished his abridged explanation, Azhir and Homen were gawking at him. He felt a twinge of disappointment. He understood that since they were mortal and not archmages, he could scarcely have expected them to share his own perspective, but it was still irksome to see two of his chief lieutenants looking so flummoxed and dismayed.
People, even the best of them, were such flawed and inadequate creations.
"What does this mean for all of us?" Homen asked.
"Well," Szass Tam said, "plainly, we failed to win the overwhelming victory we anticipated, and now we're facing some unexpected problems. But we took the Keep of Sorrows. That's something."
"If the ground doesn't crumble beneath it and cast it all the way down into Priador," Azhir said.
"Portions of the cliffs are still collapsing," Szass Tam said, "but I examined the granite beneath the castle. It will hold."
"That's good to know." Homen drained his silver cup. "But when I asked what this all meant, I was asking about... the whole world, I suppose. Is everybody going to die?"
Szass Tam snorted. "Of course not. Do you imagine the gods are necessary to the existence of the universe? They're not. They're simply spirits, more powerful than the imps that conjurors summon and command, but much the same otherwise. Deities have died before, goddesses of magic have died, and the cosmos survived. As it will again. As for us, we simply must weather a period of adversity."
"How do we do that?" Azhir asked.
"My thought," Szass Tam said, "is that we must garrison the Keep of Shadows. It's too valuable to abandon. It can play a vital role when we go back on the offensive."
"But you don't intend to continue attacking now," Homen said.
"No. We need to withdraw the majotity of our forces back into the north, to rebuild our strength and lay new plans. But you two are the soldiers. If you care to recommend a more aggressive course, I'm willing to listen."
Azhir and Homen exchanged glances. "No, Master," the latter said. "Your idea seems the most prudent."
"Good. Then let's sort out the details."
Bareris sang a charm of healing, plucking the accompaniment on the strings of his yarting. Mirror, currently a smeared reflection of the bard, hovered silently beside him.
Aoth had been escorted to a dark tent, and sat with bandages wrapped around his eyes. He opened them from time to time and glimpsed the world for just a moment, even though a man with normal vision wouldn't have seen through the bandages or in the dark. Then sight turned against him, jabbing pain into his head, and he had no choice but to flinch away from it.
He felt a cool, tingling caress on his face, a sign that the song was trying to heal him. Bards too were reportedly having difficulty casting spells, but not as much as wizards.
Still, Aoth doubted the charm would be any more effective than the prayers of the priests who had sought to help him already, and at the end of the song, he was proven right. Another peek brought another sickening spasm, and he gritted his teeth and hissed.
"I'm sorry," Bareris said. "I don't know anything else to try."
"It's all right," Aoth said, although it was anything but. He felt a pang of resentment and struggled to quell it, for there was no reason to take out his frustrations on his friend. He could
scarcely blame Bareris for failing to deliver what even accomplished clerics could not achieve.
"At least," Bareris said, "you can see through Brightwing's eyes."
"Yes, that solves everything. I just have to live the rest of my life outdoors."
"No, you have to resign yourself to being a blind man indoors, at least until your friends find a way to restore you. But outside, you'll be whole. You'll be able to fly, cast spells, and fight the same as always."
"No. I won't. It's clumsy when your sight isn't centered in your own eyes. It throws off everything in relation to your hands and body."
"In time, you'll learn—"
"Stop! Please, just stop. How are the men and the griffons?"
"The army's still in disarray, and we left much of the baggage train behind when we ran. But I made sure our company got its fair share of what food there is, and of the healers' attentions."
"Good. The Griffon Legion's yours now, what's left of it. I'm sure Nymia will proclaim you captain."
"If she does, I'll accept, but only until you're ready to resume your duties."
"That's good of you to say." Aoth opened his eyes. He'd found that, even though he knew the discomfort that would follow, the urge periodically became irresistible. An instant later, he stiffened.
Because he saw two Barerises, the figures superimposed. One—the real one, presumably—sat on a campstool, cradling his yarting in his lap. Smirking, the illusory one dangled a marionette and twitched the strings to make it dance. The puppet was thick in the torso, clad in the trappings of a griffon rider, and clutched a spear in its hand.
A throb of pain closed Aoth's eyes again, but it wasn't as
overwhelming as usual. He was so shocked, so appalled, that it blunted his physical distress.
He took a deep breath. "I've told you, this blindness isn't like normal blindness."
"Yes," Bareris said.
"I'm beginning to sense that at certain moments, it may even turn into the opposite of blindness. It may reveal things that normal eyes can't see."
"Really? Well, then that's good, isn't it?"
Aoth felt a crazy impulse to laugh. "Perhaps it is, if it shows the truth. You can help me determine if it did. I was ready to desert, and you talked me out of it. Remember?"
Bareris hesitated. "Yes."
"Did you seek to persuade me as any man might try to influence another, or did you use your voice to lay an enchantment on me?"
This time Bareris sat mute for several heartbeats, a silence as damning as any confession. "I did it to save your honor," he said at last, "and because I knew you'd feel like a coward if you left."
"Liar! You did it because you wanted me, and the riders who would follow my lead, to stay and fight. For ten years, I've been your only friend. I've sought out your company when everyone else shunned your bitterness and your obsession. But you never truly felt friendship for me, did you? I was just a resource you could exploit in persuit of your mad vendetta."
"It's not mad."
"Yes, it is! You aren't Szass Tam's equal, fighting a duel with him. You're just one soldier in the army his peers have fielded against him. Even if the other zulkirs defeat him, it won't be your triumph or your revenge. Your part in it will be miniscule. But you can't see that. Even though you're just a pawn, you had to try to push your fellow pawns around on the game board, and as a result, I'm crippled!"
"Maybe not forever. Don't give up hope."
Aoth knew precisely where his spear was. He could grab it without looking. He sprang up from his stool and only then opened his eyes, using his instant of clear and painless vision to aim the weapon at Bareris's chest.
The earth bucked beneath his feet and pitched him forward, spoiling what should have been the sudden accuracy of his attack. Vision became unbearable and his eyes squeezed shut. He toppled to his knees and the spear completed its thrust without any resistance.
"If you'll allow it," Bareris said, "I'll help you up and back into your seat."
"No." Aoth realized he didn't want to kill the bard anymore, but he didn't want anything else from him, either. "Just get out and stay away from me."
Bareris panted as if he'd just run for miles. His guts churned and his eyes stung.
"He swore an oath to serve the tharchion and the zulkirs," he said, "and so did 1.1 was right to stop him."
He was talking to himself, but to his surprise, Mirror saw fit to answer. "You deceived him," said the ghost. "You broke the code of our brotherhood."
"There isn't any brotherhood!" Bareris snapped. "You're remembering something from your own time, getting it confused with what's happening now, so don't prattle about what you don't understand!"
His retort silenced Mirror. But as the spirit melted back into the shadows, he shed Bareris's appearance as if it were a badge of shame.
"What about a taste of the red?" a rough voice whispered.
Startled, Tammith turned to behold a short, swarthy legionnaire who'd opened his tunic to accommodate her. She'd known she was brooding, but she must have been truly preoccupied for the soldier to sidle up to her unnoticed, her keen senses notwithstanding.
Those senses drank him in, the warmth and sweaty scent of his living body and the tick of the pulse in his neck. It made her crave what he offered even though she wasn't really thirsty, and the pleasure would provide a few moments of relief from the thoughts tumbling round and round in her head.
"All right." She opened the purse laced to her sword belt, gave him a coin, then looked for a place to go. Big as it was, the Keep of Sorrows was full to overflowing with the northern army, but a staircase leading up to a tower door cast a slanted shadow to shield them from curious eyes.
As they kneeled down together, voices struck up a farmer's song about planting and plowing, which echoed through the baileys and stone-walled passageways of the fortress. Today was Greengrass, the festival held to mark the beginning of spring. Some folk evidently meant to observe it even if Thay had little to celebrate in the way of fertile fields, clean rain, and warm, bright sunlight.
Tammith slipped her fangs into the legionnaire's jugular and drank, giving herself over to the wet salty heat and the gratification it afforded. It lay within her power to make the experience just as pleasurable for her prey, but she didn't bother. Still, the legionnaire shuddered and sighed, and she realized he was one of those victims who found being drained inherently erotic.
He should be paying me, she thought with a flicker of amusement.
The tryst was enjoyable while it lasted, but brought her no closer to a decision. She sent her dazed, grinning supper on his way, prowled through an archway, and spotted Xingax riding piggyback on a giant zombie at the other end of the courtyard.
"Daughter!" he cried. "Good evening!"
Reluctantly, she advanced to meet him.
"Good news," Xingax said. "I'm going home. It's no surprise, of course. I assumed Szass Tam would need me there to help rebuild his strength, but I'm still delighted. Perhaps you can come along and command my guards."
Tammith's upper lip wanted to rise, and her canines, to lengthen, but she made herself smile instead. "I believe you made me so I could charge into the fiercest battles, not stand sentry waiting for foes who, in all likelihood, would never find their way to me."
"I suppose you're right," Xingax said, "but maybe you can at least escort me to the sanctuary, and then I can send you back again. I'll ask Szass Tam about it." He leaned over the hulking zombie's shoulder, reached down, and stroked her cheek with the hand that was shriveled, twisted, and malodorous with rot. Her skin crawled. Then his mount carried him on his way.
If I have to travel with him, Tammith thought, he'll know. He isn't a necromancer himself, not precisely, but he, or one of the wizards in his train, will figure it out.
Then they'd change her back, and she wondered why she'd needed to ponder for so long to realize that would be unendurable.
As the singers struck up another song, she made her way to a sally port and peered around. As far as she could tell, nobody was watching her. She dissolved into mist and oozed through the crack beneath the secondary gate.
She drifted across the battlefield with its carpet of contorted, stinking corpses. The crows had retired for the night,
but the rats were feasting. Most of the enormous squid-things had stopped moving, but three of them were still crawling aimlessly around.
When she reached the far side of the leviathans, she judged she'd put enough distance between herself and the castle to risk changing from fog to a swarm of bats. It was unlikely that a sentry would notice her in that guise, either, and her wings would carry her faster than vapor could flow.
Just as she finished shifting, a creature big as an ogre pounced out of nowhere. Its head was a blend of man and wolf, with crimson eyes shining above the lupine muzzle. Dark scales covered its naked body. It had four hands and snatched with two of them, catching a bat each time. Its grip crushed and its claws pierced, and even those beasts that were still free floundered with the shared pain.
"Turn into a woman," Tsagoth said, "and I'll let them go."
She didn't have to. She could survive the loss of some of the creatures that comprised herself. But it would weaken her, and she was reluctant to allow that when she knew Tsagoth could keep pace with her however she chose to flee.
She knew because their abilities were similar. He was a blood fiend, an undead demon who preyed on living tanar'ri in the same way that vampires hunted mortal men and women.
She flowed from one guise to another, and he released the captive bats to blend with the rest of her substance. She shifted her feet, but subtly; she didn't want him to see she was ready to fight. But he evidently noticed anyway, because his leer stretched wider.
"You should have fled," he said, "as soon as the blue fire came, and you realized the enchantments compelling your obedience had withered away."
"Probably so." Irredeemably feral and in some cases stupid to their cores, a number of ghouls and lesser wraiths had bolted
instantly. She, however, had long ago acquired military discipline, and during those first moments, it had constrained her as effectively as magic. Only later had she recognized that escape was an option for her as well.
"Now you've missed your chance," Tsagoth continued. "The necromancers understand that they may not have complete control over even those undead who obediently followed them into the keep. They charged me to watch for those who try to stray."
"Good dog," Tammith said.
Tsagoth bared his fangs. "Do you really think it wise to mock me? Your powers are just a debased and feeble echo of mine. I can destroy you in an instant if I choose. But I'd just as soon reason with you."
Tammith shrugged. "Reason away, then." At least a conversation would give her time to ponder tactics.
"You hate our masters," he said. "I understand. So do I. But you thrive in their service. You're a celebrated warrior, and Szass Tam promises you'll be a rich noblewoman after he wins the war."
"I don't want gold or station. I want my freedom."
"Your freedom to do what and go where? Where, except in Szass Tam's orbit, is there a place for a creature like you? And even if it were possible for you to escape me, where could you be safe from the other hunters the lich would send after you?"
"I don't know yet, but I'll figure it out."
"You understand, the blue fires are still raging back and forth across the world destroying all they touch. The earthquakes are still shaking towns to rubble. It's the worst possible time to forsake your allies and strike out on your own."
"Or the best. The necromancers may decide they have more important things to think about than chasing after me."
"At least return to the castle and ponder a while longer. Don't act recklessly."
"I don't have 'a while longer.'" She smiled. "You truly don't want to fight me, do you? Because you sympathize with me. You wish you could do what I'm doing."
He glared as if she'd insulted him even more egregiously than before. "I don't sympathize with anyone, least of all one of your puny kind! But of course, I've tried to break my own bonds. It's like a vile joke that the blue fire liberated common ghouls and spectres and left a blood fiend in his chains."
"Try again," Tammith said. "Don't fight me. Change into your bat guise and fly away with me."
"I can't." Suddenly, he sprang at her.
Fortunately, she was ready. She whirled out of the way and drew her sword, then cut at Tsagoth as he lunged by.
The enchanted blade bit deep into Tsagoth's back, staggering him. She ripped it free and slashed again.
Tsagoth spun back around to face her. His left arm swept downward to meet her blade. The weapon sliced his wrist, but it was only a nick, aftd the block kept the sword from cutting another gash in his torso.
At the same time, he raked at her with his upper hands. She recoiled, and his claws tore through her sturdy leather jerkin to score the flesh beneath. If she hadn't snatched herself backward, great chunks of flesh would have been torn away.
She leaped farther back, simultaneously extending her sword to spit him if he charged. He didn't, and they started circling.
He gazed into her eyes and sent the force of his psyche stabbing at her like a poniard. She felt a kind of jolt, but nothing that froze her in place or crushed her will to resist. She tried the same tactic on him, with a similar lack of success.
Her wounds itched as they closed. The cut on Tsagoth's wrist was already gone, and no doubt the more serious wound on his back was healing too. In theory, they could duel the night away, each suffering but never quite succumbing to an endless
succession of ghastly injuries. Until the sun rose, when she'd burn arid he wouldn't.
But it was unlikely to come to that. As he'd boasted, he was the stronger, and if she couldn't beat him quickly, he was apt to wear her into helplessness well before dawn.
He murmured a word and ragged flares of power in a dazzling array of colors exploded from a central point like a garish flower blooming in a single instant. Tammith was close enough that the leading edge of the blast washed over her and seared her like acid.
Even as she staggered, she realized her foe had wounded her but likewise given her an opportunity. Fighting in a war of wizards, she'd seen this same attack, and understood how it worked when it achieved its full effect. Perhaps she could convince Tsagoth that it had done so. It all depended on her skill at pantomime.
She fell on her rump as if her mind and body were reacting too slowly for her to catch her balance. She dropped her jaw in what she hoped was a convincing expression of surprised dismay and started to rise, all with the same exaggerated lethargy.
Tsagoth sprang at her, all four hands poised to snatch and rend. She waited until the last instant, then abandoned her pretence of sluggishness and thrust the point of her sword at his chest.
She knew the ruse had fooled him when he failed to defend himself in time. The blade plunged into his heart.
He kept clawing at her, but for a moment, the shock of the injury made his efforts clumsy, and except for a scratch down the side of her face, she was unharmed. She tore her sword free and slashed open his belly. Guts came sliding out.
He plunged his talons into her shoulder and nearly tore her arm off. It wasn't her sword arm, but it might be next time, or he might manage something even worse, because his wounds were no longer slowing him.
She had to finish this exchange quickly. One sword couldn't parry four sets of talons for long. She dodged out of his way, swung the blade high, and sheared into his luminous scarlet eyes. Then she broke apart into bats, localizing the injury of her mangled shoulder in one crippled, expendable specimen.
The bats flew in the general direction of the Keep of Sorrows, the weak one trailing behind the others. She made sure their wings rustled audibly.
Tsagoth peered after her. Two red gleams appeared above his muzzle as his eyes reformed. Tammith could only hope they couldn't yet see as well as before, and that the desire to catch her and hurt her had pushed every other thought out of his head.
He vanished and instantly reappeared in her path, hands raised to rip the bats out of the air. He didn't realize that by shifting through space as he had, he'd placed himself directly in front of one of the squid-things that still showed signs of animation. Now, if the giant would only react!
It did. Trailing filthy tatters of mummy wrappings, a gigantic tentacle rose and slammed down on top of the blood fiend's head, smashing him to the ground. Then it coiled around him, picked him up, and squeezed. Bones cracked and their jagged ends jabbed through his scaly hide.
Ready to dodge, Tammith waited to see if the leviathan would strike at her, too, but it didn't. A scattered swarm of bats evidently wasn't as provocative a target as a nine-foot-tall undead demon.
She wasn't certain that even the squid-thing could destroy Tsagoth, but she was confident he wouldn't pursue her any time soon. As she swirled upward, she pondered one of the questions her adversary had posed: Where, indeed, could she go now?
Situated at a juncture of secondary roads, Zolum was a humdrum farmer's market of a town. As far as Dmitra could recall, she'd never visited the place before, and she felt none the poorer for it.
But at the moment, it possessed two attractions. Even for battle-weary legions, it was only a few days' march east of the Keep of Sorrows, and it was still standing. No wave of blue flame had obliterated it, nor had any earthquake knocked it down. So the council's army had crowded in, compelling the burghers to billet soldiers who ate their larders bare.
As Zolum was second-rate, so too was the hall of its autharch with its flickering oil lamps, plain oak floor, and simple cloth banners, devoid of gems or magical enhancements. In other circumstances, some of Dmitra's fellow dignitaries might have sneered at the chamber's provincial appointments, or groused about a lack of luxuries. Not now, though. Everyone had more important things to think about.
Which was not to suggest that everyone was frightened or downcast. His nimbus of flame burning brightly, Iphegor Nath looked excited, and Malark smiled as if life were merely a play staged for his diversion, and the plot had just taken an amusing turn.
A soldier led Aoth Fezim and helped him to a chair. The captain wore a dark bandage wrapped around his eyes.
It was a pity about his blinding. He was a good officer. Still, he couldn't command the Griffon Legion as he was.
The most interesting thing about him at that moment was that he was an anomaly. The blue fire had injured but not killed him, and since the zulkirs needed a better understanding of that enigmatic force, Dmitra had a mind to vivisect him and see what could be learned. Although it could wait until he was in one place and his legion in another. Supposedly, the men liked him, so why distress them and perhaps undermine their morale when a modicum of tact could avoid it?
The autharch kept a little brass gong beside his seat at the big round table, presumably to command everyone's attention and silence, and Dmitra clanged it. The assembly fell silent, and the others turned to look at her. "Your Omnipotences," she said, "Your Omniscience, Saers, and Captains. Not long ago, we believed ourselves on the brink of defeat. But fate intervened, and now we have another chance."
Samas Kul snorted. Although no one had set out food in the hall, he had grease on his full, ruddy lips and a half-eaten leg of duck in his blubbery hand. "Another chance. Is that what we're calling it?"
Dmitra smiled. "What would you call it?"
"Considering that we have reports of whole cities and fiefs burned or melted away, of the land itself tortured into new shapes, I'd call it a disaster."
"That," said Iphegor, "is because you don't understand what's happening." He raked the company with the gaze of his lambent orange eyes. "What you take to be a calamity is actually an occasion for great rejoicing and great resolve. Kossuth has always promised that one day the multiverse would catch fire, and that much of it would perish. It's our task to make sure it's the debased and polluted portions that burn, so that we'll dwell in a purer, nobler world thereafter."
"Nonsense," Dimon said. The tharchion of Tyraturos had even fairer skin than most Mulans, and blue veins snaked like rivers across his shaven crown. He was a priest of Bane, god of darkness, as well as a soldier, and wore the black gauntlet emblematic of his order.
Iphegor pivoted to glare at him. "What did you say?"
"I said you're talking nonsense. This blue stuff isn't really fire, and your god and his prophecies had nothing to do with its coming. It's here because Shar and Cyric killed Mystra. We know that much even if we know precious little more, so you might as
well stop trying to convince us that the crisis means we ought to exalt your faith above all others."
"You see only the surface of things," Iphegor replied. "Look deeper."
"That's always good advice," Dmitra said, hoping to avert an argument between the two clerics, "whatever god one follows. We need to weigh our options and choose the one that will leave us in the strongest position when the disturbances end."
"Assuming they ever do," Lallara said.
"They will," Dmitra said, trying her best to sound certain of it. "The question is, what shall we do in the meantime?"
"Make peace," Lauzoril said.
"No!" someone exclaimed. Turning, Dmitra saw that it was Bareris Anskuld. She wondered briefly why he'd remained on the other end of the room from Aoth. They generally sat together if they both attended a council, and it seemed odd that he wouldn't be at his comrade's side in the moment of his misfortune.
Prim and clerkish though he was, Lauzoril was also a zulkir, and unaccustomed to being interrupted by his inferiors. He gave Bareris a flinty stare. "Another such outburst and I'll feed you to your own damn griffons."
With a visible effort, Bareris clamped down on his emotions. "Master, I apologize."
"As is proper," Lallara said. "But I might have produced an outburst myself, if you hadn't beaten me to it."
"I hate Szass Tam as much as any of you," Lauzoril said. "But the truth is, we've all been fighting for ten years, with neither side able to gain and keep the upper hand. As a result, Thay was on its way to ruin even before the blue fires came. Now the realm truly stands on the verge of annihilation. All of us who possess true power should work together to salvage what we can. Otherwise, there may be nothing left for anyone to rule."
"Are you talking about reestablishing the council as it once was?" Zola Sethrakt asked, her voice cracking. She was a youthful-looking woman, comely in an affected, angular sort of way, who never went anywhere without a profusion of bone and jet ornaments swinging from her neck and sliding on her arms. As a result, she could scarcely breathe without clattering. "I'm the zulkir of Necromancy now!"
"Rest assured," Lauzoril said, "you will always enjoy a place of high honor."
"Every order has the right to elect its own zulkir, and mine chose me!" Zola screeched.