by Ed Greenwood
Elminster chuckled, took up her tankard, and laid a hand on her shoulder. “I’ll be up in the Tower preparing evenfeast when ye’re done. Florin has probably worn his sword-edge dull slicing edibles by now. I’m not much of a family, lass, but ye’re welcome, whenever.”
Narnra gave him a strange look and waved at the pool. “There aren’t—snakes or biting turtles or anything like that, are there?”
“Nay,” Elminster told her, as he conjured up a fluffy robe, towels, and slippers, and bent with a grunt to lay them out on a handy rock. “I asked the beast that eats them to depart when ye arrived, and it did.”
She gave him a longer look, until he turned and added, “Trust me.”
“I’m learning to,” she said with a lopsided smile. “Don’t make me regret it. Please.”
“Well, if ye’d like to toss your clothes onto yon rock, I’ll snatch them away with a spell and give them a wash whilst ye’re soaking—because they certainly need it. Knives and all, mind. I’ll be careful not to let things rust. Oh, and the little blades ye keep hidden in thy hair, too they’re starting to tarnish.”
Narnra gave her father quite another look and said, “If you trick me …”
“I’ll be overcome with remorse,” he said with a grin and strolled off, his pipe floating after him.
Narnra watched him go, shaking her head. Well, at least she had an interesting father. When she heard the Tower door close, she disrobed, carefully putting her gear where he’d indicated—all but one knife with its sheath, which she laid ready at the water’s edge.
She lifted the stone Elminster had pointed out, scooped up some flakes of soap, and waded in.
The water was wonderful.
* * * * *
“B’gads, what if they find us here?” Bezrar muttered. “What tale do we tell them then?”
“That we’re thinking of importing some new sort of shingles from—from Alaghôn, and had to see if the barracks roofs would ever be a market for us,” his partner Surth hissed. “If you shut up for once, perhaps they won’t find us here!”
They both froze, there on the roof of the largest Purple Dragon barracks in Marsember, as at least a dozen dragons—each larger than any barracks, and far more impressive—swooped past, in a mighty hurry to get to somewhere in the city!
The great wyrms passed over the barracks so low that Malakar Surth, the taller of the two swindlers, could almost have touched one of those vast and scaled underbellies by standing tall and leaping upward.
He chose not to do so. It seemed more sensible to faint instead.
Twenty-Two
A LITTLE VICTORY
Sometimes, all you can do is take what little victory you can.
Sorbraun Swordmantle
Seventy Summers A Purple Dragon:
One Loyal Warrior’s Tale
Year of the Prince
“Stand easy,” Laspeera murmured. “Whatever happens, we’ve War Wizards enough to keep you both safe.”
Filfaeril and Alusair gave her identical sighs. “Speera, it’s not that,” the Steel Regent exclaimed, armor gleaming. “It’s how many loyal folk this will cost us—and how many noble families who lose their young hotheads here will turn against us. When will Cormyr stop bleeding?”
“Here they come,” Caladnei muttered, stepping back, as many men stalked into the dimly lit hall, drawn swords glittering in the light of her conjured light.
“Hail, Ladies Obarskyr,” one of them called in a grand and cultured voice. “Your attendance—even with so many of your mages—gratifies us. We desire to discuss the future of our fair real—”
The noble staggered forward to fall on his face with a cough and lie still, sword ringing on the tiles. His fellows whirled around with shouts of anger.
Many men in robes were fading into visibility out of empty air—Thayans! Harnrim Starangh glared coldly around Thundaerlyn Hall and commanded his fellow Red Wizards, “Kill them all—yon women first. Let no one leave alive!”
* * * * *
Bezrar and Surth came back to Marsember at about the same time, with damp and misty air singing past their ears as a grand rooftop—all spires and skylights—rushed up to meet them. They were … oh, gods … in the grip of great talons.
Talons that were attached to a huge and iridescent silver-blue dragon. Turquoise eyes burned into theirs with force enough to keep them blinkingly, tremblingly awake. When both Surth and Bezrar would quite happily have fainted again great jaws hissed in a soft thunder, “Open those skylights so we can see and hear who’s within. I’ve no desire to provoke all the War Wizards and whatever other mages happen to be in Marsember by tearing apart a few buildings at random and slaughtering folk heedlessly.”
“B-b-but—” Bezrar managed to splutter.
“However,” Joysil told him, “I can make a few exceptions when it comes to slaughtering if you provoke me. Yes, this is the roof of Thundaerlyn Hall, and yes, I’m a dragon, just as you are Aumun Tholant Bezrar and you are Malakar Surth. Get those open!”
The two smugglers leaped to the panes with frantic eagerness, fumbling at catches that hadn’t been oiled or thrown open in decades—decades of sea-mists and incontinent birds and nesting fowl that … that …
“Oh, gods!” Surth hissed, his fingers trembling helplessly. “We’ll never—”
Beside him, Bezrar drew his longknife, puffing like a walrus and sweating a river, and brought its pommel down firmly through the dirty pane in front of him.
There was a shout from within, and a roaring gout of flame burst up out of the shattered skylight. A dragon banked sharply overhead, thrust out its neck, and breathed something back.
Bezrar emitted a sort of frightened mew as he tumbled over backward. Spells were bursting out of skylights up and down the roof now, shards of glass tumbling in all directions, and dragons were diving down and breathing death of their own.
It was, yes, a luminescent time to faint, Bezrar and Surth decided in unison—and did so.
* * * * *
Caladnei and Laspeera did nothing but hold up shimmering shielding-spells around Alusair and Filfaeril as they all rushed together to the east end of the hall—which saved them, even as Red Wizards by the dozens vanished in dragon-spew.
The very floor-tiles of the central open hall exploded, heaved, and melted where the full fury of dragon-magic struck, and the roof started to come down in great crashing chunks.
The two highest-ranking War Wizards reeled, moaning in pain and clutching their heads, as their shieldings were torn asunder. Somewhere down there, the Obarskyrs were on their own, now …
Doors burst open in the darkness all over the hall as Rhauligan and the other Highknights decided that with War Wizards screaming and fainting and igniting like torches all around them they might already be too late to rush forth and perform a rescue.
The Red Wizards Starangh had been able to assemble were the youngest and most ambitious Thayans handy in Sembia, but they neither trusted each other nor had much experience in working carefully together in spell-battle … so in the flashing, bursting confusion of swooping dragons and men running about with swords, they soon started hurling death at anyone and everyone they saw, including each other.
Harnrim Darkspells looked around from a high balcony in disbelief as War Wizards and his fellow Thayans hurled spells, chairs, and knives at each other with equally blind fury. This was a swiftly unfolding disaster! He had to—
Something made him duck and turn, and the point of Rhauligan’s thrusting blade flashed harmlessly past his arm. With a curse, Starangh teleported away, leaving the Highknight slashing empty air and airing a few curses of his own.
Down below, terrified nobles were swording everyone in their haste to escape what they correctly saw as a deathtrap. The ring and clang of sword-steel rose deafeningly in the hall.
Rhauligan whirled around and raced down the nearest stair. He had to get to Alusair and Filfaeril and keep them safe, whatever happened.
* *
* * *
“Get down, Mother!” Alusair snarled, hacking a man to the floor viciously and stamping on his throat. “That gown won’t stop a child’s knife! I’ve got to set aside having to defend and worry about you! Too many of these dogs are getting away!”
“Look—unnh!—to your own back, dear!” Filfaeril called, whirling her overgown around a man’s head and rushing past him to drag him off-balance. Wildly slashing nothing, he went down, and she leaped in to land knees-together on his chest, and drive her little jeweled dagger into a face she couldn’t see. “I’m Cormyr’s past, daughter—you’re its future!”
Alusair laughed bitterly as two swords reached for her. “Yes, but for how long?”
* * * * *
“Cala, we’ve got to get back to Luse and Fee,” Laspeera panted. “They’ll get butchered!”
“If we don’t drive off these dragons,” the Mage Royal of Cormyr spat back, “we’ll all wind up fried, crushed, and entombed before six-toll!”
“They’re drawing off!” Laspeera gasped, pointing. “Look! They’re flying away!”
* * * * *
“ENOUGH!” Joysil roared, in a voice that shook every spire in Marsember. “We can do no more without destroying every human down there! Come—to the sanctum!”
“To the dragonbinder!” dragon voices thundered in chorus, and wings flapped and wheeled in the sky.
* * * * *
“Shields!” Caladnei cried, clutching at Laspeera. “Find them! We must raise the shields around them again!”
Laspeera peered helplessly around the darkened confusion of the hall, made a sound of exasperation, and cast a bright radiance spell out into the chaos.
Everywhere, knots of men were fighting, their swords flashing. Bodies lay huddled in their blood everywhere, too, and robed War Wizards waving daggers were rushing down stairs and along balconies, shouting.
“There!” she cried, pointing to where she’d seen Alusair’s familiar hair swirl, just for a moment, amid a glimmer of clashing blades.
Hip to hip the two mages worked a casting, then collapsed with a groan.
“I worked an ironguard on them,” Caladnei gasped. “Rhauligan’s coming—see?—and he should be able … to take care of … men who can only punch … and gouge and strangle.”
“Wait, what’s that?” Laspeera snapped. Where they’d thrown their shield, something flared like a momentary star.
“Fee’s teleport gem,” Caladnei said with a grin. “She’s taken them back to the Palace. Find that portal, and let’s get there before Luse tries to bring every last Purple Dragon in the place back here!”
* * * * *
“What was that, Mother?”
“My teleport gem,” Filfaeril gasped. “This dolt of a Draco-horn brought his blade down on it, before I … before I …”
“Mother!” Alusair cried in alarm, whirling back to the queen. Filfaeril was clutching at her side. She sat down against a heap of bodies, managed a little smile, and said rather triumphantly, “Before I put my little knife through his eye.” She waved a hand. “Don’t worry, I’m just winded, not cut. I trust.”
The singing of a shielding-spell—at least, Alusair hoped it was a shielding-spell—rose around them, and she waded through the dead and dying to get to her mother.
She was still two paces away when the balcony above, smoldering in the aftermath of a spell, tore loose and crashed down on them.
* * * * *
“Hah!” Darndreth Goldsword cried triumphantly, as something splintered and the door sagged open. “Out, lads! Out!”
The dozen or so nobles of the Rightful Conspiracy surged forward as one, panting in fear and weariness. This had all gone so wrong—dragons, by the gods!—wizards everywhere! More grim men with swords than they’d been able to muster in the first place! And all the doors spell-sealed, too!
This was the only one they’d been able to get open, and now they’d have to run far and fast before the Obarskyrs set the hounds of the realm on—
Darndreth staggered back with a cry, almost spitting himself on half a dozen swords. “Who—?”
“No one important,” the lady who stood outside replied calmly, her eyes large and dark in the glow of the conjured dagger and whip-sword in her hands. “Just someone who grew bored in Candlekeep and looked in a scrying-stone to see what was happening back in Marsember. Not that I found anything surprising.”
“Stand back!” one noble shouted.
“Make way or we’ll kill you!” the youngest Goldsword added, in a snarl.
The lady slashed his thrusting sword aside with her own, the meeting of blades numbing his arm as if he’d touched lightning. “You may try,” she commented pleasantly.
“Who are you?”
“The Lady Nouméa Cardellith,” she answered, parrying his furious attack, “of Sembia. Stay within, traitors, and face justice.”
“Justice! You’re not even of Cormyr!” a noble panted furiously, trying to reach his sword past Darndreth’s shoulder to stab her.
“No matter. I stand for peace and honesty, whenever possible … to slaughter a ruling house always plunges a land into strife and outlawry and suffering, and the lurking monsters and dark cabals alike come prowling … or have you so swiftly forgotten what befell in Tethyr?”
“Hah! You can’t stand against us! One woman, alone?”
“I don’t have to,” Nouméa gasped, as a blade drove her own sword aside and two others thrust into her. “I only have to delay you, until—”
Glarasteer Rhauligan struck the knot of nobles from behind like a deadly storm, four Highknights with him—and only five of the traitors had time to start pleading. Their frantic attempts to make deals went unanswered.
* * * * *
Vangerdahast gently parted Myrmeen’s arms and set her aside. “ ’Tis done, lady,” he said gently. “Our time together. They’ve come.”
He waved above the wide expanse where Joysil had felled so many trees—and the Lady Lord of Arabel found herself looking up at a sky full of dragons.
The song dragon arrowed down into a wing-fluttering landing in front of their shattered window, the other wyrms wheeling and banking watchfully above.
“Mage,” Joysil said, “we flew to war—and this threat to Cormyr from Red Wizards and traitor-nobles, at least, has been ended.”
“In return,” the former Royal Magician replied, silver and green fires briefly shining forth in a visible web that made more than one dragon hiss and rear back, “look, and see the truth of my words: I’ve bound my dragonbindings to my own life. If I perish, they go with me.”
“And so?”
“And so I’m ready,” he said roughly, using a chair to climb up onto the kitchen counter. From there he walked out onto what had recently been his gardens and a pleasant glade, adding, “for you to slay me.”
Behind him, Myrmeen clutched a kitchen chair so hard with trembling-white hands that the wood groaned. Silent tears spilled from her eyes as she watched Vangerdahast walk to his death.
An amethyst-scaled wyrm glided down, jaws opening to breathe on the lone, trudging man—but Joysil threw out a wing to shield the retired Mage Royal, and cried, “Cease!”
Vangerdahast stood very still beneath that vast wing, as dragon after dragon thudded to earth, landing in a great ring around Joysil.
“We fought well together,” she said in her voice of gentle thunder, “but this human has ended the threat we gathered to destroy. He need not die. I offer you my hoard, to divide among you if you now disperse and never return to harm this Vangerdahast.”
Myrmeen had heard a dragon rumble in thought once before, but when a dozen of them were at it, the field shook to their purring din. Then the great head of Aeglyl Dreadclaw nodded, and the fang dragon growled, “The fray was … good, yes. I am content.”
That set head after head to nodding, until all the wyrms had agreed.
“Seek you then the spire of the ruined keep atop Claw Peak,” the song dragon told t
hem all, “and shatter it. Within it is a cavern stuffed full of speaking gems.”
“Speaking gems!” several wyrms echoed eagerly—and there was a general rush into the skies.
“What,” Vangerdahast asked, watching dragons dwindle into tiny specks among distant clouds, “are speaking gems?”
Joysil snorted. “Magical things, wizard—nothing you should be meddling with. Some four thousand-odd I had from the Church of Shar years ago … when I saw the world somewhat differently.” Those turquoise eyes stared into the old wizard’s for a moment longer before she asked, “What is it you really want to ask me?”
Vangerdahast sighed. “My life. Why did you spare it?”
“I went to confer with the oldest, wisest dragon of my kind, who took me to someone you know all too well: Elminster of Shadowdale. He offered a solution.”
It was Vangerdahast’s turn to sigh. “I might have known. And that would be?”
Myrmeen saw something out of the corner of her eye. She let out a little cry of alarm as she whirled around, snatching for her sword—and the Old Mage rising from the hitherto-empty seat of Vangerdahast’s favorite chair obligingly offered it to her.
“Old friend,” he said to the retired Royal Magician, stepping past Myrmeen, “why not this: Use thy own spells to bind thyself as thy kingdom’s guardian? Become a dragon. We Chosen can aid thee in that aim with spells to do so that will transform thee, lengthen thy years, and enhance thy vigor.”
Vangerdahast frowned. “One dragon, to defend a realm? Not even the Devil Dragon could stand against …”
“No,” Joysil said in her soft thunder. “Not one. I’ve long sought a purpose to go on living, and I believe I’ve found it. I’ll willingly join you in stasis, as your consort.”
Vangerdahast gaped at her. Then, very slowly, he turned to peer back into the ruined kitchen of his sanctum, at the tearful woman standing there.
“No,” Myrmeen whispered, face white and working. “No, I cannot give up being human. I—I … Vangey, forgive me!”
“There’s naught to forgive, lass,” two old wizards said in unison. Then they stopped and traded uneasy grins.
