by Jak Koke
No, he thought. Surely, Vraith would hold off until all pilgrims were safe.
Gregor had given out over a thousand doses by the time they were nearing the end of the line. Everyone was in a festive mood, gazing up in awe at the gauzy haze of the border veil punctuated by flashes of blue-white fire behind it. It seemed that even the Plaguewrought Land was restless behind the border, eager to reach out and touch all these willing participants to history.
Gregor shivered. This minor expansion of the Plague-wrought Land was temporary. It was a necessary test to achieving his vision-a proof of concept on a grand scale. If this worked, then he would work to enforce the agreement he’d made with Vraith.
The Commander Accordant’s perfected ritual would make it possible to contain rampant spellplague storms. They would be able to create borders where none existed before. And eventually all of the tumultuous changelands that existed in the world would be organized.
And yet, Gregor had grown more and more suspicious that Vraith did not share his vision. The ritual was dependent upon her. Her spellscar ability was critical, and even if the same result could be achieved without her, Gregor had no inkling of how that might be accomplished. If it turned out that Vraith was not willing or motivated to use the ritual to contain spellplague storms, then Gregor’s help now was more than a waste. He was all too aware that it made him com-plicit in the destabilization of the Plaguewrought Land.
Tyrangal’s words haunted him. Vraith will use this ritual to move the border of the Plaguewrought Land, to expand the total area of these plaguelands. Of that I am sure. The Order wants to increase the blue fire’s reach, and if they gain control over the border, they will eventually be able to unleash the spellplague contained within.
As he came to the last pilgrims in the line and gave them drinks of his concoction, Gregor straightened. His work tonight was nearly done. Ironically, Vraith was right about him. He despised her, but it was too late to back out now. He’d placed his bet. The stakes were high, but the payoff would be massive. All of Faerun would reap the profits of this gamble.
Tyrangal would see that. And if she did not, she would be left behind.
Gregor looked across the field, bathed in the gray light of the border. There were still many, many pilgrims who had ignored the call to line up. Every one of them would be exposed if they were inside the arc when the ritual started.
Bonfires provided hubs of warmth and celebration. In the glow from the changelands, and the warmth of the bonfires, the festival had managed to mutate this plain into a landscape of dancing and music. The smell of spiced meat and roasting garlic and warm bread mingled in the air, temporarily masking the lingering scent of the funeral pyres and the Plaguewrought Land-the stench of oranges and carrion.
Gregor gave over the task of distributing elixir to Brother Velri. “We need to encourage everyone to drink a dose,” Gregor said. “All of these who are determined to stay inside the arc. And give it to children first. It will protect them all.”
Velri nodded.
“I’m going to talk with Vraith,” Gregor said. “To see how much time we have. All these folks should be outside the arc just in case, and the Order Peacekeepers can help with that.”
Gregor stepped up his pace and caught up to Vraith. Surrounded by Order Peacekeepers and clerics, Vraith barked instructions to her minions to get the lined-up pilgrims to space themselves evenly and hold hands. “The blood bond must be complete for this to work!”
“Vraith,” Gregor said, pushing through the Peacekeepers, who reluctantly allowed him to pass.
“Gregor,” Vraith grinned at him. “Thank you for your good work. Now, you and your monks should move outside the arc.”
“We’re trying to get the remaining pilgrims inoculated.” He gestured at the bonfires still surrounded by dancers and drunken pilgrims passed out on the ground.
Vraith shrugged. “I don’t think they’ll cause trouble for the ritual.”
Gregor was appalled at her lack of compassion. “Yes, but that means that hundreds of pilgrims remain unprotected and will likely die.”
Vraith’s angular face went stone hard. “I understand that, monk. And it is not my concern. They all know what they are risking. It is their choice to make.”
Momentary shock took hold of Gregor, but he quickly quelled it. He glared at her. “That doesn’t excuse genocide, wizard.”
Vraith’s straight-chopped blonde head shook slowly back and forth. “I don’t have time for this,” she said. “These few stragglers,” she waved at the pilgrims inside the arc, “were told the same thing as those thousand or so.” She pointed at the line. “I wash my hands of the ignorant and selfish. You do what you need to do.”
“At least give me time to give these folks the elixir,” Gregor said.
“You can do that if you’d like, of course, but the ritual will begin as soon as the circuit is complete.”
“How much time do I have?”
Vraith glanced around at the line of pilgrims. There were still places where people weren’t lined up perfectly, sections where the pilgrims weren’t holding bloody palms to their neighbors’. “I’d say about a half hour,” she said. “An hour at most.”
An hour? Gregor thought. An hour to save all these pilgrims?
An hour was no time at all.
A faint breeze tickled Duvan’s skin. A dim flare of red slowly grew brighter. A burlap-covered pillow scratched against his cheek as he drowsed. The weight of Slanya’s arm draped across his chest made him feel secure, reassured that he wasn’t alone in the universe. Not anymore.
The red light brightened, spurring him awake. The door to the small chamber was opening. He opened his eyes and realized that he felt refreshed and alert. He should be exhausted after all that had happened. He’d only been asleep for several hours, but for the first time in years, no dream memories had haunted him.
Slanya stirred in the bed next to him. Sweet Slanya.
The sky outside the window had grown dark during their sleep, and the room was dark except for the torchlight coming through the opening door. The torch’s red flicker cast sharp shadows into the room as someone entered.
“Duvan?” came Tyrangal’s voice from the opening door. “Time to get up! I need your help.”
He came fully awake and sat up in the bed. Despite feeling alert and rested, pain shot through him with the movement. His back itched and burned where he’d been stabbed, and the bones of his recently broken leg ached. Magical healing and resurrection were phenomenal things, but the body still remembered the trauma. Duvan’s body was telling him that it was time to rest.
Hopefully, he would soon get to do so. “What do you need, mistress?” he said. “I am a little worse for wear, but I will do whatever you require of me.”
Tyrangal stepped into the room, tall and radiant. Her face seemed to glow with inner fire, and her eyes were like embers. She looked at Duvan, and then at Slanya slipping out of the bed on the other side.
Duvan turned to watch as Slanya shrugged into a thin, brown robe. The colorful tattoo of Kelemvor’s scales disappeared beneath the garment as it came down over her neck and back.
Slanya turned and met his gaze. Her thin lips spread into a broad smile, lighting up her whole face. Affection and gratitude welled inside him. He felt better than he’d felt in a very long time.
Tyrangal’s tone grew even more urgent. “The Festival of Blue Fire is underway right now. Vraith has Gregor’s elixir, and with it she can expand the changelands. She can unleash the Spellplague once more. Even with my guard, I cannot defeat the Order without help.”
Duvan looked around for his combat leathers and found them on the small wooden table, clean and folded. He dressed quickly, despite residual pain throughout his body, pulling on his worn and abused pants and lacing them up. He donned his thick leather tunic, and with sure hands he arranged and tightened all his gear so that he would ready for whatever challenges lay ahead this night. “I’m not sure what I can
do that you cannot,” he said. “But I am with you.”
“You are immune to the touch of the plaguelands,” Tyrangal said. “You can destroy the Order’s plans.”
Duvan shook his head, remembering the torture. “They can easily kill me in other ways,” he said with a harsh laugh. He remembered the searing burn of the fire and the deep soul-wrenching dread he had experienced during torture.
Glancing over at Slanya, Duvan saw that she was nearly fully dressed in her combat gear now. He didn’t know how their friendship would evolve from here or if it would develop into something more. But he did know that it was a friendship and that was something worth keeping. Worth living for.
In fact, he had a lot to live for, not the least of which was to avoid ending up as part of Kelemvor’s city wall. Duvan knew he wanted to do something good with his life. He needed his life to mean something. Right now he would help Tyrangal stop the expansion of the Plague-wrought Land.
Stop the plaguestorms from spreading. Prevent villages like his from being wiped off the map. That was worth doing.
He met Slanya’s eyes. “I’m going to do this,” he said. “But you don’t have to go.” He turned to look at Tyrangal. “She doesn’t have to go, does she?”
Slanya gave a grim chuckle. “You’re going, so I’m going,” she said. “And I’ll roust the other doomguides too.”
Tyrangal’s aristocratic face registered awareness at this exchange, but when she spoke, there was a deep sadness in her voice. “I need Duvan to come with me now,” she said then gazed at Slanya. “If you wish to help, make all haste possible to the festival field.”
Duvan finished preparing himself. He stood, feeling marginally more ready for battle but still a shadow of his normal self. Like a husk, ready to be blown aside on a gust of wind. Still, Tyrangal said it was important, and he owed her his life.
He turned to Slanya, who was fully dressed and heading for the door. He reached out for her hand, and his touch stopped her. Surprised, she turned to him. He mouthed, “Thank you,” then let go.
Her smile was brief, but it was enough. And then he watched her pass through the door and disappear down the hall, calling for Kaylinn and the other monks to join her.
“Come outside with me,” Tyrangal said. “I will show you my true form.”
Duvan followed quickly and quietly. In the distance, he could hear Slanya calling for the monks and clerics to gather in the central courtyard, raising the alarm.
Duvan always known that Tyrangal was more than what she seemed, that she was alien to him in some primal way. But her bounty and generosity toward him was undeniable. She had never betrayed him or lied to him, so he’d never questioned her about what made her different. It had never mattered.
Outside in the courtyard, under the deep, midnight-blue sky full of stars and motes, Duvan watched as Tyrangal commanded the gathering monastery folk to give her a wide berth. When they had backed away from a Tyrangal who seemed larger and less and less human, his long-time mentor and benefactor underwent a remarkable transformation.
Duvan watched in awe and growing recognition as Tyrangal’s neck elongated. Her skin grew rough and scaly. Her arms thickened and her body stretched until she had grown to fill half the courtyard. Duvan found his heart pounding, but more with pride than fear when Tyrangal sprouted a heavy tail and broad batlike wings.
Horns grew out of Tyrangal’s new elongated head. Teeth as long as Duvan’s forearm showed from her snout as she grinned. The torchlight reflected coppery off her shiny scales, as smooth as polished glass, and glimmered off spikes as sharp as daggers sprouting from the back of her head and neck.
Duvan took a step back as the huge beast stretched her wings and neck. Then she let out a loud, bone-shaking roar into the sky. Tyrangal was a dragon.
Duvan sucked in a breath. It made sense, he thought. It fit. He was glad he’d never tried to kiss her, though.
“Climb on,” she said. “We have a date with fire.”
Slanya watched in amazement as her fellow clerics and monks gasped at the massive dragon in the courtyard. Everyone took a step back as Duvan climbed up onto Tyrangal’s extended front knee. Slanya felt a rush of sympathetic fear as she watched her new friend grab hold of a spike that jutted from Tyrangal’s shoulder and pulled himself up to her neck.
By Kelemvor! Slanya thought. Tyrangal was full of surprises.
Was she really a dragon? Or a powerful illusionist? It hardly mattered; she was on Slanya’s side. It was good to have such friends.
When Duvan had finally settled into a somewhat secure position, straddling Tyrangal’s neck near the base, he leaned down against the dragon and swung a rope around her neck to help him hang on. And as he tied the rope loosely but securely, the dragon stretched her leathery wings and rose into the air in a swirl of wind and dust.
Wind buffeted Slanya as she watched the two of them fly off toward the border of the Plaguewrought Land, toward the Festival of Blue Fire. She shook her head to clear it. Marvels like this happened. She’d been through the change-lands and come out again! No time right now to dwell on these things.
As she readied herself for combat, Slanya considered her condition. She was tired and still in a great deal of pain. She was far from completely healed and certainly not completely sound of mind and body. But she could not afford to sit this out. She didn’t have time to heal up. She didn’t even know if her spellscar could be healed.
Slanya tried not to think about Duvan’s safety now, but she already knew that she would miss him if something happened to him. She steeled herself, focused, and tucked away her emotions as best she could.
She located Kaylinn, dragging herself from her chambers half-dressed and bleary-eyed. Slanya told her what Tyrangal had reported and what needed to be done to stop Vraith. She explained that hundreds of pilgrims could die in the festival-that the Order of Blue Fire intended to expand the border of the Plaguewrought Land.
The Order must be thwarted in this.
Kaylinn merely yawned and nodded. “Go confront Brother Gregor,” she said. “He’s not evil, just driven by selfish motives. Get him to help you stop Vraith. I will organize the temple complex, and we will meet you at the festival field.”
“Aye, High Priestess,” Slanya said. And then, overcome with gratitude, she continued, “Thank you for all you’ve done.”
Kaylinn merely grinned and said, “When this is all over, you can take my duties for a day while I sleep.”
Slanya laughed. “Deal.”
“Now go!”
Slanya grabbed her staff then raced to the stables. She quickly saddled one of the mares, eased it out of the stall, and mounted. Slanya heeled the horse into motion, quickly picking her way through the scattered tents toward the Festival of Blue Fire.
Warm wind washed over her scalp, her sideknot whipping as she rode. Despite the darkness of the night, the horse made no missteps. The mare easily negotiated the proliferation of tents and scattered wagons. Then Slanya was clear of the encampment and galloped up a short hill.
Wheeling her horse around, Slanya gazed down at the sight of the Festival of Blue Fire aglow with many bonfires. The pandemonium of the festival drew her in like a moth to a funeral pyre. Part of her wanted to dive in and dance, revel with the pilgrims, and let the chaos consume her. Part of her had always been drawn to let go of her iron grip on order. Abandoning herself to randomness would be freeing.
And self-destructive.
As the pallet of colors resolved in front of her, patterns emerged. Order from chaos. She caught sight of a long line of pilgrims arcing out from the border veil, enclosing the revelers. It made sense that the line marked where Vraith’s new border would be. Vraith would increase the size of the Plaguewrought Land by an area about the size of Ormpetarr.
If Vraith was successful, would everyone inside the arc be consumed? Burned alive by the chaotic changelands?
Where were Tyrangal and Duvan?
Slanya searched the skies above
. Eldritch light from the border veil washed the sky in blue-gray, making it hard to see shadows. For a moment Slanya saw nothing but a flat, monochrome expanse above her-no stars or motes or clouds, although she knew all of those things were up there. A flicker of red flared low in the sky, drawing her attention.
Ah, there they were. Flying low, the burnished copper dragon breathed a stream of burning acid as she dived at a small group of what looked to be high-ranking Order of Blue Fire accordants standing amid a cadre of well-armed Order Peacekeepers.
Dragon’s breath belched forth from Tyrangal’s diving form, but the Order group stood their ground near the far end of the line of pilgrims, right next to the border veil. As Slanya watched, the deadly acid was absorbed by a protective sphere of energy that surrounded th group. And as the liquid ran off and hit the ground with a hiss, it became clear that nobody inside the sphere had been touched by the acid.
A few of the pilgrims scattered in fear. Most of them, however, held their formation, and those who ran were caught by roving Peacekeepers on horseback and returned to their spots. Other Peacekeepers fired arrows and cast spells at the dragon as she swooped past.
To her right, Slanya noticed the arrival of a well-armed fighting force on horseback. From the red-brown glint to their shields, she concluded that these new forces were Tyrangal’s own Copper Guard riding in from Ormpetarr. They immediately engaged the Order’s Peacekeepers as well. It was a full-blown battle.
Abruptly, flares of gossamer blue-white arched up from the shielded Order accordants on the ground. The flares shot out like ballista bolts encased in fire, up into the sky toward the circling dragon.
Tyrangal was wheeling around for another dive when the first of a barrage of flares struck her and Duvan. The blue fire wrapped around the dragon like tendrils of smoke and the dragon was lost in the clouds of magic.
