Blackstaff Tower

CHAPTER 27

12 Nightal, Year of the Ageless One (1479 DR)

Khondar "Ten-Rings" Naomal reappeared at the apex of the conical t oof of Ahghairon's Tower. He halted a moment, assured that one of his rings would keep him aloft. His regenerative ring had healed his wounds, but he growled in discomfort from the aches in his back and arm, exacerbated by the axe that spun in his hand and fought to be released from his grip. He held it immobile with both hands and whispered, "Calm yourself Azuredge. Help me uncover the secrets of your maker. That's all that matters now-the tower and its secrets."

Khondar scanned the dingy rooftops and thick cooksmoke, the sprawl of Fields Ward and Mountainside, and the filth of the harbor and its morass of wood that was the Mistshote. He surveyed all and smiled grimly. "Soon, those secrets will make all this mine, and it will shine under wizards' rule. I shall restore its glory, and they shall call me the Inheritor of Ahghairon!" He looked down at the twitching axe and said, "And we shall find you a far better wielder with whom you can defend the Wizard-City of the North. Fot now, open the door."

The winds whipped light snow around him as Khondar swung the axe down on the magical field and the crest of the tower's roof.

The impact sounded like a thunderclap, and blue fires suffused the fields all around the tower. Khondar flinched, then realized the effect simply merged Azuredge's magic with the fields, harming him not. He laughed and slowly sank through the first magical field up to his waist. "Thank you, idiot and axe both, for your unwitting help!"

Khondar threw his cloak back behind his shoulders. From beneath the bracer on his right forearm he pulled one of the wands he'd stolen from Blackstaff Tower. He dropped the white ash wand point first onto the surface of the fields, and it lit up the second field with gold energy and emitted another thunderclap before it sank into the magic. The wand remained half-embedded inside the translucent field, the magic fading to a light yellow color. Khondar sank through the fields, the biting wind only reaching his head, shoulders, and heart outside the fields. He smiled, feeling only elation at his impending control of the city.

His grin faded when he saw opposition headed for him. "The fools would try to stop me. It is now time to show them Ten-Rings was ever their better."

"Hang on!" Eltalon Vaundrar's voice rose from its usual mutter to warn his companions as the graying wizard steered his flying carpet through some crosswinds. They dipped close to the near-empty market, its open spaces given over to sellswords or cart races as winter set in and wares for sale were no more 'till spring. Maerla Windmantle and Eiruk Weskur clung to the edges of the flying carpet, their faces serious as heartstop. Eltalon said, "The Black-staff didn't warn you or us in time, boy!"

"Look at Ahghairon's Tower!" Eiruk Weskur pointed, and the three of them saw the plume of blue fire that surrounded one of the most sacred magical sites of the city. "He's not just robbing me of memories or honor-he's out to steal Waterdeep's greatest secrets!"

"Of that, I'm hardly surprised," Eltalon said. "Maerla, once we're in range, hit him with a cacaphonic burst while I try a feeble-mind on the bastard. Eiruk, hit him with whatever you have. We may only get one or two passes to stop him."

Eiruk gritted his teeth and hugged himself as they flew into the wind and the biting flurry. He kept his attention on the tower as the three of them slalomed around chimneys and taller buildings. Once within range, Eiruk cast the most powerful spell he had with the longest reach, and a ball of fire streaked out of his palm toward Ten-Rings. The fireball engulfed the top of Ahghairon's Tower.

Khondar's smile faded, even though the flames washed around him harmlessly. An apprentice-level spell, he thought, one easily ignored. Ten-Rings willed his blue-stone ring away in favor of another, which he activated the moment it arrived. Addirional defenses fell into place around him.

With his other hand, Khondar cast a spell behind the southward side of the tower. A massive hand formed from magical force appeared and hovered out of the approaching guildmasters' sights. Ten-Rings held his concentration to maintain the magical hand. He felt but ignored the buffeting and blasting maelstrom of noise around him-Maerla's spell, no doubt. One of his rings protected him from what he knew would be Eltalon's standard mental attack. He saw them now-Eltalon, Maerla, and Eiruk-on the flying carpet speeding toward him-and their doom.

Khondar willed the magical hand alongside the tower and outward. The magical construct grabbed for the flying carpet as it flew past the tower's roof, and the hand succeeded at crumpling it in its grasp. Two figures jumped free of it and floated to the ground slowly, the wintry wind pushing them apart and farther away from the tower. Eltalon, unfortunately, found his right ankle pinned in the massive hand's grip. Despite the awkward position at which he floated above the tower, Eltalon unleashed a cone of grayish waves of energy at Khondar, but to no avail.

"Eltalon, you fool," Khondar said. "Wasted energy, that spell. My own spells easily thwart that exhausting magic-and soon, I'll claim more magic and the Open Lord's Throne. I'm doing this for the betterment of the city and its wizards. You'll see! And then we'll discuss if you're still worthy of serving as a guildmaster in my city."

The hand carried Eltalon away to the far side of the tower and lowered him out of Khondar's sight. Khondar heard the brief yell when the hand dissipated, dropping Eltalon unceremoniously into the crowd gathered below.

Khondar cast a spell barrier above him, not to close off any egress of his but to prevent being attacked from behind.

"Tymora, let me be in time. Let them have survived that." Meloon dashed down the stairs to the front entrance hall of Roarke House. When Khondar's spell ended, Meloon had landed safely on the stairs and Osco had managed to twist and grab at the railings and lintels as he fell, slowing his descent. The halfling hung overhead, yelling "Ow! My arms!"

Just as Meloon ran past, Osco's grip slipped. However, with no useful magic at hand, Laraelra fell the entire height of the house from its skylight all the way to the hard marble floor below. She lay still in a pool of blood.

Meloon reached her side and yanked the ring Vajra had given him off his finger, putting it on Laraelra's hand. Vajra promised it would heal him once a day from great wounds. Its red gem glowed, and she began breathing more regularly. Meloon looked over at Osco, who sat up groaning a pace or two away, "Let's not do that again. Ever."

Laraelra opened her eyes and smiled up at Meloon, touching his arm. "Ten-Rings?" she asked.

"Gone," Meloon said, "and he took Azuredge with him. At least that Blackstaff of yours gave him a good blast out of here."

Laraelra sat bolt upright and snapped, "Gehrallen!" The duskstaff appeared in her hands, and she sighed happily as her hands closed around it.

The crystal atop the staff glowed, and Vajra's voice said, Thank the gods. You must move fast! Ten-Rings has breached Ahghairon's Tower.

"Don't worry, folks." Osco chuckled. "I think I might know how to slow him down."

Renaer ran out of the palace in time to see two of three wizards of the Watchful Order fall as slow as feathers to the ground. The winds outside the palace whipped a light snow, but this discomfort didn't stop crowds from gathering in a thick circle around Ahghairon's Tower-at a respectful distance. None wanted to be too close to the semi-visible blue fire shields that still held a skeleton floating in their midst, the warning for the past three centuries that Ahghairon's Tower was sacrosanct and not-to be disturbed.

Renaer ran over to a friendly face and helped Eiruk Weskur avoid landing on his head, the winds having spun the feather-light spellcaster upside-down. Eiruk settled back onto his feet and nodded at Renaer. "Thanks. I take it you've cleared your name, then?"

"Aye," he replied. "It's now fairly obvious who's causing all the mayhem, isn't it?"

"Vajra sent a message to us at the Towers of the Order, exposing Ten-Rings's and Centiv's treason. We were supposed to capture him before he tried this, but we were too late. I don't understand why he's so brazen to do this in broad daylight, do you?"

"I think Blackstaff Tower has much to do with that," Renaer replied. "The ghosts of the tower set some spell on him, compelling him to try and breach Ahghairon's Tower. Even if they hadn't, he might have done this anyway before Vajra rallied all her energy as the new Blackstaff against him."

"Where are the rest of the guild wizards?" Eiruk wondered aloud, looking to the east toward the Towers of the Order. "They swore they'd follow either by air or foot."

"Could be some are more loyal to Ten-Rings and hope that by delaying, they'll be in position to garner favor from him in his new position." Renaer smacked his fist in his palm. "Waterdhavians are nothing if not practical, adapting to every changing situation, Eiruk. You know that."

Maerla Windmantle came up behind the two young men, sidling in between them briefly for warmth. "Well, there'll be many a former member of the guild by nightfall, once we determine who stood with Ten-Rings in his treason. Eiruk, stay here, while we try and bring him down from there yet again." With a few words, Maerla launched herself skyward, arcing toward the top of the tower.

Khondar smiled as he felt the magic of this place and its protections wash over him. He thought the fields would have had dangerous magic trapped between them, but he encountered nothing so far. As he looked up, he saw the matronly Maerla launching spells at his barriers to no avail. They would not hold for long, but Ten-Rings knew that he only needed to pierce another field or two before he was out of reach.

The sapphire amulet on Khondar's chest flashed as he drew its necklace over his head. Ten-Rings laid the amulet and necklace to test on the magical barrier, and another crack of thunder echoed across Castle Ward. Khondar did not hear much of the outcry from below as he sank deeper into Ahghairon's magical defenses.

Khondar was so enraptured by the magic all around him that he failed to notice the sparkles that rose around him until they became a swarm so thick they could not be ignored. He looked up and saw a more solid form taking shape-a long-sleeping defense had awakened, changing the tower beneath him as its stones shifted and slid into place. Khondar blanched in fear, but he laughed when he realized this defense held no danger for him either.

"The tower accepts me! It takes me as its rightful heir, not an invader!" No one but Khondar heard his howls-at least no one outside the tower and its fields.

Osco pushed open the door, and Meloon helped Laraelra walk into the room. She leaned on both the duskstaff and Meloon, having nearly died in her four-story fall. She smiled at him and Osco, and whispered, "Thanks. Let's find his secrets and get them out of here before someone else has the same idea."

"Gods, I thought wizards were supposed to be smatt," Osco said. "Ten-Rings had this great bedroom big enough for seven hin, and he slept on a cot in his secret workroom behind it. See?"

Osco stood on his toes and reached a hand up into the left side of the chimney to trigger a switch. A door popped open in the stone-worked mantle, revealing a smaller chamber beyond with a cot, two worktables, and a small bookshelf heavily laden with books.

Laraelra resisted the temptation to sit down and begin reading, but instead hobbled over to the farthest worktable. She pulled away a small green cloth, and found a pair of hands carved from russet sheen. On each of the fingers and both thumbs gleamed a ring. Laraelra started to cast a spell to examine the magics or determine which rings were magical, when Vajra's voice came out of the staff. Don't bother, Elra. The Jhaarnnan Hands are obviously magical, as are most of Khondar's rings. Gather those and the books, and I'll bring you home.

"We'd better find a way to seal this place up," Osco said, "or looters'll pick ir clean. After all, there's two big holes in the front of the place-and I haven't had the chance to root around much."

Vajra's voice rang out from the staff. Good thought, Osco. Thank you. A spell flashed out of the duskstaff and they could no longer hear the howling wind coming up through the atrium from the smashed stained-glass window.

Meloon and Osco shrugged and looked at Laraelra, who held up the sculpted hands and said, "Wards of some kind. Meloon, could you take these? Osco, grab that small chest down there." She gathered the books off the desk, and said, "We're ready, Vajra."

The staff said, You boys better hold on to Elra now.

The air glistened and shifted, growing darker amid a vortex of snow and magic. Within that vortex grew solid stone, and the tower itself groaned and scraped loudly as a massive shape formed four stories above the street. Folk below gasped and pointed as the conical roof of Ahghairon's Tower collapsed and shifted, the tower widening at its top to reform as crenellations and a more solid base for the statue that now loomed overhead. The summoning spell abated, and the air above Waterdeep filled with the screeching roar of a massive stone griffon. The Walking Statue that had long waited in reserve to protect this tower spread its stone wings wide with a clatter of carved slate feathers and reared on its powerful hindquarters, its talorts digging into the new stone crenellations that formed its perch.

The Walking Statue froze in place, its rearing form and spread wings now making Ahghairon's Tower taller than the minarets in the palace and the tallest structure in Castle Ward by far, save the towers of the castle set high on the mountain.

Standing in the shadow of the tower, Eiruk Weskur looked up at the statue and knew it was almost three times a normal griffon's size. His studies and experiences with magical beasts told him something else: while it might be a magical statue, it acted like a real griffon. Eiruk knew that its preening display was more a show of its power and virility, rather than any attack. In fact, its paralysis and lack of any attack posture gave him hope.

"It's not attacking," Eiruk whispered, smiling.

Beside him, Renaer saw the same clues and said with him, "Because he can't get in."

Maerla Windmantle flew over the two men, pulling her gaze away from Ahghairon's latest wonder to land next to her most-prized apprentice. "Eiruk, what do you two know?"

"The statue's not in any offensive or defensive posture, mistress," Eiruk whispered. "Khondar must not be any danger to the tower or its fields!"

"That might be the reason, but don't assume more than you can prove. Ten-Rings might simply have already been accepted by the tower, and he's controlling the statue. Let us see how this plays out. Keep your wand at ready. If spells start to fray or go wild because this thing brought magichaos with it, we'll need all the help we can get to contain a rebirth of spellplague-especially since Ten-Rings has disrupted one of the city's places of power." -

"And here you are." Vajra's voice shifted in the wind, even though she stood directly in front of them, her hands on the duskstaff as well as Elra's. Osco, Meloon, and Laraelra shivered in the cold wind atop Blackstaff Tower again.

"Can't you bring us anywhere warm?" Osco complained.

"Not until we've stopped Ten-Rings. Meloon, put the Jhaarnnan Hands down here, please."

"I don't suppose you'd let us try any of those rings out?" Osco asked.

Vajra's voice alone carried enough snap to cure Osco of that notion. "Be content with the gift you have, Osco Salibuck."

"That ring with the blue gem-what does it do?" Meloon asked.

"It looks like a spell-storing ring or one that triggers a pre-set teleport," Vajra said. "Why?" She barely looked at Meloon as she prepared the Jhaarnnan Hands with some spells.

"I want my axe back," Meloon said as he snatched the ring off the sculpted hand, placed it on his own, and said, "Rekarlen!"

The warrior vanished as the shriek of a stone griffon rang out across Waterdeep.

Khondar looked closely at his hand, admiring the rings he had collected over the years but focusing on his newest acquisiton. The sapphire ring of Ahghairon gleamed bright, as if carved and set only yesterday instead of four centuries ago. He felt the power of the ring thrum on his finger, and it resonated strongly when he crouched and pressed his hand flat against the next barrier. Again, thunder pealed within the barriers and all throughout the city, but Khondar had stopped laughing. His destiny was at hand, and he was but one barrier away from the tower's surface.

Few had been this close to Ahghairon's Tower since the fabled wizard's nine apprentices sealed it after his death. Only those few possessed by the ghostly Aghairon's Cloak ever broached the barriers or the tower, and none of them retained any memory of what wonders the tower held. -

Khondar held his breath and stopped to savor the moment as his form slid through yet another barrier. He whispered, "Ahghairon, hear me. I am Khondar 'Ten-Rings' Naomal, master of the Watchful Order of Magists and Protectors. In tribute to you, I would bring glory and power back to your city. I humbly approach your tower and take up your mantle with all the respect and honor I have. Allow me to serve your city as its Open Lord as you did."

Ending his prayer, Khondar touched the final barrier.

Meloon blinked into existence standing knees deep among blue flames. He lost his balance but soon realized the flames were neither hot nor harming him. Meloon steadied himself atop the flat tower. He saw Ten-Rings within the magical fields directly beneath him. The wizard knelt upon other fields inside, resting a blue ring against a field that pulsed with the same energy, and he apparently hadn't seen Meloon's arrival.

The warrior turned and spotted his axe. He stepped close and grabbed the haft of Azuredge, which now lodged between the toe talons of a massive stone griffon. Meloon tugged at it, and a shriek sounded louder in his ears than the grinding stone of the talons as the statue reacted in pain.

Meloon readied himself to pull Azuredge loose from the magical field, bracing his feet on either side of the embedded axe. In his head, he heard the axe's voice Patience, warrior. Vengeance sweetens with patience.

Vajra, Laraelra, and Osco stared out over Castle Ward from atop Blackstaff Tower, amazed at the massive form of the stone griffon. Their argument continued despite their combined wonder.

"Ten-Rings had Azuredge?" Vajra snapped. "Why didn't someone tell me that earlier?"

"You didn't ask," Osco said. "So what's your plan? Can you blast Dumb-Rings by blasting those hands?"

"Something like that." Vajra sent her silent instructions to Laraelra, who nodded, then approached the halfling from behind.

"What do you need me to do?" Osco asked, then stepped back in surprise as Laraelra drew her dagger and dragged a long cut down the length of her index finger. She dripped blood onto the Jhaarnnan Hands and said, "He who has caused me pain, find him through this magic. Find his scent and bring him to ground."

"Just do the same and repeat what I'm saying, little man," Vajra said, "and think of Ten-Rings while you do."

Before Vajra even began her litany, Osco slashed his forearm and repeated with her, "He who has caused me pain, find him through this magic. Find his scent and bring him to ground."

Vajra nodded her thanks, and the duskstaff whirled across the roof and into her hands. With a thought, she exchanged it with the true Blackstaff, and an eerie glow surrounded the metal wolf s head at the staff s end. In her mind's eye, Vajra could see the hidden library of the Blackstaff clearly, even though she remained outside the tower. Four phantom shapes, none distinct enough to be named, hovered around an image of a translucent wolf. The chorus of voices didn't identify which of the former Blackstaffs worked with her, but they told her, We can lendyou some aid for this, which bulwarks our works of old. Be swift though, for this expenditure weakens us all for a time.

Vajra smiled, and sent back a silent response, Better to thwart this enemy now. If he is not stopped, we'll be weakenedfor far longer.

The Blackstaff loomed almost a full yard taller than the young woman, but her magic and her will stood taller still. Vajra raised and then drove the true Blackstaff hard onto the stone atop Black-staff Tower, the impact sounding like a giant's hammer blow. She focused and whispered "Yaqrlueiehar qapeoirl suakr."

The eyes on the staff s wolf-head glowed green, while Osco and Elra's wounds and eyes glowed white. The energy leeched out of all eight points, and a pair of ephemeral wolves made of white and green energy stalked around the Jhaarnnan Hands, drinking in the scent and magic of their prey. They leaped off the tower and loped their way across the skies above Waterdeep, heading toward Ahghairon's Tower. Unearthly howls filled the air and frosted the clouds across which they raced.

Vajra finished her spell and said, "May this be enough to stop the traitor-and serve to discourage those who would follow his example."

"Actually, I think ol' Dumb-Rings will be discouraged enough when he realizes he doesn't have these." Osco grinned wide as he produced a rune-covered key and a garnet-covered dagger out of his belt pouch. "The fool didn't notice they were gone during the tussle at Roarke House. Guess my fingers must be magical too, eh?"

Vajra and Laraelra stared in shock at the halfling, then giggled, working their way up to exhausted laughter among all three.

Khondar pulled the sheathed dagger off his belt and pressed it against the final energy barrier, but he felt more resistance than usual. He pressed it point first, then fiat against the field again, and only sparks arced up his hand and forearm in response.

Khondar pulled the dagger from its sheath and screamed in anger. The blade was simple steel, and Khondar realized the gem in the pommel was an opaque red jasper, rounded and smoothly cabochon cut rather than the rose-cut garnet it was earlier. The blade held the carved words in trade Common, proclaiming the blade "Osco's Luck."

Khondar Naomal found a dry, hollow laugh escaping his lips despite himself. He reached into his belt pouch to withdraw his final item. "Perhaps Ahghairon's Key could force the final barriers open anyway," he muttered, and then realized the key he held was an ornate one to be sure, made of silver with three emeralds for its tines. It was no simple iron key like thousands of others throughout the city, but it was also not the key he needed. Some power hummed within it, but it was not a magic that would help him now. With that realization, the last glimmers of hope flickered out in Khondar.

He looked up through the fields, knowing he could still escape while the previous keys stood in place, and he paled in disbelief.

"You should be dead, boy!" he yelled.

The blond barbarian stood atop the final field, his hands around the blue axe. "I'm still striding, Ten-Rings," he said. "How do the wagons roll for you now?"

Meloon smiled, eyes locked on Khondar's, and brought his left hand up toward his face. Khondar could see the ring on his hand- for it matched the mundane one on his own left hand. His stomach tightened into knots as he cast a spell to fly out of the fields — and then he heard the unearthly howls as if they were on his heels.

Meloon's focus on Khondar broke when the first howls drifted his way. He swallowed hard when he saw the magical wolves racing toward him. He wasn't afraid of the wolves, but now that he looked out over the city, he realized just how high he stood above the streets-and his stomach lurched in fear.

He clutched Azuredge's haft as strongly as he could and looked to the west, on the chance some kinder fate wait in that direction. He stared into clouds black as night and a howling wind driving snow and ice their way. Despite it being near highsun, torches and lights blazed on the castle and palace ramparts.

Meloon looked back in time to see the wolves bring their own clouds and cold trailing them as they loped around Ahghairon's Tower. The warrior's fear faded as he realized the wolves paid him no mind, focusing all their dark green stares at Ten-Rings, who had begun to rise out of the fields.

Have faith, kin mine. Face fearand take the leap.

The voice both calmed and shocked him. Meloon looked down at Ten-Rings and knew he had to act fast to stop him. Khondar paused to pluck small items out of the magical fields and saw the wand floating in the energy field near his left foot.

Meloon reached down and grasped the wand with his left hand, keeping his right on the axe. Khondar let loose a roar of anger contrasted with the pale look of fear on his face. Meloon froze, holding both items in his grasp, and Azuredge twisted so her handle pointed out. Hold and take your leap of faith, my kinsman.

Meloon swallowed hard, whispered, "Lady of Smiles, I need your guidance," and stepped backward off the fields and the tower.

With the wand in his left hand and the axe handle in his right, Meloon spread his arms above him, wand and axe dragging against the magical fields. They slowed his plummet only slightly. Meloon wondered if the look of horror on his face matched that first look on

Khondar's face when he slid past, pulling away the two outermost keys for Khondar's escape. Any other thoughts soon left Meloon's head as the ground rushed up far more quickly than he liked.

Faith is tested in leaps, not steps, Meloon. Azuredge's voice was calm as ever.

To his surprise, Meloon's racing heart slowed and he calmed as well. "So I've heard," he said, and he looked down as he heard the crowd below scream and yell at his descent. Oddly, the first person he noticed as he approached was Renaer, who pointed at him. Meloon yelled, "For Waterdeep!" and expected to slam into the cobbles of the palace courtyard a breath later. Instead, he slowed to a stop as his weight disappeared and he floated the last few lengths down the tower. He blinked, and then looked down to see the ground a mere fingers-breadth away. He laughed and stepped down, turning to see Eiruk Weskur standing behind him, his hands in casting readiness..

"Meloon, watch out!" Eiruk yelled.

Meloon turned to see Khondar's furious face right before him. He lurched backward, pulling the wand and Azuredge with him. The magical fields snapped with thunderous booms. The recoil knocked Ten-Rings off his feet, but more importantly, the fires around the tower snuffed out.

"The wolves are trailing magic and building another spell field around the tower," Eiruk said, his eyes wide with wonderment. "They're sealing themselves in with Khondar."

The translucent white-green field completely encased the tower and all its subsequent magical fields, coalescing from top to bottom like a snowdrift built in reverse. It closed completely around and beneath the talons of the stone griffon atop the tower. The field shimmered and faded to near-invisibility. The populace watched as the wolves flew sunward around the tower, seeking the traitor Ten-Rings.

Khondar heard the howls, and he heard the claws scrabbling against all the other magical fields. The two wolves clawed their way past the first two barriers through the tears the barbarian's plummeting escape had created. But rather than close with him directly, the wolves each dodged into the spaces between the barriers, harassing and howling at Khondar with only air and energy between them.

Khondar tried to fly straight out, using the tears in the outer barriers to escape, but the fields slowed him, as if he flew through thickening syrup. The tears sealed before he could leave. He lunged toward the fallen Meloon Wardragon, only to see Renaer Neverember and Eiruk Weskur drag the barbarian back to safety. Ten-Rings slammed face-first into the second barrier. He tried to concentrate, but the increased howling distracted him.

Ten-Rings concentrated on his bracers and tried to will his spell-storing ring to him, but no transfer happened.

That Blackstaff bitch found a way to disrupt the Jhaarnnan Hands? Impossible!

He imagined "more tortures he would visit on her. Now that Meloon had taken Azuredge away, the wolves closed on him.

Khondar flew up from the base of the tower, using one of his rings to call up an earth elemental from the courtyard stones at the base of the tower. One of the wolves simply grew in size and savaged it to rubble in less than a breath. The second wolf swooped up and ate Ahghairon's Amulet. That barrier slammed shut again with a thunderclap, and Khondar realized to his horror that the barriers that penned him in meant nothing to the wolves. They dived through the tower itself if their paths took them that way. The first wolf flew above and gobbled up the wand floating in the third barrier. When the wand snapped in two in its jaws, the sound echoed, as if it were a century-old phandar falling in a storm.

The howling wolves flew three passes while Khondar flew one circuit up and around the tower, and one last thunderclap tpld him one of them had removed Ahghairon's Ring from the fields.

Ten-Rings slipped up to the top of the tower and unleashed a chain of lightning bolts, engulfing both creatures, but the energy served only to make the wolves seem even more solid. One wolf bit and slashed at Khondar as it flew past, dislodging the bracer he wore on his left wrist and swallowing it whole. The wizard did not initially feel his wounds, but soon screamed in pain as he realized it had stripped flesh from his arm along with the bracer. He pulled his wounded arm in close and readied a spell with his undamaged hand.

"I'm Ahghairon's heir! You things should be hunting down my enemies!"

Khondar "Ten-Rings" Naomal unleashed a dazzling flurry of colored orbs from his right palm, the iridescent blasts from the orbs temporarily scattering the image of one wolf. The second wolf slipped around the tower and came up from below the wizard. It clamped its jaws down on his extended right hand and chewed. The wizard screamed and pulled his arm back. All he retrieved from the wolf s jaws was half his bloodied sleeve and his muscle-clad bones. No bracer, no skin, and no rings. Khondar's last coherent thought as he descended into madness was-I'll need that skin more than they will… for spell components.

The cloud of white and green energy drifted around the tower, slowly becoming a spectral wolf again by its third circuit. It chased Ten-Rings foui full orbits around the tower before it snapped its jaws closed over his left hand, stripping it of flesh and rings. Khondar blasted the wolf s head off, as many green missiles crackled off his skeletal fight hand, but again, the green-white cloud drifted away slowly, lupine fearures growing back togethei slowly. The other wolf attacked from behind, snatched Ten-Rings up in his jaws, and worried him left and right, tearing his cloak off his shoulders and rending his tunic to tatters before letting him fly. Khondar fled.

Items clattered onto the cold, snow-covered stones at Vajra, Laraelra, and Osco's feet. The bracer she'd seen Khondar wear, along with a handful of rings, appeared, covered in blood.

"They started with the left hand and arm, I see," Vajra said, dispassionately.

"You mean… those wolves…?" Laraelra asked, swallowing hard and gagging as more bloody bits arrived to stain the rapidly falling snow. Laraelra staggered over to the tower's edge and retched. She wiped a hand across her mouth, then pulled at the trap door atop the tower. It opened easily, and she said, "I can't watch this. I'm sorry."

Osco kept his stomach from rebelling, but he too retched when steaming remnants of Ten-Rings's gore-soaked tunic and breeches landed with wet splats atop the pile around the Jhaarnnan Hands. He followed Laraelra into the tower, casting a sad eye back toward Vajra. "You coming?" he asked.

The Blackstaff shook her head without turning.

The Black Hunt delivers what it brings to ground, Vajra recalled reading, but she never realized that the wolves and the Black Hunt magic would be involved when she set her spells into motion. The bloody rain of rent garments continued, followed by the clang of the second bracer and the tinkling of five metallic rings. Vajra steeled herself and swallowed, whispering, "The Blackstaff is as hard as stone."

She thanked Auril silently for the heavy snow that now swirled around, as it helped blanket and deaden the strong smell of spilled blood.

Inside her head, Khelben's voice said softly, Birth and death always come with blood. Waterdeep has seen a traitor's death and a Blackstaffs birth-and perhaps more still.

Some mothers dragged their fascinated and bloodthirsty children away, while other Waterdhavians pushed forward or joined the crowd to watch the gory display. People cheered as the wolves clamped onto opposing limbs and pulled. The only things hindering people's views of the carnage were the constantly changing flight of the chase and the onset of winter's first blizzard.

Renaer, Eiruk, and Meloon smiled grimly when Khondar's eyes locked on each of theirs in succession as he passed by while flying from his tormentors. The wizard's brief pause allowed a wolf to catch him again and rend the last rings from his left hand- along with the rest of its flesh. The young Lord Neverember, Meloon Wardragon, and Eiruk Weskur were among the few folk who remained in place, watching this spectacle wordlessly. They were also among the very few who did not begin taking wagers as to which body part would be next to be damaged. They simply waited to see that justice was done. By the time the wolves charged in opposite directions to tear the body of Khondar "Ten-Rings" Naomal in twain, glow-globes shed light down on the snow gathered deep across their shoulders.