Farthest Reach

CHAPTER ONE

30 Tarsakh, the Year of Lightning Storms (1374 DR)

The high mage’s summons found Araevin Teshurr in his workroom, quietly making ready to leave Tower Reilloch. He was just finishing with the last of his spellbooks, efficiently stowing them in a well-warded magical trunk, when the lilting voice of Kileontheal, last surviving High Mage of Reilloch Domayr, whispered in his mind.

Mage Teshurr, please join us in the great hall, she said. We would speak with you.

Araevin looked up at the interruption, and a flicker of impatience tightened his brow. He had frankly hoped to avoid this leave-taking, when it came down to it. But no elf wizard declined a summons from a high mage, let alone a roomful of them, and he knew that Kileontheal was not alone. He sketched a graceful bow to the empty air. “I will come,” he replied.

That is the second time this year I have been called to the great hall by the high mages, he observed. They are beginning to make a habit of it.

He shook his head and placed the last spellbook in the trunk, closing and locking it with a whisper of powerful magic. Then he straightened and surveyed the workroom with a long, slow gaze. For better than eighty years Araevin had belonged to the Circle of Tower Reilloch, earning the right to call himself Mage, as well as the respect of his fellows. But the time had come for him to leave his studies there.

He caught a glance of his visage in a mirror hanging by the door, and smiled without humor. He looked the same as he had the day he first set foot in the tower, a tall sun elf with a long, sparely built frame, and an intelligent, inquisitive expression to his bronzed face. But his eyes were colder than they used to be, and there was a hardness to his demeanor that hadn’t been there only a few months ago. After arduous travel, great battles, and deadly peril in the wildernesses of Faerun over the past four months, Araevin had become as sharp and unyielding as a blade of fine elven steel, as if fate had conspired to hammer out of him the ease of his former life.

He did not like the way that felt.

“Enough delay,” he told the face in the mirror. “I am not so important that I can expect high mages to wait on me.”

But Araevin took one more moment to touch his hand to his chest, running his fingers across the smooth purple gemstone that lay embedded there. The selukiira of Saelethil Dlardrageth was invisible to any but a wizard’s eyes, and it lay concealed beneath his clothing, but Araevin found that he was hesitant to appear before Kileontheal and the others with the stone on his person.

They will notice if I do not bring it, he decided.

He frowned into the mirror again then slipped out the door, locking it behind him with another word of power. Even though Tower Reilloch was arguably one of the best-defended places on Evermeet, Araevin had acquired a very active sense of caution of late. Only a few months before, the daemonfey had proved that even a wizards’ tower in Evermeet was not beyond attack.

Araevin strode easily through the familiar halls, strangely ill at ease on the day of departure. But the Queen’s Guards who stood watch before the hall’s doors of blueleaf and mithral greeted him amiably enough, and admitted him to the high mages without hesitation.

Bright sunlight filled the great hall, streaming in through the simple glass panes of the dome overhead. The high hall had been virtually demolished during the daemonfey raid against Tower Reilloch, but in the hundred days since the battle, artificers had worked long and skillfully to repair the battered chamber. The dome was not yet set with magic theurglass-that was the work of years, not months-but for the time being mundane glass served well, filling the elegant hall with slanting rays of warm spring daylight.

“Ah. Welcome, Araevin. Thank you for joining us.” High Mage Kileontheal stood amid a half-circle of five high mages, the most Araevin had ever seen together in one place. She was a slender sun elf woman who might have been a girl of thirty, but she was in fact a full five centuries in age. Like all high mages, Kileontheal embodied a spirit of tremendous power in the frail envelope of a mortal, the potency of her Art almost shining from her wise face and slender form. She had been gravely injured by a madness spell during the daemonfey attack on the tower, but she had since been restored to her power and sanity by subtle songs of healing. Kileontheal had been fortunate; the High Mages Philaerin and Aeramma Durothil, the other two high mages of Reilloch Domayr, had not survived the attack.

“I am at your service,” Araevin replied, bowing.

He stole a quick glance at the other high mages who stood with Kileontheal. To his surprise, he recognized the Grand Mage of Evermeet, Breithel Olithir himself. Next to him stood the wry and good-humored moon elf Anfalen, then a cold and distant moon elf diviner named Isilfarrel, and finally a stern old sun elf whom Araevin guessed to be the lorekeeper Haldreithen.

“Are you well?” Kileontheal asked. “How is Ilsevele?”

“I am well enough. Ilsevele is in Silverymoon, visiting the court of Alustriel on behalf of her father. I have not seen her in a couple of tendays now, but we have spoken in sendings.” In truth, Araevin had found that he had become accustomed to being apart from his betrothed. Despite the months they’d traveled together earlier in the year, they had spent years away from each other during their two decades of engagement. “How may I help you, High Mage?”

“I have heard that you intend to leave Tower Reilloch,” Kileontheal said.

“Yes, High Mage. I feel that my studies here are concluded, at least for now. It’s time for me to follow my own road.”

“Where will you go?”

Araevin glanced at the others, who stood watching with impassive faces. High mages did not assemble for small talk, and he could not believe that they were all so interested in his comings or goings.

“The House of Cedars, Lady Kileontheal. I have not kept it up as I should have. And its solitude will suit my researches well.”

“I am sorry to see you depart Reilloch, Araevin. So many of our comrades were lost in the daemonfey raid. Tower Reilloch is not the place it used to be.” Kileontheal studied his face for a moment then added, “But perhaps you are not the mage you used to be, either.”

He looked up sharply at that. Kileontheal did not miss much, did she? He met her gaze levelly.

“No, High Mage. I am not. The trials of the last few months have hardened me, and Saelethil’s selukiira has provided me with whole new fields of lore to decipher, things I could not have imagined before.” He indicated the great hall with a turn of his hand. “I have done everything that I can here at Reilloch.”

“The study of high magic awaits you here if you stay, Araevin.”

Araevin smiled and said, “While I have changed much in the last few months, I have not grown fifty years older.”

“It is not an unreasonable wait,” the moon elf Anfalen said. “You would be taking up high magic at less than three hundred years of age. Very few of us do that, Araevin.”

“I know. When the time comes, I will be honored to begin my studies.” He looked at the high mages facing him and frowned. “Is there some reason I should not leave Reilloch?”

Kileontheal inclined her head. Without meaning to, she seemed to be looking down at him from a great height indeed, though she was barely five feet tall. “We have been discussing your recovery of the selukiira, and your subsequent reweaving of Myth Glaurach’s mythal. Lord Seiveril reports that your efforts resulted in the dismissal of a small army of summoned fiends, and led directly to his victory on the Lonely Moor, as well as the flight of the fey’ri legion and their daemonfey lords. You have accomplished great things since you left Evermeet a few short months ago.”

“Thank you, High Mage.”

“However,” Kileontheal said, not quite interrupting him, “We are… concerned about the nature of the high loregem you have found, this Nightstar.” She glanced at the others, and back to Araevin. “May we see it again?”

“It is deadly perilous to touch, High Mage. I have escaped harm only because of an accident of genealogy. The Nightstar of Saelethil will not spare you if you are careless.”

“We will be careful, Araevin. None of us will try our strength against Saelethil’s today,” Breithel Olithir answered. The grand mage was new in his post, having ascended to his duties only a year ago. He too was a sun elf, dignified and stolid, but Araevin still sensed uncertainty about him. So many of Evermeet’s mages had perished in the past few years, killed in Kymil Nimesin’s rebellion of six years past, or lost in the expeditions to defend Evereska against the monstrous phaerimm only four years later. Olithir would have been the fifth or sixth choice for the title he held had other high mages lived, and most knew it.

The grand mage offered a small nod, and Araevin acquiesced with a flickering frown. He reached his right hand into his shirt and closed his fingers around the cold facets of the selukiira. The gemstone slipped painlessly from the flesh over his breastbone, leaving not a mark on him to show where it had been anchored to his very bones a moment before. Araevin willed it to become fully visible, and it appeared in his hand, a fine crystal of deep violet about the size of a woman’s thumb, etched meticulously with tiny lavender runes.

He whispered a word and left it suspended head-high in the air, floating in place under the power of its ancient enchantments.

He withdrew three steps and said, “I remind you again, the Nightstar is very dangerous.”

The high mages moved closer, though none approached closer than a full arm’s length. Kileontheal pursed her lips thoughtfully as she studied the dark facets. Breithel Olithir whispered the words of seeing spells and stared intensely at the flickering spell-auras he read in the gemstone. The loremaster Haldreithen simply frowned, saying nothing.

Finally Breithel sighed and turned away from the Nightstar. “It is an old stone, of that I am certain-old, and strong.”

“That is what I told you,” Araevin said.

“Yes, but I wanted to see for myself. The selukiira might have instructed you to lie about its origins.”

“Grand Mage, I am not under the stone’s control. Examine me, if you are not sure.”

“We have already,” Haldreithen said. The scholar measured Araevin with a long look. “Just because no sign of the stone’s dominion is obvious does not mean that you are not under its influence. After all, through this thing you wielded spells of mythalcraft we did not even suspect were possible. Who is to say that this Saelethil Dlardrageth didn’t possess enchantments that we cannot detect?”

“If the Nightstar had overthrown my mind, Loremaster, why did it then permit me to strike against Sarya Dlardrageth and bar her from the mythal of Myth Glaurach?” Araevin demanded. “For that matter, why did it not hide its identity, and invent a more innocuous origin? It could have used me to subvert one of you if it had concealed its true origin.”

“Sometimes half a truth is the best way to cover a lie,” the moon elf Anfalen said. “Still, I agree that your Nightstar would probably not have allowed you to tell us so much about it, if it really controlled your mind.”

“Even if you are not shackled to the stone’s will, you may be under a more subtle influence,” Kileontheal said. “If you are right, the Nightstar is the handiwork of a monster. Selukiira hold much of their maker in them, and it seems to me that you might be wise to put it away somewhere for safekeeping and never handle it again.”

“Better to destroy the thing outright,” Haldreithen added.

“I understand your concerns,” Araevin replied. “But consider this: The Nightstar holds spells of mythalcraft that no elf has known for five thousand years. Secrets as old as ancient Aryvandaar remain inside the selukiira. I do not understand all of them now, but in time I will.”

Kileontheal gazed on the stone for a long time, then looked up at Araevin and asked, “Is the selukiira capable of instructing you in high magic?”

Araevin hesitated. He felt the other high mages awaiting his answer. He did not want to speak the truth, but he dared not attempt to deceive them.

“Yes,” he said at last. He heard soft intakes of breath and sensed widened eyes and sharp sidelong glances around him. It was not often that high mages were surprised. “The spell I used to sever Sarya Dlardrageth from the mythal of Myth Glaurach was a spell of high magic. There are a number of even more powerful high magic spells in the Nightstar, as well as a great store of lore on mythalcraft and similar works. I have only scratched the surface of the selukiira ’s contents.”

“Have you embarked on the study of the other high magic spells contained in the lorestone?” the diviner Isilfarrel asked.

“Not yet, High Mage, but it is my intent to do so.” Araevin felt the consternation of the others, but he did not look away. “Sarya Dlardrageth did terrible things with the mythal of Myth Glaurach. What else might she do, given the chance? Who else might be able to do such things, now that the daemonfey have demonstrated that they are possible? Faerun is littered with the remnants of elven wards, vaults, and gates.” He paused, allowing the high mages to consider his words. “I fear that things are stirring in Faerun, things that our forefathers buried and forgot long ago. Our ignorance may prove deadly.”

“The impudence!” growled Haldreithen. “Kileontheal, you erred gravely with this one.”

Kileontheal’s eyes flashed, but she kept her voice calm. “Araevin, you have no way of knowing what perils might sleep in that ancient lorestone. Even if you succeed in your efforts, we may all have cause to regret it later. If nothing else, your defiance of our will in this matter speaks poorly of your readiness to become a high mage.”

“I understand, High Mage. I have weighed all these factors in my decision. Whether you believe it or not, I am the best judge of the perils of the Nightstar.”

“You will not study that lorestone here,” Kileontheal replied.

“I know,” Araevin said. He offered a deep bow. “That is why I have chosen to depart the tower. As I said, the time has come for me to follow another path.”

Deliberately, he stepped forward and closed his hand around the selukiira as the high mages watched. He slipped the lambent gemstone beneath his tunic, and pressed it to his breastbone again. Then he turned his back on Kileontheal and the others, and strode out of the great hall.

Patches of snow still lingered beneath the green branches of the evergreens that mantled Myth Glaurach’s rocky shoulders. Despite the bright sunshine that had lingered all day, spring did not come early to the Delimbiyr Vale. The air was damp and cold with the snowmelt, and not far from the ruined walls and broken domes of the ancient elven city, the Starstream-second of the four Talons that fed the mighty Delimbiyr-roared and rushed with white, cold floodwaters, so loud that its roar filled the air miles from the river’s course.

Fflar Starbrow Melruth pulled his cloak closer around his broad shoulders, and gazed over the jagged stumps of a long-abandoned colonnade on the city’s southern heights, watching the last embers of daylight painting the snow-covered mountaintops and high, wooded hills with soft splashes of gold and orange. He was a moon elf, tall and strongly built, with the strong hands and long arms of a born swordsman.

“A clear night coming,” he remarked. “The stars will be out, but I think it will be cold.”

Lord Seiveril Miritar looked up from the large map he was studying on a table nearby. He was a noble sun elf with red hair showing silver streaks at his temple, a high cleric of Corellon Larethian who wore a surcoat emblazoned with the star and sword of the elven god he served.

“I think I’ve come to like the spring here,” said Seiveril. “I find it… bracing.”

As High Captain of the Crusade-even Seiveril had come to think of Evermeet’s expedition as “the Crusade,” despite the fact that he’d resisted the appellation for some time-he had chosen the ruins of Myth Glaurach’s library for his headquarters. Though the empty shell of white stone was mostly open to the sky, the building still possessed strong walls that were easily enclosed with light screens and rugged canopies. Nearly six thousand elf warriors were encamped in the city’s ruins or in the forest nearby. An elite guard of twenty Knights of the Golden Star stood watch within a stone’s throw of the old library, along with dozens of officers and aides who helped Seiveril and Fflar to keep order in the elven army.

“A couple of months ago you might have thought differently,” Fflar said. “The wood elves of Rheitheillaethor told me how bitter the winters are in these lands. Do you know the ice broke on the Delimbiyr only a tenday ago?”

Fflar was more than he seemed, an ancient hero of fallen Myth Drannor whom Seiveril had called back into life with a powerful spell of resurrection. Together the sun elf cleric and the moon elf champion had led Evermeet’s Crusade in a fiercely fought campaign to defend Evereska and the High Forest from the daemonfey legions of Sarya Dlardrageth.

“Will we still be here in midsummer? Or the fall, perhaps?” he continued.

Seiveril straightened up from his map table and looked at Fflar. “There’s more on your mind than the weather, my friend. What is it?”

“How much longer can you keep this army together, Seiveril? Araevin banished Sarya’s demons, we destroyed her orcs and giants, and her fey’ri have fled the field. It seems to me that you have accomplished your goal: Evereska has been preserved, the folk of the High Forest are safe. Your army has no enemy to fight.” Fflar turned from the open colonnade and climbed a couple of weathered stone steps to the empty shell of the library, lowering his voice. “For that matter, have I now accomplished the purpose for which you summoned me from Arvandor? What am I supposed to do now?”

Seiveril frowned. “I do not know that I have an answer to your second question, Fflar. What are any of us supposed to do?”

“You called me back from Arvandor to beat an army of demons. Now that Sarya’s demons have been defeated-through no doing of my own, I’ll add-I find myself wondering whether I am supposed to, well, go back.” Fflar looked at Seiveril and shrugged. “Do I just discorporate when I’m ready to go this time, or do I have to go throw myself off a precipice or something?”

“Is that what you want to do?”

Fflar looked at his hands for a long time. “I don’t think so. I feel alive enough right now. I miss Sorenna, I miss her terribly. But I know she is waiting in Arvandor for me, and time does not mean much there, Seiveril. In the meantime, there seems to be more of the world for me to see and more things for me to do. I just don’t know if it is wrong for me to linger now.”

Seiveril stepped close and set a hand on Fflar’s shoulder. “I think I know Corellon’s will in this,” he said. “You were not called back to live one hour, or one day, or one battle. You were called back to live, for as long as fate, chance, and your own heart allow. There is nothing wrong in tarrying here. It is nothing more or less than any of us do.”

Fflar looked up, a crooked smile on his face. “Well, good. I would hate to leave again without finding out where in Faerun the fey’ri legion has gone to ground.”

“You and I both,” Seiveril murmured. He returned his attention to the map spread out on the table. “You asked me a moment ago how long I intend to keep the army here. My answer is this: I will stay here until I am convinced that Sarya’s legion won’t return, and cannot be found. I don’t expect all of our warriors to stay that long, but I certainly hope that some number of them do. We have unfinished business with her.”

Fflar joined him at the map. “We fought her at the Lonely Moor eighteen days ago. As recently as ten days ago, she and her fey’ri were here at Myth Glaurach.” He tapped on finger on the Delimbiyr Vale, thinking. “Some of her fey’ri can teleport, but not many. They would have used that tactic in combat, if it was available to them. But they do fly. How fast could a flying army travel? Fifty miles a day? Sixty?”

“They didn’t seem to be tremendously strong or fast flyers, not like an adult dragon or a giant eagle. And they must carry some equipment with them. I expect they’ve abandoned anything like a supply train. Sixty miles a day, ten days… that would be six hundred miles from here.” He looked more closely at the mountains and forests depicted before him, and frowned. Within that distance lay tremendous swaths of the great desert Anauroch, most of the wild backcountry of the Nether Mountains, the Gray-peaks, the southern High Forest, the High Moor and the Evermoor, as well as the forbidding Ice Mountains north of Silverymoon, and even the Spine of the World and the High Ice. “She could be anywhere.”

“Have you been able to divine any clues?”

“I have been casting divinations every day, with little luck. I suppose I must redouble my efforts, and ask Vesilde Gaerth and Jorildyn to have their own clerics and mages begin the search, too. Perhaps if enough of our spellcasters search at once…”

“I suppose it’s the best chance we have. But Seiveril-if we do not find some sign of the fey’ri soon, you will have to give thought to how much of this army you can send home.”

“Excuse me, Lord Seiveril?” Both elves turned as the priestess Thilesil entered the hall. She was also a cleric of Corellon, junior to Seiveril, who had joined Lord Miritar on his quest and served as his adjutant and chief assistant. “Lord Keryth Blackhelm of the High Council is here to see you.”

“Keryth, here?” Seiveril frowned. Keryth was the High Marshal of Evermeet, leader of the island’s armies, and one of Queen Amlaruil’s most valuable advisors. “Show him in.”

Thilesil nodded, and beckoned their guest in. “This way, sir.”

She stood aside to permit Keryth to enter, and followed him in, anticipating decisions to record or orders to issue.

Keryth Blackhelm was a moon elf of middle years, perhaps a little past his prime as a swordsman, but still hale and fit. He was not as tall as Fflar, but he was a commanding presence anyway, with a fierce determination burning in his eyes and a gruff, confident manner.

“Lord Miritar,” he said. “Thank you for receiving me.”

“Of course, Keryth.” Seiveril took Keryth’s hand in a firm clasp. They’d served together on Evermeet’s High Council for many years, and even if they did not always agree with each other, they shared a mutual respect. “Have you traveled long? I can ask for refreshments to be brought.”

“No, the trip was quick. The grand mage loaned me the services of a sorcerer who knows the spell of teleportation. We left Evermeet not more than half an hour ago.” Keryth looked about the ruined building. “How is Ilsevele?”

“She is well. I spoke to her just this morning. She is visiting Silverymoon with her companions, though I believe Araevin is attending to some business at Tower Reilloch.”

“I have not seen Silverymoon,” Keryth replied. He wandered into the old library and through to the ruined colonnade outside, taking in the view. “This was Glaurachyndaar?”

“Yes. It was called the City of Scrolls in its day.” Seiveril gestured at the ruins beyond the library. “The daemonfey used the grand mage’s palace as their lair. While I have seen no sign of them since I have been here, I decided it was not prudent to take up residence in their quarters. There are deep vaults and armories hidden in the heart of the hill beneath the palace, and I am not sure that we have found all of their secrets yet.”

“It seems that you have matters well in hand otherwise,” Keryth said. He faced Seiveril. “Speaking of which, I have been sent here to ask if you would consent to attend the High Council’s meeting in seven days and provide the queen and her advisors with a firsthand account of your campaign. We have heard many stories, and we want to get the most accurate report we can.”

“You may have forgotten, Lord Blackhelm, but I am no longer a Councilor of the Realm.”

Keryth shook his head. “No, the queen is not summoning you as such. Nor is she summoning you at all, to be honest. She only requests that you come to speak before the council, my friend. She will send a mage to teleport you, if you like, so it should not take you long at all. And to be honest, you will save us a lot of pointless debate in which Veldann or Durothil question the veracity of every report we have received.”

Seiveril considered the request for a moment. He was certain that Selsharra Durothil and Ammisyll Veldann would question him harshly on any account he cared to provide. On the other hand, he could think of nothing he cared to hide, and he no longer needed to be particularly polite to the conservatives and antimonarchists on the council, did he?

He looked over to Fflar and asked, “Lord Starbrow, can you keep things in order here for a time?”

Fflar shrugged. “I’ll know where to find you if I need you.”

Seiveril turned back to Keryth. “All right, then. If the queen requests my presence, I will not tell her no. I will be there.”

The House of Cedars stood on a rocky headland on Evermeet’s rugged northern shore, hidden within a sparse forest of wind-shaped cedars and hemlocks. It was a rambling old elven lodge of open verandas and promenades anchored into the very rock of the headland. Araevin’s ancestors had built themselves a home in which they remained a part of the world outside, instead of a burrow from which they could shut things out. Light screens of wooden paneling and large windows of strong glass in clever wooden frames allowed him to close or open most of the rooms as he saw fit.

Early in the winter Araevin had spent a tenday there, repairing the damage of many long years of weathering. As the spring turned toward summer and the days grew bright and windy along Evermeet’s shores, he was pleased to see that his repairs were keeping well. He had lived in the house as a child, more than two hundred years past, but no one had lived there for a century or more. When he’d finally gotten around to visiting the place a few months before it had been in poor shape.

On his arrival Araevin spent three days arranging the personal effects and arcane tomes he’d had sent from his chambers in the Tower Reilloch. The house featured a handsome library on its eastward face, which Araevin filled with the collection of grimoires, spellbooks, journals, treatises, and scrolls he had accumulated over eight decades of residence at Reilloch. Next to the library stood an empty hall that Araevin converted into his workroom, installing at one end the cabinet of theurglass in which he stored his collection of magic wands and other such devices. He also wove a potent fence of abjurations and magical defenses around the entire house, since he could no longer count on the wards of Tower Reilloch. He wove careful illusions to hide the books and artifacts he was most concerned about, and summoned magical guardians to defend the house if necessary.

As the sun set on the sixth day since he’d stood before the high mages, he removed the Nightstar from its hiding place over his heart and set the purple gemstone in a small stand before him.

“I think the time has come for you and I to speak at length,” he told the selukiira.

The Nightstar made no answer, but Araevin thought he saw a lambent flash in its depths. The high loregem was a living artifact. It held dozens upon dozens of spells, much as Araevin’s own spellbooks did. But beyond that useful function, the Nightstar protected the deeper secrets of mythalcraft and high magic. Already it had shown him spells for examining and shaping mythals, but the secrets of even greater power still awaited within the stone.

He drew a deep breath, and focused his attention on the flicker of light that lived in the heart of the gem, allowing his perception, his consciousness, to sink deeper and deeper into shining purple facets. The stone grew brighter, and distant voices whispered in his mind-and with an abrupt plunge he felt himself drawn into the gemstone, falling into a vast and illimitable expanse of towering amethyst ramparts.

He opened his eyes, and found himself in the poisoned garden of the Nightstar’s soul. It was a magnificent place, a palace of gold colonnades and elegant arcades that existed nowhere except in the gem’s own intellect. Lovely vines and flowers filled the open courtyard, but they were malicious and alive, things that slowly coiled and hunted with thorn and venom. In an old house on Evermeet’s shore, his body stood locked and immobile, facing a shining purple gemstone, but as far as Araevin’s senses could discern, he was physically here, a visitor in the infernal grandeur that lay at the heart of the gemstone.

“Saelethil!” Araevin called. “Come forth! I wish to speak to you.”

The hungry flowers rustled and groped at the sound of his voice, but Araevin did not fear them. They were not real, and had no power to hurt him. He simply exerted his will and made a small brushing gesture with his mind, and the sinister things recoiled from him, leaving a clear circle around his feet.

“Saelethil! Come forth!”

Araevin frowned and glanced around, wondering if perhaps he had erred in some way, but when he looked back Saelethil Dlardrageth was standing silently only an arm’s reach from him, regarding him with bright green eyes that held all the malice and venom of an asp. Despite himself, Araevin took a step back.

The ancient sorcerer smiled at the motion. In life Saelethil Dlardrageth had been a tall and regal sun elf, with handsome if cruel features, and the figment of his consciousness and personality that was embodied in the Nightstar chose to manifest itself in his living appearance.

“The measure of an undisciplined mind,” Saelethil rasped, “is that the intellect allows emotion to challenge the observed truth. You know that I am not permitted to harm you, and yet you quail like a child at the mere sight of me, Araevin Teshurr.”

Araevin did not refute the accusation. Saelethil would have excoriated him for denying it, in any case. The shade of the long-dead intellect that had crafted the Nightstar despised self-deceit more than anything. Instead, he decided to take the offensive.

“I spoke with the high mages about you recently,” he said. “They wish you destroyed, and I am not altogether certain I disagree with them.”

“Your high mages are fumbling incompetents, Araevin. They have no idea what it means to be worthy of that title.” Saelethil sneered in contempt, but he turned away to inspect the garden, folding his arms imperiously across his chest. “Bring one here, and I will demonstrate the extent of their ignorance for you.”

“Tell me of the high magic spells you hold, and I will judge the question of their ignorance for myself,” Araevin replied. “You have shown me only one high magic spell so far, even though you claim to know a dozen more.”

Saelethil glanced back at Araevin and grinned without humor. “Ah, perhaps there is some Dlardrageth in you after all, my boy. You’ve tasted true power, and now you thirst for more.”

“What I thirst for is not your concern, Saelethil. Now, are you able to make good on your claims or not?”

The Dlardrageth archmage studied Araevin for a moment, his eyes cold and measuring. “I could, but you are not yet suited for the spells I haven’t taught you.”

“Not yet suited? In what way?”

“The highest and most dangerous art of high magic is the manipulation of magic more powerful than the mortal frame can bear. Your so-called masters in Evermeet accomplish this by forging a circle of mages to wield high magic. They cooperate with a number of other high mages to collectively shape a magic that would destroy any single one of them who attempted it.”

“I know that much,” Araevin said.

“Indeed. Well, there is another tradition for wielding high magic, Araevin Teshurr. Those of us who did not care to shackle our power to the weakest of our fellows wielded solitary high magic, free and unfettered by the prejudices of our peers. In order to wield power that otherwise would destroy us, we devised the telmiirkara neshyrr, the rite of transformation. We sculpted our very natures to suit ourselves for the power we intended to wield. With such preparation, a single high mage could transcend mortal limits and manipulate powers that otherwise might require a whole circle of high mages to manage.”

“I did nothing of the sort when I severed Sarya from the mythal.”

“You did not need to. Many spells of high magic can be cast without the aid of a circle or a transformation. The mythaalniir darach, the spell of mythal-shaping you wielded against my kinswoman Sarya, does not conjure into existence the awesome power of a high mythal. It simply allows manipulation of an existing font of power.” Saelethil shrugged. “However, I did not see fit to preserve many spells of that sort in my Nightstar. The rest of the high magic spells I recorded require the telmiirkara neshyrr.”

Araevin frowned, considering the notion. He did not think that Saelethil was permitted to deceive him, but he was certain that the Nightstar’s persona was capable of choosing not to tell him something he didn’t ask about.

“So you can teach me the rest of the high magic spells you hold if I perform this telmiirkara neshyrr?”

Saelethil nodded.

“What sort of transformation is involved?”

“You exchange a large portion of your mortal soul for demonic essence. Demons are magical beings by their very nature; a demonic nature serves to shield one from power of untrammeled high magic.” The Dlardrageth smiled cruelly. “It is not very difficult.”

Araevin blanched in horror. He understood the bargain the Dlardrageths had made so long ago.

“I will not do that!”

“Then you will find most of my high magic spells inaccessible,” Saelethil said with open contempt. “I expected no better of you.”

Araevin glanced down, thinking hard. He noticed that the poisonous creepers squirmed closer to him, and he brushed them aside again. If Sarya had access to the sort of mythalcraft he did in the form of the Nightstar, she would be able to wield those spells as if she were born to them… which, in fact, she was. He found himself thinking of the melodious voice of Malkizid, the sinister presence he had felt in Myth Glaurach’s mythal when that device had been under Sarya’s control. What had Malkizid told Sarya about him? What did Malkizid know about mythals and their uses?

A thought occurred to him, and he said to Saelethil, “Demons are not the only creatures of supernatural power in the multiverse. Can your telmiirkara neshyrr bind other essences to a high mage, essences not steeped in evil?”

Saelethil hesitated, but said, “Possibly. You must transcend your mortality to wield these spells safely, but there may be more than one way to do that. Chaos, order, the elements, the concept you term ‘good’… all these principles give rise to supernatural forces, and might prove suitable.”

“What other transformations do you know, then?”

“I do not know any other than the one I used.”

“Do you know of anyone else who would know?”

The Dlardrageth archmage frowned. “Yes,” he said finally. “Ithraides and his students wielded high magic without the benefit of a circle.”

“Ithraides?” Araevin said in surprise. He knew that name. Ithraides was the grand mage of fallen Arcorar, the ancient archmage who had driven the Dlardrageths out of Cormanthyr thousands of years in the past. From there Sarya Dlardrageth had gone on to subvert the realm of Siluvanede and breed her legions of fey’ri warriors… but before all that House Dlardrageth had been defeated by Ithraides and his allies, more than five thousand years ago. “Was he also bound to a demonic essence?”

“No. He shared your useless scruples. He discovered another soulbinding, something that allowed him to match my mastery. I sincerely doubt he would have had the stomach to follow the path I chose.”

Araevin offered a grim smile and said, “No, I suppose he wouldn’t have.”

He took a step back, and willed himself up and out of Saelethil’s poisoned garden. There was a dizzying moment of soaring recklessly upward into a world of great purple planes and dancing storms of lambent fire, and he opened his eyes with a sudden gasp of breath.

He sat in his library in the House of Cedars, the Nightstar gleaming on the table before him. The sea wind rattled the windows of his study, and the ocean was dark and wild beyond.

Ithraides knew how to wield high magic without a circle, just like Saelethil, he reflected. And he did it without transforming himself into a demon. That knowledge might still exist, if he looked in the right place.

“Arcorar,” Araevin breathed, his eyes distant. Arcorar had become the realm of Cormanthyr, and Cormanthyr’s capital was the city of Myth Drannor, which had fallen only six hundred years ago. Much lore of ancient Arcorar had been carried out of Myth Drannor in its final years to Evermeet and places such as Evereska and Silverymoon. Evermeet’s hoard of Cormanthyran lore had been largely destroyed when Kymil Nimesin destroyed the Towers of the Sun and Moon five years ago, but what of Silverymoon? Araevin had heard that many Cormanthyran mages and scholars fled there when Myth Drannor fell.

It seemed as good a place to start as any, and Araevin had other reasons to visit the city in any event.

He reached out for the Nightstar and slipped the gemstone inside his shirt again, pressing it to his breastbone. He had a journey to make ready for.