Swords of Eveningstar

Epilogue

There was only one way to defend Cormyr.

Only one way to restore the honor of House Crownsilver.

Every god there is, give me strength to do this.

To do what must be done.

Rethendarr was the war wizard who’d been most angry in questioning her-the youngest, most eager and restless. To Rethendarr she would go.

After she made one necessary stop.

“I am the Lady Narantha Crownsilver,” she told the startled Purple Dragon at the guardroom. “And I have need of-ah. This one will do.”

Her sliced thumb told her the slender long sword was very sharp. Carrying it like a walking stick, she marched off before the guard could think of a pretext to stop her.

“Two things,” she murmured to herself, “all the realm knows. The Wizards of War stand ever-ready to defend the realm-not the king or Obarskyrs or palaces, but Cormyr itself-and right now every last spellhurler among them has one peril uppermost in mind: the Arcrown, that can easily slay any mage from afar. They search for it day and night.”

She stood before the door to Rethendarr’s study for a long time, trembling, before she mustered courage enough to open it and step inside.

There had been a chair… and that high marble-topped table.

There still were. The table was too heavy for anyone to shift alone-good-but the chair Narantha dragged to where she needed it-and wedged the sword hilt in its back cushions, the blade angled up over the table.

Ah, he had a glowstone. Even better. She put it on the marble, just beside the sword with its jutting point.

Now, where did the wizard keep his wine?

Ah.

She chose the best, and his largest goblet, and it was good. She had a second goblet.

Yet found herself still trembling.

“Lorneth,” she whispered, “guide me.”

And she flung the goblet with all the force in her arm, at the closed door Rethendarr must be on the other side of.

He was, by the startled curse she heard through it.

In a moment he’d wrench it open, and she must be ready. Standing up straight and proud, she tossed her head, trembling so hard that she thought she’d fall over, and cried in as triumphant a voice as she could manage, “Ha! Face me if you dare, Rethendarr, for I wear the Arcrown-and I want to see your face as I slay you! You, and all who stand between me and the Dragon Throne!”

There was a moment of silence, then a swift incantation.

The glowstone on the table winked out-and several other things around the room changed, too.

“My, antimagic fields are wonderful things,” she commented aloud, talking to keep her courage up.

The door crashed open-and Narantha hurled herself onto the sword.

Rethendarr’s face was furious, his hands raised, but the jaunty greeting she’d meant to give him was lost in the sob of pain that burst from her.

The steel was so cold. So cold…

She slid down it, gasping. Blood was running from her lips like a waterfall, it was through her and must be thrust out through her back by now, dark and wet…

So this is what it’s like, to die.

In a room far away in Arabel, Dove Silverhand’s head came up sharply.

“What is it?” Myrmeen Lhal snapped.

“Something… bad,” Dove said softly. “Oh, Mystra.”

The knights burst into the study, a frantic Florin at their head, and ran right over the war wizard in their way.

Narantha Crownsilver was impaled on a sword, dying. “Highly overrated,” she gasped, not seeming to see them, and her face twisted as she tried to laugh… and found she couldn’t.

As Florin flung himself across the room, clawing at his belt for a potion, Narantha spat blood and turned to look at him, her face still twisted in agony. “It’s in my head, ” she sobbed. “Don’t heal me, or it’ll get out!”

“What, Nantha?” Florin cried, flinging his sword down and reaching for her.

Narantha drooled blood all over his hands as she shuddered, and let her head fall back onto his shoulder. “This,” she whispered. “ This is what it means to love Cormyr.”

“What’ve you done?” he cried. “Why-why?”

The Lady Narantha Crownsilver peered up at him pleadingly through her mask of blood and tears to gasp, “Oh, Florin, I had to do it. You see that, don’t you?”

And then she died.

Here ends Book 1 of the tales of the Knights of Myth Drannor.

Their adventures are continued in Swords of Dragonfire.