The Herald

CHAPTER 7

"Stand aside,” the darkly handsome young man told the guards coldly. “As the son of Lamorak Tanthul and grandson of the Most High, it is my right to have an audience with my grandsire.”

The guards barring his way to the tall, closed doors of the palace at Thultanthar’s heart kept their faces impassive. “Even so,” the elder one replied, “our orders are clear. No one may pass.”

“You have no right to stop me. I say again: stand aside. Or I shall do what is needful to clear my way to the Most High.”

“Calm yourself and wait here, while we send word of your arrival. It may be that the Most High will see you, but it is not within our power to freely admit you through these doors. Stand, please, while we-”

“No. Get out of the way!”

The guarded doors opened, and Prince Aglarel Tanthul looked out, his face like stone.

“Or what, Draethren Tanthul?” he asked. “Is there something wrong with your hearing, or your wits? ‘No one may pass’ seems clear and simple to me; why does it not to you?”

“As the son of your brother Lamorak, and a prince of Thultanthar in my own right, I demand audience with the Most High. So much is my right-and not something you can deny me. So you too, should stand aside.” Draethren raised one hand and moved his fingers in the weaving gesture that Shadovar used as a warning of their sorcerous power and their willingness to use it.

“Admittance denied,” Aglarel replied flatly, folding his arms across his chest. “I am aware of the strength of your sorcery-and of your temper. You are on the verge of raging right now. Why should I let you get one step closer to the High Prince?”

“Where did you get the idea that my loyalty to the Most High or Thultanthar is any less than yours?” the young prince snapped back. “How do I know you haven’t slain him and are just preventing me from discovering that? Now stand aside. My sorcery is more than sufficient to compel you-or destroy you.”

As if that threat had been the order for an often-practiced military maneuver, Aglarel and the two door guards spread out in front of the doors to get apart from each other, and raised their hands as if to cast spells.

“Your estimation of your own might, young prince,” Aglarel said quietly, “is more than mistaken.”

Draethren’s eyes blazed, but he backed up a step, darting glances at the three Shadovar arrayed against him.

“Stand aside and let Draethren, son of Lamorak, pass.”

That cold, calm, and unexpected voice came from the darkness behind Aglarel-who stiffened at the sound-through the open doors.

“I could not help but overhear the polite salutation Prince Draethren employed to seek audience,” Telamont Tanthul added.

The door guards stepped aside, and Aglarel turned to regard his father, who added gently, “It is always a mistake to dismiss the young and rash as of no account. For the day always comes when they are.”

Aglarel inclined his head with an expressionless nod, and stepped back to let a wisely silent Draethren step past.

Then he fell into step behind his triumphant nephew, to escort him into the chambers within, but the Most High of Thultanthar, already on his own way back down the passage to deeper chambers, met Aglarel’s eyes and commanded firmly, “Leave us.”

Aglarel lifted his head in a silent signal of surprise and reluctance, but stopped right where he was-until a silent inclination of his father’s head signaled him to advance and close an inner door.

Leaving Telamont Tanthul alone with Draethren, son of Lamorak.

Who was drinking in his first sight of the audience chamber without it being thronged with guards and more senior Shadovar. Deserted, it seemed both smaller and more imbued with watchful menace. Was it because of the towering seat of obsidian that seemed to loom over the entire room? Or the great black sphere-studded rod hovering upright in its corner?

Or the vast relief map that Draethren had never seen before. The metal table on the other side of the throne from the floating rod was bare, but its top was a single, irregularly sculpted black mass. A model of the lands between Anauroch and the Sea of Fallen Stars-complete with tiny floating cities hovering above it, and here and there little glows and lines of radiance that-Draethren peered-yes, denoted magical wards.

His grandfather regarded him with something that might have been wry amusement in his eyes. “You’ve never seen a map before?”

Nettled, Draethren shook his head and waved a hand as if to brush away both the question and all thought of maps, and burst out, “The city is moving!”

Telamont turned to study the map. “Our home is a flying city,” he replied mildly. “Flying cities … fly.”

“Yes, but why? My father set me the task of altering the life-drain spell to affect ward fields-and no sooner do I begin to achieve real progress than you whisk us away from the warded tomb of Anlathgrus, the only handy ward we can sacrifice. With every passing moment we get farther from the tomb, and my work is at a standstill!”

Once begun, the rage that had been simmering inside Draethren for too long boiled over. “Surely the finished ward-drain spell will enable us to use the portals, overwhelm the elves, and so take Myth Drannor in far less time and losing far fewer swords than wearing it down in a protracted siege! Is that not why you wanted a ward-drain spell?”

The Most High bent to peer closely at a particular city-possibly one of the Sembian ports-and asked, “Can it be that the son of Lamorak, the most vaunted sorcerer among the younger princes, has forgotten how to magically take himself from one place to another?”

Then he straightened, turned to face his grandson, and asked, “Why confront me, when you could simply return to the tomb and pursue your vital work?”

Draethren flushed. “I–I don’t want to be away from Thultanthar at this crucial time.”

“As the kin you most desire to destroy are all within it?”

The son of Lamorak slowly went pale. He opened his mouth to frame a cold and scornful protest, but found no words under the dark weight of Telamont’s knowing look.

“I have been aware of your intended treachery for some time, Draethren,” the Most High told him calmly, “but I should warn you that now is not the time for it. You will find my tolerance rather low.”

The air in the chamber suddenly darkened and swirled, until it seemed as if many vast cloaks were gliding soundlessly through the air, circling the young Shadovar sorcerer-cloaks that had fangs.

“W-what do you mean?” Draethren stammered, finding himself eyeing them and hastily forcing himself to look back at his grandfather.

“Every one of my sons, at one time or another, has judged the elders of this city cruel and ignorant fools whose deeds and policies will soon doom Thultanthar itself. In turn, all of my grandchildren have, quite independently, come to embrace the same views. I have grown quite used to it. Some, regrettably, grow imprudent in their actions. Did you never wonder what happened to your elder brother Tantoras?”

“The accident that befell him was … no accident,” Draethren muttered. “I have always known that.”

“Yet you learned nothing from that knowledge? Then you are more foolish than I’d thought. That you despise your elders has been clear enough for some time now. Young princes of Thultanthar are seldom subtle-and even less often able to hide their aims from their older kin. Thankfully, most of them eventually come to see that working together for the good of our city is preferable to defiance and poorly thought-out, airy schemes.”

“How is moving so slowly to conquer best for Thultanthar?”

“Those too hasty to snatch prizes often damage what they grasp for. Why bleed the lands that shall be ours in pointless warfare, when we can work smaller violences and steer those realms into our control without all the destruction? Lay waste when you must, but never casually ruin or consume what may be useful in time to come.”

“I do not see in such lofty platitudes any justification for idle inaction.”

“Draethren,” his grandfather said grimly, “you do not see. Now go, and think on what I’ve said, as you perfect that ward-drain spell for us all. You may even live long enough to grow wiser.”

The son of Lamorak stared at his grandsire for a long, silent time, then nodded curtly, turned on his heel, and strode out of the audience chamber.

As he swept past the door guards, he took care to ignore the trace of a smile hovering on the lips of his uncle Aglarel.

His grandfather’s coldly contemptuous smile was like an icy dagger between his shoulder blades at every moment of that long, lonely walk.

The Most High of Thultanthar indulged himself in a cold little smile as he watched Draethren go. Then he awakened one of his rings to bolster his mantle before he turned his back on the young fool.

He really did want to study his map right now. The ever-shifting Weave had been collapsing for a century, yet somehow it never crashed entirely, nor faded away-and increasingly it seemed to him the reason for that seemed to be its many small local anchor points.

Some of which were here, here, and here.

Could it be that to truly understand the Weave, and come to govern it, one had to know all of its anchors, and so see how to best grasp it?

Telamont recalled with distaste his utter failure to bend the Weave to his bidding the last time he’d tried to work with it directly, rather than calling on it with spells. It had been like trying to grapple with a great wave crashing over a harbor rampart, or a gale that was shattering stout trees-and it had crashed over him in a great dark whirling that left him helpless to influence it or even work any magic at all, shattering him into an oblivion that had taken a long time to recover from.

He sighed. To find and mark every last anchor of the Weave, not to mention the moving ones that were creatures, would take a handful of days less than forever, and …

He smiled sourly. If Draethren thought matters were taking too long right now …

Telamont let his wraith-slaying mantle fade back into invisibility, and called on the little ward that cloaked the room to carry his words to Aglarel, outside the doors.

Fetch the next hotheaded young traitors. Dethud’s daughters, I mean; I’m well aware our kin harbors a large and growing collection of the seditious. Those two are easier on the eyes than the Prince of Peerless Sorcery who just marched out of here.

Aglarel was close enough to the open door for Telamont to hear his snort of amusement, even before he leaned in to give the Most High a nod.

The two female elves facing Storm were as tall as she was, and more splendid of face and figure. They had a presence to match her own.

Yet the senior Myth Drannan elf-a male who strode between the two female guards, to the fore, and stood a head taller than them all, and as straight as an upright grounded pike with robes wrapped around it-was grand enough to awe even Arclath Delcastle. Arclath and Amarune were sheltering behind Storm and holding hands for comfort, as she faced the haughty Varorn Irrymgalis, Steward of the Southern Gate.

She was trying to offer her services-and those of Amarune and Arclath-in the defense of the city, and it was not going well.

The steward was clearly dubious.

“A longtime Chosen of Mystra, an untried young woman of uncertain magecraft, and an equally young member of the restive nobles of Cormyr,” he said dismissively, his careful courtesy somehow anything but. “You must appreciate that our usual suspicion of N’Tel’Quess who serve other masters before our coronal, within our city, is necessarily heightened now, while we are besieged. Tell me, how is it that you passed through the foes surrounding us, if you are not of them, or sent by them?”

“Magic,” Storm replied dryly. “And a little base guile. Elves are not the only dwellers in Faerûn to indulge in either of those things.”

Varorn’s gaze went colder. “I have little patience for bandying words with children, and even less so with those who offer me evasive answers.”

Storm gave him a sad smile. “I felt old when your grandsire Imlarren first asked me to dance, here under the leaves in Shimaeren’s Glade-when there still was a Shimaeren’s Glade. Yet your prudence is only right, in time of war. So many of my fellow Chosen have fallen and yielded their fire and their knowledge to me that my magic is better now than it was but a short time ago. It sufficed to hide our true natures from the army that besets you, and enabled us to pass over the fighting unrecognized.”

“Through the mythal? Human, tell a better lie!”

“The mythal knows me, Varorn. I had a hand in its repair.”

“That’s hardly a better falsehood.”

“It’s the truth, son of Orblyn. And if you knew the true character of my companions, you’d not so swiftly dismiss-”

“Ah, but I do not know them. Nor you. Only the words you offer me, words so far beyond belief that I can scarce-”

“By the First, Var!” interrupted one of the female elves. “We need every sword, every spell, every healing hand, every pair of eyes-and you spurn this brave handful? If you’re suspicious of them, our spells can see their thoughts, true likenesses, and root natures easily enough. Even if they came awash in mischief, they’ll hardly have time to indulge in it, if we put them to fighting in the trees where the Shadovar hirelings press us!”

Arclath sidestepped to peer past the haughty elf lord at the exasperated female. So that must be Narya Ilunedrel, whom his mother had once met and grudgingly spoken highly of …

“You do not command here, Narya,” Varorn snapped without turning.

“Nor do you,” said a new voice, deep and grim.

Fflar Starbrow Melruth, the High Captain of Myth Drannor, came into the chamber, lurching in weariness, his armor scarred and stained, reeking of sweat and blood and the emptied innards of those who’d recently died on his sword.

Striding past Varorn, he regarded the three newcomers for a long, silent moment, and then said, “Be welcome, all of you. As Narya says, we need every sword, or Myth Drannor is doomed.”

In the silence that followed, every pair of elf eyes in that room held the same knowledge.

Lord Arclath Delcastle was too polite to voice it, but could read it loud and clear:

Myth Drannor is doomed anyway.

Dethud’s daughters were the sort of tart-tongued and darkly beautiful femme fatales who preferred to have the world think they passed their time in the languid sway of indolent boredom and were incapable of being awed or impressed by anything their mere elders did or wrought. Yet the High Prince of Thultanthar was amused to see how their eyes darted around the audience chamber whenever they thought he wouldn’t notice. Their restless gazes passed over the table from which his conjured map had vanished, and returned again and again to the towering throne and especially the tammaneth rod-despite the glass globes enclosed within its black spheres being empty and dark.

How fearful of their High Prince they truly were was difficult to discern beneath their purringly arch manner, but Telamont knew that to threaten or bluster would never be the right approach with these two. Not when Lelavdra and Manarlume were together, at least.

“Your manipulations of the rising arcanists of our city have not,” he informed them dryly, “gone unnoticed.”

“And so?” Lelavdra voiced what Manarlume merely signaled with one scornfully arched eyebrow.

“And so,” Telamont continued, “I have certain special tasks in mind for you both. Your first service for Thultanthar; your path to earning trust and reputation and real power.”

He paused for their questions, but they merely shifted their poses and waited in half-smiling silence for him to continue.

Cool young things, indeed.

“You will not find this work to be a stretch from your habitual … entertainments,” he added. “You are to secretly form a club or group that meets for drinking and intimacies, behind closed doors, and invite any and all ambitious arcanists to join. Make the proceedings seem exclusive and attractive, so that your contemporaries will seek to join.”

“And then do what to them?” Manarlume purred.

“And then befriend the most suspicious of them. Seek to gather even the slightest hints of disloyalty to Thultanthar, and of any secretive schemes.”

“All of the ambitious arcanists?” Lelavdra pouted. “Some of them are frankly … slimy. Others, hardly men.”

“All,” the Most High replied calmly.

“Seducing the least loyal and biddable of Thultanthar-sharing ourselves intimately with every last one of them-is hardly a duty Tanthuls expect to be asked to perform,” Manarlume observed. “I prefer to choose my partners.” She gave Telamont a sly look. “As you have no doubt already learned.”

By way of reply, he regarded her in impassive silence.

After a moment, she asked softly, “And if we refuse?”

“New princesses of Thultanthar can be sired easily enough,” he observed calmly. “You will not be remembered. Save as warnings to others who may contemplate such disobedience.”

“Are our lives worth so little, Most High?” she asked, her voice quiet but dark fire rising behind her eyes. “Advance this or that nuance of your latest scheme, or be casually destroyed?”

“I do nothing casually, nor do I embrace ‘latest schemes.’ I advance Thultanthar always and unstintingly, in many ways. Such is the duty of all Tanthuls.” Telamont’s voice was conversational, and for the first time he felt they were a little afraid of him. “As for the worth of life, those who do not strive toward goals are hardly alive. Not that I’ve observed any lack of striving in either of you.”

“You have been watching, haven’t you?” Lelavdra asked archly.

“Of course. How else could I know the work for which you are best suited?”

“Your words,” Manarlume observed calmly, “strike true. Shall we begin immediately?”

“It is why I summoned you now, and not a day ago.”

“Then we should take our leave and begin.”

Telamont nodded. “I have no doubt you’ll enjoy this work. It will be preferable if you work together rather than as rivals.”

“Your will be done, Most High,” they murmured in chorus, and withdrew, sultry grace in every gliding movement.

Telamont watched the doors close in their wake, and muttered, “Neither of you are quite as expendable as you believe I consider you. Yet.”

The steam rising from the stewpots in this dim corner of the lengthy Candlekeep kitchens dripped off the walls. Just as the sweat of Maerandor’s own hard work dripped off his nose.

He stepped back with a sigh and wiped his hands dry. When chopping with a cleaver this sharp, even if the cleaving was being done just to parsnips, dry hands were a must. He wiped the cleaver’s worn leather grip for good measure, hefted it, and stepped forward to the chopping board again.

And then stiffened, to freeze with cleaver raised and no parsnip menaced, as an unexpected hand touched his shoulder, then slid down his back and started to massage the stiffness there.

For an instant, Maerandor was whirling, hands darting up to slay-and in the next instant, he was forcing himself to stop and relax, shuddering under the caressing fingers.

“Locks of the Binder, Norun, but you’re upset! What’s wrong?”

It was Shinthrynne, and her voice held the soft concern of a friend. Not a lover. Good, that was a complication he didn’t want. Lovers noticed when you slipped out of bed and away.

Not that he knew where Chethil’s bed was. Shar curse and shatter. That hadn’t been among what he’d been seeking in the dying cook’s mind.

And of course, should have been. Why was life so full of “should have beens”?

Maerandor feigned a cough, then growled, “Apologies. I-” He coughed again, and it was genuine this time. The spices down this end of the kitchens were catching at the back of his throat.

Ah, but he had been getting stiff, and hadn’t yet noticed it. The Southerner’s long, slender fingers were digging deeper into his back now; she was good at this. He hastily started to pay attention to just where and how she was kneading, in case-

“Right, old snapjaws, now you do me. Stirring batter is much harder on the back than a little bending and chopping.”

“Of course,” he agreed, and found himself facing a truly splendid back, curving muscles flanking a long, sinuous, and deep line of spine. Shinthrynne wore only a light smock, smudged here and there with flour and a few stray petals of parsley, and he dug his fingers into it and tried to emulate what she’d just been doing to him.

“Hoy, lovers!” Rethele called, from the far end of the kitchen. “The thrummel and the dagh will be sticking and scorching in a trice, and I’m stuck down here stirring my goldaevur! Stir now, and fondle later!”

“Sorry,” Shinthrynne called back, and was out from under Maerandor’s fingers in a lithe instant.

Leaving him quelling a sigh. Good. Too much more of that, and his loins would have been more than just stirring.

And he had no idea how things stood between these two amiable young women and the senior cook of Candlekeep.

Well, at least he knew what thrummel was.

Men stank as they rotted. As did their dung pits, and the smoke of their cooking fires when left untended to burn refuse and nearby shrubs and saplings. Thin threads of reeking smoke were drifting through the trees as Storm, Amarune, and Arclath trudged warily along through a deep and soaring forest that was still beautiful, despite the war that had come to it, and was all around them now.

There was a faint, ever-present singing too. An ethereal, wordless rising and falling chorus that was by turns mournful and filled with exultation. Despite what looked like wild forest, they were within the City of Song.

Or what had once been Myth Drannor, before its fall and rebuilding on a smaller scale and now this siege.

Just now, the three companions were walking in a little dell that held no bodies or combatants. Just the three of them, walking among the tall trees.

“One hears so much errant nonsense about fell wizards energetically engaged in dooming the world, that one shrugs the words off like an ill-fitting cloak after a while, and pays no attention,” Arclath remarked. “Lately, of course, the rumors and reports have come darker and wilder with each passing month. Tumult across the world entire, mountains thrusting up and seas draining away, dragons falling from the skies and scores-nay, hundreds-of mortals proclaiming themselves Chosen of this god or that, and rushing here and there plundering things and destroying things and mustering armies. Yet tell me now-the wizards of the city that floats above Anauroch are behind this siege, truly?”

“Floated above Anauroch,” Storm replied. “Thultanthar is somewhat nearer now.”

Lord Delcastle rolled his eyes, then fixed them on his beloved. “So, a city of ancient archmages hovering above us, blotting out the sun as they enthusiastically hurl dark and mighty spells down on our heads … we are doomed.”

Amarune Whitewave looked back at him and rolled her own eyes. “We are all doomed in the end, my lord. The trick is to make the journey from birth to doom as delightful as possible.”

“Base philosopher!” he reproved her fondly. “I left my warm hearth and-dare I say it-splendid wine cellar for this?”

He waved a dramatic hand at the vista of burning trees and rushing men and elves, the din of battle rising loud from the still-unseen front line of the fray beyond.

“No,” Rune told him, “you left hearth and goblet for this.” She ran a hand down her curvaceous front and gave him a wink that was just this side of a leer.

“Right,” Storm observed briskly, “I believe it’s now my turn for some eye rolling. By all means bill and coo, you two-but on a battlefield, time for such dalliance must be earned. The hard way.”

She cast an arch glance Arclath’s way. “As a noble lord of the Forest Kingdom should know well, if he’s been raised properly.”

And with that, the silver-haired bard led the way over a ridge cloaked in dead, fallen leaves and a deep, rich emerald carpet of moss, heading for the fighting.

“But of course, Marchioness,” Arclath replied mockingly, following her. Amarune strode at his side, a dagger out as she darted swift glances in all directions. He looked at her admiringly, still secretly in awe that this mask dancer who’d stirred him with her looks and spirited flippancy for years, and turned out to be as fierce and staunch a companion as any man could wish for-not to mention brighter than he was and of the blood of an infamous, age-old wizard-loved him.

Oh, many a tavern dancer or shop drudge had leaped at the chance to wed a noble of Cormyr, or even become a lord’s kept, cloistered mistress … but his Rune liked his company and wanted to be with him.

And he wanted to be just where he was now: right by her side, no matter what befell, and even when they were both aged and aching, unsteady and frail and wrinkled.

“Arclath Delcastle,” his ladylove said warningly into his ear, her dagger-free hand pinching his cheek and jolting him out of his thoughts, “if you don’t stop simpering at me, you’re going to walk straight into yon tree!”

Arclath blinked at her happily, heard Storm sigh deeply and then chuckle, from just ahead, and found himself staring into the frowning face of his beloved.

“Arky, could you take a break from being a love struck lord for the next little while?” she asked. “I want you to live to see nightfall, not get butchered by the first man with a sword you wander within reach of!”

The Fragant Flower of the Delcastles shook his head and groaned, “Arky’? Really? Must you?”

“Well,” Storm put in, pinching his other cheek, “if it keeps you alive, Arky dear …”

“Nooo!” Arclath cried, giving Rune a glare. “How can I buckle a swash with heroic confidence, knowing my foe is sniggering at facing ‘Arky’?” He swung around to face Storm, and snarled, “Still less, ‘Arky dear’!”

The bard smiled impishly, long silver tresses stirring around her as if a freshening storm breeze was rising. “A grave matter indeed, Arky dear. We must discuss it over flagons of something suitable, after we-”

Something large and heavy and aflame came hurtling through the trees to crash down, bounce, and roll onward in a whirlwind of smoldering leaves. In its wake, there rose a ragged shout as motley armsmen charged into view through a tangle of trees-trees out of which fell an elf in mottled leaf-and-leather armor, limp and dead.

“-break this siege, and hurl back these hired swords, clear through Sembia and into the sea!”

And with her silver hair spreading out as wide as four men and clutching a dozen swords she’d plucked up from amid the fallen, Storm Silverhand strode to meet the onrushing men.

With a yell, Arclath roused himself and sprinted after her, to come up on the bard’s left flank. Rune gave him a wink and a grin and headed for Storm’s other flank.

And with various contemptuous shouts and snarls, the dozen-some mercenaries charged to meet them, blood-drenched blades in hand.

Helgore strolled along the dimly lit halls as if he belonged there. His elf guise was gone, banished in his draining of that meddling elf guardian, but he cared not. That fool’s shed and empty skin was still slithering along in his wake, but it was more amusing than annoying, and might even prove a useful distraction if he met other elves.

Not that they seemed to come down into these cool, damp, endlessly curving passages often. He’d been exploring for a long time now, with neither a sighting nor a challenge. Still, during a siege, anything could happen.

It was surprising how extensive these underground ways were. Elves were popularly thought to love fresh air and green growing things and the out-of-doors, not stone-lined holes in the ground. Was such terrain not dwarf territory?

Myth Drannor had been a city where many races were welcome, so perhaps these underways were unusual for elf cities, but surely the elves would have considered their dead sacred to themselves, and not let dwarves dig out and tend the vaults where the elves laid their ancestors?

If the crypts were as extensive as they seemed-given that he’d walked a long way now, along passages and past many doors that presumably led to many rooms-then taking Myth Drannor might be a longer, harder endeavor than the Most High and all the princes had thought. He kept a conjured spell-shield moving along ahead. It would float along, silent and invisible, until it met the sort of magic awakened by intrusion-and then it would flare into sight, warning him and hopefully shielding him from the worst of whatever erupted.

Hopefully.

His task would have been far easier if he’d been able to find any sort of map of where the crypts of the high elf Houses were, but the team of junior arcanists who had promised as much and had plunged in to find such a thing with enthusiasm had turned up nothing at all.

Helgore was beginning to suspect no map existed, save in the minds of each family of elves, knowing where their ancestors lay, and probably the neighboring crypts. Still, finding a crypt almost certainly meant finding a baelnorn, for the strange elf undead were guardians bound to the crypts of their families.

Guardians whom he was here to destroy.

So they couldn’t manipulate the wards against Thultanthar, in ways the arcanists and even the Most High just didn’t have time to unravel and thwart. The baelnorn had to be gone, and soon.

Which meant he could do what he loved to do most: slay ruthlessly and viciously.

Helgore smiled in anticipation, and flexed his fingers. The Most High had given him spells that should rend baelnorn with ease, and after his long, cruel, exacting training, he ached to lash out at something.

Ho, now, what was this?

Ahead, his shield had flared blue and come to an abrupt halt, the seemingly empty air in front of it thickening into a blue curtain.

Well, more wall than curtain, though it rippled like a hanging tapestry. He thrust at his shield with his will, forcing it to move forward-but it merely quivered, as if caught fast in a titanic spider web.

Helgore chuckled, enjoying the moment, and dropped into a catlike stalk, focusing all his senses in a straining effort to see and hear everything as he advanced slowly. There could be pit traps beneath his boots, death waiting to plummet from above, deadly spells lurking …

Or nothing at all. All was silent in the passage save for the small sounds of his own progress, his faint breathing louder than the gentle breeze ghosting past his ankles. He came up to his shield and thrust his hand through it, at the blue wall-a vertical patch of air that was only opaque and blue where the shield touched it, and mere dimly lit emptiness everywhere else.

His fingers felt the chill prickling of arisen magical energy, flowing endlessly up and down, forming the wall.

So was it a barrier to him, or just active magics such as his shield? He withdrew his hand, got out the long, needlelike poniard sheathed down his left forearm, and extended it. It bore small enchantments to keep away rust and resist acid, and to glow when a wielder willed it to, so it was magic.

Would this blue wall just block his way, or try to visit some harm on him? The selukiira was awake too, thrumming subtly as he leaned nearer to this wall.

The long dagger thrust into the wall as if it weren’t there-and a moment later, it wasn’t.

The wall was gone as abruptly and as silently as if it had never been there, his shield racing forward unopposed-only to wink out with a little sigh, destroyed by something unseen.

Helgore frowned. No doubt he’d just set off some sort of magical alarm, but who would answer it?

Somehow the warding magic felt old, not something cast recently to warn of current besiegers bursting up from the Underdark or through the crypts into the city …

He stepped forward with slow caution, into utter silence.

“That’s close enough, human. I have little reason to love or trust Netherese. Your most accomplished spellcasters are rash, to put it politely, and those of less mastery-the Tanthuls, for instance-are a danger not just to your own cities, but to all the world.”

The voice was as calm as a gently reproving mother’s, not as cold and harsh as might be expected from the words spoken.

Yet Helgore, peer as he might, could not see its source. So he kept on advancing, very cautiously now, his dagger in one hand and the other raised and ready to hurl a mighty spell.

“So you serve a Tanthul, and hail from Thultanthar, and are here to work ill.”

Blue flames erupted out of empty air to dart at Helgore’s eyes.

He turned them aside with a frantic spell, just in time, and fell back with a snarl. “Who are you? Show yourself!”

The air a little way down the passage rippled as if a curtain was being parted, and there was suddenly a very tall, impossibly thin elf lord facing him-floating with feet together, off the ground, legs nearly skeletal. Helgore could see ribs, arm bones … the flesh cloaking them was translucent, and he was seeing the male elf’s bones right through it!

“I am Thurauvyn Nathalanorn. Guardian Undying of House Nathalanorn. Just as you are an arcanist of Thultanthar, hight Helgore. Helgore Ulitlarathulm. Sent to destroy baelnorn. My, my.”

“And you know all of this how?” Helgore asked softly, not wasting breath in denials, but making sure his strongest ward spells were awakened.

“The selukiira. Telamont should have warned you about that. If he knew about it at all; Telamont Tanthul always was a careless, too-hasty youngling. Who considered those working for and with him expendable tools.”

Helgore wrenched the loregem free and flung it aside.

The baelnorn winced. “Such vandalism is … distressing. Unworthy, even of young and foolish humans drunk on their burgeoning mastery of the Art.”

It looked past Helgore, gazed at the empty elf skin slithering closer to him, and repeated more sharply, “Unworthy, indeed.”

The slaying spell whirled up out of nowhere to blast Helgore with roaring emerald flames of fury.