Tanalasta stood, taller than most men and as imperious as Azoun at his most fierce. “Am… I… clear?” she repeated, biting off each word. Aunadar rose behind her and placed a supportive hand on her shoulder. He had to reach up to do it. As he looked at the Royal Magician, his other hand went slowly and deliberately to the hilt of his sword.
“As always,” the wizard replied calmly, also rising, “I will send word as we know more.”
“Do so,” said the princess coolly. “You have my faith, as my father and the baron have my prayers. You are dismissed.”
Expressionlessly Vangerdahast turned his head to regard Aunadar Bleth. The young noble treated him to a short, serious nod-a warrior’s farewell to an equal-but made no motion to depart. Nor did the princess make any motion that might have been interpreted as a dismissal of her suitor. The High Wizard bowed slightly from the waist, then strode to the door.
Before leaving, he looked back at the pair. Already Tanalasta’s moment of strength had passed, she was slowly collapsing back onto the divan, her face in her hands. Her slender shoulders were shaking. At her side, Aunadar Bleth stroked her shoulder and her hair and spoke words the wizard could not hear, his face close to hers. It was as if Vangerdahast, the palace, and all the court had become invisible, leaving the pair alone together.
Vangerdahast heard the heavy outer door of the princess’s chambers close behind him-and, ominously, the sound of a lock being thrown. The wizard raised his head as if to take in badly needed fresh air, letting his gaze stray up at the hallway’s ceiling. Warriors, witch lords, elves, and dragons battled in the yellowing plaster. Their eternal struggle ran all along the ceiling of the hall, in silent contrast to the tumult stirred up by this day’s disaster.
Vangerdahast lowered his gaze to see a figure running along the carpets toward him, a figure dressed in sapphire-hued robes. He gave her a raised hand of greeting and asked, “What are you called, lady priestess?”
She blinked at him, and then said, “Gwennath of Tymora, lord wizard, sometimes called the Bishop of the Black Blades Adventurers.” And then, without pause-a swiftness which Vangerdahast admired greatly-she plunged into what she had been going to say to him. “The convulsions have stopped for both men, and their breathing is weak but steady. Neither has roused, and both are extremely pale. They are hot to the touch, but cold compresses seem to moderate this condition somewhat. Loremaster Khelbor argued against leeching, but the sages are taking just a bit of blood for their own divinations.” She paused for breath, brushing a stray hair out her face with an impatient thumb.
The wizard nodded approvingly. “Any idea yet as to the cause?”
Gwennath shook her head. “None. They’re bringing the clockwork thing into Belnshor’s Chamber, next to the Satharw-but you know where that is. I’m sorry, lord… I assume you’ll want to look at it. Its very presence at the fray suggests poison, but whatever afflicts the king and his cousin continues to resist every purgative, curative, and medication we can call to mind.” Her confused frown deepened. “And, lord…?”
“Yes, blessed lady?”
“I tried that incantation to raise the dead on his lordship the duke. It didn’t work.”
“Given everything else, I’m not surprised,” Vangerdahast told her, the barest hint of bitter weariness in his voice.
“It’s not supposed to happen like this,” she added, shaking her head in exasperation.
“Just what is supposed to happen when a royal duke dies and your king’s life is endangered?” asked the Royal Magician in the mildest of tones, raising his eyebrows slightly.
“I’m sorry, lord wizard,” stammered the young priestess. “I was thinking aloud and meant no disrespect. It’s just that… when one of the royals falls ill, cost means naught, and no power need be spared. There are a score or more things one can do to give aid. We’ve tried them all… with no result. There’s more spell power in that banquet hall than anywhere else shy of Waterdeep and, I suppose, Shadowdale-and we cannot get either man even awake!”
“And frustration eats at us all,” the wizard murmured, eyes no longer seeing the earnest young priestess before him but looking instead at the distant room where priests and sages were fighting for the king’s life.
“Yes,” Gwennath sighed, then pursed her lips. “Lord wizard?”
“Yes?”
“Should King Azoun… I mean, if we can’t bring them back… what happens then?”
“Indeed,” Vangerdahast echoed softly, looking at the closed door of Tanalasta’s chambers. “What happens then?”
Chapter 4: The Raid
Year of Leather Shields (-75 DR)
Alea Dahast crept along the edge of the clearing, the dappled green and burnt orange hues of her hunting cape making her almost invisible in the long shadows of the Cormanthor sunset. All around her moved companions who were just as well concealed. The only sounds of their passing were occasional wolf whines in the brambles, each followed by a soft shushing noise, and then silence again.
They came down from the low hills, using the trees for cover. Ahead was the clearing: a scar carved out of the forest, which had once run unbroken to the rocky lakeshore beyond. Its edge was a rough pile of uprooted, close-tangled trees and brush. Alea was still amazed that these humans were so stupid as to think that this unguarded rampart of tumbled, ravaged forest would be enough to keep out a determined predator.
And she and the other elves in her hunting band were determined predators. They had carefully scouted, and easily found, passages through the maze of woody detritus, both the intentional routes and the ways left by carelessness. These humans aped the brambled fortifications of her people, but their work had none of the beauty of elven creations-and none of the security.
Another wolf whine, and another soft shush, the beasts were getting restless. Alea wondered about the wisdom of bringing them along, but they would undeniably be useful both for their speed and their ability to terrorize the humans.
Despite their growing restlessness, she gave the signal for a halt and heard the faint noises of the sign being passed among her people. She wanted to watch the humans for a moment. She wanted to be sure.
Inwardly she heard Iliphar’s voice. The old Lord of the Scepters always recommended calm, always recommended accommodation… always recommended negotiation. When the furry brutes had attacked the first elves they encountered, he’d recommended containment and observation.
Iliphar was letting the weight of his years rule him. There were more and more of these humans wandering through elven lands now, wreaking havoc as they went.
Typical humans were like orcs come down from the mountains-hunters seeking prey, refugees seeking settlement, merchants seeking stability. The great forest held no long-term lure for them, and when they saw that the land of trees was held by the elves, they drifted on, to wherever humans drifted on to. But these men were different. This breed of human cleared the forest, killing nearly all the trees. They piled the rent corpses of forest giants-and their own wastes-around their clearings and chased off the animals. And when they had done all this, they moved on to do it all again, in another part of the forest. Someday, if they were allowed to go on, there might be no forest.
Alea watched the human camp from her hiding place. The houses were little more than camp hovels, consisting of nothing more than bent saplings lashed together and topped with animal hides. Elves put together such flimsy quarters only for a evening’s housing against a stormy night, to be dismantled the following day. These humans made such crude sheds their permanent homes, to be used until the land was despoiled and sucked dry.
The largest of the huts was a common feast hall and sleeping quarters, and likely the home of the reigning petty lord. There was a scattering of smaller buildings, including one low hut with bars that Alea thought was for tamed beasts, but she’d seen no sign of goats, chickens, or the like.