The body slumped and slid a little amid its gushing blood as women screamed and men came running into the hall with drawn swords.
Lord Breiyr stood staring in horror at the slain elf-lord, wondering if this would mean his death and the destruction of his hold. Men had died for less, before now. Then all the color drained out of his face, and he husked, in a horrible echo of his usual bellow, “Look! Look ye, all!”
He pointed at the corpse in the chair with a trembling hand. Amid the dark, glistening blood, there in the dancing firelight, it was moving—flesh sliding wetly, shifting and rearranging into the form of… a man.
” ‘Tis Ubriien, Mage Royal of Athalantar!” The shocked, wondering voice belonged to the Knight of the Gate, come from his post in haste with sword drawn.
In the silence, they all heard the herald say softly, “Well, well. It seems I’d best take a sharp look or two around Athalantar, after all.”
Something in that voice had changed; the Knight of the Gate and his Lord both looked at the young herald sharply.
Before their eyes, the sleek and bearded visage of the herald Huntinghorn melted away into the bone-white face of a sorceress known up and down the Delimbiyr.
“Darkeyes!“ A servant hissed, as men shrank back.
Myrjala gave them a slight smile and turned to face the Lord of Morlin. “I have known pleasure and welcome at your table this night. As I said before, my Lord Breiyr, I am pleased to know you. Peace and good fortune attend this fair hall.”
In the heavy, hanging silence, she said to the shocked Knight of the Gate, “Look not for my horse; it knows the way out.”
Gaping at her, he made no reply. Myrjala smiled and met the eyes of the dwarf, who gave her a fierce grin. “May thy axe be ever so sharp and swift, lord—for the sake of Ammarindar and us all.” He bowed.
She returned it, then turned and walked away from them all.
Servants and armsmen alike drew away from her as she strode toward the fire. Two steps short of its flames she wavered, like a wisp of smoke, and was gone.
Lord Breiyr swallowed and looked back at the bloody corpse at the table.
A soft hand touched his shoulder. “Father?”
“Get back, lass,” he said roughly. “Ye should not see this.”
“I have seen it,” was the simple reply, “and I fear ‘tis not going to be an easy time, these years before us, living so close to Athalantar.”
Not for the first time, Lord Breiyr knew she was right.
DARK TALONS FORBEAR THEE
Oh, Great Mistress, hear me.”
The whisper is soft, but carries an eerie strength, rolling out across the void in every direction from the spread-eagled, ivory limbs of the floating Priestess of the Night.
“Hear me, I entreat.”
As usual, the words move Vrasabra the Anointed to the verge of tears, as she floats alone in the endless darkness. She feels drained, as she always does after the dark talons of the Devourer have manifested out of her. That night they had torn the flesh of the screaming men with furious energy, crunching even the bones of the doomed sacrifices before fading away.
Leaving faithful Vrasabra alone again, floating in the dark and whispering, “Hear me, my goddess, I beg.”
The darkness is suddenly alive with bristling energy and an invisible menace floods into her, jolting every last raven-dark hair on her body into a rigid spearpoint.
Shar has come.
I AM PLEASED, FAITHFUL SERVANT. WORTHY SACRIFICES, ALL. YOU ARE CLEARLY WORTHY FOR A GREATER TASK.
A wise woman would tremble and swallow a curse of despair, but Vrasabra of the Dark Talons is not a wise woman. She is a Priestess of the Night—and, just now, the Priestess of the Night, exalted above all others.
“Command me, my goddess,” she hisses, limbs glistening with the sheen of excitement.
OF COURSE. Shar’s mind-voice is as cruel as ever. MY MOST HATED RIVAL HAS THREE SHE-SERVANTS WHO HAVE LIVED FAR TOO LONG ALREADY. THE LOSS OF THESE THREE DAUGHTERS WILL HURT HER VERY MUCH. YOUR TALONS WILL CAUSE THAT LOSS.
“Oh, yes, goddess!”
YES, VRASABRA. The echo is mocking.
GO SPEEDILY AND DEVOUR FOR ME THE ONES CALLED AMBARA DOVE, ETHENA ASTORMA, AND ANAMANUE LAERAL. THREE HUMAN MAIDS WITH LONG SILVER HAIR AND ALLTHE RUDE DEFIANCE OF THE MYSTRA THEY SERVE. THEY ARE IN THE CARE OF THE ONE CALLED ELMINSTER.
Vrasabra’s hiss of hatred is strong, but Shar seems almost to chuckle.
SLAY THAT ONE NOT. I HAVE OTHER PLANS FOR HIM.
“Yes, goddess,” the floating priestess promises, not troubling to hide the disappointment in her voice.
The darkness seems to surge through her, and she gasps in sudden fear, pain, and ecstasy.
Rapture that overwhelms her and rewards her for everything, now and forevermore…
When Shar’s touch leaves her, there is no more darkness, and Vrasabra is sprawled facedown on the cold stones of her temple in the moonlight.
She arises, simmering with power, and it is the turn of the ring of kneeling underpriestesses to gasp.
The bare skin of the Priestess of the Night is as ivory-hued and flawless as ever, but her eyes are now two dark wells, lacking pupils and whites entirely.
Her smile, however, is as cruel as ever.
The ruins were too old to have a name. Not that anything more than a short and simple name would have suited them, for they were not much more than a few butter-smooth, cracked stone slabs around the circular base of a long-vanished pillar, in the ferny depths of a forest glade.
The girls called them just The Place, and loved to play there—mainly because Uncle El had forbidden it, but also for the reason behind his prohibition: Spells cast there were “twisted wild,” and made one’s skin glow like faint moonlight, one’s feet leave the ground in a gentle floating, and all cold dwindle away—even in the depths of winter. Snow never fell on the stones of The Place, even when it was piled neck-deep all around.
Dove was idling there now, in the moonlit heart of a warm summer night, dancing lazily in midair with all the indolent confidence of her seventeen summers. She was wasting the few feeble spells El had taught her and watching them ripple forth from her fingers as blossoming flowers, eels, and little jets of scorching flame. The Art smelled like rain-tang, stinging her nostrils, and her skin prickled with its surges.
“Unleashing magic in The Place was… dangerous,” their tall and bearded guardian had said, frowning severely.
Dove had shown him the length of her tongue then, and she aimed it at his unseen, distant presence now.
As if in reply to her rudeness, a familiar figure slipped gently out of the trees to join her. It was both more slender and shapely than Elminster Aumar, and preferred to be known by the name of “Storm.”
Her sister’s long unbound silver hair flowed behind her like a cascade of moonfall as she came to the edge of the stones, grinned at Dove, and announced cheerfully, “Andur Marlestur is at the cottage.”
“Looking for me? At this time of night? Has Uncle turned him into several sorts of frog at once yet?”
“No, because he’s doing nothing more amorous than earnestly asking your opinion of what flowers his mother would like best for her year-day gift. He forgot, of course, and—”
” ‘Tis on the morrow, yes. And just what am I earnestly replying, given that I’m nowhere to be found? Or is Elminster scouring the forest, and you’ve kindly come running to fetch me before he does?”
“Uncle El is calmly smoking his pipe and chuckling at Lord Marlestur’s tongue-tangles. And you’re teasing him mercilessly—which is making poor Andur even more stumble-spoken than usual, and delighting Uncle to the point of choking on his smoke.”