“Six hours,” Kelemvor said, without turning away from the troops. He had seen the look in their eyes many times before, and he knew what it meant. “They’re off to battle,” the fighter noted. “And they don’t think they’re coming back.”
He turned and limped toward the stairs. Blackstaff’s restorative had worn off, and the warrior’s feet still suffered the effects of having been frostbitten. “We’d better see what’s happening.”
Midnight followed him down three flights of stairs to the anteroom on the ground floor. Blackstaff and Elminster were already there, Elminster holding the tablet beneath his arm. Both men looked as though they had not rested in more than a day. While Midnight had slept, the two wizards had been laboring to remove Myrkul’s magic from the tablet. She wondered if they had succeeded.
Mordoc Torsilley, commander of the White Wyvern, was just unrolling a long scroll. He addressed Blackstaff. “Are you Khelben ‘Blackstaff’ Arunsun?” he asked.
“You know who I am,” Blackstaff answered. “We’ve met many times.”
Mordoc looked up from the scroll apologetically. “This is official business, Your Splendidness.” He began to read from the scroll, “For the good of all citizens of Waterdeep, and in order to defend the city from its enemies, Khelben ‘Blackstaff’ Arunsun is hereby commanded—”
“Commanded!” Blackstaff snorted, insulted that anyone would dare use such a term to him. He ripped the scroll out of Mordoc’s hands and read the rest silently. Finally, he asked, “I am to take command of the Wyvern Company?”
“Aye, that would be the long and short of it,” Mordoc replied, hastily adding, “sir!”
“Incredible,” Blackstaff muttered. “I’m no general.”
“And our enemy is no army,” Mordoc replied.
“What is it then?” Elminster said, irritated at the intrusion.
“And be quick about it. We have important business to attend to.”
“As near as we can tell, sir, they—”
“Who?” Blackstaff demanded. “What is it you want?”
“Fiends, sir. Hundreds of ’em, and their number is increasing all the time. They came from the caverns beneath Mount Waterdeep, then started pillaging the city. They’ve got everything from Harborwatch Tower to Snail Street—that’s most of the Dock Ward. We’ve slowed them down, but that’s about all. And the griffons are taking a beating from the ones that can fly. Before long, they’ll have all of Waterdeep—unless you can stop them.”
“The denizens,” Midnight gasped. “They escaped the Pool of Loss.”
“So it would appear,” Elminster replied, scratching his beard. He immediately realized that Myrkul was the only one who could have countered Midnight’s spell. But he did not understand why the Lord of the Dead would have bothered. Even for the God of Decay, destroying Midnight’s sphere would have been far from easy. Elminster did not see why Myrkul would waste the energy, when he undoubtedly knew what he wanted was in Blackstaff’s tower. The old sage and Blackstaff had been unable to dispel the magic the Lord of the Dead had placed on the artifact.
“We’d better act quickly,” Blackstaff said to Elminster. At the same time, he thrust the scroll back at the captain.
“The men are outside, sir,” Mordoc said, assuming the black-bearded wizard had been talking to him.
“Men?” Blackstaff retorted. “Take them and begone. I have important matters to attend to.”
Mordoc frowned and reached into his cloak. He looked as though he were a dog that had just been kicked, and with good reason. It was not safe to be the one who told Blackstaff Arunsun he had to do something against his will.
Mordoc withdrew a ring, then handed it to Blackstaff. “Sir, the warden of the guard ordered me to give you this.”
Blackstaff reluctantly accepted the ring. It belonged to Piergeiron the Paladinson, the only acknowledged Lord of Waterdeep, Warden of the Guard, Commander of the Watch, Overmaster of the Guilds—and a dozen other titles. Blackstaff sighed and slipped the ring onto his finger. He had been summoned to serve his city. If he did not answer Piergeiron’s call, he would lose his citizenship. Turning to Elminster, he said, “I have no choice.”
Elminster nodded. “Go. It will be better if somebody keeps the denizens at bay. Undoubtedly, they’re coming for the tablet.”
“You know where to hide it?” Blackstaff asked.
Elminster nodded. “Aye, the vault. Now go.”
Before leaving, the dark-haired mage turned to Midnight and Kelemvor. “If you need anything—”
“A dagger,” Midnight requested immediately, recalling that hers had melted in the caverns below Dragonspear Castle.
Blackstaff nodded. “Elminster can get it for you.” He turned and walked through the wall, saying, “Perhaps this will take only a little while.”
“Perhaps,” Elminster repeated absently. After Blackstaff left, he remained silent for a long time, puzzling over why Myrkul had released the denizens.
Finally, Midnight ventured to ask, “What now?”
Her question snapped Elminster out of his musings. “Yes—what now? We hide the tablet, I suppose.”
“Why?” Kelemvor exclaimed. “I thought we were going to attack Myrkul!”
“The situation has changed,” the old sage said. “It appears he is coming to us.”
“Which is why we should attack” the fighter maintained. “It’s the last thing he’ll expect.”
“True,” Elminster noted thoughtfully. He liked Kelemvor’s aggressive strategy, but suspected the warrior had not thought through the details of his plan. “How are we going to sneak up on our enemy when he can track us by our tablet?”
Kelemvor remained confident. “We leave it here, so he thinks we’re still in the tower.”
“Leave the tablet unguarded?” Elminster objected.
“Why not?” Kelemvor said. “If we defeat Myrkul, we’ll be the only ones who know where it is. If Myrkul kills us, at least he’ll have to steal it from Blackstaff’s tower.”
“And how are we going to find Myrkul?” Elminster asked, drumming his bony fingers on a tabletop.
“The same way he’s finding us,” Midnight replied. “I can locate his tablet as easily as he can locate ours.”
Elminster shook his head doubtfully. “Ye know how unpredictable magic—”
“We’re fighting for the fate of the Realms,” the warrior said forcefully. “We’ll have to run a few risks.”
“I think we should carry the fight to Myrkul, too,” Midnight said. “I, for one, am tired of running. Will you come with us or not, Elminster?”
Elminster raised his eyebrows at Midnight’s gentle rebuff. She had just taken leadership of this small company, but that was to be expected. “Of course I’ll come,” the sage replied. “Ye are going to need all the help ye can get.”
Elminster went to the library and took the tablet into Blackstaff’s sub-dimensional vault, where he also retrieved a dagger for Midnight. To the sage’s consternation, he could not seal the room when he left. After a couple of quick experiments, the ancient wizard determined the door simply could not be closed while the tablet was inside. Myrkul’s magic kept it open, in effect raising the sub-dimensional vault back into the normal dimension. The only thing guarding the tablet would be an illusion of a wall.
Still, as nervous as that made Elminster, he realized Kelemvor was right about one thing. If they stopped Myrkul, the tablet would be safe anywhere inside Blackstaff’s tower. On the other hand, if Myrkul killed them, it would be better if the tablet was not along. The wizard pushed a bookshelf in front of the vault, then went back downstairs.
While Elminster hid the tablet, Midnight performed her locate object incantation. She nearly went mad as it misfired, flooding her mind with the present location of every item she had ever owned. However, after collapsing in a confused heap for a few minutes, the mage sorted through the jumble of contradictory directions and focused on Myrkul’s tablet.