Amber and Blood - Margaret Weis [10]
He wanted nothing more to do with Mina. Chemosh was sorry he’d ever seen her, sorry he’d fallen in love with her and taken her as his lover, sorry he’d used her to help him create new followers, the undead Beloved, who had been a sad disappointment, ending up being loyal to Mina, not to him. He held himself disdainfully aloof from the argument raging among the pantheon. Thus he was the only one who noticed the three gods of magic, who had heretofore kept silent, now conferring in low voices among themselves.
Solinari, the child of Paladine and Mishakal, was god of the Silver Moon, magic of light. Lunitari, child of Gilean, was goddess of the Red Moon, magic of neutrality, and their cousin, Nuitari, son of Takhisis and Sargonnas, was god of the Black Moon, god of the magic of darkness. Despite their different ideologies, the cousins were close, united in their love of the magic. Together, they often defied their parents and worked toward their own ends, which is what they were undoubtedly doing now. Chemosh drew closer, hoping to overhear what they were saying.
“So it was Mina who raised the tower from the bottom of the Blood Sea!” Lunitari was saying. “But why?”
Lunitari wore the red robes of those dedicated to her service. Her aspect was that of a human woman with inquisitive, always seeking, eyes.
“She planned to give it to the Lord of Bones,” said Nuitari. “A love token.”
He wore black robes; his face was that of a round moon. His eyes kept his secrets.
“And what of all the valuable artifacts inside it?” Solinari asked in a low voice. “What of the Solio Febalas?”
Clad in white robes, Solinari was watchful and careful, walked and spoke quietly, his eyes gray as smoke from the smoldering fire of his being.
“How should I know what has happened to it?” Nuitari demanded testily. “I was summoned to attend. My absence would have been noted. But once this meeting has ended—”
Chemosh did not hear the rest. So that was why Mina had given him the tower! He cared nothing for some old monument to magic. He desired what lay beneath the tower—the Solio Febalas.
Long ago, before the Cataclysm, the Kingpriest of Istar had raided the holy temples and shrines dedicated to the gods of Krynn, removing holy artifacts he deemed were dangerous. At first, he took only those from the Gods of Darkness, but then, as his paranoia grew, he ordered his troops into the temples of the neutral gods, as well. Finally, having determined he would challenge the gods for godhood himself, he sent his soldiers to raid all the temples of the Gods of Light.
The stolen artifacts were taken to the old Tower of High Sorcery in Istar, now under his control. He placed the artifacts in what he termed the “Hall of Sacrilege”.
Angered at the challenge from the Kingpriest, the gods cast a fiery mountain onto the world, breaking it asunder. Istar sank to the bottom of the sea. If any remembered the Hall of Sacrilege, the survivors assumed it had been destroyed.
As the centuries passed, mortals forgot about the Hall of Sacrilege. Chemosh did not forget, however. He had always fumed over the loss of his artifacts. He could feel power emanating from the relics and he knew they had not been lost. He wanted them back. He was tempted to go in search of them during the Fourth Age, but he was involved at the time in a secret plot with Queen Takhisis, a plot to overthrow the Gods of the Light, and he dared not do anything that might draw attention to himself.
He’d never had a chance to seek them. First he was caught up in the War of the Lance, and then Chaos had gone on a rampage, and later Takhisis had stolen the world. The artifacts of the gods remained lost until Nuitari had decided to secretly rebuild the ruined Tower of High Sorcery that lay at the bottom of the ocean. He had found the Solio Febalas, much to Chemosh’s jealous ire.
Chemosh had asked Mina to enter the Hall of Sacrilege and bring out his artifacts. But she had failed him and caused the first rupture between them.