Elminster in Myth Drannor - Ed Greenwood [46]
Shalheira Talandren, High Elven Bard of Summerstar
from Silver Blades And Summer Nights:
An Informal But True History of Cormanthor
published in The Year of the Harp
There were no mists, this time, only a soft moment of purple-black velvet darkness, and then Elminster was elsewhere.
The white-robed elven ruler stood with him, in a cool, damp stone room whose ceiling arched low overhead. Luminous crystals were set in the places where the crisscrossing stone ribs of its vaults met, one with the next.
The elf and the human stood in the brightest spot, a clear space at the center of the domed chamber. In four places around its circular arc the wall was pierced by ornate arches that gave onto long vaulted passages running-El peered down one, and then another-to other domed chambers.
A narrow, winding path had been left clear down the center of each passage, but all of the rest of the space was crammed with treasure: a spreading sea of gold coins and bars and statuary, holding in its frozen waves ivory coffers that spilled pearls and rainbows of glittering gems.
Chests were stacked six high along the walls, and chased and worked metal banner-poles leaned against them like fallen trees. Nearer at hand, a dragon as tall as Elminster, carved from a single gigantic emerald, leaned amid the branches of a tree of solid sardonyx; its leaves were of electrum covered with tiny cut gems. The prince of Athalantar turned slowly on his heel to survey this treasure, trying to look expressionless and very much aware that the Coronal was watching his face.
There were more riches here, in this one chamber, than he'd ever seen before in all his life. The wealth here was truly staggering. The entire treasury of Athalantar was outshone by what would lie beneath him, were he to simply fall on his face in the nearest heap of coins. Right by his foot gleamed a cut ruby as large as his head.
El dragged his gaze up from all the wealth to meet the searching, starry eyes of the Coronal. "What is all this?" he asked. "I-that is, I know what I'm looking at, but why keep it here, underground? The gems would dazzle far more in sunlight."
The old elf smiled. "My People dislike cold metal, and keep little of it to look at and touch on a daily basis; something gnomes and dwarves and humans never seem able to grasp. The gems we need to serve us as homes for magic, yes, those we keep about us; the remainder rests in various vaults. That which belongs to the Coronal-or rather, to the court, and thus, all Cormanthor-conies here." He looked down one of the passages. "Some call this the Vault of Ages."
"Because ye've been piling up riches here for so long?"
"No. Because of the one who dwells here, guarding it all." The Coronal raised a hand in greeting, and El stared down the passage that the old elf was facing.
There was a figure there, tiny in the dim distance, and as thin as a post. A very graceful post, swaying as it came toward them.
"Look at me," the Coronal said suddenly. When Elminster turned, he found himself looking into the fall, awakened might of the ruler of Cormanthor. Once again his boots rose helplessly from the floor, and he hung in the air above the old elf as irresistable probes raced through him, calling up memories of a ferny dell, his spellbook left behind, Iymbryl gasping, and a certain scepter.
The Coronal stopped at that, and then sent El's mind racing back, through brigand battles and The Herald's Horn, to a certain encounter outside the city of Hastarl, where- Now the smiling face of Mystra was back again, blocking the Coronal's probings. She raised a reproving eyebrow at the elf, and smiled to soften her rebuke as the elven ruler reeled and shook his head, grunting in mindshock and pain.
El found himself abruptly back on the floor, dumped like a sack of grain.
When he looked up, he found himself