The Temptation of Elminster - Ed Greenwood [49]
"All who enter here," the guardian said, gesturing with the chamber pot as if it was a scepter of office, "must obey me utterly and work no magic unbidden. Anyone who takes or damages even the smallest thing from within these walls forfeits his life, or at the least his freedom, You may rest within and take water from the fount, but no food or anything else is provided…and you must surrender to me your name and all written magic and enchanted items you carry, no matter how small or benign. They will be returned upon your departure.”
“I agree to all this," El told him. "My name is Elminster Aumar. Here's my spellbook and the sole item of magic I yet carry: a dagger that can be made to glow as one desires, bright or dim. It can also purify water and edibles it touches and is guarded against rusting, I know of no other powers."
“This is all?" the fire-eyed guardian demanded, staring intently into Elminster's face as he accepted the book and the sheathed dagger. "And 'Elminster' is your true and usual name?"
“This is all, and aye, Elminster I am called," the Athalantan replied.
Mardasper gestured that he should enter, and they passed into a small chamber, dark after the bright sunlight, that held a lectern and much dust. The guardian wrote down Elminster's name and the date in a ledger as large as some doors El had seen, and waved at one of three closed doors behind the lectern.
That stair leads to the upper levels, wherein are kept the writings you doubtless seek."
El inclined his head and replied wearily, "Have my thanks."
Writings I doubtless seek? he thought. Well, perhaps so…
He turned, his hand upon the pull-ring of the door, and asked, "Why else would a mage come to Moon-shorn Tower?"
Mardasper's head snapped up from the ledger, and his good eye blinked in surprise. The other one, El noticed, never closed.
"I know not," the guardian said, sounding almost embarrassed. "There's nothing else here."
"Why came ye here?" El asked gently.
The guardian locked eyes with him in silence for a time, then replied, "If my stewardship here is faithful and diligent for four years…two being already behind me…the priests of Mystra have promised to end the spell upon me that I cannot break." He pointed at his staring eye and added pointedly, "How I came to have this is a private matter. Ask no more on this, lest your welcome run out."
El nodded and opened the door. Probing magics sang and snarled around him for a moment. Then the darkness inside the door became a shrinking, receding web that melted away to reveal a smooth-worn, plain stone stair leading up. As the last prince of Athalantar set his hand upon its rail, an eye seemed to appear in the smooth stone just above his hand and wink at him… but perhaps it was just his over-weary imagination. He went on up the stair.
"To work!" The balding, bearded mage in the stained and patched robe threw up the shutter and set its support bar firmly in the socket, letting sunlight spill into the room.
"Aye, Baerast," the younger wizard agreed, wrapping his hands in a cloth to keep dust from them before he caught up the next support bar, "to work it is. We've much to do, to be sure."
Tabarast of the Three Sung Curses peered over his spectacles a trifle severely and said, "The last time you made such enthusiastic utterance, dearest Droon, you spent the entire day with some Netherese chiming-ball child's toy, trying to make it roll by itself!"
"As it was meant to do," Beldrune of the Bent Finger replied, looking hurt. "Is that not why we labor here thus, Baerast? Is restoring and making sense of the scraps of elder magic not an exalted calling? Doth not Holy Mystra Herself smile betimes upon us?"
"Yes, yes, and aye besides," Tabarast said dismissively, waving away the argument like three-day-old feast table scraps. "Though I doubt overmuch if she was impressed by a failed effort to resurrect a toy." He hefted the last support