The Temptation of Elminster - Ed Greenwood [66]
Elminster stared up at her, unable to speak, agony still ruling him. She looked into his eyes, her own orbs two dark fires, and smiled slowly. "Your loyalty, however, outstrips theirs. You shall duel my worst foe for me and best him…when you are ready. You'll have to learn to kill first, though, swiftly and without reckoning the cost. He'll not give you much time for reflection."
At last El found the strength to speak. His voice was thick-tongued and halting, but it was speech nonetheless. "Lady, who is this foe?"
"A wizard Chosen by Mystra as her personal servant," the Lady Dasumia replied, looking away toward the last traces of the setting sun. Beneath them, the carpet started to descend. "He left my side to do so and though he could not follow the narrow path the Lady of Magic set for him and is now called the Rebel Chosen, he's not returned to me. Hah! Mystra must be unable to concede that anyone could turn from blind worship of her."
Her eyes were burning as she turned back to meet Elminster's gaze, and added in tones once more light and casual, "Nadrathen is his name. You shall slay him for me."
The last prince of Athalantar looked at the night sky rushing past and shivered once.
The rustling and croaking of night had begun in earnest in the thick stand of hiexel and thornwood and duskwood nearest the castle. As the flying carpet descended toward the tallest of the black towers, a pair of eyes blinked amid the fissured bark of a lightning-scarred duskwood and slowly sharpened into a coldly angry elven face. Roused anger glittered in Ilbryn Starym's eyes as he said softly, "Your wards may still my ears, proud Lady, but my spells work well enough when you are out over the wide world. Don't count overmuch on your apprentice. His life is mine."
He glowered at the tallest towers of the lady's castle long after the carpet was gone from view, until his glare slid suddenly into a calmer look, a frown of thoughtfulness rather than fury. "I wonder if anything in that mage's tower survived?" he asked the night. "It's worth the journey to see…"
Dark-hued radiance flashed and curled like smoke, and the duskwood glared no more.
Dasumia's castle rose up into the sky above them in dark, forbidding ramparts. Tabarast watched the flying carpet disappear into its many-turreted heart and grunted. "Well, that was exciting," he said. "Another day of splendid and energetic furtherance of the Art, I must say."
Beldrune looked up from the tankard of magically warmed soup he was cradling and spoke in tones of some asperity. "My memory may be failing me from time to time, esteemed Baerast, but did we, or did we not, agree to moan no more about wasted time and forgone opportunities? Our mission is, and remains, clear. Callow idiot this One Who Walks may be, but he-and what he chooses to do…are the most important developments in the Art in all Toril just now. I think we can afford to obey the dictates of a goddess…the goddess…and miss a few years of peering at fading, dusty writings in hopes of finding a new way of conjuring up floating lantern lights."
Tabarast merely grunted in wordless acknowledgment. A few lights blinked into life high in the turrets of Dasumia's castle, and the night noises resumed around them. They kept silent for a long time, crouched on little stools at the end of the hedgerow that marked the edge of the nearest tilled field to the Castle of the Lady, until Beldrune murmured, "Mardasper must have given us up for dead by now."
Tabarast shrugged and said, "He guards Moonshorn Tower, not we."
"Hmmph. Did he ever tell you about his fiery eye?"
"Aye. Something about a curse… he lost a spell duel to someone, and his service as guardian was payment to the priests of the Mysteries, to break the magic and restore him. Another poor mage-wits, driven into the service of the Lady who governs us all."
Beldrune lifted his head. "Do I hear the faith of Tabarast of