The Temptation of Elminster - Ed Greenwood [81]
A dark-robed figure was coming across the bridge…the Master! Halglond hissed a curse, and Curthas felt like joining in, but the mage ignored them, turning to join the chase along the battlements well ahead of his two guards. He carried a wand in one hand.
The guards saw her turn, hair swirling in the moonlight, amid the binding-racks, and silently beckon the Master of Wyverns, as coyly as any lover in a minstrel's ballad. As he approached her, she danced away to the edge of the battlements. The hard-running guards saw him follow warily, wand raised and ready. Glymril looked back at them once, as if deciding whether or not to wait until they reached the Tower, and Curthas clearly saw amazement on his face.
Not of their master's making, then, and unexpected to boot. They did not slow in their now-panting sprint… but even so, Curthas knew the strange foreboding that precedes by instants the sure knowledge that one is going to be…just…too late.
The woman became a snakelike, formless thing, and the shocked guards heard a long, raw howl from Klandaerlas Glymril as something bright whirled around him in a swift spiral, climbing toward the moon.
An instant later the Master of Wyverns became a roaring column of flame that split the night with its sudden fury. Curthas clutched at Halglond's arm, and they came to a ragged, panting halt together, all too close to where the battlements joined Bloodtop Tower. There was a booming thump, and something exploded out of the pyre, trailing flames down into the inner courtyards: the wand.
The guards exchanged fearful looks, licked dry lips, and started to back away in fear. They had managed two strides before the stones beneath their feet rippled like waves on a beach and started to slump and fall.
They fell into oblivion with the gathering roar of Glymril Gard collapsing ringing in their ears.
As the moon saw that great fortress crash back down into the tumbled ruin it had been before Glymril's spells had rebuilt it, a bright and triumphant mist danced over the rising dust and fading screams, its chimes mixed with cold, echoing laughter.
The court mage looked at the guard captain's grim face and sighed. "Who was it this time?"
"Anlavas Jhoavryn, Lord Elminster: a merchant from somewhere south across the sea. Brass work, sundries, nothing important, but a lot of it. Many coins here over many seasons. His throat was cut."
Elminster sighed. "Maethor or one of the new barons?"
"L-lord, I know not, and hardly dare s…"
"Your hunches, loyal Rhoagalow."
The guard captain glanced nervously from side to side, El smiled crookedly and leaned over to put his ear right to the man's lips. "Limmator," the officer breathed hoarsely, El nodded and stepped back. No particular surprise if Rhoagalow was right, Limmator was the only baron…or lordling…in Galadorna busier in dark corners with bribe, threat, and ready knife than Maethor of the Many Whispers.
"Go and dine now," he told the exhausted guard officer. "We'll talk later."
Rhoagalow and his three armsmen hurried out, El took care not to sigh until the antechamber was quite empty.
He murmured something and moved two fingers a trifle. There was a faint thump behind one wall, as the spy there abruptly went to sleep. El gave the section of wall a mirthless smile and used the secret door he wanted to keep secret a little longer, taking the lightless passage beyond to one of the disused and dusty hidden rooms in the House of the Unicorn. A little time alone to think is a rare treasure some folk never seize for themselves… and others, the truly deprived in life, cannot.
Three barons had died so far this year, one of them with a dagger in his throat not two steps from entering the throne chamber, and six…no, seven…lesser lords. Galadorna had become a nest of vipers, striking at each other with their fangs bared whenever the whim took them, and the court mage was