Farthest Reach (13 page)

“Let’s stop here. I have a couple of spells to cast, now that we’re inside the mythal. Keep watch for me.”

Ilsevele crouched beside him, an arrow on the string of her bow. Starbrow stood behind a tall pile of stones, sword in hand, watching the ruins with his face set in an unreadable expression. Maresa and Filsaelene guarded the other side.

Satisfied that they were ready, Araevin first cast one of his divinations. Myth Drannor’s magical aura made scrying impossible, but he hoped that a different sort of divination might work. He spoke the words of the spell that conjured up unseen drifting eyes, hovering above his head like a halo.

“Spread out and search for the daemonfey,” he instructed them. “Return when you sight any.”

The intangible sensors whirred away out of sight, each dodging and darting its way into the ruins and the forests around him

He waited patiently for several minutes, as his spellcreations went about their searches. Then they began to return, one by one. Araevin caught each in his hand as it came back, closing his eyes to see played out in his mind’s eye the things the magical eyes had seen. He glimpsed buildings with broken windows, fallen-in roofs, and piles of masonry inside; streets overgrown with vines and wild trees; proud old manors and schools still surprisingly intact, though their windows were dark and empty. And he also found the daemonfey-glimpses of fey’ri companies bivouacked in whichever buildings were best preserved. The demonspawn were hard at work in repairing their weapons and armor, forging new weapons, drilling with spell and blade, or simply patrolling the ruins, fluttering from building to building like oversized bats.

“Well?” Maresa asked.

“Yes, they’re here,” Araevin said. “This is the fey’ri army, I’m certain of it.”

“We have to leave, then,” Starbrow said. “I have to get word of this back to Gaerth and Seiveril.”

Araevin nodded. “In a moment,” he said. “There is one more thing I want to see here.” The others shifted nervously, watching the ruins for any sign of approaching enemies, but Araevin moved his hands in arcane passes and murmured the words of another spell, the spell of mythal-sight that Saelethil had taught him.

He closed his eyes, and when he opened them he perceived Myth Drannor’s ancient and mighty mythal as a golden vault filling the sky, a huge dome of drifting magic threads that slowly orbited the whole city. The beauty and power of the thing astonished him. Araevin trained his vision closer in, studying carefully to see what the mythal’s effects were. He glimpsed protections against scrying well, he knew about those already, didn’t he?—and wards to suppress spells of compulsion and domination. There seemed to be no modifications to the drifting strands of magic.

Sarya hasn’t figured out how to manipulate this mythal yet, he decided. Maybe it takes her a while to determine how to attune herself.

He allowed himself a confident smile, and spoke the words of a spell that would allow him to gain access to the mythal so that he could raise defenses against Sarya. But even as he spoke the last syllable and reached out to grasp at the magical strands he saw around him, he realized that he had made a mistake.

From the drifting golden strand hovering in arm’s reach, a shimmering red-gold thread suddenly emerged, appearing from nowhere. Araevin yelped and stumbled back, but not before the new strand hummed angrily. A scarlet veil descended over him, dancing across his body in a thousand motes of painful pinpricks, jabbing and sharp. With each pinprick, a spell vanished from his mind, draining away at a horrendous rate.

“Araevin!” Ilsevele cried.

She sprang to her feet and backed away as he jerked and flailed in his crimson cocoon of light motes.

The great golden dome of Myth Drannor’s mythal wavered and faded from Araevin’s view. He desperately tried to speak a counter-spell, but before he had even said the third word of the enchantment, the spell was sucked out of his mind in mid-casting. He tried to quickly think of another, but then there was no more time—every spell he held prepared in his mind was gone, drained away.

I am powerless, he realized. Sarya set a trap for me!

“Araevin! What’s wrong? What has happened?” Ilsevele asked. “Are you hurt?”

“Not physically,” he managed. He steadied himself against the wall. “But I’ve been drained of magic. I have no spells. We have to flee, before the daemonfey come for me.”

Starbrow drew back from his post, and glanced at Araevin.

“Can you walk?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” Araevin answered.

He hugged himself, feeling a strange ache in the center of his body, as if something had been torn out of him. He wasn’t sure exactly how he’d been injured, but he prayed to Corellon that it wasn’t permanent. He couldn’t imagine being powerless for the rest of his days.

He forced himself to look up at Starbrow and say, “Yes, I can walk. But I think we ought to run.”

21 Mirtul, the Year of Lightning Storms

“Lord Seiveril Miritar, Your Highness,” the majordomo announced, ringing her ceremonial staff once on the stone floor.

Seiveril inclined his head to acknowledge the courtesy, and strode into the Dome of Stars amid the golden glow of the fading daylight. The dark marble of the floor caught the pale rose sky and mirrored its serried colors, so that the council table drifted in the darkness between gold-glowing floor and brilliant sky, a white ship adrift in the shadows between the two. Seiveril almost hesitated to set foot on the floor before him, as if he might disturb the sky’s reflection with a careless step, but he continued without a pause and approached the high table where he had sat in council for so many years.

Amlaruil greeted him with a cool smile. The queen wore a silver gown, and her face shone like moonlight in the shadows.

“Welcome, Lord Miritar,” she said. “We did not expect you this evening; what brings you before us?”

“I am afraid something has come up, my queen,” Seiveril replied. He halted two paces before the outswept arms of the council and bowed to Amlaruil. “I must conclude my business here in Evermeet and return to Faerun immediately.”

Amlaruil met his eyes, and her brow creased. “What news from Faerun, my friend?” she asked.

“I have received a sending from Lord Vesilde Gaerth, Your Highness. He tells me that a hidden portal network has been found under Myth Glaurach, portals through which Sarya Dlardrageth’s army may have made their escape.”

“Portals?” said Keryth Blackhelm. The stern-faced marshal frowned. “Why, the daemonfey might be anywhere by now!”

“The portals are being searched even as we speak. Rest assured I will not give up until we have destroyed the daemonfey root and branch,” said Seiveril.

“The daemonfey have been defeated, have they not?” Ammisyll Veldann asked. “How much longer will you persist in this interminable folly, Miritar? While you chase after ghosts and garrison gloomy old ruins, Evermeet itself remains vulnerable to attack!”

“Clearly, Evermeet was vulnerable to attack before I called for my Crusade,” Seiveril replied. “My efforts in Faerun are your best defense, Lady Veldann.”

Veldann scowled and began to frame a response, but Amlaruil interceded.

“The Dlardrageths are the enemies of all the elf race,” she said. “I will pray to the Seldarine for your success.” The queen did not glance at Ammisyll Veldann, but the highborn sun elf frowned and subsided, leaning back in her seat. Instead, Amlaruil studied Seiveril. “Have you given more thought to Lady Durothil’s proposal, Lord Miritar?”

Seiveril glanced up at the pale sky overhead. An empty chair stood at the foot of the left-hand side of the table, opposite the seat occupied by the high admiral.

It would be easy to take my place there, he thought. I would certainly wield power at least equal to the power I held as Lord of Elion—perhaps even more, since I would hold a high office indeed, with no one within three thousand miles to countermand my commands. I could do a great deal of good, if I chose to take that seat.

But how long would that good last? he wondered. Evermeet might set a shining example for the young human lands of Faerun to follow, but ultimately Evermeet is a refuge, a retreat. All the troubles that were foremost in his mind—the daemonfey, the phaerimm, the assaults on Evermeet, even the fall of the realms of Eaerlann and Cormanthor hundreds of years ago—seemed inextricably linked with the pattern of Retreat and flight that had been established for a dozen elf generations.

The empty seat at the table was inviting. It was familiar, comfortable. And it might undo everything he had accomplished so far.

“Lady Durothil’s suggestion has great merit,” he finally said. “I wholeheartedly endorse the notion of appointing a minister or a marshal to sit on this council and speak for those of the People who remain in Faerun. But I respectfully decline to hold any such office, or to answer to anyone who does.”

“I don’t understand,” Keryth Blackhelm growled. “You tell us to raise up a councilor for the east, and you say you will pay no heed to him? What is the point?”

“If I accepted the seat you offer, I would be honorbound to answer to Evermeet’s authority and conform my actions to the will of the throne and the council. I do not have confidence in this body’s ability to take the actions I deem necessary in Faerun. Therefore I must decline to be so bound.”

“Isn’t it arrogant of you to decide that you, in the solitude of your own heart, are better suited to make such decisions than anyone else?” High Admiral Elsydar asked.

“Perhaps, but I have work that is not yet done in Faerun,” Seiveril said. “I will remain until I know that I have done all that I can, and I will not let Evermeet’s isolationists to tell me otherwise.”

“Wander around in Faerun’s dying forests as long as you like, Miritar,” Ammisyll Veldann hissed, “but send home the sons and daughters of Evermeet you have inveigled with your promises of glory!”

“Each elf who followed me into Faerun is free to return to Evermeet whenever he or she chooses,” Seiveril said, standing as straight as a fine blade. “I compelled no one to follow me to Faerun, and I will not allow you to compel anyone to return, Veldann. If I have to, I will found a realm of my own to prevent it.”

The council fell silent for a moment, astonished. Even Amlaruil’s eyes widened.

The queen said, “Seiveril, think of the People who follow you. You are not the only one who must accept the consequences of your crusade.”

“By what authority?” snapped Selsharra Durothil. “By what authority do you name yourself a king, Seiveril Miritar? Where is your realm?”

“By what authority?” Seiveril repeated. “By the authority of each elf who chooses to follow me, Lady Durothil. I claim no crown. All who remain with me shall have a voice in choosing who we name as our lord and how we do so.”

He looked at each of the councilors and went on, “As far as our realm … how many of our lands lie empty now? Who would argue with me if I raised a city in the High Moor, where Miyeritar once was? Or the wild lands west of Tun, where the towers of Shantel Othreier stood? The Border Forest, where once the sylvan realm of Rystallwood lay? Or the Elven Court, or Cormanthor itself?” He paused, and said again, “Why not Cormanthor itself?”

Seiveril looked up at the sky overhead, where the first stars were beginning to glimmer in the darkening sky.

Corellon, guide me, he prayed silently. Hold me to the course you have set for me.

Then he turned his back on the council, and strode from the Dome of Stars, leaving Evermeet behind him.

*****

The portal near the Burial Glen failed to work, as Araevin knew it would. The spells that had powered the device for centuries were designed to allow intermittent functioning only—once used, the portal could not work again for hours. He knew a spell or two that might suspend that particular property and allow the instantaneous use of the gate, but with all his spells drained, he did not have a chance of opening it.

“I am sorry,” he told his companions. “We can’t escape through this portal. It will be hours before it opens again.”

“Damn! Why build a magical door that’s nothing more than a dead stone most of the time?” Maresa snarled.

“Among other things, it makes a portal much harder to sneak an army through,” Araevin answered. “We’ll have to wait for it to activate again.”

“We certainly can’t wait here,” Starbrow growled. The moon elf looked around the clearing, his hand on Keryvian’s hilt. “Let’s keep moving. There’s a lot of forest to hide in, and maybe we can circle back in a few hours to try it again.”

“Agreed. The farther we are from this place, the better,” Araevin said. If she were in Myth Drannor, Sarya would certainly have sensed his attempt to manipulate her mythal defenses and the pounce of her spell trap. He couldn’t believe that she would not order her fey’ri to hunt him down, especially if she knew that her trap had drained away all his spells. “Starbrow, you know this place. Take the lead.”

The moon elf nodded curtly and set off at once, leading the small party away from the portal clearing along a small footpath. Ilsevele followed behind him, her bow in her hand, and Araevin trotted behind her, his disruption wand clenched in one fist. He was fairly sure that the wand would still work for him-wands didn’t draw on any spells held in the mind, they simply contained spells of their own that any competent mage could make use of. It was a good weapon, and he had two more wands at his belt with equally destructive spells. But he normally held dozens of spells in his mind, many of which were significantly more powerful than any he could build into a wand. Without the power and versatility of his normal repertoire, he was in no position to invite a battle against Sarya’s fey’ri or any of their infernal allies.

How did she do it? Araevin wondered. If she knew a spell to secure the mythal-weave from another mage’s examination or touch, why didn’t she guard the mythal at Myth Glaurach in the same manner? He could only think of three possible answers: Sarya Dlardrageth was simply careless at Myth Glaurach, which seemed scarcely credible; there was something different about Myth Drannor’s mythal; or Sarya Dlardrageth had learned something new about mythalcraft in the relatively short time since he had bested her at Myth Glaurach.