Farthest Reach (42 page)

“No!” Araevin cried. Saelethil redoubled his assault, but still Araevin refused to let himself be extinguished … and with that came the realization that Saelethil might not be able to crush him, not unless he allowed it to happen.

I am stronger than I was when I first encountered the Nightstar. I have completed the telmiirhara neshyrr and I have shaped high magic, Saelethil’s seluhiira could have destroyed me a few months ago, but no longer.

Saelethil’s terrible will lashed Araevin again and again, but Araevin pushed the assaults to one part of his mind, and concentrated on gathering his own counterstroke. In his heart he conceived a white sword, a blade of purpose and perfection. He poured his determination, his hope, his love into the sword. He shaped its point with his pride and ambition, and he envisioned himself gripping the hilt with his hands and drawing back for the blow.

“I will not be extinguished!” he cried back at Saelethil, and with all the force of his will and mind he burst against the darkness, lunging out with his white sword.

In a single great cut he slashed a white gap across the encompassing darkness, and Saelethil screamed a high and horrible scream. The Nightstar trembled and thundered. Araevin lashed out again, and the white-hot fury of his wrath against Saelethil and Sarya, and all the evil the Dlardrageths had wreaked against him, drove him onward. He struck and struck again, until the great violet abyss within the Nightstar blazed with jagged lines of white lightning, and the purple ramparts crumpled in white fire.

The Nightstar’s interior filled with an awful flash of white light, and Araevin found himself standing in the courtyard of Saelethil’s garden, his sword in his hand. He wheeled about, searching for an adversary, but the horrid crawling vines were withered and dead. He looked at the ruddy fields of lava beyond the walls, yet nothing but cool black rock met his eye.

Saelethil Dlardrageth lay at his feet, a bloodless wound piercing his heart. Even as Araevin watched, Saelethil’s form froze into a perfect statue of purple crystal then the crystal grew dark, gray, and brittle. Slowly it crumbled to powder and hissed away into nothingness. Araevin looked at the smear of lambent dust in the dead courtyard, and he turned away, gazing up at the white-shot sky overhead. The Nightstar was evidently damaged, possibly dying.

“The Aryvandaaran spells,” Araevin whispered in a sudden panic, and whirled to look around him. But at the instant he conceived a desire to see the secrets within the loregem, he felt an artifice of magic awaken in his presence. Golden scrolls appeared around him, drifting in the air, each seeming to shimmer and tremble with the power of the spell it held.

He stared in wonder, surrounded by the secret hoard of lore. If Saelethil had not lied to Araevin, those spells were ten thousand years old, the legacy of the proudest and most powerful empire of elves that had ever existed in Faerun. The things that the Aryvandaaran mages might have set down… .

Choosing a scroll at random, Araevin gently pulled it closer and began to read.

*****

The setting sun glowered in the west, sinking into the distant forest amid the acrid smoke of dozens of great fires. The day had been hot, and in the sweltering heat and fumes it seemed that Myth Drannor was burning again. But these were the fires of industry, the spewing plumes of soot and ash from new foundries Sarya’s best craftsmen were raising amid the wreckage of Myth Drannor’s outlying districts. The air rang with the sound of hammers beating against hot metal as her fey’ri worked to restore one by one the war machines and battle-constructs they had brought with them from Myth Glaurach.

The sound pleased Sarya well. She lingered on the balcony for a time, simply enjoying the open air and the sounds of victory being forged in the ensorcelled foundries of her folk. Then she turned away reluctantly and descended into the great hall of Castle Cormanthor, descending in a single graceful leap, her wings snapping open only at the last moment to arrest her descent.

Her captains bowed deeply, until Sarya took her seat. “You may rise,” she told them.

As they straightened and folded their wings again, she glanced to the side of the dais. There Malkizid stood, a pale swordsman dressed in black robes, his wounded forehead showing only a thin line of dark blood that evening. The devil prince smiled sardonically and inclined his head to her. In the presence of Sarya’s underlings he was careful to remain subservient, advising only when asked, never instructing or issuing orders, not even in her name. She believed she was an ally that Malkizid did not want to discard for a long, long time, but only a fool would trust an archdevil, even an exiled one.

She reclined in her throne, and considered her fey’ri lords: Mardeiym Reithel, the brilliant general, resplendent in his dragon-blazoned armor of black mithral; Jasrya Aelorothi, the fierce champion, the match of any bladesinger she had ever seen; Teryani Ealoeth, back from her work among the Sembians with Borstag Duncastle’s eyes in a small silk pouch at her belt. They were the tools with which she would raise her new Siluvanede, and her heart glowed with dark pride as she considered her cadre of captains.

“I have tidings from my son,” she began. “This afternoon Xhalph broke the Red Plumes on the Moonsea Ride. Maalthiir’s army is falling back on Hillsfar in disarray. Meanwhile the Sembian army is vanishing like the snows of last winter. Whole companies of mercenaries have abandoned their standard entirely.” Sarya smiled on Teryani Ealoeth. “Lady Teryani, you have done well.”

She smiled at the fierce glow of pride that sprang up in Teryani’s eyes then returned her attention to the rest.

“Seiveril Miritar and the army of Evermeet are fleeing for their lives. The Zhentarim have been shown to be less than nothing. Everywhere we look, our enemies are in retreat. We are literally the masters of all we survey. No army within a thousand miles dares take the field against us. Cormanthor is ours now, the realm we have waited five thousand years to rule. We are the true heirs of Aryvandaar, and this is our ancient home. No one will deny us our birthright again.”

“Command us, Lady Sarya,” said Mardeiym Reithel. “We await your bidding.”

The other fey’ri lords bowed, and voiced their assent.

Sarya looked down on the fey’ri. Not long ago their faith in her had wavered in the wake of their defeat in the High Forest, but they were hers once again, mind, heart, and soul. She need only stretch out her hand, and they would die to do her bidding. She felt Malkizid’s eyes upon her, and she met his avid gaze with a dark smile of her own. Archdevil or not, she was the one who ruled in Myth Drannor.

“A month ago, we did not have the strength to challenge Miritar on the open field,” she said. “But we have grown stronger while Evermeet’s army has bled in Shadowdale and Mistledale. The time has come to smite Seiveril Miritar and break Evermeet’s power, once and for all. We will fall on our ancient enemies like a hurricane of fire, and we will utterly destroy them.”

*****

The blackness in the hall brightened, and Morthil’s Door became sharply visible. It started to revolve again, a ghostly image made of white light, and Araevin stepped through. He felt strange, light of step and clear of mind, as if his encounter with Saelethil had served to hammer out of him the last bit of dross that weighed down his heart. His mind reeled with the things he’d survived and seen in the last few hours, and he longed to do nothing more than sit silently for a tenday and simply sort out what he had learned. But he had things to do.

He opened his hand, and let the Nightstar fall to the stone floor. It was dull and gray, its diamond-hard facets starred with countless cracks. He ground the device to powder with his foot, until a single white shard remained, bright and undamaged. He carefully picked up the smaller gemstone and slipped it into his pouch. The spells of Aryvandaar remained within, but nothing else. Then he whispered a minor spell to disperse the gem dust left on the floor.

Good-bye, Saelethil, he thought, and the corners of his mouth turned up in a small, hard smile.

“Araevin! You have returned!” Ilsevele ran up to embrace him, but when he looked up to greet her, she gasped and came to an awkward halt. She stared at him, her face open with amazement. “What … what happened in there?” she finally managed.

“I found Morthil’s tome, just as I had seen it in my vision, and I performed the telmiirhara neshyrr,” he said. “After that, I had a word with Saelethil Dlardrageth in the Nightstar. Do not concern yourself with the Nightstar any longer, Ilsevele. Saelethil’s sentience in the loregem has been destroyed.”

Maresa dropped down from the top of the great hall, alighting near Araevin. “I don’t think that is what Ilsevele meant,” the genasi said. Her face was tight and concerned, with little of her customary sarcasm in her voice. “Have you looked at yourself, Araevin?”

“Looked at myself?” Araevin glanced down at his clothes, and saw nothing out of the ordinary. But a faint golden glow clung to him, an aura of magic that flowed through him with the smallest motion, as if he swam in a pool of light. It was not bright, but it must have been noticeable, or his friends would not have remarked on it.

A temporary effect of the rite? he wondered. Or something more permanent?

Ilsevele looked at Maresa and said, “I don’t expect he would be able to see it. Do you have a mirror?”

“Oh. Of course.” Maresa hurried over to kneel by her pack, rooting through her gear for a moment. Then she returned with a hand-sized mirror, and without a word she handed it to Araevin.

Araevin felt his companions watching him, and with a little trepidation he raised the mirror to his face. He saw the cause of their consternation at once, and almost dropped the mirror in surprise.

His eyes were blank, shining orbs of pearly silver without a hint of iris or pupil. Faint streaks of emerald, rose, and sapphire danced within, slowly changing as he watched. And his face was young, even more so than might be expected of any elf. He looked as he had when he was twenty-five or thirty, in the first bloom of an adulthood that would last for centuries. Light, promise, and vitality had left his face free of the small marks and habitual expressions he’d accumulated over his long life.

What did the eladrin’s kiss do to me? he wondered. “Araevin . .” Maresa said quietly. “You’re not … dead, are you?”

“No,” he answered. “No, I’m not. I am not entirely sure what has befallen me, but I know I am not dead.” He looked back to Ilsevele. “How long was I inside Morthil’s sanctum?”

“It’s hard to judge time here,” Ilsevele replied, gesturing at the lightless hall pressing in on the small company. “But I would guess twelve hours, perhaps more. We have repelled the nilshai or their monsters several times since you left.”

“Did you find what you were seeking?” asked Donnor. “Can you defeat the daemonfey with the lore you’ve mastered?”

“Yes, I found what I was seeking. As for the daemonfey, we will have to see.”

Araevin closed his eyes, thinking back to what he had seen when he stood in the Burial Glen of the ancient city and looked on its mythal’s secrets. The wards were old and treacherous, much damaged by the city’s fall and the centuries that had passed. Burning wheels of magic turned in his mind, sweeping arcs and crackling fonts that geysered from the ground. He found that he could set names to things he had not known before, and understand more of things he had previously glimpsed only in part.

With a sudden shock, he perceived the true peril that was rising in the heart of Cormanthor. Doors, he thought. A thousand doors. And they are open wide.

He shook himself free of Ilsevele and stared toward the west, or what would be the west if nilshai-poisoned Sildeyuir were a place where such things mattered, trying to peer through the deadly gloom of Mooncrescent Tower to distant Myth Drannor.

“Aillesel Seldarie,” he breathed. “It cannot be!”

“What, Araevin?” Ilsevele demanded. “What is it? What do you see?”

“We must return at once,” Araevin said. He looked around at his friends, his eyes glowing like fire opals, luminous and alive. He saw their confusion and fatigue, but he pressed on. “There is a graver threat at hand than the daemonfey, a threat to all Faerun. We must destroy the Last Mythal of Aryvandaar, or everything is lost. Everything.”

It was a peaceful spot, a grassy sward high on a hillside, with the cool waters of Lake Sember glinting through the trees a short distance below. The wind sighed in the treetops, and the forest creaked, rustled, and breathed around Fflar, warm and alive with the summer. Insects buzzed and chirped in the noontime sun, and lances of golden daylight splashed the forest floor through hidden gaps in the canopy overhead.

At his feet a smooth stone marker showed the place where Sorenna’s spirit had been burned free of its mortal frame, five hundred years ago. She had outlived him by a century and a half, it seemed, there in the restful forests of Semberholme. Still, that was too young, was it not? She would have been a little more than two hundred years in age, with centuries ahead of her still.

Someone might have known her here, he thought. A few of the older moon elves who lingered in Cormanthor after the Elven Court Retreated. I hope it was a peaceful life. So much strife befell our city in the last decades, so much horror in the years of war. It would please me to think that she passed the rest of her days in peace. If I bought her a hundred years of life in Semberholme by spending my last days fighting on without hope, I would count it a bargain.

Fflar’s eyes strayed to the marker beside Sorenna’s stone, and he felt his heart break for the hundredth time that day. It was not his son. That would have been hard, but he would have been content that his child had lived with his wife even for a short time in Semberholme. But there was nothing there for Arafel, and he could only guess that their son had gone on to live out his days in some other place. He hoped so, anyway.

The second marker in the glade was the stone for Sorenna’s husband, Ildrethor. He laughed softly at himself, even as tears gathered in his eyes.