The Summoning

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

30 Nightal, the Year of the Unstrung Harp

A bevy of meadow quail broke from the grass some miles distant, two dozen plump flecks scattering into the air. The sight of so many juicy birds brought the water to Aubric Nihmedu's mouth-as it did to the mouths of all the Noble Blades and Lordly Wands tucked into their spider holes across the sun-baked hillside. For a nearly tenday now, the Swords of Evereska had subsisted on crisped lizard and spell-baked mouse, forsaking even cacti and wolfroot for fear that the phaerimm would notice any plant-gathering. It was hardly the ordeal proud aristocrats envisioned when they joined the Swords of Evereska, but no one complained. Since forsaking open combat for ambushes and surprise attacks, they had cut their losses from staggering to merely heavy, and they had killed more than twenty phaerimm. By Aubric's estimate, the Swords would need only ten lives apiece to eradicate the remaining phaerimm from the Shaeradim.

Two hundred paces ahead of the quail, a pair of moon foxes darted across a stream, herding four young kits along between them. There was something out there, slinking into the eastern end of the Blazevale-the broad, sand-scoured valley that separated the Sharaedim from the Greycloak Hills to the north. Though curious, Aubric resisted the temptation to augment his keen elf sight with magic. Not two hours before, sentries had sent the Swords scrambling for cover with news of an approaching company. Aubric had to settle for staring out across the plain with his naked eye, waiting patiently for the next hint of the creature's presence.

Soon enough, he noticed a narrow riffle in the grass. The disturbance was advancing steadily toward a high, bowl-shaped outcrop known as Rocnest, a natural citadel that had housed elf garrisons for nearly a thousand years during the Crown Wars. Though the fortress had been abandoned after the fall of Aryvandaar, its location between Evereska and the Greycloak Hills had lately prompted talk of reclaiming it as a watch post.

Aubric's heart began to pound faster. The riffle was easily half a mile front to back, too long to be caused by an animal and far too straight. It advanced steadily toward the natural fortress, pausing neither to search for prey or check for predators. There was only one creature that traveled so efficiently, so confidently in the open plain. Aubric flipped the top off his spider hole and turned up the hill, flashing the signal to prepare for battle.

Rhydwych Bourmays, the company artmaster, poked her sable-tressed head out of the next hole. "You cannot be thinking to attack!" she hissed. 'Ten thornbacks is too many- especially with illithids and beholders to back them up."

'Tell your wands to prepare themselves," Aubric said, sidestepping the argument. "There is help for Evereska out there, and I won't stand idle while the phaerimm ambush it."

Rhydwych arched her thin eyebrows and looked across the plain. "Invisible is good." She studied the line a few seconds longer, then said, "And fast, I'll give them that. But help is an exaggeration. There can't be two hundred riders in the column."

"We don't know who those two hundred are, Artmaster- or what they intend." His tone was sharper than he intended, perhaps because of the disappointment Rhydwych's question had engendered in his own heart. By the Swords' best estimate-an estimate they had been unable to communicate to Evereska or anyone else-there were two hundred phaerimm in the Sharaedim. "Will you signal your wands, or must I?"

"No need to get nasty, Lord Nihmedu," snipped Rhydwych. "I know the ladder of authority-though you may be sure the House of Swords will review it if matters go badly." "If matters go badly, they will have no need."

He shooed Rhydwych off with a wave, then turned to find a watchman bounding down the shoulder of the hill. Aubric signaled his Noble Blades to hold steady, then began to tighten his armor. By the time he finished, the sentry was beside him, and a hundred Swords stood scattered across the hill.

"The phaerimm weren't hunting us, Aubric." As a superior noble, it would have been beneath the Gold elf to address Aubric by his title. "They're on the move." "Down the Blazevale, Lord Dureth?" Dureth nodded. "How-"

"Someone is trying to reach Rocnest." Aubric pointed toward the grass riffle. "It may be help."

The elf looked in the direction indicated. "If it is, it's not much." Dureth narrowed his eyes, then said, "Unless…" "Your thoughts do me no good unless you speak them."

"I'm wondering about the Rocnest," explained Dureth. "Why trap yourself there-" "Unless you'll be able to fight your way out-"

"But you need to defend yourself until you can," finished Dureth. "Could they be erecting a gate?" Aubric nodded. "It's all that makes sense."

Dureth pointed toward the hill's western shoulder, which descended gently to the plain near the mouth of the Blaze-vale. "We'd better hurry. They'll be closing on the Deadwall."

Aubric signaled the Swords to follow Dureth. "Lead the way-and quickly."

The Noble Blade started forward at a steady jog, and Aubric hurried after him. The Deadwall was the intangible barrier the phaerimm had erected around the Sharaedim and Greycloak Hills. It had earned its name not because it killed everything that tried to walk or fly through it-though it did-but because it blocked all magical communication and travel with the outside world. Rhydwych and her mages spent every spare hour trying to defeat the barrier, but had yet to succeed.

The Swords bounded up the slope in utter silence. At the top of the ridge, Dureth, Aubric, and Rhydwych crawled to the crest and peered into the Blazevale.

They found themselves a few hundred paces above the phaerimm, who were advancing toward Rocnest. In addition to the ten thornbacks, there were a dozen illithids, a like number of beholders, and two hundred mindslaves. The slaves were a mixed bunch, mostly humans and bugbears, but with an alarming number of elves as well. A fair number of elves wore the elaborate, beast-head helmets favored by Evereskan nobles. It filled Aubric with despair to recognize a gilt hawk and two stylish lions as the helms of Noble Blades.

Leaving Dureth to skulk along behind the crest and watch the enemy, Aubric and Rhydwych slipped down the slope and led the Swords along a parallel course. Soon enough, the ridge fell to a bare seven feet, and the enemy company streamed out beyond the shoulder to the line of decomposing birds and rabbits that marked the Deadwall. Aubric signaled his company to wait.

On the plain, the ruffle had closed to within four hundred paces of Rocnest. Though it was impossible to tell whether the invisible newcomers had seen the enemy, the phaerimm were making no secret of their presence. They stopped at the Deadwall only long enough for one of their number to run his four hands through a spell, creating a shimmering half-disk of greenish light.

"Four hands! No wonder we couldn't find the spell!" whispered Rhydwych.

The first two phaerimm pressed themselves to the shimmering doorway and melted through it, their bodies spreading across one side, then oozing out the other. Aubric grimaced. The slow process precluded a mad dash to take the enemy from behind. They would have to fight for the doorway and hold it, like an army claiming a crucial bridge.

The other phaerimm floated through the portal one after the other, leaving the illithids and beholders to herd the mindslaves through. Arrogant as always in their power within the Sharaedim, they were not even worried about being attacked from behind-an unfortunate testament, Aubric realized, to how little damage the Swords had truly inflicted on their enemies.

By the time the last phaerimm had crossed the barrier, the fast-moving newcomers had reached the base of Rocnest-or at least their riffle had. In front of the tor, a steady progression of birds began to take wing as invisible warriors fanned out to set up an advanced defense line.

The phaerimm huddled together arguing, filling the air with strange whistles and angry gestures. After a few wasted moments, they returned to the Deadwall and created nine more shimmering portals. The beholders and illithids began to shove mindslaves through en masse, while the thornbacks worked frantically to arrange them into battle ranks. Aubric could not help smiling. It was the first time he had seen anyone disrupt a phaerimm plan. The newcomers seemed eager to press. A dozen golden meteors arced away from Rocnest, landing short of the phaerimm lines, but exploding into huge curtains of amber fire. "That's Vhoorflame!" hissed Rhydwych.

Aubric raised a finger to his lips, drawing an irritated-but silent-scowl. He did not take offense, for he understood the excitement that had led to her exclamation. Vhoorflame was a specialty of Evermeet's fleet mages, invented for the rare occasions when the island nation found it necessary to defend itself at sea.

A stiff wind-no doubt magical-rose behind the flames and drove it toward the Blazevale. The mindslaves grew agitated and more difficult to arrange, angering the phaerimm enough that they killed a handful as an example. That only sent the others into a panic, and several dozen turned to flee through the portals back into the Sharaedim.

A pair of the smaller phaerimm left the group and called up an opposing wind that stopped the Vhoorflames three hundred paces from the Deadwall. When the blaze continued to burn, they called rain down from a clear sky. The water merely turned to steam. They used a ground-moving spell to flip a huge wall of dirt back onto the fire. The Vhoorflames continued to burn, consuming the dirt as though it were coal. The fire began to advance again.

Finally, one phaerimm tried to dispel the magic that had created the fire curtain. Normally, dismissing the spell of a fleet mage was no easy task, but the phaerimm were far more than normal magic-users. The creature had barely stopped waving its arms before a section of flame faded, leaving a thirty foot breach in the blazing curtain.

A blinding bolt of silver fire came streaking through the gap to catch the phaerimm in the torso. The thing erupted in a dazzling flash, hurling thorns and arms thirty feet into the air.

"In the name of Angharradh!" hissed Aubric, turning to Rhydwych. "What manner of spell was that?" Rhydwych only gestured to the plain, where a robed man stood with a black staff in one hand. Aubric was just starting to make out the shadow of a thick beard when another ball of Vhoorflame streaked down to seal the gap in the fire curtain.

"It appears our help may not be needed," whispered Rhydwych.

"1 pray we will be so lucky," said Aubric, "but we must be ready. Prepare the eye shield."

"There is no harm in being prepared." Rhydwych turned away to join her small cluster of Lordly Wands.

If the newcomers thought the destruction of one phaerimm would discourage the others, they were badly mistaken. The creatures merely spread out and floated forward in a line, then dispelled the entire wall of Vhoorflame at once.

This time, there were no streams of silver fire, only a flurry of lightning and golden bolts. The phaerimm vanished inside nine columns of roaring magic, each one pelted by such a tempest of spells that the ground split and the sky shook. One creature spun madly around and dropped in a heap of gashed flesh, but the others floated firm where they were, returning the attacks in kind.

A long rank of wizards-some looked human, others elf- was approaching through the fading smoke, all visible now that they had attacked. They fell in twos and threes, or sometimes just vanished into blood and smoke. Fearing his allies were not as well-prepared as he'd thought, Aubric longed to call out to them to change tactics, for he and his Swords had discovered the hard way that spells hurled at phaerimm had a nasty habit of ricocheting back at the caster. On the other hand, there was value in keeping the thornbacks busy, and perhaps that was all the newcomers intended. Clearly, they had come with a plan-and at least a few surprises.

Aubric tried to find the bearded figure again, but quickly realized it was hopeless. Deciding the time had come for Evereska to unveil a surprise of her own, he stood and drew his sword. "Arrows and spells!" he yelled. "Loose at will, slow advance!"

Bowstrings thrummed the air, sending a wall of hissing death down into the mindslaves trapped against the Dead-wall. The first volley and most of the second dropped the illithids before they had a chance to whirl and use their mind blasts against the company's spellcasters. The Lordly Wands hurled a few fireballs and ice storms to keep the enemy off balance, but eight of the dozen remained quiet and assumed positions in the first rank of advance.

When the beholders finally recovered and turned their death-dealing eyes toward the invaders, Rhydwych called, "Eye shield!"

Together, the Wands uttered an incantation and poured a handful of powdered silver to the ground. The air in front of them shimmered with mirror like brilliance, and the beholders' rays ricocheted off in all directions. Aubric's archers took aim at the eye tyrants and waited, then, when the creatures spun their big magic-dispelling eyes around to dispel the eye shield, they loosed their arrows. Most of the beholders dropped to the first volley. The handful that survived perished in the second.

The confused mindslaves, now on their own, turned to meet the attack in a jumble.

"Spare them if you can, but be quick!" Aubric cried. "We must show our friends at the Rocnest how to kill phaerimm!"

Rhydwych and her Wands unleashed a flurry of spells, dropping a full third of the mindslaves into a deep slumber. Another twenty fell into helpless fits of laughter, and dozens more dropped their weapons and simply wandered off. A handful went blind and fell to their knees screaming. Unfortunately, a full two-dozen warriors remained to block the Swords' advance.

Aubric led the crash into them, using his elven sword to parry the wild axe of a vacant-eyed human, then slipping inside to knock the man unconscious with a mailed fist to the jaw. As he spun away, he snatched the fellow's axe and hurled it into a charging bugbear, dived under the monster's legs, and came up flinging sand into the eyes of three elves standing in front of the portal.

"Rest well," he said, adding the arcane syllable that gave his command its magical force.

The knees of two elves buckled, but the third danced forward in the practiced steps of a bladesinger-a pattern that Aubric Nihmedu had often taught his most promising students at the College of Arms. He should have backed away and called to one of Rhydwych's Wands for a killing spell, but he could not do that to one of his own pupils. Knowing what would come next, and trusting his own skill to defeat it, he blocked the low attack, slipped the lunge, parried the returning backhand, and knocked the fellow unconscious with an elbow to the jaw-then felt something hot and sharp pushing through his chain mail.

Aubric looked down to find a silver dagger protruding from his flank. "Oh, very good." He pressed himself into the shimmering Deadwall portal. "Very sneaky."

The world grew hot and flat looking. He experienced a strange instant of infinite expansiveness and intoxicating energy, then his side erupted in pain, and he fell.

The pain, Aubric promptly shunted to one side of his consciousness, to a place where he would be aware of what it told him, but not dominated by it. The falling, he threw himself into, flinging himself over his shoulders and rolling to his feet, his own blade and the dislodged dagger weaving a defensive pattern around him. He felt his sword slice across a body behind him and knew a human was trying to rush up on his left, which meant someone else was coming from the right. He flipped the dagger under his sword arm, aiming high for the throat and a quick kill. A strangled gurgle betokened an intuition still as sharp as two centuries before, but Aubric barely noticed. He had fallen into the grasp of the blood dance now, his mind and his body becoming one, an instrument being played by a will indistinguishable from the mad whirl of combat around him. His foot lashed out in a blind back kick, drawing a pained howl from the man he had wounded an instant earlier.

Aubric spun, blade flashing, blood coursing. It would have been wrong to say he became a bladesinger again-such a thing was impossible for an elf of so many responsibilities and so little time-but a gift hard won and long nourished returned. He became stronger, quicker, more supple-if not quite the dancing sword with whom Morgwais had fallen in love those few centuries ago, then at least once more a whirling blade. The old battle song tolled in his ears, and he began to feel in the Weave everything happening on the field of combat. He saw the wall of glassy-eyed mindslaves rushing up to attack, felt Lady Bourmays and Lord Dureth pushing through the Deadwall behind him, heard the voices of Lordly Wands calling out incantations to both sides of him. In the plain ahead, he saw the phaerimm streaking forward through a tempest of blades and bolts, heard one of the creatures fife its pain as an iron spear impaled it, felt the crackling energy as a blue force-dome rose up to cover all of Rocnest

A strand of silk appeared in Aubric's hand of its own accord. He flung it at a dozen charging mindslaves and called three arcane syllables. A golden web engulfed their legs and brought their charge to a halt Pounding feet sounded to his left. He dropped to a whirling crouch and swept his attacker's legs with an extended foot, then knocked the woman senseless with a heel kick to the head. The smell of musk saturated the air, and he launched himself backward, somersaulting into the legs of an astonished bugbear, thrusting his blade up through its guts, rolling free before the gore came showering down. He sprang up and heard a pair of light feet approaching from his wounded side.

Aubric lowered his sword, then seeing no more mind-slaves to attack, stooped down to clean the blade on a human's tunic.

"Impressive," said Rhydwych. She thrust a healing potion into his hands. "But you might want to leave the bladesinging to younger nobles."

"Old habits die hard." Aubric allowed himself a wince, then drank the potion down. Its healing warmth coursed through his weary body, but there remained a chill deep in his wounded side. "Damn, that's one youngblade I wish I hadn't taught so well." Rhydwych cocked her brow. "If you are too badly hurt-"

"When I am in too much pain to defend Evereska, you will know it by the pieces on the ground."

Aubric glanced over his shoulder and found the rest of the company assembling. They had lost perhaps twenty Noble Blades, but still had all twelve Wands. He waved his sword toward Rocnest and started after the phaerimm. "For Evereska!" "For Evereska!"

If the reply was weaker and softer than Aubric would have liked, so was his own voice. The pain was spreading, filling his abdomen with cramping fire. The blade had pierced something vital, but there was nothing to do about it. Both of the company's healers had long since been killed, so he could either fight through to Evereska's allies and hope they had a good healer, or he could sit down and die.

Aubric closed off all awareness of the pain, calling on his old bladesinger talents to draw strength from the Weave and lead the charge across the charred plain. As they drew closer to Rocnest, he was astonished at the newcomers' losses. Elves and humans alike lay scattered by the dozens, most motionless and quiet, some writhing and groaning. He saw at least seventy or eighty casualties himself, and guessed the total could easily be twice that number. He assigned half a dozen of his own walking wounded to do what they could for the injured, though everyone knew that would be all too little.

Seventy paces from the enemy, a tremendous crack echoed across the plain. The newcomers' blue dome flickered and dimmed, then flashed out of existence. The phaerimm started forward again, only to be met by a volley of arrows and spears from Rocnest. The dark shafts struck in a clattering cloud, many ricocheting harmlessly off the thorn-backs' scales, but a few finding soft seams. One monster dropped to the ground with the butt of an elven spear in its mouth, and two more trilled in anguish, but most showed no reaction at all to the sticks bristling in their bodies.

A hundred warriors appeared atop Rocnest, visible now that they had attacked and turning to scramble down behind the jagged lip. They made it only a step before the rim erupted into curtains of golden fire and showers of fuming black rain. There was a cacophony of crackling flame and anguished screaming, then another sound-four roaring voices booming out the same intricate spell, complementing each other, working jointly to twine together separate strands of the Weave in one creation.

"It's a Circle!" Rhydwych said, coming to Aubric's side. "The high mages are trying to open the gate!" "How long?" Aubric asked.

'Too long." Rhydwych pointed at the surviving phaerimm, who were plucking the last of the arrows from their bodies and rising toward Rocnest. 'Ten minutes, at least."

Aubric's heart sank. The whole battle so far had taken only fifteen minutes, and the newcomers had done well to delay the phaerimm that long. He thrust his arm into the air, extending his thumb and smallest finger in the "bow" signal.

"Arrows!" He turned to Rhydwych. "How many of us can you magic up there?"

"None, if you expect us to put up a fight," she said. "There's a moment of confusion after any translocational spell-and a moment would be all the phaerimm need."

Aubric nodded, then closed his fist and lowered his arm, calling the Swords to a halt "Dying that way would do no good, but we must buy them time. Take your Lordly Wands and do whatever you can. The Blades will follow as we can." Rhydwych's face paled, but she nodded. "For Evereska."

"For Evereska-and all the elves remaining to Faerun." Aubric's stomach turned hollow and queasy. It was one thing to lead the charge into peril, quite another to order a dozen brave elves to their certain deaths. "May the Harp Archer watch over you."

"And you as well, Lord Nihmedu." Rhydwych gave him a weak smile, then kissed his cheek. "Don't let them make a mindslave of me." "Nor you of me," answered Aubric.

Rhydwych drew a pair of battle wands, then closed her eyes and used her magic to mindspeak with her fellow wizards.

Aubric looked toward Rocnest again, where five healthy phaerimm were already halfway to the rim. The other two remained closer to the ground, wobbling about on their tails as they tried to recover their wits. "Loose and advance!" Aubric yelled.

A volley of arrows darkened the sky, a dozen flying toward each phaerimm. Perhaps a quarter of the shafts directed against the injured creatures struck home, lodging themselves deep between their scales or in the pulpy rim of the mouth. One thornback dropped writhing and flopped like a trout out of water. The second vanished in the glimmer of teleport magic. The other flights streaked to within a few inches of their targets, then struck some invisible shield and bounced harmlessly away.

By the time the arrows tumbled to the ground, Rhydwych and her Wands were in the air, streaking after the phaerimm like sparrows after hawks. Aubric started to raise a hand to call a ground charge, then saw a dark-bearded human step onto a jagged spur atop Rocnest. He held a black mage's staff and wore heavy winter robes, and Aubric felt certain he was the same man whose silver flames had destroyed the first phaerimm.

Hit them again, my friend, and this time your arrows will strike home. On my signal.

Aubric did not question how the voice came to his head, nor hesitate to implement its command. He raised his thumb and little finger in the "bow" signal and called a halt. "Nock and aim!" he yelled. "Choose your targets well."

Even as he yelled this, the phaerimm unleashed a tempest of magic at the figure atop the rock. There were fireballs and ice storms, swirling clouds of vapor and black bolts of death, lightning forks and even a great disembodied hand. The human stood through it all, his arms spread wide, his black staff raised high above his head, its body surrounded by a purple aura as it drew attack after attack down into its shaft.

The figure could only be Khelben Arunsun. Aubric's spirits rose at once, for with one of the Chosen fighting in Evereska's defense, surely it could only be a matter of time before the phaerimm were driven from the Sharaedim. He waited patiently for the promised signal, all the while watching his Wands draw closer to the phaerimm, and the phaerimm closer to Rocnest, until he began to worry about distance and accuracy, and to fear that his archer's shafts might strike the Swords' own wizards.

Finally, the bearded figure lowered his staff. Though it was impossible to hear the archmage's voice over the booming chant of the high mages and the general battle roar, Aubric saw the human's fingers flashing through the familiar gestures of a magic dispelling spell. He lowered his arm. "Loose!"

The thrum of eighty bowstrings sounded as one, and a cloud of arrows hissed through the sky. As they neared the phaerimm, the shafts bunched into swarms, almost like wasps streaking out to sting the fools who dared disturb their nests.

The flights struck with an almost audible thud, driving the phaerimm closer to Rocnest's basalt cliffs and a little downward. Fully half the arrows snapped against the creatures' scaly armor, but the others sank deep, adding their feathery tails to the forest of spines already rising on the backs of the phaerimm. The Lordly Wands adjusted their course and swooped to engage, but were brought up short when a handful of battered human mages appeared alongside Khelben to hurl a fusillade of bolts and flashes at the phaerimm. Several blasts ricocheted off their intended targets and streaked back to the caster, and a full half dozen merely vanished without causing visible harm. The other spells hit on mark, spraying cracked scales and broken thorns in every direction.

One phaerimm lost an arm and went tumbling ground-ward, only to vanish in a silver flash. The other four fought back in kind, swinging out to spray Rocnest's scorched rim with every color of hissing bolt. There were lightning blasts and fire streams and storms of exploding hail, but the most destructive attack was a surge of invisible force that slammed into the cliff itself, creating a boom so loud it hit Aubric like a punch. A web of fissures shot across the rocky face, bringing the rim down in a crashing mass of stone and black dust.

Rhydwych and her Wands swooped into the roiling cloud somewhere beneath the phaerimm. Aubric raised his arm to signal the blade charge and was startled to realize he was already half a dozen steps behind everyone else. Determined not to dishonor his position by being the last into battle, he reached out to the Weave and felt its strength surge into him-but he found also that his legs would not rise faster, nor his lungs draw deeper, nor his heart pump harder. He could not understand what was wrong-until he noticed the dull burning in his abdomen and felt the wet warmth pouring down his leg. The pain he had shunted aside, but one could demand only so much from a body, and he had long ago passed that threshold.

As the landslide settled, brilliant flashes and deep rumblings filled the dust cloud. A Lordly Wand tumbled out of the roiling mass in a dozen pieces and rained to ground amidst the Noble Blades. They paid no attention and vanished, screaming, into the swirling murk.

Aubric raced after them, lungs aching and muscles burning. The plain turned into a hazy field of jumbled stone and ghostly silhouettes, and the air grew thick with choking dust, filling his throat with racking coughs. It occurred to him he might not survive to thank Evereska's new allies, and his thoughts turned briefly to Morgwais-the Red Lady, with skin so bronze it was scarlet-and he was sorry he had not gone with her into the High Forest, not because he feared what was about to befall him, nor even because he knew he would never see her again, but because he had let her think that his duty meant more to him than she did.

Aubric came to the base of the landslide and saw his ghostly Blades scrambling up the boulders, chasing after handfuls of long gray cords dragging across the stones. One elf sprang off a stone, and letting his sword fall free, caught hold of the rope. He began to climb, and the line dragged across the ground more slowly. Another warrior caught hold and dropped to his seat, bracing himself between two boulders to hold it in place.

Coughing and hacking so hard he could hardly hold himself straight, Aubric ran his gaze fifty feet up the line to the amorphous blob above. In the swirling dust, it looked like some sort of jellyfish, with a shapeless body and a string of long tentacles dangling below It took the blademajor a moment to recognize what he was seeing, to identify the tangled knot of limbs as the grotesquely broken arms and legs of three Lordly Wands, wrapped tight to their foe by the sticky white strands of a magic web.

A rolling ball of flame engulfed the phaerimm, drawing an anguished shriek from a lone elf voice. Aubric thought for a moment that Khelben or a human wizard had hurled the spell down from above. When the creature did not come crashing to the ground, he realized that the fireball had been no more than a desperate attempt to free itself-but elven ropes did not burn. A half dozen Noble Blades grabbed hold with the other two warriors and hauled their foe down toward its death. The thornback had other ideas and vanished in a twinkling of silver spell light.

A second phaerimm, still reeling from the fury of earlier attacks, was not so lucky. A trio of elves caught its ropes, then drew it down while their fellows poured arrows into it. By the time the dazed creature finally thought to raise a shield, they had it on the ground, dragging it past a teetering boulder. When their fellows pushed the monolith over, the spray of green blood left no doubt about its fate.

Aubric clambered over the rocks toward Rocnest, searching the sky for the last two creatures. The booming voices of the high mages continued unabated, as did the cries of the wounded and the rumble of shifting stone, but an ominous pause had descended over the battle itself. By the time he reached the base of the cliff, the dust cloud had thinned to a mere haze.

Dureth came up beside him. "Aubric, you look in a bad way."

Aubric nodded and searched the landslide below. "Did you see what became of the last two phaerimm?" A worried look came to Dureth's eye. "No."

"Then tell those who can to hurry." Aubric turned toward the cliff. There was perhaps fifty feet of vertical face, then another hundred of steep bowl where the avalanche had caved away. He sheathed his sword and looped a coil of rope over his shoulder. "I'll see you above."

Dureth caught his arm. "You can't do this, my friend," he said. "Not alone."

"How can I not?" Climbing as nimbly as a spider despite his wound, Aubric started up the cliff. "I doubt there is anyone left who can keep up." "Aubric, no one expects the blademajor to-"

But Aubric was already twenty feet up, his fingers and toes moving quickly from one hold to another. Dureth began to yell at the others to regroup, asking if anyone had a spell of flight. By the time the high lord had everyone gathered, Aubric was pulling himself off the vertical face onto the treacherous slope left by the landslide. He yelled for the others to stand clear and scrambled up through the loose stone, twice falling and nearly sliding to his death.

The high mages continued their spellcasting, their voices rising to a fevered pitch as they neared completion. When the top of the slide basin came into view, Aubric began to think Rhydwych had killed the other two phaerimm herself-and that, of course, was when the crackle of a war spell rumbled over the crest of the slope. He tied the rope off to a spar of rock and tossed the free end to the others, then drew his sword and scrambled into the saddle.

At the top, Aubric dropped to his belly and peered into Rocnest. All that remained of the ancient fortress were a few sections of elf-raised wall along the jagged rim. But down in the basin stood a rectangle of lustrous black stone, still shining with the magic that had drawn it from the ground. In front of the block stood a gossamer-robed Gold elf female, her voice ringing heavenward as she plucked strands of Weave from the air and plaited them into the dark monolith. She was fashioning an elegant keel arch, its purple depths growing ever darker and richer. With every fiber she laid, the mage herself seemed to grow wispy, translucent, as though she were braiding herself into her work. Aubric thought it so, for though the high mages kept their art to themselves, he had heard that their magic often involved the binding of their own spirits.

Arrayed around the elf woman were three male mages, their bodies as black and opaque as the female's was translucent. They held their arms spread skyward, spraying shimmering arcs of magic into the circle. Their voices were booming to a crescendo, each calling out a separate spell of support, yet weaving their incantations together in music-like harmony.

The slope directly below Aubric was more dirt than rock, strewn with bodies both human and elf-many writhing in agony, none able to stand. Halfway down hovered the two phaerimm, still swaddled in Rhydwych's magic webs and flinging spells at a scintillating dome of colors. Though Aubric recognized the dome as one of the most powerful defenses taught by Evereska's Academy of Magic, he could not understand why the phaerimm were wasting their time destroying it when the high mages were so close to completing the gate.

Khelben Arunsun stepped out of the dome, hurled a spell at one of the creatures, and dived back into his sphere. The stricken phaerimm froze and began to sink into the ground. Whistling in alarm, the other floated around the sphere and dispelled the magic drawing its fellow down into the stone.

In the basin below, the voices of the high mages rose to a thunderous roar. The archway glowed deep purple, and the female elf faded to a shimmer.

Khelben popped out of the dome again and cast a ray of black death at the second phaerimm, only to have the magic reflected back at him. He tried to bring his black staff down to intercept the spell, but even Mystra's Chosen could not catch their own spells. The bolt took him in the chest, hurling him a dozen paces up the slope. He landed in a heap, brown vapor rising from the puckered hole in his chest.

Aubric was already bounding down the rocks, his knees quivering with weakness, his breath coming in hot, wet wheezes. As he passed Khelben, he was relieved to see the edges of the hole already closing, but it seemed clear the archmage would be of no further use in this battle. The closest phaerimm spun to meet Aubric's charge, its barbed tail tangling in its skirt of elven ropes. The second creature extracted itself from the ground and started down the slope toward the high mages.

Aubric sprang six feet to the right, then right again, as though trying to work his way around the first creature. When he gathered himself for a third leap, his foe took the bait, spraying his path with sizzling black acid. Aubric jumped left, drawing on the Weave's magic to launch himself into a glorious flying somersault, his sword whirling about him as his panicked target filled the air with flashing magic.

In the basin below, the voices of the high mages fell silent. The female vanished in a brilliant burst of purple radiance, and the gateway glowed with a magic so deeply violet it was black.

A magic bolt caught Aubric in the shoulder, but he twisted around, launched himself off the phaerimm's fleshy lip-one of the few areas not covered with magic web-and dived over the scintillating dome. The startled creature whistled an alarm, and its fellow spun on its tail, splicing the air with a sheet of scything magic.

Aubric was already on the ground, rolling to his feet and dancing toward the phaerimm in a tornado of flashing steel. The creature called to its fellow and moved to block the elf's path across the hill. Aubric feigned an attempt to circle above it, then saw the weary mages below lower their arms and knew the gate was complete. He changed directions, barely escaping as a nest of tentacles sprang from the ground to snatch at his legs. The second phaerimm streaked by, trilling in anger as it swept down into the basin.

"Watch yourselves!" Weak and croaking as it was, the call sent Aubric into a spasm of coughing. Bright blood sprayed from his mouth, taking with it what little remained of his strength. He dropped to his knees, then tried again to warn the high mages. "Behind you!"

Whether or not they heard the cry was impossible to say, for the elves turned almost sedately to look up the slope. Their golden faces had gone sallow and gaunt with exhaustion, and when they raised their arms, it almost seemed they were trying to ward off a blow instead of preparing to cast a spell.

The phaerimm was faster. Still wrapped in its amorphous cocoon of magic web, it stopped at the bottom of the slope and struck the ground with its tail. A deafening crash shook the entire Rocnest, then a network of magma-belching fissures shot across the basin floor toward the black gate.

The high mages crossed their arms in front of them and calmly awaited the assault. The fissures shot to within a dozen feet of the trio, then turned aside and scribed a fiery loop around the floor of the basin. The phaerimm warbled its frustration and struck the ground again, causing a blinding ring of magma to roar dozens of feet into the air.

The archway's black silhouette remained visible through it all, but when the fiery curtain sank back into its crevices, all that remained of the three mages were fuming black robes, lying rumpled and empty along the edge of their circle.

Though it seemed minutes had passed, Aubric knew by his labored breathing and trembling muscles it could only have been seconds. He looked away from the receding fires more disheartened than awed. The gate had been raised- but to what purpose? Even if others wanted to help, Evereska remained as alone as ever. Any forces sent by Evermeet or Waterdeep would be destroyed the instant they left the gate-or, worse, added to the ranks of the phaerimm mind-slaves.

A shadow fell across the ground before Aubric, then he heard something wispy and sibilant inside his mind. Come along quietly, and you will live.

It was all Aubric could do to find the strength to look at the dusty, web-swaddled mass before him. "I doubt it."

Do not. I have a fondness for you brave ones. You hatch strong larvae.

Aubric heard a soft rustle and brought his sword up beside him, catching the phaerimm's tail just above the barb as it came whipping in at his flank. There was a wet slashing sound, then the feel of hot blood as the severed tail sprayed his face.

Leaving his pain to come flooding into him, Aubric called upon his last tiny reserve of strength to launch himself into a mad, cart wheeling attack.

He did not make it, of course. The phaerimm floated aside and let him tumble down the slope, and the searing spray of green vapor came sizzling down on him from above.

Aubric hardly noticed, for the strength had fled from his body. He felt the sword slip from his grasp, and the last thing he saw was the luminous face of the female mage watching him from the mouth of the black gate, and he was struck by how much her smile looked like that of his beloved Morgwais.