Blackstaff (43 page)

Hundreds of sharn sloughed off their shimmering black skins, and many Faertelmin stepped from the darkness to reclaim lives as elves, humans, dwarves, centaurs, and others. Their skins slid across the smoldering plains, slithering toward the central pyre or a closer sentinel tower.

All the beings caught up in the eldritch flames heard a new sending as they marveled at the magic at play:
Know there are yet sharn in the Realms. There are those of Miyeritar who would become dhaerow with the Corellon’s Descent, should they become
n’fhaorn’quessir.
They choose to remain as Rhymanthiin’s defenders as well as defenders against corrupt magic across the Realms
.

Tsarra and others wept for their sacrifice.

His imprisoned form hovering near yet consipicuously untouched by the flames, Frostrune struggled, but not even his hatred could break the bonds his own magecraft built. How could the Rune have betrayed him so, sharing his greatest spell with his worst enemy? How did they dare defy his obvious superiority?

Frostrune’s self-absorption kept him from noticing the buzzing flies and hazy brown air that rose from the High Moor toward him. The ochre- and olive-drab rain and poisons also rose on the winds whipped up by the Second and Third Circles. It wasn’t until the poisonous matter was heavy enough to fill out the lich’s form for the first time in
more than a hundred years that he realized what was happening. The magic pulled the poisons and infestations and killing magic from the soil, the sharn, the plants, and the air. Worse yet, they imprisoned those poisons in his own form, and they proved virulent enough to eat away further at his form and the energies that bound his soul to it.

As the sun crawled toward dusk, all that remained of Priamon “Frostrune” Rakesk was a partial skull without a jawbone and a few spinal bones. The Killing Storm had rotted his form and also undid much of the necromantic magic that kept him active. Still, while he had feared he would be destroyed, he knew his phylactery was safe. He had contingencies in place, and he would have laughed if he could speak. He had but to wait patiently, a skill natural to liches.

When the swarming fireflies obscured his sight, Priamon felt a subtle shift. He had been teleported away from his enemies. Priamon found his head being turned around by someone holding it. His eyesockets aligned with darting and twitching eyes set in a wrinkled bald face. Priamon discovered that even the blackest of hearts can be broken by the unexpected.

“Khelben was right,” the Mad Mage of Undermountain gloated. “I owe you a grievance, Priamon Rakesk, for pains ye visited upon me five years agone.”

In his other hand, Halaster Blackcloak idly toyed with a rod of Shoon trade rings, a collection of seventeen gold coins looped onto a platinum rod—Priamon’s phylactery.

Screams echo unceasingly in the halls of Undermountain. The same can be said within the minds of those without hope.

T
sarra heard the sending meant only for Khelben’s ears, which by necessity were hers at present:
Khelben, hear me. I’ve known since yesterday, darling. Khelben, you never say good-bye when you die. Khelben, let the fires heal your body again. Khelben, do not leave me, leave your children. Khelben! Not so soon. Not now … not now.…

It shocked Tsarra to hear Laeral beg, and the despair in her sending tore at Tsarra’s heart. It shocked her even more to see Khelben. He was just as distraught, but he did not respond at all. He slumped forward in his chair, his face hidden, his body wracked with sobs. Tsarra understood, but it tore at her, the two archmages whose love outshone their power, and both trapped by fates beyond them. She reached toward Khelben, hoping to comfort him … and Ualair’s image
appeared in her way within the
kiira
-library.

Ualair embraced Khelben, and the two images merged together. Ualair turned, and Tsarra saw he had traits of both wizards in his face and form.
Tsarra, Khelben is in both of us now, as he must be for this final ritual. We shall ensure you survive this, even though Khelben and I cannot. It is the toll exacted to restore the City of Hope to the Realms
.

Can’t I be the sacrifice in his place?

No. This world needs its Blackstaff for reasons you shall learn in time. For now, that Blackstaff is you. Now come, and be the first half-elf ever to be a central caster in a High Magic Ritual of Myriad
.

Ualair leaned forward, and rested his hands on Tsarra’s shoulders. She did the same, and when they brought their
kiira
together, a flash of blinding magic escaped and flashed from the pyre. The pyre wove itself in a pattern of fire, creating the massive Highfire Crown among the stories-tall flames.

Out on the High Moor, wizards, sorcerers, and priests stopped as the golden objects they wore began trembling and glowing brightly. Through them, they heard a strange voice—an amalgam of voices speaking as one.

The trinkets you wear are now sacrifices to bind the powers at work here, to restore a world’s faith in brotherhood. The
akhelben
and many others made these sacrifices so that ye might aid a high magic without the cost of all your lives. Now, with these oblations, surrender yourselves into the high magic and help us build hope anew. The restored
fhaorn’quessir
ask our aid with their city. Lend them and us your thoughts and hopes and magic to help build a city that shall not fall to treachery again
.

One reward for every soul is the knowledge that this city exists at all. For now, you shall be the only souls on this plane who can find your way here to the City of Hope. This city shall be a dream of unity to draw people together. Those who truly embrace the brotherhood in Oacenth’s Vow may
be brought here or may find their own ways. The city shall accept only those worthy of her, and those with malice in their hearts shall not find their way here. For your courage and your aid, homes are being built here for every participant throughout the city, where you may better get to know our brethren in years to come. Now attend us with your hopes and dreams and magic
.

As the sending ended, every golden item borne by those of the Second, Third, and Fourth Circles dissolved into golden fireflies and buzzed around their former wielders. Magic filled every breath, every step, every moment of the waning day into the night. The Highfire Crown animated the pyre and above it, the once-sharn grand mages concluded their ritual. The grand mages of two realms guided the magic and drew on the emotional and magical support of everyone within the working.

Tsarra’s body stood immobile, still cloaked in the illusion of Khelben’s form, even though his essence resided with Ualair. The ancient grand mage maintained a stream of energy between his
selu’kiira
and Tsarra’s
kiira’n’vaelhar
. She could feel the magic, even if she was still blocked from hearing the rituals or truly participating. What she was free to do was to cast about with magical senses everywhere the ritual touched. Tsarra used the enhanced senses of her tressym and the sharn, and they could find no corruption or darker magic that had tainted the land for so many millennia.

Tsarra touched the lingering connections of the first ritual working, and she flitted from one participant’s eyes to the next, seeing the effects of the third ritual from all angles. The loam, rock, and scrub wood of the High Moor folded and twisted itself into new forms. Magic permeated everything, and those who had been sharn worked to build their city as a unified vision in the craftsmanship of elf, dwarf, gnome, centaur, and human equally. All of them wielded magic and brought their wills to bear on the landscape.

While much of the building material came from the Moor itself, Tsarra watched some sharn shed their oily black skins as they returned to their original forms, the nude Art-workers weaving their former skins into their new city. Thus, much of the architecture took on a variety of darkened hues, though it lacked any malevolence in its demeanor despite that.

The first to emerge complete and intact were the streets and outer walls, very dwarflike and orderly with clean lines and heavy block constructions. These would last untold generations, and they laid out the city in the shape of a circular wheel. The central court plaza surrounded the Counciltor, atop which the pyre would eternally burn. From that point, nine major trade roads split the city like spokes, each directly aligned with the nine sentinel towers twenty-five miles distant in each direction. Five broad roads provided a circumference for the city just inside the walls and each equidistant from the others down to the smallest of the ring roads that encircled the Court Plaza. The streets and defensive walls kept the black-as-pitch hue of the sharn, and Tsarra knew that any malefactors on those streets would face the three-mawed avengers that could form from any wall or street.

The full moon shone brightly over Rhymanthiin as it grew in the night. More than ninety minds and souls lent their energy to the high magic, while many hundreds more labored directly and under the mystical direction of their own ruling grand mages. Tsarra stared in amazement as buildings of various styles and shapes and sizes grew along the skeleton of the major and minor roadways. She laughed as perfect duplicates of the Eightower, Blackstaff Tower, and the Dragontower rose from the loam in various places throughout the circled city. The magic continued into the night until Highmoon and the end of the Feast of the Moon.

To those attuned to it, the City of Hope was a marvel.

Tsarra reined in her senses as she felt the ritual wane. She returned to her body at the center of the pyre, more than fifty feet above the ground and atop the Counciltor of Rhymanthiin. As she returned, she saw the only participants still attending the high magic ritual—Elminster, Alvaerele, Alustriel, Laeral, and the three grand mages of Rhymanthiin stood in a circle around the silver and green flames. Tsarra willed herself back into her body, and the pain and sorrow hit her all over again. She couldn’t feel Khelben’s presence in her gem at all. She barely felt the touch of Ualair on her shoulders, as he seemed almost entirely mystic flame, rather than flesh.