Troy Denning: The Sorcerer

"Evereska is not ours to give," she said.

The noncommittal answer caused a dark anger to rise in Galaeron, and he had to fight it down by closing his eyes and reminding himself of all that Alusair had done on his behalf.

"Nor is it yours to defend," the phaerimm answered through Mourngrym. "All we are suggesting is that you concern yourselves with the Shadovar and leave Evereska to our brothers."

"Then you are not from Anauroch?" Alusair asked. She was stalling, trying to buy time to consider all the ramifications of the phaerimm's proposal. "You are here on behalf of the Myth Drannor phaerimm?"

"The Shadovar have made this the fight of all phaerimm," Mourngrym's voice replied. "Much as they have made it the fight of all the human realms."

"And what do we receive in return?" asked Ambassador Hovanay. The selfish light in his eye made clear that he was free of the phaerimm's influence. That was not, at least for Evereska, necessarily a good thing. "How will you repay us for our help?"

The phaerimm pushed its many-fanged mouth over the shoulders of the Dalesmen and said, "A better question would be what will you receive for our help."

Hovanay waited expectantly, and the phaerimm swung its mouth in Alusair's direction.

"Your enemy is our enemy," the phaerimm said. "Should your alliance strike a bargain with us, it would be in our interest to stop the melting of the High Ice. Your realms would be able to rebuild their armies and feed their people. They would be strong again."

Though every sinew in Galaeron was screaming for him to leap to his feet and denounce the phaerimm as a fraud and a liar, he knew he would win nothing by such a display. The humans would believe-rightly enough-that he was only trying to protect Evereska's interests, that he would claim such a thing whether the phaerimm could be trusted or not Instead, he had to speak reasonably and make the humans see the pitfalls for themselves, make them realize that by selling out the elves, they would be selling themselves out as well.

"You are promising a lot," Galaeron said, not quite able to keep the quaver out of his voice, "but I've seen the Shadovar magic, and it is not defeated easily. If you can do what you promise, why do you need the humans at all? Why are your cousins still trapped inside the shadowshell?"

Instead of answering Galaeron, the phaerimm had Mourngrym turn to address Korian Hovanay again.

"We would pledge to leave your caravans in peace, even to protect them when it is in our power."

This brought a grin to the Sembian's lips, if to no one else's.

Piergeiron Paladinson said, "You have not spoken to Galaeron's point. If the phaerimm can do what you claim, why does the shadowshell still stand?"

"Because, as you yourselves learned at Tilverton, the Shadovar are formidable enemies," the phaerimm said. "We who are free are too few to prevail, and those who are trapped in the Shaeradim are weak and starving. When the shadowshell falls, that will change."

"So you say," Piergeiron said.

"So we will prove," the phaerimm replied. "You are familiar with the peak Untriwin, in the east of the High Ice?"

"Where the tomb tappers rise," said Borg Ohlmak, the woolly-headed chieftain sent by the barbarians of the Ride. "We know the place well."

Mourngrym's head nodded to Borg. There are three shadow blankets at the base of the mount. When the shell falls, we will destroy all three as proof of our capabilities."

"And still we will not be able to come to terms," Alusair said. "Evereska is not ours to bargain away. Wouldn't some other place serve you as well? The Goblin Marches, for instance, are-"

"Worthless wastelands," the phaerimm said. "It must be Evereska. We have no interest in your castoff barrens."

"Then perhaps the Tun Valley," Alusair suggested. "The lands there are as fertile as any in Cormyr, and I'm certain the alliance would be willing to provide any assistance required to take Darkhold."

"Evereska."

Alusair frowned, clearly trying to think of some other place the phaerimm might desire. She was, Galaeron knew, trying to reach an unreachable compromise. The phaerimm wanted Evereska for the same reason they lived in Myth Drannor: its mythal. They needed magic the way other races needed air, and the mythals that surrounded both cities were living mantles of woven magic. Asking a phaerimm to choose another place to live was like asking a fish to make his home someplace other than in the water.

"Evereska is not ours to grant," Alusair continued, still trying. "Name another place."

"He's not going to name another place," Galaeron interjected, though he did not say why. The existence of the mythal was an elven secret, and he no longer felt any trust for the humans gathered there, not even Alusair. "When will you learn? You can't treat with phaerimm-only surrender to them like cowards, or stand and fight them like warriors."

Alusair’s head snapped around to glare at him, her eyes furious and black.

"And when will you learn, elf, that it is not wise to call someone a coward when it is her people's blood that must be shed to save that of yours?"

Allowing no opportunity for a reply, Alusair glanced at the guards behind Galaeron's chair and said, "I have heard enough from him."

One Purple Dragon pinned Galaeron's arms to his chair, and the other covered his mouth with a waist sash. A sinister voice whispered to Galaeron that Alusair had betrayed him and would seal the bargain by turning him over to the phaerimm, but he was wise enough not to struggle. The Steel Regent was famous for her fiery temper, and though some part of him knew she would never do as his shadow's voice suggested, he did not think she would hesitate to have him thrown in a very deep, dark dungeon.

Alusair nodded her approval, then turned back to the phaerimm and said, "You were about to name a place it is in the alliance's power to grant."

"Evereska," Mourngrym's mouth said again. "There is no other place. The elf is right about that much."

Alusair sank back in exasperation.

Through its mind-slave, the phaerimm said, "You have until the third blanket vanishes."

The creature drifted out from behind its shield of Dalesmen, and ignoring the ring of guards around it, panicked Borg Ohlmak and Nasher Alagondar by floating to their end of the table.

"We expect your assent by then."

Alusair’s eyes hardened. "And if we do not give it?"

The phaerimm braced two of its arms on the table.

You will.

Alusair sat bolt upright and started to order the guards forward, but the phaerimm had already vanished.

Mourngrym and his fellow Dalesmen cried out in bewildered voices, then stumbled toward the nearest chairs, their hands trembling and their mouths hanging agape. The

Purple Dragons looked to Caladnei for orders while the royal magician busied herself casting detection magic. The envoys sat in their chairs looking alternately relieved and uncertain as they considered the wisdom of betraying Evereska.

After a moment, Alusair brought order back to the chamber by turning to her royal magician.

"Can you tell me how that spy came to be in here?" It was a deft maneuver, turning the envoys' thoughts from the phaerimm's proposal to the threat it had displayed in its arrogant use of its power. "It could have killed us all!"

Caladnei paled and shook her head.

The chamber is warded against invisibility, teleportation, scrying-"

"Obviously, it was not," Alusair interrupted. Still determined to keep the envoys' thoughts on the how of the phaerimm's presence rather than the' why-no doubt buying time to gather her own thoughts on the matter-she looked to Galaeron. "Perhaps Sir Nihmedu can explain how it was done?"

When the guard lowered the sash covering Galaeron's mouth, he glanced around the council table and saw-or at least his shadow saw-guilty expressions on every face.