Ed Greenwood - Death of the Dragon

“I… I b-beg your forgiveness, Princess,” stammered Korvarr. “We thought you called.”

“I did.”

Filfaeril snatched the bed gown off the floor and thrust it at Tanalasta.

“Find Alaphondar and tell him to meet me in the library,” Tanalasta said, draping the bed gown more or less over her breasts. “And send me something to wear.”

“As you command, Princess.”

Korvarr did his best to escape the room without looking at Tanalasta.

As the door shut, Filfaeril turned to her daughter and said, “My, you have changed.”

Tanalasta smiled and draped her arm over her mother’s shoulder. “And you have not seen half of it-which reminds me, I have only heard half the news. What of Father?”

“And Dauneth, perhaps?”

Tanalasta rolled her eyes. “If you must, but I warn you, I have less reason than ever to interest myself in the good warden.”

“What a pity. You’d make such a handsome couple.” Though the pout Filfaeril feigned was playful, there was a serious element to it. The queen and king had yet to hear of Tanalasta’s marriage to Rowen Cormaeril-or her pregnancy. Filfaeril raised her hands as though to forestall her daughter’s ire. “I’m not goading-“

“Only ‘handling,’ perhaps?”

“Perhaps.” Filfaeril smiled briefly, then grew more serious. “The last I heard, your father and Alusair-“

“Alusair?” Tanalasta gasped. “Then she is safe?”

“Yes,” Filfaeril said. “Your father came across her in the Stonelands. As I was saying, they were to meet Dauneth and his army in Gnoll Pass-“

“Was Alusair alone?” Tanalasta demanded. After Vangerdahast’s disappearance at the battle of the Farsea Marsh, Rowen Cormaeril had somehow come into possession of the royal magician’s horse and set off to warn King Azoun about the ghazneths. Unfortunately, Tanalasta and Alusair had come across his trail a few days later, heading north into the Stonelands for some reason they could not understand. Alusair had set out alone to track Rowen down, and that had been the last Tanalasta heard of either one. “Did she find Vangerdahast’s horse?”

“As a matter of fact, Alusair did send a message for you-how silly of me to forget.” The queen’s sly smile made clear that she had not forgotten. “She said to tell you ‘the king has Cadimus, but your favorite scout is still on the prowl.’”

Tanalasta retreated to the bed and sank down, suddenly feeling weary and weak.

The queen came and pulled the cover up around her shoulders. “Tanalasta, I’m sorry,” she said. “I had no idea this would upset you.”

“It shouldn’t, I suppose,” Tanalasta replied. “The mountains have grown so dangerous, and I was hoping for something a little more… certain.”

Filfaeril leaned down and embraced her daughter. “I know. If I could even count the times I have wondered after your father’s safety… and often as not he was off with the daughter of some minor noble.”

Tanalasta shook her head. “Rowen wouldn’t do that-even if there were noble daughters in the Stonelands.”

“Rowen?” Filfaeril stood up again and frowned. “The only scout named Rowen I know is Rowen Cormaeril.”

Tanalasta nodded, then patted the bed beside her. “You’d better sit down, Mother. I have something to tell you.”

“They’ll draw off now,” Alusair said with some satisfaction, “and wait for the dark. Just make sure we’ve gathered brush enough for a good, big ring of fires.”

The royal army stood wearily leaning on well-used swords, atop three hilltops somewhere in the northern marches of the realm. They watched orcs beyond counting growl and hiss and snarl their way down the hillsides, leaving their dead heaped in spilled gore behind them.

The fray had been long and bloody, the tuskers rightly not believing that such a paltry few humans could stand their ground-even high ground-against charge after charge of tested and eager warrior orcs. The slaughter had been frightful, awing even gray-haired veterans among the Purple Dragons. If the orcs had been able to muster just a little more boldness, they might have forced their way past tired human sword arms and cleared the hilltops of human life, reaping a king and a princess among their kills.

The ghazneth had exhorted them with harsh Orcish cries and barked orders, shaking its iron cage in its eager fury, but to no avail. The attacking orcs, so far as Alusair’s experienced eye could tell, had mounted no special effort to reach the imprisoned creature.

In the eerie silence that had fallen on the heels of the retreating orcs, the Steel Princess and her father watched the first cautious forays of dragoneers and noble blades move out to gather brush, then turned to face each other.

“Time to learn what we can of the fate of Vangerdahast,” Azoun muttered, taking care to turn his shoulder between his lips and the watching ghazneth.

“Do you still have the tracing dust Vangey gave you to find wayward, rebellious princesses?” Alusair asked, arching an eyebrow.

Azoun nodded and said, “I’d not forgotten it. I yet retain the firefending magic he laid upon me, too.”

Alusair’s eyes fell to the wands hanging from her father’s belt, and settled on a certain one marked with a red rune. “Bait?” she asked simply, and the king nodded again.

“Let’s be about it,” he said tersely, and beckoned a lancelord to his side, to deliver the orders for everyone to stand back-a good twenty paces back-from the cage.

The ghazneth laughed harshly as the Cormyreans backed warily away, not sheathing their blades or taking their eyes off it for long. The deep, rumbling laughter grew as the two Obarskyrs strode forward to approach it.

“Made bold by your iron bars, paltry excuse for a king?”

“Well met, Luthax,” Azoun replied evenly. “Found your way out yet?”

The ghazneth who had once been the second most powerful-and in a brief, dark moment, perhaps the most powerful-war wizard in Cormyr hissed and rattled long talons along the bars. He could draw those talons right back into his fingers, Alusair noted, taking care to keep just out of reach of those corded black arms.

“Seeking to supplant the rightful royal magician of today?” the king continued, almost playfully.

Luthax threw back his bald head and laughed, the broken fringe of beard around his jaw giving him a truly bestial appearance. “Is that fool’s fate your most pressing concern? O blind King, you’ve far worse troubles to worry about right now. There’s the survival of your throne and kingdom, for instance.”

The ghazneth leered at Alusair through the bars, and asked, “How much for this she-wolf, Azoun? I have need of a spirited apprentice-or a breeding wench for the steed I plan to birth wrapped in truly powerful spells. Care to try your best mages against me?”

“Not particularly,” Azoun said, strolling around the cage with a humorless half-smile flickering at the edges of his mouth. “My duty is to preserve the lives and well being of my subjects as much as I can-even subjects such as you-not throw them away in pointless spell hurlings.”

“I’m not your subject!” Luthax spat. “Go find Vangerdahast, if it’s the fawning kisses of tame, groveling wizards you want.”

“And just where would I find him?”

“Oh, no,” Luthax taunted. “You must be used to crossing verbal swords with very dull-witted courtiers, Azoun. Think you to worm one word out of me that I don’t care to let fall? I’m Luthax, a mage the likes of whom you’ve never seen and can’t, brute-wits that you are, even hope to understand. Cormyr seems infested with ghazneths just now, doesn’t it? Enough of us-more than enough of us-to hold one feeble old Vangerdahast where neither you nor any other man will ever find him.”