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  The Wizardwar

  ( Counselors and Kings Trilogy - 3 )

  Элейн Каннингем

  Defeat breeds anger. Hatred breeds revenge.

  Once again, the counselors of Halruaa have beaten back an attack by the wizard Akhlaur. Once more, the kingdom has been saved from its enemies.

  But victory comes at a terrible price. The aged king is weakened, his powers diminished. His chief counselor Matteo is torn between his duty and his heart. Tzigone, the hero of the battle of Akhlaur's Swamp, has been hurled into a dark world from which she may never escape. And at the edge of time, Akhlaur and his ally, the Magehound, plot their final revenge.

  Elaine Cunningham

  The Wizardwar

  Counselors and Kings Trilogy

  Book 3

  Entered

  into The King's Lorebook,

  on this the 22nd day of the Redtide Moon,

  in the 73rd year of Zalathorm's Reign.

  If cattle were bards, butchers would be villains. This jordaini proverb reminds us that every tale is shaped by the teller. I am Matteo, King Zalathorm's newly appointed counselor, a jordain sworn to the service of truth, and Halruaa, and the wizardlords who rule.

  Once, not long ago, I would have said these three masters speak with one voice. Now a hundred voices call my name, all of them compelling, many of them contradictory. Be that as it may. This is no time for introspection or philosophy-too many tasks lie before me. I will present my tale in straightforward fashion.

  Halruaa's history begins in Netheril, an ancient northern realm famous for extravagant magic. Before Netheril's glory become her downfall, a group of wizards left their homeland and traveled far south, settling in a beautiful haven protected by mountains and sea. In this, our Halruaa, we have avoided the excesses of lost Netheril through elaborate laws and protocols, and through a series of safeguards. The jordaini, counselors to the wizard-lords, provide one of these safeguards.

  We are an order of warrior sages, strong of mind and body, vessels destined to remain forever empty of Mystra's Art. The Lady of Magic has granted us no arcane talent whatsoever but rather has imbued us with a strong resistance to magic. Jordaini are identified before birth, taken from our families, and raised to know the art of warfare and the lore of our land. Lacking magic, we can advise our wizard patrons but can never coerce them. Nor can any wizard compel us. The secrets entrusted to us cannot be stolen or altered through magical means.

  Additional laws and customs ensure the jordaini's faithful service. Ambition cannot tempt us, for we possess neither land nor title. We are forbidden indulgences that cloud the mind and discouraged from forming personal ties that might bias our judgment. Among the most powerful guardians of jordaini purity are the magehounds, wizards who serve as Inquisitors in the church of Azuth, Lord of Wizards.

  Magehounds are granted spells and magical items powerful enough to pierce even a jordain's resistance. If a magehound declares a jordain unfit to serve, that jordain's service is over. If a magehound claims that a jordain is tainted by magic, this pronouncement is a sentence of death. Harsh indeed, but the trust between wizard and counselor demands absolute certainty.

  Last spring a magehound, an elf woman known as Kiva, visited the Jordaini College. She passed judgment on Andris, the most promising student in recent memory. His "death" was carried out on the spot. Kiva, though, proved false. She spirited Andris away and used her position to secretly gather an army of magic-resistant warriors. She led them into the Swamp of Akhlaur, so named for the infamous necromancer who disappeared there two centuries past. Here lurked the laraken, a monster that fed upon magic. In my opinion, Kiva's intention was not to destroy the laraken but to unleash it upon the land. Her purpose, insofar as I can ascertain, was to wreak havoc upon Halruaa's wizards.

  Kiva might have succeeded but for a young woman named Tzigone, a street waif untrained in magical arts. Tzigone possessed a powerful raw talent for evocation. Her voice was the lure intended to draw the laraken away from its magical sustenance: a bubbling spring originating in a leak from the Elemental Plane of Water. Where Tzigone is concerned, however, things seldom go according to expectations!

  Tzigone called the laraken and held it in her sway while we fighters attacked. We might have destroyed the monster, but it escaped through the gate leading into the Plane of Water just before Kiva moved this gate to some unknown place. This effort was greater than Kiva's strength, and by battle's end she clung to life by the thinnest of threads. I myself delivered her to the fastness of Azuth's temple, hoping the priests might revive her and learn the gate's secret location.

  Kiva revived indeed. She escaped and gathered allies for a renewed attack upon Halruaa. She and the elves of the Mhair Jungle raided the Lady's Mirror, an Azuthan shrine and a treasury of rare spellbooks and artifacts. Other magical treasures were collected for her by a band of Crinti raiders-the "shadow amazons" of Dambrath, female warriors descended from human barbarians and drow elves.

  Although it pains me to write this, Kiva's allies also included Andris, who learned of his distant elven heritage shortly after the battle of Akhlaur's Swamp. We jordaini know no family, and Andris was overwhelmed by the prospect of kinship. This, perhaps, led him to see honor in Kiva's actions where nothing of the sort existed.

  Kiva must have had contact with wizards in neighboring lands, for her plans moved in concert with theirs. Though I hesitate to suggest Halruaan wizards were also in collusion with her, the actions of Dhamari Exchelsor, a wizard who befriended Tzigone, undoubtedly added to the chaos. (Let it be noted that Azuth's Inquisitors have examined Dhamari and have found him not guilty of conspiracy with Kiva.)

  While these diverse events were unfolding, I searched for Kiva, fearing that the elf woman might open the gate and unleash the laraken. Andris, who awaits trial for treason, insists that Kiva's purpose was to destroy the ancient necromancer Akhlaur. She followed him into the Plane of Water expecting to prevail but not to return.

  So Andris swears. I wish I could believe him. To Andris, Kiva was a hero who sacrificed her life to destroy every vestige of Akhlaur's dark reign. I have seen Kiva at work, and I do not believe anything good can be born of such hatred, such evil.

  Whatever the truth of the matter, the former magehound was defeated. Once again, Tzigone thwarted Kiva's designs. Two doors were closed by the magic Tzigone triggered: the gate to the Plane of Water and a veil between our world and the Unseelie Court. As I write, Tzigone is trapped in that dark and unknowable realm. May Lady Mystra grant Tzigone grace and strength to survive until a way can be found to free her!

  Despite our victories and our sacrifices, the turmoil Kiva set in motion was not easily quelled. The Crinti attacked in force from the north, and the fighters who engaged them were further harried by the Unseelie folk. An army of clockwork warriors was unleashed upon the royal city of Halarahh. Any one of these foes might have easily been put down, but our strength was diminished by Kiva's earlier ploys. Divisions of militia were diverted to the western borders to guard against further incursions of hostile elves. As word of the laraken's defeat spread, many doughty wizards and adventurers disappeared into Akhlaur's swamp to search for treasure the necromancer reputedly left behind.

  Even the season conspired to aid Kiva, for in the early summer, before the coming of the monsoons, piracy reaches its height Halruaa's ships set sail to protect seagoing commerce and coastal towns, taking many of our best fighters. Halruaa's might is considerable, but it was thinly spread and sorely tested.

  Now came the truly stunning blow. An invasion force from Mulhorand passed over the eastern mountains into Halruaa itself-undetected by Halruaan magic.

>   For the first time in nearly a century, King Zalathorm, the greatest diviner in the land, failed to foresee a coming threat. I cannot express how profound and devastating a blow this dealt to the Halruaan mind. Perhaps this was what Kiva had intended all along.

  If this notion strains credulity, consider this: One of Kiva's allies, the creator of the devastating clockwork army, was Queen Beatrix, Zalathorm's deeply beloved wife.

  I have nothing but admiration for my king, but in truth I must name Beatrix as Zalathorm's greatest weakness. Whatever she once might have been, she is no longer Halruaa's queen. Scarred within and without by terrible suffering, she has been steadily withdrawing from the world, seeking companionship only from the clockwork creatures whose creation she oversees.

  Early last moon cycle, one of Beatrix's warrior constructs went amok. I fought and destroyed it but not before one worker was killed and several more were injured. In the time it took me to report this to the king, the clockwork monsters magically disappeared. The family of the slain worker was offered resurrection, the wounded given healing and redress. The matter might have been dropped, had not Tzigone intervened once again.

  Tzigone can mimic voices with uncanny clarity and hold an audience in her hand with skill a bard might envy. Lately she left behind her life as a street performer to play the role of apprentice wizard, but her unsettled life has honed other, more questionable skills. Her fingers are light and nimble. She conjures entertaining half-truths as easily as a behir spits lightning. She walks like a shadow, climbs like a lizard, and smirks at the most formidable locks. Even the palace wards and safeguards could not deny her.

  Tzigone slipped into Beatrix's workroom and with a magic mouth statue she recorded a most disturbing interview between the queen and Kiva. The elf woman came to Beatrix, commended her for her efforts, and took the metal monsters in preparation for the coming battle.

  When Tzigone brought the statue to me, duty compelled me to inform Zalathorm of his wife's treachery. The queen awaits trial. This tragedy destroyed what might otherwise have been regarded as one of Halruaa's greatest triumphs.

  Destroyed? Yes, I fear so. The invaders were repelled, and the floodgate was closed both in fact and metaphor. But the queen stands accused of treason. Although no one dares speak the words, everyone knows King Zalathorm is likewise on trial.

  If the king knew of his queen's perfidy, he is as guilty as she. How could the most powerful diviner in all of Halruaa not see what was happening in his very palace? On the other hand, what if he truly could not? Is his power gone? Is this why he knew nothing of the invasion until Mulhorandi forces stood upon Halruaan soil?

  All of Halruaa whispers these questions. If the cycle of history turns true, soon powerful and ambitious wizards will do more than whisper. No one has challenged Zalathorm's crown for nearly three generations, and the land has been at peace. In past times, though, Halruaa has known terrible wars of ambition, wars in which wizard fought wizard with spells of astonishing art and devastating power.

  This brings my tale full circle and to another safeguard we jordaini provide. We are the keepers of the lore, and we spend the first twenty years of our lives committing Halruaan history to memory. Stories of wizardwars are the most fearsome we know. I pray daily to Lady Mystra that we Halruaans have learned from these oft-told tales and grown wise enough to avoid war.

  Yet I cannot ignore this disturbing truth: if these prayers are granted, then we will be the first truly wise men in history.

  Prelude

  In a dark moment of Halruaa's past, some two hundred years ago, a black tower stood near the edge of an ancient swamp.

  Cages lined the walls of the great hall, a vast circular chamber encompassing the entire ground floor of the tower, which in turn was far bigger than its black marble exterior suggested. In these cages a bewildering variety of prisoners paced in frustration or slumped despairingly against the bars. Their mingled cries filled the tower, reverberating like echoes rising from the Abysmal pits. Red-robed apprentices calmly went about their business, either oblivious or uncaring.

  In one cage huddled a small, bedraggled female, clad in a brief shift that did little to hide scars left by repeated magical experiments. She stared fixedly past the dwarf-forged bars, her eyes glazed with the knowledge of certain death.

  Once known as Akivaria, a proud elf maid of the Crimson Tree clan, now she was simply Kiva, the necromancer's favorite captive and toy. Her heart had died the day the necromancer slaughtered her clan, but an unexpectedly deep reserve of stubbornness and cunning sustained her life. She had even survived the laraken's birth, a feat that surprised both her and her human tormenter. But today, at long last, it would end.

  Kiva ventured a glance at the large, oval glass set into the bars of her cage, a window into a world of water and magic. Behind it raged a fearsome monster, a demon lured to the Plane of Water from the primordial depths of the Abyss. Twice the height of a man and as heavily muscled as a dwarf, it was purest evil encased in powerful flesh. Kiva knew the demon well-the wizard had captured and tormented it before-and memories of past encounters with the fiend filled her with terror and loathing.

  The demon's massive fists pounded soundlessly on the portal. Like a water-bound Medusa, it was crowned with eels, which writhed furiously about a hideous, asymmetrical face. Their tiny fangs gnashed and snapped in counterpoint to the demon's silent screams. The necromancer commonly kept the demon imprisoned in magical limbo until the point of frenzy. Kiva never knew when the demon might erupt into her cage. This waiting was one of the wizard's crueler torments.

  Kiva reminded herself of the experiment planned for that very night, one she could never survive, but even the promise of death brought little comfort. The joys of an elven afterlife were as far beyond her reach as her dreams of putting a knife in the necromancer's heart!

  She craned her head, looking for the necromancer's favorite toy-a crimson gem that imprisoned the captured spirits of her clan. To Akhlaur, an elf's lifeforce was a source of energy, a thing no more highly regarded than the sticks of deadwood a kitchen wench might use to stoke a cook fire. For one of Akhlaur's elves, death offered nothing more than a new kind of enslavement.

  The gem was not in its usual place. That meant that Akhlaur and his laraken were out hunting again.

  A long, strident creak ripped through the cacophony. Kiva sat up, suddenly alert, and her resilient spirit grew bright with hope. The stone sentinels had awakened at last!

  The necromancer's tower was guarded by undead armies, warded about with terrible traps and protected from wizardly incursion by the magic-draining hunger of the laraken. Never before had anyone fought through these defenses and triggered the twin gargoyles protecting the tower door.

  Kiva struggled to her feet and pushed aside the mat of hair that once had been a lustrous jade. She clung to the bars and strained her ears for the sounds of battle. A distant clamor grew steadily louder until it settled around the stone warehouses imprisoning most of the necromancer's captives. The elf maid's heart leaped-many of her people languished in those prisons!

  She heard the warehouses' stout oaken doors explode like lightning-struck trees. A chorus of elven song surged, then faded as freed prisoners fled into the surrounding forest. Joyous tears spilled from Kiva's eyes, though she herself did not hold much hope of rescue.

  The tower's doors flew open and crashed into the wall. Two enormous gargoyles, similar in appearance to the water demon, stalked into the room. They took up ambush positions on either side of the open door.

  After a moment of stunned disbelief, the apprentices quickly armed themselves with wands or fireball spells. One young man conjured a crimson lightning bolt and held it aloft like a ready javelin. Even the tower itself prepared for invasion. Bright lines of fire raced through the cracks between the marble ties, gathering power that would erupt in geysers of random, killing flame. Stone carvings stirred to life. Winged serpents peeled away from the ceiling's bas-relief and spira
led heavily downward. Black marble skeletons wrenched free of the grimly sculpted tangles that passed for art.

  A hush fell over the tower as the captives awaited the coming battle with a mixture of dread and hope.

  Up, and quickly!

  The silent command rang in Kiva's mind like an elven battle cry. Perplexed expressions on the faces of the other captives suggested the message had come to all. There was powerful magic in the silent voice, magic untouched by the necromancer's malevolent amusement. That was enough for Kiva.

  Hope lent her strength. She leaped and seized a crossbar, swung her feet up and hooked them over the bar, then pulled herself up and reached for the next handhold. Around the room other captives scrambled upward as best they could.

  An angry gray cloud erupted in the midst of the tower with a roar like a captive dragon. It exploded into a torrent of rain. The force of the downpour threatened to tear Kiva from her perch, but she climbed doggedly, and a small, unfamiliar curve lifted the corners of her mouth as she perceived the attacker's strategy.

  Steam rose from the floor with a searing hiss as the arcane waters met the necromancer's lurking flames. The apprentices stumbled back, screaming, throwing aside their magical weapons as they tried to shield their faces from the rising, scalding mist.

  Instantly the cloud changed, compressing into an enormous, ice-blue blanket. It swept over Kiva like a ghostly embrace, then drove down into the scalding mist. Steam changed to delicate webs of ice crystals, which in turn crunched down into a thick, solid sheet of ice.

  Stone and marble guardians froze, their feet encased in ice, the magic that animated them gone. One winged snake had not yet landed. Its wings locked in place as the ice-cloud passed over it, and it plunged down, exploding on impact and sending shards of black marble skittering across the frozen floor.