Ed Greenwood - The Sword Never Sleeps

It all began with the gruesome murder of Ondel the Archwizard, whose various pieces were found on many stoops, porches, and thresholds up and down Shadowdale.

Or perhaps it began with the finding of the legendary, long-hidden hoard of Sundraer the She-dragon.

Or then again, mayhap it started the night Indarr Andemar's barn exploded in stabbing lightnings and balls of green flame that soared up to try to touch the stars.

Or the morning the best woodcarver in Shadowdale, Craunor Askelo, discovered his wife was not his wife and that for years he'd been sleeping with something that had scales and claws when it wanted to.

Or a handful of days after Vangerdahast, the Royal Magician of Cormyr, had stood inside a dank stone castle sally chamber, seen the Knights of Myth Drannor provided with new mounts, armor, weapons, and much spending-coin by his command, gestured in the direction of the rising portcullis, and given them a firm order of his own: "Tarry within Cormyr no longer!"

Days that had been spent riding and discovering just how hard new saddles can be-and, despite what they looked like on maps, how astonishingly large the wilderlands of northeastern Cormyr were.

Not for the first time, Semoor rolled his eyes and asked, "Gods, will these trees never end? "

"Picture each of them as a willing wench, arms and lips opening to welcome you," Islif told him, her saddle creaking under her as she turned to smile. "And the ride will seem less endless."

Semoor closed his eyes, growled appreciatively a time or two, then opened them again to favor her with a sour look. He shook his head. "My aching shanks remind me that this is not the sort of ride I'd prefer to be endless."

"You fail to surprise me," Jhessail said in acid-laced tones of mock disapproval, running fingers through her red hair to rid it of some of the clinging road dust. A small cloud obligingly swirled away in her wake, causing Doust-who was riding there-to wince even more than she did.

Islif shrugged. Dirt had been their constant companion growing up in Espar-dust when dry, and mud when wet. Grime bothered her not at all. Little crawling insects, now, itching in intimate places

Under the hooves of their patient mounts, the Moonsea Ride ran tirelessly on northeast, rising and then falling away again over gentle hill after gentle hill. Around it, as they rode, steadings grew fewer and fewer, and the scrub of abandoned fields and forests ravaged by woodcutters gave way to darker, deeper woods. Cormyr this might still be on maps, but much of it seemed unbroken wilderland, the road spawning small campsites at every trickling stream, but the trees otherwise standing dark and unbroken.

Pennae and Florin rode at the head of their band of six, peering watchfully into the forest shadows on either side. Florin's searching gazes were almost hungry.

Yet Vangerdahast's order had been both curt and clear. "Tarry within Cormyr no longer!" The Royal Magician wanted them gone out of the realm before anything else befell them and hurled trouble across Cormyr-or as Pennae had put it, "Gave us a chance to save the Forest Kingdom from itself, while nobles aad war wizards dither, again."

That sentiment had earned her one of the wizard's coldest, darkest looks and a slowly rising, menacingly silent finger pointing at the doorway beneath the risen portcullis-not to mention Purple Dragon patrols following them along the road, so far back as to be just clearly visible, for the first few days.

"Subtle, isn't he?" Semoor had asked everyone then. Several aching days in the saddle later, he stirred himself to ask, "So, are we fated to spend the rest of our lives riding out of fair Cormyr and not making it?"

"Avoid all inns," Doust said darkly, in the same grand portentous tones favored by priests of Tempus and of Torm, who often visited Espar.

Islif gave that feeble jest the sour smile it deserved, then turned arid asked Semoor, "If I answer you, will you say nothing more about our journeying and progress until the morrow?"

The priest of Lathander winced. "Well," he said carefully, "I'll certainly try."

Pennae turned in her saddle to fling a single word back at him: "Harder."

That smoothly twisting motion made the arrow that sped suddenly out of the trees burn past her cheek without striking anyone.

The second arrow, however, hissed to catch her squarely in the ribs. Sinking in deep, it smashed her, sobbing, right out of her saddle.

Wizard of War Lorbryn Deltalon sat alone in the small, windowless II stone room, staring silently at the carefully written notes spread out on the desk before him. He was no longer seeing what he'd penned these last few months. He was staring past his neat jottings and beholding memories.

Recent memories. A succession of pain-wracked, sweating faces belonging to a lot of tormented nobles. Every one of them staring back at him in wild, mouth-quivering terror.

All too often, the sharp-eyed, faintly smiling visage of the Royal Magician of Cormyr loomed up amongst them. Looking back at him mockingly, Vangerdahast's unreadable gaze seemed a silent challenge. No frightened nobleman, he.

Deltalon sighed and shook his head, seeking to banish the piercing stare of the great mage he served. Yet the weight of Vangerdahast's menacing regard refused to fade.

The veteran war wizard sighed again, passed a hand over his eyes, and tried to stare at the all-too-familiar curves and swashes of his writing. He did a lot of silent staring these days.

Ever since Vangey had set him this task. The slow and distasteful work of spell-slaying all the mindworms Narantha Crownsilver had put into the minds of nobles. Hopefully without killing said nobles or leaving them more furious foes of the war wizards than they were already.

Work that, time and again, left him sitting alone, brooding.

He had now only two nobles left to cleanse: Malasko Erdusking and Ardoon Creth. Young, handsome fools both, who would be improved by a little healthy fear.

Yet Deltalon had something else, now, too: grave misgivings about the whole matter.

At first, Vangerdahast had commanded several senior war wizards to visit the nobles the ill-fated Lady Narantha had infected and to use magic to slay the mindworms. When some nobles had been left witless or damaged in their wits and bitterly aware of it and one young lord had died along with the mindworm riding him, the Royal Magician had ordered the work to cease.

Yet that hadn't meant dealing with the mindworms was abandoned or unfinished. Rather, Vangerdahast himself had without warning taken over the task of "fixing nobles," abruptly and imperiously whisking himself to mansions and country castles all over the realm.

Vangey's visitations had gone on for most of a month before he'd just as abruptly summoned Lorbryn Deltalon and ordered him to use "all slow, deft care possible" to kill the mindworms still in the heads of a handful of remaining nobles.

Lorbryn Deltalon was a careful, loyal Wizard of War, and several other things besides, but he had never been a fool.

Vangerdahast, he strongly suspected, hadn't killed a single worm. Instead, the Royal Magician had altered their spell-bindings to make them obey him rather than the fell and vanished wizard who'd compelled Narantha to spread the little horrors. And, no doubt, he had commanded them not to gnaw away any more of the brains in which they dwelt.