The wizards of war had sunk beyond untrustworthiness; the current royals were weak; and the highest-ranking courtiers a more corrupt and venal band of pompous greed-heads than she would have thought tolerable, even to a weak king.
No, it was all up to her.
And with the blueflame ghosts hers, she could at last…
This one. This was the door.
Closed and locked, but that meant little to a death knight. Drawing her sword, she positioned herself just so, aiming her blade so it would plunge down the crack where door met frame, and swung it high.
Before bringing it down with all her might, straight and true, to slash through the forged locking mechanism in one great shriek of metal.
Then she gently pulled on the door ring, let the great door swing wide, and went in.
The room beyond was a mess, of course. The windows had broken long ago, and generations of pigeons and whir-wings had nested on the desk, shelves, and bed, winter snows and winds had scattered parchments across the floor and set about rotting them into the moldering ruin of carpet, and the closet was right over- there.
Its curtain fallen, its The door she’d just forced slammed shut behind her, and a doorbar thudded into place. Targrael whirled around with a snarl, sword up.
A woman was facing her, leaning indolently on a sword of her own. Someone she knew. The ghost of the Princess Alusair Nacacia Obarskyr. The Steel Princess. The Steel Regent.
“Well met,” Alusair said dryly. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
Targrael wasted no time in words. She sprang at her hated foe with a snarl, bright blade singing.
“You traitor and stealer of Obarskyr secrets,” Alusair added almost gently, flying up into the air to parry and draw Targrael out into the room.
The death knight charged, trying to pounce and hack the ghost down to the floor in a flurry of slashing swings.
Though the princess might be insubstantial as a wraith, she was solid enough to hold and swing the weight of a sword-even a sword made of her own ghostly self, sharpened momentarily to the strength and keen edge of warsteel. So she could be hurt.
Alusair laughed amid the clang and skirl of steel. “Is that your best, kitchen-cleaver-maid? How many beds did you have to warm to get made a Highknight?”
“I never!” Targrael shrieked, stung to speech at last. “You bitch! You evil, reckless-of-the-realm, rutting slut of a-”
Her blade crashed home, right through Alusair’s ghostly sword-and right through the ghostly breast beyond, pinning it to the floor.
She crowed in triumph, as Alusair arched and writhed in soundless agony beneath her.
“Ha ha! Not so insolent now, are you, failed regent! Disgrace to the realm! Overmatched fool of an incompetent warrior!”
Through her open-mouthed, gasping pain, Alusair spat out the words, “Fly, Fang.” And then she smiled.
As up through her, up from the moldering heap of rubble she’d been lying on, sprang a glowing blue dagger.
Point first, it sped through Targrael, up through her leathers into her breast and inwards, through ribs, slicing upward like icy fire.
“Meet the Fang of Baerovus,” Alusair whispered. “The blueflame treasure you sought… the only one we Obarskyrs have. I wish you joy of it, would-be tyrant!” She faded into darkness, a wisp that drifted slowly across the floor, toward the door.
Targrael lashed out sideways with her sword, seeking vainly to slice that whispering shadow as it flew this way and then that, wriggling snakelike out under the door.
But the Fang of Baerovus was caught in her throat and sliding higher…
Desperately she dropped her sword, reached up with both hands, and broke her own neck, thrusting her head grotesquely to one side to hang limply down her back.
Just in time. The Fang burst up to the ceiling, trailing one of her ears, and struck sparks off the stone there.
Before it arrowed to the door, out through the gap she’d made by chopping through the lock, and away.
She knew by the utter agony, that her wounds would be mortal for one with lifeblood to spill. She felt too weak to do anything more than slump down atop the rubble and whimper.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
The oldest, grandest Delcastle coach had thickly cushioned seats, but nothing else to soften rides. Wherefore Amarune was clinging to Arclath to keep upright, with her booted feet wedged against Mirt’s knees where he sat facing the noble and the dancer. Loose cobbles on this particular lane were making the coach rattle almost deafeningly as it rushed toward Delcastle Manor, where it had been agreed they’d tarry until Storm or El appeared to fetch Mirt to different lodgings under a new face and name.
“So who did kill the cook?” Rune was asking.
“Almost anyone may have,” Arclath said bleakly.
“Not so, lad,” Mirt rumbled. “The slayers were working for a noble.”
“Likely, yes,” Arclath granted, “but tell me why you say so. Is it merely one more ‘dastardly nobles are behind everything’ thought?”
“Nay. They carried off Lady Greatgaunt with no mess or noise. No ransom demands, no snatching all her gowns or the jewels off ‘em, no blood or tussle. Following clear an’ detailed orders-carefully.” Mirt waved a hand. “Therefore, working for nobles, hey?”
“Hey,” Arclath agreed with a grin.
“I-” Amarune hesitated, then continued, “I learned much from Elminster’s mind, while he was in mine. It’s only right you should know as much as we do about all of this. The ghosts, I mean.”
Arclath nodded, and Mirt made a beckoning “out with it!” gesture.
“At the Council,” Rune began, “a blueflame ghost appeared briefly during the fighting and felled several nobles, specific ones, but then vanished. So, obviously someone in the room was controlling it.”
Mirt nodded. “A noble who attended yer Council has a blueflame item.”
“A mystery for Elminster, or his old foe Manshoon, not to mention half the ambitious nobles in Suzail, now, to solve, as they all scramble to get that item and control the ghost,” Arclath added.
Rune nodded. “Elminster wants it to try to restore The Simbul-you know about her?”
Mirt chuckled. “I do. More’n I want to, but that’s another tale.”
Rune shook her head. “Not now, I pray you! Manshoon presumably wants the ghost to have another slayer he can send forth, in case he ever runs out of mind-slaves or beholders.”
Mirt nodded. “I remember him, too. That one will never be able to resist seeking such power.”
“Yes, but he mustn’t yet have it, or he’d be using it, not faring forth himself or sending agents. The blueflame ghosts frighten and therefore dominate-and Manshoon lives to control and dominate.”
Mirt nodded again. “Over the years,” he growled, “some things change very little. Names and faces, aye, but the games, nay.” He flexed his hands-and a dagger suddenly gleamed in one of them.
He held it up, smiled at it, and told Amarune and Arclath, “Fortunately, I always did enjoy playing these particular games.”
In a place as sprawling, tall, and deep as the royal palace of Suzail, there are forgotten places.
There are also “almost forgotten” spots. One of them was a neglected corner deep in the palace cellars where ancient and mighty interwoven ward spells foil detection magics and hide magical auras, very much as a thick fog conceals small scuttling things.
Targrael thought she just might be the last rememberer of that spot, judging by the condition of a particular ill-mended wall that had been getting worse for centuries. It had two dark recesses, cavities where stones had collapsed out to leave behind holes like missing teeth in an old warrior’s jawbone.
One of them was large enough to hold a death knight, one who had managed to unbar the door, escape Druth’s room, and make her slow and painful way to the doors of the royal crypt after several long and agonizing hours of crawling. Only her incredible force of will kept her going.