Ah, but his Lady Dark Armor was a treat. He’d almost been seduced by his enjoyment of her coldly malicious mind into keeping her active too long. At an ever-increasing risk of losing her to the spells of frightened wizards of war as they finally awakened to the growing perils all around, as nobles poured into Suzail, the day of the council rushed nearer, conspirators plotted busily on all sides, blueflame ghosts stalked the streets slaying at will, and Elminster strolled the passages of their own palace uncaptured.
They were still an utter chaos of incompetent, overly officious fools, but they were starting to face life without Ganrahast and his faithful hound of a Lord Warder and-at last-trying to make some decisions themselves.
The wrong ones, thus far, and all of them too late, but even idiot magelings can’t help but notice a beautiful, elegant, and very dead woman striding around their palace in black armor of archaic style, defying all orders … and even idiot magelings can aim and trigger wands.
Yes, it was more than time to send Targrael back to her slumber to await the day when he’d need her again.
He’d need others, too, at least one war wizard among them, so it was time to also withdraw from the minds of Talane, Rorskryn Mreldrake, and various Stormserpent servants as if he’d never been there at all.
Which was something he-perhaps he alone-could do.
A certain Emperor Manshoon would need all his useful tools after Elminster was dead and he’d dealt with the pitiful remnants of Cormyr’s past; what was left of the wizards of war, of Vangerdahast, and of Alusair the Ghost Princess.
Then it would be time to rule, and truly loyal agents would be most useful.
Until then, no one would ever know they’d ever been his creatures at all.
“Not for me the clumsy mind-reamings of Cormyr that so often drive wizards of war and those they violate into madness,” Manshoon told the dark emptiness around him, as his beckoning finger brought a decanter and a great crystal goblet floating out of the darkness to his hands. “Vampire I may be, but I am before all else a real archwizard; I ride minds and depart them leaving no traces that lesser fools can find.”
Simple truth, not vainglorious boasting; he had worked hard on crafting spells while others played tyrant or meddler. He could do things no mage of Cormyr could even hope to achieve through magic. Hah, he could do things most would think impossible.
Manshoon unstoppered the decanter and poured, savoring the delicate scent of the rare and ancient elven vintage wafting up from the goblet.
Very soon, Targrael would step through yonder door and put into his hand the enchanted dagger that he could compel into magical flight to swoop and fell Elminster from behind, if a fight with the Old Mage should erupt before the old fool’s carefully plotted doom befell him.
Once the dagger was his, he could send the death knight back to well-earned rest. He no longer needed her to guard this cavern, as he had it ringed with undead beholders under his command, and he’d fully mastered a living beholder body of his own-and blasting that mind had been a feat to celebrate-to occupy whenever he pleased.
Or if someone destroyed the human body he was using.
Manshoon scowled at that thought, remembering who had slain more of his bodies than anyone else, down the centuries … and had played with him, as an unwitting tool, even more often.
“Elminster,” he whispered gleefully, “you will die. Very soon now.”
Soon indeed, for as he’d intended and so patiently arranged, the Sage of Shadowdale was alone.
Elminster’s lover had gone howling mad again, and his lone remaining loyal ally and healer, Storm, was off to Shadowdale to see to her. Where both silver-haired bitches would die or be kept too busy fighting to cling to their lives to return to Suzail in time to help the kindly old Sage of Shadowdale. What he’d made his dupe Mreldrake tell the Highknight Starbridge should ensure as much.
That diligent hammer of Cormyr’s foes should even now be scouring the dale for signs of Elminster and his two silver-haired wenches, believing those three were preparing to magically attack King Foril just after his council.
Manshoon sipped and nodded appreciatively. Yes, his plans were unfolding nicely.
He would use Talane to kill Gaskur, the mind he’d most often inhabited and of necessity altered, in Stormserpent Towers-after enspelling Gaskur to look like Ruthgul. Scrying to make sure Amarune Whitewave saw Ruthgul dead, he’d then dissolve his spell so she’d witness her dead client “melting back” into Gaskur, a man she should not know.
That little ruse should frighten her into repudiating Elminster rather than agreeing to work with the Old Mage.
Not that she had much aptitude for magic. Whitewave was very little more than an accomplished thief, and could be slain with ease-but she was far more useful as Elminster’s tormentor. If she repudiated her ancestor, it would crush the old fool more than anything Manshoon himself could do.
And Elminster must suffer.
Rejection or betrayal at the hands of everyone the Sage of Shadowdale depended on should bring on that suffering nicely, before an unexpected longtime foe-the oft bested and belittled Manshoon-revealed himself and killed the old goat.
Manshoon smiled at his decanter. “And when Elminster is dead and these hands have slain him, I’ll be out from under his shadow at last,” he told it. Then he noticed it seemed to have half-emptied itself rather quickly.
He shook his head. That was the problem with decanters …
It was time to bid farewell to the mind of Marlin Stormserpent, too. A young fool doomed by his own ambitions, yet thus far playing his useful-if unwitting-part.
“I have loosed him like a wild arrow among the court and nobility of Cormyr, to see how many lives he can reap before he’s brought down,” he purred. “Whereupon someone else will seize the blueflame ghosts and use them against their rivals and foes … and so on.”
Watching that bloody, ongoing game would be great entertainment.
Wherefore it was almost time for young Stormserpent’s guide Lothrae to fall silent-which meant, of course, a certain meddling Manshoon would be departing the mind of Understeward Corleth Fentable, too.
Something moved in the distant darkness, a boldly striding, curvaceous shadow. Targrael, there at last and offering him the double-bladed dagger precisely as he was compelling her to-with one of its points held against her own throat and her other arm behind her, so he could destroy her with ease with the gentlest of shoves.
“It’s not just a matter of avoiding detection as the wizards of war start prying in earnest, just before the council,” he told her with a smile as he took the proffered dagger. “I’ll soon be too busy to move my pawns around, with nobles galore arriving in a great flood of highborn scorn and pomposity. My attention will be on a series of subtle mind-invasions of lords and ladies of the realm, to decide who will be my future tools, and who-in a land burdened with far too many troublesome nobles-is swiftly expendable.”
“Of course, Lord,” Targrael murmured, going to her knees before him.
Manshoon smiled down at her, seeing in her mind as well as her eyes that if he wasn’t compelling her to this subservience, she’d be trying to swiftly and savagely slay him right then.
“Let’s get you back to your nice cold tomb to await more slavery to me,” he murmured, letting go of decanter and goblet.
Both floated contentedly where they were, in midair, as Manshoon drew his Lady Dark Armor to her feet and waved her away on her last stroll through the palace-for a while.
A part of his awareness went with her, riding and compelling her, but her part was done; almost all of Manshoon’s attention was back on what he’d conjured at the center of the cavern; his scrying scenes, his many eyes on Cormyr.