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  The wizard didn't respond to the obvious compliment. "The dalelords will probably be waiting downstairs by now, and the others will be arriving shortly."

  "Then you should make sure that the 'frightening old woman' from Rashemen is ready to address them," Azoun told Vangerdahast. He glanced into the mirror once more and straightened the ceremonial purple sash across his chest.

  "You can joke about that woman because you haven't had to spend much time with her, listening to her tales about the Tuigan invading her land," the wizard said, picking up his satchel and opening the door. "I'll see you in the meeting hall in a few moments," he added as he left the room.

  The king stared at the closed wooden door for a moment, not really seeing anything. He considered what Vangerdahast had said about his inexperience, then frowned. The wizard was right: He had seen battles, but never a war. Cormyr had been at peace, apart from a few border skirmishes, for his entire life.

  Spinning abruptly on the toe of one highly polished boot, Azoun turned toward the high, dark-wood bookshelf that covered an entire wall of the study. He walked briskly to the shelves, his heels thudding on the carpeted floor.

  As he got close to the rows of ancient tomes he kept in the study, Azoun could smell the familiar, musty odor of old, well-read books. He ran his index finger along the spines of the mostly leather-bound volumes, searching for a particular book, a fifty-year-old family history.

  Though most of the older books did not have their titles embossed on their spines, Azoun had little trouble finding the one that he wanted. It had a worn red cover and was the thickest volume in the study. The king quickly located the tome between his own treatise on the history of polearms in warfare and a collection of notes on falconry. He pulled the book from the shelf and headed for his desk.

  A small, thin black tube rested on the dark oaken desk. As Azoun sat down he lifted it, and the rod of steel that the tube had covered cast a bright yellow-white light over the desk. The glowing rod, a simple piece of shaped metal with a spell cast upon it, was a product of Vangerdahast's magic; the radiance cast by the steel augmented the weak natural light in the study.

  Gingerly Azoun unsnapped the chipped metal band from around the book and allowed it to fall open. A tight, neat script covered the yellowed pages, broken only by a handful of beautifully detailed illuminations, some done in ink laced with gold or silver dust. The king flipped cracked pages until he reached the section detailing the end of his grandfather's reign. Azoun III had died when his son was only six years old. The king's brother, Salember, had taken control of the kingdom as regent until young Prince Rhigaerd grew old enough to seize the throne.

  Azoun knew the family history's version of what happened next almost by heart. The wear on the pages certainly attested to this particular chapter's use over the years.

  Civil war, the section began, was almost inevitable from the day Salember, "the Rebel Prince," became regent. Salember was a shiftless, lecherous traitor to Cormyr's crown, and within a year after taking hold of the government, he began plotting the demise of Prince Rhigaerd. The details of the Rebel Prince's crimes against our fair land will not darken these pages. It is enough to note that the bloody revolt that eventually claimed Salember's life was of the regent's own making.

  The king licked his dry lips and continued to read. The text on the next page, under a stylized rendition of Rhigaerd II, Azoun's father, leading troops against his uncle, contained the information for which Azoun searched.

  Cormyr has been cursed-or blessed-with few wars. The War of the Regency, however, should remain a bloody reminder of what grief war can bring. In 1260 and 1261, the span of the conflict, the land was wracked with strife and famine. In the Battle of Hilp alone, three thousand men died. Corpses rested in the fields instead of crops in the fall of that year, and plague ravaged the countryside.

  Few were prepared for the sacrifices the conflict demanded. However, as King Rhigaerd, ruler of Cormyr at the time this history is written, so rightly points out-

  " 'War is an endeavor never entered into lightly, though there are many reasons to fight,' " the king quoted as he closed the tome. He heard his father's voice behind those words, heard his strength and his commitment to the land.

  "I've found one of those reasons, Father," Azoun said softly as he covered the light. "Now I must convince the others that I don't enter into this conflict lightly."

  The crowd gathered in the castle's large meeting hall that day included representatives from Sembia, the Dales, the various free city-states around the Inner Sea, and many of the most important Cormyrian nobles. Each dignitary was allowed, by Azoun's consent, one advisor or guard at the meeting. Some representatives, ever fearful of assassination attempts, brought powerful wizards or well-trained warriors with them. Others required only the company of a scribe.

  All were there to hear Azoun give one final request for aid. Most did not know that the king had asked a representative of Rashemen, a country far to the east of Cormyr, a country already overrun by the Tuigan horselords, to speak to the assembly. Azoun hoped that the old woman would be able to sway the politicians who were still reluctant to commit any sizable number of troops or large sums of money to the crusade.

  The king was wondering just how effective the woman would be, when a page knocked on the study door. "The lords and ladies are all gathered, Your Highness," the young boy said, bowing deeply. His mind racing ahead, full of speculations about the meeting's outcome, Azoun absently dismissed the youth and left the study.

  The hallways the king paced through on his way to the meeting were a sharp contrast to his study. No soft carpets lined the hard stone floors, and no richly woven tapestries covered the whitewashed stone walls to prevent drafts. Where they butted against the castle's outer walls, the corridors were bordered with small windows. These cast only weak light in most places. The real light sources for the hallways, in fact much of the castle, were small metal globes that had been magically prepared to cast light continuously. Shadows hung thick in many places despite the regularly spaced magical globes.

  Pages bowed and soldiers saluted as Azoun made his way to the court's central meeting hall. The king snapped automatic greetings to some of the servants and courtiers whom he passed. To others he simply nodded. By the time he reached the meeting hall, its doors guarded by a dozen well-armed soldiers, Azoun had gone over the outline of his speech three times.

  Whatever comments he had prepared about Tuigan troop strength and the khahan's tactical abilities flew from Azoun's mind when he entered the hall. The burst of loud laughter that greeted him as he opened the door drove such organized thoughts away and replaced them with unsettling confusion.

  The herald standing inside the hall started as the monarch entered, and the grin on his boyish face weakened to a faint smile. He quickly bowed to Azoun. "His Highness, King Azoun of Cormyr," the herald announced loudly, and the laughter died away.

  The stylishly dressed men and women who sat at the three long trestle tables turned from something at the front of the large room and faced the door. Those few who were sitting immediately stood. All bowed to Azoun in the silence that had suddenly overtaken the room.

  "Please, my friends," the king said, "there's no need for that. We are here as allies, to solve a common problem." He slowly scanned the crowd, meeting the gaze of as many people as he could. "Let us relax and speak as friends."

  The lords and ladies, magicians and generals, visibly relaxed, and a murmur of renewed conversation washed over the room. Many of the thirty or so people sat down again. When they did, the king saw a handsome, dark-haired man sitting alone in front of the room. The blood-red shirt the royal bard wore was neat and proper, and it mirrored the embarrassed flush on his face quite well. Azoun smiled and walked to the young man's side.

  "No doubt you were the cause of that outburst when I entered the room," the king said. "Just what story were you telling them, Thom?"

  "I was trying to lighten the mood a bit,
Your Highness," the man said, bowing his head and hugging his harp tight to his chest. His fingers slid nervously over the whales carved into the instrument's neck. "Vangerdahast told me to play for the gathering until you arrived. They were all rather somber … so I told them the tale of Sune and the hayward."

  Azoun flinched slightly. That particular story of Sune Firehair, the Goddess of Beauty, was one of Thom Reaverson's better. Still, though not vulgar, the tale was a bit bawdy for mixed company. "Was that a wise choice, Thom?" the king asked, turning to look at the gathered nobles. Various polite excuses ran through his mind as he studied the assembled rulers of the most powerful cities and countries in Faerun.

  "They requested it, milord."

  "What?"

  Thom smiled and pointed to an attractive young woman. As the king watched, the Cormyrian lady tossed her head back slightly, laughing at another noble's jest, letting her hair dance luxuriously around her bared shoulders. "She asked if I knew that particular story," the bard quietly told the king. "When I said yes, she requested I tell it. I tried to suggest another, more appropriate tale, but the other lords and ladies followed her lead."

  King Azoun sighed, then smiled. "Thank you, Thom. You did the right thing. They probably wanted a little light fare to cut the tension before the meeting started." He pointed toward the doorway. "I'd like you to remain in the meeting hall, but at the back of the room. Observe what you can. We'll talk again later."

  The bard nodded, then quietly moved from the front of the room. A few of the nobles applauded Thom, and he smiled and bowed in response. As the bard reached the door, Vangerdahast and a very, very old woman entered.

  "Time for us to begin," Azoun announced, and the assembled men and women took their places at the long, polished wooden tables. Chairs lined one side of each table instead of the benches often used with them, and the three tables themselves formed a large U. The opening in the tables' arrangement faced the front of the room, where Thom Reaverson had played and Azoun now stood.

  The room in which the dignitaries gathered was large and had a high ceiling, with brightly colored pennants hanging from the rafters. The king had purposefully chosen the meeting hall, located deep inside the castle, because it had no windows, a single door, and thick walls of stone. If someone thought to assault the assembled leaders, he would have found the task difficult, if not impossible.

  Still, though the hall was secure, it was rather drab, apart from the pennants hanging near the ceiling. Barren stone walls, whitewashed like all the walls in the castle, surrounded most of the room. Brightly glowing globes hung at regular intervals around the hall and sat upon each table, but shadows crept into corners and made many a face look far more ominous than it did in daylight. The only unusual ornamentation, a large, colorful cloth-and-thread map of Faerun, covered much of the wall behind the king.

  Azoun stood framed by the tapestry, waiting for the assemblage to settle down. After a moment, he inclined his head slightly. Everyone recognized the subtle request for silence. Vangerdahast and the old woman continued toward the front of the room as Azoun said, "May Torm, God of Duty, help us discover our responsibilities to Faerun, and may the gods of all gathered here aid them in their search for the best path to the truth."

  By now the royal magician had reached the front of the room. A servant quickly brought a chair for the old woman, but she waved it away silently. Her tight-skinned, age-spotted face remained impassive and unreadable, even when Azoun smiled at her in greeting. Looking at the woman, the king realized why she so unsettled Vangerdahast. A prominent, knife-thin nose jutted out from between her close-set violet eyes, and it, like the rest of the woman's thin face, was covered with ash-gray skin pulled taut. In all, it seemed to Azoun that he was gazing at an ancient, but well-preserved corpse.

  "Go ahead, Vangy," the king said softly as he pulled his eyes from the old woman's steady gaze.

  Vangerdahast patted his beard, and his eyes seemed to lose focus under the bushy covering of his eyebrows. He inhaled deeply once, then again. Closing his eyes, the mage started to mutter a low, rumbling incantation. The few wizards in the room, members of various delegations, leaned to their companions and whispered that the royal magician was casting a spell to detect scrying. If anyone was attempting to magically eavesdrop on the conference, Vangerdahast would be able to ferret out their spell.

  At the front of the room, Vangerdahast's chant grew louder, more frantic. His hands wove a complex pattern in the air. Without warning, he raised his fingertips to his temples, opened his eyes, and uttered the spell's final word. A brilliant blue-white flash burned through the room.

  "By Mystra's wound!" Vangerdahast cried. The wizard covered his eyes and fell backward onto the floor.

  The skittering sound of swords leaving their sheaths and daggers sliding from boot tops hissed in the room. A few well-trained soldiers, guards for various dignitaries, crouched next to their lords, ready for battle. A mage cast a spell, and a glowing sphere of protection appeared around one of the dalelords.

  The few Cormyrian guards in the room rushed to Azoun's side, but the king paid them no attention. "What's going on, Vangy?" he asked as he helped his mentor from the gray stone floor.

  The wizard rubbed his eyes with both hands and muttered curses under his breath. "Someone close by had a very powerful spell locked on this room. That flash was caused by my incantation uncovering the other mage's scrying spell. Their contact with the room has been severed."

  Many of the dignitaries relaxed, but few of the bodyguards put their weapons away. A large, middle-aged man slammed the hilt of his broadsword against the tabletop, breaking the room's uneasy silence. "If we could trace that spell," he growled, "we'd find a Zhentish agent to be the spellcaster."

  "How do you know that, Lord Mourngrym?" asked a quivering merchant from Sembia.

  All eyes turned to the nobleman who had spoken first: Mourngrym, lord of Shadowdale. The dalelord frowned as he slipped his broadsword into its jeweled sheath, but when he saw that he commanded the room's attention, he straightened his thick-muscled frame to its full height and smoothed his immaculate, stylish surcoat. Almost casually he cast an appraising eye over the crowd and drew his mouth into a hard line in the midst of his neatly trimmed beard and mustache. The politicians in the room who were allied with the dalelord would later call the look on his face as he spoke benign, even paternalistic. Those who thought less of the nobleman labeled the expression condescending.

  "Who else but Zhentil Keep would want to spy on this gathering?" Mourngrym touched the symbol of Shadowdale-a twisted tower in front of an upturned crescent moon-which lay over his heart on his impeccably tailored surcoat. "We from the Dales know of the Keep's evil better than anyone."

  Vangerdahast shook his head and stepped forward. "The mages at the Keep would have used a far more subtle spell than the one I discovered."

  "What about the Trappers' Guild, then?" the dalelord returned. "I hear you're having trouble with them about the crusade."

  "A few grouchy hunters hardly constitute 'trouble,' " Azoun offered. He bowed slightly to the delegates from the important merchant kingdom of Sembia, "Though we certainly have the highest respect for our trade guilds."

  The leader of the Sembian delegation, Overmaster Elduth Yarmmaster, stood. A rather flabby man with a relaxed, almost discourteous air about him, the overmaster was resplendent in rich purple robes that morning. "We have heard of the trade unrest in your land, Your Highness, and it does trouble us. However, isn't it more likely the Tuigan themselves are spying upon us?" He waved a fat-fingered, gold-ringed hand in lazy circles. "They, above all, would dearly love to learn our plans."

  "You obviously know little of the Tuigan."

  The voice was low and gravelly, but strong. All heads turned to the front of the room, where the old woman stood. She regarded the assembly coldly, through hooded eyes. After running her fingers along the fold of her plain white wrap, the woman added, "The Tuigan do not value magic as w
e do, and they care little for what you do here in Cormyr."

  Gasps and mutters answered the woman's slight. Vangerdahast and Azoun both stepped to her side and held up their hands in an attempt to calm the crowd.

  "Do not quiet them on my account, Azoun of Cormyr," the old woman said flatly, turning her sharp gray features toward the king. "Once they hear the wisdom of my words they will be respectful enough."

  The muttering grew angrier, and Azoun silently wished that they had not been blessed with the woman's presence. She may have won Vangerdahast to his side, but she was about to alienate most of his allies. "Please, noble lords and ladies, Fonjara Galth is a representative from Rashemen. Hear what she has to say."

  When Azoun identified the woman, the assembly quieted almost instantly. Though many in Faerun traded with Rashemen, which lay on the easternmost fringes of the "civilized Realms," few westerners were very comfortable in the presence of that country's people. Ballads often referred to Rashemen as the "Land of Berserkers," for many of its inhabitants were savage, relentless fighters. More mysterious still were the country's rulers. A huhrong nominally guided the land from his steel-walled palace in the city of Immilmar. In reality, a powerful, secretive group of witches held the reins of Rashemen's government.

  Though the witches rarely traveled outside their country without adopting foolproof disguises, the lords and ladies who stood and sat in shocked silence wondered if Fonjara might indeed be one of Rashemen's real rulers.

  The short old woman held her body still, her thin, bony arms folded across her chest. She surveyed the room for a moment, paying particular attention to the wizards who waited, slack-jawed, for her to speak. "I will not pretend or play games with you. I am here on behalf of Huhrong Huzzilthar, lord of Immilmar and commander of our standing army-and the sisterhood who also rule the land."

  Gasps and murmurs washed over the room anew at Fonjara's overt reference to the witches. A faint, fleeting half-smile crossed the woman's gray face as she listened to the astonished hum from the nobles. A few of the Cormyrian lords looked to Azoun and Vangerdahast for some kind of confirmation. The king and his advisor remained stone-faced as best they could, though Azoun was finding it difficult to contain his excitement.