As the deadly flames died away, the dead man toppling and then collapsing into swirling ash, the other Shadovar all whirled around and stared up.

To behold the Prefects of Candlekeep, standing on the highest gallery, frowning back down at them. Each monk was aiming a rod or staff, or holding up an orb-and every one of these enchanted weapons was glowingly awake with roused and ready magic. The highest-ranking monks of the keep had fetched the monastery's most powerful magics and come to make war.

They let fly.

Fire and frost and snarling lightning rained down, followed by the whirling chaos of more arcane deaths. Men screamed, convulsed, and died. Past the raging of unleashed magic, the fleeing false monks below-Elminster among them-could see tomes floating out into view from behind the shoulders of the Prefects, open grimoires and spellbooks from the libraries of Candlekeep, each wreathed in a rippling aura of risen magic. And from book after book, one by one, glowing beams shot down to immolate running monks below.

Elminster kept on crawling, trying to put solid stone between himself and what the Prefects could hurl. Preferably where he'd find a door out of this chamber straight ahead.

It didn't feel like the right time for parleys or explanations.

It seemed the Shadow Sword didn't care if it drank undeath or magic or the vitality of the living. Helgore had slain the last two elves by parrying their furious attacks while his dark conjured blade flew around to slide into them from behind-slicing into armor and flesh alike in silent ease, as if drifting through empty air.

Not that he'd resisted stabbing them when they were already dying. Shadow Sword or not, they were his kills. The latest in a count he'd already lost reliable track of, after a day of walking along in stone-lined underways, busily slaying.

Cormanthorian elves weren't so formidable, after all.

He looked around at all the lifeless darkness.

The glows of the armor had died with their wearers, leaving him alone in a corridor littered with dead elves and pools of their blood.

Helgore wiped his blade clean on a corpse's half cloak, sheathed it, and headed for the next crypt doorway. This was almost too easy.

He mind-guided the Shadow Sword to hang horizontally in the air, its star-kissed edge outermost, a dark and deadly barrier to anyone rushing up on him from behind. He willed it to flare its dark reach outward on either side of its blade as much as possible, to ensnare passing magic any elf might unleash at his back, and watched its darkness spread and loom obediently.

There. A shield nothing should be able to pass without his being warned.

Helgore smiled and went to the double doors of the crypt. Again, the device on it was unfamiliar, but really, what did it matter? One more forgotten family of elves too highnosed and haughty to have survived Toril's last few centuries. Even if one or two elves fighting in the forest above him right now still bore the same surname, they'd be dead soon enough. They all would.

Elves or titans, beholders or alhoon ... none could stand against the arcanists of Thultanthar for long.

No coldly defiant baelnorn faded into view to challenge him. Well, perhaps some of them were learning prudence at last.

Helgore blasted the doors to pebbles and powder, enjoying the destruction. There were a few doors back home he'd not mind doing this to, so he could gloat over those cowering behind them ere sliding the Shadow Sword hilt deep through a few Thultanthans too haughty for their own good.

Yes. That was something to look forward to. After all, he knew the secrets of the Shadow Sword now. Telamont could hardly reach in and take away memories, so ...

Well, now. Look at that. Riches at last.

Through the swirling dust, he could see many blue glows. Bright and strong, many layered ... and mighty.

Oho. The Most High would be pleased.

Helgore strode forward. Yes, this crypt was packed with harps and swords and gauntlets-and all manner of gewgaws beyond his naming at first glance, each one of them aglow with the blue radiance of powerful magic.

This crypt was so crowded with loot that the dead lay not on their backs, but stood upright, the remains held vertical by magic that shaped truly lifelike effigies.

Helgore sneered. Well, they'd collapse into bones and dust swiftly and satisfyingly enough when all their magic was drained awa- The centermost of the three effigies facing him had just opened eyes the hue of mithral flame, and stepped out of the soft blue glows to face him.

Copper-colored hair, pale skin, an elf female he knew from the training the Most High had given him-except that the real thing looked far angrier than Telamont's mind-portrait. He was face to face with Ilsevele Miritar, the Coronal of Myth Drannor.

Helgore stepped back hastily, ducking low and willing the Shadow Sword to turn and thrust into the crypt point first.

The coronal strode to meet it, blazing eyes fixed on him. "If you'd cared to learn some of the mysteries of the Tel'Quess before destroying them, Shadovar, you might have survived longer. The coronal can feel the breaching of any crypt in this city."

Whatever she unleashed then, howled into and through Helgore of Thultanthar's hasty wards and shieldings as if they didn't exist-and then into and through him.

He didn't even have time to scream as he met his doom.

So there was no one at all to see the coronal let the Shadow Sword slide into her and through her. Shuddering in agony, she embraced it, tugging at its great hilt to pull it hard against her breast as blue fire flared up around her in a snarling inferno.

And raged in that crypt mouth and out into the passage beyond, hot and bright and blue, racing away down the passage and then rebounding.

It roiled, spat, and became dimmer and smaller, fading ... dying away.

When it was all gone, there was no Shadow Sword at all, and the coronal stood tall and unwounded, blue lightning crackling here and there in her copper hair, swollen with all the magic the sword had held.

Yet there was no pride in her face, only sorrow. She shook her head and went out into the passage, weeping softly.

Her tears glowed blue as they fell, dancing like little dying flames on the stone floor in her wake as she went, weeping for those now lost forever.

Deadly magic was still howling and snarling around the high-ceilinged chamber deep in Candlekeep, with dead or dying or frantically fleeing monks among it, and the grim Prefects of Candlekeep staring down from their balcony with the powerful tomes of magic floating around them, directing the death they'd just unleashed.

"Die!" the Keeper of the Tomes had shouted, and the echoes of his cry were still reverberating around the hall, borne on the roiling, spark-studded backwash of deadly energies.

"Die yourself," Maerandor muttered in reply as he finished his spell, locked eyes with the Keeper of the Tomes up on the balcony above, and unleashed death.

That end of the balcony vanished, the very stones becoming tentacles that should flail and batter even before they crushed and tore.

Farewell, Keeper. Good farruking riddance.

Other Shadovar spells were stabbing up at that balcony, too, and other monks up there were reeling. An orb exploded with a shriek and a bright flash, and Maerandor saw what was left of the monk who'd been wielding it stagger and then topple, now headless and armless ...

The Most High was watching.

Maerandor smiled, chose another Prefect along the balcony, worked a deft spell-and killed the man. Harper or Chosen or Red Wizard impersonator, or genuine Avowed of Candlekeep consecrated to learning and Oghma the Binder ... it mattered not. They all had to die, and the sooner the better.

Smiling a colder smile, Maerandor chose another target.

El had reached the doorway he'd sought, but didn't go through it. The Shadovar were both swift and obviously unimpressed by threats from massed old men on balconies who should have cast aside honor and struck first rather than hurling warnings from on high.

Now, every last one of the Prefects looked likely to be slaughtered in short order if nothing was done.

And if you want something done in the Realms, you call on Elminster ...

Pah. El did a working he hoped no one would even notice that thrust an invisible tongue of the wards of Candlekeep straight across the room, right in front of this Maerandor of Thultanthar. The arcanist's next hurled doomspell should strike it and rebound right back on its caster- Like that.

Grinning ruthlessly up at the balcony, Maerandor had flung a spell Elminster remembered from long, long ago. A magelord of Athalantar had been fond of that same bone-rend spell, the distinctive red-and-black cloud of grisly destruction as a living man's bones were torn right out of his body, bursting through flesh in an invariably messy explosion of wet spattering blood and innards.

The wet red heap that had been Maerandor looked no cleaner than any of the other victims El had seen.

Elminster looked down at what was left of the arcanist for a moment, then turned away. He'd seen little enough of Telamont Tanthul, but what he had taken in should be enough to convincingly feign being High Prince of Thultanthar for a little longer.

"Another traitor falls," he announced loudly, keeping his voice cold and calm, "failing himself and Thultanthar alike."

Shadovar were turning to him, listening. Telamont must have them well whipped.

"Leave these old fools for now!" he ordered. "Time enough to destroy them later, when the Moonstars are dealt with! The Moonstars who are creeping up behind our backs even now!"

And he spun to face the door he'd been crawling for, and blasted it open. Its shards were still hurtling and clattering down off walls beyond when he sent a second blast through the space where it had been-and blew apart an innocent statue, several rooms away.

"Spittle of Shar," he snapped, "I missed that one! After him!"

He pointed and then sprinted, not looking to see if any Shadovar followed.

Yet soon enough he heard them pounding along after him.

Every one of them. The ruse had worked. The Shadovar tore off through Candlekeep, away from the chamber of the balconies-and the dumbfounded Prefects.

This morning, the attacking mercenaries seemed endless. Even more numerous than the trees that stood all around this particular corner of the widespread fray.

Storm, Rune, and Arclath had been fighting for what seemed like forever, an endless deadly dance of swing, duck, dodge, parry, rebound from the numbing clang of blade on blade, and hack again. There were a score of besiegers to every defender of Myth Drannor, or even more.

Even given how many were being slaughtered with every panting, passing moment as the ring of attackers tightened around the city, yard by blood-soaked yard.

"F-fall back!" Arclath panted, slipping again on dead bodies underfoot. They were slick with blood, flies buzzing in profusion everywhere.

Not that he could hear the little pests. He was half deaf from all the clanging of blades striking blades or shields or armor, men shouting or screaming, raw dying shrieks on all sides. It had been nigh ceaseless, until a few panting moments ago.

Amarune flung out a hand to catch his shoulder and steady him. Gasping, he thanked her with a nod, and leaned on his sword, using it as a crutch to keep himself upright while he fought for breath.

This little lull in the fighting had come when the foe had fallen back to regroup. Which in this case meant drag the wounded away, reform survivors into new bands under the commanders who were left-probably all of them; these particular mercenary captains led from the rear-and in the meantime send fresh troops forward to pick up bodies and the dismembered, and fling them into heaps to clear some ground to walk on.

So they could all come charging up to the elf lines again.

Huh. Such as the "elf lines" were. There were perhaps a score of elves still on their feet, for as far as he could see along this ridge. And behind them all, there was no more wild forest, just the trees that sheltered and adorned the homes and garden terraces and soaring spires of Myth Drannor itself.

If the defenders retreated again, it would be the city itself they were yielding. Building by building.

"Sorry I got you into this, my love," Rune whispered into his ear, as they leaned together for support, both gasping for breath. "You could still be safe by your fireside, back at home."

"While you got butchered here without me? Never! After all, you'd haunt me over it-I'd never get a moment's sleep!"

"True," Rune whispered as she leaned against him. Forehead to forehead, they clung to each other, sharing their aches.

Storm had been helping elf wounded, and was now trudging back to meet them, with her hair, with all of her, drenched in blood.

Brow to brow with Arclath-who smelled as good as ever, she couldn't help but notice-Amarune watched the bard come slowly up to them, trailing a sword that dripped with gore. So Chosen got just as weary as mere mortals.

Somehow that was both discouraging and reassuring at the same time.

They'd all been fighting hard amid the trees for what seemed like forever, and everyone's arms-sword arms especially-ached and felt as heavy as castle stones.

"Kissing again?" Storm teased them, as she picked her way over heaped elf bodies to come up beside them. "You young ones never stop, do you? Don't forget to breathe, now!"

They were both still too winded to give her suitably arch replies, so Rune settled for a rude gesture. Storm chuckled and embraced her, hugging her and then massaging the younger woman's shoulders. Rune groaned.

Arclath smiled at them both fondly-as a war horn blared far off in the trees.

From far back in the enemy ranks somewhere.

He peered in that direction. The besieging mercenaries seemed endless; Arclath could see banners swaying among the trees as their bearers clambered over roots as high as tables, moving closer. The farthest banner was distant indeed.

He sighed, and leaned a little more heavily on his sword. There were too many mercenaries, too great a host for the surviving defenders to hold for long.

But then, he'd known all along that without far superior magic to hurl on the battlefield, Myth Drannor was doomed. It wasn't a question of if the city would fall, but when.

The banners were moving again.

"They're coming," he muttered. "Are there any elves in reserve, or is it just this handful of us to hold back an army?"

Storm looked back over one shapely shoulder, then told him, "No, there's another handful coming. I'd say Fflar is standing more or less alone against the mercenaries attacking the far side of the city. He's sent most of his command to join us."

Then she added, "Excuse me. Stay where you are."

As Amarune and Arclath watched, the bard plunged down the steepest nearby slope, into a little pit ringed by the heaped dead-and shook herself like a wet dog, all over, her long silver hair thrusting itself out straight and stiff like a pincushion.

The heir of the Delcastles hauled Rune hastily down, so only a fine rain of blood fell on them like a mist, rather than a huge wet wall of it.

When they scrambled up again, to peer at the advancing mercenaries-who were thankfully coming with wary slowness, not shouting and charging-the Storm who joined them had hair that was silver again, clean of blood. The rest of her, however, was still besmirched.

"That's a neat trick," Rune told her. "Show me that, when we have time."

"Gladly," Storm agreed, as she raised a hand in greeting to the elves hastening to join them.

"Lady Storm," the foremost warrior greeted her with a wry smile. "Well met. It's been a few summers."

"It has, Velathalar. Good to see you again. Are those with you likely to take a suggestion from a human, or are they more interested in trumpeting their precious honor and so dying in their own way?"

Arclath was greatly amused to hear that a dumbfounded male elf said "Eh?" in just the same tone of voice a male human did. But recovered, he had to grant, faster.

"Why?" Velathalar grinned. "What suggestion are you apt to make?"

"That we retreat, right now, to just there, where the fallen end, so we can stand on sure footing while the mercenaries struggle on the dead underfoot."

"Wise," the elf agreed, "not that honor will agree." He whirled around to snap an order to the elves with him. "Back! Back to where the footing's clear!"

"What?" a taller, older female elf snapped back at him. "And surrender soil of our city without even fighting for it? Where is your honor, Velathalar Muirdraevrel?"