The Wizardwar by Elaine Cunningham

it in my hands.”
    When the jordain hesitated, Dhamari pressed a small, coin-filled bag into his hand. “Our lady has no need of wealth. She is enriched by your faithful service,” he said meaningfully.
    “And the potions?”
    “I am qualified to administer them.” He paused for a wistful smile. “You have not seen the wizard Keturah in a temper. It would be best if she hears the full story from my lips and in private.”
    “As you say.” Zephyr handed Dhamari a wooden box.
    Dhamari opened the box and took from it one of many tiny vials. He emptied the potion into the contents of a gem-encrusted wine cup. “We will begin this very night,” he assured the jordain. “You may tell your lady that all will go as planned.”
    An odd little smile touched the elf’s face. “She will be gratified to hear this, I’m sure.”
    “And please, convey my regards and thanks to the queen.”
    That strange, secretive smile flickered again. “I will do that, as well,” Zephyr agreed, “although at a somewhat later time.”
    He punctuated this cryptic remark with a proper jordaini bow, then he turned and disappeared into the night with disconcerting elven grace. Dhamari shrugged and took a small packet from a hidden pocket of his tunic. He ripped off a corner and spilled the powder into the wine. For a moment the liquid fizzled and bubbled, seething as it turned a hundred shades of crimson and purple and green. Then, suddenly, it settled back into the sedate, aged gold of fine haerlu wine. Dhamari smiled with satisfaction and went in search of his bride…
     

     
    Fury, pure and searing, tore Tzigone from the past and jolted her back to herself. Around her lingered the faint shadows of the green tower, and the garden full of ghostly revelers. Tzigone’s eyes sought her mother among the shadows.
    “She didn’t know,” the girl murmured, thinking of the potions which had shaped both her mother’s destiny and her own. “That son of a scorpion poisoned her!”
    Fury filled her, focused her. Tzigone swiftly fell back into her vision of the past…
     

     
    Keturah’s respite was short-lived. A member of the Exchelsor family, a stout, matronly woman whose name Keturah had never heard spoken, pounced on her like an overweight tabby and dragged her into the midst of the feasting. The bride stood with her back to the garden wall, an untouched plate of food in one hand, watching the celebration with the bewildered detachment of an ancient, fading wraith spying on the living. By wind and word, she could not understand why these strangers were so pleased!
    Her new-made husband came toward her, a wine goblet cradled in both hands. There was a strange glint in his eyes that made her skin crawl. Keturah was no stranger to the ways of men, and she knew full well the response her face and form evoked. She took the cup from him and managed a single sip. Her stomach roiled in protest, and she turned away so that he could not read her revulsion.
    Dhamari’s mother chose this moment to bustle over. Dressed in cloth-of-silver, a reminder to all of her wealth in electrum mines, she rustled like aspen leaves in a gale.
    “Where is your steward, daughter? There are arrangements to be made and apprentices to dismiss.”
    “Dismiss my apprentices?” echoed Keturah blankly. “Whatever for?”
    The woman tittered. “You must have drunk deeply if you’ve forgotten the moon of seclusion! Lady Mystra grant, you will soon thereafter devote yourself to a mother’s duties. There will be no time for apprentices for years to come.”
    Ambition gleamed bright in the woman’s eyes, shedding light on the family’s collective glee.
    The Exchelsor family had wealth in great abundance, and they did not hesitate to use it to get what they wanted. They’d given her this very tower as Dhamari’s apprentice fee. Their son was accounted a wizard, but his talents were small, and he would never be famed for his mastery of Art. But if he wed a wizard of