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.It resembled a giant mastiff with black-crusted fangs and a shimmering coat of maggots.Mask trembled so violently his form grew blurry and indistinct, but he did not flee."Do I have your promise?"The Chaos Hound cocked his head, then swung his massive snout toward the Shadowlord and snuffled.Threads of poison-laced drool fell from his chomping maw.Tempus nodded."I give you my word."Kezef charged.Mask tossed the scroll at Tempus and leaped over a pile of warriors and disappeared into a shadowy corner.The Chaos Hound streaked between two ranks of charging cavalry, then bounded over a knot of grappling footmen.He shoved through a tangle of blood-spattered knights, flashed past Tempus's throne, and disappeared into the shadows after Mask.The Battle Lord sat watching the Eternal War for a moment, then opened the scroll Mask had thrown him.The Shadowlord's plans always made him uneasy, but Tempus would convene the Circle of Twelve.The Battle Lord rarely gave his word, but when he did, he always kept it.ThreeThe great gods of the Circle of Twelve gathered in the Pavilion of Cynosure-eleven in all, for Cyric the One was not among them.The Battle Lord Tempus arrived first, followed by Mystra, Lady Magic, and her lover Kelemvor, Lord Death.Then came Talos the Destroyer and Shar the Nightbringer, Goddess of Loss and of all the wicked things men do under cover of darkness-a pair upon whose support the Battle Lord was counting.And too there was Chauntea, Goddess of Bountiful Nature, along with her paramour Lathander the Morninglord, who appeared in a streak of golden light.Never to be outshone, Sune, Goddess of Beauty and Love, appeared in a flash of flame as red as her hair.Silvanus Treefather, God of Wild Nature, also saw fit to attend, as did Oghma, thieving God of Wisdom.Tyr, the eyeless God of Justice, came to act as judge.Though many called him Tyr the Evenhanded, this was something of a joke, as his right arm ended in a stump.The gods did not "arrive" in the pavilion so much as turn their attention upon it, for deities are more energy than body and can manifest themselves anywhere with little more than a thought.By dividing their concentration, they can perform many tasks at once, or "travel" between locations in an instant But their abilities are not entirely without limits; they can divide their attention only so many times, and the greater their exertion in any one place, the more of their attention they must concentrate there.The Pavilion of Cynosure appeared different to each god.Chauntea the Great Mother perceived it as a lush and fragrant garden, burgeoning with dew-kissed blossoms of impossible brilliance.Shar the Nightbringer saw a dark cavern where no light could shine, filled with barbed stalactites and hidden abysses that seethed with pains long buried but never forgotten.To Mystra, Lady of Magic, the pavilion was an alchemist's laboratory, strewn with simmering beakers and jars packed with arcane spell components.The gods saw each other as differently as they saw the pavilion itself, each in accordance with his or her own nature.Mystra saw her companions as wizards of awesome power, cloaked in robes spun from the shimmering energies of the Magic Weave.In turn, Tempus envisioned her as a valkyrie armored in gleaming plate of the purest silver.Oghma the Wise viewed her as a young sage, while Talos the Destroyer saw her as an annihilating whirlwind of magic that left havoc wherever she went.But Mystra did not know how Kelemvor, Lord of the Dead, saw her-perhaps as a skeleton of polished ivory, or a mummy wrapped in golden silk.She had asked him once, in a quiet moment alone, and he had refused to answer, saying only that he regretted some things about becoming a god.When these eleven had come to the pavilion as gods do, they waited.Two places remained empty in the circle.The first was a large gap between Oghma and Chauntea; it was always left open in acknowledgment of Ao's eternal presence.A smaller space lay between Talos and Shar, the space reserved for Almighty Cyric, the One and the All.Although the Dark Sun had not deigned to attend any circle in many years, the gods stood in such awe of his power that they did not dare begin before allowing him a few moments to appear.When it grew clear that Cyric had chosen not to grace their meeting with his presence, Tyr the Evenhanded gazed around the pavilion, lingering upon each of the gods until he caught their eye.Slowly, the chamber fell silent.Tyr the Just turned his empty eye sockets in the direction of fickle Tempus."I believe you called us here, Foehammer?"Tempus walked to the heart of the pavilion, which he saw as a war room cluttered with maps and markers.Most of the other gods remained in their places, arranged in a circle, although some created chairs in which to sit or couches upon which to lie.Ever restless, Talos the Destroyer and Sune Fire-hair began to wander about, Talos tearing map corners and Sune pausing at every shiny surface to study her own reflection
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