Horn of beckoning death

The horn of beckoning death was a powerful magic item created by the lich Szass Tam, Zulkir of Necromancy and the Regent of Thay, to invoke a spell of necromancy known as the Beckoning Death in order to turn mass numbers of people into his undead servants.
==Description==
It took the form of a curved horn, similar to a small dragon's horn. It had an uneven mouth at the wide end, a cap or nozzle at the point, and was engraved and bound in metal, as if fashioned into a drinking horn. When held, it glowed from within from an infernal red light.The Honor Among Thieves movie and novelization never say what the red horn is nor what it does apart from being used in the spell beckoning death described by Xenk. The official stats in the "Legendary Magic Items" article on D&D Beyond say little more, except to name and describe it in terms of itself. However, it seems similar in concept to the Grail of Shargrailar, which is a drinking horn made from the horn of a dracolich. It also shares a name with the , which is when the dracolich Daurgothoth, the Creeping Doom and leading candidate for greatest evil in the Realms, moved into the ruins of Dolblunde, a place depicted in the movie but from which he is conspicuously absent.
==Powers==
The horn of beckoning death required attunement and its powers could only be commanded by a mage, whether a wizard, a sorcerer, or a warlock. When they held the horn and chanted arcane phrases over it, they could invoke the Beckoning Death. It was a spell that was unspeakably unholy and described as "the greatest evil the world has ever known."
When raised aloft, the horn would cause storms to gather overhead and draw down from the sky strange crimson strands that appeared much like fresh blood before turning dark. These would channel through the mouth of the horn, which would then spew red smoke from its point. Initially, the smoke filled an area of up to in radius from the horn. It remained stationary, but expanded by another every several seconds. In this way, the spell could affect vast numbers of people, even the populations of whole cities.
This smoke consumed the souls of all those who beheld it, instantly killing those caught within the cloud and swiftly transforming them into undead creatures under the control of the horn's creator, Szass Tam. Humanoids were raised as zombies. Only living creatures who were not especially resilient were affected, and even the horn's user was at risk if not already an undead creature like a lich.
The Beckoning Death lasted for ten minutes or until the user ceased concentration on the horn. After it was used, it could not be used again until a whole year had passed.
==History==
===A Curious Precursor===
While the Harpers were distracted with the Harpstar Wars in the late 12 and early 13 centuries DR, the corrupt and ambitious Harper Rundorl Moonsklan happened to meet Szass Tam, a Red Wizard of Thay, who was by then the already a lich and the Zulkir of Necromancy. With Rundorl desiring to be 'a Harper King' and the power behind every throne in the North and Szass scheming to destroy his rivals in Thay, the two made a dark deal: Szass would funnel Rundorl information on his rivals and Rundorl would gain prestige by sending Harpers to win victories over them.
To justify this focus on Thay, a land previously neglected by the Harpers, Rundorl spread the story of "the spell of Undeath". According to information he'd 'discovered', the Red Wizards were developing a new spell capable of instantly turning the populations of whole cities into undead slaves in order to quickly produce armies and threaten and enslave all of Faerûn. According to Rundorl, the Red Wizards were yet to perfect a way of protecting themselves from "the spell of Undeath", especially when cast by a rival, and experiments were naturally difficult to conduct. The only things stopping them were these issues—and the Harpers.There is no known connection between this (apparently fake) spell and the Beckoning Death introduced in Honor Among Thieves. It is included here for the close similarity and connection to Szass Tam. It is possible Szass Tam gave Rundorl his real idea in order to discredit it later, or Rundorl inspired Szass to develop it for real.
The plan went perfectly and Rundorl sent his fellows into battle against those Red Wizards and even zulkirs whom he claimed had involvement in "the spell of Undeath" and both he and Tam advanced in power. Eventually, though, Rundorl realized more Harpers were dying than Thayans and his exhausted men were being assassinated and reanimated as undead themselves, and he rightly suspected that Tam had betrayed him. He broke off the alliance, then got into worse troubles.
And Szass Tam would go on to do exactly what the Harpers had feared...
===Szass's Surprise===
As Xenk Yendar would recall, when he was a boy in the mid-1370s DR, Szass Tam called all the other zulkirs and all the people of the Thaymount tharch, Xenk and his parents among them, to a grand celebration atop the Citadel on the eve of the summer solstice. A few of the common people carried sun symbols.Honor Among Thieves only says "the capital" of Thay, which at the time should be Eltabbar. However, it is presumed Xenk lived in Thaymount, owing to him bearing Tam's tattoo and the apparent depiction of the Citadel. Moreover, Xenk may be referring to it as the present capital. Therefore, the Citadel is presumed instead.Honor Among Thieves mentions only the eve of the solstice; due to the presence of sun-like symbols in the crowd, this is presumed to be the summer solstice. The newly revived sun god Amaunator has a similar holy symbol and treats the summer solstice as a holy day, suggesting a link to the celebration. But it was all a lie—instead, Szass interrupted Zulkir Dmitra Flass as she addressed the crowd and produced the horn of beckoning death from under his robes. With it, he invoked the Beckoning Death, thereby creating an army of undead under his control for his following conquest of Thay. All who tried to flee were slain by Red Wizards in his service, such as Sofina. Xenk saw a girl his age, Ishira, standing alone and lost in the panic and saw parents attack their children. In their fear, Xenk's own parents tried to force their son into the ritual, but he refused and fled, but the mark of Szass Tam on his head glowed with a magical connection. He escaped, but only barely, losing a part of himself to the Beckoning Death and left changed by the necromantic magic. From then on, he would age slowly.It is difficult to reconcile Xenk's account and the scenes in Honor Among Thieves with the established history of Szass Tam, the zulkirs, and Thay, as Tam's betrayal here contradicts his betrayals elsewhere. It appears to conflate the zulkirs gathering at the Citadel in The Crimson Gold in 1373 DR; the meeting of the Council of Zulkirs in Eltabbar, the start of the War of the Zulkirs, and Tam's takeover of Thay in Unclean in 1375 DR; and a later new event of Tam creating his undead armies from his subjects. Since this is presented as a story from a book a century later and from Xenk's childhood memories, it's presumed to be a case of unreliable narration or movie dramatization.
Meanwhile, these undead would doubtless form the basis of the Dread Legions that Tam maintained for the defense of Thay in the 15 century DR.
At some point, however, the Harpers seem to have acquired or stolen the horn of beckoning death, perhaps preventing Tam from invoking the spell again. They stored it within the vault of Korinn's Keep, far from the lich's reach.From Honor Among Thieves, it is unknown how the horn managed to pass from Szass Tam's possession and into the Harpers', and when this occurred. Most likely, they stole it to prevent him using it again. While speculative, the event is included here for context.
===The Greatest Evil Unleashed===
In the mid-1490s DR, the Red Wizard Sofina, now operating in disguise, hired the ex-Harper turned thief Edgin Darvis and his band of thieves, Holga Kilgore, Simon Aumar, and Forge Fitzwilliam, to aid her in infiltrating Korinn's Keep to steal its treasures. But the horn of beckoning death was her true goal and Sofina and Forge betrayed Edgin and Holga and escaped with their prizes.
Two years later, Sofina had aided Forge to become Lord of Neverwinter. But their scheme was far larger and more terrible in scope than simply ruling. One of the Forge's main acts was to revive the High Sun Games, a monster-filled bloodsport that had been banned by Lord Neverember as he considered them too brutal. Forge also ordered the construction of the Neverwinter arena to host the Games.As no structure of the kind has been seen or mapped in Neverwinter before, the arena is presumed to be new and built by Forge. The first Games were to be held in the late 1490s DR, allegedly as a way of bringing the city together, as well as many wealthy visitors from outside Neverwinter, with their riches.
During the High Sun Games themselves, Forge Fitzwilliam encouraged everyone in the audience to stay until the very end, promising "a wonderful gift" for each of them, and later tried to flee the city with the riches he'd stolen. Finally, the culmination of the games, Sofina revealed herself as a Red Wizard of Thay and used the horn of beckoning death above the Neverwinter arena. The crimson smoke engulfed the viewing platform used by the gamblers and the servants, turning Din Caldwell and Porb Piiradost and the others into ravening zombies. Fortunately, Edgin and his thieves used a portal from the hither-thither staff to pour the stolen treasure from a hot-air balloon over the stands and streets, leading all the people out. The Beckoning Death was rendered useless and Sofina's concentration was broken, ending the spell.
==Appendix==
===Notes===
===See Also===
* Chaos Curse
===Gallery===
Horn of beckoning death concept.jpg|Concept art of the horn of beckoning death.
===Appearances===
===References===
Category:Magic items
Category:Wondrous items
Category:Horns
Category:Items from Thay
Category:Items from the Unapproachable East
Category:Items from East Faerûn
Category:Items from Faerûn
Category:Items from Toril
Category:Items