“Except for the drow,” said Catti-brie.
“Yes, and that they were not Lolthians, that their society was neither cruel nor unjust. Quite the opposite, for if what Freewindle told me in his rambling tales of these drow is true, we have come upon a society that is egalitarian and moral, a place where you survive because you can rely on others and where they survive because they know they can rely on you. Do you now understand what such a promise means to me, who had to survive Menzoberranzan? To Zaknafein, who gave his very life simply so that his matron wouldn’t murder her own son, and for no better reason than him denying the vile demands of the Spider Queen?”
“So Zak knew,” Entreri said.
“No,” Jarlaxle sharply replied. “I told no one but Dab’nay, who was with me in the east, and swore her to secrecy as well. Do you realize how great the disappointment would have been for Zak if Freewindle’s tales were indeed rambling fantasies? I could not do that to him, or even to Kimmuriel or Gromph.”
“Gromph?” Catti-brie echoed incredulously.
“Gromph,” Jarlaxle declared. “Or any of the others. Any of Bregan D’aerthe, and most of those in Menzoberranzan, as well. I didn’t tell you for the same reason Dab’nay wouldn’t: because we understand the stakes here for those of us who escaped Menzoberranzan and the Spider Queen. This, Callidae, the aevendrow, all of it, is something we dared not even hope.
“So, no, I reject your anger and your claim that I deceived you, because this is, too, about Doum’wielle, for her sake, for the sake of her poor mother, and for the hope that we can do something to prevent, or mitigate, or at least make sure the correct side wins in, the coming storm in Menzoberranzan. That may not matter to you, but it matters to me, deeply.”
“It doesn’t matter to me,” Entreri said, but he looked down as he did, not making eye contact, and Catti-brie thought he had just wanted to say something, anything, to strike back for being deceived.
“It matters to me,” Catti-brie said to Jarlaxle. “It matters to my husband, to my family.” As she finished, she considered Drizzt’s mood of late, and silently added to herself, I think.
“That said, I add this warning: we don’t really know what Callidae is,” she added.
“We’ve seen them fight,” Entreri interjected, looking up again, his expression deadly serious. “You don’t learn that in knitting circles or from painting pretty pictures. And in my night with Vessi, I saw them fight even more, weapon duels with blunted blades. If a score of aevendrow fought a score of Menzoberranzan drow, the only bet I would take is that both would lose.”
“It’s a harsh land,” Catti-brie reminded him.
“Perhaps,” Entreri replied. “But it is my experience that those who fight so well fight often.”
“They are as they seem,” Jarlaxle insisted. “They play hard, they love free, they live for life itself. I saw this on the Stenchstreets of Menzoberranzan. For all my life, I thought that merely a response to the strict edicts of the matrons and Lolth, but now I see that the ways of the Stenchstreets were because the drow there, for all the pressures and threats upon them, were free.”
Entreri scoffed, but said nothing as a woman came over to the table then, carrying two drinks in each hand. Her hair was more blue than white, and her skin showed bluish shades amid the dusky gray of drow heritage. Her eyes, too, were blue, light blue, though, not the same deep hue as Catti-brie’s. Still, blue was an eye color none of the three had ever seen on a drow. She was dressed in a beautifully laced and revealing gown, trimmed with golden fur that seemed soft enough to fall into and never return. She placed down three of the mugs, which looked like glass but were, in fact, made of ice, and were filled with a heady beer.
“To new friends,” she toasted, lifting her own mug for a large swallow. “Billibi,” she said after she had wiped her foamy lips, and she indicated one of the aevendrow, who was pushing a large cart. “He will come by with a fine assortment. Take what you will, but if you are very hungry, take the tagliog. It is the steak of the tail, full of fat.” She smacked her lips together and winked, then started away, but paused and turned back. “I spoke with Ilina,” she said seriously. “You haven’t done as she asked.”
The three looked at the woman curiously.
“Persimmons,” the blue-eyed drow explained. “With kurit muskox cheese and Scellobelee ice wine, of course. I have some coming for you shortly. You will thank me.”
Another wink and she danced away.
“I’ve found the answer of the gods,” Jarlaxle said, “for surely I’ve died and gone to paradise.”
“This is a place where danger is all about,” Catti-brie said. “They survive by counting on each other. Maybe that’s the key to their love of life. I think you are right, Jarlaxle.”
“Gioi,” the rogue said. “The love of life and the appreciation that it is temporary.” He hoisted his ice mug and Catti-brie tapped it with her own.
“I’m surprised there is such a word in your language,” said Entreri. “But as to what you claim as the reason,” he added to Catti-brie, “haven’t you also described Menzoberranzan? What gioi do you find there, surrounded by danger?”
“The Stenchstreets,” Jarlaxle said again.
“The murders,” Entreri countered again.
“The Stenchstreets without the shadows of Lolth, then,” said Catti-brie, and to that, she and Jarlaxle lifted their icy mugs again.
This time, after a grunt and a grumble—because he was, after all, Artemis Entreri—Entreri joined in.
The tail steak was every bit as delicious as promised, and the trio were devouring large cuts when the blue-eyed woman returned.
“You are a priestess, I am told,” she said to Catti-brie.
The woman nodded, her mouth full.
“When magic returns, I will teach you how to create this,” the drow promised.
“What is your name?” Jarlaxle asked.
“Ah, I know yours and forgot to tell you my own! I am called Ayeeda, but my real name is Aida’Umptu.”
“I’d love to learn to make it,” Catti-brie said. “I’m amazed that this can be accomplished without killing an animal.”
“It’s a necessity, since there are so few animals around. Besides, we love our animals. Consider this: I share my house with two mukteff. I would no sooner skin them than I would skin . . . well, you! And I must admit, I do find the color of your skin quite beautiful.”
“Should I worry?” Catti-brie asked with a laugh.
“No, but maybe he should,” Ayeeda answered, and she poked Entreri’s shoulder, then laughed and spun away.
“So it is true, as we were told. They have learned to shape their magic to replicate beautiful things,” Catti-brie said when she was gone. “You really are in your paradise, Jarlaxle.”
The look Jarlaxle returned in that moment truly gave the woman pause, for she had never seen such an expression on the face of the irascible rogue. He looked like he was about to cry.
Ayeeda returned soon after with the promised persimmons. She pulled up a chair and joined the friends, and showed them how to properly eat the Scellobelee delicacy, with the perfect and necessary ratio of cheese to the fruit, with the wine chaser close at hand.
“As I promised!” came a voice when the four took their first bite and sip of wine, and they turned to find Ilina, Emilian, Ahdin Duine, and several others coming over to join them.
“There is only one greater joy to be found in all of Callidae,” Ayeeda said, and she cast a glance at Entreri. “And even that is a contested opinion!”
“Yes, cazzcalci,” Ahdin Duine immediately countered. “Cazzcalci. There is nothing to exceed cazzcalci.”
“To Ahdin Duine, then,” said Emilian, lifting a mug. “If she does not find an opportunity to get on the rink this festival, then may she find a full battle next sunset!”
“Ahdin Duine!” the others cheered.
“Where is Vessi?” Entreri asked, looking about to see if he was among the group.
“He is in seclusion, of course. Biancorso will not be seen until their first battle under the shimmering night.”
“The shimmering night?”
Filled mugs were brought to all and the next toast roared throughout the common room. “Biancorso! Quista Canzay!”
“Your head will hurt even more tomorrow,” Catti-brie warned Entreri as he put his mug back to the table and suppressed what clearly would have been a tremendous belch.
“Worth it,” he replied.
Catti-brie sat back and joined in the toast. She still couldn’t dismiss the fear that this was all a deception, but as the revelry wore on, she came to realize that her fear remained only because she truly didn’t want it to be a ruse. Even aside from whatever danger such a deception might mean for her and her friends, she didn’t want this to be anything other than what it seemed.
For Jarlaxle.
For Zaknafein.
And more than that, for Drizzt.
And most of all, for Brie.
“I must say goodbye for now,” Azzudonna told Zak.
Zak spent a moment catching his breath, which was becoming increasingly difficult. He felt as if he had a feather in the back of his throat, one that constantly tickled him. “Where?” he managed to ask.
“I must go into seclusion with Biancorso before cazzcalci,” the warrior explained. “Sunset is only three days away. We must prepare. We must consider nothing but cazzcalci.”
Zak nodded and turned his head back to a neutral position, staring straight up at the ice. He thought of his son, and now believed he would never see Drizzt again. He thought of Catti-brie—yes, he would have them bring her to his bedside. He owed her an apology for those early days when he had first come back to life, when he hadn’t quite been able to get beyond the prejudices that had been ingrained in him since the day of his birth. Even if, especially if, it was with his last breath, he wanted to tell her that one more time. He hoped for a better world for his granddaughter, and now, seeing this place, he dared to believe it could be so.
But still, he could not die happy. He could not leave again now and accept it.
“I will fight,” he declared, though he really didn’t even know what he was fighting. He had no feeling in his shoulder or his arm, but that was mostly the ice, he figured. What was scaring him, though, was the creep of tingling numbness and the crackling lines that now covered half his chest and had crossed over to his other hip and down his right leg.
“I wish you would fight beside me in cazzcalci,” Azzudonna said. “Next year, yes!”
Zak heard the false optimism in her declaration, her exaggerated exuberance for his sake. She understood what he was facing here. He turned his head to regard her again and, despite his discomfort, was struck by the image. A fire burned in the room behind her, its light dancing into the deep alcove. She was on all fours, the tunnel being too low to stand in, and was shifted just a bit to the side, her head bent that way, her smile wide.
Too wide for the fears that were in her heart, Zak knew, but he couldn’t help but appreciate her effort here.
Her long hair bundled on her shoulder and rained down from there, like a sparkling waterfall, the flickers of firelight flashing between the strands with her every movement.
There was something about her in this moment, in this light, a softness that struck Zak profoundly, and it took him a moment to understand why.
He had never seen a drow woman this . . . gentle. This emotionally open. This giving. The closest had been Dab’nay, and his scattering thoughts began to summon those tender memories with the priestess. He began to lose himself in that past.
Azzudonna lifted her hand from the floor, holding something, and Zak was brought back to the present.
His shirt?
“This was yours, yes?” she asked.
He managed a slight nod.
“May I tear it?”
The question confused him.
“A strip of it,” she explained. “I wish to wear it about my wrist in the battle. I will be Zaknafein’s champion, if he will allow.”
Zak nodded.
She gave a tug, creating only a minor tear.
“Mithral,” Zak whispered as the woman inspected the garment and noted the light metal inside the fabric layers. She smiled and separated enough to rip a piece off the tail of the shirt. She looped it about her right wrist, rolled it under into a knot, and looped it again, then tightened it, tugging with her left hand while holding the other end in her teeth.
She stared at him with those lavender eyes so much like his son’s, smiling all the while. “There,” she proclaimed when she was done, holding her hand out to him, the back near to his face.
“Do you give me your blessing?” she asked when he didn’t respond.
He started to say he would when Azzudonna moved her hand a bit, showing him what she meant. Zak leaned forward and kissed the back of her hand. Then she took his hand and similarly kissed it.
“Biancorso will win,” the woman said. “I will throw with the strength of Zaknafein.”
“Throw?” he tried to ask, but barely a sound came out.
“Rest, my new friend,” she answered. “Rest and fight against the affliction. Sunset is soon and the wane of magic will turn to wax. Hold strong and we will win your fight soon after Biancorso wins its battles. I promise.”
She came forward more then, and pressed her lips against Zak’s cheek.
“I promise,” she said again, and she crawled back out of the alcove.
Zak closed his eyes and tried to focus his will. But it was harder now. He was glad for her promise.
Even if he didn’t believe it.
Chapter 19
Cazzcalci
“He looks terrible,” a devastated Catti-brie said to Galathae when she and the paladin left the building housing Zak’s vault. It could not be denied. Catti-brie had been coming to him every few hours since the aevendrow had allowed it, and Zak’s accelerating disease was plain to see. Now the entire left side of his chest was swollen and red, almost glowing red, and his mouth had stretched, reaching nearly from ear to ear, making him almost unrecognizable. He was failing, clearly, and he was changing.
Galathae offered her a hand on the shoulder for support, but said nothing in reply.
“I thought your people had experience with this,” Catti-brie said.
“Vast experience. Too much experience.”
“And knew how to counteract it, to heal the phage.”
“There is a reason we have increased our watch about the city in this time of the year,” Galathae replied. “There is a reason why none but those patrols are outside of Callidae at this time. We have little experience with the chaos phage in the time of Twilight Autunn because we do not engage the slaadi in this time, nor do they—so dependent upon magic themselves—press their attacks against us. Twilight Autunn is a time of peace because there is no magic, no illusions, no healing, no escape.
“Zaknafein has to survive through the first few days of this sunset,” she went on. “He must find it within himself to resist the final bites of the transformation until our magic returns. Perhaps the herbs and the ice will help to slow the progress, but it is his will that will carry him through.”
“And if not?”
“He will become a red slaad.”
“And your magic? You said the greatest of spells . . .”
“We have nothing to save him, then,” Galathae grimly replied. “Once, so say the histories, we had a wizard who reversed the transformation, who wished the victim back to her previous life as aevendrow. But it cost the wizard greatly and he was not able to cast that most powerful of magic spells ever again, to the day of his death.”
That thought jarred Catti-brie’s thoughts. A wish spell? Who did she know who might cast such a legendary dweomer? No Harpells, certainly. She thought of the Hosttower of the Arcane. If anyone there could perform such a great feat of magic it would be . . . Gromph Baenre.
Could he? More importantly, would he?
“If the transformation is completed, Zaknafein will be quickly and mercifully slain,” Galathae said, jolting the woman from her thoughts.
“No,” she argued. “We will take him back to the south. We have powerful wizards—”
“No,” Galathae interrupted. “You would have no way to get him back there in time for any wizard to perform such a reversal.”
“And you would not allow it,” Catti-brie said.
Galathae didn’t confirm that, but Catti-brie could see that the paladin was truly torn here. The slaadi were obviously mortal enemies of the aevendrow, and the thought of letting another of the beasts free was not one the paladin could easily digest. Red slaad were prolific procreators, so Galathae had told her.
“Sunset is tomorrow,” Galathae said. “Take heart. Zaknafein is strong—most would have succumbed long before now. Our magic will return soon, as will yours.”
Catti-brie nodded and took a deep and steadying breath, steeling herself against the grim possibility before her. Because she saw the decline and doubted Zak would live another day.
“The battle is tomorrow,” she said, hardly thinking.
“Cazzcalci, yes. It is glorious.”
“Have you ever fought in it?”
“Almost. But my journey and my piety took me to another place, one that I value greatly,” Galathae explained.
Catti-brie nodded. “Glorious and vicious, yes?” she asked. “Few rules and the violence of a weaponless war, so I’ve heard.”
“What you have heard is true, though I doubt you can fully appreciate it until you have witnessed it. All of Callidae turns out for the four battles, each cheering for their borough, each cheering for the tradition of this place we call home, and the determination that keeps us here alive.”
“Why would you do that in this time?” Catti-brie asked. “If people are wounded, you have no magical healing, no potions even.”
“If?” the paladin echoed with a chuckle. “Many will be wounded, some terribly.”
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