“But it will be unnecessary,” Emilian said. “We are bringing a powerful force. We are not strangers to these fights and we do not intend to lose.”
“Of course, you are under no obligation to join in the battle at all,” Ilina added. “So perhaps you can guide us to the cave entrance and recall yourself and your friends to the city and await our return. We would think no ill of you in that event. This is our fight.”
“Then it is ours as well,” Catti-brie answered without hesitation, and indeed, she was shaking her head with their every word excusing her from the expected battle. “Do you think we have forgotten that you took us into your homes in our time of desperate need? Do you think we have forgotten cazzcalci and the Merry Dancers, and what you, all of you, did for our beloved friend Zaknafein? Your biggest challenge, Emilian, if you are leading the battle, will be to keep us from getting too far ahead in the fight. All we ask is that you arm us.”
“Ah yes, that,” Emilian said, nodding to Ilina, who pulled the sack from her shoulder and handed it to Catti-brie.
“Your items,” she explained. “That is a most wonderful and clever belt buckle!”
Catti-brie fished about and found the belt, holding it up for them with a grin. “Thank you. I fashioned this at the Great Forge of Gauntlgrym. The bow is Taulmaril the Heartseeker, whose creation, I believe, traces to the eladrin. You will see it in action, I’m sure.”
She bent over and again fished about in the sack. “But that is not the most favored of my possessions,” she explained, standing back up and holding a beautiful onyx figurine. “I doubt you’ve had any success in trying to sort out the magic in this one.”
Ilina and Emilian shrugged.
“Do not be startled,” Catti-brie warned. “I promise you are safe.”
The three looked at her curiously, as did a few other nearby Callidaeans.
Catti-brie second-guessed herself a couple of times on her impulsive decision, but eventually wound up back at the beginning. She closed her eyes and whispered, “Guenhwyvar.”
“Not poison?” Ilina asked when the gray mist appeared and began swirling before the human woman.
Catti-brie shook her head. “No, no. Not poison.”
“Oh, it is an artwork of smoke,” Emilian said as the swirling fog began to take shape, but the last word of that remark came out as a gasp when the huge black panther arrived right before Catti-brie, who reached down immediately and stroked the cat’s head and ears, assuring Guen that everything was peaceful and calm.
“By the Wind Gods,” Galathae gasped.
“She is beautiful,” Ilina said.
“Her name is Guenhwyvar,” Catti-brie said. “I name you as my friend, and so she is your friend. She likes to be scratched just above the shoulder.”
Ilina hesitantly moved toward the panther, but pulled back. When Emilian laughed, the priestess stepped forward again.
“And yes,” Catti-brie told them, “Guenhwyvar will join in the fight. She, too, was wounded in Zaknafein’s battle in the lower chamber, I know, because she was banished to her Astral home for recovery. Now she is healed, and quite angry with whatever it was that harmed her so. She’ll get her revenge.”
Seeing Jarlaxle in his outrageous hat and eyepatch once more brought a sense of normalcy to Catti-brie, and she was surprised how much she appreciated that feeling. As enchanting as Callidae and the aevendrow had been, as strange and beautiful and wonderful all of this had proven, she had been away from home for a long time.
She wondered if Brie would look different when she returned. They’d been gone for more than forty days; Catti-brie had lost track of time in those early days, with no real day or night to guide her, but she knew the date of the autumnal equinox they had witnessed at cazzcalci.
In some ways, it felt as if she had just left her home, but in others, it seemed like she had been gone for months and months. She wanted to see Drizzt and Brie. She needed to kiss her husband. She needed to hold her child.
She took the remaining seat at their table. The common room wasn’t crowded this day for the first time since cazzcalci, but the streets outside remained full of Callidaeans, most sleeping on the grasses near the warm water of the many tributaries that crossed Scellobel.
“I’m surprised they returned everything to me,” Jarlaxle said.
“Everything,” Catti-brie agreed. “Even Guenhwyvar. She is healed—I brought her to show my aevendrow friends, but dismissed her right after, as I expect we’ll be wanting her company soon enough.”
“Not everything,” Entreri answered.
Catti-brie returned a curious glance only for a heartbeat before catching on that there was no gauntlet on Entreri’s right hand, and no sword on his left hip. When she thought about it, she wasn’t really surprised, for Charon’s Claw was among the most powerful and malignant of magical weapons she had ever seen—much more so than Cutter, even.
“Likely they’re still trying to figure out the malice of that red blade,” Catti-brie told him. “I hope that none tried to hold it without the protective gauntlet.”
“Were that the case, then I doubt our hosts would have been so cheerful in returning our other items.”
“You still have your dirk?” Catti-brie asked Entreri.
He pulled forth the signature jeweled dagger, spun it by its tip on the table, then gathered it up and slid it back into its sheath.
Jarlaxle nodded at Catti-brie, then turned back to their other two companions and continued, “It is a ritual, I would guess, and not one that pleases me.”
“You must understand their reasoning,” Zak said. “They’ve been more generous with us than we might ever expect. What do you think might have been the reaction had a group of aevendrow stumbled upon Menzoberranzan?”
“Or Waterdeep, even,” Entreri added.
“What are you talking about?” Catti-brie asked.
“Jarlaxle believes they intend to dull our memories of this place before they allow us to leave,” said Zak.
“I would agree. Galathae has stated exactly that to me.” She looked to Jarlaxle. “You think they did that to Freewindle.”
“Maybe he was just old,” Entreri put in.
“I am sure that they did it to him,” Jarlaxle replied. “They took his memories and blurred them, or reshaped them into dreams, indistinct and without an anchor anyone might act upon.”
“Act upon to find Callidae, you mean,” Catti-brie said. “Do you blame them?”
“Of course not.”
“But that doesn’t mean we have to like it,” said Zaknafein. “I’m not too keen on allowing such an intrusion into my thoughts and memories.”
“He has often wanted to murder Kimmuriel, I fear,” Jarlaxle said lightly, drawing a laugh from Catti-brie, but a glare from Zak.
“A common thought,” Entreri remarked.
“Isn’t it possible that this elf you met was driven mad by the spell these aevendrow cast upon him?” Zak asked.
“Many thought him mad,” the undeterred Jarlaxle continued, shaking his head, “but only in regard to this place, if it even was this place.”
“Of course it was Callidae,” said Catti-brie.
“We do not know that. The world is full of coincidence. In truth, Freewindle was very old, ancient even, and he could not be sure of anything. Perhaps it had just been a dream—Freewindle was convinced it was, and then he was not, and then he was again. And certainly the old elf didn’t tell me anything to match what we have witnessed here—and truly, I don’t even know if this is the same place he dreamed of, or visited, if he even did come north.”
Catti-brie fixed him with a glare. “Perhaps we could have had this conversation in the Hosttower in Luskan.”
“I did not lie to you,” Jarlaxle protested. “I merely did not reveal my hunch.”
“Your what?”
“My hunch, I say, for it was only that.”
“But you took us here on that hunch,” she scolded.
“Not on fal
se pretense! No, Khazid’hea’s sensations are real. Perhaps we will cleanse the sword, perhaps it cannot be done, but that was never the point, after all. Doum’wielle is alive, the sword tells us. Finding her is still paramount to me. Do not underestimate her value in the cause of Menzoberranzan. If she can help us keep Barrison Del’Armgo allied with House Baenre, vile Matron Zhindia has little chance of finding friends, and so, no hopes of prevailing. And Doum’wielle is no Lolthian. It was the sword that drove her to evil deeds. We know that. Being freed of it, conquering it, will perhaps bring her to a place of desired redemption, and that place will be back in Menzoberranzan, in House Barrison Del’Armgo. Doum’wielle might help us avoid a war. Is that not a chance worthy of our efforts? Isn’t that—”
“Yes, Jarlaxle, we know,” Zaknafein interrupted him.
“And yet you should have told us all of it,” Catti-brie said, angry. “From the moment you asked us to accompany you. The very notion that there was a place akin to Callidae up here is rather important, don’t you think?”
Jarlaxle replied with a slight nod—what could he really say, after all?
“It doesn’t matter now,” Entreri put in. “We found it and know more about it than any old elf in Silverymoon might recall, yes?”
“Agreed, and so it is settled,” said a sardonic Zak. “Callidae exists.” He lifted his glass in a toast. “And glad am I that it does. Perte miye Callidae!” The others smiled at that, but didn’t toast.
“I agree with Jarlaxle’s assessment of our hosts,” Catti-brie said, bringing the topic back to the original discussion. “They will not hold us here, for they are not jailers and have no designs to do us harm in any way that I— that we, have seen. Quite the opposite. But it makes sense that they will hold many of our memories of this place.”
“As long as that’s all they demand,” Entreri said. “Though I have to admit, it is a painful price. I don’t want to forget Callidae.”
“The aevendrow will do as they must,” Catti-brie decided. “They have a lot to lose. Everything to lose.”
“You could take us home now,” Jarlaxle said. “Right now. And we could return—with Drizzt, even! Should he not see this place before it all becomes but a dream to us?”
“I cannot.”
“We will come right back,” Jarlaxle assured her. “Doum’wielle is out there, and she is important to our cause. Even if Callidae were not here, it is worth our attempt.”
Catti-brie shook her head. “We cannot.”
“Why?” a surprised Entreri asked. “I am in no rush to be away from this place—I rather like it—but why can’t we?”
“For one, we have our own obligation to them. We must take them to the cave where we fought the green slaad.”
The others nodded.
“And we will, with even more help. We can come right back to the north and fulfill that obligation,” Jarlaxle repeated.
“We can’t.” She was almost sighing at this point.
“I don’t understand,” Jarlaxle said.
“I’m unable to cast the spell,” Catti-brie explained.
“But the Twilight Autunn is over—”
“No—it’s not that. I’m not allowed to remove us from this place. On my word and my acceptance of Galathae’s geas.”
“Her what?” Entreri asked.
“A geas? You accepted a geas?” Jarlaxle asked.
“I had little choice. But yes, I did, and would have even if offered the choice.”
Entreri held up his hands, at a loss.
“It is a magical prohibition,” Catti-brie explained. “The spell would not execute to take us home even if I tried, for the geas, much like a curse, would prevent it. There is no way around it.”
“I can’t believe you let her do that,” Entreri remarked.
“I wouldn’t have cast it anyway,” Catti-brie answered him. “I gave her my word that I would not cast it, and I’ll not break my word.”
“Still,” Entreri said, staring at her, his expression catching her strangely. She could almost see him playing it all out in his thoughts, and watched as his initial resistant surprise seemed to be melting away.
“Then we have to let it play,” he said after a moment.
“Then let’s go kill some frogs,” Zak said.
After a few exchanged glances, Jarlaxle nodded his agreement, but the old rogue also rubbed his face.
He was calculating his options, Catti-brie realized, as he always did. This land of Callidae was everything to him, as she knew it would be to Drizzt. She wondered then if perhaps Jarlaxle would not return with her and the others when this was all over, and would instead choose a life here among the aevendrow.
What would that mean for her memories of Jarlaxle if their theory about the aevendrow ritual proved accurate? She couldn’t help but give a little laugh at the prospect of Jarlaxle the rogue becoming no more than a confused dream to her, Entreri, and Zaknafein. The thought of the ever-present Jarlaxle somehow being wiped from their minds seemed impossible.
There was no magic in the multiverse powerful enough to do that, Catti-brie expected. Not with Jarlaxle, whose sheer presence mocked such a possibility.
Jarlaxle started to say something, but went quiet abruptly and looked toward the inn door, past Catti-brie. She turned to see Galathae approaching, wearing a familiar gauntlet.
She removed it as she arrived, dropping it on the table in front of Entreri.
“Quite remarkable,” she told him.
“I warned you, or your friends at least, out in the rift. I hope no one ignored that warning and held or even touched the sword without the gauntlet.”
Galathae smiled and reached over her shoulder with her now-bare hand, lifting a familiar sword up and over.
“Quite remarkable,” she said again. “You were wise, and kind, to offer such a warning.” She widened her gaze to take in the others. “You do carry some powerful magic, and some with designs of its own. Evil designs, or wicked at least.”
It didn’t escape the notice of any of the four friends that this paladin drow so casually held Charon’s Claw in her bare hands. Only a powerful and veteran warrior could hold Charon’s Claw unshielded from its malignancy. The sword had no sway over her, it seemed, a keen reminder that many of these aevendrow were even more formidable than the southerners might have thought.
“I do not put it to evil use,” Entreri answered her. “Once I was a prisoner to the power of that sword when it was wielded by a Shadovar tiefling. But now . . .” He shook his head.
Galathae studied him for a moment, then very deliberately laid Charon’s Claw on the table before him. As she reached to unfasten the scabbard set across her back, Entreri put his bare hand on the backbone-like hilt of the wickedly beautiful sword and lifted its decorated red blade up before his eyes.
“The inquisitors argued over whether we should return the blade to you at this time,” Galathae admitted, handing over the scabbard. “Or substitute a white ice sword and wait to give this back until your ultimate departure from Callidae.”
“I understand your concern.”
“I was the tie-breaking vote among the inquisitors, who were tasked with deciding the fate of your various magical items,” the paladin told them all. “Pray you do not prove me wrong.”
“The only ones who will regret your choice are the giants and the slaadi,” Entreri promised.
“So you do plan to join us in the coming fight? I was told as much by Ilina and Emilian.”
“We do,” Catti-brie answered.
“Gladly,” Zak added.
“That is why I came to you now, and I am pleased to hear of this.” Galathae pointed to a nearby chair. “May I join you?”
“Of course,” all four replied, or at least nodded.
“I will tell you all that we know of battling the slaadi and the giants, in tactics and in the most and least effective magic to use against them, both to attack and to defend. These are lessons long and painfully learned by the peopl
es of the north.”
They all leaned in, particularly Catti-brie and Jarlaxle.
“Tell us, friend,” Zak said, “how we can kill these awful enemies.”
A large party of aevendrow, oroks, and kurit shadowed the four southerners from Scellobel, through Cascatte, and down the tunnel, out of the glacial rift and back toward the mountains. Night remained deep about them, the sky cloudy and hinting of snow, and no Merry Dancers were shining above later on that day’s march when they came into the dead Ulutiun town.
There, they found the calved ice block the glacier had thrown at them.
“Near the glacier, we will be careful with Zak’s whip,” Catti-brie told Ilina and the others. “And I will be careful not to reach through my ring.” As she finished, she held up her hand and rolled the ring about on her finger.
“Until we are far away,” the nearby Azzudonna replied. “Even if you think us to be safe from Qadeej’s response, the force following us is large, and may have support groups trailing distantly and still within reach of Qadeej if you anger him.”
“Of course. I saw groups of dwarves bearing heavy litters,” she agreed.
“The cave will be cleansed,” Azzudonna said, as if that explained the burden of the dwarves. She moved away then, called by some others.
“Dwarves and orcs accompany us, but I have seen no humans other than myself and Artemis Entreri,” Catti-brie mentioned to Ilina as they continued on their way.
“This is no business for Ulutiuns. We are in the mountains and so they are not needed.”
“I noted none in cazzcalci, either—fighting, I mean.”
“Those Ulutiuns who have joined Callidae do not believe in battle,” Ilina explained. “They are fine hunters—or were—but they are not warriors and do not wish to be. It is not their way. I doubt they would raise arms against the giants or even the slaadi if they invaded us in Callidae.”
“They would not protect their homes?”
“Not in battle against reasoning beings,” Ilina explained. “I don’t think it general among their peoples, but for this tribe, such things as war are forbidden.”
“Yet you value them as citizens,” Catti-brie asked as much as stated.
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