Rethnor was not accustomed to such insolence from a mere female, and his black brows pulled down into a stern V of disapproval. “Mind your tongue, woman.”
The drow glowered at him. “Your eyes are worse than I had suspected, if you mistake me for a woman! I am Shakti, matron heiress to House Hunzrin. You should know the name of the person who brings your death, and I swear by the Mask of Vhaeraun that I will kill you if you presume to lay hands—hand,” she sneered pointedly, “upon me, ever again.”
He shrugged off this warning. “You are certain the ship has escaped? But how is this possible?”
“The drow I seek is a wizard. She is … powerful,” Shakti admitted from between gritted teeth, and then she struck the ship’s rail with her balled fists and let out a string of what Rethnor took to be drow curses.
“The wench is not out of reach, not even on Ruathym,” the captain said, surprised to find himself giving assurance to the angry elf. “You will have your prisoner yet.”
The drow stopped in midtirade and eyed him warily, as if weighing his words on some scale of her own. He returned her stare, letting her measure him as she would.
“I had never given thought to how persons might be shaped by the world around them,” she mused. “The underground home of the drow is complex, riddled with layers and full of unexpected twists and turns. And you—you are as cold and as deep as this sea, are you not?” she said with obvious approval.
“But little good will that do me!” she mused, her mood turning dark once again. The drow snatched Rethnor’s left sleeve, and before he could guess her intent, she lifted the maimed limb mockingly high, as if raising an imaginary sword in a gesture of challenge.
“You wish to kill the man who took your hand,” she scoffed, “yet you have not bothered to have it replaced! Only a fool would go into battle without his sword hand!”
Again Rethnor stared at the drow, this time with a stirring of fascinated interest. “Replaced?”
“Or improved, if you prefer,” Shakti said smugly. “In my homeland, our priestesses could regenerate a limb to its original state, only younger and stronger. Or our artisans could build you a new one—or several, each to suit a different purpose—of steel and mithril that is nonetheless as supple as flesh. Of course, if we were in my homeland, you would by now be either dead or enslaved.”
The captain ignored this taunt. “Could you do this?”
“Not here,” she admitted. “The needed tools and magic remain in the Underdark. But I could replace your hand with that of another human.”
“No man would consent to such a thing!”
“I never imagined that one might,” Shakti said dryly, not understanding the captain’s horrified reaction. “But there are human slaves in Ascarle, are there not? And I assume a slave’s consent would hardly be needed. When we return, choose one that pleases you, and I will see to the rest.”
Rethnor fell silent as he pondered the drow’s macabre suggestion, and he wondered what kind of being could speak of such things so casually. He had heard there were spells like this—usually wielded by necromancers, those wizards who dealt in death. He’d even heard rumors of a hideous slave trade in which healthy men were captured and sold for such purposes, their bodies auctioned off piece by piece as if they were mere swine to be divided into hams and chops and bacon. This notion went against all Rethnor’s Northman sensibilities, for how could a man unwhole hope to enter the halls of a warrior god? And the very thought of integrating the flesh of another man with his own utterly appalled him.
And yet …
“The hand,” he began tentatively. “How much skill will it hold? Will I be able to wield a sword again? Not just lift it and flail about, but will I be a master?” he demanded, his voice gaining passion as he spoke.
The drow eyed him with a dour expression. “It depends. How skilled were you before?”
“Very. The best.”
“But why would you offer to do this?”
Shakti smiled in grim approval, shielding her eyes against the starlight with one hand and turning her gaze far out over the dark waters. “You doubt my motives. That is good.”
He waited, but the drow did not add to this. “You consider it wise to go into battle with only strong allies,” he guessed.
Her eyes darted like two mocking red flames to his face. “If you like. That explanation will do as well as any.”
Although Rethnor was not accustomed to verbal fencing, he was a skilled swordsman, and he knew a parry in any form. A familiar exhilaration came over him as he met the challenge in the elf woman’s crimson eyes. He had not had a good battle for many days, and he hungered for the thrust and retreat, the bold attack and the clever treachery that made for a truly good match. Here, in a guise stranger than any he had ever imagined possible, was a foe truly worthy of battle.
And perhaps, he thought as he considered the ample curves beneath the elf woman’s somber dark robes, this one was worthy of conquest, as well.
“How do you propose to capture the wizard?” Shakti demanded, shattering his pleasantly salacious musings and returning him to the task at hand.
“She will no doubt head for Ruathym. I have spies on and around the island.” He hesitated, not sure how much he should reveal. Enough, he decided, to gain this one’s confidence. There was a new hand to be gained and perhaps a bit more.
“There is a portal between Ascarle and Ruathym,” he said. “Recently discovered, it is an ancient magical path, probably conjured by the elves who once lived in both lands. Messengers use the portal to carry orders. When your enemy reaches the island, we will know of it.”
Shakti stared at him as she absorbed this. “Why doesn’t the illithid use this portal to launch an attack?”
“You have much to learn of the Kraken Society,” he told her. “Information is the weapon it provides, not warriors. Vestress asserts that it is better for all if Ruathym appears to collapse largely under the weight of its own lawlessness.”
The drow sneered. “And you believe that? There is one reason alone why the illithid does not use the portal for conquest: she cannot.”
Rethnor did not dispute her words, for he himself had occasionally wondered why his Kraken contact—whom until recently he had visualized as the woman in his lost scrying ring—had insisted that the portal could be used only by her fey messengers.
“What type of beings carry your orders?” the drow demanded, her words echoing his unspoken thoughts.
“Nereids. They are vain and malicious creatures from another world—”
“The elemental plane of water,” she interrupted. “Yes, I know all about those. But what about mortal beings? Humans, elves? The illithid’s sea ogre troops? Can they pass through?”
Rethnor considered this. “I do not know.”
Shakti gave a derisive sniff. “Perhaps we should find out.” She jolted suddenly as if a new and illuminating thought had struck her.
“Liriel has proven herself skilled at managing portals,” she mused. “If she can move an entire ship, surely she could find a way to pass through the gate that leads from Ruathym to Ascarle.”
“Ah,” Rethnor said, smiling a little as he nodded his approval. “You plan to lure this drow through the portal to Ascarle.”
“Try not to be any more of an idiot than you must,” Shakti advised him coldly. “Of course I would not risk such a prize in an untried portal! But think on this: by now the illithid knows Liriel Baenre as well as I myself do! Vestress has asked me many questions about the rogue wizard and has no doubt taken any information from my mind that I did not speak aloud. I now understand the illithid’s interest. Mark me, Vestress needs the yellow-eyed bitch as much as I do!”
“To help her open the portal,” Rethnor reasoned.
“It is the only possible explanation,” Shakti agreed in a glum tone. The illithid had brought Shakti here, ostensibly to learn about recent events in the Underdark. Shakti, in return for this information, had been given sur
face contacts to the vast trade and intrigue network of the Kraken Society. It had seemed a worthwhile exchange for both. But as she reviewed her conversations with the illithid, Shakti realized Vestress had shown an inordinate amount of interest in Liriel and her adventures. Whatever worth Shakti had to the illithid was temporarily overshadowed by the promise of Liriel’s wizardly skill. This deeply angered Shakti. Despite her newfound power and confidence, she found that her resentment of the Baenre princess was as keen as ever.
The drow seethed with deep frustration as she measured the delay Liriel’s escape would bring. Shakti wished to return to Menzoberranzan as soon as possible. She could not do so, however, on her own power. The water wraith had brought her to the elemental plane of water, and from there to the undersea city. Shakti had expected a brief meeting with the head of the Kraken Society, not an extended stay. The demanding Baenres—Matron Triel and that wretched Gromph—might accept a brief absence while Shakti met with surface conspirators, but this delay was becoming untenable. The longer Shakti stayed away from Menzoberranzan, the more important it became that she return with a captive Liriel in tow. She could not wait for Rethnor’s spies to find the wizard. It was time for her ally from the elemental plane to make good on their deal.
“Where is Iskor?” she demanded.
“The water wraith? She disappeared when the water elemental was destroyed, and I say good riddance to them both,” Rethnor responded.
A wise move on Iskor’s part, Shakti thought grimly. The priestess was losing patience with the flighty creature and had started contemplating ways by which she might shatter the water nymph’s glassy form. But those pleasant thoughts aside, Shakti needed to find Liriel, and soon, or her own welcome in Menzoberranzan would be less than cordial.
Neither Matron Triel nor Gromph were known for patience.
CHAPTER TWELVE
RUATHYM
Liriel knew she would never forget her first glimpse of Ruathym. They reached the island at twilight, and the setting sun framed the land with a spectacular display of brilliant clouds and gilded sea. But the image that would ever cling to Liriel’s memory was not that of the island’s rugged coast and fingerlike coves, or the picturesque villages and rounded green hills beyond, or even the deeply forested mountains that cast long purple shadows in the dying light. It was the look on Fyodor’s face: joy mingled with poignant longing.
“One would almost think you were returning home,” she commented.
Fyodor nodded, not taking his rapt eyes from the hills. “It is very like. If indeed my ancestors came from this place, I think I know how they must have felt when first they saw Rashemen.”
His dream of homecoming was contagious, and for a moment Liriel missed the familiar tunnels and caverns of the Underdark. A stab of pain—and jealousy—pierced her. In all likelihood, she would never again see her ancestral home, and it troubled her that Fyodor was so clearly eager to return to his. Not that she begrudged him his homeland. She simply realized, suddenly and forcefully, that their shared journey was all she had. Now Ruathym was within their sights. After they reached their long-sought goals, what then?
This thought had never occurred to the drow before. She was not much given to introspection, and she found it deeply troubling. Since the day she had been thrust from Menzoberranzan, Liriel had thrown herself into the perilous journey, following a rune quest meant to culminate with the permanent possession of her drow powers and Fyodor’s ability to once again control his berserker might.
But indeed—what then?
Liriel had little time to ponder this troubling thought, for the Elfmaid swept toward the island with breathtaking speed. It was a dangerous passage. Large, barren rocks thrust upward from the sea, much like the stalagmites of her homeland, forming a lethal maze that only the best—and best informed—sailors might navigate. And the harbor beyond lacked conventional docks; a rounded cove with a sweep of pebble-strewn beach served as the only landing. Shallow-keeled boats, both large and small, had been drawn up onto the beach, and a few massive piles had been driven into the sea floor to provide mooring for deeper ships. To one of these Hrolf headed, flying toward land with an abandon that had the fearless drow staring with astonishment.
Then the square sail dropped, and the oars fell deep into the water. The Elfmaid slowed abruptly, and Hrolf and his men leaped the rail and dropped into the chest-high water of the cove. Ibn stayed to secure the ship to its mooring; the others waded for shore with joyous haste.
Their approach brought a glad rush from the village beyond. Children, some of them already nightshirted for bed, evaded their mothers’ grasping hands and splashed into the water to throw themselves into the arms of returning fathers or brothers. The Ruathen women, for the most part, were more decorous, awaiting their menfolk at water’s edge with calm faces and shining eyes.
As agreed, Liriel and Fyodor hung back until Hrolf had a chance to explain their presence. The drow could hear the captain’s bluff, hearty voice raised in a storytelling cadence, but his words were muffled by the crowd who gathered around him to listen. There was no mistaking their response, however; an angry murmur began, like the rumbling hint of a summer storm, and soon erupted into a loud and bitter argument.
Liriel waited and listened, her face stoic. Fyodor’s concern, however, was written clearly in his troubled blue eyes.
“Olvir has told me much about the village,” he said. “Hrolf is much loved, but he is considered odd by his people. Sometimes they listen to his schemes, sometimes not. There is no telling how they will receive us.”
“Regardless, we have come too far to fail now,” Liriel said coldly. “We have come to this island, and the people can like it or not.”
Fyodor’s worried expression deepened, and he took the drow by the shoulders and turned her to face him. “Little raven, do you trust me?” he said urgently.
Liriel scowled. This was unlike Fyodor. The young Rashemi seemed to sense that proclamations of this sort were beyond her dark-elven sensibilities, and he usually respected her emotional boundaries.
“What’s your point?” she demanded.
He responded by sweeping a hand toward the wildly beautiful island, the snug wooden cottages, the grim-faced folk dressed in simple, brightly colored clothes.
“These people are my far kin. From all I have heard, their ways are very like those of my ancestors. You must believe me when I tell you to tread carefully.”
Liriel eyed him coldly. She might not like his words, but she had to admit there was wisdom in them. No stranger to Menzoberranzan could hope to understand its intricate layers of protocol and intrigue; this place no doubt had its own peculiar customs. She accepted Fyodor’s advice with a brusque shrug.
“What do I do?”
“Do not use magic unless you have no other choice,” he cautioned her. “I am sure Hrolf has told them you are a wizard, and many will be watching you. Do not give them any more reason to fear you than they already have. Try to remember that everything about you is strange and frightening to these people—your magic, your elven features, the reputation of your people, the silence of your step, the sound of music and wind in your voice. For a time, it is best that you speak but little. Listen and watch. Allow me to speak when it is time to tell them of our quest.”
“Tell them? This is wise?”
Fyodor nodded somberly. “It is best to speak plainly. Warrior folk prefer words that are simple and direct. Nor should we try to hide our purpose; they would not take kindly to dishonesty. Also, Olvir has given me to know that they are likely to welcome a Rashemi warrior on dajemma,” he said, naming the coming-of-age journey taken by all young men of his homeland. “Like my people, the Ruathen enjoy hearing of far places, and a wandering warrior is expected to carry tales of valor.”
“But you said you weren’t sure how they would receive us. What you really meant was not us, but me,” Liriel observed.
The young warrior shrugged. “It is much the same. We travel dajemma t
ogether; I will not go where you cannot. Hrolf will surely make this known to them.”
Liriel absorbed this in silence. She had indeed come to trust Fyodor, but she had never imagined she might have to depend so completely upon him or any other person. The proud drow was accustomed to controlling her life, making her own way. She accepted that Fyodor’s grasp of the situation was probably accurate, but it grated on her nonetheless.
“There is one more thing,” Fyodor said hesitantly. “Olvir tells me that the womenfolk of Ruathym tend to hearth and family, leaving most other matters to the men.”
The drow sniffed. “So they are fools. What of it?”
“You will need to show proper respect.” When Liriel continued to regard him blankly, Fyodor elaborated. “You have told me the womenfolk rule in your land. In Ruathym, the tables are turned, and you might expect the same sort of treatment a drow male might receive in your homeland.”
“Nine Hells!” the drow muttered, clearly appalled by this revelation. She turned a defiant glare upon her friend. “I will limit the magic and listen more than I speak, but I’ll be damned as a yochlol if I’ll bed any bearded human he-rothe that beckons for me!”
Fyodor blinked and fell back a step as he absorbed this new fact about drow culture. “Perhaps I was hasty in comparing the lot of dark-elven males and Ruathen women,” he said with a bit of wry humor. “Believe me when I say you need not fear anything of the sort.”
“Because …” Liriel prompted, hearing the rising tone in Fyodor’s voice.
Again the young man hesitated. “Since you and I travel together, they will assume you are my woman. Trust me, it is better than the only other assumption they would make about a lone female aboard a pirate ship. There is more,” he said, raising a hand to cut off Liriel’s ready tirade.
“In this land, warriors hold the highest rank. The people will consider a Rashemi berserker worthy of honor. Although they might not understand my choice of companion, if they accept your presence it will be in respect of what they consider to be my property.”
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