“My blades were inconsequential,” Barrabus said. “I would be dead on the field, with only minor victories to show for my efforts, had not that other force, who still battle beyond your walls, arrived.”
“And you know of them, too,” Jelvus Grinch said wryly.
Barrabus nodded. Jelvus Grinch grinned from ear to ear and held his arms out wide.
“What do you want?” Barrabus the Gray asked.
“Join us,” Jelvus Grinch replied. Behind him, many cheered again and echoed that sentiment.
“I just did.”
“No,” Jelvus Grinch replied, shaking his head emphatically. “Not just for that one battle. Join us in our efforts to give rise to a new and greater Neverwinter. Work with us, protect us.”
Barrabus the Gray laughed as if that notion was absurd.
“What tribute would you like?” Jelvus Grinch asked. “A statue?” He waved his arm out to the main market square. “A statue of Barrabus the Gray, blades in hand? A tribute to the warrior who kept watch so the new residents of Neverwinter could raise the city anew from the ashes of the cataclysm.”
“A statue?” Barrabus echoed incredulously. “You would carve me in stone?”
Jelvus Grinch held up his hands. “What man… what man of rotting flesh and blood, after all, would not aspire to achieve a measure of immortality in stone?”
“Or perhaps you might employ a medusa,” Barrabus teased, “and save your artisans for work on your buildings.” Suddenly a perfectly wonderful, perfectly cynical, perfectly wicked thought came to him. “Or your bridges,” he added.
“Our bridges?”
“The Winged Wyvern Bridge,” Barrabus said.
Every head in the crowd turned to regard the distant structure, just the tips of the wyvern’s wide-spread wings visible from that vantage point.
“Yes, what of it?”
“It was not always called that,” Barrabus explained.
Jelvus Grinch looked at him curiously.
“For a brief time only,” Barrabus elaborated. “The Lord of Neverwinter renamed it in the days before the cataclysm-perhaps that’s why the angry volcano unleashed its rage on the city.”
“We know nothing of-”
“Of course you don’t,” said Barrabus. “For everyone within the city at that time was killed… everyone but one.” As he ended, he turned to face the first citizen directly, his expression explaining much.
“You?” a thoroughly confused Jelvus Grinch asked.
“I was here,” Barrabus replied. “When the volcano blew, I was in Neverwinter.”
“There were no survivors,” someone behind yelled.
“Then how do I stand before you?” Barrabus said. “I was here on that fateful day.”
In the crowd beyond came many gasps.
“Master Barrabus, you already have our gratitude,” said Jelvus Grinch. “There’s no reason-”
“I’m not lying. I was here.” He pointed down at the Winged Wyvern Bridge. “I was down there, actually, standing atop the Winged Wyvern when the first explosions rolled the ground beneath the city, when the first fireball punched into the sky. I was there when the mountain leaped from afar, charging down from the Crags, through that valley. I watched the river run gray and red with molten rock and ash. I heard the thunder of every roof being shattered by great boulders, tumbling from on high.”
“You’d be dead!” one woman in the crowd shouted.
“I should be, many times over,” Barrabus said with a helpless laugh.
“You have spoken of this before,” said Jelvus Grinch.
“You have no reason not to believe my words.”
“How, then?” Jelvus Grinch asked.
“Go to the center of the Winged Wyvern,” Barrabus said. He reached down and flipped his belt buckle, turning it into a knife. He held the blade up in front of the surprised Jelvus Grinch. Many in the crowd gasped once more.
“Climb under the bridge,” Barrabus bade him.
“Under?”
Barrabus laughed. “You will find it, ‘BtG,’ scratched in the stone with this very knife on the day I was certain my life was at its end.”
“You weathered the storm of the volcano under the Winged Wyvern Bridge?”
“Can I say it any more clearly?”
Jelvus Grinch started to respond, but simply couldn’t find the words. He glanced back at his comrades, who shrugged, nodded, or shook their heads.
“The Winged Wyvern Bridge,” Jelvus Grinch muttered in disbelief.
“A fr-An enemy once claimed that to be a stupid name,” Barrabus said. “Though I loathe him, I cannot disagree.”
“What do you want?”
“You wish me to work with you, to help keep you safe while you rebuild your city,” said Barrabus.
“Yes.”
“Rename the bridge.”
“Barrabus?”
“The Walk of Barrabus,” the grayish man replied. He easily envisioned the froth coming from the lips of Herzgo Alegni when he learned of it.
“It’s possible,” Jelvus Grinch said after glancing around to determine the mood of the crowd. “And you will join with us and serve as captain of the Neverwinter Guard?”
“No,” Barrabus answered without the slightest hesitation, and that, of course, drew more than a few whispers.
“I’ve already served you well,” Barrabus said. “And I’ll continue to be around-perhaps I’ll choose to help you again when the need arises, as it surely will.”
Jelvus Grinch blew a heavy sigh. “So much like the drow,” he said, and Barrabus perked up at that reference.
“Do tell.”
“Heroes wander through Neverwinter and aid in our plight, but none will stay,” one woman said.
“That’s my bargain,” said Barrabus. “And know that I’ll be more inclined to aid in your cause, whatever that cause may be, should I learn of the Walk of Barrabus.” With a curt bow and a little grin, the small man took his leave.
“Would that Drizzt Do’Urden had kept his swords in Neverwinter,” he heard one man lament as he moved toward the gate.
The name stabbed at the heart of Barrabus the Gray.
“Is he dead?” Sylora Salm asked, only half-jokingly. She looked at Jestry, splayed head down over the arm of a couch. His hand hung down and his fingers barely brushed the floor. His naked back showed bright lines of blood from many deep scratches.
“I’ve been known to kill a few,” Arunika replied with a laugh. She walked over and slapped Jestry hard on the side of his head, and he stirred and coughed. “But not this one. Not your pet. Not yet.”
“Not at all, I beg,” Sylora replied, reaching for her own clothes and wincing at a few of her own scratches. “When Jestry is of no use to me, I’ll take that pleasure as my own.”
“You believe he’ll live that long?”
“He’s a fine warrior.”
“You just told me that you intend to pit him against Lady Dahlia,” Arunika said, for indeed the two had shared much in conversation these last hours, their words punctuated by the heavy snoring of the exhausted Jestry. “How many times did you mention her prowess with that unusual weapon of hers?”
“Not enough times to do her justice, I admit,” said Sylora. “Kozah’s Needle is a mighty weapon indeed, and none have ever mastered it to compare with Dahlia’s proficiency.”
“And this one?” Arunika asked, and she grabbed a clump of Jestry’s hair and pulled his head up so that Sylora could see his face. The sight had both females smiling. Jestry’s lips were wet with spittle. Arunika let him go and his head dropped and bobbed. “Do you believe that he can stop her?”
“I hope it won’t come to that, but should it, I intend to offer him every advantage.”
Arunika smiled and headed for a dresser across the room. Sylora watched her, enjoying the view, her perfect humanoid form not blocked, but somehow enhanced, by those leathery devil wings.
Arunika reached into a drawer and fumbled with some ti
es. Then she reached in farther, up to her elbow, up to her shoulder, though there was no way the drawer could be nearly that deep. She felt around for a bit and retracted her hand from the obviously extra-dimensional bag, holding a small box. She moved back to stand in front of Sylora.
“A gesture of good will,” she said. “To seal our alliance.”
“I thought we’d just done that,” Sylora replied seductively, and Arunika laughed.
The succubus bent low in front of the sorceress and slowly opened the box, revealing a copper ring with an empty gemstone setting.
“A stormcatcher band,” the devil explained.
Sylora looked at it, and back at Arunika.
“It will catch the magic of Kozah’s Needle and turn it back on Dahlia,” Arunika explained.
Sylora’s smile widened. She gingerly reached for the band and pulled it from the box, holding it up in front of her eyes.
“I’m sure that my alliance with Brother Anthus will provide more to help you build your champion,” Arunika said.
The devil was right, Sylora knew. She wasn’t looking at Jestry as a man, a free-willed human being. He was her champion, or soon to be, and she would construct him as such, with armor, with a superior weapon, with this stormcatcher ring. He was an instrument, not a companion. Even in their sexual encounters, Jestry was no more to her than a means to an end, and woe to him if he failed in that role. He had purpose only in those goals Sylora determined.
Something stirred deep within the sorceress, some regret that she’d allowed herself to move to such a place of callousness. What forks in her road had she chosen? What decisions might she have made to alter this destination in her life?
Sylora let these questions fly away as she glanced back at the ring, reminding herself of how badly she wanted to see the corpse of Lady Dahlia. Perhaps she would raise the witch as a personal zombie servant. Perhaps, with Valindra’s help, she might even be able to allow Dahlia to retain enough of her former self so that her continuing torment at Sylora’s hand would wound her all the more profoundly.
Sylora peered through the ring at Jestry and considered the many tools she could bestow upon him to give him the edge he needed. What a fine beginning this ring would offer! Sylora grinned wickedly as she imagined Dahlia hurled backward by the lightning burst of Kozah’s Needle. She remembered the elf’s pretty face so very well, and in her mind, she twisted it into a look of sheer shock and stinging pain. That was how Dahlia would recognize the last moments of her life.
Delicious.
“So, once again, I’m needed to save the pitiful Barrabus the Gray from certain doom,” Herzgo Alegni announced loudly when Barrabus entered the Netherese encampment not far from the gates of Neverwinter.
“All hail Herzgo Alegni!” one of the Shadovar saluted, and others took up the cheer.
Every laughing face that met the gaze of Barrabus went stoic immediately, though, for the assassin obviously wasn’t taking the joke very well.
“Saved me?” Barrabus remarked to Alegni, stepping up in front of him.
“Why, my small friend, it was obvious,” the tiefling replied. “They had you flanked-an army of zealots against one small man.”
“Do you believe that I would’ve been foolish enough to go out amid that swarm had I not known of your impending arrival?” Barrabus replied.
“You deny your predicament?”
“I served you up a feast of zealots,” Barrabus said, and he took great satisfaction in seeing the doubt spreading on the faces of the gathered Shadovar-and all of Herzgo Alegni’s charges had gathered and were listening intently by this point. “I could have remained within the city walls, of course, destroying zombies. But to what end?” He turned around, appealing to the crowd as if they were a greater and more important judge than Herzgo Alegni.
“To what end?” he said again, more loudly. “The zealots had recognized that they couldn’t breach the wall, and seemed content to let their zombie fodder do what damage they may. But I, of course, could not allow that, and so I ventured out. I knew that the zealots couldn’t resist the chance to defeat the Gray. I knew they would find comfort in their numbers and would come forth from the forest. What a prize they might have scored-”
“Enough!” Herzgo Alegni shouted.
“And this is the gratitude I’m shown for taking such a risk?” Barrabus continued, spinning back on Alegni. “You mock me when I’m the cause of your vic-”
He ended with a growl of pain as Herzgo Alegni drew his red blade just enough to tap the tuning fork in his hand. Answering the call, Claw sent forth its devastating magical energy-powers attuned to the life force of Barrabus the Gray.
“This… is the… gratitude…” Barrabus the Gray said through teeth clenched so hard the veins on his neck stood out clearly.
Herzgo Alegni leaned in close and whispered, “You would mock me in front of my minions?”
Barrabus growled in response, and Alegni gripped his sword tighter, bidding it to greater intensity.
Barrabus went down to one knee. He lowered his head, trying to fight the pain, but a cough escaped his lips and it carried with it bright red blood.
“Why do you force me to treat you this way?” Herzgo Alegni asked, walking around him. “Certainly you did your job… acceptably, though I’m surprised that you put yourself into such a situation that required me to rush my counterattack in order to save your life. Perhaps I should have let the zealots slaughter you.”
Barrabus thought that a preferable choice, indeed.
A few heartbeats slipped past, and finally Alegni called to his sentient sword and the vile blade released its grip on Barrabus the Gray. It took all of his willpower to keep from toppling over. He slumped down to both knees, but he wouldn’t give Alegni the satisfaction of seeing him lying on the ground.
“You let her escape,” Alegni said.
Barrabus managed to turn his gaze up to the tiefling.
“The witch, Valindra,” Alegni explained.
“The lich, you mean?”
“She’s both. Our victory would’ve been complete if we’d taken her down. And if you had fought better against the worthless zealots, I could have delayed my charge and the lich would have more likely been lured into the battle.”
Barrabus rose to one knee, letting the waves of anguish pass. He tried to ignore Alegni’s preposterous claims, because he knew that otherwise he would surely say something the Netherese lord would make him regret.
“So I had to choose… because of your mediocrity,” Alegni went on. “But in the end, I had nothing to gain by delaying. The lich would’ve destroyed you from afar and would have remained beyond my grasp anyway.”
Alegni’s gloved hand appeared in front of Barrabus’s face, and the assassin knew better than to let that invitation pass. He took the hand and the powerful tiefling roughly hoisted him to his feet.
“So, as I explained, I saved you, and for no reason other than my generosity,” Alegni insisted, and he ended with a prompting stare at Barrabus.
“Thank you, my lord,” said Barrabus. “I’m not worthy.”
“No,” Alegni agreed. “Not unless you can assure me that your efforts in the battle, and indeed your warning to the Neverwinter settlers of the coming storm, has put you in proper standing among them.”
“They begged me to stay,” Barrabus said.
Herzgo Alegni considered that for a short while. “You can gain access to the city whenever you choose?”
“They will throw their gates open wide for me.”
Alegni nodded, taking his time as he considered the words. Finally, he started walking away. “Then perhaps you were worth the effort of my rescue,” he said without looking back, “despite your ineptitude.”
“You got your prize!” Barrabus dared yell after him.
“The lich escaped.”
“The prize was the defeat of the Thayan forces, and they are defeated,” Barrabus insisted. “The prize was my foothold into Neverwinter, and the
y are ready to celebrate me as their first citizen!”
Herzgo Alegni stopped walking away and a hush fell over the gathering, with many Shadovar actually falling back a few short steps. Slowly the Netherese lord turned around to face the impudent Barrabus.
“So I have,” he said with a wry grin. “So I have.”
Herzgo Alegni turned away and walked off, leaving the sputtering Barrabus alone in the cul-de-sac of the encampment. All of the other Shadovar dispersed, many of them looking at Barrabus and shaking their heads, as if to scold him for his ridiculous pride.
And truly Barrabus the Gray felt ridiculous at that moment. Ridiculous and helpless. Trapped as he’d never been trapped before, not even when he’d lived among the city of drow elves in the Underdark enclave of Menzoberranzan.
He took a deep breath and stood straight, denying the remnants of the wracking vibrations of pure agony.
He took some comfort in imagining the expression Herzgo Alegni might wear when he learned of the Walk of Barrabus. Alegni had long coveted that crafted bridge as his own tribute.
Barrabus the Gray would take his small victories where he could find them.
Jestry stumbled down the steps of Arunika’s front porch and staggered off after Sylora Salm. It took him a long while to compose himself enough to actually catch up to the sorceress, and when he did, she stopped short and turned a scrutinizing eye upon him.
“I don’t know what to say,” Jestry remarked.
“Gratitude?” Sylora prompted, and Jestry looked back through the trees to the small cottage, and rubbed his face.
“Yes,” he managed to whisper after a few heartbeats, and he turned to stare back at Sylora, this woman he so adored. “Surprise?”
“Why?”
He looked back to the cottage, holding up his hands to indicate to Sylora that the answer should be obvious. Among Jestry’s male peers-even some of the female zealots-discussions of such escapades were fairly common, the typical bonding and bragging of strong young warriors living on the edge of disaster. But how could Jestry even begin to brag about this night? Who would believe him?
He looked back at Sylora and couldn’t help himself. “I love you.”
She hit him so hard that his weakened legs wouldn’t support him and he tumbled sidelong to the ground.
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