On and on it went, and finally, the umber hulk dived down to the ground and burrowed away, digging deep through the cobblestones and into the soft earth below. Barrabus actually went into the hole after it, scoring many more vicious stabs at the retreating monster’s feet and legs.
When finally he simply let the umber hulk burrow away, leaving him in a trench a dozen feet below the city square above, Barrabus blinked many times and wondered what in the Nine Hells he might have been thinking.
As he ascended, he did so to a growing chorus of elation, and indeed, when he exited, he found that some of the folk were cheering him for his actions in the square.
Mostly, however, they cheered for Herzgo Alegni, and despite Barrabus’s hatred for the tiefling, he couldn’t honestly claim that those cheers were misplaced. Not at that moment, at least.
Alegni fought a second umber hulk, his mighty sword hacking at the beast with abandon. Its skin hanging in torn flaps, the umber hulk tried to keep up with the relentless cuts, tried to turn around in pace with the surprisingly quick Alegni.
But the tiefling had gained an advantage and he would not surrender it. Claw, that terrible sword, inflicted heavy damage with each strike, damage that went beyond the torn skin and muscle, broken bones and spurting blood, damage that reached right to the heart of the umber hulk’s existence, the core of its soul.
The creature turned, and turned some more, and turned yet more as it screwed itself down to the ground, where Alegni finished it off with a great overhead chop, splitting the beast’s skull in half.
“You should have finished the task with the cataclysm,” Szass Tam scolded Sylora. The sorceress had just informed him of the new information Arunika had supplied regarding the heroic exploits of Herzgo Alegni. “He gains strength and alliance with the villagers.”
“I struck at them hard,” Sylora countered.
“You?”
“The Abolethic Sovereignty-and I count their alliance as my victory.”
“Fair enough,” Szass Tam admitted, but he chucked his disgust with every word. “Some villagers were killed, but once again, the Netherese became their heroes, did they not?”
Sylora lowered her eyes. She couldn’t answer that.
“It was a good attack,” Szass Tam unexpectedly concluded. “Many of the villagers were killed-I sense their souls feeding the Dread Ring now. And not one of our zealots was slain, not a zombie destroyed. Now we must convince the settlers that the reason you attack them is their alliance with the Netherese.”
“Arunika,” Sylora reasoned, and Szass Tam nodded.
“She can be quite persuasive, I’m told,” the archlich said.
“I need more Ashmadai,” Sylora dared to remark, and to her surprise, Szass Tam nodded once more.
Sylora breathed easier, her mind already concocting the lies she would feed through Arunika, already thinking of new ways to wound the settlers, to turn them against the Netherese.
But her relief proved short lived.
“You took from the Dread Ring,” Szass Tam stated.
Sylora looked up at him with surprise.
“I feel its power diminished, stolen by you.”
The sorceress shook her head, trying to make sense of it, for Szass Tam’s tone had taken a darker turn-and that usually meant someone was going to die, horribly.
“I didn’t…”
“Into a scepter, perhaps?” Szass Tam remarked, and Sylora understood then.
“J-Jestry’s weapon… yes,” she stammered.
“You took from the Dread Ring.”
“I asked the Dread Ring for strength,” Sylora protested.
“Strength it provided, to its own detriment.”
“Master, I…” Sylora started, but stuttered and shook her head, trying to figure a way out of this.
“Jestry’s weapon, you say?” Szass Tam prompted her, and she jumped on that sliver of hope.
“My champion, yes! He is being prepared to-”
“ Your champion?” the archlich remarked.
“ Our champion,” Sylora corrected. “Your champion. Jestry of the Ashmadai. I’ve strengthened him. With the help of the aboleth ambassador, I’ve molded him into a warrior above all other Ashmadai, a warrior worthy of Szass Tam.”
“You stole from the Dread Ring.”
“I strengthened his scepter, creating a weapon truly fitting a champion of Szass Tam,” Sylora explained. “He will face Dahlia.”
“Dahlia?”
“She returns, and brings with her a powerful ally.” Sylora swallowed hard and considered whether or not she should complete her tale, as the spirit of Dor’crae had relayed it through Valindra Shadowmantle. But she realized by Szass Tam’s posture that she had no choice but to reveal it all.
“Hadencourt is gone,” she explained. “Dahlia and her drow companion destroyed him and his devil bodyguards. She knew he was Ashmadai. She knew he was allied with me. She’s fully a traitor now, and intends to defeat me and our mission here, and so, yes, Master, I dipped Jestry’s weapon in the Dread Ring and prayed for it to lend the weapon some of its power. If Dahlia is successful, the Dread Ring will be imperiled, and that we cannot have.”
Szass Tam let her words hang in the air for a few moments before finally replying, “You chose well. Dahlia must be destroyed. Do not fail me in this.”
“More warriors?” Sylora dared to remind him. “That Ashenglade will be fully garrisoned?”
Szass Tam nodded. “Presently,” he said. “Prove to me that your… that my champion is suitable.” For dramatic effect, he raised his skinny, almost skeletal arms up high, the voluminous sleeves of his great robes sliding back from his dark skin. “Finish this unpleasantness with Dahlia. Oh, my disappointment in that one! I will have her before me-dead or alive, it does not matter!”
He ended with a flourish and the ash lifted up around him, obscuring his increasingly insubstantial form as he melted into thin air, returning to Thay.
Then Sylora did breathe easier. She hated those moments with Szass Tam. Even when she had nothing but good news to deliver, as when she’d revealed Ashenglade to him, she could never be quite sure what his reaction might be. Many claimed he was unstable, insane, and perhaps that was true, but Sylora equally suspected that Szass Tam used his unpredictability to his advantage. She was never balanced when speaking with him, never prepared for what might come her way, never certain he wouldn’t kill her for some reason or another, for some excuse she hadn’t even considered.
Yes, she realized, he really was her master.
13
Dahlia watched the cold water breaking left and right as she dipped the cloth into the stream. Beside her, Drizzt picked at one of the wounds where a broken piece of barbed quill had stubbornly stuck. His entire right arm was covered in blood again. He flexed his hand and clenched his fist, pushing even more blood forth from the many wounds.
Dahlia rubbed the soaked cloth over the drow’s arm, washing away the majority of the blood and revealing his wounds to be a series of punctures rather than one long cut.
Drizzt held his arm up, turning it in the sunlight. He motioned to Dahlia, who moved the wet cloth near enough for him to bite it. He pushed the small knife into his forearm. He grimaced and twisted, then retracted the blade, dropped it, and reached back to his arm to remove the stubborn quill.
The drow let go of the cloth and sighed, shaking out his hand before dipping his arm into the cold stream.
“Wretched little beasts,” he remarked, staring at the quill for just a moment longer before flicking it into the stream.
“How many wolves have said the same of porcupines?”
“I know of few porcupines who find the courage to chase wolves through the forest.”
“Perhaps they’re wiser than devils, then,” Dahlia quipped, but while that brought a smile to Drizzt’s lips, the woman couldn’t quite manage one.
“Hadencourt is gone,” Drizzt assured her.
Dahlia nodded absently.
Again she nodded, but it was clear she was hardly listening. She didn’t look at Drizzt either. Her gaze roved the shadows of the trees clustered along the riverbanks.
“Sylora is prepared for us,” she said. “We’ll not have the element of surprise in our favor. Hadencourt was her agent.”
“We don’t need to continue,” Drizzt replied. “We can turn aside now. The whole of the North is open to us.”
“No,” Dahlia stated flatly.
“We can return another time, not too far in the future, then,” Drizzt offered. “Perhaps now that Hadencourt and his minions are gone, we’ll regain a measure of surprise. Perhaps if we delay, just a bit, Sylora will let down her guard.”
“No,” Dahlia said. “There never was a chance to surprise her, and I was a fool to think otherwise. Sylora Salm is a seasoned veteran of Thay and a great disciple of Szass Tam. Hadencourt merely reaffirms what I already knew: Sylora Salm has eyes all around her, and now that she’s warned of our intent, she’ll never let down her guard.”
“What do you know?” Drizzt asked, sensing that something more was going on, particularly from the way Dahlia kept looking into the shadows, as if she expected some devil or other monster to charge out at them then and there.
“Dor’crae,” Dahlia admitted. “He’s still around, or will be again presently. I’m certain of it. He can find us and we cannot know of his presence.”
“As I said, we could turn aside-”
“No,” Dahlia cut him short.
Drizzt watched her for a while, trying to read her eyes as she continued to stare off into the forest. There was little caution to be found there, and quite a bit of seething anger. She hated Sylora, of course, but it seemed to the drow that there was something more than that.
“Are you always so eager to kill?” Drizzt asked quietly, though there was nothing quiet about the implications of such a question.
Dahlia kept staring off into the distance then suddenly snapped her head around to consider the drow.
“Sylora, Beniago…” Drizzt remarked. “Do you know only one manner of negotiation?”
Her face tightened with anger, but it didn’t hold. She seemed sadder and more wounded then, and Drizzt regretted his off-hand remark.
“What anger drives you?” he pressed on anyway. Drizzt rose from beside the stream and paced toward her, but took a circuitous route around her. “She’s beautiful. She’s accomplished-a skilled warrior, a hunter, a tactician.”
He continued to circle. “She’s young and can command the world at her feet. Every road is open to her, yet she ever chooses those trails that will lead her to the greatest danger.”
“Does Drizzt Do’Urden shy from a fight?” she asked.
“Do I hunt the wolves in the forest?”
The porcupine reference did bring a bit of smile to Dahlia’s fair face.
“For one who avoids trouble, your blades carry the smell of much blood,” Dahlia retorted. “And for all of your bluster now, are you not walking that same dangerous road beside me?”
“I have my reasons.”
“I know your reasons,” Dahlia replied. She grabbed Drizzt’s hand as he moved around her and pulled him down roughly so she could kiss him.
He didn’t resist.
Drizzt moved to the top of the ridge overlooking the stream. He saw Dahlia below him, splashing water on her face. He looked at her curiously for just a moment, for something seemed… different. Then he realized her braid was back, and as he considered the water dripping from her shining face, he recognized that mesmerizing woad pattern of bluish spots.
His initial reaction was to pull back. Before he even considered the elf’s exotic look, his instincts made him react negatively to this harsher appearance. He was surprised by his response, for he’d previously found Dahlia’s exotic hair and woad enticing. And still she was beautiful-he couldn’t deny that. This was a more dangerous look, but wasn’t that, after all, what Drizzt’s life had become?
Hadn’t danger been his choice, his preference?
He closed his eyes and imagined the “softer” Dahlia, tending his arm, her hair bouncing lightly around her shoulders, her face clean and fresh and unblemished. He opened his eyes and looked upon her again, considering the change that seemed to come over her at a whim.
Drizzt remembered his midnight ride to Luskan and back, the exuberance of the danger, the thrill of the hunt. Those emotions better accompanied this incarnation of Dahlia. Even though she’d worn the softer look when they ventured into Luskan, it was this impression of Dahlia that helped Drizzt take the risks and enjoy the experience with little regard for the consequences. This incarnation of Dahlia was not vulnerable, was hardly delicate.
As he trotted down to join his lover, it occurred to Drizzt that perhaps he’d become as paradoxical as she.
“Have you ever been in love?” she asked without looking back at him as he neared.
The question stopped him in his tracks.
“Tell me about her,” Dahlia said.
Memories of Catti-brie swirled around his thoughts, and it occurred to him that he would likely tell Dahlia of Catti-brie in a different way, with different emphasis and different tales, if she’d been wearing her softer guise.
She looked up at him and wore a smile, though it was lost in the mesmerizing swirl of her woad. Perhaps she meant it to be a warm smile, but he couldn’t tell.
“It was a long time ago,” he managed to reply.
Dahlia laughed at him. “I’m not jealous,” she assured him.
“I know.” His voice was flat.
Dahlia’s smile disappeared, replaced by a pensive look then a slight nod of understanding. “Tell me of the dwarf, then. Of this King Bruenor Battlehammer. I knew him only for a short while, but he intrigued me. How long did you know him?”
“More than a century,” Drizzt replied, and he found he was indeed more at ease then. It would be far easier to speak of Bruenor than of Catti-brie, particularly to Dahlia. “Perhaps closer to two centuries.”
“From afar?”
“My closest friend.”
“For a hundred and fifty years?” Dahlia asked incredulously, and her smile returned, this time reflecting astonishment.
“Would that I had him beside me for another hundred,” Drizzt said.
“Instead of me?”
The suddenness of her question again threw the drow off-balance. He had to think about the answer-and wondered how he might phrase his impulsive thoughts even if he could sort them out.
Dahlia laughed again, relieving the tension. “Beside me, perhaps?” she offered.
“I’ll tell you of him and let you decide,” Drizzt replied, glad for the out.
“And of your lover?”
Drizzt felt his face grow tight.
Dahlia reached down and retrieved her wide leather hat and plopped it on her head, adjusting her braid so that it curled around her shapely neck and ended at the top of her cleavage.
“Come,” she said as she rose. “The road lies before us and I wish to hear your tales of King Bruenor.”
Drizzt moved down to the stream and vigorously shook his wounded arm in the cold water. He hustled to catch up to Dahlia, drawing a bandage from his pouch as he went. By the time they reached the road and he lifted his whistle to summon Andahar, he’d wrapped the arm from above the elbow all the way to the wrist. For the rest of that day as they rode, he clenched and unclenched his fist, battling the tingles of the residual devilish poison, and his bandage soon enough showed more than one red stain from the renewed blood flow.
Drizzt didn’t care about that inconvenience, however, for he told the tales of Bruenor, as Dahlia bade him. Those stories, happy and thrilling and filled with love and friendship, forcibly battled a different type of poison within the heart and soul of Drizzt Do’Urden.
They set their camp long after the sun had disappeared
below the horizon, and were off again before the light of dawn. Andahar carried them effortlessly. Soon enough, they came to the northern reaches of Neverwinter, but on Dahlia’s insistence, they didn’t venture into the settlement. They set their camp just northeast of the town.
While looking for some wood for their small fire, Drizzt heard a rustle of leaves, a footstep. That alone didn’t concern him too greatly-the Neverwinter Guard was likely around the area, and they were not enemies, after all. But as he moved around to investigate, using all the stealth that marked the night as the time of the drow, Drizzt quickly grew more concerned, for whomever he followed showed himself to be quite practiced at the art of avoidance.
The drow at last spotted his quarry, and when he did, he understood why it had taken him so long to locate the source of the noise that had brought him deeper into the forest. The moon was full and bright, after all, and Drizzt’s drow eyes could cut through the shadows on a night like this as easily as in full sunlight. Any normal traveler, even a city guard, should have been easy to spot. But now, finally, when Drizzt discovered the source of that footstep, he forgave himself for not locating this one earlier.
The man-or woman, he couldn’t tell-was of the Shadowfell, a shade who blended into the darkness beneath one wide-spread elm so easily Drizzt for a moment wondered if he were watching a Netherese lord shift back into that dark realm.
He spotted his prey again, and knew then that it was indeed a man, heavyset and powerfully built. Again Drizzt took up the silent pursuit, moving as invisibly as the other, and far more quietly with his practiced steps and full understanding of the forest floor. He smelled the campfire before he spotted it, and moved more quickly. He counted at least three more shades, all in armor and strapped with weapons.
He recalled what Dahlia had told him of the turmoil in the wood and recognized the war party for what it was.
Drizzt soon enough melted into the night and trotted back the way he’d come.
To his surprise, he found Dahlia on the edge of their camp, her staff already broken into flails and looped over her sash belt on either hip, within ready grasp.
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