Shadowrealm

by Paul S. Kemp

  Regg studied his face, and Abelar imagined his mind whirling behind the calm facade of his expression. Abelar saw no judgment in his friend’s eyes, but neither did he see understanding.

  “The sun rises and sets,” Regg said. “So be it. I will lead.”

  Cale noticed the cold first, an unearthly frigidity that settled in his bones and chilled him to his core. Wind assaulted his ears, the sound the anguished howl of a trapped animal as it surrendered to death. He pulled his cloak tight as the darkness that had brought them dissipated.

  “Ephyras,” Rivalen said, glancing around.

  They had materialized on the decaying corpse of a world. Black, barren earth with the consistency of sand stretched out in all directions for as far as he could see. Dry gullies cut deep, jagged lines in the dead earth but he saw no water to form them. The wind blew up dust cyclones here and there, little black spirals that frolicked on the grave of the world before losing their coherence and collapsing. If there had ever been vegetation on Ephyras, Cale saw no sign; it had long ago dried out and crumbled away.

  The air smelled faintly of ancient decay, like the memory of rot. Long ribbons of shadow floated through the air, squirming in the wind like worms. A tiny, exhausted red sun hung in the sky, ringed by a collar of absolute black. Its wan, bloody light made no real attempt to light the world, merely colored it in a hue that hinted at slaughter.

  As Cale watched, the darkness ringing the sun expanded slightly, reducing its glowing core to an even smaller circle. The darkness was choking off the sun.

  “Dark,” Cale oathed.

  The dimness of the light allowed him to see stars twinkling faintly in the black-gray vault of the sky, appearing and disappearing behind the long columns of ink-black clouds that streaked across the heavens. Cale did not recognize any of the constellations. Lightning flashed now and then, long, jagged bolts of green that seemed to stretch from horizon to horizon, as if they ringed the world.

  The sight of it all caused an ache in Cale’s head, made him dizzy. He felt pressure building in his ears, numbness in his extremities, then realized of a sudden that his feelings had nothing to do with the sight of a dying world. Something was wrong.

  He turned to Riven and Rivalen but his body answered him awkwardly and he stumbled and nearly fell to the black earth. He felt heavy, dulled. He grabbed at Riven’s cloak, tried to speak, but found his mouth stuffed with cloth, his lips numb.

  The expression on Riven’s face suggested the assassin was experiencing a similar feeling. He staggered backward, out of Cale’s grip, and slumped to the ground. Cale’s legs failed him and he, too, fell. He hit the ground on all fours, collapsed, rolled onto his back in a bed of dead earth on a dead world looking up at a dying sun.

  The shadows swirled around him, but neither they nor his regenerative flesh could combat the effect. He knew it for what it was. He and Riven had experienced it in the Shadowstorm. Ephyras’s air drained life. He should have known.

  Clutching his mask, he tried to invoke a protective ward, but his numb lips garbled the words. Rivalen appeared over him, golden eyes staring out of the black clot of his hood. The Shadovar appeared unaffected by the life draining effect of the air, of the world. He must have kept permanent wards on his person.

  The shadows around both of them roiled and touched. The prince reached down for him, took him by the arm, and pulled him easily to his feet.

  “You need to ward yourself,” Rivalen said. “I assumed you had.”

  The prince intoned a spell and energy flowed into Cale, enough to let him stand on his own feet. He shook off the prince’s touch, wobbled, gathered himself, and managed to mouth the words to a ward before Ephyras again stole his strength.

  The moment the spell took effect, the numbness began to leave him. He felt his heartbeat return to normal, inhaled a deep breath. He pushed past Rivalen to Riven, kneeled, and cast the same ward on the assassin. Riven’s wide eye cleared. He blinked, breathed, sat up with a grunt, and spit.

  “Negative energy,” Cale said. “Same as the Shadowstorm.”

  A thought tugged at him, but flitted away before he could pin it down. He stood, pulling Riven to his feet after him.

  “How can there be a temple here?” Riven said. “No one could survive.”

  “It must have been different here, once,” Cale surmised. He looked at Rivalen, who surveyed the world as he might his own domain. Shadows leaked from him in long strands.

  “Rivalen?” Cale asked. “What happened here?”

  Rivalen seemed not to have heard him.

  Cale started to ask again, but Rivalen spoke, awe in his tone.

  “Another Shadowstorm is what happened here.” The words took Cale unawares. He and Riven shared a look.

  Rivalen’s hand went to the black disc at his throat, a symbol not unlike the one Riven wore, a symbol eerily reminiscent of the dying sun and the black collar choking it to death.

  “In the darkness of night,” Rivalen said. “We hear the whisper of the void.”

  Cale felt chilled. “How can there be another Shadowstorm?”

  “There are many worlds,” Rivalen said, his voice distant, the shadows around him dark. “Ephyras is older than Toril. Here, the Lady has already triumphed.”

  “Triumphed?” Riven asked.

  Cale thought of Sembia, of Faerûn, of all of Toril. “You’re telling us that the Shadowstorm withers a world, and kills its sun?”

  “And more still,” Rivalen said, his voice the disconnected utterance of a man in a trance. “Nothingness is the end. Soon Ephyras will be gone entirely. Annihilated.”

  Cale echoed the word, said it softly, the way he might a blasphemy. “Annihilated.”

  He found himself looking at the dust, the death, the darkness, wondering if there were still more worlds that Shar had killed. He supposed there must be. She was responsible for the deaths of millions.

  “There were people here,” he said, not a question.

  Rivalen made no comment, though the shadows around him whirled.

  “Dark and empty,” Riven oathed. “A whole world? A whole world.”

  “All words die in time,” Rivalen said. “In time, all existence ends.”

  “How can you look upon this and offer prayers?” Cale asked. He took the prince by the shoulder, pulled him around to face him.

  Rivalen’s eyes flashed. He took Cale by the wrist, for a moment they tested one another’s strength, but determined nothing. They released one another and Rivalen stared into his face.

  “How can you not feel awe as you watch a sun die?”

  The shadows around Cale swirled. “Death does not awe me. Death is easy.”

  “You are broken, Shadovar,” Riven said, contempt in his words. He advanced to stand beside Cale.

  Rivalen stared at Cale, at Riven. “I acknowledge the truth that the fate of all worlds, of all of existence, will be the same as Ephyras. Is that broken?”

  “You don’t acknowledge it,” Cale said. “You elevate it to an article of faith. You worship it.”

  “That is broken,” Riven said.

  The shadows around Rivalen whirled, as if stirred by the wind. “We are here because I wish to stop the Shadowstorm on Toril. To prevent this.” His gesture took in Ephyras.

  “And I cannot figure that out,” Cale said.

  Riven eyed the Shadovar, and said to Cale. “I trust him about as far as his blood will spray when I cut his throat.”

  Rivalen leaned forward, his golden eyes ablaze. He towered over the assassin. “If I wished you dead, you would already be so. Do you think there is anything that I would do that you could thwart?”

  Riven had both sabers free in a heartbeat. “Why don’t we find out?”

  Cale shook his head. “Why stop it, Rivalen? This is what your goddess strives for.”

  Cale’s question diffused the tension between Riven and Rivalen. The Shadovar prince stepped back and said, “My reasons are my own.”

  “Not good e
nough,” Riven said.

  Cale asked, “You can live forever but worship annihilation?”

  “I do not worship it. I told you. I simply acknowledge its inevitability.”

  “You seek rule over a realm whose fate is dust and death,” Cale said. “Why?”

  “I forge meaning for myself in the face of ultimate meaninglessness.”

  “But nothing you do will matter.”

  The darkness around Rivalen whirled and he tilted his head to acknowledge the point. “In time.”

  And all at once Cale understood Rivalen. “In time” was the crux of Rivalen’s life, the fulcrum that balanced meaning and meaninglessness. The prince wanted to control the pace of approaching annihilation. He wanted it to happen tomorrow, never today.

  “You don’t want to stop the Shadowstorm on Toril,” Cale said. “You want to delay it, have it happen when you want it, on your terms.”

  Rivalen regarded Cale for a long while. “You also must struggle with meaning, Maskarran.”

  “Can the Shadowstorm be stopped?”

  The prince stared into his face.

  “Can it?”

  Rivalen’s eyes flared. “No.”

  Cale could find no words. Riven did, all of them curses.

  “But it can be delayed,” Rivalen said. “Delayed for a time that is long even to Shadovar high priests. For the moment, that aligns our interests.”

  “For the moment,” Riven said, and glared at Rivalen.

  Rivalen kept his gaze on Cale. “Perhaps we should seek the temple lest Toril experience Ephyra’s fate sooner than any of us would like.”

  Cale considered that and nodded. There was nothing for it.

  Brennus felt the magical ring on his finger open a connection between him and his brother.

  We are on Ephyras. It is a dying world. The Lady’s will is manifest here. The time is drawing close, Brennus. You must determine how to capture Kesson Rel’s divinity once it is freed.

  Brennus listened to the words, heard the hint of exaltation in his brother’s tone, and seethed. He wished he could reach through the connection and choke Riven to death, hear his stilted, dying gasps, leave his corpse to end in nothingness with the rest of Ephyras.

  Brennus? Rivalen asked.

  I am still seeking after the answer, Rivalen. You will know when I know.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  5 Nightal, the Year of Lightning Storms

  The storm moved inexorably toward the refugee encampment. Wide eyes watched the growing darkness, exclaimed at the thunder, and recoiled at the lightning.

  Abelar, Regg, and Roen stood at the far edge of the encampment, drenched in rain, in darkness, watching time drain away.

  “They are terrified,” Roen said, nodding back at the refugees.

  “The storm is nearly upon us,” Regg said. “We can wait no longer.”

  “Agreed,” Roen said.

  A void opened in Abelar’s stomach. “Regg, hold until the last possible moment. If Cale and Riven have not returned. …”

  But Regg was already shaking his head. “You know we cannot wait, my friend. We march on the hour. And by our lives we will purchase as much time as we can for the refugees. We do not have wards enough for men and horses so we will leave the mounts behind. If Cale and Riven do not return, rush the Stonebridge. Dare the river.”

  Abelar mined for words in the earth of his mind but found none. He nodded, a fist in his throat.

  “Gather the company,” Regg said to Roen, and the tall priest nodded. “Tell them mounts stay. And volunteers only. Any who wish may remain behind with Abelar and the refugees.”

  Abelar knew that all would volunteer. Only he among the company would remain behind.

  Only he.

  Roen embraced Abelar before he left to pass the word. The priest’s long arms engulfed him.

  “I am honored to have followed you into battle, Abelar Corrinthal. The light is in you still.”

  Abelar’s tears mixed with the rain. “And you, Roen.”

  The priest jogged off toward the camp, his mail chinking, shouting as he went. Regg and Abelar stood alone in the rain. They didn’t face each other, but stood side by side and faced the Shadowstorm, their enemy, as they had so often in previous battles.

  “We have known each other a long while,” Regg said, his voice choked.

  “I am the better for it,” Abelar said.

  “As am I.”

  They clasped hands, and held onto each other for a moment.

  “I always thought that if we fell in battle, we would fall together.”

  The tightness in Abelar’s throat made his words stilted. “As did I.”

  “We stand in the light,” Regg said softly.

  “You do, my friend,” Abelar said.

  A shout from the gathering company below turned their heads. Jiriis ran toward them, her face stricken, as red as her hair.

  “I will leave you,” Regg said, and headed toward the company.

  Jiriis ran past Regg to Abelar, stopped before him, her breath coming fast.

  “You will not lead us?” Her green eyes swam in tears she refused to let fall.

  “It is Regg’s company to lead.”

  The space between them seemed much larger than it was. Abelar bridged it. He stepped forward, and took her arms in his hands.

  “You could stay with me,” he said.

  She looked up at him and he saw her consider the offer, but then she shook her head. “You know I cannot. Come with us.”

  “You know I cannot.”

  Both clung to the other as if they could delay the inevitable if they hung on hard enough. At last he released her.

  “I love you,” he said. But he loved his son more.

  “And I you.”

  He kissed her, passionately, fully, and both of them knew it was the last kiss they would share. He let himself fall into the moment, into her, the taste of her, the smell of her skin and hair. When they parted, neither looked the other in the eye and both were crying, tears born in the regret of what might have been.

  “Go do what you were called to do,” he said to her.

  “And you do what you were called to do,” she said, and left him.

  Abelar stood alone in the rain, thinking of his son, his life of service, wondering what it was that he was called to do. He was unmoored.

  Ephyras’s wind gusted, blew up a blizzard of black sand. The shadows around Cale and Rivalen deflected the particles. Riven, without any such protection, kept his hood up and his cloak drawn tight.

  Cale tried to pry open the mental door Magadon had left ajar in his mind.

  Mags?

  He received no response and his worry manifested in a swirl of shadows.

  “Which way to the temple?” Riven asked, as lightning bisected the sky.

  Cale and Rivalen held their respective holy symbols, and both intoned the words to a minor divination.

  “That way,” Rivalen said, pointing.

  “Agreed,” Cale said, when the magic of his divination pulled at his body.

  The prolonged rumble of falling stone sounded in the distance, the thunder of collapse. The ground vibrated under their feet and for a moment it felt as if the entire world were about to crumble.

  “Over there,” Cale said, and pointed.

  In the direction they were to travel, a cloud of dust rose into the dark sky, the only landmark of any significance for as far as he could see.

  “Magical transport will be dangerous,” Rivalen said.

  “We do not have time to walk,” Cale said, thinking of the Saerbians, thinking of Magadon, thinking of Ephyras’s death throes.

  “You serve no one if your body materializes underground or in a stone. The currents of magic are wild here. You do not feel them?”

  Cale did not, and had to rely on Rivalen’s word. “Let’s move, then.”

  The three men melted into the darkness and started out on foot, moving fast. The earth felt brittle, hollow under Cale’
s feet. The tremors that shook it from time to time nearly knocked him down. He imagined the entire world to be as hole-ridden as a sea sponge, ready to crumble into pieces were too much pressure applied to it.

  He sweated despite the cold. They saw nothing of interest for a league and the flat, featureless landscape made distance hard to estimate. The sound of still more collapsing stone and the ever present cloud of dust ahead kept them roughly oriented.

  Time weighed on Cale. He pressed the pace until all three men were soaked in sweat and gasping.

  Ahead, mounds dotted the landscape like burial cairns. Eventually the mounds took shape and Cale recognized them for what they were—crumbling structures poking from the dried earth, ghostly hillocks lit by lightning flashes and covered in the dust of a destroyed world. Little remained, but he discerned partially collapsed domes, crumbling arches, hollow columns.

  “Your goddess is a bitch,” Riven said to Rivalen.

  Rivalen said nothing, merely eyed the wreckage of a ruined world. A minor divination fell from his lips and, presumably led by its pull, he stopped from time to time to pick at this or that in the black sand. He finally lifted what he had sought—a coin of black metal, the markings upon it nearly worn away entirely.

  “You collecting trophies, Shadovar?” Riven asked.

  “Reminders,” Rivalen said, and the coin vanished into his shadows.

  The dying sun made its way across the dark sky as the three men made their way across the dark world. The ruins grew more frequent as they progressed and Cale thought they might have been moving through the remains of a city. The skeletons of some buildings remained standing here and there, lonely, hollowed out testaments to the remorselessness of time and Shar.

  Holding his holy symbol in hand, Rivalen whispered imprecations and Cale could not tell if the prince was awed or appalled.

  Bones appeared in the dust. First just a few—a thighbone jutting from the earth, a skull leering from the ruins—but then more and more. Soon they couldn’t take a step without walking over remains.

  “This place is a graveyard,” Riven said.

  It was as if an entire city had been murdered at a stroke and the bodies left to rot in the open. Cale could not help but think of Ordulin.