The anger, he thought. The anger was still there. He grasped it and clung to it. His rage gave him form and sense.
He searched for Myrin. She had to be here somewhere, he thought—she had taken Sithe’s power, but she couldn’t control it. He remembered well when she had absorbed the slaying spells of a wizard far her superior—how the spell had gone wild and nearly slain him and countless bystanders.
Just like that, as though thinking of her brought them closer, Kalen sensed her. Blue fire filled the void, reaching out from him like tendrils toward something—someone. Someone alone, afraid, and despairing of a way out.
Myrin, he thought to her.
Kalen? Oh gods, not you, too!
The full force of her panic fell upon him, rending his wits such that he almost lost himself in the emptiness. He kept together only by focusing on two things: his anger and his goal. Her.
He visualized himself holding her, enfolding her in his numb, scarred arms. In some part of reality he understood only dimly, he was holding her. Blue fire wrapped around them. Her presence seemed to calm—albeit slightly.
You have to take us home, Myrin, he conveyed. You have to do it now.
I can’t! she replied, refusing to meet his gaze. His vision broke up. I don’t know how. You shouldn’t have come—now you’re trapped, too.
I came to Luskan to save you. Kalen imagined himself brushing a lock of hair out of her eyes. Do you really think I’d leave you in darkness?
Myrin’s heart hammered. But we’re trapped—
I suppose we could stay here. At least the smell is less.
He felt a relaxation of tension, but worry remained. I don’t know if I can do this.
I do, he said. If you wish it, we will go back.
Do you wish it, Kalen? she asked. You seemed so upset before. Do you—do you even want me back?
He clutched her tighter. Of course I do.
Very well, Myrin said. Here we—
They came back into the world in a rush, and all of existence bore down upon them in such an unstoppable flood of sensation that Kalen staggered. The otherwise bare chamber was suddenly filled with a teeming swarm of creatures smaller than fleas, flowing all over each other. Heaps of slithering vermin were held together only loosely by a mutual desire for survival. The floorboards, the scant furnishings, the air itself—all were horribly, feverishly alive in infinite minutiae.
The overwhelming being of that moment was enough to shatter Kalen’s mind. Heartbeats sounded like thunder in his ears. Myrin lay enfolded in his arms, her body curled against him. They gazed into one another’s eyes, at once comforting and taking comfort, seeing each other with a clarity neither had ever known. Kalen wanted nothing more than to lie here with her, and let the world fall apart around them.
A cry arose, breaking the moment. Kalen saw that the common hall had become a frenzied mass of people. Dead Rats argued in panic and rage.
Rhett stood among the crowd, his sword ready. “Saer Shadowbane!” he called.
As though his voice woke her, Myrin stirred and sat up. “We did it,” she said. “We—” Then tears brimmed in her eyes. “Gods. Toy—is he …?”
Kalen brushed the blood from Toytere’s beating out of his eyes. A few paces distant, Sithe stood over the fallen halfling and a spreading puddle of blood.
“Get away from him!” Myrin cried, leveling her wand at the genasi.
Kalen restrained her. “It was mercy, not anger,” he said. “He’s dying.”
Sure enough, at Sithe’s feet, Toytere’s body shuddered. He loosed a whine like that of a rat caught in a trap. Rhett had tended him, Kalen saw, but the wound was too great—that, or the plague would not permit him to escape.
Long past the point of coherence, Toytere squealed and roared in pain. His hands grasped at his midsection and his limbs stretched painfully.
“Why haven’t you ended it?” Kalen indicated Sithe’s axe.
“It is for her to do,” Sithe said. “He betrayed her, his life is hers.”
“You also betrayed us,” Kalen said.
“And my life is also hers,” Sithe said. “But she should decide sooner for him.”
Myrin sat at Toytere’s side and took his hand. The halfling’s bloody eyes turned to her and his lips formed her name. “Myrin?”
“Yes,” she said. “Toy, you’re dying.”
“Hrk!” A cough wracked the halfling’s body. “Die … die a man?”
“A man,” Myrin said, clasping his hand hard. “The man you should be.”
Toytere gave her a bloody smile. “Aye, that’s all I wan—” His body jerked taut and his eyes glazed over. A sound emerged from his bloody lips—a low, buzzing hum.
“What’s happening?” Rhett asked.
“Prophecy. He—” The halfling clenched Myrin’s hand hard, cutting off her words.
“Too late,” the gang leader said, in a voice suddenly distant. “Dren will fall to the dark.”
“What?” Kalen asked, eyes fixed on Toytere.
Myrin was staring at the halfling, the blood beating in the hollow of her throat.
“Darkness will take you, Champion of Ruin, fight as you will,” Toytere said in that odd drone. “All that you love will sift as ash through your fingers. It is too late!”
Kalen pushed Myrin wide of Toytere’s grasp and caught the halfling’s collar. “What do you mean? What are you saying?”
The halfling eyes blinked out of the Sight. “Little Dren,” he said. “Gods, I See it. I’ve got to warn—”
Then his eyes widened past the red surrounding the whites. He loosed a savage snarl and lunged at Kalen, who kept from being bitten by wincing back. He held the halfling down with a foot on his chest.
The crowded Rats parted and Myrin approached. “What is—oh gods, Toy!”
“Stay back,” Kalen said. “He isn’t Toytere anymore—that man’s dead.” He turned to Rhett, who backed away, taking Vindicator with him. Instead, Kalen seized Sithe’s axe and raised it over his head. “Turn away.”
Myrin stared at him, eyes wide. “No.”
“I said—”
“I heard what you said.” Myrin straightened her shoulders. “And I’m not turning aside, Kalen. If this is what you are, so be it.”
He hesitated, his blade held high. Beneath his foot, the raging beast that had been Toytere uttered a fitful cry and grasped at its midsection. A huge mass was creeping up, like a boil growing before their eyes. The halfling whimpered in pain and fury. The huge pustule rising from the halfling’s chest continued to grow and squirm.
The ring of Dead Rats expanded, giving the thing more space. Toytere’s body jerked and squirmed, sending blood flailing. Finally, it burst open, spilling forth a quivering horde of half formed insects—locusts, bees, beetles, and gods knew what else.
Kalen brought the axe down and Toytere stopped dead.
The steel on wood rang throughout the hall, followed by the utter silence of three dozen men and women looking to Kalen and his burning steel. The axe flared, burning the twitching vermin. They went up like pinecones in a chorus of sickly pops.
One voice rose from the back of the horde. “Shadowbane!” it cried. “King Shadowbane!”
“King Shadowbane!” another voice answered. “King of the Rats!”
Myrin stared at him, her gaze dark—disappointed. She drew away, turned to confer with Rhett. Kalen watched her go and felt a part of his heart draining away.
“King Shadowbane!” the Rats cried, and “Kalen of the Rats!” and “Shadowbane!”
Kalen nodded grimly.
Eden leaned back from her scrying pool, letting the image waver and die, and tapped her fingers together. What an unlikely series of events—one that she would need to plan around.
Seeing the fate that had befallen Toytere when he tried to move against Kalen and Myrin dissuaded her, even considering the kingly sum offered for the lass’s capture. Still, it was the principle of the thing. Offended pride such as hers was wor
th the ransom of kingdoms, not mere kings.
The Horned One had told her to stop, so Eden meant to press forward.
Why would the Horned One, favorite of the Lady, be so adamant Eden not touch this Myrin Darkdance? What power did the girl hold—and how could Eden possess it? How could she use Myrin against the Horned One himself?
It would have worked, and she would have had Myrin, had not a certain halfling decided to kill himself out of misguided nobility.
“Bane’s black balls,” Eden murmured. “You can’t trust anyone these days.”
Well, she’d just have to deal with Kalen’s standing in the way of her next move. And if he met a horrible death in the process, all the better.
She thought of the scroll the Horned One had given her. Yes.
A knock at the door announced the arrival of her advisors—two men, one tall and fat, the other short and precipitously lean, both ugly and odious. She’d never bothered trying to learn their names. The short one spoke.
“Me lady, beloved of Mistress Fortune,” he said. “You summoned us?”
“Yes, yes,” Eden said. “I’ve called you to say that a miracle has come to pass. The Lady provides protection from the Fury.”
The men looked stunned. “Me lady, that’s a blessing for true!” said the short one. “We—we must tell everyone! Immediately! Bring adherents flocking to our—to the Lady’s banner! All will be drawn to this cure!”
“Cure?” Eden let a smile steal across her features. “Ha. I offer no cure, you oafs, but a blessing. It is an assurance that those the Lady favors will go untouched.”
“How is that not a cure, me lady?” asked the short one.
They were growing tiresome, Eden thought. Her head was starting to throb and she would much rather consider how best to move against the Horned One.
“Very well,” she said. “I’ll show you.”
The men quavered a bit at that, but their faces still shone with eagerness. Fools.
Eden reached into the bodice of her dress and withdrew the scroll the Horned One had given her. She had mastered the script and could pronounce the letters in her sleep. Still, holding the scroll was key to unlocking its power. Unfurling it across the bed in front of her, she began to read, her voice twisting into the dark and guttural syllables of the Abyssal tongue.
At first, nothing happened and her advisers’ nervousness faded a touch. “I—that is, we,” said the short one, with a nod at his companion. “We don’t feel any different.”
Eden smiled, even as she cursed them mentally. “This plague—the Fury,” she said. “It isn’t a cough or a pox or the like, but rather the gift of something … greater. Something darker. Something that scours.”
As if in response to her words, the room filled suddenly with the sound of rustling and scuttling—thousands of tiny legs tap-tap-tapping on wood and stone. The three humans were far from alone in the chamber.
Blackness seeped out of the walls and floor: a flood of tiny, ferocious bodies, all of their fangs and claws serving Eden’s will. Her advisors cowered back a step.
“Oh, not to worry.” Eden tapped the scroll with one long finger. “With this, I can summon and keep the beast at bay. I extend the Lady’s blessing to any I deem worthy.”
“You,” said the fat one, wiping sweat from his brow. “You mean the goddess—those that she deems worthy.”
“Not actually, no,” said Eden. “For instance, I’m sure the goddess loves you two. I, on the other hand, do not share her opinion.”
With a lazy hand, she indicated her advisors.
The two men screamed as the blackness swarmed over them.
“A single bite leaves the Fury,” Eden explained as they flailed and gibbered, “but a thousand bites leave much less.”
Now that the plague was a weapon rather than a threat, she had only one thing left to take care of: becoming queen of Luskan. Queen of the North would come later.
Her brother and that thrice-damned wizard of his stood in the way, but Eden expected that would resolve itself. Her brother would, after all, fall into darkness—so said Toytere’s last prophecy.
She had to admit—as the demon finished its meal, leaving only bones for later removal by her slaves—that her brother turning into a “champion of ruin” struck her as a delicious concept.
27 KYTHORN (EARLY MORNING)
GRAY CLOUDS BOILED UP IN THE NIGHT SKY, BLOTTING OUT Selûne and her tears. Already the clammy, sticky rain of summer had begun to fall. A storm was coming to Luskan, and it would grow far worse before it grew better.
Later that night, after plans had been made, Kalen stood in the dark and drizzle of the old Yewblood yard, a block off Aldever’s Street northeast of the Drowned Rat. From here, he could see lights flickering in the tavern, suggesting a flurry of activity to match the orders he—the new king—had given.
In the little graveyard, however—so overgrown and stained with graffiti as to elude the memory of most natives—Kalen found a certain measure of tranquility. Anger simmered beneath the surface, but here he could breathe easier. He had spent most of the night burying Toytere. No one else seemed inclined to do it and he felt he owed the halfling that much. Enemies though they might have been in the end, Kalen had once counted Toytere his friend.
Now, hours later, he stared at another grave, marked with what in happier times had been a crude nymph dancing among river stones. He remembered it as it had been, fifteen years past, before vandals defiled it. Now, time and weather had worn away the headstone’s inscription to a single word: Dren.
He could not say how he detected the beggar—perhaps a slight rustle or the feel of the air he breathed. His senses had grown sharper since he’d come to Luskan and he trusted them more and more each day. Regardless, he knew he was not alone in the graveyard.
“You’re Dren’s boy, right?”
Kalen turned. Where he sat, the beggar became just a part of the scenery, easily overlooked and even more easily ignored.
“Kalen, methink?” The beggar coughed, his yellow teeth catching the moonlight. “You’ve grown, for true, but I knows you still. All on the street knows you.”
Kalen nodded.
“Godsdamned shame, what it is,” the man said. “She were so beautiful.”
The wind rose, whipping Kalen’s tattered cloak against his legs. Still, he was silent.
“Pretty Drenny—bestest face in the city, never aged, never caught the pox. Even that crazy chit of a daughter she had—even that don’t ruin her. The right best of us.”
“Not that I remember,” Kalen said.
“Heh, aye, but—” The man pushed himself clumsily up. Kalen watched, impassive. Coughing, shuddering, the ancient beggar managed his feet, wobbled a bit, then stepped toward him. “You weren’t to birth until after,” the beggar said. “After that damned Silverymoon dandy done broke her heart. She weren’t the same after him. Thought it would all be well—a lord of Luruar come to save us poor tluiners, but he were just like all the others: blaggard, turncoat, oathbreaker.” The beggar hacked and shook his head. “Me apologies. He’s your father, I suppose.”
“Don’t apologize,” Kalen said. “I had a father—and it wasn’t him.”
The beggar grunted.
They stood there, in the silence and greasy rain, as the moment stretched. Kalen knew he had been injured and should be in pain, but he couldn’t feel it. He couldn’t feel anything.
“A’ times it’s Tymora,” said the beggar with a sigh, “a’ times it’s Beshaba.”
“What?” Kalen said, not turning.
“What I mean is,” he said, “no matter if you a bright angel or a filthy devil, fortune will sway as it do. Foul fates for good folk, fair for evil.”
“Foul fates for good,” Kalen echoed, “fair for evil.”
“Speaking of.” The beggar extended a hand.
Kalen looked into the man’s greasy palm, then up into his face. The scamp’s eyes gleamed with a golden glint in the moonlight.
/> Fifteen years dissolved. He saw again a shadow standing over him. His cheek exploded in pain where he’d been struck. He heard the ringing sound Vindicator had made when it struck the grime-coated cobblestones. “Never beg again,” Gedrin had said.
The beggar waited. Kalen drew a gold coin out of his sleeve and set it in his hand. It was more coin than the old codger would likely ever see at one time. It wasn’t even the tiniest bit of what Kalen owed to this city—this world.
The man gave a toothy smile. “You’re a good man, Kalen Dren.”
They stood, silent again, as the night waned.
“There you are, Saer Shadowbane.”
Rhett and Myrin stood a dozen paces away, at the edge of the graveyard. The boy, his wounds bandaged, gave him a nod. Myrin refused to meet his eye. He could sense her anguish. “Don’t mind the—” Kalen turned to point out the beggar, but the man had vanished into the night. He wondered if the beggar had really been there or if he just needed sleep.
“Preparations are under way,” Rhett said. “It looks like the Rats mean to fight a war starting tomorrow.”
“They will,” Kalen said.
“And what would you have of us?” Rhett asked. “Myrin and I can—”
“I need you to leave,” Kalen said.
“Hold just a moment—” Rhett said.
Myrin shrugged and said simply, “Very well.”
“Very well?” The young guardsman stared at her. “What do you mean?”
She crossed her arms. “Shall I leave in the morning or on the instant?”
Kalen hadn’t expected such immediate agreement, but he wouldn’t refuse it. “Either,” he said. “Can you walk out of Luskan by magic?”
“Yes,” she said. “One of Umbra’s memories contained me, walking through shadows, across vast distances. I think I can reason out the ritual.”
Her face had a harried look. She grasped the elbow of one arm behind her back and ground her toe into the floor. Kalen realized the meaning of this posture: unassuming, tentative. She had something to say, but feared it. Also, from the way she pressed her nails into her palms, she was angry.
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