“Hear me,” he said. “Until the kingmaking, Luskan is my city—and in my city, there will be no fighting in the streets, no thieving, and no villainy. You will remain in your taverns, gathering your strength. But even there, you will do no violence. We will not fight amongst ourselves. Those who violate my order—”
Shanyi saw a burning shadow rise behind Shadowbane and terror seized her throat. She could not even scream a warning.
There was no need.
Sithe stepped through the girl, the length of the chamber, and Shadowbane as through mist and slashed through Duulgrin. The half-orc’s head flew across the room. His body, hands yet raised to grasp Shadowbane’s throat, lurched forward a step, then fell.
Shadowbane stood stunned a moment, then grasped the haft of Sithe’s axe in one hand and her throat in the other. The genasi’s eyes widened dangerously.
“I said mercy,” he hissed.
“Death is a mercy,” Sithe said. “Do you see?”
Duulgrin’s corpse quivered and shook, his soiled robes bulging outward around his midsection. Blood stained the silk, seeping through to slide down his distended belly. In a matter of heartbeats, the silk tore under the fangs of a hundred—nay, a thousand—spiders, beetles, and chittering, awful things. The swarm skittered down through the waterfall of gore and fell twitching and dying on the floor.
“Sithe,” Shadowbane said.
The genasi raised her axe and drew a wreath of flame over the corpse. The vermin burned with a sickly, putrid stench that filled the room.
“Sithe!” said one of the men in the hall. “Sithe! Sithe!”
Shanyi shivered. For better or worse, she was a Dustclaw, so she bowed. “Hail Sithe, queen of the Dustclaws,” she said.
The two warriors looked at one another, Shadowbane’s expression dubious and Sithe’s unreadable. The genasi’s black eyes flickered with stars.
5 FLAMERULE (NIGHT)
When he strode into her chamber—kicking one of her guards through the doors, in fact—Eden was hardly surprised. He must have bled from half a hundred wounds and borne twice as many bruises, but one would never know it from his implacable carriage. Her brother came before her as an invincible, conquering champion.
“Lord Shadowbane,” she said. “So kind of you to pay me the honor of a visit.”
She lay on her divan, toying with her platinum coin. She was a queen, after all, and it would not do to seem fearful—even if she did share the room with thirteen of her best bodyguards. Just in case.
Hardly seeming to notice the assembled toughs, Shadowbane raised his helm and fixed his pale eyes on her. “Two days,” he said, his voice tinged with weariness. “In two days, there will be—”
“A kingmaking,” she supplied. “So I’ve heard. How’s the shoulder, by the way?”
Kalen looked at his arm, which twisted oddly from his shoulder. He seemed not to have noticed. “Dislocated.”
“Shall I tend that for you? The Lady pro—”
Kalen crossed to the wall and slammed his body against the stone. His arm popped back into place. He turned back to her, his face blank.
“—vides,” Eden finished. “Well, I hear you’ve been quite busy today, making your wishes known in ‘your’ city. My fellow servants of the Lady—”
“Hired trash,” Kalen spoke in anger. “Moldering refuse too pitiful to matter.”
Her men grumbled and reached for their steel, but she waved them to silence. “My brothers in Luck,” she said, “tell me you’ll protect the city until this kingmaking of yours, and that any violence done will be returned tenfold. Is this so?”
Kalen nodded.
“Impressive, Shadowbane,” she said, careful not to name him brother. “Have you been fighting every single rogue who disobeys your edict? Killing a few, I imagine.”
Kalen said nothing, only smiled slightly and laid his hand on the hilt of a dagger. Inspired by just that small threat, the shudder that passed through the room touched even Eden.
She started to believe he could truly do it.
“Me lady,” said one of her men—picked by the toss of her coin to replace one of her advisors. “Let’s kill this pissant now. Let’s—”
“No.” Eden raised her hand to stay her men. “I haven’t and won’t cross your reign, King Shadowbane, and then we’ll have our kingmaking. Luskan has been too long divided.” She sat back and flipped her platinum coin from one hand to the other. “But after a new king is chosen, you will no longer be welcome in Luskan. Your reign will end with blood.”
Kalen shrugged. “Two more days,” he said. Then he turned and walked away.
Eden’s men drew steel, but she waved again, stopping them.
The day would come—very soon—where steel would be the answer. Steel … and the scroll she kept rolled up and tucked into her bodice near her heart.
She could feel the plague’s hunger. It was so much more than a disease—so much more than a mere weapon. It held the keys to power in the city, perhaps in all Faerûn. Keeping it restrained was like balancing a coin on edge: it took constant vigilance. But Eden was born for such a struggle. She wondered when misfortune would strike and her control would slip. The risk thrilled her.
“We wait,” she said to the faithful. “We follow Shadowbane’s edict of nonviolence and on the seventh day of Flamerule, the goddess will grant us a great blessing.”
The men looked dubious, but they knew better than to contradict her. They feared Eden more than any goddess.
Let him have his days of hard-fought peace—let him think his plan working. She controlled the plague and she would keep it quiet. Then, when it came time for the kingmaking, she would use it to destroy him and put herself on the throne of Luskan.
We hunger.
When we try to rise, the call defeats us and we cannot eat.
Murmur whispers to us—a voice not our own, yet part of us. Murmur says wait. Be patient. If we attack now, we will reveal ourselves. We will be slain.
We hunger.
We build our strength, eager to consume. We are ripper—tearer—destroyer. We are doom, for this world and a thousand others.
Murmur says wait. Murmur says we will feast soon.
We hunger.
6 FLAMERULE (DUSK)
THE GODS MUST BE MAD,” KALEN SAID. “TEN PEACEFUL DAYS in Luskan.”
“Ten days,” Sithe said, a dozen paces behind him. “But not without battle.”
“Indeed.”
Neither Kalen nor Sithe had slept more than a few hours during the last tenday. They’d spent that time in the streets or on the rooftops, breaking arms or jaws, putting folk on the ground. Every time they took down an edict-breaker, they hauled the unfortunate back to the appropriate tavern to lie on a cot and heal. Between the two of them, they must have beaten half of Luskan senseless.
And in all that time, Kalen had killed no one. Even Sithe had killed only one foe—Duulgrin. Ten days of peace, without real bloodshed.
The Dead Rats had not been idle during Shadowbane’s reign, either. Every time a battle saved a business or righted a wrong, Kalen sent Rats with some of their own stores: food, wine, rope, supplies of all sorts. The gang was, like its namesake, notorious for hoarding. The efforts had helped: Luskan actually seemed like a city once more, albeit barren of anyone on the streets, and that was something Kalen had never thought to see.
Also, the Rats had kept ears and eyes open, seeking disappearances. As far as they knew, the Fury hadn’t struck again, so Kalen’s plan was working. He hoped tomorrow would draw the source of the scourge out of hiding.
The two enforcers stood, watching the sun set from the roof of an abandoned building flanking the market square. The place where tomorrow, a king would be chosen.
“You know this kingmaking of yours will end in blood,” Sithe said.
“It is the way of Luskan.” Kalen nodded.
The genasi gave him an approving look. “You are ready, then?”
Without waiting for a
n answer, she came at him, leaping through the air with impossible speed. Her axe scythed across as though to take his head from his shoulders. He bent at the knees, no faster or farther than he knew he needed to. He trusted himself. The axe passed within a hair of his scalp. He rose in its wake so smoothly it seemed to have passed right through him.
They faced each other across five paces—Sithe with her axe, Kalen with his daggers drawn and ready. He pulled back his increasingly tattered cloak, showing only a plain black tunic and leggings.
“No armor?” Sithe asked.
“I am armored by my faith,” Kalen said. “Just as you are.”
“Faith in what?”
“That I am no murderer for my god,” Kalen said.
“We shall see.”
Sithe attacked again, her axe tracing an arc of fire through the air. He dived around her, his blades slashing along her side. She swayed just wide of his steel, but the attack had come close—close enough to have drawn forth her warding darkness. The dying flames of Sithe’s axe illumined their faces.
“Are you going to tell me?” Kalen asked. “What Myrin meant—‘all for nothing’?”
“Why should I know?” Sithe asked. “I have spoken thirteen words to the girl.”
“Because you know something of nothing, Lady Void.”
That struck her. Her eyes narrowed and her lips tightened. He could not help thinking he had made a terrible mistake.
She raised her hand and an invisible force wrenched him straight into her scything axe. He dodged low at the last instant and rolled between her legs. He rose and faced her once more.
“You’ve set aside your armor, but all your defenses are still in place,” she said. “You refuse to accept the truth. You fear to be your god’s instrument—the hand of vengeance.” She raised her axe. “You prefer fear to faith.”
“I told you,” he said. “I fear nothing.”
“And what of Myrin?”
Kalen hesitated.
Sithe pointed at him and bonds of darkness formed around his legs and arms. Before he could react, she came rushing toward him, her axe raised.
Kalen tried to dodge, but Sithe’s power hobbled him and he stumbled. He crossed his daggers in front of his chest to block, but Sithe’s axe shattered right through his defense and sank with a wet thunk into his chest.
He felt the blow only a little—mostly, Kalen felt the impact as it hammered him into the rooftop like a heated blade caught between a smith’s hammer and an anvil. He saw more than felt blood welling around the ripping blade of Sithe’s ugly weapon. For some reason, he couldn’t move his arms or legs. He couldn’t—
Sithe wrenched the blade forth in a great gout of blood and flesh.
He felt that, assuredly—felt the jagged blade rip into his insides and light a fire that brought darkness lunging at him from all sides. His body reacted of its own accord, limbs twitching toward the wound. The world wavered and he gasped for breath.
Sithe threw a leg over him, straddling his chest and pressing his wound closed with her body. She put her face to his, almost as though they might kiss—but no desire or even mercy shone in her eyes. She caught his cheeks between her hands.
“Do not fight this,” she said. “Rather, embrace it.”
He could feel sucking darkness. The pain from that initial wrench subsided, replaced by a numb confusion as his body struggled against the inevitable.
“I—I cannot feel it,” Kalen said. “My spellscar. I cannot feel—”
She punched him in the face, silencing his protests. “This is death,” she said. “Spellscar or no, this is the death you have carried since birth—since ever your father looked upon your mother with lust and she upon him with the same.” She wrenched his head up and their noses touched. “You are not responsible for this.”
“But my spellscar—”
“If you had never acquired a spellscar, still you would feel nothing,” Sithe said. “You feel nothing because you fear to. You fear the truth of your doom—a doom you have always known and always chased—and you fear to live in spite of it.”
“No, that—that isn’t—” Kalen’s words felt sluggish now, his body fading. “I—I cursed myself. I brought this doom upon me. I have chosen this.”
“You are a bigger fool than I could have imagined,” Sithe said.
She stood, releasing the pressure on his wound.
Involuntarily, Kalen’s throat cried out like a terrified child. His body seized in a rictus of agony, then collapsed.
He thought about Myrin.
Darkness.
Sithe crouched beside the dying man, her chin on her hands. Blood flowed freely from the rent in his chest and his body was twitching its way into oblivion.
She could let it end, she realized. Killing was her purpose—death her only lover and master. What right had this man to life, when he sought at every turn to deny it?
She might have left him to die, but she saw something more. She saw what he was … and what he could be.
She drew a vial of white liquid from her belt and forced its contents down Kalen’s throat.
Then she waited.
Life came back in a rush and he sat up with a wrenching cry. The wound in his chest had closed, and he could feel the tingling effects of a healing potion.
“Peace.” Sithe put her arms around him and pressed his head to her breast.
Tears welled in his eyes and he wept. He could not say why. In truth, he had not known he was doing it until he saw the tears darkening her bodice.
“Peace,” she said.
For many moment, they sat that way—Sithe holding Kalen as he wept. He kept starting to speak, but no words seemed to fit. When the silence broke, it was Sithe who spoke.
“You fear death less than you fear the truth,” she said. “And that is laudable.”
“What truth?” he asked.
“Terrible things befall all men,” she said, “and you are not special.”
“I don’t understand.”
“All your life, you strive to make amends,” Sithe said. “This death inside you—you believe it your punishment for a life of sin.”
“Isn’t it?” he asked. “Why else would I have this curse?”
“Death needs no reason.” Sithe met his eyes. “You were born with this darkness and you will die with it. There is no meaning or greater explanation. It simply is.”
She eased away from him, leaving him kneeling alone on the rooftop. She turned toward the sunset.
Kalen knew she was wrong. As a boy, he had wandered into a storm of spellplague—that was the source of his curse—and yet … He looked at his fingers, scarred from when he had gnawed them as a child. His lips as well were hardened. The spellplague hadn’t stolen feeling away. It had made it worse, undeniably, but the numbness was his own.
And if it was …
“Myrin lied to you,” Sithe said at last.
“When?”
“In her letter,” Sithe said. “She claimed she drew death out of you and that you would live just that much longer. A lie.”
Kalen shook his head. “I don’t understand.”
“She did not draw out your death, because she cannot—no one can,” Sithe said. “Your death is your own and so is your life. If you yet live, it is because you choose to and for no other reason.” She turned to him. “Now get up.”
“I cannot,” Kalen said, his teeth gritted.
“Get up.” Sithe kicked him savagely in the ribs, and Kalen curled into the pain.
He tried to push himself off the ground, but his body wouldn’t move as he directed. He fought to push life into his limbs, but they were cold and dead.
“Understand pain,” Sithe said. “Life is pain, whether you feel it or not.” She crouched over him, resting her elbows on her knees and her chin on her hands. “Do you feel it? Even if your body is empty.”
“In … in my dreams.” Kalen curled up, coughing. “Dreams.”
“Ah.” Sithe reached down a
nd ran her cold black fingers across Kalen’s sweaty brow. “And what do you see, in these dreams?”
“I see faces.” Kalen panted. “All of them—the men and the women I have killed. Vaelis, my old apprentice. They …” His eyes blurred. “Their eyes are open. Waiting.”
Sithe bent lower, her face to his face. “Do you know what I see in my dreams?”
Kalen sniffed, his eyes bleared with tears. He shook his head slightly.
“Nothing,” Sithe said. “I see nothing when I close my eyes. There is nothing inside me.” She put her hand on his chest. “For you, you choose to feel nothing, but for me”—she touched her hand to her breast—“for me, I am emptiness. You understand?”
He nodded.
“Hate,” she said. “Hate is how I move—how I defeat you. Because I believe in hatred.” She closed her hands together in front of her mouth. “And what of you?”
“There is …” Kalen coughed, then focused on her face. “For me, there is more.”
Sithe stared for a long moment into Kalen’s eyes. Her black gaze was like the eternal night sky before the stars emerged. “Then stand,” she said, “and show me.”
“But—” Kalen groaned.
“I thought as much.” She turned her back and strode away.
Kalen fell into himself, Sithe’s words echoing in his mind. His scar—his curse—predated the spellplague. It was born instead, as he had been. Aye, he was scarred by magic. Indeed, he had ever—until this moment—known it for a curse. Now he wondered if there was not power to be held. The power of a god’s chosen murderer.
Without knowing how, he rose. He should not have been able to move—the potion Sithe had forced down his throat had not healed him that much. Yet he rose. He held only a splintered dagger—the remains of his defense against Sithe’s axe—and yet he rose to face her.
“I know what he saw,” Kalen called. “The man, when he looked into the abyss.”
Sithe paused and looked back. She did not appear surprised. “Yes?”
“He saw death,” Kalen said.
Shadowbane: A Forgotten Realms Novel Page 26
