When it cleared the door, leaving smoking wood at every point of the jamb, it grew to its full, gigantic proportions, towering over the distant companions, mocking them with its intensity and its size.
A fiery monstrosity from the Elemental Plane of Fire.
Drizzt sucked in his breath and lifted Taulmaril, not even thinking to go to his more trusted scimitars. He couldn’t fight the creature in close; of all the four primary elemental beasts, fire was the type any melee warrior was least capable of battling. Its flames burned with skin-curling intensity, and the strike of a scimitar, though it could hurt the beast, would heat the weapon as well.
Drizzt drew back and let fly, and the arrow disappeared into the swirl of flames.
The fire elemental swung around toward him and roared, the sound of a thousand trees crackling, then spat forth a line of flames that immediately set the birch stand aflame.
“How do we fight it?” Regis cried, and yelped as the elemental scorched the trough he hid behind, filling the air with thick steam.
Drizzt didn’t have an answer. He shot off another arrow, and again had no way of knowing if it scored any damage on the creature or not.
Then, on instinct, the drow angled his bow to the side and let fly a third, right past the elemental to slam into, and punch through, the wall of the structure housing the wizard.
A cry from inside told him that he had startled the mage, and the sudden and angry turn of the fire elemental, back toward the house, confirmed what the drow had hoped.
He fired off a continual stream, then, a volley placed all around the wooden structure, blasting hole after hole and without discernable pattern. He judged his effect by the motions of the elemental, gliding one stride toward him, then one back at the wizard. For controlling such a beast was no easy feat, and one that required absolute concentration. And if that control was lost, Drizzt knew, the summoned creature would almost always take out its rage upon the summoner.
More arrows flashed into the house but to less effect; Drizzt needed to actually score a hit on the mage to turn the elemental fully.
But he didn’t, and he soon recognized that the creature was inevitably edging his way. The wizard had adjusted.
Drizzt kept up the barrage anyway, and began moving away as he fired, confident that he could turn and outdistance the creature, or at least get to the water’s edge, where the Mirar would protect him from the elemental’s fury. He turned and glanced to the water trough, thinking to tell Regis to run.
But the halfling was already gone.
The wizard was protected from the arrows, Drizzt realized as the elemental bore down on him with renewed enthusiasm. The drow fired off a pair of shots into it for good measure then turned and sprinted back the way he’d come, around the edge of the building hit by the same fireball that had nearly melted him, which was burning furiously.
“Clever wizard,” he heard himself muttering as he almost ran headlong into a giant web that stretched from building to building in the alleyway. He spun to see the elemental blocking the exit, its flames licking the structures to either side.
“Have at it, then,” Drizzt said to the beast and drew his scimitars.
He couldn’t really speak to a creature from an elemental plane, of course, but it seemed to Drizzt as if the monster heard him, for as he finished, the elemental rushed forward, its fiery arms sweeping ferociously.
Drizzt ducked the first swing then leaped out to his right just ahead of the second, running up the wall—and feeling that its integrity was diminished by the fires roaring within—and spinning into a back somersault. He came down in a spin, scimitars slashing across, backhand leading forehand, and both sent puffs of flame into the air as they slashed against the life-force that held those flames together into a physical, solid creature.
That second weapon, Icingdeath, sent a surge of hope through Drizzt, for its properties were not only affording him some substantial protection from flames, as it had done against the wizard’s fireball, but the frostbrand scimitar took a particular pleasure in inflicting cold pain upon creatures with affinity to fire. The fire elemental shook off Twinkle’s backhand hit, as it had all but ignored the shots from Taulmaril, but when Icingdeath connected, the creature seemed to burn less bright. The elemental whirled away and seemed to shrink in on itself, spinning around tightly.
Its flames burned brighter, white hot, and the creature came out enraged and huge once more.
Drizzt met its charge with a furious flurry of whirling blades. He shortened Twinkle’s every stroke, using that blade to fend off the elemental’s barrage of punches. He followed every strike with Icingdeath, knowing that he was hurting the elemental.
But not killing it.
Not anytime soon at least, and despite the protection of Icingdeath, Drizzt felt the heat of the magnificent, deadly beast. More than that, the power of the elemental’s swings could fell an ogre even without the fiery accompaniment.
The elemental stomped its foot and a circular gout of flames rushed out from the point of impact, sweeping past Drizzt and making him hop in surprise.
The creature came forward and let fly a sweeping right hook, and Drizzt fell low, barely escaping the hit, which smashed hard into the burning building, crushing through the wooden wall.
From that hole came a blast of fire, and as it retracted, Drizzt leaped for the broken wood. He planted his foot on the bottom rim of the opening and came up flat against the wall, but only for the brief second it took him to swing his momentum and leap away into a backward somersault and turn, and as he came around, climbing higher across the alleyway, he somehow managed to sheathe his blades and catch on to the rim of the opposite building’s roof. He ignored the stun of the impact as he crashed against the structure and scrambled, lifting his legs just above another heavy, fiery slug.
As fast as he went, though, the elemental was faster. It didn’t climb the wall in any conventional sense, but just fell against it and swirled up over itself, rising as flames would climb a dry tree. Even as Drizzt stood tall on the roof, so did the elemental, and that building, too, was fully involved.
The elemental shot a line of flames at Drizzt, who dived aside, but still got hit—and though Icingdeath helped him avoid the brunt of the burn, he surely felt that sting!
Worse, the roof was burning behind him, and the elemental sent out another line, and another, all designed, Drizzt recognized, to seal off his avenues of escape.
The elemental hadn’t done that in the alley, the drow realized as he drew out his scimitars yet again. The creature was smart enough to recognize a web, and knew that such an assault would have freed its intended prey. This creature was not dumb.
“Wonderful,” Drizzt muttered.
“To the bridge!” Deudermont ordered, running from the collapsing wharf to the collection of rocks and crates, stone walls and trees his crewmen were using as cover. “We have to turn the wizards from Brambleberry’s men.”
“We be fifteen strong!’ one man shouted back at him. “Or fifteen weak, I’m saying!”
“Two fireballs from extinction,” said another, a fierce woman from Baldur’s Gate who, for the last two years, had led almost every boarding charge.
Deudermont didn’t disagree with their assessments, but he knew, too, that there was no other choice before them. With the collapse of the bridge, the Hosttower wizards had gained the upper hand, but despite the odds, Brambleberry’s leading ranks had nowhere to retreat. “If we flee or if we wait, they die,” the captain explained, and when he charged northeast along the river’s northern bank, not one of the fifteen sailors hesitated before following.
Their charge turned into a series of stops and starts as the wizards took note of them and began loosing terrible blasts of magic their way. Even with the volume of natural and manmade cover available to them, it occurred to Deudermont that his entire force might be wiped out before they ever got near the bridge.
And worse, Brambleberry’s force could not make pro
gress, as every attempt to break out from the solid structures at the edge of the bridge was met with fire and ice, electricity and summoned monsters. The earth elemental was finally brought down by the coordinated efforts of many soldiers and friendly wizards, but another beast, demonic in nature, rushed out from the enemy wizards’ position to take its place before any of Brambleberry’s men had even begun to cheer the earth beast’s fall.
Deudermont looked downriver, hoping to witness the return of Sea Sprite, but she was far into the harbor by then. He looked forlornly to the southeast, to Blood Island, where Brambleberry and the bulk of his forces remained, and was not encouraged to see that the young lord had only then begun to swing his forces back to the bridge that would bring them to the south-bank mainland and Luskan’s market, where they could march up the riverbank and cross along the bridge farther to the east.
This would be a stinging defeat, the captain reasoned, with many men lost and few of the Hosttower’s resources captured or destroyed.
Even as he began to rethink his assault, considering that perhaps he and his men should hunker down and wait for Brambleberry, a shout to the north distracted him.
The mob rushing to enter the fray, men and dwarves with an assortment of weapons, terrified him. The northwestern section of Luskan was known as the Shield, the district housing merchants’ storehouses and assembling grounds for visiting caravans from Luskan’s most important trading partner, the city of Mirabar. And the marchion of Mirabar was known to have blood connections among the Hosttower’s highest ranks.
But the rumors of a rift between Mirabar and the Arcane Brotherhood were apparently true. Deudermont saw that as soon as it became obvious that the new force entering the fray was no ally of the Hosttower wizards. They swept toward the wizards’ position, leading with a volley of sling bullets, spears, and arrows that brought howls of protest from the wizards and a chorus of cheers from Brambleberry’s trapped warriors.
“Onward!” the captain cried. “They are ours!”
Indeed they were, at least those poor lesser mages who didn’t possess the magical ability to fly or teleport from the field. Enemies closed in on them from three sides, and the wizards fleeing east, the only open route, could not hope to get past the next bridge before Brambleberry swept across and cut them off.
The fire elemental reared up to its full height, towering over the drow, who used the moment to rush ahead and sting it with Icingdeath before running back the other way as the great arms flashed in powerful swipes.
Thinking pursuit imminent, Drizzt cut to the side and dived headlong into a roll, turning halfway into the circuit in case he had to continue right over the edge of the building.
The elemental, though, didn’t pursue. Instead it roared off the other way, burning a line over the front edge of the building, then down into the street where it left a scarred trail back to the house from which it had emerged.
“It’s a pretty gem,” the wizard agreed, staring stupidly at the little ruby pendant the halfling had spinning at the end of a chain. On every rotation, the gem caught the light, bending it and transforming it into the wizard’s fondest desires.
Regis giggled and gave it another spin, deftly moving it back from the wizard’s grabbing hand. “Pretty, yes,” he said.
His smile disappeared, and so did the gem, scooped up into his hand in the blink of an astonished wizard’s eye.
“What are you doing?” the mage asked, seeming sober once more. “Where did it…?” His eyes widened with horror, and he started to say, “What have you done?” as he spun back toward the door just in time to see his angry elemental rushing into the house.
“Stay warm,” Regis said, and he fell backward out of the same window through which he’d entered, hitting the alleyway in a roll and running along with all speed.
Fire puffed out every window in the house, and between the wooden planks as well. Regis came back into the street. Drizzt, smoke wafting from his shoulders and hair, emerged from the front door of the house behind the battered water trough.
They met in the middle of the road, both turning back to the house that served as battleground between the wizard and his pet. Booms of magical thunder accompanied the crackle of burning beams. The roar of flames, given voice by the elemental, howled alongside the screams of the terrified wizard. The outer wall froze over suddenly, hit by some magical, frosty blast, only to melt and steam almost immediately as the fire elemental’s handiwork won the contest.
It went on for a few moments before the house began to fall apart. The wizard staggered out the front door, his robes aflame, his hair burned away, his skin beginning to curl.
The elemental, defeated, didn’t come out behind him, but the man could hardly call it a victory as he toppled face down in the road. Regis and Drizzt ran to him, patting out the flames and rolling him over.
“He won’t live for long without a priest,” the halfling said.
“Then we must find him one,” Drizzt replied, and looked back to the southwest, where Deudermont and Brambleberry assaulted the bridge. Smoke rose along with dozens of screams, the ring of metal, and the booming of magic.
Regis blew a long sigh as he answered, “I think most of the priests are going to be busy for a while.”
CHAPTER 11
THE ARCHMAGE ARCANE
T he building resembled a tree, its arms lifting up like graceful branches, tapering to elegant points. Because of the five prominent spires, one for each compass point and a large central pillar, the structure also brought to mind a gigantic hand.
In the centermost spire of the famous Hosttower of the Arcane, Arklem Greeth looked out upon the city. He was a robust creature, rotund and with a thick and full gray beard and a bald head that gave him the appearance of a jolly old uncle. When he laughed, if he wanted to, it came from a great belly that shook and jiggled with phony but hearty glee. When he smiled, if he pretended to, great dimples appeared and his whole face brightened.
Of course Arklem Greeth had an enchantment at his disposal that made his skin look positively flushed with life, the epitome of health and vigor. He was the Archmage Arcane of Luskan, and it wouldn’t do to have people put off by his appearance, since he was, after all, a skeletal, undead thing, a lich who had cheated death. Magical illusions and perfumes hid the more unpleasant aspects of his decaying corporeal form well enough.
Fires burned in the north—he knew them to be the largest collection of his safehouses. Several of his wizards were likely dead or captured.
The lich gave a cackling laugh—not his jolly one, but one of wicked and perverse enjoyment—wondering if he might soon find them in the netherworld and bring them back to his side, even more powerful than they had been in life.
Beneath that laughter, though, Arklem Greeth seethed. The Luskar guards had allowed it to happen. They had turned their backs on law and order for the sake of the upstart Captain Deudermont and that miserable Waterdhavian brat, Brambleberry. The Arcane Brotherhood would have to repay the Brambleberry family, to be sure. Every one of them would die, Arklem Greeth decided, from the oldest to the infants.
A sharp knock on his door broke through the lich’s contemplation.
“Enter,” he called, never looking back. The door magically swung open.
In rushed the young wizard Tollenus the Spike. He nearly tripped and fell on his face as he crossed the threshold, he was so excited and out of sorts.
“Archmage, they have attacked us,” he gasped.
“Yes, I am watching the smoke rise,” said an unimpressed Greeth. “How many are dead?”
“Seven, at least, and more than two-score of our servants,” the Spike answered. “I know not of Pallindra or Honorus—perhaps they managed to escape as did I.”
“By teleporting.”
“Yes, Archmage.”
“Escape? Or flee?” Greeth asked, turning slowly to stare at the flustered young man. “You left without knowing the disposition of your superior, Pallindra?”
“Th-there was nothing…” the Spike stuttered. “All was—was lost…”
“Lost? To a few warriors and half a ship’s crew?”
“Lost to the Mirabarrans!” the Spike cried. “We thought victory ours, but the Mirabarrans…”
“Do tell.”
“They swept upon us like a great wave, m-men and dwarves alike,” the Spike stammered. “We had little power remaining to us in the way of destructive magic, and the hearty dwarves could not be slowed.”
He kept rambling with the details of their last stand, but Greeth tuned him out. He thought of Nyphithys, his darling erinyes, lost to him in the east. He had tried to summon her, and when that had failed, had brought from the lower planes one of her associates, who had told him of the betrayal of King Obould of the orcs and the interference of that wretched Bruenor Battlehammer and his friends.
Arklem Greeth had long wondered how such an ambush had been so carefully planned. He had feared that he had completely underestimated that Obould creature, or the strength of the truce between Many-Arrows and Mithral Hall. He wondered if it hadn’t been a bit more than that strange alliance, though.
And now the Shield of Mirabar in Luskan had surprisingly joined into a fight that the Luskar guards had avoided.
A curious thought crossed Arklem Greeth’s mind.
That thought had a name: Arabeth Raurym.
“They will be compensated,” Lord Brambleberry assured the angry guard captain, who had followed the Waterdhavian lord all the way from Blood Island to the Upstream Span, the northern and westernmost of Luskan’s three Mirar bridges. “Houses can be rebuilt.”
“And children can be re-birthed?” the man snapped back.
“There will be unfortunate circumstances,” said Brambleberry. “It’s the way of battle. And how many were killed by my forces and how many by the Hosttower’s wizards with their wild displays of magic?”
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