Easy Betrayals tddts-8

by Richard Baker

  "Are you I’ll?" Miltiades asked, studying him closely.

  "He's from Edenvale," Rings answered for him.

  "What's that mean?"

  "It means that I'm dying," Belgin said weakly. "It's the damned bloodforges. Doegan has its fish scales… and lately the black malaise that incapacitated the warriors of the city. In Konigheim, it's a weakness of the will or the mind… everyone knows a Konigheimer who's snapped."

  "Including Kurthe," Rings muttered.

  Belgin nodded. "Some say Konigheimers have been known to grow a third eye. I don't know about that, though."

  "Edenvale's curse is simple," Belgin continued. "We just die young. That's it. My father died at thirty three, my mother at thirty one. My grandsire, he lived to be forty-one. He was accounted lucky. Everyone pays the price for our kings' toys."

  Miltiades and Jacob stared at him in silence for a long moment. "How old are you now?" the paladin asked.

  "Thirty four. I guess all the time I spent at sea's been good for my health. I'd probably be dead by now if I'd stayed at home."

  "Tyr has the power to heal-" the paladin began.

  "Not this," Belgin interrupted. "It's a curse, a magical curse. Believe me, plenty of our priests have tried to undo the bloodforge's effects. I don't know of any who have succeeded."

  "Tyr grant that Kern destroys that infernal device. And any others that remain in the Utter East, for that matter. Nothing could be worth that cost." Miltiades stood, his face set in a stonelike expression. "Can you continue?"

  "I'll live. For now, anyway," Belgin said with a grimace of false bravado. Although his hands trembled with the palsy of an old man, the sharper pushed himself to his feet and retrieved his satchel. "Don't worry, Miltiades-I mean to make sure the doppelganger doesn't outlive me. Lead the way."

  Moving slowly now, the two warriors and the two pirates sallied from the old temple into the stone city. As Belgin feared, the howling wind erased tracks almost as soon as they were made; Eidola's trail was nonexistent. They circled the ancient shrine, searching the buildings nearby to no effect. Again Belgin felt a cold tone in the wind, a hint of malice and solidity that plucked at his cloak like a living thing, but it vanished before he could even say a word of warning to the others. What kind of guardians watched the crypt we disturbed? he thought. Could they still be here?

  The outer buildings seemed more intact than the central temple. Smaller and sturdier, some even retained their roofs. Beyond the ring of buildings there was a large open space and a crumbling wall that seemed to circle the whole set of ruins. Broken and buried in drifting sand, nothing but desolate sand and flat sheets of rock stretched out beyond the walls. After one deliberate circuit, they paused in the lee of the outer wall, considering their next move. "This place isn't a city," Rings observed. "There aren't enough dwellings or private buildings."

  "A temple complex or holy city, then," Miltiades said. "Deliberately removed from the mundane world, isolated as a retreat for worship and ceremony."

  "It would be appropriate for a city of the dead," the dwarf added. "The builders interred their kings and nobles in a sacred city far from the common folk. They could hide the tombs anywhere in Faerun with those magical gates."

  "Who would go to that much trouble?" Jacob asked.

  "I can think of someone," Belgin said. "The mage lords of ancient Netheril."

  "Netheril?" Jacob guffawed. "Tell me another tale, charlatan."

  "The statues in the tomb we found were carved in the mode of ancient Netherese dress," Belgin said, tugging at his ear. "The runes and hieroglyphs marking the portal, they were Netherese as well. And I've seen a few faint traces of more hieroglyphs in walls sheltered from the wind. Besides… we're sitting in the middle of a desert. If these are Netherese ruins, I'd expect we're somewhere in Anauroch."

  Rings stared at Belgin. "What's a Netherese? And where in the Five Kingdoms is Anauroch?"

  The sharper shrugged. "I'm no expert, Rings. I'm just guessing. But Netheril was once a great empire ruled by mighty wizards, far to the northwest of the Five Kingdoms… fairly close to the homeland of these gentlemen, in fact," he said, nodding at Miltiades and Jacob. "A long time ago, the Netherese brought some kind of awful magical doom down on their heads, and their kingdom fell, only to be buried by the sand and rock of the desert called Anauroch."

  "I've traveled Anauroch before," Miltiades said. "I've never seen this particular place, but it feels right. How did you learn of these things, Belgin?"

  "I was given an unusual education." Belgin spread his hands with a disarming gesture. "I've read a hundred books and learned a thousand tales. But just as my old mentor predicted, I've wasted my learning on a life of iniquity, deceit, and moral ambiguity." He grinned abruptly. "If only she could see me now, battling fiends and consorting with paladins. She might think I'd tinned out right after all."

  "Do any of your tales offer insight into the catching of doppelgangers?"

  "Nothing as practical as that, I fear," Belgin said.

  'Then I think it's time I called on Tyr to aid us in our quest," Miltiades said. Standing, the paladin raised his warhammer, his lips moving in silent prayer. The seething brown murk seemed to lift for just a moment, and his silver armor gleamed scarlet in the setting sun. Opening his eyes, he turned to face the old ruins, seeming to search the dusty arcades and plazas with a sense keener than mortal sight. "She's in that direction," he stated with confidence. "Tyr has granted me a seeking spell, and I can sense the lariat that binds the doppelganger."

  "How far off?" Rings asked, scrambling to his feet.

  "Not far," Miltiades answered. He glanced over his shoulder at the ruddy glow along the western horizon, the only hint of the sun they'd seen in hours. "If we move fast, we can confront the doppelganger before darkness falls."

  The four glided through the ruins, intent on their goal. They trailed quietly down a narrow alleyway drifted knee-deep in soft sand, crossed the shell of an old barracks house, then padded across an open boulevard lined with shattered columns. The stump of a round tower rose ahead of them, above the low rooftops and dunes. Miltiades raised his hand and crouched low behind a ruined colonnade. The others followed his lead.

  He nodded at the tower and whispered, "In there.

  Remember, she's caught by Noph's magical rope. If you can lay hold of it, she'll be powerless to resist, and we can take her back to Waterdeep."

  Rings glanced at Belgin. The sharper returned his gaze without expression, and the dwarf silently nodded in agreement, drawing his axe from his belt loop. She won't be standing trial if Rings or I have anything to say about it, he decided. They weren't being paid to pass judgment, only to execute the judgment their unknown employer had decided upon.

  "We're ready," Belgin said.

  Miltiades stood and vaulted over the stone block, dashing for the splintered doorway as if his armor of silver plate was a light cloak. Belgin and Rings ran after the paladin, while Jacob brought up the rear at a more cautious pace, keeping an eye on the dismal ruins and howling sand behind them. The great paladin stormed the dark tower like a righteous hurricane, the pirates only a step behind him.

  They caught Eidola in her natural shape. Gray and gaunt, she was a skeletal creature draped in loose, leathery flesh. The lariat still circled her neck, although she'd carefully coiled the trailing end and secured it by her side. Hissing in rage, she crouched like a monstrous spider and whirled to face Miltiades as the paladin charged straight at her.

  "Insolent human! What must I do to teach you to stay out of my path?" she howled.

  "Surrender, monster! We have you trapped!" Miltiades shouted. He leaped forward, attacking in a deadly hail of hammer blows. Lithe and quick, the gray creature eluded the first rush, and then there were two Miltiades, identical to each other, flailing away with silver hammers.

  Belgin checked his own rush, Rings hesitating as well. "Which one is real?" the dwarf roared in frustration.

  “I am!" cried one M
iltiades.

  "Don't listen to him!" answered the other.

  The sharper looked at the dwarf and said, "Don't tell me you didn't expect that."

  Scowling, he circled the battling paladins, rapier at the ready. Rings grunted and followed his lead. Behind them, Jacob filled the doorway, watching the fight as he tried to gauge which one to strike at. Belgin glanced around the room, measuring the arena. The tower's floor was choked with rough rubble; its stone walls rose only twenty or thirty feet before ending in a jagged stump. The walls above them glowed orange with the last rays of the sunset. One Miltiades stumbled but parried the other's attack and drove his reflection back toward Rings. "Think, lad, think!" Belgin muttered to himself. "Which one's real?"

  The dwarf raised his axe but held his blow, cursing. "I don't know which one to hit!"

  "I know a way to find out," Belgin said, smiling grimly. "Miltiades, don't say anything. Eidola? Which one are you?"

  "I am," said the Miltiades with his back to Rings.

  Instantly the dwarf swung his axe in a low, vicious cut, but Miltiades-Eidola leaped over the blow and quickly grappled with the real Miltiades, spinning around. Belgin slashed at the imposter as the two reeled close to him and was rewarded with a hiss of pain. Dark blood stained his sword blade, and the battling paladins moved away again, locked in their deadly embrace.

  From the doorway, Jacob surged forward. "I've got her!" he cried. He raised his mighty war blade for a monstrous stroke certain to cut the doppelganger in two.

  "No, Jacob! That's the wrong one!" Belgin shouted in alarm.

  Undeterred, the Tyrian warrior lashed out, the blade flashing like a gleam of doom in the dusk. At the last instant, the Miltiades he struck dropped to one knee and used his hammer to turn the blade aside, though not before the tip of Jacob's sword cut a long, shallow gash down his face. Bright red human blood splashed the sand.

  "Jacob!" Miltiades cried. "You almost killed me!" Miltiades-Eidola stepped forward to strike at her foe's back, but Belgin and Rings moved in from the flank, driving her back. Suddenly they faced the gray doppelganger again as she abandoned her imitation of the paladin. She bared her fangs in a fierce snarl, then whirled and leaped high into the air, catching hold of the worn stone of the tower's wall. Like a great insect she scuttled upward, fashioning hooks and loops from her hands to speed her climb. In the blink of an eye she'd vanished over the wall's broken parapet, thirty feet above.

  "She's fled outside!" Belgin called. "Come on! She's wounded!"

  Shaken, the real Miltiades rose, one hand pressed to his bleeding face. He glared at Jacob, then pushed past the fighter without saying a word. He paused in the tower's door and scanned the darkening city. "She's moving," he stated flatly, then vanished into the street beyond.

  Belgin quickly followed, keeping Miltiades in sight. Behind him, Rings caught Jacob's arm and spun the fighter to face him. Despite the difference in their stature, the dwarf forced the fighter to meet his eyes. "You idiot," he snapped. "We had her! Have you got rocks between your ears?"

  Jacob's face whitened, and the warrior tore out of Rings's grasp. He angrily slammed his mailed fist against the ancient wall, flailing at his own mistake. "I know what I did," he retorted. Then he bolted out the door after the other two. Rings lowered his head and charged in pursuit, refusing to be left behind.

  They ran through the dusty streets, following the silver gleam of Miltiades. The paladin halted in a stone plaza before an old palace, closing his eyes to sense the magical lariat. Belgin skidded to a stop beside him, scanning the plaza with his eyes. There! A dark shape slipped up the weathered stairs of the palace.

  "Forget your divination," the sharper said, catching Miltiades's arm and pointing. "She's gone in there!"

  "After her!" Miltiades sprinted across the plaza and up the steps. Belgin loped after him. Jacob and Rings, a short distance behind, altered their course and ran toward the palace.

  On the horizon, the red crescent of the sun slid beneath the earth. In that moment, everything changed. The wind, quiet and sad, instantly returned with a screaming, stinging gale of hard-driven sand, catching their cloaks with ghostly talons. Driven dust and sand obscured the square in the space of moments, blinding and disorienting paladin and pirate both. The temperature of the air dropped abruptly, as if they'd waded into a stream of icy water. And the watchful, mournful presence Belgin had sensed earlier suddenly seemed tangible and malevolent, a cold and hateful thing that closed on them with the fall of darkness. "Miltiades!" he shrieked, though his words were torn away by the wind.

  The paladin stumbled on the steps. Belgin scuttled toward him, keeping low to the ground. He turned once to shout encouragement to Jacob and Rings, but the return of the storm plunged the Netherese temple into impenetrable gloom. The fighter and the dwarf were nowhere in sight-but the more he looked, the more certain he became that something was moving towards him in the roiling murk. Coughing, he drew a silken scarf from his collar and pulled it up over his nose and mouth.

  "Do you feel it, paladin?" he called to Miltiades, a few feet away.

  "I feel it, Belgin," Miltiades answered. His voice was distant and faint, even though he shouted to raise his voice above the storm. "The evil of this place sleeps no longer!"

  "What is it?"

  "I know not!" The paladin scrambled to his feet, spinning to search the ruins with an arm raised to shield his eyes. "Where are Jacob and Rings?"

  They were thirty or forty yards behind me, in the middle of the square. They can't be far!"

  They must have gotten turned around in the dust," Miltiades said. He stood, buffeted by the vicious wind. Sand hissed from his armor like the sound of rain falling on a hot skillet. For the first time, Belgin saw human hesitation, human frailty, in the paladin's face. He glanced toward the empty storm behind them, up to the dark doorway at the top of the steps, then toward the square again. "Jacob!" he cried. "Rings! Are you out there?"

  They'll never hear you in this," Belgin said. "Do we look for them, or do we stay put?"

  "We're all blind in this Tyr-cursed dust storm. We could spend the whole night blundering around looking for each other."

  "Split up, then? You pursue the doppelganger, while I wait here for the others?"

  "No, that's too dangerous. You said yourself that we can't be caught alone by her, and there's something else here, Belgin, something that awoke when the sun vanished below the sands. I can feel it seeking us. If I left you here alone, I don't think I'd ever see you again."

  Then let's leave Eidola to whatever it is that watches this place, find our comrades, and get out of here," Belgin said, raising his voice to carry over the wind. "We can return at sunrise to see if the doppelganger's still alive."

  "No," said Miltiades. "No monster, no fiend, no force in this world will sway me from my course." He turned back to the crumbling palace and battled up the steps, "Come on; Eidola is somewhere within. Jacob and Rings know our quest. They must fend for themselves."

  Chapter 3

  Dark Designs

  Night and chaos descended like the fall of a titan's maul. Trotting across the ancient square a few feet behind Jacob, Rings could see Miltiades and Belgin racing up the broken steps of an old palace, darting toward a gaping, shadowed archway. Then the sight was erased by a gust of wind powerful enough to spin him half around and blind him with an eyeful of grit. His world narrowed to a dimensionless sphere of dust, sand, and the old flagstones under his feet. "What now?" he growled aloud, even though the wind stole his words away.

  He caught a glimpse of a dim, metallic gleam off to his left and moved toward it. He bared his teeth in anger and drove his stocky frame through the storm, until a tall, ragged shape appeared suddenly from the mist. Jacob whirled to face him, greatsword at the ready. "Who goes there?" the human challenged.

  "Who do you think?" Rings answered. "Hold your blade, numbskull."

  Jacob scowled fiercely but lowered his sword. "Where did this come from?" he sho
uted, waving one hand to indicate the brown gloom that surrounded them.

  "I think that Belgin's guardians have finally taken note of us," Rings answered. "Maybe they were waiting for the sun to go down. Can you see or hear the others?"

  "I can't see my hand in front of my face. The last I saw, Miltiades and the dandy ran into a building over that way."

  Rings eyed Jacob's choice of direction. "Are you sure? I thought it was over there."

  The fighter nodded. "I'm sure of it. I was looking right at them when darkness fell."

  "Okay, I'll take your word for it. Let's get out of this damned dust."

  Jacob glanced around once more to fix his bearings, then moved off into the murk, leaning into the wind. Rings followed, one hand resting on the fighter's pack. They seemed to walk for a long time before they encountered a low, stone parapet that ran until it vanished in the gloom to either side.

  "This can't be right," Rings said. "The building we seek had a long colonnade and a big staircase in front of it."

  “I think I saw this wall on the left side of the square. We need to follow it toward the right to get to the palace."

  "I don't remember any damned wall at all," Rings snorted. "I think this is going to be a lot harder than we thought."

  "Well, do you want to lead?" Jacob snapped. "At least I know when I'm lost. Try it your way; maybe you're right after all."

  Jacob looked left, then started along the wall toward the right, trailing his left hand along the old stone. Again, they seemed to walk a long time. The world ceased beyond the five or ten feet they could see around them, but Rings began to suspect that something or someone trailed them just out of sight, moving in and out of the corners of his perception like a half-remembered nightmare.