by Dave Gross
Was this Ineffable Vault the Sorcerer's own test of his guest's fidelity?
Thamalon weighed his curiosity against his desire to be a good guest. In any other situation, he would never even consider snooping about his host's abode. The twin coincidences of the castle's name and the Sorcerer's appearance, however, tilted the scales toward impropriety.
Even as he considered where next to investigate his new surroundings, Thamalon couldn't dispel the memory of the guard's fear when he imagined the Sorcerer's displeasure. If insolence to a guest was so awful an offense as to set a young man to trembling, Thamalon didn't wish to learn what punishment the Sorcerer reserved for those who abused his hospitality.
CHAPTER 14
ABOVE THE CLOUDS
Cale watched Shamur lean into the wind, her eyes closed. The light of sunset turned her hair to gold as the wind lifted it up from her shoulders.
Fleetingly, Cale missed the feeling of wind combing through his hair.
Since a spell had rendered him permanently bald, he'd had few occasions to regret the loss of his distinctive red locks. In the years since, he had devoted himself so completely to service-first to Thamalon Uskevren, then to the Righteous Man, and finally to the Lord of Shadows himself-he'd rarely had time for mourning such petty pleasures such as the feeling of wind in his hair.
Besides, his baldness saved him the unpleasant task of washing skwalos mucous out of his hair.
When the creature's mouth had first shut upon him, Cale thrashed against the suffocating enclosure. Not only did he fail to escape but he also managed to fill his nose with the faintly citric saliva that washed over him.
Before he was smothered, his fleshy prison convulsed and sent his body deeper into the belly of the skwalos. Cale felt himself squeezed upward, then to one side, then upward again. Each time he turned or paused, another titanic contraction of muscles sent him shooting in another direction.
For a frantic instant, he imagined the experience was not unlike birth. The life-affirming image did nothing to comfort him.
Cale's lungs craved air. He wished he'd taken a deep breath before entering the mouth of the skwalos. He wondered whether Muenda had failed to warn him out of spite or mischief. Perhaps he thought it best not to frighten his guests. Or perhaps, Cale mused darkly, Muenda hadn't warned him because he wasn't being welcomed but eaten.
Just as the throbbing emptiness in his lungs began to ache, the skwalos spat him out onto a soft, moist surface.
Cale had emerged into a cavernous room. Blue-green light filtered through the translucent membranes of the ceiling. A single round passage led from the room to a brighter chamber beyond.
Strong hands gripped Cale's arms and helped him stand.
"Fun, yes?" Muenda asked, smiling at him through a thick glaze of mucous.
Cale couldn't be sure whether his enthusiasm was genuine or a subtle form of mockery. He gave the elf the benefit of the doubt and didn't punch him in the mouth.
Shamur emerged moments later, smothered in pinkish slime. She waved away the elves who awaited her and rose with as much dignity as a woman dripping with sputum could muster. Wiping the stuff from her mouth, she gave Cale a few succinct requests she wished relayed to their hosts.
Cale translated them in more diplomatic terms than she'd employed, omitting certain emphatic adjectives.
Fortunately, the elves were accustomed to the bizarre mode of transportation, and Shamur's first demand was quickly satisfied.
The elves led them to the next chamber, the yawning mouth of which opened to the bright sky. There they found a natural pool in the surface of the skwalos. Without ceremony, Muenda and his companions plunged into the bracing rainwater. Cale and Shamur followed their example.
As they washed the slime from their bodies and clothes, Cale and Shamur gazed out over the broad back of the skwalos.
From this vantage, the place-Cale could still not think of it as a creature-seemed like a mountain plateau. It was as wide as Selgaunt Bay and four or five times longer.
On top, the creature's hide was almost entirely opaque except for a few wide patches on the side where thin membranes ballooned from its sides. Its surface was more rugged in a wide swath running ventrally from its blunt head and tail. From deep crags and furrows sprouted wild bushes and fruit trees. Among the flora walked elves with the same deeply tanned skin and black hair as Muenda. Some tended the plants, while others knelt over smooth patches of the skwalos, stroking its bare hide.
Almost without exception, the elves sang as they worked. Some of the lyrics were strange, perhaps in an ancient dialect peculiar to these elves. Some of them were more familiar. Cale heard invocations for spring rain, odes to elven beauty, and even a few old ballads whose lyrics had inspired a hundred legendary human bards across Faerun.
Cale spotted five small circular tents scattered over the length of the skwalos. When Muenda noticed the direction of his gaze, he said, "When the moon rises, you will talk with our elders."
In the hours since, the elves had left Cale and Shamur alone to explore their fabulous conveyance. They went to the farthest edge of the creature and found a ridge of hard, gnarly thatch that marked the safe margin of the skwalos' flat back. From there they looked down on the land. The deep green forest sprawled to each horizon. A few meadow clearings dotted the expanse, rare and lonely among the uncountable trees. To the northeast, Cale spotted the mountains he'd seen earlier. South of them, a flat blue crescent curved toward them from the horizon, a vast lake or sea.
Cale and Shamur scanned the landscape for any sign of human habitation, but they saw none. The skwalos rose into the wispy clouds, and the fine mist briefly invigorated their tired bodies. When the creature emerged into the naked sky, fatigue gripped them at last. They left the edge of the skwalos and climbed to a higher vantage point upon the rugged spinal ridge. There they rested as the breeze dried their bodies and their clothes.
Several times they repeated their respective stories of the previous night, speculating on which of the Uskevren's enemies was behind the latest assault. The Talendar and Soargyls were obvious candidates. Their wealth and enmity for the Uskevren were almost without limit. Shamur favored the former House, assuming they wanted revenge for her killing Marance Talendar. Cale pointed out that the surviving Talendar had equally good reason to thank her for ridding them of their undead ancestor.
Shamur suggested the possibility that their rivals had joined forces, as they'd done so long ago to destroy Thamalon's father. Cale allowed that it was possible but reminded her that the Talendar and Soargyls hated each other even more than either of them hated the Uskevren.
They considered other political permutations. They considered the thieves' guild. They considered personal vendettas. Everything seemed possible. Nothing seemed likely, much less certain.
Eventually their conversation dwindled with the daylight. As the last embers of twilight faded in the west and the skwalos drifted south with the breeze, Cale was fretting uselessly about not feeling the wind in his hair.
In any event, it wasn't his long-lost hair or even his brief spate of vanity that troubled him.
It was the night sky.
Cale knew the constellations as well as most any man, and he recognized no pattern in the emerging stars.
"Look," said Shamur. She pointed to the horizon. There rose the crescent moon, lonely in a sky of distant stars. At a glance it appeared normal, but its attendant shards were missing. "That is not Selune."
"The stars are wrong, too," said Cale. "I think we aren't only far from Faerun but far from Toril."
To Cale's surprise, Shamur nodded as if she had already been thinking of that possibility.
"The journey through the painting," she said, "reminded me of a time I traveled to another plane of existence."
Cale felt an eyebrow rise at her remark, but Shamur didn't seem to notice. Cale was beginning to understand that she hadn't revealed all of her secrets. Not by a long shot.
Shamur
sighed and leaned into the oncoming breeze.
"In other circumstances," she said. "I might have enjoyed this strange journey."
Cale knew how she felt, but he kept it to himself. Rarely did he question his continued service to the Uskevren. Since the death of the Righteous Man and the revelation of his own role as the Shadow Lord's favored servant, Cale had wondered about his purpose. It was becoming increasingly difficult to believe that his masquerade as a servant among the nobles of Selgaunt had any great purpose.
Perhaps it was only sentiment that had kept him there so long. For years, he'd dedicated himself to serving the Uskevren family without becoming a part of it. No matter what affections he held for them, he remained a favored servant-separate and unequal.
Even in the familiar halls of Stormweather Towers, he knew, Cale had no home in Sembia. In his heart, he felt his destiny lay elsewhere, as yet undiscovered.
All he needed was a sign to know it was true.
"It has all the makings of one of Tazi's 'wildings,'" said Cale.
Shamur turned her head to him.
Cale didn't meet her gaze. Instead, he affected not to notice how much his comment had surprised her. In truth, he'd surprised himself with it. He had sometimes wondered whether Shamur suspected his affection for her daughter was more than protective. The constant spats between Tazi and Shamur were sparked not by their differences but by their sameness. Cale was certain of it.
So, too, was he certain that if anyone in the Uskevren household could guess his love for Tazi, it would be Shamur. To provoke her on the issue, however subtly, was undoubtedly dangerous.
Cale felt Shamur's studious gaze on his face. He continued to stare at the horizon, where the moon and the stars suffused the clouds with gray light.
Eventually, Shamur spoke.
"When I was Thazienne's age, I believed I was free. My brother would inherit, and my sister would marry well, leaving me to follow my heart. And so I did, both in love and in adventure. If you think these wildings of hers are something, it is only because I have not told you all of my stories."
Cale smiled at her and said, "I should like to hear them one day, my lady."
Shamur didn't return his smile.
"My first lover gave me two gifts," she said. "One was a magical sword. It was keen and fast, and it made my feet lighter than down. With Albruin in hand, there was no height I couldn't climb, no leap I wouldn't dare."
Then she did smile, a wistful expression of sorrow long ago distilled into wisdom.
"What was the other gift?"
"He left me," she said. "He knew what a young girl I was, how easily I would become attached to him, and he knew-even as I did not-that my "wildings,' as Tazi calls them, would someday end. No matter how far I chased through the Dales and along the Moonsea coast, one day I would have to come home.
"I didn't believe him, of course. I believed my entire life could be one long adventure, that I would be forever free of family bonds and obligations, but one day I did come home, and it was to take my niece's place as Thamalon's bride. I did not love him, then, nor did I relish the prospect of becoming a lady of the Old Chauncel, and yet I loved my family. I wouldn't buy my own happiness with their ruin. I sold Albruin and put aside my wildings with no more thought of my youthful lover or our adventures."
Shamur stopped speaking and looked at Cale.
"Thazienne has been away for a long time," she said, "but soon she will come home."
Cale considered her words. There was little doubt in his mind that Shamur understood his feelings for Tazi, and less still that she didn't condone a prospective relationship between her daughter and a family servant.
He knew he should resent her intrusion, but the matter wasn't that simple. Even if he believed Shamur's mores were the shallow bigotry of the noble class, there were other, far more compelling reasons he shouldn't pursue his love for her daughter-reasons Shamur could never imagine.
Before he could formulate a polite continuance of their conversation, the elves rescued him from the uncomfortable silence.
"Erevis Cale," called Muenda. "Shamur Uskevren. The elders will speak with you."
They followed him down the skwalos' spine and across the tangled woods upon its back. Muenda led them to a tent illuminated from within.
Inside, a lantern glowed with enchanted light and warmth. Blankets covered the floor except beneath the bare legs of the tent's three inhabitants.
Two were female elves so old and frail they might have been skeletons wrapped in blankets. The third was an ancient male elf with more flesh on his small, round belly than on all the rest of his body. Their skin was the color of old oak, their hair as white as ash. One of the women beckoned them to sit.
"I am Rukiya," she said. "This is my sister, Kamaria, and her worthless husband, Akil."
Cale inclined his head, uncertain of their custom. Shamur did the same.
"You have come far from your home," said Rukiya. Her voice was as clear and as strong as a girl's.
Cale replied that it was so before quietly translating for Shamur.
The woman nodded and said, "The children sing of a strange human man in the forest this morning. He helped a throbe caravan escape our blockade."
Cale considered defending Thamalon's actions as those of a man unfamiliar with the local conflict, but he decided the elders had already considered the point.
"Is he safe?"
Rukiya said, "He went south with the dwarves-" her expression turned grave as she added- "into the domain of the Sorcerer."
"Your enemy?"
"Our mortal enemy," she agreed.
"It was not always so," added Kamaria. Like her sister, she spoke with the voice of youth. "As a young man, the Sorcerer was a friend to the elves. Even now, my great, great granddaughter remains at his side. The foolish girl."
"She would not stay if there was no hope," Akil said.
"Be quiet, you old fool," said Rukiya.
Cale sensed a warm sentiment beneath her scolding words.
"I merely say what no one else wishes to remember," Akil replied.
"We wish only to find my master and return home," said Cale.
"How will you find your way, shadow walker?"
At first, Cale thought perhaps he had misunderstood her words, but Rukiya's eyes glittered with mischief. They saw more than he realized.
"I do not understand."
"Your master whispers your name to us," she said. "Yes, his shadow falls upon our land as well as yours. He tells us what kind of man you are. A killer."
"Assassin," added Kamaria.
"A righteous man," said Akil.
"Silence, you useless bag of bones," Rukiya scolded.
Cale didn't like what the elves were implying, but he couldn't mistake their meaning.
"We didn't come here to kill the Sorcerer," he said.
"And yet," said Rukiya, "you require our help."
"I see," said Cale.
"What are they saying?" asked Shamur.
Cale didn't answer. Instead, he looked back into Rukiya's eyes for some sign that she was testing him. Was it failure to refuse or to accept?
His voice reedy and high, Akil sang,
"I forbid you maidens all,
"Who wear gold in your hair,
"For to go to Stillstone Hall,
"For young Tam Lin is there."
"What was that?" insisted Shamur. "Is he singing about my son?"
"Never mind Akil," said Rukiya. "He dreams when he is awake."
"Why do you sing that song?" Cale asked.
"Pay him no mind," said Kamaria. "The song is forbidden in the Sorcerer's demesne, for it contains the name that must not be spoken. To utter it there means death."
"Why?"
"For once, before he buried it with his soul, Tam Lin was the Sorcerer's name."
CHAPTER 15
THE BURNING CHALICE
Dolly held the crystal decanter and poured the mead, careful to avoid touching the Q
uaff of the Uskevren. She spared only a quick, blushing glance up at Tamlin. He noticed her hopeful look but didn't acknowledge it. Instead, he stood upon the dais where his father's chair usually sat and watched as Escevar lifted the silver tray and bore it to the presiding cleric.
Standing beside High Songmaster Ammhaddan, Tamlin smelled the sweet, musky bouquet of the honey wine. His mouth watered for a taste. For the second time since his kidnapping, he was about to violate his oath of abstinence. This time his excuse was that such a solemn ritual shouldn't be sullied with a base substitute.
Not with most of the Old Chauncel looking on.
The feast tables had been pushed to the walls to make room, and the hall was filled to capacity with members of all of Selgaunt's noble families, great and petty. Among the hundreds of visitors were faces Tamlin knew well: Baerent, Toemalar, Baerodreemers, and Foxmantles. Soargyls and Ithivisk mingled with the Karns, Mandrales, Elzimmers, Malveen, and Kessyls.
In the nearest row, seated comfortably in places of honor, were the most prominent and powerful lords of Selgaunt. Tamlin listened to the High Songmaster's evocation and smiled at those he counted most dear-and most dangerous.
Fendo Karn smiled warmly back at Tamlin. His loyalty was all but assured by blood, for he was cousin to Shamur Uskevren. Beside him sat Saclath Soargyl, the fat and sneering son of a man whom Thamalon counted as one of the family's deadliest enemies. Next was the honorable Ansible Loakrin, Lawmaker of Selgaunt, who had a reputation for impartial justice.
Conspicuous among the merchant lords was the Hulorn himself, Andeth Ilchammar. While many, including Tazi, joked about the man's eccentric tastes in art and opera, Tamlin enjoyed the lord mayor's generous galas and his devoted patronage of the arts. The nobleman returned Tamlin's gaze with a courtly nod.
