Swords of Dragonfire tkomd-2

by Ed Greenwood

  “Dauntless!” Laspeera’s rebuke betrayed the fury she was swallowing. She gave the Knights a long, level look and snapped, “Let’s get you out of Arabel before anything else happens.”

  “Lathalance blundered,” Sarhthor reported, “and it cost us the mageling Neldrar, who had showed some small promise.”

  Manshoon, Lord of the Zhentarim, turned from lighting the last of the tall bedside candles to smile sardonically. “Lathalance’s blunders are part of his charm. Make his death serve us some useful purpose.”

  Sarhthor nodded. “I’ve ordered him to Halfhap.”

  “And in that flourishing metropolis he’ll prove useful to us how?”

  “The adventurers who were just given the Pendant of Ashaba by the Blackstaff will reach there on the morrow, on their ride to Shadowdale.”

  “I quite see. This may prove amusing. Leave us now.”

  Sarhthor bowed, turned, and went to the door. When he opened it, he found himself gazing into the darkly beautiful face of Symgharyl Maruel, The Shadowsil, Manshoon’s current favorite. It was a face widely feared among the Zhentarim-in particular when it was wearing the little catlike smile adorning it now.

  The Shadowsil lifted an eyebrow in unspoken challenge as their eyes met. Sarhthor carefully kept a faint, polite smile on his own face, and his eyes on hers. Her black robe was hanging open, and she was bare beneath it.

  In smooth silence he bowed and stood back to wave her in through the door. The Shadowsil slipped off her robe, handed it to Sarhthor, and strode into Manshoon’s bedchamber, clad only in high black boots.

  “At least the sarking rain has stopped,” Semoor muttered, peering up at the bright moon riding high above them, in a sky full of stars and a few tattered clouds.

  “Hush!” Jhessail hissed, from beside him. “The gods will hear! And we’ll have hailstorms, or worse!”

  “I’d like a rain of gold coins,” Pennae said, looking up into the sky. “Of respectable mintings, slightly worn from use, that no treasury’s missing.” She waited, hands outspread, but nothing happened.

  “ I think the gods believe they’ve rewarded you more than enough,” Islif grunted, “coming through that fray without a scratch-leaving the dead heaped in your wake.”

  “That,” Pennae replied flatly, “was my doing, not any achievement of the gods.”

  Doust and Semoor cleared their throats in unison, and she turned and laid a finger to her lips in a “be quiet” admonition. Semoor used one of his fingers to make another sort of gesture in reply.

  The Knights were trotting their horses cautiously along the moonlit Mountain Ride, heading north-northeast out of Arabel. They were making good time, and talking in low tones about all that had unfolded.

  “How will we even find Shadowdale?” Jhessail murmured, looking at the dark forest, and the soaring mountains beyond.

  “This road leads there,” Doust told her, “so if we don’t stray off it in Tilverton or elsewhere…”

  Pennae turned in her saddle, teeth flashing in a grin, to unbuckle the saddlebag behind her left leg. Flipping it open, she plucked something forth with a flourish. A map, splendidly drawn-as they could all see by the magical glow that awakened across its drawn surface, the moment she unfurled it.

  Doust blinked. “Where’d you get that? ” Without pause for breath he added gloomily, “As if I didn’t know.”

  “Stolen,” she replied cheerfully. “Speaking of which-”

  With a more elaborate flourish, Pennae flipped aside her half-cloak and drew forth something from behind her back.

  It caught the moonlight as she reversed it in her hand: a well-used, splendidly made sword. She handed it to Florin, who hefted it appreciatively. Before he could ask, she said, “Now Officer Dauntless has a place to store his blinding temper. Inside his empty sword-scabbard.”

  Florin groaned. Semoor whistled in appreciation. Jhessail snapped, “You didn’t! ” Doust and Islif turned in their saddles to look back at the road behind them, for signs of pursuit.

  Pennae shrugged. “I did. And War Wizard Laspeera saw me, and said not a word. She was too busy winking, I guess.”

  In the darker streets of Arabel, it was not unusual to see the few folk of wealth and importance who walked around by night inside a protective ring of bodyguards.

  In this particular street, this night, a drunken merchant came reeling out of an alley-mouth to stumble against the foremost bodyguards in one such ring. One bodyguard roughly slapped the drunkard aside-and then stiffened, whirled around, and took a swift step to clutch at his master, walking in the center of the ring; a wizard of the Zhentarim.

  Who in turn stiffened, even as the other guards wrestled their fellow bullyblade back from him.

  They saw the wizard’s eyes glow eerily. “Release him,” he ordered them curtly. “No harm was done.”

  The bodyguards stared at their master suspiciously, for both the attitude and the manner of speech were unusual for him, but his wave to continue on was emphatic, even angry. They obeyed, leaving the drunken merchant slumped on the cobbles in their wake.

  A few steps farther on, the wizard suddenly crumpled.

  Bodyguards snarled curses and reached for him. Their curses turned to shouts of fear and horror when they felt the light weight in their arms-and saw they were holding little more than bones shrouded in skin. They let the lifeless husk fall to the cobbles and fled in all directions.

  None of them saw the cloud gathering in the darkness above the nigh-skeletal wizard. It thickened, whirling, as Horaundoon mentally pawed through the memories he’d just ripped out of the wizard’s mind.

  None of the bodyguards were left to hear him murmur, “So Lathalance is out on the Moonsea Ride… for a very little while longer. Ah, Lathalance, you’ll be first! ”

  “True, Horaundoon,” Old Ghost muttered, arrowing through the moonlit night, high above the Mountain Ride. “But you won’t be the one to claim him. When you arrive, you’ll find me.”

  He began the plunge that would end in Lathalance’s unsuspecting body. The Zhentarim was galloping hard along the road ahead, not caring what he was doing to his horse. He had no intention of slowing until he caught sight of the Knights, whereupon he’d begin trailing them more stealthily, to Halfhap.

  Duthgarl Lathalance was as cruel and capable as he was handsome, a Zhent swordsman and mage who obeyed his masters with unhesitating efficiency, coolly slaying scores at their behest. His magics shielded him against arrows and the like, and would even protect him if his hard-racing steed fell and hurled him down. He was crouching low and enjoying the ride.

  Until something hurtled down out of the sky into him, causing him to arch his back and gasp.

  Lathalance swayed in the saddle, eyes glowing red… then gold… blue… then returned to their normal brown.

  Slowly his worried frown faded, and he smiled a wolfish smile.

  Dauntless hadn’t been back at his desk long enough to feel truly dry-and they had to bring him this.

  He glowered in the lamplight at a darkly handsome young lad, perhaps fourteen summers old, that he was certain he’d never laid eyes on before-who beamed back at him, despite standing clamped in the none-too-gentle grip of two hairy, burly Purple Dragons.

  “Sword-brawls, wizards blown to spatters, what next? ” Dauntless snarled. “Well?”

  “Says his name’s Rathgar,” one of the Dragons said laconically. “Says he was expected, by whoever dwells inside the window we caught him climbing through.”

  “Oh?” The ornrion’s voice fell into soft tones that dripped sarcasm. “Does he carry it around with him, this window, or was it part of a building I might know?”

  “The widow Tarathkule’s house, on the Stroll.”

  Ornrion Dahauntul stared at the boy, who gave him a merry wink and said brightly, “She’s insatiable! Worth coming all this way for!”

  “Lad,” Dauntless said heavily, “she’s seen ninety-odd winters, walks with two canes, is as deaf as yon wa
ll, and looks about as handsome as this desk. Try again. ”

  “Ah. Well…” The lad who gave his name as Rathgar looked at the Purple Dragons on either side of him, one after the other, and then peered past Dauntless as if seeking spies in the gloom beyond the desk. He tried to lean forward, but the Dragons hauled him firmly back, so he settled for lowering his voice into a confidential whisper. “I got lost on the way to my tryst with the princess. I said the Tarathkule tale, first, as, well, ah, one doesn’t like to stain a lady’s hon-”

  “You got lost — stay! Which princess?”

  “Ahh… Her Highness, Alusair Nacacia Obarskyr. She’ll vouch for me.”

  The Dragons looked expressionlessly at Dauntless, and he looked back at them. None of them bothered to roll their eyes.

  Silence fell, and stretched, until the ornrion grew tired of the view, and turned his head to peer harder at the handsome lad.

  “Lad,” he growled, “I don’t know what your name is, except that it’s not Rathgar. I don’t know your game, but you lie like a sneak-thief. I don’t believe you for the time it takes me to draw one breath, and all I really know about you is that you come from Westgate-your speech tells me that-and that you own”-he squinted at what was lying on the older Purple Dragon’s palm-“three thumbs, five falcons, and a dagger too big for your hand. Which means you can feed yourself in this city for about five days, if you eat in the worst places, drink nothing that doesn’t come out of a horse-pump, and sleep on the streets. So, d’you want to be turned out of our gates? Or are you looking for work?”

  “I don’t particularly want to be a sarcastic, bullying ornrion,” the lad replied, as his stomach rumbled loudly, “but if the job lets me keep my vow to lovely Aloos, I’ll accept your kind offer.”

  Dauntless gave him a glare, and then smiled grimly, turned away, and snapped, “Jar him for the night. And give him something to eat. Leave the dagger here.”

  “It starts with a dungeon inspection?” the boy asked impishly, as the Dragons lifted him off his feet, turned him, and started marching away. “Or does she want me in chains? She didn’t mention such tastes, but…”

  A heavy door slammed behind them. Shaking his head, Dauntless turned back to his reports.

  Chapter 9

  A NIGHT UNSUITED FOR SLEEPING IN SADDLES

  Then the king spake the last words he ever said to me: “When you hear the wolves, lad, it is unlikely to be a night suitable for sleeping in your saddle.”

  Horvarr Hardcastle, Never A Highknight: The Life of a Dragon Guard published in the Year of the Bow

  When Dauntless looked up again, just before dawn, the dagger was gone from atop his papers-and a key was lying in its place.

  A cell key.

  His eyes narrowing, the ornrion looked up at the key-board, clapped his hand to his belt-and swore horribly.

  His purse was gone, its lacings neatly cut and dangling.

  Striding heavily and breathing like a winded horse in his anger, Dauntless snatched up the key and headed for the door to the dungeons. With his luck, the lad had locked both Glarth and Tobran in the cell, wearing signs reading, “Kiss me, I’m the Princess” or some such.

  Little rat.

  But how by the blazing Dragon Throne itself had he known about the Princess Alusair being in Arabel this night?

  Laughing, Horaundoon plummeted down out of the night like a striking hawk, plunged into the hard-riding Duthgarl Lathalance of the Zhentarim-and swirled right back out again, shrieking in pain.

  “Yes, Horaundoon,” the Zhent said coldly, the voice clearly that of Old Ghost, “we meet again. You can burn this worm to ash in a day or three, if you want, but not now. And if you cross me, I’ll burn you — and the Realms will hold one fewer Horaundoon. I can. Believe me.”

  “What… what d’you want of me?” Horaundoon gasped.

  “Absolute obedience, all the time the Knights of Myth Drannor are in Halfhap. If you don’t give it, I’ll destroy you. If you serve me well, you can have Lathalance and your freedom in a few days. I’ll even help you destroy Manshoon.”

  “ Manshoon? You know?”

  “Oh, stop gasping, man. How high did you rise in the Brotherhood?”

  The War Wizard Gorndar Lacklar flung open the door and rushed inside, gasping, “ Sorry I’m late, Ghoruld! Gods, what a night! Off to Arabel with the queen’s new blades, then back here again to see to the Andamus matter-and then Sarmeir tells me I’m to report to you again for another jaunt to Arabel! Queen’s own orders, he says! What’s up?”

  “ This, ” Ghoruld Applethorn said sweetly, ramming a wand into Lacklar’s mouth and speaking the word that triggered it.

  Even before the back of Lacklar’s head had finished spattering all over the old cloaks he’d pinned ready on the ceiling, Applethorn had laid hold of his underling’s slumping body and whirled him aside, into the glow of another waiting portal.

  He’d be back before Lacklar’s brains started to drip onto the floor. Damned disloyal young war wizards-who’d have thought it? Better call in the best of the alarphons to investigate. Good old Applethorn.

  Dragon-damned right he’d be back. There was Sarmeir to butcher before this night was out. And if Gorndar Lacklar, Sarmeir Landorl, and good old Applethorn, too, all went silent, Vangerdahast would have to send Laspeera to investigate. With whoever else she thought she’d need hurrying along right beside her.

  Right into the trap he’d prepared in Halfhap, and thereafter, oblivion.

  The sudden shrieks of pain were far behind them, but were certainly clear enough.

  The Knights of Myth Drannor grabbed for their weapons and asked each other, “What was that?”

  A wolf howled then, nearby in the trees off the road to the north, and the horses became very uneasy.

  The Knights held their reins in firm hands and made gentling sounds and speech until their horses slowed again, and Semoor dared to answer their shared question: “Someone screaming in agony, obviously. It didn’t last long.”

  “So much killing,” Florin muttered. “It goes on and on.”

  Semoor nodded. “I’ll confess I was glad we were leaving Arabel, earlier, and gladder still that the rain stopped, but now…”

  “Oh?” Pennae asked. “Is the stern and oh-so-certain Light of Lathander actually changing his mind?”

  “The changing of my mind,” Semoor purred back at her, “is the best evidence I know for proving I’ve got one. Unlike certain barb-tongued present company.”

  Doust managed the feat of rolling his eyes and yawning simultaneously-and so impressed himself that he promptly repeated the yawning part.

  “ Don’t go to sleep and fall out of your saddle,” Islif told him, spurring her mount near enough to take hold of his elbow. Doust looked at her with heavy eyes, and she told him crisply, “Listen to the splendid entertainment Semoor and Pennae are providing, and stay awake. ”

  Ahead of the battling tongues Islif had just heralded, Florin scowled into the night like he wanted to slay it. Jhessail frowned at him and asked gently, “What troubles you just now, Florin?”

  “Narantha,” her friend told her. “We’re just riding away from her, leaving her unavenged, and every time I try to think of her and make peace with myself, someone else comes at me with a sword and snatches the time away from me again, and… and…”

  He set his teeth, and shook his head. Jhessail put a hand on his thigh, looked up into his hard stare, and murmured, “I understand, Tall Sword, and I’ll do my best to see to it that you get plenty of time to think of her in days to come.”

  He nodded curtly, and they rode on. After a time Jhessail hissed, “And to you I swear this: I will give all aid I can to help you deal with those who drove her to slay herself, when the time is right.”

  Florin brought his hand down to cover and then clasp hers, where it rested on his leg, and managed a smile.

  “I thank you,” he said, “which should mean that ’tis now time for someone else to attack us.�
��

  Jhessail smiled thinly. “ ’Tis certainly starting to seem that way, isn’t it? This life of adventuring is not what I dreamed of it being, back in Espar.”

  “No,” Florin sighed. “ ’Tis… dirtier.”

  No sudden menace came at them out of the night, so Jhessail risked a look back over her shoulder. The horses were faltering, plodding now as often as they trotted, and their riders all reeled and yawned in their saddles. This fighting and riding all night wasn’t the splendor-glory minstrels made it out to be! When they reached Halfhap-hah! If they reached Halfhap-it would be high time for all, humans and horses alike, to rest. Being Knights of Myth Drannor or carrying said Knights across the wide Realms, it seemed, were similarly wearying professions.

  The young prisoner wasn’t in his cell, of course, but neither were the two Dragons who’d put him there. Evidently the lad had picked the lock and let himself out after their departure.

  Thinking darkly murderous thoughts between persistent urges to just blow out the lamps and seek his bed, Dauntless trudged back to his desk-and came to a sudden halt at what he saw awaiting him. Watching Gods Above, what deep sin had he committed, without even remembering doing so, to be so amply rewarded this night?

  The Lady Lord of Arabel herself stood waiting for him, leaning on his desk with her hand on her hip. She was in full armor-the leathers that clung to her so interestingly, not her battlefield coat-of-plate-and no fewer than four senior Purple Dragon officers were standing behind her, similarly garbed. Everyone wore swords.

  “Do you leave this desk unguarded often, Ornrion?” Myrmeen Lhal asked mildly.

  “No,” Dauntless told her. “Only during jailbreaks.”

  “Oh? Who’s missing?”

  “A young lad, a thief, from Westgate, who was caught climbing through a window not his own, but insisted he was here to tryst with Princess Alusair-who was in Arabel this night. He gave his name as Rathgar.”